Fun and Games Dept

Weekend Warriors.

Originally uploaded by macwarriorny.

To celebrate the beautiful Saturday morning, Earl and I did a little photo shoot in our backyard. We invited Tom to join us as well but he was too busy smelling trees around us to make sure his territory was secure.

Earl was about to get his work done for the week, so we are spending the night in Buffalo at the Hampton Inn. We’re going to meet up with our friends Tim and Steve for dinner and then go out to Bear Night, a fun time for all involved.

I’m not sure where we are eating dinner. I’ve heard rumours about German or Thai food (now there is diversity!). I’ve never had Thai food before, but I suspect it’s spicy.

Sometimes it’s nice to just get away from the routine and relax a little bit. When you go at 1000% all week, it’s good to throttle it back a bit for the weekend.

Nirvana.

Originally uploaded by macwarriorny.

Earl and I decided to celebrate the beautiful weather by going for a little ride. Including the nap in a Thruway service area, it was around 14 hours long.

We drove through three states.

It all started on Friday when Earl asked if I was in the mood for Chick-Fil-A for lunch. He was just being funny, because the closest Chick-Fil-A is about 200 miles from here. So that’s where we went for lunch yesterday. Chick-Fil-A at the Burlington Mall in Burlington, Mass. I haven’t been to the Burlington Mall since I was a twinkie shopping for clothes at Jordan Marsh back in the late 1980s. Much has changed.

On the way out we drove across the southern portion of Vermont on Route 9. It was a route I hadn’t taken before. We stopped at a scenic lookout, bought a couple of bear stuffed animals for our collection and the obligatory maple and chocolate fudge.

We then drove south a little bit into Massachusetts and went across the state on Route 2. Route 2 between Harvard and Concord used to be my daily commute. The road was never designed to be such a heavily traveled corridor and little has changed. It was good to drive the Concord Rotary and it was better to see that the office building I used to work in, which was closed shortly before Digital Equipment Corporation (DEC) was sucked up by Compaq (then HP), is back in business with a new company occupying. I could see my old cubicle walls from the street. No mardi gras beads hanging on the pole in the middle of the cubicle though.

After Burlington Mall (with a failed attempt at convincing someone of joining me at purchasing lots of stuff at their beautiful Apple store), we drove through Boston through the Big Dig project, making an unnecessary stop out to the airport and everything.

Leaving Boston at 9:00 p.m. or so, we decided that the Mass Pike was boring and jumped off at Marlborough and drove across the state on Route 20 (a local road that goes through LOTS of towns).

After taking a necessary nap in a Thruway service area once we were back in New York, we finally rolled into the driveway at 3:30 a.m.

Earl and I attended my family’s traditional Thanksgiving-Christimas dinner at Halloween celebration today. The tradition started nine years ago when my grandfather remarried and started going to Florida right after Election Day. Since he and his wife weren’t going to be around for the holidays, we’d all celebrate early with a delicious buffet and a smattering of presents. It was a good time to get together with all my cousins and such and catch up with the family.

I didn’t know if the tradition would continue since my grandfather passed on in July, but I was glad to find out that everything was going to go as planned. So Earl and I trucked up north and went through the whole early holiday dinner routine. It was good to catch up with the family and share some stories. It’s probably the last time we’d see my sister before she heads back to Moscow to join her boyfriend while he plays hockey. She’s going to be gone until April this time. This is going to be an odd holiday season. Thank goodness for the internet and webcams.

Earl and I just returned from a friend’s Halloween party. We had a blast hanging out with everyone and the food was delicious and it was a romping good time. On the flip side, I feel like a big weight has been lifted from my shoulders because it was a costume party. And I’m not really that good at costumes.

I’m afraid my gay card will be taken away.

I always think of the *perfect* Halloween costume on November 3rd. It’s a given. I look back at the festivities we attended and say “oh, I should have dressed up like Spiderman” or something like that. This year I had absolutely no idea what to wear for tonight’s costume party so Earl and I went as Eagles football fans. Not very ingenious since we are Eagles fans, but a comfortable costume nonetheless that allowed us the luxury of hanging out in football jerseys without the fear of dragging a bat’s wing through a cheese dip or a mistakenly leaving a Zsa Zsa Gabor diamond in the fruit punch.

