The Terrible Catsafterme

Time marched on as we attempted to free ourselves from the unyielding Winter tentacles of February. Still it was a relatively enjoyable month, despite the drudgery of the weather which was actually quite worse than January’s. It kept me mosty indoors, where I was mostly unmotivated to exercise or control my ravenous appetite. Jackie and I became enveloped in watching the TV series Lost. We blew through the first two seasons (which she had never seen before) during the first couple weeks of the month and polished off the third season by month’s end. I also allocated more concentration on upkeep of my music collection in iTunes than I had in well over a year. I’ve been busily trying to clean up the catalog and add new music in anticipation of picking up the new 160GB iPod Classic sometime soon.

The first high point of the months came on Sunday, February 3, when Jackie, Ashleigh, Derek, and I gathered in the living room to watch Super Bowl XLII. It was a great game and the New York Giants pulled though with a defeat of the New England Patriot. I was glad to see the underdog the victor. But I was even gladder to get pigs-in-blankets, chicken chunks, cheddar Chex mix, potato skins and ginger ale. Jackie would continue to make gourmet dishes throughout the months including a sausage-bacon-swiss omelette, cake, tilapia, fettucini, more pigs-in-blankets, and the best peanut butter fudge I’ve ever had in my life. I just need Spring to get here so I can go for my patented walks!

Baby in February

Saturday, Feburary 9 was a rather busy day. I started out going to the post office to attempt to apply for a passport. After waiting in the ridiculously large line, they advised me that they ‘didn’t do passports on Saturdays.’ I then went to visit my friend from high school Heidi Maynard. You can read more about our reunion here, which was unique because she lives in my old neighborhood in Beavercreek. While I was in the area, I decided to swing by my old house on Echo Hill before we met up. Then when I arrived at her place she gave me a tour of her house, which had belonged to our old neighbors the Hinds. After lunch we stopped and visited the final resting place of my grandparent - Dad’s Mom and Dad. I had never had my picture take with the grave, so I took the opportunity to have Heidi snap the photo. We then drove around my old neighborhood for a bit so I could get a look at everything - and finally we walked two doors up from her place to scope out my old residence. On my way home, I picked up a gift card from Kohl’s and bought myself a new shirt.

At the grave of Grandpa and Grandma F*rrell

That evening, Denise, Aaron, and Adam came into town and we all met at the Golden Dragon Chinese buffet in Centerville for Mom’s birthday; she was celebrating her 58th that very day. Ashleigh came along with and Bryan and Erine met us there as well. For some reason the food all tasted like crap that night. I always thought that restaurant was too good to be true. Now everyone has heard about it and they can’t keep up with having good, fresh food out. Oh well. I think I was the only one who was really complaining.

Mom and me on her birthday

Adam: Bring on the Chinese!

Denise and Yaht

Adam is delighted about Grandma’s card. Bob looks on.

Adam assists the janitorial crew at the Golden Dragon

Bob and Aaron spot a wheatback penny in the lucky Chinese fountain

Afterward, I dropped Ashleigh off in Kettering so she could see Derek’s band play and then I headed back over to Mom’s. Jackie and Grace met us over there and we played pool into the very late evening. I was still pretty-well sizzling from my last billiard encounter there with my cousin Chris. I ended up going home stuffed with both Chinese food and cake - which Mom had baked to celebrate her own birthday.

Thursday, February 14 was Valentine’s Day. I chose to take Jackie to Las Piramides instead of the usual Olive Garden dinner so we could enjoy a nice fiesta of Mexican food. It was a great dinner with great company as we sat across from one another and made the same goo-goo eyes that we were making at each other in high school, 1988 - so much so that I neglected to take any photos. Jackie bought me the third season of Lost. It was good timing as we were just about ready to finish the second season. As I mentioned, we finished it before we got out of the month and are currently working our way through the first season of Arrested Development.

That weekend, I met Denise in Beavercreek on Saturday, February 16, at the home of the parents of Denise’s old friend Ginger. There we enjoyed a little birthday party for Ginger’s oldest daughter Alexis. You can read more details about that reunion here.

Adam is ready to party at Ginger’s

The next day, Jackie and I made our way to Ascension for church. That particular Sunday would have been my Grandma Murphy’s 84th birthday. Nearly all of the Murphy family was in attendance with my Grandpa, all of the sibs, and many of the grandchildren present. One representative from each family carried the eucharist to the front, but I allowed Denise to fulfill the honor. Also present was Carolyn, Jeanette, and their Grandma O’Connor. It was nice to see Jeanette’s three girls Alex, Madi, and Emma who I hadn’t seen in a long while. Emma let me know exactly how much she missed me.

 The gang at Marion’s

I really do like pizza

After the service we all went to Marion’s for a nice lunch. Ashleigh, Derek, and Grace met us there. Some were going to a women’s basketball game after lunch and then visiting Grandma’s resting place at Calvary Cemetery, but we bypassed the game and went directly to the cemetery, taking my cousin Chris with us. It was nice to visit all of my Grandparents’ graves this month and I had Chris take a photo of me with the Murphy grave marker as well - even in the pouring rain.

At Grandma Murphy’s grave

The last weekend of the month, I had a special treat to bring home from work - my KTV training video that I had filmed in January! And when I say ’special’ - that’s the understatement of the century. Carolyn took Ashleigh and Briana skiing on Saturday, February 23, and when they returned to Dayton, she dropped both of them off at my house. I hadn’t seen Briana since Christmas so I was excited to see her. Naturally, teen that she is, she spent most of the time either on the phone, on the computer, or in front of the television - to busy for much quality time with ol’ Brad.

 Cynthia introduces me

One of my solo rants

On Sunday the 24th, Christi and Creed visited for the first time since Thanksgiving, so it was nice to see them, but of course they dragged out the new video and added my other performances in Time and Temperature and Road Tripped to the afternoon screening. I didn’t care. At least they bought me Wendy’s. We had a full house while Creed and Grace played, Christi caught up with her girls, and Derek was present - so I confined myself to the spare room and began the long process of actually cleaning it out. Jackie even got the twin bed prepared so that Grace could sleep in there when they stay over.

Our busy house on Sunday the 24th

After all of the work and company of Sunday (not to mention the pigs-in-blankets, Wendy’s cheeseburger, and fettucini alfredo) - I was surprised to wake up in the middle of the night with a horrendous stomach flu. I had to stay home from work on Monday as the symptoms got worse and my temperature rose to 101.4. It was certainly the worst I have felt since I had my kidney stones last year. Fortunately, it only lasted the one day and I was as good as new by Tuesday. What a nice way to end the last full Winter month…and by the way, nature’s final cruel trick was to make the crummy days of February last even longer by making this a leap year.

2008 will continue…

This entry was posted on Sunday, March 2nd, 2008 at 6:07 am and is filed under 2000's - Late. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.