Big Announcement!

This is the biggest announcement of our blog to date, Heather is going to have a baby! We’re going to be parents, Woo-hooo! Heather’s due date is July 5th. We may have a fantastic 4th of July. Here are pictures of our beautiful baby (you need to use your imagination a little). Heather’s second doctor’s visit was this Wednesday. I think the baby may be a girl, the baby was very fussy during the sonogram, kicking and rolling around the whole time. Knowing that little girls are much fussier than boys leads me to this hunch. We’ll find out what the baby actually is in 6-8 weeks.

Death By Chocolate

This past Sunday, we went to my sister’s house to have an early holiday lunch with my parents and my Aunt Joyce.

I need to thank Vicky and Rich for making a great lunch. We brought dessert which was Death By Chocolate. As you can see Becca really liked dessert.

You can see that Richie didn’t like his cereal nearly as much as Becca like the Death By Chocolate.

You can see that Morgan was very tired by the end of our visit.

Snow Dog

We got our first snow of the season. It actually snowed enough this morning to lightly cover the ground. I let Bogey run around like a little maniac for a few minutes. She really seems to like the snow. She had a little puppy-fit where she runs really fast in giant circles. I took a few pictures but they were almost all blurry. Here is the only one where she would sit still.






Sandi on the other hand was not happy to see the snow. She tends to stand on the deck and look back over her shoulder at you thinking, "You're kidding right? You want me to go out here where it's cold and wet to go to the bathroom. I'm not happy with you." As you can tell our dogs are opposites in many ways.

Just Checking In With Everyone

Things have been a little hectic since our last blog. The restaurant that I work at has been sold again. I'm on my fifth set of owners now. The last owners were doing really well early in the summer but their sales have dropped off since the weather started getting cold. I think there was a lot of curiosity early on but the product wasn't good enough to keep people coming back. The new owners are going to rename the restaurant, so it won't be Brannigan's anymore. They are going to try and make it an upscale restaurant again, instead of a Sports Bar/Restaurant.

This past Sunday we had our season ending golf tournament at Yale. It was a shamble tournament (everyone hits their drive, then plays their ball out from the position of the best drive, and you record the two best scores of the foursome). My group finished second with a net total of 118 (-22). It was a really fun tournament. My group used 14 of my 18 tee balls. They all enjoyed having no more than a 9-iron into any par-4. Our D player (highest handicap player) was on fire. She made 4 birdies for net eagles or better. She drained a birdie putt on a par-3 where she was getting 2-strokes for a net score of zero on the hole! We had a cumulative net score of 1 for that par 3 (our C player also birdied while getting a stroke). The funniest part of the day for me was making a very nice, proper, older, women swear. On the first hole I hit my drive and she blurred out "Holy S***!" She quickly covered her mouth and blushed. Needless to say she was impressed with my drive.

Heather and I are looking forward to Thanksgiving. It's a great time of the year; we get to eat ourselves sick if we like. Thanksgiving usually start by us joining my sister and her family at my parents house for lunch. We proceed to eat very well (minus whatever my mother has forgotten to take out of the oven while we are eating - i.e. rolls, sausage, or stuffing). We then head over to Heather's Dad's house for dinner. We have no intention of eating as much as we did for lunch but we always do. I will put out my toothless threat now - if we do not have cheesy potatoes for Thanksgiving I'm not going to Mr. Hutchins.... O.K., I'll go but I won't be as happy about it (I'm sure there is still going to be pie).

Our dogs have been getting over a little bug. Bogey and Sandi were a little under the weather the past few days. Bogey seems to be back to her old self - running around like a little idiot. Sandi has also returned to her usual 16+ hours of sleeping. Sandi (aka - Fat Dog) isn't nearly as fat as she once was. I think her special food has helped her get down to her "ideal" 17 pound weight. It's a little funny to say "Fat Dog do you want food?" And to then have the much skinner of our two dogs come running into the kitchen. Our dogs are not nearly the size of my sisters little puppy, Morgan.

I also wanted to wish my sister a Happy Belated Blog Birthday. We went over to Vicky and Rich's house on the 4th to celebrate her birthday (November 3, I won't give the year though). It was nice to see everyone all together. Richie is becoming quite the big baby. He just turned 6-months old and boy does he have strong legs. He has a little jumper that he gets fairly high in the air with. I took a bunch of pictures but unfortunately most were not blog quality.

Pumpkin Raid 2007

This past Sunday we were invited to have lunch at my dad’s house. It was nice to see daddy, Pat, April, Kayla, and Sophie. We had a great ham lunch. We also had Pumpkin Raid 2007. My dad lives near a farm and ever year we’re allowed to take some of the leftover pumpkins. Kayla had fun playing in the Pumpkin Patch.

Sinjin Smith & Karch Kiraly Have Nothing on Us

Heather has been playing adult co-ed volleyball for the last few years through the Meriden Parks Department. She really enjoys playing volleyball so I decided to join her. I was worried that I would be the worst player there, but after yesterday I don't have that fear anymore. There are some really bad and good players there. Heather played volleyball in high school and she's pretty good. I guess it doesn't matter if you're good or not. It's just fun to get out and do something together.

