Praha, Pivo, Prosim

This has certainly been the longest I’ve gone without posting something. Anything. Bad me. I know, I know. Six weeks. Ouch.

But unfortunately, I have nothing really interesting to report.

Bus, bus….who has a bus? I did an overnight to Bratislava in February. But since it was a quick trip and I only brought a change of clothes, I didn’t want to bring along a camera & camera bag; therefore, I have no interesting photos of Slovakia. Nothing. Zip. Not even a stamp in my passport to show that I’ve been there. Sigh. Oh well.

I can report that Bratislava seems like a lovely town. For those who don’t know, Slovakia and the Czech Republic were formerly known as Czechoslovakia. In fact, many people still think it’s Czechoslovakia. Nope. Not since 1992. The bricks of communism fell in November of 1989 (The Velvet Revolution) and the country split a few years after. They are separate countries with separate flags, capital cities, currencies & languages.

The language part is interesting. Czech & Slovak look almost identical. And, most of the language is very similar. Many words are the same. However, there are other words that are completely different. I’ve been told that children of either country/native tongue can’t quite understand each other but adults are so used to hearing the differences that it’s not a problem. In fact, there are many Slovaks/Slovans that work here and the communication ‘barrier’ doesn’t exist. Well, this isn’t confirmed from my non Czech/Slovak speaking ass however, the two seem to get along quite well.

Messing with my emotions….Spring is coming. I’m ready. For those of you living in/at a more southern latitude, I am jealous. The upcoming season has been teasing us here and for that I tell her to fuck off. Damn. One day the sun will be shining and for once I won’t need to wear extra clothes. I will have happy thoughts of pivo and the beer garden only to be brutally rebuffed by the cruel bitch of winter. She slaps me in the face and then tells ME to fuck off. Damn. Fucking seasons.

Time….. But alas, the time change is soon and having daylight begin at a reasonable hour is nice and makes it much easier/more comfortable when required to wake up at early hours. I currently have a 5:30am wake-up (Monday, no less) on the roster and it ain’t fun. I don’t mind so much setting the alarm and getting up and doing necessary things but when it’s dark it’s just a bear. And doing it in the dark makes it more difficult.

Speaking of getting up early….I’ve now been waking up at 7:30 on days when it’s not required. Anybody else? I know it’s good to get a regular schedule and that acclimates your body to routine, blah bah but man, on Saturday?

Clockwatcher….. I have a have always had a (bad) habit of looking at the time when I wake up during the night. The reason for this is unknown to me but nevertheless, it happens. Additionally, there is the mental math that occurs when I determine exactly how many more hours/minutes I am permitted to sleep until the alarm is set to jolt me from my slumber. So, when I roll over to examine the clock even on the lazy days, Im not surprised to see that the display reads 7:27am. Shit. Damn. I do sometimes feel guilty for sleeping too much or sleeping too late. And, generally, I don’t do this. My schedule doesn’t permit it and I certainly can’t stay up late enough so that I’m still in bed at 4pm. Somehow, I feel obligated to GIT-R-DONE and not just lay around and not accomplishing anything other than widening my ass. Anyway, I’m not saying I want to sleep until noon however, I’m saying 8:30 would be a bit more respectable on those days made for nothing.

Facebook assholes….. A few things on this topic.

What’s up with random friend requests? From ‘friend finder’–what the hell is that? I assume it’s some random programming thing but it ain’t my thing. If I don’t know you, it’s unlikely I’ll accept the random friend request of some douchebag ‘looking for fun’ with ‘conservative’ political views from Saskatoon.

What’s up with the people who post about how awesome they are, how much their life sucks or are generally miserable/depressed and post their doom and gloom into the feeds of others? Jerkoffs. I get that people want to vent about a bad day–everyone does it. But, at some point you just start sounding like a whiny baby who is bringing down the mood of others who are reading the incessant bitchyness. The negative energy isn’t appreciated. There are numerous motivational factors behind these kinds of posts. Sure, maybe it’s done to get a ‘reaction’ out of others or maybe it’s just some kind of reaching out for attention/help. I’m no princess of sunshine but I’m aware that other people read what I post. Facebook isn’t my psychiatric sounding board. So, bottom line–these people have been deleted. Goodbye. Your outbox is empty.

Random food….

Sloppy Joes & Kraft Mac & Cheese!! It’s American food that when you can get it anywhere and everywhere, you can take for granted. This is my Euro version with my Euro beer backdrop.

Cheese omelette with bacon & tomatoes! Some oven roasted taters & a nice slice of toast with peanut butter & jelly. By the way, PB is quite pricy here so this is my contraband American version sent thanks to my Mom. **I was also photo editing while eating breakfast. So, here’s a trivia question–can anyone tell what the image is on my computer here? Be specific.

Salad!! Big green salads like this are hard to find and really don’t exist here. This was my version: spinach, mixed greens, salami, tomatoes, roast onions/potatoes,carrots, bleu cheese crumbles, cucumber, hard boiled egg, deli ham & a creamy orange vinaigrette. Sorry, this photo is underexposed.

Random breakfast casserole/concotion! I don’t have a name for this so you can call it what you want. Since I have to live on a budget and throwing away unused product is cost prohibitive, I try & develop recipes/ideas that can use everything I buy. Because I DO cook, it’s not difficult to do this but my limited funds and resources leave me with fewer ways to adapt the ingredients. This was my breakfast idea…. Initially, I wanted to make a quiche. Quiches are great. If you have never had one, go buy one now. Eggy goodness with a crust. Perfection. But, when I was thinking about a quiche I didn’t really want to make a crust and I have yet to see a premade frozen crust anywhere in any market here. There are, however, some ready-made dough options in the refrigerated food cases but I didn’t want to roll one out and par-bake it, etc. Call it lazy–that’s a fitting word because it’s true.

The process…

So, instead of the quiche crust, I decided to do a potato crust.

First, in a saute pan I cooked up some ‘English’ bacon (the words on the packaging, not mine). It’s similar to ‘American’ bacon only not as thick and this is much wider.

2. With the leftover and tasty bacon grease in the pan, the potatoes*** were cooked (or at least partially) with some salt & pepper.

3. I lined a pan (approx. 7in x 9in) with wax paper and then arranged the sliced potatoes in the bottom. The greasy & beautiful bacon went on top of that.

4. There was leftover spinach and mushrooms in the refrigerator so I sauteed those in the same pan as the potatoes & bacon.

5.In a bowl off to the side I mixed 4 or 5 eggs with some heavy cream, salt/pepper, thyme, rosemary, basil and cubed bleu cheese.

6 The spinach mixture went on top of the potatoes & bacon and then the eggs were poured on top of that.

7. The oven was preheated to about 200C an in the stuff went. Sorry, I don’t have a conversion handy for this temperature.
Cook until the eggs get fluffy and increase in size. You should be able to tell when it’s done just by looking at the stuff.

8. Near the end of the process I topped it with sliced tomatoes, sliced Eidam (yes, Edam–they spell it differently here) cheese and a nice sprinkle of paprika. Why paprika? I’m a woman and a nerd and I want my food to look pretty. Also, I knew i would be photographing it so it gives a nice aesthetic.

I was surprised that this held together and actually came out of the pan in recognizable squares. I was wondering if the potatoes would function as a reasonable base and if the potatoes/eggs would ‘stick’ together. They did.

***If you choose to do something like this, it is important that the potatoes are cooked first. Eggs cook quickly–potatoes do not. If this ‘casserole’ was baked until the potatoes were done, the eggs would be shit. And because everything else in this pan is already done, the actual oven cook time is quite low.

