Live Blogging Flying to Germany

• Thanks, mom for the ride to the airport

• For a quick paleo meal at the airport, you could do a lot worse than Cousins BBQ. Brisket is good, the sausage is meh.

• 20€ for in flight internets. Expensive but I'm not dropping out streaming The Hardline unlike Virgin America.

• Upon getting served a red wine, one or two sips later and the steward was going down the aisle to top off wine. So of course, I slammed mine to get a refill.

• Euro travel is fantastic. After dinner question, "Bailey's or cognac?". Cognac, of course.

• Sonofabitch. Netflix thinks I'm already in Germany and won't stream to me.

• Turning around over the Atlantic for "emergency" landing in Canada. The emergency is a strong chemical smell in the crew quarters. Great, some cut a nocturnal fart and we have to turn around.

• In Gander Newfoundland until the find out who fährted.

• Eavesdropping on people wondering why the clock in the terminal appears to be off by 30 minutes. Geegle. Stupid Americans.

• Been here three hours. No word as to when (if) we are going to leave. Luckily Netflix is allowed in Canada.

• The pilot just announced that per regulation, a lufthansa mechanic must sign off that there is no problem. It will take at least 12 hours to get a mechanic here. We are being put up in hotels and best case scenario we will land in Frankfurt at 4 am.
• The funniest moment of the night (now early morning) came when an older Jewish sounding complaining to one of the local workers helping us who doubted that nothing else could be done about our situation said, “This sounds very German.  We’re just following orders.”
• Finally made it to a hotel around 10am local crazy Newfie time.  Time to nap.
• Woke up around 2pm.  Not the best nap ever.  Best case scenario, we leave before 8pm.  In the mean time I’ve got a $140 food voucher to burn through.
• Was going to get room service at 4pm but they don’t serve between 2 and 5.  So, I hope the restaurant has a pants optional policy, cause i was looking forward to eating prime rib pantless
• Buses to pick us up at the hotel and take us back to the airport at 6:30. 

• 11pm. Have been at the airport since 730. The crew showed up at 945. No word as to when we will start queuing up.

• Midnight. We should start boarding within the next 30 minutes. But I'm not holding my breath.

• I blogged too soon. As soon as I posted the previous entry, they announced pre-boarding.


-- Post From My iPhone

Location:Lufthansa Flight 439

Walkabout 2011 Starts Today

And don’t tell me what I can’t do.

Eating Dallas: Pecan Lodge

Eating the first Fried Burnt Ends.


-- Post From My iPhone

Location:S Harwood St,Dallas,United States

The Sierra Nevadas: Day 3 Part 2

Sierra Nevadas D3P2 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

The Sierra Nevadas: Day 3 Part 1

Sierra Nevadas D3P1 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

The Sierra Nevadas: Day 2 Part 2

Sierra Nevadas D2P2 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Hitler’s Fantasy Football Draft Threated by Sturm Adoption

What can I say.  I love Hitler humor.

Philthy phacebookers are on their own to find the yuck yucks.

The Sierra Nevadas: Day 2 Part 1

Sierra Nevadas D2P1 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Sierra Nevadas: Day 1 Part 2

Sierra Nevadas D1P2 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

The Sierra Nevadas: Day 1 Part 1

Sierra Nevadas D1P1 VIEW SLIDE SHOW DOWNLOAD ALL

Having taken over 1200 pictures over the long weekend, I will have to publish them half days at a time.  Please to enjoy.

What I Did Today That There's No Fucking Way You Did Also*

Made snow angels.

*unless you're Kateri.


-- Post From My iPhone

Area Husky Shows Plush Toy Who’s Boss

The Coolest Video You’ve Seen Today

And probably even this year.

Winter Pic of the Day

THE STREAK IS OVER.  LONG LIVE THE STREAK.

This will be your last Winter Pic of the Day for 2011.  Thank you to everyone who participated and made this all happen.

Winter Pic of the Day

Scientists Find Bagged Lunch Could Lead to Food Poisoning. Still No Cure for Cancer.

I read this article on HuffingtonPost and couldn’t help but bang my face against my laptop in exasperation.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The key graph:

According to the University of Texas, a whopping 99% of the 700 box lunches belonging to preschoolers contained foods that were kept at unsafe temperatures. These significant results revealed an accommodating environment for bacteria to grow, ultimately the cause of food poisoning and other bacterial infection.

First of all, it’s no surprise that bullshit like this is coming out of t.u.

