How Old is the "New Bridge"?

My wife and I were watching the LSU baseball game vs. Mississippi State last night when the camera panned out to get a shot of out Mississippi River Bridge in Baton Rouge. It was of course the bigger, nicer, and newer bridge of the two that we have in Baton Rouge.
Local Denham Springs and LSU baseball legend, Ben McDonald, was the color commentator for the game as he works for ESPN now as a baseball analyst. Ben told his fellow announcer that that was the new bridge of the two and that it wasn't that new anymore as it was about 25 years old. My wife and I both instantly said to each other that the new bridge was very much older than 25 years old as Ben McDonald had stated on the telecast.

I agreed and stated that we used to drive over the bridge when I was a kid all the time to get to out camp that we owned on False River. Of course, my wife grew up in the False River area and she too was certain that the bridge was a lot older than 25 years old. She quickly got on her phone and Googled to find out the the new bridge will actually be 50 years old next year.

She asked did I know the name of the new bridge and I surprised her by stating the it is the Horace Wilkinson Bridge. Not many people know that or call it that. Most everyone just calls it the "New Bridge". If you are not familiar with the bridge it is the one in the header for this website. Anyway, I quickly got on Twitter and send Ben a message about the actual age of the new bridge and to both my wife and I's amusement, Ben came back on the air after a commercial break shortly after that and told everyone that the bridge was actually 50 years old and that everyone was sure to let him know about his mistake.

We go a great laugh out of the whole thing. Thanks Ben for taking the time to read my Tweet. The home team Tigers did pull off a thrilling come from behind victory as well.

Pressure Washer Purchase and Use

We hadn't done any pressure washing outside in about two years. I usually borrow a friend's pressure washer and finally got a hold of it this past weekend. I was making some progress when the machine ran out of gas. I filled it up and then could not get it started again.

The machine had been used quite a bit since I last had possession of it. We pulled on it and it got to where it was hurting my hand to try to start it. We brought it back around the corner to my friend and went straight over to Home Depot. Owning my own pressure washer is something I had always thought about doing but had been able to borrow one for so long. Well, my friend suggested that if I was going to but one that I might try an electric one so I didn't have to mess with the motor.

That sounded like a good idea so we ended up getting a Ryobi 2000 PSI Electric Pressure Washer for about $179. It worked well for us to get a good day of work in. Dealing with the power cord in the way along with the high pressure hose and water hose was an added challenge to deal with but I sure didn't have to put gasoline or oil in my new machine. Here is the YouTube Video we made about the new machine and shows us putting it to good use.

Thanks!

Spring Means Getting the Yard in Shape

As spring is here and we are getting ready for the summer and no school, that means getting the back yard in shape. We spent a big amount of effort on swapping out pools recently. The next big thing that I needed to do was to get our big oak tree trimmed. It constantly has low hanging branches that make it difficult to cut the grass underneath or to even walk underneath it.

We trimmed a good bit on it last year but this year I decided to take it to another level. I purchased a Remington Ranger Electric Pole Saw from Amazon and we got after some big limbs on Mother's Day. It made a huge difference for the yard and I wanted to share out video on this project for you. If you need to do some serious tree pruning then this pole saw is a good buy and I recommend it. For only about $80 it was well worth the cost. Thanks!

Area 51 is Popular and Fun for Kids

One of the newest things that kids love to do is go to these indoor trampoline parks. There are a least two of these in the Baton Rouge area. The one that my kids like to go to is behind the Mall of Louisiana called Area 51. It has been an instant hit with young people in the area. If you've never been to the place, it is basically a large indoor space with various forms of trampolines and trampoline type games such as a dodge ball area, a foam pit for flipping into, another foam pit for swinging down into, a few basketball goals to dunk on, a climbing wall and things like that.

Customers must log into their website and have their parents sign a waiver if under 18. Obviously, there is a potential for someone to get hurt at these places so jump at your own risk I guess. It is set up safely and there are young people that work the floor areas to monitor and make sure people are playing in a safe manner. I will post a couple of videos I have from the place below for you to get an idea if this is somewhere you would like to take your kids.

