that guy over there...

my weekend in haiku...

 wow it's been a while
since i last updated here
'cause i got nothin

yes stuff has happened
but nothing interesting
or worth writing 'bout

maybe that's a lie
certainly i've done some things
that are worth your time

wednesday was st. pat's
my favourite holiday
drank and danced with friends

been forty one days
since i'd had a beverage
boy were they tasty

nice to show restraint
even for just a short time
so i know i can

not that i doubt me
i'm chock full of confidence
other people might

but i say fuck them
and wonder why i'm bitter
no one called me out

just sorta did it
even though i knew i could
wanted to prove it

and then the next day
thursday was a little rough
way out of practice

but i gotta say
hangover is good for me
teach me a lesson

what the lesson is
of that i can't be too sure
rest is good for you?

so not much happened
i watched tv and took naps
pretty much all day

then i found something
that i forgot i wanted
a bisque recipe

down in new orleans
at emeril's place nola
some amazing soup

a roasted garlic
reggiano parmesan
concoction of joy

popped into my head
causing me to google it
and *poof* there it was

automagical!
i had searched for it before
but came up empty

thanks to emeril
for putting it on his site
you can find it here

friday i woke up
and failed to get pearl jam tix
that was a downer

so i went downstairs
and watched some law and order
still a damn good show

then i thought of soup
and the thought made me happy
to the store i went

shopping is easy
when you have a list of stuff
you don't buy randoms

i love random stuff
especially groceries
don't know what you'll see

like marshmallow fluff
or some mozzerella sticks
garlic dill pickles

i got out of there
and hurried on my way home
got started cooking

then it was draft time
schadenfreude is my team
in the outcast league

won cash last two years
hoping to threepeat that feat
it won't be easy

but the draft went well
got players i targeted
too many in fact

is it good or bad
players i wanted were there
each time that i picked 

seems good on surface
but it could be a bad sign
that things went so well

and back to the soup
came out incredibly well
garlic and cheese, yum

was like being there
in the restaurant again
only much cheaper

that was my weekend
had fun got drunk cooked drafted
told ya it was lame
 

lowered expectations, obama, domino's, and the dead like me movie...

lowered expectations.  it's not just a mad tv bit, it's a way of life.  as a pessimist, i generally believe all things will go horribly wrong.  when people tell me i should be an optimist and look on the bright side of things, i ask them why.  they generally come up with some sort of "positive thinking is good" mumbo jumbo and i usually reply to the effect of "but if i think it will suck, i can never be disappointed."  lowered expectations are important for all of us.  they allow us to say "well, it's not that bad" or "it could be worse" instead of "what the fuck is this shit?"

let's take our president.  i voted for him.  i'll be honest, i wasn't incredibly pleased with myself for doing so, but i figured if he was half as good as the hype he built up for himself it wouldn't be too bad.  sadly, the only change i've noticed is that there's a younger black man lying to me instead of an older white man. 

"change," "hope," "yes we can," were his three catch phrases.  oh he talked on and on about those things.  he was going to pull all of our troops out of the places bush invaded, he was going to give us universal health care and make sure the negotiations would be on c-span, he was going to get a dog from a shelter, and i'm sure there's a bunch more.  as it turned out, he lied about it all.  not only are the troops not coming home, he sent more.  universal health care is a pipe dream and the negotiations will most definitely not be publicized.  the dog?  well it didn't come through a shelter that's for damn sure.  it technically does count as a rescue dog because some rich person pretended to want it only to give it back so the president could have a rescue dog. 

and yes, i know he's probably done some good.  but this is being written from a negative point of view so i wouldn't name any of it if i could think of any (there was some, right?  please tell me there was some.)

all in all though, he hasn't done a horrible job.  you may not be able to tell, but i'm generally much less unhappy with the government now than i was with bush in office.  i'm just saying had he lowered expectations a little we might all think he's doing a great job. 

instead of "all the troops will come home" he should have said "i'd hate to have them there much longer but they may be."  instead of "health care for all" he should have said "do you really want to be like canada?" and instead of "i'm getting a dog from a shelter!" he should have said "c'mon, i'm gonna be the fucking president.  are you an idiot?"  or i guess he could have said "hey middle america, watch how you forget about all that shit when i hire a tranny!"

i'm for everyone having rights and all, but quite frankly some dude who said "i want to chop my dick off" probably shouldn't be in charge of anything...

and then there's domino's new pizza.  i tried it today.  why?  because there were so many fucking commercials telling me how great it was that i felt i needed to.  the verdict?  meh...

i'll give it one thing, it smells fucking fantastic.  i love garlic.  anything that smells or tastes like garlic is a-ok in my book.  they did nail the garlic butter smell.  that of course is suspect in itself.  sure they nailed the smell, but often when a giant corporation makes it and it smells good, it rarely tastes good.

i got two pies.  because they were $5.99 each and there's a few guys to feed here.  let's go bit by bit over the new improved domino's...

crust:  smells extra garlicky.  tastes like fake garlic butter.  it's as if they stole that nasty stuff papa john's includes with every pie and poured it all over the crust.  if you lift a slice you can even see where the extra garlic butter stuff soaked in.  i'm fairly positive it's not real butter which means it's probably the same as movie theater fake butter which is loaded with fat and chemicals and ultimately gives you heartburn.

