Happy Easter! :-) Tyler spent the night at Shan's folks place last night, but Emily decided to stay home. So, when she woke up, she was pretty excited that the Easter Bunny had come! We do not get the kids a bunch of candy for Easter - they get enough of it from .. er, uh.. other relatives. So, Emily got new Barbie sunglasses and Tyler got Yugioh cards. They each also got a little bit of candy and about three bucks worth of change in their plastic eggs. They also each got a TVNow! recorder. It is a handheld DVR, for lack of a better description. They both plugged them in and started recording stuff to watch later. The built-in memory is not very much (128MB), so I am going to buy them each an SD card to use with their players. That will let them record a full-length movie or two at a time. The cool thing is that there are no moving parts, so in a lot of ways, it's better than a portable DVD player! :-) (At least in theory, guess we'll see, huh?)
The best surprise was the phone call that came this morning. After two rings, Emily picked up the phone, and soon her eyes were as big as half-dollars! POPPY was on the phone! She talked to my Dad for a bit before handing the phone to me, and then as Shan came in, Emily ran over and LEAPT into her arms, "It's Poppy! Poppy called me!" I have a feeling that when Dad gets back from Iraq, he's going to have quite the 'shadow' following him everywhere he goes.... :-)
Nick (Shan's sister's husband) told us a story about one of their dogs. Forgive me if I don't quite get it right, but I'm afraid my re-telling of the -er, uh- "tail," will not do the adventure justice....
It seems that Star, one of their dogs, decided he knew a good meal when he saw it... As the dog ran passed Nick one evening, Nick said he thought he saw TWO tails go running by... Perplexed, he caught the dog only to discover that it not sprouted a new tail, but rather was attempting to purge itself of a previous snack - one of Nick's socks.... Nick said he grabbed the dog's hind-quarters with one arm, while trying to 'help' the dog relieve himself of the sock. As Nick pulled gingerly, the dog was going spastic, trying to figure out just what the heck Nick was doing back there! When the sock finally pulled free, it something akin to a magician's "handkerchief up the sleeve" trick... You see, much of the sock had been digested and so there were strands of material still coming out as Nick pulled...
Truly one of the funniest stories I have heard in a while! :-)
My aunt corrected me on my cocaine reference. Coke does not cause hallucinations, evidently. Guess I missed that in my education somewhere.... :-)
Alright, let's just get this out there - Mr. Trump, what the heck were ya thinkin'!? He should have fired Frank and Nicole tonight... Heidi screwed up this time, sure, but come on, she runs circles around the other applicants. And, Nicole was saved only because Trump was so distracted by the whole Heidi-Frank mess... At this point, I think James will win, unless Stephani beats him out... At least everyone is back inside the house without all that stupid backyard camping stuff... That is one of the dumbest concepts yet.
Now, before anyone gets all wiggy on me, I fully admit that two of the presentations tonight were absolutely horrid. Someone needs to tell these people that Power Point is dead if they are simply going to read what's on the screen... Anyone can do that. It's not their fault, and it's not Power Point's fault. Somewhere, someone missed the 'reason' for Power Point - highlight ideas, but leave the talking to the presenter. I think what happened is that Power Point got "too" fancy. Strip it down and force people to use it like it was SUPPOSED to be used, and you're good to go.... Oh well, I can't say too much - I have a few presentations I have to edit, too... At least I'm not presenting to the world, right? Look, if Mr. Trump is your customer, you cater to him as the customer - have your crap together and know what you're talking about. It's not rocket science, people.....
We went with friends to the batting cages in another town. We let the kids (they have two girls) practice their hitting. Emily practiced T-Ball. The batting cages are arranged by speed and type. So, we have slow softball, slow baseball, medium softball, med. baseball, and finally fast of each. Tyler jumped in the medium cage. Turns out medium means "roughly 80 MPH." He did alright, but moved to the slow baseball (around 45 MPH). For whatever reason, Greg and I decided to try our hands at the medium baseball cages. I mean, come on, just keep your eye on the ball right? Before I go much further, let me remind you that I am NOT athletic, that's why I dink around with technology... So, let the humiliation begin...
The first pitch comes, and I am still in the "okay, get ready" position as the ball hits the pad behind me. Next pitch, and at least I swing the bat this time. "Keep your eye on the ball," I tell myself as the fourth pitch comes out of the machine (yes, there was a third pitch, but it is over and done by the time I tell myself to watch the ball). I swing, and I managed to hit the ball. Now, before you get excited for me, let me just say that in the Majors, the catcher would have caught the foul-tip that really changed nothing of the trajectory of the ball....
Several pitches later, I do manage to hit one in a generally fair-like direction. For me, it's a homer, okay? Then, something strange happened... I watched, and swung, and missed... repeat... (Yes, much like washing your hair). At some point, I just wanted the dumb thing to QUIT pitching! Later, the kid who runs the cages offered me a free token (10 pitches) if I would stand in the fast (90-95 mph) baseball cage. I told him I would be happy to STAND in the cage, but that if he expected me to hit anything, he'd be better off playing the lottery..... :-)
And, yes, I did try my hand at the slow pitch baseball, and hit every pitch, many of them really were homers... But, really, it's hard to be excited when your 11-year old son can do the same thing.... :-)
After the cages, we decided to grab a bite to eat and then we headed over to the mall, where they have a new black-light mini-putt golf course. Sounds fun, right? For about 7 bucks, you play one round.....of 27 holes.... Have you ever played a 27-round game with 4 kids, one of which is under 5!? And, we grownups didn't even PLAY! Greg and I 'supervised' while Michelle and Shan sat on the glowing seats talking.... It was a LOT of fun, really! But, after T-W-E-N-T-Y-S-E-V-E-N holes....even the kids were to the point of picking up the balls and dropping them into the holes... :-)
That reminds me - we stopped at Sonic after that and I got an Oreo Blast. I did not finish it all by the time we got home, and I think I put it in the freezer...I think it's still there...... :-)
