The Elasticity Of Face...

Adam, The Annihilator of Fine Cheeses Everywhere, just sent this over to me today. Originally it came from this link at Tiny Gigantic which is a site worth browsing regardless if you find this video interesting. The music, I think, is CSS, a Brazilian band that I really don't dig that much. However, the music fits pretty well in this instance. There is something remarkable about the straight on slow motion image of a face being hit. I also think it's interesting that both guys and gals are getting the glove in this. A while back, while at a frat party (when I say a while I really mean about 7 years ago) I got knocked out via the old sucker punch. I'm betting my face looked somewhat like this...

Finding the weekend…

What you will get out of reading this post: a recipe, a concert review, where to play pick up soccer in Portland, not too subtlety implied suggestions about etiquette while attending a concert/music festival.

It was a tough weekend, but a good one. Kristina took 4 days and headed out to Austin for Austin City Limits. It sounds like she had a great time and saw an obscene amount of bands within a three-day time frame, during which I received a vast number of text messages indicating how much I was missing out on. Friday was particularly the worst day of this as Kristina was fresh to the festival and I was stuck in the office on a light work load day. Each text/call marked the hours that I was not having fun… Also, note to all: Concerts do not sound as good via phone as they do in person. The thought is nice but it hurts my ears.* I’m glad that Mack and Bop ran the show in Austin and I do wish I could have been there to enjoy it with them. However, in their absence I had to put my own set of plans together.

Friday…
Erad and Clairie came over for a debate and dinner party. As the name suggests, our intention was to watch the Presidential debates and cook dinner. Claire was going to hook up a quinoa salad, I was on enchilada duty and Erin was going to work dessert into the mix. Unfortunately, due to the preceding nights events Erin was forced to fend for herself (enchiladas would have hurt the tummy) and we lost our after dinner sweet treat. On top of this once we got back from the store, and about half way through the prep/cook process, I realized I had forgotten both black beans and tortillas. What to do, what to do? I improvised and things turned out pretty damn good. By substituting garbanzo beans for black beans and making a layered chip plate out of the enchilada filling we were able to eat with healthy enjoyment. My recipe is below.

1 bag of Kettle chili lime chips
one can Garbanzo Bean
one small tub cream cheese
two garlic clove
one red bell pepper
one orange bell pepper
one poblano pepper
one ear sweet corn
one group of chives
three small potatoes (white, russet, your choice)
two tomato
two avocado

Directions: Dice potatoes and cook in microwave with a little olive oil. Into a large pot put peppers, garlic, and chives after cutting peppers into strips, dicing the garlic and chopping the chives. Cut the sweet corn off of the cob and put in pot. Add olive oil to pot and heat the contents while keeping them covered. Do this until pepper strips are semi soft. While doing this heat the garbanzo beans in a separate pot. Once beans are heated and soft put all ingredients together and add cream cheese and potatoes. Heat on low while stirring. Do this for 5 to 7 minutes, salt to taste. Layer chips on plate, then layer “enchilada filling.” Repeat until desired amount of food is presented. Garnish with diced tomato and sliced avocado.

Makes food for 3 – 6.


Saturday…
It was great weather this weekend in Portland and in turn I was all about getting outside. Claire and I took the short bike trip to Laurelhurst Park where we chatted and followed the sun while taking pictures of hipsters and make out sessions. For dinner we hit Biwa and had a really good time with Sapporo and Potato Curry Croquettes. Claire also got the chilled Udon noodles but didn’t find them all together that tasty so there was a pretty healthy amount left when our dishes were cleared. After assuring the wait staff that it just didn’t suit her taste buds they still comped the dish and invited us back soon. This act secured Biwa as one of my go to places in the neighborhood. If you can make sure you check it out.

After dinner we hit the Crystal Ballroom for The Cave Singers and Calexico. Both bands offer distinct styles of music and have a great feel for what they do. The Cave Singers proved to be a very interesting and enjoyable act as they came across with an earth grown vibe and substantial amounts of twang. A product of the post punk folk scene in Seattle they were almost quaint in their stage presence and definitely unknowingly charming. Check out a great video by them here.



