Mother's Day Snark

I simply cannot stomach PostSecret on Mother's Day. My god. We all have secrets about our moms - GET REAL, TURKEYS.

Bring back the real secrets, and I'll be fine.

I'm in the process of making mala beads for my mother for the other half of her mother's day present. I tried one thing, but it looks like shit, so it's time to do something else now. I'll blog about it when it doesn't look like shit.

In other news, my stupid dream of being an off-off-off-off Broadway star has reared its ugly head again. Go figure.

Breaking Point

You guys.

I just listened to a bunch of Daniel Roop's poetry (thanks Amanda).

And I've got a lot of shit to say.

I may have to set aside some time to have an emotional blowout.

Here, think about this while I'm working.

Extolling The Virtues of White VInegar

Guys, seriously. What can't vinegar do?

I stopped by my sister's apartment the other day to check on a cat she was taking care of while someone was out of town. She has a real small apartment, tiny even. Her bedroom and living room are the same room. Anyway, the cat had been barfing, which cats seem to have a pleasant penchant for, so I promised to go check on it. I noticed in the kitchen that her dishes, I swear to God, had spot welded together in the sink. And. It. Stank.

So I thought, hey, I'm a nice guy, I'ma do these dishes. And about midway through doing the dishes I had thought of at least five things I would have used white vinegar for in her apartment. And if you will indulge me, I will list those things right now:
1) Small bowl of vinegar on coffee table to take out cat barf smellz
2) Cup of vinegar in warm water and mop yr floor. And if you want it to smell okay, you could drip in some peppermint extract or vanilla extract or (more expensive) essential oil if you got it
3) Vinegar and water in a spray bottle and spray some shit down, forget Windex.
4) Pour some o dat vinegar down the drain, you turkey!

Okay, maybe not five. But four things, and she had Windex, she had air freshener, she had all these things that she didn't have to spend money on! Coulda bought a gallon jug of white vinegar!

Here is someone who found 1001 Uses for Vinegar!

And Borax!

And Baking Soda!

Because I honestly feel that if you have those three things, you can clean anything. I used salt to scour her sink, because she had no baking soda.

I would really love to send her some sort of tips list for things to have around that are absolute necessities of a household and at the same time are incredibly cheap and multifunctional. Can anyone help me out with this?

MEGASTUPID

I just spent the weekend with my brother and Adem in Greensboro, NC. It's a nice college town, and it's nice to go someplace with actual places to go hang out, sit in the beer garden and have some sort of food. And it was a gorgeous weekend. But when I got back....

My garden has gone MEGASTUPID!

Alright, well the bluebells are wild in my backyard. But the guy who mows the lawns left them, and I choose to believe that it's because that everyone has some sort of sense of aesthetics, such that they would leave a bluebell alone and NOT weedeat them for God's sake.

Along that same line, I thought a lot about hollow people this weekend, and about some advice I got from a guy I used to know, the same guy that unknowingly created my online moniker: "Sometimes, you think a person is mysterious, and you dig and dig, and open boxes and go on hunts, and then you find out - really - there's nothing there after all."

I think I've done well sifting these people out of my life so far. I would much rather be around people who would let the bluebells grow.

Egg Droup Soup - the Proud Fighter of Chinese Take-Out

Alright, I like egg drop soup. I used to make fun of people for eating it, because, I'll admit, it looks like snot. It feels like snot. It's snotty. And every time I get it from Wok and Hibachi, there is some kind of mysterious corn in the bottom. But I love it, I do, and I wanted to figure out the best way to make it. So what did I do?

Allrecipes.com, baby.

Why would I not go to a well-respected cookbook and just get the recipe out of there? Because I can easily go to a place like allrecipes.com, and all of a sudden, my recipe hasn't just been tested a hundred times, it's been tested three thousand times, by people with all sorts of tastes! Don't like spicy? First time was gross? Tried it again? Next time was better!? Or maybe someone preferred it the first way? You choose! The voice of the unwashed masses is rising up against the Draconian ways of the Cook Book, and I for one love it.

Basically, my point is this: cookbooks are only good for church fundraisers. You might as well, though, take recipes that you've tried a thousand times among your family and friends and start a cookbook of your own. My grandmother did this for me for Christmas, and I've used it more than nearly anything else in my house.

Now, for the egg drop soup. This is the basic recipe I drew from:
http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Restaurant-Style-Egg-Drop-Soup/Detail.aspx

Which is good. It's fine. I didn't add chives, because chives don't add anything to me. Instead, I opted for shallots, AND (just because it's like home to me) some kernels of corn to sink to the bottom. Is this going in my personal cookbook? Well, just have a gander and then YOU TELL ME.

So now I present to you, my fans, a photograph which has currently become my "most viewed" picture on my Flickr stream. BEHOLD:
Hot and Sour soup, though. That's fucked up.

Reason #273

Don't mess with crafters.

Gotta Catch Em All.

Tell me this isn't the coolest thing.