Zanecrawl Chicago!

September 8, 2008

As promised, I will give some more deets about the Chicago weekend.

Those of you who have hung out with us in the past 6 months have discovered our love of a TV show called "Three Sheets", shown on an obscure HD cable channel called MOJOHD. Well, the host of the show, Zane Lamprey, has been hosting pub crawl weekends all over the country called Zanecrawl (he's done LA, NYC, Boston, and will head to SF in October after Chicago).

On a whim, Will and I signed up for Chicago. Why Chicago and not SF, you ask? Here's why:

1) When you sign up, you can only sign up for the whole package: hotel, shuttle bus, food, drink, schwag. So, if you're going to do an entire weekend, why not go somewhere else?
2) I loved Chicago when I was there in early June, and Will has never spent much time in the city, so why not Chicago?

So, we took off on Thursday night (9/4) and got in late. We had a nice sleep-in, I checked out the hotel gym, and we signed-in for the Zanecrawl around 2pm. At 3pm, along with 30+ other people, we got on the shuttle bus for the first evening festivities. The itinerarary was 5 stops from 3pm to 12am. Oh goodness...

FRIDAY

It was great meeting some new folks on the bus, and finally Zane and his college drinking buddy, Steve McKenna, got on the bus. Along with them were Karen (the organizer), Kristin (the photographer) and Wes (security). Zane explained that all the stops on the Zanecrawl were "international" in theme. Our first stop was a German beer bar and restaurant called Mirabell.

Despite consistent guidance in the bus about "pacing yourself", the first activity at Mirabell was a chugging contest...

I definitely didn't win the chugging contest, I did it in under 10 seconds, but Zane's baseline was around 4.5 seconds. Will might have won, if he didn't Jim The Cop.

The next stop was an English pub called The Globe Pub. The activity at The Globe was a darts contest. I made it to Round Two, but had a sad score.

After The Globe, we headed to Polish Village for dinner at a Polish buffet called the Red Apple (Czerwone Jabluszko) Buffet. This place was ridiculous, with a phenomenal spread of polish food. It was the first time in a long time that I had cabbage rolls, oh delicious!

Zane also had a treat for us, a chance to try Absinthe the classic way.

After the Polish buffet, we headed to a whiskey bar called Moonshine. Shenanigans ensued.

The last stop of the night was an 80's theme bar called The Regal Beagle (yes, think of Three's Company).

This place definitely had the girly drinks, I quite enjoyed the Tony Danza Extravaganza.

The night ended with a nice short walk home, we decided to get some air before bed, and thankfully, missed out on some more shenanigans to rest up for the next big day...

SATURDAY

The next day started out with another nice sleep-in, and breakfast buffet courtesy of Zanecrawl at the in-house steakhouse, Shula's in the Sheraton hotel (which reminded me of the "work" trip that Katharine and I took to Florida in 2002 and we stayed at Don Shula's Resort in Miami Lakes...oy!).

A few hours later, we boarded the bus at 1 PM and then drove to our first stop in Lincoln Park, a Korean BBQ joint called San Soo Gab San.

The food was delicious (I heart Kalbi ribs!), we consumed some Soju and Korean beer, and then left the place smelling of Korean bbq for the rest of the day.

Our next stop was a Belgian beer bar called the Hopleaf, noted to be the second best Belgian beer bar in the country (the first is some place in Manhattan and third is SF's own Toronado).

Following some great Belgian beers and a dice game called 4-2-1 (which Zane learned in the Belgium episode), we headed out to the next stop, The Goose Island Brewery. At Goose Island, brewmaster Greg Hall treated us to a small tour, a discussion about brewing, and then lots of good beer to taste.

Greg and his girlfriend joined us for the rest of the night. From Goose Island (where Zane ran into some older folks who happened to be outside and huge fans of Three Sheets!), we headed to Adobo Grill for some Mexican-flavored eats and drinks.

At Adobo, Zane tested our Three Sheets knowledge with a test, our group fared pretty well, though surprising considering how all the Three Sheets info started melting into one pot in my brain and I had a hard time remembering what happened in which episode.

We were stuffed with great food, so off we went to a Jamaican bar called Ja' Grill, where they had a private basement bar for our entire group.

Zane thought that it would be a great idea for us to do a boat race after dinner...

My team was made up of three girls + one guy, with one of the girls as the anchor. After the first round, we were first (sweet!). In the second round, we came in a close second (boo!), but we were psyched to do so well against all the other teams, as we had the most ladies (some teams had all dudes!). Go girls!

The last stop o' the evening was an English/Irish bar called Gingers Ale House.

Gingers Ale House:

After we got back to the hotel, some of the gang hung out some more at the hotel bar, Chi Bar, and then got late-night eats at another Irish bar, Timothy O'Tooles, just a few blocks from the hotel. I think that the late-night grease-fest saved me from a nasty morning...

SUNDAY

On Sunday morning, we had to pack up our stuff, schwag, and get checked out of the hotel by noon, just in time to join up with Zane and the rest of the crawlers for Champagne brunch at PJ Clarke's. We enjoyed a slide-show of some of the pics from the weekend, and Zane handed out prizes to some lucky (or unlucky) folks.

Examples of awards including a couple "Steve McKenna'd" awards, best drinking buddy (friendliest person), and the cutest couple (awarded to two dudes from Bakersfield who were NOT a couple...hilarious!) Will got the distinction of the "Jim the Cop" award, for spilling his beer during the first chugging contest.

After saying goodbye to everyone and getting some memory-lasting pics, Will and I wandered around downtown Chicago (Magnificent Mile!) and enjoyed the nice weather. We checked out the Riverwalk and Navy Pier before we had to catch a cab to O'Hare and get on home.

Well, Zanecrawl was worth it, an indulgence before we settle down into mortgage-dom. I heart Chicago and am so excited that we've met some really great folks that I hope to hang out with in the future. Hey-la-di-la-di-lay, hey-la-di-la-di-lo!

Here's a slideshow from Picasa, where I posted these blogged pics and more:

Chicago!

September 7, 2008

Will and I just got home from a long weekend in Chicago and we are spent.

You may wonder what we were doing in Chicago, and I have two words for you:

Zane + crawl

More pics and stories to come, here's just one to whet your appetite:

Tapestry Arts Festival

September 1, 2008

On Monday morning, it was nice to not have to go to work, so instead, I headed down to south bay for a day with Angie and her family. We had breakfast and the kids entertained me for a bit...



Dance Party!:


In the late morning, we headed out to downtown San Jose for the Tapestry Arts Festival, which always takes place over Labor Day weekend and proceeds from the three-day festival help fund arts education programs in elementary schools throughout the South Bay.


Lots of crafts tables for kids to make sculptures, masks, puppets, spin art, etc.:











The twins were tuckered after missing their nap and it was typically south bay hot, so by late afternoon, I was done and ready to head home. These kids are tiring.

The weather was wonderful this weekend, and as expected, it passed far too quickly.