August 31st Pic!

"Twins"

Clearly still excited about the Kindles! I'm moving in with Eva this week so sorry about the slow updates on the blog...but hopefully by next week the Blog will be back on a more regular schedule once I get my computer to Eva's and can update each night instead of driving home just to update my blog the next day! 

August 30th Pic!

"Mates"

Monday morning at 7am, Eva and I went to the Botanical Garden for a Bird Watch Walk...thanks to Groupon we're members for the year now! We've tried unsuccessfully to go Bird watching before in Phoenix and Joshua Tree. Eva would beg me to get up at 5am and go out to watch birds...more specifically I carry her equipment while she watches for birds... OK I imitate bird noises so the birds will come out and play...I mean whatever gets me back in bed faster! 

Finally at the Botanical Garden we met up with a group of 60-80 something retired self proclaimed "Bird-Nerds" and got a PHD's worth of knowledge on how to spot birds. Admittedly it was pretty cool...something new and though I was tired from lack of sleep mentally invigorating. 

"Bird amongst Cacti"

OK a literal title...sue me! Since I did go Bird watching I figured I owed it to my future self to put up a bird pic, I'm sure my future self will one day read this and think why the hell did I lead a bird watching trip with a pic of Butterfly's and what's with the titles!? Note to future self: Your past self was just tired and Eva had the telephoto so you didn't take any good pics. Loser. 

 "Reflections"

August 29th Pic!

"Phone 1.0"

Wrigley Mansion on Sunday Night for some Wine and Buffet, 1/2 off Wine that is! with live music! Well we ended up getting there kinda late but I'm glad Sam still got to see the Mansion before she left town. We ended up walking all around and pretty much seeing the entire place...I could probably live there now, I'm pretty familiar with the layout. 

I do find one thing baffling, the Mansion has some great (read VERY Expensive) original artwork, such as Renior just hanging on the wall, near an exit door no less. I don't get how post 9/11 a place is so lax on security...it is sort of refreshing that some place trusts people to be decent, I'll have to enjoy it while it lasts. 

 "Transferring"

"No Line!!"

August 28th Pic!

"Sat Night"

Sam and Maria came to visit for the weekend, this is a pic from some Sat night shenniganry prior to heading out to Mill ave...only one bottle of wine down! We played some scrabble earlier in the day to pass some time and beat the heat, I lost to Maria by 1 point, or 5 points if you're a stickler for rules! The best part is English is the second or third language for Sam, Maria and I...and with exception of Sam (who finished last!) we managed to beat someone whose first language is English (I won't name names). I guess it's only another sign of American decline, pretty soon Indian's and Chinese..err Vietnamese will be beating the U.S in Scrabble too....I blame Facebook.

August 27th Pic!

"3000 books in one"

Eva and I got our Kindle's today! I get to play with mine first, so I uploaded it with almost all the free books from Amazon. It is surprisingly light, I felt like I was picking up a 30lb weight when I went to get my camera. It's pretty easy to use, but for people who want to compare Kindle to an Ipad, trust me that's like comparing a Ham Sandwich to an Almond. They don't belong in the same product category...I'll still have to get an Ipad (or an Andriod tablet) but I'll still need my Kindle to read an actual book! I can't imagine staring at another light emitting screen to read, I do that plenty every damn day...and I have the glasses to prove it!

August 26th Pic!

"Le Creuset Quad"

The thing I'm excited about the most in this pic is my awesome new Orange mug! All of these were purchased from the Le Creuset outlet store in Anthem. Eva and I'll be joining the local CSA so we can get organic veggies weekly...I'll have to teach her how to cook w/o a cookbook ;)

August 25th Pic!

"Valley Ho"

Night out on the 25th at ZU ZU Cafe located inside the Valley Ho. This is one of my first photo shopped images, merged two shots from one night. I used Gimp, and it was not as intuitive as one would lead you to believe, I figured it out but I'm sure I'll produce better results with some better shots later on. 

If you haven't been to the ZU ZU cafe, check it out, the service is amazing for a small place. The prices are a bit high but the food is great, especially the dessert.

August 24th Pic!

"No Head"

Went out to Terrior Wine Pub last night for wine and trivia night, out of 3 rounds of trivia we won one, which entitled us to one bottle of wine! The round we won was multiple choice, so we won fairly easily, the second round was True or False, and the Third round was simply answering the question...we lost the 3rd round on the question, name the 3 kids + the dog in the movie Peter Pan...WTF, where's Michael Jackson when you need him!? 

Anyway the shot above was from a store adjacent to the wine pub, they had a few freaky mannequins there, headless ones, and ones hanging from the ceiling...maybe it was the Wine in me but I found these mannequins very unsettling. 

