Play Ball!

Hi Friends. Welcome to the first YIFY post that I have ever written out by hand prior to typing. I'm writing this from 30,000 feet on my way from Charlotte to Boston. By the time I post this (and you read this) I'll be in Beantown. I'm going there for work, but today just happens to be the first day of the baseball season for the Boston Red Sox. So as soon as I get off of this plane, I'm heading to Fenway Park and should make it just in time for the first pitch. Forgive me if you aren't a sports fan, but I figured since I'm going to a baseball game in a couple of hours I'd write the first sports-related YIFY post about our national pastime. 

It's hard to believe that this is my first YIFY sports post because sports have always been a big part of my life. My dad was a P.E. and Health teacher, so I always played sports. Growing up I played pretty much every sport. I landed on golf as the one sport that I would play competitively in high school and college. I don't really know if that's because of natural talent or because I outgrew (width-wise) every other sport by the time I was a junior in high school.

Even though I stopped playing baseball competitively long ago I've always loved watching the game. So the official opening night of the baseball season was on Sunday. I made a date with my television to watch the game. Kate looked up from her monitor's warm glow to ask "Why do you like this stupid game?" So I decided to give it a little thought. 

I like the numbers. Baseball is all about numbers and math. My Rain Man-esque habit of counting pretty much everything works well with baseball. Sure there are stats in every other sport, but baseball is by far the most stats-obsessed sport. They continue to make them up.

It puts on a great live show. Just like there are bands that suck live, there are also sports that are fun to watch on TV but are lame in person. Baseball is great in person because it is played outdoors, played in the summer when it's nice to be outdoors, allows for public drinking, and has super passionate fans. I'm about to go to Fenway and I'll be surrounded by 20,000 people who could've easily been cast as "drunk Boston guy #4" in Good Will Hunting and I can't wait. Whenever I travel to a city for work in the Spring/Summer, I always check the schedule and try to catch a game.

There's a paternal/nostalgic quality to the game. Maybe it's a guy thing, but when you're sitting in the stands for three hours, it's impossible not to think of playing catch with your dad or going to a game. How else can you explain that I still cheer for the Cincinnati Reds? I've never lived in Cincy and there were always teams that were closer to our house, but my dad was a Reds fan, so I am too. 

Baseball absolutely has its flaws. I might have to take out a second mortgage for a ticket tonight, the game lasts a really long time (at least one Oklahoma! in most cases), and the players seem to have a penchant for sticking needles in their ass so they can hit the ball farther. I tend to overlook these flaws and focus on the positives which is so not me.

So I guess this is my public service announcement post. Try to get to a baseball game this summer. Whether it is major league, minor league, or your nephew's Tee Ball game. Give it a shot. If nothing else, you can drink a beer and work on your tan. Although drinking at a tee ball game probably isn't a good idea.

Editor's Note: Sox won 5-3. Just a typical game. There will be 161 more this year, but I'm going to remember this one for a long time. 

Oh, and I really need to work on my handwriting. 

And Cut!

Today's post title is a relatively obscure reference to one of my favorite stand-up comedians, Jim Gaffigan. He has a bit where he talks about how he likes to walk around and act like he's a movie director during his everyday life. Basically when something happens that he doesn't like, he just likes to say "And Cut" and then everyone has to stop doing what they are doing, like it's the end of a take. 

I bring this up because I've had a few "and cut" moments in the past couple of weeks. Basically just stuff that has dragged on way longer than it should. I thought I'd share some of these experiences/my thoughts with you guys. 

Scenario 1 - Oklahoma!

A couple of weeks ago, somebody thought it would be a good idea to spend a perfectly good Saturday night going to a high school musical. Not an awesome movie starring the dreamy Zac Effron, but an actual, high school musical at a real high school. Come to think of it, it wasn't just a perfectly good Saturday night...it was a better than average Saturday night. There were NCAA basketball games on and I was still alive in my brackets at this point. But I was peer pressured to go to the local high school and watch Oklahoma! instead. During the next THREE HOURS, here's what I learned:

1. High school kids don't shower everyday and sort of smell like b.o.  (Kate's observation)

2. This high school really needs a wealthy alum to park his/her ass in one of those wooden chairs for three hours. Then s/he would donate some seat cushions or money for padded seats. 

