Archives 2003

After the wild football game it can’t be expected for my birthday to compare. I felt like I was in a haze all day from the limited sleep. After going to bed at 4am I was awakened at 8:15 by the dog crying. I got up and let her out and never went back to bed. I spent the morning blogging the game and ripping off the pics from it. AT 11:30 I left to do some stuff. First I hit the gym, I got the idea to do 3 miles on the treadmill for my bday. I haven’t run that far in ages. I managed to do it, barely. My heartrate was in the 170’s at the end. Next was the mall.

I had a few people to buy for but had no general idea of what to get. So I wandered around the mall looking for inspiration. I found 3 small things. Next a “quick” stop at the bank drive thru. For some reason with only 2 cars in front of me it took 20 minutes to get to the window. Incredibly slow. My last stop was the dreaded post office to mail some stuff for Ali. I figured, mid afternoon on a weekday would be a safe time to go. Wrong. Line to the door, an hour wait. They are soooo slow. Hate going there. Oh well worst was behind me, time to drive home. Bang, the road to my house is blocked, traffic at a dead stop. Evidently there was an accident. I do a u-turn and have to backtrack to another route to get home. What I thought would be 2 or 3 hours out turned out to be 6.

My birthday dinner was eggplant parmigiana from Sam’s. Ali asked if I wanted to go out for my dinner or have her make a cake but I just wasn’t into it. After dinner I opened up my stuff. The one cool part of living away from home is all of your presents are delivered to your door. I scored some cool stuff including one of those RC helicopters we have all been getting spam about, a new volleyball, the Hulk DVD, an XBox game and a new electric razor. Great gifts.

Not a memorable birthday but once you get to be this age you don’t expect them to be. My bro, sis and dad called me and wished me well. Dad was exceptionally chatty and once again spoke about bringing down his motorcycle to Florida so he could give it to me. Personally I think he’s crazy to go 1200 miles on a motorcycle but if he wants to have the adventure, good for him. If he does bring the cycle down it will live a very protected life, it would see very limited and cautious use by me. I’m old enough now to know that mom wasn’t kidding about motorcycles being dangerous. Helmets aren’t required in Florida but you won’t catch me on a motorcycle without one.

Just call me Mr 36

Here are the pics from the game. A lot of them have captions to explain it a bit. Some are a bit blurry, my digital camera pretty much blows in low light conditions unfortunately. Some good ones up there.

Watching the NFL on TV is great, I enjoy it immensely. But after my second live game of the year, nothing beats being there in person.

Our drive over went well, only one wrong turn and we were very early so it wasn’t a big deal. Once we parked it became immediately apparent that the Eagles were well represented by their fanbase. Birds fans were EVERYWHERE. As we walked through the tailgating area other fans told us they were expecting as many as 27000 Eagles fans! Incredible. We were yelling to other Eagles fans, slapping hands, doing Eagle cheers all through the parking areas. You heard the E A G L E S EAGLES chant echoing throughout the grounds. We spent a good hour and a half walking around before they opened the gates. We both got some drinks but didn’t eat because we wanted to wait and eat inside the stadium. The 2 glasses of zinfandel on an empty stomach knocked Ali into silly street and soon she was just as crazy as everyone else, yelling, jumping and carrying on. It was funny.

We got inside just as the gates opened, collected our Mark Duper and Mark Clayton commerative coins (they retired their jerseys at halftime) and headed up to our level. The upper deck was a sea of green, cheering, chanting, taunting and smiles everywhere. We immediately hit the food stand and took it up to our seats to check out the view. We were way up there, maybe 20 rows from the top of the building but even there our views of the place were great. By the time we finished eating we still had close to an hour and a half before kickoff. We walked around the stadium some more, just taking it all in. It was as close to a home game as I can imagine a team can have 1200 miles away from their home city.

