WDW Day 2: Drinking Epcot

Though we finally got to sleep at 2am after our first day at Disney World, Annie sprung out of bed ready to get to Epcot as soon as it opened.  I wasn't having it.  Though she wasn't totally thrilled at the idea, we agreed to meet at Epcot at 10:30am, just before the World Exhibit opened.  This gave her the chance to run back to Animal Kingdom, buy a shirt she was considering, and ride Expedition Everest a couple more times.

This was my first encounter with what would become the Achilles' heel of Disney World:  the bus system.  Though I was out waiting for the bus by 10am, which seemed reasonable since Epcot was across the street, I don't think I actually got to Epcot for over an hour.  (Oh, and though Epcot was literally across the street, it was the World Exhibit part of Epcot, which means the entrance was on the other side, and it took forever to get to.)

Epcot is the only thing that I remember about Disney World when I went there in high school.  There are a bunch of different countries represented by a little neighborhood of shops and eats that are supposed to feel like you're in that country.  They were even worked by people who were brought over from that country.  It was mind-blowing for sheltered, white trash, young ~RoB, who was much less educated about the rest of the world when he was 16.

We started in Canada & the UK.  It was too early to drink, and I don't drink beer, so it was primarily looking at things to buy.  Annie wanted a London Olympics shirt, but we didn't buy it until we came back at the end of the night.  There were Highland games for the release of Brave, but it was swarming with little kids, so we skipped it.  Somehow, cornhole was considered a Highland game.

We were walking through a shop in France when I noticed a bunch of wine bottles lining a counter.  Granted, it was maybe 11:30am at the latest, but who doesn't want a little French wine to get through their day at Disney?!  The man behind the counter was asking the man in front of us in line how he planned to spend the day.  The guy responded, "I have 4 kids dragging me around."  Then he walked out with his full glass of Champagne to find those 4 kids.  They sounded wonderful.  Upon looking into it, we realized that there was a World Wine Walk where you could drink wine from the different countries as you travel through.  We signed up, and we drank the French wine.  I convinced Annie to get some French pastries from the bakery, but they sucked. Don't get 'em.

It was hot, so we liked to stop in all of the museum-things to see art and the like, since they were extremely air conditioned.  Morocco was just, eh.  Japan was better. They had this whole exhibit about how Japanese legends and ancient gods have influenced video games and cartoons.  Taiko drumming rings throughout the pavilion.  Annie did a Sake tasting and also got some sushi.  We skipped 'merica, cuz we're pretty well-traveled there.  Italy was the next stop on our wine trail.  It was also when shit started to hit the fan.

We drank the Italian wine.  This was probably the most disappointing of the countries, because the old lady behind the counter was bitchy.  However, we realized we needed some food asap, cuz things were slowly getting drunk, between the heat and the alcohol.  We found the Tutto Gusto Wine Cellar, sat down and drank wine and munched on some light food.  It was all really amazing.  One of the highlight meals of the trip.  Stumbling back from the bathroom, I realized that everyone around me was pretty red-faced.  Apparently, the only way to experience Epcot is to drink it. And to start early.

On to Germany. We actually enjoyed the German wine, and now we have our eyes open for Spatlese. I also got a lesson on the German wine-making region from the lady behind the counter.  Annie got beer, too.  China didn't have alcohol, but it did have a shitty, frozen-food version of a steamed pork bun.  We really miss living beside Oakland's Chinatown, because we got addicted to those damn little buns.  Who knows how much MSG we consumed in our last year there.  Anyway, China did have another cool exhibit about the life-size army of statues that one of their emperors was buried with.

Finally, Norway for the viking boat ride, and Mexico to drink in their new Tequila bar. At some point, it started to rain.  So, being sturdy, outdoors-y people, we took the opportunity to walk to the other side of the park, Future World, and ride some of the rides while people were evacuating or hiding.  Only a few things stick out.

