"On the road again. I just can't wait to get on the road again...."

Well, the Daily Yak hasn't quite been "daily" the past few days. My apologies.

The Yak clan (is that the proper term for a group of yaks?)* left our humble home this past weekend for some adventures of the traveling sort. We packed the kids into the minivan and headed off down the road.

The end of the first day of our little vacation** found us making a brief, 24-hour, rest stop at Nana and Grandpa Yak's home. DD3 and DS2 had been looking forward to the visit, anticipating the fun of having some feline playmates. I'm sure my parents' cats had a slightly different outlook on the situation as they were chased around the house by a couple of excited little kids. Being a cat-lover, I made sure they (the cats) weren't terrorized too much. Grandpa remarked that one of the cats, a rather rotund fellow, could probably use the exercise.

The following day we continued our journey, arriving at our final destination after a total of 17 hours on the road. The trek took us through 7 states and 2 time zones (I should've left my watch on Standard Time instead of "springing forward" a few days ago).

So, now we're here at DW?'s parents' place (that would be Grandma and Grandpa Yak-in-Law?). We've caught up on our sleep (we drove through the night) and the kids have been busy chasing Grandma and Grandpa around like the did the cats a few days ago. We've also been, unexpectedly, joined by Thumper. We're all here to help the family matriarch ring in her 60th year, tomorrow. We have balloons, presents, cake and ice cream (and screaming kids... what's a birthday party without screaming kids?) awaiting the festivities.


*Update: As far as I can tell, it looks, disappointingly, like a group of yaks is simply called a herd. Damn.

**Now, if you're a parent (particularly a stay-at-home parent) of small kids, is it ever really a vacation when you travel with the kids? You can pretty much forget your normal routine with the kids, a favorite toy is invariably left behind, the kids don't like sleeping in a strange place, etc. I think it's more work than if you just stayed home. Not that I would want to stay home, mind you. Just that it's not quite what I envisioned as a vacation before I had kids (ie, kicking back on a beach, a nice cool tropical drink in one hand and a good book in the other. Oh, and of course my wife laying there next to me!).