Hey everyone. Little backstory, mskate is into American Girl Doll and Gymnastics, and I'm into Diners Drive-Ins and Dives. On Saturday March 2nd all 3 of those things came together in Ann Arbor Michigan. In one of the nearby cities there was a major local American Girl Doll sale where multiple people were selling parts of their collections. Not to far away in Ann Arbor there's Crazy Jim's Blimpy Burger, a small burger place that was featured on Diners Drive-Ins and Dives. Then at University of Michigan, the state college that's in Ann Arbor, there was a men's gymnastics competition between them and Oklahoma University. I'll get to all this in a moment, but first I'd like to thank my sponsor, good luck. Have you ever wanted to live an interesting life, one great for being an influencer type person like myself where you have things to talk about online? Well with good luck you can get this. Go to the good luck store and mention pokematic, and you can get a fun life so you can make blogs and vlogs like me. Jokes aside, lets get into the story.
OK I'll actually start out with a funny story from earlier in the week. Mskate was taking care of my grandma on Thursday and without her around I decided I was going to see Madame Web because it seems like it might be leaving theaters soon (because it's bombing hard) and I like the Sony Spiderman Universe. I didn't tell her I was going to the movies because I didn't think it was that big of a deal, and it wasn't known when she'd get home so she might not even notice I left. Like a responsible theater goer I silenced my phone before the movie started. About an hour and 10 minutes into the movie I decided to check the time on my phone because I forgot my watch at home, there are 12 missed calls and multiple missed texts trying to figure out where I am (my brother in law asked if I died). Apparently mskate was freaking out that I wasn't home and thought something bad happened, so she called my mom asking if she knew where I was and called her dad to try to figure out what was going on. I didn't mean to cause problems, I just wanted to see a movie. That was funny.
OK, now for the main story. Mskate found an American Girl Doll swap meet about this time last year that we missed out on, and kept it in mind to make sure we didn't miss it this year. I'm not much of an AG fan but I appreciate the neat dolls and the stores as seen in my vlogs to the Columbus store.
We got there pretty close to when it opened and started looking around. Mskate wanted to get the Christmas outfits and Addie books, and maybe some other things. There were many venders of different types. Unlike things like craft shows or flea markets where everyone is kind of "a professional seller," there were some people who were like professional sellers and some that were just collectors that are leaving the hobby. Basically it was everything American Girl had to offer, mostly clothes and accessories, and a number of playsets and dolls, but some people had the books and one person had a bunch of empty boxes for sale. One of the venders was a former employee of the Columbus store that was selling display model dolls and an employee apron she picked up when the store was closing (because it's unfortunately closed now). I almost bought one of the store display dolls that was mounted on a piece of display wood since I love "store things" (I have a "thank-you for shopping at blockbuster sign," a family video "free kid's movies" and "new releases" sign, a Chuck-E-Cheese table topper, various display stands, and some other things), but as I said I'm not super into American Girl Dolls so $50 for something that only has some attachment to and interest in is not really worth it. It was pretty fun. skate found some books and outfits that interest her, and I found a toy camera and can of almonds (the same brand that Mskate really likes). After the first purchase we didn't have a bag, so I pulled out the grocery bag I keep in my picket and used that for our purchases. She got one of the first outfits from the 90s and a christmas dress (don't remember which doll it's for though).
Now that the American Girl Doll sale was over, we went to Crazy Jim's Blimpy Burger. Part of the great thing about Tripple D is that it spotlights restaurants that aren't like 5 star and super expensive, but are still very good and successful (it's not like a "bar rescue" or "restaurant impossible" where the restaurant might be bad again by the time that the episode airs, or completely out of business, making them a "safe pilgrimage"). Then there's the other great thing that the featured restaurants are all over America, and I've started keeping a list of restaurants in places I might go to one day. One of the restaurants on that list is Crazy Jim's Blimpy Burger, a burger stand in Ann Arbor Michigan. This isn't the first time I've been there (vlog below), but this is the first time they had pumpernickel buns (and I love pumpernickel bread when I can get it on special occasions). On their bun options they have pumpernickel listed, but they didn't have it the other 2 times I'd been there. Anyway, it was great. I had a triple with cheddar cheese, grilled onions, grilled banana peppers, grilled salami, lettuce, raw onions, and pickles on the pumpernickel bun. Mskate had a double with pepper jack cheese and grilled mushrooms on a bed of lettuce. Definitely not healthy, but REALLY good, definitely recommend. On the TV for customers they had food network on (as I think they always do), and it just to happened to be Triple D; it wasn't their episode, but it still was Guy.
