Orion's Steakhouse

Unlike almost 90% of the content on this blog, here is something no one will care about. By the way, sometimes I'm writing for Future Jim or possibly my kids but they will not care about this one either. I plan on writing a whole bit someday about how certain songs bring up memories and images in people (and of course to me in particular) and how every time you hear the song, the same collage of thoughts flies through your head just as it did a hundred times before.... of course, this might not happen to everyone since not every refuses to get new music and has to listen to the same tiny amount of the music he's managed to get into digital form which is itself a small subset from a meager collection of cd's, 95% of which he purchased before 1999.

Anyway..... I hate to draw you away from this fascinating pretext but to the point that no one will care about:

When I listen to Metallica's "Orion", an instrumental from their 3rd album which came out around 85 or 86, do I think of a Grecian hunter clad in a tunic and olive leaves jaunting through the forest with a bow and his legendary belt? I'm sure there's great story there somewhere but I don't know it and I don't think of that or anything else from Clash of the Titan's.

An image fills my head of a massive spaceship not streamlined or menacing but bulky and girder-encrusted... a little like the ship from Disney's "Black Hole" or maybe the one in 2001... but bigger. Much, much bigger. And at it's stern is an absolutely massive metal bowl a mile or so in diameter with the filling side pointed away from the ship. First, the ship is being built in some extensive orbital yard.... sections added on to it's growing bulk... figures in spacesuits welding plates and guiding equipment. All with the glorious blue and white sphere of the earth completely filling the background.

Then the figures are detailing it's interior... loading materials, running cables, etc. and putting the final touches on the exterior. And after a lot of milling about and some inspirational scenes of a launch sequence, small rockets fire and the behemoth slowly leaves earth's orbit and once it clears the engines die and a small object emerges from the center of the bowl.

And the H-bomb explodes.

I remember learning about the ORION project in the 80's either in a science fiction book (told as if it was a real project) or I saw it on the Carl Sagan COSMOS show. It was put forth as a way we could get to the stars with existing technology and I haven't looked it up since so I could be completely wrong about what it was.

So now I'll check it out.

Violet the Frog?

Erin has always had a fondness for bugs and so-called "creepy-crawlies". I can get her excited by saying "Let's go look under the log!" and we'll go down the hill in the backyard to where I burn sticks and pinecones. There's a big log from a tree I cut down 5-6 years ago that we sit on while cooking hot dogs and marshmallows.

Anyway, I'll push it over and Erin loves to see the ants, centipedes, maggots, whatever.... she'll pick up the worms and put them in whatever is her current "garden".

Over the winter, she kept a pet snail. It was "Shelly" for a while then became "Sheldon" when it changed shells (?). She would give it spinach leaves or pieces of carrot and she'd keep the jar clean in an attempt to show us that she's responsible enough for a pet. Then she had a toy dalmation with wheels that she pulled around everywhere and she gave it regular baths.

Now she's got a little terrarium in her room with 5 tadpoles (according to her... I'm assuming a few died) named Rosemary, Daisy, Blackberry, Blueberry, and Violet.

Casa uno mas

Home for a while but still wired
Mountain Dew and Coke go juice
Fun time, lots of visiting
brothers and sister in law, father and mother in law
mother father sister aunt uncle
canoed with Erin and Liam at Wekiwa Springs
fantastic beautiful saw a gator two turtles
Erin freaked out a little with the gator but in a nervous jokey but a little serious "heh-heh, let's get the heck out of here" kind of way
went to the Brevard Zoo
otters were Liam and Finn's favorite, Erin liked the armadillos who licked her feet
saw an early morning launch of the Discovery space shuttle, one of the last
lotsa Easter candy
egg hunts and bike riding including a major wreck by Liam - shaken but ok
Many Yenlings, Heinekins, plus a not half-bad vodka/pink lemonade/grape fanta concoction
saw Inglorious Bastards - brutal but cool
played 5-6 hours to finish Risk - a game that HAD to be invented before TV - 5 HOURS!!
Swam in a few pools and the ocean
awesome weather,
left at 5:40 Friday morning going down... made it in 9 hours, would've been 8 save for a wrong turn at Albuquerque
coming home, left before 7am Sat morn but took just shy of 12 GODDAMN HOURS
good times

I Heart Train

Well I'm down here on Spring Break in Central Florida... And, yes, if you have kids in gradeschool... you have Spring Breaks again.

