Fins to the Left, Fins to the Right...

Bust out the margaritas, Jimmy Buffett is in town this weekend and he's causing my wife some chest pains. Buffett is my hero as his easy way and beach living lifestyle is something (if ever lucky enough) I hope to emulate one day. It's no secret I've been seeing one of his shows at least once a year since before I could drive and this Saturday he's heading to Tampa. I've been fortunate enough to see him in Tampa once before in November 2006 with Carrie and her cousin. Those two put on their own show and left me to the babysitting. I had tickets for a few months later when he was playing Alpine so I thought I would be okay only to invite my brother who also decided to put on his own show and required me to babysit him. So the score - Friends/relatives I'm handing out tickets to - 2, me - 0. So this year I'm looking to don my grass skirt and get a little tequila payback. I have had these tickets for ages patiently counting down the days until Jimmy rides his shark fin into town desperately nagging my better half to find a babysitter (for an actual baby this time) to watch Quentin. Nothing. Weeks pass and I'm still nagging. So here we are today, four days away from the momentous Summerzcool tour and still we haven't put out a feeler for who is going to watch our kid. Yikes. It's starting to look like that 150% mark up for these tickets on the internet is the investment I'm going to get out of this show. But, no, Jimmy needs me there singing along at his show. He needs to see me in a coconut bra. He needs me to spread Corona cheer across the land. Carrie needs to break herself of this motherly instinct and have parrothead date night. So if you know Carrie and especially if you are a mother please write her and tell her everything will be okay. A few hours of fun will not make her a bad mother. (In case you were wondering I'm very comfortable with the whole babysitter thing - as long as it's not a stranger - danger). I think Quentin's first words the other day were, "dada, buffett, coo, cooing." I think it's a sign.

If not it looks like one of us, and I did volunteer, will need to stay home. I volunteered today because it will take me a good 4 days to get over it. But I think it will set a good precedent and give us future date nights if we break the babysitter seal early. We do have quality folks around that could do it. He'll be sleeping for most of it. We have people coming into town for this show! We need a psychologist (pro-bono) to help her work through this (quickly) in the next four days. Know anyone?

Okay, got that off my chest. Quentin's got a nubber of a tooth. It looks like it will be his front bottom (my) left (his right) tooth. I'm sure that particular tooth has an actual name, but I was a history major and didn't make it to dental school. It's been trying to break the surface for about 3 days so we're hoping by the time our guests arrive on Friday he will have one pearly white to show off. He has tons of teething rings now and there isn't room in the freezer for the ice cream any more but that's good for our waistlines. I have attached a pic of Q's third plane ride and as you can see he fills out a Badger uniform quite nicely and was also very happy on the plane, which was good for us and the weary passengers next to us. Send your good babysitting, Buffett flip flop wearing hula skirt, margarita drowning, lei giving, sweet hawaiian shirt barely buttoned so your coconut bra shows wishes out to the mother of my child. Thanks and enjoy!

Happy Easter!

Quentin did very well on yet another plane ride. He may very well be a world traveler some day. We had an extremely turbulent ride home on the plane that bothered Carrie a great deal trying to hang on to such precious cargo while enduring an extremely bumpy ride. Quentin didn't mind a bit and barely made a sound the entire trip. It is a lot of gear to haul through an airport though, with child in-tow. You can check all the baby goods free of charge though, interestingly enough but not a single piece of your own luggage. Wouldn't it simply be a better system if they just charged everybody an extra $5 on their ticket so we could go back to checking luggage if we wanted to or not? What a monumental hassle for the airline to make a whopping $15. That must be the single greatest line item keeping them out of bankruptcy.

