posts by year

2023

Osprey

less than 1 minute read

Close-up of an osprey while walking today.

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2022

Hanging Rock

less than 1 minute read

Great vistas from Hanging Rock and Moore’s Knob.

Jordan Lake

less than 1 minute read

Jordan Lake SRA is a convenient campground while in the Research Triangle Park (RTP) area.

Smoke On The Water

less than 1 minute read

Andrew Jackson State Park is a convenient campground when visiting Charlotte.

Linville Falls

less than 1 minute read

Boondocking along the Blue Ridge Parkway.

Chimney Rock

less than 1 minute read

A long and winding road for an incredible view.

Tallulah Gorge

less than 1 minute read

We check out the falls at Tallulah Gorge.

We Bought an RV!

1 minute read

We check out the Florida RV Super Show and buy an RV!

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2021

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2017

2016 Reads

2 minute read

Reflections on some of the books I read during 2016.

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2015

Gaming in Oregon, Part 2

3 minute read

On Thursday, we transitioned from epic and war games to euro games for the remainder of Chris’ gaming event on the Oregon coast.

Gaming in Oregon

2 minute read

Relaxing with gaming friends, old and new, on the Oregon coast.

2014 Books: SF

2 minute read

Science fiction I finished in 2014. What did you read?

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2014

BGG 2014 – Friday

3 minute read

On Friday, we played several new (to us) games and all were good! As has become tradition, Chris and I have thumbed our collective noses at the Hot Games Roo...

Asimov on Creativity

less than 1 minute read

MIT Technology Review publishes a ‘lost’ Asimov essay on creativity from 1959.

2014 FHS Lacrosse – JV v HSE

less than 1 minute read

Fishers JV Lacrosse drop a close match to rival HSE and the Varsity squad exits the state tournament in the quarterfinals.

2014 FHS Lacrosse – Penn

less than 1 minute read

FHS Varsity LAX notches a win over Penn while the JV sees a win slip away after 3OT!

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2013

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2012

GTF 2012

1 minute read

Came across this (mostly) finished draft of GTF 2012. Rather than delete it, I give it to you with little additional changes. GTF 2013 is coming up in just a...

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2011

Fiction and Me

3 minute read

Reflecting on this year’s reading habits…

iOS Bootcamp: Day 5

less than 1 minute read

Back home in Indiana after a week filling my head with iOS programming knowledge!

iOS Bootcamp: Day 4

less than 1 minute read

In the home stretch … four days of iOS development class down and one to go. I am a wafer thin mint away from the finish line. ;)

iOS Bootcamp: Day 3

1 minute read

My phone is on strike! It’s not talking to Xcode but I’m still cranking through exercises in day 3 of my iOS Bootcamp!

iOS Bootcamp: Day 1

less than 1 minute read

The first day of iOS Bootcamp (1-5 Aug, 2011) and my brain is filling up fast!

A Prelude to uberGeek

less than 1 minute read

I travel to Atlanta for a deep dive into iOS application development topics.

Bike to Work 2011

2 minute read

Today was the National Bike to Work Day. A couple of weeks ago I decided I would participate in this year’s event. This meant getting the bike out and workin...

GTF 2011 – Deck Building

3 minute read

My annual guys/gaming weekend wrapped up a week ago. I was able to play a few of the games I listed in my preview as well as some new (to me) titles. Before ...

GTF 2011 Preview

1 minute read

GTF commences in a few days. It’s the annual gaming weekend I and several friends started in 2000. This year marks 12 consecutive gatherings at Cumberland Fa...

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2010

BGG.con 2010

6 minute read

Another gaming convention put on by the folks over at BoardGameGeek has come and gone. Aldie, Derk and the gang continue to deliver an amazing show. I consid...

Moving …

less than 1 minute read

I’ve moved my blog over to my personal web site and into WordPress. Please update your link:

GTF10

1 minute read

For the 11th year running, our annual break from the rest of the world, GTF, happened last weekend at the usual spot in southern KY. It’s our chance to hang ...

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2009

Running in downtown Indy

less than 1 minute read

I typically run at lunch on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. Today’s run was a soggy excursion with light rain and moderate wind from the north. Fortunately, th...

