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So last weekend, the family and I worked the Lemonade Booth at St. Dominic’s Festival. According to Shantel, we have been doing this for 15 years. Personally I think we have been doing it longer than that, but who am I to argue with my older sister.

In years past, I have blogged about this family tradition. For those that are new, here is the run down. Every year my parents, my sister and I (and our significant others if we have any at the time) work the festival. We sell Lemonade at a dollar a glass. Since the supplies, booth sponsorship, and workers are donate by our family the church makes pure profit on the sales. We even pay for what we drink. No one gets free Lemonade at the festival (although Dad will probably buy you one if you are a Police Officer working the festival or a member of the church Clergy). Our previous record for sales was 1900ish for a 19 hour weekend. This year we sold 2007 for the same 19 hour weekend.

It was a very busy and very hectic weekend. My body hurt each night by the time I reached closing. I know Shantel’s back had to be bothering her something fierce, and mom and dad were probably feeling the pain as well. My brother-in-law Matt got off the easiest, only having to work around half of the festival, but he wasn’t any slouch while he was there helping us. Tempers flared, words were spoken, but in the end we stuck together and tackled it like the well oiled machine that our family is. I have to say I was proudest of my niece Ayla who busted her butt to help out despite her young age. And she did very well to boot. I ran into some old friends from high school I hadn’t seen in years. My friend and coworker, Mrblong, even visited the festival and according to him had a good time.

During the start of the final day of the festival, my parents asked point blank if I thought we should do the festival next year. I didn’t have an answer for them at the time, and told them we should wait to see how the day plays out. When my sister found out about this she asked me, “You told them no. Right?”

Before the festival started on the last day, the church does a quick (even by Catholic standards) mass for all the festival workers under the food tent. Most who know me well know that while I generally don’t talk a great deal about religion to others, I am a fairly religious person. I just tend to flow outside of organized religion. The homily the priest delivered was about spreading God’s word. He mused that a converstation between God and Jesus after the resurrection would have gone something like this:

G: So who did you put in charge of spreading my word on Earth?
J: My friends.
G: The same ones that denied you, betrayed you, and ran away from you scared?
J: Yes.
G: So what’s your backup plan?
J: If they don’t do it, it doesn’t get done.

I thought about these words the rest of the day. Truth be told, I have been thinking about them all this week.

When we stop doing the festival, who will do it? I’m sure that the church could find people to run the both, but would they really have the best interests of the church in mind, or would they spend more time socializing and treating the festival like an obligation that they have to do because they have kids in Catholic School? Would they just decided to delete the booth from the festival line up, and if they did how long before it was just forgotten?

It would be nice to do other things on Memorial Day weekend, like going to MARCON, but I know I would miss one of the few activities we still do together as a family. I would miss the people we run into every year at the festival. I would miss the Lemonade.

So for those of you who don’t live in Ohio, we got nailed by about a foot of snow Friday afternoon to Saturday night. Needless to say, I didn’t leave my apartment till Sunday morning.

Now I know what you are thinking, why in the world I brave the road conditions if they were so bad. Easy, my preorder for Super Smash Brother Brawl came in.

So I made my way out to the garage and spotted what I thought to be a problem. The snow removal service for my complex had cleaned the roads for the complex, however they had failed to plow the section in front of the garages. This left about 4 feet of snow about a foot high butting up next to my garge door. I opened the door, got in the car and said fuck it. I floored it and plowed my car out on the first try. Woot!

So I’m driving down the street. Its mostly plowed but really just a lane of packed powder. Those rally racing skill I picked up playing Gran Turismo really paid off. Although I’m not sure you can get rally tires on a Mazda 3 4-door.

So I popped into Gamestop to pick up my game. Here is the conversation as I was checking out.

GS Employee: Hey Mario Kart is coming out in April would…

Me: (Cutting him off) Sure. What’s the minimum for pre-order

GS Employee: $5

Me: Do that.

I slide my way back home, and slip the game into the console. It was like an old friend coming home on a new console. So I pick up and Wii Mote and Nuchuck and wasted my entire afternoon. Well I wouldn’t call it a waste, but it was fun.

So about the game. The classic mode is everything that made the series great. All of the characters I care about are there. Some of the new ones are pretty cool too (Solid Snake, Sonic, and Zero Suit Samus to name a few). The story mode however does lack something, namely a cohertent story. I mean my nephew, who started middle school, could write a better fan fiction story than the thing they threw together. But let’s be honest, if you bought this game for the story you should be drug out in the street and shot.

So are you still wondering what a donkey kick. Its a kick that Zelda had in Melee, and presumably has in Brawl, that can knock you off the board for good at only 30% damage. Its what I like to refer to as her “I Win” button. Granted any decent player can avoid it, but it only takes one time lucky to feel the pain.

Speaking of the “I Win” button, I think I’ve mashed it so may times using different characters this afternoon that I have become numb to the carnage. God did I miss Smash Brothers.

It’s been a long time, and I don’t think about the show no more.

I want to go home……I want to go home.

Home, its been a foreign word for me for almost two years. That’s not to say that I did not like or appreciate the places I have stayed since the winter of 2005, its just that they weren’t mine. For those who know me, you know I am a very independent person, and its been a rough two years having to depend heavily on others. It was an interesting role reversal to say the least.

Almost two years ago I had to make a hard decision, live out of my car or go bankrupt renting when I was working a job that only paid $10.26/Hr, or admit I need help and move back down to Cincy to live with mom and dad for a while. I made the trip back with only a portion of the things I had collected over the years, losing most against my will. After a couple of weeks of searching, I landed a job working a 6 month project at Children’s Hospital. I made some friends and had the time of my life.

After the project was over, the company moved me up to Columbus. Still short on case I asked for a favor from my Cousin Andy and his girlfriend (currently fiancee and soon to be wife this Saturday). I asked them to let me “rent out” their spare bedroom so I could move back up to Columbus. Until Wednesday of last week, I’ve spent almost a year and a half as their roommate.

Yesterday, with he help of Katy (a sort of John), I moved the first of my stuff in my new One Bedroom apartment. I was getting the PVR computer system setup, when I flipped on a rerun of Scrubs. The message of the episode was that sometimes things happen for a reason. I am not over the bitterness I feel to the events that happened in November of 2005, and honestly I doubt I ever will be. What I do know, is with out that event in my life, I would probably not be as successful with my career as I have been. I would have never taken the project in Cincy. I wouldn’t have made the friends I did down there. I wouldn’t have ended up working for the same company here in Columbus, which led me to meeting some very close friends. I wouldn’t have received the offer I did to specialize in Information Security with the current company I’m with.

As much as I hate to admit it it took rising from the ashes to be as sucessful as I am today. I did not make this trip alone, so thank you to all who helped get to where I am today. Thank you for bringing me home.