Because I chose to keep my hair long unlike any other time in my life, I’ve gotten very few haircuts over the past couple of years.

In fact, I documented the 2 most recent haircuts I got at Second Glance Salon and 18 Shades Hair Salon in mid-2019. But I decided to go back to having it long after a little while since I was self conscious about my look.

That’s in spite of my significant other really enjoying the clean-cut look I had before. I wanted to do something different, but I decided to keep a 5:00 shadow and reduce my hair at The Hair Tailors based out of Clark NJ.

I had to schedule an appointment because of COVID protocol, but luckily they had an opening that same day. That’s from the way they said it, but the hair salon was empty with just me as a customer.

There’s nothing more socially distanced than that. The lady at The Hair Tailors, whose name I either forgot or didn’t ask for, has been styling for more than 20 years and was very helpful in ensuring my hair looked the way I wanted it to.

Update: I was informed when sharing this blog post that my stylist’s name was Jenn. She’s the subject of a lot of the positive reviews I found on Google.

It felt weird having someone else wash my hair, as it’s been so long since another person has shampooed me. I’m not sure if she conditioned me as well, but I’d assume it’s a 2-in-1 formula to maximize my hair’s potential.

It took a year and a half to grow my hair out and 15 minutes to get it cut up. I had a full beard with this hairstyle and knew it wouldn’t be for me, especially since I was tired of maintaining it and getting sauces & such stuck in it to the point where I smelled & tasted them until I washed my face.

I’ll probably keep getting my trims done at The Hair Tailors, as I had a nice experience there.

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One of my favorite things to do with my significant other is dance. We’ve danced in many places to various types of music, but we’ve never done a silent disco.

Until now. Our friends turned it on to us because of an experience they had with it in London. We found that a company called Lime N Lights Silent Events that was running one at The Brown House in Metuchen NJ.

I used to live right near there and always passed by the place since it was at an odd location right next to an overpass near a major highway, but not near an exit ramp that gives you a direct route to it. But it’s a bar that apparently has a spacious outdoor area, which is where the silent disco occurred.

How silent disco works is that there are 3 different DJs playing music at the same time and the only way you can hear any of them is through headphones that you can tune to each individual DJ. It’s kind of like flipping between radio stations, except the stations played:

• Bollywood Indian music
• Punjabi Bhangra music
• American Top 40 music

The stations all had their unique mix on their own culture’s music, though the Bollywood & Punjabi stations had some American tunes bleed into their respective musical styles. I felt like it was a fun time since I love dancing but sometimes clubs are blaring, though taking off the headphones leads to silence.

Especially since the dance party took place in The Brown Stone’s spacious outdoor area that contained a bar, a nice patio space and some grass with a tree, lights overhead & a cornhole court. Not sure if they play cornhole on a court, but still.

It was overall quite the fun experience, especially since the headphones designated colors to show what music you were listening to and what others are dancing to. It was about 4 hours that was definitely worth a second chance thanks to Lime N Lightz.

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I know I spoke about celebrating the holidays with family, but I also celebrated with my coworkers and one of my bosses at the office. The first time I went into the office since late March mind you. 

And it was nice to see everyone again… as well as get a new computer, as the graphics card on my old one was starting to crap out on me. But, my company’s holiday party was 3 different parts of fun.

Part 1: Sparkling Wine & Food Pairing

The husband of one company owner started off the afternoon with a wine tasting that did not resemble the VintEdge Wine & Spirits tasting I went to earlier this year. This was calculated and the portions of sparkling wine were a lot smaller.

He did wine tastings like this during college, so he was quite used to this. Flight 1 started us off with Jeio Proseco Brut from Italy paired with a thinly-slice Anjou pear with a candied pecan topped with an Italian parmesan over mixed greens, which added an element of lightness where the pear & wine flavors melded.

Flight 2’s beverage was Bohigas Brut Cava from Spain that was my least favorite of the 4 wines, but didn’t taste bad. It was paired with a warmed corn tortilla that contained fresh cilantro, avocado, black beans & sweet white corn splashed in citrus, which was clearly inspired by the Spanish heritage of the wine.

Flight 3 probably had my favorite wine on the list: a rosé called Cote Mas Cremant de Limoux out of Protegee, France. Paired with this wine was the hottest food of the day that warmed me up on the cold afternoon: roasted butternut drizzled in a sage, honey & butter sauce.

Flight 4 contained my favorite food item: a fresh arugula salad with French brie & a grilled peppered skirt steak that was grass fed. This salad is one that I’d typically order since I love the bitter green with the sweet cheese, which conveniently paired with Laurent Perrier Brut Champagne that can legitimately be called that since is comes from the Champagne region of France.

