Turkeys, Reunion, Rockettes - OH MY!
Hello everybody! I'm still among the living. *LOL*
I had a wonderful holiday/birthday weekend. Shall I recap? Of course, that's what this place is for isn't it?
Thursday - Thanksgiving
We had a mellow Thanksgiving holiday at my hubby's grandmother's home outside of Phila. It was very relaxed and I actually slept after dinner and missed dessert! Oh well, Lord knows I don't need the extra weight on my thighs anyway. There were only 12 of us and Ariel and Aurora were the only kids. Good time.
Black Friday/My HS Reunion
Michael started out his day early by going shopping (nutty boy). He needed to get some things for my birthday. I had to pack for the girls and myself since we would be spending the night in Allentown and then for the rest of the weekend in NY with my Aunts (more on that later). So needless to say I was running around like a chicken with no head. I thought packing for 2 nights would be effortless - na uh! When you have yourself, a 4 year old, and an infant to pack for, well, it took FOREVER! We were up to Allentown later than I had hoped since I'm always running late and this day was no exception. So it was basically in enough time so I could feed Aurora one last time before leaving and to give my mum-in-law her instructions for watching the baby for the first time, etc. I had knots in my tummy on the way to my reunion. It was at the Iron Lakes Country Club where my hubby and I had our wedding reception so I had that "tickle-belly" feeling from joy but then the flutters from nerves/excitement/stress of being late, etc. Oh it was much too much!
I opted to go "naked" to my reunion. What I mean by that is that I went without any make-up on (which is no biggie since I'm not a make-up wearer to begin with, but for most special occasions I do tend to put on some eyeliner, mascara, and lipstick). I arrived about 10 minutes late but so did a bunch of other folks. *whew* I would have hated to walk in and have all eyes on me. So I get to the door and Tim Graham takes my coat and I embarrassed myself by asking, "Oh are you on the reunion committee?" and he said, "No, but since I was standing by you and by the coat rack I thought I would offer." DUH DOLORES! Way to go dipshit! Anyway, I get in the door and there they are - the beautiful people - the reunion committee. Meh. I never did fit in with that crowd but didn't care and don't now either.
I got my name badge and raffle ticket with program and grabbed a seat at a nearby table where my buddy Matt Snyder was sitting. Just ahead of us in line was fellow LJ user, dcmoon, and she joined us at the table as well. It was great to see Dawn (that would be dcmoon by the way) in person after all this time keeping in touch only via cyberspace. We hugged real tight! After introducing Michael to her, I saw a familar face across the room. That face belonged to Doug Walbert who came all the way from Texas to be at the reunion. Doug and I went to school together since the very beginning...we were together all through our school years since Mrs. Silimperi's Kindergarten class! He's also the reason I got the nickname "Woody". See, in 5th grade we had an English class assignment to write and perform our own original play. We wrote "Snoopy and Woodstock Go To Hollywood" and I played Woodstock. Well I OWNED that role by dressing up like that bird even down to making a mohawk and spraying my hair yellow. Oh boy. Ever since then, kids called me Woodstock which eventually got shortened down to just WOODY. So do you think I got a picture of myself with him? Nope. I was just too busy talking, showing pictures, and playing catch-up and shit.
With Doug was his lovely wife whose name is totally escaping me - dammit. I really liked her. She is gorgeous (Way to go, Doogie!) and very nice to boot! She's also a Faire fan as they live nearby (by nearby I mean about a couple of hours away) from Scarborough Faire, TX. Also with them was Steven Tirpak...he's another one whom I went to school with since grade school days. Besides, Doug, Steve, and I had history from being in the same neighborhood and after high school they were in a band called MID-EVIL and I have their first tape still with guitar pick even! HA HA! I also showed the guys some pics I took of them from back in the day practicing and whatnot. It turns out that my photo albums were a huge hit actually at the reunion. I got scolded by a few folks for not sending some pics to Pat Slattery (he was the reunion coordinator) to put up on the big screen. Yeah ok...right...the only folks who made it up on the big screen were "the beautiful people". All the pics were of them. Pfft.
