Chris Moody’s Blog

While on vacation, I decided to take my family to SkyVenture Colorado for indoor skydiving in their big vertical wind tunnel. Pretty fun stuff!

Just returned from a big vacation with my family. It started early on a Saturday morning with me getting up at 3:30am to catch a plane to Denver. I met up with my parents, some extended family, and Kabinett neighbors to board another plane to Orange County.

In the O.C., we spent two days at Disneyland. We hit most of the staple rides. Star Tours, Thunder Mountain, Pirates of the Carribean, Indiana Jones Adventure, the Haunted Mansion. I bought my dad a Capt. Jack pirate hat with dreadlocks and he promised to wear it the whole day. He didn’t disappoint, getting lots of great looks and comments from kids and adults alike.

Monday rolled around and we all piled into a shuttle van to take us to L.A. (well, San Pedro) to board Royal Caribbean’s Monarch of the Seas cruise ship. After settling into our cabins, we met in the dining room where my dad was wearing his pirate hat and commenting on “meeting up with some friends later.” After dinner I went to one of the night clubs to watch people make fools of themselves singing karaoke.

Tuesday morning rolled in and not being used to noises of a ship, I woke before sunrise and went up top to take picture of our arrival into San Diego. We passed a few other vessels on the way in, including a submarine, the USS Ronald Reagan, and an aircraft carrier that was pretending to be the WWII version of the USS Enterprise (is there a movie being made?).

Our excursion into San Diego was a whale watching trip. We boarded the Marietta headed back out to a noticeably more turbulent sea. It took us a while to find a whale, but saw sea lions sunning them selves on a channel buoy, and dolphins bow running our boat on the way. To be honest, I thought they were more exciting anyway. The whale just shot up a spout, showed us his tail and then disappeared for 5 minutes before repeating the process.

The evening was filled with me donating some money to the casino and going up to watch the fools singing karaoke again. But this time I discovered it was much more fun to watch after two amaretto sours.

Wednesday started with us pulling up to Catalina Island… but not docking. Our ship was too big for their port so we were ferried to the island on little tenders. I made the mistake of signing up for a snorkeling excursion in the first week of March. Granted they did provide wet suits, and granted the wet suits did help tremendously, but my hands were completely numb by the time I got out of the water. About the only thing making that excursion worth while were all the gals in bikinis (before they put their wet suits on).

I skipped dinner in the dinning room that night in favor of the buffet instead. After that I caught the tail end of a show in the auditorium (a musical impressionist). After that was over I went to go laugh at the karaoke singers again, but they were getting much better which meant I was clapping more than laughing.

Thursday came with us docking in Ensenata, Mexico. I had an excursion scheduled for something to do with Fox Studios down there, but discovered that half of the 5 hour tour was spent driving to and from the location. So I skipped it in favor of reading by the pool, watching a movie in my cabin, and finding an internet connection.

Breakfast and lunch had been buffets in the Windjammer Cafe as usual, but I was back to the dinning room for our final dinner. I ordered my 2nd steak of the week, the wait staff danced for us, and we passed out our gratuities.

Evening entertainment started with karaoke that night, since it had been moved up several hours. Almost everyone was great on the last night. There were some I wouldn’t be surprised to see on American Idol next season (if I actually watched that show).

Following that, was an entertaining hour of “The Quest”. Essentially the host called out a item, and a drunk team member had to rush up to the dance floor with said item. Things progressed from common items like our “Sea Pass” cards, to men wearing lipstick, to men wearing women’s shoes, to women holding men’s jeans, to men holding women’s bras. It all ended with guys from the audience standing on stage in their boxers shorts wearing almost all of the aforementioned ladies items. That was good for a laugh and made me glad that I didn’t join a team as I happened to be wearing briefs that night.

And that was just about it. Lots of waiting on Friday. Waiting in line to get off the ship, waiting in line for US Customs, waiting for our shuttle to LAX, waiting in lines at the airport, waiting for my plane. I was glad to get home. And I was glad that I didn’t have to wait for Nicole to pick me up.

Click below for my photos on Flickr.

By popular demand, here’s the recipe for the pineapple pudding I made this Thanksgiving.

2 sticks of butter
2 cups of sugar
4 eggs
20 oz. crushed pineapple (drained)
1/2 cup milk
4 cups bread cubes

Tear up the bread into cubes and let it sit out all night. Beat butter and sugar together well, add eggs and beat. Add drained pineapple and milk. Fold in bread. Pour into 11″ x 7″ pan and bake one hour at 350°F. You can make this ahead of time and refrigerate before baking.

