Weekend Report

So where to start... Friday after work I got my hair cut. While I was sitting there, the barber and I were discussing local restaurants. Apparently there's a lot around (Indian, Japanese and 3rd Thai place) that I didn't know about. Lots more to try now. Sarah and I just hung in Friday night, but tried a new Chinese food place. We have a winner! Finally. Panda Garden, on the recommendation of my aunt's sister, was fantastic. Beef teryaki was ok, but the chix fingers, general gao's and crab rangoons were all really good. (those are our staples. If a place has those 4 foods to our satisfaction, it'll get our business) We also watched a stand up on Comedy Central, Jeff Dunham. He's a ventriloquist, and if you haven't seen him, he's hilarious. I happen to love stand up comedy, but I haven't heard Sarah laugh that hard in forever..
Sidenote: I've got a buddy who's in San Diego right now with his wife. (she has a conference for work) Apparently he's got a thing for disasters. A year after Katrina, we went to New Orleans for his bachelor party. Unbelievably good time, but we felt a little guilty as you could still see the water marks on the sides of some of the buildings. (never mind the hundreds of cars still sitting under the highway) Now he's in southern California, right near the wild fires. Apparently he's got a thing for partying in depressed areas. What's next, a trip to the beaches of the Caribbean?
Moving right along, Saturday, we started the floor. The 3rd floor has been painted, except for the trim, so it was time to start sanding the floor. $50 to rent the floor sander for the day, not too bad. So after we spend 20 minutes trying to figure out how to attach the sandpaper to the sander (you don't attach anything, the weight of the machine holds it in place), the real work begins. I did all the sanding, while Sarah took up the last piece of carpet tack strip that was still down.

I hate taking up carpet strips, so my lovely wife was kind enough to finish the job for me. The reason there was still some left to do, is because the cast iron, 200 lb. radiator to her left was still on a piece of carpet. It took me a few minutes to move it so she could remove that last piece of carpet to get at the floors. And it may not look like it, but the walls are actually yellow, almost a sand colored yellow. They look great.
There's that incredibly handsome guy again. The machine probably weighs 80-90 lbs, but once its on, it practically moves itself. You just have to guide it along.

Here's the mostly finished product. I went over it multiple times with different grades of sandpaper then got down on the floor with the handsander to get the spots the big sander missed. I think I spent more time on my knees then a french hooker this weekend. There's still a lot of touch ups to do and you can see that the baseboards still need to be painted. We haven't decided if we're going to do them before or after we stain the floor.
If you don't remember from an earlier post, here's what the floor used to look like. The room I sanded first is on the left, and the hallway floor is on the right. The hallway has since been sanded a couple of times, but still needs lots of work. We're going to stain the floors a darker color. They're pretty old and beat up, so a darker stain will hide a lot of the imperfections too. Hopefully we'll get that done this week.

That mask was white. The dust was so bad, that Sarah couldn't breathe all that well, so she cleaned the house instead. So now we have newly sanded floors and an incredibly clean house. I had a couple of windows open, with a fan sucking the air out of the room, but it didn't help that much. My boogers were black from all the dust. Gross huh. Too much info, I know, deal with it :)
Saturday night was spent doing the same thing millions of other people were doing, watching the Red Sox game. While I was doing the floors/watching the game, Sarah cooked. She made a fantastic chicken pot pie for dinner. (thanks Lisa for the recipe)

Sunday I attacked the floors again, this time focusing on the small hall outside the 3rd floor room. We're most likely going to have a runner on the stairs and continuing to the doorway of the room, so this floor doesn't have to be as perfect. Which is good, cuz its in HORRIBLE condition. Sarah had a pretty bad headache and lots of homework to do, so I went outside and tackled the leaves. I noticed that they're more yellow than in years past. I seem to remember raking lots of orange leaves in the past, but who knows. The best part is up here you don't have to put them in bags and wait for the leave collection. All you need to do is pile them like a column on its side, along the street and they have this truck with a giant leaf vacuum that comes along and sucks them all up. Nice huh. Made my job a lot easier.

Tonight Sarah made a chicken soup for dinner. Normally I don't think that soup is a meal, after all, when you go to a restaurant its on the same page as the appetizers, right? But this was so full of yummy goodness, that it was definitely a meal.

On a completely unrelated note, I would like to thank my parents for the ah ha! phone call I received today. Dad had tix to the Patriots game, and took mom (he totally should have taken me, his first born and favorite child). While they were in the pregame tent eating and drinking for free, they felt the need to call me and rub it in. So thanks guys.. .jerks.. :)

And finally, two new beers to report on: (well one new, one new to the blog)

1. Weyerbacher Blanche - its a white beer, which its a Belgium ale. I'm a big fan of this type of beer, and this hit the spot. There wasn't as much bite to it as there is in some other white beers. Its light in color and goes down very smooth. Overall, I'd give it an 8 on the Jayscale.

2. Dogfish Head Punkin Ale - Fantastic stuff. I had it while eating the chicken pot pie Sarah made and it complimented it perfectly (ever Sarah agreed, and she really doesn't like beer) The spices (pumpkin, brown sugar, allspice, cinnamon and nutmeg) were all very evident with every sip. Its a brown ale, so its a darker color, goes down very smooth and actually tasted better while eating, than on its own. Overall, I'd give this one a 9 on the Jayscale. Dogfish Head is one of the better beer makers on the market right now. I'd recommend most of their beers.

Anyway, time to finish up, I've taken up too much of your time as it is. Sox start in an hour and a half, so here comes another late night...