did you know i have a private beach?
no, really! it runs the length of our property. of course, it does lead to a skanky drainage pond, but still ... it's mine and someday, given the insane prices for lakefront real estate in minnesota, people will be selling their grandmothers to get this prime piece of shore.
but today is not someday. today is, well, today, and the shore had been ignored all season. as nature is wont to do, it began to take back what man had claimed, by allowing all sorts of plants and green stuff to grow between the small pebbles. and since all of my neighbors here in suburban paradise have been diligent about policing the rampant growth ...
except me, and except for today.
i got me some kick-ass weed killer today, and even got serious about it by buying a pressure sprayer. i pulled all the weeds that had roots i could gather -- meaning, anything that isn't grass, because grass roots are just fucking tough -- and then sprayed within about five feet of the water, because i love the earth.
really.
well, there was one thicket of weeds that i could not get rid of, because as i pulled my first handful of roots out ... two frogs jumped out into the water. and i thought of those little frogs spending their lives homeless on the streets giving handjobs for crack.
so i left the frog neighborhood alone ... now the shoreline looks like st. louis -- barren nothingness for miles on end, and then, just when you're about to cross the border into someone else's area, a thick downtown ... that still smells like waste products.
you're welcome, frogs.
7.26.2006
7.25.2006
mill city/guthrie theatre pictures
i was downtown last week and visited the mill city museum and the new guthrie theatre. some of my favorite shots ...
this is the mill museum reflected in the shiny blue side of the guthrie.
just some metal supports that are holding up the ancient mill structure.
and of course, shiny new fire hydrant valves.
this is the mill museum reflected in the shiny blue side of the guthrie.
just some metal supports that are holding up the ancient mill structure.
and of course, shiny new fire hydrant valves.
7.19.2006
7.18.2006
E-V-Oh-shut-up-already
There are very few areas of my life in which I've grown in talent ... sports? Nope. Guitar? Peaked at 22. Fashion? Come on -- were it not for my wife showing me what and how to dress, I'd still be wearing Members Only jackets.
But cooking -- ah, when it comes to food, I've only gotten better at preparing and serving it. I always tell people that I learned most of what I know from my mom, and that's true, to a point ... mom and grandma both were extremely handy in the kitchen, and I learned my ease and comfort from them.
Most of what I know how to make, though, has come to the fore in the past few years, and for that, I can only thank the Food Network. While other people watch MTV or CNN on lazy afternoons, I'm glued to the Food Network. And the first thing I ever made that I consider to be a resounding success was "mini meatball soup" from Rachael Ray. I knew it as Italian wedding soup, but she can call it what she wants -- it's a good recipe. It was so good that I think it's my wife's favorite meal I make. We even made it together on our honeymoon, it's that good.
That's what started my love affair with Ms. Ray. And she's only gotten more popular over the years -- 11 cookbooks (by my count), a few shows on Food Network, and even an Oprah-produced talk show coming up this fall. It's Rachael's world, and we're just cooking in it.
Which is why, I think, so many people hate her with a blind passion.
She is often annoying, especially with the "EVOO" thing she's popularized. It's extra virgin olive oil, and it doesn't hurt to say it all the way. She does use way too much of said oil, and at too high a temperature. And that hideous "garbage bowl" just makes me want to wash my hands repeatedly.
But why the haters? One suspects most of the anger comes from two areas: jealousy, and snobbery. The former is hard to prove, but I'm sure that an average cook with average looks getting a talk show from Oprah™ makes more than a few serious amateurs pretty green with jealousy. The latter, though, is more provable -- at least, it is to me, because almost all anti-Ray rants seem to contain two words that prove beyond a doubt that snobbery and foodie-ism fuels the rage:
Anthony Bourdain.
Bourdain is to Ray what Bill Cosby is to Larry the Cable Guy. What Charles Winchester is to Frank Burns. What Johnny Unitas is to (insert Bears' quarterback name here).
Bourdain is an effete food snob -- and I love his Travel Channel show. A good friend of mine is just a huge fan, and actually turned me on to him. He's fun to watch precisely because he's honest, he's direct, and he's not afraid to speak his mind.
One can be a fan of both -- it's not hard, actually, to enjoy Rachael for her easily accessible recipes, and also enjoy Bourdain for his excellent taste and finely tuned taste buds. Ray's recipes I find easy to modify for my own purposes, which gets me to thinking more about the ingredients I mix together, and how they might pair with side dishes, wines and desserts. Bourdain shows me places I've never known, and lets me see a side of cooking that makes me strive to be more professional and exotic when I have friends over for dinner.
