A Canine Analogy
Peeing on public property is a dog's version of graffiti . . . but, of course, dog's are working in the realm of the olfactory instead of the visual; perhaps this could be Banksy's next project.
Breakfast Food Woes
I'm not sure which task is more difficult . . . peeling a boiled egg or breaking apart an English muffin.
Does This Count As Fair Use?
For the first time in my life, I used our granite mortar and pestle (it is quite heavy, and so I balanced it on top of our panini maker so I didn't have to squish my panini manually).
Not For Those With Two Weeks of Vacation Time
All you folks with full time jobs probably don't want to hear this, nor will you believe it, but nothing is worse than the end-of-the-summer-holy-shit-I've-got-to-go-back-to-work anxiety stomachache . . . it's an awful feeling (but not so awful that I would choose to work in the summer . . . God bless the agrarian calendar) and my stomachache was compounded by the fact that a tooth of mine cracked off at the crown, and so on the same day that I return to work, I will also visit the dentist for some kind of procedure which I can only imagine to be horrific . . . and the worst part is I can't even whinge about all this because it falls on deaf ears, since most people have been working all summer long and have no sympathy.
Wrestling for a Greased Watermelon is Laborious
Last year on Labor Day weekend, I learned that "wrestling for a greased watermelon with buff lifeguards" is not the theme of an adult film, it is an event at our family swim club-- and this year I learned that last year's melee was rather tame because the watermelon broke open after one round; this year we played best of three and I am proud to say that I scored the first point, hefting the watermelon over the side of the pool from distance . . . but there is plenty that went on in this scrum that I'm not proud of-- ankle grabbing, the dunking of minors, pleading with the almighty that I might be allowed to return to the surface, attempting to drown my friends and neighbors, occasional cowardice, and a general sense of bewilderment that I have never felt in any other sport (besides cricket) . . . a petroleum jelly coated watermelon behaves very strangely in water-- someone said it is neutrally buoyant, so it goes in whatever direction you push it-- up, down, sideways, or all three-- and apparently, you can see where it is from the sidelines, so there is lots of cheering and screaming, and when my tall friend John, from Team 1 (my team!) spiked the melon over the side and broke it, cementing both our victory and the end of the battle, everyone was exhausted and relieved, and I am positive that the event was far more exciting than an Olympic water polo match.
Unpacking VERY Slowly (A Follow Up To Yesterday's Stupid Question)
After a vacation, instead of unpacking one's luggage, is it acceptable to leave the piece of luggage on the bedroom floor and simply take clothes out of the piece of luggage until it is empty?
Probably Not As Long As I Left It Up There
How many days after you return from vacation are you allowed to leave the big sack full of beach stuff attached to the roof of the car?
Breaking Meta-News!
The New York Times claims that 1/3 of all "consumer" reviews of books and other products found on the Internet are fabricated, whether by marketers or the retailers themselves, or by friends of the seller, or even companies that you can hire to write positive reviews.
Glad That's Over With
I finished the fourth George R.R. Martin book in his epic A Song of Ice and Fire series, and all I can say about A Feast For Crows is that I survived it (unlike most of the characters) and I hope the next one is an easier read.
Cow or Cat?
As we were walking home from The Dish Cafe, my son Ian spied a strange creature posing on a stoop-- and so he asked, "Is that a cow or a cat?"-- though the thing was most certainly a cat, but his question was reasonable because it was a hairless cat-- and spotted like a cow-- and not only was it hairless but it was also very saggy (much saggier than this hairless Sphinx cat in the picture) and apparently (this is news to me!) there are a number of hairless house cats, each one uglier than the next.
