see here.

do you want a bag?

so sometimes when people buy the useless crap i hawk at the gift shop i work at, i'll ask them if they want a bag and they'll respond, "Aw, nah. Save the planet." surely, if you wanted to save the planet you wouldn't buy the worthless crap that's made largely of processed oil. Consumers can be idiots.

i'm returning to the motherland on august 8th. that's assuming homeland security lets me in. so, sarah, if i haven't arrived by then, i'll probably be isolated and chained up in a damp, concrete box somewhere in gitmo. make sure you call my parents.

that's the way society crumbles

"Meanwhile, Victoria Beckham is set to make a splash on U.S. television three days later when NBC airs a one-hour special titled "Victoria Beckham: Coming to America" on July 16." -- washingtonpost.com

I just vomited a little in my mouth... and then I snarfed it out my nose.

* * *

Joel Achenbach's article from this week's Outlook section:

Here's who we need in Washington: Socrates. The Greek fella. We need him not because of what he knew, but because of what he knew he didn't know, which was pretty much everything. He was one of the all-time great doubters. [continue reading]

LEFT CHEEK! LEFT CHEEK! LEFT CHEEK!

OK. So Transformers didn't suck. It was actually, um, good. Sure it didn't make a lot of sense, but what it lacked in brains it made up for in charisma and huge fucking robots that blow shit up and transform into cars. It could've used a little more of the original transforming sound effect, and I was bothered by the fact that two out of three black characters were clowns. The dialogue wasn't totally asinine... well, until the end. Optimus Prime sounded awesome, probably because it was the same voice actor, Peter Cullen, as in the original show. Cullen gets around, by the way. He voiced on a bajillion of everyone's favorite cartoons: Scooby Doo, GoBots, Voltron, GI Joe, Rainbow Brite, Smurfs, Snorks, Heathcliff, Ducktales, Chip'N'Dale Rescue Rangers, Dino-Riders, and Gummi Bears, among others. Also, remember Orson Welles? Large rotund guy? Deep focus? Changed film forever when he made Citizen Kane? Yeah. He voiced Unicron in the original Transformers movie.

the burning

So i've now had a couple of brief lessons on the pizza oven at Pizza Pomodoro. Getting the pizza onto the pala (or pizza peel) is a finesse job requiring short quick back and forth movements. it also requires speed. As i learned the sauce can soak through the thin base pretty quickly making it prone to tearing. putting it in the oven is relatively easy. It's like pulling the tablecloth out from under the place setting, just without the expensive wine glasses shattering and getting glass shards in your eye and having to use tweezers to pull the little splinters of stem out of your cornea and then blinding your right side permanently because you're not a trained tweezing professional, or trained at tweezing at all, and so out of inexperience didn't pay much mind to the itch that slowly built in your right triceps which then peaked as you brought your hand to your ocular lens making your arm spasm awkwardly and your tweezers jab into your iris, not once, but twice. Thankfully, you managed to dig out the shard on the second spasm. So, problem solved. You can go back to your party tricks. Just as long as they don't require any depth perception. The point being, that getting the pizza in the oven is a bit like a party trick, but easier and less impressive. Then there's the turning of the pizza, which is also comparatively easy (when compared to getting it on to the pala, or, say, verbally explaining to how to tie ones shoes). There's a different pala to use. It's kind of a 6 or 8 inch disk on the end of a long pole. Just slide it under the center of the pizza, flip it up on a slight incline keeping an edge on the oven floor, and pull it toward you. The pizza should turn 180 degrees so that the side that was facing the fire is turned away from it. I haven't quite figured out exactly when to turn the pizza. I just know you don't do it until the crust is cooked enough that it's rigid. Trying to turn an uncooked crust is just asking to tear a hole in it. Another thing I learned: the embers keep the floor of the oven hot, while the flames help cook the top of the pie. Claudio explained this to me after he'd pulled the pizza I'd ordered out of the oven and the crust was perfectly cooked, but the cheese hadn't melted.

A couple shots of the 2nd ever pizza I cooked in a real pizza oven (from 11 June):




Yeah, it was just a practice. So only sauce and mozz, and by the time I took the photos, the cheese had congealed. But pretty good for my second attempt.

"Why are you trying to destroy us?"

Rise of the Silver Surfer actually may be the greatest film since Pearl Harbor. Take from that statement what you will. It wasn't as bad as Stephen Hunter would have you believe ("'Silver Surfer' is drearier than corn dying in the Iowa sun, slower than molasses in Antarctica. Sentient humans should stay away; all others may enter confident that their IQs are already in the Chernobyl-fried range and will not be affected, except for downward."), but there are certain things it was hard to get around: the ludicrous amount of make up that Jessica Alba was buried in and the fact that she could have been replaced with a shapely brick without anyone noticing; the god awful dialogue between the FF and Dr. Doom while flying at high velocities 10,000 feet in the open air; the lack of chemistry between any of the actors; the relatively pointless power transferring effect the Surfer had on the Human Torch; the objectification of women and the treatment of them as complete idiots, and using that as a source of amusement; &c. On the bright side, the Silver Surfer looked cool, and the witty banter and arguing among the FF kinda worked sometimes. Well done, there. The film-goer in me is thoroughly disappointed and maybe a little bit disgusted. The fanboy in me is satiated.

Living at 128 has it's advantages and its disadvantages. One of the
hardships that i must suffer as a caretaker at 128 is the lack of
heating. Outside a water bottle, a fire on the hearth, or the
occasional cup of tea--which the house silently protests with its
drafty, and often broken or non-existent, windows--the best source of
heating is three or four layers of clothes or my sleeping bag. It's
the kind of cold that inspires revolutionaries to face their
insecurities regarding anarchist chic fashion (black on black with
black patches hand sewn on) and walk around wrapped in their bedding.
One would think that any stray particles radiating heat meandering
about the house's ether would eventually, due to the laws of physics,
rise and accumulate, huddled like a small band of overboard sailors in
frigid seas, in my loft, which is the highest point in the house. But
no. My bedtime reading is too often marred by the sight of my own
breath obscuring the page.

It's a rugged life here on the fringe. Not for the faint of heart or
those without slippers.

if you close your eyes they can't see you.

"His 12 'commitments' include promises to end illegal immigration, decrease abortions, cut taxes, prepare for terrorist attacks and increase access to health care... [to] 'keep America on offense' in the war on terror and separately vows to 'ensure that every community in America is prepared' for the possibility of an attack or a natural disaster... He also promises access to a quality education, a legal system with 'strict constructionist' judges, fiscal discipline and careful spending."
-washingtonpost.com article about Giuliani's campaign promises.

No more illegal immigration. You know what that means: open borders! Possibly the end of the nation-state! That's what I call progressive. It would make the anarchists very happy. And every community will be safe from crazy fuckers and acts of God. Will that be like how we were prepared for nuclear Armageddon by being told to duck and cover? Or a bio-chemical attack with duct tape and plastic sheeting? Or maybe we can be prepared by preemption and carpet bomb more poor countries...

gah! gaaaaaaaaaaaaah.

According to the Hostess website, Christopher Sell invented the "fried Twinkie" at the Chip Shop, his restaurant in Brooklyn, New York. It was described by the New York Times in this way: "Something magical occurs when the pastry hits the hot oil. The creamy white vegetable shortening filling liquefies, impregnating the sponge cake with its luscious vanilla flavor. . . The cake itself softens and warms, nearly melting, contrasting with the crisp, deep-fried crust in a buttery and suave way. The shop adds its own ruby-hued berry sauce, which provides a bit of tart sophistication." - wikipedia

"'Spring Awakening,' a buoyant rock musical based on Frank Wedekind's 1891 German play of the same title, won [the Tony] for best new musical," according to the washingtonpost.com.

