Mackenzie Elizabeth Soles

At 12:26am today, 12/24/08, little Mackenzie Elizabeth Soles was born! She's a teeny one. She weighs 4lbs 14oz. I just got back from the hospital and had to blog my new pics! This baby is already a celebrity. Kymm went with me and took a lot of pictures. She didn't budge. Just slept the whole time. So cute.

Here's Mac and her daddy.

Had to take a serious black and white.

Had to get her diaper changed. You can tell how small she is by comparing her to Rebecca's hand.

She fussed a little when she was changing but didn't really cry. She just made these cute little sounds that made me and Kymm crack up. We melted.

She's got lots of dark hair!

I am so happy that I get to be a godfather and a new uncle!

Washington D.C.

I went to Washington D.C. this weekend. Heather's friend, Sherrie, lives right on the edge of Virginia and works in D.C. She's a big lawyer and is really smart. It was her birthday so she invited Heather and myself to join in the birthday festivities. We drove down Saturday afternoon and got there a little after 1 or so. Dropped our stuff off at the apartment and got on the Metro, which is the subway in D.C. It's a lot fancier than the subway in Philly or NY. We took it right to the stop at the Smithsonian. We didn't have much time, so we could only do so much. So there was not enough time for museums or anything like that. Maybe next time I can do all that. First stop was the Washington Monument. Very cool close up. Just neat to be around.

I took a picture of the monument from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial with the reflective pond. Everytime I show this picture to someone they say, "Oh Forrest Gump!"

What I wanted to see the most was the Lincoln Memorial. Don't ask me why. It was what I wanted to see and when we got there, it was just so moving. I didn't think it would impact me the way it would.

Just seeing the statue close up just left me in awe and silence. I just stood there and I read every word and just realizing what was happening at that time.

On the right side wall was his speech he gave at the inauguration of his 2nd term. It was 3 columns and I read the whole thing. Pretty amazing.

I wanted to get closer and take another picture.

This was kind of hard to see in the picture but this is the left wall with the Gettysburg Address on it. Reading it made me think, where are the leaders like this in these days? Has our politicians sunk so low? How easy is it to forget all that these founding fathers went through and stood for, when the president is surrounded by it right in D.C.?

We went to the wall with the names of all that were lost in the Vietnam War. I felt out of respect, I shouldn't take any pictures. But it was crazy to see how many names were on there. You don't realize it until you see it first hand.

There is a new World War II Memorial in between the Washington Monument and the Lincoln Memorial. It was so big and just so great. There were two sides that said Atlantic and Pacific. Around the edges were columns that represented every state with wreaths on them.

In the middle was a huge fountain. You can see the state pillars in the background.

There was a wall filled with these gold stars and a fountain around it. There was a ranger there talking about it but there were too many people around him that we couldn't hear what he was saying. I'm assuming it is a representation for people that were lost in WWII. Like one star stands for 50 or 100 people that died.

There were quotes all around the Memorial and this one stuck out to me the most. How scary must that be to have been at Pearl Harbor.

This is the entrance to the Memorial. You can see Lincoln Memorial way in the background. These things were not that close to each other so we did a lot of walking. But it was worth it.

We were walking back to the Metro b/c we had to get back to the apartment to get ready for the night. Sherrie came to pick us up. We were waiting for her at the Washington Monument and we look off to the side. Lo and behold, there's the frickin White House. We had no idea it was right there. I zoomed in as much as I could. There was a giant Menorah (sp?) and a Christmas tree outside.

We went back at night after the party and walked around some more. None of the pictures came out b/c they were too dark. We got a closer look of the White House, which was a lot smaller than I expected. Seeing the Monument and Lincoln Memorial all lit up was really cool. There was a ton more stuff I wanted to see but it was late (almost midnight) and it was freezing outside. So we went back to the apartment. We were so exhausted today from all the walking that we didn't do anything today. We just came back home. I want to go back b/c there's so much more I want to see now. The Capitol building, Jefferson Memorial, the Museum of American History, etc. I never had any interest in history in school, but being there and seeing it all makes it that much more real. It's funny that you don't really have an interest in learning until you're old and out of school. Haha In school, I wanted nothing to do with it. Now all of a sudden I care.

And just for fun, this was my buddy this weekend, Simon. He's Sherrie's cat and he was really cool. We hung out. He was sitting in my bag when I was trying to get ready this morning. When I went for my camera, that's when he jumped out. He knew what I was doing. Haha

MuDvAyNe

Colleen and I went to see Mudvayne yesterday (Friday, 10/12) at the Electric Factory. I have seen Mudvayne many many times over the past couple years. They just released their 4th album. So they played the Factory, which is the biggest venue I've seen them headline. So that was exciting. I didn't think that many people were going to be there since I've seen them in smaller venues all the time. And when I told people I was going to see them, the response I would get was, "They're still around?" Yes people! Geez! They're more popular than ever! Haha And their last album had the song "Happy?" played on the radio a lot. Even Colleen knew that one. She was scared during the show b/c we were in the pit. But we stayed out of harm's way. She's used to shows like Fall Out Boy and Panic! At The Disco. So she's not used to the metal shows.

So we went to the pub before hand to eat a bit.

Ok so when the band first came out back in 2000, their thing was they wore war paint. Which is basically just painting your whole face and looking scary. Mostly for theatrics. They were nominated for an MTV Video Music Award and they all wore these white tuxedos and then had bullet holes in their foreheads and blood all over their faces and tuxes. It was sweet. Their 2nd cd came out and they were still doing it, but not as hardcore. Their 3rd and now 4th cds, they're just plain clothes, no makeup, let's rock out kind of vibe. So I was shocked when I saw the lead singer coming out in what could only be described as a huge Elmo costume. It was red and furry. Literally. But he totally had a red mohawk, which made me go, "Hmmmmm, I could totally do that." And he had some makeup on to reminisce on the old days. The guitar player was rocking this awesome top hat with stars on it. It was cool.

He was getting hot so he put on some overalls, which he wore as his costume for the 1st cd.

We didn't get too close but I tried to zoom in as much as possible. And as you can tell, some pics came out blurry. It's hard being in a pit with people pushing you around and you're trying to take a steady picture! Haha

We went back to the pub afterwards for some drinks. I lost my voice for a while and I sounded really weird. I was screaming during the whole show singing along. It was the best show I've seen them do. So I was very happy. And I take these pictures and post them on my blog because otherwise everyone that reads this would have no idea what a Mudvayne or even a Marilyn Manson concert would look like. I'm here to share, people. Haha

To give you a better idea since my pics were so crappy, I stole these from the internets.