GTF09 – Still Going Strong After 10 Years

3 minute read

Ten years ago, 6 friends had a meetup at Cumberland Falls State Park in southern Kentucky. The aim was to catch up with each other, play a few games and take...

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2008

BGG.con Day 0

less than 1 minute read

Arrived in DFW and hooked up with Chris Brooks. Spent the afternoon helping with the setup — bagging goodie bags, etc. Played one of the new Martin Wallace d...

Goo

less than 1 minute read

If you have a Wii and you like puzzles…pick up World of Goo (Wikipedia) from the WiiWare section of Shop Channel on your Wii. I played through about half of ...

TKD Results

less than 1 minute read

Caleb placed out of the medals this weekend. He recently passed the 2nd Degree test and is learning a new form. Also, since turning 14, he competes in the ad...

Youth Football: Week 6

less than 1 minute read

I was at the TKD tournament with Caleb and Tristan in Gatlinburg this weekend and didn’t see this game. Another loss but the report from Jill’s parents was t...

Nat’l TKD Tournament in Gatlinburg

less than 1 minute read

Caleb, Tristan and I are in Gatlinburg until Sunday morning for one of the 2 national tournaments run by their TKD association. It’s raining now but we spent...

Youth FBall: Packers are 1 – 4

less than 1 minute read

Logan’s team played the Steelers tonight and had a rough go, losing 0 – 21. Logan played most of the game at corner and the last few plays at nose guard. It’...

Youth FBall: Packers – 6, Colts – 12

less than 1 minute read

The team can’t seem to turn the corner this season. Lots of mistakes, particularly the false starts on 1st down handicapping them another 5 yards, contribute...

Renovations

less than 1 minute read

We’re having the floors on the 1st and 2nd levels of the house re-done right now. Everything is NOT business as usual right now. The installers were in today...

Youth FBall: Packers – 28, Giants – 29

less than 1 minute read

Another tough loss for Logan and the team. This time they were tied at the end of regulation and lost in double OT. Logan was in on many tackles again, inclu...

Youth FBall: Packers – 0, Patriots – 6

less than 1 minute read

Heartbreaker this morning. Logan’s game was early this morning and the dew was heavy. This meant the field was damp and the ball was often wet. Mistakes occu...

Packers 14, Eagles 0

1 minute read

It’s the first weekend of football for Logan. He’s with the Packers again this year (4th Grade league). The team has the same coaches as last year and they d...

2nd Degree Black Belt for Caleb

less than 1 minute read

Caleb tested for 2nd Degree and his instructor collar last weekend and passed for 2nd Degree. He had a couple of missteps on 2 of the forms and will retest f...

UK/Ireland

less than 1 minute read

Spent last week meeting with folks at our sites in UK and Ireland. Snapped a few pics with the iPhone. It does a good job if the conditions are right.

Tristan’s Dolphin Adventure

less than 1 minute read

For Tristan’s birthday, he and Jill went over to the Indy Zoo on Sunday to ‘swim’ with the dolphins. OK…they didn’t get to swim with the dolphins, but they d...

TKD Midwest Regional – 19 Jul 08

less than 1 minute read

We were off to Columbus, OH this weekend for a regional tournament. Caleb was on the sidelines this weekend, recovering from multiple, non-TKD injuries (he c...

iPhone 2.0

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Chris clued me in that the 2.0 software update was available. After loading it up, I wandered over to the new Apps section of iTunes to see what was there. L...

Camp Quest 2008

less than 1 minute read

The boys had a great time at camp again. The ride home clocked in at about 2.5 hours and it was as quiet as a mouse in the van. You could say they were worn ...

Quick Philly Trip

less than 1 minute read

Friend and colleague, Jason Brown, and I travelled to Philly this week on business and snapped a few pics on the iPhone along the way…

‘caching at McCormick’s Creek

less than 1 minute read

The family, dog in tow, hiked around McCormick’s Creek over Memorial Day weekend. We picked up a few geocaches. Tristan and Logan traversed Wolf Cave:

New 1st Degree Sr

less than 1 minute read

Tristan achieved his 1st Degree Sr rating over the weekend. The award ceremony was this evening. It took a couple of times for him to pass. He and Caleb are ...

