January Rain

You wouldn't expect Thursday, January 10th to have any other weather than snow or just plain cold.  Instead, it was raining and in the high 30's.

I met Tanya in the pouring rain on Lyndale Avenue in front of our dinner destination, Ecopolitan.  We were both looking forward to going there as we hadn't been there since last May.  When we arrived at the door, this is what we saw:

We tried to hurry up and think of an alternative place to go while standing in the rain and decided on Roat Osha.  I had been there one time before but it was years ago.  

I had the Pad Pak Raumid (broccoli, cauliflower, celery, green beans, asparagus, carrots, mushrooms, onions, cabbage, tomatoes, pea pods and bell peppers with a side of rice) and it great.  I ordered it to include mock duck (wheat gluten known as seitan) but I wish I just would have kept it with just veggies.  

Since we got a late start and then a change in plans, we didn't get to spend too much time with each other but still had a couple of hours to catch up since we hadn't seen each other since Madonna in November. 

Roat Osha made a great replacement but hoping Tanya and I can get to Ecopolitan together again soon, even though I do already have another friend date scheduled for there in February so I know it won't be long for me.

Lots of cropping since the hostess took the photo from so far away

   

Dinner and a Movie...with my mom

My lovely boyfriend took off November 2nd-4th to go deer hunting with the boys (and niece) at their cabin.  I think a little bit more drinking might have been going on than hunting.

As for me, my mom and I went out to eat to Noodles and Company on Friday night.  My mom had eaten Noodles once before at my sister's Super Bowl party but had never been there.  For those that don't know my mom, she doesn't do much.  She doesn't get out and explore much so going out and doing every day activities is a new adventure for my mom since my dad died.

We ordered our noodles and she liked them (it's the small things) and then we headed to the movies.  I can remember the last time my mom was in a movie theater.  It was 22 years ago!  In 1990, we went to see Arachnophobia (apparently my phobia was not nearly as bad then) as a family and a very severe thunderstorm passed while we were in the theater.  That's the only time we ever went to the movies as an entire family and the only time I was ever in a movie theater with my mom.  My dad had brought my sister and I to two movies in our lifetime, The Care Bears Movie in 1985 and 101 Dalmatians in 1986.

This time, we went to see Argo.  I thought the movie was good and I was even able to tolerate Ben Affleck in it.  I think he's a terrible actor but not bad at all in this one.  Despite knowing how the movie was going to end, it gets pretty intense the last half hour of the movie, even though there are some historical inaccuracies but hey, it's Hollywood and it's based on true story not is a true story.  Have you seen it?

I'm happy my mom was feeling ok enough to come out with me and I'm hoping we can do something like this again.  It's a new life for her now and I hope she can embrace it.

  

Dinner @ RL

I was supposed to meet Tanya at Red Lobster on Wednesday, September 19th but I wasn't feeling well.  We last minute decided to meet the next day after my original plan for that day was cancelled.  Tanya was craving Red Lobster.  I hadn't been there for years.  It was good though.  I had been so stressed out from benefit planning that having dinner with Tanya was a great distraction from everything else.   

Florida Visits Minnesota

My friend Becky was up visiting from Florida for just a few days but we managed to go and have dinner together Sunday, August 5th.  

We went to Manitou Station in White Bear Lake and sat on the patio.  The weather had just turned cooler the day before so it was perfect sunny but not too warm patio weather.  It had been three years since we'd seen each other here in MN and almost four years since I'd seen her in Florida. 

We had yummy food....scallops for Becky and risotto for me.  The only bad thing that happened on the patio was the annoying bees and flies.  I'm not afraid of bees so I just let one buzz around me but then it landed on my eyelashes/eyelid! Weird.

It was great seeing you, Becky!  Until next time...

A Celebration

M and I went for dinner at Pittsburgh Blue in Maple Grove on Thursday, June 14th.  We had been there once before shortly after it opened in 2007 and decided it was a good but pretty expensive.  Well, our palates and wallets have developed a little bit more over that time frame and so we decided that to try it again despite the price.  

We did have a reason to celebrate.  Some of you may remember this horrific post I wrote in January.  So, this day, June 14th was the one year anniversary of Michael being told he was free.  No more Florida court dates...ever.  

Because of this day, I very much wanted to take M out for a fabulous dinner. We enjoyed filet mignon, chopped salad, hash browns and grown up mac 'n cheese and each other's company.  The dinner was perfect and delicious.  

Just shortly after we ordered, someone said, "Dana?"  I looked and it was one of the servers named Val, who I went to school with.  She was always funny in school and just as funny now and it was truly fun to see her since I don't think I've seen her since we've graduated (except on Facebook).  She even gave us a huge piece of chocolate mousse cake to take home. 

Happy Freedom, Michael.  I'm so thankful that you are in my every day.  

