Tonight I went to see 42nd Street with my Grandma at Kilworth House Theatre. We had such a great evening, the show was really good and was amazing what they did with a smallish cast.
Its fathers day today, Ethan got me some really cool Lego plants for my office. We then went to Go Ape at Coombe Abbey for Treetop Adventure Plus. Ethan and I had a great time, it was great being in the trees. We then went to Costa for lunch and in the afternoon we played Minecraft.
The Plex data SSD died and I had wanted to build a new server for a while. I was originally going to go for an Epyc processor, but it wouldn't have been new, with no warranty. After some research I decided on an AMD Ryzen 9 5950X 16 Core 32 Thread CPU with a MSI MAG B550 TOMAHAWK MAX motherboard, an 850W MSI MAG A850GL power supply, 128GB Corsair DDR4 Vengeance LPX of RAM, a few WD SSDs, a 4GB PNY NVIDIA RTX A400 graphics card, a Hauppauge WinTV-quadHD PCIe TV card and a be quiet! Pure Loop 120mm AIO Cooler. I got it all setup on my bench first and once I had got Plex installed I removed the old hardware from the case and added in the new hardware. It took another few days of configuration to get everything installed on it. It is now back in the rack. The machine is super quick, Ethan and I have a Minecraft server running on there so we can play together which is great.
Dad, Ethan, Thomas and I went skating today at Midlands Roller Arena. It had been a while since I had been on my skates, but I had a great time skating around with Ethan. He has really improved and can now go round on his own without needing to hold onto me. After skating we had dinner at McDonalds.
We packed the cases this morning before heading for breakfast. We then went into the park and went on Buzz Lightyear Laser Blast, then Le Pays des Contes de Fees before having a walk round La Cabane des Robinson. We then queued up for photos with Donald Duck. We had lunch at Starbucks before heading back into the park and going on Cars Road Trip. We then headed back to the hotel and picked up our cases and caught the Disney bus back to the airport. We had a McDonalds before going through to departures. Our flight was at 10pm and we ended up getting back home just after midnight.
May
29
This morning we had breakfast at the hotel before heading into the park. We then went on Star Tours: The Adventures Continue which was quite good as we didn't know what to expect. We then went on Le Carrousel de Lancelot before heading to Starbucks for lunch. We then reserved a slot for the photos with Stitch, in which he looked really cool dressed up as Elvis. We had an afternoon drink in the hotel and then photos with Goofy. Ethan and I then went for a swim before having dinner back at Hunters Grill. I then went off on my own to go on Star Wars Hyperspace Mountain and Indiana Jones and the Temple of Peril, before meeting back up with everyone to go on Buzz Lightyear Laser Blast. We then stayed and watched Disney Tales of Magic show.
May
28
It is Rachels 40th Birthday today. We had breakfast at the hotel before heading into the park. We went straight for Buzz Lightyear Laser Blast before heading on Le Pays des Contes de Fees. We then went for lunch at Starbucks, had a look round the shops and then went to the hotel for an afternoon drink and had some photos with Mini Mouse. Ethan and I went swimming. We then headed back into the park for dinner at PYM Kitchen, which served lots of cool food. We then went on Ratatouille and then I went on Avengers Assemble: Flight Force and The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror before we headed back to the hotel for a drink before bed.
May
27
This morning we had breakfast at the hotel before heading into the park. We went on Spider-Man W.E.B. Adventure first as we really enjoyed it last time. We then to watch the new show, Alice & the Queen of Hearts: Back to Wonderland and it was great, they had fire, trampolines and bikes. We then had some Marvel photos taken before heading for lunch at Starbucks. In the afternoon we went on Buzz Lightyear Laser Blast before heading back to the hotel and had photos with Mickey Mouse and then had an afternoon drink and some food in the Compass Lounge. Ethan and I then went swimming before heading out for dinner at Hunters Grill. We then went in the park and Joy and I went on Pirates of the Caribbean before watching the Disney Tales of Magic show.
May
26
We were up at 3am this morning, drove to Birmingham airport for 5am. We then had breakfast in Starbucks before getting on a flight to Paris. Once we walked half way across the airport we got to the bus terminal and got on the Disney bus to take us to the Disney Newport Bay Club. We had upgraded to the Compass Club, so we had private check-in which went nice a quickly. We then headed to Starbucks for some lunch and a drink. The first ride Ethan wanted to go on was Buzz Lightyear Laser Blast, which is our favourite ride. We then went on Autopia followed by its a small world. We then headed back o the hotel for an afternoon drink and some food in the Compass Lounge. In the evening we went to Hunters Grill for dinner and then had a look round the shops before heading back to the hotel and went bed after a long day.
It is Rachels 40th on Wednesday so her Auntie and Uncle had everyone over for a family lunch. It was great to see everyone, chat and eat some good food. We then went for a walk, went to a park and then had an ice cream.
Today Dad, Ethan, Thomas and I had a little trip out. We went to McDonalds for lunch and then went to Clip N Climb in Derby. The session was really full, so you had to wait to get on certain walls, but it was really good fun.
