And So It Begins … Again

When our first little voice started kindergarten, we were thrust into the wonderful world of fundraising. Twice a year wasn’t so bad. It was cookie dough in the fall and Lou Malnati’s personal pizzas in the spring. Our second voice started school this year and we had to figure out how to split the cookie dough orders between the two. Won’t be as worried for the pizzas (if they do that again) because I really like those pizzas. I will buy a bunch just myself. Not a big deal on the school fundraising front. Something else changed this year however, that no doubt will solidify taking me down the road of avoidance and contempt from my friends and coworkers for years. Girl Scouts.

Our oldest little voice joined Girl Scouts this year. More accurately Daisies. While I personally haven’t gone to any of the meetings (that is Mrs. Voice’s realm), from what I gather it is a relatively new troop(?) and still finding it’s place. They are very easy going, and not even really getting any full uniforms. I think they are getting a sash for patches. The one thing they ARE doing that is classic Girl Scouts is selling … yup … Cookies.

Don’t get me wrong, I have been a fan of cookies, Girl Scout or otherwise, probably since birth. My favorite of the GS have always been the Do-Si-Dos … the peanut butter sandwich cookies. There have been other well liked varieties over the years based on the bakery supplying the various groups. I have bought them from my niece, from neighbors, friends and the occasional freezing child outside of a grocery store. This is the first time however that we … I mean “my child” … has to sell them.

Here are my issues: 1) We are selling late. Seems everyone has been selling for weeks already. Mrs. Voices says this is good as people will get their cookies from us after they run out of their previous cookie order. Um … ok. 2) I JUST got done talking the three people I work closely enough with into buying the cookie dough. 3) They aren’t ALLOWED to sell door to door. (same issue I have with the school fundraisers). As I recall, this used to be one of the main tenets of selling cookies and whatever else. It helped with communication skills and self-confidence and salesmanship … or something. When it is parents doing all the selling to friends and family who buy because they feel guilty … what does that teach the kids?

Despite the above, I can’t disappoint my little girl. I will end up buying enough cookies to make sure she gets a patch. I will freeze them, bring them to work to hand out or slowly eat them, one cookie at a time over the course of a wee … year. I AM thankful that it doesn’t appear that we will need to sit outside of Walgreen’s and push cookies on Dell Webb residents picking up their diabetes prescriptions.

 

Anyone want to buy some cookies? Anyone?

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Bobby’s Burger Palace – Customer Service Excellence

When my better voice and I went to Vegas in January, we saw a restaurant that was opening soon called Bobby’s Burger Palace. It wasn’t open yet but I thought it was pretty cool that I was opening a burger joint. (Yes, I am one of those dorks that says that when anything has my name on it) I knew I was coming back for a wedding in April so I put it on my list of things to do. I looked it up when we got home and only then found out that it was a Bobby Flay burger place. I HAD to make sure I went. So I did.

On Easter Sunday I went to Bobby Flay’s Bobby’s Burger Palace. I had the Bobby Blue Burger, because I am a fan of moldy cheeses. It was an awesome burger! Juicy, flavorful and the sauces that were available … pretty damn good. There was a steak type sauce called “burger sauce” and chipotle ketchup and a jalapeño sauce. All quite yummy. I also had a side of onion rings. BIG slices, beer battered and cooked perfectly so they weren’t mushy, but the onions didn’t pull out on the first bite. The sauces went quite well with the rings too.

Because I am that dorky type, I had to get a t-shirt. They have the name of the place on the front with “Las Vegas” underneath so you know where you ate, in case you couldn’t remember. I had to settle for a large as they were out of XL. (I like my shirts baggy and loose fitting) I ate my meal and went back to my hotel, put the bag with the shirt in it into my suitcase and didn’t think about it until I got home.

Once I got home, I was showing Mrs. Voices and thought “geez, their larges are really small”. I looked a little closer and it was a child’s large. D’OH! Well, at least Tori had a shirt to grow into.

I still really wanted a shirt so I went to their webpage to see if I could order one my size. It was my fault for not looking so I wasn’t going to cause a stink about it. To my dismay, they don’t sell shirts or hats on their site. I was sad. So, I emailed the customer service address.

