As promised the night before, Sarah and I made our way over to Jess & Nick’s flat the next day to have tea (and whisky) and Christmas fruit cake. We even remembered to drop off the gift we forgot the night before!

They have a brilliant flat near the Pimlico tube stop with a lovely view from the roof deck. We had a nice visit and the conversation was stimulating. Sucks that there is a big ocean between us.

As their last great service, Nick & Jess alerted us to the time-saving of using the overground train from Vauxhall to Wimbledon, and walked us to the train station. This allowed us to visit with them longer, so we were grateful.

The train ride was quick and we easily beat Spahr, Tait, and Sharp to the planned meetup spot at Wimbledon station. It was great to see the lads again and I was pleased to introduce them to Sarah. Spahr brought along his son, who I hadn’t seen since he was a tot. Great kid.

As a group we rode a train over to a stop near the grounds and walked until we reached Craven Cottage. Once there, I had a small issue with my ticket, which required me to bounce around between helpful people with orange jackets and handheld computers; however, I eventually was able to enter and meet up with Sarah, Sharp and Tait at our seats in the neutral section (”Come on, Neutrals!”).

Despite ending in a 1-1 draw, the match was quite enjoyable. The home team fell behind late in the second half on a goal by Marcus Bent—who, from my vantage point, appeared to be offside. Up until that first goal, Fulham had been the better side going forward. After the goal they worked hard and, eight minutes later, American Clint Dempsey, equalized with a low drive from the edge of the area.

After the game, we met up again with the Spahrs and headed over to a pub by the tube stop. The place was packed, but I managed to wiggle my way to the bar rather easily and ordered a round for the group. The Spahrs left shortly after, and the rest of us (Sharp, Tait, Sarah and myself) went in search of another drinking establishment. Hopefully one showing the late-starting Wolves match.

We only walked about a block when I noticed the familiar orange strips on the telly in a large, posh bar. We went inside, Tait got the round and we all ordered food. The burgers were huge and served on thick breadboards. The game was at half time and the Wolves were down 0-1, but they scored midway through the second half to equalize. Shortly after that they scored what appeared to be the winning goal, only to have it (rightfully, honestly) called back for offsides.

After the match, Sharp left for home while we made our way to a quiet pub to catch up. The Harcourt Pub near the Edgware Road tube stop met our needs and we relaxed over a last round before calling it a night.

Next: A Day Trip to Cambridge

Planning the trip seems easy compared to the hoops we had to jump through just to get to the airport to start our trip.

A snow storm dumped about eight inches on most of New England, making it difficult to get the dogs to camp (read: the kennel) in East Montpelier before the trip. Being a Sunday, the drop-off window was from 3-5 p.m., meaning we had to leave around two. The round trip was slow, and we had to stop once to scrape the windscreen when the snow turned briefly to sleet, but the dogs got to camp. We hate thinking of them like children, but it always difficult to drop them off when we leave. Not so much because we will miss them (we will), but because they don’t know we are coming back. We worry less about Haley, but Mickey was bounced around between homes before we finally adopted him and he doesn’t do as well with extended periods of our absence.

This morning we got up, packed the truck with our luggage and stopped by Chelsea Station in South Royalton for a big breakfast before continuing on to Lebanon, New Hampshire to catch the bus to Boston. The Dartmouth Coach is a great service, which saves time and money. Instead of having to drive to Burlington and pay for an extra flight to Boston or New York, we took a 2-hour bus ride directly to Logan airport. We arrived at the bus station, with plenty of time to spare, and were pleased to see that they had plowed the parking lot.

When the bus arrived, we piled on. I finished reading “Equal Rites” while Sarah worked on a set of socks she was making for our host’s mother. For the most part the bus trip was good. The only downside was a small child, wearing her father’s noise-canceling headphones while watching the film (”Rudy”) the bus was showing, was sitting across the aisle from us. She didn’t understand the film, which was excusable; but she also didn’t understand that she was shouting “DAD! WHY IS RUDY SAD! DAD, WHAT HAPPENED TO HIS FRIEND! DAD! DAD!” The father didn’t make much of an effort to explain to her that she didn’t need to shout, and instead tried whispering to her… while she wore the noise-canceling headphones. “WHAT!? DAD, DID SOMETHING BAD HAPPEN TO RUDY’S FRIEND? WHAT? DID SOMETHING BAD… WHAT!!!!!????” I put in my earplugs, which I carry for just such occasions. So instead of hearing this little girl shouting, I just heard her talking really loud. Well, at least they weren’t on our flight.

