Goodbye 2007

This is one of my favorite posts of the year to do. It's a recap of the entire year based on what has been written in my BLOG.

JANUARY

* I issued a few challenges to people to become more active BLOGGERS.
* Apple first introduced the iPhone.
* Major changes at my Company, including shutting down the Frostburg facility.

FEBRUARY

* My Buddy Phil got drunk on the cheap liquor I sent him and got verschnockered so he could not see his shadow. A lot of good that did, it snowed more AFTER he didn't see his shadow.
* Moke graduated from AIT training in Mississippi.
* Amy was in a car accident with Ralphie. They were both fine but her car was pretty much a total loss.
* Brittany Spears chopped off ehr hair. Oh the Humanity.
* I had my forst Doctors visit in 14 years.

MARCH

* I had my first of Four Diabetes education classes.
* I gave into the trend that everyone else was doing and went and started a MySpace account. Everyone else was doing them, I figured I better get with it or get left behind.
* West Virginia University Basketball team won the NIT tournament.

APRIL

* John Beilein leaves to coach Michigan in Basketball and WVU replacesd him with WVU Alum Bob Huggins.
* Softball practice started for the year.
* Terri celebrated her 40th birthday.
* The Virginia tech shootings had taken place.
* I had a full eye exam and right after the exam I met someone who would touch my life.
* I started dating Amy.

MAY

* Softball season had started and was well underways. I started out in a personal slump for the year, but got red hot once the slump ended and the hot streak remained the rest of the season.
* I made my first ever visit to Sarris Chocolates in Canonsburg PA with Amy and Josie.
* Renee graduated from M-Tech.
* I went to my second Pittsburgh Pirates game in my life. Lifelong fan, only the second game with the first being Willie Stargell's last game.

JUNE

* Amy and I had split up. My local squirrels started to get treated very well as I was paying more attention to them and feeding them to take my mind off of other things.
* I took a trip to Kennywood, this was my first trip there in a number of years.
* I retired my Cavalier and bought an Isuzu Rodeo.
* I attended the Rosiak family 4th of July celebration for I think the 10th or so consecutive year.

JULY

* I attended Morgantown's 4th of July Celebration on Morgantown's Riverfront Park. It was arguably the best fireworks display Morgantown had ever put on.
* I took part of a better fireworks display with Kim and Robert at Ron's house. A number of us pitched in and all I can say is WOW. A memory that will last forever for me.
* Josh Judy was drafted by and signed with the Cleveland Indians.
* The Daily Kneads closed its doors.

AUGUST

* Barry Bonds hit his 756th all time Home Run passing Hank Aaron as baseballs all-time home run leader.
* I purchased the domain name nicknterri.com, although I have done little to nothing in developing it as of yet.

SEPTEMBER

* Kim had a surgery to check on her medical problems.
* I first checked officially on the availability of Klaer Lodge for our Christmas party.
* I had a business trip out of town. I took a trip to the home office in Sterling Virginia for a week.

OCTOBER

* WVU men's Soccer played and beat the #1 ranked team in the country.
* We spent Halloween at Jean's and had quite a few trick or treaters come through.

NOVEMBER

* I officially reserved Klaer Lodge for Christmas festivities on the year.
* I went with Pam and George to see one of my all-time favorite comedians. Gallagher came to Morgantown and I did manage to get a picture of myself and Pam with him.
* WVU Football was ranked #1 in the coaches poll for the first time in school history.

DECEMBER

* My 44th Birthday is a day that I am sick, #1 Ranked WVU losses the 100th backyard Brawl to Pitt (A team we were 28 point favorites to beat) and the start of one of the worst months in WVU history.
* Rich Rodriguez announced he would be the second WVU coach this year to go to Michigan.
* Daniel and kamey made it to Morgantown for a visit.
* It was a time of reconciliation and new dreams to begin as Christmas 2007 happened at Klaer Lodge. Years in dreams, months in planning and my dream came true.
* 404 Posts for 2007. What a year.

See you in 2008.

Next to last post for 2007

Wow has this year went by fast, this will be post #403 for the 2007 year and tomorrows Goodbye to 2007 post will be #404 and the final post of the year. The last two years the funnest post I did each year was the final post of the year where I took a while and reflected upon that year based solely on what had been authored in one of my Blog posts each month.

The first time I did this was a Goodbye 2005 post I did two years ago. It was the first time I had a calender year of BLOG entries to refer to and at the time it was one of the funnest BLOG posts I had done.

