Jammin'

Jammin'
Originally uploaded by frobinso.

What a trip, what a beach. Destin is el caribe of the U.S. I'd never been before last Thursday - now I plan on making it a regular stop on the vacation tour.

We took off Thursday morning and ended up in Birmingham at around lunch to meet up with AN and R. We ate lunch, loaded up a single vehicle, and headed south. We got there around dinner and went to this restaurant named The Back Porch before arriving at our condo, Pavillion Palms. Mmmmm, oysters as an appetizer and an Admiral's Feast for entree. Can't beat it. When we got to the condo we met up with one other couple to vacation with us, we'll call them RR as both their names started with 'R.'

Friday morning we woke up, put on the swimsuits, and headed out to the surf. It was a day of sun, football, frisbee, and lots of beer drinking.

Friday night we headed out to this restaurant named Harbor Docks. My meal was good, but the other entrees were quite lacking. The salad was hopeless, the crab-stuffed shrimp were good, but not great. On the other hand, the scallops were the best I had while in Destin, and the Gumbo was excellent as well, just don't expect friendly service and good salad.

After eating we headed to this club named A.J's Friday night. I, not being the party-go-clubbing type, hated it. No bashing of the club - if I was a single guy in college I may as well have been in heaven - but as I am a post college real world person it wasn't my cup of pina colada. They did have a great live band and the atmosphere was kickin', it was just slam packed, no tables, dirty old men, and loud. The good thing was that it was an outdoor bar so it wasn't that smoky.

Saturday morning we woke up, headed back to the beach, and enjoyed another day of sand, sun, Corona, football and frisbee. For dinner, we headed to a restaurant named The Crab Trap. What a great restaurant! The picture posting above is from this place. If you head to the bar before eating, be sure to try their famous "Bushwhacker" drink. Great food, great atmosphere. Saturday night we went to a place called Bay Towne Wharf. Now, as stated earlier, I'm not the party animal I once was. But if ever there was a locale that would incite those primal urges again, it would be this place. We got out of the car, walked through a parking lot to a sidewalk that disappeared into the woods. Dark, very dark. We walked about a quarter of a mile into woods, couldn't see a thing. All of a sudden it opened up to this huge village with christmas lights in all the trees, surrounding a big lake, and adjacent to the intra-coastal waterway. It was like a neverland for party-goers. In the middle of nowhere was this huge happy place with tons of nice bars and good drinks. It was set up literally like Disney World or Dollywood, but for grown-ups.

Sunday morning we went to, guess what, the beach again. It was another day filled with sand, sun, football, frisbee, and beer. Sunday night we went back to the Back Porch for 1 1/2 LB of Alaskan King Crab Legs. My favorite seafood, it made the trip complete. Later that night we all stayed at the condo and relaxed for what was to be our final day.

After a quick shopping stop, mandated by the girls, we made the trip back. A & I didn't end up getting back until nearly midnight, but it was well worth it.

I love Destin, and I love the beach. It is one of those beaches that has more than enough to do, but isn't yet (but likely soon will be) sold out like Myrtle or PCB. The water was crystal clear, the sand was as white as I've ever seen, and the weather was fabulous. The weekend was spent with great friends, and will be a fun-filled, relaxing trip not soon forgotten.

ZZZzzzz.....

I can't go to sleep right now, even though I know I need to. I think my brain is working overtime right now because I'm excited about going to Destin tomorrow. Or maybe it's because today has been one of those days in which a lot of things happened, and I have a lot to think about. Let's see if I can write some of them down and then go to sleep.

I packed for my vacation today.
I ate lunch at a hot wings restaurant, and the hot sauce from the to-go box splattered into my left eye when I opened it. PAIN!
I conducted an investigation at work today, the results of which will more than likely end the associate's job with us.
I met up with D after work, we went to a favorite local bar - really crowded tonight due to a special event - celebs showed up.
Really strange crowd at our favorite local spot, I guess it was all the out-of-towners for the event.
Finished packing for vacation just now.
Lots of interesting news.

Anyways, all that stuff and more has got me to thinking about the day in general. Especially the work related stuff. I guess I really need this vacation. Other than getting this crap off my mind there is no intention nor point to this posting - hope you enjoyed it. If not, well, post a comment and we can discuss - then YOU can think about them instead of me!

I'm headed south...to the beach.

The Trip Home

I finally got to meet our newest family member over the past weekend. He's as cool as ever.

Although he was only four to five days old, he was surprisingly alert and active. He has already established a routine. Sleep for awhile, wake up and take a poo, be alert for about 30 minutes and eat, then go back to sleep. What is it with us humans and our adherence to routine? (All psychologists, psychiatrists, etc...please disregard that question)

I made the 450 mile drive home on Saturday and left there early Monday morning to make it back to work that night. Last night (Monday) was quite the marathon. On the way up there I very much enjoyed the iPod and the FM transmitter A bought me. The trick is finding a radio frequency that no channels are broadcast on and will stay that way for quite a distance so as to avoid frequently changing the station and the transmitter. At any rate, I found 89.5 and 89.9, which both worked well.

