Second Week on February 2011

Monday I went to the doctor about my back pain, and I set into motion to get a stand up cube at work. I think it will help alleviate my back issues by being able to stand all day ... sitting is bad. After work I went over to CJ's for the latest gathering of the Disorder of the Stick, i.e. our Pathfinder group. My character is quite uncooperative at times. Our group was railroaded into an encounter with an obviously much higher level character who 'conveniently' needed our help. He proceeded to try to tempt/bribe us into cooperation. He knew a little too much about us, and if he was really that powerful, why did he need our help? I refused to go along with the story. It'll be interesting to see how it ends up.

Tuesday night I dinner with VK. On Wednesday I stayed home and didn't do much. Thursday my back was finally better, so I bowled. I had a 432 series, so that's four pins total above my average. Wow.

Friday I got back on the exercise band wagon, and that felt good. However, on the way home, I about as bad of a panic attack as I have had in years and years. No real logical source, but it's panic attack, not a thinking attack. Finally after getting it all cleared up and calmed down, I went to the annual jitterbugs pink party.

Yes, everyone finds love on Saint Valentine's Day. Photo credit: Matt

Saturday morning I did chores, then in the late afternoon, headed over to Kaleb's game night. We, meaning just Kaleb and I, played a game called Battle Line, which I really liked. It's a card game where you use your hand to control portions of the board. Our game was as close as it gets, Kaleb won, but the card he had was the only one he could have gotten to win, I had more options, but didn't get the draw. I mean possibly enough to buy it and/or get the iPhone App. We also played a game of Endeavor. I didn't win.

I left there and went to the dance at GAMe. Dan was the deejay and played ZZ Top if you can believe it. I did have a fifteen second conversation with Shannon, I suppose it's a good thing. You can see me not dancing here on Jillian's Flickr.

Sunday was the latest installment of Mass Chaos and lunch. The weather turned beautiful, and I walked around the neighborhood, quite mindful of standing water. Later in the evening Kimee and I had dinner at Culver's, and then we attempted a walk, but by then it was too cold.

First Week on February 2011

Monday had one of the strangest beginnings I've ever had. I woke up, got ready for work, and headed out on the east side of the subdivision, I was planning on going to Bucky's on 370. I came up over the hill, and in the middle of the intersection, that I had to stop sign for, was a garbage truck, two garbage men, and pickup truck. I hit the brakes and nothing. The road was sheet ice. I had plenty of time to react, and managed to get the car into a snow bank. I scared myself pretty badly though, and went home and stayed home ... too dangerous out there.

I mostly played video games all day, not a productive day, but no one was killed by my car, so it turned out to be on the plus side. In a related weather note, VK had to drive Kristie down to Bellevue to get a four wheel drive truck, and on the way back, they stopped in and I made dinner, chili, curried rice, and a fresh salad. Kristie left, and VK and I played Dance Central.

Tuesday Snowmageddon 2011 continued, but it was snow, not ice, and I got into work just fine. After work, I went over to VK's and Kristie, her, and I played Settlers of Catan, VK won. I got fed in the process. The drive home was not as pleasant, but not as bad as Monday morning. By Wednesday morning Snowmeggedon 2011 had ended, and really, the Omaha area got missed mostly. I got up early to shovel, but Merinda already did half of the driveway. I did half of what was left, and then went into work. I guess getting up early didn't agree with me, I went to bed pretty early after work.

All that good rest must have done my body good, Thursday I was in a ridiculously happy mood. Everything was sunshine and roses. After work I met VK at Peony Park Hy-Vee and ate. It was a short meal because Thursday night is bowling night. It was the only thorn in my day, I bowled quite badly, a 346 series.

Friday during lunch I got my driver's side front tire fixed over my lunch "hour". Jensen tires took an hour, so obviously I took longer than an hour. Later in the evening, I was on the clean up crew for Jitterbugs, so I went to the dance. We had some very funny moments in the bar, sorry, can't relay it here. After the dance, surprise, we went to Alvarado's.

Saturday was Merinda's big day planned for Mount Crescent. We were going to go tubing, but when we got there the tubing was horrible, so they had us do this thing called zibobbing. It's a minisled, about 18 inches wide and 30 inches long with a big handle on it. They hauled us up the chairlift, and we walked down a bit, and then road these things over about 1/4 mile long and 200 foot drop in elevation. They were really fast, snow flying up in your face, feeling like you're about to wipe out the whole way down. So in other words good times. I probably had ten runs, I did not take my camera, but the scenery was beautiful: big snowflakes, little wind, temp between 25F and 30F, and a pretty view looking back at Crescent, IA, I'll remember it for a while. You may be able see James video of the experience here, it's on Facebook.

Unfortunately, so will Todd. He had a wipeout and blew out his MCL. I felt pretty bad for him, it was at least a spectacular fall. Jillian also had a close encounter with the snow, I'm sure you can read about it on her blog. The worst thing I happen to me was ripping a huge hole in my rain gear. We had about 90 runs between all of the people there, and we had one and a quarter injuries. Despite the couple of bad things, I would do this again. It was a hoot.