Enjoying what I did in 2006, Goodbye to 2006 had to cap off last year. It was nice to reflect on what had happened the previous twelve months again and was a post that I really looked forward to.

Tomorrow's BLOG will be me once again reflecting on this past year. A year when I found and lost love, where reconciliations were made and new hopes futures were born. A Year where I saw the WVU football team rise to #1 in the rankings for the first time, to watch everything crumble apart on my 44th birthday and beyond. It was a year where I challenged Kim to do 100 Blog Posts and she was stepped forward and not only accepted the goal, but Met the goal for the year.

Enjoy tomorrows reflection of 2007 and have a Happy New Year, we'll see you again in 2008.

Christmas 2008

Started an account today with the money raised and donated from December 24 of this year for next year.

$92.00 from tips
$20.00 from Kim and Robert

Account opens with $112.00 in it today, looking for fund raising ideas over the next 12 months. Anyone have any ideas?

Big Ole Hairy Friday

Of course this was/is a short week of work for me being only three days, but the good thing is I have another four day weekend coming up after today so that will be nice. A chance to actually relax and have some fun and enjoy myself.

The coaching search for WVU's next football coach is still ongoing. Butch Jones was interviewed for a second time yesterday for the position. Previous people to interview that are still in the running are Florida's Doc Holliday and Terry Bowden. Something tells me we will not know who our next coach will be until after the team returns from the bowl game next week. It's hard to speculate who will be named as the next coach at this point. Too many twists and turns so far in the search to do any accurate speculating.

Enjoy your weekend on this my last day of work for 2007.

Looked at the new iPhone

I took a good look at the iPhone yesterday now that CellOne has switched over to AT&T and being the exclusive carrier of the iPhone. It would require an initial $399 to purchase the iPhone, then I would lose about 250 minutes a month and my bill would go up an additional $25.00-$30.00 per month if I switched.

I have always been a frugal consumer, so I am starting to do my research to see if this is what I want. I know it would suit me perfectly, because it would be a state of the art computer on my hip to carry around. My question is can I justify the additional costs and do I need this phone. I know the next generation is going to be coming out later this year, and from Kim's advice I may just wait until the next generation is released.

However if you want an iPhone, they are now available in Morgantown.

Back 2 Work

It was a nice long four day weekend (actually it was too short), and now it's time to get back to the grindstone and start working again. The good part is that it is going to be a short week for me (Three days) and then another four day weekend will follow with two Holidays for the end of the year and the first.

Fun, Fun, Fun back to work.

My final Christmas gift for 2007

Christmas ever 2007

Last night months of planning for Christmas eve and a large group effort finally paid off. The Christmas eve clock finally struck zero hour and Christmas eve. Around 6:00 people started arriving one after another to fill up the lodge and enjoy in a festive feast.

What a feast it was, I lost track of everything that was there available to eat. People had one or two things specifically eyed up became full before they even managed to to get to what they had their eye on. It was a feat fit for the finest of kings and enough to feed a very large army. Everyone had a chance to bring breakfast home for this morning, I know I just finished off a Hot Sausage Hoagie that I didn't have room to put last night.

After the feast I think we had 23 people participate in the Chinese Gift exchange. many of which have never been involved with one and playing for the first time. I think the exchange itself was the excitement and provided much of the nights entertainment. There were a few people who had selected and only one gift was stolen. Once we started to get about half way through the entertainment started. Gifts were starting to be stolen and restolen and so on. From tool sets to digital picture frames on a keychain, everything started to become fair game. The final play of the night was made by Mary, who was in the #1 position and started and ended the gift exchange. I think that this went well and created a few memories for everyone. It's not what you got, it's about the ever lasting memories that you created obtaining it.

There were plenty of images taken last night, not only from my camera but Kim, Amy and a few other had their cameras going preserving a special moment in time. I have already uploaded all of my images to my server and the Christmas 2007 Album is uploaded and online. I have also uploaded the images to Kim's Flicker site. I'll let her manage how it's presented, I have uploaded the images for her. Kim and I have agreed to burn of CD of each others images so we can both share similar images on the both of these sites. Hopefully I can get copies of other photos that were taken and create one big collection.

For me, this Christmas was long over do. It was a time of reconciliation and a time to spend quality time with family. There were no TV's, Video games or any other forms of electronic entertainment. There were board games, but we really never had an opportunity to play them except for a little random trivia as we were stringing popcorn the night before in preparing TreeZilla. Everyone left fed and had leftovers in tow. There were magical memories captured in many different formats and there were irreplaceable memories created and preserved. There was interaction, appreciation, love and special memories created in the whole process.

