I dropped my triplets at college and all I got was three gray hats.

\You know how sometimes life just gets so overwhelming that you don't know what to say - all the words stack up behind your cerebral cortex, logjammed and tangled like some sort of insane game of pickup sticks. That's what happens when you're dropping 3 kids and three colleges in 9 days or so. Houston, Texas. Boulder, Colorado. St. Louis, Missouri. 

All great schools and a good fit for each of my kids. 


Houston // Rice. 

Rice had a STEM, celebratory vibe. They did this great things where the kids were rolling up where they all chanted the kids name. Ally! Ally! Ally!

Highlights. The campus. Montrose. The people. Houston just feels like a big vibrant city that people actually live in. Ally had a good time thrifting. Another highlight was eating w Ally's roommates' family at Pondicherry. Also, running with my wife in Memorial Park. Sticky - ran on the mountain bike tracks about four miles. 

Indeed, we ate well in Houston, attempting to pack on the freshman fifteen in three days. 

Best coffee: Catalina Coffee company, next to the Reserve men's store. 

Best meals: Snooze A.M. breakfast burrito and the Hobbit Cafe. 

Boulder // University of Colorado

Highlights: Nature. Trail run along Ceran St. Verain Trail. Hiking from Brainard Lake to Blue Lake. The wonderful house we stayed in above Jamestown and dinner with the cousins. We had ten people with the surname Godsil in one place. It had been awhile. Can't wait to go back. We will stay at Scott & Heidis when we go back - Scott will be in Utah, but it's good to have a free place to stay. 

It seems like we spent all of our time in Boulder on Pearl Street. 

The Bookstore there was great. 

Best Coffee: Boxcar on Pearl Street - really good. 

It was so good to be back in the west. Colorado University and Boulder just feels like a city of healthy young people. Virgil said that they couldn't remember being around so many people their own age. Will will do well there. He's spending this weekend in Breckenridge at a retreat with other people in the business class. I don't think he needs to play baseball there - what a gift here, but there's so much to do there. 


St. Louis // Washington University

The campus is absolutely beautiful. Brick buildings and green quads - archetypically collegiate. A very special place. The home of scholar-champions - they do take the whole 'scholar' thing very seriously. Really glad we aren't doing the Ivy Preppy thing. Everyone was so nice. Our flight back ended up getting delayed there which was a gift - we got to spend an extra day with Virgil/Morgan. She went for the weekend with the Danforth Scholars to a camp on a lake. Great way to get introduced to college. 

We saw one presentation by the Sam Fox School. Straight-laced; not really all about the nose ring at tattoo crowd. That's a good thing. Virgil may be a They, but that's not really who we are. 

St. Louis had a great coffee shop - Kaldi and the most consistent food. We ate a lot of crepes. 

If it's possible, I think that St. Louis out-humiditied Houston but we did get in a great run in Forest Park. 

The place we stayed at was sub bar - though the last night we stayed at the Moonrise Hotel, and that was fun. 

So that's the bulletpoint rundown. 

Lots of excitement now back to the daily grind.  

I'm actually just floating on a Pink Cloud. My college experience was such a shit show, a hassle, not well-considered at a all just a box to be checked while I did my nihilistic self-destruct party/music scene thing - this is just so great that the my kids get to do their education the right way. This feels like redemption. My thrills are more than vicarious. I do feel like I'm going to school with them. 

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