Sunday was a busy day. First up Mass Chaos, I learn something new every week. Saint Matthew in Bellevue meets in the school gymnasium. After Mass we went up to Culver's as a group, but there was no where to sit, so we ran over to my place and ate in the basement.

Next up was the memorial for Bart Wormington. It was only a couple months ago that I went to his wedding with Margaret, six weeks later he passed away without any warning. Matt did a fabulous job on a video slideshow from Bart's life, he used (with my permission) some of my pictures, and it really brought it home to me when I saw pictures that I took of Bart. He was a good guy. Hugs to you Margaret, you deserve better.

Next up was the Superbowl party at CJ's. I mostly did not watch the game, I ate, drank, socialized, and played games. During the game, we played Endeavor, and after the game we played a game called Telestrations that led to much laughter, it was kind of a mix up of the telephone game and Pictionary.

Fourth Week in January 2011

Monday was a very busy day at work. After work I managed to have a few minute dinner with VK, and by a few minutes, I mean a like ten, I met her at Whole Foods, and we had the pizza special. She had to go to an appointment. I went home and literally slept as soon as I got home. Tuesday and Wednesday were normal days, and then Thursday was the next edition of Mass Chaos Bowling. I bowled a 399 series, this makes my average 136 so far.

Friday after work I went to Jillian's for dinner. Lee, Maggie, Anna, and David were there also. I don't think any of them quite believed how much food I ate. We then went to the dance. I had a funny moment shortly after we got to the dance where I was out of breath after one short dance, but later in the night I was just fine. It took me a couple days, but I figured out that I just ate a lot before hand.

After the dance, I joined Joe, James, and Vesper at the UNMC ice rink (who even knew they had one) for a benefit skate-a-thon for Parkinson's. It was a magical experience, not too cold, you could see stars, there was a group of skaters who did 'Thriller' on ice, and we also did the chicken dance!

The view from the skate house. Not pictured: Joe on his butt.

Saturday was Beddescon. I figure you may not know what it is, but that's okay. It's an all day board gaming event. I wanted to go last year, but I was on call. This year, I was not. It was in the conference room at a hotel, and there were probably about 40-50 people who came and went, maybe more.

I played six different games starting with Castle Ravenloft. This is the second time I've played it, and the heroes won again, this time fairly handily.

The second game that was played was Tsuro. It can be played with up to eight players. We played three games, and I did not win. It seemed to be very popular game, at one point there were three different sessions going on.

Surprise, Annette showed up. Well, I wasn't surprised, but she was that I was there. Jess and I got some lunch ... okay I got lunch and she went with me. Afterward, CJ showed up and we played a game of Puerto Rico. This is the #2 game overall on the site, and it's a good one, but it's not my second favorite. CJ won, but for the first time I can remember, I did really well. There was a table in the corner that seemed to be playing all games with a betrayer in it ... I decided not to befriend anyone there ... you know, just in case.

We then played a game called Vikings that was new to me. I didn't win, I came in second out of four. I liked it, but I may have gotten really lucky with how my game went, so I can't really say much about the game until I play a few more times.

The next game was a game that Kevin liked to play, Empire Builder. This is an old school game (1980) of railroad building. I generally suck at this game, and this time was no exception. In my opinion, it relies too much on luck, but like life you have to overcome your bad luck. I started out bad, but closed well.

The last game that was played was a favorite of mine, here. We played the five player game, and it was really interesting. In the end I didn't win, but I thought it to be quite exciting. This game is easily in my top five. I like that so many different strategies can be played by different people at the same time and all can work, in other words, it's a well balanced game. In the end, I only won the first game, and only as a group, but it was very fun.

CJ, Jess, and I left immediately after the Ra game and went to the Maple Road location of La Mesa for dinner. VK, Bente, and Amber were already there, and Chris joined us shortly after that. Yes, that's a mixed group of friends. CJ and Bente had not met before, and they were very entertaining to listen to talk ... very entertaining.

After dinner, Chris, CJ, and Jess went back to Beddescon. While VK, Bente, Amber, and I went over to Boondockers for karaoke. It was a big crowd, Joe (the instigator, I mean organizer), Lindsay, Merinda, Troy, Amanda, Chris, and Ben ... I'm sure I am missing someone. I sang Moondance ... badly, I need to get a few songs and practice them. The best part was five of us dancing behind Bente when she sang Girls Just Wanna Have Fun. And that was Saturday, it was a very magical day.

Sunday was the latest installment of Mass Chaos. Afterward we went out to eat at Village Inn, our 40 minute wait time was about ten minutes. I took the camera in and took some artsy monochromatic pictures.

You can see the rest of my Village Inn pictures here. The rest of Sunday was spent being nappy.

Next week: snowmeggedon!