OK, I was at the National Archives this week, and I did hang around for while looking at the exhibits, but I didn’t steal a hard drive.

Honest.

Now, if you excuse me, I’m off to buy an outboard disk enclosure.

If your child is going on a trip that has at least one overnight, someone needs to go with him or her. It’s not fair to the child or the parents who go along to give up your responsibilities for a weekend. One poor girl burned through the spending money her mom had given her when she dropped her off at the airport, and the other parents chipped in to make sure the poor thing ate on Monday.

If you do go on a trip with your kids, then please act like a parent. I had to correct a lot of kids who acted inappropriately over the weekend. Not the kids who got loud in the park. I mean the kids who tried to climb up on the lap of President Roosevelt’s statue in his memorial for a cute picture. Or the boys who thought it would be fun to stare at and take flash pictures of the homeless people sleeping on a grate near Union Station. If you don’t like me correcting your kid, then you act like a parent.

When you’re on a mass trip like we just did, teach your kids to be polite. We were moving through crowds at the various museums and memorials, and I was never prouder of Girlie Bear than when she kept excusing herself and making way for other people. A lot of the kids acted like they were the only ones using the stairs, escalators, elevators, and sidewalks.

Don’t let your child take a Gameboy or whatever when you’re out and about at the sites. One kid had his parents spend hundreds of dollars for him and his mother to go to Washington, and never stopped playing his Nintendo DS, including during the changing of the guard at the Tomb of the Unknowns and at the Kennedy gravesite in Arlington Cemetary. Something tells me this trip isn’t going to go into his autobiography.

On a more positive note, I owe a lot to Girlie Bear’s teachers for all of the work they did to put the trip together and make it happen on the ground. Good teachers deserve a heck of a lot more money and respect for what they do.

A shout out to the nice young lady who was riding in the car we got on at the Metro Center subway station on Saturday. That pole dance you were doing at the front of the car was quite entertaining. While I’m sure your boyfriend liked it, I had a heck of a time getting myself and other dad between you and the kids so we wouldn’t have to explain what you were doing.

Another shout out to anyone who flew on Southwest between Baltimore and Louisville on Friday and Monday. I’m so very sorry. I know it was only an hour or so in the air, but it was probably the longest hour of your week.

Same shout out to the people who rode the Blue or Yellow lines in the Washington DC metro this weekend. We tried to keep the kids down to a dull roar, but we know our large, noisy, and energetic group disturbed you.

When visiting our nation’s capital, please remember that security is up. Don’t get snitty with the security guard at the museum when she wants you to open your bag for her. It’s not personal, it’s her job.

Every 16 year old boy and girl should be forced to accompany and participate in a 5th grade class trip. It would be the best birth control known to man.

Sorry I didn’t get this out sooner. I was just plumb exhausted on Sunday night, and it’s been crazy since Monday morning.

Sunday we went to the American History museum, and it was awesome. Girlie Bear and her friends really enjoyed going through the military history display. We were in there for almost 2 hours. They also spent a lot of time in the Abraham Lincoln exhibit. Of course we went to see the original Star Spangled Banner. The Smithsonian just finished a renovation of both the museum and the flag, and both were worth the expense and time. The museum was able to grab and hold the attention of 10 year old girls for hours on end, and we could have spent all weekend at that museum alone.

We went to the National Archives on Sunday afternoon to see the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution. That was the one thing that Girlie Bear insisted that she had to do while we were in Washington. The security there was the tightest we had to go through, including the airport.

Sunday evening, the teachers took all of the kids to the ESPN Zone restaurant for a few hours to give the parents a break. Bless them. I’ve said it before: They aren’t paid enough to put up with those animals. I had plans to stroll down to a book store to get something for the flight home, but I passed out for 3 hours on my bed until it was time to retrieve Girlie Bear. Apparently a fun time was had by all.

Monday was our last day. We spent the morning and part of the afternoon at the Air and Space museum. Again, it was wonderful. The kids really enjoyed all of the interactive displays, and I got an appreciation for early aviation that I didn’t have before. They even had a display of Unmanned Aerial Vehicles, which took me back to my days at Fort Huachuca.

Our flight back was pretty uneventful. We got back to Louisville at about 9 PM on Monday, and were home and in bed by 10. I haven’t slept that soundly in a long time.

Well made it through day2. In the mornng we went to Arlington. Amazingly the children were very well behaved. We got to see the changing of the guard at the tomb of the unknowns.

After that we went to the natural history museum. That was nice because I was able to sit down in the main area and send Girlie Bear off to see different exhibits. There is some benefit to your daughter getting older.

