Sheep Guarding Llama

We might have been exhausted when we finally arrived back in Geneseo last night but when we got to spend the night sleeping in our own bed we were quite happy. I slept for nine hours not getting up until almost 11:00. Boy did that feel good. I have not yet caught up on my sleep but that is going to help a little bit.

Dad called at 12:20 and said that he was down at the Silver Lake Family Restaurant and that the Ralstons were going to be there in a few minutes and that we should come down for lunch. So I woke up Min and we ran out the door. We made it right at 1:00 which was pretty impressive for having woken Min up only forty minutes before.

We took Oreo along with us down to Perry and after lunch we took him down to Letchworth to go for a hike. Oreo has never been to Letchworth before and he had a great time. We went for a walk from the St. Helena parking area up to Tea Table and back down again. Then we drove up to the Middle Falls and went for a shorter walk. We stopped at the Upper Falls snack bar and had a quick meal. I love eating at park snack bars. When I was a kid my mom and I used to come down to Letchworth all of the time during the summers and we would get hot dogs and French fries at one of the snack bars and eat while looking out on the falls. It was a lot of fun. One summer my mom and I came down to Letchworth at least once or twice a week and walked consecutive sections of the park so that we managed to walk the entire trail on the west side of the park which is more than double the length of the road that runs through the park.

I included some pictures that I took while we were out walking. The leaves were really nice and I am really glad that we managed to get out to go for a trip outdoors at least once with the leaves changing.

We didn’t get back home until after 6:00. While we were at the park we stopped by the gift shop. We got an Empire Pass so that we can go to Letchworth or any of the New York State Parks anytime. I also picked up the book “Events of the Genesee Vally 1668-1986” while we were there.

Min had to get ready for work when we got back home. She had switched shifts with Mary earlier in the week. So she is working from 9:00 pm tonight until 7:00 am tomorrow. A little shorter than her regular shift. She was almost delirious with exhaustion by the time that she left for work. Hopefully she will be able to make it through the night. We have a busy week ahead of us. Tomorrow morning is the funeral at 11:00 in Covington. It is at the church just down the street from my parents’ house. I haven’t been in that church in years. Probably not since Sonic Brass played there in the mid-90’s. Ten years ago easily. Maybe more. Dad, Min, the Richardsons and I are all going out to Ohio on Friday and will be there until Sunday. The Ralstons are taking Oreo for the weekend. We are all going to be staying at the Comfort Inn in Canton.

Min got off to work and I got onto the computer and got caught up on the weekend’s updates. I finished watching A Wrinkle in Time that I started watching several days ago. It wasn’t very good. I had loved the book but the movie was just blah. It wasn’t awful but it sure didn’t live up to the book. I haven’t read the book in forever. I plan on reading it again soon. Oreo appreaciated the chance to pass out on his pillow and get some rest.

I was hoping to get a lot of work done tonight but it didn’t take long before I figured out that that wasn’t going to happen. I pooped in Hooper which is an old Burt Reynolds’ film from the late 70’s that we have had for a while but I have never gotten around to watching. Nothing special but a cute film. I hung around in the office for a long time but Mr. Humphries never got up to hang out. I thought that he would want to come out and visit but he decided to snub me tonight. We got up when Min was still home and got his food but after I fed him he was gone for the night.

I wasn’t really tired yet and I had some paperwork that I needed to take care of so I hunted around in the basement for a movie that I hadn’t seen yet and came up with Another 48 Hours. I never saw the original 48 Hours but I read a quick synopsis and it didn’t look like I was missing very much. The good news is that the movie has Eddie Murphey. The bad news is that it has Nick Nolte – one of the worst actors to ever sneak into a feature film. The hamster did finally decide to wake up and come out to play.

I ended up staying up really late because I got my paperwork done but wanted to get some technical work done before hitting the hay so I stayed up to get a jump on that. There is an unlimited amount of work to do. I never seem to be able to get on top of it.

