After a botched attempt to have my dad and step-mom visit for Thanksgiving, I was always looking for a time when they could come up. The stars aligned for a visit over Father’s Day weekend. Neither my dad nor my step-mom have ever been to NYC, so I knew it would be an exciting visit for both of them. Not to mention, we hadn’t seen each other since Christmas.
As an added bonus, I scored 4 tickets to a Yankees game that weekend versus the Cubs. Dad and Mary (that’s my step-mom) are avid baseball fans and were very excited to hear that we had gotten tickets. It was my Father’s Day gift to my dad. I think the only thing that could have made it better had it been the Yankees versus the Rangers, but alas, I couldn’t control the schedule of MLB.
We set all this up sometime in early May, so the countdown began and my excitement kept building. I think I was driving Maggie fairly crazy with it, but she understood. I had gone from seeing my dad every weekend to seeing him once in almost a year.
The only hitch of the trip was the morning of their flight when they got held up a security and missed their initial flight out of DFW. Luckily, there was room on the next flight and they only lost an hour. It could have certainly been much worse. So instead of meeting them at JFK and taking the Subway back to NYC and then the PATH to our apartment, I met them at LaGuardia and we took a cab to Times Square.
One of the things I try and have guests do while they are here is to enjoy a nice lunch of what I lovingly call “Street Meat”. It’s served by vendors all over the city and it’s nice and spicy chicken over rice with a side salad. They top it with “white sauce” which is just yogurt and mayonnaise and they also put some hot sauce on it if you want. There’s a particular vendor I really like that’s on the corner from where I work and I’ve always tipped them and they’ve always taken care of me when I needed it. On this day, they went out of their way to welcome my dad and Mary. They gave them drinks on the house and they also gave us all a taste of lamb (they normally add a small piece for me because I usually ask, but it was very nice of them to throw it in for my parents as well). We took our lunch and ate it at Bryant Park which is across from the other corner from where I work and I think they enjoyed it. At least, they told me they did.
Now that we had full stomachs, it was time to make our way to my apartment with the luggage. This wasn’t so bad and they handled the Subway and the PATH very well. To get home, I always have to pass through the World Trade Center site and they were moved when they saw it. The walk from the PATH station to the apartment is about 8 blocks and well, my dad has bad knees. So we had to stop a few times, but he really enjoyed the view of New York from our side of the Hudson.
Finally we got home and then they relaxed while we waited for Maggie to get home. Once she did, we made them dinner and then we took another walk to look at the city from across the Hudson. It as a nice night.
The next day was the day of the baseball game, so after breakfast and piddling around for a little while, we started making our way to the game. Luckily we got on the 4 train early on the way to Yankee Stadium because by the time we got there, the train was packed. We were running a little later than we expected and I thought we were going to miss the first pitch. As we were walking down the train platform, there was a fly over with F-15s which would have been during the National Anthem.
We got inside rather quickly and found our seats in the bleachers. Amazingly, we hadn’t missed the first pitch. The game was pretty good, although the Yankees killed the Cubs (none of us like the Yankees much). The best highlight was seeing Derek Jeter hit his first career Grand Slam. (Even seeing a Grand Slam is amazing, let along the first by a player you would have thought had hit one before.) We did have to leave the game a little early because dad was getting a headache from the kid sitting behind him constantly screaming. It was starting to annoy me too and make my head hurt as well.
So we got on the Subway and headed to Grand Central. From there we took a cab to Times Square, which royally ticked off the cab driver since it was like only 3 Avenues over, but I told him to shut it and gave him a generous tip to make it worth his while. Once in Times Square, we decided to eat at the Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. location there. It’s a Forrest Gump themed restaurant that was a tasty meal. After that, we decided to head to the Empire State Building and waited a couple of hours in line to go to the top. It was a nice view, but even being warm on the ground, it was still cool up there. I just wonder if it ever gets hot up top? We wrapped up the day with a cab ride home and everyone came home and passed out.
For Sunday, we went into the city and went on a Circle Line tour of Manhattan. We took the 3 hour tour that goes all the way around the island and we all learned a great deal of NY history. After pushing them hard for a couple of days, we decided to take Sunday a little easier and headed home.
Monday was their last day and we mostly spent it getting into the city and then the Port Authority Bus Terminal to catch a bus to the airport. I hung out with them and had lunch and then waited for them to go through security at the airport and then I started my way home on the bus.
