Nice Weekend

The Mrs. and I headed up to Cinci to celebrate her nephew's birthday. It was nice.

We got up there around 11 am on Saturday. It was a 'pool party', so we all ended up at the pool at the complex where Maryann's parents live. And so I swam. And it was fun. I honestly couldn't remember the last time I had been swimming in a pool. It's been a long time. I'm almost thinking it's been like 10 years or so. We got Norah in the pool and she LOVED it. She was splashing up a storm. While it was warm, we were all intelligent enough to put sunscreen on so no one got sunburn which was nice.

After swimming for an hour and a half, we all headed back to M's parents place. They ordered up some LaRosa's pizza. I thought it was okay. It's handtossed which is good, but the crust was very thick and fluffy. I tend to like the thinner crusts better. If I want fluffy crust, then I'll get a deep dish pizza.

After all the pizza was gone, M. and I dumped off the little one on to her mom so we could go out and have an evening out. A date if you will.

We ended up at Showcase Cinemas to see Ratatouille, which is the new Pixar animated flick. We got there a little bit early, so went to the inhouse bar and grill and had a beer. They were out of Miller Lite :( so we had to have Bud Lite instead. No biggie.

After drinking our beer, we went to the movie. It turns out it was a Digital Projection theater. I have to say this: Holy Shit. It was like watching a DVD on a very very very big screen. The images were crystal clear. No dots or fuzz or scratches flying by during the previews or during the movie. It was very very nice. If you have a chance to see something on a Digital Projection screen, I say 'Do so immediately!'. The movie was Pixar so of course, it was pretty darn good.

The only thing that was disappointing about the whole experience was that during the entire movie, they had a fluorescent light on in the projection booth for who knows what reason. So even during the dark scenes, there was a weird backlight coming from behind you. It bugged me a little, but my wife used to work in a theater, so you can imagine how much it bugged her. She actually left midway through the movie to ask someone to have them turn it off. Of course, that never occurred. After the movie we went to the customer service area to complain, or at the very least, ask why there was this light on. M. talked with the manager and was told 'well, that's the digital projection booth and we have to leave the light on in case anything breaks'. Um... what? If something goes wrong THEN you can turn on the light. Why in the hell would you leave it on ALL THE TIME. Anyhoo, they gave us some free movie passes. We might have given them to her parents for babysitting, though, her mom might have not wanted them or something. So we might have free tickets... or her parents might have them. I'm not sure who got them.

After the movie we went to Graeter's Ice Cream. Since this month is Ice Cream Month, you can get a free mini-scoop with any order. So I went to the counter and asked for a Cherry Cordial sundae with a mini-scoop of Buckeye Blitz on top. In the busyness of the evening, somehow or another that translated into 'Give me a buckeye blitz sundae with a cherry on top'. I didn't complain cause it looked damned tasty... and it was.

An aside: I have always said that I liked Handel's Buckeye ice cream better than Graeter's Buckeye Blitz for two reason. 1) Handel's Buckeye ice cream literally has little buckeyes in it. And I think that is cool as hell. 2) The Greater's Buckeye Blitz has these huge chunks of chocolate in it and that just bugs the shit out of me. If I wanted a damn hershey bar crammed into my ice cream I would ask for it that way. I don't mind little chips or chocolate chips. I'm fine with that. Now, I've told several people this, including my wife, and have in general been told that I am nuts. Until the other night. So I get to the bottom of my Graeter's Buckeye Blitz sundae and tell my wife she can have the 2 chunks of chocolate. I hand her the cup and she says "I don't want a piece of chocolate that big!". They were both about 2" x 1" each. So I told her that this is why I like the Handel's Buckeye ice cream better than the Graeter's ice cream. These are the kinds of chunks that I ALWAYS get when I get Buckeye Blitz. Maryann agreed that that size of chunk was a bit much, but also said that she had never had that problem. *shrug* So there you go.

We got back and Norah was asleep. She of course woke up later in the evening and didn't really ever fully get back to sleep, so neither of us got more than 4 hours of sleep the entire evening. By morning, we were a bit whipped.

But M's mom made a hearty breakfast. I myself had 2 eggs (over easy), 2 fresh blueberry pancakes and 4 sausage patties. It was TASTY!!!

After that we packed up the car and went over to her sister's house to pick up something... I totally forget what that was. Then we went and got lunch at Jocko's chicken and biscuits. I'm a big fan of fried chicken gizzards for god knows what reason. Lee's Famous Recipe has them, but there isn't a Lee's around Columbus, that I know of. The last time I got to eat them was when I was doing some work in St. Louis. But the ones at Jocko's were just as good. Mmmmmmmmm mmmmmmm. Gizzards are good.

We finally got back into Columbus around 5:30pm. We were beat. Norah went to bed around her usual time. We watched the Next Food Network Star program as well as the new Gene Simmon's Family Jewels episode and hit the hay.

All in all, it was a nice weekend, esp the part where I got to spend some alone time with the wife.

I hope your weekend was just as nice.