Road trip to South Bend

James and I took a little road trip to South Bend/Chicago a couple weeks ago to see Utah get spanked by Notre Dame.  It wasn't really the outcome I was looking for, but that's what happened. 

Thursday was Veteran's Day and since James is a veteran we took advantage of a free night's stay at a Bed & Breakfast on Wednesday night in Newfane, about a half hour from our house.  We left from there Thursday morning and headed to Elkhart, IN, about 45 minutes from South Bend.  We spent the night there in a classy Holiday Inn Express.  (I'm being sarcastic here)  Friday morning we headed off to Chicago to visit the Frank Lloyd Wright house and then pick up my parents from the airport.  They also got to witness the horrible Utah loss. 

Friday night we went out on the town to a restaurant called Timothy O'Toole's, who serves delicious food.  After dinner we went to a sports bar called Mother Hubbards on Hubbard Street.  How clever...  This place was amazing.  There were so many Utah fans in there and we were all cheering for the Jazz so they turned down the music and for the last quarter of the game they turned up the sound on the Jazz game.  Luckily the Jazz won.  They also had these sports trivia games we played.  They had a list of all the team names in the league (football, basketball, baseball or hockey), but they were in "code" and you had to decipher which team was which.  We obviously won all four and they gave us Mother Hubbard towels.  But I'm not sure what I will use them for. 

Saturday was the big day.  We had to be to the Marriott by 6:30am to catch the bus with the Crimson Club.  They had 9 buses full of Ute fans all heading to the game, not to mention the fans that were just driving themselves from Chicago.  When we got to South Bend there was a tailgate party waiting for us.  There was awesome food and I also was a bit of a klepto and stole some nice souvenirs.  After this it went downhill.  We were harassed as we walked around with the usual comments about having seven wives and being polygamous, as well as getting our butt's kicked inside the stadium.  All in all it was a fun day because of the fun we had with my parents, but a win would have made it better.   We headed back to Chicago Saturday night with the Crimson Club, only to wake up Sunday morning and make the 10 hour trek back to Buffalo. 

Memorable moments from the trip:

- James saying he didn't like my ipod playlist but singing to every song that came on.

- Getting glares from everyone while wearing my Utah shirt/hoodie.

- The HUGE spider in our hotel room in Elkhart, which then made me start screaming and jumping on the bed.

- Sonic in Parma, OH.

- Mad Anthony's in Elkhart.  Except for the shot of spicy bloody mary vodka that gave me heart burn for 2 days.

- Going to the Frank Lloyd Wright house in Oak Park, IL.  I'm a nerd, I know.

- Seeing other Ute fans in Chicago and just being able to shout out GO UTES!

- Seeing many familiar faces at the game.

- Spending quality time with my dad and Elizabeth :)

- The guy at the gas station in Indiana who on the way home said he wished we would have won.  It made me feel a little better.

The bed & breakfast

SONIC!

The Frank Lloyd Wright house

Chicago

The bus to South Bend



I took way more pictures than this!  To see all of them, watch the slide show :)



One good thing about living in the Northeast...

is the abundance of trees and the colors they turn in the fall.  It makes the cool weather of fall a bit more enjoyable to look at all the pretty colors of the leaves.  I took this picture last week, it doesn't do justice to the colors.  But now that it's gotten colder, many of the colorful leaves have fallen off the trees.  This is the time of year when I start my countdown until summer.

Update

I have updated the Travel Arrangements part of our wedding website. 

Check it out!

A visit from some of my favs

My cousin, Christopher, called me a couple months ago to see if he and my uncle Ken could come to Buffalo and stay with us because they wanted to go to the Gordon Lightfoot concert.  For those who are less musically savvy, Gordon Lightfoot is a 70's folk singer.  But I only know who he is because my uncle Ken would play his music all the time when we were younger.  So Friday they flew in (after a delayed flight, a diversion to Philadelphia, and a long wait on a tarmac) and arrived about 12:30pm.  We headed off to John's for a delicious sub for lunch.  They then went to dinner at one of my favorite restaurants, Encore.  It's the hot spot before all the concerts at Shea's.  We went to a wedding that night and after we met back up at home. 