Mission: SPACE was probably the most fun. More because they ask you to leave at least a dozen times if you have motion sickness issues.  It ended up being the best simulator I've been in.  The Seas with Nemo was uber disappointing.  Living with the Land was an interesting look at sustainable farming and research performed there.  And, of course, we had to do Soarin', since Annie loves it.  It's the exact same as the one in California.  I think we finished with Spaceship Earth.  I remember really disliking that ride the last time I was there.  However, the new interactive movie they create for you at the end made the ride totally worth it this time.  Annie tried to upload it onto her blog, but the link is broken, so here it is:

Annie apparently broke the camera on her side, but my face is classic.

Now you see why it took so long to publish this post, it's damn long,
~RoB

Walt Disney World Day 1: Animal Kingdom

Annie and I just took a week-long trip to Florida.  In general, we don't support the state of Tim Tebow & Urban Meyer, but Annie had never been to Disney World.  She's been to Disneyland about as many times as you've ever gone to the grocery store.  So, she wanted to compare the two.

Anyway, the trip consisted of 4 days at a Disney World Resort, the Caribbean Beach Resort, and a park hopper for all four days, then 2.5 days with my aunt & uncle, who just retired to Ft. Myers.

When I hear the words "Animal Kingdom" in reference to Disney World, I honestly only have one ride in mind:  everyone piled into a jeep driving through the back lot of a zoo.  Apparently, the park was built around this concept.  The ride I'm describing, Kilimanjaro Safaris, is hands-down the coolest ride there.  Annie really liked the roller coaster, Expedition Everest, but I wanted the encounter with the Yeti to be way scarier.  We both enjoyed the Lion King show, too.

At Animal Kingdom, we also rode the shittiest ride of the four days.

Annie was excited that her Home was the top destination.

I was getting hot & thirsty, and I knew alcohol was going to be the only thing to help me survive the trip, so I was dragging Annie to the bar inside the park.  On the way there, we stumbled upon a South African wine tasting.  Nothing says ~RoB like wine tasting.  So we both did it, and it was really fun, and it was pretty good wine.  I'm changing my mind.  Wine tasting was the best ride in Animal Kingdom.  They only do it in Animal Kingdom for the month of June, and it's only 4pm to close.  The coolest thing we found was Jam Jar, a sweet Shiraz.  Highly recommended, check it out.

We ended the day with a ride on Kali River Rapids, which is a shittier version of Thunder Canyon, for all you Cedar Point buffs out there.  I got more wet than I wanted to.  Especially since we were heading to Cat Cora's new restaurant at the Boardwalk*, Kouzzina.  The food was great, the atmosphere is always fun when there's an open kitchen, and the amount of food we got was more than we could handle.

We rode a ferry from there to Hollywood Studios, where we showed up 5 minutes late to Fantasmic.  This was one of my surprisingly favorite things about Disneyland, and it held up at Disney World.  We were going to take advantage of a bunch of rides since it stayed open later for Resort dwellers, but the lines were still ass-long.  We snagged the Little Mermaid show, which sucked almost as much as Primeval Whirl.  That's sad, cuz Ariel is smokin' hot.  We got to ride the Star Wars simulator, then we went home to pass out, which finally happened at 2am or so.

Fuck is it hot & humid right now in Florida,
~RoB

Birthday Party: Part 1 - Wineries

My birthday this year was on a Wednesday.  I turned 27.  Such an awkward number.  My birthday also happens to fall the day after Valentine's Day.  Annie and I had made plans to visit the most highly regarded winery in KY that evening.  Well, they were so busy on VDay that they decided to close for my birthday.  Kind of a bummer.  So, Annie took me out to dinner at a local place that was trying so unbelievably hard to be straight outta San Francisco.  It's called Table 310.  The food was great, but the wine wasn't spectacular (for a wine bar), and we both expected a little more from the dessert menu, since the pastry chef is in line for some big award.

So, we had decided to push the winery back to the Saturday after my birthday.  We actually decided to hit up three wineries in the same area southeast of Lexington.  We had a Groupon for one, and we were recommended another, so it all made sense.  We planned to leave at 4pm.  At almost 4 exactly, I opened my door to check my mail.  2 friends of ours were stepping up onto our porch.  Apparently, Annie had lined up another couple to hang with us for the day (and one to be a DD).  Spectacular!

We started off at Grimes Mill.  This winery is brand new (opened in September), and it's not even on the KY Wine Map that gets handed out at most of the local wineries.  I like 'off the map', and I liked this place.  They only have 6 wines, and they don't have the cheapest tasting ($6 for 3 wines), but it truly feels like a small, family winery.  We bought a bottle of their Bianca, which is a fan favorite.  I met both of the owners, one of which was the grower/winemaker, and we were served by the Tasting Room Manager.  Yeah, not a huge staff.  The best part was where I got all technical with the owner.  I asked him how crush worked in KY, what the residual sugar was on his moscato, and why he didn't have any Italian varietals considering his strong Italian heritage.  I told him I thought that Nebbiolo or Barbera might grow well here (my favorite Piemonte grapes).  That caught his attention.  Though he didn't know if he could find those vines anywhere nearby, he asked if I had any interest in working there.  More about that to come, I hope!

We then progressed to Talon.  Earlier that week, I had actually put in an application to pour in the tasting room at Talon.  They never responded.  I understand, I have 2 Master's degrees in engineering, but I totally would have worked for them.  I had already tried a bunch of their wines, but this gave me a chance to hit a few more on their list of at least 15 wines.  Tastings are typically $5 for 6 wines.  A couple wines weren't bad, but one was absolutely atrocious.  I seriously thought that I had found my first example of cork taint, but the flavors didn't match.  It didn't smell like trash, but a little like horse poop.  Apparently, that's a common thing for one of the local, popular varietals.  Though, they won't say 'horse poop'.  I did.  It was staffed by a bunch of guys that looked like UK students, so at least they kept the convo light.

We ended at Jean Farris.  Their cab just won a double gold at the San Francisco Chronicle wine competition, which is a big deal, especially for a KY wine.  I don't believe any KY wine has ever won such a prestigious award.  And the wine lived up to it.  Between the few of us that were still going (one girl hit her limit by winery #3), we managed to try most of their reds.  Their pinot was nothing special, but I really liked their merlot, and their cab sauv was delicious and perfectly balanced.  As we were sitting there enjoying a delicious cheese tray, another pair of friends walked in and wished me Happy Birthday.  'Cool,' I thought, 'Annie got another couple to come for dinner.'  Before I knew it, there were 11 people there, and we had a private room.  I felt so cool.

Though the service at the wine bar left a lot to be desired, our waiter in the private room was really cool.  The whole winery had an air of pretentiousness, which I'm really surprised with in KY.  Don't they know who their typical clientele are?  However, having lived near Napa Valley, we were used to it.  The food was amazing!  I got duck confit for the appetizer, and it was one of the better things I've eaten in the past year.  The large amount of wine may have had a little to do with it, but it was really, really good.  Twice now, I've considered walking in and ordering it by itself for a quick, delicious bite.  Most people got the special, and we went through 2 bottles of merlot and a bottle of riesling.  We spent a good deal of money, but again, coming from Northern California, it was a great deal.

This day is getting long, so I'll split it into 2 parts,
~RoB

Equivalent of Crying

I'm not an emotional person.  I laugh everything off.  Not so much that I hide behind laughter, but I think that's how it started.  Now, I've trained my emotions to just be odd.  So, when I say that I at least admitted that I was affected by hearing that Whitney Houston died, that's pretty much the equivalent of crying in my book.

I never really understood any of the hullabaloo when Michael Jackson died.  Hell, I was there... kinda.  Now I do.  It just has to be an artist that means a lot to you and had a large impact at some point in the past.  Not only did I admit that I was down about it, but I had a mini-meltdown that was unfortunately documented on Facebook:

I ditched my plans for the night to go out dancing.  I seriously considered walking to a nearby pub and drinking until I thought I could out-sing Whitney.  Instead, I took off to Coldstone to drown my sorrows in ice cream:

Took me about 15 minutes.

I swung by some friends' house across the street from Coldstone, drank a bottle of wine, and they played cards with me until I was sober enough to drive home.  I didn't drive home.  I drove to Steak n Shake and ate a grilled cheese combo (with bacon and a side of ranch).  By the time I got home and I stopped whining on Facebook, I was able to snuggle up with Angel and pass out at like 3:30am.