Part 2: Anthony’s Coal Fired Pizza Lunch

I’ve always heard about Anthony’s Coal Fired Pizza and our holiday party decided to get our lunch from there. The food pairings were really more of an appetizer, though they were more intricate.

Here’s what the menu, seen above, was comprised of:

• Margherita pizza
• Sausage pizza
• Cauliflower pizza with garlic & oil
• White pizza
• White pizza with meatballs
• Herb-spiced bread
• Wings covered in caramelized onions
• Salad with the usual plus olives & eggs

I don’t like white pizza, but I ate everything else. The salad was what it was, while the margherita & sausage slices were good. The cauliflower slice & herb-spiced bread was very different and a refreshing take since it tasted the most like a pizza that was coal fired. The reheating value of the pizza was severely lacking in my opinion.

Part 3: AmbiArts Ambidextrous Art

The last part of my holiday party was team building via something called ambidextrous art. I’ve never heard of this and was curious once I met Donna Mikkelsen who runs AmbiArts.

Her talent is the ability to make artwork using 2 hands at the same time and I saw some of her artwork online & it’s amazing. We sat around a couple of tables and first started drawing on our own white erase boards to practice moving markers with 2 hands at the same time.

Then, we did it with a partner and then 3 partners. Each time, we were all drawing symmetrically (or at least trying to) with 1 person being the leader and everyone else in our groups following. It was hard since some people anticipated movements, whereas others went too fast.

We wound up practicing a lot for our final drawings. I was grouped with 2 of my coworkers and we made this with permanent crayons and paint that we did afterwards:

It looks like something alien, but it’s ambidextrous art that’s somewhat symmetrical. Donna Mikkelsen taught us that going at a good speed and waiting for the rest of the group to finish (if you’re the leader, which I was for our group since they weren’t confident enough to be) before moving onto the next line.

AmbiArts is a unique concept I would definitely try again. I learned that my lines were a lot wider with my left hand than my right since it’s my dominant one. I’ll never be an ambidextrous artist, but I can at least say I tried and enjoy doing it with my coworkers.

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As most people know about me by now, I’m a stepparent who thinks of the 2 kids as if they were my own. Like a father, I love them, I care for them and even discipline them.

But, I also take pride in their achievements. That’s the case when I found out that Woodbridge Public Library was going to be hanging my little girl’s artwork in a display along with other local kids & their artwork.

For context, my little girl loves to draw. And she’s amazing at it. She’s a better artist at 8 than I am at 33. My stick figures and mutated-looking animals are put to shame. See for yourself.

Her artwork was unveiled during an event held at the Woodbridge Public Library where they were celebrating its 250th anniversary. The celebration was compromised of artwork from children and adults from the area, along with some boxed wine and food.

Among the food served was:

• Coldcut platters with pepperoni, salami & cheese (cheddar and swiss)
• Raw vegetables including broccoli, cauliflower, carrots, celery, tomatoes & peppers with hummus
• Indian style chicken and savory pastry… unfortunately, I did not catch a name
• Entemann’s chocolate chip cookies & brownie circles for dessert

But back to the art at woodBRIDGE to ART. There were some interesting paintings upstairs that resembled places I’d love to vacation and beautiful renditions of animals. I had a blast at the Woodbridge Public Library and I didn’t even have to read a book.

It also marked the first time I spent a significant amount of time with their father. Though we didn’t really interact much outside of hellos (as usual), it’s a good sign that there’s no outward animosity especially in front of the kids.

Hopefully, this speaks to how easy things will be as I attend events when the kids get older. I also saw my little boy sing Christmas carols and he knew a lot of the words to 5 songs.

I have such pride that I have 2 smart and good kids.

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My mother recently retired to Florida in April after my brother & I threw her a retirement party at Mascali. And she came up to visit for the first time to celebrate Christmas with me and my family.

She flew up from Clearwater earlier in the week and came to visit us Friday afternoon through Monday morning. I picked her up at the train station & me, my mom & my significant other had lunch from our favorite Italian restaurant while she gave me a huge remote control-sized Ziploc bag full of business cards from her area.

I didn’t get to spend much time with her Friday night since I had a wrestling gig, but it gave my mom some one-on-one time with my significant other & the kids. We spent the whole next 2 days together on Saturday and Sunday.

Saturday was comprised of building a gingerbread house with the kids, which had trouble staying up because the frosting just would not hold. The house collapsed by itself a couple of weeks later, by the way.

That night, we wanted to see a Christmas display. I chose the Magic of Lights show at PNC Bank Arts Center since it was a 1+-mile drive-thru Christmas light show that looked cool. But the line was so long that it went off the Garden State Parkway exit ramp and took 2 hours to move slightly, so I took the first opportunity to turn out & run though I almost didn’t make it since I accidentally cut ahead in line at first.

