Holy
crap in a Bundt pan...
Due to the
recent well-publicized shortage of
amateur websites produced by assholes who consider themselves to be
clever, I
have been called into action. My name is Jeff Kay, and I’m an
Ugly American living
on the cusp of a mid-life crisis, near Scranton, PA. And I’m here to
serve, baby.
The
State of My Fat Ass A journal of
sorts, updated every once in a while.
--
How was the weekend? Ours was good, thanks for asking. It was damp,
overcast, and cool here, and that's perfect for mushrooms and me. 'Cause
man, I love this kind of weather; gray and dreary makes me happy
deep-down. If I didn't think the Half-Shirts were monitoring our every
move, I would've stripped down to a pair of fire engine-red micro-briefs
and gloom-bathed on the back deck.
Anyway.... What follows are a few bite-sized "highlights" of
the big three-day holiday weekend here at the Surf Report Compound.
Please note: bite-sized means I'm running late again, and fully
intend to half-ass it. Thank you for your attention to this matter.
-- On Saturday the remnants of Ernesto (did it ever actually make it to
hurricane status?) passed through, and it rained most of the day. We
considered taking in an afternoon movie, Ricky
Bobby to be exact, but ruled it out because we already had an
expensive anniversary dinner planned for Sunday. And what are we, Ted
Turner here? I mean, seriously.
We ended up at the Chinese buffet again, where the Secrets each ate
their own body weight in orange chicken, and I, the pain in the ass,
ordered off the menu. The buffet is fine, but they don't label the
selections and I'm always afraid they'll be saturated, simply saturated,
in garlic. Therefore, I end up eating the same thing over and over
again, and it gets old. So screw it, I just went with the #2 lunch
special: cashew chicken.
And needless to say, I was reminded of my old boss in Atlanta who made
the same joke every time we had Chinese for lunch: "It doesn't
matter what you order, it's all gonna end up as #2 eventually." For
six full years I heard him say that, and it'll probably be one of the
last things to go once the Alzheimer's kicks in.
After visiting a few stores, we returned home and I watched a show about
cluster-bombs way up on one of the three-digit cable channels. That made
me happy, and after it was over I told Toney I was going out to buy a
Powerball ticket, and stop at the dive bar for a couple of beers. That
last part didn't seem to go over very well, the normal reaction, and I
promised to be quick.
For the first time ever, the big mannish
fat girl wasn't holding court at the end of the bar. She'd always been
there on previous visits, and I felt myself spinning complicated
explanations for her absence in my mind, and hoping she was OK.
There
was a Penn State football game on the TV, and every head was ratcheted
in that direction. I don't know a thing about it, and couldn't give a
candy-coated crap. But I watched too, powerless to do otherwise, while
nursing a sweaty pint of the golden elixir.
It was an uneventful outing. The only thing that came out of it was a
possible new addition to the Rules of Thumb list: men with moustaches
drink piss beer. It's true, you know. And I was sad to see that they're
apparently doing renovations of some sort. Highly concerning.... If they
bring in a single fern, or mop the floor, or anything crazy like that,
it's all over. I've seen it happen time and time again.
-- On Sunday we went to the Italian Festival in Scranton, and it was
fun. I think we've been every year that we've lived here, and food is
the reason we keep going back. Last year we made the mistake of not
being very hungry when we arrived, but timed it perfectly in 2006.
I ate some sort of strange (and supposedly "not to be missed")
sandwich called porketta, which turned out to be a pile of gray,
peppery pork on a hamburger bun. It was only OK, I thought, and couldn't
really understand the massive line of people trying to get at those
things. Man, they were in a full-on porketta frenzy! More power to 'em,
I guess.
Then it was two massive slices of pizza, a full 45-degree angle on my
greasy paper plate, prepared by the good folks at one of the oldest
Italian restaurants in town. Yum. A giant tumbler of fresh-squeezed
lemonade came next, and before we finally threw in the towel: cannoli. I
always walk away from those festivals gorged to the point of
hallucination, yet kicking myself I wasn't able to "sample" more things.
And so
it goes.
I took some pics, but they looked a lot like last year's. So I'll just
link to those again, screw it. Here'sone new one, a couple in
front of me at the pizza stand. And anyone who attended Dunbar Junior
High School will understand why I didn't patronize this particular
stand. No thank you! Heh.
That night, many hours later, we went to a fancier restaurant than we're
accustomed to visiting, and had our anniversary
dinner. Since it was a special occasion, we had 'em roll out the
appetizers and the whole nine yards, and Toney and I indulged in vodka
martinis. I'm not really a liquor kinda guy, but it just felt right under
the circumstances. For dinner I went with the Flintstones-sized prime
rib, and Toney opted for some sort of fish in garlic butter. I just
don't know....
But it was good. And I didn't even gasp too loudly when they brought me
the bill. Maybe that's why people insist on having a stiff before-dinner
cocktail in those kinds of places? It takes the sting out of the payment
booklet they bring you when you're done. Sweet sainted mother of Helga
Pataki!
-- And I'm all out of time here. I'll have to tell you about Monday on
Wednesday, and our tour of a spooky-as-crap nineteenth century prison.
Very cool!
In the meantime, what did you guys do over the weekend? Use
the comments link to tell us, won't you?
Also, did you see anything
interesting on the Jerry Lewis Telethon by any chance? I tried to watch some of it, for curiosity's sake, but quickly
became bored and found a special on flamethrowers instead, way up in the
170s. Did I miss anything?
And is it very obvious that I sprinted through this bitch? If so, it's
our little secret, OK? I appreciate your discretion.
--
How was the weekend? Ours was good, thanks for asking. It was damp,
overcast, and cool here, and that's perfect for mushrooms and me. 'Cause
man, I love this kind of weather; gray and dreary makes me happy
deep-down. If I didn't think the Half-Shirts were monitoring our every
move, I would've stripped down to a pair of fire engine-red micro-briefs
and gloom-bathed on the back deck.