So I finally finished college this quarter. Woohoo! Not. My first week of postgraduate life has been bombarded with balancing 3 different jobs. Accepting one offer, following up on another offer, and working for my current employer. Along with that I’ve been hosting people all week. What a spring break, or spring busy. I guess this is the introduction to the real world. Things don’t stop moving anymore. No breaks, no relaxation. Now back to work….
A while back I blogged about my excitement for the NCAA Tournament. This tournament fulfilled those expectations, and put on a great show. Two 15 seeds winning?!?! One of those 15 seeds beating DUKE?!?! This has been another tournament of inspired hoops.
This year the Final Four is in New Orleans. It should be legendary. Michael Jordan’s famous game winning shot, with 16-seconds to play, was in the the Big Easy. So too was Chris Webber’s timeout call which cost Michigan the National Championship.
Kentucky and Louisville are in-state rivals whose meetings date to 1913. I will be looking to Louisville for the upset.
I am really interested in the Kansas-Ohio State game. Kansas’ 7 foot center, Jeff Withey, went to my rival high school. In high school, I think he would have failed a DUI field sobriety test, during basketball practice. I also know that he could not make a shot in high school unless he dunked. That has all changed, and now he has NBA potential. As they say, “you can’t teach size”. His matchup with Ohio State’s Jared Sullinger will be epic. Withey is a bit soft, but he can rebound and block with the best of them. Sullinger’s athletic ability will be a challenge for Withey. I think in the end the combination of Withey and Robinson will overwhelm the Buckeyes and take the Jayhawks to their ninth National Championship game.
Grilling in the rain. Not as fun as singing in the rain…
What better way to start finals week than to go snowboarding, right? While most people are stressing out over studying, and testing, I will be going up to Northstar Resort for a day trip. Tahoe got over 3-feet of fresh powder this weekend, and I cannot wait to take advantage of it.
There is something thrilling in the night before a trip like this. Usually for me it is surfing, but I enjoy the adventure no matter what the sport. Tonight I get to pack the car, envision what tomorrow will be like, and let my dreams run rampant. I have already started planning out photographs that I hope to take. I love the adventure, and it starts here. Come back tomorrow (or maybe Tuesday) for an update on the conditions and my trip.
I wanted to fulfill my promise to the readers and complete my review on LG Meats. The Chorizo is fantastic. It is on the sweeter side, similar to Linguica, but it great for breakfast burritos. I usually prefer chorizo that comes out of the sausage casing and becomes ground meat. LGM’s chorizo is a normal sausage link, but does the job just right.
I also cooked the ribs tonight. They were good, but not great. As I said in my earlier post, I got the mesquite BBQ pre-marinated ribs. I cooked them in a roasting pan with 12 oz of Anchorsteam Liberty Ale. The taste was phenomenal, and the meat was tender. But, the cut was rather fatty. At $15 for a rack that easily fed two people, I can’t complain. But, next time I will definitely shell out a few more dollars to get a more premium cut.
Los Gatos Meats represents what is All-American about knowing the butcher. They provide a man sized sandwich, variation of excellent fresh meat, and friendly service. I went in craving their SuperHero Tri-Tip sandwich. It comes with LGM’s Signature Tri-tip, cheddar cheese, thick-cut peppered bacon, fresh avocado, and LGM Bar-Be-Que Sauce, all in a soft Dutch Crunch roll. It fulfilled my craving, and my stomach. This sandwich is huge. I only eat the first half for lunch, and save the leftover for dinner. It also comes with a pickle spear, which is very refreshing after such a large sandwich. The sandwich costs $7.99.
Originally I went for lunch, but I couldn’t resist picking up some food for later in the week. I picked up spare ribs for $15, which I thought was a great deal. The butcher gave me all the instructions I needed too. Because of the rain, I have to cook these indoors. He said put them in a roasting tray, with some beer, for moisture. Roast them at 250F for 3 hours.
I also picked up a few chorizo sausages, for my eggs in the morning. I grew up on breakfast burritos, which contain egg, chorizo, potato, various vegetables, and salsa. Safeway’s chorizo never does it for me, so I am excited to try something new.
I’ll report back on the ribs and chorizo, but in the mean time go grab yourself a “SuperHero” from LG Meats, and have a conversation with the butcher while you’re at it.
