Royal Oak Memorial Day Parade 2008

Another year, another memorial day parade. Back on Main Street this time - last year, Main was all dug up. We located ourselves opposite the Hollywood Market - getting there early enough to get coffee and snacks - handed out by the Hollywood market - good job!

The parade was similar to last year's - perhaps a little smaller

We sat opposite the brewery billboard - hmm - now there's an idea!

Kona Grill in Troy. A Coney Island with nice furniture?

A few days back, we has a family meal at the Kona Grill. The attraction was, that being American-Asian cuisine, both the sushi-eating and kid-food-eating kids would be happy.

Now, I've been there before, but only for lunch. And, admittedly, it was pretty good. The atmosphere was decent, and the raw fish was nice. I think I remember having an ahi tuna burger there and being impressed too.

All of the above did not quite carry into the evening meals. We started with Calamari - given the nice appearance of this place, we assumed they would have had a half clue about cooking calamari - i.e. the oil needs to be the right temperature and you don't want to under or over cook it. Unfortunately the oil was too cool - which resulted in the greasy mess you see below

Look how it glistens!!

Even the kids were not impressed. And left lots of it behind.

So, onto the main courses. The sushi-kid had a spicy tuna roll, some squid and some salmon roe. I sampled some; it seemed pretty much ok. The only gripes were that we had to ask for wasabi and ginger - it didn't come with it (or maybe the server forgot), and the price. There was nothing special about it - we have definitely had better elsewhere, locally, and spent less.

The non-sushi kid had macadamia nut chicken fingers and fries. Not good. Fries were super oily, the macadamia nut crust simply fell off the chicken (oily crust too), leaving some over-cooked chicken underneath.

Onto the adults - she had Thai-Peanut Chicken Noodles. To me, it wasn't bad. To her, the sauce was overpowering. I had the 5-spice bbq chicken pizza. Again, not too bad, but overpowered by the slathers of bbq sauce on it. And, the menu said it had cilantro. There might have been cilantro on there somewhere, but I did not find it.

Beer - I had a small glass (I guess 16 oz - not stated how much) of wheat beer. It was ok, but it cost $5. She had Pinot Grigio - apparently good, and should be at $7.50 a glass.

Deserts. I did not do desert. She did, and had Creme Brulee. Which apparently tasted more like custard with a little badly burnt (not caramelized) sugar on top. Could this have been microwaved??

The kids had a root beer float. Apparently good - but it's pretty difficult to mess that up.

All in all, it cost us over $80 for a mediocre meal.

Like I said, it's good there for lunch. But I won't be back for dinner.

At least the Colney Island is realistic in its prices. And there, we are realistic in our expectations. And the furniture is not as plush, nor are the clientèle, but there's not much in it when it comes to comparing the quality of the food - well, at least the food we had.

One last thing about the Kona Grill. When we pulled in, I was rushed at by a Valet attendant. Apparently, if you pull to the front of the restaurant, you're opting for 'complimentary' valet parking. This is so 'complimentary' that an individual company operates the valet service (sure, no tip is mandatory, but, ya know..). So, when I told him No, I want to self-park, he told me I had to park behind the restaurant! (it seems they had not yet put the signs out). Now that is something that really, really bugs me. Why can I not park where the heck I like, whether there is a valet parking option or not? Why do the stupid valet parkers get areas reserved for them? Why can't they simply find a space like the rest of us? Is it important to the car owner that the car is parked close to the door? Should it not matter, as valet parking means that you don't have to worry about where your car is? Arrggggh!!!! The restaurant is in TROY, not LA!!!!!

CHAMPIONS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

What a victory!!
Wings, you had me very worried for the last 2 minutes of what was a great game.

But no worries.
The Stanley is back in Hockeytown.


And, Red Wings, you're welcome for the advice. No problems.

I expect a check in the mail.

Red Wings! Listen Up! I WASN'T JOKING!!

Dear Red Wings,

Hardee-poopin'-ha. OK, you got me.

