A series of downers?

George Lucas has nothing on Terry Brooks when it comes to ending a book/movie on a series of downers... I just finished reading Bearers of the Black Staff which is book 1 in the Legends of Shannara series and I have to stay a bit stunned on the way it ended. In the last hour of so of the book half of the main "good guys" get killed!? I'm not saying he leaves them in cliff hangers or anything, he just outright kills them.. I'm obviously not going to say who lives or dies but holy jeez.. What a serious series of downers.. And Randal thought Empire Strikes Back ended on a series of downers, at least in that movie none of the main characters got killed...

The really shitty thing is that the next book does not come out till next year, when will I learn not to read a part of a series as soon as it comes out.. Wait, I did learn that but apparently I must have forgotten... On a side note, I still have not read the latest Wheel of Time or the third Eragon book so as I said, but..

Anyway, if you have not read the new Terry Brooks book yet don't.. I'm NOT saying don't read it ever, I'd just wait till next year and read both of them together..

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As you may or not know Luna loves peeing on my bed, she did so the other night and I ended up trying to sleep on the normal (select comfort) bed. I was in bed for about 10 mins before I started getting real itchy so we decided to take it apart and really clean it the next day. When we did so we found mold growing, yum... Anyway, called Select Comfort and they mailed us an entire new bed, now the question is do we put it together or do we sell it? Ever since we got that bed Jessie has been unhappy with it so we are thinking of selling the *new* bed on eBay and buying something else. I am probably going to list it tonight but if anyone who is reading this is interested ($1200?) let me know and I will end the eBay auction.

This last weekend I went to Brad's house for his AnimeFest, I really think each year it becomes less of an appropriate name. The entire time I was there I don't think there was actually any Anime on, people were watching movies but not Anime.. I for one played Heroscape, which is basically a board game version of Shining Force, Castle Ravenloft which sucked and Empire Builder which is always one of my favorites. I really want to get Heroscape but I have to admit the size of the board makes storing it rather daunting, I actually got up and walked away from Castle Ravenloft it was so bad.. What can I say about Empire Builder? We realized that Empire Builder is to thank for all of our Board Game hobbies, back when I was working at Saturday Matinee my friend Joe introduced me to that game and I in turn pulled Brad and Christian away from console gaming long enough to fall in love with it.. I wonder how many other people owe their board game addiction to Empire Builder? After all these years and many, many board games later it's still one of my all-time favorites!

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I'm about to start some crazy long time away from home, I guess I can't complain too bad because two weeks of that time is vacation but.. At least it's not as bad as it would have been, I swapped one week of travel with another instructor. Next week I'm in Santa Clara CA, I will be going to an Oakland A's game on Sunday and a San Fran Giants game on Wednesday so it will be a fun trip.. I get home Friday morning and we will probably leave for Disney World Friday night or maybe Saturday morning. I was supposed to go to Dallas as soon as I got back but that's the week I swapped out so I will be teaching in Franklin instead, then the next week I go to Mclean VA.. So I will be home one of the next five weeks... Will have to make sure the time I am home is as full as possible..

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Speaking of as full as possible.. Saturday I'm going to the CT Ren Faire with Jessie, my mom and Joe.. If anyone is interested in joining us let me know... This year they are doing an all musical show..

Two Pints & the Shark

Just finished the final season of Two Pints of Larger and a Packet of Crisps the other night. My dad got the DVDs from the UK and me and Jessie have been watching them over the last few months, the show literally jumped the shark in the beginning of season 7 when one of the main characters won a trip to America and died in a shark attack after jumping it.. That season was pretty painful to get through but it redeemed itself in season 8 for a very good finale. One really odd thing is that the final season DVD does not have the final two episodes which apparently aired as a special after the season DVD came out!? Thanks to TV Torrents we now have those two episodes but have yet to watch them.

Onto other shows.. Comedy Central just got the rights to air the old It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia which I caught while in Philadelphia last week (ironically), it reminded me how funny that show appears to be so we downloaded season 1 on TV Torrents. I also stumbled upon Junk Yard Wars on Discovery, it's a game show where teams have to build odd devices out of stuff in a junk yard. I only watched one episode so far in which they had to build a off road golf car to hit a soccer ball without human intervention, gotta love building stuff from junk!

