Mud Bowl 2003

One of the perks of loving an American girl is that you get to celebrate Thanksgiving twice each year. Such was the case this year as I took a couple of days off last week to wander across the border to Pennsylvania to spend the American Thanksgiving with Alicia and her family.

Thanksgiving is a really big holiday in the US, much more so than in Canada. Generally, the family get-togethers seem to be larger. Cousings, aunts, uncles and what not get in the mix. At the Heinle household, some gifts are even exchanged and a family football game is planned.

This year, not everyone wanted to get involved because it rained the entire day and the field was a muddy mess. As such, we ended up with only five willing participants: Alicia, Cousins Tim and Mike, myself and Alicia’s father. We ended up playing some two on two while Alicia’s father just roamed and played offense. We had fun and got rather… dirty.

On Friday, Alicia and I drove into Meadville and went ice skating at the rink. We both rented skates and I ended up wearing these lovely brown figure skates (all they had in size 14) from the 1930s. Ankle support? I think not. We were a little wobbly but we had a lot of fun. That evening we rented three movies and just decided to sack out. Dreamcatcher was pretty unusual but surprisingly thought-provoking.

On Saturday, Alicia and I jumped in the Accord and drove up to Erie to do a little shopping and to catch a movie or two at the Tinsel Town. We ended up seeing “Bad Santa” and “The Last Samurai”. I won’t get into the details as I’ll probably write up a short review of both movies in the near future. We had fun!

Alicia’s cousin Mike was kind enough to acquire some Steelers tickets for us on Sunday so we got up early and headed South on I79 to Steelertown to catch the battle with the Bengals. Before the game, Alicia and I gobbled up a bucket of chicken wings from the Quaker Steak & Lube stand at Heinz Field. That turned out to be the best part of the afternoon as the Steelers ended up losing in dramatic fashion after a defensive collapse with a lead and roughly one minute remaining on the clock.

Quite a busy weekend, huh? Now I have to finish up my Christmas shopping because it’s just right around the corner. Wow, how time flies…

The rest of the pictures I took on Thanksgiving weekend can be viewed in my gallery.