My birthday was on the 24th, but we normally put off any celebrations until the following weekend. Mer was in charge, naturally, since we like to surprise each other on our individual birthdays. Mer added to the fun by having plans for both Friday and Saturday.

On Friday, we headed off through a moderately snowy night to Twinsburg High School, where the Twinsburg Community Theater was putting on a production of the musical The Music Man. The Music Man is a play about how a huckster named Harold Hill dupes an entire town into buying band instruments, and how Harold falls for the town librarian along the way. It is a fun musical that I am quite fond of, and, increasing our interest, there were two CVCA students in the production; one was in the chorus of townspeople and the other was playing the daughter of the mayor. Additionally, the play was directed by a former CVCA mom.

The play turned out to be enormous. When they advertise as a community theater, they were not kidding. They had a cast of over 120 people. Most of those actors played townspeople and sang chorus parts, and many of them were children from about five to about twelve, but it was very impressive to see that many people on stage.

On the whole, the play was solid. Marian, the town librarian, had a beautiful voice and a radiant smile. This was opening night, and it showed in some nerves on the parts of some of the actors – there were some dropped or flubbed lines, and some of the actors had “nervous feet” when they were standing. The backing music for the production was simply played from a computer, which was a little disappointing, but understandable given the size of the on-stage cast. The CVCA girl who played the mayor’s daughter did a fun job with it (the character is pretty ditzy), and Mer and I both had an enjoyable evening.

On Saturday, Mer took me up to the Cleveland area, to a middle school. It turned out that the middle school had a professional-looking auditorium, and we were there to see another musical, by Heights Youth Theater, called A Little Princess. Needless to say, there were a ton of little princesses in the audience. The lead character in the production was being played by a senior at CVCA, and she did a fantastic job. I knew she could act, but I did not know she could sing.

Speaking of singing, the cast was stacked with talent. Most of the actors were in 7th-12th grade, and the vocal and dancing and acting talent were all top-notch. Mer and I both kept looking at our programs to see the ages of the individual actors, and we were almost always imagining them to be several years older than they were. The director also called in a friend of his to play the father of the lead girl, and I about fell out of my chair the first time he sang – he filled the place with his voice. According to his bio in the program, he has acted at Playhouse Square in Cleveland and sung in the Cleveland Opera. What a voice.

So, while I found the plot a bit saccharine, the spectacle on stage was engaging. I was delighted at the songs and the dancing, and that made up for any shortcomings in the story.

After the show, Mer took me to a burger joint called B Spot. I had wanted to try the place for some time, based on some pictures I saw of their shakes, which looked pretty amazing. They were, and the burgers and fries were pretty tasty too. After supper, we wandered over to Barnes and Noble. Mer had a gift card for the store, and we happily found out that you could use the gift card in the cafe. So, we loaded up on several pastries, and headed home with our baked goods.

Lest you think that my birthday was simply about seeing CVCA students perform in musicals, Mer also gave me tickets for us to go see Guys and Dolls at Playhouse Square in the spring. I love that musical, but have only seen it once at a community theater; I am looking forward to seeing what the Playhouse can do with it.

On Thursday, we finally managed to get together with our friends Matt and Clarice. I see Clarice every week when she helps me with my Royal Fools improv group at school, but I had not seen Matt in months. We headed over to their place, where we then made a quick trip to Five Guys Burgers and Fries for takeout. Sadly, I mistook what a “regular” burger was; it turns out to be two patties, so I ended up eating four hamburger patties as well as french fries. I was very full pretty early in the viewing of the movie that was the main event of the evening. With the help of one of Matt and Clarice’s cats, who flopped down on one movie when presented with two options, we spent a very happy time watching the old 1930s film The Thin Man.

Mer and I had heard the name before, but we had never seen The Thin Man. What a treat. It is a light-hearted mystery thriller, and the main couple in the film who solves the crime is one of the most wonderful screen couples I have ever seen. They are witty and sarcastic with each other, and they clearly are crazy about each other. The chemistry between the actors was perfect. A tremendous film that is worth seeing, and we are looking forward to seeing the sequel (there were several made).

