#108 - tropical cherries.

for as much as i hate war, i'm sort of a fan of non-spielberg stories that deal with war. renowned director samuel fuller's novel the big red one is one of my favorite books, but i've yet to see the film by the same name. three kings, stalag 17, apocalypse now (obviously)...i love all three films. generation kill is possibly my favorite tv miniseries. it's not like i've ever been in the military or anything. the closest i've ever come was saying to my mother back in high school, "really? so i have to fill out that selective service card or i go to jail? well, ok then. i guess i'll sign it." to be honest, i'd have likely fled for canada if they'd ever reinstated the draft. i'm the first generation in my family who hasn't gone to war or at least been in the military. i'm pretty sure my high-school aged brother doesn't have military ambitions, so maybe the military tradition in my family will skip a generation.

...but i like war films. friday night, after i returned home from a short evening with two friends down 5th ave at bar reis & reis 100 (the bar's newly opened sandwich shop, where i totally had a white anchovy, pickled carrot & daikon, spicy mayo & cilantro sandwich. BAM!), i decided to watch a movie. i was in the mood for a lil comedy, so i queued up tropic thunder, the comedy about a group of actors shooting a war picture that turns into the real thing. it's taken me so long to see it because for me, the film had ended up in the same category as the crying game & its secret ninja penis, in that one aspect of the movie--academy award-nominated robert downey jr playing a black man--often became the main story surrounding the film. the cast is stellar beyond downey jr, with ben stiller (who i like) & jack black (who i tolerate) & a cast that includes nick nolte, steve coogan, kenny powers danny mcbride & friggin' tom cruise.

as the story goes, downey jr, stiller & black's characters are part of a group of prima donna actors shooting a vietnam war film directed by steve coogan's character, written by nick nolte's character & produced by tom cruise's. to be honest, i didn't even know it was cruise until at least half way through the movie, although i suffered some serious "who the hell is that guy" feelings every time he came on screen. the film shoot's going horribly, so the director & writer decide to shake things up by dropping the actors into the jungle, miles away from the set & their trailers. the director takes charge & coogan's character really explodes on the screen as the war picture becomes MORE REAL THAN THEY'VE BARGAINED FOR.  hilarity ensues.

i liked it so much that i've decided to go back & watch a few war films this summer, most of which i've yet to see. how the lineup plays out thus far:

ON LIST:
- three sam fuller war pictures--the big red one, fixed bayonets! & the steel helmet
- renoir's la grande illusion
- jarhead (the only war movie i own)
- the deer hunter

POSSIBLY ON LIST:
- quentin tarantino's inglorious basterds
- the hurt locker
- in the army now, with pauly shore

NOT ON LIST:
- saving private ryan

#108 - tropical cherries.
snack: cherries
drink: samuel smith organic cherry ale



cherries are probably my favorite fruit. when i was but a wee lad, i'd eat those bright red maraschino ones right out of the jar. ice cream with a cherry on top? i'd have ice cream with four cherries on top & four others hidden within the ice cream itself. i can't say that i ever remember eating a non-maraschino cherry as a kid though. now that i'm an adult (of sorts), i'm trying to overhaul the diet a bit these days & that includes eating nothing but natural snacks for a little bit, hence the bowl of cherries. i'm so glad that i eventually discovered non-jarred & juice immersed cherries, because, pit & all, they're a damn tasty fruit...now if i could just get down that sexy cherry stem-tying thing. actually, screw that. i don't need cherry stems to prove my dexterity.

it turns out that cherries don't have a very long shelf life. tonight, i went back to finish them off & those mofos had already started molding & turning into wine & whatnot. boo cherries. now i'll have to get more of you tomorrow to get my fill. if you're not careful & i'm not stuck to my mattress come 8am, i might even get feisty & chop yo ass up into a morning smoothie along with no less than four other fruits. your own mother won't even recognize you.

since i was going all tropical & fruity, i opened up a bottle of samuel smith organic cherry ale to accompany the cherries. along with the raspberry & strawberry varieties, it's one of sam smith's three fruit beers, which are brewed with actual fruit juice. it's absolutely amazing tasting--think the flavor of a cider, but not as watery & bitter. it's a flavor similar to what you'd get from a syrup-infused berliner weisse, sans wheatiness. paupers take note: it's not a beer for the indigent & downtrodden. i forked over $8.50 for a 18.7oz bottle & i'd do it again, since the ale & cherry combo created an orgasmically pleasurable & fruity explosion in my mouth.

