Last Swiss Post

A few more pictures from the trip.

Thursday night we had dinner with LL's business associates at Les Armures, a pretty nice restaurant near the Maison Tavel, the oldest home in Geneva which has a museum of sorts inside now.

Here's the menu, not a very exciting, picture, but something I wanted to capture.

And here's what I ordered, chicken stuffed with prune and duck liver. Those two sides are different kinds of polenta. Tasty meal.

One of the sites we saw on Friday was Central Perk, named after the coffee shop on Friends! The inside didn't really resemble the shop too much, but they did have sofas.

Look at this crazy crossing sign. They are very common in Geneva. Which one is for the pedestrian? It's that little one across the street which you can see is green when I took this picture.

Here's one of the towers of the main cathedral in Geneva, St. Pierre. We climbed up the narrow, circular staircase up the north tower and then walked down the south tower. Here's the south tower from the north tower I believe.

This picture from the tower shows how high up we were!

A shot of the city and fountain from the tower.

After getting some help from our concierge, Lionel, a very helpful guy, we took a free 25 minute bus ride across the city and country side to the French border and within a 10 minute walk of Mount Saleve. We got off the bus and walked to the border crossing. Unfortunately, as soon as we got off the bus, I realized I had forgotten my passport!! Doh! I was prepared to ride the bus back and forth, but decided to see if the border was actually guarded. Success, it wasn't. Getting back of course could be a problem.

Looking up at the end of the cable car ride on the top of Saleve. Yes, it was a bit cloudy on Saturday. Excellently clear weather up until Saturday though.

A picture from the cable car looking back down on Geneva. It's 3,600 feet up the mountain.

LL on top of the mountain with Geneva in the background. You can see some of the Alps in the background too.

ESDNM would have been jacked to hike this trail! It's on top of the mountain and is supposed to be a 30 minute walk. We walked about 15 minutes on it though and it was still going down hill. We're not dumb. We know we were going to have to walk back UP at some point and there is really something to that altitude training. Yowza.

Just a picture of the grounds at the top of Saleve leading out to the trail.

We rewarded ourselves with a nice late lunch at the top. Here's what LL had. She ordered off a price fixe menu.

I ordered my own combination, with an entree of mushroom stuff mini-raviolis. Delicious and filling.

This was the view out the window while we ate. Not bad.

We headed back down towards the border and found a shortcut to get there more quickly, thus eliminating most of the time for anxiety to build up while walking towards the border. Fortunately there were no guards again and we strolled through. LL was joking most of the time about how of all people, I was going to be stuck in France.

After hiking around the rest of the afternoon and nearly getting trapped in France, we built up a hunger later in the evening. Going back to the area of St. Pierre and Maison Tavel, we found this place. It was the first reasonably priced meal we had the entire trip! Remember, a coffee, tea and two muffins at the Starbucks was $18. No kidding and no exchange rate issues. Unbelievable.

This is what they served up. Sort of a small menu but they do it well. A half chicken, pommes frites and a salad for something like $14. Not a bad deal at all. The place was packed and people were waiting out the door to get in. We just barely beat the crowd and were seated immediately. They even had locally grown wine AND tap water!!

On the way back to the hotel, we were rewarded with this stunning night view of another fountain, this one in Place Neuve.

Overall a very nice, but short trip. Swiss Air constantly fed us on the flight and were very nice. The plane seating was 2-3-2, so there was only one strip of middle seats. You had your own screen so you could watch one of several new movies, tv shows, or play games. Much better than our airlines.

Day two/three of Geneva pictures

More pics of the trip to Geneva.

Here's the lobby of the Beau-Rivage Hotel, where we stayed through LL's work. The room was $575 a night!! Insane right? And other than the bidet, there wasn't much special about it. The staff was very nice though.

Remember that $30 lunch I talked about? Here it is. The pizza is really thin, but you can't really tell that from here. It was delicious though. The restaurant was Cafe Espresso oddly enough.

This is the inside of the bar we went to on the Place Molard. The amber beer was very tasty and LL liked the blanche.

Now for the fun pics. Here's the urinal in the bar....very much ala Wrigley Field. Ha!

A Lamborghini and a Colt. Two horse logo cars....not really the same though huh?

If you're from Chicago, you probably know the upscale restaurant March`e. This is what I found in Geneva:

This is probably the scariest mannequin I've ever seen. Really, really spooky.

Another funny doggie bag dispenser. Look at that tiny little mutt. Just like the French.

Geneva, day one or so

Here are a few pictures from day one and two of the trip to Geneva. LL was still working those days, so I was on my own.



The alps from the plane as I approached Geneva. The flight path was interesting as we took off from O'Hare and then headed north east over Grand Rapids, north of Montreal, across Greenland and Iceland and then south. Odd. Flight there was 8.5 hours and the return was 9.5.







The Geneva airport is filled with chocolate! It's all very expensive though, as you might expect in an airport. Following some internet advice, I bought most of my chocolate in the supermarkets: same stuff, about 1/4th of the price.








They don't just make chocolate bars or bunnies there though; they make some serious works of art. Here's one of the more simple chocolate designs. This was one of the really, really less intricate designs. They had scenes from movies set up and all sorts of stuff. Crazy.













Here's the big fountain for which Geneva is known and a Youtube link to it in action. The Jet d'Eau shoots an impressive 460 feet in the air. Many swans and ducks surround the lake too. They love tourists, who tend to feed them.






















As I sat on a pier in the middle of the lake and sipped a coffee and read a book, I thought it would make an interesting picture with the lake and Alps in the background. It probably would have been interesting if I had a camera and not just my phone, or if I had a modicum of photography talent. Sigh.

Geneva is serious about a few things: chocolate, pedestrians having the right of way and picking up after your dog. To that later point, they have doggie bags all over the place and garbage cans too.

We pay lipservice here that pedestrians have the right of way. When you're in the hospital or in court after getting hit, the judge will say you had the right of way, but over there, the cars actually stop! It's amazing. In fact, if you stop and don't cross and let cars go first, it causes all sorts of problems because they don't know what the hell you're doing. More than a few times we caused some delays by not crossing. Doh!







