So, last night’s dinner with Bulgaria’s abandoned BF went well. It was clear that the poor guy needed badly to talk to sympathetic parties, as his holiday at home with the (neoconservative) family was less than an emotionally calming experience. He’s at a difficult crossroads right now, finishing up with his Masters’ degree, and applying (again,) to Law School. His LSATS didn’t go so well, and so he’s kind of thinking that he’ll transfer after his 1L year, if his grades are good enough. In the meantime, though, we mostly talked about the tough time he’s having right now, and what Bulgaria’s going through at home… In Bulgaria.
Orpheus kind of sat around after making drinks for us while I helped out in the kitchen. Dinner itself was very, very good. We started with a lovely, hot chili and smoked chorizo fried shrimp concoction, followed up by a beautiful smoked chorizo-and mustard/mint-sauce speckled potato salad. The final dish was, essentially, a mildly altered Italian version of Coq au Vin using pancetta in place of bacon… Except that BF was going to use (of course,) smoked chorizo instead. Unfortunately, he forgot to add said delicious pork-based dream-component, so we just had drunken chicken for the main course, accompanied by asparagus tossed in a lovely honey-lemon dressing. He bought a cheesecake for dessert.
The big surprise of the evening was that, after the conversation petered out and BF’s roomie came home, I did really well playing guitar hero. I still don’t like the game much, and once again received a thumb blister for the trouble of playing, but it was better than my initial disastrous encounter with said e-spectacle. Orpheus did so poorly when he tried playing, that he stopped half-way through a song. It’s the first time I’ve seen him do such a thing. I mean, we’re talking about a guy who can’t wait to get the dance pad he bought on amazon.com so he can play his cheap Korean rip-off version of dance, dance revolution on the computer.
Anyway, tonight should be a bit higher on the gaiety scale, as O. and I are going out to one of his work-colleague’s goodbye party, at a ratty student bar. I still have yet to hear back from my gaming buddies if the reservations they sought were available, so still don’t know what’s going down on Friday night, but keep your fingers crossed for me!!!
Thursday, January 29, 2009
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Visions of sugar-beets dance through my head...
This week has been very odd. Though we were supposed to do something grand last weekend to compensate for our general lack of any non-sexual activities on off-days of late, Orpheus and I, well… Pretty much, we did nothing. We tried Saturday night services at the UU church downtown (which suck compared to Sunday morning, if you’re wondering), and I made Dal for lunchtime consumption all week on Sunday. We only had sex twice, which makes me sad. The only positives to come out of this weekend were 1) planning stuff to do this week with others, 2) the Dal, and 3) the Sweet Potato pancakes I made on Sunday morning, which fed me both on Monday and Tuesday nights.
O. ended up getting a promotion at work last week, which is pretty cool… It stabilizes his hours at work somewhat, and gives a nice office-work-ey boost to his Resume. Also, to his great excitement, it means that he now holds one of the gayest job titles extant (no, I won’t tell you what he does per his request). Though all of the changes are positive, he’s had odd hours this week due to training, and left me all by my lonesome for the last two nights in a row… At least, until about 11 PM, when he’s gotten off work. This has left me to my own devices, free to use up leftover batter, and dream the dream of the culinarilly disaffected…
See, Orpheus and this poor little monkey are a little short on cash ‘till the end of the week, and this week is Madison’s restaurant week… For $25.00, you can get a set menu selection of some of the most popular food at all the greatest places in town. Two of my gaming friends (who are dating, and who I recently cooked for,) have skads of disposable income, and went out every night this week together. O. and I may be going out with them on Friday, but part of me thinks it might be better to cook for them, as they’ve spent enough cash this week, and I don’t want to dress up. Also, the sweet potato pancakes have given me a lovely idea for a vegetarian dinner... Considering that this particular pair are pescatarians at their most meaty, it may be best.
Monday, I had spinach in the fridge, and wanted rid of it. Since I was being good, had had only a salad for lunch, and wanted to continue the trend, I figured I’d go vegetarian. However, since bacon is the best thing to wilt spinach with, I was in a quandary… Until I thought about the lonely jar of delicious high-quality beets I’d been saving, and the blue cheese crumbles I had to get rid of in the fridge. I sautéed the spinach with red onion and garlic in good extra-virgin olive oil, tossed in drained sliced pickled beets to sear, then tossed with a little sherry vinegar and tossed in some blue cheese, serving the potato pancakes up on the side. I added a hot garam masala spice mix to the pancakes. It tasted like dying and ending up in heaven.
