My Royal Friend is a practiced hand in these matters of the drink mix. I even think she wields a certain type of sorcery concerning these things. We have, over the years, concocted several beverages, many of which are not actually to be consumed but rather just made fun of. One such mix is dubbed Non-alcoholic Punch (although it is intended to be consumed.) It started out as a recipe for Thanksgiving Punch but due to her lack of options she made this instead.

Imagine, if you will, throwing into a cauldron a bottle of Absolut Superior, two bottles of champagne, and two gas station sized bottles of orange juices. Serve chilled. I think that White Bread put it best when after having essentially chugged a glass on an empty stomach and whilst working on his second cup he said a little airily, “Woo, that really puts the buzz on.” Needless to say, that it quickly became a holiday favorite.

We thought we would reproduce this when we went camping this weekend. Unfortunately, there was some confusion about the alcohol used and we subbed 151 instead… with disastrous results. The name is still to be determined but among the candidates are Jet Fuel and Turbo Juice. I was done with one cup. Chupys got sick and hungover with two. White Bread was hung over(a rare occasion indeed) with three not sick though.

The moral of this story is… stick to the fucking recipe.

On the next installment of mixology, we’ll talk about the Hobo Car Bomb.

About a year ago, I went to a renaissance faire here in Washington. This was, of course, something that someone of my social stature was wont to do. Protocol also dictates that the faire be attended in costume. Now, anytime I’m at functions such as these, there are a great many objects that beckon to me softly like whispers on the wind. Generally, my lack of coinage is my last vestige of protection against these onslaughts.

Chupys is less steeled against these mental attacks than I so it was to be expected that we left with several pounds more of loot than we had arrived with. One such item was a Mongolian style horse bow. I can’t help but feel supremely puissant when I’m shooting the bow. It’s so smooth and powerful. There’s something primal and deep seeded in my genes that quickens when I fire it. I think it has to do with my ancestry. Some historians believe that Koreans were descended from eastern Mongol tribes. Plus, anyone who has seen the Korean archery teams in the olympics would certainly agree that Koreans get at least a +2 to archery and since I’m half then I get a bonus too.

So, naturally, when I have a party and we have been drinking the bow comes out. I do see the faultiness of the wisdom in giving inebriated persons projectile weapons but only now, in hindsight while my judgement is less impaired. Despite, our concocting a recipe for disaster, no one has gotten hurt… yet. But it was a lot of fun. I even managed to pull off a couple trick shots shooting two and three arrows at a time.

When I hold the bow though, I feel as though I’m tapping into a part of my heritage that has previously been denied me. Namely, my lack of musical talent, math skills, and natural affinity for karaoke and ddr. I did however, inherit the bad driving genes and in the future I may find that I have the crazy parent gene. Maybe though, just maybe I got the archery skills and I’m ok with that.

I placed my digits into my contact cases this morning to put said contacts in. I had just cleaned up the kitchen from all the Indian food we ate last night. The resulting sauce was 1 part saline and 1 part delicately spiced curry, all parts pain.

Moral of the story: Wash your goddam hands, kids, before you go poking your eyes. It’s just sanitary anyway.

-J

Or as it was recoined, SPAM or spam. They are supposed to be case sensitive. At least Hormel would like you to do so for the sake of branding. Anyhow, I was thinking about updating my blog with something and was trying to think of a suitably interesting topic. Of course, any conversations that bring up potted meat products are sure to be memorable, right? So it was the other day. I was just chatting with My Royal Friend about SPAM and how it tasted. Yes, it’s true, I have had the rich experience of consuming such a dubious product. It’s very big in South Korea. Probably not as much as in Hawaii but I’m no expert.

So the description is as follows: It tastes hammy and salty with a smack of sweet. It has a uniquely processed taste that is inexplicable if the former terminology does not suffice. As a joke, I used to try and sneak cans of potted meat into the shopping basket. Usually Chupys caught me but once I got all the way to the conveyor belt checkout and I obviously didn’t want to actually buy it so I had to pull it off. I imagined that it was something heroic as I did it. Making it to the metal containment cannister just in time and whatnot. If the entity known as Wikipedia is to be believed (I do mostly because I’m sure it’s as reliable as at least half the other shit i hear on a daily basis) the common way to eat SPAM in America is cold. This is cause to shudder. At least when I got it, it was fucking warm and a bit crispy on the outside.

I think that it’s safe to say that the word spam (or SPAM) carries a negative connotation. Of course, it’s been months since I logged onto my blog so when I arrived I had to clean out all the spam comments from my blog. I hate spam even more than SPAM. At least, if I were starving there would be a tiny shred of me that relished in the fact that I might have SPAM to eat. But spam, on the other hand, is foul to its very core. The mere existence of it is a taint on the universe. Like cockroaches only moreso. Even the fleeting idea of spam is an affront. Not just to me. If there were some powerful deity or being, spam would be their nemesis. In the Christian faith, that makes spam the Antichrist.

I don’t just denounce the object but also the act and the perpetrator. What kind of morally debased husk of a human would ever inflict such a terrible plague on the information multiverse? Think about everyone you know. Are they such a person? If they are… then you know what you have to do.

-J

I fell into this rut when Koroshiya came to visit. I didn’t update while she was here and I kept putting off updating. Then I felt like I should still get caught up to speed. It just continued to snowball and so I’m going to give the 2 minute version of what’s happened since the last post.

Koroshiya visited. We had fun. I blew a bunch of money. I’m sure she did too. Thanksgiving was ok. Nothing special. Weeks passed in a blur. Christmas week it snowed. There’s a steep dip in the road leading to my house. I was stuck for days. Christmas dinner was ok. Nothing special. Work was busy. New Year’s Eve I got sloshed and past out by nine. I threw up. I had worked 13 hours that day. I resolved to get in better shape. I also resolved to get back in touch with old friends. Still working on both. I checked out gyms to join. I hate gyms. The sales rep from the gym won’t give up. I get called daily. I put myself on a budget. I got my tickets to Orlando for Blimphead’s wedding. I’m excited to go. I don’t get to hang out with My Royal Friend and Ravyne at all since we have conflicting schedules now. My friend has cancer. KittyLady and Chupys are at odds. It’s been miserable. I finally got my goddamn scooter back. It only took 7 months. They are almost done with the kitchen. It only took 4 months.

Summed up like that, it sounds pretty eventful. It doesn’t really feel that way though. I haven’t been going out and doing anything really to try and save money. Anyhow, we’re up to speed.

-J

A little while back, some of us got together and went to sing karaoke. My friend GirlDog invited us and so she had pick of the venue. This is the first time in Seattle that I’ve gone singing karaoke and so I didn’t really know any places to do it. (That’s not completely true but the first time didn’t really count because I didn’t set out to go sing. I just went to a seedy little dive that happened to have karaoke going on. Same difference? Meh. I’d like to think there’s distinction in the choice.) 

The place we went was called The Royal Unicorn. It’s a little place in Shoreline that couples as a Chinese restaurant/lounge. I’m sure that at one time, this combination would have sent me reeling (as did the aforementioned tuna and rice combination from my last post) but I think I’ve grown numb to the monumental clashes the Asian people can produce over the years. My mother is especially adept at this sort of thing. 

The Unicorn itself was a small place and it was clear that most of the people there were regulars. It didn’t have that oppressive miasma that some places acquire though. This miasma that I refer to is the one where you may drop dead for even daring to intrude on territory that clearly isn’t where you belong. This is something that I’ve seen in Seattle more that anywhere else in my life– this being a sort of cliquey public isolation. 

We all had some $3.50 well drinks which is a not too bad deal. I did a couple songs alone and a couple with others. It was fun but I think I would choose a different venue next time. The selection of songs were somewhat limited. I think already after just one night, I exhausted the songs that I would want to do. The timing was off on some of the songs too. I hear that Seattle’s Best Karaoke or SBK is pretty good. Not just because you’re spared the embarassment of belting out drunken tunes to complete strangers but on it’s own merits as well.

-J

I’m not talking about bread and butter, Flaming Hot Cheetos with garlic dip, or mayonnaise and rice (The latter is the concoction of my roommate, KittyLady. I personally think it’s deplorable and take no responsibility should you choose to mimic her.) The Ultimate Combo is… *drumroll* Zombies and Beer! I know that you think this is made up but I insist that it exists.

It strikes me as I write this that if someone didn’t believe me I might pass this off as some religion clinging to it unwaveringly through any adversity I encounter. I believe it but you may vehemently deny it. Those that have experienced it can join the fold as it were.

Anyhow, what I’m actually refering to is a special production that Seattle Children’s Theater put on of Night of the Living Dead. For the first experimental time ever, they did a 21+ night with beer for donations. I imagine the person who schemed this up not so much what one would imagine as a marketing director in a suit or some other thing like that, but rather a mad scientist. They would wring their fingers in anticipation as the insanity coalesces into some tangible form of what could only be described in one encapsulating word: glorious.

In theory, that is exactly was it was. Is it wrong to get tingles from thinking of flesh-eating undead denizens while you sip on an adult beverage? Possibly decadent? The play was great and plenty funny. My libations, I’m sure played some part in my perspective of the play though. The beer was an IPA which, I’m not really keen on but there was no other option. I look forward to the opportunity to do something along similar vein. There is rumbling rumor on the horizon of doing the Wizard of Oz on a 21+ night.

I also agreed to go to plays and musicals more often(read: more than never) with KittyLady who gets the fancy for that sort of thing every now and then. Perhaps, I’m trying to remedy my being a bad gay by infusing my life with theater. It is requisite after all.

-J

Halloween is my favorite holiday. And getting in the spirit of this sanctimonius holiday, this weekend we all went to the corn maze up in Everett. I had never been before mostly because in Florida there is a distinct lack of corn mazery. Outwardly, the idea of a corn maze and the reality do not deviate from each other very much.  

Perhaps, if my first experience was as a child, there may have been a mysterious quality to the experience with a seemingly real possibility of never emerging from that hellish grain labyrinth. I can envision my overactive imagination as a child working against me in that way. Instead of a minotaur I would instead be accosted by the Children of the Corn. 

However, since growing up I’ve learned to use my imagination in a more pragmatic way. I’ve entertained the idea of being lost in a vast labyrinth and finding my way back out keeping my wits about me. This scenario has played out often enough that I was even eager to be in a maze so that I could test my mettle. I imagined it would be more like a maze from the movie The Labyrinth – of course, minus the goblins and David Bowie. Clearly, I would also have nothing to do with saving a goddam ugly baby either.

Regardless, my first maze experience was not the torturous and terrifying situation that it could have been but I still felt a sense of mild accomplishment upon completion of my epic quest. Clearly, I have what it takes to survive in such a scenario. 

Aside from the maze there was a pumpkin cannon. Reading about this on the website thrilled the hell out of me. Seeing it left me a little wanting. I had hoped they would be launching full sized pumpkins. Rather they were softball-sized with some slightly larger than that. The sound I expected would have been a deep resounding boom as befits a squash siege weapon. It was more like the sound of a spitball leaving a straw but louder. 

Another thing that tainted the experience of the pumpkin cannon was the calls of the  crowd. I can appreciate their excitement but listening to their “Whoo-hoo!”s transported me into a living room sausage fest complete with beer, football, and talk during the commercials about hunting. It was a scene I felt dirty just imagining and I’m shuddering now as I read what I just wrote.

-J