bobmacliberty

You are on fire this cruise! Find the machine with the biggest jackpot and go for it.

Today is day 3 of my bachelor week. Micheline is in Cincinnati looking at wedding venues with my daughter and helping her clean/paint the condo that she just bought with her fiancé. I'll play golf a few times, complete some of the tasks on our house to do list, and watch the PGA Championship on TV. Pretty much the same as what I'd do if she was here. 😁 The big difference is that I'm responsible for watering all of her plants. For some plants, that's a daily task. If she comes back to any dead plants, I'm in big trouble. Also, I just started an exercise/training program called Golf Forever. It's essentially resistance training, but with exercises that are focused on improving flexibility and swing speed for golf. I know myself well enough to know that I won't get in a car and drive somewhere to work out. That little bit of extra effort is enough to derail me. It needs to be falling out of bed easy for me to keep up a routine, and I can literally fall out of my bed and start exercising. So far so good with this program.

The Bills, Sabres, and Bandits were all there. The Pegulas (owners of all 3 teams) were there as well with former players like Bruce Smith. It's reported that every single Bills player and coach attended to show their support...some like Stefon Diggs flying to Buffalo specifically to participate. The Bills are incredibly tightly tied to the community there and I hope that their actions helped those impacted by this unbelievably vile event. Enjoy the wings! Post a picture if you can. I'm not sure when I'll be back to Buffalo so I'll need to live vicariously through you.

That's one of the few drawbacks to staying on deck 17. With the WJ right below on 16, the elevators get a lot of WJ traffic going up and down. It can take a while for one to come all the way up to 17. With so few people on 17, the elevators are usually empty by the time they get there. If you have a genie, they can do their magic thing with the elevators so you don't wait, or at least so I've been told. Haven't had that experience yet.

We moved from Cherry Hill to Buffalo (Williamsville) in 1972. I think we moved to Cherry Hill around 1964. In Cherry Hill, we lived on Old Orchard Road which literally ran along an apple orchard. Our backyard was right up against the orchard. When they were harvesting, we'd stand in our yard and they would toss apples to us. That only lasted a few years as the orchard was eventually turned into more houses. Cherry Hill is now a huge Philadelphia suburb with just about everything that you think of when you mention suburbia. There wasn't much in Marlton at the time (you drove through it on the way to Atlantic City/the Jersey shore) but it looks like is also now a big suburban area.

I see what you did there. 🤣 I'd also love to have you cover Seattle. We'll be there for a couple of days before our September cruise. Still finalizing what we'll do but a Pike Place food tour is definitely on the short list.

Congrats Crystal on it being official. It's great when you get that kind of send off...it shows how much you mean to your old company. When does the move happen? Oh, and the Neutrogena Beach Defense sun tan lotion is our favorite. You'll need lots of it. 😁

Continuing the NJ diner discussion...I lived in Cherry Hill, NJ until 5th grade. We had a great place there called Olga's Diner. They sponsored my little league baseball team, and we went there a lot for our victory celebrations. It looks like their original location closed and was demolished to turn a major traffic circle into an overpass (intersection of Rts 70 and 73 in Marlton). They were closed for a decade and recently reopened in a new location nearby. They no longer have a traditional looking diner building, but hopefully the food is still as good. Anyone been to Olga's?

Thanks for this. We'll be in Seattle in September and love Sushi. I've added Umi Sake to my list. I think I'll keep this info to myself. Micheline is not a fan of heavy seas. I had to convince her that Alaska and TP cruises wouldn't be bad. Fingers crossed, This is my biggest question. Do I bring my Canon 7D and lenses on our upcoming Alaska/Hawaii trip? On the positive, it still takes better pictures than my phone and everything fits neatly into a single backpack. I'm thinking that I'll want to make a large print of at least one picture (probably more based on what John is posting here) that I take in either Hawaii or Alaska. On the negative, we're already going to be taking way too much luggage just for the different Alaska/Hawaii climates. Would be nice to have one less bag to deal with. I rarely use my DSLR anymore but if I'm ever going to use it again for travel, this seems like the right time. First world problems...

A Union Jack Lava Flow sounds like a Miami Vice with a layer of Curacao in the middle. I'll definitely need to try that. We have 5 traffic circles near me. Much better than a traffic light, assuming that people know how to use them. We'll often see someone stopped at a circle, not knowing when to start moving again, with an out of state license plate. The locals mostly drive straight through, even if they're driving 10 miles below the speed limit. 🙄

If/when you're back in Naples, I highly recommend a self-led tour of Capri. The ferries were easy to manage and the views from atop Anacapri were amazing. We took an early morning ferry to the island and an early afternoon ferry back so that we had plenty of time before all aboard. I never felt worried about running into a problem and I believe that the ship excursions were on ferries after ours, both going there and coming back.

When I lived in Cincinnati, WOW airlines offered very cheap flights from Cincinnati to Iceland. I had several neighbors that flew there for a week or even just a long weekend to get the experience. Those WOW flights only lasted about 6 months. I heard that WOW was never able to make money.

Amazing picture for a phone. The detail in the feathers is impressive. Great framing also...well done.

Not sure about Spectrum, and I can't comment on Singapore right now, but we think the larger room alone is worth (at least some) of the extra cost of a JS. 50% more space in the main area plus a larger bathroom with tub/shower (not just the shower tube) and walk in closet. Wider balcony to be able to be able to more comfortably sit 2 people on an angle. If the extra cost for a JS was not at lot, I'd choose it, even without the other potential benefits. We're D and soon to be D+ and get many of those benefits anyway. Edit: I just watched a couple of Spectrum JS videos and it appears that there are some differences vs Oasis Class, so not everything that I said above applies. Still, I like having more space.

The Bald Eagle is such a majestic bird. It's no wonder the US chose it as the national bird.

Terrible cards. Even if you combined both hands, the best you could do was aces and fives. Yuck. How does the pub crawl/poker run work? Does the organizer hand out a card at each stop? I've never been involved with one but sounds like fun, even if you don't win.

We were just the opposite. Told our agent in Florida that we didn't want a pool. Had one for 20 years in Ohio and we enjoyed it a lot, especially when the kids were younger. We had an open BYO pool party most Friday nights...if there was a green flag flying in front of our house on Friday, everyone was invited to come over with a their own beverages and a snack to share. We'd throw a big blow out party around either July 4th or Labor Day weekend. We set the heater at 83F but that was only needed in early summer. It would often get up to 90F by mid-late summer. It was a lot of cost/effort to keep it clean for very little use once we and the kids got older. Our pool season in Cincinnati was limited to essentially the summer, even with a heater, so we had the added cost of opening/closing the pool each year. Weather was fine for swimming through September but once the kids were back in school, no one really used the pool after Labor Day. Fortunately, our Florida real estate agent found a perfect house and it has a small pool. No heater but even with cool winters here, we have a longer pool season than Cincinnati. We're debating adding a heater to extend the season. And since our pool is small, it's much easier to care for (especially since we pay someone to do it 😉). I love going for a swim at night right before bed.

Privacy. 👍

Congrats on your winnings! There are certainly worse reasons to meet the men in customs.

I flipped it for you. They deserve to be seen right side up. Thought I could just rotate and save but tried that several different ways and it still ended up upside down here just like you. I finally rotated and saved as a .png file rather than a .jpg file. That worked. Don't know why.

The surface of the grill can be raised and lowered to different heights above the coals as a way to adjust the temperature. Great for searing meat on high heat and then cooking through on lower heat.

So sorry to hear this. What devastating news. My deepest condolences to you and your daughter's family.

I'm not a big NBA fan but the Celtics just made it to the Eastern Conference Finals. A sportswriter tweeted about the Celtics yesterday saying, "The Celtics are real and they're spectacular". Terri Hatcher would be proud of the reference. 😁

To my bourbon brother Greg...happy birthday!