Annie's not here.  She's at home visiting her family.  It's probably good timing.  She shouldn't have to deal with me when I'm being so ridiculous.  This is way worse than when the Spice Girls broke up, and that kept me home from school for a day.  (Puberty was rough.)

I could only be as devastated if all the members of Boyz II Men died simultaneously,
~RoB

Royal Wedding - Day 1

Annie and I took off to Omaha, NE, to participate in the wedding of one of my favorite people ever.  He's the groom in the pic below (not to say that his new wife isn't just as amazing as he is).

All of these fancy cartoons are taken from the groom's blog.

The trip started with an invitation to the rehearsal dinner.  (Technically, I guess it started at 3:45am when the taxi picked us up to drive us to SFO.  After all, we had 2 cities to touch down in before we would eventually make it to Omaha [though we were on the same plane throughout].)  I guess checking into the hotel happened before the rehearsal dinner, as well.  We took a shuttle from the airport to the wrong Hilton.  Why the fuck are there two different Hiltons in downtown Omaha?  We also received a gift bag when we checked in, which excited Annie so much that she hasn't stopped talking about it.  Seriously.

Moving on.  I had never heard of general riff-raff being invited to the rehearsal dinner (or anybody outside of the actual rehearsal), but I'm glad they did it.  It was the first opportunity to meet people and family, and it was a good introduction to the high taste and classiness that the wedding would be.  We discovered that there were only a handful of people that we knew, and only 1 or 2 that I knew well (the groom was a friend of mine from U of M).  So, I had to come out of my shell a little and try to be social.

There was way more food than I expected, and it was really good.  (I ate just before going so that I wouldn't be a ravenous monster.)  The red wine was Flowing, with a capital 'F'.  Anytime somebody walked by, your glass was filled.  I probably drank something like 10 glasses.  After a slide show, we all congregated to the bar, and the Jack&Cokes started to make their appearances.  Then there was talk of progressing onto the next bar.  Which led to more and more bars, until we closed the bar at our hotel and I finally returned to the room with an already sleeping Annie.

Notable moments were:

Giving the bartender at some dive a $10 tip after keeping a tab open.  Alcohol was cheap, and we drank alot, so it was a fair tip.  However, he walked out from behind the bar to approach me as I was walking out, shake my hand, and thank me for the tip.  This is why I tell Californians that they have no fucking clue how nice we are in the Midwest.

A fight broke out at one bar right next to us.  The crowd splitting the multiple guys apart ended up pushing us into the bar.  We pushed back, and one of the groomsmen jumped in front of the groom in an attempt to shield him.  (Way smarter than my "punch him, pussy" cat calls.)  It was just this side of ridiculous, but the craziest part was the drunken redneck yelling "I'll fucking kill you, faggot!"  Who the fuck says the word 'faggot' anymore?  In my head I pictured him spelling it 'faget' or 'faggit'.  We were also surprised that they let him sit back down and continue drinking.  I guess it makes sense not to kick everyone out so that they can kill each other in the street.  Or maybe that's just how things roll 'round here.

Great Facebook statuses when I woke up:  "Alcohol is so cheap!" In Nebraska, True.  "What bar number is tjis?"  Fair question, but asking the same thing 12 minutes later is a bit obnoxious... and a sign that things are going downhill.  "Crazy dex happening in rhe 5040s. Come lisson!"  This was the last thing I communicated before passing out around 2am.  I thought I could hear some wild sex going on in my hallway.  I apparently thought we should all congregate outside of the participants' door and enjoy it together.  Note:  drunken texts are funny and between two people.  Drunken facebook statuses are funny and between 1,000 people.  Try to keep that math in perspective next time, drunken ~RoB.

Magically, a hotel shuttle arrived outside of one of the bars as we were all about to stagger home.  I have no clue who was in a right enough mind by that time of the night to make it happen, but kudos to them.  There were way more of us than the shuttle should transport, so the Super Groomsman (who shielded the groom) and I were going to walk back.  It would be an opportune time to start burning off the alcohol before taking off to nappy, nappy land.  They ended up shoving our whole party onto this little shuttle, which probably wasn't smart by any means.  I stood the whole way back.