Here's a big wall that was part of the fortress surrounding Old Town. Pretty cool, unless you need to get to the shops on the other side, then they are a pain in the ass.






One of our favorite places to visit was Place Molard. Not only did it have a bar with it's own brewery and some tasty beer, but at night, this is what it transformed into:



















Each of those little bricks had a saying in some language and it would light up. How awesome is that? Look how pretty the plaza looks at night. Just beautiful.

Much more to come!

Switzerland (at least some of it)

Sooo much to talk about related to Switzerland, or at least Geneva. Many, many pictures to come later on Tuesday after I have some time to put them together.

Most of you already know that today was my birthday, my second golden birthday. I was born on the 22nd, so my 22nd birthday was my first golden birthday. I figure turning 44 was twice the number so twice as good, right? And it totally was! LL got me great birthday gifts including a Patrick Kane Olympic hockey jersey. Sweet! Then it was off to the Field Museum of Natural History. It's been a long time since I was there and really enjoyed the Lions of Tsavo (saw the movie), Sue, a new diamond exhibit and a 3-D dinosaur movie. Awesome.

The night was topped off with dinner at Sappori, a great little Italian place which is owned and operated by chef Anthony. Not only was the food just absolutely outstanding (possibly the best grilled calamari in the city, though I think Erie Street Cafe might still be better), but he gave us a wonderful bread pudding desert and glasses of Champaign. Very nice touch. Yay for me!!!

A Fine Day in Geneva

Another beautiful day weather-wise here in Geneva. LL and I took the water taxis back and forth across the lake in order to save walking a few more blocks than necessary since it was so nice on the water (where it could be a bit chilly I imagine). The highlights of the day were the big fountain and climbing the very narrow towers in St. Peter's Cathedral. Awesome, awesome views and I was able to post a picture to my facebook page. It and the rest will get posted upon my return.

Again we had Italian style pizza, which you actually CAN'T get in the U.S. to my knowledge, certainly nowhere that I've seen. LL didn't get to go there yesterday, so we went back for her to try it. Turns out my pizza from yesterday had squash on it, not cucumber. Not bad.

We started the day by moving hotels, leaving the Beau-Rivage at $575 a night to the much more affordable Hotel Tiffany. The rooms are little different, maybe a little bigger at BR, but certainly not worth 2x+ the price. For dinner we went to a place called The Pigs Foot in English, and they actually had a pigs trotter dish, but we couldn't do it. At $30+ a plate, we couldn't bring ourselves to try it. I had chicken stuffed with prunes and duck liver while LL had a duck dish (a l'orange?).

Afterwards we headed back down to the Mollard Square where a nice pub is which we visited yesterday too. In a foreign land and already settling into a routine. Sweet.

Tomorrow, weather permitted, we're going to take a bus to the France border and then a cable car up the side of a mountain. Should be fun!!!

Day of wandering around

Just some quick notes as it's after midnight here on Friday morning.

LL was still working today, so after sleeping in, I headed out on my own for the day. Starbucks coffee and a low fat muffin to go, $9. Yikes.

Good fun walking around and taking lots of pictures. I made the public transit system my bitch already and took a water ferry 3 or 4 times across the lake. Good stuff. Already bought some chocolate, mmmmmmm.

Lunch was a highly recommended pizza place and also on the "low budget" Wikapedia Travel site. Dandy! Menu in French, sole server only speaks French, so Joe ends up with a pizza with pesto, some kind of salami and some kind of squash or cucumber on it. Odd. But it was delicious! I ate the whole thing. Cost? With water, it was $30. Yeah, freaking crazy I know, and that was the LOW BUDGET option. It gets ugly fast in this town let me tell you.

More over the weekend I'm guessing. I can't upload pictures, so those will have to wait until Monday's entry.

A-OK!

Made it safe and sound to Geneva. Didn't sleep on the plane as anticipated...not sure why. Maybe I needed just a little bit more room and it would have worked. Slept when I got to the hotel before a nice dinner with LL and her work group. Tomorrow I'm on my own to walk around, have chocolate and drink coffee. Sweet!

The Journey of a Thousand Miles

As you know, it's been three months since I've been able to work out regularly and I've just recently started up again. After a few successful trips on the elliptical machine, today I decided to hit the tread mill for the first time. The results were not great, but I'm happy to have tried it. It'll be a tough road to hoe, but it starts with that first step, right? The weight lifting is coming along as well. It's kind of funny when I was doing bicep curls at weights much lower than I'm used to doing. My right arm would require a bit of effort while my left arm would just snap the weight up and almost go back through my shoulder. It kept asking for more weight and more challenge, but I have to work it the way I work my right arm, otherwise I could end up like a lopsided Popeye.

So the big flight to Switzerland is Tuesday night! Very excited. It's 8 1/2 hours, but the seats on my Swiss Air flight are 2-3-2 and I have a window seat. The seat also has it's own screen for movies. And there's dinner and breakfast served. Nice! Basically I wake up in Zurich, go through the airport and take another flight to Geneva which is only like 30 minutes in the air or something silly. Wednesday and Thursday the weather should be nice, but Friday and Saturday the outlook is for rain. I'm sure we'll find something to do regardless, but I'm taking an umbrella with me!!

Short Changed

Today is one of the worst days of the year in my opinion. It's not because of anything in particular that happened, though the Blackhawks losing 4-3 after having a 3 goal lead through two periods didn't help. No, it's that whole time change thing that gets me. Don't get me wrong, I LOVE the fall back portion of daylight savings, but the spring ahead side of it kills me. It's only an hour, but it screws up my entire day. Even as I write, it's 10 o'clock and it feels much earlier.

The last few days, and sporadically prior to that, I've spent a lot of time thinking about things related to my trip to Switzerland with LL. She's on the flight right now in fact, if you read this in the next 8 hours or so. Since I'll be on my own for one day and we'll be hanging out for two days together, we don't have a ton of time to see what we should/want to see. There are the obvious things like the big fountain on the lake and the flower clock in addition to old town. We'll see what we end up touring. It might just be that, a tour. Either way, it's going to be pretty relaxed. They just opened up a tram that goes up a mountain that would be fun. It's only open on weekends now, but when it's warmer, it will be open every day. I imagine the views from there are unbelievable. We'll see!!

