Bomb Threat

Dallas's only daily newspaper is reporting my high school is under a bomb threat.  Shit like this never happened when Dona Stovall roamed the third floor.

Ankle Update: Week 2

The swelling in my foot is greatly reduced. But the ankle itself is still very swollen. And I love all the purple.

For I Have Looked Upon the Face of God

This is the greatest article in the history of the internet as it combines my two great loves -- booze and bacon.

The recipe:

Bacon Vodka
makes up one pint
Fry up three strips of
bacon.Add cooked bacon to a clean pint sized mason jar. Trim the ends of the bacon if they are too tall to fit in the jar. Or you could go hog wild and just pile in a bunch of fried up bacon scraps. Optional: add crushed black peppercorns.Fill the jar up with vodka. Cap and place in a dark cupboard for at least three weeks. That’s right- I didn’t refrigerate it.At the end of the three week resting period, place the bacon vodka in the freezer to solidify the fats. Strain out the fats through a coffee filter to yield a clear filtered pale
yellow bacon vodka. Decant into decorative bottles and enjoy.

Thank You For Noticing

Picture courtesy of Matt Curry.

Drinking Dallas: Black Friar Pub

From the folks that brought us The Old Monk and The Idle Rich comes this new bar -- Black Friar Pub. It's only been open a few days so the first impression may not be fair. It's not as hip as the Monk or "cool" as the Rich. Although it is "warmer" than both. The food menu is similar to the Monk and the beer menu is almost identical.

Since it is so similar to the Monk, I went and tried me some of their Fish and Chips. And boy was I disappointed. They were flavorless and bland. The batter is "flavored" with Smithwicks. I think they should reconsider this and just do whatever they do at the Monk. The chips were good, though.

I did like the feel of the place -- lots of warm wood and cozy nooks. And they at least try to have a good beer menu -- albeit mostly imports. So for that I'll give it a good grade.


B


2621 McKinney Ave. Dallas, TX

Ankle Update

Some of the swelling has gone down and in it's place -- a lovely shade of purple. I can walk now with a minimum of limping. But I can't walk very fast. I'm gonna head over to TO's to see if I can borrow his hyperbolic chamber.

Movie Review: Juno

Can't we just like kick this old school. You know, like I stick the baby in a basket, send it your way, like Moses and the reeds?

I have to admit. It's a lot more fun to review a movie or a restaurant with flaws than ones that are flawless. Juno is nearly flawless -- hilariously funny both smart and broad, great acting and a cool soundtrack. All I can do is implore you to go see it as soon as you can.

• 0 breasts
• purple vomit fu
• Academy Award Nomination for Michael Cera and Jason Bateman just for their work on Arrested Development.

King Wally says check it out.

A+

King Wally's Amazing Technicolor Ankle

What a shitty week.
Tuesday morning I woke up with the flu. For much of Wednesday and Thursday all I would do is sleep, wake up, take another shot of NyQuil and go back to sleep. Finally I started to feel good on Friday. So good, in fact, I finally got around to bottling my second batch of brew.
But then on Saturday -- yet another Winter League Saturday where we had only one sub thanks to the huge lack of commitment from one of our captains -- in the middle of our second game I actually ran. And I was punished handsomely for my showing of effort and hit a horse divot and rolled my left ankle all the way.
After pounding the ground repeatedly and spouting more "Fucks!" since playing on Kip's Winter League team, I limped off the field to polite applause.
I probably did more damage by hanging out at the fields until 10pm. But, hey, I was having fun.

Does Anyone In Dallas Know The Heimlich???

This blog has been largely sports free. I think the world is better served by guys with bigger sports brains or at least bigger breasts. But this latest choke job by a Dallas sports team is just another in a long list of chokes. So bummed am I that I will not listen to my beloved Ticket all day. Well, at least we still have the Rangers. They will never disappoint us by choking in the playoffs.

• NBA Finals -- Mav lose series after choking away game three.


• Romo fumbles snap for game winning field goal.


• Stars lose series to Vancouver even though Turco has three shutouts in the series.


• A 68 win Mavs lose in the first round to the 8th sede.

Floodgates Opening?