Last night, I found that I’d run out of the green beans I thought were still hanging out in the freezer, and so did the same thing with about five times as many beet slices, a huge mess of coarsely chopped parsley, and a prayer. And that’s when it hit me… Root vegetable theme dinner. I can start with a low-fat (don’t knock it, it can be done,) cream of beet soup based on a veggie stock. I use fat-free sour cream for this type of soup… It works very well in my famed cream of asparagus soup, in fact! Then, serve the beet greens and chard along with the stems, julienned, as a sauté a-la Monday’s dinner alongside curried sweet potato pancakes. If I felt like getting really fancy, I could even do little turnip croquettes composed with sautéed shallots in the mix and a horseradish cream as an amuse bouche… However, I don’t feel like I should be quite THAT pretentious. Hell, if I were being really fruity, I could even serve the soup in bowls of roasted or steamed celeriac, throwing the innards of said veggie into the beet green saute! I hate making desserts, otherwise that would be part of the menu, as well… But I feel that, as a dinner, the idea is quite cohesive, and I’ve tasted the outcome. I can guarantee it’s better than what they’re serving at half the restaurants participating in restaurant week, anyway, so that’s a start.
The question becomes, what wine do I serve? Root veggies have a little more oomph to them than most, so a stiff white or a good, dry rose may not be enough this time. Pinot Noir? A medium red should do… Probably be a good kick in the pants of convention, even. Nothing sweet, though. With so much on the line in terms of beets and sweet potatoes, a sweet wine would just end up cloying, no matter how alcoholic it also happened to be.
And, after all that, I just got an invite to one of two places on Friday night from the gaming buddies, both of which have menus that, while not as cohesive or cool as mine, do make a good deal of sexy-sounding sense, regardless. Once again, I lose.
O. ended up getting a promotion at work last week, which is pretty cool… It stabilizes his hours at work somewhat, and gives a nice office-work-ey boost to his Resume. Also, to his great excitement, it means that he now holds one of the gayest job titles extant (no, I won’t tell you what he does per his request). Though all of the changes are positive, he’s had odd hours this week due to training, and left me all by my lonesome for the last two nights in a row… At least, until about 11 PM, when he’s gotten off work. This has left me to my own devices, free to use up leftover batter, and dream the dream of the culinarilly disaffected…
See, Orpheus and this poor little monkey are a little short on cash ‘till the end of the week, and this week is Madison’s restaurant week… For $25.00, you can get a set menu selection of some of the most popular food at all the greatest places in town. Two of my gaming friends (who are dating, and who I recently cooked for,) have skads of disposable income, and went out every night this week together. O. and I may be going out with them on Friday, but part of me thinks it might be better to cook for them, as they’ve spent enough cash this week, and I don’t want to dress up. Also, the sweet potato pancakes have given me a lovely idea for a vegetarian dinner... Considering that this particular pair are pescatarians at their most meaty, it may be best.
Monday, I had spinach in the fridge, and wanted rid of it. Since I was being good, had had only a salad for lunch, and wanted to continue the trend, I figured I’d go vegetarian. However, since bacon is the best thing to wilt spinach with, I was in a quandary… Until I thought about the lonely jar of delicious high-quality beets I’d been saving, and the blue cheese crumbles I had to get rid of in the fridge. I sautéed the spinach with red onion and garlic in good extra-virgin olive oil, tossed in drained sliced pickled beets to sear, then tossed with a little sherry vinegar and tossed in some blue cheese, serving the potato pancakes up on the side. I added a hot garam masala spice mix to the pancakes. It tasted like dying and ending up in heaven.
