The Corgis Return to the Beach

Movie, Restaurant and Cleaning Tool Review

Friday night we saw Cabin in the Woods.  I like most horror films and I was curious to see what Joss Whedon had put together. I'm a regular listener to the Doug Benson helmed "Doug Loves Movies" podcast and they talked about it when Doug was at South by Southwest film fest.  Thankfully they warned everyone to avoid watching clips, trailers, seeing film posters, etc. because it would spoil the film for you.

There is a big twist in the film and it kind of goes off the rails after that. So worth it! It isn't super scary horror, it's more gore and intrigue with lots of comedy added in.  So far this has been my favorite film of 2012. If you are a Joss Whedon fan (he did Firefly, Dollhouse, Buffy etc.) go see it!

Saturday night we went to see a show down at The Capitol Theater located in Downtown Clearwater.  I'd never been to downtown Clearwater so it was quite an experience since it is pretty much Scientology headquarters. We got there early and wandered around downtown a bit before heading into a restaurant to kill some time before the show.

Tony's Pizzeria Ristorante is located right on Cleveland Street in the heart of downtown. It's a good sized restaurant with really friendly staff.  We showed up around 4PM and wandered over to the bar area to get a few beers. We ended up staying for dinner after having such a nice time.

Our friendly bartender recommended a few appetizers including the garlic knots and he didn't have to go any further after that.  They arrived hot and plentiful with a good serving of homemade marinara sauce to dip them in.

One bite of that little knot full of garlic and I fell in love with the marinara sauce. I don't know if I was because I was insanely hungry or it really is that good but I couldn't believe how good it was!

I had another beer and my husband ordered a White Russian because he hadn't had one in quite a while and apparently had been staring at the bottle of Kahlua behind the bar for 30 minutes thinking about one.  We relaxed a bit more before ordering entrees.

I had the veal scallopini piccata and Ringo had the spaghetti and meatballs. My piccata sauce tasted wonderful and had lots of capers in it. I didn't try the meatballs but Ringo reported they were amazing.  I would definitely go back. I was sad I was too full to try the dessert but the food was so good I couldn't eat anymore. Before leaving we even got to meet Tony the owner who works in the restaurant every day usually helping to cook back in the kitchen. You can tell he loves his restaurant and works very hard.

Eat at the bar! I think we got great service because of that.

And now for a cleaning tool review! I've been battling hard water stains in my master bath toilet forever and finally found a tool that takes care of it without using any chemicals. I tried all sorts of chemicals and nothing worked! After doing some internet research I discovered lots of people use this little tool called a Pumie Scouring Stick.

This little stick scrubs the hard water buildup right off like magic. It doesn't harm the finish of tile or porcelain either. Sometimes you can find them in ACE Hardware or Wal-Mart stores but they sell out quickly.  I order mine online from Amazon. Keep several on hand since as you are scrubbing they do wear away. I still think it is less expensive than using chemicals and you don't have any fumes to have to worry about.

I'm going to try it on my tile grout next!

Photos from the Poochie Paddle

I took the boys to the March poochie paddle! Here are some photos.

Photos from our Epcot trip

We did a late Valentine's Day and spent part of the day at Epcot in Orlando. I brought along my camera and decided to bring only my 50mm 1.8 lens to see what kind of photos I'd get.  It made the photography challenging at the fixed focal length and the fact I wasn't able to get any wide angle shots but I still think I got a few decent photos.

I played with a few filters in Adobe Lightroom when I was editing so some of the photos have a "1980's" feel.

We road on the GM Test Track, Spaceship Earth (inside the big ball), Nemo and Friends, and Mission Space.  We also saw the original 1986 Captain Eo show starring Michael Jackson in 3D. I'd never seen it before but my husband loved it.

Doggie update

Basil got good news at the surgeons checkup last month.  We have another four months of recovery before we can see how good he is going to be. Crossing my fingers his other knee stays healthy. Dogs with one torn ACL have a 30% chance of tearing the other so I'm hoping we beat those odds. He is in good spirits and is enjoying running around in the yard again.

Byron is doing great in agility class. Last night we made epic progress on the baby teeter totter. He walked down it himself and tipped it himself three times. The fourth time he hesitated and scared himself a bit backing up but he recovered and tried again. I'm happy to see how much progress he has made since December. His little brain has matured and he can focus for nearly a full hour now. He loves his contact obstacles!

Weaves are probably going to take another 12 months or so but I'm not in a huge rush for anything. With him being my third dog I want to enjoy the process more and have fun with him rather than rush to competition. When he's ready I'll know. Our major issue with competition is going to be other dogs nearby so I may do some Control Unleashed exercises and see if I can get him to learn to stay with me no matter what pretty Aussie is sauntering by the ring.

Bernie is typical Bernie. I took her to agility with me last night just to run her through some obstacles.  She did her typical thing where she ignores me and then runs back when she feels like it.  I ran her through all the contacts and did some jump sequences before she decided to go say hi to a new student there. That was probably the highlight of her evening.



Those are some recent iPhone photos of her relaxing! It's what she's good at.

The boys did have fun playing with their new Chase It toy. I'm glad I got a new one.

Photo Post - long overdue!

Movie Review - The Grey

I was talked into seeing this movie over the weekend - the last movie we saw wasn't that great (Young Adult bleh) so it's been a while since January is a slow movie month typically and things don't start warming up till March.

Regardless, the hubs read the Rotten Tomatoes numbers to me and surprised I was that it had gotten such good reviews.  I wasn't quite sure how both critics and users had agreed that it was 77% fresh but I decided it was worth a shot.  

Liam Neeson has never let me down.

In fact... I'm surprised there is still a list of things that Liam Neeson should punch that he hasn't punched.  Pretty sure all of those items are on his 2012 goal list.

Oh was I doing a movie review? Oh yes.  We don't know much about the dude Liam Neeson is playing other than he's suicidal, he keeps having flashbacks to a wife under a white sheet that likes to stare at him a lot, and he works in a really, really cold place with a bunch of other hardass dudes.  

For some reason they allow planes in the air during blizzards and of course, things do not go well once the plane hits the ground. 

In this alternate universe folks don't get frostbite if they leave their faces uncovered in the bitter cold for days on end, wolves are the size of small buildings, falling into a river doesn't result in immediate hypothermia, and you can successfully detonate a shotgun shell with a pointy stick. 

The first half of the movie is awesome. Then it slows down while you wait for the really annoying survivors to be eaten by wolves. This takes a long time. 

It starts to pick up towards the end before you're given another gigantic let down. 

I won't spoil the ending but let's just say that this movie has no replay value.  Watch it once and you're done.  You got all the info that you need.  There is no Inception mind twist in this movie. Still - worth at least one watch for the Liam Neeson punching value.