Fourth of July Weekend 2015

[BigKen]

Friday July 3rd officially kicked off the long weekend to celebrate Independence Day.

It's now officially Independence Day and I was wondering what all of you Patriot fans were doing.

I'll start..................Yesterday, my wife and I decided to go to Massachusetts' first legal casino, located in Plainville, MA. The Casino is located 5 miles west of Gillette Stadium and Patriots Place.

We arrived at the casino about 10:30 AM after a 90 mile drive from Manchester, NH. Not really ornate, but very nice. It's totally electronic. There are no dealers, no croupers. Every game, roulette, craps, blackjack are all video games. Here's what bothers me about these games.......when you make a bet, say $10 on black, the computer knows how much you bet and what you bet on. If there are 10 people at the table and seven of them bet $1000 on black and three people each bet $5 on red, what's stopping the computer from doing the math and dropping the ball on red?? Hell of a lot cheaper to pay 2:1 on red than it is to pay 2:1 on black. We dropped $150 and decided to head over to Patriots Place.

Patriots Place, for those of you who've never heard or seen it, is a shopping mall of individual stores that all have an outside entrance. It's like a little town. We stopped into a few places and decided to eat at Tobey Keith's Bar and Grille. It sits across from several store fronts including Old Navy which is closing today. All three stores are being taken over by the Hilton Garden Inn. Back to lunch.......Absolutely the worst restaurant food I have ever eaten. My wife had a small salmon on a salad and she had to spit out the first bite because the salmon in her mouth had five small bones. The entire filet was laced with bones...I ordered Pulled Pork Nachos which arrived, cold. The plates had sat so long on the counter that the jalapenos were dry. Apologies up the ass don't make up for horrible food.

After lunch we decided to go over to Gillette Stadium which is about 200 yards from the center of Patriot's Place. The entire entrance was preparing for a 5K road race and there must have been 20 sponsors giving away food and trinkets. It was festive and fun. We then went into the Patriots Pro SHop which has been expanded to the size of half a Walmart. There are hundreds of new style shirts and hoodies. I broke down and begged my wife to let me spend a couple of hundred dollars on a real game jersey. I could have had any number and/or any name on it, but I decided on 00 and BUMPAH, which is what my grandchildren and every kid I ever coached has called me. I'm going have a photo taken of my back and make it my new avatar.

We drove home after that and fed the dog and took it for a walk and headed over to Arms Park. We set up our chairs along the Merrimack River and watched what had to have been the best fireworks since 1976 bi-centennial.

I think I may just go down into my man cave and veg....and watch 3 Games to Glory. So far it's been a great weekend and it's only 9:30 AM on Saturday.

I hope yours is as much fun as mine.....less the lunch

"Freedom is not free"
"For those who've fought and died for it, Freedom has a flavor the protected will never taste"

 

[NWPATSFAN]

Ken and all the other NE fans have a safe and wonderful 4th.
Considering I've been doing so much travel lately, my week and start of the holiday was not near as eventful as yours. My week has been catching up on honey do's. I still haven't fully adjusted to my last belt of jet lag. So I normally pass out around 1630 each day. We're in the middle of a remodel so it's been non stop for me. I did sneak in a round of golf on Thursday. Played like crap in 90 degree weather which is uncommon here in the NW.
Friday my nephew arrived. He and his mother will spend the weekend with us. So he and I did the normal uncle/nephew things. He lost his dad when he was one. He's now eight and I try filling that male influence for him. We went to the park, played some games, then he went and played with some neighbor children.
Today we'll have friends over. Barbecue for lunch, tri tip for dinner and plenty of cold beverages of your choosing. This evening we'll shoot off fireworks. Our little culdesac gets together and has a great time with the kids.
Boring I know.
Again everyone have a great weekend

 

[Yankee Traveler]

Rain showers here all weekend, scattered thunderstorms. My wife had bought me a bottle of Creed, some expensive aftershave, but she bought the big bottle. So yesterday we went down to Nashville to exchange for the smaller bottle. I work around a sewerage treatment plant. Not many days I need cologne at work.
Bought some cheesecake for the kids.
Today is cookout and fireworks. Crawdads, shrimp and alligator sausage. If I was cooking it would have been brats and my gourmet burgers, but we did that with the same family last weekend.

I saw the 5k posted on some other site, we did the Titans version here last year. Skipped this year because they changed the date, but will catch it next year.

Happy Independence day to all!
In the words of Bob, "We are all Patriots."

 

[Southieinnc]

Rain showers here all weekend, scattered thunderstorms. My wife had bought me a bottle of Creed, some expensive aftershave, but she bought the big bottle. So yesterday we went down to Nashville to exchange for the smaller bottle. I work around a sewerage treatment plant. Not many days I need cologne at work.
Bought some cheesecake for the kids.
Today is cookout and fireworks. Crawdads, shrimp and alligator sausage. If I was cooking it would have been brats and my gourmet burgers, but we did that with the same family last weekend.

I saw the 5k posted on some other site, we did the Titans version here last year. Skipped this year because they changed the date, but will catch it next year.

Happy Independence day to all!
In the words of Bob, "We are all Patriots."

Sunday morning here in Okinawa. Got up early to go for a bike ride while my wife snores.
It's raining like hell. Maybe I'll make some breakfast.....