Hamster Dancin' Around the World

Have a great recipie for toblerone cheesecake if you want it.

I'm hoping to introduce Penny to school in Aust which doesn't start back until End Jan.

Its about time that young lady started her formal education.

Walter--



You're a possessive man.

I was just checking how long it took for Rocky to reach dadpad last year -- apparently only about 4 days??!!! (I sent him about January 12th, and he had arrived by January 16th. That's American time of course though, may have been January 17th Oz time, but still!)

I think I'll try to send Penny by next Monday, January 7th. She'll go to margo first, hopefully make it in time to go with margo to Olga, then after that...?

We went to the Franklin Park Conservatory today and had the best time. It's a really great place, and I'm glad that Penny (with a slight assist from ehBeth) got us to go.

Uploading, editing, sorting, and now uploading the chosen photos out of the 100+ that sozlet and I took (mostly sozlet) has taken way too long, so I'll just give you a sampling and then do the whole thing (with explanations etc.) tomorrow.

Outdoors:



Indoors:



Some Chihuly stuff... it was more impressive than I expected it to be:

Gorgeous glass(?) balls. That last one's impressive, though I can't decide if I actually like it.

What did Penny think?

I'd read that there was now a permanent Chihuly installation there. It looks like there are some different pieces from the ones we saw.

It's a great space at the Conservatory. I'm glad Penny was able to get out to see it.

Aww! You did do a lot with her, didn't you? The whole time Mr Cypher and I had her, we kept joking about how we couldn't show her nearly as good a time as you did... Or if we went out somewhere and didn't bring her, one of us would always say, "Walter wouldn't have left her at home!"

Joeblow, I think Penny was a little scared of it! She didn't want to pose with it anyway. The plant at the base is enormous so it's hard to get a sense of scale -- it's a really big sculpture, maybe 30 feet high? And more towards venus flytrap, if a plant at all -- all those voracious tentacles seeking... something.

It was really cool to get glimpses of it here and there, though as we made our way around. Really stood out against all of that lush greenery.

We loved that section, "Orchid Forest" or something -- warm and steamy and fragrant and a welcome change from the cold. Our favorite part of it was the koi pond. The fish were very friendly, and came up to say hello and to listen to Penny's tales of her travels so far:





More shots of the glass spheres -- really liked 'em:




(note the fishie game of chase in this picture -- those two had a lot of fun)


(that one by sozlet, she's proud of it)

We could see this bamboo forest out of the window but we weren't able to GET there -- evidently it closed about when we arrived.



Penny thought the oranges looked delicious -- we figured they wouldn't miss just one:



Chihuly glass ceiling -- Penny was less scared of it than the big orange tentacly thing:



This one was a bit worrisome but the colors weren't as scary:



People just love Penny, don't they? Lots of people asked about her. The Conservatory has this thing with landmarks from around the world, like the Taj Mahal:



And "passports" to stamp when you see each one. So we found that when we told people that Penny was going around the world they'd assume we meant "around the world," Conservatory-style. Sozlet figured out that the way to make the point was to say "no, REALLY around the world -- she's going to Australia next!" Then they got it. (And seemed to think it's really cool!)

When we set up Penny for this picture...



... some guy with a fancy camera grinned and swooped in to take a quick pic, himself.

The "tree" is made out of poinsettias. All of the holiday decorations were still up, really beautiful.

Here's the Franklin Conservatory from the outside:


We'll be back!

Wow! Great pictures!

Wow!

I love glass - I need to get to that place.

How do you think Penny will manage with the extremes of temperature.

It's stinking hot and humid here.

So...where is Penny now?

We haven't heard anything in at least two weeks. <fret>

Well, I'm glad I did all of those "no rush, this is the laid-back, no-deadline tour" reassurances when other people had Penny... :-)

She's still here, with plans to ship out today. Things have been especially busy/ crazy and sozlet wanted to take her a few more places. We didn't have time to do that, and now it's getting late. Need to write in the journal and package her up and send her off to margo (I have her address).

Murray the platypus is so excited. He cant wait for Penny to get here.

Penny unfortunately missed the trip to Melbourne and the Australian Open tennis.

We saw some unbelievable matches.

Looks like she'll miss Australia Day on Sydney Harbour as well. Things get pretty tame around here after that

OK, she's off!

The P.O. thought there was a chance she'd get there by Friday. Not a big chance, but a chance. Australia is interesting no matter what, though!

Sorry for the delay. Sozlet was REALLY happy to see Penny and not very happy to see her go. She kept wanting to do one more thing, have one more day... I eventually said, "You know, we don't have to send her on her adventures again... we can just keep her here, and that would be OK," and then she (sozlet) decided that she didn't want to keep Penny from her adventures, and that she DID love seeing new pictures and reading new stories. So she was brave and gave Penny lots of hugs and sent her on her way. (There were even some tears!)

I don't remember if I ever commented on the journal entries so far, they were SO COOL! We loved the sketches (Dasha) and cicada wings (JPB) and the seaweed (cyphercat) and absolutely all of the descriptions, and even just seeing everyone's handwriting! You all did such a great job with that, too -- we know that the reports here on A2K were great but the journal stuff is really fabulous too. Thanks!

Boy can I understand that feeling! I know exactly what thats like.

So, is Penny enjoying Australia Day in the box?

(A happy day, btw!)

Well, she's somewhere between there and here. I hope she's enjoying it.

Me - well - it's Australia Day and I'm about to get our amongst it! See ya!

It takes some time ... The P.O. thought there was a chance she'd get there by Friday. Not a big chance, but a chance. ... but it's only Wednesday today :wink:

Well - it's now Thursday - and still no sign of her.

I guess they didn't specify which Friday. There's usually one a week. (Sometimes I'm not too sure!)