I was saddened - nay, depressed - to hear the news that Hunter S. Thompson, the originator of “gonzo” journalism, was found dead Sunday night, apparently from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
HST was a true original. His drug- and borderline psychosis-fueled writing, especially his works from the 1970’s, were startlingly funny and incisive, different from just about anything else you would ever see on the printed page. His landmark novel Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas was an inspiration to me and my friend Steve when we made our post-graduation cross-country trek thirty years ago, although there was no way a human being with normal body chemistry could even attempt to replicate most of the stunts Thompson chronicled in that book. His report on the 1972 election, Fear and Loathing on the Campaign Trail, was a new generation’s Making of the President, capturing perfectly the spirit of that desperate and twisted Presidential race. And when She Who Must Be Obeyed and I went to the big island of Hawai’i for the first time, my appreciation for the place was magnified by having seen it though the lens of HST’s mania in The Curse of Lono.
There are people who still refer to me as “Dr. Gonzo” on the basis of my affection for the good Doctor’s works (and possibly my similarly bizarre personality), and I consider myself honored.
How tragic that Thompson died by his own hand...but then again, he always did have a fondness for Very Large Guns. I - along with other HST devotees like Nino the Mindboggler - will mourn.
Requiescat in pace, Dr. Gonzo. Vaya con queso.
Update:
Not surprisingly, the Blogging World is turning out en masse to grieve at the passing of the Good Doctor. Be sure to read the fine obits by Roxanne, Pete, and Ricky - and let’s not forget the photographic tribute by Mark.
Monday, February 21, 2005
LOTSA SMALL MAMMALS
and other critters are available for your perusal at the latest Friday Ark (hosted, as always, by that most modular Modulator). If your preference is for matters feline, drop by the 48th Carnival of the Cats, hosted this week by The Flying Space Monkey Chronicles.
Ya gotta love a blog that calls itself The Flying Space Monkey Chronicles. I am actually old enough to remember a time when there really were Flying Space Monkeys, and it’s good to know that there are those of us in the Bloggy-Sphere that wish to keep that memory alive.
Ya gotta love a blog that calls itself The Flying Space Monkey Chronicles. I am actually old enough to remember a time when there really were Flying Space Monkeys, and it’s good to know that there are those of us in the Bloggy-Sphere that wish to keep that memory alive.
Friday, February 18, 2005
A WEEKEND OFF
I’m off to a religious retreat this weekend, so there will be Zero Blogging for a couple of days. I have - in a burst of impetuousness - handed the keys to She Who Must Be Obeyed, so let’s see if she does anything with ’em, shall we?
MAKING A LIVING
This morning at Ye Local Bagel Emporium - that fine establishment to which the Minyan Boyz repair after the daily morning worship - something made me think about how we used to earn pin money as kids. I thought back upon some of my early jobs...and before.
There was one summer I earned my bread in what was perhaps the lowest-paying work I ever did: I drove an ice-cream truck. Yep, ol’ Elisson was the Good Humor Man. That job is worth a post or two by itself. But that was a real, grown-up type job, requiring a driver’s license and all. Let’s go back even farther, shall we? Back to pre-teen days, when a driver’s license wasn’t even a gleam in my eye.
Probably the first real earned money I made was shagging golf balls. We lived a block or so away from a nine-hole neighborhood golf course. It had been built when the neighborhood was first developed, back in the beginning of the 1950’s, and was a real drawing card for potential residents. It wasn’t a fancy-pants club like the ones you see today in golfy neighborhoods - no Country Club of the South - but it served, especially if you didn’t want to schlep the five miles to Bethpage State Park (yes, that Bethpage) and queue up for a ticket.
Our little golf course had a treacherous ninth hole, a par-five that ran parallel to the edge of the course. Any ball that had the slightest amount of fade on it would sail over the chain-link fence that marked the boundary, and would land somewhere on Cedar Drive, either in the street, on the median, or in one of the yards of the homes on the opposite side of the street.
Where a small army of kids was waiting for it.
We would snag those balls, and, being too young to play ourselves, we did the enterprising thing: we sold ’em back to the golfers who had just smacked ’em over the fence.
Let me tell you, we developed an eye for quality. The prize ball in those days was the Titleist, and it was especially nice to get a new one - one without any nicks, dents, or “smiles” on it. The balls in those days had wound cores with balata covers - the two-piece Spalding Executive had not been invented yet - and so they were very vulnerable to damage by the mostly inexpert players. A new Titleist was worth a dollar, maybe even $1.25 - and those were 1962 dollars which packed a much bigger wallop than our skeevy 2005-vintage bucks. You could make a handsome handful of dollars working Cedar Drive.
I wonder if the kids in the old neighborhood still shag golf balls. The course is still there, and the golfers aren’t any better than they were 40-plus years ago. Do kids hustle to earn those few bucks anymore?
There was one summer I earned my bread in what was perhaps the lowest-paying work I ever did: I drove an ice-cream truck. Yep, ol’ Elisson was the Good Humor Man. That job is worth a post or two by itself. But that was a real, grown-up type job, requiring a driver’s license and all. Let’s go back even farther, shall we? Back to pre-teen days, when a driver’s license wasn’t even a gleam in my eye.
Probably the first real earned money I made was shagging golf balls. We lived a block or so away from a nine-hole neighborhood golf course. It had been built when the neighborhood was first developed, back in the beginning of the 1950’s, and was a real drawing card for potential residents. It wasn’t a fancy-pants club like the ones you see today in golfy neighborhoods - no Country Club of the South - but it served, especially if you didn’t want to schlep the five miles to Bethpage State Park (yes, that Bethpage) and queue up for a ticket.
Our little golf course had a treacherous ninth hole, a par-five that ran parallel to the edge of the course. Any ball that had the slightest amount of fade on it would sail over the chain-link fence that marked the boundary, and would land somewhere on Cedar Drive, either in the street, on the median, or in one of the yards of the homes on the opposite side of the street.
Where a small army of kids was waiting for it.
We would snag those balls, and, being too young to play ourselves, we did the enterprising thing: we sold ’em back to the golfers who had just smacked ’em over the fence.
Let me tell you, we developed an eye for quality. The prize ball in those days was the Titleist, and it was especially nice to get a new one - one without any nicks, dents, or “smiles” on it. The balls in those days had wound cores with balata covers - the two-piece Spalding Executive had not been invented yet - and so they were very vulnerable to damage by the mostly inexpert players. A new Titleist was worth a dollar, maybe even $1.25 - and those were 1962 dollars which packed a much bigger wallop than our skeevy 2005-vintage bucks. You could make a handsome handful of dollars working Cedar Drive.
I wonder if the kids in the old neighborhood still shag golf balls. The course is still there, and the golfers aren’t any better than they were 40-plus years ago. Do kids hustle to earn those few bucks anymore?
FROM THE ELISSON ARCHIVE
Dutch Toilet. Photo by SWMBO, 1987.
This photograph graces the wall of our downstairs half-bath. She Who Must Be Obeyed took the picture in Amsterdam eighteen years ago. Having no vase, she improvised...and the resulting image was irresistible.
ON FRIDAY WE BLOG THEM CATS
Today is Friday, and for once I am observing Bloggity Convention by posting my catpix on time. For Friday is Catblogging Day!
First up, we have Hakuna and Matata nestled amongst the folds of the bedclothes and the splayed limbs o’ SWMBO. Hakuna lurks discreetly in the background adjacent to She Who Must Be Obeyed: typically, she will avoid walking on the Great Bifurcated Gods but will cuddle up next to us on occasion. Matata, however, comports herself like a great, fuzzy Ho-Bag, and will lay anywhere, nuzzle anything. (Not that, ya filthy-minded bastids!)
Hakuna and Matata nestled amidst the Limbs o’ SWMBO.
In this next photo, Matata has climbed into this bag completely without human assistance. Her eyes have a devilish glow...but notice the halo reflected on the chest of drawers behind her.
Matata - in the bag again.
Finally, here's ’Ta in her favorite comfy chair. Yogis may have their “Lotus,” but Matata has the “Meatloaf” down pat. Ommmmmmmmm...
Matata in her "Meatloaf" pose.
First up, we have Hakuna and Matata nestled amongst the folds of the bedclothes and the splayed limbs o’ SWMBO. Hakuna lurks discreetly in the background adjacent to She Who Must Be Obeyed: typically, she will avoid walking on the Great Bifurcated Gods but will cuddle up next to us on occasion. Matata, however, comports herself like a great, fuzzy Ho-Bag, and will lay anywhere, nuzzle anything. (Not that, ya filthy-minded bastids!)
Hakuna and Matata nestled amidst the Limbs o’ SWMBO.
In this next photo, Matata has climbed into this bag completely without human assistance. Her eyes have a devilish glow...but notice the halo reflected on the chest of drawers behind her.
Matata - in the bag again.
Finally, here's ’Ta in her favorite comfy chair. Yogis may have their “Lotus,” but Matata has the “Meatloaf” down pat. Ommmmmmmmm...
Matata in her "Meatloaf" pose.
Thursday, February 17, 2005
BEHOLD THE POWER OF BLOGGING
Behold the Power of Cheese? Bullshit. Cheese ain’t powerful...unless you’re talking about the stinky Camembert that was so vile, so pungent, that She Who Must Be Obeyed yanked it out of the fridge and threw it right into the back yard.
No: Behold the Power of Blogging.
Because Blogging is much, much more powerful than cheese.
Blogging got Dan Rather shoved out the door, credibility besmirched. Cheese did not.
And blogging got our friends Steve and Sue - they of the Famously Excessive Luggage - to change their behavior.
Yes, you heard right. Steve and Sue arrived this evening for a weekend visit with only four bags. Two huge wheeled duffels, yes - and two backpacks. But that was all of it.
Steve and Sue, sans luggage.
What occasioned this drastic change in behavior? For drastic it was. Last trip, Steve and Sue packed the equivalent of a fuckin’ U-Haul. For a weekend. What was different?
Why, they read my blog, in which I had Ripped Them a New One. And they felt mickle ashamed.
And so, today: Reasonable Quantities of Luggage. Halleluyah!
No: Behold the Power of Blogging.
Because Blogging is much, much more powerful than cheese.
Blogging got Dan Rather shoved out the door, credibility besmirched. Cheese did not.
And blogging got our friends Steve and Sue - they of the Famously Excessive Luggage - to change their behavior.
Yes, you heard right. Steve and Sue arrived this evening for a weekend visit with only four bags. Two huge wheeled duffels, yes - and two backpacks. But that was all of it.
Steve and Sue, sans luggage.
What occasioned this drastic change in behavior? For drastic it was. Last trip, Steve and Sue packed the equivalent of a fuckin’ U-Haul. For a weekend. What was different?
Why, they read my blog, in which I had Ripped Them a New One. And they felt mickle ashamed.
And so, today: Reasonable Quantities of Luggage. Halleluyah!
MAIDA STRIKES AGAIN
When Elisson runs a contest, he does not screw around.
The two people who snagged the screenshot of my 10,000th hit have each received rich, dazzling prizes, the sort that make me think of that whiny-assed Robin Leach (Champagne dreams and caviar schemes, or some such drivel).
One of our winners has received an iTunes gift certificate that will enable him to stuff his iPod with yet more thrashmetal, gangsta rap, and/or Yanni tracks. The other - Missus Barbecue General! - has scored a Triple-Threat Cheesecake, baked by the very hand o’ Elisson his ownself from the recipe of the Desserty Queen Bee-yotch her ownself, Maida Heatter.
Ahh, the Triple-Threat. The Cheesecake Factory would be proud to serve this bad boy. It's a dense vanilla cheesecake, sitting atop a graham cracker crumb crust (enhanced with a little cocoa powder, cinnamon, and powdered coffee).
“But what is this ‘Triple-Threat’?” you ask. And well you should, because a dense vanilla cheesecake, while good in its own way, would not carry such a Vaguely Dangerous Moniker without something in it to kick it up a notch.
Chocolate chips? Boo. Cookie dough? Feh. What makes this cheesecake interesting is that it is riddled with dense clots of asphalt-like congealed Hot Fudge. You betcha.
So, Janet...enjoy your cake. I only make cheesecakes for special occasions or special people (lest my ass become Prematurely Enhuged), but you qualify on both counts. Just be sure to give Wylie a taste...maybe when you open that restaurant, there’ll be a place on the menu for Maida’s (and Elisson’s) finest.
The two people who snagged the screenshot of my 10,000th hit have each received rich, dazzling prizes, the sort that make me think of that whiny-assed Robin Leach (Champagne dreams and caviar schemes, or some such drivel).
One of our winners has received an iTunes gift certificate that will enable him to stuff his iPod with yet more thrashmetal, gangsta rap, and/or Yanni tracks. The other - Missus Barbecue General! - has scored a Triple-Threat Cheesecake, baked by the very hand o’ Elisson his ownself from the recipe of the Desserty Queen Bee-yotch her ownself, Maida Heatter.
Ahh, the Triple-Threat. The Cheesecake Factory would be proud to serve this bad boy. It's a dense vanilla cheesecake, sitting atop a graham cracker crumb crust (enhanced with a little cocoa powder, cinnamon, and powdered coffee).
“But what is this ‘Triple-Threat’?” you ask. And well you should, because a dense vanilla cheesecake, while good in its own way, would not carry such a Vaguely Dangerous Moniker without something in it to kick it up a notch.
Chocolate chips? Boo. Cookie dough? Feh. What makes this cheesecake interesting is that it is riddled with dense clots of asphalt-like congealed Hot Fudge. You betcha.
So, Janet...enjoy your cake. I only make cheesecakes for special occasions or special people (lest my ass become Prematurely Enhuged), but you qualify on both counts. Just be sure to give Wylie a taste...maybe when you open that restaurant, there’ll be a place on the menu for Maida’s (and Elisson’s) finest.
WHO ARE THESE PEOPLE, ANYWAY?
Some of my Faithful Readers may wonder about some of the links on my sidebar, specifically about the ones in the Miscellaneous Useless Crap section. So here’s the skinny.
When I was setting this blog up, I wanted to have a separate section for links to sites that weren’t blogs per se, but that might be of interest to a few readers. They’re certainly of interest to me, and I probably use a few of these links way more regularly than I do my browser’s ugly and unwieldy List o’ Bookmarks.
The first item on the list, Steve’s Monumental Exercise, is my old “traditional” website. I don’t monkey with it much these days (I really need to update the pictures!) but since it doesn’t have a whole lot of dynamic content, that doesn’t matter. Go there if you want to know way more about me than you really want to.
