The Olympics come to a close on Sunday night, and I think it's finally time we discuss what everyone has been talking about during these games....Ryan Hot-te...excuse me, Lochte. Now, in my mind there are two Ryan's:
1) The swimmer:
2) Giant d-bag:
I wish the two were mutually exclusive and I could just pick the swimmer at all times. Sadly, I get the vibe there is more giant d-bag than swimmer going on over here.
I pretend that Ryan #2 does not exist. Ryan #1 would never say things like "Jeah!"(I'm sorry, was the 'y' key too far away for you?), or wear a grill, or go to the University of Florida (sorry Gator fans).
How am I an expert on Ryan #2 you ask? I pretty much dated Ryan #2 types several times in college and partied with his type on Kingsley Court at good ole Illinois State. If he were there I can guarantee he would be in a baby pink polo shirt (collar popped, naturally), hair gelled to perfection, and some kind of ridiculous footwear. He'd also be an SAE, just sayin'. I'd also be the girl going "Oh, did you want another beer?" to which he would say "Jeah!". Sigh...silly college girl.
I know I'm not the only one that feels this way about Ryan, have you read the post by Erin Gloria Ryan on Jezebel? Priceless. The newly acquired medals will only add fuel to this ever growing blinged out fire. Rumor has it he's planning to go to Rio as well, which will only make the situation worse. Ugh, don't get me started on Rio...
Anyhow...the whole Lochte duo befuddles me. I am so distracted by this:
That I can somewhat overlook this:
I said somewhat! Those glasses are totally ridiculous. Am I the only one having this internal battle? Please tell me you struggle with the Lochte duo as well.
The weather has finally warmed up, and most of tourists are gone (minus the Brazilians who I am positive are rubbing in the fact that they got the Olympics over Chicago, yup still bitter) so yesterday we decided to take the kiddos to Animal Kingdom. I have to say this is by far their favorite park, they love animals and everything there seems to keep in mind that most kids are in strollers. As soon as I put their shoes on, they headed to the door and were ready to go.
We happened to plan it just right that when we got there we were able to see the Festival of the Lion King show back in Camp Minnie Mickey. The last time Scott and I saw this show it was still in an open air auditorium, yeah, it's been a while.
It was no surprise that the kids loved the show, we have the soundtrack to the Broadway version which they love, and well, Jill is part South African in spirit. Aaron was fascinated with Timon and Pumba being right next to us and Jill waved hi to all the performers. You forget the level of talent that is at Disney sometimes, it's amazing.
After the show emptied out we hung out in the Camp Minnie Mickey area to see some of the characters, plus one of our friends is "friends" with Mickey and Minnie so we wanted to do photos with her. I have to say we are really lucky because the kids love the characters! I think their favorite yesterday was Donald, and he was great! He gave the kids a ton of kisses and before we left Jill gave him one too!
So after seeing all of those characters we waited around to see our friend, Scott thought she was going to be hanging out with Minnie around noon so we hopped in that line. When we got up there we were like huh, interesting, she's not really fussing over the kids. Come to find out she was hanging out with Mickey, not Minnie and Scott and I need to relearn how to read. Oh well, we still got a cute picture!
Since the park wasn't that crowded we were able to go to our new favorite sit down restaurant in the park, Yak and Yeti. It is so yummy! If you like Asian food, you need to go. I'm not a beef eater, but Scott had their Kobe beef burger and said it was to die for! The kids did really well too, which I'll be honest, was surprising because it was nap time.
After lunch we went back on the trek to see some animals and kill time before the bird show. Now, here is something I don't understand, where the tigers are located they are several and I mean SEVERAL windows that you can look through to see them, how is it that my children managed to see none? Oh simple, because everyone congregated in front of the main window to see the tigers and would not anyone get close. Ok people, it's a stroller, you can see over it! Scott was able to take great pictures even though he wasn't right at the window, so what's the problem? But they did get to see all the other animals and were really excited about that.
Since they had been so good at that point during the day we figured we would reward them with some cookies. Scott decided to get them chocolate chip instead of the usual sugar (maybe because he likes chocolate chip better?) and really, the kids weren't all about it. They like the sugar cookies better, but they did nibble a little bit of it before we went to see Flights of Wonder.
I really thought the kids would like the Flights of Wonder show since it is all about birds, but I forgot how "informative" it is rather than super entertaining. The kids created their own entertainment though and still managed to have a great time! They even got some "awes" out of everyone around us by giving each other hugs.
The kiddos were still going pretty strong at this point so we thought we would head over to the Pangani trail to see the gorillas and then call it a day. On the way in I actually took a moment to read the sign and you have to read the quote, it's so true.
Definitely something to keep in mind, right? It was a great day (minus the Olympic hosting Brazilians, I'm working on my bitterness), beautiful weather and awesome animals.
Scott and I got to go to Food and Wine at EPCOT last night. Being the foodies (and slightly winos) that we are we were excited to try some new and yummy food. The best part about this is all the food is served tapas style, so you get to sample all the foods without committing to a large dish. Our biggest problem whenever we go to this is determining where to start.
This year we decided to start on the right hand side with Santiago, Chile. The logic behind this was they had a rock shrimp ceviche and I figured that if I had a few glasses of wine I would more than likely up chuck the ceviche. The ceviche was really yummy, Scott thought it was somewhat spicy, but if you mixed it with the popcorn on top it was wasn't bad at all.
