my boys are growing up...

to celebrate fat tuesday, kate came up with the swell idea to have everyone pitch in a dish for a cajun-style potluck lunch. to fill out the festivities, we also decided to mix in a little midday baby shower for two of our kitchen boys. ryan and gary, who are shortly to become proud first-time fathers (separately, for the record). they got some swell gifts (ryan is pictured holding the onesy and gary's about to open a book of stories for children) and we finished out the luncheon with cake. at the time, the whole thing seemed like a pleasant enough time-killer in the middle of the working day, but i found myself feeling a little more deeply when i saw this picture. i've worked with both of these guys for years now and definitely feel a strong mix of pride, love, and even a little envy to see my good friends about to grow into good fathers. our best wishes to ryan and kelly and gary and kara as they welcome the little ones that will change them from young couples into new families. lechaim!

hey, it's those guys!

so, my first full day back turned into a particularly full fourteen hour day ending in a plated dinner for 25o guests at the crawford auto and aviation museum in university circle. nothing like jumping back in head-first, i suppose. the event was a great success and we used a little bit of our extra time to check out the museum's cool collection of vintage planes and cars...my personal favorite being the all stainless steel '66 lincoln continental convertible. i've always thought the rear suicide doors on this car were killer and nothing really warms a chef's heart like a lot of shiny stainless steel. sweet ride. pictured here are most of my kitchen boys posing for a quick group photo before the real work got underway. (top row l-r: gary, peter, commander michael smith, jason "the sensation", and ryan. bottom row l-r: gabriel and byron. not pictured: me, jakub, ben, chris, bigfoot, and the elves that we've imprisoned to help with our most labor intensive projects.) Anyhow, we had a good time producing a great event...about as enjoyable a first night back as i could have asked for.

super-old, but super-swell overhead shot from our last renegade lunch

well, i'm finally back in the shop after my furlough in south carolina's low country. right before i skipped town, we threw down our first public ben and greg's renegade lunch project. if you haven't run into this neat little concept of ours before, find out more at http://renegadelunch.blogspot.com/. of course, thanks to my poor planning and design skills, the first thing you'll see there is the picture that you see here. what can i say? i've found that this particular camera angle is very slimming for me. of course, it also gives the viewer a nice idea of what the thing is all about...a concern which is apparently secondary to my own vanity.

blog on holiday

a great big south carolina hello to katie and the other three people who follow this blog. i'm currently on sabbatical and living in a small house at coffin point on st. helena island, trying to work on a project that requires solitude, focus, and vodka and soda. the first and last parts of the equation have been coming along really well so far. i've got all of the solitude and vodka i can handle. the focus, well, it comes and goes. anyhoo, i'll be back in another week or so and hopefully will have some interesting things to share with everyone then...heck, anything's possible.