Within about 10 minutes of each other today I heard from two recruiters. Hopefully this is the opening up of the job floodates I was expecting last week. I really need a job, not just financially but mostly psychologically. I need some focus other than that tiny carrot in the distance that is Wally's.

Debauching Dallas: Frat Party V

My team of legal advisers reminds me that what happens at Frat Party stays at Frat party. Therefore I'm bound by civil law, common law and man law to not divulge the full extent of the debaucherousnessitude of Frat Party. At least until all litigation has been settled.
But I will say it was one dandy party.
Was that gay enough??
As the kids today say, major props to Glenn and Kyle for another great party. Although the creeping sense that I'm getting too old for this stuff was starting to bum me out. Luckily I doubled down on the jello shots and that feeling quickly disappeared.

Sweet Greggo, Out!

With obligatory Green Day song.

You Tell A Dog To Do Something....

and eventually she'll do it. I found this in my yard yesterday. I guess Alex finally did what I asked when I said "Where's the squirrel? Go get the squirrel!!".

Catch Up for The Wire Season 5

Here's a quick digest of what's happened on the first four seasons of the best show in the history of teevee.



Season five started last Sunday and is in heavy repeats on HBO.

Drinking Dallas: The Amsterdam Bar

As part of our adventure to open the best dang bar in Dallas, The Jester and I have a weekly business meeting at a bar neither of us has ever been to. This week's candidate was The Amsterdam Bar.

Located just a fried tiramisu's throw from Fair Park (ooh that sounds really good), The Amsterdam is one of many hipster hangouts in the area. It distinguishes itself by having an interesting array of beers on tap. I was as delighted to see beers on tap I had never seen before (like almost everywhere I went in Seattle) along with my beloved Dogfish Head 60 Minute IPA. $3 pints on Tuesday and Hop Head Thursdays are among there specials.

I didn't get to eat anything so I can't comment on the food. And the place is very smokey. Why do hipsters smoke so much?

One of the more interesting sites was a couple of 20-somethings drinking a Maredsous and doing a crossword together. I thought that was really cool and I wanted to kill both of them. That's just the dichotomy that is The King.

It's very smokey and a bit out of the way. Otherwise this place would have gotten an A.

B+

831 Exposition Ave. Dallas, TX

Cool New Blog

Some guys are blogging about opening a bar. Check it out.

A Failure Pile in a Sadness Bowl

This is some of the funniest shit I've read in a long time. I wish I could write 1/100000 as well as Patton Oswalt.

Some of the funny:

It wasn't. Kentucky Fried Chicken had filled a bowl with gravy, mashed potatoes, corn, breaded chicken, and finally, cheese. Shut-ins, people afflicted with Prader-Willi Syndrome, and manic-depressives also do this. If you're trying to make a fortune in the food and beverage industry, those are the three demographics to shoot for—the Famous Bowl is one of the bestselling items on the
KFC menu.
KFC calls it their version of the shepherd's pie. Shepherds in Kentucky must be full of rage and slathered in confusion. They must hang their fat, skin, and muscles from bones carved with runes of surrender.

Dallas Declared Crime Free Paradise

Yes. You read it here first. There is no longer any crime in Dallas -- well, apparently, except for riding your bike around White Rock Lake without a helmet. The Commissioner, The #1 cop, Chief Kunkle has decided that the best way to solve our city's outrageous crime rate is to harass the law abiding tax payers that want to ride their bikes around lake without a helmet by handing out chickshit tickets. Now, it's perfectly legal to ride a motorcycle around the lake without a helmet. But the city thinks it knows better than the state and passed a stupid law in the mid 90s requiring helmets for bicyclists.

And if you're thinking "Well, Steve's just angry because he got a ticket." I say nay and good day to you. I did not get a ticket. A jogger passed me and advised me that the cop ahead was handing out tickets to cyclists sans helmet. So, instead of biking 28 miles I took a quick left up Fisher and went home for only an 8 mile ride. Now what was more healthy for me -- a 28 mile ride without a helmet or sitting at home watching Oprah and eating Banana Pudding Blue Bell right out of the carton since this is the only real alternative?