Just prior to kickoff, Mark Dupers brother sang God Bless America, a good rendition. Then the national anthem was something I will never forget. Evidently in Miami they don’t have a singer do the anthem. The anthem is played by a guy on a trumpet, and all of the fans sing the anthem. I mean they sing it loud enough for all to hear and then just as it ends, perfectly timed, 4 F14’s scream over the stadium with their afterburners blazing. I have a hard time describing how cool that moment was but all I can say is after they went over Ali had tears in her eyes and she hugged the Dolphin fan to her right. The sound and feeling of overwhelming power of those planes was something I never ever felt before.

Can it get any better? YES! The Eagles score a touchdown in 3 plays!!!! The Eagles fans went nuts. I don’t need to recap the game on the field as that will be well documented elsewhere. The activity in the stands was classic. Chants going back and forth. Clearly, the Eagles fans were more agressive, our cheers came more often and were in many cases louder than the Dolphin fans. Some of the cheers heard courtesy of Eagles fans, AUTO-MATIC (when Akers kicked his field goals), DOLPHINS SUCK, YOU CANT STOP US, ASSHOLE (to a few Dolphin fans that were trying to piss of our fans), IT’S ALL OVER, MVP, THIS IS OUR HOUSE and when it was apparent we would win the Nah nah nah goodbye song was sung repeatedly to the disappointed Fin fans milling towards the exits. The Dolphin fans had a few good cheers, the most memorable was F*CK THE EAGLES. I had pretty much lost my voice by halftime from yelling so much. It was the most I ever cheered and yelled for a team at any sporting event by far. I had to make one third quarter bathroom run and was dreading that the Green Bay sink pissing drama would unfold again. Luckily the sinks were still being used for washing hands but when I got to my urinal, it had a beer bottle, a beer can, and a plastic cup in it. 🙂

Once Fielder threw his final interception to ice the game for the birds our fans went beserk. It was such a cool feeling. The trash talking got pretty severe. The one guy behind us was running back and forth the aisle yelling to the Dolphin fans “Why are you still here?? It’s over, go home, this is our house now!” I must have slapped hands with 100 Eagle fans. Game over, Eagles 11-3, 9 in a row, unbelievable.

The journey back home was not so fun. As we walked out to the cars there were some isolated pockets of angry, drunk Dolphin fans that were looking to start some trouble. As I was walking to find our exit gate a bunch of 10 or so were heckling every Eagles fan they could. I just gave them the one finger salute and continued on. While we were stuck in gridlock, there was a small mini-bus filled with Eagles fans, they were heckling a car of Fin fans. They were just chanting stuff like Dolphins suck! Well I guess that was all it took because the Dolphin guy got out of his car, went to the back of the bus, and slammed the glass with his fist, breaking it! When the bus driver got out, the guy jumped back into the car and sped off. That sort of crazyiness is a bummer but it is hard to be avoided when football and alcohol are involved. All in all the interactions between the fans was loud and biting but not terrible.

We got in our car at about 12:45. We didn’t get onto open highway until at least an hour after that. The drive across alligator alley was very tough for me. I had a cup of coffee and it did very little to keep me alert. By the end of the trip I was hallucinating and catching myself literally dreaming with my eyes open. The last 45 minutes of the trip I kept myself alert by holding my breath a minute at a time. It worked. 🙂 We didn’t get home till almost 3:45 am, my head hit bed at 4.

I am off work today, I have no voice, I’m tired as hell but man was it worth it. Happy birthday to me.

Look for pics soon….

I don’t get it. Maybe it’s the brain shutting down after 39 days on an island feasting on crap, being eaten by bugs and smelling like garbage. Why do people at the end of Survivor always take the wrong person with them? It happened once again last night, Lil had a guaranteed win if she took rat bastard Jon with her to final two. She doesn’t and gets beat 6-1. STUPID. The finale was pretty good. We watched it at our friends house. However, due to football running late, which in turn made 60 minutes run late, the festivities didn’t begin until a little after 8:30. The whole ball of wax didn’t finish up till 11:30 ish. After the drive home and shower I didn’t get to bed till close to 12:45 am. Compound that with the fact that I will probably not get home from the MNF game tonight until 2-3 am tonight will result in some extreme drowsiness. Luckily I took the day off tomorrow for my bday.

