My Days

There are 364 days in a year. Of those days, I can think of about 20 through the entire year that I circle on the calendar because I anxiously look forward to them every year. For the sake of space and time, I will narrow those twenty down to six. If I didn't I might have to change the name of this blog.

6. January 1: No, not New Year's Eve. I love New Year's Day. I love this day for 2 reasons. My son, Abe, celebrates his birthday on this day. He was born on January 1, 2002 at about 6:30 in the morning. While in the hospital with my lovely wife and beautiful newborn baby, I had the pleasure of enjoying my other favorite part of January 1, New Year's Bowl Games. Does it make me an insensitive dirtball because I watched football games in my wife's hospital room while she was resting and recovering from childbirth? I hope not. But New Year's Day bowl games are incredible. They used to be even better before the BCS started dragging games out all week long. It watered the day down a little bit but it's still a great day for football...and my son Abe.

5. November 9: This incredible day was the day I was brought into the world. That's right, my birthday. It seems the older I get the less celebration is involved with this day but now that I have kids they seem to enjoy it just as much as me. This particular date is in the middle of two friend's and my wife's birthdays. So now we all have a tradition of planning some type of event to celebrate everyone's birthday at the same time. It's nice and it makes for more memorable birthdays.

4. Halloween: I have already expressed my love for this holiday in a previous post. This year, I get the extreme pleasure of attending a wedding on this day. Of course it is a dress up wedding due to it being on Halloween. My wife and I have decided to go as "Wal-Mart Customers". For the past couple of weeks I have been taking notes at the local White Trash Outlet in order to create the most authentic costume possible. I can't wait to unveil it. Candy, costumes, and scaring the crap out of little kids just make this day even better. Love it, love it, love it.

3. NFL Draft day: The NFL has turned into a year-round sport with the climax of the "off season" being draft day. I absolutely love to see the drunken Jets and Eagles fans screaming at every pick that walks across the stage like they have any idea of how the draftees will wind up performing. For every Payton Manning that walks across that stage there is also a Ryan Leaf. Because I am a Bears fan, I usually see my team picking in the middle teens of each round and that is usually when the talent is fairly watered down. But it's still awesome to see what happens.

2. Day 1 of the NCAA tournament: At the end of March the NCAA men's basketball tournament begins in full swing. From noon until midnight CBS is full of wall to wall coverage of the tournament. The biggest memory I have of this day was in 9th grade when Northern Iowa was playing Missouri and Mr. Johns had the game on in gym class. UNI wound up pulling off the HUGE upset and beat the Big 8 powerhouse. Nowadays, I look forward to having my tournament brackets ripped apart after only the first day. For me, this is day is easily the most exciting sports day of the entire year.

1. December 26: In 1996 this was the day I joined the Navy. In 1997 this was the day I married my wife. In 2002 this was the day I was discharged from the Navy. This December, I will have been married to my wife for 12 years. We have had to endure a lot of ups and a lot of downs in the last twelve years with this past year possibly being the toughest year so far. But in the end we made it. December 26 is a great day and it's definitely one I, along with my wife, will be looking forward to.