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2007

Jekyll and Hyde

less than 1 minute read

The Mystery Rummy series is one of our favorite 2-player games. I pulled out Jekyll & Hyde this evening to play during dinner (I arrived late after unsuc...

BGG.con Wrap-up

4 minute read

BGG has hosted another terrific con. Hats off to Aldie, Derk, Vickie, Randy, et al for continuing to provide a wonderful board gaming convention. The move to...

Back from BGG.con

less than 1 minute read

Back home after 3 packed days of gaming in Texas. Bright spots for me were:

Gone to BGG.con

less than 1 minute read

See y’all in a few days. Out for serious gaming time with everyone at BoardGameGeek. Will be playing the new Essen releases and lots of other games and catch...

More Twilight Struggle

1 minute read

Jeff and I broke out Twilight Struggle this evening. It’s been a long time since either had played and it was slow going in the early turns reacquainting our...

Logan and Football

less than 1 minute read

Logan’s been playing 3rd grade tackle for the last 2 months.

TKD Nat’l Tournament

less than 1 minute read

Jill and the boys participated in the most recent national TKD tournament held in Cincinnati, Ohio on Sep 21 and 22. Jill — 3rd in one steps (sparring), Cale...

Cousin Roger

less than 1 minute read

No, I don’t have a cousin named Roger but I do have a co-worker friend that fronts a band named Cousin Roger. Jill and I went to listen to him at the Champps...

Potter

less than 1 minute read

Spent the last few weeks rereading all the Potter books and just finished #7. Good stuff!

Our new puppy…

less than 1 minute read

We added a puppy to our household about 3 weeks ago…as if there wasn’t enough energy in the house! 🙂

Mt St Helen’s photo published!

less than 1 minute read

One of the photos I took when we visited Mount St. Helens last year has been included in Schmap’s Portland guide.

New Black Belt

less than 1 minute read

Logan received his black belt this evening! Now, all the boys are black belts (Tristan in December, Caleb in April). Logan did not break one of his boards in...

Twilight Struggle with Kieron

1 minute read

I had an opportunity to play Twilight Struggle (twice!) with Kieron on Saturday. He came over after the boys finished TKD testing. We started about 2:30 and ...

Connelly – The Overlook

less than 1 minute read

Just finished reading the latest book featuring my favorite fictional detective – Harry Bosch. The Overlook by Michael Connelly is a quick read, clocking in ...

Simmons – Ilium/Olympos

less than 1 minute read

Just finished the Ilium/Olympos cycle by Dan Simmons. Like the Hyperion/Endymion cycle, there are a lot of interesting ideas tossed about. Unlike the other t...

Unplugged Afternoon

less than 1 minute read

Jill and I hosted an ‘unplugged’ afternoon today. A couple of families came over this afternoon and we played several easy to learn and quick to play games. ...

Winds of Plunder – Initial Impressions

2 minute read

I received my P500 copy of Winds of Plunder (WoP) a couple of weeks ago and have been itching to get it to the table. Finally had the opportunity to play a c...

GTF Recap

6 minute read

Long overdue…here is a recap of this year’s GTF. Three plus days of gaming with about 20 friends at Cumberland Falls State Park in southern Kentucky. It’s ou...

GTF in less than a week!

1 minute read

The annual gaming weekend I co-host with 5 other friends kicks off next Wednesday (Feb 14). This will be our 8th consecutive year for this party. It’ll run u...

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2006

TKD – New Belts for all the Boys

less than 1 minute read

The boys tested last Saturday for their next belt and all were successful. Logan and Caleb are now Red Belts and are 2 tests from becoming Black Belts. Assum...

Vanished Planet

1 minute read

I’ve had Vanished Planet for about a year and played it solo to get the mechanics down quite awhile ago. We decided to play this tonight during family game n...

Essen 2006 – Photos

less than 1 minute read

I forgot my camera. But others didn’t. Here is Chris Brooks’ set on Flicker.

Essen 2006 – Part 1

5 minute read

I’ve recently returned from Essen, the pilgrimage every gamer should make at least once. The game fair at Essen is the largest of its kind in the world. GenC...

