Dylan really enjoyed the cup cakes yesterday. My birthday weekend was a bunch of fun. Had drinks with a bunch of my staff on Thursday night and had dinner with the Euro guys later. Played golf on Friday morning and hit an 82 which was good enough to beat Terry for hte first time this year. Had dinner with Kumie, Joseph, Micheal, Pattay and Steve at Vermillion. I also opened a bunch of cool gifts, including: wine glasses from Linda and Gil, a great shirt and pullover from Aunt Elaine, some candy from the boys and Blanca, a PC programmable universal remote from Kumie, a fantastic brief case and overcoat from Nicole and I know I have a few more gifts on the way. Good times... thanks to everyone. I just loaded 55 pictures to www.durpenters.org from Labor Day in Minnesota. Enjoy.

We had dinner last night at Vermillion, a funky Alexandria eating and drinking establishment. Kumie, Joe, Micheal, Pattay and Modean met us there. Good times but I was ready to sleep after a late night  

First Day of School



They were so excited we couldn't get them to sit still for a real portrait but I got the top one of them walking into class. I chopped off the tops of their heads but this is the best shot I could get. Nicole has already picked them up and they did fine. I'm sure in high school they will be whining about having to get up early and go to school like I did, so we should be happy they are so excited right now. Next week they will start going for the full 3-4 hours.

I'm going out tonight for a pre-birthday drink or two. Golf tomorrow and dinner with a few folks in Alexandria after that. I'm getting old and my joints hurt.

More soon.

The boys waiting for a train in Wayzata Minnesota. The track runs along Wayzata Bay of Lake Minnetonka, home of many teen age boating stories. In fact, this is where I kept my boat when I owned one in my early twenties. Good times...  

We are on our way home and going back to work tomorrow. We had lots of fun in Minnesota with grandparents and all. The top shots are on the car ride at the Mall of America and the bottom ones are on the old street trolley on Lake Harriet. More soon...

Saturday we went to the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum and walked around the grounds. It was pretty rainy most of the day and 6 inches last night with thunder and lighting for 5 straight hours. We went to the Mall of America today and rode rides at camp snoopy then went on old trolly car ride at Lake Harriet. I have pictures of these events I'll post tomorrow. Heading to dinner right now, gotta run.

These are the first of many photos I'll put up on Durpenters.org when I get home. Lots of good pics of Dylan, Finn and Sam having a good time at the fair.

Park

Park
Originally uploaded by homerclees.

Big red car

Minnesota get together

I took close to 150 pictures today and if I get time later I'll put a few up on the blog and in flickr. We did tons of fun stuff today including eating cheese on a stick, sitting on big farm machinery, going to the little farm, riding airplanes and race cars on the kiddie midway and taking a plunge down the giant slide.

We also stopped by the AARP event in front of the grandstand to listen to some oldies and talk to some AARP Minnesota colleages. Good times.

I've also decided that all people selling tickets to Merry Go Rounds hate life. We had this woman today that looked completely stoned which reminded me of the person in central park who had a hard time pulling herself away from a cell phone to complain about me using a 20 dollar bill to pay 12 bucks in carosel fees.

They are suppose to be happy rides.

Mark Carpenter
General Manager
Web Strategy and Operations
www.aarp.org
--------------------------
Sent from my BlackBerry Wireless Handheld (www.BlackBerry.net)

State fair

Minnesota's great get together. I should have some good pictures later today. The flight to Minnesota yesterday was pretty smooth and the boys are loving grandma's and grandpa's toy filled basement. More soon.

Mark Carpenter
General Manager
Web Strategy and Operations
www.aarp.org
--------------------------
Sent from my BlackBerry Wireless Handheld (www.BlackBerry.net)

This is really heart wrenching to see. I've spent some really good times in New Orleans, including 4 Jazz Fests and a couple business trips. It's an amazing town that will never be the same. It will be months before they get all the water out of the city and re-building even possible. AARP's Member Event was scheduled for late September and will be cancelled. I was looking forward to having a burger at the Port O Call on Esplande, having a few cocktails and hearing some music at the Shim Sham Club in the quarter. We were planning on dinner at Jacque Imo's and of course having beignets at Cafe Du Monde. I know NO will bounce back and I hope AARP tries to hold our annual event there again. I think they will need our tourist dollars when they get this city back on it's feet. You can go to AARP's web site to find links to places to give money to relief efforts. http://www.aarp.org/about_aarp/hurricane_katrina_resources.html We're going to help out this city with a donation. More soon :-(

My mother took this picture last week while we were watching Baby Mozart. I'm wearing a Jazz Fest t-shirt which reminds me that if hurricaine Katrina is as bad as they say, the Jazz Fest fairgrounds are going to be under 10 feet of water. The AARP Member Event is in 5 weeks in the French Quarter. That could also be a problem if it goes bad. More soon... 

Sam's new hat

Sam's new hat
Originally uploaded by homerclees.

Bucket head

Marky Mark

Who would have thought that I could rap the ABC's better than Dr. Dre. The boys love my hip hop\rap version of the old standby and are requesting it before bedtime. We took the boys to get haircuts today and didn't do much more. It was cool and rainy so we spent most of the day in doors playing with trains and watching movies. We are watching Beyond the Sea, the Bobby Darin movie and it's alright. I hope we can get to the pool tomorrow. It's the end of the season and the boys do enjoy splashing around. Word....

