Lots of Snow

Not even sure how much snow we got, however, our deck is completely covered (almost hip high). Here is a night shot of our house, hard to see the lights, but you get the idea.

snow day

The Weather men and woman got it right. Just after 3 or 4 hours of snow we have about 4 or 5 inches! Here is a picture from the security camera of the front and back of my house, I will add another picture before it gets dark to compare. Have fun in the snow and if you have to, drive safe!

Making wine for real

As many of you know Lori and I have been making wine at home for many years, however, the reds that we make have not been all that exiting. So, we have decided to up our ante and make it at a facility close by called the Cherry Hill Wine Room.
At the wine room they provide all of the wine making equipment and ingredients (crusher, destemmer, wine press, yeast, grapes, etc.) This year we are making a combination wine called a Trilogy (cab. sav., merlot, and cab. franc) After the grapes were crushed and destemmed we pumped them into this giant container were the yeast will be added for fermentation; here Lori is stirring it up.

Rides at the stratosphere

While in Vegas the four of us decided to ride the rides at the Stratosphere hotel. The unique thing about these rides is that they are set up on top of the Hotel which makes them over 1100 feet high. In the videos you will see Rob and Rod riding the Big Shot and also riding the X-scream. Then you will see Rob and me riding the big shot. We didn't get any video of the third ride with us on it, only a quick vid of someone else. Note: I know our names are confusing but keep in mind there were #3 Robs and #1 Rod on the trip. last note, you will notice a bit of arm swaying/dancing, this was a signature move create by Rod.

Vegas

Rob, Rob, Rod, and I are in Vegas for a few days. Here is a picture of them standing out front of the Pawn shop from Pawn Stars from the history channel. It however, was not as cool as we were expecting, for those of you who know the show Chumley was there. We then went to the Stratosphere but due to the wind the closed the rides, maybe tomorrow.

Bermuda

We just got back from a five day cruise via the Explorer of the Seas that left out of Bayonne, NJ. We hit a lot of rough seas which caused Lori a little extra time in the room, but once we reached Bermuda the weather was perfect. We didn't actually have a lot of time in Bermuda, but we choose to fill up our days by going on two excursions. The first one was a tour of the dockyard on our own personal Segway.

If you have never had the opportunity to try one- DO IT. They were extremely easy to navigate and only took a few minutes to master. The only drawback was they maxed out at 12.5mph!


After the Segway tour we decided to rent a single scooter and tour the island at our own pace. We have heard plenty of daunting stories regarding scooters, but we went for it anyway. Driving on the opposite side of the road was a little challenging, but I had Lori constantly in my ear telling me "STAY LEFT, STAY LEFT" We rode up the coast and made it to Hamilton, which we learned ever so quickly why we didn't want to stay due to the overwhelming traffic. We turned and hightailed it back to Jobson's Bay for a little romantic walk on the beach- sorry no skinny dipping for us!

The next day we arose very early to reach our next excursion which was the Hartley's Helmet Dive, after a 30 or so minute boat ride, we got in the cool blue water (and our heavy helmets) and descended into the coral reef. Under 10-12 feet of water there was a strong current, but our guide kept us tethered and showed us around the reef pointing out the sea life and allowed us to handle his "trained" local fish Stormin' Norman. The neatest part was when I was given a piece of coral to hold and Lori was given bits of squid on her fingernail and she held the squid just over a hole in the coral and a little itty bitty blue crab came out and snatched his snack from her. (all the while I was being nipped from the other side of the coral buy the rest of his clan!)

The Ship- Awesome dinner companions!! We sat with three other couples, we had such a good time with them that it seemed we ran to dinner and the staff was pushing us out to make room for the next seating. The casino wasn't nice to us, it was a bit smokey and we had more fun in the arcade playing Galaga! We did manage to have some free champagne by attending the onboard art auction and we did purchase two small pieces and a third as a present. We did have a smoother ride home for the most part, but they tell us we encountered a very strong storm, yet due to our wine coma we didn't feel or hear it.

Any cruisers here is a tip- Sign up for the express check out. It was great, we were off the boat within minutes and in our car within 15.

MoonFlower

A few years back my neighbor had given me
some really old seeds (about 20 years old), he told me they were called moon
flowers and that the seeds were hard to germinate. That first year
I was successful in growing the viney flower, however, I was only able
to get a single flower. The following year I wasn't able to get the
seeds to germinate and the following year I lost them. Now this year
while shopping at Lowes I came across a packet of seeds and
low and behold they were Moonflowers. Determined I tried and successfully
germinated four seeds and placed them in different locations outside. It seemed to
take forever but I finally got some flowers. The cool thing about this vine is that the
flowers only open up at night, (they start the opening at dusk, remain open all night, and close at dawn). the vine itself grows up to 15 feet and the flowers have a fresh
cotton smell and are 4 to 6 inches across. If you have the space and something for them to grow on they are
worth having!

