Gentleman, Start Your Engines

The end of October is a special time in Atlanta. Just tell anybody your going to 'the Race' and their face will light up. Then you realize that their brow starts to furrow and their hand is reaching to itch that spot that always starts itching when they're thinking real hard. Finally they just give in and say "What race?"

We've been heading down to the Atlanta Motor Speedway for the past four years and have finally gotten it down to somewhat of a science. The only thing that gives us much trouble is finding a taker for the "fourth" ticket. This year we had a good buddy of mine from Oversight lined up and pre-paid but on the day before the race his wife threw out her back. Luckily we had Darrin on stand-by and avoided the dreaded empty seat.

In the past we've headed down early, set up the site, and made breakfast. A strategic decision was made to stop at Waffle House this year as it would give us the strength to start the day...and fast forward to the Bloody Mary's!

When we got there we were told that our order would take a little extra time as the cook was cleaning the grill. I still haven't figured out if this was code for in the bathroom, having a cigarette, or late for his shift but anyone that's been to Waffle House knows he wasn't "cleaning the grill!"

The centerpiece for any outdoor event in the fall is the fire. Thank goodness we had our resident Eagle Scout in hand because it was quite a cold morning. A combination of dew, strong breeze, and unaged wood made the process take much longer than normal, but since we were all well fed we had beer and my special ZingZang Bloody Mary's to power us through.

Darrin had just completed a busy shift of hauling away drunken drivers on their way home from the Wide Spread Panic concert at 3AM and kept referring to yesterday as this morning. We gave him a break because he chipped in and picked up the fourth ticket.

George had been introduced to "hanger golf" while on a business trip earlier this year and bought a rig from the local Walmart. Always looking for something to do with the hand that isn't holding my drink, I thought it was good addition to the day's activities.

We set the hanger golf up in front of the car and began to play. The funny thing was that no sooner did we have our first game finished when our neighbors set up their very own hanger golf! It a craze folks...sweeping the country!

I thought we were going to have a throwdown with a guy that walked up to Darrin and asked if he could "toss his balls once", but after a quick point to the hanger golf rig everything was cool and we let him have a throw.

Lunch was a combination of hot italian sausage and bratwurst. Green Peppers and Onions were both available and each man took personal responsibility for their intake ;).

After lunch we made our way into the track.
Our timing was perfect as they were just through with introduction of drivers when we made it inside the gates. Michael Johns, an American Idol contestant that has ties to Atlana sang the National Anthem. The flyover was a C-130. This year we switched our tickets and got the four seats on the end of a row. I'm not sure that it really mattered as it seemed that attendance was way down...lots of empty seats.

I'm not sure if it's the new car, the chase format, or what but the race was just plain boring. I'm not looking for 10 car pileups but passing would be interesting. A lot of follow the leader and few leader changes. Carl Edwards ended up taking the checker flag.

Once the race was over, we headed back to the car. We got our fire started back up and started preparing dinner while the traffic cleared out. We had ribeye sandwiches, roasted red potatos and twinkies. Thoroughly satisfied we packed it all up and headed home. George took us out the "back way" which helped keep us moving and everyone made it home safe and sound.

Backyard Camping

I wanted to take the girls camping while Dina was in Ohio but all the campsites were full! We decided that it would still be fun to set up the tent outside and do a trial run for the kids.

I set up the tent on the first try and the girls complimented me with a "wow dad, you really are a camper!". As you can tell, they have been blessed with a lot of confidence in their dad.

The girls were anxious to get in and see how much space they had. They especially liked the window in the back and the "front door."

Every campsite needs a picnic table. Thank goodness the girls have some imagination because this was the best I could do.

They did mention that it really did feel like we were camping because I faced the door and the campsite towards the trees in the back.

Maggie joined us at the campsite, but she didn't seem that impressed by the whole thing. However she seemed to enjoy the tent as well, especially when a can of sprite was spilled.

She did learn that a lot of things hit the ground during a night of camping, and I believe that elevated her overall enjoyment of camping tremendously.

Tent - Check

Picnic Table - Check

Coke and Beer - Check

What are we missing????

FIRE!

Oh yeah, I drug the chimnea off the deck and set it up so we could cook dinner. Dinner was hot dogs and salt & vinegar chips...yummy!

This is me drinking a beer. Something I found that helps tremendously when you are camping with two small children and a less than brilliant dog.

With the children (and dog) fed and me comfortably numb it was time to break out the computer and slip in a favorite movie!

We made jiffypop popcorn using a grate over the top of the chimnea and it worked out pretty good.

