My nephew Tommy tied the knot with his girlfriend Mindy this weekend in West Chester, PA. We had a blast getting together with everyone right before the holidays – Ma and Pa were there, and brother Dan, Val, Bailey, Corey, Niki, Tammy and Diane, Uncle Chuck and Aunt Jeanne, Tommy’s friend Colin, etc. – it’s been a long time since that whole group has been in one place. We drove up through awful traffic on Thursday, but Tommy had a worse travel story, missing his plane and doing lots of driving just to make it to his own wedding. But we all arrived safe and sound. While the bridal party had their rehearsal dinner, Andrea and the girls and I and my folks, headed to SuTao, a completely vegan Asian restaurant that had an entire buffet including desserts. We were all in the same nice Holiday Inn hotel Friday night, Dan and I hung out with Corey and the rest of the next generation for a few drinks and an overdue tech talk. Entertaining the wait staff with our antics kept us pretty busy Saturday morning. Then the wedding – downtown West Chester has that quaint charm, and it rolls on for blocks. The Catholic church was a beautiful stone building with gorgeous stained glass windows and an old worn hardwood floor. In between the wedding and the reception, we had a chance to grab a muffin and a coffee/tea/hot chocolate with Uncle Chuck and Aunt Jeanne. The reception was the highlight – on the Greystone Manor grounds – an old English-style manor that is reserved for special occasions. Instead of a large generic banquet hall, the catering took place throughout the manor, in all the nooks and crannies. Hord’erves were everywhere, drinks were served in the colder lower wing, while Andrea and the girls and Bailey and I had the main course next to a massive roaring fire. The caterer made us a special pesto meal with a wonderful glaze. Later there were chocolate-covered strawberries with coffee, and of course dancing. The girls showed off their moves! We did our best swing dancing, and everything else we could think of. We were up late again, ending up at the hotel bar with the younger gang. We had more fun at another hotel breakfast. We’re finally back home now, and we’re exhausted! CONGRATS TOMMY AND MINDY! :>
Category: Daily Life
Reiley’s epic play
Reiley did a great job performing in a 2+ hour epic play at church over the weekend. The play was written by one of the leaders of Reiley’s acting troupe, and spanned the entire history of the Bible, CNN-style. Our friend Keith is another of the leaders and he designed the stage. Creativity flows!
If I ever get any time (ha!) I’ll try to post some video…
Holy Cat and Rat, it’s Finnigan and Hermes!
I can’t keep up. We got Apollo as a friend for Quincy when Orion passed away. Sadly Quincy followed recently. But they lived good long lives for rats. So youngster Apollo needed a buddy of course! The girls and I picked him up at the same PetSmart where we got Apollo – each store only holds one sex to make it easier to avoid babies everywhere. Hermes was the last one left of his litter, poor little shy guy. He’s still smaller than Apollo, so we don’t think he’s from the same litter. Still, chances are good that they’re brothers!
Meanwhile, kittens are everywhere out at Ms. Debbie’s stable. The girls (all THREE of them of course!) fell in love with one orange little fellow in particular. I couldn’t believe they wanted yet another pet – Andrea’s been going crazy keeping up with what we’ve got – so I insisted that if the girls were going to acquire yet another friend they would have to take over our farm first to earn it. And they stepped right up! They did a great job, splitting up all tasks between them – even taking over cleaning up of the worst messes (trust me it’s a daily occurrence around here!). Unfortunately, it wasn’t the safest environment for the kitties at the stable, so my 6-month “prove yourself” schedule got whittled down to 3 months, 1 week, and then 2 days! It’s rough being the heavy when you’re a softy! :P
By now, the kids are still going strong helping run things, and Finnigan is pretty much acclimated to all the other beasties. Life is good. :>
We ran hard for Obama
The whole family dug in and ran hard to help get Obama elected.
