Hey Hosers

Happy Canada Day! I would not have realized that our neighbors to the north were celebrating Canada Day on Wednesday had it not been for this week’s business trip to Toronto . When I visit Toronto , I do not feel that removed from the US . However the subtle differences such as the metric system, oodles of new about the upcoming Argonauts football season, and miscellaneous Frenchspeak tend to remind me that I’m not on my home soil. I also have Rush songs going through my head all the time. From "YYZ" at Pearson International to "The Camera Eye" driving down the Gardiner Expressway, to "By-Tor and the Snow Dog" walking down Lakeshore Dr , the scenes tend to conjure up my favorite Canadian musical import. My ears did get distracted from Rush momentarily when I heard Joshua Redman's jazz version of Led Zeppelin's 'The Crunge' in the lobby of the Hilton (of all places). But, ultimately, it just made me remember The Bad Plus rendetion of 'Tom Sawyer.' As for the business, I have been to Toronto three over the last five years and am always overwhelmed with the hospitality of my colleagues. This time around, they took me to the 360 restaurant in CN Tower. CN Tower is the tall spire that essentially defines the city’s skyline, and the 360 rotates atop providing great food and incredible views of the city. I picked up a disposable camera so I could get a few shots, but did you know...no one can develop these in less than a week now. It was an exhausting couple of days, not to mention one flight from hell (taking off to the Great White North), and another delay from hell on the way back. I must say, it is great to be home!!!

Speaking of home, I can’t believe my summer break is over half over. We have managed to cram a whole lot of activity into the past several weeks, but most has been work of some form. It seems like all I have done is to catch up around the house on stuff that I couldn’t do during the spring semester. For instance, we started a project to replace the mulch bed with large rocks and install some nice path lighting. I honestly thought this one would be relatively easy, but as usual when it comes to household endeavors, my miscalculation was monumental What I thought would take only a couple hours consumed a full day and a half total. In the end, we were sore from head to toe. Now that we can move again, it’s easy to see that the results were worth the effort. Quite honestly, I am ready to find a little more time for relaxation before school starts again.

I did decide on the Subaru Legacy. Yep, it's a bit of a departure from the last few vehicles that I have had. On the other hand, Rebeca opted for the adventure wheels. I took the 50 mile commute option.

Between all the house projects, we did manage to take a vacation in June. This year we took a trip back to the PU’s place at Myrtle Beach . We always have an incredible time when we venture down to Myrtle, but this time we made a conscious effort to spend more time at the resort. This trip wasn’t all about the R&R, though. We also made an effort to wake up relatively early every morning to do some form of exercise. That’s not to say that there was nothing but healthy living going down. We both consumed volumes of foodstuffs that would rival Takeru Kobayashi at Nathan’s. From all you can eat meat from Rioz Brazillian Churrascaria, to several pizzas from Ultimate California Pizza, to our morning junk food pile, we stuffed our faces like Neanderthals. In the midst of Calabashing at Crabby Mike's we ran into our good friends Adam, Kat, and their kids from back in KY. What a small world.

Now that we have completed our vacation hedonism, we are officially in training for our first Marathon run in November. Until then we will be running a few 5K’s. The second of these is the Livstrong Challenge. We wrote about this in our blog last summer, and are looking to start our fundraising… uhh… RIGHT NOW!!! If you would like to contribute to our cause, or just learn more, click on ME or REBECA.

So, now that Canada Day is in the books, it’s on to Independence Day. And, yes, I will be glued to ESPN on Saturday morning to see if Kobayashi can reclaim the hot dog eating championship. What Rush song would go best with a mouthful of hotdogs? Maybe, "Working Man"? Have a happy 4th!!!

Hello Cleveland!!!

I've never been to Cleveland, but this video makes it look like a pretty sweet place...

One great tourism video not enough?...This one is even better:

Maybe we can't compete with Cleveland for its great entertainment value, but we can sure give nearby Cedar Point a run for their money. This weekend has been a roller coaster that even the greatest of theme parks would have trouble competing with.