Then it was HELLO, GORGEOUS! Ted Falcon came and he's famous now (sort of). He's a world renown musician! He played some instruments for us all...a tamborine-like thing, mandolin, and violin. He also brought us up to date with things going on in his life and living in Los Angeles. It was kewl because I really enjoyed the stuff he played. I unfortunately didn't think to bring any cash with me so I couldn't get his CD (which he conviently brought with him...*LOL*). The only thing was when I was talking with him I noticed as soon as I said I didn't have any money to buy his CD he became uninterested in my company. Oh well. I got my picture with him though. He reminded me a lot like that actor who was in Serendipity with the girl from Pearl Harbor...he played her fiance and was a New Age musician...anyway I digress. (Look it up in the imdb if you wanna' - I don't have the time or else I would)
After some announcements and such, it was back to mingling. I found some old peeps that I once was very tight with...John Klega would be such a person. I got my pic with him and then Dawn, Doug, myself and Klega got together for a group shot recreation...we were all in the same English class sophomore year and I have a pic of us from the last day of school back then. (So does Dawn too!) Anyway, I don't remember who took that pic but I know I want a copy of it! Another duo I ran into was Steven Denny and Christopher Wagner. Man, it's so funny how we all look the same but aged, you know what I mean by that? Anyway, those two boys and I were on a Whale Watching trip during our sophomore year (it seems a lot happened in my sophomore year, eh?) and I saved their assess, literally. We ate at Cafe 296 in Provincetown, MA (Cape Cod region - and is the 2nd most highest homosexual populated town in the USA) which turned out to be a gay bar/restaurant and since I was with the boys, it was the only thing that showed they were heterosexual for the most part. So I was their salvation...heh heh. I didn't get my pic with them either. I suck. Oh well.
Later I ran into Jose DeJesus - my partner in THE MOST SCHOOL SPIRIT category. He and his wife are just the salt of the Earth! Picture? Yes, I did manage to get a pic with Jose - a couple of shots actually. I also got a pic with dcmoon of course and I know Michael took a pic with Steve Denny in it. My hubby played papparazzi for me all night and I love him for it! Who am I forgetting? Oh yeah - a bunch of other folks I went to grade school with as well were sitting at the table next to ours so I showed them all my albums too. Donna Lerch actually married Larry, her high school sweetheart. They are both 1988 grads and have been married for 14 years already. That's so awesome! I showed her a pic I had of Larry from when?...why from MY SOPHOMORE YEAR of course!...and on the back I have the names of the guys in it - we have Joe Courey, Alex Deutsch, and Donna's boyfriend. That's what it said. See, I didn't know his name back then and just knew him as "Donna's boyfriend". They both got a good laugh out of that one. I'm glad I brought my photo albums as they really were a hit among the "neighborhood kids" - the bunch of us who not only were in high school together but middle and elementary schools as well. Other folks I talked very briefly to were: Amy Citro, David "Scott" Laubner (well actually we talked a while and exchanged info to keep in touch), Robert Migliore, Tom Luckenbach, Kelly Walbert, Sheri Reid, Patrick Slattery, Christine Kline, Daniel Franges, Tara Belfield, Bryan Landis, Tammy Miller, Barbara Plumlee, and Richard Gawlick...that's it. I didn't mingle much - I let whoever wanted approach me for the most part. I had the albums so it was easier that way.
Also I got my boogie down on the dance floor! Dawn and I danced for a while there towards the end of the night. I just loved that they played nothing but 80's songs as it should have been!
I had a blast at my 18th year reunion. As the motto was "18 years to get out and 18 years to get back together". I'm already looking forward to our 25th in 7 more years! Anyway, wanna' see pics? Alright...you can find the "Official Reunion Pics" over HERE and you can find Michael's pics that he took for me over HERE. ENJOY!
