the holiday table

will be groaning under the weight of tonight's feast. which is:

roasted turkey breast (w/ oil and herbs and wot not under the crispy skin)
sourdough sausage stuffing (not in the bird tho, that's a hospital trip waiting to happen)
my figure-friendly mashed potatoes (ha! heavy cream and butter?)
wild mushroom gravy (made w/ chicken stock i made myself!)
butter-braised baby brussels sprouts
cranberry sauce (see my previous post... the black pepper is the making of it, trust)
butterflake rolls
pumpkin pie w/ maple whipped cream

yeah... i'll be eating nothing but salad for a few days probably.

i hope you and yours have a lovely meal, wonderful conversation, and a long list of things to be thankful for.

much to be thankful for

i've seen people list ten things they're thankful for.

1. i'm thankful i've had wendell in my life for five and a half years. life has made sense in a way it didn't before i knew him. there's been lots to get through, and we've brought out the best in each other.

2. i'm thankful that i can laugh so hard i can't breathe. it happened last night. my brother came along for the ride. we were gonna invent a gluten-free tofu turducken. turns out it's call a tofucken and it HAS to have gluten. but thanks for the smoke stef!

3. i'm thankful that someone with half a brain won the election on the 4th. i'm also glad he's been doing a press conference or fireside chat every day lately. the country needs assurance right now, and our current occupant's only official activity yesterday was pardoning the damn turkey.

4. i'm thankful i have my health. oh, i've whined aplenty lately about my various ailments (and i'm adding arthritis to the mix... my right knee's been causing me grief lately), but i'm really fine. no major problems, and i could have a grip of them with the genes i inherited.

5. i'm thankful i've finally worked up the nerve to quit smoking. smoking killed my mother at 62. i have a marriage that isn't miserable and i'd like to get to live as long with wendell as my mom was stuck with my dad. they were married almost 39 years. that'd make me 74, and that's not long enough.

6. i'm thankful i learned the trick about adding just a wee bit of black pepper to my cranberry sauce. that and vanilla, again just a skosh.. like a capful. oh, and grand marnier. or cointreau. but especially the pepper. going back to the shit in the can that jiggles isn't an option.

7. i'm thankful my brother has decided he likes brussels sprouts.

8. i'm thankful the house hasn't fallen in on us. there's any number of things wrong with this place, shit that should have been dealt with before it was (re)listed. if it sold it wouldn't pass an inspection. but it's still here, even with the wind and shit we've had lately, and for that i'm thankful.

9. i am thankful that my dad lives in michigan. i don't have to explain that one, do i?

10. i'm thankful i still have my three loyal readers. they're all people i'd have a beer with if they didn't live at least 2,000 miles away... have a beer and listen to some tunes... perhaps burn one. they provoke me in ways they'll never know. make me think things i might not have otherwise. stretching out is good for more than just the body.

grrr!!!!!!!!!!

kona is to blame -

the roolz:
1. post your list of the seven best albums, the seven bloggers you will tag, a copy of these rules, and a link back to this page. (what page? see #2.)
2. the trackback links for these things are always fucking broken, so fuck the rest of the rules he posted.
4. post a link back to the blogger who tagged you.

k, seven's a bitch. i could easily name 70. these are 7 that i listened to today. they are in no particular order, and some of them might have a comment or 2.

1. louder than bombs - the smiths
2. fables of the reconstruction - r.e.m.
3. rage against the machine (they opened for pearl jam at the palladium and tossed out copies of this on cassette. i was floored.)
4. nevermind - nirvana.
5. doolittle - pixies
6. 10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2,1 - midnight oil (this is what opened my eyes politically speaking. i think i was 13 when i first heard it... it had a huge impact on me.)
7. dummy - portishead (omg the times this cd got me laid.)

now comes the hard part... picking seven peeps to foist this upon.