cheese:  it's supposed to be better.  i can't tell.  it definitely didn't meld with the sauce the way a real pizza should.  instead it sort of floated above it.  one bite rips a good portion of it off the slice.  never a good thing.

sauce:  i guess it's better.  can't really tell.  it tastes tomato-ey.  so i guess that's good.

all in all it wasn't bad enough to ask them for my money back (as they promised) but not good enough to make me ever think "let me get domino's" when i want a pizza.  if i ever order from them, and i will, i'll stick to the thin crust because at least that tastes like a yummy pizza flavoured cracker.

i just wish they hadn't hyped it so much.  hype gave it something to live up to and it failed.  had the commercials said "hey we have new pizza.  it's not as shitty as the old stuff we used to make."  my review would be an astoundingly positive "definitely less shitty!"  it just feels wrong to describe something that's not that good as "better."

finally we have the dead like me movie "life after death."  i had recently started watching dead like me again thanks to netflix streaming.  dead like me was an awesome show with great writing and attractive women.  as it turns out it was based on a book by piers anthony.  i wound up reading it because someone who used to be special in my world told me to.  she never fulfilled her half of the deal though which i guess should have told me much sooner than i figured out that she didn't deserve to be special.

wow, where did that come from?

anyway, i was excited when i heard the movie was coming out.  then heard nothing about it for 2 years. after watching a couple of episodes on demand, i decided to throw the dvd sets on my goozex want list and own them.  when searching for "dead like me" the movie came up.  the movie?  wow.  it came out.  so i looked it up on amazon.

the folks at amazon were none too pleased with it.  because of that, instead of purchasing it, i went to netflix and found it on demand.  i watched it last night.  what did i think?  it wasn't that bad.  was it good?  would i say you should go watch it?  no, not really.  don't go out of your way.  

it had most of the right ingredients, but it mixed them up in weird ways.  it was basically a longer episode of the show but more fluff than substance.  they spent a good amount of time reliving the first episode which was good for newbies but then gave those people no reason to want more.  for those who'd been watching since the beginning it had reasons to smile and some almost closure.  it was definitely better than the people who said "omg this sucks and is nothing like the show, they ruined it!" 

it did have one bright spot though.  britt mckillip (who occupies the spot up top normally reserved for a redhead).  she plays reggie the main character's younger sister.  she became smokin hot in the time the series was off the air.

decent writing, 2 hot girls who spent most of the flick on screen together, and tie ins to a show i loved.  yeah, that was a good movie.  like obama, domino's, it could have been better, but because everyone said it would suck it came out smellin like roses.

and that my friends, is why lowered expectations are important...

should have played connect 4...

so i (e-)mailed it in yesterday.  sorry to anyone who had high hopes for me being witty and funny with my picks.  and even sorrier to those who came with lower expectations that i still failed miserably by refusing to be even the slightest bit interesting.  as it turns out it looks like i'm having a pretty shitty week with my picks anyway.

been a while since i did a real post that wasn't just about sports, so i figure now is as good a time as any.  what's been up?  a lot of nothing really.  been home a lot less lately, doing a lot more, but having nothing to show for it.  good times no doubt, but nothing really worth chronicling.  friday was almost interesting.  it had the potential to be great, but sadly had the rug pulled out from under it. 

we'd gone out for adam's birthday (yay adam!).  hit up a place called f.a.t.s by penn station.  they have an amazing buffalo chicken sandwich that gets served on a pretzel roll.  i've likely talked about it before.  pretzel rolls are the shit.  

before we go on.  why can't i spell sandwich correctly?  i always think there's an "h" after the w and before the i.  it always looks right to me and spell check always tells me i'm wrong.

so we were at f.a.t.s. brian, sis, and adam were there and christine introduced me to some dude named john.  in all honesty i didn't pay attention to the intro and didn't catch why we knew him.  the night went on and we drank and drank.  i noticed john talking to the bartender a lot.  thinking he was one of adam's friends and had never been at this place before, i took that as a sign that he was going to do well with her.  then we decided to leave.

after a bit of arm twisting we got the bartender to agree to meet us at hibernia.  by "us" we meant john.  see we talked john into coming by talking the bartender into coming by convincing her friend that she should come as well.  and off we went.  outside while waiting for john and sis to come out i asked adam how he knew john.  the answer "i don't.  he was sitting there talking to christine when i showed up."  so i asked christine.  her answer "i don't.  he was sitting there talking to brian when i showed up." brian was long gone by this point.

it dawned on me that not only did we sort of befriend a complete stranger, but we pretty much peer pressured him into leaving a bar he's a regular at to go to hibernia.  we also gave him the impression that a girl he clearly liked but didn't think we be into him would be joining us.  yeah, that didn't happen.  she did text at some point sayings he was cashing out, but was eventually a no show. 

that's when a bunch of random girls walked in because they heard the sing-a-long of sweet caroline going on.  t'was around 2:30 which is about the time eddie throws on the "they'll sing this because they're hammered" playlist.  and in walked the girls.  all kind of cute.  oddly i liked the blonde, but realized quickly she wasn't the fun one and zeroed in on the cute brunettish one who sadly had short hair or she'd of rated far better than cute.

now that i was pretty much ignoring my friends, adam was almost falling asleep, and john had been let down they all left.  christine decided i had everything under control and took off with them.  and that's when suddenly, suddenly all of a sudden my girl's friend decided she no longer liked the guy she was talking to.  but i handled it fine for a few minutes.  it would have been nice to have a wingman, but it wasn't necessary.

and then someone stepped up to be wingman.  cool!  only, not so much.  it was a guy at the bar who i've talked to a couple of times and never did i think he'd blow this situation.  he's a black guy.  don't ask me why but i just always assumed all black dudes know how to talk to women.  i mean, the fresh prince always got the girl, right?  hell, even urkle got laura after a while.  and my sister married a black guy. 

thinking about it, perhaps i should base my stereotypes on more than 2 sitcoms from the 90s and my sister...

so this guy went ahead and ruined it.  he ruined it more than the night i stumbled into a group with my friend intending to help him out and drunkenly slurred "you're hot.  and you smell good!"  i mean, at least that night they were able to make fun of me to get the girl.  no, this guy just went ahead and took any alcohol induced amorous vibes and sobered everyone the hell up.  it happened so quickly, but felt like it was forever.

it was at this point i realized i should have gotten them started playing some connect 4.  we have board games at hibernia and damnit connect 4 always works. it's just enough competition which almost always intrigues girls and distracts them from the fact that you're not letting them win because you like them; you're letting them win because you are too fucking drunk to remember how to play connect 4 and have been staring at her tits while keeping yourself from drunkenly saying you're staring at her tits.  by the time she realizes this she's already decided you're cool and she's going to hook up with you anyway.

so yeah the girls went away and i was left to drink with the remains of the night as the bar closed.  thankfully hibernia is full of cool people.  i relayed my misery to one of said patrons.  to which he responded "oh yeah, we call him '(word in another language i don't remember).'  it means 'he who scares away women.'" 

well, fuck...

and with that i'm off
black guy didn't get the girl
and lost one for me

connect 4 is fun
and distracts girls from knowing
just how drunk you are

happy thanksgiving
to all you canadians
especially kev

sunday randoms for monday consumption...

so i've got nothing better to do right now.  figure i'd throw some thoughts up such that it looks like i'm doing something later, when i'm not.  unless of course, i'm bored and type something tomorrow for tuesday.  that's usually called being ahead of the game and is something i don't do often.

i'm not a huge fan of deadlines.  hell, i'm not even a fan of having a set time to meet someone for dinner.  i'm way to random to really care much about time.  i have no concept of it at all.  i can't even begin to tell you how many times i've gotten myself all set to go out and then stared into oblivion for 20 or 30 minutes causing me to be late for whatever it was i made it a point to be ready for.

so fuck time.  unless it's a sporting event or transportation, it's meaningless.  concerts used to be on the "have to be there on time" list, but then i realized they never start on time and the opening bands tend to suck anyway.  i'd much rather drink at the bar for an extra hour than pay $10 for a jameson on the rocks.  loves me some jameson, but it's far more delicious for $5 than $10.

and now the randoms...

• i have nothing to listen to for the next 2 weeks.  opie and anthony will be on vacation and while it's good for them, it's not so good for me.  this is usually the time that i branch out and try to find new forms of entertainment.  that said, i wonder if anyone's got suggestions for new music or podcasts that might be out there?  and by new, i mean new to me, a closed minded ass.
• the mets season is officially over.  david wright took a 94 mph pitch to the head and wound up with a concussion.  thankfully, the mets made a proper medical decision and put him on the disabled list immediately.  last guy we had that got a concussion, they kept him active and flew him around the country like a bunch of dumb fucks.
• that said, it's football season.  go giants! 
• and lay off michael vick.  i get it, he killed some dogs.  i like dogs too, but how come none of you people all pissed off about dead dogs are saying shit about donte' stallworth?  mr. stallworth killed A PERSON.  vick did 2 YEARS in prison for killing some dogs while stallworth got 24 DAYS for killing a fucking person.  seriously, think about that for a second.  
• but really, isn't philly the perfect city for him?  i guarantee after mcnabb gets hurt in week 4 like he does every year, those savages will be hanging stuffed dogs to celebrate every touchdown.
• 2 words:  brazillian girls
• 2 more:  god damn
• another 2: great asses
• and again:  thank you!
• had a burrito today.  it was quite yummy, but not nearly as delicious as anything i had out in san diego.  from the place girgy and scarlette took me to, to the shack with the yellow roof and no sign i went to with the people from the hotel bar to even wahoo's you can not beat the fake mexican food out in the most beautiful city in america.
• a guy just came in named arvid.  i don't think i've met, seen, or even heard of anyone named arvid since the old sitcom head of the class. (please excuse me while i read that wikipedia page and reminisce.) 
• i'm shocked i spelled "reminisce" correctly, shocked.
• though reading that reminded me of the first redhead i may have ever had a crush on.  looks like the hottie in the corner is gonna be replaced by simone.  mmm, simone.  i used to wake up at 530 in the morning before high school to watch reruns to see her.
• ...and because a hot chick i liked talking to was usually online at the same time.  and yes, i did seal that deal, so yes it was worth it.
• hooray for tangents in a randoms post!