3. The exclamation point at the end of Oklahoma is a complete tease. This isn't exciting at all. They just added that so people would think it's an exciting play. 

4. The entire first act of Oklahoma! can be removed. Seriously, they spend the entire first hour and a half talking/singing about who is going to take whom to the box social. Don't they realize that the Box Social is actually being held in Aunt Eller's backyard. It's like 10 feet away from where they are doing the dancing and singing...does it really matter who goes with whom?

5. I can download a whole lot of iPhone apps in three hours.

Editor's Note: I'm not really a fan of the arts. The arts really haven't done anything for me. Actually, the arts were the only blemishes on an otherwise stellar report card for years. Unless Movies and Television and Blogs can be considered 'the arts.' If that's the case, then I love the arts. 

Scenario 2 - Beerfest

So this one was actually pretty fun. We went to a brewery on Saturday and took the brewery tour. Exactly the kind of thing that I would like, right? Here's the deal...

1. With the tour comes 5 complimentary tastes - each about 6 ounces

2. I crunched some numbers in the back, and the only way that 5, six ounce tastes would have the desired effect is if I do the drinking of all five in quick succession

3. There is a tour in the middle, so I pretty much need the tour to happen fast so I can finish up my tastes and have beer do what it is supposed to do

4. The tour took a long time because somebody kept asking a bunch of questions. I understand that it's sort of research for his blog, but some of us really don't care what temperature the water is when they add the yeast, as long as the beer tastes good, right? Nerd.

Oh, and the brewery was like an hour drive from our house. I know that doesn't sound like it's very far away, but since I started working from home, I really don't drive at all. Like I'll go a week where the only driving I do is to and from the airport. Now my ass starts to hurt on an hour drive because of the whole sitting on the wallet thing. That didn't used to happen until after a few hours. Hmm, both scenarios 1 and 2 have included something about my butt hurting...I'll try to work on that for scenario 3.

Scenario 3 - Dessert Bar

This one is a good idea gone bad. Charlotte added a dessert bar downtown a couple of weeks ago. What's that saying about arranging the deckchairs on the titanic? Don't these people know that we're in a recession? Anyway, whatever. Dessert is good, so I'm cool with it. Somebody thought we should go, and it didn't take much arm twisting. Now I'm usually a pretty patient person at restaurants. I'm used to big fancy client dinners where I have to sit in the same place for three hours. Also, my dad is the least patient person in the world (like he has to walk around if it takes more than five minutes for his food to be brought out, or he'll take his empty glass up back to the kitchen to find the server for a refill) and I try not to do that. But this is a dessert only place. So it's just one course. Or you could say two courses, if you want to count a cocktail as it's own course. 

Somehow this process takes 2.5 hours. This is .83 Oklahomas. The Oklahoma is my new unit of measurement of time. 1 Oklahoma = 3 hours. The Oklahoma has replaced Braveheart as my unit of measurement for time.  During that 2.5 hours, we had one drink. We ordered three desserts, and received zero desserts. Orders 1 and 2 were out of stock. Order #3 was prepared incorrectly. So we went to a dessert bar for 2.5 hours and didn't get any dessert. During this 2.5 hours, I thought about how many Steak'n'Shake Milkshakes I could drink in that amount of time, or if I could walk to a McDonalds, order an apple pie, then run a 10k, write a blog post, walk the dog, and still be done in less than 2.5 hours. At least the booth was comfortable. 

Now I didn't start out to write a bitter rant of a blog post, but that seems to be what this has become. All of the scenarios above were fun (especially beerfest) because we were with friends. I think I started 1,000 words ago with a Jim Gaffigan reference. Maybe I should take my own advice.....And Cut!

This Week in Blogs, Volume II

Greetings, and welcome to the second weekly food blog roundup. Thanks for coming back. It’s been an exciting week in Food Blog World, and I’ll do my best to take you around in the next 1000 words or so. I’ve decided to change it up a bit and go for more short reviews, instead of a handful of really long ones. We’ll see how that goes. I usually just start rambling, so that might not work. Here. We. Go.

