Functional Junk

Tetsudo Otaku

2010-12-10T23:46:00.001-06:00

Two weeks in another world. Someday I'll write everything down. Plus that Olympic stuff too. Time to sort through 1400 pictures!

The Olympics in Vancouver...

2010-02-28T23:45:00.001-06:00

were amazing! Need to write some more detailed posts later!

Run 70 - Half Marathon in Vegas!

2009-12-06T10:03:00.000-06:00

Las vegas Rock-n-Roll Half Marathon
13.1 miles - 2:01:47

Amazing! Raised $5400 for CCFA and nearly reached my goal time of 2 hours. A very tiring run but so much fun. Totally worth it!

Run 69

2009-12-02T18:01:00.001-06:00

Treadmill - 1% slope.
2.0 miles - 16:21

Last run before the big one!

Run 68

2009-11-28T08:58:00.000-06:00

Around the neighborhood.
5.2 miles - 46:01

Tapering continues.

Run 67 - Turkey Trot

2009-11-26T10:32:00.001-06:00

Dallas YMCA Turkey Trot
8.2 miles - 73:59

Slow start due to all of the congestion but a good 9min/mile run despite all of the hills, dogs and strollers.

Run 66

2009-11-23T19:09:00.000-06:00

Around the neighborhood
5.2 miles - 48:21

Still tired from Saturday.

Run 65

2009-11-21T09:06:00.000-06:00

White Rock Lake - group training
12.0 miles - 91:16

The big one! Another trip around White Rock Lake plus an extra 3 miles, just a tad over 9 minutes per mile. This will be my longest run before the half marathon!

Run 64

2009-11-18T19:03:00.000-06:00

Around the neighborhood
4.1 miles - 38:01

Tired and slow today.

Run 63

2009-11-17T19:00:00.000-06:00

Around the neighborhood
5.2 miles - 47:07

Good run today under 9 minutes/mile.

Run 62

2009-11-14T09:57:00.001-06:00

White Rock Lake - group training
10.0 miles - 91:16

Another trip around White Rock Lake plus an extra mile, right at 9 minutes per mile.

Run 61

2009-11-11T18:40:00.000-06:00

Around the neighborhood
4.1 miles - 36:23

Good run today under 9 minutes/mile.

Run 60

2009-11-10T18:39:00.000-06:00

Around the neighborhood
5.2 miles - 47:33

Sunset. Pretty much at my 9 minute pace even though I dogged it for a bit and hard a hard time keeping an even pace.

Run 59

2009-11-07T10:11:00.002-06:00

White Rock Lake - group training
11.5 miles - 102:41

Another trip around White Rock Lake plus an extra 2.5 miles. A new long run! I was on my own this time because we got there a tad late but did manage to keep under 9min/mile. I'm happy with this one considering I ran 35 miles this week and was pretty sore on Friday. Just 1.6 miles away from the half marathon!

Run 58

2009-11-04T18:27:00.000-06:00

Around the neighborhood
4.1 miles - 36:27

Sunset.

Run 57

2009-11-03T19:05:00.000-06:00

Around the neighborhood
6.1 miles - 53:56

Sunset. A pretty nice long run.

Run 56

2009-11-02T18:58:00.000-06:00

Around the neighborhood
4.1 miles - 35:18

First run after sunset. Seemed faster in the darkness.

Run 55 - Double Digits

2009-11-01T09:56:00.001-06:00

Around the neighborhood
10.0 miles - 91:56

Sunny and warm. A new long run. Lots of hills.

Run 54 Where Are You?

2009-10-30T17:38:00.001-05:00

Around the neighborhood
4.0 miles - 35:44

Sunny and warm. Not feeling too bad after the morning garage sale.

Run 53

2009-10-28T18:36:00.000-05:00

Around the neighborhood
4.0 miles - 36:00

Cooler today and a bit tired.

Run 52

2009-10-27T18:50:00.000-05:00

Around the neighborhood
5.1 miles - 43:52

Sunny and warm. A good fast run. My fist mile was in 8:10, a new fast time for the sportband.

Run 51

2009-10-24T08:55:00.001-05:00

White Rock Lake - group training
9.0 miles - 77:17

I made it all the way around the White Rock Lake loop! Running with Nikki was great, especially making it up the big hill by the spillway around mile 5. She kept me moving pretty good and I set a new fast time for 10K in the process (52:58). It was really cool when we started, about 49 degrees but then it didn't take long to get warm. It felt good to finally make the loop without waking. Then I went and bowled two games at the Aerotech breast cancer fundraiser!

Run 50

2009-10-22T18:54:00.001-05:00

Around the neighborhood
4.0 miles - 36:16

The bottom fell out of the temperature this afternoon so it was cloudy, windy and cold for this run.

Run 49

2009-10-20T18:28:00.000-05:00

Around the neighborhood
4.0 miles - 35:58

Sunny and warm agin. Windy again and I felt pretty tired.

Run 48

2009-10-19T18:26:00.000-05:00

Around the neighborhood
5.0 miles - 46:00

Sunny and warm. A good run but very tiring doing this many miles after work. It was also pretty windy.

Curling Week 1 - Poissant 11 v Meyers 1

2009-10-18T22:32:00.001-05:00

First week of curling with Team Poissant. We won the coin toss and had the hammer in the first end and used it to full advantage to take 2. We had a good chance to steal in the second end but a guard slipped into the rings allowing them to hit and stick for 1. In the third end we got things together and took 3 to go ahead 5-1. In the fourth end I had a great draw into the 4-foot that wound up counting and we stole 2 to go up 7-1. The next two ends also resulted in steals after they wrecked on both of their final shots, and we ended up winning 11-1 after six ends.

We have a bye next week so it'll be after Halloween before we get on the ice again.

Run 47

2009-10-17T09:23:00.000-05:00

White Rock Lake - group training
8.2 miles - 71:39

New longest run and a very fast pace for me at this distance: 8:41/mi!

Run 46

2009-10-14T18:40:00.000-05:00

Around the neighborhood
4.0 miles - 36:17

Sunny and warm today for the first time in a while and it slowed me down a bit but I wasn't too far off of yesterday.

Run 45

2009-10-13T18:27:00.000-05:00

Around the neighborhood
4.0 miles - 36:06

Overcast and warmer but wet. The road surface was pretty slick so I had a hard time getting good traction on some stretches. It also started drizzling a bit past the halfway point.

Run 44

2009-10-12T18:36:00.000-05:00

Around the neighborhood
4.0 miles - 35:53

Overcast and cool but damp.

The Sounds @ The House of Blues, Dallas

2009-10-11T23:48:00.001-05:00

Amy and I went to see The Sounds over at the HOB in Dallas tonight after helping set up her office during lunch and then taking DART over to the State Fair for a rain-shortened visit. The first time we saw The Sounds was actually way back in September 2003 at Trees when they were an opening act for another band we were seeing. Was a great show then so we were hopeful for another good one tonight.

We got to the venue just as the first band, Foxy Shazam, was finishing. Semi Precious Weapons was next and they were a total trip. Lots of energy and a base player who spent most of his time laying back on his shoulders kicking his legs up in the air. Plus he was wearing a blanket/poncho thing that seemed like it would be tricky to play guitar in. The lead singer made an on-stage costume change, so we got to see "him" in two pairs of shiny silver ankle boots. Was not expecting the opening acts to be in heels.

After 30 minutes of deafening loud, punishing dance music that made it impossible to talk between bands, The Sounds took the stage with their Swedish New Wave assault. They wasted no time getting everybody into it with their very "danceable" beats and rhythms with hook-heavy choruses. Maja, the swedish blonde lead singer, was simply delectable in her black old school swimsuit, leather jacket and heels, which is rather remarkable footwear given how much she jumped around stage. Not to mention climbing up on the drum riser and crawling down to the front row all while effortlessly carrying along their bouncy tunes that get everybody hopping. The main show ended in a similar fashion to the one a Trees six years ago, with the drummer and two other members of the band doing some crazy Japanese-style drumming on a couple of large electronic drum pads. A great show and amazingly my State Fair root beer and tater twister remained settled nicely despite all of the bouncing and moving to the music!

Run 43

2009-10-10T09:00:00.001-05:00

Around the neighborhood
8.10 miles - 74:02

Overcast and very cool (low 50s) and windy. Plotted out a long course around the neighborhood and it turned out to be a bit hillier than I expected!

Run 42

2009-10-09T18:14:00.000-05:00

Around the neighborhood
3.22 miles - 28:02

Overcast and very cool (low 50s) and windy. Turned out to be one of my faster runs I think because I was able to keep so cool the whole time. The special fabric of the running shirt did keep me warm when first starting out which was nice. My legs were still chilly though.

Run 41

2009-10-08T18:38:00.001-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope
3 miles - 25:43

Back to the treadmill for some more interval training. I was feeling really sore and tired so I cut this one a bit short. I also had to make sure I got home in time for an evening work conference call.

Run 40

2009-10-06T18:22:00.000-05:00

Around the neighborhood
4.0 miles - 37:03

Overcast and cool but very windy and humid. Plus I was feeling pretty tired from yesterday. Still I gutted it out and made it the whole 4 miles.

Run 39

2009-10-05T18:25:00.000-05:00

Around the neighborhood
4.0 miles - 36:03

Overcast and cool for a good run.

Run 38

2009-10-03T09:57:00.000-05:00

White Rock Lake - group training
8.0 miles - 74:04

Another beautiful morning. A new distance record for me and a pretty good time for it! Went counterclockwise around the lake again and over the big hill right before crossing onto the abandoned railroad right of way rght before turning around.

