The final day of the trip up to Portland was a bit mellower than the rest. I’m not sure if we were still recovering from our nightmares featuring dusty boots or if it was staying up late the night before but we were all moving a bit slower. We rolled over to Starbucks to grab a quick breakfast before the Burkes had to head back to Seattle. Andrew had his comic book reservation to pick up, so they went on home earlier than the rest, even though Brian tried to chase them down.

After the 45 minute goodbye and some Meerkat Manor at the Gorski’s, we went over to the park up their hill where we had our second match of Calvinball. I mean, baseball and bocce ball. Since Joe had actually played baseball before, there was at least an air of credibility in that day’s game. Joe even managed to catch a fly ball after tripping over a hill. We were in awe.

After a few more hamburgers it was time to head back to San Francisco. I’ve overused amazing so I’ll have to say that it was truly a great weekend. Thanks so much to Joe and Michelle for letting us crash at their new house which is superb and beautiful. Thanks to the Burkes and Karen for coming on down and to Alex for coming on up. Thanks to Brian and the Puhalas for picking us up and making the weekend so much fun. And thanks to Carolyn for getting this whole madness planned and for keeping it secret for so long. You win at the “best birthday giver, ever” award.