Please Do Not Read

Before you venture down this path, I ask you to heed the warning of the title of this post. Should you choose to continue, then you walk that line at your own risk. I ask you please not to pass judgment on me for I am about to use my blog, which has served as an outlet to relay my thoughts and my life to all the world, for the silly and useless purpose of cursing the weather.

I know that is ridiculous because it is something I have no control over, and there is nothing to do to make it better. I know I should just deal with it and it may even be sinful to shake my fist at the climatic circumstance that God has chosen for me to be in. None the less, I bite my thumb at thee Weather. Honestly, what the heck!?

If you are still reading this, then you must really care about me since this is a significant waste of both your time and of mine. On the other hand, maybe you care about me, but not enough to take my advice in the title seriously. That is an odd thing to ponder. I am just going to assume that if you have read this far, you have also read much of my blog and therefore must care about me. If that is the case, then you probably know that I like snow. I am not so crazy about snow that I want to move further North and get blasted by snow on a weekly basis throughout a long and cold winter, but I great appreciate 5 – 7 significant snow falls a year. When it is snowing, I get excited. I love to sit and watch the snowfall. When it is dark outside, I step away from what I am doing once every 20 mins or so just to flick on a light and see how much as accumulated, how hard it is snowing and simply admire the event for a moment. Beyond watching it, I like playing in it. Even in college I would suit up and make some homemade sled and go out and play, or jump in my truck because I love the fun of driving in snow.

Here is the problem with all of that…. I submit that there has not been a truly decent snowfall in the location that I living since December of 2005. There is one small exception last winter when we got 2-3 inches and Liz and I attempted to go sledding. Beyond that, crap, pure unadulterated crap! My frustration has been building for over 3 years, and it is time to come out. I remember in November and December of 2005 when we got 2 good snow falls in Lock Haven and a few friends piled in the back of my pick up and ventured over to a huge parking lot where we strapped a rope and crappy circular sled to my bumper and pulled people around for the time of their lives. It was crazy and fun and I loved it so much that I asked for snow tubes for Christmas. My parents pulled through and I got 2 adult sized extra strength snow tubes and I could not wait for the good snowfalls I expected to hit us in the beginning of 2006. Every time the weatherman predicted some snow might hit, I waited by the window with eager anticipation only to have my spirits crushed by a measly 1-2 inches. The winter passed by and the snow tubes remained in their original packaging. The frustration had starting building then, but I was able to put it aside until the next year.

Unfortunately both snow tubes popped while using them to travel down the Yellow Breeches a few times over that summer. When winter hit again, all I could hope was for a good snow before mid December since I was going to be leaving Lock Haven and the people that originally joined me for those wonderful days in late 2005. Alas, the frustration mounted even more as we got jack by the start of 2007. By then, I thought the frustration would go away. I started working and wouldn’t be able to enjoy snow days anyway, but then things took a terrible turn for the worse as a new age came upon us: “The Season of Ice.” Seriously, what is going on with this ice malarkey? From Jan of 2007 to March 2008 I have only seen light dustings and freezing rain. In that time period I completely obliterated 3 scrappers trying to pound my way trough the ice that was mounted on my car. I got a little more frustrated because I missed snow, but even more so at the hours, yes hours I spent chipping away at ice on my car in the 3-4 ice storms we got in that time frame. The only glimpse of joy I got during that time was the one snowfall that we got 2-3 inches of snow followed by enough freezing rain to harden the snow to the point that I could jump on it and not fall through. That was some crazy fun sledding. By this time my frustrations were starting to become vocal to the poor people that accompanied me in those harsh times.

This winter has been the last straw. It has been a little different than before, instead of small dustings OR freezing rain, we have only got some small dustings followed by freezing rain followed by rain. I have no idea what is going on, but there has been 3 separate times this winter that I have had to work hard to chip away ice on my car in the rain. I doubt anyone would disagree, that is the worth weather imaginable. 32 degrees and raining? With ice on everything? Just awful. I can’t take it any more. I am giving Mechanicsburg one more winter, and then I am out of here! I had so much hope for this last snow fall. The weathermen, if they can actually call themselves that, predicted “significant snowfall.” The next day they said 3-5 inches, but it will most likely turn to freezing rain. Finally, the eve of the storm brought the correct prediction, 2-3 inches, then freezing rain, then just rain. Why is it raining in Pennsylvania in the dead of winter?? I don’t understand, but I am frustrated! I think other people are too because I kid you not, I saw kids sledding through this painfully icy mess IN THE RAIN. Kids are so desperate to play in snow that they will put aside reasonable thinking to slide around on ice in the rain. My friends have been planning of a ski weekend this weekend for the last 2 months. We are still going to go, but this weather has tried to stop us. Ski resorts around here are so desperate that they have resorted to making their own snow that covers the entire mountain. They used to make snow to help the popular areas of the slope not get too icy and stay open, now they have to make snow for every place on the mountain because we don’t get any natural snow anymore. Then after they spend all this effort making fake snow, the weather goes and rains on top to make the conditions terrible. We would have been better off getting nothing over this crap we got this week. GHA!!

Ok, I am done. That was much longer than I thought it would be. I’m sorry if you did indeed waste your time reading all of that complaining. I think I feel a little better having that all out. I can now move on with my life and hope for a darker snowier future.

Arrgh! Hear The Man-Cries of Zackery

Upon this Christmas past, I have acquired through gracious gift by the ones who bore me, a possession of such great magnitude that it will take me much more than one full sentence to introduce. This gargantuan item is so magnificent that I would venture to say it has expanded my manhood by a great multiple. In fact, this item has induced such levels of testosterone that I ensure you the very hairs upon my chest have grown to a richness known only to the likes of David Hasselhoff and others of his enormity.

Yes ladies and gentleman. I have obtained…. A Man’s Grill!

I have at last ventured away from my pubescent state of before, and shot forward in a blaze of glory to manhood. I must warn you before scrolling down to feast your eyes upon this object of splendor that you should back away from your computer screen, as the picture may educe salivation or possibly even seizures.

You must also know that this picture does not fully do it justice. For this grill stands taller than a man. It has 4 glorious tube burners heating below a field of porcelain coated cast iron grates. It has such depth that it could surely cook a slain wild boar whole. It is accompanied by a side burner, table, drink shelf, and even a bottle opener. This puppy can burn at 40,000 BTUs and will straight up kick you in the crotch with awesomeness.

So at last, here it is.

Drink in its majesty.

I have been required on more than one occasion since its installation to call the authorities to clear out the crowd of people that have gathered to kneel before it and lay herbs and spices at its legs. If you feel the driving need to come and visit it to experience its magnificence, then please, come. You are all invited to revel in its grilled goodness.

Listen, Calm Down, I Am Back

It has been over a month since I last posted. I know that is normally shameful, but I have a good excuse…

… and look how cute that excuse is.

Yea… I’m a father. Crazy isn’t it? There were a number of times in the last month that I thought about posting, but then found myself a little too busy caring for my son, changing diapers, making food, and spending time with all the many visitors and family we saw over the holidays. Not to mention I was basically off work for 3 weeks, and I rarely look at a computer when I’m not at work. So please forgive me. Now I am back to blogging. I started to write this post about a week ago, and then it got pushed off by madness at work. We are in the midst of closing the books for 2008 which has everyone working a bit harder than normal and a bit longer. Thankfully I can now say that our book have closed, though the closing was pushed back 2 full days on account of insurance numbers that was on me to provide. We were doing reconciliation after reconciliation to have the numbers work out correctly, and then we were waiting for some data from our brokers.

I’m sure the reader doesn’t necessarily care about that work information, but HAH! You’ve already read it… It’s too late to take it back. I’m just going to have to assume that you did care.

Moving on. Life has been going pretty well. I am enjoying fatherhood. Weston will be 1 month old tomorrow, wow did that month go by fast. He is starting to get more interactive which is nice. Every couple of days something new would happen that would make his parents proud. Right in the beginning he was able to lift his head (though it would flop right back down), then his eyes were open more often, then he would try to suck his thumb but get frustrated because he couldn’t figure out how to separate his thumb from the rest of his hand. Those little excitements led to him putting himself in some funny positions. One day, not kidding, he was sleeping and raised his arm straight in the air and held it for about 30 seconds. Liz and I were astonished and asked “Weston, do you have a question?” Then there were other times when he would ball up his fist and put it to his chin between his thumb and pointer finger and looked like he was pondering some intense thought. Liz and I can tell that he is going to be smart. Soon after that he started looking at people instead of staring off to no where and being able to control his head a bit more. We also think he is strong and will more than likely start walking before he can talk. We have tried to put him on his stomach on the floor to see if he tries to move around, and he works with all of his might to move. One time, to our amazement, he nearly pulled off a pushup. This is quite impressive since I’m not sure if I could pull off a pushup at this time. He had his arms just about straight and only one small part of his body touching the floor. I guess you would consider it as more of a “girl” pushup (sorry if that is an offensive term, not sure what else to call it). All in all, fatherhood has been very excited. Granted, there are some nights that we weren’t able to get a lot of sleep, but that is to be expected.

Beside Weston, not a whole lot is going on. I had a great vacation from work that was enjoyable. I don’t wish that it was longer, I just wish I was home for a bit more of it. We spent a whole lot of time with family, or with people visiting, and I missed having some time to myself on the only time off I took all year. Actually, by the end of the time off, I was ready to go back to work. I was happy to discover that as it meant that I do like my job. Since I’ve been back, work has been very busy, but that is a good thing. I do have a couple of blog post ideas for the very near future, so I don’t want to get too much into other things going on. Don’t get too excited, it isn’t much. As a side note, Liz and I finished watching the series of West Wing for the 2nd time through. I really appreciate that show. We are now watching Alias and are into the 2nd season. I know the hard hitting female hero may be a bit against my normal viewing pleasure, but the show is pretty good. I always knew I would watch it since Liz really likes it. We just had to wait to get the 1st season on DVD as a gift. Liz already owned the 2nd-5th seasons. We also got sports night on DVD. I am greatly looking forward to that when we are done with Alias.

Finally, Dan Kenyon got married. It was a great celebration and I am very glad that I was able to go. I don’t have time at the moment to get into the fun of that day, but I do have this great picture of all the Boiling Springs friends that I had to share.

Thank you for reading.