There was a time in my life where throwing up was as common as taking out the trash. Actually, it was probably more common, but I have to say that I didn’t mind it as much. And at the time, that really didn’t seem like an issue. If you carry gum “in case you puke”, something could be wrong. If you’ve made peace with the fact that throwing up is a common part of your day, something’s definitely wrong. At least, it was for me. But that was a long, long time ago.

As far as I’m concerned these days, if your body decides that you have to throw up, I think it should be for two, or maybe three reasons: 1.) To teach the body’s owner that debauchery has a price, 2.) To make the person disgusting enough when passed out that no one wants to put their balls on them and take pictures, or 3.) Possibly to punish the person for spinning around and around in circles one too many times. That’s it. Vomiting should not come on randomly like it did to me this week.

It all started when we went to visit #1GF!’s sister this weekend. Because I was heavily involved with the semi-annual maintenance on their family PC, my inquisitive brain parts were busy forming questions starting with “How the fuck…”, while my fix-it brain parts were spending a fair amount of energy pushing the inquisitive parts out of the way, so it could get the PC fixed. With all the pushing and shoving in there, I failed to take better stock of the fact that #1GF!’s normally energetic sister had suddenly climbed under a mountain of blankets and was not the least bit interested in dinner. Although I am a wiz at diagnosing PC issues, I admit to being less than skilled when it comes to humans.

Let’s fast forward 24 hours or so when I started getting nauseous. Because I get migraines all the time, nausea creeps up on me enough that I don’t take much stock in it. I grab a coke and something bready and wait for it to pass. What I didn’t seem to notice this time was the lack of headache that one would normally expect to accompany a migraine. Like a child that can’t seem to get the attention of a dismissive parent, my body changed tactics and replaced the nausea with a very large temperature drop.

The fact that I was dressed in a sweatshirt, sweatpants, and under two blankets and a quilt did not alarm me at all, probably because, as I said, I am merely a human who troubleshoots computers. If I were a human that could troubleshoot other humans, I may have reacted differently, but I was so relieved by the repeal of the nausea that I simply amused myself by jolting #1GF! with my ice cold feet until she fell asleep.

After spending hours trying to distract myself from the minor waves of nausea and the lack of heat within my thermal cocoon, I finally started drifting off to sleep after a Valium-like dose of a late-night PBS special on the topic of the construction of the Alaskan pipeline. Because I had never been so cold inside the house without running out of heating oil, some small part of my brain must’ve finally started to worry. Just as I was drifting off, I was jarred awake by the thought, “If you fall asleep, you might die.”

“I’m fine,” I thought. “I’m just cold and nauseous.”

Then, I started churning, “I’ve never been this cold. What if I got bitten by a spider when I was cleaning out the PC yesterday? What if this is some sort of reaction? I could drift off and never wake up.”

“This is irrational,” I thought, and started drifting off again. Just as I touched sleep, I was again jarred awake by a skull on a black background in the center of my vision. And there I was, awake, irrationally nervous, nauseus, and freezing in the dark. I figured that even if I was being irrational, it couldn’t be good that I was still so cold. The only way that I could think of to get warmer was to hop in a hot shower. I snuck out of bed and made my way through the black hallway to the bathroom.

When I closed the door and flicked the light switch, the sudden burst of bright light burned my eyes, as waves of nausea washed over me. I turned the shower handle as hot as it would go, and while waiting for it to warm up, I weighed the pros and cons of throwing up in every single receptacle in the room, just in case I was presented with an opportunity to choose. As soon as I reached into the shower and my fingers touched the falling water, my choice was made for me.

I dropped to my knees and heaved. My body stiffened, and the force only made it to my chest. “Fuck,” I groaned, “Fuck.” And then I tightened again as if every cell was trying to pry itself away from me.

And I threw up like I hadn’t done in years. By then, #1GF! was at the door and trying to get in, and I was waving her off. Whatever was in me, it wanted it out, and I wasn’t going to let anything distract me from letting it go.

And I threw up again. And again. And then, for a minute, it all stopped.

Despite being baptized with an icy sweat, it was the best I had felt all day.

After I collected myself a little, I showered, changed clothes, and tried to go back to bed. My temperature started to normalize, and I thought relief was on the way. Unfortunately, by now we all know my record on human diagnostics. As soon as I warmed up, the nausea came back. The warmer I got, the worse I felt. I would eventually have to wait for #1GF! to fall asleep before returning to the cold linoleum floor of the bathroom where, using my sweatshirt as a pillow, I would see only flurries of sleep. My subconscious would only wake me up once wondering whether I was having a heart attack because one of my arms had gotten caught under me and gone numb.

There was a time that sleeping on the bathroom floor was common, but that was a long, long time ago. And even though I can see the holes of mortality have worn through the invincible armor of my youth, I can’t say that I’d trade a moment of where I am now to mend them.

I was recently introduced to the joy that is dim sum. For those who have never been to a dim sum restaurant, it’s the absolute ultimate in eating for lazy people with short attention spans and zero patience. I cannot comprehend how it wasn’t invented by an American.

The way it works is, you get seated, and black and white people get forks in addition to their chopsticks. They’re put there in case you need them. Bitching about this will only slow down the process, and honestly, there just isn’t time. Within 2 minutes, the wait staff rolls carts full of bite size Chinese food to your table. Within 8 minutes, you have a table full of food that you have selected with a lot of pointing and nodding. And then the carts keep rolling through the restaurant in an endless convoy for you to grab food off of whenever you see something you like.

Unless you consistently wear sweatpants to restaurants (you know who you are), it is guaranteed that within 25 minutes, you’ll be toast. Your stomach will be bloated enough to make you loathe the thought of getting up and getting your ass back to work where you will sit for the rest of the afternoon sweating and trying not to fall asleep.

I’ve done this 3 times so far, and every time I end up feeling like a goldfish with unlimited access to the whole can of fish flakes. If humans lived in water, you’d be able to tell my dim sum days because I’d be floating upside down at my desk trying to keep my little fish eyes at least half open.

The reason for my overeating can be blamed on one simple problem:

Jon Dyer loves steamed buns.

I grew up in the Asian center of Southern Massachusetts, and I can’t believe that I have never been exposed to such a delight. I also can’t believe an American didn’t invent them. Americans love rolls, and they practically invented BBQ pork, yet a Chinese guy beat the Americans to baking the pork inside the roll by about 2,000 years.

It’s like a self-contained BBQ Pulled pork sandwich, no bigger than a White Castle hamburger. I know what all my American readers are thinking: HOW DO YOU TOP THAT? HOW? I’ll tell you how. Instead of baking the roll, you fucking steam it. Oh mama. Yea. Then, your roll is essentially a big, sweet marshmallow full of pulled pork. Can you get more American than that? No, you can’t. It makes me want to sing a fucking campfire song and hump a den mother at tractor pull while combing my mullet.

Yet, it’s totally Chinese. The perfect food was invented by the Chinese.

As there is always ying where there is yang, the perfect food must have it’s its nemesis. Balance must prevail. Even though I ate at least a tray of steamed buns, I also figured I’d go Joe Rogan this time and eat some Phoenix talons. In America, we call those chicken feet. In America, we also throw that shit away. You know when you get chicken wings, and there’s that useless part of the wing that’s pointy and full of nothing but bone and skin? Yea. Take that and boil it. That’s what chicken feet are like. They’re not Fear Factor gross, but they’re essentially devoid of meat. If an American had invented Dim Sum, I can guarantee that he would’ve replaced chicken feet with something a hell of a lot meatier.

I didn’t really understand the point of them with all the filling and delicious other foods flying by, but the lady at the next table was sucking them down as fast as I could get through the rolls. Then again, I don’t think that she is sitting at her computer a mere 10 hours after eating, still feeling bloated, floating at the top of her virtual tank with her eyes half open, like I am. She’s probably comfortably sleeping by now, like I wish I could.

Then again, a good night sleep, just ain’t worth eating chicken feet for.

I worked 40 hours in 4 days, then had a 3 day weekend on which I ripped 50 CDs, drove 2 hours to Maine to buy 2 pairs of socks, and had 3 people over. On Easter, we made 12 blueberry muffins, 2 quiches, 2 pounds of potatoes, 1 pound of bacon, and a tropical fruit salad.

