Blue

Earlier at work, an email announcement of free brownie sundaes in the cafeteria led to the greatest sense of urgency I've witnessed all day. The stampede of engineers to free food is really quite spectacular.

Tonight I washed my car for the first time since driving up from Palo Alto. That was more than eight months of caked-on Californian, Oregonian, and Washingtonian dirt, grime, brake dust, and road salt that are finally off the car. The old school bucket and towel session brought back memories of car washes at 307, when the sun would dry your car before you were done soaping it up. (Some things are no longer a concern these days...)

Ah yes, the purple car parade.

Meanwhile, I've been seriously thinking about taking my car in for a new paint job. It wouldn't be cheap, but it would be nice to enjoy looking at my car for a change. Of course she'd become some shade of blue (or blurple?), which means I'd have to change her name, because a blue car named "Blue" wouldn't be nearly as funny. Well, one can dream...

So, anyway, after a nice, detailed wash, Blue looked pristine for a moment. And then it started raining.

Fo' Pizzle My Nizzle

Yesterday I went to the 99 Ranch Market to buy Chinese groceries. It's always quite the experience being spoken at in more dialects/languages than I knew existed...and later learning some of that colorful vocabulary from the arguments that break out in the check out lanes.

Still more interesting, however, are all the findings in the store. It is a veritable museum of plant and animal species. Imagine pomelos bigger than my head (think grapefruit on steroids), durian fruit on sale (the experience of rotting garbage in your mouth - yum!), and types of meat you wish you never saw.

Oh yes, the "meat."

Yesterday at the meat department I caught sight of a single package tucked away in a corner labeled "Beef Pizzle." What is this beef pizzle?, my curious mind inquired. The fact that it was left by itself, untouched, should have been my first clue not to go pick it up. Through the cellophane, I could see it resembled sausage, but chopped into segments. And each cross-section revealed fully intact muscle tissue (i.e., not processed meat product), suggesting this was definitely not the typical sausage...at least not in the literal, culinary sense.

Ahem.

I had my suspicions confirmed when I Googled it today. And then I wanted to barf. Suddenly, eating fish heads, duck heart, and chicken feet seemed like child's play.

If you're still not sure what I'm talking about, Google it, and enjoy the experience of upchuck in your own mouth. Here's my favorite search result: Dog chews. "No two bulls are created equal, so girth of pizzle sticks may vary."

Ugh, do my people deem anything beyond the limits of consumption?

Playlist Snapshot

Dude, I've been tagged. Thanks, Lara! These are always fun.

Instructions: List seven songs you are into right now. No matter what they are. They must be songs you are presently enjoying. Then tag seven other people to see what they’re listening to.

1. "Jesus Paid It All" by Kristian Stanfill
2. "The Valley Song" by Jars of Clay
3. "Walk On" by U2
4. "Stolen" by Dashboard Confessional
5. "Read My Mind (Pet Shop Boys Stars Are Blazing Mix)" by The Killers
6. "Where'd You Go (Big Bad Remix)" by Fort Minor
7. "What Goes Around...Comes Around (Junkie XL Small Room Mix)" by Justin Timberlake
And since I'm bad at following rules...
8. "The Birth And Death Of The Day" by Explosions In The Sky

The following bloggers are hereby tagged and should therefore consider themselves it:
TPiglette (Tag Dmeroit and complete the...square? :D)
Dokes
UnityXX
Howie C
Johnkangw
Theoderick
Alice

Haha, I think I'll have to personally notify the latter ones... I honestly don't know who else visits. If you're a visitor who feels slighted by my ignorance, don't blame me! There are simple ways to make your presence known in the audience... (Leave a comment, you lurker.)

Oh, and I should probably tag an eighth: Sei, wanna share your list in the comments? :)

Pedigree

My multivitamin pills are getting old. How can I tell? They reek. Like dog food. It's quite revolting.

Speaking of dog food, some of my college friends will remember how it seemed like every other project I did for my Product Design classes at Stanford centered around dogs. While I love dogs, it was not by choice that I ended up designing products for dogs, their owners, caretakers, veterinarians, and food manufacturers. You name it, I brainstormed it. (Don't believe me? Somewhere in a box I have logbook sketches of various devices to save owners the trouble of picking up poo. One design boldly assumed that dogs do not care about diaper rash. This idea thankfully never reached user-testing.)

Man, I don't know what sort of canine obsession our teachers all shared, but they apparently did not feel sorry for the one student in our class who was deathly afraid of dogs. No joke, she was in tears when our first dog project got announced. And she was in tears for the second one. And the next one. Of course, no one feels sorry for her now, because she braved through it all, graduated as the star of our class, and is now working at IDEO (the Google of the design industry). I don't believe she receives any sympathy from her unemployed, starving, designer friends.

So what was the point of this post? Oh yes. A classmate recently pointed out that Masterfoods USA, which sponsored one of our final dog projects, has begun implementing some of our design solutions for their Pedigree brand of dog food. I browsed the website and it's neat to observe how the fruits of many a late night actually came to see the light of day. That rocks.

New Hobby, New Friends

Okay, so one benefit to the snow is the chance to take up new hobbies. Like fishtailing. No wait, snowboarding. I've gone three times this season now, and it keeps getting more fun. Last Saturday, the powder was just awesome. It kept snowing all day and I learned how to link turns, do 360's, and tumble (of course) in the softest powder I've ever experienced. But let us not forget how much time I spend on my butt/shoulder/head/face... sliding/tumbling/skidding down the slope. It's pretty amusing for everyone involved. Oh, and I'm pretty sure I beat Jenn in Slinky status bragging rights.

Here's one picture of the aftermath on our first trip (thanks for the pic, Nick):

No, I do not have prematurely graying hair. Yes, I have since invested in a helmet.

Snowboarding has been fun, and it's largely thanks to the friends with whom I've been learning. Since some of you have asked (great idea, Lara), I might as well take the opportunity to introduce them. Meet James and Nick, two guys I've come to know through work, church, playing cards, and boarding.

That's James on the left and Nick on the right.

I met Nick first through work. He hails from Omaha, Nebraska, so I respect him as a fellow Midwesterner who probably faces more persecution than this Illinoisan. During one of my first weekends here, he took me and a couple coworkers sailing in Puget Sound on his boat, the Midnight Sojourn. Immediate impression: A nice, generous guy with a very cool sailboat.

My next impression of Nick came on his birthday, which he did not spend celebrating, but instead helping multiple friends who were having car trouble that day. He tugged one out of the ditch and provided another with rides to and from the repair shop. Selfless and considerate? Very much so.

Unfortunately, first impressions are often wrong. As I've surely proven to most of you, a nice, refined exterior oftentimes masks an evil bastard within. And yes, such is the case with Nick. He has a wicked sense of humor. And I don't mean wicked as in awesome. I mean wicked...like how you'd describe me. Case in point: A few weekends ago, while snowboarding, I performed a total face-plant on the slopes. I sat up, brushed the snow off my goggles, and saw Nick slowing down to check up on me. Or so I thought. He proceeded to peg me with a snowball as he rode past. I'm pretty sure I heard cackling. The pelting happens on the lift, too, if I should have the misfortune of sitting vulnerable in the lift chair in front of him. I tell you, he's mean.

But I guess that's why I get along with Nebraska Man.

Now, meet James:


Don't let the perspective fool you: James is a giant. This towering Texan was the third enginerd from my company to join our church community group in three weeks (our poor group...). James lives close by, so we've spent more than a few Saturday nights eating dinner, playing cards, and discussing matters of faith, life, and more. He's a man of principle and character, and I hold him in great respect. But, I must confess, that respect comes crashing down whenever I find myself on the receiving end of yet another one of his humiliating pranks or insults. There are just too many to recount. So, yes, he too has a messed up sense of humor and keeps me on my toes in more ways than one.

There he is in the back, suppressing his gag reflex after swallowing the nasty Luna breakfast bar that Nick and I left him (we grabbed the last two non-feminine-nutrition bars). I do not regret our actions that morning. Not one bit.

And there you have it...a quick toast to two of my new friends. Demented and mean as they may be, I am grateful to call them my brothers.

Cheers.

I do, in fact, have more than two friends in Seattle, so you can anticipate (or skip) more introductions in the near future. :)

Dinosauria

All right, Howie, this post's for you...

A couple weeks ago, my friend Howie commented that my new house needed more dinosaurs. To explain, we had bonded at good ol' 307 over our mutual love for dinosaurs. So, allow me to indulge him in proving that dinosaurs do continue to live in my house. Or, at least, in my imagination.

Behold the prehistoric scene unfolding on my dining table:

Check out the action, as Tyrannosaurus engages Triceratops in a battle to the death. T. rex lunges for Trike's neck, but all he gets is a mouthful of horns. OUCH! He'll be spitting blood tonight...

Hanging behind the battle scene is a rather unfazed Stegosaurus. He's got an armor-plated back and a spiked tail, so he really doesn't give a crap. Moreover, he's quite preoccupied with his romantic pursuits. He thinks he has found true love in the beautiful, blue "Ms. Sutego Zaurusu." Unfortunately, he doesn't realize that she is merely a fossil imprint on a cup imported from Japan. Sorry, Steggy...she's made of glass, you're made of plastic; she speaks Engrish, and you don't speak; it's just not gonna work out.

If we pan now to the left foreground, we see Parasaurolophus, the placid duck-bill dinosaur with a crest on his head. He's happy munching on foliage. Apparently parsley grew to gigantic proportions in prehistoric times, much to the delight of these fine-dining dinosaurs. But herbivores always had to watch out for the similar-looking, but deadly toxic cilantro bushes that littered the landscape of the Cretaceous period. It was the inevitable misfortune of dinosaurs with challenged taste buds to die early deaths because they couldn't detect the bitter poison of this vile, vile plant. We recognize this process as natural selection and move on.

Finally, hiding in between the cups in the background is Brachiosaurus. His long neck and gawky stance brought him endless ridicule all through childhood and have left him feeling like an outcast to this day. And so he mopes around, terribly emo, searching for a soulmate who will "understand" him. Like Steggy, he's also looking for love in all the wrong places. You see, that Buronto Zaurusu that he's flirting with won't be having Brach's kids anytime soon. For one, Buronto is another species. Secondly, he's male.

That's right, folks, you've seen it theorized on bumper stickers and on Facebook.com... Now we have photographic evidence: Gay marriage killed the dinosaurs.

(Thanks for the cups, Auds!)