I think a good time was had by all and it was a great visit but over way too soon.
After a slightly disappointing May, I decided I needed to step it up in June. And the results for June certainly show that I was doing something right. I lost an amazing 13 pounds over the course of the month. Not too shabby if I must say so myself.
I’ve upped my running to 3.5 miles 5 times a week at a 9 minute mile pace. I also had to increase the number of sets of inclined sit-ups from 3 to 4 (and soon I think I might have to move that to 5 sets) . I did stop doing the weights this month, but my dietitian gave me the evil eye for that and has asked me to get back on them. Not necessarily to bulk up, but to keep what little muscle mass I’ve built. So I’ll be adding those back, but won’t be pushing the weight level up much.
As I’ve written before, the JP Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge run went very well. I’ll post soon about what I did the Saturday afterwards…let’s just say it hurt.
Here are the numbers for June:
Start Weight: 276 lbs
Current Weight: 221 lbs
Goal Weight: 200 lbs
Weight Lost This Month: 13 lbs
Weight Lost Total: 55 lbs
Remaining Weight: 21 lbs
Percentage of Goal: 72.4%
Well, ok, maybe not a super celebrity, but I did run into someone fairly important in NYC today.
I was getting on the elevator with some co-workers after a second-hand smoke break and after I got on, these two huge security guys get on, and then Mayor Michael Bloomberg himself. You know, Bloomberg as in Bloomberg News.
You might be asking yourself what the Mayor of NYC was doing in my building, let along on the elevator with us. Well, his re-election campaign headquarters happens to be a couple of floors down from us. He’s occasionally in the building, but I’ve never run into him before. Although, you can usually tell when he’s around, the lobby security gets all uptight.
One of the downsides of having the Mayor’s campaign headquarters in your building is the occasional protest…like the one today at lunch. Walking through them so I could go get a haircut was “interesting”. I still don’t know what they were protesting, but you know, there’s always a group of people in NYC who have something to bitch about.
Next time I might even say hi to the Mayor, but for now, I’ll just enjoy the fact that I can say “I once rode in the elevator with the Mayor of NYC.”
So after posting about it the other day, Maggie and I were grocery shopping yesterday and lo and behold, they had started carrying baked Cheetos in the big bag just like all the other Baked chips Frito Lay sells. I was pumped up. It prompted me to say “Post it, and they will come.” 🙂
On Thursday I ran in the JP Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge 3.5 Mile run in Central Park. The event is designed to get office workers out of the office and doing something active. They hold the race in several cities throughout the year and then have a championship race back here in New York City in October where they invite all the other city winners and top corporate teams from around the country/world.
It was a pretty awesome thing to run in. I had previously done a race like this for the Dallas Turkey Trot, but at the time I hadn’t been training at all and just kinda ran till it hurt and walked a lot of the way.
As I have posted before, I’ve been running 9 minute miles on the treadmill, and in the past month, I’d been running for 30 minutes 5 times a week. Meaning I was running 3.25 miles and the cooldown was taking me to 3.5 . I figured that since running on a treadmill and running in a park with slopes and curves are so completely different, I’d really be pressing to maintain that sort of pace for all 3.5 miles.
My goals for this run were to not have to walk any and to finish in under 45 minutes. To my astonishment, I succeeded on both counts.
I started back at the “Non-competitive” start line because after reading what type of runners they wanted at the competitive start (people who could run 6 minute miles the whole course). They even had these nice little markers along the street to note different running paces. I stood next to the 10 minute mile marker and thought I’d be good managing that.
Well, that put several thousand people in front of me. And looking back, I probably should have started in the 8 minute mile area to get ahead of a lot of people. There were certainly a lot of people that shouldn’t have started so close to the front, since they were quickly passed. Some of them started out walking from there, which was certainly against the race rules since walkers were supposed to start further back than were I started.
Anyway, the starting horn goes off and we are stuck waiting for all the people in front of us to get moving. And sadly, there’s not race clock at the start line, so I really have no idea how much time passed from when the race started to when I actually crossed the start line.
I ran fairly well. It was very crowded at first, and I had to watch my pace. There were some downhill parts early, and slowing myself down on them was tough. By the time I passed the 1 mile marker, the clock there said 16 minutes had elapsed, and in my mind, I was thinking “No way I’m running that slow.”
