King Tut, which is short of King Tutankhamun and what all of the King's good friends called him, was an Egyptian Pharaoh from 1333 BC – 1324 BC. He become Pharaoh at the ripe old age of nine and reigned until his death ten years later at 19. His good friends, who already called him Tut because it was shorter and easier to pronounce than "Tutankhamun," also called him the Boy King because, well, he was sort of a king and he was more or less a boy when he started.
The Schaads recently went to visit the Boy King in Philadelphia. Philadelphia is located to the east of the Schaad household, somewhere near the mouth of the Nile, and has a severe traffic problem. This is the result of all of the animal crossings that have been erected by PETA for the crocodiles, hippos, ostriches, beetles (largely of the dung and scarab varieties) and street-side hot dog vendors that regularly cross the streets to make their way to water holes, or to buy a hot dog. On the way out of the city we were caught in the throes of a large "automobile" migration which was headed, ironically enough, to the zoo to take part in Earth Day festivities. (Earth Day being a relatively recent addition to ancient Egypt - a day wherein you celebrate the gift of the Earth by piling into these "automobiles" with the goal of loosening as much carbon dioxide into the air as possible by sitting, parked, in a tremendously long and slow moving line of automobiles headed to celebrate Earth Day at the local zoo.)
Our trip to see the Boy King was filled with excitement beforehand. Here we were, Schaads, very not worldly, headed to see Egyptian artifacts that were thousands of years old. I should say that I just looked up an antonym of "worldly" and the best I could find was "homey," which I suppose describes us well enough.
The King Tut exhibition, found at kingtut.org, promises the return of the "treasures of Tutankhamun." Furthermore, you read that "Tutankhamun's treasures are back" and "The exhibition includes approximately 130 objects from the tomb of King Tut and other valley of the King Ancestors."
It was this last part that should have been a clue, because there you see that they begin to throw in "other valley of the King Ancestors." These would be King Lenny, King Rupert, and rarely discussed but terrible to behold King Merle. (I can't seem to find any of these in Wikipedia, or I would link right to them sorry about that.) If I had been doing my due-diligence, I would have poked around more on their website and found the FAQ that said, "The death mask is not allowed to leave Egypt and therefore is not included in the exhibition." I suppose that's not critical, to see a death mask, because there are lots of other cool things to see.
Our trip down was uneventful and the time passed quickly. Mostly we sang songs in the car like, "Ooooh I can't wait to see the Death Mask!" and "Beautiful, beautiful Death Mask!" and "A thousand gold Egyptian Death Masks on the wall, a thousand gold Egyptian Death Masks on the wall, take one down, pass it around, nine-hundred and ninety-nine gold Egyptian Death Masks on the wall..." Our hotel was very easy to find; it was near the airport and there was basically one major road to and from that. It also helps to stay near the airport because there are generally signs everywhere that show people how to get to the airport, since most people going to the airport don't know where it is.
We made out way down to the Franklin Institute on Saturday to see the Boy King. The Franklin Institute is actually very cool even if it wasn't having the King Tut exhibit. For example, there was this giant inside the Franklin Institute who had unfortunately been turned to stone by an ancient Gorgon:
It's too bad he was turned to stone, I'm sure he could have filled in some details about the giants that use to live in Philadelphia in ancient times.
The Franklin Institute won me over completely with "Legodelphia" - a model of the city of Philadelphia made completely of LEGOs:
The other big highlight for me was this:
Which was billed as "the oldest thing you'll ever touch." Obviously, the Franklin Institute has never seen the inside of my refrigerator. But I touched it anyway. I mean, if something bills itself as the oldest thing you'll ever touch you pretty much HAVE to touch it, otherwise you may get back home and then one night you'll wake up at 3 a.m. screaming "AHHHH! I NEVER TOUCHED IT!!" and you'll probably have to jump in the car right then and drive non-stop back to Philadelphia just to touch it. I also touched the metal bar that goes right through the rock, because I wasn't sure if that was even older than the rock and it looked like everyone else had been touching that part as well because the paint was all worn off.
Although looking around the FI was great, we did eventually make our way to the King Tut exhibit at our appointed time. (The tickets came with a time when you could go to the exhibit, like "Noon to 2 p.m.," which was when you had to show up. We know this because we tried to show up at 11:50 a.m. and were beat about the head with a large golden ankh and told to wait in the gift shop until our appointed time.)
We eventually did get in and I would show you all of the cool artifacts except that there was no photography allowed, no video taping allowed, and no juggling of flaming batons allowed. I know, I know, when are the Schaads going to go to an exhibit, museum or mall that actually allows photography? I don't know, it's a mystery.
However, the King Tut exhibit web site does has a number of nice photos. You can view these in all of their glory here:
The exhibit itself was pretty cool. Even though there were a few artifacts missing from the exhibit (coughDEATHMASKcough) that really wasn't too disappointing. One thing that was definitely a bummer were the crowds. I mean, how dare these people come to the museum on the SAME DAY that I did! Unbelievable. (When I think of museums I think of almost-deserted, large open areas with priceless artifacts in the middle of the room. You know, like the pictures above provided by the Franklin Institute. Instead, what you should picture is a busy day at Disney World, with a throng of people who WILL NOT MOVE standing around something - what you're not sure, because there are too many people in the way to see it and they WILL NOT MOVE. That would be a more accurate picture of what you're going to see, as opposed to the photos above which do not show any people, particularly people who WILL NOT MOVE.)
The second day of our trip - well, third if you count the first day - was spent touring the historic section of Philadelphia. We saw three crossings in all: Hippos, Egrets and Scarab Beetles. We also saw the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, and the Ancient Home of Giant Philadelphians, or what was left of it. (There was only a few bricks, an old fire pit and a broadsword of hobbit detection +2.)
When we arrived home from our weekend, we asked the kids what they enjoyed the most and while the educational aspects of the trip did rank high, the clear winner was our night out at Dave & Busters Friday. Cassie played air hockey with anyone who would play her and crushed all takers (sadly, she wasn't wagering on her games.) Actually, there was one person who defeated her - her Dad, who won a fierce battle 7 to 6 but not before Cassie tried to take him out with a puck to the head. Dad fought on through the hazy-double-vision to seal the win. (And Carl would like to take a moment to dispel those "bad loser" stories that are going around.)
Cassie prepares to crush another unfortunate Air Hockey player.
Connor wowed the crowds with his inhuman DDR performance, which defies all explanation as well as attempts to photograph. Now that the family has just purchased a camcorder, videos will no doubt soon grace the blog. But not of me.
Nor of King Tut, as video recording the Boy King is expressly forbidden. Especially if he would have been at the museum.
RSS:
State College actually saw snow today - we woke up to 1-2" on the ground (I'm sure the snow was "much deeper" at Jesse's, Henry's and Joe Bastardi's house, as always seems the case) and it snowed lightly throughout the day. The sky in the evening was very weird; like a giant ashen blanket - a thick gray color not unlike the color of your dearly departed loved one's remains being deposited at a Disney ride. 
I missed a post yesterday, which means no one will ever see the sticky 8 I created. Maybe I'll link to it in a future post, so those of you collecting at home will have a full set.
The Schaads are off on a trip to visit the boy king... 
