So, I went out to play tennis tonight with my new San Diego best friend, Wilson. He's my new San Diego best friend based on the premise that he's the only person in San Diego that I've actually had any personal interaction with outside of work for more than 1 minute and 15 seconds. He takes the honor away from Erica and Tyler who are my neighbors across the breezeway and they were my best friends in San Diego based on the fact that I said Hi to them, they said Hi back and then I helped them carry in a few pieces of furniture.
So, as you can infer, my social calendar has been rocking and rolling, so I went to craigslist to see if someone was looking for a tennis partner and sure enough I found Wilson. I was pretty sure 20 minutes into our hitting session that he was going to walk off the court and tell me not to call him again as I was so rusty I couldn't sustain a rally of more than 3 shots (that's with the caveat that Wilson hit 2 of the shots before I hit a double off the fence or hit a grounder into the net for an inning ending 6-4-3 double play.)
Funny thing about tennis though, sometimes if you play for a long enough period of time, strange things happen. In this case, I was sweating and the steam was coming off the top of my cranium. Pretty sure Tom Cruise doesn't have this problem. Wilson, who was very well endowed in the follicle department didn't have this detriment, I'm sure. So, as the steam is accumulating around my face like I'm in a sauna, I actually started returning some shots in play. Seriously, I'm not exaggerating about not hitting a shot in. After awhile, Wilson stopped chasing my errant shots and just watched them like he was witnessing a fireworks display with his head cocked to the side facing up in the air.
One thing I've noticed after playing with my #1 San Diego friend (I'm going to play with a few titles and see which one sounds best for Wilson), is that I'm not 18 anymore. I remember when I was 18, I used to run and play all day long and never think twice about it. On one occasion, I wiped out on my bike, skinned my leg from knee to ankle, watched it bleed, and then proceeded to go on to the basketball game I was headed for. I played a full game of hoops, then rode my bike home and felt like a champ. In fact, I remember when I used to work at Tops, I had a friend, named Melissa, who came in one time to buy a sports drink and I was like what are you doing and she told me she was jogging around the city. I was like, "What?!? Are you crazy?" By all estimates, Melissa lived about 7-10 miles from Tops, and I might add that the road she lived on was not exactly "jogger friendly". I'm pretty sure that if she continued to jog and not get picked up before returning home that she probably jogged 20+ miles that day. I don't know what happened after she left, but that inspired me to start running and now I'm pretty much in constant pain. Ahhh...good times he said!
So, as I was saying, my game is pretty weak, so to compensate I've got to really hustle after every shot, because when I'm running all over the place, I actually tend to get some shots back. It's the slow shots that are hit right to me that I lauch to the moon. Well, after a few of these dead sprints across the court the thought occured to me that there wasn't a great flow of oxygen getting to my brain. Wilson was doing just fine. I could pretty much taste my spleen. He destroyed me on the scoreboard and as I was walking to my car, I thought well this is going to be an interesting night if I don't get some ibuprofen immediately.
The perfect ending to the night is that as soon as I sat down to relax, Sammie came and nudged me to go outside for a walk. Mercifully, she wasn't pulling or else she might have ended up dragging me like a corpse on the end of a rope.
Miles Walked Today: 2 (Does the dog ever get tired - I'm setting all kinds of walking mileage records in the brief time since I've moved)
Friends Made Today: 1
Friends Elevated to "Best in San Diego" status: 1
Odds that Wilson will ever call me to play tennis again: It's a crap shoot, but probably 60%
Friday, January 20, 2012
Thursday, January 19, 2012
That's Offensive...I think...
Here's how the move went down - it was cra-shizzle...
Day 1 - actually, let's back the bus up - Saturday before day 1 - 6 or 7 of my best friends came over for what I declared as about "an hour's worth of loading". Sha-right. About 5 hours later we were almost done. Our house was trashed - literally. The only things left in the house were garbage and an air mattress. OMG - my body hurt so much!
Note to anyone moving - Forget u-haul, forget pods, forget 2 guys in a truck - they are all overpriced. We used ABF U-Pack it and the money we saved allowed us to get movers on the other end to move our stuff out of the trailer into our new apartment. ABF has it's pros and cons, mainly that you must have a place to drop the trailer on both ends and don't even think about the cubes unless you currently live in a shed or the like. Your best and only bet is to go with the trailer. It's a great deal. You only pay for what you use and the rates are very affordable. Instead, you could choose the other companies and while you're at it, why don't you just spend the rest of your money on mail order brides. Duh...