Run 37

2009-10-02T18:34:00.002-05:00

Around the neighborhood
3.1 miles - 27:46

A good 5k around the neighborhood to warm up for the long run Saturday morning. I think I actually went farther due to the Nike sportband calibration being a bit slow.

Run 36

2009-10-01T18:58:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope
5 miles - 45:00

Back to the treadmill for some interval training. The middle 20 minutes was spent alternating between 1 minute fast and 1 minute at a slower pace. I was averaging a much faster pace over the first 4.5 miles but I included the final 5 minutes of slower cool down running into the total to get to 5 miles.

The Get Up Kids @ Granada Theatre, Dallas

2009-09-30T23:54:00.000-05:00

Amy and I went to the big emo show to the reunited Get Up Kids on their first tour in quite some time. It was a great show with lots of energy and a good "best of" setlist. The Granada made for a nice venue, still small enough to be intimate but big enough for a good crowd and a more open feeling than being packed into one of the smaller smokey clubs. I don't think any emo tears were shed but it was a good show and everybody seemed to leave happy.

Setlist (order might be off a tad):

1. Holiday
2. I'm a Loner Dottie, A Rebel... (after the obligatory Deep In The Heart of Texas refrain)
3. Coming Clean
4. The One You Want
5. Valentne
6. Woodson
7. Overdue
8. Keith Case
9. Red Letter Day
10. Off the Wagon
11. No Love
12. Campfire Kansas
13. Holy Roman
14. Mass Pike
15. Action & Action
16. Walking on a Wire

Encore
17. I'll Catch You
18. Close To Me (cover of The Cure)
19. Beer For Breakfast (cover of The Replacements)
20. [Oh Amy] Don't Hate Me
21. Ten Minutes

Run 35

2009-09-29T18:47:00.002-05:00

Around the neighborhood
4.0 miles - 34:57

Less windy today but still fairly cool. The result was a much faster time!

Run 34

2009-09-28T18:39:00.000-05:00

Around the neighborhood
4.0 miles - 37:26

Sunny and windy but fairly nice temperatures. The wind really slowed me down on some sections, particularly when going uphill. But a good run. The Nike Sportband seems to be calibrated pretty well as it matched the length of route I plotted online pretty closely.

Run 33

2009-09-26T09:02:00.000-05:00

White Rock Lake - group training
7.6 miles - 74:34

A beautiful morning. Went the other way around the lake for some variety.

Run 32

2009-09-24T18:20:00.000-05:00

Around the neighborhood
3.1 miles - 26:25

Same course as last week but faster since the weather conditions were nice and cool, ideal really.

I think I've now run over 100 miles since I started keeping track at beginning of August!

Run 31 - Chicago

2009-09-22T06:37:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope
3 miles - 25:34

Early morning run on the treadmill at the Hampton Inn in downtown Chicago for the AREMA Conference before a day of technical sessions. I would have gone running on Lake Michigan but it was still dark out!

Run 30 - Chicago

2009-09-19T17:55:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope
2.5 miles - 21:00

On the treadmill at the Hampton Inn in downtown Chicago for the AREMA Conference squeezed between the end of my committee meeting and a group dinner while watching Washington upset USC.

Run 29

2009-09-17T18:56:00.001-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope
3 miles - 25:37

Very hot and humid in the club today with all of the rain we've been having. Plus I was in a bad spot away from the air conditioner vents.

Run 28

2009-09-15T18:58:00.001-05:00

Around the neighborhood
3.1 miles - 26:58

Same course as yesterday. A bit faster though the sun was out in a few places.

Run 27

2009-09-14T19:22:00.000-05:00

Around the neighborhood
3.1 miles - 27:35

Still raining when I started. Then it stopped and started to get really humid and steamy. It was also pretty windy down some of the streets. Not bad for less than ideal conditions.

Run 26

2009-09-12T10:05:00.001-05:00

White Rock Lake - group training
7.7 miles - 77:11

A new longest run for me! There was a steady rain this morning so I got soaked but at least it was nice and cool. The temperature and constant automatic shower made it feel like I could keep going a lot longer than usual.

Run 25

2009-09-11T20:03:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope
2.33 miles - 20:00

Short run today to get ready for Saturday morning.

Run 24

2009-09-10T18:35:00.001-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope
4 miles - 34:23

Run 23

2009-09-08T18:38:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope
3 miles - 25:24

Took it a bit easy today.

Run 22

2009-09-07T10:26:00.001-05:00

Around the neighborhood
4.1 miles - 41:05

Got started kind of late on Labour Day morning and it had already started to warm up. The sky was clear so the sun was really beating down on the streets without any larger trees to provide shade. On the sunniest part I was really dragging along around mile 3. I think this is why I didn't go as fast as I hoped. It's easier when you have a machine or other runners to help set the pace. I did do the first two miles in 18 minutes, which is right on pace. But still the time passed much quicker than on the treadmill.

Run 21

2009-09-05T09:20:00.002-05:00

White Rock Lake - group training
4.7 miles - 44:15

A great early morning start with a nice breeze coming off of the lake and overcast skies. Made for good running.

Run 20

2009-09-02T18:39:00.001-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope
3 miles - 25:15

Felt pretty tired today after three days running in a row but made it through.

Run 19

2009-09-01T18:29:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope
3 miles - 24:45

Run 18

2009-08-31T22:28:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope
3 miles - 24:59

Run 17

2009-08-27T20:01:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope
3 miles - 24:39

Home again and a new fast time for 3mi!

Run 16 - at THE Gym in Vegas!

2009-08-24T14:59:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope
3 miles - 25:41

Kinda slow but I blame altitude, desert dryness, too much time in the pool that morning and the awesome steak dinner at TENDER the night before.

Run 15

2009-08-21T18:01:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope

3 miles - 24:48

Run 14

2009-08-20T18:58:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope

3 miles - 25:01

...so close!

Sir Paul McCartney at the new Cowboys Stadium in Arlington

2009-08-19T23:59:00.003-05:00

We celebrated Amy's birthday a bit early tonight by heading to the palatial new Cowboys Stadium in Arlington to see Paul McCartney in concert. Although the sound in cavernous stadium is a bit muddy with lots of echoes, and the huge overhead display screen didn't fire up untl the final few songs (not sure if that was intentional or not), Amy was all smiles at the conclusion of the show. This will probably always rank up there as one of the top concerts I've ever been to. He is, after all, one-quarter of The Beatles!

Set List and comments:
1. "Drive My Car" (rocking start)
2. "Jet" (crazy spinning LED sign dude liked this one)
3. "Only Mama Knows"
4. "Flaming Pie"
5. "Got To Get You Into My Life" (ba ba ba bup ba baah...)
6. "Let Me Roll It"/"Foxy Lady" ending (a galloping Hendrix conclusion)
7. "Highway"
8. "All My Loving"
9. "The Long And Winding Road"
10. "My Love"
11. "Blackbird"
12. "Here Today"
13. "Dance Tonight"
14. "Calico Skies"
15. "Mrs Vanderbilt"
16 "It's So Easy" (perfect Buddy Holly cover really got things going)
17. "Eleanor Rigby"
18. "Sing The Changes"
19. "Band On The Run" (rocking!)
20. "Back In The USSR" (furious!)
21. "I'm Down"
22. "Something" (as poignant as can be with a ukulele intro)
23. "I've Got A Feeling"
24. "Paperback Writer" (this was awesome! it is my favorite signing in the shower song)
25. "A Day In The Life"/"Give Peace A Chance"
26. "Let It Be"
27. "Live And Let Die" (epic! full James Bond pyro and fireworks in effect)
28. "Hey Jude" (nah nah naaah...)

Encore 1
29. "Day Tripper" (ripping!)
30. "Lady Madonna" (rollicking!)
31. "I Saw Her Standing There" (maybe the most fun song of the night)

Encore 2
32. "Yesterday" (incredible)
33. "Helter Skelter" (insane!)
34. "Get Back" (seriously chugging)
35. "Sgt. Pepper's Reprise" (a perfect finale)

36. "The End" (well how else would you end it?)

Run 13

2009-08-18T18:06:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope

3 miles - 25:14

Run 12

2009-08-15T11:21:00.001-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope

5 miles - 44:55

Man that was a long haul, especially after running 3 miles the evening before. But I still got it done at less than 9 minutes per mile.

Run 11

2009-08-14T18:20:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope

3 miles - 25:30

Team Challenge - Half Marathon in Vegas!

2009-08-13T23:51:00.003-05:00

Well it is official. We're signed up to run a the Rock-n-Roll Las Vegas half marathon in December to raise money for the Crohn's and Colitis Foundation of America (aka the charity for my illness).

What better way to spend our first anniversary than to run 13.1 miles. In Vegas. Around the Vegas sign and up and down the strip past all the big casinos and hotels. For the cause that hasn't the biggest impact on my life.

Fundraising will be tough but it'll be an awesome experience!

Run 10 - Ooops

2009-08-12T18:46:00.002-05:00

I was about 16 miles into my run tonight when the treadmill suddenly came to a dead stop and the display went completely blank. A I catapulted forward toward the handles at the front of the machine, I noticed that the treadmills on either side of me had ground to halt as well with their users equally disturbed. I guess we must have blown a breaker or something as they were the only three machines that seemed to be having any difficulty.

Because of the interruption and the need t switch to a different treadmill halfway through my run, I'm not sure exactly how far I ran in total or how long it took. BY the pace I was going and what I remember the last time I looked at the distance covered on the first treadmill, I probably ran a bit over 3 miles in right around 26 minutes.