The second link takes you to the official website of Alamaailman Vasarat, a really strange (but excellent) Finnish band. Years ago, I somehow managed to stumble upon them in the course of a Google search - I forget what for - and once I heard their “Kosher-Kebab-Jazz” music (I’m not making this up), I was hooked. They have two albums out, and they’re both...different from pretty much anything you’ve ever listened to. The band’s name, incidentally, means something like “Hammers of the Underworld.”
Link Three is to the site of a random bunch of British golfers who (apparently) get together to play golf and drink. I liked their sense of humor.
Next up we have Chef Andy’s Jell-O Pages. Chef Andy seems to have an obsession with gelatinous desserts, and the ones he shows on this nutty little website range from the (sub) lime to the ridiculous. I recommend the Tang Pie - not a Jell-O recipe per se, but informed by the same twisted sensibility. It sounds horrendous, and it is, but at the same time it’s perversely tasty.
We’ll skip down a few lines to Hatrack River, the official website of Orson Scott Card, a SF author whose work I particularly enjoy. For the Web, Card writes some political material - typically farther right that I stand, but generally well thought out and always well-written - and random film, book, and restaurant critiques. Read his novels and short stories, though, if you want a taste of intelligent and thought-provoking science fiction.
Skip down a couple more lines to TexasArtChick, a truly demented painter whose artwork does not suggest “chick” in the least. (That’s called irony, folks.) I particularly love the one of the grinning clown slashing the teddy bear with a butcher knife. I actually have a tenuous six-degrees-of separation connection here by way of Sister-in-Law d’Elisson, at whose wedding the ArtChick was a guest.
McSweeney’s needs no introduction (I hope) - I am an occasional contributor.
The penultimate line is What’s Inside Jeremy’s Wallet a website of notable historical interest. It’s easily the oldest site on my List o’ Links, having been up since 1995 - ten years! It’s on the list not because it’s old, but because there’s something strange and compelling about a person who based an entire website around the contents of his wallet. Really. This goes back, I suspect, to a time when people were still trying to figure out what the Web was good for. Posting Random Stupid Shit™ was one early and all-too-obvious answer...and now, with blogging, we can all post our wallet contents...or whatever other Stupid Shit we care to lob out there.
Finishing off the list is Zippy the Pinhead. Ya gotta love a comic strip whose main character wears a polka-dotted shift, eats Ding-Dongs and taco sauce, and who speaks in elliptical (but strangely meaningful) epigrams. Are we having fun yet?
So that’s my Heap of Miscellaneous Useless Crap. Surf...and enjoy!
When I was setting this blog up, I wanted to have a separate section for links to sites that weren’t blogs per se, but that might be of interest to a few readers. They’re certainly of interest to me, and I probably use a few of these links way more regularly than I do my browser’s ugly and unwieldy List o’ Bookmarks.
The first item on the list, Steve’s Monumental Exercise, is my old “traditional” website. I don’t monkey with it much these days (I really need to update the pictures!) but since it doesn’t have a whole lot of dynamic content, that doesn’t matter. Go there if you want to know way more about me than you really want to.
The second link takes you to the official website of Alamaailman Vasarat, a really strange (but excellent) Finnish band. Years ago, I somehow managed to stumble upon them in the course of a Google search - I forget what for - and once I heard their “Kosher-Kebab-Jazz” music (I’m not making this up), I was hooked. They have two albums out, and they’re both...different from pretty much anything you’ve ever listened to. The band’s name, incidentally, means something like “Hammers of the Underworld.”
Link Three is to the site of a random bunch of British golfers who (apparently) get together to play golf and drink. I liked their sense of humor.
Next up we have Chef Andy’s Jell-O Pages. Chef Andy seems to have an obsession with gelatinous desserts, and the ones he shows on this nutty little website range from the (sub) lime to the ridiculous. I recommend the Tang Pie - not a Jell-O recipe per se, but informed by the same twisted sensibility. It sounds horrendous, and it is, but at the same time it’s perversely tasty.
We’ll skip down a few lines to Hatrack River, the official website of Orson Scott Card, a SF author whose work I particularly enjoy. For the Web, Card writes some political material - typically farther right that I stand, but generally well thought out and always well-written - and random film, book, and restaurant critiques. Read his novels and short stories, though, if you want a taste of intelligent and thought-provoking science fiction.
Skip down a couple more lines to TexasArtChick, a truly demented painter whose artwork does not suggest “chick” in the least. (That’s called irony, folks.) I particularly love the one of the grinning clown slashing the teddy bear with a butcher knife. I actually have a tenuous six-degrees-of separation connection here by way of Sister-in-Law d’Elisson, at whose wedding the ArtChick was a guest.
McSweeney’s needs no introduction (I hope) - I am an occasional contributor.
The penultimate line is What’s Inside Jeremy’s Wallet a website of notable historical interest. It’s easily the oldest site on my List o’ Links, having been up since 1995 - ten years! It’s on the list not because it’s old, but because there’s something strange and compelling about a person who based an entire website around the contents of his wallet. Really. This goes back, I suspect, to a time when people were still trying to figure out what the Web was good for. Posting Random Stupid Shit™ was one early and all-too-obvious answer...and now, with blogging, we can all post our wallet contents...or whatever other Stupid Shit we care to lob out there.
Finishing off the list is Zippy the Pinhead. Ya gotta love a comic strip whose main character wears a polka-dotted shift, eats Ding-Dongs and taco sauce, and who speaks in elliptical (but strangely meaningful) epigrams. Are we having fun yet?
So that’s my Heap of Miscellaneous Useless Crap. Surf...and enjoy!
STROKE IT
My ego, that is, ya filthy-minded poivoit.
Not that it will do this blog any good, but I was pleasantly surprised to see my actual honest-to-Gawd street name on World O’Crap a few days ago. Woo-Hoo!
WOC, for those of you new to the Bloggy-Sphere, is one o’ them “Big Dawg” bloggers, a left-of-center political/humor blog, with a collection of the most brilliant commenters I have ever seen. I have absolutely no idea what its author, S.Z., does by way of a day job, but I cannot imagine she has one, given the reams of quality stuff she pumps out on a daily basis.
Reading WOC convinced me that I would never be a serious big-time blogger - at least, not in the political arena. I simply can’t compete. No, I will needs be content to plumb the murkier depths of the Truth Laid Bear Ecosystem with my peculiar mix of foodblogging, dadblogging, kitty photos, occasional Social/Political Diatribe and Commentary, and whatever other crap pops into my head.
But ain’t it nice when one of them Big Dawgs throws you a chunk of gristle off of that nice meaty bone?
Not that it will do this blog any good, but I was pleasantly surprised to see my actual honest-to-Gawd street name on World O’Crap a few days ago. Woo-Hoo!
WOC, for those of you new to the Bloggy-Sphere, is one o’ them “Big Dawg” bloggers, a left-of-center political/humor blog, with a collection of the most brilliant commenters I have ever seen. I have absolutely no idea what its author, S.Z., does by way of a day job, but I cannot imagine she has one, given the reams of quality stuff she pumps out on a daily basis.
Reading WOC convinced me that I would never be a serious big-time blogger - at least, not in the political arena. I simply can’t compete. No, I will needs be content to plumb the murkier depths of the Truth Laid Bear Ecosystem with my peculiar mix of foodblogging, dadblogging, kitty photos, occasional Social/Political Diatribe and Commentary, and whatever other crap pops into my head.
But ain’t it nice when one of them Big Dawgs throws you a chunk of gristle off of that nice meaty bone?
Wednesday, February 16, 2005
DROP THE CHALUPA
or whatever other fat-raddled crap you were about to eat. (You know you were.)
Drop whatever it is you’re doing right now and get your Bloggy Ass over to Wampum and vote for Anntichrist S. Coulter, a 2004 Koufax Awards finalist for Best Commenter.
You can catch Annti’s wit ’n’ wisdom in the various comment threads at World O’Crap and Sadly, No! Alas, she has no blog of her own, preferring (apparently) to let others serve up th Bloggity Content so that she may jab it repeatedly with her acidulated and extremely pointy pen.
Annti doesn’t know I exist, but I don’t give a shit. All I know is, she’s from Louisiana, which makes her left-of-center political bent and lack of webbed fingers and toes all the more amazing...and if she were to drop a comment on Blog d’Elisson, I’d probably soil myself with excitement. Now go vote, dammit!
Drop whatever it is you’re doing right now and get your Bloggy Ass over to Wampum and vote for Anntichrist S. Coulter, a 2004 Koufax Awards finalist for Best Commenter.
You can catch Annti’s wit ’n’ wisdom in the various comment threads at World O’Crap and Sadly, No! Alas, she has no blog of her own, preferring (apparently) to let others serve up th Bloggity Content so that she may jab it repeatedly with her acidulated and extremely pointy pen.
Annti doesn’t know I exist, but I don’t give a shit. All I know is, she’s from Louisiana, which makes her left-of-center political bent and lack of webbed fingers and toes all the more amazing...and if she were to drop a comment on Blog d’Elisson, I’d probably soil myself with excitement. Now go vote, dammit!
CARNIVAL OF THE VANITIES #126
If you’re searching, searching for your weekly Dose o’ Bloggy Goodness™, search no more - you may find it at Soccer Dad, who hosts the 126th edition of the Carnival of the Vanities.
As always, plenty of good reading. The Carnivals are a great opportunity for you to sample the work of many good bloggers that may have escaped your attention. Enjoy!
As always, plenty of good reading. The Carnivals are a great opportunity for you to sample the work of many good bloggers that may have escaped your attention. Enjoy!
Tuesday, February 15, 2005
ROADFOODBLOGGING
On the road again...this time in Columbus, Ohio. I’m recuperating from a serious Customer Dinner at M, one of this town’s finer eateries.
A fine spinach salad, followed by Steak in a Bowl...an eight ounce plug of prime beef tenderloin, expertly grilled, served on a bed of veal jus and bleu cheese-stuffed fingerling potatoes, crowned with a chunk of foie gras. Dessert: Earl Grey Ice Cream. Boy Howdy.
We lucked out with the weather. I left a fogbound Atlanta and arrived to find a sunny day with temp in the mid-fifties. Lovely...and unusual for this time of year.
I’m blowing through my e-mails and getting ready to turn in. I must arise at what the Mistress of Sarcasm calls “the Butt-Crack of Dawn” in order to get to the airport in time for my 7 am flight. Wonderful.
Road food. It ain’t all Quarter Pounders with Cheese. Not for this boy.
A fine spinach salad, followed by Steak in a Bowl...an eight ounce plug of prime beef tenderloin, expertly grilled, served on a bed of veal jus and bleu cheese-stuffed fingerling potatoes, crowned with a chunk of foie gras. Dessert: Earl Grey Ice Cream. Boy Howdy.
We lucked out with the weather. I left a fogbound Atlanta and arrived to find a sunny day with temp in the mid-fifties. Lovely...and unusual for this time of year.
I’m blowing through my e-mails and getting ready to turn in. I must arise at what the Mistress of Sarcasm calls “the Butt-Crack of Dawn” in order to get to the airport in time for my 7 am flight. Wonderful.
Road food. It ain’t all Quarter Pounders with Cheese. Not for this boy.
Monday, February 14, 2005
MY VALENTINE
Valentine, circa 1938, from collection of SWMBO’s late Dad.
By rights, I should look at St. Valentine’s Day with a jaundiced eye. Both it and Hallowe’en started out as pagan celebrations, later converted to Christian holidays by that fine process of assimilation and redefinition. As a Jew, I have no legitimate truck with either day.
But in America, the Great Leveling Ground, the religious aspects of both of these days have been ground off and worn smooth. They have become completely secular observances, steeped no longer in religion per se, but saturated in that greatest of American popular religions - the cult of merchandising. On Hallowe’en, it may be costumes, masks, and haunted houses, while on V-day it’s greeting cards, flowers, hotel rooms, and expensive dinners.
And chocolate. Let’s not forget the chocolate. Both Hallowe’en and St. Valentine’s Day are beloved of the chocolate industry, because on those two days doth their Annual Profit rise and fall.
And so, I have absolutely no qualms about Valentine’s Day observances. The “Saint” in St. Valentine’s Day almost seems archaic, so removed is the day from its former religious roots. No, it’s as good a day as any to remind our Significant Others that we love them...should the way we live our day-to-day lives not be sufficient to the task.
I have noticed, of late, a phenomenon I like to call “Valentine Bloat.” No, it’s not what you get when you eat that entire Whitman Sampler, or glom too much Godiva. It’s the growing tendency of people to send Valentine’s Day cards, gifts, et cetera, and what-not to all sorts of friends and relatives, not just “lovers.”
I’ll give you a fer-instance. She Who Must Be Obeyed got a couple of Valentine’s Day cards for us to send to Elder Daughter and the Mistress of Sarcasm. Now, I love my girls unto death, but to me it seems a little strange for a parent to be sending a Valentine to a child. To me, Valentine’s Day is all about romantic love, not parental or filial love or even friendship. Am I wrong, or is the Collective Valentine Products Industry succeeding at selling us on the notion that all loving relationships - of whatever stripe - should get a tip o’ the Valentinian Toque on V-Day? Am I just being a grump, or am I right to restrict my valentining to She Who Must Be Obeyed - because it is She With Whom I Share The Marital Bed?
To whom do you send your Valentine’s Day greetings and candy?
Now, about my Valentine.
She has stayed with me through thick and thin, through our peregrinations that have involved four states, five towns, and seven houses, through more than half a lifetime. She has given me two children, young women now, than whom there are no finer walking the planet in my completely disinterested, unbiased eyes. She is a model of common sense and good old-fashioned horse sense. She is the apple of my eye, the spring in my step, the lead in my pencil (oh, yeah). She comforts me when I feel afflicted, nurses me when I am ill, laughs at my lame-ass jokes and general Silly Shit. She smiles, and the room lights up. When I am with her, I am twenty-five again. She is my best friend, the one I can always count on.
She is my SWMBO, and I love her.
I AM A WEE BIT MIFFED...
...that I didn’t make this list. Why not, I have no idea. Damn, another social cut!
Thanks to Lair Simon for the link.
Thanks to Lair Simon for the link.
CARNIVAL OF THE CATS #47
Once again, it’s time for the regular roundup of fuzzy felines. This week, The Conservative Cat does the honors.
Having (somehow) missed the bus last week, Hakuna and/or Matata are featured in three - count ’em! - three kittilicious posts. It’s practically fur-gasmic!
Having (somehow) missed the bus last week, Hakuna and/or Matata are featured in three - count ’em! - three kittilicious posts. It’s practically fur-gasmic!
