March Madness!

Thanks to a good, close friend of mine, Robby and Dear ol' Dad were able to attend two of the March Madness NCAA Basketball games held at Wells Fargo arena in Des Moines!

Myself, not a huge fan of basketball (although I prefer college MUCH more than the NBA) I was strangely excited for this and Rob was geeked out as I would have expected!

We were not disappointed.  We had one of the luxury suites which was shared with about 12 - 13 people total and completely catered; chicken strips, potato chips and dip,  tortilla chips and salsa, several dipping sauces for the chicken,  meatballs, and spicy corn bites.  They also had a couple of trays of cookies, brownies and other dessert-y type things, and a fruit and veggie tray.  Oh, and a fridge with beer, water, pop and other things.

We are not worthy...   but we enjoyed it!  Immensely!

Minnesota during the warm-ups.

Some live action in the Minnesota vs. Louisville game.  This was a great match-up!!

This was nearing the end of the game and Rob was pretty much beside himself as it was close and VERY exciting!

The hand shake after the Minnesota win.

This was Bradley vs. Michigan St.  Michigan state got some ridiculous calls in their favor during the first half of play but remarkably,  Bradley was up by 1 point at the half.

Michigan St. would prove victorious and the second half was a much better half than the first!

I'm not a very polished person and like to wear my raggy old clothes, but I could get used to watching live sports from the suites!!

Studying for his Learners Permit

What's a guy look like when he studies for his learners permit?

A bit like this!

He's passed the test and has driven quite a bit since then.  He's also nearly hit deer twice in the past month since obtaining his license!  That's not good luck!

Schmitz 2018 Vaca, Post 8 - Seafood Lunch in Maine

Post 8... we left Boston, technically speaking, Milton, MA at some point in the morning after cleaning up our Airbnb.

It was raining so we weren't in a HUGE hurry to carry luggage around the house and up the hill when the radar told us it would be ceasing soon enough.

So once we had everything as clean or cleaner than we found it, we loaded the van and made our way back Northeast towards Boston.  We went thru the amazing tunnel (the big dig) and over the amazing bridge (cable bridge) on our way thru this wonderful city as we headed towards our destination in Maine.

This is the point where Robby is totally geeking over Boston and his new found love for the city!

From that point on, I honestly can't remember if we took Hwy 1 or I95 up but they pretty much run parallel to each other and it's possible that we used a combination of the two.

We stopped in Kittery Maine at the outlet stores as Kathy from our Milton Airbnb says she drives up there late summer to take the grandkids school shopping.  Well, turns out that neither boy was in the mood for any type of shopping but, as luck would have it, we drove past a brewery just a half mile back!

So back we went to Woodland Farms Brewery.  The kids went next door and ordered some fancy coffee based drinks and then joined us at the brewery shortly thereafter.  The buildings were literally connected so it wasn't a big deal.

Once they came into the brewery, they discovered that there was an old Nintendo console to play video games on.  They humored themselves with antiquated games while we sampled beers and talked to the brewery dudes about local stuffs to do.  I sampled their Hop Soup #2 (IPA), Blinky (IPA), Galaxy (Pale Ale), Cerveza Medico (lager) and Prenerpils (uh...  Pilsner).  Yummy, and fun people to talk to.

Back to the point!!!!

We were heading North, ultimately to Acadia National Park but had to pull off the highway at one point to feed the hungry masses!

Mama Chaos found a seafood joint at Cape Elizabeth called The Lobster Shack.  It was quite the trail of winding roads and whatnot to get to this place, but we made it.   It was busy as crap, tons of people all around and I wanted NONE of it!! I had to pee and even that was a hassle.  Couldn't find anywhere outside where that was a possibility and certainly didn't want to go inside, which is what I ultimately had to do...

HORRIBLE!

But, the food was GOOD and, as you'll see, the scenery was amazing!

Our table.

So there you have it.  While there may be too dang many people every now and then,  there's sights like this to make up for it.

Schmitz 2018 Vaca, Post 7 - Pt. III, Walking Around Boston

Well, it's been well over a month since I did a post on our last vacation...

We left off with the Boston duck boat tour in which Caleb got to drive the thing with no consideration for the lives he held at the tips of fingers!

After the duck boat tour,  we headed out on foot for what was a VERY long and, quite frankly, tiring walk around Boston (the home of Extreme, which is what I'm listening to as I complete this post!!!).

It was AMAZING though to see the old cemetery's and the architecture and historical "stuffs".

Let's get started!

