Big Gulps, eh? See ya later!

I haven't had a moment when I wasn't too lazy to write about Greece, or Eggnut, or X-mas 2007 (below), but I'm taking such big delicious gulps now I have to mention this. I got highball glasses for X-mas from my special lady, and I thought I'd christen them with actual highballs, so I had to check online. The only thing I really know about highballs is that characters in Salinger's short stories drank them. Turns out highballs are whiskey and ginger ale. I didn't like the first sip, but after the second sip I started to like it very much. Now I'm feelin smiley facey.

As long as I'm on, X-mas was pretty good, including much Eggnog, Christmas cod, two kinds of marinated mushrooms and fresh ones in a sauce for broccoli, giant fresh ham (16 lbs.), a yule log, hamburger buns (for left over ham sandwiches), and poopy milk (all homemade, of course). Great gifts include, beyond the highball glasses, an electrical mixer which will save me much whisking and three belts which bring me closer to my goal of having a belt for every pair of pants, so I never have to take the belt off (or search for a belt in the morning).

In the religious spirit, we watched Bible Josef, as it's spelled here, and today we're watching Bible Jesus. They weren't bad, for real!

p.s. oops, clearly what i meant was "poppy milk."

I am too busy and/or tired to post

so here, this onion article is really funny, especially the second photo!

I guess my work place isn't as crazy as I though :(

These work stories are funny! Specifically they are:

1. Inspirational
2. Good competition
3. So desperate you risk arrest
4. Good lesson
5. Don't work with French people
6. Shows you're stupid not to send it back
7. I do most things nude besides working with power tools
8. I guess they won't be flying to the international speedo convention!
9. My friend was arrested for being a fake doctor and giving people shots of grape-ade
10. Too awesome
11. Same team, same team!
12. I only ask my boss for things when she's in a good mood...duh...
13. :D
14. Now who's a weiner??
15. I hope that wasn't Sim...

Lithuanian Lithuanian Dance Groups

Saw Liepa's dance performance Saturday: fun. Two things I noticed. First, half the groups didn't hold hands while making gates: lazy, and sloppy, despite the more identical angle. Second, all the groups wore uniforms, in old Soviet style. I realize it's cheaper, but really, is it worth being a communist just to save a few bucks?

Happy Anniversary

I'd like to wish a happy anniversary to my life partner, my boots. We met exactly ten years ago in December of 1997. I bought them for the (now) low low price of 140 Douche Marks, though it seemed expensive to me at the age of 16, and they certainly weren't the cheapest. We've been through thick and thin together, ten winters and much work in muddy muck and slushy snow. In all that time I've only had to change the laces three times, have the soles reglued twice, and have parts of the lether repaired once. I love my boots.

Feelin Guilty

I been trying to put on more classical music lately so that my special baby doesn't become stupid but listening to too much trash, e.g. her fave, Shakira. I have more classical music than I listen to regularly. Last night something came on that I really enjoyed, it sounded vaguely familiar, but I couldn't put my finger on it. Then I looked down at the name of the song strolling along my music player...Canon in D. I felt really bad for enjoying it, since I decided to hate it forever after watching my favorite youtube video five times a day for a month. Maybe I'll watch it again right now...

Professions that might suit me

If I were a judge, this would be I!

The Drunken Hillbilly Vote

The support of Ric Flair is sure to get Huckabee this key demographic, vote, if they don't forget to vote...

Thanksgiving 2007

Liepa came out to visit us for Thanksgiving this year. We thought about just making Turkey breasts, but we wanted gravy, so we had to get something greasier: two thighs, two drumsticks, and half a breast, total of 4.5 lb. we got plenty of grease and made delicious gravy, stuffing with sausage, broccoli, cauliflower, Brussels sprouts, and big salad. The next day we made carrot cake, awesome. We drank beer, red wine, jagermeister, Cyprus ice tea, and several liters of pina-coladas with fresh fruit blended in. Nice. Tonight's sweet and sour turkey and stir fried vegetables. Double nice.

P.S. Liepa can't post comments, so she asked me to post this (i spell checked it for her):
why don't you mention anything else fun that we did, like tell so many jokes on the bus ride back and laugh so hard that we almost forgot a special someone... and after much arguing, watched troy and then psycho again? and play ALIAS with various sets of rules on various days, various amounts of which we agreed about, and ironically aras the single player won while the liepa-special team won by a landslide! maybe because aras forgot what "ziedadulkes" are; and buck euchre, and the vas-ki-chi game, and seinfeld. and getting up early to go the turgus and finding you hot pants and me freezing my toes off because my socks fell off and getting covered with snow and undressing into a shopping cart like bums at akrop, where we also made a t-shirt which included the words "pomidorcikas" and "ackarikas" and "malacius" and ate chinese soup and played MINI GOLF which i haven't done in years, but we totally ruled that floor, especially because we just did the holes in any order, avoiding all little kids and other goofs who take like 20 minutes per hole. and don't forget how we planned a fancy chinese dinner last night, but then ate so much leftover stuffing and chips with GUACOMOLE (the best we've made yet-- thanks to bacon and beans), that we forgot about dinner and just made dessert. but we grated about 7 cups of carrots (from 6 carrots!), when all we needed was 3 cups, so now you'll have to think up something else that might use so many damn grated carrots... maybe consider getting a rabbit as my special niece’s first pet.

I put the winter liner into my trench coat today

Coincidentally, today is also the day after the day when I watched The Last Stand. I didn't realize it was an X-Men movie, because I have a brail copy of it without pictures. Therefore, I was very excited to watch it when I put it in and realized what it was. Imagine how devestated I was when the movie was, uh, stupid. The X-Men continue to fight each other, for reasons that are no longer descernible in the least. All mutants were threatened with extermination in a much more real way than in the second movie, when they teamed up against the government. Now they fought against each other instead. Why? No reason. Plus they kill most of the good characters, but not in ways that serve a purpose, like when they killed Terminator 2. Almost all of them were killed, it seemed, just cause it's the last movie. I rate this movie a negative three.

Spicy Porkchop Paradise

We have this favorite rentaurant, Neringa, my special lady and I. It's not spectacular, but it is really good and close to home and reasonably priced. We always get the same thing: pork schnitzel and wild mushroom sauce for her, and a porkchop with jalapeno sauce for me. Ten times we been there, and we always get those dishes, they're so good. When I noticed an inconsistent jalapeno appropriation, I started telling the waitress each time to feel free to be generous with the jalapenos, I like it spicy. Since then I always get plenty. Last night though, when we went, I almost got more than I bargained for: there were jalapeno slices litterallly piled onto my pork chop. The "sauce" was mainly the peppers, not something more saucy. They were so piled onto the chop that they were overflowing onto the potatos. It was spicier than I thought it should be, even so, and towards the end I saw that the chef had mixed in a stub of piri piri too: awesome! My nose was running, I was sluggin beer back: perfect.

Do as I say, not as I do

I realized I gotta, I mean, have to shape up if I wanna, I mean, want to lead by example. This I realized when my special baby started say "yeah" instead of "yes." I imagined a conversation with a future English teacher who gives my special child a bad grade, telling her I'm a native speaker English professor, her critisizing my English, and me saying "Oh yeah, wanna fight about it?"

Soduko

Ever seen Psycho, by Alfred Hitchcock? Awesome movie! Had me guessing till the final minutes. They don't make such good movies anymore.

p.s. I head working out Soduko puzzles helps postpone dementia, so I started playing on my phone. The only other games I have on my phone are such mindless wastes of time, I had to try it anyway. I dig Soduko. I think I can actually feel it making me brain stronger.

Cheeseburger Cheeseburger, wherefore art thou Cheeseburger?

Man, I made such delicious cheesburgers last night, it was unbelievable. Sauted mushrooms and onions? You better believe it. They were the tastiest cheeseburgers of my life. Unless that was just the three shots talking I took with my brother-in-law before eating. Either way though, we totally scarfed those burgers. It was one of those meals so delicious that you finish it, and you realize you forgot to drink your beer.

International "Students" Day

Why are the q-marks around students, you wonder? Well, it's because only pseudo-students celebrate this day, so it's really more of an internation anti-student day. On Mother's Day, Mothers spend time with and/or are cherished by their children. On Frotteur's Day, they do the same. On Students Day, they celebrate by not being students at all, i.e. skipping class! Now, there is an hour and a half event that they may skip class for. So the professors let them out, and they walk right out of the building and don't come back after for their remaining classes. On their way out, I heard the receptionist ask them if they're not going to attend the event, and they replied, "Madam, have you taken leave of your senses?!" ("Nespank!")