So...
Day 1 - We got in the car and let me reiterate that sleeping on an air mattress only works when you're making like Blair Witch or something. An air mattress in an empty room is horrible. #1 - It's freezing. Try sleeping on it - you'll literally think you're an eskimo. I didn't know if I was ready for a blizzard or bed. #2 - even worse is an air mattress on hard woods - the thing is literally moonwalking across the floor while we're sleeping. I'm like - is this an air mattress or a turbo flyer? On a positive note, we were already half way to the car by the time we woke up.
We got up at the crack of dawn - actually it was still dark outside when we woke up and I'm happy to report it was a balmy 17 degrees. With an absence of sweat on my brow and the defrost on full blast we backed out of the driveway for the last time. I don't get sentimental about most inanimate objects, but there is something to be told about all of the struggles we had in building our house and getting everything we wanted in it. There were battles, fights, and there was no giving in. Perhaps that's a good topic for the next blog, but for now, we were ambling down to the interstate and on our way.
If you've never traveled for 4 consecutive days in a car with a "large" dog, then I'm not sure there is anything I can say to prepare you for what you are going to experience. Side bar - according to all of the designations out west, Sammie is known as a "large" dog. Don't worry - we're all properly offended.
In any event, we drove for about 12 hours and stopped just west of Jackson, MS. It was a really cool drive and by someone's insistence (read: barking and slobber) we stopped about every 2 hours. On a positive note, that made the trip much more doable because you're always a maximum of 120 minutes away from stopping and stretching. I had never been west of Atlanta in the car, so there was a lot to see. On the way, we decided that Blood Gnome would visit all of the "welcome" centers. The best was on our way into Mississippi, there were 2 ladies at the desk next to the clock in shape of a state. I told Jill to ask the ladies if they would pose with Blood Gnome and they did. The picture was priceless because the one lady was smiling and the other was like - get this crap over with and get your sorry east coast/west coast wannabe butts out of our cotton-pickin state...If you look closely at the picture, she is ready to break the Gnome in half. In the vein of this is insanely ridiculous - I'ma tryin' ta do my state proud an'a I get these yayhoos comin' in with this stupid troll wanting a picture...
~Day 2 Tomorrow ~
Wednesday, January 18, 2012
Can you tell me how to get...[redux]
Stop me if you've heard this one before...
2 Adults and a dog, drive across country in a car that is stuffed to the gills with worldly belongings...
Not even gonna lie. The first item in the car was my flat screen tv. The flat screen was getting packed and then "let's see what else we can fit" was employed. The dog was cramped. The wife was cramped. I was cramped.
Obligatory worst part of the trip -
Saying ok to my wife when she decided to put us in that Motel 6 in Big Spring, TX. I literally slept with one eye open all night long. That place smelled. There were sketchy people lurking in the breezeways with their doors open. Meh! Don't even get me started on the fact that the bed sheets were collages of all that was well and good with Motel 6. If that was truly the case, they would be empty/white except that the filth would show up in a NY Minute.
Obligatory best part of the trip -
Xanadu! Staying in the Hampton Inn in Tuscon, AZ. That place was heaven on earth or at least it seemed that way coming on the heels of the Motel 6. I was like hell with the road trip, I'm going to live in this place because this is clearly nicer than any place I've lived, let alone stayed.
So, here's the damage - 4 days, 36ish hours, stops at every "welcome center" rest stop to take the picture with Blood Gnome. That's an inside joke, but the gist of it is that I have a broken Cincinnati Bearcats Gnome that follows me everywhere. It's terrific and weird all at the same time.
Most importantly - 0 incidents, and at the end of the day that's all that is really important, isn't it?
So, while I'd really like to write more, the dog is pushing her wet nose into my arm. For those lay people, that's the I have to go to the bathroom type of nudge. So on that note...
2 Adults and a dog, drive across country in a car that is stuffed to the gills with worldly belongings...
Not even gonna lie. The first item in the car was my flat screen tv. The flat screen was getting packed and then "let's see what else we can fit" was employed. The dog was cramped. The wife was cramped. I was cramped.