Saturday was packed full.  First we went to the Darwin Martin House, which is a house designed by the famed Frank Lloyd Wright.  We went on the in-depth tour, but unfortunately we were not able to go in the main house because they are removing the asbestos in the walls.  Then we were off to lunch at the Anchor Bar, the original home of the Buffalo Wings.  This is where the wings were first invented many, many years ago.  They aren't the best wings in town, but it's a place you have to visit when you come to town.  After lunch we headed to Niagara Falls.  We rode the Maid of the Mist, walked around and enjoyed some fantastic people watching. 

The next day we woke up early to tailgate for the Bills game.  Once again, the tailgate was a lot more fun than the actual game, even if it was rainy and cold the entire time.  Monday, I dropped Chris and Ken off at the airport in the early am.  I love when visitors come to my house, it is so much fun.  So anyone out there reading this, come visit me!

To see all the pictures click here.

Pooped Pooch

At Tank's new daycare, Fisher's Friends, they are having a "Pooped Pooch" contest.  You send in a picture of your tired out dog after a day at daycare and they will decide which one is the best and that dog receives a free day of daycare.  Tank needs daycare whenever possible just to tire the little meatball out so he's not such a jerk all the time.  I entered in two pictures so we have twice the odds of winning.

Plant update:

It is still alive!!

I have a problem.

I have a severe addiction to online shopping.  I can't resist the daily e-mails with the coupon codes for free shipping and 20% off.  Especially for stores like Banana, PetsMart and Amazon.com.  I did have my debit card number memorized so that I didn't even need to go through the steps of getting my wallet out of my purse and then having to find my debit card in my wallet. This was working out well, too well even. I was purchasing A LOT online.  Packages were showing up daily on my porch.  USPS, UPS and FedEx should have personally thanked me for keeping them in business.  At first I felt bad for the delivery men because they were coming to my house daily, then that would go away as I opened up my packages and felt pure delight.
Then my debit card was stolen at the Bills game a couple weeks ago.  Some horrid person ended up charging about $400 to my bank account.  Luckily I wasn't held liable, but I did have to front the money for about two weeks.  This kept my online shopping habit to a minimum, it was almost non-existent.  (Almost).  Last week Key Bank refunded my money and sent me a new debit card and my shopping habit went into overdrive.  My mind was crazy thinking about the things I needed to purchase. 
Yesterday I came home to two packages on my front porch.  Two more are supposed to arrive tomorrow and one more on Friday.  This is how you know you have a problem.

(Please don't pay attention to the dead plant to the right or the mismatched door and trim.  I will be painting the trim this month)

Too much to ask?

I got an e-mail from Walgreens advertising a desk calendar with personalized photos for only $6.  James is always complaining that he doesn't have a calendar at his desk.  So I think I'm being a nice person and I upload our engagement photos and purchase him this nice little desk calendar.  And I tried to pick out the least girly-est layout.  When it comes in the mail, I open it up and hand it to him and let him know it's for his desk at work.  What does he say to me?  "I'm not taking that to work, it's gay looking".  Really?  I don't think it is.  And is it too much to ask for him to just humor me and pretend to take it to work?  I guess so.  So I decided to bring it to work with me and here it sits on my own desk.

I kill plants

I have this problem with plants.  I tend to kill them and at a rapid pace.  I buy them thinking this will be the time that I will be able to keep a plant alive.  Every time I end up killing it.  When I get it, it looks all nice and fresh and alive.  This is where I forget to water it.  I don't realize I have to water the plant until it starts looking brown and droopy.  Well, I bought another plant today for my desk.  I asked Kelly to remind me to water it at least every other day.  I'm going to try to remember the other days.  We'll see if team work can keep this plant alive.

The vending machine

I'm in charge of the vending machine at work.  Not filling it with candy or chips or anything like that.  I am the one who decided to go with this vendor and their machines.  Well, this machine is a big piece of shit and every single item in there has gotten stuck at least once.  And who do my co-workers blame?  Me of course, because I obviously made the machine and set the settings on it so everything gets stuck.  Some people get a little cranky when they haven't had their daily fat intake.  They also think that slamming their fist and other body parts into the machine will cause whatever is stuck to fall.  It obviously doesn't and they hurt themselves.  So I decided that instead of having everyone bitch at me I will 1) set up a fund of change for those items that get stuck and 2) make a little comic strip about it so people get a laugh and aren't so livid with me.