Who needs a drive shaft anyhow..

I just sat down to a nice bowl of my new world famous Superior Stout chili, with an ice cold glass of High Seas Indian Pale Ale, when the phone rang. WORK! Damn. Turns out something was wrong, and I was needed back at the office. I ate my meal, drank my beer, and headed back in the Bronco. On the corner of Third and Monroe St., I laid heavy on the gas to make my left turn, when the most horrific sound burst from under the bronco. Next thing I hear clanging spinning noises as i try to give it some gas. Nothing. Phone call to AAA. Tow truck there in minutes. Tow truck guy calls the cops (jerk). Cop arrives and just sits there with his flashers on, making more of a scene then the tow truck. Tow truck driver gives me the keys I need, and off with the bronco he goes to Pauls Automotive (I'm a regular). I glanced under the truck as he was leaving, and it appears to be the drive-shaft.

So here I am at work, stuck here until I can find a lift home. It's too cold out to walk home, I considered that. Of course, I could try to make it to Dino's, rest there over a $1.50 beer, then hike to Mugsy's for a .99 cent margarita. Sounds like fun, but too much work - had I changed from my work dress clothes, I'd already be hiking home.

Some links I ran across:

New Orleans - First FREE wi-fi city: Problem with this, no one has computers to use it. The first of many cities to offer free wi-fi. My crystal ball tells me within 5 years, every major city in the US will offer this.

Secret Santa - this ones for you Aaron. A metal song by the band Karkis, all about how Secret Santa, if you rearrange the words, could also be called Secret Satan. I'm speechless on this one.

Am I the last to hear about stamp prices rising two cents on January 8th?!

1980 Arcade Games!! A ton of them too - I just played a round of Mrs. PacMan, and got my ass kicked by those freakin ghosts.

Alright, I suppose I should start looking for a ride home, or curl up on my office floor to sleep for the night.. Happy Thursday!! woohoo. Wings vs. Calgary - we'll be at BW3's at 6pm for a pre-game party - come join us!!

Holy Smoke!

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Originally uploaded by robg2251.

No wonder I was so stuffed up the next morning.. look at all that smoke!!

I've been on vacation for a few days. Jen and I went out to Kansas City Missouri to see her sister and family. We had a really great time - I'll be posting some pictures on my flickr site soon. We had the chance to eat some GREAT food - I had the best mexican food I've ever eaten, along with the best BBQ i've ever had. I'm really looking forward to going back - next time Jen and I decided we would take a direct flight - stopping off in Chicago added a lot of time to the trip.

Prior to the trip, I ventured out for the annual Thanksgiving Eve bar celebration. It was a good time - the bars were packed. I had this bright idea of telling people they would appear on StevesTavern.com if they posed for the picture.. so of course, everyone wanted their picture taken. So there you have it - check out the pictures. (by the way, there is no stevestavern.com!)...

Last night Aaron and I did another taste test. $25 smackers for tasting marinara sauce. It took us 15 minutes. We went to Grizzly Peak brewing after and enjoyed some of their newly brewed Bitter Rye (it has some long name, but the only two words I remembered was bitter and rye). It was so good, that I filled my growler with it.

Alright. Boston Bruins are playing New Jersey Devils right now.. I think I'm going to kick back and watch this. Hope everyone had a good turkey day.

Today was a good day...

I didn't even have to use my AK.
I don't even know what an AK is, I'm assuming its a gun. I'm quoting Ice Cube there, in case anyone wondered.. Anyhow, why was it a good day?! Well - besides dropping some serious cash on a new furnace (not good) - I did manage to get a bunch done at work. I also went to my sisters this evening to borrow luggage, and ate a bunch of fried green tomato's. I freakin LOVE them!! Tim (bro-in-law) also hooked a brotha up with some vanilla pipe tobacco.. So, I'm sitting here with a nice glass of Superior Stout (not to be confused with Imperial Stout) - and enjoying a pipe. What a good way to end the day.

