In the Holiday Spirit

I made it far beyond the morning hour when I sort of know what I'm going to write for the day. A few minutes ago, I got my inspiration while checking in on the stock market for the day:


My muse was the little innocuous bit in the center of the page, take a moment, zoom in for a closer look. I said to myself, "Self . . . you have to read that one." The more I read, the less I could believe that this was a true story. I checked the calendar and nope, nowhere near April Fool's. You don't have to read the article if you don't want to, but it is funny and the little puns and thinly veiled euphemisms were true genius. Here's the Chuck E. Cheese police blotter if you just want the summary:


As the holiday party season kicks into high gear, I am going to take some of these stories to heart. The next time somebody does anything to upset my balance of fun, it is on! If there are two things I enjoy they are 1) a celebration and 2) beating somebody down. There's nothing more festive than a donnybrook, a rumble, a scuffle, or a full on brawl.

I hope having an armed guard at these eatertainment venues cleans thing up. Speaking of, do you know how hard it would be to clean up when one of these guards unholsters his pistol and takes down an 8 year old in the ball pit? And how are the police supposed to draw the chalk outline on that one? None of this is really a laughing matter . . . oh wait, yes it is. Way to represent, Middle America, nice work. Sorry, it could happen anywhere, but it is a curious geographic spread.

Cool Stuff

In sifting through magazines while being lazy this weekend, I came across some really cool design stuff from modern to what was modern. I have a stack of Dwell Magazines sitting around that have been partially read, partially skimmed. I did some more page flipping and one of the articles that caught my attention was about Hugh Ferriss. Ferriss was an architectural delineator, back in the days before fancy CAD programs, when everything was done by hand.


You can see more examples of his drawings here. His drawings had a huge impact on modern architecture as well as art and culture and that which is considered "Gotham". I'm trying to track down a copy of his book The Metropolis of Tomorrow for kicks.

I came across this one in Food & Wine, flipping through recipes and whatnot and I can say it is nothing short of kitchen porn. You can get more information on a product that isn't really available in this country yet so far as I can tell (but I did see a $2000 price tag) at Fisher Paykel.


As it always seems to do, one bit of browsing led to another and I was reading through all the posts on Appliancist and then their other sites covering interiors, design, outdoors, etc. It is pretty amazing what can be done with a limitless budget . . . the rest of us can always dream.

My Dog Satan

Between the glowing eyes and the demented smile, distorted further by the frost on the whiskers, my dog looks like some sort of hound of hell.


The visit to the park this morning was not even remotely what I would consider warm. I did some extra bundling and broke out the overmitts to try and keep the hands warm. Overmitts make it very difficult to a) hold onto the coffee mug and b) pick up and throw the ball. Dempsey was bother neither by the cold nor the snow. Last winter he'd start limping around because his toes were cold, that is until he got distracted enough by playing fetch.

Keeping with the dog theme, I'll end the week with this gem . . . way to drop the ball on that one PETA . . . too busy putting the smack down on the Colonel's chicken?

Uhh . . .

Despite the tragic nature of the impending doom of the American Auto Industry, I can't help but laugh when reading articles like this. I don't even know where to start . . . It is a good thing the heads of these companies have not had to worry about their compensation packages being based on performance measures with any bearing. At least their financial futures are secure, likely at the expense of all of us. I can only hope that the industry will be thoughtfully restructured and the executives will be hung out to dry.

The slide show on the WSJ site has a lot of images that indicate this was all a long time in the making. Detroit has not been hit by a sudden decline, nor is it news that US auto makers have been churning out terrible product (possibly trucks excepted) for years. I might have to go back and watch Robocop again to see how many elements of the 1987 film are applicable to Detroit on 2009's doorstep.

Early Start to the Season

It might be that Hutchison got me paying attention with his blog yesterday, but I saw more than one house this morning that not only had their outdoor Christmas decorations, but also their tree . . . up and fully decorated. I'm not the most experienced when it comes to tree scheduling, but it strikes me as a bit early, given that it is only the first week of December.

There is one holiday tradition that can't come soon enough, no not the annoying music all retailers find it necessary to play . . . the holiday gift baskets that show up at work from the vendors saying thanks for spending your money on us.


