October 31, 2005:

I hope everyone had a happy and safe Halloween!  We had such a blast this year! Despite the torrent of rain throughout the day, it stopped just in time for the boys to go trick-or-treating with their friend Jordan.  We would like to thank all our friends and family who sent tons of Halloween fun stuff for us to enjoy!  You're the best!  Pics and details to come soon...  :-)

October 18, 2005:

Driving home from massage class today, I waved a car into my lane.  Upon closer inspection, the car was from Massachusetts. <grin>  On the radio was "Stacy's Mom" by Fountains of Wayne. <grin>  Then further down the road, I passed by a Chinese food restaurant. <grin>  Right at that instance I was thinking about my mom (and dad).  Does anybody believe in "signs"?  My parents just left for vacation yesterday and they won't be back until next month.  I was thinking about them and hoping they had a safe flight and then *poof*.  I get some cosmic validation that they're doing just fine.   I won't hear from my mom for the next 3-4 weeks and she usually calls me on the weekends to see how we're all doing.  I actually look forward to these phone calls and so do the boys, esp. Patrick, 'cause he'll talk to Po-Po ad nauseum.  I should take a picture of him talking to my mom.  It's so cute.  He'll lie down on the floor/couch, cross one skinny chicken leg over the other and prop the phone against his ear.  Then he'll jibber-jabber about random stuff till I take the phone from him.  heheh.

Hm, let's see, what else is new?  The boys had a couple of games over the weekend.  I believe they won Friday's night game (they played in the rain no less) but then they got annihilated Sunday afternoon by the Wolf Creek team,  4-15! <ouch!>  Luckily, they're good sports about it all.  There are only three more games left to the season.  It's been a great experience for them and we'll most likely sign them up again in the Spring.  Oh, I almost forgot... the games book ended our trip to the pumpkin patch this past weekend.  We went to Fir Point Farms out in Canby, OR.  Other than the 100+ mph wind gusts (j/k!), we had a pretty fun outing.  I'll post pics when I get the chance...  more later... :-)

October 11, 2005:

I had my first day of class today.  It feels great to be back in school again.  Don't get me wrong, I was so happy to take the entire summer off and spend time with family back home in Boston.  That was just the break I needed.  Now that summer's over and the boys are back in school, I'm itching to finish my massage therapy program .  I really like my new instructor, Jon H.  Apparently, he's been in the massage field for over 20 years, both in teaching and in practice.  I'm confident that I'll learn a lot from him. There are about 12-14 students in my Massage 2 class and they're mostly women.  I kinda feel bad for the lone guy in class.  Actually I don't.  He's in a class with a bunch of cute girls, heheh.  Odds definitely play in his favor.  I also noticed that there is a huge age range in class.  I think the youngest girl is about 20 yrs old and the oldest woman is in her 50's.  I guess I fall kinda in the middle.  We got to briefly do some bodywork in class today.  I met a girl who was even more flexible than me!  She could torque/twist her leg into pretzels!  Pretty cool.  :)

Onto other news, had a dental cleaning the other day, and look Mom, no cavities!  :P  The boys are going in for their cleanings next month.  Hopefully Jarod won't puke on his hygienist like last time.

And don't even talk to me about the Red Sox.  I have a close friend who lives in New York and we've had a friendly baseball rivalry going on for years.  We give each other a lot of grief over our respective teams.  I don't know how many times I've emailed him with "yankees suck!".  He sent me his "condolences" over the weekend.  I sent him mine yesterday after the game 5 loss against the Angels. Oh well.  There's always next year to look forward to.

October 6, 2005:

Here are the pics from the Green Day concert!  It was a pretty awesome show!  Jimmy Eat World was amazing and they played my all-time fave, "The Middle" as well as a whole bunch of other cool songs. During intermission, some dude in a pink bunny suit was chugging beer on stage much to the delight of the screaming audience members.  Then the big pink bunny got the crowd pumped up with his own rendition of "YMCA". When Green Day finally came out on stage, pandemonium erupts!  Highlights of the show include Billie Joe mooning the crowds, special lighting FX's, ticker tape cloud of confetti, amazing pyrotechnics (the heat from the flames was intense!), simulating self-love on stage during "Longview" and Billie grabbing the water cannon & spraying the audience with the hose.  They played a lot of my favorite songs like "American Idiot", "Holiday", "Boulevard of Broken Dreams", "When I Come Around", and "Good Riddance (Time of your Life)".  It was a touching moment when the lights dimmed low and the coliseum was suddenly lit up in a colorful sea of cell phones & lighters during "Wake Me Up When September Ends".  It's such an amazing song!  Lastly, one of the coolest moments of the night was when Billie brought up three lucky fans from the audience to jam with them! Then that freaked-out, geeky-nerdy dude got to KEEP  Billie's guitar!  The night finally came to an end with Green Day's version of "We are the Champions".  All in all, it was truly an unforgettable night!  :-)

Another turning point, a fork stuck in the road
Time grabs you by the wrist, directs you where to go
So make the best of this test, and don't ask why
It's not a question, but a lesson learned in time

It's something unpredictable, but in the end it's right.
I hope you had the time of your life.

- "Good Riddance (Time of Your Life)"
 

October 2, 2005:

BOO-YAH !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!