The ride started on the morning of Wednesday, May 20 when Mrs. Meow was laid off. Her entire department was disbanded while other departments were reorganized. In the end, rumor has it that 140 jobs were cut between two facilities in the US. Word had been going around for months about the coming re-org, so Mrs. Meow had prepared her resume and posted it online. Coincidentally, she had an interview scheduled for the afternoon that the poop went down. That interview went so well that she was eventually offered the job.

After an eventful day, Rebeca and I spent Thursday and Friday celebrating house week. House week, you ask? Yep, this is my annual holiday where I set aside vacation days to make things happen around the casa. With Mrs. Meow at home, she was "lucky" enough to help scrub and stain the deck over the course of two days. Okay, so it might not sound exciting, but check out the results!

On Thursday evening, Rebeca and I ran in the Legal Runaround 5K in Somerville. So, after already facing a day with total highs and lows, Mrs. Meow's next feat came in a personal best race time, and placing 3rd in her age group. She received a speeding ticket as a prize. Congrats to the Bex!

So Memorial Day weekend was one marked by some good, ol' fashioned relaxation. We did some running around in Rebeca's new wheels. As part of the deal on her car, they gave her an introductory 3 month free subscription to XM. We've found a lot of neat and diverse channels over the last few weeks, but spent the holiday weekend with our ears peeled to The Boneyard. What a blast from the past!!! It was like Rush, followed by Judas Priest, followed by Iron Maiden, followed by Dio, followed by Rush...repeat. We capped off Monday with a 6.5 mile Kayak trip down the Delaware and Raritan Canal from nearby Griggstown and burgers on the grill on our freshly stained deck.

So Mrs. Meow was offered her new job Tuesday morning, and that night we travelled to NYC to see a concert that we had been planning. We had the distinguished honor to catch Christopher Guest, Harry Shearer, and Michael McKean at the Beacon Theatre. It was their Unwigged and Unplugged tour where they played a number of songs that they had written for their movies, This is Spinal Tap, A Mighty Wind, and Waiting For Guffman. They actually sounded so good, it's amazing to think that they aren't really full time musicians. If you don't already know, Spinal Tap is my favorite movie of all time!!! So the concert did not fail to please.... they did practically every one of the 'Tap songs including Sex Farm, Big Bottom, and of course Stonehenge. One surprise was Elvis Costello popping out on stage to play Gimme Some Money. They also showed several videos, including this one from their new album, done by a couple of guys in Australia.

Enough for now. We have an eventful couple weeks on the horizon. We'll post more stuff very soon!

Hey All,

Sorry for being anti-social. So much for that New Year's Resolution to write a blog entry once a month, huh? I guess it's been about 3 months since the last time we blogged. Admittedly, taking seven credit hours during the spring semester toward my MBA at Seton Hall has kept me pretty busy. The good part is that I should now be able to graduate by the end of next year (if I can pull off a short summer class next year.) So, after finals this past week, I have a clear schedule until mid August and am ready for some normalcy. Yesterday, I actually took on yardwork like I really missed doing it. I was overjoyed to actually relax this past weekend to classic rock lp's, a bottle of Zin, and yet another butt kicking in Scrabble. For all the countless times I've played Scrabble with Rebeca, I have only won once. On Saturday, I had the lead the entire game until she played her last tile....a triple letter score with a Q.

Anyhow, one of my courses last semester was a marketing class in new product development. We had a group project to come up with an idea for a new product and build a launch strategy around it. For the final course project, we handed in a full business plan around our idea and did a presentation for the class on our product as if we were presenting to a venture capitalist. I'm not sure how interested you might be in my homework, but I have posted the commercial that I made for our new product. All the clips came from youtube, but I did all the video editing, graphics, and music.

So what have we been up to the last few months, you ask? Back in March, Mrs. Meow bought a new car. She had been driving my XTerra for her 7 minute commute, while I was taking her Golf 100 miles a day round trip to Wayne. With that abuse over the last few years, the VW was really starting to show its age. So she traded the 'pickle car' in for a Honda Element. Since she liked the blue and bought it on the same day that Kentucky announced its new coach, she is calling the car Coach Cal. So, in the meantime, I'm burning up gas in the XTerra until I get something in May or June. Right now, I'm looking at a Subaru Legacy.

