I love live music. I have often said all it takes for a bar to be a good one is some good live music and cold beer. Well the only thing better than that is a concert.
This past weekend we went to the John Mayer Concert with Hunter and Mindy and had a blast. We got a babysitter and planned on eating before hand, so we called each other to coordinate the plans. Originally we were going to go to a restaurant, but because the concert was on a Sunday, and we would be a little pressed for time (we did have to work the next day), we suggested tailgating beforehand. My wife thought this might be a little strange, “I’ve never heard of Tailgating for a John Mayer Concert.”
Blasphemy, I can’t believe my wife could say such a thing. I mean I keep camping chairs in the trunk of my car just incase a tailgate breaks out at the mall. So it was settled, we bought some chicken, chips and beer and my wife made dip and cookies. Off we went to the concert, parked in VIP parking for free (I don’t really know how that happed, we just parked). And lo and behold there actually were a lot of fellow tailgaters. We had a great time eating (except for me forgetting the Dip), and missed the opening acts to enjoy the cheap beer and company.
I consider it a practice run for College Football season. Sort of like a preseason game. We worked out all the kinks (now I know not to forget the dip) and shook the dust (and bugs, one in particular that I hope is no longer residing in Hunter’s Car) our of our equipment. We are ready for the big time…I’m just happy the College football games are on a Saturday…it’s pretty hard to make it to work after a Sunday night concert.
Monday, August 30, 2004
Monday, August 23, 2004
Date Night
Remember when you were dating your significant other? Things were exciting; there were a lot of unanswered questions. Would we have fun? What would she be wearing? How would she look? Would we make out? Would she have a good time? Would she enjoy spending time with me? This feeling continued on late into the relationship although it had some changes. As the relationship progresses questions such as “would we make out?” turned to “Will she stay over?” And things were even more exciting.
Well as much as we don’t want to admit it, things change. When you are married for a while a lot of this excitement gets replaced by day to day things. And you try hard to keep things exciting, by life gets in the way. There are the exceptions such as Valentines Day, Anniversaries and Trips, but they are few and far between. Then when you have kids things are even harder. Spontaneity is gone. Even sex has to be scheduled between nap times and locked doors.
Then comes your savior….Date Night; with a babysitter and everything. You start to feel like a dating couple again. You cherish things as simple as having a few drinks with some friends in a bar (a real bar, with no family sections). A meal where one of you doesn’t have to scold the little one for throwing the salt shaker then chase her back to the table. You get to wonder those questions again (now it’s “what is she wearing underneath” and would the little one stay asleep after the babysitter left so you could find out) You actually broke out the old cologne (even though you had to blow dust off of it).
Well this Friday night we had Date Night thanks to one of our neighbors babysitting for us. We had a blast at our local bar with all of our friends and even had a few beers back at home with our neighbors. Then as everyone left and my wife and I jogged back to the bedroom…..my daughter woke up teething with her 2 year molars. She then proceeded to keep us up all weekend long. When we finally did get time for each other late Sunday…we just wanted to sleep. Poor her. Poor us. Oh well there is always the next Date Night to look forward to.
Well as much as we don’t want to admit it, things change. When you are married for a while a lot of this excitement gets replaced by day to day things. And you try hard to keep things exciting, by life gets in the way. There are the exceptions such as Valentines Day, Anniversaries and Trips, but they are few and far between. Then when you have kids things are even harder. Spontaneity is gone. Even sex has to be scheduled between nap times and locked doors.
Then comes your savior….Date Night; with a babysitter and everything. You start to feel like a dating couple again. You cherish things as simple as having a few drinks with some friends in a bar (a real bar, with no family sections). A meal where one of you doesn’t have to scold the little one for throwing the salt shaker then chase her back to the table. You get to wonder those questions again (now it’s “what is she wearing underneath” and would the little one stay asleep after the babysitter left so you could find out) You actually broke out the old cologne (even though you had to blow dust off of it).
Well this Friday night we had Date Night thanks to one of our neighbors babysitting for us. We had a blast at our local bar with all of our friends and even had a few beers back at home with our neighbors. Then as everyone left and my wife and I jogged back to the bedroom…..my daughter woke up teething with her 2 year molars. She then proceeded to keep us up all weekend long. When we finally did get time for each other late Sunday…we just wanted to sleep. Poor her. Poor us. Oh well there is always the next Date Night to look forward to.
Tuesday, August 17, 2004
Confessions of an Olympics addict
Auburn Athlete Kirsty Coventry is swimming for Zimbabwe in the Athens Olympics.
I confess, I am a bit of a sports junkie. I have found myself watching the 9 ball tournament on the Duce (if you don’t know what the Duce is, your fortunate enough to not share my problem) at 2 a.m. on a weeknight on more than one occasion. And forget about college football. Last year my wife and I had a conversation something like this:
HER: “Is there anything else on other than football.”
ME: “Yes, but this is a really good game.”