Obligatory worst part of the trip -
Saying ok to my wife when she decided to put us in that Motel 6 in Big Spring, TX. I literally slept with one eye open all night long. That place smelled. There were sketchy people lurking in the breezeways with their doors open. Meh! Don't even get me started on the fact that the bed sheets were collages of all that was well and good with Motel 6. If that was truly the case, they would be empty/white except that the filth would show up in a NY Minute.
Obligatory best part of the trip -
Xanadu! Staying in the Hampton Inn in Tuscon, AZ. That place was heaven on earth or at least it seemed that way coming on the heels of the Motel 6. I was like hell with the road trip, I'm going to live in this place because this is clearly nicer than any place I've lived, let alone stayed.
So, here's the damage - 4 days, 36ish hours, stops at every "welcome center" rest stop to take the picture with Blood Gnome. That's an inside joke, but the gist of it is that I have a broken Cincinnati Bearcats Gnome that follows me everywhere. It's terrific and weird all at the same time.
Most importantly - 0 incidents, and at the end of the day that's all that is really important, isn't it?
So, while I'd really like to write more, the dog is pushing her wet nose into my arm. For those lay people, that's the I have to go to the bathroom type of nudge. So on that note...
Thursday, October 13, 2011
The Donnas...
...Rock it out!
Of all the music I listen to and/or follow, The Donnas have to be my favorite band. They went mainstream back around 2002-2004ish with the release of Spend The Night. The song "Take It Off" was all over MTV, the radio, etc. Right around the same time, "Who Invited You" was released from the same album and suddenly this all-girl band was on the map.
I love their music, but I have to say that I'm a relative newbie compared to most "Donnaholics". Besides Spend The Night, I also own Gold Medal and Bitchin'. I've asked for Greatest Hits Volume 16 for Christmas, so hopefully this will fill in a few gaps for me.
So, about the band and what makes them so popular. At the start, each of the four girls were named Donna with their real initial. For example, Donna R., Donna A., etc. After some time, the girls seemed to have ditched these monikers for their real names: Maya, Allison, Brett, Torry.
Throughout the years, I've listened to their music but not really followed the band too closely. They don't often tour to the city closest to my part of the east coast - Charlotte - and the music was my main love, so that was good enough for me.
Of all the music I listen to and/or follow, The Donnas have to be my favorite band. They went mainstream back around 2002-2004ish with the release of Spend The Night. The song "Take It Off" was all over MTV, the radio, etc. Right around the same time, "Who Invited You" was released from the same album and suddenly this all-girl band was on the map.
I love their music, but I have to say that I'm a relative newbie compared to most "Donnaholics". Besides Spend The Night, I also own Gold Medal and Bitchin'. I've asked for Greatest Hits Volume 16 for Christmas, so hopefully this will fill in a few gaps for me.
So, about the band and what makes them so popular. At the start, each of the four girls were named Donna with their real initial. For example, Donna R., Donna A., etc. After some time, the girls seemed to have ditched these monikers for their real names: Maya, Allison, Brett, Torry.
Throughout the years, I've listened to their music but not really followed the band too closely. They don't often tour to the city closest to my part of the east coast - Charlotte - and the music was my main love, so that was good enough for me.
To backtrack a little, when Gold Medal came out, circa 2004ish, I had heard some press about this being a more mellow album due to someone in the bad having some physical problems of some sort. Not sure what I heard or who had the problems, or even what the issues were, but I loved the collection, so I never questioned it any further. Then, back to the present, I realized that a friend of mine from the left coast is also a fan of their music, so we got to talking about the band and it made me think that I should do some research and find out if the band had any plans to travel to the Queen City. Long story short, no tour is currently in the works. Or maybe it is, and nothing has been released. In any event, as I was going through the clips of articles, I noticed that Donna C., a.k.a. Torry Castellano a.k.a. the band's drummer is no longer with the band. It seems that back in the early to mid 2000's when I had heard that the band was focusing on slowing things down it was because Torry had developed some type of wrist injury that she eventually had surgery to repair. According to what I read, she relearned how to hold the drumsticks and everything. Then sometime in 2008 (I could be way off with the dates, so bear with me), she apparently developed pain in her shoulder. This eventually forced her to retire from the band. Retire at 30ish...don't we all wish...
As I thought about it more and more, I couldn't help but feel awful for her. She is doing the thing she loves more than anything (this could be a stretch, but I have to believe if you're making music and touring with a band of your best friends, then at least on some level this is your greatest love, right?)
