Welcome To Notre Dame Brian Kelly

Well the search is over. Notre Dame has a new head football coach. I am glad ND has found a new head football coach and I wish him the best of luck. I would have preferred a more established coach (Stoops or Meyer) but it sounds like they were not willing to make concessions. I do hope that Kelly can restore the Irish to national prominence. I hate listen to Mark May mocking and ripping apart the Irish on Saturday nights. Lou needs an Irish team to jab back at May with. On a related Irish note, Golden Tate won the Biletnikoff Award as the nation's top wide receiver. He and Jimmy Clausen will sorely be missed next year, however we wish them good luck. Check the video clip out below for a glimpse as to why he won this award!

Melissa's Top Ten things I learned over my Thanksgiving break

10) Nick will not react well if you put him in a collared shirt, but he will adapt to it because he thinks Benihana is pretty cool!

9) Nick does not need a lot of food to make him happy on Thanksgiving. Greg will be eating this stuff for lunch for 2 weeks.

8) If you tell Nick something scares the dog he will do it repeatedly to torture her. NOT NICE!

7) Nick can sleep through a 20 pound dog jumping on top of him

6) Nick and Greg will move very quickly for free Doritos at Costco

5) Be careful how you pronounce someone's name, you might never hear the end of it.

4) Nick is not at good at that NCAA game as he thought.

3) Desmond Howard is not smart enough to realize he is fighting with a teenager on twitter.

2) Nick & Greg will forever hold out hope for an Irish win.

1) It is almost as funny to watch Greg try to touch Nick with his feet as it is to watch Greg try to hug my Dad.

Thanksgiving Weekend!

Thanksgiving weekend started out with the 100th Thanksgiving Turkey Trot in Cincinnati. I didn't run the whole thing, however I think I did good for barely having trained for it. I ran at a 12:03 minute pace and ran the entire race in 1:14:48. I then went back to the house and did some clean up because Melissa's brother was coming in from Florida. We started making some of the food for Thanksgiving Dinner, since Melissa's brother flew in on thanksgiving evening we moved our dinner to Friday. We drove to the airport to pick up Melissa's brother and had our "Thanksgiving Dinner" at a CrackerBarrel Restaurant. We then drove home and Nick and I traded jabs in NCAA 2009 on xBox 360, that was after April turned into peeing fountain when she saw Nick. I would say that she peed close to a half a gallon of pee.
The next morning we had to get up and start making the food for our Thanksgiving Dinner. Nick and I brought our total of NCAA games to a 3 - 3 tie. Melissa took a nap and then we cooked the turkey a little too fast and were about an hour a head of schedule. We sat down and ate our dinner and Melissa's brother just had turkey, cranberries sauce, and mashed potato's. We had so much food left over. Tomorrow we are taking Nick out to Benihana for his annual Christmas dinner.

Dude You Broke My Wife

Today was our second ultrasound. The doctor walked in and I said: “Dude, you broke my wife!” Everyone laughed and we started the procedure. He said everyone looks good, good size, and we even got to see the hearts beating. He said see this pulsating blob right here, that’s the first heart beating. He then showed us the second heart beating. It was so neat. Melissa and I looked at eachother and we were so happy. Melissa said that there had better be 2 babies in her stomach due to the sickness and sleepiness. I have told Melissa that I don’t care what we have, boy – boy, boy – girl, girl – girl as long as they are healthy. We added the US photo to the fridge, along with the other one. I CAN’T WAIT UNTIL THEY ARE BORN, I AM REALLY LOOKING FORWARD TO THEM BEING HERE. The midnight feedings, long hours of no sleep, diapers, bottles, laundry, DOESN’T IT SOUND GREAT!

Eat, Sleep, Puke – And The Babies Aren’t Even Born Yet

Well it’s official, Melissa has morning sickness. She can’t seem to keep anything she eats down. Last night I made her dinner, she tried some of it but ended up gagging on it  Now I know my cooking may be bad but not that bad. She is always tired too. I don’t think she has made it past 8 PM, if not 7:30 PM when she usually goes to bed by 9 PM. She called the doctor today and they said she could take a B6 pill 3 times a day. I hope it works cause even 1 baby needs lots of nutrients and food, let alone 2 babies.

A Lazy But Busy Weekend!

After a slow week at work, it's been a pretty lazy weekend so far. I use the term busy in the title of my post because last night we cleaned the kitchen, picked up the living room, put the laundry away and made the bed and cleaned the bedroom. I am currently watching the Irish have a mental lapse as they are losing to Navy by 14. I hope they can turn the game around and win this game. They will need to win it to stay in the BCS hunt. Tomorrow the Buffalo Bills don't play so I imagine we will walk the dogs, watch some TV and hava a nice relaxing day, assuming we get the clothes put away tonight :-)!

Two for One Special

Today, Melissa & I went to our first sonogram appointment at the doctor's office. Melissa had been trying to not get to excited in case something went wrong however I'll admit it, I was anxious and excited! The doctor asked, "How are we doing?" and I said "She is always hungry." to which he said, "Well, I can give you a couple of reasons why that is!” We both knew what that meant, TWINS! We were excited and stunned! I couldn't stop grinning from ear to ear. Check out the sonogram piture and you can see 2 dark blobs signifying two babies. We called our parents to tell them the good news and went to have breakfast to celebrate. I was a space cadet the rest of the day. Melissa and I are so happy we have been blessed with this gift. We'll keep you informed!

Niagara Mini-Marathon Complete - We Both Made It!

Well we are one week removed from our trip to Buffalo for the Niagara Falls Mini-Marathon and I can't believe that we have a Mini-Marathon under our belts. Melissa and I ran the race together and I started to have some foot pain around mile marker 5 so we decided to slow our pace but move like the tortise (slow and steady wins the race). It was great seeing and hearing all the high school sports teams and groups along the way cheering us on and supplying us with water and gatorade. It was funny, at mile marker 3 I could see Niagara Falls and I turned to Melissa and said look and she just started laughing. At mile 11 though, we both looked and said: "That's not so scary and far now!" We crossed the finish line in just under 3 hours and they even annouced our names! I look forward to my next Mini and my first full Marathon!

