Rosy and Grey is Back

MTH has decided to start up his blog again. It had been so long since he updated it that he forgot his user name and password. So, the blog is actually a new one with a different address but you can click on the link on the right and it will take you to the new one. I'll have him put a link on that one that will link back to the old one.

Seattle and Aspen

I've been off working on the other side of the country and then vacationing in Aspen. It was quite a nice week. The weather in Seattle was awesome. Barely any rain - almost all blue skies and sunshine. I bought flowers at the Pike Place Market the first day for my hotel room and they were beautiful the entire time. I also took a picture of the original Starbuck's just for ETK. I'll upload it eventually. Aspen was nice, as usual. Since I had already been on the West Coast for 6 days, I didn't really have to adjust to the new time. That part was nice but it seems that the high altitude still made me tired. We went to the top of Aspen mountain for the first time. It's quite a view although there were clouds so it wasn't as good as on a clear day. We played disc golf which turned out to be much harder than I expected. We also played horse shoes. It was interesting that they had all of these games up there.

As I said, I'll post some pictures later.

MTH is committed

MTH has signed up for the Lake Placid Ironman Triathlon that will take place next July. We bought him a road bike yesterday. We still need to get the biking clothes and the wetsuit. I'm sure there are many other things that he'll need. For now, he has to get used to riding this bike. It doesn't have real pedals. Instead it has clips on the bike and he wears special shoes that clip in. The story goes that the first few (or maybe many) times he tries to start riding, he'll fall over. Here's more info. It's very light. It's made out of both aluminum and carbon composite. Based on our research, it seems that we got a fairly good deal out of it. Oh well, it still wasn't cheap :)

I'm sure you'll be hearing more about this Triathlon training in the year to come. MTH is already doing well. He ran 4 miles today in 90 degree weather!

We tried it ourselves

If you'll recall, in my post about Rustico, I talked about this awesome grilled Romaine salad. MTH and I decided to see if we could do it too. Well, we can. Here's the recipe:

"Fake" Caesar Dressing
(It's fake because it doesn't have raw egg or real anchovies in it - instead it has Worcestershire for the anchovies and parmesan and garlic for the egg - it was still a little runny but tasted great - recipe found on www.recipezaar.com)

1 finely chopped clove garlic
1 juice of lemon
1 teaspoon hot sauce (Tabasco)
1 teaspoon worcestershire sauce
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1/3 cup extra-virgin olive oil
1/2 cup shredded parmesan cheese
salt
coarse black pepper
4 servings
Mix everything in blender. I added more mustard than it called for to get more that flavor. You can flavor it however you want. Or even use a different dressing.

Grilled Romaine Hearts
2 Romaine hearts
olive oil
fresh ground pepper
Wash the Romaine hearts. Cut in half lengthwise. Brush or pour lightly with olive oil on both sides. Pepper with the fresh pepper. Grill on high heat for 1 minute on each side. Enjoy with aged goat cheese and Caesar salad.

For the entree, we had mustard marinated pork tenderloin. You mix together dijon mustard, rosemary, garlic, salt and pepper in a mini-food processor. Once it's like a paste, spread it on the tenderloin and allow to marinade for 30 minutes in the refrigerator. Then, sear the meat on each side for about 3 minutes (the searing didn't work as well as I had hoped but the meat was still very good - we may need to let our grill heat up more). After searing, turn it down to medium high heat, cover and cook for 12 minutes (internal temperature at 145 degrees - an instant thermometer is a great tool to have). I'm thinking you could make this in the oven by broiling it first to "sear" and then turning down the oven to finish roasting. Or you could sear it on the stovetop in an ovenproof pan and then put it in the oven to finish it. The meat was tender. And, the great thing about pork tenderloin is that it's relatively inexpensive compared to other meats of its quality.

Let me know if you try out the recipe or recipes and what you think of them!