March=Madness. It doesn’t matter if you are a sports fan or not, at somepoint over the next month, you will get chills from the passion, effort, and emotion that goes into the NCAA Tournament. In my opinion, this is the best college sporting event there is. Everyone grew up playing some sport or another. Everyone also had to come to grips of ending that career, be it myself or Michael Jordan. That is what makes the NCAA Tournament so great.
Most of these players have devoted their entire lives to the game of basketball. For some it was an outlet from gang life. For others it was a way to get a good education. And for the select few, it will be a career. I still remember the day my Dad told me that I wasn’t going to make it to the pros in any sport, and needed to consider using my brain. Luckily I got that speech early.
The NCAA Tournament thrives on athletes with their backs against the wall. For most, this is the biggest, and last, stage they will ever play on. Unlike the NBA, where the regular season is really just practice for the playoffs, and the playoffs are really just scrimmages until the finals, these athletes care. When every player on the court is playing as if it is their last game, which it could be, the stakes are elevated and so too are the performance.
I think the video speaks for itself, if you don’t get chills, then we may need to have a conversation. To another year of upsets and surprise stories!
In this day and age our society craves immediate gratification. We have instant updates from email, Twitter, Facebook, texts, banking—you name it, the iPhone can have it instantly. There’s an app for EVERYTHING.
This is no different in the world of photography. Digital photography has changed the game forever, not that I ever really knew it the other way, but I like to consider myself a student of the art. To give myself some credit, my first few years of proper art education were with film. It wasn’t until 11th grade that my school abandoned the dark room, and paid for computers, Photoshop, and Epson printers.
As a member of the first generation born into the fully tech world, my opinion is split. Film photography is old, slow, methodical, and expensive. Digital is new, cool, fast, and easy.
As my opinion is split, so too is my time. I love to take photographs with digital and with film. Digital allows me to learn on the spot with image review. I can take unlimited photos, which is convenient for things like surfing. Film, on the other hand, almost always produces a better final project. There is a reason the entrance to my room has 4 film photographs and no digital. I enjoy showing the fact that i did everything old school, from rolling the film on a cannister in the dark, to developing the film, to printing the images, and mounting them on posterboard. It is a slow process but it is unimaginably gratifying.
The point I wanted to make here is that both have the pluses and minuses. Just yesterday I dropped off a roll of film from my Holga camera to get developed (sometimes I dont have the time nor the means to do the film process, in this case I dont have the means for color developing). It throws a little excitement in my week to know that I get to see 12 photographs that I took over the last 4 months. I have no idea what is on that roll. All I remember is that I took it surfing, and I took it to Napa Valley. To anyone starting, or developing a hobby out of photography: do yourself a favor and pick up a film camera. You can get one for free on Craigslist, I bet. In fact, I recently dug through my moms closet and found 3 Polaroid cameras, from the 80s. How cool?!?!
Call me a nerd, and tell me I am behind the times because I despise Instagram, but film will never die. This all coming from a philosophy major heading to law school, I love abstraction. But, film is tangible, and no matter where the tech revolution takes us, human desire for physical contact with their product will always be. So give a shot, I bet you’ll like the results (and try black and white while you’re at it…).
In anticipation of spring quarter…
I spent Thursday night with thousands of people anticipating AARP mail. But, Jimmy Buffett is a legend. Thursday at HP Pavilion, Jimmy Buffett and the Coral Reefer Band brought down the house with classics like “Cheeseburger in Paradise,” “Margaritaville,” “A Pirate Looks at Forty.”
The week before, a friend of mine thought it to be the best of ideas to purchase two row nine tickets to Jimmy. He was heckled and laughed at, but I gladly took him up on the offer of going (or maybe more like I made an invite for myself). The deal was that he would give me the ticket, and I would pick up the beer tab. Not a bad deal on either of our parts.
The show was awesome. It was like nothing I have ever been to before. 60 year olds sloshed, little kids dragged to the show with their parents making out, and two 21-year-old dudes loving every moment of it. Talk about a generational divide. The guy behind us, who we made friends with, was partying it up with his wife. The people in front of us kept turning around, confused why we were there. And, the beer lady nearly cut us off because we were “too young” to be at the show.
Despite the feeling of being the outcast, this show was a blast. Anyone who has a shot at seeing Jimmy Buffett in concert should. He is 65 years old and still tearing it up on stage!
our new found friends
myself and the fish
the legend at work (note blue armbands)
