Baby Genevieve
Wow, Jess and I just got back from a quick trip to Pittsburgh to see our new niece Genevieve Monroe Gribble, and my what a cutey she is! The trip started out with an after-work flight from DIA to the Akron-Canton airport courtesy of Frontier airlines. Oddly this was pretty much the only “direct” flight to Pittsburgh we could find. Tickets were also reasonable, and the Hazelton chauffeur and auto rental business was ultra accommodating (thanks Chris and Betti). Our flight arrived at midnight local time, so we greatly appreciated the ride to Macedonia and the bed.
The next morning we slept in a little late (a recurrent theme throughout the trip) and hopped into the 2000 Cav for the trip to Pittsburgh. We had to stop at a rest area in Ohio to grab a cup of coffee and get the camera out of the trunk. The Chevy was about to hit 170,000 miles, and we could tell Chris was a bit sad he wouldn’t see the flip. No worries, we took a little video of the occasion and a still shot with all of those zeros. It took us a little longer to get to Pittsburgh without using the turnpike, but I was glad to remember town well enough to get around without a map.
Finally we got to see Genevieve! She wasn’t terribly interactive (different if you’re breast feeding and diaper changing, but that’s another issue all together), but was super cute.
Jess and I both got some holding time, and she handled all of our strange hands pretty well. The proud parents (Erika and Heidi) seemed quite happy if a bit stir-crazy. Genevieve is in that eat-every-hour phase that makes it difficult to do much—besides the aforementioned interactive activities.
My dad took the day off from work and he and Sandy came to visit with all of us Wednesday. We mostly hung out around the house and took turns holding the baby. Eventually a game of Trivial Pursuit broke out. Sadly my team lost when our valiant comeback effort fell just short. I blame that darned pink category! Later we managed to get the parents and baby out of the house for a nice dinner at the Spaghetti Warehouse down in the Strip District. It’s a pretty quick drive from Erika & Heidi’s place in Carrick, and we even found parking in their lot. After dinner we headed back to the house and said goodnight to my dad and Sandy. We stayed up a bit later with the baby, but went to bed pretty early.
Thursday, we again slept in, but not too late. We were heading to the Carnegie Science Center to see the new CMU robot exhibition. We were excited to play air hockey, foosball, and basketball against the robots, and my Dad and Sandy get free admission with their membership—way cool. My dad met us, and we took two cars downtown. In part because of the incredible space requirement of a baby and in part because Genevieve might need to leave early. Inside the museum we went straight to the 2nd floor to see the ‘bots. The robot greeter was malfunctioning when we arrived. Jess commented that it was just like my full-time, part-time job at Dave & Buster’s fixing video games during grad school. Some technician had to come out and reset the poor greeter. He even used the same unplug-it-and-plug-it-back-in technique that was popular at D&B’s.
Moving past the greeter, we quickly spotted the basketball robot. It was hard to miss because it took up most of the room. At that point in time, the robot was shooting a respectable 70%+ including behind-the-back free throws. The humans, a dismal 7%. Still, I thought the robot would be almost perfect. Maybe it wasn’t trying very hard.
The next stop was the air hockey robot. Jess lost pretty quickly (actually she beat herself), but I managed a draw. From my observation, the robot plays a strictly defensive game. It effectively protects its own goal, and waits for its opponent to make an own-goal. According to the docent, the robot had lost 6 games since it was installed. It made a wierd shhh sound when it couldn’t reach the puck and needed it to be fetched by the stick-wielding docent. Humans have a definite reach advantage over that robot.
They had a nice display of robots in cinema along one wall. Jess especially liked the Gort model. “He” looks a little like a stylized academy award trophy. Jess also found a number of spelling and grammatical errors in the signs and videos throughout the exhibition—very disappointing!
One of the most fascinating robots was a neat machine that reproduced drawings using little BBs that it picked up with a small vacuum tube and deposited onto a spinning platform. It was crazy fast, drawing the picture in about 60 seconds. Jess programmed it to make her famous Rex drawing. The resolution isn’t great, but the picture is obvious. There were a couple of loose balls rolling around, but they came from a previous sketch. Again, the robot wasn’t always perfect, but very impressive nevertheless.
