The Quern

It's All Grist for the Personal Mill

Posts Tagged Weekend

Coasting

Nov 6

Posted by Matt Wigdahl in Family, Humor | No Comments

05-07_Honda_Odyssey_Touring[1]So let me tell you all about the trial I’m hearing!  Oh, wait — I could get thrown in jail for that?  OK, let me tell you about what’s going on with my entry in IFComp ’09!  Wait — that’s a violation of Rule 5 and could get me disqualified?

OK, then let me tell you about something stupid I did last weekend!

The five of us had just gone out for our first family weekend at the zoo with Jonathan.  We had a good time, although we kept it a bit short for our first major outing.  The zoo is a good 20 miles away, at least, and so when we were almost back home, I happened to glance down and noticed that the low fuel light was on.  And the indicator was below empty.

The question then was what to do.  I was almost home — less than 5 minutes away.  But I was not sure at all that I had even 5 minutes of gas left.  So, thinking quickly, I diverted north on the final exit rather than south, and headed towards a nearby filling station while trying to preserve as much speed as possible.  Probably 2 miles short of the exit I needed, the engine gave out.  We were headed down a hill at the time, and I just switched into neutral and moved over to the shoulder to try to eke out as much extra distance as I could get.  We got to the bottom of the hill still going near 70, and started up the next one.

The exit we were waiting for was still over a mile away over the hill, and the minivan was slowing down every second.  We continued to climb the hill and slow, unsure all the time whether we were going to have enough kinetic energy to keep going.  As it happened, we hit the crest at about 30 mph, and coasted down the very slight incline on the other side of the peak all the way to the base of the off-ramp we needed, with the filling station in sight not 200 yards away.

A quick jaunt up to the station and back, and we had enough gas to get going again.  But I’m sure glad we made it up that hill.  That would have turned a 15-minute round trip into a 45-minute one, and with three tired kids in the car that would not have been pleasant at all, particularly for Robin who was stuck feeding Jonathan, who had just woken up hungry.

Tags: ,

Farm Party

Oct 8

Posted by Matt Wigdahl in Family | No Comments

fp_54Last weekend ScriptPro had its annual Farm Party, a get-together for employees and their families held at the president’s horse ranch.  Although Robin was low on sleep and so stayed behind to rest, I took Thomas and Katherine, along with my mom, and we had a great time!  There were big horses and ponies to ride, a little petting zoo enclosure with assorted farm animals, a climbing wall, inflatables, games stalls for the kids, and a massive volleyball tournament.

There was also barbecue, but we left before it was served.  By that time, however, we already had the fever for it and so we got some Oklahoma Joe’s when we got home.

As usual, it was a great party and the kids had a fantastic time!  Pictures below (click to enlarge):

Tags: , ,

Out Sick

Sep 8

Posted by Matt Wigdahl in Family | No Comments

sick-bed[1]I was either unconscious or reading in bed most of the day; what I though were allergies turned out to be a massive head cold.  I think the day of rest has really helped, though; from miserable yesterday I now feel pretty good, and should be able to get back to full function tomorrow.

The weekend was fun!  My mom came down to stay for a few days and we went to the Kansas City Zoo on Monday.  It was a great day for it, with mild temperatures and nice sunshine after the early fog burned off.  We toured “Africa”, where the animals were particularly active.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen the cheetahs running around as much as they did yesterday; they were chasing and wrestling each other like kittens!

Tags: ,

August Dinner Club

Aug 4

Posted by Matt Wigdahl in Family | 3 Comments

42-15516468One of the things Robin and I do as a couple is a monthly dinner club with our friends.  The club got started by a couple — the husband, Garrett, worked with me, and his wife Ginny is a developmental pediatrician.  The club started with kind of an equal distribution of computer geeks and doctors — a surprisingly compatible mix — with a sprinkling of other professions for flavor, and it’s pretty much held steady since then.

We were not original members of the club, but joined up as replacements a couple of years in.  Since then there’s been some turnover, but for the most part people stick with it if they can.

The way it works is that the person or couple who is hosting comes up with a theme and picks recipes for a menu based on that theme.  They take the entrée and everyone else picks the other recipes on a first-come, first-served basis.  Usually the menu selections are pretty advanced — since everyone only prepares one item, we can get fairly elaborate without overwhelming everyone.

Whatever can be done ahead of time is, and the remaining items are prepared or finished at the host’s.  Most of the time, guests bring a bottle of wine to go with the meal, and the combination of good food, good wine, and good friends that you may not have seen in a month does the rest.

This month was slightly different; the theme was appetizer-wine pairings, and so there was no need to bring extra wine, as the hosts had already selected the appropriate ones (we have some true wine experts in dinner club — one of the fringe benefits of membership).  Also, my brother and his family were down for a visit and so he and his wife were able to attend as well.

WARNING!  Pretentious-sounding foodie talk ahead!  WARNING!

It ended up as a complete success!  The appetizer-only format has worked in the past, but this, I think, was the high point.  We started off with sesame shrimp with an Asian-inspired dipping sauce, paired with a very light white wine (Ribeiro).  Next was a Southwest quesadilla with a cumin-lime sour cream topping, paired with a Reisling.  This was excellent!

