Giants versus Dallas

This past weekend afforded me a rare opportunity to catch a live Giants game. With my dad down in Long Beach Island for a week with my mom, my Uncle Dennis needed a tailgating partner. So, I volunteered (twist my arm, haha). He picked me up around 12:45 for the 4:15 game, and we headed to East Rutherford. Good thing we went when we did. The lots were already clogged with NY and Dallas fans, all cooking, drinking, throwing around footballs, and everything else that goes along with the fun of tailgating. We cooked and ate and caught up on current events. After a while of that, it was time to pack up and head into the stadium.

On a good note, well.....you know how the game turned out!! Sorry all you Dallas fans!!!

Max visits Brooklyn

On the day after Halloween, Max and I found ourselves in our usual Saturday afternoon mode--on the computers, picking up dinner, doing some chores, etc. Towards the night when cabin fever set in, it was evident that getting out of the house was the call to order. So, a relaxing car ride turned into a spontaneous drive into NYC. Despite a bit of traffic heading into the Holland Tunnel, the drive into the city was met with enthusiasm. Max loved all the bright lights, tall buildings, and busy streets. My surprise for him stemmed from an interest he has in the bridges that cross the East River. Not only did we tour areas like Chinatown and Battery Park, but we also took a ride across the Manhattan Bridge into Brooklyn, to do nothing more than just say he was there..we drove for a bit and then banged a Uturn and headed back into NYC. For the rest of the ride, we headed up the FDR to look at the rest of the bridges, and then ultimately came back to New Jersey via the George Washington Bridge.

A waste of gas? Nah. I have to say, I'm not a huge fan of NYC, but there's something about it that makes you think twice when you see the fascination of it all in your son's eyes.

Trick or Treat!

Halloween had a special meaning this year, as Mr. Max (clad in a terrific Superman costume) was slated to participate in Trick or Treating for the first time. While we've taken him out in the past and have outfitted him with various costumes, this year would put him in the position of doing his own candy collecting with Lynn or me at his side (Pictures of Max can be seen to the right).

Lynn took Max out in the afternoon for a while, and I took over when I got home from work. After around 90 minutes or so of venturing around the neighborhood, we paid a visit to my parents so they could get a look at him in his costume. Some pictures were taken, and after a short while, it was evident Max had his fill of the day, as fatigue rapidly set in.

Now the challenge is to gobble down all that candy!

Halloween Party in Long Valley

On October 25, my good friend Anthony hosted a Halloween party for friends and family. About a dozen kids sported costumes ranging from sports figures, faerie tale figures, and Hollywood characters (Max was Eli Manning). The afternoon was filled with food, drink, activites, and visiting with friends. Much of Anthony's extended family were on hand as well as most of the guys that normally get together for our periodic wine tastings.

Despite a very, very rainy and windy day, it was nice to get together and watch the kids enjoy themselves.

Birthday Shout-Out for Max on Wine Library TV!

Hey folks. In keeping up with the tradition of requesting birthday shoutouts for each of us, the latest shout-out was for Mr. Max. If you go to
http://tv.winelibrary.com/2008/10/10/yellow-tail-a-sauvignon-blanc-and-a-dessert-wine-episode-555/ and drag the slider to about the 9:40 mark, the happy birthday wishes start.

Happy Birthday, Max!

A Tale of Two Races

Ok, so this past weekend had me put my running prowess once again to the test, but with a twist--for the first time ever, I dared to run hard races on back to back days--while I originally had only planned to run on Sunday, October 12, a work colleague told me about a short 3 mile run right across the river (Rutherford) on October 11.

There's a side story to share about Saturday's run. During the summer my Aunt Margaret and I had been talking about running in a race together again (mind you our last run together in any kind of race dated back to 1988). Well, when this opportunity surfaced in Rutherford, home to more relatives of mine (the Waller family), I thought I'd encourage my aunt to run in it. She had built up to that distance already, so the biggest concern she could possibly have that day were stomach butterflies! As a bonus, my cousin Anna would also take part in the race (I warned her since she was so young she'd better be WAY ahead of us).

The Rutherford race was a 3 mile run (the "Pumpkin Run"). The course weaved through town, starting and ending in the park just off Washington Street. As was expected, Anna placed ahead of my aunt and I, somewhere around 27 minutes. I came in at a respectable 30:15, and my aunt a bit over 32 minutes (I can't seem to find official results on the internet). After the race I unfortunately couldn't really relish too much in my performance, because I had my normal Saturday afternoon errands to run and work to do at the house, and then finally rest up for a much longer run the next morning.

