The Colonel's 25th

Hey kids.

A Black Bean Brownie Cake Mom dropped off in the morning.

Yours Truly turned 25 today. A monumental milestone, really, watered down slightly by the fact it fell on, you know, a weekday this year.  Not a whole heck of a lot you can do on a weekday as far as birthdays are concerned, but I count myself fortunate that I'm one of those lucky assholes that never has to go to work on my birthday.

One of the perks about being a teacher and having a birthday in July. Kinda rules.

Kris asked what I wanted to do on my birthday this year - if I had anything special in mind, if I wanted to go out to dinner, etc. - but I'm low-maintenance anymore, and honestly my 'dream day' is pretty basic: all I wanted to do was head to Radio Wasteland later on in the morning and shop for some vinyl, then spend the afternoon cleaning, resleeving, and cataloging my ever-expanding collection. You know, total nerd shit. 

I've spent far crappier days, I can tell you that much.

A couple days later - when it was the weekend and we didn't have any huge plans in the calendar (for once) - some of my friends took me around downtown Midland on a bar crawl for a belated celebration of my 25 years on this planet. Good times as always.

So here you go, folks - my 25th Birthday in a nutshell.  Enjoy.

My favorite thing to do on any birthday is hit up Midland's local record store, Radio Wasteland (where I'm considered a regular, and am additionally a 'Top Fan' of theirs on Facebook.)

My shelving situation is definitely getting dicey at home - I'm running out of space for additional records, so I don't buy in bulk as much as I used to, and my 'want' list is probably around 15-20 records. Still, I do enjoy the treasure hunting aspect of walking into a record store and stumbling across LPs I didn't realize I wanted. I probably spent 90 minutes in Jim's store today, thoroughly canvassing the entirety of his wares.

Walked out with seven boxed sets of classical music and operas, a 2-LP compilation, double-LPs from Brubeck and Chicago, Pablo Cruise, Loggins and Messina, and - the jewel of my finds today - the second compilation from Fat Wreck Chords, Survival of the Fattest (one of my first punk CDs I ever bought, back in my sophomore year of high school.) All for $44.

An awesome birthday haul, if I do say so myself.

Once I got home, I broke out the ol' Spin Clean machine and set to work cleaning, cataloging, and sleeving my new albums. I had ordered some new inner and outer sleeves in preparation for this undertaking days before, and made sure they were shipped to my house in time for my birthday. Once the new additions were all taken care of, I began resleeving a bunch of my existing albums that needed an upgrade. Took about five or six hours, but it was an awesome five or six hours, I'll tell ya what.

And some jalapeno honey whiskey accompanied the undertaking quite nicely.

A couple days later, me and some of the dads from our Midland friend group headed over to the Larkin Beer Garden to kick off an evening of bar-hopping downtown.

The beer selection on hand was minimal, but decent. Morgan, Mitch and Erik were on hand this evening (Collier was unfortunately out of town this weekend), and while we were at the beer truck we bumped into my old realtor, Rick, who helped us in buying our home back in 2017. Coincidentally, Rick - an avid record collector himself - was wearing a Radio Wasteland t-shirt.

We stayed for a single beer, then decided we'd head somewhere else to mix it up (there weren't a ton of people there, and there was zero shad to speak of since, you know, it's in the middle of an empty parking lot and everything.)

What are you, a cop?

Not gonna lie, this sign is pretty accurate.

Murals are starting to spread throughout the city, which grows more and more hipsterly with every passing year.

Heading downtown towards The Commons, where you're allowed to drink outside downtown (within the marked barricades, obviously.)

After picking up some beers from Molasses - a barbecue joint on the main drag - we set up shop at a table outside me and Erik's Lodge (the third story of the Larkin Building, in the background there.)

There was a quartet of saxophonists doing covers this evening. I forget what they're called, but I like to think their name is Sax on the Beach. That'd be the name of my sax quartet if I had one.

After a couple beers on Main Street, we decided to grab some food at nearby Whichcraft - probably my favorite bar downtown.

This place has the best beer selection in Midland, bar none.

Kicking things off with an imperial sour from Transient (never heard of 'em.)

Snackables.

Once we had eaten some food and had a few drinks at Whichcraft, the guys were really jonesing for some Old Fashioneds, so we headed over to Three Bridges, back on Main St.

This place distills their own liquor, so Erik and I checked out their vats for a hot minute.

Morgan, Mitch, and a weird-looking plant at our table that sorta looked like hops.

This bozo was providing live music to the bar patrons throughout the duration of our stay there. He was not good.

En route to the next stop. . .

Obligatory group pic under these lights.

We stopped off at Decker's for a nightcap (a few pitchers of cheap, domestic beer that went down like water.) When I got there I realized it was filled with my brother Chris' old high school buddies: the dude bartending was his friend, Jess, who used to be the singer in Chris' high school and college bands.

A regular at Decker's is one of Chris' oldest friends (from like elementary school), Sverchek.

Sverchek belts out some classic '90s alternative for the night's karaoke session. . .

Erik picked up the tab at Decker's and, on our way out, noticed how Jess the bartender kept track of our ordering.

Morgan gifted me this for a birthday present - one of my all-time favorite Irish whiskeys. Perfect way to end a stellar birthday - hoping next year pans out just as awesome.

- Brian

Erin Go Bragh, Brah

Happy St. Patrick's Day (Observed!!!)

Well folks, like we've done the last few previous years (2018, 2019, and yes, even 2020), the Houghs decided to host a St. Patrick's Day Party at our house once again.  With Clare more or less shuttering its infamous Irish Fest this year, we didn't bother heading up for our usual visit with Dad and Cindy, the 5K run, the St. Pats Parade, and our afternoon hangout at the Doherty.  Nay, this year we just woke up and started celebrating this, our third favorite holiday of the year (behind Christmas and Halloween, that is)

So here you go, America - the Houghs' 4th Annual St. Patrick's Day Party.

Slainte.

Before any of my roommates were up this morning, before I even had a cup of coffee and sat down to read the news, I poured myself a short tumbler of my go-to St. Pat's whiskey, Jameson.  This Stout Edition is really good, pretty subtle with the stout notes but definitely worth the uptick in price.  And then, you know, you gotta add a little food coloring to it. . . 'cause St. Patrick's Day.

I created a St. Pat's photo album to stream on the living room TV, via an Amazon Fire Stick app called PixFolio, which syncs to my Google Photos account.  This album, about 200 pics in length, features highlights from the many St. Patrick's Days we've collectively celebrated over the years, from our very first ones (back in college, when Virgil Q's ran in the bed races and marched down the streets), to our years down in Florida celebrating in Melbourne, to our Clare outings and parties of recent years.  It's nice to have streaming randomly on shuffle in the background while people are hanging out and walking in and out of the room.

Wouldn't be St. Patrick's Day without having some shitty, 'Irish,' cereal on hand for the kids. . .

. . . or Green Pancakes.

My typical Green Eggs.  Looks like shit, obviously, but it's a good base for a day filled with not-healthy food and booze.

Props for this year's photo op station (we bought a backdrop this year - gettin' fancy as the years go on.)

As we were cooking and preparing our house for a shitload of guests later that day, a few of the guys decided to run up to Clare in order to check out the festivities (I had talked this up so much in the previous years that they decided it'd be worth their time to drive up and check it out for themselves.)  I was pissed I couldn't go along with them, but I did have a house to get ready.  Here's a bloody mary they grabbed at the Bully for breakfast before they set out.

Erik and Brad, on location in scenic Clare, Michigan.

Abby, taking a moment of quiet with Samson in the backyard.

Drinking some shitty green Coors Light at Ruckle's Pier.

Cacklin' and Cabbage.

Grasshoppers at the Doherty, right before they hit the road for the return trip to Midland.

This fat son of a bitch hung out in the kitchen for the entirety of Kris' food prep, desperately awaiting dropped corned beef, cabbage, and potatoes.

Later on in the afternoon, as we approached the kick-off of our party, I decided to test out our photo op setup (which we hung along one of the walls in our living room, down the hallway that runs to the bedrooms.)

I'm classy.

The Houghs, ca. 2021.

An Irish-y afternoon at the Hough residence. . .

Kris, havin' a blast in her office making corned beef-and-swiss sliders - soooo much better than the usual corned beef done up in an Instant Pot.

Behold - my St. Patrick's Day weapon of choice (a shot of Jameson at the bottom of a Guinness is just about as close to perfection as you can get.)

People began rolling in around 5pm, even though we said things kicked off at 6pm (everyone was getting anxious to start, I guess.  As usual, the wives staked out the living room.

Some of this year's offerings.  If it's one thing our friend group knows how to do, it's set up a solid spread of food.

Danielle, Amy, and Kelli

Tom offering up wings to the dads, who, as always, hung out in my Study.

In the basement.  Jackson, Alayna, and Alayna's friend from school, Sylvia.

Kris' potatoes and corned beef sliders (and Mitch's smoked salmon, off to the left.)

We borrowed Ryan's poker table for the party, which is nice because it accommodates a shitload of people and even has cup holders (the old guy there is Mitch's dad, who was in town for the weekend and hung out for like an hour or so.)

Morgan, Omkar, and Tom

Brad

Ryan and Mitch

Grazing in the kitchen

Lonnie Big Balls, who hasn't hung out with anyone since Halloween, made his triumphant return this evening.  He and his family have been on strict quarantine since the beginning of the school year, since he's the head coach of Northwood University's boy's basketball team, and him getting their players sick would be disastrous.

Hens, cluckin'.

A ridiculous amount of food, for sure.

Lonnie tears into some of Erik's ribs (it's awesome having so many excellent grill masters in this friend group.)

Deanna, Danielle, Alicia, Courtney, and Mees (feat. Morgan.)

Kris planned a few activities (via Pinterest) for the kids to do in the backyard this year, seeing how the weather was somewhat decent out.

Anything to keep 30-some kids occupied, folks.

Awaiting instructions for the second game of the evening.

Kris gives folks their marching orders.

This second game was insane.  Kids stood apart from their partner, facing them, with one kids having a cup full of cheese balls and the other had their face slathered in shaving cream.  Then the first partner tried throwing their cheese balls at the latter partner's face in order to create 'leprechaun beards.'

Rest assured, this led to a ton of cheese balls scattered across our yard.  The dogs didn't seem to mind, though.

Making short work of some cheese balls.

Total chaos.

Back inside, LJ and Myles test out the photo op.

Elise and Nora

The Cannonball

The Dads prepare to head outside for a smoke break

We had to move to my front yard because our backyard was full of like two dozen kids, running around, screaming, jumping on the trampoline, etc.  It's nice to be able to enjoy one's smoke in peace.

The Moms called me in at one point to snap this pic of them all.

Yours Truly, Ryan, Erik, Brad's back, and Omkar.

Drawing up for some Irish Car Bombs.

Slainte.

It was pretty close to Danielle's birthday, so while we were enjoying our cigars and pipes outdoors, the ladies all sat around and watched Danielle open up some of her gifts they had put together.

Stephanie and Amy watch Danielle open up some of her shit.

Food, taking a serious hit.

More shots in the Study. . .

Rylan, Nora, Maddie, and Teagan.

A couple hours later, towards the end of the night, some of the dads opted to hang out indoors and have another round of cards. . . 

. . . while others decided to fire up a second cigar.

Around 11pm or so, the first families started to leave.  By the end of the night, it was down to the Larsons, Colliers, Boses, Griffins, and Johnsons.

Grabbing some last-minute photo ops, at the end of the night.  Here we have the Johnsons.

The Colliers (sans kids.)

The Griffins

Myles and Ryan

(Not sure if Courtney is dancing or just passing through while I was testing out the flash.)

See ya next year, America.

- Brian