Impressions from a Pretty Nice Weekend

I spent a lot of last year using this space to vent frustrations. I have dedicated myself to making this year different; not just trying to ignore the bad and focus on the good, that's mumbo-jumbo, I mean changing circumstances to lessen the bad and create more good. So far, so good, as evidenced by my weekend. I started out Friday getting all my work done that I wanted to while also visiting the BLT prop and costume storage and figuring out some geeky stuff on my new GPS. Saturday was a great day spent with Lisa while John was at band Districts Auditions (he didn't make it, but had a good time). So to celebrate, I'm going to share highlights :-)

The Crazy Uncle's Attic -- I always liken the Brunswick Little Theatre storage units to the crazy uncle's attic. I've loved digging through old stuff since forever (hence the anthropology minor) and BLT has lots of old stuff. Looking through this stuff for props and costumes for use in our upcoming Once Upon A Murder mystery party (buy tickets today, it's going to be great) and the Winnie-the-Pooh Let's PLAY! show was every bit as fun as I expected it to be. Well, digging through this stuff with Jen was every bit as fun as I expected it to be. She's like having your crazy uncle (aunt?) around to ID the stuff you find. Max or I would hold up a kimono or a jacket or an urn or a crystal ball or a plumy hat or a giant fake joint and ask "Hey, what was THIS used in?" and Jen would rattle it off. Great fun! For Max and I at least. And just having time to chat with a pal is always good for the soul. Better than any medicine when you've been feeling blah.


My New Toy -- OK, so I recently came into a little bit of money from my grandfather's estate, long story. Anyhow, I used a small bit of it on myself and bought a brand new handheld GPS to replace one that had died about a year or so ago. This new one looks much the same but it's color and has much more memory and new capabilities for geocaching. One feature is its ability to accept map downloads to augment its internal maps (which suck). I spent some time Friday tinkering around and found a great site full of free maps for download, and also figured out how to get them on my new toy. It's pretty damned cool, trust me. I just bought a micro SD card so I can find MORE free maps. I have a thing for maps.

Big Retail Sucks -- Ok, it's hip to hate on Walmart and "big box" stores and all, but I resist that as much out of my distaste for group-think as anything else. Saturday, though, really brought the failures of major retail outlets to my attention. We went to Kohl's so Lisa could spend a gift card that has been burning a hole in her pocket. While we were there and she was looking around, I was tasked with finding a few long-sleeved shirts and a jacket for the boy. Turns out almost all the clothing that is even remotely fit for the weather we are actually experiencing outside has been thoroughly picked over with the residual inventory on a collection of 70% off clearance racks. Really? No long sleeved shirts in January? I'm too much of a realist to get all choked up about the clothing being produced by 5 year old Bangladeshis, but at least have the freaking little slave kids churn out some sleeves for sale in January, ok?

Next stop is Target, where they carry everything. Everyhting, it turns out, except the two things I wanted to buy. I wasn't looking for anyhting exotic, just some tupperwares to hide in the woods (see Geocaching above) and a micro SD card for my new toy. I batted zero, so today I placed orders on Amazon.com that will be at my house Wednesday. Easy peasy. Screw driving to Wilmington.

But Local Kinda Rules --  I love the "Buy Local" movement in theory. In practice, if you define local as really close to home, the SE Brunswick County area, it only really works if you're in the market for weird artwork, quasi-locally grown produce, or other people's discarded items. The retail options in the Southport-Oak Island area aren't exactly expansive. But Wilmington, now there is some cool stuff. We went to a camera shop on the advice of an ex-reporter friend and camera aficionado and I can't wait to go back. The place was a little like the Crazy Uncle's Attic of photographic......stuff. They had all sorts of new and shiny things, but also loads of old and funky things. I can't wait to go back and browse for, like, ever.