Sunday morning was all planed in Toronto – I was going to take Mer to a local mansion called Casa Loma that is based on a castle. I ran over to a nearby Tim Horton’s coffee shop to get breakfast and to use their wi-fi connection, and upon trying to look up the hours for Casa Loma, I discovered it had closed that day for renovations. Ah. Plan B, except I did not have a Plan B.

What I did have was a city map that the hotel had given me. On one side, it was very detailed in the downtown area, and then on the other side, it was more general, showing the farther reaches of the city. When I was back in the hotel room waiting for Mer to finish getting ready, I looked around the map for potential things to do. I initially settled on the Toronto science museum, which also happened to be near Greek Town, but then I saw that way out in the east of the city was an area that looked like bluffs overlooking Lake Ontario. I like vistas and lakes, and it looked to only be a few blocks from the nearest subway stop, so that became the new plan.

We headed out via the subway, and got to our stop after about thirty minutes or so. We then started walking in what turned out to be pretty darn cold weather. We walked south, and I kept looking for the first major cross-street on my map. We walked. I looked. We walked some more. I kept looking. I started to worry. We finally came to the street, and I was confused. It was the first of three major cross streets we needed to find, but we had been walking for some time. We continued on. And on. And on. And it was cold. I finally caught a glimpse of the lake, which seemed to be discouragingly far away. We kept on. Finally we stopped a friendly woman who told us we were a long ways from the bluffs, and was amazed when we told her we had walked from Kennedy Station. She recommended walking the fairly short distance to the Rosetta McClain Park, which overlooks the lake from fairly high up.

We took her advice, and we were still a good fifteen minutes from that park. It was worth finding, though. It was very pretty, with paths and tons of trees and a formal garden area, and the south end did look out directly over the lake. We wandered around for about twenty minutes or so, and then we needed to head back. I decided we should catch a bus if we could find the right one, to take us back to the subway stop. Mer was aghast to find out our transit passes covered buses, and wanted to know why we had not taken one earlier. The simple answer was that I simply had not realized how far the bluffs were from the station. Ooops. Anyway, we caught a bus, and got back to the hotel via the subway.

We grabbed a quick snack of cookies from Mer’s dessert stash, and then headed back out on another very cold walk. This was all in the downtown area, and every piercing wind brought with it the question from Mer as to why we were not taking the streetcars. Again, the simple answer was that I did not know where the streetcars went, and we could end up way off track, and we had a deadline.

I walked with Mer down near the Rogers Center, to an apartment complex. Mer thought I was crazy and/or lost again, but I found the building I was looking for after asking one person for directions. It was an apartment building, where we were greeted at the front door by Ben. Mer then understood.

Ben and Heather are musicians who have given concerts in our house and in our area. Mer and I are huge fans of their music, and Heather and Ben had agreed to share in the birthday festivities. We wandered up to Heather’s apartment, where we got to meet Heather’s significant other and Ben’s significant other. Mer was delighted. We talked together as a group for an hour or more, and it was delightful company. Ben then played various instruments while Heather sang for an hour or so, with the rest of us joining in on the choruses. Mer and Heather sang a couple of duets together, and it was wonderful. By this time, we were quite hungry, so as a group we headed over to Chinatown, to a place that serves various dumplings. Mer went with Ben and the others via car, while Heather and I walked. We got to go past the Rogers Center, where a monster truck rally was just letting out, which felt festive. Heather and I chatted as we walked, and got to the restaurant after the others were seated. We ordered various kinds of pan-fried dumplings, and ate very, very well.

After supper, Ben and his girlfriend had to go, and Heather’s boyfriend had an engagement as well, so Heather walked us back to King’s Street, where we hugged and said goodbye. It was a pretty perfect afternoon and evening, and had been the cornerstone of my birthday plans for Meredith. What gracious people.

Mer and I stopped by Tim Horton’s just as they were closing up, and we bought some doughnuts as dessert. We went back to the hotel, where we ate them, and then read while I took occasional reading breaks to watch the Patriots-Ravens playoff football game, but with only halfhearted interest; mostly I read.

