This weekend involved a ton of busy, moving parts. Saturday we had our annual Wingle Supply Home & Outdoor Living Show at The Sussex County Fairgrounds. Believe it or not, we start planning this many months ahead of time. We meet with some vendors and brainstorm ways we can always try to improve and give everyone a fun, wonderful experience. Once we get into early January, we really start ramping up all of our efforts both on the radio and behind the scenes too. We love having our annual Home Show at The Fairgrounds. To many it's one of those several rites of Spring passages. With New Jersey weather in late March, to quote Forrest Gump it's definitely "a box of chocolates, you never know what you're gonna get." Some years it's been in the 70s, sometimes we've had snow flurries. This year was a classic example of a March weather week. Last Thursday we were well north of 60, Saturday go figure there was an actual wind chill feel temperature at The Fairgrounds.
Despite the challenging weather, this was still our biggest and best Home Show in history! Our turnout was tremendous despite that cold wind at The Fairgrounds which never stopped. So many people had great experiences with our outdoor and indoor home improvement vendor friends. On a much smaller scale, I surprised Girlfriend Brooks with two things: a candle from Sparta's Simple Bare Necessities and Sue's House Of Fudge. The candle she loved smelling perfect, nice cocoa butter and cashmere mix, right up her alley. The fudge? Caramel cookie and chocolate flavored cheesecake. I always love the caramel, Brooks liked it too but then fell in love with the chocolate flavored cheesecake.
Another one of my many proud fun events at our event? The delicious food trucks! I've personally enjoyed Smokin Mo's BBQ, and The Columbia Inn Cyber Pizza Truck, plus Green Valley Farms ice cream truck (salted caramel is my go to for sure.) You can see our Facebook live video right below where at the end, I surprised my morning guys Steve Andrews and Borasio with a very well deserved pepperoni pizza. I was able to share it with our Street Teamers and VP Mike. Unanimous everyone loved it. I was quite popular - for about five minutes or so. Shout out to local classic rock cover band In The Name Of Love. They were fantastic, and never complained once about playing outside in those strong wind chill feel temperatures. Everyone was happy with how they sounded, it was just so cold out most folks usually only lasted a song or two. I definitely hope to see and work with them again in the future!
Saturday I went out with workwife Bestie Shawn, Bestie Stacy, VP Mike and Josh for our annual post Home & Outdoor Living Show victory beer! We usually go to Airport Pub for a beer, and on many years we sit out at the picnic tables and have so much fun watching skydivers land at next door Sussex Airport. It can be like watching all different colors of the rainbow, several different parachutes landing at the airport one after another. This year, the weather between cold and wind definitely wasn't conducive for skydiving. All good. We still enjoyed a fun victory beer together celebrating a hugely successful event.
Saturday night by the time I went to see Girlfriend Brooks in Hackettstown I was pretty wiped out. I was basically asleep on her couch by 8:45pm. She said "I totally get it, but I want to still watch a movie while you sleep it's early." We both agreed, you do you. I think she woke me up around 10:30 to basically go back to bed.
Sunday was definitely a low key day for us in Hackettstown. Not as low key as last Sunday when I was basically napping on and off all day after another action packed work event Saturday. Sunday morning I did some good errands in Hackettstown. I hit up Walgreens, then went back over to Marshall's where I scored! I was able to get 4 shirts for $75 total! One new blue dress shirt, white dress shirt, pink polo shirt, and a red white and blue short sleeve plaid shirt that will be simply perfect for this summer. Considering all the Country shows at Bethel Woods we want to attend, plus all of the America 250th Celebrations I'll likely be attending, this shirt will likely be worn early and often. Since one of my pink polo shirts I remembered last year having an annoying stain we couldn't get rid of, this shirt will be the perfect replacement. For years whenever I get a new article of clothing, I have always thrown one old one out. Now my friends have shown me where to donate old clothes instead of simply throwing them out so at least someone can make fabric out of it, etc. That helps me feel better and better about upgrading my wardrobe a shirt or two at a time.
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Sunday afternoon, I was able to go get dinner to go from Marley's Gotham Grill in Hackettstown. I have always loved this place! I brought with me a gift card from Brooks' wonderful parents Terri and Joe, they gave me for Christmas. They bought us a delicious dinner! I had half Nuclear and half BBQ wings, and Brooks had a Quesadilla with chicken and jalapenos. Success!
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We then watched March Madness Basketball, UConn vs. Duke! Even though I'm not a huge college basketball fan, since UConn is based in New England they're usually one of my go to teams to cheer for victory. The first half it wasn't just looking good, but almost painful at times. Poor UConn couldn't hit a 3 point shot to save themselves at all, starting off 1-11. They were down by 19 points during the first half, then 15 at halftime. The experts during the TV halftime show all said "The Fat Lady hasn't sung yet - but she's definitely warming her voice up for sure!" The second half starts. UConn is still not doing great, but they and Duke kept starting to battle back and forth with Duke keeping their 10 point for most of the second half...until the end.
They even showed the graphic on TV that NO Number 1 seed Team had ever lost after leading by 15 points at halftime in NCAA March Madness History! NEVER!
It took many missteps from Duke to happen honestly but what an amazing, historic and dramatic comeback for UConn. When they took that 3 point shot with 2 seconds left and made it - I jumped off the couch screaming my head off in excitement. Even though Brooks is a Syracuse fan who usually roots against UConn as a rival, she was impressed and enjoyed watching the game.
That's why they are sometimes accurate calling this March Madness. Thank you so much for taking the time to read my Epic Weekend In Pictures. Time to start planning next weekend!