Gross and Grosser
September 6 1998		Oh, his mind is not for rent But can the metal spoon be bent?
The task of the day: Shopping		Several readers have noted the rather one sided view in this journal (ie, nothing but cooking junk). One cited it as "interesting." I think that's being polite. In all honesty, I really do little else when I'm here, but I'll try to interject some more personal observations and such as well. * * * Went to see Something About Mary yesterday. Everyone was talking about it as if it were a funny romantic comedy. But everyone also points out that it's made by the folks who made Dumb and Dumber. I should have known that these two things don't belong together. The slapstick is over the top, the "jokes" are mostly crude, and the romantic comedy part is out of place. Chris Elliot proves that Cabin Boy will be his finest effort. It wasn't he worst movie of this type. But I guess I'm just not wild about the type. Good slapstick can be great. But I don't think that Ben Stiller's style works very well here. He just isn't a physical humor kind of guy to me. I like Ben Stiller, and have since his short run show on HBO (or was that Comedy Central?). Of the four cast members, all but one have gone on to decent careers. Ben Stiller. Janeane Garofalo (spelling now correct thanks to Diane's email). Andy Dick (tall skinny guy on Newsradio). Bonus points if you can tell me the fourth. One of the trailers was for The Waterboy, with Adam Sandler. Forest Gump meets Flowers for Allgernan But that's not the scary part. The scary part is the music playing over the trailer. Tom Sawyer by Rush. Of course, my initial thought was something along the lines of "This is me in Grade Nine" by the Bare Naked Ladies. * * * Did some clothes shopping. New York State is weird. Weird thing number one is that for some reason all Sales Tax for clothing and shoes on the first week of September is turned off. Stores couple this with sales of the clothes itself. I loaded up on button down shirts, which I was beginning to run out of nice ones at home -- plus I didn't bring any here. Got some cool colors and textures, all dark ones. Four very nice shirts for $100? Can't complain there. Collarless shirts are out of style, so I unfortunately couldn't find any of those. Weird thing number two was my attempt to find black jeans (mine have faded into the "gray" area and have some holes that are becoming a bit too "interesting"). I specifically wanted black button fly 501s. But I'd have been willing to settle for any button fly. After a while, I was willing to settle for any black jeans. And after still more while, I found myself looking at some dockers. That's when I finally called the quest off. What's the deal with no black jeans here? Please don't tell me that black jeans have gone the way of collarless shirts and I'm hopelessly out of style. As if that's oh-so critical for me, but still. Not that I could have actually bought dockers (Advertising Motto: For Wide Butted Men), mind you. Jeans usually come rectangular height wise, as in 34/36 (waist/height), with the "fattest" you'll find something like 36/36 -- what I refer to as "square." Dockers are the complete reverse. "Square" is the thinnest setting for dockers, and most are something like 44/34. Okay, it's not that bad, but the mix sure seems that way. The primary reason for going to the mall to try to catch a film and find a watch. I didn't bring a watch here, basically on purpose. But after a while I've realized that there is one thing I need a watch for. I want a watch with a countdown timer. One that's easy to set, and easy to turn off when it fires. Digital and waterproof would be ideal. Cheap would be another plus, but I would be willing to pay for features. Hourly chimes (it's 3 AM! it's 4 AM!) are not desired, but as long as they are turn-off-able that's okay. None of my existing watches meet these goals anyway (For everyday wear, I like simple analog watches with plain designs). Neither do any that I found in the stores. Not that sales people were overly helpful here. The closest I found was a $70 G-Shock. This seems a bit steep because I don't need all of the features. On top of that, it's huge and looks as if it should be serving as a control board for the Enterprise. The original one. (Rimshot). If anyone out there has a watch they love, fire off an email, eh? It's this kind of failure shopping that makes me hate the mall. I usually go shopping when I know what I want, in this case : solid dark color button down collarless shirt, black button fly 501s, digital watch with countdown timer, funny movie. Which of these did I actually obtain? None. I hate shopping. * * * I finally found a cool place to hang out. Very quiet local bar. Small number of people. Jazz on the radio typically. Good selection of bourbons and scotches. Guinness on tap. Top Three Caesar Salad. There are only three places in the world when you can get a proper Caesar Salad. I mean the correct egg-based dressing, not some creamy overly garlic glop with anchovies on top. I mean a dressing made with lemon, not vinegar. The original Caesar did not have anchovies, but got the flavor from worcestershire sauce, which has anchovies in it. Those three places are, my Dad's house, my house, and the Red Hook Tavern. Of course, my Dad doesn't eat many whole eggs anymore. And real Caesar Salad is illegal in California (rawish egg, don'tcha know). "You! In there with the wooden bowl! Put down the croutons and nobody gets hurt!" So maybe the Red Hook Tavern is where it's at from now on. Now don't you all go crowding in there and spoil my hangout, okay? Private note to C: yeah yeah yeah, there's that Sasha thing, too. :-) * * * Marla spent the night in the city after work, and Shawn is still dead asleep. House is quiet as I type this. The plan is to go up to the Farmer's Market today. The three of us are having a BBQ tomorrow, and we need to get fixin's. Marla's making a tomato salad, so we need to get some real tomatoes.
past home future index		Copyright 1998 Tom Dowdy Comments? dowdy@poubelle.com