Kelsey at Bites + Bowls had a very busy week. In addition to wearing some Flashdance-style leggings, she also tried on 17 different colors of nail polish and took about 15 inappropriate pictures of fruit and veggies. Since Kelsey doesn’t eat mammal, there is usually fruit and/or veggies with every meal. This means three opportunities per day for phallic fruit and veggie placement. Oh, and she also became the first food blogger to take a picture of her dirty laundry. Congrats, Kelsey. Bites and Bowls was also under attack this week by a Negative Nancy commentor. There were like five consecutive posts when the same person kept writing nastygrams about pretty much everything. So I had to put on my disguise as my blog commentor alter ego/sassy middle-aged woman (this time I was named Marge) and come to the rescue. Marge saved the day and once again stopped the advances of Negative Nancy.

VeggieGirl – I hope your VeggieCameraman/VeggieDad is feeling better. He didn’t sound too good on your last video. I could send you some Robitussin or maybe some Sucrets or something. I’m hoping it’s just a springtime cold, and not a ventilation problem in the VeggieGirl kitchen/VGTV Studios. Oh, and VeggieGirl, my blondies have not arrived yet. What does a girl have to do to get some VeggieGirl blondies? Everyone else in Blogland seems to have received their VeggieGirl Blondies, and mine are nowhere to be found. Did you lose my address already? And why doesn’t my cable package come with VeggieGirl TV? I get Starz 8 in HD and four shopping channels, but no VeggieGirl TV. That ain’t right. Time Warner - If you're listening, can you please add VeggieGirl TV to my channel lineup?

 

Caitlin at Healthy Tipping Point is considering a move to Charlotte. I am 100% in favor of this move. If it helps make your decision, I'll let you refer to me as “Replacement Meghann” after you move. I’m cool with it, really. Caitlin had the first food blog night that I could actually relate to on Saturday. It involved onion rings, watching basketball,  and drinking beers. Not just A beer, but beers plural. Then you had to ruin it by running 10 miles while listing to the Twilight Soundtrack. Why must you torment me like this? You can move here if you want, but you better leave those damn vampire friends in Florida. Caitlin also finished her 30 day shred. Finally! I was exhausted just from reading about it.

On a Lobster Placemat. Okay, so I haven’t started reading this one yet, but I really dig the name and Kate likes your blog. Most of these food blogs seem to follow a pretty consistent naming convention of [Name/Nickname] + [What I like to Do] OR [ Name + What I like to Eat] OR [Some Noun and Verb Combo]. And then out of nowhere comes this fantastic abstract blog name that I really don’t understand. This is the food blog equivalent of Pearl Jam’s “Elderly Woman Behind the Counter in a Small Town” in a sea of one word song titles like Daughter, Jeremy, Alive, and Black. I will start reading your blog, just because of the name. And because you play with your food.

Super Caloric Chalk Dust is also a pretty fantastic blog name. I also feel like SCCD must live in one of those cities where companies  test out all of their new products before launching them across the country. That's the only theory I can come up with, because I spend a lot of time at the grocery store, and I’ve never seen half of the products that you’ve tried this week. Doritos Collisions? Jelly Belly Pudding? Aloe Juice? Where do you find these treasures, and have they been approved by the FDA? I get scared when you go a couple of days without posting. I start to think that maybe one of these experimental/only available wherever the heck you live foods caused some significant health issue that is keeping you from your blogging responsibilities. Or maybe you just have other stuff to do.

 

ZestyCook – So I finally started reading this one so I have more to talk about than his beautiful bald head, but then I got sidetracked. I saw that you made a chocolate cake and used a Skor Bar as a topping. They still make Skor bars? I thought those went the way of the Rollerblade. Maybe they just started selling them in Canada and stopped U.S. distribution. Which reminds me – do they still sell Clearly Canadian in Canada? Because that stuff kicked ass. So if you can get your hands on some Clearly Canadian, you can send it my way. It would go really well with VeggieGirl’s blondies (which should totally be here by now).

The Fitnessista got a shout-out in one of her favorite (and my favorite) magazines this week – Glamour. My favorite part of Glamour (and Cosmo) is taking their little quizzes. It always comes back with results like "you really need to work on pleasing your man" or "you are a strong independent woman." I'm starting to think that maybe those quizzes aren't designed for men who are just killing time at the grocery store checkout. Anyway, Fitnessista's Glamour quote had something to do with healthy living and loving your body. I didn’t really read it. But I did see that she said something about doing Zumba. Kate and I tried doing Zumba once in South Beach with my Uncle Joe and Aunt Rolando. It was not pretty. My uncles were Zumba professionals and we were not.  I think Kate and I were both two entire songs behind the rest of the class. I also like Fitnessista because Kate can’t even come close to pronouncing her blog’s name correctly. So I like to ask Kate what she’s looking at (while I know she’s looking at Fitnessista) just to hear the pronunciation.  Kate’s version includes about 12 S’s and 6 I’s.