Naturally, any trip to Buffalo means that we are coming home with some Buffalo food! Saturday night we went to Tops, a local supermarket, and picked up the following:

• Case of LaBatt Blue
• 6 Cans of Grandma Browns Beans
• 4-5 Bottles of Weber's Spicy Mustard.

We also had a post race celebration friends luncheon at The Anchor Bar (Home of the Chicken Wing). We took Monday off for the drive and then got ready to head out of town. We ran to J.C. Penny's for some Bills hats and clothes and then we were on to Tim Horton's to pick up some Tim Bits, Mighty Taco for lunch and some to go for lunch the next day, and then we called ahead to La Nova Pizzeria and had them make a large Peperonni Pizza and a double order of Bar-B-Q wings, with extra blue cheese. I don't know what it is about Buffalo blue cheese but there is just something about it and you can't get it better any other place. I took the week off of exercising to recover from the Mini-Marathon (and my waistline noticed) but tonight I was back on the case again running a 3 mile jog. I need to start training for the Turkey Trot. Talk to you soon!

What a Difference a Couple of Hours Makes

Today we went to Costco to go shopping and on our way into Costco, I said to Melissa: “Are you hungry?” She replied and said that she was not hungry and that we had eaten out too much this month. I said ok and let it go. Now I have to tell you that since she has become pregnant she has been very hungry. So we headed home to unload the groceries, let the dogs out, and then we had to head out for some more shopping. We happened to pass a “Logan’s Roadhouse” and Melissa said we should get some of their rolls to go along with the ribs that we were cooking back at the house. As we pulled into the parking lot Melissa looks at me and says: “If they do not have rolls to go, we are eating dinner here!” I told her didn’t you just tell me about eating out earlier and she said, I don’t care I am starving. Luckily, they did have rolls to go so we were able to have them with our dinner, that we made at home. I am going to have to keep my ears open to prevent any binge eating.

Notre Dame / USC Weekend Thoughts

This weekend started out with Melissa and I running our final long run prior to our Mini-Marathon next week in Buffalo, NY. We ran a path that we had road bikes on to a Notre Dame Football game a few years ago. During that bike trip, Melissa and I had shown our fitness level when we were breathing heavy and being extremely fatigue. This past Saturday we ran the entire path and back and were just a little fatigued. After this we headed back to my parent's house to shower and get ready for the Notre Dame vs. USC game. We made a stop at Martin's Supermarket to get a salad from their salad bar, we stopped to pick up a coat for Melissa's brother, and then we were off to campus to see Notre Dame defeat USC. We parked and walked to campus. On the way way there Melissa bought the shirt that you can see in the picture to the right. She is very proud of it and I think it is pretty cool, too! We walked around campus taking in the atmosphere and see the usual gameday activities. We snapped a couple of pictures of the campus and then it was on to the game. The outcome was not what Irish fans expected however we it was the best college football game that I can say I have had the pleasure of going to. I will post some hightlights of the game and a couple of other pictures from the weekend soon. I can say that even though the outcome stinks, I am glad that the Irish were able to hang in with the trojans, which had been a problem as of late. The Irish are now 4 - 2 and I hope that they can meet the trojans again in a bowl game as I think the game will end differently. A few things that need to change:

• The defense needs to step it up. You can't have the team on 3^rd down and 9 and give up 30 - 60 yards.
• You can't let time that you will NEED later in the game to run off the clock to prevent the other team, IN CASE you score from getting the ball back.
• PETE CARROLL NEEDS TO STAY ON THE EFFING SIDELINE AND NOT ON THE FIELD!

After the loss we went to visit Melissa's brother and then went to my parents house to get some much needed sleep. We woke up the next morning, took the dogs on a long walk since we were getting Family Portrait done by our wedding photographer Sunday morning. The pictures turned our really well and I hope to post some for everyone to see. Well here's to the start of hopefully a good work week, oh and the Buffalo Bills pulled out an overtime win against the NY Jets. GO BILLS!!!

Didn’t you Pee on Enough Sticks

Well Melissa decided she was going to take a home pregnancy test to see if she was pregnant or not. This was on a Wednesday and I was on my way home so she took it and I logged into facebook while I was waiting for our food and her status was "Melissa is well......" I called her and she respond with, we're pregnant. Now I was ecstatic but Melissa said we should do it again in the morning to make sure (hey, they were dollar store pregnancy test, so you never know!) So she took another one with the same result, and another, and another, until we had 5 positive tests over 3 days and then the digital test on the last day. We were happy, however, we got bloodwork done at the doctor just to me safe. Now we agreed to get the info together however the doctor's call caught Melissa at home and me in the car on my way home. We were headed out of town to run in the NIMM in Buffalo. Melissa took the call and then called me and told me, I said I thought we were going to get the phone together and she said I was anxious! I can't blame her cause I would have probably been the same way. To Buffalo We Go

Been A While...

Well it has been a while since I have blogged so I thought I would let everyone know what has been going on in our lives plus we are also coming up on a big game this weekend so I wanted to blog a bit prior to updating everyone about the game this weekend.  Things are going good at work.  I have been working on a redesign of our company webpage for the past year and we have finally begun beta testing it with some of the sales staff and managers.  It was just released to them today, but the overall responses have been positive and happy with the amount of information there.  When you compare it to our current website, it is leaps and bounds ahead of it.  I'll keep you updated and hopefully will provide a link when it is live.

Training for the upcoming Niagara Falls International Mini Marathon has been coming along.  Melissa and I are going to be running at the same pace, which is her's not mine, that will help me pace myself so that I don't do what I sometimes do, start too fast and end up walking.  This past weekend we ran 9 miles straight (4.2 miles less than the full length of the Mini).  We will be running 10 miles this week and then tapering off the running up until the big race.  Wish us luck!

Bush for the Push

Turning to sports, the Fighting Irish are 4-1 with their only loss coming to Michigan and a controversial loss at that.  They have won the last 3 of the those 4 in the final minutes and in one case seconds of the game.  This weekend's showdown in South Bend, which we are going to, should be a good game.  I had tickets to the 2005 "Bush for the Push" game in the Bend and didn't get to go because of work so I hope this weekend's game is as exciting as that game was but with a different outcome.  Here's hoping that Jimmy Clausen and the Irish can put a hurting on the Trojans of Troy.

