On Wednesday, Ginny and I and Cara headed out for the University of Kentucky in Lexington, where Cara will soon begin her freshman year. Thinking to combine some tourism with one of the last acts of basic parenthood (everything after this gets placed in the supplemental category), we headed first for Cleveland, where we saw the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame (left), which sits inside a dazzling I.M. Pei pyramid on the shores of Lake Erie, which, as just as the advance word promised, is indeed a Great Lake. We stayed in a Crowne Plaza Hotel with bad room service, and then hit the Hall on Thursday. It was pretty cool, although it wa bit disconcerting to see one’s youth in a musem. The effect that is produced is not the warmth of nostalgia, nor the intellectual 
stimulation that is produced by going to, say, the Met. It’s kind of cool, but kind of dull. The best moment was seeing a montage of British Invasion groups, and being reminded how very cool the Kinks and the Zombies and the Animals really were. It was amazing how well Eric Burden could shake his hair and his ass simultaneously, but of course one now sees that lhe indeed loked like the spastic madman his critics said he did.
After lunch it was south on a very straight and boring I-75 (highlight: a huge billboard in a cornfield says Hell Is Real), through 
Cincinnati, and then onto Lexington. On Friday we moved Cara moved into her room, a process hectic 
enough to inspire a couple of stories that will be top of the line private stock family stories. After she settled in, we went back and spent the night in a very nice Hyatt. The next day, we visited Ashland, the home of the Great Compromiser Henry Clay, and then attended a couple of information sessions with Cara before sharing a pretty bland meal at an Italian restaurant (this is why Tony Soprano was neve drawn to the witness protection program), before taking our leave, and driving back up to Columbus, where we spent the night in an excellent Westin, of whose quality we were not worthy. (Top right, a new Wildcat in her lair; bottom right, Clay’s pile; Top left, Cincinnati, Thursday, 4:55 PM; bottom left, Columbus, Sunday, 8:30 AM.)
On Sunday, we drove from Columbus to Canton, which turns out to be far from everything, to visit the Pro Football Hall of Fame. (If you wonder why the Hall of Fame is in Canton, it’s because football had it’s roots in Canton specifically and Ohio generally. But football soon left Canton for the bright lights of the big cities, and it’s no mystery why.) I liked the museum–it had some pretty cool Baltimore Colts stuff, including the Marching Band’s drum and Tom Matte‘s famous play-inscribed arm bands–but a lot of it was kind of static. They really could do a lot more. The best part was the collection of amazing films. And then it was eight hours back through Pennsylvania, and home. Happy to be back, but already missing Cara.