Saturday and Sunday in NY
We left early Saturday morning for Staten Island to spend the weekend with my Aunts so that we may celebrate "Turkey Giving Day" (see http://fairegirl69.livejournal.com/220251.html to find out what that means). We didn't hit too much traffic so it was smooth sailing. We got there about lunchtime and we drove thru White Castle to get a sack of burgers for ourselves! Ya' gotta' love gettin' a whole sack of burgers! Anyway, it was a very relaxing Saturday. Then for dinner we celebrated "Turkey Giving" and even John Scaltro (he's going to be Aurora's Godfather) came over and brought some killer eggplant parm and some cupcakes for dessert. After dinner I opened my birthday cards/gifts even though it was a day early since I knew I wouldn't really have time on Sunday. I even got a candle on a cake too! *grins* It was a nice day. I got the best gift from Michael though (I totally cried when I opened my card) - He got us tickets to see Phantom of the Opera on Broadway in February!! He had hoped to get them for the weekend show but that was the ONLY time when tickets were NOT on sale. So I said to him, "That's ok - now this can be a combo thing with Valentine's Day and you can take me out to a fancy restaurant in The City after the show," to which he agreed. SCORE!
Now on Sunday I had a surprise waiting. I was told I needed to be ready to leave by 7:45am so we can go into The City (that's NYC of course) for my birthday present from Scaltro. Well, we went to Radio City Music Hall to see their Christmas Spectacular with the Rockettes! I am a native New Yorker but this is something I have never done before. I thought it was just dancing girls. Boy was I wrong. It was fantastic! Now, I would like to make this a yearly event and start a tradition. I thanked John up and down (not literally) for buying us tickets. We had excellent seats too. After the morning show (it was at 9am) we headed on over to a place called Virgil's BBQ for lunch. We got there at 10:57am and we actually had to wait the 3 minutes before they would seat us. Whatevah. We all got the Hush Puppies to share as an appetizer and then Michael and I split a Sampler Platter that was on Special for the day...it had: Mini Corndogs, Popcorn Shrimp, BBQ Wings, some kind of sausage, and BBQ Ribs. I really enjoyed the shrimp and the corndogs, the rest was just ok. But boy was it enough food that's for sure!
Once we left there we headed on over to B&H Photo where Michael had to exchange a flash since it wasn't working properly. John and I waited in his truck for him and had some laughs talking about "the times" from when we were teens. When Michael returned we left for Staten Island. We hung out there for the rest of the day and we were home by 9pm. I had a great birthday needless to say. Here are the pics from Saturday and Sunday - mostly of the girls, Ariel & Aurora...MAKE WITH THE CLICKY HERE!
I had a wonderful holiday/birthday weekend. Shall I recap? Of course, that's what this place is for isn't it?
Thursday - Thanksgiving
We had a mellow Thanksgiving holiday at my hubby's grandmother's home outside of Phila. It was very relaxed and I actually slept after dinner and missed dessert! Oh well, Lord knows I don't need the extra weight on my thighs anyway. There were only 12 of us and Ariel and Aurora were the only kids. Good time.
Black Friday/My HS Reunion
Michael started out his day early by going shopping (nutty boy). He needed to get some things for my birthday. I had to pack for the girls and myself since we would be spending the night in Allentown and then for the rest of the weekend in NY with my Aunts (more on that later). So needless to say I was running around like a chicken with no head. I thought packing for 2 nights would be effortless - na uh! When you have yourself, a 4 year old, and an infant to pack for, well, it took FOREVER! We were up to Allentown later than I had hoped since I'm always running late and this day was no exception. So it was basically in enough time so I could feed Aurora one last time before leaving and to give my mum-in-law her instructions for watching the baby for the first time, etc. I had knots in my tummy on the way to my reunion. It was at the Iron Lakes Country Club where my hubby and I had our wedding reception so I had that "tickle-belly" feeling from joy but then the flutters from nerves/excitement/stress of being late, etc. Oh it was much too much!
I opted to go "naked" to my reunion. What I mean by that is that I went without any make-up on (which is no biggie since I'm not a make-up wearer to begin with, but for most special occasions I do tend to put on some eyeliner, mascara, and lipstick). I arrived about 10 minutes late but so did a bunch of other folks. *whew* I would have hated to walk in and have all eyes on me. So I get to the door and Tim Graham takes my coat and I embarrassed myself by asking, "Oh are you on the reunion committee?" and he said, "No, but since I was standing by you and by the coat rack I thought I would offer." DUH DOLORES! Way to go dipshit! Anyway, I get in the door and there they are - the beautiful people - the reunion committee. Meh. I never did fit in with that crowd but didn't care and don't now either.