My attempt at taking a pic turned into a fairly accurate representation.

Those people still going strong made our way to the hotel bar just before last call.  We ushered out a bride and groom, still in full wedding reception garb, cuz everybody within 4 states was getting married at our hotel in Omaha over Labor Day weekend.  Anyway, by this time there was a half dozen of us, including a girl that had fallen out of the shuttle onto the pavement at the Hilton, only to return in sweatpants and a renewed enthusiasm for drinking.  I had promised the Super Groomsman that I would still walk around with him before hitting the sack, but whiny messages from drunken Annie sent me up to my room with the groom when he finally decided to call it a night.  I found out the next day that the Super Groomsman managed to stay out an hour past that point, and he eventually returned to his room "smelling like a homeless person".

It had been a while since I've hit the hard alcohol, and Day 1 in Omaha was way more fun than I had prepared for!
~RoB

(Day 2 to come.  Day 3 is summarized in my last post.)

Bottle Shock

Have you ever seen Bottle Shock?  It's the best wine movie I've ever seen, though it didn't get a big surge until after it left the theaters.

The first time I saw the movie, I made a great wine-pairing dinner, and uncorked a bottle of pretty good wine (I think it was a Howell Mountain Cab from Mahoney, but we don't support Mahoney any more).  By the end of the movie I was pumped up on adrenaline and a little sloppy from finishing a bottle of Napa wine by myself in 109 minutes.  In my enthusiastic state, I decided to stagger down to Blockbuster to return/get another movie.  Somewhere along the trek, I remember talking to Annie on the phone and wildly gesturing with my hands, which led to the video flying into somebody's bushes right next to the window of their house, about 10 feet from the sidewalk I was walking on.  I'm sure they thought I was peeing in their bushes, if they noticed me at all.

Anyway, this was just to say that I really like the movie, and you should watch it.  In our Napa trip for my birthday, we ended up exploring more of the Bottle Shock movie then we meant to (we actually had no intentions of doing anything related to Bottle Shock... it just happened).  We went to Gustavo Thrace's tasting room (Freddy Rodriguez's character in the movie).  Then we drove off to...

Chateau Montelena!

I left with an autographed copy of Bottle Shock, signed by the real Bo Barrett.

I included this picture, not because it's focused or flattering by any means, but because there's so much going on.

Now if I can just get Chris Pine's autograph on it, too, cuz he's a hotty.

Chris Pine or Adam Lambert..?  Tricky, but definitely Pine (no goatee was the secret hint)!

What are your feelings on a red wine (w/ grapes?) tattoo on a dude?

~RoB

Sonoma Valley Trip

On Friday, Annie and I got to experience our first pickup party as wine club members.  It was fun, and I truly believe that we found one of the hidden gems of Napa/Sonoma Wine Country: Hook & Ladder Winery.  Their wine is delicious, super reasonably priced, and their tasting room is the most welcoming environment I've found in all of my wine tasting travels.  Friday, we showed up about 20 minutes before closing.  It was jam packed full of people, and we were immediately nervous about who we check in with and where to stand and how everything works.

Five seconds after we were through the door, one of the ladies pouring yelled over for us to come join her while she found us 2 clean glasses.  Every person I talk to there is more than willing to tell you everything they know and to make you feel as comfortable as possible.  Then, when they gave me the total bill for this quarter's club shipment and all the extra wine we had bought there, it was about $50 less than I expected.  We just kept adding bottles, since it felt that cheap!  The worst part about it was that they had sold out of my favorite vintages of my favorite wines, but I can't really complain that they make good, popular wine for such a small winery!

We woke up Saturday morning and hit up the Healdsburg Downtown Bakery & Creamery to try their doughnut muffins (among other things) since they were featured on Best Thing I Ever Ate.  They were good, but not nearly as good as their Pain au Chocolat or their Sticky Buns (we got both while they were warm)!!!  Then we went to pick up our quarterly olive oil shipment from Dry Creek Olive Company.  We're part of their olive oil club (just like a wine club, but cooler).  The guy there remembered me, which always makes me feel like a VIP, and we tried some of their just-released, new oils.  This place is always great, they have bocci ball on site, and we're seeing them pop up more and more in Norcal.  I really wish they had a facebook or twitter page so I could hype them more!