Tropical Fruit Salad:

Chop into bite sized chunks and put into a big bowl:
4 kiwis
3 oranges
2 mangos
1 pineapple

Make the juice:
Thaw 1.5 cups of frozen strawberries and throw in a food processor with 1 tablespoon of sugar
Blend until you have a strawberry liquid

Put it all together:
On the bottom of a bowl put a few scoops of strawberry yogurt.
Cover with fruit
Drizzle strawberry juice on top

Grab your balls or talk about NASCAR before anyone accidentally calls you Brenda or Nancy.

Here’s a question for you Boston locals. If a person was coming to Boston for her very first time, and had limited time, where would you tell them to visit?

Off the top of my head, I thought…

• Grab a coffee at Dunkin Donuts (It sucks, but nuthin’ says “It’s ok, I’m from heah” like Dunky’s)
• Hit the record stores in Harvard Square and maybe stare at the Charles for 2 or 3 seconds,
• Visit the Boston Public Library (BPL) and sit on the stairs,
• Go to Long Wharf and stare at the Constitution for 10 seconds,
• Run through the North End and grab some pastry from Mike’s,
• Roam Quincy Market and Faneuil Hall,
• Walk down Newbury Street to rub elbows with the rich and fancy,
• Wander the Boston Common and Public Garden (maybe hit the Bull & Finch pub aka “Cheers”?),
• Hit a cheesecake factory (for deserts) or Dick’s last resort (for weird raunchy dinner),
• Or seek out Redbones for some fantastic BBQ…

Any other suggestions?

Saturday: Attended 4 Xmas eve parties.
Highlight: [from the other room] Oh Shut The Fuck Up!
Kid: [running into crowded room] Mom Mom Mom Mom Mooooom!
Kid’s Mom: WHAT?
Kid: [tattling on Dad] Dad just said “Shut the Fuck Up.”
Mom: [exasperated] Well…shut the fuck up then!

Highlight2: No matter how innocent “Hey, could you grab my package” may seem, you have opened yourself up to a barage of comments.

Sunday: Attended 2 XMas day gatherings.
Highlight: (Too many. Will follow up)

Monday-Wednesday: Went away to a cabin in the woods with the family.
Highlight: Uncle dad and me are standing in a room
Me:[to Dad] Hey did you give him his tickets, yet?
Dad: What tickets?
Me: The tickets I gave you.
Dad: What tickets?
Me: [rolls up sleeves] The tickets to the gun show. Oooooh yeaaaaaa.
Uncle: Seriously. You can’t be related to me.

Highlight2: Name that tune with a 100 TV tunes CD set.

Thursday: Had a doctors appointment and visited with my aunt.
Highlight: I got an ultrasound where the lady showed me some spots on my kidneys that look a lot bigger than they did 3 years ago. In a previous visit, I thought it would be funny to ask if it was a boy, to which the radiologist gave me a look that seemed to say “Stop fucking around.” This time, the radiologist beat me to the punch and asked #1GF! if she wanted to know the sex of the baby.

Friday: Went to the gym and did some shopping.
Highlight: BestBuy and Circuit City!

Saturday: Sat on my ass and did some cooking
Highlight: Made lasagna and 9 quarts of sauce with #1GF!

A couple of days ago, #1GF! and I went to get Chinese takeout. After waiting for what seemed like an unusually long time, a semi-exasperated guy came out of the kitchen with our food. He smiled at us and said, “Taypisonay! Thank you. Have good night.”

#1GF! and I thanked him, took our food, and headed out the door. Once out of earshot, I gave her a look of confusion which she mirrored right back at me. “I have no idea,” she said. “Really. None.”

We walked back to the car pondering the possibilities until I broke the silence. “Nothing I can come up with makes a lot of sense,” I said. “He either just told us that the kitchen staff pissed on our food (They piss on it!) or on him (They piss on me!) and it took some extra time to get a new bag or clean pants. On the other hand, he could’ve meant that the kitchen staff was ‘Pissing him off’ (They piss on me!) for taking a long time with the food.