Panthers Fall in Hard Fought Game

1 minute read

Undeniably, the two best teams in the 6th grade youth football league played today. They were also the most evenly matched teams. The final score was 9 to 6....

Panthers to battle Dolphins

less than 1 minute read

Caleb’s team won 29-12 over the Packers last night. Dolphins won 13-2 over the Steelers. Both are undefeated and will meet tomorrow afternoon to determine a ...

Tristan advances to Sr Red

less than 1 minute read

Tristan was awarded his senior red belt in Taekwondo tonight. He will be eligible to test for his probationary black belt in December. He’s worked hard to ge...

Panthers #1 Seed into Playoffs

less than 1 minute read

Caleb’s team (the Panthers) took over 1st place this weekend. They won their last game – 28 to 12. The other undefeated team (the Dolphins) also won but allo...

Football update

less than 1 minute read

Caleb’s team remains tied for 1st and undefeated with 1 week left to play. At this point, his team would be the #2 seed in the playoffs. They’ve allowed 20 p...

Whiskey Runners!

1 minute read

We fired up the family still, loaded a few crates of the best sour mash this side of Fall Creek and dropped it by the local speakeasy for some quick cash. Sh...

Nexus Ops

1 minute read

Played Nexus Ops this evening with Caleb and Logan. Picked this up online at TRU for $20 and free shipping. It’s a light science fiction themed war game that...

Football and Games

2 minute read

Caleb’s team is still undefeated after 4 games. With the exception of their first game, they have manhandled every other team they’ve come up against. With 3...

Caylus at Game Night

1 minute read

Game night at my place last night. 6 others showed up. Jill also played giving us 8 for the evening. Kieron gave us an overview of The Great Space Race and h...

Opening Weekend of Football

less than 1 minute read

Caleb and Logan played their first football game on Saturday. Logan is in his second year of flag and his last. He wants to play tackle sooooo bad. Caleb is ...

Invading Britain at Game Night

3 minute read

Last night, we celebrated the midpoint between our annual gaming weekends at Dan’s place. It’s been approximately 180 days since the end of GTF’06 and anothe...

What I’ve been reading this year

3 minute read

A mish-mash of stuff so far…mostly science fiction and some fantasy mixed in for good measure. Oddly enough, no non-fiction yet this year. Hmmm…I see a coupl...

GenCon 2006 – Day Two

4 minute read

The boys and I made the trek to the convention center for the 2nd day. I rolled for my prize at the WotC booth (after finishing my card yesterday, the line w...

GenCon 2006 – Day One

3 minute read

The boys and I made our way to GenCon this morning. We spent most of our time in the exhibit hall today doing WotC demos to fill up our cards for the prize a...

Ack! BoardGameGeek is Down!

less than 1 minute read

Apparently they lost the database server early on Wednesday. I didn’t see or hear about it until I went to look up a couple of games played at game night. I’...

Gaming on the eve of GenCon

3 minute read

GenCon starts in the morning. The boys and I will spend time over the next several days checking out the vendors, playing some new games and meeting some fel...

Friday Game Night in July

2 minute read

Finally able to hold a game night at Bob’s! The previous two attempts were cancelled for various reasons. We actually had a nice turnout for a Friday game ni...

Runebound with 4

1 minute read

I had an opportunity to teach Runebound to three new players on Sunday. Nelson, Patty and Jeff came over and we played for about 5 hours before finishing the...

Game Night – July 12th

1 minute read

I hosted game night this week on Wednesday. We had an excellent turn out this time — 9 players. Dave, Lynn, Bob and Dan played Louis XIV. Bob had played twic...

GeoCoin

less than 1 minute read

A friend of mine and avid Geocacher, IndyMagicMan, recently gave me one of his GeoCoins after helping him on one of his Geocaching adventures. This is number...

Coast to Coast

1 minute read

Back in April, we visited Chris Brooks’ family and explored Portland and the Oregon coast. Last week, we drove over to the other coast and spent the week on ...

Games by the Pool

less than 1 minute read

We went to the neighborhood pool this afternoon with the boys. While they swam, Jill and I did a bit o’ gaming. We played Jambo and fretted as the sky darken...