We arrived at Logan airport so far in advance of our flight that no one was even at the Virgin counters. So we read and knitted and had some coffee and chilled until it was time to leave.

As for the flight, it was horrible; for me at least. Virgin provides the video screens in the head rests, and they show movies, TV shows, and one can even play games. However, my system was wonky, and because the same controller that runs the video also controls the light above the seat there were times when the light wouldn’t turn off. This was a red-eye flight, so the wonky light was irritating, and the flight attendants were unable to do anything about it. Every once in a while the video system would just reboot. Not just my screen, but every screen I could see would suddenly reboot. This did not build confidence in the plane.

All of this was tolerable, but once the plane started dropping suddenly, shaking, and people screamed I was a basket-case. I was holding on to Sarah and rocking back and forth. I had told Sarah many times that I don’t like flying, but this was the first time she had been with me on a plane where we encountered turbulence this bad. The turbulence/shaking lasted for a long time. When I checked the in-flight navigation system I noticed we still had two hours in the air. I wasn’t sure I was going to make it. Thankfully things calmed down shortly thereafter.

We arrived at the airport a little later than scheduled, and Chris Mear was there to pick us up. It was 8 a.m. GMT, but it felt like 2 a.m. to us. Sarah rode up front on the ride from Heathrow to Chris’ place in northeast London. I eventually fell asleep in the back awaking as we go to our destination.

Once at Chris’, we met his mum, chatted a bit over tea, and then took a 2 hour nap to recharge our batteries. When we woke up, Chris walked us down to the closest Underground stop so we could get our bearings and an Oyster card. Naturally we stopped by a local pub and had a pint to help split up the trip. When we got back we hung out some more with Chris and his mum. Chris’ brother, David, stopped by a few hours later to start his Christmas holiday.

It was at this point that Chris’ mum really began the process of spoiling us rotten. She cooked an amazing Chinese meal made up of spring rolls, sweet and sour pork, glazed chicken, and a curried beef dish. YUM!

After we were too tired and too stuffed to do much, so we played Wii. Neither Sarah nor I had ever played Wii, but now we are very interested in getting one ourselves. We’re not big gamers, but we really liked that the Wii is more about movement and less about sitting on your bum and using you thumbs.

Next: Playing Tourist

This past summer Sarah reminded me that we had planned to take a real honeymoon. With our fifth anniversary coming up in October I wasn’t about to argue, and so we booked tickets to England and started planning our “Real Honeymoon.”

I won’t go into the boring details of the planning other than to say that with so many friends in the United Kingdom, it was difficult trying to coordinate schedules, especially considering our trip coincided with the Christmas holiday. We were disappointed we weren’t going to be able to see James and Ruth in Wales because of their holiday plans, but we ended up being able to schedule visits with nearly everyone else. Planning a MetaFilter meetup helped.

While we were on our holiday we created an bullet-point outline our adventures. The following narrative is retroactively time-stamped to try and recreate the trip in real time.

Next: And Away We Go!

Our trip began with a 12-hour train ride from Vermont to DC, as we decided to save some money and the hassles of airport security. With prior proper planning, not to mention knitting, reading material, snacks, and a laptop for watching movies, we managed the trip fairly well. When we pulled into Union Station it was just a quick 4-block walk to Josh and Lori’s Capitol Hill townhouse.

On Friday we grabbed breakfast at our favorite bagel/croissant shop on the Hill before heading into town for a meeting and lunch date. Later, we met up with our dear friends Chris and Nicole and got to meet their new daughter, Emma, for the first time. Emma is a cutie pie who has her father’s coloring. After some quality time, the five of us headed down to Atomic Billiards for a recreation of what at one time was our weekly Happy Friday ritual. Soon we were joined by other friends for tasty beverages, games of pool, and lots of catching up. We missed seeing Fil, Homer, and the other folks who were up at Otakon in Baltimore, but are glad they were out having a good time too. It was great to see our favorite bar tender, Rich, again after a long stint away. (There is nothing quite like being a regular at an awesome bar where the bar tender remembers your name and your drink.)

