It felt like we had the place to ourselves at times. The end of December is the off season so the weather was just ok by Aruba standards (high 80s with low humidity) but felt perfect compared to Detroit winter. I guess most people stay over in the high rise area of island in one of the big hotels. We stopped over there for an hour and hated it. It was filled with chain restaurants like you would find in the US near a shopping mall. The Eagle Beach area was much nicer in our opinion.

Like other parts of the Caribbean, Aruba has a lot of jewelry stores including Little Switzerland which is one of my clients. It was really helpful to see the stores in person. I now have a better understanding of the brand. Little Switzerland seems to be the leader in Caribbean jewelry stores and I am proud to be associated with them.

Technorati Tags: aruba, beach, Manchebo Beach, Ocean, paradise, travel, vacation

Sunset from the boat we Chartered

Me on the beach enjoying the weather

Some dolphins we saw from the boat

Chickens have free rein in Key West

My niece at My Blue Heaven restaurant

Still life taken at My Blue Heaven

One of the buskers/street performers we saw at Mallory Square Dock

The roosters crow constantly. They just don’t know what time it is

They were tearing down this old motel. I liked the googie signage

Sort of a generic pastel post card picture

You can check out more photos of our trip.

Technorati Tags: beach, key west, Ocean, paradise, travel, vacation

Check out more on Flickr

Yesterday a friend of a friend of mine played at an outdoor concert in Mott Park up in Flint. I used it as an opportunity to practice taking photos of live performers. I need some work getting the flash to work right as well as some other things but I think it was good experience.

Check out more on Flickr

Technorati Tags: beach, flint, lake michigan, michigan, road trip, summer vacation, up north

I attended a rally in DC on the 26th. It was about the Military Commissions Act that congress passed last year. It is a really bad and unconstitutional law. If you do not know about it you should really find out immediately. The law makes a mockery of our bill of rights. For one thing it gives the President the right to declare someone an enemy combatant and place them in a prison cell for ever with no trial. It denies the right of habeas corpus which is really a cornerstone of our freedom and dates back to the Magna Carta.

In order to get to the rally I spent about 12 hours on a bus from Detroit. It left around midnight and I presumed we would sleep during the ride. The sleep did not happen as the bus was cramped and my seat did not recline. Not to mention the foul smell from the chemical toilet in the back of the bus. But we made it there and arrived just as the rally started.

During the rally I took these photos:

I missed Senator Leahy’s speech though I did see him in the hallway outside his office. He has been one of the biggest critics of the Military Commisions Act. I might have spoken to him but he was moving pretty fast and his entourage would have probably tackled me anyway. I heard most of the other speakers including some who were survivors of torture. I got these shots of Kucinich and Dodd who were the only presidential candidates who attended.

Later we spoke with Senator Carl Levin and Stabenow as well as an underling of Sander Levin. I was only really impressed by Carl Levin. He seemed to be the most genuinely concerned about the problem. It was disappointing though to hear him talk about the strategy to get a bill through Congress. I think that I can tell his heart is in the right place. But it is clear that, even if you are well intentioned and even if you are dealing with matters of great import like people’s lives and our basic freedom’s, getting things done in government is really treated like a game.

The whole trip was pretty arduous. A long sweaty uncomfortable ride there. Then rushing from the rally to the offices of the Congressman. And then a long sweaty uncomfortable ride home. At least I was able to snag a seat that reclined on the way home. The ACLU people were very nice and the ACLU leadership thanked us for our time and assured us we made a difference. At least I tried.

Technorati Tags: ACLU, Carl Levin, Day of Action, Dodd, Habeas Corpus, Kucinich, Protest, Senator Leahy, Stabenow, Washington DC

thing I wanted to see in every state we visited. Farmount, Indiana is

apparently the hometown of fifties rebel icon James Dean. We visited

the small museum there and a very nice elderly lady showed us the

artifacts on display. We learned quite a lot about him. I was surprised

to learn how athletic he was. He lettered in several sports. He also

showed some ability in art and music. Jen found a letter he had written

to his young cousin discouraging him from drawing pictures of fighting

and war and encouraging him to look for the beauty in the world. That

told me a lot about his character. I wish more people in the world felt

this way.

We found the cemetary somewhat accidentally looking for the way out of

town. A lot of people had left little notes and gifts on the grave. I

was reminded of that Morrissey video in which he came

here and drove a tractor or some nonsense. The whole visting someone’s

grave thing is lost on me, especially someone you have never met, but I

have done it twice today. I guess our trip has to end someway I guess

it is fitting for the last site we visit to be a grave.

Technorati Tags: camper Van, camping, cross country, Grave site, James Dean, road trip, travel

At Sun Studios I was informed that the Stax museum was already closed

at that point int the day. I was also given directions which I promptly

forgot. I decided I had to try anyway since I am a huge fan of Stax

artists like Steve Cropper, Sam and Dave, Otis Redding, Al Green, etc,

etc.

