The family watched “Space Chimps” last weekend. It lived up to expectations, which were pretty low. It had a lot of action crammed into its 82 minutes, with an emphasis on slapstick physical humor. It’s not going to win any awards, but it was cute, and funny, and not a bad way to spend part of an evening.

There was one bit of dialog that had me howling, then fumbling for the remote so I could back it up and play it for the wife. The chimps are coming back to Earth in their jury-rigged space capsule, and the reluctant hero (Ham) is being told he has to save the day by the gung-ho NASA-trained chimp, Titan:

Ham: I’m not an astronaut!
Titan: Are you wearing alumimum clothes?
Ham: Yes.
Titan: Are you in a rocket?
Ham: Yes
Titan: …in outer space?
Ham: Yes.
Titan: Are you David Bowie?
Ham: Uh… no.
Titan: Then you’re an astronaut.

Comedy Gold.

Yesterday, when I finally got around to making a late breakfast, I decided to have a peanut butter and banana sandwich. So, I toasted a couple of slices of como artisan bread that we had left over, spread one with Adams peanut butter, sliced a very ripe banana onto the peanut butter, and then drizzled a small amount of clover honey on the whole thing. I then applied the second slice of bread and gave the sandwich a very gentle squish to consolidate the whole thing.

As I went to take a first bite, I glimpsed a bit of color that does not belong on a sandwich. Looking closer, I espied a small patch of bluish-green near the crust of one slice of bread. Mold? Surely not. I turned the sandwich over to check the same place on the other slice of bread. Small patch of bluish-green. Bleagh.

I carefully excised the offending proto-penicillin, and ate the damn sandwich, hoping there weren’t any other patches to affect the taste. It tasted just fine, but I couldn’t help thinking that I really wished I had seen the mold BEFORE I made the sandwich.

And it struck me that this attitude could be applied to several aspects of my life these days. “I really wished I’d seen the mold BEFORE I made the sandwich.” It serves as a rueful acknowledgment that hindsight is 20/20, while foresight is usually nearsighted coupled with ferocious astigmatism.

You may have noticed that I have been unforgivably deficient in updating this blog lately. This is largely due to being preoccupied with other things, things I can’t blog about. I’ve been undergoing some drama at work, some of which has been in the works for months, and some which is very recent. Although it would be cathartic to vent my spleen, I have always believed it would be a mistake to blog about my job, for both personal and professional reasons. So that’s out.

Our interactions with the Girl continue to exhibit a manic variability. On the one hand her musical and artistic ability are jaw-droppingly impressive, on the other she is a fully-involved thirteen-year-old, with all the screaming, pouting, scheming, and resentment that comes with the package. The Girl has always been the primary source of blog-fodder in my life, but unfortunately things have changed. I’ve become aware that at least one kid in our neighborhood, and who goes to her school, knows who she is. This was probably inevitable, but it has made me a great deal more reluctant to post about the very things that would be most worth blogging about. She didn’t sign up to have the details of her life spread around middle school.

My relationship with the Wife has taken an unusually rocky turn, for the incredibly mundane reason that we are having arguments about money. Well, routine for most couples, she and I usually are usually in remarkable agreement when it comes to purchasing priorities. Not this time. I could blog about that, except back when I started this little exercise I decided I would never blog about something instead of talking about it with her. I can, and will, blog ABOUT her, but I refuse to blog TO her. Even I am smart enough not to touch that particular third rail.

And to complete the Perfect Storm of blog-delaying factors, then there is my health. Aside from the knee problems, aside from having to wear a fighter pilot oxygen mask every night, aside from everything else that I’ve been dealing with, this episode of sciatica has been quite educational. It’s both a matter of the pain being truly extraordinary, and the degree to which it effects my ability to do almost anything. As a result, I’ve come to believe that slip-on shoes are one of Mankind’s greatest inventions. I’ve also started asking the kids to fetch things for me, so I won’t have to get up off the couch. Some days just walking the dog around the block is out of the question. My mobility, which had already taken a hit when my knees went bad, is now sufficiently poor that I’ve started to break out in a cold sweat when I see commercials for Rascal scooters. Dammit, I’m too young to feel this crippled.