I got my name badge and raffle ticket with program and grabbed a seat at a nearby table where my buddy Matt Snyder was sitting. Just ahead of us in line was fellow LJ user, dcmoon, and she joined us at the table as well. It was great to see Dawn (that would be dcmoon by the way) in person after all this time keeping in touch only via cyberspace. We hugged real tight! After introducing Michael to her, I saw a familar face across the room. That face belonged to Doug Walbert who came all the way from Texas to be at the reunion. Doug and I went to school together since the very beginning...we were together all through our school years since Mrs. Silimperi's Kindergarten class! He's also the reason I got the nickname "Woody". See, in 5th grade we had an English class assignment to write and perform our own original play. We wrote "Snoopy and Woodstock Go To Hollywood" and I played Woodstock. Well I OWNED that role by dressing up like that bird even down to making a mohawk and spraying my hair yellow. Oh boy. Ever since then, kids called me Woodstock which eventually got shortened down to just WOODY. So do you think I got a picture of myself with him? Nope. I was just too busy talking, showing pictures, and playing catch-up and shit.
With Doug was his lovely wife whose name is totally escaping me - dammit. I really liked her. She is gorgeous (Way to go, Doogie!) and very nice to boot! She's also a Faire fan as they live nearby (by nearby I mean about a couple of hours away) from Scarborough Faire, TX. Also with them was Steven Tirpak...he's another one whom I went to school with since grade school days. Besides, Doug, Steve, and I had history from being in the same neighborhood and after high school they were in a band called MID-EVIL and I have their first tape still with guitar pick even! HA HA! I also showed the guys some pics I took of them from back in the day practicing and whatnot. It turns out that my photo albums were a huge hit actually at the reunion. I got scolded by a few folks for not sending some pics to Pat Slattery (he was the reunion coordinator) to put up on the big screen. Yeah ok...right...the only folks who made it up on the big screen were "the beautiful people". All the pics were of them. Pfft.
Then it was HELLO, GORGEOUS! Ted Falcon came and he's famous now (sort of). He's a world renown musician! He played some instruments for us all...a tamborine-like thing, mandolin, and violin. He also brought us up to date with things going on in his life and living in Los Angeles. It was kewl because I really enjoyed the stuff he played. I unfortunately didn't think to bring any cash with me so I couldn't get his CD (which he conviently brought with him...*LOL*). The only thing was when I was talking with him I noticed as soon as I said I didn't have any money to buy his CD he became uninterested in my company. Oh well. I got my picture with him though. He reminded me a lot like that actor who was in Serendipity with the girl from Pearl Harbor...he played her fiance and was a New Age musician...anyway I digress. (Look it up in the imdb if you wanna' - I don't have the time or else I would)
After some announcements and such, it was back to mingling. I found some old peeps that I once was very tight with...John Klega would be such a person. I got my pic with him and then Dawn, Doug, myself and Klega got together for a group shot recreation...we were all in the same English class sophomore year and I have a pic of us from the last day of school back then. (So does Dawn too!) Anyway, I don't remember who took that pic but I know I want a copy of it! Another duo I ran into was Steven Denny and Christopher Wagner. Man, it's so funny how we all look the same but aged, you know what I mean by that? Anyway, those two boys and I were on a Whale Watching trip during our sophomore year (it seems a lot happened in my sophomore year, eh?) and I saved their assess, literally. We ate at Cafe 296 in Provincetown, MA (Cape Cod region - and is the 2nd most highest homosexual populated town in the USA) which turned out to be a gay bar/restaurant and since I was with the boys, it was the only thing that showed they were heterosexual for the most part. So I was their salvation...heh heh. I didn't get my pic with them either. I suck. Oh well.
