Sara and I are celebrating our 10th anniversary by spending five days and four nights at the Valentin Imperial Maya at Playa Del Carmen. We’re beyond excited!

I first heard about Hamilton Pool last year. With moving into our house and 5 longs months of unpacking, we never got out to any Texas swimming holes. But today was the perfect day. We had nothing planned and it was HOT! Perfect! Hamilton Pool is only 45-60 minutes from the house. After an $8.00 entry fee and a 1/4 mile hike down to the actual pool, you’re at one of the coolest places I’ve seen in Texas.

Supposedly the pool and grotto was formed over a thousand years ago when the dome of an underground river collapsed. The result is a beautifully secluded pool with a 45 foot waterfall feeding the pool. On our visit today, the waterfall was more of a trickle. The preserve only has parking for 75 cars (we had to wait 15 minutes for a parking spot today). It’s a good thing the lot doesn’t park more as the pool was busy with people. It wasn’t uncomfortable, but it was plenty full.

This was Titus’ real first time swimming this summer. He did really well. We were in the water for about an hour. The water was cold, so he clung tight to me for the first ten minutes or so. Later he got in his inter tube (reluctantly at first) and we floated out to the middle of the pool. Last of all we tried on his new life jacket. He wasn’t as wild about the life jacket or being in the water without something to hang on.

We had a lot of fun splashing each other, spinning around, throwing him up in the air and dunking him (just kidding, there was no dunking today). Overall, it was a beautiful day in a perfect location and everyone had a blast. Sara and I kept remarking how it really felt like we were in some far-off and tropical get-away while only being 45 minutes from home. Yeah, we love where we live.

I love movies. Love them. One of my favorite things to do is watch movies. For the last decade, just about the only place to rent movies has been Blockbuster.

Well, about 8-9 years ago they changed their return policy. Remember, they changed the return from Midnight to noon the next day. They claimed it was to give me another 12 hours of movie enjoyment, but I was on to their scheme. I’d never had a late fee before. With this new policy, I was always late. I remember talking to a clerk and said, “you guys must be raking it in with the late fees.” The clerk said, “no, by having a noon return time, people can drop off their videos on the way to work.”

I wasn’t buying it. I talked to a friend who worked at Blockbuster. He said that “everyone” was late with the new policy. Blockbuster eventually got sued for this among other things.

It was at this time I moved to Texas. I was done with Blockbuster. I had some friends come visit us and they wanted some movies, so we got 3 or 4 to watch. We paid almost $20. Yeah, I was done with them. However, something happened.

Blockbuster launched “Blockbuster Online.” For $20 a month, I could get 3 movies at a time through the mail. Yeah, I had to give this a try. I knew Netflix was doing this too, but Blockbuster gave me 2 coupons a month for in-store rentals. It was a no-brainer. I did this for almost 4 years. In order to make an even bigger impact on their market share, they released their “Total Access” plan. This was where I could return my “mail-in” DVD’s to the store for an exchange for an “in-store” DVD. As soon as I turned in my “mail-in” DVD to the store they shipped my next movie from my que. It was amazing. I actually had way more movies than I had time to watch. I think I actually got to the point that I had seen every movie I cared to see. My que was filled with documentaries and such.

Then they changed their policy, something they are so good at. No more monthly coupons and I could only return my “mail-in” DVDs for an “in-store” DVD 2 times a month. Oh, and the price had gone up, again. I moved to Georgia where they don’t have a Blockbuster, (they couldn’t compete with the other video stores in town) so I canceled my membership and switched to Netflix.

So here’s the deal. I use Netflix and I pay $10 a month for 1 movie at a time. I’m probably going to increase this to 2 movies at time soon. I also use Red Box. I pay $1 for a movie a night. So, going into Blockbuster and paying almost $5 for a movie that’s been out for almost 2 years is infuriating.

Okay, I know that was a totally silly post and no one probably cares, but I just felt like writing it.

Just do everythign it tell you to. If you’re runing a computer built in the last 8 years, you probably have flash… you just need to update it.

Glad to help.

We had a big change in our marriage recently. Kenny learned to share. Well, that’s not really a fair statement. He’s always shared many things with me. However, he never shared the camera.

Please remember, we got married when I was very young. I did not have my own camera growing up, and I was always content for Kenny to photojournal our life. A few years ago he asked me to take his picture on vacation, and I had to ask a million questions about it.

“Don’t you know how to use a camera?” he asked.

“Um. Kenny. No.” I replied. “You’re kind of a camera hog.”

“Guilty as charged,” he admitted.

Well, Dixie Gypsy has changed that. I want my own pictures now. And since I now have control of the camera at times, and since I need practice learning to take pics, we’re starting to collect a million new pics of Titus.

SO the LONG WAIT for all you Titus fans is over. Here are some new pics. Enjoy!

Titus and his new truck.

Working on a smile…

Aah…there it is.

Prepping for his future GQ spread.

Fun at the pool.

“This is the life.”

My personal favorite.

Happy birthday Titus!