I Suck At Apple Picking

Yesterday was a pretty fun day as Karen, our baby daughter (Briana), and I went apple picking. Too bad I suck at apple picking.

Luckily for me, I have a BFF (Kerry) who organized the plans for picking apples. Originally, the people available to pick apples yesterday were Karen, Briana, Kerry, myself and my friends (Marc and Kelley). Unfortunately, Marc and Kelley had to back out that morning as each came down with a sickness. I wonder if they have been hanging out with my friend (Hot Amy) too much, because Hot Amy is always sick. I'm just kidding.

Needless to say, it was just going to be Karen, Briana, Kerry and I picking apples. We ended up going to the Brooksby Farm in Peabody. The place is a quick drive from Kerry as she lives in neighboring Salem.

Anyway, the place was very nice. Although Kerry has never been to the apple orchards there, she mentioned that the farm was owned by the city of Peabody. There's a lot to love about Peabody. I'm just kidding.

The orchards, however, are nice. The place was not that crowded, at least not when we went late morning. There was plenty of parking. We didn't have to pay to get into the orchard like that ripoff, the Marino Lookout Farm. There was no hour wait for apple cider donuts like at the Honey Pot Hill Orchards. (And for anyone curious, the apple cider donuts at Brooksby were much better. They were delicious!)

Last year, a bunch of us went to the Honey Pot Hill Orchards for apple picking. On our way back, we saw a car literally in flames. We could feel the heat as we drove past the car. It was that crazy. Yeah, well this year: no car on fire... always a good sign.

I had a good time at Brooksby and I'd say their prices were very reasonable. In addition to the apples, the farm has a store with... apple cider donuts... other farm-grown vegetables, pumpkins, etc. The place even has animals for people to "feed at their own risk". The animals consisted of pigs, sheep, turkeys, chickens, emus, and llamas (or alpacas)... oh my!

It was definitely a good place to go apple picking. Following the trip to the farm, we ended up having lunch together back at Kerry's before grabbing some ice cream up the street from her at a place called Treadwell's. The ice cream was good, but I would still say that Kimball's in Westford is my top choice for ice cream.

As a random side note, our friends (Renee and Jeff) who live in nearby Lynn happened to have been driving down the street when we were walking to Treadwell's. It was a bizarre coincidence. Apparently, Jeff had recognized us, which led to Renee calling Karen's cell phone to inquire if indeed that was us walking down the street.

Regardless, the ice cream was a good way to end the day. Al in all, it was definitely a great day. And really, how could it not since we were spending it with my BFF? Speaking of whom, we thought Kerry should write a book about grilled cheeses because... well... she is a grilled cheese aficionado. Karen added the part that Kerry could rate grilled cheese sandwiches at various restaurants by slices of cheese.

I don't think Kerry was going for it though. That was just one of the various topics of discussion. Among the other topics was whether it was worse to not vote or to vote ignorantly. Both are pretty terrible options in my opinion. I suppose from a purely ideological point of view, not voting is worse because you are not exercising your freedom to vote. At the same time, if you are ignorantly voting then your vote has more potential to do greater harm to everyone.

Naturally, that led to a discussion of politics and well... discussions of politics are never good, especially when the parties involved include someone who works for the government and someone who thinks the system is highly flawed and inefficient. I happen to be the latter.

On the lighter side, Kerry did joke about how my high school memory is better than my real life memory. Perhaps that is why I enjoy high school movies so much. That whole topic of conversation was a result of our discussion of someone we knew in high school who currently is engaged to an actress.

From there, I ranted about our high school boys volleyball team because that person was on the boys volleyball team. My main gripe was that after every volleyball match, all I ever heard from every single player on the team was how they should have won the game. For anyone curious, when I was in high school the boys volleyball team was absolutely terrible. I'm not sure they won any games all year, yet after every match I heard the same thing about how they should have won.

Kerry was impressed that I could rattle off the names of so many people on the boys volleyball team. (Hence, her joke about how my high school memory was better than my real life memory.) Truthfully, I could rattle off so many names because all I ever heard after every losing match from different members on the volleyball team was how they should have won. It was so annoying at the time. Heck, it's still annoying.

Anyway, Karen and I made a brief pit stop on our way home from Kerry's after apple picking. We stopped by Karen's parents to drop off a few apples as well as get Briana used to seeing my in-laws. With Briana's separation anxiety, we were hoping that she would get used to seeing other people now and then who were not named "mommy" or "daddy".

From there, we headed home whereby I ended up watching another movie while everyone else went to bed. That movie happened to be Sherlock Holmes.

(The video below is a trailer for Sherlock Holmes.)


The movie was okay. Obviously, the film left open the opportunity for a sequel. All in all it was entertaining.