Category: Adventure

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Adventure

Christmas 2010

Christmas this year was pretty low key. So much of the family had moved, passed away or just alienated themselves the past few years. But less people did mean much less drama, so that’s not such a bad thing I suppose.

Thanks to the magic of Skype, we were able to have my brother Anthony take part when we exchanged presents. The interent really has opened up some amazing communication possibilities, it was really cool.

Everybody seemed very pleased with what I’d gotten them, so that was great. It seems to get tougher every year to think of something to get my parents, feel like after so many years I’m starting to run out of possibilites at times.

Here’s a list of some of the really cool stuff I received:

  • Lego Hoth Wampa cave
  • mononucleosis (harmless this time!)
  • Mass Effect 2
  • Spectacular Spider-man volumes 6-8 on DVD
  • Mario & Luigi radio controlled karts
  • a few flannels and t-shirts
  • Fraggle Rock Christmas DVD
  • Rudolph the Red Nose Reindeer DVD
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Adventure

2010 Holiday Gift Exchange

2010 Holiday Gift ExchangeThe 4th annual Holiday Gift Exchange was held yesterday in the employee cafeteria. I thought it was a great time and another highly successful gift exchange. Slightly biased here I’m sure, but it’s the finest gift exchange at work.

I would like to thank all those who participated Especially those who went the extra mile bringing in food, drink, taking photos, or just assisting with the setup. A truly great team effort.

This was the furthest that the swap had gone, with several swaps after the initial mandatory round. A wide assortment of gift cards, swords, blankets, Buccaneer attire, and a shake weight just to name a few swapped hands. Well I don’t think the shake weight swapped hands, but most everything else seemed to at one point.

I wound with with the gift I happened to bring in. A foam sword, monkey (together forming a monkey sword) and a Target gift card.

Great strategy was exercised and all seemed to have a pretty good time. It’s great to have a good time with co-workers and look forward to next years.

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Adventure Sports

Media Mud Stain

Media Mud Stain 5 Mile FinishI participated in the Media Mud Stain 5 mile run yesterday. It was a pretty cool run. NGM picked this one out, and I drove up with him. It was at the Ridley Creek State Park in Pennsylvania.

The park and run were very scenic. I felt like I was in the Revolutionary War. There were some very old but awesome houses around there.

The race was a little over 5 miles. There were a couple of tough hills mixed in there, one very tough one around the midpoint actually. Towards the end of the race there was an 8 year old looking girl and her father closing in on me. They made sure that I kept on running towards the end, I really didn’t want to finish behind and 8 year old.

Afterwards we stopped and got a bite to eat at the Court Diner in Media, PA. Even though I had just eaten a ton of the excellently catered food from after the race, I still ate a full breakfast at the diner too. Food was very good there.

Another excellent run with NGM.

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Adventure Video Games

Day of Many Adventures

Lego Polar BearYesterday turned out to be one of my more adventurous days in quite a bit. I guess I was a bit overdue for some adventure since I really haven’t gotten the chance to leave the house much yet this summer due to some bad luck with some unkind viruses and such.

The day began with me making some yummy waffles for breakfast, then heading over to the Philadelphia Zoo. The Zoo was awesome as always and had a really cool Lego exhibit going on. I’ve been working on a Lego sculpture myself recently, so this was a treat for me to check out. The polar bear made of Legos there was amazing, I can’t imagine just how many bricks must’ve gone into making it. Also, the weather wasn’t really that bad while I was there, glad I got there a little on the early side as later in the day it would get extremely hot and humid.

Wall of BricksNext I embarked towards the King of Prussia Mall in search of the Lego Store. I really need some more individual bricks for my sculpture, and I was truly a kid in a candy store in the Lego Store. I figured out a system to most efficiently pack as many bricks as possible into a container. You pay by the container not the brick here, so maximizing brick placement was key.

There were some really cool stores at the mall too, and being in the air condition after on this really hot day turned out to be a nice idea. I got to eat some Chik-fil-A for lunch, which I sorely miss ever since they left the Hamilton Mall. It was one of my favorite lunch spots for the longest time at work.

As great as my day had been thus far, something else ever greater lay in store. As the day was beginning to wind down all the way at the other end of the Mall my eyes caught glance of it. The Wii Games Summer 2010 was in King of Prussia today!!!