Ray vs. Bourdain -- is this the Beatles-Stones argument of my generation?
But cooking -- ah, when it comes to food, I've only gotten better at preparing and serving it. I always tell people that I learned most of what I know from my mom, and that's true, to a point ... mom and grandma both were extremely handy in the kitchen, and I learned my ease and comfort from them.
Most of what I know how to make, though, has come to the fore in the past few years, and for that, I can only thank the Food Network. While other people watch MTV or CNN on lazy afternoons, I'm glued to the Food Network. And the first thing I ever made that I consider to be a resounding success was "mini meatball soup" from Rachael Ray. I knew it as Italian wedding soup, but she can call it what she wants -- it's a good recipe. It was so good that I think it's my wife's favorite meal I make. We even made it together on our honeymoon, it's that good.
That's what started my love affair with Ms. Ray. And she's only gotten more popular over the years -- 11 cookbooks (by my count), a few shows on Food Network, and even an Oprah-produced talk show coming up this fall. It's Rachael's world, and we're just cooking in it.
Which is why, I think, so many people hate her with a blind passion.
She is often annoying, especially with the "EVOO" thing she's popularized. It's extra virgin olive oil, and it doesn't hurt to say it all the way. She does use way too much of said oil, and at too high a temperature. And that hideous "garbage bowl" just makes me want to wash my hands repeatedly.
But why the haters? One suspects most of the anger comes from two areas: jealousy, and snobbery. The former is hard to prove, but I'm sure that an average cook with average looks getting a talk show from Oprah™ makes more than a few serious amateurs pretty green with jealousy. The latter, though, is more provable -- at least, it is to me, because almost all anti-Ray rants seem to contain two words that prove beyond a doubt that snobbery and foodie-ism fuels the rage:
Anthony Bourdain.
Bourdain is to Ray what Bill Cosby is to Larry the Cable Guy. What Charles Winchester is to Frank Burns. What Johnny Unitas is to (insert Bears' quarterback name here).
Bourdain is an effete food snob -- and I love his Travel Channel show. A good friend of mine is just a huge fan, and actually turned me on to him. He's fun to watch precisely because he's honest, he's direct, and he's not afraid to speak his mind.
One can be a fan of both -- it's not hard, actually, to enjoy Rachael for her easily accessible recipes, and also enjoy Bourdain for his excellent taste and finely tuned taste buds. Ray's recipes I find easy to modify for my own purposes, which gets me to thinking more about the ingredients I mix together, and how they might pair with side dishes, wines and desserts. Bourdain shows me places I've never known, and lets me see a side of cooking that makes me strive to be more professional and exotic when I have friends over for dinner.
Ray vs. Bourdain -- is this the Beatles-Stones argument of my generation?
7.11.2006
my beloved pirates
i've pretty much given up on my beloved pittsburgh pirates.
if you follow baseball, you can pretty much stop reading right now -- you know the story. fourteen consecutive losing seasons. the rule five draft debacle. no bottled water allowed. chris shelton. bronson arroyo. jason schmidt. and there's more that i can't bring myself to remember right now.
when i was working at the wheeling news-register back in the mid '90s, the family that owns the paper -- headed by g. ogden nutting -- bought into the ownership team that was purchasing the pittsburgh pirates. the head of the team, kevin mcclatchy, was an old newspaper-empire friend of the nutting family, which i think explains why the nuttings were brought in.
at the time, i remember thinking that good things were not in the pirates' future, because i saw how the parent corporation was run. but at the time, remember, the nuttings held just a small part of the team -- mcclatchy was the face and the money running the show. but over time, the nuttings were offered more and more control, and made the appropriate investments -- by 2003, i think, the nuttings were the real force behind the team.
i won't go into the wretched history of this team since sid bream broke all our hearts ... i write this because a thread on honest wagner (one of the best pirates-focused sites on the Internet Tubes) brought me to rant ... or as much as i do rant ... about ownership of my beloved pirates.
bones, one of the proprietors of the site, asked a question: are the nuttings evil, or just greedy?
my response ...
***
hmmm.
greedy or evil ... it's a tough call. i really think it depends on your definition of "evil," and whether you think the nuttings have any evil intent with their actions.
EVIL
i know them from the journalism side of their "empire," and it definitely was demoralizing in the newsroom when we realized that making money, not reporting the news, was the primary goal for the papers.
what made it more demoralizing: none of us knew exactly how much was being made -- we all knew the fourth floor (executive suites) were rolling in it, but we had no idea how much. we also didn't know what sort of budget we had to go out and do our jobs, and we were constantly looking for ways to stretch dollars.
sounds familiar, doesn't it?
the list of things we couldn't say in the paper could fill a stylebook. ogden's other interests were so numerous, and he used his papers to slant coverage in his favor, meant that some things were verboten -- like yellow pages. or riverboat gaming -- never gambling, just gaming, as if we were softening it up a bit for the little old ladies who read the paper after going to morning mass.
and is that "evil," or is that just greedy and/or stupid?
INTENT
when i was 24, i'd have voted "evil" over and over. now that i'm older and, allegedly, wiser, i'd soften my judgment a bit -- not because of any facts at hand, but because it certainly seems to me that the nuttings really don't care enough to be evil.
making money on mediocre newspapers? to them, that's no different than making money on mediocre baseball teams ... or ski resorts ... or the utne reader ... or awkwardly named telephone directories ...
if there's a buck to be made, they'll make it. if that buck can be doubled by reducing the quality to the lowest the public will still pay for ... well, that's two bucks made, and that is the definition of a good investment.
if the nuttings seemed to give a damn about what businesses they were running, then i'd say "evil" a hundred times over.
but is apathy evil? that's a good question.
if you follow baseball, you can pretty much stop reading right now -- you know the story. fourteen consecutive losing seasons. the rule five draft debacle. no bottled water allowed. chris shelton. bronson arroyo. jason schmidt. and there's more that i can't bring myself to remember right now.
when i was working at the wheeling news-register back in the mid '90s, the family that owns the paper -- headed by g. ogden nutting -- bought into the ownership team that was purchasing the pittsburgh pirates. the head of the team, kevin mcclatchy, was an old newspaper-empire friend of the nutting family, which i think explains why the nuttings were brought in.
at the time, i remember thinking that good things were not in the pirates' future, because i saw how the parent corporation was run. but at the time, remember, the nuttings held just a small part of the team -- mcclatchy was the face and the money running the show. but over time, the nuttings were offered more and more control, and made the appropriate investments -- by 2003, i think, the nuttings were the real force behind the team.
i won't go into the wretched history of this team since sid bream broke all our hearts ... i write this because a thread on honest wagner (one of the best pirates-focused sites on the Internet Tubes) brought me to rant ... or as much as i do rant ... about ownership of my beloved pirates.
bones, one of the proprietors of the site, asked a question: are the nuttings evil, or just greedy?
my response ...
***
hmmm.
greedy or evil ... it's a tough call. i really think it depends on your definition of "evil," and whether you think the nuttings have any evil intent with their actions.
EVIL
i know them from the journalism side of their "empire," and it definitely was demoralizing in the newsroom when we realized that making money, not reporting the news, was the primary goal for the papers.
what made it more demoralizing: none of us knew exactly how much was being made -- we all knew the fourth floor (executive suites) were rolling in it, but we had no idea how much. we also didn't know what sort of budget we had to go out and do our jobs, and we were constantly looking for ways to stretch dollars.
sounds familiar, doesn't it?
the list of things we couldn't say in the paper could fill a stylebook. ogden's other interests were so numerous, and he used his papers to slant coverage in his favor, meant that some things were verboten -- like yellow pages. or riverboat gaming -- never gambling, just gaming, as if we were softening it up a bit for the little old ladies who read the paper after going to morning mass.
and is that "evil," or is that just greedy and/or stupid?
INTENT
when i was 24, i'd have voted "evil" over and over. now that i'm older and, allegedly, wiser, i'd soften my judgment a bit -- not because of any facts at hand, but because it certainly seems to me that the nuttings really don't care enough to be evil.
making money on mediocre newspapers? to them, that's no different than making money on mediocre baseball teams ... or ski resorts ... or the utne reader ... or awkwardly named telephone directories ...
if there's a buck to be made, they'll make it. if that buck can be doubled by reducing the quality to the lowest the public will still pay for ... well, that's two bucks made, and that is the definition of a good investment.
if the nuttings seemed to give a damn about what businesses they were running, then i'd say "evil" a hundred times over.
but is apathy evil? that's a good question.