Sunday, February 13, 2005
LETTING GO THE TREE
[Following is my entry in the Blogging for Books contest #8, hosted by The Zero Boss. This month, entrants must write a blog entry about a time when they took a risk in their lives. Was it a resounding success or a crashing failure...or something in between?]
You sit in the optometrist’s chair for your annual eye exam, head clamped to that Optical Monster Machine. You look at the chart projected on the wall, trying to decipher those tiny letters while the good doctor flips and rotates lenses...
“This way...or that way?
“A...or B?
“First one...or second one?
“One...or two?”
And on, and on.
But no matter how many lenses you look through, no matter how clear those tiny letters appear, you can’t see the future. And that’s what I need right now. I need the glasses that will let me see the future.
The phone sits in front of me, dark green handset on a warm cherry table. On the other end of that phone is a man with a job for me, a job that may be the first step in a lucrative new career.
I’ve been toiling away in the Great Corporate Salt Mine for, what is it, fourteen years now? I have had several assignments, starting in technology, moving through international operations management, most recently in field sales. Sales – who would have imagined? I, whose previous experience in selling had been peddling ice cream to neighborhood kids as one sweltering summer’s Good Humor man, am now selling 165 million pounds of plastic resin a year to industrial customers. Trainloads!
Those several assignments have come with a price. We’re now on our fourth house, and the prospect of moving back to Houston – Sweat City – fills us with dread. But that’s the inevitable, inexorable next step. A job in marketing, then some sort of management assignment, then…who knows? But all with a certain grim predictability...if I hold fast to the tree.
I look at the phone. How many days has it been since I spoke to the man? How long has it been since we sat in that restaurant and talked about business plans, of salary, of bonuses, of health plans? Just how much do I want this new job as an international chemicals trader? Trading is risky. You make ten deals, maybe seven of them are good ones - if you’re good. Disaster always lurks behind every twitch in the global market, every news bulletin. You buy a boatload of plastic pellets. If prices drop, you hemorrhage green money – for every thousand metric tons, a penny lower means you’re out $22 thousand. A dime, $220 thousand. You don’t get many chances to screw the pooch before you get the Bum’s Rush, but you can really stick it to the investors if you do. Those are the risks the shareholders take.
But what risk am I taking? I’ve got my track well mapped out at the Great Corporate Salt Mine. I have a good idea of where I’ll be ten, fifteen years from now. I have a good idea of how much I’ll be making.
And I’m bored.
Hugging the tree, ah, it has its comforts and rewards. It’s security, that tree. I feel safe under its branches, its sheltering leaves. The cold wind does not touch me and I do not hear the wolf’s howl.
But I’m thirty-five years old, almost thirty-six – and I am bored.
And maybe just a little scared.
Because I don’t have those glasses that will let me see the future.
“This way...or that way?” – Do we stay here or do we buy yet another house? How are the kids going to deal with yet another move?
“A...or B?” – Will this new company survive?
“First one...or second one?” – Will I succeed?
“One...or two?” – Will the investors hang tough, or bail if a few deals go south?
I can’t see without those glasses. But I know that I’m not yet forty, and if I don’t let go the tree today, I never will. I’m young enough to grab another tree if I have to, but in five or ten years, it’ll be hell to hook my fingers to strange bark.
The phone sits in front of me, dark green handset on a warm cherry table. I pick up the handset and punch the number. The number of the man.
I WANT SOME SOUP
Maybe not this soup, though.
On the other hand, it looks like just the thing on a cold, desperate night.
Recipe bloggers, look out. Emeril, step aside. This guy may just be the Next Great Thing.
A tip o’ the hat to the Big Hominid for th’ link.
On the other hand, it looks like just the thing on a cold, desperate night.
Recipe bloggers, look out. Emeril, step aside. This guy may just be the Next Great Thing.
A tip o’ the hat to the Big Hominid for th’ link.
ROLL CALL
Those of you who notice such trivia will observe that the ol’ Blogroll looks a little different today.
I finally got off my lazy ass and put my Bloglines roll up on the sidebar. At the same time, I chopped down my old Blogrolling roll to eliminate the duplicates. The only blogs remaining on Blogrolling are the ones without RSS or XML feeds.
I’ve also started categorizing the Roll. Right now you have “Blogroll Buddies” - those Esteemed Readers who have added me to their blogrolls - and then comes the regular Blogroll d’Elisson. [If you have me on your blogroll and I’ve somehow missed it, let me know...link-whoring is (cue Martha Stewart voice) a good thing!]
I don’t play favorites (well, not too much) - if your blog is on either of the Blogrolls d’Elisson, then I am reading your new content every couple of days via my Bloglines subscriptions. I will probably be tweaking the categories over the next few days just to keep things nice and confusing.
Anyway, just thought you might like to know. If you don’t give a rat’s ass, that’s OK, too.
I finally got off my lazy ass and put my Bloglines roll up on the sidebar. At the same time, I chopped down my old Blogrolling roll to eliminate the duplicates. The only blogs remaining on Blogrolling are the ones without RSS or XML feeds.
I’ve also started categorizing the Roll. Right now you have “Blogroll Buddies” - those Esteemed Readers who have added me to their blogrolls - and then comes the regular Blogroll d’Elisson. [If you have me on your blogroll and I’ve somehow missed it, let me know...link-whoring is (cue Martha Stewart voice) a good thing!]
I don’t play favorites (well, not too much) - if your blog is on either of the Blogrolls d’Elisson, then I am reading your new content every couple of days via my Bloglines subscriptions. I will probably be tweaking the categories over the next few days just to keep things nice and confusing.
Anyway, just thought you might like to know. If you don’t give a rat’s ass, that’s OK, too.
Saturday, February 12, 2005
WHEN LIFE HANDS YOU LEMONS...
...make lemon curd.
And what do you do when you have a bowl full of delectable Meyer Lemon Curd sitting in your refrigerator? [Recipe courtesy of the most redoubtable Bakerina, her ownself.]
Well, Option One is to just get yourself a tablespoon and eat the Whole Fuckin’ Thing. I seriously considered Option One, but, alas, I have a conscience.
So after leaving that beautiful bowl of sunny goodness to sit in the fridge for a few days while I cogitated upon what to do with it (occasionally grabbing off a spoonful), I finally had that Great Light Bulb That Floats Above Your Head, Signifying A Great Idea sensation. Ah, Option Two! I would make Meyer Lemon Curd Tartlets!
Simple process, really. Whip up some sweet crust pastry and bake it in little tartlet pans - or be a Lazy Turd and buy the pre-made ones, which are far superior to pre-made graham cracker crusts in any event. Into each tartlet crust, emplace a handsome dollop of Meyer lemon curd, and then garnish with fresh raspberries. Raspberries and lemons go well together, but blueberries - hell, blackberries - would have been perfectly serviceable.
Meyer Lemon Curd Tartlets.
Set ’em out...and stand back.
She Who Must Be Obeyed has enjoined me Never To Make This Stuff Again, after having tasted a spoonful of that glorious Curd. But I may, in this rare instance, disobey...
And what do you do when you have a bowl full of delectable Meyer Lemon Curd sitting in your refrigerator? [Recipe courtesy of the most redoubtable Bakerina, her ownself.]
Well, Option One is to just get yourself a tablespoon and eat the Whole Fuckin’ Thing. I seriously considered Option One, but, alas, I have a conscience.
So after leaving that beautiful bowl of sunny goodness to sit in the fridge for a few days while I cogitated upon what to do with it (occasionally grabbing off a spoonful), I finally had that Great Light Bulb That Floats Above Your Head, Signifying A Great Idea sensation. Ah, Option Two! I would make Meyer Lemon Curd Tartlets!
Simple process, really. Whip up some sweet crust pastry and bake it in little tartlet pans - or be a Lazy Turd and buy the pre-made ones, which are far superior to pre-made graham cracker crusts in any event. Into each tartlet crust, emplace a handsome dollop of Meyer lemon curd, and then garnish with fresh raspberries. Raspberries and lemons go well together, but blueberries - hell, blackberries - would have been perfectly serviceable.
Meyer Lemon Curd Tartlets.
Set ’em out...and stand back.
She Who Must Be Obeyed has enjoined me Never To Make This Stuff Again, after having tasted a spoonful of that glorious Curd. But I may, in this rare instance, disobey...
A STUDY IN BEIGE AND CHOCOLATE
Hakuna sunbathes.
Sometimes, a kitty’s gotta do what a kitty’s gotta do. Namely, lie in the sun as it peeks through the blinds in Elder Daughter’s room.
EINSTEIN AND ME
So I’m getting my hair cut, and it comes time for Tucker to trim my eyebrows. And she says, “Those eyebrows – those eyebrows are sayin’ Einstein.”
I said, “Yeah. I have the eyebrows of Einstein, and right behind ’em is the brain of a Pauly Shore.”
STILL MY LITTLE GIRL
Daddies, if you haven’t figured this out already, hear me now: No matter how old your girl-children get, you will always be Daddy – and they will always be your little girls.
This past week, the Mistress of Sarcasm was going through all kinds of minor trials and tribulations. “Minor” to me, that is, from my vantage point 265 miles away. To the Mistress, 22 years old and in the home stretch of her college career, these issues loomed large and immediate.
When I get phone calls from the Mistress, I always say a silent prayer that they fall into the “just wanted to see how you were doing” category, rather than the less desirable “I need some money” category. Or the even less desirable “ my car broke down category” – really the same as the previous category, only more expensive. There are other phone calls that we parents dread even more – there’s a whole list of ’em – but I will not name them here. Last week, however, I got several calls – and they all turned out to be in yet a tricky new category: “I have a technical problem, can you help me?”
One day, it was “Dad, I’m trying to print an image in Photoshop and I keep getting a border. I don’t want a border. What do I do?” I offered whatever lame-ass suggestions I could, but this was the kind of problem that I’m ill equipped to solve from a distance. Niggling issues: 1 - Dad: 0.
Two days later, it was “I just installed a new ink cartridge in my printer, and it still won’t print. What do I do?” Again, I proffered a few useless, unhelpful ideas, the last one being to take her document over to Kinko’s on a memory stick. The Mistress was frustrated; I felt impotent. But what could I tell her about dealing with those days when nothing seems to go right? Suck it up? This too, shall pass? Niggling issues: 2 – Mr. Helpful: 0.
After a few of these calls, I was feeling put-upon and incompetent…but She Who Must Be Obeyed helped me find my perspective.
“She’s asking you for help on all these things because you are the All-Knowing, All-Wise Daddy. She thinks you know everything because you’re the Dad. To her, you’re the Ultimate Authority. So do the best you can.”
The next call from the Mistress came the following afternoon as I was leaving the Great Corporate Salt Mine. She was calling to say things were getting better, and that she was sorry for bending my ear about all her problems earlier that week.
And I told her, “Sweetie, don’t ever be sorry about asking your Dad for help. You can always tell your ol’ Dad about your problems. Whether I’m able to help you solve ’em or not, I will always listen…because I will always be your Daddy.”
The Mistress: still my little girl.
And for that, Dear Readers, I am thankful - every single day.
This past week, the Mistress of Sarcasm was going through all kinds of minor trials and tribulations. “Minor” to me, that is, from my vantage point 265 miles away. To the Mistress, 22 years old and in the home stretch of her college career, these issues loomed large and immediate.
When I get phone calls from the Mistress, I always say a silent prayer that they fall into the “just wanted to see how you were doing” category, rather than the less desirable “I need some money” category. Or the even less desirable “ my car broke down category” – really the same as the previous category, only more expensive. There are other phone calls that we parents dread even more – there’s a whole list of ’em – but I will not name them here. Last week, however, I got several calls – and they all turned out to be in yet a tricky new category: “I have a technical problem, can you help me?”
One day, it was “Dad, I’m trying to print an image in Photoshop and I keep getting a border. I don’t want a border. What do I do?” I offered whatever lame-ass suggestions I could, but this was the kind of problem that I’m ill equipped to solve from a distance. Niggling issues: 1 - Dad: 0.
Two days later, it was “I just installed a new ink cartridge in my printer, and it still won’t print. What do I do?” Again, I proffered a few useless, unhelpful ideas, the last one being to take her document over to Kinko’s on a memory stick. The Mistress was frustrated; I felt impotent. But what could I tell her about dealing with those days when nothing seems to go right? Suck it up? This too, shall pass? Niggling issues: 2 – Mr. Helpful: 0.
After a few of these calls, I was feeling put-upon and incompetent…but She Who Must Be Obeyed helped me find my perspective.
“She’s asking you for help on all these things because you are the All-Knowing, All-Wise Daddy. She thinks you know everything because you’re the Dad. To her, you’re the Ultimate Authority. So do the best you can.”
The next call from the Mistress came the following afternoon as I was leaving the Great Corporate Salt Mine. She was calling to say things were getting better, and that she was sorry for bending my ear about all her problems earlier that week.
And I told her, “Sweetie, don’t ever be sorry about asking your Dad for help. You can always tell your ol’ Dad about your problems. Whether I’m able to help you solve ’em or not, I will always listen…because I will always be your Daddy.”
The Mistress: still my little girl.
And for that, Dear Readers, I am thankful - every single day.
Friday, February 11, 2005
I WONDER...
just what about our everyday lives in the year 2005 would be the most jaw-droppingly strange to a time traveler from, say, the year 1955.
After getting over the disappointment over the lack of 24-lane superhighways and domed cities everywhere, or there being no Gyrocopter in Every Garage! as pictured in Popular Science - what would be the biggest single observation that would convince our friend that, yes, it is now the year 2005?
Would it be the wide-screen high-definition color TV’s? Jumbo jets? Digital cameras? Computers? Calculators the size of credit cards? Credit cards, for that matter?
No, I think it’d be those Bluetooth-enabled schmitchiks that people hang from their ears, letting them talk hands- and wire-free on their cellphones.
Because our time-traveling friend would take one look at all of the people walking around, seemingly carrying on a conversation with Harvey the Six-Foot Invisible Rabbit, and he would immediately know that he is in a strange World o’ the Future where fallout from H-bomb tests has turned everyone into Lunatic Zombies.
After getting over the disappointment over the lack of 24-lane superhighways and domed cities everywhere, or there being no Gyrocopter in Every Garage! as pictured in Popular Science - what would be the biggest single observation that would convince our friend that, yes, it is now the year 2005?
Would it be the wide-screen high-definition color TV’s? Jumbo jets? Digital cameras? Computers? Calculators the size of credit cards? Credit cards, for that matter?