Run 9

2009-08-10T18:04:00.001-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope

3 miles - 25:34

Run 8 - full throttle in train-speak

2009-08-08T14:53:00.004-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope

4 miles - 35:44

A new personal best. Just a shade under 9 minutes per mile over that distance. I didn't give it much of a kick at the end so I could probably do it faster.

Then I slowed the treadmill down a bit and ran another half miles, finishing 4.5 miles in 39:33. That's about one-third of the way to a half-marathon!

Run 7

2009-08-06T19:19:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope

3 miles - 25:44

Run 6

2009-08-05T20:37:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope

3 miles - 25:53

Run 5

2009-08-03T19:59:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope

3 miles - 26:19

Run 4

2009-08-01T11:28:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope

4 miles - 36:26

I'm pretty sure this is the longest run I've ever done.

Run 3

2009-07-31T20:18:00.001-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope

3 miles - 26:28

Run 2

2009-07-29T18:41:00.000-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope

3 miles - 26:32

unexpected

2009-07-28T18:45:00.002-05:00

I discovered today that a girl I went to junior high and high school with passed away a few days ago. It is quite shocking as it is so unexpected. She was one of my Facebook friends and I had talked to her a couple of times over the past year, the last time being a few months ago when she was pulled over by by a police officer who happened to be a guy we went to school with. It was quite the funny story. Her Facebook page has now turned into a memorial of sorts, with dozens of my old classmates posting their remembrances. The crazy thing is that you can scroll down and still see her last few status posts. She was really excited about catching a fish while fishing last week but said she was really tired and not feeling so well. The next day she passed away suddenly due to a blood clot in her lung. It's just really crazy to think about it like that, especially since she was really active and always playing on several sports teams. So sudden. Rest in peace.

A start...

2009-07-27T18:37:00.001-05:00

Treadmill - 1% slope

3 miles - 27:36

CNN Shows Train Enthusiasts Some Respect

2009-05-11T12:54:00.003-05:00

A great article from CNN on the "railfan" hobby and why us train geeks have this particular fascination.

I sometimes wonder where I would be right now if it were not for this hobby. Would I still be in Manitoba designing highways or would I even be a civil engineer at all?

Wedding Adventure - Day 12 - Vegas to DFW

2008-12-02T23:07:00.000-06:00

Running on Hawaii time, we didn’t get up very early at the Hard Rock. It is too bad we didn’t get to spend more time in the room with the 11Am check-out. Maybe we’ll have to stay here on a future visit.

Since it was lunch in Vegas by the time we got our day started, we ate at the Pink Taco in the Hard Rock (not to be confused with Fuzzy’s Taco in Fort Worth by TCU). My enchiladas were really good.

After lunch we took a cab down to the strip and tried our luck at a few tables. Neither O’Sheas or the Imperial Palace were very good to us on this particular trip. We walked through the Forum Shops and picked up some gourmet chocolates at Vosages. Then we headed down the strip to Coca-Cola World to try the “Around the World” soft drink sampler tray. The tray contains 16 different carbonated and non-carbonated Coke products from around the world. Some of them are very good while some of them are just awful. If you are ever in Italy, do not order a Beverly. Drink the wine instead.

It was then time to retrieve our bags from the Hard Rock and head to the airport for our US Airways flight home. The flight was not very busy and uneventful. We arrived back at DFW airport where Amy’s parents picked us up, eager to hear of our adventures.

After so much planning for so long, everything seemed to go just as we planned it. A perfect wedding and vacation all in one!

Wedding Adventure - Day 11 - Hawaii to Vegas

2008-12-01T23:51:00.000-06:00

Today we had to say goodbye to our room at Turtle Bay and our trusty cute little red Jeep. Leaving the hotel, we made one last stop at Pahipahi’alua Beach on Kawela Bay to scoop up some sand for safe keeping and display at home with the octopus. We stopped at the bakery in Haleiwa to pick up lunch and ate it at the beach park. We then made the drive across the island to the Honolulu airport.

Our flight left Honolulu at 4PM local time and was much faster going back to Vegas, at just over 5 hours. The Hawaiian Airlines 767 was not quite as nice inside as the one on the way out, but the flight still went by quickly while we listened to music and watched movies on our iPod. We were given turkey croissantwiches to eat and they were pretty good.

We arrived back in Vegas with all of our baggage and grabbed a cab to the Hard Rock Hotel right about midnight. It was a pretty deserted Monday night, but the room was very cool and modern. Overall the place has a pretty rocking vibe with the constant loud tunes in the casino and tons of rock and roll memorabilia everywhere. The entire wall of Elvis stuff is very cool. After grabbing some snacks from the 24-hours store off the casino, we crashed for the night.

Wedding Adventure - Day 10 - Hawaii

2008-11-30T23:39:00.000-06:00

Our last full day in Hawaii started off with a trip to the spa at Turtle Bay. This was quite an adventure for me as I’d never been to a spa before. After getting changed into robes we were escorted out to a little thatch-roof hut right beside the ocean for a very relaxing couples massage. The sound of the waves crashing ashore made it that much more enjoyable. After the massage we both had traditional pineapple pedicures. The process involved numerous steps, including soaking in warm coconut milk and scrubbing our feet and legs with red Hawaiian sea salt, (that part didn’t feel too good on my gashed up toes from surfing). They then poured honey over our feet and legs. This was followed by lots of crushed pineapple. Next they wrapped our legs up in Ti leaves and hot towels and let us sit for a good ten minutes sipping cucumber water. Cucumber water tastes awful but we just had the most relaxing massage ever so we didn’t care. After unwrapping our legs and feet and sealing everything with aloe, they massaged our feet and hands. After all that pampering we practically floated out of the spa.

During the afternoon we went to the Dole Plantation, the home of Dole Pineapple in Hawaii. I learned a few things here. The first was that pineapples are not native to Hawaii. They are actually native to Brazil and South America and we brought to Hawaii in the 1700s when a Spanish ship happened to wreck on the island. The second was that pineapples don’t grow from tress but instead grow on little spikey plants that look the top of a pineapple. Each plant produces three pineapples. Two are eaten/sold while the third is used for replanting.

There are many things to do at the Dole Plantation. We figured that the pineapple maze would be a bit muddy but we did ride the little train through the pineapple fields known as the Pineapple Express. We happened to catch the train boarding at 4:20. Yes, we rode the 4:20 Pineapple Express. We’ll never be the same.

The plantation has a huge souvenir shop and snack bar serving soft serve pineapple ice cream. It’s really tasty and makes a good float when combined with Sprite.

After the sunset on us at Dole, we headed back to Haleiwa. Tried of the hotel offerings, we wanted to eat at a local place in town. With the surf contest nearby at Sunset Beach, most of the seafood places were crowded and Amy had pretty much had her fill of fish (insert Futurama penguin joke), so we wound up at Pizza Bob’s. Pizza Bobs actually dated to the 1970s and was the fist pizza place on the North Shore, serving generations of hungry surfers since. Our pizza and cheese sticks were very good and Amy recommends the Longboard beer to anybody going to Hawaii (little did we know you can also get it at Kroger at home). It was fun and different, and a little less expensive than everything at the hotel.

Wedding Adventure - Day 9 - Hawaii

2008-11-29T23:14:00.000-06:00

Saturday morning we awoke crashing waves. The swell had peaked out overnight and although the waves were still big, the front had moved in and along with it, the wind had picked up, blowing most of the waves apart, making for tough surfing conditions. A Coast Guard airplane was still flying along the beach looking for the missing surfer. We later found out that he had been washed down the shore to a different beach where he went home safely without telling any of the friends he was out surfing with and were left wondering when he didn’t show on the beach at the end of the day.

With the big waves rolling in, the surfing contest at Sunset Beach was resuming this morning and we decided to go watch. The contest is the second jewel of the Van’s Triple Crown of Surfing, held every year in Hawaii as the final three stops of the world pro surfing tour. Yes, such things exist on ESPN2 when nothing else is on. The first jewel was held at Haleiwa a few weeks prior and the third jewel would be held at Pipeline at the beginning of December. The contests are scheduled over a two-week span, but the contest is only staged on days with good surfing conditions. Friday was perfect with big waves and nice weather while today things were getting a bit choppy.

Since we were arriving at the contest from the Turtle Bay end and not from the Haleiwa end (where everybody from Honolulu driving up for the day would be coming from) and there is only one road along the North Shore, we managed to find a good close parking spot about a ten-minute walk from Sunset Beach. We found a nice spot in the crowd on the beach and settled in to watch the pro surfers tackle waves in the 15 to 20-foot range. Every few minutes, a monster set would plow through the line-up, sending the surfers paddling out f the way and those sitting closest to the water scurrying as the huge waves eventually crashed ashore. The crazy accent of the PA announcer made this whole experience enjoyable and they did a good job of explaining how everything worked between the 20 minute score heats.

Unfortunately, the clouds rolled in and the rain started to come pouring down. It let up once, but the second time appeared to be sticking around for a while. Since the rain decreased visibility to the point where it was hard to see any of the surfing action, we decided to go back to the hotel where we spent the remainder of the rainy afternoon in our hotel room reading and going through all of the wedding photos that we had already received as prints.

For dinner (on the recommendation of Hurricane Bob a few days earlier) we dashed between the raindrops and went to Lei Lei’s, located in the clubhouse of the golf course at Turtle Bay. Another fabulous meal, I had the pork shop while Amy had fresh ahi tuna again.

