out of hibernation

if you were working this past monday the 19th, i have only one word for you ....

Sucka!

monday was drop-dead gorgeous. that morning, jon's youngest sister, joanna, (who was in town for her spring break) went out to breakfast with me at the sunroom cafe, where we chowed down on breakfast burritos and spinach & feta omelettes before strolling up and down our vibrant little state street. we eventually made our way over to jon's place on the west side to pick him up and return back to central madison for a leisurely, long walk in the arborteum.

it was so gorgeous out that we made time to lay down in the grass and absorb the rays on our pasty white legs and arms. it was the kind of day that makes you love living in wisconsin, where you appreciate the seasons, and get to feel what it's like to actually fall in love with a day.

at about 3, i dropped joanna off at jon's other sister's apartment on campus, stopped at home to grab my hiking boots and a warmer jacket, and raced over to jon's house.

there's no time to waste when you're heading to devil's lake.

man, i love devil's lake. i love warm days and hiking and lakes and conversation while walking. and our "date afternoon" was all of that. so after driving 40 minutes to get out there and buying a wisconsin state park season pass, we were ready for a solid afternoon of outdoor activity.

there were a handful of other hikers at devil's lake (yet another reason i love having mondays off), so we rarely had to stop to let someone pass or move too quickly from a scenic overlook if other hikers approached. the lake made things cool at the bottom of the hill, where patches of snow remained in stubborn obstinence to the early spring heat. but up top, even my long sleeved tee was much too warm of an option. and that's pretty sweet considering it's still march and all (of course, we've recently seen al gore's "an inconvenient truth" so it feels wrong to enjoy the early spring too much now).

after our hike, we drove to prairie du sac for dinner at the blue spoon creamery cafe. as the site says, the blue spoon was named after the traditional blue spoons used at culver's and is a concept developed by the co-founders of, duh, culver's restaurants.

it's a nice little spot in the main drag of town, seated on the wisconsin river - kind of like an upscale culver's. jon had been there before, and says "as a one-hit wonder, i like it." so when the waitress told us they were planning on franchising out to middleton, we questioned how successful they'd really be.

i mean, i liked the lighting upstairs, but i enjoyed the view of the river WAY more. they've got a great outdoor seating area there which is going to be impossible to duplicate out in middleton. and the food was nothing to write home about, but was decent and a tad more adventurous than culver's. my tuscan grilled cheese was a little lacking (and was quickly cold) earning it a C+, but jon's bbq sandwich special deserved a solid B. still, the tiramisu gelato at the end made up for my sad sandwich and i left feeling quite rewarded for my day's hike ...

i'm very curious as to how they'll really do in middleton, so keep your eyes peeled for it and let us know what you think when you hit it up.

seat of your pants

As Mary and I explore Madison we tend to approach the night with either a well-defined plan or spontaneous desire. Those two approaches usually line up according to our personality types so Mary being the one who is able to be more laid back decided to create the night as it came.

She knew we were headed to a lecture/performance that was part of the Line Breaks series at the Wisconsin Historical Society but it was too early to head over there and we were both hungry. So we started walking down State Street waiting for inspiration. It struck quickly as we decided to just take the edge off and wait on dinner until after the lecture so we ducked into Einstein Bros (I have never called it that until now) for a coffee and bagel. I am not much of a bagel connoisseur but their apple-something-something bagels are tasty.

So with coffee in hand we walked the short distance to the Historical building. As we took a seat and got comfortable, I was not really sure what we were in for but I was hoping to learn something new. I was not disappointed. First off, I have very little experience with seeing or hearing spoken word art and I found the host's opening performance powerful. Then after creating an open definition of hip hop, Kamilah Forbes, Executive Producer of Russell Simmons’ HBO Def Poetry Jam was introduced.

Most of what was discussed was eye-opening to me and created a number of interesting questions about art, culture, television and the line between artistic integrity and selling out to The Man. This series continues through the end of April; we hope to go back to experience and learn more.

Towards the end, the Q &A portion was starting to feel a little long, so we headed out to find something to fill our now grumbling bellies. Mary narrowed our choices down to getting a good burger, so we found it convenient to be so close to one of Madison’s favorite burger places, Dotty’s.


We quickly ordered some burgers, fries and beer and sat back to discuss the many questions and ideas recently created by the aforementioned lecture.

And thus ended another good date night.

italian dishes and indoor putt-putt

a couple of weeks ago now (i know, i know - late again!!), jon and i spent another exhausting monday wedding planning (less than 5 months to go!), and we needed a solid break to just hang out. so even though jon had hoped we'd go to the uw's distinguished lecture series, i put in my request to hang out with jon and jon alone. i mean, i can enjoy a good lecture most of the time, but i enjoy jon and jon alone all of the time (ooh, brownie points).

so jon rearranged his plans and drove us out to tutto pasta in middleton for a classic italian dinner.

my memories of tutto pasta are limited to first dates at their location on state street - big portions, small tables, and flirty smiles and conversations (i swear, if you weren't watching a game in the bar there, you were on a first date).

