Well, Brenden is just over 6 months old now! I can’t believe how quickly time has passed. It just seems like yesterday that he was born.
The last few weeks have been very fun for the little guy. We’ve been to two 1 year old’s parties as well as a wedding. He was very well behaved during all of it, even though he’s just a baby.
He’s learning so much and is pretty much on the verge of crawling. And the other day he grabbed Maggie’s cup and knew to bring it to his lips. We were both stunned that he knew what to do.
So typical parent thing, a stats update:
Weight: 18 lbs 10.8 oz
Height: 27 1/2 Inches
And here are some fun photos from the last little while:
Getting ready for bed after a bath
Brenden went as a pumpkin for Halloween
Taking a nap with the cat
Brenden has started taking on “real” food. This is his first try with Carrots.
Brenden loves his Excersaucer. He knew what to do with everything in like 10 seconds.
He also has a tendency to fall asleep in the cutest of ways.
Finally, here he is posing with his new “I’m on the verge of crawling” pose.
I went to the Dallas Stars Home Opener on Saturday and while waiting for tickets in the will call line, I saw this guy coming and I loved the front of the jersey. When I saw the back, I had to stop him and take a picture. ( He was pretty sure I was going to “end up putting it on the Internet”). Man, people just assume the worst. 🙂
So it would seem to outside observers that maybe, just maybe, I’d forgotten that I have a blog. Well, the news of my blog’s demise is certainly premature. I know it’s here, I just haven’t been able to sit down and actually post anything.
My goal now to rectify that and try to post something (even it’s it just two words) most everyday. I have a lot of ideas I’ve been meaning to get on here, so now I’m making an effort to try and finally put them out in the world.
Hopefully my blog won’t be so neglected in the future.
Ok, so this post is just a little bit late in coming. But hey, better late than never. For those that have been following my blog, you will know that my most wonderful wife, Maggie, was due in early May to deliver our first child. Well, as she so aptly posted on her blog, that got moved up to late April. So there we were, bright and early on the morning of Saturday April 29th. Maggie was induced with some Pitocin and the journey began
She contracted for the majority of the day, but by 6 PM, she really hadn’t progressed at all. So the Dr decided that we would stay the night and we’d start again at 4 AM. So we hunkered down for the night and bright and early at 3:30 AM, Maggie went back at it again. This time, her Dr broke her water, and that started the most painful contractions to this point. Before long, it was mid morning and Maggie was really starting to feel it, but yet, wasn’t making much progress. She got an epidural, and was passed out for most of the afternoon.
5:30 PM came, and she had only dialated 5 cm. The Dr decided it was time to go to plan B, also known as C-Section. They wheeled Maggie away while I got into surgical scrubs. Finally, they came to get me to come to the operating room. I sat up by Maggie’s head while the performed the C-Section. Just before the baby was born, the Dr asked if I had a camera and if so, I better be ready to take some pictures.
At 6:11 PM on April 30th, Brenden Patrick Burleson was born, weighing in at 8 lbs 9 oz with a length of 20 inches. He was very loud coming into the world, pretty much not enjoying being yanked from the comfy confines of Maggie’s womb. But they got him all cleaned up and brought him over to us while the Dr’s patched Maggie back up. He was so beautiful. The most amazing thing I had ever seen.
After that a nurse took me and Brenden to the nursery while Maggie went to recovery. While in the nursery, the nurse took the time to point out that Brenden was born without his right hand. We’ve had him looked at by a geneticist and she’s assured us it’s a defect isolated to the hand and that Brenden appears to be very healthy otherwise. His condition is called “Terminal Traverse Acromelia of the Upper Right Extermity”. (Say that a few times really fast) We’ve had tremendous support from friends and family who know other parents of children with a similar diability and we have tons of great information about what his options might be in the future. Thank you all who’ve given us your info. We know Brenden will overcome any challenge put in front of him.
I was very lucky that my employer gives 3 weeks paternity leave, and I took full advantage. We’ve been home just over 4 weeks now and it seems like a blur and like a long time at the same time. Brenden is growing like crazy (he’s now 9 lbs 14 oz and 22.5 inches) and bringing us new surprises every day as he becomes more and more aware of his environment. We’ve been very lucky that he likes to sleep, and at night will generally go at least 4 hours between feedings, letting us get that extra hour or so of rest than the usualy 3 hour regiment during the day.
