Chumados Awards Banquet

Chumados 2005

Saturday, Freddy threw another fun party in honor of the Chumados Spring 2005 season. TONS of yummy food, as always. I think Freddy could have thrown another party with the leftovers, as everyone brought plenty of dishes in addition to the steaks, burgers and hot dogs Freddy grilled up. Bianca provide celebratory Jello Shots and a good time was had by all.


MVP (Freddy) and MVC (Joey B) with Mrs. B (Chris)

After William's heart-felt visual presentation of the Chumados' team history and pictures from the season, the MVP and MVC (Most Valuable Chumado) awards were distributed. William questioned the results of the voting. Last year, there was a little mix-up with the certificates when Lena inadvertently switched the MVP and MVC names. Could this have been another Lena-gate year? A little suspicious that the person who had the trophies made up won MVP. Hmmmm... Maybe next year, the voting process will be handed off to someone not on the team to eliminate suspicions of tampering with the nominees.



Isn't that a beautiful shirt? John fights off the sleepies.

I can't believe summer is coming to an end so soon. This will be a very busy week with Sean's 40th on Wednesday and Joey L's 30th on Friday. Then we're off to the Outer Banks for Labor Day weekend. We'll have some newcomers this time with the addition of Mark B and girlfriend Julie (all the way from RI!) and Joey L and girlfriend Michelle. It's been a while since we've had new folks join us. Hopefully, one of them knows how to cook too!!!

Have an awesome week!

Mmmmm... Chocolate!

John and I went to see the new Charlie and the Chocolate Factory today and as weird as it was, I enjoyed it. The feeling of the movie is definitely Tim Burton-esque, which means Johnny Depp was the perfect person to play the Willy Wonka role. We originally only got some popcorn and a drink, but after seeing the chocolate river, I needed a chocolate fix! I went out and got a soda refill and some M & M's. YUM!

Not much else is going on. John and I may go down to the southern MD house after his doc appointment tomorrow. He has at least another week off due to the mono, so we might as well go down and put up the new mini blinds we bought the other week.

UPDATE : UPDATE : UPDATE
Hmmm... I started this blog Wednesday night and never got back to it. Getting old (and not having worked in 3 months) has my brain all frazzled. Just returned from a quick overnight trip to the beach house. John put up some mini blinds in our bedroom and we just hung out, reading and napping. I got half a dozen YUMMY crabs for dinner yesterday and ate 3 last night and 4 today. Now, you may be thinking, "3 plus 4 is not half a dozen!". It turns out they gave me an extra one! A yummy surprise when I discovered their miscount.

Of course, on the way down to Leonardtown and on the way back, we stopped at Rita's for a couple Misto's. Unfortunately, John hasn't been able to find the "Mint Chocolate Chip" flavor since his first Misto earlier this summer. I think that is his favorite so far. I'm partial to the Black Cherry myself, which no one seems to have anymore either. So, I keep trying something new each time. They're all OK, but I may stick with Cherry for the rest of the summer (unless Black Cherry is available). If they'd only open one in Laurel and year-round, we'd be set!!!

So John's mono has him off work till after Labor Day (doc's orders!). We have all this time to spend together! It's like a glimpse into what life might be like when we're old and retired. Two old folks hangin' out.

Wishing everyone a fantastic weekend!

Saludos de Laurel!

That's Greetings from Laurel. I don't know Spanish and apparently, I'm very good at overlooking it when my eyes are only drawn to the pretty pictures on postcards. See, last week when I was at Epcot, I bought some postcards and sent one to my darling husband. I picked one that had 4 scenes - Epcot, Mickey, some tree and Cinderella's castle. John must have had a big laugh when he got the card, as he said he thought I sent the Spanish card as a joke. When I got home, he asked about it. I had no idea and he showed me the front of the postcard. The only thing I could do was laugh at myself. Is it more comical that he thought I sent it to be funny or that I had no idea I picked up, not one but TWO, cards in Spanish?

So John found out today the reason he's been so tired, achy, and feverish is he has Mono, just as Mark had suggested. The only cure for Mono is stress-free rest and lots of it. Seeing as John's job requires lots of physical labor, he's been given orders by the doctor to take the rest of this week and next week off. He may be off the following week too! We talked about how this may affect beach week, but Mono isn't a contagious disease unless you're swapping saliva with someone. Hopefully, he'll be well by then!

Saturday, I left John to fend for himself and went to a housewarming party at Shaun (aka Jake) and Lena's. They recently moved to a townhouse about 6.5 miles north of our house. Lots of great food and fun, although it was 100 degrees and humid that day. I somehow managed to escape the party without any mosquito bites!

I leave you with this picture of me at the Coca-Cola Museum in Atlanta:


Coca-Cola Polar Bear

It was pretty interesting and I made sure to drink $9 worth of free soda samples to get the most out of the admission price. They had flavored sodas from all over the world. Some were yummy, some just plain weird. I tried an Orange Coke from Germany (I think) and the Watermelon soda from China wasn't bad. My favorite was the Lychee soda... from Thailand, of course! I wonder if you can get it at the Thai Market. I'll have to scope it out next time I go there for pork skewers and sticky rice!

Message to Bill C of DE: Come down and visit us while you're still unemployed!!! Maybe we can go to a Nat's game and get you some skewers to take home.

Till next time, folks...

Seven Days, 2075 miles

Hot and humid Epcot!

We started our family vacation to Florida last Saturday and returned Friday night. I can't recall a time when I was so happy to be home, especially since John didn't go and he was home sick all week. By family, I mean my mom, dad and aunt. We went to visit a friend in Orlando, then hopped up to Gainesville to visit Mac & Amanda, who used to work with mom at Sears, and then to Atlanta to visit the niece of my aunt's friend.

During this journey, I did most of the driving... carting the old folks down and up the east coast. I never realized how wacky my folks are. Have they always been this way or is it just that they're getting old? For example, my dad has always been a map fiend. He has always been very thorough about researching the route we're to navigate before our travels. I remember the trips to AAA to obtain the TripTik, maps and guide books before every vacation as a kid. But now my dad's obsession with travel seems to have extended beyond just the maps and directions. He tracks mileage and time milestones as we hit various points in our trip such as crossing into a new state, gas stops, lunch stops, etc. He records these milestones into a mini tape recorder. What does he do with this info???

Overall, the trip was fun, although tiring. I got to see folks I hadn't seen in 20 years or more. I realize this is probably one of the last road trips like this I'll be able to take with my parents, so I tried my hardest to cherish every moment, even when my mom was back seat driving with no map in hand or idea where we were headed. It's nice to be home.