Gloom, Boom and Doom

There was an interview on yahoo business with Marc Faber and Mike "Mish" Shedlock, the later being the editor of a publication called "Gloom, Boom and Doom". They discuss, in essence, our economic world collapsing in the not too distant future and that there's nothing the government can do about it. They want you to do some of the typical things to protect yourself like investing in gold. They also want you to do some less conventional things such as: move away from major cities (crime will go out of control), buy farmland (you'll need to plant something to eat) and buy assets outside of the U.S. Pretty radical. They, especially Shedlock, have been espousing Chicken Little like collapses for some time and since they've been right once, now they are getting lots of press coverage.

While I give them very little credence, I do find it an interesting supposition. What if our monetary system began to collapse and inflation went out of control and unemployment hit 25% (not actually espoused by Marc and Mike but it's implied)? What if the major cities had crime that tripled in frequency and significantly in degree? What if gold went to $5,000 an ounce?

Again, I don't see these kinds of things happening, but we can get a glimpse of some of what we might look like if we watch the news out of Greece. Granted, there are many, many differences between our country and theirs both economically and historically, but the environment I think would look similar if these things came to pass. The police get paid so poorly because their state equivalents are broke too, that some of them are crossing the picket lines!! You could easily see that happening in Chicago or NY or LA. There is more rioting in the big cities than elsewhere in the country and they are being led by students who don't have jobs and not a lot of options connected to a lot of frustrations. It's very interesting to keep an eye on.

Spring Ahead

For those of you who roll their eyes when I talk about the hicks in south, I offer further evidence of Americans who have yet to evolve.

Over the last few months, I feel my entries have been less.....substantial. Clearly not every day is going to be a novel or wonderful piece of writing, but it's clearly been slipping. My blog is more of an online journal of what I'm thinking on any given day as well as a documentation of what I've been doing. It seems that I've been doing more of the later and less of the former. Why, I ask myself? A good portion of the reason is, I think, that I often don't write my blog until after 11:00 at night, just before bed. Like most people, I'd bet my brain function isn't at full tilt just before going to bed. So I'm going to make a concerted effort to write before dinner. When I look back years from now, I think I'll be happier with the results.

Julius Peppers, the new Bears free agent, has taken #90. Who is your favorite Bears #90 of the past? Al Harris? Joey LaRocque? Alonzo Spellman? Jarron Gilbert? Antonio Garay? No threat of retiring THAT number.

Texas Ranger

Just read that Chuck Norris turned 70 today. 70!!! Holy cripes.

Today was a busy day which included a trip to the office and a meeting at a client. Neither were particularly taxing and they did get me out of the house into the wonderful 60+ degree weather. Unfortunately, I was pretty sore today from working out on Monday and then a hard PT session yesterday. Thursday will bring both a work out AND PT on the same day, but the PT session will be a bit easier as most of my at home work is stretching and mild strengthening.

Another note on my shoulder, I'm just past 3 months now from surgery! Full recovery is supposed to be 4-6 months. Next month, I'm hoping to be able to start some light tossing and then swinging the bat a bit. We'll see though, I'm not going to rush it.

A very fun Hawks game tonight!! Two fights, which I think are just one of the best things about the game. Good times. One of our players, Adam Burrish, came back from injury and he said he wanted to get a goal and get in a fight. He got in the fight and got an assist, so mission nearly accomplished. I had tickets for the game which I bought from a season ticket holder as one of four games which he could not attend. Instead of going though, I sold them to Bill the Bear for what I paid. It's harder and harder to get tickets at any reasonable price, so it seemed like the right thing to do. Turned out to be a great game to attend!!!

What's that number again?

Yesterday I hit the gym for the first time in three months and what was my biggest issue? The damn lock combination. Arrgggh. After using it several times a week for several years, it slipped my mind. Fortunately, I remembered what it was, or a close proximity thereof and was able to open it. After trying it a few times to make sure I had it down, it was off to the elliptical machine. The workout went pretty well, though I was focused on my aerobic exercise and working my legs.

Some Oscars talk. What happened to the tributes to Farrah Fawcett, Bea Arthur and Ricardo Montalban?? WTH? They mention Michael Jackson and leave these stars out? That's appalling. How long would it have taken to add those three to the In Memoriam section?

Though I haven't seen The Hurt Locker, it gives me pause that the highest grossing movie OF ALL TIME didn't win best movie of the year. Not best director? Fine, even though Avatar took 4 years to make and pushed technology to the limits through Cameron's direction. But no best picture? It doesn't make any damn sense.

Finally, the Bears don't have a first or second round draft pick in the upcoming draft, so they had to do something in free agency which began at midnight last Thursday night. On our way to Ricardo's cabin in Wisconsin, I had the sports radio on to see if the Bears made any acquisitions. Due to some technical issues, a mess of players who should have been free agents were relegated to a lesser status thereby limiting the pool of available players. It turns out that the Bears made a few pretty huge moves though and their future for the next couple of years should be significantly altered, so remember this day! They signed the most in demand free agent available, Julius Peppers, a defensive end. If he can put pressure on the opposing team's quarterbacks, our defensive backs and corners will be better since they won't have to cover for so long. It's like the goalies for the Blackhawks: if your two defensemen are good enough, you can get away with lesser goalies.

In addition, we signed a bruising runningback, Chester Taylor, who not only helps our running game, but it hurts a primary divisional contender, Minnesota. Finally, we signed a big blocking tightend, Brandon Manumaleuna, who should help both the running game and our passing game as he can provide more protection than our current group of ends.

Without draft picks who can start right away, we needed some players to fill holes and contribute right away. Looks like the Bears brass has done just about as much as they could given the situation.

limited post today

Lots to talk about, but I took my computer in to a local repair guy to see if he can get it souped up again. It's been running slow and crashing periodically, so I think it needs more memory. We'll see. So I'm on my laptop and the keyboard isn't ergonomically correct, which means it's considerably less comfortable to type on. So this is all you get today folks. Sorry. More tomorrow though!!

Wisconsin Weekend

LL and I headed up to Wisconsin, just north of Madison, for a nice, albeit short, weekend at the second home of Ricardo and wife. While there, we went to a fish fry with my good friends Portage Terry and Sharon and their daughters. Good fun. The restaurant? Hooker's on the River.
Suggestive name, but AWESOME place to go. You can cook your own steak or take part in the all you can eat fish fry, which gives you your choice of cod, walleye, blue gill or frog legs. Very, very tasty.





















Here are some pictures I took with my phone of our walk through a state park in the area. The rocky first picture has a piece of wood with a chunk of snow on it that is just laying there unaltered by the waterfall going on around it. We had a really nice weekend and stay up wayyyy to late drinking wine by a very warm fire. Good fun was had by all.

























Last week, while shopping at Yorktown Mall in the burbs, I decided to grab something to eat. Faced with all sorts of bad alternatives, I thought I'd go with Arby's. Their food seems not too gross or offensive at least. Here's a picture of what was on the tray. One penny off coupons for meals. I know it's a marketing ploy, but I think it's a bad one.

Finally, I looked up online what was the nutritional content of my food. Some of you are going to say, "Joe, duh. Of course it's bad." But I didn't think it was this bad. As you know, I'm watching my sodium intake and so all I had was a medium beef and cheddar. BAM!!! 1640 mgs of sodium. The RDA is 2400 mgs. Unbelievable. And I thought I was doing something good!! This is why, in part, that we're getting fatter and less healthy. Even a reasonably intelligent person doesn't have a chance without the information. Putting it on the internet is a start, but let's have it posted AT THE RESTAURANT. Then we can make intelligent decisions before we consume. That's the key.

Busy Thursday

Hawks win! Hawks win!! We ended up spending 5 hours at the United Center last night as we got there at 5:30 and didn't leave until 10:30. Good fun. The reason we were there at 5:30 for a 7:30 game was to get the handout bobble head doll. Mission accomplished. After a relatively edible beef sandwich with peppers and a few beers, we settled in for a decent game against a bad but game Edmonton Oilers.

Today I sat down at my computer and did some serious work. When I'm serious, the television is turned off and my distractions are minimized. I have to say, I did some good work for my client. It's part of a bigger project, so he won't know it for a while, but it was good stuff.

Tonight I drive out to the burbs with LL's dog so she doesn't have to fight rush hour traffic and then drive to Joliet and back late into the evening. This way, I take the dog to the burbs to her office, drop off the pooch, grab some dinner out there and then head back home. Traffic shouldn't be bad. Plus, she's already west of the city, so it's an easier trip for her to get to Joliet. What a nice boyfriend I am!! We need to drop off the pooch as we're heading up north to Ricardo's cabin with him and his wife for the weekend. Should be fun. Plus we'll be able to see my childhood buddy Terry and his wife Sharon.

A Blackhawks kind of night

Tonight, LL and I are headed to The United Center to enjoy a Blackhawks game against Edmonton. The team laid an egg last night in their only meeting against the NY Islanders, but hope to bounce back. The highlight of the night regardless? It's Jonathon Toews bobble-head night!! It's only for the first 10,000 fans though (that's about half the stadium), so we're going early.

We're hoping to see a good game!

Shrimping

Yesterday afternoon I decided to go to the grocery store and buy something to cook for dinner. As I've stated before, I really don't have much food per se in my house. When I want to cook something, it's off to one of three very close by stores to get what I need. So yesterday I opted for some shrimp, frozen of course because I actually saw one store fill their bin of thawed shrimp with shrimp from a frozen shrimp bag that I could buy just a few feet away so it really just doesn't matter, and thought I'd try to make shrimp scampi.

First of all, there are bags of pre-made scampi you can buy, but the sodium content is higher than I would like (yes, I'm trying to cut back on sodium) so I thought I could just make it. And guess what? I did!! After I got home, I looked up recipes online and then made another quick trip to pick up a few more items. Yes, it would have been smarter to actually figure out what I wanted to cook first, but it's tough for me to operate that way.

So the dinner menu ended up being 9-grain bread slices (really, really awesome!), a salad with low sodium high taste dressing, acorn squash with a brown sugar sauce (no butter!) and shrimp in a sauce of butter, white wine, lemon pepper and garlic over linguine. Very tasty, though in the end I think it ended up being too much food. I'm going to have to start cutting back and get ready for softball.

Olympic Losers?

This morning I looked at the sports page as usual and saw all the medal results for the winter Olympics. While the USA had the most medals, Canada had the most gold medals. In 1964 and 1968, the USA won only one gold medal and a total of 7 medals each time. This year we won 9 gold medals and 37 total. The last three Olympics we've really stepped up our game.

But another world power did not. This year, one country with 61.5 million people won only one medal, though it was gold. It was such a surprise to me and probably to you, that I can even tell you the even they won: women's Skeleton. Of course you don't know the country because no one saw the women's Skeleton races.

This country's GDP was $2.7 trillion. They are a nuclear power for goodness sake and they only managed one medal in the Olympics!! They are a G-7 member and won only one medal. For God sake, put forth an effort Britain. You're embarrassing the other world powers.

Do you remember this guy?

What an outstanding hockey game today between the USA and Canada. Unfortunately the good guys lost, but it really was a fun game to watch. Wednesday I get to see the Blackhawks play which means I'll see four of the guys who played today in the gold medal game, plus two who played for the bronze medal (but lost). It should be fun! It's a bobble-head night, so we'll get a Jonathon Toews bobble-head. Good stuff.




Here's a link to the 1965 first episode of Atom Ant. It's only 6:25 long. Well worth the time. "Up and at'em, Atom Ant!"













So February is really over? Wow. Two months into another year. I thought I would have accomplished more.....

Whoops, forgot to post!

Has a busy end to the day yesterday and I never finished my post. After having our Christmas card picking day at my folks' house, I can now reveal my favorite cards from this year that I received.

And here they are:



This first one I received from my sister Bee AND it was the card that I sent out and entered into my parents' competition (one of two cards I entered actually).





This card I got from Katie (KC) and I just thought was too funny to pass up. It said "wishing you smooth skating". That's just funny.










This card is from Dry Dock and it opens up into a pop up card. Very nice.




How could a self respecting Cubs fan NOT appreciate this card? Des sent this from Singapore, so props for distance traveled as well.









Finally, this card was from LL's sister and it's just a nice scene. I do like my birds!

Oven cleaning

You probably never thought you'd see a topic on my blog like "oven cleaning", but I strive to confound. Though my stove is probably 4-5 years old, I've never cleaned. Mind you, it's a self cleaning oven, so it shouldn't be that hard right? Well, I'm not sold on the whole self cleaning function to tell you the truth. It just heats everything up to like 600 degrees or something right? That doesn't seem like it would work on all the stains and gook in my stove, so I opted for some good old fashioned, lemon scented, fume free Easy Off. And boy did it work well!! You spray this stuff on, wait two hours and wipe off the grime with a wet sponge. Easy as pie!! And clean as all get out!

That's the kind of stuff I end up doing on a Saturday when I don't have softball, don't work out and LL is out and about on her own. I'm not entirely sure what that says about me......

My own Christmas card contest results.....

....are on their way. Today, I really thought I was going to be able to get to them, but I just didn't have time. I received some nice cards this year, so the decision won't be easy.

My physical therapy (PT) is going well by the way. It's been a while since I updated you on my progress. Today I started doing push-ups off of a bar that's about 3' off the ground. Up until now I've only been able to do push-ups off a wall in front of me. As an intermediary step, I put an exercise ball between me and the wall and did the push-ups off of the ball. The killer for me still is putting the back of my hand on my back and going up towards my head. By the end of the exercise I can do it a bit, but it hurts just to start the exercise which I have to do 10 times and hold it for 10 seconds. Ugh.

Ideally, March will be a big improvement month for my PT. I'm hoping that I'll be able to start lifting weights in the early part of the month and do some cardio as well. To warm up my shoulder now at PT, instead of heat, I have to spend 10 minutes on the arm bike, which is exactly what it sounds like. Since I can do that movement, I should be able to do the Elliptical machine. Working out was a big part of my life before my surgery and I'm looking forward to getting back into it!

A work day

Today was a work day where El Supremo De New Mexico (ESDNM) was in town and we called on all three of my clients. It was a good day, but tiring.

If our men's curling team loses to China, the match is going on as I write this, we should deport the entire U.S. team. That's ridiculous. In ALL OF CHINA, there are fewer than 200 curlers. If we can't beat them, we should stop sending a team. I'm also thinking about burning John Shuster in effigy, so don't be surprised if you see something like that outside my condo.

At the end of the day, ESDNM graciously offered to cook dinner for LL and myself! I happily took him up on the deal and we went shopping at Whole Paycheck for ingredients. It was kind of comical because he would ask me if I had something and invariably I did not.
"Do you have onions?"
"Nope."
"Carrots?"
"Nope."
"Garlic?"
"Nope."
"Rice?"
"Yes! I have rice."
"Thyme?"
"Nope."
"Dijon mustard?"
"Maybe....I can't remember."

Too his credit, ESDNM didn't lose his patience. When I cook, I go buy what I need for that meal, and that's pretty much it. I won't use those ingredients again usually, if there's extra, before they go bad. Such is the life of a non-foodie! What we ended up having was delicious though! Not that I can describe it too well, but there were rice and carrots flavored with a seafood stock broth. Nice. Bay scallops with shrimp, clams and mushrooms in a cream sauce. Yum. Then we had some baked asparagus. Good eating.

Damn Technology!!

Today was Christmas Card Picking Sunday, the 30+ year annual event held at my parents' house where the family gathers and we pick the best card that got sent to my parents that year. As a reminder, you don't know who sent what card and we're not allowed to look. Perenially I'm at a disadvantage as the either I'm by myself or I'm outnumbered by the other "family" units who may or may not know what card their spouse sent. I'm not saying there's cheating going on, but I lost again.

Thirteen cards were initially selected, but it was quickly whittled down to three. Sommer, my niece, chose the two cards that would end up receiving the most votes: one that I sent and one that my sister Brenda sent. Though my card was clearly better and more frameable, remember that these cards are put in frames and hung in the hallway of my parents' house, she won by one vote, 5-4, I think.....I'm not sure, but it was close!

Technology thwarted my efforts to show those two cards to you. I took pictures and after downloading them to my computer to be uploaded here, the files became titled "scrap". It's something I've never run across, but it means my pictures didn't download. Damnit. I'll get pictures again or maybe a scan from my folks and post it. Also, LL received honorable mention for one of her two entries, though I liked her other card better.

Ever sensitive to my health issues, my family stopped at The OG to pick up the salad for dinner. It came with a bottle of the dressing which has, get this, 510 mgs of salt in 2 tablespoons. Unbelievable. I opted for a dressing from the refrigerator that had only 40 mgs of salt for an equal amount.

I'm in charge now!

Alexander Haig passed away at the age of 85. He was the Secretary of State under Ronald Reagan when Reagan was shot in march of 1981 (was it really almost 30 years ago?!?). My lasting memory of Haig was him claiming, "I'm in charge now." as Reagan went into surgery and the VP, Bush, was out of the country. My memory was that is was said contentiously and emphatically. Thanks to CNN who have the clip of the newsconference up on their website today, I now have a more clear picture of what happened. He was actually very calm and there wasn't much discussion about him being correct.

He merely said that he's in control of what's going on at the White House until Bush returns and was in no way taking premature authority. Granted, he did say "Constitutionally, gentlemen, you have the President, the Vice President and the Secretary of State in that order..." which is not true. After the VP, you have the Speaker of the House and then the President Pro Tempore of the Senate. But Haig meant what was happing practically at the White House.

Salt, you are evil.

Most Americans have too much salt(sodium) in their diet. Doing so leads to all sorts of problems from high blood pressure, stroke and heart disease to enhancing the possibility of an onset of a Meniere's attack, a disease I have unfortunately. More on this in a bit.

Today I went to get my teeth cleaned by my dentist who happens to be my childhood dentist. Though I've had many dentists in my adult life, they kept leaving the business for one reason or another: retired, got pregnant, moved with husband who was a dentist to another state, etc. So i eventually said screw it and went back to the guy who has been there for 30+ years in Naperville. After my visit, no cavities!, I met my folks for lunch at one of their favorite haunts, The Olive Garden. Now, I know I just recently wrote about having one of my first experiences at The OG not too long ago, which makes it kind of ironic that my folks wanted to go there. Not having tried many of the dishes and trying to drop some weight as I prepare for softball season, I opted for the soup and salad special for $6.95. It's quite the deal really: unlimited soup and salad and breadsticks.

Now I get back to my first paragraph topic: salt. When I have too much salt in a day, my left ear starts to ring. This is the ear with the imbalance in it that leads to severe vertigo. It's also the ear in which I've lost about 30% of my hearing. Even as I write this at 9:00 p.m., my ear is ringing up a storm. So I looked up the nutional content of the various dishes on The Olive Garden's website. Boy, was I shocked!!! I had no idea how bad this food is for you. Below is a sampling:

		Total Fat	Sat. Fat	Sodium
	Calories	(g)	(g)	(mg)
Breadstick (with garlic-butter spread)	150	2	0	400
Garden-Fresh Salad (One serving with dressing)	350	26	4.5	1930
Chicken & Gnocchi (One serving)	250	8	3	1180
Chianti Braised Short Ribs	1060	58	26	2970
Pasta e Fagioli (One serving)	130	2.5	1	680
Eggplant Parmigiana	850	35	10	1900

Here's the RDA table:

For people 4 years or older, eating 2,000 calories per day, the RDIs are:
Total Fat	65 g
Saturated Fat	20 g
Sodium	2300 mg

So my soup (chicken and gnocchi) and salad meal is murder on sodium. The entree that I loved when I was there, Braised Short Ribs, has 129% of my DAILY allowance. Unbelievable.

In a nutshell, it's not that The OG has good food, they just salt the hell out of it until it tastes good. I really don't want to know about the butter and fat figures, though I present some of them above.

Family Matters

The other day I heard a reference, on one of my very diverse themed sports radio shows, regarding the television show Family Matters. They said it was the second longest running sitcom starring predominantly African-Americans. It was second to The Jeffersons. No Cosby Show?? Well, Cosby was on for 8 years and Family Matters was on for 10. Get this, it was a spin off of Perfect Strangers!! Yep, the show with Bronson Pinchot playing Balki. Too funny. Anyway, I had NO IDEA what Family Matters was as I've never actually seen an episode. Turns out, it's the show with Steve Urkel on it, even though he was actually the next door neighbor originally. It just seems funny to me that with all the sitcoms I watch (I'm currently Tivoing Barney Miller episodes from 1975), that I've never seen an episode of that show.



On Tuesday the Olympics showed the USA vs. Germany in curling. If you aren't familiar with curling, it's played on a straight, flat sheet of ice and is basically like Bocce. The object is to end up with the most stones, or rocks, closest to the center dot in the "house" ( a series of concentric circles at either end of the playing surface).


Here's a stone or rock. It's made of polished granite and weighs about 40 pounds.













Here are four sheets side-by-side which is pretty common for curling tournaments. Four games can be played at once. Each game is made up of 10 ends, which are like innings in baseball.







Anyway, I mention curling because our Skip (the captain and final thrower) sucks!!! He was awful against the Krauts, though to be fair, the German Skip is 38 and might be the most experienced athlete in the olympics this time around. The dude made our Skip look like a Lead throwing Light and short of the Hog Line. Unfortunately, our team followed the 7-5 loss to Germany with a 6-5 loss to Norway and then a 7-6 loss to Switzerland. 0-3, crap. Germany is 1-2 and Norway is 1-1, so it's not like we're playing all the tough guys, though the Swiss are 2-0.

Is it warming up?

In short, no, it's not. We're mired in the upper 20's and low 30's, just as we should be in mid-February. But man, I wish it would get warmer. This winter has been mild, but I still want spring and then summer to get here. Two things have attributed to that feeling I think: first, my therapist today gave me "10 throwing" exercises. Yes!! I don't actually throw in any of them, but we're going to be focusing more on those muscles I need to throw, not just to have healthy shoulder movement. So that got me thinking about softball and the summer as well. And second, pitchers and catchers are reporting to their teams this week which means the start of the baseball season; a sure sign of spring. Ahhh, soon.

Today I had a 7 a.m. meeting at the church, which meant a 6 a.m. wake-up call. The meetings are fine and worthwhile, but boy is that early to have a meeting. When I got home, I tried to take a quick nap, but it didn't work, so I've been screwed up the rest of the day. Hopefully I'll be able to catch up on my sleep tonight.

Some Facebook Talk

The other day I made a lifer altering decision. Nope, not about what to do with my third 20 year period of life, though maybe I did a little. The decision was to stop two time-wasting games on Facebook called Farmtown and Farmville. I'm not sure what caused me to start playing the games, though some friends were playing them so I guess that was it. But you wouldn't really think about me as a guy who would play farming games on the computer. Something about planning out the farm, growing it, plowing the fields, planting and doing it more efficiently that just hooked me. Finally I just had to say enough and let the farm go. Mafia Wars is completely different though and I'm still playing that! Bring on those Bangkok gangs!!!

Congratulations to Andy "Sausage" AKA "The Sausage King" on his engagement over the weekend. While I congratulate him, and I did, I would advise single gents against getting engaged around a holiday. Legally, if the engagement doesn't work out, the ring doesn't have to be returned if it was given around a holiday (like Valentine's Day). The courts have ruled that the ring could be considered a gift. If the ring is given NOT around a holiday, legally the ring has to be returned if the engagement is broken off by either party. Now this isn't Joe being unromantic, but the engagement can happen at anytime, so why pick a holiday if it has a potential downside? Keep in mind, you could be talking about a $10k or $20k or $30k ring! Or more! Something to think about.

Happy Valentine's Day!!! And President's Day!!