Some people have been begging for some pictures, so here you go:
Our neighbors were very sweet and decorated our door for when we got home:
This is Brenden in what we call “Burrito Mode”, or our “Little Burrito”:
Again, it does seem he sleeps a lot:
We really like this sleep position, we call it “Touchdown Baby”:
Our dogs are still trying to figure out this whole baby thing, this is Sam checking Brenden out:
And finally, to show that yes, he does eventually wake up, this is Brenden playing on his Einstein mat:
Maggie and Kelli posted this on their blogs and since I’d seen so many I had to do it too. I’ve seen 118 ( out of 200 ) of the movies and most of what I haven’t seen is waiting in our Netflix queue. And what’s really sad is how many times I’ve re-watched some of these.
SUPPOSEDLY if you’ve seen over 90 movies, you have no life. Mark the ones you’ve seen. There are 200 movies on this list. Put your score in header and repost:
(x) Willow
( ) Shop Girl
(x) Rocky Horror Picture Show
(x) Grease
(x) Pirates of the Caribbean
(x) Boondock Saints
(x) The Mexican
(x) Fight Club
(x) Starsky and Hutch
(x) Neverending Story
(x) Blazing Saddles
(x) Airplane
Total: 11
(x) The Princess Bride
( ) Young Frankenstein
(x) AnchorMan: The Legend of Ron Burgandy
( ) Napoleon Dynamite
(x) Labyrinth
(x) Saw
(x) Saw II
( ) White Noise
( ) White Oleander
(x) Anger Management
(x) 50 First Dates
( ) Jason X
Total: 7
(x) Scream
(x) Scream 2
(x) Scream 3
(x) Scary Movie
( ) Scary Movie 2
(x) Scary Movie 3
(x) American Pie
(x) American Pie 2
(x) American Wedding
( ) Band Camp
Total: 8
(x) Harry Potter
(x) Harry Potter 2
(x) Harry Potter 3
(x) Harry Potter 4
( ) Resident Evil I
( ) Resident Evil 2
(x) The Wedding Singer
(x) Little Black Book
( ) The Village
(x) Donnie Darko
( ) Lilo & Stitch.
( ) Lilo & Stitch 2: Stitch has a Glitch
Total: 7
(x) Finding Nemo
(x) Finding Neverland
(x) Signs
(x) The Grinch (jim carrey)
( ) Texas Chainsaw Massacre
( ) White Chicks
(x) Butterfly Effect
(x) Thirteen Going on 30
( ) I, Robot
Total: 6
(x) Dodgeball: A True Underdog Story
(x) Universal Soldier
(x) A Series Of Unfortunate Events
(x) Along Came Polly
( ) Deep Impact
(x) KingPin
(x) Never Been Kissed
(x) Meet The Parents
(x) Meet the Fockers
( ) Eight Crazy Nights
(x) Joe Dirt
Total: 9
(x) A Cinderella Story
( ) The Terminal
( ) The Lizzie McGuire Movie
( ) Passport to Paris
(x) Dumb & Dumber
( ) Dumb & Dumberer
(x) Final Destination
( ) Final Destination 2
( ) Final Destination 3
(x) Halloween
(x) The Ring
( ) The Ring 2
Total: 5
(x) Mystic River
( ) Dark Water
( ) Blue Crush
(x) Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle
( ) Practical Magic
(x) Chicago
( ) Ghost Ship
( ) From Hell
( ) Hellboy
(x) Secret Window
( ) I Am Sam
(x) The Whole Nine Yards
Total: 5
(x) The Day After Tomorrow
(x) Child’s Play
( ) Seed Of Chucky
( ) Bride of Chucky
(x) Ten Things I Hate About You
( ) Gothika
(x) Nightmare on Elm Street
(x) Sixteen Candles
(x) Remember the Titans
( ) Coach Carter
( ) Bad Boys
Total: 6
(x) My Girl
( ) Cinderella Man
( ) Tristan and Isolde
(x) The Lion King
( ) Godsend
( ) Bad Boys 2
(x) Se7en
(x) Ocean’s Eleven
(x) Ocean’s Twelve
(x) Identity
( ) Lone Star
(x) Bedazzled
(x) Predator I
(x) Predator II
TOTAL: 9
(x) Independence Day
(x) Cujo
( ) A Bronx Tale
( ) Darkness Falls
(x) Christine (But oddly, I own it, lol! It was a gift from good friends)
(x) ET
(x) Children of the Corn
(x) My Boss’ daughter
(x) Maid in Manhattan