7.10.2006
even the morning TV gods like my car
i've been obsessed with a car lately -- for the past year or so, in fact.
we'll be driving down the road and i'll tell the missus "now look at that one ... tell me that isn't cute?"
she'll respond by laughing, or sticking her tongue down her throat, or insulting my sense of style. "why don't you go buy one of those ugly-ass pontiacs while you're at it?" she'll sneer, and i'll just sit there and fume.
i think i know cool. it's just that my defintion of cool isn't necessarily anyone else's ... like my parents'. or her parents'. or her friends'. or most likely my friends' as well.
i might be alone on this, but for my money, the honda element is a really neat vehicle. it's got nice lines, it's incredibly useful in a whole number of ways, and it's a great dog vehicle.
when the missus and i were looking to replace her company car last year with one of our own, we test drove tons of vehicles. the one that intrigued us the most was the land rover discovery, so of course we jumped at the chance to drive one around the twin cities highways. and you know what? we discovered that it handled like a tank, rode like a tank, and sipped gasoline like a tank.
we crossed that off our list.
and now i was told that on saturday we could test drive the element.
i liked it. i loved it. it rode smooth, it handled well, and it felt like being in an SUV, but without the hideous gas mileage on the highway (20/24). even the missus said it wasn't as bad as she thought it would be.
on sunday, while we were out running errands, we came across an element with a peace sign on the back, parked in front of the store we were headed to ... and its owner was walking toward it. so we stopped the man and asked if we could ask him about his car.
it was tim sherno, formerly of fox 9 news!
what a nice guy. spent about 10 minutes talking with us about his car. his advice? "don't think about it -- just buy it."
i'm trying to get the missus to agree.
we'll be driving down the road and i'll tell the missus "now look at that one ... tell me that isn't cute?"
she'll respond by laughing, or sticking her tongue down her throat, or insulting my sense of style. "why don't you go buy one of those ugly-ass pontiacs while you're at it?" she'll sneer, and i'll just sit there and fume.
i think i know cool. it's just that my defintion of cool isn't necessarily anyone else's ... like my parents'. or her parents'. or her friends'. or most likely my friends' as well.
i might be alone on this, but for my money, the honda element is a really neat vehicle. it's got nice lines, it's incredibly useful in a whole number of ways, and it's a great dog vehicle.
when the missus and i were looking to replace her company car last year with one of our own, we test drove tons of vehicles. the one that intrigued us the most was the land rover discovery, so of course we jumped at the chance to drive one around the twin cities highways. and you know what? we discovered that it handled like a tank, rode like a tank, and sipped gasoline like a tank.
we crossed that off our list.
and now i was told that on saturday we could test drive the element.
i liked it. i loved it. it rode smooth, it handled well, and it felt like being in an SUV, but without the hideous gas mileage on the highway (20/24). even the missus said it wasn't as bad as she thought it would be.
on sunday, while we were out running errands, we came across an element with a peace sign on the back, parked in front of the store we were headed to ... and its owner was walking toward it. so we stopped the man and asked if we could ask him about his car.
it was tim sherno, formerly of fox 9 news!
what a nice guy. spent about 10 minutes talking with us about his car. his advice? "don't think about it -- just buy it."
i'm trying to get the missus to agree.
7.08.2006
"his brain is gone!" (dramatic chord)
so in my never-ending quest to find good TV shows to watch in the few hours of downtime i've had since i left my previous employer, i search directv for some tivo-able entertainment. and i've stumbled across star trek 2.0 -- kind of like pop-up video, but far busier and more filled with interesting factoids about the episode.
it's interesting, because i distinctly remember times during my childhood when we'd watch "star trek" over dinner on a little 12-inch black and white TV in the kitchen. my dad was a huge fan -- he might still be, for all i know. (if the history channel aired "star trek" he'd know every word to every episode.) and i was eager for "the next generation" when it first came out, but i quickly bored of it -- i was learning that, post-pre-adolescence, i wasn't much of a sci-fi fan.
but it's fun to revisit these original shows, because a few things stick out:
everyone speaks english -- with an american accent, no less -- in space
william shatner is canadian ... "to seek out new life, new civil-I-zations ..."
all the women are hot, in a late-1960s way
the dialog is just horrible.