What's triple infuriating about this is that just minutes before there was a dumbass driving his car in the jogger/biker lane. Where was the officer to ticket this moron?? Well, he was handing out chickshit tickets to people who could only harm themselves.

Here's a good website that I think has the facts because their facts agree with my position.

Lime Oregon

One of the coolest man-made things I saw on my Walkabout was an abandoned cement factory in the southwest corner of Oregon near Lime. Unfortunately it was dusk when I drove by (making the place look extra spooky and interesting) and I was unable to take any good pictures. Well thanks to the miracle of Internets and my copious amounts of free time, I have found others on the Internets who also thought this place was interesting and were nice enough to upload pictures which I have now stolen and posted.
Dang that was a long sentence.

In Other TeeVee News

I knew all of these except the one about Festivus.

The Time Is Now

A part of a very good Simpsons. Favorite line from Homere "Ooooh, the Patriot Act is soooo scary. The government is going to find out what books I take out of the library. What's next, they'll find out what operas I go to??"

Let the Panic Begin

Well I guess the guys at Data Reference didn't like the cut of my jib. Which is a shame since I just spent a small fortune on jiboplasty. Coupled with the silence from a pre-holiday phoner with a company in Portland, the King's self esteem is at a 52-week low. Well, probably more like a 26 week low.
Perhaps it was foolish to wait until the money started to run out to start actively looking for employment. Or maybe this is just another way the universe is telling me to not get back into programming and to open up Wally's as soon as possible.

Job Interview: Data Reference

This morning I had to get up at a decent time for a 8:45 phone interview for a job at Data Reference located Hillcrest and the tollway. The phoner went well so a face-to-face interview was scheduled for the afternoon. So, I suited up and headed for my first dreaded interview.
This was my first job interview in over a decade. Just before the holidays I canceled an face-to-facer with a company in Las Colinas. It didn't sound like my kind of job, and I just wasn't psyched, so I canceled. In retrospect it might have been nice to practice.
I think the interview went well. For the most part I answered all the important questions correctly. Although at one point, on a fairly tricky question, sweat started to form on my forehead.
I guess I know why I haven't been on a World Poker Tour final table now.

Health Insurance

I am currently part of the alleged 49 million uninsured Americans. I do have a bit of a COBRA safety net. But I'm not quite sure how safe that netting is in the new year. And since I'm probably going to be contracting and not going full time with anyone anytime soon, I figured it would be better for me to go ahead and get my own health insurance. So I went to my friend, the internet, and found me some insurance. The first shocker was that it will be at least 2 weeks before I can get covered. I can get any number of credit approvals online instantly. But health insurance I guess is still done all with paper and abacuses (abacii??).
The other beatdown was they wanted me to remember all of my ailments for the last ten years. That was easy for me. I've only been so sick I needed a doctor twice in the last ten years. I had gall bladder surgery in 2002 and that nasty bacterial infection this past summer. But what about someone who isn't as robust as I? And I have no records of who treated me in 2002. I don't even know my surgeon's name.
Well hopefully all my records will be in order and I can get my $108/month health insurance. Otherwise I may have to marry one of my readers (preferably female in gender) and glom onto her (again, preferably) insurance. You can fight it out.
Pillows at 20 paces.

Stuff I've Been Too Lazy to Write A Full Review About

Admitedly my post have been very sporadic the last few months. And a few items have slipped through the cracks. As always, I'll try to do better in the future.

Capitol Pub
It's in a great location with lots of parking, which is a plus for that area. Otherwise I just don't see what's so great about it. I need to go back and try something else on the menu. But what I had, scallop fritters, were bad. The usual supects on tap. Christ Dallas needs a bar that has something interesting and different on tap.
C
2401 Henderson Dallas Tx

Jimmy's
Walking into this place is like walking into many of the little grocery/delis back up in Jersey. This place gets an A just for it's smell. Fantastic sangwiches. So great I even went back today for their Cuban.
A
4901 Bryan, Dallas TX

I Am Legend
Does any Charlton Heston movie need to be remade? Did we learn nothing from the whole Planet of the Apes fiasco? Well, this is what I thought before seeing it. But this turned out to be a pretty good movie. More Castaway than Omega Man in many respects.
B+

Finally a Candidate I Can Support