Later I ran into Jose DeJesus - my partner in THE MOST SCHOOL SPIRIT category. He and his wife are just the salt of the Earth! Picture? Yes, I did manage to get a pic with Jose - a couple of shots actually. I also got a pic with dcmoon of course and I know Michael took a pic with Steve Denny in it. My hubby played papparazzi for me all night and I love him for it! Who am I forgetting? Oh yeah - a bunch of other folks I went to grade school with as well were sitting at the table next to ours so I showed them all my albums too. Donna Lerch actually married Larry, her high school sweetheart. They are both 1988 grads and have been married for 14 years already. That's so awesome! I showed her a pic I had of Larry from when?...why from MY SOPHOMORE YEAR of course!...and on the back I have the names of the guys in it - we have Joe Courey, Alex Deutsch, and Donna's boyfriend. That's what it said. See, I didn't know his name back then and just knew him as "Donna's boyfriend". They both got a good laugh out of that one. I'm glad I brought my photo albums as they really were a hit among the "neighborhood kids" - the bunch of us who not only were in high school together but middle and elementary schools as well. Other folks I talked very briefly to were: Amy Citro, David "Scott" Laubner (well actually we talked a while and exchanged info to keep in touch), Robert Migliore, Tom Luckenbach, Kelly Walbert, Sheri Reid, Patrick Slattery, Christine Kline, Daniel Franges, Tara Belfield, Bryan Landis, Tammy Miller, Barbara Plumlee, and Richard Gawlick...that's it. I didn't mingle much - I let whoever wanted approach me for the most part. I had the albums so it was easier that way.
Also I got my boogie down on the dance floor! Dawn and I danced for a while there towards the end of the night. I just loved that they played nothing but 80's songs as it should have been!
I had a blast at my 18th year reunion. As the motto was "18 years to get out and 18 years to get back together". I'm already looking forward to our 25th in 7 more years! Anyway, wanna' see pics? Alright...you can find the "Official Reunion Pics" over HERE and you can find Michael's pics that he took for me over HERE. ENJOY!
Saturday and Sunday in NY
We left early Saturday morning for Staten Island to spend the weekend with my Aunts so that we may celebrate "Turkey Giving Day" (see http://fairegirl69.livejournal.com/220251.html to find out what that means). We didn't hit too much traffic so it was smooth sailing. We got there about lunchtime and we drove thru White Castle to get a sack of burgers for ourselves! Ya' gotta' love gettin' a whole sack of burgers! Anyway, it was a very relaxing Saturday. Then for dinner we celebrated "Turkey Giving" and even John Scaltro (he's going to be Aurora's Godfather) came over and brought some killer eggplant parm and some cupcakes for dessert. After dinner I opened my birthday cards/gifts even though it was a day early since I knew I wouldn't really have time on Sunday. I even got a candle on a cake too! *grins* It was a nice day. I got the best gift from Michael though (I totally cried when I opened my card) - He got us tickets to see Phantom of the Opera on Broadway in February!! He had hoped to get them for the weekend show but that was the ONLY time when tickets were NOT on sale. So I said to him, "That's ok - now this can be a combo thing with Valentine's Day and you can take me out to a fancy restaurant in The City after the show," to which he agreed. SCORE!
Now on Sunday I had a surprise waiting. I was told I needed to be ready to leave by 7:45am so we can go into The City (that's NYC of course) for my birthday present from Scaltro. Well, we went to Radio City Music Hall to see their Christmas Spectacular with the Rockettes! I am a native New Yorker but this is something I have never done before. I thought it was just dancing girls. Boy was I wrong. It was fantastic! Now, I would like to make this a yearly event and start a tradition. I thanked John up and down (not literally) for buying us tickets. We had excellent seats too. After the morning show (it was at 9am) we headed on over to a place called Virgil's BBQ for lunch. We got there at 10:57am and we actually had to wait the 3 minutes before they would seat us. Whatevah. We all got the Hush Puppies to share as an appetizer and then Michael and I split a Sampler Platter that was on Special for the day...it had: Mini Corndogs, Popcorn Shrimp, BBQ Wings, some kind of sausage, and BBQ Ribs. I really enjoyed the shrimp and the corndogs, the rest was just ok. But boy was it enough food that's for sure!
Once we left there we headed on over to B&H Photo where Michael had to exchange a flash since it wasn't working properly. John and I waited in his truck for him and had some laughs talking about "the times" from when we were teens. When Michael returned we left for Staten Island. We hung out there for the rest of the day and we were home by 9pm. I had a great birthday needless to say. Here are the pics from Saturday and Sunday - mostly of the girls, Ariel & Aurora...MAKE WITH THE CLICKY HERE!