and with that the sunday randoms for monday consumption come to an end.  gotta love what stream of consciousness can get you sometimes, i got me a trip down memory lane with the ghosts of redheads past and you got...well you didn't get much unless you like redheads or head of the class.

cheers all!

drunken ideas...

i like to drink.  drinking is delicious.  it's also great great for stimulating the mind and helping you come up with ideas you never dreamed possible.  sometimes this is good, sometimes this is bad.  had a few drunken ideas the last couple of weeks lets go through em and decide if they were good or bad and if they might possibly happen...

tots!  this is a recurring drunk idea.  my friend and i are convinced a restaurant that serves only tater tots would be incredibly successful.  sure, there'd be regular tots, but then there'd be stuffed tots as well.  we're talking jalapeno cheddar tots, bacon and cheese tots, even cinnamon sugar tots for dessert.  it'd be a small place, making tots fresh all day with some seats in the back, but it'd be our small place. 

potential?  yeah.  i think if we actually went ahead and did this, it would rock.

pissing off a pretty girl.  couple of weeks ago, i thought it would be a good idea to act like a jealous fool and call a girl who doesn't like being put on the spot out on many stupid things in front of people she didn't wish to be called out in front of.

results?  definitely a bad idea.  this is one of those things where drunk you thinks you're having fun but you're really just making someone miserable.  worse it's someone you like.  even worse, you should have known better.  will some good time spent apologizing and ass kissing fix it?  maybe, but why dig the hole to begin with?  definitely a bad idea.

road trip to new orleans.  came up with this one the other night.  see, the jets and giants are both playing the saints down in the big easy this year.  seeing that most of my friends are jets fans and the giants have never won a road game i've been to (never lost a home game) i'd be inclined to go with the jets fans.

the idea,  rent a winnebago and drive down a few days before the game.  stop in some southern city along the way and pick up a few hookers.  let hilarity ensue.

prospects?  well, the trip to new orleans is a good one.  the road trip, not so much, i don't think.  the hookers, definitely not.  but like i said, we were drunk.  it started as a trip and started expanding from there.  may happen, may not.  we'll see who's game.

roast a whole pig at u2 tailgate.  this one is not my idea.  in fact i think it may even be a sober idea of a friend.  u2 is playing giants stadium in september.  it's a thursday/friday too and brian was kind enough to pick up some tickets such that i might attend both shows.  w00t.

so the pig.  serge decided he wants to roast a whole pig before both nights.  apparently he knows how to procure a while pig and he's willing to show up at 9 am to get the ball rolling.  a ballsy statement indeed.

prospects?  well, i don't see this happening.  maybe one night (i mean, seriously, do you need to roast two whole pigs?) but both nights i think is a no go, especially because unlike serge (who can pretty much set his own schedule) and myself (off thursday/friday), most other people will be working all day thursday and won't be able to get to jersey for a tailgate.

friday?  that's a different story.  pretty sure everyone we know is going took the day and hopefully there's sun to go with out lil piggy and booze.  it'll definitely be a sight to see, roasting off a pig in a parking lot.  other than bacon, i don't even like pork, but i'm totally down to enjoy this feast.

food, all right...

so this is going to be a bad couple of weeks for updates.  see, normally i pound one of these out every saturday, sometimes even sunday and usually try again during the week.  unfortunately one of my guys is on vacation.  this is bad enough as he's one of the more interesting people i've ever know and often fuels the creative fire just by being around, but with him gone i got a summer guy to take his place.  a fairly useless summer guy who'll now be tag teaming with my already useless (unless he smells money) regular guy.  so instead of trying to be creative, i'm going to be babysitting grown men in the hopes i can keep them paying attention enough that my day doesn't get ruined by a pissy resident...YAY.

it's also the summer.  weird thing about the summer is i do more stuff.  go out more, enjoy life more.  you'd THINK this would give me more material to work with and thus make me more interesting for you the bored person who stumbled here either randomly or on purpose, but you'd be wrong.  when i'm out i generally use the creative juices to entertain myself and whoever i may be with.  this leaves me depleted when it comes time to click and clack on the keyboard.

so what do you get?  a list.  yeah, lists suck, we've gone over that before and this one is no different.  here is a list of my  favourite things to eat.  fascinating, i know...

