MichaelandChrissy.com

On the day after Halloween last year, Chrissy and I bought a whole bunch of new decorations on clearance.  In fact, Chrissy left early that morning in order to get the best deals on the 50%-off holiday swag, and she grabbed so much that she had to call me at home to come and man a second cart.  We toted two jammed grocery carts out of Target that day!  We got two stand-up interactive monsters, a giant pumpkin, several new tombstones, a weird skeleton lamp post, and other assorted goodies.

Fast-forward to this year.  I usually wait until the last second to put up Halloween decorations, but the neighbors next door started putting theirs up last weekend.  Then the people across the street saw them doing it, and immediately ran outside to get theirs started too.  What’s the rush?  There’s still a good week of September left!  Of course, Chrissy saw all this and ordered me to pull all of our own Halloween decorations out of storage as well.

I had completely forgotten about last year’s post-holiday haul, so I was amazed at home much I had to carry down out of the garage rafters.  We almost have as many Halloween decorations as Christmas decorations now!  Well, maybe a 2:3 ratio, but close to 1:1.  I used as many extension cords to electrify everything as I usually do for Christmas, so that’s a lot.  I’ve got a big front yard, so I haven’t really been satisfied with our anemic Halloween setup until this year.

Everything looks really good though.  And I haven’t even put out my strobe lights and fog machine yet!  I took Aiden outside with me last night to plug in the final few decorations (the mosquitos chased me off the first time).  He’s enamored with the six-foot-tall monsters on our front porch.  And anything that even remotely looks like a cat.  He loves those.  We’ll have to see if he still loves them when they get all spooky on Halloween night!

Despite the flooding last weekend, Aiden and I tried to drive over to Target to visit the pharmacy.  We couldn’t take the normal way, since Main street was closed between Kennedy Avenue and Indianapolis Blvd due to flooding.  The second normal way was closed too, since 45th Street was also closed due to high water.  We went to the next intersection north, Hart Road, and crossed over to Indianapolis Blvd there, then turned back south towards Target.

Once we got there, we saw that the entire parking lot was under water.  We drove towards the stores, but had to turn back because there was literally nowhere to go but into the lake that had formed in the lot.  The road was dry along the mall itself, but I couldn’t get over there.  The water between me and the stores was at least two feet deep (you could tell from the half-submerged car).  I wasn’t going to chance it.

On the way home, we took some pictures of the flooding at Main Street and on 45th Avenue.  The flooding on 45th wasn’t evident from Kennedy Avenue, but you could plainly see it from Indianapolis.  There were work crews out with pumps and portable pipes to try to drain the water.  It was all pretty crazy.  Aiden watched it all from the copilot seat.  We made it home safe and sound though.  Maybe we’ll try again tomorrow.

The remnants of Hurricane Ike came up through the Midwest from Texas and hit Northwest Indiana hard. It rained for several days straight, causing all of the local rivers to flood.  The Little Calumet river crested and flooded many Northwest Indiana towns along its banks.  Nobody seems to notice the Little Cal until it rains too much, but no one could have expected the nine to ten inches of rainfall that we received last weekend.

The news is showing aerial footage of Calumet Avenue in Munster where the Target and all surrounding roads are under water.  Lake George has gone all wonky in Hobart (where I grew up) and washed away the Third Street bridge.  In Highland, the Highland Plaza parking lot was completely under water.  The Lake County Board of Commissioners declared a state of emergency Monday morning in the wake of last weekend’s record rainfall.

The heavy flooding is causing road closures all over the place. The Borman (80/94), which runs parallel to the Little Calumet, was closed from 394 in the west to Cline Avenue in the east. The Bishop Ford was closed completely. The onramps to the Borman were under water at Calumet Avenue and Kennedy Avenue.  Cline Avenue was closed as well, but I’m not sure how bad the flooding was there.  Since I live south of the Borman, I couldn’t get to work at all this morning!

Aiden and I were in the local Target, looking for new Transformers, when I noticed the new lightsabers in the same aisle.  Hasbro released the new Clone Wars toys on July 26th, and along with tons of new Star Wars action figures, the new lightsabers were on display.  Aiden had played with a lightsaber at his cousins’ house last weekend, so he knew how they worked. 

I let Aiden play with one for a few minutes in Target, and he loved sliding the “blade” in and out of the handle.  I was sure that he would end up beating us with it about the head and shoulders, but he didn’t want to part with it.  I gave him the choice of the blue, green, or red sabers (the red one had a Darth Vader handle), and he eventually chose the green one to take home.