Rustico

MTH and I went to a restaurant called Rustico last night. We have been there before The beer list would be impressive to most as it's about 5 pages long (not quite as extensive as Brickskellar but it's much closer to our house). Although it's walkable, due to the high temperatures yesterday, we took a bus. Of course, that included walking a half mile to the metro to catch the bus. The bus ride itself was only about 4 minutes. They don't reservations so you just put your name in when you get there. We had about a 20-30 minute wait. While we waited, we had a beer. I tried one called Allagash Tripel. It's a Belgian style beer from Portland, Maine. MTH had some type of IPA (I don't remember the particular name). Once we were seated, he had another type of beer but I don't remember it either. He had yesterday off because his office is moving to a new building. So, he spent the day playing golf but for some reason didn't have lunch. So, he was especially hungry. We started with a Bavarian Board. As the name implies, it was an assortment of German sausages, sauerkrat, cheese, rye bread and mustard. It was actually quite good. For dinner, I had a grilled Romaine salad. That was the best salad I've ever had. It's exactly what you're thinking - the Romaine salad is grilled so that it's slightly wilted and has a smoky flavor. The menu said that the dressing is a Caesar dressing. It was a little different than most Caesar dressings that I've had. There was a noticeable mustard flavor and no noticeable anchovy flavor. The ingredient that brought it all together was an aged goat cheese that was grated over the salad. Aged goat cheese is different from the normal fresh goat cheese you usually get in a salad. It looks more like parmesan but has that distinctive goat cheese flavor. Overall, it was an outstanding meal. I'm now going to try to make that salad at home. I think that MTH even liked it! He had the mushroom and goat cheese pizza like last time. Since I didn't eat any, we have a nice amount of leftovers for lunch today.

The Book I'm Reading

Yes, I'm still reading that book, Against the Gods: The Story of Risk. The reason is because I haven't actually looked at it in about a month. There's been no time. But, I still really would recommend this book to others. The story is interesting about how statistics and probability were created/discovered. I will one day soon finish it and there will be a new book to the right. I leave for Seattle in a few weeks so maybe I'll finish it on that trip.

A New Car

We are now a 2 car family again. MTH's office is moving to Chevy Chase so our nice little commute together is no longer viable. He'll go northeast to Maryland and I'll go northwest to McLean. So, buying a car was not as bad as I thought it would be. MTH really wanted us to get a used Audi A4 or BMW 3 Series. I wanted the Acura TSX. I've wanted that car since it came out. So, on Friday, we went to the Audi dealership near our house. We took a 2005 A4 out for a spin. It was fine except for the stench of cigarette smoke. That one was definitely out. We looked at another one and it seemed like a possibility. Then, on Saturday morning, we were the first people at the pre-owned BMW warehouse in Pentagon City. We took one of their only manual transmission 3 Series' out. It was a 2 door and had not been kept very clean inside. I wasn't too impressed. Then, we head to the Acura dealership. We take a new 2006 TSX out for a drive. I love it. It's got a navigation system that talks to you. My phone has bluetooth and so does the car. So, now I can call people by talking to my car. Just like Knight Rider!! Of course, I still have to drive the car myself. The color is Glacier Blue. We finished buying the car by 4pm on Saturday. Not bad. That night, I went to the soccer game with MTH. All for love. I'm not really a big fan of soccer but the one good thing is that you know almost exactly when the game will end. Each half is 45 minutes. The halftime is 15 minutes. There's usually a few minutes of stoppage time added at the end but no more than 3-4 minutes. Plus, soccer's not nearly as popular as football or baseball so the crowds when you leave are not enormous. On Sunday, we went to Bistrot du Coin just north of Dupont Circle in the District. We hadn't been there since November! I love that place. They have the best country pate in the US (in my opinion). I also love their spaetzle. They were still decorated for their Bastille Day celebration.

MTH and I are still trying to figure out our fall vacation. We're trying to decide between England, France or Ireland or some combination. We also would like to go to Iceland over Labor Day weekend but since we haven't made any plans yet, I think that one's probably out now.

Almost Paradise

Here's how I started each day when I walked out the door!

The wedding was on the second day I was there. Here's the view to the right of my seat.


Since MTH couldn't be with us, we figured the next best thing to a real lobster dinner was a picture of the tail and his placecard.


There were iguanas everywhere. So, of course, we took a lot of pictures. I picked this one for the hibiscus in the background - an iguana's favorite food.

