As I got older, it became a place to bring a date and ride the Himalaya with.  You were guaranteed to get close.  It also was a time where I got to try a lot of different foods.  The Raleigh area hadn’t yet become the diverse area that it is now.  Barbecue and other Southern cuisine were still the dominant culinary choices.  The smells that the Fair offered seemed very exotic to me.  Speaking of exotic, the Burlesque Show was still a part of the Fair when I was younger.  I remember thinking this was something very, well, strange.

As I got older, the Fair lost a lot of its magic and became a place that seemed dirty and over priced.  I still liked the food, but it was by no means exotic any more.  Deep frying anything, although funny, seemed a bit nauseating.  The only reason Amy and I went was to eat and people watch.  People watching at the Fair is just delicious.   There are people there that haven’t left their hometown since the same time last year.  The same type of people can also be found on one of my latest favorite sites, People of Walmart.

Then we had kids and they finally reached an age where we couldn’t just eat and watch, or skip entirely.  Getting the kids out of bed on the day we are going to the Fair is as easy as it is on Christmas morning.  They were so excited this year.  Everything came full circle.  The Fair took on an air of wonderment again.  The lights, sounds and smells were reflected in their faces.  It was probably one of the best Fairs ever this year.

We took a few pictures with our iPhones.

Fireball Froggy Grady

A couple of Fridays ago, “Spoon”, our neighbor caught and brought over frog (toad?). Spoon, his wife “T”, the boys and I all went into overdrive making a home for it. I had a cracked aquarium in the barn that couldn’t be used for fish so I grabbed that. I also had a bag of aquarium rocks, so I poured some in. Spoon grabbed some foliage and tossed it in. Spoon then went and found some crickets and other bugs to feed the frog/toad. While we were setting up his new living quarters Josh had named him/her “Fireball Froggy Grady”. He looked very red in the night light, so Fireball made sense.

We’ve been having a good time with him.  We enjoy feeding him.  He’s been loving the flies that we swat for him.  He also enjoys crickets very much.

While in my thoughts I began to notice more bikers on the road than usual.  It was a beautiful day and they were making the best of it.  I happened to be trailing a couple of them and so I was able to witness over and over again the “biker wave” (as shown in the graphic).

I thought it was so cool that this group of people had their own “secret handshake”.  Being the proud new owner of a Nissan Frontier truck and constantly spotting like minded purchasers, I thought it would be cool if we had our own wave.

Over the next few weeks I tried a bunch of waves; two fingers in a quick axe chop, flip flopping the hand in a three stooge-like manner, open handed Indian “how” while fluttering my fingers, and the list goes on.  It took a while but I finally found a combination that people started responding to.  I found that one finger, the middle one, raised straight up with your palm facing towards you worked the best.  It is really catching on.  Whenever I see other Frontier drivers, I give them the “Frontier Finger” as I like to call it and sure enough, they return the wave.  Awesome.

This year, I was greeted on Monday morning after a wonderful week at the beach (those pics coming) with everything in and around my desk saran wrapped. When I say everything, I mean Everything. The guys at the office wrapped every cd, box of paper clips, pen, snack, you get the point. I’m still unwrapping things. Take a look at the pictures. Man, these guys are a hoot (jerks).

Check out all the pictures.

One of my coworkers, Erik, lives and works from Spain. His new camera prompts him to take more photos than he did before. He recently took a panoramic shot of a Spanish river basin during low tide. I thought it would be cool to see the picture across my three monitors. Yes, I know I’m a geek. Here is the original photo.

View Larger Map

Anyway, the kids are going to LOVE the pool this summer. Amy is going to love it more. She will be able to take the kids to the pool every day, let them get worn out and bed time will be so much easier.  I’ll get to enjoy it after work and on weekends.  It should be a really fun summer.

The second "first" I had this weekend was watching my neighbor pull his son and nephew around his backyard in a boat that was being pulled by his lawn mower.  I can’t believe I didn’t get pictures!  …only in the South.

I hope everyone had a great Memorial Day Weekend and I’d like to say thanks to all the soldiers for their service to our country.

I’ve only driven it from the dealership home and to work this morning, but I LOVE IT. It really is a nice drive. The boys are at home right now waiting for Daddy to get home so we can all go for a ride. “Daddy’s truck is nice!” was heard often over Frosty Flakes this morning.

Thanks to Uncle Mike (husband of Amy’s sister Emily). He works at the Nissan Dealership and gave us the VIP treatment.

As most of you know, the Writer’s Guild of America has been on strike since November 5, 2007. This means that new television episodes are few and far between these days. Well, I thought I’d take this opportunity to catch up on series that I wasn’t actively watching before the strike. I came across a few in the process that are really good. I was watching the episodes on the big networks’ websites. I then found a site, hulu, which has shows from all the networks. You have to register for their beta program in order to check the site out. Hulu had shows from some of the networks that I hadn’t checked out before. The USA Network was one that I hadn’t thought to check before. One of their shows, Monk, is a favorite of mine and pretty much the only one that I had watched more than once.

I came across a show, Psych, that I had seen USA actively promoting recently so I thought I’d check it out. I’m glad that I did. It is a good show. The show is about two life long friends, Shawn and Gus, who have formed a detective agency called “Psych”. Shawn has “heightened observation skills” which he plays off as psychic ability and Gus acts as the straight man against Shawn’s zaniness. They use the “psychic” angle to do consultation work for Santa Barbara’s police department.

The crime solving the two do is good and Shawn’s observational skills truly are amazing at times, but that isn’t what makes the show for me. It’s the friendship between Shawn and Gus that takes the show to the next level. There are flash backs aplenty that show Shawn and Gus as friends even at very young ages. The chemistry between these two actors reminds me of the real life friendship between Weaz and I. They are such good friends and know each other so well that they can banter back and forth in ways that are both funny and sometimes annoying to those around them.

The show airs on Friday nights at 10pm on the USA Network. Check it out sometime. I’ve included a youtube clip below of the show to give you a taste of the dynamic between Shawn and Gus.

Video games haven’t been a part of my life since the kids were born. I have an Xbox, a PS2 and I did have a PSP. I sold the PSP to the neighbor’s kid because the only thing I used it for was to surf the net and the iPhone made that obsolete. My PS2 and Xbox have layers of dust on them.

Well, I shouldn’t have felt guilty. The Wii has been a rocking and a rolling so far in our house. It’s a hit. It really is an innovative video game system that reinvented how things can be done. I think one of the biggest pluses for the Wii is that females like them. This makes life in general a lot easier when the wife will join you for a game of golf or tennis (and beat you).

I asked my buddy at work, James who writes a blog about bacon and is a video game head, what game was a must have for my new toy. He immediately said, “Mario Galaxy”. He went on to say that in some circles it has been voted the best game of all time. Wow! The best game of all time? I’ve played some games now. I even worked as a project manager for a video game company. Well, let me tell you that THIS GAME IS AWESOME!

The game would be fun and challenging even if Josh didn’t play along with me, but he does and that has made this game truly a really fun thing in our house. The game allows for a second person to use a second Wii Remote or “wiimote” to help you pick up items in the game and to even help you jump at times. Josh and I have a blast playing this game. Nate, not so much and I’ll have to really watch it so that I get in my Nate time as well.

It is fun watching Josh take to this game. He really gets involved and helps me through the levels… helping me find my way, picking things up and generally being a great wingman. He is now playing the first position and I’m being the picker-upper-guy. He’s getting pretty good at the thing and let me tell you that it is really an involved process controlling Mario in some of the wacky innovative situations that the wii has brought to the table.

So, thanks again mom! We are loving the Wii.