Catching Up: DuNord Trip

It’s April (but it’s almost May). And this is a post about February. And it’s out of order. You understand how burdensome this is for me…but embracing my tendencies and then deliciously abandoning them for posting’s sake is part of the reason I’ve been posting at all.

Well, DuNord was a blast. Throughout the weekend, the nine of us went XC skiing, walking, and hiking; we cooked and we ate, we charaded and we puzzled. Our cabin vernacular included creepy Jolly Green Giant references as well as Scientologist warnings. The whole weekend was a highlight, but my favorite moment involved Max imitating the Titanic during charades. Max would disagree. His highlight vote would be cast for his and Pete’s homemade cinnamon rolls.

You can see photos of the cinnamon roll process (but sorry, not the Titanic imitation) here: http://www.flickr.com/photos/ccharp3r/tags/dunord2007/

Catching Up: Savannah Trip

In mid-March, we fled Minneapolis for Savannah and Charleston. It was a restorative vacation full of eating, walking, sipping, swinging, rocking, looking, seeing, and exploring. I have decided that in my next life I will dwell on a front porch.

The urban form in both places was unique, but Savannah’s culture and physical environment were more comfortable and pleasing overall. I’m now a die-hard fan of town-square-as-organizing-mechanism approach.

Check out our photos at http://www.flickr.com/photos/ccharp3r/tags/savannah2007/. They are heavy with the urban studio curse: demand for additional resource library images. Maybe I should bill my vacation time to the office.

Favorite things (all involve porches, patios, or some other form of outdoor space):

• fried green tomato benedict with grits at Poogan’s Porch restaurant (we ate on the porch)
• police action views from our inn’s second story porch
• wine and rocking chairs on a porch overlooking the Savannah River
• late night exploration of Charleston, peering in windows and evaluating porches
• pizza and beer on the Mellow Mushroom restaurant sidewalk (kind of like a porch)
• coffee and lunch on the Gallery Espresso sidewalk (also like a porch, just not elevated)
• porch swing on the Tybee Island beach