squidbag

No Country For Stupid Men

The world is not safe for disrespectful pricks in restaurants any longer. Two instances from last week, the first from Friend of the Squidbag (SquidFriend? SquidFiend?) Joe Basilone out of Chi-Town:

"Took the boys out for lunch, and there were two men sitting across from us having a loud, profanity laden conversation. Realizing that my only "backup" were 2 and 7 year olds, I did the only rational thing I could think of.

Walking over, keeping my voice low enough so that the boys couldn't hear me, I said calmly, "You may not have any children with you, but I do. Have some respect before I shove that hot dog down your throat for you. Sideways." I then slowly walked back to my table and sat down to finish. Neither one of them knew what hit 'em. And neither one uttered a single word for the rest of our meal."

This one's mine: Stopped into a Mickey D's (I know, my mistake) for a quick breakfast between an Abby school activity and a presentation I had to give last Friday when some Seniors, skipping classes, decided to heckle an older woman who was working the register: the main heckler was six feet plus, pasty and red-haired: 

"Hey, you disrespectful Ronald Weasley looking motherfucker; you'd best calm down and keep your mouth shut or I'll drop you like a bad habit right now. Test me." It looked like he might speak, and I did my best dad/dog owner "Ut-tut-tut! No more talking 'til you leave," accompanied by closing mouth hand puppet gesture. It worked, everyone else had a peaceful wait for breakfast, and I did not hear him speak again.

We're out there, people. It's about respect. Behave.

Washing Up

...the main thought that drifts like a soap bubble through my head as I'm doing dishes these days is to simply wonder where all these damn dishes come from in the first place.

See, like most men, I secretly believe that I could do an adequate job of cooking just about anything from yak flank to tapioca with a Swiss Army knife and a reasonably placed open flame. This could be a cigarette lighter, even. Granted, coffee, tortillas and flan might be hard to make with only these tools, but fuck flan, I hate that gelatinous crap anyway.

It's a hard fact of grown up kitchen existence to branch out and use tools. You end up rationalizing it; "Mechanics don't use the same sockets for everything, ninjas have throwing stars and katana, a soldier has a rifle and a sidearm and a backpack full of stuff." Being truthful though - there's something about the intrepid individual out on a mission with the one thing they need the most that does almost everything. Indiana Jones and the bullwhip, Thor's hammer, Captain American's shield, Wonder Woman's lasso, The Doctor's sonic screwdriver. Columbo's coat. Lightsabers. Towels in the Hitchhiker's books. Katniss with her bow. Excalibur. Lucille. We like it when we're resourceful enough to use very little to produce a lot, that's why all those fucking kitchen books like "One Pot Meals" & "Fix it and Forget It" exist. Using a bunch of different knives and implements and stuff feels like anathema, like I'm prancing around the kitchen simply using shit because it's there.

This reaches a point of ridiculousness when you're in the midst of some cooking project and you run into a delay of 10 minutes or more because you can't find the specific thing you were looking for. Laughable. I could've used almost anything to mash bananas - bananas are inherently mashable. I can mash a banana by looking at it. Why did I have to find the masher? Because I always use the masher (twice yesterday for Thanksgiving) and I wanted to know where it was. I knew where my hammer was, I could have used that; but no - gotta find the masher, right now.

Finally, this culminates in washing 1000 dishes. When I could have just put my lighter in my pocket and wiped down my Swiss Army knife. Even if the "dishwasher" were working (which it isn't) everyone knows it's really just a dishwarmer anyway, for people who like hot dishes. You can't load in anything you've fried anything in, or cooked meat on, or baked cookies or casseroles in without washing it first. Some will say 'rinsing' but that's a crock pot of bullshit right there. When I had to 'rinse' the bowl in which my wife cooked her grandmother's squash casserole recipe yesterday, I had to scrub it with soap and water. You know what that's called? Washing.

Anyway - I hope you had a good Thanksgiving and are avoiding that Black Friday nonsense right now.

