Category Archives: Wild Beasts

January 1, 2016 · 0:00

Hillary’s Chicken

Yesterday, I braved the grocery store to come up with an edible antidote to 2015.

I found myself pacing the aisles of the local Giant Foods, and well, I heard voices.  Or a voice.

If I were a Republican, I would have assumed it was God.

Jesus Meme

But as it was, I realized I was talking to myself.  Chanting.  And naturally I listened.  I’m not crazy, you know.

The Voice, my voice, told me what to do.  What to get.  How to do it.  And I saw that it would be good.

You see, I remembered a long-ago gift from my niece that actually held the secret antidote to 2015.  Only I had forgotten about it.

Congressional Cookbook

The Congressional Club Cook Book, Copyright 1987, The Congressional Club, Washington, DC

Yup.  Who woulda thunk that an antidote would be in a cookbook!  But this one is special.  You see, it was published in 1987, when the folks in government still believed that the government has an important role in the country.  When the government is, essentially, how we all contribute to improving our society.  Educating our kids, making workplaces safer, the air and the water and the land cleaner.  Yeah, I know it was published at the end of the Reagan years, but that cancer hadn’t yet metastasized.

Here’s the antidote to 2015:

Hillary’s Chicken.

Hillalry's Chicken

Congressional Club Cook Book, 1987, at page 266

As you can see from years of cooking smears, this is a well-used recipe.  It is simple and delicious. And I’m going to make it for New Years’ Day — and often between now and November.

Because while this woman eats chicken.  She is NOT a chicken.

Hillary Clinton at Bengazi hearings -- LA Times Photo

Hillary Clinton, Testifying for 11 hours at the Bengazi show trial.  Photo Image, LA Times

And the GOP?  I see little evidence that the GOP clowns are anything but chicken, can you?

Air Force

Google Image

 

Happy New Year!

 

***

 

It’s a little hard to read the instructions from this picture —

Combine all sauce ingredients, mixing until well blended.  Wipe each piece of chicken dry and coat well with sauce.  Place chicken,skin side up, in shallow baking pan.Tuck edges under, forming a compact shape, about 1-1/2 inches thick.  Roast in preheated oven at 450 degrees, basting occasionally with pan drippings.  Bake until opaque nearly to center, about 14-18 minutes, depending on thickness.  Remove to warm plates.  Spoon pan juices over chicken and sprinkle with parsley.  Makes 4 servings.  May be frozen.

83 Comments

Filed under 'Merica, 2016, All The News You Need, All We Are Saying Is Give Peace A Chance, ¿Jeb!, Bat-shit crazy, Beating that Dead Horse, Bloggin' Buddies, Books, Climate Change, Conspicuous consumption, Crazy Folks Running, Criminal Activity, Disgustology, Do GOP Voters Actually THINK?, Elections, Elections Matter, Global Warming, GOP, Growing up, Holidays, Huh?, Humiliation, Humor, Just Do It and I'll Shut Up!, keys to success, laughter, Mental Health, Peace, Politics, Pooders, Taking Care of Each Other, Voting, Washington, Where does the GOP get these guys?, Wild Beasts, WTF?

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , ,

December 16, 2015 · 0:00

Jerks with Joysticks

Yes, I did watch some of it.  Last night’s GOP debate.

Oh Look! They're Circling the Circus Wagons! NYTimes Image

Oh Look! They’re Circling the Circus Wagons! NY Times Image

I actually watched as these clowns stroked themselves and postured about who was more willing to kill innocent men women and children.

These men (sorry, Carly, but you’re not ready for prime time) are revolting.  Jerks with Joysticks, fondling themselves while they play at war.

Only it’s not a game.  And all their fear-mongering does is breed more fear.  Well and hatred.  It breeds that too.  It’s a two-fer!

Elections matter.

 

34 Comments

Filed under 'Merica, 2016, Adult Traumas, All The News You Need, All We Are Saying Is Give Peace A Chance, ¿Jeb!, Bat-shit crazy, Being an asshole, Campaigning, Cancer on Society, Crazy Folks Running, Disgustology, Do GOP Voters Actually THINK?, Elections, Elections Matter, Farts, GOP, Gross, Huh?, Humiliation, Hypocrisy, Oh shit, Political Corruption, Politics, Shit, Shit happens, Stupidity, Taking Care of Each Other, Useful thing to do with poop, Vote, Voting, Where does the GOP get these guys?, Wild Beasts, WTF?

Tagged as , , , , , , , , , , , , ,

December 14, 2015 · 0:00

‘Grave’ Therapy

Over the years, I’ve had to do some pretty weird things for work, had to work for some  weird people.  And while I have sometimes felt that my job was hell, and that it would be the death of me, well, I never thought that it would lead me to an early grave.  Or an early casket.

Possibly among the things I’ve hated most have been those retreat-thingys organized by HR.

For the most part, I’ve gotten along with folks I worked with.  Still, I find HR retreats — with their artificial conviviality — uncomfortable.  And even I, who willingly tells my most embarrassing stories to the whole world, finds doing so in a closed room to folks I work with when I don’t choose the timing — awkward.  They always seem so false, so forced.  Perhaps because they are.

Work-Life Balance

Google Images

Never again will I complain though.  Because as bad as things seem, they can always be worse.  MUCH WORSE.

Today I found out just how much worse things could be.

Yup, I read on my new BBC App that some Korean companies are holding mass funerals.  For their employees.  For their LIVE employees.

According to the article as well as independent sources, the Korean suicide rate is quite high, because folks are seriously stressed out.  Of course that is a serious situation — so much is expected of employees that they just can’t take it.

So, to alleviate the stress, somebody came up with a colorful approach to stress reduction.  [Please don’t tell my boss.*]

Well, they hold a company retreat, of sorts, many companies worldwide do that too.

But this one has a twist.  Or maybe it’s just twisted.  Perhaps both.

You see, they have groups of employees all get together, and write farewell letters to their families.  As if they are about to kill themselves.  Then, while gathered in a room with the folks they work with, they stand next to empty coffins.

The participants at this session were sent by their employer, human resources firm Staffs. “Our company has always encouraged employees to change their old ways of thinking, but it was hard to bring about any real difference,” says its president, Park Chun-woong. “I thought going inside a coffin would be such a shocking experience it would completely reset their minds for a completely fresh start in their attitudes.”

Yes.  They get into the fucking coffins!

Let me reiterate:  You go to work one day, and head off for a company retreat, knowing that it will be an awkward, wasted day and that you are already way behind in your work.

Then they have you write a suicide note and put you into a coffin.

lyingincoffins

BBC Photo, I’m guessing. Because while it came from the article linked to above, there is no credit given. Perhaps the photographer did not want to disrespect the, umm, un-dead.

The idea is to make employees feel that their lives are worth living.  However, I think that if someone forced me into a coffin, I would be thinking long and hard about my career choice.

And about litigation.  I would definitely be thinking about suing the shit out of somebody.

So the next time you decide you hate your job, count yourself lucky.  Because things aren’t really all that bad unless they trade your cubicle for a pine box.

***

*My current boss would never do this.  She’s a doctor.  She tries to keep people OUT of coffins.  But there have been other bosses …

 

 

71 Comments

Filed under ; Don't Make Me Feel Perky Tonigh, Adult Traumas, All The News You Need, All We Are Saying Is Give Peace A Chance, Bat-shit crazy, DON'T go back to your day job either, Huh?, Humiliation, Humor, Mental Health, Oh shit, Seriously funny, Seriously weird, Shit, Stupidity, Why the hell do I tell you these stories?, Wild Beasts, WTF?

Tagged as , , , , ,

December 5, 2015 · 0:00

The NY Times — Right on Target

On the front page of today’s New York Times is an editorial I could easily have written. If I could write that well.  If I worked for the NYTimes.  If I had millions of readers who’d nod and say “Right On!”

