Hows my little Tough Mudder?

Jolly Roger made a triumphant return to Tough Mudder this year and showed big mudder what's up in a big way. Our crack team of six mostly out of shape teammates ran through over 10 miles worth of mud, obstacles, and not a single hill. The lack of hills was due to the location, northern Illinois just west of Joliet. If you've looked out from the top of the sears tower you'll understand.

Since I don't have a waterproof nor, indestructible camera I don't have any shots from the race on hand. Know this, I would have provided if I had the means. Taking pictures during a mud run like this is more exciting for the same reason as running it is. There is hardly anything boring about people dressing in costumes, or almost nothing at all, getting muddy and testing themselves to the limits of their physical abilities. With all the jumping, crawling, diving, sliding, climbing, helping, pushing, and hauling its easy to see how this is more fun than the traditional race.

Here are a few pictures I gathered from the event. If you're thinking about participating in one, do it. Its way more fun than a marathon and you get muddy.

Jason's face is priceless, but so is my Dad's hunch in the background.

I'm convinced these weren't live this year, instead they dug a trench and filled it with water. 

Post race beer!

We got everyone on our team up Everest this year!

Earned nap.

Photobomb!

This year compared to last, everything seemed easier. In a twisted sort of way I missed that the electroshock obstacle wasn't lit up. I know I felt a hint of something but compared to last year, it was nothing, is Tough Mudder getting soft? Would I do it again? absolutely.

Hows my little kitchen tool?

At Thanksgiving Laura's brother showed us this fantastic kitchen tool they recently got, which at first seemed too good to be true (like most kitchen gadgets). Even after discussion and watching it in action I was still not sold. I mean really, isn't a blender just that, a blender? Well it is until you quadruple the price of said blender, only then do you break into a whole new realm of food processing.

A normal blender can effecively do about three things, crush ice (see daiquiri), make smoothies, and take up space. Anyone who says they use their blender all the time is a damn liar or a compulsive smoothie drinker.

Laura and I have a food processor/blender combo (two containers one base) and I hate cleaning all of them, sharp blades don't mix with sponges and flying bits in the dishwasher are scary. So I asked Laura's brother, "ok so it's probably a pain to clean, right?" Wrong. The Vitamix cleans itself. SOLD.

Lucky for us we got one for Christmas. I got pretty excited and decided I was going to try to make something new with it at least twice a week for a month, to try and get to know its many capabilities. Naturally that fell apart after three weeks but I kept taking pictures of this and that until recently. 

So, here is my photographic journey of Vitamix learning thus far.

Starting easy, frozen yogurt:

Almost Almond Milk:

Failed pancakes.

Frozen Martini:

Diced Garlic and Onions:

Hummus:

Ground Flax:

Another Smoothie:

Smoothest Hummus Ever:

Red Winter Wheat Four (forgot to take a picture before I turned it on):

Ground Cinnamon!

Homegrown Cyanne Powder:

Poof! Don't breathe!

Mayonnaise (it was disgusting):

This post has been months in the making but I was holding out for one thing before writing it...peanut butter.
Well, Almond Butter:

The best part of all...
Dishwasher:

In truth it's really a fantastic tool, our old blender which I never thought sucked until this came into our lives didn't ever get things as smooth, and it did everything much slower. Our hummus is better, I can grind our own flour as needed and when I'm out of milk (and hopefully not almonds) I can make almond milk as a substitute. The vitamix came with a book full of recipes and ideas for different things to make with it and I've only grazed the surface.

A blender is a strange thing for me to post about but I just want everyone to know how awesome this thing is.