So far, the furnace is working good - the bathroom is usually the hottest room in the house, and right now.. its cold in there.. so, I think there might be some issues.. but we'll see. Funny they didn't even leave me a note or anything. Tomorrow they come back to do the A/C.

I plan on hitting work around 6am tomorrow to start getting things in order for my two days off work. I need to pack tonight, because tomorrow.. obviously, thanksgiving eve, is the biggest bar night of the year. I don't know what the plans are yet, but I would like to get some hockey time in at 330 tomorrow, then from there I need to load up the dogs and take them to Karens Canine by 5pm. Then, it should be an easy night. Our flight out on Thursday is around 7ish. I'm looking forward to seeing a new city. Bryan gave me the run down on Kansas and Missouri today, I'm Kansas City schooled.

Anyhow, I suppose I should get to work packing. Here are some links for your viewing enjoyment:

USB powered Lava Lamp for your desk. Only $9.99 too!

Bare Naked Ladies: set to release new album on a USB stick for $30.

Christmas Lights house: Take a second and watch this - imagine what this guy had to do to put this together.. picture by picture, light by light.. wow! good job.

Flash Games! Not to be played the day after Thanksgiving at work, when no one else is around. :)

Gift Box! A handy website (free) that you can keep track of gift purchases, gifts received, buying lists, and can even send thank you e-cards right from the site! Neato!

That's all folks. Happy Thanksgiving Eve!

Pub Crawl

I'm patiently waiting the arrival of my furnace install dudes. 4 whopping grand, actually.. close to 5, but it includes central air. Which, I don't need - but, the house value will increase, and I'll have an easier time selling when I decide to buy that 5000 sq. foot ranch sitting on a 40 acre plot of land.. :)

What would everyone think of a pub crawl? We've been talking about it, but haven't really done anything with it - or done the actual pub crawl. I'd like to make it a bigger event then just a few of us. Maybe make up some shirts, or hand out flyers.. or run advertising.. Anyhow, we have enough bars in the downtown area that we could walk to each one. I also would like to make it a cab-ride home event - because, hell.. how often do you get to ride in a cab in Monroe!
Here's the list of bars in no particular order. I know I have a map of the downtown area, I can number it up and label the bars.

- Whistle Stop

- Steve's Tavern

- You & I

- Uptown Bar

- Kelly's Pub

- McGeady's

- Beeks

- Roarks Tavern

- Club 129

Am I missing any? Might make for a fun downtown event - I just don't know if all these bars would go for purchasing advertising - if we decided to go that route. Either way, throw some ideas at me - it'll be fun. Might be better to do in the warmth too... summer. We tossed the idea around for the night before turkey day.. but, for as big as I think this event could be, I'd really like to take some time to plan it more - maybe we can just do a practice run to see if it works!

Alright then. back to waiting for the furnace guys.

Road trippin for Stout.

Friday night, we went to the steak roast. All you can drink beer is a BAD thing, is all I have to say about that. But, the steaks were good.
Saturday morning, I woke up early and headed out to Webberville, MI - Michigan Brewing Company in search of the holy grail - Imperial Stout. MBC's Imperial is only brewed once a year, and they have a limited supply of it, so it goes really quick. I called twice in the past week, just to make sure - both people said they had it, and it would probably last about three weeks. It took me about an hour and a half to get up there.. maybe a little less - but I was feeling pretty rough, so it didn't make the drive too easy. Anyhow, I arrive finally.. only to find that the Imperial Stout isn't even done yet - 'three more weeks' the bartender says. He said they probably were confused with the Superior stout - which was just brewed recently.
I was pretty bummed out, but sat down for my 10am Indian Pale Ale and bowl of hot and spicey chili. That place has the BEST chili ever - its really hot, and I found out, the secret ingredient is stout beer. crazy eh? The specialty beer on tap was a Cherry Dubble - which was actually really good. I ate, picked up some beer to go - and headed back to Monroe. What was pretty funny was my muffler pipe broke just as I was heading up there.. so the whole way there, and back I had this mega loud muffler sound, I had to drown out by cranking my stereo full blast..

