February 2, 2004

Super Weekend.

As I write this, the Panthers and Patriots are tied with 40 seconds left in the game. I haven’t really been paying attention to the Superbowl, since the Philadelphia Eagles didn’t make it (I have to be an Eagles fan living with a Philly native, and I really don’t mind), but nevertheless I hear a hoot and a hollar once in a while from the family room… Earl seems to be enjoying the game.

We’ve had a super weekend. Friday night we met up with my Mom and sister in Syracuse for supper at a favorite haunt, Spaghetti Warehouse. We ate way too much food and drank way too much sangria, but we laughed and laughed and had a great time.

In fact, we were all in such good spirits (or perhaps the moon was aligned with Mars or something), that we set plans to get together on Saturday night to go to a Syracuse Crunch hockey game. It’s been a long time since we’ve seen my Mom and sister two nights in a row, but what the heck… 2004 is about living on the wild side.

We started out Saturday by driving to rural Parish, N.Y., right in the middle of the Lake Ontario snow belt. Rumor was they had over 60-inches of snow over the past week. Earl and I can safely confirm that the rumor is true. Lots and lots and LOTS of snow. It was like driving through a tunnel in a winter wonderland. The snow banks were higher than some houses!

Here I am standing next to a road sign.. which, by the way, is around twelve or fourteen feet off the ground…



After sliding around in Parish, we headed down to Syracuse to do some shopping at Carousel Center. I picked up some networking equipment for work and Earl picked up some goodies for the kitchen at Williams-Sonoma.

We were at the mall for only two hours, but quite a bit of snow fell while we were inside…



… that “shelf” of snow under Earl is our car. 🙂

Afterwards, we met up with my Mom, slid our way up to my sister’s to grab her and then we all trotted down to the hockey game. We had a thoroughly GREAT time. It was nice to get together with the family. We laughed and cheered and just basically had fun. I’m looking forward to spending more time with them soon.

Today has been a lazy day. I’ve been messing around with computer stuff all day and Earl has been watching the Superbowl festivities since 12 noon or so. Here he is with another fan…



… and now it’s official, the Patriots kicked a field goal and inched ahead of the Panthers with four seconds left in the game. As a former resident of New England, I’m pleased.

A nice way to wrap up a Super Weekend.