Pig-Maul-ion

The grand finale to In-Law-A-Thon is our visit to Wife's oldest brother G1 and wife B. They live in lovely new house they bought recently after an efficient 17 year search in the country of Medina County Ohio (south Medina County). The purpose of this trip was to do a dry run of a whole pig roast which we are intending to duplicate for the In-Law family reunion next summer. So here in pictorial fashion is our event.

Production of the Tool

Master engineer and mechanic G1 in his shop working on Friday to get the Pig-Mauler 1700 ready for operation on Saturday

Another View of the Pig Mauler 1700

G1 and Miss Piggy

After going to the meat market and picking up our 94 pound date for Saturday morning we were left with the problem of keeping in cool over night. G1 the ever resourceful suggested a nice relaxing ice bath for Miss Piggy

Miss Piggy Resting Comfortably for the Evening

Proper Operation of a Pig Mauler 1700

If your Pig Mauler 1700 is roasting correctly it should cook your pig at a low temperature for long period as seen below

Incorrect Operation of the Pig Mauler 1700

There is a great temptation to let the heat get to high when roasting your pig which can cause the fat in the pig to incinerate as below.

Pig Preparation

Miss Piggy being prepared for the spit

Being mounted in the "pig firm" (tm), an exclusive feature of the Pig Mauler 1700

Hmmmmm, 94 pounds of roasting piggy goodness

de-Intimdator was pleased to have a guest appearance from that maven of higher scientific style, Styling with Renee Michelle. Does that put us on the social map or what!

Removing the Roasted Pig is a Snap with the Pig Mauler 1700

G1 and son Shaun the Geek (click, click, click...I don't know why you can't connect to the Internet Dad) show how easy it is to get Miss Piggy out without losing a morsel

Takes One to Know One

Here Mr. D a razorback from Arkansas and friend of Styling shows no mercy to one of his brethren. Please note Styling homme de apartment, Charles the First of somewhere west and north of Bath before he dives (literally into the porcine carcass)

In-Law-a-thon Interlude - Eat-a-thon

We've been in Chicago for three days. I've been working. Friends Steve and Lady Di from CA are here - he for business with me. Wife and Di had day running around town. If it's Chicago it must mean the over consumption of food and drink.

We started on Monday night at Custom House where Steve and Di met up with us, MR and J the Armenian. It was the second time we've been there and it was very good again. Steve and I selected two Pinot Noirs, a French Pommard from Burgundy and one from Oregon. The difference in styles was so notable. The nod when to the Pommard.

On Tuesday, after Steve and my meeting, we went to the PG wine tasting networking event where Wife and Di met up with us. These events are going really well. It's too bad the owners of venue where we have them are so lacking in customer service. Unfortunately there venue is almost one of a kind and perfect for what we do. Afterwards, Lakeview, Ricardo, young friend T, and the Wife-Di-Steve group all went to dinner in Greektown at Pegasus. A much more laid back meal but Lakeview and Ricardo both thought it was better than the average in Greektown which they labeled as pedestrian. Steve had bought two more Pinot Noirs to bring with us for dinner again one French, a Nuits-Saint-Georges, and one from near where he lives in Salinas, CA. Once again a notable difference in style with the drier French one being the preferred.

Finally on Wed I was introducing Wife to Ricardo's wife J. We (Wife, I, and Lakeview) had cocktails at the Ricardo mansion then retired to Cafe Matou, a totally French place in Wickham Park. Food was fabulous, very French. The wine sommelier/GM was very pretentious to begin with but softened to my relaxing pitch and we ended up with two great wines from Languedoc. The whole thing was $291 with three appetizers, 5 main courses, two desserts, two coffees and two bottles of wine. Not bad. Put this up with Lula Cafe on the price value chart. I thought the food was every bit as good as Custom House, maybe better.

Finally a couple of short notes. Congrads to J the Armenian for passing his RE exam. And to Lakeview - no problems with the early exit, we totally support you.

On to Cleveland today for the resumption of the In-law-a-thon.

Pictures From In-Law-A-Thon, Part 1

Band Playing on the Danger Stage

Wife and Sister at Restaurant

View of Foliage from top of Hill

Wife - Super Photographer

The Waterfall - Note on left how the rock has dropped as a result of the fault

Nieces in Crime
(There are so many GP2 nieces we use Borg designations)

3 of 4

2 of 4

4 of 4

1 of 4

Hayward Niece

More From Hayward – de-I, Sherpa

After the exertions of Saturday everyone slept in Sunday morning. Even I didn’t get up until 8:45 which is about as late as I’ve slept in as long as I can remember. T the Oil-guy made a fine breakfast of pancakes, Canadian bacon and eggs. We decided to go for hike. Wife’s sister had researched an area about 45 minutes from us where there was a nice rise and a great view. I call it a rise because with the full arrogance of a westerner who hikes in “real” mountains, going on a hike taking us up 500 feet to 1,500 feet in altitude isn’t really going up a mountain. That having been said, it was a very nice trail with lots of shade and surface that for the most part was much more forgiving than the loose rock and hard pack I’m familiar with. While we only went 3.5 miles round trip, I made up for it by packing up and down most of Wife’s camera equipment including her tripod and her incredibly heavy telephoto lens.

This far north the leaves are already in full color change. When we got to the top there was an incredible tableau of color for miles in front of us. I don’t think I’ve seen anything like it in my memory of recent times. Wife had a great time taking her shots and used every lens so I felt my efforts were rewarded. On the way down there was a side trail to a waterfall, a very interesting structure that looked like it was formed by a slab of rock that had fractured and dropped leaving a narrow passage for water to flow down. The children of Sister-in-law the elder and T who love being out-of-doors were climbing all over and exploring the stream.