Wedding Adventure - Day 8 - Hawaii

2008-11-28T23:52:00.001-06:00

We awoke this morning to find that the ocean outside had changed overnight. The waves had grown much bigger as front started to push down from Alaska. When we arrived, the waves were in the 5 to 12-foot range. They were predicting waves in the 15 to 20-foot range by the end of the day, with the odd waves possible reaching 25 feet!

The day before I had booked a surf lesson in order to fulfill my dream or surfing on the North Shore. Chance, my guide from the Hans Hedeman Surf School located in the Turtle Bay resort, helped me paddle out at Pau’ena Point where I managed to get up on a couple 3 to 5-foot waves for a few short seconds each. It was a lot of fun and a triumph considering my physical condistion and that a year ago my illness almost had me in the hospital. Even if I had been in shape, this was considerably more diificult than my last surfing experience at Santa Monica in California. There I managed to get a couple good rides on some slow rolling waves over a shallow sandy bottom. Here the waves were much bigger and steeper, the current a lot stronger, and the bottom covered in rocks and reef. I did hit the bottom once with my foot and scraped up my toes pretty bad. Still, I had an absolute blast out there even though I wound up dead tired. At the time I was surfing, the air temperature was 72 degrees and the water temperature was 74 degrees. With these nearly perfect conditions I didn’t even need to wear a wetsuit. I was able to wear my usual swim trunks and a rash guard shirt. Even though Pau’ena has sheltered surf for beginners, during the lesson you could tell that the waves were getting bigger and more and more people were paddling out. At some of the more open surfing spots, the waves were getting close to forecast size and it was becoming the biggest and best day of the surf season so far. After my surfing we triumph we celebrated with some more Matsumoto’s shave ice! I had lime this time and it was also good.

After lunch we headed for the more sheltered beach at Turtle Bay (Kuilima Cove) that still had some nice crashing waves. Amy and I stashed our stuff on the beach and went for a swim. The water was shallow enough that you could swim out to the first reef. Normally during the winter on the North Shore the water is too stirred up to be clear enough for good snorkeling, but standing in the shallow water over the reef, you could look down and see tropical fish swimming around your ankles. It was very cool.

At one point I was trying to get on the reef by stepping on some rocks under the water. The “rock” kept sort of moving away from me. Then I looked down and noticed that the rock had fins and a shell pattern on it. I was actually trying to step on a sea turtle! It kind of freaked me out and I started treading backwards away from it, but it seemed to hardly notice and swam away on its own.

After swimming we hung out on the balcony watching the steady lineup of surfers paddling out Kuilima, the surfing spot right next to the hotel. A few surfers were even more adventurous, going for some tow-in surfing on the outer-outer-outer reef which with the big swells was breaking nicely over 15 feet.

We walked down to sit on the reef and rocks while watching the sunset. It was a spectacular view with the surfers riding waves in front of the setting sun; something right out of “The Endless Summer”. It seemed like they were going to keep going to see who could last the longest into the rapidly adding light when Coast Guard helicopters started to fly up and down the North Shore with their spotlights shining down on the waves. This got the last few holdouts into shore pretty quick.

We later learned that a number of surfers had to be pulled from the waves via helicopter that day. At dusk, one surfer was reported missing when he didn’t rejoin his friends on shore and was the subject of the intense helicopter search.

For dinner we elected to eat at the Bayside Café, the restaurant and sports bar in the hotel. The problem with a sports bar in Hawaii is that because of the time change, by the time dinner rolls around, most of the games are over. The Dallas Mavericks happened to be playing the Lakers in LA, so what would usually be a late-night matchup made for good dinner entertainment since it was too dark out to enjoy the view of the ocean out the windows. After the long day swimming in the ocean and battling waves, Amy had a burger and fries and I had pizza.

Wedding Adventure - Day 7 - Hawaii

2008-11-27T23:15:00.000-06:00

We decided to spend Thanksgiving driving around the island since we figured it wouldn’t be too busy. Apparently the local Honda clubs had the same idea as their were dozens of little ricer Civics and the like driving along the North Shore as we headed towards Haleiwa. We drove through town and through Walalua (home of the soda works and some great root beer) to Mokule’ia Beach Park. We walked in the sand for a bit and took in the view (and watched some skydivers at the nearby Dillingham Airfield) before moving down the road to Army Beach for a few minutes.

We had the goal of reaching Ka’ena Point which is the westernmost point on Oahu and is famous for having some of the largest known waves in the world. However, the paved road ends about two miles from the point and only a rough dirt trail leads the rest of the way. We put the Jeep into 4-wheel drive and headed down the very rough and irregular trail. We had to go very slow since there were all sorts of ruts and holes in the road, and our rental Jeep, not intended for off-road use (explicitly forbidden in the rental argreement), wasn’t equipped with good all-terrain tires. It was such slow going that after several hundred yards we pulled off the trail to pose the Jeep overlooking the crashing sea. It made for a great picture and although I’m sure the view from the point is spectacular, it wasn’t worth the effort and time.

We got back in the Jeep and drove down to the south shore and through Honolulu. We took H3 up into the ridge separating the south and east coasts and through a long tunnel. The tunnel popped us out high above Kane’ohe on the east shore of Oahu. We wound down through a few short tunnels before we were at sea level and could see the road coming out of the tunnel high above us. Quite the feat of engineering.

We stopped for lunch at Kualoa Park on Kualoa Point on the east shore. The park was very nice with many families out having Thanksgiving picnics. We grabbed a bench and had a lunch of sandwiches and leftover Hawaiian pizza. Several cardinals flitted by to enjoy our leftover crusts. We walked along the beach that was sheltered by Mokoli’I Island (aka Chinaman’s Hat) and like all the others, it was picture perfect and not very crowded.

After lunch we continued on to Kahana Beach which is near Kauhi’makaokalani (aka Crouching Lion Rock). It was also very pretty, a beautiful sheltered horseshoe bay.

Our final stop was at the Foodland in La’ie where we bought some beach towels and reef walkers so we could make better use of the beautiful beaches.

After another sunset from the balcony, we decided to order room service instead of going to the somewhat pricey Thanksgiving buffet. I had the spaghetti and meatballs again while Amy opted for the Ahi Tuna. We spent the evening reading in the room while the waves grew bigger and bigger in size outside. It was a very relaxing Thanksgiving.

Wedding Adventure - Day 6 - Hawaii

2008-11-26T23:51:00.001-06:00

One advantage of the time change (four hours from DFW) was that we were up early on Wednesday morning for breakfast. The vacation package we booked with the hotel included air from Vegas, the rental Jeep, the room and the breakfast buffet each morning. Breakfast was always scrumptious with an array of strange fruits available. Who knew that starfruits actually grew like that? The had a selections of juices, cereal, eggs to order, toast, rolls, bagels, and an option of pancakes, waffles and french toast that rotated each day. They also had a section of strange breakfast seafood that seemed to cater to the many Japanese and other Asian guests.

Our first stop today was to drive down to Haleiwa (or Haleiwa-town as the locals say) to go to the North Shore Surf Museum. The North Shore is famous in surfing circles to being home to some of the biggest, most consistent waves. Each winter, storms in the bearing sea create huge ocean swells that race across the ocean until the hit the warm water and air of Hawaii where they rise up into monster waves that challenge the best surfers in the world at spots such as Pipeline, as made famous by the Chantay’s instrumental rocker. It is also mentioned in the songs “Ride The Wild Surf” by the Rip Chords (and the movie of the same name) and ‘Hawaii” by the Beach Boys as well as being the setting for the movie “Big Wednesday”, is featured in the classic “The Endless Summer” and the documentary “Riding Giants”. In fact, my desire to travel here stems from the terrible 80s movie “The North Shore” that I saw a few times on HBO or Showtime in hotels while on vacation with my parents one year in the late 80s. The surf museum included memorabilia and surfboards from a who’s-who of the surfing world. The museum is run by Hurricane Bob, who was stationed in Hawaii with the Air Force starting in the 1950’s. His job was to fly old surplus second world war bombers into the eyes of Pacific hurricanes to study them and help track them before satellite weather technology became widespread. He had a wealth of studies, including some about friends who flew spy missions over the Soviet Union during the cold war and never returned. Well into his 70’s, though he doesn’t even look 50, he’s an avid surfer and is the national champion for his age bracket. We purchased a few souvenirs and cards and also picked up a coffee table book on Haleiwa (since I’m a sucker for coffee table books). Right as we were purchasing it, one of the co-authors happened to walk in to visit with Bob, so he signed our copy.

Next to the surf museum was a glass shop and a cool blown glass octopus in the window caught our eye. Since Amy has a bit of thing for squid and octopi, we went in to check them out. Since they guaranteed we could get it home without it breaking if we carried it on the plane, we decided to purchase one. The one we selected is light blue with dark blue/purple spots. Apparently it is patterned after a species native to Australia that has a very deadly sting/venom that is lethal to humans as there is no known antidote.

After doing some shopping we grabbed lunch. Amy had a turkey sandwich from a bakery in town while I had a couple slices of pizza from the restaurant next door. Then it was time to go to Matsumoto’s general store for their world famous shave ice. I first learned of the place while watching a PBS documentary called “An Ice Cream Show” back in high school. I’ve been to a few of the places featured on the show, and since this was just a few miles from our hotel, it was a must while we were in Hawaii. The shave ice comes in dozens of flavors and with several different options. You can get plain shave ice, which is basically a snow cone or you can get shave ice on top of ice cream, which is the option we selected. Then you can get it “with beans”. The beans are Japanese Aoki beans that have been boiled in sugar. Amy had her orange shave ice with ice cream and the beans while I had my root beer shave ice with only the ice cream. She said that the beans were very weird, both in terms of taste and texture. The final option is to have your shave ice topped with condensed milk. We left that to the more adventurous but it seemed like there was a large contingent who preferred theirs with the condensed milk and the beans.