Cool (as a Cucumber)

That my new name for this cocktail I learned about from Lokys. Take five shots worth of gin, soak one cucumber sliced lengthwise in it for 24 hours, and mix in tonic at three to one and add some ice. Good for five cocktails.

It's amazingly cucumbery. And if you're too lazy to go make yourself another, you can just eat the gin soaked cucumber you used for garnish. Plus, I think it counts as a vegetable, so you can have less vegies at dinner and your mother can't yell at you, you just point to your drink, and smile, and she'll say, touche. It's the healthiest cocktail since bloody mary came to town!

Kaip Suprast

Oddly, I don't know how this happened, but Kaip Suprast wasn't abandoned as I had thought. My link to it became wrong, a link to a similar sounding but wrong page. Maybe somebody stole my blogger password and did that to sabotage the Kaip page count so they couldn't sell any ad space? I don't know...Kaip suprast?!

Is anybody stealing my passwords?

Sometimes I accidentally sign in somewhere with the wrong password. It's especially common since I have whoeverthefuckiam for my user name more often that not, so I'm used to typing it then one of several passwords. I wonder, when I enter a password that's wrong not from a typo, but completely a different word/number combo, I wonder if, say, some evil technician at google, for instance, tries to use that password with whoeverthefuckiam@something.else, or whoeverthefuckiam on amazon or ebay. That seems like a good idea for identity theft.

Hillary Clinton: hard to say she's less stupid than anybody else!

These are awesome little bits of her contradicting herself repeatedly:

The Politics of Parsing

This is even funnier than Bushisms! It's so funny, now that I think of it, it's hard to imagine she's leading the polls...Hopefully people are just joking with those polls, like they were with the Lieberman polls.

It's funny (or sad) (or highlarious) because it's true! So true...

No truer story has ever been told: Study Finds Working At Work Improves Productivity

Always Ask!

One of my colleagues today told me I have to redo some work I did, basically just move around a bunch of figures from some columns to other columns, because the college is switching to a different report form. I just did it a three weeks ago the way, so I said whoever chose to change the form can do it herself, I already did that once. They said, it doesn't matter, you gotta redo alot of things in this life. I said that's nonsense.

Then I went to talk to the person in charge of these reports, turns out I was right. That new format is only for departments that haven't alread handed in their reports yet.

Moral of the story is, if you waste your time because of a mistaken colleagues, it's often your own fault for not going over her head.

Lyme Disease is Gay

Not sure if I've got lyme disease again, but my lower back and neck are really sore and I'm suffering fatigue (not alcohol related).

The gay thing is that it recurs without being bitten again. Most doctors don't realize this, and some will think you're crazy to suggest it, just because they don't know about it, e.g. my butthead Boston University doctor. I had to insist on a blood test, he wouldn't even do that willingly. Then he called a few days later to apologize, I did have Lyme again, without being bit again. What an ass. This was my second time with it, four years ago. Hopefully it ain't that, or what my ass colleague scared me with, Radiculitis, which isn't exactly eponymous the way I hoped it would be!

UPDATE: feelin better, guess it was just the microbus trip or carrying the 80 pound backpack.

All Saints Day

Thursday was November First, so Liepa and I went to the cemetary where our Senelis is buried. Nobody went with us because our gims like to go a few days early when it's not packed. It wasn't really packed at 1:30 though, and it all looks much nicer when all the graves are decorated with flowers and burning candles.

On the way home I bought a new BBQ sauce which is by far the greatest one in Lithuania. It's easily in the same league as the ones I use in the states...unfortunatley, it's like three or four times as expensive as the next best one...fortunately, the next day we my special lady found them on sale at a different store for half price! But, she only bought four, so I went back the day after that for a dozen more. Hooray!

So far it's been used on chicken fingers, french fries, and meatloaf. Hooray!

Happy Halloween Party

Siga didn't recognize me when I went to pick her up. Even when I told her hey, get in the car, she was hesitant. Well, who wouldn't think twice about getting in a car with Borat? She was a yoga instructor. Also, before the night was over, she spent about 45 seconds pushing on a pull door before I explained her mistake to her. She hopes nobody finds out about that... :)

My special baby was Borat's chicken, my special lady was Ursela, Liepa was the Cat in the Hat's wife, Gedas and Juste were clowns, one sad one happy, Bronius was John Trabolta from Grease, and Donkus was a Yankee. Aurimas was bandit for like ten minutes. The rest of the crowd didn't manage to dress up, so they were losers for Halloween.

The funnest part of my show was singing the Kazakhstan National Anthem, twice! Sing along!

My Anti-Heroes

Three of my heros are pirates, but I wouldn't want to be one of the loser pirates writtten about in this article.

And that firestarter in the X-Files was pretty neat, but I can't imagine any kid I'd hate to be more than this kid! Jesus H. Fuckface!

And ugly is ugly, but this is the ugliest presidential candidate I know of!

And I wonce ate a heaping bowl of salt!

Last night I made long sandwiches, on like a three foot baguette: tuna salad sub sandwiches. Everything would have been fine, the tuna salad wasn't too salty: it was just salty enough. However, I added two things to the sandwiches which resulted in my culinary undoing: pepperoni and fetaki (salted feta) cheese. The pepperoni wouldn't have been so bad except for one thing: I fried it, a process that quadruples its saltiness. The cheese is naturally salty, so after adding those two things, we ended up having to accompany the sandwiches with something else: milk and/or beer poured down our throats with mega haste!

Liepa Weekend

Yo, Liepa came to visit for the weekend. We can't do much cause we're baby sitting, it's pretty hard to find a baby sitter on the weekend, so I don't even try unless it's like my birthday or something. Liepa wanted to watch Hannibal, but, shocking as it might be, said she hadn't seen Silence of the Lambs, so I said you gotta see that first. So we put that on for ten minutes till she realized she had seen it and moved to Hannibal, which she passed out watching.

In the morning I made kefir pancakes, which were scrumptious, and mimosas. I said, what are we going to do now, she said, well the first thing is pick out what five movies we're going to watch today. Shwe chose Hannibal, 300, Thank You for Smoking, and Resevoir Dogs. Then we went to market and got a bunch of food, and got some Chinese turkey on the way home. Washed that down with some brewskies. Yeah.

Naps. Playing cards. Eating Dijon Tarragon Chicken, wines, going to church on Sunday, blah blah blah, the end.

Spell Checker

You ever write something in Word, and you get a red underlining indicating that it's misspelled? And then you look at the word and you can't figure out what's wrong with it? That happened to me this morning when I was writing about boybotting. I got all frustrated. How could Word not know the word boybotting?! That's a perfectly normal word. I'm sitting there, writing a letter about boybotting products from China, and my thought process is totally destroyed by retarted Microsoft Word. I thought, it's my own stupid fault for stopping my boybot of Microsoft products, maybe I should start boybotting them too, go back to good old Apple computers. Well, just for the hell of it, I right-clicked the word...oh, boycotting! That's what I meant.

Why read new books when I've already read all the good ones?

I've gotten out of the habit of reading good books. Last night I started reading for the fourth or fifth time the greatest book ever, Tai Pan by James Clavell. I know that I'm not in the habit anymore, because I don't keep my eyes on the same line the whole way through. You know when you're reading something entertaining but like whatever, by Janet Evanovich, you can just read like half of every other line and that's plenty to keep the story going? Well, not with a great book like this.

It's a classic, which means it gets better each time you read it. Other books like that are others in his Asian saga, any fiction by Ayn Rand, the best of Heinlein including Stranger in a Strange Land and The Moon is a Harsh Mistress, some stuff by Ludlum like the Bourne Identity, the founding trilogy and the twins trilogy of the Dragon Lance series, some of the short stories by Salinger, Poe, and Hemingway.