An Update

I've been away for a while. I know that I promised an update about our cheese tasting. All in good time. I'll give an update of other events. Nothing interesting that following week or weekend except that I had gotten tickets to the Orioles versus Nats baseball game in Baltimore. According to the weather, it was supposed to rain so we decided not to drive to Balto. That was Saturday. Sunday was an ok day. Not much going on. Then, that night, it started raining and it wouldn't stop. MTH and I were watching TV when the dryer buzzer started buzzing but didn't stop when it should. We ran down to the basement to find out what was wrong. But, we didn't make it down the stairs before we saw the problem - water. Our basement had flooded. We figured out later the drain had gotten clogged and thus backed up. Once the rain stopped, the pump got the water out there in no time at all. Then, Monday was spent cleaning and driving to the dump. We felt pretty good and lucky since we had not "brown" water down there. Well, Monday night came and it started raining again. Guess what? It flooded again! So, we spent Tuesday cleaning again. This time, we built a debris catcher just in case it rained Tuesday night. Of course, now that we were prepared, it didn't rain. I'm not really complaining.

As you may remember, we were supposed to leave for St. Thomas on Friday. MTH decided that he was worried about mold. There's a few pieces of dry wall down there. He pulled it out while I was lazing around on the beach. Yes, I went without him. Only because it was my friend's wedding and other friends were going to be there. Otherwise, we would have just postponed the trip. The trip was great (although would have been more fun with MTH there). We went snorkeling, swimming, drinking, dancing. Plus, I flew business class back. The upgrade wasn't that expensive so I decided to take it. These are old planes so they can't really charge too much.

I got back late on Monday, 7/3. MTH's parents' were in town so we met them for breakfast the next morning. Then, later that day, we had a few people over - just a laid back 4th of July. When they first got there, it was over 90 degrees outside. Then, it decided to start raining. So, we ended up staying inside for most of the time. Then, we headed out for the fireworks. We watched the fireworks that are on the Mall from an overpass near our house. Much easier to get home afterwards!

Then, it was only a 3 day work week. Should be easy, right? Well, it seems that everything was compressed into those 3 days. I worked more than normal but nothing too bad.

The weekend was great. I'll post a more in depth update of that later. It was MTH's birthday this past weekend and we celebrated it with a cookout on Saturday. I even went to a movie with him on Sunday night!!

Noah's Ark

It seemed last weekend that we needed Noah's Ark after all the rain that came to Northern VA. I'll give a much longer update in the next few days. Today's the 4th of July and we're having people over to celebrate Independence Day. I'll also give an update on my trip to St. Thomas. I had a great time. Unfortunately, MTH did not make but with good reason. He held down the fort here and cleaned up the basement. He's a wonderful husband.

CHEESE!!!!

We're about to leave for a French cow's milk cheese tasting at my favorite cheese shop, Cheesetique. Will give an update later.

Back from Richmond

We didn't end up going to see Carbon Leaf. We got to Richmond around 2:45pm. MTH wanted to see the USA versus Italy soccer match. We went to Buffalo Wild Wings in the Bottom. Of course, we had a few beers and wings. Then, we went to BL's places and had more to drink (although I did switch to water). Then we went to the Hard Shell for dinner around 8pm. We had a cocktail each and shared a bottle of wine. We took our time and enjoyed dinner. By the time we finished, it was well after 10pm. So, we didn't make it to the concert in time. I was disappointed and I'm sure that MTH was even more disappointed. We did get up this morning and have brunch at the Hill Cafe with BL and Brit Girl. I definitely have a great time hanging out with them. Hopefully they'll be able to make it up for our cookout on 7/8.

Getting Excited

We leave for our trip to St. Thomas is less than 2 weeks. It's going to be such a good time.

Can you believe it?

1. We're going to Richmond today and not for me to work. We're going to visit some friends and see Carbon Leaf, a band that MTH has liked since he lived in Richmond. I also really like hearing them live.

2. We just finished watering and weeding the plants on the deck and in the backyard. The only ones not looking too good are the hanging plants. The issue is that they dry out very easily and I don't always remember (or am not able) to water them everyday. I almost think that they need to be watered more than once a day! If these get to the point of being basically dead, we'll throw them out. Then, I'm not sure what we'll put there.

3. We re-decorated the living room last week finally. We have some nice new shelves and we now even have DVR. MTH is especially excited about the latter. We also cleaned up the basement quite a bit. MTH could have a poker game down there now!

