Fall 2010: Another Great Line-Up

I hate to think about it, but my calendar does not lie: we will soon be in the final week of July. Summer, you have done it again. Where are you going so fast?

I have made this summer a great one so far. Thanks to 80-degree weather hitting the area as early as March, I spent the early part of the summer canoeing on the Pigeon River near and in Mongo, Indiana. These trips were awesome and I definitely plan to go back at least once more before the summer is up.

I have spent lots of time in my favorite nearby parks with Elli, including Oak Openings, Farnsworth, and Sidecut Metroparks. Each of these trips have been great, although Oak Openings is a significantly different place now due to a tornado that touched down there in June.

So while summer is still in full force thanks to unusually persistent 90-plus degree weather, I am at least beginning to look forward to everything that fall has to offer, and for me the fall season will kick off in under two weeks with the Wood County Fair.

Just as I did last year, here is a summary of my upcoming fall season.

Wood County Fair - Aug 3rd - Aug 9th

This was the event of the summer during my high school years, and while it lost a lot of luster during my college years ("It never changes!"), I am looking forward to the fair this year. I am more interested in the fair food than anything else, but I am also looking forward to socializing with friends and family all week long at the fair.

Green Day Concert - Aug 23rd

I saw Green Day last year at the Palace of Auburn Hills and they put on one hell of a show. Green Day has lost a lot of my attention in a year, but I am still going to see them at DTE Energy Music Theatre this August. I am actually more interested in a concert at DTE than I am Green Day. DTE is an awesome venue for concerts, especially if the weather cooperates. With beautiful surrounding country, lots of space to move about and great snacks, being at DTE is more of a draw than seeing concerts there. I am weird, I know.

Roche de Boeuf Festival / Sea Wolf - Sept 25th

A small but busy area festival has certainly grown on me in the last couple of years - The Roche de Boeuf Festival in Waterville. Because it is close to my parents house and held in an immediately-familiar town, I love spending all day (a Saturday in this case) at this festival. A variety of food certainly helps - both homemade candies and delicious pizzas and burgers. I take Elli to this festival all day and she always seems to have a blast. Hopefully this year will be no different.

An excellent indie band - Sea Wolf - will be in Toledo this day too. Mickey Finn's Pub is the venue, which is convenient since the "Finn" is indeed that Finn. I first saw Sea Wolf as an opener for Silversun Pickups several years ago, and they absolutely rocked. I am sure that being able to see them in a tiny, intimate venue like Mickey Finn's will be quite an experience.

Birthday Vacation - Oct 1st - Oct 10th

Ahh yes, my birthday week. As tradition dictates, I will have this entire week off work to do whatever I please. My birthday falls on a Monday this year, and on that very Monday another band I love - Band of Horses - will be in Cleveland at The House of Blues. Quite the birthday present, huh? I will get to see two of my favorite indie bands less than two weeks apart! As for the rest of my birthday week off, I have no particular plans, although the Apple Butter Festival takes place in Grand Rapids on October 10th, so I may very well spend the last day of my vacation there (even if it has become a bit too crowded in recent years).

Xbox 360 / Rock Band 3 - Oct 26th

I have not been huge on any particular game lately. That changes near the end of October. While I have been tiring of the rhythm game genre throughout most of 2010, Rock Band 3 looks like a legitimate revolution of the genre. With a full-featured "Pro" mode that recreates one-to-one guitar, drum, bass, and psuedo-keyboard note charts, RB3 will be a teacher more than a game. I am going to go all-out for this, buying all-new game peripherals and a new console as well.

I will be making a serious investment in Rock Band 3 as a whole, but I will not be doing that on my Wii. The Wii is a great console no doubt, but for such a big investment I find the Wii lacking: online options are weak and there is no universal account system. A great multiplayer game like Rock Band 3 requires a great online community and purchasing music from a huge library of thousands of songs deserves a solid place to store and manage them. Rock Band 3 is the game that will finally make me buy an Xbox 360, so this October I will be making that plunge as well. I am thrilled.

As October closes and I enjoy my new games, I will be looking forward to the holiday season ramping up. Thanksgiving will certainly approach quickly, then not far behind it Christmas and the end of 2010 - only to start the cycle all over again in 2011. Time absolutely flies, does it not?

B3 out.

Love and Marriage

This past weekend was another great example of summer done right.

Saturday

I was up early Saturday morning in order to get a solid start on what was going to be a long day. My mom and I went to Kohl's for gift shopping but ended up (thanks to the heat) buying light, casual dress clothes for me to wear that day. It was going to be a hot one. By 1:00pm I was in Bowling Green for a very special wedding: my good friends Austin and Korinne wed in a beautiful hour-long ceremony. And holy shit, I am growing up. Between marriages, babies, and new jobs, my friends are really making me feel old and behind. Then again, I consider myself a career guy rather than a family guy, so I have time before I need to start a family.

