Anniversary in the ATL

Wife and I had our wedding anniversary weekend in Atlanta this past weekend. Shout out to Il Mulino for bringing excellent Italian to the South. Good god that was good. Prior to that, we were hanging out on the roof of the Glenn Hotel downtown, the Sky Lounge as they like to call it. And, truth be told, the wife and I were looking forward to going out to a club that plays hip hop and R&B. And man, good god the DJ that was there was awesome. Old school rap (man, we walked in to the Digital underground's "Humpty Dance" playing) and hip-hop. We were the only white people there. It was sweet.
Trouble is, we had to go to dinner (the aforementioned), and the lounge closes down at 8, switches dj's, and re-opens @ 10. No big deal, right? But it was, because every where else we went we ran into things we didn't want, or were closed, or whatever. In fact, the whole weekend was like that.

We arrived at 1:30 on Saturday afternoon, checked in, and made our way to the High Museum. Great, right?  No, because there was a line a mile long and when we got to the end of it, there was a museum employee with a sign saying that they were no longer taking any more walk-up customers. No mas.

After dinner, we went to another lounge our hotel hostess had told us about. And while the music and such was fine, the drinks were very expensive, the music was loungy (expected, but when we asked for a hip-hop club, she suggests this....grrrr....I want my booty-shaking rap!!!!!), and I get hit on. By a guy. (I was flattered, actually,  but totally didn't realize I was getting picked up. The wife helped me out on that one.) And then when return to the hotel to go back up to the other SkyLounge, its douchebag central listening to bleeps, bits and blops electronica.

Atlanta, you were bit of a disappointment.

Now, maybe this was my fault. Admittedly, I don't like to plan too much when it comes to leisure time. Sure, I get the general outlines sketched out, but my itinerary is rarely fleshed out  in detail. But maybe that's what these quick weekends require. More details. More plans. More pre-investigation. More Hip-hop. Less electronica.

The next day we did salvage a bit of good feeling for the ATL. We spent several hours at the National Historic Site dedicated to MLK, Jr., saw his house, looked at his grave site, and hung out. Then we went to Buckhead, walked through massive malls, and got back in the car, shivering in fright from the sheer amount of marketing that had been thrust in front of our eyes. Ye-gawds. Makes me want to do the Freedom Trail from Selma to Montgomery all the more.

OMG - FOOTBALL!!!!!!!!

First off, a confession. I used to hold it as a source of pride and "better-than-you" esteem that I went to schools that did not have football programs. In fact, my two main criteria for choosing an undergrad program was that:

1. The school did not have a Greek system
2. The school did not have a football team.

See, I wasn't allowed to play football when I was a kid. Nor hockey for that matter. Both are sports I would have loved to have played, and currently love to watch. (Alright, hockey's not my favorite, especially not on television, but I like to see a good fight, just like the next guy.) And it wasn't that I wasn't friends with guys on the football team that made me not want to be around them. It's that I wasn't friends with all of them. Specifically, there was a specific sub-species of football player I did not approve of, did not like, and did care to associate myself with.

The meathead.

You know that guy. The guy who punched out the panels of your garage door because he showed up at your house for a party he wasn't invited to and you didn't let him in. The guy who punched your books out of your hands as he passed you through the halls. The guy who grabbed the ass of the girl you liked. The guy who reveled in belching. You know that guy. We all know that guy.

That guy.

So when in came time to pick schools, it was a no-brainer that I would not willingly put myself in an environment that shared space with them.

What's that? What that, you say? What about Carnegie Mellon's football team? (I went to CMU for grad school) Uhm, well...let me put it to you this way.

Dorks playing football.

Do you have the image? Ok, 'nuff said.

Look at that sea of orange. Isn't it magnificent?

Now, quite possibly one of the coolest things that Auburn has going for it, (that everyone can agree upon), is the football. Holy cow, I was impressed. I mean, wow, that's 83,000 people, for goodness sake. Just look at them all.

And that's only 1/2 half of the stadium, and the upper deck isn't even completely full. 

Here's another shot, from a different angle.

 I think that shows the rest of the stadium fairly well, right?

That's just a lot of people, a lot of orange, and a lot of people who previously spent a lot time hanging out in the parking lots, drinking, eating, and tailgating.

And that was part of the whole experience, too. The tailgating. The hanging out with friends, the throwing around of the football, the subtle barbecue one-up-mans-ship subtly playing itself out between RV's and campers (I've got something cooking here that will really impress you!)

But sometimes, the students take it a little too far. As in, holy cow, I don't think she's going to be able to keep herself up. Ladies and gentlemen, I present exhibit A.