Finally, we spent the rest of the day tasting at 5 other tasting rooms (3 of them at wineries) while driving south to head home.

Big Surprises
Kaz Winery.  We went there because we have made friends with someone in the Bay Area with really close connections.  Our friend got us a free tasting of their whole fleet of wines, and Kaz was happy to give us the 'friends' discount which was RIDICULOUS!  We bought a 1/2 case of their wine.  For those of you that know us, this is a TON of wine for one winery.  We were worried that it wasn't going to be good, but that we would power through to save face with our friend.  We were wrong.  Their alicante blew my mind.  We even did some port tasting, which is usually not one of Annie's things.  She liked it so much that we bought one just for her!  Heck, we even bought a bottle of their hot sauce!!

Also, we ate at Zazu, which is a restaurant adjacent to the farm that's providing most of the food.  They make and sell their own bacon.  The food wasn't spectacular, but their bacon-wrapped dates were superb.  We bought a package of their bacon to take home.  We ate the whole package Sunday morning.

Disappointments
In asking around for winery suggestions before going to Sonoma, we heard Benziger a few times.  I even started to see it more at retailers (though I think that's because I always used to confuse it with Beringer).  Their property is gigantic, and they were in the middle of a huge party for their wine club members.  That wasn't a big deal, since it was separate and didn't really clog up the tasting room.  Though nobody was rude or snobby, big places like that just don't have the same warm feeling that Sonoma does so well.  You never feel like anybody cares rather or not you like their wine.  2 of their wines were absolutely amazing, but I couldn't afford a single bottle in their reserve tasting room.  They did move us halfway through our tasting to an even cooler room (just us and one other couple tasting) because the first reserve room was filling up, but that didn't really make it any better.  They also overcharged my card for an extra tasting, and the lady had the hardest time fixing it.  She ended up giving me her card and saying, "In case you get charged for 2 extra, which may have happened at this point, feel free to call and give them my name."  We got a free tasting for their sister winery, Imagery, and we're hoping we have a better time there.  One other thing to mention is that they are a biodynamic winery, and if you have any interest in super-organic woo-woo farming, you should research what biodynamic means.

Annie and I live off Cline Ancient Vine Zinfandel.  They sell it at Trader Joes and BevMo! and other wine retailers.  So, we were enthusiastic to hear that the wines they pour at their winery aren't mass-produced or widely distributed.  When we showed up, it was the end of a huge party (April in Carneros), so the property was filled with intoxicated people.  We got to taste everything we wanted for free, but the environment wasn't that inviting.  The kid pouring our wine couldn't have been more than 19, and he was pretty tied up by 3 drunken 19-yr-old-looking girls.  At least he admitted "a few of these wines are cheaper at BevMo!" for those wines that they actually sell at BevMo! (not the wines we were tasting).  I'll definitely be going back here once I can find an odd time where they'll be empty and able to treat me like the huge fan that I am.

Other places
Mutt Lynch, a dog winery that Angel was invited into and treated like the princess he is.
Deux Amis, a winery that shares a tasting room with Mutt Lynch, but I couldn't sip without my big nose being in the way of the shape of their small tasting glasses.
Glen Ellen Market, a gigantic deli with good food right next to Benziger.

One great moment of the day was at Mutt Lynch/Deux Amis when a group of 4 friends came in and tasted.  As they were leaving, they told one of the pourers they were heading over to Napa Valley and asked if they had any recommendations.  None of the 3 pourers in the room could think of a single place, since they all "hadn't been to Napa in years."  It's so funny to think that they are so close, yet there is really no reason to go spend money in Napa when you're surrounded by amazing, cheap wine in Sonoma!!

If you are heading up to either Napa or Sonoma in the near future, I'd be happy to tag along or just offer advice,
~RoB

Pimpmones

Yesterday, I went over to Annie's uncle's house to use some of his power tools.  The projects (yes, plural!) that I'm working on will be featured later this month (get excited!).  Anyway, I spent all day Sunday doing things by hand.  I was sore and getting whiny.  So, I had Annie call around and see if anybody had a circular saw and a Dremel.