Eco-Dinner Part III

I met up with Tanya for our third monthly meeting for dinner at Ecopolitan on Wednesday night.  While there's still plenty on the menu to try, it's not all stuff I'm interested in trying.  Tanya had the chili cheese burrito, which is what I had last time and this time I tried the Savory Casserole, which was not my favorite.  Here's what it consisted of and looked like:

dill cashew cheese + fresh vegetables layered with zucchini, avocado + buckwheat

 breadcrumbs.  Served with a side salad.

If you recall, Ecopolitan is all vegan, organic, gluten-free and raw. Raw means unheated or cooked under 115 degrees.  This dish was like a big slap of cream cheesy-texture and probably would have been great on crackers.  I spread it out over the salad to eat it.  It wasn't bad, it just wasn't the best either.

What was good was this...a Green Julia, a smoothie consisting of bananas, orange juice, vanilla, coconut oil and spinach.

This was also good...my company!  Even though Tanya and I cut it short due to weather and the sirens going off, I'll take any time I can get with my chica!

Yarusso's

Last Wednesday, my mom's side of the family got together for our quarterly Yarusso's dinner.  We were a little bit late doing it but my grandpa thought it would be good to do it during the week of the anniversary of my gramma's death.  We were missing a few but it's amazing how many of us can get together with just a couple of weeks notice.

Belated Birthday Dinner

A week ago I went out with my bestie Tanya for sushi.  She took me out for a belated birthday dinner.  We met at Bagu which is about a block from Pepito's in South Minneapolis.  The place is very small as you'll see below that both walls are in the photo.  It also has the worst lighting ever, again as evidenced in the pictures of  the sushi.  It's almost like a pale green fluorescent lighting, which as you can imagine is not very flattering on your skin. Would I go there again?  Probably not but it was ultra convenient for our plans that night.  

After dinner we went over to Tanya's house, had a glass of wine and chatted away until it was almost 10:30 pm, which is really late for this girl on a work night!  Thank you Tan-Tan for dinner and great company!

Alphabet Happy Hour

I can't even remember how long it's been since the entire Alphabet Gang got together but that happened last Thursday evening.  We met at Crave in the Mall of America for dinner and drinks.  I had a stir fry over rice that wasn't very good. If you've been to Crave, you know how much it costs. Despite the cost, it was so great to see everyone together again under one roof.  Even though we ate indoors, it was nice enough to have had another HH on a patio somewhere as we had something like 7 days in a row of 80 degrees or more. We won't have many more of these days here in MN.

 I paid $19 for this:

I don't know if the plate looks large but it was not

A big boatload of sushi

Blogger Dinner

I met with a bunch of lovely bloggin' ladies last Wednesday night for dinner.  The group consisted of myself, Ang, Kim, Kristi and Krysten.  I know both Kristi and Kim from high school and I've met Ang a few times now so Krysten was the only one I hadn't met yet and I was excited to meet her as she seems (and is) so nice and cute and has a great sense of style.  We ate at Axel's Bonfire in St. Paul on Grand Avenue which also doubled as a restaurant outing for Kristi and her Twin Cities Restaurant Blog. (Check it out!)  I had the veggie fajitas which were deliciouso.  We had lots of fun and I'm sure we'll be doing it again in the future.  The only bad thing about the night was that Ang, Kristi and myself all received parking tickets for parking on the streets off of Grand Avenue.  There was some tiny little print about permit parking on the sign and none of us saw it.  Boo!

P.S. I was of course the last blogger in our group to write about our meet up!  I'm less than a week behind in my blogs now but Ang, I'm trying my hardest to blog in real time!  :)

Photos are courtesy of Kristi

Ang, Me, Krysten- We're all lefties :)

Kristi and Kim

Kim, Me, Krysten, Ang, Kristi

Dinner with Gramps

I haven't been good at documenting how often I've been going out with my Grandpa since my Gramma passed away in February.  We've been pretty consistent with going out to dinner on Wednesdays.  Sometimes it's every other Wednesday and sometimes it's every week, just depending on, well, mostly my schedule. This past Wednesday I picked up Grandpa and took him to American Burger Bar in downtown St. Paul.  He is likes all kinds of food but he definitely likes a good burger and I thought this would be a good place to take him.  It turned out to be a great place because he just loved it.  Most times when we've gone out, M has been with us too and my aunt came once but this time it was just him and I, which was really nice to have the chance to talk between just the two of us.  I try to get him to tell me what certain foods and places he likes or would like to go to and most times he just has me pick.  Being that he is an FBI, which as a kid he told me that stands for Full-Blooded Italian, I asked him if he likes Italian food like the Olive Garden, since it's a chain and not real authentic.  He said he did like it but in his whole Italian life, he's never tried Alfredo sauce!  Alfredo sauce is a thing in northern Italy and his parents lived in southern Italy and both the north and south didn't really get along so the north had white sauce while the south had red sauce.  Kinda funny.  I'll have to get him to try white sauce on one of our outings.