We Regress -- Lately, Lisa and I have been able to have more "couple time" than we've been accustomed to having. John's involvement with marching band and indoor percussion have him busy all day on a bunch of Saturday's, leaving Lisa and I up to our own devices. John's having fun and we have discovered that we still have as much fun together, just the two of us, as we did when we were dating. In fact, we kind of tend to regress to those days a bit. This is great for our mental health, sometimes not so much for our physical health. Yesterday, for example, we had hamburgers with Marianna sauce and fried mozzarella sticks on top of them for lunch. Then, since we decided we had eaten so much and weren't hungry for a "real dinner," we had Pillsbury cinnamon rolls and popcorn for supper while sitting on the couch watching Penny Dreadful on Blu-ray. Good times :)

Museum Book Stores Are Nirvana -- Even small museums have them and they are ALL awesome. The one at Brunswick Town-Fort Anderson is no exception. I found so much worth buying I need to go back. They have Stamp Act Defiance t-shirts (if you don't think THAT'S cool, you were probably the kind of person the opposite sex talked to in high school). None in my size yesterday, so darn, I need to check later. I did declare that since Lisa made me leave the house before my coffee I was buying myself a book. A Big Book. With lots of maps. So there!

New Year's Resolutions

I don't do these. Never have. I don't have a good reason, it's never been my thing and I'm kind of generally opposed to doing what you're "supposed to do" in pretty much any case. But this year I'm giving it a try and hoping to take it seriously. But they aren't going to be the kind of self-improvement, make the world a better place resolutions that are called for in politically correct society. Nope, tried that, not the resolutions, but the branching out into new things and giving of one's self to the benefit of others thing this year and it's left a sour taste in my mouth.

I started out all hopeful and ready to jump into it, as evidenced by this first post of 2014. By August the stress was getting to me. We'd just put on a show that drained our resources to almost nothing and didn't attract the ticket sales we hoped it would and then began the lease of a new facility that threw us into totally uncharted waters. My complaint at the time was purely personal, that it was changing me in ways I didn't like and causing me to run past roses I normally would have been smelling. That sentiment only grew the rest of the year. And it is the basis for this year's resolutions. I would normally feel bad about resolving to do LESS good for others, but not this time. Others frankly don't appreciate it.

That sounds incredibly self-serving, self-centered, self-everything, but damn it, it's true, so sue me. I never wanted a parade or any sort of recognition for the work I did as BLT president, I know that in the performing arts it's the artists who seek and get that, and that's perfectly fine by me. I'm not a spotlight kind of guy and am not out to impress strangers. But I do feel I am entitled to a little respect and the benefit of the doubt, and I got neither. I got the required "thank you's" and "good jobs" and all from the people who have to say such things, but even the people closest to what was happening all year never actually grew to trust me. Despite guiding this organization through some very difficult times and leaving it in rather better shape than I found it, if there is a negative conclusion to leap to, it's leapt to. And if anyone says "B" after I've said "A" a hundred times, "B" is what even those who should know better believe. That really hurts. It makes me feel like I've wasted a lot of time that would have been better spent on family and job and even self.

So that's what I'm resolving to do. I'm going to spend more time watching TV. It sounds like an anti-resolution, doesn't it? But it's symbolic of how this year will be different from last. I'm not a huge television guy, but there are amusing things on there I'd like to enjoy, things friends watch that I'd like to be able to discuss, things our whole family can sit and get into together, things Lisa and I can experience as a couple. It starts Sunday night with ABC's Galavant, which looks hilarious and Lisa and John have both expressed interest in. No more writing press releases or answering a dozen inane emails or updating the website or editing and sharing photos or balancing the BLT checkbook as first priority. I'll get around to the things I agree to continue to do, but it won't be as fast or as consistent. It won't be first on the list, and I regret that it ever was.

The television thing is just a start, an example. I'm also going to read. I am partway through about 8 books and I'm going to finish them all. Stephen King's "Revival" is gripping me right now, and I've devoted time to it the last week or so, so I have a head start on that one. I'm going to buy a new handheld GPS and begin geocaching again. It gets us out of the house together, it shows us the world and it leads to paths full of roses to smell. I'm going to walk on the beach again. I'm going to play our new Disney Infinity game. I'm going to take naps, dig out the computer room and plan weekend or day trips to new places. I'm going to write on this blog much more.


I'll keep up my involvement with the theatre, I have one more year on the board, though as 1 of 9 I am going to point out to everyone as often as I can. But I'm going to pick and choose. There are things about BLT I enjoy and things I don't. I'm done with the things I don't. I'm looking forward to helping plan and put on another murder mystery the end of this month. I'm really excited about the Winnie-the-Pooh workshop and show. I'm trying to cajole the board into scheduling a show I will help produce for the fall. I may stage manage this summer. All things I have found I love.

