Thursday, April 12, 2007

Spring Break Tourism

I'm finally getting around to posting pictures of the touristy things we did while Tim and Rachele were here. I'm kicking myself for not snapping a shot of the no parking sign, but it's probably for the best. I'm sure no good could come from having that evidence in my possession. I guess I just need to move on.

Tuesday April 3

Franklin Institute in Philadelphia (You know - the day of the infamous parking ticket - but I'm moving on. Really.) Unfortunately there was no picture taking allowed in the King Tut exhibit. I'll try to describe it to you. A lot of extremely old stuff in big glass cases. Just think of The Mummy and The Mummy Returns and you'll get the idea, though we didn't see anything quite so gruesome as a decomposing body. Which reminds me, there were things belonging to Amhenotep II and Amhenotep III, both believed to be the grandfather and great-grandfather of Tut. This excited me because my vast knowledge of Egyptian history has been gained to me through the Mummy movies.

Me: (With much awe and wonder) Oh look! I wonder if this is the same Amhenotep from the movie!

Todd: (Not so awed) Maybe.

Me: No. Now that I think about it, it couldn't be. He wasn't a second or a third and he was only a priest, not a Pharaoh. So he couldn't be the same one. Maybe he was the father of Amhenotep II.

Todd: (Probably a little patronizing, but I hadn't caught on yet) Mm-hm. Could be.

Me: Except, that's probably not right. He was a priest so he couldn't be married. At least I don't think so. And in the movie he wasn't married, but carrying on an affair with the Pharaoh's mistress. So if he were the father of Amhenotep II, then the Amhenotep II probably wouldn't have become a Pharaoh.

Todd: And we all know the "Mummy" movies are historical fact.

Me: Hmph! (At this point I realized the ludicrous nature of my one-way discussion, but was unwilling to admit it.)

Surprisingly we still felt like eating after seeing the parking ticket. (Really! I AM getting past this!) So we took Tim and Rachele to Sonny's. And for those attentive readers out there, yes, the date stamp on the picture is wrong. I forgot to get a picture of the restaurant that day so I went through my picture archives and found this one from a year before. But I don't consider it cheating because that's really where we went to eat.

Sonny's has the most fantabulous cheese steaks! And it's more of a local place as opposed to a tourist trap so they're never too busy, though they have a steady stream of patrons.

We stopped at Costco on the way home, but I didn't get a picture of that, either. And I don't believe I have a picture in my archives so you'll just have to use your imagination.

Wednesday April 4

The boys stayed home while the three girls went to KOP (that's local talk for the King of Prussia Mall). Rachele was on the hunt for a maternity swimsuit and Katie thought she was looking for an Easter/Concert dress. I indulged her a little bit and I have to admit, it scared me.

First of all, why is she drawn to the hooker section? She'd pick out a dress that looked like something from Pretty Woman - and I'm not talking about the nice clothes - and I'd say, "That's lovely, but Auntie Rachele says no." I figured Rachele was only here for a short time and didn't have to live with Katie's wrath. Somehow, however, Katie knew I was lying.

And second, can huffing, flouncing and rolling one's eyes back into one's head be dangerous over time? Maybe she got it all out of her system and the teenage years - THAT WE HAVEN'T EVEN GOTTEN TO YET - will sail by smoothly.

Alright. I need to continue on. I'm feeling the urge to huff, flounce and roll my eyes and that can't be good.

While we were gone Tim decided to go on a walkabout. He walked 4 miles, taking a circuitous route to the beer store where he purchased two cases of beer and walked a good mile back holding one under each arm. Talk about endurance exercise. I would have stopped to get him some if he wanted it that bad.

Thursday April 5

We went to see the plain folk, starting with the Intercourse Cannery in Intercourse, Pennsylvania. In the snow.
I wish they'd change the name of the town because I still can't say it with a straight face. I suppose I could wish I'd grow up instead, but I think a name change is more probable.

After that we went to the Old Candle Barn. Neat place with lots of candles (who could have guessed) and primitive knick knacks. Downstairs they make the candles and you can go watch. We girls thought that sounded like fun, but when we got down there they weren't doing a darn thing. Lazy Amish people!

Across the parking lot - where they had FREE parking (moving on) - was Kitchen Kettle Village, Tourist Trap Extraordinaire. But since it was snowing there wasn't a big crowd.


Here's a picture of an Amish bus.


After that we drove to an outlet mall to look for good tennies. No blogworthy photos from that little adventure.

By this time we acknowledged the need to feed the diabetic and the pregnant woman. So we drove down the street to Fuddrucker's, not only one of the best hamburger joints, but a fun and shocking thing to say. Again, I've never professed to be terribly mature.
The last stop was at Sonic - definitely blogworthy! Sonic is as prolific in Arkansas as Starbucks is in New York City. They're on practically every corner. Our family alone supported two in our town. So you can imagine our utter dismay when we moved to an area with no Sonic. One day in a moment of culinary despair, I went online and found out there IS a Sonic in the state of Pennsylvania. In Lancaster County. So we can't go to Lancaster without stopping at Sonic. It didn't matter we were completely stuffed from our dinner at Fuddruckers. It would have been wrong to drive by since we were in the area.

There are still a couple more days to go, but this post has turned out to be rather lengthy. Come back tomorrow for the rest of the post. I know you can't wait!

Labels: family, fun, touristy

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