Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Monthly Archives: April 2007
Real or fake?
Way too much fun. (For a guy, anyway.) From The Sun Online, via Word Oyster . . .
Play “Spot the Bogus Boobs.” I got 7 out of 8 correct. How did you do?
Spend some time over at Word Oyster, by the way. You won’t regret it. And please keep reading down to my next post. My question at the end is no joke.
D.
PS: have an appetite for more? Click on the photo.
Freaking out
. . . over this melamine scare.
From horsesass.org (gotta love a website like that):
Months after dogs and cats started dropping dead of renal failure from melamine-tainted pet food, American consumers are beginning to learn how long and how wide this contaminant has also poisoned the human food supply. Last week, as California officials revealed that at least 45 people are known to have eaten tainted pork, the USDA announced that it would pay farmers millions of dollars to destroy and dispose of thousands of hogs fed “salvaged†pet food.
But this is just the tip of the iceberg. Through the salvaging practice, melamine-tainted pet food has likely contaminated America’s livestock for as long as it has been killing and sickening America’s pets — as far back as August of 2006, or even earlier. And while it may seem alarmist to suggest without absolute proof that Americans have been eating melamine-tainted pork, chicken and farm-raised fish for the better part of a year, the FDA and USDA seem to be preparing to brace Americans for the worst. In an unusual, Saturday afternoon joint press release, the regulators tasked with protecting the safety of our nation’s food supply go to convoluted lengths to reassure the public that eating melamine-tainted pork is perfectly safe.
Which leaves me asking my readers one simple question:
Can you recommend a good vegetarian cookbook?
D.
Back to Eureka
. . . which is our most conveniently accessed “big city.” I’ve written about Eureka here and here, and although those two posts have cool photos, I’ve never posted one of Eureka. Hmm, let’s see what I can get off Google.
Ah, there we go. Eureka at its finest: the peace march on March 20, 2004. That’s what I like about Eureka: it’s called home by a few thousand folks who would be right at home in Berkeley.
And what is it about Berkeley, anyway? I spent four years of my life there, but it feels more like home to me than the San Gabriel Valley, where I’ve spent 23 years, or Palo Alto, where I spent 7. Or, for that matter, my current digs, where we have lived since ’98. So home is where the heart is, and I left my heart in Berkeley, is that it? And a rolling stone gathers no moss and the squeaky wheel gets the grease.
More rambling below the cut.
Coming soon
Karen watched that video yesterday — you know, the vid where you learn everything you need to know about the man’s penis power, and how critical it is not to let just any man hit your bottom, and God help you if he gets his sperm up into your brain — when she noticed this trailer for Shrek the Third.
Will this one be as good as the first two? Maybe not; from the trailer, 3 looks a hell of a lot like 1 + 2. Still, even a bad Shrek has to be better than 99% of the crap that hits the big screens these days.
***
Where I Live
A 50-something-year-old woman came up to me in the grocery store parking lot. She had noticed our Draft Gore bumper sticker (yeah, we’re Edwards backers, but we would still love to see Gore enter the race, too).
She asked, “Draft Gore? Isn’t he too old to fight?”
Yes, she was serious.
Speechless, I stared at her until she went away.
***
Live-Blogging tonight Saturday night at 7:30 PM PST . . .
Quite a crowd, folks, and good fun, except for the nazi punks and the guy with the limp wiener. But I’ve learned how to kick people out of chat — yay!
D.
Self-taught
Several times a day, complete strangers criticize me for something I can’t help. If I conformed to their idea of “normal” behavior, I would be in pain for most of my work day. Not right away, perhaps, but after an hour or two? You betcha.
Here’s a sampling of the remarks I hear all the time.
Did you injure yourself?
You look like a caveman.
If you had gone to my grade school, the nuns would have murdered you.
I bet you’d be a better surgeon if you [did it the right way].
and the most common question,
Who taught you how to do that?
To which I reply in my most obnoxious voice, challenging the questioner to give me even an ounce more of their shit: I’m self-taught.
Follow me below the cut to see WTF they’re griping about.
Aw, screw it.
Walnut’s Thirteen Generator is broken. (From Frankie Name’s Photostream.)
I began working on my Thursday Thirteen last night. Plenty of time, right? But I didn’t count on the self-disgust factor.
Let me explain.
While live-blogging a few weeks ago, I got to make all kinds of obnoxious groaning noises over All The Great Movies Shaina Hasn’t Seen. Someone, Shaina perhaps, suggested I turn this into a Thirteen. Terrific idea, right? I could gush about all my favorite movies.
But between initial conception and ultimate execution, the idea morphed into “Thirteen Essential Films.” I’ll bet you see the problem already: rather than write about the films I think are important, enjoyable, life-changing, you name it — I decided to assemble thirteen “essential” films, whatever the hell that is. Which would be fine if I were a film critic, a latter day Pauline Kael (kids: substitute “Roger Ebert,” okay?), but I’m not. See, I forgot rule number one of this blog: write about everything through the filter of me.
And now it’s past 9, I’m tired, my back is sore from working out yesterday, and I still have emails to answer. So screw it. I’ll do what I wanted to do from the moment I woke up this morning. I’ll tell you about my dream from last night.
