Josh and Erin in the Twin Cities

You know, it's not that odd of a combination.

So, you all know that I am mad about cars and motorcycles, and I have recognized a need up here in the aftermarket car parts industry that I am looking to fill. As such, I am looking for a shop area to rent out while I test to see if my theory is correct. I hope it is, but time will tell.

This brings us to clothes, and you all (I hope) know about E and I going to India a few years back. Well, while there I made some contacts in the clothing industry to make custom suits for people. Those of you who know me will know that it didn't turn out so well. But what did turn out well was the production of jeans for Trav's shop. I am once again looking into that, but I would also be trying to sell them out of the shop up here as well, and I have a different supplier who is talking about the same quality at a fraction of the price. Of course this is a much larger organization, so they are really looking to grow the sales significantly, so it will be interesting to say the least.

Well, now you know what I have been working on lately, sorry it wasn't a very funny post, but I thought I would let everyone know what is going on.

No, I didn't break anything.

For this breaking news update, we take you to the weather desk where our trusty weather man, Heavy Coat has information for us, Heavy?

Heavy: Thanks, Useless Intro Guy, this is Heavy Coat at the Blogger weather station, and we have breaking news that it is cold in Minnesota.

Useless Intro Guy: That's breaking news?

Heavy: Of course!

UIG: Dude, it Minne-fricking-sota! They are north of the Arctic Circle, of course it's cold there. Where did you get your meteorology degree from, the University of Morons-R-Us?

Heavy: No need to get nasty...

UIG: Annnnd, while we look for a new weather man, we will take you back to your regularly scheduled programming...

And by the title, you must know that it is Thanksgiving and that we are playing dominoes again. No, Bonnie hasn't busted out the infamous, 'BIATCH!' yet this year, but there is still time, it is only Friday...

E made a smorgasboard of different treats for everyone, roast turkey, green beans, salad, stuffing, dressing, and the most wonderful pumpkin bread pudding ever. I made home-made hot cocoa to drink with the dessert and put a dollop of freshly whipped cream on top to finish it off. Can I say it was AWESOME?

We went to our favorite breakfast joint this morning, Hells Kitchen, to meet up with Bonnie's brother Zoom who was in town. It was good to see him and his family and spend a few minutes catching up on what has happened since we last saw him. I can't remember the last time I saw him because I was so doped up after surgery.

Let me just say, if Bernie wants to play dominoes, go for it, he'll let you win... :)

We arrived home last night around 11, and have spent a little while getting back into our routine. The cats have been pretty clingy, but no pee! I think I like our new cat-watcher-people-service-thing. The cats seem to like them as well.

The trip was a good one, it was really hot and humid down there, but it was also gorgeous. It was tough to make ourselves get back on a plane and head back here, although the weather is pretty nice here. There is just nothing like the water and weather down there in the Keys. If it wasn't so expensive I would be working pretty hard to find a way to move there. It was nice to be near/in the ocean again too. I only got mildly sunburnt, and that was after putting on sunscreen.

Once we get some of the photos ready, we'll put them up here so everyone can see how nice it is down there.

Today is the day we head out to the Florida Keys for the weekend Halloween festivities. It should be a crazy good time, I'll write all about it when we get back.

Have a good weekend!

Seriously, it has been raining for effectively 3 weeks now. They say that if this keeps up, we are in for a super-snowy winter. I guess that would be cool by me, since we bought snowboards at the end of last season and have yet to really try them out. But jeez, I am sick and tired of carrying my umbrella all the time. We didn't accidentally move to England or anything, did we?

On another note, this past weekend was the first official 'Man Day', and the rain did decide to hold off for a few hours so that we could get some serious fun in. We started with some Rugby World Cup action, watching England defeat France in the semi-finals. Sunday of this weekend England meets up with South Africa for the title. After Rugby, we headed out to Elko Speedway for the 'Eve of Destruction' event. Let me tell you, this was crazy, it was nuts, Travis would have loved it. They started the evening with the 'Super Bee' class, which is all four cylinder cars like preludes, sentras, and a lot of saturns. They then moved into the big V-8s, but here the catch was that there were two people in the car, one guy steering, and one guy working the throttle and brake. This was insane, cars crashing all over the place.

After the first intermission, they started the 'spectator drags' where anyone could take their car out there and race against everyone else. It was a single elimination event that came down to a Dodge Ram Diesel 4x4 and a Firebird Ram-Air. The Ram dogged him off the line, but the Firebird had much more HP and passed the Ram on the straight. This period was one of the highlights of the evening, don't know why.