Last night, I found that I’d run out of the green beans I thought were still hanging out in the freezer, and so did the same thing with about five times as many beet slices, a huge mess of coarsely chopped parsley, and a prayer. And that’s when it hit me… Root vegetable theme dinner. I can start with a low-fat (don’t knock it, it can be done,) cream of beet soup based on a veggie stock. I use fat-free sour cream for this type of soup… It works very well in my famed cream of asparagus soup, in fact! Then, serve the beet greens and chard along with the stems, julienned, as a sauté a-la Monday’s dinner alongside curried sweet potato pancakes. If I felt like getting really fancy, I could even do little turnip croquettes composed with sautéed shallots in the mix and a horseradish cream as an amuse bouche… However, I don’t feel like I should be quite THAT pretentious. Hell, if I were being really fruity, I could even serve the soup in bowls of roasted or steamed celeriac, throwing the innards of said veggie into the beet green saute! I hate making desserts, otherwise that would be part of the menu, as well… But I feel that, as a dinner, the idea is quite cohesive, and I’ve tasted the outcome. I can guarantee it’s better than what they’re serving at half the restaurants participating in restaurant week, anyway, so that’s a start.
The question becomes, what wine do I serve? Root veggies have a little more oomph to them than most, so a stiff white or a good, dry rose may not be enough this time. Pinot Noir? A medium red should do… Probably be a good kick in the pants of convention, even. Nothing sweet, though. With so much on the line in terms of beets and sweet potatoes, a sweet wine would just end up cloying, no matter how alcoholic it also happened to be.
And, after all that, I just got an invite to one of two places on Friday night from the gaming buddies, both of which have menus that, while not as cohesive or cool as mine, do make a good deal of sexy-sounding sense, regardless. Once again, I lose.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Catchup, Ketchup, Catch Up…
So, it’s been a long damned time (excepting yesterday's love-letter to our outgoing commander in thief), since I put anything of merit up here. Therefore, I will do a very quick summation of the last couple months for you, as some pretty exciting things have happened…
• Thanksgiving – Orpheus and I traveled to St. Joseph, MI to the home of my sister and her husband for the holiday. O. met Mom and Dad, and Dad pulled me aside before he and Mom left to say that he really likes my boyfriend… These are words I never expected out of Dad’s mouth, given the head-pounding that happened when I told my parents that I was dating a man… We spent an extra couple days in St. Joe with Komponist and the little sis, and very much enjoyed the visit. I was even able to get a little more used to their dog, Chloe, who is getting smarter and more adorable with age.
• Christmas – Orpheus went home to Appleton for the holiday, and I had met my parents in Chicago on the 22nd for a nice dinner out and gift exchange. I begged off driving five hours home to Grand Rapids, MI, and spent Christmas in the company of BakedAlaska, QuakerNoOats, and their daughter, EvilGenius. I was also supposed to hang out with Aries’ family for a couple hours, but they had to cancel on me. It was a lovely holiday, and I made a somewhat disjointed if delicious meal comprised of a beautiful rice pilaf, sweet potato pancakes with mock caviar, and perfect fried eggs served with a sauce mornay… I based said sauce on a béchamel, which meant it was very thick and creamy.
• New Years’ Eve – O. and I went to Club5, the regrettable gay club in town, for the party. We were ogled by many nasty old men, paid way, way too much for drinks, but had a fairly nice buffet with unlimited and surprisingly tasty bubbly afterwards. I made a beautiful dinner at home before the fact, of pan-fried then oven roasted marinated tenderloin with roast mashed potatoes and braised leeks. Overall, a disappointing evening, if only because nobody was dancing. Dinner was good, though. So was the sex.
• New Years’ Day – Back over to BakedAlaska, QuakerNoOats’ and EvilGenius’ place for a rompin’ good time New Years’ Day celebration! Orpheus and I brought a good deal of bubbly and orange juice, with which we kept BakedAK happy, and we all went shopping for QuakerNoOats-safe food so that I could cook dinner for everyone. Ended up doing a variation of a margarita sauce braise with sirloin and tomatillos instead of tomatoes. It was so tasty, I have altered the basic recipe for personal use. Also, finally broke down and bought a new camera (a shitty one, unfortunately), as I’ve been going crazy without something to click pictures with.
