The Curtis Clan - Spring 2011

Spring Equinox to Summer Solstice

Spring Break

Springtime came on a Sunday and we couldn’t ask for a nicer day. We celebrated by walking to Einstein’s as a family; a parent Del Taco picnic in Forest Park as the girls enjoyed a classmate’s birthday party at Margaret park; a Beerita on the back porch, Kirkwood Fortel’s al fresco, stocking up on Indian at Global Foods and a double header of Amazing Race.

The next few days were about as nice as we celebrated the girls’ Spring Break by taking a 2+ day trip to the YMCA’s Trout Lodge at Sunnen Lake about an 1 ½ hours from home (Camp Lakewood is at the same place). We took long overdue advantage of Bethany’s ½ off discount which got us two nights in a two floor loft suite and 6 meals for $175, with most activities included. We canoed, played six rounds of miniature golf, rode horses in the woods, archery, built and fired model rocket; made stepping stones and tie dye shirts, played basketball and games of Uno and Apples to Apples Jr. edition.

Jane putting at the Trout Lodge Miniature Golf course	Randy and Cate paddling on Sunnen Lake

Rocket girls	Bethany helps Jane with archery

Jane and Cate making spirals tie dye shirts	Curti at Sunnen Lake

In keeping with the fickle nature of March, we returned home as the day time high temperatures dropped over 40 degrees and flurries turned to several inches of accumulation (a ridiculous amount of snow for this time of year that melted the next day).

Snow on the Daffodils

Cate at 7

We celebrated the latest anniversary of our youngest birth in typical fashion of a low key family gathering with pizzas and cake. Her big present was a digital camera which she was quite pleased with. It was interesting to see what she chooses to take pictures of besides the regular ones of family, dogs and videos of her sister making goofy faces, singings silly songs and dancing. She’s fascinated by fabric patterns and likes many of her dad’s ties (even if her mother does not). In retrospect, this is in keeping with her observant nature of the details around her, more than the larger cultural context to some extent. She’s strong willed and resolute, which at less proud parenting moments we might refer to as stubborn and ornery (no idea where that might come from ?). Not bad characteristics necessarily and we don’t want to break her will but it would be nice if she chose her battles more judicially (yes, we’re aware of the Glass House nature of that statement). She laughs often and is generally cheerful except when confronted with tasks she’d prefer not to do. Cleaning up after herself in the bathroom, playroom or her room is a frequent source of frustration for everyone (see “stubborn” above) but we generally save our daily nagging for the common rooms. She seems blissfully unaware of the disorder in her surroundings but hates it when she can’t find or looses stuff, which remains a bit of a personality trait. She’s really picked up on reading and generally does so for a half an hour or more after going to bed, whether we give her permission or not. At first we were inclined to disapprove since she has trouble going to sleep and getting up but the reading hasn’t seemed to effect that, so why not. Besides, we both did it as kids too so…

Jane George Cate and Henry on our swing set fort

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One of her great pleasures (and ours) is giving hugs. Frequently, she leaps into her dad’s arms when he comes home from the bar stools or the steps to the 2nd floor. Her best friend remains Jane but mentions others in her class regularly particularly Constance. Playing with her Indy and in-town cousins are also a source of regular joy for her. It has been really nice to see how well they play with the younger kids and watch out for them.

Margaret Park Merry-Go-Round:

George, Bethany, Henry, Cate and Jane

2011-04-02 Bethany Jane Cate George and Henry.jpg

APRIL

Our April was filled with many social gathering surrounding the girl’s school, such as the Trivia Night auction with our team winning once again. We only “placed” when it came to the amount of money we spent on the auction items, thus proving the reason why there’s generous amounts of booze at such fundraising events. Another school spring event was the Choral Concert. The Music Teacher’s song selection eschewed anything you might have heard of and was a revue of animal related songs (e.g. Don’t Polka with a Porcupine, etc.). We heard the girls perform snippets of the songs for the month leading up to it. The girls loved the songs but we might have preferred something that had stood more of a test of audience and cultural appeal ahead of time.