Calexico is a band that has continued to evolve record after record. Seeing them live however really demonstrates how talented they are. Boasting only two official band members and being based in Tucson Arizona they travel with friends and accompaniments that range in origin from Germany to Spain. This range helps to influence their musical sound as the grab and pull from elements that inspire them. Always with a mariachi feel there is plenty of whopping and hollering from both the crowd and the band throughout any given performance. However, aside from all of the various musical elements they bring to the table and the copious levels fun that they inject into their music I would describe the overall presence of Calexico as Sensuous†. They feel what they are doing and they embrace that feeling, swaying into rhythm and addressing what music should be on a note by note basis.

Sunday…
My mission Sunday was to find a soccer pick up game somewhere in Portland. Again the weather was beautiful so after a little web research, and again with Claire in the passenger seat, we headed out in search of parks and fields. After trying 3 we found a weekly pick up game at Clinton Park. It’s a co-ed thing and the skill level was good. On top of that everyone seemed to be out there solely to have a good time and kick the ball around. No attitudes emerged. Check out here for a monthly listing of pick up games in the Portland area…

*Kristina always has the best intentions.

†Otter: My cucumber. It's bigger. I think vegetables can be very sensuous, don't you?

Marion Wormer: No, vegetables are sensual. People are sensuous.

Otter: Right. Sensual. That's what I meant. My name's Eric Stratton. People call me Otter.

Girl Talk Friday...

He is a real, normal person. Just matching his music to this day of him hanging out in real life gets me loud.

What the other flower wants: Random Detroit fact #3...

America is vanity, narcissism and disco balls. But then again, I created a blog for you to read. Ohh, I'm still patriotic. Oh man am I patriotic right now... In fact, I'm so patriotic right now that I'm going to hit you over the head with Random Detroit Fact #3.

An Egg of Knowledge, Cracked All Over You: Among cities with more than 500,000 residents, Detroit has the safest drivers, with accident rates that are 20 percent below the national average.

Yeah, they make cars. They care about what they make. Self pride. Like America*.



* The American Gift Shop

How to get a date...

Kristina and I are pushing 6 years of togetherness. That's a long time. And although we always, and I mean ALWAYS, enjoy our time together, we have lost some of that initial date night fever. It's a bummer, plain and simple, but it is something that we are willing to work for. Just the other night we checked out the perfect "Date Night" place. It's over on Williams in NE Portland, just after the corner store where you can stop and pick up your nightly crack rock. Off on the left hand side you will find Old Lompoc's 5th Quadrant pub stationed right next door to a boutique dessert shop named Pix. On Monday nights you can catch a burger (veggie or non) and brew at Lompoc before hopping over for a gourmet treat, complemented by a drink and Movie Monday at Pix. This last Monday was showing "Pump Up The Volume", a true classic. While we only had a minute to stop by I think that next Monday will find us there, enjoying a couple hours of TRUE romance*.



So, here are the rules on how to get a date, as I remember them...
1. LOOK DECENT: In the comic above our protagonist has great looking hair. This fact goes a long ways to getting him into that first date. However, if you live in Portland you might not need to follow this simple rule. I see plenty of stained and greasy street kids walking hand in hand while they comb the cityscape for loose change and safety pins.

2. HAVE SOMETHING TO OFFER: Timmothyy obviously has much to offer. The fact that he has a published poem tells us that he is a sensitive artist in the beginning levels of success. Soon he will be publishing work in the Gazette Times or the Deseret News. The sky is truly the limit after that. Perhaps he will move to Italy and become apprenticed in the art of custom shoe making. In return for his apprenticeship he will educate the shoe cobbler on the finer points of poetry (Under Career, 1990's, 5 paragraphs down).

3. HAVE SOMEWHERE TO GO: I would suggest a location similar to the one described in the opening paragraph of this entry. To start, look at the interests your date has and determine which of those interests you might share. Attempt to select a date location that capitalizes on these interests. For us (Kristina and I) it's a love of good pub food, beer, then after dinner treats and drink with the option of a movie. Also, as Kathy will tell you, good lighting is always a bonus. For someone like Timmothyy and the unnamed beauty above he might try to nail down a nice cave with candle light where the acoustics are good for reading poetry. Of course this is a first date so caves sometimes don't always work. On the other hand he might want to stick to a coffee shop during beat night.