( ) Frailty
( ) Mr. Destiny
Total: 7
( ) Best Bet
(x) How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days
( ) She’s All That
( ) Calendar Girls
(x) Sideways
(x) Mars Attacks
(x) Event Horizon
(x) Ever After
(x) Forrest Gump
(x) Big Trouble in Little China
Total: 7
(x) X-Men
( ) X2
(x) Spider-Man
(x) Spider-Man 2
( ) Sky High
( ) Jeepers Creepers
( ) Jeepers Creepers 2
(x) Catch Me If You Can
( ) The Others
( ) Freaky Friday
( ) Reign of Fire
( ) Cruel Intentions
( ) Cruel Intentions 2
( ) The Hot Chick
Total: 4
( ) Swimfan
(x) Miracle
(x) Old School
( ) The Notebook
( ) K-Pax
(x) Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring
(x) Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers
(x) Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King
(x) A Walk to Remember
( ) Boogeyman
Total: 6
(x) BraveHeart
(x) Count of Monte Cristo
(x) Hitch
(x) The Fifth Element
(x) Star Wars Episode I The Phantom Menace
(x) Star Wars Episode II Attack of The Clones
(x) Star Wars Episode III Revenge of The Sith
(x) Star Wars Episode IV A New Hope
(x) Star Wars Episode V The Empire Strikes Back
(x) Star Wars Episode VI Return of The Jedi
( ) Troop Beverly Hills
( ) Swimming with Sharks
Total: 10
(x) Air Force One
( ) For Richer or Poorer
( ) Trainspotting
( ) People Under the Stairs……
( ) Blue Velvet
(x) Sound of Music
(x) Parent Trap
(x) Parent Trap Re-make
( ) The Birds
(x) The Terminator
(x) Terminator-2
(x) T-3
Total: 7
(x) Empire Records
( ) SLC Punk
(x) Meet Joe Black
( ) Nightmare Before Christmas
(x) The Silence of the Lambs
(x) Sleepy Hollow
( ) I Heart Huckabees
( ) 24 Hour Party People
( ) Blood In Blood Out..
Total: 4
While we were living in New Jersey, a friend of mine convinced me to check out the Sopranos. He loaned me Season 1, and by the end of the box, I was hooked. Maggie and I put the remaining seasons in our Netflix queue and we started watching pretty regularly.
When we got closer to the move back to Texas, we were almost finished with Season 4. Then something funny happened. We got back home and suddenly, our time was filled up and there was no time for catching up on the show. We had the first disk of Season 5, and had had it about 3 months.
I realized that March 12th, the date of the Season 6 premier, was getting very close. Like, 3 days away close, when I noticed that Comcast had a “Sopranos Countdown” on OnDemand. This category had all the episodes from Seasons 4 and 5 on it. I made up my mind, I was going to be ready for Season 6 by the time Sunday rolled around.
So began the epic 9 hours of Sopranos watching. 4 hours on Saturday and 5 on Sunday. I finished the season 5 finale 30 minutes before the start of Season 6. I was definitely on violence overload. But I loved every minute of it.
Season 6 has started out “interesting”, but it looks like things are going to pick up now. Since is the last season, with some bonus episodes for next Spring, I can’t wait to see how then plan to end the story.
I’ve moved my domains over to TextDrive from my co-lo. I couldn’t justify the cost of the co-lo or have the time to properly manage my own machine any more. So for the first time my domains aren’t being hosted on equipment owned and run by myself. But I’m kinda glad to be rid of having to deal with all the maintenance.
So far TextDrive has been good. The intial setup was a little confusing, but their support has been very good. I’ll post more as I use more of their system.