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This week has been very tiring, this Lyme's Disease is kicking my ass on a daily basis but it will be over soon.. Wednesday night I went to Tony Luke's to get a Philly Cheese Steak, Tony Luke bought the building across the street from his original cheese steak stand and turned it into a sit down restaurant. It was raining pretty hard (not always sunny in Philadelphia) so we (me and Josh) went inside instead of to the stand. Got an original wiz cheese steak with a side of alfredo pasta and was NOT disappointed, I'd had a Tony Luke's cheese steak at Citizen's Bank Park the other year but it was certainly much better at the restaurant.

Thursday I went out to Matt's house which is about 60 miles from Philadelphia, unfortunately about 40 of those miles is on a two lane road that goes nothing but straight right across NJ, it's a VERY pretty road but the traffic going to the ocean was out of control. My GPS said it would take an hour but it ended up being more like 2 hours 30 mins.. The ride was worth it though. We went to a little crab shack and I got an egg battered tilapia with crab meat on it. When I say crab meat I don't mean the normal bread crumbed crab meat, it was big chunks of naked crab meat! The ride back was great till I hit Philly, the last 20 miles took me over an hour!

Friday was driving home day and I of course I got stuck in major traffic in NYC and CT, had a late dinner and a very quick weekend. Went to Mom's house on Saturday for dinner and to meet her new dog Storm. We made portabella mushrooms on the grill and asparagus with lots of bacon on them. Sunday I went up to Nurit's house for her birthday and played DDR and Dominion, I ended up calling it an early night because I was tired but I had a good time.

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Long drives are always made better with good books, I am currently listening to Time Travelers Never Die by Jack McDevitt, it grabbed me right from the beginning and I would recommend it to anyone who likes Time Travel books. Before that I listened to Castle in the Air by Dianna Wynne Jones, it is the 3rd book in the Howl's Moving Castle world. Her books are very fun and good for all ages. You know, I just said it was the 3rd book but apparently I (and audible.com) are wrong, it is actually the 2nd book in terms of publish order but the 3rd in terms of reading order.. I guess that counts of 3rd right? Anyway, I think I'm going to grab some of her other books in the months to come.

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Last thing I want to mention, Vote Wright! David Wright is in 2nd place for 3B in the all-star game voting. Got to MLB.com and vote, you can vote 25 times per email address. If you have 2 email address you should vote 50 times!

---Diversion of the Day

Kings of Metal...

I just got back from the worst hot tub ever... It was certainly HOT but it only had one working jet... I'm in Duluth Georgia again, you know last time I was here I was also healing from getting my tattoo done, this time it's all the way healed at least but I'm still hesitant about being submerged in water but that's ok since the main pool is closed for repairs and the hot tub sucks..

Last time I was here I spent most nights at Barnacles and met some really cool people. I went there last night and I was the only white person in the whole bar. I went by there again tonight after dinner and once again nobody I knew was there.. :(

A guy in my class found a bbq place he heard was good so I think I'm going to go there tomorrow, tonight I went to a British Pub that's about 9 miles from the hotel. I was told about it by a girl from OKCupid who I have not seen online since.. Speaking of OKCupid, work blocked that as of this afternoon, I guess it was just a matter of time.. Anyway, so this place ended up being pretty cool, they had Fat Tire on tap and sold fish in chips in a single or double portion, I got the single portion which was plenty of food. Left plenty of room for my Fat Tires.. :)

Another guy in my class was talking about how great the hotel next door was, I wish it were a Marriott because this place is pretty lame (hot tub & pool suck and TV/channels are weak) but it's all about the points..

It's been a long time since I blogged but I'm going to pretend that nothing of interest happened during that time because I was starting to feel overwhelmed with trying to recap the ever missing blogs.. One thing I will say.. I went to see Percy Jackson and the Olympians: Lightning Thief, it was bad like one of those made for TV fantasy movies, the sets however were great. Speaking of Percy Jackson, I read the first book recently and it was VERY good and I just started the 2nd (Sea of Monsters) and it's just as good so far. Whoah, this blog is truly a tangent in a tangent... Speaking of books, I just finished And Another Thing which is the 6th book of the Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Trilogy. It was written by Eoin Colfer with permission from the estate of Douglas Adams.. It was very good and really captured the feel of the old books. If you're a fan of the books I recommend it. And another thing regarding books (see that clever use of the previous title), they finally released Good Omens on audio! I have that on my iPod and it will be the next book I listen to right after Sea of Monsters.

