Your bonus for the day: Parents, make time in your busy lives for your kids’ education.
And one for the road (to the nonvegans out there): Animal protein for the lean, mean machine in you…
Tag Archives: food
Fortunate Drawers
Sitting here in a café in a small Turkmenistan town, watching caravan after caravan go by (what you Americans might call tractor-trailer rigs), smelling jet fuel and gunpowder, I figure this is part of the forward base action I was expected to report to my superiours in a conference call later this afternoon.
At first, I complained about this satellite phone, looking like a geek at a debutante party, or rather the rich geek father depositing his little princess at her coming-out party (and yes, you can take that for all it’s worth, these days).
But looking at those guys across the street cradling their smartphones covered with acronyms trying to get a good signal, I say being the sore thumb at an M.C. Hammer hardware store is a good thing, for once.
Besides, I’ve got a friend who carries her lucky knickers just for me.
And I’ve got another friend, El Presidente, who thinks about nothing but al Qaeda and schooling in Sunday afternoon football smackdowns to keep my thoughts warm at night, too.
I wasn’t always like this, sipping stale coffee, spreading badly-worded rumours from underpaid government copywriters, but then maybe I was…we just called it primary school back then.
That’s okay. It beats sitting at home, not making any money there, either, watching the television news or surfing the Internet for useless tidbits like every other secret organisation in the “business.”
Where was I? Oh yeah, spiking my coffee with homemade hooch.
You see, in the hinterlands of the former Soviet Union, radioactive material is as easy to get as rabies from the raccoons I used to…well, let’s not go into boring details at this juncture in the punctuated story.
But hey, when a guy gets lonely…never mind.
Anyway, I was sitting on a crate of rotten eggs, unable to distinguish the smell of my ripe, unwashed body from that of chickens that’ll never live to see the light of day reflecting off a machete swinging toward their heads, when it hit me.
The kid down the street, always pestering me to call a tobacco shoppe down the street from his cousin in London and asking if they have Princess Edward in a can, looked at this blog I was texting with my calloused thumbs (calloused, mind you, from texting — what else did you think caused the callousness? I mean, calloused hands.).
He asked if I had a more interesting writing style, after he’d thrown the uranium/plutonium ball at my noggin.
Hey, that reminds me. Maybe I’ve got a gold mine at my feet. Either that, or the pyrite the panhandler pretended to think was gold and sold it only to me, his best friend in the whole wide world, if not the block in which we both live, at a bargain basement we were using to brew the hooch I give out to unsuspecting tourists before I remove their overweight wallets.
Seriously, what have I got that you don’t?
All this nuclear fissable material. No, that’s the Coke gurgling in my stomach that’s fissable.
It’s the fissionable stuff I’m dreaming about right now.
You see where I’m going with this, don’t you?
Yeah, you know it. Re-activating Project Orion.
We’ll just declare Turkmenistan off-limits and use it to launch the Mars mission my fellow members of the Committee are dreaming with me.
We’ll rename the country ChernobylTwo or something like that.
We can put this whole “war” to contain nuclear proliferation to a rest and just keep starving the Iranian people to death while their leaders bask in the personal glory of the sacrifice of their people to show them old episodes of “Who’s The Boss?”
Can you think of worse torture than that?
Rumour has it the last thing that Andrew World’s-worst-job-as-overpaid-angry-man Breitbart saw before his heart acted up was Alyssa Milano pretending to act.
Let that be a lesson to you, kids. Don’t get your hopes up. And further more, don’t listen to a word your clueless parents have to say. They were terrible students in school and the only reason they’re doing well is that their bosses were even worse so the whole adult scheme is to pretend that everyone is smarter than they really are.
Of course, you kids have no clue what I’m talking about because, as we’re supposed to know, genetic research proves that our species has actually gotten worse, our purity as animals watered down with talks about backyard BBQ parties, easy-to-hack security alarm systems and other ways we deny we’re overdressed members of the fight-or-flight club.
Almost time for the conference call.
Go back to looking at your cute kitten videos and sports scores.
I’ve got a nuclear bomb powered rocketship to promote!
Happiness-adjusted life expectancy
Last night, she cooked the largest large BBQ-sauce topped hamburger, a sticky burger with everything, she’d ever prepared.
Why?
Because she never concerned herself if anybody listened or anybody cared.
She worked for a living, taking customers’ orders, served drinks, cooked the food, carried food to the table and accepted cash before the customers left.
She couldn’t tell you that Charles Schulz retired from the life of a daily cartoonist with an announcement in the comics section of newspapers on Sunday, the 13th of February, 2000.
She didn’t know the president of Germany had resigned after losing complete immunity from the law.
She knew many of her customers by name, their favourite menu items, their job status in town, how her football team was doing and why the ice cream machine was broken.
She believed but didn’t preach to others that many pairs of hands folded in prayer reach out to touch the whole earth.
There’s always that better life somewhere if…
Lucy had just given real, helpful psychiatric advice to Charlie Brown; Snoopy had shot down the Red Baron; Schroeder went on to become a famous philosopher and concert pianist; Linus came to terms with a security blanket; Sally and Pigpen fell in love, marrying and producing the next Peanuts generation.
Dilbert: If we know it’s doomed, why do we bother?
Boss: It’s the same reason I had kids.
Dilbert: [thinking] At least there’s a reason.
She filled up a takeaway cup with Dr. Pepper and handed it to the customer walking out the door.
“I’ll see y’all soon, okay?”
The customer nodded. After 35 years of eating Bubba’s good homestyle burgers, there ain’t no question of coming back…right after the weekly paycheck clears and maybe after the bills are paid.
Naw, the bills can wait!
Quality of life — hamburgers, fried pork chops, grilled liver and onions — food pyramids around here are simple triangles, happiness more important than life expectancy or international news headlines.
In any language, it’s still the same sentiment: let the good times roll.
Drawing of the day
Last night, my wife and I ate in Thai Garden, a local restaurant featuring food styles of SE Asia.
At a nearby table, a couple sitting near the window reminded me of some retrofuturistic social rebels celebrating a recent victory by having a romantic dinner together.
So, of course, I had to draw them on a paper placemat while I had a St. Valentine’s Day romantic evening with my wife:
"To the Revolution!" "To us!"
Meanwhile, in Ireland…
Beer, cabbage and potatoes aren’t the only staples in Ireland — the competitive advantages associated with culture, that is.
There’s also the annual St. Patrick’s Day parade.
But can it prop up the ailing economy?
Let me find a four-leaf clover, mix it in with my Irish breakfast tea leaves and read you their fortune, eh?
The stuff of life
A nod to food lover’s celebration of National Croissant Day.
Last night, while I was working on the computer, my wife watched a television show centered on competing celebrity cooks. One of the cooks, named Rachael, commented that a guest on the show, her publicist, was her closest friend only because she paid him to be (or something like that). I’m sure she was joking but the look on the guy’s face…well, I won’t watch another show with my wife when that particular celebrity cook is on. Either her jokes fall flat or her friends are being paid enough to pretend to like her.
Besides, here in the States, the quinessential professional sporting event that centers on husky guys bashing their minds to pieces is coming up — the NFL Super Bowl, of course.
Speaking of which, will the Indianapolis Colts survive as a/n inter/national brand if a new quarterback takes the helm from an elitist school like Stanford? It’s one thing to be good or even great at the position — it’s another to be the complete “regular guy” package, John Elway an example of the exception rather than the rule.
Enough of the chattering. Time to give the reluctant leader his word on the state of the world economy:
Last night, as the Committee debated whether Greece should be more intricately tied into the global indebtedness scheme or cast aside as worthless chattel, I looked at the Committee members’ face, hooded as they are beneath a variety of caps, hats, hairstyles and heavy eyelids.
What were they thinking? I can look back at supercomputer analysis of their previous behaviour and make a well-educated guess as to what they’ll do/say next, but in those moments before they speak or act, can I assess, can I surmise, can I imagine the vast difference between how their brains work and how the brains work of non-Committee members?
Therefore, I turned up the sensitivity of the brain readers mounted in the walls, floor, and ceiling of the room to answer my question.
The results amazed me. It was not only the individual brains that astounded but also the smooth transition between chemical emissions of the individuals, basically how their/our whole bodies acted as one at the molecular level, that impressed me.
Which made me realise we are one species on one planet as always.
No matter how we decide to treat the disparity between the Greek economic output and monetary inflow, we must still deal with them — the Greek people and their in/efficient enterprising ways — as part of our species’ total interaction.
In other words, if the density of people per square hectare in certain parts of the world — I’m thinking of India and China, especially, but can think of other places, too, such as Bangladesh — encourages them to continue their outward migration, would Greece remain Greece if the traditional inhabitants loosely associated with descendancy from those Greeks who formed what we think of classic Greek art/architecture/philosophy/science (i.e., “Ancient Greece“) were completely replaced with people from other cultures, who may or may not have completely assimilated?
You get where this going, don’t you? Are the Committee members dedicated to preserving Greece as the seat or foundation of Western Civilisation even if the people of Greece are no longer related to the founders of Ancient Greece?
Ultimately, are economic decisions purely economic? After all, we aren’t unemotional robots moving numbers in a spreadsheet. Culture still plays a part in our daily lives.
How do we want sub/culture — past, present and future — to influence us at the superficial and molecular level?
I guess the reluctant leader would like a view 1000 years from now to tell him which decisions worked best, wouldn’t he?
Let’s save that view for another blog entry. Time for more music…
Note
My wife’s 50th birthday cake, using her favourite kid’s toyline theme, Helly Kitty:
A nod to Gift, Eric, and Noina at Thai Garden; Cheryl, DJ and Sam at Publix; the friendly faces at Walmart, including Roy (miss having you at the front door and sorry to hear Walmart is fading out the greeter role, becoming just another bland/faceless warehouse/big box store); ziiplight’s photo blog.
