A Day Like All Days

TUESDAY (New Year's Day)

I got up around five to find Gary awake and doing something with his phone. I went to the bathroom and back to sleep until the alarm went off at six. Gary told me he'd been up since 1:30 or so.

We were packed and ready to go about 7:40, and arrived at Colleen's by eight. We each had a banana for breakfast and Colleen put away the leftover soda, applesauce and gelatin cups. We chatted for a half hour or so, then said our goodbyes and left for the airport. We got our bags checked in and got through security without incident, even though I had to do a bit more disassembly and reassembly than usual due to the tablet and my suspenders. We went directly to the gate and decided to wait until Minneapolis to have lunch.

The aircraft was a Bombardier with four seats across, but we both needed seat belt extenders, which was unexpected. A cute cubbish dude in a heavy tan jacket kept getting up with the seat belt sign on. Across from us was a family of four, likely grampa and three grandkids, who were headed to Saskatoon.

When we arrived in the concourse in Minneapolis, I noticed someone sleeping on the floor between the charging station and the people mover. We made our way to the airport mall, but found the food court closed for renovation. Fortunately there was a restaurant just before the entrance to concourse F, where we had lunch (a turkey burger for Gary and a Juicy Lucy with sauteed onions for me, both with coleslaw and surprisingly good unsweetened tea).

The gate area got very crowded and I noticed a couple of bears across the way, the younger with a thick dark beard and the older wearing a T-shirt with a cartoon labeled BEER which was a bear with antlers. I saw them seated together as we boarded the plane. I thought the cute daddy cub with 3 children had the aisle seat, but it remained vacant until a very well-behaved girl of perhaps 6 or 7 boarded with her mother and took the seat; her mother sat a few rows behind us. We got to see snippets of the first half of the Rose Bowl in which Ohio State was leading 14-3 before we landed. I ended up having the same shoulder and back pain I experienced in Tacoma during my last SMC performance there because there wasn't room to "spread my wings", so the wait for the multitudes of children having to get out of the way before we could disembark was agonizing.

When I got into the terminal I sat down to stretch my back before I hit the restroom. We collected our bags and caught the shuttle to the light rail station. The train trip was unremarkable. When we arrived at Union Station bus stop to catch the bus to Everett, we heard a screeching of tires and witnessed a pedestrian crossing against the light and nearly getting creamed by, of all vehicles, a police cruiser. That car and a second police SUV just behind it in traffic lit up, and when we boarded the bus (a Double Tall, where we sat downstairs in the back with our bags) and passed the scene, two officers were still interrogating the hapless pedestrian, who was a rather cubbish dude but clearly not very bright. On the bus back to Everett Gary showed me the final score of the Rose Bowl: Ohio State 28, Washington 23.

When we arrived at Everett Station I called for an Uber but the driver apparently picked up someone else and my phone battery died before I could cancel the trip. So we ended up taking a conventional cab home. I later got the Uber trip straightened out without incident.

THURSDAY

We got a late start and missed the hotel breakfast, so we stopped by Frisch's Big Boy for their breakfast bar. From there we headed down to Union Terminal to visit the museums underneath the rotunda which is shaped like an old Art Deco radio set. The line for tickets was rather long, spiraling around the box office in a semicircle. At one point I noticed a black bear about our size with dreadlocks and wearing a sweatshirt with the logo of Bogart's, a live-music bar in Clifton. I suggested to Gary he just might be a bouncer there. We were served by a cute cubbish dude with a trim black beard and a nice smile; Gary noticed the rainbow pin he was wearing.

We descended the escalator to the mezzanine level to visit the Holiday Junction display, then continued down a long ramp to the Duke Energy model railroad display, which used to be in the lobby of the CG&E building when I was a kid. Also on the lower level was a reproduction of the Cincinnati Public Landing from the 1800s, complete with the Gibson print shop, a beer hall, a stand at the 5th Street Market, a boarding house, and a photographer's studio among others. The highlight of the exhibit was the Queen of the West, a steam paddlewheel riverboat model with simulated cargo. From there we returned to the mezzanine level to view the Lego model train exhibit before following a cute cublet in a construction hi-vis vest up the escalator to the rotunda level and making our exit.

The next stop was Dad's apartment, where we were surprised to find Colleen and Sheila had assembled his new reading lamp and table. We chatted for a bit while an occupational therapist checked to see if Dad could manage to wheel himself to the dining room. He did well walking the chair with his feet to the bottom of the ramp, but not so well navigating up and down the ramp itself. Colleen took care of testing his blood sugar and administering his insulin, then we all accompanied him to the dining room. On the way, an older dude thought Gary looked like his brother, but when Gary told him he's from Brooklyn, he said his brother is from Kansas City. We said our goodbyes at the dinner table and went our separate ways.

Gary and I returned to the room to charge phones and decide where to go for dinner. We ended up going to Golden Corral since we'd missed lunch and were pretty hungry. There was a cute ginger cub in a feathered cowboy hat with a lady companion. After dinner we went shopping at Meijer for drinks and snacks, and noticed the wind had gotten much stronger while we were eating. We checked out with a tall bear whose height and voice reminded me of Joe Dietl from Where the Bears Are; he had a nice gingerish beard though.

When we arrived at our room we watched axe throwing on ESPN, featuring rather a lot of cute bears and cubs (the runner-up, David Cycon from the Philly location of Bury the Hatchet, is particularly cute), then switched to hockey (the Tampa Bay Lightning beat the Flyers 6-5 in overtime; Carter Hart was not in net). After that it was news and bed.

This weekend gmjambear and I have been busy exhuming the pond in the backyard. The pond was constructed of a Rubbermaid 150-gallon stock tank, a length of drain pipe that goes we know not where, a whole lot of dirt (backfilled against the fence, which is why it all has to come out) and a retaining wall. We'd gotten most of the retaining wall removed over the year or so since we made the decision to replace the fence.

Yesterday we managed to get most of the remaining bricks from the base of the retaining wall moved, and the dried mud and gravel out of the tub itself. As we worked I noticed a tall and muscular young dude at the house behind us across the alley, who was wearing a pair of really tight, stretchy gray shorts and no shirt; and also a small poodle-mix dog (perhaps a cockapoo) who left us a present in the small patch of lawn between the temporary fence and the alley.

After sifting a few wheelbarrow loads of dirt and rocks, we were done for the day and decided to have dinner at Buzz Inn on Evergreen. We saw a number of cute daddybears and their kids passing by our table as they left. Cue Gary: "aw, hell no." After dinner we finished up some laundry and surfed the net a bit before I decided to call it a night.

I woke up about quarter to six to find Gary had made an excursion downtown. When I came downstairs for breakfast around nine-thirty, I saw Gary was back, but had been up all night, so I gently encouraged him to get some sleep. After breakfast I picked up the present the dog had left, and while doing so had a nice chat with Eric, the young dude with the tight shorts, who had come to retrieve the dog (his name is Puddles) as he'd wandered into our yard. They are busy building a new back porch to go with the addition on their house.

After that I swept up the tub and sifted another wheelbarrow load of dirt, then went inside and caught up with Dad by phone. My sister Sheila's youngest son was scheduled to graduate from high school this afternoon, and my sister Colleen's youngest is preparing to move to Boston in the next month so she is managing separate parties for his friends, for our side of the family and for her husband's side. She had to work this evening so I guess I'll have to call her later tomorrow.

Once I got off the phone with Dad, I decided to pick up a few more buckets from Home Depot, grab lunch, and pick up some groceries at Costco. At Home Depot I asked a cute ginger otter if he knew of anyone who deals in bulk dirt, as we'll probably have 4 or 5 cubic yards left over when all is said and done. He suggested Craig's List because if people are desperate enough for fill dirt they'll come over and dig it up. Another possibility he suggested is the sand and gravel place a couple doors north on the same side of Highway 99. I ended up picking up three 5-gallon buckets and two 18-gallon plastic planter tubs with rope handles. I checked out beside a cute daddy bear with a wife and two girls. He had some nice ink on one arm.

Lunch was at Heaven Sent Chicken on 112th Street. I had the three-piece special with corn and an extra side of collard greens. As I ate I texted Gary to relay the results of the morning so he could read them when he got up, and he suggested I pick up some fruit at Costco as well: grapes, blackberries, and bananas. I was surprised he was awake. At Costco there were at least two cute daddybears shopping; one I kept crossing paths with was tall and dark, perhaps Native American or Hispanic, with elaborate, somewhat faded ink on both arms.

After I got home and got the groceries put away, Gary and I watched part of the Memorial Cup (Canadian Hockey League) final between the Erie Otters and the host team, the Windsor Spitfires; then we started in on the sifting and sorting. Toward the end we traced the PVC drain pipe to an elbow in the middle of the back lawn well outside the perimeter of the retaining wall, and decided we should dig no further but rather get a plumber to trace the pipe so we don't ruin the lawn unnecessarily. Then I fixed dinner: bratwurst boiled in beer (a local microbrew called Scuttlebutt) and finished off under the broiler (unfortunately, we have construction debris piled up too close to the outdoor gas grill to use it at the moment), and fresh coleslaw. After dinner we sort of vegetated in front of the TV until Gary decided he'd better get to bed and catch up on sleep.

Christmas was fun. gmjambear and I each got some video footage of the family's "Jingle Bell Rock" gift exchange (everyone stands iin a big circle and you pass packages to the right on "Jingle" and to the left on "Rock") and hopefully we'll get some more from my sister and edit them all together.

Boxing Day brought a significant snowfall, after which we went outside and played in the snow with my grand-niece Alyssa and grand-nephew Aiden; there's a big hill behind my dad's place and they had sleds already waiting for them in Dad's garage. After Alyssa's mother came by to pick her up (as she got off work early due to the weather) we headed out for chili for lunch.

Thursday we had lunch at White Castle and did some grocery shopping with Aiden in tow, and that evening Gary and I headed for downtown Cincinnati to see the Cyclones play hockey against the Elmira Jackals. As usual, lots of bears in the stands and a few on the ice. Unfortunately for the 'Clones, Elmira won 4-3. As a promotion, they had the Stanley Cup out on the concourse so we got our pictures taken with the Cup.

Friday I went to get my hair cut and beard trimmed since I was done with my Santa impersonation for another year. Later we did some photo processing on Dad's computer so he's got copies of our Christmas snaps, and then hit the YMCA on Winton Road which I'd visited last time I was in town. We were pleasantly surprised to find our ActivTrax accounts work there too, since the old FitLinxx system was specific to the facility where you signed up. Unfortunately one of my contacts washed out in the pool so I have to wear my glasses until we get back home.

Yesterday we attended my nephew Andy's wedding. A good time was had by all, even if there was a slight misunderstanding when it came time for family photos, but that was cleared up by the time the party was over.

This morning I took Dad to church, where a very nice-looking otterish/bearish fellow was the lector (reader). Afterward we had breakfast at Dad's favorite restaurant, First Watch, did a bit more shopping and came home to watch the Bengals beat the Ravens, 23-14. The late game is still in progress and I'll catch up when I finish this post.

We return to Everett tomorrow evening just in time to ring in the New Year. Wishing you and yours a happy and prosperous New Year!