Notre Dame 37 vs. Washington 30

From Notre Dame Scoreboards

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Welcome Penelope, aka Penny!

About a month ago we took over raising my brother's dog, Penelope. We call her Penny for short. She is an Austrailian Sheep dog. She loves to play fetch and having her backside scratched. She and April get along well and they play and look after each other. My co-worker loves to watch them when we are out of town. I would say that Penny has grown accustomed to her surroundings and will fit in well with our family. Looking at the picture to the right, how can you not love those eyes, oh and I told you she loves to play fetch, that's one of their tennis balls in the picture.

I LOVE Sending Purdue Fans Home Sad!!!

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Notre Dame Defeats Purdue & Tailgating!!!

My wife, her cousin (a Purdue fan, but otherwise a nice guy), & I went to West Lafayette for yesterday's game between the Fighting Irish and Boilermakers. We parked prior to the game and tailgated a stone's throw from the stadium. We enjoyed watching the gentle ribbing both teams fans were giving each other and after 4 beers each we decided we should head to the stadium for the game. Due to the past seasons of football, this year is make it or break it for Charlie Weis, so the Irish needed to win the game. Starting quarterback, Jimmy Clausen, was hurt with turf toe so Notre Dame did not have their usual air attack which meant they had to go to the ground attack. Notre Dame has recently started to use the Wildcat offense so that's what we saw a lot of. Notre Dame jumped out to a halftime lead however a blown coverage play gave Purdue the lead with about 4 minutes left in the game. Needing to go almost the length of the field Jimmy got the ball and lead the Irish down the field to inside the Purdue 5 yard line. 1^st, 2^nd, and 3^rd down came and went and it came down to 4^th and goal and Jimmy rolled out and hit tight end Kyle Rudolph for the go ahead score!!! The southern endzone and Irish fans in our section went nuts and the rest of the stadium went home sad with a lose. Check out the pictures to the right and the scoreboard picture above. I will also post the go ahead scoring play here.

Running and Tailgating with My Cousin

Well I have resumed training for the Niagara Falls International Mini-Marathon. I ran close to 7 miles this past Sunday and I am slated to run 8 miles this week. I am slowly but surely getting to my goal of 13.2 miles. I will be twittering during the race and I may even upload some images if I can get that set up prior to the race. I run about 4-5 days a week and may even do some strength training. I have also switched Melissa's BodyBugg to my weight/height so I can start watching what I eat and resume losing weight. This weekend Melissa and I are going to meet up with her cousin and go to the Notre Dame vs. Purdue game in West Lafayette. Hopefully it should be a fun and exciting game for Irish fans since Purdue lost to Northern Illinois last week. I play Farmville on Facebook and if there was any question who I was rooting for you can see based on the picture to the right.

Notre Dame 33 vs. MSU 30 Scoreboard

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First Victory over MSU at Notre Dame Stadium since 1993

Thoughts on the ND vs. Michigan Game!

Just got done watching the Notre Dame vs. Michigan game and I can't believe the Irish lost it :-(. There were a few miscues on the game that I want to talk about. I cannot believe that the touchdown in the first half was overturned. The video evidence was not inconclusive and therefore the call on the field should not have been overturned - I blame the refs! Second, the Irish should not have been throwing the ball when they had the lead in the forth quarter, you run the ball with the lead - I blame the coaching! Third, there were 3 seconds stolen from the game that need to be addressed. There was a reason that the refs ran from the field after the game was over - Again the refs are to blame! Now as I told some of my Michigan fan aquaintances that I don't mind losing, that is IF I LOSE FAIRLY, and I don't feel that that game was a fair game. Now with that said, bring on Michigan State and I now have to root for OSU, cause I hate USC!

Notre Dame 35 vs. Nevada 0 Scoreboard

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Go Irish! Keep It up!

Tenn. Trip Day 2 – Smoky Mountain Waterfall Hike!

Day 2 started with Melissa and I having a nice big breakfast and then we went to the outlet mall for a few since it was raining outside. Once it started to clear up we decided to head to the Smoky Mountains State Park and go to the Cascade Falls.

We knew it was going to be a 4 mile strenuous hike and knowing this thought we should take a flashlight with us since we were headed out at 4:30 PM. According to the park map we should be able to make it out to the falls and back by 8:30 PM. Well we hiked and hiked and hiked, took several pictures and finally made it to the beautiful Cascade Falls. Check out the pictures to see how beautiful it was! We then started back and got about half a mile in to the hike when it started to get dark. Around mile marker 2 it was pitch black dark and we had to use the flashlight. Melissa slipped and sprained her ankle at mile marker 3 but was a trooper and kept going all the way to then end. We were able to make it back and now we have an adventure store to tell :-). Leaving the cabin and already miss it.

Tennessee Trip Day 1 - Dinner @ Ye Old Steakhouse

For dinner I decided that we should go to a local place called Ye Olde Steakhouse. I had seen it on a "Taste of the Town" segment that ESPN does during its Thursday night college football games. If you call the number for the business you find out that they don't serve alcohol, just beer, so we had to bring our own wine which was something new for Melissa & me. The draw to this place was (obviously enough) steaks. The way they cook them is on the grill, then the cook them in vegetable oil and then back on the grill again. The steak was very, very tender & very, very good. For desert we had a nice warm piece of apple walnut pie with a scoop of ice cream, the perfect way to finish any dinner.

Tenn. Trip Day 1 – Waterfalls & ND Football!

