Possible World Record

I know I've been out of the workforce for awhile, but there's still a level of expectation for fancy hotels in my mind. Yes. I'm out of town on a business trip stuck at a conference in a fancy hotel in Dallas. Not exactly a prime vacation spot. Though the weather is beautiful and refreshing, I'm mostly stuck indoors. During a restroom break, I turn to send the water down the unknown path to the sewer. I look up noticing the ceilings are high and there is a ledge with lighting shining at the ceiling illuminating a gigantic...

daddy long legs spider. I'm pretty sure it was triple the size of the one in the photo to the left. I know it was in an odd location, but I expected a little more from a fancy hotel. Especially since he looked like he had made a home for himself and I had seen him two days in a row. It was a little creepy. Maybe Texas just has bigger daddy long leg spiders than Wisconsin. I swear it could've been a world record size spider.


Have a great day!

Grapes

According to Wikipedia, "the process of fermentation in winemaking turns grape juice into an alcoholic beverage. During fermentation, yeasts interact with sugars in the juice to create ethanol, commonly known as ethyl alcohol, and carbon dioxide (as a by-product). In winemaking, the temperature and speed of fermentation are important considerations as well as the levels of oxygen present is a must at the start of the fermentation. The risk of stuck fermentation and the development of several wine faults can also occur during this stage, which can last anywhere from 5 to 14 days for primary fermentation and potentially another 5 to 10 days for a secondary fermentation. Fermentation may be done in stainless steel tanks, which is common with many white wines like Riesling, in an open wooden vat, inside a wine barrel and inside the wine bottle itself as in the production of many sparkling wines."

Grapes

Check

Over 95 degree inside car temperature

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5 to 14 days

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Small plastic container hidden under the back seat

Check

The last part of the process is where my children failed the winemaking recipe experiment. Since there was no stainless steal vat or wooden barrel, the carbon dioxide by-product escaped the plastic container filling the inside of my car with a lovely, putrid smell of fermenting grapes. 

Insanity at the highest level...well at least for the Midwest

In between four soccer games this weekend, the Handyman and I completed the Tough Mudder course along with some friends. For those who don't know what Tough Mudder is, it's a 11.8 mile run/obstacle course including water, mud, fire, and occasional electrical shock obstacles. My favorite obstacle is shown below. What a thrill!

Anyway, I brow-beated the Handyman into doing this with me. If he was telling this story, he would probably tell you I threatened to divorce him if he didn't participate. It's my story so I deny any threats.

Though running isn't the Handyman's thing (he hasn't ran since high school when he used to play soccer), I still needed him to participate to help with the obstacles. My upper body strength has declined as I've gotten older, but he still has an unnatural ability to leap human size hay bales, push my body up over a two story wall, and carry another human (I'm that human) while running a 50 yard dash. Which leads me to believe if you combined his strength and my running endurance into one person, we would be the ultimate competitor (we have hope for our children). As much as he complained about the running (more like a combination of jogging and walking), I have to give him credit for completing the whole course with me. He admitted after it was all done he had fun. Not that he would ever do it again he still had fun. I had fun too! He even admitted that my friend and I were tough. Hooah!

Though I had fun, I have to tell you I thought the course was poorly set up. For the first six miles, there was probably only one big obstacle. Now to be fair it was raining and they did shut down a big obstacle due to lightening (understandable). All of the really cool obstacles were at the end when you were the most tired, muddy, and soaked. I would've liked to have seen them evenly spread out throughout the course. The other disappointment was that they repeated some of the smaller obstacles. Once you do one obstacle, you don't want to repeat it. You want a new challenge. A lot of other participants thought the same as us. Either way the outcome was good, no one in our group got hurt and we had fun.

What was harder the marathon or Tough Mudder?  Definitely the marathon.

Would I do Tough Mudder again?  Probably not. Once was good enough. Another check off the bucket list.

Hooah!