The BriggsWald Vacation Diary or Are We There Yet or How Lucky are We to Have Such Great (Grand)Parents

As many of you know (because we probably invaded your home), the Los Angeles five just returned from an epic three week road trip (think National Lampoon's Vacation meets Little Miss Sunshine meets Poison Ivy (the Michael J. Fox camp one not the creepy Drew Barrymore, Lolita one) meets Easy Rider (dad on his dirt bike) meets Thelma and Louise (minus the stupid suicide ending) meets the Levitra commercial where all the baby boomers have to stop at all the rest areas to pee, totally killing their wild and crazy boomer fun) through the western half of the United States, or as the numerous billboards on highways 2 and 93 called it "God's Country." (As a side note, Washington gubernatorial candidate Dino Rossi must be pretty tight with God because his billboards always surrounded the "God's Country" billboards while Chris Gregiore billboards were generally only seen in the Devil's Playground of Seattle.) Kalin and I have been planning this trip for three years, (two years ago it was cancelled because of a surprise I like to call Jamison and last year it was cancelled because of a surprise I like to call Molly) and I was prepared for a major letdown because my anticipation of the trip had reached a disturbing, can't sleep, night before x-mas pitch over the final three weeks before we left. (I think Molly and Jamison were feeling the same way because they have not slept through the night for about 2 years now - clearly they were very excited.) To my surprise, the trip exceeded every expectation and had to be one of the best experiences of my life. (It will definitely be in my Heart Project 2008.) Of course I owe all of this to the wonderful family members we saw on the trip and their unbelievable efforts to make this such a memorable experience for me and my family. We can never thank you enough but we can post pictures so here they are. I have broken the posts up into the four mini-trips within the trip - Montana, Seattle, Portland and San Francisco.