What Life is Like

Woke up this morning at 7:01 from a dream where my friends lived on a giant interconnected farm and one of them had been taking Kung-Fu. I was also missing my wife, who was in Nashville overnight for a training thing. She would never have let me sleep with my glasses on and my cheek stuck on the corner of a book about witches that I'm not really enjoying, but I'm 400 pages in, and dammit, I'm not going to have wasted all this time and effort for nothing. I'm also not going to read the rest of the trilogy, I'm thinking. I'm bull-headed, not stupid.  

Rolled over to find the dog, who's not supposed to be in my room at all, sitting on the floor and looking at me, and the kids downstairs watching Ruby Gloom and not letting the dog out. So I got up and let her out, made coffee, and spent almost $200 online on textbooks for my semester that starts on the 27th. Let the realization that this is my last week of Summer freedom sink in and then went and got a shower after dicking around on Facebook for a few minutes over the coffee.

Showered and went out for breakfast, which ended up being at a Waffle House, because my kids like it there. The couple across from us was weird, with the lady complaining about the food quality and sending stuff back (at Waffle House?) and soaking her cutlery in ice water. That's a picture of their table up there. The lady behind us was having problems with her kids, which made me additionally grateful for my kids, who were being awesome, full of bacon and ideas. After that, we had errands - dog treats and fish tank supplies and potting soil and a poster frame for my new Dr. Who poster.

My house is relatively quiet now as my daughter swats flies in the kitchen and hums songs, and my son designs a game involving target shooting and swords. I've been reading up on the web about various skin treatments for my daughter, and am about to head back out to get things with muds and acids in them, things I never thought I would know anything about, and some of the basic grocery items we're out of. We have big plans to watch the Three Stooges movie this evening and re-plant Abby's squash plants while Max mows the lawn.

This is Saturday.

Chick-Fil-A: Princess Party

So's I'm out driving through mall hell this morning and doing boring errands when I happen past my local Chick-Fil-A restaurant (previously mentioned here and here) which is kind of the center of my Chick-Fil-A universe, and guaranteed home of the no-homo chicken sandwich here in the 'Boro. There was nothing of note about the building or its traffic between 10 and 11 o'clock this morning, but this marquee on the sign did get my attention:

PRINCESS PARTY TUES AUG 21 5-8 PM 

This seemed like something I should know more about, and after some quick reading, I discovered that this is part of a regular thing at Chick-Fil-A, Tuesdays where they get kids in and give away dead chicken. Tonight's special thing is Super Science Night with Mr. Rich! One can only presume that Mr. Rich will go over the times when men and dinosaurs roamed the Earth eating chicken together, and then move on to how being gay is an abomination to science, which is just another facet of God's infinite love we as people have yet to properly comprehend.

Next Tuesday, though, promises serious princess fun (according to the event's Facebook page), including 

* Dress like a princess and receive a FREE Nuggets Kid's Meal (4-ct)!
* Meet your favorite storybook princess
* Mini-manicures by Pint Sized Pampering
* Disney sing-along by Bravo Performance Academy
* Decorate your own magic wands
* Goodie bags for each little princess!

First off, my favorite storybook princess is Anastasia Romanov, so I can't wait to meet her and solve the mystery at last. That'll go great with lemonade. The other thing about this that seems like it's worth exploring though is the assumption on the part of the CFA people that all of the pretty princesses who show up will be little girls. Those of us with minds not constricted by archaic thinking realize that little boys can be princesses, too. Probably especially if there's free chicken in it. And maybe bigger boys and girls, too.

I can't think of anything more potentially funnier than Chick-Fil-A Princess Night in Murfreesboro being overrun by every fabulous drag queen and lesbian I know, and then all of the ones they know, too. You know the 'Boro's not the only CFA restaurant that does this - there's lots of chances to subvert this event. Everybody done up like a pretty princess and hanging around waiting to decorate their own wand. No statements or signs, just physically making the simple point (with taffeta, make-up and feather boas) that anyone can and will be a princess, just as people can and will love those they fall in love with, and maybe, just maybe, it's time for Chick-Fil-A to catch up to the way smart evolved people think about things.

Not that I claim to be one - I just think it'd be funny as hell.

Chick-Fil-Gay II

(Getting a lot of mileage out of this graphic.)

You know, I drove past Chick-Fil-A today (as did many of you) to see a depressingly long line of cars stretching out onto the little mall road that runs in front of the restaurant. It made me want to move away. To fucking Mars.