There's me sitting in front of the TV until 9 minutes before 1am. Watching you play since 8pm. Almost 6 periods. That's like 2 games, or, taking the tiredness factor into account, 20 games.

And then you go and let Petr Sycora go and score on you and win the game.

The joke's over.

It was bad enough when you were up 3-2 with 35 second to go before you could skate around the ice with Lord Stanley's cup hoisted above your heads. Decided to hold that one of for another night, eh? Good job! Cos I had meself on the edge of the seat and had the family all around me and us all ready to celebrate. But no. You were playing your little games and allowed Pittsburgh to score and force overtime.

Heck, the police in Royal Oak had all the barricades out and were all ready for a celebratory riot. The helicopters were circling like happy-vultures. Looks like you had them fooled too.

This is no longer funny. I command you to go to Pittsburgh tomorrow night AND COME BACK WITH A BIG SHINY STANLEY CUP!!!!!!!

Yea, real funny it was your periods of sleepiness, which got between admittedly excellent offense and defense. And also funny your 58 shots on goal (as opposed to 32 from the Penguins), out of which you manages to put 3 in the net. You know that's only a 5% accuracy rate. Hilarious!

Tomorrow night, JUST DO IT!

Here are some lessons. Please, everybody who is a Red Wing, listen up. Except Ozzie. I'll get to you later.

First off, here is a puck:


Now, what you do with this is put it into the net.











Or, you could call it a goal. What-ever! It looks like this:

Pretty simple. Inside the net. Not around.
Not above.
Inside.

Got it?







And, just so there's no confusion, hit it into the net using a hockey stick. You know, it's the thing you all carry around with you. Example:

Hit with the wide end.

Unless you're Kris Draper, you has used his face to nudge the puck in. Not advisable, Kris, but nice.









Anyway, there may be a slight, certainly not insurmountable obstacle. It looks like this:




Don't worry about it. It's really a girl. You just need to put the puck around it and into the net lots of times.

Us it as a marker for the net you need to put the puck into. No, not the one with Osgood in front of. The one with this ballet-dancer. OK?





Also, you have no need to worry about this little fella, despite what the NHL and Channel 4 seems to think.
He really is just an over-rated mini-mite.

Give him a few years - when he can grow a play-off beard he might be useful.




















OK. Osgood. You have been just about outstanding in these play-offs. Just keep it up, but better than last night. Your defense will help all they can, but JUST STOP THE PUCK FROM GOING INTO THE NET BEHIND YOU. No matter who hits it. Pretty simple, right?

So, great Red Wings, just follow the steps above. Put the puck in the Penguins net lots and lots of time. Don't let them put the puck in your net. Just do that and you will get this.
























Respectfully,

A Very Nervous Fan

WIN WINGS WIN!!!!!!

All we need is one more win! Tomorrow night?



Will Stevie Y get to hold it again, but this time as Red Wings On-The-Board guy? I think so!

The Blackfinn in Royal Oak - New Bar!!! (Got Guinness Potential)

Last night, a small handful of us visited the Newest Bar To Hit Royal Oak. This is The Blackfinn, in place that used to house Fudruckers.

Royal Oak has been waiting for this place for quite a while now - apparently it had to jump through all the hoops to get that highly coveted thing, a Royal Oak liquor license. There was quite a lot of controversy; city residents were worried that there would be all kinds of drunken debauchery happening. Well, apparently common sense won over and the place was allowed to open.

It was originally discussed as an Irish theme bar & Restaurant. From what I could see there was very little that made it Irish, apart from Guinness and Smithwicks.

Anyway, I got there at about 6 or so. The place was packed! Apparently it was its Grand Opening, even though I believe it has been open for about a week. What made it a Grand Opening? There were people wandering around giving out snacks. Which is never a bad thing.

Now, for me, the litmus test for any bar is the quality of it Guinness. So, I found a place at the bar and ordered a pint from a male bartender. The pint came up excellent. Creamy, smooth and cool.