Sunday

Long. Ass. Day.

I was up early yet again and on the road by 9:00am. This time Colleen and I ventured to Port Clinton via St. Rt. 105. The hour-plus drive was beautiful; the 105-to-163 route to Port Clinton was an adventure worth doing in its own right. Once at Port Clinton we swam briefly on a private beach in Lake Erie (holy crap, much better than a crowded beach) before attending a birthday party for a beautiful 1-year-old baby girl. The weather was fantastic and I got to see a few awesome people before I had to return home in an attempt to return to a normal life in Findlay.

In retrospect this past weekend felt a bit like a dream: fantastic things happened with fantastic people in fantastic places, and I really did not want any of it to end.

Next Up: A long-overdue return to biking, hiking, and river walking over a weekend finally dedicated to me.

B3 out.

Take Your 6 Megabits Per Second and Shove It

For the past week I have been unable to get this article off my mind. Actually, I have not been able to get a lot off my mind. Hell, sometimes I feel like I cannot get enough on my mind.

Lately I find myself obsessing over information. Reddit provides a daily fix of random news, funny articles, and endless pictures to see. Facebook provides an almost-literal waterfall of news about my friends anytime I want it. Engadget, Gizmodo, CNN, CNet, WWTDD, Ars Technica - I frantically click on all of these links every time I open a web browser, which itself is quite frequently. Some people complain about an information overload nowadays. I complain about an information hole in my brain. It is like an information deficit disorder - I have to keep my mind entertained every moment of the day or else I have withdrawal.

This was not a problem ten years ago - I am not even sure it was a problem five years ago. I blame the Internet. Yes, I am a gamer, so the Kotaku article I linked above has some merit to me, but the core of my attention problem stems from the Internet. Information is extremely easy to come by. Thanks to always-connected hi-speed Internet connections I can plop myself in a chair and have new information flowing to me within one or two clicks of a mouse. Thanks to my iPod touch I am almost guaranteed to have this same information available wherever I travel thanks to free wireless Internet access available many places.

What is the first thing I do when I wake up in the morning? Head to Facebook and Reddit. What is the first thing I do when I get home from work? Head to Facebook and Reddit. Going to bed? Not before I get one final update from my favorite sites. I am obsessed, yet a little sad all at the same time. I do not feel like my happiness is my own, but rather tied to how often I can get my Internet fix.

Why was I so much happier ten years ago? It was not because I was having an incredible time in high school with friends, girls, and gaming, but because I had to dial-up the Internet, wait a full minute for one page to load, then disconnect so our home phone was available again. My access to limitless information was restricted. I got a lot more done offline than I did online.

Maybe I am getting old, but I sure do miss the good ol' days.

B3 out.

East Harbor, Cedar Point, and Fail

This past weekend was a very, very good example of what The Fourth of July weekend should have been: an absolute blast. While last weekend was a complete bust, this past weekend made up for that thanks to two very unique trips: one to East Harbor State park for swimming and another to Cedar Point for, well, Cedar Point.

Saturday

Laura and Kristin have been practically begging me to go to East Harbor State Park for years now, so I finally reserved some time to do so (plus, my usual weekend routines have been KILLING ME, in case you have not noticed). It was spectacular to get away on this great, short trip. The day began in Bowling Green (at Meijer, go figure), and we quickly made our way to the (already) crowded beach on Lake Erie. I have not been swimming in Lake Erie in about a decade, but the water was warm and the sand soft. There was a disgusting amount of dead mayfly body parts in the water, but I overlooked that minor detail as best I could. Swimming was all around fun. I also met the insanely awesome Jessica, a friend of Laura and Kristin. I rarely get along with new acquaintances so well, so this made the whole trip all the better.

After swimming we made several quick stops: Cheese Haven for snacks, Marblehead Lighthouse for photos, and Margaritaville for the hell of it.

All in all, Saturday was a very entertaining day, even though I came home very sunburned.

Sunday

Up at 6:30am and out the door by 7:30am, my family, Colleen, my sister and her boyfriend, made our way to Cedar Point. The day began with an unusually delicious McDonald's breakfast, of which my egg-and-cheese biscuit hit the spot like never before. After suffering the drive down the Ohio Turnpike to Sandusky and getting situated in line near the Cedar Point gates, we rushed to our first pick of the day: Millennium Force. The day was off to a terrific start.

The day then took a shit on me faster than any Cedar Point gull could have.

As of 10:00am we were in line for Millennium Force and near the front of the queue. The ride is then stopped (with a train on the first uphill climb - scary as hell I bet). We wait. And wait. And wait. Nearly a half-hour passes before any progress is made, but eventually the ride starts back up and we get the thrill of a lifetime without any further hiccups. Despite the first hill being terrifying, Millennium Force is still my favorite ride at Cedar Point and I believe it will be for years to come.

