We met some friends at Flounder Brewing Company in Hillsborough yesterday, and the beer was great (especially the Fred IPA, the Brown Ale, and the Black Emerald) and the atmosphere was even better-- the tasting room is rustic, all wood and big rough-hewn beams, and there are several nice patios and dogs are allowed-- eventually, a bluegrass-style band started playing and it was hard to tell you were in central Jersey (unless you listened to the conversation) and then, once we had sampled the beers, we wandered ten yards over to Bellemara Distillery and the drinks they made from their single malt gin and single malt "spirit" were, incomprehensibly, even better than the beer next door . . . I had a Herbaceous, which had Thai Basil, Star Anise, Lime, Jalapeño, Lemongrass Syrup, and their single malt gin-- yikes it was good-- so we will be returning to this little complex on the way to the Sourlands, it's scenic, only twenty-five minutes from Highland Park, and feels like a little vacation.
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Cheers to Tennis (in February)
I am drinking some celebratory beer tonight for several reasons:
1) we got through a carnival of a workshop day in school . . . there were twenty teachers from area schools, various administrators and the associate director of the Rutgers Writing Program, all present to watch me and my colleagues teach the Rutgers Writing course; things went off without a hitch, partly thanks to our excellent and competent department chair and my wonderful teammates Brady and Strachan but mainly due to my charm and good-looks . . . a dozen adults sat in one of my classes and then one of my students endured an essay conference with ten random people watching; it was a wild and busy day made more interesting by the threat of a student walk-out and the news vans and helicopter hovering on the periphery of our school because our township decided to put armed police in every building, fueling a media frenzy (I should also note that on Monday-- President's Day-- after playing some tennis with the kids at my school, as I was driving across the empty parking lot . . . as it was a day off from school, a beautiful blonde woman flagged down my van, and so-- being a male-- I stopped to investigate and found that she was just as pretty I surmised, and that's when I noticed the CBS jacket and the microphone . . . I declined to make an official comment but I did chat with her for a while, just to look at her thick lustrous hair, pearly white teeth, and TV quality facial symmetry, I think her name is Natalie Duddridge)
2) despite some grim blood test results, our dog is still eating, walking about, and wagging his tail;
3) though my foot hurts, I taped it up and was able to compete a bit, but the beer might alleviate some of the pain;
4) I'm pretty sure my kids and I played the most outdoor tennis by a central Jersey family in February ever, in the history of planet . . . I played with my buddy Cob after school, Alex played his buddy Liam, then Alex played my brother, then I went out and hit with Ian under the lights, despite the fact that my foot hurt, because I know we won't get this chance again anytime soon.
1) we got through a carnival of a workshop day in school . . . there were twenty teachers from area schools, various administrators and the associate director of the Rutgers Writing Program, all present to watch me and my colleagues teach the Rutgers Writing course; things went off without a hitch, partly thanks to our excellent and competent department chair and my wonderful teammates Brady and Strachan but mainly due to my charm and good-looks . . . a dozen adults sat in one of my classes and then one of my students endured an essay conference with ten random people watching; it was a wild and busy day made more interesting by the threat of a student walk-out and the news vans and helicopter hovering on the periphery of our school because our township decided to put armed police in every building, fueling a media frenzy (I should also note that on Monday-- President's Day-- after playing some tennis with the kids at my school, as I was driving across the empty parking lot . . . as it was a day off from school, a beautiful blonde woman flagged down my van, and so-- being a male-- I stopped to investigate and found that she was just as pretty I surmised, and that's when I noticed the CBS jacket and the microphone . . . I declined to make an official comment but I did chat with her for a while, just to look at her thick lustrous hair, pearly white teeth, and TV quality facial symmetry, I think her name is Natalie Duddridge)
2) despite some grim blood test results, our dog is still eating, walking about, and wagging his tail;
3) though my foot hurts, I taped it up and was able to compete a bit, but the beer might alleviate some of the pain;
4) I'm pretty sure my kids and I played the most outdoor tennis by a central Jersey family in February ever, in the history of planet . . . I played with my buddy Cob after school, Alex played his buddy Liam, then Alex played my brother, then I went out and hit with Ian under the lights, despite the fact that my foot hurt, because I know we won't get this chance again anytime soon.
Post-Birthday-Blues
Yesterday's birthday-get-together at Jersey Cyclone was very fun-- a perfect way to spend a rainy afternoon: the brewery is located in an industrial park and it's spacious inside, plus you can bring your own food-- Catherine made some of her incredible special sandwiches; we had a good crowd, and the beer was delicious, and we pretty much had the place to ourselves . . . and the bartender was an EBHS alumni, so Chantal and I had fun remembered folks from high school in the mid-aughts . . . and while all the varieties of beer were very delicious, and so were the sandwiches and the desserts-- my body can no longer handle that kind of stuff in large quantities-- luckily we stopped drinking around 6:30 PM so I suffered through my hangover around four hours later and then slept soundly . . . but today I re-tweaked my calf muscle playing pickleball-- I think I really need to let it heal for a couple weeks and it is HOT outside, which is kind of fun, but also reminds me just how much I hate the heat . . . Donaldson Park is still swamped and muddy, but today it is packed with people, all kinds of yahoos, and most of them drove int and are parked all over the place, in the mud, etcetera . . . and I have turned into a very aggressive walker-- if I see a car coming, I get myself and the dog into the croswalk, don't make eye-contact with whoever is driving and then I amble across the street-- hoping the car will stop-- and I know this isn't mentally healthy or physically safe but I'm sick of people in enromous cars ignoring stop signs near my house and in my park, so the least I can do is fuck with them . . . and if I get hit, I'll miss a few days of work and maybe some idiot will feel guilty about their shitty driving and realize cars are destroying this once great nation.
2/23/2009
Saturday night Catherine and I went to a "reunion" of the Melody bar; Catherine wanted to see her old roommate, who often played music there and who invited her on Facebook-- but on the Facebook invitation it said that only those 36 and over would be admitted, which we thought was a joke, but when we got to the Elks, the old bouncer from the Melody was working the door (wearing a NASA suit and looking as dour as ever) and he checked our ID's and actually turned a fellow teacher away who was 35 3/4 years old, so he had to wander off to meet other people at Harvest Moon, but he didn't miss much-- it was hot and crowded inside, and although we talked to a few people and everyone looked half familiar (and scarily old)we were ready to go after an hour (you couldn't get a drink-- they had the old bartender from the Melody working, too, and he looked like he was about to have an aneurysm)-- Catherine got to see her roommate again, who looked exactly the same (except I think she got a nose-job, but I didn't ask)and once we got outside there was actually a giant line to get in, and luckily we saw the rest of the North Brunswick crowd we were supposed to meet (I think this is as close to a twenty year reunion as class of '88 is going to get)and pulled them out of line and went to Harvest Moon, and it was definitely fun to see everyone-- but I still don't understand how Harvest Moon has survived for so long, it's been making average to awful beer for a over decade now-- you think they'd either get better at making beer or go out of business, but it's always crowded.
Weekend of Dave!
Catherine and I attended two parties over the weekend . . . Friday night was the Third Annual Scary Story Contest and Saturday night was a Beer Pong Birthday Party -- and I won Best Story at the Story Contest and at the Beer Pong Party, I held the table for several hours with my silent and stoic partner Bob, who was prone to diving on the floor for difficult shots, and then when we were finally unseated, my wife and I returned and held the table until the party ended . . . so quantifiably, this was pretty much the most successful weekend of my life, as it was rather easy to measure how well I did at each party . . . I wish all of life was so concrete and simple, with transparent rules and immediate gratification, but now it's back to the confusing, ambiguous daily grind of life, where there is no apparent way to keep score and no easy way to figure out if you are holding the table or winning the contest . . . by the way, would anyone like to play darts with me at the Park Pub on Thursday?
Vacations With Kids Are Not Really Vacations
Another phenomenal Vermont vacation, full of snowboarding, skiing, great local food/beer, and plenty of anxiety (not only anxiety from supervising my children on the mountain, but also in our rented house-- a beautifully converted barn in Stockbridge which contains a couple of spiral stair-cases, which seem excellent in theory-- but spiral staircases with smooth and worn wooden risers are death-traps if you're wearing socks-- I slipped and fell hard-- and while my kids are getting better and better at navigating the mountain, they are also getting good enough to hurt themselves-- Alex whacked his head when he caught an edge snowboarding, but he was wearing a helmet so he only suffered a bump on his head and a bruise on his face, but no concussion, and Ian twisted his knee when a little kid cut in front of him) and after three days straight of riding-- longer days than usual because we met our friends on the mountain and peer pressure really motivates kids to keep on keeping on-- so after three long days, we finally took one off to relax, but we also promised my son Alex that we would play Settlers of Catan on this day off, and not just regular Settlers of Catan, but the new very-advanced "Cities and Knights" add-on that he got for Christmas, and it took four hours to finish the game (which I won!) but we took a break in the middle of the game for some sledding (Alex befriended some friendly Stockbridge locals) and then a trip to Rochester, Vermont to eat lunch at the Rochester Cafe and Country Store, which I highly recommend: the town is scenic, surrounded by mountain peaks, and the food and raspberry/peach pie at the cafe is super-delicious . . . and I hate pie; while I'm at it, I'll also recommend my favorite local beers from the trip: Rock Art American Red Ale and Alesmith IPA (and it's VERY important to have good beer on hand when you're playing a four hour board game with children).
Carousel of Torture
Although I highly recommend The Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World-- for the maps and the descriptions of rides, attractions, food, and traffic patterns in the parks-- I also think the writers are completely insane, for one very good reason . . . give me a moment to explain: my parents offered to wait in the twenty minute line for The Haunted Mansion with my kids, giving my wife and I a few precious minutes of free time (our plan was to meet them back in Tomorrowland at the Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor, which would give Catherine and I time to grab a beer while we waited-- little did we know that The Magic Kingdom is a dry land after all) and since there was no beer to drink, we went on the PeopleMover and nearly fell asleep, and then, in our somnolent state, we ambled into an "audioanimatronic theater production" called "Walt Disney's Carousel of Progress," which begins with a scene in a kitchen in the early 1900's where a mustachioed man talks about the technology of the day, and then the theater rotates to another kitchen-- a few decades later-- and the same man talks about the technology, and there's some stuff going on in the wings, some youngsters with a desire to do their hair in beehives and dance, and a girl trying to lose weight with some kind of belt contraption, and then the ride went a bit haywire, and the mustachioed man-- who had the look of a third-rate porn star-- kept singing the same song over and over and someone made an announcement that we would soon be moving along and that the 26 and 1/2 minute show would take a bit longer . . . 26 and a half minutes? . . . and finally, we moved through a few more decades of "Progress" and then there was a hip, video-game playing grandma who actually said, "We smoked'em!" and then there was some special effects when the voice activated stove misheard Grandma's score and turned the oven to 550 degrees (what video game scores in the hundreds?) and smoke spewed from around the oven door, and then finally-- finally!-- the Carousel of Progress (which my usually sunny and optimistic wife named "The Carousel of Torture") let us back into the sunlight, yet the Unofficial Guide people-- who are generally accurate in their descriptions-- call the mustachioed porn star narrator "easy to identify with" and they say the attraction is a "great favorite among repeat visitors" and they include it on all their touring plans . . . and so I have two questions: What were they smoking when they went on this thing? and How does Disney put this ride next to Space Mountain?
Road Trip Day 10 into Day 11: We Learn Too Much
We were barraged with salvos of information from Sunday evening through Monday, probably too much to absorb, so don't quiz me on any of this-- and if you need any visuals, head to Captions of Cat:
1) on our way to dinner at the Firehouse Brewing Company in Rapid City-- highly recommended for both for the food and the beer-- we took an impromptu presidential quiz, as Rapid City has a presidential statue on every street corner; Ian would run ahead and stand on the plaque, blocking the name, and then we would guess which president the statue depicted . . . a number of them were easy: JFK, Taft . . . who was a fatty, John Adams (thanks Paul Giamatti!), Lyndon Johnson, Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush . . . and I nailed a number of more difficult ones: Herbert Hoover, Andrew Jackson, and Harry Truman . . . but some were impossible for us: Martin Van Buren, Chester A. Arthur, and James K. Polk;
2) after a fantastic meal at the Firehouse, we walked through Main Street Square and stumbled upon a theater group setting up an outdoor production of Hamlet-- which was to begin at dusk-- and though we were full of food and beer and tired from a day of hiking, this piqued my curiosity-- were they going to do all four hours of the most famous Shakespearean tragedy on a tiny stage in a South Dakota park? or was this going to be a parody?-- so we stayed to see and it was fantastic: a boiled down, eighty minute version of the play, but all Shakespeare-- just the best bits-- and my kids loved it (I was also giving them a running commentary, using my brother Marc as King Claudius, which was probably very disturbing . . . you come home from school and I'm dead and Uncle Marc is in our house and he says I'm your new dad and then I show up as a ghost and tell you that Uncle Marc murdered me . . . so what would you do? . . . and my son Alex didn't bat an eye, he said "kill him" and then I remembered that The Lion King was a less disturbing parallel to the plot, and used that for reference) and my kids also loved watching the South Dakota delinquent teenagers hanging out in the parking deck just behind the stage, setting off car alarms and smoking cigarettes and acting cool (and Ian also loved sneaking behind the stage to see what character was going to enter next);
3) Monday morning we drove to Wind Cave National Park and I learned, for the seventeenth time, that I don't like cave tours and that if you've seen one cave, you've seen them all-- but my kids loved it and they want to do the four hour "Wild Cave" spelunking expedition once they are old enough (I also learned that some people are really really stupid . . . who brings an 18 month old screaming child on a cave tour? . . . though this wasn't as bad as when Cat and I went through Mammoth Caves in Kentucky and got stuck behind a family with horrible body odor);
4) we learned that bison really do roam free on the plains of South Dakota;
5) we learned that Hot Springs is the most scenic town in the Black Hills-- all the buildings are made of light red sandstone and some are stately, a warm stream runs through the center of town-- fed by the springs-- and there is a even a waterfall . . . the place has none of the tourist vibe of the towns up near Mount Rushmore (it actually has a sense of decay, which is paradoxical, considering the solid nature of the buildings);
6) my children learned that Evans Plunge is their favorite place on earth-- it is billed as "the world's largest natural warm water indoor swimming pool" and it is quite huge, a giant gravel bottomed pool filled with 87 degree mineral water from the eponymous hot springs of the town . . . and it has some old school water slides-- extremely fast and scary-- and rope swings and rings, and an outdoor pool and water slide as well . . . worth visiting;
7) and though we had learned too much, we had to visit the Mammoth Site, as that's the reason we were in Hot Springs-- so we took another tour, and it was well worth it-- this site rivals Ashfall-- but this time the fossil trap was a slate-ringed waterhole . . . animals would come to snack on the plants that grew year round at the site (because of the hot springs) and then would slide down the slippery slate into the pool of water and drown or die of starvation; the site is sixty seven feet deep, a treasure trove of Pleistocene bones preserved in sandstone like fruit in jello-- mainly mammoths (there are several different species represented, including the gigantic Columbian mammoth, see the photo below) but they also found the remains of the giant short-faced bear, the biggest bear and possible one of the biggest mammalian terrestrial carnivores to ever live on our planet;
8) we learned about Crazy Horse on the way to Wind Cave National Park-- the twenty minute film at the monument nearly made me cry-- carving this mountain is like a great underdog sports movie . . . a far more moving place than Mount Rushmore (in fact, you could fit all four busts at Mount Rushmore in Crazy Horse's head);
9) I learned that nothing looks sillier than a skinny dude in full cowboy attire-- black Stetson, black pinstriped button down long sleeve shirt, blue jeans, boots-- discerningly tasting an ice cream sample on one of those cute little spoons.
