Sunday, October 30th, 2011

Wow last night was AMAZING.  One very, very good day.  Elizabeth and I met up with Erick Ude and Jen Schumacher and went to the BEST Halloween house party ever.  It's hard to explain how awesome it was... they had their own haunted house in their 4-car garage (complete with a chain saw maniac, complete darkness, odd things hanging from the little walkways like plastic bats and strings and stuff that feel weird), so we had to walk through that before we were allowed to enter the house.  The chainsaw guy scared Elizabeth pretty well. We didn't know the owners, kind of a friend of a friend thing, but they were very hospitable.  So they also had an amazing spread of goodies for their guests... guacamole, orange & black tortilla chips, homemade brownies, little smokies & bbq sauce, buffalo chicken dip, basically lots of little hors d'oeuvres.  Also very good jello shots.

After sampling all of the goodies, we went downstairs to find a karaoke machine (one of their friends is a real DJ).  Naturally Elizabeth is in heaven.  We all sing lots of songs, one of the girls at the party was an amazing rapper... I even sang some Tenacious D.  Meanwhile downstairs they also had a keg and lots of beer pong & flippy cup. I was 3-0 in beer pong :)  Oh, and the ISU/Texas Tech football game was playing in the background.  I was soooo happy seeing them have a blowout win, on the road, AGAINST A RANKED TEAM, in a place where Iowa State had never previously been victorious.  I could probably write a huge blog just about this game and how happy it made me, but I'll keep it short.  I believe Iowa State was a 17 point underdog going into the game... and it's funny seeing all of the "expert predictions" before the game.  Here is a better link about how the game actually turned out.  Hopefully the Clones can keep it going next week against Kansas when mom & dad come down for the game. 

To make my sports night even better, the stupid, evil Iowa Hawkeyes lost to a HORRIBLE Minnesota team 22-21.  This is almost as good as when we beat Iowa this year... I mean we beat, no... destroy a ranked team on the road, and the Hawks lose to probably the worst team in a AQ conference this year.  In the 4 weeks leading up to the Iowa game, Minnesota lost by 13 points to North Dakota State (they play in a lower football division even), they lost by a score of 58-0 to Michigan, 45-17 to Purdue, and 41-14 to Nebraska.  Hahaha... but they're good enough to beat the Hawks :)  You might think it's silly that I take so much pleasure in Iowa losing, but I really, really just don't like the Hawkeyes.  Understatement.  Anyways, I was also happy to see Nebraska beat Michigan State, and to see losses by Colorado and Texas A&M.  It would have been hard for me to script the college football weekend better.

Ok, back to the Halloween stuff.  Eric and Elizabeth had a funny two-person costume of Garth and Kat from SNL's Weekend Update.  Check them out:

 Here is a link to the original SNL skit.  I hope you can tell the difference between the two clips!

Finally, check out my costume: Blind Referee :) 

It was fun throwing penalty flags at people!

Sunday, October 16th, 2011

We had a fun and busy Sunday thus far... we went shopping at the mall & I picked out a Halloween costume, Elizabeth made some delicious star-shaped  sugar cookies, I carved an awesome jack-o-lantern, we roasted the pumpkin seeds, and Elizabeth made me a yummy tortellini in a  homemade cream sauce with garlic, spinach, and tomato so I can bring something good for lunch tomorrow.  Oh, and earlier we made some homemade guacamole (and we at the whole thing today).  Lots of time in the kitchen, but it was a fun day!  Check out the scary jack-o-lantern...

Monday, October 10th, 2011

Happy Columbus Day 2011!  I guess?? One of those holidays that I really had no idea it even was a holiday until I look at the news.  But anyways, WAAHHOOOO!  COLUMBUS, YEAH. YOU ROCK!!  IT'S A HOLIDAY!
Ok, I'm sorry about that.  Anyways, to get to my point for the day... it's really nice to come home from work to have a nice home-cooked meal waiting, and that's what Elizabeth did for me today :)  She made a nice Italian salad with prosciutto, pepperoncini, salami, pepperoni, carrots, tomato, lettuce... all that good stuff.  Then a red wine vinegrette.  Yummy.  After that she served me some delish beef enchiladas. 

The nice Italian salad that Elizabeth had waiting for me when I got home :)

Beef Enchiladas.

So thanks to my lovely wife we enjoyed a very nice supper today.  One more thing that I would like to note is my score from Frisbee golfing yesterday.  I went and played at the course just north of Freddy Court.  Here is how I fared on each hole:  Maybe I can compare the next time I play to this time...
Hole #:                Par:                    My Score:
1                          3                           3 - Par
2                          3                           5 - Double Bogey
3                          3                           3 - Par
4                          3                           3 - Par
5                          3                           4 - Bogey
6                          3                           4 - Bogey
7                          3                           3 - Par (I hit the goal and almost had a birdie)
8                          3                           3 - Par
9                          3                           3 - Par
10                        3                           3 - Par
11                        3                           4 - Bogey
12                        3                           3 - Par
13                        3                           2 - Birdie :)
14                        3                           4 - Bogey
15                        3                           3 - Par
16                        4                           4 - Par
17                        3                           4 - Bogey
18                        4                           5 - Bogey

Total:                   56                          63 (+7)

Thursday, October 6th, 2011

One month ago today I started my job at SportsPlus in Marshalltown :)

In response to my previous post, I did in fact buy tickets for the ISU/Texas football game... and it was a disaster!  One of the worst performances I've ever seen from Iowa State.  ...but let's not dwell on that.

Right now I'm at home watching the Detroit Tigers play the Yankees in a decisive ALDS game 5.  The Tigers are leading 3-1 over the hated Yankees.  Some time I will have to make a post where I detail which teams I hate the most and why.  Speaking of baseball, on Tuesday this week I took Elizabeth to see the movie Moneyball.  We both really enjoyed it, and I would suggest that you see it even if you're not a big sports fan.  Brad Pitt plays Oakland's general manager Billy Beane, and the movie documents his struggle to succeed in a small market in a game that is inherently unfair because of the cash that rich "evil" teams like the Yankees spend to buy all of the best players.  Very entertaining.

Other sports news on my mind is the constantly changing college conference landscape.  As of this year, the Big 12 only has 10 teams and will be losing Texas A&M next year.  Right now Missouri is openly exploring the possibility of changing conferences.  So screw the Tigers and Aggies.  Even if Missouri stays in the Big 12 I will like them the least of the remaining schools.  Then just announced today, the Big 12 has invited TCU to join the league.  It may take some time for them to consider, but I think that it would be a good addition to the league.  It will be fun to see if more teams will join the league... but as for now we basically need to have Missouri make up their mind.  Rumors on ESPN now say that other schools being considered for the Big 12 may be Louisville, West Virginia, BYU, or possibly Tulane.  I would prefer teams in a close geographic location to teams like WVU.  I guess we'll see how ridiculous this all turns out.