Worst Green Foods

I've seen some awful pictures of green food for St. Patrick's Day, but these take the cake.

1) Skyline Chili - People are pretty divided on chili and cheese on pasta (I'm generally in favor, because Real Chili in DT Milwaukee is the real deal), but this looks....unappealing.


2) Green Brats - Thinking of firing up the grill today with some homemade sausage? Maybe try to make them not look like a turd.


3) Green Eggs and Ham - I know it's cute and Dr. Seussy, but it looks like it came out of one end of your body. Just not sure which end.

Pepper Pain

Yesterday afternoon, I decided to get domestic and make some homemade salsa. I had done it before with various types of peppers - jalapeno, serrano, poblano - but nothing too crazy. I decided to buy two habaneros yesterday to add a little extra kick to the salsa because, you know, YOLO, as the kids say.

Bad idea.

I didn't even get the pepper into the salsa before trouble reared its ugly head. I had the windows open in the kitchen and my allergies had been kicking in a little bit, so while dicing the pepper, I had to wipe my nose.

Oops.

The pain slowly crept into my nose, and then flooded its way into my sinus cavity. The numbness began to overtake my face - it was a weird feeling to describe - but after a while, I was able to look up a method to alleviate the pain.

Google suggested I use corn starch. I obviously didn't have any, so I just covered my face in flour. Seemed like the logical thing to do. I looked like an idiot, but it kind of worked? Or maybe, it had a placebo effect, and I thought it was working, and calmed down.

My face was numb/tingling for about an hour. I wouldn't recommend it. Kids, don't mess with peppers.

Wheelbarrow food

I was at Lambeau Field on Saturday for what proved to be quite an experience. Sure, the Badgers somehow beat LSU in front of 80,000 people, but the main event is what happened in the parking lots prior to (and after) the event.

I had some gumbo, which was delightful, but I was introduced to something called boudin and ate in the best possible way: out of a wheelbarrow. Some guy was hauling around a big batch of it in a (relatively clean) plastic wheelbarrow, and who am I to question his methods?

I didn't get a picture (one of the great regrets of my life) but I did find this website that explained what it was.

Presentation: Wrapped in butcher paper and placed in a brown paper bag at the register. (Or in my case, eaten out of a wheelbarrow)
Casing: Moist, yet breakable.
Rice/Meat Ratio: Excellent.  More meat than rice.  Good meat without much grease.
Texture: The rice was well cooked and not broken into bits.  It retained its form.  Meat appeared in small pieces providing a good feel and some body. Bits of green onion throughout add to the color of the product.
Spices: A subtle mild spiciness.  The heat from the red pepper grew after each bite but was never “hot.”

This is an artful way to describe boudin, but it is 100% accurate.

Deaf by Spice?

I like spicy food, but I'm not an idiot.

Suicide Squad

I went and saw "Suicide Squad" on Saturday afternoon, because I'm into superhero movies and there had been a good deal of hype surrounding the movie. Let's just say, looking back on it, it was...disappointing.

The visual effects were good, the characters were cool, but the plot was...lacking.

SPOILER ALERT here, but if you've seen it, this video is fantastic.

Hot Chicken

I love getting unique food whenever I'm in new places, and I knew one of the places I wanted to stop on my trip to Alabama was in Nashville for hot chicken. Now, we found a little hole-in-the-wall place (that had great reviews on Yelp) so my brother and I decided to stop.

They had four levels of spice on the menu - mild, medium, spicy, and extra hot. I wanted to be adventurous, but I also wanted to be able to feel my face so I went with medium. It was an excellent choice. Flavorful, but with a good kick.

My 22-year old brother on the other hand, went with "spicy" and when the waitress laughs when the white kid from the North orders, you know it might be have a little kick. About 40 napkins, a gallon of tears and an extra stop at McDonalds for vanilla ice cream, I think the burn finally subsided.

If I had to do it all over again, I'd probably choose the same thing. My brother, probably not so much.

SHARKNADO 4

That's right. The movie you've all been waiting for.

(I actually haven't seen any of them. Shhhh.)

National French Fry Day

These made-up holidays are mostly stupid...unless they're delicious. I can get on board with National French Fry Day. Here are my favorite preparations of the classic dish.

5. Baked, homemade, with melted parmesan
-Actually made these last night. Salty and delicious.

Not quite that fancy, but you get the gist.

4. Fast food fries dipped in sweet and sour sauce
-Don't knock it until you've tried it

3.On top of a Primanti Bros. sandwich
-A Pittsburgh classic

via PrimantiBros.com

2. Drenched in nacho cheese and bacon
-Clearly the healthiest method, especially when eaten out of a helmet at a ballgame

Gotta get all that cheese outta there

1. Sweet Potato Fries with Maple Syrup.
-First had them at Howie's, and they're life-changing.

Spam Alert

Tired of getting your inbox bombarded with spam? These are the worst offenders, according to Unroll.me

If your new years resolution of "going to the gym" isn't working out, how about settling for clearing up your inbox?