We headed out of Haleiwa with the aim of stopping at a beach that looked nice. Well, they all look nice. We chose to stop at Laniakea Beach and discovered that two sea turtles were up on the beach sunning themselves. Although cute and oblivious to all the tourists crowded around, the turtles were guarded by a marine biologist who placed a rope around them to give them some space. We looked at the turtles and dipped our feet in the Pacific while watching the surfers on the growing waves at Laniakea and Hultin’s.

Leaving the turtles behind and again on our way back to the hotel, we stopped at the Waimea Bay Foodland store for some groceries. The prices of everything are a bit of a shock but if you just remind yourself that you are on vacation in Hawaii they are not too bad. Since it was the day before Thanksgiving it was rather busy with last minute shoppers. We also stopped at a roadside stand to buy a fresh pineapple from a lady wielding a rather scary looking knife.

After watching the sun set from our balcony, we had dinner in the Palm Terrace restaurant in the hotel. I had a nice big steak dinner while Amy had one of the local fish species. Both were very good.

Wedding Adventure - Day 5 - Vegas to Hawaii

2008-11-25T23:05:00.000-06:00

This morning we had to say goodbye to our Vista Suite and experience with how the other half lives. Still we were excited as this meant we were on our way to Hawaii!

Checking out went smoothly and we were pleasantly surprised to discover that the hotel had completely comped one of our nights in the Vista Suite instead of just putting the small allowance that was part of the wedding package towards it. That was probably our biggest win in Vegas right there!

The flight from Vegas left mid-morning and we spent about 6 hours on the Hawaiian Airlines 767 before landing in Honolulu. The flight was long but went rather fast. I think my favorite part (besides landing and getting off the plane of course) was when we pushed back from the gate and they started playing “Hawaii Five-O” by The Ventures over the intercom. It really got me in the Hawaii mood. On approach to Honolulu we flew over Pearl Harbor and saw the Arizona Memorial.

All of our bags made it to Honolulu on the same flight and we made our way to the rental car center. Going outside, the air was such a change from Vegas: humid and very fragrant, much like a flowery shower spray. It rained and then became sunny twice while I was filling out the rental paperwork. Our rental car was a very cool bright red Jeep Wrangler convertible 4x4! It was trick to get all of our luggage into it with the small trunk area but we managed and headed off across the island of Oahu to the famed North Shore.

The Tuesday afternoon pre-Thanksgiving traffic was pretty heavy and the frequent rain slowed things down. However, as we got further outside Honolulu, the interstate traffic cleared up. Coming into the little town of Haliewa, we came over a rise to our first glimpse of the ocean on the north shore with an endless parade of waves stretching to the horizon. The beaches looked gorgeous and the surfers (and their old VW buses) were out in force as we drove along the shore to our resort hotel, Turtle Bay, located on Kahuku Point, the northernmost point on the island of Oahu.

You know that the weather is going to be nice when the hotel lobby doesn’t have any doors. Turtle Bay, famed for its setting amongst the undeveloped fields of the still rural North Shore is a sharp contrast to the Waikiki beachfront crowded with high-rise hotels. It was featured in the movie ‘Forgetting Sarah Marshall” but as always, some Hollywood liberties left us not knowing exactly what to expect. Our room was one the 4th floor on the west side of the part of the hotel that juts out into the ocean, with a balcony perfect for watching sunsets. We were very lucky again!

After taking a short walk around the grounds we watched the sun set from our balcony and ordered room service. I had spaghetti and meatballs while Amy had Hawaiian pizza. Both were very good. With a second two-hour time change and the long flight dragging on us, we drifted off to sleep pretty early in the evening as darkness enveloped the waves crashing onto the reef outside the balcony.

Wedding Adventure - Day 4 - Vegas

2008-11-24T23:37:00.001-06:00

“The morning after” began around 8 when room service pushed a breakfast cart into the main living room of the suite. The breakfast was included as part of our package and we pushed the cart over by the windows so we could look down on the busy casinos while we ate a feast of toast, steak, eggs, sausage and hashbrowns. It also came with a huge fruit plate that we ended up picking on all day long. We also had plenty of leftover cake to tempt us!

After breakfast we got back into our wedding gear and met my parents downstairs so we could take a couple of pictures of us standing in front of the Las Vegas sign, just like our cake topper. We didn’t factor on the sign being so blinding and shining right into our eyes, but the pictures we took with sunglasses turned out great. Well worth the effort!

After taking pictures, I hurriedly packed my tux up so that my parents could drop it at the Bell Desk for pick up by Tuxedo Junction. While my parents were taking care of that, we headed off to the photo place for 11AM to go through our wedding pictures and pick out the prints that were included in our package.

Going through all of the wedding pictures doesn’t seem like something you should be doing the day after a Vegas wedding, but such is the way the world of digital photography and Vegas wedding marketing works. The couple ahead of us was taking forever to make their choices, with both sets of parents in the office as well going back and forth between two identical looking prints. Finally it was our turn to head into the back room, much like we were going to buy a new car. This is where the slick marketing began as they already had a few framed prints of us sitting out and had a slideshow of the best images already prepared and ready to roll. Since we really wanted to go have fun, visit with relatives and friends and gamble instead of selecting 44 images from the over 200 options, we elected to just buy the rights to all of the pictures along with an additional selection of enlargements. Amy was happy with the deal and so was I.

After the photography place and a snacking lunch, we started packing up the suite. Rodney and Stephanie volunteered to drive a lot of the stuff we shipped out and wanted to keep back for us, so they helped us pack and we carted everything down to their room where they helped us drink the bottle of champagne that came with our wedding package before going to play slots for a while. Finally, the work was done and we could start to relax and enjoy our wedding experience and vacation.

With Amy’s family on planes back to Texas, my parents off to see the early Beatles Love show at the Mirage and Rodeny and Stephanie going to the later showing on the Beatles Love, we had the evening to ourselves.

A fancy dinner for two at Mandalay Bay was also included in our wedding package. It was originally slated for the Asian-fusion Shanghai Lily but at the last minute was switched to the French restaurant Fleur-de-Lys. We dressed up all fancy for the occasion and once seated, were told that our dinner included an appetizer, entrée and dessert along with a wine pairing for each. Although I know it is a serious faux pas to turn down the wine in a French restaurant, I didn’t want it to go to waste and our waitress had to go out into the casino to get me a Sierra Mist.

The dinner started with a pre-appetizer consisting of a tiny bite of a white fish over a tiny dollop of mashed potatoes with a few other fancy ingredients thrown in. I could tell this was not going to be an ordinary dinner. It seemed like we were on iron Chef as they had to explain each item to us along with what was in it. For appetizers, Amy had the tartare with a tiny quail egg on top while I had veal ravioli. Both were fantastic. For the entrée, Amy had some sort of fancy dish with ahi tuna while I opted for the Fleur Burger, that, listed at $85 on the menu, would eb the most expensive burger and fries I’ve ever had. The burger was made from Kobe beef that just melted in my mouth and was topped with Foie Gras and soaked in truffle oil. The fries were made from fingerling potatoes and came with a small cup of truffle oil to dip them in. It was simply fantastic. For dessert, Amy had a chocolate soufflé with mocha ice cream while I had a combo consisting of three parts: a miniature peanut butter milkshake, a little chocolate banana volcano cake, and some vanilla ice cream on a bit of chocolate dipped ice cream with crunchy carmel and peanut butter crumbled over top. Again, it was incredibly good. They then brought out a plate of little petit-fors to snack on and conclude the meal. It was very nice to see that the meal, coming in at nearly $300, was comped as part of the wedding package.

After dinner, we tried our luck in the casino a bit before going to the Fantasy show at the Luxor next door. It was very entertaining but I think we enjoyed the X show at the Flamingo a bit more on one of our previous visits. Still, not a bad way to start married life!

Weddind Adventure - Day 3 - THE Day!

2008-11-23T23:59:00.000-06:00

The alarm went off early and I don’t even think I really woke up as Amy went off to get her hair and makeup done and do the bride thing. Thus I was left to my own devices on the morning of the wedding. I had a lot of things to keep me busy, however, from setting up the candy bar to placing the cake toppers. The grooms cake had a surprise cake topper that we had been keeping secret from everybody. After we got engaged, I somehow convinced Amy that we should have a little Lego bride and groom on top of one of the cakes since Lego was a big part of my childhood and a big reason why I’m a civil engineer. We found a person in England who sells little bride and groom kits on eBay and ordered one from her. She even customized the bride’s hair and other details as requested. Not being one to leave anything Lego alone, I added a few more details from some Lego I happened to have stashed away, and swapped the little groom’s flat plastic hair with some spikey brown hair from a Spider-Man set (Amy thought about giving the bride the Mary-Jane hair but it seemed a bit too orange and a bit too volumous at the time). Then, by pure chance, on a model train site I happened to find a little scale replica of the Las Vegas sign that actually lit up and flashed just like the real one. It was perfectly sized to serve as a base for our little Lego couple, and Amy and I wound up with the, in our opinion, the coolest little Vegas groom’s cake topper ever.

