Spring Break

I am taking the week off during the kids spring break. On Monday we went to the zoo with Penny and Madison.

Then on Wednesday we left for a trip to Tampa/St. Pete and Sarasota. We had lunch at La Teresita in Tampa and walked around downtown St. Petersburg and The Pier area. We are staying at the Hilton on the bayfront across from the formerly named Al Lang Stadium.

Today we visited De Soto National Memorial in Bradenton and learned about some Spanish history and saw a live musket demonstration. We then went out to St. Pete Beach in Treasure Island and had some pizza from Original Pizza.

Tonight we are watching the Rays play the Baltimore Orioles. The first 10,000 fans received a Super Cow Bell (pictured) sponsored by Chick-fil-a. Jeff Niemann started for the Rays but left in the 2nd inning after getting hit by a Miguel Tejada line drive. The Rays are leading 2-1 in the bottom of the 4th.

Opening Day for Softball

The season started this afternoon with a beautiful afternoon. Ashlyn's team is the Hot Rods and they won 6-2. I am an assistant coach and there are 15 girls on the 8U (8 and under) team. The age range is 6-8 I believe. Ashlyn had a good time playing.

Lego Magazine

About 2 months ago I signed Ethan up for a free, 2-year subscription to the Lego magazine. After a very long wait by his standards he finally received it in the mail and was very excited. From what I understand, he was checking the mail saw it and yelled to his sister for her to get everything else. He had what he was looking for.

Mark's Basketball League

Our score from week 1 was 61-37 not 61-32 according to the weekly newsletter. Also a new feature Christ's Church is doing this season is a player of the week for each division. I was named POTW for Week 1 in our division.

Our game tonight was against one of the better teams in our division. We prevailed 59-58 in double overtime. The rules for OT are 3 minutes for the 1st OT and then 1 minute for each OT after that. We actually found ourselves down 29-8 with about 7 or so minutes to play in the first half. By halftime we had cut the lead to 30-22. We then went up 54-50 but saw the other team tie it at the end of regulation. I scored 17 and went 2-3 at the line. I think I had 5 boards again and made 3 3-pointers. I had a poor shooting night. I had one short stretch in the 2nd half when I scored 11 quick points on 3 threes and a two.

Yes...I finally caught up...

It is much easier to fall behind then to stay current much less catch up on blog postings. And yes since I am using this blog to chronicle various events, things about family, etc. I have backdated postings to make sure they are in the time frame of when it happened. My biggest holdup tends to be wanting to get pictures with a post which works great with a camera phone but causes a delay with a non-wifi digital camera. So going forward I may just have to publish a post without the picture for expediency.

I finished getting up to date while listening to the Canadian national anthem for the curling team's gold medal. At which point a certain someone commented "what I don't understand is they are in Canada but they are singing the national anthem in English."

Ethan & Ashlyn...learning to play basketball

We bought an adjustable goal for the kids at Christmas...well we actually bought it the day after Thanksgiving but gave it to them as an early Christmas present. Ashlyn of course could make baskets with the rim at 8 feet but Ethan struggled to get it up that high. A few weeks back he told us he made a basket but his first basket was witnessed on Valentine's Day. That same day, Gina raised the rim to 10 feet for a while and Ashlyn made it at that height for the first time. Yesterday Ethan called me at work to let me know he made 20 shots with the rim at 8 feet. Gina and Ashlyn stayed outside counting the number he made until he hit 20. Needless to say he was very excited. Of course I told Ashlyn her practice needed to be making 100 shots each day. I think the reaction was along the lines of that is too many.

Christ's Church Basketball League - Game 1

Our season kicked off last night with a 61-32 victory. We were up 38-10 at halftime. We are in Division 3 (the lowest). Of course since we don't have guys who can dunk and basically since I am the youngest or second youngest guy on the team at 38y/9m it is best that we avoid D1 and D2. Team members are Rob Scoonover, John Shields, Greg Stuart, David Hudson, Jim Griffin, David Putz and myself. And as of this morning we picked up Milton Bullard...he brings size and youth...now I am for sure not the youngest. Last night we played Panda Express which was probably a mid-20s-30 year old team. They could not keep up with our fast break offense. They had me down for 27 points, 5 boards and 2 assists. 2-3 at the line, and 3 3-pointers. John had 19 points. And my point guard David was racking up the assists all night long. Last year we basically played 3 on 5 the whole game with no subs so it was nice being able to get a rest during the game. Yes we have 5 on the court at all times last year but 3 on 5 gives you an idea of the rest of the team from last year.

2009 tax return...e-file complete!

Not an exciting post but a post nonetheless before the end of January. I'll strive to post more often. I actually have drafts saved just haven't posted them. Of course that doesn't do a lot of good.

As for the tax return, it was e-filed this evening which establishes a new record for how early it was done. I've come a long way from the days of driving to the post office in the 11 pm hour on April 15th.