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And here's the vlog from one of my other times.
While we were on our way to Blimpy Burger, mskate looked into the gymnastics meet. She knew it was a gymnastics meet happening but couldn't figure out how to buy tickets. While we were at Blimpy Burger mskate figured out it was a free event so we just had to go to the arena. We drove to the arena and found parking while finding our way to the arena entrance. Apparently UofM gives out free souvenirs at every event, and this time they were giving out capes. The even cooler thing is the seats were unassigned, and we were able to sit right up close to the floor routine mat. Mskate wanted to sit up higher but then I said "babe, when are you going to be able to sit almost front row again?" so we sat right close to where they do the floor routine. I'm not into gymnastics or sports in general, but I do kind of enjoy watching things in person and stadium energy; I have no energy watching alone on TV or online, but if I'm watchin in person surrounded by excited fans I have some energy. What was really cool is I got a picture with the Wolverine Trooper.
The event was pretty cool. I got a lot of videos and pictures of the competition, specifically the competitors that mskate and her mom like. What was really funny is they steadied the rings for the ring event using a crutch. I also saw some pretty wild falls, which was interesting. They also gave away t-shirts between events, and while we didn't win them I did take note of how they did the tight roll for throwing, and learned how to do that for when we travel since it will make it better for packing (less space).
Good news is UofM won, which made everyone very happy. After the event the entire team was signing autographs. I had them sign the picture they were giving out, and mskate had them sign one of the capes we got. I was able to get the picture signed faster than mskate, mainly because I was willing to hold my arm above the children that were taking a long time to get through the line. I ended up getting pictured and ending up on the U of M website in my yellow shirt and puffy jacket and blue jeans (school colors) as I'm reaching over children to get the autographs of the team.
It was quite a fun and full day. Sunday was pretty basic, just went to church, got my hair cut, cleaned my shower, and my kitchen faucet decided to break so I got the replacement and called a plumber. It should get fixed on Tuesday. Yep. Well this has been Pokematic, signing off, and bu-bye.
Hey everyone, time for my annual Christmas blog, and this year I'm throwing in New Years and Thanksgiving for a little extra fun. First I'll start with Thanksgiving, which was pretty basic. Mskate and I went to my parents and we had thanksgiving with the family, then we had desert and accordion playing. The next day IRA and I went black friday shopping, but the most interesting part of that was IRA woke mskate and I up at 4:30 saying "it's time for shopping it's time for shopping." Why, because everyone was empty, didn't have the same craziness as last year. When I went back to work there were people talking about how the news was all ready to interview people like they did last year but there wasn't anyone out. It was fun enough, we still bought a fair amount of things, but nothing to write home about. This is why I didn't do one this year; I'm sure I could have woven an entertaining story, but I just didn't feel inspired this year. Between Thanksgiving and Christmas Mskate and decorated for Christmas, wrapped gifts, and I did a 12 days of Christmas puzzle advent calendar. It was quite fun and I framed it quite nicely where it'll make a good decoration in the years to come. Given how busy we were and how short Advent was this year Christmas came pretty fast. Because it went so fast we almost didn't do the county lights this year, but we did after work on like the 21st, and we did it with my grandma and mom. Since it's a drive through exhibit thing we wanted to take her to it for a year or 2 now, but kept forgetting. She really enjoyed it.