We took one long intermission to make some smores.

After the movie was over we hit the tent. It was chilly but a pretty night. You hear some crazy stuff late at night in the 'hood however. I'd say I got about 2 hours of sleep, but the girls actually slept in until about 7:30!

I spent the night putting each of them back in their sleeping bags and keeping Maggie from trying to push one or the other off in her attempts to "snuggle."

I woke up with a sore back and a new appreciation for what it's going to take to get these two out to a real campsite when the potty isn't a sprint inside to the house!

Gracies Birthday

We celebrated Gracies 5th Birthday over the Labor Day weekend. She had two special requests for the big day: a veggie-tales cake and beer-can chicken. We were only too happy to oblige.

Dina and I worked on the cake as a team. She baked and frosted and I licked the bowls clean. As you can se we make quite a team. I actually cut Larry out of the sheet cake (he's the cucumber) and provided some detaling around the mouth and eyes.

Larry was chocolate and Bob (the tomato) was white. The noses where cupcakes cut in half.

I don't have any pictures of the beer-can chicken...who wants to see that anyway?

However you can tell from these happy and contended faces it must have been outstanding!

Note the satisfied looks and the expressions of "wow I just had a great meal."

As if turning five and getting to chew bubble gum for the first time wasn't enough, people actually gave Gracie presents.

Thanks to everyone who was able to attend!

American Commercial Lines 200

George's job provides him the opportunity of enteraining some of his accounts with access to the Alanta Motor Speedway and hospitality at the UPS suite. Yesterday I had a change to experience this "hard to stomach" job duty for myself and I had a blast!

We traveled down to the track and took the back way into in in hopes of identifying a better route out of track after the fall race. I'm glad George knew what he was doing because we would still be finding our way to the track if I was driving. Eventually we made it to the track and I performed my obligatory shopping duties. Three t-shirts, a hat, and a coozie later we were ready to head up to the suite.

We ended up being the first arrivals at the suite and I took the opportunity to take a couple of shots.

Snack food including chips, chex mix, popcorn and pretzels were laid out and they were serving a beverage known as "beer."

When we arrived, practice was underway for the Nationwide Series. The day began with rain and some were predicting a complete wash out. The scheduled was packed and they had already completed truck practice with Sprint Cup practice, Truck Practice, Sprint Cup Qualifying and the American Commercial Lines 200 yet to come! Rain was going to throw a monkey wrench into that if it happened.

After a beer or two the Sprint Cup cars began to line up for their practice.

George works with a very nice group and one of his co-workers suggested that we attempt to get down to the infield as he had a former customer that always came to the race and parked their bus in the first turn. We did not have pit passes and were initially denied entrance to the tunnel under the track but we explained to security that we were very nice, responsible young men and that we had no intention of going to the pits...so didn't need passes. They agreed (figure that one out) and we were able to get into the infield! We passed an autograph line and I almost got to speak with Paul Menard but he left before I could show him my ID and convince him we were cousins. We say Carpantier and then the highlight was getting within reach of my sister's favorite driver: Carl Edwards.

After picking up another beer from the UPS hospitality RV (again, not sure how that happened) we walked to the first turn and eventually found "Hog Wild" the bus we had been looking for. George and I immediately began taking notes and figured that we absolutly had to convert an old bus for the express purpose of hauling the families to every race we could. Heres a shot of George enjoying the deck on top; try to figure out why he'll never live it down.

At that point in the day the weather had held off beautifully, but a dark line of clouds was moving through. I took a final shot from the unique infield vantage point and we headed back to the suite.Dinner was being served and George's customer had arrived so he begain "schmoozing." The suite had filled up some and it was obvious that one or two of the invitees had not previously experienced that 'beer' beverage that I spoke about earlier. We watched the completion of the cup qualifying and everyone breathed a sigh of release when Dale Jarrett made the race in the 44 UPS Toyota.



The main event of the evening was the Truck race. Neither George nor I had seen a truck race, but several of the atendees felt that it was some of the best racing to see. A preview of the race stated that the largest margin of victory to date was .93 seconds and that the end of the race was always something to see. George and I watched 123 of the 130 laps, but after the race was red flagged with what ended up being the only rain of the evening we decided to take off. It had a been a good race as Ron Hornaday and Kyle Busch had the two strongest trucks and had swapped leads throughout the evening.



They say Kyle Busch ended up being the winner that day, but I'd beg to differ. I think I came out better all around.