I have to send out a Thank You to everyone who helped make Christmas Eve 2007 happen. I had a goal of creating a piece of time that we will all recall for years to come in our fondest of memories memories. I think we did it we just successfully created that memory. This was not your typical going through the motions what did I get type of Christmas that our society has grown accustomed to. I think the only thing that could have made this any more special was a little bit of snow on the ground, but I guess we will have to keep striving for perfection.

Merry Christmas to all and thank you for helping my dream come reality.

Good start last night

We took over the cabin last night and managed to get both fireplaces up and running and Gary brought a Live tree. 8' ceilings and a 13' tree, needless to say it had to be cut down a little.

Gary, Nick, Terri, Robert, Kim, Brittany, Moke and Ang were all present and a big help in helping getting this started last night. I think it is starting to turn out pretty well.

Today is the day

Today is the day we acquire Klaer Lodge for two days. It has been next to impossible to get three people together at one time to organize anything, however it looks like it is going to be a good time. As disorganized as the organization was, I think this is about to come together quite nice.

We take over th4e lodge at 2:00 today, that is when I will be there to check in and register.

I've told everyone to BYOB, but I've purchased some cases of soda, anything anyone else can bring will help.

If you have any games, chips, cards, radio anything to help entertain it will be much appreciated. I went out this morning and bought a board game called Urban Myth, I know Kim mentioned a small Texas Hold Em Tournament, (Kim bring your chips if you can) and I;m sure there will be other forms of entertainment.

There are no TV's, Computers, Game systems or anything like that, you'll have to depend on spending quality time with your family and interacting with them to entertain yourselves. Wow, what a concept, families actually sitting around the fireplace on Christmas eve telling stories and playing games with each other. Oh the humanity.

Please anyone attending, check your egos and attitude at the entrance of the park and let's make this a stress free, relaxing and enjoyable time with the family.

ROFL

Ouch

As if losing our football coach and a couple large supporters to the University wasn't bad enough, I just read something that makes this all minor.

I read This this morning and lost all faith in my alma mater. Unreal and this is beyond the worst thing that could happen to WVU. Academic Integrity of the University has now been brought into question with the actions of New President Mike Garrison and the current Governor.

If this is true, Joe Manchin needs to be impeached and Mike Garrison needs to be removed just so West Virginia University can save face. When the academic integrity of of the University is questioned... Wow, unbelievable.

Christmas is getting closer

Christmas is getting closer and closer. The Family Christmas site has been very helpful in organizing this years event.

I work tomorrow then I'm off for a four day weekend!!!!

Daniel and Kamey's vist

My nephew Daniel has been visiting from Kentucky for the past few days. A Link to the pictures I have taken.

WVU BOG Statement

BOG Chair Issues Statement

By WVU Release

Posted Dec 18, 2007


Stephen Goodwin, chairman of WVU’s Board of Governors, expressed his support for WVU’s administration in handling the coaching Tuesday. In addition, Goodwin issued the following statement through the University:


“WVU appreciates donors to its academic and athletic programs. The University and the Board listen to their suggestions, as we listen to students, alumni, faculty and staff. People who are successful in other areas of life often have important insights into how we operate, how we are perceived, and how we can improve the University.

"At the end of the day, the University is governed by its Board and its President, and the people they appoint to positions of responsibility. Making donations to a public university does not entitle anyone to dictate policy or personnel. The Board has a lot of confidence in how Ed Pastilong and Mike Garrison are handling this coaching change. They’ve taken a responsible approach to this throughout – and really offered Coach Rodriguez and the team a lot of support in a very difficult time for the team. We’re heard a lot of support from fans, from alumni, and from donors – large and small – about how the University is handling this.

WVU went to the ends of the earth to keep the coach here – and clearly, some of our major donors assisted the school in that effort.

*His salary was increased by 70%

*His assistants salaries were increased

*We built a $2 million academic center for the team

*We have started construction on a $6 million locker room renovation

There were some very minor issues that he raised with the administration – and people were working on them. I think you will agree that the things that are being talked about are pretty minor in comparison to what has been done already.

But he clearly was looking for excuse to leave—he looked last year, and again this year. When he went to visit another team, and then came back to campus with demands based on those minor issues – university officials simply told him they would continue to work the issues. He was asked to focus on the student athletes and the upcoming bowl game. There’s a long off-season coming up to work out those sorts of minor issues. Whoever comes in as coach will know that they can count on support from WVU on big issues and small issues.”

This could be huge.

Everyone knows Rich Fraud has resigned as WVU's coach. Last year John Beilein left and walla, seven time coach of the year Bob Huggins decides to come home.