Dominica and I decided that we really do need a real vacation so we are going to Disney World in two weeks. We are flying out of Rochester on October 31st which is both Halloween and my grandma’s birthday – and we will arrive in Florida around 3:30 in the afternoon. We will manage to get half of a day in the park probably once we get there. We are staying in the same hotel that Eric, Mark and I stayed in many years ago when we last went to the park. I called today to get the hotel reservations moved forward one day and discovered that the hotel was no longer a Radisson. That was a surprise. It is a really good thing that I called to make the change or we would have discovered that the hotel was no longer there once we actually arrived. That might have ended up being a real problem if we had arrived down there and then couldn’t find the hotel. With the change in plans we are going to be able to be in Disney for 6.5 days! We are pretty happy with that. That should be enough time to get pretty sick of the park. The hotel is in an ideal location that allows us to walk to the park in the morning and get Disney provided transportation all day long. It is great because it keeps us from having to worry about how to get back to our hotel if we decide to stay until the park closes because the Disney transportation always runs until everyone has had a chance to get home. We aren’t doing anything in Florida other than going to Disney. It is going to be a nice relaxing time. Min has been going crazy making plans for all of the places that we are going to go.

With the exception of my honeymoon last year this vacation will be my first vacation longer than an extended weekend since Eric, Mark and I went to this very same destination in 1999. I am almost 100% sure that it was 1999 because we went in November (so Min and I are going to the same hotel to visit the same park in the same month) and I wasn’t able to help drive down because I didn’t have my driver’s license back yet after having lost it for having too many speeding tickets in too short of a time period. I am pretty sure that I lost my license in early 1999. I know that I did not lose it until I had been working at the Wellesley Inn for several months because I went back and did some consulting work at the Days Inn for a day or two and I had to be chauffered around to be able to do it. I am pretty sure that I started at the Days Inn in late 1997 and left there in 1998. Then I worked at the Wellesley from 1998 until February 19, 2000 when I quit to move to Pittsburgh. February 20th was the big moving out party when Andy first introduced “For Me To Poop On” which all of the SGL readers know and love. I must have been without a license during most of 1999 because I was getting rides to and from the Wellesley and not the Days Inn. But I know that I had a driver’s license by the time that I quit the Wellesley to move to Pittsburgh. I think that I only ended up losing my license for about six months but I am not sure.

It is amazing how time plays tricks with you. It seems ages ago that I was living with Josh in Greenleaf Meadows in Greece and commuting down 390 to the Wellesley in Brighton and going to MCC. I can barely put together enough pieces from that time period to figure out when I was where and what I was doing. I went to school at Monroe Community College from the fall of 1996 until the spring of 1998. I finished three semesters. I had graduated without knowing it in December, 1997. My appendicitus was towards the end of the spring semester in 1998 if I place it correctly. It was because of the operation that I was unable to complete the semester. Josh and I got the apartment in Greece in September 1998 I think. Prior to that we had been living in Irondequoit. The appendicitus hit within my first two weeks at the Wellesley so that places that pretty well. So I must have worked at the Wellesley for almost two years. I would have been at the Days Inn from summer 1997 until very early 1998. Could it have been less than a year? I can still remember going to apply at the Days Inn. The previous auditor had quit the night before and they had no one to work that night. I interviewed with the front desk manager, Chrissy, who was doubling as the life guard and so interviewed me in her swimsuit. That is how I am able to remember that it was summer that I started there. She hired me on the spot as the only auditor that she was able to find. It was a crappy job but it worked out well for me. A few months later Andy came to work there as the other auditor. What a joke that place was. But it was a good experience for me. Part of growing up. It definitely made me sure that I didn’t want to get stuck doing anything like that for the rest of my life. It was about the worst job like that that you could possibly imagine but it should me just how mad it could be and I think that I needed that right about then. I was very lost when I was there. I had no idea what I wanted to do or where I was going. I was in college to be a performing musician. I was pretty serious about it back then. I guess most twenty year olds are pretty serious about music. That sure isn’t what the Lord had planned for me. But it definitely had a lot to do with who I am today. I can’t say that I am unhappy for the experience. But what a strange trip it has turned out to be.

One of these days I am going to construct a timeline and try to fill in as many chronological details as I can. I am so disappointed that I didn’t start keeping this journal/diary/blog thing until so late in the game. Now that I understand that value of it I so wish that I could go back so much farther and see what was happening back then. Now I have to piece together significant days as much as possible through loose records and connected memories. My father has a really good record of a lot of important stuff that he is going to try to convert to some form that I can use. A lot of it is handwritten and very inaccessible. But the last several years are digital and can be used pretty easily. So maybe I will be able to start using that to start building back more information from the past. Now that I am looking at turning thirty in just a few months I am starting to see how the memories of my youth are starting to slip away. And now that I have fewer and fewer of the people left around who shared those memories with me I find it more and more important to try to hold onto them.

