Tag / Bills

by Greg

Two Days

Bills Fans
Are you ready for some football??? Man, we are!!! I can’t believe it, but by the time you are reading this, there are only TWO DAYS until the Bills start training camp! TWO DAYS!!! We’ll be heading out to see them practice on Friday with the Drake family (Dave of Buffalo Bills Review fame) and perhaps another friend or two.

There is always reason for optimism this early in the season, but have a look at some stuff on my Buffalo Bills site at some of the actual reasons for optimism. I might write one more article this week as the beginning of the season approaches, but for now there’s plenty of good stuff up there.

We’ll be starting up our show again if not this weekend, next weekend. If you haven’t checked it out yet, I encourage you too. We’re have some new segments planned, a new host or two, and we’ll hopefully be working in many interviews throughout the season.

Fun stuff! Football is almost here!!! WHOOHOO!!!!!

by Greg

Various Endeavors

There’s been a bunch of randomness this week. Things are in a “down time”, or a “lull” in the web design world, so I have been taking advantage of that by working on some other projects that I ordinarily would not be able to give time to. Some of those include:

  • Trailer Refurbishment
    We decided to sell our basic trailer, since we have not used it (except as storage for our musical things) since February of 2005!! It is still in decent condition, and should sell for a decent price. I had to replace the thing on the front that raises and lowers it. The handle had snapped off, so the whole thing needed to be replaced. And since I was doing that, I ended up painting the whole front hitch assembly part. And the fiberglass top that had faded. My neighbor has been helping as well, and he helped re-fasten the loose light on the left side. I’m even taking off and cleaning/painting the tires! It’s been a bigger job than I thought it would be… but the trailer is going to look nice very soon!

    If anyone is interested in a 6 x 10 cargo trailer in very good condition, please let me know. I’ll be putting it on CraigsList.com as soon as it’s ready (very soon, once it stops RAINING!) so let me know before that. Just click the e-mail me links (top, and right column).

  • Blog Updates
    As mentioned recently, I have also been updating the right column of this site. Adding links to my various websites and just cleaning things up a bit.
  • Buffalo Bills Review
    The Bills season is upon us! Training camp starts in less than a WEEK! So I have been updating our website (BuffaloBillsReview.com) as well as doing a bunch of other behind the scenes things. We even decided to make some “staff” t-shirts (which I might make available to the general public later). We’ll wear them on visits to training camp, and pre-season games… a little advertising ploy… 😉 I’ll have a link up on the Bills Review site soon with a photo of the shirt, and maybe a link to order some.
  • There’s The Steeple… Here’s The Church Audiobook Podcast
    I have also had time to get a little ahead in the audiobook recording. Been posting chapters/episodes weekly. You can download them at gregshead.net/church or, just go straight to iTunes. This week’s chapter is actually part two of last week’s “A Bigger View of Church”. Includes an article by Wayne Jacobsen titled, “Living in the Relational Church”.
  • Selling Tickets
    One of the updates I made to our Buffalo Bills Review site was to add some “sponsors” down the right side. OK, they’re not really sponsors… but I am an affiliate of some sort for most of them, so when people click on banners those and use their services, we will receive a commission of some sort. Pretty neat!

    Anyhoo, one of them is StubHub.com. It’s a ticket reselling marketplace. So, you have tickets, you can offer them up for sale. You want tickets – to about ANYTHING – you can find them there! We purchased Bills season tickets and have been selling the ones to games we won’t be going to. It actually has worked out to make our tickets to the games we’re going to a bit cheaper! Fantastic! So, most of the ones we have listed are gone, but there are a few left! Head over to my Buffalo Bills Review site and check out StubHub.com! (Our tickets are in section 225, if you want those…) 😉

  • Making Ice Cream!
    I’ve kind of mentioned this already, but man, we’ve made more ice cream this summer than ever! Last night’s vanilla turned out awesome! The strawberry not as much, but it was still pretty good! The consistency is absolutely the hardest thing to master. I’m getting better, but still have much room for improvement. Oh well… guess I have to make more ice cream…. 🙂

The one thing I keep feeling the urge to do but have not taken the time to do yet is to work on our One Man, One Woman book. Several things recently have reminded me of the very cool lessons in trusting God contained in that book (that is not yet written). I think it may be time to flesh it out a bit more. I have more on trusting (or not trusting) God… but that’s for another upcoming post to GregsHead.net. Stay tuned…

Till then… time for some more odd jobs! 🙂

by Greg

Skyline Party (with an NFL QB???)