Summer Upon Us for 2017

It's been a good while since I last posted on this site. It is one that means a lot to me. The photos here of me spending time with my kids bring back great memories. It is amazing how time has flown by. My son will be a senior next school year and it will be my daughter's 8th grade year. This school year has been just crazy for all of us as our little town of Denham Springs just outside of Baton Rouge was hit with some terrible flooding only a few days into the school year in August of 2016. It was truly a devastating event for Denham Springs and many, many people across the Baton Rouge area. The flood waters devastated many people's homes and both my son's high school ( DSHS ) and my and my daughter's school, Southside Junior High.

We have been relocated to a temporary campus behind Juban Parc Junior High School in the south part of Denham Springs. We are all hopeful to one day be able to go back to our old location to maybe a brand new school if the FEMA authorities agree to their 90% cost of the anticipated multi-million dollar project. Again, this is all just speculation at this point but the hope is a shiny new junior high school for our community one day soon.

This blog continues to get plenty of traffic on a regular basis. I am going to do my best to work on it in the next several weeks as I will have extra time on my hands for the summer time. Thank you for your support of this effort and I wish all of God's blessings on you and your family.

Baton Rouge Hurting

Having grown up in Baton Rouge, the events of the last several weeks have been difficult to take. My experiences in Baton Rouge for most of my life have been overall quite positive. I don't ever recall things being that bad but of course I grew up in a time where there was no social media and instant video cameras in everyone's pocket with their cell phones. I know that the people of Baton Rouge are good people and the attention the city has gained has certainly not been what the city leaders have desired. From the unfortunate death of Anton Sterling at the hands of police officers during a struggle to the brazen military style murder of three fine police officers on Airline Highway this past Sunday morning, these have not been the best of times in Baton Rouge. I hope that if you stop by to read this post that you must realize that Baton Rouge is not a bad place. Like all cities across America it has problems but by and large it is not a bad city. This post is to ask all to pray for peace for Baton Rouge and the rest of our great country. Let's not let the bad actions of a few people turn everyone against each other with hatred. May God bless the city of Baton Rouge and may God bless the United States of America.

Four Wheeler ATV Riding

If you live in the Baton Rouge area, one fun activity that you may choose to get into is four wheeler riding. I purchased a pair of four wheelers from a local dealer around Christmas time in order to have something to do with my family that was a break from sports and dance. It was a big investment for me and my family to buy these machines but I figured that my time with my kids will soon be up as they grow and move on with their lives. I want to make as many fond memories as I can with my kids and I thought the four wheeler riding would be something that would be really fun and that they would enjoy. We took our new machines out with close friends in January of 2015 to a place no for outside of Baton Rouge called Tower Trax in Fluker, Louisiana. This is a huge place over 1,000 acres for people to ride there. They charge $10 per person and $10 per ATV. It's well worth it, especially if you don't have your own land to ride on. Tower Trax is a huge place with some really good trails that ATV riders from all over the area come to ride. We had a great trip and my friend had a Go Pro camera on his machine and we took some great video. There was a particularly funny event that took place about a third of the way into the trail ride that day. My son stuck his four wheeler and then, well, watch the short YouTube video yourself and you can see why we were all laughing so hard. If you are looking for something fun to do and can afford it, then ATV riding is something you may want to consider giving a try.

Bayou Country Superfest Better Than Ever

After taking a year off from attending, my family and I once again attended the Bayou Country Superfest concert featuring some top notch big time country music superstars in Tiger Stadium in Baton Rouge in May of 2014. For the first time, the concert was extended to three nights with Reba McIntyre and George Strait playing on the Friday night of the beginning of the Memorial Day weekend. Supposedly, for those people that are really big George Strait fans, he put on an awesome show and it was also said to be one of his final performances ever. We did not go on the Friday night but did go the final to days and nights. On Saturday the performers were Gloriana, Easton Corbin, Lee Brice, Florida-Georgia Line and Luke Bryan. I really enjoyed Lee Brice more than I was expecting to and Florida-Georgia Line is a talented duo that really put on a great show. I can see these two guys could easily be headliners for this big time concert sometime in the future. They were full of energy and did a great job with hits like "Shine On" and "This is how we roll". Luke Bryan, not surprisingly, even ran out on stage to join FGL for his part of "This is how we roll" and the crowd really liked that.

