Back and at them

I'm not sure exactly what Labor Day is for (I assume it's a holiday in honor of the blue-collar labor force, hence its name), but I'm glad we have it. And if it is in honor of those folks, then I heartily tip my hat to all of the unsung heroes who keep this country running, like my dad who works for the railroad and my brother who works for Kawasaki. But whatever the reason for labor day, it's nice to have the three-day weekend. We spent ours back in Nebraska visiting family, which also included a baby shower for my brother's wife (my wife went to this while I went to see the mind-blowing District 9), a baptism for which my wife and I were sponsors, and a bonus from my big brother: he's officially engaged to his girlfriend now. So yeah, all in all a pretty sweet weekend. No Amigo's, though, but my mom was nice enough to buy Valentino's for everyone on Saturday night when people were over for my other brother's birthday. Definitely an acceptable substitute.

I started watching a series this morning called Man vs. Food, and I think I'm intrigued enough to stick with it for a while and see what happens. Apparently it's about this dude who goes to various locations around the country (possibly world, but I've only seen one episode), susses out the local food lore, and tackles the sorts of eating-based challenges that most of us would never dream of doing. The episode today was about going to this place in Texas that serves a 4.5-pound steak, and the guy actually finished the whole thing in under an hour. But it's just a TV show, so why mention it on the ol' blog? It reminded me a little of how I like to experiment with food by trying odd combinations of stuff just to see what happens. Tonight we made homemade burritos, and I saw some parmesan cheese in the fridge, so I figured "why not?" I couldn't really taste it in the end beneath the salsa and ranch dressing, but it sure didn't hurt.

Before I close out this post I wanna mention the storm we had tonight, and how cool it was. Being a midwesterner by birth and by trade, I enjoy me a good window-rattler, and this evening's storm handled that in spades. :)