Rockford, in the Rain

Welcome back, readers.

So, weeks ago, Kris and I had planned on an overnight trip down to Rockford to hang out with my best friend, Black Paul, and his wife, Sam, and their daughter, Delia. Kris was set upon seeing some kinda lantern thingy (think Tangled, I guess) at the local zoo down there, but unfortunately with Alayna's end of the school year plans, we weren't able to head down there until Saturday (today.) At that point, the lantern event was over and done with, so she reluctantly relented on pushing for it.

Rockford Brewing - one of those places I'm always cool with visiting here. 

BP suggested going to the beach at Muskegon instead, making a day trip out of it, which we were totally on board with. Unfortunately, the weather ended up being downright crappy this weekend - it rained almost non-stop Saturday and Sunday, and so the beach idea, too, was shelved. We still planned on going downstate to hang out with them - they always come up to visit us, for our Halloween parties, etc. so it was only fair we return the favor - and basically resigned ourselves to just going along with the flow.

I had some roasted chicken falafel wrap thing that was super good. . .

Upon arrival, around 1pm, everyone was hungry and we ended up over at Rockford Brewing for some lunch, some beers, and some strategizing for how the rest of the day would pan out. I'll cut this short and just let the pics and video do the talking folks, you know the drill around these parts.

Enjoy. . .

So at lunch we decided that Kris and Sam would take Abby and Delia (Alayna stayed behind in Midland because her friends' annual, end-of-school-year party had been switched to Saturday, after all that re-planning on our part) shopping around downtown Rockford to hit up some local shops and boutiques. This freed up The Knights of Pokemon to head into downtown Grand Rapids to check out the area's greatest vinyl record store (which I was obviously totally cool with.)

Vertigo Music. BP's talked about this place before, and the last couple times we've hit up record stores in Rockford they've been the smaller, shittier ones. This one had a ridiculous selection to choose from, and I could have spent hours in there.

There's a sweet spot when it comes to buy records in a store, though. See, while this place had a ridiculous amount of new vinyl on hand, and they were below the Discogs asking price, they seemed to hover around what you could get them for on, say, Amazon. I have sooo many records these days that I'm only hunting down a few, elusive albums for my collection, so I can't just waltz into a place and come out with an armload of new records without purging once I get home. I couldn't find any of the albums I wanted off my to-buy list among the 'new' section, so I went into the 'used' vinyl. Their prices for used vinyl was beyond stupid - only a couple bucks cheaper than the new versions, which is absolutely absurd. I ended up walking out of their with one, new album (from Calexico), so it wasn't a total wash, but still - kind of a let down.

While BP (who ended up walking out with four albums) and I were shopping for vinyl, Kris and Abby and the DeBoers bounced around different shops, checking stuff out. At some point, I guess, there was some kinda loom or something? I'm not sure where this is, or what that's doing there, or anything - I just pulled pics off Kris' phone, folks.

After an hour or so, BP left Vertigo Music. I'd definitely return  to this one, but my expectations would be adjusted for sure.

Heading back to the car, in the rain.

We met Kris and the others back at the DeBoer residence, where BP and I re-sleeved his new acquisitions and tested the out on his turntable. His collection is coming along, but he's not looking to expand past the cabinet he has here, so he's more or less in the same situation as I am (just on a much smaller scale, obviously.)

After an hour or so back at their house, we decided to head back into downtown Rockford to do something else.

BP has told me before - multiple times - about this retro, arcade spot in Rockford that he and Delia frequent from time to time, and suggested we hit it up (knowing my affection for old videogames from my childhood.)

So this joint, Pinball Land, is a pay-by-the-hour venue, which is honestly way better than nickle-and-diming you to pay per machine (I wish Brinstar in Midland was more like this, honestly.) 

We all paid $7 per person for an hour's worth of unlimited game time, which - if you do the math - is cheaper than what you'd pay if you were paying 25 or 50 cents per play anyway (the fancier games sometimes charge $1 per play, too.)

Kris and Abby battle it out in Street Fighter II

Whooped Abby's ass in this head-to-head driving simulator (which, by the way, would have been one of those $1-per-play games back in the day, 100%.)

I was excited to come across this nefarious relic from my Showbiz Pizza Place days. Good to see it's still nearly IMPOSSIBLE to play as ever (I couldn't advance past the first five seconds of the game, still can't play it for shit.) You should Youtube this bullshit and see for yourself how emotionally scarring this game is.

