Too Little, Too Late

Today is going to be big. How big? Well, I'm predicting to double the highest number of people my house has held since the beginning of September. That's right, there will be at least, if not more than, two individuals in my apartment. I don't want to get ahead of myself, but this weekend could possibly even see triple the previous record population of my apartment since Brad and Leroy left, that would mean nearly three souls all told.

Not Your Left, The Chair's Left

But seriously, starting tomorrow I'll be having a guest at the bachelor pad for the next several days, which is wonderfully exciting and unreasonably stressful.

Surely not stressful enough, however, to make me actually begin cleaning my house more than two hours before bedtime the night before, or to actually try putting together the table and chairs that I bought last weekend until, after learning eight wrong ways to put together a chair, I finally do it right two times and don't have enough time to finish the other two chairs.

I also Boraxed every horizontal surface in my house, Windexed every vertical surface, and attempted to hang too-small pictures on everything in between.

But more importantly:


P.S. Pretty sure I just got borax in my eye.
P.P.S. If I don't get 3 more comments on the Heroes post I will end myself.
P.P.P.S. I also bought sheets today. Don't ask.
P.P.P.PS. I freaking love lolcats.

And most importantly, the song that lends its name to this entry is too good to waste on a post this crappy, I reserve the right to use it again.

Do You Sleep?

My students all have to wear uniforms and I'm required to wear dress slacks and a tie. The students attempt small modifications like wearing short white socks with their blue Dockers and trying to hide the fact that they've got on a white belt when the dress code calls for black or brown. So far this week I've worn a sport coat or a suit every day, but yesterday I wore my Pi Phi boxers and my FBL t-shirt underneath it all. I felt pretty rebellious.

The Trouble with 'Tillas -or- The Great Blog-out of '08

This is just a slightly cleaned up version of a post I decided not to use a couple days ago, but since I'm no longer able to steal wireless dependably from my home you'll find this post to be distinctly mono-media. I'll try to get to a coffee house tomorrow and perhaps get some official internets in the coming week again. For now this is the best I can do:

I feel 100% wiped out at the end of every day. I've been keeping the Ramen to a minimum lately and trying to eat healthier, despite the fact that I'm still waiting on Friday and the arrival of my first paycheck.

In my search for healthy and cheap food, I figured out that tortillas cost less than bread and since they are used in wraps I figure they are more healthy. However, yesterday I realized far too late that I had eaten tortillas for all three meals: a PB&J tortilla for breakfast, a turkey tortilla for lunch, and burritos for dinner.

When I finally got around to asking the internet whether bread or tortillas were the healthier option, this is the conversation I found on Yahoo Answers (my commentary is in italics):

Question: Are tortillas fattening? Do they have fewer calories than bread? Are they a low calorie snack?

Response #1: depends on if they r baked or fried
read the facts on the sides of the products and it also depends on the type of bread

This answer was deemed 'the best' by the person who asked the question originally; it is the least assertive and furthest away from an actual answer of any sort.

Response #2: no. actually, tortillas are more healthier than bread. so no, its not fattening. if i were you, i would throw out my bread and get some tortilla wraps.

This person states their opinion as a fact, then cites their opinion as authoritative, then gives some personal advice.

Response #3: no tortillas have a few calories but not as much as bread does, tortillas are actually a good diet food just not too many.

Again, this person says nothing.

Response #4: nahh..more fattening than bread.way more carbs & calories

This person disagrees with everyone above and decides that they don't need to cite any authority to do so.

Response #5: yes i believe they are better than bread, as they are thinner.

This person believes that they are better, because they appear to be thinner. I would have liked to have responded that they were more fattening because of their more round shape.


Those wonderful people are why I am a teacher, so that no person I ever meet will spend their time answering objective questions on Yahoo answers without actually looking into the subject at hand, or really even understanding how to have an argument in the first place.

Rant over.

My first week of school is officially over and for the first time I'm really celebrating Labor Day. I feel as though God has given me this extra 24 hour period of weekend-goodness to spend it in giving my body a constant supply of beer and nachos. I kicked that off this afternoon at "happy hour" at a local microbrew with some colleagues.

Breakfast...

