What's Happening...
For this year's events from January to now, see this year's archive page
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05/05/10: Cinco de Mayo Dinner With Marissa
Marissa called me at work about 3:00pm. She had driven home from college as exams are going on and things there were pretty dead. She wanted to go out to dinner - "Hey! It's Cinco de Mayo! Let's go!"e; So, what was I to do but head out a little early?
She picked me up around 5:00pm at my house just as Colin was swinging by to exchange cars so he could do some work on mine. We went down to T.G.I. Friday's in Newington and had a terrific time and meal. Of course, I had to have Corona. And they came with the cuttest little multi colored poncho around the neck of the bottle. Nice.
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05/07/10: Dinner Out
My disciple, 4th Degree Black Belt Yondan Russ Jones came down from Laconia, NH for some discussion. We decided to head over to Christopher's here in Dover. We had been there on one of his other trips down, and we both enjoy it. We had a great dinner, came back here to my condo, and sat and chatted over a final glass of wine until after 11:00pm. Sort of rough for him as he has an hour and a half or so drive back home.
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05/08/10: The Great 2010 Cinco de Mayo Backgammon Tournament And Santa Fe Rice And Beans Border Feast!
What Cinco de Mayo would be complete without a backgammon dinner party? And so, Saturday May 8th I hosted The Great 2010 Cinco de Mayo Backgammon Tournament And Santa Fe Rice And Beans Border Feast.
This was my 56th backgammon dinner party since I moved in here to The Garrison in 2004!
I fixed Santa Fe Rice and Beans with garlic and Corona spiced and marinated chicken while everyone played backgammon and talked trash. It was a great time, and one of the largest gatherings in quite awhile: 12 of us enjoyed the evening together.
And I had a new camera to try out. The one I had was 4 years old and I just have not been happy with the quality of pictures that I have been getting out of it for the type of photography that I do. Marissa had suggested an Olympus 10X Stylus digital camera, and so I ordered that over the web. It came earlier in the week so we'll see how the new pictures come out.
The movie of the night was the just released James Cameron's Avatar in Blu-ray. It was, to say the least, spectacular!
Though I didn't get to bed until after midnight, I was up Sunday morning at 7:45am. Got the coffee going but had to shut the windows because it was so windy and actually cold out!
Had a relaxing day programming until Sue came by for dinner and to watch... yes, Avatar. She hadn't seen it yet, and I could watch it three more times so we had a nice evening. I fixed a really nice chicken and cauliflower with red leaf lettuce in what turned out to be marvelous garlic, ginger, cumin, scallion, coriander and turmeric mix.
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05/13/10: Visit To Towson, MD!
I took a couple days off work from Thursday morning 05/13 and came back Sunday 05/16 to fly down to Towson, MD to visit with my brother Alan with the secondary goal of practicing The Fine Art of Southern Porch Sitting.
Also, to just go for once when the weather wouldn't be a hundred degrees in the shade. But the main reason was to celebrate with him for his upcoming 80th birthday June 13th.
June is fixing up to be a really busy month for me, and I suspect it will be for him as well. So, I thought I'd go down now!
Other than a quick, but massive, thunderstorm on Friday afternoon, the weather was just super, and I was able to get in a lot of training and direction by Alan in The Fine Art of Southern Porch Sitting. Yeah, baby!
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05/21/10: Friday Night MNG: Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood: What Do You Do with the Mad That You Feel?
I warned everyone about this weeks ago, but it's time to celebrate Mr. Rogers debut on tv
on May 22, 1967 with the 60min episode: Mr. Rogers' Neighborhood: What Do You Do with the Mad That You Feel? for a Friday night Movie Night At The Garrison.
I started the party at 6:00pm, and Tim House showed up not long after with a bottle of Charles Shaw Merlot. As we chatted, I got a big pot of spaghetti going that I just heated up a jar of Barilla sauce for. Also had some toasted garlic bread to take the edge off with.
As you can see from the picture, I've got the closest thing to a 'Mr. Rogers sweater' on as I could come up with. Nice.... I started the Mr. Rogers movie at 7:30pm and then at 8:30pm, the 1972 Robert Redford movie Jeremiah Johnson.