Our next stop was Athens, Greece. Scott had the spanakopita (spinach and feta cheese in a phyllo crust) and I had the chicken souvlaki with tzatziki in a warm pita (wayyyyyyyyyyyyy delicious). In Wellington, New Zeland we had a seared scallop with vegetable slaw (the scallop was perfect) and a lamb slider with tomato chutney (yummy!). In Cork, Ireland we had a scallop and lobster fisherman's pie (way to hot for a 90 degree day but yummy nonetheless). Next we went to Paris and had Cabernet short ribs with mashed potatoes. This was by far the most savory yummy dish we had! The ribs were inside the potatoes and it was just like a little bite of heaven each time, see:
At this point we definitely needed to take a food break so we went to watch the film about France. Now, I love this film, it's beautiful and the music is amazing, however the film was made when EPCOT opened and is in serious need of being updated. But other than that it is beautiful and I highly recommend it.
We got back into the food in Toyko, Japan (I was thinking of boycotting them because they got more votes than Chicago, but I really wanted sushi). Scott has never had sushi so I figured this would be a great way to start. We split a California roll, and much to my surprise, Scott totally loved it!
Next up was New Orleans, Lousiana, which is like the mother land to Scott (no joke). They had one of his favorite dishes Crawfish Étouffée. I'm going to be very serious here, I was lucky to get a bite of this dish. It's a good thing I got my own chicken and andouille gumbo otherwise I would have not eaten in New Orleans. And what's even better is he talked about the crawfish all the way to the park exit. All that amazing food and he was in love with the crawfish.
While enjoying our food from New Orleans we got to watch En Vogue (for reals).
Funny thing about them being there was Lani and I were just talking about them because they are on one of the Sesame Street DVDs. Now here's the ultimate photo, notice the fist pump from the guy. I had no idea "Free your mind" had that big of an impact on people:
Vienna, Austria was up next. We had Goulash mit Servietten Knoedel (Paprika Beef Stew, Bacon Dumpling) because anything with bacon immediately makes it delicious.
Next up was Bologna, Italy. Now, here's my beef with the Italy booth, it's all stereotypical Italian food, meatballs, cannelloni and pizza (we had the meatballs in case you were wondering, haha). I really want them to do traditional Italian food, but have a feeling it wouldn't go over as well as the meatballs and such. As a total side note I took 3 or 4 semesters of Italian when I was in college and am always overcome with sheer panic when I'm in the Italian pavilion. I love to listen to the cast members talk, but have the fear that I will laugh too loud and they will realize that I know what they are saying and then try to talk to me. Yeah, my Italian is pretty rough now and I would need at least 3 or 4 glasses of Prosecco prior to responding to them.
After the Italian adventure we went to Munich, Germany and had apple struedel. It's so good, I get it everytime we are there. If I had to eat one thing for the rest of my life, it would be apple struedel, I am so not kidding.
Next up was Cape Town, South Africa where we had a beef tenderloin with sweet potato purree and mango barbeque sauce. It was heavenly and Scott now wants to recreate the sauce.
Shanghai, China was next and Scott desperately wanted to show off his mad Chinese speaking skills (all learned from Ni hao Kai-lan) but chickened out. We had pork pot stickers there and I showed off my mad chop stick skills (yeah I'm being sarcastic here, I can't eat with chop sticks to save my life), see:After China we went to my mother land, Krakow, Poland. Like a good Polish girl I got the kielbasa and potato pierogi (with sour cream, naturally). It was good, Dad's homemade kielbasa is better, and Grandma's pierogi's are better, but in a pinch this works.
We hit up Barcelona, Spain next (I didn't boycott because Madrid was the one that tried to get the Olympics, not Barcelona). Now, the guy working the register at this one was...well...he had no business being there. He had no idea what he was doing and honestly I think we got our food free (not that I'm complaining). We did the taste of Spain which was serrano ham, chorizo, manchego, olives, and tomato bread. It was really yummy.
Our last stop was the Mouse Catch which featured cheeses from the Netherlands, Spain and Italy. We tried all three cheeses which were really yummy. Fun fact, across the way from Mouse Catch was Rio de Janiero, you know where people dress like this and get the Olympics:
Sorry, I'm still bitter, and definitely boycotted them.
At this point we were stuffed and decided to ride Spaceship Earth (with my phone safely tucked in my purse) and go home. It was a great night, and I think I'm still stuffed. My only regret of the night is not taking this photo BEFORE eating all that food:
Hope you had a great weekend! Stop by Multiples and More today to read a really touching twins story.
It has come to my attention that the fine city of Chicago was eliminated from the running to host the 2016 Olympic Summer Games, and that instead you have chosen to go with Rio. I understand South America has never hosted an Olympic Game before, but really, you passed up on Chicago??? Really?! Chicago is an amazing city, focused on all types of sports. We have several complexes already and would need to do minimal construction. Plus, as an added bonus, the city is situated on beautiful Lake Michigan. It makes me wonder why you dropped us, first nonetheless. I cannot believe you dropped us before Toyko, no offense Japan.
I felt we had a strong campaign and made quite the effort. Is it because we don't have women that walk around in this: I see how this would make you lean towards Brazil, however I feel if you had seen this, you would have changed your mind:Conservative, right?! That way we would not offend other countries, like say in the Middle East. Bet you didn't think of that IOC! Ha!
Is it because Brazil brought Pele to help campaign? What, is Oprah not good enough anymore?!
Or, is it simply because we are the birthplace of this person:We cannot apologize anymore IOC! We thought by sending her to New York the curse would be broken.
Now I urge you to reconsider you choice. If you would like I can prepare a power point presentation with graphs and flow charts that would be narrated by my father (so you can get used to the accent and language). I would also be willing to send a deep dish pizza as a bribe, just saying.
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