Home in March

March 6 saw us return to the States, to our family, our friends, and our dentists. Indeed, an unplanned trip back to our old LA haunt was hastily thrown together when it turned out that Kate's teeth were improperly crowned way back in September 2007. But we turned it into a jolly good time, having dinner at our favorite sushi spot (Hide, on Sawtelle in Santa Monica) with Val and DD and then lucking out in that a friend from school - Elliot - had a show with his new band that night. Most excellent. And back in SD, our social calendar was no less hectic, as exemplified by this picture which, while sorely needing an explanation, will not receive one here.

Indeed, most of our two weeks in SoCal was much more hectic than our past few tranquilo meses had been. We were dragged all over San Diego County by my parents who seemed determined to make sure that a) we saw all the sights while were in town and b) we never went hungry or, indeed, even slightly less than full. We got to see the sis - Laurel - plus the grandparents, Balboa Park, Downtown, most of the various bays, and even a couple things we'd never seen before, including a dachshund with wheels for front legs.

Next up was Pittsburgh, PA for a week with Kate's parents. There, we got to relax a bit after the whirlwind tour of my hometown, but still made it out to Amish country for an afternoon... though it was mostly closed as it was Sunday. But we were still productive - we bought a new camera, or rather, we bought a used, backup camera for me as we were sending our trusty Canon in for some factory repairs (you may have noticed many of our South America pictures have a purple stripe running along one side of the frame). And what a deal we got! $20 for a 5 megapixel camera. And you lucky readers get to see here the first picture taken with it the day before I left for the Land of Milk and Honey...