The only other explanation that I can come up with involves an elaborate hoax involving his ability to speak perfect English and running $5 bets with the cooks that he can get a customer to smile at him after telling them that someone pissed on their food.

Sunday
Today, we got to go see #1GF!’s cute-as-a-button niece who is just crossing the age where children are wary of me. She’s still in that “pick me up and hold me” age where #1GF! is more appealing than climbing on the jungle jon. Soon, she will cross into the age of of “chuck me around the room” where Jon will dominate. Enjoy it now, auntie. The End is neigh.

I then somehow developed a motherfucker of a migraine and spent 4 hours hiding from light and sound, recovering just enough to go to a cookout with some of my friends. Even though I’ve known them for at least 15 years, no one hit me in the nuts once. That shouldn’t have to be counted as a benefit for a cookout, should it?

Friday
We went kayaking with my parents and I accidentally swamped my kayak while goofing off. A dry hold is where you store all the stuff you want to stay dry when you swamp your kayak. The air pocket that it creates also stabilizes the kayak while you get back to normal. When you treat a regular hold like a dry hold, you will have to drag all your wet stuff to shore before you can even think about emptying it out.

Thursday
We went to the beach all day. While walking around…
#1GF!: “Jon!”
Jon: “Huh?”
#1GF!: “You look like you’re going to kick someone’s ass.”
Jon: “Me? [guy sidesteps me] I think it’s just the way my face is.”

Quiche
Real men don’t eat it, but they can make it.

4 large eggs
1 frozen pie crust
1 cup milk
1/4 cup cream
a pinch of salt
a few twists of pepper
garlic powder
some basil

1 tomato, chopped
5 or so cheese slices cut into strips

Pre-heat the oven to 400. Take the pie crust out of the plastic and put it on the counter to thaw for 15 minutes. Don’t do one good goddamn thing that it says on that wrapper such as trying to take the crust out of the pan. Leave it the fuck alone. Put all the first group of ingredients into a large bowl and whisk it all together. Loosely cover the bottom of the pie crust with the cheese, add some tomato, then a little more cheese. Pour your egg mixture in there. Put it in the oven for 50 minutes.

Blueberry Muffins (8)
These kicked so much ass that they should be nominated to be the pie in the next version of American pie.

Group 1
———-
1 1/2 cup of flour
3/4 cup of sugar
1/2 teaspoon of salt
2 teaspoons of baking powder

Group 2
———-
1/3 cup of oil
1 large egg
1/3 cup of milk

A small package of blueberries

Topping
———-
1/3 cup flour
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 butter squooshed with a fork
1 1/2 teaspoons cinnamon

Combine first group in a bowl. Combine the second group in a measuring cup. Mix both together. Fold in blueberries. Pour into 8 greased muffin tins. Mash up topping with a fork in another bowl. Cover cups with topping. Bake at 400 for 25 minutes.

It’s all over
The relaxation that I stored up over that nice, long vacation was expected to last me at least two weeks. Unfortunately, I used up all my calm on dipshits and side tracks in a mere 2.5 days. At one point somewhere near the end, I think I actually referred to someone as a “stupid dick,” in a pretty matter-of-fact way that surprised my co-workers into a burst of laughter, but could probably be construed as “not very professional.” At least no one construed it as some form of pseudo-sexual harassment. So, I got that going for me…which is nice.

And it Tastes like Poop
Even though making a drink called Mexican Hot Chocolate sounds exotic, the smell of chili powder and cinnamon in your hot chocolate gives the distinct impression that you are drinking a steaming hot cup of poop.

Interestingly enough, after I made this connection, I took two more sips. And then left the rest on the counter for my GF to try.

To make 2 cups of the most chocolaty hot chocolate ever:

Ingredients

• 1 cup milk
• 1 cup half and half
• 8 teaspoons sugar
• 1 ounce semisweet chocolate, finely chopped (It’s like a giant semi-sweet chocolate bar)
• 1 oz or 1.5 Tbs unsweetened chocolate, finely chopped (you can get a tin of unsweetened cocoa to make it easier, sissy)
• 1 tablespoon brown sugar

Instructions

1. Put ingredients into saucepan and stir over low heat for 20 minutes.
2. When it’s cooked, pour half in the blender and whip it up for a minute or so.
3. Pour into 2 mugs.