It's all a part of the new year for Jeffrey, do the things that make me and my family happy. Self-improvement without sweating and pain, baby, that's me in 2015 :)

Mary Poppins On Stage

Outside the DPAC before the show

We didn't make it to Broadway for this one, but the next best thing came to us. Or kinda sorta close to us. Ok, a 3 1/2 hour drive away from us that required a vacation day to make work, but it was totally worth it. A couple weekends ago the lovely and talented Miss Lisa and I made a weekend out of going to see Mary Poppins the musical at the Durham Performing Arts Center, and it was a spectacular experience. I'm not at all qualified to "review" a Broadway style show, but I can tell you about what an awesome experience the whole weekend turned out to be.

This whole adventure started on a whim, like many Stites activities tend to. Lisa bought me the DVD of Mary Poppins for my birthday and one of the extras was a documentary on the making of the musical. I started out watching it by myself, but before long all three of us were glued to it and talking about how much we were able to appreciate better what went into putting on a show after our family's experience in Oz over the summer. During the rooftop chimney sweep scene, the musical features a bit of technical wizardry that had all of us floored. Bert takes a walk up the side of the set, across the top upside down and back down the other side. It's a really impressive piece of work and after seeing that we all decided it would be really cool to go see this show. Lisa wandered off and came back a few minutes later with the news that as luck would have it, Mary Poppins was coming to Durham in February and tickets were still available, but only a very few. We found a few seats for a Sunday night show, the final show as it turned out, and ordered them up.

Our trip went from being a family adventure to a couple's getaway after John's church youth group retreat got rescheduled for the same weekend. We were disappointed but found we'd crossed some sort of threshold in the parenting world. The morning of our last day in Durham we admitted to each other that this time we really didn't find ourselves missing John. That sounds terrible, I know, but it isn't a bad thing at all really. We were in touch with him and he with us all weekend. We were sharing our experiences, though different ones. He was having a blast in the mountains and wasn't missing us one bit either. We are all growing up and I find that it actually feels good. We had a great time as a couple, just us two, and it was perfect that way. I guess it's nice to have it pointed out so clearly that we haven't turned into one of those marriages that stays together for the kids' sake. We'll be OK, more than OK, for a long long, long time, and that feels great.

All it needed was a monorail running through it

So on with our little couple's excursion. Our show was on Sunday night, but since we were without kid from Friday morning to Monday afternoon, we decided to make a weekend out of it. We didn't go nuts and get up early on Saturday or anything, we just left about lunchtime and headed North toward our one bedroom suite just outside Durham. Lisa found that deal as well, a huge suite with a king bed and kitchen for about $85 a night. The girl is good. It was a fun drive through a very rare North Carolina snowstorm. We arrived without incident and found that our hotel looked like the Contemporary Resort in Disney World, without the monorail. Strange, but it amused the Hell out of us. The room turned out to be great, the hotel very nice and situated near a rather large mall/outdoor shopping complex. Off we went in search of dinner and amusement. We found both and spent the night laughing and talking and exploring.

Our show wasn't until 6:30 Sunday evening, so we had plenty of time to explore that day, too. We started the day with a morning bubble in the hot tub, and decided once again that we REALLY need to get one for the house, then headed out to see what we could see. We ended up on the Duke University campus and took in the cathedral (beautiful), some geocaching (unsuccessful), and the gardens. We even tried to find a spot in the gardens to play Pooh Sticks, but there was a sad lack of water in the creek beds. Oh well. Then we headed "into town" for an early dinner.

Oh my. Let me just say that if you go to Durham and are anywhere near the DPAC and don't stop into Bull City Burger and Brewery you must simply hate yourself. The place is awesome. It's a brewpub and they have taken the "sustainable restaurant" thing to new heights. These folks make their own bacon out of pigs fed on the leftover barley mash used to brew the beer. Their website explains it well, and despite it all being very "hipster," I was pretty impressed. And the food is not only delicious, but creative. I had a "bowl of pickled stuff" as an appetizer. Yep. It was like they knew I was coming and designed a menu just for me. We also tried their Bull Nuts, peanuts cooked up with bacon and sugar and rosemary and who knows what else. If you invite us to a party and ask us to bring a munchy, we are going to try making this, just so you know. The burgers were great, using beef from cows raised on a farm just outside the city and served on homemade buns. They probably grew the wheat on the roof or something. The condiments were even homemade. And the beer. Wow. I love beer and this place made me a very happy Jeffrey. We tried barley wine, which is a highly alcoholic, very slowly crafted brew served in a snifter so you feel all fancy-like drinking it. Let me just say that Youngen Horny Barley Wine is one of God's great gifts to humanity.

