FW: Invitation to view gil.even's Picasa Web Album - 2011- 04 -DC

Some new york  and DC photos

 

From: gil.even [mailto:gil.even@gmail.com]
Sent: Monday, May 02, 2011 8:03 PM
To: Gil Even
Subject: Invitation to view gil.even's Picasa Web Album - 2011- 04 -DC

 

You are invited to view gil.even's photo album: 2011- 04 -DC 2011- 04 -DC Apr 22, 2011 by gil.even View Album Play slideshow Message from gil.even: These pictures were sent with Picasa, from Google. Try it out here: http://picasa.google.com/ If you are having problems viewing this email, copy and paste the following into your browser: https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/sredir?uname=gil.even&target=ALBUM&id=5602272108046744273&authkey=Gv1sRgCIS4t4fggaOK9gE&invite=CJaGtN4O&feat=email To share your photos or receive notification when your friends share photos, get your own free Picasa Web Albums account.

 

on Solon, Art and hunt

Another vacation ends… we are now somewhere in Pennsylvania driving back to Cleveland from a green Washington to the areas where spring is not fully out.

 

The previous Friday we left home later than planned due to a D&D game, drove about 2 hours, stopped in some motel and woke early to drive all morning and get to NYC by noon. NY was under interesting fog that covered the upper half of the city from floor 40 and above. The rest of the gang was scattered so we decided to kill time and go to the Guggenheim museum.

We walked from the hotels for 40 blocks and  the day warmed up and sun threatened to come out, the line was not long and we quickly got in. I have been to several museums of art and this place is totally and utterly not for me.

I don't get modern art, I don't get why people think its art; I only get that I don't get why they think its art, so I think this was my first and last Guggenheim visit. An hour and a half later (since my co- art critique likes this type of kids drawing that costs millions) we left the museum after a short stop to the Kandinsky exhibit. I only know the name since Seinfeld referred to in an episode, that room was packed, but for me it was total bore. They had 1 room of non modern art and I found 1 Pissarro I liked (next to a row on irrelevant Manet, Monet and Cézanne);

 

We walked back 40 blocks to meet everyone. My mom, Moti, my brothers shai, yaron and Michal and the kids then left to a Jewish deli on Passover week. The bread was good.

In the evening we walked by times square with its impressive neon lights and too many tourists (we of course were locals…).

 

On Sunday morning new York was planning for a special event, my birthday, and a secondary reason was Easter holiday. They Easter parade is not really a parade, it is more of a street party full of people dressed with weird bonnets. I don't know why bonnets are related to Easter but they are totally creative, they even have hats on dogs (poor beasts), so you walk around and fight the other vultures (tourist with cameras) on the rights to take a shot with someone wearing the house from the movie UP or a huge flower bouquet. Unlike Cleveland, new York got warm, which was great at first but we looked for shade quickly. We walked after to the intrepid, which is an air craft carrier, never been on one and took the tour , saw the black bird, the Israeli Kfir plane and lots of small interesting things than had a new York surprised.

 

We were in a hurry and there were no cabs so we took a paddy cab, I read on one of the guides that specify what not to do in new York is take one of those, since its expensive, but rush was drive so we took it ( a paddy cab is a bicycle driven wagon) we had a lovely chat with the driver but the surprise came at the end with the price. I guess if we had time we would have checked, bargained or something but we silently cursed they guy, paid and moved on.  In the evening we went to my step 2^nd cousins who live in Manhattan and shared a lovely home cooked meal and gift unwrapping ( I will send photos).

 

On Monday we said goodbye to the kids and my brother yaron and went down town to pier 17 to pick up cheap show tickets. They didn't have Wicked so we got Rock of Ages instead. We walked passed china town to SOHO where we did a phone based scavenger hunt.

When you walked in an  area you don't know you miss a lot of small things, if you have a book or a guide you see the highlights, but with this game, you get small easy riddles and need to find specific things on specific building and receive interesting facts (we also learned about the Hebrew name for Darts 'מצלף' according to the new Hebrew by moti , another name for dart board is 'מחטא'). So we did it for about 4 hours and got to know soho real well. After that we went to a Turkish place with another 2^nd aunt by shared experience Juanita and later went to the show.

Rock of Ages is a musical, based on 80's music which I like. The story line is not important, but it was nice; the key is the songs and we sang the whole show of over 2 hours. After that we took the subway to the village and went to a blues bar, listed to some live tunes and drank schnapps.

 

On Tuesday we woke earlier and did another scavenger hunt, this time in the Greenwich village and I may have spotted Juliette Lewis and later we had good Shawarma on McDougal street and shopped at a Mongolian store. We moved on to a tour of the UN. Since the UN is not a part of any country, I am adding it to the list of countries as a separate territory. The tour was ok and we felt our Italian guide was not the best guide, and later found that this was his first tour. I have a photo with bank E moon but that was just a carton cut out.

