Philrad71

^ & ^^ Thanks guys! It was really awful driving two hours up and two hours back to Buffalo General every day - especially once the snow started. Driving up there was pretty much my entire life for three months...it seemed like every time he would take a step forward, he would take two steps backwards. Getting him to Erie has been the real turning point. In Buffalo he was "surviving" while since being at Select Specialty Hospital in Erie, he is actually "recovering & healing". Can't say enough good things about that place!

This is gold...the perfect description of La Ronde! Looking forward to the rest!

^ We rode it the same year that they re-tracked the helices and they were still the roughest part of the ride (besides the trick/track section).

^ It would be cool if they could do a Breakers entrance somewhere down around the Magnum queue, Lighthouse Point entrance near _____ Streak/Gemini and a Soak City entrance to the park where the tunnel used to be.

I thought the same at first too (removing the Magnum tunnel). Forgive my stupidity, but I'm still trying to visualize that pedestrian tunnel gone - even with the photo. If I am looking at this correctly, instead of the tunnel going under the Breakers access road, guests will now need to walk across the access road via pedestrian path. Does that mean a potential stop light for the access road? If so, could or would this create a potential bottleneck & safety issue for traffic and guests at certain times of the day? Or is the resort guest entrance being moved somewhere else due to the water park expansion?

It would be a great idea if every Golden Corral guest were "corraled" through a Party Zone where they are forced to go up and down the inflatable slides ten times and then walk through a lengthy haunted maze before leaving the premises - in order to work off some of the insane amount of crappy food that they just ate.

^^ Yikes...that is one nasty looking attempt at chicken and waffles.

^ & ^^ Thanks guys! Better news today in that he is now back on solid foods and liquids (there are still some restrictions due to risk of aspiration) and PT stood him up as well as sat with him on the edge of the bed for close to 20 minutes! Bad news is that we're predicted to get yet another horrible winter storm here. I went out to Erie earlier this morning so that I could get ahead of it and drove home through about 20 miles of white-out conditions. Think that I may end up chilling at home for the next couple of days until this one blows over. But at least we can text each other now (his voice is still quite raspy from being on the vent and trach so long) and I can also get back up to speed on what's been going on with my TPR family!

That is horrible about Debbie Reynolds and Carrie Fisher. 2016 just can't end quickly enough.

Howdy friends...hope this post finds you all having a wonderful holiday season! Just wanted to give you an update on Michael...it's been a while. On December 12th, we were finally able to get him out of surgical ICU and get him transferred to Select Specialty Hospital in Erie, PA. Not only is that an hour closer of a drive for me, but he is getting all the care that he wasn't getting in Buffalo. He now has a physical and occupational therapist that works with him five days a week in order to get his muscle strength back. We hope to stand him on Monday and get him walking again very soon! He also has a wound specialist, throat and speech therapist, infections doctor, regular doctor and (obviously) round the clock nursing. While he will still likely need to go to rehab after this, this place has been phenomenal with how far they have gotten him in less than three weeks. He went in on a ventilator and trach and since that time, he is off of both of those and talking on his own! So after months of living hell, there is finally some light at the end of the tunnel! Happy pre-2017 everyone!

I am so freaking stoked for the announcement for this - this is exactly what this coaster needed. It's such a beautiful structure that it would have been a shame to tear it down. It's interesting to think about what they might have been able to do with SoB if RMC had been doing those conversions before they tore it down. I could care less if it opens in 2017 or 2018, I just know that I would like to plan on being there for opening day - whenever it is. Can't wait!

Could you imagine a 400' star flyer swinging out over the edge of that cliff by the mine train? Talk about a ride that would literally make me crap my drawers...that would certainly do it.

Loving the reports thus far...thanks for sharing! Also love that there was a bar named after our dog (Bacchus). Oh wait, it's named after the Roman God of Wine...same as our dog!

This. 2016 can go f#ck itself at this point - just more horrible news to pile on to this already horrendous year. Hopefully they can get the fire contained soon.

^ Tennessee Tornado would like a word with you, please.

Wow...they really opened up a lot of space there!

