2007 August Archive at eastowners

« Older Entries

Monthly Archive for August, 2007

Where did the summer go?

Published

charmaspice

on August 31, 2007

in Family and Music

. 0 Comments

Current Mood: Sad emoticon Sad & Surprised emoticon Surprised & Tired or Sleepy

I feel that since it is Labor Day weekend that our summer is wrapping up. I have no clue where our summer when this year, especially since it really did fly by. I suppose that’s what happens when you have 3 monumental family events in 3 months! There are so many things I wanted to do this summer….we did a few of them, but alas I wish we had like 3 more weeks of summer to cram it all in. I wanted to take Clare to Chicago to see a dino exhibit at the Field Museum…..alas our weekends filled and when we didn’t have anything to do I just wanted to stay home. I also wanted to take Clare up to Traverse City for some fun times at the Great Wolf Lodge…..maybe this Fall or Spring we’ll do something up that way. Finally I wanted to get a day or 2 in at the Lake. There’s still time for that, as the water will stay warm for a little bit.

I am however ready to begin Fall with our annual trip to Paw Paw for the wine festival next weekend. The Wine & Harvest Festival is held every year on the 2nd weekend in September. They have lots of great stuff for the family. There’s a small festival area with rides for the kids, an arts & craft fair for the entire family, and best of all free samples during the day of the wines from St. Julian & Warner! St. Julian has a huge tent beind their winery with live music throughout the day and evening, and all the wine you can handle (of course they are served in little plastic shot glasses, but that just means you go back again & again). We go and meet our parents there for an afternoon of fun, and then sometimes we go camping with them and continue to drink around the camp fire! It’s a great weekend, and a great way to stock up on wine for the winter.

Where has the time gone?

Published

charmaspice

on August 30, 2007

in Family and Kid-friendly

. 1 Comment

Current Mood: Confused emoticon Confused

Today I took Clare to see her new school, and meet her teacher. We had a nice visit, and her teacher is super nice. I think she’ll have lots of fun in school there, and will learn a lot more than she would have in the public school in our neighborhood. I have nothing against the public schools, but here in GR things seem to be put at the bottom of the bucket when it comes to schools. So, we opted to send her to a charter academy instead. The student teacher ratio is lower, and she has opportunities here that she wouldn’t have had else where. I worry that had we tried GR Public she would have been bored, as we’ve worked pretty intensly with her at home to prep her for school. I’ve put 5 years of my life into making sure she knows her stuff! Brad’s been working on her reading, and she is now reading small books. Most kids that go into Kindergarten don’t know those things, and I just think that it’d be a lot of repeat for her if we stuck with GR Public. While we were visiting her classroom today they read a story about starting Kindergarten. I sat there, watching her with all these other kids…..and realized that my baby is going to Kindergarten! All along I’ve been saying no….I won’t cry, I’ll be doing a jig. After all I get my free time back 5 times a week, and she gets a great educational experience. It just feels like yesterday she was born, and we were bringing her home, having to learn how to take care of a newborn. Now, she informs me that “When she grows up” she’ll get to do some things that she can’t do now. She also thinks that because she’s 5 she doesn’t have to do things any more like hold hands…..or hang out with Mom at the park. Why is it that as chldren we are in such a hurry to grow-up, when as adults we wished we could be children again?

Short post

Published

dead headphonist

on August 28, 2007

in Alcohol and Funny

. 1 Comment

Current Mood: Loopy emoticon Loopy

OK. So many of you know that I enjoy imbibing in that which the yeast makes. As part of my general liking for all things bar-based, I read a lot of various things regarding the subject. Yes… fair readers, I also read the counterpoint and have yet to find an argument other than my stomach screaming at me that’s compelling enough to make me quit. That’s for another post, though.

So here’s the funniest thing I’ve read today. It’s from the good folks at Modern Drunkard, who I sporadically read. They sport some very good (and funny) fiction from time to time.

We bought some Papaya liqueur tonight for mixing with the watermelon vodka. I’ll post results as soon as I get back to slinging drinks in the kitchen. cya l8r.

Lazy Day Haze

Published

charmaspice

on August 28, 2007

in Food and Movies

. 1 Comment

Current Mood: Bored emoticon Bored & Tired or Sleepy

In lieu of my usual Tackle it Tuesday post I am Offically calling it Lazy Tuesday today. Clare is still with my in-laws, and I was able to sleep in until oh about 8:45am or so. I went downstairs to muster up some breakfast, which was a YUMMY bran muffin I bought from Nantucket Baking Co. last night. They are located at 208 Union NE, Grand Rapids, MI 49503 right next to the other YUMMY store Martha’s Vineyard. Martha’s has a fabulous beer cooler, and some absolutely delish desserts in their dessert case. So, after heating up my muffin I decided that I was going to start watching my The Thornbirds dvd’s I had checked out from Netflix. I spent literally the entire day watching this epic mini series…..and it was almost as good as I remembered it from my younger days. I’ll admit there were some slow parts I started dozing through, but my all time favorite part is when Meggie tells Father Ralph that she’s dieing because she bleeds all the time for days, but then some how it stops and she just knows that her days are numbered. It’s so silly, yet I’m sure almost reminesent to every woman that reads this of when their time began. I did get a few loads of laundry done during the course of the day, so I feel some what accomplished. Tonight Brad & I are off to the elementary school for parent orientation. We get to meet Clare’s teacher and learn about how they will be teaching our fine new Kindergartner. I can’t believe she’s off to Kindergarten in one week…..I can remember just yesterday they thrust her into my arms and said here’s your baby girl. I swear I won’t cry……although I think I’ll do a jig, I can’t wait for school to start!

Becoming Auntie & Babysitter Extrodnaire

Published

charmaspice

on August 27, 2007

in Family and Kid-friendly

. 0 Comments

Current Mood: Ecstatic emoticon Ecstatic

So, this morning started by babsitting my friends little 20 month old boy. He’s super cute, and was very good for me today. It took him 5 minutes to notice Mom was gone, but after some Calliou and finding the kitchen stuff he was ready to play. We ate breakfast, and headed to my MOMS Club meeting. He played happily in the other room with all the kids while I learned about the joys of e-bay from Good Idea Momma. She’s been selling her clutter and making a profit to help pay for extra’s around her house. It sounds like a great idea to me, however I don’t know that I have that much motivation to go through with the hassle of doing it. I could make some great money on items around our house, but I still don’t know how ready I am for all the hassle. After our meeting we came home for some lunch and a fabulous 3 hour nap. I’ll admit I dosed some too while catching up on some of my Days of Our Lives. We all have our guilty pleasures! I had to remember what it was like however this morning to watch most of his every move. I’m so used to having Clare that can take care of herself for most of the day without too much help. I tell Clare to go play in her room, she goes, and I don’t see her for a while, and I have no worries. And to the parents…..NO this did not make me want to have another child.

While we were eating our lunch my mother-in-law called to let me know about the arrival of our new niece. Clare is down there for a few days of fun, so she was able to see her new cousin right after she was born. Why is Clare down there you ask, well my in-law’s have this week off and she wanted Clare for a few days since she missed out on her usual time during our CO trip we didn’t take this year. It’s kinda nice that our parents take her, it gives us a much needed break for more than a few hours. It gives us a chance to rejuvinate our relationship, and do some of the things we normally can’t do when we have Clare. Back to our new niece Danielle Lynn Watson, there are pics in our gallery….and Brad has beat me to the blog punch, so the birth day details are in his blog. We’re planning on going down to see them this coming weekend some time, so I’m sure there will be many more pics of her after then. We are very excited for Dan & Karyn…..and can’t wait to teach Danielle all the naughty things Uncle Dan teaches Clare!

Uncle-y n-uncle

Published

dead headphonist

on August 27, 2007

in Family

. 0 Comments

Current Mood: Esctatic emoticon Esctatic

Hopefully, I don’t become that creepy uncle that no niece or nephew is happy to see. My brother’s wife, Karyn, gave birth to their first, Danielle Lynn at 10:07am today. The latest female unit in the clan was 7lbs 15oz and was 21 inches long. Congrats all around. Smoke ‘em if ya got ‘em (but not in front the baby ya cretins).

Orange Juice and Blood Pressure

Published

dead headphonist

on August 27, 2007

in Health

. 0 Comments

So I found something kind of interesting about orange juice. Up until pretty recently (in the past 5-6 years in fact), I was a huge consumer of orange juice, consuming somewhere in the neighborhood of two gallons a week. While all that sugar certainly isn’t good for you, it seems even a couple of glasses of the tropical stuff is enough to lower blood pressure in some people.

It’s made me wonder if my previously low blood pressure might be due in part to this. I have, over the years and out of concern for my blood sugar, drastically reduced the amount of juices I drink. I’m going on an experimental diet just to see… the only change I’m going to make is that I will drink, minimum 2 8oz glasses of OJ a day. After a week, I want to see if my BP is any lower or not.

Should be interesting… now to see if watermelon vodka mixes with OJ…

Better late than never - NMAS

Published

dead headphonist

on August 26, 2007

in Alcohol and Music

. 0 Comments

Current Mood: Happy emoticon Happy

If you’ve been paying attention, then you’ve already read about Char’s blog about Friday evening; dinner at Roses, followed by finding our cheap-as-hell vodka up on Alpine, the Eastown Hookah Lounge, with a final hurray at The Intersection with North Mississippi All-Stars. It was a rockin’ good time. I’ve posted some blurry phone pics in the gallery for your enjoyment.

The hookah really dropped my blood pressure a lot. I’m seriously considering this as a therapeutic sort of deal, but only every once in a while. The shisha has some tobacco in it (far less baddies than cigarettes, but enough to still be a concern). For most all of Saturday, I was really relaxed though. It felt good to be chill for a little bit.

So on to a quick review of the vodka. We picked up the elusive, bottom-of-the-crap-pile Burnett’s, in Watermelon, Coconut, and Grape (yes… glorius grape kool aid flavor). The grape was workable when mixed up with Sprite… the good news here is that while it is still pretty sweet, the vodka cuts the sicky sweet of the Sprite, so that’s a good thing. It really tastes like one of those purple freeze pops… it’s kinda crazy. The grape tastes a lot better than it smells.
The coconut flavor was pretty useful mixed with tropical juice and creme de cacao. I added a little amaretto for that almost complete Almond Joy taste. Add a little soda and now it’s fizzy for ya. It has a little bite to it, but it’s not the worst liquor I’ve ever had. It’s no Grey Goose or even Effen, but it’s still pretty ok… cheaper than Smirnoff and arguably just as good (or bad depending on what you’re after).

I’m not quite sure what to do with the watermelon. I tried a watermelon martini (trying hard to cover up the funkiness of the bottom-shelf swill). It didn’t work out so well. I’ll have to try harder… perhaps some melon liqueur is what’s needed to make it really snap. We’ll see. I didn’t have any at the time, so we’ll have to wait until next time.

The North Mississippi All-Stars show was fantastic. They are one of my favourite bands around and play rotten-to-the-core electric blues that just oozes history and is mixed with a fair amount of funk and jazz. Luther is a simply amazing guitarist. Chris Chew is probably the hardest working bassman in the business. He’s also completely amazing. The big thing about these folks is that they are all highly talented folks who play very very well together.

At one point, I went up front. If anyone was paying attention, they would have seen a 30 year old, overweight pony-tailed dude standing there with his mouth half open staring in amazement. Yes… they were that good. One of my favourite shows of late… hands down. I highly recommend seeing them if you get the chance.

For the most part, the rest of the weekend has been pretty chill. My folks lost power, so Clare’s trip down south was delayed until today. Char and I delivered her into the capable hands of the parents, relieving us for a couple of days. We stopped by Harbor Freight and bought some tarps and other junk we needed around the house. We’re planning on converting our back porch into a temporary storage space for the office crap and need to keep the rain off.

After that, we headed to Home Depot to pick up some other junk (and use the gift cards we had lying about). Now… as is usual, we are chilling, watching some TV before bed. In the morning, the ratrace begins again.

The Much Needed Date Night & Good Times

Published

charmaspice

on August 25, 2007

in Alcohol, Date-Night, Local and Music

. 0 Comments

Current Mood: Eat Drink Smiley & Happy emoticon Happy & Lovey

Last night we booked our babysitter for a much needed date night. It’s actually been some time since we’ve been able to have a night out as we’ve had a lot going on this summer. We left home wondering what to do for dinner, I made mention of Roses on Reeds Lake in East Grand Rapids. Brad said there was no way we’d get in, as it’s always busy….not to mention on a Friday night. Apparently we got there at a good time because we were seated with no problem. We started out the night with a pitcher of sangria…..YUM! For an appetizer we had the Cheese of the Day which was a baked bri served with toasted cranberry walnut bread, apple slices, grapes, and quince (which is like a jelly spread). It was super yummy and a great way to start out a meal. Because I went with a small plate for dinner I had a Baby Spinach Salad which had sun-dried cherries, red onion, gorgonzola, tosted pine nuts & balsamic vinaigrette. And my Small Plate was Sesame Seared Ahi Tuna with ginger-soy glazed edamame, pearl onions & cashews, with sriracha & sweet soy around the plate. I WISH we had taken a picture of it before I started eating, however I was so eager to try it I dug in with an eager palate. It was ~~wonderful~~ ~~fabulous~~ unbelievably tasty! Brad has a picture of my polished plate on his phone….I’m sure it’ll make it in his blog later this afternoon. I got a head start blogging this AM because I was woken up at 6:30am by our darling daughter. I dozed for a while, but then I was startled awake again to help put “planting pants” on Barbie at 7:30am.

Anyway, back to my review of the evening. We’ve been on the look out for Burnett’s flavored Vodka lately, and it’s hard to find around town as it’s WAY bottom shelf stuff. However, we heard rumor of a great new liquor store up on Alpine just North of the Best Buy & York Creek Apt.’s (our old home sweet home). They of course had the Burnett’s and much more! We picked up Coconut, Grape, & Watermelon for our weekend consumption. It was kinda funny, the lady was like “Having a party?” I said, ”No… we just like to drink.”

We got in the car and decided to head back into Eastown to try our local Hookah Lounge. We went to one out in AZ with Larry & Meghan and that was lots of fun, and it’s VERY relaxing. We ordered up 2 pineapple-strawberry smoothies and a hookah with raspberry flavored goodness. Once again Brad took photos on his phone, I’m sure they’ll be up. We were obviously the oldest people in the room, not that it’s a problem for us…..but we were definitely the people we stared at a decade ago ( or at least I stared at ). We got in contact with a friend that was downtown at a show, and decided to join the party after our hookah was finished.

After some smokin’ we got in the car and headed downtown to The Intersection to see The North Mississippi All Stars with some of the Geek friends. The show was pretty good I must say…..I don’t like all of their music, but most of it is pretty good…especially their newer stuff. They are though one of Brad’s favorite band, and for a chance to let him see them I would go and enjoy the company of our drunk annoying friends and have a few drinks myself. We stayed until the end, and it made me want to come home to watch Back Snake Moan. We didn’t watch it last night, but I foresee it in our future movie watchings. It was a night of randomness for us, but it was oh so enjoyed by me. I miss being able to wander around town on a whim doing what we do best…..finding interesting things to do. Maybe once things settle down this Fall we’ll be able to get back into do some things for us again.

Minty Goodness

Published

dead headphonist

on August 23, 2007

in Food

. 0 Comments

I like mints. No… you don’t understand… I -really- like mints. It’s a bit of a problem area for me and lately, it seems there are a lot of great little bits of herbal goodness on the market. Here’s my list of favourites and links on where to get them.

By far, my favourite are the Oral Fixation Night Light mints. They very much like a good Indian chai, buried in a mint. They are lightly caffeinated, so you can eat a lot of them without getting loopy (if you can afford to). They are a bit on the expensive side, so I eat them sparingly.

Altoids Spearmint are my favourite of the Altoids line. I have a particular liking for spearmint over peppermint and the strong Altoids flavor makes these a total winner in my book. They are a little difficult to find sometimes, but worth the wait to get them in the mail if no one locally is carrying them.

The Vojo Citrus are different than just about any other mint out there. They have a strong Citrus flavor that is strong on oranges. Vojo also makes a peppermint that is not bad, but tastes a little too much like medicine. The Vojo mints are pretty highly caffeinated, so they have some bite. Just a few will do ya.

Altoids Wintergreen is my second choice in the Altoids line. What? No classic peppermint? We’ll get to that, but no… they are not my favourite… maybe it’s just from eating too many of them in previous times. The Wintergreen are clean and tasty and arguably just as strong as peppermint (the Spearmint aren’t as strong).

Oral Fixation Mojito mint is one tasty little mint. The OF line isn’t as crazy over-the-top in flavor as the Altoids, but they do make some seriously tasty combinations (and I’m a sucker for packaging). This particular flavor is sugar free and manages to not taste all chemically by using sorbitol as it’s sweetener. It doesn’t exactly taste like a Mojito (they are missing the rum it seems), but they are good nonetheless.

Next on our list is the Altoids Chocolate Dipped Peppermint. What’s to say about this? It’s the Altoids classic mint dipped in dark chocolate. It’s tasty. It’s not terrible for you. It’s that tiny bit of chocolate to get you through whatever is ailing you mentally. There’s nothing bad here.

Last but not least is the Altoids Liquorice. Unfortunately, these guys have a bit of liquorice root in them and I can tell you from experience that I’m one of those people who is affected negatively by liquorice; it raises my blood pressure. The problem is that I love liquorice. Now I just can’t have as much. I’ve rationed to only eating a couple of these a week because if I eat 3-4 in one sitting I can feel it affect me. The same thing applies for anything else with liquorice in it.