My friends joined me, and a round of pints was pulled by one of the gals behind the bar. Unfortunately, she was not as good as her male counterpart - no top up, - just pour and go. Which gave us pints with large heads and lots of bubbles. But we drank them none the less.

One really nice thing here was the very high ceiling, which allowed the smoke to be not too noticeable.

I didn't have any food, nor did I even look at the menu. Next time.

The restrooms..... Functional, but complete with one thing that really really annoys me - an attendant. Why anyone would feel the need to have someone hand them a paper towel, and maybe spray some smelly stuff on them is beyond me. What exactly is the purpose of this guy???

So, in summary...

Pros: Potentially good Guinness, lively atmosphere, reasonably priced Guinness ($3 - maybe happy hour?), airy, lots of TVs.

Cons: Some bar staff who can't pull a good pint of Guinness, Bathroom Bouncer, crowded, lots of TVs.

I'll be back.........

Update.... there was a comment about the bathroom attendant explaining his purpose... contained some swearies so I had to delete it.

B-Bar-A in April - And the Boy Scout Museum

Recently, we took what was probably our last trip to D-Bar-A with my son as a Cub scout.

The weather was excellent - no rain, and not too hot. Friday night was hobo pie night - I made the camp fire and we all sat around with pie irons. Them things are great - there is an endless amount of recipes you can put in there. I got frowned upon for making a cherry-cheese pie, but it did taste unique - and good.
Saturday morning, I was involved with fire again. This time, it was breakfast. I was the Bacon-ator - using a large griddle and an indoor stove, I knocked out enough bacon to feed 77 people. The fat caught fire a bunch of times and my arms lost some hair - but it was a small price to pay for fried pig. Beside me, my good friend was pumping out the french toast - they didn't catch fire. Lesson for the future - if you values your arms, cook french toast.


Anyway the weekend went pretty well, despite some adult disagreements which I won't go into here.

We did see a pair of what I believe were Michigan Water Snakes - see below.
I assume it it a mother with her young - but I'm not sure. It was pretty cool to get close enough to take the photo - I don;t even know if they bite - thankfully they chose not to show us. They simply lay there, then looked at us, and then wriggled of into the pond.


Having gone there for years, we never managed to get in to the Boy Scout Museum. This time, we walked up the door, and one of the (I assume) resident D-Bar-A guys seen us and invited us in.

The museum is cool! Lots and lots of bits and pieces from scout groups over many, many years. Below are just a few pics from our visit.











And here's some random pics of D-Bar-A from near the museum. It really is a nice place - and certainly already holds a lot of memories for me.

And, a Totem Pole!

It's that time of year again - GO WINGS!!!!!!

Game 2 v the Pittsburgh Penguins was last night. I wasn't there - watched it from the couch with neighbors.

It was GREAT!!!!! 3-0!! Puts the Wings 2 games to none up. The stanley is on the way.

I found this very amusing clip of Mark Andre Fleurry on another Wings game at the Joe... look at the little kids on the side....

Let's now hope that Ozzie keeps his record up in Pittsburgh on Wednesday - and Saturday - and return to the D with a big shiney cup!!

Again....

GO WINGS!!

Gas and Lawn Mowers and Health and things

Ah gas is getting expensive again. I bought a gallon of gas for the lawn mower yesterday $3.95.99 a gallon. The complaining is everywhere.

This brought me back to a previous post.

It seems be time to walk a bit more instead of driving. Works for everyone. Added to what I said in the linked post, if people walked more or rode their bikes, they would be healthier. (Of course, that's only true if they don't get hit by an Hummer or Escalade driving to Costco to save 3 cents a gallon).

But assuming walkers or bikers survive, they would ultimately get more exercise, and get less sick. And, therefore need to spend less on health care - as a result, save money.

And less sick people should mean lower health insurance costs! So we all win!!!!!!

Granted I drove to the gas station to get lawn mower gas, and I could have went and bought a pushy non-motorized lawn mower, Heck I could have made a manual ride on lawn mower - see below!!!!

