Whistle Stop, Baltimore!

This weekend was Barak Obama's Whistle Stop train tour. He started in Philadelphia, went through Wilmington, Delaware to pick up Joe and his wife and then came to Baltimore to make a speech. After the Baltimore stop they went on to D.C.

Everyone got into the spririt of things:

We live about 1 mile from the train station and the street in front of our apartment building and several other streets around our neighborhood were completely shut down. You couldn't park your car on the street and when it got close to the time they were going to be here, you were not even allowed to be on the street.

Barak was going to give his speech at 4:15, so we left at 3:00 to go down to the War Memorial Plaza. We had to go through a metal detector, which went surprisingly quickly. There were quite a few people there, but I think that the cold weather kept a lot of people away.

Morgan State choir performed before the president elect showed up. They were very entertaining.

When Obama arrived (on time, which was surprising) there were about 4 people that were introduced before him. Every time a new person was introduced and it wasn't Obama the whole crowd groaned. It was pretty funny. Some people had been there since 1:00 pm, so I think they were getting cold and crabby.

Obama's speech was very good, short and sweet. I was very glad that we went.

Another project finished

A friend of mine is having a baby in February, so I have been working on a baby sweater for her and I've just finished it:

Front

Close Up of the Design

Back

Chickies Rock, PA

To start the new year out, John and I thought we would go on a hike. Last year we had a goal of hiking 100 miles, we fell short by 2 miles. This year we are starting early, so we can be sure and get to 100.

In my Structural Geology class last semester, we were supposed to have taken a field trip to Chickies Rock in Pennsylvania, but it was cancelled due to weather. So I drug John out to visit the largest anticline on the East Coast: Chickies Rock. It was a nice day, the sun was shining and the temperature was about 36 degrees. We made it to the top of the formation and got a great view of the Susquehanna River.

Chopper had no problem negotiating the rock formation - I think he's part mountain goat.

We were planning to also hike along the river to view the rocks from below, but in Pennsylvania it is still hunting season and we didn't have any bright orange, so we decided to not hike further. One mile down and 99 to go!

Happy New Year!

I hope everyone had a safe and happy new year! We did not go out on New Year's Eve, just stayed in and watched Robbie Knievel jump over a fake volcano on a motorbike on tv. As you can see, Chopper was very impressed:

The New Year's Extravaganza in downtown Baltimore was postponed because of wind. Apparently the organizers did not want searing hot fireworks to fly into the crowd and cause irreparable harm. So, they had them on New Year's Day at 7 pm. We went to that. It was a great show.Watch a short video: