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bright purple berries

With the summer officially over the beach house is not being rented any more so this past weekend we took the opportunity to head there for a long weekend.  The Columbus Day holiday allowed for a long three day weekend and the first opportunity to see the beach house after the long summer rental.  We were hoping to go during the Labor Day weekend, but surprisingly people rented the week before and after.  Getting a late start on Friday was not much of an issue.  So late after summer the usual exodus to the beaches over the weekend didn’t happen.  The only trouble we had was around Annapolis and that was general rush hour traffic.

When we arrived the house was in great shape.  Actually most of the summer rentals are repeat customers, some have been coming for over 10 years to the house.  So they treat the house almost as if it was there own.  The yard was of course in pretty bad shape.  During the summer someone does come out and mow it, but that is the extent of the yard care.  Weeds had flourished in most of the flower beds and the bushes were gangly.  On the inside we removed all the baseboard heating radiators.  They must have been original ones because of how corroded they where, with the new heat pump they are no longer needed.

view across Lake Comegys

Other than that the weekend was pretty open and relaxing.  Sunday’s big thing was the Redskins game at 1 against Carolina.  It was a crappy game in my opinion.  The Skins suck and lost the game by three points.  They couldn’t block, couldn’t score, couldn’t tackle.  They even had a safety scored on them when Clinton Portis couldn’t get out of the end zone.  On top of that the Cowboys won against Kansas City in over time and Wisconsin lost a heart breaker of a game, one they easily should have won.  Ohio scored two defensive touch downs and ran one kickoff for a touchdown.  Definately not a good weekend for sports.

But on Sunday Nancy and I did get out for a long walk Sunday afternoon.  We walked down to Silver Lake, down along the beach and headed back home up Rehoboth Avenue.  I was surprised by the number of people that made it to the beach over the weekend.  While walking we ran into a lot of other people biking, walking and just enjoying the pleasant weather.  Even the beach was packed, no one was in the water, but many still went down to the water for a lovely afternoon.  Down Rehoboth Avenue we did a little window shopping in the stores that were still open, after the Columbus Day weekend many more will close for the winter months as the crowds get thinner.

Monday we took the opportunity to do a little shopping before making our way home.  Not that we can’t get stuff back here in Virginia, but not paying taxes is a nice little benefit, every dollar helps these days.  We even had time to stop off at this ice cream shop just outside of town.  It is actually a dairy farm and they make their own ice cream, highly recommend it if you are in the mood.

I wish I could have gotten into the water, but it was a nice weekend regardless.  We always manage to get a little work done and have a lot of fun while up there.  We ate well and drank like sailors.  Most nights we would sit outside talking and finish the bottle of wine we opened for dinner that night.

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When I went to the Nats vs. Red Sox a week ago a good friend of mine, Rob, wanted to come along.  But with the game sold out it was impossible to get three tickets next to each other.  Instead we decided to catch another game.  He had never been to the stadium and wanted to see a game, just like me he is not a big baseball fan, but it’s good to say you did it at least once.

The best day for everyone was a Sunday afternoon game on the 5th of July against the Braves.  If Will and Saundra were able to make it for the fourth, I thought this would have been a great way to end their trip to DC.  But after getting all interested parties together, it would be my Dad, Nancy, Rob and myself going to the game.  We of course followed the same plan as with the Sox game: meet at my Dad’s house, drive to Pentagon City Mall, and Metro to the stadium.

Me, Nancy and my Dad

When we arrived because Rob had never been to the stadium we walked around some so he could get a good look at the stadium.  We also got food and beer, what would a ball game be without beer?  Our seats for this game were right behind the visitor dugout.  These seats were covered so when I checked the weather early in the week there was a possibility of rain, but we would have been protected.  The weather could not have been more perfect game day.  It was in the mid-70’s I believe with near zero humidity.  Clouds hung in the sky most of the day, but rain was never a threat.  For being the dog days of summer the weather sure was not playing along.

The crowd for the game was much thinner.  I should not have seen a sold out game vs. the Red Sox first.  There might have been 15,000 people that day and that is probably just because it was a Sunday game after the 4th of July.  Everyone is already in the city for the fireworks so why not catch a game.  Even with the low turn out the crowds was pretty good.  Again there were a lot of Braves fans in the stadium, this time we Nat fans were not outnumbered 4 or 5 to one.

your OUT!