Now I’m looking back at the party and thinking I should have worn a barber’s smock and thrown a comb and a pair of scissors in the pocket and gone as a barber. I think a barber with a shaved head would have been cute. See, I always think of these things too late.

The last time I had a really original costume was in the early to mid 1990s when I dressed up as a bag of recycleables. I wore nothing but a blue recycleables bag and hung a bunch of soup cans and pop bottles off of it. It was a bit drafty but I didn’t feel fat because I wasn’t in a Hefty bag after all and it was environmentally conscious. And very suggestive. Good thing I was single at the time.

I think I’m going to make a note to review this blog entry in mid October 2006 so that I’m better prepared next year. Barber smock. It’ll look great.

Talking To Myself.

Originally uploaded by macwarriorny.

In honor of the release of the second season of Bewitched on DVD, the same season that introduced Samantha’s look alike cousin, Serena, I decided to do a little video project utilizing split screen technology. It’s going to take a little while for me to figure out all the logistics and whatnot (so the project hasn’t been posted yet), but I thought it might be fun to practice with the still camera first.

Now there’s proof that I do talk to myself when Earl is out of town.

I found this test on my blog friend Snarl’s webpage. Click below if you want to take the test yourself.

I am 9% White Trash.

I, my friend, have class. I am so not white trash. . I am more than likely Democrat, and my place is neat, and there is a good chance I may never drink wine from a box.

Take the
White Trash Test
@ FualiDotCom

Stroll.

Originally uploaded by macwarriorny.

I decided to celebrate my feeling better today by going for a walk during lunch. The sun was shining brightly, the breeze was mild and the enchantment of October was riding the wind. So I decided I needed to enjoy our downtown area. This is about a block from where I work. As you can see, the streets aren’t that busy at lunch time!

As I look at this photo, I realize that downtown looks like a city scape you’d see on a “behind the scenes” movie tour set you’d see at Walt Disney World or Universal Studios. All that’s missing is the fountain that the Friends played on.

Earl and I are very excited about our friends Steve and Tim coming to visit from Buffalo. They’re spending the weekend with us to get away from it all and we’re looking forward to seeing them.

It’s also a wonderful reason to clean the house and spend money redecorating.

The spare bedroom has never looked so good. The bed is made, the scented candles are lit to give it a warm, homey feeling. I’m a little disappointed that I don’t have mints for the pillows, so I’m going to leave a couple of Butterfingers instead.

Yesterday I went to the local Kohls to get new towels and bathroom accessories. They had the ideal shower curtain on display that matched the color of our bathroom perfectly. Of course our mini-me version of Kohls didn’t have any of what was displayed actually in stock, so we jumped into the car last night and drove to Syracuse to go the real Kohls. While we were in Syracuse we also went to Carrabba’s for some pasta fun. Whenever we go to Carrabba’s we shun waiting for a table and opt to eat at their pasta bar instead. I had a couple of glasses of wine, Earl ended up driving home after a stop at Wegmans to grocery shop. Wegmans is grocery nirvana and can not be duplicated by any chain, regardless of how many times they try. (I should get paid by someone for all these retail endorsements.)

So now we’re armed and ready for fun with our friends. I might even cook breakfast in the morning!

Smile. Halfway through the work week.

Originally uploaded by macwarriorny.

Sometimes you have to just take it all in stride. It helps if you smile, and bitch about stuff on your blog.

I also downloaded the latest iTunes and Quicktime, both announced today in concert with a bunch of goodies from Apple, including a video iPod. Music videos, movies and tv shows, among other things, are now available from iTunes. I tried it out by downloading my first music video, “Deeper and Deeper” by Madonna. I enjoyed the video so much I downloaded a second Madonna video, “Rain”, one of my favorite tracks of all time.

I was going to be so productive around the house this weekend. I was going to get the garage sorted out to make room for the Acura. I was going to scrub, dust, polish and ‘dazzle-fy’ the house from top to bottom so that it would once again meet health inspection requirements. I was going to make cookies and other assorted goodies so that we’d be ready for the week.

I’ve spent all my free time to today trying to make myself disappear (via a movie) like a Star Trek crew member.

I’ve got my own unique sound effect down. I played it over the phone for Earl, he’s given it his stamp of approval. Now if I could just get the video effects just right. It has to have the right amount of flair.

Now if I could only beam this house clean.