Matt at Brew and Bake just posted his 7th step in his how to home brew series. 7 steps and we can’t even drink the beer yet! I’ve decided that if anything takes more than three steps to explain, I’m probably just going to buy it instead. Or, I’ll just hang out in Matt’s garage when he gets to the ‘bottling’ step. And when he goes in to type out his blog post, I’ll just take the beer. Probably shouldn’t have written that plan down – there goes the element of surprise.

Stock Up/Stock Down – With Commentary. Sometimes.

Stock Up

Green Smoothies – Yeah, somebody thought it was a good idea to put spinach or kale in a smoothie. I’m sure it’s pretty healthy. It’s been a great weight loss tool for me. No, I haven’t tried one of these, but Kate has jumped on the bandwagon, and every time I see the post-Green Smoothie Blender in my kitchen I start to throw up in my mouth and skip my next meal. Thanks ladies!

Kombucha – So it costs like $3.50 and tastes like garbage water…what’s not to love? Oh, and it’s the only drink I’ve found that still doesn't taste good, even after you mix it with alcohol.

April Fools Jokes – Seriously... saying you ate something fried or had fast food is not enough. Ladies, this is your one day out of the year when you can lie and nobody can get mad at you. Go out on more of a limb. Next year I’m expecting a food blogger to say they were coked out with Lindsay Lohan or huffed gasoline for breakfast with an Olson twin. 

Breakfast Cookies - I stopped getting excited when I found it they weren't talking about Oreos

Stock Down

Pistachio Nuts - This latest recall hit the food blogging community very hard. We're going to pull through this. I promise.

Exercise-related injuries - Everyone seems to be magically healed now.

30 Day Shred – Level II - That was so last week.

Using the terms 'sammie' and 'brekkie' - Specifically for sandwich and breakfast. Actually stock is way up on these two. I just really want it to stop. So I thought maybe putting them in the stock down category would lead to their demise - at least on this side of the Atlantic.

That’s all for this week. I should be back next Friday. Give me a couple weeks and this food blog roundup will have its own blog. It'll probably have a weekly long post and then some shorter stuff on a daily basis. The new design will be fun, flirty, and feminine with a spunky edge. Not really. I actually just stole that from a food blog.  A free VeggieGirl blondie to the first person who can tell me where I stole that last line. I'm lying about the blondie too, but curious if anyone can name that blog. 

Alright, time to go.  See y'all next week.

Summer Plans

It's that time of year again (check local listings). There are leaves on the trees, the birds are chirping, and there are lots of door to door people trying to get me to buy everything from gutter cleaning to tree trimming to lawn care.

The lawn care guy came to our door today. He was from the TruGreen -ChemLawn company, I think. And why the hell would they include "ChemLawn" in their name? I think I'd try to downplay the use of chemicals, but what do I know. Anyway, TruGreen guy is warmly greeted by Kate (never really interested in dealing with a door to door salesman) and Gilbert (who was already in a bad mood because it was raining outside and he couldn't go to the bark park). So the doorbell rings and Gilbert starts barking like crazy. Kate gets the door because I'm lazy and don't feel like leaving my couch and Martha Stewart for five minutes. I know I didn't enter Publisher's Clearing House this month so there's no chance it's the prize patrol. Kate answers, realizes it's the lawn chemical guy, and responds with a firm (but polite) "no thank you, my husband takes care of the lawn." I loved it. It was delivered with the right amount of voice inflection, and had the undertone of traditional gender roles that are so not us. It could've only been better if she would've finished it off with "now if you'll excuse me, I have a roast in the oven to attend to. I said good day sir." 

Anyway, chemical man didn't stop there. The rejection before his pitch and the barking dog did not stop this guy from delivering his killer close-the-deal line of "what are your plans for your lawn this summer?" Kate responded with a quick "to mow it" and that was that. It was short and just enough smartass to get him to go away. 