Anyway... About this new Train song... as those hip kids in those wicked cool Mickey D's commercials say... I'm lovin' it!

The Perfect Storm

Biiiiig day tomorrow.... first, Erin's Pinewood Derby... worked on the car this week, registered it this evening... then Erin's soccer game.... THEN Erin's Leprechaun-themed birthday party. Took a half- day today at work to help get ready... still haven't come up with the games yet... instead I'm blogging...

And after her party, Erin plans to attend another.

Runny, Part 5

So I'll run 2 - 3 times a week for only about 3 miles each time. I'm taking glucosamine... I've never been a pill guy but it's basically chopped up shrimp casings or some chitonous substance... wait a sec, I forgot to mention that one of the reasons I'm running again is related to my anti-pill thing. It turns out that my cholesterol has recently crossed a threshold that has caused my doctor to recommend I take a drug to get it down. I've always had slightly high cholesterol in the 200-225 range but since my good cholesterol level was high, my doctor just said keep up the exercise and decent diet.

But now it's 230 and rather than go the drug route, I'm going to go stricter on the diet and keep up the running. My typical diet every day is a bagel with hummus (instead of my usual cream cheese), coffee with half&half (can't skip this) and for lunch, black bean burritos with spinach and more hummus instead of cheese, a bag of raw veggies, and a bag of cereal then whatever my wife makes for dinner. So we'll see how it goes.... if the cholesterol gets worse, I'll likely end up on Pravichor or whatever is making the rounds these days.

Anyway, although I miss running for real, I'm going to keep to it for health (not to mention the stress-relief and getting-outside thing!) I don't want to overdo it and hurt my knees which may threaten my hiking plans.

Speaking of, the fam did it's biggest hike ever together today... about 7 miles up and down Blood Mountain, the highest point on the Appalachian Trail in Georgia. Erin and Liam made it to the top with nary a whine and Finn stayed on my back like the smart lad he is.

Diamond Dave

Thursday I heard that the guy who played Davy Crockett and Daniel Boone, Fess Parker, had died. I do remember having a coonskin cap at some point in my childhood but I don't really remember seeing much of his shows. We did watch Disney's "Davy Crockett and the River Pirates" a few years ago and it wasn't bad for what it was.

Anyway, the first thing I'm thinking is could they re-do a frontiersman show? Make it serious and realistic?

The 2nd, Fess in the 60's picking up chicks in a bar "Hey, I'm Davy F*cking Crockett!"

Top o' the mornin'

Last week, Team Keough went to downtown Decatur for a booksigning (well, "stamping", her hand had been injured) by Mary Pope Osborne of Magic Treehouse fame.

While Kerry braved the madding crowds with Erin, I wandered the square with Finn and Liam. There were a few guys putting up some banners around Mac McGee's, an Irish pub for St. Patrick's Day. From the outside, the pub looked very inviting and I was a wee bit parched. The fact that I had watched a show on the Food Network the previous night where they were in Ireland demonstrating how to pour the pefect Guiness did not help ease the temptation to head in. Having the kids though was a little awkward and we were planning on eating at Doc Chey's again so I declined.

Tonight though, once again yet another St. Patrick's Day has passed, another one much like the others with a few Smithwick's (the current beer being pushed as 'what they drink in Ireland'), and corned beef and cabbage, a meal I've always loved, my older son is starting to like a lot, and my daughter still is disgusted by... like seemingly 75% of everything we put in front of her these days.

Two additions:
1) a trip to McDonald's, a fine Irish establishment, for Shamrock Shakes, and
2) a shot of Bushmill's

Another St. Patrick's Day where Erin tries to trap the wily Leprechaun... this time with a trap on the kitchen table and another in her room using a glass of green food-colored tainted grape choose... which she promptly spilled onto the carpet AND neglected to mention it.

Sure and begorrah, tis a wild child she be.

