Laxing into March

Song of the Week: Strength by Zebrahead. My favorite song off their best album MFZB from 2003. Rediscovered my love for these guys freshman year of college, and still consider this album one of my all-time favorite albums from cover to cover.

Tuesday February 24th, went shopping and got a ton of food. Had some pizza and homemade breadsticks for dinner.

Wednesday February 25th, Picked up some Burger King for dinner and then had dinner again when I got home, stuffed shells made by mom, yum. Beth and I watched Of Men and Miracles, the 30 for 30 about the Russians side of the 1980 Miracle on Ice. Very interested training methods and history behind the men of Russian hockey, ending with the Russian 5 entering the NHL and dominating on the RedWings winning some Stanley Cups (back when I liked them!).

On Thursday February 26th I picked up a mcdouble and 2 mcchickens for lunch and had my first shamrock shake ever? Or maybe in a few years. I cannot recall, but it was very tasty and not nearly as minty as I thought it would be. I suggest a shammy shake to all this spring. That evening Rach and I watched another episode of Better Call Saul. We enjoyed a dinner of pasta with veggies, sausage, & Balsamic dressing. 

Friday February 27th was a super busy day at work with kids off of school, I brought the ps2 back to Naperville since in the 5 months of living here, we haven't even plugged it in yet. I also finished the book Ender's Shadow on Friday. An awesome book that gives the perspective of Ender's Game from Ender's Shadow, Bean. Also had the background of Bean and was all revolved around Bean, the superhuman! Can't wait to continue this series and see where Bean will end up next. Went to bed early.

Saturday February 28th was my last Saturday morning practice. In the afternoon I had to take some dumb coaching testing certifications. It took forever, but I finished and passed the test with the help of Beth. We both had to do it, and some of the scenario videos were outdated and hilarious, in a badly made kind of way. That night Rachel and I watched House of Cards season 3 which was just realeased on Netflix.

Sunday March 1st, I had a morning practice, went back to my parents and watched some lax on TV with Beth while i cleaned my room. Then I went to another practice. Afterwards I headed back home and meal prepped with Rachel for the week, making a burrito bowl style type of meal for lunches during the week. First time doing this, but hoping it will continue and allow me to eat more and build more muscle. We also worked out prior to this. For dinner that night we made some tasty burgers with fries, and enjoyed them while watching the movie St. Vincent featuring Bill Murray. Great film about an odd friendship that develops between an old guy and a kid, brought a tear to my eye.

Monday March 2nd, I watched an episode of The Walking Dead. Last season is going pretty good, excited to see how it will end up in the last 5 episodes. We officially booked a band for our wedding! So get excited some live music! High school lax has also officially started with tryouts occurring that evening outside. Dress warm my friends! 

Video of the week: Lost Kubrick - A short documentary about the unfinished films of Stanley Kubrick 

Movie of the Week: St. Vincent

For the next 2 1/2 months, I will be coaching a lax team every single day. Let the fun begin with the 3 teams I have this year!! I am pretty excited to coach some high school lax. Should be a fun year coaching for the alma mater JV squad.  Rachel is the best for being so accommodating to this!! Love you!

YaBoy is Out

Josh

Hashtag Overgrads

On Tuesday November 11th, after work I made Jack Daniels Pulled Pork mini sandwiches for Rachel and I. She made a side of sweet potato fries which were really tasty. Just slice up a sweet potato, throw on a magic seasoning and toss em in the oven for 20 minutes or so. Scrumptious meal. That night we finished House of Cards and I'll I will say is knock knock. Also jammed out to some more Deer Tick Vinyls on the record player. Oh Happy Veteran's Day to all the Vets out there. Thank you for serving our country! Solid day.

Wednesday November 12th introduced me to the dark side of iTunes and their RED logo? This is a change and interesting. I am still searching for the blue logo I have come to know for so long. Once on the new iTunes I found out that Deer Tick had one more album that I did not own. Fuel for the Fire EP. A four song album with 3 new jams I had never heard, so I purchased that up and now have all of Deer Tick's songs that I know of. After work I watched a few episodes of Video Game High School. A pretty cool show my brother told me about. Basically a high school where kids play video games all day for class, seems like a good time!

For dinner on Thursday November 13th, I made some delicious pizza breads that my mom taught me to make, that her dad taught her to make. So thanks Grandpa for the easy and delicious meal! Although I did throw a curveball into the recipe and made them in the oven wrapped in foil instead of the microwave in order to make the bread a little crunchier, although the cheese did not melt with the same properties. Food! More Video Game High School that evening before bed.

