We Are So Going To Very Narrowly Beat The Panthers

Our QB and their QB are friendly with
each other. Andre Dyson (SEA) and
Steve Smith (CAR) were college room
mates. Ken Lucas(CAR) is a former
Seahawk and still has a lot of friends on
the team. In short, both teams admire
and respect each other a great deal.
So howcome Skip Bayless, who isn't
on either team, gotta hate so much?

Greg:

We've been over this before. I know you don't give either one or two rat's asses about football. That's okay. I don't expect everyone to be as obsessed with certain things as I am. However, I would like you to set that peanut butter sandwich down just long enough to suspend the notion that you're not listening at all whilst I rave briefly.

We will beat the Panthers. Even renowned Hawk Hater Skip Bayless says we're gonna beat the Panthers. (My reply to his column is included below.) And - here's a shocker - I like the Panthers. I was all over 'em in Super Bowl XXXVIII. They're a swell buncha guys, a team that no one believed in. They're all the players the other guys passed over. I think their QB Jake Delhomme is a player any team would be lucky to have. And this ragtag buncha scrappers made it all the way to the Super Bowl, and were narrowly defeated by those media darlings, the New England Patriots. That was a skins versus button-down shirts game if ever there was one.

But that's the beauty of this Sunday's game. It's the Good Guys vs. the Good Guys. Neither team is a media darling. If you stacked up all the press that both teams got last year, it wouldn't reach, say, that rat's ass that you care so little about. And yet both of these teams are a stone's throw from the Super Bowl. It takes a lot of heroic tales to come to a crossroads like that, tales that many a douchebag journalist doesn't have the grapes to tell. Why? Not a big enough eyeball draw, hence not "important" enough. Brett Favre (who had a dismal year) cuts himself shaving, and it's headline news. Two also-ran teams scratch and claw their way to the top, and nobody notices.

Okay, so just to prove to you that I can talk about something other than football, let's make some small talk. Ummm - Well. I had a cup full of little cookies after lunch. They had nuts in them, I think. I went to the Seahawks Pro Shop and - no wait! That's football. My bad. Okay. So - yeah. How 'bout that Mozart? Two-hunnert and fitty years old this year. Dang. That guy rocks like Dokken. Ever heard that "Rock Me Amadeus" thing? Ossum.

So how's the real estate thing going in Nevada? (Do they still have real estate in Nevada? Or do they call it something else, like Arroyo Cayuse Longhorn Flintcraw Saddlecock?) Real estate - now that's mostly dirt, right? Or is it something fancier? Like dirt with cheese in it?

(By now your katana-sharp intellect has seized upon the fact that without football, most interpersonal conversation is a rather grim and sugarless affair - is it not? I believe I speak the truth.)

'Kay. So. That's about it for now. Goodnight and Go Hawks! Or if that's too gauche a phrase to pass your delicate eyes, then I say Geaux Hacques to you!

Cheers, and give my best to Marie.

-Thaddeus

My reply to Skip Bayless' column:
Skip, you're still welcome in Seattle as far as I'm concerned, regardless of your opinion of our team. Seattleites welcome dissenting views. I'm a true blue Seahawks fan, I admire the Panthers, and I'm looking forward to a very good game. I have no underhanded jibe or thinly veiled putdown to insert here, either. All I can say is that I'm sorry you feel the way you do. I can't see how such vehement negativity could possibly increase anyone's enjoyment of The Greatest Sport Ever Devised By Man any more than me insulting you for your low opinion of my team would ennoble me. I love football and I support my team, win or lose. I wish you the best of luck in all your future endeavours, whether they include a trip to Seattle or not. -TRG

Poetry & Football: Together Again For The First Time

Poet Megan Grumbling:
Probably not a huge Seahawks fan.

Greg:

Look, I know that you've had it up to here (he said, indicating a latitude about 4'10" from the floor) with me going on and on about football. The season will be over as of the night of February 5th, so at least you may take some comfort in the fact that there will be no more fuel for my obsession. After the Super Bowl, my interests will no doubt return to the introspective - Buddhism, poetry, coffee, dysthymia - you know, the standard Pacific Northwest leisure pursuits.

Speaking of the Pacific Northwest, here are some quick notes on life in the Big Wet One:

• As of this morning, we are on our 27th consecutive day of rain. As of Friday, our annual precipitation is 4.10" above average, a fact that I find 99.9% less than ossum. We don't live in a state. We live in a leaky basement.
• Humorous sign seen on a house during a recent trip to Portland, OR: HIPPIES USE SIDE DOOR.

And speaking of hippies - Arrrrgh! Body - strong! But - will - weak! Must talk about football!! Jake Plummer, the quarterback of the Denver Broncos, has either ceased all forms of personal hygiene for the duration of the playoffs, or is appearing in an off-Broadway revival of Jesus Christ Superstar. His exceedingly beardacious and hair-riffic appearance caused me to dub him Jakus Christ Superstar while the Gunn household was enjoying the Patriots/Broncos game yesterday. By the way, Jakus Christ and the Broncs beat Tom CryBrady and the rest of Coach Bill Bitch-A-Lot's Patriots rather soundly - 27-13. Undoubtedly, the Patriots will attempt to file a nuisance suit in civil court claiming fraud, robbery and battery by a crazed band of hippies in tight white pants. ("We was only there to goes and does some skiin', which we hear is wicked nice in Colorader this time of yee-uh," the plaintiffs said.)

Which brings me to poetry. Had a rather nice discovery in the last issue of Poetry magazine. (Yeah, I'm a subscriber, so what? Shut up!) A poet with the unfortunate name of Megan Grumbling (adolescence must've been hell on her, no doubt obviating the career choice) has a book out titled Booker's Point, a series of poems written around and about an old Maine coot named Booker. Poetry magazine has a selection from it online, the poem Raking Near The Great Works. (Please go read it before they update the page and the link breaks.) It might remind you a lot of the autumns we had in Michigan. Now that I live in the Land Of Two Seasons (and those would be Unbearably Shitty and Fawking Gorgeous), I miss those true autumns something ferocious.

And one final note, since you probably haven't been following the playoffs much-if-at-all, the Seattle Seahawks won their first playoff game in 21 years. And they did it despite 3 turnovers and the loss of their NFL MVP running back in the second quarter - which of course prompted me to write the following truly awful (and probably the first) Seahawks football haiku:

You heard us knocking / Now the door is coming down / Cold pond overruns

Cheers, and give my best to Marie.

-Thaddeus

Like I Said

Andre Dyson, Marquand Manuel and Bryce Fisher make juice out
of the Redskins' Taylor Jacobs.

Dear Washington Post:

Shut up.

Sincerely,

Thaddeus R. Gunn

We Are So Going To Cream The Redskins

A local family prepares to grant custody of their child
to Seahawks Wide Receiver Bobby Engram as a special
"thank you" for a particularly ossum season.

Greg:

I know that you look forward to my letters as a source of deep discussion of salient matters and gleamingly unprejudiced discourse. Or perhaps you just anchored my blog to your F10 key so you can instantly launch it to obscure porn when the boss walks by. Either way, I appreciate your oblique references to it in your phone calls so as to maintain the illusion that you actually read it.