I told them what happened, asked if they could send me a shirt and asked how much it would cost. I was totally willing to pay for it. They wrote back saying that they would send me a shirt, no charge, and apologized for the inconvenience. WOOHOO! It is very good to see that someone as big as Bobby Flay (or his management team or whoever actually runs his restaurants) doesn’t just say “too bad so sad”. They totally could. Even though he will probably never know anything about this incident, and like I said, it is probably some company that actually runs the restaurants, it still gives me a reason to like Bobby Flay a little more. I admit I am a little overloaded on him on TV, but I still like his food.

The moral of the story, I get a shirt. I had an awesome burger, and Bobby Flay is pretty cool. Go to Bobby Flay establishments. I love awesome customer service experiences! When the shirt comes, I will take a picture of me and Tori and post it here. Just in case anyone from Booby’s Burger Palace is monitoring their tags, yes, feel free to use it in publicity! I am such a shill.

Bob’s Travel Tips – Vegas

Told you this would be a series. Welcome back to the riveting and scintillating advice offered by the travel experts here at VIMB. If you missed out on the last Travel Tip, you missed me explaining what this is. So just go look back.

I have been to Vegas a few times. By NO means whatsoever am I an expert. I do however think that I can offer some advice to someone who has never been there before, from one amateur to another.

I have been to Vegas 3 times, all in about the last 2 years. Been there the first week of December, the last week of January and Easter weekend. The pools weren’t open the first 2 times and when I was there over Easter, it was for a wedding and only a few days so I never got out to the pools. So, I can’t give any tips on that. I also have pretty much been relegated to the strip and Freemont St. other than a couple of other excursions. I can give some simple advice on simple things. Those of you that go to Vegas a lot will probably laugh at me and call me a hack. That’s ok. I can live with that. With that in mind, and a Rhode Island sized grain of salt, here are my tips for Vegas.

 

Travel – Fly if you can. Flights are not as cheap as they used to be because of the resurgence in popularity of Vegas, but McCarran airport is KICK ASS! Be sure to see my tips on flying.

Rooms – There are all kinds of rooms. You can stay on strip, off strip and off off strip. Where you stay depends on how much you want to spend and if you want to be on an episode of C.S.I. or not. I have stayed at MGM Grand, Excalibur and Mandalay Bay. So far, Mandalay is my favorite. Both for room and amenities. There is a tv in the bathroom for cryin’ out loud. Mrs. Voices has been a number of times for conferences and has had work pay for rooms at Paris, Ballys, MGM Grand and Mandalay. Her fav was Mandalay as well. (oddly enough we stayed at Mandalay separately and not together). The ONLY drawback to Mandalay, is it is at the south end of the strip. That means that it is a long way to anything. Which brings me to the next tip …

Walking – Bring a good pair of walking shoes. When you fly in, or look up and down the strip from the 20^th floor of your hotel … you will say “well that doesn’t look that far”. It is. On average, the few times I have been out there, I have walked about 10 miles a day. That is just casual walking, not even walking on a mission. You easily can double that amount. Walking is bar far the cheapest and easiest way to get around the strip. If you really don’t want to walk …

Bus – The bus is the next best thing to move up and down the strip and back and forth to Freemont Street. You get unlimited rides for a pretty cheap price for like 24 hours. I think they have other passes too for longer times. Cabs … don’t, it can cost like $70 up to Freemont. There are a few free trams and monorails that are ok. There is also a monorail that costs money. While it is fun and a good novelty, the problem is that it goes along the back sides of the resorts so … it really isn’t a time saver. It actually makes you walk more. And when you end up walking that much, you are always hungry.

Food – There is great food in Vegas. Be prepared to pay. You can’t get away from the cost of food, especially on the strip. On the strip, there is no such thing as a $5 all you can eat buffet that I have found, and I have looked. Love me a good buffet. Don’t think that going to McDonald’s or Denny’s will save you some money. It won’t. Besides, why the hell would you go to one of those places when you can experience fine dining from just about every famous chef out there. The only drawback to that is, it gets a little harder to find quick eats later at night.

Casinos – Not much help here as I am not a big gambler. There is an I Dream Of Jeanie slot by the poker area of Excalibur that I like. I play penny slots. That way I can get a lot of free drinks.

Drinking – Did you know that technically it is illegal to have open alcohol on the strip? Who knew? Drink. A lot. You probably aren’t driving. You can drink early. It is good. It is fun.