After we were done Ziplining we made an executive decision to head to the Smoky Mountains State Park and head for some hiking and to take some pictures of the waterfalls they have. We got out of the car right after the game had started and ND had scored its first touchdown. Now, before I begin I hope everyone realizes this was hard to not watch this game: home opener, high hopes, first game of the season – but don’t worry I have it TIVO’ed. We started out on our hike to the Laurel Falls and the skies started to look threatening. We kept going and started to hear

“There’s a bear on the trail” and “Yep honey that was Yogi Bear” which made us a little curious and we kept going. As we approached the falls someone was pointing to a place on a nearby cliff and sure enough there was a small bear! I snapped a couple of pictures that didn’t turn out but we kept going and took several pictures of the falls, and wouldn’t you know it as we started to take pictures the rain came. We hung out under a tree/ledge and were dry for a while and as it started to let up we headed out. We got back to the car and I immediately jumped on the phone and checked the text messages that Melissa’s brother Nick was sending us about the game. “28 – 0 ND at the half” he said and we decided that we would head back to the cabin we were staying in and get ready for dinner. We got back to the cabin and were able to see some of the highlights of the game and from what I saw I think we are going to be good this year. If we can beat Michigan next week that will be the litmus test for the season, win there and we should do well for the rest of the season.

Tennessee Trip Day 1 – Ziplining

Well Melissa and I woke up on our first day of vacation and had some eggs, bacon, and a biscuit for breakfast. We took the dogs out for a little bit, watched some ESPN College Gameday and then we headed out to stop by Wal-Mart for some items prior to heading out for our day. On our way to Wal-Mart we saw a place that was advertising Ziplining.

Melissa & I have never done this before and Melissa said “That sounds like fun!” So we found a place that takes you up to the top of a mountain and you Zipline down. We signed up, finished our lunch, and headed on our way. Mental note: Krystals = White Castles. The Ziplining was a blast. We headed up with 2 guides who were cool and funny. Our group was great too! I was able to snap some pictures of Melissa using my Blackberry, check them out. I would suggest that anyone who has the option of doing it does it because we had a lot of fun.

Lost In Mountainous Tennessee!

This weekend Melissa and I are going to mountainous Tennessee for the weekend to relax and have fun.  We plan on hiking and taking the dogs for a walk and having a lot of fun.  We are going to be staying in a cabin that has no internet connection so we will be out of touch for the weekend.  The picture to the right shows the view from the back deck.  We will take plenty of pictures and I will post them after the weekend is over.

Construction, Construction, Wedding, Construction...

So this weekend my buddy Aaron and his Fiancee (now wife) got married in the great state of Michigan. So this is how our weekend went. Friday night we went and got haircuts since I was looking like Grizzly Adams and Melissa wanted to get her hair cut as well. Saturday morning we woke up 1/2 hour late to getting out of town. Dropped off the dogs to stay with my co-worker Lori for the weekend since the plan was to drive up to the wedding and drive back we didn't have anywhere for them to stay with us. We headed out of town and drop from Monroe where we stopped to get breakfast all the way till we hit the greater Detroit area, stopping for a bathroom break and a fill up. Now I didn't buy a Diet Pepsi at either stop since they were $2.⁰⁰. Now we did have to stop since I picked up April back at Lori's house and she got dirt on my shirt. So according to the GPS we were going to be about 45 minutes early, which was perfect, enough time to find a good seat and say hi to everyone prior to the ceremony. We grabbed a shirt at Old Navy, stood in a line that was entirely too long for such a gorgeous day (GO OUTSIDE PEOPLE) and we were on our way. Our 45 minutes early had turned into only 10 minutes early, which turned into 15 minutes late when we hit, as the title gives it way, construction traffic on the 75. So now we are 15 minutes late and we make a detour and find another road that gets us to the Van Dyke which we are flying down until we hit, yet again, construction traffic. We are now 1/2 hour late per the GPS. We get to the church just in time to see the end of the homily and we did get to see the exchange of the vows (the most important part).

So we had set up meeting a friend of ours for a quick bite after the wedding but before the reception which was a couple hours away so we headed off to that. We headed for an Applebees 20 minutes away via the Van Dyke which on our way we hit, YET AGAIN, construction traffic. Forget that "Pure Michigan" advertising slogan I got it for you so listen up Michigan Department of Travel/Tourism/whatever: Michigan, Construction Traffic. I finally get to calm my nerves and order some food and 2 tall La Batt Blues since we are in Detroit they have it on draft, LOVE IT. We had a nice snack and conversation with our friend but now we are off to the reception.

The reception was nice. I got to see my buddies Aaron and Justin, Aaron's wife Christina, Aaron's family and we met a couple of new people, too! Now we got to the reception at 7 and had dinner and talked with everyone but now it is 11 and we still have a 5 hour drive ahead of us. We were given the option to stay in Michigan at Aaron's/Aaron's parent's house but we wanted to get back to the dogs cause we missed them and it was Penny's first weekend with us and we wanted to see how she was doing so we headed back. We decided that we would drive and spend the night in Toledo and then head out in the morning. Mental note to everyone, just because a Quality Inn and Comfort Suites are run by the same company and may be a parking lot apart from each other doesn't mean that you will get the same type of room $59 / night or any room for that matter.

The next morning we headed out and picked up the dogs who loved staying with Lori and are welcomed back anytime from what I understand and headed home. We unpacked the car and everyone were bumps on a log for the rest of the day, what an action packed weekend :-) and hey there was plenty of purchasing of Tim Bits and Ice Cappes! Congratulations Aaron and Christina!

Ideal Body Weight, Milkshakes, & Benihana!!!

