Thursday, December 3, 2020

Thanksgiving 2020

 Thanksgiving 2020

Well, Turkey Day 2020 has come and gone without much fanfare! We all decided against having Laurie's parents over, too much risk of exposing them to Covid, since Laurie is still teaching in person, Collin and Dylan have been out of the house/around some friends lately. We kept it small, with just 3 guests, one of which was Debbie, it was good to have here here for the day again!


Table looking good and ready for everyone to sit down to eat! I did 2 turkeys again this year, which is serious overkill, but we had plenty left to make Turkey Pot Pies with!


We were all glad to be together, everyone healthy and doing our best to get through 2020!

Spotify 2020 Review




It's always fun to get this recap from Spotify on what I've listened to over the year. 

#1 Song? Brown Noise...it's on repeat each night to drown out my tinnitus!

Saturday, November 7, 2020

Feeling so relieved and happy!

Today truly is the happiest I have been in a very long time! I feel such relief and hope for the future, that I have not felt in a long time!




We are celebrating with beers, a fire and going to be doing some smoked wings later on tonight!!

Tuesday, November 3, 2020

We voted!

 Collin and I were in line at 6:30 am when the polls opened! Only took 45 minutes total and I was glad to share Collin's first time voting with him!




Sunday, October 18, 2020

24th Wedding Anniversary weekend

 We got out of town!

Yes, we finally got out of Akron for the first time since March! Tomorrow is our 24th wedding anniversary so I booked us a hotel in downtown Columbus, arranged for the boys to puppy-sit and we hit the road Friday after Laurie got done with work.

We got a suite and the Westin, downtown. The staff was nice and provided a bottle of wine, but he suite we got "upgraded" to was a total let down. It hadn't been updated in 20 years and the furniture was definitely retro! I complained and got all the points I used refunded, so that makes it better.


We have not opened the wine yet, but I'm sure it's nice.

For dinner on Friday I made reservations at Hyde Park Steakhouse and wow, did that place come through. Considering that this is the first restaurant we have been to since early March, I was a bit nervous, but no need. It was excellent.

The staff was attentive without being intrusive and they even managed to honor my request for as private of a table as we could get.

We got a nice bottle of wine, splurging for us, but on the low end of the price scale for them.

Laurie went with her favorite, a nice filet. I had never had dry aged beef, so I got a bone in steak that had been dry aged for 56 days!





To say that my steak was "good" would be a disservice to the chef! It was absolutely amazing! Certainly one of the best steaks I've ever had.  Laurie's was equally as good. Our side of Brussels sprouts and Lobster Mac & Cheese were outstanding!

We finished dinner with nice Old Fashioned (yes, we were using Uber). Speaking of Uber, Laurie left her phone in the Uber and as soon we realized it, the driver had it to our hotel in 15 minutes!
That concluded Friday!

Saturday was  day full of exploring what we could in Columbus. Some things we wanted to do (Columbus Brewing Co. closed due to Covid) were closed, but we made the best of it. We spent some time at the North Market downtown, were we got fresh apples and apple cider.

We then headed to the German Village, which I have to say was a bit disappointing. I'd like to go back when I can get around much better and perhaps we'll discover more there.  We visited the Book Loft, which was really cool. I only made it through 5-6 rooms as I was not feeling that great 2 1/2 weeks post surgery. @velerie stephens would love it.  It was HUGE!  You could easily spend a couple of hours in there.
 


We stopped for some great fudge at Schmidt's Fudge house. Had to have some fresh fudge and it really is quite good.

By this time I was quite thirsty and ready to be off of my feet! We found a couple of places to have some adult beverages!

Antiques On High

A berry sour! Quite good!
Had a flight of some nice IPAs and a Stout!

After that I had to retreat to the hotel for some rest!

We couldn't really decided what do do for dinner, so we ended up playing it by ear and had a enjoyable evening out. We visited Elevator Brewing for a beer. We were quite impressed with the bar that was brought to Columbus from the Chicago World Fair in the late 1800's. 

