First, and most compelling for you dear reader, I have embarked on a quest. There is an emptiness in my life I mean to fill, however the means. My target will be tender, complex, of appropriate age with a red complexion and occasional smoking habit. Yes, I am exploring the charcuterie arts, first stop, pastrami.
I’ve used my WSM Bulllet to smoke brisket, ribs, pork shoulder, turkey, salmon candy and chicken. I’ve wanted to make pastrami for some time, but it takes planning and patience, neither of which I have in abundance.
I started it last weekend, mostly using this guys method as it got props on several forums. FYI: when you inject several cups of liquid into a brisket, expect some blowback. They recommend 3-5 days for it to be cured (corned) and ready to smoke I went 7, mostly to coincide with the weekend.
With a week to wait, whats to do? I guess I could could look for a date. As it happens a couple of weeks ago I signed up for Match.com. Internet dating has come a long way since my college roommate met a girl on IRC (pre WWW chat-rooms) back in 93/94. Actually, I had 2 different roommates do that. I guess that’s kind of a less glamorous version of living next to Michael Dell tinkering around in his garage. And making fun of him…but then as the name of this website attests, my hypocrisy knows no bounds.
Turns out there is no shortage of interesting, attractive and eligible women within a 10 mile radius of me, at least if you trust the profiles. Ever the cynic, and probably more picky than I have a right to be, I am being very prospect in my approach. But in viewing hundreds of profiles, I’ve seen more than a few common themes.
And let me preface this, none of these are bad things, but they’re like the most common letters they started giving on Wheel of Fortune way back in the day because everyone picked the same letters for the final puzzle (RSTLNE). In other words, these are table stakes, let’s move on.
Common Fact about Girls
Typical Quote
What This Means
What isn’t mentioned
They like a night on the town, but also staying in watching a movie curled up on the couch
I love my little black dress, but I’m just as comfortable in jeans and flip-flops
Absofuckinglutely nothing. It means she somewhere in the gulf between a worn-out barfly and a socially dysfunctional hermit.
Her frumpy work slacks or the bra she’s had since college
They love to travel, and want someone who is as spontaneous as they are
Wether it’s scuba diving off Portugal or a cafe in Paris, you say the word and I’m there!
I need to forge some stamps in my passport.
Most of her “world traveling” occurred in a 4 week trip right after college funded by daddy. Also, she gets 3 fewer weeks of paid vacation than I do right now.
A disturbing number of them have skydived
I like skydiving and would do it again
Bitches be crazy
They kind of want to bone the skydiving instructor
Their lives are great, rewarding and extremely busy.
I have it all, now I’m just looking for someone to share it with
I’m going to have to pretend to have it all together until they break first.
The empty bottle of wine and carton of Haagen-Dazs in the trash.
I actually called out several of these things in my profile before remembering the point of the site was to attract people.
That being the case, maybe I should tell them about my meat. Yes, my pastrami was realized this weekend. Homemade Russian dressing, Beecher’s Flagship cheese and of course some kraut. Here is the rundown from last week to this:
Ingredients
Ready to Cure
After 6 Hours of Low and Slow
Seriously
The Sandwich
In conclusion, strides have been made towards the goals of spending more time curing my meat and less time, well…
So I have an old house, one of the quirks is that one of the bathrooms is 2/3 of a bath. It has a shower and toilet, but no sink. There’s no room. This would solve that problem. And it’s green. Hit the picture for the story.
So Billy Mays died today, and like Michael Jackson’s death earlier in the week news first spread via twitter. In Mays case by his twittering son. Sorry if that last part sounded insensitive, it was merely meant as factual. Just like the twits and Facebook status updates of nearly every person with a web connection and a thought.
So is social networking’s ultimate purpose news distribution? Tittering doubled and Facebook status updating tripled with news of the gloved one’s death. People bragged about finding out via Twitter a couple hours before CNN was running stories. No doubt others bragged about knowing that some people (though not themselves) found out via social networking prior to mainstream media. Social media wins, yeah! Old people suck.
Sure there may be a hoax here or there, that’s what happens when you take anonymous information 2nd hand, or more likely 1,956th hand. But there is obvious value, just look at the number of people on the update train. I can see how knowing things in real time via the one-to-many distribution model of Twitter (and to a lesser though more personal degree Facebook) would be valuable. I just think there might be some confusion out out there as to what information is valuable.
Not valuable for other people to know:
I just had a burger! Yum.
Tiffy has to drive to Dallas this weekend, god that drive is boring
Can’t wait for Sunday family dinner tonight. Hope I have enough asparagus
I just took a shit. I think it was that yummy burger
Valuable for other people to know:
Seeing black spots in my periphery, someone call 911
I am so gonna rob this asswipe on 5th and Main as soon as he gets out of the store, prob in next 10 minutes, sweet!
Just sold nuclear secrets to terrorists for big $$$$$, this is going to be the best summer ever!!!!!
I’ve got a special treat for anyone that gets a burger from me at the Broiler Hut in Katy today. hehe, I’m gonna ***** all over your burger.
…without my help, or drinking out of the bottle.
I’ve definitely outgrown IKEA’s furniture, but a lot of their smaller items are pretty fine. I picked up some under cabinet wine glass racks a couple of weeks ago and just mounted them today. I rarely use things as designed so naturally I mounted these to a beam crossing the ceiling of my kitchen. I can just reach the bowl of the glasses, they look good IMHO and it frees up valuable cabinet space (80% of which is visible in the below picture) in my antique kitchen.