The sign and Lego people were to be placed on the groom’s cake, which was a log-style cake from the Jeanne’s bakery in Winnipeg. I decided to place the topper at one end of the cake such that it looked like the couple was about to walk down an aisle of little icing flowers. To keep the sign, with it’s somewhat heavy base containing a few AAA batteries, from sinking into the cake, I built a pile foundation out of lollipop/cookie baking sticks from Michael’s driven into the cake. Always an engineer you know…

After completing a bunch of these little tasks I got dressed up and walked down to the wedding chapel. A few of my relatives were already waiting outside, so out popped all of the cameras. Amy’s brother had rented an Elvis costume for the wedding, and when he emerged from the chapel dressing room in his get-up, the flashbulbs really started to pop. I wasn’t too sure about this idea at first, but the costume was a really high-quality one with all of the accessories, so it came off with the right tongue-in-cheekiness without looking cheap. It certainly added a little something extra to our Vegas wedding!

As the time for the wedding drew near, Amy’s grandfather was nowhere to be found. Apparently an improperly set hotel room clock had him running a bit behind, but he zipped into the chapel on his scooter right before 11 AM as the pianist was finishing up the last of the five songs we had selected to be played while the guests were being seated: “Going to the Chapel”, “Wonderful Tonight” by Eric Clapton, the traditional Hawaiian Wedding Song in honor of our honeymoon destination, and two by The Beatles (of course) “I Will” and “In My Life”. These things are pretty important when an audio engineer is waiting in the bride’s room.

Then it was my turn to walk into the chapel. Since there were no other members in our wedding party, I had to stand up there alone while the pianist went through the Sinatra classic “I’ve Got You Under My Skin”. Very Vegas but a rather long song when you are just standing up there with nothing to do. I imagine I looked rather concerned but I was very happy at the time. It was nice to see that some of my friends from the U of I had actually made it to the wedding as I hadn’t seen them yet in Vegas.

Then Amy walked down the aisle, looking fantastic in her Vegas wedding cocktail party dress in white with green trim, complete with pearls and big green heels. The ceremony went quickly and had a few moment of slick Vegas production, like when the minister just happened to hold the rings off to the side so the photographer could snap a picture of them overlapping in his hand. Thanks to my trembling hands, I had a somewhat difficult time getting Amy’s ring on her finger, drawing some chuckles from the crowd. Amazingly, without any tears from either one of us, it was time for that first kiss and the happy walk out of the chapel with the photographer snapping away. Just Married!

Then it was right back into the chapel for pictures with all of the immediate family in all of the various permutations and combinations. Then we took a couple with all of the wedding guests up front with us. We didn’t know if they would work but they wound up turning out great!

The guests were released to the casino as we embarked with the photographer on our hour-long wedding photo safari around the Mandalay Bay grounds. He took some classic poses in the chapel and then some more fun ones around the pool. He also took a bunch near the arches and waterfalls that they have in front of the hotel but most people don’t even know are there. We even had some done where we are playing slots in the casino. Any Amy managed to stay in her heels the whole time without switching to the green Converse. The photographer took over 200 pictures and we look cute in every one of them! Look at me… look into the distance… look at each other… a little kiss now… All those seasons of America’s Next Top Model finally paid off.

We had a few minutes to race upstairs to put a few things away before heading to Café Giorgio in Mandalay Place for our wedding luncheon at 1PM. We had one of the small banquet rooms in the rear of the restaurant to ourselves, with four tables of guests (26 guests total) and a little sweetheart table for us to sit at. The menu included:

House Salad
Choice of: Butternut Squash Ravioli with wild mushrooms, garlic, basil and fresh tomatoes or Spaghetti with meat sauce
Choice of: Flattened Chicken in a garlic parsley sauce or Pink Snapper served with a lemon caper sauce
Tiramisu

By all accounts the food was excellent and left our guests stuffed even before the cake party. A funny moment came when my Canadian relatives began to tinkle their glasses with their forks and look in our direction. I had been concerned about this cultural misunderstanding as I had never seen this done at any of Amy’s friend’s wedding we had been to previously and I guess it is just a bigger deal in Canada. Hearing the tinkling, Amy turns to me and asks me if they want me to make a speech. I had to tell her that they wanted us to stand up and kiss! So we rather awkwardly kissed as most of Amy’s family was expecting us to give a speech as well. Everybody caught on for the next round of glass tinkling and we did a much better job.

After lunch everybody did some shopping or found a slot machine while we raced up to the suite to finish preparations. I made five or six trips to the ice machine to fill the drink buckets while Amy got a few more things in place. It was a mad flurry of activity as Amy turned an extra bouquet into a centerpiece. She was going to put some flowers on top of the cake, but with Stephanie’s concern that the white orchids might be toxic, we elected not to. Even without the flowers, the cake looked fantastic with all of the delicate scroll work and beading around each of the three layers to hold the green ribbon in place. We decorated the top with a little silver “A&T” letter set. However, for those who walked behind the cake, the topper read “T&A” with a backwards ampersand. Such is life.

With our guests beating down the door for a few minutes around 4PM, it was finally time to welcome them into our Cake Party in the swanky vista suite. As the guests entered they were greeted by the vision of the bride’s cake in the place of honor with the Vegas strip stretching out behind it, just as we had envisioned almost a year before. It certainly drew many Ooohs and Aaaahs from our family and friends. They set about exploring the suite and hitting the candy bar that included bins of gummi slot machine cherries, red gummi coins, mint truffle Hershey kisses, lego brick sweettart candy, mints in poker suit wrappers, chocolate poker chips, red gummi dice, Laura Secord chocolate cigars from Canada and green and white M&Ms. The M&Ms were customized with “Amy & Tyler”, “November 23 2008”, “Maybe in Legoland”, and “You’re Mine” written on various ones. We also spent a lot of time organzizing a playlist for the party, combining Vegas classics with songs that have personal importance to us or just seemed very wedding appropriate. It was quite the eclectic mix but perfect for us.

After the sun set and with the glittering strip as a backdrop, it was time to cut the cakes. There were actually three types of cake, with one layer of the wedding cake being lime cake with strawberry frosting, the other layer being vanilla with strawberry frosting and the groom’s cake being banana cake with vanilla frosting. All were delicious, tasting just as good as they looked!

The cake party lasted until around 8:30 PM when our parents and my friends from the U of I were the last to leave. This was the first time the old U of I train geek crew had been together in the same room since campus seven years ago, so there was plenty of catching up to do and old stories to tell. Kevin and Tanya had just moved to Edmonton, Alberta from Mississippi, so it was very nice of them to take time out for the trip. Joe and Yolanda don’t fly very well, so they actually drove out to Vegas from Indiana, and Jim and Attalee managed to leave their two young boys with family so they could make the trip from Iowa.

After everybody left we tried to clean up a bit but soon discovered that we had forgot to buy trash bags. So it was off to Von’s while still in our wedding gear. We also stopped at In-N-Out for a late dinner snack of burgers and milkshakes. We got a few compliments at the In-N-Out by UNLV and took a few more cute pictures inside while waiting for our food.

After a day we will never forget, it was time to enjoy the spectacular view from the bedroom portion of the suite...

Wedding Adventure - Day 2 - Vegas

2008-11-22T23:49:00.001-06:00

As nice as THE Suite was, we didn’t have too much time to enjoy it Saturday morning. Since we were changing into a Vista Suite in the main Mandalay Bay tower for the next three nights, we had to pack everything up into the car before check-out time. After hauling everything down to the parking garage and arranging for the room transfer (we couldn’t get a key to the Vista Suite until 3PM) we hurried through the casino to the valet area where our ride to the Courthouse was waiting.

We knew that our wedding package included limo transportation to the Clark County Courthouse to obtain a marriage license, but we figured that just meant some sort of fancy town car or big taxi. We were quite surprised to discover a black stretch limo with room for 8 waiting for us. Despite these limos being a dime a dozen in Vegas, we still felt a bit like celebrities as we were driven to the courthouse and dropped off at the marriage license bureau.

The marriage license bureau was not exactly what I was expecting. It was a small space with a few tables for filling out forms, and then a set of ropes to line up in, much like making a deposit at the bank. Actually it was more like buying tickets for a movie as the clerks were behind glass with the whole microphone and speaker arrangement and a little slot to slide your documents and cash back and forth. We didn’t have to wait very long and the whole process took about 20 minutes. Walking down the steps out of the marriage bureau, we encountered a group of people peddling wedding guides and transportation to near by chapels (the closest is two blocks away) in case we were in for a spontaneous quickie wedding. Since we already had arrangements in place, they wished us a hearty congratulations before moving on to the next couple behind us. When the limo driver picked us up to return us to the hotel, he told us that we were very lucky and picked a good time to get our license as during the week the line can be one or two hours long. I guess that isn’t too surprising since a typical day in Vegas will average over 600 weddings. Luck finally seemed to be turning our way!

Arriving back at the hotel, we found the Impala and drove over to Tuxedo Junction on West Sahara to pick up my tux and shoes. A few months prior, Amy had measured me and submitted them online along with my selection from the various tux, vest, tie and shoe styles. I was pleasantly surprised to find that everything fit perfectly when I tried the tux on. No alterations needed. Amy, who was sitting on one of the comfy couches in the tuxedo shop actually started to cry a bit when I came out of the fitting room with the tux on. This did not bode well for a tear free ceremony.

With my classic retro Vegas 50s-esque tux and rat pack like black and white shoes in the trunk, we stopped at a nearby Jimmy Johns sandwich shop for lunch and discussed the last few remaining items we needed for the wedding and cake party we’d be having in the Vista Suite in place a of a true reception. The last thing we needed was iced tea for all the southerners who would be in attendance. We hadn’t had any luck finding the right stuff at Von’s and there were not any Chick-fil-a’s in town, so it seemed like we were pretty much stuck. I took a wrong turn after leaving Jimmy Johns but it happened to take us past an Albertson’s grocery store. We decided to give it a try and it happened to have the iced tea we needed.