"Water into Wine"

August 21 Pic! (Whoops forgot during one of my updates)

"Connoisseur"

Looking back at my posts today I realized that I forgot to post the 21th pics! I can't fool the system to place it between the 20th and the 22nd so I had to break my titling sequence...well I lasted 8 months before messing up...so that's pretty good!

Th pic above is from Saturday when we went Wine tasting at Uncorked, we sat next to one of the pouring tables and learned a little bit about wine, met a lady that plays in a professional Woman's football league (no joke).

"Field Care"

A contribution by Eva, she took this as we were driving back from Uncorked. I like the water sprinklers.

August 23rd Pic!

"Left Over not Behind"

It's an awesome thing that Eva doesn't like left overs....which usually means I get to try two things from the restaurant. Since she's vegetarian I get my fill of non V8 veggies from eating her left overs. After moving some (most) of my clothes into her place yesterday I chowed down on her Veggies w/ Noodles (can't remember the name of the dish) from White Thaiger. Good Stuff. We also had dessert there, Mangoes with Sticky rice, it was amazing. Highly recommended if you're in downtown Phoenix. It's on Central about 2 miles from Postinos Central.

August 22nd Pic!

"Thaiger-licious"

After a long day of outlet shopping what's better than some carb filled Thai food! @ The White Thaiger. The waitress was amazed at how well Eva knew Thai stuff....it's like when I got to a Mexican Restaurant and order a Burrito w/ extra Pico de Gallo with accent, they're blown away. Except in my case I get a second glance to see if I'm Mexican, which they realize I'm not when they see my side-ways parted hair with my nerdy glasses and my timbuck2 bag (soon to be filled with a Kindle 3!). 

"Order Up!"

August 20th Pic!

"Shades"

Eva made up for her digressions on Thursday, where she forgot to take a pic for me. So this is an Eva contribution. These are the shades that hang over the lake look-outs near the Grigio. I've been trying to get this pic for a while but I think Eva utilized the telephoto to get this awesome shot. 

"Parallels"

"Hole in the ground"

August 19th Pic!

"No Pic"

Eva borrowed my camera on the 19th, her's is being cleaned by Canon. She said "Can I borrow your camera? you'll be at work all day" me, "No problem, please take a pic a day for me since I will be a work, working all day", Eva "Ok, I'll make sure to take a pic! since you're at work all day". 

Later that night, around 11:30pm. 

Eva: "I forgot to take a pic today...hehe" 

You can see my reaction above...ok I wasn't trying to snuff her out with a pillow, she just covered her face with a pillow.

August 18th Pic!

"2 Mph"

Green! Greeeeeeen! and I'm slowly off the blocks at 2 mph. This was snapped on the way over to Eva's place. Sorry for the lameness, I was trying to get a pic of my speed vs the speed monitors we have on the streets...I thought I got it, but it turned out terrible. :(

August 17th Pic!

"Time Equals Rupees"

Picked up this little holder in India, not sure what else you'd put in the holder besides stacks of Cash...I also missed the opportunity to mention Indian Independence Day on August 15th...there I mentioned it. In case you were curious, Will Smith did not make an Alien invasion movie for Indian Independence Day, asshole...Imagine the franchise possibilities, they could make one for every country!

Also I know the clocks aren't synchronized in the pic, the one in the back is the actual time I took the pic, therefore the one in the back is the clock that works.

August 16th Pic!

"Served Painted"

Breaking tradition from watching copious amounts of Netflix while drinking equally copious amounts of Wine, Eva and I decided to hit the town last night. As I'm sure I've lamented on the blog before, there really isn't a whole lot to do in Phoenix on a Monday night. This town sure ain't Vegas, SF or LA. We went to downtown Scottsdale for a drink and a walk. We ended up at RnR a new semi quirky restaurant on Scottsdale road, after begging to check it out for months Eva finally relented and agreed to go there for one drink. After our Martinis were downed, both of us made a promise to come back for breakfast, they don't serve anything but meat for lunch or dinner. 

After RnR we took in the sights of downtown Scottsdale on a Monday night, with exception on one lonely piano playing singer the place was pretty dead. 

  "Summer"

At the sugar bowl, the place was mostly empty except for one family. 

"Howdy"

Scottsdale, though small does a pretty nice job of accommodating tourists. The main streets have maps painted on the sidewalk, with little markers throughout the city so tourists can walk the historic tour of Scottsdale. Very similar to Boston, except instead of Bronze markers, ours are painted. 

August 15th Pic!

"Testing"

The plan at the moment is to visit Argentina during Feb just in time for their Carnival and Beer festivals. Argentina is also known for their amazing Beef and Wine (Malbec). Eva is the wine expert between the two of us, which isn't saying much but she knows considerably more than I do. 

