Seward, AK at Twilight

Posted via email from Preposterous

Zombie Village

Once upon a time, this existed in Oakland, CA. I haven't looked for pics yet, but that's a killer ad. Spotted in the men's restroom of a local eatery.

Posted via email from Preposterous

Asymmetrical Lighting

What would otherwise be a uniform hallway at the criminal justice building now feels sloppy due to the random light panels that are on or off. I can't imagine how blindingly bright it would be if they were all on, though, so perhaps it's a blessing.

Beyond the Starts

Methinks they didn't consider the fact that their spangley apostrophe looks like a "T"

Viney Cherub

Seen on my walk with the pups today. This baby dryad emerges from the neighbor's hedge ready to wrap it's fledgling vines around an unsuspecting squirrel or two. I kept my distance, lest he mistake me for one.

Crema!

Do you drink espresso? Do you pay attention to the latest snobbery surrounding espresso? Machines, shops, mugs, beans, brewing times, etc etc etc? Then you've heard it said that the sign of a good espresso is the crema - the foamy, beige stuff that floats on top of your shot o' concentrated caffeine.

Well I've got news for you, bucko. Why pay through the nose for 1 oz of high-pressure bean extract when you can have a mugful for cheap? Behold!


My instant coffee has a crema! Granted, it's not flawless what with the oil bubbles, but it does have that "tiger striping" so coveted by the espresso drinker in the know and . . .

Do I detect the sound of massive screeching brakes being applied? Perhaps you, faithful reader, are aghast at my comparison of instant coffee to espresso. How can you drink that swill, you may ask? Believe me, I asked myself the same thing when I bought it for a backpacking trip - but this ain't your grandpappy's Taster's Choice.

This is coffee extruded from the veins of 100% Columbians (and then subsequently freeze-dried). I give you . . .


Trader Joe's 100% Columbian Instant Coffee. Try it and you'll see. Depending on the volume of "grounds" you add to the water, it's just like drinking an entire mug of espresso - only with less jitters (and cost). Granted, my viewpoint may be a bit skewed since I'm on my third cup of the day, but nevertheless - this calls for a side-by-side comparison!

Next steps: making an instant coffee cappuccino. Or Insta-Cap.

This perplexes me to no end.


1. Either there's an emergency happening and no one told me about it.

or

2. If there is an emergency, I'm fresh outta luck.

There is a third option, of course. It could be that if I'm having a "towel-hanging" emergency, I now know where to go.

Boardwalk and Pikes Place

Oi, I'll tell ya right now. Starbucks' new "Pike Place" roast doesn't get any better by being Decaf.
And yet I wanted decaf coffee. And it was my only option that came with wifi on site. Peet's is across the street, but they don't have the Webs. I stood on the corner torn, laptop hanging heavy on my shoulder. A book would have tipped the scales in Peet's' favor, but I've just finished two and haven't replenished.
Hence, I write and roll my overtaxed tastebuds around the surface of my scalded tongue.
Ok, in all honesty, it's not the worst coffee. I have a coworker who brews the worst coffee. If someone could summon enough drool to fill an entire coffee carafe, and that same someone drooled 12 cups of drool over a spoonful of coffee grounds, that would be a strong version of the "coffee" he brews when he gets his mitts on the coffee maker first. I've banned him from making coffee unless he KNOWS beyond a SHADOW OF A DOUBT that he's going to be the only person in the office all day.

Back to Pikes Place. It has this peculiar brewed-in-a-balloon "synthetic rubber" finish that not even 100% half & half can cut. And isn't 100% half & half an oxymoron? No? Well, it ought to be.

I'm thinking about getting a warm-up. They're battening down their hatches at the mo' - maybe they'll give it to me for free. Why I want another cup of Reebok-insole-filtered coffee is beyond my ken. Maybe it's because I paid for the first one, and frankly, I didn't get enough unleaded bang for my (star)buck.

[Update: It was free]

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Now playing: Up, Bustle & Out - Coffee Contamination
via FoxyTunes

Sen-tea-ments

I discovered this bit o' wisdom on my tea bag yesterday.


That's nice and all. Apparently, the following also holds true:

"An attitude of gratitude brings platitudes"

. . . assuming the tea-proverb author(ess) lives a life of thankfulness. I'd imagine that's a prerequisite to work at Yogi Tea. What exactly is being thanked is another matter entirely.

aaaaand here's the link to Ted's photoset, with your humble narrator pictured therein:

Here's how I spent my Saturday.

"On top of Mt. Wiiiiiiillllsssson, All Covered with Antennaaaaaae!"

The fellow in the photo isn't me. It's Ted Beam, of Thornbeam fame.

For the complete set of completely awesome photos, go here.

Prepare to be perplexed into wonderment!

I just got a phone call a moment ago from Wells Fargo informing me that since I'm a valued customer of theirs, I can try out million dollar life insurance FREE for 60 days. If I'm not completely satisfied, I can cancel within those 60 days and I owe nothing.

Wow. Free!!

Wow.

That's . . . um . . . great. How does one "try out" life insurance for sixty days, exactly?

I guess there are several different options, really:

1.) I can die and be completely unhappy with the million dollars and then cancel.
2.) I can feel a general sense of lack of protection (I need TWO million dollars! to be truly comfortable) and then cancel.
3.) I can imagine what it would be like to have to pay the monthly fee, feel unhappy about that fantasy malaise, and then cancel.
4.) I can keep it.

Life insurance doesn't lend itself to a trial membership like a lot of other places. Say . . . Netflix, for instance. I did a trial membership with them and found that I used them so I kept the service. Great!

I don't want to start a trial life insurance membership, find that I will use it, and then . . . .*

Besides, I already have insurance through my company so there's that.

Heh! heheheheheh! This is easily the strangest oatmeal I've ever come across:

(as seen at the Glendale Whole Foods) I really . . . words really can't describe how yak-tastic this "oatmeal" appears to be. Well, they can but I run a family site and frankly no one came here to read about Ordure du Chien in salamander-skin sauce.

Whole Foods, I expect better of you when you steal my paycheck! And anyway, you owe me after busting my tooth. (which broke again, bye-the-bye . . . this means two more visits to the dentist. Methinks I need a crown.)

My Jeep's on Google StreetView


View Larger Map

It's a good thing I washed it.