Mother's Day in Royal Oak 2008

Well it wasn't much... it rained so we did not have as much fun as last year. I don't even know if Royal Oak In Bloom happened.

But we went to the Royal Oak Brewery for lunch. I like it there. A place that serves decent food and makes beer. Great!!!!!

I had cajun catfish, the mom in the family had a cajun salmon sandwich, and the kids had burgers.

Great - we left there not hungry, nor thirsty.

I highly recommend the Northern Light beer. Hint: It ain't Bud Lite!

Cell by Stepher King - why I now hate Stephen King.

I listen to audiobooks in the car. Apart from NPR, and 89X, there's not much radio to listen to these days, so audiobooks are the way to go for me.

I took out Cell, a novel by Stephen King. Over the years, I've read most King books, and enjoyed them, with one or two exceptions.

#######SPOILER ALERT##########
.....Don't read any further if you want to read the stupid book......

By about half way through the book, it seemed to me that this would be no exception - I was well and truly hooked on the story. But that changed as the book headed to its end. I'll explain.

The story is about the cell-phone using population getting hit by a 'pulse' which effectively wipes most of their brain and turns them into crazed deranged pants-pooping zombies. Pretty interesting reading - and an interesting concept. What do you do if you see people acting like this? You pick up your cell phone and try to call someone - and as a result become a phone-infected crazy yourself.

I thought it was going to be a little like The Stand - an apocalyptic global reset, which it maybe was, but this was not the focus of the book - it was mostly focused on the remaining normal people wiping out the phone crazies. Unfortunately, King was not happy enough with the wild idea of people being driven crazy by cell phone, which is far-fetched enough but remotely concievable. He done this well enough in The Stand, and he scared the poop out of enough people with Misery in which there was no parnormality. No, he had to let the phone crazies start reading minds, creating dreams in the heads or normal people and then to top it all, they started levitating. So that was my first let-down.

Then, at the end of the book, the main character, (an out-of-work comic artist) goes seeking his kid son. A boy who was forced to take the cell phone pulse (albeit a weakened one). He finds him, and the kid is somewhat a zombie. His dad decides to, on the advice of another kid, try to fix his son by letting him listen to a further mutated pulse. So, he puts the phone to the boys ear. And then, THE STUPID BOOK ENDS!!!!

THE END. NO FURTHER DETAILS!!!! STEPHEN KING, YOU @#$%^&* @#$!!!!!!!!

While I can understand the need to keep the reader hanging on, and how it's cool to finish the story on a cliffhanger, I thought this was not very well done. It kinda seemed that ol' Stevie K just got tired writing, - maybe it was time to get a beer - and he just closed out the story. I guess he is pushing on in years....

I was mad. I shouted at the cd player and called King all sorts of names. It's been a while since a book made me mad, and longer since a book made me mad at the author.

To anyone who reads this and is also reading the book - apologies for spoiling the end, but I feel you may thank me for saving you from wasting a few hours of your life.

To make matters worse - I took that stupid audio book out of the library and got so hooked on it that I kept the book longer than I should and I now face a fine for not returning it on time.

Dean Koontz next.

Leon and Lulu - Skate On In!

My wife got really excited about a store a couple of weeks ago. She had gone there mid-week, and insisted that we all should go see it. So off we went to it's 'Terrible Two's" birthday bash - an event that doubled as a fund raiser for the Gilda's Club.

The store that caused this excitement was Leon and Lulu in Clawson. Now, to label this store is no easy task. It's a furniture-gift-book-nicknack-toy store. And it's a lot of fun.

What makes this place pretty unique is that it's located in Clawson's old Ambassador roller rink. There's a lot of evidence of this scattered all around the store - it just adds to the diverseness of the place.

There's still a lot of the skate rink stuff here - Above is the lobby

The original score board. I don't know what games they play in a roller rink - roller hockey?