We had a blast in Wisconsin. We arrived in Milwaukee on Thursday and set to work on getting Quentin up to speed on euchre with the college fellas. He did alright but kept getting confused with the jacks. I soothed him by explaining it's a common error. He slept good at the Sloppy's and everyone had a good time catching up on old times enjoying delicious, hard to find Wisconsin beer and munchies. On Friday Carrie and Q headed off to Lake Geneva to visit with our immediate family while the boys attended Opening Day at Miller Park. We had a great time and won in exciting fashion as entering the 9th the Brew crew were down a run and rallied with a play at the plate to notch their last victory in the past 7 games. The victory was that much sweeter as we knocked off our hated rivals, the Cubs.

My folks threw a get to know Quentin party on Saturday and we had the extended Petrie posse and Spiegelhoff clan over for the evening. It made for some nice catching up and some photo ops. We were fortunate enough to get to see Quentin's great grandparents who were back in Wisconsin after wintering in California as well as several of his second cousins, great aunts and uncles. For Easter my we grilled out as Auntie M has an adverse reaction to hams. It was an interesting twist on Easter but another delicious meal we were happy to devour. The three grand kids got to go on an Easter egg hunt and had their own baskets, which allowed Carrie and I to steal the majority of Q's candy since he's not old enough to eat it. We had a real nice time and as usual had to go back to work all to soon. Thanks to everyone who came and visited and to my folks who cooked a ton of food. It's good to know I'm still number one at pinball. Enjoy the pics!

It's a man's weekend...sort of

Every year the fellas get together and attend opening day for the 2008 playoff making Milwaukee Brewers. This is our 9th consecutive year of getting together for the inaugural home game of the season. We have been going for as long as Miller Park has existed. This year the cherished man weekend happens to fall on Easter weekend creating a bit of a conundrum. It's tough to explain to your "new" family that you won't be making it this Easter because the mystical call of the Miller Park sirens are in your ear. Lesson one, generally learned shortly after the I do's, you don't get to ditch out on holidays to drink a few brewskies with the boys, who probably can't hang out anyway due to similar circumstances. Surprise! We're bringing the fam this year. Beginning tomorrow night, barring tragic travel snafus, Quentin will meet the boys for a little welcome back to college thirsty Thursday entertainment. I know things will be a wee bit different this year when I checked my email this morning and received a message from our fearless host letting me know that he is making a trip to Babies R' Us this evening and wanted to know if I needed him "to pick anything up for me." You know when your college roommate is asking to purchase some diapers for you in anticipation of your arrival it's not going to be the same man weekend it used to be. By the way he already has the pack and play set up and ready to go. Oh boy do times change! We will still have a blast and I do very much appreciate our extended Sloppy family for accommodating our ever expanding family.

My folks are throwing a hootenanny on Saturday night so Quentin can meet his extended Wisconsin family. He's been gearing up all week(end) mostly by practicing his regurgitation of his meals on our house guests. I warn all, wear a bib before holding on to him or bring a change (or two) of clothes for he will strike multiple times. Think of it as winning the lottery of love. Carrie's folks were here this past weekend and it was great for all of us. Carrie and I snuck away for a couple hours on Saturday to hit a few golf balls and grab some alone time. It was the first time we did something date-ish in about 4 months. As we were sitting there enjoying the sunshine I was thinking to myself why don't we do this more often? Oh, how easy it is to forget with just a few short hours of leave. I know this weekend will be the same. With all the people trying to get some Q-time we will probably miss him.

On a final unrelated note I stumbled across a news story regarding a $3 million mansion on the water complete with boat dock that is being raffled off down here in lovely Florida. I sent the link to buy tickets to several friends and the response was a little more positive than I expected so I am including the link here. Tickets are $10 a piece and they are selling 300,000. It's a better shot than winning the lottery. If anyone is curious the taxes were $34,000 last year. Quite reasonable for a free house on the water we thought. Check out the link at http://www.floridaluxuryauctions.com/. We are hoping to move to the other side of the state and get a boat. Feel free to crash after we move in. Attached is a pic of Quentin getting ready for baseball season. Enjoy the Easter weekend!