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Updated:
06/04/10 |
Mike's Blog
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| #1 Fun Event | Mike: Terry: Hilton Head vacation |
| #2 Fun Event | Mike: Bauer visit in May Terry: Footmas 2007 |
| #3 Fun Event | Mike: Sprinkler zone
installation with Aaron in pouring rain (with
Bloody Mary's by Terry) Terry: Grandma Barb's visit |
| Best Purchase in 2007 | Mike: 50" HD Plasma!! Terry: Cast iron pan; Plasma TV; automatic shower cleaner; a new glue gun! |
| Best Projects | Mike: Backyard landscaping
& grass; new sprinkler zone; re-launch of
Budboys.com! Terry: Plasma installation and speaker surround inserts |
| Worst Project Progress | Mike: The 6 year hot tub
project or the $1800 bed that still kills my back. Terry: Painting the second floor; organization (see our sock drawer); actually delivering the items to be donated to Goodwill. |
| Funniest Event | Mike: The out-of-the-blue
Cindy attack on Mike!, Josh & Mike's secret
Tailgating Party in the driveway, Terry: Terry and Mike's Christmas 2007 Video Message disaster! |
| Proudest Moments | Mike: Josh being accepted
by the Culinary Institute of America in New York. Terry: Painting my very first acrylic landscape on canvas!, baked a successful ham. |
| Biggest Disappointment | Mike: No proof of Bigfoot
this year so I can prove all of you wrong!
He's very elusive. Terry: Still haven't been offered my own television show. I can do this! |
| Most Embarrassing Event | Mike: Forgetting that I
invited our dear friends and neighbors Gayle and
Marilyn to dinner at Applebee's... and we never
showed. Terry: Accidentally throwing-up in my underwear... while wearing them. (Don't ask!) |
December 12, 2007 - We had some nice snow showers last week... no accumulation, but it was pretty! Another exciting weekend! After 30 years, I finally got to spend some time with a friend I grew up with from about 5 years old. Chris Lloyd and I grew up together on the same street, attended the same schools. I moved to Florida when I was 16, but Chris and I managed to stay in touch. Chris was in the area for a family reunion and visited on Saturday. We had a great time catching up, sharing stories about our past - and the 30 years since. Interesting things were discovered, such as the fact that we went to school with Wanda Sykes, a famous comedienne and television star. The name always rang a bell with me, but it wasn't until Chris pointed out we were classmates that I understood why! Cliff and Amy hosted another fun poker night on Saturday... with about 13 people playing. I lost. Terry lost. And Jim, a recently transplant from Lexington, KY, started off good.... but no, he lost too. It was still fun, and we were more than happy to contribute a few bucks to the Messer household and friends (yeah, right!). It's official... Aaron is finally getting old! At almost 30 years of age, Aaron is finally paying the price for doing 4 splits during the song "Foot Loose" at his wife's company Christmas party. Now, I've actually seen this performance "live" at other events, and I have to admit it's actually pretty good... but you can now tell that his body isn't quite responding the way it used too!! I'll have to find a picture of this! We have a forecast for a major winter storm this weekend... but they're saying it looks mostly like rain. Maybe soon!! We want some more snow!
December 4, 2007 --
Ahhh... FOOTMAS 2007! We had a great time with some great
people on Monday night. Footmas made it's return... 23
people... Christmas music... 17 bottles of wine... and Monday
Night Football! It was a lot of fun... pictures coming
soon! Tomorrow is our first shot at seeing snow. The
forecast is for flurries or a light snow shower, no
accumulation... but it's snow! Hopefully it'll be the
start of something cool!
November 18, 2007 -- Thanksgiving is almost here! Following tradition, Andy will be joining us for some great food and fun times... the food is ordered (yes, Ukrop's does an awesome job and saves hours of cooking time!). We'll set up Woofcam during the festivities! Rough weekend for one of our neighbors... an intense kitchen fire resulted in about 13 emergency vehicles being dispatched, most of them staged in front of our house. Fortunately, the family is safe, but it will likely be a few months before they can get back in their house. We spent the weekend preparing for winter, winterizing the sprinkler system, cutting the yard and plants... it looks great! We're ready for snow! (And no, Terry's prediction didn't pan out this year... no snow in site yet but we're hoping!) Terry and I, along with Aaron and Lisa, went to Applebee's Friday night... and then went bowling. Terry kicked our butts and made $15 in the process. The neighbors are grumbling... and frustrated. It seems that our annual Halloween Party was sorely missed by many. So, to make up for it... Footmas 2007 is right around the corner! Footmas is a Mike & Terry holiday spectacular! It's a wine tasting party, casual holiday dress, great food, Christmas music... and Monday Night Football!! It's actually a lot of fun... and something a little different! Pictures coming soon!