After a short drink break and a robot sugar cookie, we went up to the third floor to check out the aquarium exhibit. It was a neat arrangement of coral showing the difference between the front and rear of the reef structures where the currents are very different. Genevieve seemed to like the display, so Erika and Heidi got her out of the stroller and held her up by the glass for a good look. I don’t know what it looked like to her, but it was pretty cool. The live coral was the best part. It really sways with the currents.
Eventually, it was clear that Genevieve needed to get home for a good meal and some additional diaper changing. Jess was planning to make yummy Indian Food (Saag Gosht) with some fresh chapati bread, so we rode with dad and stopped by a little grocer called the McGinnis Sisters to pick up a few ingredients. It was a neat small grocer, and they were able to cut a leg of lamb to size for us while we waited. I found some basmati rice and with help, dad was able to find the lime juice. We also picked up some yummy potato chips to replace the ones we’d collectively wolfed down the previous night during Trivial Pursuit.
Back at Erika & Heidi’s place, we got the baby fed and changed (I say we, but you know who did all the work), and played a few games of Carcasonne while we waited for my mom to arrive from Ephrata, PA. Jess left for the kitchen after the first game, but mom jumped right in. The game was pretty fun, which is good because we got it for Erika and Heidi last Christmas. About mid-way through the 2nd round, I left to finish off the chipati (man, you should see me with a rubber spatula). A bit later, we were all enjoying dinner, comparing digital cameras, and trying to figure out the white balance adjustment to get Genevieve to look the right color.
The next day we slept in really late. By the time we were all up and showered, Genevieve had eaten about a dozen breakfasts. Mom brought yummy cinnamon-raisin bread (and Mennonite pretzels, which we brought back to Colorado) that we all ate. Eventually we headed over to a “nearby” bookstore where we met up with dad and satisfied my over-priced coffee addiction. We hung out and talked a while, then went to get some lunch. After lunch, we took a couple of big pictures and said goodbye. Next stop Allison Park!
A while back we threw a picnic at Jess’s brother’s (Matt & Erin) place in Newark, Ohio. It worked so well, we planned a similar dinner at Nathaniel & Laura’s place in Allison Park. Luckily for them, the planned attendance was much smaller. It was just the two of them, Jess and me, and Chris and Betti. It took forever to get there during rush-hour traffic, but we made it by about 6:00. We did have to stop about a mile from the house and call for directions. Turns out, Jess “remembered” the wrong street number, so the marker on the Google map was a bit off.
Dinner was tasty (burgers and corn on the cob) and we enjoyed a tour of the gardening efforts Nathaniel and Laura had made. The landscaping is looking very good. Maybe we can contract them for a little work around our house. After dinner we said goodnight to Chris and Betti and powered through enough Rock Band to make Steven Tyler hoarse. We finished off the night with a little Jungle Speed and headed off to bed.
The next morning, we got up early (really) and drove back towards Cleveland to meet up with Matt & Erin at Chris and Betti’s. Matt brough the badminton net and a Cornhole setup. We avoided the ground bees and made each other sweaty messes running around the badminton court. I’m pretty sure I lost every game, even the doubles matches Jess and I had against the Hazeltons (sorry honner). I guess my game isn’t up to snuff.
We ordered in for dinner, and had some more great conversation before Matt and Erin headed back to Newark. Shortly thereafter we headed to bed, but not before I struggled to sever off a couple of huge hunks from Erin’s old birthday cake (an ice cream cake) and enjoy a weird show about Sturgis on Discovery Channel.
The next morning we awoke at 2:00 MST to make our 6:30 EST flight back to Denver. We got back just in time to crash for a couple of hours before playing an outdoor concert with the Rocky Mountain Concert Band in downtown Lafayette. It was a long day, but a fun way to end a great trip. Next time I’ll remember I need something to keep the music from blowing off the stand and me from nodding off to sleep during rests!