 

We went to Tribeka later and walked around, got bored because we didn't have info on the area so we walked to the Brooklyn bridge and walked on it till the half way point, then walked back to a not good Mexican place. After that we went to a comic club which was a lot of fun.

 

We left the apple the next morning and headed for DC.

 

I have been there before and was not much looking forward to it assuming I have seen everything, lucky I was wrong. We went to the national archives and saw the constitution , the declaration of independence and other documents, the interesting fact about it is that the documents are fading, which is fitting since rights are fading. After that we did a quick tour of the natural history museum and went to Taj of India for dinner in George town.

 

Both DC and new York are in full spring, the trees are green, flowers are in bloom and the air is clear, this is in contrast to cold Cleveland where spring has just begun but winter is still hanging on. The Indian food made Alla sick, so she sent the food back to India half the night. Next morning we  left early to try a new mode of travel in the US. The local bus.

 

We went to the bus station and watch a bus pass us by and not stopping! (I have not been on a bus in the US since moving here, since Cleveland is not known for its public transportation. The bus we wanted didn't stop so we took another that goes to a closer neighborhood, we walked from there and miss our tour hour so we altered our plans and took tour tickets at Washington monument, then walked to the white house visitor center (not a must), then the national  aquarium which had a nice jelly (medusa) display but not a must as well. After that we had 40 minutes to do something before our schedule Washington monument tour begins, so we went to the nearest place which was the American history museum, I didn't even plan to stop there but it was surprisingly nice since it focused (on the 1^st floor) on science and inventions. The monument itself was ok, had nice city views of the city but I didn't see anything Dan Brown wrote about. Since the upper pyramid was closed.

After that we went to the newseum and took the tour, a very interesting place, filled with few stories covered to extreme and nothing on the rest. After that we went to the printing and engraving museum without tickets and found some there (these tickets are free but limited) and saw literally hundreds of millions of dollars a few meters away behind secure glass and other stuff, so close…

 

In the evening we went to meet Alla's former roommate in one of the suburbs here great shishlik from a waiter with an unidentified origin.- the shishlik here was on the bone, unlike the Israeli shishlik. We went later to a wine store and had wine (they had, I drank a diet coke) then to a sports bar (the last open place) for desert).

 

Earlier today we went to the congress and took the tour which was short but the rotunda is impressive, then walked to the library of congress which was the most interesting building of all , then to the supreme court where we found who Solon was ( a Greek law maker, I am ashamed to report that I never looked what or who solon was). We dined at the eastern market.

 

A few hours before on the cab over I pulled a regular trick and forgot my phone in the cab. Since then we are calling, but the phone is on vibrate and no one picks up, but we have left DC and I hope it will be found.

 

Its evening now, we approach the Ohio state line and have no real plans for this weekend with my brother and my mom here in the car, but I am sure we will do something.

Cheers from somewhere near Pittsburgh

 

 

on Grubs, Man Vs Tree and other outdoors discoveries

“You have grubs”, told us a Jason, who is a Gardner, the only grub I heard of in the past were an indication of food as in (“give me some grub”), but now it takes a whole new meaning.

So this jason dude explain about grubs, then comes another Jason (popular name for gardeners , oh sorry landscape artists) and tells us that grubs(some insect) are asleep now and they would only come out a month from now, so who is lying Jason or Jason?

Spring is here finally but it brings new unexpected chores, starting from lots of leaves raking, trees removal and shopping.

 

Leaves raking is an activity that breaks the boundaries of science as we know it today. You have a raker and a certain area with leaves. You rake,  fill several bags with leaves and then look back at the yard, and the number of the leaves remains exactly the same! Einstein cannot explain it. We had some patches with tons of leaves , now most( a quarter) are in piles soon to be picked up.

 

So again we had several service people each saying different things on the same back yard, different solutions and contradiction of the other so we remain clueless in garden science.

So what we did was take down the tree that fell from the snows, taking down a tree is not as easy as I thought it would be. For a change I would like to describe my battle vs the tree in a D&D way

 

Assuming I was in a fantasy world (some would say I always am, they may be right) then I would have the following abilities (in D&D abilities usually range from low of 3 to high of 18 where human average is 10)

Strength , above average, but not by much , 12; endurance , definitely below average 8; dexterity , I had a good side step but I can’t hit a target to save my life, so 9; Intelligence, probably my best feature, 15, or 16; wisdom (life intelligent if you will) on the low side of average, 10 ; charisma , always assumed I was a leader behind the scenes, the center stage is not my thing, but I do impact so 13.

If I was a fantasy character, I a guess a wizard of some kind would fit me, definitely not any fighter of any kind.

 

Ok , sorry if the above freaked you out, back to the tree.

 

The battle began before the vacation.

I summoned the elements to hit my nemesis, winter responded and pounded my foe with heavy snows, felling the tree to the ground; but the tree has strong roots and it refuses to let go. So now I felt brave to face the tree on my own (kind of like someone looses the bottle cork, then you come and do the rest). I snuck up on the tree with a new fancy saw and performed an ‘off with its head’ attack on the 3 heads (commonly known as branches), I didn’t settle for that and I took our new branch chopper (a scary scissors type tool, but much larger, that someday will chop my finger off) and chopped the fallen branches to small pieces; now that the tree was very weak , it was time for the final fight.

I equipped myself with a hoe (not kidding, that is the name,,, it’s kind of a toria), wore my trendy red sweat pants and green t-shirt and gone out.

The fight was long, I dug and dug (It would have been a lot easier if I had a shovel) , but the tree was persistent, I stood on it and rocked it back and forth, I attacked it with hoe, but just like my attacks in D&D I was doing very little damage with every attack ; the tree held. I had an a special encounter attack (in D&D these are your stronger attacks) but in this case, whenever I encountered another big root, I  used the future finger chopper and removed it, after an hour of ‘pull the carrot’ (at least they had dad, mom, sister, brother, grand mom and mouse) , so I kept pulling, tugging, pushing, cutting and digging and finally the tree gave up. Now I have a tree carcass in the yard.

When I blogged the above story in my head, it sounded better; well  next time.

 

We have some new birds in the yard

A Junko is the latest identification, we also have several types of sparrows, sparrows other then Jack are not interesting, there are a few more we are unsure of but the identification project continues.

Michal my sister comes tomorrow, so the April family events are coming, with Passover and my birthday in new York coming up…it should be fun.

 

 

 

Sorry, this was a stranger kind of blog

 

 

 

 

 

 

FW: Invitation to view Alla's Picasa Web Album - Killington Vermont March 2011

Enjoy some Vermont photos

 

You are invited to view Alla's photo album: Killington Vermont March 2011 Killington Vermont March 2011 Mar 27, 2011 by Alla View Album Play slideshow Message from Alla: These pictures were sent with Picasa, from Google. Try it out here: http://picasa.google.com/ If you are having problems viewing this email, copy and paste the following into your browser: https://picasaweb.google.com/lh/sredir?uname=a.greenberg2010&target=ALBUM&id=5592678208660242705&authkey=Gv1sRgCPqT1oGCnKKBzwE&invite=CPGDhM4K&feat=email To share your photos or receive notification when your friends share photos, get your own free Picasa Web Albums account.

 

a Mission in Montelier and Moscow cats

There is nothing more fun on vacation then paper work!

 

We left a document unfinished related to annual home taxes which were due by the end of march, so we waited till the very last minute.

 

We reached Montpelier which is the capital of Vermont since we knew would have a FedEx or something similar.

We had to do something simple, log in on line somewhere, fill a form, print and mail it, seems simple enough.

 

We stopped at the Montpelier tourist information, got a city map, and asked on the local attractions, the guide pointed to a few restaurants, state building, maple farm and that’s it. I am still not used to capital cities which are so insignificant for a tourist. It’s a regular city, actually the smallest capital in America.

 

We passed by the state capital with its golden dome, passed the post office and reached main street. We heard of the ‘new England culinary school’ which we assumed would have good clam chowder. This place is a chef school that operates a restaurant and bakery, we went there. Of course it was closed, for one week only… this week, spring break. So we went to some random diner for chilly and some local hot dogs in corn cover. Alla had an apple and brie cheese crepe.

We reached the library at around 3 pm and started to fill the annoying form, on the way we found that we had to have it signed by a notary, lucky again for a city since we may not find one elsewhere. So 30 minutes later we finished the form, printed it and headed on to city hall for the notary. A few minutes later we found a building that acts as the local dance theater and also holds the office of the mayor and reached the main office that sells theatre tickets and does Notary work. Then we found that they need ID to do their notary work, where is the ID? Not here, why would it, it would be to simple.  It was close to 4PM and this office closes at 4:30 and we didn’t know when the post office closes. So we rushed to the car, got the ID, rushed back, in the middle noticing that the camera was missing. We made it in time for the notary and had it signed, then found the camera in Alla’s stuff (usually it would be mine). We got to the post office in time and mailed it. Mission accomplished.

 

Filling very accomplished we left down town Montpelier (drove 1 minute) and went to Morse farms. This farm has a model of the capital building, so we took a snapshot. This farm harvests maple sap.

We stopped at the little shop before we took the tour. We visited the “factory” which was 1 not very clean barn, with steam coming out. The guy explained the process on taking sap from trees which has mild sugar and heating it to extract the water and leave the maple syrup. It was a nice simple process, after that we went to look at the trees and got the real picture. The farm has over 4000 maple trees with lines between them, each line hooks inside the tree like an IV line and the lines lead back to the factory, all they do is milk the trees and vent the water. We took a very short hike in between the trees. The guy who explained to us about maple was a 7^th generation maple harvester. Later on a brochure showing Vermont’s attraction, this guy was on the picture. We sampled some maple ice cream and left the capital area on our way to Stowe.

