This past weekend was Rhonda's big birthday weekend. Adale & I went with Rhonda & Toby down to the Bloomfield Italian festival and had a fun afternoon among the guineas. We watched some old guys play a little bocce ball, saw lots of tasty food stands, and almost bought some great Italian pride t-shirts.

Last night John & Janet (Adale & Rhonda's parents) came to town for some birthday fun. The day was almost ruined when the wings I ordered from Fox's Pizza turned out to be spicy rather than the desired plain, but I saved the day by calling up Fox's and having them bring out the correct wing order. Earlier in the day John told me that he had a extra cake from making Rhonda's cake so he made me my very own special cake. He wouldn't tell me what the cake was so I was imagining some sort of obscene design, maybe a big cock.

He made Rhonda a really delicious coconut Igloo cake. It was one of the best cakes I've had - moist with tasty icing.

Rhonda & Janet getting excited about the pizza & wings

The cutting of the cake

And here's the special cake John made just for me...a boobie cake with cherry icing

Wednesday we went & hung out with Adale's dad. He's recovering from an accident at work - a rock fell onto his leg & he'll be off of work for maybe a month. Nothing broke but it's all black, blue, and orange. We helped Spike with the computer (we're his tech support) and then went off to Wing Night at the Jefferson Hotel. They have big, whole wings, not little wing dings. The pictures aren't pretty but boy oh boy they're tasty.

I haven't had much to say about what we've been up to because we've pretty much been doing the same thing for the past several weeks. Adale & I have been working at home, watching the cats run around. We did go to Games n'at twice last week, which was pretty fun. There's a sit down car racing game that we've been slightly obsessed with, as well as a stand-up first person zombie shooter game that we've been having fun with. Adale had a meeting last week at The Franktuary, a hot dog shop in the basement of a church (it used to be called Hot Dogma but there was an already existing place with the same name that made them come up with a new name) & I went along. Not to the meeting, but to the hot dog shop. I had the Texan, a chili cheese dog, but next time I'm going to try the Buffalo (blue cheese + buffalo wing sauce).

I didn't let y'all Mr. Droolface's recent health problems. As some of you may know he's gotten really skinny. When he had pancreatitis a few years ago he lost a ton of weight, but even after his pancreas stabilized he's been getting skinnier. He was about 13 pounds before the pancreatitis and is 7 pounds today. After his yearly blood test a few weeks ago the vet said he has an overactive thyroid, which is the reason for his weight loss. If it kept going without treatment he probably would die within the year. The two treatments are daily pills or a $1500 radioactive zap. There were a few days where I thought I was going to just let him pass away w/o treatment - the radioactive treatment seemed too much to spend on a cat when $1500 could make a big difference in a person's life, and the daily pills didn't seem like it was possible with our lives (traveling and whatnot). After talking to the vet I found out the pills would totally reverse his problems so we're giving it a try. The pills are really small so I can squish them into a kitty treat and he'll eat it w/o knowing. It's only been a few weeks and the vet should we'll begin to see changes after a month or so. The long and short of it is that Droolsy was on death row for a few days but got yet another reprieve.

FLASHBACK: Pittsburgh, PA

I think I neglected to relate our fun time at the Bike Bike conference party last month. There was a recycled bike conference in town and Saturday night of the weekend they had a spandex themed dance party. My parents were in town that day and we all went to dinner, and afterwards we dropped them off at their B & B Adale and I rolled out to the party.

The recycled bike kids are all "grassroots" (= dirty). The dance party was held at a place called Construction Junction, which is a big warehouse where they sell architectural salvage (all sorts of stuff cheap, not like the fancy salvage place in Ithaca).

The theme of the party was Spandex. Adale & I rolled up in our B-Cas (that's business casual to you laymen). I expected the spandex theme to be expressed in biker spandex. Boy I was wrong.



* note The Man lurking in the background, trying to start a conversation about the mortgage industry crisis.

The gal on our left in the background is Etta Cetera, a friend, activist, puppeteer, artist, and CEO of Iron City Sweeper (a housecleaning service).






The most awesome part of the night happened out of the blue like Moses parting the Red Sea. Everyone was crammed up together dancing to the dj and, all of a sudden, the crowd opened up & a group of spandex clad angels appeared. As a circle formed around them, music began and they started breaking it down - it was the Jazzercize - Troop Radical Pittsburgh!

DATELINE: Pittsburgh, PA

I'm laying around on the couch, suffering from a head cold. DayQuil did a fair job over the last two days but not this morning. I'm going to go to the doctor tomorrow because I've developed a cough.

DATELINE: Coal Center, PA

Adale & I went out to her parent's house yesterday to get out of town and away from our lives for a little while. For comic relief, Adale's dad (Spike) had me help him out putting the finishing touches on his shed. one of his favorite games is to get me to try to do something handy so he can laugh and tell me how useless I am at these kinds of things, all in a good natured way. I'm always eager to lend a little comic relief to these family outings.

Notice my excellent hammering skills.

Hammering on a ladder = 2X bonus degree of difficulty.

Coming to TLC this fall: Pimp My Shack!

After fixing up the shed I hopped on the riding mower and proceeded to take care of business with the lawn.

Attention to detail is key - note my laser focus on getting the job done.

Unfortunately, Spike did not appreciate my mower lines & kicked me off.


Spike showing me that he's still got game.

The day ended with a celebratory BBQ*. Very very tasty


* This picture is from a BBQ last week, but yesterday's BBQ was almost an exact replica.