Family Reunion results
July 23rd 2009 10:18 pm
I mentioned last entry that I would come back with photos. I also mentioned I had suffered a flat tire. I converted 9 photos that didn’t disclose tons of personally identifiable information and put them up, and in case you’re not in the mood for looking at photos I even added a “Read More” thingy for what I think is the first time ever…
Anyways, after replacing the flat tire, we were on our way again. Our route took us from the lowcountry of coastal Carolina across the Appalachian Mountains. Although not horribly impressive as far as mountain ranges go it was still pretty cool. You really started to notice it in North Carolina, but we were in Virginia by the time we started snapping photos:
Turned out we had a second tire burst on the way, the tire on the opposite side of the car as the first, both in the front. Really, extremely annoying. I even took a picture that time:
This time there was a visible hole in the sidewall, but nothing that would indicate what had caused it to have a hole. These tires are almost literally no-name (only a model number is visible on the side). The Goodyear Eagles they were replaced with were not horribly expensive at all so I’ll probably stay away from el-cheapo tires from now on.
Once we made it to our destination 700 miles from home (1127 km for you who don’t have KRunner available to convert…) we found things much more enjoyable:
There’s still a lighthouse at one of the gardens (not sure when it was added, I know it wasn’t there when I was younger):
The children got along fabulously, especially after that nice long car ride:
Emma is on the left, with one of her second cousins:
Ian in particular had a lot of fun. He jumped out of bed at 7:00 am on the day of the reunion and basically was running around keeping all of the adults busy until after dark. It was worth it though — it was unseasonably cold so after his bath he was shivering. I wrapped him in a blanket and sat down and you could actually watch him zonk out. It’s never been easier to get him to bed (and likely won’t be in the future either. :-/).
It was especially refreshing to see Ian having so much fun. Although I don’t think I’ve mentioned it on my blog before, he is autistic. Autism, as best I understand it, is not a simple “mental disease” but an entire range of different afflictions. Many computer-geeky types of probably heard of Asperger’s Syndrome, which is on the spectrum. Less neurotypical is high-functioning autism, then autism, and etc. We’re not exactly sure where Ian will end up on the spectrum. Right now he’s classified with PDD-NOS (Pervasive Developmental Disorders – Not Otherwise Specified) Obviously I’m hoping it will be a “mild” form but it’s hard to tell at this point.
What I do know is I’ll be doing my best to take care of him and help him figure out life as best as he knows how. He’s incredibly brilliant even at a young age, I just hope he can use some of those extra smarts to help him navigate what I can only assume is a very disorienting world…
afiestas on 
mandarin on 
You really should avoid cheap tires indeed, but not because you risk running flat, like you did, but because both the handling and braking distance sucks compared to quality tires, and as you noted, the price difference is really not that big.
The link below is from the British magasine, Autocar, where they have a rather thorough test between a big brand european tire (continental, which they note in the test is probably not the best quality tire out there) against 4 cheap asian import tires, the difference in quality is scary. Yes, this is europe centric, but i bet the same applies in the US, though the names will be different.
http://www.conti-online.com/generator/www/de/en/continental/automobile/themes/news/download/dl_artikel_pdf_en.pdf
Nice story, good luck for you and your family in your new home.
Hey, nice of you to talk about your son, My syster as deep Autism from the pictures I would say Asperger’s, belive me Asperger is very very nice. Best of luck and be brave.
If you want to talk about it im allwyas online as you know, my syster is now 24 years old so I have do know my share about autism.
Troels: Thanks for the link. The tires in question are “HP 259″, which best I can tell is made by Yokohama and is a not-unpopular tire brand. Of course the ones on my other car really are the cheapo imports from China, but they are coming up on time for replacement anyways.
STiAT: Thanks
Nuno: Thanks, I’m glad to know I’m not the only one with autistic family. :)
If Ian has Asperger’s syndrome, or is otherwise considered socially abnormal with an intense interest in computers and/or video games, I suspect he’ll do quite well considering how hosed you were when we first met (I occasionally spout out a “you just got Pyned” to somebody when they state something so obviously stupid. These days, I simply get looked at awkwardly followed up by an expected, “huh?” instead of having Chuck around to lambaste you further). Now you are just a model of godliness (with a 1470 on the GRE to boot; ass).