1.kona ok... give me seven more!
2.bizza
3.eden
4.dr. doug
5.lebowski urban achiever
6.heidi rude
7.american guy

the devil wind

it's actually the santa ana winds, but i think i understand why they're sometimes called the devil wind... it smells rather like hell.

we're about 12 mi from the westernmost parts of the two fires burning locally. one started in the west end of corona, and cinders from that fire caught in yorba linda. a separate fire started in brea, and given the topography out there, they could very well merge.

we won't ever be in actual danger from these fires, ie we're ordered to evacuate... but fuck is it ever nasty here. the house is closed up, and the a/c is coming on about once an hour for about 15 mins.

check out these pics:

the above pics were taken about 12:30. notice the ash gathering in the corner of my bro's back window? notice the palm tree blowing?

the last three were taken about 2:00 pm. notice how much nastier it got in 2 hrs time? and how the area of blue sky has actually gotten bigger? wen'l thinks there's some sort of weird inversion happening. i think he might be right.

november 4th

two days from now. if you haven't already voted (and aren't planning to tomorrow), make sure you get out and vote. i know most people say something like, "i don't care who you vote for, just vote." fuck that. i care who you're voting for. i want a president who says it's ok to have a lover's quarrel with your country. (wish i could remember who said that on maher the other night. i'd give em snaps.)

november 4th is also my 4th anniversary. wen'l and i got married 2 days after the chimperor was "re-elected". i want more than anything else to celebrate barack obama having won the election. we're poor, and about to be more so, what with the medical and dental bills i'll be racking up. we're exchanging presents, but we had a small budget. we're staying home for dinner and i'm making spaghetti con polpette. part of me wants to say fuck it and buy a bottle of champagne, even though i'd have to massage my budget for the rest of the month.

so i will be there, at lord baden-powell elementary, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed, tuesday morning. i am not a morning person, and i will have to get up about 530 i think. much coffee will have to be consumed, and probably a bracing shower too. but i wouldn't miss this for anything. not only do i have to vote for obama, i have to vote no on a proposition on our ballot. the state of california cannot be in the business of making denying an entire group of people's civil rights part of our constitution. i haven't noticed more straight people filing for divorce since same-sex marriage became legal here. apparently, the institution isn't in danger as a result.

so, i better go get dinner out of the oven. if you live in california, please vote no on proposition 8, and no matter where else you live (in the US anyway), please vote for barack obama. if my 70 year old, lifelong republican aunt is, so can you.

i admit it. i choked up.

don't mind the credits.

when it rains, it pours

indeed.

i have to have my upper wisdom teeth extracted. i had a dental emergency the other morning, and went to dr. papazian. he sed they had to go. referred me to an oral/maxillofacial surgeon over in long beach. my consult and panoramic x-ray is the 12th.

get this - the thing in my parotid gland will probably show up in this x-ray. i will definitely be informing the doc of all my recent medical adventures at my consultation.

i wish i'd had the damn things taken out when i was a kid, before they ever came in. my ma had killer dental insurance back then. they paid like 75% on my orthodontia killer. instead, they started coming in around the time i was 27. my bottom ones have never fully erupted, but the upper ones did.I probably haven't been as diligent about the hygiene as i should have been, but these teeth are right against my tonsils (another relic i'm still equipped w/), and i gag like a bitch most of the time.

the bottom ones should come out eventually too, but thus far they're ok. no cavities or much decay, and they can wait.

i tried to have this all done a couple years ago, when wen'l and i had dental ins. the damn company denied my claim. that pissed my dentist off to no end. "they weren't pathological?" he almost seethed! the place the ins. co. would have wanted to do the damn procedure scared the shit out of me though. perhaps it's a good thing i'll be having it done by this guy.

i heart my dentist. i always have. he didn't charge me for the visit, or for the x-rays he took to give this surgeon. i just hope the dude will work out some sort of payment plan with me.

primus sucks

too many puppies are being shot in the dark.
too many puppies are trained not to bark.
at the sight of blood that must be spilled so that
we may maintain our oil fields.
too many puppies
too many puppies are taught to heal.
too many puppies are trained to kill.
on the command of men wearing money belts that buy
mistresses sleek animal pelts.
too many puppies.
too many puppies with guns in their hands.
too many puppies in foreign lands.
are dressed up sharp in suits of green and
placed upon the war machine.
too many puppies are just like me.
too many puppies are afraid to see.
the visions of the past brought to life again,
too many puppies, too many dead men.


that's from 1990, people. located on "frizzle fry", an album that was called the bastard child of dr. seuss and frank zappa.