Groupon – 388 emails sent on avg per user
LivingSocial – 363 emails sent on avg per user
Facebook – 310 emails sent on avg per user
Meetup – 199 emails sent on avg per user
J. Crew – 175 emails sent on avg per user
Twitter – 173 emails sent on avg per user
Victoria’s Secret – 160 emails sent on avg per user
Linkedin – 157 emails sent on avg per user
Gilt – 155 emails sent on avg per user
Kohls – 154 emails sent on avg per user

Super Bowl

The game came and went, but the commercials will live forever.

Quickly: I thought the Panthers' loss can be blamed on their O-line and their wideouts. Cant' block, can't catch, can't win. The Broncos had like one legit touchdown drive. The Denver defense played well, but Carolina maybe made them look better than they were.

Now, onto the important stuff.

National Anthem: Second-best ever, only to Whitney Houston. You go, Gaga. But what was that suit?


Commercials: Solid, but not spectacular. PuppyMonkeyBaby was effective, but creepy. I'm not sure I'll look at Doritos the same way again. Too many prescription drug advertisements. The NFL Super Bowl babies spot was my favorite.


Halftime:

Coldplay = England's Nickelback

— Andrew Wagner (@ByAndrewWagner) February 8, 2016

Coldplay is meh. Beyonce might be the queen, but Bruno Mars reminds me more and more of Michael Jackson. What a showman.

New Way To Cook Turkey

Sure, deep frying a turkey is kinda dangerous and makes it taste delicious, but after seeing this video, there's no going back to a "traditional" method.

Ringo Junior

Have you seen the kid play 71 different Beatles songs in five minutes...on the drums?!?!



Insane talent and concentration.

Alligator Slacklining

I'm not sure I'd go slacklining in sneakers. I would die immediately. I have the worst balance in the world.

Sizzl

Does your dating life need some...sizzle? Well, there's app for that.

Oscar Mayer‘s latest gimmick is a dating app to help bacon lovers meat one another. The puns are endless, as one of tag lines for this program, aptly dubbed Sizzl, is “giving new meaning to the term ‘bacon-wrapped dates.'”

That's not me. But check out more here: http://time.com/4035044/oscar-mayer-bacon-dating-app-sizzl/

Beer Mile World Classic

If I had any ambition, this would be the event I competed in.

It's the Beer Mile: you basically have to chug four beers while running a mile. Four laps around the track, one beer during each. The winner clocked in at 5:09 - pretty damn impressive.

From  SF Gate:
The inaugural Beer Mile World Classic had about 300 willing participants, including plenty of serious running ringers. The goal? To beat competitors in running a mile, while stopping every lap to chug a beer.

“Making sure just to burp and not to puke is very difficult,” warned Alex Carney, 25-year-old graduate student who did plenty of his own puking at the event. The Berkeley resident clocked in at 11 minutes — way slower than the Beer Mile world record of 4:55.

There were plenty of amateur racers who lamented that downing the beer was the hardest part. The beer had to have an alcohol content of 5 percent or higher and if runners puked during the race, they’d have to run a penalty lap.

Here's a taste:

Chris Farley

I sat down and watched two hours of TV last night without changing the channel once, which says something about the caliber of the programming that was on the air. It was the "I Am Chris Farley" documentary on Spike TV, which I thought was incredibly well done.
Here's a description of the documentary from Deadspin:

The result is worthy of the big screen even if it’s getting its network-TV debut almost simultaneously: short and bittersweet, not unlike the life of the comedian in question. There’s a late cut to a Weekend Update clip where Chris plays correspondent Bennett Brauer, who talks about his own inadequacies using air quotes and flattens the distinction between the actor and the real person, the joker and the joke. You’re led to believe that maybe Farley himself didn’t know the difference.

It's good TV. Find it if you can.

Cecil the Lion

If you haven't seen this yet, you've gotta watch.

Secret Burrito Compartment

There's a lot of reasons why it would be cool to be a MLB player. Having the means (aka $$$) to do something like this is near the top of the list.

Sean Doolittle is on (the DL of) my fantasy team, and is nursing an arm injury, which might explain why his main focus is that delicious looking burrito.

https://twitter.com/whatwouldDOOdo/status/625852668850761728

Sharknado 3

As much as I've been a part of Sharknado-related conversations over the past few years, I've admittedly never seen the movies. Is that bad? I kind of feel like a hypocrite. Oh well. The idea of the movies is cool, but not enough for me to actually sit down and spend two hours watching each one.

It premieres tonight on something called SyFy, if you're interested.

Quad Flip

I tried pulling a backflip on a bike once. I made it halfway and then my mom sold my precious BMX roadster at a garage sale for $7.