I mean, just imagine if something happened to me and I couldn't go to work and run the selling report that my boss is going to lose on his desk before it eventurally ends up in the garbage. Or if something happened to me and I lost my creative ability to develop advertising in the system that sucks the life out of you by giving you an error message every 2 minutes, or by having you retype everything until you have memorized every word of every ad down to a "T". Ok, well maybe my examples aren't mano-e-mano with Torry's but you get the idea. I'm obsessed with tragedy, I've decided. I find something tragic, which I believe this situation is, and then I have dreams about turning back time and making everything better. Most times it involves people I don't know and probably never will know. But I have a strong sense of empathy and wish that people didn't have to go through the things people have to go through.
In the end, I hope that The Donnas have success with their new drummer, Amy Cesari, and that Torry enjoys a life free of pain and full of excitement.
I'll leave you with this...Treat yourself to The Donnas today! Gold Medal and Bitchin' are awesome listens...who am I kidding...everything from The Donnas is a great listen! Your ears will thank you!!!!
Tuesday, September 6, 2011
ESCAPE TO EXCALIBUR!
You know the parents, they always want to know when you get somewhere so that they can stop worrying. Well, we got in at like 3am, so I sent my parents this picture as a text. Somehow, they made the connection that we had arrived!
Wow! What a vacation we just had at Excalibur in Las Vegas! We spent Friday-Monday there and had a great time! We made some great friends, of which we got information on zero - so there's no chance of us keeping in touch. Nice job to us.
There was Marth from the plane. She is studying to be a doctor in Atlanta and we met her on the plane. Mercifully, she likes to talk almost as much as we do, which made the 4.5 hour flight go by a little quicker. I was pretty sure that I was going to have to sleep the entire flight in order to make the time go by fast. Most interesting set of crossword puzzles I've ever worked on.
Then there were 4 people we met at the pool. Again, should have gotten info, but instead a big fat "You Stink" to us. George Bueno and Christian Sanchez were the funniest duo ever. Pretty sure George has sampled every decent eatery in all of Vegas. "As you can see, I like to eat..." was his mantra. Then Daniela and Kristen (or maybe Crystal - sorry, I wasn't there for the intros) from Grand Junction, Co and I shared a moment when we saw a 70 year woman in a thong bikini. Yuck! This woman was seriously like 100 pounds soaking wet, and not a piece of eye candy. Then we proceeded to spot all of the funny things that people were wearing/doing around the pool. You want a good slice of life? Go to a resort pool and you'll see more than you could have imagined.
Ok, so now onto the rest of the trip. As I mentioned, we stayed at Excalibur, which was a HUGE step up from Bill's Gamblin Hall (That's where we stayed in January). Bill's probably isn't too bad when it's offseason because there is no pool to be concerned with. Excalibur had 3 pools and they were all awesome! One had a water slide on it, of which I was the only one that did not go down it. The funniest part is that Fish went down the slide with a totally serious look on his face. Everyone else is smiling and laughing and having fun. Fish is coming down the slide looking like the Secret Service or something.
The gaming was good to us. In very limited action, I doubled my money. I didn't start with a lot, so don't get too excited about that statement. Let's just say I don't have a problem when it comes to gambling. The coolest scenario was at Red Rocks Casino, where they have digital screens to keep track of your money and total up your cards for you. It's great because I don't have to try to add my total to figure out how to proceed. Then I can hit or stand all at the touch of a button.
This is me outside my favorite place in all of Vegas - New York, New York!
The sights were tremendous! We had a great view of my favorite place on the strip - New York, New York! The food was also great! We went to Ellis Island Casino - they have this great special - 10oz steak, vegetable, mashed potato, salad, and a beer or pop of your choice for 7.99! You'd think by the price that the quality is lacking, but this was one of the best steaks I've ever had! We toured around many of the casinos. The coolest thing I saw was a Lion exhibit inside MGM Grand! That was pretty awesome! The worst part of the trip, for many reasons, was the flight back. I hate leaving Vegas because that means I have to get back to the real world.
As for this picture - You're probably thinking that I grabbed this stuff off a shelf in a store to pose for this picture. Sadly, I actually own the glasses and the vegas beads. Stay classy!
