From those guys at Blendtec and their popular “Will it Blend?” series of viral videos comes a new as-of-yet unannounced program entitled “Will it Fly?”. Seems they have brought in the services of a professional Emo who is outfitting various cars with wings from a Cessna, an F-16, a barnstormer, a hang glider, a Fokker Red Baron Triplane, and the dare-devil-you-ain’t-seen-nothing-yet 197-foot wide wing from a new 787 Dreamliner attached to a CRX Turbo modded Honda “whip”. Sorry guys for the spoilers, but I hate these winged wonders, even if they do prove to fly.
What We Eat
Inspired by the book Hungry Planet: What the World Eats by Peter Menzel, I took today’s photo to show what Caroline and I will eat in a typical week, minus restaurant visits. Our food costs for grocery shopping are about $120 per week which does not include meat. With Caroline being a vegetarian I have found it easy and satisfying to only cook vegetarian meals at home. When my meat craving strikes I go out. What foods are pictured and what we will eat over the coming week are as follows:
Homemade pomegranate syrup (used for making Fesen Jan), cauliflower, Napa Valley Grapeseed Oil, Bates & Schmitt Apple Balsamic Vinegar, fresh mint, fresh thyme, sweet butter from Spain, goat and water buffalo yogurt, flaxseed oil, orange juice, collard greens, cashews, pine nuts, currants, celery, Roma tomatoes, limes, jalapenos, brown eggs, fresh corn, red bananas, Himalayan pink crystal salt, chipotle chilies, walnuts, organic pasta, Kala chana (black chickpeas), red onions, nectarines, green beans, margarine (used for making Ethiopian flavoring), Nanak paneer (Indian cheese), tofu, bell peppers, carrots, cilantro, potatoes, pattypan squash, soy kielbasa, Sprecher soft drinks, brown rice, fresh coconut, blueberries, green peas, gobi mix (Indian cauliflower dish), vegetable Tawa mix, vegetable biryani mix. Most of our fruits and veggies are organic. Missing from the photo are curry leaves, fresh dill, parsley, strawberries, Thai green chilies, yellow split peas, and homemade sauerkraut.
So, what does one make with the above? Here are some of the planned dishes:
Herbed rice with currants marinated in oil, thyme, and balsamic vinegar
Yellow split pea stew and gomen (Ethiopian-style stew and collard greens)
Fesen Jan with tofu and veggies (Iranian pomegranate and walnut dish)
Vegetable Tawa (a veg dish from India)
Vegetable Biryani (rice dish from India)
Sauerkraut and sausage
Kala Chana dal and gobi (dishes from India)
Smoothies or eggs with veggies for breakfast, dinner leftovers for Caroline’s lunch.
Drunk and Cooking
Bored in Phoenix with nothing to do? Try getting drunk and falling asleep at one of our local bus stops on a 115-degree day. If you are drunk enough you won’t recognize that you are baking to death. After taking this photo I stuck a fork in this guy, but he budged, so I assumed he wasn’t done yet. I came back later but someone had apparently stolen my dinner.
Buy Now, Or I’ll Punch You
A local Phoenix, Arizona car dealer has the bright idea that if he features this bigger-than-life Lucha Libre inflatable superhero that more people will stop and buy cars. Lucha Libre in Mexico is what is known on this side of the border as professional wrestling. So, just what is it that motivates someone driving by to register: Hey, there’s an inflatable Lucha libre man and at the same time they are selling cars, I think I have to stop and maybe buy one. Personally, I stopped because I thought this was from a new Japanese anime series and might be the hottest new thing in Mecha.
Bighorn
While up on Mt Washburn early in our trip to Yellowstone, we passed a large herd of bighorn sheep near the summit. Still clad with partial winter coats, these sheep could not have been any more relaxed. My temptation to walk up and pet one was tempered by some semblance of understanding that these wild “strong” animals would probably simply knock me off the 10,000-foot mountain I was currently standing on had I gotten too close. Yeah, sure, I admit it, I had the same lame idea about the bear.
Are You A Bear?
We were out for a drive just this past Saturday afternoon heading towards the eastern park entrance there in Yellowstone, but the road, which was under construction, unpaved, with no guardrails, at a scary high elevation with impatient idiots tailgating us, forced an early turnaround. Lucky for us, a few miles back near Yellowstone Lake was the tell-tale sign that an animal had been sighted, meaning half a dozen cars piled up on the side of the road with heads gawking out of windows. Strangely enough, these people were looking towards our side of the road, and there were no vehicles sitting on that side, so we pulled right up, and seemingly out of nowhere, this black bear was pawing about the ground, looking for something or other. In the excitement of seeing a bear this close, you wouldn’t believe how difficult it is to take one picture in focus, even if you try fifteen times. After what seemed like ten minutes of blocking everyone else’s view, we left and, not three miles later, stopped at another bear-jam to check out a grizzly in the forest. The grizzly was too far away to get a decent photo.