Monday, February 1, 2010

Girls from Ipanema Take a Road Trip

Spotted in front of the police station in Savannah, Georgia, the Girls from Ipanema were seen enjoying a relaxing day of sight seeing. An unlikely duo, but great traveling companions, the girls set out on a more than 1300-mile road trip in early January. The 20-hour trip from Connecticut to Florida should have been a two day trip. However, being from Ipanema and not all that familiar with the cities on the eastern seaboard, the girls took a leisurely trip, hitting points of interest along the way. Averaging 2-3 hours of drive time per day, and never driving more than 5 hours on any given day, their journey took them eight days to complete.

Here’s a chronicle of their journey:


Day 1 – took photos in Simsbury, CT, ate dinner in White Plains, NY with friends, slept in Philadelphia, PA.

Day 2 – Visited City Hall, Starbucks, the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, and the Reading Terminal Market (where they ate a Philly Cheese steak w/cheese whiz), then drove to Falls Church, VA, watched the Texas/Alabama championship football game and slept at the Smith B&B.


Day 3 – Woke up to 1” of snow, visited Mount Vernon to see where George Washington slept, drank hot chocolate in Alexandria to prevent hypothermia, played hard with new playmate Lily who’s a full time resident at the Smith B&B.


Day 4 – took the train into Washington, D.C., walked the National Mall in temperatures not hospitable to Ipanemans, took photos of the Washington Monument, World War II Monument and
Lincoln Memorial, took a ride with an angry, politically-opinionated cab driver from Jordan, ate lunch and visited the National Art Gallery with their wonderful hosts from the Smith B&B, saw the Declaration of Independence and Magna Carta, played hard with playmate Lily and spent another night at the Smith B&B.

Day 5 - said their goodbyes to their incredibly gracious hosts, drove into D.C., took pictures of the White House where one girl had a practical joke played on her by a White House security guard, ate lunch, spent the night in Fayetteville, NC.

Day 6 – drove most of the day, visited Pedro Land in South Carolina where one girl got severely freaked out and over stimulated by Pedro’s odd looking city (this is the same girl who got picked on by the security guard), ate dinner in Hilton Head, SC, went out for dessert and slept in Savannah, GA.

Day 7 – walked around, shopped, and took photos in historic Savannah, tried (not too hard) to spot Paula Deen, spent the night at the Disney World equivalent for golfers, on the outskirts of St. Augustine, FL.


Day 8 - walked around historic St. Augustine, got a car wash and drove to their final destination... JUPITER.

Thursday, November 5, 2009

Troop Cohesiveness in Jeopardy

In time of war, it’s important to have unity amongst the troops. Currently my two new WMDs are not able to work together. Stinky refuses to allow BooBoo Kitty access to the lower home front during the day watch. BooBoo is much more advanced at searching and destroying the enemy, but at this time we are only able to use her skills during the night watch.

Wednesday, November 4, 2009

New WMDs Need Tweaking

I’ve noticed that my new WMDs are attracting the enemy by leaving a portion of their food rations out each night. I don’t agree with this tactic and have been forced to remove their rations to discourage this behavior. It would appear that my new automatic WMDs are going to need more human interaction than previously planned.

Tuesday, November 3, 2009

Mouse Wars 2009

The enemy’s first attack didn’t come as a surprise to me this year. After carefully studying my opponent last year, it was pretty obvious they’d plan their invasion once the temperatures dropped below 40 degrees.

Well, my battlefield is different this year, but my opponent is still the same. This year I’ve added two new Weapons of Mouse Destruction (WMDs) to my arsenal:

Prince a.k.a. Stinky

Strengths:
• can make a lot of noise to scare off the opponent
• loves to chase things – can be relentless

Weaknesses:
• has a tendency to go after the wrong opponent
• has difficulty focusing at times, gets confused easily

Trouble a.k.a. BooBoo Kitty

Strengths:
• eats the majority of what she kills
• has sharp jaws that can penetrate skulls for chewing and devouring the enemy

Weaknesses:
• unable to take orders
• has a mind of her own