After our first coaster we stood in line for Maverick. The queue was already expected to take an hour or so, but we waited to board Maverick for nearly two hours. Hour one: in line. Hour two: ride malfunction. With the heat of the day beginning to get to me, and only one ride under our belts three hours into our visit, I was becoming upset with our day. Maverick was worth the wait, however, so I complained a lot less after the Maverick.

Oh wait, no I didn't. Our third ride was quick to get on - Gemini - but again, the ride suffered a small malfunction as we climbed the hill. By now it was past 1:00pm and I was fed up with the long queues, the heat, and the ride malfunctions. My day was ruined at that point.

By 2:00pm I was suffering from minor heat stroke, so I sat down as frequently as I could in the shade and drank a ton of liquid (we had wristbands for free drinks all day long - they come highly recommended). Sweat poured from every inch of my body the rest of the day and I was generally fatigued, but we still managed to get on a few decent coasters and rides, including Power Tower, Raptor, and a few smaller thrill rides.

To be honest, yesterday was not very good, but it was a learning experience and a turning point for me: no more hot July trips to Cedar Point. The heat and the crowd were too much for me to bear, and the constant ride malfunctions just compounded the problem. In the last couple of years I have become very fond of making Cedar Point trips in the fall around my birthday, and from now on that will be the only time I go.

The day ended with a trip to Margaritaville on our way home. We met up with our very good friends, Jason, Melissa, and Denise, and had a fantastic dinner. The perfect end to a decent but hot day.

Overall

This past weekend was non-stop from Friday until Monday. I was busy almost every minute of the weekend and had somewhere to be at all times. It was by far the highlight weekend of the summer, and I am no longer going to restrict myself to doing just one or two things with one or two people - variety is the name of the game, and going into the the excellent upcoming fall season, I expect to have tons of fun.

Next up: a wedding for two very good friends and a special birthday party out in Port Clinton.

B3 out.

Snapshot: This Is Me

Well hell, what a week it has been. After a highly-disappointing Fourth of July weekend (my head was in the clouds anyway), I have been slammed back to reality in the hardest ways possible.

One: I have been insanely retrospective since I got back to Findlay Monday night. From time to time I fall into a spell where I reminisce of fond memories and better times in my past, particularly with my high school years. This week it has not been merely memories, but real feeling. Sometimes I get so caught up in my reflections that everything else I am doing at the moment comes to a halt. This kind of thing is rather disruptive, but I am trying to barrel through it as best I can. I know that within a week it will pass and I will be able to focus on much more current events.

Two: The coming weeks at work are going to be super-crazy-mega busy, as I have four different projects that need wrapped up by the end of July. As usual, I do like being constantly busy, but this one will require me to put in a couple of extra hours in the evenings and perhaps a weekend or two. I expect to get a lot of work done, however.

Three: While I have not been blogging as much as I promised I would, I am working to remedy that by firing up a new weekly routine that sees me accomplishing a small but worthwhile goal every night of the week. This includes blogging at least once a week, along with regular programming blocks, exercising, working on fiction, and seeking new interests over time. If this new system works out I will definitely share it with the world.

B3 out.

The Aging Fourth of July

Let me tell you a quick story about summer.

In high school, summer was eternal. Summer was the reason for going to school. Oh sure, us teenagers were being forced to learn and do the K through 12 march, but for me and many of my friends, we went to school because it made summer just that much better. Summer was the anti-school, providing all the freedom and relaxation that we could handle.

For me The Fourth of July has always been the pinnacle of summer. Since I began driving as a sophomore in high school I have always made huge plans with my friends - dinner, dates, movies, and biking to name a few. This was our moment, our time to be young. I loved every minute spent with my friends and family, and as long as the weather cooperated, I had nothing to complain about. After high school things were a bit harder to hold together with my friends scattering in all directions for school or work.

In the last few years the Fourth has really taken a tumble for me. Work is year-round (unlike school) and exhausts me both physically and mentally. My friends are literally split in half, which means I have two groups of people wanting to make different plans every year. I have had trouble finding the motivation to enjoy friends, festivities, and fireworks over this particular holiday. The magic and instant joy of the holiday is gone, and with it, an important artifact of my youth.

This weekend, however, is looking like a rebirth of sorts. Rather than spend another Fourth trying to mash together plans with competing friends or complicate my weekend with work, I am looking forward to the perfect weekend. How does three and a half days off work, sunny 90-degree weather sound on top of having absolutely no plans whatsoever? This is one of those "relax-first, plan-later" weekends where I focus on improving and entertaining myself by whatever means necessary - otherwise known as a Reboot Weekend.

With such great weather coming up and no intention of even trying to make specific plans, I am going into this weekend with unlimited possibilities and a strong focus on myself - which for this adult, is more than I could ever ask for.

B3 out.