• pasta:  pasta rocks.  sometimes i just like to cook it up nice and al dente and throw some parmesan cheese on it.  no sauce, no nothing.  this leaves it delicious and kind of salty and since it's devoid of a messy sauce, i can eat it with my hands.  i'm not a fan of utensils if they're not absolutely necessary.  fingers are so much better than forks.  a new fav of mine is something i like to call bruschetta pasta.  i'm almost certain i stol the idea from tgi fridays, though i'm not sure if i made it before i saw it on their menu or not.  basically you warm up some extra virgin olive oil (or EVOO as rachael ray would call it) with a lot of garlic.  you just want to flavour the oil, so keep it at a low temp.  chop up some onions and throw them in, just until they're soft (turn up the heat as you do this).  while that's going, chop up some nice ripe tomatoes.  as you drop the pasta, toss the tomatoes in your garlic/onion/oil.  you don't want to cook them so much as you want to warm them up. salt and pepper as you go to layer flavours and add some basil, oregano, and parsley along with the tomatoes.  drain the pasta and toss with the oil.  if you'd like, serve it with a piece of grilled chicken that was marinated in your favourite italian dressing or a balsamic vinaigrette.  fucking delicious.
• pizza:  how can you go wrong with pizza?  give me a nice slice of new york pizza any day and i'm a happy camper.  chicago deep dish can be pretty damn nice every now and then too.  i like it from giordano's who conveniently has a mail order business.
• brownies:  who doesn't love brownies?  i've done at least 2 or 3 posts on brownies and for good reason.  if they're done right, they're the greatest treat on this planet.  even if they're not, they're still pretty good.  unless they're cakey.  fuck you and your cakelike brownies.  from scratch is always best but if you've gotta use a mix you can't go wrong with ghiradelli chocolate syrup brownie mix (and actually, my brands is a good place to order em from. ordered before went very well. and no, that's not a referral link).  my suggestion, use extra virgin olive oil instead of regular vegetable oil.  it goes great with the chocolate and in my opinion makes em moister, which is always better especially with...
• girls:  i just put this here to see if anyone noticed, but i thoroughly enjoy it and am fucking good at it too.  mmm, redheads.
• buffalo wings:  how can you not love buffalo wings?  i like the wingy ones myself as oppose to the drumstick ones, but i'll take whatever i can get.  my current favourites come from hibernia.  the hot ones are delicious and a tad spicy.  a lot spicy if you're not a huge fan of heat.  which makes em even better, they make me happy and make me look like a big tough guy when the other guys are crying cuz they're so hot.  you can keep your bleu cheese too, though if i get stuck with a drumstick one i might grab a bit for a change of pace.
• french fries:  give me some steak fries with salt and malt vinegar and i'm a damn happy camper.  no ketchup for me, not even catsup.
• zone perfect double dark chocolate bars:  every now and then i'll have one of these instead of a meal, but they're great when you snap em in half and make 2 snacks out of them.  in all honesty they're better than most candy bars out there, especially if you like dark chocolate.  they have other dark chocolate bars, but double dark is by far the best.
• stonyfield farms organic fat free strawberry yogurt:  i'm pretty sure i've done and entire post on this once.  still a delicious and healthy snack, though i wish they'd go back to bigger chunks of strawberries.  those big strawberries always made me happy.
• pickles:  i love any and all pickles, but my favourite are ba-tampte garlic dills.  if there is a finer pickle on the planet, i'd like to taste it.
• cucumbers:  this makes sense as pickles come from cucumbers (well, you can pickle anything technically), but cucumbers just rule.  for a nice spicy and sweet cuke salad, slice em thin and let them sit in a rice wine vinegar and sugar solution. throw in some thinly sliced chile peppers (whatever kind you like or are available. use red chile flakes if you can't find fresh).  don't forget to salt and pepper and feel free to use any herbage you like as well.
• bacon:  how did i almost leave the greatest food ever off of the list?  sure, i did just talk about how great it was a week ago, but does that mean i shouldn't again?  of course i should.  bacon rules.  it makes anything you put with it better eggs, salads, sandwiches, chocolate, ANYTHING.  and bacon fat is damn good too for cooking.  bacon is the greatest, just ask the dog from the beggin strips commercials or erock from the opie and anthony show.

yup, so that's what i like to eat.  how bout you?  let's be boring together!

guilty pleasures...

wikipedia tells me a guilty pleasure is something one considers pleasurable despite feeling guilt for enjoying it. often, the "guilt" involved is simply fear of others discovering one's lowbrow or otherwise embarrassing tastes, rather than actual moral guilt. fashion, music,and food can be examples of guilty pleasures.  i loves me some wikipedia, it's always got the answers.  here's some of mine:

girl's with brittish accents:  i'm not certain how or why this one came about, i think it's because they all sound as if they've been drinking a bit, but i love a chick with a brittish accent.  there's just something about their pronunciation of words.  perhaps because it's so similar to a new york accent, yet in a way softer.  maybe it's because they know my ancestors kicked their ancestors' asses?  in any case this guilty pleasure leads to another...

the ting tings:  yep, it's just totally her voice.  she's not bad looking either.  in all honesty it's just the "that's not my name" song but the rest of the album isn't bad if i forget to pick another songs and it keeps playing.  and yes, i absolutely sing along any time it comes on, even in public.  which reminds me of another song i shouldn't like...

lady gaga's "poker face":  the hook to this song is incredible.  "can't read my, can't read my no he can't read my poker face"  just makes me happy.  the "p-p-p-poker face, p-p-poker face" part isn't bad either.  the rest of the song and for that matter the rest of her music isn't really all that good.  and while we're on the subject of ladies...

chubby girls:  now this is a fine line.  i'm not a huge fan of fat girls, nor am i a fan of particularly skinny girls.  being kinda fat myself, i also don't really have the right to be picky.  but i like a nice round ass and for the most part a skinny girl doesn't have that (there are exceptions, of course).  so yeah, give me a chubby girl with a pretty face and a nice ass and i'm a happy camper any day of the week.  how might a girl get chubby?  perhaps if she ate too much....