Skyline Chili!One of our favorite foods is Skyline Chili. It’s a regional delicacy for Southwestern Ohio. Specifically from Cincinnati. There are many brands of “Cincinnati-style chili” but we like to think Skyline is the best. (Of course, Chi might tell you it’s Empress Chili… but I’m sticking with Skyline.) Over the years I have taken a recipe for Skyline chili that I received from (I think?) my mother-in-law, through my sister-in-law (Jen’s entire family are Skyline afficionados…) and added, subtracted, monkeyed with, and attempted to match the real deal as best I can.

I’m close… but still not quite there.

Still… it is a fantastic thing that I can make GALLONS of Skyline-like Chili in my own house!!!

Well, this weekend, we’re headed to Clarence for a little family party (celebrating the graduation of one of our neices, among other things). It was requested that I make and bring the main course – Skyline Chili!!!

There are many things being celebrated this weekend. There’s Megan’s graduation. 🙂 And a church that my in-laws have lent their musical and preaching talents to on numerous occasions is celebrating 100 years of existence. So we’re celebrating that with them. My in-laws will be leaving soon for their summer travels, so it will be a good-bye party of sorts… and since they’ll be gone for my father-in-law’s birthday and their anniversary (same day), I’m sure we’ll be celebrating that too…..

But that just wasn’t enough.

My mother-in-law is very gifted. She can play the piano like nobody’s business. She has probably sewn (or do you just make?) THOUSANDS of quilts in her lifetime. She can sew anything. AND, she can cook. Add to that the fact that she loves to do all of those things for people, and she keeps herself pretty busy! 🙂 Well, she had been trying to have the Holcomb family over for dinner, where our family could join them – and we’d get to meet a (former) Buffalo Bills, NFL QB!

The problem is that little “former” word back there…

Kelly was traded to Philadelphia a while ago. His family still lives here in Buffalo area, and they attend the various functions at the Clarence Church of Christ (where Jen’s family attends, and Dad was the preacher for 31 years!). Jen’s Mom has been trying for awhile to get together with them again, and found out that they are headed to Philly very soon. SO…

They’re coming to our party! 🙂

So now we’re celebrating everything above … AND it’s a “going away party” for the Holcombs! 🙂

This morning as I was adding all the right seasonings to the giant vat of Skyline, I was thinking, “Kelly Holcomb – #10 for the Buffalo Bills – will get to eat my Skyline… CRAZY!” 🙂 It’s certainly a fun addition to an already fun weekend… and as you can guess, the boys are quite excited to have a meal with KELLY HOLCOMB. 🙂

I wonder if we’ll get to play a little football??? 🙂

So, that’s part of what we’re looking forward to this weekend. I’m sure I’ll have some kind of a report here by Monday.

Hope your weekend is full of Skyline, family celebrations and milestones, and meals with NFL QBs also!!

by Greg

An Eulogy

Buffalo SabresLast night I dreamt that I was a member of the Buffalo Sabres. We were at some awards presentation. I was dressed in my full uniform, as were my team mates. I know for sure Ryan Miller was there, but I forget the other guys faces. All were bummed. Most faces were sullen, gloomy… although the reason for the gathering was to celebrate the season that was.

At some point it dawned on me, the Buffalo Sabres player that I was, that we were all privileged to be there, doing what we were doing. I said as much to my fellow team mates. We were Buffalo Sabres I said to them. We had all grown up as fans of the team (which, in reality is not the case, but made a good point in the dream…) and now here we were playing in the conference finals!