I’m in my 20s, in med school again, and a few weeks ago I broke up with a tall and pretty blonde. She was kind, sweet, caring, and so not right for me. I recall feeling relieved when she told me she didn’t think things were working out. Such a nice girl, I didn’t want to hurt her feelings.
So I’m in a restaurant having dinner with a friend, an older man in his 60s who is short like me, paunchy, nearly bald — nice dude, but nothing much on the hunk scale. We’re talking about my erstwhile girlfriend and I tell him, “Oh, I really don’t think she loved me.”
“You’re wrong,” he says. “And I’ll prove it.”
Turns out she’s in the restaurant too, sitting at another table with her friends.
We go over to her table and she says, “Yes, I loved you. But I’m a vegetarian and you eat meat. It wasn’t meant to be.”
I’m flummoxed over the fact she had loved me. I had not been in love with her. The older guy whispers in my ear, “I can get her back for you.”
I don’t want her back, but now I’m curious. “Come on — she broke up with me.”
“Blow in her ear and she’ll follow you anywhere*.”
“Get out of here! You’re full of it.”
“I’m not. And I’ll prove it.”
He gets close to her, leans over, blows in her ear. At first she looks baffled, then a little disgusted — and then, turned on.
She gets up out of her chair and follows him out of the restaurant.
True story: I’m describing to my nonagenarian patient the scars the operation will leave on her face. Her younger friend says, “She’s not interested in winning any beauty contests.”
My patient’s eyes get big and round as she turns on her friend and says with mock fury, “I beg your pardon!”
Still yucking it up at 96. I love her.
D.
*No, idiot, blowing in her ear is meaningless. You have to use your penis power and hit the bottom.
Hat tip to O’Brien, you nut.
The Too Much Information Quiz
Regular readers know: I like to pretend that I have no shame. But is that really true? Surely there are some things even I wouldn’t do. I’ve never given you the full monty, for example, and never will. If it were something to write home about, I might reconsider. But until those “Why Be An Average Guy Any Longer?” pills kick in, you’ll have to live in ignorance.
So I thought: why not devise a test to see whether I lack all shame? and why not share it with my readers? and why not have some fun with it, too?
Here we go. Excuse all the male pronouns, but tonight I have no patience for the he/she business; substitute appropriate pronouns for yourself.
Some of the local family trees . . .
are bamboo.
From our paper, The Daily Triplicate (click link for the rest of the story):
11-year-old crashes vehicle
Published: April 24, 2007
By Nicholas Grube
Triplicate staff writer
An 11-year-old girl drove a car over a steep embankment Friday, ejecting her four passengers, one of them a 3-year-old boy.
California Highway Patrol is still investigating why the 11-year-old was driving the vehicle in the first place, when two adults – one of them her father – were in the vehicle at the time of the accident.
“The father gave the 11-year-old keys to drive the vehicle,” California Highway Patrol Officer Don Bloyd said. “She had her father’s permission to drive.”
However, Bloyd did not release information as to why the father allowed his daughter to drive the vehicle.
The girl was driving west on California State Hwy. 169 near Klamath around 6 p.m. Friday when she failed to negotiate a curve and lost control of the vehicle. She hit another car coming from the opposite direction and continued over the edge of a steep embankment, rolling the vehicle several times.
The girl, who was wearing her seat belt, stayed in the vehicle while her four passengers were ejected. Arlen Charles, 36, April Rodriguez, 24, and two boys, 9-years-old and 3-years-old, flew from the vehicle and down the embankment.
My OR staff tell me that Hwy. 169 is one of those curvy, two-lane highways with steep embankments — not exactly a big, vacant parking lot. (And even if it were a big, vacant parking lot, if you wanted to teach your 11-year-old to drive, would you load up the car with all the other kids?)
I want to know the story. What was dad thinking?
D.
Hot Dog
For one of my newer readers, Thorne, a gal who knows her way around tattoos:
From The Noise Board. I don’t know who this woman is, but she’s gorgeous, has a great smile, and loves dogs. Those are more than enough reasons to be featured here at Balls and Walnuts.
Wish I had more for you tonight; I really do. But I’m wiped out. More tomorrow, I promise.
***
I have to add a huge: Woot! to Cap’n Dyke’s spouse Dedra Farmer. We just caught her testimony in a rerun on C-SPAN2. You go, girl!
D.
Green Acres extra available for bar mitzvahs, bachelorette parties
. . . and he’ll clean ear wax, too!
Wandering the ‘net looking for a pic of child actor Johnny Whitaker, I found Genesis Creations Entertainment’s Celebrity Bookings list. Now I’m a kid in a candy store. Who knew Lisa Loring (Wednesday Addams) was this hawt?
Add to the hawt list Erin Murphy (Tabitha from Bewitched); and I have no idea who Ivonna Cadaver is, but I dig her look.
For you hetero girls, look no further than Brandon Cruz (Courtship of Eddie’s Father). But since he’s surrounded by screaming 13-year-olds, you’ll have to lust after Potsy instead.
What if yesteryear’s stars aren’t good enough for you — what if you want yesterday‘s stars? Book Fergie and Keven Federline through Esterman.com. Esterman has Ron Jeremy, too — you’ll have to watch the vid for a while to catch Jeremy playing with his pooch.
His dog. Jeez.
D.