In the middle of the month Randy attended a reunion of a handful of his fraternity buddies held at Aspenhof and Central Missouri wine country, including Washington, MO. Although called “Wild Man Weekend”, such reunions are getting tamer with less alcohol consumed all the time. Along with visiting wineries, there was antiquing amongst the consumption of mass quantities of pork products. The film screening consisted of watching an Ultraman episode. Still it was “wilder” than their regular existence and the unfiltered and un-PC sharing of managerial woes was enlightening and cathartic.

WMW 2011: Bamboo Jungles of Augusta

In late April, the girls celebrated Easter getting baskets from the Easter Bunny again and donning of nice frocks for the day.

Easter 2011

The following Friday 29 April 2011, we arose early, along with the rest of the world, to watch The Royal Wedding of Prince William & Catherine Middleton at Westminster Abbey. The girls all wore hats for the occasion, though none as fancy (or silly) as the ones at the wedding. Those wacky Brits.

Watching the Royal Wedding

After years of gently suggesting that perhaps the Yew bushes in the front of the house had become overgrown, Randy finally came to agree that the 6-8 inches of bush above the windows did count as overgrown, especially after recalling that the bushes were already full grown when he moved in 22 years ago. So, in honor of Mother’s Day, he cut them out and replaced them with 18 inch Bay Berry shrubberies that should take a few decades before becoming a similar nuisance. We also planted a Japanese Maple and filled in a burning bush and arbor vitae along the property lines.

Mothers Day at Van & Gwen's

Randy giving blood at the Holy Redeemer drive

while the girls took loads of picture watching the process.

Varmint Cong in the Attic

“To kill, you must know your enemy, and in this case my enemy is a varmint. And a varmint will never quit - ever. They're like the Viet Cong - Varmint Cong. So you have to fall back on superior intelligence and superior firepower. And that's all she wrote.”- Carl in Caddyshack

After years of “attacking” the cars, the dogs and us by dropping acorns at us (Bethany says “aiming”), it appeared that the squirrels advanced their front line to inside the house via the attic. We first noticed the noises directly above our bed last fall, so we borrowed a Have a Heart trap from a neighbor and waited to catch our quarry. The crunchy peanut butter bait disappeared as did the noises for a half of year over the winter. They returned in early May but this time, it was much louder, with clear scrapping and scratching that sounded like there was a small heard of squirrels having a party that started about 1 AM. Pounding on the ceiling or grating did nothing to deter them from their unnatural acts (or perhaps all TOO natural acts). Randy did get a rather nice knot on his head having the ceiling fan thwap-thwap-thwap him when standing on the bed, half asleep to pound on the ceiling. Of course by this point it was WAR! We did the easy stuff moving our mouse ultra sonic emitter repellants, turning on the attic light or flashlighting the area but this did nothing to dissuade them. Bethany was able to roll over and sleep on her good ear but Randy ended up sleeping downstairs because of all the racket mumbling like a crotchety old man several decades than his actual age. After several semi-sleeplessness nights and visions of chewed up wiring and ductwork, killing the varmints wasn’t an issue but concerns about the smell of rotting carcasses was. The internet was full of many dubiously helpful solutions about adding an annoying stench to the attic (e.g. moth balls, ammonia, etc.) but came with warnings that the stench didn’t just stay in an attic. There were numerous firms that offered to trap the squirrels with the first trapping for free and subsequent one ONLY $75 per trapping. After reading about the ineffectiveness of catching them and that it typically took numerous trappings to rid the home of the family of squirrels, the best solution appeared to be buying a $200 Evictor Strobe light. It was far more powerful and annoying than a $30 disco party strobe light. When it arrived and Randy climbed into the attic to install the Evictor, he shown the flashlight in the corners again and actually saw one of our uninvited house guests and saw that they were not squirrels but rather…

Our Varment Cong

Actually this isn’t a picture of our raccoon but a darn good match (couldn’t get a picture before he made his escape). The first night of the Evictor, things were much subdued but not gone and we began considering Plan C options. However, by the second night all things were quiet and on the third night, we were ready to claim victory. Six weeks later and all remains well.

