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June 28, 2004

June 15, 2004

   The day after night golf, Alma and I went out mini-golfing again, this time with my sister and to a place out on Route 10. The par was 47; I had 48 and Marian 49 (Alma had slightly more). When we got there a group of seven teenagers - featuring six girls and one beleaguered guy - had just started. After playing the first hole it became obvious that we weren't going anywhere fast with them in front of us. We skipped ahead to the ninth hole, then played the whole back nine before coming back for holes 2-8. When we finished the eighth hole, the huge group was halfway done with the ninth. Good call. We also saw a gopher on the golf course, which was pretty interesting since, like most mini golf courses, the whole place was turf, stones, and woodchips. I'm guessing he was just passing through.
    We also went to Toro Loco for one last shot at the chips and salsa. Great and packed with onions, as always. Mmm. Before leaving New Jersey, I took pictures of my emptied-out room to compare with the mess pictures I had taken last year. Vive la différence. Here's shot one of the messy room, and here's the corresponding clean room shot. Shot two messy... shot two clean.
    Then it was down to DC for a brief rendezvous with my dad at the new house. I really didn't take any pictures of it, but Marian has the salient ones, though hers are of a house that had only the barest of furnishings. It's still fairly sparse, but then, this house is huge, so it would take quite a bit to make it look crowded.
    The new house has HDTV. If you've never been inside a Circuit City, let me just say that HDTV is gorgeous. I can't believe how clear the picture was. That said, there are distinct disadvantages. For one thing, maybe a dozen channels have HD counterparts. If you're watching a channel that isn't HD on an HDTV, the altered aspect ratio makes everything look like it was shot with those cameras they use for low-budget soft-core porn, the kind that comes on Cinemax at one in the morning. (Uh, not that I'd know.)
    The TV also had Comcast On Demand. Because we could just start playing it whenever we wanted, and because it was free, Alma and I decided to see if we could sit through The Master of Disguise. We could, but it was tough. I'm not sure I've ever seen a worse movie, and I've seen The Blair Witch Project. I know it was really made for kids, but I don't think I would have found this funny at any age above six or seven, and some of the humor is very definitely not appropriate for kids that age (and/or will simply go flying above their heads). Basically, Carvey should have made it at home with a camcorder and just shown it to his kids; that would have saved the general public a lot of grief.
    The drive back was more interesting than the drive out, I dare say, though not much more. We hit some rain in Ohio, though - man, did we hit some rain. I could actually see the place on the road ahead of us where the rain was falling, but it wasn't just rain - it was a storm. As soon as the car hit the rain line, whoosh - a huge gust of wind shook it from side to side. It was rough going with the wind and near-blinding rain, so eventually I just pulled over. And a good thing too, because the rain ended up stopping within 15 minutes and leaving this in the sky. I'm pretty sure that's the first time I've ever seen a complete one like that. In fact, there were actually two of them, though the second one was much fainter.
    All in all, a pretty good trip. I did about 1730 miles of driving in just five days, which is crazy, but it really wasn't a very big deal. I guess I like road trips. It was kind of sad having such an abbreviated farewell to the house I lived in for 18 years, but really, I don't know how else I would have done it. Either way, it was nice having Alma there to help me say goodbye - as Semisonic says, every new beginning comes from some other beginning's end.

June 11, 2004

   I decided to come home for the weekend because I had a couple things I needed to do out here (close my savings account, for one thing), and Alma came along so she could meet my family and visit a friend in New York. Said friend turned out to have left for Germany a couple days ago, so I didn't have to give up any Alma time.
    This is probably the last time I'll ever see this house (people were actually here looking at it today), and consequently the last time I'll ever be in this area, period. Thus I decided to take a final tour of particular favorite dining establishments. Today for lunch we went to the Millburn Deli, where I got the sandwich that placed second on my list of favorite restaurant foods ever. It was as good as any I've had, so it was a good way to go out. I also got not one but two pickle slices (albeit one was the end piece), plus my mom didn't want hers. Score. I also tried the creamy red birch beer - it's quite excellent.
    Then a trip to Neelam with Alma, where I had the alu chhole, as well as - natch - the panir pakora (with plenty of onion chutney). Also quite good. We tried an interesting new appetizer that Marian had suggested called Bhel Puri. Bhel is apparently Hindi for "Rice Krispies."
    Finally, we went miniature golfing in the dark with Redd. We got to Crescent at 9:05 when they close the course at nine, but the guy said we could play if we didn't think it was too dark. It was dark but okay, except that halfway through they turned off all the lights and we were left to play by the street lights and a single floodlight streaming back from the driving range. Redd still posted a course-par 42, beating me by one stroke thanks to two holes-in-one.
    Then we stopped by the ice cream place in downtown Maplewood for dessert. When we walked in, I noticed Ian Johnson - a former CCNer I hadn't seen in five years - was behind the counter. He eventually came over to us and said, "Redd?" Redd confirmed his suspicion. Ian re-introduced himself and then confirmed that I was Flax, and we made some brief small talk. Later, after we got our ice cream and went out onto the sidewalk, Redd turned to me and asked, "Who the hell was that?"

June 2, 2004

It's taken like, a week and a half, but here, finally, is the review for Mean Girls.

June 1, 2004

   Hi-C Sour Blast was ten for $2.50 with a Dominick's card, so I went for it. I like sour stuff, though the concept seemed like it might be too weird to work. Coat the inside of a straw with sour sugar, then drink juice (well, a sugary concoction containing some juice) through it. Whoa there! Do you think you can handle that level of excitement?
    Here's what happens. You take one sip and all the sour crystals come right off the inside of the straw. Then you spend the rest of the time drinking mediocre juice-sugar-water. It didn't help that I would have preferred apple but Dominick's only had strawberry.
    More importantly, though, what is wrong with parents? How could stuff like this make it into a kid's lunch? Let me tell you, my kids are getting 100% juice just like I did, like it or not.

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This page last updated: Tuesday, June 29, 2004 02:58:09 AM