I’ve just spent my first full day on vacation in Colorado with Kurt and Monica. We took the cog railroad up Pike’s Peak, we sprinted through Garden of the Gods, and we had a family dinner. A nice full day.

Tomorrow we see the Colorado Rockies take on the San Francisco Giants, and then drive up to the Kabinett. Hopefully we can relax and sleep in once we’re up there.

Click my Photos link in the menu if you’d like to see the pictures.

It’s a Monday evening as I write this. I just got home from work, and I’m thrilled to see my power is finally back on. We had our second ice storm of the season this weekend. As usual it knocked down trees which in turn brought down power lines all over St. Louis. This was the third extended outage for me since moving into my house last May. It was finally time for me to do something.

With the assistance of Kurt, who ran to the store and laid claim to the last generator, and my neighbor Eric, who helped wire the gas guzzler into my circuit breaker, I was able to enjoy sweet, sweet electricity and not freeze to death… Not to mention catch all of the 24 season premiere.

I have plans now to make the connection to the house permanent, so I won’t need as much help next time. Just plug something into an outlet, through a switch and go. It’ll cost a lot, but it’ll be worth it!

Margaret “Peg” Ann Morgan Phelps
May 16, 1919 – December 22, 2006

It’s a little past midday on Sunday and the holiday weekend is winding down. My parents flew out to spend Thanksgiving with me. I did the pre-cooked deal from Schnucks and I highly recommend it to anyone that doesn’t want to spend all day in the kitchen. The food was very tasty, and more than enough for the three of us, so I’ll have plenty of leftovers.

Later on Thursday we put up my Christmas tree and decorated that, and then sat around the TV while I caught my parents up on Battlestar Galactica. If I could just get ‘em a TiVo, maybe they’d watch it on a regular basis.

On Black Friday we didn’t exactly go Christmas shopping, but we did hit a couple furniture stores looking for things for the house. My parents wanted to buy a house-warming gift for me. Right now I’m thinking bookcases and DVD cases would be nice. And maybe some art for the walls. For lunch, I introduced them to the wonder that is Penn Station Subs. In the evening, we watched more BSG, and then Da Vinci Code.

Saturday was a small party for my parents to meet my closest friends. Kurt & Monica, Katie & John (w/ Sam), and Nicole all came out for some Bandana’s BBQ, games, and socializing. Monica made a great strawberry cake, Nicci brought out the right wine (not to mention some Bailey’s Irish Cream for me), and John brought his Nintendo Wii. The Wii was a hit. I’m gonna have to get one. Now the graphics and processing don’t even come close to matching the X-Box 360 or the Sony PS3, but the controller is great! Since it’s motion sensitive, you use it like a bat, or a tennis racket, and try and hit the ball (or whatever) just like you would in real life. The golf game was even popular with my dad. Way to go John for bring that over!

So anyway, that’s my holiday weekend. Now I have to get ready for peak season at work which starts tomorrow. Later and later evenings, more and more boxes, and bigger and bigger paychecks!

Goodbye Grandpa

Congratulations to friends Katie and John Haney. Samantha Ellen Haney was born today around 4:00pm. She weighed in at around 9lbs 1oz. According to mom Katie, she likes to sleep and hasn’t really cried a lot. Let’s hope it’s stays that way.

Well, as we roll into Saturday, Kathy, Meredith & Noah are rolling out of St. Louis. This concludes my two weekends in a row of guests (with my parents having visited last weekend). I had a nice time the last few days. Whereas my parents took me to one restaurant that served everything à la carte (Ruth’s Chris), Kathy was equally generous when we accidentally discovered that Shannon’s Steaks & Seafood had the same philosophy. Thanks again to her for that.

Friday (which I took off from work), turned out to be pretty exciting too. I recommended that, instead of the zoo (honestly, how different is it from theirs), we try out the City Museum. I’d heard great things about it, and honestly, with Noah I finally had an excuse to go. I wasn’t disappointed. The main attraction there has to be all the stuff for the kids (of all ages) to climb through. Think hamster tubes, but made out of anything and everything. From airplanes, to wrapped wires, to whatever. You couldn’t walk anywhere without some child crawling out of a hole in the floor/wall/ceiling. Just make sure you’ve had a tetanus booster.

A portion of the outdoor section led to a ball pit from hell. Kids are mean. And I’m not talking about getting hit with a ball in the crotch or the side of the face, both of which hurt. No I’m talking about when they told the kid standing near me to “move away from the parents.” I got old today.

The hotel pool was relaxing too, and had a wonderful view of the New Busch Stadium. And since the outfield is fairly open, you could see right in (though the field is below street level and hard to see). I should have taken pictures of it, but the windows weren’t too clear, and I didn’t want to get my camera wet.

All in all, a nice weekend.