also, in other recent work/cherry-related developments, i'm now heading up the site for john mellencamp's fan club--"club cherry bomb." i grew up with "hurts so good" and "jack & diane" & "pink houses," but they've mostly just been a part of the larger mass of 80's songs in my head. coincidentally, npr's fresh air had an interview with him on friday, timed to coincide with thursday's start of the dylan/mellencamp/willie nelson tour of minor league ballparks. after listening to the interview & mellencamp performing a few songs acoustic, i have a better appreciation for his music & for his take on things. when asked what he learned from the experience of his song "this is our country" being used in chevy silverado ads, he had this to say: "i learned that an artist shouldn't have to do this. this is not what my songs are about...but i also learned that chevrolet was a better record company than columbia." amen, john. amen.

nosh nook #49 - thursday, may 21, 2009

in mumbai, it’s mango season (link)
05.20.09 - the ny times - by kavitha rao

after the recent success of the oscar-winning film slumdog millionaire, the indian city of mumbai, with its copious slums, has become sort of a household name. since folks just love seeing the places where their favorite films are shot, mumbai's guided "slum tours" have experienced increased interest. unless you're on some sort of humanitarian mission, there's something very unsettling about taking a trip through a city's slums to gawk at the horrid conditions. if you're going to mumbai, it should be for the tasty mangoes...not for the slums.

ny times correspondent kavitha rao knows a thing or two about mumbai's mangoes. according to her "globespotters" report, it's currently mango season in mumbai (til the end of june) & while you could go pick up some mangoes, bring them home & make something delicious out of them (i suggest mango sushi), it's much cooler if you have somebody else make them into something awesome for you. there are the standard mango drinks--the familiar lassi (a milkshake of sorts), the green mango-based aam panna--but you can also find a wide variety of yummy desserts in mumbai.

since i'm not that big of a fan of pudding, i'd probably pass on the mango shrikhand. of all the treats rao describes, i'd probably have to go with the kulfi (a milkier ice cream) topped with mango slices.  it's not that i wouldn't enjoy mango & chocolate donuts or a big ol slice of mango cheesecake (from a place that madonna likes!).  it's more that you can get the kulfi with mango slices delivered.  i'm amazed that it's even possible to deliver ice cream (even slow-melting kulfi) in mumbai's scorching temperatures & there's something pretty awesome about the idea of hearing a knock at your front door & when you open said door...BAM!  ice cream.  i can only imagine the utter joy that such a delivery service must bring to the people of mumbai.

#60 - office hilarity.

seriously, if you don't enjoy the hilarity that is the office (us edition), you are a soulless, humorless, redcoat spaniard greycoat nazi communist terrorist. that's a scientific fact. watch nova or discovery channel. i don't have time to get into the specifics of it right now.

...so the office returned last week from winter hiatus with an hour-long episode entitled "stress relief" & i finally got to watch it yesterday & there are all kinds of awesome story lines in it & they should just give them the emmy right now for best comedy episode of the year. no competition, really. sorry tina fey, i know you probably have a lot of great episodes lined up (don draper!), but i assume you're a rational human being, so i'm sure you agree with my decision to give them the statue, even this early in the year. i love you & all (in a non-creepy way), but you already have a bunch already from this year's ceremonies anyhow.

if you, the reader, haven't seen the episode yet, i'm going to spoil a few of the awesome plot points for you right now:

opening sequence - dwight is the safety officer of the office & doesn't feel people have properly heeded his fire evacuation instructions, so he decides to make sure they learn. he starts a fire in a trash can in a side room and by locking & heating the handles of various doors, creates absolute chaos that results in such hilarity as oscar climbing into the drop ceiling, angela's cat crashing out of the drop ceiling, people using the copier as a battering ram & michael throwing a chair through a window before dwight informs them it is just a drill & stanley has a heart attack...roll opening credits.

the cpr training - michael convinces corporate to not fire dwight & to prepare for future emergencies, he sets up a cpr training at the office, where they practice on a dummy. kevin gives up after 20 seconds, declaring "call it." the cpr instructor tells michael to perform pumps to the chest of the dummy to the tune of "stayin' alive." after michael mistakenly starts pumping to the opening lyrics of gloria gaynor's "i will survive," everyone gets into "stayin' alive" with much dancing & singing, including a moment where kelly gets to show off her dance skills. the training ends with dwight cutting open the dummy to harvest the organs (after the instructor claims they lost the patient during all the dancing) & then cutting off the face & wearing it ala hannibal lecter.