Sunday was the day my mother bought tickets for all of us to a local production of the musical Seussical performed at the Cranford Dramatic Club. The performance portion of it was great, but the costuming really felt like a ripoff considering it’s a play about Dr. Seuss characters and they just looked like people in clothes.

I understand it’s a local theater on a budget, but Horton was just a heavy-set actor in a gray suit. You would only know who the Grinch was because he wore a Santa hat & had his beard dyed green. Hell, Sour Kangaroo wore regular clothes with a golden fanny pack.

My mom wanted to leave halfway through, but I was enjoying my nap. The kids had a good time and that’s all that really counted. But my mom thought it was just going to be a recreation of the Dr. Seuss books based on what the ticket office told her. That it was not.

Even though everything didn’t turn out like planned, it was still a nice weekend with my mom.

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I love a good pun and I love a good business card. And the FestiFall, the nickname of the Westfield Fall Festival fell into both categories. Not to mention a nice day of family fun.

It started with getting some food including some hot dogs and my significant other wanting sausage & peppers, though she tried twice to get sweet sausage instead of hot to no avail. As a result, me and my little girl made jokes when the guy would yell out the food he was selling by saying “no hot sausage here!”

Then we got to the center of the festival where it was like a cross with booths throughout 4 different blocks. I would snag business cards as I walked from the multitude of vendors until we approached the Redeemer Lutheran School booth since the kids got to design their own capes with markers. It was a pretty neat setup and the ladies were quite nice & good with the kids.

We walked another way and saw a couple of other interesting things:

• The Good Donut Shop where they gave out a free mini doughnut if you told them a bad joke
• Escapology offering a 2-minute escape room challenge on the street
• Heather Wallace, also known as The Timid Rider who is an author & runs a horse farm
• A slime vendor (whose slime has since gotten black specs in it over the past few weeks we’ve had the slime)

And the final fun part about FestiFall is the carnival offerings provided by Seashore Amusements. They had several attractions including bounce mazes, swinging rides and even a wheel where up to 4 people got to sit inside while it went around & around.

It was overall a nice day. It truly amazes me how much having a significant other and 2 kids truly fulfills me. It makes me appreciate the little moments and the quality time spent together. And the Westfield Fall Festival definitely fit into that category. I’m sure we’ll be coming back next year.

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This is a story about another discovery made by my significant other. This time, it was during a work happy hour she attended a few months back. Ever since, she talked about wanting to go to Topgolf, located in Edison NJ.

And now we finally did and it was a lot more fun than I expected it to be. I typically go to driving ranges, spend $20 on a bucket of balls and rage at the fact that I can’t hit a ball anywhere close to where I want to.

But Topgolf is different… very different. It’s a unique experience unlike any other I’ve ever encountered. And I’m not talking about the tour this business card is promoting at the Edison location.

The first impression I got of seeing this place was just the vast size of it. It truly looked like a huge complex and it was evident by its popularity on the nights we went. That’s right: the PA said “we hope to see you tomorrow” and it turns out, we went back the next day. The “I’m not coming back tomorrow” joke was on me.

The Golf

Let’s talk about the golfing game that we played. I said game because it was a contest due to the fact that you had to hit the ball into certain areas of fake holes throughout the range. The holes had colored lighting underneath to have a theme of fun and to help you see where to hit the ball.

And each ball has a microchip inside to tell you where it landed, though it only recognizes when it goes into a hole. Not sure how that tech works, but it’s a fun experience. But at $50 per hour to rent out a bay for up to 6, it’s definitely something to do with a group.

Especially if you’re competitive since Topgolf has a few different game types to choose from. I know we did a top score version that I did somewhat decently at. Ironically, I am horrible at regular golf and usually don’t fare so well at the driving range.

The Food & Drink

I was told that Topgolf served alcohol and they made some good drinks. Their novelty drink is called a golfbag, which is a lot bigger than a typical drink and comes in a special themed cup with special themed straws, and we shared the citrus cabana golfbag that has Bacardi superior rum & limon run, Deep Eddy ruby red vodka, St-Germain, monin cane sugar, premium citrus sour, fresh lemon & grapefruit juice.

I also tried the Cucumber Melon Cooler (Ketel One, St-Germain, monin pure cane sugar, lemon juice & watermelon) and it was refreshing, but I wouldn’t get it again.