Now that I am using the upstairs office all of the time I have really come to notice how incredibly loud the water heater in the basement is. I always knew that it was unbearably loud if it came on when we were trying to use the theatre in the basement. But this is really loud upstairs as well. I can’t believe that Andy never said anything living directly above it for two years.

Okay, it is 4:10 am and I have to be up in the morning for the funeral. Min will be home in three hours. I just wrapped up the work that I was trying to get done and luckily I did manage to get it done. Oreo is looking at me trying to convince me to go to bed so I had better get going.

Dominica didn’t get any sleep last night. Dexter is a restless sleeper and insists on sleeping with us and it doesn’t give Min a chance to fall asleep. With my CPAP I can sleep through just about anything. Dexter probably jumped on me a hundred times during the night and never managed to wake me up. Growing up with Buffer as a kid (she was our Cocker Spaniel that I had from age ten until I was in college) I am used to dogs walking on me at night. Buffer used to wait until I fell asleep and then walk over me and leave the room. So Min was exhausted today.

Dominica had to get up early this morning so that she could go and get her hair done somewhere in Frankfort before the wedding. I stayed in bed with the dogs for a little while. It is very difficult to drag yourself out of bed when you have two snuggly Boston Terriers who want to snuggle with you!

Min and I drove to the wedding separately since we had to be there a little early because Min is doing a reading. We left the house at 10:15 and managed to arrive early enough over at Hamilton College that we stopped by the Nice’n’Easy and I picked up a quick breakfast.

The wedding was held in the Hamilton College Chapel which was built in 1827 and the interior was restored in the mid-1900’s as a war memorial. It was a really beautiful venue for a wedding. Simple and austere but elegant in its own fashion. The weather outside was perfect for an indoor wedding. It was heavily overcast but since the chapel did not have stained glass windows the overcast caused the light to be a cool, almost blue colour that worked perfectly. And the humidity caused the back windows to fog which kept there from being a clear view behind the priest which would have been distracting.

Dominica and I didn’t get to sit together. All of the readers sat together is the front left of the chapel to make it easier for them to get up and down without walking through the church. I sat on Min’s family’s side, the right, two thirds of the way back in a row with Joe and Brittany.

The service was very nice. Both Dominica and I commented on how impressed we were with the priest’s message. Towards the end of the service the rain really started. It was pouring by the time they were wrapping up and just about then the thunder started as well. So everyone stalled at the chapel as long as possible. Dominica and I had to stay for family pictures so that kept us out of the heaviest rain fortunately. After pictures we were over to “The Little Pub” which was on campus just across from the chapel where there was hot cider, donuts, sandwiches and cookies for lunch.

We went back to Min’s parent’s house to take care of the dogs and to change before the reception. We packed the car and watched a little television before we left. Oreo was very glad to see us. We are pretty sure that he gets pretty nervous when we leave him at Min’s parent’s house when we are not there with him.

We left for the reception at 5:10 which was a bit later than we had hoped to leave. Then, only minutes after locking the door and leaving, Dominica realized that the card that we had gotten for the newlyweds was still sitting on the kitchen table where we could not get to it. So we had to run to the store on the way out of town to pick up another card. That didn’t help our timing any. While I was in getting the new card Dominica was rumaging through my car and discovered her parent’s and discovered the house key that she has been missing for almost two years now. So that didn’t help much.

We actually managed to make it to the reception right on time. In fact, we were probably about halfway through all of the people that were arriving so it was perfect. From 6:00 until 7:00 was a cocktail hour. We hung out with Joe and Brittany and had snacks. “Snacks” is putting it lightly. We mostly “settled” for baked brie with raspberry drizzle, spring rolls, quiche, etc. There were a lot of really nice meat items as well but I didn’t pay much attention to them.

