Go-go Gadget Blog!

After a lengthy delay I am back to my old blogging ways. A lot has happened in the past couple of weeks so let’s try to recap it now. Is this going to be a long one? Yup. Are you going to sit there and read it all? You better. Just in case I added a little something extra at the bottom.

FIRST UP: St. Patty’s Day Weekend (Sort of)

I admit, our St. Patty’s day celebration was held the weekend before the actual date. This is because Chicago’s parades (the Downtown and the Southside) are scheduled for the Saturday or Sunday, on or before March 17. So basically, this year’s calendar gave us opportunity to celebrate that most emerald of saints twice. Am I Irish? No. Am I Catholic? No. Do I wear women’s underware? I prefer not to answer that question. Regardless, this is my favorite non-Hallmark holiday to celebrate because it’s basically one big excuse to drink.

Clare did a really good job recapping events, but, while definitely putting up a good showing, she didn’t make it through to the end of the night. Personally I’m still trying to recap everywhere we went to:

• Merkle’s
• Lucky’s
• Red Ivy
• Sluggers
• Bar Louie
• Gold Crown Liquor
• Piro’s Casa de Red Bull (this is where Clare tapped out)
• A house party God knows where
• Ta’Too
• And finally home.

I'd have to say the highlight of the night would have to be Dave forgetting his credit card over at Sluggers. Highest of high comedies, only because he seems to do it everytime he goes out (see below).

Coming in a close second would be my brand new socks blowing out. Seriously, I thought the Gap brand would be better than that. I should I know, I'm a Gap alum. I'm halfway through my second wearing and all of a sudden I feel a bit of a draft in the right show. Turns out the seam completely blew out. I knew I should have gone to Abercrombie.

I’d post more pictures but most of them are password protected for the sake of our careers. I will however share these before and after shots.

Clare and I (before)

Clare and I (after)

Me (after after...mostly just after shotgunning a couple of beers)

Good times.

SECOND UP: Team America: Play-offs Week 2 Report

Team America plays in the intermediate indoor volleyball league for the Chicago Sports and Social Club every Thursday night.

In a rematch of our Week 5 opponent Team America put up a valiant effort but came up short, losing 2-1 against Come From Behind. I’m not sure what to say about this loss. Ordinarily I’d have gone Bobby Knight after a loss, or at least a smoldering Gene Keady, but that didn’t happen this time. While there were obvious flaws in our game, we played our best ball when it counted, but we came up short. Seriously, the scores were 15-13, 10-15, 15-13. You don’t get any closer than that and not win.

Hopefully, our rising to the level of our opponent will carry over to the next league. Starting March 28, Team America moves up to the Upper-Intermediate league. It should be pretty exciting and it all begins tomorrow!

THIRD UP: March Madness

Ok we are well on our way to a new national champion but I thought I would recap the events of the first weekend. As is our custom, Steve and I took the first day of the tournament off and headed to Durkin's at 11 o'clock, in time for the first set of games. To our dismay the special of the day had been switched from domestic drafts to Bud Light only. This presented a problem since I have a hard time with Bud Light. Not only does it give me a wicked hangover, but it isn't that good going down either.

Still, Steve and I powered through and managed to consume more than our $25 share of Bud light, Domino's pizza and wings. All that in only five and a half hours, not too bad. Afterwards we made our way to Joe's where I'm sure we pissed off our waitress because we only ordered Diet Coke's and a basket of french fries. Honestly, I didn't even feel like drinking anything anymore because my bladder was so fatigued. We sat there, watched the first half of the Illinois game and then headed off to our volleyball final. All in all, not a bad first day. I even won most of my picks that day too. Which leads us to...

The second day, this is when things went down hill. Garrett's college fraternity brothers were in town for a bachelor party and I ended up tagging along with them. We started out at Durkin's again and this time the Bud Light went down a lot easier, mostly because I was more concerned with getting my money's worth on the shortened St. Patty's day schedule at the bar. $25 all you can drink 9am to 1pm. I didn't get there till 10:30, so I had to catch up. After that it was bar hopping all over the northside, when we finally ended up at Red Ivy at 6 p.m. where Clare met up with Dave and I. The rest of the crew decided they were going over to Barleycorn for food, but we stayed to 1) meet up with Clare and 2) go back to a previous bar so Dave could pick up his credit card that he forgot (see, I told you he does it all the time).

That night I ended up in bed and asleep by 9:30, well before I could realize that Kansas lost their game and I had just lost the national champion in my bracket. So basically, this marks the second year where I was effectively eliminated from competition in the pool that I was running. Good times.

The rest of the weekend was a blur, but mostly it was just watching A LOT of basketball. Thank God Clare likes basketball otherwise this may not have gone over as well.

Fourth Up: The Hidden Gem

This is a clip of Chuck Norris reading Chuck Norris facts. "This is my thesis!" (extra points to anyone that can name the movie the quote came from)