Big Dude, Little Dog

As promised, heartwarming photos of dudes with Carson.

First, my uncle Dennis:



And a great one of Josh:



As he mentioned, Josh and I had a lovely visit, which involved some fine beers at Strange Brew, breakfast at a diner where there's Scripture on the back of the menu, and plenty of dog-related hijinks.


Here is Josh, settling down with his bunkmates. He woke up with at least two of Carson's toys in his bed.

We've decided that we're going to move to Paris to become garbagemen.... 8 weeks of vacation!

I think I might be in a codependent relationship.

With a Chihuahua, that is. He waits for me to come home at night, sleeps under my covers or around my neck, and just this evening followed me into the bathroom and camped out on the mat while I took a shower. It's getting quite intense.

In other Carson news, I'm going to begin posting my photo series, "Big Dude, Small Dog." I have a few shots of the little guy being held by men, and, well, I can't keep them to myself. Furthermore, any men who find themselves near me, a camera, and The Dude, would do well to smile and say cheese.

So, here are those inaugural photos (courtesy of Gil):

Here are Seth and Carson, engaged in a meeting of the minds.



Here, Chris has discovered how the Chihuahua is fully-poseable.


Not bad, right? Come Thanksgiving, I'll likely be able to trick my uncles and family friends into picking him up. Stay tuned.

Sooo.... I'm back in New Hampshire. I was going to post a lengthy treatise on the New York weekend's activities, but realized there are only so many ways you can write about eating, drinking, and sleeping before you start to seem like some kind of lazy, lushy glutton. I could also write about the magical land of Berlin, located in (The Interminable State of) Connecticut, where Mapquest took me needlessly on the drive home. I saw many strip malls (featuring Home Depot, Chile's, Panera Bread, Staples, etc.), Adult DVD and Video stores , and traffic lights. I also nearly ran over a hitchhiker (by accident).

The highlight of my return is the mysterious resurrection of my iPod (might have to rename it "Lazarus," from "The Pookah McPhellimey"....oh, I'm a nerdlinger. You'd better frickin' believe it.). Seriously. I don't know what happened, but I do know that I won't have to scan through a million radio stations playing James Blunt and Nickleback. And that makes me unimpeachably happy.

Sometime soon I'll give you denizens of the Interweb a rundown of my most recent trip the Russian and Turkish Baths, unless Claire beats me to it. At the moment, I find I'm in the throes of fighting off a nasty cold. I may enlist my mother and her laryngoscope to determine whether there are, in fact, hedgehogs living in my throat. Mean little hedgehogs with fiery spines. 'Til then, it's grapefruit juice, AirBorne, and lemons for me. All that Vitamin-C has the extra effect of activating my adamantium blood. Excellent.

Tomorrow, with any luck (and hedgehogs willing), I'll get cracking on a loaf of Bittman's slow-fermenting bread. Then, I'll put my oar in here. Stay tuned. Come on over if you'd like to be a guinea pig.

Diwali is a festival of lights....

I was tempted to congratulate myself on posting so hot on the heels of my last effort, but then I realized that these photos are a week old and, well...

Anyway, here are some pictures of my compatriots at work on the night of Halloween and a few from the previous Saturday, which was Halloween, (drunkenly) Observed For the Purposes of Partying. The chronology may be a little bitched up, but stay with me.

Here's Dan[imal], the nighttime grill cook. His official costume on Saturday night was Clean Sanchez, superhero who fights crimes of the sexually perverse. His Halloween night costume was hat-based to avoid long sleeves catching fire and whatnot, so he sort of looked more like a Gay Mexican. Here he displays a plate of chicken nachos.
















Here's my boss, Aeva, and her mother, Jess. At 14 months, Aeva is deeply enamored of skeletons and scary witches, but Jess's chicken costume was more than she could take. She ran away when Jess made her first appearance....





















Aeva, as you can see, was dressed as a laser of cute. So... much... cute.
















Here's Chelsea, dressed as a pink bunny. Heather, in the background, was an elven archer, replete with pointy ears.




















Jen, a beer wench.




















Mike, sporting another hat-based costume. It's at a jaunty angle, to the north-east.
















Izzy's barber-shop quartet-style hat.
















John, dressed as "Random things found in the restaurant's office." Smashing.




















Josh told fortunes whilst washing dishes.




















Jay, one of the fabulous bartenders, as a sleepy cowboy. Sure can't quit him.




















Amy, a woodland fairy. She also had pointy ears.




















Here's Aeva, again, inspecting our decorations. Note how she's not frightened of the witch hiding behind the tree.
