This was the third in a series with Atlanta, tied at 1-1 with the Nats winning the game on Saturday they were heading into game three with the pendulum swinging toward their side.  Right from the start the Nats quickly took the lead and by the third inning were up 3-0.  The Braves struck back and took a nibble out of that lead in the third with one run scored.  By the ninth inning, with the game all but won, the score was 5-1.  We were still staying till the final pitch was thrown and the game was officially over.  But the Braves had a little life left in them and scored two in the finally inning.  It looked like we had a game on our hand and extra inning was a possibility.  But with some great pitching the Nats won the game 5-3.  My Dad’s win streak was still holding with a win every time he sees a game.

Once the game was over we decided to hang out and let the crowds die down before fighting the crowds on Metro.  This time the staff was more vigorous in getting the people out of the seats.  With fewer fans in the stadium it was much easier to clear out.  Getting kicked out was not a problem, we decided to take the hint and hit the Capitol City Brewery in Shirlington again for some victory drinks.  We ponied up to the bar and ordered a round while we savored our teams victory.  I couldn’t wait to get to work on Monday and nag John about the Nats victory.  He is a huge Braves fan and the lowly Nats won two in the series.

crazy shot

After the first round of drinks it was getting pretty late and we needed to head back to my Dad’s house.  My Dad was grilling flank steak and Rob was staying for dinner.  With such nice weather we decided to eat out on the deck.  But before we left Shirlington we stopped by the Best Buns Bread Co. to get some bread for dinner.  While there I also picked up some lemon squares for desert, everything looked so good.  When we did get back to his house we started cooking and had some great wine to go with dinner.  We sat outside for several hours enjoying dinner and just talking.

It was a great idea Rob had to see a game at the ball park and Sunday was the perfect day to do it.  A lazy Sunday afternoon at the ball park, drinks after, and a good home cooked meal on the deck, life is perfect.  I can’t wait to do it again.

July 5, 2009

	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9		R	H	E
Atlanta	0	0	1	0	0	0	0	0	2		3	9	1
Washington	1	2	0	0	0	1	0	1	X		5	14	0

crazy

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Being only 25 miles from DC I was looking forward to going to the city to see the fireworks display on The Mall.  I have seen it several times in the past, last year in fact I made the trip up.  But I have never been able to get Nancy to go with me.  Yeah it might be a small trip and there are a TON of people that attend it each year.  But how often do you get to participate in something as extravagant as this, right in your back yard?

I had Nancy convinced to go to the city to enjoy the celebrations, but not because of my doing.  Her brother and wife were coming up from North Carolina to visit and they wanted to see the fireworks on The Mall.  Unfortunately at the last minute they couldn’t make it because of work so the plan of going to DC got scrapped.  Instead we headed to my Dad’s house to celebrate our nations birthday.  I certainly knew we were going to eat well if we came.  Matt mentioned a week earlier that he was planning on smoking some ribs on his brand new grill.  Yum.

When we arrived Matt was almost finished smoking the ribs, the smell coming off the grill made me want to dive right in.  I had not eaten all day so I was definitely hungry for some food.  After he took the ribs off the grill and let them rest he cut a rib for himself, my Dad, Nancy and I.  Sometimes it pays to hangout with the cook, normally you get to try stuff that “falls off the plate” before anyone else.

With the ribs finished and plated, we headed to a neighbors house in my dad’s culdesac to party it up with a few friends and lots of family.  In fact half the people at the party was our family, we certainly brought the troops.  Walking through their kitchen and out onto the deck we passed a full spread of food, enough to feed a small army.  At least enough to make everyone in attendance stuff with good food.  After the mandatory mingling the hostess opened the flood gates for everyone to grab a plate and start eating.  There was so much food I was a kid in a candy store.  I didn’t get a lot of any one particular things, but I made sure to sample everything that was offered.

Nicolas Cage from The Rock

It was wonderful sitting down talking with everyone and catching up with my family.  Bobby and Tracy brought over both kids so half the time they were chasing Ellie around while the other one had Ty.  Nancy did some baby holding and even I got in on the fun.  He is so tiny and I am so big I was afraid I would cruse him or possible drop him.  But Tracy said not to worry, kids are pretty durable.  I must have held him for 3o minutes, most of the time he was awake and staring back at me.  Cute kid.  Very animated too.  He was smiling and laughing the whole time and I didn’t have to do much.  Tracy was saying he doesn’t do that often so it felt good that I could get him to smile.  You know we bro’s got to stick together, I certainly look forward to him getting older and then we can have some real fun.