After Chemlawn man left, the four of us (Kate, Me, Gilbert, and Martha) sat around and discussed how we could've answered that question better. Well, it was basically just Kate and I discussing it, but Martha and Gil were both there too. Anyway, how the hell are you supposed to respond to a question like "What are your plans for your lawn this summer?" We came up with several options. Feel free to borrow any of these if the TruGreen guy comes to your door:

TruGreen Man: What are your plans for your lawn this summer?

You: I'm not sure. We were thinking of taking the lawn to see my folks up in Wisconsin. But probably only the front lawn, because the back lawn gets car sick.

or

You: Well, we're going to enroll the lawn in a summer reading program at the public library. We want it to stay sharp and to keep on learning even during the summer months. Oh, and lawn is on the waiting list for swimming lessons at the YMCA, so keep your fingers crossed!

or

You: We've got a lot of things lined up for the lawn this summer. Including, but not limited to: letting the dog pee on it. Pounding some metal stakes into it and throwing some horses shoes back and forth, and probably digging some holes in it at some point.

or

You: We're probably going to take it easy this summer. Lawn had a big year last year (with the trip to Europe and all) so we'll probably just stay around here. I mean, lawn will grow and get cut and then grow and get cut, but that's about it. We'll probably do that every week or so.

or

You: We're planning on digging up the entire lawn, donating the grass to science, and then paving the entire yard.

That's all we could come up with. Then Martha butted in with something about making your own honey or something like that so we stopped thinking about the TruGreen guy and his silly question.  Again, feel free to borrow these, or share your own suggestions as comments.

Blog Housekeeping and House Hunters

Hi Everyone. Sorry for the delay. I've been doing some YIFY soul-searching this week. Lots of trust falls and ropes courses with me and my blog.

So I'll start with a little blog housekeeping. This food blog week in review thing seemed to work pretty well, so I should probably do some more of that. That being said, the food blog critic thing really doesn't fit into the strict charter of this blog - nor is it entirely interesting to people who don't spend their free time blogstalking (except reading mine). So the master plan now is to create a new blog where I just talk about other blogs. I'll start working on that one of these days with a new domain, new design, and all of the other things that go along with starting a new blog. Once that happens, YIFY will go back to just being a random collection of my thoughts about nothing in particular. Oh, and the new food blogstalker blog (yet to be named or created) will have pictures and graphics and all of the things that a blog should have. YIFY will remain in its current (ugly) format. So for the next couple of weeks, I'll continue doing the food blog posting thing here until I get motivated and make the pretty blog. 

Okay, that's enough housekeeping for one day. Now I'll make the smooth transition from blog details to cable television...

As many of you know, I spend a significant amount of my life watching television. I can't spend all of my free time stalking food blogs, and television is more than happy to fill this need. There are really three categories of television shows that Kate and I watch:

1. Shows that only Kate likes (about 15 shows - mostly those on HGTV or TLC)

2. Shows that only I like (about 100 shows - pretty much everything)

3. Shows that we both like (4 shows that I can think of)

I can think of about four shows that we both like off the top of my head: The Office, The Biggest Loser, Barefoot Contessa, and The Today Show. Of course, The Today Show should count as more than one show, since it's literally on for 24 hours per week (two hours on Saturdays and Sundays, and 4 hours each weekday). That's ridiculous, but that's for another post. This one is about House Hunters. It used to be one of the shows that we both like, but I recently made the decision to move it into the 'Shows that only Kate likes' bucket.

I'm not entirely sure why I broke up with House Hunters, but I can think of a couple possible reasons - I could be burned out from doing actual house hunting not very long ago and the thought of house hunting again just is not appealing at all. Or (more likely) I've finally realized that every single episode of House Hunters is exactly the same. Since it's still in the "shows that Kate likes" category, I still have to sit through my share of episodes. So I've decided to come up with a list of things that will likely happen in an episode, and then rate the episode based on how many of these things actually happens. Every episode has at least 2 of these things happen, if you're lucky, you'll see an episode with four or more of the following:

1. [Wife/Girlfriend] - Steps into walk in closet and makes some stupid joke about "Well, this is big enough for my wardrobe, but I don't know where he'll put his clothes" ha ha ha

2. [Husband/Boyfriend] - Sees dishwasher and makes dumb joke about "not having dishpan hands anymore" ha ha ha

3. [Wife/Girlfriend] - shows some apprehension about the backyard. Usually something about "I don't know if a pool is really safe with the kids" or "what if a bear comes in from that wooded area and eats the kids." Okay, that second one never happens, but the first one is pretty common.

