April Vibe Check
April 30, 2024
Intro
Welcome to my first Vibe Check! I've always been interested in journaling and tracking events in my life for later reflection. I came across the concept of a monthly Vibe Check blog post after checking out a blog I found on the People and Blogs newsletter.
Travel
Jamie and I started to shake off our winter hibernation in April with a trips to Texas and Louisiana. The primary focus of our Texas trip was to fly to Houston and meet up with Jamie's dad and uncle. Then the four of us would drive north to be within the total totality zone for the eclipse. About a week before our trip, her dad and uncle bailed due to a cloudy forecast which would limit (if not completely block) the eclipse. We were really looking forward to getting out of town so we decided to keep our flight into Houston and not drive north. It ended being a great weekend of drinking beer, eating good food, and spending some quality time together.
On the morning of the eclipse, we took the local light rail to the Japanese Gardens and were lucky enough for the clouds to clear and watch the eclipse. While we didn't see full totality, it was a very cool experience none the less. We spent the rest of the trip brewery hopping and eating tasty food.
Two weeks later, we flew to Louisiana to visit Jamie's Grandparents who recently moved from California. This was an fantastic vacation full of visiting (we met Cathy's family for the first time), eating (sea-food was amazing), and sight-seeing (we visited the Tabasco factory, a swamp boat tour, and checked out some local Lafayette sites). The MVP for me was a visit to Parish brewing (their Ghost in the Machine hazy IPA is out of this world).
Dogs
Jean-Luc and Hicks turned one year old this month. They're now fully grown and wild so we started them in a doggie training class which has been life changing. The pups have been thriving with structure and I'm excited to see their improvement over the next few months. Hopefully we can take them back-packing this year without worrying about them running off... as much.
Media
Movies
April was pretty light on movies, while we were in Texas, we watched Dune: Part Two and later in the month, the second entry in the Rebel Moon series, The Scargiver.
TV
- Survivor: We've started getting back into the most recent seasons of Survivor after taking a decade hiatus. It's been fun to see how the game has changed - every vote is a blindside now!
Games
- StarCraft: I've been watching a lot of uThermal on YouTube which inspired me to replay through StarCraft 1. The nostalgia is real.
- HellDivers 2: Still enjoying this during my weekly gaming session with my brothers. Democracy!
- FarmRPG: This has been my idle-esc go-to game for the last few months. In April I finally unlocked the Tower!