Silence on Guns - Eiko Ojala NYT

Image credit:  Eiko Ojala – for the New York Times, 12/4/15

Actually I’m mixing this image from an editorial published yesterday in the NY Times.  Because like me, the NY Times believes that we need sensible gun laws.  And so they, like me, keep beating that dead horse.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Here’s today’s front page editorial reproduced in full:

End the Gun Epidemic in America

By DEC. 4, 2015

Half staff - Doug Mills - The NYTimes

Doug Mills for the New York Times


 All decent people feel sorrow and righteous fury about the latest slaughter of innocents, in California. Law enforcement and intelligence agencies are searching for motivations, including the vital question of how the murderers might have been connected to international terrorism. That is right and proper.

But motives do not matter to the dead in California, nor did they in Colorado, Oregon, South Carolina, Virginia, Connecticut and far too many other places. The attention and anger of Americans should also be directed at the elected leaders whose job is to keep us safe but who place a higher premium on the money and political power of an industry dedicated to profiting from the unfettered spread of ever more powerful firearms.

It is a moral outrage and a national disgrace that civilians can legally purchase weapons designed specifically to kill people with brutal speed and efficiency. These are weapons of war, barely modified and deliberately marketed as tools of macho vigilantism and even insurrection. America’s elected leaders offer prayers for gun victims and then, callously and without fear of consequence, reject the most basic restrictions on weapons of mass killing, as they did on Thursday. They distract us with arguments about the word terrorism. Let’s be clear: These spree killings are all, in their own ways, acts of terrorism.

Opponents of gun control are saying, as they do after every killing, that no law can unfailingly forestall a specific criminal. That is true. They are talking, many with sincerity, about the constitutional challenges to effective gun regulation. Those challenges exist. They point out that determined killers obtained weapons illegally in places like France, England and Norway that have strict gun laws. Yes, they did.

But at least those countries are trying. The United States is not. Worse, politicians abet would-be killers by creating gun markets for them, and voters allow those politicians to keep their jobs. It is past time to stop talking about halting the spread of firearms, and instead to reduce their number drastically — eliminating some large categories of weapons and ammunition.

It is not necessary to debate the peculiar wording of the Second Amendment. No right is unlimited and immune from reasonable regulation.

Certain kinds of weapons, like the slightly modified combat rifles used in California, and certain kinds of ammunition, must be outlawed for civilian ownership. It is possible to define those guns in a clear and effective way and, yes, it would require Americans who own those kinds of weapons to give them up for the good of their fellow citizens.

What better time than during a presidential election to show, at long last, that our nation has retained its sense of decency?

* * * * * * * * * * * * * *

It’s me again.

Yes I know that I keep beating this dead horse.  I know that we are all feeling hopeless.  But really, it is up to us.  And the remedy can be found in the ballot box.  Gun Control must be a make or break criteria for any vote we cast in 2016 and beyond.  Because the folks in office today are cowards.  They fear the retribution of citizens over gun control legislation.  So let’s show them that they work for us.  For the US.  Not just for the NRA.

Elections Matter.

 

39 Comments

Filed under 'Merica, 2016, All The News You Need, All We Are Saying Is Give Peace A Chance, Beating that Dead Horse, Campaigning, Crazy Folks Running, Criminal Activity, Disgustology, Elections, Elections Matter, Gun control, Health, Health and Medicine, Huh?, Humor, Hypocrisy, Just Do It and I'll Shut Up!, Peace, Shit, Stupidity, Vote, Voting, Wild Beasts, WTF?

Tagged as , , , , , , ,

November 25, 2015 · 0:00

Mom’s Most Memorable Meal

Today as I prepare a million different dishes for Thursday’s feast, I thought I’d share (for a second time) another family story, about the year my Mom forgot her turkey.  I’m pretty sure you’ll buy fresh from now on.  I certainly do!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING!

It seems like just the other day that I was talking about folks to whom strange things just happen.  Maybe that’s because it was just the other day that I told this story.

I have a secret, though.  I’m not the only person in my family with this, ummm, gift for attracting the strange and humorous.  Dad used to say that if there was a weirdo within 5 miles of him, that weirdo would find Dad and have a nice long chat.  But if something weird was going to happen, well, it would happen to Mom.  Somehow I managed to inherit both weirdness magnets.  Sigh.

