The Current State of Feminism in My Household

I've just listened to two people debating who could kick whose ass: Mr. Clean or the Brawny guy.

UPDATE: Apparently, they changed Brawny guys. For the record, the debate was about the previous guy.

Road Less Travelled?

Continuing in his tradition of coining new and important terminology for our times, my roommate Hambone yesterday referred to a dim-witted co-worker as: The Information Frontage Road.

I approve.

Free New Zealand Yadda Yadda Five

(So's against his very explicit wishes, here I am, Teddy at your wood chopping service, blogging on Ryan's site thing, because I've got the day off and just got a bit of a raise, had a bit of a piss off last night in Bannockburn, feeling troublesome and bored on my boat, waiting to see if it's going to rain or just stay cloudy or what. It goes without saying that I know Ryan's password and email login, just as I know all about his online banking activity and the emails he exchanges with his parents [Hi Moms!], as he yells them all to me in his Yankee falsetto across the water.

(The boss has had me splitting wood from one of his work sites for the past three weeks, just up in Lowburn. Thirty-five meters in all, told me he thought it'd take the better part of three weeks, assuming alls we got was a day or two of good rain. Knocked the whole job out in one week five days, tell you what. Thirty-five meters, mind you. Boss came by and told me he was quite impressed. Quite impressed indeed. Told me to take off at three yesterday, have a bit of a piss. Told me he'd see to it that I got a dollar or two raise. Not bad for an old fart from Auckland, eh?

(So here I am, layin on the boat, waiting for the wine tour busses to drop them nice lassies off for a spill in the river. I'm all booted up in case Ryan comes by wanting to get in touch with his friends from the States. I keep my eye on the hill, just waiting for him to pop around with his stupid ass baseball cap and those dinky rubber shoes he always wears. Sometimes he pops by on that purple bike of his, wearing that red helmet. That kid really needs to get a car.

(Neways, this is none but a quick g'day mates from Teddy, fisher and mover, chopper and clipper, jack of all master of none, as they say. Hope things are well in the States, and you're not all getting suckered into another decade of bullshit by the Obama or the Hillary, as we Kiwis all assume you are!)

I seem to be leaking

Have I mentioned that I drool?

No, not all the time. Specifically, when I use my neti pot. (Yous guys remember my neti post, right? Of course you do. What was I thinking?

So anyway, here I am, stream of warm salt water flowing through my face, and I look up, and, look at that, I'm drooling. Two simultaneous lines of water, falling parallel into the sink, where they combine and continue on their merry way down the drain.

And I can't really figure out what about the neti-pot process is compelling me to drool, but it happens almost without fail. So much so that I don't even really think about it anymore.

But today as I 'potted, I looked up in the mirror mid-pot, and in addition to the usual parallel streams, a single tear—potting can make your eyes water a bit—was flowing slowly from my left eye, across the bridge of my nose to the tip, from which it fell gently into the sink, as if to say, "Hey guys! I'm coming with!"

It was lovely, and I wish I had a video to share with you. But alas and alack, I do not.

I can has hot things?

Hands down the best birthday gift I got this past weekend was a slow-cooker that looks just like this one. I haven't had a chance to break it in yet, but I'm hoping this weekend will see its debut. Maybe with chili. Or pasta sauce. Or soup. Or lentils. Or black beans. Or. Or. OR!

The possibilities are seemingly endless and awe-inspiring. Oh, and did I mention it has a timer? Yes. A timer. DO YOU REALIZE HOW EXCITED I AM ABOUT THAT? Well, I'm very excited about it, and you should be too and maybe that'll get you some soup if you're lucky.

Thanks, eekbeat. You rock (as always).

About that time I accidentally took an opiod and then had to play drums for three hours

Me: Yeesh, my head is pounding. I'd hate to play a three-hour set like this. Do you have anything for a headache?
Soundguy: Yeah man, I was having the same problem. Here you go.

