Monday, April 22nd, 2013

Happy Earth Day to all.  This must me one of the lamest holidays there are.  It's not that I have anything against the Earth or recycling or anything, but how many "holidays" do we need?

This past Saturday should have been a holiday though as it was Cy's House of Trivia!!  This marks the second year in a row where we've attended this event.  It's really hard to get tickets for this event.  In fact, we likely would not have been able to go except that I won a "lottery" that Iowa State held.  Five new tables were chosen this year in the lottery, and I was #2.  I believe that this means we will be able to attend next year as well, but after that we will need at least 2 tables not to renew their tickets.  I definitely want to go every year that I can!  This may be the most entertaining sporting event of the year for me.  I'm just so happy to be able to meet some of the players and coaches! 

Our team name this year was "Tyrus McGee's Fan Club".  I chose this on the chance that the organizers would put Tyrus at our table this way... and wouldn't you know it, that's exactly what happened.  They had Tyrus sit at our table right off the start in Round 1.  I talked to him a little bit about him vs coach Hoiberg in games of HORSE, and I thanked him for being a fun Cyclone to watch.  Other notables that sat at our table were ISU's offensive line coach, Chris Klenakis, and I believe the Swimming & Diving coach, Duane Sorenson.  We also had the chance to meet and greet quite a few other Cyclones during the night.

Tyrus and me, just chillin'

Our team with Coach Paul Rhoads

Elizabeth with CPR after she won an autographed football via raffle ticket

The Gleasons with Jamie Pollard

John Walters and myself

Korie Lucious

Myself, Anna Prins, Chelsea Poppens, Ann, and Tim

Our group with Cy

Wednesday, April 10th, 2013

Another busy weekday for myself as always... Today I woke up around 5 AM, had a little time to shower, make breakfast, etc, before I headed off to work.  Mondays & Wednesdays are my early days of the week as I need to be in Marshalltown before 7:00 for my first patient. 

As of now I'm happy to say that Elizabeth and our little one are now in the third trimester!  July seems like it's so far away, but I know that it will be here before we know it. 

Of course there are now other things growing in our house besides a baby... I've just started a few seeds in a tray of potting soil for our garden this year.  Right now I have some "Better Boy" tomatoes, some Bell Peppers, and some "Gardener's Delight" tomatoes.  It's my understanding that the Better Boy variety is more of a traditional full sized tomato that should yield well, and the Gardener's Delight is a small, cherry tomato.  I also just found out that I should have likely started these seeds back in February.  Oh well.  I'll still give it  try, and if they are late to mature I'm sure it's no big deal.  It's not like the seeds cost much money anyways.  Since it's the first year I've been in charge of a garden, I'm not expecting a garden like Marcia used to have.  I may go and buy a tomato plant that's already started anyways just to make sure that we have something.  I'm also planning on planting some carrots as well.  Not sure if anything else will make the garden yet or not.

Tomato ands pepper seeds getting ready to be planted.

Saturday, April 6th, 2013

SPRING IS HERE!!!

This has been an enjoyable Saturday now that the weather outside has finally turned for the better.  Hopefully it lasts!  We enjoyed a high in the mid-60's in Ames. Our day included some "spring cleaning" as we organized the house (I even vacuumed).  Another sign of spring was our first grill-out of the year.  I cooked up some burgers from the Salton farm & some hot dogs.  We also played some ladder golf and relaxed on lawn chairs listening to music.  I am really looking forward to grilling out regularly this year! 

Ingredients for our cook out: Burgers, mushrooms, tomato, cheese slices, hot dogs, buns, and of course I needed a couple of beers :)

My view while playing ladder golf.

Burgers, hot dogs, and twice baked potatoes in aluminum foil.

Here I am manning the grill.

Sunday, March 31st, 2013

Happy birthday to me, happy birthday to me, happy birthday dear Brian, happy birthday to me :)

That's right.  I am officially 29 as of today.  I should also say happy birthday to my bro in-law Christian as he turns 27.  It's pretty cool that we both share the best birthday ever I think!

I guess that it's worth mentioning that today is also Easter.  This marks the 3rd time in my life where the holiday shared the same day as my birthday (1991, 2002, 2013).  The next time will be in eleven years during 2024.  I still remember my Easter birthday in 1991 when my parents hid marshmallow "peeps" around the house, and I got to run around and find them all.  I can't say that I really care for peeps anymore, but that's still a pretty clear memory I have. 

This weekend Elizabeth and I went to visit her mother Becky, and then to my parents place back on the farm.  Friday after work we drove up to Mason City, and the three of us went out for some delicious Northwestern Steakhouse steak (Becky had Walleye though as it was still Lent).  We ended up staying to about 11 Saturday morning having a nice visit before we left for my parents' place.  The plan was to make homemade pizzas and have a nice meal with the family.  However, this night will mainly be remembered for the twin calves that were born that night.  Elizabeth had never seen a baby calf be born before, and it just happened that a heifer was getting close to giving birth.  Eben took us out to watch, but it became clear that the cow may need some help.  We got her into a shoot, and Eben did his best to assess the "situation".  He could feel 3 front feet, and he said that the head was twisted sideways and not lined up straight how it should.  He tried to turn the head but was unable to get it right, so we had to call the vet.  It was a little hard getting a hold of a vet around supper time the day before Easter, but the third one we called was able to come.  It turns out that there were twin baby calves, and their legs were tangled together which made it difficult.  Luckily, the vet was able to deliver both calves naturally, and both babies and the mother turned out all right.  This all happened around the time the pizzas were starting to cook... so supper ended up being an afterthought. 