OBFT XIX
The 19th Annual Outer Banks Fishing Trip went off without a hitch, and a big thanks to Whitney for putting us up and putting up with us for this many years . . . here are a few things that I vaguely remember from OBFT XIX: 1) driving with a hangover while Whitney participated in a 90 minute conference call for work . . . very boring and oppressive, especially when Whitney had a bout of flatulence, and would not allow me to roll down the windows because he needed to hear 2) an innovative and scary ride home from Tortuga's for Jerry and me, thanks to Cliff 3) Whitney and I reigning for five hours in a row at corn-hole 4) waiting too long at Tortuga's and never getting to order lunch 5) cornbread and beef brisket at Taylor's Barbeque , which is just outside fo Salisbury Maryland 6) back to back pork bbq sandwiches at Southland and Pigman's, within a two hour window 7) napping on the ferry to Cape May 8) getting "shushed" at the bar 9) the best water in a long time (but no waves, I had to wait until I got up to Sea Isle City for that) 10) Bruce's fantastic joke, which cannot be repeated, even on the internet.
A Man With A Beard Is More Of A Man Than Me (But That's Not Saying Much)
I don't know how men with beards got over the IT ITCHES! hump.
Alfred Hitchcock Was Right!
A presumptuous seagull swooped down and yanked a Blueberry Belvita Breakfast Biscuit right out of Lynn's hand while she was chatting with Dom on the beach, and this is a frightening development in avian intelligence, because once all the other birds learn that humans wandering around with food in their hands are fair game, we are going to starve to death (or I guess we could just eat indoors, but you can't make a horror movie about being forced to bring your kids off the beach and eat lunch inside . . . even though that is a horrible process).
LeCompt Plays Best Set Ever!
Every trip to Sea Isle City includes a night listening to LeCompt-- the hardest working bar band in the world-- and they outdid themselves last Sunday evening: they played an entire set of Who songs, from the obscure to the epic . . . these are the ones I remember: The Real Me, Cut My Hair, 5:15, Love Reign O'er Me, Doctor Jimmy, Baba O'Riley, Getting in Tune, However Much I Booze . . . but I am sure there were others . . . the band has inspired me to go back and listen to The Who By Numbers.
We Don't Need No Stinking Bags
As I was walking off the beach, my wife yelled to me to bring back her "bag from the house" and the only bag I could find back at the house was a cute little pink and purple striped hand bag-- rectangular in shape, with a thin handle that stretched across the top of the bag-- so I grabbed that and then made my way to the 7-11 to get some coffee, and a guy spotted my Spotswood soccer shirt and asked if I went there and I so I gave him a brief history of my coaching career-- forgetting that I was flinging this little bag around every time I made a hand motion-- and then when I brought the bag up to the counter at the 7-11, the young dude at the counter said, "Cute purse" and I laughed and then he said, "You've got to be confident in your manhood to carry around a bag like that," and I said, "That's me, all man" and then when I left the place, I said to my friend Connell: "What if that really was my bag? That guy was making a pretty big assumption?" but I guess I didn't look fabulous enough to be carrying that thing around . . . and then we went back to the crew at the beach and I told my funny story and my wife said, "I didn't say 'bag,' I said 'badge' . . . my beach badge."
Some Decisions Make Themselves
So when the dim sum cart comes to your table at the new China Bowl, and your choices are fried chicken feet, tripe buns, or shrimp dumplings, which do you choose?
An Evil Mountain by Any Other Name
One of the excellent things about having children is that you have an excuse to revisit great movies . . . our family has just started the Lord of the Rings saga, and one of the things that makes me chuckle is that amid all the high fantasy diction-- the Elvish and Old English and Germanic derivatives-- Aragorn and Mordor and Bara-dur and Balrog and The Council of Elrond-- amidst all this gibberish is the much more pragmatic sounding "Mount Doom" . . . it's possibly the only place name in the series that doesn't require a doctorate in language studies to decipher (of course, Tolkien did give it several other names, including Amar Amarth and Orodruin, which makes me believe he was not very successful with the fairer sex).
Ask Not What You Can Do For Your Country, Ask When You Can Take A Nap
I guess it's okay for a President to be a tee-totaller-- although I know I would need a beer or seven after a long day of diplomacy at the G8 Summit-- but the fact that Mitt Romney doesn't drink coffee precludes him from the top spot in The White House, in my book, because how do you make it through something like the Cuban Missile Crisis without a little caffeine?
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