I am pumped for the game tonight. We are leaving work early to get over there early enough to walk around and see the sights. Maybe tailgate, maybe hang with other Eagles fans. Surely it won’t be the same as Green Bay with Keener but I hope to have fun, just a less drunken outgoing kind of fun than I would have with him. Go Birds! I have my camera with.

The weekend was mild, we got a lot of xmas shopping knocked out (online primarily), I went out with the dog on Sunday and picked up a few more items while Ali was at work. She (the dog) is my buddy.

As usual I had a number of things that run into my mind over the weekend that seemed like good blog material and as usual those ideas just as quickly have run out of my head now. If I remember later I’ll try to hop back.

We finally caught the bastard. I honestly never thought it would happen at this point. Another amazing example of our military making us proud. I can only imagine how this will change things over there. I am sure millions of people could not trust the idea that he was really gone and unable to return to power until he was captured. Hopefully the attacks on our men will wind down as it is now apparent that what was will never be again. A great early Christmas present for all of us.

Been very busy lately. Some holiday related, some work related.

I added a couple pics to the holiday page. One is of the nice tree skirt Ali made along with the train I have set up around the tree. Sappy eh?

The other is a picture of our stockings. Now, mine is the HUGE one on the left. Seeing this would make you think my rant about how receiving presents doesn’t matter much was a farce. However I have had that stocking for over 10 years, it is a throwback to when greed was good. I just am too sentimental to throw it out and switch to a normal size stocking, honest…

Last night we went to Ali’s work xmas party. It was held at a local community clubhouse. A beautiful venue with some unbelieveable decorations including a 30 foot high christmas tree. I wish I had my camera with. I made a few rare appearances on the dance floor during fast dance time. I am a TERRIBLE dancer. I need to be way drunk to even have a shot of looking somewhat loose. I only had 2 beers last night so the gears weren’t greased nearly enough. Conversely, my wife is a very good dancer. Regardless she was very happy to see me out there trudging around. The party itself was just ok, not terrible not great. Sucks having it on a weeknight.

I heard who got the boot in Survivor but didn’t see it yet. I have it Tivo’d, sounds great.

Xmas related weekend, wrapping stuff, buying more stuff as well as getting plans in place for our MNF trek to the east coast to support my Eagles as well as our weekend trip to Disney next weekend. December is going to be VERY VERY expensive.

Jingle Bells……

Last night there was a brand new Peanuts Christmas special, All I want for Christmas is a Dog Charlie Brown. It was the best of the modern specials I have seen. They got people to do the voices that sound very close to the originals. It’s funny, entertaining and all around very well done. The only knock is it really isn’t a Christmas special. Christmas is an afterthought in the cartoon. It’s all about dogs. 🙂 Still a strong effort after a string of subpar specials.

Last night my wife and I were discussing how Christmas and what it means to us has changed over the years. First of all, moving to Florida obviously changes the holiday season dramatically. The warm weather makes it feel more like Memorial day. The 1200 mile buffer from our friends and family makes the friendly holiday visits no longer possible. So obviously that takes some enjoyment out of it. Then we talked about the gift part of it. When I was younger, Christmas was pretty much the only time I cashed in. If I wanted something big I better ask for it for Christmas because otherwise it wasn’t going to happen. The older I have gotten the more ability I have had to buy “presents” for myself whenever I want to. (to a degree) Plus I seem to get more of a kick from giving than receiving gifts anymore. Don’t get me wrong, it’s still fun to open presents, but it’s nowhere near the excitement level that it brought in years gone by. Another old age reality, deck the halls….