Saturday we awoke and made a bee line for a greasy spoon favored by our hosts, after which Sam and Michael were kind enough to meet us at a metro station and drive out to Rick Jones piano warehouse so that I could look at some of their pianos. (I’ve been on their mailing list for some time but wanted to check the place out for myself, so thanks to Sam, Michael and Rick for indulging me!) Afterward, we piled in the car and headed out to Wheaton, MD for the main event and the reason we chose this particular weekend to visit DC: a huge party that an old buddy of Ricks’ throws every year, a combination of lots of people from all over, live music, great food and drink, and general good time being had by everyone. The weather was incredible, clear and mild with low humidity, which made for a brilliant afternoon. We chatted, took silly pictures, drank tasty beer, ate delicious food, met new people and re-connected with old friends. Rick even got to sing a song with the band. Happy and exhausted, we made our way back into the city and decided there was one more thing we couldn’t pass up while we were in town: the chance to see Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix at the historic (and hugely-screened) Uptown Theater. We enjoyed the film, though of course some of the more subtle plot points and character development had to be left out due to time.

On Sunday morning I packed while Rick procured baked goods and coffee, then we headed back to Union Station for our train to New York. The three and a half hour journey was a snap compared to the grueling ride we’d taken on Thursday, and before I knew it we were pulling in to Penn Station. It was an easy walk to our hotel before meeting up with Kevin Murphy of Ghost in the Machine for coffee. Rick has known Kevin casually for years and introduced me to GitM a couple of years ago. I’ve been a regular reader ever since, and so it was a pleasure for me to get the chance to meet Kevin in person. We talked about politics, pop culture, and growing up in South Carolina before Kevin had to catch a train and head to a friend’s wedding. (Here’s hoping he was able to dance with a couple of bridesmaids!)

Rick and I then made our way to Brooklyn to meet up with some friends from MetaFilter as well as my cousin, Esther Bell. We started with drinks at Iona before heading to Aurora for some awesome upscale Italian cuisine. After a very long evening of chatting and several bottles of wine shared at the table it was time to head back to our comfy hotel room at the Colonial House Inn in Chelsea (a very comfortable and reasonably priced hotel for the gay and gay-friendly traveler).

Waking to torrential rain on Monday, there was nothing to do but catch a cab back to Penn Station and take our train to Vermont. For some reason, the ride seemed longer, even though we had a shorter distance than the straight-shot from Vermont to DC on Thursday. The crowding and the delays might have made the journey feel longer and more exhausting. We were very glad to pull into Randolph and make our way to our cozy house. Many thanks to everyone who took time to host us and help us plan and organize our trip. We had an awesome time and look forward to another annual pilgrimage next summer!

P.S. Now it’s your turn to come visit us in Vermont!

After a light breakfast, we decided to go on our first snowshoe expedition of the season. Rick and I would have preferred to have four feet of snow on the ground, but with the warm winter we’ve had so far, we decided to take advantage of the five inches we did have. We tromped about on our property a bit, found some animal tracks (most likely rabbits and deer), and then proceeded to trespass on our neighbors’ fields. By the time we returned home the power had been restored. The lights on the porch were a welcome sign as we made our way back up the steep, icy driveway.

Sometimes, you have to improvise or jump in to a situation even when conditions are not exactly what you’d like them to be. This year we have a lot of plans that we want to try to put into play, and we’ll most likely need to be flexible in order to have success. Here’s hoping that at least a few of our ideas will come to fruition.

Thursday morning I dropped Sarah off at work and then drove to East Montpelier to drop the dogs off at “camp.” Ruby’s Run is a great place to board, and more importantly, the dogs seem to like it there. With Mickey still on his special diet of steal cut oatmeal and boiled pork (yum!) we had to send him off with a bunch of his pre-made meals too. We appreciate that the staff at Ruby’s are okay with folks bringing their dog’s own food. When I returned home, I finished cleaning the house in anticipation of our various house-sitters and completed the packing before heading off to pick up Sarah and get to Burlington International.

