Olympic Influence

Talia and Fernando watching the games together
Though the Olympics are gone, our family has noticed several residual influences. Our DVR allowed us to record and fast forward hours of events in order to capture the unique and entertaining. Some favorites are: Race Walking with its swaying hips and incredible heal toe action, Rhythmic Gymnastics showing us all that hula hoops and ropes can be graceful appendages, Synchronized Swimming ok actually synchronized anything to name a few. Martin Short clip is funny but the "I know You" part doesn't compare to the flips and lights coming from the real deal.

Some fun family moments:

To feel more apart of the host country, we went to Panda Express. Nothing says China like Americanized gooey "Chinese Food".

We held our own mini Rhythmic Gymnastics with a children's lawnmower and inflatable sprinkler ball. You can judge for yourself the quality of performance. (Tiago is singing Life is a Highway from Disney's the Car Movie and Mia is making up something fun like she often does.)

Caverns

With an ad boasting temperatures of 68 degrees year round family fun minutes from San Antonio, one wonders why we took so long to get to the Caverns. The ad was misleading in several ways. The temperature was 68 but living caves are loaded with water and its natural offspring of humidity. No bother, it still was refreshing to be out of the sun and active.
Family fun? Well, Fernando and I really enjoyed learning about the intricacies of living caves like the fact that constant dripping water helps the cave to grow with minerals and such. Or the water in the cave is fairly clean dripping from the rocks and well all took a risky sip. The kids on the other hand were bored and were confused why we drove and waited almost an hour for our tour of a cave. Talia was equally unimpressed and slept most of the time.

I only now realize the frustration of my parents when they dragged us off to some "exciting" place and we didn't even try to enjoy it. I guess frustration isn't the word. The feeling is one of "next time we'll just pull out the hose and run around the backyard for good, cheap fun". I also want to point out that our new high school graduate tour guide was sporting the latest fashion and was apparent every time she bent over which felt excessive. Whomever decided that thongs should be visible any other place besides one's feet was mistaken. Even the one young and single guy turning away in disgust.
Complaints aside, I am glad we went. This earth is too amazing to miss. Besides, how often can you see a waterfall underground?