Monday morning, we slept in, as the hotel had a generous noon check-out time. We packed the car, but before we left the city, we both wanted to go see the bluffs we had been trying so hard to see the day before. So, we headed east in the car. We got most of the way there when I spied a huge sign advertising hot chocolate. It turned out to be a Belgian chocolate store, so we stopped in the area. We both agreed we needed some real food first, so we went into a pub called The Fox and the Fiddle. It was not busy yet, as it was not yet noon. Oddly, it took about forty minutes to get our food. The food was excellent, but we never got any explanation or apology from anyone as to why it took so long. Odd. After lunch, we went over to the chocolate store and bought about twenty dollars’ worth of chocolates under the excuse that we needed to get rid of our Canadian money. Thus supplied, we proceeded to the bluffs.

We took a couple of minor wrong turns in the area of the bluffs, but we eventually found our way down to the lake. It was beautiful, and we had almost the entire huge park to ourselves. The bluffs are clay-and-sand cliffs, not made of rock, which is unique in the area. The park itself gave wonderful views of the lake and the cliffs, and it was well laid out, with paths throughout. The day was quite cold with the wind, but not unbearably so. We wandered in the park for about thirty or forty minutes before we had to leave.

We stopped at a doughnut shop on the way back into the city to use their bathroom, as the restrooms in the park were closed for the season. We always buy something at stores when we use their restrooms, so we left with a cookie and a pastry, which were consumed on the way back out of the other side of the city.

We had smooth driving all the way to the border with Buffalo. There was some snow along the way, but nothing too bad. We had to wait at the border for about twenty minutes, and then we proceeded through Buffalo. Just south of the city is when the snow started to pick up. Then it really came on. Then the police closed Route 90 (the road we were on) because of weather conditions. Thus began hours of white-knuckle driving and lots of prayer. It normally takes three hours to get from Buffalo to our house. On this Monday, it took seven and a half (including dinner). We pulled into our snow-free driveway about 12:30 at night. Once we had unpacked the car, I called work and left a message that I would be late on Tuesday. There was no way I was going into work on four hours’ sleep after that drive. Don’t get me wrong – both Mer and I were very grateful that we were safe. It was some of the worst weather I have ever had to drive in. I just needed some sleep before facing work.

So, that was our Toronto adventure, in honor of Mer’s fortieth birthday. We had a wonderful time, and think highly of Toronto and of Canadians in general. Everyone we met was very nice and polite, and Toronto seems quite easy to get around in. We are looking forward to going back.

January 18th was Mer’s fortieth birthday, but we always push our birthday celebrations off to the following Saturday. Since this was a big birthday for Mer, I decided to go a bit splashy. I told Mer to be ready and packed to go on a weekend trip right after school on Friday. We managed to be on the road by around 4:00, and we had good traveling weather. We headed northeast out of Ohio, and through Pennsylvania, and stopped for supper at the Angola rest stop, near Buffalo. After a pretty decent supper from a chain offering made-to-order burritos, we headed through Buffalo, and crossed with ease into Canada. I had to declare our intentions at the border, so Mer knew our weekend plans – to go to Toronto. We arrived in downtown Toronto, and were directed by a very affable doorman on where to park cheaply. We were situated in the middle of downtown, at the King Edward Hotel, a four-star hotel on which Priceline had worked magic for us. The room was on the eighth floor and had a view of the top of the CN Tower antenna, and was a quite lovely room. The only drawback was that the hotel was older, so soundproofing was not total, and we could often hear the man in the next room when he was on his cell phone. That was fine, though, as he seemed to keep our hours, more or less.

We were both up relatively early on Saturday, and were heading out the door around 10:00 or so to explore the waterfront. We bought a day-pass for the mass-transit system, and rode one stop toward the southern terminus of the subway. From there, we walked to the waterfront, and along it for quite a ways.

Toronto’s waterfront is lovely. It is publicly accessible, and looks out over Toronto Island, where there is a large park and a good-sized metropolitan airport at one end. We strolled along the lake, and enjoyed the ever-changing views of Toronto’s skyline, including the famous CN Tower. The amount of high-rise buildings going up in downtown Toronto is astonishing – there were cranes everywhere.

We made several little happy discoveries along the waterfront. I loved the up-close view of small jets landing at the airfield. We then came across a sculpture and fountain where you could walk inside the sculpture, which was shaped roughly like a globe. We stumbled upon a community ice rink that was very active on a Saturday morning. We found a spiffy walkway with lights laid out like sails, and ran across a sidewalk that was designed to be rolling like waves. We wandered around inside Pawsway, a building dedicated to cats and dogs and stories about them. We then headed back to the hotel by going past the Rogers Center (where the Blue Jays play baseball) and past the CN Tower. It was quite a marvelous little walk.

We stopped by the hotel briefly before heading across the street to a burger joint that was quite good and served an enormous helping of fries. After lunch and a brief hotel stop, we walked north through the shopping district, heading to the first event of the day. We arrived at a cross street while I looked for our destination, and found it – a theater across the street that happened to be flying a rainbow flag. Mer blinked a couple of times and asked, “Are you taking me to a gay theater for my birthday?” Since I had only looked up the show based on the summary, my honest answer was “Apparently so.” Gay theaters can occasionally do work that is extremely risque, and we were both a little anxious over that.

We did not need to be. The production we saw was being put on by an all-women company of actors, and it while it was certainly suggestive several times, it was about a PG-13 rating. Yay! We were there to see The Penelopiad, a retelling of Homer’s The Odyssey from Penelope’s point of view. (Penelope was the wife whom Odysseus left behind for twenty years while he was off at the Trojan War.) The show was tremendous and thought-provoking. It was very well acted, especially by the woman playing Penelope; and the woman who played the male Odysseus was so good at what she did, I often forgot she was female. The show explored the relationship Penelope had with her family and her household, especially her slave girls who (in this interpretation) sacrificed much to protect Penelope. It also shows how difficult the situation was in the house while Odysseus was away. It was a great show, and we were both pleased to have seen it.

After a brief return to the hotel, we jumped on the subway and took it out pretty far east. Toronto’s subway really is amazing – clean and efficient and not overly crowded. We found the next theater to which I was taking Meredith, and so then decided we could find a restaurant for supper. We walked a couple of blocks and ran across Queen’s Pasta Cafe, an Italian restaurant. It turned out to be a charming two-story restaurant. The experience was odd, though – it took awhile to be waited on, and then the food came very quickly. It was excellent. Then, the service disappeared again for over twenty minutes, so we did not have time for dessert, but headed back to the theater.

We were at a little community theater to see another play of which neither of us had ever heard – Queen Milli of Galt. The play explored the claim of a woman, Milli, that she had had some kind of a relationship with Edward, the Duke of Wales, and the later king who would abdicate the throne to marry an American woman. When Edward died, Milli had a tombstone erected that claimed she was “Queen Milli of Galt.” It turns out to be wonderful material for a witty and sometimes poignant play, and one that only required five actors. The actors in the work all did a wonderful job with their roles, and we both loved the play.

We headed back to the hotel via the subway, getting there around 11:00 or so. Mer had insisted on bringing much of her birthday food students and friends had given her, so we had a very pleasant dessert in the hotel. The day had gone more or less as I had planned, and we still had all of Sunday for more exploration of Toronto.

One of our semi-formal New Year’s resolutions for this year was to try to get together with CVCA colleagues for dinner, with the aim of offering an invitation once a week. Granted, people may be busy or we may get busy, but we figured if we aimed for once a week, then we had a good chance of being social with fun people at least twice a month.

Last Thursday we managed to catch up with Craig Rupe, who teaches science at CVCA. Craig is also heavily involved in cross country and track, and he is one of the more amazing runners I have ever known. Craig had an inclination to go to the Cheesecake Factory, and Mer and I do not ever have to be persuaded to do that.

We had an excellent supper, and got to chat for about an hour. Dessert is the main reason to go to the Cheescake Factory, so we all had a slab of cheesecake. It was a promising start to a new year.

Last Saturday, I started the morning out with an eighteen-mile run at Sand Run Metro Park. My boss and friend Jim had suggested it as a good run since the path is maintained even in the winter. It was also unseasonably warm, so the path was in good shape. What Jim did not tell me, and I had not remembered, is that two miles of the three-mile path are uphill, which meant six miles of uphill running out of eighteen miles. My legs hurt pretty badly by the end of the run.

It was Mer’s day, and so she had us drive to Canton to the second-run theater, where they were showing the movie Hitchcock, a film about Alfred Hitchcock’s struggles to get the movie Psycho made. My mom loves Hitchcock and passed that trait on to me, so I loved the film. It was an engaging story, and it was stunningly well acted.

After the movie, we ran by Dale and Carlene’s place and helped them hang some more pictures. Mer was kind enough to let me go out to Handel’s ice cream afterwards, so it wrapped up a mellow little Saturday.

On Sunday, we had our family Christmas dinner and gift exchange, for the King side of the family. Aunt Mary put together a quite wonderful meal, and we all had a good, relaxed visit. We did also get to exchange gifts, which I quite enjoy. The day was pleasant, and I probably ate too much, but it was a good time.

We had planned to spend the last day of J-term hiking the nearby Happy Days Visitor Center trail that leads up to the exposed rock of The Ledges, with a finish on the connector trail to Kendall Lake. That is a really scenic hike, and Jim and I were looking forward to introducing the students to the hike. The problem was, it rained all morning. I do not like hiking in a cold rain, so we cast about for another option. We decided to stick to the park system, and headed instead up to the Cleveland Metro Parks Zoo.

I’m not sure why the Metro Parks system runs the zoo, but it is sort of a park and so makes some sense. The kids were very excited to be going to the zoo, and the rain stopped by the time we got there. Since the paths at the zoo are all paved, or the animals are indoors, we were free from mud, and the day was quite warm and pleasant to be out in. We split the group into two groups – Jim and I took a group of nineteen students who wanted to hike a little more outside, and Vicki (the other adult staff worker who helped us) took a group of six students who thought they might like to be inside more than not. Vicki took her group to the indoor rain forest exhibit to start, and Jim and I took our group around the perimeter of the zoo.

We did stop to see animals, and we even went inside for one exhibit. We saw elephants and flamingos and big cats and fish and lemurs and primates and rhinos and a polar bear. We saw a few giraffes and a zebra from a distance, and we hiked all over the zoo, although we did catch the bus to the far part of the zoo when we discovered that the main path we were on was closed for construction. We saw Vicki and her students outside at one point, which I was pleased with (since it was such a nice day for January). We were only at the zoo for about seventy-five or eighty minutes, but we saw quite a bit of the grounds in that time. It ended the hiking class on a very good note.

Mer had her students do their mini-presentations on Italy. She said they went well enough considering the students only had thirty or forty minutes to put them together. One student took the project home the night before and made a very cool painting of everything she had learned about Italy; it was very well done. Mer was pleased with her class, and has some ideas of how to improve it should she offer it again in a couple of years. Mer finished her class by watching most of the movie Letters to Juliet, which was filmed in Italy.

J-term is a fun time at CVCA. That finishes up the third year of the program, and as far as I have seen, it has gone very well.

Friday evening, Craig and Jordan (of the Social Studies Department) came over for Mer’s and my monthly “History Night,” when we watch one DVD of the series Battlefield. This month the topic was the Battle of the Atlantic during World War 2. We ate pizza and cookies and watched the show and visited, and it was a fun and mellow way to end the work week.

Today’s hike was at the Nature Realm, in Akron. The Nature Realm has a visitor center with a bird-watching station, many stuffed animals, and naturalists on hand to answer questions. We met up with a naturalist who had also taught science at CVCA as a long-term substitute teacher a few years ago. He stayed with us the entire two hours we were there, and was very friendly and helpful.

We started the day with looking out the windows of the bird-observation area, and Dave (the naturalist) explained about some of the species of birds that stay in Ohio for the winter and some of the adaptations that allow them to survive during the cold weather. We then headed outside and tried to feed the birds, but the weather was warm enough (in the forties) that the birds were not all that interested. We then hiked all three trails at the Nature Realm, which includes a small but very cool suspension bridge, several small hills, a couple of ravines, and an overlook or two. Dave gave us fun facts about some of the plant and animal life as we walked along, and while some of the kids were not always riveted in their attentions, they were at least polite and not being a distraction for those who were listening. In the end, I’m guessing we hiked about three miles, and then we went back inside of the visitor center. Dave got out a mid-sized snake to show the students, and gave them time to wander around the center, looking at the exhibits. The entire visit seemed to go well.

Mer’s Italian culture class started to wrap up today. She finished covering Italian music and how the classic music of Italian culture remains relevant even in Italian popular culture. She played a couple of different review games to try to help cement some of the information she’d shared over the last six days, and she ended the class by giving the students time to work on mini-presentations they would give on Friday.

Today was another great hike. I was worried when I went into work and it was lightly raining, but by the time 11:45 rolled around, the rain had gone away and the sun had come out. One of the morning classes ran over slightly, so we got started about five minutes late, but that worked out fine.

We went down into the Valley, near Boston Store, to the Stanford House and the associated Stanford Trail. The Stanford Trail runs up and down several large hills and has several small bridges to cross. It eventually leads all the way up to Brandywine Falls, which are the best waterfalls I have seen in Ohio (although I hear there are some spectacular ones in the the southeast of Ohio). The hike was a bit slick, as the trail was wet with packed snow, and sometimes ice, but I was fine since I use “Yaktrax” traction guides on my shoes. Some of the students had some trouble with their boots, but no one got hurt (although we had people slipping a fair amount). The day was sunny and very warm (mid-forties).

The hike was again very pretty. I had never hiked the Stanford Trail, and it is a great trail. The hills are steep in places, but it makes for dramatic scenery. I have been to Brandywine Falls before, but hadn’t seen the falls so full with snow melt-off before. I had hoped to hike down to the river-level observation deck, but it was closed because of snow and ice. Still, we were able to see the falls pretty well from the upper platform and trail.

After the falls, we took a brief detour to walk on the newly completed paved Bike and Hike extension that runs through the woods. I wanted the kids to know about the trail since it is a paved trail that is about thirty miles long, and is a great trail for bikers.

We headed back to the Brandywine Gorge Trail, which took us a down a steep and icy incline to river-level. We crossed the newly completed footbridge (you used to have to cross on fording stones), but stopped long enough for the requisite group photo. The trail then looped back to the Stanford Trail, and we headed back to the bus after a good, but tiring, hike.

Mer had a field trip today in her Italian class – they headed up to Cleveland’s Little Italy for lunch. Mer was joined by three former students and a former CVCA parent, as well as her full class. They got started about forty minutes late because of waiting on a late morning class trip to return, but they had a successful trip once they got underway. Mer and her party had to wait on their entrees, so they got back to the bus five or ten minutes later than everyone else, but Mer said the food was excellent. Both of our trips came back with everyone and no injuries, so it was a successful day!

Today was a grand hike – we hiked the Oak Hill area, a series of trails near Peninsula, Ohio. It is only about eight miles from school, but has three ponds, a very cool tree alley, multiple bridges, dense forests, and a pretty deep gorge. Throw in the snow and a sunny day, and we had a very beautiful hike.

The trip started out well – because of J-term’s requiring more buses than we can get a hold of, we got a rented bus, with high-backed seats and pretty regal comfort. It was almost too bad that we were only on the bus for about fifteen minutes each way.

We hiked somewhere between four and five miles, and it took almost two hours. We got back to school about thirty minutes early, so if I ever do this class again, I’m adding in a two-mile extension that we did not hike. I’d much rather be a few minutes late than thirty minutes early.

My boss Jim could not go on this hike because of a sore tendon that resulted from a treatment shot. Happily, my co-worker Vicki was still able to go, so I was not alone with twenty-six students. The hike itself went well, and except for the slowdown from an almost-continuous snowball lobbing being done by some of the males of the group, all went smoothly.

In Mer’s Italy class, she taught more vocabulary, and then looked at scientists, authors, and musicians. She said that the students are on the quiet side, but that the class seems to be going well in general.