Friday November 14th was a long eventful day. Let's skip ahead to 8:30pm when I got off work. First I filled up with gas for $2.89, the cheapest I have ever filled up for in the area. Then I went home, slammed two pieces of deep dish Giordano's pizza. Rachel and I got in the car and we headed down on a 2 hour 20 minute journey down to U of I. We arrived to John's apartment in Champaign around 11:30pm, right when everyone else: Brian, Adam, Dan, Chris, & Alyssa were gonna head out to the bars. Rach and I stayed a few minutes and had a couple more drinks with John in his place, then we met up with the others at Murphy's. At Murphy's we all came to love and remember cheap alcohol. $2.50 beers, $2.50 shots. After an hour or 2 at Murphy's we were graced with the presence of a new 24 hour McDonalds right next door. We couldn't resist the golden arches and headed over for 4 McDoubles & 4 McChickens and a value fry, for John, Rachel & I. We then walked home, ate our fill and headed to bed.

Saturday November 15th was an early rise for such a late night. We woke sometime around 5 am to the sounds of war outside the window. Oh wait, it was just some metal behind dragged and scrapped by construction workers across the street. After being in and out of sleep with the war sounds in my brain, we all woke up for good around 8 am. We put on our layers and got ready for the big Illinois vs Iowa football game. We headed out to the tailgate area and circled around our 2 cases of beers. We then realized we were kind of hungry and thirsty for actual liquids, so Adam and Dan ran over to the gas station and picked up some gatorades, chips, & granola bars to add to our tailgate. Things were getting wild.

Minutes later we got our shot glasses and began our power hour of fun before the game. Only after a few shots of beer I headed to the porter john. Now I am not sure how many of you have used the facilities in some ice cold weather, but let me tell you about it. I watched my feces fall from human to toilet and while it came out and was falling, it was steaming with quite a force. I now know where the phrase "Steamy Dumps" comes from.

Aside from the steamy dumps, we tailgated for about 100 minutes, thinking about inviting the guy who was sitting in his car alone drinking a beer next to us to our tailgate, and only being spoken to by a woman handing out $1000 bills which we showered Rachel with. Once all finished with our drinks and foods, we headed into the game, with a couple of sock beers and jacket drinks.

When I was using the bathroom initially and talking to Rachel, somehow the rest of our group got separated from us, aka they left us behind, so Rachel and I made our way to the student section and joined the Block I for the initial part of the game. We had some quality endzone seats close to the band, but were separate from our friends. Once the first quarter ended we headed up to the 200 section to join our friends, only to leave that section and find our actual seats after halftime. We stayed until the end of the third quarter when U of I was losing 30 to 7, almost getting a view from every spot in the stadium. It was my first U of I game and if I am correct, it was Rachel's longest time at a U of I football game, not bad for having season tickets during her sophomore year of college. But we had both ran sprints on the football field during her senior year of college, so we were no strangers to the stadium. Check out some shots from the game!

After the fooseball game we stopped at Rachel's old apartment to recollect the start of our relationship and such beautiful memories at 201 E. Armory. Snapped a photo and we then hit up Maize on the way back to John's apartment, a small quesadilla for me as my stomach was pretty full. Around 2pm, once everyone was back at the apartment, we all agreed to take a short 30 minute nap. 3 Hour later we woke up at 5pm. It was like a hobo shelter in there. Everyone wrapped up in their coats, I still had my shoes on, people were laying all over the studio apartment, and there was food and beers spread about. Once we were all up, Chris and Alyssa departed us and the games began. We still had 2 cases left and 6 humans left. Let's just say by the time we left to go out to Blind Pig around 11pm. All 48 drinks were drank. We played a variety of fun games to manage such a feat, but we did so in stylish fashion. We left for Blind Pig around 11, and Rachel called it a night, staying home. So, John, Dan, Brian, Adam, and I walked a few blocks in the snow to reach the Blind Pig. Supposedly one of the best bars in America? Or maybe it was Illinois? Anyway, it was a nice cozy joint, filled with hipsters and a weird guy named Stevie who claimed he didn't own anything he wore and had 76 cents to his name. This San Fransisco man was the only person to chat to us that evening and even let me try his hat on. Which means I probably have lice now. Thanks Stevie. After the Blind Pig papa was in the house as we devoured 2 large pizzas. Thanks papa.

We awoke on Sunday November 16th, packed up our goods, and headed to Kankakee to visit Rachel's grandparents. First we picked up a Jimmy Johns sub and a day old loaf. Tasty. After a nice visit with the grandparents that included a lunch of chicken, creamed corn, mashed potatoes, and ice cream; as well as fun games like Kings in the Corner and Farkle, we headed to Rachel's parents place. We made a pit stop there for a couple of hours then headed to see my cousins Emma and Anna star in the play Peter Pan. Emma was a pirate and Anna was a lost boy. A nice show and they both did great, and so did the people making the popcorn, yum!

The long week ended on Monday November 17th with some American Horror Story Season 4 which I find to be more interesting than scary and a Panda Express dinner with the sister. Although they made me pay an extra $1.25 for the steak I got. Outrage! Although the steak was delicious, a sly way to get extra money from me. Yarrr.