The rest of the weekend went pretty well, we partied at MT Loonies on Saturday night, which was a last minute thing - and turned out really fun.

Thursday we're going to Kansas City to visit Jens sister, I'm looking forward to a mini vacation.. its been a while since I've had some time off work.

Anyhow, more to come later.. this is going to be an insane work week - so I hope I find time after work to post.

Go Blue!

Well, I've officially decided not to tailgate. It really sounds like fun, but I really like my warm house. Speaking of, I'm getting a new furnace next week, so if anyone wants to loan me four grand, I'd really appreciate it. :) This week flew by.. I'm really glad its over. I freakin LOVE the weekends.. don't you?!

Wow - this sounds yummy!! Salmon Soda - or Pop as I'm supposed to call it. Ya know, the fizzy soft drink. Anyhow, that's just gross.. what'll they think of next.

I really shouldn't be laughing at this, because it is really awful. But - you decide whether to laugh or not. This story is about a series of hoax prank calls this guy would make to businesses, and make the people do things - for instance: One of them, he calls this McDonalds, and says that he's a cop, and one of the employees stole a customers purse. So, he has the manager take this girl in the back room and strip search her. Some of these are so silly, I couldn't believe they were real - if a caller is saying he's from corporate, and telling me to strip then spank an employee.. I'd probably think something was up.. wouldn't you?!

50 years in photos. Hey photographers.. if you haven't seen this yet, check it out. Very cool.

You may have heard this - but incase you haven't, a $100 Laptop is set to be released soon. If this is real.. i'm so getting one just to say I had one. I bet they're disposable.

Wow, average meal at this restaurant: $277!! Check out forbes list of the 25 most expensive restaurants in 2005 .

Billiards anyone?!

And finally, check out the Alibi Network. This company will provide you an alibi if you need one. I'm hoping this is fake. :)

Holy Shit!

This has been my longest stint yet of not blogging. This week has been totally crazy. I have been working early and late every night, and coming right home, changing, then going back out. Crazy I tell you.
Next week is Thanksgiving. I'm going to KCMO with Jen. I have never been there, and if I was to pick a place I could fly to, I never would have imagined Missouri. I have heard they have wonderful barbeque - so I'm looking forward to that. If anyone has been there, let me know - Jen and I might get to do some venturing while were there, so we'll need to hear about wher the good food is.
I have no links to give out tonight, because I haven't been reading my news reader lately.. Other then the above - kcmo. I went to that site, and it kind of sucks, but, the strategic thing they did was get themselves on a top 'kcmo' google search. Have you ever googled your name? That's fun to do. I'm freakin #91 when I do a google search on Gorczcya.
Now that I think about it, I'm going to start emailing Gorczyca's, and telling them I have the same last name, and see if I can't make some friends. I'll post the results.

I went to Buffalo Wild Wings tonight. I hate calling it that by the way, i sent Val a text message today reminding her of the get together, and I had to spell out the whole thing - because I was corrected the other night when i called it Bdubs.. someone said, what the hell is that?! Why do you call it that?? It's cuz I'm freakin OLD. Ok?! :) Anyhow, it was fun. Nick had this big scam, that he was going to cash out with one waitress, and get a new one - because she was much hotter then the current girl. I ratted him out to our waitress, and she was really pissed. He ended up doing it anyway, and made us all wave to him like he was leaving.. he never left, he just turned around, came back in and asked to have the waitress he wanted. I left and he was snugged up talking to her.

I should get some z's. I just finished a Negro Modella - wow it was really good. I had bells all night, and a couple miller lights (ugh).. so this beer was very good.. I brought a pale ale in from the garage.. I'm debating on it right now.. this game has been really good - and its 1-1 - I'd only be doing my duty as a Wings fan, to stay up and watch the rest of it.. right?!

Aaron wants to tailgate the UM vs. Ohio game in a2 this wknd. I want to, but nick just said its goint to rain, and be 40 degrees. I'd rather sit inside and enjoy the game with some pbr's and chili.. :)

Have a great thursday ya'll. I'll be blogging again soon!