Luke Bryan was the headliner for the night. I was most looking forward to hearing and seeing him perform for this night. I was a bit disappointed to my surprise. Luke came out on stage and seemed to be on a bit of an ego trip of something. He started messing around on the keyboard and playing random songs that his band had no idea what he was trying to do. It was getting late and I was tired and my ten year old daughter was extremely tired and just trying to stay awake by the time Luke was on stage. I was ready for him to play his familiar songs that had made him a star. Finally, he did start to perform his own songs and we lasted through some of them but we decided we would leave a little early to beat the traffic and get our tired selves and kids back home to get some rest so we could return the last day of the concert.

We returned on Sunday to hear Joe Nichols, Big & Rich, Hunter Hayes, Eric Church and Jason Aldean. This was no doubt a star studded line up and promised to be a good day. After tailgating out on the "Old Front Nine" grassy area outside Tiger Stadium with some friends we made our way back into the stadium for another big day of music and fun. Big & Rich are kind of unusual but I liked them and they brought there black cowboy buddy, Cowboy Troy, to spice things up a bit and they were fun. Hunter Hayes was more appealing to some of the younger people at the concert, especially the girls and some of them held up signs that Hunter could see. Hunter Hayes is a talented young man and he is also from nearby Breaux Bridge, Louisiana. It was good to see a talented and seemingly nice young man get to perform in front of his home state fans.

Eric Church began his performance at about 7 PM when it had just gotten dark and the crowd was pumped up and ready to party by the time he took the stage. Eric Church portrays a rather tough guy or "badass" persona and does it quite well. He was really good and the crowd was loving every minute of his show. Eric Church truly seems to enjoy what he's doing and doesn't seem to mind mixing it up with his fans. He got a beer from someone in the crowd and chugged it along with a fan in the crowd. Everybody cheered wildly while he did this. His "These Boots" song was fun too as he got a couple of boots from fans to hold up while he sang and he autographed then before he handed them back. My son who is 14 at the time said that he really liked the performance too.

Jason Aldean was the headliner for Sunday night and the last performer for the entire concert. For whatever reason, Aldean's equipment somehow had not arrived at the stadium. This is hard to believe that his stuff could not have been there on time given the magnitude of this big concert with 50,000 plus fans in attendance. It took about 45 minutes for Aldean to begin playing as the crowd was getting really restless. The crowd even started to do the wave while we were waiting for the roadies to get Aldean's stuff all set up to play. Aldean wasted no time and went strait into singing all his big hits and did a good job. Once again, we left a little early and missed the last few songs but again it was very late and we were all quite tired.

All in all, the Bayou Country Superfest is a great event to attend. Local news reported that the event was a great one for the local hotels and restaurants and it pumped a lot of money into the Baton Rouge economy. If you are a country music fan and can make it to this event next year I think you will have a great time like we did.

Mardi Gras Time

Last weekend, I took my family down to Houma. LA which is about an hour and a half from Baton Rouge. My good friend from high school lives down there with his family. We like to go down there during the Mardi Gras season to visit with him and catch some of the many parades that they offer down there in Houma. The parades are always a great family event to go to. Of course, in the Baton Rouge area there are the popular Spanish Town parade and the Southdowns parade too and those are great parades and fun for the family. I believe that the Spanish Town parade can get a little raunchy but as I recall there is a designated area to sit for those that are cutting up. If you have never been to a Mardi Gras parade there are plenty of options that are family friendly and not down in New Orleans. There are parades all over South Louisiana to attend.