The reception was quite an affair. Save venue as last year, the country club at Turning Stone Casino. We had a really good time. Dominica and I were sat with the grooms parents, Min’s parents, Joe and Brittany and the priest. So we were one of the “mature” tables. Apparently Dominica and I have graduated from sitting at the kids tables. Dinner was awesome. Great service and presentation. Our vegetarian selection was some sort of ricotta based filling in a pan-fried eggplant wrap that was simply amazing. Last year we hadn’t been that impressed with the vegetables Napolean that they had done there but Min’s uncle Sam said that they had specifically made sure that the vegetarian selection was different this year and they had had the casino get this recipe from a different resort. Let me tell you: it was worth it. I only know of there being three vegetarians on Min’s side of the family: Dominica, Stephanie and I. One of the coolest things was a chocolate fondue fountain. It was a five or six tiered flowing fountain that you could dip fruit, marshmallows or rice crispy treats into. Very cool. The cake was amazing too. Kind of fudge layered with cake.

We partied until 11:00 and stayed just long enough to hear the last song and then we hit the road quickly to beat the rush out of the casino. Oreo had been in the car all night and we didn’t want him to have to be in there any longer than he had to be. We did go out around 9:20 and walked him and made sure that he was warm enough but we couldn’t do much to entertain him. We were on the road by 11:15 and home by just a little after 1:00. Boy were we tired. It was all that we could do to stay awake while driving home. If it had been any fartehr I could not have made it. Oreo was especially glad to be home.

Dominica and I are going out to Clinton, New York this afternoon for Min’s cousin Sam’s wedding rehearsal. Min is going to be doing one of the reading in the wedding so she has to be at the rehearsal. We spent the early morning packing and getting ready to be able to leave. Dad came over a little before noon and we all went to lunch at the Omega. We ate and then had to hit the road pretty quickly. The rehearsal is at 3:45 and it takes three hours to get there so we had to boogie.

We got to Clinton right on time. I have never been to Clinton before. I was really impressed by what an attractive town it is. It is a small village to the west of New Hartford which is just to the west of Utica. Hamilton College is just outside the village. It is one of the most beautiful campuses that I have ever seen. I got Min to the chapel – which was built in 1827 – and then took Oreo out to explore the campus. Oreo had an incredible time running around exploring everything. He dragged me from tree to tree trying to see and pee on everything. He had the most fun he has had in a long time. It was drizzling the whole time and he got very wet. After a while it started to rain and I had to take him back to the car. He was getting very cold.

After the rehearsal I drove Min over to the Stonebridge Country Club and dropped her off. I ran back to Min’s parent’s house to drop off Oreo and to change for the after-rehearsal dinner. I made it back to the country club just in time to get in line for dinner. Now that is good timing.

Before going to bed we watched Kingdom of Heaven with Min’s father. It was quite good. I really enjoyed it. It wasn’t strictly historically accurate. At least Saladin really was the sultan that sieged the city. That was about all that was accurate. There was a tiny bit of truth to some of the story. But not much. You can learn more about The Siege of Jerusalem in 1187 at Wikipedia.

The sun is almost out today. Not quite but it isn’t the total grey overcast that we have had for the past two weeks. I really prefer it to be dark and cool in colour. But this will do.

I finally managed to sleep in today and didn’t have to get up until almost 9:00. Min got up just a little bit after I did. She had to leave at 10:00 to get out to FLCC in Canandaigua in time for her test today.

Dad is over at Eaton-Watson this morning dealing with grandma’s funeral arrangements. The funeral is going to be on Monday morning in Perry and then internment is going to be, if all goes to plan, next weekend in Canton, Ohio where my grandfather is buried. So all seven of us left out here are going to go out there for the burial. It is weird to think of the family as only being seven people left in New York including Dominica.

Dad came over this morning and picked Min and I up for lunch at the Omega. Min had been at class this morning doing a test. She had to fix a computer that the professor had broken. She thinks that it went well.

I had to do some banking this afternoon so I ran up to the city. Eric and I were going to get coffee when I was done but he ended up having work to do so we weren’t able to schedule it. I stopped by Target and Best Buy after going to the bank to do a little gift shopping. While I was there I picked up the latest release from Nickleback as well as The Explorers with Ethan Hawk and River Phoenix which was a terrible movie but one that was awesome when I was young so I have been looking for it for years.