2K

lest you think my mind is all on myself tonight, it's not. tonight i heard the number i've been dreading for months - keith olbermann said tonight that it was the 2000th day since the declaration of mission accomplished.

i have a cousin over there.

there are much worse things in the world, even in my tiny one, than a tumor in my parotid gland.

sometimes i wish i were the kind of person who prays. sometimes, when things are really bad, i have a conversation with my late cousin stephen. (who died from a lack of health care btw. i remember all too well and it makes me scared in a way i can't adequately explain.). this conversation occurs only in my mind, but i remember having a very frank talk with him a few weeks before he suddenly died, and it brought me a very profound peace. i suppose it makes some sense that an atheist like me would have to have a vent (if you will) like that. i haven't yet had that conversation with him, so things can't be as bad as i was afraid.

stephen's been gone for 14 years now. the ache i feel at his absence is much deeper than what i feel for my own mother. that may sound pretty fucked up, but i'd known for 9 years that it was going to happen with her. he was alive, and a day later he wasn't. i think it's his being snatched away from us like that left a mark on me that will never go away.

i got to (just) long enough to say that life is long. trust me, even when i'm whining about how fucked up things are, i am incredibly grateful i've gotten to be here long enough to earn saying that.

fuck me

well, the doc called this afternoon about quarter till five and said i need to get a ct scan of this thing, my "suspicious" parotid gland. too bad i had to blow the $ on the damn ultrasound to find that out. it might have provided me with a down payment on the damn thing if nothing else.



so i have to go pick up the report from her and take it an ent, who will invariably schedule the super-expensive test.





two things:

1. i'd be considerably less fucked if i lived in los angeles county. they have hospitals up there where i could receive treatment regardless of my ability to pay for it. no such safety net exists here in orange county, because they don't give two shits about poor people... i suppose back in the day if you didn't have insurance it was because you were poor. for whatever reason, you were poor. these days though, you can have a decent paying job, and not have it. or be eligible for it but not be able to afford it (our current pickle... it would run us in the neighborhood of $700/mo and that just not doable). there are supposedly some low-cost "alternatives" here in the OC, but sliding scale isn't going to be cheap for me.



2. i also wouldn't be in this pickle if the governator, mr. schwarzenegger, hadn't vetoed SB 840, which would have provided californians a single payer system. from the los angeles times, dated september 6, 2006:

An analysis commissioned by Health Care for All California, a nonprofit group that favors universal health insurance, estimated that universal coverage would have cost an extra $17 billion, but the state would have saved $25 billion through bulk purchasing of drugs and eliminating the multiple bureaucracies now required for hospitals and private insurance companies. The report was prepared last year by the Lewin Group, a Virginia-based healthcare consulting firm.

i wonder how much insurance company money has flowed in ahhhnold's direction since he took office. (*) this is going to become an even bigger problem in this state, and sticking his head in the sand and refusing to be the one to deal with it was the behavior of a very girly man.

