Go BIG or Go Home
What Happens When A Small-Town Family Visits The "World's Largest"... Whatever!

We Get Around

In our quest to indoctrinate the world with the “Go BIG” message (MWAH HA HA!), we have ventured off in a few different directions of late. For “Show and Tell” today, may we present:

appSmitten.com

The first exciting development we’d like to share with you is that Matt and I are the new – and only – travel app reviewers for appSmitten.com! This site hand-selects the best apps in several categories (food, kids, health, news, education, etc.), then sends you weekly or daily recommendations via email to help keep you organized, entertained, productive, etc.

Our first reviews describe the brand new app for the iPhone and iPad, the Travel Channel Layover Guide With Anthony Bourdain, and a handy Android app, Packing List. Stop by and check us out on appSmitten! (Disclaimer: we receive a small commission each time someone we refer to the site signs up to receive the e-mail service.)

Kelley’s Break Room

Kelley’s Break Room is a really funny humor blog I’ve been following for a while. I was tickled – and a bit like “who, me?” – that she considered me humorous enough to write a guest post last week! In my oh-so-compelling post, 5 Ways to Create a Family Vacation You Can Actually Afford, I offer some ideas to incorporate fun into cheap (sorry, “budget-friendly”) family travel. While bringing the funny. I hope I succeeded; what do you think?

The Azumano Travel Show

The Azumano Travel Show, a radio program on AM860 radio in Portland, OR, interviewed me last week about our strange compulsion to visit BIG roadside attractions! The best question they asked me: “If you could build a world’s largest, what would it be?” Hint: My answer involved food. Naturally.

You can listen to the five-minute program right on their website. Mom says I sounded “professional.”

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World’s Largest Toilet, Columbus, IN

Sometimes this blog will enlighten and enrich your life with descriptions of artistic, cultural, or spiritual sites, like the large Buddha at the Chuang Yen Monastery.

Other times, we ditch all that highbrow stuff and go for the easy chuckle. This is one of those times.

Our guest post for October, graciously submitted by Julie Henning, is about the World’s Largest Toilet. Yes, you read that right!  Julie is the “Feed Me” Editor at a great site, Road Trips for Families. I met her at the BlogHer conference, and was jazzed to realize that there are other moms out there who: A) love quirky roadside attractions; and B) have no qualms about forcing them upon their defenseless children.

Worlds largest toilet

I can only imagine the stories these kids told their friends about this experience!

The toilet is located inside the Kids Commons Columbus’ Community Children’s Museum in Columbus, IN. Here’s Julie’s take:

Where we went, and who was coerced into going:

As a way to intentionally break up our recent 18-hour road trip from Madison, WI to Charleston, SC, we downloaded the Roadside America iPhone app to our iPhones. With a touch of a button, the app detects your physical location and returns back an interactive list of nearby unusual, interesting, and “Go BIG-worthy” places. Restless in Indiana, we gave the app a whirl.

WHY did you go there, exactly?

Truthfully, we hadn’t stopped since a rest area in Illinois and we all had to go to the bathroom! Fate intervened with the “World’s Largest Toilet” a short distance from I-65 in the heart of downtown Columbus, Indiana. Housed in the Kids Commons Columbus Community Children’s Museum, the museum gracefully allowed us to use the real bathroom and visit the big-daddy loo too. Normally, there’s a nominal admission fee.

Okay, what was so cool about it?

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