Now if it wasn't enough fun wandering around this roller-rink-emporium with a coffee, Gilda's were havening all sorts of flying monkey contests. These little monkeys had elasticated arms , which, then pulled and released, propelled the whole monkey across the room. And, if you wanted to have even more fun, you could aim it at a table with bottle-targets, and if you're a sharp-shooter like me, hit a little bottle and win a fabulous (!) Foot In The Door doorstop!!
OK, mine was black but this was all I could find.

Lots of little wind-up old-time toys - these were the kind of things I had a child.

The pic above and below are chalk boards , with notes from patrons of the original roller rink, detailing their injuries and memories.

Above and below - just some of the bits and pieces they sell there.....

Dog Poop DNA

On another website, I posted something about this - here are the bare bones now that I have 5 mins to spare.

I was out with my mutt one morning recently - and a really nice morning it was. We were walking past some stores when we seen a guy walking his black lab (I think) ahead of us - he stopped as the dog went onto a small somewhat grassy areas right next to the sidewalk. I slowed up a little - my pooch can be overly friendly and jumpy (she's still got a lot of pup in her).

Eventually we reached where they had stopped. Quite close to the sidewalk was a steaming heap. Black lab man was too far ahead to say anything - although he may well deny it. To me it was pretty undeniable that it was his dog - you generally don't allow your dog to sniff poop.. and thats where the dog had spent some time... Man that makes me mad - stupid irresponsible show-off dog owners who probably own dogs to look cool.

I'm not sure if I was glad I was out of the 2 bags I took with me - if I had one I may have felt compelled to pick up some one else's dirty work.

Anyway, through discussions, I came up with the National Dog Poop DNA Registry concept - or NDPDR as I like to call it.

We all required to resister our dogs, i.e. license them. What if it were mandatory to submit a poop sample with the paperwork for the license? (just think, a wee sandwich bag with poop in it stapled to the application and rabies shot cert). The city would then run a DNA test, and record the results. They can then do with the poop what they wish - although what to do with it would likely get buried in bureaucratic, well, crap.

But seriously - look at the benefits.

No need for dog-chipping - a dog gets lost and picked up by animal control- check out its DNA and off you go!
Dogs phantom-crap on your lawn or sidewalk - take a photo and a sample - and you'll catch the offender!
Dog hits the town and barfs in your doorway - a swab and you know where he lives to exact revenge!
Parental canine disagreements - DNA is all on record!
Mutt involved in violent crime - he better not leave a hair or we'll nail the scoundrel!

Ah, the possibilities are endless.

But imagine the newspaper headline!

The Blue Nile in Ferndale. An Ethiopian Experience

A few days back, we wanted to eat out and have some fun. I wanted to try somewhere that we hadn’t been before - after a lot of ‘no I don’t wants’ and ‘urghs’ we finally settled on The Blue Nile in Ferndale. I’ve heard about this place, even attempted to go there when it existed in Greektown quite a few years back – it was closed (I don’t even know if it exists there anymore).

All we knew about it was that it was Ethiopian, and that you eat the food with your fingers.

We got there – the place was pretty much only 1/3 full – but it was Thursday night.

Seating choice was either a booth or sitting around what looked like an upturned straw hat into which a plate full of food is placed. Having kids, and being our first time, we opted for the safer booth. Next time, we’ll sit around the hat.

Decor - Wood, with rotating upside-down umbrellas hanging from the ceiling.

The deal there is this: the menu is fixed to either a fully vegetarian or meat and vegetarian served-up buffet – that is, they load a large round plate with food, put it onto your table (or hat), and you all have at it. The waiters will drop by to serve you more of anything you finish on there and want more of.

We opted for the meat and veggie as we figured the kids might not be too big on the lentils and cabbage.

