Unless it’s frozen and pretending to be ice cream.
My comment stands:
I’m just saying that if I was fake stranded with Bear Grylls or real stranded with Les Stroud, all the food we had was a cup of yogurt, and a hawk flew over and happened to drop a pair of mountain goat testicles, I would be like “So, call Alton Brown or get on Pinterest and find the best way to cook up these wild-ass mountain oysters!”
So, browsing one of the local flea-market/yard-sale type groups on Facebook, I discovered this post…
Gladiator on VHS for sale. Only $3.00 American!
As you can imagine because I’m blogging about it, many questions came to mind. It’s hard to even know where to begin.
We’ll start with the obvious. Who would pay $3 for a VHS cassette of any movie, let alone this movie? I mean Gladiator was a good film… but here is a shortlist of better values available online…
This is just for physical media. I didn’t even look into streaming. I get that not everyone is set up to stream and that some people (myself included) like to put their hands on physical tangible media.
Who has a working VCR? OK. I do, but I’m odd. It’s a VCR/DVD-recorder, and someday I will transfer all of my VHS tapes to DVD (which is already a dead format). Who is still watching video tapes? I mean, watching the old 4:3 aspect ratio drives me nuts these days.
The other side of this… who goes through their stuff, decides they can part with this, and assigns a $3 value to it? I mean, I could see if this was a collector’s item. I have Star Wars on VHS and I’ll probably have it forever, but The Gladiator? Sure, it was a good movie… but not that good. Why were they even still making video tapes in the year 2000?
What do you need that badly that costs $3? This wouldn’t be worth the gas money or the bus fair to meet someone to make the sale.
I have been strapped for cash, but never would think to list what essentially amounts to garbage for a negligible value on a Facebook flea market group. If this sells, I really have a lot of stuff that I need to be listing for under $5 amounts.
So, Axl is everywhere in the rock media world again and 15 year old me reads every stupid article like those it’s those goofy gossip columns in Rip or Metal Edge that used to be one sentence stories with bold rock star names jammed into one long nonsensical paragraph. I’m actually excited to maybe try & see whatever version of Guns N’ Roses eventually ends up in Pittsburgh (if it makes it that long).
#AxlRumors
I even made a parody news article with my last post that fell super flat with no reads or comments. Oh well, my bad.
I know I broke the one rule of blogging by never having regular steady content any more, but work with me here. I want some interaction. Maybe no one cares. I guess we’ll see.
Let’s start some Axl Rose rumors. Use the hashtag #AxlRumors on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, or newer cooler social media platforms that I am wholly unaware of but still use hashtags.
You can post the url to your rumor(s) here in the comments, and we’ll see if it gets beyond this little corner of the internet, and if anyone finds their way back here.
Kapish?
I’ll start:
Now you.
⚠ Go! ⚠
(Don’t forget the #AxlRumors hashtag!)
Ask A Pittsburgh Expert: Best Ways To Discover New Music
I was recently asked to put together some thoughts on discovering new music for an article on CBS Local Pittsburgh. The article is now up!
Please take the time to check out the article by local blogger Jennifer Stockdale and share your thoughts here (or on the Facebook link) on how you discover new music:
Comments aren’t available on the CBS Local article for some reason, but please share your ways of discovering new music here, or share a link to the main article on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, Pinterest, or whatever to start your own discussion amongst your friends and peers.
Most importantly, the take-away is that I may now be considered an expert for all of your musical discovery needs.
So, I’ve been hungry for meatball subs. They’re so simple to make, but we just never seem to do it at home. I shared the photo on social media, because I’m weird like that and it annoys people, and some people seemed to dig it. wanted to share how easy it was with a minimal amount of effort.
So, the wife got a pound of ground meat from Aldi the other day, and I picked up the rest of the stuff that we didn’t already have at Giant Eagle on my way home from work. I probably could have gotten all of this from Aldi.
So this is what I used…
And this is what I did…
MEAT.
Turn the oven on first so you don’t have to worry about it later. Put it on 375° because that’s always what they seem to say to put it on. I don’t know why. I don’t even know who they are.
I made some meatballs with the meat, some hand-crushed crackers, a dash of the pizza sauce, a dash of Italian dressing, a dash of whatever spices I grabbed off the rack (probably pepper, season all, onion powder, garlic powder, and paprika), a bit of the Parmesan shake cheese and the mysterious “six cheese Italian” stuff.
