1) woody allen. I have always hated woody allen movies. I can’t fucking stand them. Little irritating man whining and moaning and navel gazing over and over and over. Also, casting the women he did to play his love interests….yeah, right. hate hate hate. I don’t even care about the step daughter thing. weird, but not surprising.
2) conspiracy theorists. I hate conspiracy theorists because the the narcissism inherent in their theories. CTs come in two nutty flavors. The first is the kind that has lots of opinions and occasionally hints that if he’s not careful about what he says, the secret government agencies will assassinate him. okay first, your friends don’t think your cool because you have this secret ‘information’ that could get you assassinated, they think you’re a dork and secondly, the government has its head so far up its ass it’s completely incapable of having organizations that are that secret and efficient. If they had those secret, efficient organizations, we’d rid ourselves of terrorists, drug dealers, illegal immigrants, people who boat without a license and so on. Do you think that secret government agents are really interested in some dude in a cheap suburban subdivision? The second CT is the one that really pisses me off. These are the armchair experts. These are the people who know that the WTC didn’t fall down from the plane, but it was packed with explosives. These are the people who know why the bridge fell in minneapolis last month. These are the people that look at the aftermath of a situation from the comfort of their stinky la-z-boys and instantly they can see the evidence! Wow! It’s amazing to me that you could figure this out from your living room! You have no formal education in engineering or anything and yet from the photos and news footage YOU can see what the trained structural engineers cannot! Why waste your time in front of the Zenith, your country needs you. Go! Go on now, you could save the government billions of dollars in research money to figure out the causes of surprise catastrophes. All that saved money could be funneled into a secret government agency that could be contracted to kill your neighbor, the one who knows too much.
All things considered, my favorite WTC conspiracy has to do will all the hidden gold under the foundation. I imagine them planning the building and constructing it and when it’s all done they’re like “ho shit! we forgot to put a door in there. Fuck, how are we going to get our gold?”
“dude, you can’t just build a door now, if you want your gold you are going to have to knock the building down”
“knock the building down? hey, i know this guy that works for this secret government agency…”
Oh also, I like the dude that built a little tower out of chicken wire and put bricks on top. He doused in gasoline and started it on fire. it didn’t fall down. Proof that planes could not knock down the towers! oh yeah? well I took a bat and went to my neighbor’s house and beat the shit out of their stucco and they called the cops! See you can’t bake a cake in an oven! I just proved it.
(I really really hate conspiracy theorists)
3) snotty knitters
4a) people who bring their little kids and toddlers to the dog park and get all upset when the kid gets knocked down by a running dog or something. It’s a dog park, not a kid park. It’s the one place where dogs can run like hell and be boisterous and jump around. I’m not talking about out of control dogs, I firmly believe that your dog should be under voice control at all times, but the dogs act crazy and sometimes don’t notice the little kid stumbling around. Hell, sometimes they don’t notice the big people either, it’s not uncommon to have some lopey dog hauling ass after another and miscalculate a turn and crash into you.
4b) people who do not control their dogs at the dog park. I don’t mean the little scuffles for dominance or whatnot, those are natural and important in the dog world. To get involved in dog politics means that you are forcing yourself into a situation you don’t understand and you are not welcome by the dogs. Often, you end up messing things up worse. I mean the excessively aggressive dogs, the ones that are poorly socialized and attack other dogs, the ones that don’t understand or ignore that another dog is saying “fuck off” with his snarl. They’re a goddammed pain. Also, please teach your dog not to jump on people. I don’t need giant dirty paw prints on my shirt. As an aside, it is important to know that when you meet a dog for the first time you do not, DO NOT, immediately put your hand on top of their head to pet them. I know it seems natural to humans to do that, but to a dog you are clearly saying “I’m the boss of you now” and the is going to say “what the fuck, dilly, I have a pack, I didn’t join your pack! you are not the boss of me”. Instead, extend your hand out and allow the dog to come forward and sniff it first. This is you saying, “hello, how are you, my name is specific scent” and a dog will say “AWESOME” or “Meh, i thought you would smell like butt, im outta here”.
International Vet of Mystery?
Or International Vet of Fucking Awesome!
A couple months ago I took Maddie in to see the IVoM and we came up with Maddie’s long term plan. David and I worked vigilantly on her feet and her meds and she very very quickly improved.
We know that she cannot take less than 1 prednisone a day. Each time we tried to ease it back her feet would become inflamed and uncomfortable. I am concerned about the long term effects, but I understand and accept them.
When Maddie’s feet were at their worst we could not let her off her leash at the dog park. She was always picking fights with bigger dogs, she was always cranky. Eventually we stopped taking her altogether. The pain and discomfort in her feet was making her cranky and irritable. You’d be pissed if your feet hurt all the time too and you had to way of getting relief.
As her feet got better we started taking her more and more often and we let her off the leash. Amazingly, she was not the aggressive dog she had been. This is not to say she didn’t have her moments there, like the time she totally stared down this giant akita until he submitted. In the dog world, a stare down is pretty much a dog’s way of saying “you are such a stupid pussy! you suck and you are a wiener and also I will say something crude about your mother dog!” (dogs are not so eloquent, even in translation). Also, akitas are not dogs that submit. Imagine me rushing over trying to grab Maddie before she got her ass kicked.
Initially, Maddie’s forays into the dog park pretty much just involved her franticly sniffing and drooling and peeing on everything. She wasn’t really interested in the dogs unless they chased chester or barked too much. She’s become more and more interested as time has gone on.
Today I could have died of happy. Maddie was thrilled to be at the dog park. Today she played with dogs, she ran like a maniac, she spun in circles, she and I jumped around like retards. She’s still not the best at playing, occasionally she’ll be chasing a dog and forget that she’s playing and think “oh my god! I’m chasing this dog! I bet I’m doing it because he’s a pipehole” and try to take him down. But it was good. The dogs played, she was happy.
I wish I had the words to describe her transformation from a crabby dog, one that mostly just walked around the dog park, into this excited and youthful dog. I wish I had the words to express what it means to me that we have found a level of success with Maddie. I’ve had her since 2005 and my only hope for her was to make her happy and comfortable and we far exceeded that.
I wish I had the words to adequately express just how grateful I am to Dr Pierce Fleming, International Vet of Mystery. He didn’t just walk into the exam room, take a look and make a guess. He did research, he tried to find answers. He took time to listen to me and my concerns. He explained things thoroughly and he gave me hope.
Shar Peis tend to bond with one person and that bond is solid and tight. They will protect that person at all costs, they will adore that person at all costs. The things that make Maddie the happiest include me coming home from work, getting to cuddle next to me on the sofa and sleeping near me. She is not an independent dog in any way, she needs me in order to feel secure and content. Sure, she’s happy when David gets home from work, but she is frenzied when I get home. For that love and loyalty she deserves everything I can give her. To do any less would be a grave sin against all that is good in the universe.
And let’s be honest here, I get equal comfort from her. When I am stressed or anxious I need only sit quietly and Maddie will crawl onto my lap and I can feel the tension ease, I can feel the endorphins being released. She is my therapy dog.
Maddie shoving her hippo head into my chest. It’s her way of saying, “My name is Maddie. This is my head. My head is on you. This feels good. Also, my name is Maddie!”
happy happy happy
oh my god! It’s the happiest game ever! Go there and play a happy game and smile.
Try all the Orisinal Games. All of them are super cute, some are more frustrating than others. It’s the thing to do when Ravelry is going oh so super slow!
It’s a good stress reliever! Today I finished most of the first sleeve on my cardigan and I tried it on and OH! I overestimated how fat my arm was. PZANG! Had to pull out the entire sleeve and then close the armhole a little and then recalculate the decreases! I probably won’t have it done by tomorrow and I can’t start any new projects until I finish a project.
I also started to make a loaf of molasses oat bread and didn’t stop to check if I had any molasses left. Molasses is something you never buy, it’s just always up there in the cupboard, it’s label aging away. I actually have to buy molasses on occasion since I like to make the molasses oat bread. I subbed brown sugar. Also added wheat germ and flax seed to give it a hippie feel. Ate it with the homemade wild blue buddy berry blueberry jam (made from the blueberries I picked in the BWCA. It’s really awesome. No, you can’t have any. I’m just telling you about it because I’m an asshole.).
Also, you know what’s good on everything (except fruit, ironically)? Tajin!
smartgarlic
I’m not sure that writing about a restaurant while the food is burbling around in your gut is the fairest thing to do, but it’s 8am and I can’t sleep and Ravelry has forgotten to wake up the dancing clowns for my amusement.
La Grolla
La Grolla is one of those places where the super awesomeness is so evenly matched with its super unawesomeness that you’re just not sure what to tell people. Yeah, the food was good…but
A big hit in its favor is that they are open until 11pm. Half the time, David and I don’t even think about food until later in the evening, then it’s a 12 day marathon of “where do you want to go?” “I don’t know, where do you want to go?” “i don’t know, where have we eaten lately that we liked?” “I don’t know, let’s go somewhere new.” “like where?” “I don’t know what do you think” “I don’t know, what do you think?”
In a more perfect world people like this would die of starvation before they had a chance to breed. Lucky for us, humans don’t cull the weak or the sick, they accommodate them with later serving hours.
After all our digging around, La Grolla won out simply because it was open and it got a good review from Dara Moskowitz. Oh Dara….I’m losing faith in you.
It definitely had that “cozy little italian place” going on, without having to resort to strands of garlic bulbs on the walls and fake salamis and cheeses hanging over the kitchen. Unfortunately, when I think ‘cozy’ I don’t think ‘300 watt lightbulb 12 inches from my head trying to burn a hole through my vitreous humor”. Turn down the lights a bit! I’m not saying dark and moody, just…less intense.
The waiter was nice he had his “flirt with the girl just a little but not too much while still talking up the guy” patter down. The menu was diverse with your old time italian standards, a good number of italian dishes you don’t often see in your average italian place and then a few surprises here and there. The wine list was packed and varied, maybe a little too packed. Unfortunately, the mark up on the wine was obscene. Obviously there’s mark up on a bottle, that’s expected and accepted, but $8-9 bottles going for $30, $42 and even $50 was a bit much. These are good wines, these gems of the $10 and under world, but a mark up like that is…ugly.
The calamari came highly recommended to we ordered that and a salad of belgian endive, hearts of palm, fresh fennel and pecorino in a lemon vinaigrette. I loved the calamari, very light with a crisp puff and tender tender squid. The arrabiata sauce that accompanied had a fresh, almost undercooked flavor. I enjoyed the calamari, but I think David was somewhat unimpressed. The salad was consistently all one color (off white) but for the single radicchio leaf garnish. The salad was very light and crisp, the kind of thing you’d want to eat on a very hot summer evening just as the sun was going down. All of the ingredients worked well, but they just didn’t ‘POP’. It was missing one thing, but I’m not sure what that would have been, maybe orange vinaigrette, maybe candied pecans? I don’t know. We’ll place this salad in the “tasty but not memorable category”
We chose the Bonny Doon Sirah to go with dinner. I thought it went well, but was probably a tad heavy. It was perfect for the arrabiata sauce with the calamari.
David ordered the rigatoni alla matriciana. I only had one bite of his, but compared to what I ordered, I was not interested. I had the tagliatelle alla bolognese and I wanted to sit there all night slowly eating bite after bite. This was the perfect bolognese, not just some red sauce with meat. This was slow cooked, flavorful and almost creamy. I wanted to slam my face into the bowl and scream filthy things at my pasta, but perhaps it was the wine.
The problem with pasta dishes is that they are so hit or miss. I know never to order stuffed pasta as you with only get a few raviolis or manicotti artfully arranged to seem like more. Sometimes you get a dense bowl stuffed with pasta or sometimes you get what David got and end up joining the clean plate club a good 15 minutes before your partner. Poor guy, he had to sit there watching me eat all that and I was not exactly offering it up to share. No, this tagliatelle alla bolognese is MY DIRTY GIRL!!!!!!
also, there was a drunk guy at a table near us trying to not be obvious about the sexual references he was making but he was too drunk o realize that BJ isn’t a sly code word that no one knows, especially when he yells “and there were no…BJs for him anymore!!”. Indeed, the rest of the area was thinking, ‘oh, poor guy, no more Ben and Jerry’s’ and not ‘dang, a blow job is like the easiest thing to ask for, if he’s not getting them then he must have really pissed her off’ (this is one of the myriad reasons why I cannot be a professional food critic, I talk about blow jobs). The table next to me was 2 couples living vicariously through their children. The polite and genteel oneupmanship regarding the professional lives and childhood achievements was the best argument for stealth sterilization that I’ve heard in a long time. Also, if you could make a career out of name dropping, the dude next to me would be the Steve Forbes of talking about other people who knew other people. But don’t forget these people, we’ll get back to them momentarily.
