Over the Hills and Far Away

Howdy y'all,

This isn't going to be a very long post, but I wanted to drop one quickly tonight.
This may be my last chance to post for a week or so.

We're leaving for Panama early Saturday morning, and I have to say, I'm pretty excited.
The close we've gotten to this trip, the more I've found myself looking forward to it.

Michelle's dad has a whole bunch of stuff planned for us. Practically a tour of the country. We're going to be bouncing around to three or four different hotels, touring some museums and coffee plantations, visiting some beaches and just generally have a real good ol' Panamanian time.

Right now the only thing that is concerning me is that yesterday morning I pulled a muscle or pinched a nerve or something in my neck and it's giving me a shitload of trouble. I went to the doctor this morning for some muscle relaxers, and I think I may end up going to see an orthopedic specialist in the morning. All-in-all, it's gonna make the flight down there suck all that much more.

But enough about that. A quick word about my writing. I think I'm going to try and put another sample up soon. I've just finished what I think will be chapter 1 of my first novel. The working title is "The Red Dragoon." I've got about ten pages of the manuscript written so far, but it's kind of alot to post in a blog.

I'm also thinking about trying to start smaller and put this out as a series of short stories. Then maybe I can try to get them published in some magazines.

I don't really keep up with the Fantasy/SciFi mags that are out there, so if anybody can suggest some good ones, I'd like to get a few copies and see what kind of stuff they're publishing.

Anyway, if you're interested, I'll try to figure a way to put more of my stuff up for you to read. Maybe I can set up a seperate site and serialize it there.

For those of you I see regularly, I look forward to seeing you all when we get back from the land of Van Halen. Hopefully I'll have some great pics to show off.

For the rest of my loyal readers, I'll try and get my ass in gear and post some pics as soon as possible after we get back next Saturday.

Wish us well.

State of the What Now?

Okay, it's been way too long since I last posted, but I figure this is a good excuse to jump back on.
I, like most people in the country, just finished watching the State of the Union adress. And like alot of internet users, if the speed that Blogger is responding is any indication, I feel the need to blog about it. So here is the Storyteller's fast and dirty summary of the 2007 State of the Union Adress:

Opening: Hey whazzup! Oh crap, what happened to all my dudes? Whoa. Is that a chick back there? I better say something to her. Blah, blah, blah shallow statements. Blah blah blah let's get on with this or I'm gonna miss the Daily Show. I love it when they make fun of Cheney, hehehehe.

Economy: Whew, we're finally climbing out of the whole. I'm glad to say rich people are still making lots of money. I'm gonna take credit for the economy being great, even though it only looks good compared to how crappy it's been since shortly after I took office. Blah blah blah foreign oil. Hey, judging from the look on Cheney's face, I think he just got a chubby when I said 'oil'. Man, that guy is creepy. Let's see, what else. Oh yeah, I better say something about the brown people. They're coming in anyway, we might as well make wage-slaves, er that is, guest workers out of them. I mean, somebody's got to replant the flowers in front of the corporate headquarters every other month.

Spending: Okay, now how to do I phrase this talk about spending so that it doesn't sound completely hypocritical since I have yet to meet a spending bill that I didn't like and up til now my boys have been spending like sailors on shore leave. Hmmmm.... Nope, there's no real way to do it, but what the heck, Fox will make me sound good after they edit the sound bites. Oh yeah, and I better toss out the Social Security bone. This next bit is going to be hard. Something about insurance and tax breaks. Okay, just read the teleprompter. You can do this. After all, you used to be a cheerleader.

The War on Terra: OMG!! 9/11!! OMG!! TEH MOOSELIMS ARE GOING TO KILL US ALL IN OUR SLEEPS AND STRANGLE OUR KITTENS AND RAPE OUR PUPPY DOGS!! OMG!! GIANT NUCULAR IRANIAN ANT LEGIONS COMING OUT OF THE DESERT TO EAT OUR BRAINS!! OMGWTFBBQ!! EVERYBODY PANIC!!!!!11!1one!!!11eleven!!1!!!

The Wrapup: Okay, gotta bring it back down. Start wrapping it up, end this on a high note. It's time to go to the balcony. Laura brought plenty of people that I can point out exploitatively. See, there's an army guy up there who is a real actual hero, unlike me who hid out in Alabama and pretended to fly planes while all the other folks got shot at. Gees I hope people to still remember that. Oh hey! They've even got some black people up there! Suck it, Kanye. I love black people. Especially on the rare occasions that they'll make me look good on TV.

The close: Stay the course. Thousand points of light. Er. Oops, sorry. I was channelin' Daddy there for a minute. Anyway, God bless Amurka. . . . Suck it, Allah.