Saturday, August 27, 2011
Vacation in Orlando
July 2 - We went to pick up my parents from the airport. Up until this point the trip was wonderful. That sounds funny, but I don't mean that against my parents in any way. We had not hit any toll roads or excessive traffic, so it was awesome! As soon as we picked up my parents we hit so many tolls that I swear we financed their next road project. We immediately went over to Celebration, Florida, which, as I understand it, was formerly owned by Disney. In any event, it was beautiful there! We ate lunch at one of the lakeside shops in the village and walked around from shop to shop. We found a dog bakery and bought some 4th of July treats for Sammie and then found a shop that was selling $5 4th of July shirts with Celebration, Florida on them. We each chose a different design. Our goal was to come back to Celebration for the fireworks display on Monday so we walked around to see where the best area was to see the fireworks.
After some time, we drove down to the church that was near Celebration and went to Mass. It was a nice church, which seemed to be brand new. After this, we went to a local Italian restaurant back in Kissimee to celebrate our anniversary. It was an ok establishment, but not great. The food was fine, but it was more of a greasy spoon, than an elegant restaurant. Personally, I'm glad that I forgot the name because I won't be going there again. We went to Publix then and got a cake to celebrate and went back to our condo to have cake and coffee and open presents. Jill got a computer for her anniversary gift, Dad got a 40th anniversary Buffalo Sabres photo book, Mom got a Keurig K-Cup storage drawer, some K-cups, and a gift card to a massage parlor. Mom and Dad were having birthdays, so that is why they were getting gifts. I had gotten my gift before we left, so that is why I did not get a gift that day.
July 3 - This day, we planned to drive to see Jill's mom. She lives just south of Tampa, so all in all we were traversing the whole state. We got on Interstate 4 and (some would say predictably) there was a furniture truck about 1/4 of a mile in front of us that caught on fire. The whole highway shut down as police cars and fire engines zoomed by us. Everyone shut off their cars and began walking around to see what was going on, including Jill. There was a car next to us with a long-haired dark skinned man, who we referred to as Lenny Kravitz, and then another guy who seemed to be following him around giving directions, who we referred to as "The Manager". Lenny and The Manager popped the trunk of their car and began to set up for a picnic, including bottles of pop and snacks. We turned off the car for a period of time, and then realizing how foolish this was in the Florida heat and humidity turned it back on so that we could run the A/C. After a couple of hours, we finally were able to get moving, just as The Manager finished his Mountain Dew. We made it to see Jill's mom around 4:00 and then had dinner with her mom and grandfather, who lives next door to Jill's mom. We talked for awhile and had a nice dessert, then got back in the car and drove back to our resort without incident. It's funny, but when you go to see relatives, it almost always involves a meal and talking. There isn't any going out, or big event. It's always something lazy.
July 4 - This was our most active day on the trip, and also one of the more frustrating. After breakfast we drove down to Disney Marketplace and walked through the communities surrounding it, as well as all of the shops. We took the small tourist boat to get from one end to the other and I couldn't help thinking when we were in the middle of the lake that the bars/clubs around this area must gain a lot of attention after hours. My parents bought my newphews some Mickey Mouse bobbleheads and we took a shuttle bus, then a skytram around to visit all of the theme parks. We didn't go in any of them. We were just checking everything out.After our experience with the traffic yesterday, we decided that traveling to Celebration to see the Fireworks would not be a good idea. There was one main access road to let people in and out of the area and the section of Celebration where the Fireworks were going off was deep into the community, so we probably would be sitting in traffic for quite some time. We decided to go to get some pizza from Pizza Hut and bring it back to our condo and watch the Fireworks from our screened in porch. What a great decision that was! We had a tremedous view of the area as well as 3-4 sets of fireworks. The only thing we missed out on was music, but it was a great night. We had some more anniversay/birthday cake and all-in-all called it a great night. One of the big things that we were trying to figure out is where I could find a whimsical themed picture frame that read "Orlando". There were several that were "Disney World" themed, but I didn't want one of those because we weren't going to Disney and I preferred to have a themed frame from the area instead of a theme park. This would prove to be very challenging.
