Movie Reviews

Over the past week Mindy and I have watched a few movies on pay-per-view at home. Direct TV sent us coupons for two free movies a month for the next year so we have a relatively narrow group to select from each month.

One choice made was "The Number 23". I would probably never have paid to see this film but some aspects of what I imagined the plot to be seemed interesting enough to burn a free coupon on. Well...as it turns out, it was not even worth the free coupon. The story was ridiculous, the acting terrible and only reason we stuck it out to the end was we were curious just how bad it could get. I cannot imagine how anyone would find this movie enjoyable on any level, in fact, we were both stunned that it was even made. If you have not seen it, don't bother and if you have, and actually liked it, please let me know what it was about the movie that you enjoyed. Perhaps we both missed something, but overall, it was one of the worst movies I think I have ever seen, which puts it right up there with "Face Off" and "Ghost Dad".

Last night we watched "Apocalypto". This was very enjoyable I thought. Essentially, it is two hours of action, tension and gore. Mel Gibson might be a crazy, alcoholic bigot but he sure knows how to film an action sequence. The violence is quite graphic and horrific so don't expect to be treated to a nice film about Mayans in the jungle. It was somewhat long (about 2.5 hours) but I did not feel this while watching...I enjoyed every minute. Certainly worth a look.

Weekend Stuff

This weekend was amazingly busy. On Saturday was our cricket final against our rivals from Columbia University. I lost the toss and they batted. We all bowled and fielded well and after a slight rain interruption, managed to bowl them out for 135. Every bowler took a wicket but Bert, our West Indian quickie, destroyed their top order taking 3/21, including a caught behind that exploded off the pitch and almost took the head off our keeper! It was quite an amazing ball.

I felt confident with the chase, we had a good batting side. Keith and I opened and I managed to get away to a quick start, hitting a 4 from the first ball. I ended up with 27 from 24 balls, our #3 had a similar innings and Keith and Oli got us there 2 wickets down with about 10 overs to spare. It was quite satisfying to beat them after a game earlier in the season had left a bad taste in our mouths with their antics. So Mad Dogs are the champions of the "World Series League" for the second year running. The story behind the name is quite simple...when we formed this league 7 years ago, we had to pick a name. Our captain at the time put forward the World Series League and so for the purposes of humour, it stuck!

After a couple of beers I drove home and had to shower and change quickly for poker night at Gary's. This was also a lot of fun. We played a 10 player tournament where I finished second (after two rebuys). Then a 6 player tournament where I finished 3rd or 4th (not really sure). So a $20 profit on the night and a lot of fun makes it all worthwhile. For the record, on one of my bust outs before rebuying I had JJ cracked by 99, but fortunately the cards fell the way they should later in the evening.

I arrived home at about 1:30, just in time for the broadcast of the Parramatta v Melbourne league final. Of course I had to watch and despite the result, it was a very good game of football. So I crawled into bed at 4:00am and managed to grab 3 hours sleep before getting up to help Mindy get ready for Fiona's 3rd birthday party.

It was a relatively small group but Fiona had a lot of fun. The theme was a "ballerina" party and the girls all had fun dressing up and dancing. Mindy then took Naomi to "Peace Day" with their "Roots and Shoots" group while Fiona and I napped on the couch.

So after all of this, I guess it is no surprise that I got sick on Monday. I have bronchitis and am on antibiotics. I am feeling a lot better today and should be back at 100% for my work trip to Vegas next week.

Back To School

Last week was the kids' first week back at school. For Fiona it was obviously a change but she took to it amazingly well and is enjoying all of the activities. Naomi also had to get used to a new class of people as she is now attending morning classes instead of the afternoon classes. I think she will do fine but it will take her a little while to make new friends etc.

They are both also in ballet classes this week, a change from the gymnastics of last year. They both seem to be enjoying it, we will see if it lasts. They certainly like the costumes and music!

Practice Makes Perfect?

...or at least makes you better I guess. On Friday night, a couple of other members from my cricket team met me in Morristown NJ to check out the re-opening of the Indoor Cricket USA facility there. It is really quite impressive - 3 full length indoor cricket pitches with netting allowing indoor practices at a really nice place. We each had a 30 minute bat and a bowl and it was nice to get the have a hit after work.

