The Bawdy Cloister

Rowdy's High School Friends in Review

ITEM!

A guy in my high school creative writing club, Bryan Mealer, just published a book.  It's called All Things Must Fight to Live.  Go, Buy, Read.  And be sure you take the time to watch the videos on his website. Bryan's running around on a book tour these days; he was in San Antonio last week.  After his reading I overheard one woman sitting next to me tell another that her daughter, K., went to high school with Bryan.  I turned to her and immediately recognized her: 

"You're K.T.'s mom!"

"Yes!" 

"I'm Rowdy, I was at your house quite a bit.  I'm the guy that took K. to the Bo Diddley concert." 

"Oh, yes, I remember."

"Just want you to know that I still haven't forgiven you for setting K.'s curfew so early, we only caught the first 30 minutes of Bo's show before I had to return her home." 

"Well, I was the evil mother."

"Grrr."

She was nice enough to forward me K.'s email though, so she's regained a couple of points.

Anyway, after Bryan finished his appearance we headed over to the Alamo Cafe and caught up.  We hadn't seen each other since 1993.

ITEM!

I learned tonight that I'm not the only person from my high school with a website dedicated to a defunct restaurant.  My friend, Eve, has a site recognizing the great cafeteria that once was Dubrow's.

ITEM!

Earlier this week I got an email from my high school buddy, Crizzabster, in New York.  He's in a film called "Off Off Broadway" that you can watch for free online.  Don't want to spoil it, but it's funny.  It's a full-length feature, so set aside some time and get a comfortable chair.  Here's the link.  Let me know what you think.

Rowdy's Week in Review

Extremely eventful week, so here goes:

ITEM!

Wednesday morning Mrs. T and I drove the Acolyte down to Ochopee, Florida for his first airboat ride in the Everglades.  He dug it very much.

After boarding the boat, we floated slowly away from the dock.  The Acolyte was curious and pointed at whatever wildlife he'd see on the bank.  Then the boat took off.  As we got up to speed the kid burst into laughter.  The kid next to us burst into tears.

We used a company called Wooten's.  They've been in business forever and run a great outfit.  In fact, I took Mrs. T down there on her first trip to the States back in '98 when we were just engaged.  In addition to the airboat, they've got a nifty animal sanctuary that the kid just loved:

ITEM!

We were in Florida to visit my paternal grandma.  She had five kids, 12 grandkids and the Acolyte is her 13th great-grandkid.  Seven of the 12 grandkids were in town along with 12 of the 13 great grandkids.  It was chaos.  By chaos I mean a dozen kids piled onto one golf cart driven by an eight-year-old zooming around the house and nearly toppling over into an alligator infested pond.  The Acolyte has a few years yet before he can join such revelry, he stuck to the indoors and played with my Aunt's dog, Jimmy.

ITEM!

For some reason Waffle House isn't big in San Antonio.  That is to say, we don't have any!  The closest one to my house is in Austin.  So while in Florida I took the kid on his first trip to the legendary Greasy Spoon.

Several years ago Florida passed a law that prohibits smoking in restaurants.  Now I quit smoking a while back, so I wasn't upset that I couldn't smoke.  But I have to say there ought to be an exemption for Waffle Houses.  Cigarette smoke is at least a recognizable odor.  And for years it masked copious other odors a Waffle House and its clientele emit.  By the end of breakfast I was praying that someone would blow a big puff from a Marlboro red right in my face.

While I'm on the subject of short order diners, I'd like to plug my all-time favorite-- Huddle House.  They're big in Georgia and other southeastern states.  But they're slowly creeping westward (3 locations in east Texas now!)  Westward Ho Huddle House, Papa's hungry!

ITEM!

The weekend before leaving for Florida I threw a party at my place for a bunch of high school friends I recently reunited with over Facebook.  I'm happy to report that property damage was kept to a minimum.  The only loss was a 10-cent sake cup.  Knowing this crowd I was prepared for much worse.

ITEM!

We got to the airport a bit early for our return home.  Once in the terminal we grabbed dinner at the Jose Cuervo Tequileria.  Our waiter was very bald.  When the Acolyte first saw him his eyes lit up with a smile, he quickly stood up in his chair, pointed at the guy and excitedly shouted, "Anpanman!"

ITEM!

We arrived home late last night.  Now it's time to prepare for the big move in earnest.  The lease to the new place starts January 1 and we have to be cleared out of this place by January 31.  So if I'm a little light in my posts these next few weeks, that's why.

