The Happy Wanderer

Review - Way off the Road by Bill Geist

I like gentle humor.  The kind that makes you smile and feel good about the world.  No making fun of nice people, just silliness and recognizing the joy of life.  Bill Geist is a master at the deceptively simple task of making people happy.

I picked up Way Off the Road because I’ve watched Bill Geist for years on the CBS show, Sunday Morning.  Towards the end of each Sunday, Geist shows the audience how someone or something is wacky but still endearing. As I thumbed through the first vignette, I wanted to see if he can write as well as he can make perplexed looks on TV.

It turns out he is a great writer.  Even when he described a few events I’d seen him cover on the show, I found myself laughing out loud.  He acts as the straight man to a diner full of people who believe in alien abductions.  There are humorous descriptions of just how bad traveling can sometimes be.  A few black and white pictures dot the book, but it is Geist’s ability to set you down on a ledge in the Grand Canyon or inside a dirty, no-frills motel that makes the book worth having.

At the beginning of the book, the author explains that he grew up in a small town and some of his favorite places to travel have been to low population areas.  He ends up being a champion for the people he reports on.  Yes, Bill thinks taking photos of cows for a living is funny, but he obviously admires and likes the woman who takes these photographs.  He’s having fun watching the cow coercion, and he’s willing and able to share his good times with us.

If you don’t know Bill Geist or have never read his book, Way Off the Road, you need to find yourself a copy.   Sometimes we can’t make it to Hanlontown, Iowa, (population 229) to see the Red Rails in the Sunset, but we can always read good books, like this one by Geist, and feel like joyous travelers.  Enjoy.

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Related Links:

Review - Under the Tuscan Sun by Frances Mayers

Review - The Long Way Round - Ewan McGregor

Cool Dinosaurs Take Over the Carnegie

Imagine you are standing five feet from the biggest creatures that ever walked the earth.  Would you be their snack?  Or would you be more like a squirrel, running away from them because you don't want to get smooshed underfoot?

These are the kinds of questions that flitted through my mind on July 19th, when I visited the Dinosaurs in Their Time exhibit at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History.

As I walked through the different time periods starring this creature locked in stone all the way through to a pair of T-Rex dinosaurs dining on a skeletal torso, I kept thinking, "Man, those things were big."

They weren't all big, though, and their world was full of many different kinds of life.  This exhibit goes a long way to help you remember that the dinosaurs lived along side giant trees, fern-like plants, and the ancestors of birds.

There was so much to look at.  I will definitely go back to read more of the computer displays, look at the paintings of what the dinosaurs could have looked like, and I will stand next to giant thigh bones and look up at impossibly long necks.

Of course, for me, part of the fun of seeing gigantic, extinct fossils is to make goofy faces and have my picture taken in front of them.  Dinosaurs aren't just about science.  They are also about fun.  Every six-year-old kid knows this.

Luckily, the Carnegie Museum of Natural History has made the space as fun friendly as possible.

One of the things the Travel Boyfriend and I kept remarking on was the light in the dinosaur hall.  It's cheery among all those skeletons.  A large spiral staircase leading to two balconies overlooking the exhibit lend an elegance and beauty to your experience.

I recommend this as a must-see for anyone in Pittsburgh.  I loved the vegetation surrounding the dinosaurs in their lifelike poses.  There were museum staff members answering questions about huge, fossilized teeth, and the upper level viewing areas allow you to understand the scope and complexity of this bygone world.  Overall, I was in complete awe.  Well done, Carnegie.

Related Links:

Mollusk Wonder at Carnegie Museum