the roast - michael again convinces corporate to not fire dwight & soon after realizes that he is the source of stanley's (& many others') stress. to alleviate tension around the office, michael arranges a roast of himself down in the warehouse & he urges everyone to let loose on him, since "anything goes" in a roast. as a result, the roast gets really nasty, including a line declaring that if his penis "were an ipod it would be a shuffle" & a song by andy called "what i hate about you." at the end, michael stumbles off the stage & walks off behind a shelf, leaving all the cast captured in one full shot, sitting silent in the warehouse.

michael's ending counter-roast - after calling out of work the next day & after much soul-searching (including a hilarious scene feeding the pigeons in the park), michael returns to the office wearing a turtleneck & carrying a stack of note cards. with everyones' attention he starts..."jim, you're 6'11" and you weigh 90 pounds. gumby has a better body than you. boom. roasted."...& he carries on, roasting everyone in the office, ending with "boom. roasted" each time. halfway through, when he gets to stanley & says "you crush your wife when you have sex & your heart sucks. boom. roasted," stanley begins laughing & his laughter continues to grow & spread, completely shifting the tone of the entire scene as he does so. it's hilariously brilliant & is responsible for my new catch phrase. check it..."hey reader. you smell funny & have no taste in shoes. boom. roasted."

the pam & jim stories - there's pam's parents getting divorced (which OBVIOUSLY leads to jim being all dimply boyfriend good). there's andy learning about love through watching (with jim & pam) an illegally downloaded copy of mrs. albert hannaday (a fake movie made just for this episode), starring jack black, jessica alba & cloris leachman (featuring the best scene with a stairlift since gremlins). sometimes jim & pam make me want to throw up in my own mouth.

what continues to astound me most about the office is that its format & direction, with the confessionals & caught facial expressions, give each character multiple opportunities to shine in each episode. in particular, in this episode, there are situations like the fire scene & the roast scene & the counter-roast scene where absolutely everyone is a part of the scene & contributes to the overall mood. i mean, in my recap, i've named almost every character & always for a hilarious reason. anyway, i eat that ensemble crap up.

#60 - office hilarity.
snack: harry & david bing cherry dark chocolates
drink: archer farms orange passion mango italian soda

[segue] ...speaking of eating things, while i watched, i feasted on some harry & david bing cherry dark chocolates. according to the packaging, harry & david/bear creek orchards, a medford, oregon based company, has been around since 1934. that's pretty cool. they seem to have a pretty good story going for them, one that started during the great depression, when two brothers traveled to nyc with boxes of pears & by the time they had left, they'd made pear-giving fashionable among nyc executives...how quaint...& much nicer & wallet-sucking than that cocaine trend.

it turns out that the beavers of harry & david's home state are celebrating the state's "sesquicentennial" this coming valentine's day. i wonder if my oregon friends are celebrating with some bull riding or a cappuccino. or a covered wagon! i wish i could go play actual oregon trail with my pals on v.d.! oregon is so far! [frowny face].

...but holy friggin bing cherries. seriously. if i had no "off" switch (& it's slightly busted as it is), this package wouldn't last more than ten minutes. the package warns that they "may contain pits," so it's probably best that i take it slow anyhow, to avoid choking & dying & whatnot. that'd be the pits.

& since i'm all up on target's jock recently, i'm pounding a bottle of archer farms orange passion mango italian soda along with the bings. mamma mia! it's 12% juice, which is actually more juice than i often get, so i guess that's a good thing. the oranges & mangoes are really yummy no-brainer fruits. as for the passion fruit, i have no passion for it. alanis morrisette should have sang about junk like that...would've made more sense...silly canadian.

#19 - feeling blue never felt so good.

you know what food i'm (sort of) crazy about (today)? i'll give you a hint...a certain stoned-looking non-casper cartoon ghost loves them so much that he became the mascot for a cereal bearing their flavor. give up? too convoluted of a clue for ya?

if you guessed the blueberry, you win the food guessing game. bonus points if you identified the ghost...boo berry. a hearty virtual pat on the back to you, reader. please note that by inserting the word "virtual," i am denoting that this pat on the back is not in any way real.

#19 - feeling blue never felt so good.

snack: frosted blueberry pop tarts
drink: lipton blueberry pomegranate pure leaf red tea

in celebration of the blueberry, i've decided to pair a package of frosted blueberry pop tarts with a bottle of lipton blueberry pomegranate pure leaf red tea, my own personal devil-angel combo. as we all know, some sort of canceling out will occur when the extremely manufactured nature of the pop tart comes into contact with the guarana-ginseng nature of the tea. that's just science.