Hope everyone is enjoying their holidays!

Rowdy's Week in Review

ITEM!

This week was about as cruddy as they come.  I was sicker than a dog for most of it, running a fever and my ears stopped up.  Pretty miserable stuff, but I think I'm over the worst of it.  It hit me Monday afternoon like a ton of bricks.  Tuesday and Wednesday  passed like a dream and yesterday I could finally open my eyes for more than 30 minutes at a time without getting dizzy.  I think the fever finally broke this morning, but still feel a little queasy.  Come Monday I hope to be back at 100%.

ITEM!

Author, activist and friend of The Reliquary, Kurt Vonnegut has gone to that great typing desk in the sky.  I guess it's up to us to carry on his legacy:

  I'm just not too sure what to do with it.

ITEM!

Inspired by her sister, Mrs. T has started her own blog!  But true to form, it's written entirely in Japanese and is password-restricted.  But don't worry, from time to time I'll break in and run bits of it through Babel Fish.  Then I'll insert [clarifying notes] for better readability.  For starters, here's her April 5th entry:

Cheese

Me who love the Greek cooking. When the variety while being noisy, visiting the United States with even the mother, when the Greek cooking resin it keeps accompanying, rejoicing, you ate. [I love Greek cuisine.] After all the deciding factor Feta Cheese. [I especially love Feta cheese.] Originally the garnish which is unique stench and the body with the cheese which is made from milk of goat and in the Greek cooking it cannot miss. [It makes for an unmistakable garnish.] It meaning that some days ago Master Rowdy goes to the vegetable store, writing the thing list which we want buying, it transferred. [A few days ago, I gave my husband, Rowdy, a grocery list.] Being Greek the salad to eat and to apply, the cheese of goat for the salad buying, writing, it left "Feta" word was not made, but instead of the Greek cooking love also Master Rowdy to tell the truth we would like to major the ancient Greek literature department/the philosophy section at the university, therefore the leprosy we are understood, you intend probably to do it is, but, (considerably coercive expectation.) [I intended to list the ingredients for Greek salad, but forgot to use the term "Feta" and instead simply wrote "goat cheese" assuming my husband had the intellectual capacity to understand what I meant, considering he's a Classics major and all and fond of Greek food himself.] There is no Feta Cheese and bought the cheese of French make goat. That rub to being the small package super it is high! ! A little before buying, I why buying this, if you think whether you ask using tact, meaning the thing of Feta Cheese, when the it is, it is from the the thing? ? [He returned from the store without any Feta.  Instead, he came home with a tiny package of French goat cheese that was wicked expensive!  So I started to chastise him.]  With me of opposite being cut off. Somehow, as for Feta Cheese there is no milk of goat recently and however using the milk and being many, also price has become convenient, originally when you use goat milk, is. Don't you think? such is intellectual viewing. [He cut me off, and explained that our grocery store only sells Feta made of cow's milk, and since my list specifically stated "goat milk" he thought he was justified in paying $7.00 for a four ounce packet of cheese.  Arghhh!!! His bloody sophistry!] Temporarily, housewife nature is exhibited, "too high to be,! The becoming dim "you got angry, but when really it tries eating, the unreasonable oral it is good! ! Just it is high it is. Unique stench creamy with being connected enormously, elegantly the it is too good! ! With, it was not good speaking unintentionally. . [After cooling down from my rant about how expensive it was, I decided to taste it. And it was good!  So much in fact that I can't describe my reaction here among family and friends, but if you've seen Meg Ryan's performance in When Harry Met Sally, you catch my drift.] As for Master Rowdy the pride so doing the face, "There is no mistake in those which I buy!"

Dessert

So last month, Mrs. T and I thought we'd get the snowman cake pan from Williams Sonoma.  Thought it would be cute when all the folks were down for the holidays.

But when we got it home I discovered there was a recipe printed on the back for a spice cake and heavy buttercream to decorate it with.  Apparently, you're supposed to use their recipe.  I thought I'd be smart and go with an instant cake mix and a premixed tub o' frosting:

The experiment failed.

The mix didn't make quite enough batter and it cooked unevenly.

So when the folks came down, I bit the bullet and baked the recipe the pan recommended.  Between the cake and the icing, it took EIGHT sticks of butter.

This time the cake came out fine, but it was near midnight by the time it was cool enough to decorate.  I wasn't about to break out the icing decorating funnel thingys, so I just slapped on the buttercream.  My Evil Little Brother thought he'd be cute and shoved about an 1/8 of a cup of the buttercream in his mouth.  After briefly gagging near the sink, he laid wailing on the couch for the rest of the evening. 

We had no coloring, so I crushed raspberries and mixed them into the scarf and chocolate into his hat, then shoved a real carrot in his head for a nose.  Wasn't much to look at, but tasted 100 times better than the initial experiment.

Maybe next year we'll get it right.

On Returning Home from the Office Holiday Party

***burp!***

Don't Touch my Bags if You Please, Mr. Customs Man

This is Alco, one of my most favorite places in the world.  It's just a three minute bike ride from my wife's parents' house.  Alco is a giant liquor store with prices that beat anything I've found so far in San Antonio.  Therefore, I did a wee bit of souvenir shopping before heading home:

Purchase #1

Suntory Single Malt Whiskey aged 12 years

Can't leave Japan without a bottle of Yamazaki.  Check out a commercial for it here.

Purchase #2

Bowmore Darkest Islay Scotch

I like my Scotch smoky and peaty and no region delivers finer than the Isle of Islay.  This here hooch is Sherry casked which only stands to enhance its earthiness.  I could drink it with a fork.  At any rate, what I really need to do is hop on a plane to Switzerland and buddy up with the guy that shot this hot Islay footage.

Purchase #3

This one requires a bit of background.  You see, I already had this bottle...

of Habuzake stocked in my bar here in Texas.  The problem was that I couldn't open it because I had no Awamori to refill it with.  You see, Habuzake is the Everlasting Gobstopper of reptilian-based alcoholic beverages.  However much you drink, refill the bottle with Awamori and let it steep a while, you'll never run out!  So, my third purchase, naturally...

a 1.8 liter tanker of Awamori!  Let the Habuzake flow!

Flavor of Love

Tonight's the big night, the grande finale of Flavor of Love.  For those of you who may have missed the catfight between New York and Pumpkin, you can check it out here.  You'll need to scroll down and click; the clip itself is about 8 minutes long, but so worth it.....

Speaking of "Flavor of Love," I just typed that into the Google Image search engine and it referred me to this picture of Ramune....

Which, coincidently, I am drinking right now...

Damn Hippies

It's obvious Kellogg's has made great strides over the years to balance fun with nutrition and social responsibility.  Consider the evolution of Smacks cereal:

Back in the long, long ago they were known as Sugar Smacks and they featured a savage indian painted in war make-up.

Kellogg's obviously wanted to exploit the nostalgic "wild west" craze that had swept the nation. In 1975, however, the shooting deaths of two FBI agents on an indian reservation cast into serious doubt whether murderous indians set a good example for America's children. So Kellogg's quickly introduced a new character to grace the box of Sugar Smacks...

  Dig 'Em the Frog!  Kellogg's determined that frogs were a relatively safe bet.  They figured frogs have been peaceful and kid-friendly creatures, at least since the Egyptian plagues.  But Kellogg's knew that even then frogs were adorable...

  especially compared to the other plagues, like the icky boils.

Some years after Kellogg's had found a respectable spokesperson for Sugar Smacks, questions arose concerning the violent connotations of the name of the cereal itself...

In November of 1980, Sugar Ray Leonard boxed Roberto Duran to regain the title of world welterweight champion.  Sugar Ray delivered such a pounding that the fight ended notoriously when Duran returned to his corner toward the end of the eighth round saying "No más."   After such a beating, Kellogg's knew the word "Sugar" would forever be associated with raw brutality and changed the name of its breakfast cereal to...

  Honey Smacks!  The good folks at Kellogg's thought they'd finally landed on the answer.  But then, in late 2003 the unimaginable happened...

  Universal Studios released a movie entitled Honey that sent critics scrambling to find words to describe its impossible badness.

"Honey is the movie for those who couldn't handle the complexities of Flashdance."
--Jeffrey Westhoff, Northwest Herald, Crystal Lake, Illinois

"Fame!  I wanna leave the theater.  I wanna gouge out my eyes!"
--Phil Villarreal, Arizona Daily Star

Needless to say, for the sake of the public welfare, Kellogg's did not want to endorse this movie.  Nor did Kellogg's want to affiliate itself or its cereal with the film in any way.  So they changed the cereal's name again, this time to...