No, I think it’d be those Bluetooth-enabled schmitchiks that people hang from their ears, letting them talk hands- and wire-free on their cellphones.
Because our time-traveling friend would take one look at all of the people walking around, seemingly carrying on a conversation with Harvey the Six-Foot Invisible Rabbit, and he would immediately know that he is in a strange World o’ the Future where fallout from H-bomb tests has turned everyone into Lunatic Zombies.
Thursday, February 10, 2005
THE RIDDLE OF THE SPHINX
“What animal is it that has four legs in the morning, two legs in mid-day, and three legs in the evening?
“Give up?
“Give up?
“Give up?
“No, it’s not a metaphor for humanity, ya dumb twit. You humans are such egocentric turds.
“It’s...it’s...a cockroach amputee with a prosthesis...on a bad day! Yeah, dat’s it!”
MAN BITES DOG
Just when I was looking for something weighty to blog about, along comes an interesting discussion (via Charone) on an important ethical and philosophical question: Would you first save the dog you love or a (human) stranger if both were drowning?
According to Townhall wingnut Dennis Prager (as quoted by the Zebra Report),
So what Dennis Prager is saying is, if you’re a secular humanist, you would likely save the dog first. And he goes on to rant that “That is why people estranged from Judeo-Christian values (including some Christians) support programs such as ‘Holocaust on Your Plate,’ the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) campaign that teaches that there is no difference between the slaughtering of chickens and the slaughtering of the Jews in the Holocaust. A human and a chicken are of equal worth.”
Well, I’m not sure I’d take Prager’s approach of blaming all this on Evil Secular Humanism. I think it’s just plain stupidity, but more about that later.
Just to let you know where Yours Truly stands on this issue, I’ll tell you:
If I have to choose between saving an animal I love and an unknown stranger, I will choose the human every time. I mean, I love my cats - really, I do - but a human is worth more than a cat.
I don’t even have to play the religion card. Sure, I can invoke the “we are made in God’s image” mantra - hell, I say it every day as part of my morning prayers: Blessed are You, Lord our God, King of the Universe, who has created me in His image. But absent any religious justification, humans trump animals every time on the Sentience and Intelligence Scale.
Anyone - secular, religious, whatever - anyone who would save an animal before a human (unless we’re talking Wilbur the Pig versus Scott Peterson)is a fucking moron has a system of values and ethics that differs radically from mine. Really.
Let me say it again. Humans are worth more than animals. Every time.
We are at the top of the food chain - usually. We’re capable of abstract reasoning. We communicate. We invent. Animals can be or do some of these things, but they cannot do them all.
This is not to say that we should go out of our way to inflict suffering upon animals. Cruelty is cruelty. That’s why I admire the Jewish laws of kashrut, even if I practice them mostly in the breach. Animal slaughter that is in accordance with Jewish food laws is as humane and painless as that process can possibly be.
But I will eat beef. And chicken. And fish. And eggs, milk, and cheese. And that brings us to PETA, the perpetrators of the “Holocaust on a Plate” ad campaign, a campaign I find disgusting in the extreme. I really don’t want to sound like I’m agreeing with ol’ Dennis, but he’s right on that one score: equating the slaughter of chickens for food to the deliberate genocide of humans for the purposes of “racial purification” is utter bullshit. I’d like to believe that the PETA people used this inflammatory and misguided comparison because they knew it would generate attention-getting controversy, but I fear that it’s really because these people have a warped sense of values. And, no, Dennis, it doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with Secular Humanism...it’s just plain dumbassedness. As a Jew, I find it particularly insulting.
I eat animals. I believe humans evolved as omnivores: we eat anything that’s not nailed down. Just go to China if you don’t believe me. I believe animal protein is a necessary component of a human diet - although we in Western countries tend to eat way too much of it owing to the fact that we have made it cheaply available.
And I loves me my kitties, too. They share a loving home with us - food, veterinary care, a warm place to sleep and upon which to shed Massive Amounts of Hair. We’ve had other Companion Animals in our lives, too. I ain’t hatin’ on animals, people. I’m just saying that, as a human, I outrank them. I am a rotten speciesist, I admit it.
To any PETA member who takes the “Drowning Dog” test: If you elect to save the dog, you are an idiot. What would you do if you had to choose between a drowning chicken and your drowning baby? The question is the same; the details have been tweaked. What would you do?
If you don’t agree with me, kindly let me know, so that if you are drowning next to that one-in-a-million dog that can’t swim, I’ll save him first. As a human, you are entitled to your opinions - opinions which may not be the same as mine.
Ah - opinions! Animals don’t have those.
According to Townhall wingnut Dennis Prager (as quoted by the Zebra Report),
The answer depends on your value system. One of the most obvious and significant differences between secular and Judeo-Christian values concerns human worth.
One of the great ironies of secular humanism is that it devalues the worth of human beings. As ironic as it may sound, the God-based Judeo-Christian value system renders man infinitely more valuable and significant than any humanistic value system. The reason is simple: Only if there is a God who created man is man worth anything beyond the chemicals of which he is composed.
So what Dennis Prager is saying is, if you’re a secular humanist, you would likely save the dog first. And he goes on to rant that “That is why people estranged from Judeo-Christian values (including some Christians) support programs such as ‘Holocaust on Your Plate,’ the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) campaign that teaches that there is no difference between the slaughtering of chickens and the slaughtering of the Jews in the Holocaust. A human and a chicken are of equal worth.”
Well, I’m not sure I’d take Prager’s approach of blaming all this on Evil Secular Humanism. I think it’s just plain stupidity, but more about that later.
Just to let you know where Yours Truly stands on this issue, I’ll tell you:
If I have to choose between saving an animal I love and an unknown stranger, I will choose the human every time. I mean, I love my cats - really, I do - but a human is worth more than a cat.
I don’t even have to play the religion card. Sure, I can invoke the “we are made in God’s image” mantra - hell, I say it every day as part of my morning prayers: Blessed are You, Lord our God, King of the Universe, who has created me in His image. But absent any religious justification, humans trump animals every time on the Sentience and Intelligence Scale.
Anyone - secular, religious, whatever - anyone who would save an animal before a human (unless we’re talking Wilbur the Pig versus Scott Peterson)
Let me say it again. Humans are worth more than animals. Every time.
We are at the top of the food chain - usually. We’re capable of abstract reasoning. We communicate. We invent. Animals can be or do some of these things, but they cannot do them all.
This is not to say that we should go out of our way to inflict suffering upon animals. Cruelty is cruelty. That’s why I admire the Jewish laws of kashrut, even if I practice them mostly in the breach. Animal slaughter that is in accordance with Jewish food laws is as humane and painless as that process can possibly be.
But I will eat beef. And chicken. And fish. And eggs, milk, and cheese. And that brings us to PETA, the perpetrators of the “Holocaust on a Plate” ad campaign, a campaign I find disgusting in the extreme. I really don’t want to sound like I’m agreeing with ol’ Dennis, but he’s right on that one score: equating the slaughter of chickens for food to the deliberate genocide of humans for the purposes of “racial purification” is utter bullshit. I’d like to believe that the PETA people used this inflammatory and misguided comparison because they knew it would generate attention-getting controversy, but I fear that it’s really because these people have a warped sense of values. And, no, Dennis, it doesn’t necessarily have anything to do with Secular Humanism...it’s just plain dumbassedness. As a Jew, I find it particularly insulting.
I eat animals. I believe humans evolved as omnivores: we eat anything that’s not nailed down. Just go to China if you don’t believe me. I believe animal protein is a necessary component of a human diet - although we in Western countries tend to eat way too much of it owing to the fact that we have made it cheaply available.
And I loves me my kitties, too. They share a loving home with us - food, veterinary care, a warm place to sleep and upon which to shed Massive Amounts of Hair. We’ve had other Companion Animals in our lives, too. I ain’t hatin’ on animals, people. I’m just saying that, as a human, I outrank them. I am a rotten speciesist, I admit it.
To any PETA member who takes the “Drowning Dog” test: If you elect to save the dog, you are an idiot. What would you do if you had to choose between a drowning chicken and your drowning baby? The question is the same; the details have been tweaked. What would you do?
If you don’t agree with me, kindly let me know, so that if you are drowning next to that one-in-a-million dog that can’t swim, I’ll save him first. As a human, you are entitled to your opinions - opinions which may not be the same as mine.
Ah - opinions! Animals don’t have those.
Wednesday, February 09, 2005
ALL THE MYRIAD HITS
A couple of posts ago, I announced that I would be giving a prize to the Good and Faithful Reader that sent me a screenshot of my Sitemeter when it hit 10,000.
Real bloggers write for the sheer pleasure and/or catharsis of it. They don’t give a crap about hits, right? Unlike us egocentric, self-aggrandizing, link-whoring amateurs. But, after all, 10,000 is a nice, round number. Even if it is small potatoes to all y’all serious bloggers.
Well, as of this afternoon, WE HAVE A WINNAH!
Even more fun, it’s someone we know and love - our own Janet McC., AKA Mrs. Barbecue General! Hah!
Of course, now I gotta come up with a really good prize. And seeing as how shipping will not be a problem, options that would have been unworkable with some of my more distant Esteemed Readers can come into play.
So, what’s a good prize? Normally, I’d say something involving meat and/or pie, but that’s so Four Days Ago. And besides, handing out meat to Janet is like schlepping coals to Newcastle.
Hmm. I’ll have to think on this...and enlist the formidable resources of She Who Not Only Must Be Obeyed, But Who Must Work With The Prizewinner In Her Place Of Employment. Hoo-hah.
CLOSE CALL
I’ve stopped off to grab a cup of coffee during my pilgrimage to the Great Corporate Salt Mine, and I’m standing behind my rental car, rearranging the crap in the trunk...and suddenly, the tail end of some lady’s Camry is half an inch from the rear end of my car. She was backing up, trying to turn around in a tight space to get past a delivery van, and came that close to nailing me. Shit!
Nailing me is exactly correct. Never mind the car - one foot to the right, and I would have been pinned between the cars. Bye-bye legs.
“Lady! Do NOT back up any more! Pull straight forward...and get the hell away from me, please! THANK you!”
Man, did I need that cup of coffee...
Nailing me is exactly correct. Never mind the car - one foot to the right, and I would have been pinned between the cars. Bye-bye legs.
“Lady! Do NOT back up any more! Pull straight forward...and get the hell away from me, please! THANK you!”
Man, did I need that cup of coffee...
Tuesday, February 08, 2005
CARNIVAL OF THE VANITIES #125
Edition 125 of the Carnival of the Vanities is hosted this week at Coyote Blog.
What better time to have a Carnival than in the waning minutes of Fat Tuesday? Celebrate Mardi Gras by reading some of the fine work by my fellow bloggers. And, hey - I have a category all to myself!
What better time to have a Carnival than in the waning minutes of Fat Tuesday? Celebrate Mardi Gras by reading some of the fine work by my fellow bloggers. And, hey - I have a category all to myself!
Monday, February 07, 2005
MEET THE MEATLES
The Barbecue General takes no prisoners.
Those of my Esteemed Readers who have been enjoying the stories of our recent Meaty Adventures will be pleased to meet Wylie and Janet, that fine couple whose idea of a “modest appetizer” is a couple of slabs of smoked barbecued ribs.
Wylie, AKA the Barbecue General, takes his meaty business seriously, and if it is not already abundantly clear from my earlier post, let me restate it: his smoked ribs are as good as any I have ever eaten.
While I have not had one of Wylie’s smoked briskets, I suspect that his only serious competition is located in the World to Come, where SWMBO’s father Bill has been smoking briskets with Moshe Rabbenu for the past nineteen years. Bill introduced me to real Texas barbecue 28 years ago, back when I was a newly-arrived Yankee boy who thought to “barbecue” meant to throw a piece of meat on a charcoal grill.
I would give my left nut to see a cookoff between Wylie and Bill today. Alas.
As you can see from the picture, Wylie and Janet are not your average backyard Weber grill people. They compete - and win - at the national level, and they’ve even made a brief appearance on the Food Network.
But I’ll put my Jewish-style braised brisket up against anything Wylie and Janet can throw at me. Sure, it’s like comparing apples and oranges (now, there’s an original turn of phrase!), but who gives a crap?
Because when my brisket goes up against Wylie’s, who wins? We both do.
Urp!
A FINE LEFT-HANDED COMPLIMENT
Want a good, all-purpose insult left-handed compliment?
This one’s a bit musty - it’s from the writings of one Nicholas Poussin, a seventeenth-century Frenchman, here describing a “ridiculous book” by one M. Scarron. But it’s a good one...
“Il fait des merveilles, car il a le cul rond et fait des étrons carrés.”
Which is to say:
“He’s a miracle worker: has a round ass and shits square turds.”
Boo-yah!
This one’s a bit musty - it’s from the writings of one Nicholas Poussin, a seventeenth-century Frenchman, here describing a “ridiculous book” by one M. Scarron. But it’s a good one...
“Il fait des merveilles, car il a le cul rond et fait des étrons carrés.”
Which is to say:
“He’s a miracle worker: has a round ass and shits square turds.”
Boo-yah!
CLOSING IN ON THE 10K MARK
Not that this is any Big Fat Hairy Deal, but I just noticed that my hit counter is approaching 10,000. Anything with a lotta zeroes gots ta be Meaningful, right?
Geez, 10,000 hits in, what, seven months of Hot Blogging Action? For something that started out as a place for me to deposit my Random Written Detritus, I guess that’s not too bad.
So, not to get obsesively self-promotional or anything, whoever ends up sending me a screenshot .jpg of Hit 10,000 will get some sort of prize. I have no idea what, but I promise it won’t be too extremely chickenshit. Hey, if Jay Allen can do it, why the hell not me?
The proverbial Fit will likely Hit The Shan during my impending Bidnis (that’s Texan for “Business,” y’all) Trip to Sweat City. Yes, my sleepy ass will be on the Great Silver Bus at 7:15 tomorrow morning...so if you e-mail that .jpg and you don’t hear from me in the next ten minutes, don’t panic, OK? Give it a couple of days before sending me the inevitable Pissy Follow-Up Notes.
Ten. Frickin’. Thousand. P. T. Barnum was right!
Geez, 10,000 hits in, what, seven months of Hot Blogging Action? For something that started out as a place for me to deposit my Random Written Detritus, I guess that’s not too bad.
So, not to get obsesively self-promotional or anything, whoever ends up sending me a screenshot .jpg of Hit 10,000 will get some sort of prize. I have no idea what, but I promise it won’t be too extremely chickenshit. Hey, if Jay Allen can do it, why the hell not me?
