Greg Comes to Visit

Spencer's little brother, Greg, came to visit us this past weekend. He is leaving on a mission to Portugal in less than a month. We weren't able to go home to see him before he left, so we brought him here instead.

We picked him up on Wednesday night and took him to eat at Buffalo Wild Wings. They have pretty good wings, and we especially like the Honey BBQ sauce. Then he stayed in our living room. We put a bed in it, so it was kind of tight, but at least he got the big screen plasma TV in his "bedroom."

The next day Greg went with Spencer to the Bill's football practice. I guess that he had fun meeting the players, coaches, and people that Spencer works with. For one part of practice they needed Greg to play Defensive End. He was a little nervous at first since he has never played a single play of football. But he got the hang of it, and did pretty good. He got a few scraps and burns from gloves...but managed not to get too hurt.

We went to Taffy's for lunch. Which is a small place that serves Sahlen hot dogs and has tables that swing. It was a nice day for it.

That night Spencer and Greg played basketball at the church. I guess that Greg was quit impressive here, too. They played later than normal. And everyone was disappointed when Greg and Spencer had to leave.

By this time, everything in Orchard Park was closed except for AppleBee's. So we ordered stuff to go. Then we hung out at home and played NHL video games and watched a movie.

The next morning we let Greg sleep in. He must have been tired because he slept until 11:30! Spencer got to come home at noon and brought the best pizza in Western New York, Nino's. We played video games the rest of the afternoon.

That night we went to a Buffalo Bison's baseball game. We got suite tickets from Spencer's boss. It was a little chilly that night so we decided to use it. We watched the game and hockey on the TV at the same time. The Bisons were playing the Oriole's farm team, so Spencer was excited. He was especially excited to see their catcher, Wieters, because he is probably going to end up being a really good player.

Here are some pictures.














The Bison's won 4-1.

After the game we went to the Melting Pot and just got the dessert. We got Yin Yang and Banana's Foster. It's chocolate fondue that you dip strawberries, bananas, pound cake, marshmallows, cheesecake, and other things into. It was really good.

Then we went home and watched more playoff hockey. I think that Spencer turned Greg into a huge hockey fan.

Fall Out Boy 2009

On May 5, 2009, Spencer and I drove up to Toronto to go to a Fall Out Boy Concert. I got dressed up as my inner punk and wore my sweet FOB tee-shirt that I got from Spencer for Christmas, and we joined all of Canada's 14-year-old girls at the concert.

This is outside Ricoh Coliseum.

It was amazing. One of the best concerts I have ever been to. I had so much fun! It was a really good show. We watched Hey Monday, All Time Low, Cobra Starship, and Metro Station. We like all of these bands.

Then Fall Out Boy played. I have never had so much fun as being at a concert with my sweetheart singing and dancing to songs we love. Here is what they played:

Disloyal Order of Water Buffaloes

Thriller

A Little Less Sixteen Candles, A Little More "Touch Me"

Sugar, We're Goin' Down

This Ain't A Scene, It's An Arms Race

I Don't Care

Headfirst Slide Into Cooperstown On A Bad Bet

I Slept With Someone In Fall Out Boy And All I Got Was This Stupid Song Written About Me

Grand Theft Autumn/Where Is Your Boy

What A Catch, Donnie

(Coffee's For Closers)

She's My Winona

The Patron Saint of Liars and Fakes

Beat It (cover)

America's Suitehearts

Thanks For The Memories

Tiffany Blews

Hey Ya (cover)

Dance, Dance

Saturday

PNC Park

Our GPS is good at getting us to a specific address, but it is not very good at finding places to eat or get fuel. We wanted to eat at Steak and Shake and it didn't say there was one for a couple hundred miles, but then we saw one at the next exit. So we went to eat there on our way to Pittsburgh. There were some crazy drivers in Pennsylvania and West Virginia. But we still managed to make it to our hotel.

We stayed at a nice hotel in Pittsburgh. However, the people who worked there didn't believe that we were actually going to stay there. We must have looked like white trash or something because they treated us like we weren't good enough to stay there. We didn't have many bags, so we refused to use the bell hop and I think that that made them mad.

We ordered pizza and called our families to wish them a Happy Easter. Then we watched the Milwaukee baseball game that we almost went to.

Here are some pictures from our hotel window.







The next morning the forecast was cold and rainy. So we got a lot of jackets and walked to the baseball park. This included walking across the bridge in this picture.




The thing about Pittsburgh is that everything seems to be either black or yellow, just like the city's team colors.