Smacks!  In addition to the name change, Kellogg's demonstrated its benevolence by increasing the cereal's nutrient fortification from "8 Essential Vitamins & Iron" to "10 Essential Vitamins and Minerals," thus increasing its value as part of a complete nutritious breakfast.  Our families' interests truly lie at the heart of Kellogg's business practice.

But this week a new threat arose that endangers the future of Kellogg's, its products and the happiness of children worldwide.  An evil so insidious, so repulsive that entire corporate boardrooms shudder at its mere mention: Hippies.

Yesterday, two Hippie organizations announced their intent to sue Kellogg's for what they claim is a deceptive and unfair business practice-- advertising to young children!  Sheri Carlson, Lisa Flythe and  Susan Linn of the Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood and Stephen Gardner of the Center for Science in the Public Interest held a press conference in Washington, D.C. alleging that such advertising by Kellogg's caused more than $1 billion in economic harm to Massachusetts consumers.

Disgusting I know.  But don't worry, I have a solution.  Sign my petition.

West Coast Review

   I just returned from a week long trip to Los Angeles.  I didn't have any time at all to play, it was for work and boy did I work...several 15 hour days, yikes!  I did manage to sneak a couple of hours in the first evening to visit Santa Monica pier where a fellow would sculpt your face in 10 minutes.  When Mrs. T learned that this was her "major" souvenir she was a wee bit disappointed.  I think I snapped maybe ten pictures the entire time I was out there, still haven't had time to develop them yet.  Though I didn't have time to visit anything, I did see a few recognizable landmarks from my car as I drove from meeting to meeting, including this, this, and I drove down this.  About the only other thing I recognized was an autographed picture of Don Knotts hanging in a UPS Store on Pico Avenue....Oh the joy to think I made copies where Ralph Furley might receive rent checks from Jack and the girls.

I had never been to California before, so I was pretty excited, making it official, to finally say I've seen the country now coast to coast:

create your own visited states map or check out these Google Hacks.

Of course, I was a little disappointed that I couldn't knock out even one item on my short list of things I wanted to do in LA.  They were: 1) Pay my respects to George & Gracie  2) See the footprints of C-3PO, R2-D2 and Darth Vader at Mann's Chinese Theatre and 3) Eat at Tail O' The Pup.

On the bright side, my hotel was within walking distance from a great Japanese restaurant called Torafuku.  I normally don't eat at the same place twice when I'm in a new city...but after having their Kurobuta Kakuni on Monday, I had to come back Wednesday for their Kobe Beef Rib Eye from Snake River Farms served with an assortment of sauces.  I couldn't help but return Friday for another serving of Kurobuta Kakuni...and this time I splurged for dessert, Matcha Tiramisu that looked pretty similar to this.  I then worked it off by walking a couple of blocks to Nijiya Market and bought Mrs. T, literally, a suitcase full of groceries.  If I had it to do over again, I'd have given her the sculpture first and made the groceries her "major" souvenir.

On a completely unrelated note--  Friday Cat Blogging will resume Jan 2.  Bad idea on my part to start a weekly serial one week then not post for two in a row. 

Taking the Square Route

It looks like Wendy's is finally getting their marketing act together.

Most folks know the fate of last year's Mr. Wendy campaign.  You remember, the night stalker who'd break into your house and remind you that the Wendy's drive-thru was open until midnight or later...

   Hated by nearly everyone, especially Phil Nelson, Mr. Wendy's demise was welcomed and well publicized.  The campaign that followed was no less creepy.  They resurrected Dave Thomas, founder of Wendy's, who died of liver cancer in 2002.  The new ads were pitched as reflections on Thomas' business philosophies, but resulted in sentimentally mournful 30-second memorial services.

I had just about given up hope.  Then tonight, I was watching TV and saw these little guys in a commercial....

Meet Smart Square & the animated circle people. 

According to Sharon Ehrlich, co-creator of Smart Square, the idea arose while pondering the question, "Where do Wendy's square-shaped hamburgers come from?"  The answer was simple: square cows.  They created a back-story about Square Cow who lived among a herd of round cows.  Of course, Square Cow liked to do things differently and that made him special.  But lessons were learned...people lose their appetite when they're creeped out, so having a masochistic Square Cow demanding from people, "Eat me!" would probably be a bad idea.  So, as Ehrlich succinctly states, "we decided to take the cow out of Square Cow."  And a new advertising character was born!

For more fun with Smart Square and the animated circle people, visit their website.