HER: “Oh, who’s playing…I didn’t even know they played college football on a Tuesday night.”
ME: “This is the ’89 Tennessee/Alabama Game”
HER: “This game didn’t even take place this decade? Don’t you already know who won?”
ME: “Yes, ummm, No errrrrr”
HER: “I’m going to see what else is on.”
So it was no surprise that I took to watching the Olympics with almost a zombie like devotion. I mean most people get excited about the Olympics and enjoy watching the prime time coverage and cheering for Team USA. So why would I think I have an addiction?
I think the first clue came to me while watching team table tennis. I mean part of the fun of the Olympics is being exposed to different sports, but I was arguing a call made by the ref…and I wasn’t even watching the Americans.
That brings us to my next clue. You see, this year NBC has done a great job of offering tons of coverage. Which is great, but if you’re going to be an addict; you can’t limit yourself to watching just Team USA. So I started searching for other teams to root for and low and behold there are a ton of my fellow Auburn Alumnus participating in the Olympics this year. And many of them will be doing so for other countries. So now I have 11 more countries to cheer for…well only when they are competing, and I can’t cheer for them to beat Americans…wait this is getting confusing. I need to make rules:
1. Cheer for Americans
2. When no Americans are competing Cheer for Auburn Alumnus
3. When no Americans or Auburn Alumnus are competing, Cheer for The Underdog.
Then of course there are exceptions. For example, last night I cheered for American Natalie Coughlin to win Gold (which she did) and Auburn senior Kirsty Coventry, who swims for Zimbabwe to get the Silver (which she did). So it was fun to watch, although it did dawn on me that when you make detailed rules such as this…you have a problem. Well I can’t worry about that right now; I have to watch Men’s swimming while recording Women’s Soccer and watching pre-recorded Rowing.
For you fellow addicts:
TV Listings
Results
Newsweek’s Athens blog
Auburn Athlete Kirsty Coventry's Olympics Diary
Monday, August 16, 2004
Sorry Charley
Well today we are going to hear from a guest blogger, my sister. This past weekend my sister was supposed to visit us for my daughter’s birthday, but the weather did not cooperate. She was stuck in the path of Hurricane Charley and her flight was canceled. So she had to brave it out (by herself, because everyone was up here for the weekend). So here are her thoughts on this past weekend:
Ask Anyone - I've always been a weather freak. I don't know what it is but I love the weather. My family often teases me that the Weather Channel is my favorite station (I admit - it is). So this weekend I was in my element
- I live in an area where I literally dodged Hurrcane Charley.
Starting approximately Monday of last week I became "aware" of tropical storms Bonnie & Charley(btw in my opinion he should have been named Clyde -don't you think that's more appropriate?) To be honest the only reason that they "hit my radar" was the fact that I was scheduled to fly to Atlanta to participate in the birthday party for my 2 year old neice, Ainsley over the weekend. However, on Thursday, Charley truly became part of my life.
On Thursday the Hurricane Center predicted that this storm would hit somewhere between Pinellas and Hillsborough Counties. To put this in perspective - I live in Pinellas and work in Hillsborough (btw 2 of the most populous counties in the state of FL). The forecast continued through the day and everytime continued to place the bulls eye of the storm directly between the place I live and the place I work.
O.K. so maybe I wouldn't have reacted the way I did if I wasn't a first time homeowner but for the amount of time I have lived in FL (approx. 28 years) I have never been in the direct line of a hurricane. I knew it was serious when my firm closed on Friday (they never close for anything). I rushed home on Thursday and did all the things you are supposed to do - buy the water, fill your car with gas, batteries (thanks mom and dad for your supply of "D"
batteries), pet supplies and of course beer (not Lucky beer - but that's another story). So Friday morning came and I was ready although very nervous - I've never gone thru anything like this on my OWN.
I have to say that I've never been so happy in my life when all of a sudden Charley took a turn toward the northeast taking a direct path towards the Punta Gorda area. I truly feel sorry for the people of Punta Gorda but tomorrow I will happily put back all of my patio funiture (apparently I have a lot of it- I can attest to that cause I took it off my patio yesterday
evening) and be happy that I live in FL where we can actually PREDICT disaster.
On another note, I have to tell you that when you are in the direct hit of a hurricane you tend to tune to a favorite station. Well, I found one - the local ABC channel. Funny side note - several years ago the meteorologist for this station was caught gambiling (several years ago this was a big deal). Well, this forecaster turned out to be my favorite. He made bets and predictions that turned out to be more accurate than what the hurricane center was predicting - well on top of that - he actually had a personality and a funny one at that.
So the fear is over and the relief sets in and once again we realize that we choose to live in PARADISE and as a result sometimes we have to deal with storms like Charley .
Ask Anyone - I've always been a weather freak. I don't know what it is but I love the weather. My family often teases me that the Weather Channel is my favorite station (I admit - it is). So this weekend I was in my element
- I live in an area where I literally dodged Hurrcane Charley.