Game Night at Kieron’s

1 minute read

Friday was our regularly scheduled game night. Kieron hosted this month and we had a small gathering. Kieron, Leroy and I played Fairy Tale followed by Duel ...

Boston Wanderings

1 minute read

Jill flew into Boston at the end of the week and we stayed through the weekend to do a bit of sightseeing. We did sightseeing activities during the day and a...

Bus Drivers Strike

less than 1 minute read

Late Tuesday, the unionized bus drivers (Teamsters, I believe) decided to strike. Lovely that they chose TechEd to inconvenience, eh? Although, if I were uni...

Hanging out at TechEd

less than 1 minute read

TechEd (Microsoft’s annual technical conference) is this week in Boston. It’s been a couple of years since I’ve gone and was able to swing a trip this year. ...

War of the Ring

2 minute read

After GTF, Brian left his copy of War of the Ring at my house in hopes that it would see more playing time here than in Chicago. It took a few months but I g...

Play by Web — Wally and E&T

less than 1 minute read

Chris initiated the last couple. Here’s a game of Wallenstein at SpielByWeb for any interested:

Gaming over the Holiday and Fairy Tale

3 minute read

I picked up copies of Maelstrom and Mystery Rummy: Al Capone late last week and enjoyed a pleasant long weekend of gaming. We didn’t get to any monster games...

TKD Tournament in Ohio

1 minute read

I’ve been lax in my posting lately. Jill, the boys and I travelled to Westerville, Ohio (Columbus ‘burb) so the boys could compete in a TKD tournament last S...

The Golden Age of Greed, uh, Steam

5 minute read

Game night occurred at my place last night. I planned to give Domaine a go but 5 showed up so we decided to play Railroad Tycoon instead. We’ve played this a...

Logan Turns 7

less than 1 minute read

It was Logan’s 7th birthday this week. Happy Birthday Logan!

Games that start with the letter H

1 minute read

Taking a little longer than usual to report on our regular game night. This week we were at Jeff’s home and we had a total of 6 — a tricky number for game ni...

Spring Break in Portland, Oregon

3 minute read

We are usually warm weather spring breakers (Florida, that is) but decided to visit our friends the Brooks and the Humphreys way out west in Portland, Oregon...

Caylus is on its Way!

less than 1 minute read

Just received notification that my copy of Caylus is on its way…Woohoo! Or, is that Jill’s copy?!? I pre-ordered this last November but not soon enough to ca...

Drac is Back!

less than 1 minute read

Finished our play of Fury of Dracula this evening. We needed to wrap it up so Logan could get to bed. I moved into the same city as Mina Harker (Jill) and we...

Another run at Runebound…

2 minute read

Tristan, Logan and I squeezed in a play of Runebound today. The game only lasted about 3 hours this time but was set up most of the day because they took a c...

Game Night at My Place

2 minute read

My group’s regular game night is each month on the 2nd Wed and 4th Fri this year. I’m hosting on odd month (Jan, Mar, etc) Wednesdays. Last night I had a eig...

GTF 2006 – Day Four

4 minute read

On Saturday, I ran some playtests of a prototype by KC Humphrey (designer of Havoc) called Tres Amigos. It’s a card game loosely themed on the movie, Three A...

GTF 2006 – Day Three

3 minute read

I got a little more sleep but not much after Day 2. And my butt’s been draggin’ at work this week in the afternoons because of it.

GTF 2006 – Day One

2 minute read

Brian and I were the first to arrive at Cumberland Falls State Park on Wednesday about 3pm. Greg and Sean were about 10 minutes behind us and DJ and Don were...

GTF has arrived!

less than 1 minute read

The annual gaming retreat, GTF, with my friends starts today. That means I’ll be off-line until at least Sunday. It’s not a large gathering (25 this year) bu...

Taekwondo Testing…Again

less than 1 minute read

The 2 month cycle for TKD testing came around today. All 3 boys were ready and tested today. Caleb was testing for Blue while Logan and Tristan were testing ...

Game Night – Wallenstein

1 minute read

Game night was at Jeff’s house tonight. Dan, George, Troy, Jeff and I played Wallenstein. Kieron hung out while we set up the game and played the first coupl...

Gaming in 2005: The Year in Review

4 minute read

Last year, I became more serious about keeping stats on how much and what I was playing. BGG makes this a little easier since you can log your plays at the s...

