Archive for May, 2008
Well, a few weeks ago we had a couple special guests, Ryan Guse and Natalie Morten came from Marshall, MN. We had done a little pre-planning and decidedwe had a few things we weanted to make sure to see.
I took work off that Friday, picked them up at the airport after talking to David on the phone. Brought them through the city, up the turnpike, to Wawa, to get beer, and home. Rick and I quickly downed 2 beers, ate our Wawa sandwiches, which they really liked, and we loaded up for Atlantic City.
We then picked up Linds at her school, just as she completed her last day of collegiate life (trust me, no tears were shed) and we hit the road.
It was pretty funny, the two of them were very picture happy. We’ve had some guests that don’t bring out their cameras for anything, and some that take pictures of everything. That was them. We checked into our shitty hotel, walked on the beach, and decided it was time to eat. We chose a place called the A Good Dam Sports Bar, which was actually pretty tasty and had $5 40oz beers. With To-Go cups! So, we were definitely getting there, if you will.
Then we did some gambling, I quickly lost $100 on blackjack (smallest table I could find was $15 min bet) and then we met up with the girls, and went to The Irish Pub. A pub Linds and I went to on our mini-honeymoon. We got drunk, mom was a buzzkill with her news about Kim, though.
The next morning we woke up and headed for home, had a cheesesteak, which they preferred the Wawa over the Geno’s, and did a quick run-through on some of the sites.
We then went home and we had a package. Linds turned to me somewhat angrily and said, “what did you order from Amazon”. And of course I looked somewhat guilty because I buy stuff from there all the time. Then Tony’s message he had sent me made perfect sense and I was the proud owner of Mario Kart for the Wii. Rick is actually pretty amazing at the game.
Then we headed to watch the Phillies play the Giants at Citizens Bank Park. Don’t you love how every stadium has some business attached? It got pretty cold, but we were able to just show up and buy the tickets. We ended up being near 2 of the 3 homerun balls hit. When getting beer #2 I was in line with a guy who caught the first one. Since it was hit by the Giants everyone cheers to throw it back onto the field, so I asked him, “dude, why didn’t you throw it back?” and he said he gave it to a little kid. Can’t mess with the kids. Phillies lost in 10 innings but really didn’t play well at all. When leaving we saw plenty more evidence that Philadelphia just doesn’t know how to drive.
We went home and pretty much played Mario Kart and drank, started watching Die Hard 2 and realized everyone was asleep for a good 45 minutes before we got up and went to bed.
Sunday we went into Philly, checked out the liberty bell, and then the drama started. We were driving on a one-way one-lane road when traffic started getting really slow. Ends up on both sides of this intersection we go through are barricaded and its just people walking around having a good time…until we take a closer look. It was a gay festival. The dead give aways were the hand holding by gay looking people and how every third person had some type of “gay and proud” shirt. I remember one that said “I love girls”…and a girl was wearing it.
So, I continue down this scary road and we’re on our way to the Philadelphia Museum of Art. We are ready to turn when a motorcycle guy comes from behind us, tries to just illegally pass everyone in between parked cars and the cars in traffic and completely takes off my driver side mirror…and keeps going. I quickly look and see the guys license plate and this guy in a van behind us yells, “go after that guy!” Well, I didn’t, but I did call the cops and gave them the information and guess what, even with the type of vehicle and the license plate they havent’ caught him. Give me a break.
So, we went to the museum, was mostly uninterested, I did like the asian war stuff, but I didn’t find anything I wanted to take a picture of the entire time. Also, I had my mirror hanging on by an electrical cord.
We then drove around center city and found a hole in the wall pizza joint, ate, and then took off for the airport.
They said, “it was nice to come here and it’s nicer knowing we never have to go back”.
May 22nd, 2008
http://www.startribune.com/sports/twins/18934699.html?location_refer=Homepage
May 14th, 2008
With my NYC pictures post (which didn’t even work) and my birthday, plus the weekend, I haven’t really updated everyone on the shoulder issue.
Background:
In 7th grade I was running my first competitive race, the 5k Corn Run. I was roughly half done when my right shoulder started to ache. I remember it felt very uncomfortable, but it didn’t feel like a muscle tear, more like a cramp. I could raise my arm over my head and it didn’t hurt, as soon as I put my arm back done, it hurt again. It rarely bothered me.