After class this morning, where I had to give a presentation, I came home and then Maggie and I had a nice cozy afternoon in front of the fire. We watched “Just Like Heaven”, which was a very cute in a chick flick kinda way. ( Ok, ok, I got totally sucked in, but I was able to predict the thing the whole way)
Maggie and I did go get paint for the baby’s room, it’s this kinda creamy yellow, and marked the walls for how high up we are going to do wallpaper. We are doing neutral colors since we’re waiting to find out the sex of the baby until after it is born.
Tomorrow I’m going to go install a phone for my dad. That should be fun out in the cold. Afterwards, I’m hoping to get some good World Of Warcraft play time in.
There’s an old saying about the Weather, “If you don’t like it, give it 5 minutes and it will change.” Well, in Texas those changes can be as big as the state, such as the last 24 hours.
Yesterday afternoon it was 80 degrees F here in Dallas. This morning, we’re in the mid 30s. A nice 45+ degree swing.
Then again, we’ll be back into the 60s before long, unlike NY, where once it gets cold, it doesn’t get warm again until June.
I’ve just come across something that makes me scratch my head. Last night, I went to my univeristy’s website to make a tuition payment, and I was greeted with “The system is currently closed, our hours are the following:”.
I couldn’t believe it. An online system to take money didn’t operate around the clock? How could this be? The system just provides students with course info, the ability to make payments, add/drop classes, etc. Why should these things be doable only during “our hours”? (These hours are generally from 8AM to 10 PM, so it’s not like the school’s offices have to be open)
Further proof to me that some Universities are very out of touch with the real world.
Oh my! It’s been a very long time since I blogged. I mean, it was last year!
First, the New York Adventure has come to an end. Over the summer, Maggie and I decided it was time to think about heading back to Texas. It wasn’t anything wrong with New York, we just realized it was time to move on to the next steps in our lives. We both wanted to come back and finish school and we were also thinking it was about time to start thinking about having our own family.
I called up my previous employer and luckily I was greeted with “When can you start?”. That set the wheels in motion for us to come back. We were renting out our house in Texas and the lease of the people we had in here ended at the end of October. Our lease in New Jersey ended at the end of November. It seemed that the stars were aligning for us. This was sometime in August.
At that point, Maggie and I made a huge list of things we wanted to try and get done before we left the NYC area. We did a pretty good job going through that list. It ranged from the simple ( “Ride the Staten Island Ferry” ) to the slightly more complex ( “Visit Niagara Falls” ). The one thing on there that we didn’t do that I wished we had was visit both Boston and Maine.
I started back at my old job on October 17th, spending the week in Dallas staying at a hotel. Then spent the next few weeks back in Jersey working from my apartment. Which also started the long process of packing up everything and preparing it to move back to Texas. As Maggie will point out to anyone who asks, I saddled her with all the packing on the move up to New Jersey. So she was bound and determined to make sure I didn’t miss out on the packing this time. And man, I didn’t. If I ever pack another box for moving again, it will be too soon.
We used the same moving company coming back that we used to get to New Jersey. They did another excellent job, and almost beat us back to Texas. The drive is 24 hours long, and we did it again with our dogs in the back seat ( luckily, they were sedated with some great pills the vet gave us ). Everything went pretty smoothly, except for the 3 hour traffic jam on the second day as we were trying to get out of Knoxville, TN. In 3 hours, we went 3 miles. Ouch.
We’ve been back in our house since November 18th. Our stuff got here the morning of the 20th, which was really fast. We started the process of unpacking and get re-aquainted with our house. The renters didn’t damage it too much. And my in-laws had done a lot of work cleaning it up and setting up some things for us so we wouldn’t be without anything while we waited for our stuff.
So, you might say, wow Patrick, that’s a lot going on in your life. And I’d say, yeah, it is. But guess what, there’s more! Maggie and I are going to be parents! We found out when we got back from Niagara Falls that Maggie was 5 weeks pregnant! We’re so excited about it! But to be honest, I’m excited and scared sh*tless at the same time. I’m scared I won’t be a good parent, or I’ll break the kid or something. But I’ve come to terms that if I just use some of my instincts, I’ll be okay. Maggie is doing great and is starting to show the “Baby Belly”. We go for the big sonogram later this week. And for those that want to know, we’ll be going the “surprise” route for finding out if it’s a boy or girl.
