Tag / Fun

by Greg

07.07.07

It’s just fun to put that in print! 07.07.07. We are planning to meet with some friends at Young’s Jersey Dairy in Yellow Springs, OH today – an awesome ice cream (but so much more!) place in the land of my birth – and originally, thought it would be fun to meet at 7:07pm on 07.07.07. BUT, alas… they are not able to. We’ll be getting together earlier.

Will have to figure out something else to do on that fun date. We’ll have to wait a year and a month till the next such date. 🙂 What will you be doing on this “special occasion”?

Perhaps something involving sevens?

Let me know in the comments if you have any good ideas. 🙂

by Greg

Ice Cream Update

As you know from previous entries, July is national ice cream month, and we’ve been doing our part to celebrate that! Here’s a quick run-down on the month so far.

  • July 1 – We made home made ice cream with friends (Philadelphia-style Vanilla, and Strawberry Sherbet)
  • 7/2 – Made some more home made ice cream, and ate some of the previous day’s ice cream!
  • 7/3 – Finished the home made ice cream off! Mmmmmm!!!
  • 7/4 – Went out with friends for some home made ice cream at Sharks Custard & Candy in Bloomfield, NY! (Then I had a tad more Breyer’s when I got home…) 🙂
  • 7/5 – Travel day… had a Frosty at Wendy’s (Does that count?) and then stopped at my Dad’s favorite ice cream spot, The Frosty Eagle in Bellbrook, OH!
  • 7/6 – Got some more home made ice cream at Graeter’s Ice Cream in Centreville, OH! Great “inclusions”! (Big chunks of chocolate!) AND… we even got to eat some Astronaut Ice Cream at the Creation Museum today!
  • 7/7 – Meeting some friends at Young’s Jersey Dairy for some great home made ice cream! And Young’s is not just an ice cream place, it’s an experience! You can feed/pet the animals, play on the farm toys, even play a round of mini-golf if you want! It’s a childhood, nostalgic stop during National Ice Cream month, in Springfield, OH (really, Yellow Springs, OH.)

More to come…

by Greg

Optical Illusions

Optical Illusion - Pink and Green Dots
After first-hand viewing of a cool optical illusion of the summer moon, I got this in my e-mail today from my Dad. (He likes to forward stuff… this one’s pretty cool…) 🙂

The instructions in the e-mail were as follows:

  • If your eyes follow the movement of the rotating pink dot, the dots will remain only one color, pink.
  • However if you stare at the black “+” in the center, the moving dot turns to green.
  • Now, concentrate on the black “+” in the center of the picture. After a short period, all the pink dots will slowly disappear, and you will only see only a single green dot rotating.

It’s amazing how our brain works. There really is no green dot, and the pink ones really don’t disappear. This should be proof enough, we don’t always see what we think we see.

Thanks, Dad! 🙂

by Greg

Chill & Grill x2

Our friend Chi reminded me that I never shared the story of another “food fest” day (with food (mostly) provided by Chill & Grill) just a couple weeks ago. June 16th, I believe. It was certainly akin to FOOD FEST I, detailed below.

The Chis arrived in time for lunch, so they got their pugs out, we got our kids in the stroller, and off we went on the 1-mile trek to Chill & Grill!

We went all out. Chi & I got Monster Burgers. There were lots of fries. Some chicken. Probably some other greasy stuff…. it was fantastic! AND THEN, the Chis treated us to ice cream afterward. Chi ordered a Large. Only the second person I’ve seen even ORDER a large. And he finished it. AND this was after a 1-lb Monster Burger. Nice job, Chi!

BUT there was more!

We went back home and just hung out for the afternoon… even got to play a round of the Hulk board game! I won! HULK SMASH!!!!

As it was getting toward dinner time… we decided to make a nice waffle dinner! It was awesome! Waffles fresh off the grill. It was rather surprising we had room, after our big Chill & Grill excursion.

We hung out in the yard a bit more… but even more surprising… we decided we hadn’t had ENOUGH ice cream… so the Chis treated us to ANOTHER ROUND of Chill & Grill!!!! Ha! And yes, Chi ordered ANOTHER LARGE. And finished it. He is an eating machine!

Nice work, Chi. But next time you need to eat two Monster Burgers, too! Whoohoo!

by Greg

Food Fest I

FOOD FEST I - July 01, 2007
Yes, I know yesterday was Canada Day (I believe it is “observed” today), but I believe that July 1st may now become the official day of FOOD FEST.

