Balls and Walnuts
more than you ever wanted to know
Monthly Archives: September 2006
SBD: Woof
For today’s Smart Bitches Day post, I ask the question: what’s up with all the dogs?
A friend and I were getting into it the other day. Or rather, I was getting into it, and she was egging me on. She told me Janet Evanovich had a dog in her stories, and I had that very morning been placed into a tizzy by Jennifer Crusie’s needless introduction of a dog in Welcome to Temptation.
This person went to the bother of assembling a partial list of critter characters. Here’s the Crusie portion of the list:
Crusie, Jennifer – Anyone But You (Fred the Basset hound)
Crusie, Jennifer – Crazy For You (Katie the dog)
Crusie, Jennifer – Getting Rid of Bradley (dog)
Crusie, Jennifer – The Cinderella Deal (Liz the cat)
Crusie, Jennifer – What the Lady Wants (Bob the dog)
and she left out Welcome to Temptation! This dog (in WtT), I’m talking serious left field. As if a light bulb suddenly flickered in Crusie’s brain: “Need . . . more . . . comic relief!”
Listen:
Something furry brushed her leg and she looked down and screamed.
There was an animal there–a big one, it came halfway up to her knee–and it had matted red-brown fur on its barrel-like body and short white legs with little black spots on them, and Sophie had never seen anything like it in her life.
I didn’t mind the dog in Crazy for You. That dog was instrumental to the plot; Crusie couldn’t tell Crazy for You without Katie the Dog.
I remember liking Kate’s dog, but I read Somebody Wonderful very early in my romance-reading life. Would I still like the ugly mutt as much today?
Botty must have heard his steps. The scruffy little mutt came careening down the stairs, a misshapen cannonball of a dog. He’d lurked up in the the top floor, probably hiding from the widow.
Mick put down the full basin and bent to scratch the dog’s remaining ear. Botty pushed at his hand with ecstatic wheezing growls.
Kate, you had me at “remaining ear,” and you cinched the deal with “wheezing growls.” Okay, I still love Botty. In a literary universe of ugly mutts, Botty out-uglies all of ’em. Botty is Teh Mutt.
But, what are they doing here, these dogs? Is it a “Must Love Dogs” kinda thing? I hope not, because that movie sucked. Suhhhcked. And the dog in that movie was named Mother Theresa — that’s what I call really reaching for a laugh.
I can understand giving your hero a dog, especially if said hero is the gruff silent type. Gotta show he has a heart, he’s capable of love. And if he can love a flatulent*, one-eared mutt, he’s bound to love our heroine.
But why do Crusie’s heroines need dogs? Except in Crazy for You, of course. That dog made sense.
I admit to placing a cat in my romance, and yes, he’s the heroine’s cat, but he’s only there to pounce on my hero’s balls in the middle of the night. I never bothered to turn the cat into a character. Was that a mistake?
Yes, I know: I have more questions than answers, but You Who Are Wise in this genre will, I’m sure, educate me.
D.
*I don’t remember for certain if Botty was flatulent, but Kate went out of her way to make him disagreeable. If he wasn’t flatulent, he should have been.
A taste for human flesh
Can’t remember how we got onto the topic, but this morning I told Michelle about my short story, “Sex and the Single Wendigo,” and she asked me to post it. Here you go.
Despite the title of this post, this is NOT a disgusting, gory story. Much. It’s funny. No, really, it is.
Let me know what you think.
D.
Don’t speak too soon
Before I get started: L’shanah tovah! That’s Happy New Year for you goyim. Today is Rosh Hashanah, which I’m Jewish enough to know about but not Jewish enough to celebrate. Unless watching Hebrew Crunk on YouTube counts as observation of this High Holy Day.
***
Can’t remember whose blog I commented on . . . but the issue of the hour was, how do you find the time to write? How do you manage to finish what you start?
Stubbornness, I replied.
Usually, after doing the day’s chores, I sit down and write. But today I feel meh. I’ve done two loads of laundry, washed the car, cleaned a mess in the garage, cleaned the kitchen, and organized the computer corner of our bedroom (doesn’t sound like it, but that was the most time-consuming task of all). And now I have to whip myself into writing mode.
