Joe and Jamie’s Blog

I was rummaging through old posts and realized that around this time last year Jamie and I both stopped smoking.

Well we both have made it one full year with no slips. We went completely cold turkey and are still smoke free. I must say it feels good to stick to something this beneficial. It also helps looking at today’s cigarette prices, glad I’m not paying near $8 a pack.

Here’s a link to our post from day zero of no smoking. Congratulations to us!

Jamie and I chose our vacation location early this year, due to the fact that we are traveling by plane. I don’t know why I started to look here, but it’s a spot you just can’t go wrong with.

We chose to go to Miami Beach this year. Ah yes, I cannot wait to be there. If only July can come sooner. I booked the hotel and the flight together on Hotels.com last night, got a great deal. Just for booking both we got $250 off the whole order, and two of the nights were free at the hotel. Our second choice was Ocean City, Maryland, but that was more expensive than Miami, even with us driving versus flying.

We are staying at the Fontainebleau Resort. From what I have been hearing it’s a pretty snazzy place. When it comes to hotels I go for location, not really amenities. I could care less if was a shack with a leaky roof, as long as it was right there on the beautiful beach. Who actually spends enough time in the hotel to care anyway right? Hey it’s not Poughkeepsie, its warm and on the beach, the rest is just extra really. When choosing this hotel, I did notice it was rated four and a half stars, so I think we are in for a big treat. There are four actual hotels that make up the place, including a bunch of restaurants, a spa, pools, and of course the beach for the backyard. Here is a blurb on what they offer right from their website:

Following a $1 billion renovation and expansion, Fontainebleau is a spectacular blend of Miami’s glamorous golden era and stylish modern luxury – 1,504 rooms and suites, 22 oceanfront acres, 11 restaurants and nightclubs including three signature name chef restaurants, 40,000-square-foot spa, and a sophisticated poolscape with private cabanas.

I was able to snag some birdseye photos of the hotel, courtesy of Microsoft Virtual Earth. Now one of the hotels isn’t shown yet on the map, it was still under construction the last time the satellite took a picture. It is completed now, you can see it if you watch their video on their website. Check it out.

Today I purchased a four game pack of tickets to the MLS team New York Red Bulls. Jamie and I both like soccer, but we have never been to a real MLS game before, go figure.

Pricing for the MLS is really cheap, well at least compared to other sports. I got seats near the midfield line, end row seats, mid section for all four games. This should give us a good view of the whole field without too much disturbance. I believe they currently play at the Giants stadium, but they are having their own stadium built as we speak, well read I guess. You can check out the new arena’s website here. They have a web cam to watch the progress.

Can’t wait for our first game, I’ll have a bunch of pictures to show everyone. For now, you can visit the team’s website here.

I was finally able to redeem my Christmas present on President’s Day. Jamie had bought me tickets to go see my favorite hockey team play, the Pittsburgh Penguins. They were playing the New York Islanders at the Islanders arena, the Nassau Coliseum in Long Island.

I have been to a couple hockey games before with my father, but this was the first time Jamie had ever gone to one. She enjoyed watching the game, so I was very happy. I like the sport, actually my most favorite to watch. It is constant action, not like baseball that takes 40 minutes just to strike out or football that has 15 seconds of game time for every 20 minutes of TV timeouts.

This was my first trip to the Nassau Coliseum though, the other times I went my father got tickets to the New Jersey Devil’s arena, called the Continental Airlines Arena at the time, now the Prudential Center I believe. The stadium was very nice and well kept, crowds weren’t that bad at all considering it was a day off for most people. I just love the highway robbery at the concessions though, but that is everywhere now.

Maybe we can snag some more tickets later in the season. I want to see some other teams play, so we should be able to find some open games. It’s tough getting tickets because these local teams only play the Penguins so often at home. I’m still loyal to my Penguins, even though many years ago they traded my favorite player…now get this, to the team I hate the most (New York Rangers)! Just swell!

The Islanders wound up winning the game in a shootout. For those of you not up to what happens in a tie in hockey, they play a 5 minute period with only four guys on each time (normally five). If it is a tie after that, three players from each team go to a one-on-one shootout with the goalie, whoever scores more wins, if it still ties then it is a tie. Final score after shootout, Islanders 3, Penguins 2. Enjoy some pics from inside the arena.

Scoreboard

Rink before the game, nice and smooth

Shot of stands at Nassau Coliseum

Penguins trying to score

Go Penguings Go!

Waiting for ice girls to finish shoveling the ice

Full rink shot during game

Faceoff down near Pittsburgh's end

FIGHT! FIGHT! FIGHT! Yes there is always one in hockey!

Happy 21st Birthday Jamie!!

PPPPAAAAARRRRRRTTTTYYYYY!!!!!!

Now we can finally order a drink together when we eat out! :)

Sunday the 7th was our four year anniversary. To be honest, it seems like it has been so much longer. We can’t believe all that we have done in just four years, and how much we still can do in the years to come. We kept it simple this year, just nice little gifts for each other and going out to eat. Jamie came up with a cool gift of getting me some chocolate covered strawberries from Edible Arrangements. She knows how much I love to eat fruit. I got her a new Fossil watch to replace the one I got her last year; it was really scratched up from using it at her job. She likes the brown color metal they are making now.

We decided to eat at Greenbaum and Gilhooley’s Steak and Seafood House in Wappingers Falls. We have never eaten there before so we gave it a shot. One of my new things lately is trying to eat someplace new each time we go out, enough of the same places over and over again. Greenbaum and Gilhooley’s has a very Irish homey feeling to it. It is styled just like every old Irish house I have ever been to. The food was absolutely delicious. Jamie ordered the poached salmon and I had the chicken marsala; best marsala sauce I have ever tasted. We played some Quick Draw while eating, just something to do for fun. We didn’t win anything.

Besides the night being incredibly cold, we had an excellent night. Looking forward to another great year together.