I know that some of these people are simply there because they're pissed that anyone, for any reason, has tried to tell them where they should or should not eat lunch. These people are unthinking automatons, akin to a uni-cellular organism that jumps when you poke it, and I bet that they're a much higher percentage of the crowd there than you'd think. I'm not spending any more time on them. They just want chicken, and everyone else can fuck right off. I don't agree with them, but I'm not going to waste my time talking stuff over with them, either.

Second, I'm sure there are a few hundred carloads of people around who think that they're supporting the 1st Amendment rights of the founders, the Cathys. They're wrong, of course; if the 1st Amendment was really the reason they were there, then you'd also see them at Klan rallies and gatherings of the Westboro Baptist Church. Come to think of it, maybe you do. They're also mixed up in thinking that spending money is a form of free speech, but you can't blame them for that; the Supreme Court's been telling them that's true for years now. Of course they're confused.

The third group of folks there in support of a major food service corporation are the Bible-thumping Huckabee clones who are "defending traditional marriage," and their primary (loudest) argument is that the Cathys can give their money (which they donate to several organizations that fight against gay marriage, person who lives under a rock) to whomever they want, and why the hell would you boycott someone for spending their money how they want to? There's a secondary argument, but they don't say that one as loudly; they're icked out by gay people and don't want them to get married.

Two things here (theoretical Chick-Fil-A supporter who would never have read this far down on my blog): the first one is that the rationale of your opposition is wrapped in your initial question, you thick, thick person. It's fine if Mr. Cathy wants to rail against gay marriage because he's intellectually challenged and gets his rules for living from a 2000 year old book designed to control people. It's even fine if he wants to use the profits from his corporation to spread inequality in our country where everyone is supposed to be equal. Repugnant, but fine. It's NOT fine for me to support it, given that I so strongly disagree with his dumb ass, and it's NOT fine for people who are supporting him to pretend like they're doing anything else other than backing a movement for institutionalized inequality. These people who bullshit themselves into thinking they're not supporting Cathy's Crusade? Delusional, disrespectful, disgusting and just so prideful, haughty and puffed up with the confidence of the zealot.

Which brings me to my main point: Apparently, you don't realize that we - the people who oppose you on this issue - are CONSTANTLY ENGAGING IN THE ART OF TOLERANCE by not yelling and screaming at you, by not explaining the issue to your bashed-out brains on the sidewalk, by not burning down Chick-Fil-A billboards and cackling roadside at what you mistakenly believe is your righteous anger. We have emotional reactions, too - we're not ruled by them as you are, and we don't follow through on them until they rob others of their rights. Therein lies the motherfucking rub, friend.

I know you think that we are all crunchy free-love people who don't understand tradition, discipline or rules. I have seen you bounce-label us as "hateful" like a Jedi mind trick, and we try our best to bring our signs, not buy the chicken, and take the high road as you make fun of us for missing out on your shit sandwiches and supporting other humans and their love and relationships, when love and relationships between humans are ALL THAT MATTERS. Just keep in mind - tolerance is not a natural activity for some of us - we are gritting our teeth and trying very hard not to smack and school you until you shut up and grow up.

Frog Nog

From Consumer FoodObjects, a subsidiary corporation of Squidbag Endeavor Group, and from the same people who brought you Caffles, InvisiBreakfast, Tub Jenkins Beer, the Assault Bockwurst and the Fried Fat Fuck Flounder Pounder, comes a new project sure to get your taste buds jumping - FROG NOG!

That's right, Frog Nog - all the power of sheer Nog, now with the big taste of frog! This festive frog's better than grog, tastier than hog, and burns hotter than yer log - it's Frog Nog! The drink that's just as good on land as in the water - when the leg's no longer enough, take a big old gulp of nog; FROG NOG!

Seriously, though; Frog Nog - once you focus past the gag reflex - just the frog in the nog trying to jump up on you - and get some terrific tadpole taste tailing it down your gullet, you're going to be out on the street, on your phone, knocking doors, tweeting, texting, slapping down old ladies and telling them to drink fucking FROG NOG, the taste is fantastic, incredible - galvanic. You will hop around like old Mr. Jumper from Calabash County hooked up to 15,000 volts, my friend, kicking and singing and waving the top hat once your mouth gets a little frog in it. Drink Frog Nog with your friends, support group, or nature enthusiasts - serve it up to your remote and radical cult!

