Good Times, Good Friends, Good Food In Ann Arbor

Tuesday, Oct 19, 2010

(ok, Gentle Readers, please bear with me, these posts are going to be very very long. Really long. Epically long.)

Technically, it was Tuesday when The Chief Fool told me that our plans would have to change a bit because she'd gotten this amazing opportunity related to her PhD studies. I said, what's the new plan? And she told me, and it actually worked out MUCH better for us, so, yay.

Woke up earlyish on Tuesday morning aching from head to toe because of the previous 14 hours travel. We enjoyed a leisurely time getting ready and having breakfast and went off to Ann Arbor, intending to spend the day because it is a cool town in its own right. One of the big things we were planning was to go see the Michigan Theatre. It is a historic theatre and I'm a historic theatre buff. I knew I'd probably never get the chance again to see it, so I grabbed the brass ring while I could . . . and BOY, am I ever glad I did!

Here is a shot of the exterior of the theatre:

 

 And here is what the ceiling of the exterior lobby looks like:

Just look at that for a minute and take it all in. And it's like that EVERYWHERE in this theatre, inside, outside, on the walls, on the ceilings, everywhere.


Here's a couple pics of the Chief Fool and myself, just for fun:

She is standing outside in the lobby, and of course we picked the poster case that had the poster of Great Big Sea in it.

Here is me:

For being a relatively small theatre (1710 seats total, 1000 on the main floor and 700 in the balcony) the Michigan has a HUGE proscenium arch and in order to get ready for the Great Big Sea concert, they had covered over the orchestra pit also, which is where I'm standing. I'm standing right about the middle of where Sean and Alan wound up the next night during the show. The proscenium arch was SO HUGE we couldn't get all of it in the shot. The screen behind me is how they show movies.

Now, because this theatre was built in the early 1900's and also showed movies as well as live productions, they commissioned an organ from Eau Claire, WI, and had it shipped, then put the rest of it together *in situ* on the stage's right hand side. It's in its own alcove, which can be raised or lowered as well as covered up. For the Great Big Sea concert, it was covered and protected. It is totally original and they still play it every day to ensure that it will still function, because they often do movies here that require an actual, live, soundtrack.

This is the best picture I have of the organ. The Chief Fool is playing it, which was the highlight of her trip, I think, even better than seeing Great Big Sea.

Once we left the theatre we were in the mood for food, so we had lunch at Conor O'Neill's Traditional Irish Pub (which is a great place, at lunch it was quiet except for folks watching the soccer) and then wandered about the main street -- Liberty Street -- looking into shops and so on.

One of those shops was a Robot Parts and Repair shop and, being geeks, we both had to go in there. Turns out, the shop is actually a fundraiser for a local literacy group, which goes into schools and tutors kids in English, grammar and writing, and also hosts free writing workshops for older kids (ie, 10-18). I bought a couple of buttons and a sticker with their logo on it for my guitar case. The Fool bought some other stuff, all of it cool.

After visiting the Robot Shop, we turned into a cupcake shop -- that's all they do, cupcakes and coffee -- and the reason this is cool is because the owner and chief baker here has been on Food Network many a time with her pastry skills. Unfortunately I can't remember the name right now, but when I do, I'll edit this post to include it!

This is a picture of the shop:

And here is a picture of my cupcake! I had lemon and the Chief Fool had red velvet. My lemon was good, but the buttercream frosting was exceptional. No wonder the chef goes on Food Network!

After our treat, we hit the used bookstores, always fun. The Fool bought something but I can't remember what, and I found a paperback copy of The First Wive's Club for 50 cents. I don't have the book and I love the movie, so I picked it up. Didn't have a lot of time to read it until Friday on the train home, but it's good so far. We also went to the Border's there, supposedly there's something special about it (the first Border's in America, maybe?) but I found that it looks just like all the other ones. They did have some great tea, though. After our wanderings, the Fool and I wound up in their coffee shop and just hung out for a while. They had internet there so we got updates on a mutual friend's cancer surgery (it went very well) and I tried to get the Great Big Sea live show they were doing on Sirius radio *right then* via their website but no luck. Oh well. I wasn't fussed because we were going to see them live the next night!

We wound our way home and got back to Kalamazoo about 9pm, having spent a good 8 hours in Ann Arbor.

Next: The Great Big Sea Concert in Ann Arbor (with pics, adventure stories, and video!)

Vacation To Michican, In Many Parts

Greetings, Gentle Readers!


Allow me to offer you my many apologies for disappearing over the last week, the intent was to post to this blog as I vacationed in southern Michigan but alas, I had very little internet access and so the plan had to change. Instead, I will now share it with you a bit at a time, over the next few days. So you can be sure there will always be something new here for a while, good news, eh? I will also post pictures and videos here that can't be seen anywhere else, yes, it's exclusive blog content for you, Gentle Readers, because you're that special. :)

All right, let's start on Monday Oct 18th, when I left Minnesota. I got up at oh-dark-thirty, quite literally, in order to get to the Amtrak station at 7am for a 7:50 departure. And at this point in the narrative I would like to mention that I think the travel industry is crazy. It doesn't matter where you go, if you don't drive yourself to get there, you are forced to get up early on the first day of your vacation (when most people want to sleep in) and spend the next few hours traveling. Personally, I think that we travelers ought to be given the option of traveling early or later in the day!!! I am nocturnal and this business of being forced out of my normal habits in order to get to where I'm going has always sucked large pointy rocks.

When I get to the train station I am greeted with the information that there was a freight train derailed in Montana (and for those of you who don't know, Montana is something like 20 driving hours away from Minnesota) and this means that my train to Chicago is going to be delayed. And not just any delay, oh no. A full 8 hours. It's not going to get to the Twin Cities until 1-2pm.

And I had yet another train to catch -- a connection to make in Chicago -- at 6:30pm.

Yeah. So obviously that wasn't going to work. Their solution? They provided a charter type bus for everybody who was going to Chicago so that we could make our Amtrak connections.

Yay for being able to get to Chicago, but damn, if I'd wanted to take the bus I would have gone on the Greyhound. Seriously? So I felt really gypped and instead of traveling on the lovely, civilized bus (with good food and entertainment options), I got stuck on a bus with airplane-sized seats for 8 hours with a stop at the Burger King in Wisconsin Dells for lunch. Gypped. And my guitar had to travel in the belly of a bus!!!! I worried the whole way that it would get hurt.

Luckily we arrived in Chicago on time and my guitar case had only minor damage to one of the latches, which the helpful Amtrak people fixed in about 10 seconds with a pair of pliers. This is why you buy the most durable, hardest case you can afford, ladies and gentlemen, you never know what your guitar might encounter while traveling. My guitar had gotten squished so bad in the cargo hold of the bus that the pressure actually *bent*, yes, BENT the 1/8" thick brass lock ring, over to one side. But my case kept my guitar from turning into matchsticks. Get a good case, Gentle Readers, so that you don't have to stare at $600 kindling the next time you travel. I was very lucky!

My only other adventure in Chicago was the fact that after I'd stashed most of my stuff in the lockers provided by Amtrak, I went upstairs in Union Station for some food and during the 30 minutes or so I was up there, I became the victim of a pickpocket. Luckily, none of my real stuff (credit card, driver's license, etc) was in my pockets, but they did get my train tickets. And here again, I am unhappy about this. Because even though I was the victim of a crime, Amtrak's policy is that I had to PURCHASE MY TICKETS OVER AGAIN in order to A) get to where I was going and B) get back home. There went ALL my extra/emergency money. Also my 'buy swag at the concert' money, by the way. That was depressing. And I am still really angry about this. Why should *I* have to buy my tickets over again when *I* am the victim here??? Amtrak should just issue replacements in this situation, especially since I reported this to the police at Union Station.

Anyhow, I eventually got to Kalamazoo, MI and met up with The Chief Fool, my best friend and lifebonded, after about 14 hours of travel. It was a very long, very exhausting, very anxious day.

Next up: We Go To Ann Arbor MI and find robot parts and cupcakes.

Family Birthday Party

Today, Dear Readers, it was my nephew's annual birthday party. I know it's a cliche, but I swear, I cannot believe how much time has gone by. These children are the spawn of Hubby's brother and sister-in-law, making them my in-laws also, but the cool thing is because Hubby and bro are brothers, they have pretty much left off the 'in-law' thing. To the kids, I am just plain Auntie and they are my nephews, full stop. It's kind of nice having a sister, even if she isn't a geek. And it's nice having another brother, one who isn't an anti-social psychopath.

Here's a shot of most of the extended family, I took this towards the end of dinner tonight. Sorry for the lighting, I am still learning how to use all the modes on my new camera. Sorry it's so small, guys, I don't know how to resize them in this format yet.

From left to right, the young guy with his back to the camera is Dylan, my sister-in-law's nephew. Out of the pic to his left are his parents, Tim and Dawn. Tim is my SIL's brother, the blond I was talking about on Facebook. Then we have SIL's best friends Marilyn and Tammy, then my MIL Mary, my sistser-in-law Sam in the green, Dylan's sister (the blond) and the kid is Finnigan, the 2 year old. Not pictured are hubby's brother Ben and Finnegan's older brother Manning.


This is a shot of just the two kids together:

Finnegan is the red head, and Manning is the blond. This was taken moments before the Present Opening, so they were both a little squirrelly and excited.


And here is another shot of Finnegan. I have to include it because it is just so cute. That's a better shot of 'Aunt' Tammy, Sam's best friend.

Without a doubt, the hit of the party was a gift that was supposed to be for the kids, but wound up entertaining the adults no end. They're called Sing-a-ma-jigs, they even have a website: http://www.thesingamajigs.com/product.aspx and they're supposedly the hottest toys for Christmas, for young kids. Personally I think I'm going to try to buy them for some of the adults I know!