[Shrek] Reunions, part un

Now to the topic I wanted to write about last time...and it's turned out to be way too long for one post, so I'm splitting it into two parts.

A couple weeks ago John and Kile came up from Virginia for the weekend. There was a mention at TotalCon in February that we should all get together in the summer for a day of playing D&D or whatever else we decided on. So right after the convention e-mails went around trying to pick a good weekend for the possible get together to take place. We settled on the weekend of July 18-20.

So Kile and John drove up from Virginia on that Friday, and after checking into their hotel gave us a call to begin Friday's festivities. Our predetermined plan was pretty straightforward; we'd pick them up at their hotel, head on over to Scott & Jadira's house, and then off to dinner at Joey's Bar and Grill on Mill Street. (Joey's is currently working on a web site, so here's a link to Fiona's mention of them in her Large Marge blog: Where everybody knows our name.)

After enjoying some still warm focaccia with a house blend olive oil with herbs and Parmesan cheese to dip into, and pre-dinner cocktails (Fiona got her standard--a coffee. She loves their coffee so much we've gone out of our way some late afternoons to sit at the bar so she could enjoy a cup or four), our dinners were served.

John and I got the Chicken Pepperoni, Scott got the Caesar salad, and after a bowl of Clam Chowder (in my opinion, the best you can get in the city) Kile got a shrimp dish that was one of the nightly specials. Jadira ordered the "All American" burger, and as usual Trish went "off the menu" with her modified Joey's Salad and "Weight Watcher friendly" baked haddock with lightly sauteed summer squash and zucchini. Fiona and I didn't get dessert, but everyone else did. Based on what was said every dish tasted just as great as it looked.

As it has been every time we've gone there, everything was perfect at Joey's. John and Kile are both looking forward to a return trip on their next visit. As an aside, if you're looking for a quiet place for a drink (including the previously mentioned coffee or any other non-alcohol fare) and a snack--go to Joey's, sit at the bar, and order the onion rings or sweet potato fries. Heck, get them both...and add those things to the list of "best you can get in the city".

After dinner we walked down a couple of doors to the candlepin bowling alley. Being from the area, John was very familiar with candlepin. Kile, being from Kentucky, had no idea what it was about. We all had a good time bowling and hanging out, and as all of our luck is, finished and left the building in the middle of a intense downpour.

Saturday Fiona and Jadira went to Salisbury beach (look down one post for how well that turned out), while the rest of us were joined by Pinhead (yes, that is Mike's chosen, preferred, and well honored nickname) and Wes Carpenter for a day of D&D, that (as expected) turned into mostly hanging out and joking around with each other.

Throw in a BBQ lunch and chicken dinner and we had ourselves a pretty nice day.

Sunday was supposed to be the day the John and Kile spent with John's parents, and so it was...until early evening when Kile called asking if Fiona and I had eaten dinner yet, apparently looking for some "fun" people to hang out with after all day with family. We hadn't eaten, and quickly took them up on their offer to go out to dinner for some "bonus" get together time.

Our attempt to go to Pub 99 failed miserably as the dinnertime line was almost out the door. So we decided to go to Steve's Pizzeria instead, which as it turns out was more what John was looking for versus a "real" sit down meal. (Steve's doesn't have a website, so we'll head back to Fiona's Large Marge blog for more info: Steve's Pizzeria

For those that have never been to Steve's, they have the largest grinders I'm aware of anywhere around here. They are so large that Kile ordered a small meatball grinder and took half home. John got the steak and cheese (just the way I order it too--just steak, cheese, and mayo), I got the chicken salad, and Fiona got a salad topped with grilled chicken. We added fries and onion rings to the mix, and when the folks at Steve's heard we'd brought friends from Virginia in, the threw in some nicely toasted and buttered garlic bread.

We finished the evening hanging out at their hotel for a while enjoying the conversation. When Fiona and I arrived back home, there was a phone message from Ray looking to confirm potential plans for when he and Kathy are up in September. Unfortunately due to computer issues I had to cut that conversation short, but I suspect we'll be enjoying some fine dinning somewhere while they're up.

And, at least for now, I don't need Ray to repair my computer.

Part deux will follow soon, and includes some reunions with folks I haven't seen in twenty years or more...

[Fiona] What?

Ok,Ok...I know I need to post otherwise people think I have given up on sharing my little insights on the crazy things that surround my life. Fear not I am still out and about viewing the insanity of the living. I guess I just haven't been feeling like there was anything I really needed to comment about. Shrek has been at me about my lack of posting and so here I sit trying to wax poetic. Looks like I failed my pilot check. I am in a summer slump I guess.

Last weekend my galpal(two of her kiddos), myself,and a friend of ours went to Salisbury Beach. Shame on you town of Salisbury! Gross! How do you get people to come in for a visit? Kidnap them? Nothing like cruisin' by life on glory days gone by.

Shrek was surprised that we were adventuring out to Salisbury Beach. He tried to warn me. Amusement park...gone. Cute shops...gone. Beach side pizza...has seen better days. I need to say that the state park and camp grounds were nice enough. My galpal had secured a day pass from our local library and so when we got to the state grounds we got to park for free. I was very happy with our day at the state park. I was just disappointed with what has become of Salisbury public beach.



When was the last time that the governing town officials ventured out to... the police department at the public beach? I mean come on. Am I the only one to be surprised that the public men and women's bathrooms are interconnected? I was afraid to go in and use the bathroom NOT just because it was filthy but because there should never be MEN in the LADIES bathroom!!



I was not surprised to see some of the trash come off the beach. It went walking by under the influence of whatever. What moves a person to get stupid and screwed up on a hot day?

Maybe I am naive but whatever happened to family day at the beach? Where is your pride? I would lie about where I lived if I were unfortunate enough to have to live in town. You seem happy enough to take my tourist dollar... please put some of it back into your community. You could have a beautiful boardwalk and shops if you just would put in the effort. How about better public bathrooms? Find reasons to make people want to visit.

[Shrek] Reformat

This is not what I intended my next post to be about.

This was supposed to be about last weekend's get together with friends John and Kile from Virginia, segueing into a Labor Day get together with Ray Conrad, and then finally mentioning...well, I'll leave that for when I make the post, probably Wednesday.

But what happened instead was I needed to reformat my computer after being hit with a Trojan Horse.

I'm not 100% sure how my computer became infected by it because my machine is buttoned up pretty tightly, but after about five days of fighting it I became 100% sure I was losing the battle.

The final straw was when, ironically enough, I was talking to Ray after having dinner with John and Kile last Sunday night. He had left a message on our machine confirming our potential Labor Day reunion (well, technically the weekend after), and as I returned his call my firewall was turned off by the infection while I watched. I decided to quickly remove my PC from my network.

At that point I went from trying to snipe at it file by file to deciding to use the nuclear weapon of wiping the hard drive totally clean. But even in making that decision, I still faced a small hurdle. My CD drive was broken, and had been for some time. I'd tell you how long it had been broken, but I don't recall. It was long enough for Ray to have offered to fix it; not the last time he was up in Worcester, but the time previous.

Yeah, that long.

Monday morning the first thing I did was pull the old one out to make sure I was competent enough to put a new one in. After seeing how easy the removal was I was already shaking my head about not doing this earlier.

So at 8:30am, Fiona and I went off to the Circuit City at The Shoppes at Blackstone Valley in Millbury, Mass. We arrived just before 9am to find out--SURPRISE!!!--Circuit City opens at 10am. We thought it was odd that it opened so late, but as we hadn't had breakfast we decided to head over to the McDonald's on Rt20 at the Millbury/Worcester line to grab a cup of coffee and a breakfast sandwich.

As we drive up to the intersection just before the McDonald's we find out--SURPRISE!!!--that particular McDonald's is under renovations and closed. We both just looked at each other and started to laugh. So much for a quick, painless trip.

