Scenes From 2020

I wrote this in January of 2021, but I didn't post it because it didn't feel right. Now, I can see that it isn't bragging to say that you are lucky that you can count your blessings. 

I can't say that 2020 was worth celebrating, but I don't want to forget some of the things that we were able to do.

We started the year off with a bang at Universal's Wizarding World of Harry Potter.

We now know how lucky we were to have gone to Florida right after Christmas. If we had waited to go during spring break, then the trip would not have happened.

Planning for our June trip to Nova Scotia began in February. Thematically, we ate breakfast poutine at the BeerStyles Taproom while we booked houses through Airbnb. 

We were lucky that all the places we booked refunded our deposit money when the border to Canada closed. 

Charlotte attended her first piano festival in March. Here a nervous pianist gets some support from Mom. 

It was lucky that the festival was on the 7th. Things began to shut down a few days later.

Charlotte made this Easter wreath for our front door in April. 

We were lucky that she was able to roll with the punches and not just sit around and complaining all day about missing her friends.

We brought Ellie home in May. Our two girls bonded quickly, and they are now best friends.

We were lucky to get a dog with such nice disposition. 

We enjoy walking down to the Johnston library during the summer, and we were pumped when we discovered that you could pick a private browsing time. We did this more than once for books and movies. 

I don't think you can book a browsing time now, so it was lucky we got in when we could.

We lost power for 18 hours, but other than that, we weren't really affected by the derecho in August. But in mid-July, we believe a small funnel cloud ripped through our neighborhood. 

Quite a few trees were left with a "V"-shaped bite taken out of them. 

You can see another tree like that standing behind the wood-chipper.

We were thankful that no one was hurt, and we were lucky and grateful that our house and property were okay.

On August 25, Urbandale schools opened their buildings in a hybrid model, and Char was able to return to class in person.

She had to wear a mask, and only half of her class attends on "J-Hawk" days, but Char was just as excited and nervous as she was on the other first-days-of-school.  I asked her when she got home, "How did it go today?"

 

Charlotte quickly replied, "It was great! We... and then we... our teacher... then we played... Ha! I love school!" 

Daphne and I gave each other a high-five. We had been telling Char, "No, we can't do that," all summer long. We kept reminding her that our major goal was to keep ourselves as healthy as we could so she could go back to Karen Acres and see her friends again. We were lucky that it worked out for her for almost three months.

I was almost as excited when Flix Brewhouse reopened two days later. We were only going to stop by for some takeout on a Saturday afternoon, but the rest of the tables were empty, and the precautions Flix had taken were well thought out. 

When they brought us our boxed lunch, we surprised ourselves by sitting down and eating there. 

We only removed our masks to eat (and read).

The menu was limited, but I had them add tomatoes to their meat lovers pizza to approximate a supreme.

They did have Daphne's favorite salad. 

Daphne and I each took our first bites and then looked at each other. I don't know who teared-up first, but it was Daphne who said, "This is how life is supposed to be." It was the first time we had eaten outside of our car or home in 165 days. I suppose it isn't too surprising that we got a little emotional.

I felt so lucky to be able to enjoy the atmosphere at Flix again. We went back for lunch several more times. The deal was if the dining area was busy, we'd get takeout. If the area was empty, we'd stay. 

Sadly for Flix, it was almost always empty. The Urbandale Schools District moved to online learning the same week in November that Flix was forced to close their theaters again. 

We are now back in our school buildings, so I am hopeful Flix can also reopen again sometime in 2021.

We reopened up the garage theater during Thanksgiving break. It was cool out there, but we were lucky to have Grandpa's propane heater to warm the space up before the movie started.

Here's where I taught school while UHS was confined to online learning only. I didn't enjoy working with students this way, but we did okay. I never thought I would get out of bed in the morning and walk past my school desk on the way to the bathroom.

We were lucky our internet held out, and we had enough data for three computers running Zoom all day.

We had a small gathering at Christmas, and Char was exited with her gifts.

It's lucky she likes to read so much. That will serve her well in the years to come.

For New Year's Eve, Char invited us to her movie party. Her goal was to stay up until midnight. She wanted to be there when 2020 finally said goodbye.

It's lucky we made it until 12:00. I mean that in more ways than one. 

In this post I used the word "lucky" 13 times. That isn't because I do not have a thesaurus. Lucky is the word I have used all year to keep my spirits up. 

I had to keep reminding myself that we were lucky to stay healthy. Not everybody did. We were lucky to have each other. Not everybody did. We were lucky to alway have food on the table. Not everyone did. We are lucky we stayed together. Not everyone did.

I know it's too early to celebrate the end of the pandemic, but it's never too early to count my blessings.

Story Material: Poor Ron.

Char wore a Hermione Granger shirt on the first day of school. It's hard to see under her tie. 

Charlotte saw another girl wearing this shirt when we on vacation in January. She told me how funny the design was,"Dad, it's like, 'HERMIONE!'," Char snapped out an imaginary wand, "In action!" Char liked that Mrs. Norris the cat and Mrs. Mcgonagall were included. "But why was Professor Lockhart even on there? That's hilarious!"

We searched Google images when we got home, and found the shirt for sale on Kohls.com. Here's the whole Hermione design. 