They have a couple different rooms in this joint, filled with retro arcade games, pinball games, and larger more-immersive setups (like the head-to-head racing games Abby and I were playing earlier.)

Sam and Kris, playing some pinball.

Abby and Delia race each other on motorcycles. . .

Yes, they even have a game based on cornhole (or, 'bags' as they call it. . . for whatever stupid reason.)

This games was definitely harder than the real thing, and I'm not even all that great at that.

Kris tries out X-Men (the options for which X-Man you got to be were super lame, though - no Gambit?!)

Sam and Abby try out some Dance Revolution game thing.

I had Abby play me in one of the greatest retro arcade games of all time, NBA Jam. I'm not even a sports guy (as you know), but everyone needs to respect a classic.

After the arcade, Kris, Sam and the girls headed back to the DeBoer residence while BP and I ran out to pick up a couple pizzas (neither of us were that hungry, but womenfolk were starting to get there.)  Along the way, we snapped a pic to send to Kimmel - the third piece of our Triforce - who unfortunately couldn't be there to hang out with us

Back the house, as folks began to dig into pizza, we put on The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers ('cause it's BP and I, for Christ's sake), and BP and I cracked a couple beers. I had brought along my travel cooler filled with a couple hand-selected craft beers for this evening, the first of which being this one. It was. . . okay. Kinda pissed I spent money on it, actually.

BP used this time to continue working on one of his 'Treat Yo'Self' purchases from the last couple months - a Lego Rivendell (from Lord of the Rings) set, which consists of thousands of pieces and multiple bags of pieces. The price tag of this thing rivals some of my nicer swords, folks.

Abby and her damn selfies. . . she's as bad as her mom.

Nothing to see here, folks - just adult men in their 40's playing with Lego. . .

This set came with a dozen or so figures from the movie (the first installment of the trilogy, obviously) including these three - Sam, Frodo, and old-ass Bilbo.

This was a pretty run-of-the-mill pilsner - similar to a Bud Lite - but for $4 for a four pack of 16oz tall boys, and considering the cool can design, it was kinda hard to pass it up.

We went at this for a couple hours, things got dicey from time to time. I can't imagine these more deluxe sets are geared towards children, we were having a hell of a time.

About 20% done at this point, and we never came close to finishing the set while we were down there - we stopped shortly after this roof was accomplished. Around 11pm, the womenfolk all went to bed, with BP and I following suit about an hour or two later. In the morning, after a quick breakfast and coffee, we said our farewells to the DeBoers and headed back up north for home, a fun lil' day trip downstate in the books.

- Brian

Septembre

Bourbon hangout out at the Larsons' place.

Hey guys.

Well, we finally had ourselves a quasi-boring month - the first since, like, April probably. 

With the school year in full-swing, and not a whole hell of a lot on the calendar in terms of big plans, this month was a much needed calm between the insanity of our Summer months and the insanity of the upcoming Halloween/Christmas holiday season coming down the pipeline. We had some pom games, some school activities, some of the usual friend hang-outs on the weekends, a random last-minute concert with BP, but - aside from Labor Day and Homecoming - all more of the same ol', same ol'.

Anyway, here's your random assortment of pictures and videos from the Houghs.  

Enjoy.

The Larsons invited folks over to their house the first weekend of the month to hang out on their back patio and enjoy some fireside drinks (well, technically dinner as well, but we rolled in after they wrapped up eating.) Morgan broke out a try of his bourbons - some of them acquired on our recent Brocation adventure last month. This one is pretty solid.

Heaven Hill was a cool distillery, but its taste - at least to me - isn't as good as some of the other ones we visited.

This isn't a bourbon, but a rum - probably one of the only rums I've ever had that you could actually sip neat, or on ice, without a mixer.

Four Roses is a solid bourbon, but pretty middle-of-the-road compared to some of the others we sampled on our trip south last month.

Woodford Reserve is probably my favorite bourbon that I tried on Brocation - would highly recommend to anyone.

Morgan and Erik, enjoying some Woodford.

Our spouses - and Amy - sat nearby at a neighboring seating area, clucking away.

Weller I hadn't had before (I don't think), but it was pretty good. 

Omkar showed up towards the end of the evening, his family in tow. No idea what Erik's doing in the background by the fire.

Danielle, Kris, Amy, Deanna, and Courtney

Another one of my Brocation favorites (sadly we didn't get to tour this distillery, just pop in for drinks.)