Aaaaaaaaand scene.

Matt's Soon to Be Famous Black-Eyed Peas

No, not the hip-hop group. I don't know where the love is.

Actually, I devised what I think is an excellent recipe for New Year's Day black-eyed peas, and I just have to share it. I was really surprised at how well it turned out.

Ingredients:

1 tsp. butter or vegetable oil (I almost always use EVOO when cooking with oil)
6 cloves of garlic
1 medium to small sweet onion
1 poblano pepper (you can probably substitute two jalapenos if you really like heat)
2 links of pre-cooked sausage (Michelle and I popped in at this little place in New Braunfels on our way back from S.A. a couple of weeks ago, and they had the best sausage. I used chicken, jalapeno and cheddar. You can also use ham, or any kind of summer sausage or kielbasa. I figure about 1/3 to 1/2 a pound total.)
1 package, black-eyed peas (I used frozen. If you use dried, you'll probably want to soak them overnight.)
1 cup water

Instructions:

Chop the garlic and onions. You can mince it as fine as you'd like, but it's not really necessary as they will pretty much melt away during cooking. I left them in pretty large chunks.
Slice the poblano. I just cut the top of of mine, scooped out the seeds and then quartered it.
Slice the sausage into 1/2 to 1-inch segments, or dice ham into 1-inch cubes.
On the stove, heat the butter or oil in your cook pot over med-high heat. Probably a 2-quart pan will suffice. I used my 4-quart soup pot and it was a little big for only one package of peas.
Saute the garlic and onions. When they are done, add water, peas, sausage, and poblanos. Salt and pepper to taste.
Now, the peas package said only use 3/4 a cup of water, but I just don't see how this would work. Maybe with a smaller pot. Frankly, I added enough water to just come level with the peas, but not really cover them.
Bring the whole thing to a boil, then reduce heat, cover and simmer for 30 to 40 minutes, stirring occasionally, until the peas soften. Most of the water should be soaked up into the peas by then, and they'll lose that raw taste and take on a nice rich flavor. What liquid is left ought to be reasonably thick. Be careful not to let them burn on the bottom of the pan. I'd say that if after 30 minutes, all the water is gone, but the peas don't taste done--they'll still be kind of hard and taste rawish--add a little more water and bump the heat up a little. But then be VERY careful not to let them get waterlogged or burned.

When they're done, serve them up with some cornbread, mustard greens and sweet iced tea for a tasty and lucky New Year's Day lunch.

Happy New Year from the Storyteller!!

Oh Dear...

Ugh.

Friends don't let friends blog drunk.

So here's my three stages of drunkenness. Everybody has their own stages. These are mine.

Stage 1: Mellow. This is when it's all good. I just kind of feel laid back, enjoying the world around me. This is good for movies, especially comedies, concerts, or sitting around on the patio conversing with friends. I get a bit more talkative, but usually in a good way. I tell a few fun stories, and laugh heartily at other's stories and jokes. This is the guy that everybody likes.

Stage 2: The Professor. This is the stage that I reach most often when I'm only drinking with Michelle. She's the only one that could put up with this guy. At this stage, my internal barriers have been lowered enough that my secret desire to be a world-renowned lecturer in all things really comes to the fore. You should all be thankful that I've not inflicted this guy on you. Just a couple of weeks ago, I sat in a martini bar giving my very patient wife a lecture about the interaction of the Roman legions with the Germanic tribesmen and how this set the stage for the combination of Romance and Germanic languages to combine, forming modern English. Thankfully, I was drunk enough not to see the guy behind the bar shaking his head.

Stage 3: The Clinically Depressed Philosopher. Oh God. I really hate this guy. To date, this guy has only shown his face a couple of times, always in the privacy of my own home, and only with Michelle as a witness. Nobody else has ever met this guy, and hopefully, nobody else ever will. This guy is the worst. This is the guy that makes Michelle think I should be on antidepressants. He's just a couple of drinks away from the Professor. And there's no telling what's going to open the door to him. On Friday night, it was a question from Michelle. She wanted to know why so many people thought The Crow was such an amazing film. Well, that start the Professor lecturing on the culture of the nineties, but that woke up the CDP (Clinically Depressed Philosopher), who was reminded that he's no longer nineteen and no longer in college and that he feels really old and . . . well . . . it was all downhill from there. And the last post was the ultimate product of that. The only good thing about the CDP is that he goes away fairly quickly. Michelle managed to get rid of him by putting on Dana Carvey's greatest SNL hits DVD. A good cup of tea helps, too.

Anyway, I just wanted to let you all know who it was that was posting last time. Pray that that is the only contact you ever have with CDP. I'll do my best to keep him locked up. The world is just not ready for him yet.