TRADE FINALIZED!!!!

Well, the celebrity trade of David and Victoria Beckham to the United States has been finalized.




Much like baseball and football when huge stars are traded to another club (in this case nation) there must be reparations. In this case the United States has agreed to trade this woman to England for David and Victoria Beckham.



I personally think the U.S. has made a terrible move and I’m going to petition the commissioner to have this trade revoked. We should at least have Mr. Bean (Rowan Atkinson) added to the deal, and then it would almost be a fair trade.



I'm also taking bets as to how much weight my dad will lose while my mom is away. He is going to miss my mom's cooking and the over/under at the moment is 4.5 pounds. We love you mom and hope you are having a great vacation.

Annual Trip To The Big E

April and I have made it an annual trip to the Big E. Now Kayla is old enough to get a little more out of it, although she kept calling it " the piggy". She loved looking at all the animals, including the chicks that were hatched just hours before. Every once in a while one would try to peck at her fingers through the wire door. This was very exciting!

Kayla visiting with the chicks.

This year Kayla was tall enough to enjoy some of the rides.

Kayla conducting the train.

The airways are safe with Kayla and her new helicopter license.

Kayla on the swings. This was Auntie's favorite, because I didn't have to push.

Sofia loved her first visit to the fair. She was mesmerized by all the blinking lights of the rides.

Sofia sleeping after a long night at the fair.

Another Happy Belated Birthday - Cousin Andrew

This past Sunday was my cousin Andrew's Birthday. He is my favorite elder male, cousin from England (tough category to win first place in). Here is my photo tribute to Andrew:


He has the navigational skills of Magellan.


He puts Martha Stewart to shame in the kitchen.






He is a connoisseur of fine foods, like ice cream and cookies.


OK, I don't know what this pictures says about Andrew or my dad. Oh well, he once caught a fish that was this big.


I hope you had a great birthday and I hope they let you eat the entire plate of cookies this year.

Happy Belated Birthday Bogey!

We almost forgot an important birthday; Bogey turned 1 the day before my birthday, September 6, 2007. Happy Birthday Bogey or as Becca says Bow-bow or Badgie. It’s amazing how big she has gotten. She could fit in the palm of your hand when we first got her. I think she now weighs 23 or so pounds. She’s actually much bigger than Sandi now.

Bogey on October 21, 2006


Bogey with her brothers and sisters.

Bogey September 19, 2007.

Sandi and Bogey are good friends now. Bogey will scratch Sandi's back for her, which Sandi loves. Originally they weren't so friendly.


This use to be as close as they would get to each other. Now they sleep ontop of one another.

Back to the Grind

So, a lot has happened since I last blogged. We lost our little house guest (who I like to call Satan Dog – a.k.a. Lola).

Peter, April, Kayla, and Sophie had a great time in Portugal.

Heather, Sandi, Bogey and I just returned from our mini-vacation to Baltimore and Ocean City. On the way down we stopped at my old Alma Mata, the Johns Hopkins University, on Saturday.

Heather and the dogs resting on the upper quad on a really hot day - 94 degrees and humid.

We all walked around campus and it has changed quite a bit. The quads around each undergrad dorm are now gated with security guards; they use to be open where just anyone could walk up to any dorm. The closest I have ever been to being homeless was living in my fraternity house for my junior and senior years. Here is proof of how bad it was.

(Alpha Delta Phi House and our old rusting grill – 2000)

I was glad to see that Hopkins has contributed to the beautification of Baltimore by tearing down my old fraternity house (coincidently the rat/mouse population in Baltimore has decreased recently). It looks like they will be making a new apartment or a parking lot on the site.

(Former Alpha Delta Phi House – 2007)

If you know me you know that I love hamburgers, in particularly Fuddruckers Hamburgers. Heather and I went to Baltimore to see an Orioles vs. Red Sox game but to also have a Fuddruckers Hamburger. When we got to the Inner Harbor to have our Fuddruckers burger we discovered they weren’t there anymore. This was not an auspicious start to our trip. My birthday was on Friday and Heather got me the best birthday present available – a good old Red Sox butt whoopin. The Orioles thrashed the Red Sox 11-5. The big blow in the game was a grand slam by Scott Moore, a rookie. It was Moore’s first hit and homerun as an Oriole. The bonus to the night was that the Yankees won and the Mariners lost.

Heather getting the sand out of her sandels.

A nice calm day on the Maryland Coast.

Part of my birthday present from Heather was that I got to golf a couple of times while I was on vacation. I played Rum Pointe and Nutters Crossing. Rum Pointe was really nice, you could see water from 17 of the 18 holes.





Along with real golf Heather and I played some mini-golf.





Look at what happened to the sky while we were playing.

Heather and I tried walking back during a lull in the storm, but it started coming down again. I got soaked running back to the hotel to pick-up the car while Heather was able to wait in a store. On the bright-side I ran the 0.7 miles back to the hotel in really good time.

It's hard to see in the picture but the rain is literally coming down sideways.