Well, it’s been a while since I blogged so this one is going to be peppered with randomness…

1. Usually, when using the metro, I stand. This isn’t because the seats are gross and dirty, this is because many times it’s just easier to get off the metro if you are in front of the door. That said, the other day I was seated just minding my own business. Then, to my left and at perfect eye level there stood a man. While this man was facing away from me, therein lies the heart of my story. Uh well, rather perhaps I should say therein lies the ’seat’ of my story.

The man in question was reading a book or a magazine (I can’t remember and it isn’t important) and perhaps he was unaware of an apparently chronic problem. You see, this man has an unfortunate condition; for the sake of definition, this is something that I’ll call ‘twitching ass syndrome.’ Due to lack of medical acumen, I could not nor cannot ascertain what said condition is actually labelled therefore and for the sake of this writing, it is TAS for short.

This guy’s ass was twitching at full speed. Both cheeks were fully engaged in said twitching activity. The alternate flexing and relaxing of the cheeks was a most interesting visual. Perhaps some could consider such movements to be a kind of silent ass symphony.

I’m not even quite sure what the expression ‘full throttle’ means but I’m going to use it when discussing the separate entity that is/was this dude’s twitching proclivity. This display of gluteal twitches went on for about 5 metro stops and that’s only because I got off the metro and went on my merry way.

All of this brings me to a series of queries…..Does this guy’s ass really twitch uncontrollably for hours at a time? Is this a real and diagnosed condition? What (if any) medical treatment can be sought in connection with such a chronic issue? Has the medical field carelessly disregarded conditions like this for the more ‘glammed up’ research of say, warts, necrotizing fasciitis and seasonal affective disorder?

One last note….before you go Googling this condition (and I already have), there is a serious lack of written material on the subject. Funny thing, I actually knew someone years ago who also had a twitching ass (yes really). However, his gluteal twitches are associated with Tourette’s. His Tourette’s manifested in strange and frequent coughing fits quickly followed by a body shake and ass twitch. Metro man was exhibiting no other obvious Tourette’s-like tics so who’s to say what was happening.

2. The closest grocery store to my flat is the Albert at Namesty Republiky. I mention this store often not because it’s absolutely amazing (it isn’t) but because I’m there too much. There are certainly better Albert branches in Prague; I just happen to live near one of the shitty ones. But, the close proximity and frequent sales are a plus so it’s all good by me.

A frequently appearing word here in Czech is AKCE. Directly translated, I’m not sure what it means but it refers to either a sale or a discount. AKCE is in big capital letters all over Albert. Albert’s sales are pretty killer.

Exhibit A…… it was one of the big AKCE promotions that Branik beer was so insanely cheap a few weeks ago. Refresher: cheap as in 3.90Kc/each. Add in an extra 3Kc for the bottle return and you have a beer for between 25 and 50 US cents. NICE!

Exhibit B……….There was also a big sale of Milka chocolate bars a few weeks ago. Czechs go batty over chocolate (and so do I), so these candy bars were snatched up in no time. Also, I’ll mention that the chocolate bars here are not the standard US size. I’m not sure how many grams each bar weighs but I’ll guess and say these babies might be 8-10 ounces. In other words, they are quite substantial. To provide some kind of reference as to how MUCH Czechs love their sweets, there was a per person/per bar limit on the Milka sale. One afternoon, I was behind a family (that although purchased separately) that bought about 60 freaking Milka bars. Um yeah, that’s a lot of chocolate.

Exhibit C………On my morning run to Albert today, I was in the bakery area and took advantage of the AKCE on some kind of breakfast pastry. I didn’t bother to read the name but I jumped at the 4.90Kc price. Anyway, I’m a sucker for beer/alcohol/wine on sale especially when it’s ‘foreign’ to my palate. All this sale stuff I buy could be complete shit but frankly, it’s ‘exotic’ to me so what the hell.

Hmmm, what’s that inside? Oh silly me, it’s chocolate. Ok, I’ll eat it. Poof! Magic! All gone!