i mean, take this episode. a beautiful alien beams aboard and smiles at everyone. then, suddenly, she knocks everyone unconscious (suspiciously using the same weird sound that other aliens use when they do evil things themselves). when everyone wakes up, dr. mccoy discovers that spock has been put on a table in sick bay, where he's wearing a gold hairnet.
mccoy tells kirk that the alien took spock's brain!
his brain! i mean, come on ... take his spirit. take his eyebrows. but his brain? that reminds me of the famous troy mcclure movie "the president's neck is missing" it's so comically bad. just bad bad bad.
and yet, still i watch.
it's interesting, because i distinctly remember times during my childhood when we'd watch "star trek" over dinner on a little 12-inch black and white TV in the kitchen. my dad was a huge fan -- he might still be, for all i know. (if the history channel aired "star trek" he'd know every word to every episode.) and i was eager for "the next generation" when it first came out, but i quickly bored of it -- i was learning that, post-pre-adolescence, i wasn't much of a sci-fi fan.
but it's fun to revisit these original shows, because a few things stick out:
i mean, take this episode. a beautiful alien beams aboard and smiles at everyone. then, suddenly, she knocks everyone unconscious (suspiciously using the same weird sound that other aliens use when they do evil things themselves). when everyone wakes up, dr. mccoy discovers that spock has been put on a table in sick bay, where he's wearing a gold hairnet.
mccoy tells kirk that the alien took spock's brain!
his brain! i mean, come on ... take his spirit. take his eyebrows. but his brain? that reminds me of the famous troy mcclure movie "the president's neck is missing" it's so comically bad. just bad bad bad.
and yet, still i watch.
7.06.2006
gangly teenage dog
trotter had some matts (i'm not sure if i spelled that correctly, but who cares -- i'm unemployed) around his buttal area. we took him to a little groomer in tonka bay, and the verdict: total shave, because the matts were so close to the skin that to get under them would be impossible without turning my dog brazilian.
i laughed and laughed when i saw him, and i think i offended the groomers. i laughed only because he was so huge and it was all hair! underneath it all he's just a gangly teenage boy.
i laughed and laughed when i saw him, and i think i offended the groomers. i laughed only because he was so huge and it was all hair! underneath it all he's just a gangly teenage boy.
7.04.2006
das weekend
mom and dad came in this weekend; it's been two years since dad was here, and mom was here in early june of last year. and since the only way i know how to entertain is to feed people.
the best part of this was the croissants -- ordered from the williams-sonoma catalog. they are as good as any we had in gay paree last fall, and we don't have to surround ourselves with dirty frenchmen to enjoy them.
jenette's family came over. lauren, as always, was a big hit.
it was mom and dad's 35th anniversary on sunday, and my in-laws' 40th earlier in the week, so we celebrated at the finest italian restaurant known to man: maggiano's little italy, which was a staple of my parents' visits to chicago way back when.
of course, fatty got some welcome relaxation on the couch monday afternoon, because it's hard out here for a cat.
a whole bunch of stuff happened, and then last night, we saw the fireworks.
this was taken right after we'd downed a whole pitcher of orange juice laced with LSD. i was yelling like samuel l. jackson in his "samuel jackson" commercial on chappelle's show.
"it'll get you drunk!"
the best part of this was the croissants -- ordered from the williams-sonoma catalog. they are as good as any we had in gay paree last fall, and we don't have to surround ourselves with dirty frenchmen to enjoy them.
jenette's family came over. lauren, as always, was a big hit.
it was mom and dad's 35th anniversary on sunday, and my in-laws' 40th earlier in the week, so we celebrated at the finest italian restaurant known to man: maggiano's little italy, which was a staple of my parents' visits to chicago way back when.
of course, fatty got some welcome relaxation on the couch monday afternoon, because it's hard out here for a cat.
a whole bunch of stuff happened, and then last night, we saw the fireworks.
this was taken right after we'd downed a whole pitcher of orange juice laced with LSD. i was yelling like samuel l. jackson in his "samuel jackson" commercial on chappelle's show.
"it'll get you drunk!"
7.02.2006
got my ass t.p.'d last night
mom and dad are up for a weekend visit, and mysteriously we wake up to a front yard filled with t.p. ... it's just such a coincidence.
i'm sure it was some dumbass teenagers who got the house number wrong. or trotter has made some enemies in the neighborhood ...
7.01.2006
gregg allman does look a little menopausal, i guess
anyone care to tell me why commercials for menopause awareness use this classic allman bros. song?
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