Shaun of the dead

Funny movie with some awsome Queen tunes. I'm all tired now and need some sleep. We gave Micheal Murray a ride home tonight and planned a dinner in New Orleans later in September. I like Micheal, he's alright.

Mark Carpenter
General Manager
Web Strategy and Operations
www.aarp.org
--------------------------
Sent from my BlackBerry Wireless Handheld (www.BlackBerry.net)

This is Sam and I giggling to the Wiggles on top and Dylan, Nicole and Kumie getting ready to do the monkey. Yes, the show was semi humorous but even at 70 minutes, a little long. Dylan was begging to watch "Baby Mozart" about 40 minutes into it. (Baby Mozart is a dvd we have at home) I think Kumie enjoyed it the most but she also she lives for Sponge Bob.

@ mci center

@ mci center
Originally uploaded by homerclees.

Wiggles

This is the Ambient Orb I got at All Things Digital last May. It's been telling us the temperture by changing color for the last few months and it is finally out of the orange and red zone that tells you it's in the 80's and 90's. It's now showing a comfortable green shade meaning it's in the 70's. I'm looking forward to some cool blue ambient colors showing that fall has arrived. It's an interesting little device that picks up it's information over the air and can be programmed to follow the stock market, various commodity markets, UV indexes, air quality or just plain temperature. The cool thing with having it programed to display temp is that it will flash when thunderstorm or tornado warning are issued.

I'm back to work and Nicole is back from California. My mother went home yesterday after helping me with the kids all weekend. We had a good time the boys want to see their Grandma again. It seems either Grandma is better than Nicole or I. We are off to see the Wiggles tomorrow. Good times.

Lake Accokeek

Me, Grandma and the boys went out to lake Accokeek today to ride the uppy downy hoarses, play in the playground and run around in the woods. It was hot so we had some diet soda and blue ice treats. We had a good day compared to yesterday's meltdown at Safeway. They were much happier and played in the pool in the morning, took a 3 hour nap and ate a good dinner. They do miss their mama but they will see her early tomorrow.

This is Sam talking to Mama in California. Dylan wasn't as talkative but I think Sam is ready for his own cell phone.  

Grandma Carolyn, Sam, Dylan and I went down to see Mark Jenkins art show in Georgetown tonight. Mark works in my group at AARP and creates art from packing tape. This is the boys standing in front of a card board cut out of one of the tape sculptures he's created. He also had a full size tape car on display. Check out his site with some photo's of his outside installations http://www.xmarkjenkinsx.com/installations.html or check out this quick article from boing boing. http://www.boingboing.net/2005/05/28/mark_jenkins_tape_ba.html

East Lake Country Club





This is where I played golf on Wednesday. Beautiful course with a ton of history. This was Bobby Jones' home course and where he learned the game. It has an old school feel and will host the Tour Championship in early November.

Stuck in Chicago

This time it's my mother who will be spending the night in a local hotel after her flight from MSP sat on the runway for 3 hours then flight after flight to DCA was cancelled. Not good times and I promised the boys they would see Grandma when they wake up. I guess they'll see her around 10am instead. The boys and I played all night and had a pizza party at around 8. I let them pick our their own pajamas regardless if the tops and bottoms matched. It was interesting what they wanted, Sam was all about a yellow striped top and a red striped bottom. Dylan went with green trucks on the top and a blue fish on the bottom. They went to sleep quickly and have not been back up yet.

I hope Kumie is having a good birthday. We had a drink after work and I gave her the camera Joseph, Nicole and I bought her. I hope she uses it for good and not to take and deface pictures of me. I will have to destroy it if so. More soon...

Kumie's birthday

Kumie's birthday
Originally uploaded by homerclees.

Her new digital camera

Stuck in Atlanta

I'm in Atlanta and I can't get out. I had a really nice day playing golf with our e-mail delivery vendors down here today but I've been at the airport for the last 3 hours and I'm annoyed. They claim the flight is going to leave at 8, but I'm not holding my breath. I took a bunch of pictures of the "home of Bobby Jones" East Lake Country Club. I hope to put them up on the blog if I ever get home.

My neck is sunburned and that's all I have left to say right now.

More soon.
Mark Carpenter
General Manager
Web Strategy and Operations
www.aarp.org
--------------------------
Sent from my BlackBerry Wireless Handheld (www.BlackBerry.net)

Drinks

Drinks
Originally uploaded by homerclees.

Intercontinental bar in atlanta

We took the boys downtown to the National Pow Wow this morning. Kumie joined us and we saw a bunch of Native American dancers and a ton of trinkets. I really didn't get that many good pictures of the event but I did get some of the kids. It was hot, hot, hot again today so I stayed inside the rest of the day. Nicole and I went to Gecko's in Baltimore last night for Sue Meoni's 40th birthday party, she was surprised and a good time was had by all.

I put a couple random pics up in flickr that you can see at www.durpenters.com but nothing spectacular. More soon...

Gecko

Gecko
Originally uploaded by homerclees.

Modean and phil