Happy Birthday, Dean!

Oh this day in history, 1981, I was born.
Why is the blog named "Happy Birthday, Dean? Well, Ill let you see:


My beautiful and loving wife seen here:
Made me a chocolate cheese cake with chocolate ganache. She was going to write "Happy Birthday Dear Husband" but the white icing got to hard. So it looks like "Dean" instead of "dear". But the wife says "Hasn't anyone seen a cursive "r"? Oh the funny hilarious times.

Well, I've up and turned 30. I don't know how to use these new fangled machines anymore. These computers. hope I can still remember how to write these blogs in my old age. So for my 30th birthday, I stole an idea from an old friend who also turned 30. I've made a list of my 30 favorite things I've done in 30 years. It was a great exercise in remembering and being thankful for all the great experiences in my life. It was hard to narrow it down to thirty, but here they are, in no particular order:

1.Going to the Alamo
2. Sitting on the back porch in Texas with my granddad, drinking coffee and eating Cracklin' Oat Bran cereal. Watching squirrels and talking.
3. Getting married and honeymooning in Spain.
4. Eurotrips 1 and 2 with Mathew
5. My many adventures at Appalachian State (such as crawling through steam tunnels
6. Eating Caramel Apples from Barber's Orchard
7. Working on my house with mom and dad
8. Eating homemade strawberry jam
9. Taming the wild cat Muffin
10. Playing music in bands
11. Learning to garden from my parents
12. Learning how to read and developing a love of reading from mom.
13. Playing G.I. Joes in the sandpile
14. Playing Davy Crockett in the fort
15. White Dragon beach trips
16. 2005: The Summer of the Dragon (was that the year? I can't remember in my old age)
17. Taking parents to new restaurants
18. Driving trips with my parents: to Texas, Civil War battlefield tours, Grand Canyon, Oklahoma, Washington D.C. etc
19. Hanging out at Haywood Community College watching Westerns (and developing a love of westerns from my dad)
20. Learning yoga from my wife
21. Trying new restaurants with the wife
22. Working puzzles and drinking hot chocolate with the wife
23. Playing fireman with my dog Joe during cookouts. We pretended the smoke from the grill was a real fire.
24. Eating the best chicken and dumplings made by my Mamaw Williams (even though my mom's comes pretty darn close)
25. Eating the best pecan pie made by my Grandmother Summers (even though my mom's comes pretty darn close)
26. Summer church trips
27. Seeing live music
28. Shooting guns with dad
29. Making gingerbread cookies
30. Being outside in the woods, whether it be sunny or snowy, playing or hiking.

That about sums it up. All the good stuff is on there, at least as much as I can remember. I probably forgot a few. I highly recommend this activity for anyone turning 30.


I don't really have any reflections on being old. There's a lot of grey in my beard now. My goal for the year is to do more yoga and stay active. I'm also going to be taking a course at AB Tech about writing and publishing for children, so maybe I'll get Muffin the Toothless Cat going. Some of my presents included books on raising chickens, bees, clothes, dominos, a John Wayne knife and a Bowie knife. Oh, and Snake Eyes the sweetest GI Joe action figure ever. See him standing guard behind my birthday dinner of turkey cheese meatloaf, mashed sweet potatoes and apples, rosemary cornbread, and green beans. Being old is delicious.