Tag: Norther Lights Qualifier

Pool play started at 8am but due to a miscommunication I arrived for a 9am start, so I missed the first match which they unfortunately lost to a local team from Minnesota. The first match was against the third seed in the whole tournament so the girls knew it would be a tough match. According to the other parents our team played very well and hung in with the bigger girls but could not pull it out in the end.

Since we lost the first one, the girls are were off for an hour then had to ref for an hour and did not get back to play until 11am. They then had to play back to back matches against a team from Texas and a team from California. Although they played hard, they lost both matches and were done with their day by 1pm.

 

 

Dinner tonight was scheduled for the Rainforest Cafe in the Mall of America so Jenna and I took advantage of the early finish and went over to see her great uncle Steve who lives with his wife Vicky near Minnetonka. Vicky is the author of books like 500 Things to Do With Baking Soda. You can find some of her books over at Bookpeddlers.

We were able to spend a relaxing 90 minutes with them which allowed Jenna to catch up as she had not seen them both since their wedding more than a year ago. Steve has been a wonderful influence on both my kids and I try and make sure we got to see them whenever we are in town. I have been back there a few times on business since their wedding, but this has been Jenna’s first chance. I will be back up there in July so my son can spend a little bonding time with Steve at a Sox/Twins game.

I had suggested that the girls take the light rail from downtown to the Mall of America as not many parents volunteered to drive the girls to dinner. Since Jen and I were doing family things we could not offer to drive. The two moms who went along took my advice and got the girls to the train and to the Mall an hour before dinner so they could do some shopping or for those who had never been here, just walk around and see it all.

I guess I am a little jaded as I have been here many times and I am just not that much of a shopper. We have Woodfield Mall which is about 35 minutes from my house and it has just as much shopping square footage as MoA but no amusement park, so if I get a hankering to spend, I can just go there. Some of the girls were looking for prom dresses which tells me either they like to leave things till the last minute and they have probably not thought about having to return the dress to Minnesota if their is a problem, unless they buy it from a store that has a presence in Illinois. Only one girl ended up buying a dress; all the other girls just enjoyed looking and commenting.

So it ended up being me and two moms at the bar with 12 girls at their own table. It had been a long time, probably 10 years since I had been to a Rainforest Cafe and I believe it was the one in Woodfield Mall. The kids were small then and that is just one of those places you take the kids for the things that go on around you during dinner. As I recall the food was ok and not really the reason you go there. Tonight though I was pleasantly surprised by the the items I ordered. I chose the soup/salad combo which paired a nice tomato basil soup and cranberry walnut salad. The soup was nice an hot with just the right acidity and a not at all overpowering taste of basil throughout. I can immediately tell if there is too much salt in something, as it starts to make me cough. Needless to say this was perfectly seasoned and I did not cough but did get the hiccups as I consumed the delicious starter way too fast.

The Jungle Chop Salad (cute name) was equally perfect with fresh greens, black olives, cucumbers, carrots, red cabbage, pecans, Blue cheese crumbles, dried cranberries and grilled chicken tossed in a raspberry vinaigrette. there was just enough dressing to lightly coat the lettuce leaves and the portion was enough to be filling in combination with the soup. Paired with a nice glass of wine it was a pleasant finish to a memorable day with my daughter. Although I was not at the table with her I could see her enjoying herself with the other girls just a few yards away.

A few of the other parents showed up after dinner so some of the girls took the train back to the city and the others hitched a ride with their parents. We offered to take some of the girls back to the hotel with us in the car but the ones who did not have a parent along decided to take the train back downtown.

Play does not start until 11 tomorrow (we have a bye for the first round) so getting back to the hotel at ten was acceptable. Off to bed.

The girls don’t start pool play till 3PM today so Jen and I started off with a nice walk around Minneapolis. The weather was a beautiful 58 and sunny just perfect for a nice stroll around the city. I get up here quite a bit on business so I was able to navigate around and show Jen some of the buildings and sites that I am familiar with. Matt and I are coming up here in July for the Twins Sox game so I wanted to take a walk over to the new Target field a check it out. Wow. Even from the outside it was a very impressive structure. We were able to stop in the gift shop and pick up an opening day shirt for Matt but that was all we could really see. Can’t wait for July. We made a quick Target stop for supplies and then went back to the hotel to meet the team for lunch ($5 foot longs for everyone).

 

The first match was against STC Xplosion a  team from St. Charles, Missouri. Both teams were pretty evenly matched as far as skill and size but in the end they out hustled us and we lost the match in two games. The next match went better against High voltage, a team from Texas. We won that one in three games. The final match of the day against Legacy Lightening from Michigan also ended in a victory for our girls. The girls took it to three games but outlasted the opponents and came away with the win.

The coach was in a foul mood today and she made the girls do pushups in the final match during the timeouts and after the game she made them run lines on the court and a full lap around the complex. It was funny hearing the comments from some of the other teams parents asking why the girls were running when they thought we had won the match. We did. Good thing they didn’t loose.

We all went back to the hotel and got cleaned up before the planned dinner. Tonight we had a reservation at ‘Hell’s Kitchen’ on 9th just off of Nicollet. Hell’s Kitchen reminded me of a cross between the House of Blues and Dick’s Last Resort. You enter off street level then take an elevator or stairs down (going into ‘Hell’) to the actual entrance. Once inside you are greeted with a funky combination of eclectic art, cabaret style seating in front of the stage (they have live music) and  cozy table in the main room and two ‘anti’ rooms.

The girls all sat at one table with the coach in the main room near the stage and the parents were ushered into the fireplace room away from the girls. We did not see them all night until a few of them showed up at our table asking for cash to pay their bill, which was the plan.

The food here was excellent. I thought Ted’s Montana Grill had the best Bison burger but this place has taken over as my choice for the best non beef burger. I ordered mine medium rare, with Blue Cheese and a side of Sweet Potato fries. They got the doneness just right which is not easy to do. At first look, the meat was brown all the way through but when you bit into the burger you then see just a tough of pink so it was perfect. If you have ever cooked bison, it can be tough to get the temperature or doneness correct. Since bison is so lean there is not much fat to make the burger moist. When we cook them we usually put a saucepan top over the meat when it is on the grill or griddle. This helps retain the moisture and makes for a nice burger. Other people will cut up sun dried tomatoes or other types of vegetables and mix them in with the meat to give the patty extra moisture.

Everyone at the table was complimentary towards the food and the wait staff. Highly recommended.

They also have awesome homemade peanut butter which I am getting all over the keyboard as I type this.

We got back to the hotel at about 11 so the girls had a quick team meeting to talk about tomorrow then we were all off to bed as they were pretty wiped out from the first day of play.

Tomorrow …pool play day two.

This weekend my daughter is participating in the 2010 Northern Lights volleyball qualifier in Minneapolis. We decided that instead of doing the normal flying thing, we would make a road trip out of it. Flying is of course more expensive but not only that, it is too quick. To quick you say? Yes too quick. When your kids get in high school and sometimes even in grade school, they have so many things going on that it is easy to loose track of them and what they are doing and becoming. Taking a nice long ride, 6 hours in this case, gives you a chance to find out what is going on in their lives and maybe do just a few silly things. Of course if you have a communication issue with your teen, then a 45 minute plane ride might be more attractive to you. If that is the case I still suggest you bite the bullet and make an effort to reconnect.

Driving through the outer reaches of Wisconsin there is not much choice in the way of radio stations. You either have country or strangely enough 70’s and 80’s music, with the later getting the thumbs up from me. Normally Jen will bring her own device full of music, but in my vehicle I only have an iPod connector that I installed about 2 years ago when I bought the car. We are both moving away from the Apple ecosystem (being a techy I don’t like being told what I can and cannot do to or put on my device, but I will leave that for another post) so Jen had her Zune HD and I had my soon to be replaced by the HTC Incredible, iPhone with mostly podcasts on it. We were soon into a game of guess that artist/tune on the ‘Classic’ rock station (if that is classic music then I guess I am considered a classic too but I will have to confirm that with my wife). I have made some effort over the years to introduce my kids to the ‘good’ music of the 60’s thru the 80’s, minus most of the hair bands. Jen is already a fan of AC/DC, The Who, Springsteen, The Beatles etc so she did very well in guessing most of the artists and only fell short when dipping back into the early 70’s for Badfinger, T-Rex and late 70’s for Rupert Holmes (who doesn’t like Pina Colada’s).

My Facebook friends are familiar with a game I like to play called ‘Where In The World Am I?’, that involves me posting a picture and having people guess the location. I play this game to remind people that there is so much to see in our everyday lives and travels. We are in such a hurry that we miss many interesting things along the way and I was very guilty of this before I started the game.

 

On this road trip we stopped just outside Black River Falls, WI for a bio break so I thought I would look for an item to post as a clue for the game. As luck would have it there were a few items to choose from and I finally decided to use the the Passenger Pigeon marker as kind of a tribute to earth day. The marker explains that all the passenger pigeons have become extinct and infers that we should take a step back and look at what we are doing to the earth and the creatures that live on it.

 

 

One of my other choices for a clue was a sign that commemorated the Black River Falls Forest Fire that happened in 1977. This one was a bit ironic as we came upon a huge fire later that evening near Menomonie, WI. I only had my point and shoot with me so I was unable to get a good close up shot but the some and orange glow was visible for miles.

 

I wanted to get out of the car and take some better shots with the DSLR but I-94 was pretty busy with truck traffic and there was not much of a shoulder to stop the car on. Oh well, still exciting.

The rest of the ride was uneventful and we pulled into the hotel at about 10:30. We stayed at this DoubleTree 3 years ago when we were here for the same tournament. Nice enough property for the price, right on Nicollet and 11th so only a few blocks from the volleyball venue and the light rail to the airport and Mall of America (we are with teenage girls who want to shop).

Tomorrow we start play. Good luck IPV.