I've decided I like blogs that are a stream of thought so.. I didn't get a chance to watch/listen to today's Mets game but John Maine started today, he left after facing only 8 batters and striking out 4 of them! Apparently he moved weird towards first base and they decided to pull him before he hurt himself again. Can't say I blame them.. Speaking of the Mets, Perez pitched the other day and got shelled, ugh! We are paying that smeghead 13mil for another 2 years.. I am however excited for the upcoming season, I think with the addition of Jason Bay our team will do much better than last year (especially if we can stay healthy)..

Right, so back to present day.. I was at the airport in Hartford waiting for my flight then none other than Don King comes and sits down across from me! He is looking old but he is an awesome guy, took a few peoples pictures with him and talked with him for a bit.. During that excitement I met a really cool girl who lives in Springfield, she works as an interpretor and was flying to Las Vegas to meet her boss. She had not flown in a VERY long time and I helped her get a seat assignment and I helped her get to her connecting flight in Atlanta, we are going to get together when we both get back. :D I also met a really cool guy from Middletown CT who travels almost 90% of the time for work. I ended up sitting next to him on the flight which made the flight go pretty quickly.

Umm.. So, back to tonight.. Yay, tangety (is that a word) blogs... I went to the British Pub as I mentioned, it is on a street that ends in a really cool park, I wandered around the park a bit before dinner and took some nice pictures which I will hopefully post tomorrow at work when I'm not on a really slow internet connection.

My car this week is a tiny little car called a Cevy Aveo.. I took some pics and will post them tomorrow as well. It's not a bad little car actually, the steering wheel is very thin but otherwise it's nice to drive.

Ok, I guess I'm done for tonight.. See ya all later..

Oh, one more thing.. I found out that there is a Marta station about 10 mins from work, the Marta runs every 8-10 minutes into Atlanta so one of these nights I will be heading into Atlanta to eat at that raw place (Loving it Live) without having to deal with traffic.. :)

---Diversion of the Day

Jessie found this band last night while staying up too late, hope you like it (I know I did)..

Ah Symmetrix, my old friend..

This may be a long blog because I actually have things to say I just haven't taken the time to write them down..

I am in Symmetrix Installation and Maintenance class this week.. Why you ask? I am branching my knowledge back up an old branch.. I will be adding Symm classes to my repertoire of classes I teach, should not take much ramp up time since I worked on that product for 5 years before becoming a SAN instructor.. Being in the class is pretty boring because it's amazing how little I forgot.. :)

So bored at work means time to blog..

My dad got a hold of the Sunday ticket plan games for 2010 so I spent this morning looking over games and which ones conflict with other plans. One thing I realized is that I set my Disney Vacation for the beginning of the playoffs, will that matter? Depends on how good the Mets do this year.. It would be bitter sweet if they made the playoffs and I was in Disney for it but I will take my chances.. :)

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I've read some very good books lately and wanted to mention one that really stood out above the rest.. Paul Levinson's Plot to Save Socrates.. I don't want to say too much because I do recommend you read it if you like time travel and especially if you have a keen like of Ancient Greece.. Here is a cut and paste of the Wiki article on it..

The Plot To Save Socrates deals primarily with the concept of time travel, and while the novel rarely discusses time travel directly, it poses several questions about its validity and possibility (or lack thereof). The story begins in Athens Greece in 2042 with the main character, Sierra Waters, thinking to herself, at which point the rest of the story begins as a flashback (both in her head and in the sense that the characters constantly flash in and out of historic eras). Sierra Waters, a graduate student, receives a copy of a previously unknown dialogue in which Socrates is being offered an escape from his death sentence in ancient Athens by a person (named Andros) offering to take him into the future and leave a clone behind. The document appears to be genuine, and this takes Sierra onto a path that leads her to a time traveling adventure of her own. On her path she meets up with the great historic inventor Heron of Alexandria but soon realizes that Heron is a suspicious character himself. The story tangles itself a bit as more and more characters appear to be intertwined with each other and on occasion even the same person at different points in life. However, the novel ultimately untangles itself, somewhat satisfying the plot's plausibility although leaving unanswered any deeper metaphysical qualms the reader might have. The story also involves Plato, Alcibiades, publisher William Henry Appleton, as well as several fictional characters. There are scenes across time, placed in the Ancient Library of Alexandria, Victorian New York City, and Roman London.

Another book that I would recommend is Howl's Moving Castle by Diana Wynne Jones. If you've seen Miyazaki's movie by the same name you will not be disappointed by this read nor by the movie after reading it. Obviously the movie has alot of things missing and some differences but Miyazaki did a great job of presenting the book in movie form.

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Back to the 20th.. The last time I wrote a blog I was getting ready to go meet Amy and Mitch for dinner. The drive down to their house really sucked, there was an accident a mile away from their exit so the 20 mile ride took me about 90 mins! I got there and we hung our for a bit before we went to Daks, a local non-chain restaurant, for dinner. Dinner was good but the place was crazy cold, Mitch found a space heater tucked behind one of the tables so we pulled it out and turned it on under our table which made it much better. After dinner we went to Baskin' Robbins near Daks and ended up leaving because they had an un-open container of chocolate peanut butter but would not open it!? The guy looked at me and said "we don't have that flavor tonight", I said "but it's right there", and he said "yeah, but it's not open"... wtf?! We drove down the road about 5 mins to another Baskin' Robbins and they had the correct ice cream so we got some.. :) It was so nice to be able to spend time with Amy and Mitch and I'm looking forward to my next trip to the DC area in April so we can hang out more. Hopefully next time she will be in better condition so we can enjoy more active activities, she had recently gotten into a bad car accident and could barely get in and out of the car because of pain..

Speaking of people I miss hanging out with.. Kaitlyn came over on the 24th and we went to the Willi Brew Pub with Lynz and Jessie. We had some good food and some good beer (as expected at the Brew Pub).. After dinner me, Kaitlyn and Jessie played some Guitar Hero.. Kaitlyn played drums and a great time was had by all..

Janine and I had planned to watch Wicked on DVD, we finally scheduled it for the 25th.. Idea, me and Jessie would go to Hoyle and Janine's house for dinner and afterwards watch Wicked.. Fail in the plan, I can't find my Wicked DVD.. Anyone have it? I know I lent it to someone but don't remember who.. Well, after spending way to much time looking for the stupid DVD me and Jessie headed over. After dinner we ended up watching Inglorious Bastards which I really liked. It was very long (153 mins) but it kept my interest throughout, Jessie was not as impressed. The only thing I would have liked was more on screen time of the Inglorious Bastards..

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Me and Jessie went to the Laire Awards ceremony this Saturday. They always have it at Dave and Busters in West Nyack NY, the last time we went the food was just "eh", this time the food was actually quite good. The Order won best group which gives us one free ward a month.

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The final episode of Dollhouse aired on Friday night. It did a good job of ending the series but I really wish it was longer, the episode seemed to be on the verge of fast forward and I think they could have done alot more with it. Hopefully the DVD set will have a longer version of the final episode. I remember reading somewhere that the final episode was going to be 2 hours but it was only 1 so who knows. Maybe my source was bad, maybe the cut an hour out for broadcast. I hope the 2nd one is true.

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When I started this blog I think I had more to say but now I don't remember what it was.. I should have made an outline before I started but oh well.. Perhaps I will remember more later and write about in another blog..

I just found out that there is a sequel being written for Plot to Save Socrates. It's called Unburning Alexandria, no listed release date but something to watch for.

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Dimension Jump XVI is being held in London on July 23rd-25th. When that schedule is being written I'm going to ask my boss if he can send me to London that week.. Dimension Jump is a Red Dwarf convention, the rumor is they are going to show episode 1 of series 10.

---Diversion of the Day

http://mchat.comicgenesis.com/d/20100129.html

Prius and warmth..

Saturday after dinner, I'm picking up where the last blog left off, me and Jessie went to see A Murder is Announced at the Bradley. We had not been at the Bradly in a long time, we apparently missed all the plays this year.. Have to make sure to get to more of those next year, the only one left this year is the Broadway Live Christmas show which is always "eh".. This play was good, I was actually wrong at guessing who did the murdering.. Jessie was right.. Not going to say who because I don't want to ruin anything for anyone who might see this play in their lives..

Onto sunny California..

The flight from Hartford to Minnesota was great! It was a brand new plane and had next to no noise and no turbulence, I actually walked up and down the aisle without having to hold the seats.. I sat next to a lady and her baby who where on their way to Irvine, she grew up in WeHa and now lives in Irvine with her husband. The baby was amazingly quiet too which was good because when I saw them come onboard I was a bit scared it would be an annoying flight.

The flight from Minnesota to San Jose was NOT a new plane, it was actually so old it still had ash trays in the seats! It was NOT a quiet turbulence free flight, as a matter of fact we hit a big storm right outside San Jose and ended up getting thrown around quite a bit.