Then I remember it in high school, specifically wrestling. I remember my shoulder hurting a lot in wrestling. The same thing worked and so I would do that or the adrenaline of the match would make me forget about it. I do specifically remember dreading Firemen’s Carry drills because I couldn’t do them. It hurt too much.
Freshman year of college I finally see Wade and he has me do some exercises. I do them very half-assed, but never have any improvement. He says that it’s probably tendinitis or maybe bursitis and that I need to strengthen my muscles and can’t Military Press or Bench Press anymore when I work out. He also said I should quit golfing so much, but realized it’s like asking a Rausch to quit breathing.
Somewhere in there I also saw Paul who told me pretty much the same thing, but with no fast results.
Then I saw a Dr. in Doylestown for my heart issue, and while removing my shirt (oh yeahhhh) for the EKG he noticed I was struggling and I said it was a shoulder issue, he wanted me to see his specialist and said that a PT is NO DOCTOR. Wow. Cause of his arrogance I chose not to get him his referral bonus.
Finally I saw a Dr. specifically for my shoulders, he X-Rayed and MRI’d them both. Finally recommended a specialist, I found my OWN specialist, and viola. You’re all caught up.
I went to see Dr. Cody who pushed and pulled on my shoulders, said he thinks my shoulders are very unstable (yeah it won’t quit crying, LOL OMG!) and imbalanced (it keeps cutting itself…) and that oddly enough my left shoulder has a lot more “going on” than my right.
Here’s the skinny, I have bursitis, but add a shoulder that basically keeps popping in and out of joint, like my right shoulder, and you have a bone that’s pushing and aggravating the bursitis. How do you fix this? You need to strengthen the shoulder with PT, but you can’t strengthen it without being pain-free. So, what does Uncle Bryce and every star Running Back in the NFL have in common?
Any guesses? We’ve all had cortisone shots! Right in the shoulder. And you know what, no pain since then. I’m literally afraid to move my right arm because I have been able to sleep at night, to sit through a movie, to drive in my car, and to just sit watching TV all pain-free. No aches, no shooting pains, no nothing. Absolutely crazy. The bad part is this shot is temporary. The pain will go back and if the PT doesn’t work, I’m stuck having surgery or living with the pain.
May 12th, 2008
Well, yesterday was my birthday and Linds treated me with some much needed clothes, dinner someplace we hadn’t eaten before, and the movie Ironman. It was definitely a laid back birthday, but it was nice just chillin’ with the wife. And I admit, Ironman was good. Not better than the new Batman, but good.
My final post about NYC is just some pictures. You can see them all on my Flickr account, also.
BTW, the reason we didn’t go to Time Square is because it had been the only thing we had already seen in NYC, so we figured only if it was really convenient would we go.
First Pub:
View from Hotel:
Central Park:
NFL Draft:
Thalia:
Across the Street from Linds’ shirt store:
Wicked:
Wicked Stage:
Broadway:
Irish Pub:
Old Castle Pub:
Chinatown:
Little Italy:
And finally the WTC:
Ok. None of the pictures worked, clearly my flickr plugin no longer works and I just wasted a lot of time.
I promise, no more posts about NYC…for now.
May 10th, 2008
Oh hey, it’s my birthday. Anyone have any suggestions what to do? At this time, we’re thinking a low key birthday with dinner and a movie (Ironman).
So, Sunday was a dreary wet day. We had a few hot spots we definitely wanted to go to. Canal Street (Chinatown), Little Italy, and the World Trade Center. We hopped on the Subway, which I might’ve mentioned already, is completely filthy. I never did see a rat, though. Despite my intense fear of rats (even more so now that I’ve read
). Hopped on, went to Canal Street and it was seriously like stepping into another world. Canal St. is the hot sport for getting fake purses, sunglasses, watches, suits, wallets, belts, pirated movies, etc. It’s just crazy. I knew the trick, go to a vendor, have them help you find something (everyone is Chinese) and then haggle the price. So there are people lining the streets all haggling and negotiating for miles. Lindsey immediately turned to me and said “um…I don’t like this”. We did know we wanted to get Linds a purse and that was it. So, a 12 year old girl comes to help us, Linds says she’s looking for a purse, she show’s her some LV mocks and Linds finds one she likes. Awkward silence until Linds finally says, “so..how much?” “Well, it’s usually $50 but for you I’ll sell it for $45″ “Um, I was thinking like $30″ “I can’t do $30, how about $40″ Then I stepped in, “How about $31″ “35″ “Ok, lets settle on $32″ “$33″ “Fine”. Funny enough is that we had to pay her with 2 $20’s and ask for change.