It was finally time to head back to Mandalay Bay and check into our new room. This was a source of much worry and stress as we had planned our wedding day around having a “cake party” in a big “Vista Suite” overlooking the strip from high atop the hotel. However, they can never guarantee you the exact room and view, so we didn’t know if things would go exactly as envisioned or not. While checking in, the clerk mentioned that this suite had a really pretty view. For a second I could feel things sinking as I thought that might mean we were looking away from the strip towards the mountains. Amy was brave enough to ask, “Which view exactly is that?” The clerk responded that it looked down the strip at all of the other hotels. Perfect!

Excitedly we raced up to the 32nd floor. To give them a wraparound view, the Vista Suites are at the end of the hotel wings, so our room was all the way down a very, very, very long hallway from the elevators. We ran down the hall to the double doors. Behind them we were greeted with the most amazing view of the Vegas strip and a fantastic room in which to spend the next few nights and throw our once-in-a-lifetime party.

The next couple of hours were a blur of hauling boxes of supplies up to the room and getting things set up for Sunday. We had previously shipped a number of boxes containing all sorts of things, from cake cutting sets to all of the wedding favor boxes, to the Mandalay Bay business center. Amy’s parents picked them up on Friday after they arrived and had been holding them for us until we checked in to the suite. While Amy helped them arrange things, I went to my parents’ room to pick up the groom’s cake that my Mom had brought with her on the plane from Winnipeg. It seemed like it was just starting to thaw nicely. We also had to haul several cases of glass bottled soft drinks up from the car in the parking garage. You don’t realize how much easier plastic and cans make going to the grocery store until you elect to go the old school route.

After getting everything staged, Amy’s parents left and it was time to run down to Rodney and Stephanie’s room to check out progress on the main wedding cake. Besides being good friends, Rodney and Stephanie run a side business doing custom cakes out of their home in the Metroplex. Stephanie has created many amazing creative cakes over the years, and when she offered to create our wedding cake, we jumped at the chance. I‘m not sure if they realized exactly what they were getting themselves into, but baking a cake for a Vegas wedding turned into quite the adventure. A few weeks before the wedding, I helped Rodney construct an insulated container to transport the cakes. We lined a huge Rubbermaid storage tub with Styrofoam using liquid nails (Rodney’s great idea of using some baking soda to absorb the glue odors saved the project). Then, a few days before the wedding, Stephanie baked the cake layers and gave them a base coat of icing. Then the cakes were placed in the container along with some dry ice to keep them cool while they made the long drive from DFW to Vegas with minimal stops. They arrived around midnight Friday and had spent all day working on finishing the cake. Stephanie actually brought her Kitchen-Aid stand mixer and had it sitting on the dresser in their hotel room mixing up icing! I’m sure it wasn’t their ideal or most glamorous first day in Vegas but the cake looked spectacular! They had even rolled fondant on the cake board and imprinted a pattern that matched the one used on our wedding invitations. You can get Stephanie's take on the adventure here.

The only trick now was moving the wedding cake from their room on the 9th floor up to the 32nd floor. Unfortunately, Mandalay Bay has two elevator systems, one serving floors 16 and below, and another serving floors 17 and above, so to move the cake between rooms we’d need to ride one elevator all the way down to the casino level, walk across the elevator lobby to the other group of elevators, and then ride all the way back up to our room. Fortunately the bellman came to our rescue and showed us where the service elevators were. This greatly shortened the ride for the cake and kept us from winding up in a crowded elevator. It’s a good thing too as it seems like Stephanie was on pins and needles the whole way with the cake being one thumbprint away from disaster. The cake made the trip safely and looked even more amazing sitting on the large dining table in front of the windows overlooking the skyline of the Vegas strip. Relieved and freed from their task, Rodney and Stephanie sprinted off to the casino.

Since it took a lot longer than expected to get everything unpacked and the cakes in place, we were late for dinner at the Burger Bar in Mandalay Place. It was supposed to be a come and go thing but by the time we arrived, a lot of our relatives were seated together and well into their meals. The food at the Burger Bar was very good after such a long day of running around. I don’t remember a whole lot except for my Dad giving Amy’s brother a hard time while watching Oklahoma trash the previously undefeated Texas Tech football team.

It had been a long day and after dinner we wandered through the casino and lost a few dollars in some slot machines. After taking care of some more setup in the vista suite, we met Rodney and Stephanie at Forty-Deuce. I’m sure this place would be a lot of fun on a Saturday night, but since we had to get up at the crack of dawn to get ready for the wedding, we called it a night early. I couldn’t resist giving Amy her wedding present ahead of time however: a silver Tiffany necklace with a lock charm shaped like the ace of spades.

Wedding Adventure - Day 1 - DFW to Vegas

2008-11-21T23:44:00.002-06:00

After months of planning, this morning we awoke early to begin our Vegas-Wedding-Hawaii adventure. I was not feeling particularly well, so it was pretty rough getting to the airport and through security. We flew out to Vegas on American Airlines and I was pleasantly surprised that they did not try to charge us for an extra bag when we checked in. Since Amy was carrying her dress on the plane she still had two bags to check. While we were dropping the bags at the security screening area, the TSA officer asked me the usual questions regarding banned items in my bag. Then he asked Amy if she had more than three pairs of shoes in her bag. A nice spot of humor in what, at 8AM, had already been a long morning. Boarding the plane we caught our first bit of luck as the flight attendants made room for Amy’s dress to hang in the closet by the main door, saving her from folding (or more likely crumpling) it into an overhead bin.

The flight to Vegas was uneventful and I drifted off into iPod sleepiness for most of the way while Amy watched the remake of Ocean’s Eleven on her Nano. We were very excited to land in Vegas. However, as we waited and waited at the baggage claim and watched all of the other passengers drift away with their bags, it became very apparent that one of Amy’s bags did not arrive in Vegas with us. There was another rather concerned couple from our flight wandering around without any bags, so at least we were not alone (and had two of the three bags, plus the all-important carried-on dress). We talked to the representative in the American baggage office and she said that the bad hadn’t made the flight but would be put on the next flight arriving a few hours later. She said the bag would be delivered to our hotel later that afternoon. It had not been the best start to our trip.

Somewhat weary, we made our way to the rental car center to pick up our wheels for our time in Vegas. After a few bad experiences with the long lines at Dollar, we booked through Alamo this time, and after a few short minutes at a self-serve kiosk, we had our car: a bright red Chevrolet Impala. Although lacking in personality and excitement, the car had a huge trunk and did a great job of carrying us all over town while running our endless string of errands.

First stop was Michaels where we purchased a large tub to put drinks on ice at the keg party (we had previously shipped two smaller tubs we bought at Crate & Barrel in Dallas). Then we headed off to two different Von’s grocery stores to pick up bottled drinks and supplies for the cake party. Von’s is the Nevada version of Tom Thumb (for those of you in Texas) and Safeway (for those of you in Canada). With a car full of luggage and groceries (mostly soft drinks in glass bottles) we stopped at the In-N-Out Burger on the edge of the UNLV campus for a late lunch. It was good as always.

It was finally nearing Check-in time so we drove to Mandalay Bay and checked into our suite in THE Hotel where we’d be staying for one night. THE Suite was very cool, with a main living/sitting area with a couch, desk and widescreen television (and powder room by the front door complete with THE tp) and then a separate bedroom with another huge television. The main bathroom was huge with a fantastic shower lined with some sort of stone that felt amazing on your feet. We really need to find out what it is so we can use it when it is time to renovate our own bathroom. Our floor-to-ceiling windows faced away from the strip, overlooking the busy I-15 freeway and the anthill of a parking garage with the mountains in the distance.

After settling into the room, checking to see if our families had arrived and some blimp-watching, we wound up going to New York New York with my parents for dinner and some slot playing. Amy and my parents had dinner from the little fish and chips stand while I had some pizza from the New York-style (what else?) pizzeria just off the casino floor. It was very good. On the way back to Mandalay Bay, we went through the MGM Grand where my Mom stopped to play a Monopoly Grand Hotel machine and more than doubled her investment in a few short minutes.

It had been a long first day and we had a full schedule for Saturday, so we called it a night early (by Vegas standards).

2007 in one post...

2008-01-13T21:31:00.000-06:00

I'll probbaly go back and expound on this in other posts later but for now here's 2007 in nutshell.

January - Snowboarding trip to Winter Park, Colorado was a lot of fun though I wasn't feeling my best and eight months on steroids and the associated side effects were taking their toll. I really want to go back and try it again. I did manage some cool pictures of trains coming out of the Moffat Tunnel on the old D&RGW however. After the trip I tried a special Specific Carbohydrate Diet to try and alleviate some of the symptoms of my disease but it just made me sicker and I went back to normal food after a month.

February - Amazingly Valentine's weekend was the two most normal feeling days I've had in months. Amy and I made our traditional V-day lasagna and went for nice long walk on the Katy Trail. Saw both The Shins and The Tragically Hip play at the Palladium Ballroom.

March - Guess who won the office NCAA Basketball Tournament bracket pool? Maybe the guy who doesn't do anything but stay home and watch college basketball during the evening? :)

April - Finished final design of the 11-mile coal shuttle railroad project I've been working on for several years since it was merely an idea and a line on a map. Quite proud to see it go to construction.