Happy Birthday Cherrie

Exactly a week ago, M and I met a handful of his family members at the cemetery to say happy birthday to M's sister Cherrie.  She would have been 52 years old.  Each year we release purple balloons, her favorite color, in honor of Cherrie.  We call M's parents in Florida from the cemetery and they also release balloons at the same time from Fort Myers.   My Gramma had just passed away the day before so I wasn't in a cheery mood but most of M's family comforted me regarding my loss and my mind was temporarily taken off the bad and I was able to focus on having a good time with them.  After the cemetery, we went to Donatelli's for dinner.  

Happy Birthday Honeybear

Not only did Bert Blyleven get elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame last Wednesday, it was also my honeybear's birthday.  We worked during the day as usual but we went to see an early showing of the movie True Grit.  We were both looking forward to this movie based on the actors, previews we saw and the critics ratings.  The actors were great but the story just came up short and it was anti-climatic but you have to remember that the movie is an adaptation of the novel (1968) as well as a remake of the original movie and that came out in 1969, in a totally different era than today. We still enjoyed it and would recommend watching it, however keeping that info in mind.  I barely watch TV but I've seen the movie trailer many times and I'm sure you have too but here it is in case you want to watch it.

After the movie we went to Mancini's for a steak dinner. We hadn't been to Mancini's for quite some time, a couple years I think. The food was good and as we remembered it to be, however we've had a little bit more expensive taste and better quality for steak over the past couple of years but we also did so at a price that was double what Mancini's charges.

We went home after dinner and M opened his presents.  I got him a bunch of little things and then the present I've been waiting to give him since November.  I bought him a home beer brewing kit with all the materials needed including bottles and the beer recipe kit itself.  I picked an amber ale for him to make first.  M's talked about wanting to do this and he loves the idea of it so now let's see if he actually likes the process of doing it.  Once you have the equipment, all you have to do each time is buy the beer recipe kit, which yields about 53-12 oz bottles and ends up costing about 50 cents a bottle.  If you're interested in making your own beer or wine, I went to Midwest Supplies in St. Louis Park.  If M enjoys doing this, I'd love to make wine with him sometime also.  They even have kits to make cheese. 

Random Schmandom

I haven't been blogging much about what I've been doing lately because I haven't been up to much.  If I don't blog about what I'm doing shortly after I do it or I don't have pictures to remind me, I forget about what I've done.  I guess that means I'm getting old.  I'm trying to rack my brain as to what's been going on lately and here's my best synopsis. By the way, these Random Schmandom's are more for me than you by documenting the odds and ends of my life.

M and I went to eat at Burger Moe's on Labor Day.  Neither of us were really impressed with the place.  There weren't that many people there so the time it took to get service and actually have our order delivered to us made a negative impression.  The food was just ok.  M had the Kobe burger, I had the bison burger.  M did say the Tuscan Fries were very delicious and better than Smash Burger's Smash Fries. The patio area is really colorful though.  It used to be the old Mexican restaurant El Patio and I don't think they changed the theme. I forgot my camera that day and sorry for so many pictures of the place but I took these with my phone, which I rarely do so I wanted to check out the quality of the pictures.  Not too bad for a phone, huh?

I went over to my sister's house the day after Labor Day.  I wanted to bring my nephew Keith any dinner that he wanted since it was his first day of school.  He chose KFC.  I brought it over and hung out with Keith and my sister Jamie while her husband was at a city council meeting.  She was very pregnant when I went over there and ready to have the baby so I needed to take one last picture of her.  By the way, she's not pregnant anymore.  That post coming very soon.

Later that week, I got home from work on a rainy Friday and I decided on a whim that I wanted to take M out to dinner to Porterhouse, a steakhouse less than a mile from our house since he was going out of town for a night the next day.  We weren't able to make reservations until 8:45 pm but when we were waiting for our table, we saw M's brother in law Greg walk by.  M had recommended earlier in the week some places for them to go for their anniversary, including Porterhouse so it's obvious which one they chose.  We talked with them for a little while before being seated ourselves and enjoying an awesome steak and crab dinner.  I meant to take a picture of us at the restaurant but I forgot so we just took one when we got home and I might as well add a picture of one of the cats too. Happy 27th Anniversary, Kim and Greg!

Last Saturday marked the nine year anniversary of the tragedy in NYC.  There were lots of Facebook status's about "never forget", etc, but really, how can you forget that day?  If you're old enough, Tuesday, September 11, 2001 is forever in our minds.  

