snow falls, fortunes rise.

yup.
that's the secretly dope thing about winter in a vacation town.
on an actual snow day,
when actual flakes are dropping from the sky,
only the reddest of necktards are out on the roads in their trucks,
tomorrow,
a zillion poor-motor/social/navigation-skilled turds will flock to the area,
and F* up the roads, the restaurants, the retail shopping experience,
and of course,
the slopes.
they love a post-snow day weekend funtime in the woodsly goodness.
heck, we all do.
but,
i'll be tattooing some sort of sh!t salad sandwiches,
while the driveways of all my destinations all get iced-uphill,
and increase the risk of calamity, and simultaneously,
the risk of calumny regarding my vehicular operations,
as i slide into the studio, or back out into traffic,
on the luge slalom we call an entryway
or again, afterwards, when i'm sure to skid into slickened parking space
at the Folk Life & Liberty Fortress,
sideways, and screaming at the sky.
yup.
i doo-doo that curse-and-oath-type sh!t.
snow day snow magic has a few predictable catches cached just a wintry wisp
away in the cause-and-effect category,
but otherwise, almost ANYthing can happen.
so,
here's looking forward to single lane lame traffic lines,
and big-wheeled tall trucks turning corners on just two of 'em,
and all the worst ideas flooding the tatzap shop,
because heaven forbid you just enjoy the silent sweetness of a winter wonderland.
actually,
come and give me those movie checks.
i'll spend them on spanning time in solitude,
or maybe with my main man crabtree,
IF he can stop eating all the pillows in the house long enough to hang out a bit.
*
snow day cake?
yes.
i think that's what's up.
check the teleport:

apples to apples, neighbors.
dried fuji apple chunks, crushed up, and included in that soft, sweet, vanilla-beany,
soy yogurt-smoothed, buttery grammie-style cake.
expert.
a hint,
a whisper,
a suggestion of succulent apple fruitiness,
sneaking into your mouth, and gently massaging all those tingling tasetebuds.
yikes.
it's really flippin' tasty, too.
like,
surprisingly especially exxxtra-awesome.
it could be the streusel.
in fact,
it is most probably the streusel.
pow-powdered sugar, and butterish, and more crushed apple rings, and oats,
and vanilla bean paste,
mashed and smashed and stirred together, until that lumpy, bumpy,
crumbly crucial german-type hottness held in all the moisture in the cake,
and browned up just enough to catch a crawnch and take the taste up another level.
mmhmmmm.
what am i having for MY slice?
oh, y'know. no bog deal, just a little whirl of vanilla creme,
and a dusting of gently-warmed cinnamon.
the aroma!
the flavor!
the look!
mmmmmmmmmmmmmm.
***********
it's really falling from the sky.
sheets and blankets of iced-up hexagons,
and all of them are sticking and slicking and stacking up.
we're in for it,
before it warms up and really starts causing problems.
winter is forever kind of an A*-hole,
but,
it sure looks real F*ing good at first, every time.
damn.
i think i might love winter?
i mean,
i DO have a type.
hahahaha.
oh, stop it.
for real, c'mon.
that's just dumb-
whatever.
i've got a shovel,
and i can't tell if i'm digging myself out,
or just in deeper;
never quiet, never soft.....

round and brown

mmmmmm.
neighbors,
do you like brownies?
you do?!
me too.
in fact, i don't just like 'em,
i LIIIIKE 'em like 'em.
y'know?
yep.
so,
when i got a special request for a little brownie activation,
i did a new thing,
to keep my love of brownies interesting,
and to make sure the spark stays electric when i bite into those b!tches.
huh?
oh, no big deal,
i just made the brownies in a tart pan, instead of in a rectangle.
a little change of position can make all the difference in the whole wide world.
check the teleport:

c'mon.
that's so pretty.
it tastes like a brownie,
but better,
and it looks like a chocolate kaleidoscope of deep, rich, thick, expert hottness.
....and that's because that's exactly what it is, kids.
chocolate chocolate cocoa mix, stirred into the soymilk, heated up,
and full of melted butterish,
plus cocoa and brown sugar and vanilla, and salt,
only, when i had to bulk this baby up,
i included no wheat at all.
nope.
not one wheat berry was gristmilled into meal to make this magic happen.
nope.
i went gluten free for this one,
and you'd never know i'd made the switch.
chocolate is pretty forgiving, and it's also very overpowering.
sorry white rice flour and oatmeal,
but you taste just like regular brownies when the chocolate quotient is high enough.
yeah!
and i never leave well enough alone,
so of course i HAD to drizzle those latticed ganache stripes on it,
but,
then it looked so lonesome, like a prison grate or something.
awwwwww.
so i whipped up a chocolate & cocoa frosting to fill out the frills on that fluted ridge,
and that still didn't look like enough.
i mean, when is it ever enough?
too much is the right amount,
and in order to take it to my customary level eleven,
i had to shave up some chocolate bar sprankles, too.
word up.
it's F*ing delicious.
and it's got so much chocolate everywhere.
and,
it's fancy.
that's my personal favorite part.
i like the good looks, guys.
maybe it's just an overcompensation for my great personality,
and my nice eyes?
ugh.
you know what that means, don'tcha?
it means you're busted in the facepiece.
however,
MY facepiece has got chocolate and crumbs all over it,
so judge away,
but i bet i won't hear you over all the chewing i'm doing.
fancy treats in my mouth sweeten the sh!t i'm talkin' all dang day.
i've got a lot of work to do,
and limited time to do it in-
i'm hoping a steady charge of chocolate will remedy that with a brown-boosted
burly barbarian berserker cocoa-loco sugar rush-and-attack jack-up,
and before the day is done,
i'll have met or exceeded expectation,
and also activated all the elements of expertism.
let's hope this brownie has what it takes to take me there;
never quiet, never soft.....

the whole enchilada.

asada be kidding me!
ha.
i'm into it, and it's into my mouth.
yup.
i know a thing or two about making expert eats for my face,
and last night only proved the point a little more than usual.
mmhmmm.
thinly sliced homemade seitan-
and it's that new-new recipe jauns, too, with a touch of pureed superfirm tofu
for a toothsome al dente dopeness that stays soft, but feels strong, y'heard?
yeah!
anyway,
i marinated that in a chili-garlic ho' sauce, oregano, agave and bouillon broth,
and stir fried the F* out of it after it's little soak,
with fresh onions and garlic, and g.p.o.p. and black pepper.
neighbors,
it had alllllll the flavor. all by itself,
but that's not how i run my dinner game in the Folk Life & Liberty Fortress.
no way.
i rolled that sh!t up, with minnesota-rinotta-style underchee'
(which is still the truth, and still so necessary in my custom chee' world)
and some overactivated hooked-up refried beans,
with the daddy-blend of minced peppers and sweet onion, with extra butterishness
and nootch blasted in for a super-smooth finish.
guys,
beans. chee', and seitan, plus a strip of shredded scallion?
expert.
in a taco-sized tortilla?
exxxtra-expert.
what?
yeah.
i made miniature enchiladas.
i did.
and i steam-baked them under foil in a beige bath of homemade gravy,
so that the entire tray of tubes got lubed up and laid down,
inside and out.
....that's the right way. okay?
okay!
and after i survived (barely) the first twenty loooooong minutes of waiting
for the four hundred degree hotbox to do it's dirty work,
they still got a whole other 'nother 'nother fifteen or so, uncovered and exposed,
but upgraded with a layer of home-style slow-simmered,
stewed and brewed, spicy nicey-nice-style enchilada roja jauns.
WORD.
tell you what, kids.
let's check the teleport:

KABOOOOOOOOMFIRE!!!
hahahha.
did you really think enchiladas would be IT?
what am i?
an A*-hole??
no way.
too much is the right amount.
i got that yellow rice poppin' off,
delicately spiced, and sexied up with onions and garlic,
before a little blast-up of black beans gets it going a little harder and hotter.
mmmm.
with those rainbow heirloom grape tomatoes decorating the top?
you like that?
as well you should.
it's good.
how about that guacamole?
my signature blend of hots and sweets, reds and greens,
with the exxxpensive fancy chip... they're beet and kale or something...
color-coordinated to add a little somethin' MORE to the plate.
it works, though, doesn't it?
i think so too.
and a dollop of refrieds, and a dollop of that red sauce,
and a dollop of that spicy rough-cut salsa fresca magic-
yep,
the same cool limey sensuality that's sitting on top of that all-out ball-out torta!
wu-TANG!!
flaky peppered pie crust, packed into a tiny tin,
and filled full up with some serious new big action.
word.
sweet potato, black bean, tomatillo, garlic, onions, green pepper,
fire-roasted chilis, and mucho spices for the complete and total effect of blowing my effing mind.
topped with those shreds of daiya(rrhea) doo-doo,
and baked into preeminence on my plate!!!!!
I LOOOOOOVE FOOD.
that's no joke,
and on mexican miercoles,
i know what i want,
and i know one more thing, too-
if you ain't blasting the whole damned thang with scallion and cilantro sprankles,
your sh!t is the weakest there ever has been.
real talk.
*
so,
i mean, yeah.....
i'll spend hours in front of a stove;
i'll stir and simmer and saute and sear all the components of my sorcery.
because i make the magic happen,
and i do it all so loud, fresh, and hard,
but,
it takes time,
and that's one hefty pricetag.
i gladly pay it, however,
and i'll sip on the sauce,
and i'll snack on the strips,
and i'll smack my mutha-lickin' lips,
and most of all,
i'll make an awful lot of all of it,
and make sure none of it is awful, at all.....
....and,
i'll eat it all up.
i'm getting fatter,
but i'm maybe also getting a little bit better?
oh man,
i sure hope so;
never quiet, never soft.....

snow day!

we've got a pow-wow of powpow,
and it's fluffy, it's light, it's white, and it's going to be alright.
there's freshly fallen, newly-driven snow across the breadth of the woodsly goodness,
and it's breathtaking in the dim lights of the few homesteads with anyone up this early.
y'know?
there are orange rectangles of cast radiance reflecting and refracting the angles
of all the snow angels and devils that've blanketed the mountain vale.
and that's sweet looking, neighbors.
i'll be out shoveling, on the double, after a little Tea 'N' Toast,
to make room, and make way,
for our cars to exit the horseshoe-shaped ice-flume i call my driveway.
yikes.
i'm sayin',
it's a snow day,
and that means ANYthing can happen.
for instance, maybe crabtree will behave himself.
....that'd be a mutha-effing snowy miracle.
or,
maybe he'll take it easy on our snowshoeing sh!t-hike
through the poorly plowed hills of my friendly frozen neighborhood,
with fewer whines and bites for my ears and boots?
ha.
neither of those scenarios seems very likely......
but,
a more realistic expectation of this cold winter's day is as follows-
maybe i'll make some expert treats,
and possibly fire up some fresh dinnertime dopeness,
and perhaps produce a painted picture or two in the interim?
we'll see.
snow days are good for you,
because they open up the door to infinite variations on finite fortunes,
and also,
the first little bit looks pretty dang incredible;
with snowflakes clinging to the tiniest tendrils of nature,
and drifts covering all the muddy butt of the last storm.
*
speaking of butt.
i've been busy drawing on my face some more.
what i do to get ready every day is different than what you do.
check the teleport:




























hahahaha.
duders, i already know.
i have a problem with obsessive compulsions.
it's fine, though, because today is a snow day,
and that means this is well within reason until tomorrow,
unless it snows again overnight.
then,
i'm solid for a whole other 'nother 24 hours.
yeah.
i do my own thing,
and i do a lot of it.
too much is the right amount,
and being prolific is almost as expert as being good;
never quiet, never soft.....

