January was an interesting month. We started it off with a visit from Justin to celebrate the passing of the New Year and it ended with a pretty devastating ice storm that knocked our electricity out for three days. We were lucky in many ways though. Several people I know were without power a week later. Most folks I know seem to have been restored within six days. My friends Craig and Karen put the six of us up in their home. They did not lose their power throughout the storm and had an extra room that we slept comfortably in. Craig and Karen have made my list for best person in the world. Not many people would take-in a family of six for three days and nights. We had fun. Craig has two kids (one boy and one girl) and all our kids played well together. We ate out at Red Robin, Longhorn Steakhouse and of course McDonald’s. We watched movies (Stepbrothers was a riot … loved seeing the Metallica posters up on John C. Reilly’s wall … guess I am an immature loser too). We took the kids to see “Hotel for Dogs”. Melissa and Karen went out for a massage. It was a great way to weather the storm and we are very lucky to have friends like Craig and Karen Matthews.
The weekend before the ice storm I was rear-ended in the G35. The rear bumper and the rear quarter panel absorbed all the force and everyone was OK. I have a 1/2″ gap between my truunk and the right rear quarter panel and the absorbtion material between the rear bumper and the frame is completely pushed in. I can’t get the car into the shop until the first week of March due to all the wrecks that have happened the last several weeks with the weather. If it weren’t so slick and icy (and cold) I would drive the K bike into appointments.
All the rest of the photos for January are here.