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05/22/10: Saturday Movie Road Trip: Iron Man II
I kept hearing the terrific reviews that Iron Man II was getting but had resisted paying to see it at the theater. But, everyone was wanting to go, so, why not!
There were 6 of us that met up at T.G.I. Friday's in Newington, NH at 6:00pm for dinner. I was 4 points up on Rick from Thursday night's backgammon play, and he was looking to even out the score for the week. So we went at it over the board pretty tough for a couple of games. He was really getting the shots and pulled 2 points on me to come out just 2 down for the week. But Rick, you're still down...
And the movie was just super! A lot better than the first one and terrific in its own right. And Robert Downey, Jr. was excellent. A nice, entertaining movie! And that's what it's all about, anyway.
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05/23/10: Sunday Dinner Party
Marissa had badgered me a couple of days ago about having a dinner party sometime. She said
she would particularly like me to fix Cornish Game Hens.
She just loves the recipe and process James Haller from the old Blue Strawberry restaurant wrote about in one of his cook books he autographed for me a long, long time ago.
Even though I love fixing them, I wasn't too sure about that as it was really getting hot out, and to have the oven going at 475 degrees is just not something I was looking forward to. But, of course, she insisted and who am I to be a party-pooper? It was on!
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05/29/10: Memorial Day Weekend
Up fairly early for a Saturday morning but I had some algorithm changes to my programming project I wanted to get started on. That worked out pretty good, but I ended up with more questions than I could answer. I called one of my students, Eleanne, who has a PhD in bio statistics, and begged for help. She said she could come over in the morning.
My disciple Rick Downs swung by around 5:00pm and we headed off to Castaways restaurant on the water here in Dover for some backgammon and dinner to bring in the Memorial Day weekend. I hadn't been to Castaway's since late last Fall, so it was nice to get back there. Very relaxing along the river, and we got a nice table outside. After dinner, we came back to my condo and Rick was all up to watch Avatar! Why not? Great movie, for sure.
Sunday I got up around 8:00am and got the coffee going. Eleanne came by around 11:00am after her Sunday morning karate class with Nidan Downs - he has held a class, sometimes with only himself outside along the bank of the Piscataqua River on Four Tree Island in Portsmouth for more years than I can think of. Anyway, I went over my theories with Eleanne, trying to explain what I was trying to accomplish. She was a big help in taking me through the clutter of my thinking. What was neat is that some of the points that I had programmed intuitively proved to be the best mathematical solution.
Sue came over around 6:00 after work just as I was finishing up the heavy lifting dinner chopping and prep work. A wonderful time to pop the bottle of Spanish red wine she brought with her. I fixed that Sauteed Baby Veal Chops with Herbed Bread Crumbs recipe that Alan and I had made while I was visiting him down in Towson, MD a few weeks back. Of course I couldn't leave the recipe totally alone. However, because it did represent a traditional Portuguese dish, I kept my changes pretty minimal; the biggest of which was first, that I didn't broil it (too hot out), and second, I threw several handfuls of red leaf lettuce on top just before it was done and steamed that. Marvelous, if I do say so myself.
Monday I was up early and onto the programming so I could fully implement the suggestions that Eleanne had made Sunday. I had planned to break off with that late morning or early afternoon, go park myself out on the deck, and catch up on some of my back reading. But you know what? It was just too windy and sort of chilly out. I was programmed out and had little desire to do anything serious so I flopped down on the sofa and watched the movie Titanic! As the young-ens might exclaim, "OMG!" Sue came over around 7:00pm to rescue me from that fate. We sipped some Chardonnay and went through some of her photography work that I had asked her to bring over.
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06/04/10: Dinner At Riverworks
It's been awhile since I had been over to the Riverworks in Newmarket, so thought I'd take Sue over there for dinner Friday night. It was really relaxing to just kick back with a glass of wine after a pretty intense week at work. And the food was, as it always has been, outstanding.