Runny, Part 4

So my plan was to start biking at work for exercise... I bike on the weekends, I'll just start taking short rides at lunch... maybe I can find a big hill in Norcross... there's a big landfill just south of Jimmy Carter...

But it didn't work out. Biking is a heck of a lot more of a hassle than out-the-door running. So maybe I'll join a gym. But now I get to work at 7 because of traffic... I don't see getting up at 4 to get to a gym. Actually, that could work... what I don't see happening is going to sleep before 10 the previous evening. Once the kids are in bed, that's my time to catch up on crap...

I could do a gym in the evening... possibly... but I really don't want to go to a gym anyway.

1) I like getting outside.
2) Actually going somewhere and having to go back is a great motivation vs. some computer thing.
3) I'm a cheap bastard.

So I decide to start running again.

Runny, Part 3

Then we stop and drink a little at another spot off the side of the road while the "runners" keep on truckin' down the line... finally I cross the finish line.... along with one other guy that like myself, actually wanted to get a time.

Speaking of, my time from went I crossed the starting line was 2:29:00. Last year it was 0:49:20. Not bad when you consider I drank about 6 beers along the way...

And then, naturally, we all ended up at The Highlander.

Banner Weekend - Part 2

Well, I keep getting behind in these posts so let me wrap this one up...
after the zoo, we didn't feel like driving back to the burbs it being such a swell day and all, so we went to Doc Chey's in the Highlands, a nice, safe choice.. they even had kid's menu's and crayons.... man things have changed intown, ya know?

Anyway, a bit of a surprise especially given my post about the kids only liking standard fare but they loved it. And $4 for each kids meal... what a bahgin. Best, of all, Kerry and I got to enjoy a meal on a deck with real music and ketchup nowhere in site.

The next day the whole gang ended up biking on one of the new Greenways. Well, Liam and Kerry were biking, I was sitting on the side of the path re-attaching Erin's training wheels. She can "ride" without them... using the strictest definition of the word... she just can't steer or go straight for more than 3 feet. But then we did all ride... the kids saw other kids they knew... and we had fun.

But I didn't really get enough exercise so decided to another ride on my own. I was pondering doing my Taco Mac run but then a friend called and asked me to help him get his pool cover off. His place was about 7 miles away so I set off. I had picked a route to avoid as much riding along busy roads as possible however I had to assume there was an extra back way connecting two subdivisions to a third. One I knew about and involved a ride on a rocky maintenance trail connecting a park and some kind of power utility station. The other I had to hope for the best.. it looked to be no prob on Google Maps - Satellite.

But of course I ended up sloshing through a less-than-sparkling stream, riding along the trail-less side of a weed-covered hill, then pushing my bike up pretty much a cliff (I failed to notice the "contours" on my so-called problem-free route) to finally make the cut-thru. Then, it took some time to haul the soggy leaf-mass cover Deadliest Catch-style from the pool and, with the sun quickly sinking, I had to kill myself to make it back the 7 miles to home before dark.

Yup... a good weekend.

Banner Weekend - Part 1

Last weekend was fantastic. Of course the amazing weather was only more so given the fact that the weekend before, we were sledding after the biggest snowfall in Atlanta since 93.

Friday night, didn't do much but blog a little... but I was a-buzzin' on Bushmill's so chalk it up to a good night.

Saturday, we went intown and visited some friends in Oakhurst, I ate a pricey and tasty sandwich at Nectar in the village, then went to the zoo which had all the Finn favorites: gorillas, elephants, lions, and the pandas. Erin was into the meercats. Liam later made a poster about a Red-Tailed Boa Constrictor he saw (and touched) at the zoo for scouts.

And Daddy lost his employer's BlackBerry.

I had it attached to the backpack I was hauling Finn around in and we had taken him out of it but I neglected to find a better place for the phone and it must have slipped off. I realized this in the parking lot as the zoo was closing so went back to the gate. Things were a madhouse so I figured that even IF someone had already found it AND turned it in to a zoo person, the likelihood of it actually making it the lost and found by now were extremely slim.

But I knocked dilligently on the door with an actual LOST & FOUND sign and after a little while, a guy came out with my BlackBerry... and promptly dropped it to the ground as he was trying to pass it to me.