July 5 - We started off the day by going to have breakfast at Bob Evans. This is one of my Mom's favorite places to have breakfast. We started off the day by going to the various Flea Market/Premium Outlet Malls that were in the area. We walked around those for some time, with the majority of the experience being to distract my dad from buying overpriced junk. We continued to look for the elusive frame, without luck. Other than a free key chain that Jill got, neither her nor I made a purchase. My dad bought a pair of aviator sunglasses "Pull 'er over" and some socks. Apparently they don't sell those in New York. I actually think the real reason was that he forgot to pack any and was looking for a store and figured he could get a better deal at this Flea Market, but the booth owners seemed to be doing some shady math. After walking the Premium Outlets, we went back to the condo and decided to hit the pool. Amazingly, we had been in Orlando for over 4 days and this was the first time we were in the water. There was a blow up ball and the 4 of us played a game of how many times we could hit the ball before it hit the ground. Our record was 66. After some time, we went back to the room and got ready for dinner. That night, we went to eat at Don Pablo's Mexican Restaurant. It was so good! Jill got 2 gigantic Margaritas that must have put into orbit. Both of us had bottomless tacos. That night, we went back home and immediately hit the treadmill, before relaxing on the screened in porch.
July 6 - We woke up and decided to make this a longer pool day. My dad scouted out the pool and noticed that there was a section of chairs that was almost entirely shaded by trees. We staked out these chairs and literally spent hours there. Jill and I resumed our blow up ball hitting contest and set a 2 person record of 76. That night we went to have dinner at The Melting Pot. This is one of our favorite restaurants. My parents especially love the chocolate fondue at the end. My only complaint is that I wish there was a bottomless plate of stuff to dunk in the chocolate. This was our first encounter with awful traffic. We literally sat in traffic for about an hour. That put a damper on the whole evening. Once we got to The Melting Pot, it was great, but the traffic would be the story for the next 3 days. After eating there, which is more of an experience rather than a meal, we returned to our condo and went for a walk before unwinding with the Yankee game.
July 7 - We started off with breakfast at Perkins. This is one of my favorite restaurants. One time, when I was at St. Bonaventure, I walked to Perkins with my friends and while in was in the Perkins, the temperature dropped some 20-30 degrees and it began snowing. The cup of pop that I stole from there was completely frozen solid by the time that I walked home, as was I with my shorts on. After Perkins we drove to Historic Kissimmee and walked around the downtown area. There was an interesting Farmer's Market set up where a guy was playing musical instruments in ungodly heat. The antique shops must have thought that air conditioning was too modern for them because they were all using fans. I could do all of those people a favor by taking a well lit match to that place. After walking around there, we went back to the pool and promptly got rained on. It was so refreshing though that we stayed in the water. It was not lightning, so there was no risk. That night we went to dinner at Bonefish Grill. At this point, the rain was torential and traffic was absurd. I was struggling to think of 2 days in my life where I had encountered traffic this bad. After a great meal at Bonefish, we went back to the condo and had dessert and coffee before going for a walk.
July 8 - We were fighting the clock with a lot of food in our condo as this was our last full day and we still had a lot of food to eat, so we had a gigantic breakfast at home, then my parents went to the pool, while I stayed behind to watch the shuttle launch. I took stock of this momentus occasion by taking a picture of the television screen with my cell phone as the shuttle was taking off. After this, I walked down to the pool. We were all pretty baked at this point, so dad was physically moving around as many umbrellas as possible to block the sun from us. We noticed just about everyone at this resort was of English decent so our running joke was that we were sitting next to "Cheerio" or "these lads were walking by us". It was pretty funny because my dad would not whisper these phrases. After a few hours at the pool, we went to the Florida Mall and walked around. Dinner was low-key at Ruby Tuesdays and of course traffic was again an issue. They really need to figure that out, especially with as many roads as they have, you would think there would be a way to thin things out, but I guess not. We stopped off for some ice cream/Slurpees, and then went home and began to pack.
July 9 - This was a sad day, because our trip was over. We were going to drive home in one day, so we had to check out, have breakfast/brunch and then leave. We dropped my parents off at the airport around 11, and then met up with Jill's mom and grandfather around 2 to drive back home. It was very stormy that day as we drove by the coast of Florida and into Georgia. By the time we got home, it was around 9:30 and I was very glad because Jill and her grandfather were in the car in front of me and I was driving by myself with nothing but Pearl Jam to keep me company. Once we dropped off Jill's grandfather, we had to drive another 30 minutes to pick up Sammie. I was completely exhausted by that point, probably looking like death warmed over. By the time we got into our neighborhood, I was never more happy to see our house.