* - apparently it's over a million dollars.

today's the day

i'm having that ultrasound the doc threatened me with a few weeks ago this afternoon. i really need it to be something that doesn't require immediate (and expensive) intervention. we're barely squeaking by right now as it is. i don't need to be dumping untold thou$ands worth of medical bills on top of my current liabilities.

those of you out there with health insurance should consider yourselves lucky today, and don't ever take your benefits for granted.

fuck

so southern california is burning again. we've got optimal conditions - a weak santa ana with temps (locally) in the mid-80's, humidity in the high single digits, etc. warm, but not hot enough to turn on the a/c, so everything is coated in this mixture of ash and dust. my eyes are also full of that shit, and i'm miserable. low humidity alone will make one's eyes feel shitty, but it's 10x worse with all that crap in the air.

and, my skin is driving me nuts. i cannot drink enough to keep up with the air sucking the water out of my skin. there isn't enough lotion in the world. i'm actually ashy!

lol

i'm here with the cause
i'm holding the torch
in the corner of your room
can you hear me?
and when you're dancing and laughing
and finally living
hear my voice in your head
and think of me kindly

i usually indulge my smiths jones when wen'l is at work. any guesses as to what song that is? and is karaoke dead? cuz i could sing the shit outta some smiths tunes, that one included. i think "heaven knows i'm miserable now" would be the one i'd be best at though.

so it's saturday night, and one of the side effects of being dead crackers broke is that old married farts can't go out and live it up. so we stay home, cook something yummy (and cheap! i think dinner tonight's gonna set me back about $8), watch some shit on the tivo, smoke a doob, and have a quick plook before going to bed early. things could certainly be worse. least i have some good company!

seasonal fruits and veg - fall 08

if you're like me, you've noticed with considerable alarm the increase in your outlay for provisions. you might also have a slight weight problem like i do, and have a definite need to add additional vegetation to your diet. perhaps you're already a vegetarian (snaps to kona :D), and you've grown bored with your usual lineup of stuff.

perhaps you're already familiar with the concept of eating seasonally, and perhaps not. if not, did you know one can eat better AND cheaper by eating this way? and did you know the vast amount of stuff other than the root veggies and hard squashes to choose from? in our increasingly dire circumstances, both financial and environmental, more of us ought to be giving more thought to what we're eating, and the time of the year we're eating it. take peaches for example. i saw some at the store today. $3.99 a lb, and they're from chile, for fuck's sake. they must be scrumptious.

so, without further ado, here's the list of the stuff that's currently in season, and most of it is widely available.

after the list, you will find a recipe for one of my favorite soups. it contains three of the things on this list. give it a try on some chilly evening. we're having it tonight. it's supposed to get down into the 40's for the first time since last winter tonight, and here in california, that qualifies as cold.


apples
artichokes (second crop)
arugula
beets
broccoli
broccoli rabe (aka rapini)
brussels sprouts
cabbage
carrots
cauliflower
celeriac (aka celery root)
celery
chard
cranberries
edamame
eggplant (early fall)
fennel
figs
garlic
grapes (early fall)
green beans (early fall)
horseradish
jerusalem artichokes (aka sunchokes)
kale
kohlrabi (late fall)
leeks
lemongrass
lettuce
limes
mushrooms (wild)
okra (early fall)
onions
parsnips
pears
peppers (early fall)
persimmons
pomegranates
potatoes
pumpkins
quince [killer with manchego cheese!]
radicchio
radishes (all types)
rutabaga
salsify
scallions
shallots
shelling beans (early fall)
sweet potatoes
turnips
winter squash

and now, the recipe... baked potato soup! and sorry, but this won't work for vegans. lacto-ovo's, sure.

4 oz. bacon, rendered and crumbled, reserving drippings OR 3 T butter (or oil, i suppose)
6 c chicken stock, hot
4 large leftover baked potatoes, halved. pulp scooped out and put through a ricer or mashed
1½ c buttermilk
½ c sour cream
½ c freshly grated parmigiano-reggiano
2½ t salt (and don't use morton's for fuck's sake!)
1 t freshly ground pepper
2 T sherry vinegar
¼ c minced chives

in a dutch oven, over medium heat use the drippings or melt the butter and add the leeks. cook until the leeks are translucent and add the garlic. add the hot stock and whisk to combine. in a separate bowl, whisk together the potatoes, buttermilk, sour cream, and grated parmigiano-reggiano. add this mixture to the soup stirring constantly. season with salt and pepper. remove from the heat and add the sherry vinegar.