Kohls sells other Potter character tees in the same style, and we wanted to see what they looked like.

For his shirt, Harry stands defiantly with the Sword of Gryffindor on his shoulder and with Hagrid and Professor Dumbledore at his back. A worried Dobby is there, too.

Draco is looking menacing while his dad, Crabbe and Goyle, and Professor Snape all lear at us for being muggles. Even the Hand of Glory mocks us.

Now let's see Ron's design. What?! The other shirts make their characters look cool. How come Ron has to make the ewww-face while wearing earmuffs? Hermione waves a wand, Harry has a sword, Draco holds his Nimbus 2001, and Ron is stuck clutching a crying mandrake? Ginny looks embarrassed for him, and Fred and George aren't supportive. They can't believe they're stuck on a Ron shirt. Instead of the flying car he flew to school, Ron gets the Howler his mum wrote. 

This is no shirt for a guy who chases down Hermione's attackers, "Hey! That's my girlfriend, you numpties!"

Even Neville got a design that makes him look tough.

Poor Ron. That's no way to treat a mate.

A Surprise Vacation for Charlotte: Simpsons, Suess, and a Parade Edition

While looking for lunch, we ended up in the Springfield area.

Char hadn't seen the cartoon before, and she became enamored with the Simpsons while watching the TV clips they show while you wait in the restaurants' lines.

We rode the Simpsons Ride at Char's request. They showed cartoon clips in that line, too. Char was so hooked. She watched the first season of the Simpsons on YouTube back in our hotel room, and now she's almost done with season two. I think it is safe to say that she's officially a Simpsons fan.

I had a Krusty Burger just before we got on the Simpsons Ride. I wouldn't do that again...

After the ride, we chilled out by the lake. They have a water show that reminds me of the Fountains of Bellagio in Las Vegas.

The Beat Builders also put on a good show.

We celebrated New Year's Eve in the parks by watching the 5:30 Macy's parade.

Insert the sounds of paper horns tooting here:

We were back in our hotel room by 8:30 p.m. Char insisted on watching the Simpsons until it was "at least midnight", but we negotiated the time to 10 p.m. We all laid on the same bed watching YouTube on my old laptop. It wasn't the most exciting New Year's Eve, but it was one of our nicer ones.

Not surprisingly, we were up early on New Year's Day. The parks felt almost empty until noon when they swelled back to capacity again. With the extra space in the morning, we were able to cross off the last items on our to-do lists.

Char might turn ten this year, but she still enjoys checking out playgrounds and other "little kid" attractions. 

One of her last to-do items was to eat green eggs and ham in Seuss Landing.

I wasn't expecting tots, but I never say no to them. This was a great snack for the three of us.

Well, that's our trip. We arrived at 3:00 p.m. on Sunday afternoon, and we had to meet our airport shuttle at 5:55 a.m. on Thursday. In between, we were either in the parks or in our beds.

After each park day my watch looked like this:

FYI: 25, 416 steps is a bit over 10.5 miles... I'll admit that sometimes this was one of the most welcoming signs for me to see. 

Charlotte told us last night that if she could repeat our vacation in Florida, she would want to do it every day for a year. I'm pretty sure my body couldn't handle that. Places like Universal can really beat a guy up. But if Char wants to do it again, that's a sure sign that our vacation was a success. 

A Surprise Vacation for Charlotte: Cars and Monsters Edition

Although the Wizarding World of Harry Potter was our focus, there were other things to see and do in the Universal parks. For instance, I didn't know I could visit the Mel's Drive-In from American Graffiti. It looked good in Christmas decor. 

That reminds me. We also saw a lot of cool vehicles. 

John Milner's '32 Coupe:

Steve Bolander's '58 Impala:

Dr. Emmett Brown's DeLorean:

The Mystery Inc. van:

The Bluesmobile:

A random Vespa near our hotel:

And I can't forget Sirius Black's motorbike ( It's only fair to let Daphne drive since she does all the planning for our trips):

Of all the vehicles we saw, I have to admit this was our favorite. 

Daphne had read that the Horror Make Up Show was a "hidden gem" experience, "In this outrageous live show you'll watch how top make-up and special effects artists craft some of the creepy characters you've seen on the big screen. Featuring movie clips, props, and interactive demonstrations, this experience offers fascinatingly funny insight into the moviemaking process."

I have to enthusiastically agree. It was an all-ages comedy act with fake blood and monster surprises. When the show began, one of the presenters ran through the audience with a knife handle sticking out of his bloody chest. When he asked Daphne for help, she started to get out of her seat. She promptly sat down when he explained he needed mouth-to-mouth resuscitation. 

He replied, "Don't 'cha at least want to think about it?" She didn't.

Here are a few of the movie props you can see in the lobby.

The Thing (1982). This is one of the more memorable moments (to put it mildly) in this film:

An American Werewolf in London (1981). One of the funniest, scary movies I have seen:

Jaws (1975) This prop is from the other "popcorn in the air" scare:

I hadn't seen this poster for Frankenstien (1931) before. I really admire how the golden ratio is used to give this a sense of movement. 

Speaking of monsters, the Jaws ride may be gone, but you can still pose with one of the Sharks from the film.

I wouldn't ever want to see this in real life. 

Flirting with danger.

I'll finish up with this image. It's a nice transition to my next post.