Starting approximately Monday of last week I became "aware" of tropical storms Bonnie & Charley(btw in my opinion he should have been named Clyde -don't you think that's more appropriate?) To be honest the only reason that they "hit my radar" was the fact that I was scheduled to fly to Atlanta to participate in the birthday party for my 2 year old neice, Ainsley over the weekend. However, on Thursday, Charley truly became part of my life.
On Thursday the Hurricane Center predicted that this storm would hit somewhere between Pinellas and Hillsborough Counties. To put this in perspective - I live in Pinellas and work in Hillsborough (btw 2 of the most populous counties in the state of FL). The forecast continued through the day and everytime continued to place the bulls eye of the storm directly between the place I live and the place I work.
O.K. so maybe I wouldn't have reacted the way I did if I wasn't a first time homeowner but for the amount of time I have lived in FL (approx. 28 years) I have never been in the direct line of a hurricane. I knew it was serious when my firm closed on Friday (they never close for anything). I rushed home on Thursday and did all the things you are supposed to do - buy the water, fill your car with gas, batteries (thanks mom and dad for your supply of "D"
batteries), pet supplies and of course beer (not Lucky beer - but that's another story). So Friday morning came and I was ready although very nervous - I've never gone thru anything like this on my OWN.
I have to say that I've never been so happy in my life when all of a sudden Charley took a turn toward the northeast taking a direct path towards the Punta Gorda area. I truly feel sorry for the people of Punta Gorda but tomorrow I will happily put back all of my patio funiture (apparently I have a lot of it- I can attest to that cause I took it off my patio yesterday
evening) and be happy that I live in FL where we can actually PREDICT disaster.
On another note, I have to tell you that when you are in the direct hit of a hurricane you tend to tune to a favorite station. Well, I found one - the local ABC channel. Funny side note - several years ago the meteorologist for this station was caught gambiling (several years ago this was a big deal). Well, this forecaster turned out to be my favorite. He made bets and predictions that turned out to be more accurate than what the hurricane center was predicting - well on top of that - he actually had a personality and a funny one at that.
So the fear is over and the relief sets in and once again we realize that we choose to live in PARADISE and as a result sometimes we have to deal with storms like Charley .
Friday, August 06, 2004
The Amazing Race
I love this show. I have traveled all my life, for work and for pleasure so I can identify with the concept. I know how they got the idea (I guess it was Affleck/Damon) sitting around after missing a Eurail train and laughing because they couldn’t understand the hotel employee that gave them directions. Then after they finally got on the right train they found out the hard way that the rail car they were on got left behind as the rest of the train went on to their destination. They sat there and said…this could be a show.
Everyone who travels internationally has a funny story or two from every trip they take. That is part of the charm of traveling: to experience new things and to learn. I just wish the show would teach them some of the real world lessons, like before you drink 10 beers while crossing the English Channel, you should know that they close the bathrooms while they dock the ship. Or, no matter how drunk you are, you really shouldn’t tell a bar full of Englishmen that in the U.S. soccer is a girls game…men play football. Know that in certain parts of Spain the phase “Hamburger” is taken very literally. If you need directions in Italy, ask three people not one, then take the majority opinion. And when you decide to walk to save money, find out just how expensive the cab really is, you may be surprised.
No, the show doesn’t really catch the true lessons you learn while traveling. And you never see them in the bar after making mistakes; laughing about it over a beer. But all-in-all, it is entertaining TV.
My wife and I go back and forth on whether we would be any good at this show. Most of the time I think we would rock. We know each other’s strengths, and we can usually agree on a good course of action. Other times we worry we would kill each other. If a mistake was made (and it will be made) we would Monday-morning-quarterback each other (I would have gone that way).
I think I would prefer to do it the old fashion way: I’d rather laugh at the mistakes at a bar over beers then be sent packing.
Everyone who travels internationally has a funny story or two from every trip they take. That is part of the charm of traveling: to experience new things and to learn. I just wish the show would teach them some of the real world lessons, like before you drink 10 beers while crossing the English Channel, you should know that they close the bathrooms while they dock the ship. Or, no matter how drunk you are, you really shouldn’t tell a bar full of Englishmen that in the U.S. soccer is a girls game…men play football. Know that in certain parts of Spain the phase “Hamburger” is taken very literally. If you need directions in Italy, ask three people not one, then take the majority opinion. And when you decide to walk to save money, find out just how expensive the cab really is, you may be surprised.
No, the show doesn’t really catch the true lessons you learn while traveling. And you never see them in the bar after making mistakes; laughing about it over a beer. But all-in-all, it is entertaining TV.
My wife and I go back and forth on whether we would be any good at this show. Most of the time I think we would rock. We know each other’s strengths, and we can usually agree on a good course of action. Other times we worry we would kill each other. If a mistake was made (and it will be made) we would Monday-morning-quarterback each other (I would have gone that way).
I think I would prefer to do it the old fashion way: I’d rather laugh at the mistakes at a bar over beers then be sent packing.
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