Ok, that should just about get me caught up with all the major things I’ve got going in my life. I’ve still got a couple of draft posts that I’ll get posted about some other things that went on in NYC before we left. Oh, and one final note, I really, really miss Street Meat. 🙂
As a part of our fantastic trip to Niagara Falls, we made a small drive up to Toronto, which was about an hour or so away. On the way, I talked Maggie into being dragged to the Hockey Hall of Fame. I mean, if we’re in Toronto, I’ve got to go to the Hockey Hall of Fame!
For those of you that don’t know me, I’m a huge fan of hockey! Which is really strange since I grew up in North Texas. But I’ve been a fan since I saw my first game on ESPN back in 1989. And once Dallas got a team and I was able to go to games, I was hooked even more.
Once we got there and got in, I was in awe. There was memorabilia everywhere. It would take a lifetime to see it all. I was drawn to the sound of pucks hitting boards and found two games they had setup. The first was one where there were targets projected on a screen and you had to try and hit them with the puck. I did pretty well at that one, hitting 2 out of 5 targets. (Heck, I was happy I could lift the puck)
The other game I was not very good at all. It was a simulation where you played a goalie, putting on the blocker and the glove and grabbing a stick. Then you faced this wall where simulated shots came out of holes. The simuation was of Gretzky and Messier shooting at you. The only shot I saved was the one that hit the post. But I guess, technically, the goalie isn’t responsible for the post. 🙂
After doing that, Maggie and I moved upstairs to where they had a “production truck” setup so fans could see how a hockey broadcast is put together. That was really neat. Via the power of computers, I was able to be the director calling the shots of which camera feed to use. Then I was the sound engineer changing various levels of sound during (like ice level, crowd, announcers, etc). Finally, I was responsible for putting together a replay package. It was really fun.
In the same area, you can also test your announcer abilities. Well, since Maggie laughed at mine, I’m guessing I shouldn’t go for a career in broadcasting.
Finally, we made it to the most important room at the Hockey Hall Of Fame: Where they keep the Stanley Cup and all the other trophies. I got pictures of all the trophies and then got pictures of the cup up close showing the year the Stars won it. I also got a picture of me with it, as you can see:
For any hockey fans out there, you must make a pilgrimage to the Hockey Hall of Fame, it is a sight behold.
For those of you that don’t know, this is the restaurant where Buffalo Chicken Wings were invented. And before we left Texas, I had become addicted to chicken wings in a bad way.
The best place in Dallas has to be Pluckers with great tasting sauce and huge wings. So, I was very excited to be moving to the New York area thinking I’d be in the middle of some sort of Chicken Wing Mecca. Sadly, I am not. I’ve tried several different wings places here including the charming Pluck-U and the decent Atomic Wings, but neither lived up to my expectations.
But undaunted, I still had very high expectations for the place that originated the dish. And thankfully, I wasn’t disappointed. The wings were fantastic and I could understand where the Pluckers guys (all formerly of the Buffalo area I believe) had gotten the base taste for their sauce. The wings were huge. I guess the only thing I didn’t like was how dry the wings were as they didn’t seem to have a lot of sauce on them.
I highly recommend a visit to the Anchor Bar if you’re a lover of all things Chicken Wings, although be prepared to wait, as it seemed to be a very popular place. For good reason.
For the long holiday weekend, Maggie and I decided it was high time to go check out our neighbor to the North, Canada and went to Niagara Falls. What a great choice that was.
Niagara Falls is about a 7 hour drive from where we live in New Jersey through parts of Pennsylvania and Upstate New York. We drove across the top of the Finger Lakes region. We made a stop in Buffalo on the way there which I will be writing about later (hint: It has something to do with Buffalo Wings)
After that small detour we made our way to the border. Now, I must admit that this would be my first time to leave the United States which I know is pretty lame. But I was a little nervous crossing the boarder, which seems silly especially with it being Canada. I had our Passports ready to go, and was shocked that the guy didn’t even look at Maggie’s. He just asked what our nationality was, what was the purpose of our visit and how long we would be staying. Then let us on our way. I was floored.
