Monthly Archive for July, 2007

In The Key Of Gnocchi

Published
by
Jordan
on July 21, 2007
in Well-Being
. 2 Comments

I've been lucky enough to have access to fresh produce from a community supported farmshare my friends Mike and Christy are a part of while they're gone: The 47th Ave Farm. Last week I received turnips, baby red potatoes, fennel, arugula, mixed salad greens, baby onion, garlic, farm eggs, and a strange goat cheese variety. All fresh, all organic, and all cut the day of pick-up. The farm is local and this is definitely something I look forward to investing in in the near future.

Using the baby red potatoes I was able to make a dish I from a recipe I recently found in The Oregonian FoodDay section from July 10. Written by Leslie Cole, the article was called "A Knack for Gnocchi" and the dish took about 3 full hours to prepare but yielded one of the most satisfyingly light lunches I've ever assembled. Surprising since it's really just potatoes and flour, but as usual it's all about the process.

Reminiscent of pasta, Wikipedia states that gnocchi, pronounced "no-key", is the "Italian word for dumplings". If you decide to try the dish, I recommend working with a partner and using "light flour and a light touch". The fresh tomato sauce is super easy and delicious, especially with some fresh basil, but don't forget that it has to simmer for 45 minutes. I didn't have a food processor and so did not get a chance to make the Arugula Pesto but substituted it for an average powdered pesto mix.

Finally, if I had to do some recommendations they would be as follows,
Music: Don Ellis "Live at Montreux"
Beverage: Guayaki "Magical Mint" Yerba Mate
Day of the Week: Sunday
Time of day: 12:30PM
Accompaniments: Light salad with balsamic vinegar

Ve: Aggression Release Party

Published
by
Jordan
on July 18, 2007
in "Guy Stuff"
. 1 Comment

Last night I participated in Veneer Magazine's Release Party. And by release party I mean a paintball "party" where the writers of the articles reading their work over a megaphone were defended by three editors while everyone else (acting as the readers) pelted them 10 times.

For those of you who do not know, Veneer is a new magazine, the first, put out by Marriage Publishing House. This party was Flint's idea and he was extremely excited for it. He is the man behind Veneer and he put together the first few games. He also got the worst beating of anyone.

It was the first time I had ever held, pointed, or shot a gun of any sort and I got really nervous when we started putting on masks and the guys started making fake cups. I had no idea what to expect. Suddenly we all were transformed into super-crazy-gun-wielding-combat-soldiers all instructed to aim for each other. Some people were way into to. The entire field was wild as well. Totally covered in grease. Totally. The arena floor was composed of about two feet of broken paintball shells which are filled with what seemed to be a very greasy substance that covered all our clothes and gave everything a gross slick coating. That is what we were running around in, squatting, sniping, creating chaos in...grease.

I must say that it was thrilling. I must say that it was also very haunting. Extremely savage and fierce. Although some played it safe at the beginning and would chill when the horn was blown, some went for the glory, not giving a fuck and not ducking behind shit! Straight up in your face running directly towards you shooting 200mph pellets right toward your head!!! Our noggins were all covered with masks which were fierce-looking SWAT team type of helmets and allowed no air circulation at all. I thought about the masks a lot today. The way your breath was right in your face, the heavy panting and the loud shots of fire whizzing by. The way a ball would bust open on your mask was one of the most innocuous yet terrifying things I've ever experienced. It only happened once but made my heart skip a whole measure of beats before I realized that I wasn't in pain, just amazing slow-motion shock.

We all got hit a bunch of times as most of the games ended when everyone had either a) been hit (either in a certain place on their body or number of times), or b) hit everyone else and was the only person remaining. Flint, the poor-guy, took it deep with the welts and bruises, some of them looking really gnarly today. I am definitely sore today but my hits weren't too deep, the worst and most sore being on the fatty part of my legs. Even the one that somehow snagged me on my ass was pretty mellow today.