ladle into bowls and garnish with chives.

did i mention that...

the suites those motherfuckers spent those nights in went for $1295.00 per? per night? per person? that's like a month worth of unemployment for one night at that pile. and believe me, nothing comes cheap at the st. reeeg. not even if one is sleeping, eating, and parking as a group, as those fucknuts certainly were.

another thing - am i the only person in the world that wants to wring that skinny, over-surgeried, can't keep her fucking yap shut mrs. mcsame's neck? she's so underfed i could probably do it with one hand. gawd, she needs to shut it. too bad her plastic surgeon can't do us all a favor and botox her fucking vocal chords, you know?

also, i'm beginnning to wonder where my 3 readers disappeared to.

$400k+ for...

so this is where those AIG executives took a vacation on OUR dime: the st. regis resort and spa in monarch beach, california. now, i've spent a few nights at this place. back in the day, when wen'l was still working at neologic, the xmas festivities always took place at the st. reeeg. the only good thing i have to say about the place is that they had nice bath products (acqua di parma, to be exact). wait. one more good thing: their bars stock woodford reserve, my go-to bourbon.

anyhow, those execs, a week after we the people bailed their asses out to the tune of $85,000,000,000, flew to tacky-ass southern orange county and got spa treatments on us. ON US. motherfuckers need to pay us back and then find themselves applying for unemployment. no parachutes, golden or otherwise, for these assholes. they need to figure out how to pay their bills on $420 a week like the rest of us when we lose our jobs.

yet another food meme

Got this from Eden, aka Piggyhawk :).

1) Copy this list into your blog or journal, including these instructions.
2) Bold all the items you’ve eaten.
3) Italicize any items that you would never consider eating.
4) Optional extra: Post a comment here or at http://whitetrashbbq.blogspot.com linking to your results.

1. Tomato Soup Cake (?)
2. Turducken
3. Chicken Feet
4. Sauerbraten
5. Limburger Cheese
6. Asian Pears
7. Ham Hocks
8. Ghee
9. Corn Bread
10. Buffalo Mozzarella (mmm... mozzarella di bufala)
11. Florida Stone Crabs
12. Som Tum
13. Oxtails
14. Sundried Tomatoes
15. Beef Jerky
16. Tongue
17. Calves Liver
18. Shoofly pie
19. Pulled Pork
20. Sour Cream Chocolate Frosting
21. Bison
22. Persimmons
23. Monkfish (ahh... the poor man's lobster)
24. Hoja Santa Cheese
25. Whoopee pie
26. Peking Duck
27. Sopa de Ajo - Castilian Garlic Soup
28. Pistolettes
29. Naan
30. Country Ham
31. Jambalaya
32. Anchovies
33. Black and White Cookies
34. Chives
35. Potato Pancakes
36. Boudain
37. Macoun Apples
38. Brooklyn Pizza
39. Star Fruit
40. Dosa
41. Lutefisk
42. Rhubarb
43. Scrapple
44. Huitlacoche
45. Cherry Pierogi
46. Kumquats
47. Ambrosia Salad
48. Taylor Ham
49. Sardines
50. Capers
51. Dungeness Crabs (the best crab of all, I think)
52. Grape Leaves
53. Pepper Jelly
54. Hanger Steak
55. A just picked vine ripened tomato still hot from the sun (one of my favorite things to eat is a sandwich made with one... some mayo, basil, really good white bread.... mmm!)
56. Stuffed Quahogs
57. Smoked Eggs
58. Chicken Kiev
59. Bigos
60. Andouille
61. Shropshire Blue Cheese
62. Real Moonshine
63. Yuca
64. Chicken Katsu
65. Clams on the half shell
66. Scallion Pancakes
67. Tamales
68. Maine Lobster (not my favorite though)
69. Picadillo
70. Romesco Sauce
71. Sour Cherries
72. Paella
73. Gulf Shrimp
74. Empanadas
75. Fluff
76. Ostrich
77. Wild Blueberries
78. Skate
79. Black-eyed Peas
80. Hatch Chile Peppers
81. Morels
82. Water Chestnuts
83. Massaman Curry
84. Goose
85. Jamon Serrano
86. Knish
87. Quail Eggs
88. Gyoza
89. Conch
90. Rutabaga
91. Turtle
92. Salsify
93. Hummus
94. Ceviche
95. Barbecue Baby Back Ribs
96. Parmigiano-Reggiano
97. Pine Nuts
98. Basmati Rice
99. Pickled Herring
100. Kohlrabi