Both Claire and Tom are 40 and to celebrate they threw a birthday party at Ashorne Hill. We had a great evening eating food, catching up and paying on the Nintendo Switch.
Apr
25
We spent the morning packing up and then loading the car. Ethan and I went to the Subtropical Swimming Paradise for a few hours. We then went Starbucks for lunch. In the afternoon we did Family Ball Wall which is great and then Short Tennis which we were not the best at. Before we left we went to Dexters Kitchen for dinner. The drive home was quicker and only took 3 hours.
Apr
24
It was an early start again this morning, with our first activity being Family Karts, we had a time trial and I was 1 second off the lap record. We then went for lunch at Starbucks followed by a Scooter Ride and a trip to the park. Ethan and I then went to the Subtropical Swimming Paradise and then we all went to Café Rouge for dinner.
Apr
23
We were out early this morning for Boogie Bounce, which was doing dancing and trampolining at the same time, it was very hard work but good fun. We then went to Starbucks for lunch. Ethan and I then went on a Scooter Ride and to the Park before heading to the Subtropical Swimming Paradise until we had to leave to get to Hucks for dinner.
Apr
22
This morning Ethan an I went Aerial Tree Trekking which was great fun, then off to Subtropical Swimming Paradise for a few hours, going on the Canyon Ride many, many times. We then went to Starbucks for lunch. In the afternoon we played Pickleball as a family and then to The Lakeside Inn for a roast dinner.
This morning we had a 6 hour drive to Whinfell Forest Center Parcs, it should have took 3 hours but because it was a bank holiday there was a lot of traffic on the road and also lots of roadworks. We stopped what should have been half way for a KFC which was lovely. When we finally got there it was 4pm and Ethan and I went straight to the Subtropical Swimming Paradise for a few hours. When we got out we helped unpack before heading to Bella Italia for a lovely meal.
We decided to give a really large track a go this evening, leaving at 3:30 in the afternoon to get to Stafford Radio Controlled Model Car Club by 5:30, so we could have some food before racing started at 6:15. The track was huge and I got to try out my 23 pinion gear which gave it a lot of speed on the main straight. Ethan and I had a great evening. I also got the highest score out of everyone in bowling with 142 points.
We decided to have an evening out with everyone in the Tech team this evening. We went to Lane7 Sheffield for Pool, Bowling and then Burgers at Fat Hippo inside the venue. It was a great evening getting to talk to people face to face and with people I don't get to speak to much.
Apr
14
As Ethan is on half term we decided to try the Leamington Radio Controlled Car Club this evening, it is now in Coventry just off the M69 so it only took us about 20 mins to get there. The track is longer but not as deep as our normal track. We had good fun racing with some new people.
It has been 11 years since Rachel and I got married. We went to the Old Bulls Head Woodhouse Eaves for dinner to celebrate and had a lovely meal.
We havent had the old shells long, but we have crashed a lot learning to drive these cars. I got both Ethan and I new shells and new front bumpers. Ethan went for half grey and half green which turned out looking really good and I went for spearmint green which is nice and bright.
My old bike that Rachel got me 15 years ago has broken and I still want to be able to go out for bike rides with Ethan. I had been looking round at different bikes and I really liked the Scott Aspect 950, I found it at a good price and ordered it online. It arrived today, Ethan and I built it and it looks great. I went on a little ride on it and it is very smooth.
This evening was the Huncote Vipers Model Car Clubs 35th birthday this evening. We tried an easier track and we had 18 racers which is a lot more than normal. We still had a great night with vouchers being given away to winners and there was also cakes which were lovely.
Ethan and I gave Leicester Electric Car Club another go this evening as we heard it was going to be quiet. The track was fun and they put us in our own race with Scott. We had some great fun and it was some good close racing.
Scott mentioned trying a different venue, so we decided to give Hinckley Radio Control Car Club a go. The track was really large and the people were really friendly. The 6 hours we were there went by really quickly but we had such a great time.
Ethan and I have been going to the Huncote Vipers Model Car Club for a few weeks now and are really enjoying it. Tonight they were taking some photos ready for their 35 year birthday.
Tonight was the 1st race night for Ethan and I with our Minis. We got there early and helped setup, then got our cars ready. We had 5 races during the night with 4 Minis in each race. On the 1st race the rear wheel fell off on lap 6 and I couldn't get it fixed in time. In the next 2 races the car was really quick and I won both races. In the 1st final I won again which was great and finished 2nd in the 2nd final. It was a really great evening.
Today Ethan and I went to my parents house to spray the shells. My Dad had made a spray booth out of some cardboard boxes and a hover. We all had a go at spraying the shells, Ethan went for neon green and I went for neon blue. They both turned out great, with the spray booth working really well.
Now we have all the parts for the RC Minis, Ethan and I spent some time assembling them and then cutting the shells to fit. A member of the RC Club, Dave offered to do the soldering for us, which he made a great job of and then another member Roy offered to set the car up for us, which was very kind of both of them.