This is me, perhaps the day after Halloween, sporting one half of The Great American Hat Swap of 2006. Mike took my awesome tweedy hat on tour with his band, and left this Fidel-ish one in exchange. It's a new plateau in our friendship, you see.




















Rewind to Saturday. Bridget, jetlag up the wazoo, dressed as Little Red Riding Hood and ready to party.



















I got all pirated up and off we went to see aforementioned local band play in Manch-Vegas. Here's an extreme close-up at the show.














Juliana, decked out as a fabulous Cleopatra.



















Then I got distracted and didn't take any more blog-worth photos.... so let's fast-forward back to Halloween and the super cute parade of children that went by the restaurant in the middle of the day.

Here's a kid dressed as Gene Simmons from KISS, mugging for the camera.
















A cowgirl, replete with horse. Soooo cute.















Here's another good one... a praying mantis.
















And, the thing de la resistance: a tornado! He has little matchbox cars and whatnot glued to body of the tornado. He was a rather intense little kid, and the costume was a bit unweildy, but I tip my cap to him. Very cute and creative, considering the eleventy billion kids in Darth Vader outfits.

mm mmm good.

On my days off, I try to do a bit of cooking. A stew, some cookies... something to exercise the stove and my culinary mind. I'm thinking about imposing a sort of Iron Chef challenge upon myself (a couple of ingredients and away I go) one of these days, to start getting a little creative. Then perhaps I'll post the results here...

Anyway, here are a few pictures of my latest kitchen efforts.


One of the many benefits of a giant stove, is the ability to roast all of your Anaheim chiles at the same time. These little beauties later went into a beef stew.
















Here's a Guinness Gingerbread, set to cool on the empty beer bottle. I've had a request for the recipe, and I wish I could take credit, but it's from epicurious.com. I tend to use the bundt pan,
because it's pretty, but a loaf of it would be easier to transport to parties or potlucks. I also double the amount of cardamom (duh). Also, since the recipe only calls for a cup of stout, you get to drink the rest of the bottle (a nice perk).















Stay tuned... I've been cooking up a storm for an upcoming house party, so I'll be posting pics of those things eventually.

Many days late, a couple bucks short.

So, here are a few pictures from the lovely Columbus Day visit of Claire, Erin, and Seth. I didn't have my shit together to take pictures all through the weekend, so these are just a selection from the apple picking trip. Erin is not feature in these, as she was "visiting" her "sister" in "Boston" that day.








Here's Claire, doing her best William Tell's son impression in the lovely Mapadot Orchard in my town.
















Seth, juggling apples. Show-off. I managed to drop an apple onto my own head off of a branch. Now THAT takes talent.
















Here are Claire and Seth, desperately trying to tell the difference between Monroes and MacIntoshes. We later threw some Corlandts into the mix. It was chaos.
















As you can tell, it's very nice up here in New Hampshire... dontcha want to visit???

 

When you send a gang of dudes out into the woods in the middle of the night to get firewood, you may find they come back with dead trees taller than themselves. You may also find that they make quite the ruckus in the process. Then, there's the occasional splinter the size of a two-by-four.



The other thing about building campfires with a bunch of dudes is that they become determined to get the thing burning higher and hotter than any campfire you've ever seen. I do believe we were able to do some smelting over this one after we'd finished making our s'mores.


This is me, whittling a marshmallow-roasting stick. Shortly after this photo was taken, the boys wrestled me to the ground, took away the stick, threw it into the fire, and then ran around the fire beating their chests and howling at the moon.
 

Y'know what's fun? Building campfires. Also, nearly setting your shoes on fire (Bridget) by said campfire.


It's also fun to take group photos by campfires. Here's a picture of me 'n' the sisters, looking very much from the same gene pool:


And then the gang, less Gil who is operating the photopicture machine:

 

It's hard to say "leaf peeping" without giggling.

Well, we're neck-deep in "leaf peeping" season here in New England. It's not quite peak foliage yet, but we're getting there, so it's time to batten down the hatches and prepare for slow drivers, directions-seekers, and people who just want a Mich Light, but only after hearing what we have on tap (happened to me again yesterday). I'm not really complaining, as the "peepers" (giggle) keep the tips a-streaming in, but dear God. A Mich Light (or, heaven forfend, Ultra)? Listen to the voice of reason (me), and have an Otter Creek Stovepipe Porter. It's fucking brilliant, and you and I will respect each other in the morning. Sigh.

But, you can see why people are flooding across our borders to have a looksee. It's very pretty.


