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Looking For Quacks In The Pavement

Author: Karel Kerezman

  • Money changes everything. Or maybe just something.

    While it’s true that money can’t buy happiness, and there are problems for which the best solution may not be the application of wads of cash, I still feel better knowing that federal tax refunds landed in a couple of specific bank accounts this morning.

    My weekend will still be busy, but at least it won’t suck quite so much due to lack-of-funds like my weekends tend to do.

    Now I just need my new computer to get here already. Oh, and my birthday vacation, too. And… well, never you mind what else I need.

  • What would have been the fifteenth.

    Fifteen years ago today, I went and got married. (A few years ago, of course, I got unmarried.)

    To commemorate the occasion, my ex-wife gave me a big bundle of stress to deal with this week. Ain’t she sweet? I won’t go into details here, but suffice to say I’m a bit whole lot of annoyed right now.

    Hooray, or something. I just love special occasions.

  • Never saw any caps, with or without feathers.

    A couple of weeks ago, Kyla and I took a chance on the Macaroni Grill in downtown Portland, having been denied the chance to dine at Kells due to it being a Monday night. I approached the experience with some trepidation, as the place looks altogether too fru-fru for the likes of plebians such as myself. Never mind what I feared the final monetary tally might look like.

    Here’s the first thing we enjoyed about the experience:

    Yes, those are crayons on a paper-covered table. Yes, the crayons have food-related color names.

    No, Kyla didn’t take the purple eggplant crayon home after dinner.

    Speaking of dinner, let’s talk about the food. While we may have missed out on that other restaurant‘s garlic bread sticks, the bread loaf provided was quite yummy nonetheless. After considering the mix-and-match pasta plate, I decided to go instead with my usual dish of chicken parmisan. What better way to judge an eatery than by sampling their rendition of one of my all-time favorites?

    It was scrumptious, I tell you. The portion was considerable, too, enough so that I took half of it to work the next day for lunch. Even better, instead of the standard side of spaghetti with marinara sauce, they instead twirled a considerable helping of angel hair pasta onto the plate, flavored only with butter and herbs. I love angel hair pasta!

    We deliberately (if only with considerable self-restraint) saved room for dessert, consisting of a chocolate-filled ravioli-type pastry which was cute, but sounded more appealing than it tasted. Still, we really didn’t have anything to complain about with the food. (I recommend forgoing the salad before the main dish, though, as it’s an extra charge and nothing particularly special in its own right.)

    And then, the dreaded tally: With dessert, I still ended up paying less overall than at the other, similar-cuisine dining establishment. Wow. That’s not to say it was cheap, but they provided more dining delight per dollar than expected, and at a very competitive price.

    In short: Enjoyed Macaroni Grill. Will patronize again.

  • How to destroy the Earth

    If you’re anything like me, which in this case means “a geeky weirdo with a fascination not only for the physical sciences but also anything which involves what Marvin the Martian once called an Earth-shattering kaboom,” a description which probably applies any number of Mythbusters fans, you might want to read up on how to destroy the Earth.

    Here’s a sample quote to whet your appetite.

    The Earth is built to last. It is a 4,550,000,000-year-old, 5,973,600,000,000,000,000,000-tonne ball of iron. It has taken more devastating asteroid hits in its lifetime than you’ve had hot dinners, and lo, it still orbits merrily. So my first piece of advice to you, dear would-be Earth-destroyer, is: do NOT think this will be easy.

    I believe I’ve found my new favorite bedtime reading…

  • Happy VD to you, too.

    I didn’t know that working across the street from a car wash could constitute a health hazard, but this morning I’m being proved wrong. It’s all thanks to this:

    Apparently the car wash is having a pre-Spring cleaning of some sort, and that truck is involved. If you haven’t had the “pleasure,” imagine someone humming one note in the low-tenor range right behind your head at very high volume for about two solid hours. There’s plenty enough subsonic activity to set the skull to throbbing, which means I’m in the process of growing a right fine headache. And here I am with no pain meds and no way to escape.

    Lovely.

    Happy gaudy heart-shaped decorations day.

    EDIT: It’s amusing when one of the most famous companies operating today screws up their “trademark” custom logo for the day…

    For some reason that makes me feel better. This probably indicates that I’m a bad person.

  • San Jacinto

    Via everywhere on the Internet, but specifically average bear, comes this “amusing” excuse to exercise my newly-created rock-and-roll playlist…

    Instructions: Use your media player set to random to answer the questions with random song titles.

    What does next year have in store for me?
    Candle (“just take this candle / it’s the one you gave to me / it has enough light / just enough to torture me” … Oh, goody.)
    What does my love life look like?
    Airhead (I’m sorry, what? Apparently this meme hasn’t met my girlfriends.)
    What do I say when life gets hard?
    Concrete (“Concrete you don’t free my soul” … I have no idea what that’s supposed to mean.)
    What do I think of when I get up in the morning?
    Get Down Make Love (Er. Ahem. Never you mind, you sickos.)
    What song will I dance to at my wedding?
    Behind The Wheel (Wedding? Hah!)
    What do I want for my career?
    Army Of Me (“you’re on your own now / we won’t save you / your rescue squad / is too exhausted” … This meme isn’t exactly batting cleanup, is it?)
    Favorite saying?
    Diamonds Aren’t So Hard (It’s one of my favorite tracks on Tony Banks’ “Bankstatement” album, but as a saying? Not so much. “So come with me / where dragons rule the air / and diamonds aren’t so hard to find…”)
    Favorite place?
    Whoah (“whoah oh / don’t wanna see you back here again / whoah oh” … Well, I’m bewildered. How about you?)
    What do I think of my parents?
    You May Not Be Released (One last Oils song for the list. So much for Winamp’s randomizer. Note my lack of comment on the actual song selection…)
    Where would I go on a first date?
    Heat (“better run while you can / better set the tall sail / better make deep cover / before the boys have you nailed” … What any given Jethro Tull song has to do with dating is anyone’s guess, let alone this one from the spy-movie-themed “Under Wraps” album.)
    Drug of Choice?
    Flames (“when I am with you / there’s no reason to pretend that / when I am with you / I feel flames again” … No additional comment should be necessary, especially if you know the rest of the lyrics. Ahem.)
    How do I describe myself?
    Going Under (Last summer, maybe. Since last fall I’ve been trying to come back up again…)
    What is the thing I like doing the most?
    King Nothing (“wish I may, wish I might / have this wish, I wish tonight / I want that star, I want it now / I want it all and I don’t care how” … Look, I don’t know. I just like that snippet of lyric.)
    What is my state of mind like at the moment?
    Anybody Listening (“is there anybody listening? / is there anyone that sees what’s going on? / read between the lines / criticize the words they’re selling” … Maybe “at the moment” isn’t accurate, but… sure.)
    How will I die?
    I Don’t Care Anymore (“I won’t be there anymore / get out of my way / let me by / I got better things to do with my time / I don’t care anymore” … Er, huh?)
    Song they’ll play at my funeral?
    Metropolis (“there’ll never be another quite like you / I’m so involved with everything you do / don’t say nothing good will ever come of this / don’t say the damage is worse than it is” … Well, it could’ve been worse. Hmm.)
    What song will I put as the subject?
    San Jacinto (“we will walk – on the land / we will breathe – of the air / we will drink – from the stream / we will live – hold the line”)

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