My emotional speech seemed to have a little effect on the guys as they all did manage to at least nod in agreement. It was almost time for us to take the ice and have a skate around for the fans when…

I woke up.

And the reality is, I’m not a member of the team, but we have invested a lot of time watching – and cheering on – the Sabres this year. And it was not wasted. They were fantastic. Tons of goals, tons of comebacks, tons of fun. Even the playoffs. It didn’t end the way we expected it would, thanks to a fantastic performance by the Ottawa Senators.

Let me tell you, I don’t like the Sens. They tend to play at least aggresive, sometimes nasty. They certainly have our number this year, winning 9 of 13 games in the regular season and playoffs. They’re the division rival you love to hate. BUT… I am very happy for them. Not happy they beat my team, but man have they had a rough several years. Let’s hope the Sabres don’t wait as long as they do. They have been fantastically talented but, “underacheivers” for several years running now. Perhaps this is finally their year.

Let’s hope next year is ours.

So, a season comes to an end. We “mourn” for a bit, but I already can’t wait for the next season! I’m sure the NHL will schedule Buffalo vs Ottawa at least as our home opener, if not the season opener. 🙂 Already looking forward to ALL EIGHT of those games!

84 games is a looooong time to wait for another run at the Cup, but assuming we keep the core of this team together (read: SIGN CHRIS DRURY) we should have another great season next year! Already looking forward to it.

So now we get ready for Bills football! 🙂

Go Buffalo!!

by Greg

Tuesday Tidbits

  • NFL Draft
    This past weekend was the NFL draft, as I mentioned here previously. This year, the crazy part was the Bills drafted pretty much as they were expected to! How crazy is that? Last year everyone was flipping out over the insane picks the Bills made… this year, everyone is much happier. (Last year, all the picks made the team, and made significant contributions to the team… what does that mean for this year?) 🙂 Anyhoo… I wrote an overview of it yesterday at my Buffalo Bills Review site. (It’s also on the Bills website, but that’s a crazier link… you can get there from the BBR site…) (PLUS, there are some fun videos on the BBR site…) 🙂
  • Sabres Update
    The Buffalo Sabres lost in double overtime on Sunday. We almost missed it due to the confusing side of TiVo. Long story. But, thankfully we did not. 🙂 Well, sorta thankfully… Game four is tonight… look for the Sabres to take a commanding 3-1 lead heading back to Buffalo for Game 5 Friday night.
  • Macs
    Lots of interest in Macs lately. Been seeing lots of folks who previously have had no interest in the Mac OS switching over to the wonderful world of Apple. If you’re tired of spyware, virus protection, strange error messages, and would like to just enjoy using your computer – Apple has a great section of their site you can check out: apple.com/getamac. It has tons of reasons to buy a Mac, and answers to questions about switching. AND, all those fun commercials with Justin Long and John Hodgman. 🙂

    If you’re interested, I would love to help you pick out the best computer for you. I can even get some discounts too, so definitely let me know if you’re interested. If you don’t need discounts, just click here: bwd-graphics.com/apple. Just enter my Agent ID at checkout. Thanks! 🙂

  • BEAUTIFUL weather
    I don’t really like summer… at all. But, I am loving the recent couple days. Beautiful blue sky, sunny days, green grass, budding flowers… and only in the 60s!! That’s perfect, if you ask me. 🙂
  • Visits
    Grammy & Grandpa are coming to visit this weekend (that would be my parents). We’re looking forward to it. Have lots planned for the short three day visit. Grandma & Grandpa W (Jen’s parents) might be joining us for Friday night too. The boys play baseball on Friday. That would be so fun to have both grandparents there! 🙂 We’re looking forward to seeing them again…
  • Busy…
    I’m feeling busy, but not seeing the return in $$$ at the moment. That is a frustrating place to be. Hopefully that will change in the month of May. Lots of new business on the horizon… perhaps I’ll have to start nudging this week. 🙂
  • Vacation!
    One more thing on my mind of late… VACATION! We already have a week of vacation planned in California in late October – JUST ME AND JEN! But my parents have graciously offered to help us have a family vacation also this year, and the only time we can do that is THIS MONTH. 🙂 I’m not complaining! We’ll be vacating to a favorite vacation destination in the Poconos two weeks from Saturday! Can’t wait! 🙂
  • We’re Still Singing…
    Because of that newly scheduled vacation… we had to REschedule a concert we are doing this month. They were gracious enough to move the date out one week, and we’re looking forward to our evening with them. Now you can hear us at Impact Theater here in Palmyra on May 25th, at 7:30pm. It’s free, but you have to make reservations.