I put some spices on the outside because why not, and tossed them into a frying pan with EVOO and a small pat of butter on the bottom. I pre-heated it to high, then turned it to 6 before I tossed in the balls. 6 is at about 6:00 on my stupid electric stove top.
I melted a bit of butter in the microwave. I quickly cut open the buns, put them on a baking sheet, spread on some melted butter with a brush and added… garlic powder, onion powder, a dash of shake cheese, and “Italian seasoning” to the buns. No Italian seasoning for my wife, and no garlic powder for my 2½ year old. I popped them in the 375° oven on the middle rack for a bit.
I used tongs to turn the meatballs over & popped a lid on the pan.
I dumped the remaining pizza sauce into a soup cup (it was a little jar), and added a sprinkle of brown sugar. I nuked it for 45 seconds or so. Why? I like sweet sauce, and grandma always said “it cuts the acid.”
I turned the meatballs on to an undone side, and got the sub rolls out of the oven. I knew they were done because… I didn’t even look at them. I just took them out. They looked fine. Plus, we’re not totally finished. I added some pizza sauce and some of the finely shredded awkwardly named cheese to the buns.
I made sure the meatballs weren’t going to kill us with the food thermometer. They weren’t. I put those on the buns and added more sauce, shredded cheese, and shake cheese.
I set some meatballs aside for my 10 month old. The sandwich was a little much for him, but he will eat just about anything you put in front of him. Seriously. even if it’s not edible.
I put the now built subs into the oven and cranked the knob to 400° because I am impatient and my 2½ year old kept asking if lunch was ready. I turned the light on in the oven and watched the cheese melt. Not only was that fun, I could also make sure I wasn’t going to burn the bejesus out of things. I didn’t. I took it out in time.
Well, some of the cheese that fell on to the baking sheet burned, because I made a mess. Oh well.
These were pretty good, although next time I will use different/better sauce. That squeeze stuff isn’t bad. Maybe I can make a simple marinara. Also, homemade-ish deli rolls or Cellone’s are worth it… and I would cut a little triangle out of the top like Subway used to, before we were over-saturated with them and they started to serve terrible cream-of-deathfish.
At any rate. This is easy to do. You could buy your own meatballs or bake your own bread or use cheese slices to make this as easy or as difficult as you like. I cut my 2½ year old’s into 3 sections so she had sliders. I cut my wife’s in 2. I ate the whole thing in one big sandwich like a hungry hungry pig. I refuse to apologize.
Share photos of yours or links to your own blogged recipe in the comments!
Thanks to Farcebook, these two articles about Finnish band Pertti Kurikan Nimipäivät came on to my radar:
Besides being awesome new (to me) enjoyable punk rock, I feel like it served as some sort of cosmic reminder, warning, or inspiration. Not only to me, but to everyone who happens to read this.
Not feeling a bunch of paragraphs today, so I will hit you with a bulleted list.
I’m sure there’s more, but you get my point. Notice little things like this in life. Be thankful for your insight. Be thankful that there are others out there reminding you to put forth your best effort. Learn something or learn about something often. Make some noise that gets heard.
Check out these videos.
…and more.
I need to get my hands on some music & get a peep at this documentary. Anyone already have these cats on their radar? Tell me more!
This year, we’ll have 3 bowls of treats for Halloween. We’ll have the traditional chocolate gooey goodness, a bowl of peanut/tree-nut free treats, and a bowl entirely made up of non-food party favor-ish goodies.
Why? Why not? I was able to pick up a bunch of party favors at the Dollar Tree, and my wife Bethany got some Halloween themed stuff from Target. The no-nuts candy wasn’t a big deal either, all we had to do was read the label… which we’re used to. Even the extra bowl was only $1. It wasn’t a whole lot of effort or money.
Even painting a foam pumpkin teal for use for years to come wasn’t a big deal, or printing the posters from the FARE website. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention that. This is a movement. It started with some of the most kick-ass people on the planet, food allergy moms in Tennessee.