According to this tasty gem, as a company, we are worth $69.95 (retail) to Intermountain Hardware. The moose munch rocks the casbah. I don't really care for the red apple caramel balls, they taste like wax. There are some other companies out there we have big accounts with, I expect the next few weeks to be very snack filled.

Note: Whoever preemptively took the Aged Sharp Cheddar Cheese Straws is going to pay . . .

New Toys

Sometimes the impulse purchases are for me, sometimes the dog has his day too. Dempsey was treated to a new ball yesterday for his good behavior and for being a good pal. That and I feel trapped, being confined to the strip of well lit park when there is plenty of other park space where we could play in the morning and evening hours . . . if Dempsey didn't lose the ball in the dark.


The ball, besides having some of the cheesiest packaging I have seen in a while, is pretty well made. It has a nice weight to it, so it doesn't feel like you are throwing a ping pong ball. Unlike some of the other lighted balls out there, it has a rubber shell so it bounces like a ball should. I'll work on getting some action shots, but Dempsey tends to disappear in the shadows.

The new "toys" I have coming my way aren't nearly as exciting. I've been doing a bit of light fixture shopping for the garage and backyard lighting. These just came in for either side of the "man" door:


And this one is on the way for above the door on the back of the house:


I was shooting for something in the neighborhood of a classic barn light, but anything under $300 basically looked like a trash can lid on an arm with a light bulb coming out of the bottom. Word on the street is that I'll have the concrete apron by the end of the day.

Food and More

We were treated to some snowfall in Breckenridge over the Thanksgiving holiday, but thankfully, we got out of town before the madness started. With heavy snow falling and blizzard conditions thanks to the winds, sections of I-70 were closed yesterday, stranding people in Silverthorn, Vail, Copper and other areas. I was sitting comfortably at home, enjoying a light snowfall in Denver, Dempsey enjoying his first romp at the park in the snow.

A couple weeks back, I made yet another woot.com impulse purchase, this time a Breville indoor grill. I have long sung the praises of the Black and Decker griddle/waffle iron combo, but it is relatively flimsy in its construction. The griddle also has an impossible to clean non-stick coating that is microns thin and scratches when you look at it wrong. The price of the woot was just plain silly and then became even cheaper when they realized they sold the grill as new but it is a refurb, subtract another $20! Refurbished appliances don't scare me, expensive electronics on the other hand . . .


The trusty appliance has been the go to for anything griddle worthy in the past. It makes a pretty mean grill cheese, it can be flipped open for maximum surface area for pancake making or the plates can be set to waffle for some waffle making. I avoid the waffling for the most part because despite the non-stick coating and a heavy dose of cooking spray, the batter inevitably gets stuck and waffles butchered.

The Breville 800GRXL is essentially the same as the boxer hawked indoor grill, but prettier and a bit better built. Like the Black and Decker, it opens flat for maximum surface area, but the plates are fixed so the grill is always a grill and likewise with the griddle. Don't let the pictures fool you, the thing has a footprint of about 19" x 15" so there is plenty of pancake making space.


And pancakes it made . . . very surprisingly the griddle temperature was consistent from side to side, edge to edge.


And pancakes I ate . . . well, just a couple. The remainder hit the fridge for weekday morning consumption.


The grill got put into service later last night as well when it came time to make the grilled cheese to accompany the soup I decided to concoct. Being trapped within the comforts of my house, I decided it was a perfect day to make use of the remainder of the pumpkin sitting around by making some soup and some more pumpkin muffins. The soup recipe was pretty basic, start with some aromatics, dump in some broth, pumpkin, corn and spices. I added a few extra ingredients and it could have used a few more.

This batch of pumpkin muffins got a dose of blueberries for a change. The recipe calls for dates, but I find them to be too sickly sweet for my liking. Unfortunately, I lost the cash register receipt from the Co-op in Nederland that had the recipe for the pumpkin blueberry muffins with flax seed and spelt flour. Those hippies make a mean muffin. I am almost out of pumpkin, except for the stash in the freezer for use at a later time. Now that Thanksgiving has come and gone, I'm never eating again . . . what's for lunch?