     Well, your probably wondering how the 3 things in the title go together.  They all have something to do with how my weekend went.  Starting on Friday, I had a doctors appointment.  Last time I was at the doctor (October of last year) I weighed 265 lbs. and this time I weighed 219.5 lbs.  I asked the doctor if this was an ideal weight for me, and after asking me if the number was right or if it was a typo she said yes based on your height and body build my weight was a healthy weight for me.  Working out has completely changed our (Melissa and I) lives, we have more energy, eat healthier food, and have fun working out.  We have been leading a healthy lifestyle and will continue to live this way.
     Having said all of the above things, everyone is entitled to slip up at least once or twice.  So let's talk about the rest of the weekend.  We had dinner Friday night and took April out to the dog park.  On the way, Melissa and I split a peanut butter shake, yummy!  April had a lot of fun at the dog park.  We let her play by herself (thanks to the German Shepard that came at her when we got there)  and she seemed to like playing fetch and running around by herself.  She loves the dog park!
     Saturday we got up early and went to register my car.  We also found out that Purdue opened up some tickets for the Notre Dame vs. Purdue game so we are going to the game with our cousin John, a Purdue graduate, and it will be fun!  Then we took April with us and headed to the Outlet Mall in Jefferson, Ohio.  The Outlet Mall there is pet friendly which means that some of the stores allow you to bring your dog in with you.  April got a ton of pets, compliments, and lots of love.  Being out by the Outlet Mall also put us near a Tim Horton's which means TIM BITS & ICE CAPP'S all around!  We then headed back to Cincy and Melissa turn to me in the car and said "Benihana for dinner?"  and I said SURE!
     Melissa signed up for their "Chef's Club" which gets you a free dinner entree during the month of your birthday which means that her meal was free!  Going to Benihana is always fun and it gives me the option to get some sushi.  I like to order the Spider Roll, a soft shell crab roll.  Melissa turned to me after I ordered the Spider Roll and said, "Can I have some?" and I looked at her and said sure.  She had tried a roll I had in the past and didn't like it but this time when my Spider Roll came she had some and liked it (and even asked for a second piece).  I was happy to share with her and it brought an end to a great day!

Doggie Pool Party!

Melissa and I have been training for the Niagara Falls International Mini-Marathon. We should be ready to go by the time the race comes around. We run 5 nights a we and do strength and conditioning 2 nights a week. This helps us keep losing weight and get in shape for the race. This weekend we did some work around the and today there was a Puppy Pool Party at one of the local dog parks. I posted some of the pictures and videos from the event below.

Thirty!!!

It's hard to believe it but I turn the big 3-0 today! I have been a little apprehensive about meeting this milestone as the past couple weeks have gone by, but I've decided to embrace it. The best in life is yet to come and I have a great guy to share the coming years and my life with!

I've decided this song will be my motto for the coming year.

Cincinnati Premium Outlets

There is a new outlet mall in the Cincy area! It opened yesterday and Greg decided to take me out there today for a little birthday shopping! I'm still not sure if this was a great idea for opening weekend. I began to wonder when traffic began slowing 6 miles from the exit where it is located, but I thought there is no way this traffic is due to the outlet mall. Boy was I wrong! It took us nearly 40 minutes to drive those six miles. Here are some of the highlights:

• Jimmy Buffett, Songs I Know by Heart. I sang every song making Greg crazy. This was the second time we heard the CD today. I'm not so sure Greg wants hear Jimmy Buffett again for awhile.
• I decided I am going to move to Florida or somewhere in the Carribbean so I can become a Buffett head and go to Margaritaville frequently
• You should never risk it with your gas, just ask the three people with broken down cars along the way.
• I posted at least 5 messages on facebook
• I realized there was a Tim Horton's at exit 29. That meant I would have an iced capp after sitting in the car forever, maybe even some TimBits. This combination is way better than birthday cake!
• It's great to be able to budget a specific amount of money for clothing shopping and not feel bad about spending
• People in Cincinnati must be crazy for outlet shopping! Do they not realize we are in the middle of a recession????

Dave Ramsey

Last October we got a satellite dish so we could start watching the Buffalo Bills football games. This decision also impacted our lives in other ways. As part of our package we also began watching the Fox Business Network and discovered Dave Ramsey. I knew of Dave Ramsey previously as my Dad had been preaching his plan in my general direction for a couple years. However, since as adults we all seem to insist upon learning things on our own I did not pay much attention to his recommendations.

I watched Dave's show for a couple months before I decided to pick up his book and learn more about his plan to help people get out of debt. I read the book and encouraged Greg to read it as well. We decided at this point that we needed to get on this plan and change our attitude about debt as it had become a standard in our lives. So far under this plan we have paid off and closed accounts for three credit cards and we have three to go, along with our cars & student loans. We are projected to have everything paid off in the next two to three years depending upon how Murphy impacts us during this time frame.

Here are Dave's Steps (we are on step 2):

1. $1,000 In An Emergency Fund
2. Pay Off All Debt With The Debt Snowball
3. 3 To 6 Months Expenses In Savings
4. Invest 15% Of Income Into Roth IRAs and Pre-Tax Retirement Plans
5. College Funding
6. Pay Off Your Home Early
7. Build Wealth And Give!

We continue to watch the Dave Ramsey show daily as part of our motivation. We also recently watched a documentary, Maxed Out, about credit card companies and the lengths they go to keep people in debt to make money. We may take Financial Peace University down the line but for now we are doing well. We meet weekly to discuss our budget as a family and use the envelope system to control our spending. We love changing our family tree and hope our decisions now have a long term impact on keeping our children and those around us out of debt as well.

Half Marathon Training

In July we took a hiatus from training. We've still be running and exercising the dog this past month but we needed some well deserved down time from consistently training for a race to allow our bodies to heal before we begin training for the half marathon at the end of October.

August brings the end of the break and starting tomorrow we are following Hal Higdon's 1/2 Marathon training program. I went ahead and created a weekly calendar we are hanging by the door so we can maintain our focus as we begin to build up towards our first distance race. It is going to be nice to get back into the swing of training and jumpstarting bigger amounts of weight loss again. We've both lost a little bit during our hiatus but not as much as we'd been losing before. We are officially down a combined 95 pounds! We are each looking to drop just a bit more but are very happy with our weight loss and increased fitness levels to date.

Sorry It's Been So Long!

Hey everyone, sorry I haven't posted in a while. I have been pretty busy. Having been out of town for 3 weeks straight, Melissa & I needed a few days to "veg out" to recharge our batteries. Fortunately these came during weekends in which the weather was less than great. Work has been a little hectic with our new website that we have coming online at the end of the year. I have been coding like crazy and have been coordinating several people collecting and entering data into our new product database. I can't wait to unveil it and it will blow our current website away!

With the upcoming seasons change that means that College and Pro Football are right around the corner. I love this time of year since I get to watch the Fighting Irish on Saturdays and the Bills on Sundays courtesy of our discounted NFL Sunday Ticket (IN HD). I hope both teams do well this year and speaking of the Bills we have started watching "The T.O. Show" on VH1. Watching the show gives me the opportunity to see a lot of places I know. It has also begun to make me homesick for the great place we call Buffalo. My wife's father thinks I am crazy for loving the city so much but what can I say?

