Busy Summer Bees!

Summers are always busy.  It’s the way life works, I guess.  All winter long you sit in the house, watching the falling snow (or lack thereof) in the freezing cold temperatures.  As soon as it warms up though, you are itching to get outside and go for walks and fix up your yard.  And then all the summer activities begin.

Last weekend was a busy one.  We started our Saturday waking up at 6:30 AM for a 5K at the Blair County/People’s Natural Gas Ballpark.  This was my wife’s third 5k, and my zeroth.  Seriously, my son and I just sat in the stands and watched.

Someday I will run one with her.  I really try not to make excuses for myself, and I was to the point last September where I could do a 5k on my own in under 40 minutes, but then I gained a little weight back over the winter and then sprained my ankle severely a couple of months ago by stepping in a hole in my back yard.  As you can tell from my last post though, I’m back to running again, so maybe by this September I’ll be fit and able to do one with her.  Hopefully!

Anyway, my wife and four-hundred plus others ran around the outfield of the ballpark, then took to the streets outside, did a few laps, and then ran back inside to finish.  She didn’t do as well as she would have liked, but it ended up being a quarter mile longer than the 3.11 miles.  I guess they really REALLY wanted the runners to have the opportunity to run laps inside the ballpark.  Anyway, it was a nice experience both as a spectator and as a runner, as my wife would attest.  She was one tired little lady afterwards, but Daddy and Adam were proud of her!

From there we went to the Blair County Arts Festival at Penn State Altoona, although by that time my son was ready for a nap and was rather grumpy.  We walked around, saw some ducklings at the pond, checked out the craft vendors, and ate some of the carnival-style food (hot dogs, gyros, fries, shaved ice).  We typically go every year, although when my son fell asleep with his head on my shoulder, our little excursion ended rather abruptly.  If you live close to the area and have never been there, I suggest you go next year.  They usually have it during the middle of May.

Later on that night we went to see the Avengers at the drive-in in Portage.  My son, who will be three in a couple of weeks, did fairly well for his first big-screen movie.  There were times when he preferred to inspect the parts of the car he’s never able to while strapped into his car seat, but for the most part he sat and watched the movie.  He loves the Marvel characters, and the scenes with Hulk especially caught his eye.

Drive-ins never quite amount to the same viewing experience as watching in a movie theater or in your own home, mostly because people never can seem to follow the headlight rules, and you inevitably have someone parked near you who is blabbering away about “Dina and Tina,” as was the case with us that night.  Still, we enjoyed the movie, are looking forward to seeing it on Blu-ray at home, and now we know that our son can possibly, hopefully, maybe sit through a movie in a real movie theater.  Fingers crossed!

Over the course of the next couple weeks we are visiting relatives in northern Pennsylvania, hoping to check out the Kinzua Bridge/Sky Walk while we are there.  If you don’t know anything about it, check it out:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kinzua_Bridge.  It's a very interesting part of Pennsylvania history.  We also have an aunt’s wedding shower that my wife and mom are attending, my son’s birthday, and then in July we are heading to the beach for a week.  Fun times ahead for certain!

Of course, this doesn’t really leave me much time for writing and blogging, but that’s OK.  I realized after an afternoon spent on the golf course a few weeks ago that I actually do look better with a bit of a tan--not so sick and zombie/vampire-like.  I think I need to build a patio out behind my house so that I can sit out there on the weekends and evenings after work and write to my heart’s content on my tablet, rather than sitting inside at my desk.  Heck, maybe I just need to buck up and sit in the grass for the time being.  Anything is better than being inside on a pleasant summer day.

Even though I'm more of a fall/winter type of person, I'm really looking forward to this summer.  I’m not naturally fond of being too busy, but that’s because I sit on my butt watching TV too much.  Luckily the summer TV schedule has me feeling rather blasé (with the exception of Big Brother and True Blood), so hopefully we’ll get outside and enjoy life a little bit.  Maybe dust off and tune up the bikes, or perhaps make an impromptu weekend trip to Pittsburgh or NYC or Delaware.  Maybe we'll check out a zoo or roadside attraction as well.  Whatever it is that we end up doing, I’m looking forward to it!

So how about you?  What fun things have you planned this summer?  Any suggestions?