I’m posting this pic because these little bastards are delicious. Not much more needs to be said when you have pecans in the mix. I don’t know what it’s called but I’m pretty sure there’s crack inside. *The pic looks oddly like a stock photo; it’s not. The white plate underneath just gives the illusion that this image is for an in-store demo.

Exhibit D………What else have I bought on sale, you ask? Well of course, I’ll tell you….. some locally produced wine! I’ve purchases cheap wine before, I’m not above doing so. I’m pretty far distances from being an oenophile, so I’m insulting nobody buy making poor choices in the vino department. This week the big AKCE was on wine labeled from Prague 4. F.Y.I., Prague 4 is pretty much in the heart of the city so it’s rather laughable that a bottled product is coming from somewhere in Nusle. While Tesco (and even Albert) have super SUPER cheap boxed wine for the homeless guys, this stuff was only about a half notch above that. I dropped a whopping 27Kc on a bottle of this stuff. Eh, it was fine but at least it was in a bottle.

Dramatic posing of said wine.

3. So as I type this it’s Saturday morning at 945. I’ve been up for two hours (boo!) and if I was a normal person, I’d go back to bed. Alas, this will not happen just yet. I should be in bed because I was out much later than usual last night. It’s always the nights that you don’t PLAN to stay out late that shit happens and you just do.

My friend Dita wanted to go for a beer. Cool by me; I’m always up for a good pivo. We went to Chapeau Rouge which is a bar/club here in Old Town/Prague 1. I’d heard of this place and a bunch of friends had been before, but last night I popped my Chapeau cherry. The vibe of the place is pretty cool. There’s tons of random stuff around and it’s kitschy and a bit funky. We sat at a table in the front and there is a hilarious display in the front window.

I’ll do my best at describing it…..Imagine if you will a ceramic Mary. Yeah, Mary as in, ‘I’m having a baby Joe, take my ass to Bethlehem,’ Mary. Mary is holding a tiny CD, she’s positioned in a bowl of plastic grapes which are flanked by wooden fish. Said bowl is underneath a small spinning disco ball. The bowl is situation on a turn table so yes, Mary is a turnin’. As she does her never-ending cycle of spins, it’s then you notice the plastic guns that surround the whole piece. The symbolism is quite obvious and I love it. Now of course to the Christian fundies this is all obviously very offensive and sacrelege. To the rest of us normal fucks, it’s just plain awesome.

So anyway, back to my story…. when we arrived at Chapeau, it was about 8:30. A fairly early evening out even for American standards. But, we arrived at a good time as we were able to commandeer a table and hold it all night. The place filled up relatively quickly but we had our seats. Most excellent.

Dita & I met some interesting folks during the night. First off I’ll say that Dita is Czech and since I don’t know shit about this language, we were speaking English all night. I’m not sure if it’s because people heard us speaking English but they found us more interesting and wanted to talk and practice their own English. One guy we met is a local camerman and he told us some interesting tales of his travels including one of his buddy who had a vital organ removed (no, not the normal hospital variety excision) when he was kidnapped in Peru. Yikes! This guy was nice enough and we got a free beer out of it. Free beer is my favorite kind.

Camerman dude left and then we met the interesting ones… Again, I think because they heard us speaking English is why they asked if they could roll a joint at our table. (Yes, people DO smoke in public here!) This was a trio consisting of 2 Czech guys and a Slovak girl. One of the Czech dudes (Ladislav!) lives in Ronkonkoma (Long Island) and has a Slovak stripper girlfriend. Yes, live the American dream, buddy! The other two were a couple oh and by the way, they were wearing latex. Yeah, latex. Chapeau Rouge isn’t a fetish bar. But this couple you could just TELL is really into some kinky shit. Anyway, George (latex man) was telling me how his latex is the most comfortable and breatheable (my word, not his) item of clothing he owns. That is, until the dancing and fucking happens (this time his words, not mine). So, this statement gave me the visual of him & his latex girlfriend going at it screaming dirty Czech words to each other while they bite and slap and kick their way out of sex harness/swing. Yikes.

All that said, this trio was pretty nice and friendly and the two guys spoke rather decent English. We split two joints with them and chatted away. (’Why yes, so nice of you to offer, I think I will have a toke!’) During this toke toke pass ritual, George then started telling me about some monthly ‘parties’ in Palmovka. (**Sidenote: I wrote about Palmovka in a blog a few months ago. This is an area of town that I referred to a Communist wasteland. Palmovka is NOT the pretty Prague. ) These ‘parties’ while I’m not exactly sure what goes on at these parties have regular ‘underground’ body modification sessions. George then went into detail about what kinds of body mods they do: piercings (um ok, fine sure yeah, whatever), burnings (WTF), scarrification (again WTF)…… I do not get the hardcore body mods at all. I’ve heard of scarrification but burnings? Who does that shit? But the best part? George gave me his e-mail so I can get on the ‘list’ to these parties. Check and done. Really.

4. Even though I live thousands of miles from ‘home,’ I still like to know what’s happening there. Occasionally, I’ll check the local paper and look at local party pics. I came across these while looking through pics from Taste of the Bluegrass.

Other than say The Joker, has anyone seen a grin like this before? It’s like infinity.

Seriously, WTF is up with her dress. A stupid ribbon/bow that goes right across the middle? I don’t know shit about fashion but I am positive this is shit. The guys from Project Runway would vomit cashmere over this.

And now she’s dancing. And what’s with the expression on the face of the woman in the middle. You just know the that the normal and cute friend regretted going out with those two that night. Too many bad photo ops!

5. It’s Saturday. It’s June. The sky is clear. I don’t have to work today. What am I going to do? I think it’s Brevnov Monastery this afternoon. And I’m bringing the tripod. Hotness.

And here’s a random image of my plush quarters here at Chez Andrea.

Note: this is where the magic is NOT happening

Yes, my desk is boring but this is where I spend most of my time. Imagine me sitting there now typing this.

Funny sidenote…. ok, the lowest window at the bottom behind the right door… there isn’t much visible. A while back I popped right up out of bed at 3am one night. I was wide awake. Of course I opened up my Mac and said hello the these here interwebs. Becuase my table/desk is situation just so, I can clearly see the windows of the flats across the street. In the aforementioned window I noticed a light on. And then I saw movement. I had a glimmer of hope that perhaps I could have been a bit of a voyeur that night and seen people having sex. Nope. Instead I saw something different. First, the normally closed curtains were wide open. There was a light on inside. At this point I’ll also mention that my street is one-way so it’s quite narrow and the buildings are closer than average. So, just inside the window and sitting in a chair was a man. A hot, sexy, strapping man, you ask? Ha, no. This was an old man. An old naked man. The chair was turned outward towards the street. This guy wasn’t doing anything sexual he was just sitting naked in his chair. Maybe he was smoking cigarettes or reading Newsweek. I don’t know how long he had been sitting there nor how long he continued to sit there but the curtains are now closed and the show is over.

First, here are a few images of some supplies I purchased at Lidl’s last week.

And note that although I only bought a few things, the total was 60-ish Kc. The beer was on sale for 5.90Kc. Yeah, that’s basically free.Well, it sat in the fridge long enough. I cracked open the infamous HAM ROLL.

You will be shocked to read that the mystery ham product was actually NOT that bad. It did have a slightly vinegary taste which my palate is not used to. I don’t know if that was part of the aspic or just a flavor component of the white cheese/non-cheese filling. I do not know and it’s hard to determine. But, I can confirm (as can you from the photos) that the layer of clear stuff was frightening. I prefer not to scrape, peel back, or scoop anything away from my food. The ham & questionable filling were encased in the stuff and although I’m fairly certain it’s entirely edible, I did not want to ingest a fork or spoon full of gelatinous clear stuff that looked like it came from a bone marrow transplant. Just the mere act of removing the strange and slightly wiggly top layer of ‘food’ is a strange set of motions. All in all, although the overall taste wasn’t gag-inducing, I probably won’t be buying another one of these. For a small fee though, I will gladly ship some back to my American friends! Overall? The ham roll just not something you crave after a long day of work. Give me a bag of Fritos and a nice beverage instead; you can keep your aspic encased meat burrito.

Well, it’s week two and the TEFL Gods have wasted no time throwing us to the wolves! Ok, that’s being dramatic; the TGs aren’t wolves, they are perfectly normal adults who just speak very little English. Shit.

We did a brief bit of classroom instruction (to real students–no, not children either) last week and then prepared a full lesson plan for today’s class. Now we’re in the thick of things and pretty much doing new lesson plans everyday. Today’s plan was a lexis (look it up, it will be ironic), and tomorrow’s plan is a listening exercise/lesson. Although the content isn’t terribly confusing, it’s devising efficient and well-structured lessons that the students ‘get.’ Of course the easy thing would be to just write down words and definitions on the board and ask if the class understands. The problem with that is people will usually say that they DO understand even when they do not. Also, admitting you don’t understand something is a confidence crusher as well as a bit embarrassing. That said, we are required to continually CCQ (concept check question) the material without blatantly saying a definition of a word. Synonyms were my friend today. I don’t know how the hell I’m going to instruct some abstract idea. Shit. Oh well, hopefully that will be for advanced students. The level I’m at this week is pre-intermediate (just above beginner) and it’s rather difficult to ‘dumb down’ your way of speaking and also noting what kind of verbal structure you are using. Eh…. All in all though, today’s lesson went well and I was told so and that makes me feel pretty pleased. Our actual ‘observation’ period has been next to nothing so cranking out lesson plans that ‘work’ has been a challenge. I supposed unless I drop my pants and take a shit on a Czech-English dictionary, it will probably be alright.

On the food front since I know some of you are interested…..

Food update… I have seen some very interesting meat-like items in the refrigerated case of the local grocery. I’ll get to that in a minute….

Again, I picked up a couple things to eat. (Keeping with my theme of getting a few unknown and known items, by the way.) I bought a small plastic container of what I thought was tuna salad. Not even owning a Czech-English dictionary, I can only go on pictures; also, the fact that I know about 10 Czech words doesn’t help in any shopping experience. So, since this container was clear, I examined the contents and the photo on the packaging and deduced that it was probably a rather innocuous tuna salad. Harmless, right?So, I’m back at the flat after class today wanting something to eat…Ah-ha! The tuna! I peeled the top back and it still totally looked like tuna salad. Ok, that’s good. Phew. Problem averted. Hungry stomach satiated.Ok, let’s try this thing…. with fork in hand, I freely took a bite and well, it wasn’t tuna. It was never tuna. Even if I close my eyes and click my heels three times, this shit is never going to be tuna. It’s basically a mayonnaise-y fish puree that is kept chilled probably to discourage any funky Euro bacteria invasion. Damn, I really need to get a friggin’ translating dictionary.

Ok, back to the other weird stuff I saw in the refrigerated case. In the same area as the non-tuna, there are several containers of various meats in various states of um…..suspension? (In the near future–I’ll buy one just to see how ‘interesting’ it is. Yes, of course–photos!) One (I don’t know what it’s called) of these items looks to be sliced deli meat (pork or chicken? The jury is out on that). Oh no, it’s not plain and boring deli meat. This thing is sliced meat wrapped around what could possibly be cream cheese? I am guessing on this. It’s white and looks rather thick. I’m a cream cheese girl but this uh….no thanks. Maybe this was the same stuff on my random sandwich from last week? Perhaps–just making associations here. So, we have the meat wrapped around white stuff and it’s encased in a clear gelatinous matter. I refuse to call it liquid as it is not. I think this particulate is the fourth state of matter also known as plasma. So, the meat rolls are sitting at the bottom of a clear solidified goo. The presentation is questionable at best and I also don’t understand the function of the solidified clear stuff. Is it for preservation? Is it just damn delicious? I believe it is used for the purpose of the former rather than truly being the latter. No way. Impossible. When I picked up a container of this stuff and turned it over, nothing inside moved. At all. Didn’t even budge. Maybe if I experimented with various temperatures the contents would shift and I could use the gelatinous hellspawn as some kind of household glue? It certainly appears to possess the properties of a commercial adhesive or maybe even a solvent.

INFOMERIAL!!!! Got paint on your favorite blouse? Need to clean up the boat for the Missus this weekend? Fuck Sham-Wow–this is the new shizz!! Why go ahead and bust out your pork cheese rolls and keep the clear stuff for miscellaneous chemical stains removal! Buy Mom a tube today!

Ok, I promise I’ll get a slideshow up here somehow. It’s just that every way I can think of to upload won’t work because of the file size. Problem number one is that I have copyrighted music on it and YouTube will mute any videos with said music. So, YouTube is not an option. If I could get it hosted directly on this site, I would would do so. However, due to the size of the show, uploading is impossible. Boo. I’ve also done the movie on Picasa & iMovie. iMovie turns the vid into a Quicktime video which is great but again….GRRR.

Update on the food pic from Facebook….The canned soup? Yeah, the stuff that I thought was completely innocuous and harmless? Fuck no. Bloody hell. I opened that thing up and it smelled bad which should have been a red flag. Bad as in masticated dog food. Secondly, after I microwaved it, the stuff smelled worse. It didn’t look appealing and although we ‘eat with our eyes’ first, that really isn’t an issue. Ok, first bite…. OH MY GOD WHAT THE HELL IS THAT MEAT? Eew, gross. The taste & texture was all wrong. No, no, no…. I ran the stuff through my translator only to find that it was pork liver soup. Granted, I hadn’t eaten liver in years and don’t recall liking it back then well…. nothing had changed. Fucking swill. I quickly dumped out that Devil’s juice and ate something else.

The bag of tortellini/dumplings? Meh, had some tonight. Not horrible but not great. They taste is a bit ‘off’ for some reason and they are kind of sour. What are they? I have no idea.

McDonald’s report–Big Macs are fine but the ’special sauce’ is more tart than what we’re used to in the U.S.The beer is still good and cheap. Hooray! I had some good local stuff last night. If you want to see where I ate dinner last night, check out http://www.deminka.com 

If you look up that site, be sure to roll over to the English menu–that option is in the upper right of your screen. We sat at the tables right in front of the rounded bar and I had the fried cheese app (under Deminka beer specials) and the Goulash. The beer? I had some local dark stuff–it’s the one with the longest name on the beer menu. Woo hoo!

The yogurt here is still delicious and I had one for ‘breakfast’ today which was chocolate and coconut. Oh, and the same company that made the pork flavored chips, also makes a paprika/pepper flavored chip and they are quite good as well.

If you read the previous entry detailing my cheap-ass meal purchased at Deal$, then you can appreciate this.

I can honestly say I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything packaged as ‘prebrowned.’ Maybe because it’s at the dollar store? A bag of Prebrowned Chicken Breast Chunk Fritters only sells for a paltry FOUR U.S. dollars? Sorry the quality of this pic is crappy–this was taken with my cell. Click thumbnail for larger version.

And since I’m on the food tip, here’s something I noticed while checking my Gmail account.  I had to investigate.

 Um, seriously? Yes, it’s real. French Fry Spam Casserole? I’m all about saving your money due to budget constraints buy why put such a horrible burden/agony/defeat/plague upon your own colon? Jesus H. Christ.

What is this crap about? Talk about tearing yourself a new one. There’s potential for peeling the paint off the walls. Damn. As my awesome Photoshopping indicates… EEW!

Here’s the latest iMovie installment. This required some stealth moves on my part as the neighbor was inside when I shot this.

As any American who hasn’t been living under a rock would know, The Girl Scouts of America make some damn good cookies. Depending on where you live the names of the cookies are slightly different but the recipes remain the same. My particular favorite is the Caramel DeLite/Samoa variety. 

I just took a shower and used some shower gel that smells exactly like the above mentioned cookies. And I’m not just talking about the coconut part, either. I mean to say the full kit & kaboodle: shortbread, chocolate, caramel and coconut. Too bad I’m single as I’d expect if my ass smells like a batch of Girl Scout cookies I’d be getting lucky tonight. Hooray for sex cookies! Hooray for cookie shower gel! 

On a side note…what a fucking idiot.

Well then, I have just the website for you. Like everyone else in the world, I get a moderate amount of interest while looking through other people’s personal items and being a bit nosy. No, I don’t go digging through purses or anything of the like but when you make a ‘find’ of something other than your own, it can be fun. I suggest you check out Found Magazine. It’s pretty cool. Go for the random ‘finds’ as they tend to be the best. Here are a few I screencapped this morning for your pleasure. Of course, as usual with small images, just click for the larger version.

This is completely unrelated to anything but I screencapped this a while ago and meant to upload.

This image was taken from Hulu.com. Hulu is a great site which offers freebie tv shows and movies with limited commercial interruptions. The streaming feed is usually really good so therefore, no sitting around waiting for the little clock to finish ‘buffering.’ Anyway, I was looking through their free movies and came across the above image.

Ok, first movie is Porky’s. Yep, absolutely a comedy. Lots of horny teens having sex with various goofball antics interspersed throughout. Animal House is the second on the list. Yep, another comedy for sure. Who hasn’t seen one of Belushi’s classics? Ok, third movie…. Fatal Attraction. Yeah sure, another comedy. Oh wait, what the fuck? I can’t figure out which is funnier–the part when Glenn Close’s character tries to kill herself or when the family rabbit gets boiled or when GC just goes fuckng batshit crazy on Michael Douglas for most of the movie… Hmmm, tough call.

Good God, using Wordpress is so easy. I heart it. That said, I’m blogging twice in one day. I know, quite a feat.

So, as promised I’m posting a pic of the neighbor’s latest poop pile. Although this photo doesn’t fully display the record number of poos stored in plastic bags, I still think it’s awesome and hilarious in a gross kind of way.

While the last image of the purple bagged doggie poo was more cohesive in an aesthetic kind of way, this one just really piled up. Perhaps I should have photographed from eye-level rather than above so one could truly experience this visual masterpiece. Oh well. As I said in the previous post, I presumed there to be approximately a dozen or so in that pile; I’m upping that count this time and going for a 15 ballpark. No, I did not pick any specimens up I’m just going on what I saw.

Here’s something interesting I learned about my neighbor… My neighbor on the other side is a coworker and he saw her outside a few nights ago. He told me that she had apparently taken the dog outside to the front lawn of the apartment building so that said pooch could do some business. Neighbor lady then proceeded to bag up the poo and add it to the pile at the door. WTF, dude. If you are already OUT THERE why not take the stuff and toss it over the rail into the dumpster. For any reader who has never been to my apartment building, the dumpster is maybe 25 yards away and you don’t even have to use any stairs to get to it. It’s that fucking easy. So, the pile of poo is now just a pile of mystery. It’s a quandary, a conundrum and an enigma all tied into neat little grocery bags. Hell, it’s a pile of shit.

On another note, here’s the latest installment of WHAT’S IN MY REFRIGERATOR THIS WEEK…..

Yes, that is a nice round number of 18 beers. And it was a belated birthday gift that came as the Best of Belgium beer pack. Ahhhh. Go try a Leffe Blonde right now; it’s one of my all time favorites! I have the best friends! Thanks Alli May!