Since I'm blind when it comes to wine, I needed to know that Eva knew her stuff, so I conduced a blind taste test. I had a suspicion that when one orders wine, they simply look at the price and decide that it's good...i.e. Costly Price = Good Wine and visa versa. To read more on this topic check out "How Pleasure Works" by Paul Bloom. Based on the NPR segment about the book, it deals more with how brand identity makes people feel better...i.e. I'd rather pay for the real Iphone because Apple is cool vs a fake Iphone, but I think the concept applies to price vs perceived value also.

Anyway I ended up with a really really cheap (crappy?) wine in my fridge a few months back. Eva commented that it was a crappy label, and that it was cheap. So on the 15th I told her I'll go get some Wine and we'll do a blind taste test (notice in the Pic the label is covered with a Roadrunner coupon). Even I knew the wine was crap after the first sip, but I'm not the test subject. The wine was a Merlot from Turning Leaf, Eva doesn't really drink Merlot's but she took a few sips and did some swirling tests and color checks and decided the wine was crap. We dumped out the rest and opened up a better bottle of Zin, which I bought as a back-up so I won't get yelled at!

I feel a lot more comfortable going to Argentina now, but after this test I think even I know a little bit about Wine.

August 14th Pic!

"Toxic"

This is not a pic from Wisconsin, and it's not the Black Lagoon where the creature lives. This wonderful piece of swamp is in fact located right outside of the Gregio, the apartment complex where Eva lives. It's not the result of an emptied out lake due to the dam breaking, rather it's poorly constructed lawn which happened to collect water during the monsoon season and turned into a swamp. It's amazing how quickly life can multiply...there are millions of small critters in the parking lot and I'm positive the swamp doesn't help and not the mention the rotting fish in the empty lake. 

Now the snowbirds from Florida can bring their Gators along for the ride because we have homes for them!

August 13th Pic!

"mmm..Milk!"

Chocolate Milk on a hot summer day in Phoenix! 110 Degrees today folks with a high next week reaching up to 115! Actually Milk might be a bad idea on a hot summer day...but whatever, it tastes damn good!

Since this is the first post most will see, check out the posts dating back to August 5th Pics leading up to August 12th, those posts chronicle my Wisconsin trip, with tons of pics!

August 12th Pic!

"Weary Traveler"

Day 8, back in Madison in the airport on our way back to Phoenix. Connected through Dallas then to Phoenix by 8pm. I hate flying. Nothing bad happened per se but Airports are getting more and more ridiculous. I was actually charged $25 to check-in my baggage...I call BS on that...that's not the way we flew in the 90's! or the 00's! 

"Busy Traveler"

Eva could care less about waiting at the airport.

August 11th Pic!

"EAGLE!!!"

Day 7, I'm not even going to try to come up with a creative title for this one...I lamented out loud to Eva's dad that I'd never seen an Eagle, so he made it a personal mission to show me an Eagle! We went out on his boat searching for Eagles. I took about a 100 pics but I like the typical poster pic of an Eagle that I got above. 

"On a Boat Trick!"

I also learned how to fish this day!. I caught something named blue, the first one I hooked I got it through his mouth, he survived after I unhooked him and threw him back. I had to take a big nasty worm and split it in half or quarter and put it on the hook. It was nasty at first but got to be second nature after a while. The second fish I caught, unfortunately was not as lucky as the first! It flopped around a bit on the line, and I noticed that the hook went through the poor guys eye. After I finally un hooked him, the eye came with the hook and the fish was practically dead :( ...as Eva's dad said, Eagles need food too! 

 

August 10th Pic!

"Hike with a View"

Day 6, Eva's dad took us on a 17 mile bike ride around some trails near their house in Minocqua, WI. Minocqua is in Northern Wisconsin and there are no Bus's, or Trains that go up there, so it's a little in the woods...and if you get the chance, check out 'The Outdoorsman' an AMAZING restaurant that probably get's lost in this part of the country. I can't wait to get back during winter to go Snow Shoeing, Ice Fishing and other animal related activities. 

"Riding the Pine"

"Father Daughter Ride"

"Through the Grass"

"Bug Lovin"

"Shroom Buds"

"Hand Model"

"Miniature"

August 9th Pic!

"Off the line"

Day 5, Mmmmm.....Beer! Went to New Glarus Brewing for some beer tasting and sight seeing...which mostly involved watching how beer gets made! ...Eva picked this one out! Thanks Baby! This was our pit-stop before seeing Eva's parents. Great Strategy, getting my liquored up before the meeting!

"Double Double"

"On the floor"

"The Floor"

"How I get made"

We got the keep the glasses! 

"The Truth"

August 8th Pic!

"Saki Baby!"

Day 4 went around town with a reader of my blog ;) and checked out the Campus. After the campus tour the drinking commenced till the end of the night. AND of course we went to Ian's for a post drinking meal!

"Peeping"