By mile 2, the crowd was still thick, but it was certainly starting to thin out. I was feeling pretty good. My pace was good, I had a sweat going and I felt like I could certainly keep it up. I think one of the things that helped me with my pace was all the other runners. Having so many people around gave me inspiration (and more importantly) paces to match. The clock at the second mile said 25 and a half minutes, so I knew then that I was running roughly 9 to 10 minute miles.
By the time I reached the 3rd mile marker, I was starting to hurt a little bit. I got one of those pains in my side. I kept on going though, as I was so close. The time then was 35 minutes. So I was keeping my 9 to 10 minute pace.
Turning the final turn into the finish line, I was so glad to see it coming. I was drenched through with sweat, but by that time I had run through the pain in my side and was just pushing my legs to keep going. The time when I crossed the finish like was 39:50. I figure I need to subtract about 5 to 6 minutes from that to get my real time. So I’m guessing 34 to 35 minutes to run the whole thing.
I found Maggie waiting for me at the end of the race and she was smiling and was so proud that I had finished. I told her I didn’t have to walk any and that I had come in faster than my expectations. We stood around a little bit with the rest of my corporate team and then we left the park in search of dinner.
I had one more goal originally, and that was to beat our CEO in the race. That was until I saw him and knew immediately he was a runner. He finished in something like 24 minutes. The second executive to cross the finish line, they kept tabs since that was one of the races within the race going on.
There were over 15,000 people there representing over 500 companies. It was quite an event. And just to note, the men’s winner ran the course in just over 17 minutes. or roughly 5 minute miles. Not too shabby.
So I was talking with my dietitian during my appointment last month and I was telling her about finding “Reduced Fat” Skippy Crunchy Peanut Butter. I thought I had found something really good. Maggie did as well, since in her diet, she tries to minimize both carbs and fats. But we were both wrong…a closer look at the label proved it to be a bit of a sham. Check out these nutritional information labels:
Notice anything funny? They have the same calorie count per serving (that’s the only number I really care about), but note that the reduced fat version does have 5 grams less fat, but 7 grams more carbs. Maggie was not amused.
My dietitian told me to stick to the regular peanut butter, mostly because she likes the fat in peanut butter. She calls it “good fat”.
Still, it was a lesson learned for Maggie and I. There are a lot of companies out there jumping on the health food craze caused by South Beach and Atkins, but not really producing a product that’s any better for you. But, luckily not all.
My two favorite brands in that regard right now are Jello and Frito Lay. Jello for making Sugar Free Jello Pudding Snacks with only 60 calories. And Frito Lay for introducing baked Cheetos (still can’t find them in the big bags though, just in the “grab bag” bags at my local news stand).
Maggie and I were sitting around a couple of weeks ago trying to decide what we wanted to do for our 3rd wedding anniversary. After going through some ideas, we decided that it would be a good idea to try and rent a beach house on the Jersey Shore.
We started looking for rentals for Memorial Day weekend that were in our budget, and my first few calls made me think that we had waited too long to look for a place. But on the third try, I got in touch with someone who had a small condo available for the weekend, so we booked it.
This place was pretty darn cool. It was right on the beach and just North of Atlantic City. (We could see the casino’s while walking along the beach) We brought the dogs along so we wouldn’t have to board them. They enjoyed the time with us and really enjoyed pulling us along the beach and into the ocean (which was really, really cold).
The weather on Saturday wasn’t great with lots of clouds and a high in the 50s. We spent the evening at the Casinos and also had dinner at one of the buffets.
Sunday was much better. The sun finally came out and it got warm. I did a run along the sea wall that was quite nice and helped me work off some of the extra food I had at the buffet. Then Maggie and I made some sandwiches for lunch and headed to the beach for a bit of a picnic. Then we sat on the sand and read our books. After awhile we brought the dogs back out and had another fun time with them.
Even after putting on sun block, the backs of our legs still got burned. (I guess it was the one place neither of us put much sun block). But it was worth it to finally have some nice weather.
Monday morning we packed everything up and headed home. It was a wonderful and relaxing weekend. And a great way to celebrate 3 wonderful years of marriage. I love you Maggie and here’s to more wonderful anniversary trips.
Whew, what a month. We had visits from friends and family for two weekends in a row in the middle of the month. I wasn’t my best on those weekends, but I also wasn’t too out of line. Although, the crab stuffed lobster with some England Clam chowder and then the killer, a piece of chocolate pie. It was taunting me.
