Here, in photos, is what I did the weekend before the summer solstice time, that longest day of the year, which brings out the Druid in me.
Friday night Best Fest Buddy Tom and I hit one of our locals, where we met TV legend Larry David. Maybe it wasn’t him. We had a lot of wine.
Saturday, we headed to Itasca for our annual trek to the Chicago Scots Scottish Festival and Highland Games. Tom looks like a cop in a pipe band – though I think a lassie asked him if fries went with that shake. Or maybe it was one of those guys he was talking to about tobacco pipes.
We met up with my writer buddy Allison, her husband Tony, and their cute kid, Kick. Kick likes me. Kids think I am just an oversized version of one of them – one who, for the most part, is potty trained.
My buddy Marty Duffy is a good soul, and he volunteers to emcee the stage area for this fest. Okay, he does look a little Sound of Music in his get-up, but with a kilt. Marty knows his whiskeys and whiskies and his cigars, and he was kind enough to introduce us to some of the folks in the tasting tent.
I only sipped. Seriously. It was a hot day, I’m getting old, and I dehydrate like a stone in the Arizona sun. I like the souvenir glass.
I live near Elgin. I’m going out on a limb here, but I’m betting that the place in Scotland, -where it’s pronounced as it should be, with a hard G – makes way better beverages. I think the Elgin Classic out where I dwell was either a golf tournament or a road race.
New Holland Artisan Spirits had a white whiskey they dubbed a “hopquila,” which just shows how complicated drinking can be these days.
Tom took a break on the set of his new movie, where he plays a cop sent undercover into one of the aforementioned pipe bands, where he solves a crime and falls in love with a lady bass drummer. The working title: Your Bleating Heart.
This isn’t me, but I bought yet another kilt – like this one. I made this guy model it for me to see if it fit. Because I was wearing a kilt the proper way and didn’t want to scare children or upset flight patterns of the planes coming and going from O’Hare not far away.
I think this guy was on Game of Thrones Sunday. They were selling the cool t-shirts, but only had smalls and mediums left when I asked. Go figure. I’m surprised they even made smalls and mediums.
I forgot to go back to this stand to buy a shirt to go with my new kilt. I probably will steal some of these phrases to use on Facebook posts.
Because we never act our middle ages, our next stop was working as bar backs at a beer and wine fest in Schaumburg, for the stand from the folks at the Village Vintner Winery and Brewery. It was not to work off a tab. I swear.
Tom’s evening wear included this classic shirt. I was supposed to wear one that said Drunk Two, but I didn’t get the email.
Chicks dig wine. A lot of wine. In fact, the Vintner sold nine cases in pours in just three hours – and a half a keg of beer.
Sunday’s Father’s Day fun – a trip to Medieval Times. These kings like burgers, aren’t Latin and had to eat with their hands.
I’m hiring these two to accompany me when I cover meetings for my day job.
They printed what would be served on the napkin. At some places eating the napkin is better for you than the food – but here, it actually was better than I thought it would be.
If you’ve never been to Medieval Times, each section has a different color code, and you’re supposed to root for the knight in the battles who’s donning those colors. Our guy was red AND yellow, and it’s tough to come up with a to-the-point chant when you have two colors. You can’t beat Red for that – and Red did beat our guy to win the tournament.
Finally, it was time to kick back in front of the big HDTV in my new plaid shorts (NOTE: I’m not sold on polyester as a fabric for shorts, I felt flammable). Game of Thrones fit in nicely with the weekend’s motif.
And this is all I’ll say……
