Explosive Donut

Eric and I went to the Fremont Fair a couple of weeks ago. It was similar to the University District fair a month before, but much larger: there were more crafts for sale, more carnival food, and more live music. There was also people offering to end poverty if you gave them a dollar. This seemed suspicious. But most of all, the Fremont Fair had an absurd number of people soliciting for ballot initiatives.

I’m not sure why Seattle seems to have an enormous amount of people constantly looking for signatures and why they need to ruin my fairs. I have serious issues (As many friends have heard me rant about) with these people. Most of the time they give you limited and slanted information and expect you to support them. More often than not they will say what they want to resolve without explaining how they plan on solving it. I’m all for clean energy, but if you can’t explain how my signature supports it, why should I sign? For all I know, you’re generating energy through child labor. Unlikely, but possible.

I’ve also heard that if a ballot measure does not get enough signatures your information can be sold to telemarketers (not sure how true this is though).

But what should be done? The ballots are important for voicing your opinion to government. If people can’t collect signatures on the street, how will any of these measures succeed?

The best method I’ve seen is some free-standing stations that have info on the initiative. You can take your time, understand what the issue is and how the initiative intends to solve it. If people don’t feel comfortable writing their info on the page, have a website. It’s not too expensive to set one of thes stations up, they get plenty of visibility, and nobody is pressuring anyone.

If only there was a ballot to use ballot stations…

Another of those pesky sale flyers was in my mailbox when I got home from work today. However, an add for fish oil supplements caught my eye. How exactly do you get oil from a fish? My second question was why anyone would voluntarily eat something called fish oil.

If you squeeze a fish, do you get oil or can you rub them? Is that why fish are slippery? Do fish like being oily or do they have special shampoo for oily scales and dry scales? Also, do fish have shampoo?

I would like to buy the giant bottle of fish oil suplements but instead of eatting them, I want to bathe in them. Once I’m oiled up fish style, I think I’ll be much faster, at least in water anyhow. Maybe it works like sunblock too.

My apartment has doubled as a large oven the past couple of nights. There’s been a bit of a heat wave in Seattle and my apartment feels like the epicenter. I don’t have an air conditioner and my fan broke so I’ve had to come up with some inventive ways to cool off so I can go to sleep:

Drink a really cold glass of water really fast. I’m not sure if these cools me down or just gives me a brain freeze so severely that I pass out, but seems to work.

Flap my front door open and closed. The idea behind this one was that it was colder outside so this would ventilate my apartment. I think it may have left me too exhausted to stay awake. I came up with this one at 12:45am so that may explain this one.

Cook something really hot and eat it. I made Korean bulgogi last night which involves some spicy sauce and a lot of hot stovetop action. After I finished cooking and eatting it, I was so hot that even my apartment felt cool by comparison (warning: make sure apartment door is open or you’ll just cook the apartment).

Another one to try:

Take a cold beer from the fridge and hold it up to your forehed. Right before it loses its chill, chug it. Repeat until cold enough to sleep or too drunk to do anything but sleep.

Nachos, you are so great. I enjoy you with beer down the street, or by yourself in my apartment. You just have to melt your cheese on tortilla chips, but you can become so much more! Sour cream, salsa, chicken, peppers, beans, guacamole. Your toppings are endlessly delicious.

Even pizzas, as amazing as they are, are just giant nachos. Quesadillas are like a nacho sandwich. Even a tuno melt is like a fishy nacho. But nacho, you’re always the best.

I started today off with a few hours of God of War. This is one of the bloodiest games I’ve played. I’ve already impaled all three Hydra heads and ripped the head off of Medusa. Killing innocents seems to be encouraged as it gives you extra life. I can’t stop playing this game.

I realized the post office was about to close so I ran down there. I tried to explain that I keep getting someone else’s mail with the same name as me. They didn’t seem to understand that two people could have the same name. It’s no wonder that they also lost the package full of stuff from Paris that my mom sent me a month ago.

When I came back, I saw Eric called me and had gone to the Ballard Locks and Magda (from college) was visiting too. I drove down there and watched the salmon jumping upstream. They only did it occasionally and barely left the water. I thought they were going to fly out of the water by the hundreds. The ranger talking was very passionate about the salmon though. Really passionate.

We then made our way over to a cupcake caf̩. I had a chocolate cupcake with mint frosting Рit was pretty tasty. I also had an Italian Soda which apparently is just soda water and syrup.

I also signed a petition simply because they left a booth out. I really hate it when people walk up to me to sign petitions because I don’t understand what I’m signing and hate being pressured. I hope the booth thing catches on.

Just finished my third week of boot camp. Although my knees have been happier, I’m doing well overall.

Corey announced our grouping yesterday, which are really an excuse to punish some more than others. I’m a Bravo (medium punishment). The whole group works out together, but Bravos do more sprints/pushups/waterboarding than Charlies. Alphas get even more than Bravos so at least I’m not getting the worst. The funny thing is that you have to do more work if you do well. If you are lay and show up late, you also have to do extra pushups. Your punishment truly is your reward.