4. HAVE A PLAN OF ATTACK: What are you two going to talk about? Bubbles? The Large Hadron Collider? Perhaps the early works of Charles Bukowski or the economic elasticity of the Terminator franchise? Again, the conversation should be based around what you know your date enjoys. If you know she enjoys figs perhaps you could brush up on the subject.†

5. ASK THE GIRL/GUY: Get your emotions and teenage angst in order (in our society this still applies to 20 somethings) and just ask the person if they would like to spend time with you. It's as easy as that, example: "Kristina, would you like to have a date night with me next Monday? We can go do dinner, dessert and movie, and then on the way home we can score some crack."

I am such a nerd...

* True Romance is just a turn of words, a construct of phrase as I am not sure if the actual movie True Romance is playing.
† There are some advanced maneuvers available, depending on how well/far you want the date to go. Most of these involve dropping wads of money on the floor and making sure that Ice cream is involved during some portion of the night. Scary movies are also always a good idea. If you would like to learn more about these full proof schemes (yes, they are schemes) just drop a comment with you email. I will make sure you get the official manual.

Closing out on a Friday...

The Comeback...?

I know Apple is where it's at right now. Hell, everyone in Portland is walking around with a Mac these days. In fact, I just went with my friend to help her buy one. But seriously, good gigs to the other side of the fence for this. This is great.

Large Hadron Collider: What a cool Name...

If you didn't already notice, Google is repping one of their special images today. It's a cartoon representation of the Large Hadron Collider, located on the France/Swiss boarder, and I must say, that is one damn cool name. For cereal, who wouldn't want the chance to play around with something deemed A Large Collider. Aside from the cereal serious name it's the possibilities that the machine presents that make the Large Hadron Collider something to talk about for the next couple of months. Today was it's initial trial run, passing lead heavy ion particles around a 17 mile ring at unreasonable rates of speed. On October 21st, just 7 days away from my own miraculous day, we will quite possibly see some real fireworks as the real experiments start. Several things might be attained or learned, including but not limited to, confirmation on the existence of the ever elusive Higgs Boson, or, as it is sometimes referred to, the "God Particle". All this is far to interesting for me to even begin to comprehend but I would like to share this with you.



Not only is it pretty bad ass, I mean I love to see Physicists having fun, but it also sheds light on what this whole thing is about in pretty basic laymen's terms. I wonder if they are going to show this in schools...

My 2008 MFNW History...

# of Bands Total: 250

# of Venues: 20

# of Days: 4 (Wednesday night through Saturday night).

# of Bands I saw: 14

F__K Buttons, Mogwai,
Animal Farm, King Cool Nuts, Cool Kids, Deerhunter,
Britt Daniels of Spoon, Built To Spill, TV on the Radio, Explode into Colors,
Ratatat, Les Savy Fav, Copy,
Dan Deacon

# of 40's consumed: more than enough

# of trips to the 40 mart: 7

# of hours waiting in line for shows: 7.70

Best Shows, in order: Dan Deacon, Built to Spill, Les Savy Fav, Ratatat

Best Video Installation: Ratatat

# of People who told me I have a Purdy Mouth: 1

Amount of the weekend that was On The Chain: NONE

Some Pictures of some stuff listed above.

D. DDD. DD. DDDDDDAN DEACOn....
Ratatatatatatatattttt...

40 Water...

Tramp vs Stamp...

I was sifting through a couple of new blogs today when I found this little piece of news. It seems that our federal government, in tight economic times, has taken up the ever lucrative profession of phone sex.


On the the Duck Stamp for 2008, which I am told is basically a hunting permit (note the $15 price tag), our Post Master has allowed two numbers to be transposed. The result has been taking the everyday phone order for these stamps and channeling it to chain smoking, verbally loose women with great imaginations. This of course is just another department in the post office. It has just been underutilized until now...

