Itakuwa Safari Njema

We're all here, me, The Bob, LP, Eli and Garlando Magic Parsley. My whole family, together in Africa.

Photo taken in Galveston, Tx., two weeks ago. I was not in Texas two weeks ago. Brings to mind that really cool company NCI. (I think this should be our Christmas card next year. Christmas cards are always so boring and predictable; I want to be the family when I grow up that always does something cool/funny/creative on our cards)

That will be a departure from the norm of the past two years. I've been home a total of 10 weeks since June 2006, and the last time my dad used visiting me as an excuse to travel for an exotic and distant land (Turkey), Elizabeth didn't join them. So I'm pumped. We're doing a safari in northern TZ -- Tarangire, Ngorongoro, Manyara and the Serengeti -- and I'll be chilling for a week.

Of course, The Bob got geared up like a mother for the trip. I go to the airport to pick him up tonight, and the man's got on a brand new pair of Chaco's. "It's official," I said, as I looked down at the black socks he wore underneath them, "I'm never wearing Chaco's again." It was a good run: from the summer after high school, 2002, until now. Sandals aren't it though. He got the hat, the dry fit gear, the pants that zip into shorts, the shirts with excessive amounts of pockets and ventilation systems ... and that's not even counting the purchases he's alleged to have made from SkyMall. Garland, who sat next to him on the flights to Amsterdam and then Kilimanjaro, said he was having a ball using his new "neck pillow," a device from the future that you inflate, wrap around your neck like a brace, and then just doze off without having to lean against anything.

What is it about safari's that make people want to go and buy REI? I mean, you're just sitting, in a car, looking at animals. You're sitting. For like five days. On your ass. You don't need to buy anything for the wilderness; you're just in a car. There is no trekking. No mountaineering. You're having all your meals cooked for you and sleeping in "tents" that are actually canvas houses. For Christ's sake, I've heard they put down table cloths when you eat outside! I've never been on a safari, so I can't say yet, but my prediction is that all the super high tech, dry fit, this-cloth-is-so-sweat-absorbent-you-won't-even-think-you-ever-actually-sweated gear will have been rendered superfluous.

Honestly, I could care less about the safari (we'll see if I'm saying that if my one hope gets fulfilled: that I witness at least one act from the circle of life, like sex, or death, or child birth). I'm just happy to be with all my family. Honestly.

(But I'd be lying if I said I wasn't excited about being able to show off my Swahili.)

Itakuwa safari njema sana, Mungu akipenda.