a soggy sunday

Well I hear it is snowing back home, however it is rainy here. You don't have to shovel rain, as Josh reminds me.

We have been busy, being tourists. We are also in our second hotel room, in the first hotel we are staying at. The first room had problems with the tv, so they moved us. This new room does not have a view of the Garden parking lot. The first room did, we were able to spy on the Celtics and Bruins players arriving before their games.

On Saturday we went to the Sam Adams Brewery, via a quick trip on the T. What a nice little tour, there was free beer. It was like a tailgating Saturday, beer at 11:50am. We sampled 3 different kinds. The Sam Adam Lager, which is the standard brew, the Sam Adams Winter Lager, which was tasty, and we were priveledged enough to taste a beer contest winner flavor. It was a honey, all spice mix, not my favorite.

After we got buzzed, we thought we would go to Cheers and find out who really knew our name....or get some lunch. It was tasty stuff, we had to have some more beer there too. Then we continued our toursity day. We made our way to the cemetary where Sam Adams and Mother Goose are buried. Then went to Quincy Market to do some shopping and people watching.

We ended the day by heading to the North End of Boston, a heavily Italian populted area, with lots of great restuarants. We toured through the Old North Church and the gift shop. We then were looking for a restuarant that we had eaten at before but it wasn't open, in fact it had changed names too. We ended up eating at Al Dente, and having some home made pasta, sooooo tasty.

It was getting cold so we made our way to a nearby Dunkin Donuts to get some coffee and then headed back to the room to warm up. I fell asleep, Josh wondered off later for some beer. When Josh returned and I woke up the room was about 80 degrees. We cou;dn't figure out how to control the temp. It was sooo hot.

Today we decided to go tour the New England Aquarium. Lets just say the admission price was a little steep for the exhibits that were available. Josh says he was underwhelmed.

We then walked over to Quincy Market to grab some sort of snack. Lucky for us we found bacon wrapped scallops, oh so tasty!!!!!! They also served them with home made fries, can you say oily goodness!!! After that we went to check out Fanueil Hall. There is so much history in Boston.

Now we are going to hit the Boston Beer Works (they make their own beers) and watch the Patriots football game.

Hope all are well back home, and no one pulls a muscle scooping snow. HA HA HA

Comin atcha from the east coast

Hope all had a Happy Thanksgiving. We did, we joined my parents in Plato, for some delicious ribeye steaks. Even got a nap in, and Kona got lots of frisbee time. then we traveled to Amb's to crash for the night, becuase we boarded a 6 am flight to Boston.

Here we are in downtown Boston. We managed to lug our bags through the public transit system and settle in to our hotel right across the street from the Garden, where the Celtics and Bruins play.

We went to watch the Celtics stomp over the 76ers, a good time even from the nose bleed section. We were surprised to find out that former hawkeye Reggie Evans plays for the 76ers.

A big week ahead, lots to do, sightseeing, visiting family and watching the iowa men's bball team play BC.

Another great weekend

Wow, what a weekend! Josh stayed in Iowa City to take care of everything sports related at the University. On Friday he had wrestling and volleyball I believe. Then on Saturday he helpd run the Women's bball tournament, which then concluded on Sunday, followed by a men's bball game Sunday night. He was busy! Thanks to mom and McKenz for letting the dogs out for us, it is greatly appreciated, and the dogs thank you as well!!

I was not at home. Friday night after work I hoped into my car and headed north to Minneapolis (MPLS) I stopped at the Shell gas station in CR to get my free gas and supper, it was gross by the way. I was headed up to visit my friend Kate, go to the Hawkeye football game, and run my 5k in St. Paul. It was going to be a busy weekend. I also was trying to get to IKEA, do a little shopping. Christmas is coming!

I arrived at Kate's apartment around 10:30. I was greeted by her "clean" apartment. We caught up on "Ugly Betty" then called it a night. Saturday we thought we should go check out the 5k race course before we ran it. Didn't want to hit some unexpected hills. The race was around Lake Como in St. Paul. After taking the scenic route we checked out the course, and then came upon the botanical gardens and Como Zoo. We had to go check these places out.

The botanical garden was beautiful. All kinds of flowers and trees. This placed was like a giant greenhouse, complete with humidity and tropical temperatures. They had a room with fall mums, many palm trees and a fern room. A great place to check out. We continued touring the facility and came across the zoo. All the animals except the reindeer and bison had been moved inside. This is a great little zoo, hiding in St. Paul.

It was now approaching lunch time, so we headed back towards MPLS and stopped off at the French Meadow for some eats. Then trucked out to IKEA, which is located near the Mall of America. We shopped and browsed the strange items, made some purchases then returned to Kate's apartment. It was nearing game time.