I can just see Janice now. Graying hair, skin slick with wax after years of carcinogen ingestion. A waxy skin that causes the wrinkles around her eyes to draw tight with each blink as you ask for yet another pricing option. Only now she is no longer at the counter helping you ship a package overnight to NY, now she is in the back room, behind a desk with a corded phone glued to her ear. And while she is still dressed in the normal gray-blue drone of the post office uniform her appearance sparks with tragic appeal as her button up work shirt is now thrown open, exposing one wrinkled shoulder and the not quite white halter top that lives underneath. As she speaks her voice is a whisper in the phone, a whisper so deep that she frequently is forced to stop and spit before she resumes her tease. Her speech is also slightly slurred, alerting the caller to the always sexy possibility of inebriation, while in fact she is working a piece of Trident gum in one side of her mouth and a toothpick in the other. Every so often, as things grow heated and she feels the need to enunciate her sordid sultry story she will stab the gum with the toothpick and twirl it around in front of her face, watching the spit dribble off...

Alright, enough of that. How did this mischievous error occur you might ask? Well, what was supposed to read 1.800.782.6784 (1.800.STAMP24) instead was printed to read 1.800.872.6784 (1.800.TRAMP24). Ohhh, how grevious, how profane, how fowl... What makes it worse is that the mistake is just a little too expensive to fix. Check out the entire article here...

KWAME: A Tribute...

Kwame M. Kilpatrick has today pled guilty to obstruction of justice charges and agreed to resign from his office as Mayor of Detroit, the 11th largest city in the U.S. This comes as his darkest hour, and only after more than a year of corrupt incidents, a progressing roll call of felony charges and an undying pledge to fulfill his time in office, no matter the cost. This morning, Thursday the 4th, 2008 Kwame has, much like his apparent hero Suge Night, been knocked out.



This brings mixed emotions for me; a warmhearted smile and a tear to the eye. Kwame's desperate cling to the mayorship, one of the most esteemed positions in respectable culture (social ladders, treats and disco balls), was an attempt to salvage both his public and self respect after simply acting a fool. I would like to ask who among us has not gone out, at one point or another, and acted the same damn fool. It's a personality trait inherent in the human genome. Simply look at Adam and Eve, The Yucca Tap Room or any soap opera on TV between 12pm and 3pm. However, on the other hand there is only so far you can go. Murder is out. So is thieving. A couple other biggies, although not quite as dramatic as the first two, are don't lie in court and don't hit other people, especially if their cops.

In total Kame was working against 10 felony charges in two criminal cases that involved allegations of perjury and assault. He walked away after pleading guilty to two felony counts of obstruction of justice and a no contest plea to a felony count of assault on a police officer. He will pay restitution to the GREAT city of Detroit in the order of $1 million. He will also surender his law license, forfeit his state pension to the city and be barred from elective office for five years. He will also serve 120 days in the Wayne County jail, followed by five years’ probation. All other charges were dismissed.

That might sound harsh but after facing a total of, once again, 10 felonies I feel that the above is a pretty good deal. After all, even with the human genome as an agent of blame there is only so far you can go. The real question now is what will happen in the city of Detroit, both on the streets and in the white halls. Eminem???...

START: MFNW...

Today is the first day of MFNW. I am excited. Chris shared something exceedingly nice with me last night. Andrew gave me great news yesterday. It is sunny outside here in Portland Oregon. Brightness, Rays, Colors, Sounds.


For the first night of MFNW (Music Fest North West) I have decided to start with the Roseland show of F*_k Buttons, hailing from from somewhere on the other side of the pond and Mogwai who names their home as Glasgow, Scotland. The show promises to be a good mix of Mogwai's soft slow rhythmic precision, highlighted by quality instrumentals and F_^K Buttons ambient universe driven sounds. Both bands throw great intensive crescendos into their work. It should be a solid opening set for the festival. Kick off is at 9pm and the $50 bracelet should get you in the door.

Mogwai Myspace
Mogwai Home
F__K Buttons Myspace
F__K Buttons Home

Quote of the week...

I had always wondered where exactly cancer came from, until now...

"I am surprised. But, as Christians, we cannot throw stones," she said. "There were some people who judged us when our daughter had a baby in high school with a person of another nationality. One person who judged us, he had cancer multiple times. Judging will come back to get you."

- Texas Delegate Carolyn Payne Lomax, on the issue of Sarah Palin's Daughter's pregnancy.