| 02:03am 17/07/2003 | ||||
Wait a minute... this started out being the description of a positive thing. My solitude! My freedom! My... creep out-ed-ness! Mom went down to Florida for the big 'cousins reunion' from her side of the family. I was invited. I considered it for less time then I would consider not breathing. Nothing shudders me more than the thought of having to repeat my doings of the last 4 years to 60 people whom I don't know, nor particularly want to know. So I volunteered to watch the dog. Fine by me. I've actually been having fun with it. My dog, Sage, a Black-and-Tan Coonhound, and an old one at that, has little fun these days. She can't run like she used to. Nor wrestle the tug-o-war rope I trained her with 10 years ago. So, before this mini-vacation of me as her caretaker began, I tried to think of everything that would make this week one of her best ever (and quite possibly one of her last best-evers). So I did a little shopping. Walmart has more dog edibles then I would think possible. I don't actually remember the last time I was looking for dog treats as Sage food is a mom job, but heck. Where have I been. Last i remember the dog dreat world consisted of "Snasauges" (coolest name ever, and cool commercials) and a couple other similar type things. Now, I can't say the dog section matched the selection of the cereal isle (although I *almost* can say that), but it certainly matched its luminosity. The marketing machines for dog treats are on high. The cartoony "Dopey Dog" pictures, each portraying a dog looking completely high on top-grade wacky tobbaky, affected me negatively. I don't want to buy the synthetic equivalent of would be "Dog Nip"- especially not after seeing the nuclear-yellow, bacon-smoke flavor "Twisty Chews". Dogs don't eat "Twisty Chews". They eat meat. They use those incisors to tear into felled creatures that they rip and tear as they howl and snarf blood and guts all over their snarling muzzles. "Twisty Chews". What an insult to the beast within all dogs. Then I saw the plastic wrapped bones. Bones, real bones, wrapped in cellophane and packaged as if it processed; and yes, they too are slapped with a Dopey Dog picture. This time it's Pound Puppy Pussy Dog, eyes closed, licking the bone as if it was a friggin lollipop. Like hell. I headed to the butcher area of the store, slapped down some bucks, and purchased me some bloody femur. Yup. I built up some major anticipation before presenting the "kill" to my elderly Coonhound. "What's in the bag?!?! WHAT"S IN THE BAG?!?!" This sort of taunting gets that tail wagging so fast it's actually broken a window before. No lie. She has a fairly lean tail, but it can really get whippy and snappy (and slappy, and sometimes crappy) when she's excited. Anyway, the Mystery of the Bag got her goin'. Sit her under a drum kit and she could handle all the double-bass work for Fear Factory. She even got me excited about what was in the bag, and I already knew what it was... Out clops the bone onto the kitchen floor. She looked at it for a moment. Looked at me. Looked at it, smelled the air a little, gave the bone some ultra-fast, hyper in-out sniffing and then l-i-c-k. LICK. L*I*C*K...... KA-CHOMP!!!!! and she grabbed that femur and tore out of that room like she was 2 years old and disappeared from site for, well, until now (1:46am). almost 7 hours after she started. It was as good for me as it was for her. She's exhausted now, behind me on the floor, and I feel like a good alpha male. Good hunt today. Already planning her highlight for tomorrow. |
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| Read 3 - Post | ||||
accomplished| 09:45pm 17/07/2003 | ||||
Sometimes I really hate the iron heads who live in this and seemingly all gyms. They wear muscle shirts and baggy pants from the 80's and are prone to chest puffing, like birds, when they walk by. But sometimes it's also entertaining, and a bit mysterious. The best way to describe the scene would be to compare it to a zoo's mating range. It's just Darwinian science at the end of the day, but it never ceases to amaze me how perfect certain members of our species are for illustrating particular principles of natural selection, survival of the fittest, and dumb female attractibility. Sometimes the chest-puffers are funny. They peek at you to see how much weight you are lifting, even if it's just your warm up, and then quickly look away if they sense you'll see them. The other peekaboo routine occurs while walking past them. As you approach, they scan you over, puff, widen their arm-hang, suck in a little, stomp past, extra bounce from the calf. Maybe a sniff. Sometimes they can be a bunch of motherfuckers. They talk loud. Leave protein bottles and towels and sweat marks everywhere. The leave weights on the bars so the person who follows will know that someone in the gym can lift huge amounts. They hog equipment. They say they're still using this or that rack when they really aren't. They gawk at women and make them uncomfortable. They try to talk with women and generally bother them. They walk around in constant flexion. They walk around like royalty. Sometimes I fantasize about fighting one of them. It would have to be the leader... the guy who comes in wearing a sleeveless lumberjack shirt and bandana. I bet if I beat him, the others would mellow out, like when you kill the lead Orc or the lead nasty in a Zelda dungeon. The Zelda case would be better because then the follower goons would just vaporize and leave me jewels and money. They equate maximum squat weight with overall strength, and thus they tend to have enormous, fat, disgusting -albeit muscular- asses. Sadly, they also equate maximum bench press weight with fighting prowess. Ask a boxer what his max bench is. Or better yet, ask a full contact mixed martial arts fighter like Sakuraba, or Tito Ortiz... or even a Navy SEAL. Typically they can't bench 400 lbs, but they can bench pretty heavy weight 400 times (and then start a 7 mile ocean swim, in the case of a SEAL). For the Peterborough Gym goons, moving big weight is an invincibility meter. In the real world, weight lifting strength is only part of someone's overall invincibility. Actually, using brute strength as a benchmark for invincibility is ok, to a degree. Individuals who can bench over 500 lbs are generally mammoth sized naturally, and the general rule is, avoid fighting people who are freakishly large unless you are freakishly strong or as freakishly large as they are. But the fucktards in my gym only look the part of freakish from their attire and attitude and accessories, right down to the custom chopper lifting belts with "MAD DOG" burnt into them. I'd like to serve them a steaming bowl of creamy justice. But it's pointless. At the end of the day, let them have the one aspect in their life where they feel superior. If someone's going to enlighten them to their silliness, it's not going to be me. Besides, I want a ride on one of those choppers. And these guys make great allies in times of need. So, tomorrow, maybe I'll throw a "nice bike" onto the floor in between chest puffs. See what happens. |
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hungry| Let's talk about my ability to cook! | |||
| 11:34pm 17/07/2003 | |||
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My, my, my did I do a great job tonight. So great was my creation that I thought of sharing. So great was my experience eating more of the stuff just now, even cold and from the fridge, that I know I have to share for the benefit all people cool enough to cook for themselves. I was starving and drooling with desire for spice, heat and zowiness. I headed to the "Oriental" section of the international foods isle of a mega-supermarket called Hanafords, an ok chain scattered throughout New England. My only complaint with the place is that they have no Dr. Pepper clone, at least not at the one nearest me. The closest they have is some sort of cherry pop, which isn't way far from Dr. Pepper, but definitely more fruity than a Dr. Pepper clone should be. Anyway, I saw lots of things I wanted to try but settled on some ingredients from Thailand. I just ran downstairs to fetch this label because the product is this good: "A Taste of Thai- Peanut Sauce Mix" with excellent web page here. Basically, to make normal Thai peanut sauce (which is great on most edible substances, but especially fettuccini, rice or chicken) you have the peanut side of things and then the coconut side of things. The "Taste of Thai" packet is sized to require 1 can of coconut milk. People, get light coconut milk. After checking the cans out, I was shocked to find that even the light version is almost sickeningly full of saturated fat. I'm no dieter, but sheesh. A can of LIGHT coconut milk, which tastes the same in peanut sauce anyway, at least I think it does, has 28 grams of saturated fat. That's like 5 hotdogs. I don't even want to know what a regular can has. So, there you are. Mix the peanut-side with the coconut-side and boil it up. Smells great. Makes you feel like a good cook. Then I added my particulars, which ended up particularly friggin' excellent. While boiling, I added an entire can of stewed tomatoes. It was in the cupboard and I was tired of looking at it, so "plunk" it was plunked. Then, needing to feed my on-the-way-to-invincibility muscles, I added a large, pre-cooked chicken breast that I chopped into bite-sized chunks. Noting the soupiness, I decided to add an entire large-size (6 servings) can of albacore tuna fish. Albacore is the kind that looks a little like chicken; slightly pinkish and almost edible on its own. Almost. Much better for you than the gray sloppy tuna for mercury reasons, which has to do with the size and lifestyle of the species of tuna fish. KERPLUNK! That went in. Simmering now, and stirring. And mushing the large chunks of meat down. Wow it smells good at this point. Wow. The thing about this "Taste of Thai" brand, in this package anyway, is that it had no spicy heat. So I added some chili sauce. I figured Jalapeno didn't fit the peanut sauciness of this creation. And the chili powder matched the color. But it didn't work- still not hot. So I ended up splattering Tabasco on my servings, which worked very nicely with the other ingredients. Then I added some cleanly cut slivers of ginger- not many. And simmered away which brought things together into thickness. Once it was stewed and thickened (about 8 minutes on simmering heat) I searched around for something to use as a bed for the sauce and found some fettuccini. It turned out to be the ideal starch here. After that perfecto first chowing, about 3 hours of sauce refrigeration later, I discovered that when cool, the sauce congeals slightly and is forkable. I forked some into my re-droolified mouth and holy jeez yeah, the stuff was excellent. This will be a regular thing, I can tell. Yes, it's that good. And yes it is that good. |
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