I Was Regurgitated by a Pterodactyl

I am 28 years old. I know people who range in age from 24 to 42. On any given Friday night I am sitting at home with my fat husband watching American Pickers and petting my cat. We never go to a party. We really never go anyplace where the express purpose is drinking. In my world that kind of thing is something that I “left in college.” Seriously though, I never did it in college either.

But, I know people, all 24 to 42 of them, who still occasionally (or frequently) partake in these activities. They go to parties, get drunk, throw up in a vase at someone else's house, and pass out. I was black out drunk once. It was the worse experience of my life. I woke up feeling like I'd been regurgitated by a pterodactyl.

We don't even have alcohol in the house. Not because I'm that salty about it, just because it never occurs to us to buy any. There was a bottle of wine once, I had a glass, the bottle sat in the fridge for 2 months and I threw it away. Alcohol doesn't even taste good! Now don't give me the “then you haven't had good alcohol” nonsense. I have. It was still gross.

I almost had a dry wedding. I didn't see the point of spending the extra money. But I got so much flack from others that I gave in an we had beer and wine. Therefore, we also had drunk people. Why was this necessary? I didn't want drunk people, but apparently drunk people are “part of the experience.” Why?

I don't feel old as I sit on my microfiber sofa with my dogs watching Antiques Roadshow and crocheting. In the middle of the day. In a house coat. Now, take this with a grain of salt, because I also don't own make up. Or anything that you could wear to a cocktail party. I might in all actuality just be a stick in the mud. But I just don't see the point! It's expensive, it tastes bad and it will make you all weird in the head. And I'm already weird in the head.

A Gun Post! Look at All The Controversy!

Guns! Yes, guns. I like guns. Guns, guns, guns. Guns! I am not a crazy gun toter. I do not belong to the National Rifle Association. In fact, I think that the NRA oversteps their bounds far too much. I mean, I know that they are concerned with guns other than rifles.  

One of my favorite guns to shoot, and my Dad's least favorite to clean, was the Colt Navy. This was the first gun that I really remember my Dad owning, even though I know he had some, but I think they just hung out in the attack. It was a reproduction, and it was very cool looking. It was a cowboy gun! The first one was not the sturdiest thing, and after a while my Dad retired it to a decorative piece. But he replaced it with another. This one was all stainless steel. It was a crazy looking thing. It was huge and shiny. I liked to call it the hand cannon.

The Colt Navy was a six shot, black powder revolver. This thing really was history in motion. A kid can gain a lot of respect for a civil war soldier just from watching this thing be loaded. It took a long time. Each cylinder gets a certain amount of black powder, a ball and a “wad.” All of which need to be packed down individually using the ram rod lever attached under the barrel. It could take 10 minutes. If you were fast, maybe 5. Think about that while you're hiding behind a log with an army shooting similar lead balls in the direction of your head.

Once you've done that, you have six shots. Good luck.

You literally see in black and white while shooting this.

Living history aside, it was a lot of fun to make go boom. I learned my marksman technique from this gun. It's naturally much more inaccurate than a modern weapon and therefore you have to concentrate far more. I would brace myself against a support structure, like poll supporting the roof of the firing line. Then I'd close my eyes and take a few deep breaths. Raise the weapon while inhaling once more and then hold it in. Don't blink, don't even think. Just aim, and when you're ready pull the trigger so slowly that it startles you when it goes off.

And this thing would definitely startle you. Fire came out of the barrel! And not in small amounts! I still love shooting this thing, but like I said, my Dad hates cleaning it. And I don't want to clean it. So I don't bug him too much about it. He also has a .50 caliber long gun that is beautiful and also black powder. I don't bother him about that one either. It's also not so easy to clean. Plus, it's only one shot. But what a shot it is!

The smell of a black powder gun is also something that sticks with you. Smell is the strongest scent related to memory, and the smell of a recently discharged black powder round is one of those for me. I was lucky growing up to have a Dad who was into this stuff, and luckier still to have been a weird enough kid to appreciate it.  

All That et Une Frites

Bonjour! La pomme et les robes sont rouge. Le garcon est riche. L'homme et la femme ecris une lettre.

That was French. I wrote it myself. I didn't use Google translate or anything, it came out of my very own head, my own head which knows French now. Four days ago I knew no French. How did I do it? It's a secret. OK I'll tell you. I went to Paris and sat in a cafe for four days and spoke only French and ate baguettes and snails. There was a beret.

That was a lie. Snails are gross. I didn't eat snails. The rest is true.

That was a lie too. I didn't go to France. What I did do was use a free app on my phone while laying in bed at night. I'm amazed at how well this works. If this free app has performed this miracle, I can only imagine what the far too expensive Rosetta Stone can do. I'd almost be willing to buy it if I had any kind of real reason to learn French other than wanting to feel fancy.

I took Spanish in school. Spanish is a way sexier language than French in my opinion. “Tu es muy caliente” is much more arousing than “Vous etes choud,” which when pronounced properly sounds like you're falling asleep at the end. Also, I may have used Google translate for that one, I'm not far enough into my app to know “hot” yet.