bacon:  bacon is by far the greatest food on the planet.  on a sandwich i like it nice and crispy, but if you cook some up with some eggs for breakfast i like it nice and floppy.  hell, yesterday i just made myself a few slices as a snack.  yes i had smoky delicious bacon just because i could and it was fantastic.  i don't have a fun segue for this next one because it's...

being racist:  listen, i don't care how liberal and politically correct you are, sometimes it's just nice to scream out a few racial slurs.  they don't even have to be the right slur, just directed at a person when you're angry.  like when you're stuck in a bit of traffic and some person of another ethnicity cuts you off it's just awesome to scream "goddamned cocksucking motherfucking _________."  isn't it?  oh c'mon you know you do it too.  which leads me to something the women hate...

the word "cunt":  we've been over this one before.  the c-bomb is the ultimate argument stopper if you're getting into it with your lady friend, but it's also the most delightfully descriptive word in the english language.  when we hear the word "douchebag" we all think of a stupid looking guy wearing a polo with the collar popped and probably some gelled spiky hair.  it's the same with a cunt.  she's the girl wearing giant sunglasses, carrying her coffee that had far too many adjectives to be any good to drink, who's being rude to people simply because she's her.  and one last thing while we're talking about girls...

pink drinks:  we've already done the delicious shots > manly shots bit here, well, same goes for drinks.  sometimes you just need to have a frozen strawberry margarita,  will all the other guys laugh at you while they drink their shitty coors light?  maybe, but inside your silly little tulip glass is a delicious slurpee like concoction of strawberries and tequila.  besides, you can always add a shot.  oh shit, one more...

the secret life of the american teenager:  i absolutely love this show, but i'm certain it's for the wrong reasons.  see, they have a cute chubby redhead, a fuckin hot brunette, and a blonde that makes me want to like blondes.  and that's not all!  the show is kind of like a "best of" of all those bad after school specials.  it's almost always a very special episode!  and they have a kid that looks just like corky from "life goes on" only, he's funny.  the guy gets all the best lines on the show.  there's just something hilarious about a guy with down syndrome verbally bitch slapping the hell out of someone who is completely over blowing a situation.  yup, it's a really great bad show.

now that i've completely thrown myself under the bus, join in!  what are some of the things you'd rather nobody know you enjoy?

the kitchen sink...

 i've got a lot of half formed thoughts, nothing worthy of a post on its own, but worth throwing out there for the sake of looking like i didn't forget this place.

so lately i've been droppin some weight, which is a good thing.  i wouldn't say i'm on a diet, but i'm definitely eating less shitty with the intention of being less fat.  diet sounds way too restrictive.  i pretty much eat what i want, but less of it.  and i try to get my fat ass off the couch during commercials to dew a few sit ups.  but it's workin, i'm down a good 15 pounds and am down to looks pretty decent in a t shirt weight.  not great, but decent.  the real fun is if i odn't eat for a couple hours and suck in my gut i'm at doesn't look completely hideous without a shirt weight...yay!

my real problem is not snacking while i'm watching tv.  i'm not incredibly certain why, but when i'm layin on the couch i feel naked without some snacks.  i can be anywhere else in the house and not give a damn, but once i plop on that couch i just want some chips, or popcorn, or chocolate, or ice cream, or lots of other shit that will lead me back down fat ass road and that sucks.

as i continue to lose weight, my beloved mets continue to lose games.  one of these things is not like the other.  one of these things is bad.  i've mentioned this before, i knew the mets would be in bad shape the second the announced that citifield would have 15,000 fewer seats than their old home of shea stadium.  the way i see it is they made the place smaller because they intended to cut payroll at some point in the future and suck like they did for most of the 90s.

unfortunately for the mets, their plans to be at least kind of respectable this season went to hell when 3 of their top players decided to get injured.  the injuries weren't helped by their useless medical staff who for the last two seasons have misdiagnosed injuries and sent guys who had no business being on the field on cross country road trips which certainly only aggravated their problems.

what really bugged me about this year is general manager omar minaya.  i've always liked him until this winter when he was defending his lack of moves.  i will give him that he patched our bullpen, which was a huge need for the team, but he didn't do anything to fix the rotation or even get an extra bat which was sorely needed.  as he talked about how he thought the team was good, i couldn't help but think he sounded like every dominican guy we have at work and how they sound when you call them out on not doing their job.

i'm not picking on dominicans by the way, i'm just saying the ones we have here at the job work really hard to not work.  it's impressive really.  they gt a certain ramblyness to their voice when they are questioned, and they smile a lot.  that's exactly what omar did as he said the team was ready to be a contender this season.

i didn't buy it.  and it seems i was right.  and that makes me sad.

is it just me or do people using phones that have antennas just look silly?

lastly, is there any food better than bacon?  i'm having a hard time thinking of one.  not only is bacon awesome on its own, but it makes pretty much everything you pair it with better.  i think bacon deserves its own post some day, until then i'm getting a blt with avocado for dinner. 

yes, a blt with avocado.  it's amazing.  try one.  oh, and put mustard on it instead of mayo, mayo sucks.

a redhead, an idea, chocolate sorbet, and being emo...