So we get to our hotel and check-in. We had originally booked a City View room, meaning we would be facing away from the falls. I asked the clerk if they possibly had any Falls View rooms left. She checked and only had a “River View” left. I said we’d take it and up to our room we went. We actually ended up with a partial view of the falls as you can see here
For Saturday morning we had made reservations to ride the Wet Jet Boat from Whirlpool Jet Tours. This ride is an open jet boat that takes you through a class 5 rapid (on a scale of 1 to 6) a few times getting you very, very wet. They also pull up beside a class 6 rapid to show it to us, but can’t go into it because it’s entirely unsafe. These rapids are downriver from the Falls, but are caused because of the thousands of years of erosion by the falls that carved the gorge the river is going through. As it was explained to us, the rapids are compression waves which aren’t caused by rocks, but by the amount of water being pushed through the gap causing a lot of pressure. I’ll be posting a picture later that they took of us plunging into the rapid.
On the way to the Jet Boat place, we took a nice little ride through the Canadian wine country. So many vineyards…so little time. Here’s a picutre we took of the Niaraga River on it’s way into Lake Ontario
That afternoon we drove up to Toronto, which I will be posting about later (hint: I got to see something I really, really cherish there)
That night we had dinner at a nice German restaurant and then tried to get some cash out of the ATM to go the casino next to our hotel. Needless to say, I know where ever ATM is in Nagara Falls now and well, lots of them were having problems connecting with our bank. So we finally gave up and went up to our room and crashed.
The next morning we went for some Tim Horton’s because, well, when you’re in Canada, going to Tim Horton’s for a doughnut is a requirement. After the Tim Horton’s, we tried an ATM at a 7-11 and low and behold, we were able to get Canadian cash out….Casino here we come!
After an hour of gambling where I did fairly well at a blackjack table, Maggie and I made our way to the Maid of the Mist tour. This is the boat Jim Carrey’s character in Bruce Almighty goes on for his “live shot” at the beginning of the movie where they announce the other reporter has gotten the anchor position. Anyway, they take you right up to the falls with the mist blowing on you and you can feel the power of the falls, it was amazing.
After that, we walked back down the river and Maggie grabbed these two shots of the falls, the first is one of the Horseshoe Falls (also known as the Canadian Falls) where you can see a Maid of the Mist boat in the middle of the poole. The other shot is of the American Falls. The rainbows caused by the mist are beautiful.
Finally, we went to the Hard Rock Cafe so I could get a shot-glass and then we made a stop at the other casino and had another hour or so gambling away. I had another decent run on the blackjack table.
And then we hit the road and got quite the hassle from the US Customs Agent coming back into the country. Kept asking us questions and basically made me feel like he doubted we were legit. But he finally let us pass and we were back in the country.
Ever since the Mac Mini came out I’ve been wanting one. I enjoy using a Mac with OS X for a lot of the development I do. I really need the Unix underneath, but at the same time the Linux GUIs drive me crazy most of the time. OS X is a very nice mix of “Just Works” and UNIX. In fact, after power on, the Mini found my wireless network, joined it, then discovered my laser printer via Bonjour (the new Apple name for ZeroConf), I was all set.
I got the highest end model and upgraded it to 1 GB of RAM. So far it’s held it’s own very well. For a few things it’s beaten my work PowerBook, mostly to do with some of my Java work. That probably has a little bit to do with the slight boost in CPU speed the Mini has over the PowerBook. And it’s so freaking small. I was able to just set my LCD on top of it to conserve desk space.
So far, the only performance thing I’ve noticed is that if I overload the HD with requests (copying a lot of files, doing several thousands DB inserts, compiling java, starting Tomcat, etc) at the same time, it bogs down. But I knew that HD I/O would be a bottleneck on the box. Luckily I shouldn’t regularly be doing that. Just for the few couple of days while I get things really setup for it. Worst case, I can get a Firewire enclosure cheap and put a spare 3.5 in drive in it and boot off that.
