5/23/2025 – Hike in Little Pee Dee State Park
On Saturday we dodged the rain and headed out to Dillon, SC to visit Little Pee Dee State Park. The day was pleasant – a bit hot and a bit humid, but not oppressively so. The hike was relatively short and didn’t have any elevation, but it quite pretty. After we completed the loop we took a stroll by Lake Norton and saw a Great Blue Heron!
Photo by our friend Brandon.
We also caught a few Canada Geese harassing fishermen. We kept our distance but I did get this photo.
After we returned to civilization (Dillon, SC), we visited The Red Cardinal for drinks and ice cream, and then got some really good Vietnamese food at a hole-in-the-wall restaurant in a shopping plaza. Overall it was a great getaway after a frankly difficult May so far.
5/9/2026 – Rip Review – 2026 Panini Prizm Stars and Stripes
Jess surprised me with a retail blaster of 2026 Panini Prizm Stars and Stripes. This set features players for the various USA National Teams in a glossy chrome style card. The base look very nice, though there are pretty wild centering issues.
Fortunately, the centering issues are seemingly not present on the insert that I consider the star of the set – the very attractive Prizmatics. The cards look phenomenal. This isn’t a tough insert to pull, though the color parallels give them some depth. I just think they look outstanding and I was happy to pull 3 of them. The green Bobby Witt Jr. is one of the nicer pulls of this box.
The hits of the box were a pair of game-used jersey cards. Jacob Lombard is expected to go in the top 10 of the 2027 MLB draft, according to MLB.com. The Coleman Borthwick (Prizmatic) is the other first-round player in this box. Overall, super fun rip. Great cards, some great names, and some nice additions to the collection.
5/2/20226 – Artfields!
This weekend Jess and I visited nearby Lake City, SC for their annual Artfields event! This is a two-week long celebration of art and local business, where downtown shops and restaurants host works of art. We had a great time wandering around Lake City’s charming downtown, visiting with friendly shopkeeps, and taking in the art. My favorite piece is a very therian-coded work called “Skins” which I will post below, along with a gallery of some of the other art we saw.
4/24/2026 – Muenster! A Good Cat
Today I want to write about Muenster, one of our three cats. She is a tortoiseshell cat, which means she is insane. Her mom – the mother of all 3 of our cats – was also a slim tortie. She is very skittish and slow to warm to strangers. She is extremely resistant to being picked up, though she does love attention once she gets to know you. She almost never knocks things over – a trait shared by all our cats! She is a very good cat.
The real defining characteristic of Muenster, though, is her voice. She loves to meow and yowl all through the house, at all hours. I genuinely love this. I think most people who spend time in our house find this annoying, and I get that, but I think it’s great when she yells. I think self-expression is perhaps the most important part of existence, and I am so pleased that she is a vocal creature. I also think she is the only one of our animals who has chosen me as her favorite; the rest of our family animals have very much imprinted on Jess. I’m not sure why this is. Perhaps she can tell how much I appreciate her yelling!
4/17/2026 – Saint Louis Blues 2026 Season Recap
It is a sad day for your Saint Louis Blues; the 2026 season has come to an end and the blue note faithful will have to wait until October to see their boys again. It was a challenging season; the team got off to an incredibly cold start with problems in every area of the game, though the goaltending stood out the most. Binnington and Hofer struggled, and the offense, defense, and special teams were not able to pick up the slack as the team dug themselves a deep hole in the standings. A change in net came midway through the season, as Joel Hofer became the starting goaltender for the first time in his career and he started playing very well. The Olympic break did the team some good, as Binnington seemed to return to form (though he did not return to his starting role), while Snuggerud took a huge step forward. It was not enough to overcome the team’s early struggles though, and the team traded away an A and a C – Justin Faulk and Captain Brayden Schenn – at the deadline. A team trading its captain is always sad, and doubly so for me, as Schenn is my favorite player. The team played well down the stretch and ended up with a winning record, though they missed the playoffs by a few points.
Things to watch/reasons for hope in 2027:
- Jimmy Snuggerud – In the final months of the season, Snuggerud played like a legitimate top-6 scorer, playing at a point-per-game pace in March and April. If he can carry that momentum into 26-27, he’ll play on the first line all season.
- Dylan Holloway – Like Snuggerud, Holloway really turned it on after the break. Personally, I think he came into the season hurt and he did eventually hit the IR in the middle of the season but his play even before he went down was uncharacteristically poor. If Holloway comes into the 26-27 season healthy, he’ll be a major player for this team.
- Joel Hofer – Another guy who benefited from the long break in February, putting up a 2.19 GAA after the Olympics. It will be interesting to see what Saint Louis’ net looks like next year; what would Binnington have to do to win his starting job back?
- Dalibor Dvorsky – The Slovak sniper is a mystery at this point in his career. His anemic scoring in his first NHL season has me a bit concerned, but his play in best-on-best at the Olympics was outstanding, scoring 3 goals and 3 assists in 6 games. His shot makes it easy to see why the Blues like him. The 26-27 season will be crucially important for him – can he stick in the lineup or will be get sent back down to the AHL for more seasoning?
- Leadership – Though the loss of Schenn hurts me, personally, guys like Neighbours and Thomas seem ready to lead this team, which admittedly played better without their captain than with him.
- Draft Capital – The Blues have the 11th, 15th, and 31st overall picks in the 2026 NHL draft. While they may not get anybody who can help the team immediately, three first round picks for a team built around youth is exciting. The next few years of Saint Louis Blues hockey should be pretty fun if one or more of their picks pan out to be NHL players.
Though I am sad for the season to end, I remain steadfastly confident that this team will be successful and I’m already looking forward to next season. Let’s go Blues!
4/6/2026 (updated 4/16) – Bewhiskered!
This past weekend we visited Durham, NC for Bewhiskered, 2026! It was our second trip to our most-local furcon and we had a great time! It was my first time getting to wear my commissioned therian mask out of the house. We got some great photos with some furries with really neat fursuits. I participated in the fursuit photo, though I was only wearing a partial with a therian mask. The panels were not what I expected, but the Battle Zoo dance competition was outstanding, just like it was last year. The highlight for me is just getting a chance to wear my furry stuff around other furries and feel comfortable. It’s hard to overstate how good that feels. Seeing furries – and being one of them – in the downtown of a big city is very precious to me.
We also did some non-furry stuff in Durham, including a really nice night out at Nanasteak by the Durham Bulls stadium. On Sunday we had a Big Bad Breakfast before heading to Boxcar Arcade. We learned that Jess is better than me at air hockey, skee ball, and video games, though I tend to do better than her at pinball. The Pokemon pinball machine was my favorite, of course. We also dumped several dollars each into the big, immersive House of the Dead rail shooter, which was awesome.
After we exhausted our tokens, we strolled around downtown Durham. We found a little park that had a big cardinal sculpture!
cute community-owed bookstore, as well as a small vintage shop that had an Audubon print from the 40’s! I was quite taken by it, though I did not have the $250 it would have taken to carry it home with us.
Other bits – Jess does not like driving around Durham, and has declared that next year I will be our pilot. Our hotel was nice – not one of the con hotels, just a Hilton relatively nearby. Overall it was a lovely trip. Jess is a perfect travelling companion and I can’t wait to go again next spring!
Update, 4/16: I wanted to post the official stats from NCAS:
Topping two thousand is exciting! BWS seems to grow by about 500 furries every year! And of course $15,528 for the charity Safe Haven for Cats is thrilling!