Jane’s First Communion

On Sunday in the middle of May, Jane participated in her First Communion, with the rest of the 2nd Graders at Holy Redeemer. Her PSR class had met every Monday night during the school year preparing for the traditional celebration of a young Catholic’s first reception of the Sacrament of the Eucharist. As such, the greater Sage clan joined us for Mass that day as Jane looked quite fetching in her dress and wreath of flowers.

The family clan at Janes First Communion

2011-05-15 Clan af Janes First Communion.jpg

The Curti all cleaned up

2011-05-15 Curti at Janes First Communion.jpg

The end of the school year marked the Girl Scout tradition of the 1st grader Daisy Scouts bridging up to Brownies (2nd grade). It was nice that the Brownie escorting Cate across the bridge was her sister Jane.

Jane bridging Cate up to Brownies

2011-05-18 J bridging C up to Brownie.jpg

Photo Scavenger Hunt

One of the school auction items we purchased was a dinner cocktail party at the Principal’s Washington Street loft she shares with her husband the Principal of Clark School. This year the party became a photo scavenger hunt around their home. Given our experience and our competitive nature, we thought we were a lock to win and we certainly wanted to show that our school was better than the south Webster one. It was the principals first time organizing such a party and they didn’t think anyone could finish in the allotted time nor that there would be a 4 way tie for first. Hence there was no rule to determine a winner, which they decided on the spot should be based on the order people came in. This is certainly reasonably unless your team in an echo of the parable of the Tortoise and the Hare, took their time arriving right exactly at the finish time, feeling certain that were the only ones that had all the pictures (and certainly had the BEST pictures anyway). We had a great time none-the-less and looking forward to avenging ourselves in the future.

With an Arch on the Photo Scavenger Hunt

Holy Redeemer Carnival

Since the Bethany joined Holy Redeemer this year, and the girls have been enrolled in PSR, we have participated more and more in the activities of the church including going to the annual carnival this year. The girls had fun on the Scrambler. However, when Jane and a friend spun one of the Heart pods on the Spinning Hearts ride, it became clear there another one of the Curti that doesn’t have the Right Stuff when it comes to astronaut training. She didn’t throw up but was definitely done for the day. It was a good that we didn’t by two $35 wrist bands for unlimited rides because we didn’t use all the $20 of tickets we bought.

Jane and Cate on the Scrambler

Cate and a friend on the Heart Pod

2011-05-28 C and friend at HR Carnival.jpg

Cardinal Luxury Box with Neighbors

Some neighbors made the winning bid to for tickets to watch the Cardinals play the SF Giants on May 31 game and invited all of us to join them. They got Suite 2, one of the luxury boxes on the first base side of Bush Stadium. In addition to the terrific cushy seats under cover, it had an air conditioned interior with a bar and private bathroom. We were all quite smitten with our dalliance among the swells and the Cards won 4-3.

Cate, Jane and Bethany in the luxury suite at the Cardinals game

On the down side, not included with the tickets was the food and drink. There was a fairly extensive selection menu of options but the prices were clearly geared toward a corporate spending account. A pizza was $45 and a six pack was $27 which didn’t seem too bad at $4.50 a piece given the price at the concession stands so the guests decided to chip in and buy a round of beers. Yes the several nerd boys did the math to convince themselves that it was competitive with going to the concession stands. Competitive until they added taxes and a delivery fee which did not include a tip for the server, which became apparent only afterwards. The two six packs the guests decided to buy ended up costing $80 with the tip ($6.67 a 12 ounce can). The waitress did bring us complementary pop-corn and potato chips, so tipping well is a good idea sometimes. Still, when anyone wanted more, they went to the concession stands which are never too far in the new park.