Saturday brought about our last league match of the year. If we won the game, we would finish top of the table and get to host the final next weekend. We bowled and fielded well, the highlight being a running, over-the-head catch by Ollie to take care of their best batsman. We bowled them out for 210 which was a decent score but I felt confident as our batting is our strong point. Opening the batting with Keith, the ball was coming off the bat quite well and I was able to ride my luck a little as well with a couple of sharp chances being dropped. The end result was that I managed to score my first century, finishing on 101 not out and with the Mad Dogs being quite easy victors, scoring the necessary runs for the loss of 3 wickets in the 23rd over. I guess if I was ever going to do it, I had to do it soon as few players get any better past their 35th birthday (unless you are a Major League Baseballer, of course). Now we have to win next week against Columbia and get revenge on them for an early season, distasteful match against them.

The Rest Of Florida

For various reasons, I was not able to add to the blog as we went along but I am now back from our trip to Florida. Over the last few days we managed a trip to Jacksonville zoo, which is a very nice zoo. I guess we are becoming experts in this field having young kids but it has a nice diversity of animals; it is flat, unlike Taronga; and is not so big as to be overwhelming. A recently added attraction is a kids play area where the girls enjoyed dressing up as vets and pretending to treat a procession of stuffed animals. Also, there is a nice little water park which the girls loved and it also provided some welcome relief from the heat of the day.

Next day involved a trip to the beach. Naomi loved getting dirty and enjoyed the water as well. Fiona was not that interested in swimming but loved digging and making "cakes" out of sand.

Saturday was Dave Schwab's wedding, which we were able to attend "kid free" due to having grandparents handy. The reception was held at Sea Island in Georgia, a very nice, quite exclusive resort. It was outdoors and for the first couple of hours, amazingly hot. Then, after the alcohol kicked in and the sun dropped, it was much more pleasant. After many beers and several "Baily's" to finish the night, the dance floor looked a lot more appealing. I vaguely remember doing my "Peter Garrett" impersonation at one point, but I might be mistaken.

Sunday begain the drive back home. It was sad to say goodbye to "Granddaddy" and "Grandma Terry". Hopefully we will see them again soon. We drove 1/2 way back without incident. Then we had to make an early start on Monday so I could get to the train station. I took a train the rest of the way and Mindy took the kids to Virginia to visit her mother. Life has been quite hectic since being back, catching up on work and other chores...hopefully I can get everything caught up by the weekend.

MOSH

Today we visited the Museum of Science and History (MOSH) in Jacksonville. It proved to be a nice diversion but was certainly not even close to the scale of other similarly themed museums we have visited. We were able to comfortably see the entire thing in about 90 minutes…although the main display had to be avoided due to it completely terrifying the kids. They had a room full of robotic dinosaurs and ice age mammals and Naomi and Fiona are just not into this at all. They actually don’t even like the Rainforest Café, which is quite tame in comparison.

I guess the biggest event of the day, at least from my perspective was at lunch when I chipped a tooth. It does not hurt but will certainly need some dental attention upon my return to NJ.

Tomorrow will likely be a beach day but we will see how things work out.

Birthdays and Florida

Late August is birthday season in our house...Fiona (28th) and me (31st). However, things have been too busy to have appropriate celebrations just yet. On Thursday night we began the two day drive south to see Mindy's father in Florida. 7 hours on the highway, thankfully avoiding any traffic hassles, got us to Wilson, North Carolina where we made our scheduled stop. Leaving the next morning, we spent the next day driving tha final 7 hours to Jacksonville. The highlight of the trip was a brief stop at "South of the Border", an non-politically correct "Mexican" outpost on the border between North and South Carolina. It is a collection of shops, loosely grouped together on the fact that "Pedro" is supposed to have stopped there and started a sandwich shop many years ago. The billboards advertising the place start about 100 miles out and show a caricature of Pedro and some bad pun of a slogan, often typed in such a way as to emphasise the Mexican accent. It is quite tacky but kind of an interesting place to stretch your legs. In the store we bought two Whoopee Cushions which amused the kids for the next couple of hours of the drive.

Since arriving in Jacksonville, we have basically been relaxing and hanging out with Mindy's family. Today we went fishing and the only luck one was Fiona, who caught two! She was quite excited and proud of herself. We plan to go back out later this afternoon when the tide is heading out.