…

Me [to guitarist at set break]: Man, I think I'm coming down with something. My head still hurts, and I just feel...off.

…

Me: Phew, we made it. It was a little rough there towards the end. I'm exhausted. What were those pills you gave me anyway?
Soundguy: Oh, man. Were they the pink ones?
Me: Yeah.
Soundguy: My bad! Those were vicodin! Whoops.


Whoops indeed.

Free New Zealand Verbal Post Number Four

Rode my bike into town the other night and caught the 172nd most popular circus in the world, The Weber Bros Circus Presents La Jester!, which was performed in a canvas tent roughly the size of the room you're sitting in right now (assuming your office/cubicle is bigger than a closet yet smaller than a cafeteria). La Jester is the touching story of a court jester embarked on a magical journey in search of laughter, which he knows to be hidden in the belly of a monster that looks suspiciously like a rock prop used in one of the other scenes. Meanwhile, there is a lot of acrobatics, and some of the best juggling I have seen at least since the last time I saw anybody juggle who wasn't drunk.



The highlight was the grand finale, where they rolled out a metal ball cage about the size of a bedroom, then rode three motorcycles around inside dodging a girl who stood in the middle a did a little shimmy dance thing (also this was the girl who sold me my popsicle at intermission). It was impressive, and I was so convinced that some or all of the motorcycle riders were going to collide and rip their heads off that I had to turn away and look at something else.

'allo Gov'nah

How many U.S. governors can you name off the top of your head? Go ahead. Think about it before going on (spoilers below!). I'll wait.

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Done? Okay. See, I was talking to someone from Illinois about something not-at-all-political, and I mentioned something about Blagojevich, much to the other person's surprise. "How do you know who our governor is?" he asked. I explained that I had grown up in Chicago and still had family there, yadda yadda.

But it got me thinking. I probably tend to follow politics more than the average Jane or Joe, but I doubt I could even name half the country's governors. Off the top of my head I got:

• Blagojevich (obviously)
  
• Kaine
  
• Richardson
  
• Napolitano
  
• Spitzer
  
• Corzine
  
• Schwarzenegger
  
• Crist
  

And that's it. Oh, I remembered that Massachusetts had elected a black governor, but I couldn't remember his name (Deval Patrick), so that doesn't count. And it probably makes me a racist.

So: eight. Out of fifty (not to mention territories; sorry Aníbal Acevedo Vilá! oh, and a happy belated birthday to you). Of course, once I checked a full list of governors, there were several I realized I did know (Sebelius! Duh; Barbour; Jindal; O'Malley—right next door! Strickland; Rendell; Perry).

But even more surprising was the number of executives I'd never heard of. Dave Freudenthal?! Wikipedia doesn't even know what you look like.

Which is all a long way to tell you this has been this site's most boring post to-date. But at least I didn't talk about Valentine's Day.

Coverage

I was excited to learn today that my friend (and occasional commenter) Andrea plans* to buy me a beard cap for my upcoming birthday. A reminder to one and all: just four short shopping days remain!



*yeah, not really, but she sent me the link

Lifelong

This may be completely obvious and meaningless, but it didn't occur to me until last night: George H.W. Bush was in the White House as VP starting in 1981, so there has been a Bush or a Clinton in the White House for longer than I’ve been alive.

Just got back from voting. Am fired up, etc.

Relatedly: one of my Ron-Paul-supporting roommates never changed his voter registration info, and he can't afford to drive all the way to Staunton to cast a ballot. When you can't afford to vote for a Republican/Libertarian, it's probably time to reassess your political priorities.