Friendsgiving ahead.

See ya there

Josh

The Proposal

On Tuesday October 28th, Rachel and I celebrated our 3 year anniversary.  I got off work a little early and headed home to make a tasty dinner of shredded chicken lettuce wraps with Rach. How lucky a guy I am to have met such a wonderful woman and have been able to share the last three years with her. Here's to many more!

That night I finished American Horror Story season 1. Spooky show!

Wednesday October 29th, I started American Horror Story season 2: Asylum which seems to be a bit more creepy since it takes place in a psych ward. That evening the boss brought me a Portillo's Big Beef, saucy and scrumptious. I also finished the book The Jungle. It took a socialist turn in the last chapter, but the whole book really built up for it, so it makes sense. A sad, but inspirational story, and a good book. I suggest if you are into the history of the meat packing industry in Chicago and want to learn a bit about being over worked and underpaid.

Thursday October 30th, I left work a bit early and picked up something special. For the rest of the afternoon I walked around some shops, picked up 2 McChickens and 1 McDouble and ate them walking around. I felt somewhat bad eating them in front of a handful of homeless people that I walked by, but also noticed that everyone was staring at me as I ate my McDonalds and strolled about the streets. I picked up a pair of aviators for my Halloween costume and decided not to buy a long hair wig from the Halloween Store because who pays $25 for fake hair?

Rachel got home right around when I did at 7pm and she graced me with 5 Deer Tick Vinyls for our 3 year anniversary. Amazing! Can't wait to play them, too bad we don't have a record player here... yet!

Rachel was having some friends over for a girls wine night, so I headed over to Wrigley to hang out with Adam. He picked me up and we went over to his (Brian's) place and watched some TNF, which is one of the dumbest things I have heard of in awhile. For some reason the NFL feels the need to try and have a game every day of the week and then call it MNF, SNF, or now TNF. Lame. I said peace to Adam after he fell asleep on the couch, little did I know, for the last time in awhile, and ran my way home.

Friday October 31st, Halloween is here. Got out of work a bit early since all the kids are trick-or-treating and got ready for the night of costumes and parties. Rachel dressed up as Deer Tick and I dressed up as John McCauley aka The Bump. I had a cookie and a few beers and we headed out on the town. Ended up enjoying two parties that evening, unfortunately not making it the third I was planning on going to. But we ended the night by heading the Burwood Tap and enjoying free popcorn. Wow was that tasty.

The Big Day was finally here. Saturday November 1st, 2014. The best day of my life that I will forever remember. Myself and a few others have been waiting just under two weeks for this day, and it is finally here. Rachel and I planned to have a day date to celebrate our 3 year anniversary, and decided to go out to eat at MityNice in WaterTower Place.

I'll write the full story once we have told it to family and friends in person, but to make a long story short, Rachel and I decided to go up into the John Hancock when we were at lunch since neither of us had been up there. We took the elevator up, and it was on the 94th floor, after walking around and snapping some photos, we found the most perfect spot amongst the fresh air and sounds of the city below, that I asked the love of my life, Rachel to marry me. She said yes! and we are now engaged to be married. Exciting times in our lives! We didn't have to go take photos around Grant Park in the 30 degree weather as I had originally planned, which we were both thankful for! There have also been a few parts of my life left out of the blog the past two weeks for obvious reasons! Like visits to Rachel's Dad, best friend Sarah, picking out a ring, picking up a ring, and other minute details that Rachel couldn't know about. But, since I left these things out, Rachel was super surprised and shocked when I proposed. Lovely! I cannot wait to spend the rest of my life with this amazing, inspiring, beautiful woman.

Check out a few pics from the day:

We walked home, probably 3 miles or so, calling family and friends and telling them the great news! That night I made cupcakes to celebrate our engagement along with some champagne. We watched a couple episodes of House of Cards as we informed many family members about the proposal.

On Sunday November 2nd, Rachel and I watched some House of Cards, she did a bit of wedding planning while I watched some Football, and we made a delicious pasta with sausage for lunch. That evening we went to Frontier Bar with Rob, Phil, & some of their friends to hangout and have some drinks. The bar had quite the menu which included full animals, and fresh alligator. Rachel and I split some wings. Yum.

Monday November 3rd, the record player that I had ordered over the weekend arrived and it is AMAZING. It came in a box inside of a box inside of a box to ensure its fine quality and protection. The first album I played on it was Black Dirt Sessions by Deer Tick and jammed out to Mange. Sounded so good and awesome. Check it out in the images below. Vintage, also has a axillary port for them ipods and a cd player for them cds. Oh and also a radio, solid pickup. Next week will be another busy week for us engaged folks! Stay tuned! I love you Rachel, my fiance!

Josh