• 1/2/09’- Second anniversary of meeting… We went out to one of the places through which we matriculated on our initial, fateful pub-crawl. Nattspil is the name of the place. The service sucked, but the food, as ever, was good. The sex was pretty hot, too…
• The sex, the sex, the sex… TerraFirma’s been gone every weekend for the last little bit, thank god. This has meant that O. and I have had run of the apartment on our days off, and have used this privilege to screw on every non-verboten surface in the place. We’ve also finalized that, after our individual leases expire in August, we’ll be getting a place together to save money, and continue the great experiment that is our relationship in cozier surroundings. Oh, god, the sex…
And that’s about it, for now. Money is pretty tight, but isn’t it always? Overall, I’m very glad Obama has taken office, and hope things change for the better. In the meantime, I’m still working at the same job, which is much better than the old one, and the world is still turning. Our ability to subsist, much like roaches, on the face of this god-forsaken ball of dirt in times of difficulty is vastly underrated. I feel like the clouds are just beginning to break, and any time now, I’ll see a glorious ray of sunshine breaking through…
• Thanksgiving – Orpheus and I traveled to St. Joseph, MI to the home of my sister and her husband for the holiday. O. met Mom and Dad, and Dad pulled me aside before he and Mom left to say that he really likes my boyfriend… These are words I never expected out of Dad’s mouth, given the head-pounding that happened when I told my parents that I was dating a man… We spent an extra couple days in St. Joe with Komponist and the little sis, and very much enjoyed the visit. I was even able to get a little more used to their dog, Chloe, who is getting smarter and more adorable with age.
• Christmas – Orpheus went home to Appleton for the holiday, and I had met my parents in Chicago on the 22nd for a nice dinner out and gift exchange. I begged off driving five hours home to Grand Rapids, MI, and spent Christmas in the company of BakedAlaska, QuakerNoOats, and their daughter, EvilGenius. I was also supposed to hang out with Aries’ family for a couple hours, but they had to cancel on me. It was a lovely holiday, and I made a somewhat disjointed if delicious meal comprised of a beautiful rice pilaf, sweet potato pancakes with mock caviar, and perfect fried eggs served with a sauce mornay… I based said sauce on a béchamel, which meant it was very thick and creamy.
• New Years’ Eve – O. and I went to Club5, the regrettable gay club in town, for the party. We were ogled by many nasty old men, paid way, way too much for drinks, but had a fairly nice buffet with unlimited and surprisingly tasty bubbly afterwards. I made a beautiful dinner at home before the fact, of pan-fried then oven roasted marinated tenderloin with roast mashed potatoes and braised leeks. Overall, a disappointing evening, if only because nobody was dancing. Dinner was good, though. So was the sex.
• New Years’ Day – Back over to BakedAlaska, QuakerNoOats’ and EvilGenius’ place for a rompin’ good time New Years’ Day celebration! Orpheus and I brought a good deal of bubbly and orange juice, with which we kept BakedAK happy, and we all went shopping for QuakerNoOats-safe food so that I could cook dinner for everyone. Ended up doing a variation of a margarita sauce braise with sirloin and tomatillos instead of tomatoes. It was so tasty, I have altered the basic recipe for personal use. Also, finally broke down and bought a new camera (a shitty one, unfortunately), as I’ve been going crazy without something to click pictures with.
• 1/2/09’- Second anniversary of meeting… We went out to one of the places through which we matriculated on our initial, fateful pub-crawl. Nattspil is the name of the place. The service sucked, but the food, as ever, was good. The sex was pretty hot, too…
• The sex, the sex, the sex… TerraFirma’s been gone every weekend for the last little bit, thank god. This has meant that O. and I have had run of the apartment on our days off, and have used this privilege to screw on every non-verboten surface in the place. We’ve also finalized that, after our individual leases expire in August, we’ll be getting a place together to save money, and continue the great experiment that is our relationship in cozier surroundings. Oh, god, the sex…
And that’s about it, for now. Money is pretty tight, but isn’t it always? Overall, I’m very glad Obama has taken office, and hope things change for the better. In the meantime, I’m still working at the same job, which is much better than the old one, and the world is still turning. Our ability to subsist, much like roaches, on the face of this god-forsaken ball of dirt in times of difficulty is vastly underrated. I feel like the clouds are just beginning to break, and any time now, I’ll see a glorious ray of sunshine breaking through…
Tuesday, January 20, 2009
There's the Door…
Dear Mr. (outgoing) President…
I will not waste overly much time or energy writing here what a waste of space you are. Instead, I wish you god-speed and a long life. Further, I wish you a swift trial and just punishment, hopefully something like a prison term that takes more than full advantage of the aforementioned long life. Finally, I genuinely hope that you and your ilk burn in Hell. Your time is over, and the Nation can finally breathe again.