People – The 2 times I was there when it was not spring break and the pools weren’t open were my personal favorite times. Not a lot of people comparatively and not a lot of kids. Although there were some. When I went over Easter … holy crap there were a lot of families. More than I thought were going to be there. It was more kids than anything. And going back to the whole walking thing … FAMILIES WALK TOO SLOW! I do have to say though that people watching is pretty freaking awesome! Put a large emphasis on the FREAK part. There are a lot of them.

There is one more thing I want to point out that I forgot under walking. I have walked around a lot by myself out there 2 times. Once because Mrs. Voices was in conferences all day and the other because I was out there by myself for a wedding. When you walk around by yourself, you don’t get sold anything. You don’t get approached in the hotels by salesmen. You don’t get approached by the guys on the strip selling you tours. You will still however get the strip club flyers shoved at you.

There are so many things I would love to talk about and so many things I have already talked about that are probably worthless. It’s a start though. I may re-visit this topic with some other things, or, after reading backlash of how much my Vegas info sucks, I may not.

Be sure to tune in next time when Bob’s Travel Tips will talk about the family road trip.

 

Voicesinmybrain and it’s affiliates were not paid for and did not receive any compensation, monetarily or otherwise for any referenced entities. VIMB does not itself endorse any mentioned Hotels/Casinos/Restaurants. We would however, mention that IF any hotels/casinos/restaurants wanted to give us any freebies … we would not be opposed.

Don’t Judge A Food By Its Cover

Recently I decided to be a grown up, put on my big boy pants and go and get myself a physical. Turns out that I have type 2 Diabetes. My numbers were pretty high so the Dr. put me on some meds and told me what I need to do for some education and to get a glucose monitor. Of course, dealing with insurance put delays for everything while they decided who I could see, what I could have, yada, yada, yada. I decided that on my own, I would start to change my diet.

I have always eaten balanced meals. Unfortunately, I also liked to indulge in various foods that probably aren’t the healthiest choices. I also had (and still have) much different ideas of what a “serving size” is.  So, I started tracking everything I ate. To Mrs. Voices point, I am probably obsessing a leetle too much about tracking every line on the nutrition labels. It is driving me a little batty about how much I am having of what and too many grams of this and not enough milligrams of that. What is HAS done however, is make me LOOK at the nutrition labels, which I really haven’t done before.

It is amazing what you can actually learn when you read the labels. It is even scarier when you realize the serving sizes of things against the nutritional values. What I thought was a single serving bag of Honey Mustard & Onion pretzels, was actually 3.5 servings. What I thought wasn’t that bad, really was far worse. Ugh. It is also scary how much sodium is in EVERYTHING! Even thing that you think are healthy. Apparently they use sodium to make “healthy” things taste better. Sugars are another thing that are crazy on how much is in things that you think might not have as much as they do.

So, there are certain things I am supposed to eat that are better for me: Whole grains, lean meats and the like. I found out grocery shopping that just because the name of something sounds healthy, it doesn’t mean it is. For example, I saw something that said “whole grain tortillas”. I thought that would be great! I would still be bale to enjoy the Fiesta this year. I flipped it over and grabbed a package of regular flour tortillas that was next to it.  SHOCKER! The regular flour variety, were actually overall healthier that the ones that touted themselves as a “healthy” option. There were a lot of other things that I found as well. It also took me about 3 times as long to shop since I had to read all those labels.

I know a few of my friends who might read this are going to say “Duh! An entire pizza is not 1 serving”. It is going to be a long road. It will take a lot of getting used to. I won’t be able to do things like enter a hot dog eating contest, drink Marion under the table in Tibet, judge a cake baking contest with David or cure depression by eating a half gallon of Americone Dream. It will all be alright though and eventually I will be able to partake in Summer Beer once again … as long as I read the label.

 

No TV … Day Three

And hopefully the last. I am not saying I am addicted to TV … but I think I am addicted to TV. While it has been a good few nights without the box blaring in the background, or the foreground, I am finding that me not having something to draw my attention is a bad thing for one main reason. Tori. I never ignore her, in fact I play with her all the time when the TV is going. The problem is, without the TV grabbing at least some of my attention, I find various ways to amuse myself at her expense. Last night, it entailed giving her a piece of spaghetti. Someone told me to give her that and now I know why. OH EM GEE! She was soooo cute. At first, she couldn’t figure out how to get it in her mouth since it kept sliding out. Then, she got frustrated with that and decided it was what she calls “pretties”. That is jewelry to her. She tried to wear it like a necklace. I finally broke it into smaller bites for her after I felt she suffered enough. I would have taken video of it to share but a) I was laughing too damn hard b) I was cooking and cooking and laughing that hard can be rather dangerous, at least for me.

