2005-06-25 23:00:00
Def Leppard, State Police Youth Camp, Birthday Party
A pretty eventful couple of days. Thursday was awesome! Mary and I went to the Chevy Ampitheatre in Pittsburgh at Station Square to see Def Leppard. Tesla opened for them. They were great. But Def Leppard... wow! They are my favorite band. Other than the sound displacement that occurs in large open venues, they sound as good live as they do on the cd's. Great songs, great guitar work, and awesome tight harmonies! They played all of my favorites, including Promises, Photograph, Foolin', and encored with Pour Some Sugar On Me. After the concert was a little interesting. I figured, it was cake getting here (I had never drivin to the South Side by myself before) so I can just reverse the directions to get back home. So I get on East Carson, turn onto the Smithfield Bridge, turn on to Fort Pitt Blvd., then... uh oh. I can't make a right on to Grant Street. Hmmmm... this isn't good. So I turn left and figure, I can just turn back around, come at it the other way, and I'll be fine. No. Not happenin. So I turn back on to Fort Pitt heading North (which, for those of you not Pitsburghally aware, is not the way to get home). So we ended driving past the ballparks, almost to the North Shore before I found an exit where I could turn and head back south. After that we were fine. But for those two minutes, I had no clue where I was going...Friday I only worked for two hours (I put in a lot of hours the previous week and will be putting in a lot of hours in the coming week). I dropped Mary off at the mall before I went in, then picked her up after I was done, ate at Hoss's, then came home and got ready to leave for Chambersburg. My sister went to the State Police Youth Week. It's a week long camp sponsored by the American Legion and the State Police for high school students who want to get into law enforcement in some way after they graduate. My sister wants to be a Corrections Officer. Anyway, graduation for the camp was Saturday at 10AM, so we got a hotel room Friday night, which prevented us from getting up at 5AM Saturday morning to drive there. Mary and I's room had a great view of the neighboring farm. Yes, that's right, a farm. The Super 8 Motel was right next to a farm. Welcome to Chambersburg. We got to the Scotland School for Veterans Children around 9AM so we could see them march in formation to the graduation site. It was really cool. You would have thought those kids were in the military for years. They were split into three platoons, Red, Blue, and Gold. Kelli was in the Blue. They marched with their platoon from the flagpole to the graduation site while people took pictures of it. When they marched to their seats they all stood looking right of the stage until the command was given to face forward. When it was, you heard a big woosh and saw the whole group of 89 "cadets" turn and face the front. That was cool. Like I said, no one expected to see anything like this. But my sister loved it. The first day they were screamed at and made to do pushups like they just signed up for Army boot camp. The camp started with 118 people and ended with 89. Yup, 29 kids quit within the first couple days, some even upon arriving and seeing the boot camp style situation. But Kelli stuck with it and made it through the whole week, even making friends with two of the State Troopers, one of which works in Indiana, who knew... I got a picture of Kelli, Dan, her friend from school who also attended the campe, and Trooper Jacobs, who was one of the two she befriended. That's gonna be sent to the Blairsville Dispatch.
Today was Kelli's birthday party. She doesn't turn 17 until the 30th, but we had her party today. Mary and I went to Riverside (Bilo) to get the pop and got her a card that was a monster mask cutout. It's awesome. I want a card like that. But she got some money, clothes, and jewelry. All in all, a good day for her. After the party, me, Mary, and Kelli went up Dode's to swim. I found that someone of my size shouldn't go down a sliding board meant for toddlers. Ouch. After that we came back down to my house and watched Family Guy and Extreme Makeover: Home Edition, which was a repeat.
So, it was a good long weekend. Got to spend four days with Mary, some of that time with my family, what more could I ask for?
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