Kristen and Cory Visit!

October was relentless in its fun. After West Virginia and California, Kristen and Cory came to visit Columbus!
They arrived late Wednesday the 29th and we spent Thursday work-from-homing together. With the workday done, we could finally take a walk around our neighborhood.

I could’ve sworn I took a picture of Cory during our walk but I guess I didn’t.

Then, to make a good Columbus impression, we went and had dinner at Bonifacio and ice cream at Graeter’s.

October 31: To continue impressing Kristen and Cory with Columbus, we took them down to Cincinnati and Kentucky for the day. First stop, Wyoming, Ohio and the Sticker Shop! And then we headed on down the road a bit more…

…to the Ark Encounter! Because when planning Kristen and Cory’s trip, it was really really hard to shake the idea that they absolutely needed to visit this amazing destination. I’m going to show you a ton of pictures. For words (and a ton of pictures), see my Ark Encounter post from 2022. (And it’s funny how similar some of my photos are between the two trips. Things caught my eye in 2022 and they caught it again in 2025!) And I trust that Kristen and Cory will make a blog post with their thoughts on their experience at the encounter. Read that. I’ll link to it, too.

After the Ark Encounter we thought we’d take Kristen and Cory to see a great Cincinnati institutions: Jungle Jim’s Grocery Store. And the trip was a treat for Liz and me, too, because turns out we went to a different Jungle Jim’s than we thought we were going to. A whole different Jungle Jim’s! Imagine that.

November 1: Ok. Saturday. This is the part of the Columbus trip where we show Kristen and Cory Columbus. We start off with Cherbourg the gluten-free bakery for Cory, then Fox in the Snow, then a walk around German Village, then a visit to Blacklick Metro Park, then lunch at Brassica in the Short North, then Jeni’s ice cream nearby.

Then that night we made soup and watched the Dodger’s win the World Series. No pictures of that stuff, but it was a lot of fun. And, sadly, the next morning I drove Kristen and Cory to the airport on my way to church because it was time for them to go home — NOT because we wanted them to go home, because we didn’t, because we had had a lot of fun having them over to show off Columbus, Kentucky, and Cincinnati.

California Getaway

A number of months ago Grandma asked me when I would next visit. Late October looked good for my calendar. So in late October, off I went to pay Grandma a visit.

October 22: I get to San Marino and off to Lupita’s we go right away! Then it’s back to Grandma’s to check on everything and take a nap (I’d been up an awful long time what with my early AM flight out of Columbus). Oh and I gave Grandma her belated birthday vest!

Upon waking…a quick visit to the CalTech turtles

And then I was off to Hollywood as my trip coincided with quite the bill at the Palladium: Whispers, Midrift, Nuovo Testamento, Big Boy, Scowl and Sunami. Wow! Nearly too much awesome music for one night. Grandma told me she had been to the Palladium to see Lawrence Welk — what a treat that there is now a permanent tribute to him there in the form of a lounge. And after the show I went and tried family-favorite Angel’s Tacos. My tacos’ poor tortillas could barely handle all the goodness piled upon them.

October 23: Up and at em and out on a real long walk to Cal Tech, Lacy Park, and back. This is the life!

And then, the day’s big activity, a visit to the Broad. It was Grandma’s first time and we were fortunate to be able to visit the Infinity Room while we were there. And after the museum? Amboy for lunch! Proud to say that the museum and the cheeseburgers were hits with Grandma!

October 24: Another San Marino morning, another walk. This time I went down to the part of Huntington Drive that I consider “downtown San Marino.” There’s not much going on there.

For my daytime activity, I went out into the city and visited places I used to like to go. Like LaBrea street, where I stood in a long line to go in the Stussy store and stood in the Stussy store for about 3 minutes. LaBrea doesn’t interest me like it used to. I drove around quite a bit, it took a long time, looking back at it, my time could have been much better used. Oh and I just have these 4 weird photos to show for it?

But my outing was worth it when I got to my late-lunch destination, Holbox! Finally, Holbox, the extremely highly rated marsico counter. That first taco, the smoked fish taco, may be my bite of the year (or at least my bite of the trip). Albacore and uni tostada very good, fish taco good, scallop taco fine. Oh and a couple Yucatan tacos from another stand while I was there for good measure. Great stuff. Live a little, be slightly adventurous, and eat at Holbox.

That night? Dinner with the Mapps at the Smoke House. They sat us in outer Egypt by the linen closet (which they kept the door open to). Basically the my-earlier-trip-to-LaBrea of Smokehouse trips. BUT Grandma and I saw a car carrier with a car on it that was on fire on the way home, that was pretty wild.

October 25: Up early! I walk all the way to Sidecar Donuts to get Liz some “I-missed-you” donuts. And also some donuts for Grandma and me. It was a nice long walk and fun to carry donuts all the way back.

Went to Smart and Final with Grandma, picked up sandwiches from Roma Market, and Grandma insisted on Hailey Bieber smoothies from Erowhon. Now that’s a twist to my trip I had not expected.

Later that afternoon I went out for gas and wound up getting a For the Win cheeseburger while I was at it. Nice. Getting to be that a smash burger is a smash burger, though.

That night I went to Grandma’s Tri-Ward Halloween Party / Trunk or Treat and I have to say that the whole undertaking was quite impressive. A nice night.

After a good long session of talking at the kitchen table (something that happened every night) and saying good night, I decided to venture out once more and try this taco arabe place I had been hearing about. I am so glad I rallied and went. It was so good.

October 26: One more morning walk.

and then … church, lunch, and off to the airport. Thanks for having me, Grandma. I’m awful glad you wanted me to come over.

West Virginia Weekend

As I was saying with my Pittsburgh post, a fun thing about the Columbus life is there’s all sorts of places that aren’t all that far away. For example, October 17 & 18 we zipped down and over to West Virginia to visit the new New River Gorge National Park. We began the trip with a night in Charleston, West Virginia. Took portraits of each other while waiting on our Indian food, had a little walk around, called it a night.

And the next morning we were up and adventuring! It turns out it was “Bridge Day”, an annual event where the bridge that spans the New River Gorge is closed to traffic and open to pedestrians (and base jumpers!) so navigating the park was a little difficult without the use of this major thoroughfare. But we had nice visits and walks rounds in a couple areas and the detour incurred by their not being bridge access lead us to spending time at an apostolic church yard sale (parking lot sale?) where we loaded up on baked goods and vintage dining room items for a song. And I had a West Virginia hot dog!

And on the way home we had milkshakes at a fine place called Nancy’s.