I want to visit France one day. It is a beautiful, culturally wealthy country and when I go there I want to speak their language. Being able to speak the language of a country you're visiting sets you apart from the tourists. It makes you a traveler. Even if you can't speak fluently, most locals respect that fact that you tried and will then speak English with you. Communication aside, speaking a language allows you a deeper understanding of the culture. Speaking with someone in their native tongue puts them at ease and gives you a better experience.

The French are known to be, well, French. And Parisians are double French with a side of frites de pomme de terre. At least, this is the stereotype. My parents visited Paris (speaking no French mind you) and even my Father, after a lifetime of talking about how terrible the French are, found Parisians to be polite, helpful and kind. He even told me this after having his wallet and passport stolen and coming down with a cold. He also said that, not surprisingly, the food in Paris was the best that they had on their whole tour of Europe.

If my parents are correct, and Parisians are not as awful as their reputations says, imagine what speaking their language could net you. Imagine being in France and for the time that you are there actually being French. This goes for any country. I've learned in the past 4 days that it is surprisingly easy to learn a language if you want to learn it. It is, in fact, easier than learning it in school ever was. So do yourself a favor, download Duolingo and choose a language that excites you. You will feel enriched and you'll be better for it.

A Bird in The Hand Will Poop

I was sitting in my living room watching Love Actually when I saw a pretty little bird outside the window. I thought, “How lovely. What a lovely little bird. Hello feathered friend!” Then it flew away, the fickle bitch. So I started reading up on songbirds of the United States. Here are some fun facts:

The Common Cuckoo visits the nests of other birds during mating season. It will shove the eggs already laid in the nest out and sometimes eat them. It then lays its own eggs in the carnage and continues on its way.

There is a middle English poem written in the 12^th or 13^th century called The Owl and the Nightingale. It is an argument between the two birds, obviously, whatever else could it be about?

The juvenile of the Common Raven when finding a food source will send out a “recruitment call.” This alerts other juveniles to the beast feast thus allowing the juveniles to outnumber the adults and not be chased away.

Mockingbirds are dicks.

The taxonomic name of the America Robin is Turdus migratorius. This translates, loosely, to “traveling turd.” Indeed.

Blue Jays have vocalizations known to bird watchers as the “rusty pump.” African American folklore says that the Blue Jay is a servant of the devil and never seen on Fridays because it is too busy collecting sticks to stoke the fires of hell.

There are way too many species of Cardinal to deal with.

Hope this information was useful and gives you a sense of oneness with the wilderness in your backyard!

Zak 4 Life

I freakin' love paranormal TV shows. I just can't fathom the depths of denial and gullibility that these people are swimming in. Now, I do believe in some form of afterlife, and I do not completely write off the existence of “ghosts” or “spirits” or what-have-yous. And since I watch so many of these shows I must admit that out of the hundreds of hours of footage I have absorbed I have seen 1 or 2 things that I was genuinely intrigued by, and I watch Ghost Adventures (Obviously, the penultimate resource on supernatural happenings. Zak Bagans 4 life. His book is on my coffee table.).

One of these things was personal footage of a family's home with a supposed poltergeist haunting. The people, to me, seemed credible and have made no money off of their footage. What they showed was their home, after they had gotten up in the morning, with permanent marker scribbled on the walls, cans of food stacked to the ceiling everywhere, furniture flipped upside down, etc. They had hours of footage of these events, obviously taken at different times. They would always clean everything up only to have it happen again. The overall package presented actually gave me pause. Either these people were telling the truth, or they were all very good actors.

This story told, let's move on to the pile of crap that is most of this nonsense. Right now I am in the midst of a mini marathon of “Haunted Highway,” Jack Osbourne's supernatural/cryptid adventure extravaganza! This particular episode consists of Jack and his friends hanging bits of meat from trees and screaming and running a lot. There's some sweet IR shots of raccoons in the distance too! What am I learning from this? If you go out into the desert at night, there will be potentially dangerous wild animals. Whether or not they are “skinwalkers” is irrelevant. You are dumb.

My second favorite of these shows (The first being Ghost Adventures. Zak 4 life.), is Finding Bigfoot. These people try so hard. You gotta give them a pat on the back. They organize town hall style meetings with the local townies to talk about their bigfoot experiences. They actually do some semblance of research, and you think “OK, there's a little science, I'll stick with it.” But then, things start to get “squatchy” and the show devolves into running and screaming at night in the woods accompanied by the chilling the sounds of fat men making “squatch calls.”

I also enjoy “A Haunting,” but mostly for the awful reenactments that they produce. There is no science, no investigating, no real effort. They just find some people who had a spooky time 20 years ago and then hire some “close enough” looking actors to recreate said spooky time. These stories always end with “and he was never seen again.”

I will never stop watching these shows. I love seeing what people will think they saw. They freak themselves out and lose all sense of reality. And it's pretty hilarious most of the time, especially right now when it's Jack Osbourne wandering through an old mine in the middle of the night rattling chains to summon hell hounds. "I think what we have here is a hell hound in the cave and a cryptid that we don't know about. That's a plausible scenario." In closing, Zak 4 life.

Smoldering Intensity.

Don't Look Now, But You're Already Being Eaten

I believe that some dinosaurs are the genetic ancestors of birds. Now, I said some. Triceratops, Stegosaurus, Diplodocus and even my beloved T-Rex probably are not hiding inside the genetic code of my Cockatiel. He would probably argue with that, he clearly believes that he is a full blown top-tier predator. Even so, when I look at those wings and those hooked claws dangling on the end of skinny, scaly legs I can't help but see a tiny dinosaur. Look at the footprint of a Raven one day, and then look at the footprint of a big theropod. There are similarities.

One of the most famous of the bird-type dinosaurs is the velociraptor. The first thing that you should know, if you don't by now, is that the velociraptor made famous by Jurassic Park is a lie. Velociraptor was tiny. He may have been quick, but not scary quick like the movies. I am also sure that they didn't systematically attack electric fences or learn how to open doors. But, there were no doors or electricities in the Cretaceous, so what do I know?

Anyway, there is a monster called Utahraptor that may warrant another look. This single specimen found in, well, Utah, is a lot more exciting. Standing at 6 feet tall and sporting the eponymous giant retractable toe claw, this guy would probably hang out in a dark alley. We know that this guy regularly grew to the size of a grizzly bear, but there is speculation that some may have been upwards of 30 feet long.

Now, imagine a 30 foot long bird-like killing machine. It's adorned with a new fashion accessory, feathers. It's slowly moving its head back and forth, allowing its eyes to focus on you better. It's faster and smarter than Tyrannosaurus, and just as large. It is the wave of the future. And in the time that you have been conjuring up the image of this alley dwelling monster it is already eating your legs.

Why did Hollywood forsake our very own, American born raptor for a ridiculous, over sized version of a tiny mouse eater? I guess “velociraptor” just sounds way too cool. Which it does. I'll give them that. But, a whole generation of less educated dinosaur enthusiasts were totally let down by the sad reality of velociraptor. I however, upon seeing the velociraptor's silver screen debut, giggled. I also giggled at the “dilophosaurus,” because, you know, what the fuck was that? Also, I was 9 at the time.

They Crunch and Then Squish When You Bite Them

Eating is gross. Think about it. Biting, chewing, swallowing, it's all kind of disgusting. Think about a cow with the sideways chewing, grinding grass and cud. I mean, what is cud? It's solid puke is what it is. And they chew it and swallow it multiple times. No, it's gross, it's gross. Now think about your fat uncle at Thanksgiving. Yes, now you see it. Eating is gross.

We have to eat. We have to eat to live, unfortunately. We need things, things to make us go. So, naturally a culture has grown up around the subject of food and eating. We all have to do it, so let's capitalize on it. This is the “foodie” culture. Foodies are people who are so into food that they actually do it for a hobby, or a job. How do you “do” food as a hobby? And why aren't all of these people morbidly obese? Every food blogger I've ever seen is a skinny, beautiful person. Where are the tubby bastards? Those are the people who's opinion I want on food. The skinny ones only talk about salads and sprouts and tofu crap. These people aren't foodies, they're some kind of bipedal rabbits.

As far as I'm concerned newsworthy food involves, wait, never mind, food isn't newsworthy! Christ, it's food. I actually heard the phrase “culinary map of America” on a news program. An honest to God news program. It was a real story. Shouldn't you be covering something more pressing than stuff that people shove into their mouths that literally will become shit?

I don't understand this notion of adventurous eating either. People like Andrew Zimmern who wander the world stuffing their faces with fetal fowl, fish that can kill you if cleaned improperly and a plethora of things with exoskeletons that aren't prawns. This isn't food, it's sadomasochism. I have no interest in eating bugs. There's a lot of talk about insects being the “protein of the future” because they're extremely prevalent, easy to cultivate, and apparently full of delightful nutrients.

They also crunch and then squish when you bite them.

No.

No.

Very no.

I have discovered a phenomenon known as “texturous interruptous.” This is why certain people, like myself, can't mix foods on their plate. Let's use a simple example, yogurt. Many people enjoy yogurt with bits of fruit. I like yogurt. I also like fruit. But if I am eating yogurt and get a bit of fruit I will vomit. It's not a taste problem, it's the interruption of the smooth texture of yogurt by the slimy, sometimes crunchy texture of the fruit. I will vomit. I believe that all restaurants should use segmented plates. Gordon Ramsay would say that I hate food because of this, and I'm OK with that. My father has always said that he would be content to blenderize his entire meal and squeeze it into his mouth from a pastry bag. But what if there is an errant piece of unblended corn? Vomit.

So, if you are feeding me. Please, do not be pretentious. And if you are a pretentious food Nazi and you tone it down for me, tone it down again. Because I will snub you. I will 100% snub you and your silly food.

Kill me.