The proverbial Fit will likely Hit The Shan during my impending Bidnis (that’s Texan for “Business,” y’all) Trip to Sweat City. Yes, my sleepy ass will be on the Great Silver Bus at 7:15 tomorrow morning...so if you e-mail that .jpg and you don’t hear from me in the next ten minutes, don’t panic, OK? Give it a couple of days before sending me the inevitable Pissy Follow-Up Notes.
Ten. Frickin’. Thousand. P. T. Barnum was right!
GIMME MUH PILLS, DAMMIT
Here’s the latest Official Act of Stupidity that is racing down the pike toward us poor Georgians...
In other words, if you have a prescription for Plan B, an emergency contraceptive drug, and your pharmacist has personal issues about dispensing what he or she believes to be an abortifacient (and therefore Evil), under this legislation, your pharmacist can tell you to take a hike, and neither you nor the pharmacist’s employer can say “Boo.”
According to the article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution from which the above was snipped, an Eckerd drugstore in Texas last year dared to fire a pharmacist who did exactly that. The pharmacist refused to sell Plan B to a rape victim and was dismissed. But if Jim Whitehead has his way, that won’t be happening in Georgia.
And now my two cents - that’s what you were waiting for, wasn’t it?
Bull. Shit.
I think a pharmacist who refuses to sell a legally-prescribed medication for any reason should be subject to strong and immediate disciplinary action by his or her employer, and, furthermore, should be subject to legal action in the civil courts should the customer suffer damage as a result of such refusal.
You have a problem doing your job? Get another job.
I would stop short of criminalizing the pharmacist’s conduct. Hey, if you don’t want to do what your employer pays you to do, that’s a matter between you and your employer. You’re not a slave. But you have a job to do, and if you don’t like certain aspects of it, you are free to seek employment in another field that will perhaps be less traumatic on your conscience.
It’s all about choices and decisions. If you have sex, you may become pregnant. If you use contraception, you reduce the chances of becoming pregnant. If you become pregnant, you either carry the baby to term, you terminate the pregnancy artificially, or the pregnancy self-terminates. Those are the choices, and circumstances dictate those over which you have a measure of control.
But I tell you what: if I were a rape or incest victim, I would at least want the option to terminate any resulting pregnancy. And if I could prevent such a pregnancy from happening, so much the better. But you, O High And Mighty Drugstore Person, you are going to make that decision for me? I don’t think so.
The religious right wing wants to prevent abortions, but then they take measures that inevitably result in more abortions. Have I mentioned abstinence-based sex education?
Of course, the issue that lurks just in back of this one is the whole “Effect of Abortion Politics on What Medications are Granted Legal Status.” That’s a whole ’nuther bag of wind, friends, but for the sake of argument, let’s not even get into the discussion on why or why not RU486 (which can reasonably be called a pharmaceutical abortifacient) or Plan B (an emergency contraceptive) should be available under a doctor’s prescription. Medicines need to be safe and effective for their intended uses, but the FDA is not above the grasp of politics in today’s increasingly religious right-influenced administration. Which is why RU486 has “pariah status” in this country.
But we’re talking about Plan B, which is - in theory - legally available. Unless Mr. Druggist has other ideas.
Oh, brother. Time for a new license plate slogan, Georgia. Instead of the old standby “The Peach State,” how about “Now Increasingly Moronic!”?
Under a bill filed Thursday by freshman Sen. Jim Whitehead (R-Evans), pharmacists who oppose abortion on “moral or religious” grounds and who refuse to dispense emergency contraceptive drugs would be immune from lawsuits or disciplinary action by employers.
In other words, if you have a prescription for Plan B, an emergency contraceptive drug, and your pharmacist has personal issues about dispensing what he or she believes to be an abortifacient (and therefore Evil), under this legislation, your pharmacist can tell you to take a hike, and neither you nor the pharmacist’s employer can say “Boo.”
According to the article in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution from which the above was snipped, an Eckerd drugstore in Texas last year dared to fire a pharmacist who did exactly that. The pharmacist refused to sell Plan B to a rape victim and was dismissed. But if Jim Whitehead has his way, that won’t be happening in Georgia.
And now my two cents - that’s what you were waiting for, wasn’t it?
Bull. Shit.
I think a pharmacist who refuses to sell a legally-prescribed medication for any reason should be subject to strong and immediate disciplinary action by his or her employer, and, furthermore, should be subject to legal action in the civil courts should the customer suffer damage as a result of such refusal.
You have a problem doing your job? Get another job.
I would stop short of criminalizing the pharmacist’s conduct. Hey, if you don’t want to do what your employer pays you to do, that’s a matter between you and your employer. You’re not a slave. But you have a job to do, and if you don’t like certain aspects of it, you are free to seek employment in another field that will perhaps be less traumatic on your conscience.
It’s all about choices and decisions. If you have sex, you may become pregnant. If you use contraception, you reduce the chances of becoming pregnant. If you become pregnant, you either carry the baby to term, you terminate the pregnancy artificially, or the pregnancy self-terminates. Those are the choices, and circumstances dictate those over which you have a measure of control.
But I tell you what: if I were a rape or incest victim, I would at least want the option to terminate any resulting pregnancy. And if I could prevent such a pregnancy from happening, so much the better. But you, O High And Mighty Drugstore Person, you are going to make that decision for me? I don’t think so.
The religious right wing wants to prevent abortions, but then they take measures that inevitably result in more abortions. Have I mentioned abstinence-based sex education?
Of course, the issue that lurks just in back of this one is the whole “Effect of Abortion Politics on What Medications are Granted Legal Status.” That’s a whole ’nuther bag of wind, friends, but for the sake of argument, let’s not even get into the discussion on why or why not RU486 (which can reasonably be called a pharmaceutical abortifacient) or Plan B (an emergency contraceptive) should be available under a doctor’s prescription. Medicines need to be safe and effective for their intended uses, but the FDA is not above the grasp of politics in today’s increasingly religious right-influenced administration. Which is why RU486 has “pariah status” in this country.
But we’re talking about Plan B, which is - in theory - legally available. Unless Mr. Druggist has other ideas.
Oh, brother. Time for a new license plate slogan, Georgia. Instead of the old standby “The Peach State,” how about “Now Increasingly Moronic!”?
HELLO, MEAT
As I was writing last night’s post about our Excessively Meaty Dinner, it occurred to me that Tuesday, February 8 (tomorrow, as I write this) is Mardi Gras. Fat Tuesday.
For Christians, Fat Tuesday is the day before Ash Wednesday, the day that marks the beginning of Lent, a period of penitence, introspection, and privation (the degree of which depends on your specific religious beliefs and practices. I guess.) Back in the day, it was traditional to eschew certain elements of a rich diet during Lent, things such as meat and butter. Lent was a fairly ascetic time of year. [Now, at least among certain segments of the population, giving up Sony Playstation is about as rough as it gets, am I right?]
And since you would be giving up meat for Lent, the day before Lent started - Fat Tuesday - would be an all-out blowout. Party, party, party. Eat, eat, eat. Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow, you diet.
Which is pretty much why it’s called Fat Tuesday. Mardi Gras. Get your fat in, quick!
In Brazil, the Fat Tuesday festivities are marked by the Carnaval celebrations. Carnival / Carnaval - the word is the same, coming from the Latin carne vale - literally means, “Goodbye, Meat.”
Well, it struck me that our dinner Saturday night was more in the way of “Hello, Meat.” We sure did say “hello” to a lot of meat, we did. Said “goodbye” to it, too, as we wolfed it down.
And tonight, leftovers! The best thing about leftover brisket - when it’s braised, anyway - is that it gets better when it sits for a day or two. So we’ll be saying “Hello, Meat” again tonight.
[Now, all y’all nice Christian people out there, if I’ve got any of my facts wrong concerning Lent, etc., wrong, feel free to drop a comment. I’m writing from the perspective of someone who is on the outside looking in when it comes to all that Lent stuff...kinda like you would be with respect to Counting the Omer. But I’m never too shy to act like Mr. Know-It-All.]
For Christians, Fat Tuesday is the day before Ash Wednesday, the day that marks the beginning of Lent, a period of penitence, introspection, and privation (the degree of which depends on your specific religious beliefs and practices. I guess.) Back in the day, it was traditional to eschew certain elements of a rich diet during Lent, things such as meat and butter. Lent was a fairly ascetic time of year. [Now, at least among certain segments of the population, giving up Sony Playstation is about as rough as it gets, am I right?]
And since you would be giving up meat for Lent, the day before Lent started - Fat Tuesday - would be an all-out blowout. Party, party, party. Eat, eat, eat. Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow, you diet.
Which is pretty much why it’s called Fat Tuesday. Mardi Gras. Get your fat in, quick!
In Brazil, the Fat Tuesday festivities are marked by the Carnaval celebrations. Carnival / Carnaval - the word is the same, coming from the Latin carne vale - literally means, “Goodbye, Meat.”
Well, it struck me that our dinner Saturday night was more in the way of “Hello, Meat.” We sure did say “hello” to a lot of meat, we did. Said “goodbye” to it, too, as we wolfed it down.
And tonight, leftovers! The best thing about leftover brisket - when it’s braised, anyway - is that it gets better when it sits for a day or two. So we’ll be saying “Hello, Meat” again tonight.
[Now, all y’all nice Christian people out there, if I’ve got any of my facts wrong concerning Lent, etc., wrong, feel free to drop a comment. I’m writing from the perspective of someone who is on the outside looking in when it comes to all that Lent stuff...kinda like you would be with respect to Counting the Omer. But I’m never too shy to act like Mr. Know-It-All.]
Sunday, February 06, 2005
MORE ADVENTURES IN EXTREME DINING
Salad by SWMBO.
Sometimes, She Who Must Be Obeyed and I amaze even ourselves with how much Sheer Meaty Food Goodness we can pack in over the course of a dinner.
Well, I’ll amend that statement somewhat. SWMBO actually does not make a pig of herself. The Missus has remarkable self-control, yes she does. And no, she is not standing over me, rolling pin in hand, as I write this.
I, on the other hand, enjoy my food all too much. Sheer survival requires that I keep a reasonably good leash on myself most of the time. But, to continue on the “leash” analogy, once in a while, I let the dawgs out. That’s what I did last night.
Bad enough that I cooked up a Lil Pachter-style Braised Beef Brisket. And, having made one Shaker Meyer Lemon Pie last week and being extremely pleased with the result, I couldn’t resist the burning urge to make another one. Because, after all, nothing exceeds like excess.
She Who Must Be Obeyed was in on the act, too. She contributed some multi-hued creamer potatoes, roasted in olive oil with herbs and an astounding number of whole garlic cloves. Even better, she assembled a gorgeous salad (pictured above) with mâche and arugula, artichoke hearts, avocado, and shaved Pecorino Romano.
And that’s where all semblance of moderation ended. Because the friends with whom we shared this fine repast had their own unique ideas as to what constitutes an “appetizer.”
No, not for them the little smoked oysters. Not for them the little bits of Brie and smoked salmon perched on delicate water crackers. No crab dip. None of that frou-frou crap.
When Wylie and Janet come to dinner, their idea of an “appetizer” is a couple of slabs of Wylie’s own smoked ribs. Holy. Freakin’. Crap.
We are not talking amateur ribs here either, folks. Wylie is an honest-to-Gawd room-fulla-trophies-winning competitive barbecue guy. The man is serious...and so are them ribs. The racks he brought over were just two out of 36 racks he had smoked that day. Yow!
So: ribs, braised brisket - a very different version of brisket than the one Wylie usually makes! - plus his patented Killer Smoked ’n’ Baked Beans (with chunks of brisket thrown in), Salade à la Mode de SWMBO, and those fine garlicky potatoes, all washed down with a couple of fine bottles of California Red. And let’s not forget that damned Shakerina Pie, definitely better-looking than the first shot out of the barrel two weeks ago:
Shakerina Pie -
It’s purely a miracle that we could get any sleep after that meal. No Brazilian Meathouse could compete. All I will tell you is, I had exceptionally vivid dreams which, by rights, should have featured fields of fragrant lemon trees.
FRIDAY CAT BLOGGING IS ON SUNDAY TODAY
What’s cookin’, Doc?
Matata watches the proceedings in the kitchen with feline fascination.
“Hey, maybe The Great Bifurcated Gods will drop something on the floor, that I may, in my humble kittitude, snarf up! O, Great Bifurcated Gods, pray be clumsy in Thy comings and goings in the kitchen, that Thou mayest inadvertently give unto me a treat!”
I vant to be alone.
Meanwhile, back upstairs, Hakuna prefers to take her solitary rest under the antique chair. “While my sister deals with The Bifurcated Ones, she is not trying to chew my ass. O happy day!”
I CONFESS
It’s true. I admit it.
I don’t give a rat’s ass about the Super Bowl.
Patriots? Eagles? Who gives a shit?
I cared not a whit about Janet’s bare tit.
And if Sir Paul McCartney takes it right out
And waves it about, I won’t wail and shout.
Yeah, I’ll TiVo it. That way, I can watch the commercials at my convenience, without any useless football interruption.
But as for the game itself? Bread and circuses, friends. Bread and circuses. And me, I’d rather pay attention to the bread.
I don’t give a rat’s ass about the Super Bowl.
Patriots? Eagles? Who gives a shit?
I cared not a whit about Janet’s bare tit.
And if Sir Paul McCartney takes it right out
And waves it about, I won’t wail and shout.
Yeah, I’ll TiVo it. That way, I can watch the commercials at my convenience, without any useless football interruption.
But as for the game itself? Bread and circuses, friends. Bread and circuses. And me, I’d rather pay attention to the bread.
Friday, February 04, 2005
MR. SMART-BRAINS
Ahh, Friday. I love Friday. Especially the part that starts when I clear out of the Great Corporate Salt Mine.
My first stop on the way home tonight was Harry’s Farmers Market, a subsidiary of WholePaycheck Foods Market. My main objective was to pick up a pile of Meyer lemons, advance prep for a Shakerina pie that I wanted to make for tomorrow’s dinner. Gotta get them lemon slices macerating early, so a Friday Harry’s run was necessary.
Of course, there’s a shitload of other little items that will inevitably find their way into my cart at Harry’s, especially if I’m shopping on an empty stomach. A jar of bright green Ba-Tampte half-sour pickles. Dried blueberries – really tasty sprinkled on my favorite Colon Blow. A nice chunk of Manchego. Well and good, but do I really need the Lake Champlain hot chocolate mix? In two different flavors, yet?
