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The Bongo Room

/ Shane / 2 Comments

Over the weekend we found yet another amazing breakfast place, the Bongo Room. We knew about this place and had wanted to try it out for some time, so we finally gave it a go. The thing is, it’s just around the corner from our other favorite breakfast place, Yolk. The first time we just sort of flipped a coin between the two and ended up going to Yolk. It was so good, we never really had a reason to look for another place.

So you can’t help comparing the two places. The thing is, it turns out it’s not really as much of a head to head competition as you might have expected.  Although they both serve breakfast, Yolk has more choices in the savory department (like egg-based things) and the Bongo Room has more choices in the cake-y department (like pancakes).

The things that we had at the Bongo Room certainly were amazing. Sara had an apple French toast with crushed up ginger snaps on top. I had red velvet pancakes with a white chocolate sauce. It was basically like eating a cake for breakfast! The interesting thing was that 3 of us independently made the comment that, although our food looked really decadent, it wasn’t too sweet. That is, it was plenty sweet, but not to where you were thinking, “I can’t eat all of this” (although it should be noted that I could not, in fact, eat all of it). There were also plenty of choices that looked good that I wasn’t able to order, so future visits should not be a problem.

The Bongo Room is much smaller, with nowhere really to wait. I imagine it could be hard to get in at times. We’ve had to wait for awhile at Yolk, but it is a huge place, with plenty of waiting room.

So, at the end of the day, I highly recommend either place. I guarantee you will not be disappointed! As to deciding between the two, it would depend on what you are in the mood for. For savory, I’d still go with Yolk, but for sweet, choose the Bongo Room.

Bacon Soap

/ Shane / 1 Comment

For Christmas, I got my brother an extra special gift, that only he could truly appreciate. I had soap custom-made to smell like bacon. And further more, this wasn’t just any old soap, but special oatmeal goat’s milk honey soap to help with dry skin.

It was pretty awesome, when I got the package in the mail, you could smell the bacon-smell rolling off of it. I don’t know if he’s tried them yet or not, maybe he can answer in the comments.

So anyway, if you need any custom-made soaps or body products, especially those that smell like bacon, you can check out the Natural Soap Shanty. I can vouch for both the products and the owner! 🙂 (She’s Sara’s cousin, but more importantly, she’s both a reader and commenter on this blog!)

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/ Shane / 4 Comments

Go see this movie.

Sure, the plot is pretty predictable. I know you’ve seen it before. But believe me, it is well worth the price of admission. I look at this movie more like an amusement park ride than a movie, where you pay your money, enjoy the ride, and then go back to the real world.

Sara and I don’t see many movies these days. This is only the 3rd movie we’ve seen in the theater since Evie was born. I really wanted to see this one in it’s full 3D glory, rather than waiting for it on DVD. The movie is truly breathtaking.

I haven’t been to many 3D movies. At the beginning of this one, I was rolling my eyes a little bit. I thought, “Oh boy, the traditional putting-a-golf-ball-toward-the-audience shot. How cliché.” But pretty soon those fell by the wayside as the movie really got cranked up. The 3D became a lot more subtle as the movie went on, to where you weren’t really noticing it. This is when it was at its best, when I wanted to swat aside a mosquito that was buzzing by my face. At one point I even flinched away from something that was falling, and then looked around sheepishly to see if anybody noticed.

Of course the Internet is crawling with people hating this movie. Ignore those people. I can’t imagine anybody with an open mind not enjoying this movie (meaning, people who aren’t looking to find problems with it, or going into it hating it because it is popular). Very cool.

The restaurants of break

/ Shane / 2 Comments

Over the break (the two weeks over the holidays during which I didn’t blog), we were out and about a little more than usual, which led to us hitting up more restaurants than usual. So I wanted to mention a few of the highlights:

The best of the lot was Electric Cheetah in Grand Rapids. Evie was pretty excited to go here, since she considers us the “Cheetah family” (on account of how fast she and I run at soccer practice). She must have been hungry too, because she insisted she was going to order “everything” from the waitress. The waitress must have been taken with her, since she spent a few minutes showing her pictures of her kids. I had one of the best sandwiches I can recall, the “Sloppy Jalopy” which was:

House-smoked corned beef brisket and black forest ham, caramelized red onion, tomato, thousand island, Dijon, and Swiss on grilled rye.

They also had a root beer list the way a brewery has a beer list, which was also enjoyable to read (but the one Sara ultimately chose did have high fructose corn syrup in it). They also had good fries with *awesome* dipping sauces for them. I don’t remember what they all were, but there were like 10 different kinds and they were all delicious. My favorite was the dill. Also, Sara had some saffron-tomato soup which she enjoyed. All in all, a very awesome “hipster” lunch spot (it even said hipster on the menu, so I know it’s true).

Obviously that was a little more interesting than the Pizza Hut lunch buffet, but that doesn’t mean Evie didn’t enjoy it more. Evie ate more than Sara! She had 3 pieces of pizza, garlic toast, a dessert breadstick, 3 slices of peaches (she didn’t beat her old man though).

Next up was a restaurant a little closer to home (and one we go to now and again), Chant. At this one, Evie was excited about getting to try “sushi” (except it didn’t have fish). She had wanted to try some at Sara’s work Christmas party, and then she got a set of play sushi from Rachael, which she loves to play with. So I ordered some so that she could try it. I don’t think she really liked it, but then again it was non-traditional sushi, so she might go for it again some time.

The last and least exciting restaurant was Quiznos, the name of which Evie found hilarious. “Quiz-nose? The restaurant is Quiz-nose?” Now, it’s just funny to have “nose” in the name, but this was especially funny to Evie, because she has special names for all of us in the family. Evie is Spoon-nose, I am Fork-nose, and Sara is Kitchen-nose. This all happened one day when Evie and I were being silly, and I was wearing a spoon on my nose, but in true Evie-fashion, she never forgets a thing. So these names have been around for a long time and she never forgets them. So this sort of added to the humor of Quiz-nose.

There were a few more restaurants, but those were the ones that stood out.

The Addams Family

/ Shane / 5 Comments

Over break, Sara and I took a day for ourselves and went to see The Addams Family. It is a musical that is premiering here in Chicago before going on to Broadway in New York. It stars Nathan Lane as Gomez and Bebe Neuwirth (A.k.a. Lillith, from Cheers (Frasier’s wife)) as Morticia.

Overall it was pretty good. I absolutely loved the scene where Uncle Fester is singing to the moon. For me, it was worth seeing for that scene alone. The guy who plays Uncle Fester is great, and so is the kid who plays Pugsly. Without a doubt, Grandma got all the best lines. As far as Nathan Lane and Bebe Neuwirth, they were okay. I was excited to see them, and they didn’t do bad, but they didn’t really knock my socks off either.

Overall I’d have to rate it a solid B. I enjoyed myself, and I didn’t regret seeing it, but I can think of a couple of shows off the top of my head that I thought were better (but of course I can think of plenty that weren’t as good, either). At one point I thought to myself, “What is missing from this show?” It had everything you could have wanted; good actors, good sets, jokes. Somehow it just didn’t catch me. I think the music wasn’t that catchy. Sara thought the jokes were too corny maybe, but then again, they usually are in things like that.

So anyway, if you’re looking for a show to see, I would recommend this. Especially if you were a fan of the T.V. show; there are plenty of references to the show (I actually saw a fair number of episodes via Nick at Night, back when that showed old reruns). Just don’t pick this one over Wicked.