So, now comes the REALLY fun part. Now they start the figure-8 races. Yes, you heard that correctly, figure-8 races. IT. WAS. AWESOME. That is all I can say about it. They had those big V8's out there again, this time running in the figure-8, and then they had the school bus races (in the figure-8), then to top it all off, they brought out the trailer races. This was just plain old destruction for the sake of destruction. It was Man-Awesome! The finale of the evening was something to top it all off, they had brought in a jet-powered firetruck. This jet powered firetruck backed that ass up to a school bus and fired up the afterburner. The noise was deafening, but it was awesome. Molten steel was flying off the bus, the back door was blown open and set aflame, everything on the bus was burning, including the steel frame and structure. Did I say it was awesome? Well, it was.

Other than that, not much has been going on up here in the Land o' Lakes. I have been badgering E for weeks to sell the Acura and get an M5, but maybe this is not the time to sell a front wheel drive car for a rear wheel drive car. Especially with a whole lot o' snow coming. We bought a rug for the living room the other day, it should be here in a couple of weeks. When it shows up I will post photos of it in its natural environment. Until then, look here and you will see what we bought. We are also getting ready to paint the bathroom, so I will have photos of that up soon as well.

So today marks 2 whole years of wedded bliss. It seems like everything has changed in the last two years. We got hitched, Erin started her own business, we sold our place in STL, moved to Minneapolis, got a new job, E got a new job, and then finally moved into our new place in Mpls. That's a whole lot to cram into two years.

So, to celebrate, we rented a convertible mustang and drove all over Minnesota and Wisconsin checking out the changing of the leaves. It was a great trip, and you wouldn't believe how tiring it is to spend a day in a car. The sun and wind really take it out of you. I think E took some photos, but I am not so sure. If she did, I am certain that you will see them soon.

Oh yeah, and happy birthday Drew!

**EDIT**
Due to my perverted father, I must point out that the area in () are supposed to be crowd noises, nothing else. Sicko.

Yes, ladies and gentlemen, you heard it right, we now have furniture. Fun for the whole family, come one, come all and check out the latest invention to come out of the twin cities! We have a couch! (ooooh!) We have a Dining table and chairs! (ahhhh!) We have curtains!! (ohhhh!) And last but not least, we have a new bed!! (oooh-aaahhh-ohhhhh!) I know, technological marvels such as this are often reported but rarely confirmed by independent scientific study, I assure you, our claims will be proven!! All we need are some volunteers from the audience to come on stage in the Twin Cities and you will be able to feast your eyes on the miracle of the modern world.

(pictures to follow)

We are officially moved into our loft!! Some friends helped move the last of our crap over to our new place today, we had it all here in two trips, and now this place is packed!! You never know how much junk you really have until you move, and then it starts to set in. I walked around the loft yesterday and decided that I didn't want any of the stuff that was left at the apartment, but then I realized I didn't have a coat and that I would have to go back. So much for minimalism. At least our storage locker is still pretty organized, even if we have more to move down there in the coming days. I have vowed to get rid of anything that I don't use for 6 months, so we shall see how that goes. Maybe I'll put stickers on things with the date of last use, or maybe that is just a little more anal than I really am.

We also stopped in to the Room and Board outlet store today to see if we could find some cool chairs for the living room, and lo and behold! There was our couch!! The one that we had just put a deposit on at the local store! So, we canceled the order at the retail store and bought the one at the outlet for a nice discount! Now our furniture is going to be delivered next week instead of the following one. We are heading back tomorrow to see if we can find some chairs, but unless they get a LOT of chairs in the overnight shipment, it is not looking good.

The home theater guy stopped in on Friday morning and checked the place out, and is supposed to get back to me with options on Monday, I can't wait to hear what he suggests. He and I have already agreed that a DLP is the only way to go for the size I want, and the price point I want to be within. The only thing that is causing me fits is that the 'standard' stereo rack is 20" deep, and we only have 17" to work with. He had some creative ideas of ways to mount everything, one being that the front of the hardware would come through the wall, another would be that the whole system would hang from the ceiling and be somewhat out of the way, but we shall see what he comes up with.

That's about it for now. We just saw '3:10 to Yuma' and it was really good, check it out. There is also a new movie coming out with Tommy Lee Jones that looks awesome, I really want to see it, it's called 'In the Valley of Elah'. Check it out, it looks awesome.