Well.....it may be Deja Vu again to an extent.

Nick Saban's agent has contacted West Virginia University.

For thos of you who don;t know who he is, he won the National Championship at LSU a couple years ago, recruited all the guys playing for it this year, was the Miami Dolphins Head Coach last year before leaving to take the job at Alabama, the one Rich turned down.

This could be H U G E


Oh, and he's from Monongah

Got to love Kevin Connolly

We started softball practice last year when John Beilein announced he was leaving for Michigan and Kevin said he had something in store for the next morning.


He just topped it.


LISTEN

Woo Hoo

I spent all morning Christmas shopping. I am officially done and all the gifts are wrapped! Now I can start concentrating on other things for next weekend.

One week

We take over Klaer lodge one week from today at 2:00. Christmas is getting closer and closer, maybe this means I should start my Christmas shopping sometime soon.

Rich Rodrigeuz ordeal

He we go again, only this time it's Michigan instead of Alabama. Rich isn't going to leave, I say they will have to drag the man out of man kicking and screaming and against his will.

With that being said and considering the ink isn't even dry on his new contract yet, it's time to start dragging him out of town and showing him the door. I have no problem with his program or how he runs this team, but the fans and this University have bent over backwards to accommodate one of our own, it's time to call his bluff.

Big Ole Hairy Friday

You have to love it, weekend is once again upon us and work is done for the week. Time to relax and enjoy the fruits of our labor.

The good news is it finally did stop raining yesterday. I stopped down at the Bar last night, and everyone was talking about all of the roads that were closed down locally. I think the drought is officially over if we were in one.

This is the last day of finals for WVU for the Semester, so traffic around town will be a little easier to navigate around for the next few weeks.

You find the strangest things sometimes.

I was surfing the net earlier this morning and came across this article. It's an article posted in an Australian News Source of all places. I guess the internet makes this world a smaller and smaller place every day.

HERE is the same article in Forbes.

In case anyone doesn't recognize the name, it's Jane's partner.

Tidbits

* I talked to Jean this morning, her Mickey and Sheila were heading out to Sheila's family Christmas. They ALSO get a cabin, for Christmas time like we are going to do this year. It's down in the southern part of the state, so she'll be out of town a few days. Rich is still at home.

* They said Michael has a new deli in down at the Valley Mart. They are serving Pizza's and Subs, so I'll have to swing by one of these days and try it out.

* Rain Rain go away. Pam called me this morning and was kinda trapped between home and work. I guess Pedlar Run Road was flooded and no one could travel it and the road was flooded near the shack. There are flash flood watches in Morgantown today.

* While I am thinking about it, there is a big back porch at Klaer Lodge, some people may want to bring a lawn chair possibly.

* I am actually on a pace to do 400 BLOG posts for 2007. I just wanted to average one a day for 2007, I'm already well above that total. Maybe 400 is a doable number.

* In 2008 I should reach my 1,000th Blog post since I became a blogger. Now it's nice to look back on to see what I have had to say during the years. I am glad I have kept the integrity of this blogs content in tact.

* Daniel and Kamey are on again. It's been entertaining the past few weeks reading people's MySpace, there are others, but this one in a weird way has been entertaining.

* This world needs more Bloggers.

Mid week

Hey what do you know, it's hump day and my hump day is already over with. I see the Family site has been generating a few new members and a little bit of activity. Don't be shy, type something people.

Klaer Lodge Photo's

I took a trip up to Klaer Lodge today. I uploaded the pictures I have taken of Klaer Lodge. I tried to get quite a few pictures of the lodge, so it could possibly answer any questions anyone had.

I had cell Phone coverage up there, but it did drop a call from no service, so Cell Phone coverage may or may not be available.

The downstairs is heated by a wood burner and a Fireplace, while the upstairs is heated by Propane.

There are two large sleeping rooms upstairs, one has seven single beds and a double bed, the other has nine single beds and a double bed. If anyone plans on sleeping up there, you will need to bring a sleeping bag or what ever you plan on sleeping in and a pillow. There are nothing but bare beds upstairs.

Downstairs there is a fully operational bathroom with an additional closed in toilet for the handicapped if need be and a shower. If you are planning to shower there, this isn't the Hilton, so you will need to bring a towel and any toiletries you will need to use.

The kitchen has a large fridge and the dining room also has a fridge. I figure beverages can be kept in the one in the dining room. There is a stove, a microwave and a double sink in the kitchen.

We will need our own cookware and obviously plates, cups and silverware.