OK time for Christmas Eve. First I'll start with it being REALLY foggy around where everyone lives. This made things rater interesting. Mskate and I packed up our car with all the gifts we were giving away and overnight stuff for the 2 days we'll be staying at the in-law's house. The fog was kind of cool on the drive up, kind of like a Halloween atmosphere. We dropped off all the overnight stuff and divided the gifts between who we were giving them to (my grandma, her family, and my family). I did the dividing while she settled in with the overnight stuff. We also visited some with her family, and then went off to the McDonald's by my grandma's.
For those who might be new to the blog, when I was little and we do the gift exchange with my grandparents, we'd all go to the McDonald's that's a block away and then Santa would come while we're eating lunch. To this day we still go there because it's part of the tradition. Now for the silly fun time story of this. I have the McDonald's app which means I can get free food and discounts while also getting points for future free food and discounts so long as I log in. However, I don't know if it's my phone, how I use my phone (normally I have location and mobile data turned off, so connecting can take some extra time), or just the android app, but it regularly crashes or becomes unresponsive whenever I try to use it. IRA also wanted the Kerwin Frost adult happy meal toys, so we got 2 of those for the family members that wanted chicken. We also got my grandma a happy meal; mom said "is it just so you have the ebay inventory toy," and I said "no, it's that but it's also just enough food for her and it gets apple slices for mskate." I'm going through the app trying to maximize the savings while the family is saying "I'm hungry." I eventually get us saving quite a fair amount of money with the discounts. It ended up going really well, and VikingPolak was able to get a free McChicken with the points since he still needed some food after everyone was done. We also got some very interesting chicken nugget toys with the Kerwin Frost box.
With McDonald's eaten we went to her house and exchanged gifts. It was primarily everyone giving grandma gifts and her giving everyone else gifts. We got grandma a bunch of snack foods, a build a bear outfit, a cinderella doll to go with her micky and minnie doll, and some other things. She gave me Krabby Patty Fruit Snacks, Duckman the complete series, a pokemon puzzle, lemon cookies, Dragon Ball season 3, Perfect Blue on steel book, hazelnut wafer rolls, goldfish, highlander on 4K, young justice season 3, a yo-yo, burger king gift cards, a reindeer ornament, a spongebob magic towel, hot chocolate, a meat stick and cheese pack, and a wooden puzzle marble run. This is a high level model that is fragile with a lot of pieces, definitely not for kids. Mskate got hair clips, popcorn, 2 hairbrushes, a disney mystery box stuffed animal (it was pumba in the shape of a pretzel), socks, a Lizzie Maguire mug, fruit snacks, gluten free cookies, jelly beans, milk chocolate truffles, smoked guda spread, a glitter star tree topper, bath bombs, crayola hat, hair ties, harry potter fruit snacks, an Anna from frozen magic towel, hot chocolate, and peppermint peeps. All the while we had the Arendale Yule Log playing on the TV, it made for a nice festive. After all the gifts we made it to church. While on the way I got some great video of the flog.
Video is uploaded with creative commons attribution, click here for details (youtuberumble)
After mass we had dinner, pizza I think. We then said our goodbyes and went to mskate's parent's house. When we got back we did some additional gift exchanges, I got some pokemon mega blocks and a mcdondald's gift card I think. Mskate got a peanuts christmas display thing, some ornaments, and a starbucks gift card. We also gave Delilah some gifts, peanut butter filled cow hooves and jerky treats. We gave her one of the peanut butter cow hooves when they had to put Duke to sleep earlier this year, and she was happy to have more of them since she really likes peanut butter. The rest of the night was pretty calm, I watched A Christmas Story on TBS as part of my tradition, and made some jokes on twitter about how it was my tradition. Having watched the first airing in full I didn't have to drive my families crazy with "I have to watch A Christmas Story on TBS." What was great was I was able to shower during the commercial break and miss nothing. Yay.
OK it's now Christmas morning. IRA is super excited (bragging about how he only slept for 2 hours). Before I get to the fun stuff, I need to explain/remind a thing about my father-in-law. He's notoriously hard to shop for, either thinking that what you got him is too low of quality or thinking that you spent way to much on something. I have cracked him though, what he needs are household items he doesn't yet have and doesn't realize he wants. We ended up getting him washing machine cleaner, gaffers tape, 3 different bird feeder feeds, pet stain cleaner, and a novelty sign that says "forget about the past you can't change it, forget about the future you can't know it, forget about the present because I didn't get you one" (we had him open that last). He liked all of them. For Delilah her final present from us were pawstruck dog bone treats. She REALLY liked those. They were a little big for her but she loved jumping on it and biting it and breaking off crumbs she later licked up. I think I won Christmas for the dog (at least for now, more on that later). From them I got more pokemon mega blocks (specifically the pokeballs that make for great desk decorations, IRA had them stacked together since they link together on the top), a pikachu children's model (I think I'll do a "model review" where I give Crash a friend), pokemon puzzles, a tin of breakfast blend tea, a buckees shirt, a Naruto mug with Naruto socks, a new polo work shirt, a Naruto shirt, more McDonald's gift cards, a lego parrot, gum, life savers candy, a stuffed snorlax, and a stuffed dragonite. IRA picked out the Naruto stuff because when we went to Disney I had ramen twice, and he associates ramen with Naruto and not "I can make my own food/broke college student." Oh well, I like Naruto even though I haven't watched it in a long while. Mskate also gave me some things here. She gave me a gourmet cookie that she bought from someone at church and a hot sauce variety pack. I gave her her presents from me the day after with my parents. She got peeps, Harry Potter legos, a calendar, stationary, a saint a day book, a harry potter shirt, a harry potter mini backpack purse thing (similar to loungefly but not that brand), cheese knives, American Girl Doll accessories, a starbucks gift card, jelly beans, a phone protector, high quality markers for art things, candy canes, a stuffed Harry Potter and Hermione, a stuffed Winnie the Pooh and Piglet, and stuffed santas. We gave IRA various nightmare before christmas things and volume 1 of invincible. It was a great day. I don't remember what we got mom-in-law, but they were things she liked. There's also this funny chocolates we got. It's a company that makes Easter chocolates and they did Santa and his reindeer, but I swear the reindeer were just the bunny mold with antlers on the ears in the foil.
Now with gifts over we went to get mskate's aunt from 2 blocks away. When we got her in we gave her her little gifts from us (rice krispy treats). She really liked them. We had breakfast and all went well. Now for some of the Delilah story, she was going absolutely crazy with the bone thing, running around everywhere, digging in her dog bed, and general hyperactivity. After breakfast aunt's daughter picked her up and went to their next activity. She also brought over her dog Edison, a big dog that they gave some big rawhide treats to that were too big for Delilah. The dogs ran around together and had a lot of fun. I don't know if they knew each other before this, but they enjoyed each other it seems like. We rested for a few hours before going to my parents. I watched A Christmas Story on TNT during this time (because TNT aired it on the odd hours and was a different channel). It was fun.
It's now about 2PM, time for my parents party. We got there before everyone else, and then mom and grandma got there. We helped grandma into the house and got her seated. After Mrs. G joined us we did coloring cookies; one Easter we got my grandma these coloring book cookies with edible markers and we found it's a food and activity my grandma really likes (it's the only thing she eats really quickly). We got her the cookies on Christmas Eve and we did them on Christmas day, with some extras for her to do at a later time. We were going to use the different markers from other times but we lost them. Oh well, we'll get them another time since this is going to be a thing we do with her for a while. After the cookies we did oplatke, a Polish tradition. Mskate and I got the oplatke from our church since ours does it, and it was fun. We did it at our little gathering and dad and vikingpolak did it with our grandpa and aunt. It was a fun little time.