Maggie "Sketchers" Menard

We've been through a lot, there's probably more posts to the story but it's been a pretty sad one and those are always the hardest to post.

So with this post, we are going back to "happy". Goldilocks was with us only one week and it was a hard one but she left us too soon and that hole needed to be filled.

When we picked Goldilocks up we had an "issue." We had gone to see Goldilocks only, but Grace took an immediate liking to a dog named "Sketchers". This dog was interesting to say the least and while Hannah and Dina were holding Goldilocks, Grace and I were "checking out" Sketchers. A real lover, she was kissing and interested in Grace, who soon decided that "this" was the dog for her. As many parents dread, we were in a decision as to which dog we should take home. I could have gone either way, but decided that since we came to see Goldilocks we should stick with her.

As chance would have it, both Goldilocks and Sketchers came down with the Parvo virus. While Goldilocks struggled, Sketchers was able to overcome the virus and end up thriving. After Goldy's death we fought with the decision of bringing another dog home. The pros -- a dog that had survived Parvo was very unlikely to acquire the disease again. The cons -- how could we put our Angels through another roll of the "life" dice.

After a lot of contemplation, we left it up to a family decision. Everybody was in for whatever life was to bring us, and that hole in our hearts was going to be filled by another dog.

We were going to give Sketchers a second chance. She was available and ready to come to our home. We are still deciding on whether to keep Sketchers as a name...again we face one of those "tough" family decisions.

Goldilocks

Lets welcome the newest addition to our family.

Her name is Goldilocks.

Christmas Pasta

This year, I took on a new Christmas tradition. I decided to make pasta for neighbors friends and family. I've been making homemade pasta for about a year and decided that it would be a nice treat for families to have around the holidays. Something that they could cook up quickly with little mess and more wholesome than a bag of cookies.

Dina took the girls out and I went to work.

Following are some shots that I took while working and some comments related to what was going on.

The Pasta

It all starts with the pasta. Here, I'm making the basic well as suggested by favorite chef Mario Batali.












Next, we mix and break down the well. At this point, its in with the hands and the start of the kneading. It takes about 10 minutes or so of kneading and flour management until you get the right consistency for the dough. Obviously no pictures of the kneading process...just too messy!









At this point, we have our formed doughball. Don't adjust your sets folks, this is in fact green dough. I added spinach to the dough for some color and seasonality.

The dough was wrapped in plastic wrap and allowed to set for 30 minutes. In all I made 6 balls of dough.







The Filling



I decided to make two fillings. One filling would be a meat filling whose recipe I just winged, the other would be the classic style ricotta cheese filling.

For the meat filling, I started with pancetta and rendered out the fat.

I mean really, how can you go wrong when you start out with bacon fat?




At this point, I brought in some sirloin, italian sausage and onions and began to cook. One thing that a lot of people don't do is cook their ground meats long enough. This was going to be a sort of bolognese style, so I cooked the meat for like 30 to 40 minutes or until it began to carmelize with yumminess.








You can see in the following picturehow some of the meat has begun to carmelize and develop a deeper flavor .












To the meat I added some parmesan, ricotta, fresh parsley, nutmeg and an egg. I hand mixed then moved to the food processor because I wanted to make sure that the meat was ground and had the same consistency throughout.










Your finished product.














The second filling was a standard ricotta sytle filling that contained ricotta cheese, parmesan,
fresh parsley, an egg and some nutmeg. I also added some cooked pancetta to give it a bit of a smoky flavor.


A quick spin in the processor and this filling was done as well.






Putting it Together

It was time to put it all together, and for this I was going to use a brand new kitchen gadget bought just for this effort. I've been cutting the pasta by hand, using a round cookie cutter and putting the pieces together, but now I have a manual pasta cutter.

You can see in this picture that I placed two pieces of tape on either side of the pasta maker. These would be my guide to determine how long each piece of pasta should be cut. Two pieces per batch of pasta

I rolled out the spinach pasta using the mixer and the pasta maker that I've been using for the last year.

The first piece of pasta is laid over a steel plate with 12 holes. The plastic cup piece is used to ident or make pockets in the pasta. Those pockets are then filled with about a tablespoon of the filling.









Once filled, another piece of pasta is laid over the top. A roller is used to roll out any air and press the pasta together. Ridges on the steel plate are eventually exposed and cut the pasta into the shape we've all come to love.









The pasta was then dumped out onto a tray where it would eventually hit the freezer.














We made a couple of batches of Mario's Basic Tomato Sauce and gave a cup or two to each friend with a requirement that it be used like a condiment, not drowning the pasta!