Back to the point, yesterday I used a circular saw on plywood and managed to assemble two hinged/collapsible wooden objects that I designed.  I got to use sawhorses, a power screwdriver, a hacksaw, and a Dremel.  By the time Annie showed up to get me, I was in a rippling, hairy-chested man-frenzy.

Yes, me.  The wine-sipping, beer-hating, musical-loving, ballroom dancer felt super manly.  My man-hormones (I'm officially dubbing the word pimpmones; get that sh*t on UrbanDictionary stat!) were raging.  As soon as I got home I was flexing my muscles in bed, which led to DIWMGf.

I'm waiting to stub my toe and be returned to reality.

I made one huge discovery in going from manual to power tools.  You've heard the old adage, but it has changed:
Before power tools: 'Measure twice, cut once.'
After power tools: 'Measure once, screw it!'  (you can quickly redo the whole darn thing if you need to)

I discovered this after screwing up one of my drill-holes by 1/4", something I would have never done when I was methodically taking my time and manually screwing each screw in.

My pimpmones be flowin',
~RoB

P.S. Ewww, I don't actually have a hairy chest.

Michael Scott & Granny

If the title of this post gave you a mental image of Michael Scott nailing Granny, like the boss and his coffee mug from Office Space, then you are fucked up, and you should leave now.

Gets your juices flowing, eh?

Instead, the title is a reference to the fact that I work with someone who is so much like Michael Scott, that it literally isn't even funny.  He's a middle-aged engineer with a productivity level of a special needs child.  He walks from office to office (there are 4 offices in my trailer, not including his) sparking up random convos and stories.  I heard him giving the full synopsis to The Social Network to the poor girl next to me who hadn't seen it, and I wanted to blow up the whole trailer, as a martyr.  Today he rolled into my office, because he heard me talking to one of the cooler cats about tequila.  He wanted to let me know that he knew a few things about tequila... like how to mispronounce Reposado and Anejo.  He also pointed out, since I talked about wine with other people, that the famed Franzia is boxed in the town where he lives.  Wow, if he were any cooler, they'd put an ad on our website of him riding his mountain bike around by himself.  Oh shit, they did!

Granny just got back out of the hospital today.  On Tuesday, Mom called me hysterical because they had to rush Granny back into the hospital.  That makes time #3 since Xmas Day, and she's spent less time at home than in the hospital since this all hit the fan.  Apparently, on Tuesday she fell and Mom couldn't help her back up.  She was having some of the same problems that she had around Xmas, and an ambulance was called.  While in the hospital this time, they found cancer in her other (right) lung, and gave her a full-body PET scan.  Nobody knows the results yet, but she still sounds like she has stroke-face.  She said she was so happy to take a nap today without anybody "poking her to wake her up and take a blood sample".  I'm not ready to deal with that, but everyone is pushing me to go back and visit her.  I know it would lighten her day, but it'd suck for me, and I'm selfish.

So, I guess I'm torn between hanging with Michael Scott or Granny,
~RoB

Annob's Valenbirthday Wine Weekend

Annie and I went on a little wine trip for my birthday, mostly, and Valentine's Day, coincidentally.  We stayed at Old World Inn, a B & B in downtown Napa.  Our plan was to walk downtown Napa so that we could taste a lot and not worry about driving.  That is exactly what we did.  We had initially planned to buy the tasting card, but our innkeeper gave us enough complimentary passes to deter us from that itinerary.  The Old World Inn was everything that's great about B&Bs without the grandma decor; the evening chocolates were the best (cake and chocolate covered strawberries set out for late night snacking).

Annie will probably provide a more detailed listing of the day on her blog in the upcoming days, but I would like to give a shout out to the lady that made my day, Trisha from Mason Cellars.  We were the only ones in her tasting room for about 30 minutes, so we talked for a while.  She gave us wonderful advice, the tasting was complimentary, and the wines were dirt cheap for Napa standards yet really good.  She explained the rise and fall of Copia (which we had toured years before) and even offered to drive any wine we bought that day (from any winery nearby) back to our hotel and drop it off for us.  We took her up on her offer, and she ended up dropping off almost an entire case of wine to our B&B (we only bought 4 bottles of Mason wine)!!