Yes, I do.
And I can’t forget black peppercorns. Gotta get black peppercorns for that empty grinder.
I load up the car with my swag, then head home. I unpack, and now it’s time to recharge the old pepper mill. I open the plastic clamshell container of peppercorns and start loading the pepper mill, pinch by painstaking pinch. Whereupon She Who Must Be Obeyed throws her two cents in:
“Why don’t you use a spoon,ya dumbass honey?”
Which I proceeded to do. Yep, that sure sped up the process. Duh. What else could I do but roll my eyes at my own slack-jawed genius and say:
“Mr. Smart-Brains, with the engineering degree from Princeton.”
My first stop on the way home tonight was Harry’s Farmers Market, a subsidiary of Whole
Of course, there’s a shitload of other little items that will inevitably find their way into my cart at Harry’s, especially if I’m shopping on an empty stomach. A jar of bright green Ba-Tampte half-sour pickles. Dried blueberries – really tasty sprinkled on my favorite Colon Blow. A nice chunk of Manchego. Well and good, but do I really need the Lake Champlain hot chocolate mix? In two different flavors, yet?
Yes, I do.
And I can’t forget black peppercorns. Gotta get black peppercorns for that empty grinder.
I load up the car with my swag, then head home. I unpack, and now it’s time to recharge the old pepper mill. I open the plastic clamshell container of peppercorns and start loading the pepper mill, pinch by painstaking pinch. Whereupon She Who Must Be Obeyed throws her two cents in:
“Why don’t you use a spoon,
Which I proceeded to do. Yep, that sure sped up the process. Duh. What else could I do but roll my eyes at my own slack-jawed genius and say:
“Mr. Smart-Brains, with the engineering degree from Princeton.”
MORE USELESS FACTOIDS
This is not really a blogmeme, but it might as well be one. I snagged it from Sharon, who got it from an e-mail. Anyway, here are my answers. Feel free to come up with your own!
1. What time do you get up? Weekdays, about 6:00. Weekends, maybe as late as 7:00. Miss Matata’s hairy ass ensures that we humans shall not sleep any longer than is necessary.
2. If you could eat lunch with one person, who would it be? If I couldn’t talk about growing up in the ’hood with Jerry Seinfeld, I’d love to take lunch with The Famously Constipated Dooce™, if only to watch her eat plenty of fiber and then be unable to turn it to account.
3. Gold or silver? I like both. But gold is nice and heavy, and doesn’t tarnish.
4. What was the last film you saw at the cinema? The SpongeBob Squarepants Movie. Really. And with no little kid(s) in tow. Come to think of it, words like “film” and “cinema” really are a bit overreaching when it comes to the ’Bobster.
5. What is/are your favorite TV show(s)? I don’t spend a lot of time watching TV, but I love Scrubs, Cold Case, Medium, and The Venture Brothers. Of course, the Simpsons are in a class by themselves, but I rarely catch ’em on the first run.
6. What did you have for breakfast? Baked (i.e., kippered) salmon, wrapped up with raw onion in Romaine lettuce leaves. Mini “everything” bagel, innards scooped out and toasted, lightly buttered. Coffee.
7. Who would you hate to be stuck in a room with? Anyone who takes this “meme” shit too seriously.
8. What inspires you? Reading great books. Listening to great music.
9. What is your middle name? Barry. Now that I’ve told you, I’ll have to kill you.
10. Beach, City, or Country? To live or to vacation? Vacation: Beach. City. Country. Live: City. Beach. Country. Wait - do the ’burbs count as “City” or Country”?
11. Favorite ice cream? In no particular order: My homemade Blackberry Sage Tea Ice Cream. Green Tea. Ben & Jerry’s Wavy Gravy. Coffee. Fuck - pretty much any ice cream, as long as it doesn’t have strawberries or nuts.
12. Butter, plain, or salted popcorn? Gawd forgive me, real butter and salt.
13. What color is your bathroom? Well I know there’s white, blue, green and red. Some stripes are involved. I just wash up and crap there; don’t ask me to be the decorator, too.
14. Favorite color? No such thing. My favorite color for a sports car will be different than my favorite color for a kitchen appliance. But you can pretty much rule out avocado.
15. What kind of car do you drive? Chevy Impala. Not that I love the make/model so much, but it’s a company car, so my cost to operate it is minimal.
16. Favorite sandwich? Pastrami and tongue with chopped liver, on rye. Seriously. I just had one last Sunday, except that Ye Local Bagel Emporium was out of tongue, dammit. She Who Must Be Obeyed is horrified by this sandwich, as two of the three components are Meats That Will Not Pass Her Lips.
17. What characteristic do you despise? The ability to despise characteristics.
18. Favorite flower? If you insist, roses. Although that Rafflesia thing - the three-foot-wide Indonesian blossom that smells like rotting meat - might be interesting.
19. If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would it be? Depends on who’s paying. Bali, Maui, London, Brussels, Jerusalem - who can say no to any of ’em?
20. Favorite brand of clothing? For shoes, Cole-Haan. For gotkis, Hanes. For shirts, Perry Ellis. For jeans, Levi’s. For suits, Jhane Barnes or whatever the hell strikes my fancy, since there’s no point in pretending I can ever afford a Brioni.
21. Where would you like to retire to? Hawai’i would be nice, but impractical and expensive. How ’bout right here in Atlanta?
22. Favorite day of the week? Saturday, of course. Shabbos!
23. What did you do for your last birthday? Went out and ate too much good food with friends. Probably at one of those Brazilian Meat Factories. Meat - it’s what’s for dinner!
24. Where were you born? Brooklyn, New York. Soitenly!
25. Favorite sport to watch? Golf. Yeah, I know, it’s a little like watching paint dry. But I don’t give a rat’s ass about 99.9% of televised sports.
26. What fabric detergent do you use? Unscented Tide. Gets those bloodstains and that pesky gunshot residue out - and with cold water, too!
[Honestly, do you really give a crap about all this?]
1. What time do you get up? Weekdays, about 6:00. Weekends, maybe as late as 7:00. Miss Matata’s hairy ass ensures that we humans shall not sleep any longer than is necessary.
2. If you could eat lunch with one person, who would it be? If I couldn’t talk about growing up in the ’hood with Jerry Seinfeld, I’d love to take lunch with The Famously Constipated Dooce™, if only to watch her eat plenty of fiber and then be unable to turn it to account.
3. Gold or silver? I like both. But gold is nice and heavy, and doesn’t tarnish.
4. What was the last film you saw at the cinema? The SpongeBob Squarepants Movie. Really. And with no little kid(s) in tow. Come to think of it, words like “film” and “cinema” really are a bit overreaching when it comes to the ’Bobster.
5. What is/are your favorite TV show(s)? I don’t spend a lot of time watching TV, but I love Scrubs, Cold Case, Medium, and The Venture Brothers. Of course, the Simpsons are in a class by themselves, but I rarely catch ’em on the first run.
6. What did you have for breakfast? Baked (i.e., kippered) salmon, wrapped up with raw onion in Romaine lettuce leaves. Mini “everything” bagel, innards scooped out and toasted, lightly buttered. Coffee.
7. Who would you hate to be stuck in a room with? Anyone who takes this “meme” shit too seriously.
8. What inspires you? Reading great books. Listening to great music.
9. What is your middle name? Barry. Now that I’ve told you, I’ll have to kill you.
10. Beach, City, or Country? To live or to vacation? Vacation: Beach. City. Country. Live: City. Beach. Country. Wait - do the ’burbs count as “City” or Country”?
11. Favorite ice cream? In no particular order: My homemade Blackberry Sage Tea Ice Cream. Green Tea. Ben & Jerry’s Wavy Gravy. Coffee. Fuck - pretty much any ice cream, as long as it doesn’t have strawberries or nuts.
12. Butter, plain, or salted popcorn? Gawd forgive me, real butter and salt.
13. What color is your bathroom? Well I know there’s white, blue, green and red. Some stripes are involved. I just wash up and crap there; don’t ask me to be the decorator, too.
14. Favorite color? No such thing. My favorite color for a sports car will be different than my favorite color for a kitchen appliance. But you can pretty much rule out avocado.
15. What kind of car do you drive? Chevy Impala. Not that I love the make/model so much, but it’s a company car, so my cost to operate it is minimal.
16. Favorite sandwich? Pastrami and tongue with chopped liver, on rye. Seriously. I just had one last Sunday, except that Ye Local Bagel Emporium was out of tongue, dammit. She Who Must Be Obeyed is horrified by this sandwich, as two of the three components are Meats That Will Not Pass Her Lips.
17. What characteristic do you despise? The ability to despise characteristics.
18. Favorite flower? If you insist, roses. Although that Rafflesia thing - the three-foot-wide Indonesian blossom that smells like rotting meat - might be interesting.
19. If you could go anywhere in the world on vacation, where would it be? Depends on who’s paying. Bali, Maui, London, Brussels, Jerusalem - who can say no to any of ’em?
20. Favorite brand of clothing? For shoes, Cole-Haan. For gotkis, Hanes. For shirts, Perry Ellis. For jeans, Levi’s. For suits, Jhane Barnes or whatever the hell strikes my fancy, since there’s no point in pretending I can ever afford a Brioni.
21. Where would you like to retire to? Hawai’i would be nice, but impractical and expensive. How ’bout right here in Atlanta?
22. Favorite day of the week? Saturday, of course. Shabbos!
23. What did you do for your last birthday? Went out and ate too much good food with friends. Probably at one of those Brazilian Meat Factories. Meat - it’s what’s for dinner!
24. Where were you born? Brooklyn, New York. Soitenly!
25. Favorite sport to watch? Golf. Yeah, I know, it’s a little like watching paint dry. But I don’t give a rat’s ass about 99.9% of televised sports.
26. What fabric detergent do you use? Unscented Tide. Gets those bloodstains and that pesky gunshot residue out - and with cold water, too!
[Honestly, do you really give a crap about all this?]
FRIDAY ARK
It’s Friday, and you know what that means. Time for a little Muskrat Love over at The Modulator, host of the Friday Ark.
Well, actually, there are no muskrats this week. But there is a raccoon. Hell, there’s even a sponge...and Sponge Love, as many of us know, has been in the news lately.
Well, actually, there are no muskrats this week. But there is a raccoon. Hell, there’s even a sponge...and Sponge Love, as many of us know, has been in the news lately.
Thursday, February 03, 2005
FROM THE ELISSON ARCHIVES
Estes Park, Colorado, 1974.
This picture was taken a little over 30 years ago, during the Great Post-Graduation Road Trip that my friend Steve and I embarked upon shortly after collecting our college diplomas.
Think of it: a one-month, 10,000 mile trek across the great American continent, spanning almost the entire east-west and north-south dimensions of the Lower 48. The West Coast, all the way from Tijuana to the Puget Sound. San Francisco. Los Angeles. Denver. Yellowstone. The Grand Canyon. Las Vegas. All impossibly remote and exotic to us young East Coast boys.
And all on a budget of about $600 apiece. Man, those were the days. Cheap motels when we wanted to splurge - otherwise, racking out in the car, a thoroughly utilitarian 1970 Ford station wagon. If we had thought to name it, we could have called it “The Babe Repellent.”
But it’s a few years down the road, now. Next time I go to California, my ass will get there on an airplane. And not some Dinky-Ass Jet, either. A Big Ol’ Widebody, thankyewverymuch.
Now, what’s the number for room service?
PUT ON A HAPPY FACE
Yesterday, as I was getting up to leave the table at the Local Bagel Emporium, one of our newer Minyan Boyz paid me what may be the finest compliment I have heard in years.
He said, “Steve, do you ever not have a smile on your face?”
I consider that praise of the highest order.
Let’s face it. None of us is happy all the time, and there’s plenty that goes on in the course of a routine day that will wipe a smile right off your face. But if that smile ain’t there to begin with, you’re at a disadvantage right off the bat. Besides, what would you rather look at on someone else’s pan - a pleasant smile, or a ferkrimpteh punim?
That’s me - Elisson, Grinning Like a Complete Jackanapes Since 1952!™
He said, “Steve, do you ever not have a smile on your face?”
I consider that praise of the highest order.
Let’s face it. None of us is happy all the time, and there’s plenty that goes on in the course of a routine day that will wipe a smile right off your face. But if that smile ain’t there to begin with, you’re at a disadvantage right off the bat. Besides, what would you rather look at on someone else’s pan - a pleasant smile, or a ferkrimpteh punim?
That’s me - Elisson, Grinning Like a Complete Jackanapes Since 1952!™
RAMBLIN’ MAN
I found this nifty website that allows you to create maps showing the countries you’ve visited - and even the states within the U.S. that you’ve visited.
Here are mine:
Create your own Visited Countries map
Create your own Visited States map
I’m not the most well-traveled guy, but I have been to most of the states in the U.S. And one of these days, I’ll get around to visiting North Dakota, Nebraska, and Iowa. Really!
As for the rest of the world, there are many places I’ve been but - as is obvious from the map - many more places I have yet to see. [And plenty I don’t particularly care to see.]
But at least I can say I’ve had a Manhattan in Manhattan, and a Singapore Sling in Singapore.
[Thanks to UnDivine Comedy for the link.]
Here are mine:
Create your own Visited Countries map
Create your own Visited States map
I’m not the most well-traveled guy, but I have been to most of the states in the U.S. And one of these days, I’ll get around to visiting North Dakota, Nebraska, and Iowa. Really!
As for the rest of the world, there are many places I’ve been but - as is obvious from the map - many more places I have yet to see. [And plenty I don’t particularly care to see.]
But at least I can say I’ve had a Manhattan in Manhattan, and a Singapore Sling in Singapore.
[Thanks to UnDivine Comedy for the link.]
Wednesday, February 02, 2005
STRANGE HEADFELLOWS
Herr Doktor Head Shrinker.
The Six Flags Fun Guy.
The top picture is Yours Truly, playing a comic bit part in a song from West Side Story. The one below it is the mysterious Fun Guy you see in the Six Flags amusement park ads. What do these illustrious personages have in common?
It’s those snazzy glasses.
Yes, I managed to score a pair of Ultra Goliath eyeglass frames for my (mercifully brief) appearance on stage, from the same guy who supplied ’em to the Six Flags people. They certainly provide a certain je ne sais quoi (French for WTF), do they not?
GROUNDHOG DAY
Yes, Groundhog Day. The day on which we ask the famous question, “How much ground could a groundhog hog if a groundhog could hog ground?”