This is a wild guesstimate of where and how far we walked.  It was so beautiful that we really didn't care until close to the end.  But man, was everybody happy to get back to our AirBnB at the end of the day!!!  We hit a beer store and a couple of locally owned resturants for dinner that night.  Good stuff.

The start of our walk.  Robby wanted to visit TD Garden to see where the Celtics play.  We hit it but didn't get very far as the tours were expensive and booked.

We did get to hit the gift shop at TD Garden but as you can tell, Robby is not quite as pleased as the bee's knee's.  Everything was as expensive as crap!!!

A bit later on our walk, we found out what the locals do the outsiders who refuse to annunciate our R's as W's...   Honestly, we have no friggin' idea what was happening here.   I can only assume it was a L.A. Rams fan.

Again, I have no idea who this is a statue of.   Had I done a post closer to the actual time of vacation, I would have (maybe) remembered...

The site of the Boston Massacre.

The seat of British colonial government from 1713 to 1776. The Boston Massacre took place in front of the balcony.

The innards of Park Street church on the freedom trail.  Some history of the church is here.

Park Street Church from our front.

The oldest restaurant in America,  ye olde Union Oyster House where we had some AWESOME food and I had a Samuel Adams beer that is exclusively brewed for this location, which is kind of sexy,  it's called, "Union Oyster House Colonial ale".

Here we're in the Granary Burying Grounds.  It's hard to read, but it says, "Victims of the Boston Massacre, March 5th, 1770, were here interred by order of the town of Boston.  Her also lies burried the body of Christopher Snider, aged 12 years, killed February 22nd 1770, the innocent first victim of the struggles between the Colonists and the the Cro*** which resulted in INDEPENDENCE.
Sobering, to say the least.  Amazing that so many "modern day folks" are ready to give this up for various reasons.

I like your beers, son.  Thank you.   Seriously tho,  I learned what kind of a bad-a$$ this fella was on our vacation.  Some massive respect for what he went thru to help make my life so easy!!!

A wall of tombs.

Some dude name Franklin...  I think it's perhaps, maybe, the dude from the Peanuts cartoon...   This is actually the burial site of Benjamin's parents as I believe Benjamin is buried in Philly.  However, another one of those moments where it gave me goosebumps to realize what this guy did that is enabling me to take my family easily halfway across the continent on vacation to show them stuff!  In-crazy-credible!

Another slightly historical marker of some fella with the last name of Hancock...   Nothing to see here, move on.   *Goosebumps*

As we began our journey thru the Boston Common Park.  It was STUPID beautiful!!

Monument of some random dude with the last name of Washington...  Can't remember the first name.  *sarc*

Our walk down the sidewalks of Commonwealth Avenue.

More... this went on for about a mile!

Atop the Prudential Center around the 50th floor.  That's the Chawles (Charles) river where we ended our duck boat tour earlier in the day.  That long line of Greenery from the lower left of the photo to the upper right is where the pics just above this came from.  That's along Commonwealth Ave.

A little ocean in the distance.

Notice the car accident?  There's a traffic jam where there's vehicle "blood" running across the lanes of traffic with a few cars moving past but a whole host of them being backed up!

Our Bnb in Milton, Massachusetts.  Should you be heading to the area, I would recommend a stay at Kathy's house!  I have always felt bad about the review I left for Kathy!!  She was awesome and frankly, she's someone who I would immediately count as family.   I gave her a 4 star rating because of ants in the kitchen but that was horse poo.  She went above and beyond for her guests and I should have given her a 5 star, even though she's a Patriots fan!  She did get the Cleveland Browns game on for Robby while she taught us the ins and outs of the place.  She's a good lady and deserves YOUR business!!

This concludes our Boston visit and we were quite happy to get back to our AirBnB home and chill for the night!

Robby LOVED Boston and decided that he wanted to live her, which is cool with me.  Let us not forget that this city gave us Extreme!!!

Warm Hound = Happy Hound

The Beast likes to stay warm.  In the winter, this is easier for her to do since we have an all electric house and I vent the dryer into the house to get the heat and the humidity.  She has discovered that laying on the pair of panty hose that I vent into to catch the lint keeps her good n' toasty!!  And she's awfully cute.

The Driveway of Death

The driveway during winter...it's insufferable and...  well it just sucks.

2019 Volleyball Season is in the Books!

Final day of volleyball after what seems like a month of missed games due to our crazy February weather.

We had 7 boys show up so everybody played most of the day, which is always fun for the critters!  They played pretty good and appeared to have a good amount of fun while doing it.

Caleb serving in the first gym.

Caleb serving in the second gym.

The group of fine young lads!