Trans-Siberian Orchestra

As an early birthday present, Tim's parents got me tickets to see the Trans-Siberian Orchestra in Madison yesterday (thank you so much!). For those who don't know, this is a talented group of musicians and singers that play the rock band verison (not the video game, but real rock music) of classical songs. Think Beethoven with an electric guitar and an electric violin... it's awesome! Overall the show was good, but Tim and I were a bit disapointed by the first half. The show in Madison was their Christmas show, which meant that instead of the rock songs we were expecting, it was set up like a Church Christmas show... a narrator told a happy story with a merry ending, ballads, a little jazz. Overall much calmer and quieter music than we were expecting. They are an incredibly talented group of musicans and singers, so it was still amazing, just not quite what we had anticipated.

The show lasted about 2 hours (or so we thought), and then they decided to play us a few songs from their new album Nightcastle. And by a few songs, they played for an additional hour (make that 3 hours total)!! But FINALLY they started playing the rock songs we had anticipated! Not to mention their highly choreographed light show with lazers, fire, and a stage that lifted into the air! They had dueling guitars, dueling violins, flashing video screens, and did I mention fire?! It was a really awesome show! Here are a few pictures from the night, and a video so you can see the mayhem that ensued! I took the best pictures I could considering I'm no professional and I wasn't allowed to use a flash. Bare with me!

The Narrator who told the Christmas Story: something about two men, a snow storm, and a good (alcoholic) beverage. Because what Christmas story doesn't begin at a bar?!



One of the many effects from the moving lights and video screens.



Yay electric violins! And another awesome example of their light show.



They filled the Kohl Center with smoke so that they could shoot the lazers across the entire venue. It was a pretty cool effect, though I hope my retinas didn't suffer too much! You can't see much else in this picture.

Parts of the stage being lifted into the air!



Guitar solo, vocal backup, drums in the back, and more lazers!

Dueling guitars. They competed for who had the better half of the audience by performing and then getting us to cheer. It was pretty funny!



Suddenly they moved from the main stage to a hidden stage right in front of us that air lifted off the ground (possibly with the help of the ropes attached to the ceiling!).

This is one hell of a way to end a show! Lights, lazers, fire, electric instruments, and flying performers. Seriously, what more could you want?!

Well, so much for the video, I can't figure out how to upload it. One day I'll figure out all the little tricks to Blogger, but for now, trust me it was a cool show!

Cooper Pictures

I haven't posted some of the funny pictures of Cooper in a while, so here is a bit of what our crazy furry child has been up to!


Me messing with Cooper, and Coop smelling Tim's shoes (bleh!)

Tired puppies are good puppies!

Coop all stretched out and chewing on his lizard!

Making Pizza!

Since I moved away from home, one of the most traumatic things was realizing no one was cooking for me anymore! Don't get me wrong, I miss my parents very much, but if you grew up with their home cooking, you'd miss that A LOT too! Ever since I moved out of the dorms I've been doing my best to reproduce my parents cooking. For the most part it wasn't too hard, considering that I LOVE to cook and I had great role models willing to share their secret recipes. But of all the things I could make to remind me of home, one thing I couldn't make was my dad's pizza. His pizza was required (yes, it was assumed it would be made) whenever my high school friends came over and was a stable of my childhood (correction: life). I never ate a frozen pizza or ordered a pizza a day in my life until I left home (and frozen pizza just sucks).

So what's been holding me back? Well, pizza dough is much easier to make with a bread machine (expensive), and pizza requires other accessories like a pizza stone and a pizza peel. Well recently Tim and I had a little thing called a wedding, and all the things that we needed to make our own pizza were suddently available! So tonight we made our first pizza from scratch (with special thanks to the bread machine)!


Me with the before pizza, in case something happened to it while it cooked we would at least would have one picture of our attempt!


Tim with the finished product!

We decided that for a first try it was pretty good, but not quite at the grand master level. It was yummy though!

I also realize that since I have dedicated an entire blog to one of my dad's specialties, a future blog will need to be dedicated to my one of my mom's specialties! More to come!

Halloween!

Halloween started for us when Tim's parents sent us Halloween candy! They also sent Cooper a Halloween bone, and he was SOOO HAPPY! He chewed that bone until it disappeared!



For those who don't know, Halloween is kind of a big deal here in Madison. There is a street downtown called State Street, with bars and restaurants and shops, and only buses, taxis, police and cyclists are allowed onto the road. It's a neat place, about a mile long, and it leads right up to the Capitol. It's a popular place not just for students but for residents of the city as well. And on Halloween it is where 40,000 people gather in costume! When I was in college, Halloween was a bit out of control, with store windows being broken, riots breaking out, etc. No one was ever hurt, but they decided to make "Freakfest" a closed event and started charging entrance to the street after 7pm. To make it more interesting, they started having bands play and putting food vendors on the streets.

It sounds cool, but unfortunately I'm a bit halloweened out having been here for so many years, and dealing with drunks on State Street has lost its appeal (yes, I'm old and married and old). Instead this year I went to a few parties with the graduate students in my program. Tim unfortunately was given the schedule from hell, and had to work Friday 4-10, Saturday 8-2, 3-6, and cover a sporting event that night, and Sunday 9-7. Needless to say he was not able to come out on Halloween. I went to 2 parties that weekend, and here are a few pictures from them (oh year, I dressed up as a genie, gypsy, something):

The first year CMP students (missing Utibe!), and myself and Danielle

Lyndsae and Toni, devil and rockstar

Danielle and Lyndase and Bob Marley, and Toni and the boy

It was a fun weekend, although I did call it quits early so I could come home and be old with Tim and watch TV (slacker didn't want to come out). That's ok, I forgive him, I would not have wanted to either! It was a fun weekend though!

Birthdays and Visitors

The month of October was a big birthday month for us. Although these are all quite belated, I would like to wish a happy birthday to Tim's dad John (October 5), my dad and Tim's mom Jennifer (October 7), and a happy anniversary to my parents (October 9). I would also like to wish a happy birthday to all of the September and October birthdays of our friends (there are far too many to name, and I don't want to deal with the awkward situation of leaving one out)!

In addition to all these birthdays, Tim and I have had visitors the past 3 weekends in a row! Three weeks ago, Tim's parents came down to visit us. It's always good to see them, especially since they spoil us by taking us out to eat and grocery shopping. We had a wonderful weekend with them. The following weekend our college friends Ben and Alex came down to attend the Iowa Wisconsin football game with Ben's dad (who flew in all the way from Oregon to see the game). They had a great time showing his dad and his buddy around Madison, and we got to see Ben and Alex! Last weekend we had a big group down to Madison just for hell of it. There was lots of drinking, lots of football watching, and lots of $1 bets placed on completely absurd things. Oh yeah, and if I was as good at real bowling as I am at Wii bowling, I'd be a rockstar (alas, that is not how the world works; maybe they can make a Wii Scientist to boost my ego too).

And coming up this weekend is Halloween, which is a city wide drunken celebration! I'm sure some entertaining pictures are to come!

Congratulations Dan and Sarah!

Tim's brother Dan recently proposed to his girlfriend Sarah! We are so excited for them! They are getting married next September, and have already started to make plans. Yay, and congratulations!

Wofford Football Game

Who has ever heard of Wofford College? We sure hadn't! But Dan's boss actually claimed to have gone to this school, and low and behold our football team was playing his team! So Dan's boss was coming down to Madison to see a football game, and Dan decided to come to the football game, and he brought with him Sarah, Katie, Beth, Brad, Ben, and Alex! Tim and I had not yet been to a football game since the season started, but Tim had the entire weekend off and we planned on spending that drinking with good company and watching our Badgers! Luckily we won, but not by much. It was a great weekend, and it was great to see so many of our college friends. Here are a few pictures from the weekend:


The girls posing with a cutout of Bucky Badger.



We played a lot of baseball and beanbags.



Katie kept score because she broke her wrist and throwing was tough with a cast on (but still managed to help us win in beanbags!).



One of my friends from gradschool game with us too. She asked me to share half a brat with her, and I took my half... in one bite (my hands were full maybe?). Didn't quite think that one through!

Sarah with her stellar beer... mmmm Miller Lite!

Without a mouth full of brat, but confused?

Part of our group at the game!

Tim and myself!