Took a little drive

We decided to take the new truck for a drive and made it eight hours away to Snowshoe, WV, after having to turn around at City Line Ave b/c I forgot my camera and computer (dummy). We are staying on the mountain in a tiny studio condo overlooking the village square, we imagine it would be more spectacular if the village was under 3 feet of snow. Have not done much, just grabbed a bite to eat and took the ski lift down to see the lake. in the picture you can see an adventure's mountain bike on it's way back up to the top. Over the weekend there is a mountain bike race and a butterfly festival.

Big Elvis and the pinball hall of fame

A few miles off the Vegas Strip there is an awesome little place called the pinball hall of fame, it has over 200 machines including south park, star trek, cyclone, adams family etc...also there are some non-pinball such as donkey kong, spy hunter, and ms. packman. We spent $5 in quarters and spent a few hours playing, it was a lot of fun I will absolutely make it back there. In this video, big elvis is singing a louis armstrong song what a wonderful world, and for me it is just great! Quick background on big elvis, this guy use to be close to 1000 pounds and he has up to now lost 550 lbs!! I think he sounds better then elvis.

Las vegas

v

We are in cool Las Vegas, Thursday it is going up to 111 degrees, Lori is not too Happy!
Anyway, we had a very good time at our convention. We got to meet Adam savage from Mythbusters, Penn & Teller (we actually heard teller speak). We also got to see Penn & Teller's show and it was awesome. Sunday we got to attend Linda and Calvin's wedding which the happy couple looked amazing. In the video clip the older guy is Jack Jones and he is telling a joke. (incidentally we saw his show as well)

Stupid Airlines!

Select	Passenger	Status	Rapid Rewards Number	Date	Scheduled Depart Time	Flight Number	Routing	Fly By Lane Availability
No Boarding Passes Available	ROBERT SMITH	Airport Checkin Required	ADD NOW	JUL 09	02:25 PM	2467	PHILADELPHIA (PHL) to LAS VEGAS (LAS)	No
	LORI ANN SMITH	Available	ADD NOW	JUL 09	02:25 PM	2467	PHILADELPHIA (PHL) to LAS VEGAS (LAS)	No

Some of you may know that we are flying to Vegas tomorrow, however, because the name ROBERT SMITH is such a common terrorist name, the name has been placed on a "watch list" As a result of said watch list I can not use the little kiosk at the airport nor can I print my boarding pass from home. NO, because of this, when I flew home from Ireland I was detained by the TSA for questioning! I actually joked with the tsa agent that I should change my name to Muhamad..... she laughed and said "that would only make it worse"

200 + Babies

Some of you may have known that I have placed 5 mantis egg sacks around my property. You may think I am crazy or may think it is a neat idea, either way I was lucky enough to watch as they hatched out of one of those sacks! Unfortunately for me as soon as I got out there with my camera the battery died, then Lori's camera (a point and shoot) would not focus on the little guys. So, I ran back in, plugged the battery in, and had a cup of coffee. I took a little video using Lori's camera and while it is not in focus you can get the idea.



This link has a very simple graphic of the life cycle of the Praying Mantis if you are interested. When I was cutting back my ornamental grasses this year I found 2 of the mantis egg sacks, however, I had already ordered the other 3 ($12). As far as I can tell this sack in the pictures is the 2nd one that has hatched so far. Very cool!

West Virginia

Click HERE to see more pictures of our first day in West Virginia. We drove from NJ through the Maryland Panhandle into West Virginia's Potomac Highlands taking roughly about 5.5 hrs. Once in West Virginia we stopped at BlackWater Falls and Canaan Valley Park, which was very impressive. From the falls we traveled south through Monongahela Forest as well as Dolly Sods (aka Satan's hole) The drive through the "hole" was very dangerous, foggy, pot hole ridden, and wet (very wet). It must have been awesome scenery but we were too busy changing our Depends to notice! It had been a very long day at that point so we made our way to Elkins, WV- our home base for the next few days. We had a quick Cinco De Mayo dinner at the local Mexican eatery, Humberto's, and headed back to the room. At that point we realized we will not get the Hockey games down here. This was followed by the sun coming out and a rainbow which we saw from our hotel. We are too bushed to get back out there to enjoy it. Tomorrow we are heading further south towards Snowshoe and back.

The Catskills

Lori and I have spent the last few days tooling around the Catskills in New York. We saw lots of waterfalls (unplanned), reservoirs, got lost, and had a awesome lunch in Roscoe NY in a place called Zach's (also unplanned, but worth the trip). Most of the time we were on roads that were not on our maps nor the GPS, yet we made it back to the hotel with out getting too lost, (many " Look kids Big Ben's/Parliament" from the movie European Vacation). One of the pictures we posted is of our future dream home we will never own, just amazing!