    So…. we’ll see ya out there! 🙂

by Greg

NFL Draft 2007

NFL LogoToday is the big NFL Draft! Well, today and tomorrow. The Bills have 8 draft picks in the 7 rounds this year. They should be able to get some pretty decent players. (Last season, all the players we drafted made the team, and most made pretty significant contributions.)

The funny part about the draft for the Bills is that they NEVER pick who ANYONE thinks they are going to! Ha! Last year with pick #8 we picked Donte Whitner and not one single prognosticator had forecast HIM as our #1 pick. Or ANYONE’S #1 PICK for that matter. 🙂

So, there may be trades, there will be shock and surprise once pick #12 is announced… but it will be fun. And Marv and Co. will add some great talent to our already talented young team! The Bills will surprise people this year. I (almost) guarantee it. 🙂

GO BILLS!

by Greg

Various Things

  • Kirsten joined us for reading the Bible today (usually it’s just Dad & the boys…) and in today’s story, Jesus was going to have dinner with one of the Pharisee’s named Simon. Well, we had just been talking about how we’d like to go to Wendy’s for dinner, so I said, “Maybe they went to Wendy’s!” The kids all thought that was cool, but the next line said, “So they went to his house for dinner.” I said, “Oh, I guess not Wendy’s. They went to his house. So, they probably had Skyline.” Kirstie replied, “Like us!!!” 🙂 (Which, though I’m 100% certain they did not have Skyline, got across the point that they were peoples just like us.) 🙂
  • Jen wants to make resurrection rolls. That’s awesome. 🙂
  • The Buffalo Bills schedule comes out today (along with the rest of the NFL). It will be announced at 4pm on the NFL Network (which we DO NOT get!!!) and around the same time on the Buffalo Bills website.
  • The Buffalo Sabres have three games to go, and are 1 point behind the Detroit Red Wings for the best overall record in the NHL. Detroit only has 2 games left, so the Sabres are definitely in the driver’s seat. And with games against Boston, Washington, and Philadelphia, they stand a very good chance of winning all of those. Tonight’s game is against Boston, whome the Sabres have a 5-0-2 record against this season! Go Sabres! We could have home ice through the whole playoffs!
  • My wife loves to give gifts. Today I opened my drawers to get my clothes for the day and found an Almond Joy (one of my favorites) on top of my shirts and some travel cups for hot drinks that I enjoy on top of my socks. A fun surprise to begin the day.
  • Mac sales of late have been going at a pretty good clip. At least interest has increased. I am getting calls/emails from folks I don’t even know 🙂 Pretty fun. I love hooking people up with Macs! And the bonus is, now I also get paid by Apple to do it! It’s not a lot, but it’s definitely a nice bonus! Lemme know if you need one… 🙂
  • We are Bills season ticket holders once again! It’s a pretty expensive endeavor for us to go to Bills games (tack on another $50 to even $100 on game day for gas, tolls, parking, food, etc.) so a friend reminded us of the wonder of StubHub. It’s a site where you can buy (and sell!) tickets of all sorts. He’s pretty sure we can cover the cost of our tickets to a game or two we want to go to, by selling the games we don’t want to (or, can’t as it were) go to. SO… we have four seats in the Family section, 225 I believe. See ya there! 🙂 (Guess we’ll find out today WHEN we’ll be going to these games!!!)
  • Jen also surprised me by getting a baby sitter and “taking me” to El Pacifico for dinner last night. It’s our new favorite place. She and I can eat for $15-20 and it’s AWESOME, authentic, Mexican food. Great stuff!