I guess I have to start drinking wine now.
So for Mother’s Day I made sliders and homemade shoestring french fries. The sliders were good, not great. The fries, and this is coming from someone who should know, were specfuckingtacular.
In this case, I think the tools made all the difference. My new fryer gave me the capacity I needed, but my mandolin was the real difference maker, as I prefer super thin fries and don’t even remotely have the knife skills it would take to duplicate what the mandolin accomplished.
I saw somebody eating a cheesesteak on the Travel Channel this morning, looks good, but it’s hard to cut meat as thin as you need for a really good one. So of course, believing in the power of the mandolin I believe it can do anything, including cut meat. The internet says no, the internet is stupid.
I bought some top sirloin, froze it and then sliced it. Easy.
raw
Dosed it with olive oil, kosher salt and black pepper and hit the griddle. Spatula chopped and tossed with some already sauteing onions, then topped with some pepperocinis and the only choice for a real cheesesteak: Cheese Whiz
griddled
Slopped into a fresh hoagie roll with nothing else on it. It was awesome, and I had only had 2 beers, so it wasn’t the culinary version of beer goggles.
Here it is finished, and I did finish it. All.
When I grow up (better camera, lenses and skills) this is the type of vacation video I want to shoot. This is of Dartmoor in the South West of England, shot by James Watson. To watch in HD you’ll need to follow the link to Vimeo, it’s worth it I think.
Wednesday I went to opening night of the play Mauritius at the Alley courtesy of my sister. It wasn’t great, but it was pretty good, particularly the first third. I’d read a book on writing from this playwright (who’s also written extensively for tv) and based on that book expected it to be fairly funny, which is was, but thought it might veer a little feminist, which it didn’t. In other words it was better than I expected.
Thursday a friend and I went to Little Bigs for some sliders. I really wanted to like the place. It was OK. The meat was good, but sliders are great because of the ratio of ingredients working in perfect harmony. These had too much meat. And no pickle slice. Plus the buns were browned too much for my taste, weren’t sweet enough, and lacked any condiment other than grease from the meat. In other words they weren’t as good as I expected.
P.S. We (Crystal and I) went to the cast party after the play, there were quite a few hipsters there and they ate from the food trays like they hadn’t eaten in days. I guess when you are too cool to actually do anything productive it’s hard to make enough money to buy much food, especially after buying really cheap, shitty, watered-down beer.
P.P.S. We (James and I) placed a large enough order for sliders that the cashier girl asked us twice to verify the number. I told her if there were any left over I was going to take them to the park and feed the hipsters. I didn’t really say that, but I would have found it funny if I did.
For X-mas I made one of these ormanents/decorations (they’re really too big for the tree) for each of my sibbling’s households. I got the idea from HERE, though I think I made some significant design improvements.
Of note: the reindeer are Jose Cuervo bottles, the sack of presents is a bag full of assorted beer bottle caps and a pull tab serving as red antlers on the lead deer.
Loaded Sleigh
And, as an added bonus – and yes, this would have been better posted 4 or 5 days ago – here is the version of Twas the Night Before Christmas I wrote for my newspaper column back in college. It was one of my most popular columns (more so than the one where I attacked the school’s traditions believe it or not.) And luckily you have no way of checking out my super-awesome long-haired byline picture from that year.
‘Twas The Night Before Finals
‘Twas the night before finals when all through the dorm
Not a creature was stirring, and that was abnorm;
The scantrons were hung by the backpacks with care
In hopes that the knowledge soon would be there;
The overachievers were nestled all snug in their beds
While visions of 4.0’s danced in their heads;
But I with my No-Doz and a baseball cap
Was absolutely positive I didn’t know crap;
When out on the porch there arose such a clatter
I sprang from my chair to see what was the matter;
Away to my Nikes I flew like a flash,
Grabbed hold of my wallet and what remained of my cash.
When what to my wondering eyes should appear
But my friends (all jackasses) and a large keg of beer
With a shiny old tap and a pump so quick,
I knew in the morning I’d surely be sick.
But back to reality and my senses I came,
I remembered my classes and called them by name:
“Now Econ! Now Bana! Now Neuropsychopharmacology!
On Physics! On History! On Paleobiology!”
So up to the top of the library I flew
With a bag full of books, and a Snickers bar too.
And then in a twinkling it was time for the test
You’ve heard the beginning, now here comes the rest.
As I reached for my pencil and was turning around
Down to the podium the prof came with a bound;
He was dressed all in tweed from his head to his feet
With a touch of polyester to make it complete;
A bundle of tests he had flung on his back
Some called him a doctor, but I preferred “quack”
He had a nice briefcase, but his shoes looked homemade
And I laughed when I saw him, in spite of my grade;
The notes I had borrowed, and the book I had read
Soon gave me to know I had nothing to dread;
I spoke not a word, but went straight to my exam
And despite what they tell you, it does pay to cram;
So listen up kids, as your finals loom near;
Give them respect, but don’t give them fear;
And remember, if the time for studying seems less,
The procrastinators best friend is the educated guess;
So hear me exclaim as I rhyme out of sight
“Your finals aren’t tomorrow, so have a good night!”
The Swell Season (the guy from The Frames and some chick)
Beck (what a fucking poseur, if you’re such a fucking artist that you can’t be bothered to give a decent effort to your fans, then don’t sign on to perform in front of 100K people at a fucking festival)