Well I guess this explains all the dead preschoolers stacked up like cordwood at my neighborhood nursery school.  As a nation, have we run out of things to worry about?  We now have to hired bored “scientist” to find new things to worry about.  And haven’t kids been taking lunch to school since the dawn of time?  And what exactly is the point of this research?  And what would these researchers have the parents do? Turn their kids over to the “healthy” foods served at schools – fish sticks, mac & cheese, a pudding cup and skim milk?

And the study does not find that the lunches had bacterial growth.  This could have easily been done by swabbing the lunches to see what nasty pathogens were growing in young Aiden’s lunch box.  But I guess we weren’t really interested in finding something bad.  Speculating about catastrophe is far more fun.

Stay tuned for an upcoming headline:

Going Outside Could Lead to Death

Soon to be followed up,of course, with:

Staying Home Could Lead to Death

Winter Pic of the Day

Accuweather Continues to Tease

Although I’m sure this will come true since I’ll be in California for most of this.

And when did 95°F become the Maginot line of climatic comfortablitinessitude?

The Canyons of Tietze Park

The recent heat wave/dry spell has taken its toll on my neighborhood park.

Winter Pic of the Day

Twitterer of the Week

This week’s Twitterer of the Week is another bawdy, blustery broad (yeah, I may have  a type).  A Canadian Indie Rock legend (if Canadian Indie Rock can have legends) and now a member of the The New Pornographers.  This week’s Twitterer of the Week is:

@NekoCase

I discovered her originally in the mid oughts on an Indie music channel on the Yahoo Radio that used to be on Messenger.  I immediately was mesmerized by her voice.

A sampling of her tweets:

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The next person who tells me "Go Vegetarian" I'm going to fucking eat YOU! I don't harass you. Leave me the FUCK ALONE!

The open drain/sewer gas access feature of my hotel room is fancy!! I am transported to ancient Rome!

If you ever hear me sing in that quirky, sickening, wounded, "Baby Alive" radio voice, please kick me in the Vag with a boot made of rasps.

@glttrgrrl @kirkland24 I work hard at NOT eating my dogs. They look like twinkies and smell like fresh baked bread and fritos.

@cram_mandible Come up with some opinions and TV catch phrases of your own, and let me make jokes about fucking beef jerky.

Happy Friday everybody! It's shower-time!!! I am a SKANK!

@ChrisRRegan The U.S. Never paid me back for that abortion.

Group of dudes hogging a big section of chairs to play D n'D. They are not giving 2 shits what the cool kids think about this. I love them.

Why do women cut their hair into the "Kate plus 8" hairdo? Did they just give up?!

Oh, lady with GIANT boobs running through the airport, I am so sorry. (and my chest hurts sympathetically)

The airport is the underside of humanity's balls.

I'm a dude, by the way. I've just decided.

I've been a dude for years,but if feels good to just say it out loud. I'm going to go change the batteries in some guitar pedals. #Mantime

I LOVE being a dude. I never have to have, look at, think about, hear about painting or talk about "fingernails" EVER. Blissed-out.

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Her solo

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And with The New Pornographers

Winter Pic of the Day

But I Can Still Have a Pom Martini, Right?

Slate.com once again has a fine article that rocks nutritional conventional wisdom.  Which can be read by clicking on the Slate.com link in the previous sentence.

 

 

 

 

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Well, there is a wee small problem in our ongoing anti-oxidize-athon: As it turns out, we have no evidence that antioxidants are beneficial in humans. (Though if you're a Sprague-Dawley rat, there's hope.) In fact, as Emily Anthes wrote last year in Slate, the best available data demonstrate that antioxidants are bad for you—so long as you count an increased risk of death as "bad.

My favorite bit, since it throws the dreadfully moronic Doc Oz under the bus:

But, hey, who ever let a little evidence stand in the way of a good time? Especially in this case, when the charge toward lifestyle legitimacy has been led by willowy celebrities with karmic equipoise, ably supported by the Four Horsemen of the Alternative: Drs. Weil, Oz, Null, and Chopra. The seduction of this confederacy (sex! doctors! pills!) is immense; to appreciate its power, one need only consider the pomegranate.

It turns out, like our overuse of antibacterial products which are actually making our bodies more susceptible to dangerous infection, anti-oxidants are turning our cells into microscopic pussies.

If only reality would play along. As noted by Anthes, and Michael Specter in his bookDenialism, the first clear crack in the façade was the 2007 revelation in JAMA that antioxidant vitamins were not merely useless but harmful. Building on this clinical observation, a German group has developed a plausible scientific explanation of the increased risk. The title of the group's most recent publication, "Extending life span by increasing oxidative stress," pretty much sums up their view: The human cell should toughen up. It can benefit from enduring something harsh like the insult caused by free radicals. This way, the organism is more prepared to fend off the inevitable Big One, be it cancer or a toxic fume or perhaps a bout of cholera. Practice makes perfect.