You would think that Groundhog Day is a singularly American holiday, steeped as it is in Local Color, Historical Tradition, and More Than A Little Utter Silliness. Think about it: a day on which a large rodent is expected to predict the weather based on its paranoid reaction to Conditions of Illumination. And as if Punxsutawney Phil weren’t enough, down here in Georgia we have our own General Beauregard Lee to do the predictin’ honors. Gaaah.
But, ridiculous as Groundhog Day may be, we Americans don’t hold the patent on silly-ass animal-based holidays. Herewith, for your delectation, Blog d’Elisson presents an overview of...
Groundhog Day Observances Around the World
Canada
The Canadian equivalent of Groundhog Day is Muskrat Day, March 1. If “Inuvituk Izzie” sees his shadow, no maple syrup may be consumed until the Queen’s Birthday.
Germany
Domestik-Schweinestag is observed on March 15. A randomly-selected domesticated pig is taken outside. If it sees its shadow and squeals, it is promptly slaughtered, smoked, and eaten in the form of Rauch-Schinken (smoked bacon) to prevent malevolent Teutonic spirits from lodging in people’s hair.
Tanzania
Tanzanians celebrate Banana Slug Day on July 10. If Blinky the Banana Slug does not return to his habitation promptly after being coaxed from it, people refrain from eating bananas for six weeks. At the same time, they are encouraged to slug one another repeatedly and without obvious provocation.
India
The closest Indian equivalent of Groundhog Day is Cow Day, observed every freakin’ day of every year. If you see a cow, you are expected to get the hell out of its way. You are never expected to eat the cow. By observing Cow Day properly, Indians are assured of having twelve months of suffocating humidity, heat, and monsoons. As usual.
Know of any other interesting international holiday traditions? Leave a comment and tell us all about ’em!
You would think that Groundhog Day is a singularly American holiday, steeped as it is in Local Color, Historical Tradition, and More Than A Little Utter Silliness. Think about it: a day on which a large rodent is expected to predict the weather based on its paranoid reaction to Conditions of Illumination. And as if Punxsutawney Phil weren’t enough, down here in Georgia we have our own General Beauregard Lee to do the predictin’ honors. Gaaah.
But, ridiculous as Groundhog Day may be, we Americans don’t hold the patent on silly-ass animal-based holidays. Herewith, for your delectation, Blog d’Elisson presents an overview of...
Groundhog Day Observances Around the World
Canada
The Canadian equivalent of Groundhog Day is Muskrat Day, March 1. If “Inuvituk Izzie” sees his shadow, no maple syrup may be consumed until the Queen’s Birthday.
Germany
Domestik-Schweinestag is observed on March 15. A randomly-selected domesticated pig is taken outside. If it sees its shadow and squeals, it is promptly slaughtered, smoked, and eaten in the form of Rauch-Schinken (smoked bacon) to prevent malevolent Teutonic spirits from lodging in people’s hair.
Tanzania
Tanzanians celebrate Banana Slug Day on July 10. If Blinky the Banana Slug does not return to his habitation promptly after being coaxed from it, people refrain from eating bananas for six weeks. At the same time, they are encouraged to slug one another repeatedly and without obvious provocation.
India
The closest Indian equivalent of Groundhog Day is Cow Day, observed every freakin’ day of every year. If you see a cow, you are expected to get the hell out of its way. You are never expected to eat the cow. By observing Cow Day properly, Indians are assured of having twelve months of suffocating humidity, heat, and monsoons. As usual.
Know of any other interesting international holiday traditions? Leave a comment and tell us all about ’em!
CARNIVAL OF THE VANITIES #124
Ken Sain hosts this week’s Carnival. And that inspires a host of semi-rhetorical questions:
How big of an ego must you have to name your blog after yourself?
For that matter, how big an ego must you have to post your random screeds on the Internet for others to read? And how much bigger must that ego be for you to participate in events like the Carnival of the Vanities?
How big of an ego must you have to name your blog after yourself?
For that matter, how big an ego must you have to post your random screeds on the Internet for others to read? And how much bigger must that ego be for you to participate in events like the Carnival of the Vanities?
Tuesday, February 01, 2005
FROM THE ARCHIVES OF THE MISTRESS
The Mistress, age 7
It’s either my sheer laziness when it comes to creating new Bloggy Content, or maybe it’s my desire to build up my Daddy Blog cred – after all, Daddy Blogs have been getting a lot of nice publicity these days – but I thought I’d treat my Esteemed Readers to some of the brilliant writing of the Mistress of Sarcasm.
There’s precedent for this. A few weeks ago, I slapped a couple of guest blogposts by the Mistress into Bd’E. You could tell it was a different writer – the Mistress lobs more F-bombs than even I do, and that’s saying something, bruthuh.
But these pieces hearken back to an earlier, more innocent time…
September 7, 1989
My favrit day was The day I got owr cat. My sister and I named him strips we named him strips Becos he had strips we pet him a lot so almost all of them came off. My favrit thing at shcool is Jim.
Sept. 29, 1989
To day I am gowing to glastonbeary. I am visiting the Clincops.
I am real icsitid. They have a dog her name is mooshoo.
It is one of those dogs that is rincoly.
October. 4, 1989
If I hade a cat that came to my house I wood fead it food and keep it ther for one nihte and then let it go the nesxt day or sel it to somone you no.
Oct. 18, 1989
I think the earth cwake was real bad my dad is away and my dad’s frend lived there. A lot of aportmints had got roowind and my dad’s frend lives in a aportmint. My mom and I hope he is ole rihgt.
Well, there’s been a lot of water under the bridge since then. The Mistress is, alas, no longer a seven-year-old who makes amusing spelling errors. She’s twenty-two, and looking forward to getting her college degree this Spring. And as much as She Who Must Be Obeyed and I miss the little girl she was, we are enthralled with the young woman she has become.
But you Daddies (and Mommies) out there, [cue Ali G voice] hear me now. If your kid isn’t keeping a journal – hell, these days, they probably start blogging by age four! – get him or her started right away. Fifteen or twenty years down the road, you will have something to treasure.
Something that will make you laugh until you piss yourself. Trust me on this one.
HAMBONE ALERT
99.9% of the acting, singing, and dancing talent in Family d’Elisson resides in the collective bodies of Elder Daughter and the Mistress of Sarcasm. Elder Daughter, in particular, has spent a lot of time in front of the footlights, in high school (in Houston, in a drama department ranked right up there among the city's professional troupes), in college, and even in an honest-to-Gawd independent theatre production.
But Sunday night it was the Old Man’s turn to be up on stage. Here I am, along with my fellow Talented Song-and-Dance Men, singing “Standing On The Corner.” Cute song, but the lyrics, written in a more innocent age, have a twisted undertone in these cynical times. Nowadays, spend too much time loitering and leering at female passersby, and you very well could get arrested...lyrics notwithstanding. Or get the shit beaten out of you. I can see it now:
“What the hell are you lookin’ at, Mac?” WHAM.
Ah, well.
Brother, you can’t go to jail for what you’re thinking...
Hey, blogging ain’t the only way to feed a Bloated Ego!
But Sunday night it was the Old Man’s turn to be up on stage. Here I am, along with my fellow Talented Song-and-Dance Men, singing “Standing On The Corner.” Cute song, but the lyrics, written in a more innocent age, have a twisted undertone in these cynical times. Nowadays, spend too much time loitering and leering at female passersby, and you very well could get arrested...lyrics notwithstanding. Or get the shit beaten out of you. I can see it now:
“What the hell are you lookin’ at, Mac?” WHAM.
Ah, well.
Brother, you can’t go to jail for what you’re thinking...
Hey, blogging ain’t the only way to feed a Bloated Ego!
Saturday, January 29, 2005
ICEBLOGGING
Winter came to Atlanta last night in the form of the Dreaded Ice Storm - freezing rain and sleet that created a beautiful tracery of crystal on every branch.
But beautiful as it may be, an ice storm is a Major Pain in the Ass.
Our steps and driveway were covered with a half-inch glaze of sheet ice. Only the thin layer of sleet encrusted in the top surface provided enough traction so that I could walk down the driveway to fetch the morning paper.
You know you’re in trouble when you rely on sleet to provide extra traction.
The ice gave us an excuse to stay in bed a little longer than usual. Instead of rushing off to shul, She Who Must Be Obeyed and I had a leisurely morning. A Pancake Morning. A lounge around in the pajamas morning...something bloggers should all relate to. Hah!
Rather than spend the day watching the tube, I decided to bake a couple of batches of cookies. First out of the chute was a load of cardamom cookies. The most estimable Bakerina had written a cardamom-infused post a couple of weeks ago, which in turn directed me to Kimberly (she of the gorgeous cats), who had posted a recipe that had been gnawing at the base of my brain ever since I first saw it.
I followed Jen’s advice and jacked up the cardamom content of these cookies roughly sixfold from Craig Claiborne’s original recipe, and they were dead solid perfect.
And then, since I already had a Big-Ass Bakin’ Mess on my hands, I figured “what the hell” and decided to throw together my all-time favorite: Mexican Chocolate Icebox Cookies.
The recipe is one that I originally found many years ago in Maida Heatter’s Great Book of Chocolate Desserts over twenty years ago. You can tell how much I enjoy that book - and that recipe in particular - by the amount of crusty build-up on the pages. It was a pleasant surprise to see that Saveur magazine had published the recipe in their most recent issue, but I was shocked to discover an apparent error in the version they printed [their version called for ½ cup of flour versus 1½ cups in the Heatter original. Wrong-O!]
Anyway, for your delectation, go to PCAMB for your Mexican Chocolate Icebox Cookies and remember that it’s 1½ cups of flour, not ½ cup. (My bad for not noticing the hack when I transcribed the Saveur version!)
Our friends Gary and JoAnn braved the ice this evening and joined us for dinner: pan-seared Hamburger steaks, sugar snap peas with butter and Ile de Ré fleur de sel (fancy-pants sea salt), and whole-grain kasha with onions, prepared with my yummy made-from-scratch chicken stock. Dessert? Coffee, cookies (natch!), and a fine 1999 Deinhard Riesling Beerenauslese. Boo-yah!
As for the ice storm, we lucked out. An enforced day of leisure, with no power outages, no broken trees, no pratfalls. Turns out that the only real negative was that it forced a one-day postponement of our shul’s Talent Show. Funny, that. The last time our congregation held the “Challe Follies,” it was five years ago.
The exact same day Atlanta had its last big ice storm.
Friday, January 28, 2005
SUNSHINE ON A PLATE
I try to avoid overindulging in pastries and pies, due to an allergy from which I have suffered all of my life. When I eat pie, I break out in Fat-Ass.
But then, sometimes you just have to deal with the Occasional Rampant Pie Jones.
It’s my own fault, of course. If I am going to pay a visit to the Bakerina, I am just setting myself up to have to deal with Major Temptation. And I was not disappointed when I saw this excellent recipe for Shaker Meyer Lemon Pie.
No wimpy, everyday lemon meringue pie, this. No, this pie is made with whole sliced Meyer lemons, macerated in sugar for at least a day, and crammed into a flaky butter crust. I could not resist.
Shakerina Pie
My pie is not as pretty as the one Jen made, but, then again, who gives a crap? I’m purely an amateur at this baking business - it’s not like I grew up in a household where baking took place.
[My mother baked a cake - once. I can still recall its aroma (it was a spice cake), possibly because of the dramatic rarity of the event.]
Amateurs do what they do for the love of it, and I do love me this wonderful dish of intense lemony goodness. The Meyer lemons lend it a finesse that is lacking in regular stupid-market lemons. It is a happy, happy pie, and I am happier for having made it. It is sunshine on a plate, on a cold, sleet-raddled winter night.
But then, sometimes you just have to deal with the Occasional Rampant Pie Jones.
It’s my own fault, of course. If I am going to pay a visit to the Bakerina, I am just setting myself up to have to deal with Major Temptation. And I was not disappointed when I saw this excellent recipe for Shaker Meyer Lemon Pie.
No wimpy, everyday lemon meringue pie, this. No, this pie is made with whole sliced Meyer lemons, macerated in sugar for at least a day, and crammed into a flaky butter crust. I could not resist.
Shakerina Pie
My pie is not as pretty as the one Jen made, but, then again, who gives a crap? I’m purely an amateur at this baking business - it’s not like I grew up in a household where baking took place.
[My mother baked a cake - once. I can still recall its aroma (it was a spice cake), possibly because of the dramatic rarity of the event.]
Amateurs do what they do for the love of it, and I do love me this wonderful dish of intense lemony goodness. The Meyer lemons lend it a finesse that is lacking in regular stupid-market lemons. It is a happy, happy pie, and I am happier for having made it. It is sunshine on a plate, on a cold, sleet-raddled winter night.
MEATLOAF...WITH HAIR
Is it bedtime yet?
Must be...because I’ve gotten undressed, brushed my teeth, and taken the Evening Round o’ Pharmaceuticals. (Just wait’ll you’re 52, smartass. Then it’ll be your turn in the Medicine Barrel.) Yep - ready for beddy.
But what’s this? What hairy ass graceth mine pillow? Why, it’s Miss Matata, her ownself! Fie! Cannot a man sleep in his own bed without getting a face full of cat hair?
Not at Chez Elisson.
FRIDAY ARK
This week’s Ark is up and running...on little cat feet, doggy paws, and squid tentacles...at The Modulator.
Thursday, January 27, 2005
A STAR IS BORN POOPED OUT
The latest trend in Hollywood plastic surgery has nothing to do with chin tucks or Botox. It’s a little more...fundament-al.
Celebrities are flocking to doctors practicing the latest and most innovative subspecialty: plastic gastroenterology. With a few snips and stitches, they can get their sphincters reshaped, allowing them to crap “designer turds.”
Credited with originating this new procedure is Dr. Richard Thomas Braun, of Sloan-Kettering Memorial Hospital in Garden City, New York.
“It’s remarkable how quickly this has all caught on,” Braun said in a recent interview. “The procedure originated as an unintentional side effect of a particularly serious hemorrhoidectomy, but when the patient noticed that the surgery had an apparent, er, ah...aesthetic effect on his stools, well, the rest was history.
“We now have the capability to allow people to create all kinds of profiles. Stars, hollow tubes, rectangular prisms, turdblossoms...the possibilities are almost limitless.
“Why, just the other day, we had a well-known director come in to have a ‘triangle job.’”
The procedure is performed on an outpatient basis and typically costs $5000-8000. Most insurance companies do not cover the procedure at this point, although discussions are underway. Despite the cost, several thousand people have had the “tushie tuck” performed in recent weeks, to the point where the waiting list at Cedars of Lebanon Hospital in LA is over a month long. And there seems to be no end (you should excuse the expression) in sight. One well-placed Tinseltown source commented, “Plain old cable? How boooorrring.”