Adios, have a good weekend.

This will work a whole lot better if you start at the bottom and work your way up...


Our Couch!!!

Beautiful downtown Minneapolis
Our new grill!!!
our current furniture situation...
Ain't she cute?
Lookit!! E is going to work!
The last throws of my birthday, Jen is playing Connect 4 with Brad.
Awww, ain't that cute?
Fritz, Pat, Brad and I on my birthday at Psycho Suzies.
Me whoopin everyone's but on the go-karts
T-rav and Jalynn riding Curtis' beach cruiser. Contrary to popular belief, Travis had a hard time riding a wheelie on this one.
Wonder twin powers, ACTIVATE!!

Seriously, this was right after Travis surprised me by showing up here for my birthday. This was taken at one of my favorite places, Brits Pub.

I'm so excited I'm giddy! I cant wait!! We have been getting all of the last minute stuff set up for moving in, setting up cable, internet, phone, buying a fridge, a couch, chairs, barstool, curtain attachments, bathroom fixtures.

Did I say I can't wait to move in?

Yes, that is right, yesterday was the big 3-0 for me, the triple decade. It was a pretty average day as far as days go, E had her first day on the job, and I had just another day at the office. We finished up the day by going to Fogo de Chao, a Brazilian steakhouse in the same building as my office. We had always wanted to go there, but just never found the time. That, and it is $42.50 per person for the meat orgy that it is. If you have never heard of this place before, let me tell you, this place is ridiculous. So they have a mammoth salad bar for those vegetarians out there, but that is not the highlight, we are talking about the meat here, after all, it IS a steakhouse. They give you this 'coin' that is red on one side and green on the other. Green means you want the crazed men carrying swords stacked with steaks to stop and give you a slice, red means you don't. Sounds simple enough, right? So, I warm up with a little salad and then decide to start the meat orgy. I flip to green. Within minutes, I have 5 of these guys queueing up next to me, ready to chop a big hunk o' steak onto my plate. They were coming so fast that I didnt have time to flip my coin back over to red and get them to stop. Did I mention that this is an all you can eat place? Well, it is, and as Mike put it, this is 'a meat lover's Valhalla'. It was surreal, the amount of meat being cut onto plates. As our server put it, 'this is a marathon, not a sprint, so pace yourselves'. I think we were there for a few hours, and I think I put on another 20 pounds.

So, that was yesterday, but the real fun was on Saturday. Erin surprised me with Travis and Jalynn flying up here on Friday night and joining us at a bar, it was pretty great to see Travis up here and get to show him around. He has been threatening to come up since I moved up here last year (and yes, it has almost been a year). We started off the day with some indoor go-karting at the place in Burnsville that I used to go to for the league, and as usual, Travis kicked everyone's butt. Kaleb came with us and kicked my butt, but I was able to come back and stay on his tail for the rest of the session. Travis' friend from MMI, Todd, also came out for the races, but I don't think he was ready for the level of competition that we were putting out there. In the first race, we all bashed by him in the third corner and left him for dead. 8 minutes doesnt sound like a long time to drive, but when you are doing 20+ laps in those 8 minutes, your arms, back, and neck all get tired. By the second race I was done, I didn't have any energy left, and was only able to improve my laptimes by .7 seconds. Overall, it was a LOT of fun. We picked up a load of BBQ from a local place called Rudolph's, (which was VERY good) and headed back to the casa for everyone to start the party. People started showing up around 6 for dinner, and we annihilated that BBQ. I bought two party platters, and by the time the bus showed up, both were just about gone. Oh yeah, we had a party bus, and we went barhopping. This is where things started to get really out of control...