June

We “steamed” into June with typical hot temperatures and the passage of the Union Pacific’s last steam engine built, the No. 844, passing by the Tuxedo Park station at the end of the street 1 pm on Thursday, June 2. Randy took off work early and dragged the kids to watch it go by. A smattering of neighbors showed up as well, along with a contingent of train nerds watched. The train nerds were easy to spot as they had the nicest cameras and a couple sported train CB scanners to hear the train cab chatter. It was helpful to know when the train left the whistle stop in Kirkwood giving us 8 minutes heads up. It didn’t last long as the train quickly headed eastward toward a stop downtown.

Union Pacific's last Steam engine passing Tuxedo Park station

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Randy and the girls at Tuxedo Park station

Piano Recital

That weekend, the girl’s spring piano recitals were once again held outside in the small park across from their teacher’s house. While a nice idea and certainly a thrifty choice, the temperatures of the high 90’s made it an event only a parent could enjoy. The girls’ songs were typical of those made up piano lesson books for students but we’re still proud of the steady progress they’re making.

Santa Cruz Bachelor Party

Randy missed the piano recital by HAVING to go to a bachelor party in Santa Cruz for his college roommate Jake (Randy was honored to be the Best Man). He got into San Francisco on Thursday allowing him and Jake to hang out all Friday before gathering with the rest the gang of nine. The group consisted mostly of Jake’s SF pals he met through BATS [Bay Area Theatre Sports], an amateur improve troupe at Fort Mason. Randy had met about half the guys previously during his stays to SF over the last 16 years, though not with so much frequency of late.

The bachelor party weekend was a pretty tame affair by “Hangover” or previous experience standards but there was no antiquing at this Men’s Only weekend. There was lots of immature jokes and cursing, but I don’t think any of had to lie to our spouses about we did or didn’t do. Randy had originally hoped to have a Road Trip weekend as did Jake but was dissuaded by the others who were uncertain of the lack of planning and insisted on a “fun” destination reasonably close to SF instead of the possibility of getting stuck at the Super 8 in Modesto. Not wanting to force them into seeing the wisdom of “There’s no such thing as boring places, only boring people”, Randy caved and agreed to the aging seaside resort town of Santa Cruz, though the irony of Improv types being concerned about being able to find fun anywhere was on par with Steinbeck novel (i.e. obvious).

Besides the world class surfing, Santa Cruz is kind of a West Coast Coney Island or Atlantic City with its seaside amusement park and Cocoanut Grove, which hosted the former Miss California contest for decades. Locating a hotel, via Kayak near the beaches and Boardwalk led us to the Lani Lodge, relatively inexpensive motor lodge from the 1960s owned and operated by an Indian family.

Getting into town late on Friday, we went out drinking, going to a couple bars including Poet and Patriot Irish pub, before and ending up getting fabulous slices at the Pizza My Heart in downtown Santa Cruz. Instant gratification for the post midnight munchies.

Having coffee Saturday morning of Jakes Bachelor Party Weekend

2011-06-05 Jakes Bachelor Party coffee.jpg

On Saturday, we skipped the “continental” breakfast at the motel (pre-packaged Danishes) and found a nice café. We returned to motel to park before heading to the Boardwalk, goofing off playing a bit of “French” cricket and hackeying a soccer ball in the parking lot while waiting for everyone to regroup. The beach was too chilly for swimming but was covered with organized kids soccer and volleyball teams playing in the sand. At the extensive arcade, we played laser tag, air hockey, and a number of pinball and video games from the last 30+ years. A few of us took a ride on the iconic Giant Dipper roller coaster, one of the oldest and best-known wooden coasters in the world. Tame by today’s standards but still fun. We had dinner at Hulla Island Grill and Tiki Bar with the table consuming several of the $40 Volcano rum drinks which had a reservoir of flaming 151 rum in the center. The rest of the evening was spent bar hopping with much of it being a rehash of the previous night with everyone spending the extra buck to get a T-Shirt at Pizza My Heart with a slice.