4. [Husband/Boyfriend] - expresses some interest in turning the basement, shed, or bonus room into a 'men's den'. Bonus point if he uses the term 'man cave' and acts like he's the first person to ever use the term.

5. [Wife/Girlfriend] - dismisses one of the houses because of something stupid like "I just don't know about the paint color in the baby's room." This is usually when Kate starts talking to them through the TV and says something about how easy it would be to change the color of the baby's room. 

6. [Realtor] Ends up showing houses that are not in the couple's price range. Bonus point if they end up buying a home that was not in their original price range.

So next time you watch House Hunters, see how many of these you can check off your list. Or, next time you lose control of the remote try to come up with a your own episode cliche scavenger hunt. It helps pass the time. 

This Week in Food (Blogs)

Hello, and welcome to the first (and potentially last) edition of the YIFY Food Blog Roundup. This could probably go in a couple of directions from here. Either it could become wildly popular and create it's own spin-off blog, or I could offend a bunch of people that I don't even know, feel guilty about it, and then go back to blogging about my dog or hard alcohol. Only time will tell. A few of the ground rules:

1. Blogs were selected at random. And by random I mean I'm commenting on the handful that I read regularly, or those that seem to be popular because they get frequent shout-outs in the blogs that I read.

2. If you have your own food blog that you want to be included, or, if there's one that you read and you want me to comment on it, just leave it as a comment. No promises here - remember that this might be the last edition.

3. I'm not trying to be an ass. Really. This is about as edited/filtered as I get. Sorry if it is still in some way offensive. This is the first post where Kate actually has editorial control. Mostly because she's the nicest person that I know.

4. If I write something about you and you don't like it, you can email me and I'll edit the post, print a retraction, or apologize profusely - your pick. But if you don't think it's too painful, I'd say just laugh it off. There may be some symbiosis here eventually. If we hit the big time, then maybe we can help drive traffic your way.

Alright, now that we've got that our of the way, here's your roundup

Blog: Kath Eats Real Food

Blogger: Kath

Kath returned from Africa last week and got back to her normal blogging schedule. I'm not going to lie...life was a little more difficult when Kath was in Africa. Posts were inconsistent. Matt did his best to fill the Kath shaped hole that was left in blogworld, but it was hard on all of us. And when Kath did post, there were comment battles popping up everywhere. It was very difficult.

But now Kath is back and all is right in blogworld. She had a bunch of contests in the past week. I think it might be related to her trip to Africa. I have a feeling that next week she's going to announce that she's actually a Nigerian princess, and if you make a small deposit (of barney butter) into her account, then she can access all of the riches of her motherland and shower you with gold and ivory and probably some oatmeal. Be on the lookout for that, as I think it might be a scam.

Speaking of oatmeal, Kath and Oatmeal were fighting earlier this week. And by fighting, I mean that she chose other breakfast treats for a few days. It was difficult to watch. I felt like I was sitting in the back of the minivan and plugging my ears and saying la la la to myself to drown out the noise of Mom (Kath) and Dad (Oatmeal) fighting. I was worried that I would have to pick sides if they split up for good. I mean, we really like hanging out with Kath and Matt, but Oatmeal and I have such history together. Fortunately, it didn't come to that. Kath and her oats are reunited once again. 

Did I really just write an entire paragraph about someone else's relationship with oatmeal?

[Leaving the United States. Driving North. Going through Customs. Welcome to Canada] 

Blog: Oh She Glows

Blogger: Angela

OSG just launched a "Bikini Body Bootcamp" contest. Basically she's having her readers send in some 'before' pictures in bikinis (along with their measurements) and then they'll have a winner at the end of the thing. I'm trying to figure out how I can show my support. Which of these would be the least creepy?

1. I could take my picture wearing a women's bikini

2. I could go with imitation being the most sincere form of flattery, and also ask my blog readers to send in bikini pictures

3. I could send in my picture wearing a speedo and an "I Glo" baby tee

I think all of the above are pretty creepy, so maybe I'll just send in a celebrity bathing suit picture and say its me. I'd probably go with the famous Tyra Banks or Jennifer Love Hewitt pictures or something like that. 