Notes

If you’re going to do the chopping, I’m warning you now that it’s a fat pain in the ass. A cheese grater works better than a knife, but it’s twice as messy. I suggest making multiple bags of the above and stashing them in the cabinet, because you’re going to like the results, but not the process.

Dick 1
My Dad described my work situation as follows: And I quote, “It’s like having your dick nailed to a burning building. I mean what do you do? Stand there? Pull away? What do you do?”

He also said that I wasn’t a corporate man, as I didn’t kid myself into thinking that the corporate world is the real world. I think that was a compliment, but I couldn’t get past the image of my burning dick with a nail in it.

Dick 2
One of my good friends went to Siam house in Quincy for dinner. He called me immediately to tell me that there were two kinds of sherry on the menu: Cockburn and Dry Sack. We’ve known each other since we were 8, and never really progressed from there.

Pie 1
Over the last week, I’ve cooked spaghetti squash, homemade chicken soup, and three(3) homemade, from scratch, puree the motherfuckin’ pumpkin, pumpkin pies. Soup is easy. Spaghetti squash is kind of fun. Trying to puree pumpkin pie will leave you finding bits of orange in weird places for a week.

Pie 2
This is the actual recipe for pumpkin pie that I cobbled together from a few sites on the net. It’s easy except for making the pumpkin puree, which sucks fat ass.

Required tools:
Spatula (A)
baking pan (B)
Blender (C)
Paper Towels (D)
colander (E)
fork (F)
spoon (G)
knife (H)
oven (I)
oven mitts (J)
measuring cup (K)
measuring spoons (L)
and a big ass bowl (M)

Ingredients
1 12″ store bought graham cracker pie crust (baking isle)
3 large eggs
2 cups of fresh pumpkin puree
1/2 cup heavy cream
1/2 cup light brown sugar (granulated easy to work with)
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ginger
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon salt

Making the Puree

1. Go to the store and buy a small sugar pumpkin (not a jack o’ lantern one) no bigger than your head. If you have no idea what this is, ask. While you’re there, make sure you have all the ingredients listed above, as going back to the store will just piss you off later. Also, try to stand behind some hot chick in line, as you won’t care how slow the checker is.
2. Go home.
3. Cut the pumpkin in half, from stem to bung with your knife
4. Scrape out all the seeds and strings with the spoon. If you want, you can save the seeds, soak them in salt water overnight, and put them on a cookie sheet at 275 for an hour to toast them, but don’t worry about that right now.
5. Put a cup of water in the roasting pan and put the pumpkin halves in it face down.
6. Turn on the oven to 350 and throw the pan in there.
7. Leave it there for about an hour or until you can easily pierce the skin with the fork.
8. Take the halves out and leave them on the stove top to cool for 20 minutes.
9. Scrape out the pumpkin into a bowl.
10. Now the shit part: Feed the pumpkin into the blender a little at a time to liquefy it. The only issue is that the pumpkin is so dry that the blades just whip through it, leaving you with a mess of pulpy crud in your blender. Not one recipe fucking tells you this, but you have to add a little water to the blender until you get a nice pumpkin tornado going in there. Then, add a little pumpkin at a time until the vortex just barely vanishes. Pour that smooth pumpkin shake into your big ass bowl and repeat this process until you have pureed all of the pumpkin. There should be no chunks, no strings, just smooth pumpkin puree.
11. The problem now is that pumpkin puree is supposed to be thick as hell. Yours is watery, so you need to get the water out before you bake it, so get out the colander and line it with a couple of paper towels.
12. Dump the pumpkin into the colander and let it drain in there for an hour or so. Shake it if you want, I don’t care. Just get the water out of there.
13. Once the puree is thick, you can refrigerate it until tomorrow if you’re sick of this already, or continue on to making the pie. All you will need in the end is 2 cups of fresh puree per pie.
14. If there is a woman of the house, now is the time to clean up the big ass mess that you have made of the kitchen before she gets home. This will also make it seem like you know what you’re doing if she walks in on the process later.

Making the Pie

1. Pre-heat your oven to 375.
2. Wash your big ass bowl and crack the eggs into it. Whisk them with the fork like you’re making scrambled eggs.
3. Add all the rest of the ingredients and mix with a spoon until it looks pretty even (no spice chunks, no milk patches).
4. Open the pie crust. Notes: (a)Don’t throw away the plastic cover: you’ll need it later. (b)If there’s graham cracker dust in there, don’t flip over the crust and try to shake the dust into the sink. The crust will break and fall down the drain, leaving you to curse more voraciously than a drunken sailor in a Bohemian hump-hump bar.
5. Pour your pie mix into the crust.
   Carefully put the pie in the oven for 55 minutes. No more, no less. If you leave the pie in any longer it cracks and burns; less and you’ll be eating pumpking soup. It’s going to look done about an inch around the edges, and the middle is going to look a little soupy. No one tells you this, but it’s normal. Also, no one tells you not to touch it, or you will have a big, fat fingerprint on your pie. So, I’m telling you: Don’t. The pie will thicken as it cools in the fridge.
6. Take it out and let it cool on the stove burner (off!) or a pie rack for an hour or two, until it’s dead cold.
7. Invert the plastic cover that I told you to save, and use it as a pie lid before putting it in the fridge.

Then, eat the motherfucker for breakfast.

Friday: While discussing whether Halo was too violent for her 11 year old son. When told that the game may be a little frightening for kids, but nothing to worry about, she pressed on with,

Well, is it scarier than say… Frogger?

Once the laughter subsided, we found that we really couldn’t name one game that wasn’t.

Saturday: With the aid of a personal computer, I transformed a card for a 7 year old into a birthday card for my Mom. We then went to dinner at a restaurant that a friend that I haven’t seen in 10 years now owns. The food was on par with my favorite restaurant, Tosca’s, and my Dad swore that it was actually better. We spent the entire dinner with a newspaper clipping of my friend when he was about four swimming on the table. We were told that it would be available on the table whenever we came back.

Sunday: Ate a good breakfast in the middle of which a very shaky guy ordered and quickly drank a White Russian, we moved my GF out of her apartment, walked 3 or so miles to the store to pick up a ham steak that I would later drown in ketchup and macs n’ cheese, laid in the grass listening to a free big band concert in the park where the singer didn’t have the faintest idea of the words to “Just a Giggolo”, and ate pumpkin ice cream.

The GF liked everything except the pumpkin ice cream, which she described as the way a candle would taste…if she ate candles. She also clued me in to the fact that when we Bostonians want to say “Shaw Ave,” we say, “Shawr Ave.”

Kids
As we were driving a load of stuff from my GF’s place to mine, a chubby young girl on the side of the road yelled the dirtiest word that she could muster at our passing car.

She yelled, “UNDER WAYER!” (which I spent the remainder of the day yelling from the car).

Adults
While shaking her head at me like there was something wrong with me, the GF’s sister in law looks at her and says, “You know, he’s funnier than most comedians that get paid for this stuff.”

Those are the best rewards.

Me
The strangeness of opening a menu and seeing “Gingerbread pancakes with cinnamon butter and real maple syrup” forced me to not only order it, but to push myself way past full in order to finish the last delicious bite.

The strange thing is, I don’t even like gingerbread cookies.

Movie Review
The House of Sand and Fog (Drama): My mother prefaced this movie by using the word sad 50 times. She was right. It was sad. It was a character piece, and I didn’t really mind the length. Plus, you get to see Jennifer Connelly’s butt (which, from what I could tell was pretty nice.). B

Twiden
Ok. Say you traveled 1/2 way around the world just to visit your friends for a week in an imaginary country called… mmm… Say “Twiden.” Let’s just say for the sake of argument that you think that they are worth it. Now, if those same two friends came halfway around the world and stayed 40 minutes from where you live for three weeks, how long would you expect to see them?

A. Mi casa, su casa, so three weeks.
B. Maybe a couple of weeks, as I am only human.
C. Fish and company stink after 3 days.
D. I get paid by the hour.

What if you only saw one of them for 2 hours with no notice, and a time limit set by another set of plans?

Yea. I’d suppose that I’d feel like I got checked off a list, too.

Restaurant Review
Barefoot Bob’s in Hull has been no less than 3 places in the last few years, and I expect that it may be another in a few more. It has ok food, ok service, and a noise level that suggests that it is more of a place that locals go to have drinks and hang out, rather than eat. I think it would be a great place for hanging out, and better for eating after a few beers in the sun. B-

La Musica
I realized that I have enough music here to listen for something like 30+ days without repeating a song. Thank you, MediaMonkey for helping me to organize and play them. Now if I can just find the time to tie in an X-10 remote interface like I did for Winamp a while back (yea, I did), then I can be cool. Well, not cool per se. Something like cool? Forget it.

After a blueberry pancake breakfast at Stars, we decided once again to get on the highway and head North. This time, we only got as far as Cambridge. When we arrived, I convinced the GF not to park in a garage and to make a round to see if there were any spots. While making the second pass around the square, we luckily snagged a great spot in the middle of the square.

I think it was the last weekend for the Harvard kids, as there were orange dumpsters everywhere. In the first one we passed by, there were two Russian guys in it digging deep. One was holding a soup spoon.

We walked down to the river and walked along Memorial drive, which was closed to cars for the day. It’s a great and odd feeling to walk along a main road without hearing the sounds of traffic. While we were walking, two exasperatingly fit young girls ran by, yanking an exasperated, “Bitches!” out of the GF. Her only excuse for the comment was that the women’s legs were as tall as her.

After walking the river, we hit a couple of used record stores. The weather was nice, and made for a very nice day. There the usual crowd of street performers, and interesting faces circulating around them, so we sat for a bit and watched the world pass by.

A couple of women smiled at me, and I thought that I might have a blueberry on my face. The GF confirmed that this was not the case. At one point, when the GF was bent over tying her shoe, I caught a guy trying to get a look down her shirt. His GF caught him too, and gave him heck. I found the whole thing quite amusing. When the GF asked me why I wasn’t angry at the guy, I simply stated that men can’t help themselves. Even though propriety tells us that we shouldn’t stare, we are compelled to do so anyway.

Before we left, I wanted to head up to see my friend’s record store one last time, so I grabbed a Sobe energy drink and headed for the end of the square. There was a time when I couldn’t walk into a record store in Cambridge without recognizing someone, and seeing the “For Sale” sign in the window of my friend’s shop and peeking into the empty interior signaled the end of an era. Harvard Square was for another generation. I was officially a stranger in a strange land. So, we walked down to the car (without jumping into any dumpsters) and headed toward home in search of dinner.

Halfway home, my colon decided that it didn’t like energy drinks. This made for a very sweaty ride, and mandated a pit stop to “freshen up” before dinner. After leaving half my body weight at home, we headed to dinner at Dalat in Hull. Dalat’s food is not bad, but it’s way overpriced. I feel as good eating it as I do if takeout had a $50 surcharge. After dinner, we headed home, and I lost the other half of my body weight while the GF watched the current season of Coupling on the BBC (the 3rd season is available on DVD on 6/1).

All in all, a good day.

Trixters
As we were driving, a woman in a souped up Dodge Neon cut off my GF abruptly enough to get her to lean on the horn.

For nearly two miles on the highway, I aided her in boxing the woman in. I think she must’ve switched lanes 4 times before I let her past.

Afterward, I mentioned to my GF that the woman was probably not normally a nutty driver, but her husband was at the hospital dying. As this changed the tone of our fun, it was not well received.

Fuji
Went to dinner at Fuji with Palatzo. Even though I think that Fuji sushi is the best in the Boston area, the dinners end up being more of a social event than a simple sushi dinner. There is always import tuner talk, insults, and a good amount of fun between us, the owners, and the staff. As usual, the dinner took over two hours.

Before we left, we were standing with the staff shooting the bull. When asked what I was doing after dinner, I said I was going home to my GF. Then, some Chinese shot back and forth between two of the staff. When asked what was said, the embarrassed translation was that the woman couldn’t understand how I could have been married to “the mean one.”

