Odds and Ends

Not much going on as of late. Shawn (and Mom and Dad) has finally settled into the school routine again. It seems like we are in constant motion from about 5:30 every day until Shawn goes to bed at 9pm every night. From school, work, daycare, dinner, cross county practice and homework there is barely enough time to breathe. About cross country, Shawn seems to finally beginning to finding the competitive fire in his belly. He's really beginning to run well; I'm really interested in seeing how he does at the meets this year.

This weekend was a rather quiet one for us. Partially because we couldn't agree or come up with something we all wanted to do. Basically just hung out at home along with running a few errands. I did however found it necessary to buy a new grill. Yes, the old one pretty much took a trip down the crapper and it was going to cost $100-$125 to fix it and poor man engineer the portions of the grill that were beyond merely purchasing replacement parts.

I ended up buying a nice grill on clearance. This one has a light under the grill cover, a small smoke box mounted inside the burner box and an electronic fuel gauge that indicates how much time is left at the current consumption rate you will run out of propane. Needless to say, I was supposed to run out in the middle of grilling last night and I never actually did. So much for accuracy! Oh yea, the grill also has a built-in ice tub and bottle opener too!

News on the diet front...in the first 22 days of our diet (excluding the weekend in Cleveland where we partied like world class eating competition champions) I am down nearly 12 pounds and Lisa is down 7. Only 33 pounds left for me and nowhere near that much for Lisa. I'm not sure if I miss pizza, burritos or b-dubs the most. Just think of all the weight I could have lost by now if I stopped drinking beer!

Da Grill

This Weekend

Holy Schnikies, nothing planned this weekend! The layer of scum on the surfaces in the house will be cleaned. I must be sick but I am actually looking forward to giving the house a good cleaning with Lisa's help of course.

I also get to keg a nice IPA that will be just my style coming in at over 100 IBU!

Cleveland Weekend

Chickenfoot Rules

Had a good weekend in Cleveland. Took the day off on Friday, dropped the kids off at Nana and Papa's house and headed into town. On the way downtown, Lisa and I stopped off at two different Marc's, Bed Bath and Beyond for a hot pot and to Five Guys Burger and Fries for Lunch. I guess I should explain the Marc's issue with Lisa. Lisa is totally addicted to the closeout section of Marc's. She loves the bargain that can be had about 30% of the time. Sometimes the selection varies from store to store slightly so it has become sort of a personal quest to find all the good deals every time we come within 2 miles of a Marc's store. Typically we shop the entire store at the first stop and then it's merely a 10 minute look around the front of the store at any stops thereafter. By the way, Five Guy's was pretty damn good! The best fast food burger I've probably ever had and the free toppings didn't hurt matters. One other item of note before I go too much further is that Lisa and I definitely fell off the diet wagon on this trip and started back this morning.

Friday afternoon, we met up with my Mom and Ron and headed to the Rock Hall. The Rock Hall has been open for probably more than 10 years and I had never set foot in the place. Matter in fact, I never had the urge to plop down $22 to go through the museum. I'm glad I got free tickets! Not that the museum isn't interesting but most of the people highlighted, I had never heard of before. If I had about 6 hours and was by myself, I probably would have learned a lot about the history of Rock N Roll but I really didn't feel like reading what would have amounted to a small novel while I fought for a decent position to read. Anyway, I am glad I finally saw it but it may be another 10-15 years before I go again. After the Rock Hall visit, we all jumped in a cab and headed to The Great Lakes Brewing Company. I've been wanting to go to Great Lakes for some time and finally had the opportunity...thank to Ron for suggesting it. Mom, Ron and I shared a sampler and then I had another pint of my favorite (the IPA) before heading back to the hotel to change clothes for dinner.

Dinner was at Brasa, which is a Brazilian type steakhouse. The food was pretty good but not as good as I remember when I went to a different Brazilian Steakhouse. Brasa didn't seem to have the same entertainment factor and the service wasn't as quick as I remember at the other place. The meat wasn't seasoned as well either. All in all, it was still a good meal and I was grinning ear to ear with all that juicy meat being served. I did enjoy myself but I think I would pick a different spot next time I'm going to spend $35 a person downtown.

Saturday, Lisa and I slept in late and then headed down to The West Side Market. I hadn't been to the market for probably more than 20 years and I was bound and determined to go and buy a fish. I have absolutely no idea why I wanted to buy a fish but I did....and I didn't buy a fish at all. I ended up buying a really cool montage of Cleveland pictures in a print by Jim Ptacek. I spent some time speaking to the artist and he's a really nice guy. My sister, Kim, actually bought me one of his prints several years ago of Jacob's field which I have hanging up in my office at work. Jim even threw in a few postcards and signed them for Lisa. I also picked up a really nice t-shirt that is a picture of a half ham with the word HAM printed on it. I will wear that one to work one casual Friday for obvious reasons.

After the market, I headed to my brother's house to pick him up for our wine making session. We had time to kill and Lisa and I hadn't had anything to eat so we stopped by The Brew Kettle for a quick bite and a couple of beers before walking two doors down to make our 30 bottles of Shiraz. The process was incredibly simple. Basically mixing a coagulant into grape concentrate, mixing in some oak and adding the yeast. The hard part comes over the next 8 weeks or so. There will be 5 racking and more additives before we go back to bottle mid October. After wine making, Lisa and I headed back down for the big concert.

We ended up heading down to the concert 2 hours before show time in order to get a seat in the VIP tent. In the tent we were served hamburgers, brats, coleslaw, chips and cookies along with all the Miller products you could drink. The concert wasn't bad at all, it was much more enjoyable because of all the people I know that attended. It was nice catching up with everyone. Jeff is a groupie of the opening act, he and his fiance Paula have seen the guy 8 times (I think that's what he said anyway) and the only way I can describe his music is Eric Clapton style. Chickenfoot was exactly what you would have expected out of a group let by Sammy Hagar. I didn't mind the music at all. After the concert most of the group headed to Flannery's (see several previous opening day posts). I had a beer and then Lisa and I headed back to order the one and only Rascal House Pizza (again, see opening day posts)!

Sunday morning we had breakfast at the hotel, stopped at a few more Marc's stores, a stop at Target and Marshall's and then headed for home. Lisa did find a nice picture for Katelyn's room for the wall over her bed at Marshall's. We stopped at the grocery store on the way home for a few things and then Bev and Ted dropped the kids off and had dinner. Brad; your Mom liked the Berry Wheat but your Dad preferred the pale ale.

Here's some pictures from the weekend.....

Surprise

Well, I found out yesterday that my latest win that includes the Chicken Foot tickets may not have been such a great feat. Jeff, one of my oldest friends if not the oldest (duration, not age) is a huge contest junkie. He's won so many items and trips I can't even begin to list them all. Well Jeff and I tend to keep each other updated with contests that we run across so the other can enter the contest as well. Come to find out that not only did I win but so did 4 other guys I hung out with since Junior High School as well as several others that Jeff tipped off to this particular contest. In all, there are about 10 people Jeff knows that won! Looks like a small reunion of sorts or a second opening day trip minus a few people. Pretty crazy stuff!

Lisa and I will head in early and stop at the ever popular (with Lisa at least Marc's..probably several locations), have dinner with my Mom and Ron, make wine with Mike and probably make a trip to the West Side Market. It's been forever since I've been to the market and it's been a family joke that every time I go to the Cleveland area that I need to go to the market to pick up a fish. Yes it is a really stupid joke but consider who the joke is coming from and you'll understand.

I also registered for a Fraternity reunion at BG for the end of September which should be fun.

End of the Summer

I can't believe Shawn returns to school next Monday. Today actually marks the first official day of cross country practice for Shawn and and it is going to be hot as hell this evening. Now we will have 6pm practice Monday thru Thursday form now until October...lucky us!

Of course, we seem to be cramming family activities into the last 3 weeks of the summer break and last weekend was no different. Lisa and I packed up the family and went for a visit to see Uncle Brad in Chicago. We arrived Friday evening and grabbed a bite to eat at Portillo's which is one of Lisa's all time favorites for hot dogs; the Italian Beef is pretty damn good as well. Then it was time for a home brewer's tasting party. To say the least, I had a bit too much and felt like it in the morning.

Saturday, we headed out to Lego Land Discovery Centre. Brad and I dropped Lisa and the kids off and headed over to Ram Brewery for a couple of cold ones while we waited for Shawn to get his Lego fix. We then headed to Fry's electronic which was pretty much an adults playground. I have purchased virus protection software for my PC a few times from Fry's but to be at the store was something else. The place had everything you can imagine as far as electronics were concerned and more! I could have spent a few hours looking around but I did enough damage in the 20 minutes of so I was there on Saturday. We ended up picking up a couple of 4 GB USB drives, a set of three cordless Panasonic phones an a couple of items I can't mention because they will end up being gifts for a couple of readers of this blog. The biggest bargain by far was the phone set...less than $50 and they seem to work great! After a stop at McDonald's to feed the kids and a stop at the Asian market (we were the only round eyes in the place) in which I picked up a spicy tuna roll and a bottle of sesame oil and a tirp to an international supermarket, we headed back to Brads. The kids were in dire need of a rest.

For Dinner, we ended up picking up some fried chicken and an order of chicken livers for dinner from Harold's Chicken Shack. The chicken and livers were great but the french fries and wonder bread were nothing spectacular. We also dropped by our favorite Mexican Bakery and picked up some tasty treats. Needless to say, Lisa and I are both on a diet beginning today. Back to calorie counting, I need to loose 50 pounds and Lisa wants to drop about 30.

Sunday we went to breakfast and stopped by Sur La Table in downtown Naperville (I love this store too). On the way back to Brads we also stopped to look around the best candy store ever; Binny's. Then we headed for home. By the way, traffic was nasty.

When we got home, my concert winnings information had finally arrive in the mail!

Here's a couple of pictures check back later, I will add the rest to the album tonight.

Bump in the Road

Sorry, but I had to post this clip. I may be the only one that thinks this is absolutely hilarious but watch at the end when the girl acts like nothing happened. I've watched this so many times and I laugh myself to tears every time I see it.