We didn’t get home until 6 PM. Sister-in-law had wonderful beef and barley soup ready for us (memories of my Mom) so we were able to eat quickly which was just as well since we were all ready to crash. T and I suffered through the Bears loss to Dallas.

Special note to Lakeview Coffee – you are in for a loooonnnngggg season. You might want to think about some sort of support group with son-in-law Tim de Buffalo.

A Helluva Good Day in Hayward!

Say what you will about the hassles of travel, there are certain things that only are experienced if travels. One of these is the unexpected experience. We had a great day to day in the northlands of Wisconsin. My brother-in-law T the Oil-guy agreed to take me out for a day of kayaking. We went down the Namakagon River. The Namakagon is part of the larger St.Croix National Waterway system and is therefore, protected from development. So there is no development allowed along the waterway an while not totally wilderness it has that wilderness feel.

What a blast. I had never done this before. Going in I had some minor (maybe major) trepidations about my ability to navigate a kayak (read stay upright and dry). In fact it wasn’t that bad and was truly enjoyable. The only thing that was really challenging to me was getting in and out. That required a sense of balance that seemed to escape me so I was very glad to have T’s assistance. The waterway itself was a combination of mild rapids (Class One – Training Wheels Rapids) and long stretches of slow tranquil calm water. So you had areas where you had to concentrate and had the rush of fast water followed by periods where you could just flow with the current and take in the beauty.
The weather was perfect. We saw a blue heron, king fishers, merganser ducks, and teal ducks. With the exception of my getting stuck under a fallen tree limb during one white water section, I managed it without a hitch.

For dinner we went to a place that was suppose to be a tapas place. It wasn’t in the Spanish sense but it had some nice wines at reasonable prices and live entertainment. We tried two Australian wines (a Shiraz and a blend) that were very reasonably priced. The second was recommend by our waitress. I was very inexpensive ($24) and also quite good. Unfortunately I don’t remember the name (it was the second bottle you know).

The physical set up was like an old European place with a small narrow building. The upstairs was a narrow area with only room for four tightly packed four tops with the outside seats of the table banquets. Across from stairway leading up to the upstairs dining a stage called L’Etape de Danger (the stage of danger in French) that was no more that six feet in width. There was a three-piece band (actually four pieces because there was a drummer on the stairway with some bongo/congo type drums. How they managed to play (70-80’s rock for the most part) with as much vigor without falling of this stage was a mystery to me. When the band members wanted to refill their wine glasses, they put the into a bucket, lowered it to the bar below, and hauled it up. We had a wonderful evening of listening to music and enjoying wine.

In-Law-a-thon – Two

I have a lot to do in the morning before we join the GP2 clan – meditate, exercise, make reservations for a complicated October trip – so we don’t get there until 9:30. The GP2 have four lovely daughters (we will use Borg designations 1 of 4, 2 of 4, etc.) and they have always made a major commitment to their education. GP2 wife has at various times taken the children out of public school and home schooled them in frustration over the educational system. It was wonderful to see these girls who are so into reading and mechanical things. They had a set of Lego stuff that any junior engineer would die for – and they spent hours putting things together. Unfortunately our schedule this trip is very tight and we only had the day together. Then it was on to northwestern Wisconsin to see Wife’s next oldest sister. On the way, we are running a bit late (an unfortunate incident with some fried chicken at a locally noted bakery restaurant) and it is getting dark as we are headed north towards the north lands of Wisconsin. Calling sister-in-law we are informed that we need to watch out for the deer! Evidently this area is known for multitudes of accidents involving deer and cars. So the next hour and a half is a drive of terror. But in spite of one deer crossing and one deer sighting, we get to sister (in-law) two without problems.

In-Law-a-thon – One…Maybe Blog Name Should Be de-Travel Catastrophe?

On Thu Mrs. De-I and I headed out to start the In-law-a-thon (three siblings, four states, in 10 days). Our first stop is her youngest sister who lives in the Minneapolis suburb of Brooklyn Park. I have been on a roll lately with my last two trips being wonderfully benign from a travel perspective. I thought that karma was going to give me a nice respite from all the problems of this summer. I should have known that it was an anomaly.

Our first flight from Albuquerque to Denver was without problem and quite empty. Our flight in Denver was ready and waiting and pushed back on time. We were on the runway when the pilot says that bad weather was going through Minneapolis and that we were on a 40 minute ground hold. 10 minutes later he says that the hold is up to an hour and half and he’s going back to the gate so people don’t have to just sit on the plane. The entire wait ends up being 3 hours. We get into Minneapolis at 4:30 rather than 1:30, just in time for the evening rush hour.

People complain about O’Hare in Chicago but I find Minneapolis to be a very annoying airport to go in and out of. The baggage carrousels are very tiny and when there are three flights disgorging at one carrousel at the seam time, it is chaotic. Getting our rental car we drive out into the traffic. We hear these strange sounds that we found out later are tornado-warning sirens. Then the rain hits. It’s a downpour. One of those rains where you can barley see ahead of you while your creeping down the road at 25 mph. We only had to go through one underpass where we thought the car might stall. It took about twice as long to get to GP2 house. We went out to a local Italian restaurant that Wife had researched that turned out to be very nice. The caprese salad had good tomatoes and nice fresh mozzarella with just a light wash of dressing. I had a main course of Salmon cooked with artichokes and olives in a light wine and tomato sauce with spaghetti. It was different from anything I’d had before in that the fish was cooked with the spaghetti and sauce en papaillote, or encased in a paper (or in this case aluminum foil) tent. When it was served they cut the tent and slid out the dish onto the plate. Wife and I shared a bottle of a nice Valpolacella as the GP2’s don’t imbibe.

We got to our hotel pretty late and crashed.