I had a fun time and although I'm not instantly an avid paintball enthusiast I am glad that I was able to be a part of this experience. On a whole other spectrum of thought about the event check out Claire's thoughts and pictures on the official Veneer post.

Not Hot Smoke (Ciggy Puffs, Fuck Off!!!) 2007 Full Body Tour

Published
by
Jordan
on July 3, 2007
in Well-Being
. 5 Comments

So for those of you who did not know, today is day 3 of my indefinite "Not Hot Smoke (Ciggy Puffs, Fuck Off!!!) 2007 Full Body Tour". I've thrown in the damp stinky towel of cigarettes. And I didn't do it for Lent, I didn't do it for Jesus, I didn't do it for my Mom, I'm doing it for myself. There are some obvious reasons and some not-so-obvious reasons for my scheduled decision and I'd like to tell you some details.

First of all, Brother Caleb kicked me down with some information about the Georgia Tobacco Quit Line (1-800-NO-BUTTS) which is a government-run program that sets you up with quitting plan (mostly a date), a counselor (not annoying at all, in fact, mine was very comforting to talk to and kept it real), and provides healthy mental and physical alternatives (breathing exercises, beverage switches, etc.) which means...that's right: free patches or gum - and it's open to people from every state, they'll set you up with the right person. The GTQL has been around for three years or so and they've helped 35,000 or so people with their addictions. ANYWAY...the patches are working pretty well and, when I chose July 1st for my quit date in early June, I decided to space them out since I only got one box of Step One Nicotine Tranasdermal System Patches (14 patches at 21mg each - that's a lot of nicotine=1 1/2 packs of Parliament Lights).1 They keep a sort of "deep buzz" going all throughout the day and give your tongue a parched sense that makes water taste like gold.

Secondly, my friend (and, loosely termed, "boss" at Marriage) Curtis gave me some Nature's Plus Tea Tree Toothpicks that not only pack a powerful punch but also help with keeping my hands busy during those tough cravings. Helps with the onion breath, too!2

And finally, as many of you know I have type 2 diabetes which, with it's proven links to high-risk heart disease and stoke, puts me in a place where with the build up of "fatty materials" in the lining of my blood cells is akin to me already having had a heart attack (more). I don't need no tar clogging up my flow, so obviously it's not a good place for a smoker to be in.

I'm really not trying to advocate quitting (even though the toothpicks are nice treat for even the most smokeless person), I am just ready to stop. If you have thought about quitting, definitely give it some serious thought and pick the right time - that's very key. I wouldn't recommend quitting on an impulsive decision.

Alright, 'nuff about all that, time for breakfast.

Love,
Jordan

1. Right on the box, it clearly states that "if you have vivid dreams, you may remove the patch at bedtime and apply a new one in the morning". Well, fucking hell! Bedtime is when I'm most prone to lightening up cig and so I've been putting on new ones before I go to bed. Thus, I have been experiencing some incredible dreams! Such as a) narrowly diverting the explosion that an 80-year-old decrepit Jack Nicholson and I set up in a 5-star hotel elevator shaft where apparently Princess Diana was staying, and b) not only playing Futsal with the Uncle Joey, Uncle Jesse, and Danny Tanner from Full House but rocking the goalie position as well with one assist! Seriously, these dreams are like incredibly lucid, multi-sensory, technicolor-type-of-LSD-trippin'-shit. They are actually turning into one of the most interesting "pluses" of quitting.

2. I had initially bought a large amount of cinnamon sticks, before hearing about the toothpicks, for the same "oral fixation" reason. Cinnamon is a natural neutralizer of blood sugars and the sticks are pretty intoxicating after a couple of minutes when some of that saliva gets soaked in and you get real juicy squirts. On a side-sided note, Isucked my thumb when I was a little to middle-aged kid and have be enticed by similar actions ever since. When I was six or seven the thumb-sucking got so bad my front teeth were starting to come in wrong and my mother had to put a disgusting, rancid nail-polish on my thumb to get me to quit.