Britney Spears and Ashlee Simpson are rumored to have undergone the increasingly popular surgery. An anonymous source reported that Spears had had “one of those six-sided stars done...a Mogen Doody, she called it.” (Spears’s publicist refused to comment on the rumor.)
Celebrities are flocking to doctors practicing the latest and most innovative subspecialty: plastic gastroenterology. With a few snips and stitches, they can get their sphincters reshaped, allowing them to crap “designer turds.”
Credited with originating this new procedure is Dr. Richard Thomas Braun, of Sloan-Kettering Memorial Hospital in Garden City, New York.
“It’s remarkable how quickly this has all caught on,” Braun said in a recent interview. “The procedure originated as an unintentional side effect of a particularly serious hemorrhoidectomy, but when the patient noticed that the surgery had an apparent, er, ah...aesthetic effect on his stools, well, the rest was history.
“We now have the capability to allow people to create all kinds of profiles. Stars, hollow tubes, rectangular prisms, turdblossoms...the possibilities are almost limitless.
“Why, just the other day, we had a well-known director come in to have a ‘triangle job.’”
The procedure is performed on an outpatient basis and typically costs $5000-8000. Most insurance companies do not cover the procedure at this point, although discussions are underway. Despite the cost, several thousand people have had the “tushie tuck” performed in recent weeks, to the point where the waiting list at Cedars of Lebanon Hospital in LA is over a month long. And there seems to be no end (you should excuse the expression) in sight. One well-placed Tinseltown source commented, “Plain old cable? How boooorrring.”
Britney Spears and Ashlee Simpson are rumored to have undergone the increasingly popular surgery. An anonymous source reported that Spears had had “one of those six-sided stars done...a Mogen Doody, she called it.” (Spears’s publicist refused to comment on the rumor.)
A SIMPLE OBSERVATION
Blogger, being a cheap-ass platform, does not give me the capability of categorizing my blogposts, but I’ve made a few observations in the months since I started this little time-sink. One thing I’ve noticed is that the amount of feedback I get from you, my Esteemed Readers, varies widely. Some topics always seem to generate a lot of heat and smoke in the form of comments (although, keyn ayin hora, nothing so far in the way of trolls and other random obnoxiousness). Others seem to drop into the Cone of Silence, where you can’t even hear the crickets.
My posts about religion and food usually attract a lot of commentary. Conversely, if I throw off a post about feces, I get goornisht. Nada. Zero. Zilch. The Punchbowl Meme, f’rinstance, never seemed to go anywhere. A few comments, sure, but nobody grabbed that bad boy and ran with it.
She Who Must Be Obeyed noticed this some time ago. “Nobody wants to talk about shit,” she said.
I disagree.
But maybe it’s because I don’t talk about shit well. In that arena, I must yield to the Famously Constipated Dooce™, the world’s pre-eminent poopblogger. She rarely opens her blog up for comments, but one of those rare times, I saw that she got, what, 225 comments? On one post? And a turd-related post, at that. So either Heather Armstrong is insanely popular (she is), an extremely talented writer (ditto), or people just love to talk about shit (they do).
Just not with me. And that stinks. Like, well...shit.
My posts about religion and food usually attract a lot of commentary. Conversely, if I throw off a post about feces, I get goornisht. Nada. Zero. Zilch. The Punchbowl Meme, f’rinstance, never seemed to go anywhere. A few comments, sure, but nobody grabbed that bad boy and ran with it.
She Who Must Be Obeyed noticed this some time ago. “Nobody wants to talk about shit,” she said.
I disagree.
But maybe it’s because I don’t talk about shit well. In that arena, I must yield to the Famously Constipated Dooce™, the world’s pre-eminent poopblogger. She rarely opens her blog up for comments, but one of those rare times, I saw that she got, what, 225 comments? On one post? And a turd-related post, at that. So either Heather Armstrong is insanely popular (she is), an extremely talented writer (ditto), or people just love to talk about shit (they do).
Just not with me. And that stinks. Like, well...shit.
Wednesday, January 26, 2005
GUT RUMBLES
No, this post has nothing to do with Acidman.
As I was zooping through my Bloglines feeds during lunch today, I caught this entertaining post by Mac.
It seems a couple of my esteemed fellowslaves in the Great Corporate Salt Mine co-workers decided to get married - an office romance that actually turned into something permanent. [“Permanent” is a strong word for any affair of the heart involving Normally Fickle Humans, but this one is still going strong after 20 years. WTG, J.T. and Juanita!] And She Who Must Be Obeyed and I were invited to the wedding.
When we arrived at the church, SWMBO and I took our seats amidst several other of our co-workers, and, at the appointed time, the ceremony got underway.
That’s when I had a major attack of The Dreaded Borborygmi.
For no apparent reason, my stomach started growling. Well, “growling” is not an adequate descriptor. “Squealing like a semi-trailer load of hogs locking up its brakes going downhill at 85 miles per hour” is maybe a little closer to it.
It’s not like it was painful or anything. I had eaten nothing to roil the ol’ kishkes, and in fact I felt just fine. But the noise...the noise! There was absolutely no fucking way everybody in the whole damned church couldn’t hear it.
This is all going on right in the middle of the wedding ceremony, mind you. I took one look at SWMBO, and she looked right back at me, and then the real struggle began: the struggle not to burst out into uncontrollable, hysterical, fall-on-the-floor-and-piss-yourself laughter. How the two of us managed to get through the rest of that wedding ceremony without totally cracking up, I have no clue.
Hah. And they say I have no self-control.
As I was zooping through my Bloglines feeds during lunch today, I caught this entertaining post by Mac.
Like a smacked ass, I decided I’d throw caution to the wind and eat a bowl of Kashi Go Lean for breakfast this morning. Bad move. My stomach is making increasingly alarming whining noises that are loud enough to attract attention. I fear the worst.Those lines, in particular, reminded me of an incident that took place a long time ago...
It seems a couple of my esteemed fellow
When we arrived at the church, SWMBO and I took our seats amidst several other of our co-workers, and, at the appointed time, the ceremony got underway.
That’s when I had a major attack of The Dreaded Borborygmi.
For no apparent reason, my stomach started growling. Well, “growling” is not an adequate descriptor. “Squealing like a semi-trailer load of hogs locking up its brakes going downhill at 85 miles per hour” is maybe a little closer to it.
It’s not like it was painful or anything. I had eaten nothing to roil the ol’ kishkes, and in fact I felt just fine. But the noise...the noise! There was absolutely no fucking way everybody in the whole damned church couldn’t hear it.
This is all going on right in the middle of the wedding ceremony, mind you. I took one look at SWMBO, and she looked right back at me, and then the real struggle began: the struggle not to burst out into uncontrollable, hysterical, fall-on-the-floor-and-piss-yourself laughter. How the two of us managed to get through the rest of that wedding ceremony without totally cracking up, I have no clue.
Hah. And they say I have no self-control.
CARNIVAL OF THE VANITIES #123
This week’s Carnival is hosted by The Raving Atheist. Lots of nice, chewy blogposts - get ’em while they’re hot!
Tuesday, January 25, 2005
A MATTER OF PERSPECTIVE
Religion.
Balm for the afflicted. Opiate of the masses. Fairy tales. Myth. The deepest truths.
Religion is a lot of things.
In today’s various wars - the War on Terrorism, the Culture Wars, the Jihad Against the Great Satan and the Little Satan, religion is a key element, if not the key element. Religion inspires us to do and be our best - but through so much of history, religion also has inspired us to kill and hate one another.
The Crusades were just one example. Western Christians think of knights in shining armor on a holy mission, but Muslims and Jews remember that slice of history differently: women and children raped, disemboweled; whole families, whole villages murdered. Not that the Muslims were that much more pleasant to live with, if you were not a believer.
And it’s no different today. Islamic fundamentalism. Suicide bombers. The 9/11 atrocities. Madrid. Bali. Executing teenage rape victims for “indecency” in Iran.
Not that the Christian fundies have given up. You have right-wing religious zealots bombing abortion clinics, shooting doctors. They even have us hatin’ on SpongeBob! The bastards!
The Jews have their own issues. Some Jews throw rocks at other Jews because they do outrageous things...like reading Torah. Outrageous, that is, if you’re a woman - at least, so the ultra right-wing Haredim say, even if you are in a women-only prayer group.
Sometimes, a little perspective is in order.
Twenty-seven years ago, I was working on a project with several technologists from one of our affiliated companies in Japan. These guys got to spend a month in Texas, learning about an alien culture and eating bizarre food. Barbecue! Chicken-fried steak!
The work required round-the-clock coverage, and so it was that one cold Sunday morning in mid-December I found myself wandering around the process area with Yamada-san, one of the Japanese technology guys. And he turned to me and asked, “Elisson-san, what will your family be doing for Christmas?”
[Actually, this sounded more like “Erisson-san, what wirr your famiry be doing for Kurisumasu?” But the meaning was plenty clear enough.]
And I answered, “Not a whole lot, Yamada-san. We are Jewish, and we do not celebrate Christmas.”
Yamada-san considered this for a moment. Then he said, “Oh, that’s OK. All you Western religions are the same to us.”
* * *
Christian or Muslim, Muslim or Jew -
The difference depends upon your point of view.
Step far enough back, and that alien “other”
Starts in to lookin’ more like your brother.
When the little green men come from outer space,
They won’t ask to whom you pray or note the color of your face.
To them we’ll just be Humans - prey to be destroyed,
By the Bug-Eyed Monsters from the Outer Void.
And will God shed a tear? Will He say “Boo-Hoo”?
Well, the bug-eyed dudes are His children, too.
So we’d better stick together in our Earthly stew,
’Cause the difference depends upon your point of view.
Balm for the afflicted. Opiate of the masses. Fairy tales. Myth. The deepest truths.
Religion is a lot of things.
In today’s various wars - the War on Terrorism, the Culture Wars, the Jihad Against the Great Satan and the Little Satan, religion is a key element, if not the key element. Religion inspires us to do and be our best - but through so much of history, religion also has inspired us to kill and hate one another.
The Crusades were just one example. Western Christians think of knights in shining armor on a holy mission, but Muslims and Jews remember that slice of history differently: women and children raped, disemboweled; whole families, whole villages murdered. Not that the Muslims were that much more pleasant to live with, if you were not a believer.
And it’s no different today. Islamic fundamentalism. Suicide bombers. The 9/11 atrocities. Madrid. Bali. Executing teenage rape victims for “indecency” in Iran.
Not that the Christian fundies have given up. You have right-wing religious zealots bombing abortion clinics, shooting doctors. They even have us hatin’ on SpongeBob! The bastards!
The Jews have their own issues. Some Jews throw rocks at other Jews because they do outrageous things...like reading Torah. Outrageous, that is, if you’re a woman - at least, so the ultra right-wing Haredim say, even if you are in a women-only prayer group.
Sometimes, a little perspective is in order.
Twenty-seven years ago, I was working on a project with several technologists from one of our affiliated companies in Japan. These guys got to spend a month in Texas, learning about an alien culture and eating bizarre food. Barbecue! Chicken-fried steak!
The work required round-the-clock coverage, and so it was that one cold Sunday morning in mid-December I found myself wandering around the process area with Yamada-san, one of the Japanese technology guys. And he turned to me and asked, “Elisson-san, what will your family be doing for Christmas?”
[Actually, this sounded more like “Erisson-san, what wirr your famiry be doing for Kurisumasu?” But the meaning was plenty clear enough.]
And I answered, “Not a whole lot, Yamada-san. We are Jewish, and we do not celebrate Christmas.”
Yamada-san considered this for a moment. Then he said, “Oh, that’s OK. All you Western religions are the same to us.”
Christian or Muslim, Muslim or Jew -
The difference depends upon your point of view.
Step far enough back, and that alien “other”
Starts in to lookin’ more like your brother.
When the little green men come from outer space,
They won’t ask to whom you pray or note the color of your face.
To them we’ll just be Humans - prey to be destroyed,
By the Bug-Eyed Monsters from the Outer Void.
And will God shed a tear? Will He say “Boo-Hoo”?
Well, the bug-eyed dudes are His children, too.
So we’d better stick together in our Earthly stew,
’Cause the difference depends upon your point of view.
SPIT IT OUT
One of the guys in our morning minyan told me this story a while back. Supposedly it’s a true story, but I have my suspicions...
By way of background, Roy is a former New Englander who has boldly re-entered the world of Little Kid Daddyhood after raising adult children. He and his wife have three-year-old twin daughters, cute as the dickens. [Just how cute is the dickens, anyway? Oh, never mind.]
One day (so the story goes), Mrs. Roy was out for the evening, leaving Roy in charge of the dinner-fixing and child-monitoring activities. In lieu of the usual macaroni and cheese, or beanie weenies, or whatever the hell it is kids eat these days, Roy decided to get some venison out of the freezer and make Bambi-burgers.
As the girls started to chow down, they realized that something was...different about their hamburgers. They didn’t taste like regular hamburgers. So one of the girls asks Roy, “Daddy, what is this we’re eating?”
And this is where Roy decided to get cute and play the “What Izzit?” game. So he says, “See if you can guess.”
“Is it chicken?”
“No.”
“Is it beef?”
“No...but I’ll give you a hint. It’s something Mommy calls Daddy sometimes.”
Whereupon the little one turned to her sister and said, “Sarah! Spit it out! We’re eating assholes!”
By way of background, Roy is a former New Englander who has boldly re-entered the world of Little Kid Daddyhood after raising adult children. He and his wife have three-year-old twin daughters, cute as the dickens. [Just how cute is the dickens, anyway? Oh, never mind.]
One day (so the story goes), Mrs. Roy was out for the evening, leaving Roy in charge of the dinner-fixing and child-monitoring activities. In lieu of the usual macaroni and cheese, or beanie weenies, or whatever the hell it is kids eat these days, Roy decided to get some venison out of the freezer and make Bambi-burgers.
As the girls started to chow down, they realized that something was...different about their hamburgers. They didn’t taste like regular hamburgers. So one of the girls asks Roy, “Daddy, what is this we’re eating?”
And this is where Roy decided to get cute and play the “What Izzit?” game. So he says, “See if you can guess.”
“Is it chicken?”
“No.”
“Is it beef?”
“No...but I’ll give you a hint. It’s something Mommy calls Daddy sometimes.”
Whereupon the little one turned to her sister and said, “Sarah! Spit it out! We’re eating assholes!”
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