It’s a national competition with people competing on various Wii games, and by some amazing coincidence I happened to be there on the day when it was taking place. What amazing luck indeed. I quickly signed up and began competing as the team “Best Team in Town”. I wanted it to be “Best Team in Town 2”, but alas it as too many characters.

My teammate tore it up in bowling and hula hoop on Wii Sports Resort and Wii Fit Plus. I did so so on 3 point shoot out on Wii Sports Resort and finished very well on Mario Kart (even though I hit that damn goomba twice). Haha, I actually got tired on my third round in 3 point shooting, it was a very exhausting day and I really needed some water in me at this point.

The final challenge was a 2 player coin grab in Super Mario Bros Wii. I thought we did pretty well in this, it was one of the tougher levels. I was really hoping that Super Mario Galaxy 2 would be part of the competition as I’ve played so much of it recently when I wasn’t feeling well, but oh well the other games were a lot of fun to compete in as well.

“Best Team in Town” finished in a respectable 3rd at the time, and checking the leaderboards just now it looks like we can in 10th place overall out of 48 teams. So that wasn’t too bad considering that neither of us really played these particular games much with the exception of bowling.

After this, finally got a bite to eat then headed home. A truly adventurous day for me, and so nice to be back out doing stuff like a normal person again.

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Adventure Sports

RunAmuck NY

Ran in another RunAmuck with NGM yesterday. This one took place all the way up at Sebago Beach (Harriman State Park) in NY. It was an amazing place, massive with some incredible rocks and mountains which I would learn to despise.

My day began with waking up around 5:00 AM then driving an hour over to NGM’s. Ummm, I kinda found myself driving on the Parkway instead of the Expressway for a bit, and had to turn back early on. I guess that’s what waking up that early does to me. Once I met up NGM and company, we began our 2 1/2 hour drive up to NY. So yeah, I spent a good 7+ hours in a car yesterday, not a good feeling.

We managed to get there with no major problems. Up in North Jersey it was very mountainous and quite scenic, very different from the New Jersey I’m used to. Again the RunAmuck was a very well organized event, and that was apparent as we pulled into the park that was packed with so many people.

NGM and I registered quickly, duct taped our shoes to prevent losing them in the water/muck and eagerly awaited the start of our race. There were so many people, even more than the NJ RunAmuck race. Lining up for the race, NGM and I were pitted next to an older fellow we called Jack Lalane. This old guy was ripped, and would go on to easily crush us in this race.

The race began and NGM and I both began with a steady and consistent pace. Only a few meters in and the runners were faced with a brutal incline up a rocky terrain. This early in the race you could sense a lot of the runners lose confidence, and regret signing up for this. This was a true precursor to the most difficult run I’ve ever experienced.

I found the ground to be extremely unique, there were huge rocks almost everywhere. This make footing very difficult and interesting, as well as slick and not too kind to the ankles. I can’t even begin to count how many times I rolled an ankle during the run, as well as a couple of near spills (one literally almost was a spill  as I almost fell into the lake).

The inclines and declines were so very brutal. Several of them required walking attentively to successfully navigate through them. About 1.75 miles in I was completely exhausted from the hostile terrain. I would then slow it down a bit until NGM caught up then, finish this race up with him.

We even had to trek through a lake! The water was up to our armpits at times. This was so great for me, it allowed me to slow and cool down, catching my breath for the upcoming final leg. NGM and I ran out the final leg of the race together and made it through the final mud pit with a respectable finish.

This was by far the most grueling run I’d ever took a part in. Today my ankles are sore with some swelling, and my right shoulder is shot (I have so rotator cuff issues in there and probably got aggravated with the climbs). So I guess I’m getting a bit old, haha. All in all this was an amazing race and a very fun day, we’ll have to do this again.

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Adventure

Eating with half a numb face

I had an dental appointment to replace a filling for a crack I had in a molar that was done when I was in high school. Going to the dentist was never too bad for me, and I was pretty much in and out in under 45 minutes (way to go Dr. Josh).

However, what I wasn’t expecting was for half of my face to be numb for 4 hours. I half to admit, it’s a very strange feeling. Eating pizza a little bit afterwards turned into quite the epic adventure.

I’ve been known to be a little too rough at times, so I was extremely cautious to make sure I wasn’t accidentally biting into the right side of my cheek while eating. Small bites that were only being chewed on the left side of my mouth was the recipe for success.

2 slices felt like 4, with only half of my jaw doing any substantial work. All in all the whole numbing thing has turned out to be a pretty interesting experience.