^ Thanks Mark....appreciate the well wishes!

Thanks guys! Michael has been stable for the past couple of days and has been cognizant and responding to command. They are weaning him from the o2/vent and hope to extubate him tomorrow. Going to be a big step to get that done and work on the lungs now...as well as get him out of bed and into the chair (with hopefully NO MORE BLEEDING!). It's going to be difficult spending Thanksgiving in ICU, but turkey dinner is the last thing on my mind at this point!

Thanks to Robb, Joey, Chuck and all for posting these IAAPA updates...awesome as always! Even more awesome is to see is Jack Crouse back in some of these reports. After seeing what he went through, his recovery is giving me strength and hope while my partner Michael is currently fighting a very big battle with cancer and complications from recent surgery. Thanks to my friends at TPR for their support (Bill, David & Bert in particular) for the well wishes. Hope to be back on TPR posting regularly soon!

I'm sure Michael would be all in on the sushi guy...and he hates sushi! Unfortunately, we had another major setback last Friday. Michael had a hepatic aneurysm and almost bled to death. Fortunately, the doctors were able to suture it, but it's yet another setback for my poor guy. I'm staying in Buffalo for a few days to avoid the four hour round trip, but need to go home tomorrow to get my paperwork done for FMLA. In hospital now (they have a Tim Horton's) & am just getting ready to go up to see how he's doing. Thanks again for the well wishes, guys!

Thanks a lot guys....your caring comments and well-wishes really mean a lot. Good news is that they were able to get him into a chair yesterday for a couple of hours and there was no bleeding. Bad news is that there is so much fluid build-up in his lung cavity and abdomen that he is too weak to even talk. They are giving him meds in hopes that he can "pee it out" but if that doesn't happen quickly enough, they are going to extract the fluid through his back and abdomen. Luckily my stomach issue may have just been something I ate. I am still a stressed-out hot mess, but we'll take any positive steps forward at this point. Time to get showered and head back to Buffalo... Thanks again...even though I have never met any of you, I know that you are very kind & caring guys. Hopefully we can get through this and maybe we can all meet one day at a park and/or go out for a beverage or two of your choice - on me.

Great news, David...so happy for you and your partner! I wish that I could provide a good update on here too, but things have not been good with Michael - hence why I haven't been on here for a while. On October 14th, he went in to have surgery to have the cancerous bile duct removed and replaced with a portion of his small intestine. Once they got him open, they found cancer had reached into the liver and pancreas, so what was thought to be a 2-5 hour procedure turned into a 12 hour procedure. The next evening, I get a call at home saying around midnight saying that they had to rush him back to surgery as his BP had dropped and he appeared to be bleeding internally. They were able to find a nick in his aortic artery from the previous days risky surgery. Just when he was starting to recover from all that, he had another setback last Friday when they were getting him up take him into the bathroom. His BP dropped again and he fainted. Doctor found blood going into all four of his abdominal drains so back into ICU he went. Last Tuesday they had him sitting up and the same thing happened, only this time his heart stopped beating. They were able to bring him back, but on Friday he had to go back into surgery where this time they found bleeding around one of his drains. Today they took him off the ventilator and he has been doing okay. Given that he has two other drains going behind organs, the doctor couldn't check those during yesterday's procedure - we certainly hope that those are not bleeding because there is no way that he would be strong enough to have that type of exploratory surgery. Last night on the way home, I got severe abdominal cramps and have spent the past 12 hours battling some sort of stomach bug. Given that, I cannot drive out to Buffalo today to see him. I hope that it was something that I ate, but I can't take any chances with passing along any type of virus. This catastrophe combined with the election results have me wondering if I am really living a true nightmare? All I can say is: F%ck 2016. F%ck it all to hell.

Hmmm....now why was I expecting a somewhat different response from you with regards to this announcement? Guess it's due to being away for a little while...things seem a little bit askew to me here.

^ & ^^ I agree...that was awesome. I was thinking when the song started that it sounded like something off of Ween's - 'The Pod' or 'God/Ween/Satan'. Weird music...gotta love it!

^^^^ Thanks for the interesting information and great photos - neat stuff!