I admit that I was amused.

Both my Dad and a good friend of mine have been raving about a new breakfast place in Quincy called Mannions. For a couple of weeks, the GF and I have been itching to try it out. Today, we did.

Little did I know that this place was an Irish breakfast place. There were pictures of Ireland, Irish ex-pats, and Irish music. Given my Dad’s torturous love of the John Latchford Irish Hour that had developed in my youth, I was all set with the surroundings. The food, on the other hand, was supposed to be good, so we sat down at the counter and opened the menu. They had bangers, rashers, black and white pudding, and a whole bunch of crap that I had to ask what the hell it was.

The beauty of the Irish being born with a penchant for strong drink and without taste buds is that they can eat almost anything no matter how tasteless or downright foul. And they do. This was something that I had forgotten.

The girlfriend ordered some egg based skillet breakfast that sounded very good, and I figured that I was in Rome, so I’d eat like the Romans. I ordered the full Irish Breakfast, which included two rashers, two bangers, baked beans, 2 black and white puddings. What we got:

GF:
eggs and potatoes with a full stick of Velveeta melted on top of it.

Me:
“Rashers” aka “Irish Bacon,” in reality are two slices of ham, with the taste generously boiled out of them,
two “bangers” aka the thinnest, wrinkliest, funniest tasting little sausages I ever ate,
baked beans, fresh out of a can, unheated and untreated,
two “black puddings” aka 2 burned balls of pigs blood, with a taste only describable as if a fart had taste,
two “white puddings” aka 2 balls of pig’s god knows what (they wouldn’t say),
and two nicely done eggs over medium

As Fear Factor is one of my favorite shows, I ate it all. Unfortunately, unlike Fear Factor, there was no $50,000 prize waiting for me: merely a bill for $18.72. The only prize that I can hope for is that the entry for a free trip to Ireland that I put in my Dad’s name on comes through. Then, he can experience the beauty of Full Irish breakfast in all it’s glory and at full strength.

With $18.72 and 4+ trips to the toilet under our belts, the best thing that we can say is that at least we didn’t waste our weekly Sunday breakfast on Mannions.

The beauty of living in a beach town in the winter is that it’s not very hard to get a table on a Friday night. Tonight we had appetizers and desert at the Red Parrot, and were one of two couples in there. During my appetizer course, I got busted by the waitress for lifting a long string of cheese from my French onion soup high over my head like a 7 year old. She did so from across the restaurant.

Spending a Sunday reading the paper (Best Buy and Circuit City ads mainly), watching bad TV movies, and catching the world’s strongest man contest on TV is something that I rarely afford myself the luxury of. I need an excuse to do something like that. Today, I found my excuse in the kitchen. I, unfortunately, had to help to cook a large pot of chicken soup, leaving very, very little time for constructive endeavors. Alright, alright, I admit that it was a piss poor excuse, as well as a great reward for doing nothing but being me.

1. Boil the chicken in a pot for 20 minutes a pound.
2. Pull out chicken, de-bone, and throw all available meat and skin back in (if you wait too long, it will fall apart as your taking it out).
3. Cut up an onion, six carrots, and some celery, and throw it in.
4. Boil it more, and add more parsley flakes than you think you should.
5. Add more salt than you think you should.
6. Add 2 TBsps of sugar. (Yup. Sugar. Check your Lipton package. They use a ton of it.)
7. You have chicken soup without adding any chemicals, MSG, or partially hydrogenated crap that Lipton throws in.
8. Eat for a week.

On a 74 degree day in November, walking from Lafayette Place through the homeless spotted Commons, through the tourist-filled Public Gardens, and down luxury laden Newbury Street ending on Mass Ave and back can be a phenomenal way to spend a Saturday. Midway through our walk, my girlfriend turned to me and said,

“You know what the best thing about this walk is? We don’t have anywhere to be.”

And she was partly right: Leisure without a planned end can be a very relaxing way to spend a warm fall day, but eating a dinner after a long walk consisting solely of nachos supreme and enough cheesecake to make one feel nauseas can be much, much more rewarding.