Emily: i heard

i love that it's a buoyant rock musical based on a dark dark german expressionist play

oy

me: i'm flabbergasted.

completely at a loss.

unless you're doing a parody, i just don't understand how it could possibly be a buoyant rock musical.

buoyant is not in spring awakening.

there's no buoyancy.

it's about sinking.

that's what it's about.

it's about drowning in your natural environment.

mnftiu

get your war on #65.

take a leak on my genius

using nothing but my two hands, various tools and hardware, scraps of
guttering and piping, and my innate ingenuity, i did a particularly
shoddy yet fairly functional job of replacing a gutter the other day.
the old one had a giant piece missing out of it as if a large acid
dispensing reptilian had expectorated on it, and therefore wasn't so
much a gutter as a hole.

The future is made of ceramic Muslims who won't degrade

"In the end, only Muslims themselves can defeat the violent radicals," Romney says. "But we must work with them."

Well, then. OK. If you say so, Mitt. But if only the Muslims can defeat the violent radicals, why do we need to increase our troop count by 100,000? Also, coal and oil are soooooo 20th century. How about this ceramic battery thingamajig? or maybe some sweet photovoltaic cells?

Sometimes I am a fuck up. It doesn't happen regularly, at least, I don't think it does. I suppose those around me can be the judge. But last night at the pizzeria, while being the sole kitchen hand at the pizzeria for what seemed like four or five eternities while Claudio was out delivering pizzas, I managed to make a mess of just about every activity I did, with the exception of dishwashing. Did Massimo yell at me? Thankfully, no. He did seem quite agitated though that I could not complete even simple tasks like placing boxed pizzas on the counter without accidentally juggling them awkwardly like one who has never used his hands before or perhaps has no hands or even maybe no arms. Was I a bit panicky? I was. There were too many phone calls for me to handle competently in that there was more than one. Did I cry under the pressure? I did not. Though I very much wanted to do so. I also just wanted to curl into a ball and perhaps roll away, somewhere far off where people were not upset at me for asking them repeat themselves. Massimo is very particular about how things are organized in his kitchen, which I can appreciate. Phone orders for delivery should be placed next to the register so they can be rung up. Phone orders for pick up should be placed on the counter in front of him so he can take care of them. It seems simple enough. Though I still somehow ended up with three or four green order slips in my hand at once searching for the right buttons on the register, frantic, wild-eyed and cursing myself under my breath for every wrong button pushed.

Luckily I get a chance to redeem myself this evening.

sometimes i find myself blogging about the inanities of my everyday life, such as i was yesterday, and i want to apologize to you, my tiny flock of readers. not so much because the post is self-involved and comprises useless information for most of you, but rather because the writing isn't very good. it just sometimes seems to lack any verve, humor, or even a hint of interest on my own part in what i'm writing about. it may best be described perhaps as gormless. in the future i'll try to put in more of an effort.


Wolfowitz on being fired: "I think it tells us more about the media than about the bank and I'll leave it at that," he told the British Broadcasting Corp. "People were reacting to a whole string of inaccurate statements and by the time we got to anything approximating accuracy the passions were around the bend... I accept the fact that by the time we got around to that, emotions here were so overheated that I don't think I could have accomplished what I wanted to accomplish for the people I really care about."

I also blame the media. It's a shame that such an upstanding citizen--nay! a good samaritan!--such as Paul Wolfowitz would have his name sullied by such a nefarious group of gossip slingers. Mr. Wolfowitz, I weep tears of sympathy. All you wanted to do was help the poor of the world and the thanks you get is the vitriol of... well, everyone. You did manage to lift your significant other out of the bonds of poverty. A noble deed. Only 3 billion people to go. Maybe now that you find yourself with some spare time, and your S.O. has some extra cash to spare, you can haul yourselves out of the mud you've been dragged through and truly express your love and goodwill toward the disadvantaged of the world. Or maybe you can't.

spy vs. concerned citizens

so the government has been spying on my friends. it was reported this weekend that Solid Energy, a government run coal mining company, contracted Thompson & Clark, a security/private investigation company to investigate the Save Happy Valley Coalition. Thompson & Clark in turn paid at least one person to infiltrate and report back on the SHVC. it was also reported that Thompson & Clark paid at least one other person to spy on Peace Action Wellington and the Wellington Animal Rights Network. PAW has weekly meetings where I live.

the bad thing about this is that plans for protests, etc. may have been compromised. the good thing is that it makes Solid Energy look like a bunch of weasels and makes the SHVC look like a group of Jesuses by camprison. also we now know that we were being spied on and who the spies are.

saturday evening i worked my second shift at pizza pomodoro. and this probably isn't particularly exciting for anyone but me, but i was able to answer some phone calls and started to familiarize myself with the register. i also had a good chat with Claudio, an italian working there as a kitchen hand. he's also there on a working-holiday visa. i'm hoping to get him and Massimo the pizzaiolo to join in the sunday soccer games.

speaking of which, sunday brought a pretty good game of soccer. there seems to be a bit of a tradition of heading over to Ronnie's house afterward for a drink and some homecookin'. Ronnie is Chilean. He and his wife, who's from Larchmont, NY, both play with the NSO here. Chitto, also is Chilean and is currently staying at 128, and I hop a ride with Vladav, a Serb with refined taste and also a car.

i banked my first assist during the game. it was a solid bit of play--cutting through the midfield, i somehow managed to slip by three or four guys before slotting the ball to my teammate for an easy shot in front of the goal. it was the lone bright spot in terms of my play. the rest of my game was plagued with passes gone astray. beautiful day though. windless, sunny, and warm.

pizzaiolo in the making

sunday i had what was by far my most successful pizza making experience. i was invited to a friend's place with the purpose of making pizza for a handful of select people. the oven was sufficient. it went up to "high," which is some undetermined temperature after 250 degrees C. It also had a fan bake. getting all of my pizza making things over there was a pain in the ass. 6 balls of dough, a pizza peel, baking stone, olive oil, salt, half a bag of flour, and 2 1/2 lbs of canned tomatoes don't fit into a regular back pack. I had to pack it into my hiking bag for the bike trip over. wearing stuff like that messes with my equilibrium, though i somehow managed to not fall over.

sadly, i only have a couple of photos as proof of the scrumtrulescent results. i actually successfully got six pizzas in and out of the oven with minimum calzone-ing. the alpha pie was a pizza bread--no sauce or cheese. just dough, olive oil, crushed garlic, salt, and pepper. the results were pretty fucking great, if i may say so myself. second up was your basic margherita, also a success. the next three pizzas were a free for all in terms of toppings. i left it up to the guests to bring their own and we ended up with tomatoes, eggplant, garlic, mushrooms, bell peppers, and even some spinach. basil and garlic were the most popular toppings of the evening. we ended the evening on a half marinara/half margherita pie. yum.

of course, it wasn't a perfect outting. the cornicione of the first few pies was a bit undercooked and gummy. also the fresh mozzarella (kapiti brand) that i'd purchased was tasteless. so we had to go out and get some aged.

all in all, i'd give me and my pizzas an overall score of B-, which is good. A B- is good pizza.

in other pizza news, i apparently have been hired by pizza pomodoro (so far the only pizza place i've found in wellington worth going to) to be a bit of a kitchen hand. i'm not making pizzas or anything. mostly i'm a dishwasher, but i may move up to working the register (yeah, i know big whoop). actually, some pizza-making lessons look like a possibility. also i get free pizza out of it. so this evening i worked three hours and it looks like it'll turn into a pretty regular saturday evening gig.

dropped some photos on my flickr site.

almost got run over yesterday by a moving van. it was backing up straight into traffic as i was biking past. still have all my faculties though.

W.: a D-grade Nazi.

can someone tell me why Bob Barker's retirement from the Price is Right is a homepage news on the washingtonpost.com? and do we really need a photo of a teary-eyed, mylar confetti-dusted Bob? by contrast the nytimes.com has a photo of Putin and an accompanying article about his comparing the US foreign policy (and apparently NATO) to the Third Reich. while i see his point (the use of bigotry and fear to mobilize a nation, imperialism, delusions of grandeur (or even just delusions) by the commander-in-chief, etc.),  it seems somewhat unfitting. the Third Reich was much more competent and effective than our current administration... too bad they had their gooey innards replaced with evil.