I spent the majority of the day with my parents.  They were going shopping at the mall, particularly Macy's to begin with because we all had a coupon that was only good until 1 pm.  I don't know if my parents actually knew I was going to the mall at the same time as them but when I got there, I found them in Macy's and we ended up just shopping together.  We all used our coupon before 1 pm and headed over to all the anchor stores in Maplewood Mall except for JC Penney's.  My dad had said that he hadn't been in the mall with me since I was a little kid and that he actually had fun shopping with us together.  I ended up leaving them and going to run some other errands while they did the same but then met back up with them later for dinner at their house.  We ended up having takeout Chinese food from one of my favorite places, Joy's Kitchen.  While I could have been with my friends or doing whatever else while M was away, I enjoyed hanging out with my parents. 

I ended the night back at my house and watched 2 movies....Leap Year and Remember Me.  I didn't care for Leap Year and Remember Me was different than I thought it would be.  That movie came out on DVD back in June so when at the very end of the movie (*SPOILER ALERT*) you find out that it is the morning of September 11, 2001 just before the attacks happened and then the movie ends.  I just thought it was SO CRAZY that I ended up getting that movie from Netflix at the time that I did not knowing what it was actually about and happening to watch it on September 11th.  WEIRD.

The next day was the first Sunday of the football season so the majority of the day I watched the games and paid attention to my fantasy football teams and weekly picks. I ended up winning my first week in fantasy and it was fun to start football as I just finished up with a horrible season of fantasy baseball.  I did go out and take a much needed walk later in the day though so my whole day was not inside in front of some type of screen. 

Finally, we're getting ready for the Vikings home opener which is tomorrow.  I hope we can pull off a win against the Miami Dolphins. I went to the grocery store in preparation for tomorrow and also for Monday as I am bringing dinner over to my sister's house.  While at the grocery store, I bought ingredients for a salad that I've been wanting to try for so long so I finally made it....Wilted Spinach Salad.  It was very good and I had to take a picture of it because I thought it looked very presentable. 

Ok, I'm pretty much caught up again with a few more posts coming in the next few days. 

Lastly, I want to say congratulations to my cousin Mike and his new wife Tonia who got married today in north central Wisconsin. We wish we could have been there but we are definitely there in spirit!  

Sightseeing Saturday

On Saturday, August 21st, M and I went out to breakfast at The Copper Dome in St. Paul. We were going to go canoeing however we woke up to warm, humid weather but complete overcast. After breakfast we drove around St. Paul a little bit, particularly Cathedral Hill.  I never get sick of admiring the cathedral or architecture of some of the old buildings and houses in the area.

Once we got home, we bummed around for a bit before deciding to go on a motorcycle ride. We had no destination in mind but I had suggested driving down to Rochester.  I've never been to Rochester and not even sure what's there besides the Mayo Clinic.  We headed down Highway 52 and realized very quickly it is a boring drive and not conducive to a beautiful scenic motorcycle ride.  I also realized that I have never been that far down Hwy 52 and have only been as far as Inver Grove Heights, which is kind of ridiculous because it's less than 20 miles from my house. What's even more odd is that just past Inver Grove Heights it totally becomes a rural area and less than 24 miles from my house there is a city called Coates that I had never heard of until that day. It's an easy miss though....after looking up Coates, it's only 1.4 square miles and boasts a population of 163 as of the 2000 census. I guess I haven't been missing much.

As we continued down Hwy 52, M decided he didn't want to drive all the way to Rochester because it was so boring and it was making him tired, plus the weather didn't look good.  We had open sky to look at all angles over the cornfields and it looked like it was going to rain.  We headed down as far as Cannon Falls instead. We stopped at a park at Lake Byllesby before heading into the little, quaint downtown.  We stopped and took a few pictures at Minnieska Park. The sun came out for a couple of minutes before turning gray again.

We then headed northeast towards Hastings to make our way back up to the cities via Hwy 61. On our way to Hastings, we could see beautiful blue sky and sun and while it was already warm and humid, it really started to get hot.  We stopped in downtown Hastings, a city right on the Mississippi River and saw there was a car show going on.  

Our last stop before heading back home was to Battle Creek Regional Park, just off Hwy 61 and Upper Afton Road.  At the beginning of the park, there was a cave, that we believe is made of sandstone. We walked back on the windy paved path that took us to somewhere we weren't sure of.  The sun was beaming over all the greenery and it was easy to forget you are in St. Paul until you heard the harsh bang of the railroad cars crashing in the near distance. We walked about a half mile into the park before deciding to turn around.  After we got home, we realized there wasn't much more to the park than what we had already seen.  

We finished the evening with tacos and heartburn from one of our favorite Mexican restaurants, Acapulco, before returning home, cracking a bottle of red wine for me and beer for M and listening to music before going to bed. A great day!