You know, for kids

Today Luke introduced Justin and me to a very fun game, I think called "ripstick jousting". The idea is pretty simple: two kids get on ripsticks (those pseudo-skateboards that require wobbling your feet and are hard to stay on) and get whackers (Luke made these- PVC pipe with some styrofoam-type stuff on the ends) and try to knock the other kid off. Even though I was not skilled enough to even stay on the ripstick, it was very fun to watch the kids who were good enough joust.

Last weekend I went up to College Station for the first TAMU football game of the season. It was quite a disappointment. But other than the bad football, I had a pretty good time. Our graduate student friends who are from Iran came with us, and I think they had a pretty good time. They had never been to or even watched a football game before, so in addition to explaining all the A&M traditions, which is enough of a challenge, I was also trying to summarize the rules of the game. Justin and I enjoyed our personal tradition of eating overpriced football hotdogs.

This past weekend Justin came to Houston, where we did a bit of exploring.
We went to Swirl, a frozen yogurt place where you add your own toppings:

We went to Discovery Green, a new park in Houston, where we saw a Scottish Dance performance. The dancing was decent, but the real fun was seeing the park. There were remote-control mini sailboats for rent, a fountain for kids to play in, several grassy lawns, and a shaded boardwalk area with free WiFi.

We also went to Ikea to get Justin a kitchen table for his duplex (no picture). Overall it was a fun weekend.