I think there were 15 or so people in the bus, and it was just one of those shuttle-type buses from the airport with the luggage rack taken out. We stowed the cooler and headed for uptown and the Independent Bar and Lounge. So, I know it was early, but this place was D-E-A-D and not very receptive to a big party like ours. We ended up commandeering the patio area and hanging out there for a bit, but it was not long lived. The most memorable part of the Independent was when Aric downed his martini as we were leaving. From there is was over to Brits in downtown to have some scotch eggs and cider. Everyone liked Brits so much that we ended up staying there twice as long as planned and then heading over to Psycho Suzie's to see Ryan and party on their patio. By now the bus rides between bars were pretty fun, and getting more and more rowdy. I think everyone had a good buzz going by now. Suzie's was hopping and standing room only, so we went out to the wet patio and stood under the umbrellas whenever it started to rain. This was the beginning of the end for most of the party-goers. We also spent double-time at Suzie's and had a blast until they thought one of our revelers had booted in the bathroom. This was our exit cue, whether it was one of us or not. BACK TO THE BUS!!! We only had a few minutes of the bus left, so we took it over to Cuzzy's, our local neighborhood bar that we could walk home from. Everyone filed in and we found a table in the back, near the games. Someone broke out 'Connect Four' and it was ON!! Girls vs. Boys. Unfortunately, the boys representative was quite a bit more intoxicated than the girls rep, so it wasn't really fair. I am officially calling for a rematch between equally sober or drunk people. Well, this was the end of the official birthday, and at this point most people headed back to our place where a few people crashed out on our couch.

So that was the end of the day, and it was a really good time, but Sunday was a little rough. Overall, it was the best birthday I have had in a lot of years. Big thanks to all of you that came with us!

We just had our annual national sales meeting, and all I can say is holy frickin' hell!! Our keynote speaker (surprise) was none other than Colin Powell!! This doesn't even get into all the musical performances we had. Let me see if I can remember them all, Collective Soul, Michael Buble, Carrie Underwood, Alicia Keys, Some Teeny-bopper girl group, and someone else I am forgetting. Overall it was a lot of kool-aid drinking, accompanied by a LOT of Archer Farms snack food (all fat-free mind you) and a nifty new clutch for E and a lunch bag for me.

I am still in shock of what I just witnessed. I never in a million years would have imagined a company actually setting something like this up. COLIN-FRICKING-POWELL!!! By the way, he does great impersonations of Bush, Reagan, Bush Jr, and Gorbachev, and he is quite funny.

If I get an invite, I'm definitely bringing a camera next year. AMAZING!!!

Looks like we are going to close on September 4th, unless something changes. We have gotten everything (to quote Snorenson) theoretically set up. We have been given some news that we are working to figure out regarding the earnest money and what-not, but it looks like we should be good to go on the 4th.

For the great 2007 furniture sale, we have sold the TV, receiver, DVD player, media cart, coat rack, coffee table, and hopefully the TV Stand as well. That leaves us with the couch, hutch, crafty desk, and my glorious chair. Any takers?

Everything must go, and I mean everything!! We're talking the TV, Receiver, DVD Player, coffee table, TV stand, media cart, craft desk, everything. If you want dibbs on something, then you had better speak up now!!!

Lots of things have already been posted to Craigslist so we can get ready for our big move!

can you tell we are excited about moving?

Not only was today our final walk-through in the loft, but today is the day that E got a job offer from the big T!! Based on the offer, it looks like she will be starting on either the 20th or the 27th of August. They liked her so much they don't want to wait that long, but it apparently takes a few weeks to get through the red tape and get someone set up and on-boarded.

Needless to say, we are extremely stoked to have her starting here, and I personally can't wait for us to be able to go get lunch together, and for me to stop in at her desk during the day when I am in her part of the building. (which I am often)

Happy Days!

These pics were requested by mom (Bonnie). We've been so excited about the small things in our loft (carpet and appliances) that we haven't taken any pics of the space - including the windows. So here you go! The last 2 are of our parking space - quite a big deal here in MPLS. Josh is excited because we'll have room for his next motorcycle purchase.

We had a great time grillin' & chillin' for the 4th this year!

Josh surprised me with a trip to Grand Marais last weekend (my b-day present). It was the most perfect gift! We got to relax and spent a lot of quality time together (those cats can be quite demanding). Our cabin was up on the Gunflint Trail surrounded by the boundary waters. We actually kayaked from Minnesota to Canada one day. Pretty neat.

The only thing we didn't really think about was the fact that Lake Superior is COLD. And the wind coming off the lake is COLD. It was in the 60's during the day and got down to the 40's at night! Kinda refreshing though. Next time I'm bringing a windbreaker.

The highlight was definitely riding the horses. J's horse was Sourdough (makes funny faces) and mine was Dizzy (kinda slow - needed a whack in the bum with a stick). Our trail ride included breakfast halfway through. It's kinda hard to get back on a horse with a full belly ...

Our dream is to own a couple of horses someday ... and don't try to talk us out of it! It's our dream! We know they're a lot of work! We can dream, can't we?????

Here are a few pics: