Mac Book Parody

I came across this today. It cracked me up!

Merry Christmas!

Amish Country

Happy Anniversary to us!!

For our third anniversary Nikki and I visited Amish country, or more specifically Lancaster County PA.
We had a great time! Here's a run down of what we did.
DAY 1
-Toured farmland around Lancaster checking out the Amish and their buggies and such.
-checked into our B&B. (Adamstown Inn) CLICK HERE to go to see our room and B&B we stayed at.
-Went to the Black Horse Restaurant for dinner. It was well reviewed at the B&B and they gave us a coupon. CLICK HERE to see the restaurant's website. YUM. The service was great too!

DAY 2
-Went to the Mennonite Information Center. We picked up a few souvenirs and checked out the informative movie on the Mennonites and Amish. Nice Ten thousand Villages there too! CLICK HERE for the website.
-Went to Issac's for lunch. If your in the area you should go to one. they have great sandwhiches and soups. CLICK HERE for Isaac's website.
-Then we went to The Ephrata Cloister. The Cloister was a radical Christian cult led by Conrad Beissel. CLICK HERE to see the website. I think i can sum up their beliefs like this: live your mortal life about as difficult and uncomfortably as possible and you'll spend eternity with God in paradise. I won't go into all the wierd things they believed but I'll say this, a board about a foot and a half wide and 8 feet long served as their bed. A wooden block was their pillow!
-We had dinner at the Shady Maple Smorgasbord. From the outside it looks like an AMC theater or something. I've never seen such a huge restaurant. Food was pretty good though, we gorged outselves! CLICK HERE to see Smograsbord.

DAY 3
-Did some shopping at the Kitchen Kettle Village. CLICK HERE to see the website.
-Went off to Hersey park to see THE GREAT AMERICAN CHOCOLATE TOUR. It was entertaining. It was like chocolate propaganda...but they didn't get me...i bought Jolly Ranchers HA! Nikki got her favorite. Kit Kat. From there we went to Hersey's "Sweet Lights" which is there christmas light display. The first half was ok but the end was cool, we drove on a tiny road up a small mountain with the lights in the woods. Very pretty.
-For dinner we headed to Ephrata to go to Lilly's on Main. A very nice place with great food and excelent service! CLICK HERE to see Lilly's website.

DAY 4
-Checked out of our B&B.
-Went to see the Amish Experience. It's supposed to be a tour of an Amish house and a movie but the house tour was closed. the move, Jacob's Choice was an entertaining if not fairly cheesy movie about a young Amish man's decision to stay with his Amish faith or venture out in the "Real" world. CLICK HERE to see the website.
-Went back to Issacs for lunch
-Went to Cabelas
-Hit TONS of traffic and finally got home.

We had a great time!!

The Dog Park

Bear had his big introduction to the dog park yesterday. We went to the one in Echo Lake Park. It was his first time dealing with other dogs since he was with his littermates. We were waiting to make sure he was big enough, had his shots and also had anti flea meds on to make sure he didn't pick up anything making nice with the other dogs.

We were a little nervous, wondering how he'd be with the other dogs, especially the smaller ones since he has a history of wanting to tackle just about every dog he meets on walks. It turns out he was just fine with the other dogs and had a great time running around sniffing butts and just doing what packs of dogs do I guess.

There was one dog (a boxer) that Nikki is still fuming about. He was quite a bully and numerous times dominated poor Bear and at one point scared him to the point of crying. At which point the whole "playground" came over as if to say: "FIGHT!, FIGHT!, FIGHT!" but Nikki ran over there, threw the boxer and other dogs to the side (This from a girl afraid of a Chiwawa at one point in her life!) and grabbed Bear.

He promptly shook the dirt off and ran off to play some more but Nikki was full of rage! I guess no one messes with her puppy!

Anyway, Bear had a good time at the dog park and we'll be back soon. Good place for doggy socialization!

Holy cow!!!

Oh my gosh...he did it!! AMAZING!! Nikki and I have already reserved our room for January 20!
It's just great....that's all that needs to said...it's just great.

Electoral Vote Prediction

Holy cow the big day is here! I don't know whether to be relieved or scared!
The map above shows my prediction for how the election will turn out. It shows a 364 - 174 Electoral Vote win for Obama. I'll briefly explain how I came to my conclusions. The key to Obama winning is increased turnout among African Americans, younger voters and Democratic voters. Also, hopefully, some Republicans stay home since Republicans are not nearly as motivated as 4 years ago.
Florida: Obama: Polls have consistently leaned slightly in Obama's favor. The margin is very close however.
North Carolina: Obama: Polls since early October have consistently leaned slightly Obama. Democrats also registered large numbers of new Dems in Primary. Early voting has shown a distinct Obama lean and more voters have voted early than who voted in all of 2004. It will be very close.
Virginia: Obama: Polls have favored Obama since late September. His margin for weeks was above the margin of error. Polls have tightened to around 4-6 points but i think he'll pull it out. Polls on election day close at 7 pm. If it is apparent Obama has won here McCain needs a miracle.
Pennsylvania: Obama: McCain's best scenario for winning is to flip PA. For most of October the margin between them was double digits but the margin has tightened to within 5-10 points. However, that is beyond the margin of error and not one poll has shown McCain with any lead in PA.
Ohio: Obama: Obama's margins have been good here in October but the race has tightened. The average of polling leans toward Obama but it's going to be close. Hopefully Obama's voter turnout machine works better than the Republicans'.
Indiana: McCain: For a while Obama had some leads but lately it seems McCain has gained some sort of a lead. This race will be close but I think McCain will hold on to the state.
Missouri: Obama: Polls have been trending Obama since October but it is very close. this race is truly 50/50 depending on who gets there voters to the polls. I'm betting Obama can do it but this choice may be more of a hope than an educated guess. We'll see.
New Hampshire: Obama: Obama has been kicking butt in polls for the whole election season.
Iowa: Obama: All the time during the primary paid off. Obama is kicking butt. Bush won this state in 2004.
New Mexico: Obama: Obama has maintained a large polling lead all year. Bush won this state in 2004.
Colorado: Obama: This is probably Obama's best chance at winning the Presidency. 60% have already voted early and that tally favors Democrats. Polls have consistently favored Obama by more than the margin of error. In fact I don't think a poll has given McCain any kind of lead here except maybe slightly right after the RNC convention.
Nevada: Obama: This race has polling close but leaning Obama fairly consistently. Polls have shown that as much as 70% have voted already and of those voters Obama has a commanding lead.
Georgia McCain: This race just got close recently. Early voting numbers are high and they favor Obama, but that doesn't mean he'll win. Polls have consistently favored McCain. I think it'll be very close here though. Maybe McCain 1-5 points.
Montana McCain How in the world did Montana become competitive! Polling his shown a tight race in the last few weeks but polls have consistently showed it tied or favoring McCain. I think McCain will win but i don't know what to expect here.
North Dakota McCain Same thing as Montana, I think it'll go McCain but all of a sudden it has polled barely McCain or tied.

OK, that's my guess...jeez i hope I'm right!! ....

Jack-O-Lanterns!

Here are our jack-o-lanterns! They look great on the balcony!

High Point State Park and Dinner Party

On Sunday we had Elise, John, Sophie, Nathan, Gloria and Rose over for a dinner party. I will speak for everyone and say we all had a GREAT time! =)

On Saturday, looking for something interesting to do, we decided to go to High Point State Park. I learned of a place at High Point called Cedar Swamp from a dog walking book. I thought it would be an interesting place to visit and let Bear run. The swamp was small and a bit of a let down (hence no pictures) and also there were too many people to let Bear off the leash. Next time We'll just go to a WMA where i don't have to worry about leashing the dog. The monument was impressive looking and the view was great.
Here's a picture of the Appalachian trail (stretches from Georgia to Main and passes through New Jersey), it passes right next to the park.

Wow

Wow, check this photo out. This was taken in St Louis, Missouri today. According to the NY Times the crowd was 100,000. I don't know how they get that number...but it was A LOT of people nonetheless! Hopefully these large crowds mean something on election day!

2008 Presidential Election update

Welcome to the party West Virgina and North Dakota! More than one poll in West Virginia and North Dakota has shown the race very close, either leaning McCain or tied. This is very surprising since both states voted for Bush in 2000 and 2004 by large margins.
In fact, the Obama campaign has started running ads big time in West Virginia and may do so in North Dakota.

Here is the new assesment of "battleground" states.

Strongly leaning Obama: Virginia, Colorado
Leaning Obama or tie: Nevada, Ohio, Florida, Missouri
Strongly leaning McCain: Indiana, North Dakota
Leaning McCain or tie: West Virginia, North Carolina

Sources:
www.electoral-vote.com
www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/latestpolls/index.html

Obama's Early Vote Lead

SurveyUSA released several polls for President recently and if that state allowed early voting it asked if they voted. If they had voted it asked for whom. The graph shows the results. It's very interesting but important not to look too deeply into the results. It doesn't mean that Obama will win North Carolina by 34 points. However you can definitely get the picture that Democrats/Obama supporters are definitely VERY motivated. What happens when your side is really motivated? They vote in large numbers!
Similar polls in 2004 showed either a slight lead among Bush supporters or pretty much a tie between Kerry and Bush.

Opening Day of Duck Season

My dad and I went to the Paulinskill and Hyper-Humus WMA for our annual outing on opening day of duck season. The day began with the alarm at 3:30 AM...BLEA!

The interesting aspect of going to this place is the part where we use bikes to get to our spot. It is quite a sight I'm sure to see some guys on bikes with shotguns on their backs in camo!

It was a pretty slow morning and if it wasn't for some luck we wouldn't have even had a shot. My dad got two and I got one. As you can see from the pictures, the highlight of the morning was the beautiful fall colors!
Oh and if you think you see ducks in the pictures, they are not, they're just decoys! I always think it's funny when people think they are real. :)

2008 Presidential Election

Some people may want to understand the state of the race right now. Here is a brief outline of the state of the race.

Using the map shown above you'll see the states are shaded into RED, BLUE and TAN colors. RED = McCain, Blue = Obama, TAN = undecided. The numbers on each state represent their electoral votes.

Can McCain take traditionally Democratic states?:
The Traditionally Democratic states that McCain has been trying hard for are Pennsylvania, Michigan, New Hampshire, Wisconsin and Minnesota. Polling within the last two weeks have shown that Obama has healthy leads beyond the margin of error in all of those states. So offensively McCain isn't doing so well.

Can Obama win states won by Bush in 2004?:
Obama has been polling very well in two states won by Bush in 2004: New Mexico and Iowa.

Who is in the best position?:
A candidate needs at least 270 electoral votes to win the election. As the map is laid out here Obama has 264 to McCain's 174. In order to win the election Obama only needs to win 1 of the undecided states. McCain would need to win all of them. One interesting note to consider is that if Obama only won Nevada and McCain won the rest the electoral vote would be a tie at 269 - 269. What happens then? The election would be sent to the House of Representatives which is led by Democrats who presumably would vote Obama President. (the Senate would vote for Vice President)

Who is leading in the undecided states?:
The undecided states do have leanings.
Strongly leaning Obama: Virginia
Leaning Obama or tie: Colorado, Nevada, Ohio, Florida
Strongly leaning McCain: North Carolina, Indiana
Leaning McCain or tie: Missouri

Conclusion:
Things of course can change but right now Obama is in an extremely advantageous position. It would be very unlikely for McCain to win every undecided state considering their leanings...we'll see! I'll post another update sometime soon.

Sources:
www.electoral-vote.com
www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/2008/latestpolls/index.html

2008 Governor's Surf Fishing Tournament

Nikki, Devin, Dad and I again hit the beach for the 17th annual Governor's Surf fishing Tournament and yes once again the Governor was nowhere to be seen. Boo!

There were slightly over 1000 participants and only 27 fish entered! That's surf fishing i guess...seems like it's either dead or the fish are all over the place!
If i find official results I'll post them.

Devin dares a fish to strike his pole!

We did catch a few Sea Robins but they aren't an enterable specie. In fact I think a very large Sea Robin was Devin's first fish caught surf fishing. He was very excited even though it didn't count for a prize.

Devin's Sea Robin!

Here are some pictures from the day. If you click on them they'll be larger. For more pictures you can visit our shutterfly page HERE

This is so sweet!

This is sweet enough to melt my cold, fall-hardened heart (just kidding). Barack Obama has done more for this country culturally than it is possible to quantify! yes we can!

New Dinnerware

Nikki has been begging for new dinnerware so today we finally picked up a new set. She's really happy with it!

Fetch!

Sorry for the lack of updates!! This one will be mostly pictures. Let's see if I can sum things up a little bit. Bear is getting bigger (45 pounds?) and is completely house and crate trained. His obedience is ok better inside than outside but best when food is involved lol.

He likes to relax on the bed with us and continues to be SO dern CUTE!

I started teaching fetch outside more frequently and also in thicker cover. He loves jumping into bushes and uses his nose to find the bumper if he didn't see it fall.

As far as training is concerned problems would be: slow to respond to sit and come especially outside, distractions make training go out the door, sometimes fails to bring bumper back and when at eye level he sometimes wants to wrestle. We're workin on it!

Here we are kayaking for the first time on the Rahwey River. It was harder to steer a kayak than i expected...if there were Kayak police we would have been pulled over for drunk driving! We were all over and i don't think we ever did get it figured out.

We took Bear to Assunpink WMA for some water training. He always has a great time! Here he's going after the bumper.

He got it, here he comes!

Bear found a friend there, who promptly played keep away from him! They had a blast chasing each other, he was exhausted and slept the whole way home!

HAHA Bear in mid air going after a bumper in the bushes.

He found it!

After a long day of romping around Bear loves to snuggle hehe.

Bear's Introduction to Water!

We took Bear for his intro to water maybe 3 weeks ago to Round Valley Resevoir. He had a great time. At first of course he was wary, but then was wading all over and even swimming short distances, even over his head to grab a stick. Although he didn't like the over the head part and started shying away from that.

Since then he has gone into streams and ponds and loves the water. The other day i threw a stick in a pond (Lenape pond) where it was over his head maybe only a foot out from the bank. (i didn't actually know this) Needless to say he got quite the surprise when he jumped in but he certainly didn't get scared! It's a good thing i had a leash on him because he started swimming off to the middle of the pond! hahah!

Here are some pics of the round valley trip.
I also threw in some pics from Memorial day, which was his first trip to the beach. Dogs never cease to amaze me in what they eat. He ate so much sand the poor thing was constipated for several days and threw off his digestion for practically a week!

"hmmm i think i like this..."

"This is awesome! Throw the stick, i DARE you!!"

Good Job Bear!

Bear loved the beach...i guess it made him tired...or maybe he's just sleeping off a meal of sand...yum!

Wow! Bear is growing so fast! He still has lots of growing and we're already saying..."aww remember how small he was!"

Bear is a rascal sometimes...but really...he's such a nice puppy.

230th Battle of Monmouth!! June 21 & 22

If you can find the time I highly suggest that you attend one of the two days that the Battle of Monmouth will be commemorated.
This year is the 230th anniversary of the battle and re-enactors love key years like this. They go all out. This year promises to be the largest Revolutionary War re-enactment in the country!
There will be 67 British and American regiments attending which will include reg infantry, militia, artillery, mounted infantry/cavalry, and loyalists.

The event is fun for all ages! You can:
-tour the park's museum and learn about the battle.
-watch a talk on Molly Pitcher
-children can march around with toy muskets and drill like a soldier.
-Tour the British and American camps
-Shop at the sutlers selling period items
-watch a talk about artillery during the period and see a demonstration.
-watch the battle!!

Saturday's schedule:
10am camp opens
3pm Battle
5pm Camp closes
Sunday's schedule:
10am camp opens
1pm Battle
3:30pm Camp closes

A detailed schedule is available at the park. Things are happening hourly.
Modern Food, drinks and bathrooms will be available.
Here is a website for the park and event.

CLICK HERE FOR EVENT WEBSITE

Here are acouple pics from the 225th; also a very large event.