Quote of my letter to Amazon after trying to place an order for some xmas gifts…

“I have been a loyal Amazon.com customer for many years. I have always enjoyed the convenience and great service I have received from your company. However, it looks like this year you will be getting no business from me. Today, December 8th, I went to my wife’s wish list and checked off a few items. Most of the items were listed as shipping within 24 hours or 2-3 days. However when I went to checkout, EVERY single item was listed as arriving after Christmas! This was using the standard 3-7 day shipping option that I pay for. As an experiment I went back and checked off everything on her wishlist. The checkout window reported that EVERYTHING WOULD ARRIVE AFTER CHRISTMAS. I never had such issues like this with your company before. We are 2 and a half weeks away from Christmas yet you can not promise delivery before the holiday with regular shipping??? I do not know if this is an attempt to pad the bottom line by forcing customers to pay for more expensive expedited shipping or just a result of poor performance of your delivery model but the end result for me is I will not be buying ANY of my Christmas gifts from you this year and I highly doubt I will return next holiday either. I am very disappointed with Amazon.com.

Sincerely,
Shawn Duffey”

First let’s get the visual entertainment out of the way. Here is a pic of the little dogs that were on our property the day after Thanksgiving. (hopefully) they got a good home.

There are some updated pictures of Nicki available. I have to admit that I love her now as much as any pet I ever had.

This weekend we finished up our Christmas decorations, see pics of it all here. (as well as some non holiday pics)

The weekend was another good one. The temperature was below normal with highs in the 60’s both days. It is a result of that nasty storm that hammered the northeast this weekend. Back into the mid 70’s this week. My mom got her first taste of REALLY being glad she was here. We feel bad about our friends and family having to deal with the crappy weather but at the same time we feel content about not having to deal with it anymore.

As I mentioned up top we finished our decorations. I got inspired and hung additional lights across the roofline of the house. I never did that before at any place so it was cool. Ali made the wreath you see on the door by hand from branches we had to trim off the xmas tree. Our tree is a bit of an ugly duckling, a charlie brown tree. It’s trunk is crooked, is split in the middle and has a big bare spot up top. We really loaded it up with ornaments to cover up the blemishes. I think it looks good.

I did some mowing and weed whacking on Sunday. I have a strained back and a welt on my forehead that looks like I was shot with a bb gun as a result. The strained back was from being lazy and trying to mow the trenches in the back (instead of weed whacking them) and getting the tractor mower stuck. To get it out I had to lift up the backend and pull it out. Of course I didn’t learn the first time, I got it stuck at least 5 times before I gave up on that plan. When I went back with the weed whacker a branch somehow wound up pelting me on the forehead. When I went inside I noticed I had a small stream of dried up blood there. Always wear those safety glasses!!!!

What is up with college football? The BCS ratings are f’d up. The number 1 team loses, the number 2 and 3 team win in convincing fashion and the national championship game puts the number 1 team that LOST against the number 3 team?????????????????? Come on that make no sense. Stupid system.

Sunday great day for pro football. The Eagles came back in the second half and humiliated the Cowboys. Another great game, I can not believe how well it is going now after it went so terribly in the beginning. I’ll just enjoy the ride and be happy to eat all the crow I have to. I loved watching the New England – Miami game. Thousands of seats were buried! People were digging their seats out or in some cases just sitting in the snow! The scenes of the fans throwing the snow in the air to celebrate was one I’ll never forget. Talk about diehards….

The carnivore fish I had in my office died, no tears shed. I’m decommisioning the tank.

I’ve GOT to get some Christmas shopping done soon…..

Last night I was walking up the driveway after putting the garbage can at the curb when I noticed a huge shadow go flying over our neighbor’s roof. I could see something sitting on their roof so I went over to check it out. It was dark so I couldn’t really make it out until I was right next to their house. It was a HUGE owl. The biggest owl I ever saw. It just kind of hung out, gave me a look like it could care less about me and then went back to looking around. It stuck around long enough for me to show Ali. Wild.

This weekend we will be putting up the christmas tree and the rest of Christmas decorations. Back home in PA they are having xmas like weather, a big snowstorm is hitting. Hopefully they don’t get buried again this winter like last.

BIG Eagles game Sunday. They can take firm hold of first place with a win, here’s hoping…..