So, Linds had her purse, I would’ve liked to get a watch or sunglasses, but none looked that great, and I didn’t want a broken watch. Though, since then I’ve heard they usually are fake but work just fine.
We walked around for a while and went to Little Italy and had a pizza. I have been just SCOLDED for going to Little Italy and only having pizza. I guess you can get decent pizza anywhere, you really should get something like pasta. So, I guess we’ll have to do that next time.
Then we went back to the subway and went to the WTC. It is mostly blocked off and fairly sad. Several memorials and such around the area, but not a lot to see.
At this point it had been a long weekend and were both very tired. We went back tot he hotel to get our bags and went to the train station which is near MSG and the Rockefeller Center.
The train to Trenton was boring, but the guy taking our parking lot ticket sure wasn’t. He kept calling my Dr. Love and laughing. Weird.
Anyway. That was the trip to NYC. Things we’d like to do in the future: Statue of Liberty, Time Square, Brooklyn Bridge, Yankees/Mets game, etc. I mean, it’s NYC, you can’t really run out of things to do.
Have a great weekend.
May 9th, 2008
I am seeing a specialist today for my shoulders. I am fairly excited to maybe get a real answer for once, but I realize he’ll probably be like, “lets do another MRI” or something dumb.
Wish me luck.
Here’s a random picture.
May 8th, 2008
In the last post we went to NYC and were just leaving Central Park…
So, we walked down 5th Ave and saw all the rich people stores. Gucci, Prada, Coach, LV, etc. Then checked into the hotel. Linds had forgotten the shirt she packed for the show so we rushed around searching for a cheap store, found one and got ready for the show. When I checked in they told me that they upgraded my room to the Penthouse Suite. Sweet.
Here’s the room.
Not bad, right?
If you didn’t know, I managed to scalp Wicked tickets. Tixx.com, go there, it was pretty easy. So, went out to eat at a place called Thalia’s. No clue what their specialty is, but I wish we would’ve gone somewhere else. Then we went to the theater (can someone tell me the different uses of Theater and Theatre), which ends up is just down the street from the Radio City Music Hall, where the NFL draft was going on. We had some time to kill so we got some drinks first, got into the show and bought a shirt for each of us ($36 per t-shirt, I felt so dumb the next day, seriously, when will I wear it?). Had to pee the whole first act. And the show was great, by the way. I wish I hadn’t heard all the songs before. But it was cool seeing a show on broadway.
Then I said we had to go out at least a little bit. We first went to a place called “The Irish Pub” which was pretty cool. Had a couple beers and then Linds craved fries. Went and had fries at a place called Old Castle Pub. Went to the room, and they had cleaned. Which I thought was weird, but whatever. One complimentary bottle of liquor later and we collapsed in our super comfortable bed for the night.
May 7th, 2008
Part 1:
Well, some of you know, some of you don’t, but Linds and I two weekends ago went to the Big Apple. I have to say that it was a pretty great trip, but expensive. I’ll break it into a couple/three posts. I did take 2 videos and numerous pictures.
I got home Friday night, having already booked the room thru my buddy from work, for Saturday so Friday we planned out our trip. Linds had the timing down to a science and we analyzed train and subway schedules and headed for bed. Of course, not without some drama as Linds got upset with me for being at Happy Hour too long (as if that’s even possible!).
That next morning the cats started acting all weird on us, as they tend to do. It’s funny, our cats are such pansies. When we start leaving they act all distant and run away, when we come back, we have to smooth into things before both will decide to be normal again. Bear is more obnoxious, he’ll flat out pack himself in with our luggage. Anyway, we hit the road, drove to Trenton, NJ (another one of the nation’s most dangerous cities) and took a train into NYC.
We immediately went to our hotel, checked our luggage in, though the room wasn’t quite ready and headed to get some chow and to see Central Park.
We stopped by a pub, had a couple pints and some food, and went across the street to Central Park. Not what I thought it’d be like. Basically, it’s a big wooded area with roads and paths and baseball fields galore. Not much of a park at all. We saw a lot of two things, gay people and foreigners. Everyone that was walking by us were gabbing with their foreign tongues.
In Central Park we did see this:
Thoughts?
May 6th, 2008
