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U23D, Matchbox, and Fire Trucks

Alex and I had a great weekend this weekend. When I went back to Kansas for my Dad's funeral a couple of weeks ago, I picked up all of my Matchbox cars that I had when I was a kid. My sister was kind enough to ship them out to me because there were too many to bring on the plane. Alexander's great-grandpa is into everything to do with cars which includes toy cars, so he asked to see them. Alex and I went over Saturday afternoon and had fun looking at all of the cars with his great-grandpa. He brought out some of his toy cars, too. All of us had fun playing with the cars even if our combined ages are over 120. Some things never get old.

On Sunday we drove the fire truck in to Seattle to the Pacific Science Center to see U23D in IMAX. The old firetruck doesn't get a lot of us in the winter so I thought that it needed to go for a nice drive. We used almost a half a tank of gas to drive into Seattle and back - the same trip would not have even moved the fuel gauge on the VW - but I need to drive the fire truck once in a while. If you like U2 you have to go see the 3D IMAX show. The show was nearly sold out. It was flippin' awesome. Awesome I tell you! Alex liked it, but thought it was too long, but he's only 7. After the concert I wanted more music so we went over to the Experience Music Project and fooled around in the area where they have instruments that you can play. Alex practiced playing the electric guitar like The Edge, and then had great fun with a drum kit. What he lacks in experience he makes up for in style and volume. While Alex was playing the drums I was trying out an electric guitar. The amp had volume knobs that went to 11. I kid you not. I felt it was a moral imperative to crank the volume up to 11 so Alex and I wailed away, playing no particular song but being very noisy. Fortunately that was in one of the sound proof, practice rooms so we didn't get ejected. When the EMP closed, Alex talked me into eating at Red Robin, so we really made a day of it.

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