and the First Family will be visiting Yellowstone and the Grand Canyon this weekend. Talk about a whilrwind tour!

So I spent Saturday night at Wolf Trap, America's National Park for the Performing Arts, watching one of the great party bands, the B-52s. For those unfamiliar with Wolf Trap, it's a pavilion with lawn seating outside of Washington D.C., in Northern Virginia. Given the high price of most concert tickets, lawn seats at Wolf Trap are a bargain at $25 and you're allowed to bring in your own food and drink, including wine and beer.

Last night's show was one big dance party from beginning to end.

The Bs have a new record out after 16 years (Funplex) and they sounded and looked great. I was shocked to learn Kate Pierson is 61, you'd never guess it by the way she looked or sounded.

Celebrating something the government does right -- parks.

A few weeks ago I accidentally found out, by showing up at the gate of my local park, Gulf Islands National Seashore, that our national parks set aside 3 weekends this year that you could get in for free. The final weekend of the summer is August 15-16 and will be here before you know it, so here's a reminder, to give you plenty of time to plan ahead, and some photos to entice you away from your keyboard.

So Congress just passed another $95 billion appropriation for Iraq. What have we spent now, as we pass the (no doubt to be largely ignored) milestone of 2500 dead soldiers? And how little a dab of that $95 billion would have taken to hire a few more folks to mow grass and do maintenance at parks that honor victims of previous wars? Per the NPS Morning Report:

On the evening of Saturday, June 10th, after working in the park all day, Don Turner, a maintenance employee at Manassas National Battlefield Park, died from a massive heart attack. As the maintenance staff in the park dwindled because of tightening budgets, Don worked harder to make sure that the park always put forward its best appearance for its visitors. He was so dedicated that when we had to bring our employees in from the field during heat advisories, we had to go out and find him and get him off his tractor.

Any of you in northern Virginia have any idea how much 5000 acres of open, pristine landscape would go for in that market if it were put on the auction block to developers?