1) on our way to dinner at the Firehouse Brewing Company in Rapid City-- highly recommended for both for the food and the beer-- we took an impromptu presidential quiz, as Rapid City has a presidential statue on every street corner; Ian would run ahead and stand on the plaque, blocking the name, and then we would guess which president the statue depicted . . . a number of them were easy: JFK, Taft . . . who was a fatty, John Adams (thanks Paul Giamatti!), Lyndon Johnson, Jimmy Carter, George H.W. Bush . . . and I nailed a number of more difficult ones: Herbert Hoover, Andrew Jackson, and Harry Truman . . . but some were impossible for us: Martin Van Buren, Chester A. Arthur, and James K. Polk;
2) after a fantastic meal at the Firehouse, we walked through Main Street Square and stumbled upon a theater group setting up an outdoor production of Hamlet-- which was to begin at dusk-- and though we were full of food and beer and tired from a day of hiking, this piqued my curiosity-- were they going to do all four hours of the most famous Shakespearean tragedy on a tiny stage in a South Dakota park? or was this going to be a parody?-- so we stayed to see and it was fantastic: a boiled down, eighty minute version of the play, but all Shakespeare-- just the best bits-- and my kids loved it (I was also giving them a running commentary, using my brother Marc as King Claudius, which was probably very disturbing . . . you come home from school and I'm dead and Uncle Marc is in our house and he says I'm your new dad and then I show up as a ghost and tell you that Uncle Marc murdered me . . . so what would you do? . . . and my son Alex didn't bat an eye, he said "kill him" and then I remembered that The Lion King was a less disturbing parallel to the plot, and used that for reference) and my kids also loved watching the South Dakota delinquent teenagers hanging out in the parking deck just behind the stage, setting off car alarms and smoking cigarettes and acting cool (and Ian also loved sneaking behind the stage to see what character was going to enter next);
3) Monday morning we drove to Wind Cave National Park and I learned, for the seventeenth time, that I don't like cave tours and that if you've seen one cave, you've seen them all-- but my kids loved it and they want to do the four hour "Wild Cave" spelunking expedition once they are old enough (I also learned that some people are really really stupid . . . who brings an 18 month old screaming child on a cave tour? . . . though this wasn't as bad as when Cat and I went through Mammoth Caves in Kentucky and got stuck behind a family with horrible body odor);
4) we learned that bison really do roam free on the plains of South Dakota;
5) we learned that Hot Springs is the most scenic town in the Black Hills-- all the buildings are made of light red sandstone and some are stately, a warm stream runs through the center of town-- fed by the springs-- and there is a even a waterfall . . . the place has none of the tourist vibe of the towns up near Mount Rushmore (it actually has a sense of decay, which is paradoxical, considering the solid nature of the buildings);
6) my children learned that Evans Plunge is their favorite place on earth-- it is billed as "the world's largest natural warm water indoor swimming pool" and it is quite huge, a giant gravel bottomed pool filled with 87 degree mineral water from the eponymous hot springs of the town . . . and it has some old school water slides-- extremely fast and scary-- and rope swings and rings, and an outdoor pool and water slide as well . . . worth visiting;
8) we learned about Crazy Horse on the way to Wind Cave National Park-- the twenty minute film at the monument nearly made me cry-- carving this mountain is like a great underdog sports movie . . . a far more moving place than Mount Rushmore (in fact, you could fit all four busts at Mount Rushmore in Crazy Horse's head);
9) I learned that nothing looks sillier than a skinny dude in full cowboy attire-- black Stetson, black pinstriped button down long sleeve shirt, blue jeans, boots-- discerningly tasting an ice cream sample on one of those cute little spoons.
Park Rangers: Do Not Read
Yesterday afternoon, I took the dog for a spin around the park adjacent to my house on my new rollerblades and I'm pleased to report that she was very well-behaved-- to celebrate, I stopped back at the dog park for Dog Park Happy Hour . . . while I cannot reveal the name of the park that hosts this Dog Park Happy Hour, for fear that the park rangers might descend upon it, apparently every Friday afternoon (once it gets warm) the dog park crew brings coolers of beer and wine so that they can imbibe while the canines frolic; a retired teacher from Staten Island offered me a Long Trail IPA-- my favorite!-- so I couldn't refuse . . . a few moments later my son Alex called me, asking for a ride home from tennis practice and I told him I couldn't get him for a while, and so he should either start walking or call his mother because someone had given me a beer at the dog park and I hadn't finished it yet; he said: "Dad, they told us in Health Class that you should never accept alcohol from strangers" and I told him that was very good advice (with the exception of Dog Park Happy Hour).
This Beer Tastes Good
Once again, I've found a beer that tastes really good (Sixpoint Sensi Harvest) and once again, I neither have the discriminating palate nor the gustatory diction to describe it properly, so once again I'll turn to Beeradvocate for some descriptive language that might do it some justice-- and while all the quotes are stolen and verbatim, the final exclamation point is my own:
1) candied grapefruit and mild pine;
2) a thin cap that leaves gentle lacing;
3) resin;
4) slightly sticky;
5) caramel maltiness;
6) super-floral and a bit peppery;
7) grassy, melon vibe . . . pithy;
8) soapy, gingery, fresh hopped up the nose;
9) dank earthy hops with an almost vegetable quality to it;
10) refreshing and quaffable!