Ever had a falling out with a book? When I read Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance, I loved it so much I decided I'd read it once a year for the rest of my life. Well, it's been about ten years and I've made good on my promise exactly zero times. Over the same time period I've read repeatedly books that I didn't fall so head over heels for. Well

Spoiler Warning--and I'm not talking about a device for changing the airflow past a moving vehicle, often having the form of a transverse fin or blade

Hey American Beauty, good movie, huh? I saw it for the first time last night. I tend to admire the people in movies who should be bad examples, I admired Kevin Spacey and Mena Suvari, and sort of Peter Gallagher. I especially liked when Spacey smashed the asparagus dish on the wall because his wife interrupted him, but I was glad my special lady didn't notice how much I enjoyed that. I was sad he got killed and wished to know how everything ended, maybe I should read the book.

One thing I don't completely get, even after talking to Liepa, is the gaytastic kiss, then Chris Cooper shoots Spacey. I thought, okay, he killed Spacey cause he paid Wes Bentley—his son—to give him blowjobs. Fair enough, but why'd he have to kiss him first? I thought, at the moment, what, is he testing to see if Bentley was telling him the truth? But then it can't be that, cause then he wouldn't have killed him when he finds out Spacey is not gay. Liepa said it's cause Cooper is gay, he's just always hated himself for being gay. But so then why did he kill him? Anger at being rejected? That doesn't seem quite right.

While trying to find a quick answer to this question, I found this ridiculous site: ChildCare Action Project: Christian Analysis of American Culture (CAP).

We all took turns being under the weather this weekend, so:

We watched these awesome movies: Rambo: First Blood Part II, Being John Malkovich, The Big Tease, March of the Penguines (twice), Envy, awesome.

I bought fresh pumpkin and made pumpkin bread, delicious. First time. Also a first was making Icebox oatmeal cookies, which are not bad, but they make up for their quality by convenience.

I had the longest conversation of my life, with a man no less, Darius, though I guess that's subject to debate: one hour, fourteen minutes, and forty-nine seconds!

Ate Chinese sesame chicken, salmon with wild rice&peas and everybody's fav brussel sprouts, buttermilk pancakes, bacon egg and cheese sandsiches, chicken sandwiches, and moussaka. Just kidding about the last one, but I forgot what we ate Friday.

Went to the gym a whopping once.

And I thought this week would be hectic!

I'm having one of those days I have about three or four times a year, when I sort out and file all the piles of paper that have accumulated around me, water my work plant, reorganize my folders, remove my coffee maker from my desk (I quit drinking coffee in June), clip my fingernails and brush my teeth with my work tooth brush, wash off my work knife (with spit and toilet paper), and catch up on the constant tasks I have. One of the things I have to do now is decide to whom I can regift the stupid knick-knacks that have surrounded me since my last house-cleaning. It has to be someone I don't work with...

My colleague that shares this office with me said to another colleague when they walked in, "Am I dreaming or is Vebra cleaning?!"

I can't remember what I wanted to post about today

It was gonna be good, but so anyway, I'll post about this: Lonesome Dove is an awesome movie. Anybody like Robert Duvall? Well, if you haven't seen him lonesome, you haven't seen him at all. And what about falling on your back? I bet nobody likes that, huh? Well, this movie might floor you, but in the good way.

Nightmare about Paul Giamatti

The persecuter in my nightmare last night was Paul Giamatti. I left my car in a garage at a mall (there are no such garages in LT, but anyway) and went in. Then I remember that I left the car unlocked. That's no big deal, as long as I have my keys, cell phone, and wallet. But wait, I left my wallet on the passenger seat! Crap! I go back and find I've been robbed. The money and credit cards have been stolen. I bring the wallet to the receptionist to file a complaint or report or whatever, and it's Paul Giamatti. I show him what's left in it and explain what's missing. He writes it up in a report for the police, and then takes a closer look at my credit card. "This is expired," he tell me. Yeah, so? "So I can't give it back to you, it's no longer valid." I start arguing about it with him, I get very upset because to get it renewed from Lithuania I have to be able to send it in the the CT DMV by post; we argue for the rest of the dream, and then I wake up.

Soy Russian!

I got some soy milk just to try this weekend. I was all excited about writing a post about how disgusting it...unfortunately, it was delicious! I liked and and my special baby too. There was one person who didn't like it, so I used her left overs to make a soy milk white russian: awesome!

One question though: is it really supposed to contain fructose???

Interesting concept

What's really intersting is to see Slatecard now, when they've raised less than a thousand bucks. Now where did I put my credit card...?

Is it okay to wear pants to work that have a huge hole in the crotch?

Cause almost a year ago, I started putting on alot of weight, as I went through working 4 jobs at once, writing my master's paper, getting married, and spending three gluttonous weeks in the states. The result of this is that my legs got so fat my inner thighs rub against each other and wear out the crotches of my pants, even my jeans. Luckily, my suit pants are alright, since when I was so busy I often didn't have time to put a suit on, but all my jeans are crotchless now.

Dos and Don'ts of a Trip to Latvija

• Do bake cookies for your colleagues on the bus
• Don't use 4 minutes mixed oats instead of 1 minutes instant oats for oatmeal-raisin cookies
• Don't order anything with mushroom sauce in Biržai
• Do give them your Lugan passport at the border, the U.S. one will need to be checked for 10 minutes
• Don't stay anyplace besides where i stayed, if you like a fantastic breakfast, a fifteen foot three room single with a giant bed, flat screen tv, and free wifi.
• Do bring your laptop to the seminar, it'll get boring at the end, boring (I'm writing this during the Belorussian's speech)
• Don't save room for lunch during the first coffee break, the croissant sandwiches are way better than the buffet lunch (also when the Latvian told us about lunch he pronounced the T in "buffet lunch")
• Do drink on the bus on the way home

Dos and Don'ts of a Trip to Cyprus

• Do spend your long layover in Prague in the corner booth at KFC, it has an outlet, with something from duty free
• Don't bring any umbrellas
• Do bring a variety of shorts
• Don't bring any suit jackets
• Do bring an adapter, they got stupid-style plugs
• Don't take anybody seriously, they're all jokers
• Do try to stay in a hotel on the beach, but not necessarily Lenios Bitch Hotel (if you like clean rooms with running toilets and internet)
• Don't fill up on the first 19 courses at dinner
• Do get ready to stuff yourself with the 20th course: "shifty yeah!" It's delicious beef balls.
• Don't leave room for dessert, it's made from soap...we ate it just to be polite, but we couldn't help from looking at each other trying to figure out another solution.
• Do ask the waiter to buy some of the house wine, he'll give you a bottle as a gift!
• Don't wait till the afternoon to buy anything from the fruit market, they're closed.
• Do call ahead wherever you want to go, other places are closed at weird times too.
• Don't be afraid to save wine bottles from hitting the airport floor with your bare ankle; the bottles will be worth the bruise.
• Do bring your special lady!

Alice? Who the fuck is Alice?!

I don't know if everybody in the States knows the Ray Brown dirty version of the song Living Next Door to Alice, but nobody in Riga does. I know this cause when Uncle Bob and I were there eight years ago and shouted along the dirty part in an ourside beer garden, every Latvian in the house was staring at us.

I remember this today because the cabbie this morning on the way to work was playing it. I asked him if he'd drive me back home first so I could copy it; he just lent it to me.

Now, if you like shenanigans with paper and pencil, check this out!

Brussel Sprouts Have Landed

I consider my greatest achievements in the kitchen to be preparing something my special lady likes that she never liked till I made it for her. These have included brocolli, fish, corn and bell peppers. Onions too, but I add those secretly so she doesn't realize yet that she has grown fond of onions. The trickest so far has been brussel sprouts. Steamed, baked, boiled, parboiled, buttered, cheese-covered, salted, salted-buttered, cheese-buttered...no luck! Finally I managed to serve them up so she liked 'em yesterday:

1. warm 3T olive oil in a pan on medium low temp
2. immediatly add 1T red pepper flakes (I would have thrown in a garlic clove but I couldn't find one)
3. when they start to blacken, remove them with a flat spatule
4. add so much breadcrumbs that they soak up all the oil; if you add too much add some butter to soak the remainder
5. if sensitive to the sound of wook scraping on metal, insert earplugs
6. work the mass around a bit with the spatula
7. add cored, halved brussel sprouts and continue working around; add 1t salt; cover for a minute and work around and cover, work, cover, work, cover, work for 6 minutes

She totally like it.

My Own Backyard

I found a list of the top ten diners in America to use for a class about English speaking countries and their cultures. Here's one that I can reminisce about getting breakfast at:

O'Rourke's
728 Main Street, Middletown, Connecticut
860-346-6101

At the far end of Middletown's Main Street, O'Rourke's is a 1946 silver-sided treasure with counter stools and worn-smooth marble counter. Although it's old and a bit rickety-looking, it is a head-turner of gleaming stainless steel, as well as a fantastic place to eat. The menu includes mid-Connecticut's unique steamed cheeseburgers, southwestern dishes made with chili that chef Brian O'Rourke imports from New Mexico, and local shad roe in the spring, when he barters meals to get the best of local fishermen's catch. Waffles, pancakes, and French toast (made from freshly baked bread) make Sunday brunch especially good, but expect to wait for a seat.

Golfing is the Sport of Whom? Rich People.

We got a free pass to the driving range and a lesson that I used last weekend. My special lady was busy, so I took Tadas Vyšniauskas with me. It was hell getting there, it's in the middle of nowhere, we literally had to spend a while going down a dirt road. He'd never played before, and I haven't played for many years. We did alright though, me hitting 150 with the driver about half the time. He hit it that well sometimes too, and we each almost hit the 200 mark once.

On the putting green he thought he'd best me, so we bet a beer on it. I won that one. Then we bet on who could get it in from a certain distance with less strokes, and I won that too. I lost the rematch, so we had some beer buying for each other on the schedule.

Anyway, can you imagine how expensive it is to actually golf? Before you can golf you have to pass a test and get a green card, which costs 900 litas, that's $340. After you pay that, if you want to become a member, it'll be $14,000. This is in a country where the average wage is $600 a month.

A Fountain of Knowledge

We tried one of these drinking games with Animal House last night...fun!

I lost my lunch...literally!

Well not exactly, but I left it at home twice in one morning...how stupid is that? I made a tuna sandwich and packed it with half a liter of tomato juice in my cooler-lunchbox. Then I went to work without it. At 10:15 I had to drop off the car at the mechanic and take a cab back to work. The mechanic's close to home, so I decided to stop by and grab my lunch and some papers. I grabbed the papers and forgot the lunch again! What the hell! Now I'm gonna have to have a tuna sandwich for dinner instead of tacos! That sucks! Tacos're way better!! Dammit!!!

p.s. I had the sandwich as soon as I got home and the tacos a couple hours later...

Adding Spinach to Dune Casserole is a good way to get more Spinach in your diet

One thing I forgot from Darius and Ellen's wedding is this. See, Darius was planning to wear a tux, so I was too. He changed his mind with several days left, but we were already on route, and my special lady had planned to match my level of elegance...with just the luggage we had, we couldn't change. So oddly, the the most formal wardrobe that evening wasn't worn at the alter, it was at the Krupnikas Toast.

So this camera man came up to me early on and asked me if I'm the groom. Of course I say, "Yes."

He explains that he works for the vinyard we're at and they are making a promotional ad about the place a site for weddings. Would I give him permission to film some of the festivities and use it for the vignette? I respond, "Will I be able to get a copy of the raw footage?"

He guesses I will. "Well, there's a few things I'd really like included, then," I explain, "which you probably won't use for your movie, but I'd like in the raw footage you'll give me. It won't take long. Just get a decent shot of all the good cleavage in the house. Then I'll point out a few guys, you go up behind them and kick them in the ass, and film their indignation; tell them it's all part of the show. Okay?"

Shocked, he mutters about just wanting some candid shots. "Well, if you want something so humdrum, I'm not interested. Why don't you ask the real groom? He's right over there!"

I haven't had any straight soda (or pop for you goofuses)

besides rootbeer in many years, but I might start if Lithuania starts importing this one.

Coffee's for Suckers...and people who wake up early

After two months of no coffee this summer, I decided if I'm ever going to quit drinking coffee it'll be much better now than later. I was afraid that as soon as I started working, I'd need it. But I didn't. Until today. I was fine with tea until today. Today I had to get up as 6 a.m. (God, no!) I've had two strong cups of black tea, but at 10:40 I'm already brewing a third. Yawn. I have a colleague who used to drink coffee alot and quit, she inspired me to do this, pretty much. Well, I hope it doesn't take too much longer. However, my schedules getting a little jumbled around, and it looks like my early classes will probably get moved. I'll never have to wake up so early again!

Watch TV or Beware!

Next time a special somebody, I don't know, possibly let's say your wife, turns the TV down so quiet you can't hardly hear it, just turn it back up when she goes to the bathroom. DO NOT turn it off and just start reading diet books about good nutrition right before bedtime. You'll end up having nightmares about Flavanoids and Polysomethings and Ascorbic Acid and Carotenoids and Folate and Omega 3 Fatty Acids. If you don't fall asleep and have nightmares about them, you'll lay awake tossing and turning, wondering how the hell you can possibly get blueberries and spinich into your diet every day! I'm telling you...just put the TV back on...

The State of America: FAT

After three weeks in the States, I no longer fit into most of my pants. I ate the best meal of my life about fifteen times. Steaks, swordfish, Popeyes chicken & biscuits, hash browns and breakfast sausages (anybody have a recipe? i'm willing to make them from scratch at home), home grown corn on the cob/tomatoes/cucumbers/squash/broccoli, D'Angelo's, spaghetti with hot Italian sausages, beef stew with home growns, dozens of cheeseburgers, Krispy Kreme donuts, lots of pizza and onion rings and buffalo wings, including from Anchor Bar (I survived the Suicidal Wings), roast chickens, Margherita Hard Salami, pork chops, pork loin, and smoked pork loin (three days in a row) and if that wasn't enough pork, we also ate Famous Dave's Legendary Barbeque. It was all awesome, but now I'm obese.

I gave the Krupnikas toast at Darius and Ellen's wedding. It was not too embarrasing for either of them, which was a relief. I was clever enough to present them with an obscene gift during the speech without anyone noticing. I heard that it wasn't tame enough for all the guests though:

Old Woman: Did he just say what I think he said???
Sim Philips: No, he just said they used to bare knuckle box.
Old Woman: That's what I thought he said!!!
Sim Philips: Oh...
Old Woman: Did they really do that???
Sim Philips: Well, no, not much actually, they usually wore gloves. I was there alot of the time.
Old Woman: OH MY GOD, NO!!!
Sim Philips: Yeah...

I rode on the Viper, the awesomest ride in the world, at Valley Fair, the awesomest park in the world. It's totally better than Six Flags or Disney World.

I went to a bar in NYC where you had to swim to the bar to get drinks.

I got all worked up with Peanut and went to see StraddleDaddy.

I saw Niagara Falls on my honey moon.

I won the last game of buck euchre in Minneapolis.

I had a blast seeing the fam and friends I haven't seen for three years or more.

No Breakfast? Ha!

My special lady and Liepa got up early this morning to go to the big Giriunai market (at 10, real early!). I guess they thought they could play a joke on me. As they pulled out of the driveway, I went into the kitchen. Lo and behold, they've left me abandoned with nothing for breakfast and no car.

All there is is ham and cheese. I pulled that out and realized there's no bread for sandwiches. That's okay, I can make eggs with ham and cheese. No, there's no eggs. That's okay, I can make crepes with ham and cheese. No dammit, there's no eggs. Oh but there is a little left over cream of mushroom soup. What if I made a casserole out of koldūnai, sour cream, the soup, ham and cheese? It's be awesome is what! But crap, no dunes! How about porridge? Well, how am I supposed to get ham and cheese into porridge?! At this point I almost gave up and called them to say ha ha, very funny, now where's all the food?!

I didn't give up though. I looked through the freezer. Guess what Jesus had hid there for me? A loaf of white bread! Why Jesus? Why the hell would there ever be a loaf of bread in the freezer? No reason but divine intervention.

It's too cold for sandwiches, but I figured it would be perfect for grilled cheeses. Why? White bread in Lithuania doesn't come pre-sliced, except for super shitty bread. If you slice it yourself the slices are too thick, and the bread burns before the cheese melts. But if it's frozen you can slice it thinner without smushing it, and it won't cook as quickly. I spread a layer of fetaki (spreadable feta cheese), ham, normal Lithuanian cheese, and adžika (spicy tomato spread). The best grilled cheeses ever, so good even my special baby ate half of one and loved it (last time she tasted adžika she cried...)!

Nice try ladies, but you got to get up pretty early in the morning (before 10) to pull one over on this guy!

Surprise Wedding

Gedas and Juste decided not to host a reception for their friends to express their love for them. At the initiative of Donkus, we decided that just won't stand. So we threw them a surprise wedding!

Traditional Lithuanian wedding: the couple to be has to pass several corrals: the gypsy corral, which tells their fortunes, the medic's corral, which administers tests, and the musicians corral, which plays games with them. Liepa and I volunteered to be in the medic's corral, because the gypsy corral was very popular, and we wanted to stand out more. And we're not good enough singers to make that our main attraction.

I wasn't officially the head medic, but I became the leader de facto. Liepa's and my experiences at Neringa and other camps made us qualified and skilled at thinking up funny bits to put the couple through. We all dressed up as doctors, and when the car came through to us we held across the road a long bandage entwined with flowers, and I held up my hand. They got out. They had no idea this was coming, cause like I said, it was a surprise, and there's actually many different ways weddings can go traditionally.

I said we're the highest commission of medics in Lithuania, Dr. Aiaras, Ailiepa, Aigvidas, and so one, everyone's name getting an Ai- in front of it in honor of Dr. Aiskauda, Lithuania's legendary medical hero. They have to pass our tests if they want to get married. After inspecting their eyes, the doctors and I decided that Gedas needs to pass a psychological test--to prove he can swallow his anger, he has to funnel a beer. He failed!

After inspecting their elbows, ears, butts, and noses, doctors and I decided that they need to pass reactionological, comradological, balancological, and child-foddering tests--they passed everything else. The only other really funny one was child-foddering, Juste had to feed Gedas a bottle full of beer while he laid on her lap with a bonnet on his head.

Then we sang this song for them and the Gypsies too:

Ten toli ošia žalia girelė,
Prie jos čigonai buria porelę.
Skamba gitaros, visi dainuoja,
Justė pašoka, Gedas nemoka. (2x2 k.)

Oi, jūs, čigonai, iš kur atėjot,
Plačiam pasauly kur vaikštinėjot?
Kur jūsų valda, kur užtvarėlė,
Kuri išbūrtų šią šeimynėlę? (2x2 k.)

Mes medikantai, kūnų klajūnai,
Tik pro mumis bus, santuokos rūmai.
Užkūrę pirtį, šoksim, trepsėsim
Ir savo didžią pjankę pradėsim. (2x2 k.)

Taip susitarę šoksim, trepsėsim,
Klausyk, Justina, ką tau kalbėsim:
Neieškok meilės turtingo pono,
Vilioki jautrią širdį čia Gedo. (2x2 k.)

Gedas - sveikuolis, Gedas - varguolis,
Gedas laimingas, Gedas vaisingas!
Gedas neturi ant savęs pono,
Kur tik pažvelgsi - žemė čigono! (2x2 k.)

Wedding Highlights II

Šv. Kazimiero was a great church to get married in. Father Vitkus was really great, funny, and entertaining. The organist and hymn singer were amazing. The latter was warming up in the back where the best men and I were dressing, Peanut goes, "Oh my God, she's amazing...is she for your wedding?!?"

Žaldokynė was a fantasic restaurant. It's thanks to us for booking it ten months in advance, but it's also thanks to them for being honest. They said they got countless call from people offering any amount of money it takes to get the hall for 7-7-7. I believe them. My special lady saw a bit on TV about people getting double crossed left and right for limos and other wedding servces for that day: "Pay double, or we refund your down payment in double." Our down payment was 300 litas. They would have been within their rights to refund us 600 and make an extra ten, twenty, thirty grand. But it wouldn't have been honest, so cheers to them.

Liudas Masys was a great photographer. Lots of really good non traditional shots, many candid. The posing ones felt like we were posing as models, not family members. He came by the next day, less than 16 hours after he'd left us, with a cd with over 1,200 pictures and an album with about 30 choice pictures printed out super high quality.

Kapelija (sp?) was a great band. Traditional, old fashioned music, exactly what we ordered. They even had a guy MC the whole evening, which was a godsend, cause I can't imagine who we could have got to do it so good: games, sing-alongs, special dances, the works.

Santa Salonas, where the best men and I got our tuxedos, is the worst place in the world. When I came the first time somebody was just leaving, in disgust. I wish I hadn't assumed it was an isolated incident and given them a chance. They didn't have any bow ties, except for clip ons, and they didn't have any shoes. They promised to get the bow ties. Okay, I guess the men and I can supply our own shoes. The mes are flying in, though, a week ahead of time. They tell me that's not enough time to prepare everything, we have to send ahead our measurements. Liars! Idiots! Because of this stupid move on their part, they were in a real bind when adjustments had to be made with less than 24 hours till show time. If they managed to do it in that time, though, they would have been much wiser to do it a week ago and not sew them wrong in the first place. Not to say that they did a good job sewing them: all the best men had velcro cummerbunds, and Peanut's was sew together backwards, so the ends met face to face instead of overlapping! Plus when we went to get them, a young woman was bitching them out and demanding her money back for sewing her dress wrong twice and wasting her time. They never got the bow ties they promised, there were slips of paper belonging to previous renters in the pockets, and the shirts had sweat stains around the collar. Those fuckers are lucky Gedas dropped out of the wedding party. If I wasn't in breach of contract myself for ending up short one best man, I would have given myself a sizable discount for poor service. When I went to return the tuxes I heard yet another damsel crying inside.

Pirates the third, or Pirates the TURD?

Pirates of the Caribbean is a movie I can watch once a month and not get bored of it.

Pirates II is okay too: original, funny and exciting, visually entertaining too.

Pirates III, At World's End, however, should be renamed At Wit's End, since I was at my wit's end trying to enjoy it. No success.
1. Many of the jokes are recycled from the first two movies. Liepa said that made the movie funnier, I don't see it. If I know the punchline before it comes, I consider it poor writing, not funnier.
2. No great fight scenes. II managed not to be repetitive by having the great sword fight on the mill wheel rolling down the hill. All III managed was having sword fights in the rain...wow!
3. No new visual effects. II had the pirates hanging in cages, the sword fight mentioned above, Jack falling between those cliffs, and Davey Jones and his crew. All III had was the maelstrom, and my next complaint.
4. The delirious scene? All white with a guy's nose crawling along the screen? Get out of my face. I thought this was a pirate movie, not a weirdo mind trip movie. Most out of genre scene ever!
5. And every seen a shitty bad guy? Not this shitty! Lord Becket was all talk, and even that he was shitty at. How's this for a farewell as the ships goes down: "It was just supposed to be good business." Too bad I didn't know it wasn't supposed a good movie instead!

Wedding Highlights I

These are gonna come in bits and pieces--quotes and moments--cause the celebration lasted 8 days. Weddings that include a mass and 100 guests are very rare in Lithuania (usually it's just the marriage sacrament and ~30 guests), so comments about the splendor are re: that.

My speech at the reception included this: "We're not getting married married because we love each other..." I couldn't finish my thought before a tremendous roar of laughter silenced me for a minute. "I mean, we can love each other all we want without getting married; we're getting married in order to have a family. We want a big family because both of our families are so caring and so fun to be with."

One woman with two unmarried children said, "I've never been to such a wonderful wedding in all my life, and I probably never will!"

When we got to the reception we had to win our table from cross-dressers, since the place was dramatically overbooked. To satisfy them, we had to sing them a song. What song to we both know better than any other? Krambambolis! Several Lithuanian folk experts were astonished to hear a folk song for the first time. I guess first wave immigrants brought it over to the States and it died out in Lithuania.

I'd never seen my aunt wear pants before this in my life. Possibly she never had. After a few days of seeing me and my friends in casual wear, my 77 year old aunt pops in wearing torn, cut off jeans and laughs, "I found these going through some boxes of clothes; you think I can hang with Sarunas and his crew now?!"

wait, when tf is the election!?

after all the hubbub in newspapers, and after i added the frontrunner's link to my toolbar, i got all excited about giuliani winning this autumn. then today when i was looking at the title, join in 2008, i realized, it's not 2008 yet. so now i gotta wait another year and a freakin' half!? jesus maria! what's up with starting campaigns two+ years ahead of time? if it's that beneficial, let's have the 2012 candidates start up this summer. i can't wait!

Since you're board

Everything that's happened over the past week is a secret. That's why I haven't been posting. I've gotten a few complaints from bored people that they don't have anything on my blog to read on work breaks. Therefore, I give you this hilarious, totally indecent link, courtesy of Rachel, which I hope nobody respectable opens, but if you're bored and want to laugh out loud and have to cover your mouth so your supervisor thinks you're having a coughing fit, click at your own risk!

Which century are we in?

I think this rural Lithuanian woman might have traveled forward through time. She seems a bit in the dark:

Interviewer: How far away do you think the sun is from the earth?
Young woman: Crickey, it's far away! 30 km I reckon!

(30 km = 18.75 miles)

p.s. here's a great opening line from an email i received today: "People judge your dick size by your shoes size." that's...just great...really peaks my interest.

What do I have to say today?

Don't go to doctors. Living in a socialist healthcare system, I go to doctors all the time. They rarely do me any good, and the good they do do me ins't worth the hassle or the pain. Tuesday they shoved a hose down my throat to take tissue samples from my gut: endoscopy. Absolutely devestating, even though he told me it wouldn't hurt at all, and my throat still hurts from the procedure after two days, I'm begining to think it's infected. Guess what the brilliant conclusion of the test was: I've got a little heatburn. Thank you Doctor Deduction, you goddam genius.

Then Dr. Ear-Nose-Throat tells me I've got a hypoatrophied tonsil, I don't know, which may be causing some other problems I've developed recently. That tonsil's been like that forever, though, I told her. But it still might be responsible. Without testing it to find out if it is responsible (an easy procedure, I soon learned), she recommended I have it removed. Why not, it's free?

Oh, and get this: the clinic no longer supplies containers for urine samples, you have to bring them from home! They gave me a note, said to bring back the sample in a clean container with the note and leave it in the Pee Test Reception window. Well, it's their own fault they get to handle pee covered jars now. How am I supposed to know which of my jars are air tight and which ones are leaky? And thank God I never throw any jars away! In your face special lady, I told you they'll come in handy one day!

The Year's First BBQ

Is it still a BBQ if there was no BBQ sauce? Cause there wasn't. There were two types of grill marinated pork and pork sausages, half a potato size french fries, guacamole bean dip and vegetable for dipping. And five million mosquitoes. Here's the best part: Egle and Mindaugas show up, and I have to greet them thus "Mindaugai help! I can't find the grill!!!"

Here's Rastenio idea for my bachelor party: march me naked through the streets of Vilnius wearing only a 9-speed...something...and videotape me being forced to pick up women.

Sandles's okay then

I expected many more people to ridicule me for wearing sandles to work. I skipped the suit coat, and I've got on normal pleated trousers, not suit pants. I'm still wearing a tie though, that's the only incogruence I see. The receptionist at work though told me I'm crazy, that sandles are not propper work attire..."what will students think, you have to set an example!" Here's my example: wear sandles, it's hot out! Since only one person ridiculed me, I guess it's okay.

The Onion is even funnier...

...when you read it at lunch and your colleagues ask you what you're reading about and you tell them, and they think it's real, and they're suprised and intrigued! I remember Lokys once said some Erasmus students came over and thought the Onion articles I'd printed out to read on the bus were real, too. I didn't see their reaction though.

Never wait to buy anything

It might be gone, and then you'll be quite the jack ass!

Don't like it? Open your open restraunt you loser!

The loser in this story doesn't realize that America is a free country, and the lawmaker's no better. The more I think about it, their position isn't just un-American, it's absurd. If Mr. Díaz's law is passed, "requiring retail establishments to accept all forms and denominations of legal tender," that means fast-food restaurants can't have their "no bills larger than 20" policy. That'll be a great incentive to make counterfeit bills, Mr. Diaz. And after somebody pays for a cheeseburger with a thousand dollar bill, there won't be any small bills left to make change for anybody else, dimwit. And I just love the idea of car dealerships being forced to count $50,000 worth of pennies, that's a splendid idea. And guess what else? Do your "diverse ways” of paying for chicken wings include checks and credit cards? Because if they do, that'll increase the price of everything when restaurants are forced to pay fees and instill of those systems. So instead of the poor paying for food with the money they can get ahold of they can't pay for it at all and go hungry.

Mr. Jones and Mr. Diaz, remember how much fun you had today the next time somebody dies of starvation in Albany.

p.s. I'd be just as angry as Mr. Jones, but you know what I do when that happens? I don't throw a tantrum. I don't get the city involved (thanks for wasting thousands of tax dollars). I certainly don't try to get the place shut down, you fuckin fascist. I just don't go there anymore.

Windows, is a piece-of-trash! Windows, more annoying than-my-rash! Windows, ba da da Windows, you make me want to kill myself!

well, i finally made my father a 32 minute dvd of the past years photos with soundtrack and video clips. it took me exactly one full excruciating day. one hour of that was figuring out how the fuck to remove the titles i had added: when i added more pictures, the titles didn't move over together with the pictures they were supposed to be on, so we ended up with the "Christmas 2006" title on a beach photo, for instance. you can't possibly imagine how complicated it was to delete them, because it's un-fucking-fathomable. the help tool was useless. i even turned on skype to tell him it was ruined after 12 hours work, but he wasn't there. it's only by the greatest stroke of luck that i stumbled upon it, and then i summarily forgot and had to retrace my steps for the next titles, that's how nonsensical windows movie maker is.

of course, i guess i'm spoiled because i grew up with a mac. this dvd is measly compared to the vignette a&e biography lokys and i made of ourselves with ease three years ago.

This new Onion bit is awesome, I guess I'm a fan...

...this here is the second one in a row I've had to link to, it's so funny.

I Eat Your Stomach

You ever have somebody come up to you with a baggie of snack food and say "Here. Stomachs." Yuck. I took one chicken stomach just to be polite, but I have to say I'm not just not a fan, I'm staunchly against eating plain organs. Stomachs? Yuck. Liver? Yuck. Tongue? Double Yuck. Testicles? They weren't that bad, but Yuck!

You gotta hit this link...

Saruno post is a link to the most funniest clip that proves the Simpsons is the most accurate satire on the market!

I can't remember why I don't have a gun...

My favorite magicians reminded me in this intersting piece on Bullshit.

Scroll down to the Second Amendment paragraph of this page for a consice summary of how to reduce gun violence.

This is a funny bit, I says

In the know: our troops in Iraq

You do the math!

hosting 5 dinner parties/3 days = +15 pounds

disagree? i dare you! thanks giving is nothing, easter is when lithuanians eat their fill nonstop for 72 hours of gluttony. i heard next years it's getting cut down to a two day holiday, but up to this year monday and tuesday are official days off.

Easter Feaster

Roast Pork Leg almost as good as last year, but not so good I don't remember the other things we ate this time, including tasty pan roasted asparagus and the unbelievably scrumptios cheesecake...I got nothin' else to say, cause beyond the Easter meal all my time's been tied up in writing my master's paper and other personal business (the hard work kind)...so here's a delicious photo! Behind it is a hand made Easter egg basket.

Fifth Grade is Awesome Now

When I was in fifth grade, the closest thing to this ever happening was when Matt Gerosky sat on a pencil stuck up vertically between two couch cussions...

It's hard work bein' lazy

Does anybody remember (Tete, Loky?) the short science fiction story about the guy who was so lazy he put a huge amount of effort into his plan to get by being lazy? He became tremendousy successful on his way to laziness? I ask because I've been spending alot of time lately trying to figure out how to get the dishes clean without washing them, or even touching them, if possible.

Waitress? Bitchress, really, is what'd I'd call you.

That's what I said last night to this bitch waitress who saw that I had my leg resting on a stool and goes "Hey feet off the furniture, Mister, this isn't your house!" I wish. I just took my leg off, drank my beer and paid for it and left. I wish I'd said something to make her feel as bad as I did. Then stood up and left without paying. And if I saw the manager on the way out, told him he'd better teach his waitress some manners. I can't wait until all the idiots in Klaipeda get run outta business by better managers and more polite waitresses. Isn't that what the EU's all about? Hurry up already!

I can't believe this!

This blog is the number 10 hit for "pumpkin sized boobs!" How do you like that?

P.S. i'm glad that people looking for information on "big fuckin inner tube" can find it here!

That Table Tennis for Two Hours

It's called Beirut, really, or more commonly Beer Pong, and in Boston Bee' Pong. In Lithuanian it's called That Table Tennis (Tas Stalo Tenisas). And in Lithuania you have to play with a normal table because I don't have a ping pong table, so you have to stand a meter (a yard) away from the table to even out the throwing distances. And you have to toss beer caps instead of ping pong balls, cause somebody mishandled my balls. That makes bounce shots practically impossible. Anyway, imagine playing that with a kid running around trying to get in on the action! Well you couldn't even move the table into place probably without someone getting hurt. So we never played till this weekend, while my special baby was visiting her special grama. My special lady won the first round, apparently cause I was malnourished; I say this because after a home made kugelis break, I totally beat her in round two. I'm not sure if I beat her at eating kugelis, we both rocked the crap outta that kugelis.

Other highlights of a party weekend include doing stuff all day without naptime 12-3, the beach, jewlry shopping, other kinds of shopping, foxy boxing, backgammon, going to church, and daylight saving time ending or starting, I don't know which. The crappy one when you lose an hour of sleep. Lokys has a great idea for day light savings which I'm heartily for: move the clock back both times, so you always gain an hour. This sounds one sided, but you can make up for that by skipping a day (how about a Monday?) every twelve years. Then we come out even even though we get two extra hours of sleep each year and one shortenend week each dozen years. It's win-win baby!

Rummage through your own trash before some bum does...

...cause he'll be the king of the bums once he's got your watch on!

It's not a Rolex, but my special lady got me a pretty awesome watch for my birthday. It makes me feel like much more of an adult to check the time on my wrist than on my cell phone.

My special lady insists I don't wear it in the kitchen where I'm elbow deep in batter, usually, so the watch spends most home time on the shelf. Or on the dresser. Or on the nightstand. Or hanging from the towel peg. It hasn't quite settled down with its permanent abode, like the Amish. It has a few drinks and spends the night wherever.

And because it's not routine, I forgot to put it on last Friday, and didn't go home before leaving town for the long weekend. Upon returning I forgot to wear it again Tuesday and by the time I looked for it Wednesday it was nowhere to be found. One of the first things I looked through was the trash next to the dresser. But o oh, my special lady took the trash out already. That is, she took the trash out of the bedroom to the kitchen, beyond that it's my job to take it out. We found my watch in the trash. Hooray!

The moral of the story is, men should take out the trash, and women should do the cleaning. The other moral is, make sure no bums find your valuables.

Welcome to Octopus Thought Activated Drinking Game with Something Something

Great game. Don't know where it came from, cause I can't find it online. I think one of the youngins brought it over, Sim or Ginty or A.j. or Alvy. I only remember playing this game once several years ago, though the memory might be a blur of several times if I was always seated on the same super spot of the same cool couch playing with the same particular people at 60 Eggmont St. I been waiting, over the last few months, for a chance to pull it out again, cause we play far too much asshole and kings, but you can't just pull it out anytime, cause you gotta have a bunch of people, and they gotta be in a giggly mood. And Beirut is a hassle in a country with no 30 packs.

I explained the game to Gedas and Juste, Donkus and Egle, and my special lady. The reaction was typical: oh what a simple game, who could ever make a mistake?! And the game play was typical: it took us probably twenty tries or more to count to twenty, which we only managed once. And by the end of the game two people had passed out. And several of the rules had to be explained again and again. Well, all the rules, since there's only like three of them. Here they are:

1. Everybody sits in a circle and counts off to twenty, one persona at a time, starting at one, and continuing on to another person in the direction indicated by the person touching one of his shoulders.
2. On 8 and 16 you say "octopus" instead of the number and touch both shoulders; on 8 the top arm indicates the counting direction, on 16 the bottom arm.
3. Following 10 and 20 count off follows, just once each to 11 or 21, in the opposite direction of that indicated.
4. If/when the group successfully gets to 21, everybody wins, and the person who got to 21 makes a rule to make the game harder.

That's probably clear to anyone who's played octopus, and completely not understandable if you haven't. Well, that's your problem, you should have played it before reading this post. It was a hilarious game; I'm thrilled that I remembered it. Anybody else remember Octopus?

Dragon Burp

This has only happened twice in my life. Once, as a youth, it scared the crap outta me. This morning it just made me laugh for a second before I dryheaved. What happens is you swallow a capsule of medicine, and after the lining has ruptured but before the powder has soaked up you burp, and a cloud of medicine dust comes out of your mouth that looks like smoke or mist. I saw it from two angles this time, since I was standing in front of the mirror. That ever happen to you?

It makes you realize why they put the medicine in those capsules: that medicine tastes like crap, especially when the whole inside of your mouth is doused with it.

Good Eats When I'm On My Own

Just kidding. On my own for the weekend, I didn't make anything great, what's the point? Who's gonna say "thank you, it was delicious" and kiss me? Nobody. So Friday, alone for dinner: store bought dunes: frozen meat dumplings with sour cream and soy sauce. Saturday night for dinner I spiced it up, cause I was tipsy. I made the other half of the dunes, but this time I used double the sour cream, figuring, I can use the extra sauce as dip for potato chips. But instead of eating the dunes and leaving half the sauce, I spiced it up even more, cause I'm an idiot. I decided to eat the dunes as part of the dip: take a couple chips, scoop up a dune, and eat it all! I need to hang up a mirror in the kitchen; it'd be interesting to see exactly what a culinary cretin looks like in action. Sunday morning I ate the rest of the chips for breakfast. For lunch I went all out: instant mashed potatoes with hot dog slices mixed in. I hate hot dogs, really hate them, but they're the only precooked meat I had. Good thing I wasn't on my own more than 48 hours, I probably would have died of malnutrition!

A Number (4) of Things to Watch Out For

1. When you buy tickets to the theater, make sure it's the drama theater, not the musical theater
2. Before buying them, make sure Fiddler on the Roof is less than three and a half hours long, so you don't have to leave during intermission and buy another pair of tickets to see the end of the show another day
3. When buying a bottle of tomato juice to make a cocktail to bring along, making the show bearable, make sure it's acutally juice; I accidentally bought a bottle of sauce (wtf?!) and ended up with a rather thick Bloody Mary
4. When you get home and make quesadillas, don't forget to put jalapenos in them

The week in clothes

Monday I wore my blue striped shirt, today it was the orance striped one. In between it was white Polo Ralph Lauren that Regan left at my place stateside once. I skipped the tie with the striped shirts, but forgot the tie with the white one. Luckily I keep a spare at work, a blue one I got free with a crumby shirt once. I don't wear suit pants during crappy weather, which most of the winter; it takes a toll on the pants bottoms. I wear a jacket, though, still, gray-brown-brown so far this weak. Tomorrow I'll go gray again, I suppose. Friday will be casual day at work (only for me), so I'll just wear a sweater. If anybody votes for which sweater I should wear, I'll strongly consider it. I can't believe I wrote this!

Tree Huggers in Lithuania!

Oh yes, we have tree huggers now, just like you Americans do, you think you're so special. Our tree huggers are very concerned about the environment and environmentalism and conservationism and clean air and water and animals. Not!

On the way to the bus stop this morning, I did see someone hugging a tree, but it wasn't to protest deforestation. I thought he was hugging the tree to keep from falling down drunk, and I still thing that's how his relationship with the tree began. He was asleep. The only thing he was trying to conserve, apparently, was his verticalism.

p.s. this Onion article reminds me of something awesome I made over the weekend: cheeseburgers with jalapeños mixed in! Lately I been mixing jalapeños or jalapeño brine into everything.

What's my IQ, I wonder.

Rachel's blog led me to this one IQ test, on which I scored a measly 117. Disappointed, I tried to find a more reliable one using the most reliable advisor I have, google. I took the test on the number one hit (non-sponsored), which scored me a whopping 144, one point short of "Genius (Less than 1% of test takers)." Well, I'm sure I did do extremely well on the test, I was certain or nearly certain across the board. But if it scores me that high, maybe it was too easy.

How can I actually find out online? And don't suggest anything that takes more than 15 minutes, I don't wanna know that bad.

Oh, and by the way, I tried this other one, and to make sure it would really give me my score for free I clicked finished without answering any questions at all, and I scored a 51. How's that? You get the first 51 points for being alive, is that how it works? My cat's got enough sense to do that, is that her IQ? Here's the stats:

Your age adjusted IQ score is 51 and the average score is 100.