May - Finally tapered off of the steroids. My face starts to return to normal size.

June - My green card application paperwork is finally completed and submitted for processing. It will probably take 11-15 months to be processed and a decision to be reached. Bridge construction starts on the 11-mile coal shuttle railroad!

July - Amy and I visit some of her relatives on the family farm in Iowa. It's a fun trip to the cornfields. We also get a chance to drop in on my friend Jim and see his new (to us) kid and beautiful old country farmhouse.

August - Start work on a new secret project at work that could be of historic proportions if it goes through to construction. My work really impresses the client and, even better, I really enjoy working on the project. Hopefully I'll be able to let the cat out of the bag soon.

September - Travel to Champaign for the University of Illinois Job Fair to help with recruiting. Have a lot of fun visiting with the students and my old advisor, and even manage to squeeze in an Illini home game which tunrs into a victory over Western Illinois (little did I know the Illini would make the Rose Bowl this season). Also head up to Chicago for the AREMA conference which was rather good with lots of interesting presentations. My friend Kevin, who I shared a cubicle with in grad school at the U of I does an excellent presentation during the closing general session on a bridge replacement. The company client dinner at Ghostbar is pretty lame. Unfortunately I lost my wallet on the CTA train which makes life interesting for a few days. Amazingly it is turned in and I get it back with all of my cards and identification but without the cash that was inside.

October - Amy and I go to Vegas for a few days and I propose and she accepts in front of the big windows of our MGM Skyloft overlooking the glittering lights and mountains right before we go to see the Beatles Love show!

November - Amy gives me a iPod Touch for my birthday and it is totally awesome! I get a good chance to test it out on a brief trip to Omaha on business the same week. Thanksgiving is yummy with tons of mashed potatoes and the Friday shopping expedition to Northpark is very successful.

December - Amy and I go to New York City for a few days to visit her sister. We go to the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island, take in a Rangers game at Madison Square Garden, go through Grand Central Station, zip through the Metropolitan Museum of Art and hit Rockefeller Center and Macy's. We stay at the Hotel Pennsylvania but I start to feel pretty bad and get a good case of the chills on the way home. I drop 12 pounds in three days and keep losing weight and feel sicker every day. By the 19th I'm ready to be put in the hospital but my doctor says I'd be better off resting at home. However, I do need to go back on steroids which I'm not excited about. I make it back to Winnipeg to stay with my parents for a week over Christmas. I spend most of the time sleeping on the couch but get to see all of my relatives on Christmas Day, including five new kids that arrived since I was last at home two years ago. I also get to see The Weakerthans in concert at the Walker Theatre and eat Pizza Place and A&W a few times. Amazingly by the time cimes to return to Dallas I'm feeling pretty good. Amy comes up with some great gifts for me and after being so sick earlier in the month it turns into a wonderful Christmas. To cap the year off Amy and I make it out to our friends' new house for an awesome New Years bash!

2007... a whirlwind with a lot of ups and downs. Here's to an exciting but smooth 2008.

Behind the 8-ball

2006-12-19T16:32:00.000-06:00

Another trip to the GI Doctor today. He wishes that my reovery was proceeding at more than a snail's pace but as long as there is some improvement and things are not getting worse then we can stick with the current plan B and plan C and not have to consider plan D or E. So thats good. I've been able to get out a bit more the past few weeks, making it to both Amy's and my office Christmas parties. Amy and I actually went out to eat, ironically at Breadwinners (I've had to cut bread and bread-like stuff out of my diet) and made it to see some bands featuring friends and some of Amy's coworkers play in a pizza joint in Arlington. So things are looking up I guess, though I still have bad days and the odd rocky night if I get stressed out about work or happen to eat the wrong thing at the wrong time.

Today's Doctor quote, "These medications usually work better but you were in a really bad spot and starting from a real disadvantage being diagnosed in the hospital back in June. Your colon was really, really bad, I mean your colon looked like... um, well... the Dickens!"

Next Remicade infusion is the Friday after Christmas. A lot of people say the third time is the charm.

I'm also supposed to start cutting back on the steroids after Christmas. Hopefully the other medications will have kicked in enough at that point to keep the disease at bay while I taper off the roids. I'll be glad to get off of them and say goodbye to the joint pain, swelling in my legs, random crazy mood swings, sudden severe cramps in my hands and puffy face.
Time for some peppermint tea. It works... I think.

Leftovers

2006-11-27T11:19:00.000-06:00

Thanksgiving has come and gone. A nice four-day break from the daily barrage of design requests at work and a chance to see how smoked turkey and chocolate silk pie sat with my system.

On Friday, Amy and I ventured out to Northpark for some day after Thanksgiving shopping. Amazingly, the mall didn't seem all that busy or crowded and we were able to get a lot of shopping done. Well I did at least, a bunch of Christmas presents and some stuff that I couldn't pass up for myself. The weekend also saw the annual trek to the gift wrap wonderland at Container Store though I only picked up a couple rolls since our apartment seems to be overflowing with wrapping paper.

I had hoped to be better by Thanksgiving, but I'm not where I had hoped I would be. My GI doctor is concerned that the Remicade should have had more of an effect in getting my symptoms under control by now. However, it's only been a little over a month since the first treatment and some of the documentation I have read about this medicine says that it often takes up to eight weeks for the symptoms to go away. So here's hoping by Christmas...

Still, I think I have been feeling a bit better over the past week or so in general but it varies day to day. Besides the Thanksgiving expeditions, I've actually been able to go out curling and Amy and I made a big trip to IKEA the other weekend. It's nice to get out and about. It would be a lot nicer to be able to eat and drink while I was out and not have to schedule all of my trips out during the brief windows every day when I know that I'll be feeling pretty good. It would also be nice to actually sleep through the night for a change. But until things subside a little, that's life.

You're older than you've ever been...

2006-11-06T00:34:00.000-06:00

...and now you're even older, and now you're even older...

Looking back, I'm sick on my birthday about 40 percent of the time. Something about this time of year I guess.

I had my second Remicade infusion on Friday and am hoping that this one really starts working. I'm feeling a bit better I think but it's hard to tell with all the root beer, pizza and birthday cake going through my system which I'd normally be staying away from in favour of blander fare. This week will be telling and fortunately, unlike the past several weeks of upheaval, it looks like a nice normal recovery-conducive week. Lucky charms aligned for maximum effect...

Man or Mouse?

2006-10-20T18:13:00.000-05:00

Today the doctors "busted out the big gun" so to speak. No really, that's exactly what they said.

Today I had my first Remicade infusion treatment. I went to a local infusion clinic where they started an IV and for about two hours I had a mixture of salene and a medication called remicade pumped into my veins. Remicade is a pretty new medication and it's only been approved to treat my condition for just over a year. The weird thing is that it consists of DNA and protien extracted from mice. Seriously. For whatever reason, in most patients, this certain mouse protein binds up with one of the proteins that is one of the key bad actors in the disease I have and neutralizes it, putting the disease into remission. Crazy stuff.

The infusion went pretty well and I was in and out of there in a little under three hours. My arm is a bit sore where they had the IV in the inside of my elbow. I'm still alittle loopy from the direct injection of Tylenol and Benadryl they gave me before starting the remicade drip to help me sleep through the whole thing.

So right now I have all sorts of mouse protein and DNA surging through my body doing its thing.

I will let you know if I suddenly have the urge to gnaw on the corner of my futon or put cheese on my hamburgers.

Thankfully I don't have a cat.

The Treatment Has Failed

2006-10-17T18:07:00.000-05:00

Went to the GI doctor today, still feeling at rock bottom. The doctor concluded that, "The straightforward simple approach of basic medications isn't working... this course of treatment has failed."

*Sigh* I guess I'm one of the small percentage for which the usual doesn't work.

Fortunately there's a plan B that is pretty effective for people who don't respond to plan A. They are trying to set it up for later this week.

Square One

2006-09-06T20:34:00.000-05:00

The past week has been agony. The office move and deadlines just piled on the stress at work. That combined with an attempt to step down my medication brought my recovery to a screeching halt and plunged me back into being just as sick as I was before. This morning I didn't even feel well enough to walk the eight blocks to work and called in sick.

I called the GI doctor and went to see him this afternoon. He bumped all of my medications back up to where they were when I left the hospital. Hopefully this will clear things up to the point where I can function normally again. Then I can start the process of weaning myself off the meds over again.

It's frustrating. It's embarassing. It's damaging my friendships and relationships.

There's nothing I can really do about it but ride it out.

Lonnnnnnng Weekend

2006-09-04T23:16:00.000-05:00

Amy is upset with me.

Recovery from my illnes has stopped and I've regressed to how I was back in the hospital.

I'm running for the toilet every ten minutes.

There's too much work to be done at work in the given amount of time with the way I am feeling.

Sunday night I was reaccquainted with the feeling of ultimate humiliation.

Trachtenburg Family Slideshow Players with Corn Mo @ The Gypsy Tearoom

2006-08-29T23:59:00.000-05:00

...and eggs!

Wow what a crazy show! This was the second time Amy and I had seen the Tractenburgs and their innovative show which features music set to 35mm slides projected onto a screen. The father plays guitar, the daughter plays drums and the mother runs the slide projector. The slides are all obtained from garage sales and vary from images of family vacations and holiday gatherings to slides used in Drivers Ed and military training sessions. It's nuts!

Opening for the Slideshow Payers was Corn Mo, formerly of Denton and now living the high life in New York City. Corn Mo failed to dissapoint with his stream of conciousness banter between his selection of whimsical songs accompanied by piano and accordian.