But best of luck to OSG and the rest of the contestants. I know that bikini season is only about three days long in Canada, so hopefully they've got the scheduling figured out.

Blog: Zestycook

Blogger: Hmm, Zesty, I guess. Mind if I call you that? Perhaps Zest for short...

I have to admit that I don't really read this blog. I'm going to start, I just haven't gotten around to it. But it seems popular and fancy enough so I thought I'd write about it. Also, Zesty is successful in a female-dominated space, and I applaud that. I compare it to my success on the Taylor Swift Karaoke circuit, where it's usually just me and a bunch of women. But since I don't read his blog (yet) this is probably going to be a fairly superficial roundup.

I love Zesty's beautiful bald head - and I don't care who knows it. Have y'all seen his head? It can be seen in all its glory on the "About Zesty" page. It looks so damn smooth. It's probably good that we haven't met yet. I'm 97% sure that I'd start the conversation with "is it cool if I feel your head?" I used to think to myself that I'd much rather have gray hair than go bald, but a couple of things have changed my mind on that topic:

1. I started getting gray hair. And it seems to be coming in on the sides faster than the top. That was not part of the plan. I was hoping for George Clooney, but I'm worried it's going to be more like Grandpa Munster.

2. I saw Zesty's glorious bald head, and thought, yeah, that's definitely better than the Grandpa Munster look that I'm working on right now. 

I promise I'll stop talking about Zesty's head soon, but one more thing on that topic. When I was 14 and had to go to the dermatologist, there was a picture hanging on the wall. It was a side by side comparison of a 50-something plains Indian woman, and a 90-something Tibetan monk. The plains Indian woman spent all of her time in the sun so her face looked like an old catcher's mitt. The Tibetan monk spent all of his time protected from the sun and his bald head looked flawless. For the last 14 years I have been looking for a bald head as flawless as the monk head, and now we have found it...This concludes the somewhat-creepy section of this post where I describe another man's head.

I promise I'll actually read the blog next week so I can actually talk about it instead of Zesty's head. 

[Leaving Canada. Stopping briefly at Duty Free to buy some booze. Next stop = Florida]

Blog: The Inner Workings of a College Graduate

Blogger: Meghann

It's been a very exciting week for Graduate Meghann readers. At long last, Meghann addressed her relationship status. For those of you who haven't been following along (shame on you), Meghann has been spotted out with this guy named Derek, since the Valentine's day time frame, but he has not yet received a title on the blog. So every time Derek and Meghann do something, there are usually a handful of comments saying something like "are you and Derek dating" or "is Derek your boyfriend." 

Well, Meghann finally cleared this up for us. Sort of. In a recent post, Meghann stated:

"Truth is Derek and I discussed it this weekend and we both honestly do not know what to label each other. We both know that we enjoy each other’s company and that we are just seeing how things move from here. There is no rush to produce labels, so one day at a time people! LOL"

Well, that might be good enough for you two, but those of us in blogworld need a label. It doesn't even have to be an accurate label, as long as it is used consistently. So if you don't want to go with 'Boyfriend' or 'Dating', that's fine, but give us something. You can call him the Easter Bunny or the Pope or whatever you want - just give the guy/relationship a title. It can be like a game of blog Mad Libs.

In other Graduate Meghann news, Meghann and her Easter Bunny, Derek went rollerblading this week. Wait, what? How did they do that? Did they get into a DeLorian with Michael J. Fox, get it up to 88 miles an hour and set the flux capacitor for 1996? I can't remember the last time I saw rollerblades, but I'm pretty sure Clinton was in office. I'm not really sure why Rollerblades disappeared. It wasn't like a better technology came along like with the Zach Morris cell phone or the Betamax or laser disc player. People just stopped using them. But maybe Meghann and her Easter Bunny are bringing them back, and I support that. BTW, spellcheck doesn't even recognize 'rollerblades' as a word anymore.

Blog: Eat, Live, Run

Blogger: Jenna

Alright, this will be a short one...mostly because this post is already too long. I don't know what happened here. I went out of town last week and Jenna was like the queen of yoga and every post had something to do with yoga. Then I came back and now every post talks about swimming. What the hell did I miss? It's like someone did a big 'search and replace' on the entire blog and took out Yoga and replaced it with Swimming. I'll get over it, but I feel like it was all really abrupt. It's a good thing that this isn't a 'Single White Female' scenario, otherwise I would've already invested in my own yoga mat and personal Yogi, only to have to switch it up and buy goggles now.

