Dereliction of Duty

The crack staff at Poogie's Echo Chamber have fallen behind in their award-winning blog updates. For this, we apologize. We've missed a few important events, including Halloween, Caroline's 3rd Birthday Party, the first of two major snowfalls in NE Ohio and more gratuitous shots of Josephine. Perhaps some of the pictures will explain the problem.

Yep, that's the problem. That's our leader carving what turned out to be his brother's pumpkin. Thanks to Bill for swiping the $6.00 gourd and carving it up before realizing he had the wrong one. Judging by the look of the head Poogster, it would not have mattered.

That's Henry (above) at his preschool Halloween costume line-up. I dig Cooper's bear outfit, though. They tell me it was supposed to be Simba, but I'll call it like I see it. Cute kid and my future son-in-law (wink).

Our first trick-or-treater of the evening was none other than Mason as a warm and snuggly Elmo. We caught up to Jim aka "90" and Mason after a few houses and continued on with them during the evening. Mason had the good sense to drive to each house in his Little Tikes push car. Unfortunately, we had to abandon the car somewhere in the neighborhood in order to catch up with the older kids. Being the good sport, Mason and Caroline finished the night in the Radio Flyer and could not have been happier!

The Halloween crew sans Josie.

Cue the gratuitous Josie shot.

We received our first of two notable snowfalls in early November this year. Caroline, like her dad, loves the snow. We're readying for another Kendall Hills sledfest. Last year, Caroline was a good sport to head down the big hills with Daddy. She's been eyeballing the Wham-O-Boggan ever since.

Henry and Caroline in the backyard snow fort.

Caroline turned 3 on November 4th. We celebrated her birthday on the weekend after Election Day at Bear on the Square in Hudson, Ohio. Good times!

Caroline vs. three candles and ice cream. Advantage: Caroline.

A Beautiful Day for Baseball

On Saturday night, someone suggested we stop talking about taking a few hacks at the old ball yard and go out and do it. For the Holman brothers, beers were involved in the decision making process. That's usually a bad sign. On Sunday morning, we made the suggestion into reality.

Joined by our usual partner-in-recreation who shall be known simply as "90", we made our way in the drizzling rain to the ball fields at Barlow Farm in Hudson. It was a beautiful day for baseball. Then again, when is it not?

Ground balls, infield throws, Fungo, BP, soft-toss and the 90's one-man home-run derby show. As Brett Michaels would say, it was "awesome". (Does he know any other word?)

A couple of funny asides:

1. The Holman Brothers drilled "90" at least five times during batting practice. By all accounts, he was okay.

2. Billy "the Tasmanian Devil" broke two bats on successive swings, including my favorite El Cheapo Louisville Slugger which we finally discovered was a Derek Jeter model. So much for Derek Jeter.

3. I managed to bust a moob while "diving" (or collapsing) for a shallow pop fly. Note to self: there are no points for shagging the most pop flies when you are 33 years old.

4. Billy hit the base of the wall during his turn at home-run derby. I was nowhere near the wall and had limited swings with my broken moob. "90" managed to deliver a blast into the driveway of a home 350 feet from home plate. There were no other casualties.

Here's a picture of the Holman brothers at the conclusion of the day.

Good times.