Naturally our flight was delayed a few times, but we eventually got in the air and landed at National Airport (I still refuse to call it anything else) a few hours later than planned. Josh had graciously offered to pick us up, but the delay meant we would have to take Metro to get to his and Lori’s house on Capitol Hill. It was on this leg of the journey that we were first reminded of one of the reasons we decided to leave DC; while we were on the platform at Gallery Place / Chinatown a barely intelligible announcement was made that no trains would be stopping at Union Station, which coincidentally was where we needed to be. So we exited the station, flagged down a cab, and took an expensive trip to our friend’s house. On the way, we drove past Union Station and it was surrounded by cop cars, ambulances, television crews and stranded travelers. The latter were waving desperately at our cab as we went by hoping to get a ride to wherever they were going. It wasn’t until later that night that we learned that there was a “suspicious package” alert. Once we arrived, we greeted our lovely hosts, and being hungry, ordered a late-night pizza before settling in for the night.

Friday morning, we had coffee and bagels at a shop around the corner before heading to Bethesda to see if we could meet up with our jeweler friend, Jason. It ended up that Jason was in the Outer Banks with his family on vacation, but the nice folks at Creative Goldsmiths cleaned our rings for us while we were there.

Next we took the Metro to Friendship Heights and visited with Sarah’s old coworkers at Recording for the Blind & Dyslexic. This would begin the near-constant repetition of how much we loved our house and lives in Vermont. Not that we mind talking about such things, but by Sunday I would be hoarse from telling and re-telling the story.

By now we were late for our scheduled meeting in Dupont Circle where we planned to drop in on my old coworkers at Urban Institute, so we hopped back on the Red Line. After saying our hellos and repeating our love of all things Vermont, we went to lunch with Ros at our favorite Chinese food place in The District, Mei Wah. It was really nice to catch up with Ros over a yummy meal of crispy tofu, eggplant and a delicious asparagus appetizer.

After saying goodbye to Ros we decided we needed to walk off that meal, and so we hoofed it to Adams Morgan so we could try out a mattress at Design Within Reach. The walk wasn’t very long, but it was a hot and humid day, so we appreciated the air conditioning and that they didn’t seem to mind us lying down for a fifteen minute nap while trying out a mattress. Luckily they had mats to lie on so we didn’t mess up the nice mattress with our sweat! The salesman was nice, but was a bit obvious in his eagerness to make the sale. We let him know we are motivated buyers, but that we were simply checking to see if the mattress lived up to what we had read online (it does!). He gave us a quote, his card and wished us a pleasant visit before we left.

Despite Sarah starting to develop blisters from walking so much in her sandals we walked from Adams Morgan to Cleveland Park to meet up with many, many, many beloved friends at the place where Sarah and I first met, Atomic Billiards. Thankfully it was like the old days, and was filled primarily with our group of friends and not the chain-smoking students that seemed to have started hanging out there shortly before we left for Vermont. We were able to talk without shouting over the jukebox, and we were able to shoot pool comfortably without having to wait for a table. The only downsides were that the Best Damn Bartender in the World, Rich, was on vacation, and that a few friends couldn’t make it down. The former was unfortunate, but since Beth did a great job of accommodating our silly crew it was not so bad. The latter was remedied later in the weekend when they returned from their unexpected trip to New York. The group—there must have been 30 of our bestest friends there—finally parted ways around 9:30 and we headed back to Capitol Hill exhausted but happy.

Saturday morning we again grabbed some bagels and coffee and then took the Metro to Grosvenor where our friend Ken picked us up and took us back to his place to jam with my old bandmates. Unfortunately a few folks couldn’t make it (sorry we missed you Barb and John!), but those that did were nice enough to let me sit in and sing a few numbers. We ran through Cold Rain & Snow and Viola Lee Blues before we had to head out in order to make it to our next destination, and Ken was sweet to schlep us to Forest Glen so we didn’t have to ride the entire length of the Red Line to get to the party in Wheaton.

The party in Wheaton was the reason we chose the weekend we did. Our friends Rick and Ed have thrown a party every summer—called Dawson’s Freak because of the street they live on—for the last 6 years. And they really roll out the red carpet. As is always the case when Ed is around, there was tons of food to be had, including the usual bushels and bushels of crabs. We chowed down on a variety of salads, gazpacho, shrimp, burgers, dogs, etc., etc. There were also two kegs—including one that was a Belgian tripel—and a band. Later on we had a quick passing thunderstorm, but nothing could dampen the spirits of this rowdy bunch. When the clouds had passed we all gathered to take photos under the rainbow that materialized and then went back to eating and drinking merrily.