That's all for the amazing things that are "unbelievable" in our lives right now. We finally got up off the couch and got something done.

Memorial Day Weekend

In case you're interested, here's what we did over the Memorial Day weekend.

Friday - The Lazy Day:
My long weekend start early as I took Friday off. I had lunch with a friend in our neighborhood and met a new neighbor. She's very cool. I invited her and her husband to our cookout on Monday and she invited us to theirs on Sunday. That evening, MTH and I headed to Wintergreen. We had a wonderful meal of Wendy's on the road. We arrived at Wintergreen around 10:15pm. Then the fun began. We got our key to the room and headed over there. I walk in the door and flip the switch to the light. Nothing. Sometimes, those switches are attached to lamps which can be turned off locally. So, I walked into the room and found another switch and flipped it. Again, nothing. We walked around the entire room trying all of the light switches and none worked. We used the glow from MTH's Blackberry to see the phone so that we could call the front desk. They sent a repairman right away. He walked around trying to find the breaker box. Finally, he found it. All the breakers were in the "on" position. At that point, he said "the owners didn't pay their power bill". Aside: Wintergreen is a condo community where people buy condos but then use them kind of like timeshares. The hotel can rent out the rooms when the owners aren't there. But, apparently, the owners still have responsibility for power and other "amenities". End of Aside. The repairman called the front desk and told them that we needed a new room. He then proceeded to tell them that we should get comped for a night because we were very angry. In reality, MTH and I weren't angry. We knew it wasn't the front desk guy's fault but hey, if they wanted to comp us, that would have been just fine. But, we did get moved to a 3 bedroom 2 level condo that faced the mountains. Definitely a much nicer pad.

Saturday - The Day of Wine Tasting:
We were picked up at our mansion condo. We went to 5 wineries! Needless to say, when we returned to the room, we took a 2 hour nap and then woke up hungry. That night we went to the nice restaurant and had a nice meal and fell asleep again by 11pm or so.

Sunday - The Day of Games:
MTH and I left Wintergreen around 11am. We met up with some friends in C-ville for lunch at a Mexican place. I was so happy as I'd been craving some cheap Mexican food for a while. We then headed back home. Since we made it back before 5pm, we were able to go our new friend's cookout in the neighborhood. It's not far but for some reason MTH and I decided that we didn't want to walk. Instead, I rode my bike and he rollerbladed. We had a great time there. We ended up playing a game called Apples to Apples. It was a lot of fun. There's no board or dice, just cards. But it's not a normal card game either. I definitely recommend this game to others. We go so into playing the game that we didn't pay attention to the fact that it was dark. We then had to bike/rollerblade home in the dark. It wasn't too bad but really is not a great idea.

Monday - The Day of the Cook Out:
The cookout turned out great. People really got into playing bocce ball. The specialty food items were a hit. These included grilled Halloumi cheese, grilled doughnuts and fresh made bratwurst from Whole Foods. We'll be having another cookout around 4th of July so I need to start thinking about what new specialties I'll be offering.

Miami was fun

We had a great time in Miami. All we did was lay by the pool, shop, eat and drink. The hotel was an awesome location and the weather over all was all that we could have asked for.

An Homage to ETK

So, I didn't buy any crazy high heels this week. Instead, I went for comfort. But, of course, they must also be cute and cool. Here's my answer to that:



Again, it was taken with my camera phone so I don't know how to get it right side up. You'll just have to turn your head to see it correctly.

Can you see it?

I had a training at the Corcoran last night. When that was done, I just walked over to the Brickskellar from there. I walked down Pennsylvania Ave from 17th to 22nd. In between, I saw the following:

Can you see what doesn't belong?

Caveat: Taken with my camera phone. It would probably be a better picture if I had been able to take a wider angle view. But, you can't complain with a camera phone.

He's Off to Boston

Last night was one of many "last hoorahs" for AG. He and I were on the same team a few years back. He was always a fun guy to work with and hang out with. Even MTH liked him :) Here's a great picture from my camera phone showing AG after his 3rd or 4th shot last night.



