Dangerous, Dirty, and Unfun

Usually, just by aiming my laptop screen at a plate or a pot. To wit, this chicken soup I made the other day.

Those shadows are purely for effect.

It doesn’t make a difference to me! The food usually turns out pretty good. Eating that soup, for instance, was like getting smashed in the taste bone with a flavor mallet.

However, comma, not everyone has such a poor attitude toward food photography! My dear friend Meg has a food blog (appropriately titled Meg in the Kitchen) that not only looks excellent, but features great recipes. Meg is a fantastic cook, and she’s also studying to be a nutritionist, so you can count on her to not lead you the wrong way when it comes to wholesome ingredients. So bookmark it!

Dangerous, Dirty, and Unfun still supports print journalism.

I’ve talked about my buddy Reeves before, the writer of the Meanderings blog. Unfortunately, that blog is no more, which is a shame, because it was always a favorite one of mine. I’m sure a lot of you out there are reading this because you’re my pals and you’re being nice, but Meanderings is the kind of blog I would read irregardless of who wrote it. (Reminded me of blogs like Brainiac or Kottke, which are both in my Google Reader.)

Anyway, it’s not all doom and gloom, because his writing is appearing in some more, um, higher profile venues. This here is a Talk of the Town piece he just had in this week’s issue of the New Yorker, pictured to your left. It’s about a Long Island fundraiser for Michel Martelly, a Caribbean pop singer and one of the 19 candidates running for president of Haiti. I won’t excerpt any of it, because it’s short enough to read and enjoy yourself. Do it!

The writing that I do professionally, I try to think of it as modeled on Talk of the Town. These kinds of stories are tough! You’ve got to be short and punchy, but also get enough exposition in there so that your reader isn’t completely lost. I feel like I never do a great job, but I’m also a pessimist. In the meantime, I’m pumped that I know a guy that can do the real thing. So, congratulations, friend. Keep it up.

I spent the weekend in sunny Luddington, Michigan, at the wedding of my dear friend Michelle and her new husband Rob. (You’ll remember Michelle as the gal who is responsible for your favorite blog’s name. Without her, you’d probably be reading my second name choice, timmysblogismorepowerfulthangalactusthelivingtribunalandthemadtitanthanoscombined.net.) It was a delightful weekend. Since I’m not really great at expressing mushy feelings of gratitude and joy, I’ll let it suffice to say that I have them and will instead give you my thoughts on some of the extraneous, though still noteworthy, elements of the trip.

# Firstly, the beer. As soon I showed up, I tried an IPA brewed by the Jamesport Brewing Company, which operates a great brewpub in downtown Luddington. It was very tasty! Although probably not so tasty that I can remember its charms four days later. So oh well?

What I DO remember is the beer on tap at the wedding: Oberon, a summer beer produced by Bell’s Brewery down in Kalamazoo. This stuff was great: a little heftier than your usual wheat beer, with a slight orange taste at the front of your mouth, a little bit of spice in the back, and a sunshiney essence in every sip. I can’t stop raving about this stuff. (I also don’t think it’s a coincidence that this excellent beer AND America’s Greatest Hero, Derek Jeter, hail from the same town. Just saying!) It’s distributed primarily in the Midwest, unfortunately, although Nick, the Official Philadelphia Correspondent of Dangerous, Dirty, and Unfun, reports that he’s seen a sixer of it at the store down the block from him. Lucky guy!

# On occasion since I’ve been writing this blog, I’ve presented you with a few great ideas in action. Here is perhaps the greatest one I’ve ever come across.

It was an outdoor wedding, so there was a fancy trailer hitched out back with a men’s room and a ladies’ room. Regular readers of Dangerous, Dirty, and Unfun know I have the bladder of an infant, so it wasn’t long before I was in there, making use of the facilities. Once I was done, I go to reach for the flush, but there was no handle. Hmm? I look around, and I see that attached to the bottom of the toilet is a pedal. A foot-flush pedal. So I pressed it, the toilet flushed, and I was good to go.

The question is, why doesn’t every toilet in every public place have one of these!
The entire bathroom microbe safety system is predicated on two hopes: that people don’t whiz all over themselves, and that everyone washes their hands. This obviously isn’t too much to ask, but people routinely fail on either, or both, counts. What the foot pedal does is eliminate one of the major grossness vectors: if everyone is pressing with their feet, their hands are free to not be engrossened by a flushing handle. The handle on the door to the bathroom is still and issue, but you have to admit, eliminating any contact your hands have with any part of the toilet is a big plus! Let’s get these installed in every bar in town!

# Have you ever heard a song, but for the life of you, you couldn’t figure out the name? Maybe it’s on a commercial or in a movie, and you don’t have an opportunity to find out what the title is. I’ve had one for years. I remember seeing one of those TV-order oldies compilations one time that included it, but I never caught the title. Then I would hear it in some random movie, and it would bug the hell out of me. Infuriating.

I’m at my table, enjoying some appetizers, and the awesome country music band that Michelle’s folks found performed my song. I’m thrilled, obviously. Once they’re done, the singer asks “Does anyone know the name of that song?” And immediately, I hear someone say “‘Sleepwalk,’ by Santo and Johnny.” Yes! That’s it! Give it a listen, and you’ll immediately recognize it.

# I took some pictures, also, which I wanted to include in this post. Of the IPA I mentioned earlier. Of Lake Michigan (you can’t see the Wisconsin side from the Michigan side! It’s a lake!) Of a sign from a Tea Party Republican Congressional candidate. Of the Luddington High School wrestling team t-shirt I bought at a fundraiser. But Wordpress isn’t letting me put them in this post! Your loss!

Anyway, congratulations, Michelle and Rob, and thanks for a great weekend! (They’re two of my precious readers, so I know they’ll see this. That’s part of the bargain, guys: if you feed me steaks and beer, you’ll get a post about your wedding. I do what I can.)