My point, I guess, is that it isn’t a lot of effort but it can be a big huge gigantic deal for a kid. What’s a big deal? To feel included on a holiday where you’re hyper aware that you’re different. To know that this piece of candy doesn’t contain nuts or wasn’t “processed in a facility that may also use peanuts or tree nuts.” To know that if you’re allergic to dairy or chocolate or just about everything that everyone else can eat or isn’t one of the top 8, but this little trinket or toy (or 2 or 3 if you’re at our house) is all yours. To know that you don’t have to go home & “trade up” for safe candy on this one. To know that your parents didn’t have to drop off a safe treat with all the neighbors ahead of time, and that someone else “gets” it.
I always liked getting those Little Hugs drinks (which may be a safe treat), but some people would complain about the weight. That would have been gone by the time I got back to the road when I was a kid. Then again, times have changed. When I was a kid, we had to play the “guess who you are” game. If I asked a kid his name now, the next ring of the doorbell would probably be the local police. Also, kids… always let your parents check your candy for razor blades or syringes.
Like I said, we read labels. Luckily shellfish is generally easy form me to avoid in packaged foods, slightly less so in restaurants. Our little girl Molly can’t do eggs. Well, she can do eggs baked into things, but has to avoid straight up eggs, mayonnaise, some mustards, custard, and we just noticed… Mallow Cups? (I hate them, they are the devil’s candy. The wife loves them though… even though it tastes like someone replaced the inside of a Reese’s Peanut Butter Cup with sunscreen.) Will we have to avoid meringue too? Who knows? Hopefully she outgrow her allergy, I’ll never get over mine without some kind of cure.
There are many others out there going through the same thing. We can stick together, and support each other. We can ask those without any food allergies to support us too. Spreading awareness is the key to keeping us all safe. So, take a few minutes to learn about the #TealPumpkinProject. Use the hashtag on social media (Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, Google+, Pinterest, Tumblr, etc.), get a pumpkin and paint it teal, and/or print out the fliers. Get some safe treats.
OK, so it’s been a while since I’ve been productively making music & actively writing songs. Apparently the bug never goes away. I have been thinking about doing punk rock-ish kids songs for a while. (The Sablowskis beat me to it!)
Yeah, there is the AiXeLsyD reunion gig coming up… whenever that is, and it doesn’t seem like Ernie and the Berts was all that long ago.
I saw a contest online last week and it sparked me to get my ass quickly in gear. Music Go Round in Monroeville is holding a guitar giveaway, and I have been mentally drooling all over Eastwood Guitars online for quite some time. The Side Jack is pretty awesome!
It would be really cool if you could help me win this axe by clicking “like” on this post: https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=698216686929723&permPage=1
It may help to follow or like the Music Go Round Monroeville, PA Facebook page too. It has to be on that post on their page, no “likes” here or on my link(s) to it on my Facebook profile count. Voting is only open this week, they pick a winner on the 27th!
As far as the song goes, I threw it together in under an hour with a downloaded app for the tablet, using crappy headphones, the built-in mic on the tablet, and my acoustic guitar down in the basement. I think it shows. But, I still think it’s a hooky tune with some potential. I may have to recruit a few of the usual suspects or even some unusual ones to help me complete the process.
Molly is absolutely terrified of the Chick-fil-A cow. My guess is that other kids are too. Seems like we can find a whole lot more to relate to with some feet-tapping tunes!
Chick-fil-A-Go-Go
So, I haven’t blogged much over the last year or so. The new job has me out & around… not near a desk with time on my hands to save a draft & come back to it later. I also have less time to monkey around on the internet as it’s mostly taken up by our sweet little girl once I am home. Speaking of home, that’s new too. We finally bought a house and are no longer renters!
Check out our little sweet pea in an album on Facebook if you’re interested. This was the day after moving, and 2 days after Molly turned six months old. Photos by Kristina Serafini. This was the one we chose for the Christmas card this year:
Hopefully I can adapt how I blog, maybe use the android app… to get my thoughts out there. Maybe it’ll be shorter less link-filled stuff. Maybe not. Maybe I can do drafts with the phone and edit/post/link/add media later.
The house is taking some time to get set up, but eventually I’ll have all my toys in a room that will make blogging and computer time easier. I also have a nice workbench now so I should be able to monkey with my guitars more often. I have some ideas to put into play.
This has been a crazy year. New job, new baby, new house. What’s next?
How have things been for everyone out there in WordPress land?
In the spirit of Christmas, check out this post, and join in:
World (and Lunar) Domination 