So like 90% of the things I "misplace" (such as my keys that right now I haven't seen for 3 days), I got my phone back.

Runny, Part 2

So we start off and I do the first mile down past the pizza joint and none of the Hasher's are there so they must be at the next spot. Unfortunately, my info on the "next spot" is very iffy and I end up making some calls and running to around the 4 mile point then back to the 3.5 mile and doing a lot of standing around looking for a group with a flag among the thousands of revelers until suddenly, I end up on a side alley with a bunch of screaming people with a few coolers of beer making speeches and congratulating a hash contingent from Puerto Rico and then it's off again to the next beer stop.

Runny, Part 1

The last time I posted about running was this.

I had planned to keep it serious for the Peachtree but my knee kept hurting so I gave it up. However I had signed up for the thing so damned if I'm not going to show up and do something but what?

And then... hallelujah!!!

I heard that the Hashers were going to have a pubcrawl during the run and, of course! What could be better? Why not combine my two loves... running and drinking... into one... running WHILE drinking! Sheer genius!

By Hashers, I mean this group of runners/drinkers (throughout the world, by the way) that I've always heard about and associated with certain members of over the years but surprisingly never really committed to in any form whatsoever until...

NOW.

I get off the MARTA and my starting time is around 7:40 or something (I can't remember) but I run south instead of north along Peachtree to a pizza joint that the Hashers are meeting at and sure enough, there are two guys sitting at a table out front and YES they are drinking beer. I go to the bar and buy a pitcher with thoughts that this is about the first time I've drank beer before 8am since... well, I was going to say since some frat thing where we were camping and had no water so had to drink Busch but damn... that was probably after 8 so who knows when was the last time I drank that early? But knowing my memory, I'll be damned if I'll claim it as a record.

So, to make a not so long story less so, more people show, more beer is drank, and most aren't signed up for the run and those that are aren't bothering to start at the starting line but I have a computer chip thingie on my shoe so after cheering for the wheelchair racers and the fast guys, I hoof it on up to the starting line a mile away and stand in the massive throng of racers... a-buzzin'.

Whiteout

Just a quick one on the big snowfall in the ATL. Here's a pic of Liam sleeding on the hill down the street from us. He's on the slide from our plastic kiddie playground thing which actually made a great sled. We've had that playground (structure? I'm not sure what it's called... it's a plastic block thing made out of panels with a slide) since we lived in Buckhead with an infant Liam and it was given to us by some friends who said they had inherited it as well.

True Romance in John's Creek

Kerry and I never do a whole lot for the romantic holidays... Feb 3 was our 9th anniversary. As a tribute to something I did a few years ago, I remade a dinner from Trader Joe's (Trader Vic's would've been somethin'! Maybe next year....hmmm....), and got a tiny bunch of flowers and a card from Publix. When I was picking up the card, I noticed a card with a Grey's Anatomy theme and thought I'd look for one with Lost, something Kerry's huge into and is in it's last season right now. But no dice. I went up to the Hallmark next door and the lady said she saw one which caused me to ransack the store in search but nope...nada.

So I went home and whipped up a goofy card of my own.

For Valentine's today, I got her a little "I Love You" frog that plays "You Really Got Me", a song that I semi-planned to air guitar to at our wedding reception but didn't follow through.

Today, it was cold and slushy outside, so we did a "hike" around the mall. I carried Finn on my back, my bid at weakly simulating exercize outdoors. The kids liked seeing the giant fish tank at Bass Pro, the Lego store, and an indoor shoot'em up pellet gun thing not to mention watching Dad do a climbing wall. Too bad Kerry didn't get a shot of me actually on it!

A week or so ago, a little frustrated at seeing all the cool restaurants in the paper that I had never been to, I said we should make a goal of going to a different restaurant once a month. But of course, when we decided to go out this evening, we ended up at the same place.


It's tough when you have kids. For Liam and Erin's sake, you gotta have a place with basic burger and fries/grilled cheese selection. We push them to try different foods at home but since we rarely go out, who wants to battle at a restaurant? And for Finn, you want a place that's relatively loud so you're not bugging anyone too bad. And even then, I spend half the time walking him around (literally) the restaurant.