The highlight of yesterday's double shift was pouring my first real Black & Tan. Oh mercy me, it was fun. And... AND the dude (who's actually a chef) said it was the best Black & Tan he's ever had. Perfect halves, perfectly separated (looked like they were made of gelatin), perfect finger's width of head. I really outdid myself (such that I fucked up his second one... too much Guinness). I didn't take a picture, but there were witnesses. It was a thing of beauty.

In other news, today was Gus's first foray into the great outdoors. Observe his Gusness, surveying his new kingdom:




It was a trying week for Gussy. He was unceremoniously stuffed into a carrier (not the same one as before, mind you, but he still escaped it... should have named him Houdini) and brought to the vet on Monday. He got locked in the attic twice, and then I cruelly lured him outside to explore. Though, I turn my back for two seconds and he disappears into a crawlspace (I assume.. he may have just disapparated) under the porch. Oops. He eventually emerged, covered in dirt and cobwebs, only to find another crawlspace in our creepy cellar a few hours later. Needless to say, he's been quite intrepid in his exploration of the farm.

In other news, the "companion oven" in our bitchin' stove has a proofing setting. That means I can let bread dough rise in a warm, draught-free environment. Pretty hot, right? I've put it to the test and it's pretty awesome. Dad and I have agreed that we'll call the oven The Piano, after the wood-fired oven of Jacques Pepin's apprenticeship. It's quite a bit fancier, but given how we regard it, it seems appropriate.

So, if anyone comes up here peeping at leaves (teehee), stop on by. I've got loaves of Molasses Oatmeal Bread.

Another day, another shitty bottled beer.

So, I've been waiting tables at a pub here in New Hampshire. I've only worked 5 shifts, and while I'm not really good at it yet, it's interesting (after 5 shifts... I imagine that will soon morph to "annoying" and then later, in several months, perhaps "soul-crushing") to be serving the drinking public. I'm interested in what people drink.

According to the liquor class we had this week, 35% of wine coolers consumed in the U.S. is by underage drinkers (the other 65% would be.... people with no taste buds?).

Also according to the liquor class from this week, the number 1 purchased edible good in New England is Budweiser beer. Number 2 is Bud Light.

The pub where I work has many more interesting beers than Bud and Bud Light (though we do have those in bottles). I enjoy rattling off what we have on draft, and even utzing people into drinking some of my favorite brews. And I'm always confounded when they slip through my grasp and drink swill. Sample conversation from today:

Customer: "What do you have on tap?"
Me: "Guinness, Harp, Bass, Newcastle Brown Ale, Hoegaarden, Pennichuck Engine #5 Red Ale (brewed locally, and my personal favorite), Wolaver's Organic Brown Ale, Geary's Hampshire Special Ale, Long Trail IPA, and Harpoon Oktoberfest."

A handsome selection, no? Surely you can find something there to wet your whistle? Just wait...

Customer: Pause. "I'll have a Mich Light."

Then he took his fork and poked me in the eye.

OK, so maybe everyone has a right to drink what they like, but jeeeez. Mich Light? To our regular patrons' credit, we have some sophisticated beer drinkers in our midst. The 9% Geary's HSA is a staple on our taps. And for every person I encourage into the local Engine 5, there are another two who've had it and love it.

In other beer news, I poured two pints of Guinness yesterday and they both came out perfectly. Like, perfect head and everything. It was awesome.

In non-beer news, here's the view from one of the windows in my room:



I also took this picture to document Carson's war of attrition to become Gus's friend. He has two approaches: 1) bark and make gremlin noises until Gus runs under my bed, and 2) Inch closer to the cat as he sleeps and then pretend to be asleep as well. This is an occurence of the latter.

Here's the first shot, which is pretty close for a cautious cat and an excitable Chihuahua.



And then, five minutes later:



Shortly after this was taken, I believe Carson fell back on the barking and gremlin-noise approach, so Gus went under the bed to wait it out. I expect Carson believes that Gus will eventually give up on this "run and hide" nonsense as long as he's persistent. I'll keep you updated on how it goes.

And finally, my "thing de la resistance." This sign was spotted by me when Hayley pulled the car over this evening on the way home from driver's ed. Apparently we neglected to put the top down all the way, so the car was dinging indignantly (you see, the visibility is better in the convertible when the top's down, and Hayley's learning to drive, so we want everything to be as visible as possible, even if that means freezing my butt off in the passenger seat). I took the picture without the flash, because I was afraid somone would come running out of the shop thinking I was some kind of terrorist (in a black hoodie, chaufferred in a Volvo convertible by a 17 year old student driver). It didn't come out all that well, but I hope you can read it.




Yes. That would be the "It's Never To Late" bridal shop.

Well, they got the apostrophe....