Do you have Monday off? Well, you should, but I don't. In the afternoon I have one meeting and a conference call which is near my max amount of effort for one day. :-) Actually, each will take 60-90 minutes, so that pretty much shoots the afternoon. The morning will have it's own set of email replies and recaps. Oh well, happy President's Day to me!!

Hopefully you had a nice Valentine's Day. Sure, it's a Hallmark holiday, I don't contest that idea. However, it is nice to have someone to spend it with and to overtly state, hopefully something you do frequently anyway, how much you care for that person. If it's a Hallmark holiday, at least it has a very positive message.

Skype Town

Today I had a really nice 90 minute video Skype call with some friends out in Providence R.I. who used to live in Chicago. If you haven't used Skype, it's a video phone call which costs nothing. The friends have had a baby since I last saw them and have a house which I haven't seen either, so they gave me a tour of their house and the baby was in most of the video call as well. Good stuff. It wasn't just a social call, but it could have been.

Anyway, if you haven't used it and you have a video camera built into your computer or you have $40 for a decent camera, download Skype and find someone to call! It's technology that only existed in cartoons 25 years ago!!

As a side note, I had a regular phone call with New Zealand in December for 22 minutes that cost me $77!!!! If that were a Skype call, not only could I have seen the person with whom I was speaking, it would have cost me nada, zippo, bupkis.

Finally, Voyager 1 is now about 12 Billion miles away from the Earth after having been launched in 1977. Here's a link to show you how far away 12 billion miles is. Voyager 1 came up because it was 20 years ago this week that NASA, at the behest of Carl Sagan, had the space probe turn around and take a picture of Earth from about 4 billion miles away. Cool stuff.

Tony O

Last night. LL and I went to see the Blackhawks play. It was Tony Esposito Heritage night and we got sweet hats as part of the night. Tony O was the Hawks goalie from 1969-1984 and helped take the team to the playoffs for 14 consecutive years. Quite a run. Granted, more teams made the playoffs as a percentage of all teams, but it wasn't a given. Unfortunately, he never won a Stanley Cup, but he did win three Vezina Trophies as the league's best goalie and the Calder Trophy for rookie of the year.




















We've really enjoyed watching the Hawks play after a tough Bears season. Plus, hockey has much more action than football. A while ago I mentioned a study that said an average football game actually only had 11 minutes of action. A hockey game is SO different though and it's costant action. Very fun to watch. Throw in some beer and you have yourself one helluva night!

Freezing tour.

On Saturday night, my church held a fundraiser for its school. Normally I can't attend the event because for some reason it's held the one weekend in February when my softball team is traveling. Even if the tournament was this past weekend, which it wasn't, I wouldn't have been able to go due to my shoulder surgery.

So off to the fundraiser we went and it was a fairly elegant affair. Wine, beer, sushi bar, other nice dishes and waiters bringing around lots of hors d'oeuvres. Good stuff. There were 10 or 12 tables of silent auction items and at least eight or so live auction items (which started at roughly $2k on the low end!). Everyone was dressed up and it was much fun!

There were several items on which I was bidding from the silent auction. The tables however were on a schedule to close about 5-10 minutes apart and in numerical order. Most of the stuff I was bidding on were at table 8, the sports table. The thing is, after a table closed, everyone went to the next table. And then the next. And so on. By the time they got to table 8, a huge crowd surrounded the table and squashed what I considered rather generous bids. Damn. Good for the school though.

One thing I did win though was for a group of 10 to tour local Fox affiliate, WFLD studios! And who does the weather for Fox? Yessss, Amy Freeze!!! So finally I'll be able to meet her. Yay!! And I don't have 10 friends interested in going on the tour I'm sure, so let me know if you're interested.

Anyone been to Geneva? The Swiss one.

Today I finalized plans to head to Geneva Switzerland with Lovely Laura!! She's going there on business in March, so I'm tagging along for the free room....free for a few nights at least. Looks like we'll pay for two nights somewhere and I have to pay for my flight of course. It should be fun!!! I'm afraid to find out how long the flight actually is, but I'm hopeful that I can handle it. Though I have flown to Europe before, flying for that long isn't my favorite thing to do.

So let's talk about Geneva! The temperature should be in the 40's and it will probably rain some while we're there as March averages 10.3 rainy days. Geneva is in the southwest corner of Swizerland....a little too close to France for my liking. A Swiss Franc (they aren't on the Euro) is worth a little less than a dollar, so it will be easy to convert the prices of things. That's key!! There will probably be a lot of people speaking French, possibly some German too and hopefully a lot of English!!

We'll have two days for sightseeing, so we're open to suggestions at this point. Just hanging out will be fun too though, so even if we don't plan anything I think wandering around the town will be nice.

Divergent Paths

Three years ago, the Chicago Bears, led by a dominant defense and an incompetent quarterback, marched into the playoffs with a bye week to start and as the #1 seed in the NFC. It took overtime for them to beat Seattle 27-24, avoiding a huge potential upset. If you recall, Seattle only advanced because Tony Romo dropped the snap on a short 19 yard field goal (shorter than an extra point!) which would have put the Cowboys ahead 23-21 with only 1:19 left in the game.

The Bears then dismantled the New Orleans Saints 39-14 despite 354 yards passing from Drew Brees and 132 yards rushing from Reggie Bush. Meanwhile the Indianapolis Colts won their third straight playoff game of the year 38-34 over the Patriots. It would be the Bears and the Colts in the Super Bowl.

So the Bears beat the Saints and then played the Colts for the championship. That was the last playoff game the Bears PLAYED. As you know, the Saints and the Colts played each other for the Super Bowl this year. The Saints didn't make the playoffs the next year and the Colts lost a close one to the Chargers. The next year, the same thing happened: no Saints and the Colts lost in the first round.

Different story this year though, but not for the Bears. And next year? I wouldn't bet against the Saints or Colts and wouldn't bet on the Bears making the playoffs. Divergent paths indeed.

