Doctoring the Totino's

I am a master in the Dark Art of Totino's Doctoring. It is a skill which I became inducted during college, when my friend Dan and I would, upon successfully getting drunk, stop by Village Pantry and buy a Totino's Pizza.

Actually, let's take a moment to discuss Village Pantry; first, here is the logo they've used for years:

Note the apple, in the top of the pyramid. This is, I assure you, no small coincidence. A quick chat with anyone steeped in Marsh Corporate Culture will assure you the symbology is intentional. Village Pantry is a convenience store, which charges convenience fees, on all sorts of crap people who are too lazy to go to the grocery store might need at any given hour of the day. Frozen pizzas. Coke. Donuts. Aspirin. Batteries. Whatever. Many Village Pantries (or, for those in the know, "VPs") also serve as the Community Phone. Those who are home-challenged, or phonebill-paying-challenged will make and accept calls outside the VP, kindly offering the customers an opportunity to exercise their charity muscles. Sometimes, the National Guard will stand on the back of trucks at the VP and throw out food rations. That last sentence is entirely true, except the part about the National Guard, and if you define "trucks" as "dumpsters", and "food rations" as "stale Hostess bearclaws". Homeless people love stale bearclaws, on the real. But I digress.

So the basic premise of Totino's Doctoring is the simple addition of ingredients to a base, or more complex, Totino's pizza before baking it. New initiates might choose to add some sliced ham, or maybe mozzerella cheese (in addition to the mozzerella cheese already on the pizza). Those of the insane or no-taste-having variety might add some pineapple slices. Sliced pepperoni is added by many a Totino's Doctor, as are freshly chopped onions, but all of these items are introductory. Only time and experience allows one to be more astute in the selection of additional ingredients. For example, after a number of trial runs, Dan and I determined that possibly the best ingredient one can add to a Totino's Pizza is duck lard. Little puddles of duck lark enhance the natural deliciousness of the Totino's, and provide a nice contrast to the crispy crust.

Well, yesterday afternoon, I introduced la mia Barista to the wonders of Totino's Doctoring. Using a "three-meat" pizza (let us generously assume that all three "meats" are, in fact, meats, and that they at one time wandered the Earth under their own propulsion systems), I added the following items:

• Fresh, sliced garlic, 8 cloves worth.
• 1/4 cup of organic mozzerella cheese (possibly less; I just used what was leftover from lasagna-making)
• multiple dollups of ricotta cheese
• chopped tomato chunks

And this is key:

• 1 Nathan's hotdog, sliced thinly.

The end result was fantabulous, and utterly delicious. As a side benefit, the garlic aroma made the whole downstairs area smell pretty friggin' awesome. I had two slices, and la mia Barista had two slices, and she is now a Doctored Totino's convert. Mission accomplished!

And it's so so long
When you're so, so wrong.

Poops SITREP

Wet and copious, it required a post-poops shower. Just to be sure.

40 Year Old Virgin

It came out on Tuesday. I will buy it this afternoon, post-market close. I suggest you do the same.

Porn Tax

WTF? Let me get this right; PEOPLE PAY FOR PORN? Porn wants to be free. Go ahead and put a 25% tax on it. .25x==0 when x == 0.

We interweave so much that we've lost a bit of solid ground
All for a kiss the things that we miss are leveling out
And I waste my time, question it, drag my heels a bit.
Forever pressures me, now I want to be
Wrapped in rhythm soul space and rock and roll
Nothing appeals to me like bottoming out
And I erase time sleep a bit smoke the rest of it
Because time don't mean a thing without...

Oil and Personal Responsibility

I don't drive. While I won't pretend this decision is purely eco-hippiesque in nature, I do feel good about the fact that I consume less oil than most Americans. Mainly, I just hate driving. Actually, I take that back; I like driving, it's other drivers I hate. My life is much less stressful if I don't drive than if I do.

I do, however, feel it is important that people take responsibility for their oil overuse. It doesn't seem to me that many people do this. Instead, everyone rationalizes the use of oil because they're too lazy to walk, bike, or take the Electro-Trolley. It's certainly more convenient to pick up groceries in your car whenever you feel like it, but this behavior is irresponsible, at best. Worse yet, so many people who have resigned themselves to the slavery to Big Oil that is car ownership insist on buying hugely inefficient gas-guzzling gigantor vehicles. The ownership of these vehicles knows no standard, predictable political boundaries. You are just as likely to see a "John Kerry" sticker on the back of an SUV than you are to see a "W" sticker. "Habitat for Humanity" stickers are slapped on plenty of Range Rovers here in Raleigh, just as those Christian fish thingies are ubiquitously placed on Ford Expeditions. Those who fancy themselves "progressives" and those who think of themselves as "conservatives" are equally likely to selfishly deplete the limited natural resource of dead, compressed dinosaur flesh. I suspect the reasoning behind this is sloth.

Regardless, I feel it would be good if everyone stopped engaging in this behavior. Much talk is generated on the subject of just how to get everyone to stop being so wasteful, running the gamut from the idea of taxing gasoline more than it is already taxed, or providing financial incentives to people who buy fuel-efficient vehicles, but what is often overlooked is the idea that everyone just do the right goddamned thing and stop leaving it up to everyone else to do. I am generally against governmental efforts to cause this change, but, obviously, people just don't give a shit about doing the right goddamned thing, so I'm not sure what else there is to do other than making their decisions hurt their personal finances. Oh, the humanity.

Also, WEIRD! Attention theboz infidel: I was not specifically targetting you with this subject. I just now read your diary about your new SUV, so the above is simply coinkidink. You evil environment ruiner!

Battlefield 2: Clans

I made a clan. It is called "poojabbers". I am the only member of my clan. I rule.

I was washing my hands and face
i was starting a drinking day

Mindless Link Propagation

• It's not my fault you don't know Tiger Hand, dude.
• Marquis Cha-Cha reads soccer scores.
• Because what Mullah Mohammed Omar would do is wear a thong.
• Iraqi elections: TOTAL FAILURE! NO ONE SHOWED UP! HA HA, TAKE THAT BUSH!

ATTENTION WEATHER-"FORECASTING" INDIVIDUALS:

You promised me snow. Nature only delivered cold rain. One or the other of you is a LIAR. That one is not nature.

One Other Motherfucking Thing

When I was in Seattlé, theantix, persimmon, and I met ammoniacal down near Tacoma, where we went to a couple of military surplus stores. The first store we went to (which had the most stuff) had these kickass non-functioning training rifle models. I'm not sure what the official term for those things are, but, basically, they look like realistic versions of current-use military weaponry, but they don't fire anything. I wanted to buy either a model MP5(SD) or a M4A1 model, but figured that 1) it'd be a potential pain to get back home due to increased security scrutiny, and 2) it'd be a potential pain to get back home due to my already overloaded baggage situation. Thusly, I passed on buying one. Now, though, I want one. So, here's the question: Hey ammoniacal, what, exactly, are those things called? I assume I can probably get one at a local surplus place, since there are so many military bases in the area, or possibly online, but online searching has turned up no legit results, which is likely because I'm searching for the wrong terms. Mmmmm, fake MP5 or fake M4A1!

No, officer, this is *not* a firearm, and thusly I am allowed to take it, strapped on my back, on the Greenway Trail System! PERHAPS YOU WOULD LIKE TO CHALLENGE MY ASSERTATION THAT IT IS NOT REAL? THE TRUTH IS ON YOUR SIDE, BUT I SUSPECT YOU ARE NOT WILLING TO COME FI' TEST MI, SOUNDBOI!