Oh, dear Lord, not good. This one was not a happy camper. Eyes glazed, lolling about, teetering on her 2 guy friends who were clearly trying to keep her from being arrested from public drunkenness. Man, she was about 2 seconds from totally puking her guts out. Fun stuff!

Anyway, the wife and i had a great time, and we can't wait to go to our next game.

In the Country

Another Saturday, another day of adventure and new experiences. This time it was a next door neighbor's piece of land south of Tuskegee where we played with some horses, tried to catch cat fish, and looked at some cows.

The drive through Tuskegee was extremely pleasant. Our next door neighbor and his wife had grown up in the general vicinity and shared a lot of nice tidbits about the area, the way people live, etc. In fact, they pointed out two houses, both opposite one another, that were the exact same. Huh, why's that?, I wondered. Well, it turns out that the homes were both built by the same man. The first home was built for he and his wife to live in, and the second home was built to satisfy a stipulation of his divorce from the same woman that he build her a home that was its exact mirror. Hence, two houses, opposite side of the street, exact mirrors of one another. Spooky.

The first stop of the day was the hay field to check on the bailing process which my friend and his pops had worked on earlier in the week. Not too much progress had been made, but form what I could understand, there were some mechanical issues involving sprockets, and flanges, and hinges, etc.

And here's where my yankee-ness comes into play. We had stopped at a nearby farmer's house who had helped with the cutting and the bailing. This man was my father's age, and had been raising beef cows his entire life. And much like the time I was in Maine and spoke to a Maine fisherman and had a really hard time understanding what he said, I had an equally hard time understanding just wtf this guy was saying. I've noticed that there is bit of a lag time between what people down here say to me, me mentally filtering out the accent, and then me fully comprehending what they've said.

We went over to the barn and took the opportunity to put our neighbor's 5 y/o on a horse and take a spin. I think she had a lot of fun

The horse, maybe not so much.

Just kidding.

After this we took a quick spin over to the lake where the cows were resting, and we did some fishing. MMMMM.....Black Angus

Hey, you in the back. I am going to eat you eventually!

Last, but not least, it was time to take the little one in the tractor. Again, it looks like she had a great time.

BBQ in Alabama

Place: Birmingham, AL. about 2 hrs from Auburn, AL.

Event: Stoking the Fire BBQ Festival

Otherwise known as, Eat the Pig, Stuff your Face, I Love Butt, etc.(I'm just kidding. Those aren't the alternate names) But some teams did have some really funny names. case in point: Butt Rubbers, whose motto was, "Keep it Wet, and Do it Slow" Truer words have never been spoken. And while I didn't try the butt rubbers pork butt, the rest of the butt we did try, was very good indeed.

Interesting note before we move on, the pork "butt" is not actually the butt. The "butt" is the shoulder, while an actual pork butt is called the hock, as in ham hock. Now that we've gotten that out of the way, let's move on.

The event itself was held at Sloss Furnaces, a national historic landmark. I took a picture of the landmark sign, here: The story goes, from I could gather, was that the furnaces intersected 2 rail lines, making it a pretty logical place to set up and make very heavy things made out of metal so that transporting them long distances wasn't difficult. And while the vast majority of the operation was no longer working, you could tell the furnaces were impressive by their sheer size and scope, as evidenced in the pictures below:

This one doesn't do nearly as much justice to the "largeness" as the one below.





























See what I mean? This photo, from the opposite side of the structure, gives a little bit better idea of how big the place it is.


Anyway, the comp- etition has four categories: chicken, ribs, butt, and people's choice. The others are self explanatory, but people's choice refers to Saturday afternoon when the gates to the festival open up for the vast majority of people to roll in and taste the pork bbq (made out of the butts), that the teams have been smoking for the past few days. You then vote for your favorites. The results, for most of the teams, were delicious.

Post bbq, slightly buzzed stoopid faces

We met up with the college roommate of our next door neighbor here in Auburn, and he treated us to a few ribs, which were fantastic, and a couple of nice cold, high gravity beers. Sipping beer and eating ribs and bbq (by the way, if you are eating shredded, or pulled, or chipped pork with bbq sauce, you are eating bbq specifically. If you are eating ribs, or brisket, or anything else "bbq", you are eating bbq generally. Got it? Yeah, I was confused, too.) Man, it was good, as evidence by our silly faces. -->

We walked around some more, trying bbq, sipping beer, and then headed over to the stage where the organizers announced the winners of the competition. And because part of the furnaces are still working, the prizes were cast in iron right on the site, which I thought was pretty cool

There were also some pretty funny "sculptures" that the teams had set up, as evidenced here (ewwwh), and below

Good times were had by all, and while our friend's friend's team didn't win, these people know how to cook pork. God, I am glad I am not Jewish or Muslim.