 

Stowe is the fancy shmency ski area where the celebrities go (we didn’t see anyone btw). By this time I was tired of skiing attempts (more on that later). We found a bed and breakfast called TimberHolm which was inexpensive and went to the hot tub. We went to pie-casso which is voted top 11 slices pizza in the nation, I don’t know who votes but they should all be fired.

The next day we started with a great breakfast made by Gym, the owner. Since we were the only guests we had a choice of when breakfast would be served. So we tried some local stuff. Chedder omelets and oatmeal pancakes with great maple syrup. I tried maple before, it’s usually viscous and over sweet,  but this stuff is flowing and gentle, Gym also made some parfait with lots of fresh fruit, simple and simply good.

We rented snow shoes and drove passed Moscow road through the town of Moscow till we reached the woods, put our snow shoes on and began hiking up. Snow shoes are long wide additions below your feet so you want sink in the deep snow. It was mildly difficult in the beginning, you need to get used to walk a bit differently, but soon you catch on, it was not easy to walk on the part of the trail which were narrow and sloped to one side but we overcame that. We saw a sign that they have wild cat in this area, such as the lynx we saw a few days prior in Montreal. We saw paw tracks in the snow and we kept our eyes open but the white fur illusive cat remained hidden. The hike took about 3 hours of a mild challenge and a new activity to add to the check off list.

 

Wet from sweat and wet snow we were hungry and stopped in some food related destinations.

At the cider mill we shared an apple doughnut (came free with a coupon on the map) and purchased hot apple cider to warm up, also bought some home(cider) made sauces.

At the Cabot annex we sampled various types of cheddar in all forms of strengths and mix of flavors. It turns out I am not a cheddar enthusiast, I prefer the mild kind but also got some wasabi cheese. at At the chocolate store we took one sample and bought nothing.

The end of this food fast was the Ben And Jerri’s factory. We seen the movie on how they begun and enjoyed a nice factory tour which included a new flavor (chochhwowling something with cow fudge), not bad.

After that I was full of sampling but alla sampled less and was hungry, so we went to one of the attractions of Stowe. The von trap lodge. The von trap is the family from the Sounds of Music. They have an Austrian lodge here with Austrian food, Austrian themes etc..  I asked about my Tyrolean knoodle soupen, they had it occasionally but not today. Alla had an apple strudel and some sandwich with kraut and I had nothing (too full from ice cream), the day ended early for us, we relaxed at the lodge with movies, and a game of table shuffle board, which I finished 2^nd in the whole lodge tournament; if you recall we were the only guest, you can guess who won.

 

Then next day, which is today, we woke up, packed and went to enjoy another great breakfast. Great waffles ( I usually find them dry and flavorless) but these were soft and yummy with bananas glazed in maple, after a plate of fruit. If you come to Stowe, we recommend the TimberHolm. (btw Holm means a small round island. Gym the owner, moved from warm Florida to cold Vermont to run this place, a very nice man, great cook but did not know what Holm meant, I had to Google it.

We drove through the scenic route through the Vermont mountains and found some amazing views, then crossed on the Ferry to new York and saw one bold eagle sitting on a tree.

That was around 7 hours ago and since then we are driving, we just passed buffalo so 3 hours left to go….

 

After the day of pain a few days ago, I relaxed, watched Israel win, went to the hot tub, and in the evening we wall went to an Hibachi place which is always a fun experience.

 

On the next day I had a long debate with myself about trying to ski again. I rented shoes again and went to another lesson. Before I was in green level, now I was pushed back to light green and had a more basic lesson, still difficulty, still pain, but less, it was tolerable when I was doing the right moves, and immediate pain when I didn’t, but I passed the lesson still standing and after rest at lunch I took another lesson, this time we focused on speed and I was doing slalom on the shadows of the cable car above. Not a perfect smooth slalom but slalom none the less. I can turn left very well, but my right turn are bad, and when there is a steeper area it gets worse. I was excited about somehow skiing and happily relaxed at the hot tub again. The next day the group dispersed as Inna went to new York, Rita home and we stayed for one more skiing lesson, I was tiered again, felt not as good on the ski’s as the previous days, but in the end , on the shallow areas I felt like I was making great turns on both sides, not so good on the steeper parts. So after 5 lessons I am still a beginner, somehow depressing but will try again next year.

 

Cheers from my 37^th state, though right now we are somewhere in western new York.

 

 

                                                                                                                                                                                                                      

 

 

 

 

 

 

on ass kicking mountains, squirrel birds and motel hotel

Why am I sitting on the couch in the middle of the day when I should  be in a bubbly hot tub right about now, well let me tell ya.

