Now that's funny

Happy Wedding Day!

Congratulations to Amanda and Austin Lowe, who were married this evening on the beach in Panama City!

I'm so sorry I missed it -- I'm sure it was beautiful and I can't wait to see pictures. Amy, you're in charge of making sure that happens ;)

Congrats again to the newlyweds and best wishes for a long and happy life together!

P.S. Also a Happy 30th Birthday to Amy and Amanda -- a day early

Lazy Labor Day weekend

Happy belated Labor Day. Hope everyone had a relaxing long weekend. Andy and I took it easy, and it was so nice after a hectic couple of weeks.

On Saturday we slept in a little and then I took Layla for a 2-mile walk around our neighborhood, came back and made a nice breakfast. Then Andy and I took a drive around the community where my new office is being built and stopped for some ice cream at Cold Stone Creamery on the way home. It was so good ... and so bad. I figured that 2-mile walk made it a little better :)

Sunday, we headed to this really beautiful park down the road called Quiet Waters. It's where I did the Arthritis Walk a few months ago and had wanted to go back since. It's a very dog-friendly park, so we brought Layla with us. They actually have a dog beach that we tried out first.

It started out OK, but then Layla took more interest in the other dogs than in the water and we had to head out. She plays too rough, which tends to make other dogs very angry ... there's usually some snarling involved.

Anyway, we decided to hit the trails instead and ended up walking for a couple hours all around the park. We were all pretty exhaused by the time we got home, but we'll definitely be back.

Layla never quite recovered. She even slept all day Monday ... but we took it pretty easy too.

Doing the tourist thing

It's always good when company's in town because then Andy and I get to be tourists too and see some of the places we've been wanting to visit.

Last Saturday we hit the Inner Harbor in Baltimore with Andy's parents. We toured the USS Constellation and then walked around the harbor and ate a late lunch/early dinner at the Rusty Scupper, which if any of you come and visit me, I will definitely take you there because it was very good and the view is incredible.

Here's the view from a park behind the restaurant - so you can get an idea of what you see from the restaurant, which you can see to the right on the waterfront.

After dinner we headed to Camden Yards to watch the Orioles play. Unfortunately, shortly before first pitch, the sky opened up and a horrible storm hit. We waited out the 2-hour delay, although we couldn't have left it we wanted to because we were parked so far away and it was an awful storm. It couldn't been worse though -- the poor people in D.C. at the Redskins exhibition game had the power go out on them. Anyway, we left early because it was VERY late and the Orioles were getting crushed.

Sunday we got up and had brunch at Rams Head -- another wonderful perk of having company. Andy and I only do brunch when we have company -- it's just too frivolous otherwise :) See, there's another good reason for all of you out there reading this to come visit me. I'll take you to brunch.

After brunch we headed to D.C. ... actually Virginia, I guess, to Arlington Cemetery. It was my first time there, as far I can remember anyway. Andy's dad has been researching and writing about a Navy admiral from Penn Yan (where they live) who went to the Naval Academy in Annapolis, later trained on the Constellation, and is buried in Arlington. So he got a lot of material for his book over the weekend.

The changing of the guard ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier.

Here's a view of the Lincoln Memorial, Washington Monument, and Capitol Building from the cemetery.

After walking around the cemetery all afternoon, we were all pretty exhausted, but we were so close to the Iwo Jima Memorial, so we forged on. It was worth it. What an awesome memorial. Seriously, if you haven't seen it, you should. The pictures don't really do it justice.

Here's a cool close-up Andy took.

That's about it for the weekend. We went to a favorite local chain of ours for dinner where the food is pretty good and the beer is fantastic. On Monday, we had another great dinner (yes, more crab) at Cantler's, an Annapolis restaurant that's most famous for whole crabs -- although we all opted for easier crab options. Maybe next time.

So we sent Mom and Dad MacAlpine home with their fill of crab (and good beer). Next time we'll move on to Oysters ...

See how much fun it is to visit us? No pressure though ... I'm just sayin'.

Crabs, crabs, and more crabs

Andy's parents came down for a visit last weekend, so we wanted to show them all the local sites that are uniquely Maryland. For their first night, we took them to a good old-fashioned crab house near our house called Mike's.

After much discussion, we decided to order some crabs for the table and then see if we liked them enough to make them our whole meal. It was the first time anyone at the table had crabs like that, so we were all newbies together. We ordered a dozen ... just enough for us all to have a few. They laid the paper on the table and brought out a platter of crabs.

It looked a little something like this. I have actual pictures that I'll post when I get them.

We got a quick tutorial from our waiter and went to town. You really kinda have to step outside of the situation to enjoy it because if you let yourself think about it, it's pretty nasty. You have to really rip the thing apart, and since I really love crabs, it was kinda sad. But, don't worry, I powered through. My love of how good they taste overpowered my love of how cute they are.

Having said that, I'm pretty sure now that I've seen what's inside, I'll never order soft shell crabs. After we each ate our 3 crabs, we decided we must've done something wrong because there wasn't much to eat there. What we did have was tasty, but it was a lot of work for a little bit of crab.

Also, we later found out the crabs weren't even Maryland crabs -- they were farm-raised in Lousiana. Disappointing. I'd still recommend Mike's, but next time I do crabs I'll go with a pro so I know what I'm doing and make sure we're having local crabs.

We did all end up getting a regular meal too, but it was fun. Mom and Dad Mac, next time you come down, we'll be pros!

After that, we feasted on lots more crab ... crab dip ... crab quiche ... crab cakes (my personal favorite form of crab), crab imperial ... you name it, we had it at some point over the weekend.

Anyway, enough about crabs, huh, how about the rest of the weekend ...

You'll have to wait ;)