My half of this delicately balanced charade is to continue in these epistles exactly as though you were interested in what I have to say about that Grandest of All Sports Ever, American Football. [Insert fanfare.] So without delay, I shall deliver my completely unbiased forecast for this Saturday's NFC Playoff game between the Seattle Seahawks (I'm from Seattle - did you know that?) and those other guys with the unbelievably un-PC team name, the Washington Redskins. (Apparently the Alabama Battlin' Klansmen, the Texas Wetbacks, the New York Dagos and the Louisiana Stepin Fetchits were already taken.)


Seahawks Wide Receiver Joe Jurevicius demonstrates his technique
for giving the opposing team a pigskin suppository whilst Tight
End Jerramy Stevens looks on, chortling.

Here's my scientific forecast: we cream the 'Skins by about a bazillion points. Yeah they beat us in the regular season by a field goal. But that was only because I wasn't wearing my Lucky Underpants. When I was wearing my Lucky Underpants at the 'Hawks/Giants game (and the wind was blowing from the 300 level directly down on to the field), their kicker missed 3 field goals. See? Cause :: effect. And lemme tell ya, the Giants' Jay Feeley looked like he'd been cuttin' onions by the time that game was over, so I know he was catching a snootful of the magic. This time I will be wearing my Lucky Underpants again, but I won't be at the game. Since I'll be wearing my Lucky Underpants at home, that means that Teresa will probably require me to also wear a Lucky Lemon-Scented Urinal Cake around my neck, so that means - yeah buddy! Double-plus lucky!!

A lot of naysayers, yahoos, nabobs, and poo-prattlers will say that the Seahawks are going to win this game because they're good players. Yeah, whatever. So Shaun Alexander has practically every award in the NFL plus a jillion yard rushing record. So what if we have the top-rated offense. So what if we have pro-bowlers out the wing-wang. What-everrr! Any brainless pecksniff will try to sell you on "stats" and "facts", but I say Mike Mularkey! It's all magic! The team who rubs their rabbit's foot the hardest wins. And this year, the magic is on our side! Chief Seattle is doing the wave in the Happy Hunting Grounds for the Seahawks. Mark my Lucky Underpants. Oh wait. I already did.

Okay, so, your turn. How's your invention thingamahoolio going? Yeah? Oh. Hmm. Geez. You don't say. Wow.

Hey, wouldja look at that. It's 5PM and time to leave work.

Cheers, and give my best to Marie. Go Hox.

-Thaddeus

Beavers The Size Of Beavers

Castor canadensis in his natural habitat: the Web browser.

Greg:

I have found the most compelling sign that 2006 is going to be an extraordinarily fortuitous year for everyone: there is a beaver on the Google logo! A BEAVER! Or perhaps it is an attempt by one of the part-timers in the art department to recreate the canine form for the Year of the Dog (which is what we will be in as of the last weekend in January - "we" meaning we Mahayana-types at the Gunn residence). In which case, it's a dog with buck teeth and a really fucked-up tail. I choose to believe that it is a beaver, clutch the inherent auspiciousness of this sign to my bosom, and adopt it as my totem for 2006.

In my next NEA grant-award-winning essay, titled "Beavers: What's So Great About 'Em?", I will expound at length upon Mister Castor canadensis, his cunning, savagery, and industry. However, let me set my beaver down for a moment, and move on to matters more pressing on this New Year's Day. Namely, my New Year's resolution.

In 2005, global warming was huge. Icebergs the size of false patriotism broke loose from Antarctica. Polar bears the size of polar bears drowned. I got a sunburn the size of my body. And a hurricane larger than influenza attacked New Orleans with a fury the size of something really big. All of this left me feeling pretty small and weak, until I listened to my own advice from a few blogs back, which is to realize the actual extent of my sphere of influence. That will keep me from feeling like a failure over things I could in no way have an effect on.

I don't want to spend time that I could be using to clean up my own back yard to criticize the actions of others. So let's use my own actions as an example. I do not support the war. But will I have greater influence on ending abusive violence in the world by going down to the corner and waving a "No More War" flag and marching and putting my fist in the air and whatnot - or by going deep within my own psyche to uproot the origin of that violence that we all share, and work with all my might to end violence in my interactions with myself and those closest to me? Why should I insist on That Guy Over There disarming when I haven't disarmed myself? It smacks of US foreign policy: I'll keep building my arms stockpile, but if you try to build yours, I'll be justified in blowing you up. Whether it's on a national scale or a personal scale, I think the principle of Personal Disarmament should apply. I must disarm myself before I can talk about disarmament. I realize that most people would become concerned about disarming themselves when they have no guarantee that the other guy is going to disarm. Here's some heartening news. It only takes one individual disarming themselves to have a widespread effect on general disarmament. Think of the first few activists who took a seat at a whites-only lunch counter. Think Ghandi. Think King. Of course you don't have to be Ghandi or King, but you get my drift.

So you might say, "But Thaddeus, them last two bruthuhs got they asses shot, yo!" Well I can guarantee you this: you're going to die. Whether you march on Tienamen Square or sit at home eating Fritos out of a dog dish, you're going to die of something some day. Whether it's coronary thrombosis or bullet interruptus, rest assured that you will cack. So...in the meantime...whatcha wanna do?

Which brings me back - albeit briefly - to beavers. (The author grabs his beaver and raises it up for all to see.) Undertaking Personal Disarmament, specifically because it isn't easy, has to be pursued with the kind of focus and industry these lil' feisty peckerwoods come by naturally. (The author jabs his right index finger at the upraised beaver for added emphasis.) Inasmuch as I am as neurotic as a pack of neurotic little pack animals - say, Welsh Corgis - there has to be a way that I can bend my neuroses to achieve this end. So here's my resolution, complete with ultimatum:

I resolve to practice Personal Disarmament with the tenacity and obsessiveness of a beaver hereforward. And if I do not, a most horrible thing will happen: nothing.

Cheers, and give my best to Marie.

-Thaddeus

SPOILER ALERT: King Kong

Is King Kong gonna hafta choke a bitch?

Greg:

There are just two words you have to say to get me into a theater: giant monkey.

To put a capper on the Christmas holiday, I finally went to see King Kong (reasoning that the holiday crowds were gone by now) and lemme tell ya this: it rules. ROOLZ! Yeah, the story is poop. Yeah, Naomi Watts and Adrian Brody need some real dialogue. And maybe a sandwich or something. Christ, those people are thin! And yeah, the monkey dies. But WOW! And HEY! And SHEEZUS H, HOWDEYDOODAT? Here's my synopsis:

King Kong (not his real name), is one endangered-all-to-hell species who lives on the last stick of land on the ass-end of the South Pacific (the ocean, not the musical). His neighborhood sucks, populated as it is with rabid dinosaurs, surly giant bats; and louche, insalubrious aborigines who need a serious bubble-bath and some third-degree orthodonture...and perhaps a good creme rinse. In short: real estate prices on Skull Island must be at an all-time low. And the only job that Kong can find is to kick loads of giant lizard ass day in and day out. Reminds me of our boyhood in the 313. Hard times, to be sure.

Along comes a group of well-meaning honkies with a movie camera and about three gross of Tommy guns. Together they decide that what Kong really needs is to be bused to a better neighborhood. (Again, reminding me of our youth in the 313.) Since the crew fails to establish a simple, congenial dialogue with the giant ape, they resort to the two weapons that have been the cornerstone of every American military campaign: poontang and firewater. Distracted by the willowy form of a breathless honkette, Kong is subdued when the crew's cockswain slam-dunks a jug of Thunderbird into his snout.

Cut to midtown Manhattan. (You call this a better neighborhood?) Kong has now been hornswoggled into working as a backup singer for a minstrel show. Oh, the sheer indignity of it all! Woefully underpaid, and unable to locate his Actor's Equity representative, Kong abandons the gig halfway through, deciding to take his talents to a theater where they'll really be appreciated.

On his way to the Apollo, woefully unaware of the city ordinance regarding unescorted apes on the upper east side after 10PM, Kong gets himself in Dutch with a hilariously quaint 1930's edition of the US Mechanized Cavalry. A heated confrontation ensues. You get the feeling that what Kong would really like to do is crap in his paw and send a monkey turd the size of a metro bus rocketing at that truckload of Army chumps at about Mach 3. (That would've been some OSSUM footage!) But no, what a bruthuh really wants is to get five minutes with his girlie, so he opts to go ice skating in Central Park...where it's safe and quiet.

As whitey is compelled by his evil nature to always keep a good man down, the cavalry drives Kong and his homechicken out of Central Park and up to the penthouse of the Empire State Building. Again, unaware of the city ordinance regarding giant apes in the high rent district, the mayor's airborne goon squad punctuates the letter of the law with a hail of bullets. The big monkey gets not one but several "caps" in his "ass", and does his best impression of Greg Lougainis in the throes of narcolepsy as he plunges to his death. Boo hoo. The End.

I know I probably just ruined the whole thing by giving the plot away, but go see it anyway! S'good! Giant monkey! GIANT MONKEY!

Cheers, and give my best to Marie.

-Thaddeus

Baby Jesus Is The Antichrist

Baby Jesus: Strap on a coupla horns and he's good to go.

Greg:

A perfectly horrifying thought crossed my mind over the holidays. No, not the one about how Regis Philbin may actually be a puppet run by a gang of reprobate squirrels. The other one - the one where Baby Jesus is actually the embodiment of evil.

Think about it. During what time of year are more families and wigs torn asunder than any other? Yeah, that's right. Christmas. It is the season when the meekest of us become whiskey-fueled, wig-rending psychopaths. SUVs, chock-a-block full with holiday shoppers sport bumper stickers that read "I'd Step On Your Mom's Throat To Get A Great Deal On A Tickle Me Elmo At Wal-Mart!"

And what spirit provides the fuel for this season of revelry? Baby Jesus. Ergo? Yes. Ergo. And that is exactly my point.


Baby Jesus: Yo, Mister Potato Head! Ready to bend to my evil will?
Santa: Yes, my Dark Master.

Go ahead. Defy my perfectly circular logic. Have you ever seen two Baby Jesii in the same place at the same time? No. You have not. And you will not. Not unless they're stuffed. Or replicas. The kind of replicas with Cameras for Eyes that send Communiques back to the Factory! And then the Filthy Bottom will send His Dark Agents to Poison My Food! Igor! Bring me the ether! Sswwwffffft!

Much better. Now where was I?

Oh yes. We were talking about Christmas Dinner with the family. It went just fine, except that I think I had way too much coffee beforehand and afterhand and inbetweenhand and may still be suffering the effects of caffeine-induced toxic psychosis. And I've had tons of sugar in the past few days. I'm not too sure if I'm not sleeping at all or actually sleeping a lot faster than I used to. My gums - if you can call them that - are complaining bitterly about the truckloads of Italian nougat that I've been shoveling past them. And here's the kicker: I've been losing weight. I lost 1-2/3rds man teat in the week leading up to Christmas. But then again I've been both working out at the IMA quite a bit and badgering my wife. Wife-badgering, if you haven't tried it yet, is an excellent means of burning excess calories, although it does come with the risk of the wife getting fed up with your juvenile shenanigans and driving a stake of holly through your heart on Christmas night.

Look, before you click that little X in the upper right hand corner of your browser and close this window forever, I really do have a point. And that point is that I discovered this holiday season that certain emotional episodes may be the result of the emotional interpretation of bodily sensations brought about by diet. To wit, caffeine making a neurotic person's heart go pitter-pat might make them believe that there was something wrong with them physically, and then cause them a great deal of stress which they in turn take out on the family, the in-laws, the dog and whatever. Even people who otherwise have a great deal of emotional integrity might snap under the onslaught of increased sugar and caffeine intake combined with holiday stressors. So my theory is that it's not just the holiday that stresses people out and makes them into a bunch of emotional weirdos. It's the added crappy food/lotsa sugar/loads of caffeine thing that causes otherwise tender, loving hands to curl into the wig-rending talons of the Holiday Harpie. So - long story short - if you're a bona fide nut like me, there are more reasons to watch you diet over the holidays than just keeping your girlish figure.

And if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go back to weeping like a wee bairn - for no particular reason.

Cheers, and give my best to Marie.

-Thaddeus

My Brain Has Turned To Creamed Fucking Corn

Henry Rollins demonstrates the benefits of Neck Farming.

Greg:

I don't know what you do all day other than sit around and think up novel ways to not respond to my letters. Oh wait - that's right. You invent stuff. Each day you chisel a larger niche for yourself in the abbey of history. Whereas I sit around all day and try to think up novel ways of getting people to buy stuff they could probably do without. Barring that, I at least try to write mass marketing emails that get read before they get deleted. So therein lies the difference between us: you have lofty goals, whereas I would be happy if my goals reached as high as the crown molding in a dormouse's terlit room.

Which brings me to my next point which is that I don't have one. The wife? Fine. Kid? Awesome. Work? Same as always. And I've had some pretty fun holiday gatherings so far. So why do I feel like I'm up to my neck in cement?

So speaking of neck, there is something I have been doing, which is to do some neck-farming down at the Intramural Athletic center at the University of Washington. I have spousal privileges there since Teresa is an employee of the UW. So I've been down there hitting the plates a few times a week and am becoming rather a fetching and well-muscled (albeit hairless) beeve. (That's an archaic term for beef cattle, in case you do something other than sit around and read the dictionary whilst avoiding work.) The IMA is just about the nicest health club I've ever been to. It has plenty of space, plenty of high-tech machines, and surprisingly little cock-ogling going on in the sauna. Yeah, I know that sounds crass, but what is it about guys that makes them want to stare at another guy's Ben Johnson just because? And it's always the old farts, the tenured faculty who are staring at your nether parts wistfully as though the were remembering that they had one once. I swear to Buffo Guatto, the next Professor EuroGeeze who stares at my bits is going to be asked in no uncertain terms to buy me flowers first. But still, it's nothing like the downtown YMCA, where tonsil jousting carried on day and night with complete impunity.

Okay, so there's that. And then there's football...oh wait, did I just put you to sleep? FOOTBALL! I recently got to meet Jerramy Stevens, a Hawks tight end, and a little slip of a fellow at 6'7" and 265 (about 14 and 3/4ths stone if you're Scottish). Both he and several other of his Gridiron Brethren came back this year with full-on Amish style beards. Perhaps it is the God-fearing, clean-living ways of the Amish that enables these mastodons to perform at the height of their game (4AM! Time for milking!). Speaking of which, you'll be overjoyed to hear that the Seahawks are doing quite well, have won their division, and have the #1 win-loss record in the NFC right now at 11-2. They've scored 83 points in their last 2 games, shutting out the Eagles on Monday Night Football 42-0, and cracking the 'nards of the 49ers six days later at 41-3. So yeah, it's a good time to be a Seahawks fan, and I'm happy to have made it to 2 of the last 3 games. Still, we get NO FREAKING LOVE WHATSOEVER from the press, one MegaDullard even going so far as to say "we don't know much about them way up there in the Pacific Northwest", neverminding the fact that there are such newfangled things nowadays as the Televisory Unit, the Home Telephonic Transceiver and the InterWeb whereby people can converse 'round the globe as though they were in the very same room!

I would say "I digress", but then that begs the question from what.

So with that said, I'm glad we had this chat.

Cheers, and give my best to Marie.

-Thaddeus

Who Is Warren Christmas?

Il Natale di Buffo Guatto: Gloria im Extupido!

Greg:

You know I never use my letters to talk about the media and current events. I believe that both of those things are like boils and will go away eventually, no matter how bothersome they are at the moment. There's just this one thing that has me freakin' boggled. It's one of those times when you've just stopped paying attention because you thought it couldn't possibly get more ridiculous than this, that human beings can't possibly be that retarded en masse. And right about then, they go and raise the bar - practically build a damn monument to Buffo Guatto, the God of Stupidity. (I just made that shit up. There wasn't a Buffo Guatto until sentence before last. But you can rest assured that he just popped into existence on some corner of the universe, most likely at the corner of Mullet and Meathead in Philadelphia, PA.)

The War on Christmas? I'm agape. I can't even get upset over this one. It's too friggin stupid to believe. And yet it gets enormous airplay on Fox. Then again, enormous airplay on Fox is probably the metric by which all stupendous obtusery should be measured. "Did it play on Fox? How much? Well there you go."

Last night on The Daily Show, Jon Stewart copped to it. He and he alone is the enemy in the War on Christmas. And he "will not rest until every year families gather to spend December 25th together at Osama's homo-abortion-pot-and-commie-jizzporium". So there's something to look forward to, certainly.

Okay, but that's not even the best part. Henry Ford pulled this same BS back in the 20s (blaming the Jews), and The John Birch Society, too busy being dicks to come up with an original idea, recycled it in 1959 (blaming the Reds). And then, Bill O'Reilly, taking the ball from - oh what's his name - Zipperhead McDouchebag, the guy who wrote the book - goes and blames the lib-brrlz. My question to Mister O'Reilly is this: do you just not have enough spine to blame, say, the Negroes? Or the Guineas? Or the Beaners? C'mon. At least take a swing at some segment of society that isn't imaginary. Blame the Lithuanians. But he won't, and you know why? Because all of the aforementioned groups are armed. They have zero shit tolerance. They will kick, cut, split, and stack thirty cords of his honky ass and burn it in the pot-bellied stove to offset their heating bills this winter. (O'Reilly fully realizes how much ass he has, owns oil stocks, and therefore fears this.)

Okay. So. Anyway. Screw all that. If we wanna go back far enough, the mere celebration of Christmas is in point of fact a War on Yule. Remember: Christmas is a Christian perversion/subversion of that pagan holiday. Ergo, if you really wanna have a War on Christmas, celebrate Yule. You get to burn stuff, drink stuff, and do the nasty (required). How ossum is that? So strap on a set of horns, quaff some ale, and get as snockered as Buffo Guatto, there's a war on!

Gloria in Obnoxious Dei,

-Thaddeus

Holly Jolly Oligarchy!

These poor lil' bastards will never know what hit 'em.

Greg:

What is it about the holidays that makes everyone freak out? And by "freak out" I mean the most negative inference of that otherwise jolly term. I have seen footage of the Wal-Mart melee and its ilk - shoppers trampled, knuckles bruised, wigs rent asunder - an aggregate of events nationwide which are sadly becoming an annual celebration of carnage and cruelty on the scale of the Omak Stampede. However, the extent to which the proletariat freaks out by and large doesn't alarm me. I only wonder why the proletariat doesn't freak out far more often than it already does, in other words, why it takes an impending holiday to catalyze wig-rending behaviors. No, it is my own state of mind which shows an alarming rise in what I'd call "holiday hubris" that is my real concern.

To wit: This year, I became an oligarch.

Long story short: I freaked out, went to Ace Hardware, and purchased half-a-dozen miniature decorative porcelain houses. I set them up on my sideboard, and proclaimed myself Lord God King Daddy of Holidaytown. It was almost like the Republican Blowout of Y2K4. They didn't even see it coming...until they heard the booming-yet-lugubrious laugh of their new ruler from somewhere far, far across the dining room.

To be clear, I practice oligarchy under full protection of the Kirkpatrick Doctrine. (You may say, "hey - how is that oligarchy if you and you alone are the ruler of this tiny porcelain village?" My nearly invisible co-conspirators in this plutocracy are Seattle City Light who control the flow of electricity and the Uwajimaya Village Apartments who actually hold title to the land under the sideboard on which the village sits. I give both of these parties "kickbacks" each month in the form of "rent" and "utilities" in order to secure their silence and complicity.)

Now, moving on:

My subjugation of that tiny hamlet nearly complete, and the sweet tang of unopposed rulership swollen forty-fold in my bosom to almost Bush-like proportions, I am began to feel the urge once again to brave the winter night and scurry out to Ace Hardware where I might annex another ten - nay, twelve! - porcelain domiciles (at clearance prices).

But then, the wife threw down the kybosh. She claims that there isn't room enough in our 1,080 sq. ft. 2BR 2BA apartment for her, me, several tiny porcelain houses, and my ego. At least twelve of those things would have to go.

So here's my conundrum. There's no court in this land higher than The Wife, so any appeals on the matter are kaput. However, there is rather a clever loophole: there's nothing saying that I can't receive tiny porcelain houses as gifts from my brother for Christmas.

In closing, I implore, if you have an ounce of Christmas spirit, and are in the mood to support an fledgling nation-state and its kindly dictator, please purchase a tiny porcelain from Ace Hardware online (at clearance prices - some as low as $7 American - and free shipping, too...maybe) and have it shipped forthwith to my address. The Fatherland thanks you.

And now I must depart, as I feel the clench of madness in my hinderparts.

Merry Christmas!

-Thaddeus

The Definition Of Sport

David Carr: a man with an unimpeachably
positive attitude despite a dismal team record
- which makes him my personal hero.


Greg:

I know I should be doing something productive, like being a heckler at an open-mic poetry reading, but last night's MNF match up betwixt the Indianapolis Colts and the New England Patriots is still ablaze in my mind, so blog I must.

Yes, I know you're not a football fan, so just indulge me. Let your eyes glaze over and roll heavenward while I get this off my chest.

Fact #1: Pardon my French, but New England blows. Yeah they have three Superbowl wins in the last four years, but wins and stats ain't everything. To wit: they and their fans alike exhibited such unsportsmanlike behavior and so little grace last night that it only deepened my aversion to them. Example: When the Patriots were down by 14 points at half time, their own fans booed them. Booed them. What the hell? You root for a team, you support a team, and that means even when they suck. I sat in the teat-freezing rain in the midst of some-thousand-odd alcohol-drenched walnut-brained Bills fans until the very bitter end of the Hawks 38-19 loss to them last year. And I applauded my team as they left the field. The Bills fans around me were so stunned they were speechless, which if you know Bills fans is saying a lot.