In other ELR news, Jenna and her BF were at the beach, and apparently Jenna's BF is friends with Albert Haynesworth and other professional football players. Now I don't doubt that it's true, but it would be an amazingly funny inside joke if it wasn't. Like he could just give her another random celebrity every week and she would have to weave that person into the blog. Almost like a Barbara Walters-style namedropping (I was horseback riding with the King of Jordan just last week...I was in a hot tub with Matt Damon and Ben Affleck). Also, I'd really like to see a photo of Jenna with Albert Haynesworth. And yes, he's the one stomping on the other dude's head. If I was decent with photoshop, I'd make that happen...instead you'll all just have to imagine it in your mind.

Blogging Trends or Stock up/Stock Down (not sure what to call it yet)

Stock Up

Barney Butter

Tempeh

Commenting with ALL CAPS and plenty of !!!!

Fake signatures at the end of posts

30 Day Shred Level II

Stock Down

Yoga

Protein Powder

Labels for boyfriends

Black tar heroin

30 Day Shred Level I

Stay tuned for next week (or next time that I get around to this) when I'll review Brew and Bake, Healthy Tipping Point, Bites and Bowls, and whatever other blogs y'all tell me to write about.

That's all. Thanks for reading. Let me know what you think.

The Real Housewives of Facebook

This should probably be titled "My Digital Friends, Volume IV," but the real housewives total came to me when I was running yesterday, and I just couldn't help myself. 

So of my 387 facebook friends, there are probably 20 or so that are stay at home moms (SAHMs). A couple of these are family members. I promise this post isn't about you. Hopefully that'll stop my sister from being mad at me. Most of my SAHM friends are from high school or college who have recently followed the traditional progression of: graduated from school, got married, had kid, stay at home and raise kid. The new last step in this progression is apparently "spend all of my time on facebook." Stay at home moms are great people, and they have the hardest job in the world (other than coal miners, probably) but I know this much is true:

Stay at home moms are the worst facebook friends. Ever.

Most of this revolves around the status update. Specifically:

They Update Their Status All the time: I expect status updates at specific times of the day: Early risers update their status in the morning. 8-5ers update their status after lunch (something like "back in the office and ready for a nap") and then there are the ready to leave work, and just got home from work status updates. Finally, there are the 'I have nothing better to do tonight so I'll update my facebook status' updates. With SAHMs, they just update their status all day. Now I only know this because I'm on Facebook all day, but it's damn annoying.

They Update Their Status with Stuff that Doesn't Interest Me: I go onto Facebook to be entertained. This does not happen with your SAHM friends. You get Facebook status updates like:

"Life is good when [insert rugrat name] sleeps through the night"

"Shopping for Minivans, and recommendations?"

"Taking [rugrat] to Target. He's still trying to get over his cold. Darn that daycare"

"What does it mean when [rugrat] has green spitup?"

Again, I'm looking for an enjoyable distraction with my facebook status updates. I'm looking for an obscure movie quote or song lyric, or some interesting detail of your life. Maybe even something unintentionally funny after being overserved on a Friday or Saturday night.  Not this mom stuff about minivans or gerber products.

Their Mom Friends have Full Conversations on Facebook: So I usually judge Facebook status updates based on two criteria: 1. Does it make me laugh, 2. Did lots of other people comment on it. Usually these two are pretty consistent. If I find something funny or entertaining, I'm probably not alone. With my SAHM friends, they post the lamest status updates (see examples above) yet still get a handful of responses that are just as lame. It's like there is this vast network of moms on facebook that go from watching noggin to hitting refresh on their computer to commenting on their status and then repeat. Oh, and I know I could call them a Momtourage, but I really don't want that term to takeoff, so I'm not going to use it. Damn, I guess I just did. So if some SAHM asks for input about a minivan, there will be five recommendations up there an hour later. Maybe I'm just jealous, who knows. 

I think it all comes back to my fear that one day all of the cool kids are going to wake up and realize that everyone is using facebook, and then they'll close out their accounts and start doing something else instead. Then it'll just be me and the SAHMs left on Facebook and my only entertainment will be status updates about the Honda Odessey and Go Diego Go.