Meh, meh, meh. Meh at every level of my life. Not entirely unrelated: I’ve added a new category to my blogroll, Escape Hatch, with a link to the blog We Move to Canada. No matter what I do in my local party, no matter how many petitions I sign, I can’t get away from a sense of responsibility for the atrocities our government has committed and has continued to commit in our names. If the Democrats fumble the ball in the next two elections, or if the Republicans steal the elections, I’m outa here.
Sorry to be such a downer. One of the reasons I don’t write as many political posts anymore is my depression with respect to the State of this Union. Karen feels the same way, and in fact, stopped watching The Daily Show and Colbert Report because they only made her more depressed.
***
More live-blogging tonight? I’ll try to be on by 8 PM PST, earlier if possible. And I’ll try to shake this funk by then.
D.
Sugar is for wimps
If you’re gonna do the ultimate deed, I say revel in it. None of this sugar or jelly or honey. Who wants a sticky butt? You ought to be more considerate of the rimmee.
Just sayin’.
Hat tip to the only woman who truly understands the depths of my depravity (aside from Karen, naturally).
***
Jake’s watching nature programs, Karen’s playing WoW, and I’m blogging. A typical Friday night in the Walnut household.
What are you folks up to?
Going live in 5 . . . 4 . . . 3 . . . 2 . . .
D.
FVccing gnomes
I hate PvP.
Right now, some of you are wracking your brains because PvP sounds like computerese, but it isn’t. Not exactly. PvP = player vs. player, which you gamers knew right away, of course, but bear with me while I explain it to the non-gamers.
In World of Warcraft, you can live your entire virtual life fighting against computer-generated/controlled monsters. You need never fight human-controlled characters. Nevertheless, the game provides certain rewards for success in the PvP arenas known as battlegrounds. But there’s one problem: I suck at PvP.
I did what any logical 40-mmhmmhm-year-old man would do, given the circumstances; I let my 10-year-old do the PvP stuff for me. He’s far better at it than I will ever be. Trouble is, he made me watch, saying, “Otherwise, you’ll never learn.”
I had already spent a good long time screaming at the computer because whenever I set myself up to attack someone, someone else would Stun me, or Fear me, or Confuse me, or Whatever the Hell me, and I would stand there paralyzed or run around in a daze while the enemy clobbered me to death.
But nothing, nothing was worse than getting pwned by a band of fVccing gnomes. This is a gnome:
I’m sorry, but my life has certain rules, and these sumbitches violate both of them:
Something that comes up to my ankle should NOT be able to kick the shit out of me.
Someone that talks like a Disneyland refugee should bite the dust if I look at them crosswise.
Yeah, that’s it, those are the rules of my existence. So I’m watching my son fight these bastards, I’m not even the one holding the mouse, and I still want to punch the monitor.
By which I conclude, PvP is so not good for my mental health.
D.
Geek toy!
Major coolness for engineering geeks. Check out Armadillo Run, a virtual erector set with realistic physics. Jake ripped through the free demo in about two hours, leaving his World of Warcraft adventuring behind.
Here’s the blurb from the website:
Armadillo Run is a physics-based puzzle game. You have to build structures with the purpose of getting an armadillo to a certain point in space. There is a selection of building materials, each with different properties, which can be combined to form almost anything. The realistic physics simulation gives you the freedom to solve each level in many different ways.
Why didn’t they have stuff like this when I was a kid?
Because computers were the size of Walmarts back then, and all they could do was add, subtract, multiply, and divide — that’s why! You old fart, you.
D.
Thirteen doctor jokes
Bear in mind I’m writing this WEDNESDAY night and I’m tired, and maybe you’ll forgive me for this no-brainer thirteen.
1. The cure for tapeworm. No, I don’t have a lisp, and I don’t know why Stickam saw fit to supply me with one.
3. Here’s an old one you’ve probably heard.
Butch goes to heaven and discovers, much to his chagrin, a horrific line leading up to the Pearly Gates. He waits. And he waits. He wonders, Is this a test? Will I get thrown in Hell if I show any impatience? And he waits longer still.
Suddenly, a man runs forward, jumping the whole line. He’s wearing a white lab coat and holding a little black bag.
Butch asks a passing angel, “Who was that?”
“Oh,” says the angel, “that was God. He likes to play doctor sometimes.”
(Hey, I’m saving the good ones for video.)
4. Rick, a pre-med, had to pass Organic Chemistry to qualify for med school. But when the professor launched into another hour of endless blather on the reactions of carboxylic acids, Rick snapped.
“Professor,” said Rick, “why do I need to know all this crap?”