Landed and shuttled over to rent-a-car where I was given a Prius! It's a 2009 Prius, but it's a base model which means it has no iPod connection. The radio station it was on had Madonna playing when I finally turned up the volume so yay for me.. :)

Speaking of iPod, I finished the Element on the plane and started Graveyard Book by Neil Gaiman. I figure it's almost Halloween so it's a good time to listen to this finally. It's pretty short (7 hours), I listened to about 1/3 of it already. It's a fun book so far.

Oh, well back to class for me.. I have not done any real exploring but I found out that the hotel has free breakfast and dinner! I probably won't take advantage of the dinners because I want to hit some of the sites while I'm here but it's good to know.. Oh and since this is a customer class I get free lunch too!

Swing-a-dalla-doo

I finished listening to Twilight today, I didn't like it.. The book was about 17 hours and I would say for 16 hours the book was a badly done high school romance book, the one hour that was good was not good enough to make me download the next one... I am now listening to Nymphos or Rocky Flats which is so far a very good book about a soldier in the Iraq war gets turned into a vampire..

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I am watching American Idol from last night with Amber and Jessie. They (American Idol) are once again doing that annoying thing that they did last year.. The first few weeks are auditions which they show tons of people, some good, some bad and some REAL bad... The thing that annoys me is that they show a little about each person before they audition, what's annoying about that you ask? You can tell who makes it and who does not based on the videos they show before they audition, if they show any footage of the person at home or anything you know they are in before they sing... They should show that crap after they sing so that you the viewer can guess if they make it or not... /sigh

One contestant, Aundre Caraway, was so funny.. He was a pretty bad singer and was having so much fun dancing around on the stage, when he was done he said "swing-a-dalla-doo" in a sing song voice that made me laugh my ass off..

There was a few good people on Tuesdays episode but nobody that really blew my mind.. Onto tonight's episode..

Casey Carlson was one of the early ones in Wednesday's episode and she was the best of the two nights so far. I will be keeping my eyes, err umm I mean ears on her.. All in all Wednesday night had a better set of people than Tuesday did. I just finished up Wednesdays episode and I would say that Casey was the best of the two nights.

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I was going to write more about Tuesday dinner and all, but this AI episode is keeping me distracted.. Maybe I'll write more about that tomorrow.. :D

---Diversion of the Day


Aundre Caraway - Cactus
Uploaded by aiclips

New Thought of the Day?

Ok, so the problem with posting a "Thought of the Day" early in the day is that sometimes that can change.. So, I went to the dentist as you saw in the previous post and it was not that bad.. So should my thought of the day still be about not wanting to go to the dentist? Probably not.. I will admit that was the "Thought of the Morning" but I just read something that is truly worthy of being a "Thought of the Day", scratch that, it's worthy of being the "Thought of the Week" or possibly even more... One of my favorite quotes from Atlas Shrugged (ok, my only favorite quote from Atlas Shrugged) is "The pleasure you get from me should be paid for by the pleasure I get from you, not by guilt or any other such pain."

Which in itself could be a great "Thought of the Day".. So I guess the question is, should I post a new "Thought of the Day" or should I just save it for tomorrow? I dunno.. I just re-read the "Thought of the Day" and I guess if you take the Dentist part out is actually a good thought..

Let's try that.. "When faced with something you don't want to do, the right thing to do is NOT to avoid.. The longer you put it off the more you dread doing it.. The reason you dread doing it is because it's inevitably going to be harder the longer you wait.. "

See, now that's a much better thought.. So, do I post another thought? I guess I did by putting in the Atlas Shrugged quote.. But, that's a sub thought based on the new thought.. Ahh, screw it.. I've spent too much time debating this argument.. You can't have two "Thought of the Day" right? If you could it would be "Thoughts of the Day".. OK.. So.. No new thought today.. I will post it tomorrow..

I know, you hate me.. I hate me too sometimes..

I just had this vision of lots of angry comments about how dare I bring this up and not post it.. To avoid those here it is.. I bring you the new and improved Thought of the Day... Which is from this website..

---Thought of the Day
"A relationship is a partnership, an alliance, not some game with winners and losers."

Ya Gotta Believe

Can't the republicans come up with a different shtick? I didn't watch the debate last night, I really don't need to waste my time.. The only reason to watch debates is if you are unsure who you are voting for.. Why do the republicans feel the need to use the liberal label as if it's the worst insult you can use..