Okay, so I woke up Sunday morning slightly sore from the Rutherford race, but knew what I had to do. I got myself ready and headed up to the Oval in Nutley. I did my normal warmups and played the waiting game. Again my work colleague Aaron and his wife and brother in law were in this race. I caught up with them just before the race to shoot the breeze and help kill time.

Then the officials began to do the start cadence. At that instant in time the worst possible thing happened--my Zune froze on me and I couldn't restart it! I tried everything to get it to once again play music but it had shut down and showed no signs of life. Then the pistol sounded and the race began. So, I began running with the group, but tried like heck to breathe some life into my media player, otherwise it would be a long, long run without tunes. After a few minutes of trying, I gave up the struggle, and refocused on the task at hand, despite the time it was going to take me!

Carrying my seemingly dead mp3 player, I took the beginning of my run up a notch to clear myself from the back of the pack to someplace a bit more well--not near last. I gained a lot of ground and passed a number of runners between the first and second miles of running. One of the race coordinators snapped this picture of me and emailed it--



At around the 3 mile mark of the race was the first time I thought I had a chance to at least match, if not surpass, my time of 54:23 last year. I tried on the straightaways of Washington Avenue and Center Street to gain more ground by picking up speed. When I hit Franklin Ave at the 50 minute mark, I knew I had at a personal best in the bag, it was just a question of how much faster. Well, I ended at a 53:33, almost a minute faster!!

As long as my legs, hips, knees, ankles, and all parts in between keep letting me, rest assured you'll see more stories like this in the years to come! I only hope I'll have more success stories to share...until next time!

Return to Wine Library

Hey folks. In a last minute decision, I decided after my morning activities to drag my son down to Wine Library in Springfield, N.J. to take advantage of some heavily advertised sales today that I've seen on Wine Library TV over the past several weeks. In particular, 2005 Bordeaux was an offering discussed (see http://tv.winelibrary.com/2008/09/29/secret-pack-tasting-after-a-jets-offensive-explosion-episode-548/) that was available in vast quantities. So, I thought I'd take a look and see if I could find something at a decent price that I could pick up or even sample.

Before starting my shopping, of course Max wanted to poke around and see the place. He found the huge aquarium on the 2nd Level not too far from the Wine Tasting tables. Well, call it good timing or call it whatever else you like, but right when we were there looking at the fish (and dodging the folks browsing all the sampling stations) an employee from the Wine Library came out stating that Gary Vaynerchuk would be doing a taping of Wine Library right where we were at the tasting table in a few minutes. As that was said, Mr. Mott appeared carrying his camera and tripod ("Mott", as Gary refers to him on Wine Library TV). Soon enough he and his guest(I think he said his name was 'Joe') came out and began talking to a few folks nearby as well as ready their set. I took an opportunity to introduce myself to "Mott", and he seemed appreciative for my acknowledging me being a regular viewer of the show. Afterward, Gary took a look over and saw Max staring at him (since he's seen him enough times on the computer while I watched shows) and said 'hello', to which Max quickly responded back with a hearty 'hi'. I waved to Gary figuring he had recognized me previously at Costco, but he went right into the start of his show--oh well.

After a few minutes Max had his fill of watching the taping of the show as well as watching the fish, so we had to take a walk and began our search for something to buy. We headed back downstairs and looked at the numerous opened cases of French wines available. I came across a small tasting station and began reading about a wine on sale for $14.98 (http://winelibrary.com/reviewwine.asp?item=42146). The fellow at the station had me try a small shotglass sized cup of this wine (it had been decanting for a few hours). The nose was very fruity, mostly a dark berries type of aroma--a very nice start! The body was medium- heavy and fruit filled, high in tanins, and very complex. It also had earthy, almost vegetal, overtones to it. What I really enjoyed was the tremendous length across my entire pallete. Nice wine. So, with that experience, I thought a bit, and after thinking back to my experiences with previous medium to medium-heavy reds like this, they really mixed nicely with hard cheeses and cream-based pasta dishes (such as my Tri-Color Tortellini Alfredo). This compelled me to pick up not one, but two of them--I also visited the gourmet foods part of the store, and decided upon a wedge of California Monterrey Jack cheese (I did originally have my heart set on picking up a package of Cowgirl cheese-any variety, but for $28, I had to pass on that).

I didn't get a chance to chat with Gary this time around, but I think Max got a kick out of being acknowledged by him!