Fact #2: To build on a point from #1, stats and wins alone do not a sportsman make. F'rinstance, you may laugh, but I think one of the finest quarterbacks in the NFL is the absolutely for-fucking-lorn one-and-seven Houston Texans' quarterback David Carr. Why? Because in spite of the fact that he's been sacked over 30 times this year (which is more than most QBs get sacked in their entire career), he has a brilliantly optimistic attitude. We're talking about a little Calvin Klein underwear-model-of-a-guy who wound up underneath 250 pounds, forty ounces, three stone, half a quart and tuppence of Hawks defensive end Grant Wistrom (shown here in his college days as a Nebraska Cornhusker)and came out smiling. For comparison, let me drop a davenport on you thirty times and see how cheery you remain. And on the odd occasion when his offensive line actually blocks for him and lets him get a play off, he looks pretty damn good. To paraquote: "I know we have a losing record, but game by game we're improving, and I'm improving." David Carr, you are a PRINCE! If I were him, I would give each and every one of my offensive linemen a bare-ass spanking at mid-field during a Monday Night Football broadcast and then summarily fire them all. And then fire the coach. And then the owners. And then crown myself King of all Football.

Fact #3: New England blows (he said, restating for added emphasis, right index finger held aloft). Why? Because last night, when they were down they became whiners and moaners. Coach Bill Belichick threw an illegal challenge flag in the 4th quarter, was apprised that it would cost his team a penalty, so to save his ass, made a bullcrap challenge on a clear-as-day call. Then to save hometown darling QB Tom Brady from taking complete responsibility for a 40-21 trouncing, they reached into the team ossuary and pulled out Doug Flutie's geriatric ass to replace him for the last series of the game. Flutie, voted the World's Most Birdy-Legged AARP Member, succeeded in picking up the sucking where Brady left off, actually tried to draw a foul on the Colts by bumping into a Colts player on purpose and then whining to the ref. And to just to shine up their turd of a loss real nice, Flutie got sacked and made a turnover on the last play of the game.

I don't care if they have 3 Superbowl wins. They act like losers, so to my mind, they are.

To give one last example, the consistently beleaguered Detroit Lions came to Seattle in 2003 and took home a beating. However, QB Joey Harrington, in the 4th quarter with no way of winning the game, was still skipping the huddle and calling audibles at the line as though the game were tied. That, sir, is sportsmanship.

Competitive sport is an unequaled opportunity for humans to practice grace under adversity, which is a salient lesson in our most troubled times. It is also an opportunity for the players to teach the spectators that same lesson by example. If you fail on that score, you are squandering your chance to strengthen the human character. And that failure, dear Gregory, while short of being unforgivable, is pitiable indeed.

Cheers and give my best to Marie. Go Hawks.

Ossum.

The view from Obstruction Point in Olympic National Park is
AWESOME.

Greg:

So, you think you so smart, do ya? Well while you were out being a genius inventor, I was off changing the English language for the better. You probably hardly noticed this morning when you got up, but as the day wears on, you will begin to notice minute adjustments in the bearing and demeanor of your fellow earthlings. The chasm between Mulletards, Mediocretins, CorpoDrones, Full-On Stallions and Saints Who Walk The Earth has been closed forever. Why? Because I have cast a great penumbra of equality - a shroud of sameness, if you will - over the quick and the not-so-quick. How? Because I threw a new word into the vocab, and that word is OSSUM.

You may recall that as recently as yesterday that "awesome" was used as a blanket term for describing anything from the sublime (the Glory of the Lord's handiwork) to the mundane (fortuitously receiving 2 bags of Funyuns from a vending machine for one low price). Not any more, my friend. I have changed that forever. Hereafter, "awesome" will only be used to describe events, objects and circumstances such as The Buddha Himself, adorned with a crown pinnacle, seated on a lotus in the vajra posture simultaneously handing me a check for $2.5 million dollars (or its equivalent) and slapping me a high-five.


Josh Brown's game-winning field goal in the last second
of the game was OSSUM.

Likewise, events, objects and circumstances such as Seattle Seahawk Josh Brown's Cowboy-defeating field goal in the last second of the game a couple Sundays ago (and the set of {all other events etc. which are < or = That Glorious Moment} on a declining scale ending in the aforementioned Bonus Bag of Funyuns scenario) shall be referred to as OSSUM.

These two terms, when uttered, sound so uncannily similar, that no linguistic retraining is necessary. See how I did that? I reclaimed one great word that has been consistently bent and beat to shit by adolescents and idiots alike, and in the process created a WHOLE NEW WORD! And this act of furtive brilliance was so effective that people don't even know they're doin' it. They're just doin' it! Howya like me now, mister smarty-pants inventor?

Here's the best part. It's already happening. I've done it already. It has taken effect. The language has been incontrovertibly changed. Go outside. Go downtown. Go to a casino. See that guy who just found a coupon on the sidewalk for a FREE side of baked, mashed or fried with his greasy-ass John Ascuaga's Nugget-tastic prime rib? That man is going to use my word!!


The fact that you are a genius but also bear and astounding
resemblance to this man (and I, thankfully, do not) is
OSSUM beyond belief.

So here's a little challenge for ya. Let's see if you can use this term correctly for the following scenario:

I recently got a thorough going-over by three different health professionals: a general practitioner, a sports medicine specialist, and a physical therapist. I got checked from stem to stern with the notable exception that I declined a prostate exam on the grounds that anyone who wanted to be that intimate with me should at least buy me some flowers first. So the consensus was that I'm in very good if not excellent health for my age, with the single exception being that on the push-ups portion of the fitness exam, I scored in the "Total Pussy" category. (I'm working on that with rotator cuff exercises. By comparison, I was off the chart on sit-ups, knocking out 57 in one minute. Top of the chart was 35.) All of this was combined with an actuarial exam that put my life expectancy at 102. That's right. I'm expected to go one hundred and two freakin' years before I cack. (Man do I have a lot of time to watch TV.) And I have low cholesterol, my flexibility is way above average thanks to yoga, and my resting heart rate rivals a sleeping bear.

So, dear brother, would you describe that news as "awesome" or "OSSUM"? Send in your answer now.

Cheers, and give my best to Marie.

Screw My Birthday Already, Okay?

Greg:

I hear tell that the Jehovah's Witnesses don't celebrate birthdays. I'm thinking about becoming a Jehovah's Witness for exactly one day per year: June 27th. I hate my birthday for a myriad reasons, none of which is that I'm getting older. Quite frankly, one thing that I'm truly looking forward to is the day that I'm old enough not to give a rat's ass about anything except whether my oatmeal was hot enough or whether my pansies are blooming. I suppose that it's the proximity of death that makes me imagine that I should be that carefree at an advanced age, and am currently never-minding the fact that I'm probably looking right down the barrels of death every day just like everyone else is. Nevertheless, aging doesn't bother me. Birthdays - actually just my birthday - bothers me.

I was sounding off to my friend Matt about it because he's a big birthday-phobe as well. He hates the fact that it's a day for people to recognize you for no particular reason. He feels, as I do, that you should have done something worthy of recognition in order to be celebrated. The ironic thing is that both of us only feel that way about our own birthday, and not about the birthdays of others. Frankly, attention makes me uncomfortable. Not all attention, mind you, or I wouldn't be writing this to you on what amounts to a giant electronic graffiti wall where everyone can read it. Just that "birthday" kind of attention. Can't quite put my finger on it.

And then the author skips a groove -

But what I was saying about a blog-and-a-half ago, about artists and writers being necessarily nutso-ballo - here is the deal. I realized the other day that rumination is at the heart of every serious mental illness (disregarding those caused by brain malfunction, such as the schizophrenias). And when it comes to rumination, who has it in spades? You got it. Artists and writers. Both types must be able to seize upon an idea and not let it go, turning it over and over in the lathe of the mind until it becomes something meaningful that can be then transferred to another medium. That still does not mean that artists and writers are by necessity going to be nuts. It just means that rumination is a very potent thing, and must be harnessed in order to be used as a tool. Otherwise it can just run rampant and cause all sorts of fun things, like anxiety disorders and bipolarity. Rumination is also kin to obsession, which in small doses can go a long way to driving the "work" part of the creative process. I read today that artists and writers have to be both anal expulsive in order to free their creative process, and anal retentive in order to be able to finish things. That sounds to me like the perfect mental environment for someone who'd like to drive themselves totally nertz, but it does sound true enough given my experience.

And then the author skips back -

Okay, so there's the other thing about birthdays, which is that we all like to be reminded that we are loved or at least thought of fondly, and in the absence of that happening the rest of the year, we formalize an occasion to take care of that basic human need. It is ever so nice to be remembered on one's birthday, and such a drag when one is not. Maybe my big damn hangup is that I didn't have a ninth birthday and I just can't get over it. The day just went by unnoticed. It's very difficult for a child to articulate that he needs to be told that he's loved and appreciated when that's not something that is done. You don't just go around to people and say, "Hey, I'm feeling a little insecure and need to know that I'm liked. Could you throw me a birthday party?"

So what's the cure? Given that I can't go back and give myself a ninth birthday party, nor can I ask anyone to throw me one, the only answer is this: to overcome the need for that kind of validation - to feel okay without it. That's what maturing and being mentally well is after all, isn't it? It's the difference between wanting recognition, which is perfectly healthy, and needing recognition in order to function, which is neurotic. There has to be a way to accomplish that sort of mental self-sufficiency, even considering my history with birthdays. I suppose I should get about figuring out how it's done.

That's good. Now I have something to do, rather than something to ruminate on.

Cheers, and give my best to Marie.

In The Mosh Pit With The Dalai Lama

Why is this man smiling? Click on his nose to find out!

Greg:

I can promise you that this epistle will be short, disjointed, and altogether unsatisfying. (Funny, but that's the same way I used to preface evenings out with certain women.) The reasons for this are three in number: 1)A lot has happened since I last wrote, 2) I have a cold and am high on cold drugs, which is as high as I've been since I quit drinking five years ago, and finally 3) I have a cold and am high on cold drugs, which is as high as I've been since I quit drinking five years ago. Now then:

So, yeah, went to Tucson to see His Holiness the XIVth Dalai Lama at the TCC Arena last weekend. Weezer opened for him. I kid! Actually, it was something far cooler than Weezer. The chiefs of the Yuma tribe led the prayer to the four directions in thier native tongue. It is difficult as a writer to convey the awesome fullness and magnitude of such a simple yet ancient ritual, even when it's being recreated on stage in a thoroughly modern venue. So let's do it this way. Pretend that we're talking and I just said, "I said a prayer to the four directions with the Yuma chiefs", and then hear the sound of my voice die out, and listen to the silence that follows for a full fifteen minutes. That's about the best I can do.

The Dalai Lama, on the other hand, was not so much about reverence as light-heartedness, even to the point where I thought he might break into a vaudeville number. The guy was cutting it up practically the whole time. The highlights: A fly landed on his glasses during his talk, prompting him to start riffing on how bad he must smell because, well, he's a simple monk and he only has the one set of robes that he's been wearing for the past seven days. Later he acted out a story of a time when he was with a religious leader from Africa who got so cold during the conference that he passed out. His Holiness acted out the entire event, including wrapping his own robes around his head like a babushka.

So in short, it was a howling good time. But before the event started, as I was sitting in the mostly-empty arena, I had a strange sort of emotional experience, which I suppose one is wont to do when going on religious pilgramages such as these. I was sitting there in the cool, dark quiet, looking up at an enormous projection of a thangka of Avelokiteshvara, the Buddha of compassion, and I was suddenly filled with an incredible feeling of gratitude. The strange thing is, that it was gratitude for everything that had happened in my life, good or bad. It suddenly made me understand something that I've often said, which is that the events in your life don't matter, it's how you feel about them that determines your quality of life. And along with that, the sum of the quality of your life isn't determined by what happened to you while you were alive, it is how you felt about it and in turn how you acted on those feelings.

I've believed for some time that I could improve the quality of my life by moderating my interpretation of events, chiefly by getting rid of predilection to label them "good" or "bad". (AndI'm talking about events that concern me directly, and not world events which I have no control over. Gotta start somewhere, so why not in my own back yard?) Anwyay, not that I'm up for lama-hood or anything, but it reminds me of a bio of a lama that I read about who spent ten years in a cave and ate nothing but nettles. He knew he was "getting it" so to speak when he took a header out the doorway one day and banged his noggin on a rock, and instead of being caught up in the physical pain, was suddenly grateful for that opportunity for enlightenment. Incidentally, this lama sat two seats over from me when I went to see the Dalai Lama in San Francisco a couple of years back. I had no idea whatsoever to say to him after "namaste", because hey, what the hell do you say to someone like that? "How's that enlightenment thing working out for you? Got any good nettle recipes?"

So yeah, that was it. For a brief moment I got to see my entire past - which up to that point I had viewed as something to recover from - as a gift and an opportunity. I'm hoping that's something I'll be able to put to good use from here forward.

I suppose I could write more about it but I'm not gonna right now. I'm going to view my head cold as a wonderful opportunity to get a short preview of mahat samadhi through taking a wee nap.

Cheers, and give my best to Marie.

-Thaddeus

I Am Little More Than A Jodhpur-Clad Bourgeoisie Horsefucker

North Face fleece vest and convertible pants: $175.
Salomon trail running shoes: $140.
Ex Officio vented quick-dry high-performance cargo shirt: $95.
Coming face-to-face with what a prejudiced
bourgeoisie asshole I am: Priceless.

Greg:

Quick refresher. Two things about me:

1. I am a terrible Buddhist. I totally suck at it. Therefore, I'm coming back as a flea bite.
2. I am also a charlatan, a ruse of a man, a hypocrite; and now a peasant-baiting, tea-sipping, fox-hunting, jodhpur-wearing horsefucker. To wit:

Have you ever been to Forks, Washington? In a word, depressing. Hardcore poverty in the middle of a rain forest, so not only are these poor people broke as shit, they're growing algae on their backs to boot. Forks is a logging community that may have boomed at one time or other, but you'd be hard-pressed to find any vestiges of that now. How I wound up in Forks is a tune that goes a little something like this:

So you know me and hiking. I hike, like, all to hell. One place that I've wanted to hike all summer is the Olympic National Forest beaches. Olympic National Park has like a beejillion miles of beach that stretches from Cape Cornhatch (not its real name - I've forgotten what the "real" name is) on the Northwesternmost tip of Washington State, all the way south to This-Is-Where-Kurt-Cobain-Was-Born (again, not its "real" name, and yeah, probably not that far south). There are only a couple points of ingress in that whole stretch, and those are many, many miles apart. So suffice it to say, I was all over hiking the coast. So I calls me the Triple A, I does, and has 'em set me up with the closest hotel to the beach that had any "star" rating at all, and they sent me to the Forks Motel.

After a ferry ride and a couple hours of semi-circumnavigating Olympic National Park, we pulled in to Forks just as pestilentially-dark clouds rolled in and began to threaten rain. All of this served to make the town look slightly shit-holier than it probably is on a nice sunny day...which are probably few and far between on the wet side of the peninsula. Here's a thumbnail. Every single vehicle in the town - none of which is less than ten years old or fewer holes than a Gypsy Cab - has a lift kit and knobbies. There is no form of public entertainment, not even a movie theater. The liquor store prides itself on its display of high-power rifle ammunition. I presumed from all of this that the local pastimes must be four-bying and teen pregnancy. I could be right. And then there was our hotel room, which turned out to be an exploration of new horizons in mustiness. We got a couple of scented candles which did a pretty valiant job of holding the stank at bay, but even they eventually subsumed to the dankness.

Okay, so, now I'm both needing dinner and dreading what it might be, and The In Place which is right across the street from the motel (which I've now christened The Under Arms for all its olfactory offense) has been recommended by the staff as a safe place. And they're pretty sure it's been a year or two since anyone contracted ptomaine from the navy beans. I kid, of course. But we head on over, grab a seat, and are greeted by water glasses embossed with greasy handprints. Nice.

So let me cut to the chase. The food was all "home made" (viz., not canned off-premises in some factory). The potato salad was outstanding, the pie even moreso. The waitress, indeed, all of the townsfolk that we encountered were genuinely friendly to the point that my urban paranoia was raised to methamphetaminic levels. The people of Forks - at least, all the ones that I met - were not just cheery, but genuine and unpretentious despite being poor as hell and (gathering from their appearances) subsisting on an entirely iron-free diet. It's this sort of thing that leads to the ill-conceived notion that poverty is somehow ennobling. If that were true, the year or so that I spent living in my '74 Ford Maverick should make me a Poet King. However, I am not. I am a elitist, snobberiffic horsefucker and my prejudice against the logger families of Forks is almost criminal in its magnitude. There I sat, in logo-emblazoned gear from Salamon to The North Face, the purchase price of which could feed a logger family for a fortnight at least (hell, my freakin' briefs cost $40), and having the temerity to entertain condescending thoughts about the maitre d' because he's wearing heavy duty logging braces and a torn-to-shit flannel shirt that looks like somebody planted M-80s in the elbows. And this most telling feature - his suspenders were frayed at about the height of his solar plexus. How else do you wear out suspenders in the middle other than wrestling fir logs, fer crissakes? So in short, this guy does not one but two honest day's work per day, whereas I sit in a comfy office and write junk email - a task which would never promote the growth of a single callous on anyone, no matter how earnestly they pursued it.

So all of this served as a lesson to me that no matter how much I sit on my well-cushioned ass and practice chenrezig, I still get smacked upside the head with my own prejudice. It is a humbling thing to find out that no matter how much I try to reconstruct myself, I still keep running into who I am. I guess the metric of progress is that I really am shocked by how much of what I once found repellent in others I now find quite easily in myself.

Cheers, and give my best to Marie.

The Mud Shoe Diaries: Mile One Hundred Nine

Rachel Lake is somewhere on the other side of this forbidding wall
of granite. Wiener dogs, beware!

Greg:

While you were indoors this weekend slaving over your hot brain, I was outdoors in the high pineys clocking my one hundred ninth mile this season on USFS Trail #1313 to Rachel Lake.

Yes, it's a repeat. And you can probably remember what happened the last time I went. No such deluge or aquatic cataclysm this time, just blue skies, hot sun and the fragrant north woods. And a shitload of dogs. And some rednecks. And some weed-huffing adolescents. But I digress.

So I know how I've commented in the past on how a trail can be judged by how many Fat Grammas and Wiener Dogs you meet along the way, and this one was no different. There was not wiener dog 1 anywhere on the 3 miles of trail up Box Canyon, nor were there wiener dogs on the "cruelest mile" - the mile-and-some of gullies and snags that you have to scramble to make it to the alpine basin, 1,500 or so feet straight up from the canyon. Indeed, I would expect that a wiener dog stout enough to endure the "cruelest mile" might have tree-frog digits spliced to it...or have compound eyes or the like. So I was pretty convinced that I would encounter neither Grammas comma Fat nor Dogs comma Wiener once I made it to the lake.

Imagine my surprise when I made it to the lake and encountered Wiener Dog Turbo Mark V with Fat Gramma in tow, basking on the shore. Let me tell you first that this hike was strenuous enough to make me lose 3 pounds (this is not a lie) during the trip, so seeing the two of them was both a shock and a mystery. Now I don't wonder that the dog made it because it was actually one of those Wiener/Jack Russell mixes, which means it's a wiener dog with a lift kit. It is a strange mixture, a wiener dog with monster truck ground clearance. And I don't wonder that the third member of the party, the fellah who ostensibly invented the Man-Teat, made it. But short of a drop from Sikorsky Sky Crane, I have no idea how the Fat Gramma in question hefted her bulk up the side of that canyon and on to the lake shore. Perhaps Rachel Lake is one of those mysterious bodies of water like McElligot's Pool, and she made her way there through a subterranean aqueduct. I did not check her for gills. Perhaps I should have.

On the way back I tripped on a snag, turned my ankle, went headfirstforemostassoverteakettle, skinned my knees and bruised my shirt. I'm okay, though. It just made me realize that I had gone a very long time without skinning my knees, perhaps since I was a kid. Which then made me wonder what I had been doing all this time that could be more important than placing myself square in danger of skinning my knees.

I'm looking forward to mile two hundred eighteen. Man it's great to be a kid again.

Cheers, and give my best to Marie.

Best Damn Mac And Cheese In The Entire Freakin' Universe. Or So They Tell Me.

Not for the faint of heart.

Greg:

Teresa's birthday was yesterday, so I whipped up her favorite dish, which is of course my famous three-cheese Mac and Cheese. Since it was received with such laud and honor (the present company demanded that I crown it with a laurel wreath), I've decided to do something that I almost never do, which is publish one of my personal recipes.

I fully understand that doing so may get me in Dutch with the FDA or the AMA or one of those other agencies that try to safeguard some of our less-than-mentally-adroit citizens from expiring due to their own dietary negligence and misadventure, viz., eating D-cell batteries and the like. The fat content of this dish is alone enough to cause even the stoutest heart among us to seize up and shudder to a stop, the sodium content notwithstanding. That said, by way of illustration, a small-enough dose of strychnine will cause nothing more than ennui, so why not have just a little taste and leave the worrying to the eggheads? So here you go. Indulge. Just do so with the caveat that a serving of this dish no larger than a baby's fist is probably more than enough to kill you. Bon apetit!!

THREE-CHEESE MAC AND CHEESE

INGREDIENTS:

1 pound dry elbow macaroni

8 tablespoons butter
1/4 cup + 2 tablespoons flour
4 cups whole milk

Salt to taste (more than a pinch, less than a fistful)
Black pepper to taste (more than a pinch, less than the GNP of Indonesia)
1-1/2 teaspoons dry mustard
1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper
About yay-much paprika

8 ounces shredded extra-sharp cheddar cheese
4 ounces shredded Jack cheese
1/4 cup shredded Parmesan cheese

Panko breading - enough to cover your ass with
Diced garlic - enough to please the gods
More Parmesan
More paprika

DIRECTIONS:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. If you have some beer, drink one. Put on a Taj Mahal album. Start some water boiling in the biggest damn pot you have.

Now - melt the butter in a 4-quart saucepan over medium heat. Whisk in the flour to make a roux. Let the roux get brown if you're feeling that adventurous. Pour in the milk and continue whisking like an absolute madman so that it doesn't scorch or stick to the pan. Sooner or later it will thicken to a creamy consistency, or it just might not just to piss you off. If it does boil, it'll sputter like a mud-filled caldera and blister your forearms if you're not careful. If it does not boil, but thickens up nice anyway, then immediately whisk in the salt, pepper, cayenne pepper, mustard and paprika.

Take the dry macaroni and throw it in the boiling water. Now go back to the roux. Reduce the heat and stir in all the cheeses. Keep stirring until you have an ubelievably awesome cheese sauce. Turn off the burner. When the macaroni is just shy of al dente, drain it and rinse it with cold water.

Remember the cheese sauce? Okay, now meld the mamcaroni and the cheese sauce in the big damn pot, the one you used to boil the macaroni. Once melded, pour it all into a well-buttered casserole dish. Sprinkle the top with the diced garlic, panko breading, and additional parmesan cheese. I will not hold it against you if you also add more salt and/or paprika, or actually go completely nuts and saute the breading in butter with cayenne pepper and garlic before sprinkling it on top. Dowhatchalike.

Place the whole damn thing (which should weigh about as much as a Holstein calf by now) on the center rack of the oven and let it bake for 30-45 minutes, or until bubbling.

EAT!!

Cheers, and give my best to Marie.

Some People Will Eat Anything

...because calling it "Speckled Cock" would've been way too offensive.

Greg:

Yes, I haven't blogged in a while but I'm sure you haven't noticed other than I haven't done a lick of the work you sent my way. Here's the deal:

As you know, I "took the blue pill" and became a permanent employee of RealNetworks. After four rounds of negotiation, they gave me exactly what I asked for in the first place. In short, I'm happy. They also gave me an office that's big enough to park Shamu in. I'm sure it was available because it's out of the way, which makes it exactly perfect for me. The less I get bugged by humans, the happier I am. And the more productive I am to boot.

Speaking of productive, I've been doing another experiment on my brain, one which should interest you because it's aural. I heard tell of this Emmy-winning sound recordist named Gordon Hempton who is on a mission to preserve natural silence. Come to find out, Olympic National Park is - or at least was - one of the quietest places in the US. Hempton went and did some recording at a spot in the Hoh Rain Forest that is apparently so quiet, that you can hear a butterfly beting its wings. (Yeah. I know. Daaaaaaaaaammn.) Must be the Dr.Seussian amounts of moss in there. So anyway, what I did was put together a 20+ hour Rhapsody playlist of nothing but Gordon Hempton "jams" which are comprised from the natural sounds from various locations around the world. I let this roll in the background all damn day long, and strangely enough, I am far more productive and focused than I ever was. Now this may also be due to the fact that I have an actual office with walls and stuff, and there's not somebody babbling incoherently in work-induced psychosis mere inches from my desk, but I really do believe that I'm on to something with this "natural sound" and productivity thing. Plus, it's just fun to meet with people and have 15 minutes go by before they realize that they're hearing crickets in the hot and hissing plains of Kansas with the sound of an approaching thunderstorm in the background.

Okay, so there's that - I've been spacing off to natural sounds in my office. And then there's like other work and stuff, like finishing off things that I had promised to clients before I dutifully got the chip and became a corporate cyberzealot. So yeah, all that, and then hiking every weekend as though the warranty on my legs was about to expire any minute.

Speaking of which, last weekend I went to the Scottish Highland Games and went hiking on Mount Rainier in the same day. Am I hardcore? Mais oui! The games were incredible as always, although I believe this may have been the first time I attended them as a vegetarian. As the day wore on, the realization slowly dawned on me that Scotland is a country made entirely of meat...and stones, come to think of it...and that I would be hard pressed to find anything to eat that didn't once have a face and a beating heart. But then - aha! - I happened upon what the fry-merchants were calling "tatties", which were certainly not like the tatties and neeps that I make (to much laud and honor, I must say), but were exactly like ale-battered french fries. Before your curl your snout with disgust, let me say this: they were damn good! They were like Scottish manna. I suppose I could bring the recipe back here to Chinatown and hawk it as tattie tempura. But yes, good, and did not leave me with that "Christ, I swear the Exxon Valdez just ran ashore in my duodenum" feeling. As for the rest of the games, there were the requisite wee doggies and bonnie wee cows and yes, the 1,000 pipes and drums (no exaggeration, I actually counted) that took the field at noon, roaring like a Pratt & Whitney turbojet with a herd of cats caught in it. And then there was our dear Secretary of State of the State of Washington, Ralph Munro, who is also the Chief of the Clan Munro, delightfully shit-pied as per usual and on the mic in front of 25,000 Scots. (He may not have been actually shit-pied. He may suffer from a speech impediment brought on by too much wool.) And of course men the size of beef cattle throwing telephone poles. All of this is my idea of a very good time.


But here's the funny part: Elizabeth happened upon a can of something called "Spotted Dick" at a grocer called the British Pantry that had a booth at the Highland Games. It was obvious at first glance that it had to be purchased, if only for the comedy mileage. I mean, c'mon, it sounds like something you'd treat with amoxycillin. Even the grocer couldn't say the name of the product without sputtering with laughter. Now here's the kicker. It's really good! It's some kind of cake-in-a-can. Kinda like Boston Brown Bread. Remember that stuff? That awesome molasses and raisin bread that came in a can? And we always took it camping with us? Okay, so this is like that, only not as heavy or dark. I highly recommend it, although I wouldn't follow the preparation directions on the can. They say you should microwave it for 2 whole minutes, which in my opinion would render it radioactive. Thirty seconds to a minute should be just fine. Throw some hard sauce on there and you're pimpin', Limey style. You can purchase it here.

And then, yes, a very nice hike at Mount Rainier from the Sunrise Visitor center just down to Sunrise Lake, which is not a long ways, but at 6-thousand-some feet is still enough to get a person winded. And then I hiked the same trail this past weekend, only this time I took it 4 miles out to Upper Palisades Lake, which is gorgeous beyond belief, and actually got to speak to a Park Ranger in his natural habitat, and photographed The World's Fattest Marmot. I'll cover all of that in an upcoming edition of The Mud Shoe Diaries.

Okay, now I have to get back to all that work that I told you about, the work that has thus far prevented me from doing any of that other work that I was supposed to do for you, which I swear I will get to shortly.

Cheers, and give my best to Marie.