Wednesday, September 12, 2007

It's quiet -- too quiet

I unlock the door, push it open and walk inside the house. The only sounds are the trees rustling on the other side of the road. No sounds from the house. No scurrying feet. No “Papa’s home!!” followed by a mad dash to the front door, attacking me as I close the door. There’s not even the wail of those currently in the throes of either a tantrum, bad attitude or being remedied of them.

Nothing. Quiet. Too quiet.

But nothing is amiss. There’s simply no one else home. Nor will there be any time soon. I’ve got the whole house to myself for 5 whole days. Five lonely, quiet days. Then I get to go back to the beach and spend a whole week just bumming around with my wonderful wife and three beautiful kids.

I miss my family.

Thursday, September 6, 2007

Lucianno Pavarotti - RIP

Farewell to one of the greatest musical voices of all time.


Tuesday, September 4, 2007

Labor Day Weekend

Happy day-after Labor Day! :) Hope you had a great weekend. We got to spend some time on Saturday with Michael and Leah, went out Sunday evening (more on that below), went to Mitch & Betty's house for the Labor Day family get together, and then took Carlos to his first ever soccer practice. Whew! But it was a fun weekend. I went swimming pretty much the whole time with Jeremiah and Carlos at Mitch & Betty's. Carlos was much braver than he had been previously and even allowed me to throw him in without so much as a hint of fussing (course, it might have had something to do with Rachel and Lauren being right there). Jeremiah was hilarious. He would just jump right in whether I was ready to catch him or not! After awhile, I put some water wings on him and he loved that and was even able to float around without my holding on to him. So I left him to float and went elsewhere.... JUST KIDDING! He did do quite well and even figured out that if he kicked his legs he would move forward. And of course, Natalie was one of the star attractions of the get together, and why not? She is after all the cutest baby girl in the world (bias? what bias? :) )

Carlos seemed to really like his first soccer practice, but at the end he said "Whew, soccer practice really wears you out!" It probably didn't help that he had been swimming for about 3 hours prior to that. He did really well and is excited to play his first game. He'll miss his first game or two, but I don't think he'll mind too much since it's for a good cause - beach vacation!!

This past weekend, I had the chance to go out and do a little bit of railfanning. It was a quiet evening with not a lot of train action going on the Roanoke to Winston-Salem line near downtown Rocky Mount, but you don't necessarily need a train to get some photos. Here's a couple of the ones I took. I think I'll visit this spot again more regularly since it provides a safe place to park and wait for trains plus has some at-grade crossings.

Afterwards, I met up with Sarah and the kids at a park nearby. We went for a walk, the boys got to ride their bikes (I'm sure Sarah will be posting pics soon), and then went up to the playground nearby.

Ok, here are the pics. Enjoy!
Diverging Lines

32 Miles to Roanoke

N&W Caboose #518631