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9-15-2018 Range Practice Session

Another hot practice session at the range this past Sunday. Mostly my fault as I arrived just after 12:00 pm.

I hit over 90 balls in just about 60 minutes. I feel like this pace was a little to fast for a good range session. After watching the tape I did not line up almost any of my shots which lead to me spraying the ball all of the targets.

Still having trouble hitting my driver and pushing the ball as I fall forward finishing my swing. I also pulled the ball when my swing would break down and I wouldn’t get my hips through the ball.

Irons shots felt ok with some slight fade to push shots happening. I need to keep working on hitting my backswing position and punching my wrist. This is just part of putting the full swing together. #ugh

I was really happy how I was hit my 52-degree wedge. I was able to hit 5 or 6 shots with the wedge that had the same trajectory and distance which is a new thing for me.

I switched the camera angle from down the line to front facing to help capture my weight transfer and hands width.

Full session video below:

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Better golf in 6 Weeks?

I have a tee time scheduled in the middle of June 2018. The course is a pretty prestigious club just outside of Chicago. I will be playing with some serious golfers that can legit hit it in the low single digits. I being in the very high handicap in the high 20s…ok low 30s am pretty nervous about making a fool of myself at my friend’s club. The goal here is to keep getting invited back! So here is my quest; how much better at golf can I get in a Six-week time frame. I plan on jumping into the deep-end of golf to get my game at its best for this round.

For the past 2 summers, I only was able to play 6-9 rounds in a Chicago season, travel for work severely limited my schedule. With a new job that doesn’t require me to travel almost at all, I have cleared my Saturdays and assembled a ragtag four-some to play.

To get my game mint here is my plan:

  1. Lessons with my golf pro- which his schedule there will only be 2 available sessions-I think this should be enough. It’s the executioner the swing, not the motion of the swing that is causing my misses.
  2. Hit the driving range at least once a week. I’m hoping for a few weeks of double practice. The new range is about 20 min from me, but it has full grass range with separate pitching and putting areas. I for-see this making the biggest impact on my game.
  3. I will play every weekend a full round of golf (weather permitting) I have a huge problem with transferring what I learned with the pro to the actual game. A recent practice session with my pro enlightened me that my game on course cannot be approached the same as practice session (with a pro or on the range).

The not approaching my golf swing on the course like an every a swing on a practice range is not something that factored into being a negative behavior. In my recent golf trip to Phoenix and a very cold round in Indiana, I did this very thing every single swing. I head of trying to be an athlete I was trying to be a robot. According to measly attempts at last call on the dance floor and recent rounds of golf, I am far from C3-PO. I will be now visualizing and siting my shot before my swing and be playing in the moment rather from swing to swing.

I will keep updating this blog post below with my practice and playing sessions during this 6-week sprint and a complete new post with my round with a reaction/summary of what worked and what (Touch-wood) didn’t.

Range Session- 90 Balls -7-2018

  • Way to bent over on the setup
  • Need to focus on standing taller
  • swing felt as good as it could with how I was standing

Range Session- 90 Balls 5-24-2018

  • Best series of swings so far this year
  • Still hitting it pretty fat on my misses, keeping shoulders flat helps
  • Was able to get my swing back after losing it.  This was gratifying

Range Session- 90 Balls 5-17-2018

  • Came Out Hot on the first 7-9 swing #ablosutedingers
  • Developed a bad habit that I could shake off of hitting way behind the ball #gravedigger
  • I need some work for sure

Range Session- 90 Balls 5-10-2018

  • Not 1 solid swing all day
  • I was not dressed for the cooler air temp
  • Ball flight was everywhere #Yardsprinkler

 

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365+ Days Without Soda

Today marks the 378th day without a single drop of soda. I’ve never taken on a  challenge like this before.  I didn’t start this goal with an end date in mind, so this is more of a milestone than a job completed post.  I’ve learned a lot already in the past year, but I’ve also uncovered a bunch of deeper layers to this campaign.

In December of 2016 I started to become aware how much sugar I was consuming and how it was affecting my every day of life.  While assessing my overall diet I was having soda for lunch and most cases dinner every day of the week.  On the Weekends it was even worse, Jim Beam and cokes Friday and Saturday nights and on Bears games, every weekend was a nonstop soda fountain (plus Bourbon but that’s a different story.)  Underneath all of the liquid/empty calories from the sugars there was also the astonishing amount of caffeine I was ingesting.  For reference, just one can of coke-a-cola contains:

  • 140 Calories
  • 39 grams of Sugar
  • 39 grams of Carbohydrates
  • 32 milligrams of Caffeine

Being conservative I was having about 3 cans of coke every weekend night or 9-10 cans a weekend (during the NFL season.)  It was wild I always seemed to wake up 90% of the time with zero effects of a hangover.  I thought I was one of those lucky few of the population that was incapable of getting hungover.  After a few weekends of experimentation’s, I soundly proved that I was not one of those Lucky few that will never escape a morning/day of sacrifice for going too hard the night before.

My hypothesis was that the amount of caffeine and sugar I was drinking was hyping me up enough to the point that it was counteracting the hangover headaches caused by the dehydration of the booze I was consuming.  During the experimentation party nights, I only removed one variable, the Soda.  I still drank bourbon, but instead, I would have bourbon on ice or with ice and water.  Still ate the same foods, same bars, same activities, and was out to all hours of the night.

Initially, it was hard to drink Bourbon straight, so that restricted the quantity of bourbon in a night compared to the mixed drinks amounts.  This extended the length of the experiment by 6 weekends.  I became acclimated to the straight bourbon taste.   I was back to my standard of 2-3 glasses intake an hour. #yikes

No Surprises, I started experiencing debilitating hangovers that seemed to last all the way to dinner the next day.  This got OLD fast,  now that I had established a new control data set.  I had to go back to the Bourbon and colas to see if the hangovers would go away.  As expected the hangovers did not come but every morning after a night out I would live in fear of that dreaded hangover.  The quick conclusion was that the sodas, sugar, and caffeine were enabling me to drink the night away without the consequence of a hangover.

On the surface that simple conclusion seems to support the 2 thumbs up for Soda.  What I didn’t hypothesis would be all the little effects soda would have on my weekday life and overall health.  So I swapped the experiment to only drink soda when I was enjoying libations.  I also had a quick goal to only drink on the weekends and never during the weekdays.

The first thing I noticed was how well I was sleeping.  I had always been able to operate on 5.5-6 hours a sleep and night and not feel tired or less productive during the day.  Waking up with only one alarm, no snoozing and didn’t need any coffee to get me geared up for the day. I never knew what being completely rested felt like.  I was so used to being under-slept it just became how I lived my days.  My sleep quality would get better and better through the week, especially Thursday nights into Friday mornings.  Waking up on Friday I felt like I could sprint 10 miles before breakfast.  It was an awesome feeling getting real sleep with out caffeine keeping me awake all he night.

Getting rid of all that sugar from my system did put a serious shock to my system as well though.  Cutting the soda cold turkey tuned me into a sweet tooth especially for chocolate.   All of the sudden I was craving fats all kinds of fats.  I was using loads of butter on my toast and on my vegetables and started eating 3 times as much bacon as I usually did.  It got absurd, I even took bite of a stick of Kerry Gold Butter straight out of the fridge.  I came across on some articles that described my cravings post sugar habits.  Basically it was my  body trying to replace all the intake of sugar with fats.  This just proved to me at how bad of habit i had developed and how it was brain washing me, and sad that I didn’t make this switch sooner.

Next steps of this project will be to add other levels to capitalize on this progress.  I haven’t decided yet but here are some examples.

  • 9 hours of sleep a night (bedtime around 9:00 PM)
  • Removing as much added sugars as I can from my diet
  • 3 Strength workouts a week
  • Start stretching with consistency either by Yoga or other routines
  • Eliminating caffeine during the weekdays or all together (I love Iced Mochas)
    • Due that I only drink water most of time I will still keep drinking the Iced tea, just so I can have some diversity in my liquids

Going forward, I will continue to stay away from soda drinks but might have one here and there.  I’m not a cokeaholic or at least I don’t think so at this point but,  there are some days I want a Mountain Dew Icee or something similar to a one off situations.  I Have built a taste for the other liquids so i have good options now and I plan on sticking to those rather then the Cokes

TL:DR

Drank to much soda, So i stopped drinking soda. Started Sleeping really well but eating lots of chocolate and other sweets to compensate for the missing sugars.  Feel way better now and will try something else to progress my overall health.

 

 

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The Duck Inn Restaurant Review

I’ve been going to this place for a while now is one of my favorite places to bring friends and family for fun and it’s always a very entertaining menu that goes without saying features duck.  This was also the first place I was open to trying duck,  I’m not usually open to trying new types of food.  That just shows how impressive this restaurant is.

The Location of The Duck Inn is situated between the I-55 interstate and the south branch of the Chicago River in a pretty established industrial area. This place is a diamond in the rough,  its lighted windows and a brightly lit painted namesake of the restaurant.

When you walk into the place you enter directly into the bar area that has a mini tub in the nearest corner.  The bathtub brings you into the era of bathtub gins and prohibition cocktails.  Thier bartenders have been top notch every time still make consistent cocktails over the past years.  a majority of their drinks feature an egg white base for a different flavor and viscosity profile than typically found in the usual cocktails menus.

Not being the biggest fan of the ultra fancy intricate cocktails, I almost always order an Old Fashioned.  The Duck Inn old-fashioned is the bar that I judge all other old-fashioned on.  At home my OFs are made to mimic The Duck Inns; they are THAT good.  It is not just liquor, the techniques, or the environment that make this cocktail so great its the full composition of all parts that make 2+2=5.

The service is always very attentive and there always another drink ready for when your glass is 20% full.  Staff always seems to be a fun energetic group that are welcome to walk you through the menu and tell you their favorites, but there really is no bad choice at the Duck Inn.

Must Haves:

  • Duck Wings
  • Chochalet Binegtes

 

 

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Leghorn Chicken Restaurant Review

Leghorn Chicken

This review is of the River North Location @

600 N. Lasalle ST.

Chicago, IL 60654

(312) 944-4444

They have 2 locations in total FYI.

Price Range $12-$13 a person

This was a great lunch spot. Food tasted and looked great. My favorite part was the staff, they were so accommodating to me and my guests.  Plus, they even let me try their awesome Umami fries.

I built my own Chicken sandwich (a must.) My choices were:

  • Chicken breast
  • Not hot sauce * I’m a wuss when it comes to hot stuff*
  • Biscuit
  • Buttermilk Ranch Verde sauce

For a side, I got the Umami Fries, and to drink was Custom mixed Arnold Palmer.

The chicken was a thicker cut and fit underneath the Biscuit with just enough overhang.  It was a very good meat to biscuit ratio, that never made my mouth feel overly dry.  The fries were dusted with a bunch of spices that elevated the entire meal for me.  The fries did not need any ketchup at all, but I tried it anyway.  The fries definitely need any ketchup, but I suspect they made their own ketchup which tasted better than the standard ketchup you usually see on the table.

When I ordered my Ice tea and lemonade the cashier told me that was a good choice.  He went back to the fridge grabbed 2 larger liquid Tupperware containers, one with lemonade and the other with Ice Tea.  As he poured his custom blend you good tell this was good drink and oh my it was really good.

For a fast-casual restaurant, this is got to be in my top 3 favorites.

Go check it out!

 

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My Top 3 Moments of the Winter Olympics

  1.  Elizabeth Swany- Women’s Half-Pipe skiing

The best part of this clip is the color commentators.  They never break character and actually break down her “Olympic effort” run.  Plus you gotta love the planning that got Liz into this Olympics, only competing in event that had less than 30 participants so she was guaranteed to qualify.  She also didn’t even come in last also, other ladies that went for it and crashed somehow scored lower than riding down the shoot.  That the real travesty that a run with ZERO tricks can beat someone that tried to send with a real Olympic effort.

2)  USA women’s first Gold medal in Cross County skiing

NBC stream of the last Lap

Extremely thrilling with a massively entertaining final lap that was a fight to the finish.  Again the announcers are the ones that really make this event move to the top of my list.  So much energy and excitement in their voices, you can’t help but get amped up.  Not to undersell the efforts by the ladies, you could see the pain on their face as they were giving it all going neck and neck with the other two teams.  So much back and forth, watching this live I had to stand up and started cheering for us to win.

3) Ester Ledecka Winning the Alpine Super-G gold medal on borrowed skis

Whats even wilder is that she is predominately a snowboarder which she just casually also won a gold medal in too.  Her face says it all at the end of the run when she is able to see that she won 1st place by .01 seconds #awestruck

Honorable Mentions:

I realize that all three of my favorite moments are all Women’s events. I guess that’s just how the cookie crumbled these games. I did enjoy much more of the games then what I’ve already listed above. Below are two you probably already know about but are worth look if you haven’t watched them yet.

  1. Shaun Whites gold medal half pipe run
  2. USA women’s ice hockey beating Canada for the gold medal
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2018 Ski Trip to Lake Tahoe Part 1

Decided to have a last minute NFL AFC/ NFC championship party at my condo. As standard, I invited some fraternity brothers over that I had not seen in a while. Figured it would be a fun time to get back together and catch up and meet all the new girlfriends they had.  As the first game ended and all the food was just coming off the grill, my phone(that was playing all the music for the party) suddenly rang eight times in a row.

3 more text message tones ring out as I carried the 2 slabs of ribs from the grill to the kitchen counter.  I finally got my phone to see that 3 of my college Rugby buddies had called and texted me that they were at the neighborhood tap and wanted me to make an appearance for some beers.

I quickly texted them back a picture of the food spread we already had for the party.  In twenty minutes they stormed in with a case of beer and a healthy appetite from a long day at the Boat show at McCormick Place.  Some quick hellos and introductions that party was now in full swing.  Not long into the general conversations of what was new in everybody’s life, their annual ski trip quickly dominated my attention.  “Dude, you need to come,” blurted out and I instantly said yes.  As fast as I said yes, I remembered that I had not skied in 6 years and that was only for 1 day and last time before that was 12 years prior!  Mind you all those times I had only skied on what amounted to as a ski hill that was built on top of an old garbage dump with 100% fake snow.  I thought to myself what the heck did I get myself into?  As usual, that thought left my mind as I filed that as a future me problem.  When has that guy ever let me down? lol.

Emails got sent over and my share of the house got paid and plane tickets purchased asap, as the Ski week date was only 4 weeks away.  As a last minute addition, I was regulated to only at couch share of the ski lodge. No problem by me as it brought down my overall cost of the trip, plus we were going skiing by day and partying by night.  So sleep was less of a priority for me.

I got on the early flight with an hour layover in Denver, CO.  Met another member of the group and had a beer for breakfast (7:45 AM) as we hopped on the second leg of the flight. The three of us got to sit in a row to keep the party going.  The stewardess walked by and took our drink orders for the first round:

  1. Budlight
  2. Bloody Mary (that seemed to be missing the bloody part)
  3. MillerLite

She was pretty busy at this point in the flight so she didn’t ask for payment yet, and we had another 80 min left before we touched down in Reno, NV.  We all finished our drinks and decide that it was time for another round, but this time it was “double trouble”:

  1. (2) Budlights
  2. (2) Bloody Mary’s
  3. (2) Millerites

As the plane started on its decent, the announcement came that it was time for the tray tables to be locked into their upright position. The constant jokes about free beer started to feel like it could really happen, but to much dismay, the stewardess stopped by with her little blue credit card machine. I offered to pay cash to settle the bill, but only credit cards were accepted at 40,000 feet in the air. One swipe, two swipes, three swipes she tried as the free beer jokes really started to get funny to everybody but her. After a couple more attempts charge the card she gave up and smiled and said, “they really are free today.” As we cheered for the free beers prize, we gathered our things and packed everything away as the flight had just a few minutes till touch down. After we landed and reached our gates suddenly all that free beer was not feeling so great burning a hole in my bladder.

There is nothing more infuriating than watching people deplane in what seems to be the most inefficient way possible, as you have to go pee. By mere seconds I made it to the bathroom with my row mates as I’m sure they were all in the same boat I was. After the most reliving bathroom break of all time, we met up with another member of the group and got in line at the Squaw Valley mountain resort desk underneath a big sign stating free lift ticket with a same-day boarding pass #freestuff.com

We all got our free lift tickets and walked over to the baggage carousel to pick up our bags and Skis/Snowboards and headed out to load up the rental truck.  It was a short drive to Sqaw with fast food pit stop at Subway along the way.  It was super impressive to see the sheer physical size of the mountain I was about to ski down.  I suddenly felt unprepared as I saw how steep all the runs looked from the parking lot.  I made my way over to the ski rental house and filed out the death wavier and lied out my ass at how experienced I am as a skier and signed up for the Demo Ski Package.  If was gonna tumble down this hill I was going to do it in style.

I somehow made it on to the chairlift with zero problems,  then halfway through the seemingly endless chairlift, I realize that I cannot remember how to get off a chairlift.  As the top of the mountain inches closer and closer my anxiety rises higher and higher. When the moment comes to exit the chair I just ride the mini hill down to the snowboarder’s benches.  “how anticlimactic” I said to myself, then the boarders got all strapped in and we shuffled over to the edge of the world.

I starred down the mountain and glanced over to see the sign that had a single black diamond. Fuck, my first time skiing in 12 years and first time ever on a real mountain and it’s a Black freaking diamond.  There’s only one thing to do #sendit  Sending it only last about 5 seconds, and half of that was the time it took for me hit the ground.  Wasn’t a bad fall, just a washout.  The snow was very icy, not like all the Instagram clips I had seen in the past of the everybody skiing in 2-5 feet of powder having the time of their life.  I was 95% up against a full ice sheet under complete shade.  Took me a few minutes to pop back up on my skis, but I kept slipping before I could get my center of gravity above my feet. I finally was able to stand up, turned my tips and started to slide down the hill faster and faster. I realized I now had to turn before I was going to start flailing out of control down the icy mountain face.  One small turn right, another quick turn left with an immediate longer right turn, speed was still increasing. Time to get the skis perpendicular and get the speed in control. Nope, catch an edge make a complete tumble and start sliding down the hill on my back with my skis swings in the air.  As I’m now effectively sledding down the hill on my back I’m actually making some pretty good progress down the hill lol. After what feels like 200 feet, I swing my feet downhill and effortlessly pop up with my skis pointing downhill with only a quarter left of the run.  I speed my way down, no way I’m attempting to turn again.  Somehow make it all the way to the chairlift line where my three buddies have been watching my exhibition of how NOT to ski.

The rest of the day (3.5 hours, 11 runs)  my skiing improves and I’m able to keep a good pace with the group.  No worries, I still fell multiple times, but after I shot through all my nerves in the first run there was nothing for me to freak out about.  It took me 2 more runs before I started to feel athletic with my skis on.  I use the word athletic loosely here because nothing I did proactively looked good, but only how I reacted and saved myself from falling the 100 times in the later runs is where the “athleticism”  comes in to play.

Battle wounds from that day were my lower back getting cheese grated by the ice when I was sliding down the hill on my back.

Hat tip to my winter jacket.  I’ve had it for 12 years and took all the abuse I could give it and never ripped, tore or disappointed.  #Northface

 

Part 2: The “Jet 2 life” is upcoming and will summarize the next part of the trip.

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First Attempt At Kombucha

2/1/18 6:12 AM CST

Snap Chat Video Below

Watch out for the 10 second still pictures

Step 1) Boil approximately 1 gallon of water in 2.5-gallon pot

Step 2) Once water is at a rolling boil slowly pour in 2 cups of granulated sugar.  Be sure to keep stirring as the sugar will sink and burn on the bottom of the pot.  Once your sure all sugar has dissolved turn off the heat.

Step 3) Steep the equivalent of 16 tea bags of black tea (some other teas work just as fine.) I recommended tying them all together to make it easier to manipulate once the tea bags get soggy.  The bags should not steep any longer than 5 minutes.  I also squeezed the bags (with my bare hand, HOT!) to get the last of the flavor out of the tea bags and into the pot.

Step 4) Using the coldest water you have, fill the pot to a full 2 gallons. The goal is to reduce the temperature enough to not kill the live culture-SCOBY.

The temperature should be at least under 80 degrees Fahrenheit before you pour the tea into the brewing vessel with the existing SCOBY already in the jar.

Step 5 Be patient in 7-10 days you should be able to enjoy a couple glasses of your very own Kombucha

 

Shout out to my main man Matt Kombuchade for the starter SCOBY and quick how-to directions.