Moscow in September

We had a lovely ad-hoc northern Idaho experience this last weekend. Always eager to leverage work holidays into what feel like vacations. This fit the model nicely. We visited my brother Dan, his wife Angie and there new dog Mona. It was a blast! The drive was not nearly as long as it was... maybe that makes sense. Between "Stuff You Should Know" podcasts and trying to guess what the scenery was like (at 3 am) I kept pretty aware and things zipped along. The kids did pretty darn good too.

Moscow (thats Mosc-oh, not Mosc-ow... I mention this only because it was funny when we told people here we were going to Moscow they all corrected our pronunciation). Apparently there are no "cows" in Moscow so... go figure.

Anyway Moscow is a lovely town in the middle of the Palouse region of Washington/Idaho, a bizarre hill country formation with top-soil hundreds of feet deep in some places. The University of Idaho in Moscow and Washington State in Pullman are only a few miles from one another so we enjoyed seeing both campuses and a bit of what Dan (my brother) is up to.

We mostly enjoyed some laid back time (largely dictated by 8 month old napping schedules). We watched some funny TV, ate some good food, and played Dan's published card game (Nile). We also enjoyed some outside time with a visit to the Saturday market, to a great park in Pullman and a REALLY GREAT bike ride along the Palouse to Pines trail. It was so much fun. We busted out the bike trailer for the kids and they just loved it!

Before we left on Tuesday I was able to co-host Dan's radio show for the campus radio station. It was such a blast! We had a great time trying to peg, introduce and play our top-ten song list. I wish I could do that every week (but I am sure Dan would get sick of me quickly).

All said it was a great time in the northeastern northwest. Thanks Dangie for enduring the spit-up/crying of our kids, and barking and growling of our dog (to say nothing of Annie and I's corks). Hope to get back sometime soon.