Moose, Bears, Snowmobiles, Deer

Here is your weekly riddle: What do the four things in the title have in common?

Answer: The are all things we were warned may be crossing the street in Vermont. Interestingly, the lion's share of the roadkill in Vermont was actually birds (with snowmobiles a close second).

Our weekly adventure took us to New England's Texas. We have grown quite fond of living in the quiet corner of Connecticut, but Vermont was a league of its own. Here, for example, is a typical view as you drive through Montpelier (which only takes about a minute and a half):

I have it on good authority (i.e. it best suits my comedic purposes) that this is the tallest building in all of Vermont.*

Fortunately, the relative lack of things to look at opened the door to a wonderful two hour nap.

You'd be surprised how many pictures of my arm I took before we finally got a decent one of Toph.

At this point you may be wondering what we were doing in Vermont.

Does this answer your question?

We all had a great time camping, despite a rude awakening by a car horn at 7:00 in the morning.

This was obviously before the horn, else there would be a lot fewer smiles and a lot more questioning of what on earth was going on in my life.

We came to the conclusion in the process of the trip that the draw of camping for us is not the great outdoors, communing with nature, or any of that stuff.

It's the food.

While in Vermont, we availed ourselves of the opportunity to visit the birthplace of Joseph Smith.

Here is a link to give anyone unfamiliar with Joseph Smith an idea of why this was a special experience for us.

Topher, too, seemed pretty awestruck.

In less spiritually fulfilling news, we also paid a visit to the Ben & Jerry's factory. The tour we took was neat and we liked the ice cream, but things took a turn for the weird when the staff announced a "Frozen T-Shirt Contest." The contest consisted of five contestants trying to thaw T-Shirts that had been soaked, balled up, and left in a freezer for several days.

For a good idea of the experience, stare at this image for 15 minutes. That's about the extent of the action.

After 3 contestants left because it was taking too darn long, the dude sacrificed the win to give his thawed shirt to the girl so she could win. This picture makes it look like he is now hitting on her (which would be weird because she looked like she was 16), but the staff is actually leading them in a cheer.

"Ice Cream?!" "Get your head in the game!"**

And last, but not least, the "Flavor Graveyard" gives us our weekly Obscure-Joke-That-Probably-Only-Scott-Thinks-Is-Funny:

Now with more 20% more Syphilis!

So that's Vermont.

And because this post is coming in a day late, here is a cute video on the house:

My favorite thing about Topher walking these days is that he looks like Danny Devito as the Penguin as he does it.

* Interestingly, in reality the tallest building in Vermont is actually a battle monument built in 1891. I don't think this lessens the impact of my previous joke.

**That's two posts in a row with a High School Musical reference. Good thing I'm already married.