I Suck At The Chateau

Karen and I took the week between Christmas/Annamas and New Year's off from work. My former employer used to close the office during that week between the holidays. I am not sure if my former employer still does that for its employees, but ever since Karen and I have made a habit to take that week off.

One would think that Karen and I would relax and enjoy our week off from work. Yesterday, however, we ran through a bunch of errands on our ever-expanding "to-do" list. The main errands that we took care of yesterday were the oil change and the inspection sticker. (For anyone curious, it was a good thing that we did the oil change first because it turns out that our tail lights were out.)

Anyway, following our errands, I worked on renovating our first floor bathroom. The bathroom on the first floor has been in disarray for quite some time. I figured that I would at least work a little on the bathroom during my vacation break so that I could feel somewhat productive. And so, I removed all of the insulation that had lined the walls and the ceiling of the bathroom.

I realize that removing insulation now while the weather is cold and chilly outside is probably not the best idea. Helping to ease my mind, however, is the fact that the previous owner or builder did not correctly use the proper insulation anyway. The first floor bathroom was cold to begin with. I just made it a little colder now.

Needless to say, it felt good to finally remove the old insulation from the first floor bathroom. So now I can at least say I was somewhat productive during my break. Sadly, there is still a long way to go before I can finish this renovation project.

Having been somewhat productive, I then got ready to go out with Karen to the restaurant known as The Chateau. The Chateau, located in Braintree, is an Italian family restaurant. The restaurant took the place of Famous Dave's (near Bugaboo Creek).

Now, I suck at the Chateau. Truth be told, I think the owners of the place suck at naming the restaurant. After all, the word "chateau" is French. So naturally, I thought the place was a French restaurant. Nope. It's an Italian restaurant. I don't know what the Italian equivalent is to "chateau", but I guess the word just didn't have the same ring to it. Castello, is that?

Anyway, Karen and I were meeting up with our friends (Pam and Ed). Pam and Ed, who live in Bon Jovi's home state of New Jersey, were back for the holidays. (Of course, if I lived in New Jersey, I would be back in Massachusetts every day...) Nevertheless, they organized a little get-together. Apparently, Pam has dined at The Chateau before, albeit the one located in Waltham, and absolutely loved it. So it was with great excitement that she was able to plan and organize the dinner with the much closer location in Braintree.

In addition to Pam, Ed, Karen and myself, joining in on the festivities were my friends (Jen, Hot Amy) and my BFF (Kerry). My friend (Joanna) unfortunately could not join us due to communication issues. By communication issues, I mean that Joanna did not get the email about the plans until it was too late.

Needless to say, I have never been to the Chateau. The food was okay. Of course, there were great expectations for the toasted ravioli dish already because Pam had hyped up the meal. It's tough to live up to high expectations.

The high expectations remind me of the movie "Wedding Crashers". When the movie came out, the movie was hyped as the funniest movie ever. I was sadly disappointed when I finally got around to seeing the movie. Don't get me wrong. The movie was funny, but definitely not the funniest movie ever seen.

Speaking of movies, I forgot to mention that Karen and I also watched "17 Again" yesterday as well.

(The video below is the trailer for "17 Again".)


Interestingly enough, the movie was enjoyable. And contrary to what my friend (Cass) had joked about... not all white people look like Zac Efron. Regardless, the movie was entertaining. (For anyone curious, the movie also starred Michelle Trachtenberg of Buffy fame.)

Anyway, the food at The Chateau was okay. I actually did not have the toasted ravioli dish. I opted for the eggplant parm dinner, but I did try one of the toasted raviolis. It was okay.

Regardless, it was a fun night.