Before I posted this, I got through to theMichigan Brewing Company. They have Superior Stout on tap. Which, lasts less then a month. it's AMAZING stout, and is like 8 or 9% brew. I think i've changed my mind about tailgaiting the UM game... I think I'm going on a small road trip!!

Turkey P.D.F. (pre deep fried)

Today was a really mellow day. I didn't do too much, besides preparing the turkey, the stuffing, the taters and getting all of the equipment ready for the 3rd annual turkey fry. I also went and got the truck washed. I spent too many quarters washing the truck, and only had 2 left to vacuum out the entire truck - which is impossible. I figured I would try anyways. When i pulled up to the vacuum, I hopped out to put my fifty cents in, and sitting next to the vacuum on the cement, was a stack of quarters. WOo Hoo! The inside of the truck is spotless!!
I went to work for a while and put the movie together for our presentation to the employees this coming up week. Dana, our intern was there - and she locked her keys in her car. I called AAA, and hooked up a car unlocker dude.. he had it opened in less then 10 seconds, AND.. gave me a car freshener! That made my day. A free car freshener. I put it in the truck to top off the brand new spic and span smellin good bronco. :)
Now I'm home watching Calgaray Flames vs. Colorado Avalanche hockey. End of the 1st period, and its 4-0 Calgary. Kippersoft has an amazing helment airbrushed with skulls on each side.

Anyhow, check this out. It's supposed to be the best ever paper airplane. I haven't tried it, but I'm going to soon. If anyone makes this in the near future, let me know how good this flies. Build the BEST paper airplane in the world!

According to this article, 1 Grande Starbucks coffee, is equal to seven Red Bulls. Check this out

Are you a typing pro? Watch out, this game is addicting. Type the letters as they float across the screen. I ranked when I played it the first time, this time, i just bombed. Typing Game

Fridays

You know what I like best about Fridays?? Monday is only two days away.
I stopped at Beeks after work and had a couple beers with Sick. I was drinking this Hefenwiezan beer.. it wasn't too bad. The closest to good beer I could get at Beeks (on tap that is). I wish we had a brewery in town. I jog by this empty building next to sav-a-lot every morning, and I imagine the inside all done up as a brew pub. Floors shiny wood, a darkness hovers through the building, candle lit with big stacks of brewing equipment sitting behind some glass. The smell of beer and peanuts as you walk in the door.. Holy cow, did I just describe heaven?! But that would be great. Brewery's are also a place to meet great people. There hasn't been too many times I've been to a brewery and didn't meet someone I really liked. Rambling aren't i?
After my beer with Sick and Aaron, I loaded up on some gas, bragged to the attendant that my car gets 40 MpG, and he replied 'you Da man'.. Then, I went to foodtown for some allery pills (I have dog allergy's.. go figure), then I stopped at Monroe Liquor, which they have some pretty decent beer there. They have Leopolds, Belles and a few other odd brands. The Belles was on sale for a whopping $9.99 a sixer. I chose the Pale Ale.
I got home and started grilling chicken. I hung out in the garage for a while and poured my Pale Ale. I was shocked to see floaties fizzing all around in my beer. I took a big gulp, and i could feel all these floaties in my mouth from this beer. Gross eh?! So i called T-Bone. T-Bone is a beer master - especially Bells. Sure enough, he said to deal with it, it's just hops and sediments from the brewing process. Bells apparently does a more of a raw brewing process - and of course it's more like a meal in a glass.
So. That's my evening. Jen and I chatted for a while, and I've been watching the wings (2-0 thus far).. 3rd bru - and I'm about to go grab another. It's only 9pm, and I'm already feeling sleepy.. we'll see how long I last tonight.. I don't think will be much longer.

I guess if your still reading after all of that, here are some links for you:
Video Here
A video of japanese woman with a pork chop on their heads and one hungry pissed off lizard. This is the exact description of this video.. what the hell?!

He's five and he sings death metal. No kidding. Check him out: Tylercore

Tomorrow: jog, turkey preperation, thawing turkeys, fetching better beer for the party, michigan football, going to work for a few hours, maybe dinner, church, work for those few hours because earlier i never made it, sleep. Sunday: Turkey Deep Fry Estravaganza!!

Dude. It's Wednesday!

ROB
Originally uploaded by robg2251.

I don't blog about work much, so I'm going to continue with that tradition. I will however notify everyone of the new and improved website that we've all been working so hard on. Today (Wednesday), sometime around 2 p.m. you should be able to view the new and much improved MonroeNews.com .

I may have blogged this earlier on, but it really never gets old. It's a Paper airplane game for hours of fun.

You may have heard about this, but in case you haven't - the NHL has teamed up with ESPN to provide news and updates to cell phones and other new media platforms - as well as updates of scheduled games re-played on ESPN classics. Very cool for the hockey nut I am.. guess what that means Jen - More hockey!!! :)

If you have a second, watch this video - it's all done with a series of photographs, put together to form an animation. It's so amazing. Check it out

I wanted to save this one for a post all by itself. This guy takes some amazing photographs . He goes by TrueBavarian on flickr.

These folks have got to be rich. They created a Home Theater in their house. And I thought i was cool when I put up 4 speakers surrounding my living room.

And last but not least, Etsy.com is a new website that features all handmade items for sale. From clothing to soap to jewelry, it's a hippy, crafty paradise. I have a feeling I'm going to do a whole lot of christmas shopping on this site! Category's are also RSS-able! Very, very cool.

Picture above is me.. I think. :)

Poo

I never though of it like that.
Not much else to report today - check out the Dysfunctional Family Letter Generator - hours of fun. Reminds me of those mad libs I used to do as a kid. Well, i'll be darned - Online Mad Libs!!!
And finally, I don't recognize this game, but I played it before work today, and it's kind of amusing. But, it brought me back to those frustrating days of that single button joy stick that I would slam on the ground yelling 'The monster didn't even touch me.. What the heck!!'.. then I'd get grounded for yelling and slamming the joystick down. It was a vicious cycle. :)
Check it out: Rick Dangerous
I think all my links today are from one of my fav sites: Uneasy Silence.

Campfire

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Originally uploaded by robg2251.

I had my last campfire of the year while raking leaves today. I spent almost the whole day outside today - I managed to get all the leaves raked up, without getting dog poop on me! woohoo!

Some of these crack me up - one of the top "Things to do when you're bored" suggests pushing your eyes in for an interesting light show.. You've got to be pretty bored for these.

A bullshit guide to Drugs. This was pretty eye opening.. read about any kind of drug out there, how people do them, and what they do to people.. creepy!

This should go under the things to do when bored - Maybe its just me, but guys my age don't do drinking games.. however, I would probably give this one a try: Google Drinking Game

I don't know what to say about this one. I can't imagine eating sushi off of some stranger. Check it out: Naked Sushi

Wow. The band 'Piebald' converted their van to run on Vegetable Oil. Very interesting article..

I watched half of the Grateful Dead Movie tonight. It was ok, very amateurishly thrown together, but it's probably just that they didn't have much to work with in 1974 when this was made. I still have the second half to watch. Great music.

Here we go. The future. Nokia's Internet Tablet. Looks like it's only available in countries other then the US at this point. Now, let me stop right here - I'm really shocked that the US is one of the countries that is really far behind in technology. A good portion of countries already have wi-fi cities - where something like this could be used. Crazy! I'm reading a really great book right now that talks about a lot of new technologies and where technology is going - it's called The World is Flat by Thomas L. Friedman. Check this out - it's almost scary where things are heading.

And last but not least. When I was in grade school, we put together all this stuff in a big box and buried it in a big hole in front of the school. We all got to put something in it, I don't remember what I put in, but chances are I tossed in a half of a pencil or something silly like that. Well, if you don't like getting your hands dirty - here's the newest technology in time capsules. E-Capsules. Send yourself, or a friend an email - and set a date of delivery for 1, 3, 5, 10 or 20 yrs later. So, don't change your email address whatever you do!