1) candied grapefruit and mild pine;
2) a thin cap that leaves gentle lacing;
3) resin;
4) slightly sticky;
5) caramel maltiness;
6) super-floral and a bit peppery;
7) grassy, melon vibe . . . pithy;
8) soapy, gingery, fresh hopped up the nose;
9) dank earthy hops with an almost vegetable quality to it;
10) refreshing and quaffable!
Fortnight of Health
On Monday, I started my fortnight of health: no weekday beer drinking, no junk food, and -- paradoxically-- no sports or heavy exercise . . . I'm trying to get in shape for Spring Break, as we are going to Vermont to do some snowboarding and skiing, and if I'm sporting a gut, then it's hard to bend over and latch in . . . and I'm also trying to stay uninjured between now and then, so no soccer or basketball . . . my Achilles tendon is sore from playing hoops, and my hip is sore from making a kick save (and a beauty) last week at indoor soccer; but, hopefully, in two short weeks, I'll be slimmer and my muscles will have regenerated, so that I can re-injure myself on the slopes and re-gain the weight I lost (in the form of delicious local Vermont beer).
I Get Paddled Several Ways (All Deservingly)
Two hours into our ride to Cape Cod, I realized that I had packed my inflatable stand-up paddle-board, but had forgotten the paddle -- and this made me very angry, as I knew I would pay an arm and a leg on the Cape if I had to buy one (I even contemplated using Amazon overnight shipping) but luckily there was a kayak and paddle-board rental place down the street from my cousin's house in Chatham, at the town landing on the Oyster River . . . my Uncle Mike explained how to get there and then warned me about John, the long-winded local who ran the place, and his warning was accurate: not only did I have to pay fifty dollars to rent a paddle for the week, but I also had to listen to an hour of anecdotes while standing in the fog at the dock before I could take the paddle; I heard about his first wife, his divorce, the tax rate, the worth of his two story underground house, his family history, his life on the water, his retirement at forty-four from the "water taxi" business, the chipped windshield on his new pick-up, the dent on the side of his new pick-up, and a particularly long story about how he threw a beer can at Harry Connick junior because he was driving by the Oyster River town landing too fast in his fancy speedboat, creating a wake in a "no wake zone," and then how he drove over to Harry Connick's house (which is on the Oyster Pond) and made his way onto the property -- scaring Connick's kids (who had just seen him throw a beer can at their dad) -- and found Connick in the yard, thrust his hand into his gut (at this point, John the rental guy thrust his hand into my gut and I had no idea what was going on) and said to Harry Connick: "Harry, I'm a big enough man to apologize" and was looking for a hand-shake . . . and he said Connick shook his hand but was not a big enough man to apologize for driving his fancy speedboat too fast in the "no wake zone" but he did say that now every time Connick passes John's rental dock at the town landing, he waves at John (probably because he considers him slightly insane and doesn't want him stalking him) and then -- Thank God -- his cell-phone rang, because I had no idea how to end this interaction, but this afforded me time to escape, and I must say, this was a great lesson for me, paying for the paddle with time, money, and awkwardness -- my motto with packing used to be "don't worry, if we forget something, we'll buy it, we're on vacation" but from this day forward, I will pack much more carefully.
Triple Threat
I may not be a great cook, and I'm certainly not a great singer, and (compared to my friends) I'm not the world's best beer drinker . . . but combine the three of them into one event and I think I'm right up there, one of the best there is at beer-drinking and singing while I'm cooking (especially if I'm listening to Sheryl Crowe).
Samara
We made good time on the long and winding road to Samara-- no student protests, luckily, as there were major delays in San Jose and at the airport; the drive around Lake Arenal was beautiful, the road snaked up and down through small villages, including one with a German bakery with delicious stuff full of coconut and honey, and there were windy heights with views of the lake and the surrounding windmills and lots of one way bridges; Alex assumed shotgun/navigator for the second half of the ride and heroically hooked up the AUX cable to my phone so we could listen to music but soon after he directed me onto a back road which led directly into a river and a failed river crossing voids the car insurance-- so though we rented a 4wD Daihatsu Rush, an amazing light stripped down SUV-- I turned it around and took the paved route; a few hours later we made it to paradise . . . our Airbnb condo has an absurd view of the horseshoe shaped Samara beach, the water is warm, the kids took a surf lesson and caught countless waves, we hiked to the tidepools, ate fish and drank beers at the restaurants on the sand, found a Mexican joint that makes incredible beer, etc etc . . . once you get to Samara there's not much to say, it's a safe relatively undeveloped tropical beach town at the edge of the jungle, sheltered by a reef, and the beer is cheap and the surf instructors are excellent . . . my wife says it's the Highland Park of Costa Rica, it's small and very chill and you can walk everwhere but I think it's a little better because the 84 degree ocean water is nicer than the Raritan.
Road Trip Day 14: We Drive Until We Arrive
A long day but a good one:
1) Alex recovered from his virus;
2) we visited some of the weird and smelly sites at Yellowstone-- fumaroles, geysers, paint pots, bubbling and boiling mud springs, mammoth inside-out limestone waterfalls, etc-- these places are a great reminder of how much thinner the earth's crust is here . . . the Yellowstone Supervolcano could blow at any time (I find it hard to believe that there are diehard creationists in this region of the country, when it's so apparent-- because of all the fossils and the geologic activity-- that the earth is an old and layered, evolutionary place);
3) after suffering many delays because of road construction, we finally made it to The Wild Rose-- it is located between Emigrant and Livingston, north of Yellowstone in the Gallatin National Forest . . . and my wife did a fantastic job with the rental: it is a brand new cabin on a big piece of land on the banks of the Yellowstone River-- which is full of trout-- and the cabin has it's own trout pond; the family that lives in the main house on the property is extremely hospitable, and set us up with fishing equipment and information; Ian and I both hooked into fish, but neither of us landed them . . . and then we got to eat our first home-cooked meal in a while, as Catherine drove up to Livingston and bought groceries-- including three kinds of sausage and local beer . . . my favorite part of Cat's trip to the local grocery store is when she calls me on the phone and gives me a synopsis of the beer selection, this time I chose Moose Drool Brown Ale and Bozone Amber;
4) my kids are obsessed with Professor Blastoff, a comedy podcast that got us through many of the long drives on the trip, and they are starting to recite the bits from the show when they are in the shower.
1) Alex recovered from his virus;
2) we visited some of the weird and smelly sites at Yellowstone-- fumaroles, geysers, paint pots, bubbling and boiling mud springs, mammoth inside-out limestone waterfalls, etc-- these places are a great reminder of how much thinner the earth's crust is here . . . the Yellowstone Supervolcano could blow at any time (I find it hard to believe that there are diehard creationists in this region of the country, when it's so apparent-- because of all the fossils and the geologic activity-- that the earth is an old and layered, evolutionary place);
3) after suffering many delays because of road construction, we finally made it to The Wild Rose-- it is located between Emigrant and Livingston, north of Yellowstone in the Gallatin National Forest . . . and my wife did a fantastic job with the rental: it is a brand new cabin on a big piece of land on the banks of the Yellowstone River-- which is full of trout-- and the cabin has it's own trout pond; the family that lives in the main house on the property is extremely hospitable, and set us up with fishing equipment and information; Ian and I both hooked into fish, but neither of us landed them . . . and then we got to eat our first home-cooked meal in a while, as Catherine drove up to Livingston and bought groceries-- including three kinds of sausage and local beer . . . my favorite part of Cat's trip to the local grocery store is when she calls me on the phone and gives me a synopsis of the beer selection, this time I chose Moose Drool Brown Ale and Bozone Amber;
4) my kids are obsessed with Professor Blastoff, a comedy podcast that got us through many of the long drives on the trip, and they are starting to recite the bits from the show when they are in the shower.
OBFT XXIII
Another successful Outer Banks Fishing Trip . . . thanks to Whitney and everyone else on this year's rather light team of fishermen . . . here are a few things that happened (or might have happened or almost happened) and some notes for next year:
1) I got hit in the genitals by a stray frisbee, thrown by Rob, who might be trying to take me out (as Rob, Whitney and I are the only fishermen who have perfect attendance);
2) best water ever;
3) we were chastised at Tortuga's for clapping and cheering too passionately for a little league baseball game on the TV . . . Jersey Phenom!
4) we learned that the bartender who chastised us for clapping too much while "families are eating lunch" was actually mad at the kitchen for not making him a sandwich and took it out on us;
5) Friday morning Jerry, Rob and I almost played tennis (and Whitney almost almost played tennis but he forgot his racket back in Norfolk);
6) Saturday morning, we actually played tennis, and while I like tennis and Jerry, Rob and I had a good time, the real motivation was my wife's face when I packed the tennis gear . . . the face she made said: all you old guys do is sit around and drink beer and maybe wade into the water, there's no way you're going to play tennis . . . and so while tennis is fun, proving my wife wrong is priceless;
7) Brewmanji . . . a drinking game that involved a bottle cap, the top of a cardboard pizza box, and a magic marker;
8) cornhole on the beach, cornhole tournament with randomized partners, and surprise cornhole aptitude by ringer Matt Rodell . . . but we did NOT have new cornhole bags;
9) we ordered entrees as appetizers at Tortugas and cut them up tapas style . . . Bajan burger bites and Coco Loco chunks;
10) McWhinney surfed;
11) Whitney brought a bucket of music . . . a stereo system consisting of a cell-phone in a bucket;
12) Whitney, in a hungover haze on Saturday, used his bottle of Red Stripe as a condiment . . . he thought he was grabbing a bottle of hot sauce, but it was his beer, which he poured all over his fish taco . . . he said it didn't taste too bad;
13) we did not pound any deck nails but Paci fixed the shower door;
14) Rob's poison ivy was aesthetically unpleasing and did not fit the beach theme;
15) next year, everyone needs to bring a tennis racket;
16) after twenty two years at the Martha Wood cottage, we finally figured out how to use the coffee maker;
17) when I got up at 4 AM on Thursday morning to drive to Jerry's house in Arlington, and Whitney and Gormley were just going to bed in Norfolk, and it took me eleven hours to get back to Jersey on Sunday . . . there's got to be a better mode of transport to get down there . . . a boat? . . . anyway, thanks again to all in attendance, Whitney for hosting, the Martha Wood cottage for remaining, and another year of good weather.
1) I got hit in the genitals by a stray frisbee, thrown by Rob, who might be trying to take me out (as Rob, Whitney and I are the only fishermen who have perfect attendance);
2) best water ever;
3) we were chastised at Tortuga's for clapping and cheering too passionately for a little league baseball game on the TV . . . Jersey Phenom!
4) we learned that the bartender who chastised us for clapping too much while "families are eating lunch" was actually mad at the kitchen for not making him a sandwich and took it out on us;
5) Friday morning Jerry, Rob and I almost played tennis (and Whitney almost almost played tennis but he forgot his racket back in Norfolk);
6) Saturday morning, we actually played tennis, and while I like tennis and Jerry, Rob and I had a good time, the real motivation was my wife's face when I packed the tennis gear . . . the face she made said: all you old guys do is sit around and drink beer and maybe wade into the water, there's no way you're going to play tennis . . . and so while tennis is fun, proving my wife wrong is priceless;
7) Brewmanji . . . a drinking game that involved a bottle cap, the top of a cardboard pizza box, and a magic marker;
8) cornhole on the beach, cornhole tournament with randomized partners, and surprise cornhole aptitude by ringer Matt Rodell . . . but we did NOT have new cornhole bags;
9) we ordered entrees as appetizers at Tortugas and cut them up tapas style . . . Bajan burger bites and Coco Loco chunks;
10) McWhinney surfed;
11) Whitney brought a bucket of music . . . a stereo system consisting of a cell-phone in a bucket;
12) Whitney, in a hungover haze on Saturday, used his bottle of Red Stripe as a condiment . . . he thought he was grabbing a bottle of hot sauce, but it was his beer, which he poured all over his fish taco . . . he said it didn't taste too bad;
13) we did not pound any deck nails but Paci fixed the shower door;
14) Rob's poison ivy was aesthetically unpleasing and did not fit the beach theme;
15) next year, everyone needs to bring a tennis racket;
16) after twenty two years at the Martha Wood cottage, we finally figured out how to use the coffee maker;
17) when I got up at 4 AM on Thursday morning to drive to Jerry's house in Arlington, and Whitney and Gormley were just going to bed in Norfolk, and it took me eleven hours to get back to Jersey on Sunday . . . there's got to be a better mode of transport to get down there . . . a boat? . . . anyway, thanks again to all in attendance, Whitney for hosting, the Martha Wood cottage for remaining, and another year of good weather.
Thoughts on My Son's Eighteenth Birthday
It is my son Ian's eighteenth birthday today-- yikes-- and it's been quite a senior year, but hopefully, he will get his shit together before he has to send his fourth-quarter transcript to Muhlenberg-- my wife said she'd like to "shake him" and I said, "go right ahead, he's not a baby anymore"-- in other news, I was eating a couple of my wife's vegetable and ham egg muffins-- she was trying to use up our egg surplus and so she baked eggs and other good stuff in a muffin tin and made a bunch of them-- and while I kind of like the egg muffins, I don't love their consistency-- they are too foamy-- and I don't like foam . . . I don't like foam on my beer and I certainly don't like cold foam on my coffee-- who the fuck is paying extra for cold foam? would you pay extra for cold foam on a beer?-- and, on a positive note in the age department, yesterday at the Y, my older son (he's 19) and I beat two giant Asian dudes in two-on-two basketball-- they were seniors in college, they were very athletic and could jump and shoot, but they had no clue how to deal with a pick-and-roll and didn't figure out Alex was left-handed until I told them . . . I'm not sure how long I can keep this father/son basketball thing going, but it will be fun while it lasts (and we can't wait until Ian can play with us too-- he's gotten really tall and long, but he keeps busting up his fingers playing volleyball . . . and though my kids are coming back to basketball rather late in life, they're a hell of a lot better than I was when I was nineteen-- when I was nineteen, I played basketball like a rugby player).
Where the Beer Really Flows Like Wine
The slopes were a little choppy today and Alex and I did one run too many . . . luckily this barn apartment has a hot tub down on the lower level-- the three of us took a soak after banging around the mountain all morning and then we all fell asleep and now I'm drinking a Lost Nation Mosaic IPA, which a reviewer on BeerAdvocate describes as having a "crackery malt base" and "earthy berry notes" to go with its "lemony citrus" notes . . . best Spring Break ever (aside from the lack of dog) because in Vermont, the beer actually does flow like wine (and people describe it as such).
Growing Pains
It was Father's Day Eve and everything was wonderful. Tennis in the morning with Ian. A game of Small World in the afternoon. Ping-pong with the kids. Beer from the microbrewery down the road. We were just about to order food from the Malaysian place-- roti and noodles and curry-- and I was absolved from pick-up duty.
I was passing the time before we ordered food by playing low-stakes online Texas Hold'em in my man-cave/music studio. The action was great-- all the Dads were drunk and betting like old-time cowboys. I was raking it in.
Then I heard breaking glass-- car-crash in a movie breaking glass-- and a scream. A slasher-movie scream.
I ran up from my study.
Catherine and Ian were in the kitchen. Ian was screaming, and Catherine had his bloody wrist under the sink.
When Ian came in the house, he pushed the rounded center glass pane of the inner door and his hand went right through. It was humid and the door was swollen and stuck.
