Enter Philip (thankfully not pursued by a bear)

A nice family day, and a nice day entirely.

For one thing, it was in the sixties and sunny in Baltimore. Two years ago, it was snowing when we arrived, so this was a major improvement. It really looks like fall has barely arrived, and it feels like spring.

We slept in until we discovered how unsoundproof the doors of the hotel room are, and then got some pastries for breakfast and went to see Mary Mary asked for us to print out the blog for her. Mission accomplished.

I took a nice picture of Mary and Marjorie.

We went to get extra keys made for Mary's apartment and we admired the window at the Tomlinson Collection. Marjorie said that if she ever got rich, she'd just buy the whole inventory.

I took some video of the Tomlinson Collection clocks. Click on the arrow below and you can see it. It's only a couple of seconds long.

One item really caught our eye: a dragon large enough for a two-year old to use as a rocking horse. We looked at each other, and it was one of those moments when you realize your generation has just reached a different point in its history. I said, "If we only had grandchildren."

By then it was time to go pick up Phil at BWI. His plane was fifteen minutes late taking off, and fifteen minutes early landing. And he had no trouble with security at Logan. It appears that they have overstaffed for the holiday, which is making everyone's holiday experience so much better. Keep it up (yeah, like they would).

We stopped for lunch (Greek salad and cheesesteaks, Baltimore food in our parlance) and I took a shot of Marjorie and Phil under this gorgeous flaming red tree in front of Roland Park Place.

Then I figured you'd like to see their punims.

Barbara was there by the time we got there, and we left her and Mary to take a walk while we went to run some errands. We had brought some gifts for all of them and the room the gifts had taken was reserved for some toiletries we bought in Baltimore. When you're traveling light for a month, you have to take these things into account.

It was darker, but we decided before we left them to get everyone under the tree.





It's quite a tree, really.

Dinner was an assortment of cheesburgers from Tambor's, the best diner-Indian restaurant in the world. Not to be confused with our favorite pub-Indian restaurant in North London. I wish Tambor's had as nice a cauliflower dish, or a branch in Bangalore, for that matter. Barbara showed us some exhibit brochures from what is going on at the National Gallery of Art, including a Turner exhibit (saw a lot of him at the Tate) and an Edward Hopper exhibit, which got us quite excited. As we have promised to take Phil to Washington early on Saturday, I suspect we'll do the Hopper exhibit. I'll check out what's at some other museums, too. One thing for sure, I know the National Museum of American History is closed. I mean, why should our country ever show off its actual attic?

Jetlag caught up with us, and off we went.