Now he carries it everywhere. He’s not quite able to deploy the blade with a fast wrist movement, but he quickly figured out that it would shoot out if he swung the handle like a bat.  He hasn’t smacked any of us with it yet, so that’s a good sign.  When Aiden gets a little older, we’ll formally introduce him to Star Wars and see how that goes.  I was five years old when “A New Hope” came out, and I had a ton of the toys.

Chrissy and I look forward to the day after Christmas almost as much as the day after Thanksgiving. We wake up early every year to get fifty percent off of all the seasonal goods. You have to wake up early to get the good stuff, since there’s always a crowd of people waiting outside the store to scavenge before you. We were at Kohls by 5 AM, but they had been selling their Christmas stuff for half off all week, so it was picked over already. Next we went to Target and bought a bunch of Christmas decorations, including six strands of blue lights and a white outdoor lighted tree.

We always hit the local Hallmark stores to buy holiday ornaments. I collect the Star Wars and Star Trek ornaments, and Chrissy collects the Pooh Bear and Snoopy ornaments. It almost wasn’t worth it this year, though, since the pickings were pretty slim. I only found two Star Trek ornaments (1, 2) and two Star Wars ornaments (1, 2). Chrissy managed to get two Pooh Bear (1, 2) and one Snoopy. It seems like they have less in stock every year. Last year, I missed out on several of the ones that I wanted. At this rate, they won’t have any at all next year. It might not be worth it to wake up so early anymore…

We made one significant purchase before heading home. We stopped at American Sales and bought a new Christmas tree, a seven-and-a-half foot pre-lit tree with a rotating tree stand. It has a thousand clear lights and almost two thousand branch tips. More branch tips means that you can hang more ornaments, which is good because we have years worth of Hallmark acquisitions. Our current six-foot tree looks pretty cramped, so we decided to go big. It’s almost too bad that we have to wait until next year to see what it’ll look like. We plan to give our old tree to my sister Nikki, since she’s been using the same tree since we were kids. It’s a little nostalgic to see the old tree at her house, but after 20 years, it’s starting to look a little Charlie Brown-ish.

The Transformers Movie came out on DVD on Tuesday, October 16th. There are two versions: a single-disc version with just the movie, and a two-disc version with the movie and an entire disc of extras. Many retailers are offering add-ins with the two-disc set. For example, Target has the world’s first transformable DVD case (it opens up into a plastic Optimus Prime) and Best Buy is packing two Robot Heroes figures in with the set. Other smaller stores are giving out Transformer-branded t-shirts, mouse pads, and pen lights.

Chrissy, being the best wife ever, ran out and got me the two-disc set from Target as soon as it released. She grabbed the last one from the shelf, too! Unfortunately, I haven’t gotten a chance to watch it yet. I’m really interested in the Michael Bay commentary and the slew of bonus features, but we’ve been watching our TV shows or sampling cuisine at the new Houlihan’s that recently opened by us. I’ll get to it eventually, maybe this weekend. I might enjoy seeing the movie again so much that I’ll have to finish the Decepticon portion of Transformers: The Game.

I found the G1 homage repaint of the Transformers Movie Jazz at Target today. He’s a Target exclusive, so it was just a matter of time before he showed up there. I didn’t feel bad for getting him, despite the fact that I swore off buying any of the movie-related toys.

The difference here is that this Jazz is painted to look like the very first Jazz from 1984. I’ve got every incarnation of Jazz from 1984 to the present (Action Master from 1990 not shown here), so this figure fell into place in my collection.

After seeing the new Transformers movie, I wanted to play the new game by Activision. They had the PS3 version on display at Botcon, and it looked really nice. I’ve been searching all over for the PC version, but I could only find the console versions. It turns out that the PC version is a Target exclusive (Target is an official sponsor for the movie), and they had it for only $19.99, which is about a third of what the console versions cost. So I picked up a copy at the Target in Munster on the way home yesterday.

The problem is that I can’t play it yet. I have chores to do… Specifically, the transcript from my Oracle deposition came in the mail, and I have to point out any errata before sending it back to the lawyers. The typist misspelled “NeuStar” about a thousand times. Honest mistake, but I have to make note of it each and every time. So when I’m done editing all 247 pages of the eight-hour deposition transcript, I’ll get to play my game. I’m sure that I’ll have something to say about it once I’m done.

It’s an annual tradition in our house to go out on Black Friday. Every year, on the day after Thanksgiving, Chrissy and I head to the local shopping malls early in the morning for the doorbuster deals. Chrissy and I are a great team, and she is an insane shopping maniac on prozac. She has our strategy planned out a week in advance. The bonus is that we usually get the majority of our holiday shopping done at a substantial savings. This year, we were in the car by 3:30 AM in order to be at Wal-Mart by 4:00 AM.

For a detailed account of our early-morning wanderings, click “Continue Reading”.