Some have called it Eat Fest, and yesterday I first thought it could be called GlutFest (as in “gluttonous”) but I think I have settled on FOOD FEST.

And, just like the Superbowl, I think we’ll keep track of this (hopefully) annual event with a roman numeral. Thus, yesterday’s soirée was FOOD FEST I.

I can’t believe I am actually eating anything today… 🙂

Our first guests arrived around 11:30 or so, and we planned to eat lunch at 1ish (once the other guests arrived). So… as my mom was always good at doing, I had some goodies ready to snack on sitting on the table when they got there – and snack we did. There was fresh watermelon, cantaloupe and strawberries. We had sweet tea, unsweetened tea. We had celery and blue cheese, and added some baby carrots. And all this was just to munch on before lunch!

I fired up the grill at about five till one, and cooked up about 20 hamburgers for 6 adults and 9 children. (Two of those being one-year-olds). Add to that the potato salad, some fantastic apple salad with a hint of lime, a variety of chips, and of course the selection of about a dozen things you could put on your burger… including bacon! Whoohoo!

But… as if that were not enough…

We moved the propane tank from the grill to the fryer once the burgers were done, and I started heating up the oil for CHICKEN WINGS. Now, I don’t like to toot my own horn, but I used to think that I made the best wing sauce in Buffalo… and I’m still pretty good at cookin’ up a batch of wings. In fact, our friend Scott said they were the best I’ve ever made and I think he’s eaten at least 500 of my wings. (Plus, he makes some great wings himself!) 🙂

So, we cooked up about 6 pounds of those (leaving 2 more pounds for fresh wings later) and had those after a couple hamburgers each (and all the other goodies!) … it was a food fest alright!

BUT WE WEREN’T DONE.

Chicken wings were the “specialty” of the day… until we found out it was National ICe Cream Month! So, we decided to make some home made ice cream! Having recently attended a class on making ice cream… I put my newly acquired skills to good use and made the most AMAZING homemade ice cream I have ever made! Maybe the best I’ve ever tasted! It turned out perfect! So we sampled a bit, then threw it in the freezer to “ripen”. (That’s the step where the ice cream hardens.)

We did go for a swim with the kids (at least, me and Dave did…) so we stopped eating for just about an hour, but then it was back to the house for the ice cream, more wings, and general nibbling of all the food that was STILL left.

We ate from around noon till 7:30 or so… with almost no break. Non stop FOOD FEST. Awesome. 🙂

There was quite a bit of food left over. We had some for lunch today. And will for dinner. And might tomorrow. 🙂 But we certainly had our share of food at the innaugural FOOD FEST I.

Check back in a year for the report from FOOD FEST II! 🙂

by Greg

National Ice Cream Month!

July is National Ice Cream MonthJuly is national Ice Cream month, and I got an e-mail today from Turkey Hill dairy (yes, I subscribe to an ice cream newsletter… that might tell you something about how I feel about ice cream….) announcing a give away in July of FREE ICE CREAM. (One winner gets a year’s supply, four more get a month’s supply.) Just stop by their blog every day in July, leave a comment, and you’ll have a chance to win.

Here are the links:

How much ice cream can you eat in 31 days? I guess we’ll find out…

by Greg

Church Ball

Church BallThis past week I happened to see a movie called Church Ball come across my NetFlix new release feed. The title alone is pretty funny, but the description was even more intriguing:

Fred Willard stars as a bishop intent on pulling together a winning team for his soon-to-disappear church basketball league in this comedy from Mormon filmmaker Kurt Hale. Included among the players on the ragtag squad are an Uzbek immigrant, an overweight baker and (most oddly of all) the diminutive Gary Coleman, who serves as the center for the team.

Believe it or not, though it was corny at some spots, it’s a pretty funny movie! We watched it with the boys and they loved it. It might be funnier to anyone who has been around “church”… so, since we have, we thought it was funny. 🙂

If you like silly movies, add it to the queue today!

by Greg

FLAG DAY!

Happy Flag Day!When I was a kid, I thought I had discovered Flag Day – June 14th – when I first saw it on my calendar. Every year since then (I was probably Ian’s age…) I have made a point to celebrate it in some way. We have no official plans, except a little kidless excursion in the evening. Guess that’s pretty much a celebration!!!

Here’s hoping your Flag Day 2007 is Flagtastic!

Or something. 🙂