We started at the Brickskellar near Dupont Circle. We all just drank beer. Then, we headed to Buffalo Billiards. That's where the shots began. Unfortunately for you dear readers (and fortunately for me), I have no drunken stories of my own. I've had too many in the past and have learned my lesson :)

The reason for the last hoorah is that AG is headed to business school in Boston at Harvard. He'll be making a 3 month trip home to India this summer and then 2 years of fun.

It's going around...

ETK posted this on her blog and I think she expects at least some of us to do the same. So, here are my answers.

Put your name in the subject box.
The theory is that you will learn a lot of little known facts about your friends.
It is fun and has 50 easy questions to answer. Try it; this can be fun and interesting.

1. FIRST NAME? M
2. WERE YOU NAMED AFTER ANYONE? My father - his middle name is the masculine version of M
3. WHEN DID YOU LAST CRY? I'm sure it hasn't been too long ago but I can't remember exactly when
4. DO YOU LIKE YOUR HANDWRITING? Yep
5. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE LUNCHMEAT? Turkey
6. KIDS? Phoebe
7. IF YOU WERE ANOTHER PERSON WOULD YOU BE FRIENDS WITH YOURSELF? Certainly.
8. DO YOU HAVE A JOURNAL? I've had several but never kept up with it for more than a month at the time.
9. DO YOU USE SARCASM A LOT? I think so.
10. DO YOU STILL HAVE YOUR TONSILS? Yes
11. WOULD YOU BUNGEE JUMP? Yes
12. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE CEREAL? Cheerios
13. DO YOU UNTIE YOUR SHOES WHEN YOU TAKE THEM OFF? Yes
14. DO YOU THINK YOU ARE STRONG? Depends on what you mean by strong. I'm not physically strong but otherwise, yes.
15. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE ICE CREAM? Chocolate
16. SHOE SIZE? 8 or 8.5 for regular shoes; 9.5 for running shoes
17. RED OR PINK? Red
18. WHAT IS THE LEAST FAVORITE THING ABOUT YOURSELF? Slightly crooked top front teeth
19. WHO DO YOU MISS THE MOST? My grandma
20. DO YOU WANT EVERYONE TO SEND THIS BACK TO YOU? Of course but no one will.
21. WHAT COLOR PANTS AND SHOES YOU ARE WEARING? Khaki cropped pants, blue and green t-shirt and black hoodie
22. WHAT DID YOU EAT LAST? Brown rice cake with peanut butter and glass of milk (afternoon snack)
23. WHAT ARE YOU LISTENING TO RIGHT NOW? Green
25. FAVORITE SMELL? J'Adore
26. WHO WAS THE LAST PERSON YOU TALKED TO ON THE PHONE? MTH
27. THE FIRST THING YOU NOTICE ABOUT PEOPLE YOU ARE ATTRACTED TO? Eyes
28. DO YOU LIKE THE PERSON WHO SENT THIS TO YOU? Yes
29. FAVORITE DRINK? Red Wine
30. FAVORITE SPORT? Football (American)
31. HAIR COLOR? Brownish, reddish, blondish
32. EYE COLOR? blue-green
33. DO YOU WEAR CONTACTS? No
34. WHAT IS YOUR FAVORITE FOOD? Chocolate
35. SCARY MOVIE OR HAPPY ENDING? Happy
36. LAST MOVIE YOU WATCHED? Not sure - I don't see very many movies
38. SUMMER OR WINTER? Definitely Summer!!
39. HUGS OR KISSES? Both!
40. FAVORITE DESSERT? Hot chocolate brownie with vanilla ice cream (sharing it with MTH at Evening Star)
42. LEAST LIKELY TO RESPOND? MTH
43. WHAT BOOKS ARE YOU READING? Against the Gods
44. WHAT'S ON YOUR MOUSE PAD? Laptop when I'm at home and in Richmond; Black with wrist support in my cube
45. WHAT DID YOU WATCH LAST NIGHT ON TV? Nothing
46. WHAT ARE YOUR FAVORITE SOUNDS? Never thought about it
47. STONE OR BEATLES? Beatles
48. THE FURTHEST YOU BEEN FROM HOME? France
49. HAVE A SPECIAL TALENT? It seems like I should but not sure.
50.WHERE WERE YOU BORN? North Carolina