The first stage of the meal was the hand washing – the waiter came out with steaming hot hand towels, which we used to wash out utensils, i.e. our hands. Next came the large plate, about 18 inches across, which had a layer of Ethiopian flat bread on it, topped with about 6 or 7 different piles of veggie foods – cold lentils, spicy lentil paste, a spicy vegetable curry, collard greens with onions and chillis (Gomen(, cabbage (Tekki Gomen), and spicy split peas. Then the bread arrived – I’ve since learned how this stuff is made - it’s pretty simple, flour, water, salt and oil. The Ethiopians use teff flour – I’m not sure if this is what they use in Ferndale – either way, the bread in simple and nice.

The 4 meat dishes then arrived – Doro Wat – which is chicken in herbed butter, and Berbere sauce (which, co-incidentally, was described Saveur the day after we went – complete with recipe), Doro Aleche, which is the chicken in herbed butter without the other stuff, slightly spiced lamb cooked, in my opinion, to perfection, and Zilzil Wat – lumps of tender beef in a sauce that resembled madras curry. All 4 meats were dropped onto the bread, and we were ready to go.

The bread, we learned, is used to eat the other foods. You tear a little bit off and use it to punch up bit of food. This the kids loved – we normally let them know about it if they used their fingers. Not here.

Overall, the food was delicious – there was nothing wrong with anything. The veggie dishes were really flavorful; the meat was spiced just right and as tender as you could ask for.

The service was really good, attentive, and friendly. Heck, they kept coming over and offering us more food – remember it’s an eat as much as you can deal. We tried…

A tip for future visits – take it easy on the bread as it’s really filling. The not bread is where the flavor adventure is – so it’s worth only using a tiny bit and enjoying everything else fully.

Drinks: My wife had a glass of Ethiopian Honey Wine – apparently interesting and very nice. Me being me had beer – a Heineken. Therein was my only gripe about the place – a very poor beer selection. Being that the place is way out there in a culinary sense, I kinda hoped that I might find some way-out there beers. There are a few interesting Ethiopian beers – but none served here.

Prices were about $18 per adult and $9 per child. Given it was an endless feast of good food – it was worth it and definitely recommended.

And the bathrooms are like a continental trip back in time…

Pinewood Derby - Where Grown Men Can Beat Little Kids!

A few days back, my son’s scout pack had their annual Pinewood Derby. As he’s at a new school now, it was a new group to what we had in the last few years.

In advance (not too much), my son sketched out what shape car he wanted – pretty simple. He then cut it out, under my watchful eye, sanded it down, and used my Dremmel to hollow it out, and then massed it up. The rest was easy, he painted it and put the wheels on.

In the past, I was annoyed at the one or two families who cars were obviously made by an adult with virtually no help from the scout – the ones that weighed in at exactly 5.00 ounces, wheels professionally polished and a paint job that rivaled anything you’d see at Autorama. Invariably, these cars won or got placed

This year was different – out of the about 40 cars, I’d estimate that there were a good 15 that were professionally done. Now, I don’t mind a parent helping – certainly if they feel their kid can’t handle power took, but to me, it’s meant to be at least a joint effort.

The whole pinewood derby is, in my opinion, a great learning opportunity for a boy – he gets to learn a bit about woodworking, painting, and physics. And, of course, competition.

A few of the kids did not even see their car until it was race day. What do they get out of it? A chance to show that their dads are better at making wooden cars than their friends. Not their friend’s dads, just their friends. To the grown men whose cars won, I felt like saying “well done. You outdid a bunch of 8-10 year olds. You are THE MAN.”

The youngest kids had their own competition, and then everyone else just duked it out. And guess what? The supercars won. To make it even more boring, 3 of the top 4 were from one family. The cars were pristine, and from what I was told, it was a competition between a dad, an uncle and a granddad. Well done guys! Want to arm wrestle the kids too? You might win that also!

The answer – make the cars in the school, in a fixed time. Sure, they will not be as perfect or professional, but at least the boys will be able to take some pride in their work. They will be able to recognize their cars in the race, and when one wins, it’s because of the boy’s work, not an adult who gifts the boys.

Ah… there are bigger things to get stressed about, but sometimes it’s the little things that bother me bigtime.