Memorial Day Weekend

We spent a long weekend with our good friends, Sheri and Bruno.  Bruno was in Madison teaching a course and Sheri flew in on Thursday night.  So we picked her up at the airport and headed over to Madison for a few days since we all had spent time there during our scholastic years.  Friday morning while Bruno yakked on a teleconference - some people don't get how vacation works - Sheri, Jo, and I headed out for a walk along the lake shore path enjoying the great temperatures, views of the lake and campus, all the while reminiscing about our days on campus.  We then came back to pick up Bruno before walking over to the Shortstack for some blueberry or chocolate chip pancakes.


Next up was a quick tour of our new condo before we headed over to the world's largest Bratfest - it said so on the sign, so it must be true.  But as you might expect with four scientists reviewing a claim like that there were many questions on how it was measured: number of brats served, total length of all brats served, number of people actually eating a brat, etc.  We never found out, but we had fun enjoying a brat, the Oscar Mayer Wiener mobile, and people trying to run around in inflated plastic balls on a lagoon.  For those not in touch with Jo's Facebook page, I've included Sheri and Jo's award winning attempt to look like a hot dog.

After all the excitement at the Brat Fest it was time to chill out on the Wisconsin Union Terrace with some of Sheri's graduate school friends who still live in the Madison area.  It was fun to hear stories of Sheri and Bruno's exploits during college while enjoying the view of Lake Mendota all the while consuming a lot of beer (something like 4 pitchers between about 6 people).  Fortunately, I was the designated driver so didn't land up with any ill effects - like some of the others.  We finished the day's eating events with a delicious meal (notice the theme of us moving from food opportunity to food opportunity) at Kathy and John's place.  Then it was off to New Glarus to hear the VO5's perform.  One of the players in the VO5's was a roommate of Sheri's which explains why we were listening to 70's disco music at 11:00 at night.  Although, it did bring back a lot of college memories for Jo and I.

Saturday after a trip around the square enjoying the farmer's market and picking up some veggies for dinner later that day we headed back to Milwaukee and a 6 mile hike down to the kite festival to get a little exercise working off some of the previous day's beers and to see the kites in action.  Then since we hadn't consumed any food or beer in at least 2 hours we moved over to the Humboldt Park beer garden for a pretzel and beers.  Finally, it was home to make a refreshing pasta dinner and to collapse in the family room.

Sunday dawned overcast but the rain held off enough for us to get in a 2 hour hike of the Seven Bridges park on the south side of Milwaukee.  We got a little wet at the end but enjoyed the somewhat foggy views of Lake Michigan and the several ground hogs that kept scampering off the trail just in front of us.  After lunch we all seemed to want to catch up on some sleep while the rain came pouring down as at one point we all had our heads down and our eyes closed.  After a dinner of BBQ ribs, potatoes, fresh asparagus (from the Farmer's market), and rhubarb crisp (not cobbler as we found out) with fresh home-made vanilla ice cream we settled in for a rousing game of Mille Bornes - the boys won!!

Then all too soon it was Monday and time for everyone to head back to reality.  But not before we got to taste Jo's new recipe for creme-brulee french toast and a short hike around the neighborhood.  We had a wonderful weekend with our friends from Connecticut and really wish we could see them more often than the 1,000 mile distance allows.  We tried, but we weren't successful (as yet!) in convincing them they need to move to Madison in the future although we are now connected to Sheri's old friends in Madison for some extra help in moving them westward - hint, hint, hint.

The Garden is Off and Running

We spent a quiet weekend just the two of us with very little planned.  Jo needed a relaxing weekend since work has been particularly busy for her in the last few weeks with lots of evening events and needing several nights spent on catching up on stuff at work.  The highlight of the weekend was a 6 mile walk/hike on the Oak Leaf Trail.  Unfortunately we chose Sunday for our hike which dawned foggy with a heavy mist in the air - that's beautiful Lake Michigan in the background of the photo.  We still enjoyed our hike and spent a lot of the time working out future plans for retirement, vacations, and our summer - what else would you expect for two Myers-Briggs NTJ's (we only differ in our extroversion/introversion category - I'll let you guess which of us is which).

