Sunday, January 30, 2011

My 1st Blood Donation of 2011

The American Red Cross, Bob's Discount Furniture and the Boston Bruins joined forces for a Blood Drive yesterday. It was held at the TD Garden in downtown Boston, the home of the Boston Bruins and the Boston Celtics.

I scheduled a 9:00AM appointment to donate, and once again did the Double-Red Cell donation. So, JoAnne, Emilie and I took off for the garden first thing in the morning. After check in I was hurried off to get connected and begin the blood draw. Meanwhile JoAnne and Emilie went upstairs to take in the many kid friendly activities including face painting, balloon artist and puppet show among others.

Blades, the Bruins mascot, Buddy the Blood Drop, the Bruins Ice Girls and the Celtics Dancers were in attendance and available pictures. Also, some past Bruin and Celtic greats were on hand. We met, got autographs and pictures with:

Barry Pederson -



Andy Brickley -

Dana Barros -












It was a good take! We had a great time, got a tour of the locker rooms and in the end was able to help someone with my donation.

Wednesday, January 26, 2011

Frost Bite Burger


So, my dad came over the house on Sunday to watch the football games. Sadly, and still a rather sore subject, is how the New England Patriots were eliminated from the playoffs, alas.


Anyway, my dad arrived with ground hamburger meat and the fix'ns for burgers and announces, " I haven't had a good burger in a while".

Of course I'm thinking to myself, "oh great who's the lucky one that gets to do the grill'n", knowing full well that I had already drawn the short straw. The outside temperature here at the ole homestead at grill'n time was...wait for, wait for, wait for it 14.6 degrees!

I'm not even going to get into the specifics that the deck had yet to be shoveled or that the grill was buried in snow or that the grill cover was frozen to the grill, which proceeded to tear apart as I struggled to remove it. Nope, not gonna do it.

Best damn burger he ever had I tell you!

Sunday, January 16, 2011

Replacement Mailbox Now in Place



Here's my second project of 2011 - our replacement mailbox. As you can see this one is movable, so when future snow storms are expected I will moved this dude away from the street to prevent future damage.

The town reimbursement amount for damaged mailboxes is $40.00. The town will not pay more than $40.00 per incident per household per year. The resident must provide a paid receipt or invoice in order to receive reimbursement. Also, the DPW will not perform any of the repairs.

It doesn't surprise me that the town takes such a stance. They'll hide behind their belief that they're doing what's in the best interest of public safety. I've found it very frustrating dealing with the town on these types of incidents, alas.

Can you tell me where someone can purchase a replacement mailbox post, mailbox, reflectors, house numbers and concrete to replace the one they damaged?! Now tell me who's going to do the repairs? Who's going to cut the blacktop sidewalk so that one has access to dig a hole deep enough to mount the new post?

Saturday, January 15, 2011

Cold is NOT the word!

The outside temperature here at the ole homestead was a frigid 2 degrees this morning, yikes, but warmed up to a balmy 33.

Our old "The Weather Channel" wireless weather station died just before Christmas.



However, I scored this brandy new La Crosse Technology wireless forecast station as a Christmas gift. This new unit come with a weather girl, you can see her in the picture below. The benefit of the weather girl is that as the temperatures warm she sheds her clothing, WOW! I can't wait for the summer...

Sunday, January 09, 2011

Mailbox Down!

Awoke Saturday morning to a coating of fresh snow. We got about 3" here in our neck of the woods. It was light and fluffy so not too bad.

However, a town plow truck took out our mailbox, as you can see below! We've lived here for 10 years now and never had an issue with our mailbox. Ironically, the 'hit' didn't take place until 10AMish. At that time, the snow had all but stopped failing and the roadway was clear down to pavement. It looked like the plow driver was trying to get as close as possible to the curb and WHAM! Of course not only did he snap the post off at the curb level but also smashed the mailbox itself up pretty bad as well too. The surrounding neighbor mailboxes were spared and not damaged, just ours.

I called and left a message with the DPW, as well as sent them an email with the below picture. Let's see what they say and do. I bet they take the yeah, we're sorry approach and do nothing but we'll see.


Friday, January 07, 2011

Oh Deer!

Can I lend you a hand or paw or rather foot...yikes right!

I can't explain why this deer foot was lying in the road, against the sidewalk, in front of our house. I've not seen any three legged deers running around here lately. Interestingly, it looks like a clean cut wouldn't you agree? More than likely it fell or was bounced from a passing vehicle, as the roadway out front is in terrible condition with potholes galore. Prolly from the pickup of a hunter. I'm always finding stuff that has bounced off speeding vehicles, for example: hand tools (pliers, pipe wrench, crowbar), the green over sized landscape barrels (3 of them to date and their ~50 bucks a piece - no pun intended), several rubber blocks that you place behind your tire when parked so you don't roll backwards, and now this a deer foot. Weird huh?! Go figure!



Just the other day we noticed these two deers visiting the next door neighbors yard. We watched them forage for food just before dark.. Don't know how they do it but they looked in very good shape and didn't seem to be bothered by the teen temperatures or snow. Can you spot them?


See, she looks perdy don't she!?! And she has all four feet!

Vasilopita 2010



Above is a picture of this New Years vasilopita, Greek New Year's Bread. As always JoAnne did a fantastic job, as you can see - it was delicious! This year she scored the cake to make the cutting easier, which was tremendous!


My uncle has been doing the honors of cutting the cake for years now; for as long as I can remember. Although, he's been threatening to 'retire' from this task for years now, I guess I shouldn't have been too surprised when he turned the knife over to me this year and officially retired, alas! Yup, I've been tagged with this responsibility and hope I can do as good a job as "Unc" has done over the years. Of course with JoAnne's assistance by marking the cake to make the cutting easier how can I miss?

We cut the cake from oldest to youngest but always start with Christ first and then the "House". This year the House was the lucky recipient of the baked in dime this year.

Many, many THANKS Unc for all the years cutting and the wonderful memories you helped create for everyone! Enjoy your vasilopita retirement...

First Project of the New Year!


Hi all Happy New Year!

In an effort to keep the draft out and heat in we purchased and installed a insulated fireplace door. Nothing fancy just your basic, run of the mill ole fireplace door. It was pretty straight forward to install, however, I still threw my typical fit - whatev's.

Anyway, it sure looks better than that Christmas paper wrapped sheet of plywood that we had here originally, yes?!

Before -

After -