From today's Miscreant Bouillabaisse on buzz.mn . . .

(please visit the link in my RSS feed reader on the right for the full post)

"Elsewhere in the world of blatant larceny:  Theft.  A man left Sam's Auto Parts after paying for two tires, but not the 16-inch rims and hub caps the tires were mounted on.  The man put the items in his vehicle and fled.  He was later contacted by police and told that he would be charged with theft.  He responded by saying that he didn't care."

Lileks goes on to say . . . "How old was the thief, five?"

Oh yes. Ooooohhhhh yes.

Can't you just feel the powerful waves of "Authority" emanating from my person? Don't I exude a blaze-orange confidence as I stand five floors down from my office, texting subtly? I told you that being a Floorden is awesome! and now you have proof. Solid proof.

It's such a beautiful night here in Burbank that I had to go someplace out of doors to work on my blog. As I parked, the Jeep thermometer said "70." That's a comfortable number - a number that you ought to feel shame in squandering indoors even if you do have a month of free cable with a bazillion movies "on-demand."
A gentleman, who I see in the neighborhood often, is playing guitar nearby. This keeps me from plugging in my headphones. Instead, the Doppler white noise of the Riverside Dr. traffic and the acoustic noodlings of the middle-aged white man blues (his current song is called "Midnight Special," I believe, due to the repetition of the phrase) keep my wandering mind undistractedly distracted.
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The Fire Extinguisher Man stopped by today with his trolley full of candy-apple colored wares.

Oh the joy when the distinctive tinkling chimes of the Fire Extinguisher Man first drift down the hall. Why, it makes the children's eyes light up so! It's so much fun to see them fretting over which flavor to get: "Instructions" or the sour "ABC." Both are packed with fun!

I asked the Fire Extinguisher Man if I could take a picture of his extinguishers all lined up on his trolley. He was in the middle of tallying something on a rumpled piece of paper and glanced at me from underneath the brim of his cap.

"Eh?" he grunted.
"It's just that I've never seen so many fire extinguishers lined up like this all at one time," I said as I pulled out my camera phone.
"Ohhh-kaaaay." He replied . . . skeptically. I guess he's grown accustomed to the uniqueness of his situation.

Speaking of fire, we're due to have a fire drill at our building sometime in March. I don't know about you, but the words "Fire Drill" evoke all kinds of elementary school memories - mostly of hassles and sirens and interrupted classes. Oh the learning lost!! I've been designated the floor warden by default since I'm the only local person at my company with whom the building has any contact. As the acting floor warden, I need to designate an alternate should I be crushed by a steel beam or hurtled headlong out of an 18th story window in the course of my duties.
The fellows at work aren't exactly clambering over each other to be the first to volunteer. Not because they're afraid of danger either. I think it has more to do with the whole "Hall Monitor" aspect of the job. Counting heads, directing traffic, checking hall passes . . . that type of stuff. If I have any amount of luck, the building will provide me with a safety vest and helmet (perhaps a badge? but I dream!) . . . and then I shall take a photo of me looking official in my official garb and I shall post it in this blog.

We have an official Floor Warden's (or Floorden's) meeting on the 4th of March whereupon I shall meet my fellow Floordens and size up their mettle. The Floorden motto is "Twenty-three-floors-worth of Panicked Office Workers CAN BE CONTROLLED In Times of Crisis."

Our logo . . .


Yup. I can't wait for March 4th.


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Now playing: Bob Dylan - This Wheel's On Fire
via FoxyTunes

The Soundtrack for Dental Work

I heard this song and immediately thought of the rigamarole I've gone through to get my molar fixed. It's fixed now. That's good. This song makes me laugh about it. I wasn't laughing at the time. In fact, I was downright mad . . . which helps when you're being stabbed in the gums with a thick needle full of numbing agent. I drummed a beat on the dental seat and thought "Is that the best you can do, Dr. Kay?!" I would have said it out loud except my mouth was full of gauze, suction hoses, and rubber bite wedges.

03 Ragging the Scale.mp3

Wanna know the latest drama? I broke a tooth. This seems to be a year o' injury for me - at least, breaking calcium-based parts of my body . . . toe, tooth. Luckily it's a molar so I don't have to worry about any crazy cosmetic dental implants. The dentist (Dr. Kay) can do a sloppy job and as long as I can bite down without discomfort, I'll be good to go.

She's tried this once already, but the composite didn't stick. After looking at my busted toof, she tsk-tsk-ed and asked how I managed to break my farthest backmost molar.

"I had a rock in my broccoli from Whole Foods," I sighed. My buddy, Mark, said that I had a rockoli for lunch - I laughed a bittersweet laugh. It was funny but my tooth is still broken.
Anyway, yes I had a rock in my brocc and I think I swallowed the offending pebble. However, I managed to salvage something hard and white out of the mess in my mouth, but I think it's just part of the tooth. It's in a small, 3"x2" manila envelope and hopefully I'll be able to get Whole Foods to pay for my visits to Dr. Kay.

Anyway, my first visit wasn't without drama, but it's boring drama so I'll avoid it. Instead, I'll pick up with me in the dentist's chair, watching the hygienist bust open plastic packets of sterilized stainless steel tools in order to dump them in a clatter onto an aluminum tray. After all the tools were heaped onto the tray, she proceeded to scooch them around into a rough assemblage that I can only assume is Dr. Kay's preferred heap of instruments. The best part was the horse-sized needle that she loaded with numbing agent and stabbed through a piece of cardboard to prop it up on the tray. The industrial syringe looked exactly like this one:


. . . minus the istock watermark, of course. I wanted to snap a photo of it sitting on the tray, but two things happened at that moment.
1. My phone fainted at the sight (or at least, it ran out of batteries)
2. Dr. Kay informed me that she wasn't going to numb me for the procedure.

Ok, granted it was 5:30 and the office closes at 6, but that's no reason to cut corners, is it? We're talking about tooth nerves, after all. I grimaced and said, "you know, it hurt when you blew air on it just a second ago." I glanced at the drill as she affixed a conical bit and closed my eyes.

"Well, let's just see how you do," she said, altogether too pleasantly.
I paused. "Is that a challenge, Dr. Kay?" I asked.
"Perhaps," she replied, "Now open your mouth."

I complied, waiting for the moment when she would hit the nerve and my entire body would hit the ceiling. Surprisingly enough, though, that moment never came.

"I'm going to try to rebuild your tooth without removing more of the tooth," she explained. "Let's hope it holds. Otherwise, you'll have to come back in and we'll have to get serious."

Get serious. Hmmm. So this is the corner being cut, eh? I knew from my reading on dental repairs while I waited in the lobby that molars are exceptionally hard to fix due to the tremendous pressures exerted upon them during mastication.

Sure, I had hope that she would perform a miracle and it would hold, but the nagging voice of doubt in the back of my mind told me that I would be back. The process took twenty mostly-painless minutes and I left glad to be able to chew again.

The tooth broke again the next morning.
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Now playing: Laurie Johnson Orchestra - Sucu Sucu
via FoxyTunes

They say a picture's worth a thousand words. By the end of this entry, I'll have posted the equivalent of 4050 words, give or take a dozen. I'd say that's a good first day back, wouldn't you?

Ok, fine. It's a cop out. And for those of you who are counting my actual words - cease and desist! In all likelihood, I'll have written WAY over 50 actual words by the time this is done. So with that unnecessary caveat out of the way . . . on to the pictures! (all photos were taken with my camera phone, btw)


Sadco. I can't think of a place that surpasses Sadco in "I-don't-want-to-work- there"-ability. I'm using this photo as my cellphone's wallpaper right now, and I get depressed every time I flip it open to make a phone call. The idea of going to work everyday at Sadco is in itself saddening . . . which makes this a very successful business, apparently.


Here's a fabulous place in San Anselmo that I hadn't noticed before, though how it has escaped my attention until now baffles me even as I type this. I type in a state of baff-L-mohn to be continental about it. The picture above shows the main hall of the San Francisco Theological Seminary which does not loom large over the Golden Gate bridge as the website might lead you to believe. Instead, SFTS is located on a low hill in San Anselmo, CA, a town nestled in the evening shadow of Mt. Tamalpais in Marin County. I spotted a tower or two as I made my way to Marin Coffee Roasters and had to check it out. There's some swell architectural detail to be found there, too. Case in point . . .


Here's the door to their memorial chapel. Dig those hinges, man! I think each individual hinge on that door weighs more than the entire congregation attending services each Sunday. Seemed pretty quiet on the grounds today. As I meandered about, I didn't encounter a single soul. Some neat details are embedded on the archway's facade for those of you who are dying to see some pixellated close-ups.


At the end of the arch on the right hand side is an architectural stone carved with the likeness of a child.


The opposite end of the arch has a stone with an elderly, bearded man. Both figures have their eyes closed, one in birth and one in death. Fascinating! I expected there to be some sort of profound verse from the Bible etched into the arch along the lines of " A good name is better than fine perfume, and the day of death better than the day of birth" or something. Instead, it just says "Montgomery Memorial" which is okay, I guess, if you know what it is about Montgomery that you are memorializing.

So there you have it. A photo in the blog is worth two in the phone and if each photo is worth a thousand words, I've actually posted well over 10,000 words worth. Now that's productive (and somewhat cliche-skewing).
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Now playing: Amon Tobin - Proper Hoodidge

Ok . . . been a while. This is simply a post to demonstrate that I haven't forgotten about this blog and that I intend to return to regular writing soon. Hold on to your hats (and sides, lest they split.)

I poop on your "new price"!

A Glimpse Into My Weekend

After a Saturday morning's-worth of reading, I decided I needed some lunch. But where to go? I didn't want Subway, I knew that. In fact, I spent an inordinate amount of time not wanting Subway because I couldn't think of a better option. After entertaining the idea that I might hop into the Beastlet [for those of you who don't know, the Beastlet is the name of my trusty jeep - tt] and drive to Whole Foods in Glendale when I have about twenty restaurants within shambling distance from my house, a brainwave hit me. I was feeling sandwichy, but I wanted something fresh and hearty, not processed and mealy. I grabbed my sweatshirt and walked out the door. The sun was shining and a steady cool wind blew in my face as I made my way down Riverside Drive to a place that was guaranteed to have what I was looking for. Namely this:



A meat on meat sandwich from Honeybaked Ham - that's the ticket. I took a place by the window to watch the passersby. As I slowly devoured my layer-ed feast, I began to notice something. There were plenty of pedestrians out and about, but the only variety who seemed to be coming into the restaurant were of the male variety. Not just the male variety, but the (sweat/tee)shirted male variety. Males conspicuously devoid of female companionship. I turned around in my seat to look behind me into the dining area. I then quickly turned back around because I needed to grab my cameraphone, but then I turned around once again to snap a picture.



All guys. All with their heads hanging down or with their hands in their pockets. Normally, I would have found this immensely depressing. However, considering the fact that I, too, was unshaven and wearing a smelly sweatshirt, I had to laugh. Where do you go when you find yourself in Toluca Lake and hungry, and you are bereft of your lady-friend? Why, Honeybaked Ham, of course! Nourishing the body and soul for over 40 years.

Thornbeam strikes again! Mwaa ha ha ha ha!!! This time, the boys examine an unusual roadside attraction.

For all you Halloweenies out there . . .

There's a site that allows you to carve a pumpkin right on your very own computer screen - no messy pumpkin guts scooping or burnt pumpkin seeds because you forgot about them when "It's the Great Pumpkin Charlie Brown" came on TV required! Yes, it's one more thing to distract me from real life. Some would say, why play bowling on your Wii when you can bowl at an actual bowling alley? and I would say,

"I don't own a Wii."

You can visit the site here. If any of you feel like you have a masterpiece, print screen and post it in the comments.

Here's my contribution to the Art-O-Lantern fracas.


I call him "Cool Guy McPumpkin." See how happy he is to eat . . . I mean meet you?

Your Humble Narrator Got a Boo Boo.

Really, I'm somewhat incredulous about the whole thing. Nonplussed? Perplexed? Perhaps. It all began on Tuesday. I was jazzed about our first D-League softball game. See, the Legion of Doom graduated from our tenure in the E-League to the more-competitive, less forgiving D-League. Honestly, I can't imagine what the A-League must be like.
Anyway, I was rarin' to go. I'd prepped and stretched and warmed up, I visited the batting cages and swatted a few balls to the moon - well, not exactly - I swatted a few balls REALLY HARD into the net at the back of the cage. Felt good. Felt strong. Felt comfortable. Felt relaxed.

I wanted to win in our debut.

Our opponents, the Lockouts, were recently demoted from the C-League so they came ready to prove that there must have been some sort of gross scheduling error and they still deserved to be in the C-League. Interesting thing about the lockouts, they have a sponsor. He happens to be a locksmith. What he gets out of it for his investment, I have no idea.

Anyway, as the we warmed up for the game, we played a little infield. I stopped some balls from getting past me, made good throws . . . why, I could play any position! I'll do well tonight.

Or so I thought.

In the last few minutes of warm-ups, the outfielders gathered to catch a few fly balls hit by Eric. I was feeling good, so I wasn't trying too hard for very many. However, there was one that was hit to me that I couldn't deny. I made an attempt at it somewhat belatedly and came up just shy of the catch.

And I mean, just shy. The ball missed my glove by a millimeter and smacked into my toe. Yes, my big toe. I lunged forward in an effort to make the catch so my foot was way out in front of me. The ball, arching toward the ground as balls do, hit me in the toe and went flying off to who knows where.

I howled and hopped, but I was convinced that I would be ok after the initial pain subsided. No go. It continued to hurt and swell. Couldn't play in the field, but I batted anyway. I'd hobble to first and then get a pinch runner. The toe continued to ache. Probably a bad idea. I took my shoe off to take a look at the damage. The nail was black and the toe was red. Hmm. Guess I'll lose the nail. No big deal. Should feel fine in a couple days.

Last night, the ol' toe blew up like an overstuffed sausage and hurt at about a 6 on the pain o' meter you see hanging on the wall at the doctor's office. Odd. I decided at that point to go to the doctor if there was no improvement today.

I woke up and the toe felt pretty good. Ok. Should be fine then. But as the day wore on, it felt worse and worse. Finally, I took my shoe off to take a look at it. My bosses asked to see it and said, "You need to go to the doctor right now." Ok ok ok. I'm going.

Got to Urgent Care. They were able to see me almost right away. Doc took one look at my toe and said,
"Well, that definitely needs to be drained."
My face dropped. "Really?" I said. "Isn't the blood dry by now?" "Not likely," he replied as he walked back into the room carrying what appeared to be a travel canister for a toothbrush.

"You gonna drill?" I asked, trying to sound as manly and disinterested as I could.
"With this?" he said as he removed the cap. "Naw, this burns red hot, see?" He flicked a switch on the side of the case and a small element at the tip lit with a sudden, angry glow.
"Oh, great," I choked. "Does it hurt?" I felt like I was five years old.
"Only if I hit anything other than the toe," he replied lightly.
"Jiminy Christmas," I breathed.
He laughed and said, "Why don't you just lay back? This'll be over in a second."
"You're sure it doesn't hurt?"
"You'll be fine."
"Ok."
"Try to relax now."
My leg was as rigid as possum in a meat locker. I did my best to relax, but my body rebelled. Just. Get. It. Over. With. And . . .
He daubed my toe with some gauze. "All done."
"What?"
"All done."
"But I didn't feel anything!"
"I must have done a good job then."
"I guess so."

We discussed my toe. It should have been feeling better with the pressure off, but I still couldn't bend it without pain. It needed X-Rays. As the blood drained from my nail, he left the room to fetch the X-Ray tech. I heard him telling some nurses about my "Jiminy Christmas" exclamation and laughing. "How cute!" someone said.

I felt like I was five AND a wuss. Thanks doc. Guess it's my own fault, but still, that's harsh.

The X-Ray tech came in shortly after and pointed me into the room with the machinery et al.

"In here?" I asked.
"Yes yes, please go in," he said.
"Alri-ight."
This is why I was skeptical.

I got my foot x-rayed in, what appears to be, the file cabinet. And no, that blue item isn't a fashionable silk cravat; it is, in fact, a lead-filled thyroid shield. He couldn't get my toe to lay down on the film so I sat up and hunched next to the machine to get my foot flat for the image. Always a pleasant feeling, covering up your sensitive bits with lead and leaning toward a machine that buzzes and clicks and spews invisible death rays. A real treat.

After that, we discovered that the bone is broken. The tip is chipped. No fractures, no severing, no surgery required. Just a clean chip which my body will eventually absorb. In the meantime, I have a sore toe, I'm on antibiotics and I won't be running or playing any softball any time soon.

Does this mean more time for blogging? I know that I hope so.


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Now playing: Wax Tailor - Am I Free
via FoxyTunes

Disturbing Trends

I've noticed a disturbing trend in the blog-o-sphere. Perhaps it's that Halloween is drawing nigh. Perhaps it's because the weather is changing and it's making people act squirrelly. Whatever the case may be, the bloggers are showing us "See Food."

This is Steve from thesneeze.com demonstrating to his faithful readers that he did indeed eat the tree brain! We were, of course, thrilled to hear that he would be eating the tree brain. After all, there have been rumors circulating about that it's edible. Experts writing in, mysterious strangers sneaking tastes from the brain and then the brain "happens" to disappear the next day - intrigue! The entire brain timeline is here. Well, he ate it, and to prove it, he posted the intimate, semi-gruesome pics of his stubbly, masticating maw. I have to admit, I was a bit put out by the photo above, but whatevs! It's all part of the schtick, right? Surely, I won't be subjected to this on a daily basis.

But then today, as I perused another favorite site, I stumbled upon this . . .
Roger Barr, the webmaster of i-mockery.com, presents his bestubbled pie hole to the world, candy tattoos emblazoned on his tastebuds. (The entire Halloween candy review can be found here.) Again gruesome.

What in the name of Google is going on here?! Unshaven Gen Y blog ninjas are snapping photos of their befooded tongues and posting them on the internet, that's what, and I'll be consarned if I let them start an internet trend without me.


Here I am demonstrating what happens after you enjoy a starlight mint for ten minutes. Aren't you thrilled at the close-up, intimate portrait of a twenty-something and his culinary adventures? Yeah, I thought so.

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Now playing: Carly Simon - You're So Vain
via FoxyTunes

Mixed Messages

I really don't know what to make of this. The "Kids Funtown NAPA AutoCare Center" in Montrose, CA. Really, who thought this signage combo was a good idea?

The mind could stretch to the possibility of a NAPA AutoCare Center WITH a Kids Funtown attached - gotta keep the kids occupied whilst getting the struts restrutted, and there's only so many times Junior can leaf through "4x4 Aficionado" before he becomes mutinously bored. Send him to the NAPA Funtown Kids AutoCare Center Happytime Park and Bagel Bakery! There he can put together 70 of the pieces that still exist from the 500 piece jigsaw puzzle or move around the multicolored beads on the much-sneezed-upon activity center that rests in the middle of the room on the foam-rubber KidMats. Now that's a Funtown. In all honesty, though, I never understood those activity centers. I remember being very young and asking myself, "Now what am I supposed to do with this thing exactly? I don't want to follow the prescribed path for these beads." Ok, so I didn't use the word "prescribed" in my 2-year-old internal monologue, so sue me. Nevertheless, I had no interest in moving wooden shapes on a thick, crayola-colored wire - back and forth, back and forth - with no freedom of movement, and no payoff. Inevitably, I would be shifted from my tenuous attention to the activity c. by some largish, 3-yr-old devotee who was thrilled as a tick at the Westminster Dog Show to be sliding beads on a wire. No thanks.
One of those things resides in the waiting room of my "favorite" Pep Boys mechanic; I usually end up casting sidelong glances at it while I sit in the waiting room. I still don't get it. Why is it such a ubiquitous item in the most miserable of places? - doctor's offices, mechanics, & pathetic, paperback-strewn public libraries.


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Now playing: David Bowie - Starman
via FoxyTunes

And now for the coup de grace . . . the one video that has haunted me for over two decades before the universality of the internet granted me the ability to seek it out and destroy the power of its memory. Behold the awesome fright of . . .



The Bloodhound Gang and the Case of the Cackling Ghost! Oh my stars, this one stuck with me like no other television experience in the history of television experiences. Supposedly, I was deathly afraid of an "Open Pit BBQ" commercial in which a large man faces the screen and utters a deep, serious "Open. Pit." to the audience, but I was too young to maintain that memory. However, being the young nerd that I was (am?), I was (am?) a fan of the PBS kids' science series "3-2-1 Contact." People familiar with this show are also familiar with The Bloodhound Gang (not to be confused with the hard rock band of the same name), a group of kids who solve benign mysteries with the combined might of deductive reasoning and SCIENCE!
In this particular episode, the details of which were blocked from my mind until I revisited it, an elderly woman is the victim of the scare tactics of her ne'er-do-well nephew as he attempts to steal the supposedly-cursed Darjeeling Necklace that is in her possession. What are the scare tactics he used? On the surface, they are simply the recordings of cartoonish, maniacal laughter played through her radio and light shining upon moths in the woods (You say, "What's that now?" Just go with me on this). But in reality, it's a horror that tapped into some primeval fear center in many kids' brains. Note the comments associated with this video on youtube. The Cackling Ghost has a sobering effect on everyone, even the most idiotic of our society - the YouTube Commentor.

Here's part three for your enjoyment, in case you can't leave this unresolved.



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Now playing: DJ Vadim - Who Me - DJ Vadim, Demolition Man
via FoxyTunes

10-23-00

Alright . . . rain, big city, people, the Tokyo Hotel on State and Ohio. Tourists and stock brokers, umbrella-wielding data-entry thirty-somethings looking smug as they saunter down the street, dry in the rain, alternateens walking briskly in their Ragstock, Belmont best, city-dwelling trail devils apparently oblivious to their sopping wet Kelty packs, d.i.n.k.s with Old Navy bags, limos and leather jackets, couriers internally screaming "BANZAI" as they steam the streets with their blazing wheels.

There is a frozen drink beside me which gives me a headache when I drink it. It cost me $3.75. How often do we consider it a pleasure to pay for pain? The Gap just walked by, all tight sweater and nylon, urban-styled, navy attache case/bag/thingy, hair shaved and spiked like an ad campaign on legs.

The rain has stopped. Smiles are appearing - a large, black woman and a small Asian man are laughing together. They're behind me, ordering some form of caffeine. Who are the unique? The homeless. All dignity has been stripped and abused and drugged and frozen and cooked out of them . . . human beings whose outer shell is paradoxically both fragile and calloused. Hopeless and hardened. Fences made of communion wafers - how many people care?

I keep drinking my $3.75 Tiazzi.

How long has that fragile girl been in a wheelchair? She handles it well. I need paint. Guess I'd better get going before it starts to rain again.

Installment Three of Tyler's Tot Terrors:

When I first saw this movie, I teetered on the precipice of abject terror, barely daring to breathe lest each breath become a scream. I give you . . .



The Secret of Nimh. I know. It's rated G. I saw it during the Fall Party at Bethany Fellowship in Bloomington, MN. This was the same Fall Party in which I got my neck zipped into my Wrangler jean jacket by my Auntie Carrie. I think I was four.
The culmination of the evening, after all of the kids were nearing maximum sugar saturation, was the movie in the community dining room. They set up a screen and a projector in the corner of the room. I was so excited to watch a cartoon that would last longer than a Bugs Bunny short - I imagined how much fun it would be - but then the movie began. Eerie, creepy . . . a gnarled hand, claws clutching a quill, moves slowly toward an inkwell - an inkwell that produces sparkling gold ink! A breathy, ethereal voice narrates as, not beautiful gold ink, but mysterious ink drifts from the well. Ink is black or blue. Not swirling and golden. And it CERTAINLY doesn't make the page you are writing on flash like fire! What kind of movie is this?!
The mysterious clawed hand then produces a strange medallion with a red gem in the middle. How odd.
That's when the title comes up. "The Secret of Nimh."

In this movie, there are many vicious and frightening characters, and all of them seem bent on some sort of mad destruction of something. Even the good guys are scary. Especially that Owl. If you've seen the movie, you know what I mean. Downright diabolical. I have sense memory of clenching my jaw shut in a grimace and averting my eyes to find something . . . anything! . . in the dark on which to devote my attention. Good luck when the only light source is the very thing that I'm trying NOT to look at.

Not too long after I was traumatized by that movie, I discovered my own little secret. In my mom's jewelry box, I found a gold medallion with a red gem in the middle. To my young eyes, that was the very same necklace as the one in the movie. I used to sneak into my parent's bedroom and pull the necklace out to look at it. It would give me a terrific thrill, and I would place it back into its spot, my heart fluttering wildly. As I grew older and the memory of the movie faded, I stopped looking at the necklace. It no longer made sense. The second I realized that it wasn't from the movie, it became uninteresting, even a little bit embarrassing, to think that the jewelry box held any secrets at all. It was just jewelry, not magic.

Part 2 of the Films/Videos that scared the snot out of me as a kid.

It's tough to decide which one to share next. Having found so many of my childhood nightmare videos online, I just want to post them all. Patience . . . patience . . . So here's the next installment:



Godzilla vs. the Smog Monster. I remember hiding behind the black vinyl rolling chair in my dad's den while my siblings watched this during some sort of Saturday matinee. Occasionally, I'd need to dart into the living room to escape, but I'd keep coming back. I wanted to be cool like my brother and sister, but I was acting about as uncool as could be . . . and for good reason. Conflicting emotions!
Listen to the sound that the smog monster makes - a psychedelic wheeze with some sound engineer in Kyoto manhandling the phase knob. Absolutely frightening. And look at that! All it has to do is fly over the people and they drop down, polluted and dead. No warning. No fighting back. Very scary to a three year old.
Even the way that thing moves; its lurching, slouchy gliding was not ok with me. Nothing should move like that.

I'm on a mission. An exorcising mission. I'm searching online for all of the videos that used to scare me as a little boy. Someone's bound to have posted a few of them, at least. Here's a good start:


The part that would get me in this cartoon was when the skeletons' skulls remain stationary while their bodies do a weird, gravity-defying, synchronized sweeping motion on the ground. This freaked. me. out. It just seemed wrong. Not only are dancing skeletons scary, but the fact that they are not bound by the same laws of physics that we are gave them a femur up on us young fleshy types.

When I first saw this, I was at the Decathlon Athletic Club during a brunch of some sort. There was a kiddie room/holding pen with a TV. This was on it. I remember bolting from the room when those skeletons started waving around. I would have none of that.

Here's an interesting online calculator. It determines how much you would need to consume of your favorite caffeinated beverage for it to kill you.

Apparently, I am 1/50th of the way to kicking the bucket. Why, it would only take 98.31 more cups - mere gallons - to cause my demise!
Of course, it only takes a few pints of sea water to drown, but that's not the point. I don't willingly ingest sea water on a daily basis. I guess if I ate 12 whole turkeys, that'd probably kill me too. So you there, with your seventieth cup of espresso - you've got one foot in the grave already. Put it down!

I know that this is a couple days after the fact, but I wanted to share this with y'all. Our nation recently celebrated National Night Out. I'll let the website explain what it is. The purpose of the day is tertiary to my reason for this blog.

On the left, you may behold the Night Out Knight! After all, what would a national community building/edumacational program be without a mascot, eh? The following, then, is my ode to the Night Out Knight.










"Knight Out"

Lights out!
When the Night Out Knight's out.
Why pout?
Tout the Night Out lout
When you're out
At night.

He's the Night's Knight.
A nice Knight.
Give a shout out loud
For the Night Out Lout
Whose clout's about right
For a Knight out now.

Bridges

Today's one of those days where I can't get a particular event out of my head, and I don't think I'm alone in this. Even though I'm halfway across the country, I feel a certain resonance with yesterday's bridge collapse in Minneapolis.

Maybe it's because I still have many friends there and I was concerned about their safety.
Maybe it's because it's where I grew up; a great tragedy like this usually strikes a blow at happy memories of innocent days, driving home the fact that we live in a world that is constantly changing (read: decaying and in need of repair) - a vessel that is unable to hold the soup of our nostalgia due to the incessantly developing cracks.
Maybe it's because I've been driving across legendary bridges today - The Bay Bridge (which has recently suffered a collapse of its own), The Golden Gate - and one cannot help but think of plunging down into the water . . . not in a nervous, "it could happen to me" sort of way, but to look out at the water and for a moment understand how truly terrifying it must have felt to have the world simply drop out from underneath the tires of the 50 or so cars that fell along with the I-35W bridge.
I'm not sure I would have enough time to comprehend what had happened. That's probably a good thing - there's no time to be upset. One survivor said that one second he was driving along as usual and seconds later he was staring at the ground forty feet below through his windshield. His one thought was, "I'm going to die" but would you know why? Would you have time to think, "Well, I guess the bridge collapsed. What are the chances?"

There's an excellent vlog of the aftermath here. It does well at capturing the atmosphere surrounding the event - incredulity, morbid curiosity, and relief. Keep your eyes peeled for the little boy who glances off of the bridge at the Mississippi below. You know exactly what he's thinking, what we're all thinking.

Heidi's never been this close to such a high concentration of nerds in her entire life . . . and it shows.

Guess where I've been?



That's right. I've been at one of the world's only Kwik-E-Marts. Now, I'm not a die-hard fan of the Simpsons, though there are few things that have made me laugh harder than the 4th Annual Halloween Special of theirs. I saw it in college with a group of my dorm mates. We howled.

But that's not the point. You will never see a 7-Eleven store with a line that goes out the door and around the corner unless you visit one of the few Kwik-E-Marts in existence. They give you things to look at, though, while you're standing in line for what is, apparently, an IN-convenience store. Like-a so . . .



Wow! Real graffitti! You NEVER see THAT in Los Angeles!

After a whirlwind tour inside, I decided to get a "movie" donut and a Blue Vanilla Squishee (at the promptings of Roger Barr at i-mockery.com). The donut was quite good, and yes, I shared it with Heidi.



Buy why do you look so furious, Tyler? I'll tell you why. Because all of that sugar ramped my heartbeat up to that of a shrew . . . felt like I was vibrating. Sadly, I had to dump the rest of my delicious squishee into the garbage disposal lest I rattle the enamel off of my teeth.
Still, it was a fun visit. The 7-Eleven guys were hamming it up - saying "Thank you! Come again." to everyone as they left. People were in good spirits, taking photos. Who knew 7-Eleven could bring such joy to the world? I thought that was McDonald'ses job.

I had a lot of fun with this today. It's too bad I can't save my mix - clicking instruments on and off - to share with you all, but it should entertain you for about five minutes.

Chick chick boom chick-achicka boom!

Imagine how echo-ey it is in here. For scale, dig those doorways on the bottom right and bottom left of the photo.

Now imagine letting loose with a giant sneeze right in the middle of the room. I already thought sneezes were enjoyable, but I've never experienced one in as massive an echo chamber as this. I think my sneeze lasted about 23 seconds by the time it disappeared into the nether realms of the building where only ghosties and stray echos are kept.
This is Union Station in Kansas City and boy is it huge. I mean HUGE! Imagine if airport terminals looked like this. Why, it would almost make waiting for your overdue flight a joy. I dare say that it would . . . if you could sneeze every once in a while.

Shelf-Stable Milk: A Follow-Up

This morning, I decided to have some cold cereal. Dumped a pile of wheat pockets (Safeway's brand of Wheat Chex) into a bowl and then opened the fridge for some milk. What th'!?! No milk? Fine, I'll have some of Heidi's soy milk then. Hmmm. Lot's of boxes resembling soy milk (broth, soup), but none of them would go well with Wheat Pockets and honey. To the pantry! She must have an extra one stashed on a shelf (stably). Nope nope and nope. Does this mean that I have no milk for my cereal? Yes indeedy.

Sure wish I had that milk from yesterday.

Had a humorous moment at The Knitting Factory tonight. Eric's brother Ryan had a gig at 8:15p, and the band before them seemed . . . well . . . inexperienced; as if the freshman class Chess Club decided to form a band, learned a few chords and emoted furtively on a stage. They were about to start a song - the drummer just started clicking his drum sticks together in a manner suggesting Grandma's muffled metronome and was on his third click of four - when some jams-wearing music lover up at the front of the stage popped open a beer. The sound drowned out the last click from the drummer so the song began without the band member standing nearest the beer can, the bass player. It took him a few bewildered bars to catch up. Eric and I howled in the back of the room; the timing couldn't have been better or worse (depending on who you ask).

NEW FRONTIERS IN DIETARY EXPLORATION!!

It's lunchtime here at wordinedgewise, and Heidi's just made me a delicious meal of curried chicken with cranberries and almonds, whole wheat naan bread, and spinach. So I thought, "What better to wash down that tasty treat than Shelf Stable Milk?"

Mmm mmm! Nothing like Ultra High Temperature (UHT) processed milk in a juice box to really bring out the subtle nuances of the curry. Supposedly, no preservatives have been added to make this milk shelf stable, and the nutritional information seems to validate this claim. The best-if-used-by date is Feb. 2008. That's a ways away - that seems impossible knowing what I know of milk going bad and all (and I know a LOT, let me tell ya). But why do I have this in the first place, you ask? Well, the answer may not be as simple as you think, assuming you think that I bought it at the grocery store. Because I didn't. I got it from the United States government by way of their military. But why are you getting food handouts from the military, you ask? It's because of a claim I made to a certain Lieutenant at Ft. Irwin; I said that In-N-Out Burger, besides having delicious fries, has the best milk in the world. Yes, you heard me: The Best Milk. He found this claim to be outrageous and demanded to be taken to In-N-Out in order to try their world-class milk. Plus, since he'd never been there, he took the opportunity to get a Double-double animal style and some fries. And he got a milk. After sampling the milk, he looked non-plussed.

"Eh eh?! What do you think?" I asked eagerly.
"Meh," he said. "Tastes like milk."
"oh nononono, but they keep it on ice so it's as cold as can be. It doesn't taste different to you?"
"Not really," he replied. "You know what milk I like?" (you can see where this is going)
"What," I said, disappointed.
"Have you ever heard of shelf-stable milk?"
"Huh?"

Between mouthfuls of french fries, he went on to explain to me that the military provides a variety of new and interesting preserved items for the dogfaces to field test. He asked me if I wanted a few MREs when we parted ways the next day and I said sure. For good measure, he tossed in a carton of milk.

"Give it a try and tell me what you think," he said. This was a month ago.

So now I'm trying it. The verdict?
It tastes like individually wrapped Kraft Singles in liquid form. Very processed cheesy. Milk should not taste processed cheesy. It should taste like the milk from In-N-Out. Well, let's see what they suggest I do with their cheesy milk besides drink it. On the side of the carton, the Gossner family suggests that one can use this milk for:

Breakfast
Hiking
Camping
School Lunch
Travel
Food Storage

My vote goes to the last option. I hope it gets stored indefinitely.

Accident Prone

Here's a rundown of a few of my clumsier moments from this last week:

1. The Grand Slam that Wasn't

At softball on Tuesday, I had a monster hit that sailed deep into center field with two outs and the bases loaded. The outfielders were still running after it as I rounded second, but this is the moment when I, normally sure-footed, chose to stagger. I nearly ended up on my face in the dirt, but I managed to keep my feet with some large, ungainly, thudding steps. This didn't help my top speed though, and I ended up having to stop at third; if I'd kept my feet, I could have made it home. That moment played over and over again in my head that night - I have no recollection of catching my toe on second base or anything. It's like my internal gyroscope chose that particular instance to reset, because I have no explanation for my loss of balance.

2. The Burning Calf

I broiled some Chili Lime Chicken burgers on Thursday. They're some of my favorite things from Trader Joe's. I eat 'em with Ortega chilis, fresh tomato, avocado, and spinach all on a sweet, whole wheat bun. My mouth waters just thinking about it. Well, I just finished broiling my second two (Heidi and Rachel came home from a shoot and ate the first two, the dirty thieves) and I was breaking down the little box that the burgers come in to toss it into our recycling bin when I nearly fell down. What the . . .?!! But that's when I felt it. My leg was touching the oven, and I didn't even know it until my spinal cord decided to launch me across the kitchen to escape the burning on my calf. I stared, puzzled, at the oven because I had NO idea that it got that hot on the outside. "Maybe my leg's just sensitive," I thought, and I reached over to touch the side of the oven. "OUCH!!" I burnt my fingers, too.

3. A Race for Tempura

Last night, I decided to bake some tempura vegetables for dinner. I preheated the oven - the nasty, cruel oven - placed my tempura inside, then went to the living room to check my email until they finished cooking. At the appointed time, I jumped up and zipped toward the kitchen; my habit is to do a series of juke moves that gets me through my small, Z-shaped hallway in the quickest way possible. However, Heidi and I just bought a new armoire so the contents of the old armoire are strewn about in piles all over the place. Our TV is sitting on its rolly pedestal in the tail of the Z; it's big enough to take up most of the hallway and this threw off my juke. I slid past, and rather than having to bounce off of my left foot, I had more of a straight shot to the kitchen than usual. HOWEVER, I completely forgot about the sharp edged speaker stands that were sitting to the side in the hallway and I barreled right into them. I crashed into a painful heap cursing my stupidity for putting them there. When I staggered to my feet, I discovered that I was bleeding in many places. My right hip had a small gash in it, but my right forearm came out the worst - I have about five inches of missing skin near my wrist and several cuts from landing on the edge of the speaker stand and bouncing a couple of times. I bit it HARD!
Despite all of this, I didn't forget about my tempura. Lifting my bleeding arm above my head, I dashed into the kitchen, grabbed my food from the oven - the despicable oven - tossed it on a trivet, then bolted into the shower. Yowch! Serious stinging action. Moments later, I found my first aid kit in the closet and dressed my injuries. The tape's gonna hurt like the dickens when I remove it today to redress.

4. Lapping Milk

And now for the straw that broke this clumsy, bumbling camel's back. I usually breakfast at my computer since there a few blog sites I like to visit first thing in the morning - sort of the modern equivalent of reading the paper at the breakfast table. This morning's breakfast option was cold cereal - the Safeway version of wheat chex. As I lifted the bowl to drink the leftover milk, my spoon slipped and I made a spastic move to keep it from falling out of the bowl. This produced an effect in the milk not unlike a wave pool; the milk sloshed backwards, gathering itself for the rush forward. I watched it all in slow motion, helpless to keep it inside the bowl; the wave came forward, crested and broke over the lip of the bowl, splashing down onto my crotch with a wet slap. "Aww MAN! What's my deal?!" I yelled.

And then I wrote this (after I mopped up the milk, of course). Seriously, it's as if I'm making up for lost time with the amount of pratfalls I've condensed into one week.

The only thing that could make the tube slide at Hyland Park worse

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Mmm. Coffee. My first cup of the work week, and it's in my hand right now. Well, not right this red hot second. In between sentences, I'm sipping on it. Literalist! See, I've had this massive head cold all week long and the last thing I want during a bout with the lurgie is coffee. Not that I don't crave it on a visceral level while I'm sick - the massive, burning headaches don't help matters - but the last thing I need is for my nose to be running and my body to be exhausted while I'm struggling to suppress the desire to jump up and bolt out the door. So I drink tea, many cups back to back. Chain sipping. I've got one of those boxes of Irish Breakfast from Trader Joe's that has something like 100 bags in it - I put a serious dent in it this week. Why is tea ok during a cold? Everyone says it's supposed to be stronger than coffee; I even leave the tea bag in the water long after it's fully brewed which makes the water somewhat bitter like coffee . . . kinda like a tipsy frat boy's impersonation of Arnold Schwartzenegger. It gets laughs and all if everyone's sufficiently sauced themselves, but no one laughs when Arnie's actually in the room. Yeah, just like that. ':-/ I don't seem to have any limit to the amount of tea I can drink. After a cup and a half of coffee, though, I'm done until the afternoon. Being a reheater, I brew one large pot in the morning and then nuke it whenever the afternoon doldrums ooze in.

This morning, my alarm went off at 6:50 and I still had a sore throat. I thought, "When is this going to end?" Sometimes these things can hang on and on and on for a week or more, so I decided to get a couple more hours worth of the snoozin under my belt to see if I couldn't kick the last few straggling germs outta my system. I awoke at around 9, got some water . . . and felt pretty good actually! Then came the lactic acid test - cold cereal and milk. Verdict? No excess phlegmage due to dairy ingestion. That's a hopeful sign. Ok ok ok, let's try coffee! Quick quick. I picked up the can of beans and had a brief surge of panic - almost empty! How could I have let myself get to this point! Oh yes, the cold. How quickly one forgets. But who cares! Grind, brew a few measly cups instead of the usual 8, and drink. Ah. Mmmhmm. Fabulous.

I want one of these. Yesterday. He changes his dance every few bars. Kinda like having your own private Muppet.




I guarantee you, if I had this guy, I'd play "Mah Na Mah Na" on a weekly basis.

Manamana (aka Phenomenon) (Full Version).mp3

Check this comic out.


If you'd like, you can see it better at

http://xkcd.com/c255.html

Unfortunately, this hasn’t been my life experience. Preconceived ideas of bigness met and exceeded? Yes (The Grand Canyon, the Sequoias, etc.). Memories of forests and hills and slides retaining their epic proportions for my adult eyes? Negatory. Well, maybe the Hyland Lake Park Reserve in Bloomington, MN. That's a huge playground.


This is a photo of one corner of the park. They didn't have those crayola colored cupolas when I used to play there, but take note of the massive steel slide. That's a tamed-down version of the slide that was installed in the original playground. That thing was a beast! Kids would fire out the end of the slide like bullets from a long-barrel rifle, usually with the same amount of accuracy and spin, too; woe to the child who got up too slowly from unconciousness because there would usually be another kid, oftentimes thirty pounds heavier than you, who was hurtling down the tube like a meteor mere seconds after your ride. Not only did the slide feel like it was a mile high, but during the summer, it would get as hot as an exhaust pipe. I'd hop in there with my shorts on and my sweaty little hair-free legs would adhere to the surface like raw bacon. And then you'd feel like you were trapped - trapped! inside a sizzling hot death tube where one false move would send you careening to your doom, but to slow down meant a roasting, oven-like demise.
Most of the time, the park system would keep the entrance to the slide chained shut. They must have wondered how on earth they could have been convinced that a 50 yard, mirror-polished, steel tube slide was a good idea. Kids would crawl along the top and sides of the slide like ants after the colony's hill collapses - searching . . . searching. Hoping there was a chink in the armor that we could squeeze through.

Last time I visited that park (I think I was in college), they had removed it entirely and installed the less steep version you see in the picture. The beast has been declawed and domesticated. Oh to ride the original again!

Yet another video for your perusal. Fun with perspective!

I think this pretty much sums up my day.

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