Delicious Dinner

Every once in a while, Mother likes to dig out her old recipe cards and whip up something special for dinner. Tonight is one of those extra-special occasions. We're celebrating Mother's recent weight loss (10 pounds in 2 days! It really pays to get the stomach flu when you're morbidly obese, just ask Mother!). I am so excited, I can't wait to be let out of my room!

Mother likes to have a full course meal when celebrating any sort of weight loss. Our meal will begin with scrumptious Fish Balls and a Chilled Celery Log for appetizers. Once we've had our fill of balls and logs we'll move on to the Jellied Tomato Refreshers (my favorite YUM!), which are quite good. We don't have brandy snifters, so we just use Dad's beer mugs. I like to pretend I'm getting drunk, which usually elicits a laugh from Sissy and a hearty thumpin' from Dad. After we've drained our mugs of the jellied tomatoes, with much fanfare Mother delivers the main course to the table: Liver Pate en Masque, Mmmmmmm! I usually have two helpings of this 'cause it's my very favorite of all meals Mother cooks (besides the Chef's Surprise, which is usually all leftovers thrown into a pan and baked at 350 for 30 minutes. Oh my god, my mouth is salivating!). Of course, the best is always saved for last: dessert! Tonight is gonna be a surprise, but I sincerely hope it's the Fluffy Mackerel Pudding! Mother usually makes an extra cup just for me, as it's my favoritest of all desserts in the whole wide world! I am so happy right now I could just... oh. I just did. Well, I must change my underpants now!

A Ground-Shaking Good Time

This weekend I watched the most delightful movie about ravenous earth monsters with a blood lust for humans that I've ever seen. It's called Tremors. The story goes like this: in a desolate Nevada town named Perfection, probably since it's nestled in a water-starved valley between mountains and a cliff, the local residents start dying one by one. Considering the entire population is around 10 people, this becomes quite alarming. Now, you'd think that perhaps the local bigot finally blew his lid due to the extreme isolation, but no. Actually the increasingly violent and gruesome deaths are caused by huge, blind, stinky worms that live underground. They can sense vibrations as the towns people run about to and fro. They also have cognitive learning abilities, something the regular towns people seem to have been born without. So as the towns people learn they must get off the ground, the earth monsters (or Graboids, as they are lovingly called) learn how to destroy whatever it is the delicious humans have climbed upon, thus securing one more meal in their quest for constant food. They also have multiple tentacles with grabby mouths that snake out of the gapping hole in their heads.

Luckily, the towns people have Valentine and Earl (Kevin Bacon and Fred Ward), the local gay handymen who live, work and travel together to help solve the Mystery of the Graboid. Luckily for them, they stumble upon a plucky 45 year old geology student, Rhonda, spending her days and nights researching and analyzing the perplexing Mystery of the Seismograph. Then there's Burt and Heather, the local gun enthusiasts, who have a difficult time listening, but can wield a gun like no other. The rest of the cast who isn't dead early on includes Walter, the Chinese shop owner (and only businessowner in town, I'm guessing), Melvin, the local teen bully who has neither parents nor peers to bully, Nancy, the mother of pogo-sticking Mindy, Miguel, the token Hispanic dude, and Nestor, the town dumb ass.

Besides roll-in-the-aisles-with-laughter banter between the stressed-out towns people, the movie is loaded with intense action sequences featuring some of the finest puppetry and animatronic effects ever captured on film, balanced by sweet and tender love scenes featuring one hot threesome between Val, Earl and Rhonda as they're stranded on a rock outcrop over night. Luckily Rhonda finds some poles nearby and they vault their way to freedom (much to the delight of Val and Earl). In another scene after a Graboid makes for a game of Grabass with Rhonda, but grabs only her pleated pants, Val stares lovingly at her panties while sloppily applying gore makeup to her legs. These scenes show that even in a time of crisis, fun can be had at the expense of all.

I won't give away the farm (they all live, except poor, poor Walter) and spoil the fun for you (they kill the last of 4 by running it off a cliff), but I highly recommend investing 96 minutes of your time into a family friendly tale about love, loss, diversity, tolerance and humongous earth worms. A-

Crash Helmet

As I was primping in front of the mirror this morning I decided my helmet was looking a little too plain. Normally I won't wear my green helmet with brown slacks, usually the orange one adds a nice contrast in color, but today I was feeling a little frisky in the clothes department. At first I liked the smooth, shiny surface of the helmet, but today isn't a reserved sort of day, I needed something with a little pizazz, a little flair, something with a bit of sartorial charm. I tried using markers to paint pretty pictures, but firstly the color choices are few and far between because I so often use markers I tend to run out of ink (well, that and I chew on the ends, which Mother just despises), and secondly the marker just rubbed off when I touched the helmet. With that plan gone I decided to actually paint pretty pictures with my water colors. Well, as I'm sure you've already guessed, the colors just ran off. That's when the light bulb blew. Not because I had an idea, but because after two months it finally burnt out. But it did illuminate one alternative: stickers. Usually, Mother doesn't allow me to have any stickers because of the refrigerator incident. And the car incident. And the dog incident (I still maintain my innocence, Mother!). But I know where she keeps them. After rooting through multiple drawers in Mother's dresser, and trying on a strange black lace number, I finally found my stickers. Then came the quandary of the day: which stickers do I affix to my helmet? Superman? Scooby-Doo? The Princess Collection? So many choices, but ultimately I knew there was only one that would do my Army green helmet justice: The Princess Collection. Now I'm looking pretty cool. You should have seen the looks on the faces of each passers-by as I walked to the comic book store. Man, did I turn heads or what?!? Sure, Mother will be upset (especially when she sees what I did to her black lacy garment), but I feel complete. I'm thinking tomorrow I might go the rebel route and wear jeans with the black helmet. That ALWAYS gets the girls. Especially when I wear the purple jeans.

S.O.S. | Save Our Segway

I just found out from a dear friend that Colorado is not a Segway friendly state. There is pending legislation to ban the offending motor vehicles from the sidewalks. I need my Segway. How can I be expected to walk from my car to my office everyday? That's almost two whole blocks each way! By the time I reach the office I'm nearly out of breath, with spots floating in front of my eyes. Without my Segway, I'd just be a puddle of sweat on the sidewalk that some poor shmo whould have to mop up. We must stop this madness! I will not be told I have to walk, when clearly walking is highly overrated. And tiring. It makes me tired just thinking about it. I must (pant pant) take a rest (pant pant).

Love the Segway? Read about my adventures with Pearl HERE.