One of my projects tonight was getting the new USB switch and extension cable that we picked up last night installed and my desk cleaned off. I got that done and then moved Mr. Humphries from the bookshelf in the dining room into the office so that he is on my desk. We are hoping that this arrangement will make it far easier to keep him warm, save on home heating costs and make him much more accessible so that we are more likely to spend time with him. Being in the dining room is tough because we never use that part of the house during the hours when he is awake unless we have guests and then we don’t hang out with the hamster very much. So we are very hopeful that this will turn out to be a much better solution for everyone involved. Plus my desk is much larger so he can actually get out of his cage and explore a bit without being on the edge of falling to the floor at every moment. I have been really worried about how little time we spend hanging out with him. When we first got him he stayed in the bedroom and I had him right by my head when I slept and he seemed to really like that but now he is around us so little when both he and we are awake that he misses out on a lot of attention. Hopefully now he can wake up and come find me easily on most occassions so that he can gets lots and lots of attention. One of the problems that we have always had with him is that he has such an incredibly short attention span that it is very difficult to spend time with him. What he will do is rattle his cage looking for attention. Then you go over and spend some time with him but after about ten to fifteen seconds he will run away. As soon as you assume that he has given up on wanting attention and leave he returns and wants attention again. This is a pattern that can go on for hours and makes it very difficult to entertain him because so much of your time is spend waiting for him to come back and want more attention.

The hamster is out of his cage and wandering around on the desk while I am writing this update. It is so much more space than he is used to. I think that he is really gonig to like it, though, because this should make it that he can come and go from his cage when I am in here. He loves to go in and out of his cage. It isn’t like most hamsters that just want to be out of their cages. He likes to come out and walk around but wants to go back in after a minute. But just a few minutes later he will want to be back in again. And on and so forth. I guess that he is a rodent with very short interest cycles.

Well, the first problem with having the hamster loose is apparent: we need to block him from getting onto the portion of my desk that my computer is actually on. I think that a simple piece of wood will do the trick. Something that I can put in place when he is going to be loose and can hide when we don’t need it. He immediately comes over to where I am and starts to chew on everything – which unfortunately is mostly wires and picture frames. So that doesn’t work well at all. He is a very ornary hamster.

While I was working in the office tonight (with the crazy hamster running all over the place) I watched The Explorers since I have been wanting to see it again since I first saw it in theatres in 1985! It is has been a complete twenty years since the last time that I saw this movie. It is weird to finally be at an age when you actually can have gone twenty years without having seen a movie that you remember pretty well. I have almost never found anyone who remembers this film except for Min. It is one of the movies done in the style of Goonies but obviously not as well. It is weird how much watching a movie like this takes me right back to 1985. The clothing, the television, the furniture. This is how I remember the world from when I was nine.

I started working on getting my paperwork together for final submittal to Empire State College tonight. It has been almost a year since I worked on it last. Boy am I late! Luckily I recorded enough information last time that I worked on this paperwork that I was able to get right back into it again pretty easily.

While I was working I finally got around to watching Disney’s version of Madeleine L’Engle’s A Wringle in Time which I have been wanted to watch for a long time. “A Wrinkle in Time” was one of my favourite books when I was younger. I have the entire series of books. They were great.

Min got home around 11:20 and we headed right out to go to Walmart to do a little shopping. When we got back I was exhausted and went straight to bed.

So today I found the worst website of all time. What is the point of this page from American Rock Salt over in Retsof? There isn’t one single bit of information at all here. One image and a link to their internal email? There is a good security system. Lets make every single person who was ever interested in doing business with us get no information but give them a tool to attempt to hack us with. Great.

Okay, so here is the plan for this weekend as it now stands. The plans have been changed over and over again so I hope that they are solid at this point. We are leaving Geneseo around noon tomorrow. We will go straight to the rehearsal. Then we are going out to Frankfort and staying with Min’s parents on Friday night. Oreo will be with dad. So we won’t be coming back to Geneseo until after the wedding. The wedding reception starts around 6:00. We are hoping that we will be able to go straight back to Geneseo after the reception but it might end up being too late. We will play that by ear. So we will be home either really late on Saturday night or middle of the day on Sunday.

There probably won’t be any updates until Sunday evening since it is so hard to post while out of town. Have a good weekend everyone.