The other piece of exciting news is that the garden has started sprouting.  While we have only managed to plant lettuce and spinach so far due to the unseasonably cold temperatures so far this year (it was 39 degrees this morning).  They have started to reach for the sunshine and dreams of future harvests are blooming.  I'm hoping to start getting some beans and carrots in next week.  Besides doing some work in the pottery studio this week, that's all the excitement for the last week.  And yes, get ready for another summer of garden photos being posted here.

 

The Garden is Started - The Rest in the Hands of the Weather

The first seeds of the season are now planted.  We started some lettuce and spinach this last week although the cool weather that promptly settled in may doom this first set of seeds.  Although, at least it isn't snowing as in Wyoming and Colorado.  Our planting season is starting out late since we have been enjoying breezes from the east which means the wind is blowing over the 40 degree Lake Michigan keeping us cool.  I'm sure we will enjoy this later this summer as the temperatures and humidity begin to get sticky.

Our big events for the rest of the week were several charity events and a trip over to Madison.  This time of the year many of the local charities hold a variety of fund raising events.  Since many of the people at Northwestern Mutual are active in one or two charities this means lots of invites to help round out tables.  Since Jo is on the Red Cross board and needs to have people join her at their events, we try to be sure and reciprocate as much as we can.  This last week we had the annual Red Cross event and another one for the Milwaukee Repertory Theater.  Both were nice events, although cocktail hours are not my favorite thing to do, and seemed to be reasonably successful for both organizations.

After our event on Saturday we headed straight over to our condo in Madison to deliver a easy chair.  On Sunday after brunch with Kathy, John, and Drew (who was over visiting his mother for Mom's day) we moved a futon that Kathy is lending us for the condo.  Our condo remains sparsely decorated but at least there is now one easy chair and a couch/double bed (that isn't inflated with air).  Afterwards, we took Drew back to Milwaukee and finished the rest of the day Sunday with some homemade pizza, getting caught up on some chores, and video chatting with our niece, Christine, and nephews (Dan and Brendan) in Omaha.

A Little Bit of Spring

We finally had a little taste of spring (or maybe it is summer) as our temperatures finally managed to squeak into the 70's this weekend.  We took advantage of it by getting our bikes out and biking downtown to see the latest exhibition at the Art Museum followed by lunch at our favorite BBQ joint, the Smoke Shack.  It was a great day especially since it was finally warm, which we topped off later that afternoon with pre-dinner cocktails on our deck basking in the sun.  It should be noted that while we finally had warm temps, our trees are still missing leaves, although they are starting to show signs of budding out - they better hurry or it will be time to drop them again for the winter.

We also got to enjoy a little of the NBA playoffs, managing to get tickets to two of the playoff games between the Chicago Bulls and our hometown, Bucks.  Drew and Amy (our nephew and niece to be) were able to join us for one of the games.  Unfortunately, we continued to be bad luck for the Bucks as they lost both of the games we attended.  But it was nice to see the arena packed full and all the fans cheering.  Continuing our sports theme, we took in a Brewers game, who are not having a great season so far.  We went with Anne and Steve, our friends from Madison who we met via our Peru trip.  We got to see one of the few wins for the Brewers this year and, most importantly, enjoy a sunny day at the ballpark eating hot dogs, drinking Coke, and watching the racing sausages.  In keeping with my ongoing tradition, I've included the photo of the sausages doing their thing  in the 6th inning.  Also, since I know many of you are secretly tracking the sausages performance, the Polish sausage is off to a strong lead having won 4 out of 8 races so far this year.

I used some of the nicer weather last week to get the garden ready for the new year.  I'm thinking of planting some lettuce this week since I'm hopeful that the threat of frost is done.  The beds are all turned over, marked out for planting, and the irrigation system is installed.  Just need more temperatures above 70 degrees and a lot of luck, but I'm always hopeful at the start of a new planting year.