New home for Aunt Edna...Road Trip Pics

Headed up to Dallas this weekend with a Roady full of five kids, our 104-pound Lab, and my wife and I. I had to finally pull out the X-Cargo roof carrier for all the bags. First time I've put "Aunt Edna's" home on the Roady. Used it last on the '89 Custom Cruiser. It looked just fantastic up there...

My wife Misty signed up up for a 15K walk/run at Fair Park in Dallas early Saturday morning http://www.hotchocolate15k.com/dallas/ . As luck would have it, the weather went from the 70's last week to 30's and 40's in Dallas for the weekend. We had to be there are 7:30am and it was windy and 31-degrees. Miserable cold!

I wimped out. We got there and it was SO COLD I was not going subject the 3-year-old to it...or myself. Also Lily, my son's 11-year-old friend, flat refused to get out of the car. So my wife, her father, her sister, my nephew, my son's buddies Joseph and Jonathan, and my oldest son all did the event, and I took Lily and Tuck to Dennys for breakfast and then took them for a drive around Downtown Dallas. She wanted to see where JFK was shot...and I was just glad to be in the heated car! Ha!

Happily everyone finished the race by 10:30 and ALL were ready to get out of the cold. After the race we took all the kids to my sister-in-law's office on the 44th floor of the Trammell Crowe skyscraper. The kids just LOVED seeing downtown from up there. We finished the day by taking them ice-skating at the Dallas Gallaria Mall and then went and got Mongolian BBQ for dinner. All in all a great day!

On the trip home yesterday, just south of Waco, it SNOWED on us. The kids freaked out. It was not cold enough to stick, but sure felt weird to be driving the Roady in the flurries. Happily today it's in the 60's and it'll be 75 tomorrow. It's fun to visit the cold...but glad it doesn't last long!

Anyway here's a couple of quick pics. I got some more, will load them later.

Hope everyone had a great weekend!

-Mike

Roady in full-on road trip dress


Can't say my wagon doesn't get used!


This Buick ragtop is near my sister-in-law's in Red Oak Texas. Really sad, was a fust-free car but the top is shot and the tarp he had on it has shredded, so now water is getting in it. He won't sell it!


Here's me and all the kiddos after eating Fried Alligator at Buzzard Billy's in the way home in Waco.


And poor Texas children trying to figure out ice-skating. Hahahahaha






Can't say it's not fun being a Dad!!

-Mike

First and second pictures are Classics!!

31 degrees?! Wimp!!!

How did the new suspension and assisted steering do with a load in the car?

81X11 wrote:

got Mongolian BBQ for dinner.

Mongolian BBQ = Win. Always.

81X11 wrote:

it was windy and 31-degrees. Miserable cold!

I was hoping it would warm up to that temperature so I could change my radiator...

Flasheroo wrote:

How did the new suspension and assisted steering do with a load in the car?

It's 1000% better. It doesn't bottom out or scrape the driveways. Also, the roads around Fair Park on the east and southeast side of downtown Dallas are horrible. Patches, cracks, potholes, a mess, and before, with the old Monroe Severe Service shocks on the front, the car would crash all over the place when we drove in that area. With the new KYB's it was SO MUCH better.

I was VERY happy about how the car did this weekend.

Here's a pic I took just after loading up. Kids and dog are in the car and roof carrier is loaded. It doesn't sit nearly as low as it did before.



Here's some pics from downtown Dallas. This is West End....but at 8am on a Sat morning I could not find any West End Girls....


This was looking up at the parking lot of Jorge's Cafe, where we went for brunch after the race


And here's the Roady with some of downtown Dallas behind it. The 2nd building from the right is where my sister-in-law works, and we had fun taking all the kiddos up to her office on the 44th floor and looking out at downtown below us.


And off topic, but I like these....here's Lily trying to figure out skating. She's 11 and had never been ice skating before..



Fun weekend!!

-Mike

Oh and I have a gripe with GM on our newer wagons. In the old boxy wagons the rear window was part of the tailgate. so loading the cargo carrier was as easy as opening the back door and standing on the rear bumper. On our newer cars with the window attached to the roof, I had to use a step ladder from the side to load the bags.....either that or lay on the closed rear window, which I didn't want to do!

I will say this, my '93-vintage sliding roof rail worked just fine for securing the rear of the X-Cargo! Who needs tall rails??

lol, only Americans call it "ice" skating.

And, more lols at "31 degrees" being cold. My wife ran an off-road half marathon two weekends ago. It was -25 celcius.

Sorry Jay, I'm with Mike. It was 25 this morning and I was freaking out.

Definitely moved my heater core to my DOING IT THIS WEEKEND list.

.... I mowed the lawn last weekend....

And my phone is blowing up with the "severe weather warnings" the local TV stations have here. Part of the NWS (National Weather Service) alert system. Says that there will be a HARD FREEZE tonight and all pets and plants need to be brought indoors.

It'll be 25 tonight...... and 64 with rain tomorrow.







Winter SUCKS!

81X11 wrote:

On the trip home yesterday, just south of Waco, it SNOWED on us. The kids freaked out. It was not cold enough to stick, but sure felt weird to be driving the Roady in the flurries. Happily today it's in the 60's and it'll be 75 tomorrow. It's fun to visit the cold...but glad it doesn't last long!

Now thats the way winter SHOULD be. Enjoy it while its fun....then give it back when your finished

Bill

I forgot to mention the one wagon issue I did have on the trip. On the way to Dallas Friday night we stopped for dinner in Georgetown and I told the kids in the 3rd row to pop open the 1/4 windows back there for the dog.

Joseph opened the driver's side one fine, but when John popped open the passenger side one the glass broke loose of both pivot hinges. DUMB DESIGN! Poor John thought he'd broken my car and was holding onto the glass by the pivot and yelling "I'm Sorry! I'm Sorry!". Ha.

So I sent the family in to order dinner and I drove to Autozone, and in the cold and dark parking lot, scraped all the glue off and used rear-view mirror glue to re-attach the glass, and then bought some packing tape and taped the glass on for good measure.

Took the tape off in Dallas on Sat morning but have yet to try to re-open that 1/4 window. I may never open those again....

-Mike

Sounds like you guys had a great day.Love the shot of the 2 boys and your big dog sitting in
the third seat.Looks like the dog has laid claim to that seat and doesnt want to share.

Flasheroo wrote:

Sounds like you guys had a great day.Love the shot of the 2 boys and your big dog sitting in
the third seat.Looks like the dog has laid claim to that seat and doesnt want to share.

Yep Cache was laying all over both of them. Poor Joseph had on a black jacket and it got covered with Lab hair.

Speaking of which I have to get the hair-roller out and get after that rear cargo area side carpets. Thankfully I put a blanket down on the 3rd row seat and footwell so the hair was kept to a minimum! Ha!

-Mike

Hair is a big problem around here with 2 white dogs.Thinking about ordering a set of those
"Shiticky"rollers and seeing how they work out.They seem to work well enough but going to
investigate further first.Great pics as usual.
Thanks Mike

Flasheroo wrote:

Hair is a big problem around here with 2 white dogs.Thinking about ordering a set of those
"Shiticky"rollers and seeing how they work out.They seem to work well enough but going to
investigate further first.Great pics as usual.
Thanks Mike

One of those rollers is what I have. It works pretty well....a lot better than just the vaccum! Only issue is the pads don't last long before the sticky is used up.

These dont have pads.The roller is made of some type of real sticky plastic and once its full you
just rinse it off.I have the disposeable roller stickys and dont care for them.

81X11 wrote:

And here's the Roady with some of downtown Dallas behind it. The 2nd building from the right is where my sister-in-law works, and we had fun taking all the kiddos up to her office on the 44th floor and looking out at downtown below us.

What, no photo of the Roady from the 44th floor? What a rip off!

That's a fine looking brood you have there with you, sir! It's what I expect Bewber's tribe to look like in a few more years.

Olds Weighty Eight wrote:

81X11 wrote:

And here's the Roady with some of downtown Dallas behind it. The 2nd building from the right is where my sister-in-law works, and we had fun taking all the kiddos up to her office on the 44th floor and looking out at downtown below us.

What, no photo of the Roady from the 44th floor? What a rip off!

Left the camera in the car....dumb I know. Was fun going up though that building though. That Trammel Crow office building has a basement parking garage that goes down 6-stories underground. That's quite a trick considering how high the water table is in most of Texas and how HARD the ground is. Plus it had about the fastest elevators I've ever ridden in. We went from floor level to 44 in the time it takes me to go from floor 1 to 3 at my office. My ears popped! Ha!