Glass was everywhere.
He cut his wrist, but he was extremely lucky. He missed all the tendons and veins. So we didn't have to go to the emergency room.
It was hard to remain calm. Why was he pushing on the glass to open the door? Ian endured the lecture, and perhaps learned a valuable lesson (why do they always have to learn these lessons the hard way?) This is what teenagers do. Ian is about to grow-- his arms are long and his feet are huge but he still weighs 99 pounds. He's weird and gangly and just starting to gain a little bit of strength.
The other day, when he was serving, his new tennis racket flew out of his hand, hit the concrete and cracked. He didn't tell us because he thought we would be angry. I actually stayed calm and we ordered a new racket. We're lucky we can afford it (although we did make him pay for half . . . he needs to replace his grip tape more often, another lesson learned the hard way).
After a major clean-up-- involving a mallet, the vacuum, the dustpan and broom, and lots of wet rags-- we removed the glass from the floor and the door. I threw some duct tape around the frame and maybe we'll fix it (or maybe not . . . it's probably safer this way). We wrapped Ian's arm with gauze and a bandage and ordered the food.
Father's Day itself was less eventful.
I got a Fitbit! This thing is amazing. It has a touchscreen, it tracks steps, has GPS, shows me how far and fast I've run, maps it, and displays my heart rate. Sixty bucks! It's a refurb. I'm living in the future . . . 2012 or so?
I got to drink more local beer, I played more ping-pong with the kids (Ian played left-handed) and we went and saw my parents and wished my Dad Happy Father's Day. Ian's cut stopped bleeding, and we had an epic corn-hole/washer match: my brother and Alex vs. me and Ian. We lost the rubber match but Ian held his own left-handed.
My other Father's Day gift is on the way, a real wooden cornhole set. Ian has promised to paint something excellent on it as soon as his wrist heals.
I was passing the time before we ordered food by playing low-stakes online Texas Hold'em in my man-cave/music studio. The action was great-- all the Dads were drunk and betting like old-time cowboys. I was raking it in.
Then I heard breaking glass-- car-crash in a movie breaking glass-- and a scream. A slasher-movie scream.
I ran up from my study.
Catherine and Ian were in the kitchen. Ian was screaming, and Catherine had his bloody wrist under the sink.
When Ian came in the house, he pushed the rounded center glass pane of the inner door and his hand went right through. It was humid and the door was swollen and stuck.
Glass was everywhere.
He cut his wrist, but he was extremely lucky. He missed all the tendons and veins. So we didn't have to go to the emergency room.
It was hard to remain calm. Why was he pushing on the glass to open the door? Ian endured the lecture, and perhaps learned a valuable lesson (why do they always have to learn these lessons the hard way?) This is what teenagers do. Ian is about to grow-- his arms are long and his feet are huge but he still weighs 99 pounds. He's weird and gangly and just starting to gain a little bit of strength.
The other day, when he was serving, his new tennis racket flew out of his hand, hit the concrete and cracked. He didn't tell us because he thought we would be angry. I actually stayed calm and we ordered a new racket. We're lucky we can afford it (although we did make him pay for half . . . he needs to replace his grip tape more often, another lesson learned the hard way).
After a major clean-up-- involving a mallet, the vacuum, the dustpan and broom, and lots of wet rags-- we removed the glass from the floor and the door. I threw some duct tape around the frame and maybe we'll fix it (or maybe not . . . it's probably safer this way). We wrapped Ian's arm with gauze and a bandage and ordered the food.
Father's Day itself was less eventful.
I got a Fitbit! This thing is amazing. It has a touchscreen, it tracks steps, has GPS, shows me how far and fast I've run, maps it, and displays my heart rate. Sixty bucks! It's a refurb. I'm living in the future . . . 2012 or so?
I got to drink more local beer, I played more ping-pong with the kids (Ian played left-handed) and we went and saw my parents and wished my Dad Happy Father's Day. Ian's cut stopped bleeding, and we had an epic corn-hole/washer match: my brother and Alex vs. me and Ian. We lost the rubber match but Ian held his own left-handed.
My other Father's Day gift is on the way, a real wooden cornhole set. Ian has promised to paint something excellent on it as soon as his wrist heals.
Dave's Scarf-Technique Atrophies Due to Warm Winter
It's been a relatively mild winter, and so I haven't had much practice with my scarf-technique . . . I had it mastered last winter, but my skills have atrophied (and I forgot that I need to wear a hooded sweatshirt in order to make a scarf operate flawlessly) and it was very very cold and windy last night, but my parents took the kids overnight, so Catherine and I-- in honor of Valentine's Day-- decided to make a go of it and walk across the bridge into New Brunswick to eat at the delicious Ethiopian place (Desta) but my scarf was hanging low and my cheeks got so cold that I almost puked and I tried to convince her to turn back when we were halfway over the bridge, but she pressed on and I glumly followed . . . we finally made it to the restaurant, warmed up, drank our ice cold beer from the cooler-- ice cold beer that felt warm to our frozen hands-- and had a delicious meal, and then I really piled my scarf high for the walk home, and while this protected my face, I learned another lesson: you can't wear glasses when you have a scarf piled high on your face or they steam up and freeze, so you can't see where you're going (which admittedly, is better than getting frostbite, but still not a pleasant way to walk around in the bitter cold).
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