Why do I hope such things for you, you may ask? Well, it all burns down to this… When still a student of policy, way back in September of 2001, I sat on the roof of the Co Op where I lived with friends, and discussed the possible ramifications of the terrorist attacks that were still tying up phone lines on the East Coast. I saw the immediate outpouring of sympathy from Europe as a welcome Détente, given the bad first steps you'd taken in your presidency… A gift, I thought, this kick-start to responsible diplomacy. But, in less than a week, the power your corrupt government had to fan the flames of rumor, fear, hatred, and untruth were fully revealed. My dreams crumbled.
This dreadful initial mismanagement of what has become one of the most hideous conflicts America has ever perpetrated on the World, however, was just the beginning. And simply mentioning the ongoing tragedies of Iraq and Afghanistan doesn't even touch on the abject suffering you've caused in the rest of the world. Your policy has seen to the ultimate suffering of the middle and lower classes everywhere, all in the name of further concentration of wealth in the hands of your
big-contract defense department robber-baron friends. I won't tackle what you've done domestically to the Justice Department, the State Department, or, God forbid, the Supreme Court… Hell, if we don't prosecute you at home for the crimes you've committed, I honestly hope that the next time you take Laura to Paris for shopping, you're nabbed and taken to the Hague. Some of the crap you pulled makes Milosevic
look like a blameless child in comparison!
Finally, there is the horrible tarnish you've put on the presidency. At its' best, the office you've held for the past eight years has been a symbol of stable governance and justice in a tumultuous world. You were definitely unqualified for the job, but stole an election anyway. You were unpalatable from the very first, and only made yourself more so with time and lies heaped upon lies. You stand for everything that the country needs to shed itself of… Reganomics, abject greed, stupidity, moral ambiguity, unyielding absolutism, horrible untruthfulness, absolute opacity.
What I'm trying to say, sir is…
Don't let the door hit your ass on the way out. Oh, yeah… And good riddance!
Sincerely,
~Aeffchen
I will not waste overly much time or energy writing here what a waste of space you are. Instead, I wish you god-speed and a long life. Further, I wish you a swift trial and just punishment, hopefully something like a prison term that takes more than full advantage of the aforementioned long life. Finally, I genuinely hope that you and your ilk burn in Hell. Your time is over, and the Nation can finally breathe again.
Why do I hope such things for you, you may ask? Well, it all burns down to this… When still a student of policy, way back in September of 2001, I sat on the roof of the Co Op where I lived with friends, and discussed the possible ramifications of the terrorist attacks that were still tying up phone lines on the East Coast. I saw the immediate outpouring of sympathy from Europe as a welcome Détente, given the bad first steps you'd taken in your presidency… A gift, I thought, this kick-start to responsible diplomacy. But, in less than a week, the power your corrupt government had to fan the flames of rumor, fear, hatred, and untruth were fully revealed. My dreams crumbled.
This dreadful initial mismanagement of what has become one of the most hideous conflicts America has ever perpetrated on the World, however, was just the beginning. And simply mentioning the ongoing tragedies of Iraq and Afghanistan doesn't even touch on the abject suffering you've caused in the rest of the world. Your policy has seen to the ultimate suffering of the middle and lower classes everywhere, all in the name of further concentration of wealth in the hands of your
big-contract defense department robber-baron friends. I won't tackle what you've done domestically to the Justice Department, the State Department, or, God forbid, the Supreme Court… Hell, if we don't prosecute you at home for the crimes you've committed, I honestly hope that the next time you take Laura to Paris for shopping, you're nabbed and taken to the Hague. Some of the crap you pulled makes Milosevic
look like a blameless child in comparison!
Finally, there is the horrible tarnish you've put on the presidency. At its' best, the office you've held for the past eight years has been a symbol of stable governance and justice in a tumultuous world. You were definitely unqualified for the job, but stole an election anyway. You were unpalatable from the very first, and only made yourself more so with time and lies heaped upon lies. You stand for everything that the country needs to shed itself of… Reganomics, abject greed, stupidity, moral ambiguity, unyielding absolutism, horrible untruthfulness, absolute opacity.
What I'm trying to say, sir is…
Don't let the door hit your ass on the way out. Oh, yeah… And good riddance!
Sincerely,
~Aeffchen
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