soul samurai

i mean,
when it comes right down to it-
the cucch is better than you.
i don't think you could've done anything differently to affect the outcome...
it's just a thing.
i am not sure if, in fact, everybody even has an other.
like,
an other.
...not necessarily from another mother, but a brother in arms, and in alarms,
and even in charms and harms and so on.....
y'know?
an other.
yeah.
the complementary counterbalance of crucial competent cooperative
recuperative co-conspiratorial co-captain of kinship and kindred kith and whatnot.
the cucch, though, is mine.
he's a good one,
and i'm sorry to say this, neighbors,
but,
he brought the noise with him to the post office,
and it was delivered to me on a lightning bolt.
he knows me, and he gets me,
and what's more,
he gets me the goods.
and by goods i mean, the greatness.
check the belated-berfday-type teleport:

booooooom.
the hatori hanso of kitchen cutlery.
if you should meet god, or an onion,
they will be cut.
a shun is no joke,
and it's also the sh!t,
in the best possible way.
i'll be slicing and chopping one hundred percent
of all my expert meals this year with my new new hottness.
hammered, razor-edged folded damascus dopeness is what's up.
guys,
my best friend, my best man, my hetero lifemate, my other,
the cucch.
i'm lucky as hell to have a homeboy who brings the super-elite,
super-official, super-daddy-money movie check choppers
to the Folk Life & Liberty Fortress.
if you know, you know, and if you don't,
you'd best ask somebody.
i am grateful for the few i call my family,
and i appreciate the care the take,
and the efforts they undertake.
it's all really happening,
sharper than ever before;
never quiet, never soft.....

all the beige.

i want to eat all the food.
all the time.
always.
forever and ever.
and that's the problem.
i have too much to do,
and not nearly enough time to do it all.
however,
no matter what is on the schedule,
i'm steady making exceptions, and providing exemptions,
and offering up exclusive preemptives for any expert
one-two-three-or-four course mealtimes that might pop up
throughout the preplotted course of my day.
(tasty treats get preferential treatment, and are allowed to cut in line, every single time)
yup.
^i'm like that.
i think being awake too much makes me hungrier.
is that a science thing?
i think it might be.
i'm sayin',
at 4:30 a.m. today,
yet again,
at the windswept winter whipcrack of today's wee-est hours,
my sweet handsome darling doggy-dog was whining,
wide-eyed, and ready to race out into the icy deathtrap of a driveway
that ma nature fashioned from a deluge of downpouring drips and drops,
followed by a fastbreak lightning flash-freeze.
get me?
it's treacherously dangerous right outside my doorstep.
so,
i didn't get any sleep,
and then i nearly got my neck broken on a patch of invisible hardened water;
and while my main man crabby crapped his head off on an ice slide in the garden,
i was wishing i was soundly asleep,
dreaming of tofu.
instead,
he's back in his bed, snoring SO loudly,
and i'm typing away at this little complaint for you to look at.
yuuuuuck.
okay?
okay.
but,
how does that tie in to eating all the food?
well,
when you're up early,
you can really get a little more time invested into that first meal.
and breakfast is important, or so they tell me-
you all already know i LOVE my Tea 'N' Toast,
but when i can hit it with that leisurely upgrade jauns?
i gotta, and i do.
check the surely-early-shirley-type teleport:

mmmmmmmmmmm.
all the things.
and i'll eat them all up.
and then i'll have seconds,
and then i'll have thirdsies,
if i haven't already devoured every last scrap by then.
i just want to be eating every minute.
and honestly,
i think my shark-gluttony has spread to every aspect of my whole life.
i want all of the everything,
and more of it after that.
yikes.
that's a tall order.
i doubt i can get EVERYthing i want,
but that gives me a good reason to avoid having fun-
i've got much much more sh!t to do.
*
also,
coming home to all the beige foods is pretty nice.
what?
oh.
that's real.
teleport:

tofurky?
so beige.
stuffing?
beige.
mashed 'tatoes?
yup......beige.
and gravy?
c'mon.
don't be dumb.
ampy-d freaked it off with some brussels, asparagus, and onions,
to spice it up, and add a splash of color, an' that.
....it was all delicious,
but, as usual, i had three helpings,
which wasn't very helpful to my midesction.
sure,
my bellyhole was stuffed full up,
but,
that's a LOT of beige.
and beige makes your butthole fat.
that's real.
-
so,
i'm fat again,
because too much is the right amount,
and moderation hasn't been invited to my forties.
it's an official snub,
a severing of diplomatic ties,
a cold-shouldering O.T.L.;
and that's just about as serious as you can get.
i'm filling in all the blanks;
i'm stuffing food into all the empty spaces, places, cracks, creases, and crevices;
i'm running around earlier than ever;
i'm doing more things that need doing,
with less concrete tangibles to show for most of it,
except for the tightening of my belt, despite letting out a hole or two.
damn.
it's all really happening,
a no-holds-barred trough-feeding shark-swallow-style smorgasbord,
and the repercussions are concussive,
and the reports are percussive,
and i'm big-upped and getting more massive by the moment;
never quiet, never soft.....

battle-beasting

hours.
and hours.
and hours.
miles.
and miles.
and miles.
that's how the days begin-

crabtree tethered to me,
and my hand on the lead,
and our legs pumping and propelling us across the woodsly goodness,
exploring and expanding our territory
and seeing what the mountains have to offer us.
i'm interested in all the exercise we're getting,
and all the togetherness we get to experience as a tandem twosome.
he's interested in whatever F*ing horrible gross roadside edibles there might be.
seriously.
i've extracted some very soggy, soupy, poopy bits and pieces from his drippy maw
on almost every occasion we've been out and about.
he finds the filth, neighbors.
that's his thing.
we walk and walk and walk,
and hopefully, he gets a little tired.
more often, however, we get home,
and while i'm spent from all the uphill struggling we've conquered,
my little warrior walks through the door,
takes a deep breath,
and immediately starts sprinting, spinning, jumping, leaping, lunging,
and careening through the Folk Life & Liberty Fortress.
jeez.
i don't understand how he can never ever ever be tired.
i'm not much for rest, nor relaxation,
but damn, duders,
he's up so early,
and up so late,
and taking it to eleven for all the times we span in-between.
occasionally,
he'll take a lie down,
in amongst his treasures,
but he makes sure to keep me in his eyeline:

i mean,
just in case there's a need to start effing with me,
he wants to be assured of his proximity,
should there be a call to gnaw on, chomp on, munch up, shred, rip, tear,
or otherwise destroy whatever small moment of productivity i'm undertaking.
yeah.
that's his thing.
*
i find myself beside myself when he gets all fired up.
i do,
and i hate it.
i want to be the calm center of the hurricane,
not a contrasting cyclone whirling devilishly dervish against him.
y'know?
but,
he's impervious to discipline,
and he knows no fear.
it's not that i don't understand the concept of positive reinforcement.
i'm not a total A*-hole.
it's that after a week of sleepless dog-battles deep into every evening,
and 4 a.m. wake-ups every morning
i'm just a little short-fused,
and my shortcomings all rise up long before my logic overrides
the knee-jerk juggernaut of overreaction.
yikes.
the thing of it is,
a peanut buttery dog-chew is all it takes to be completely forgiven for
raging and railing against the stubborn innocence of his instinctive preferences.
that's one heck of a cheap date.
he's a furious ball of calamitous energy,
i am a frenzied force of infinite nature-
together,
we bring out the best and worst of each other,
as it should be.
he's a good little dude, kinda;
and i'm a good dog dad, kinda.
we're figuring it out as we go,
and our mutually hard styles and individual determination
make for a collision of nurture and nature;
werewolf and dogbaby;
and sleep stays away,
because we've got way too much work to do;
never quiet, never soft.....

mess-ups.

i effed up some frosting, neighbors.
mmhmm.
it happens sometimes,
when you've got too much fat fatness,
and not enough light airiness-
and once it turns that corner,
there's no getting it back.
so,
i had a potful of pooped-out peanut buttery chocolate marshmallow frosting,
but it was looking a whole lot more like a sad greasy brown paste
than anything i'd ever want to put in my mouth.
awwww.
the thing is,
i wasn't going to let a little overdose of peanuts and butts
turn my sweet triumph into tangy tragedy.
no way.
i did something.
and it was a good something, kids.
yeah.
that foiled frosting was folded in with some flour and other cakey additives,
and what was supposed to be a berfday cupcake topping
quickly became a whole other 'nother other thing entirely...
i transmogrified that sh!t,
i'm a cakey bakey alchemist,
and i turned the trip-up back into a trodding tread-well trump card.
yuuuuuup.
check the scallop-edged-tart-pan-type-teleport:

woooohooooooo.
chocolate marshmallow vegan hot cocoa mix.
that was the base, and that was where the frosting took a turn for the worse.
it's sugary, and gritty, and in general, an uncooperative operator in the treats game.
it's great in warm vegetable milks,
but it's a real A*-hole on the whipped buttery scene.
damn.
however,
it tastes so good, i allow it to reside in my cupboard,
and now that i've unlocked the secret to effective activation,
it'll get used up expeditiously.
i've got a prodigious plan to bake alllllll the cakes,
and this one makes me think i may actually really doo-doo that freaky sh!t.
y'know?
now, in the interest of honet and upfront communication-
the center of the cake fell inwards, despite an overlong baking period.
turns out,
deviant and defiant frosting doesn't give a F* about becoming a cake,
and will remain recalcitrant well beyond getting it's point across.
ha.
so now i've got this rogue ribbed roundie,
and it's got peanut buttery sponginess,
and chocolate marshmallow supersugar sweetness,
and i'm wondering how to turn that up a notch or two.
the answer-
MORE sugar.
ugh.
two kinds of frosting, both of which are genuinely well-proportioned
and functional versions of whipped creme-style dopeness,
and then,
to make sure it's got balance in the force,
what with all that softness soaking up all the the spaces-
i blasted the top with cacao nib sprankles.
wooooord.
it gets that crawnchy jauns poppin',
and that adds the exact contrast that makes a midsection cake-sag
turn up and out and into something expert!
yep.
*
i try pretty hard to correct my mistakes,
whenever doing my damnedest to prevent mistakes has failed.
it still happens,
after all,
i'm only one man,
with all the same vulnerabilities as anyone else.
i just fight them all day long, from way before sunrise,
and long after sunset.
does that sound exhausting?
it is.
but sleepytimes don't make you the best possible version of yourself.
they just leave you bright eyed and bushy tailed and the same as before.
crabtree sees to it that i never fall into that trap.
my little monster woke me up allll night,
and now he's over here sleeping exxxtra hard,
like his mission was molto accomplished.
hard styles, and long days, and bad weather, and weird cake.
that's how forty begins in the woodsly goodness.
it's all really happening,
and i'll surely be awake for the duration;
never quiet, never soft.....

berfday dinnertime.

portsmouth, new hampshire.
dinnertime.
the green elephant.
birthday magic.
teleport:

yeah!
have i ever made a non-A*-hole face when it's time to get delicious, and make wishes?
nope.
i can't help it.
i get excited,
like, to eleven,
and my face is superlatively expressive in those instances.
what can i say?
the ugly truth is written in every wrinkle.
ha.
......
you know i love food.
you know i want allllll of it,
especially when it's that new new vegan hottness, y'feel me?
yep.
so,
i ordered all the food, and i ate all the food,
and i spanned time with my copilot and constant companion,
ampy-d,
and together, we set a record for most food in the least time in one sitting.
that's right.
we asked.
and they agreed,
shark-gluttony is what we've got,
and how we do,
and what's really 'hood when the northern mountain barbarians
invade the gentrified quarter of the prosperous seaports of the south.
that's that lightning striking viking sh!t,
and instead of longships,
we blaze in on subarus,
and all-wheel drive ourselves crazy with berserker binge eating
like a brutal batch of boss hogs at the trough.
i mean it.
check it out for yourselves:





yikes.
and after we terrorized alllllll the apps,
we still dominated a main event apiece.
teleport:

faaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaat people.
even if only on the insides,
we're enormous.
how can we be so skinny,
and live so fat?
i think it has something to do with being the maestro?
yeah.
you know.
and then,
when we were stuffed full to the brim with vegan proteins
and spicy spices and sticy sauces and soy-based butthole-battling business?
yuuuuuuup.
that banana-nay-nay-noonoo jauns showed up with a candle:

awwwwwww.
i s'pose that's exxxactly why amber called ahead.
that's very sweet,
and so was that dessert.
*
forty isn't old if you're a tortoise,
but who the F* has time to move that slowly?
i guess i'm not ancient,
but i'm hopefully a whole lot wiser than i was last leap year.
that's progress,
and that's what i want, always.
moving forward, towards the inevitable end.
there's too much to do to do anything else.
i am grateful for the time i have been given,
and for the ones who take the time and make the effort to include me in theirs.
i have the best ones around me.
real talk.
this is What Is,
and i'm digesting that fact far slower than the supper
that's already made a second grand exit.
ew.
forty years of poop and butts.
i have a style,
and it's an awful one.
you're welcome and i'm sorry, all at once;\
never quiet, never soft.....

presents past.

i love berfdays.
i do.
i used to hate mine, a lot,
but only because i'm such an overachiever on the berfy days.
y'know?
however,
when the mad-scientific laboratory test kitchen launchpad
of the fortunate and flavorful Folk Life & Liberty Fortress
has ribbons and streamers and banners an' sh!t?
and there's stacks on stacks on stacks of presents all wrappy-snappy
and color-match metallic-foiled, with bows and bags,
i'll be honest, (as always)
i start feeling a little spoiled.
ampy-d hooked it up properly.
that's no joke.
check the phase-one-type teleport:

niiiiice.
i'm reppin' fresh scents,
and sweet sentiments in envelopes.
awwwww.
you know i got new clothes, too;
and not the emperor kind, either.
these jauns are visible,
and very form flattering.
so i'm looking snappy in a few fresh outfits,
and i'm staying warm with new winter-weatherproof underlayer hottness, too.
plus,
i got a molto sexxy molto fresh parka, in olive green,
and it looks like the earth version of some han solo hoth sh!t.
that's expert.
then pancakes happened in my mouth,
and then,
a whole other 'nother batch of wrappy rock-n-roll exploded in my face!
check the phase-two-type teleport:

c'mon.
candy, and kitchen gadgetry and gozmos, y'all.
i love that stuff.
plus,
i got a big crockpot.
yup.
the largest and in-chargest one.
so you know they'll be some serious slow-cookin' all-day dopeness
stewing and simmering into succulent success throughout the immediate future.
that's how it's done correctly.
well-presented,
situationally appropriate,
custom-tailored,
and with TWO cards.
rules is rules,
and too much is the right amount.
if you aren't about it,
go away.
ha.
*
i'd hate for you to think it's ALL great moments, neighbors.
so,
here's a little flashback to when i was the worst one ever:

jeeeeeeeeesus.
fat and hairy,
with so many more follicles, and so few of them grey,
whilst my middle mas more massive,
and somehow still less masculine,
without the added degree of difficulty presented by a cantaloupe colored button-down.
ugh.
ten years gone,
to when i was steady holding it down with one of my very best friends,
mr. dan dealy,
and in those days, he was just a wee little lad.
we're both older and wiser,
and one or two of us got better looking, too.
word up.
* 
true stories.
that's what i've got.
it's called real life documentarianism,
and it's what i do.
some good, most not so much,
and food, mostly good,
with a few failures mixed in so you know it's not a joke.
it's ALL really happening,
and i'll tell you one more true thing-
it isn't any of it any kind of easy,
but that's what makes it so interesting;
never quiet, never soft.....

gifts from the woodsly goodness.

guys,
i'm a terrible vegan.
no.
wait.
it's true.
huh?
no,
NOT because i secretly cheat on my twenty-year commitment
to culinary compassion and the vegetable-based barbarian bodybuilding
of bakery-fresh big action.
ew.
that's not something that is likely to ever happen.
i won't eat animal bits ever again.
i mean,
on the real-real-
that sh!t is SO gross to me that i don't even consider any of it
to be, in even the slightest side-way, a sick semblance of actual edible food.
so take it easy,
i'm not sneaking cheese like some F*ing amateur.
no.
but,
the reason  i'm a terrible vegan?
it's because i categorically, adamantly, enthusiastically do NOT love all animals.
in fact,
one specific branch of the animal kingdom can definitely all become extinct,
effective immediately,
and everything everywhere from that moment on will be much much better.
awwwwwwwww.
neighbors,
i hate cats.
i do.
i really really do.
and i almost wish i could muster up the will to feel bad about it,
almost,
but they're just SO the most obviously sh!ttiest ones,
i can't feel affection for little murderers who'll watch you die,
and eat your eyes,
and never ever ever truly love you.
awww.
i only tell true stories, kids.
and cats are torturers, trophy-hunters, drug-seeking narcissistic sociopaths,
and a slew of other other undesirable doo-doo buttery bad stuff
that i already avidly avoid in humans-
so why would i scoop up the sour turds of something even worse?
i wouldn't i couldn't and i won't.
cats are the devil's children,
and i don't even believe in the devil.
haha.
anyway,
ma nature took pity on my advanced age.
i mean it.
she gifted me with something exxxtra-expert,
and let it stink on ice hard enough for crabtree to sniff out on our walk.
friends,
nature wins,
but once in a great while,
she's a good sport about it.
check the happy-berfday-type teleport:

F* yes!
the only good cat is a dead cat.
is it missing it's eyes?
i sorta hope so.
that'd be cosmic comeuppance from the future.
i could only get so close, or the dog would've surely feasted on it's effluvium;
and that's way grosser than the used jawbreaker he was sucking on ten feet later.
ugh.
a frozen, broken, destroyed demon feline,
courtesy of the woodsly goodness.
there's no joy in the suffering of animals-
even ones who take great joy in the suffering of animals,
but,
that stiffened crow-food fodder did make me smile.
it's true.
still don't think there's a secret universal plan?
well,
we took the longer long way home,
and would've never found it if we hadn't.
that's fortuitous.
that's gratuitous.
that's what's unfolding as i explore the byways and dirt tracks of my world.
i'm not saying that it was the best present,
only that i got a special discovery by crabby,
withdrawn straight from the snowbanks funded by ma nature,
and nature wins.
*
today,
life resumes it's usual grind.
molto work,
minor moments of time, mostly designated as travel periods.
i'm back and forth,
to and fro,
up and down,
and on top of all of that,
i'm forty.
damn.
i rep a hard style,
but,
i'm no catsicle.
it's not much to brag about,
but still,
it's kind of the best part;
never quiet, never soft