Welcome Mahal!

We went to the zoo on Saturday. This little is guy is Mahal, a baby boy orangutan, who was born in Colorado and refused by his mother. His first surrogate mother died and now he is being raised by MJ, a female orangutan, in the Milwaukee Zoo. He is absolutely adorable and so fun to watch. He will be fun to watch grow up.

Where have I been?

I took a brief walk away from this blog and next thing I know more than a month has gone by. There was a bit of travel and a little bout of being sick, but otherwise no excuse. I am back! Will need to recap my lost month of March...

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...

The Big Chill

It's the last day of January and another day of cold and snow. I ventured outside today for only a couple of reasons - to put out the garbage can, to mail a couple of letters and to let Bailey out to do her business. Other than that I am quite happy to stay inside where it is warm and cozy. I took this picture the other day when the snow was coming off the Brise Soleil on the Art Museum - thought it looked pretty interesting. We're expecting another 3-5 inches tonight. Of course Mike is out of town so I am left with the shoveling. He's got this figured out - he's either sick or out of town when it snows...

Brrr! It's cold!

This was the winning photo from the Milwaukee Moments Photo Contest hosted by The Milwaukee Press Club. Very cool shot! Photographer: Terry O'Neill

Unbelievable is the only word to describe what happened yesterday. We went from 43 degrees to 4 degrees in a matter of a couple of hours. In less than 24 hours almost all of the snow melted - I was amazed when I went outside on Tuesday morning to find the driveway, patio and backyard almost completely clear of snow. Then at about 1pm the sky turned gray and it began to rain. The rain turned to tapioca (large pearl) size hail around 4pm and then the wind started up. Yesterday was Milwaukee's 162nd birthday and The Milwaukee Press Club hosted a birthday party at The Pfister Hotel from 5:30pm - 8pm. I almost didn't go due to the weather, but then thought "c'mon this is Wisconsin, we can handle a little wintery weather" and sure enough it wasn't that bad. I was expecting something ridiculous and it was just fine. Sometimes the media drives people crazy - they talked about 1-3" of snow and white-out conditions and there was nothing of the sort. The hail made things a bit slippery, but the salt trucks had been out and did a good job of nipping that. The party was fun and well attended. It was nice to run into some old friends and continue networking for the new biz.





Now today is different - it's downright cold! Even little Bailey was hesitant about going outside. I forced her because there are just some things that have to be done. She wasn't happy, but at least she was quick! I attended a luncheon at The Newsroom Pub hosted by The Milwaukee Press Club. The speaker was Carlos Santiago, chancellor at University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. He has acquired $125 million in private money for the school and has great plans for a new engineering campus and research facility perhaps here in Wauwatosa at the Milwaukee County Grounds near the Medical complex. I was very impressed with his candor and wit. He's a real asset to Milwaukee and understands the need for the community and businesses to partner with the school to encourage entreprenuerism and innovation. 22,000 students that attend UWM are Wisconsin kids and we desperately need these people to stay and flourish in Milwaukee after they graduate. We're a bit behind Madison and far behind Minneapolis in the whole "brain drain" syndrome. I am happy I attended the luncheon and learned quite a bit - gotta keep the positive vibe in the Mil!