Thursday, August 7, 2008

Phone Goodness

I really enjoy my phone. It’s not a Blackberry, but it’s close enough for me. I’ve had my LG Rumor for about 3 months now and find it can do just about everything I want it to. It doesn’t have push email but I don’t get that much important stuff that I need to know immediately when I get a message. The keyboard is great for sending messages and texts (although I’m still not very fast at it because my thumbs are big). I can access Facebook from it and can send Twitter messages and receive Twitter direct messages (that’s all I want at this point). I downloaded the Gmail and Google Maps apps and they work really well. It can play music and videos and takes decent pictures and accepts a micro-SD card for added space. It’s a “smart phone” without being a “smartphone” (which would cost more each month).

I wish it could upload pictures to Facebook or let me send them via email, but I think that is more of a Sprint thing than a phone thing.

I also got an Invisible Shield to protect the screen. VERY worth the investment in my mind.

I don’t know why I wanted to post this. I guess just to say I appreciate the constant advances in phones.

Summer Vacation

Gregg has been bugging me (as friends will do) to post about my own Michigan summer vacation adventure since we went to one of the same places he did. We also went to Mackinac Island but were able to spend more time than Gregg’s family did. It is an annual trip for us (8 of the last 9 years) but this year was different because my Mom and my sister and her family were there with us.

We went up on Sunday and stayed a night in Mackinaw City. That would let us decompress from the trip and the kids could swim in the hotel pool. Plus it would get us over to the island earlier and in a less stressed state. We took Shepler’s over because they tag the bags and send them directly to our hotel: The Island House. We’ve found Shepler’s to be the easiest for us to deal with (but the Arnold jet-powered catamarans are pretty cool), and we love the bed and breakfast package at the Island House (they have a really good breakfast buffet).

Since we’ve been there so often, we definitely have a routine. We brought lunches for everyone and ate in Lafayette Park (at the base of the Fort), then the kids played on the small playground that is there. We got three adult bikes (we brought the other six bikes with us) and started around the island for the first time. Our daughter just learned how to ride on two wheels and she was excited to be riding around on her own. We all rode around the island 5 times while we were there and she made it between 2 and 3 miles on her own each time – pretty good for a 5 year old! Then I got to pull her using the Trail-Gator (and answer the usual dozen questions about “where did you get that?”).

We have a spot we stop about halfway around the island so we can rest and stretch. And skip stones. Find a flat, round stone of reasonable weight, snap your wrist and see how many times it skips. Tuesday was probably the best day because the water was so calm. I think I hit 15 skips with one stone. Wednesday was fun too because it was really wavy, so we tried to skip from one wave to the next.

Dinner one night is at the Ice House, the casual restaurant at the back of the Island House. It is good food and reasonably priced – plus it is out of the way so is not very busy. The second night, we go to 3 Bros. Sarducci for deep dish pizza. Really good stuff! Then, of course, there is fudge!

We didn’t go up to Arch Rock this year. We just didn’t all feel like climbing the hills. But I took our daughter through Fort Mackinac for the first time. I hadn’t been in MANY years, so it was interesting to me too. The kids even participated in a bit of a marching drill. Pretty funny watching everyone try to keep up.

We have a good time every year we go up. Gregg will attest than I have lots of information to share about Mackinac. I’m glad to share if you want to take a trip yourself.