Since the MLB 5k (pictures to the left) is over the next race that we will begin training for is the Niagara Falls International Mini-Marathon. I plan to twitter about my progress during the race (as I do during most of my races) and will post our times and hopefully some photos from it when we are done. Well, hope this post has quenched your thirst for posts for now. I will post some more this weekend.

Running with April & Shoulder Injury

This past week I've started running short distances with April so we can burn off a little bit more of that puppy energy on our walks. I've been running with her no more than a half a mile 2-3 times a week. I figure I will work her up to a mile. She is little so I don't want to wear her down too much!

The training had been going well until this past Saturday, although I didn't know anything was wrong until Sunday. At some point during our Saturday run I sprained my shoulder when I was running with her. I was in so much pain Sunday that I couldn't even lay down without my shoulder bothering me. I had a hard time sleeping Sunday night and when I woke up Monday it was no better so I made an appointment with my doctor to have it looked at. I was looking to avoid a serious injury before we begin our half marathon training. She diagnosed me with a sprain and gave me some exercises and some pain killers to help me get better. I guess I need to get more focused on strength training if I'm going to run with my little running buddy!!!

MLB All-Star 5k Results are In!!!

Well the results are in and I finished at 31:21.  Here is a link to the results.  More to follow as I now have to drive back to Melissa and April in Cincy, cya soon guys!.

MLB All-Star 5k is Tomorrow!!!

I am so excited for the race tomorrow. I am wearing one of the new RFD chips for timing so I think that will make the times get reported much faster (at least it did for the Sunburst 10k). I should probably be in bed by now and I think I am going to get some sleep. I'll post the MLB All-Star 5k results asap! Wish me luck & night!!!

Random Thoughts While On The Road!!!

As I traveled across 3 states today and my way towards St. Louis for the MLB All Star Game 5k I started having random thoughts and ponder on them and I thought I would share them.
1. Shouldn't someone fine either the trucking company and/or the truck drivers for all the shreds of tires that litter our roadways?
2. There should be another qualifier for being labeled "International" for airports. A couple flights to canada shouldn't cut it for the Terra Haute Airport.
3. When you are a kid 70 miles on a car trip seems like an eternity. As and adult, anything under 300 doesn't seem that bad and on most major highways 70 miles is 1 hour of driving.
4. Why the hell are there so many dam weigh stations on the side of the road if the are not going to be used & even if the are used I only ever see one cop car the usually so if someone is transporting something illegally are you really going to shut down the weigh station and take off after him/her?
5. DO NOT, DO NOT, DO NOT drive 10 miles under the speed limit in the left hand lane and then give me a dirty look as I and my fellow motorist fly by you. You are not doing some sort of public service, JUST MOVE!!!

Sent from my Blackberry^®

Car Troubles & MLB All-Star 5k Run Against Cancer!!!

Yesterday afternoon on my way home from work my car started to shutter and the S.E.S light came on so we did some research online and found that a Po303 error (thanks to AutoZone) was a cylinder 3 misfire. We also found out that 75% of the time replacing the spark plugs fixes the problem so I bought new plugs (trip number 2 to AutoZone) and returned home to put them into the car, however when I returned home I found I didn't have a long enough ratchet extension to get to the spark plugs to take them out. I returned to AutoZone (trip number 3) and was able to get them out of the engine finally but found that that was not my problem. I asked the knowledgeable clerk behind the counter where he would take it if it was his car and he mentioned a place in town called Cook's Auto Service. I called them and set up an appointment for an early morning drop off. I was told he would get to Dx'ing it later on today but might not get to fixing it till the end of the day or possibly tomorrow. I was anxious and figured I would call at 11 am to see if he had looked at it yet and he said, "Yep it's fixed!" Now I would have been ready for a fight because he fixed it without getting approval for the repair but when he told me the number $150 I was ok with the speed repair, considering the amount it could have been. We picked it up this evening and everything is running smoothly. Now I am OK to go out of town this weekend to run in the 1^st MLB All-Star 5k Run Against Cancer in St. Louis. I will post the results of the race after I complete it!

Saturday Tour Around St. Louis!!!

After our plan to surprise Aunt Nett was a success, Melissa and I planned on having a fun day site-seeing around St. Louis Saturday, however the rain we got tried to make us make other arrangements. The rain did finally subside and we were off to visit the Arch, the St. Louis Science Center, & Union Station. Before we started sightseeing we went to a local pub in Laclede's Landing for lunch and then we were off to be screened by security twice and then on our way up to the top of the Arch. Knowing that Melissa is claustrophobic I was surprised that she was able to make it up to the top of the Arch. Once at the top of the Arch I pointed out the several downtown landmarks to Melissa and we hung out for a little bit and then we left the Arch for the Science Center.

We rode the Metro to the Science Center and we had a little bet about where to get off to be the closest to the Science Center since my sister said we should drive to the Science Center. Turns out our idea was better since we didn't have to walk very far (2 - 3 blocks) to get there and the money we would have paid to park would have been more than our subway tickets. Melissa is always fun during a museum/Science Center visit since she is big into interesting things like science and history. We saw several exhibits and did the traditional Science Center thing by purchasing some freeze dried ice cream :-). After leaving the Science Center, we went to Union Station to see the Fudge Makers make fudge and to do a little shopping however we arrived shortly before 6 so shopping was pretty much out of the picture. All in all, it was a great trip to St. Louis, Melissa and I had a great time! I will post pictures from our trip soon.

Happy 80th Birthday Aunt Nett & SURPRISE!

