Great Weekend

This past weekend the Mrs. and I left the kiddos with the grandparents and we trekked up to Cleveland for a weekend together. We left at 7pm on Friday, stopped to eat at Quaker Steak and Lube for some wingz, fried pickles and ribs and got into Cleveland around 10:30pm. We stayed at the Crowne Plaza which was nice enough. Better than some hotels we've stayed at. The hvac unit in the room only blew cold air which was kind of a drag since it was rather chilly in the room when it was going but got stuffy if it wasn't going.

We got up on Saturday and ate at a lil Ma and Pa restaurant called Addy's at the suggestion of the hotel staff. They kindly took us there in the shuttle even though it was only two blocks away. I had some french toast and the wife had waffles. Both were tasty.

We then walked the two block back from Addy's and then another two blocks to the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame. It was crazy windy pretty much the entire weekend, so it was like walking in Florida when there is an approaching hurricane. I'd been to the RnRHoF before, but the wife hadn't. They had changed some stuff around. I picked up on a few new things that were pretty cool. My favorite thing was seeing some pictures drawn by a young James Handrix (that would be Jimi Hendrix to you). He was a big college football fan, so he draw pictures of players from UCLA, UofC, Oregon State, etc. He also draw a rather amusing pencil drawing that said "Obey Railroad Crossing Signals" and was complete with a car with a crunched up hood. There was also an exhibit there for The Boss (that would be Bruce Springsteen to you). It was cool seeing some of the notebooks with his lyrics written in them and some of his first guitars. After about 4 or 5 hours, we left.

That evening we went to a Vietnamese restaurant called Saigon. It was right across the street from Lola which is one of Chef Michal Simon's restaurants (he's well known on the Food Network). We would have went there, but the wife got a look at the menu but nothing really sounded good. Good thing we didn't eat there. The food at Saigon was wonderful. I got shrimp in 'special Vietnamese sauce'. It was spicy and tasty and had lots of onions in it. I wisely avoided most of those since I didn't want to stink us out of our hotel room during our little mini-vaca.

After dinner we walked to the Tower City Center. One of my friends had told me that there was 'nothing down there, kinda like the Columbus City Center'. However, there wasn't a single 'for rent' sign in the place, Several upscale stores, a full food court and lots of people. We went to the theater to watch Star Trek. The theater was, okay. It hadn't been improved in some years. A step above a dollar theater. Some of the arm rests had been ripped off and replaced with duct tape, some chair were non-sittable and had black garbage bags over them. I think the Center is in the process of upgrading lots of things. The theater obviously has a ways to go. No matter. The movie was great. I'm not even close to a Trek fan. I don't know if I've seen a single movie all the way through. But I enjoyed this movie nonetheless.

The next morning we ate at the hotel, which was stupid of me. We should have just walked back down to Addy's. Would have been better and cheaper. After breakfast we went and toured the "A Christmas Story" house. It was pretty interesting to be standing in front of it. There was a little museum in a house across the street which held some artifacts from the movie, like Randy's snow suit, the hat and goggles from that weird kid in Higby's (btw... which we also saw on our way to the Tower City Center), and some other stuff. We toured that whlie waiting for the tour to begin.. which was just us. :P Of course, most of the movie wasn't filmed in the house. That was done in the studio, but many other parts of the movie were, really, now that I think about it. Basically the scenes inside the house were filmed at a studio. The rest was done in Cleveland. The Black Bart scene, the BB scene, when the leg lamp arrive, when he was trying to position the leg in the front window... those were all done at the Cleveland house. I enjoyed it for what it was. And I'm glad it was only $7.50 to get in.

And then we came home.

It was nice to get away. We were both pretty close to our wits end before this weekend. I've been working long hours at the office for about a month straight and wtching kids 24/7 tends to wear one out as well. So our little trip helped recharge the batteries.

I love my wife. She is a wonderful wife and mother.

Thoughts: I really do think I am rebelling against the diet thing. And that's half the problem... I keep calling it a diet... and that's not what I am trying to do here. It's about eating BETTER. That means watching what you eat (I watch it as it goes into my mouth and into my belly.... GET IN MY BELLY!!!). That means watching how MUCH you eat. Maybe I'm subconsciously living up to the adage of 'if there's something worth doing, then it's worth doing a lot'. Eating is good and therefore I eat a lot. Not always often (though I do that too), but just in sheer quantity. I have so many food issues it's not even funny.

Stress eating: Wind me up and watch me eat. It takes my mind off of whatever is bugging me.

'Principal' eating: I bought it therefore I must eat it, otherwise it's wasted money... and I hate wasting money.

The quantity over quality aspect: everything I do, I tend to do to excess in the quantity volume. That's how I ended up with like 6000 45 RPM records. That's how I ended up with nearly 1000 CDs. That's how I ended up with 20 rolls of tape. The list goes on and on. I'm

I like food: I watch Andrew Zimmern on Bizarre Foods. I watch Anthony Bourdain: No Boundaries. I watch Iron Chef. I watch the Food Challenges. I watch competitive eating and follow the IFOCE website. I make a point of actually watching the July 4th Nathan's hot dog eating contest. You can see how this ends up tying in with the quantity over quality.

I have serious food issues. I admit it. But I'm gonna try my best to get back to a reasonable weight. My dad has put on weight over the years and now he's borderline diabetic, probably has blood pressure issues and probably other medical issues I don't even know about. I don't want myself to get into that position. Granted, I'm kinda there already, but I need to try to get away from that is what I'm saying. I can't get there by eating a Cinnabon for breakfast, frozen meal and a raspberry filled long john for lunch, an entire bowl of Dan Dan Noodles from Pei Wei and then a bowl of chips and salsa at 9pm. That's what I ate yesterday. And I'm not working out at all. I can't to where I want to be living that type of lifestyle. It just doesn't work that way.

Maybe the answer for me is the eating smaller meals more often. Or not. I dunno. But I need to figure it out. I used to say I that I was 'fat and happy'. Well, guess what? Read everything above. 'Fat and happy' is a big fat lie.