All football all the time

Unless you live under a rock or in Europe, you knew that this weekend was the Super Bowl. The Colts played the Saints in a game that should have had little meaning for me. However, I was in two fantasy leagues for just the playoffs, so there was money on the line. Plus I bought squares in my softball team's fundraiser so there was more money on the line. Then there's the home town cheering as Sean Payton is from Naperville and I met him in the locker room at the high school when we were there for baseball. He was two years older than me so we were both in the baseball program at Naperville Central for two years. And finally, Mr. Manning defeated my Chicago Bears just three short years ago in the Super Bowl. I have not forgotten. In fact, I still have the game Tivo'd and watched it today while mentally preparing to watch the big game.

We had a nice fund raiser at Messner's bar on Southport and Addison. We charged $30 a head for food and drinks, all you can handle of both. The bartender was really nice and allowed LL and me to have Goose Island 312 instead of the regular, Bud, Bud Light and Miller products. Blech. Neither of us wanted to go hard liquor because, well, we're not 25 anymore. Actually LL could have but she has an early morning call tomorrow....yet another reason to move Super Bowl Sunday to Saturday. Like ratings are going to suffer. Though a client of mine who showed up to support the team, noted that the hosting city would lose out on another night of revenue from hotels and such. Good point. Still, I'd make the change. Plus I'd also rotate the Super Bowl to EVERY team's field over a thirty year rotation. I'd bypass Florida, California and New Orleans to start as they already have had it. Detroit hosted too, so they get left out to start.

Finally, the Bears promoted their defensive line coach to Defensive Coordinator as I predicted earlier this week. Now their Defensive Coordinator and Offensive Coordinator are the two guys who guided the Lions to an 0-16 season. Nice. Things look just freakin' awesome for the Bears.

Tassels??

So I had some light work done on my car the other day and was walking from the mechanic's shop to the train when I noticed this:



















Now, I've known plenty of people.....er things....er whatever, with tassels, but a new building? What's up with that? It's certainly not sexy. And people are living there already. If my building had tassels, I'd do something about it. Anyone know what they are for? I know they have something to do with the actual construction of it, but I don't know what.

Here are some pictures from last weekend:





LL's birthday tiramisu from Trattoria #10. Tasty!

















Here's the view from our seats for Jim Gaffigan. They were in the balcony, very nice!

Banks are pissing me off today

On Yahoo today I saw a disturbing story about banks and foreclosures. Apparently banks, who lend you money to buy a house with the house as collateral, are still coming after people after they foreclose on them and have repossessed and sold said house. Mind you, the bank doesn't take your word for how much the house is worth initially. Nope. They have their own appraiser go out and value the property. Then they charge you insurance, PMI, just in case you default prior to getting to the magic 20% of principal level.

Now they are going back after you after they've sold the house for less than the original mortgage. That just doesn't seem right to me. My house is the collateral for the loan. If I can't afford the loan any more, you get the collateral. That's the way collateral works!! If they think the collateral is below the value of the loan, they should come ask for more collateral, at which time I can agree or not.

Some states have anti-deficiency laws, but they don't provide protection for second mortgages or home equity lines, all of which I'm fine with to some degree, though still, they loaned money with collateral as an asset.

In Illinois, if the lender agrees to take the deed in lieu of repayment (actually called a Deed in Lieu of Foreclosure), they may not pursue a deficiency after the sale. That is not the law in every state however!! In some states, even if they say, "Sure, we'll just take the house and sell it. No problem." They can still come after you for the deficiency. Unbelievable.

A Lost Night

That's right Peeps!! Lost is back!! Ohhhhh, and some answers finally. Since LL hasn't been a watcher, we watched the hour long "catch up" episode prior to the two hour episode. The summary was useful and the new episode was really cool. The story line with Jacob and the bad guy is really compelling to me and I'm happy they went back to it. It seems like they lost it for most of last season. I'll just let that sink in.

Had some snow here in Chicago today, but nothing huge. In January, we had 12" less snow than less year. It was also 6 degrees warmer on average than last January, but just about normal when compared to the last hundred years or so (22 degrees). Some people might disagree, but it already feels like it's warming up a bit. We're going to have some upper 30's this week and that's sweet! Every decent day is another day closer to spring.

Today was also my PT day. My normal therapist was on vacation, so I had a sub who was pretty good, but pushed my arm a bit while stretching it. It's ok because I want to get better and know I have to go through some of this pain to get there, but like anything else, all therapists are not created equal. A different style, but still effective.

So many demands on my time....oh, and Bears talk!

This quasi retired guy is feeling a bit stressed with demands for my time coming from many angles. Work, or course, has it's place and that should be fine and generally it is, but we just added a new client on top of year end discussions with our current clients. Throw into the mix the four day extravaganza with LL for her birthday, still rehabbing my shoulder, meetings at my church, meetings with Family Rescue, helping with a fundraiser for my softball team and requests for help from friends, and my plate is full. Well, it's good to be busy to some degree, but normally my stress relief is working out and I can't really do that now....at least not yet. Yeah, even a treadmill is out for now as it's jarring on my shoulder. The physical therapist said I could ride a stationary bike, but my gym membership is on hold until I can lift weights, so I guess I'm waiting until I can use my treadmill at home. People have bigger problems, I know, but I am a bit stressed.

Is anyone else really just fed up with that guy in the McDonald's commercial who keeps saying, "Don't talk to me. I haven't had my coffee yet."? He seems like a jackass.

The Bears have finally hired an offensive coordinator. The guy hired, Mike Martz, used to be the head coach of the Rams and some other teams as well as being the offensive coordinator for the Lions when they went 0-16. Nice. The head coach for that Lions team? Rod Marinelli, the Bears defensive line coach who is now the odds on favorite to be the defensive coordinator.

But there is a small light at the end of the Bears tunnel. A very, very solid defensive end, Julius Peppers, could become a free agent this year and, if no agreement is reached between the owners and the players union, next season will be uncapped with no minimum salary that teams have to pay their collective players and no maximum either. That means Peppers will go to the highest bidder and no one needs him more than the Bears. If you have a pass rush, it makes your entire defense better. We need that badly!

One final point on the Bears, I'm wondering how many new offenses Jay Cutler has had to learn. I'm pretty sure there were two in Denver and now two in Chicago, so probably 4 in 5 years. That's not conducive to good quarterback play. Well, hopefully Martz has the answers and can work with him.