Your Grade: Low

Total number of questions: 30
Questions answered: 0
Questions not answered: 30
Questions answered correctly: 0
Questions answered incorrectly: 30
Percentage correct answers: 0%

Try this to relax a bit for a minute when you're still working at 6 p.m.

Read recipes on Epicurious. When you find a comment about an intention to experiment with something recipe related, suggest to the commenter loudly, out loud, that is, and not keeping your voice down, that he experiment with something else, something much more vulgar, "Why don't you experiment with ______ instead?!" Utter something so vulgar that once you've suggested it you have to look around quickly to make sure nobody heard you, despite your being the only English speaking person in your office. That's what I call relaxation!

An interesting thing to see outside a Children's Hospital

Patients smoking!

Do you ever see someone with a mole with a long hair sticking out and you just grab it and yank it out? If yes, know this:

When the mouse is away, the cat will...not do the dishes very effectively. See my special lady and I, we live the good old fashioned way, by splitting up responsibilities so as to specialize and be more efficient. Also old fashioned is that I consider myself the cat. The non-traditional thing, as you must know if you read this blog, is that I do the cooking. Anyway, the point is I don't normally do the dishes; I only do them as a pledge of reconciliation, which is very seldom. Now that I'm on my own for a bit, though, I've developed a very good system for doing the dishes, which I'd like to share with you:
1. rinse dish with water (no soap); if clean, set to dry in rack
2. if not clean, leave to soak for 24 hours; if dish is necessary for cooking, scrape with spatula and use immediately
3. if not clean after 24 of soaking, soak for another 24 hours
4. repeat steps 2-3 until clean

P.S. I made sweet and sour pork last night, it was unbelievably awesome.

Usually, no, whatever, I was gonna write about what I had for dinner, but then I realized all I do anymore ir write about food, so forget it.

Instead I'll write about drink. In Lithuania, we drink kefir, or kefyras. I'll tell you why that's funny after you read this Onion article.

Read it? Well, I'll explain what kefir is now then. It's chunky sour milk. It's milk, it's sour, and it's the consistency of drinkable yoghurt, with big old chunks! Is it good? Yeah, it's ok from time to time, especially with Cepelinai. Why do I drink it every day? It's wicked healthy: if you drink five liters of it daily, you can eat all the red meat you want and it won't raise your cholosterol or blood pressure.

Cepelinas Recipe for Cepelinai

Cause you never eat just one, right? Especially if you're pregnant. Not that I'm pregnant, or anybody else I know, that's just something I heard, once. Well, one of my former students is, but let's stay on target. Stay on target!

Here's my not-a-complete-success recipe for Cepelinai:

1. 5 pounds potatos for two people (that's enough if you don't want left overs...which we did): 2/3 grated, the rest boiled and mashed (the proper part to grate is more like 4/5 or greater)
2. no salt (you should add plenty of salt)
3. forget the egg (don't forget the egg)
4. 1 g. crushed vitamin C (try five grams: with only one the Cepelinai turned very dark; you can also add a bit of milk to the mashed potatos to combat this)
5. skip the added potato starch (don't skip the added potato starch; rolling the Cepelinai in it will make them look much more proper, i hear, and less like gypsies rolled into the trailer park for the holidays)
6. use a normal amount of flour in the mushroom sauce (go very light on the flour you add to whatever sauce you make, unless you like eating potato sandwiches)
7. do add lean bacon to the cooked ground meat filling (yeah. that's the only thing I did right!)

I took a photo for posterity, but I'm not including it...it's...not appetizing...

We ate 'em though, and I'm confident that next time they'll be fantestical.

Maybe...I need another hobby?

Birthday presents:

"I know you like cooking, so here's a potato grater!"

"I know you like cooking, so here's a meat thermometer!"

"I know you like cooking, so here's a pizza cutter!"

They're awesome presents, but maybe having only one hobby (playing Alpha Centauri doesn't count, does it?) makes me shallow and boring to shop for?

p.s. anybody got a recipe for Kėdainių Blynai???

Dry, you mother scratchers!

There's something I'd like everyone to know;

I'm going to print on my business cards from now on;

I'm going to have a sky writer proclaim this fact white on blue;

I'm going to include it in a p.s. in every letter and email and sms I write;

I'm going to mention it every time I introduce myself;

I'm going to tatoo it on my forehead;

It's going in my blog desctiption:

I DON'T DRINK SWEET WINE OR CHAMPAGNE!

Over the past few months, I've received a few bottles of champagne as gifts, and I've been served wine and champagne at several parties. I don't drink it sweet! I don't drink it semi-sweet! I can barely gag it down semi-dry! I need my wine and champagne dry! I want it dry as the Mohabe desert, I like it as dry as vampires like blood, which they do, alot!

But I can never receive a gift, look at the label, and say, I'm sorry, I can't drink this...it's not kosher. So I'm letting everybody know now, let's not have any mix ups in the future. Thanks for your cooperation.

what's up with levi's jeans? they only last for a year now, has it always been like that?

Stupidest trip of my life, I there's no emoticon to describe how stupid public healthcare is. On some days I work in places public transport won't take me, so I take compensated cabs. Today I didn't take one all the way back to my normal workplace though, because I had to go to the polyclinic. I had to, told me my special somebody...

I had to go get my record to bring to her. I go to the dermatologist, and there's literally 20 people waiting there. Hoping they were waiting for somebody else I just went in, and she said I have to wait, and I asked if that wait would be very long, and she said yes, she's got a lot of patients. Can I make an appointment? No: first come, first serve. Everytime you go to the doctor, you risk spending the whole day there.

I went there Monday, incidentally, and waited; she was absent for at least 15 minutes at 9:30 a.m. before I gave up. And then I gotta go to work by bus, cause I can't get two compensated cabs for one trip. So I've sacrificed two mornings this week to public health care, and I'd just like to say, go to hell.

Me? Slap Happy!

I laughed so loud at the third guy's response, I reminded myself of Lokys...

The Onion American Voices

Gender Bender Weekend

This weekend I finally bought a cordless drill. I been lookin' around for one for half a year. Where's the one I got my old man for Christmas 12 years ago for like $30?! They're all at least $150, that's the cheapest at most places. I finally found one for 142LT (~$60) Saturday, which was lucky cause I really couldn't wait anymore, I had to fix this desk so I could rearrange the furniture to make a play area for someone, dammit. I fixed it up, with a greater than 50% success rate for drilling a hole in the right place on the first try. Owning the drill and operating it successfully made me feel like a real man in a new way.

Also this weekend, I created bread for the first time in my life. The only thing I've whipped up with yeast before is pizza dough. Creating pizza isn't flamboyant, as long as you top it with dollops of spicy sauce, dabs of flesh and sautéed vegetables, and dashes of pepper flakes. Which I do, with aplomb. But what about bread? It was potato bread, is that a deviation from normal, pure baking? I don't know. Cooking may be manly, but I'm afraid baking is feminine. As good as the bread tasted, baking it make me feel like a fertile, delicate woman.

I guess I should post something, though I find it hard to believe anybody's reading this, since the politeness one didn't get any comments...

So New Year's Eve was a blast. On Christmas we found out that our special baby's special grandmother offered to take her for a week, leaving me and my special lady to fly anywhere we want to celebrate n.y.e. Every flight out of Lithuania till that time and into Lithuania after that time was booked solid, leaving us in the "party town" of Klaipeda, and yes, I'm using rock-n-roll quotes, not regular quotes, that's my thing but you can use it, cause I know you're going to steal it anyway. Luckily though my buddies Ed Pečiulis and Vytas Juškys came into town to celebrate along with some celebrities. We joined them to catch up and party. Tons of fun in Klaipeda Hotel, one highlight was Vyto room with a window from the room into the bathroom, leaving him on the can in perfect view of everyone in the room. Nice. Yummy drinks and stuff and out to dinner, luckily early enough for three of us, but Ed didn't call with his order in time, everyplace closed at 9, what the fuck? He had to make himself sandwiches. Then down to the Incluto show in Honolulu, which was awesome, then out to the street for midnight, then back for the rest of the Incluto show, which was awesome. Got to the point when dancing is still possible, but not standing up. Good New Year's!