November 11, 2007 -- We're finally getting regular fall-like weather... a few nights around freezing, and cooler, shorter days. Towards end of October, Terry drank some wine and predicted that we'll have snow by November 16-18. Now, that may sound strange... but I don't think forecasters do much more :). And, he nailed last year's first snow within 24 hours. We'll see how this works! Thanks Cliff and Amy for hosting another poker game this weekend... it was fun... congrats to Aaron for taking second place. Terry and I left broke but I guess that was the price of admission.
October 28, 2007 -- What a strange weekend! It's Sunday morning, 7AM... me and Dixie* are having coffee... watching the news... house is clean, orderly, no extra people around, back yard looks perfect. Why so strange? Well, last night would have been our 7th consecutive Halloween party. We decided to take a break this year. It's a lot of work setting up, hosting and tearing down. But it was strange last night as 8PM rolled around, and Terry and I (and Dixie*) were alone! We couldn't take it (and we were a little concerned people might still show up!) so we took off and hid at Applebee's for a few hours! It was a nice evening... but we both missed the fun! It will be back next year... bigger and better! We're house-sitting Dixie this weekend (see the Photos>Pets and Critters page) while her parents are attending a shotgun wedding (literally!).
October 7, 2007 -- Happy Birthday Terry! What a great weekend! My brother and sister-in-law (Bill and Cindy) can down from Maryland to spend the weekend with us/ It happened to be Terry's birthday this weekend (on the 6th), my brothers birthday was 4 weeks ago, Cindy's birthday is coming up, Lisa's birthday is this week... so it was a great opportunity to just party and have fun and celebrate a bunch of birthdays! Terry finally got 4 wireless microphones for our Karaoke setup... and huge help and improvement! They also work great in the gameroom for those wanting to sing along with the tunes - OK, pretty much everyone! They really are very cool! Friday night ended at 4AM Saturday, Saturday night ended at 5AM Sunday. We have shipped Bill & Cindy back home... 'cause we can't do that for a third day in a row! Terry's just too old for that. :) It was a great visit... can't wait to do it again!!
September 21, 2007 -- Wow! Oktoberfest has hit Richmond! We had a great time with Daniel and Brandy last night. We hit Capital Ale House in downtown Richmond, which always hosts a huge Oktoberfest party. Now, I'm not familiar with a lot of the German music - although I did recognize Roll Out the Barrel - but it was really very cool! Drinking beer out of a 1 liter stein gives new meaning to drinking a beer! I had enough trouble - but managed - hoisting a foot tall mug filled with beer. I have new found respect for those German women you see running around with 5 or 6 steins in their hands! After Capital Ale House we went to a new place down the street - Bank. Bank is awesome! Very cool bar! I had women crawling on me... it was so much fun! Great bar, food, music, dancing... it rocked! Watching Terry and Brandy dancing was cool - yes, even when they danced on the speaker box!
September 17, 2007 -- What an awesome weekend! The first real signs of fall arrived. Both Saturday and Sunday were crystal clear days, with highs in the mid-70's. Absolutely perfect! Terry and I did a ton of yard work on Saturday. That evening, we fired up the chiminea out back, opened a couple bottles of wine, and spent hours relaxing on the deck, enjoying temps in the 50's. On Sunday, I was invited by Aaron and Steve to join them golfing at Meadowbrook Country Club. We had a fantastic time! Aaron and Steve both shot great, I shot like I hadn't played in 3 years... but not too shabby at that! Didn't matter, it was great! Aaron is an outstanding golfer, I was really impressed watching him play - it wasn't just "talk"!! Aaron shot a 70, Steve was right behind with some nice shots during the day and scored a 74. My score... well, it doesn't matter! :) So, now it's Monday morning... and WOW does my back hurt! But it's a good hurt! Thanks for inviting me Aaron and Steve - I had a blast!
September 8, 2007 -- Labor Day is behind us and the temperature seems to be gradually cooling off. I spent part of Labor Day relaxing in the hammock... the weather was perfect! Last night, we had a bunch of friends over for a party to celebrate Mark's promotion... a great time had by all. Terry had prepared 10 bottles of wine... and everyone drank beer and Mojito's all night... not a single bottle was opened. So, I guess we're set for wine for Thanksgiving!
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Labor Day from Mike's Perspective.
August 27, 2007 -- We had a great weekend in Virginia Beach! Well, as good a vacation as you can have when traveling with Terry. Terry seems to be having a vacationing issue. This time it was food poisoning that took him out of commission for a full day. We still managed to have fun, Virginia Beach was beautiful and we're looking forward to going back.
August 2007 -- It has been a while, but not to fear! We've been busy, and we're not about to let you lose touch. First off, welcome to the re-launch of www.BudBoys.com! We hope you like the new, clean, crisp look of the site. BudBoys has grown faster than we had expected... and it was time for a facelift! Some of the changes will now allow us to post photo galleries, showing thumbnails, but giving you the opportunity to view higher-resolution photos by simply selecting the thumbnail image. We'll be adding more and more photos... our most frequent request. You will notice that we added some ad space to the right of the pages. If we make a few bucks off of ads to help support the costs of web hosting, etc., great. But - we promise you that you will never see annoying ads, no pop-ups, no strobe lights, etc.!