Today is the air and space museum.

Was listening to the 6 o’clock news while I got dinner together tonight, and a report came on as a teaser for an investigative report they debuted last night. It deals with an X rated theater and book store in Indiana. Apparently, the local NBC affiliate sent in a hidden camera to catch people doing things that were against the law. Then one of the reporters cornered local law enforcement and politicians as to why they didn’t shut the place down.

That’s all good. I wouldn’t have talked about it during the dinner hour, but hey, freedom of the press and all that.

But I didn’t need nor did I expect to hear the term “glory hole” spoken on the TV tonight. Especially since Girlie Bear was in the living room typing something up on the computer.

Had to play the old “I’ll tell you when you’re older” card.

Got to love it.

Well, it’s been a very full weekend.

Saturday, Junior Bear had his junior prom. Had to do all the last minute things like pick up the tux and flowers, etc. He had a good time with his lady, and I got him and her home last night in one piece. Got to bed at about 1 AM.

Today, of course, is Mother’s Day. Treated the family to a Cracker Barrel breakfast (Mmmmm, Cracker Barrel). After we slept off the carbs a bit, we went to the zoo to see the new giraffe. We’re glad to see that he’s doing fine. He was born with a deformity of his lower legs that didn’t allow him to stand up, which is death to a baby giraffe. They have to stand in order to nurse. The mother can’t kneel down to feed them.

Irish Woman really enjoys her work with the zoo, so we spent almost 4 hours just wandering around. Baby Bear got to see the lorikeets for the first time today, and he was entranced. These are small parrot-like birds from Australia and Indonesia. They feed on nectar, so we bought a small cup of sugar water to feed them. Baby Bear was very firm in wanting to grab one, but we were able to keep them away. Didn’t want to end up on the evening news as a story of a toddler squeezing a tropical bird to death.

Girlie Bear spent the afternoon learning how to use my digital camera. She’ll be using it on our big field trip next weekend.

After all that, had to do the regular weekend work and errands, but compressed into the couple of hours left to do them on a Sunday afternoon.

I’m bushed, and I have a 5 AM change control to do tomorrow. Think I’m going to goof off for a few more minutes and then go catch a few hours of sleep.

Hope all of you enjoyed your mother’s day!

Saw this over at Blackfive. Gregory Kane at the Washington Examiner was at the World Trade Center the morning of September 10, 2001, and apparently shares my lack of empathy for those who have been interrogated.

I’ve been listening to people CBS (Cry and Blow Snot) over the interrogation methods that have been made public over the past few years with a bit of a cynical view. To be perfectly honest, I’m absolutely apathetic of the plight of people who have been captured while actively planning or executing plans to hurt me or those like me. I went through training as the subject of interrogation by Army interrogators, both newbies and guys who’d been around the block. I wasn’t being trained, I was the training aide. kinda like being the guinea pig used to do biology class experiments, only by very motivated students. It sucked, and I’m not ashamed to say that after a while it got really tempting to just give in and tell them my “secret” just to get it to stop. But it didn’t cause me actual harm, it didn’t make my want to roll into a ball and suck my thumb, and it didn’t make me want to call my congressman and the New York Times to complain.

The one mistake that President Bush made was not getting a formal declaration of war in the aftermath of September 11th. With that, a lot of the things that have been blared across the CNN screens would have been covered by the governments war powers, and some reporters would have gone to jail for discussing classified programs such as NSA wiretapping of foreigners who happen to reside in the US.

Mr. Kane makes the point that our foreign policy should boil down to “Don’t start nothing, won’t be nothing”. I like “No better friend, no worse enemy”. Even better is “We Americans are a peaceful people, but if you raise a hand to us, we’ll cut off your arm”.

If you’ve got 15 minutes, check out this short story over at Tor.

It’s being rumored that Apple is discussing purchasing Twitter.

For what, I have no idea.

Apple doesn’t have any business that Twitter would compliment, and I don’t think that Twitter has any technology that Apple needs.

I’m throwing the flag on this one for 10 yards.

Thoughts?

I just stumbled across Private Murphy, a comic about a regular guy in the Army. For anyone who’s ever been in the military, it’ll touch a nerve. Hopefully one that makes you laugh.

Here are a few of my favorites so far:

Had a guy in my unit in Germany who could do this with his NBC mask on.

Since I used to teach a few classes at Fort Huachuca, I won’t comment on this one.

Had this happen to me once. Took almost 2 hours to get the entire platoon extricated.

Anyway, this one goes on my list of everyday links. Enjoy.