ya know what sucks about me?  i'm incredibly easily let down by little things.  stupid things.  shit that when you step back and take a look at the big picture don't matter in the slightest.  what's worse is that i realize this, yet try as i might, can't do anything to change it.  my brain simply cannot comprehend "well, why didn't this happen?"  when it tries to it comes up with "well, person x just didn't put a single bit of thought into it."  and that's where i get let down or as a friend says, that's when i get emo.

another problem with me is i have an incredibly hard time not letting the person who just let me down know.  i get sorta down.  or i take lil jabs.  or i just say it directly.  whichever i think will work best to get my desired result.  which is...well, i don't fucking know.  see, sometimes i'm complain enough that the person in question will apologize.  my response, in complete asshole fashion, is "well, if you were sorry you wouldn't have done it in the first place."

what are things that do this?  i'll list some... not offering the group a round when you go up to the bar, not giving a second "courtesy flush" to make sure the toilet is remnant free, not telling someone you're talking to that you're gonna be afk, cutting someone off as they try to enter/leave and establishment,  not doing something you said you'd do, being late without an apology text/call, or worse not showing up at all.  let's stack em all under the "common courtesy" umbrella. 

why do they bug me?  i don't know.  it's really just the "damn had you just put a second of thought into that..." sort of thing.  i guess i take em incredibly personally even if they're not remotely intended that way.  it's sort of selfish, but in my head i ask "well, why didn't you think of me?"  don't get me wrong, i don't expect millions of people to walk around wondering what i think (perhaps a couple hundred as that seems to be my daily hit count).  i don't even expect my friends or family to be constantly aware, but damn, i've known most of them 20-30 years so you'd think by now they'd at least take the path of least resistance?

it may have been different way back when.  hell, even as far back as 10 years ago cell phones weren't exactly prevalent, but now, how fucking difficult is it to shoot off a text to someone you're supposed to meet or do something with/for?  how hard is it to say in your head "well, i told this person i'd do this and i'm not, i bet they'd appreciate knowing."? 

so that's my character flaw of the day.  taking shit too seriously and not properly finding a way to vent it. 

suggestions anyone?

ya know, heather says she's gonna be back on thursday and lauren was asking why she couldn't write on my blog the other day...perhaps we could have shit on chris week?  where the people that know and love me (theoretically) can talk about how horrible i can be when i decide to.  not incredibly certain how interesting it'd be for the public who clearly don't want "an intimate portrait of some random asshole with a blog," but it'd be fun for me.  any takers? 

now onto happier things...

so i mentioned that chocolate sorbet recipe the other day.  i know mik said he was gonna show it to his wifey and i actually got a couple of emails about it.  which i thought was weird.  in any case i'll answer a few questions i got...

no, it's not my recipe per se, but i would have no idea who to credit for it.  like most things i make, i just sort of do it and have been for a while.  i "make it my own" so to speak.  that's not to say anyone should quote the recipe as "chris' chocolate sorbet" because 1.  that'd be silly and 2.  if you do a google search, i'm sure you'd find 15 recipes exactly like it or close. i can say the original recipe i started using also called to melt a bit of dark chocolate into the mix.  i didn't like that part so i stopped doing it.

and yeah, there are plenty of ways to customize it.  i found the particular batch i made to be incredibly rich.  i like rich chocolate taste, but if you don't you could probably mess with it a bit by adding more sugar and water or by using less cocoa.  i don't think sorbet is like baking in the sense that it's not necessarily so exact.  ice cream might be as you're looking to make a custard, but sorbet is basically tasty ice.

as for additional flavours...well, lots of folks like chocolate and orange.  why, i have no idea, but they do.  if you're that sort of person, use 1 cup orange preserves instead of sugar and replace the rum with grand marnier.  see, as alton brown from good eats told me (and by me i mean "said on his television show"), preserves can replace sugar tablespoon for tablespoon.  i trust alton, so why i can't tell you why it works, i can tell you it does.

(speaking of mr. brown here's a recipe of his for key lime sorbet.  i tend to use this to make cherry sorbet (goes great with chocolate!) by swapping lime preserves and lime seltzer for the same ingredients in cherry.  and i'm sure it'd work with most other fruits...)

back to the point, want it minty?  add a splash of peppermint extract and less of a splash (or none at all) or vanilla extract,  replace rum with creme de menthe (white > green unless you don't care about color).  you could simply sub whiskey for rum.  you could add a little bit of cayenne pepper, chocolate and spice works very nice. 

or you could add you could add your favourite chunk type material.  i'd imagine some mini chocolate chips would work best.  perhaps some toasted pistachios?  or some cut up frozen berries?  in any case, hold off until after churning the mixture to put em in.  otherwise they'll just wind up on the bottom.

so yeah, the recipe again...  2 cups water, 1 cup sugar, 1 cup dutch process cocoa powder, a pinch or two of salt.  a splash or so of vanilla extract.  a splash or 3 of dark rum.  bring all ingredient save for extract and alcohol to simmer until sugar and cocoa melt.  let it cool a bit.  add extract and alcohol.

i add the extract and alki after a bit of cooling because heat can burn off the alcohol.  it'll leave the flavour of course, but i like the fact that it keeps the ice from hardening too much.  also, straining it might be useful in case you didn't completely break up all the cocoa. 

oh, and one thing i left out...before you churn it, get it cold in the fridge for a couple of hours...the colder it is, the faster it'll freeze, the faster it freezes the better the texture. 

well, i feel better now.

what would reagan do (and other random hate)...?

if anybody asks, i've got explosive diarrhea today.  you read it here, that's why you know, and that's why i couldn't go to work.  yup, explosive diarrhea.

so i was visiting some political type blog the other day.  i'll be honest i was sorta half paying attention, likely because there was either porn or sport on in the background.  i saw a banner that read "what would reagan do."  is it bad my first thought was "probably forget what you said then drool all over himself?" 

my cousin is graduating tomorrow (or technically, today).  i went to go buy him a card. 

at the store, there's a guy, he looks a lil off.  i'm honesty not certain if he's a tad mentally handicapped or just really creepy and gay.  either way, one day he asked me if i needed help.  i'm not the type to want help when shopping, but on his particular day i wanted coke zero and i couldn't so i thought "what the hell?  i'll ask." 

he didn't know what coke zero was, but did his best to help me.  that was polite of him.  he now follows me around the store any and every time i go in.  i'm not certain why.  i actually avoided the store for a month to not see this guy who is clearly working the midnight shift because he scared too many folks during the day.

so i was reading the cards (way to get back on point jackass!) hoping to find the one that was most uncomfortably funny.  ya know the type of funny that makes you feel as if you're going to vomit because you know someone, somewhere wrote down a  few sentiments.  maybe they even rhymed.  and then showed it to a fellow fuddy duddy and they laughed and laughed before walking down the hall and showing it to the head person in charge of thinking things are funny and then they all laughed and laughed.  then they print em up, all proud of their work, and you read it in the store and wish they were dead?  the kind of funny i'm shooting for now, only you haven't even chuckled and feel you sorry for me.  and i did find one.

in my quest to find that card i saw a card in spanish.  it was a map of a graduate with a bunch of body parts labled with semi inspirational (based on my limited "forgot my spanish the day i left high school" spanish) sayings.  so i opened the card hoping for a punchline, which likely would have gone over my head as most ethnic humour does.  (we've got our "two jews walk intro a bar..." and they've got their "so juan and pablo fucked a goat...")  there was no punchline.  it was just "congratulations i love you" bullshit.  but then i turned it over and it had translations for all the stuff on the front of the card. 

why the fuck would a card have translations?  the only 3 situations i can think of that you would buy that card are 1.  you and the recipient speak spanish.  2.  you don't but the recipient does speak spanish (perhaps they studied it?) 3.  you want to confuse/amuse recipient by making some sort of racist joke at the end of the card,  

i s'pose a 4th reason is that you waited to long to buy the card and the spanish card was the only one left.  in that case, the kid you're buying it for is probably stupid and won't read the damn thing anyway, you'd save yourself four bucks and a trip to the atm by just buying him the beer and weed he'd use the money for anyway...

i made chocolate sorbet today.  possibly the simplest recipe ever (2 or so cups water, 1 cup sugar, 1 cup dutch process cocoa, pinch or two of salt, splash of vanilla, splash or three of dark rum).  just finished churning it in my machine and it was like frozen brownie batter.  holy shit was the texture amazing.  i'm hopin' it doesn't freeze up too much, and it shouldn't as i added the rum after i took it off the heat.  it's not much, but it should keep it from ever getting solid.  don't get me wrong, it'd still be delicious but it wouldn't be as velvety.

frozen brownies yum
getting cold in the freezer
there's no need for milk

so i hung with the family today.  i love hanging with my family cuz they're good people and tend to be amazingly fun.  well, at least when they're not pulling their own personal random problems (oh, i've got em too).  but i think the reason i enjoy em so much is i don't see them all that often.  it makes enjoying the day that much more important.

that's kind of why like short vacations too.  don't get me wrong, i love vacation.  i just, sort of, get sick of it after a while.  it's kind of like "ok, i get it, i'm in fucking paradise."  sort of touched on this with someone earlier this week.  sure it'd be lovely if everything was great all of the time, but if it was wouldn't great start to get boring?  you wouldn't think, but i bet it does.  sometimes you just need something to rock the boat every now and then...just to keep things interesting.

it's why i wonder if i'm really cut out for a relationship.  when i go away with friends or even a chick i was seeing, it's fun for a couple of days.  by day 3, maybe 4, i'm done looking at them.  i'm talking some of my favourite people on this planet.  we went away and after a few days i didn't give a shit if i ever saw them again.  i did/do of course (see them again) and love it almost always.

makes you think back on all the married folks you know.  which are the ones that broke up?  the ones that no one thought would.  why?  because they worked so hard lying to themselves and others that everything was great.  why lie?  there's nothing wrong with saying "i fucking love you but right now i don't like you all that much."  your friends will understand why you went out for drinks alone and when you stumble home drunk at the end of the night you'll have the blow off fight that leads to amazing make up sex.

that all said, there's someone out there right now that i'm totally craving more of...

...

oh yeah, 'grats richard!
today's your graduation
time to grow up, punk!