September Wrap Up

Welcome to the last blog post for the month of September 2017. 

Before I get into it, I want to remind everyone that you still have time to enter my "55K Views" trivia quiz contest where I will be giving away a $15 I-Tunes card. Check out this blog post for the info on how to enter. 
Another 5000 Views Post Quiz Contest.


Entries must be received in my RHavens1423@aol.com email box by midnight CDT Saturday September 30.  

The month of September has been a memorable one. After some problems getting it synchronized with the I-Tunes library on my desktop computer, I started enjoying my new I-Pad Mini 4. 

The highlight of the month, of course, was spending my birthday in the Smoky Mountains with my wife, son and daughter-in-law.  

I've enjoyed watching the New York Yankees return to the level of play that allowed them to get in the playoffs for the first time in a couple of years. Aaron Judge has been a lot of fun to watch. 

I have not been up to much of anything this week for a couple of reasons. 

Last  Friday, my wife and I got our flu shots at Sam's Club thanks to vouchers from Fruit Of The Loom. 

Every year after we get them within a few days we develop some degree of cold like symptoms. 

On Monday night I mentioned this to my wife that I was surprised that had not had any of the after effects of the flu shot. 

Well, as Paula always says, I should never challenged "worse". In a strangely quick turn of events, by the time I went to bed that night I started feeling badly. 

Since then, I have had just enough cold like symptoms to be rather uncomfortable at night and in the mornings. 

I have a little bit of a cough and a lot of stuffiness. Eventually it clears up, for the most part, in the afternoon until early evening. But then it comes back again. If it gets any worse or continues over the weekend; I'm going to have to go see my doctor.  

My evenings this week, except for Wednesday, have been spent at local athletic fields watching my granddaughter play softball in her fall league. 

Having 4 games in a week is a bit overwhelming in regard to planning your day so you can get to the field on time; and its just me and Paula. 

I can't imagine what my son and daughter-in-law who have 2 kids in tow and work during the day have to do to get there by 6 o'clock. 

But on the plus side I did get to see my grandchildren 4 times this week. That's always a win. 

One of the benefits from going to see so many this week, was that being at one of them helped me find something that I've been looking for a long time. Let me explain. 

At Tuesday night's game a woman, who came to watch, had her doberman puppy with her. The puppy was very cute and very sweet. 

I mentioned to the woman and her husband that when I was a teenager I wanted a doberman because of a movie called "The Doberman Gang". 

I watched it every time it came on TV when I was in high school. Despite it being barely qualifying as a "B" movie, I loved it. I would really like to have a copy to watch every once in a while.    

I lamented, out loud, that after looking for it over the last couple of years on the internet; the only copy I could find was an expensive VHS tape on Ebay. 

Brittany, a friend of my daughter-in-law, made an off hand suggestion, "You should try Amazon. They have everything." I told her that I had looked on Amazon but it wasn't available. 

Then I realized that I actually hadn't checked the website for a while. So I got out my phone, went onto Amazon.com. To make a long story short, this is what I got in the mail today. 

I am very excited to finally have these films on DVD and in my library. I will watch them this weekend. I've only seen the sequel a couple of times. But I will enjoy that one too.

Thanks Brittany for making the suggestion that I check online again. 

Also on my weekend movie list is the 2010 Oscar winner for best picture.

 The reason this is on my list is refresh us on some of the backstory of the Netflix series "The Crown" which Paula and I are currently watching. The movie is a prequel to the series. 

I saw the film in the theater shortly after it won 4 statues at the Academy Awards in 2011. I borrowed a copy from the library so that my wife could get a better insight on the people in the Netflix series. 

The Wonder Woman movie and several Steve Martin films (a birthday present from my friends Mark & Patty) on home video are also on the "watch list" for us this weekend as well. In addition, we have several TV shows that began their new season this week on our DVR.   

As the month of September comes to an end I have to admit I haven't exactly been a "Master Builder" when it comes to assembling Lego sets. 

I did complete the Ninjago Movie mini-figure set that I started collecting back in the middle of August. 

I also went to see the Lego Ninjago Movie last Friday. 

I liked it but it wasn't as good as the first one but better than the Lego Batman movie. The plot was a little heavy on the "absentee father" aspect of the story. 

I really wanted to enjoy this movie a little more than I did. It had potential but just didn't go far enough to drawl me in. Aspects of it just seemed like a copy of the first Lego movie. If there's one thing I can't forgive in a film is the lack of originality. However, there was one thing that I really liked about the movie. More on that in a bit. 

In the middle of the month I finished assembling the Creator set 31036, The Toy and Grocery Shop.  Here's the link to a video I made that's on my You Tube channel. 
 Lego Creator Toy & Grocery Shop


This past week I added to my Lego collection with 2 sets that I am really excited about. 

The first is from the Ninjago Movie sets. It's the Mech that the main character, Lloyd, wears when he becomes the Green Ninja. 

I also added a set that supplements the Lego Christmas Train that I added to our Christmas decorations last year. It's a train station. 

I can't wait until November when my family comes over and helps me put this set together. Hard to believe that the holidays are just around the corner. 

Finally I want to share something I put on my Facebook timeline last weekend. 

My wife and I installed some shelves in the closet in our new bedroom. My wife designed the shelves and bought all the materials.  

Last Saturday, we worked together to put up 5 new shelves; 4 on one side and 1 on the other. Here's a picture of one side. 

Now I am not a DYI kind of guy so I am proud of the completion of this project. It is one more step toward getting into our new bigger bedroom.  

The most memorable day of the month for me was the day that my wife and I went to Aria's school to have lunch with her on Grand-parent's day. 

 Seeing our little girl in a situation where she was behaving in such a "grown up" way was, for me, on a similar emotional level as when I saw her in Walt Disney World last year. But just like that vacation, the experience has given me a memory I will always treasure. 

So there you have a brief summary of some of the things that have happened in September and what's going on with me now. 

As October comes around it's going to be yet another busy month. I look forward to sharing it all with you. Thanks for reading the RHFactors blog. Come back next time when I announce the winner of my trivia quiz contest.