I also got a KVM switch so I can switch back and forth between the Mini and my PC. Although, I have a feeling I’ll be using my Mini more than the PC since it’s now mostly for games and MS Money. Although the Mini came with a full version of Quicken that I’m thinking about taking a look at.
Anyway, I’m pretty excited to finally own my own Mac again. (Since most of the time I’ve ever bummed off Maggie or been using the work PowerBook)
A couple of weekends ago, Maggie and I joined my friend John Snyder and his wife and their son for a fun-filled day at Six Flags Great Adventure here in New Jersey.
The biggest draw for me was that this year they opened the most recent “World’s Tallest and Fastest Roller Coaster”, which they call Kingda Ka. This bad boy goes from 0 to 128 MPH in less than 4 seconds. Then rockets you vertically 428 ft, then over the top into a quarter turn to plummet back down to Earth and finally coming over a nice hill and back into the station. This experience lasts an entirely too quick 50 seconds. But having your eyelids catch air under them and start flapping in the wind on the way down is a “neat” feeling.
John and I then proceeded to ride all the running roller coasters in the park. The one that was shutdown was Batman the Ride, but it looked very similar to the one at Six Flags Over Texas. As for the rest, it was a fun filled day of thrills.
I’d actually seen preview video of Medusa a few years ago on a show about cool roller coasters in the country. This is the first roller coaster to not have a floor in the car. Sure, there are the coasters out there where you hang down from the track, which technically wouldn’t have a floor, but they don’t need one. Medusa still has the cars on top of the track. So there are your feet hanging above the rails. It was a fun ride with some loops and twists and overall a good thrill.
Superman Ultimate Flight was definitely the innovator of our favorites. This coaster has the train hanging from the rails. And when you load onto it the car is hanging like it normally would if were sitting down. The fun begins once they lock you in. The cool part here is that they lock your legs in. Then once that’s done, the car tilts 90 degrees so that your chest is parallel with the group like you’re flying! From there, the ride is awesome. You can’t see where the track is going to take you, so it really feels like uncontrolled flight. Very fun.
And even after all that, our overall favorite ended up being Nitro based on it’s overall balance of length, thrills, and smoothness of ride. I really don’t like steel coasters that rattle your teeth, that’s reserved for wooden coasters only in my book. Anyway, Nitro is a coaster with 4 person per row and mostly very nice negative G hills. I think there was a loop or two in there, but the hills were definitely the best part. That feeling of weightlessness is awesome.
As a side note, to accomplish all this riding on a fairly busy day at the park, we used the QBot they now sell at every Six Flags. And of course, the New Jersey park the most expensive one to rent it at. Even better, they have two levels, regular and “Gold”. Gold is supposed to actually reduce your wait time. Since we had John’s son with us and didn’t know how long he might last, we opted for a Gold one. And I guess it worked since the longest we waiting for anything to come was 18 minutes. We rode the Kingda Ka ( a ride that regularly has 4+ hour wait times ) in 12 minutes. So, I always recommend you try and rent a QBot when you go to a Six Flags park.
Now I want to go to Cedar Point in Ohio to ride some of the previous records holders for Tallest and Fastest, including the one from 2 years ago, the Dragster.
The other day I was riding the subway to work when I looked up and saw a guy sitting down across the way that looked vaguely familiar. It took me a few seconds, then I realized where I had seen him before. He’s played a handful of background characters in some movies. His name is Kevin Sussman and he’s been in Sweet Home Alabama, Little Black Book, and Hitch. What made it easier to identify him was that Maggie and I had watched Little Black Book the previous weekend. Not to mention this guy has a pretty distinctive look.
So anyway, once I realized who I thought it must be, I considered if I would approach him. I decided that I wouldn’t go up to him on the train, only if he got off at my stop. And as it turns out, he does get out on my stop. I turn around and say “Hey, were you in Sweet Home Alambama and Little Black Book?”
He looks a little shocked that he’s been recognized, and I feel a little dumb because at this point I hadn’t looked up his info on IMDB, so I had no clue what his name was. He nods and says “Yeah, that was me.” I reach out and we shake hands and I tell him he did a great job and keep up the good work. And then we went on about our business.
I know he’s not huge, but it was certainly cool to A) be able to recognize someone from the movies dressed normally and B) that he was cool about being approached.
