Zero G Thrills

Thursday June 2 my cousin Jimmy graduated high school!  I am so proud of him.  I know Aunt Marie and Grandpa Al Wdowicki are looking down on him and smiling.   With that came a promise to take Jimmy to Cedar Point sometime this summer.   We had talked about doing Coastermania before I found out one of my best friends was getting married in California the same weekend.  That was only the beginning of the dilemna’s in deciding what to do.

Only about 6 weeks ago I had jaw surgery to correct a really bad under bite.  Didnt think that I would be up to par for riding coasters especially rough ones.  So I started thinking it would be a bad idea to go ride.  Also didnt want Andy thinking I blowing off his wedding for some coasters.  It just wasnt practical or affordable for me to fly/drive to California.  I will come see you as soon as I can.  I PROMISE!

It wasnt until Friday morning came and I just had to get out of the house knowing I had a 4 day weekend.  I tried all day to get a hold of Jimmy to go on a whim to Coastermania.  It wasnt until 7/8pm we finally made touch.  I through together some clothes and packed my blender and some food.  Needless to say I never used the blender or touched the food!  But by the time I got my butt out the door and to Jimmy’s house we were finally out the door of his house by 9pm!   I did say it was a whim.  How else do you get out the door, packed, and on the road in a few short hours including the time to go from my house to his to pick him up?  LOL!

We ended up stopping at about 12:30am our time in Angola, IN but found out ERT started in just 4 short hours that morning.  We quickly decided that we wanted to rest more than we wanted the morning ERT.  We did wake up about 7am and was quickly back on the road.  When we got to Cedar Point we decided to check into Hotel Breakers so we didnt have to drive back and forth between our hotel and the park.   Then took a short relaxation session at the room before we entered the park for the day.

We got over to the hotel gate to enter the park and inquired about the Coastermania registration since we went on a whim.  Quickly we got our stuff together for entry including pay less than $10 for all day drinks!  We had our passes so all we had to do was show my ACE card to get into the event and have ERT that night.

First thing we see is Magnum and then Top Thrill Dragster.  I tried to get Jimmy to go the Top Thrill Dragster right off the bat but it wasnt to be just yet.  There was a minimal line for Magnum so that ended up being the first ride of the day.   Then it off to Gemini and then the train to get over the Millenium Force.  By this point in time Jimmy was just about freaking out when watching Millenium Force climb the lift hill.  He did ride it!  Eventually after going all over the park for hit or miss rides as we felt like riding we went back to the hotel to cool off from the swealtering heat for a bit after lunch and seeing some friends of mine.

After the rest we made it over to Top Thrill Dragster right after a break down so the line was minimal.  Timing is everything and that seemed to be the story of the weekend.  We seemed to hit everything at just the right times!  I wasnt sure I was getting Jimmy on Top Thrill Dragster but even after the almost nervous breakdown he got on it.  Soon after he was hooked.  We would end up with at least 3 rides on Top Thrill Dragster, Millenium Force, and Magnum for the weekend.

Speaking of hitting things at just the right times we hit Millenium with a short line once and then it broke down.  We also hit Maverick right after a breakdown so yet another almost non-existant line!  And one of our rides on Maverick we actually got stuck on the break run for about 5 minutes.  But we got our ride on it!  LOL!

It was one whim of a weekend that will be hard to top!

Things happened yesterday in such rapid fire motion that it seems as though I really didn’t have time to even react. Now I feel some regret in not getting what I wanted but I cant blame no one but myself!

FAIL #1
Forgot to get gas in Wisconsin on my way home where the price was $3.89 and ended up having to pay $4.29 today. Seems like everyone in IL is at that price today. I would have saved myself a lot of money yesterday. FAIL #1.

FAIL #2
Went grocery shopping at Meijer.  Got so into talking to a really awesome and beautiful young lady that I almost forgot the reason I even went in the first place…Garbage bags!  The conversation was going so well but yet I shot myself in the foot yet again and choked on asking her one simple thing…For her freaking phone number.  It is a mis-step that I keep repeating over and over again.  At least I am starting to lose my fear of talking to women.  Guess that is a partial win since I didnt hesitate talking to this young lady like I usually do.  One step at a time!

A new day and new opportunities
With all that I fail at there is one thing I can keep in mind.  Today is a new day and a day where I can get a 2nd chance possibly and new opportunities can arise.  Let’s see if I can conquer this day!  I look forward to whatever this day and this weekend brings.

What a weekend I had.  Started with visiting my grandpa for almost 3 hours after work on Friday evening.  As always I lost track of time hanging out with him.  LOL!

Saturday I went to my oral surgeon for a checkup and at that time everything looked good and on track as expected.  Then after that I met up with my family at the Jellystone in Caledonia, WI.   Hey hey Boo Boo is that a picnic basket?  LOL!   The campground is really nice and fairly quiet except when some of the neighbors decided to have a lover’s quarrel in the middle of the night.  There was more than enough activities to keep anyone and everyone entertained.  Though it was kind of a shame that I accidentally got hit in the chin with a basketball Sunday in the pool.  Guess I have to get another appointment with the oral surgeon to make sure everything is ok still.  I did have brief pain initially then everything went numb and felt swollen a bit.  By the end of the day everything seemed normal but I want to be safe and get it looked at.  Thankfully I had plenty of time to relax and unwind when I was able to.  I am really enjoying weekends off right now.

I went to the Hesston Steam Museum on Memorial Day.  It’s always a blast talking to the people who volunteer there to run the various little shops and such.  The main reason for me was to get a ride on the Kiddieland steam train.  Yes this one used to run at Kiddieland in Melrose Park, IL.  Due to all the rain there were puddles/ponds that almost right up to the rails in height at some points.  If it were any higher you would have needed a boat instead of a train.  Also got to ride the train that used to run at Brookfield Zoo. It was a lot larger than I actually remembered it being.  Too bad with all the rain that they recently had that they couldn’t safely run the Shay engine but I got to see some of the equipment that I haven’t seen in the past.

Overall it was a pretty decent weekend and too all that were a part of this, THANK YOU!
(Pics and such to come sometime later).

Decided to finally bring back my website after a bit of a hiatus.   I finally found a price point that I could deal with.  Free.  Well mostly free.  The only thing I paid for was the domain name.

This site hopefully will become a one stop shop to keep up with me and all of my various hobbies and interests.  This will be a lot more than my previous version of this site was, so please stay tuned and we shall see how this one turns out.