After some time, we drove down to the church that was near Celebration and went to Mass. It was a nice church, which seemed to be brand new. After this, we went to a local Italian restaurant back in Kissimee to celebrate our anniversary. It was an ok establishment, but not great. The food was fine, but it was more of a greasy spoon, than an elegant restaurant. Personally, I'm glad that I forgot the name because I won't be going there again. We went to Publix then and got a cake to celebrate and went back to our condo to have cake and coffee and open presents. Jill got a computer for her anniversary gift, Dad got a 40th anniversary Buffalo Sabres photo book, Mom got a Keurig K-Cup storage drawer, some K-cups, and a gift card to a massage parlor. Mom and Dad were having birthdays, so that is why they were getting gifts. I had gotten my gift before we left, so that is why I did not get a gift that day.
July 3 - This day, we planned to drive to see Jill's mom. She lives just south of Tampa, so all in all we were traversing the whole state. We got on Interstate 4 and (some would say predictably) there was a furniture truck about 1/4 of a mile in front of us that caught on fire. The whole highway shut down as police cars and fire engines zoomed by us. Everyone shut off their cars and began walking around to see what was going on, including Jill. There was a car next to us with a long-haired dark skinned man, who we referred to as Lenny Kravitz, and then another guy who seemed to be following him around giving directions, who we referred to as "The Manager". Lenny and The Manager popped the trunk of their car and began to set up for a picnic, including bottles of pop and snacks. We turned off the car for a period of time, and then realizing how foolish this was in the Florida heat and humidity turned it back on so that we could run the A/C. After a couple of hours, we finally were able to get moving, just as The Manager finished his Mountain Dew. We made it to see Jill's mom around 4:00 and then had dinner with her mom and grandfather, who lives next door to Jill's mom. We talked for awhile and had a nice dessert, then got back in the car and drove back to our resort without incident. It's funny, but when you go to see relatives, it almost always involves a meal and talking. There isn't any going out, or big event. It's always something lazy.
July 4 - This was our most active day on the trip, and also one of the more frustrating. After breakfast we drove down to Disney Marketplace and walked through the communities surrounding it, as well as all of the shops. We took the small tourist boat to get from one end to the other and I couldn't help thinking when we were in the middle of the lake that the bars/clubs around this area must gain a lot of attention after hours. My parents bought my newphews some Mickey Mouse bobbleheads and we took a shuttle bus, then a skytram around to visit all of the theme parks. We didn't go in any of them. We were just checking everything out.After our experience with the traffic yesterday, we decided that traveling to Celebration to see the Fireworks would not be a good idea. There was one main access road to let people in and out of the area and the section of Celebration where the Fireworks were going off was deep into the community, so we probably would be sitting in traffic for quite some time. We decided to go to get some pizza from Pizza Hut and bring it back to our condo and watch the Fireworks from our screened in porch. What a great decision that was! We had a tremedous view of the area as well as 3-4 sets of fireworks. The only thing we missed out on was music, but it was a great night. We had some more anniversay/birthday cake and all-in-all called it a great night. One of the big things that we were trying to figure out is where I could find a whimsical themed picture frame that read "Orlando". There were several that were "Disney World" themed, but I didn't want one of those because we weren't going to Disney and I preferred to have a themed frame from the area instead of a theme park. This would prove to be very challenging.
July 5 - We started off the day by going to have breakfast at Bob Evans. This is one of my Mom's favorite places to have breakfast. We started off the day by going to the various Flea Market/Premium Outlet Malls that were in the area. We walked around those for some time, with the majority of the experience being to distract my dad from buying overpriced junk. We continued to look for the elusive frame, without luck. Other than a free key chain that Jill got, neither her nor I made a purchase. My dad bought a pair of aviator sunglasses "Pull 'er over" and some socks. Apparently they don't sell those in New York. I actually think the real reason was that he forgot to pack any and was looking for a store and figured he could get a better deal at this Flea Market, but the booth owners seemed to be doing some shady math. After walking the Premium Outlets, we went back to the condo and decided to hit the pool. Amazingly, we had been in Orlando for over 4 days and this was the first time we were in the water. There was a blow up ball and the 4 of us played a game of how many times we could hit the ball before it hit the ground. Our record was 66. After some time, we went back to the room and got ready for dinner. That night, we went to eat at Don Pablo's Mexican Restaurant. It was so good! Jill got 2 gigantic Margaritas that must have put into orbit. Both of us had bottomless tacos. That night, we went back home and immediately hit the treadmill, before relaxing on the screened in porch.