FROG NOG, irrationally in stores now, goes great with the woodsy flavor of SQUERKY, new squirrel jerky on a stick, the newest snack treat from the guys down at Consumer FoodObjects. Find your nuts, scurry down and try SQUERKY today!

(This one's for Max, Wess, and Chelle.)

Spatchcockian Goodness

My wife and I cooked a turkey for our New Year's Eve gathering.  Since we had a frozen turkey left behind by her mom when she was here just before Xmas, and ham was had on Xmas Eve, it seemed natural to feed Mer/San, the Katz-Silvermen, Cindy, Max and his friend Steven, Abby and ourselves from the 12 pound Tom that was in suspended animation in our kitchen.  Since it was universally agreed upon by everyone in attendance (much to our delight and surprise) that we had done a great job with the turkey, I thought you all might appreciate a look at how we did it.

STEP 1: Email close friend with culinary education (whose past turkeys have been awesomely delicious) and experience to ask about brining.  While waiting for response, read numerous internet articles and Food Network posts about same.  Eventually reach point of no return (10pm) and begin brining without advice from close friend.

STEP 2: Bring to boil about 3 cups of water in 5 gallon pot.  In the absence of apple cider vinegar, say "fuck it" and add 2 bottles of Woodchuck Granny Smith Hard Apple Cider and indeterminate amount of white vinegar.  Add all kosher salt left in the house.  Then, in amounts that amuse you, add black pepper, dried dill, fresh chopped basil, red onion left in fridge for a month, and remainder of green onions from previous recipe.  Add rosemary, thyme and sage, then parsley because you're a little OCD and the four must always travel together.  Realize that the fluid level is ridiculous, and call upon the spirit of Archimedes.  Quit adding crap.

STEP 3: Yank neck off turkey and save it without knowing why.  After rinsing and fisting turkey, locate giblet pack beneath neck skin (because THAT makes sense) and shout in triumph, also saving this in Tupperware for no reason at all.  Rinse and rinse and rinse turkey, saying nice things to it and patting it.  Once fluid runs clear, submerge that big bastard in a pot, spilling cold gross soup everywhere.  Hold pot shut with rubberbands, stick in fridge, ruining that with overflow also.  Check email to find advice from close friend says, essentially, not to do all that shit you just did, because you won't have time.  Scrub whole kitchen like CSI is on the way.  Spend most of next day trying to extract beers and leftovers with a 5 gallon pot full of raw bird in the way.

STEP 4: The following evening, extract turkey from the science experiment you doused it in yesterday, and lay it gently on parchment paper spread upon counters free of all the stuff you normally use in your kitchen.  My toaster is still on top of the fridge as I write this.  Watch Martha Stewart video of spatchcocking (which I can no longer find), feel sorry for turkey.  Get three heftiest kitchen knives and a pair of plastic handled scissors.  Break scissors instantly, throw them away.  Use largest knife to remove turkey's spine by hacking through the skin and tissue surrounding the backbone.  Use serrated knife to chop through ribs and stuff, finally twisting and breaking backbone loose with bare hands.  Do Predator impression.  Think about Jack the Ripper.  Flip turkey when you get a second, you referential prick.

STEP 5: Break ribs of turkey with two deft and satisfying punches.  Flatten turkey out with legs twisted up and out to display meat and complete violation of the turkey.  Rub turkey with olive oil, margarine, black pepper and nonexistent kosher salt.  Use sidewalk salt instead.  Also, the aforementioned quartet of parsley, sage, rosemary and thyme come back out for this, along with dried mustard and more advice.  Get it under the skin and all over, wacky crazy.  Put turkey in oven at 350 degrees, basting it in the runoff and rotating every 20 minutes.  Stop when other friend who knows more than you about food says, "Stop," or when it looks like the above picture.

STEP 6: Eat turkey.