Then today we had a nice and quiet morning on the farm with a big Easter lunch complete with an angel food birthday cake for me.  It's always nice having time to see the family :)

Since it was my birthday weekend, Amy let me choose her toenail color.  She has always hated pink, so that was a natural choice :)

Mom chilling at the kitchen table.  It was nice to seen her walking normally without a cane or walker now that she is used to her new knee.

Our homemade pizzas... just before the twin calf fiasco.

Amy lighting my birthday cake today after lunch. 

Twenty nine candles!

Here are the twin bull calves (less than a day old) and their mother.

Sunday, March 24th, 2013

Well today had likely not been a good one for my blood pressure.  I was able to sleep in this morning before enjoying a tasty breakfast of bacon and scrambled eggs.  Then of course there was the horribly stressful NCAA men's basketball game between the Cyclones and Ohio State Buckeyes.  It was heartbreaking to watch Iowa State's season end the way it did, but I am still very pround of our team.  The group of Seniors that Iowa State loses will be hard to replace, and it was very fun watching them play all year long.  I feel bad for Chriss Babb, as he had to sit on the sidelines and watch for the entire second half after spraining his ankle.  Still, the Cyclones managed to battle back from a 13-point second half decifit to take the lead and have a change to win the game.  Had just one more call, or one more bounce went their way, they would likely be in the Sweet 16.  But of course that is sports.  It was a good game from Ohio State, and Aaron Craft made a huge shot at the end to win it for the Buckeyes.  I hate the Big 10 so much :(

Still it was a great weekend to be a Cyclone fan.  It was great to see the men take down Notre Dame 76-58, and yesterday I was able to watch the women's team win their first-round game at Gonzaga, 72-60.

It's too bad that I will never see Babb, Lucious, McGee, Clyburn, or Booker play for the Cyclones again.  Still, I have to thank them for helping restore Hilton Magic and put Iowa State basketball back on the map. 

Here are some highlights of their big win over Notre Dame.

Friday, March 22nd, 2013

IOWA STATE CYCLONES CRUSH notre dame 76-58!!

Elizabeth and myself just got done watching the 10th-seeded Cyclones dismantle 7th-seeded Notre Dame in a game that was never in question after the halfway point of the first half.  The Cyclones played furious help defense and were clearly the better team all game.  At one point in the second half, Iowa State's lead was up to 27!  Iowa State cleared their bench (and the classy Irish, not so much) which ended up making the final score a little "closer".  What a great game by the Cyclones.  I am so happy right now.  There really is no better description than the Irish just looked foolish. 

When I say they looked foolish, I literally mean that their appearance was terrible.  Now their jerseys today were better than the all neon green ones:

God-aweful Notre Dame jerseys.

I couldn't find the exact ones that they wore today, but this gives you an idea about the ugly factor we are dealing with here.  The ones today were white with the neon, glow-in-the-dark, green trim.  They had the same green tall socks and green shoes.  To make it worse, not only did they make a statement with their ugly uniforms, they played terribly.  For quite a while (well into the second half), the Irish had the same number of turnovers as they did field goals.  If Iowa State wanted to, they could have won by 30.  Georges Niang played a solid game for the Cyclones, and led all scorers with 19 points.  Melvin Ejim added 17 (despite blowing a couple of dunks).  Tyrus McGee was 3 of 5 from three point land.  Even Bubu Palo made a three.  It was great fun for yours truly.  This marks two years in a row that Fred Hoiberg's team has easily handled a team from the Big East.

With the win, Iowa State advances to play the 2-seed, Ohio State. 

Sunday, March 17th, 2013

Happy St. Patrick's Day, and happy Selection Sunday everybody!!

The highlight of our weekend (which was a three-day weekend since we took Friday off) was taking a trip out to Chicago to meet up with friends for the annual Hooligan's bar crawl.  This is now the 8th year that a group of friends have been doing this bar crawl, which begins in Palatine and stops at bars along the Metra line until we end up in Crystal Lake, IL.  I've only done this a few years, but Elizabeth has been to most of the previous years. 

We left central Iowa on Thursday after work to head to Chicago with Erick Ude, Tim Nevins, Elizabeth, and myself.  That night we stayed in Crystal Lake, and then on Friday morning we headed downtown to spend a day in the city.  We went to the top of the Sears Tower (now known as the Willis Tower), and we went out onto the Skydeck which is on the 103rd floor.  The Skydeck is basically a thick pane of glass that you can stand on and look down to the city below you... 1,353 feet below.  Later that day we all met up with Shanae and Jackie Paulus for lunch before we headed to an ISU bar, Fizz, to watch the ISU vs Kansas basketball game.  Sadly, the Cyclones lost to Kansas, who ended up winning the Big 12 tournament over Kansas State on Saturday. 

Saturday was the big day of the bar crawl.  We had originally planned to watch the Chicago river get dyed green, but we didn't have enough time to do that before we had to catch our train back to the suburbs.  Like I said, the bar crawl was a lot of fun with a lot of old friends.  Elizabeth still had quite a bit of fun even though she was not drinking (at least she was able to take care of everyone as well).  All together there were probably 40 to 50 people in the group of us, so we basically took over each of the bars that we went to that day. 

Here I am with all of my St. Patrick's gear on...

Hooligan's 2013!

The other big thing about today is the fact that it is Selection Sunday, which I have been looking forward to for months!  We learned that Iowa State (a 10 seed) will square off against Notre Dame (a 7 seed) next Friday, 3/22/13.  The game will be played in Dayton, Ohio, and the winner of that game will play the winner of Ohio State (2 seed) and Iona (15 seed). 

It's a little surprising that I actually mentioned Notre Dame in my last post as a possible opponent for Iowa State.