contrast that to middleton's tutto pasta - same big portions, but much larger tables and booths, and, well, it's middleton, so your customers are much more varied in age; and though i couldn't spot any first-daters from our vantage point in the the aforementioned ginormous booth, this is not to say that an older customer isn't on a first date. i just want to make that clear. god knows who for, i just don't want anyone taking issue with me (i had a long day yesterday).

but back to the point, so jon and i are sitting in this huge booth that felt like it could have been a private room all on its own had they just strung a curtain rod across the top or added on a dutch door. i love huge booths because they feel totally unnecessary to me. the rest of the room is relatively small (i admit, i was raised in the burbs, so i'm used to "big"). i'd say you'd max out at 125 in there (more if everyone squished into a booth?). the lighting was just right with candles glowing a warm orange and the crooning 50s era tunes suggested you enjoy your time and order another glass of wine. oh, the power of musical influence.

our college-age-ish waiter seemed pleased that his tip for the night would be taken from a bill including a bottle of wine, so he was really cool with us all night. i, for one, love a good waiter who interacts with his customers. i always like to ask waiters what they'd recommend from the menu (i think they really should know it best), and was pleased with my mozzarella, garlic, tomato penne (i have to admit that it wasn't a mouthwatering recipe and didn't thrill me, but, to be frank, i haven't been to very many italian restaurants that do create such masterpieces). jon ordered some sort of pesto penne, which i think would have tasted better had it not been such an unappetizing shade of green (yes, i know pesto is green anyway, but it was REALLY green).

after our leisurely dinner, we raced over to dick vitense's new indoor mini golf land. sadly, the course closes at 9 pm; happily, the golf attendant charged us half since we came about 15-20 minutes before close.

the new course is created to represent all of madison's major landmarks. if we hadn't been racing through there, i might have enjoyed reading about the creation of capitol building, or spending more time in the black light back hallway where vitense recognizes rhythm and booms. lakes mendota and monona are both prominently featured, each offering a distraction of remote controlled boats should you be playing a particularly shoddy game of mini-golf.

the staff at vitense was unusually gracious, allowing us to finish up our game a few minutes after 9. but with such an early finish to our dinner & mini-golf, what was there to do next?

and herein lies another reason why i enjoy dating jon so much: there's so little lag time between his ideas. so off we went to barnes and nobles for a few games of cribbage (it's officially beat out my love for euchre, i admit). we appreciated seeing the couple at the table next to us pull out their own cribbage board. if we see them again next week, maybe we'll invite them to join us ...

so we officially ended date night with that, since at 10:30 pm, jon had to be at breakaway playing a late game with his soccer team. i joined him, since it feels rather schoolgirlish to watch your boyfriend from the fan stands (and is a whole lot cooler than being a lame-o and going to bed before letterman even gets on the air).

*just a side note, i did feel pretty sick to my stomach later on that evening - which may have partly been due to the fact that huge chunks of mozzarella are probably not a good idea for my sensitive stomach. if you might lean that way, i suggest staying away from the cheesy selections on the menu.

language barriers and unexpected musical greatness

This past weekend Mary and I spent the weekend up north with nearly a hundred middle school students for our annual snow camp. Everything went well which means the students had a great time and did their best to avoid anything resembling sleep. This also meant that once again we arrived at another Monday exhausted. Both Mary and I love live music and as much as Madison seems to want to have a vibrant music scene we have yet to really experience it.

So we were excited to find out there was going to be a Monday night show happening at the Orpheum this week. Before we went to buy tickets we wandered down State St and stopped in at Himal Chuli for dinner. When we arrived we were the only costumers but within a few minutes of being there the place started to fill up. Within minutes we ordered, Mary something with chicken and mine was a beef. I wish I could remember the actual names but I couldn’t find an online menu. Soon after ordering we ran into a bit of a language barrier. After some discussion we both were pretty sure that dal is bread, it is not, and thought our service had forgotten to bring it, which of course she had not. So Mary bravely, since I was too much of a wuss to ask, went up and asked for ‘our dal, you know bread’. Within moments the server came out with two more cups of soup and when we looked confused and asked for bread she very kindly brought out a warm plate of pita bread smothered in butter. We felt pretty embarrassed but not so much as to not enjoy the food. Himal Chuli is another one of the great things about Madison that I never had a chance experiencing growing up in small town Wisconsin.

After dinner we walked back up the Orpheum to get tickets to the Brett Dennen show. A coworker, friend of mine had recommended this show a few weeks ago but neither of us had heard his music so didn’t know what to expect. It was good enough to have a place to go, kick back and unplug after a crazy weekend. We were in for a good surprise. We arrived at the Orpheum Stage Door Theater a little after 7 for the 8 show and were some of the first people there. When the doors opened we headed and found great seats in the third row. Within minutes the opener kicked things off and thus began nearly 3 ½ hours of music.

Brett Dennen’s music has a bit of Jack Johnson, Ben Harper feel from a musician that looks 14. Brett has a shaggy head of hair that I only wish I could have and knows how to perform to his audience. It was a good show and I would recommend checking them out if they ever end up back in Madison.

And so with the purchase of the group’s CD and a slippery walk back to our car another good date night came to an end.