Last week Mrs. Meow and I reached a running milestone participating in our first half-marathon race. I have been running a distance run with the Mrs. nearly every weekend since last fall, so we are no strangers to the 13.1 mile distance. This is the first time we actually did it with 9000 other people. The Long Branch Half-Marathon took place in Long Branch, NJ which is a nice little coastal community 'down the shore'. In fact, the race started and ended on the boardwalk looking over the ocean. It sounded like a good idea, but add cold weather and rain and it wasn't as exactly how you might imagine. The race course itself was great. There were far fewer hills than what Mrs. Meow and I typically run near our house, so it made for a nice run. Check out the links for some official race pictures of Mrs. Meow and me. The rain and cool air felt good during the race, but was brutal after stopping. All in all, it was a great day anyway, and although I wouldn't call it breakneck speed, we were proud of posting a 2:20:34 time on our Garmin watches. We drove down the night before and stayed in Red Bank, which is the hometown of Kevin Smith and where he filmed his first movie, Clerks. We have a few more smaller races on the agenda for the summer, but plan to do a full marathon in the fall. We'll keep you posted.

So, just a few miscellaneous closing thoughts. Rebeca and I went to NYC for Valentines Day and sampled the famous black and white cookies at William Greenberg Jr. Desserts on the Upper East Side. I was in doubt about all the hype until I tasted them. WOW!!!! Since then Rebeca has been literally obsessed with recreating the magic of the Greenberg B&W in a low fat version. Her creation was quite delicious in its own right. We spent the weekend prior to St. Patricks Day at Mannion's, an Irish pub in Somerville.

Rebeca also took a class in risk management of medical devices in DC (yeah... sounds like fun) and had a chance to get out to see the sights.

Well, that's it for now. I PROMISE it won't take us so long to post next time.

Happy 09

It certainly has been a long time since we posted anything, but a ton has been going on. It would probably be too much detail to go into everything from October until now. The last few weeks themselves have been eventful. Without a doubt, the highlight was going back to our hometowns of Ashland, KY and Huntington, WV to see our families. It was a thrill to spend time with everyone, and best of all it was awesome to see our new nephew Taddie for the first time and my grandmother to wish her happy birthday. Here are a few pics from the last several weeks:

Mrs. Meow toasting for Thanksgiving














Huckle saying 'Merry Christmas"




Christmas Story Electric Sex (courtesy of Rooks & Missy) gleaming in the Weeeooo's window.


Me in Rockerfeller Center when we went to see the Radio City Christmas Spectacular.

Nevertheless, it is one of my goals in 2009 to be more active on this blog. Hopefully this is the first of at least 12 posts for the year. Happy New Year!!!

Septoberfest!

What a whirlwind couple of weeks. This last month or so may have been our busiest ever. Aside from some heavy deliverables at work, a business trip to Baltimore, 7 credit hours this fall toward my MBA, as well as the simple stuff like laundry and groceries we've been burning the candle at both ends. In between it all, we've managed to make time for a couple other important things.

A few weeks ago, Mrs. Meow and I celebrated New Jersey Day. NJ Day is holiday that Mrs. Meow and I made up to commemorate our move to New Jersey. This September marks our fourth anniversary of that move. Usually, we mark the day to recognize the tough decisions as well as the challenges, blessings, and opportunities that we have been given as a result. Typically we do this by taking the day to enjoy some aspect of the state and to revisit some of the locations that we frequented while living in hotels during the relocation transition. Here we are way back in 2004 at the Extended Stay America in Edison, NJ.

This year, we took a trip 'down the Shore' to Point Pleasant Beach. Usually, NJ Day puts us at a place that we once frequented. This time, we went somewhere that we quite honestly haven't frequented enough. On the way, we stopped in Freehold at The Brewer's Apprentice to pick up some bottles for our first batch of home brewed beer. Point Pleasant is small but very cozy, with what appeared to be a number of tiny rental houses along the boardwalk. The boardwalk stretches a couple miles with a few outdoor bar/grill type places and an amusement park. We had some vinegar covered boardwalk fries for lunch to commemorate the occasion. A bird of some sort nearly landed on top my head as we were making our way to a bench with the fries. The Jersey birds are pretty demanding and rude, much like NJ'ans on the highways. I say that in jest, because we have been fortunate to meet some of the nicest people on earth here. Of course, it is the complete opposite on I-287, I-78, and the Garden State Parkway. So much for those words, 'Courtesy is contagious' that Mr. Cummings used to talk about in driver's ed.

Did I mention a batch of beer? I failed miserably at a couple batches years ago with Mr. Beer kits. That experience nearly convinced me that I was unable to do it. Our first attempt together at making beer will definitely be not our last. After 20 days of maturation, the result was GREAT! This German Oktoberfest was a nice amber with a smoother finish than I would have ever ever suspected from a Brewer's Best kit.

We managed to run in the "Race for the Cure" 5K at Six Flags Great Adventure in Jackson, NJ a couple weeks ago in support of The Susan Komen Foundation for Breast Cancer. It was a bit crowded and the course was narrow and winding. It felt like NASCAR at Watkins Glen. As I took elbows and stepped on feet, I kept thinking, "Rub-in's Racin'." It's still a great cause, though, and one we were very happy to support. Like Livestrong, it was touching to be running alongside a number of cancer survivors. Check out the race photos taken at the finish and see if you can find us.
We also hit the city a number of times. We went to Niketown and Ruth's Chris to celebrate Mrs. Meow's birthday and went back only days after to experience the only US date for Echo and the Bunnymen at Radio City Music Hall. They actually performed their Ocean Rain album in it's entirety with a symphony orchestra. Admittedly, Rebeca is the huge EATB fan, and I am only now finding out how great they were. I love what I'm hearing, but am most drawn to their early stuff like Crocodiles. We also went back into The City this past weekend to celebrate our 4th wedding anniversary. Yep, it's been 4 years. We were such crazy kids way back then.

This trip we went to Peter Luger's Steakhouse in Brooklyn and caught a Kenny Garrett show to close out the evening at the Iridium Jazz Club in Times Square. In addition to a superb and enormous rare porterhouse (with a heap of schlage and apple strudel for dessert) and a steamin' jazz show, what a wonderful evening out and about on the city it was. We stopped the cab on 23rd to walk all the way to 51st. Honestly, walking is my favorite thing to do in New York. 30 blocks on foot in addition to a 9 mile run earlier in the day really put my knees out for the count on Sunday. Of course, Mrs. Meow was totally unaffected and took another run on Sunday.

So there you go.. a month or so in words and pictures, and even a NASCAR reference.

Happy Birthday Mrs. Meow

Rebeca's birthday was Wednesday and to celebrate we went for a 5K+ run. Why, you ask? Running has become a huge part of Rebeca's persona. In the last year, she has lost more than 45 pounds and brought her blood pressure down to a considerably athletic level. Exercise along with a healthy diet have together become such a part of both our lives. Promoting longevity and basically feeling good are essentially celebrating life. So, how better to celebrate a birthday than by doing something that says 'and many more....'. To commemorate the occasion, Mrs. Meow wore a party hat for the duration of the run. Based on the laughing and pointing, it appeared the folks of Branchburg, NJ were highly entertained to see the nutty girl darting by in the hat. Truthfully, we were entertained by responses too. Happy Birthday, Mrs. Meow!!!

RIP bionicmilk.com

It's official... bionicmilk.com is going away. Finally closing up shop makes me a bit nostalgic about those days, so I have included a couple old pictures. Yeah, I looked like a freak.

Anyway, bionicmilk.com was the internet home of our record label,The Bionic Milk Plant over the last 10 years. Our last release was in 2003, but we've still tried to keep the site alive. Unfortunately, without updates or releases, the site itself was not worth holding on to. But wait a second, that doesn't mean that there won't be any more music!!!! We have a bunch of projects, songs, recordings, and ideas. We simply love music and continue to write and record sporadically. In absence of our 'official site' we have created an official blog to post any new tunes, news, happenings, and just stuff about music. Check it out at bionicmilk.blogspot.com for even more blackmail-worhty photos of our past lives. We hope you enjoy!