But this is Mom’s story.

Mom wasn’t the bird lover in our family.  Dad was.  So I should have known something weird had happened when Mom identified a bird I was looking at from a distance.  Mom and Dad were visiting John and I in Connecticut.  She and I were driving not far from our house one day in about 1990, and I pulled over to look at the large birds circling above us.  Back then large predatory birds soaring were still an unusual sight — when I saw those large silhouettes, I always assumed they were eagles.  I mean, what else could it be?  I kept trying to get a good look.

“They’re turkey vultures,” Mom said with complete certainty.  “We see them all the time at home in Florida.”

You lookin' for me? (Google image, natch)

They weren’t eagles?
(Google image, natch)

“Turkey vultures?” I said, not believing her for a minute.  I’d never even heard of such a creature.  Mom pursed her lips and looked back at me, slightly annoyed that I was questioning her (never seen before) bird identification skills.

I should have been suspicious.  I should have know there was a story behind Mom’s new-found large bird expertise.  I should have known that something weird was involved.

“They’re really big.  And up close, they really do look just like turkeys.”

“When did you ever get ‘up close’ to a turkey vulture, Mom?”

She tried to avoid the question.

“Mom….” It was never too hard to get Mom to tell her stories.  Something else we have in common.  “Fess up…”

“It wasn’t my fault.  That refrigerator at home is just too small.”

“Huh?”

“Well, it happened last Thanksgiving, but I didn’t want to tell you,” she laughed.  “I knew I’d never hear the end of it.”

“Mom …”

“Dad and I went to the grocery store on Saturday, as usual, the weekend before Thanksgiving,” she continued.  “And we bought a frozen turkey for Thanksgiving Dinner.”

“OK.”  I wasn’t catching on.

“Well, it was a frozen turkey.  Frozen solid.  You know it takes days to thaw those things.  You might as well try to melt an iceberg.  I put it into the roasting pan and placed it on the counter to thaw.  But I kept having to move it around that tiny kitchen to do anything else.  Then, on Sunday night when I was making dinner, I needed my counter.  So I put the still rock hard turkey into the carport.”

“Mom, doesn’t your carport get pretty warm?  It is in Florida, after all.”

“Well, that wasn’t really the problem,” she said, laughing.  “Not exactly, anyhow.  Or not at first.  The problem was that I forgot I’d left the turkey there.  I woke up Thursday morning, ready to get started on Thanksgiving Dinner and couldn’t find my turkey!  I thought I was going nuts.  I knew we had bought one.  ‘Where’d you put my turkey?’ I asked your father, accusingly.  ‘I didn’t do anything with it.  Did it get up and walk away?’ he asked.  And then I remembered – ‘Oh Lord, it’s in the carport.  I hope it’s still OK to eat.’”

“I went out the door to find the carport  filled with turkey vultures–I don’t even know how many were in there.  They were sitting on the car, on the workbench.  On the floor.  Everywhere!  And you know, they really do look just like turkeys.  They have those red heads and bulging eyes.  They had torn the packaging apart and were eating our Thanksgiving turkey!  I sent your father out to shoo them all away.  And then he had to go to Publix to get something for our feast.”

I roared.  So did she, remembering.

“I told him to get a piece of beef to roast.  I’d had enough birds for a while.”

Mom was absolutely right.  Turkey vultures look a whole lot like turkey turkeys.  Especially after they’ve just had Thanksgiving dinner.

Oh, and her instinct was right — she should never have told me this story.  She never did hear the end of it!

HAPPY THANKSGIVING to my fellow ‘Mericans!

To those who aren’t over indulging this week, can I send you a few pounds?

37 Comments

Filed under 'Merica, Adult Traumas, Bat-shit crazy, Bloggin' Buddies, Conspicuous consumption, Cool people, Crazy family members, Diet tips, Disgustology, Driving, Family, History, Holidays, Huh?, Humiliation, Humor, laughter, Love, Missing Folks, Mom, Mom would die of embarrassment, Oh shit, Pets, Wild Beasts, WTF?

Tagged as , , , , , ,