This day in history

On this day in 1985 I met Mike at The Tap in Menomonie, WI where we were both attending UW-Stout. We've been together for 23 years - more than half my life! He's in Logan, Utah this week for business and gets back on Saturday afternoon. We'll mark the occasion and our missed Valentine's Day by going out on Saturday night.

It's been a while since I logged anything - not too much happening this past week. It continues to snow and we are bracing for another big hit on Sunday. Mid-state got it yesterday with Sheboygan getting 7" and Fond du Lac getting 11". As of mid-week, Madison has now set the record for most snowfall in the history of the city. We are currently in the Top Ten snowfalls and it is only mid-Feb. I think it is kind of pretty but it certainly puts a damper on things. I was hoping to get out on Tuesday but stayed in due to another 6" or so of fluffly slippery snow.

Wednesday was a nice day, Carrie and Mosley came over for a visit and lunch. We went to City Market near my house and then to the new Alterra and a few shops in the village. Mosley is starting to smile now - such a cute little boy.

I had a meeting at Libiamo on Wednesday night with the people from the Museum of Beer and Brewing. Talking about an upcoming event and thoughts on tours for the Pabst buildings. Libiamo is a restaurant/bar in the old tasting room for the Schlitz Brewery. The building is really incredible - cream city brick, lots of ornamentation, and great woodwork. It used to be The Brown Bottle Pub and was a kicking place to be on Import Night on Thursdays. It just hasn't caught on too well in its current state plus Manpower now has a huge parking structure built in the parking lot that used to be the main entrance to the building. A little difficult to find and certainly not a place that you walk by and think might be interesting. They have a real marketing challenge. I hope they survive as it would be sad if it fell into the wrong hands. I only had a couple of beers so can't report in on the food at this point.


I went out the other day to get a few "snowy Milwaukee" pictures. This is the Captain Frederick Pabst Mansion.

Seeing the snow in Wood Cemetery was interesting. A natural black and white photo. There were some red flowers underneath the tree.

Buried in Snow

An unbelievable amount of snow fell within a 24+ hour period. I think we probably got about 16" or more of snow. It started at 4pm yesterday and snowed lightly through the night - shoveled about 3" this morning and then it went crazy throughout the day. I shoveled two more times - 4 more inches at 11am (at about the time the snowbuddy shown here showed up on the front porch) and then 8 more inches in the late afternoon. And it's heavy stuff. I am sure to be sore tomorrow...

The house at 4pm yesterday - just starting to snow. We already had a nice base from last week.


Today at 4pm.


Bailey is not a fan of the big snow. Here she is training for the Iditarod. Or at least trying to follow my path back to the house. It's a tough world when you are small.

February Fun

So here we are on the fifth of February anticipating the biggest snowfall of the season. Claiming 8 to 10 to possibly 14" of snow. Yesterday it was rainy and gray and managed to reduce the amount of snow piles we already have from last week's 8" of the white stuff. But now everything is really wet - hopefully we won't get freezing temperatures turning every into ice underneath the snow.

Mike got back from CA on Friday. We decided to do a typical Milwaukee thing and went out for the Friday Night Fish Fry at Colonel Hart's in Wauwatosa. I had the perch and Mike had the cod - Wisconsinsites understand how that works. Colonel Hart's is the quintessential Milwaukee tavern - lots of great old sports memorabilia, mostly local; bar with a wide variety/good mix of patrons; good jukebox; friendly staff and great pub grub. Only knock on it is the smoke - it never fails that the guy or girl next to us lights one up, and being kind to their friends, lets the smoke go in our face. The fish fry was good, but I think my perch was too big - I like the little ones that I can just pick up and eat.

Saturday, we finally went to Discovery World at Pier Wisconsin - I have been there a couple of times, but was holding off on "really seeing it" until Mike came along. We went to the Discovery World Science Museum first and spent quite a bit of time playing with all the gizmos and gadgets. They have some interesting exhibits. We also went into the HIVE (Human Interactive Virtual Education) and had asteroids and planets zooming all around us. You go into this structure that looks like a bee hive, put on special 3-D glasses and get immersed into a virtual environment. Pretty freaky stuff. We really enjoyed the Reiman Aquariums - they did such a fantastic job with the design. And we got to "pet" a huge sturgeon. It's skin was like sandpaper. The rest of Pier Wisconsin is really interesting as well with an area dedicated to the Great Lakes and ships/shipwrecks on the lakes. Great addition to Milwaukee's choices of things to do, especially with kids.

After visiting the museum, we went to Water Buffalo for lunch. Great food. I had an awesome BBQ Pork Sandwich with Bacon (everything tastes better with bacon!) and Mike had a really good Corned Beef Sandwich. I think they are doing things right at Water Buffalo - nice location on the river; love the decor; both the service and the food was great.

We walked around the Third Ward for a bit, stopping at Harlequin Bakery for an after lunch coffee and a little something sweet. We both opted for a brownie - Mike had the blonde and I had the regular. mmm - they do good work! It was also fun to watch the people across the street at Fred Astaire Dance Studio learning their moves.

We did a bit more shopping/looking at Sprout, a children's store with alot of really cute things, the new Anthropologie (love it) and also two galleries. We were really intrigued by VP Gallery - they are one of the few photo galleries that have photos from LIFE magazine reproduced from the original negatives and are Wisconsin's only Master Dealer for these photos. They are also an exclusive dealer for Limited Edition photos from the National Geographic Society. In the gallery is Steve McCurry's photo of the Afghan Girl that amazes so many people. It is mesmerizing. We were also really taken aback by a set of three photos from Babe Ruth's last visit to Yankee Stadium. Would love to have the set. Good incentive to make some $.

We met up with Mike's sisters at the new Urban Outfitters on the eastside. After a bit of shopping, we went to Cafe Brucke, one of our favorite little cafes in town. It's so quaint and is a nice place to go anytime of the year. In the summer it is nice to sit on the sidewalk and in the winter it's a nice cozy little restaurant. A little bit of Euro-flair on the eastside of the Mil. Amazing selection of Belgian Beer. We shared a bottle of wine and the girls had a cheese & sausage platter and veggie sandwich. Mike & I were both stuffed from lunch, but it sure looked good.

All in all a nice day to see what's going on in Milwaukee.

Sunday was Superbowl Sunday so had to plan our day accordingly. With hesitation, Mike agreed to go see The Bucket List. The critics hated it. And we know what to think of critics... What a great movie! I would certainly recommend it. After the movie, we made chili and homemade bread and got ready to watch one of the best Superbowls in a long time (outside of the Packers, of course). Good job for the Giants. I am glad they won as they beat the Patriots the same way they beat the Packers - consistent defense and pressure on the QB. I was actually glad to see New England lose as I am getting a little sick of the "Boaston" attitude - they can't win everything!!

Time to get ready for the snow...