Penn's forest etc.

When I was about in 5th grade I learned about a colony of land in America that was given to William Penn by the King of England.  Penn was a Quaker who believed in religious freedom and the separation of church and state.  In his colony the Native American were treated as equals.

Penn wanted to name his colony Woodland, but it was named Penn's sylvania (or Penn's forest).

Driving across the state of Pennsylvania on route 80, it is clear that this state is indeed a woodland.  The forests are so thick that you can barely see into them, and cleared farmland is rare.  I don't know that I ever realized how many different shades of green there are.

What were we doing driving across the state again?  Well, the plan was to go to Aunt Mary's 85th birthday party, visit David in his Connecticut woodland home, visit around some.  But things didn't go as planned.  We should have known that things were starting to skew when we came upon grid locked traffic at the George Washington Bridge ...

Yes, it was raining and I should have gone to the bathroom before we got to this point, because for quite some time we were literally stuck in traffic.  No way to even get off to try to find a bathroom.  It was so bad I told John that it was the hardest thing I'd ever had to do in my life - (hold it)!  Anyway, now in retrospect, it doesn't seem as bad as it did at the time, but I've got renewed respect for driving through NYC traffic.

We never made it to Aunt Mary's party because Frank couldn't walk when he woke up on Saturday morning, and we didn't make it to David's weekend house because David had the flu, but we did have a nice walk around Glen Island Park.  I like the northern waterfronts.

John says that he once climbed this tower and got stuck half way up.  A police car came by but he was somehow able to avoid being detected up there. [Update: John tells me that he avoided detection by the cops because he was INSIDE the tower and couldn't get out!]

This is John before one of his old hangouts.  Took the photo so that he could send it to a Facebook friend who hung out there too.

Got steamers at a place that used to be called "Greasy Nick's" but now is called "Leno's".  I can't remember if they said that Jay Leno used to work there or that he bought the place.  Oompa and John having steamers after Oompa was released from the emergency room.

A lot of driving.  It was good to get back to our little cave here in Western PA.