May 2007 -- May has turned out to be a busy month. The Bauers - Mike, Francine, Josh, Eryn and Eryn's friend Amber - all visited and spent a few days with us. They were our neighbors and great friends in Tampa... and we think about them and miss them constantly. We had a great time, although far too short... but it was fun catching up and relaxing a bit. It always amazes me that within 5 minutes, it's exactly like it used to be... relaxed, comfortable... and just like family. Eryn is in college in New York... Josh is checking out the CIA (Culinary Institute of America) and is doing great. Terry and I are looking forward to a vacation this month in Hilton Head with Aaron and Lisa... you'll be able to find us in 1 of 4 places: room, bar, pool or beach. It's that simple... and we can't wait!! May was also a very difficult month for us... we lost our beagle, Bob, after 18 years. She's going to be sorely missed... she was absolutely a huge part of our family and lives. We will miss her dearly. In the past 18 months, we lost all 3 of our rescued animals, after leading wonderful lives... Hooter, our cat who was estimated to be 24 years old. Barbeque, our other rescued cat, who lived to be 18. And Bob, who was still chewing bones through 18 wonderful years. All of them were rescued as kittens or pups... and we try to focus on the fact that they ended up having very healthy, outstanding lives. Thanks guys... you gave us a lot of happiness!!
April 2007 -- Ahhh... spring! Well, sort of. It did snow a week ago... very strange... 70 degrees one day, snow the next. Our backs are recovering from the endless hauling of mulch... fortunately that's done. Next is weather-proofing the deck... not a fun job at all, but the results are worth it. We're going to try and spray the sealer this time... we'll see how that goes.
March 17, 2007 - Happy St. Patrick's Day -- Ahhh... March, and signs of Spring. Of course, we did have some snow flurries last night, but it was as hot as 80 degrees last week. The grass is already greening and growing, and we've started doing all the normal yard preps. It's a fun time of year, if you don't count hauling the 100 bags of mulch to refresh the beds! We're also excited because we're finally getting close to taking the plunge into the world of HDTV. Yup, finally time to go high def. We're closing in the family room alcove over the fireplace (where the 36" tube TV used to be), and preparing it for a new 50" plasma flat panel. I think that will happen within the next few days... we're close! And we decided to take the plunge again and get another hot tub. We've talked about it constantly... we used our hot tub in Tampa so much, we certainly got our money out of it... and have missed it greatly since moving to Richmond. So, that's another big project coming up soon! Bob is doing relatively good, she's struggling with normal aging issues and we're keeping a close eye on her and keeping her as comfortable as possible. Today is St. Patrick's Day... and we're staying home! I think we'll be having some green beer and a good poker game later tonight. Speaking of poker, Cliff and I had a game in February... with 16 people. Congrats to Aaron, who took first place and won $260 - although he told Lisa he only won $125, so don't mention it to her! I think Terry was the first or second person of 16 to be knocked out, not a good night for him. I took 3rd place... for $25. We have another game planned for April 7... looking forward to it.
We found Winter! -- February arrived, and so did winter! We've had single-digit morning, and it feels like snow. But we haven't had much yet. A couple of light snow showers, and that's it. But maybe next week... we're hearing of a "major winter storm" that could hit central Virginia with "significant accumulation" that is due next week! Super Bowl is over and the Colts won... and Tony Dungy finally got the ring he deserved... although he should have received the ring in Tampa! But, at least he finally got his! Way to go Tony!
Where is Old Man Winter? -- OK, this is getting stupid. It's Saturday, January 6... about 10AM... and it's sunny with a forecast of 74 degrees today. An absolutely beautiful weather. I feel like I should be mowing the lawn, but it stopped growing a month ago. The birds are all over the place. One of my favorite things about moving from Tampa to Richmond was the fact that we'd have seasonal changes. I love all of the seasons... and I look forward to the changes. But winter is supposed to bring colder temperatures... and SNOW! It only lasts for a few months, but Spring isn't too far away already... and no signs of snow exist. They say the colder temps should arrive in 2-3 weeks... towards the end of January. Very strange.
Welcome
2007! --
2007 is finally here! Even better, 2006 is gone! I say
that with a smile, because 2006 proved to be a very long, difficult,
tiring year... that was also filled with some great rewards.
Most everything revolved around work... some major, unexpected
projects... and all turned out good. As proud as I am of all
the accomplishments achieved during the year... I'm really glad it's
over! No telling what will come up in 2007, but I'm keeping my
fingers crossed for a calmer year.
Terry and I, and friends from our 'hood enjoyed Christmas and New
Years. A fantastic Christmas Eve dinner with Aaron's parents
(thanks Steve and Deborah!); an awesome Christmas Day dinner with
Gayle & Marilyn and friends; and New Year's Eve at Cliff & Amy's to
enjoy some poker. It's so nice having such good friends
nearby!
Hope everyone's New Year is off to a great start! Keep posted
for more updates soon!
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