July 6 - We woke up and decided to make this a longer pool day. My dad scouted out the pool and noticed that there was a section of chairs that was almost entirely shaded by trees. We staked out these chairs and literally spent hours there. Jill and I resumed our blow up ball hitting contest and set a 2 person record of 76. That night we went to have dinner at The Melting Pot. This is one of our favorite restaurants. My parents especially love the chocolate fondue at the end. My only complaint is that I wish there was a bottomless plate of stuff to dunk in the chocolate. This was our first encounter with awful traffic. We literally sat in traffic for about an hour. That put a damper on the whole evening. Once we got to The Melting Pot, it was great, but the traffic would be the story for the next 3 days. After eating there, which is more of an experience rather than a meal, we returned to our condo and went for a walk before unwinding with the Yankee game.
July 7 - We started off with breakfast at Perkins. This is one of my favorite restaurants. One time, when I was at St. Bonaventure, I walked to Perkins with my friends and while in was in the Perkins, the temperature dropped some 20-30 degrees and it began snowing. The cup of pop that I stole from there was completely frozen solid by the time that I walked home, as was I with my shorts on. After Perkins we drove to Historic Kissimmee and walked around the downtown area. There was an interesting Farmer's Market set up where a guy was playing musical instruments in ungodly heat. The antique shops must have thought that air conditioning was too modern for them because they were all using fans. I could do all of those people a favor by taking a well lit match to that place. After walking around there, we went back to the pool and promptly got rained on. It was so refreshing though that we stayed in the water. It was not lightning, so there was no risk. That night we went to dinner at Bonefish Grill. At this point, the rain was torential and traffic was absurd. I was struggling to think of 2 days in my life where I had encountered traffic this bad. After a great meal at Bonefish, we went back to the condo and had dessert and coffee before going for a walk.
July 8 - We were fighting the clock with a lot of food in our condo as this was our last full day and we still had a lot of food to eat, so we had a gigantic breakfast at home, then my parents went to the pool, while I stayed behind to watch the shuttle launch. I took stock of this momentus occasion by taking a picture of the television screen with my cell phone as the shuttle was taking off. After this, I walked down to the pool. We were all pretty baked at this point, so dad was physically moving around as many umbrellas as possible to block the sun from us. We noticed just about everyone at this resort was of English decent so our running joke was that we were sitting next to "Cheerio" or "these lads were walking by us". It was pretty funny because my dad would not whisper these phrases. After a few hours at the pool, we went to the Florida Mall and walked around. Dinner was low-key at Ruby Tuesdays and of course traffic was again an issue. They really need to figure that out, especially with as many roads as they have, you would think there would be a way to thin things out, but I guess not. We stopped off for some ice cream/Slurpees, and then went home and began to pack.
July 9 - This was a sad day, because our trip was over. We were going to drive home in one day, so we had to check out, have breakfast/brunch and then leave. We dropped my parents off at the airport around 11, and then met up with Jill's mom and grandfather around 2 to drive back home. It was very stormy that day as we drove by the coast of Florida and into Georgia. By the time we got home, it was around 9:30 and I was very glad because Jill and her grandfather were in the car in front of me and I was driving by myself with nothing but Pearl Jam to keep me company. Once we dropped off Jill's grandfather, we had to drive another 30 minutes to pick up Sammie. I was completely exhausted by that point, probably looking like death warmed over. By the time we got into our neighborhood, I was never more happy to see our house.
Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Who is this girl?
Her name is Suzi Barrett. You may know her from the latest E-Surance (You know the one where she gets into a back and forth with the All-Time Greatest Esurance salesman or whatever he is) or Metamucil (You know the one where she is on an exercise bike balancing a ridiculous amount of activities, one of which includes Metamucil)commercials. Look up her video on YouTube or wherever about why she hates LA and you'll think she's hilarious! I think it's only a matter of time before she's a household name on some sit-com or a star on Comedy Central. She could be up for a SNL gig.
What are you waiting for? Watch the video - Warning though - it's pretty profane, so if you're not into that, go google Radio Disney or the like.
What are you waiting for? Watch the video - Warning though - it's pretty profane, so if you're not into that, go google Radio Disney or the like.
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