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06/05/10: Movie Road Trip: Robin Hood
I had reservations about going to see the 2010 Riddley Scott and Russel Crowe version of Robin Hood, but Rick and Linda insisted. Tim also met up with us for some premovie backgammon and dinner at T.G.I. Fridays in Newington Saturday evening. We went to the 6:45 show and it was packed. And a very well done movie. We all enjoyed it. A good night out.
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06/06/10: Quiet Sunday Dinner
I was in the mood to fix a recipe I had made awhile ago. Sue came over after work, and we had a good time listening to a variety of music while I did my thing making pork cubes stewed in herbed Italian tomatoes, rosemary, and thyme with sides of sweet corn and paprika, cumin, and curry basmatti brown rice.
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06/08/10: Back To Physical Therapy
Well, after taking about a month break from both physical therapy and my chiropractor, I went back on Tuesday for a PT session so see how I had done on my own. I mean, at some point you have to take responsibility for working your way through stuff and my break was to see how I had done. And I had done pretty good, though there are still muscular issues that continue to cause pain even 6 months after my surgery. So, I got some new exercises and will work on those and see how I do for the next two weeks until my next appointment.
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06/09/10: Marissa's 21st Birthday!
I took Marissa, Gary, and Colin out Wednesday evening to Marissa's choice, T.G.I. Friday's,
for her 21st Birthday dinner. Just a little quite get together that I was so happy I could share with her on her very special day.
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06/11/10: Back To Chiropractor
Again, in trying to establish where I'm at in my healing process, I went in to see Dr. Shulde in North Hampton after I got out of work Friday. Progress again has been good, but I really needed his expertise to help my body readjust and heal. Things are going good!
And Friday in the summertime is a great time to head out for an 'Explore', as Christopher Robin in Winnie-The-Pooh would say! I had been wanting to check out the newly renovated Chinese restaurant over in Durham, so Sue and I ambled over there and had a lovely meal. Man, they really did a nice job changing that place from a college cafeteria type style to a very warm and inviting asian environment. Nice job! And good food to boot. That's a 'go back', for sure.
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06/12/10: The Great 2010 Six Years At The Garrison Backgammon Tournament And Spaghetti Bolognese Celebration
It's amazing, but yesterday, Friday, was my 6 year anniversary living here at The Garrison in Dover. Every year I have had a backgammon dinner party get together
to celebrate, and this year was no different. Party! Party!
And so on Saturday June 12th I had The Great 2010 Six Years At The Garrison Backgammon Tournament And Spaghetti Bolognese Celebration!
It's become a tradition that I fix Spaghetti Bolognese for everyone and then the movie of the night has always been Top Gun. It's a long process fixing the spaghetti sauce, and I wanted to get an early start on it because I wanted time while the sauce was simmering to play some backgammon for a change!
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06/16/10: Combined Birthday Trip To Newport, R.I.
To combine the celebration of Marissa's 21st birthday and my 61st birthday,
I took Marissa, her fiance Gary, Colin, and two of Marissa's friends, Courtney and Erin, down to Newport, R.I. for a few days of relaxation and touring the mansions.
We left on Wednesday the 16th and came back Saturday the 19th late morning. The weather held perfect the whole time, and we all had a great time together.
We visited 8 of the mansions and still had time to shop along the waterfront and hit the pool in the afternoon every day. The Howard Johnson's that we stay in each time we go down has an indoor heated pool and a huge hot tub. That hot tub really tops off a day of tromping around Newport!
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06/19/10: Dinner At Sue's
Since we got back from Newport early Saturday afternoon because Colin had a wedding and reception to go to,
Sue knew I'd be in no mood to shop or cook.
So, she had set it up before I had left to have me over for dinner to her place Saturday evening. After getting back, I had plenty of time to unpack and get squared away with snail mail and a few back emails - I had taken a laptop with me so I could at least stay ahead of that on the trip.
I got over there about 5:00, I think, and she had a nice bottle of wine ready to open. Now, that's something I can do, so we were all set on that deal.
She played a couple of great CDs of artists that
I hadn't heard before as she prepared great scallops in a mango and ginger root based sauce. I'm for sure going to bum that one off her as it's really interesting.