So let’s just say I haven’t had the world’s greatest attitude recently, which makes for poor writing. I’ve found plenty of great stuff for ‘flotsam’, and I think I’ve been keeping up ‘nonobvious’ pretty well, but I fear that this blog has suffered.

I tried a bit of creative writing, and was gratified by the kind responses some folks left. It just makes me think that I should be doing more of the same. Sometimes I wonder if I shouldn’t make an honest effort to become an author, just on the slim chance that I could quit my job, become fabulously wealthy, and world-famous. Hey, it couldn’t be worse, right?

Elaine was constantly on the edge of falling apart. Or rather, the things around her were. You see, Elaine bought inexpensive things, and so they broke. But because she could never replace them with anything of quality, anything that would last, the replacements broke just as fast.

So, instead of a new battery for her clunker of a car, Elaine bought jumper cables. Instead of a new television, she bought a bigger set of rabbit ears, and so on. This lifestyle of stopgap measures and band-aid repairs kept her both broke and constantly on the verge of breaking down completely.
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I really hate to admit it, but unlike most of the bacon excess posted online, I’m genuinely tempted to make this bad boy. But I don’t care how much Lipitor you’re taking, it won’t be enough.

For detailed instructions to make your own bbq bacon/sausage/bacon extravaganza, see BBQ Addicts.

via Neatorama.

I grew up in the Pacific Northwest. Except for a brief stint in the midwest, I’ve been living in Pacific Northwest most of my life. And one thing about the Pacific Northwest that you can absolutely rely upon, is that if you live in the low-lying areas west of the mountains, you won’t see much snow. And even if you DO see snow, it’ll be gone in a day or so.

That’s just the way it is. This is a temperate area, and the climate is moderated by the marine effect of being next to the Pacific Ocean.

Which is why the northwest has been absolutely shut down by the recent snowstorm. A snowstorm that has been fondly nicknamed “Snowpocalypse ‘08″.

How bad is it? Well, the weather started getting sketchy last week, with enough snow that folks had trouble getting in to work. Then we were told that it was going to get much worse. How much worse? Let’s just say that we stocked up on food.

Meanwhile, my sister, who lives on a wooded hillside on a steep, steep driveway, was housebound. Looking at the forecast for the weekend, we made a rescue run on Saturday morning to pick her up. I had to put chains on the van to get there and back.

So, we’ve been snuggled up and staying home ever since. It’s kept on snowing, periodically. In fact we got another four inches of fresh snow last night. This has officially gotten insane:

I really like the beers made by Widmer Brothers Brewing, and I’m particularly fond of their Broken Halo IPA. It’s profoundly hoppy, without being excessively bitter; it’s got great floral hoppy nose that’s balanced by a malty finish. It’s good stuff.

So, in the middle of a particularly good bottle of Broken Halo, I twittered to the effect that I “loved Broken Halo”. Many, many days later I got a twitter back from @dougmcarthur telling me that he really appreciated my support for his band.

WTF?

So, I twittered back something polite, and Doug indicated in return that he had realized almost immediately that I was referring to “Broken Halo” the beer, not “Broken Halo” his band. Eventually I decided to hear how bad his little garage band really was.

But they’re good. Really good. I mean, everybody tells you they have a band and that you should check out their MySpace page, but in this case you really SHOULD go to their MySpace page and listen to the tracks they have posted there. And then you can go to their homepage, halomusic.net.

These guys seem to be making quite a name for themselves in Winnipeg, but by all rights they should be more popular. Their songs are musical, complex, and they rock. The vocals and instrumentals compliment rather than compete with each other, and overall their music is reminiscent of early alternative rock, before alt-rock embraced a more overtly grunge- and punk-influenced sound.

I will rarely, rarely give you a music recommendation, because my tastes tend to run to the more eclectic and nostalgic. But I really think these guys deserve a careful listen. Give them a chance.