We’re having dinner at a friend’s house tomorrow night. She doesn’t have air conditioning.
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So. Very. True.
A classmate forwarded me the cartoon below. It made me chuckle because there’s nothing quite like a small group activity.
The carton is from the Rhymes with Orange website.
Slow Day but Lots of Foot Tapping
Vintage woxy.com just played a punk set and I couldn’t help but tap my feet. They just played the following:
The Velvet Underground-Sweet Jane
The Dead Milkmen-Punk Rock Girl
The Ramones-The KKK Took My Baby Away
L7-Drama
Violent Femmes-Please Do Not Go
We’re in that regular end of fiscal year slump at work. We’ve finished up most of the products we were contractually obligated to complete for the year and can’t yet start the stuff that we’re responsible for next year because the contract year hasn’t flipped over. As a consequence of this lag, I don’t have a lot going on at work so I’m trying to finish up the About Face book I started some months ago and I’m listening to more music than usual at work. I nearly always have music on at work to cut down on the airplane engine noise that emanates from my ceiling, but lately I’ve been paying attention to the music and lyrics. I’m sure I look like a nut sometimes rocking out in my office chair, but that’s what you get if you are hanging around in the hallway looking at me–Get Back To Work.
Posted in Listening
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They Were Drinking From A Fountain, That Was Pouring Like An Avalanche
The infusion has begun:
The better-half had a great idea on Sunday to use an old Maker’s Mark bottle to infuse vodka. So, we cleaned up the bottle, ran it through the dishwasher and started the Jalapeño infusion today. We’re using triple distilled Smirnoff and five Jalapeños from last year’s garden.
Yes, that was a hella big bottle of Maker’s Mark.
Posted in Eating, Gardening
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How Does Your Garden Grow?
In addition to the asparagus and strawberries, we’re growing tomatoes, peppers (hot and mild), green beans, corn, eggplant (ichiban), yukon gold potatoes, lettuce (mesclun mix), basil, sage, thyme, horehound, mint, french tarragon, oregano and rosemary.
Some of these plants are in the garden proper. The herbs and one tomato plant are in beds at the back door. The tomato plant at the back door is a cherry tomato and is coming along nicely. Of all the tomato plants, we only have one plant that’s blooming right now. Hopefully with the recent feeding and watering, the plants will kick into high gear. We have an Anaheim pepper coming along but the plant itself needs to grow a bit or the pepper will soon be larger than the plant.
The lettuce in the garden has gone crazy and we have a ton to eat. The lettuce we had growing in a pot at the back door is nearly done and we’re planning on trying to grow another batch out there this summer. We’ve only grown lettuce in cooler months so trying it during the heat of the summer should be a good experiment. We’ll keep it in a pot, but move it to a spot that’s a little less brutal. Having it right at the back steps means the pot gets a lot of sun but the summer heat may prove to be too much. We’ll see.
Last night we made chicken tacos for dinner and we used some of that lettuce in the soft tortillas. Additionally, we made a chunky tomato salsa using Roma tomatoes from the store. They looked really good and ended up tasting pretty good too. I just wing it when it comes to making salsa and this time around the salsa contained tomatoes, red onion, green bell pepper, jalapeno (out of the freezer and from our garden last summer), garlic, cilantro, apple cider vinegar, olive oil, lime zest and lime juice, salt and black pepper.
We also bought an avocado while purchasing those Romas. I looked at one recipe for the guacamole as a guide and then improvised. I mixed the avocado with one of those tomatoes, a jalapeno, some green bell pepper, garlic and red onion. To it, I added some of the lime zest and juice, cilantro, cumin and salt and pepper. I also added a little of the apple cider vinegar.
The chicken breast was marinated in tequila, ancho chili powder (which we made ourselves a few months ago), olive oil and salt and pepper. The better-half grilled it and then seriously chopped it up. We were able to stretch a regular-size chicken breast into four soft tacos.
In addition to the tacos we also ate a plate of simple nachos—just cheese, spices and pickled jalapeno. We joked last night as the plate of nachos sat a bit that we never had a time in our childhoods where we were commanded to finish up our snack food before we could leave the table, but last night it did take us a little longer to eat those chips than usual. The tacos were just so damn good.
Posted in Eating, Gardening
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Puhlease
This morning cable was out, not so comcastic, so I read Martha Stewart Living instead. I am about to crack on an article but before I do, I need to shout from the rooftops that I LOVE that magazine. I don’t know what it is exactly but I really LOVE that magazine. I’ve been a subscriber for years and purposefully held onto the subscription even while Martha was in legal hell and jail. Say what you will about her but she puts out excellent and beautiful products. There’s quality and craftsmanship and other magazines should take a note. I’m looking at you Real Simple (a magazine that I’ve subscribed to since its inception but am going to let lapse–you aren’t simple anymore–seriously, $200+ dresses ain’t simple, and the articles have gotten whiny).
Here’s the article.
Come back down to earth, Martha. When I entertain weekend guests, I don’t have so many rooms that I need to number them and outfit them with expensive coffee table books, stationary and housekeeping staff. I have one room and the mattress should be replaced. I do set up some homey necessities–towels, reading material (quite often back issues of MSL), soaps, water glasses, fresh flowers, etc. But, lord have mercy…I don’t type up dos and don’ts lists, itineraries for long walks in the woods, tennis schedules, etc. And, I’m sure most of the magazine’s readers don’t either. Want to provide us with entertaining tips? Get real. Get practical.
Posted in Reading
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Let’s dance, let’s shout
Even grandma would shake her body to the ground:
Chuck Brown-Bustin’ Loose
Pacha Massive-Don’t Let Go
Teddy Bears-Cobra Style
Robert Randolph w/Eric Clapton (you’ll have to select the play button)-Jesus is Just Alright
Stevie Wonder-Higher Ground
Moby-Southside
Beck-Hell Yes
John Spenser Blues Explosion-Talk About The Blues
Winding down a bit…feeling a little melancholy:
Morphine-French Fries with Pepper
Lynyrd Skynyrd-You Got That Right
Posted in Listening
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Salt and Cold Water, Whatevs
I took Friday off to extend the long weekend. It’s a good thing I did since we stayed up to 1am playing Wii on Thursday night–that bowling sure is addictive. Friday we ran errands so that we’d be ready to have The Niece as a house guest on Saturday.
She brought over some games for the Wii and so we spent quite a bit of time while she was here playing games. I finally got to try the Carnival game and yesterday morning the better-half made popcorn so it would seem that The Niece and I really were at a carnival. We stone-cold munched that popcorn. The Niece now holds the house record for most strikes in a row (4) and highest score (220). The way she bowls is hilarious and in real life the alley owner would probably ask her to leave (the ball arcs and crashes to the alley) but she can knock some pins down.
Set up for rant: Sunday morning at 1:45am the phone rang and it was the facility where the better-half’s mother lives telling him that his mother had fallen (nothing new under the sun) and cracked her head (also nothing new). She was being transported to the ER for what turned out to be staples. The phone rang again about 20-30 minutes later telling him which hospital.
Just as we were drifting back off to sleep, the cat started making scratching sounds. We have two doors to our bedroom and one was shut. He was too damn dumb to walk out the other door and around to the litter box so he just pissed on the carpet in our room. We cleaned it up, well, mostly the better-half did and drifted back off to sleep only to be awakened by another phone call to let us know that his mother was ready to be picked up. The better-half was off. At 6 am The Niece appeared and asked me if I was ready to get up. I told her no, but there was bacon calling us so off we went to make breakfast.
The better-half got home around 7 and ate breakfast with us…breakfast on groggy Sunday mornings takes many courses–a little fruit, a little bacon, a little egg, a little muffin, etc. Then the better-half started a charcoal chimney to begin the process of smoking a beef brisket. We had The Niece’s family over for dinner late yesterday afternoon. In addition to the brisket, we served barbeque sauce (The Niece made it), potato salad, green bean salad, baked beans (with bacon!) and a mixed berry roll. To start we had an assortment of cheeses, crackers, two kinds of salami, olives and gherkins. We ate outside and watched the kids get three kinds of nutty. Good times.
Let’s just get right to my rant, shall we? The better-half brought home the MIL’s neck pillow that had been stained with blood from her head wound. I took the cover off–noticed a bunch of other stains–squirted it with Zout (which is an amazing stain remover) and then washed the pillow and the case on the delicate cycle. The pillow faired better than the case but I sent them both back through the wash with another coating of Zout. The pillow did pretty well but the case still had remnants of blood.
About this time it was time for some Wii action, so I put another stain killer product on the pillow case and threw it in the washer. It’s still sitting there waiting for something else to be washed. While The Niece and I played, the better-half called his mother to see how she was doing. She told him that salt and cold water would probably take that stain out. At this point in my exhaustion and hearing this cleaning tip, I rolled my eyes until they fell out onto the floor and had to be dusted off. Whatthefuckever. The pillow was already stained and whatever amount of blood stain I am able to get out is whatever I’m able to get out without resorting to some freakin’ Hints From Heloise moment. If she was so worried about the stain, she should have toddled off to the kitchen at her place and cleaned it herself. Kissmybigfatass.
Posted in Eating, General Spleen Venting, Generic Thoughts
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We are riding on a railroad, singing someone else’s song
We’ve recently eaten at two fine restaurants in the area. Last weekend we went to the Ironhorse in Ashland. After seeing in a local paper that the Ironhorse was under new ownership, and noticing the new owner was someone I went to college with, we decided to take a couple of friends with us. I felt it was pretty weird seeing a friend from college that I haven’t seen in 18 years. My face may look the same but my body is bigger and I’m way more grey than I was in 1990. Anyway, the new owner was caught giving me the look by the better-half but after he came over to the table to check on things, it was obvious he didn’t really know how he knew me. He’s worked in many restaurants over the years so I suppose people just start looking like people, if that makes any sense. I know when I was training all the time people would come up to me and say things to me like I was supposed to know them and nine times out of ten they were in one of my classes and I’d only get a vague sense of recollection.
The food was excellent even though I dead-panned to the owner/friend that his food was passable—I was going for a joke. It took him off-guard and I certainly made sure he knew I liked the food. I had a lamb shank that was prepared perfectly and the butter beans that came with were excellent and I don’t normally like butter beans. I had a raspberry lemon tart for dessert that was mind-blowing—it was fresh, light and delicious. Our table declared it the best dessert (someone else ordered the strawberry shortcake). We all shared in a charcuterie tray and oh baby it was good. Everyone else at the table had the ribeye with chimichurri. I had a bite of the steak and it was charred perfectly and was damn fine.
If you are in the Ashland area, stop by the Ironhorse. Just don’t tell the owner his food is passable.
Speaking of railroads (the Ironhorse is on the tracks in Ashland), last night the better-half and I tried the not-so-new Thai place in our own neck of the woods, the Pad Thai Restaurant. It’s been there for awhile now but we keep forgetting to go there. It is on railroad tracks as well and last night a train went by, shaking the place. A young boy sitting several tables away joyfully announced “Train†as it went by. The food was delicious and the place stayed pretty busy while we were there. One family came in and it was obvious they are regulars since they joked around with the folks who run the place and they got their appetizer without really having to order it.
The restaurant is in an old warehouse building that’s been there way longer than I’ve been on this earth. When I was a kid, they used to have auctions there and my dad and I would go. I always liked going there because it was dark and scary and it always seemed like the place was about to collapse. I once found an old German pfennig while wandering around so it was not only dark, scary, full of grown ups but also foreign coins just happened to be laying around in the shadows. The building still looks like parts of it may fall down but remarkably there are many businesses in the building so I guess it’s sturdier than it looks.
The food, as I’ve said, was delicious and prepared pretty quickly. We started with an order of fried crispy rolls and then moved on to pork drunken noodles for me. Although I think they put steak on instead. Either that or it was the beefiest pork I’ve ever had. The better-half ordered a shrimp cashew stir-fry. We ordered both medium hot and there was some sweating and nose blowing. The better-half heats up pretty quickly with Thai food. I, being a lady, merely glisten.
Posted in Eating
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Sloppy Work
So, should my ire head towards yahoo or the AP for putting together this mess?
Even if the article is about whatever ceremony, the headline is about Kenny and that picture is decidedly not Kenny.
Lame.
Posted in Watching
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