Dessert. Is there any sweeter word in a fat girl’s lexicon? I ordered the ‘tulip’ described as a cookie with mascarpone cream and fruit. The tulip was in fact a giant almond tuile formed into a bowl and filled with sweet mascarpone and fruit. Lovely. I wanted to order something small since I’d already consumed so much but here I was with another dish screaming for me to just stuff my face. David ordered the chocolate mousse and I was much impressed. definitely made fresh, by hand with very dark chocolate and not too much sugar. I had a bite of his then got mack to my cookie-bowl of love.
There was a slight mix up with the bills and we got to see what the vicarious parents were getting charged. 2 couples went to see a show and decided to go out after. One couple ate before the show and just ordered dessert. The other couple had not yet eaten and ordered entrees. When the entrees arrived one lady offered some of her chicken to the other lady to try. The other lady took some and tried it and said it was good. The waiter saw fit to hit them with the $3 split plate fee, a fee they slap on when you decide to get one entree for 2 people. I’m not a fan of this, but fine, you can say that you are charging for the extra work the kitchen has to do in dividing things on two plates and then the extra plate that has to be washed. In this case, they weren’t splitting the entree, there was some ‘trying’ going on. There was no extra plate, the kitchen did no extra work. The restaurant listed the fair price for this entree and a person ordered it and when it arrived at her table it was hers to do with as she pleased. a split plate fee for a meal that was not split is asinine.
When we finally got our bill it was definitely higher than expected (but with no hidden charges, thankfully). The food was good, the service was lovely, but none of it was worth what we paid last night. Even our dinner at Al Vento for my birthday was cheaper than this and it was the same sort of deal, salad, appetizer, two entrees, two desserts, bottle of wine. The food at La Grolla was definitely delicious, but Al Vento has them beat by a mile for flavor and complexity.
So, while the food was good they need to drop the price a bit, dim the lights and stop charging stupid fees because we all know that the profit margin on pasta is huge. I’d definitely go back, but only if someone else was paying.
This is the thing that is thing-like
It’s 6:30pm and I have only consumed one apple and one americano. This has left me a little cranky and a tad irritable. Of course, the obvious solution is to eat something, but you know….
Actually, I’ve been forgetting to eat more and more often lately. So far my pants show no visible benefit to this new regime of coffee, carrots and utter forgetfulness.
In other (ravelry) related news (otherwise known as ‘how I spent my money’)
I am 3/4 of the way done with the Spiderweb Cardigan. I’m loving it, but I am hating my inability to put together an non-retarded seam. I made it in a light lime green. Weird? I don’t know, we’ll see.
I’m also working on my first of too many Pirate Hats. Since the pattern is in graph form it was too easy to convert to crochet after finding the right gauge and all. It whips up fairly easily, unless you aren’t paying attention and forget that it’s TWO decreases per iteration and then you have to rip out the top when you realize that it just doesn’t seem to be closing up properly. Oh well, after the first one things always get better.
I picked up fiberfill so I could recommence with the weird dinosaur/prehistoric animal project. I found a pattern that would work perfectly for either an ammonite or orthocerus depending on how you finish it. Someone needs to have a nerd baby.
After my work on the pirate hats I decided that I could probably handle Fair Isle/Shetland/Norwegian patterns. I bought some wool yarn and I am going to make a felted purse using a repeated Norwegian chart. I cannot start that until I finish off a few things first.
I also picked up the yarn to do this pattern. I’m not sure why I like it so much (besides the fact that the pattern is dead easy). Everyone else gives me very guarded responses when i ask their opinions. I’ll make it. If you later see a horrid big cowl sweater in a heather rose color at the Goodwill, you know what happened.
I need to go add arms to my cardigan and pull out a row of the pirate hat.
ps I wrote this post with my T key popped off. I hate when it does that.
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