The following post is not for women, children, or anyone else who either prides themselves on their domestic abilities or will be eating in the next hour.


Top Five "Bachelor's Kitchen" Moments of Summer '08

There's absolutely no way that I've really remember the best of the worst of our eating habits this summer, but here's a wrap-up to keep Leroy and Brad reflecting on just how good they have it back in the civilized world.

5. The Spaghetti Quick Fix: This is probably a pretty good trick, though I never intended it to be one. After making a big batch of chicken alfredo for Brad and I there was a pretty sizable surplus of noodles. Wanting to eat the food while it was hot, I left the noodles in the pan and headed to the party porch (which really deserves it's own post). Approximately two days later I rediscovered the pan of noodles (about 1/8 full), and when I stabbed the starchy mass it came out all at once leaving the pan totally clean. Now, this probably was just because it was teflon coated pan, but I like to think that I did something clever to save myself some clean-up.

4. Magic Bread: This bread (pictured below) was purchased for Jose's birthday dinner. About half of the loaf was used for garlic bread and the other half was, for some unknown reason, put into a Wal-Mart bag and thrown into the refrigerator. That would have been about a month and a half ago. After re-discovering this bread on Friday I ate it for dinner last night. It wasn't even hard. Turns out that bread keeps for an extra month or so in the fridge. But, then again, if you aren't a bachelor, your fridge is probably already full.

3. Ice Cream Cubes: Since I didn't have an ice cream scoop, when it came time for Brad and I to finish off the cookies and cream we had gotten earlier for a desert I had made (which consisted of a cake-pan of freshly baked cookie dough topped with ice cream), there was only one way to dish it out. We simply ripped the cardboard box off of the ice cream, dumped it in a bowl and used a steak knife to cut it into two equal halves. No waiting, no unnecessary melting, no need for proper utensils.

2. Bradcakes: For the first couple weeks (read: months) of summer we didn't have a frying pan, but we did have an abundance of pancake mix. One day Brad broke down and decided he would use whatever he could find and, by Hercules, he was going to make himself some pancakes. What you see below isn't some intermediate stage. It's actually the finished product. A pile of syrup-covered mush we like to call Bradcakes.

1. The Banana Solution: Okay, so it's kind of a lame number one, but "The Banana Solution" is really just a hypothetical event. Let me set this one up for you. The Bachelor, as we all know, is by far the most versatile homemaker because he is by far the most flexible. No matter what the problem is he can solve it with only two sets of salad forks, a bread-knife, and a family sized bottle of seasoned salt. The Bachelor also has only one motivation in his domestic endeavors beyond basic survival and that is being able to disguise the squalor he lives just quickly enough to deceive any member of the fairer sex that might accidentally stumble into his hovel. So, without further ado, "The Banana Solution": the other day Brad, Jose, and Leroy were talking and I, walking past the bathroom, spoke my immediate thought "something smells...unfortunate" and instantly my mind raced to figure out what I would do to cover up such an offensive odor if at that very moment an actual girl were to walk into my apartment. I inventoried my house: 4 computers, 268 books, 38 pairs of unwashed socks, an entire pack of freezer pops, left over garlic bread and... of course! I would flush a partially rotten banana down the toilet. Problem solved.



My food situation greatly improved on Friday when Brad and Leroy left a hearty stash of tasty snacks for me as a thank-you for letting them entertain me this summer. Included in their gift were: Wheat Thins, Oreos, milk, Gatorade Rain (otherwise known as water 2.0, the only real modification God has made to our planet's elemental make-up since Genesis), ground cinnamon and hazelnut coffee.



I've come to the conclusion that there must be something unnatural in Wheat Thins. There is no way that a un-enhanced "whole wheat snack" could so cripple my resolve that I would pass up Cool Ranch Doritos, Oreos, and chilled Peanut Butter M&M's and eat an entire box of Wheat Thins before Brad's sleeping-couch was even cold.


So, these helpful anecdotes should get you all set for first and second breakfast, brunch, lunch, elevensies, supper, and dinner.

And remember, if the women don't find you hansome, they'll at least find you handy.

- Podo Danderfluff of Willowbottom