Meanwhile, this is what the kids were all up to in the basement. Who knows.

After dropping off Ella at her house once we had returned from Eight Point Lake for the Labor Day Weekend, Kris drove the van back to our house with the van windows down so that Samson could take advantage of the breeze.

Later that evening, Abby showcased her ridiculous-for-her-age strength and ran Kris around the house on her back. Scoliosis be damned.

Zooooooooooommmm

Later that weekend, Kris took Alayna Homecoming dress-shopping in Saginaw. . . for like six hours. After multiple stops and countless tryings-on, Alayna selected this one (which, ironically, was one of the first ones she put on. . . which I find hilarious.)

Showing off the strappy back of the dress.

The following Friday, the girls were dropped off at Midland High for a home game (it's awesome that they're old enough where we're not obligated to stick around for the entire thing anymore - football games are beyond boring.)

The next morning, my best friend BP rolled into town for a series of soccer games his daughter, Delia, was playing in over at the Midland Soccer Complex (or whatever its called.) Afterwards, in the late afternoon, he swung over to our house to hang out for a bit before we went out to grab dinner.  It was a last-minute 'hey, if you're around you wanna hang out?' sorta thing, but we made it work.

Abby and Delia, building some random, giant-ass tower out of Duplo's (yes, we still own Duplo's - you'd be surprised how often we break those out for little kids whenever the need to watch some arises.)

For dinner, we landed on Whichcraft - my favorite spot downtown, and easily the best place in town for craft beer. This rubeaus nitro was awesome.

The girls ran over to the 'game shelf' (where the bar stores like board games, trivia, decks of cards, etc.) and snagged a few decks to we could play a round of 'Trash' (some game Alayna learned about in second grade and subsequently taught to the rest of the fam.) It's not a fun card game, but it passed the time while we awaited our food.

After dinner, we headed out on Midland's downtown Main Street to enjoy The Commons. BP and I made good use out of this readily available photo op.

Solid weather for an evening hangout outside, for sure.

Delia and the Cannonball square off in some table tennis.

. . . then it was time for the Old Guard to show 'em how it's done.

While out doing some yard work that Sunday, I snapped a pic of the back of my house to show you folks just how sun-faded our pavilion has gotten over the summer.  Back when we first got it, it was like black. The rest of it - the interior, and the metal framing, still looks brand new, so Kris and I are more than happy with it still.

That evening, Collier invited some folks over to his house to watch Sunday Night Football (not my thing, personally, but I was cool with going over for a drink and hanging out with folks for an hour or so.) He rigged up a TV to a homemade stand made out of boards and we were able to watch the game around a bonfire, which was pretty awesome.

When BP was in town earlier in the week, and we were having dinner at Whichcraft, he had mentioned how he was checking out the Canadian punk band Pup at Bell's Brewery down in Kalamazoo on Tuesday. Tickets were only $30, and I lamented that I had to work and was jealous of him going. Then he and Kris proceeded to talk me into it, and I ended up taking the day off to accompany him downstate. After meeting at his house in Rockford, we proceeded down to my old stomping ground of Kalamazoo.

The marquee outside the brewery.

We headed inside first to grab our first round of beers and hit up the restrooms before the show started. There are way more beers available here than you'd find at your local party store - coming here is always a blast.

I've been to Bell's many, many times, but have never been out back behind the brewery, where they have a very small, intimate stage setup with surrounding gardens and bench seating.  Pretty awesome.

I no longer take pics or video of bands playing at shows, instead opting to hunt down show pics that other folks post to their Instagram feeds. This one, taken in one of the band's first few songs, actually includes BP and I at the bottom center (me in my Rancid hat, BP standing on my right wearing a white shirt with his newly-purchased, green Pup shirt slung over his shoulder.)

(We're in this one, too, but it's harder to spot us.)

This was pretty close to where we ended up - after a few songs we pushed forwards towards the mosh pit.

Pup puts on a hell of a live show, they're kind of a hidden gem when it comes to new punk music.

After the show, I hunted around on Discogs and picked up their first three albums on vinyl (colored vinyl, too - because, you know, it sounds better.)

The following week, Kris and her coworkers were treated with a 'spa day' by their boss, as part of a social media campaign her office was running, where the more Facebook 'likes' the office received, the greater the reward for the office administrators and hygienists scored.

Um. . . Kris in a hat?

Pedicures.

No idea what's happening here.

Extreme close-up of, what I assume, is Kris' newly-freshened face.  I have no idea.

Alayna likes to photo-shop weird stuff with her friends. Here's her and her friend Lexi, posing on the bow of some ship (with Garfield.) My kid's weird.

That Friday evening, after work and school, Kris, Abby and I went over to my brother Jeff's house to help celebrate 'Scarlett's Birthday' (but really to celebrate Jeff's divorce finalizing.) Chris and his fam ended up showing up as well. While there, Abby felt it was necessary to 'dress up' like her old man.

I'd been sitting on this beer from Grand Rapids' Vivant Brewing for years, finally felt it was time to give it a go. It was 'meh.'

Levi is a bizarre child.

The next day, in the afternoon, we headed over to the Bos residence, where Mitch was hosting another 'End of the Summer' party (he's held a few over the course of the last two months.) As always, kid rough-housed in the pool, Moms sat by the pool and clucked away, and the Dads hung out under the pavilion watching Mitch grill various meats.

He breaks out his fancy meat gloves for this kinda thing.  Yes, he owns meat gloves.

Obviously, this was just as delicious as it looks.

The Cannonball decides to do some baking the next day. She doesn't do it often, but once and awhile the mood will strike.

Aside from our regular Masonic meetings (held on the first Thursday of each month), I also attend the Royal Arch meetings the third Monday of each month (having joined that order back in 2021.) You can see the illuminated globes are changed to reflect the body that's currently meeting in our Lodge.

Abby playing around with some Snapchat filter while riding around in Kris' van. I really don't get the teenage fascination with this f***ing app. . .

Abby's pom routine at another Northeast Football game (they perform at the half-times for both 7th and 8th grade teams on an almost weekly basis.)

Us and the Johnsons accompanied our offspring to a Friday night Midland High football game, where they were up against visiting Traverse City. The girls immediately all scattered to the four winds to walk around the outskirts of the field with their various groups of friends (packs of teens roam about constantly, it's a big social thing, apparently) while the four of us adults just sat in the cold bleachers and watched the game (you know, 'cause we Houghs are big into football.)

Selfie with BFF Ella.

Abby and her friend, Addie, watching the game from the visitor's side (they didn't realize we adults had begun to walk around the track as well, and didn't see us approach.)

The Cannonball took this pic of Samson, being Samson.

A few of the 'inner circle' families went over to the Colliers' house the following evening to just have a low-key evening with a couple drinks. No kids, no food, just some cards and some BS-ing.

Erik has gross hands.

Kris is NOT a fan of my hair when it's pulled back - she keeps threatening to chop it off.

Kris' front porch fall display, featuring that creepy-ass scarecrow she absolutely refuses to throw in the garbage (I hate it so Goddamn much.)

Abby and her (and her sister's) Orchestra teacher, Ms. Mammassian, during some rehearsal thing she had to go to. This lady has been both girls' favorite teacher since they were in 6th grade.

Cutting the boxes to scale. The Barbie Box - the main one, that most of the women and children will be posing in - is suitable for folks under, like, 5' 7". . . so she had to cut a couple other boxes out to accommodate taller folks.

Halloween decor started coming out this weekend - I programmed our color-changing, living room lights and added them to a 'Halloween' group (via our Alexa devices), so now whenever I say, "Alexa, Halloween" the entire house descends into spooky party time vibes.

The girls helped Kris construct the boxes while Yours Truly began working on the garage (I had cleaned it up thoroughly earlier in the weekend, now I was just decorating it.) The taller pink box to the right is going to say 'Ken' on it, and is suitable for our taller Dads, while the one Abby is holding up will eventually be a G.I. Joe box (black like the old school action figure packaging.)

The workbench, ready for action. I got the DVD player/monitor thing (at top right) running and was streaming The Fellowship of the Ring the entire time - one of my top three favorite movies of all time (if not my all-time fav.)

Afterwards, we went onto the back patio - where I had just strung up our orange, Halloween-ish Edison bulb strings underneath the gazebo for ambiance lighting - to play cards.

This special needs pic Alayna took of Samson while we were playing cards makes it look like he has a lazy eye.

Had to take this pic of Alayna's school outfit one morning, as it looked like she walked straight out of a mid-90s, Street Fighter II-ish video game.

Every year the Midland High School Orchestra sells 'Chemic Cards' (these credit card-sized, double-sided coupon cards for various businesses around town) for $20. Each kids sells some on their own, but then they have these 'Blitz' nights where van-loads of kids are shuttled around town by a willing parent (Kris, for example) to sell crap-loads of them in one night. Here's a shot of Alayna (apparently she didn't like the way her face looked in this pic) and some of her orchestra peeps while riding around in Kris' van on this year's Blitz Night.

One of my old co-workers from Discovery Intermediate School (down in Poinciana, Florida, where I taught from 2007-2015) recently returned to the school for a professional development workshop that was being held at the school.

He hadn't been there since like 2014 - a year before I quit there - but he said the place was basically the same, appearance-wise, but that the student body had shrunk by almost half (Charter Schools in the area have cannibalized all of the public schools, so the school's running on fumes.) There's only like one teacher still there from back when we were there, too - an insane turnover rate, which never points to a great work environment. Kinda feel bad for the place. . . . kinda.

Towards the end of the month, after I got out of work on a Friday, I drove over to the Spirit Halloween Store in Saginaw (on Bay Rd) and met up with Kris, Alayna, Abby and Ella for some Halloween shopping. This store is definitely one of the better, seasonal Halloween stores in our area - house decor, costume crap, etc. - beats anything we have in Midland, for sure. While Kris and I shopped for more decorations for the house, the girls entertained themselves trying on creepy masks. . .

. . . and the occasional corset.

Okay, this mask Abby has on isn't necessarily creepy as is, but when the person wearing it starts talking. . .

Straight-up nightmare fuel.

I hate this mask. . .

Alayna is going as a pirate this year, and is consequently borrowing several pieces from my own pirate costume wardrobe, including my cutlass, flintlock, and this larger-than-she-needs tricorn.

We prepared our basement for the 34 - 37 kids that will be crammed down there for our upcoming, annual Halloween Party next month, and decided that the karaoke setup would be better utilized down there opposed to upstairs in the Study (like it was for New Year's Eve and St. Patrick's Day.) Also programmed the LEDs down there to sync up with my Alexa 'Halloween' command, just to make it super rad. After we got back from the Spirit store in Saginaw, the girls ran downstairs and began testing out the karaoke setup. You know, just to make sure it was good to go for the party.

I'll share with you now some some stellar 'concert footage,' here . . 

The next morning, around 9am, my buddy Jon Kimmel and his wife, Kat, and their two young boys - like 2 years old and 4 months old  - swung by for a whirlwind, brunch visit. They were on there way to Alma to visit Kimmel's extended family (and our old high school buddy, Dalton), and swung out of their way to include us in their trip, too. We provided some apple cider mimosas and breakfast staples, which the Kimmels brought like a garbage bag full of fancy bagels and toppings. 

Kris is not one to turn down holding a small child. She was chomping at the bit the second they came through the front door.

Kris tried the apple cider mimosas at someone else's house once and fell in love with them, so we figured it'd be worth giving a shot. You know, 'cause Fall and everything.

Sunburnt Kimmel and his youngest son, Hank.

We kept the dogs outside, as they both get weird around little-ass kids. Samson couldn't have cared less about being stuck outside for two hours, but Watson was losing his damn mind by the back door the entire time (as you can see here, through the blinds.)

Henry, his oldest, got a lot of use out of Abby's old Star Wars toys (I refuse to let any child - even my own - play with my Star Wars toys.)

The Greatest Rhythm Section in the History of Music: two-thirds of Jeff's Left Front Pocket.

Later that afternoon, after the Kimmels took off for downstate, our inner circle headed over to the Johnsons' place for a low-key, driveway cookout.

Erik busted out his trusty Blackstone to grill up some chicken thighs for everyone, which turned out frickin' spectacular.

He, too, has one of those trendy smokeless firepits you see all the time at Costco. Perfect for evenings like this.

While folks were grazing on food, Abby started to chalk up there driveway. . . with flower-headed brontosaurs, I guess.

Unable to resist an opportunity to chalk up some dinosaurs, Yours Truly got down to business.

Houghin' it up.

(It's a nerdy T-Rex, in case you were curious.)

Alayna took this weird pic of the girls, hanging out in the basement. Leave it to these two. . .

This is Abby and Ella's 'new handshake.' Be impressed, Internet, they worked on this for most of the night.

More tricks for the camera. Well, that wraps up another month of the usual from the Houghs - we'll check in again next month, folks. See ya later.

- Brian