Chick-Fil-Gay

I was driving home from class today hungry, so I was checking every place on my route with any kind of food, and since it was lunchtime, all of the lines at the various fast food places were long, like windy snakes of hungry cars.  One was extra long, though - the line for Chick-fil-A.  It actually went out onto the feeder road in front of the little strip mall that it's in front of, it was so long.  In rapid succession then, inside my brains: "Wow, they have a little protocol for how to not block the road while they wait.  Wonder what's so awesome about the Fil-A compared to say, Wendy's which is right next door?  Or Steak and Shake?  Or that mom and pop sandwich place?  Is there crack in the food?  Probably a bunch of assholes looking for a gay-free lunch.  I bet that's a long line of cars filled with all straight people."

By which point I had turned around and found a parking space.  I got out and knocked on the window of the first car:

ME: Hi, are you heterosexual?

LADY: What is this?

ME: Just asking.

LADY: Yes, now - 

ME: (walking away, knocking again)

GUY: Yeah?

ME: Excuse me, are you a heterosexual?

GUY: No, I mean, yeah - why?

ME:  Which is it?  I need to know for my results.

GUY: What results?  I'm married.

ME: To a woman?

GUY: YES!

ME: Awesome.  (next car) Hi, are you a heterosexual?

MAN: (laughing) Yes, I am.

ME: Are you here for a specifically gay-free lunch?

MAN: What?

ME: Did you know that Chick-Fil-A has expressly said that they don't want gay people coming to their place here even though it's common knowledge that many gay people have green money and eat poultry?

MAN: (line moving forward) Really?

ME: Yup. (moves away) Hello, miss, are you a heterosexual?

WOMAN: (from behind window) I'm not rolling down my window!

ME: Understood, but are you straight, though?!?

WOMAN: Yes, go away!

ME: Did you know that Chick-Fil-A donates a not insignificant amount of money to anti-gay groups?

WOMAN: GOOD!

ME: So you're a homophobe, then?  A hungry homophobe?

EMPLOYEE: Sir?  You can't stand here.

ME: Why?  I'm not gay.

EMPLOYEE: It's illegal to block the line.

ME: I'm following the line backwards.  And what do you mean, 'illegal?'

EMPLOYEE: I think you're trespassing if you don't buy something, sir.

ME: I can't support your anti-gayness, Chick-fil-Clerk; but I will return to harass your homophobic customers!  (stalked away to my car)

So this did no good, but I feel better.

A Righteous Proposal

It never seems to end.

An unyielding wall of inescapable and redundant noise from the GOP and the rightwingnuts that roam this country, running red over the political landscape with the color and quality of cherry Kool-Aid on the white linen tablecloth of civility, logic, and discussion.  At every turn, there is Rush chuckling his stogie-thickened laugh at Godwin's law, Palin spewing some non-news at the cameras that orbit around her like flies about a swollen and blackened corpse, McCain inferring his inferno was instigated by illegal immigrants, and the pulse-quickening frenzy of name-calling that ensued from this, Al Gore advocating for family planning.

Frankly, I think that we can all agree that there are just too many of these people, swirling around the waters of our society as they describe their inevitable Corilois effect down the toilet of history, stirring the turds instead of even attempting to rise above.  You know there are too many of them by the way one feels compelled to shout "down in front," or "clear a path" when they all take the stage during what we will still, in the interest of preserving the pleasant fiction that anything was actually discussed, call a debate.  Simply too many people, and too damned proud they are of sharing one idea.  Ideas shared in this fashion quickly become thin and tear easily under duress.  Eventually, the fabric of which they are made shreds completely and what little remains of the idea is obscured by the guttural snorts and smacks of those at the trough who sought perhaps more than their fair helping.  Best to have a table laid thick with ideas and enough space and seats for others who mayhap, have brought new and fresh ideas to share.

Yes, It is clear to most reasonable people who are paying attention that there are too many conservatives in this country, that they do not have enough to do, and that there is a need that they can fill, if they are only willing to contribute.  I speak of our problem with hunger.  1 in 6 Americans is no stranger to hunger, and there is no isolated pocket in America where hunger and malnutrition live - it is everywhere, widespread among people with and without homes and jobs.  There is a clear need here for more food for the hungry in America, and so what I humbly propose in the hopes that there will be no need for objection or wasteful discussion is this: As Americans, we eat the Republican Party before it eats itself.