You know, I could really get used to this vacation stuff....
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06/20/10: Father's Day Breakfast
Even though we just got back from our Newport trip, marissa insisted on her and Colin coming over late Sunday morning to fix a Father's Day breakfast
for me. It actually turned out to be more of a brunch because I wanted everyone to be able to sleep in and rest.
It was nice that Marissa wanted to include Sue, and so we were all into full party mode when they arrived at 10:00am. I had a wonderful visit with them; just a really nice, relaxing Father's Day.
They headed out around noon and I got together a shopping list for a nice Sunday dinner for Sue and I to have. She noticed that my latest NetFlix movie was The Blind Side, and since neither of us had seen it, we watched that and really enjoyed it.
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06/24/10: Vist From My Disciple Carl Parker
My disciple, 3rd Degree Black Belt Sandan Carl Parker, from Albuquerque, NM was out to Boston on business and drove up to work out with us at Thursday's karate class. Sue had invited me over to her place for a mid week dinner, and I had leftovers from that Carl and I had for dinner.
After class, we all went up to Applebee's and had a nice visit. He spent the night at my place and then drove down Friday morning to Providence, RI to catch his flight back.
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06/27/10: Dinner Out and Boz Scaggs Concert
I picked Sue up at 4:00pm Sunday and drove down to North Hampton for an early dinner at Renaldo's Italian restaurant. We stopped in the book outlet next door and trolled the shelves for 40 minutes or so, had dinner, and then drove down to the Hampton Beach Casino for an 8:00pm Boz Scaggs concert.
It was nice walking the boardwalk for awhile before going into the show. All the sand sculptures from the day's competition were displayed along the walkway and a band was playing in the outside concert shell.
And Boz Scaggs was just beyond what I had imagined. His voice has just gotten better and better over the years. What a marvelous time.
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06/30/10: Road Trip: Boston Museum of Fine Arts, Harry Callahan Exhibit
As a photograpic artist, Sue had mentioned casually to me that she really enjoyed the work of the iconic American photographer Harry Callahan and wondered if I would be interested in a Road Trip to the Boston Museum of Fine Arts. We drove down, parked in the Prudential garage, and hopped the Green
Line E train out to MFA.
It was a rare experience for me to have someone who understood photography and composition so that I could get a better feeling for what was artistically going on. Marvelous. After spending far longer than I would have ever imagined looking at a couple dozen photographs, we went on to roam the halls until about 5:00.
We had been there since 2:00, and were getting just a little hungry. So, we jumped back on the Green Line to the Prudential Center and browsed through the Barnes and Noble bookstore there before taking the elevators up to the 52nd floor to one of Boston's finest restaurants, The Top Of The Hub.
The view was just breathtaking. I hadn't been up there for... well, over 20 years anyway, I'd think. And the food was spectacular. It was tough to leave as it would have been very easy to just go park in the lounge, sip some more wine, and listen to the jazz ensemble. But Sue had to be up early for work, so we headed down the elevator at 8:00.
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07/02/10: Seacoast Repertory Theater: Rent
Sue and a friend of hers, Gale, have season tickets to Portsmouth's Seacoast Repertory Theater, and since originally Gale hadn't planned on going, Sue asked if I'd like to go and see their current production of Rent. Yup, I'm ready for that. We went to The Oar House for dinner and had a nice, relaxing meal before walking up to the theater. Actually, we met Gale there as her other plans didn't come through and she had decided to join us.
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07/03/10: The Great 2010 4th of July Backgammon Tournament And Chinese Stir Fry Fireworks!
Saturday 07/03/10 I held The Great 2010 4th of July Backgammon Tournament And Chinese Stir Fry Fireworks party at my condo.
It was a beautiful day, though hot enough for me to keep the air conditioner on.
Just a few of us as this is 4th of July holiday weekend with most having 'stuff' to do. That's okay. This is my 'stuff' to do!
By the time I got around to fixing the Chinese chicken and cashews stir fry with scallions in sherry and ginger root, the whole condo was nice and cool and held that through dinner and the movie of the night, Wolfman (2010).
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