After a bit of driving around I finally found it. I was really

surprised to find sucha big and recently built museum. It looks really

fantastic even though it is is a pretty rough neighborhood. Memphis had

some ghettos that make Detroit look good.

It really looks like a nice place. I was dissapointed we missed it. I

guess everyone gets out of there before the sun goes down. I should

have planned our visit out. I will have to come back another time.

Technorati Tags: camper Van, camping, cross country, memphis, road trip, soul music, stax records, travel

After the Graceland tour we looked for the Stax Records museum but got

lost and decided to go to Sun first since I knew where that was. This

is a shot of me standing inside the studio next to a giant photo of the

Million Dollar Quartet.

The tour included audio clips that told the story of the studio and the

groundbreaking music recorded there. It was pretty moving to hear the

records in the place they were recorded. Even though I consider myself

a big fan I learned a thing or two on the tour.

Apparently this is the drum kit that U2 used when they recorded there. Fascinating.

Technorati Tags: camper Van, camping, cross country, elvis, johnny cash, memphis, Million Dollar Quartet, road trip, rock & roll music, sun studios, travel

We went to Graceland and took the platinum tour. I didn’t get very good photos because they do not allow flash photography.

This is Elvis’white living room.

This is my favorite The Jungle Room. During the tour a set of headphones gave us information about the King’s life.

More jungle room. Jen liked the green shag carpet. I think it was on the ceiling as well.

Here is a shot of a monkey on the coffee table in the TV room. The TV

room had three TVs in the wall because he heard the president watched

all three nightly news broadcasts each night. It was yellow and dark

blue with a lot of mirror panels.

I guess this crazy fur bed was in his dressing or was it undressing

room. I could only think how hard it would be to clean this thing. It

had a stereo built in and I think more mirrors.

Some of his weapons were on display including his turquoise handled Colt 45.

His Karate outfit was also on display and a video told us about his

respect for the artform as well as his pursuit of other aggressive

sports.

This piano is in his racquetball house. The tour told us he played here for a few friends on the morning of the day he died.

Here I am standing by his grave. I actually got a little choked up

during this tour. I always liked Elvis but wasn’t sure if I was a real

fan or sort of kidding.

After the tour of the house we saw a collection of some of his cars.

For some reason they had a Nascar and a funnycar on display here too. I

guess Elvis might like Nascar if he was alive. I can tell you I don’t.

This is the car most people associate with Elvis, the Pink Cadillac. He called it his mother’s car although she never drove.

This car was once owned by Elvis. I guess he only owned it a short

time. A fan eventually bought it and was restoring it at great expense

to give to him as a gift but he died before it was completed.

This car was never owned by The King. It was however once used as a salad bar.

Here I am below the tail of his jet named Lisa Marie.

The bathroom of the jet had a gold plated sink.

Jen and I enjoying some peanut butter and banana sandwiches. We had a

harder time finding a place that made these than I thought we would.

Technorati Tags: camper Van, camping, cross country, elvis, graceland, johnny cash, memphis, Million Dollar Quartet, road trip, rock & roll music, travel

thought this should be a stop on our tour. Like a lot of the places we

have been it was different than I imagined. It was pretty

commercialized as I imagined but had fewer attractions than I thought

it would. I thought it would be more of a Branson,MO for blues music.

Although I have never been to Branson. It was ironic that all we saw was

tons of white folks in an area that was famous for black

music. Everywhere else we looked they were pretty hard to find.

We ate ribs at the Blues City Cafe. They were pretty good.

Here is a shot of the cook and part of the dining room.

Later we watched Dr Feelgood something or other. He was good but it

made me sad to watch him play for tourists who didn’t know anything

about the blues.

Jen and I laughed and laughed about this guys car. The Praying for You

Haterz looked ridiculous to us. The car was also taxi cab yellow with

22″ chrome rims.

We also thought this street name was funny. It seems we are 12 years old.

Technorati Tags: barbeque, bealle street, blues, camper Van, camping, cross country, elvis, graceland, johnny cash, memphis, Million Dollar Quartet, ribs, road trip, rock & roll music, travel

On the way out of Amarillo we went to the Cadillac Ranch.

It was pretty far off the road and we were surprised to see it was unsupervised and had no gift shop.

People paint there name and whatever on the Cadillacs then someone

paints over the whole thing and the process starts again. We found a

couple cans of paint that where not empty. It was super windy so we had

a hard time leaving our mark.

This was the best I could do. See the heart and BH?

Me giving up. I also painted some anti Bush stuff, which I thought

would be fun since we were in Texas, but I only had blue left and it

got lost in all the other stuff. We did get to redraw a peace symbol

that some a-hole had crossed out.

Here jen proves she is a super tagger.

Based on this pose I apparently thought I was trying out for some sort of musical.

Technorati Tags: cadillac ranch, camper Van, camping, cross country, pink cadillac, road trip, texas, travel