Chewie's Family Room (Twinsburg, Ohio)

We had the family over on New Year’s day for some grazing on great food and to watch the Steelers / Browns game.  My wonderful brother brought over a few 12 Dogs Of Christmas Ales… Outstanding!

I got a nice note that a good friend of mine Tom Whittaker had mentioned me on his blog about Father’s Day.  Tom’s an awesome guy and it really made my day to hear such nice words.  If you’ve got a few minutes get into Tom’s head by reading his blog here:  http://www.tomwhittakerblog.com/

My in-laws live in a community with a huge lake in the middle.  Last year for Father’s Day we got both families together and had a great big cookout.  This is perfect for A and I as we both get to spend time with our dad’s (and families).  It worked out so well last year that we decided to do it again this year.

The Crew Down By The Lake - Before The Rain Came

Everything at the lake started off perfectly.  The boys were having a grand time playing in the water and on the beach, the grill was kicking and everyone was enjoying the afternoon.  There were a couple of rumbles of thunder off in the distance  but it looked like it was going to blow over.  PLUS, Dick Goddard said it wasn’t going to rain so we were golden.  Yeah right.

The heavens opened up just as we got everything off the grill.  We did the flight of the bumblebee trying to get everything packed up in the car before we got soaked but to no avail.  It was just raining too damn hard.  So… I found myself rolling a grill down the street back to my in-laws house in the pouring rain.  Seeing as everything was already cooked & prepared, we decided to set up shop in the garage and continue our cook out.

The Crew In The Garage - After The Rain Came

While it was a little bit unconventional, I can’t remember a Father’s Day where I had a better time.  I really can’t think of a better way to spend a day than with my wife, kids, parents, in-laws, brother, sister-in-laws, brother-in-law and grandfather.  Can’t wait to do it again next year!

A Happy Dad On Father's Day

1. I’m part of the @clevelanddotcom Twitter Twenty! #CLE20
2. I live in Cleveland but I’m a Steeler fan. In my defense, I grew up in Pittsburgh.
3. I chewed tobacco for 17+ years. When I quit I started http://www.killthecan.org/ to help others quit.
4. I’m adopted. So is my brother but we’re not biological brothers. Still love him to death.
5. I once left a brand new grill in its box in my garage for over a month. @MikeHumphries was not happy about it.
6. I’m starting to think that doing this 100 facts list was a bad idea.  (Please note that I was only up to #6 before I started having second thoughts…)
7. Even though this list was a bad idea once I start something I’m uber stubborn. I will complete it.
8. Prime example of #7? The WrestleMania Project – http://wp.me/pj6R5-j7 First post in Sept 09 and still going.
9. I’m married to my high school sweetheart.
10. I’ve got two kids. I enjoy playing with their toys probably more than they do.
11. I have a blog at http://406northlane.com/ where I tend to act much younger than my age.
12. I have what some would consider “a potty mouth”. I freely admit it and don’t think it takes away from my character.
13. I blame @Ken_Diesel for giving me the crazy idea to do this list.
14. For some strange reason, I wasn’t even following @Ken_Diesel from this account. It’s been remedied.
15. All of these tweets will be compiled into a blog post. (You’re reading it now)
16. Sometimes I’m scared that I put too much of myself “out there”. Then I realize no one cares anyways.
17. I’m trying to be considerate and not flood people’s Twitter feeds. But its noon and I’m only 17/100. #GoTime
18. Robert B. Parker is my all time favorite author. I read his works over and over again. He passed away last year RIP
19. I wonder… does Twitter keep ALL of my tweets? Can I see every single one I’ve ever made?
20. I should pass 2,500 tweets during this exercise.
21. Megatron was my first Transformer. But I have to say Soundwave was probably my favorite.
22. I live in Ohio and I’m not a Buckeye fan. Sue me – I went to another Big Ten school. Don’t worry not Michigan.
23. I’m Polish. I enjoy Polish jokes. Anyone who gets bent out of shape over stuff like that is wound too tightly.
24. There are 2 topics I rarely talk about: religion and politics. It’s pointless. People have their minds made up.
25. I can no longer drink “regular” – diet all the way regardless of brand.
26. My family is the most important thing in the world to me. This should have been fact #1
27. I will be watching #WrestleMania 27 next Sunday evening. It will be awesome.
28. #WrestleMania 28 has already been announced to be in Miami, FL next year. I was hoping for #Cleveland
29. My all time favorite baseball player is Jim Thome. Got to meet him a couple weeks ago. Turned into a little girl.
30. I am fascinated by #tattoos but don’t have any… yet. I’ve got 3-4 designed in my head.
31. I just destroyed Taco Bell for lunch.
32. I will not tweet something that I won’t say to your face.
33. I’m convinced that there is a movie quote perfect for every situation.
34. Just bought this tremendous Voltron t-shirt: http://twitpic.com/4cu0ww
35. I’m pretty sure that this “Internet thing” is here to stay.
36. I truly do hope that I’m doing this slow enough to not spam up people’s feeds. I’d hate to piss people off.
37. Growing up I was a Leo. Not sure if that’s still the case or not.
38. I prefer Target to Walmart. It’s more “upscale” (though that’s not saying much).
39. I prefer Burger King to McDonalds. Their fries are FAR superior.
40. I was a competitive swimmer for 17 years. Amazing the difference between 8 miles/day and 8 beers/day #college
41. I’m pretty sure I’m addicted to fast food. Seriously.
42. IMHO there is only one “Trilogy”
43. I have some incredibly “pretty” Twitter followers.
44. Cleveland gets a bad wrap nationwide, but I will defend her to the death. It’s a GREAT place to live.
45. I love being a dad. Even though the kids are a pain sometimes, it’s totally worth it when they greet me at the door.
46. Though I’m being optimistic, I do not have high hopes for my beloved Cleveland Indians this year.
47. I stayed away from Twitter for a long time cause I thought it was silly. I still think it’s silly. #HereToStay
48. I’m starting to get worried that I’m going to get to #100 before the end of the day.
49. I promise to tweet less tomorrow. I recognize that this is ridiculous.
50. I am half way there. I am in fact, living on a prayer. #BonJovi

At that point, I made the following tweet:

I’m making the executive decision that 50 #100factsaboutme is more than enough…

And just like that… I was done.

To make a long story very short, Swami isn’t doing all that well these days.  I (like Pip) am not one to ask for prayers from others, but if you’ve got some to share please send them out.  She could definitely use them.

Thew, Richard, Lauren… I said it before and I’ll say it again.  If you need anything say the word and I’ll be there in a matter of hours.  Believe me when I say that it’s not just lip service.

Get well soon Swam… love ya.

Friday afternoon, 2 groups (Devin, Mark & I from Cleveland and Phil & Chris from Chicago) set out to converge on Brookville, Indiana where the festivities were to take place.  The Cleveland group started out the trip with the musical brilliance of Randy “Macho Man” Savage.  Yep… the wrestler.  If you’ve never hear Randy on the mic you really owe it to yourself to check this out.  You won’t be disappointed.  If you don’t have time to watch the clip then these lyrics will give you just a little taste of what’s up:

“People wanna know if Macho’s still in the ring
People wanna know if Randy’s doin’ his thing
Everybody’s talkin’ wanna know this and that
So I’m a tell ya right now Randy Savage is back”

Yeah that’s right… Randy’s doing his thing.  If that’s not enough for you, make sure to check out “Be A Man” where Randy rips into Hulk Hogan.  Classic.  Little did we know that as we were making our way down south the Chicago boys were having issues of their own.  The figured it would be a good idea to pick up a bottle of Knob Creek to get the party started.  Someone neglected to actually take the bottle off the top of the car when they drove away and they were subjected to watching a brand new bottle slide across the sunroof and off the back of the car.  Chris did have the good sense to ask, “Do you think it broke?”  Needless to say, the clerk at the liquor store was intrigued to see them walk back in about 8 minutes after they walked out.

Once we got there it was time to build the fire, set up camp and crack a couple of cold ones.  I think we had originally planned to just take it easy that night but before we knew it about half that bottle was gone and we were having a grand old time.  The campsite that we were staying at had “quiet” time starting at midnight.  Other than us, everyone in the campsite followed this rule.  We, on the other hand decided it would be a good idea to break out the fireworks… at 2:30 AM.  Writers note: It’s amazing what happens when you throw a full party pack of fireworks into a campfire.  It’s also amazing that we didn’t get tossed out of camp for this

Once the fireworks died down it was time to wind down for the evening.  Not sure why but I just wasn’t tired so I decided to take a stroll.  I also (apparently) decided to fire up my Twitter account:

Twitter/Facebook Update
3 and wandering around. Woot.
2:57 AM Jun 27th from TwitterBerry

Dude. Jason Voorhees would be creeped out by this place.
3:00 AM Jun 27th from TwitterBerry

And on that note, I called it a night…

Saturday morning I woke (surprisingly) early and decided to start the fire and the grill. We were in for a long day and had to get properly fueled.

Twitter/Facebook Update
I feel like the old guy on Survivor who’s up before the rest of the young whipersnappers. Gotta get the fire going. Tough immunity today#fb.
8:48 AM Jun 27th from TwitterBerry

After breakfast (sausage, eggs, hash browns) it was off to the river.  Per the guy running things the river was running fast – a 4.8 to be exact.  Though none of us were sure what the hell that means.  Adam took an afternoon off from his fatherly duties and joined us for our trek down the river as well.  We bungied our three canoes together and created the mighty party barge and pushed off.

My bro and I were in a canoe together and before I knew it we were headed straight toward a downed tree in the river.  Not sure exactly how this happened but next thing I know I’m under the water with my wife and kids flashing before my eyes – that’s right folks, we’d managed to capsize.  I still don’t know what a 4.8 for the river is, but I can tell you that I don’t think I could handle a 4.9.  The canoe was pinned up against the downed tree, with me under it.  Not sure where Mark was at this point cause I was doing my best just to get air.  Luckily I came up inside the canoe which had a nice air pocket in it.  Thank goodness the rest of our crew was so helpful… they took this opportunity to go about 25 yards down the river, get out, point and laugh.  Fuckers.  On top of that they referred to me for the rest of the trip as if I had died during that episode (IE: “Too bad Chewie isn’t here, he would have enjoyed this,” a la Ghost).  Again… fuckers.

In any event, we did eventually get the canoe turned back around and we proceeded to shotgun a couple of beers to get the BAL back to where it should be.  The rest of the trip down the river went off without event and by the time we made it down river we were very much looking forward to some time out of the sun.  As luck would have it, at the entrance to our campsite sat a Pizza King.  In retrospect it should have been called Taco King but I do have to say that the air conditioning was second to none.

The plan going into the weekend was to spend Saturday night at “a bar” uptown Brookville.  While this certainly goes against the concept of “camping” it’s perfect from a bachelor party perspective.  After our Pizza King excursion we all went back to camp and had a little siesta (which was just what the doctor ordered).  I don’t know about you but after a long day of drinking and a nap it’s BRUTAL to get up and get going again.  As we were making our way uptown Devin and I decided that the first beer of the night was going to be rough.  I’m proud to say that we went and brought it home like champs.  The bar in question here is called Who Cares.  If you’ve never been there I’d strongly suggest you check it out.  It’s all kinds of awesome.  Devin was THE MAN when it came to the “One Dart Challenge” and Mark reigned supreme when it came to the on site bowling ($0.25 per game by the way).  Our bartendress Regina took very good care of us and really did give us quite a bit of leeway.

After bowling, shots and darts we started in on the pool table and commandeered the juke box.  Looking back at my Twitter updates I see that we went completely old school.  All I remember is we had a damn good time.

Twitter/Facebook Update
Rocking the juke box with Ugly Kid Joe.
11:02 PM Jun 27th from TwitterBerry

Thunderstruck!!!
11:37 PM Jun 27th from TwitterBerry

I had to do it… Freebird!
12:42 AM Jun 28th from TwitterBerry

And those are just the ones that I remembered to tweet about (man I’m a dork).  I’m getting a little long winded here so I’ll just leave you with one last photo and a couple of “keywords” that will forever be linked in my mind with this great weekend.

• Regina: The best bartendress in Brookville
• Who Cares: all kinds of awesomeness
• Combos: drunk food for the ages
• Pizza King: better tacos than pizza
• Marko: hung in there like a champ
• Jim Beam: the shot of champions
• Canoe Fest: where are they all going?
• Donuts: incoming!
• Fire Dance: Devin – watch where you’re going brudda
• The Tree: Phil – it’s definitely more than 3 swings
• Shower: Chris was the only one that took advantage
• Beer: can’t really beat Icehouse, Busch & Natural Light can you?

There were a whole lot of “you had to be there” moments during this trip.  As an older brother I’m damn glad that I was there.  All I can say at this point… I’m REALLY looking forward to the reception