In terms of food, I enjoyed everything I tried including:

• Jumbo pretzel board with genoa salami, jalapeño sausage, prosciutto, pepper jack, cheddar, gala apples, red grapes, blackberries & candied pecans with Pabst Blue Ribbon cheese sauce
• Mushi (cilantro sticky rice, drunken beans, spiced chicken, cheddar cheese, jalapeño tortilla, avocado & sriracha hot sauce that’s shaped like sushi)
• Topgolf wings flavored in Buffalo, Asian sesame & mango habanero sauces… the buffalo was great, the others were alright
• Char-grilled steak flatbread with marinated steak, grilled red onion, chimichurri & fresh jalapeño
• Pulled pork sliders

Overall, the whole Topgolf experience was one of the more fun things I’ve ever tried and I’ll definitely be back.

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I’ve been a fan of miniature golf for a long time and have fond memories of doing it with my family. Now I get to pass on my affection for mini golf onto my family.

And what better way to do that than at an indoor place called Monster Mini Golf on a hot summer night. We went to the location in Edison, New Jersey right by where I used to live. I had always seen it, but never went inside. Until now.

Upon entering, I saw the 18-hole mini golf course in the distance with a video arcade up front. It’s supposed to be a bit spooky, so the whole course is in the dark but is lit up in a haunted house type of way.

The first thing I took note of at Monster Mini Golf was the design. Between the animatronics of monsters and the scenery, it truly felt like a fun experience for kids. Adults can dig it, too though as some of the holes were really tough with difficult curves, bounce shots and even one hole where there’s a loop.

What made it fun was the obstacles surrounding each. There was also a wheel at Hole 6 that gave you options to shoot the ball in a different way. The three I remember are shooting the ball with the wrong end of the club for your first shot, someone being an obstacle in your way for the first shot and shooting with your eyes closed for the first shot. I got the latter… and a hole in one.

In total, I got 4 hole in ones by some miracle. I guess 3 were miracle and the one for Hole 18 was just shooting the ball up into the clown’s mouth. Yeah, it could have been like Dracula’s mouth, but I guess enough people are scared of clowns to make that count… especially the kiddos.

But, you should definitely consider Monster Mini Golf if you’re looking for a unique and challenging round of 18 holes. They have other locations and I’m not sure if it’s the same layout or different, but I’m sure it’s sort of similar all around. But don’t expect a spooky soundtrack since it was a lot of hit songs new and old, so I found it funny when I was watching “scary” animatronics moving to Blondie.

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I spoke about the horror show I had at Ray Catena Infiniti in my previous blog post. After getting a gross cost of the repairs I need, I decided to go to a non-dealership mechanic for a second opinion before giving up on my car entirely.

I looked for mechanics around me and went with the Quality Auto Centers location in Colonia NJ. I previously had gotten my old Nissan Versa often serviced at their Highland Park NJ location on several occasions, so I at least trusted the Quality Auto name.

When I first called them, I told the manager Darren who I spoke with about all of the things on Ray Catena’s estimate except for the horn not working. When he spoke to me, he said that he would have to take a look at everything.

Turns out that controller arm, steering panel, lower oil pan and radiator support were not in that bad of shape. However, the #5 cylinder coil and rear brakes needed replacing still. And that was still costly, but both fixes cost the same amount as just the #5 cylinder coil according to the initial quote I got from the dealership.

I’ve never owned a luxury car, so I guess OEM parts are just that expensive. That and the $150 an hour they charge for labor… yikes. I guess that’s my fault for going to a car dealership first, but it still doesn’t excuse the way I was told my car should be in a junkyard.

Back to Quality Auto Centers. They got everything done in one day and the car drives like almost new, just the way I bought it. The only issue we ran into was actually paying for the work. Funny thing happened right before I paid: there was a power surge that restarted the modem at the mechanic. Turns out, we waited there for nearly 30 minutes to try & fix the issue, but to no avail.

Even though Darren tried and tried, I had to wait a day to get my vehicle. But it’s fixed and in good condition.

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One time of year I truly dread is tax season. That’s because I have to eagerly await all of my forms and then have to make an appointment at an accountant. I’ve had some good and bad luck with H&R Block, so I knew I needed somebody new.

In previous years, I had mailed my taxes to my mother’s accountant on Long Island, but that didn’t seem logical. So, I turned to my significant other and she gave me the name Stuart Yontef since he’s the man who does her taxes.

I decided that was good enough for me and shot Stu an email. He got back to me pretty quickly and then we arranged a phone call once I emailed him all of my info.

All it took was about 10 minutes over the phone getting some further info about my living situation last year (which heavily fluctuated) and my tax refund was being processed.

A couple of weeks later, I got my checks. Best of all, it cost less than H&R Block. I’m definitely using Stuart Yontef for my taxes again.

I usually try to write a longer blog post, but this was just so straightforward that not much more can be said.

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