Weekend before last: knocked on 90 doors, called 50
Saturday: knocked on 81 doors
Tuesday: knocked on 50+ doors, called 25
Great job crew! I am TIRED. :P The Dobbs are coming over soon. Time to relax and watch the numbers roll in…
Coaster Weekend
Andrea and I are coaster-lovers, and we’ve got two brand-new recruits, Wren and Reiley! These girls rode EVERY COASTER that Busch Gardens Europe in Williamsburg, VA could throw at them! Each of their top 5 coasters is boss enough to have a mascot. Wren was tall enough to ride three of them, and she did! The Loch Ness Monster, The Big Bad Wolf, and Apollo’s Chariot all surpassed our expectations and had us wetting our pants. In addition, Reiley showed nerves of steel tackling the Griffin with Andrea and me – it’s rated as one of the top 5 in the US, with a 4g 205-ft STRAIGHT DROP. We have one left to hit when we return, the Alpengiest. WE ARE READY. :>
Bike route on Gmaps Pedometer
Here’s my current ride. On the ground it’s about 16.34 miles.
Biking by the numbers
Had my best time going home last night…
0:52:52sec, 16.37mi, 18.5 mph avgAND my worst time coming to work this morning…
1:05:32sec, 16.38mi, 14.9 mph avgIt was a cold strong headwind! And of course the hot water was broken at work… brrrrr!
All the biking I’m doing gave me some good numbers from the ABB health screening yesterday (good even for a vegan :> ):
98/60 mmHg bp
137 mg/dL cholesterol
57/76/49 mg/dL tri/ldl/hdl
84 mg/dL glucose
24 kg/m^2 bmi
20.6% body fatSoccer Mini Tournament
Here’s a super-fun drill we tried out yesterday, described via a set of funny emails with my bro Dan…
> Mike,
>
> You pocket dialed me today. That’s why I called you back.
>
> You were playing something with the girls yelling out numbers and colors
> (3, yellow!).
>
> What were you playing??
hahaha! It was Reiley’s soccer practice, we were doing a
“mini-tournament”. I’d been wanting to try it for a while now (ever since
I was taught it in a coaches’ clinic a couple years ago), and with
Reiley’s head coach out of town, it was time.
You line up the girls and boys (it’s coed this year) and they count off,
so everyone has a number. You set up a couple small fields and number
them. Then I have a list of the numbers, and call out random assignments
(“player 1, yellow penny on field 2 – player 2, green penny on field 1 –
player 3, no penny on field 1…” etc.). Everyone goes to their field and
plays a little scrimmage. After about 4 minutes, you call them all in and
go through the numbers. They yell out their scores – 1 point for a goal,
one point for an assist. Then you have a second, third, round… At the
end you can tally up the scores and give a shout out to the top three.
Reiley came in third place!!
CT scan showed tumor growth
I got my semi-annual CT scan on Friday, and Dr. Levine reported that a mucinous layer had expanded from 5mm in the previous scan to 9mm. On the previous scan, he had said I was clean, so it sounds like you have to see some change to really tell what’s going on.
I am sure I looked crestfallen as he delivered the news. His immediate response was “You’re too worried!” He recommended to stick with the schedule, and get another scan in 6 months. Even so, it took me right from “cancer-free” back to “living with cancer”. Fortunately, it’s slow-growing, and over time, there is progress in fighting the disease. For example, when I had my IPHC, there was a Stage I trial to use a newer drug instead of the older standard drug. I opted out, because they didn’t even have a good knowledge of the dosage to use at that time. But now, clinical trials like this Stage II one are using newer drugs for IPHC. There are options for the future. But for now – the battle is back ON! Time to eat right and exercise my butt off. :> And do some more research…
Bareback!
This past weekend soccer was rained out by a tropical storm, so we switched to blueberry pancakes and board games. After a game of Carcasonne (with Andrea as the sneaky victor), the weather cleared up. The girls took me to the stable and I got a turn on Sundance, bareback! Takes a lot of balance! I stuck to trotting. Maybe next time I’ll put a little more speed on. :>