But I got back on track for the last week or so of the month and did really well. I also increased my workouts to 5 days a week and those consist of running 2.5 miles at a 9:00 mile pace and then 3 sets of 12 on several weight machines (all of which I have doubled the amount of weight I’m lifting on since March).
I’m hoping this month will go better, but I do have my dad coming in for a visit in a couple of weeks, I’m going to do my best to stay on the wagon. Although, losing 6 pounds this month even through some poor eating choices, is still nice. My goal for June is another 6-10 lbs.
Oh, and I’m also scheduled to run in the JP Morgan Chase Corporate Challenge which is a 3.5 mile run through Central Park on June 24th. That should be fun, I’m trying to work my workout run to at least 4 miles so it won’t be so bad running through the park.
Here are the numbers for May:
Start Weight: 276 lbs
Current Weight: 234 lbs
Goal Weight: 200 lbs
Weight Lost This Month: 6 lbs
Weight Lost Total: 42 lbs
Remaining Weight: 34 lbs
Percentage of Goal: 55.3%
After making the mistake of seeing Episode I at a Midnight showing, and then actually making the mistake of seeing Episode II in general, I was hesitant to even think about seeing Episode III. Then I read Kevin Smith’s review of a pre-screening and he said this was the Episode all the “haters” were waiting for. And I know he’s a huge Star Wars fan, but I was still skeptical. I was damned sure I still wasn’t going to see this one at Midnight, hell, I was pretty sure I was going to let all of opening weekend proceed without me attending the festivities. But, I couldn’t resist the pull, and I ordered tickets for the reserved seats on Sunday at noon.
Most people I have talked to have had the same reaction to the movie I did. Basically, the movie is pretty good, but George Lucas shouldn’t ever, ever, ever write any sort of romantic scene. I’ve been trying to figure out if Hayden Christensen is as bad an actor as Episode II and III have made him out to be, or if the writing and direction were playing a large part. I still haven’t seen him in anything else, but Natalie Portman is a decent actress, and even she comes off as very cardboard like in Revenge of the Sith. Basically, any scene with just them in it was painful to watch. Everyone else all had great performances, but most of them all are fairly accomplished actors.
The only thing that really bothered me outside of the Padme/Anakin interaction, was exactly how quickly Anakin switched to the Dark Side. Over the course of about an hour (in story time), he switches. That seems like a pretty short time to give up all the good in the world. And of course, he does it mostly for a woman. 🙂
Overall, I enjoyed this part of the story, mostly because it definitely shows us how Anakin got to where he was as Darth Vader in Episode IV and how amazingly badass Yoda and Obi-Wan are. If you hated Episode I and II, go see III for at least a little redemption.
If there is any reason to catch a musical on Broadway, this is it. I laughed from the minute to curtain went up to the end of the show. The plot of the show closely follows that of the movie. The memorable scenes from the movie are all here, plus they have added a new section revolving around the Lady of the Lake.
The songs are pure Python, with great wittiness and silliness. (I highly recommend picking up the soundtrack) Particular favorites were “You won’t succeed on Broadway (without a Jew)” and “I’m not quite dead yet”.
One moment in the course of the show, while fighting the vicious killer rabbit, the actor who’s head is supposed to come off, well, had an issue getting it to come off. And after it’s finally off, Tim Curry (playing the role of King Aurthur) says, “Well, that usually goes a little smoother”. That made the audience crack up even more.
I don’t want to give too much away about the show, but I will say this, if you can get seat C101, do yourself a favor and sit there. It would be well worth it.
It’s that time again. A month has passed, and I need to give out the weight loss update. I visited the dietitian for my monthly appointment and got on what I am calling the “official” scale. I had a pretty good month, I lost 14 lbs this month. A slower pace than my previous 22 lbs in March, but a slow down was expected.
I’ve also changed my mindset from it being a “diet” to this being a complete lifestyle change. I’m not ever going to be able to ever go back to the way I used to eat. Unless of course I want to gain all the weight back, which I don’t. I’m really enjoying the results so far. Mostly it’s been being able to fit into clothes I was starting to stretch out of.
Another very exciting thing the past two weeks is my ability to do something I haven’t been able to do without a lot of pain for several years: run. I jumped on the treadmill last Saturday (as a joke at the end of my workout) and ran a mile without getting shin splints. Previously I hadn’t been able to go more than a quarter mile before the pain was so bad I had to sit down in at least 4+ years. So then on Sunday I was able to start on the treadmill and I ran 2 miles at a 10 MPH pace. It was pretty exciting. So running will now be a regular part of my workout routine. I’m up to working out 4 days a week. I think maybe soon, I’m going to push that to 5 days a week. It’s really starting to feel good to workout.
So here are the numbers:
Start Weight: 276 lbs
Current Weight: 240 lbs
Goal Weight: 200 lbs
Weight Lost This Month: 14 lbs
Weight Lost Total: 36 lbs
Remaining Weight: 40 lbs
Percentage of Goal: 47.3%
This event was amazing! Our tickets were also very good. We were sitting in the first 2 seats of the second tier boxes to the left of the stage. We were right on top of the stage and got very close views of every performer. And what a list that was.
We missed the very beginning, but got there in time for the main performances. First up was Tony Bennett. What a voice this man has. He sang 4 songs, one without a microphone. And he could be heard all the way to the back of the theater.
Next up was the Emerson String Quartet. They played a movement from Dvorak. (I think that’s the composer). It was very good. I think seeing them in full concert would be a nice evening.
Then, Paul McCartney came out and sang “Yesterday” and “Lady Madonna”. That was really cool to see. I mean, one of the remaining Beatles. Sir Paul! Awesome.
The next act was a group called Anti-Gravity, and they did some amazing acrobatics with some girls hanging from the ceiling in sheets doing moves thay defied physics. And the main performer on the stage was balacing umbrellas on edge on her feet and flipping them around. I was amazed!
Then, one of my all-time favorite comedians, stepped on stage. The one and only Robin Williams. He did about 15-20 minutes of material that ranged from the new pope, to the president, to NYC and the omlympic bid. I was in tears laughing so hard.
After the crowd recovered from laughing, Julia Roberts came out and read a college essay from one of the campers. This essay really tugged at your heart. It almost had the room in tears. I was pretty sure that when she finished, Julia was going to tell us this girl had died. But instead, she introduced the girl and she walked out. Which is pretty amazing since she had had her leg amputated because of cancer. The crowd gave the girl a standing ovation.
Next up was a R&B singer who’s name escapes me, but she sang a beautiful version of “I belive I can fly”. She was backed by an amazing gospel choir. It was a fitting end to the night of performances. Paul Newman finished it off by saying a few words.
Afterwards, for the people who paid some serious money to be there, they had a dinner and auction. Apparently Robin Williams ran the auction and it was a riot. Lots of famous people there as well. Which was kind funny sine when we got there, we had to walk past the photographers that would normally be taking shots of the famous people walking in. I totally felt like Steve Martin’s character in LA Story when they go to that fancy restuarant and get ignored by all the photographers.
It was certainly one of the coolest things I’ve ever been to. And the money went to a great cause which made it even better.
I realized I hadn’t posted the outcome of my inquiry of my umbrella’s “lifetime warranty”.
I posted previously that the poeple who make the umbrella obviously weren’t located anywhere with some pretty crazy wind. But as it turns out, the company is in NEW JERSEY! Not 20 minutes away. I called them up and told them what happened to my umbrella and the girl on the phone was very nice and said “Sure, we’ll send you a new umbrella. Just mail us that one, and enclose a check for $4.50 for return shipping.”
First off, I was floored they were in the area. They should have known better than call something “windproof”. But the thing that irked me was the “Yeah, we’ll give you another $15 umbrella if you spend $9 getting it back to us and paying for us to fullfill our own warranty”. I guess they don’t expect people to go through with the hassel.
But I have a better plan. Once I found out their location, I asked if I could just drive it by, and she said “Sure.”. So, I think I am just going to take a morning and drive down to their offices and pick up a new umbrella. Even if I do end up mailing it and paying their stupid shipping fee, I’m going to get my new umbrella, just on principle.
UPDATE 1/14/2009:
I’ve received a few comments about this and I wanted to provide the info I have now.
If your umbrella has the Futai name on it somewhere, Futai USA made your umbrella. They will honor the warranty replacing it with one of their Leighton umbrellas as they no longer manufacture the London Fog umbrellas. Their number is 1-800-858-2535.
If it is not made by Futai, then I’m not sure were you send it as I can’t find who makes the umbrellas now. Also, I no longer have my London Fog umbrella as I lost it when I left it on a train.
On Sunday, Maggie and I thought it would be cool to go see the nation’s capital during the peak of the cherry blossoms. Neither of us had been to DC before, so we also were excited to see the monuments and government buildings.
We drove down to within about 10-15 miles of DC itself and took the DC Metro train system to the heart of the city. We got off the train and were almost immediately on Pennsylvania Ave. We walked right passed the Treasury Department (where the Secret Service is taking care of “Duck Cheney”, which has taken up residence in a mulch bed at the entrance). Then shortly after that is the White House.
We kept on trucking and saw the Old Executive Building and then made our way to the Washington Monument. After seeing that, we were walking to the reflecting pool and saw the WW II memorial which is an amazingly awesome fountain.
After looking at that memorial for a while we walked along the reflecting pool. This is the first thing I’ve seen in real life that actually seemed as large it does when seen on TV. Once we reached the other end, we were at the foot of the Lincoln Memorial, which is really big. Larger than life in fact. We saw a girl getting her bridal photos taken inside, which was an interesting sight at a national memorial.
After Lincoln, we strolled over to the Korean War memorial, and man, that thing is borderline scary. I would love to see it in the dark with some fog. It would totally feel like being in a battlefield.
The next memorial we saw was the Vietnam Memorial, which is truly moving. All those names. We called Maggie’s parents, and her mom gave a couple of names to lookup. We found them, but it next to impossible to take pictures of them because the black marble is so reflective all I got was a picture of me reflecting in the wall.
Finally, we made it over to the Tidal Pool to see the weekend’s main attraction, which were the cherry blossoms. They were really, really pretty, but causing some serious allergy irritation for Maggie, so we had to leave somewhat quickly.
By that time, most of the day was gone and we needed to drive back home. So we still have the Capital Building, The Supreme Court, the Jefferson Memorial, The Smithsonian and a million other things left to see there. So we’ve decided to make a weekend trip out of DC sometime soon.
Maggie has some photos up on her site if you want to go check them out.
The image most people have of New York is a tough town where no one cares about anyone. And to be honest, on most days, people would rather walk over you than help you. You get really used to basically ignoring everyone around you, especially when dealing with the Subway (be it on the train or waiting in the station).
But today, I witnessed the most amazing thing. This woman was reading the paper and started crying. You could tell she was really upset. I felt bad for her, but sticking to the “Subway Code”, I just continued to jam to my iPod and ignore the situation. The woman next to me reached into her purse and pulled out a tissue and offered it to the lady. I was in shock. Made me feel bad that I wasn’t carrying my own set of tissues around to offer her.
It seems that even in this town, where everyone is in a hurry and more concerned with themselves, people can still be nice to each other.
I went to my dietician for a followup visit yesterday, which would include the all important “weigh in”. Well, I did pretty damn good for my first 4 weeks. I’ve lost 22 lbs. since my first visit. That’s pretty nice. Although I am well aware that it’s going to slow down. To help combat that, I’m also increasing my workout days from 2 to 3 (possibly to 4).
She really liked my diet (I send daily food logs, which she gives daily feedback on) and didn’t want me to change anything other than consider doing more exercise.
And for those of you out there who have struggled with your diet, I would recommend getting your Doctor to refer you to a dietician/nutrionist and then follow what they say. It’s hard work and I’ve been tempted many times. But once you start to see real results eating a diet that’s not the latest fad, it seems to get easier. At least for me.
Man, some things should just not be claimed. I bought a “windproof, lifetime guarantee” London Fog umbrella a couple of months ago. It’s really taking some beatings here, mostly while walking along the Hudson on the way to work or on the way home. The wind along that stretch could probably give the wind in West Texas a run for its money. There are times where I can’t actually take steps forward or I am just being blown down the street.
So when I saw this umbrella, I thought I would buy it and give it the ultimate test. It had been passing pretty well, that is, until Wednesday. A little storm whipped up and was blowing wind and sleet fairly hard. Certainly some of the hardest wind I’d been in yet. The umbrella was holding it’s own, until I got the corner to turn home, and then, snap, the wind caught it and almost pulled it out of my hands. But at the same time it snapped three of the shafts that hold the fabric up. I was in shock. Also at this point, I was being pelted by sleet being driven by a mighty powerful wind. Thankfully it was to my back, but it still hurt a bit.
It was very comical when I came walking in the door with my busted umbrella and proclaimed “Windproof my ass!”. Although Maggie did laugh, she had her own experience in the sleet.
Anyway, I’m going to try and make a claim on the lifetime warranty tomorrow. I just thought I would post this pic. I’ll post here when I find the outcome of the warranty.