Shrewsbury Day Camp

We enrolled the girls for the third year in a row for kids camp in the morning run by an adjacent suburb. The camp is from 9-12 and runs for 5-weeks. Its inexpensive enough we don’t feel bad pulling them out for a day or a week should other vacation opportunities arise, which has been the case each year. The girls love it as does Mom and everyone is gets along better because of it.

Randy had a work trip in downtown Manhattan, which allowed him the opportunity to work walk around at night, including a promenade across the Brooklyn Bridge, which he has wanted to do since reading David McCullough’s book and watching Ken Burns’ documentary.

Randy's bad self portrait on the Brooklyn Bridge

Wild Women Weekend?

The second weekend in June, Bethany took a well deserved weekend off to meet up with her college friends Heather and Paula. They chose to meet in Pigeon Ford/Gatlinburg, TN, outside Knoxville. They had a grand time telling stories, eating and shopping but without any pictures to show for it, one has to ask themselves if what happens in Gatlinburg stays in Gatlinburg.

Big Sur Wedding

In mid-June, Bethany and Randy left the kids with her folks and headed out to northern California for 6 days to attend the wedding of Jake and Andrea. The first couple days were spent visiting Randy’s dad Ron and Gaye in Monterey having a lovely time with them. We also did some sightseeing and shopping in the adjacent Carmel, coming back by way of the scenic drive along Asilomar State Beach. On Friday after a terrific breakfast at the Red House Café in Pacific Grove, we headed down the coast line along California 1 to Big Sur, truly one of the world’s greatest scenic drives.

Gaye, Ron, Randy and Bethany at La Bistro in Monterey

Big Sur refers to both a town in valley of redwood trees around the Big Sur River and to the 90+ miles of coastline from roughly Carmel south to San Simeon. The scenic drive is certainly boosted by the ultra conservative land use plans, prohibiting any advertising or new construction within sight of the highway. We drove roughly half this route for the wedding festivities but it’s unclear what we would have done if the wedding was a few weeks earlier. In mid-March, a landslide shut the highway down near Bixby Creek Bridge, as a lane sloughed off into the sea, cutting off access to the area from the north for months. It reopened a week or so before our trip with a traffic light installed to allow traffic on the remaining lane. As we were stopped for 10 minutes on the 1933 concrete bridge, the thought of a good earthquake hitting at that exact moment was a bit unnerving.

And with this sign, we enter the Big Sur coastline

Our lodging was at the Big Sur Lodge within the Pfeiffer Big Sur State Park. It was a spacious, comfortable updated room (cabins in name only). Two curiosities of the room though:
• An ashtray and matches next to the No Smoking plaque on the table
• A big skylight, making sleeping past daybreak pretty difficult for some

We didn’t have much time after checking in before needing to drive another 14 miles to wedding location for the rehearsal. As gorgeous as the road was, Bethany couldn’t help but curse the frequent cyclists on what seemed like an obvious death wish of traveling Highway 1. Finding the wedding spot was a bit of a challenge, due to the sign restrictions, the turn off was signaled by only a red banner. The wedding took place on private land consisting overlooking the ocean with cliffs below and to the sides. As noted above there’s no construction that can be visible from the highway, not that the location below the highway was developed in the conventional American sense. The land owner had leveled off a couple of terraces, planted grass, added a concrete dance floor and a bathroom/shower with non-potable water. This was it! Everything else had to be brought in; drinking water, grills, stoves etc. including the nicest porta-potties we’ve ever seen. Jake had spoke for months about the amount of time he and Andrea were spending planning the wedding but it became clearer as the logistics of having a really nice wedding with a hundred people at this location became apparent, which recalls the old saw about war: amateurs talk tactics; professionals talk logistics.