Next up was my offering, butter-fried sea scallops with truffle oil and chives on parmesan crisps.  A drier white went with this (Zaca Mesa Roussanne).  Following this was a delicious mushroom crostini paired with a Napa Valley red, and some delicious beef skewers with a Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon.

For dessert there was some incredibly rich flourless chocolate torte with Madagascar vanilla ice cream, and a nice port.

As I said above, I’m not a wine expert, so having Steve, Michael, and Matt on hand to explain and stage the wine was not only pretty essential, but a great learning experience as well.  My brother Nate and his wife Julie hit it off very quickly with the dinner club crowd, and aside from some regrettable post-meal shenanigans with a digital camera, I think the night was a complete success!  It certainly vindicates the “all appetizer” format as a perfectly viable alternative to a standard multi-course dinner.

Next month:  Tapas at Matt’s?  It’s up to him!

Tags: ,

Weekday Warrior

Aug 1

Posted by Matt Wigdahl in Family | No Comments

time-flies-clock-10-11-2006[1]I’m going to make a permanent change in the posting schedule for this blog, and cut out the weekend posts from now on.  I very seldom have any time to write on the weekend, so I’m either really stretching to find something to write about or depleting my hard-won backlog of content.

I’m hoping that taking the focus off writing posts on the weekend will give me more time to do interesting things on the weekend that I can write about the following Monday.

See you Monday!

Tags: ,

Movie Review: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Jul 29

Posted by Matt Wigdahl in Movies, Reviews | No Comments

rDV7kyzWPor2jdoulS0RAEkKo1_500[1]Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Rating:  4/5

We did get out over the weekend to see the newest Harry Potter movie, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.  Ultimately I found it to be a very good movie, well worth seeing, but one that was in the end merely evocative of the book rather than a true, faithful adaptation of the book.

The movie starts with Headmaster Albus Dumbledore, Harry’s guardian and mentor, arriving to take Harry with him on a trip to recruit a new professor, Horace Slughorn, after which he’s dumped off near the Weasley home prior to heading off to Hogwarts.

Harry Potter’s sixth year at the Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry starts painfully, as his attempts to figure out what the secretive Draco Malfoy is up to lead to him getting roughed up fairly badly, even before he gets off the Hogwarts Express.  From there, we’re whirled into the events of the book, with Harry discovering an old Potions textbook heavily annotated with spells and advice from someone enigmatically referring to him- or herself as “The Half-Blood Prince”.

The students plot and scheme with almost equal fervor to both unravel the plans of the Dark Lord Voldemort, and to pair up romantically.  Romances are shuffled and tested as Harry struggles to obtain a very vital memory from Professor Slughorn, a memory he is loathe to part with.

All the standard elements of the Harry Potter movies are here — a Quidditch match, classroom scenes, Professor Snape showing outrageous favoritism to his chosen Slytherin students, Hagrid waxing sentimental over some hideous magical creature only it’s mother (and Hagrid) could ever love, and some magical duelling.

I was disappointed both in scenes left out (anything having to do with Dumbledore’s Army, along with all but two of the Pensieve memories and the funeral at the end) and the new scenes tacked on (the assault on the Weasley home being the worst).  We didn’t see much of anyone but the main three characters, and many of the professors may as well not have been in the movie at all for the minimal screen time they got.

The acting was very good — Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson have matured into excellent actors, and although Rupert Grint’s performances are a bit too slapstick for me, he does have a gift for comedy and reliably gets me to laugh at the appropriate times.  Jim Broadbent as Horace Slughorn stole the show as far as I’m concerned, except when Helena Bonham Carter was chewing scenery as Bellatrix Lestrange.

In the end, though, although I think the movie has many, many strong points and is overall very faithful to the spirit of the novel, I don’t think it stands on its own as an adaptation, as some of the earlier movies did and as the Lord of the Rings movies did.  At best, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince is a great vehicle for reminiscence, each scene reminding you of the fuller, more complete events from the book, but forcing you to supply the extra details to knit everything together in your own head.

I’ve talked to a few people who have not read the book but have seen the movie, and their reaction has generally been confusion.  There’s just too much going on in Half-Blood Prince for it all to make it cleanly into a 2-1/2 hour movie.  Thank goodness Deathly Hallows is going to be split into two installments.

Tags: , , ,

Aftermath

Jul 26

Posted by Matt Wigdahl in Family | No Comments

rb[1]We got a heck of a lot of stuff done yesterday.  Lots of cleaning, and the new room is now wired for cable.  I took the kids to the pool while Robin worked on our room, and they had a great time.

The Rock Band party was awesome as usual; I left fairly early, which was probably a good thing, since I’m up fairly early this morning.

The major thing on the agenda today is that we are hoping to see Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, which should be awesome from what I hear.  I’ll review it after we’ve seen it.

Tags: , ,

Work Day

Jul 25

Posted by Matt Wigdahl in Family | No Comments

bricks-hammer[1]Not much to report today.  It’s the weekend; we have a lot to do around the house, we’re going to take the kids out biking later, and there’s a Rock Band party this evening that I’ll briefly attend.

Have a good weekend!

Tags: ,

The Quern is Digg proof thanks to caching by WP Super Cache