Spring

I am sure I wasn't the only one outside this weekend playing in the yard! We spent all day Sunday planting Gerbers and cleaning up outside. Today I took a short walk and snapped some pictures.
Left to right the 1st photo is of one of our Gerbers followed by a tadpole in my pond, followed by a stupid Canandian goose sitting on her nest right next to the play ground at Newton Lake! The 1st picture on the bottom row is of a Praying Mantis egg sack, in that little sack holds roughly 200 babies, which if I am lucky enough will be present when they hatch. The last picture is one I took a few weeks ago of an unfortunate squirrel being consumed by one the lakes red tailed hawks.

Cutest little ice cream

Walking through our local Super Fresh I couldn't help but notice the smallest of ice cream containers. At the time they were on sale for 10 for $10, not a bad deal. The only problem is I could eat the normal size pint and want more, so the small single serve does little to fill you up!

When Irish eyes are smiling

We celebrated St. Patrick's Day by going on a cruise on The Lantern Queen in Havre de Grace MD. We cruised along the Susquehanna River listening to Irish music and eating Irish food as well as sipping on a Guinness. A word about the Guinness: while visiting Ireland in the fall a lot of co-travelers suggested that the Guinness in Ireland was better then here in the states. After much consideration and many trials both here and there, I have to say I think it tasted just as great in both places; however, I will continue my experiment in the matter of science only! Back to the cruise, we were entertained not only by the authentic Irish music but also some truly authentic Irish dancers (see video). The amazingly cute red head is Katherine (our friends the Weber's little girl), who will be three in June. I'd like to point out the other little dancer in the video was four yrs old. We had a great time and hope to do it again next year!

Glazed Eyes

Yesterday our cat Licorice had to have blood taken and since he is ferocious, the vet had to sedate him with a little IM shot of Ketamine. Check out how big his pupils remained 5 hours post sedation. (I also added a picture with his normal looking eyes) Had he let the vet take blood without sedation the procedure would have only taken seconds, instead it was a whole day event. On the plus side they were able to examine his gums, teeth, and cut his nails (which is a first in 13 years). Licorice has been consistantley losing weight about half his body weight over the last 5 years. We think he may have a hyperthroid? We will find out on Monday? Apparenlty Lori gets just as upset with our cat getting sedated as she did with Courtney's knee operations.

SNOW DAY!

For the first time this season we finally received
about 6 inches of snow! It took Lori and I about 45 minutes to clear off our trucks. There were a ton a kids sledding across the park, Lori and I treated ourselves to some ice cream, and even our cat got to enjoy the birdies on the deck digging for the bread crumbs we put there.
Also check out our traveling "white boy" truck, he is almost covered in snow. (again if you don't know check out the license plate)

VA caverns + Skyline Drive

Today was similar to yesterday, we got to see one more cavern (Luray caverns) and drove the rest of Skyline drive (105 miles one way). The caverns today were really out of this world, extraordinary. Once underground the size of the caverns were just huge with many giant structures reaching from the ceiling to the ground. In the picture above we saw yet another reflection pond, but this one was 3 times the size of the one from yesterday. Also on today's tour we were not the only ones, but apart of a group of about 25 people. From the caverns we rejoined Skyline drive were we left off yesterday and continued to the end. Mile after mile there are overlooks that have views like the one shown here. We hiked one time to see a waterfall about 1.25 miles down the side of a mountain, going down wasn't so bad, but coming back up it took us about 4 times as long and Lori was shedding lathers rather quickly, if only it was 2 miles long.
After Skyline drive we drove back towards the hotel and had a tasty mexican dinner. Now are aching muscles are insisting on a little rest before our return home in the morning.
Hopefully I will add a few more photos when we get back home.

On The Rode Again

Well it has been plenty of time since our last update and Lori and I have taken two trips since Ireland. Three weeks ago we hit up Vegas for 5 days (sorry Finn we left out Flat Stanley), anyway weather was a bit chilly but much better than 120 degrees. Highlights of Vegas: Big Elvis @ Bill's Gambling Hall, Drew Carey and company @MGM, free dinner buffet at Wynn, and hitting a four of a kind at the golden nugget playing let it ride! We Stayed 3 days in the new tower Palazzo at the Venetian and 1 nights downtown at the Golden Nugget. Lori prefers the strip but I am a new fan of downtown. Enough of Vegas lets get onto Skyline Drive Virginia.

The first picture you see is of a small reflection pond at skyline caverns roughly 220 ft below ground, it was pretty awesome for only being two inches deep. It is not exactly tourist season down here and as a result the tour we took of the caverns was just Lori and I (pretty cool too). Tomorrow we plan to hit a few more caves/caverns and continue on skyline line drive. The second picture above is of the guardians of skyline drive which we ran into immediately upon entering the Shenandoah Nat. Park via Skyline drive. Skyline Drive is roughly 100 miles (35mph speed limit) traversing through Shenandoah Nat. Park, we only drove the first third today and will hit as much as possible tomorrow. I'll report back in tomorrow.