We hopped the bus downtown. Kate needed to rescue something from her office, and I got to take a tour of Target Headquarters. Then we attempted to board the light rail to the Metrodome, however decided to walk the remainder of the trip as the light rail was jam packed with Hawkeyes. We got to the dome, climbed to our seats about 15 rows from the top. We got to see the whoel field and the scoreboard!! The game started, but things were not going good as we had burned through our 3 timeouts in the first 5 minutes of the game. However things started to turn around, and we beat the Gophers 55-0, it was the biggest big ten win we had ever had. There were no Gopher fans even left in the dome, it was rockin with Hawkeyes. Becuase of the late start, it was getting late so we decided to get some pizza a call it a night.

Sunday morning, race day! the race started at 9:30 it was about 30 degrees and cloudy, great weather! We registered and did all the approriate stretching and warming up. Next thing we knew we were off, and looping the lake. A 5k is about 3.1 miles. The best time for this type of race is like 15 minutes or so. Average about 30 minutes. The winner for the race was a women who took it in about 17 minutes. Kate and I ran the whole way, never really got passed, but passed a few people, and bunch of whiny girls and finished under 37 minutes in a time of about 36 minutes and 40 seconds. Yeah we are rock stars!!! It really wasn't a bad race, nice course. I think I may run a race in December in Betterndorf, got to convince Amber to do it with me.

Well we felt good about ourselves, but had to get moving and get back to Iowa. Kate had to come back for a funeral visitation. We were back on the road at 11:30. In no time we were back to Iowa City. I dropped Kate off at the funeral home and I went home to let the dogs out on my way to go watch the men's bball game. The frisbee dogs were the halftime entertainment. It was a long weekend. I am very tired. GO HAWKS!

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

So it's that time of year again...the holiday season. With that comes the annual ligthting of West Branch. Or the drama of the lighting of West Branch. There is always a big to do about how early to hang the lights, locating the lights, getting light bulbs, oh and the big tree in the center of town.

Tonight I helped dad finish hanging the snowflake lights on Parkside Dr and hanging the banners as well. We also started with the lighting of the big tree in the center of town. Oh how this tree is a headache every year. IT is about 50 feet tall, so it is getting harder to decorate with regular lights, as it is growing out of reach of the bucket truck. One year dad and I put rope lights on the tree and by the response from the town you would have thought WWIII broke out, needess to say they did not like it. This year we need ideas. One idea was to light the tree with flood lights, alternating red and green around the base. We played with that idea tonight and it just wasn't working. Ahh so much fun!!!

Halen joined in on the decorating fun too, Kona got to stay and creat havoc in the shop.

We still have more lights to hang in the downtown area and on the main streets in and out of town. Hope it warms up a little, it sure gets cold out there. At least they started playing the holiday music in September, so we have some music to hang lights by.

Are you ready for the boom?

Hey there fellow Hawkeye fans. Here is a video from the entrance of the Hawkeye Marching Band at the 2008 Band Extravaganza. It is a youtube video do hope it works for you all. As always the band extravaganza was a great time. GO HAWKS.

Also the "O" flag was returned in time for this event. It was stolen or misplaced after the last home football game. Once again I-O-W-A can be complete.

In Heaven There Is No Beer

Lets hear it for the Hawkeyes. Friday night the men's bball team won, Saturday night the football team won, Sunday afternoon the women's bball team won, Monday morning the field hockey team won (advances to the final 8 of the NCAA tournament), Monday night the men's bball team won (barely) and now I am listening to the women's bball team take on kansas. All hawkeyes, all the time, I lead an exciting life.

It's getting cold...

Hey everyone out there is cyber space. How is life treating you? Are you gearing up for the winter and the holidays?

So last Monday night Josh and I caught up with the Iowa Rec Services for a night of bowling. We did alright, even managed a few strikes. There were four on our small team. I managed to beat Josh 2 out of 3 games, not bad. Bowling is fun, we should do it more often, someday I might break 150. Got to set my goals high. Also it is nice to go bowling now after they passed that smoking ban, you don't smell like a cigarette when you leave.

Then came Vetran's Day. Hope all you Vetran's had a nice day and were honored in style. Josh also did some basketball reffing. Wednesday came and went, well sort of, we got the front yard raked, as they are supposed to come pick up our leaves this weekend. Through the week I have been battling a small head cold, that was a lot of fun! Then it was Thursday, Josh attended a United Way function, I worked at the gym. Now it is Friday, woohoo time for the weekend. It is also a Men's basketball game. Should be a good time.

This weekend will have its fill of hawkeye events. Men's bball tonight, football tomorrow and women's bball on Sunday. That will keep us all busy.

For all of you who have been following my running progress, I know how involved you people are in this blog, I wont disapoint, here is an update. So I can now run for 38 minutes without stopping. I can run 3.1 miles, which is a 5k in 36 minutes and 30 seconds, which is fast for me. SO I have just about one week to go before the big race day. Who knows the weather could be the real factor, since the race is in St. Paul around a lake.