It was at this party that we got to catch up with two of my oldest and dearest friends, Brad and Kelly. I have known Kelly since we both worked at Chi-Chi’s restaurant in College Park and went to the University of Maryland together. We reunited when I lived in Los Angeles (and she and Brad lived in Sacramento and now San Francisco), and I have treasured their friendship ever since. The travel distance has meant that our connections have been less frequent, but as I said, thankfully Rick & Ed’s annual party has made it easier to get together.

Somewhere around 8:30 p.m. Michael, Sam and Jonah swung by from a party they were attending nearby and took us to the next party of the day, Chris’ 30th birthday party at his parent’s place near Friendship Heights. There we caught up with two of our favorite people in the world, Chris and Nicole, as well as Chris’ awesome parents, Victor and Joan. Chris’ brother Matt and his wife Rebecca were also there, and it was great to see them again so soon. They had been in Vermont over the 4th of July weekend and we drove up to Elmore to visit with them. Nicole had baked two delicious pies (peach and I think sour cherry), and there was lots of other things to eat and drink. We played night bocci with a glow-in-the-dark kit in the the back yard and caught up with everyone. Somewhere after midnight, Sam drove us and Jonah to Dupont Circle where we caught the Metro back to Capitol Hill and crashed hard.

Sunday morning we jumped aboard yet another Metro train and hooked up with Amy & Liz and Michael & Sam at our favorite comfort food place, Mark’s Kitchen. We were hoping we would run into all of our old friends who wait tables there, but it ends up that Kate left to manage a make-your-own pottery place in Silver Spring, and Ann had taken a job managing a local singer/songwriter group. However, as much as we love them, we learned this all from the the best waitress of the bunch, Sarah, and she treated us like royalty even while the place was very busy. After a wonderful carb-loaded breakfast (always the best after a day and night of drinking) we all walked over to the farmer’s market, where we parted ways after helping Amy & Liz pick up some things for a potluck they were attending. We had a little down time before our next scheduled gathering, so we went back to Capitol Hill to walk the lovely Ginger and catch a short nap.

Somewhat refreshed, we jumped back on the train and headed to Silver Spring to have dinner with Brad & Kelly at yet another one of our favorite places, Mandalay, a delicious Burmese restaurant. It was an early dinner time so we had the place practically to ourselves. The meal was awesome and it was great to have some one-on-one time with our friends. After dinner we walked around downtown Silver Spring, grabbed some ice cream at the Ben & Jerry’s and said goodbye again before heading back to Capitol Hill to catch up with Josh and Lori.

Monday we got up early and took off for the airport only to have our flight delayed and then canceled. But it ends up that this worked out best for us because we got to Vermont at a good time to pick up the dogs, who were almost as happy to see us as we were to see them.

It was a fun—if not exhausting—trip and it was amazing that we got to see so many of the people we adore. Hopefully we convinced enough of them to come and visit us soon, and we’ll definitely be back for the next Dawson’s Freak.

The Justin Morrill homestead is in the middle of a renovation, which started a few years ago with the amazing—and very pink—gothic revival house, and now has moved on to restoring the beautiful gardens.

Justin Morrill was a successful storekeeper in Strafford, Vermont when he designed and built the house, but his prominence comes from his legislative accomplishments, and not his interest in architecture and landscape gardening. In 1857, while a U.S. Representative from Vermont, he became the chief sponsor of the Land Grant Act, which was to become the most important piece of educational legislation in the 19th century.

“The goal of this legislation was to create in each state a land grant college which would provide a liberal and practical education for farmers, mechanics, artisans and laborers. Inspired in large part by Morrill’s own lack of a formal education, these colleges were to teach courses in science, agriculture and engineering, in addition to the classics. The significance of this legislation was that it expanded American higher education to include practical training along with the classical studies traditionally offered only to clergymen, teachers, physicians and lawyers.” [source]

For the foreseeable future I will be volunteering my time helping to renovate the beautiful display and kitchen gardens at the former Senator’s beautiful—and very pink—homestead.

In addition, I want to thank everyone who submitted suggestions; there were some really awesome ones and many of them would have worked well. I went with the suggestion of the name simply because it won’t have to be changed depending on my geography.

Just in time for the world premiere of the website, I got to listen to Micah Blue Smaldone and the Kamikaze Hearts at the Langdon Street Cafe in Montpelier. It was a great show. Micah’s singing and playing style evoked old-timey blues of the 1930’s, while the Hearts pumped out one catchy roots-rock tune after another. I’d love to work with these artists, or at least hear them live again, soon.