i'm a little late to the party..

but i just discovered i kinda dig that tv show "heroes".

i think being forced to watch like 7 episodes this weekend is what's responsible.

i feel like an utter dork.


anyhoo, in other news, i've been a bit under the weather lately. something called *bacterial parotitis*. the parotid glands are the largest of the three sets of salivary glands. i went to the doc wednesday, and she thought it was either 1. an infection, and she wrote me a prescription for augmentin, the biggest horse pill you've ever seen; 2. a (most likely) benign tumor. well, i've since discovered it must be the first option because i don't think a tumor would be responding to antibiotics, and this thing in my neck has dramatically reduced in size since i started on the bug juice.

i'm going to make another appointment to see her towards the end of this week so she can see how things are going, etc.

as you may know, i am w/o health insurance, and i think i may have just dodged a bullet.

a food meme!

Found this over at Culinary Adventures of a New Wife. Click the title of this post to visit!

Here's the simple rules:
1. Copy this list into your blog or journal, including these instructions.
2. Bold all the items you’ve eaten.
3. Italicize any items that you would never consider eating.
4. Optional extra: Post a comment here at www.verygoodtaste.co.uk linking to your results.

Omnivore's 100

1. Venison
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros
4. Steak tartare
5. Crocodile
6. Black pudding
7. Cheese fondue
8. Carp
9. Borscht
10. Baba ghanoush
11. Calamari
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes
19. Steamed pork buns
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes
22. Fresh wild berries
23. Foie gras
24. Rice and beans
25. Brawn, or head cheese
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper (actually it was habañero)
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters (and apparently, I'm allergic!)
29. Baklava
30. Bagna cauda
31. Wasabi peas
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi
34. Sauerkraut (ICK!!)
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar. Cognac, yes, but no cigar.
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O
39. Gumbo
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat
42. Whole insects
43. Phaal
44. Goat’s milk
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more
46. Fugu
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut
50. Sea urchin
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi
53. Abalone
54. Paneer
55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine
60. Carob chips (once and only once... faux chocolate sucks!)
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads
63. Kaolin - um, that's CLAY!
64. Currywurst
65. Durian
66. Frogs’ legs
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake
68. Haggis
69. Fried plantain
70. Chitterlings, or andouillette
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini
73. Louche absinthe
74. Gjetost, or brunost
75. Roadkill
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie
78. Snail
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum
82. Eggs Benedict
83. Pocky (?!)
84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant.
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare
87. Goulash
88. Flowers
89. Horse
90. Criollo chocolate
91. Spam *hurl*
92. Soft shell crab
93. Rose harissa
94. Catfish
95. Mole poblano
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake

and now back to our regular programming

well hello there. first post in ages that wasn't a meme, eh?

been sorta busy, and not really in the mood to do any blogging, the usual excuse.

anyhoo, what about my girl? rachel's getting her own show as soon as the freakshow that will be the rethuglican national convention is over! i'm so stoked :)

now, about the democratic national convention: i'm kinda glad they waited till wednesday to serve up the red meat, and i'm glad it was bubba who dished up the first serving. that speech made me remember why i liked him as much as i did. biden did have a lot to live up to after that, but he did just fine. hillary's speech sorta surprised me. michelle's didn't. obama's speech was one for the ages, but the speech that got me moist was al gore's, even though my heart breaks every time i see him.

i hate aching for what could have been.