I made a reference to this during my June weight loss update, but the Saturday after the JP Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge, I decide to do something I thought would be “fun”. Maggie was going out of town for our High School reunion, and I was going to be home alone left to my own devices. I had been wanting to take my bike over to Manhattan and ride on the path that follows the West Side Highway and continues on to almost the northern tip of the island.
So I get up Saturday morning and by the time I’m ready and get my bike out, it’s like 10:30 AM. I ride my bike to the PATH station and drag it down to the train. I get over the the World Trade Center station and then start the process of dragging it out of there. Finally, after carrying my bike up a couple of flights of stairs and back down another, I’m on the other side of the street and ready to ride.
The path provided along the highway is actually quite nice. There are lanes in both directions and lights at intersections specifically for the path. While this follows the West Side Highway, it also means the bike path follows the Hudson River. It was nice to watch the boat go along and to pass by the very large Cruise Ship dock at 42nd St.
Now, I was really pushing it on my bike at about 14-15 MPH and I was feeling really good. My goal was to reach at least the George Washington Bridge and possibly a little fruther. That would take me almost the entire distance of the island.
In my mind for some reason I think about going Uptown (or North for those of you not familiar with Manhattan) as going Uphill and going Downtown as being downhill. Well, I was kinda right, although most of the route was very flat. Towards the bridge though, some of the terrain started going uphill, which by that time meant some pain for my legs. But in the back of my mind I was thinking about how nice it will be when I come back the other way since it will be downhill.
So I finally get to a good turn around spot at around 12 miles (which is just past the bridge) and I start to come back. The downhill portion at the beginning of this part is certainly nice. But once I reached the flat part again, I realized I was going to have a tough time going back ( and for certain that going downtown is not actually going downhill ). The minute I hit the flat I was immediately slowed by a nice head wind. Nothing strong mind you, but just enough to really slow you down and put some pressure on pedaling.
The only thing that kept me going coming back were little milestones, like “If I can just reach 42nd St, I’ll be fine”. Once past there, it was “If I can just make it to 14th St” and so on till I got back down into the named streets of downtown.
Finally I made it and then realized that I was going to have to carry my bike back over the road to the PATH station. I dragged the bike up the stairs and back down, then rejoiced in using the elevators at the PATH station.
Once I got back to the Jersey side of the Hudson, I got back on my bike for the final ride to our apartment. Once I got inside, I went straight for water (I’d finished the 2 bottles on my bike). I also weighed myself and found that the bike ride had taken 7 pounds of fluid off. I spent the rest of the afternoon trying to get it back.
All in all, it was a great ride and I look forward to doing it again. Maggie and I have been doing an 8 mile ride to Liberty State Park and back, and I want her to at least try the West Side Highway ride to at least 42nd St. I’ll post here if we get to do that.
Well, funny thing happened on the way to the end of July. The first week of the month conspired with an apparent drop in will power over the next week or so to cause me to actually gain 2 pounds for the month. Oops. My dietitian wasn’t too please, as this was the first month she let me off from doing food journal entries. Well, I’m back to doing those. And I’ve got my will power back finally and I’m stepping back up to the plate to make August a good month to start a long chain of them again.
That’s not to say I won’t have the occasional set-back like this month, but if I can keep them 4-5 months apart, that makes me feel pretty good since in the past I couldn’t usually go more than a month on a diet before going back to my old ways.
Again this month I’ve upped my running, this time the pace, from 6.5 MPH (or 9:13 per mile) to 7.0 MPH (or 8:34 per mile). I also added in the simulated hill routine on the treadmill at level 2 to help add to the burn. It feels really good and I’m back to where I feel like I did some work when I get done. This month my dietitian wants me to juggle my workout routine up some by doing some biking and some other cardio stuff, not just running all the time. So I think I’m going to start doing a really good bike ride on the weekends.
Here are the numbers for July:
Start Weight: 276 lbs
Current Weight: 223 lbs
Goal Weight: 200 lbs
Weight Lost This Month: -2 lbs
Weight Lost Total: 53 lbs
Remaining Weight: 23 lbs
Percentage of Goal: 69.7%