“To save lives,” said the professor.
“Save lives? That’s the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. I don’t see the relevance of an Organic Chemistry class to saving lives!”
“It’s highly relevant,” said the professor, “if it keeps morons like you out of medical school.”
5. Chuck’s phone rings. It’s his doctor.
“Chuck, I have some bad news for you and some worse news.”
“Gimme the bad news, doc.”
“You have 24 hours to live.”
“Twenty-four . . . Doc, that’s terrible! What could be worse than that?”
“I’ve been trying to reach you since yesterday.”
7. ‘Kay, I have to give you at least one inside joke. If you’re outside the biz, this will probably be meaningless to you. Sorry. Also . . . if you’re super-PC, you’ll probably find this one vaguely offensive.
Q: How do you say “fuck you” in Tagalog?
A: “Yes, Doctor! Yes, Doctor!”
8. A man goes to the doctor complaining of headache. He has smashed bananas in his ear canals, peas up his nose, and a cluster of grapes up his ass.
“Doc,” he says, “why am I having these headaches?”
Doc says, “You’re not eating right.”
9. Another inside joke. You have to know surgeons to get this one.
Two vascular surgeons are discussing their morning’s cases.
“What did you do this morning?” asks Dr. Schmidt.
“An abdominal aortic aneurysm repair,” says Dr. Barron. “And, oh, it was awful. Got into some bleeding, couldn’t stop it. The guy bled to death on the table.”
Dr. Schmidt roars, “WHO THE HELL WAS YOUR ANESTHESIOLOGIST?”
See, cuz we blame everyone else for our shortcomings. Get it? Get it?
10. A guy limps into the urgent care center and is greeted by the triage nurse.
“Hello!” she says. “How may I help you?”
“Well, it’s kind of embarrassing. I’d rather discuss it with the doctor.”
“Oh, don’t worry. I’ve heard just about everything,” says the nurse. “Besides, the doctor expects me to take a complete history before he sees you.”
“If you put it that way . . . well, look, it’s like this. I have an erection ALL the time.”
True to her word, she notes down what he has said without blushing. Then she taps her pen against the intake form and says, “Hmm. Well, the doctor is awfully busy this afternoon, but I think I could squeeze you in.”
11. In the ER, the patient clutches his groin, moaning with pain. He gasps, “I have . . . blue balls.”
The ER doc calls out, “GET THE HEAD NURSE — STAT!”
12. Hold it for me.
13. My longtime readers will remember my favorite ENT joke (audio clip — yup, that’s me telling the joke).
Leave your comment below, and I will (shall? who knows!) link you below.
The last dough you’ll ever knead
This dough is amazing.
When I made bagels, I reserved half the dough and kept it in the fridge overnight. The next day, I used half the remaining ball to make a focaccia, and two days later, I divided the remaining quarter in thirds and made pita bread.
The bagels, as you know, rawked. The focaccia compared well with this recipe (that old one is an easier recipe, but bear in mind, THIS recipe makes bagels, pita, and focaccia). And the pita? Well, it worked far better than any previous pita recipe I’ve used. They puffed up! They had pockets!
I suspect you could use this for pizza, too, but since it puffs so well (see: pita), you would need to make lots of fork pock-marks all over the dough. Hmm. What else could it do? Breadsticks, dinner rolls . . . you name it.
Here da dough, cribbed from da best baking book, Baking with Julia:
Morning Wood saves the day
Continued from Wherein I am brought low.
It tickled me t’see th’lasses tremble at th’sound o’ elvish mirth. Under common circumstances, ‘twould have made yer good host tremble, too; yet I was, as they say, close t’polishing Davy Jones’ Locker, so th’diversion was most welcome indeed.
“Mates o’ yours?” asked th’fair Dax Montana. “”Twill help ye naught.”
“Nay,” said I. “Not mates. Them be elves.”
Cap’n Dyke approached me broken body. And a sorry sight I must have been, too: stripped to me underbritches, bleedin’ from a thousand stripes. The Cap’n had t’hold up me chin t’meet yer narrator’s gaze face t’face.
“What know ye of elves, Cap’n Wood?”
“I know they sail not by th’wind, but by tacking across ley lines; put yer glass on yon ship, and ye’ll see she floats above the water.”
Cap’n Dyke spied the elvish craft, then held her glass fer me own benefit as well.
This be what I saw: