Friday, October 28, 2011

fight club

Two episodes of breaking bad after waking up I was finally ready to try to eat something. All the usual symptoms, the headache, the nausea, the regret, were so heightened I had convinced myself I had a disease, plus I had a fat lip and my jaw hurt so bad could barely open my mouth. Trying to piece it all together, a couple fragments stood out pretty clearly.

I had been playing crotch-punch with D. after I got off my shift at the bar. A couple people wanted to do shots and my buddy gave me a glass of Thomas H Handy Sazerac Rye, (super zippy, lots of peppery spice, hot burn in the throat, some softer toffee and a little lingering floralness, 127 proof!) and I was into my I-don't-know-how-many-th beer, so things got a little out of hand. D. and I got tired of hitting each other in the nuts, and somehow the play-fighting transferred over to D.'s wife, K. The part I don't remember is what I did to her exactly, but I did something and suddenly she was sitting on the ground holding her mouth and mad as a hornet. I felt pretty bad, so I did what I usually do when a woman is mad at me, I apologized and said "go ahead, hit me as hard as you can." She punched me so hard in the mouth that the BACK of my head hurt. I tasted blood in my mouth and this guy who claimed to be a marine was soberly nodding his head, saying "yo, I really respect you for that." K. and I hugged, everyone laughed, and we continued along our business of getting drunk.

While I fried up some eggs and a couple slices of Quattro Farms smoked venison sausage I cut a slice of the rye bread I had baked the day before to munch on. "This'll never work" I thought as I tried to somehow chew the slice of bread without unclenching my throbbing jaw. Luckily my tea was ready, (licorice coated oolong [don't judge]) so I dipped the bread in that until it was soft enough to eat.

Wednesday, February 23, 2011

Reader Survey

Okay. Just now, while gently warming some Enoki mushrooms to put on a pulled pork and kimchi beet sandwich (just tryin stuff out), I received the following email.

Have you ever tried a pomelo? They have them in the stores here and Dad is curious.

Mom

Couple of things. My parents are on an extended trip in Poland right now, so the fact that I received this message at 8:30 suggests that my mom was up and fretting about the pomelo situation at 2:30 am.

You have to understand that my dad has eaten the same breakfast every day for probably about 40 years. A half a grapefruit and a bowl of Wheaties is what the man needs to fuel himself for a day of never making any mistakes ever, and now he has seen a pomelo. Intrigued, perhaps, by its similarity to the trusted grejpfrut, yet repulsed by its difference, who knows how many nights he has lost to the wild confusion of desire before confiding his troubles in his wife, who, unable to tear her husband from the morass of temptation into which he has fallen, turns to me.

Should he try a pomelo? Perhaps all these years he has been missing out on a unique passion; the daily consumption of a citrus fruit whose every nuance seems to be moulded to his palate. And then what? If he allows himself this little deviation, what's to stop him from, within a year, having a secret second family in Cleveland, a meth addiction and six DUIs? Who knows.
Also, he might hate the pomelo, in which case he will have eaten a fruit that he hated.

Have I ever had a pomelo? Honestly, the answer is "I don't remember." Probably, but I've also had pickled tongue in aspic, unidentifiable fish, mystery rubber-hose-looking organ meat, tripe pancakes, blood soup, donkey sausage, and more. And these things stick out a little more in my limited memory.

So, dear readers, I too find myself overburdened and confused, and I turn to you for help.

Have you ever had a pomelo? Should my dad try one?

Also, I kind of can't believe they have pomelos in Poland, I remember when you couldn't get a banana there (remind me to tell you the Polish banana story some time).

Wednesday, January 5, 2011

Technical Difficulties

Just a quick not on the absence of photographs in the latest blog post, and in future posts.

A couple months ago I spilled an entire cup of coffee on my laptop, and it stopped working. Except for this miraculous period of two days in which it came back to life, it continues to not work. All blogging and other internet business is being conducted on my girlfriend's crappy netbook, which, even though it is less than a year old, is an unbelievable piece of shit. One of its many handicaps is that it is not able to interface with my digital camera, which is also dying.

So, there will be no more photographs in the forseeable future, until we are able to buy a new computer (or if you're really really impatient you can always make a large cash donation to hurry things along, I promise it will probably go to the computer fund).

The good news is that my mom got me a slow-cooker for Christmas, so there's a whole new world of possibilities there. My grandma also got me an twelve inch long "Marine Combat Knife" with a black blade (so that the glint doesn't reveal your position when you're marauding in the dark). I don't think this has any breakfast applications, but it's still good.