How many miles are we willing to travel for decent food?

So we admit it.. we are foodies, food tourists, food snobs, whatever you want to call us. Both of us grew up with somewhat lower quality food (Marian's mom egg and cold beet salad, Wayne's parents ham and cheese rollups) So over the years, we have both acquired tastes for better and higher end foods, wine, and beer.

So let me explain a few things about Rhode Island, especially Newport and surronding communities. Pretty much 60% of businessess shut their doors Nov 1st and do not reopen until Memorial Day weekend. Wayne has been cursed by the Navy to only be stationed here between mid October and mid May. Allegedly there is a summer which is nice but I think its a myth!

So a few times thus far, we have been hornswaggled by visiting a place that was highly recommended on the web and drive there (more on that in a sec) to find it closed for the season. Which is great when you are not hungry but not so bueno when you are considering gnawing off the arm of your significant other.

So to the driving part, Marian got me a Garmin NUVI 205W for my birthday. It is very handy and tells you all sorts of stuff, like not getting lost, nearest gas station (for our next trip through AZ or TX), nearest food, hotels, etc. Wayne added on a cable that receives a wireless signal that alerts you and routes you around traffic, allows you to download directions, show you gas prices, weather, movie times, news, stock prices, and local events. Anyway, NUVI told us that the distance from our room to the restaurant was 9.5 miles. Unfortunately, this is pure straight line, as a bird flies distance. Concepts which Rhode Islanders find distasteful and geographically implausible. When you select the destination, NUVI know tells you the route distance and time. Most of the time in the civilized world, mileage is 5% farther or less. In RI, count on 200%. So our 9.5 miles became 19.5 miles and 30 minutes. Some of this accounts for speed limits that were apparently set when Henry Ford was driving automobiles. When in doubt, the speed limit is 25mph. Dont care if it is a rural backround or state highway with no congestion, speed limit is 25, 40 if you are lucky.

So with that, Marian found a burger place, if you don't how Marian loves a good burger, you don't Marian very well. She has extensive time on her hands to do foodie research while I am at school. So she found Crazy Burger, and the first thing she did was call and see if they were open or closed for the season. They were open and we set off. Many "foodie" restaurants of great quality in RI also mean it might be necessary to mortgage your unborn children into white slavery for an appetizer let alone an entree. Also, price here does not necessarily imply quality. So we were pleasantly suprised to find we were wrong at crazy burger. Magic combination of outstanding quality, innovative cuisine, amazing service all in a beach bunglow run by tattooed hippies with zero snob factor.

Marian had the Wassuppy burger, Wayne built one with bacon and cheddar. Marian had the zucchini latkes and wayne had fries. All great! Some take home key lime pie. A couple of frozen beverages and all in all a good night.

Except for the 35 minute drive home!

Newport (again)

So, this is the third time we've lived in newport in the near decade that we have known each other. Although I rarely ever say, "oh Newport, how I love it there", I am surprized again by how much I have forgotten. The cold wind literally howls as it rushes past our third floor window. Grieving the loss of summer's bounty and the golden coat of autumn? Or maybe just the a whispered spell, or prayer of preparation "sleep, my pretty, spleep". In Rhode Island, we are hurtling towards the stark and chilly inertia of winter. I had forgotten how stangely beautiful it can be.

Montreal

We are just back from Montreal. Marian was suprised how French it was. Also how bilingual EVERYONE is.

We got in Friday night after getting lost in Montreal traffic. The hotel was awesome, we were up on the 29th floor across from the Bell Center. Later, we found out no building is permitted greater than 53 floors so that nothing is taller than Mont Royal. We had a drink at a local pub and the Canadian delicacy poudin. Fries, with gravy and cheese curds. Marian thinks all Quebeckers are reincarnated frat boys. After a snack, we walked around for a while and discovered why everyone in Montreal is so skinny, they walk everywhere and shiver a lot due to the cold. We ate dinner at a Korean BBQ and turned in for the night.

The next morning we got up to rain. We took a bus tour of the city and saw Notre Dame, St Joseph's basillica, Olympic Stadium, Old City, Mcgill University. The afternoon was spent shopping, Marian bought some clothes at her new favorite store, Pre-loved, which recycles clothes and makes new ones. Wayne bought a leather blazer. We navigated using the underground city and Metro. For dinner, we had the smoked meat sandwich. For dessert, we had incredible tiramisu and then went to the hotel bar for some cocktails while Marian played corner the canadian. Did I mention she is facinated by Quebecois culture and spent serious amounts of time trying to corner candians to talk to her.

This morning we had breakfast and went to the Biodome. It recreates 4 habitats, with animals. We then made our way back to the US, stopping for some duty free ice cider to use our canadian money.

All in all a great weekend.

Trip to Boston

So instead of a useful three day weekend that Marian and I could have used to go to Montreal and enjoy an extra day, we had to work Monday and have just 1 day off. So we decided to take a day trip to Boston.

We started at the Sam Adams brewery tour. Without GPS we would have never found it. Much of the neighborhoods looked like scenes out of The Departed, with occasional scenes from Good Will Hunting, not the Harvard parts. The tour itself, well, not so great, but at the end you get 3 7oz glasses of good beer. Marian generally is not a fan of beer, but even she was craving the opportunity to find more of the 31 flavors of Sam Adams, most noteably she wanted Cranberry Lambic, Marian loves all things LAMBIC! I successfully found some today and Marian found it tasty, not as much as she hoped. There are limits when your American beer is only 6% vice Belgian beer at 13-15%. But I digress. I even bought the "Perfect Pint" glass that Jim Koch developed, I will let you know if it lives up to the hype.

We then drove downtown to Boston Common and walked the Freedom Trail. It is a path that takes in almost all the historical spots in Boston. I saw the graves of Sam Adams, Paul Revere and John Hancock. We also saw the State House, "Glory" Memorial, Fanuel Hall, USS CONSTITUTION, and Old North Church.

We ended up having a great dinner with friend Janne and her fiance' Ed.

Our next destination, Montreal.

Dormitory Hart Liebold

So we thought we would blog about where we are currently living. One of my concerns when Marian was going to come to Rhode Island with me was the fact that the average officer quarters' room is pretty small. Usually just a bed and a bathroom, a microwave fridge if you were lucky. I did have some hope before I got here because the school set up my room.

Turned out I was right, we have the best room as far as facilities that we have ever stayed in. It's not the biggest but it has a bedroom, living room, bathroom and efficiency kitchen.

The bed is either a full size or a double so slightly smaller than our normal queen. Mainly my feet just hang off the end. We have a walk in closet with plenty of space and a laundry hamper. There is a TV and VCR as well.

The living room has a loveseat, recliner, desk, wired internet, TV, DVD player.

The kitchen has a stovetop, coffeepot (Although we use our own Tassimo), microwave and mid size refrigertor. We added our crockpot and breadmaker. The kitchen has a small selection of pots, pans and dishes. (Had we known this we would not have to brought as much as we did.)

The building itself is dorm like but has free washer and dryer and plenty of parking. The building is about 10 minute walk from Wayne's current school. His January school is 2 minutes away.

As soon as we get a cable, we will post some pictures.

A Perfect Day

So we are on a mini vacation up in Vermont. Marian found a fabulous resort hotel to stay in and it was on sale because it is the post summer/pre snow season here.

We got in late last night. Boston traffic alone took an hour.

Today, we got up refreshed, I had one of the best cinnamon rolls of my life in the lobby. We drove down into Waterbury, we had a cider doughnut, some hot cider and bought some cold cider at the cider press. We then stopped at Lake Champlaign chocolates, the Vermont Teddy Bear Store, and Cabot Cheese. We then went to a wine tasting, stopped at a beautiful hand crafted furniture store and had a wonderful conversation with the owner. We went into an art gallery of Stephen Huneck's work, look it up he is very pro-dog. The gallery we went in had a puppy black lab named Daisy and a mellow adult dog named Buddha that we played with while missing Wonderpup. We bought a T-shirt and a framed piece for the kitchen.

We stopped for a brief lunch in a great place before heading down to the Ben and Jerry's factory. Good ice cream, the sample today was Strawberry Cheesecake and we grabbed a small cup of Cake Batter, a new flavor, before leaving.

We returned to the hotel, went down to the spa for some pool time. The hotel has an outdoor pool and hot tub, an indoor pool and waterfall hot tub, sauna, and steam room. After some relax time in all, we were searching for dinner.

Marian stumbled onto the perfect restaurant for our marriage. A southern food place that only uses local, fresh ingredients. Cider House Barbecue was incredible. Marian had a cup of mushroom-potato chowder and some cornbread to start followed by BBQ ribs with cheese grits and mac and cheese. Wayne had fried dill pickles followed by Fried Chicken (I have been craving this for weeks) along with Anduoille sausage stuffing and hush puppies. We finished up with some apple pear and cranberry crisp with ice cream. They also had a hot hard cider with rum that we both enjoyed.

During the whole meal, they had a couple who were singing blues and country from my childhood. We sat next to a warm fire, it was wonderful.

While we were waiting to thank the owner, I caught up on a few scores and found out Georgia Tech beat FSU and Georgia lost to Florida. All in all a pretty perfect day.

Homeowners

The goal of this blog is to document the travels and follies of 2 new homeowners.

So we now have the thing we thought we would never have...a home with a fixed 30 year mortgage in San Diego. We are not talking about Rancho Bernando, Alpine or even Tijuana. We are actually in the city of San Diego, City Heights to be exact. The neighborhood is well transitional, but coming up. You can buy Mexican coke, real sugar no corn syrup, and there is a woman around the corner who sells tamales and boiled corn. We live across the street from Reverend Molly. My commute to the base is only 7 minutes.

The house is 3 bedrooms/2.5 baths and has a yard. It was built in 2005 and has new tile floors, granite countertops, black appliances, and ceiling fans.

All we needed to do was move in, buy a fridge, washer/dryer, get the garage door fixed, get the ceiling fan fixed, get the stove fixed, and install a new disposal, new door and new door locks. We did all of this in two and a half weeks.

Now we are sitting in Rhode Island. We have a great house sitter who is taking care of the house. The ironic thing is Wayne doesn't really get to live there until he comes back from deployment next year. Marian will be back soon after the new year after she finishes command spouse leadership.