The juicy part: skip ahead 5 hours and 6 tasting rooms.  We decided to head back to our B&B for wine/cheese hour, and we thought it would be a good time to drop off our freshly purchased cabernet chocolate sauce from Ceja (amazing) and the other bottle of wine we bought there.  The wine hour wasn't all that interesting (I blame the clientele), so we went back to our room to prepare ourselves for more tastings, and eventually dinner.

Annie immediately passed out on the bed.  She woke up 30 minutes later and ran to the bathroom to throw up.  She didn't actually throw up, but laid down for a little na-na and waved her glasses around until I grabbed them and set them on the dresser.  She laid around for a while, so I snapped a few pictures of her on her fancy, new HTC Incredible.  Those of you lucky enough to catch them posted on facebook know exactly what they looked like.  She deleted them as soon as she got her shit together around 11pm.  I also snapped another picture that made it to twitter (and gmail), but that got deleted even faster.  Needless to say, we slept through our dinner reservation and didn't eat anything substantial until our amazing breakfast at the B&B the next morning.

Sunday took us on a little tour of Napa & Sonoma Valleys.  I'm hoping to write another post specifically regarding Bottle Shock, so I'll save the details for that future post.  We made one stop at Dry Creek Olive Co, where I am a member and receive regular shipments of fresh, amazing olive oil.  The day ended at Hook & Ladder, a favorite winery from our trip back in May.  I've long considered joining their wine club, since I loved so many of their wines from their last vintage.  As soon as we started tasting yesterday (a new vintage), I immediately filled out their wine club membership application.  I consistently love their wines.  They are the first wine club I've ever joined, and I'm super excited.

(Annob is what are closest friends called the two of us in college, cuz she followed me around like a lost puppy.  I made up Valenbirthday just now.)

Cheers!
~RoB

Birthday

It's that time of year again, and already things have been interesting.

I got my first birthday card yesterday.  It was from my aunt.  (I posted about my crazy family, but my aunt is the lone person that kept me this side of crazy as I grew up.)  It has a bunch of stuffed monkeys on the cover hopping around yelling 'Yahoo!!' 'Whoopee!!' 'This is gonna be great!!  I'm so excited!!'  The last monkey exclaims "I can't wait!!  I... I..." and the inside says "... I think I just pooped myself."  She signed it: "(maybe I should stop reading your blog) haha."  How perfect is that?  The check inside made it even better!  Thanks, Aunt!  (I don't use people's names other than Annie [and Angel]).

Today, at work, I easily got off next Friday to go skiing with Annie and all of her friends.  I told them it was for my birthday.  I also scheduled a drug screening on my birthday, so things can get crazy that night!!

Then things made a turn for the worse.  I came home, and Angel was in trouble.  He had eaten one of my birthday presents!  Chocolate covered Oreos that Annie had found in some fancy chocolate store.  This is the same dog that ate our roommate's cupcakes that I made her for her birthday.  Angel is the birthday ruiner (word?)!  (Don't name a dog Angel; it's setting everyone up for failure.)

We brought it back a little with a birthday card from my mom.  The front is a bunch of plastic flamingos and reads "If this is the first thing you see the morning after your birthday celebration, you may want to ask yourself these important questions:" inside "Am I naked?  Is this my front yard?  Who are these people...?"  Mom doesn't read my blog, but she apparently knows me nonetheless.  Only downer is that it came with a post-dated check.  That makes me feel really guilty... like she felt obligated to send me money that she can't afford.

Similarly, I never got a/an Xmas present from my grandparents, and I don't know if they'll send me a birthday present.  It's not really a big deal, but I wonder if they actually did send something and it was lost along the way.  Considering the current granny situation, I'm not going to ask.  Am I awful for caring rather or not they sent/are sending something?

Anyway, things are in full swing, and Annie is whisking me off to Napa for the weekend.

Hello, good wine, I've missed you,
~RoB