Ringling Bros. And Barnum & Bailey Circus Tickets

A friend and co-worker that lives nearby was able to get me some tickets to the upcoming Ringling Brothers and Barnum and Bailey Circus that will be held this weekend and the River Center in downtown Baton Rouge. The last time that I took my kids was a very long time ago when my daughter was just about two years old or so. It looks like the cheapest tickets start at around $24 dollars so this may be something that you would like to look into doing with your kids. I hope to post a few pictures and a post on our experience here for you to  read up on soon after we go. Here is the link that will take you to where you can purchase tickets if you would like to go.  http://batonrougeboxoffice.com/river-center-tickets.php

Rock Star Go Kart Racing in Baton Rouge

Yesterday, I took my kids to the neighbors birthday party at a new go kart racing place I had heard about recently. It is not anything like the races you are familiar with at probably Celebration Station which are outdoors. This place is located at Airline Highway and Old Jefferson Highway right close to Parkview Baptist Church. It is a former large grocery store that has been converted into an indoor go kart race track.

There appears to be a smaller track set up outside but since is was sort of rainy and wet it appeared to be closed. Well, anyway the place is very safety conscious and kids have to have their parent sign a waiver before they are allowed to race in the slower race featuring the junior karts that go slower. No they still go about 15 to 20 miles per hour so that's not that slow. Anyway, since we were there for a birthday party we were ushered off to the backside of the race track where the birthday party room is located. After our hostess girls brought us some pitchers of coke, the kids just had to wait a short while for their turn to race. The kids were all issued their own black "do-rag" type thing that they were to wear before putting on the helmet. This is probably a good thing to prevent the spread of lice.

Anyway, a young man came into the party room before the kids were race and went over the safety rules on the track and took any questions. Then he led the kids to the far side of the building and they got in their junior karts and had a blast racing against each other. Each kart is apparently equipped with a GPS type of device that tracks the karts speed per lap and fastest lap time and also tracks who is winning the race by completing the most laps. When a driver has a spin out then all karts have to stop while the young men run to help the driver straighten out and then they all get going again.

The kids all had a really good time and this is a really nice place. My daughter is only nine at the time of this post and she drove her own kart and did just fine racing the older boys. If the grownups want in on the action they have some adult races with some much faster karts. These karts go about 25-30 miles an hour. I didn't get to try that but it sure looks like a blast. Rock Star GO Kart Racing is a really fun thing to do in Baton Rouge.

Sound of Music

Tonight we decided to watch the great musical, The Sound of Music on TV together as a family. It's been a long while and somehow my kids have never seen it. I must have seen this movie at least ten times as a kid but of course back then we had no cable television or Internet to give us other choices to be entertained. It was good to watch it together. My son was not easily forced to watch but my daughter enjoyed it very much. It was a nice family night with a good movie.

TIgers going to Chik-Fil-A Bowl

Well, the Tigers hope for a quality bowl game did not turn out like they had hoped. The LSU Tigers will take on the Clemson Tigers in a battle of teams with 10-2 records. I guess there are some clever scores to settle here such as who has the REAL Death Valley and which team is the REAL Tigers. I'm pretty sure my LSU Tigers will show Clemson what real SEC caliber football is all about. It still stings a bit to think what might have been had the Tigers been able to hang on and win after such a great performance against the hated Alabama Crimson Tide. Yes, I'm sorry. I do hate them. Anyway, Merry Christmas everyone.

Football Season well underway

Football season is rolling right along in the Baton Rouge area. The LSU a tigers are highly ranked but have been unimpressive so far with a struggle to beat the atowson Tigers from the state of Maryland last night in a wet and smallw crowd in Tiger Stadium. A season ticket holder myself, I'm glad I chose to skip last night's game. I watched it on ESPNU and it was quite boring. The Tigers better pick things up quickly as the travel to Gainsville, Florida this coming Saturday to play a strong Florida Gators team that's on the rise with their coach, Will Muschamp. The Tigers are struggling to get their passing game unleashed under their new QB, Zack Mettenberger. He did connect on a couple of big plays to WR Odell Beckham Jr. But he needs more consistency and better pass protection to have the time to throw the ball.

Out a Southern, things are going better for the Jaguars after they fired Coach Stump Mitchell they seem to be playing much better and have won both games since that coaching change. Don't ever underestimate the value of a coach to a team. I think all you need to do is look at the New Orleans Sints and their 0-3 start with the absence of head coach Sean Payton. Hopefully, the Saints can turn things around quickly or the chances of them making the NFL playoffs seems unlikely.

Family Fun at the Movies in Baton Rouge