Brian Fields

All good things must come to and end, though.

This past week was shutdown week at work. So from Saturday morning until tomorrow night, I haven’t done any work. I’ve done a great job of playing host to some well deserved laziness and fun times.

Last Saturday, Doug, Joe and I went to Emily’s birthday party. (Emily is one of Kristen’s roomates) and we hung around there for a while, got some good drinking on, then moved along to a bar at Newport on the Levee. I wasn’t a big fan of it. But they had alcohol and that was neat. I took plenty of pictures and made new gallery because it’s been over a year since I made one!

The following day I woke up just in time to go to the Reds game. The Reds played the Indians and boy was it hot out! Going to the ball game is always fun, but in the end it turned out kinda cruddy because the Reds lost and I got sunburnt really bad on my arms and face. More than a week later and my face is still red! (Thank God it doesn’t hurt anymore, though!) And again, I took pictures and made a gallery. It’s not as exciting, but who gives a crap?

I came home from the game and hurt so much that all I did all night was sit downstairs on the couch with my laptop, cruising the internet and writing a small script to help me make galleries much easier.

That’s pretty much how the next day went, although I tried to play some video games to help take my mind off of how I wish my skin would grow quicker. On Monday night Joe and I went to spend the night in Franklin so we could enjoy a little time with Mom and Dad, then go to breakfast with them the following morning. Mom’s birthday is on the 4th, but so is Kristen’s neice’s birthday, so we went to breakfast with mom so Joe could go to Dinner with Kristen’s family.

So for dinner, I went over the Bertels’ house with Mike, Doug and Brownie. Mike got the news about 3 or 4 weeks ago that they are moving to Kansas, where they are orginally from and where Mike was born… so it’s quite possibily the last time I will see Mr. and Mrs. Bertels for a while. I know Mike is sorta bummed about the whole thing, but he knows that this is what they’ve wanted to do for a while.

So Tuesday night we all came back to Cincinnati, and we wanted to stay up and enjoy some drinks, but we all were worn out, so we crapped out around midnight. I feel kinda bad because Brownie came down just to go to bed and hang around for a little in the morning.

Wednesday, I played video games most of the day.

Thursday, I played video games most of the day.

Friday, I played video games most of the day, then went to dinner with Mike and Max and Erma’s because Doug is awesome and shares his “food allowance” with us. Came back, waited on Mike to go to a bar, but he was playing a video game until Joe and Doug got home and wanted to go to a bar, so I played video games until then, too. We went out for a couple of beers. I went to Animations bar for the first time… and I have to say I really don’t want to go back. I don’t mind the environment, but by the time I was done with my first drink, the smoke was so bad that my eyes were burning. Then the guys wanted to stay for another one and play a game of pool. It was torture.

Saturday was some more games… and in the mid afternoon, the Emen all went to the Ritter family event known as “Pondfest”. It was lots of fun. The Ritters have a very beautiful house with a large pond in the back. They have some small boats and plenty of yard space for all sorts of outdoor games. Joe flipped the kayak and fell in the pond. Then Mike overshadowed it by doing it himself no more than an hour later. I guess the kayak is bad news. If you know the Ritters, then you know they enjoy some spirited joking and do it quite well… so it goes without saying that Joe isn’t going to live that down for a couple months.

We had a complete 30 minute or so fireworks show at the end of the night, too. It was loads of fun and a big thank-you goes out to the Ritters for giving everyone such a great evening. I took some pictures, but my batteries died and didn’t get enough to warrant a gallery. I suppose I could make a small one. We’ll see.

After pondfest we went to bar simply because we could. Mike and Doug had to work around 7ish today, so we pretty much were all in bed once we got home, although Me, Joe and Brownie hit up Skyline after the bar. Afterwords we were once again exhausted and pretty much crashed.

Today was pretty much another lazy day. I had lunch with Joe and Brownie, played some games, and had dinner with Mike and Doug. Mike, Doug, and I went to Dewey’s for dinner, and a cool Italian guy bought a round of drinks for everyone to celebrate Italy’s world cup win. Go Italy!… and cool Italians that buy me a beer!!!

So now here I am. I’m trying to stay up late to offset my schedule again but my bed is calling my name. Living a first shift life was really, really great. I hope it gets back that way soon. I just know I’m not going to enjoy tomorrow because I’ll just keep thinking about how long it will be until I have to be at work. Boooo!!!

Peace out for now.

See ya.