Anyway, so the choice was Steak n Shake, Taco Mac, and Chili's. Steak n Shake was hands down the kid's favorite but I didn't want a greasy (albeit tasty) burger... my doctor recently informed me that my cholesterol has finally crossed a threshold... more on that in a later post. And I refused to break my 15 year streak of never ordering anything at Taco Mac except for Wings and beer.

So we ended up at Chili's... the same dang place we've been to the last two times we went out. Oh well, happy Valentine's Day.

Merry Christmas!

I left work at 3 today to avoid the inevitable traffic mayhem resulting from the afternoon snowfall. I brought my laptop AND my monitor so I could work at home but - sorry - I played with my kids in what, as far as I can tell, is the biggest snowfall since just before I came to Atlanta in 93.

But what I've wanted to blog about for a week... and never ended up doing because 11 just keeps rolling around and I get up at 5:20am... is last weekend. A busy, busy weekend.

9am Saturday morning the Pinewood Derby. Liam had designed, cut some, sanded, and painted his car with an eye for speed and his car easily won each of his 4 heats so he assumed that he would win a trophy... there being 3 for each group and 3 overall but no, the top 10 in his group were all basically 2.4 plus or minus 0.05 sec and he ended up in 7th place.

Then we made it to the 2nd half of a chess tournament. It's "interesting" that soccer and football around this area seem to be 80-95% Caucasian but chess... at least the tournament... was about 5% Caucasian... interesting a.k.a "pathetic".

Watched Toy Story 2 Saturday night thinking that Finn might get interested in something on the TV other than Thomas the Train but nope...

Sunday, sickened of seemingly endless days of rain, I was determined to get outside and do some hiking. Erin joined me and we did the AT from Woody Gap up Big Cedar Mt and back... a fairly steep climb and the whole deal was in ice and snow. Unfortunately, I failed to notice when we left the house that Erin had on bellbottoms and "Mary Jane" open top shoes.

No complaints from Supah-Koopa-Paratroopah Erin.

Just stone cold hiking.

She's the one that, someday, will do the whole damn thing.

C.H.U.D.

Well, I was going to give the whole long story about everything Liam and I did on the scout trip to a cave in Kentucky but you can look here for the overview.... athough that site doesn't prepare you for the fact that you will be living in a world of "muudy" clay... meaning EVERYTHING that touches the floor or walls gets instantly stained with reddish-black clay.... no big deal for the clothes we were in but the comedy of gingerly positioning backpacks, tarps, pillows, spare clothes, sleeping bags, etc was something to remember!

Anyway, although our tarp was positioned pretty close to a vile port-a-let, we had a great time.

The key thing for me is that, assuming his memory is like mine (and hopefully it won't be), although 99% of the stuff Liam does in these years he will completely forget when he grows up, he will never forget the fact that he spent the night in a big cave waaaay underground. He'll forget that we crawled around through tunnels and maybe even that we went out on an underground lake in a boat but he'll remember that he slept overnight in a cave.

Just like last year when we had an even better time on the USS Yorktown, an aircraft carrier in Charleston. Liam won't remember exploring the control tower and the pipe-and-gauge-festooned bowels of the engine room and eating sausage and grit in the mess but he'll remember the fact that he spent the night on an aircraft carrier. Too bad that even though I brought ear plugs, I can't forget the snoring...

Note that in the picture to the left, Liam is sitting on his bunk...
my bunk was the one UNDERNEATH that one!

Weekend To-Do List: Sunday

1) Short hike with kids
check
2) Help Liam on Pinewood Derby car
just about done
3) Ride bike
check
4) Drink Purple Haze at Taco Mac
check
5) Take down Xmas lights
check
6) Take cargo carrier off minivan
check
7) Tell Erin "magic laundry basket" bedtime story
check
8) Read Thomas book to Finn for 34th time
check
9) Write up blog about cave trip
not started

Weekend To-Do List: Saturday

1) Bring trash and recyclables to Recycling Center
check
2) Help Liam on Pinewood Derby car
on-going
3) Do 300 push-ups
check
4) Read Thomas book to Finn for 30th time
check
5) Organize den achievements
check
6) Write up blog about cave trip
not started