 

About 30 minutes ago I wore my swim trunks, wore my warm pants,  put my warm winter socks on, and my sandals (this is a pool after all), wore a long sleeved T-shirt, my fleece, winter hat and my coat.

Got in to the car , drove 1.2 minutes or less in the light snow; reached the gym.

Entered the secret code (shhhh 19770), got a towel, went into the locker room, took off my sandals, socks, coat, fleece, shirt and hat and place them in a locker. Notices a sign saying to lock valuables and other lockers with keys on them, so moved my stuff into a secured locker, tried to lock the locket, it wouldn’t cooperate, noticed that you need money (1 quarter) to close it. If you recall I didn’t specify taking money with me, so left the locker open. Took the towel walked around the pool to the outdoors hot tub, and of course it was closed; never mind the sign saying open daily, every day could be 6-7 PM…

So I went back, around the pool into the locker room, opened the unlocked locker, wore my socks, pants, shirt, fleece, coat, hat and sandals, left the towel in their laundry , go into the car, drove 1.2 minutes and now I am sitting on the couch.

 

Why am I here on the couch in the middle of the day instead of being on the mountain?

I began skiing yesterday morning with my brand new ski boots and skis, even before the lesson began I started having serious pain, so they rushed me to the emergency rental office, when I kicked off my sucky brand new ski boots (which were comfortable at the store) and put on an old warn out pair of boots; The relief was instantaneous.

So I joined my group lesson with a couple of Peruvians whom do not know each other and was skiing at my best (which is still a beginner level). After 2 hours I was a bit sore but felt comfortable so I kept going. I stopped for lunch and rest and decided to take a longer more challenging course, but still on the green level (the beginners). So we took 2 lifts up and started heading down. This course passes next to many blue and black level course, and those look scary as hell, I am not doing those, yet. But since I  was sore by now, I started doing the wrong movements, so more regularly unused muscles are used and cramp and ache, so very quickly the pain level increased , and I couldn’t focus on what I had to do and all I wanted to do was finish the course. Too bad it was a long long long run. I was depressed , and after an hour of pain made it down.

The only good thing is since they rushed me to the rental place (since the lesson has begun) I got the equipment for free.. the minor joys of life.

 

We went in to the ski shop in the afternoon where they heated and molded my insoles to my feet and taught me how to put them on better, there is a technique. And of course in the store it doesn’t hurt, I thing they use aerosol morphine or something.  I crashed in early yesterday feeling super tired and woke up fearing the mountain.

 

Again, I put on my newly molded brand new boots and skis and there was no pain, so I went to the lesson, and no pain. We waited for about 15 minutes where they divided the groups in to levels and pain started… and I was doing nothing but standing (in the boots). We took the lift up and pain increased.

The 1^st run in a basic hill, very wide (good for me, far from the trees) , not that steep, yesterday I did it with ease, but I couldn’t with the pain, it increased with every second, I left the group lesson after 1 hill and went to the lodge where I told myself. Go relax your muscles at the hot tub… so I took off my snow pants, long under layer, snow socks, snickers, ski shirt, vest, coat, neck scarf, hat, ski goggles and wore my… oh I already covered this part in the 1^st paragraph.

 

So now while everyone ski’s and having a great time, I am sitting here on the warm couch.

Oh, at one point during my long painful run on the slopes; my nephew little Michael, age six was passing with his teacher without a care in the world, enjoying himself effortlessly on the steep(for me) slopes.

So far its mountain 3, Gil 0

 

Lucky for me, I recently purchased  an online soccer channel which usually shows not the most wanted games, and I checked now and they show the Israel game (which is definitely not a prime time match, so I have what to do, game begins in 15 minutes, till then, I will go back in time to the last few days.

 

Last week we put the bird feeder back on, put it high in the tree (or as high as we can reach on a small ladder). We can see the tree clearly from the kitchen, that is why we put the feeder there so we can see the birds.

So far I have identified the following species: Northern cardinal, Carolina chickadee, downy woodpecker and the last common may be a titmouse. We also had a crow of some kind, a hawk and I am pretty sure I heard an owl (I know the sounds after going to an owl lecture recently), but only the first four use the bird feeder. We noticed that the birds are not eating as we know birds eat, but instead they devour the food, it is early spring, they may be hungry, but so much, for tiny birds! On Friday I found the answer and discovered a new species unknown to science. They are called the common back yard squirrel birds.  These are not your typical bird, they have no feathers but fur instead and a long tail; this unusual bird climbs the tree and go on the small branches and uses its feet to lean down to the feeder and gorge. Soon I will upload a movie to YouTube so you can see this unusual species that eat like a flock of angry birds.

