Oh where has April gone?

Hard to believe that April has almost come and gone. Sorry to dissapear, this is the worst time of year for me at work, with about 20,000 things have to be done by the end of the year.

And I've had a bad case of "spring fever" which has me outside working in the yard, on the golf course, or sitting at the baseball stadium taking in a couple of games.

Basically put, anywhere than writing these posts.

I have visited Richland (Mansfield) and Madison (London) counties in the past month and need to get the photos and write-ups posted. Wife is home this weekend and as a stress-break hoping for some time to get a couple more out of the way.

Have a great weekend!

Baseball's Back in Ohio -- Three Times Over

The weather may be wet and gray, but that is not going to kill my mood today.

It is a joyous week as baseball is back and I have had two opening days – with the third staring me in the face – already this week.

Of course, the Indians and Reds opened on Monday and both played very well. Joe Randa’s walk-off home run off course made the Reds look a little better, but both teams played very good games. Then last night, the United League of Moderate Gamers, a Strat-O-Matic baseball league I’m in opened the season and I won my first (and maybe last series) of the year.

Today is the official opening day for Minor League Baseball with the six Ohio squads opening. Columbus Clippers, the AAA affiliate of the New York Yankees, is on the road to open the season, but returns home next week. Already ordered my tickets for April 18 when the team takes on Charlotte for Dime-A-Dog night. Baseball and cheap hot dogs, what else could a married man want?

The infamous Toledo Mud Hens (AAA, Detroit) have become a house-hold name thanks to their unique nickname and Toledo native Jamie Farr donning the team’s colors on M*A*S*H.

The Indians have three affiliates in Ohio, Akron Aeros (AA), Lake County Captains (Low-A) in Eastlake, and Mahoning Valley Scrappers (Short Season-A) in Niles. The Reds have their High-A affiliate in Dayton where the Dragons often sell-out.

Coming later this summer is professional independent baseball action in Chillicothe where the Paints are a founding member of the Frontier League. In addition, some of the best college players in the Midwest take part in the Great Lakes Baseball League, a wood-bat college league, based in Delaware. The league has teams in Toledo – playing at the old home of the Mud Hens Ned Skelton Stadium – Delaware, Columbus, Athens, Celina, Indianapolis, and Canton.

So grab a lawn chair and get-out and support baseball in Ohio!

And the Winner Is...

In the first-ever Ohio Wine Producers Chili Cook Off, there is a winner.

Tarsitano Winery was the winner of the two-day event, held on February 25-26 at five different Northeast Ohio wineries. Tarsitano’s also topped Gretchen and I’s ballot (“Chili Cook Off, Wine Tasting in Northeast Ohio”, posted on March 3) for their original presentation and great tasting chili.

The event drew 80 people to the wineries and the OWPA is promising it to become a yearly endeavor. Attendees received all the chili recipes and a collectable glass and had the opportunity to win a special gift basket or the grand prize being an overnight stay at The Lodge and Conference Center in Geneva.

Donniella Winchell, executive director of OWPA, wrote in a letter to attendees, “In future years the Great Chili Cook Off is sure to become known as a fun way to warm up from the mid-winter blues, add to your recipe collection, and enjoy the atmosphere of Ohio’s unique wineries.”

The next OWPA event on the docket for the Wines and Vines trail is the Wines N’ Bloom scheduled for the first two full weekends in May.

Medina Native Tells Tale of Civil War Preaching Grand Father

Saw this article in Today's Akron Beacon-Journal and had to retell part of the story.

Elizabeth Menges Ramirez-Graham has a leather-bound diary in a velvet-covered jewelry box. It has been in her family for more than 130 years, but it has only been in the last couple of years that she began to feel the power of the words.

"It was in my family but we never looked at it very much," she said. "We heard about my grandfather, just through the family. We always felt proud of him, but we never knew many details."

Elizabeth's grandfather was Reverend Louis Miller Albright and the diary is his 1865 Civil War Diary. Rev. Albright was not a soldier but rather a volunteer for the YMCA sponsored U.S. Christian Commission which formed in 1861 to meet the spiritual needs of soldiers in the field.

February 1865: Today I was assigned to General Hospital No. 3 in Nashville. Spent all the forenoon distributing periodicals and conversing with sick soldiers in the hospital. Distributed 50 papers and magazines and conversed on the subject of religion with six soldiers.

It was entries like this that led Elizabeth and friend and self-publisher Stanley Graham to write up the entries into a collection of his journal entries, Civil War Diary, which is available for $19.95 from Belding Publishing.

Albright attended Ohio Wesleyan University and following the War returned to campus as a math and science teacher. He married Eliza Lewis Downing in 1867 and the couple became a "Methodist Power-House" in central Ohio. Albright is the founder of Asbury United Methodist Church, which still worships in the sanctuary built in 1888.

"It just seemed the thing to do. I didn't like to think that his life and his contributions had been forgotten."

New Riegel Cafe -- Ohio's Best BBQ

Best ribs in Ohio. Period. End of story.

I have had ribs from all over the state and found many good ones, but there is something about getting BBQ from New Riegel Café in tiny New Riegel, Ohio, that takes the cake.