Tonight, my amusement consisted of making the little parrot and myna bird go through a myriad of songs, dances, recitations and otherwise cute stuff. We do have some on video but I will have to see if Mrs. Voices will let herself be on video published to tens of people, and I have to see how goofy I sound. I heard her showing Tori a video earlier and my voice is just AWFUL! Strange that I want to do voices for a living huh? Maybe that is why I do so many because I think my real voice is comical in itself.

Anyhoo, the little middle voice has gone to bed, we are eating our Paczkis and I will be getting the spreadsheet out tomorrow to figure out how much in therapy for Tori this no tv thing is going to cost me.

How To Make Enemies At Work

Yes ladies and gentleman, it is another VIMB “How To” moment. Today’s moment is brought to you by the acrid smell of burnt popcorn as it wafts through the office on a Friday afternoon, making the end of a long and arduous work week all the more needed. So, without further adieu but a large middle finger to the person that does this EVERY week …

How To Make Enemies At Work

1. Remove the outer plastic wrapper from a bag of microwave popcorn
2. Unfold bag and place in work-place microwave oven
3. Press “popcorn” button
4. After approximately two and a half minutes, when timer ends, press “popcorn button again (alternately you can set the timer for 5 more minutes)
5. Go back to your desk
6. When the smoke and smell of failure finally reach your desk, go to microwave and remove your smoldering bag
7. Place directly into garbage can without dousing in water
8. Walk away so no one knows it was you
9. Make new bag of popcorn in microwave oven on other side of office

 

 

What Can I Say … I Like The Sausage

I … am a carnivore. I like my feed animals dead and char-broiled. I don’t mind if they are processed, extruded and shaped into various forms, as long as it is meat. I eat burgers, dogs, links, patties, chops, filets and any other cuts you can think of. I am not opposed to vegetables as long as they are a compliment to the meal. I will admit, I like a salad for dinner now and then, but it will always have something on it … most likely bacon. Everything is better with bacon.

I found myself in a brief discussion today with some co-workers about vegetarians/vegans. I don’t really know a whole lot about the differences between a vegetarian and a vegan. In my mind, and the little knowledge I have, is vegetarians don’t eat meat so that they can be healthier and vegans are pretty much whack jobs. As I understand it, vegans are morally opposed to eating meat and won’t even do things like wear leather or anything that was made from animals. They won’t, again as I understand it, drink milk that came from an animal because it came from an animal. I have heard that they are also boring in the boudoir since the whole aversion to animals thing and not um … eating … um meat. Yeah, I said it.

As I said earlier, I really don’t know a whole lot about vegans, and I am far too lazy to look up information about them for the purposes of this post, but I do know one thing. If vegans don’t like to wear clothes made from animals … they should get off of their high horses. Ancient man wore nothing BUT animal hides. They did not know how to make synthetic clothes. If it were not for ancient man wearing sabre tooth tuxedo, and instead, our descendants were vegans … things would be way different.We would not have clothing at all.

At first thought, most people would think that the world being naked would be a good thing. These people have an unrealistic view of the world and their lives and they picture everyone in the same way … at least when naked. For most people when they think of a naked world, they think of someone like this naked:

A naked world would not look like this

 

In reality, “cavemen” never inventing clothing, and everyone walking around naked, would just not be good. While it wold be nice if everyone looked like the picture above, in reality remember … for every ONE (1) of the above … there will be at least 10 of this …

 

 

 

Until next time, remember … “If you don’t eat yer meat, you can’t have any pudding! How can you have any pudding if you don’t eat yer meat?”

Don’t Read If You Are Allergic

WARNING: This post may contain words typed by someone who has eaten, touched, been near or thought about peanuts or products containing peanuts.

