green apron monkey

new blog, new floating cat head

I'am going to be starting a new blog up when I'm in China. It won't replace this blog because it's going to be intended for Spacekitty's students. That blog, like this one, will have the topic categories "things I am not going to eat again."

My first nomination is Starfruit juice. Spacekitty bought it at Ranch 99. It tastes like gatorade managed to genetically engineer a gatorade juice fruit.

elex wants to make the page look kinda like a chinese web site. To that end he created this little animated gif of his cat's head. If you've ever been to a chinese web site, you know.

This project lead to this exchange:
gam: Is the head ready yet?
elex: I still need to put some more exploding hearts on it.

back around

songs that are playing nicely in my head right now:
wiley - pies
wilco - I'm a wheel
!!! -intensify
grandaddy - AM 180
electralene - on parade

the shat is the shit

Shatner releases cover of Pulp's Common People

elex and I listened to it this morning. It's wonderful. Slackbastard, does not enjoy the shat and expressed his delight at not being present while the house was being shat upon.

Of course it isn't the Shat's most glorius contribution to music. That would be his acrid, funny collaboration withFear of Pop (aka Ben Folds), In Love.

According to pitchfork, it's part of a whole new album of covers. Aren't you glad I'm not going to be around to make you listen to it?

wedding

I don't really like weddings.

Weddings are parties without fun; they are all stress and uncomfortable small talk with strangers and near-strangers. I usually attend weddings for the same reasons that I attend funerals. I go to offer emotional support, not because I really want to.

Largely my opinion of weddings was captured by something brilliant that Nick St. John once said to me:

Going to a wedding involves travelling a long distance to see someone do something stupid and self-destructive. Instead of getting married I'm going to make everyone go to Phoenix to watch me hit myself in the face with a brick.

There have been a few exceptions. My friends John and Dani had a very pleasant wedding in their backyard, marred only by the prickly officient, and SlackBastard's strawberry and rum flavored vomit.

This weekend two more of my best friends got married. (Actually, they had already been married, they just had a ceremony of sorts, more on that later). Once again, I actually had a good time. I think that this fact has something to do with the minimal amount of organization and money spent on it. The equation that describes the amount of controllable wedding stress loks like this:

f(wedding stress)= f(money, time, involvement of the Catholic Church)

There is a certain amount of uncontrollable wedding stress, freaking out parents, feuding bridesmaids, emotionally irresponsible hook-ups, foolish behavior by the groomsmen and me dancing are either going to happen or not and there isn't anything to be done about it.

This wedding had jitters and chaos, too. But food and two bottles of Jameson helped smooth most everything over.

As I said earlier, the couple had eloped more than a year ago, and this wedding was more like a coming out party for their marriage. When I first learned of their marriage I, like many, shook my head and pronounced them crazy. I don't apologize for this, exactly. I think, at the time it was a reasonable reaction, and I believe they understand that.

Over the months though, things have changed. To say I have accepted their union is unjust. I enjoy being around them, I have fun with them and they help me be happy in my life. They are a pretty great couple, a fun couple. I loved being involved in their wedding.

Richard and Thalisha, I am happy, very happy for you. Your wedding rocked.

Druncation and Catwoman

Druncation: A week taken off from work not used for any particular traveling or activity.

"Ass catsuit ass" - Thalisha

hello weekend

So I got a little party together this weekend. I have a lot of weird, anti-social friends, and as it happens when they all get together they act weird and anti-social together. It had the normal trappings of a party (beer, barbeque) but with a whole bunch of people visibly uncomfortable with a large group of (largely visibly uncomfortable) people.

I love all my friends and so I really apreciate when they all try to overcome their social handicaps and come together. Still, when I look around at one of my parties I hear Bikini Kill in my head:

I said I wanna come over
You said ok just come over
Your friends are all on the couch
Your friends said let's walk around
I'll pretend your friends are my friends
And kinda try not to offend them
But I won't let you see anything real
Let you know
There's limits to --

I stopped talking an hour ago
I stopped talking an hour ago
I stopped talking an hour ago
I stopped talking an hour ago

SO yeah any gathering that we have is an entry in something we like to call The Socially Awkward Olympics. (Yes, I do have a few normal party-enjoying people in my circles, but even these are strangely clannish and have difficulty mingling).

Still I got at least a little time with a lot of people that I adore. I had an awesome time. Until about three in the morning, but lets not get into that.

The true highlight of the weekend was the greasy hangover breakfast and coffee that Kamice, Slackbastard, Joshy and I busted out with the grace, style and slight hostility of a seasoned kitchen.

Let me tell you something: cook apples and onions and bacon all together then scramble eggs into the grease. People will worship you. They will.

hot chef action

Amy has put the pictures from the 4th of ju-ly grill-off up here.

I've done you the convenience of stealing some of the pictures and providing context after the jump.

These are The Skullkickers, destined for victory, some for inebriated victory and more than a few destined to be drunkenly scrambling up hillsides to get away from yahoos with roman candles.

Team K, our interhouse rivals. They took second place for dessert, I think.

Judges were chosen for their beauty, their incorruptability and their close links with Satan, the Prince of Darkness.

Making stuff in the kitchen was hectic. There was chaos everywhere, and I ended up fishing chipotle pieces out of the vermouth reduction. Clint was fabulously drunk and the stillest thing in kitchen.

Grilling, is less strenous than sauce making. It mostly involves sitting down and drinking beer.

Fact: hot girls love fish.

The judges meet the pretty fish, the judges eat the pretty fish.

Our closest rival, the marinated bacony chicken made us nervous.

Accusations of sabotage flew after someone ate the hawaiian hamburgers, depriving the judges of a second tasting. This photograph doesn't quite offer prove that Tom and Clint were the culprits, but we have their confessions anyway. Tom may have been attempting sabotage, but since Clint was on the team that entered the hamburgers, I'm going to assume he was just hungry.

That's a jalapeno milkshake she's making. It actually did bring some of the boys to the yard.

ooooh

I fantasize about burning my workplace down.

Frequently.

The funny thing is that I only have a month left. I hope I can make it through the month without resorting to termination through kerosene.

I'm not sure if it's the store or me. I'm burnt out and hateful; but the store is absurd and badly organized.

I guess the answer is something like: who gives a crap? You hate your job and you only need it for one more month. Quit whining.

Oh yeah.

in an aeroplane over the sea

Here is some info about Dongying, the place in China where I am moving to, courtesy of the clever and infatiguable shelley.

Shelley and I are going to get along grandly in China. Here's how I can tell:

10) Dongying has a bar street that looks ... interesting. Pick your favorite place, teach them how to make your drinks the way you like them, then walk in like you own the place. They'll remember you because you're their foreign regular, and they'll be sure to treat you right because you're better than a neon sign for attracting more patrons. If we make a bar our group favorite, we can tell them what music to play. ... And kick people out we don't like. Does that sound imperialistic to you? Then get out of my bar.

Posted by otis at 02:05 PM | Comments (3) | TrackBack

tender and juicy

The Matterhorn House in Santa Cruz had it's annual grilling competition. Grandma house divided into two groups to compete. There was The Skullkickers: Tom, elex, Elizabeth, Kamice and myself. There was also Team K; Kylee, Katie and a cute little puppy in the window named Joshy.

Our entry was a big pretty Artic Char split open and grilled on its scales, with a dandy little pepper/vermouth/olive sauce. Needless to say it dominated, though the competition from the marinated chicken entry was not stiff but rather tender and juicy.

Both Team K and the Skulllkickers suffered little competition in style, with our flash homade t-shirts and rock and roll bravado.

Santa Cruz looked like Sarejavo, but with frat boys doing the marauding.