This July 3^rd Melissa and I set out early in the morning to travel to Columbia, Illinois to see/suprise my Aunt Nett for her 80^th birthday. My mom was the only one who knew that we were coming to visit. It took us a little under 5 & a 1/2 hours but we made it. We went and checked into the hotel room rested for a bit and then got changed for the party. We showed up to the party, not even my sister knew we were coming and we walked in the door and my Aunt Nett was talking to someone so I had to wait a minute until Jennifer pointed her to me and said who is that. My Aunt Nett spotted me and started to cry and said, "Oh Gregory, I haven't seen you in ages!" We talked for a bit and I got to see my Uncle's, Bill & Larry, and several other aunts and uncles that I hadn't seen in a long time due to not having much vacation.
After the party, we went and saw Jennifer's new house and I took Melissa for a tour around Waterloo. I showed my old grade school, Ahne's Bakery, the post office, our old house, and several other local landmarks, there are not many in Waterloo :-). We then went back to the hotel and partook in a St. Louis tradition, Imo's Pizza! I would say that my listings of pizza would be:

1. La Nova Pizza & Wings - Buffalo, NY - Link.
2. Imo' s Pizza - St. Louis, Mo area - Link.
3. Bob & John's La Hacienda - Buffalo, NY - Link.

It was a close race between Imo's and Bob & John's but I think this recent taste test put Imo's on top. More to come tomorrow.

10 Things We Learned On Our Florida Vacation

10. No matter how hard you hope and try it will inevitably rain at least once turn your summer trip to Florida.
9. Shell beaches are way more uncomfortable than sandy beaches.
8. It never fails someone will get into an argument if your trip involves teenagers.
7. You will get burnt even if you have sunscreen.
6. Churros are basically chew sticks of Cinnamon and sugar.
5. Always jump in the single riders line as it likely will be extremely shorter than the main lines.
4. Loss Of Use is a big con by rental companies to try and get you to purchase their insurance coverage (your personal insurance will cover it).
3. Security screening @ the airport @ 5 in the morning is a breeze & moving walkways in airports are not rides, move.
2. Saltwater + Blackberry = Corrosion + $50 for a new blackberry.
1. Witnessing and trying to help out after a 4 car accident that left a father & 2 kids losing their wife/mother can really put things in perspective.

Florida Vacation Day 1!!!

We left Cincinnati @ 7:30 am to make our flight @ 11 am. We took off on time & landed 10 minutes early. Melissa made a comment that "Airplane Seats Are Quite Rooming Having Lost +30 lbs. We picked up the rental car and were off to pick up Nick & Alex to go to the beach. We got to the beach and headed into the warm water. It was great to be on vacation!!! We hung out at the beach for an hour before heading for dinner, because it was close to 6 PM. We had dinner at Crabby Bills. Back to apt. for some shut eye! More to come!


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Adventures in Dog Sitting

So the munchkin's crazy illnesses resume. If you recall when we first got her she had hookworms, coccidia and giardia all in the first month we had her. We've also made a couple of donations the ASPCA poison control hotline because she has gotten ahold of something she shouldn't.

Our adventures with her health have continued this past month. Three weeks ago we noticed April was peeing much more often than usual on our walk. I'd heard from someone at work that if dogs do this they often times have UTIs. So we took her to the vet, got a UTI dx and started treating her with antibiotics. We also found out from the vet that she had two types of oxylate crystals in her urine which could lead to stones in her bladder. Sometimes the crystals are a product of the UTI, sometimes stones.

Two weeks later, we broght back another urine sample and the vet called within an hour and said one type of the crystals had cleared up but she still had calcium oxylate crystals and she wanted to bring her in for a urine culture (they get the sample right out of the bladder somehow) and an x-ray of the bladder to check for stones. I asked if it was normal to have a dog so young have stones and she said no but normally dogs this young don't have crystals either. So we made an appointment to take April to the vet Monday for the testing.

In the meantime when we were playing with her on Sunday we noticed she had a little cough whenever we got her running really fast. We didn't think too much of it but it concerned me enough to mention it on Monday as I was dropping her off. I figured it might be allergies or possible a collapsed trachea (which is very common in small dogs - not harmful).

I got a call from the vet a few hours later and was happy to learn that April did not have any stones in her bladder! We have to wait on the results of the urine culture to determine how to further treat the UTI symptoms. Yahoo, no surgery!! However, the vet tech asked a couple more questions about the cough and conferred with the vet and came back and told me she has KENNEL COUGH. I asked how she could have gotten this, she has had no exposure to dogs in the past month and she received the vaccine a couple months ago. After some more discussion we determined that she got it at the groomer the week before and I learned that the kennel cough vaccine does not provide 100% protection from the disease.

At this point I was a little panicked. We are going to Florida in 3 days and had made an appointment to drop her off at the PetSmart pet hotel, I knew they would not take her now. As I was asking the tech if she thought they would take and her and wondering what I was going to do, she started to tell me that the techs at the vet's office will often board client's dogs for them while they are away. I asked if she was one of the ones that does it and she does and if she was available this weekend. She was and she has two dogs as well. Although the kennel cough is very contagious she was not worried about April transmitting it to her dogs since they'd both had the vaccine and she had such a mild case. She told me a bit about her dogs and we made arrangements to drop April off tonight.

I was a bit apprehensive about leaving April for this trip but when we got there and she started to play with the other dogs I felt much better. She was running around and exploring and in general just having a good time.

We are headed to Florida in the morning and as much as I am going to miss the dog, I know we left her in good hands. I cannot wait to relax and have some fun in the sun!

2 Days Till Florida!!!

Well, Melissa and I are off to Florida in a few days.  April is staying at a Vet tech's house since she picked up Kennel Cough from somewhere!  It should be a fun trip.  We are going to go to the beach and do a bunch of fun things with Melissa's brothers, Nick and Alex.  We have decided that we are not taking a laptop for either one of us and we won't be checking work emails either.  After these past 2 days at work I need this vacation.  Our website hosting company was hacked leaving our site vulnerable and causing issues to any end users that tried to access our site.  It has been a real headache seeing as how I haven't been able to do any real "work" for 2 whole days.

This weekend Melissa and I watched the US Open that we had tickets to but chose not to go to.  It's a good thing we didn't because with all the rain delays we likely would have missed a lot of golf.  I was introduced to the Jello Caramel Pudding snack this weeked.  We saw the Chocolate and Vanilla version on The Biggest Loser and the sugar free variety with some whipped cream on to makes for a 80 calories snack that is pretty good.  I'ld say try it some time, its good!  Well we will try and post some from Florida but we just might be having too much fun to be able to post.  Talk to you later.

Old Navy Tank Tops

Today Old Navy had women's tank tops on sale for $2 each!!! None of mine fit anymore since I've lost so much weight. We got there at 8:00 just in case it was crazy like the $1 flip flop sale had been. We were first in line and by the time they opened there were probably 30-40 people waiting but it was pretty much a non-event. We got right in grabbed what we needed paid and got right out.

I replenished my stock for $20 bucks!! I love Old Navy's sales.

Thoughts on the Sunburst...

This past weekend Melissa & I ran the Sunburst 10k and I wanted to say a few things to go along with this events passing. First, I was really mad at myself for having walked 1/8th of a mile around mile marker 5. I thought I had failed since I couldn't run the whole race from start to finish, like Melissa did but I got to thinking and realized something. I realized that last year I could only barely run 1 mile before I had to stop and walk because I was so out of breath I couldn't breathe. When you look at my walk in that light, I would say that it doesn't seem so bad. Second, Melissa and I both blew our times from last year completely out of the water by improving on our overall pace times by approximately 2 whole minutes, which is quite an accomplishment. Third, and this sort of goes along with my first comment, Melissa and I ran this race "together."

What I mean by that is last year we needed each other to keep the other going in the race and not giving up. This year we decided that we didn't need to run together and that we could both run at our own pace and I believe the fact that we finished the race and that we were within a couple minutes of each other shows how much we have both grown as runners and as people/competitors as a whole.  Finally, if there is ever any doubt about whether or not either one of us can do anything, I think the picture to the right says it all, enjoy the other pictures from this weekend below.

Melissa's Sunburst Experience

Today's race day began with a flurry of activity. Greg and I knew we had to get up at 6:00 am in order to get everything together and to be in front of the College Football Hall of Fame for the 10k this morning. We got up, showered and got dressed in record time (for us) and rushed out the door at 6:50 so we could get to downtown South Bend for our 10k, which was set to begin at 7:45. By the time we got down there of course there was no parking available (because the gun time for the 5k was 7:15), so we ended up parking in front of the house my Dad lived in before he moved to Florida, which he is currently renting out. As we made the mile trek to the Hall of Fame we ran into the runners beginning the 5k and had to cut down a couple different streets to avoid the onslaught of people! We got to the Hall of Fame and took a couple of pre-race photos so we could remember the race and then got in line and we were off!

Of course Greg was gone like a shot out of the starting gate. He tends to run faster than I do so we've decided we will run separately for these races so we can see how we do time wise. I expect he will always be faster than me, after all he is 8 inches taller than I am! As we got going I also got caught in a glut of people that were going a little bit slower than I generally pace myself at and it took me about the first 1/4 mile to be able to get to the outside so I could find a group of people that was running at my pace so I could effectively pace myself. I was very excited when we got to mile marker one and I realized I was really doing this. Granted we've been running 6-7 miles every Sunday for the past month but to actually be running a distance in a real race was an incredible feeling for me. This was also where we went up our first hill. I was dreading the hills since last year this was the part of the 5k that totally killed us (other than not being as in shape as we wanted to be). I went up that hill like a champ and continued the run down the St. Joe river enjoying the scenery and thinking about the finish line. Around mile marker 3 the guy that was leading the actual marathon passed us with his 2 cop escort. It was neat to realize I was running with elite athletes! As we were running through some of the South Bend neighborhoods it was fun to see the families on their front lawns cheering the runners on! My favorite yards however were the ones where the sprinklers were placed at the edge of the yard so you could run through it and cool off slightly. The next couple of miles were fairly uneventful until I reached the point where we made the turn up the hill that nearly killed me last year. I ran up it with no problems and nearly cried as I realized how far we have come in the past 5 months. We have really worked for this and I felt incredible. When I got to mile marker 5 I knew I was really going to run the whole thing and I sped up. There is a point where you make a turn and all you see ahead is the Golden Dome of Notre Dame and it was an awesome feeling to be able to run towards it and know that I was going to end up running across the 50 yard line at Notre Dame stadium. From this point forward I picked up my pace a little bit and started running faster towards the stadium. As I approached the ND tunnel I reached a full on sprint and flew through the tunnel out on the field. I could see the finish line and there was Greg with the camera waiting for me! I ran across the finish line and all I could do was just hug him because I was so proud of us! This was quite a contrast to last year when I felt so awful after the race I didn't want anyone to touch me.

Greg's parents were there to greet us but as I looked around the stadium I couldn't see them. So we loaded up on some post race fruit and popsicles and ventured into the stadium to find them. When we finally spotted them we realized they brought our puppy in with them to greet us! It was so great to see her after our run. She greeted us with lots of kisses and love. We sat back listened to some music, enjoyed our snacks and watched some of the marathoners finish before we took April back out on the 2 mile trek back to the car.

All in all it was a great race. I was kind of disapointed in the mile markers, they did not do a very good job of marking them so you knew clearly which race they were for which was a little frustrating. I loved the Meijer post race food and look forward to coming back next Spring to run again!

2009 Sunburst 10k Done & Results Are In!!!

Well this morning we ran in the 2009 Sunburst 10k race. Melissa and I did well. I finish the race in 1:03:52 (would have been shorter if I hadn't walked a 1/8 of a mile. Melissa (who ran the whole think :-) way to go honey) ran it in 1:06:35. I am so proud of both of us for completing this race. This was a goal we set out to accomplish at the beginning of the year and I was scared it wasn't going to happen along the way, but I am very happy that we stuck with it and completed the task.
Bib	FName	ChipTime	Overall	Sex Pl	Div Pl	Pace
3268	Gregory	1:03:52	852	478	68	10:18/M
3269	Melissa	1:06:35	926	423	94	10:44/M

RedLegs 5k Results & Overall Progress

Well we finished our second race of the year and are ready for the Sunburst 10k next week. Check out our times compaired to the Flying Pig 5k.

Position	Division	Division Place	Sex Place	Name	Time	Pace	Difference
1314	M -30 - 34	144	863	Gregory	0:29:53	9:39	:29
1572	F -25 - 29	170	598	Melissa	0:31:33	10:11	:28