Brian the Blogger!

I had not planned on posting a blog for a bit as I am writing other things at the moment.  After what I experienced in church this morning, I felt compelled to get this down to share my story. Paula, Sarah and I, along with John-Phillip (JP) sang this morning on a Praise Team.  Brian and the Hoffettes (what I affectionately nicknamed the team, much to everyone's annoyance).  We had several awesome songs that we were slated to sing.  "Your Grace is Enough", "Lead Me To the Cross", "We Are", "Soul On Fire", and "Glory to God Forever". To back this up a few days ago, Paula has an eye appointment and she found out that the pressure in her right eye was abnormally high, signaling the presence of Glaucoma.  Her maternal grandmother had Glaucoma, and so the odds of Paula developing it were higher.  Well, now she has the start.  The eye doctor told her it was when, not if she will start to lose vision in her eye.  This whole proces...

Hey everyone!  First of all, I want to say to all my loyal readers that have asked over the last few months when I was getting back into blogging.  That means so much to me knowing that you guys like reading my posts and asked for more.  It's been a busy few months and I've been tied up in other things, one of which I will get into at a later time.  Trust me when I say working on Tarzan was an absolute blast!  That's a story for another post. Of all the things I would have ever thought my girls would want to do, cheering was not on the radar.  Why, you ask?  First of all, neither Paula or I were cheerleaders (please...we'll have that discussion about male cheerleaders for another time.  I am all for it, so save your fury for something else.)  Music and acting dominated the Hoff House, and Sarah seems to have taken a liking to music.  Hannah has too, but she has turned her attention to cheering. You know, now that I think about i...

Hey guys.....this post is for you.  If you are anything like me, then you know that there is nothing better than a great haircut.  However, that seemed to be a fools errand trying to find a place where I was happy.  For years, I have bounced around from salon to salon, looking for a good cut.  There are a plethora of shops around town that are geared for men that offer sports on television, a neck/shoulder massage and mediocre haircut.  You know the kind:  a cut you wanted something a little different and new.  Then after a week or maybe two, you are stuck with an uneven cut that looks like all the others you have gotten in the past.  I was in that position for many years.  I would find a place that I liked and for a while I would be contented.  Then the shop would raise the price and I would be right back where I started. One day, one a whim, I asked my buddy Adam where he got his hair cut.  He told me about a place called Cen...

Hello Everyone!  I trust that you all had a wonderful Christmas and a safe New Year!  I have been a little lax about posting regularly, so there is no time like the present.  I am sipping an iced coffee (Caribou blend...yummy) and listening to Aaron Copland's Appalachian Spring with a live orchestra on Youtube.  So I am ready to write! I have a new passion for wet shaving.  As my wife often points out to me that there is a fine line between passion and obsession.  She's right; I have had my toe on that lines many times!  That being said, I am sure that some of you have never heard of this concept and some of you said "Yup, been there and done that."  If you have, then terrific.  You know the splendor of wet shaving.  If you are unfamiliar with this, let me enlighten you. For many years, I have shaved using a muti-blade cartridge and used goo from a pressurized can.  Why?  Because that is what I saw my Dad doing.  S...

This post is personal for me on many levels.  It's a  throwback to when I was a fresh-faced kid who lived a dream and had the guts to pursue it despite my self-doubt.  Now the stakes were raised because Sarah is following my footsteps with joining show choir.  In my college days a zillion years ago, I was a member of Sinclair Singers, Sinclair Community College's prestigious show choir.  This was a scholarship-based group that was comprised of twelve members:  six guys and six girls.  You had to audition to get in and let me tell ya the competition was fierce.  The audition consisted of a prepared piece of music and a short dance that we were taught and then we had to replicate.  I knew some talented singers and dancers that were in choir that had auditioned and didn't get in for a variety of reasons.  By the grace of God I was accepted; despite doubts from myself and a family member.  This person told me they thought I was wasting ...

I have to apologize for not posting in the past couple of weeks.  I had a computer issue where my power pack went out.  After getting some help from a few friends, a got the power pack replaced (which I did myself with a bro's help) and I'm back in business! Thanksgiving has always been my personal favorite holiday.  Many centuries ago when I was a kid, the family always gathered at my house for food and fun.  My Mom delighted in the holiday as well.  I remember she got a turkey in the oven at the butt crack of dawn and the smell of that bird cooking would make us all crazy until it was done.  In addition to the turkey, Mom would make Chex Mix.  Man, I can still smell that now.  She would get the indigents and throw it together and after one hour in the oven, we all chowed down!  Now you can buy Chex Mix in bags at the grocery store.  No thanks!  The homemade version is always the best!  This weekend I am having some guys ove...

Hi, my name is Brian and I'm a coffee addict. The old saying goes admitting your addiction is half the battle.  That being said, I want to talk about one of my favorite beverages.  You guess it:  coffee! Now I do come from a family of coffee drinkers.  Both sets of my grandparents were coffee drinkers.  My Dad and my brother are coffee drinkers.  My Mom...not so much.  Oh well.  I think tea was her brew of choice.  Paula started off not liking coffee, but she now helps me indulge my need for caffeine! If memory serves, I was drinking coffee from a very early age:  four years old.  Yup, you read that right.  I was not even in kindergarten when I started drinking coffee.  The story goes that my maternal grandma started me drinking coffee.  I recall from way back that black coffee was disgusting.  I still have that thought.  But she added the cream and sugar and that was all she wrote for me.  As I r...