We ended up going to the Golden Arches across from the newly rebuilt Auburn High School, where we know some folks from our weekly stop there Thursday evenings after bowling. Of course, despite many of them usually working the occasional morning shift none of them are working that particular morning.

After we ate and returned to Circuit City, where we were helped by two really great employees that answered all my silly questions, including one that said the replacement was going to be a very easy thing. He was right, it was very easy. So easy I am still kicking myself for not fixing it earlier. That fact I have since used it very little not withstanding.

As I had already saved all the files/pictures I wanted, all I needed to do was begin the reformat process. Having done this several times on older computers, and on other people's machines when they had issues, I knew that it is seldom a pain-free process. But with a little patience it usually all works out in the end.

And so it did, but as I'm not really that patient a person there was some cursing involved before it all worked out fine. Of course, even when things do work out fine there is usually some cursing, so I guess nothing truly out of the ordinary happened.

Now come the painfully slow process of downloading all the Window's updates and various programs I had installed before nuking the hard drive. I didn't realize how many I had until earlier this week when I figured I was less than a third done recapturing all that info. Five days later, I'm still only two thirds done.

And--SURPRISE!!!--there has been more cursing involved.

[Shrek & Fiona] A "not so brief" update

We've both been meaning to make an update post but we just haven't gotten around to it until now.

Firstly, jury duty...the guy was--SURPRISE!!!--found guilty of all charges. I forgot to copy the guy's name down, but it doesn't matter that much. He'll be a guest of the Commonwealth for the next 20 years or so. A brief mention in the Telegram mentioned that he'll be facing additional charges in Connecticut soon, with any potential sentence to be served there after his time here is served.

We were both on vacation the week of July 4th, and spent the first couple days running some of the errands that had piled up over the last few weeks. We dubbed Tuesday "Hell Day" as Fiona had to go to the RMV for a new license picture, I had to go to my doctor's office for some blood work, and we capped the afternoon off with a trip to the dentist. All three errands were completed almost painlessly.

Thursday was Fiona's birthday, so we celebrated by going to breakfast at Eller's on the Hill, a breakfast place in Cherry Valley on Stafford St. Our usual breakfast place, Bickford's, closed a while back and one of our favorite waitresses from there went to work at Eller's, so we "followed" here there.

We didn't do much the rest of Thursday, and late in the afternoon went to dinner at Chuck's Steak House on route 20 in Auburn. It has one of the best salad bars around (all you can eat, too), and Fiona filled up on soup and salad and could barely touch her chicken-kabobs. I had no issue finishing my prime rib despite a couple salad bar trips.

We had planned to go to the Tornadoes game Thursday night, but with the heat and humidity we decided to pass on the game. Good thing too, because as were were driving on I-290 past Fitton Field it started to rain. It rained so hard that despite having the tarp over the infield they had to call off the game because the field was unplayable.

We spent the Fourth at a cookout at my uncle's house, catching up with family I hadn't seen in awhile. As is the custom at Hunt family gatherings, there was more food than an entire army could eat. Fiona ate lots of veggies. I ate lots of meat, potato salad, and desserts. Together we added up to a couple of well balanced meals.

There wasn't much going on last week, at least nothing worth mentioning. We did spend a portion of Saturday at That's Entertainment catching up with Paul Howley. Paul only gets to the store a couple times a year so we make sure to have nothing planned for the day he's at the Worcester store.

It's funny, despite not seeing each other much it's just like the old days when we saw each other just about every day. A few other of the "old timers" dropped by and it was just like old times.

Conversations eventually turned to blogs, and Paul mentioned Cousin Steve had one (for the record, "Cousin Steve" is Paul's cousin). Steve owns a store in Waltham called The Outer Limits--which I would have linked to had his store had a website--and writes a blog called "I Ain't No Oprah", which Paul said to check out. I did, and now it's linked in the right column.

Next weekend will be another reunion when John and Kile come up from Virginia for the weekend. We'll be joined by some other TotalCon friends for what hopefully will be a fun day.