Conservative Republicans are a hardy breed, largely healthy and wealthy, given to circumstances of contentment and comfort verging on opulence and luxury, and in this way, they have ensured their usefulness under my proposed new arrangement.  Much in the same way that a healthy veal cow is kept under a certain set of conditions that guarantee a choice cut of the finest meat, so too will conservatives be a succulent and well-fed source of food for America's hungry, largely due to how they have been kept.  Indeed, I would not be opposed to some sort of hutch, or pen, for individual conservatives.  Especially the more frenetic and vocal ones who are prone to damage themselves periodically.  In this way too, we could control their breeding schedules in ways they resist currently, and make more of their contribution by imposing some clear guidelines.

The meat of a conservative promises to be remarkably free from toxins, as the spleen and bile are regularly vented, and the brain tissue soft from little use.  The sweetmeats are sure to be useful for consumption as well, as the host has been consistently fed a diet of easily digested pablum since birth.  Be they round of bottom or long of muscle, some choice nutrition walks slightly to the right of the rest of us.  Baked, boiled, roasted - barbequed or rotisserie style, there is no end to the potential variations of preparation.  Even the older ones should be delicious in stews, with just the right amount of spice to counter the sometimes bitter aftertaste.

I know that some will certainly take issue with my proposal, but most of those will be conservatives, and while the concern that they will raise about cannibalism is a valid one, that point pertains only to humans eating other humans, and might be argued not to be applicable in this situation.  It is my firm belief that feeding the hungry in America is more urgent and important than the survival of what the conservatives call "thinking" and that it is long overdue for them become part of a movement of a different kind entire.

Humbly Submitted,

The Squidbag (with thanks to Mr. Swift)

Crawdad Larry Gunfucks Seafood Mart

Via Matt Olson:

Larry Wayne "Crawdad Larry" Kelly apparently peppered the L & T Seafood Market in Ensley over the holiday weekend because they were out of the most proliferate form of seafood, the crawfish - and Crazy Larry Wayne didn't like that.  Gotta love that "Larry Wayne" moniker on any Southern male packing heat.  

Also apparently, Larry Wayne's a "sovereign citizen," one of those crazy motherfuckers walking around enjoying American tax-dollar funded things while complaining to anyone who will listen that the government, all governments, are oppressive, and that he doesn't have to follow the rules.  This was a philosophy that actually worked pretty well for me in private school, but I haven't had the gall to try it in my adult life.  Not so, Larry Wayne, who tried it on Florida policemen who it looks like may have taken a poke at him to show him around the oppression.  A good way to end up on weekend Fox Network programming, one would think.

So Crazy Larry got arrested after he called eleven times looking for crawfish, stopped by and shot up the place with an AK-47, and then tried his damndest to run over cops, evade cops and resist arrest.  They arrested him twice, just to make sure.  And now he's looking at more than half a million dollars worth of fines which I'm going to guess they won't let him pay off with LarryBux he makes in his "sovereign basement mint,"  I bet they're going to want Gen-U-Wine American Simoleons.  And over what, again?

Crawdads.

We're talking about a creature that's actually referred to by people who live in the Florida panhandle (and indeed, elsewhere in the South) as a "mudbug," because they basically live everywhere along creek beds and anywhere you've got fresh water coming in.  You don't need a boat or a rod or a reel or a gig or a sharp stick or even a net or two hands to catch a whole mess of crawfish; a bucket dragged in the right place will pretty much do the job.  So what's Larry's fucking problem?  It's not just that God wanted Larry to eat a whole crawfish boil with potatoes and little ears of corn, it's that God didn't want Larry to have to work for it, either, and it's the fault of THE MAN (here represented by Tommy Nguyen) for keeping Larry down!

The punishment here should be taking away Larry Wayne's good shit - like his armory - and giving Larry Wayne a bucket and making him stand in hot-ass Florida Summer creeks listening to extremely competent Florida panhandle law enforcement representatives talk shit until Larry Wayne catches $500,000 worth of crawdads for Tommy Nguyen.  

At $2.39 a pound.  Retail.