Home was wonderful. The air was much cooler and it actually resembled Spring, something we don't seem to get where I am now. The mountains were beautiful as always, and of course I spent some time with family and friends, whom I never get to see. Seeing my newest family member was the icing on the cake. My sister is as beautiful as ever, and my brother-in-law seems as happy as ever. Congrats to them both.

After visiting on Sunday with AT, my mother and I went to a bookstore. I have been wanting to try one of those audiobooks for some time and figured the 7+ hour drive home would present the perfect opportunity. I ended up listening to The Americanization of Benjamin Franklin by Gordon S. Wood the entire way. It is an absolutely wonderful tale and I recommend it to anyone interested in not only Franklin but in the political climate of the late 18th century. The book itself is a refreshing difference from the typical Franklin biography in that it delves deeply into the circumstances which Franklin was forced into that ultimately made him convert, yes convert, from a loyalist British subject into an ardent patriot almost overnight. (I'm a nerd and I'll stop talking now)

At any rate, with my audiobook the drive home went pretty quickly and the traffic was almost non-existent. The weekend was wonderful, I couldn't be more pleased with my new nephew. Things are going pretty well, and what's more, I'm getting ready to head down to Destin, FL on Thursday for a long Memorial Day weekend escape. I'll be sure to fill you in all about it.

My Nephew

noname-1
Originally uploaded by frobinso.

Well, here's my nephew at about three hours old. See the post below for my tale of the day AT came to say hello to the world.

May 17th, 2005

May 17th is the day my grandmother was born 82 years ago. On May 17th this year she received the best birthday present she's ever gotten in 82 years: a grandson.

That's right, I'm an uncle.

Me being at work, as I always am, I was not able to be there for the birth of my nephew, we'll call him AT. It was tough, let me tell you, I wanted to pack up the car, leave my work, and just head east. But at 450 miles away it wasn't very feasible. So I got lots of phone calls and pictures. I woke up early at around 8 am to check on my sister, who had gone to the hospital at 6 am. By the time I spoke with her she had already gone into labor and was doing great! Basically she said it was kind of boring waiting around for the baby to get ready to see the world.

Why do I always picture Will Ferrell standing up with all kinds of goo on him and saying, "Man! It was hot in there!" - SNL skit.

At any rate, we kept in touch and at around 11:45 am she called and said the doctor just came in, said she was about half way there, and expected the little bugger by mid-afternoon. I started to get excited. I went through my daily routine of coffee, internet, coffee, book, shower, iron clothes, and drive to freakin' work. On my way to work at around 1:45 pm I was beginning to wonder what was going on, and at about that time my sister calls again. "Hey guess what....we had a baby!" She had had ol' AT at around 1:30 pm and said I was the first person she called. She had a very wonderful healthy baby, a quick labor, and no problems. Thank the lord for that. AT as 6 lb 8 oz, and 19 and one quarter in. long. With big round red fat cheeks.

I ended up telling everyone at work, I'm sure I was annoying, and the pictures I kept getting via cell phone were great. I'd forward them to my email and print them off. His eyes were wide open looking right up at the camera seeming to say, "What's that?"

So my sister's now a mother, my mother's a grandmother, my dad's a grandad, and my grandmother is a wonderful great grandmother. And we all have one more little family member to celebrate life with.

What a difference a day makes. Happy Birthday Grandmother, I'm an Uncle!

Two Years

Holy Crap! Where has the time gone? Today (the 10th) is the two year anniversary for A and I. We joke around a lot and say that we feel like we've known each other for 50 years the way we always give each other a hard time - but I must say we have had a hell of a lot of fun despite our constant 'joshin.' We've done all kinds of stuff I won't name nor review here because it won't do any of it justice. But I would like to say that I wouldn't have the last two years any other way as far as our relationship goes, and that I'm looking forward to lots of years ahead. I mean, how cool is a girlfriend that will go to a baseball game six hours away on a Saturday that she didn't even know about until Friday? (Ok, so it was the Braves, but still) And who would have thought just a couple of shots of tequila would make a guy like me as attractive as I was to A on the night we met? :) Lord knows it should have taken more...

Now to the tought part....it is our two year anniversary and I don't have a present yet for her. She already gave me mine, and it was really cool. She bought me an FM transmitter for my iPod so I can play it in the car, a DVD, and a car charger for the iPod. She's awesome! Not to fear, I'll get something good for her. The real hard part is that her b-day is on the 15th, my grandmother's is on the 17th, and her mom's is on the 19th. Now we get to the how much money do you want to spend questions.

Happy Anniversary A - I love ya! Here's to two years together and looking for where the hell they went!

A Great Weekend

This was one of the most fun weekends I've had in a long while. A and I went down to Atlanta to catch the Braves/Astros play on Saturday night.

We headed out of town and made the six hour trek to the ATL to arrive in town around 5 pm. The game started at seven, so we quickly checked in to the hotel, changed clothes, drove to Lindbergh station, jumped on the train and rode down to underground, caught a shuttle - and what do you know, we made the first pitch by about 2 minutes.

Our seats were awesome. We didn't decide to go for sure until let's say Friday morning. I got online and bought tickets. Now normally, I would have gotten some midrange tickets, but this time I talked myself into getting good ones...what the hell. We were sitting just to the right and behind home plate - section 105L for all you Braves fans. We had great views and I've got some AWESOME pictures. Maybe some day I'll figure out how to post the damn things. The game began and we quickly noticed when you get these good seats you get a waitress, who takes credit cards, brings you your food, and then closes you out at the end of the game with a handheld barcode scanner. It was cool to not even have to get up to grab a beer - that's better than I can do on my couch. Not to mention I didn't have to fast-forward through the commercials. The best thing though was that the bravos won 4-1. They ended up sweeping them in four straight games. After the game we rode the train back up to Lindbergh and stopped at a Mellow Mushroom nearby, munched on some grub, and crashed.

We awoke Sunday morning by an impatient hotel maid who was ready to clean our room at something like freakin' 8 am. I could have bodyslammed her. Anyway, not being able to go back to sleep we woke up and got the free breakfast. Other than the early 'wake up call' we slept great. Nothing like a king size bed to stretch out in. We ate lunch at Moe's and then made the drive back home in around 5 and a half hours. We made good time, but I was constantly looking out for the Po Po due to the massive amount of tickets I saw being given out just the day before. Now we are back home and it's back to the same ol' same ol' Monday night. I just got off work and I'm watching the game I recorded earlier today, A is asleep.

I couldn't have asked for a better weekend. It was beautiful weather, the Braves won, and A and I got to spend a wonderful weekend together in which we both had fun. I also picked up a bit of fan gear: I bought A a pink Braves hat, I bought my nephew-to-be a Braves onesy, and I got a polo shirt. In short, it was a great weekend.

The Older I Get

You know, more and more these days those sucky holidays from when I was a kid are becoming my favorites.

Today (or actually at this time of night it was yesterday), for example, was Cinco de Mayo. When I was a kid all I knew was I had to bring Mexican cookies or chips or salsa to school and maybe if I was lucky I'd get to beat the shit out of a piece of plaster filled with hard candy. Now as an adult, or big kid I might say, I get an excuse to leave work early, go to a mexican restaurant, drink on a weeknight, and if I'm lucky I still might get to beat the shit out of a piece of plaster filled with hard candy. Hey, it's a great holiday when there really is no point. No presents, no mucky mucky stuff, no cards, just an excuse for fun.

Holiday number two: St. Patty's Day. Again, when you were a kid it sucked. You got pinched all day long by the most annoying kids that actually remembered to wear green. You brought dyed-green food to school, wore green, had to endure annoying little pictures of leprechauns all day, and were forced to do a book report about Ireland. Once again, as an adult the holiday is much better. Instead of green food it's green beer, that is if you're too weak to drink Guiness, and then it's green - ok, it's still black, but you pretend. And once again it is another excuse to leave work early, go to a pub, and drink beer in public on a weeknight.

Valentine's day absolutely sucked as a kid. You keep putting it off and putting it off until it is the 13th of the coldest most gray and disgusting month of the year. Then you realize you don't want to be the putz who forgot to make a Valentine's day box. Remember those? You spend about an hour cutting out construction paper to tape/glue on the sides of a shoebox. Then you spend another hour taping all those damn lollipops to the Valentine's cards you're giving to every single person in the freakin' class. To make it worse, you have to give away your hard candy. Now, as an adult, well, I need not explain why it is a good holiday. I must admit though, instead of free shoeboxes taped with construction paper it's hundreds of dollars posted to a credit card bill. Ok...I guess this holiday is a bad example b/c it still can suck pretty bad.

And last but not least there's New Year's. Let's face it, if you're not 21 this holiday is nothing more than the end of your Christmas break. You sit at home with some babysitter that's just as pissed as you are about having to babysit on New Year's. You watch a damn ball lit up with a bjillion lights fall from the sky - and you don't even get to see it break. What's more, you watch tons of people having a blast that seem to be laughing at all those morons who aren't on TV with them, yourself included. Now, as an adult, it's not only an excuse to leave work early, it's an excuse not to work at all. And, you get to drink in public on what may just be a weekday - or maybe it isn't - but you could care less because you didn't have to work whatever day it was. You get kisses...from strangers. And you get to laught at all those morons sitting at home with babysitters, and the babysitters. Oh, and you learn all the new backroads in the town you moved to for the job you didn't have to go to that day to avoid all the checkpoints. As if there were more sober people on the roads that night. Yeah right - just be careful. At any rate, it's another sucky kid holiday that rocks as a big kid.

Beginning to get the picture? Mundane holidays rock! The only problem is that as an adult Christmas, Thanksgiving, Easter, they're all just big FUBARS when you have to be the ones responsible for buying presents, cooking turkey, sharing Santa's cookies with him, and helping the bunny lay eggs. And to top it all off...that damn bunny you swore you'd beat the shit out of for hiding your hard candy all those years turns out to be...well...you.

Now I know why the plaster on Cinco de Mayo is always in the shape of a bunny!

Bud Seilig & The MLB vs The Roids: Round Two

I like to ask questions to my reader(s) on my blog. Here's a good one....

What the heck is going on with these whiners who are against imposing harsher penalties for MLB athletes who illegally use anabolic performance enhancing steroids? Go Bud Seilig, I'm a fan of yours.

Granted, I'm about as big a baseball fan as any normal person is - that is, I'm not a freak who stalks baseball players but I do love to keep up with the league on Sportscenter, I have my favorite players, and I LOVE my favorite team, but I love the game itself even more. (Sidenote: Therefore I do not like the Wankees).

With that established, in protecting our wonderful pasttime fans of baseball need to support harsher penalties to preserve the purity of the game, or at least what's left of it. Bud Seilig, the MLB commissioner, has proposed a 50 game fine for first time offenders, escalating after the second offense to (I believe) 100 games, and after the third offense a player would go the way of Pete Rose, and I don't mean eventually to the hall of fame. I know, I know, you can't believe anyone would contest this either, right? Well, as it stands now a player receives a 10 game suspension after the first offense. Need I say more? This is by far the most aggressive proposal ever made by a MLB commissioner regarding drug penalties. Go Bud, go.

In the past the MLBPA has disputed some of Bud's agressive attacks on steroid use, but at this point, with the threat of congressional interaction looming, they have little room to keep Bud from hitting a home run for his stepped-up punishments. Here's what's going to happen and what has happened very recently. The chief MLBPA rep actually replied in agreement this week to an email sent by Bud regarding harsher penalties. Now the table is set. At the meeting they are planning now the two ol' boys of summer are going to play catch and toss for awhile. Bud will start out at 50, the MLBPA will tone it down a bit, then Bud will go for 100 after two and again Bud will get toned down. Here's the kicker. Bud, and the MLBPA, know Congress will not settle for anything less than a lifetime ban on the "three strikes and your out" agenda. We'll probably see something like 30 games, 50 games, and BAM - you go yard. Not exactly as beautiful as Bud's proposal, but I'll take it over what we have now anyday... and that's a closer better than Smoltz.

Your thoughts, please.

Go Braves!

Little Feat, The Braves, & Bangkok

Man, Little Feat was awesome! I was lucky enough to get to go to the Memphis International Music Festival over the weekend. Actually all A and I wanted to see was Little Feat - and that we did. Go ahead and check another thing off life's 'to-do' list: see Little Feat play Dixie Chicken on the banks of the Mississippi - done. Not a bad gig, not at all. The ground was full of complete mud, the weather was absolutely gorgeous, I got great pictures, and I drank too much.

We kicked off the day at the Flying Saucer and had a blast. I had several drafts you can't find in many places, so you know I was enjoying that. Then we headed down to the festival on the riverfront, which was a blast. After that we continued the onslaught of our brain cells by returning to the 'saucy.' And guess what, we kept on by hitting Beale Street. Needless to say I spent most of Sunday on the couch. How many freakin' times do I have to tell myself "Oh hell I'm never doing this again?" Sound familiar?

Speaking of Sunday on the couch, I watched the Braves take two of three from the Cards. Hey, I love the Braves, don't get me wrong, but I was surprised to see them do so well against such a damn good team as St. Louis. Man, they're good. I predict they'll win the NL Central hands down. Again, you heard it here first, well, maybe not first, but damnit you did hear it here.

Now Sunday night was great too. One of my (and A's) favorite things to do is to find new places to eat. There's this new Thai spot named Bangkok Alley (although the opportune time for one, there are no sexual innuendos intended) that we decided to try. Holy Taiwan Batman, that place was good. I have recently, in the last two years or so, developed a taste for Thai. I was never a big fan of peanuts in pasta before, but for some reason I very much enjoy the spicy dishes now.

I'm still loving the Mac.

And that about does it for the weekend - and Monday (today) has been just a normal work day filled with fires I had to put out. OH, I almost forgot, I set up my fantasy baseball team finally - I'm such a kid.