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It’s raining this morning so I’m driving Austen to the bus stop 2 blocks away. Hey, it’s raining hard, leave me alone. Of course she wants to stand in the rain and look cool. Uh, no. I did the same shit, “What? I don’t wanna wear a coat to school. (Insert Mom reason #37) So? I don’t care if it’s 43 degrees out . . . my coat makes me hot.” (Read uncool)

And now here I am :-)

Anyway, while we’re killing time waiting for the bus Austen asks how the Skins are doing overall this preseason. She watched some of the brutal beatdown last week, a loss to Carolina 47-3. I said we were 3-0 before that. I then uttered something like, “man did we get killed”. And that started a list of variable terms on the Redskins beating.

Me, “slaughtered”
Austen, “liquidated”
Erin, “beat”
Me, “eviscerated”
Austen, “smashed”
Erin, “creamed”
Me, “pureed”
Austen, “all isn’t well”
Erin, “whipped”
Me, “stomped”
Austen, “exposed”
Erin, “crushed”
Me, “blasted”
Austen, “emotionally scarred”
Erin, “crying to their mommies”
Me, “sliced and diced”
Austen, “frappéd”

And then the bus came.

We’re talking about real ice cream here kids. No Slenderita in sight at the University of Maryland Dairy. This is one of our favorite places to get ice cream. We like our ice cream here at The Dad Report. The trouble is the hours of operation make it tough to frequent. Open only Monday through Friday from 10am to 4pm. That’s a tough pull for most working adults.

If you can make it, its definitely worth the effort. Washington Times writer Karen Goff just wrote a nice article on “The Dairy”. I’m really pleased she did because the place is so unknown outside the school. I hope more people will make the effort to go. My favorite flavor is Fear the Turtle. Oooohhhh, white chocolate with caramel and pecan goodness. It is hard to explain how good it is so I won’t try except to say this is creamy ice cream with tons of flavor. Erin always goes for the super flavorful lime sorbet. (I know, sorbet in a great ice cream place) Austen usually tries a different ice cream flavor each time. ALL of it is great.

The Dairy is located right off of Route 1, next to the UMD Visitors Center. There is a small parking lot right there, but pay attention to those 30 minute meters or that $3 ice cream will quickly become extremely expensive.

I have discovered what may be the best flavored pistachios on the planet.

They were sent to me by my pal Uncle Flakey. He buys them at the Berkeley Farmer’s Market in that hotbed of communism, but there is an interesting story behind them.

Ahmad Dalvi is owner of Happy Nuts Farm of Sacramento, and according to my pal he always has the freshest, best tasting almonds and pistachios. While he provides raw and unsalted versions of each, his most popular offerings are flavored pistachios: jalapeno, garlic and onion, mesquite roast, lime-chile, and salsa. Dalvi doesn’t use any pesticides and all his nuts are certified organic. (Berkeley? . . . certified organic nuts? . . . oh nevermind.)

The absolute killer flavor is curry roast. It’s the most difficult to concoct according to Dalvi. For instance, he has to import fermented tofu powder from China. (Miso is a fermented tofu substitute; the real thing is made from tofu buried in the ground in big clay pots until it ferments and is then dried to make the powder.)

But this being Berzerkeley they weren’t always called curry roast; Dalvi, being the international man that he is, originally called them “Oriental Roast.” However, he received so many complaints—never mind that it’s not considered a ethnic slur anywhere but the U.S.—that he changed the name. Oy.  Read more »

My best friend and his beautiful wife just had a gorgeous little girl, naturally launching my lovely wife Lisa into baby gift buying action. Actually she launched months ago only then we didn’t know boy or girl, just baby. We were heading back from the Takoma Park Farmer’s Market when we saw a beautiful new store on Carroll Avenue.

“Oh my god, this is EXACTLY the kind of store I’d love to have”, so said Lisa when we stepped inside The Pajama Squid. This is truly the type of store that a staid and pretty boring Takoma Park needs. The PS is smart and tastefully designed with a well thought out selection of toys and gifts. Do not miss the excellent array of childrens books. We even met the owner’s husband, very nice guy.

After perusing the entire store (and taking into account our daughters numerous suggestions) we settled on a super soft striped baby elephant. I had my eye on the music box, was overruled. Something about not knowing the theme of the room, the baby’s sex . . . yeahbut . . . yeahbut . . . it’s a music box . . .

So get down to The Pajama Squid today. Right now. Go. The owner Tiffany is just giving parking money away. What are you waiting for? Huh? Oh, yes you can order online. You have no excuse now for not supporting a great local resource.