After everyone was stuff and desert was served it was getting pretty late and about time for the adults to have a little fun. We didn’t have a large collection of fireworks that shot into the air, to my disappointment.  But we did have more bottle rockets and fire crackers then we knew what to do with.  So for about an hour Matt, Bobby, Nancy and I are firing these things off as quick as we possible could.  We even started to get crazy with them and hold onto them or throw them, crazy stuff that no one should be doing when handling high explosives.  Fortunately by the end of the evening everyone had all their fingers and toes with no extra holes in our body.

yikes!

As the night started to wind down I headed inside for a few minutes to catch A Capitol Fourth on PBS.  Every year in addition to the huge fireworks display there is a concert and big production put on next to the capitol building that is televised.  All I cared about was the fireworks display.  I certainly got my fill of fireworks and when it was over it was back outside for more firecrackers.  The show stopping finally Matt had was a giant roll of two thousand firecrackers.  He set it up in the middle of the culdesac and let things rip.  It took about 60 seconds for the entire roll to go off and it was pretty cool.  What was not cool was cleaning the giant mess afterwords.

After a long day of great food and company it was time to head home down 95 where Nancy and I were treated to more fireworks from people that lived next to the highway.  For a state that outlaws fireworks that shot into the are, there certainly was a tone of illegal fireworks around.  But one day out of the year to do your civic duty and celebrate the birth of our nation, I think the cops can over look.  But if you loose an eye don’t come crying to me, your an idiot.

me and my Dad

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Last year I went to my Dad’s house for Fathers Day and cooked him  a spectacular meal.  Getting the best ingredients and making everything from scratch.  It is labor intensive, but I think the final product is well worth the effort.  Well this year Nancy and I continued that tradition and again cooked a wonderful meal to celebrate my Dad and all he has done for me.  This year especially he has helped me get my house and it is the least I can do to honor him is cook him a great meal and bring him some beer.

This time around we had a four course meal.  Well actually it was only three courses, we took the salad course and just included it with the mean.  Only fresh ingredients were used to cook all the food.  Not even the sauces were store made, all made by Nancy and I with love.  She has asked me before about short cutting certain portions of the dinner and I told her no.  I love to cook and especially for something like this I don’t mind putting in the extra effort to come up with a great meal.

Appetizer: Sizzling Garlic Shrimp
Salad: Orange, Walnut, Gorgonzola, & Mixed Greens
Main Dish: Grilled Tasty Chicken Kabobs
Side Dish: Sauteed Asparagus with Dijon Vinaigrette
Dessert: Zabaglione with Raspberries & Peaches

Things turned out really well and we spent several hours on the deck talking and eating.  To me that is one of the most important things about holiday, spending time with your family.  I even got my dad to enjoy some dessert, which he rarely eats.  But it was peaches, raspberries and a custard that plated really well.  Who could say no to that?

I love you Dad.  Thanks for being there and for everything you have done over my life time.

Zabaglione w/ Raspberries & Peaches

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With the traditional start of summer comes the traditional trip to the beach.  This year the beach house in Rehoboth was not rented over the long weekend, or for the next one actually.  So we decided to take a family trip to the beach and join the hordes of people enjoying the great weekend.

Rehoboth Beach

My Dad was flying into BWI from a week long business trip and when he got to his house we were hitting the road.  For better or worse we didn’t leave his house till just after 4.  When I was driving north on 95 traffic was stacked going south.  Not only were people trying to head home early from work but you had all sorts of people heading to the beaching in southern Virginia and North/South Carolina.  I could only hope that fewer people were heading towards the Delaware coast like we were.  I must say that getting to Rehoboth Beach, even at 4pm on the Friday before Memorial Day, was easy.  It took just over three hours, about 20 minutes longer than a trip during the off season.

As is tradition on Friday night we went out to dinner.  The last time we were here we had drinks at the Cultured Pearl and absolutely loved the place when we walked around.  It is a Japanese restaurant with a huge sushi bar and an enormous deck outside.  The deck is one of the coolest things I have seen around.  As for the food the sushi was great, even if it was not made by a Japanese man.