Photoshop Disasters, Alabama style

I would say this belongs on photoshop disasters, but the stuff they post is typically very well done and sometimes difficult to spot and notice. This, however, is illustrative of what I've found down here.

People love their football.

And if you can get the coach of the Alabama Crimson Tide to support your candidacy, then you're sure as shit to get in.

Wow. That's truly horrible.

I love the quote from the candidate when presented with the original picture:

"They said we could do it this way," Davidson said.

Props to the Birmingham News for tracking this one down

Dinner @ the President's House (funny story at the end, I promise!)

As new faculty, the wife gets invited to a bunch of "stuff". For example, we went out for dinner last Friday night with a couple of her colleagues, she gets free tickets to the university theatre productions, and she gets invited to the new faculty reception, hosted by the president of the university and his wife. So, as we were invited and never wanting to miss a party (or a free meal and booze), we put on our best and headed over.

The president's house is very nice (Apologies for the poor picture. It was the best I could find. It doesn't really give you a proper feel for the scale of it, nor the inside, which is very nicely decorated.), and is located in the heart of the campus. It has very nice gardens, and an air conditioned "Terrace - reception" area, comprised of a essentially a ballroom and an art gallery like space, half of which was "patio-ed". (God, what a horrible description. Anyway...)

We mingled with a few folks, eventually "settling" with new professors in the communications, history, and psychology departments. The conversation was good, considering all of has had just met and were feeling each other out, essentially. Dinner was a very nice, catered spread comprised of roasted chicken, pork, fried green tomatoes, and grilled asparagus, squash, etc. Dessert was banana pudding and peach cobbler with ice cream. Two words for both of those:

1. Yum -
2. EEE

During dinner, the president came to the table to sit and chat for a few minutes. He sat next to me, and we (as a table) talked bbq (he's partial to the mustard based sauces and the bbq you can find at Price's, although he does like the vinegar based if the meat is really high quality. He also doesn't like Dreamland bbq, which isn't surprising considering its a chain. He said students dig Mike & Ed's, while the locals like Byron's), and the lack of recognition sports other than football, golf and Nascar get in the Birmingham newspaper, (especially on game-days in the fall). A very nice, gracious man, who the wife described as her idea of what a Southern politician would be when we eventually come across one.

The story of the night had to be, though, when I was getting the peach cobbler from the dessert table. As I handed my plate over (already full of banana pudding (she gave me too much!)), I said something to the effect of, "Try to get some on, will ya?" The older, white woman looks at me and asks, "Where you from?"

"Connecticut"

"I knew it, I knew it, I knew it!," she screamed.

"Uh, ok."

"Are you, by chance, I-talian?", she asked.

"Wow. You're good. I am."

"I knew it, I knew it, I knew it!," she screamed again.

I asked, "I'm impressed. How could you tell?"

She replied, "Well, my sister-in-law married a man from up there, and he's I-talian, and you all look the same! You don't know him, do you? Last name is (unintelligible due to the Southern accent).... No?... You don't? Oh well...."

It was the first time I felt Asian or black.

"They all look the same!"

Got my riding group!

Wednesday nights and Saturday mornings, brought to you by the good people of East Alabama Cycling Club!

Wednesday nights start @ 5:30 and are usually around 25-30 miles of beautiful rolling hills around Auburn. We "roll" at about 18-20 mph, so its a nice 2 hr ride that isn't too stressful or hard. Given that I ride to the meeting place, it adds a few more miles, making the total (last night's, at least) to be 35 miles. This is about as much as I can do in one go before I have to eat something, so dinner is always welcome when I get home.

Saturday's ride begins at 7:30 am, breaks up into about 4 different groups (based on riding ability and length), and always ends in breakfast. (Yay!). This ride is much more social and significantly larger than the Wednesday night group, as well as accommodates riders of all abilities.

To be honest, this is my first real riding group. I didn't ride in a group in NYC because if you didn't have a high-end ride and weren't snooty, they didn't want anything to do with you. I didn't group ride in CT because I just didn't get my shit together. But I really like riding in a group. It gives you people to talk to, safety, and most importantly, people to draft. Everyone goes faster when riding in a group.

Also, I get to essentially "tour" my new area by riding around the neighborhoods. I've read before that riding one's bike around a new town is a great way to go sightseeing. And experiencing it for the first time here in Auburn, I can say their right.

I am digging the riding group and the people in it. Hope I can make some friends out of it.