Going to do a walkthrough today

After work today, I am going to go to Klaer Lodge and do a walk through of the facility to try to get a feel for what we will have for Christmas. I am going to take my camera along with me and try to get a few pictures of both inside and outside of the facility.

I'll try posting a few pictures tonight once I get back and try to answer any questions we may be having. I would tell people to call me, but as I am typing this I am in a monthly company teleconference at work, so I won't be available until I actually leave for the lodge later this afternoon.

Rainy day

Is anyone other than me ready for 80 degrees and sunshine? It's a foggy/misty type day that can be summed up with just a simple blah. I guess that could be considered appropriate because it is in fact Monday.

I guess I should just get used to it and send another case of wine and some assorted nuts to Phil up in Puxatawny so I can get his rodent rear end vershchnokered and blinded in preparations for Groundhogs day. Nothing wrong with an early start.

Yesterday I made a memorial ornament for Grandma Hall, Grandpa Hall and Dad for the Christmas tree this year. I went over to Mom's and took her and Gerald a couple loaves of Bread from New day bakery (Old Daily Kneads) and with a little help from mom and her nice printer, we put these ornaments together and now have them ready to go for Christmas.

Starting to get a few people signed up for the Family Site that everyone will have administrative access to. I have changed the settings for right now to private, meaning anyone not a member can't see the content inside. Right now it's going to be used as a communication tool for the family, hopefully this works out nice and I can keep this thing up and running even after Christmas.

Starting to get a little organized,

We are going to be doing Christmas eve this year at Klaer Lodge, but there is still a lot of planning that needs to be done and getting anyone together is almost next to impossible.

I have set up a family specific website that will give us a lot of options to communicate if we need to. Everyone is an administrator, so feel free to play with it. If you have any trouble signing up, let me know. If you have not signed up yet, use your first name as the user name and select your own password. Make sure you use the e-mail address you check the most also, this is also going to be used as reference so we can all contact each other.

Big Ole Snowy Friday

I wish that this weather would just make up its mind. It snowed for a couple of days, then yesterday it was starting to warm up and melt everything. This morning the temps dropped again, snow started to fall, and travel became tricky again.

I'm ready for the weather to increase in temperature, it's the weekend and hopefully I'm not sick this weekend.

Slippery Roads

With a nice little dump of snow yesterday to go along with a sudden drop in temperature, it made travel all but impossible yesterday. Pam called me this morning and said it took her nearly 1 1/2 hours to get home from work yesterday.

I went to Wal-Mart yesterday afternoon and the road leading down into it has two tractor trailers all sideways and hung up. One going down the hill and the other trying to get up the hill.

Conditions were less than favorable to motorists trying to get anywhere around the city of Morgantown yesterday. I heard this morning that there is a truck hung up coming up the hill on Scott Ave, good thing I work at home.

YESSS!!!!!!!!

OK, I got the scoop from the source. The Daily Kneads has not reopened.....BUT, it was rented out by the former bakers and opened up on my birthday (Dec 1) and is now back in business as New Day Bakery.

At least something good happened on my birthday.

Have I ever mentioned

Yes I know, it is snowing out. The one element I hate more than any other, the one that makes travel very dangerous. It may be pretty, but I for one have never liked snow.

Give me the warm days of summer, not this colorless blanket of crap that is dropping all over the place.

Is it softball yet?

Kellie Pickler

Former American Idol Contestant Kellie Pickler just showed kme she may be the dumbest woman alive.

Happy Birthday Kim

I would like to wish my sister Kim a very Happy Birthday today.It seems like every yer she gets one year older than me, I used to be older than her but she passed me up in age in 1985.

Happy Birthday Kim.

It Figures

This weekend was one of great expectation for me. One that you could not have scripted to be any better. Saturday was my birthday, and my Alma Mater was ranked #1 for the first time in school history playing in the 100th backyard brawl and a shot at the National Championship. It was going to be one of the happiest days of my life.

Let's see, I had a very bad case of the flu all weekend, so I spent the whole weekend sick. The WVU Women's Soccer Team was playing in the Elite 8 and ready to advance to the Final 4, but lost to USC. The Men's soccer team lost to Wake Forest eliminating them from the tournament and the WVU football team came to the realization that the Gold on Gold Uniforms is like our Kryptonite. We lost a game to a team we that we were 28 point favorites against.

Last night the WVU Men's Football team received an official bid the the Fiesta Bowl. Only problem is it is against Oklahoma, a team that we just don't match up well against.

To top off a horrible weekend for me, it's Snowing right now.