New Riegel -- all 220 people -- is the essence of quiet small-town life. A large Catholic church, a small "community" store, a bar, a bank, and the Cafe. Not much else, and the people of New Riegel like it that way. Just like thousands of other small towns all over Ohio and throughout the Midwest.

New Riegel Cafe

What makes New Riegel different is the Cafe.

I was in a Strat-O-Matic baseball league with a guy that lived between Dayton and Cincinnati, and when he found out that I'd lived in Tiffin. The first question was "Have you ever been to New Riegel?" People come from all over the state to enjoy a hearty-meal at the Cafe.

What should you expect. Great food, but really not much else. The ambiance of the place is 20th century bar motif, in other words it is your typical small-town diner. Uncomfortable wooden benches, or long-tables with uncomfortable chairs. The waiting room - always crowded - is not well-planned and you are often pressed into a corner. A gift shop sells items, but the only thing that I've been interested in is the wall that has all the news clippings on the Cafe. Neil Zurcher's One Tank Trips made a trip to New Riegel along with numerous other food editors over the years.

The place doesn't take reservations, barely has a menu. Up until about 3-4 years ago the only menu was the one printed on the wall; they must have gotten tired of being asked because now each table has a small stand with the menu on it. Not sure why though, only New Riegel rookies need to look at it. Personally, I'm a rib-and-a-half with extra sauce, the wife rotates between ribs, chicken, and shrimp. The salad is a couple bucks extra and is really not worth the money -- lettuce with a couple slices of carrots -- but the homemade salad dressing are worth the extra cost. The house, a sweet-and-sour, is excellent.

Service is a regional joke. "So what do you want?" is a common statement. They aren't there to be nice just to get you on to the food. The dinner is served in paper-tubs and you don't even notice.

If you were ranking New Riegel on all the pieces, it would not look very good. But the food out-weighs everything. It is a wonderful place to eat and honestly one of my favorite places to go.

If you head to New Riegel take cash, as they do not accept any form of plastic. The meals are reasonable, the 1-1/2 order of ribs is about $11. No free refills on drinks.

Waldo to be Featured on Travel Channel

Waldo's bologna fascination will lead to a second 15-minutes of fame for the community off U.S. 23 in southern Marion County.

Travel Channel's "Taste of America" was in Waldo in September and will debut the new show on Tuesday night at 10 p.m. Host Mark De Carlo was at G&R Tavern and Engle's Sports Bar and both are expected to be featured in this show.

A Travel Trip: The Western Basin

Since it is going to be a week or so before I can get out and visit any new counties, thought I’d do a couple of posts on my favorite places to travel to within the Buckeye state.

We’ll begin the journey in the Western Basin of Lake Erie. Anywhere from Sandusky to Maumee Bay State Park is fine with me, but the Marblehead Light House draws me in all the time. Living in Tiffin, I could be in Port Clinton or the lighthouse in about 45-minutes and after a stressful week at work, I spent many Sundays just sitting on the rocks that mark the exterior of the Lighthouse. Listening to the water lap the shore and the distant screams of thrill-seekers at Cedar Point provided a soothing calm as the water just washed away the stress from my day.

The Lighthouse is often crowded and while the state has dramatically improved parking in the last couple of years, it can still be a hassle. I like to take the first sunny weekend of the year, those days when the beauty shines through the 20-degree thermometer, and make a trip to the Lighthouse.

Port Clinton has a nice downtown section. However, in the off-season it is not quite as striking as during the summer. Downtown has the historic hotel, which during the off-season has offered a weekend dinner theatre program which offers a great deal and is quite entertaining. There is also a neat popcorn shop – that has been featured on FoodTV – making unique flavors for the popcorn. Among my favorites is the Walleye.

Continuing westward, Maumee Bay State Park was the crown jewel of the State Park Lodges until Geneva State Park opened last summer. Maumee Bay offers beautiful views and tons of things for the family to do. The wife and I spent our one-year anniversary at the park and enjoyed walking the grounds, visiting area shops, and just relaxing. We took the nature trail walk on two occasions and saw 15 deer over the two days.

Maumee Bay State Park is about as far west as I like to go. Heading further west on highway 2 lands you in the industrial section of Toledo. This area provides a vital cog in the region’s economy, but doesn’t offer the most welcome view for the beauty-thirsty traveler.

Grabbing a ferry from Port Clinton or Catawba Point will allow you to visit the islands. Kelly’s Island has traditionally been the quiet family spot with glacier grooves. I haven’t been to Kelly’s in several years, but the increase in “bar shirts” that I see advertising a location on the island makes me wonder if it isn’t beginning to take on the shape of its more famous brother to the west.

South Bass Island is probably the most famous of the islands in Lake Erie, as Put-In-Bay has been labeled the party town of the Midwest. If you head to South Bass in the early afternoon, you'll be rewarded with the peaceful beauty of the island. I have always enjoyed spending the morning riding around the outskirts of the island on a golf cart. However, head into Put-In-Bay about “happy hour” time an you will see a very different town. The small quant village becomes a thriving metropolis with more bounce than any spring break party in Daytona Beach and is not for the faint of heart.