Now for the other part of the party, where my dad and brother came back from aunt and grantpa's. Normally grandma's long time friends with the accordion come over but they had to stay healthy due to an upcoming surgery. Oh well, we still managed to enjoy ourselves, just a lot of talking. We had dinner ham, rolls, corn, green beans, and sweet potatoes. Mom didn't serve the ham on a very good plate, it was pretty shallow resulting in me spilling the juice on myself. It was a good dinner. After dinner we had desert with IRA and mom-in-law joining us. Grandma gave IRA a minions magic towel, and he made his when he got it. Since he's a bit of a doof he activated his towel by soaking it in water, and then bringing it out sopping wet to show everyone. I cleaned up the water he was dripping everywhere. Mom-in-law also brought over a dancing snoopy toy that she got for Christmas to entertain grandma, and I showed her a dance she could do to dance along (hold her arms up in front of herself and do windshield wipers). It was a fun time. When we were done we got grandma all packed up to go home, and went back to the in-laws. Delilah was still very excited, and dad-in-law figured there was something in the new bone that was making her all crazy. Apparently she didn't sleep much that night.
Now it's the day after Christmas, Boxing Day if you're Canadian (which I'm not). Mskate's dad got fed up with the paw struck treats so he threw them out. Delilah was looking around sad that she lost her treat toy. I later dug them out to give to Edison since his dog-mom causes a lot of trouble, so causing her some trouble wouldn't be that bad (he got pretty excited as well, but he just liked the new toy thing). We went to my parent's house and set-up the gifts. We gave my dad a lot of peanuts stuff (peanuts hot chocolate, the Charlie Brown and Snoopy show complete series, 4 TV movie set, and a pop-up card with the Christmas special scene where Linus says what Christmas is all about), and some cooking things I think. We got my mom brownie mix (she really likes to make brownies), bath and bodyworks soaps and lotions, gift cards, and some other things. We got my brother a flash light, shirts, an amo box, beard wash and conditioner (that we got from bed bath and beyond in the bankruptcy sale), and some other things. I got this peanut butter cup and chocolate trailmix insert mix (really good), a game called "nice buns," a squishy stress ball thing, a spongebob puzzle, spiderman across the spiderverse, a slinky, Crash 4 it's about time, pickles, sunflower seed kernels, katamari, spongebob socks, a ruby tuesdays gift card, a taco bell gift card, uber gift card, slide wistle, and a rubix cube key chain. Mskate got dominos, gluten free cookies, an american girl doll play set (a truly me doll she's naming Noel), bath bombs, lotion, and a warming unicorn. Mskate and I got matching Disney shirts, so we know what we'll wear next trip. We also got Disney 100 happy meal toys, a collection process we worked on when it was in restaurants and we are only missing 3. This is also when I gave her my gifts, The Aristocats on Bluray with the Disney 100 slip case with Marie on it (she loves Marie), and Miracle on 34th street. After all the gift giving and breakfast cinnamon rolls and bagels we watched an episode of the Charlie Brown and Snoopy show. It was REALLY funny, I picked a winner. After that we gathered up our stuff from both houses, and went home. For the next many days I was just working on finding places to keep all our new gifts. One thing I need to do is find a place in the curio cabinet for the happy meal toys that are basically just figures.
The days between Christmas and New Years were pretty chill. For the most part I organized our new presents and rested. 2 days before New Years Eve we went up to mskate's parent's house so she and dad-in-law could see The Polar Express in IMAX for his birthday, and IRA and I went to see The Boy and the Herron, the movie the Hayao Miyazaki came out of retirement for, reopening Studio Ghibli just to make (though basically that just meant that the people that made Studio Ponok went back to the old offices since they made their own studio after Ghibli closed). It was a really good movie, even though it had a lot of "Ghibli old lady face" and "Ghibli fluids," along with some "Ghibli frog face" if I'm not mistaken (3 elements of Ghibli movies I don't care for). I'll be making a review at some point. Since the theater we went to was close to where Cousin M lives IRA and I stopped by after the movie for an impromptu visit. We talked for maybe an hour just catching up, which was great since we didn't see him at Christmas. Then the day before New Years Eve we had a funeral for one of the scout moms from my old Boy Scout troop. It was sad but it was great seeing so many people I haven't seen in over a decade. Since she was so involved in the troop (regularly being an adult leader on camp outs and driving us up in her 15 passenger van (the memory I shared in facebook that made the sons smile, and I shared in the "write down a memory"). So many people from my old troop came, so many people I remembered but didn't recognize (I said "who am I not recognizing" but when he said his name I would remember instantly). After the funeral the luncheon was held at the VFW post that we would regularly partner with for blood drives with or hold banquets at. One of the VFW men recognized me from 12+ years ago, which was so cool. It was just a regular troop reunion, and the good thing is since mskate and I grew up in the same area she knew a number of people and wasn't "I don't know anyone, stick with me and don't socialize to the full extent with your old friends" like I imagine many spouses would be in situations like this. About halfway through before one of the sons had to leave we took a picture with all the old scouts that were there including the old scout masters. Just a great little thing.
