Jen and I drove north to my folks’ place to spring the surprise on them this past weekend. We got in at about 10:30 Friday night, and when we told them my Mom freaked out and smothered us in a huge hug while my Dad laughed and grabbed a bottle of champagne to celebrate. Luckily my sister stopped by not too long after that and joined in the celebration. It was a great way to start off the weekend.

Saturday, my Mom had scheduled a tour through the Wells College Book Arts Center, a small program run by the school to teach letterpress printing and bookbinding. Jen and I geeked out completely on the boxes of letterpress slugs, the old turn of the century crank presses and the piles of beautiful broadsheets they showed us. There’s something wonderful about the tactile feel of a letterpress print job and a handmade bound book; Terry and Sarah were kind enough to give us a pair of books and a pile of broadsheets from their portfolio for an engagement present, so I have lots of frames to make. Thanks guys!

Saturday evening we got a pile of Dugans in one place (my parents’) with food and booze and had ourselves a real celebration. When you get a roomful (or a porchful, as the case may be) of my extended family together, you have to come with your A-list material, and be quick, because the thing goes down like a celebrity roast. Unfortunately Grampy was feeling ill so he stayed in bed, but the official good time was had by all. My Uncle Brian, a judge in the county of Cayuga, offered to marry us on the spot, then kept offering helpful suggestions (parasailing marriage, nudist marriage, etc.) to sweeten the deal. Wisely, we declined, but thanked him for the offers. I think both Jen and I went to sleep with our sides hurting from laughing so hard.

Sunday was rainy again, so we did some driving through the county to antique stores and walking by the lake. And some getting yelled at for taking pictures of old farmhouses by crazy-ass neighbors in trailer homes. (Yeah, that one was fun. Jen was about to leave my ass by the side of the road for Captain Angry to come shoot at will. Admittedly, I was choosing to ignore the seven posted NO TRESPASSING signs, but I was going under the assumption that they were optional.) Renie’s friends Dee and Tom were in town for the weekend, and Tom had expressed interest in driving a tractor while in farm country. Always one to oblige, Brian offered one of his to us for the afternoon, and we drove to the farm to get the tractor tutorial. After a five-minute crash course (no pun intended), Tom drove a John Deere down into the pasture past the dairy herd and did circles. Jen and I hopped up on the sideboards of another tractor and rode down with Brian to spread manure (yeah, I can show a girl a good time, can’t I?)

Tom showed me the controls of the tractor and I took a turn; Renie followed and got down from the cab with a huge grin on her face. Jen then jumped on board and took it out and over the hill out of sight—the smile on her face as she came back was huge. Dee followed Jen and took it across the rows, bouncing Tom into the cab roof as she opened up the throttle. Did you know that most modern tractors have air-conditioning, automatic transmissions (there is a clutch, but once you get her in gear, it’s not unlike the Tiptronic shifter in high-end Audis) and four-speaker stereos? That Deere had a better sound system than my house.

The evening was topped off by a trip to Pete’s Treats, an outside ice-cream stand up in Union Springs, for homemade hot-fudge sundaes on outdoor picnic benches. I don’t think anybody could dream up a more small-town American weekend.

I got the first prints back from the Apple/Kodak service bundled in iPhoto yesterday; they look fantastic, and the process was simple. I highly recommend it, and I’m probably never going to pay for 35mm negatives again. Can I just say again that I love my camera?