This is an interesting "fact check".. Might be the first time in a long time that CNN is actually saying people should look at facts?! What an idea for a news network...

In other news - Paul Newman died today at 83 of cancer. He did a lot of good in his life and it's unfortunate that he is no longer with us.. Good luck on your next journey..

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I was talking to Lynz this morning and somehow we got on the topic of Bill Clinton.. Imagine how awesome it would have been if when he was confronted with having sex with Monica Lewinsky he just said something like "yeah, I had sex with her. Man, that chick gives great head".. Think of it, no impeachment, no scandal.. Would have been even better if Hillary had said "What my husband does with the whores who work for him is his business and I don't know why you (the media) feel the need to make it public"...

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I ordered three books today. Yes, actual books.. I am even going to read them.. I ordered "the Hollow Chocolate Bunnies of the Apocalypse", "4400: The Vesuvius Prophecy" and "4400: Wet Work". The Chocolate Bunnies was released on Audio but only Abridged.. The 4400 books have not been released on Audio and there is no plan to release them..

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Today's Mets game is currently in a rain delay, they have a scheduled start time of 1:45.. We really need the Miracle Mets this weekend or else they will be watching October Baseball for the 2nd straight year...

---- Comic of the day
http://www.xkcd.com/290/ (Replace Mario Kart with Watching Baseball)

---- Thought of the day
So much of the problems in the world are caused because people are afraid of what others think.. If everyone who did things "against societal norms" would admit it publicly I think we would find that "societal norms" are very different from what everyone thinks they are..

This week - the Update...

So, only a few hours later and my week looks much different.. Tonight I am going with Jessie to Verizon and Burn After Reading.. My dad is joining us for dinner and the movie..

Tomorrow - I called my grandmother and left her a message about dinner tomorrow..

Wednesday - Jessie is going to Yoga, I have no plans yet but if Lynz and John can't find a babysitter I'll be hanging with Anja.. :)

Thursday - Dinner with Lynz..

Friday - Hang at house and watch Mets/Marlins and/or play the Wii

I am working from home the rest of the week too which means at least one picnic and lots of reading on Invista.. :D

btw - I'm almost done listening to Gypsy Morph which is the last book of the Genesis of Shannara series.. If this series was not Terry Brooks I would think it was a good series, but.. Terry tried something new in this series and I think he failed.. Certainly the worst Terry Brooks series.. I guess when you have 27 books you are allowed to have 3 bad ones..

Generic Blog Title...

The only difference, on Sunday, between Ireland and Germany is that in Germany the coffee houses stay open. Me and Jessie went into Frankfurt center today to look around, do some shopping and do some tours.. Look around - check.. Tour - check.. Shopping - no so much...

We arrived in the city and ate at the train station, I had a BLT with cheese on a bagel and a Pretzel. Jessie had a tuna sandwich and a cheese danish. We went to the tour company and found the next tour to be in 2 hours. Killing 2 hours in a major city should be no problem right? Well, on any day but Sunday... The only thing open were pubs, restaurants and coffee houses.. We walked around some closed shops for a while before heading down to the river and walking along it for a while. We saw this really cool type of tree that grows pretty much straight before growing out (the only branches were way up), they had a line of them on either side of a walkway so it created a really awesome canopy. I think if you were stand under the canopy while it was raining you wouldn't get wet..

The tour was good, we saw a bunch of stuff and learned some neat things like the Euro was invented/started in Frankfurt, there is a big Euro symbol outside the building where it started. We also learned (realized) that none of the building in Frankfurt are older then World War II, the entire city was leveled by the Ally forces.. :( Even the "old/historical" buildings are recreations, some built as late as 1980!

We had some apple wine which I thought was really sweet and some Bockwurst which tasted like a bad stadium hot dog when the tour stopped in "Roman Square" which was the historical center of town.

As on each city tour I took a ton of pictures so I have something to bore you with when I get back..

Came back to the hotel via the train and a wooded path. For dinner we went to a traditional German restaurant and I had Hunter style Pork (Hunter's style = mushroom gravy) which was excellent. Jessie had Gypsy style pork (Gypsy style = spicy red sauce) which was also really good. Mine came with little potato puffs that I got to dip in the gravy - yum!

Heading to bed...

Oh, I forgot to tell you - Yesterday I saw an audiobook based on Settlers of Catan! I want to see if it's translated into English.