Game Weekend!

5 minute read

What’s better than your regularly scheduled game night? Why, two game nights of course! Friday was our group’s bi-monthly game night. Dan hosted. We had seve...

Regional TKD Tournament

less than 1 minute read

Fishers TKD hosted the regional interschool tournament today. All three boys were signed up to compete but Tristan came down with a fever and sore throat on ...

Artwork for Shirts

less than 1 minute read

What have I been working on the last couple of nights? Artwork to use on the shirts for my group’s annual micro-convention (ooh, I like that). It’s our versi...

CC:A — First Play

2 minute read

I finally played the first scenario of Commands and Colors: Ancients tonight. I’ve been scouring the internet for the past couple of days looking for replace...

More Blocks

less than 1 minute read

The folks that are finishing this job in 2 hours work fast. I finished 90 blocks tonight in roughly that time frame. The pace is picking up but I’d say it’ll...

Working on the Blocks

less than 1 minute read

Commands and Colors: Ancients arrived today! The kids are in bed and I have just started working on the blocks. Separated everything by color and size. Start...

Catan

1 minute read

We sandwiched dinner between two halves of a Settlers of Catan session on Saturday. I had tried this out with the older boys a couple of years ago but had ne...

Organizing My Games

1 minute read

We’ve lived at our current location for nearly 6 years. It has also been a long time since we’ve done any rearranging of the furniture on the 1st floor. Over...

Railroad Tycoon, Cartagena, Havoc …

5 minute read

Wednesday was the first session of our gaming group for 2006. I hosted and had 9 for most of the evening. Jill and the boys hopped into a couple of the games...

Walking the Beach

less than 1 minute read

In addition to sand castles and swimming, we do a bit of walking along the beach. We usually head to the south end of the beach a couple of times while we’re...

Room with a View

less than 1 minute read

Sometimes the view from condo’s porch can be impressive…

Holiday at the Condo

1 minute read

We tripped on down to Florida on the 22nd for a bit of rest and relaxation. Bert and Irene (Jill’s parents) purchased a condo at Sarasota Surf & Racquet ...

On Air in 3, 2, 1…

less than 1 minute read

I’ve been off-line for the last 10 days or so. I’ll have updates up in the next couple of days.

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2005

Christmas with Jill’s Family

1 minute read

This weekend was the family gathering at Jill’s folks. Everyone planned to arrive just after lunch to watch the Colts continue their quest for a perfect seas...

Warped CD

1 minute read

I’ve been a member of the BMG music club for several years. A couple of times a year, I get a buy 1, get unlimited $1.99 offer that I use to fill in my music...

Game Night

1 minute read

Our monthly game night was at Jeff’s. We had 5 (Denise, Jeff, Kieron, Troy and me) on hand. I brought Ra and Havoc. While we were waiting for Troy to arrive,...

Christmas at my Parents

less than 1 minute read

We had our Christmas get together at my folks today. Kimberly and her kids were there and we all exchanged gifts. The boys received Nerf dart tag guns from t...

First Storm of the Season

less than 1 minute read

Seven inches of snow in most of central Indiana, including the Fishers area today. It started falling downtown today around 2:30. Left the office at 3:00 and...

The Busiest Time of Year

1 minute read

The shopping is mostly done. We still have not decorated. Tristan has school programs on Wednesday and Thursday this week. The older boys have a birthday par...

Let the Parties Begin…

1 minute read

The Saturday after Thanksgiving is our kickoff for the holiday party season. Jill’s family (the Curry’s) and another (the Waitt’s) have a tradition dating ba...

Turkey and Games

3 minute read

Nothing better than a little board gaming on Thanksgiving. Before dinner, Jill and I taught the boys how to play Cartagena. I picked this game up at BGG.con ...

Monster Twilight Imperium Weekend

4 minute read

Wow! I finished my first play of TI3 this weekend. I did not win by any stretch of the imagination. I’ve had this game for a couple of months and have read t...

Stormy Tuesday

2 minute read

It has been a strange bit of weather in Indiana of late. Tornadoes in Evansville the first weekend in November and especially strong thunderstorms across the...

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