Randy and Bethany in Big Sur

The wedding party was fairly small consisting of two bride’s maids, a best man (Randy) and an officient (a friend who got a license from the internet) with Jake’s niece and nephews serving a flower girl and ushers. After a pretty relaxed run through or two, we drove back to the town of Big Sur. Big Sur is a town only in the loosest sense, as it apparently consists of a half a dozen lodging and camping areas with shopettes, restaurants and gas station caterings to them along the narrow valley that the highway runs through. We had the Rehearsal dinner at the Big Sur Bakery, which included an artist galley, meditation center, a gas pump, a restaurant along with baked goods and fancy coffee. Despite the multiplicity of purposes, the meal was an excellent series of vegetables, salmon and chicken served family style as pass arounds while maintaining a casual elegance, which are perhaps the two words that best describe the tone for the whole weekend. Afterwards dinner, we visited Nepenthe, to meet up with most of the others attending the wedding who were spending both Friday and Saturday nights in Big Sur.

Jake and Andrea at the Rehearsel Dinner

In the morning Randy woke up shortly after dawn (remember the skylight in room) and decided to take a hike through the Redwoods to Pfeiffer Falls and the Valley overlook to seek inspiration for the obligatory Best Man toast. Returning to the cabin, he and Bethany had the best breakfast they can recall in years at the Lodge’s restaurant. The Huevos Ahogados were a treat and worth the wait from the lethargic staff.

At Pffier Falls

Randy, Jake and Paul drove down early in one of the few cars allowed on the property as the rest of the wedding attendees were shuttled in 20 person coaches for the half hour ride along the 14+ plus miles to the wedding.

Randy, Paul & Jake on Hwy 1

Although casual and laid back in tone, there was little left to chance as it was clear that Jake and Andrea had considered and planned the events for the whole day in great detail with numerous creative and caring elements included from the guest book, the food and drink choices to the vows. The whole event came off with a carefree elegance belying the effort it took to pull off. The offcient Paul, known for his easy humor and gleeful clowning, did an exceptional job intoning the service with the right sense of humor, grace and solemnity. It was a particularly challenging task given that Jake’s father is an Evangelical Pastor and Andrea’s family are culturally Jewish. He handled it with aplomb and apparent ease.

Andrea and Jake Newly Married

Dinner consisted of a salad, seared salmon, grilled vegetables and most impressively five rounds of gourmet pizzas from a wood fired oven on a trailer. The last pizza was Nutella and bananas but there were also fabulous brownies. It didn’t occur to us until latter there was no cake. After the fathers’ both provided toasts, it was Randy’s turn and it went something like this based on his notes:

On this joyous occasion, at this awe inspiring location along one of the world’s greatest byways, we your fellow travelers in life gather to wish you well in your future journey together. Like the road to get here, there’s great beauty to be found on the road. There’s also lots of curves; blind spots; perhaps there’s a rock slide that hinders your progress or makes you consider a different path. When you come to these cross roads and you’re deciding which way to go, I remind you…I remind you because you already know this. You don’t come to this point, this day without knowing this: Choose love. When in doubt, Choose Love. So for the bullet point types out there, Jake and Andrea, Choose Love and Happy Trails.

After the wedding toasts, there was dancing as dusk settled in. A rousing rendition of Hava Nagila brought most people to the dance floor ending with the bride and groom lifted in the air on chairs. It was terrific fun.

Jake and Andrea enjoying the chair dance

The evening ended with songs and smores around a campfire before the shuttle bus brought us back to the lodge. Being in the middle of a bus on a windy road for a half an hour with too much heat blasting in did not sit well with Randy’s non-astronaut sense of balance. At least he didn’t get sick in the bus.

Although it would have been nice to sleep late, we (Randy) were awakened Sunday morning by the gobbling of turkeys outside our room, which with the skylight meant he was up. After having 4-5 hours of sleep Jake and Andrea hosted a nice continual breakfast at their cabin for everyone from 8-11. Our plane didn’t leave until Monday morning, so we had the late afternoon and evening to visit the city and have dinner, though it was a bit anticlimactic after the 4 ½ days. We did little beyond “enjoy” some San Francisco weekend traffic and have Indian food for dinner outside the Presidio.

Meanwhile back home the girls spent Father’s Day at Cardinal game with the Computer School and the extended Sage clan.

Jane, Cate, Gramy and Gral at the Cardinals game

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