We then found Two Truths on the north end of the Short North district. The bartender was great, making us a couple of nice Old Fashioned cocktails. We actually ended up bringing in Tacos from a take out taco place just up the street.  That was a our Saturday.

Sunday was just a drive home with a quick stop at Ikea for a few things.

We came home to some puppies that were quite excited to see us and even made a few "small" messes for us to clean up as Dylan left them inside, but not in their kennel, but it was OK!









Sunday, October 11, 2020

Halloween fun!

 Halloween Fun 2020





Yesterday was a great day! Laurie and the kids organized an outing to a pumpkin farm with herself, Collin and Marissa, and Dylan and Jada. I chose not to go because I wasn't sure I was up for a couple of hours of walking around the farm.

They had a blast and brought home pumpkins to carve! We got a fire going, ordered pizza and wings and carved pumpkins.  Everyone had a blast.  It was the first Pumpkin Jada had ever carved! I guess her family just never did that type of thing.

After the pumpkins were carved and lit up on the front porch we watched Gretel & Hansel. It was a decent movie, but not really scary at all. That was the end to a great day with the kids!

Here is the album of photos from yesterday.




Saturday, October 3, 2020

Horror Movie Month



October is here!

I'm going to try and watch a bunch of horror/scary movies this month, something I think about doing every year, but don't get around to it. 

I'm off to a start this month though. I'm going to keep a list here of what I've watched so far. Got a suggestion? Leave a comment!


    • Can't go wrong with this classic
      • Laurie really did not like this one, she had to put on a lighthearted comedy when it was over
    • Love this classic movie

Wednesday, September 30, 2020

Back surgery

Heading to Beachwood for my back surgery at 11 AM today! Won’t be an instant relief from pain, but it’s a start and within a few weeks I’ll be much better off. Never wanted surgery on my back, until I was bed ridden for 7 weeks! That made me change my mind.

Here is what I look like right now, standing up “straight”!




Sorry for the shirtless fat guy picture!

I should be done by 2 pm today and home by 3.


Monday, September 28, 2020

Two different types of dogs!

We have two different dogs when it comes to water and playing with the hose, check out this video from yesterday.

Rey loves the hose, Luna, not so much!



Sunday, September 27, 2020

Back to the blog

I hate Facebook!


I have a hate/hate relationship with FB. I generally hate it and only use it for keeping up with businesses. I don't see any posts of much quality, and generally I'm more irritated after looking at FB than before I looked, so I've deleted the apps and am taking yet another break from FB. Perfect time to start putting some new stuff up on my site for my family to see and keep up with what we are up to.

So, where do we find ourselves on September 27, 2020? Well, I'm still down with the pinched nerve in my lower back. Been confined to bed for the most part since August 12th! It has really, really sucked, to say the least. After trying Pain Management for several weeks I finally went to see a surgeon last week and he immediately saw my problem and is confident he can fix it with a simple procedure called a discectomy. Basically, he is going to trim down the disc that is bulging and pinching my nerve root so it has some room and won't be causing me all this pain. My surgery is on 09/30/2020, and it's outpatient so I'll be home that same day.

Last Thursday afternoon Laurie started feeling bad, sore throat, but not bad. Within 12 hours she is down for the count, had to call off of work and go see her PCP.  The doctor believes she has Covid-19, but we won't know until her tests comes back this week.  I'm doing what I can to help her out, but with my situation, it's not much and I feel bad!  Hopefully she gets better soon!

What a F'd up year! I know everyone is looking to a new year, but I really don't see anything changing much, which is depressing!

Puppies (Luna and Rey) are doing great, getting bigger every day it seems.



They really are amazing dogs. We really don't have any issues with them to complain about! We all love them, but Laurie really loves them and they love her back! It's a joy for Laurie when she comes home from work and the dogs go a little nuts and are super excited to see her. She hasn't had that since the boys were little!

I'm itching for a new tattoo, and I'm thinking a plague doctor, which seems appropriate to get done in 2020 if I can. 





That's all for today I think, have a good one!




One book read!

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