Study Shows Third of Studies Useless

CNN.com – Research: Third of study results don’t hold up

Wow this is a great study. It’s a study to prove that a third of all studies are useless. Great appropriation of government funds. I can do this study for you free of charge and get better results. I think a third is being very conservative and I would have to say that over half of these studies are nonsense. Oh yea, a study I just read says that you should take aspirin every day. No wait, this study says aspirin causes cancer. There are too many of these where insert item x here is good for you, no it’s bad for you. CNN.com – Research: Third of study results don’t hold up – Jul 13, 2005

Bachelor Party At A Bachelor Pad

Saturday was my friend Bill Moeller’s bachelor party. The crew went golfing up in Mequon but I have already had my allotted two rounds of golf this year. It’s an expensive sport and I don’t really like playing all that much so I skipped the golf and met everyone downtown. We met at one of Bill’s friend’s condo a couple blocks up from where I live. The guy has a very nice condo and it’s a straight up bachelor pad. The bottom floor has the kitchen and a small living room with a plasma TV in it. Then you go upstairs and its bachelor heaven. To the right you have a small bar area and to the left is a huge sectional sofa in front of a 100″+ projector TV. There was also a great sound system, a Vegas slot machine, and a stand up Ms. Pacman/Galaga video game. Then there is a fairly spacious rooftop deck with a great view of the Milwaukee skyline. We spent a couple hours there and enjoyed all the toys. We drank some beers, smoked some cigars, and ate some meat, all traditional bachelor party events. After that we headed over to a club called Mantra on North Ave. I almost wasn’t allowed in because I was wearing tennis shoes. They weren’t even real tennis shoes, they were nice brown ones. I couldn’t believe it; I hate those bouncers who need to compensate for inadequacies. What got me made is once I got into the club it was baron. There was no one there except for us. Well once I calmed down we danced and had some fun. They have authentic water hookahs at Mantra and Evraets had never had one. So we chipped in and bought some strawberry tobacco and smoked like we were in a sand hut. After Mantra we decided to go to 3. We got there and the line was immense due to the Summerfest crowd but we were with the right people. The reason we really started to going to three was because of Billy and the group of guys that we were with at the bachelor party. They went to high school with the original owners and Billy practically lived there the first year they were open. So they were able to talk us in. We drank some vodka red bulls and whoop whooped until closing time. After close the group went back to the condo as did half of the Milwaukee club scene. There was a rocking after party, something which I have not been to in ages. So around 3:30 Craig and I left. Craig wanted some sleep and didn’t want to sleep amongst the phat beats so he came back to my place. We stopped and Mykano’s and we were served the last gyros of the night. We ended up getting to bed after four but it was a lot of fun.

Well Summerfest is over. I didn’t go that much this year. I don’t know why but for some reason it just didn’t have the appeal that it had in the past. I went to see the Violent Femmes on Thursday and then this last Sunday I saw Dark Star Orchestra on the closing day. At least the coming week we should be able to find some parking spots.

Overlooked Summer Festival: Kondofest

Happy Independence Day everyone! I love the holiday weekends. This past fourth weekend was quite chill for a usual party weekend. Friday I stayed in and wound down to go into full relaxation mode for the weekend. Saturday was Kondofest. For those of you that don’t know Kondofest is a party held each year in conjunction with Summerfest. It is put on by one of my friends Mike Kondracowitz, or something like that. Any who, this year it was held at a new location because Mike now lives downtown and it’s easier to get to Summerfest than from Brookfield. This year Mike went all out. He got a permit from the city to shut down his block to through traffic and he also got a huge pig to roast up for the carnivores. The party always has a lot of people so it’s always tons of flying quarters fun. I was planning on pulling the all day party but I got a call from my brother saying he and Billie were coming down to see the Brewers. As fun as Kondofest is it isn’t often that my brother ventures to Miller Park so I decided to go to the game. Jocelyn stayed at Kondofest because she and a couple other girls were going to see Kenny Chesney at Summerfest. So I hopped into Schwenker’s Jeep and we headed off the park. We found my brother and we tailgated and enjoyed the perfect weekend weather. We headed into the game and although the Brewers lost we were able to enjoy the game. It was pretty cool after the game. Everyone stayed in the park and you were able to watch fireworks from your seat at the park. They turned all the lights off for ultimate effect. It was kind of weird seeing a full, dark, Miller Park. After the works we tailgated a bit more in the parking lot and then headed back downtown. We got a couple calls from some Kondofesters and they wanted us to meet them at the bars but I was too tired so I headed home and called it a night.

Sunday I woke up to a full house of partied out Kondofesters. We debated on going to the Brewers game but we decided to just pull the lazy day and watched it on TV and ordered pizza. That night we watched the lakefront fireworks and concluded the day.

Monday we did absolutely nothing and loved it.

Life: Next Chapter – CliffsNotes

So this weekend was pretty big. But I can’t just overlook Friday. Friday J and I went to the Brewers game. The Brewers played the Twins and these tickets were one of the sets of Beer Pen tickets that I bought on in the beginning of the year. The Brewers picked up the victory and we met some nice people in the parking lot tailgating before the game.

This brings us to Saturday. So this was the big day as was previously mentioned. I had this day planned for a couple months but it almost didn’t come together. The day kind of snuck up on me and I booked the hotel and the dinner cruise the week before. It was tough finding a hotel and my original cruise was sold out. But it all turned out in the end. We woke up early and drove to our hotel, the Congress Plaza in Chicago, at about 11. We weren’t able to check in and I had the ring (which I bought online at bluenile.com) in my bag and wasn’t about to let Jose throw it in the corner of some room. So I told Jocelyn that I didn’t want to check my bag because my watch was in there and I didn’t want it to get stolen. She didn’t buy that so I told her that I had to go to the bathroom. She kept on yelling to leave my bag but I just ignored her and kept walking. I got down the corridor a bit and ducked down a hall where I took the ring out and put it in my pocket so I ended up having to walk around with the ring all day in the cargo pocket of my shorts. Once we got our bags dropped off we headed across the street to the Taste of Chicago. The Taste was a good time. It’s a big food festival and they have a “taste portion” at eat food stand which is a sampling of the food of the restaurant. Some of the taste portions were actually a good size and we had plenty to eat. After the taste we walked to Navy Pier and around Chicago a bit. Wired NextFest was going on at Navy Pier and I really really wanted to go. If it was any other weekend I would have probably put up a stink and went but it really wasn’t on my mind this weekend. I did get to peek in the entrance doors and I did have a little “doggy in the window” feeling. After Navy Pier we headed back to the hotel to check in and get ready for the night. We got back and I was getting ready to shower when I realized I grabbed the wrong the shirt. I grabbed my light blue short sleeve one when I wanted my long sleeve one. Then I realized that I had NO PANTS! I had laid out my outfit the night before and hung my pants on the hanger with my long sleeve shirt. So I started to panic a little and off we went to try to find some pants at 4 on Saturday. Luckily we were in Chicago and there was a Carson’s about four blocks down. We got the much need khakis and I was able to relax a bit. So back to the hotel we went. We both got ready and then cabbed it to Navy Pier for our dinner cruise. The cruise I ended up booking was the Odyssey dinner cruise. Since it was a special night I also booked the “special occasion” package where you get a souvenir picture and I got the champagne special where you get two souvenir glasses. So we sat down and had some drinks. We walked around the boat and checked out all the decks. Then we had our dinner. We both ended up ordering the same thing. It started with a tasting appetizer. Our first course was seafood in a puff pastry bowl and our main course was filet mignon with some potatoes and delicious creamed spinach. Our waiter was very nice and part of the special occasion package was a special dessert. I told him that we were there to celebrate Jocelyn’s birthday which was over a month ago but that really was what she thought we were there to celebrate. But never-the-less they brought out a special dessert with candles on it. I have neglected to mention that the weather was sweltering which made for some interesting weather on Lake Michigan. It was very hazy when we left the pier and continued to be very hazy throughout our cruise which actually kind of stunk. You couldn’t see the skyline too well which is a big part of the cruise. Then all of a sudden the haze lifted but it didn’t stay that way for long. It was crystal clear for about thirty minutes. You could see the entire city of Chicago for thirty minutes and then the haze got doubly worse. So after dessert they back the boat up to Navy Pier so you can watch the fireworks but it was so foggy that we could barely see the fireworks. It was kind of cool but there was no way I could give Jocelyn my jacket with the ring in it so she was forced to tough it out. After the sub-par fireworks we headed back to our table. It was kind of strange again because no one really came back into the dinning area until about twenty minutes after the finale, so this was my time to act. I told Jocelyn, ‘are you ready for the real grand finale,’ a funny pun on the fireworks, get it. Then, after that, I proposed. She was quite shocked and surprised and couldn’t stop smiling, it was great. After that we danced to a couple songs and waited for the boat to dock. Once back on land we tried to go to a couple bars but they were closing so we ended up going to the Hard Rock hotel. It was a very modern trendy type bar. It was nice and we sat down and had a couple beers. It was a long day in the sun so we headed back about oneish and called it a night, a very special night.

Sunday we woke up and went to Cosi to get some lunch before we checked out. After we finished eating we checked out and headed over to my cousin Steve’s in Lincoln Park. We went there and checked out the remodeling he’s doing on his condo. Then we went over to a bar with an outdoor eatery and had a couple beers and enjoyed the Sunday sun. After that we headed home. I being the computer geek stud that I am will have a wedding website. There will be some cyber invitations, cyber confirmations and information for the wedding. The website is not built yet but all the information you will need be able to be found at http://www.ryanandjocelyn.com.

Life: Next Chapter

This weekend Jocelyn and I got engaged. JCPenney had a great sale on Black Hills gold so I thought it was time to get a ring. I got a sweet ring with some grapes and oak leaves on it, it looks great. But seriously, we did get engaged, more information to come in my weekend wrap up.