We got a puppy! Friday night, Roger and I drove to Baldwin, Wisconsin, a small town east of the Twin Cities. There, we found the cutest little miniature schnauzer with our names written all over him. His name is Kozmo!

Ryan and Paula’s hospitality continues to amaze us: once again, they invited us over for dinner at their home last night. Ryan created an amazing pork tenderloin and Paula spoiled us with strawberry and blueberry shortcake. Delicious!

Roger and I spent last weekend in North Dakota helping out my parents with an estate auction at the home of my grandma and grandpa, both of whom have passed away in the past two years. While we kids had our choice of nearly anything we wanted before the auction, there were a few things hidden in the boxes we hadn’t yet seen until the day of the auction. So, we all bid on a thing or two! Here are photos from the weekend’s events.

One of the cooler things we saw at NPR headquarters on our vacation last week was the NPR archives. Our tour guide, Alan Stone, took us into a temperature controlled room filled with shelves and shelves of audio files (and even a toaster oven, which once the archivists used to dry out old audio reels). In the back of the room, he pointed out the “obit” shelf: box upon box, each labeled with the names of a famous person, and each containing scripts, audio files and news clippings about those who just might die in the near future. (Boxes included Liza Minelli, the Pope, Saddam Hussein, etc.) The one box our guide pulled out and opened to show us was that of John Gotti’s …. who died yesterday at the age of 61. The contents of that box made it on the air yesterday. Kind of spooky.

After crashing my computer three times attempting to add captions to my photos last night, I determined that the images could speak for themselves. So, Roger and I happily present photos from our trip to Washington, D.C. (I promise, captions to come!)

Roger and I returned safely yesterday morning after a week in Washington, D.C. Two strange highlights from last Thursday:

1. We took a tour of National Public Radio and watched Bob Edwards interview John Ridley, the director of the newly released “Undercover Brother.” The real interview, which aired morning on Morning Edition, is here; unfortunately, you don’t get to hear Bob Edwards say “with her boobs flopping all over the place” like we did in the studio.
2. We watched a major drug bust go down in Dupont Circle during rush hour. Six or eight undercover cops with college t-shirts, shorts and backpacks, three cops on horses, two cops on motorcycles, five squad cars and a helicopter were all involved. Needless to say, we were only a good 50-100 feet from the action.

Of course, pictures of our adventures (including of the drug dealer thrown into the cop car) are forthcoming. In the meanwhile, I’ve taken a few snaps of our backyard … the grass is a mile high and the garden and weeds went wild while we were gone! We also expected new patio furniture to be delivered today, but alas, found out the table was damaged and so we only received the chairs and umbrella. It will replace the old furniture the previous owners left for us.