Have a good week everyone.

My Backyard

A down and dirty thrown together photoshoped view of my backyard (click here to see the ladder i was on) and my neighbors backyards. Yeah.. I was procrastinating raking leaves.. :)

GitRDone

GitRDone
Originally uploaded by robg2251.

Spell with Flickr! Type in whatever you want and this dandy web page will output pictures of letters spelling your word. Try it.. you'll like it! Look.. here's mine:





Last night was one of those evenings where I swore I wouldn't get stuck hanging out in town.. but ended up doing that anyhow, and had some good fun. It's fun to just get together with friends and laugh every once in a while. PIcture above I'm doing just that.

I have got to share it with ya'll.. it's a video I threw together for work. We made this huge video about the company that we're presenting later this month, and this is the trailer for it. Check it out

Red Square: Click on the red square and move it around to stay away from the blue squares. Lame but I kept on playing it over and over..

Got a question? Need a human to answer? Check out Say-So.org - People asking any sort of question from'What kind of digi cam should i buy' .. to What's the reason for living'..

Lunch is on Google! - This story is about people that sneak into Google to get the free lunch that they provide to Google employees.

Have a good weekend ya'll.

Greek Town

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Originally uploaded by robg2251.

Todays blog is brought to you by Web Dave. He gave me a Yuengling Traditional Lager . I'd have to say, it is very good. It's a darker pilsner, with a cream colored head. Very light creamy taste. No odd taste surprises here, just straight up tasty beer! Thanks Dave!!

Barnaby vs. Fischer: The fight we saw at the Red Wings game last night.

Office Space: Extended movie released - fun little game on this website.

Beard Championships!: My buddy Aaron woulda won something here..

Catch the flies with chopsticks! - Just like on Karate Kid! Cool little game...

Thriller Live!: This town does Michael Jackson's Thriller for Halloween every year. I wonder how they decide gets to be Mj?!

Pastor slip up: Funny little video of this paster preaching, and he slips up his words.. and has a hard time getting back on track. cracked me up..

1 Ounce for you!: I'm sure you've heard about this - Denver folks voted to smoke it up.

Picture above is Greek Town in Detroit.
Time for some z's.

Detroit Redwings!

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Originally uploaded by robg2251.

Good game last night. This was the view from our first seats, we ended up getting standing room spots, and watched the game from there - not bad at all. Standing room is usually always available, and is only $30. We went down and had some seats for the last few minutes of the game.. it worked out good. Check out the flickr site for more pics.. i posted some halloween pics too.. pretty much just uploaded the contents of my camera! The dudes from the Wings game were the Canadian fella's that we met, very cool guys - thanks for the beer eh! More later..
Click here to see pics

Welcome November!

My breakfast today consisted of a milky way I found in the grass as I was walking out to my car. The wrapper was wet, and after a brief examination before tossing in my mouth, it had been stepped on. But boy was it tasty!! It was like a gift from the heavens - Here Rob, here's a yummy treat to start off your day!

So, my blog looks different. And I owe it all to Dan. Like a week ago, i was messing with my links.. and I deleted my blogger friends. oops. I figured no one would notice.. oh but Dan did. He gave me hell for deleting his link. So yesterday, I tried to fix it. I ended up making some bad template changes. Me and html don't mix well. So, I had to load a new template. I kind of like the change.

Links for today:

As if you haven't had enough of Halloween, here you can carve pumpkins without the mess!

Check out this marriage advice video.. had me cracking up. I love that forget foo blog, I read it daily.

A website resembling good ol' Dos. Very fun.

I've been keeping an eye on this blog too - it's called Odd things you find in Japan. Interesting!

The picture above is the first picture under the google image search 'November'.

Jen and I are going to a wings game tonight. We're going to hit Nemo's Bar and Grill first, then head up to the game from there. I guess they have a shuttle to the game. Should be fun. Ok - time for work!