Come Saturday it was time to start working.  As much as I wanted the weekend to be about relaxing at the beach, that was not going to happen.  We had a laundry list of chores that needed to be complete before the first tenants occupied the house.  First on the list was that stupid deck.  Over the entire off season we completely broke down and rebuilt the deck.  There is now a composite floor, new railing, and a hand rail down the stairs that looks all jacked up.  My dad and I didn’t have any ideas how to get it installed properly, so with a lot of trial and error we got it installed.  As long as you don’t look to closely, it looks fantastic!

a crowded boardwalk

The other major project was getting a more secure cover over the hole leading under the house.  It was completely paved over in an earlier project and the 1″ board of plywood was not holding up to well to the heavy weight.  So we had to undo all the bricks and jury rig a support structure.  Fortunately I had the brilliant idea of number all the pavers in order making the process of putting it all back together much easier.  It even came in handy on Tuesday when a plumber had to get under the house.

Other projects including painting the ceiling in the family room, mulching the new flower beds, planting two dozen plants, sanding the bench, then painting the bench black, and a half dozen other minor tasks.  Both Saturday and Sunday were filled with work, starting early and not finishing till 7:30 and 7 respectfully.

Not everything about the weekend involved work, I ate very well while I was there.  Not only did I get to eat sushi at the Cultured pearl on Friday, but we had NY strip steaks Saturday and BBQ chick on Sunday with all the trimmings.  Sunday we even took a long lunch and walked down to Whiskey Jacks.  It overs looks the beach and provides the perfect setting for beer and pizza.  I was even able to finish watching the Indy 500 while there.  My dad and I saw the start of the race, I made sure we took a break to catch “the most exciting start in racing.”  Speaking of racing, I was able to catch the Formula 1 race from Monaco at a reasonable hour with an 8am start.  Jenson Button again took the victory, win number 5 for the driver who’s team was in doubt one month before the start of the season.

This little trip to the boardwalk offered my only opportunity to get down to the beach.  The day was a little over cast but that did not stop the hordes of people from enjoying the beach and the boardwalk.  Every were I looked everyone had smiles on their faces.  Plenty of people were walking down the boardwalk and darting in and out of the various shops and restaurants.  The main drag, Rehoboth Avenue, was packed with more revelers as well.  One crazy thing was that even though the water was about 60 degrees and technically closed by the lifeguards, that didn’t stop people from having fun.  I found a group of kids playing baseball, others throwing frisbees, people flying kits, and one old guy doing some surf fishing.

bumper car fun

A great location for people watching was Fun Land right on the boardwalk.  This little amusement park offers all sorts of rides and carnival games, was so packed I could hardly walk around.  The swinging machine of death, as I like to call it, had everyone smiling and loosing their pocket change.  The bumper cars offered a great opportunity to get some pictures smiling and enjoying the afternoon.  Everyone down at the beach had not a care in the world, even if was only for a short time.  I doesn’t matter that we are fighting two wars, we have the worst economy in a generation, the possible bankruptcy of GM and other problems.  People at Rehoboth put all those problems aside for the weekend and were just having fun.

Come Monday morning it was time for me to leave.  After all the hard work and only a little relaxing I had to drive back to northern Virginia and join the throngs of others headed home from the long weekend.  The last time I did this it took Nancy and I five hours to get home, mostly from traffic on 404.  So after a good breakfast I packed my stuff and prepared myself for the long drive home.  I stopped by Starbucks and got some coffee, I figured it would help ease the pain of sitting not going any where.  Surprisingly it only took 4 hours to get back to Springfield.

Once there I got in my truck and did some more driving, yippie!  This time it was out to Nancy’s house.  She was having a BBQ with friends to celebrate the holiday.  I arrived a little later than planned, thanks traffic, and immediately was put to work.  I was in charge of making and subsequently grilling the burgers.  Nancy already procured the ingredients, so I simply had to put it all together and form burgers.  About the time I finished up the heavens opened up and dumped rain on our parade.  For the short run we munched on some excellent guacamole dip that Nichole made and chicken buffalo dip made by Nancy.

swing batter

No matter what rain dance we did the rain never stopped so I had to grill in the rain.  This is how you know I am a hardcore griller, or it could be we were just really hungry.  But I dawned a rain jacked and braved the elements to cook burgers, hot dogs, and sausage for everyone.  When we finally sat down to eat, it was totally worth it getting rained on for the great food.

As much work and driving as I did over the weekend it was still spectacular.  I still got away from home for the weekend and got to spend lots of quality time with my friends and family.  And isn’t that why I work so hard, so I can spend time with the ones I love?  I sure think so.