 

On Friday after noon we were on our way east, we took another book of the ember series, and although I am now at the end of CD 5 (of 5 CDs) I still say the story will begin in the next CD, it’s not boring, just nothing really happens. So we drove on and had some decisions to make, go to Vermont or go to Montreal (for the weekend before the ski week).  Finally we decided and from Syracuse, we headed north , passed the amazing 1000 islands region in the dark (you don’t see a single island at this time) and stopped at 1 am an hour away from Montreal.

 

In the morning we checked the little town we stopped by and found some new things

1, MacDonald’s have a gas station of their own, the source of the gas is the same as the meat btw; since I will not eat at mc’s I chose to fill the car elsewhere.

2, the town has a food shack knows as the ‘fryer truck’ it is shaped like a truck, and I remembered a character in a book  I once read (and you SHOULD know who from a famous movie, that was recreated several times)

3. the last and most interesting is a hotel- motel. I have been to motels many times, and also to hotels, but a ‘motel-hotel’ is unusual, not sure what is the difference, but I thought it was interesting.

Well we left this town which I don’t even recall its name and soon crossed over to Quebec, making it my 5^th province out of Canada’s 10.

We entered Montreal on a sunny , cloudless and cold day.

We dressed warm and toured the city. We stopped at some impressive church (don’t have the name) then walked to the old district, stopping at the Notre Dame which I found unimpressive from the outside (though it’s a replica of the real Notre-Dame, perhaps the smaller size or the fact that the real one has nothing next to it, makes it stand out). But from the inside it was very impressive.

 

We proceeded to the museum of history and archeology. The number of museums I see definitely increased since I met racer. She stops at every single information sign, from the founding of the city to the instructions on how to open this windows in case of emergency. The museum was ok for me, it passes in the actual streets of old, under the current city level. After that we walked in the gallery street with the many souvenir shops where for once we didn’t buy a single souvenir. And stopped for lunch in a French craperie. Alla loves those and I cannot say no to chocolate (after losing 22 pounds lately …..:)  ) . we ordered a lobster bisque with cognac and a crape with strawberries, bananas, vanilla ice cream and more stuff, and we got some yummy rolls with butter…mmmmmm. Alla had some Cider with cognac and loved it, I had a hot chocolate which was not bad.

 

We walked on passing more shops and passed a booth which made a new treat. It was liquid taffy, they pour it on some ice chips and you roll it on a stick, and it quickly hardens and becomes a taffy lollypop, of course we had to try, they said it may be messy so we were extra carefully. I found the result to be too sweet for me, but racer liked it. We moved on to another area of shops, where we got no souvenirs but a gift for Rita whom is today’s birthday girl. We walked more in the city and found a hotel, then drove up the Montreal mountain for a high city views at sunset. The city is not pretty in the winter but the sun’s red glow makes it shimmer. Unexpectedly I saw 3 raccoons just below the observation point, 2 walking and  one resting on a tree.

 

We changed at the hotel and went for dinner. Alla like’s French food, so we found a fancy but not too schmency place and got there by subway. The place seemed closed, but they had a bar downstairs, so we went in to an empty place (also closed, but the door was open) and the waiter who was setting up for the next day, brought us upstairs to the real place which was open but usually works with reservations.

A snobby waiter showed us in and a request for some meat to be cooked well done was enough for him to offer Alla some chicken. She surprised the waiter by ordering a plate of calf liver, I surprised myself by ordering bison ribs on a bed of lentils (and I don’t like lentils), but I am on a major menu rejuvenation spree.

I started with another lobster bisque, which I ordered in French ( I used to know French, but forgot it, so now is a perfect time to recall).

And 1:0 Israel ……… yehhhahhhhhhhh.

 

Alla started with some vegetable soup which I tasted and tasted lentils inside and didn’t like it and was concerned from my approaching main dish. My soup was very good and so was the bread and butterrrrr….  I bison was ok, not soft enough but I actually ate the lentils (it was also potatoes and celery I think) so that was my crazy thing of the week.

 

We checked out next morning and drove to the Olympic stadium. We started at the botanical gardens and learned a bit about various fruit trees, saw some ferns and impressive orchids.

On the other side of the garden they have a buterflarium, but the queue was long and it goes through the botanical gardens so we chose not to wait an hour in line and skip the 2^nd part and walked by to the stadium. We took the guided tour; the guide was funny and full of stadium facts but the stadium itself being a huge empty area (they have a major roofing issue, the roof fell twice! So the stadium is unused in the winter), we took the lift to the tower which is the tallest leaning tower in the world for some more views, decent views probably in the summer when the trees are in bloom but not bad now.

We moved on to the bio dome which used to be the Olympic velodrome (which is not a spelling mistake, I googled it). They have 4 unique environments, it’s kind of an indoor zoo where most animals are free to roam where ever they want. Cute small brown monkeys rules the jungle habitat. Playful sea otters dominated the 2^nd part with their digging and sliding down a water slide. The beavers were boring since they were asleep and not very much mobile while sleeping. The lynx (type of cat with lots of fur) was hiding but I got a great facial shot of 2 of them (3 eyes in one frame).

The tiny colorful poisonous frogs were amazing, the unsacred turtles by the alligators were cute, but the highlight were a pair of blue parrots. They were arguing and bickering and not sure if biting or kissing each other, they were hanging on the branches with their big claws, with their beaks, on and off making loops, it was a never ending show. After that we saw some cute penguins and motionless fossils.

 

Oh almost forgot, on stairs next to the stadium a movie was filmed. Not sure what the movie was about, it was some kind of introductory movie , not a Hollywood type movie. A guy was supposed to jump with his snowboard above some 20 stairs and top metal rails which were made in parts, it wasn’t 1 long rails, but 5 sections of rail one after another with a gap of about 1 meter in between. We were just overhead when he made the 1^st jump, he kind of made it but not to the liking of the camera crew, while they were preparing for the next jump, we walked down below them and they were no ready to go, so I got my camera and put it on photo mode( idiotic of me) , the guy rolled down on the ice, jumped and crashed in between the metal gaps. The camera crew rushed to his aid and he was in serious pain and was wailing and all I could think about is why I didn’t use the video mode, there goes my YouTube fame. Not sure who they guy was (tried to Google it and no luck) but there goes his summer.

 

We left Montreal and headed south to Vermont, we arrived at around 9 PM, rested and next morning went skiing and you know the rest

 

Cheers from a couch in Killington Vermont. I hear the hot tub opens soon, time to put on my……

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

on shape, asparagus and milestones

Yes, I am shocked too, it is time for year 3 summary!!!!!!!, can someone please find a way to stop time.

 

 

Ok so what did we have this year

 

1 Surgery, not a very hip experience, my 1^st and hopefully last

1 hospital admission, my first, fun 10 days.

1 code blue experience, seeing the light (from the ceiling) also not the experience I recommend.

1 wedding , now there is an experience to remember and my second overall (to the same pharmacist/racer/travel agent/ chef etc)

1 apple house purchase

1 tree falling down

0 injuries (wait, that can’t be, calf, ok, thighs ok, knee ok, ankle, ok, back ok, neck (1 small thing not a real injury), shoulder ok, elbow ok- a rare year indeed.

 

Weight – I am very happy to report that it is less than same time last year; just like a roller coaster, lots of ups and downs (more ups I think) but in the end, I reached a mile stone I set not long ago and I am less then after the hospital stay. And now I am on a serious roll down hill.

0 number of roller coasters this year ; yes a major shame.

 

~90 the list of books left (unread) on the shelf; I will not the count how much I read this year, the list is long, I should stop buying new books.

I don’t recall if I ever wrote about a bucket list, but it doesn’t matter, item #1 on the list is ; write a book;

1 new bike was purchased, 1 flat tire

1 minor accident this year (lost a mirror)

0 tickets

0 court appearance (actually never had)

 

New animals (no, the zoo does not count) witnessed in nature

Raccoon, black squirrel , opossum (not as road kill)

 

Animals witnessed in my back yard (oh, yes, I am now a back yard owner)

Squirrel, raven, hawk, wood pecker, Red Cardinal; we also had a deer , but I didn’t see it.

 

0 times got drunk last year

 

6 months on Coumadin (blood thinners) without missing a day, a major achievement for a clumsy like myself (good thing its over); I did have some late doses..

 

3 number of gyms ; left the JCC, left life time fitness and now working hard at ATFitness (close to home, small and has soccer on TV!!!!)

 

4 tires I should have already swapped on my car.

 

New destinations

It’s was a light year on the travel scale but there were still additions.

To the countries count  we can only add Wales – to 44 over all

Next year will have at least 2 new destinations, where the list keeps changing from Iceland and Norway to all the Estonia and the area, to Romania, china, Peru, chilly, Tanzania….and the list goes on.

 

Oh, 1= number of international rugby games witnessed live.

20 pounds is the cost of tickets when you are lucky

1 hotel room that is unoccupied, even if they hotel receptionist claims is booked.

 

On states, there have been more extensions; south Carolina, new Hampshire, Virginia, Wyoming are the latest additions – lets recounts (also work to improve my memory)

Ohio, new Hampshire, Connecticut, new jersey, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Maryland, new York, south Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Louisiana, Texas, Missouri, Mississippi, California, Arizona, Nevada, Oregon, Washington, Wyoming, Kansas, Arkansas,  Michigan, Indiana, Tennessee, Iowa, Illinois, Alaska, Nebraska.= 36

 

Left to go

Rhode island, Vermont, Alabama, new Mexico, south Dakota, north Dakota, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Idaho, Montana, north Carolina,  west Virginia, Delaware, Hawaii, Kentucky.

I already have plans for Kentucky (mammoth caves in July), Wisconsin (memorial day , 2-3 day canoe trip) Vermont (ski trip)- with a bit of luck reach 40+ next year (how the hell can I get to Alabama, why would I want to go anyway)

 

1 states was forgotten (forcing me to go to Wikipedia)….Nebraska… at least the memory is intact.

 

1 special sock I am required to wear for 2-5 years.

 

New food, this year has been interesting when I tried stuff I never considered edible before.

Asparagus, which I thought that it’s something I need to plant somewhere, was ok, not sure how cow (or whatever eat it) does not go mad with rage eating this freaky weed.

Green beans, and I actually like it (with sauce of course) and actually ,even by itself.

Tuna; tried once, in a salad with lots of stuff in it, and I survived; will not attempt again this decade.

Spinach; its good actually (with sauce….)

Fried green tomatoes ; the movie is good , not the food

Cranberry less cranberry pumpkin bread ; very good that chef made.

Flounder , good fish.

Very hungry at one point, almost ate the phone (very plasticky).

Special Lucia pound cake

 

1 missed flight

No keys/ phone left behind

1 wedding ring misplaced (but not lost) in st Louis, and will return to me next month.

 

1 completed puzzle  of a tiger

 

1 amazing race event conducted (sending racer and sister all over town)

1 dog bowl, dog carpet and bag of food purchased

0 number of dogs

 

Crazy things did this year

0 , this is an absolute shame

 

1 major mountain peak climbed (Mt Washington, highest in the north east) and no it does not count as a crazy thing.

Over all highest peak reached; Indiana , New Hampshire. – so 2

 

1 old activity returning with lots of D&D lately and having tons of fun.

 

3-4 x-rays

1 dentist visit

3 MRIs

1 cat scan (I didn’t see any cats there)

 

6 hair cuts in 6 different places (including one to almost bold)

 

1 artistic experience (chalk painting of Homer Simpson)

 

0 living grandparents L and the 1^st time I witnessed death up close, a hard and impacting event.

1 beloved pet dead with Bamba, my grandmother’s dog.

 

1 briss witnessed (but looked away) of my latest nephew Rani

1st flaming take out meal in the same event

1^st live Skype briss as well.

 

1 is the number of channels I am subscribed too (internet fox sports)

 

3 different positions I held at work (same company) this year)

 

New activities

Snow shoveling, Beer less beer pong, wii bowling,  and that’s it

 

0 songs in karaoke this year

 

1 theater show (39 steps, very funny)

 

Several music events: turtles, the grass roots, the monkeys, Styx, foreigner , Kansas- not a bad year after all.

 

0 games of tennis lost last year ( undefeated in Ohio… so far)

 

1 wall broken in the basement (attempt to detect something)

 

1 walk on frozen lake

 

3-4 comedy shows

 

1 museum visit

 

Several markets visit

 

1 throwing my boss to a swimming pool

1 being thrown into a swimming pool (after throwing the boss) and taking victims with me

 

1 bag of cookies brought over by the neighbors

1 bag of something we missed by not being home.

 

1 invitation to the neighbors house , and a sad defeat in Cranium.

 

1 table tennis at home

0 games of tennis table played.

 

1 new language training- Russian, still have a lot to learn, I can’t say that I know any at this time; this was one of my milestones from last year and it is still on the list.

 

1 new Springfield visited.

 

That’s it? It has been a quiet eventless year!

 

So it’s time to do the bucket list

 

1.       Write a book

2.       Finish a triathlon

3.       Go on an extreme flight  

4.       Go to every Springfield.

5.       Visit every country (or all non hostile countries)

6.       Invent something

7.       Find more items to add to this list…and do them

 

Promises

Well I promised to learn Russian, I did , but not enough, and promised to lose weight, I did but not enough

 

Next year, not in any order of importance

 

1.       reach 40 states

2.       add 3 countries (reach 5^th continent by Americans count (out of 7) or 4^th by the rest of the world count (out of 5))

3.       know how to ski

4.       do snow shoeing

5.       do more orienteering

6.       do Cross country ski

7.       lose 35 pounds

8.       know Russian

9.       do a triathlon

10.   canoe for 3 days

11.   visit world largest caves

12.   tackle the tower (highest building in Cleveland climb)

13.   run the warier dash (obstacle course that includes jumping over fire….I did walk on fire once, but it’s still a cool event)

14.   finish another puzzle

15.   keep blogging

16.   perhaps

a.       Zorbing

b.      See a tennis tournament of importance

c.       Climb Kilimanjaro

d.      Get below 70 unread books on the list

e.      Have 3 items on the crazy things list next year.

 

 

 

That is it, tomorrow is my last day this year (I landed in the evening of the 16^th)….. I don’t think I will have items to add to the list

 

So cheers and promise to keep updating on important and other green beans related events