The Williams Family Visits the Queen City!

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Bob, Lucy & Tyler headed to Cincinnati to enjoy a weekend of fellowship, food and baseball! Tyler was all excited to see the Boston Red Sox on his first visit to Cincinnati. He was quite the gentleman and didn't rub it in when the Sox beat the Reds on both Sat. and Sun. Lucy and Bob should be proud!

Marshall was missing because he did a 20 mile hike with his Boy Scout troop! What an accomplishment!!!

On Friday Mark headed off to the game while we drove to Cheeseburger in Paradise. Everyone enjoyed the meal, particularly the chocolate nachos! Ever seen vultures attack fresh meat? I needn't say more!

Sat. after breakfast Lucy and I headed to Florence Mall in Kentucky. We visited the Disney Store among other places. Our motto for the day was "It isn't about us"! Since Father's Day was Sunday we resorted to landing gifts for the men. I struck out, but Bob got a nice gift!!! The highlight of the day was Lucy's history lesson on the Florence Water Tower. Yes, Lucy, Wikipedia has confirmed the story I was told:

"The plain water tower gathered little, if any attention. In 1974, the Virginia Erection Co. was contracted to paint the words "Florence Mall" to advertise the forthcoming Mall style shopping center - something new to the region. Mayor CM "Hop" Ewing was informed in July of 1974 by the Bureau of Highways that the signage was in violation of the law, as there was a restriction on how tall a sign promoting a business could be.
Many solutions were suggested, including everything from the obvious repainting of the tower, to covering the structure with a large tarpaulin. No inexpensive options seemed available.
During a brainstorming session with other civil staff, Ewing devised the idea of removing the vertical lines at the sides of the M in MALL to make it a Y; becoming Y'ALL. Ewing himself admitted at the time that it was a "corny" solution, but cost effective. The city paid $472 to the W.T. Marx Company of Cincinnati, Ohio to make the changes; whereas a complete repaint would have been nearly three times as much. With the completion of the modified paint job, the landmark was born." --Wickipedia

Yep, it's quite the conversation piece!!

After some shopping we returned to Cincinnati and headed to the game. It was a great game even though the Reds lost. It was exciting and even went into extra innings!

Next we headed up to Mt. Adams which is an ecclectic area overlooking downtown Cincinnati. The view is amazing! We had dinner at the Mt. Adams Bar and Grill. After learning on the sign at the Blind Lemon that George Clooney is a "local" Lucy was determined to see him (that wouldn't have disappointed me either!!). In the meantime, Mark is always teasing me about seeing my favorite Reds player Bronson Arroyo (a former Red Sox) when I am not around. So as usual, he says, "There's Bronson"! And my regular comeback remained, "Yeah, right"!! But, as I looked up, there he goes walking across the street from us!! Lucy did NOT believe it because she kept insisting that it was some "kid" who was about 16!! Sorry Bronson!

Lucy was done for the night because she had hit her two drink minimum!! I returned to my room later to find a note telling me she was "dizzy" and would see me in the morning!

Sunday we met for breakfast and sat in the lobby to "watch people". Another win for the Red Sox and happy Tyler was 2-0 for the weekend. I enjoyed sitting with him.

I decided to take some more pictures, particularly those of the people around us. You see, there are two particular items you must eat in Cincinnati that are also served at the Great American Ballpark; LaRosa's Pizza and Skyline Chili Dogs. I will reserve the picture of Bob, but below you will see that Lucy enjoyed the Chili Dog with "A POUND OF CHEESE"!!!

Man, that's one hunk of cheese!!!!!!
Don't worry Bob, I didn't post the picture of your LaRosa's!

After the game we headed off to Cadillac Ranch for dinner. Once again, good food! We also enjoyed watching the guys ride the mechanical bull. As we walked back to the hotel we stopped by Graeter's for some fabulous ice cream. My suggestion is always the black raspberry chip. The cool thing about Graeter's is that when they say "chocolate chip or chip" they mean CHUNK! YUMMY!

Outside Graeter's is the famous fountain. Hanging out around the fountain were the Reds cheerleaders (yes, cheerleaders for baseball......Bob and Mark think it's a good idea!).

Now these girls never mentioned that Tyler has "boy cooties" like Mallory did all weekend! He looks pretty happy here!

I wonder if this is when Mallory proceeded to dump chocolate ice cream down her leg, on her sock and inside her tennis shoe!!!

Mallory and Lucy look so adorable here posing with one of the Reds' mascots, Gapper. Lucy is also quite fashionable in her "Father's Day Hat"!

Coming soon................WDW!!!!!!!!