Free New Zealand Verbal Post Number Three

(As Ryan across there yells me the ones and zeros I mark 'em down on my notebook, and using some kind of software program he picked up in Queenstown and floated across to me on a kayak 'borrowed' American style my laptop here can translate those ones and zeros into neat little pictures. Here's a go:)



Across the water, but before the vines, is my cabin. If you blow it up and look real hard you can see me waving back at you with a bottle of Sauv Blanc in one hand and a cigar in the other, waiting for my clothes to dry on the line. If I leave them out there all day - my clothes - they pick of the scent of thyme that comes down from in the vineyard, where it grows wild. And if you blow the picture up insanely big you can see Teddy, lounging on his boat, staring at the sky.



This is the entrance to Cromwell, off the highway. It is indicative of the fact that they grow lots of really big fruits. You should see the carrots. Size of my face.

Aha! Yeah! Woo! I'll tell ya all about it

Any individual track of a recorded album is going to sound a bit...off. Unless, of course, you're David Lee Roth, in which case an isolated listening proves the track to be exponentially more awesome than the song itself. Seriously, I lose my shit during the last thirty seconds. Every. Goddamn. Time.

{Link supplied by the inimitable Mandy O.}

Shoe Fly

My good and kindly roommate Hambone, leaving for work, coined a quite possibly perfect name for the phenomenon—phenomenon which one sees in many an area of high occupancy density—of shoes in pairs, each pair's laces tied together, hanging giddily from power lines.

And that name was and remains: Philadelphia Mistletoe.

Free New Zealand Verbal Blog Post Number Two

Greetings from across the lake. Say Hi, Teddy. (G'day)

Had the first rain since I've been here. Everybody acts like they do in Virginia when it might snow - stampeding toward milk and bread aisles, chains on the tyres, freaking out about missing work and worrying that power will go out and we'll all freeze to death huddled together near the water heater. Anyway, not quite the same here, as it's nearly 90 degrees (35, mate), but still, they all worry about roads falling apart and the lake rising and crops crops crops. The grocery store was packed last night and I went to the nearby bar, which was shoulder to shoulder with locals talking about how it's all the fault of that system coming off Korea, it's all the fault of global warming, it's all that fault of the tourists. Then they looked at me, laughed, and drank more beer. Then I laughed, because they all wear short shorts.

Exciting news: When I took - (A bit about myself, as the kid doesn't leave room for one to get a word in edgewise, now does he? Name's not Teddy, as he claims, but let's go with Teddy as I can't say I quite understand what a blog is and all the ramifications held there within. So's, I'm Teddy. A North Islander, originally, I lived and worked in Nelson for 17 years. Fish work. Boat work. If'n it concerned salmon or hoki, I did it. Problem is, well, here's the problem: Used to be, you line up 10 North Islanders, you've got yourself no more than half a man that isn't just the nicest person on the planet. All congeniality and the like. Just a half a person, out of ten. But I don't know what happened. These days, you line up them same 10, you've now got only half a person with the sense to help change a flat, pick up a brother in need, send a line to an old mate. Know'm sayin? Just a general change in lifestyle. Nobody's nice anymore, not on the North Island. That's the truth. Now the kid's talkin about wine, the bugger. Listen:) - and where the Pinot Noirs certainly aren't bad, and many better than what I'd had in Oregon, I'd put my money, at least in Cromwell, on the staying power of Pinot Gris as a local grape. Most people -

(So anyway, I moved myself down here, down into the bowels of the South Island, where a man can do his work - and it's moving work I do, lifting and moving, driving and lifting - whilst surrounded by good people, you know. And no Maori. Not that I look down upon their kind but it's a certain kind of, I don't know, a certain kind of anxiety that surrounds them and us and nothing against them, great people, but I'd just as soon live without that certain kind of anxiety. Know'm sayin? I like it nice a quiet, here on my boat. Making a good killing, by the by, charging the kid a buck per paragraph. Listen to him go, in that crazy States slang)

- and anyway, as I said in the last post, there are pictures, and I'm working on getting them sent. But I can't exactly like throw the USB chord across the lake to Teddy, ask him to go ahead and upload. So I'm looking for another source of Internet, and when I find it (Between you's and me, it don't exist) I'll get everybody a better visual.