Now it's New Years Eve, I had some ebay packages to mail so I went to Meijer for the authorized USPS shipping location. While there I did some shopping and used some coupons while also buying on sale Christmas stuff (primarily chocolates, but also a dog sweater for Delilah next Christmas). I basically got everything for 50% off, yay. Then after my shopping I went to Wendy's and got one more free Jr. Frosty (got mskate a small vanilla diet coke and I had the frosty). Then it was time to go to our camping friend's New Years Eve party. Our contribution to the party was a meat and cheese tray, plate of cookies, champagne, fireworks, and board games. The food went over very well, and the champagne was great for the New Years toast. The game we brought was the Nice Buns game my mom got me for Christmas, and it was a really fun game. The goal is to get 3 sets of 3 cards of the same color (9 total) before your opponents, while also avoiding the "fishy buns" which prevent you from making a set, while rolling dice that determine how many new cards you can get and if you can get rid of your fishy bun if you have it, and while there's a lot of chance with the drawing of cards and rolling of dice there's also a lot of skill with how the players play the dice and cards. We had one game that went on for about an hour because we got really into strategy of how to play the dice and cards, and played it 2 or so other times. It's a really fun game and will be bringing it camping. Since my godfather and his family weren't going to be there for the ball drop I lit off some of my fireworks for my godbrother around 10PM (the others would be done at midnight). He's still young and doesn't have the "backyard shows," so he was yelling "you need to call the fire department, I've never seen up close fireworks." My godfather was a little nervous about this since he's been to some irresponsible backyard shows, but he also knew I was responsible and safe. I lit off 3 in the drive way while he and my mom stood at a far distance, and he thought they were really cool. I'm sure there's going to be some "can we do fireworks like [Pokematic] did" and there's going to be things like "no, that's a thing only specially trained people like Mr. [Pokematic] are able to do on New Years and the 4th of July." Mom also took a photo of me with the firework and said "you're just like [you're uncle who would light off the fireworks when we did 4th of July parties 20 years ago]." We all just hung out until about 10 minutes to midnight, and then we started getting ready for the ball drop. I popped the cork on the champagne into the back yard and poured as many glasses as the hosts had, and everyone that wanted some got it. I also jokingly told the hosts "send one of your kids to find the cork in the morning." We counted down the ball and toasted the drinks. I lit off the remaining 6 or so fireworks for an audience of about 5 people. The fun thing is I bought this kit and box of tanks about 7 years ago and have been gradually lighting them off 1-4 at a time over new years and 4th of July at my house, and with this it's now about done (still have some small ones and tanks left, but "the show pieces" are all done now). Now it's time for me to get a new kit since everyone really liked them (and hopefully I can get some on sale now that new years is over). Shortly after the fireworks it was time to go home.
So there you have it, my Christmas and New Years 2023 extravaganza (with a hint of Thanksgiving and Advent). It was quite a great time. It was also quite an eventful 2023 (which I'll recap in another blog). New Years day is the last day of my break (which went very quickly), and will be populated with various "get ready for the work week" stuff (and maybe some sales to get more fireworks). This has been Pokematic, signing off, and bu-bye.
Oh and here's Steamboat Willie, hosted by me on this blog (not linked). I can do so because it is now 2024 and Steamboat Willie is now public domain.
