Events of Monday, November 1, 2010

          We awoke this morning in a warm, relatively clean hotel room. This Day’s Inn is not as nice as the hotel we enjoyed outside of Boston, but we did manage to get a suite with a separate bedroom for Jim and me. Ah, privacy. We enjoyed an especially quiet morning. Especially quiet as the door to the kids’ suite had gotten locked, which Jim discovered when he went to wake them. They didn’t respond to knocking on the door so we used our cell phone to call the room phone, but I guess the phone in their room didn’t ring. So Jim is pounding on the door when he hears them telling one another to be quiet and ends up needing to raise his voice so that they know it is time to get up. Finally, one of them opens the door. What sleepyheads we have‼

          We dressed quickly and headed down to breakfast. This breakfast was substantial, but high in sugary cereals and processed foods, therefore not quite as enjoyable as our last hotel stop. Then it was upstairs for haircuts for the boys, and showers all around. During the first shower a problem was noted – the tub failed to drain. So it was pretty disgusting. The tub was not clean, even before haircuts and others’ showers. YUCK‼ After everyone was ready, we packed up the room and headed off for New Haven, Connecticut to tour Yale University. While Jim and I chatted about our plans for the next few days, the kids updated their photos in anticipation of the “great monthly photo post”. In this monthly event, Jim selects which photos best represent what we have done and seen over the past month. It is truly an honor to have your photo selected as the representative on the web page. It’s too bad none of our fabulous viewers can tell who took which picture!

          We arrived in New Haven around lunch time. After locating Yale, we went in search of a spot for lunch. Finally we found a two-hour parking spot. We popped out the slide out and had lunch. Then we discussed what we wanted to see in Hartford and had our family devotionals time. Then it was off to find parking near the Yale Visitor Center. Jim artfully negotiated one-way streets, crazy drivers and construction zones to find us a nice metered parking spot in front of Yale’s Student Health Services. It was a brisk walk – due to the pace and the cold – to the Visitor Center, but we were just in time for our tour.

          Cassie, a senior, led us through the maze of buildings that make up Yale University. Sharing stories of its history and the history of New Haven, she kept us entertained by her stories of the men behind the statues on the inner quad. The architecture of the buildings was eclectic at best, a combination of Gothic architecture and New American Revival – whatever that is. One of the architects never felt his buildings looked old enough. To solve that problem on what was then the tallest granite tower in the country, he had his workers pour acid from the roof down the walls. Problem was that after a few years this “ageing” process actually worked, the building started to crumble and had to be redone and reinforced. On another building after the slate roof tiles were installed he again decided that they looked too new. So he had is workers remove them and bury them in different parts and at different depths of the Long Island Sound. Thus the different pHs caused the tiles to change color. Then the tiles were dug up and reinstalled. Still not satisfied, the architect had his workers throw rocks at them until they were chipped in random places. He also had his workers take perfectly good, new window panes and break them and then re-solder them back together. The workers became so skilled at this task that they were able to deftly break the glass into three pieces and repair them leaving a “Y” (for Yale) in the glass. We also learned about the residence halls or colleges as they are each equipped with a “master” and a “dean”. These are senior faculty members, living in the dorms that are responsible for the students’ well being – the master watches over their social life while the dean advises about academics. One of the residence halls had interesting architecture as it was created without any 90° corners.

          One particularly interesting building was the Beinecke Rare Book and Manuscript Library. This building was funded by the inventors of Green Stamp Booklets and was designed to look like a giant green stamp book. However, unable to find enough green stone, they went with thin slabs of Vermont marble. These slabs are cut thin enough to let light through, but are thick enough to protect the rare books and manuscripts stored inside. Inside we were able to view the original Gutenberg Bible.

          Once our tour was complete, we returned to Harvey and headed north to Hartford, CT. The kids were excited to be back in a state that had a Costco, so we headed to one in Waterbury, on the outskirts of Hartford. First we shopped for some necessary supplies. Returning to the RV, we started watching the final episode of the Lord of the Rings – The Return of the King. After about an hour of watching, we headed back into Costco for dinner. The Italian sausages offered on the East coast complete with sautéed peppers and onions are delicious. After dinner, Jim obtained permission for us to boondock in their parking lot. We drove around in the parking lot for a bit trying to find the best place to park – level, dark and far away from traffic noise. Once settled, we pushed out the slide outs and settled in to finish the movie. It was late when we finished and we headed to bed. It was supposed to get down to 29° that night so we made sure everyone was adequately clothed and covered. Soon all was quiet and we were all asleep.