Here is Spencer by the river with the stadium in the background.




This is PNC Park.

Here are pictures by the statues outside.

We went to the season home opener of the Pittsburgh Pirates. We got free hats.

Here's our picture out front.

I have always really like pirates. And this experience made me embrace my inner pirette. I love pirates!!

While we were walking around we saw some of the players right next to us, so I hurried and got some pictures.

We like this stadium a lot. We love that the city is in the background.

We were there for batting practice. It was really, really windy and cold. The wind was coming off of the river and was bitter cold.

Three police officers had died during the previous week, so there was a ceremony for them and the flags were at half mast. And McClouth got the gold glove.

Because it was opening day, there were a lot of people there that didn't care about the game. It was very distracting.

I really love the logo, too.

I really like how they cut the grass at this ball park. It looks like sun rays.

In this pictures you can Heinz Field where the Steelers play. It's next door to PNC Park.

During the game we saw Franco Harris, a famous Steelers player.

Also, during the game people kept getting up continuously. Especially the guy next to us. He didn't watch any of the game because he kept getting up. He got up in the middle to go buy a clock. The people in Pittsburgh all seem to look and act the same. Everyone was drunk and about 300 pounds. Two of these guys kept getting up and dancing together. There was an annoying guy behind us that kept talking during the game, but a nice guy sat next to us.

This has the parrot mascot who likes to flash his belly and move it around. He was hilarious.

They refer to the Pirates as Bucco's. This reminded me of my dad because that is what he calls me sometimes. I never made the connection of Bucco being a Buccaneer.

I loved the cartoon pirate. He was really funny.

We saw two home runs and a whole bunch of almost home runs. The Pirates won 7-0. We are good luck. At the games that we go go, whichever team is the home team, wins.

I liked the pirates so much, that I bought a whole bunch of Pirate gear. It's great!

After the game, we hurried back to the hotel, got our car, and drove back to Buffalo to pick up our doggies. We stopped at another Steak and Shake in Erie on the way home. It is really good food. The hamburgers are made from steak. And we got malt milkshakes. Yum!

All in all, we had an awesome baseball road trip. We can't wait for the next one.

Great American Ball Park

We used Hotwire to reserve our hotels. We were nervous about it at first because we had never used it. But it worked out well for us. We got four star hotels for cheaper than one star hotels.

We stayed in the Cincinnatian Hotel. The valets wore top hats and coats with tails. It was cute. Our balcony went out to the lobby where there was someone playing music on the piano. It was nice. We ordered room service and got some delicious banana bread pudding. I took another bubble bath and took more Benedryl to aid my itching. We both put on lotion because Spencer had gotten sun burned.



Here's a picture from our balcony.



This is a picture of our room's balcony.



The next morning we put on sunscreen and walked to the Great American Ball Park. The downtown area of Cincinnati is really nice and has a good, safe feel to it. We liked it a lot.



Here we are out front.



These are the statues in front of the park.






Here is the city.



This is the logo. My dad's favorite team as a child was the Reds, so I kept thinking about him.



We got some really good seats from a guy that Spencer works with, named Gary. We were really close and got to watch batting practice.

Here I am in our seats from the edge of the field.

This is the dug out.

Here is Spencer by the field during batting practice.

During the game they had Bingo card that you could mark off spots for different plays. It was really fun, and we almost won.

The hot dogs here were weird because they tasted like hamburgers.

We really like the mascot. He looks like a crazy Italian to me.

The ball park looks kind of like a steam boat and is right on the Ohio River.

This pitcher had a complete game. He did really well.

This guy's name is Encarnacion and I kept thinking of Nacho Libre when he sings the song for the girl and says this name over and over.

We saw an amazing double play and a triple play! It was awesome! The reds won 2-0. A foul ball came by us and some jerks got it and wouldn't give it to the kids. They kept it! We booed them, and it really made me mad.

When the Reds got a run and when they won, they would blow the steamboat whistle and shoot fireworks from the two towers.

Here is the Ohio River with steamboats on it.

This is a cool looking building. I thought of my brother-in-law, Ben.

You can see Kentucky in the background on the other side of the river.

This is Paul Brown Stadium where the Cincinnati Bengals play.

We walked back to the hotel and then we drove to Pittsburgh. As we drove to Pittsburgh, we drove through a tiny corner of West Virginia. We listened to the song by John Denver "West Virginia Mountain Mama." My mom always sings this song. So I called her. This was Easter Sunday. The weather was nice. We didn't do anything traditional, but we had fun.