Nosebleeds, baby! :)

After dinner we were in fine spirits and walked the few short blocks to the beautiful Durham Performing Arts Center. This place was really cool and run very well. It was a sold out show, but the number of people never intruded on our experience. That may just as well be because we were having such a great time with each other that nothing was going to intrude, but the place was run with great precision. Our seats were in the back, the second to the last row of the very top balcony to be exact. We could have had better seats, honestly, but we could have had worse. I didn't mind at all, as being so high gave me a great look at the technical aspects of the show. A bird's eye view, I guess. I helped move sets on and off stage during our production of Wizard of Oz and wondered if I would see little dudes dressed all in black running on and off stage. Lisa said, no, she thought not. But we did, once! And we were very happy.

Mary Poppins was simply breathtaking. The music is terrific and the sets are incredible and the actors sang and danced and acted their hearts out (see, I told you I was not qualified to write a theater review). The Banks house slid onto the stage and opened up like a dollhouse. It was amazing. We were convinced this touring company wouldn't do the Bert walking upside down thing because we didn't see the framework they used in the show we saw on the dvd. Boy, were we wrong. They didn't need a frame, this Bert just walked up the side of the stage and across the top, dancing and singing all the way. We were speechless. Lisa and I are still singing songs from this show all day long, they are that good. All around a lovely experience.

We had taken off work on Monday after the show which turned out to be a good idea as we'd have gotten home really very late. As it was, we just rolled back to the hotel a few miles away, slept a nice night away and headed home at our leisure Monday morning.

Perfect weekend :)

Oh, The Places You'll Go

The Oak Island Geohound

We Stiteses are wanderers, goers, doers, seekers. One hobby we indulge in that plays to all those traits is Geocaching. If you've never heard of it, geocaching involves hiding and seeking containers of various sizes all over the world using a GPS enabled device and the geocaching.com web site. There is a great video right here explaining it all, if you are interested.

Geocaching has given us an excuse to wander more times than I can count, and when we are in new places, we always check for caches and often end up finding spots we would never have seen otherwise. I can go on and on about the joys and rewards of seeking tupperwares in the woods, but today I wanted to talk about my Geohound, who has been places I've never been even close to. Yet.

Not only do we geocachers travel from cache to cache ourselves, we also send proxies out to travel the world, called travel bugs. Soon after I found the hobby of geocaching, I ordered my first travel bug dog tag, that's the metal tag you see on the chain in the above picture. The tag has a number unique to itself that is used to track the item, in this case a Happy Meal toy my son gave me to keep me company in my car at work, as it is discovered by geocachers and moved by them from one cache to another. Cachers log the number on the geocaching web site and the tag's movements are recorded, along with comments and often pictures, on its very own web page (the Oak Island Geohound can be found here, complete with a map of his travels). Trackable items often disappear and get lost, it's just the nature of the game, but I really lucked out with the Geohound. I set him into the world on May 29, 2007 and he is still active and traveling today. I got an update on him just this morning, in fact, from Germany.

Skijorring outside Fairbanks

The Geohound was charmed from the start. His first trip was a long one, from Oak Island, North Carolina to Fairbanks, Alaska. He spent some time skijorring, which I had never heard of. Apparently, skijorring involves putting cross country skis on and tying yourself to a few sled dogs. It's like dog sledding without the sled. I can't wait to try it next time we get enough snow. Or not.

He went with the cacher who found him to St. Paul and then back to Alaska before being picked up and moved to Maine, where he traveled a bit before once again going cross-country and ending up in Washington State. He seemed to be having a fine time. He moved back and forth between Washington and Oregon for a bit then headed south for California. I started getting a few pictures from the beautiful Los Padres National Forest and watching him tour all over the greater Los Angeles area.