So, which piano to buy? It’s a huge question and one I’ve been investigating for over a month. As Larry Fine points out in his well-respected reference work/consumer guide The Piano Book, the purchase of a piano can in many ways be likened to the purchase of an automobile. There are inexpensive pianos and costly ones, used ones and new ones, plain and fancy ones, and a huge selection of models and makers. One of the major differences between the purchase of a piano or an automobile is that the piano should, with regular tuning and care, last much longer than the average car. Well-made pianos that are maintained and kept in a stable environment are expected to last at least 40-50 years. It’s a big decision, and one I’ll have to live with for decades.

One of the factors limiting my choices is, of course, price. I’m not going to spend 30, 20, or 10 grand on a piano. The budget just won’t allow it, and I have to also budget for regular tunings and maintenance (again, much like a car, pianos need regular service). That narrows the playing field considerably. Also, we won’t have room for a grand piano, so I’ll be in the market for an upright, preferably a full-sized one (48 inches or taller). In terms of looks, my personal taste is for something that isn’t solid black. Glossy ebony just isn’t a look that is going to match anything else we own. I prefer something with a warmer character, even if it’s just a bit of wood grain. I also want a good quality instrument. I’m not looking for a rusty old plunker on it’s last legs or a cheap piano made from green wood and plastic. I’m still a beginning student but I want something that I’ll be able to grow into as my playing improves; I’d rather get a nice instrument now than one I grow to dislike and feel the need to sell later. But even with all those considerations in mind, I still feel daunted by the decision.

The few new-piano dealers I’ve been to didn’t rub me the right way. Walking into their showroom was like walking into (I know you get the analogy by now) a car dealership! Lots of high-pressure tactics and marketing speak. I can appreciate that the pianos they carry are good quality, I just didn’t like the experience of talking with those sales people. Then there’s the murky market of used pianos: trade-ins at dealerships, private pianos for sale by owner, and pianos for sale from institutions. The standard advice is to take a piano technician with you if you think you might want to buy a particular used piano (much as you would take a mechanic with you to inspect a used car). Well and good, but how long will a particular used piano hold up compared to a new one? What features am I looking for? (Piano “extras” such as mute bars for practice, special pedals for different sounds, etc have changed over time and from maker to maker.)

At this point I have information overload. I’ve been to a few dealerships, I’ve been to a technician’s shop to try a refurbished piano she had for sale (pictured above), I’ve read Larry Fine’s book cover-to-cover and my mind is just spinning. I can’t buy a piano for at least a few months, which is a good thing, I think. The refurbished piano I tried out is gorgeous and is certainly a candidate. I also have a desire to try out some of the rarer brands of pianos that are imported to this country or made here. But in order to do that, I’d have to find a larger dealer or piano warehouse, because the local dealers usually only carry two or three brands. The Petrof pianos in particular sound like they’d be worth investigation. I’m also fascinated with the design of the Astin-Weight pianos, which have been made in Salt Lake City since the 1950’s and have some unique characteristics. Unfortunately, I have no idea how I’d be able to find either of these brands locally. This piano searching thing is exciting and frustrating at the same time. I may not have much of a budget, but I want to make the most of what I can spend. Anyone have any advice (or a piano for sale)?

The Super Bowl’s number in any year is also the same as my birthday that year. Growing up, I was rather spoiled by my favorite teams’ success. Between my 9th and 14th birthdays, the Steelers won four Super Bowls (IX, X, XIII, XIV). At the time my friends were Redskins or Colts fans, and they didn’t have much to cheer about.

The Steelers have still been very successful by most standards, but they haven’t won the Big Game in 26 years, and have only made it to the Super Bowl once in that time (Super Bowl XXX). This year they defied the odds, winning 3 games on the road in the playoffs as the six seed, and earned the right to play in their 6th Super Bowl.

Sarah and I have been cheering them on the whole way from our seats at McGuillicuddy’s Irish Pub. Each week we put on our Steelers shirts and yell at the screen. “Run, run, run Bus!” “Catch it, Hines!”

Today is the big game against the NFC champion Seattle Seahawks, and I am nervous as hell. All I want for my 40th birthday (2/16) is for the Steelers to win Super Bowl XL.