Candle Wax
The issue then becomes one of explaining to the full range of age groups and belief subsets how every data point, although unique, is made of the same ingredients as the set in total.
“But if we are all the same, how are we all different?”
Well, you see, we are all connected.
“But my subculture is diametrically opposed to yours. We do not feel connected.”
Emotionally opposed, yes, and thus connected by emotions.
“We would never participate in any of your activities.”
And, therefore, we complement each other, one performing the tasks the other would not.
“It makes no sense.”
Observe the candle. The wick is not the same as the wax. However, both react to fire, one feeding off the other, giving light as a heat byproduct.
“Or heat as a light byproduct.”
Precisely. It is the observation point from which one finds one’s place of understanding. ‘Who am I?’ becomes ‘I am the collection of states of energy that detects heat and light.’
“Or hot wax.”
Or carbon with which to record symbols that represent your subculture. You are the stuff of stars.
“I don’t know… My elders say I am a gift from God.”
Stars. God. I am telling you they are the same.
“We do not practice pagan religions. Stars are not living beings. Only God can create people.”
Religion I do not know. I only know states of energy, atoms, molecules and the like. And their connectedness. The teachings of your elders are your guide to follow freely as you wish.
“So why am I sitting here with you?”
And I ask myself the same question. Why do two states of energy such as ourselves choose to interact using sound shaped by our vocal chords and other movements of our states of energy we call bodies? It is what it is. Questioning it prolongs the next moment of discovery between us, adding to the wonder of the universe that is us, our states of energy, in momentary synchronisation.
“Are you not wise, then, as they told me you are?”
I am wiser than the trees, they say, and yet I cannot sprout a single leaf. This hair upon my arm cannot convert sunlight into energy yet, like bark, it provides a modicum of warmth against a winter’s cold. Wisdom is application of one’s knowledge of one’s ignorance. What I do not know tells me more about what you and I will say next to each other more than what I know says about what we can say to each other.
“So you can’t tell me if I should eat this bowl of ice cream, Great Uncle?”
A container of frozen cow’s milk and other ingredients… Does it taste good to you?
“My tongue says it does.”
Your tongue is not a separate object. It is you as much as these words we have left behind. Including the rest of you, not just your tongue, does the ice cream taste good to you?
“I don’t know. I’ve never thought about it.”
Precisely. Look at the object you call a bowl. Look at the object you call a spoon. Look at the object you call ice cream. They are connected, their function and form, their origin and destiny, all one. In reality, they are not separate objects. Imagine they and you are all part of the same universe, created, as you say, as a gift from God. Is the place where the cow came from, how it was raised, how it was milked, how its milk was sanitised and mixed with special ingredients to make ice cream, and how the spoon and bowl came into being also a gift from God?
“Of course.”
Then tell me without putting the ice cream in your mouth, does the ice cream taste good to you?
“Wow! Uh… that seems like a lot to think about just to decide if I should eat the ice cream.”
But don’t you already have an idea what the ice cream will taste like? Don’t you already think the ice cream tastes good?
“Yes.”
Then, in the space before you smell the ice cream with your ‘nose’ or place the ice cream on your ‘tongue,’ in that moment when you cannot stop the ice cream from hitting your ‘taste buds,’ I tell you the ice cream will taste like motor oil and burn like hot lava, can your thoughts switch to disliking the ice cream?
“Yes.”
Are you sure. This moment I describe takes place faster than the speed of light, an imperceptible split second before your thoughts can travel from one neuron to the next.
“Then I guess not.”
Your life is made up of all those imperceptible split seconds.
“Which means…”
Taste is a deception.
“Which means…’
All the imperceptible moments up to now have already determined whether you’re going to eat the ice cream within that bowl, which, by the way, has melted quite a bit since we first started talking.
“And I hate warm ice cream!”
There you go. You have your answer.
A Guinea Pig for Chemistry
Even behind-the-scenes writers and not-so-fortunate fortunetellers need a break every now and then.
All afternoon, I sat in a chair at the Salon Professional Academy while a friend, Tammie, coloured and cut my hair, changing me from a white-haired guy to a ginger-haired professorial type.
Thanks, Tammie, and to your colleagues, for the fun, friendship and new hairstyle.
Now, back to the story you know will keep you in your seats…
= = =
Thanks to MailPro; Richard, Ray and Julie at Lowe’s; USPS; B&N; Jonathan at Anaheim Chili.
Congrats to the NY Giants.
Homeless shelters solve protein issue…
…feed pigeon and cat meat to residents, end animal overpopulation problem at same time, fix euthanasia moral crisis.
Note to lying, cheating scum (you know who you are) – rats are edible, too.
And that’s the news this week from our offworld colony, Nua Éire, where the whole lot is used to hardship and oppression, key ingredients for successful colonisation of harsh environments.
As one colonist noted, “We don’t need no princes, princesses or prima donnas ’round here.”
treetrunkdings 