Honestly, Abe

I had the coolest museum experience of my life on Wednesday. Mark took me to the Abraham Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum in Springfield, IL. This place was, hands down, the greatest museum ever. From the moment you walk in the door, you are greeted by the man himself, Abraham Lincoln. His family joins him in front of a giant facade of the White House. They are not cheesy actors, but very realistic-looking wax figures that Madame Tussaud would be proud of.

From there, you get to see what Lincoln's life was like as a boy in Kentucky and Indiana and as a man in Springfield. There are lots of really interesting displays and artifacts from this period, as well as a really interesting look at what Lincoln's campaign, and those of his competitors, would look like if he had access to today's modern media coverage.

After that, you get to follow the Lincolns to the White House, where interesting information about Mary Todd Lincoln greets you. In this part of the museum one finds the most interesting displays of how the creators of the exhibits combined amazing techniques using light and sound with the more traditional mural/diorama displays. You feel like you are part of the action in many cases because the saturation of your senses is pretty much complete.

For example, one of my favorite parts of the museum was the Hall of Whispers. In this part of the museum, the lighting is very strange, and you see pictures of political cartoons of Lincoln hanging on the wall. Their frames are skewed and disproportionate, to match the outrageously negative things they say about Mr. and Mrs. Lincoln. There are negative quotes on the walls, and (this is the cool part) voices of gossips can be heard whispering nasty things about the first family. I was impressed by this blatant showing of how many people found them to be detestable. From Abe's desire to help the union be preserved at the cost of slavery to the type pf dresses worn by Mary, no facet of the Lincoln's lives remains untouched.

There are many more interesting sights and sounds in this museum, but it would take pages to describe them all, and none of it can really be done justice by words alone. I really encourage everyone who can to visit this amazing museum. I know I look forward to doing so time and again.

Experiencing Illinois

For the last several days, I have been spending my days in the Land of Lincoln. That would be Illinois, for those of you not from here. I have never seen more corn in my days here than I have ever seen in the first 19 years of my life. Combined. No joke, these people loooove their corn. There are lots of beans here, too, but miles and miles of corn as far as the eye can see.

Another interesting feature of Illinois is the beautiful weather. In Texas, the general temperature this time of year is near the century mark. Here, it has been 85 just about every day. It's been pretty sweet.

Mark and I went to see Lincoln's home and Lincoln's Tomb today in Springfield. It was really neat to be able to see the place where Lincoln lived and where he was buried. At the cemetery, there was a monument including the very slab where Lincoln's body was laid. I actually touched it. Not gonna lie, that was kinda creepy.

Anyway, this vacation so far has been great! I will probably provide more details later, but who can really say?

Gold Medal Ego

I love the Olympics. I love what they stand for and the way that they bring people together on a global scale. I have a huge respect for Olympians and the amazing dedication they have to their sports. Michael Phelps recently said that all he has time to do is "eat, sleep and swim," which pretty much sums up the life of these talented athletes.

Just because one has an amazing amount of talent, however, does not qualify one to sport an ego of Olympic (sorry, had to say it) proportions. I recently read an article (from this point on, I am assuming that you clicked on the link and read the story) about a former Olympian who, well, is too full of himself for my taste. Sure, he did amazing things that definitely deserve some recognition, and yeah, I feel that things could have been handled differently, but the way that he acted is to me, inexcusable.

Being voted one of the top five Olympians of all time does not mean that you are more important than anyone else in the world. No matter how much you think that there should be a spectacular show around you, with the world watching your every move, just hoping to see your face, that is not the way things should work.

I am sorry that you were not awarded the prestige you think you deserve, and that "they did not once put [your] face on television," that you feel like you were passed over, leading you to say:

"I never got invited. You don't go to the Olympics just to say, I am going to go. Especially because of who I am."

I'm sorry that you have to be treated like a normal guy, and that you think there is a problem with that.

"I am going to sit there and watch Michael Phelps break my record anonymously? That's almost demeaning to me. It is not almost—it is."

But to be honest with you, Mr. Spitz, after reading that story, if the Olympics were my party, I wouldn't have invited you either.

Blueteeth

There was a woman climbing up the stairs. She was talking to no one that could be seen, answering questions and asking them. Describing her day to her invisible companion, she walked up three flights of stairs, paying no attention to anyone along the way. No, she wasn't crazy, just a woman talking to some unknown person (at least to those not privy to her conversation) over her Bluetooth headset.

Those headsets may be growing more popular day by day, but I have yet to run across someone using one that didn't make me think, however briefly, that they were talking to themselves. Sure, I should expect less people to be doing this, but after all, in these times you never know. I don't know that I will ever fully be prepared to walk around in a crowd of people talking to someone who isn't there about the stock market, what Jim did last night or how to get that pesky stain out of the white table cloth, but as the technology spreads, I suppose I will have to get used to it.

The Grocery Store, Revisited

A while back, I posted some photos of my grocery store photo shoot. Since that time, I have acquired a desire to turn those photos into some really sweet versions of their former selves. These are the results.