The North Fork in Los Padres NF

The Smallest Post Office in Wheeler, CA

This morning, I got word that my little Geohound had left the bounds of the good old US of A and landed himself in Germany, Niedersachsen, Germany to be exact. It's near Hannover. I think I have some extedned, in-law-type family there. 

In 5 1/2 years, this little stuffed dog has traveled 23,600 miles. I'm frankly shocked a Happy Meal toy has held up for that long. Following his travels, we've learned new things and been put in contact with new people from all over the country and now the world. I've checked out the places he's visited and added to my own "bucket list." Now I'm using Google translator to read the logs. As an educational experience, this really can't be beat. As a bit of arm chair globe-trotting, it is perfect. Even when we're sitting still, there's no reason to stay at home after all.

"Treasure Hunting" In the World

A US Geodetic Survey marker in New Bern, NC

Ok, maybe it isn't treasure in the usual sense, but it's got me excited. It's the perfect storm of Geekdom! We have the opportunity to combine two of our family's favorite things, a trip to Disney World and geocaching. Geocaching involves using a handheld GPS receiver to find hidden "caches." These caches could be anything from a large metal container to a tupperware to a tiny tube and are hidden everywhere from the deep woods to parking lots. No geocaches are hidden on Disney property, they aren't allowed, but I find that an offshoot of geocaching called benchmark hunting is possible in the parks.

Benchmarks are small markers, usually a metal disc, used to permanently mark a location. Most are placed by the government to help with surveying and keeping track of boundaries. Most markers are embedded either on roads or walkways or the sides of buildings, but some are on concrete posts out in the grass and trees. They tend to often be in interesting places and/or hidden by time and disuse, so finding them can be a lot of fun. Private companies use survey markers as well, and thanks to a blog post in MiceChat, I find Disney has them scattered all through it's property.

A Disney Benchmark

Being Disney, these aren't just plain old brass discs with some initials and numbers on them. Disney benchmarks feature Mickey Ears placed on a globe with lines of latitude and longitude on it. There are a few web sites devoted to finding and cataloging these benchmarks. One of the best I've seen so far is Patty Winter's Disney Benchmark Pages. She has them broken down by resort and park and "other places," so it's easy to find the locations near where you plan to be. Each section features a .loc file with the coordinates so geeks like me can easy transfer them to a GPS unit. I'm sure from looking over the site that there are many she doesn't have listed. Most of the resorts don't have a list yet and I'm sure there are more in the parks as well. This presents the fun part, the challenge if you will. Not only will the Pooh Sticks family be seeking out all the previously found benchmarks, but we will be keeping our eyes to the ground hoping to discover, photograph and mark some "new" ones.

Sorcerers Of The Magic Kingdom

Sorcerers of the Magic Kingdom is a new game being play-tested right now in the Magic Kingdom. Similar to a Kim Possible adventure available in Epcot, this game will allow park guests to assume the role of Sorcerers defending the Magic Kingdom from Disney villains. There is a great description of the game by a couple that were part of play-testing last week over at MouseSteps, including lots of pictures (such as the one at left) and a couple of videos of the game in action.

It appears players will sign up at the Fire Station on Main Street, then proceed to one of the other lands to play. Completing the mission in one land lets you continue on to the next. Play is accomplished by finding special locations on a map, waving a playing card over a key symbol, then interacting with a video that pops up. You use your cards, each player is given five, to cast spells and defeat the villain.

I'm personally really excited to try this. Our family loves a good adventure, we (well especially me) love us some maps and we are regular Geocachers, so this game is right up our alley. On your first trip to Disney, there are probably other things you should do instead. This game is meant, I think, for those of us returning to the parks after multiple trips. It looks like it will let us enjoy the Magic Kingdom in a new way and find parts of it that maybe we had missed on previous trips. That's what I'm hoping for in any case.

Our good friends and fellow Disney Geeks are heading to the Dis in a couple weeks. Our fingers are all crossed hoping that Sorcerers is up and running when they arrive. If they get to play, the lovely and talented Jenny has agreed to write a guest blog for me about her experience. Expect to hear reports from their trip here in any case. One of the best things about Disney friends is reliving their trips vicariously, and I find myself really excited for them.