also in celebration of the blueberry, i've decided to gather three blueberry related tidbits from around the interweb & present them here, in no particular order (other than alphabetical):

blueberry diapers - the blueberry diaper is one of them cloth diaper doohickies for baby mommas. probably good for the environment & your baby & self-esteem & junk. on their website, they offer up disappointment in the form of their "blueberry cloth diaper guide" section. the link to this section features a confused woman, with bubbles around her head depicting the various questions she has. one of these questions is "what about poop?" when i saw this question, i thought to myself, "yeah. what about poop?"...so i clicked on the link. i was met with a list of eight questions, none of which were "what about poop?"...so disappointing. i still really want to know about poop.

blueberry hill - ok. first off, apparently st. louis has a walk of fame and a ton of important people have stars there...we're talking william burroughs, miles davis, redd foxx, both ike & tina, michael mcdonald, harold ramis...the list goes on. i tell you this because along this walk of fame is the loop, a shopping mecca of some sort and inside this mecca is blueberry hill, a restaurant/music club. chuck berry plays here once at least once a month. dude is friggin 81 years old, which would be impressive if les paul, aged 93, didn't play a show here in nyc every single monday. give me a holler in 2020, chuck.

blueberry month - in 2003, the u.s. department of agriculture issued a proclamation that declared july "blueberry month." never one to be shown up by their neighbor to the south, the canadians issued a royal proclamation decreeing august "blueberry month." which is the true blueberry month? as the blueberry is a native north american plant, both countries can rightfully lay claim to the official blueberry month (can they even grow blueberries in mexico?). i just wish we could come together as north americans on this one & pick one month to celebrate blueberries in. it's just like with independence day. did you know that canadians celebrate their independence on july 1st? when i heard that, i was totally all "wah? you crazy canadians. c'mon get it together." seriously canada, get it together.

EDIT: this week's weeds opened with a conversation about pop tarts!

#17 - head.

on wednesday, i made my way up to the boston area on the megabus with ryall to meet up with m.j. & my bro for the radiohead concert at the venue formerly formerly known as great woods. my trip began in the prospect ave stop on the r train, where after a few minutes, the train entered the station. as i waited for the train to stop & the doors to open, i looked at the torn advertisement behind me, which had the following message scrawled across the bottom of it:

i snapped a quick pic & got on the train. it's safe to say that as the lead singer of belle & sebastian (the band that acted as the jumping-off point for pretty much everything i've listened to since 2001), i'm not sure if i could ever let go of stuart murdoch, no matter how twee he is. regardless of this person's personal struggle with stuart murdoch, musically speaking, i took my random path-crossing with this particular message to be a positive start to radiohead day. usually the subway ads feature no more than crudely drawn penises on them.

the megabus busride was fine overall, other than the non-functioning wifi. the southwest airlines-influenced bus driver even quipped, "there's wifi on board. sometimes it works." they played two dvds during the five-hour drive--benji: off the leash! & shark bait (the reef), which is a budget attempt to cash in on the success of finding nemo. it appears that somebody else has the upper hand in the wifi-inclusive bus service market at this point, megabus...or should i say, megabutt?

radiohead was friggin' amazing, as was expected. as i have probably expressed to everyone & their mother at this point, i can not believe how lovely & clean they sound in a big open amphitheatre. i was in the absolute back of the lawn & it still sounded wondrous. my personal fave...jigsaw falling into place. my personal victory...we were the very last people they sold beer to in our section. they literally gave us our beers & shut the gates to the stand, making lots of people behind us quite sad.

#17 - head.

snack: flaming hot flavored munchies
drink: pomegranate blueberry mash

after the concert, an hour or so in the parking lot & an hour or so drive back to my brother's place in j.p., we went to pretty much the only thing open in the neighborhood after 1pm...7-11, where i, of course, spent in the area of $10 on snacks alone. clearly a smart allocation of my funds.

for this particular night, i decided i needed to eat from a bag of flaming hot flavored munchies. it was after 1pm. i had just been at 7-11. munchies were clearly the right snack for that moment. each munchies flavor features rold gold pretzels, sun chips, cheetos & doritos, with the last three ingredients changing depending on the overall snack mix flavor. you would be correct in assuming that this particular flavor features the flaming hot versions of the sun chips, cheetos & doritos. as my brother informed me, they used to have a kids' version with doritos, cheetos, popcorn, m&ms and captain crunch. if you ask me, that is one hell of a snack & should probably only be available for adults due to its high awesomeness content.

...& seriously, people. pomegranate is not going to save civilization. it is just a fruit. i defer to bevnet for or a link for the pomegranate blueberry mash, as boylan bottling apparently doesn't care enough about this product to have a web page for it. in fact, they care so little about this product that they appear to have even spelled "pomegranate" incorrectly on the label..."pommegranate" ain't correct, mr & mrs boylan. look it up.