Day Two

Near Boston at Burlington High School. We arrived here from NJ this morning. We had one rest stop on the way in New York, the trip was uneventful and I was able to get enough sleep. I am sure I will sleep well tonight, however.

Breakfast was easy, just put out donuts, coffee, pop tarts and other baked goods with the usual cereal, yogurt and stuff.

Lunch was what we call "split", which means that the brass would be fed at 12:45 and the guard and percussion at 2:00. Since it was in a single location, it is pretty easy to do. We served hot dogs and home made Mac and Cheese along with chips and apples. I made the Mac and Cheese from the ziti I cooked and chilled yesterday. I looked up a general recipe and went from there. Butter and flour for a roux, water and milk, a truly awesome amount of cheddar cheese, a couple of pounds of Parmesan, dry mustard, a touch of garlic powder and a block of Velveeta we had left and we had a large pot of cheese sauce. We made 8 pans and they ate 7, so I think they liked it.

Tonight is meatballs and spaghetti with salad and green beans plus some chocolate sheet cakes. Here are some photos:

The spaghetti and meatballs

Alice serving the chocolate cake

Yesterday they had a repairman come to fix the valve that got broken on the flat top. He told us that the back splash we had was causing many problems and told us to either remove it or cut holes in it to let the heat flow properly. This has been done so the unit should work much better. I am hoping that we will be able to do some blackened chicken sandwiches. I think the corps will love them. Here is the recipe

We are now getting ready to head to the show in Quincy. 

Matt

First Day

I arrived at the Trenton Train station all safe and sound. I was picked up by an old Cadet friend, Chris Demas. There was another Cadet at the train station too so the three of us headed to the housing site.

When I arrived I saw many old friends and met some new ones. The best part of joining the tour is getting to see all these great people, members, staff and volunteers.

I found my son, Liam, got a hug and handed off to him his new shoes and air mattress.

Today was a bit of a special dinner because a great supporter of the cadets, Greg Pych, was bringing it in. He brought country ribs, corn, baked beans and a wonderful salad of mixed greens, grapes, strawberries and a neat mixture of three dressings. Greg prepared the ribs with a rub in the oven then finished them off on the grill with barbeque sauce. We did our special "cooler corn" and it came out great as usual. A very successful meal and the members were well pleased with it. Here are some shots of the food:

Country Ribs

Mixed Salad

Corn on the Cob cooked in a Cooler

Liam showing off his meal

At the Train Station

The station in Norfolk is packed! This is very good news for our new little station.

Get the Tour Calendar

This is kind of a how-to blog post, but since we all like to know where the tour is at any given moment, here is the link to the tour calendar:

http://www.yea.org/site/PageServer?pagename=cadets_tour

Here is the cool part, if you are a Google Calendar user you can add this calendar to be shown on your calendar. All you have to do is click the little button on the bottom of the calendar:

This will add the "The Cadets Tour" calendar to your Google Calendar display. The best part is this is not a copy of the tour calendar, but a link. When the calendar is updated by The Cadets, the entries on your calendar are updated automatically.

If you have an Android phone, this new calendar should appear on your phone in a short time, if you do not see it after waiting a while, go to your calendar display and use the setting "Calendars to Display" and  make sure that the calendar named "The Cadets Tour" is selected to be displayed. Also make sure that in the list of "Calendars to Sync" that the calendar is checked as well.

-Matt

Joining Tour 2013 in New Jersey

Hey All,

I will be joining The Cadets again on Tour starting this Friday. I will meet up with them after a very early train ride from Norfolk, VA. I will be with them from the 28th until the 6th.

I hope to post at least once a day this year, we will see how busy it gets.

-Matt

April Camp!

Lunch for The Cadets, grilled hot dogs and fixings, baked beans, fruit cocktail and cookies.

On the Train

We spent a wonderful couple of nights with our daughter in New York City. We went to a famous coal fired pizza oven place and did some shopping. I picked up a high capacity battery for my phone because I thought I might need it while I tweet and blog from the shows.
We are on the train from NYC to Boston and, though we were a bit late getting off, this is the way to travel. I have a 110 V socket right next to me, a comfortable seat and a quiet and pretty quick ride.
Both Kathy and I are looking forward to getting settled in so we can start helping. Also we are looking forward to seeing our son and all our "carrot" people friends, both old and new!
That is it for now, but I am using the mobile blogger, so I will try to post little bits more often.