Yesterday we ran about 2mi to a lakeside beach, about half of which was downhill. Along the way I took a wrong turn by following someone not in boocamp who was just running home and almost got half the group lost. Once we arrived at the beach we alternated runs, pushups, and sit-ups in the sand. Running, at least the way I do it, on sand is pretty comical. It’s like nature’s treadmill except I don’t want to run in place.

After all that we ran back which was now uphill. I’ve learned to keep an easier pace when going uphill. On the last stretch, Corey was catching up behind me. I think he had already passed me once so maybe he had lapped me. Either way, I sprinted to the end and “beat” him.

Hopefully I’m not punished/rewarded on Monday.

Last night I was looking for new razor cartridges for my Gillette Fusion Power Five Blade Extravagaza. I’ve been looking for these for a week now, but every store has been sold out or victimized by well groomed thieves. I finally found a four pack at the local Rite Aid for the “low” price of $14.99. Much like an alcoholic who realizes he “has a problem” after waking up at 2pm with a hangover in the neighborhood kiddie pool, I too decided to face my dumber demons.
Looking across a sea of razor choices, it dawned on me that maybe I didn’t really need five blades. Maybe even three was extravagant. I couldn’t remember why I even wanted so many. I decided to go with the Schick Sensor as ten cartridges costed about the same as the four I was going to buy ten minutes earlier. It was shiny too.
I tried the new razor out this morning. It didn’t vibrate and didn’t have a detailing blade, but it actually felt sturdier and did just as good a job. I think there’s less “skin irritation” as the ads would say, but that makes sense as I’m rubbing 60% less sharp metal over my face.
Sorry Gillette, looks like I’m done with your infinite razor nonsense. It was awesome while it lasted.

Here’s a photo of me and my dad before I went to Japan a few years ago:

I’m really lucky to have such a great dad who loves and supports me no matter where I go or what stupid things I choose to do. I miss clicking the rotating dial on his watch while he tries to eat dinner and watching The Daily Show (with Craig Kilborn or Jon Stewart) on his lunch break on any weekday during my summer breaks. I miss choosing to watch Waterworld over eating lunch, even if we’re the only two people that liked it. I have a lot of great memories with my dad and I’m sure there’s many more to come.
I wish I could be with him in person but looks like the phone will have to do this year. I’ll try harder next year.

Pistachio is making cookies for work tomorrow. He’s trying “Betty Crocker’s Rainbow Chocolate Candy” cookie mix. It’s really just a choclate chip cookie, but instead of chocolate chips, they put in faux-M&M’s. I bought it at Safeway last week for $2. They look pretty good.
Here’s the stats:
Extra ingredients:
1 stick of butter, 1 egg
Batter Taste:
This batter tastes alright. not very sugary but very buttery
Cook Time:
7 minutes cooking, 5 minutes cooling
Cookie Taste:
Pretty good! I think it probably tastes better when it comes out of the oven and the chocolate inside the candy is still melted.
Cleanup:
1 bowl, a pan, a few spoons, and a measuring cup. Pretty light.
As far as cookie mixes go, I’ve had better, but this tastes pretty good and is easy to make and clean up. I’ll give it 3/5 stars.

I have a habit of misunderstanding signs or what people are saying. Sometimes it’s hearing something close, selective reading, or just completely unconnected. It’s usually much funnier than what’s actually going on. I think my brain has decided that things are not as hilarious as it would like and just changes what comes in to compensate.
For instance, while on the bus I saw a sign that said “No Loitering Customers Only”. Most people would take that to mean “No Loitering” and “Customers Only”. At first though, I took it as one idea: that there could be some loitering customers, but if all the customers we loitering, this would not be allowed. Some should be busy with homework or something.
I also saw a sign for milk: “1 Gallon Skim Milk $2.99 Homo.” I found it odd the sign was in the Laundromat. I’m guessing the ad was for the convenience store next to the Laundromat, but hey, you never know. As I was in Capital Hill area, I thought this was some aggressive targeted advertising: “Hey gay man! Get some milk! Only $2.99 for a gallon! It’s delicious!” I now realize that it probably means Homogenized, but that seems like a silly thing to advertise since pretty much all milk is homogenized. I think that’s a bit like advertising that your milk comes from cows. Then again, I’d probably just assume that you were advertising milk to cows, which is kinda sick if you think about it. I suppose it’s kosher though, as long as you’re not eating a bacon cheeseburger at the time.
I was playing racquetball with Jeff and Bryan last night. Bryan hit a lazy but nice shot and apparently Jeff said “you should be proud,” albeit sarcastically. I somehow took it as “your boyfriend would be proud.” That would be odd, considering Bryan isn’t gay (as far as I know). I assume that’s something you would mention to your girlfriend too.