Not to be confused with THIS Peanut

I do not have a peanut allergy. I do not know anyone that has a peanut allergy. I understand they can be brutal and quite deadly. I am not making fun of anyone with a peanut allergy, HOWEVER … I think it is a little over the top that people are protesting against Cheerios because they are now making a peanut butter flavored Cheerios. Like I said, I understand the allergies can be deadly and I understand it isn’t something that people brought upon themselves … BUT FOR THE LOVE OF GOD PEOPLE QUIT BLAMING EVERYONE ELSE FOR EVERYTHING! If something has peanuts then don’t buy it. There are bubble children out there and their parents aren’t saying “stop making everything on the planet because my child is allergic to everything.”

There are plenty of obscure allergies out there: sunlight, cold water, hot water … you name it, there is an allergy for it somewhere at some time. It seems though that the peanut allergy people are the most vocal and the most bitchy about it. When I went to school, I could bring a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. When Tori starts going to school I fully expect her to be able to bring PB&J for lunch. What I don’t understand is why, in a classroom of 30 students or whatever, if there is 1 child with a peanut allergy, everyone else has to suffer. Again, when did it become everyone elses responsibility to make sure that someone else doesn’t get exposed to whatever. Why can’t that child leave the room for lunch or let the other kids leave the room for lunch instead of banning foods. If  am allergic to bees I make sure I don’t get stung, I don’t sue the government for trying to fix colony collapse.

I know I am sounding cold and callous but I am tired of people having to listen to these groups complain about everything and think that they are so special that everyone else has to do everything their way. If you thought I was mean before, you will really hate this next comment … maybe peanuts are another of nature’s way to take care of things. Like I talked about in a previous post … people need to stop trying to stop natural selection.

With the recent bankruptcy filing of Hostess, I bought some Twinkies out of nostalgia. I was going to just keep them, but I got hungry while I was writing this and ate them. I forgot how awful they taste. They are really gross and they don’t even have peanuts in them. I think I have to go wash my mouth out now. I should have gotten a fruit pie or Ding Dong instead. Blech!

Rollin Rollin Rollin

Keep that blog a rollin’ … keep that blog a rollin’ each daaaaaayyyy.

For some reason that popped into my head about 30 seconds ago and I had to write that down. I am still trying to keep on my blogging every day to see how long I can do it, but I will admit that I am getting lazy lately. Work is busy, Tori is teething ALL NIGHT, EVERY NIGHT and I have another cold from the child I am sure. I was going to actually blog about how I didn’t feel like writing tonight but then I realized that if I wrote about that, that it would be writing and that it would then be an actual blog entry. Then my head hurt and I decided not to write about that.

Piper is laying on my feet snoring. She is making me want to fall asleep too. Hearing her snore right now, I think I have to apologize to the wife for blaming her for the snoring that woke me up the other night. Sorry wife.

A few minutes until the next episode of Chopped. I have a few ingredient lists you all have sent me, feel free to send any at any time. The first round of my Chopped Challenge will be in the next few days when I can get to the grocery store. I am goign to try to get a few in one trip so I can do a few in a few days. Stay tuned!

Chop Me!

So, I have a brilliant idea. Maybe. I am sitting here watching Chopped before I get up off my butt and start cleaning. I read a few days or weeks ago … I can’t remember … on Kapgar’s page, that he and his wife were going to try making one recipe a week from a bunch of their cookbooks. Or something like that. Whatever the idea was, I liked it, and I have been considering how I would have time to do something similar when I have to pick up Tori every day and can’t stop and buy food all the time.

Watching Chopped, gave me an idea. Of course, I am going to have to get Mrs. Voices in on this but, I think that we should follow the Chopped format. Jackie will think of 4 mystery ingredients for me to work with. Somehow, I will figure out what I am going to do with them and if I have to, stop with Tori on the way home or maybe Peapod what I need. Then I will come up with something using those ingredients without a cookbook. She will also have to think of if it will be appetizer, entree or dessert. I think this could be fun. Now, since I haven’t even brought this up yet with Mrs. Voices, I am putting it out there. Yes, you heard me. Throw out some Chopped worthy ingredients and I will do my best to make a dish and take some pictures of what I come up with. Please keep this in mind, make the ingredients something that I can get though. I don’t want to have to drive all over creation to find them.

I think I am making a really big challenge for myself but, it is already written and the backspace doesn’t work on my keyboard. (it does but that is what I am telling myself so I can’t back out.)

Bring it on and I will see you all in the kitchen!