This is just another indication that we all need to eat natural whole foods (little w, little f) – meat, fish, fruit, vegetables – and we will be fine.  And that there is no magic food that will negate the devastating effects on your body of that box of Krispy Kremes (not Top Pot donuts, those are 100% healthy, natural and life affirming) you ate for breakfast.

Winter Pic of the Day

How Bad Science and Big Business Created the Obesity Epidemic

This video went wrongfully unposted during my recent blog break.

Filthy facebookers should avoid this video and just get fat playing Farmville.

The Interwebs Makes Me Giggle

I predict this video will be to movies what Angry Hitler is to all other disappointments.

Yeah, it’s almost a month old.  But I’ve been busy.

Facebookers will have to live out their pitiful existence with the funny.

Winter Pic of the Day

Accuweather.com Stop Taunting Me

Every day I check the 15 day forecast on Accuweather.com for a glimmer of hope that this long swim through ball sweat soup is about over.  I know a 15 day forecast is highly inaccurate, but I’m grasping for straws here.

And every time I check, days 13 – 15 always look something like this:

And those three days never arrive.

It’s the End Times.  And there’s nothing we can do about it now.

Happy International IPA Day

How will you celebrate?

Winter Pic of the Day

The Stunning Revelation That One of my Indie Rock Idols Has Turned Into Someone’s Dad

From the AV Club, I stumbled upon this video featuring Husker Du and Sugar front man Bob Mould.

Bob Mould "covers" Sugar

I know I'm an old fart now. But my indie rockers shouldn't look like they're about to go pick the kids up from soccer practice in the mini van. It's very disburbing and one could say it rocked my world.

Thank you.  I’ll be here all week.

Winter Pic of the Day

The Best TV Show You’re Not Watching Because It’s So Good You Should Be Watching

The Day Tripper with Chet Garner

Watch the full episode. See more The Daytripper.

If you love Texas and finding great small town out of the way eats, this is the show for you.  Think of it as a hipper Texas Country Reporter.  It can be cheesy at times.  But I never finish an episode without thinking, “I want to go to there.”

The embedded episode is one of my favorite, Lockhart and all the great BBQ therein.

You can watch it from their website here or Saturday mornings on KERA.

Facebookers can suck it.

Is This a Tired Bit Yet?

I was hoping to reverse jinx the heat wave with this bit.

Winter Pic of the Day

Really?? This Was the Best You Could Do?

Wow.  I would like to congratulate the fucktards in congress for congratulating themselves for solving the debt crisis.  They have selflessly slashed $1Trillion (with a T, if you can’t read) (wow, that’s a lot)  over the next ten years.

What’s that you say?  Speak up?

Over the next ten years.

WHAT?  So all this bickering and hand wringing has been over $100 billion?  We’re taking our $3.8 trillion budget and reducing it to $3.7 trillion.  That’s like if I’m about to default on my mortgage and tell the bank, “Hey, I just canceled HBO.  That’s a savings of $3000 over the next 10 years.”  They would then ask for my keys and tell me to get the fuck out of their house.

But, Steve, it’s so haaaaard to make real cuts.  The Federal gummint is very important (just ask them).  It can’t be cut.

Oh yeah.  How about this:

• All those troops in Japan and Germany?  I find it amusing so many are concerned about getting our troops out of Iraq and Afghanistan when we have yet to withdraw from countries we were at war with 70 years ago. And do they really need to be there?  Germany is a rich country.  I’m sure it can defend itself against Poland.  How bad can being pelted by pierogies be?  It sounds quite delicious.
• The Department of Education.  Are the children of America smarter or dumber since the advent of this cabinet office?  Dumber you say.  Then why have it? 
• Farm Subsidies.  This is easy for me to suggest a cut.  I’m not in Congress where I would regularly be treated to “lobbyists” from Archer Daniel Midland blowing me while handing me thick packs of $100 bills. In fact eliminate the entire USDA.   All they have done is made type II diabetes epidemic with their retarded food pyramid.
• Means test Social Security and raise the retirement age to at least 70. With the stipulation that we no longer steal from Social Security to pay our credit cards.  The government doesn’t let me take money out of my 401k to pay for a new iPad.  They should have the same restrictions.

There, how many hundreds of billions, if not trillions, of dollars a year did I save and I’m just sitting on my couch in my drawers.

It’s not that hard folks.  Now grow a pair and get back to work.