House MD, Molecular Gastronomy and the Man in Black

This a hugely long rambling guest post of mine off The 80% Blog-


I have been considering for a while now whether to write my own blog cause most of the time, I end up just commenting on blackpetero’s blog. I seem to find myself constantly having to defend myself against his incessant ravings about 80% this and 20% that. I never quite know where I fall on his scale, probably somewhere in the high seventy’s I think, otherwise he wouldn’t be able to complain about me. But that’s ok, I figured it was time to make fun of him for a change and boy do I have a story for ya’ll.

Today I was sitting in Dr. B’s office waiting for blacksono to get his pre army checkup- ugh, don’t say anything, we are not thinking about that now, and there was a really interesting article in Newsweek about Heston Blumenthal, 3 star Michelin chef and culinary alchemist. The man is brilliant, and both blacksono and I agree that we want to be him when we grow up. His restaurant The Fat Duck has garnered more awards than anything and his incredibly weird Tasting Menu features items such as Snail Pudding and Egg and Bacon Ice Cream.

While discussing Heston’s show and the fact that one cannot enjoy food if ones sense of smell is impaired, I was reminded of the time blackpetero had his Nasal Polyps Removed. (This runs in his family, he could not smell anything before the op. I have the actual video of the surgery, but will not gross you out).

So there he was first night post op, with a couple of tampax stuck up his nose. Petero had downed who knows how much Vicodin to help with the horrendous pain. I am told it’s one of the more painful surgeries. The following morning, a bleary-eyed BPO mentions to me that he just “might have bought something off the shopping channel”! huh? naaah!
Now this was such a ridiculous notion. Anyone who knows him knows that that would NEVER happen. For god sake, he doesn’t let me even watch that channel, being the compulsive shopper that I am. So I forgot about it and life in sunny California went on. For a couple of weeks.

A knock on the door and the local UPS dude delivers a huge goddam box from, you guessed it, The Shopping Channel. Totally fascinated, I opened the box and found it contained The Megaknife Set - 256 assorted knives ordered right off the Red Neck Knife Show.
This incredible set included 46 Jack Knives (surgical steel with rubberized handles), 4 sets of TacOps tactical folding knives (the EXACT knife that SWAT uses), 9 navy seals aqua ops folding knives (the exact ones used in Iraq) a variety of Bowie knives, Apache knives, slip-not skinners, and there may have been a katana or two. $9000 worth of knives apparently.
Here is a live blooper clip which is funny as hell and a clip called Redneck Confederate Knife Show, in which Boone and O’Dell argue about the type of wood on the knives and threaten to kill the employee who misnamed the knives.

I did luckily find the following actual transcript of one of their programs off Front Page News that I wanted to copy and paste in its entirety cause its so freaking hilarious, but instead will give you the link to check out yourself. http://www.somethingawful.com/d/news/knife-show-on.php
You have to read it, you won't be sorry!!!

I never get tired of teasing Petero about this cause I am the one who usually fucks up. I don’t know if there is a moral to this story ( maybe don’t take narcotics and then watch infomercials at 3am) but after reading the above transcripts, I just wanna go out and buy bowie knives

Obsessive Dictator Disorder

A guest blog by me from Blackpetero's The 80% blog

I suspect strongly Blackpetero (BPO) has O.D.D (obsessive dictator disorder) and I will share with you today my reasoning.

It all started with Remote Control Airplanes. The garage was turned into a workshop and bpo spent a couple of years building and flying RC planes. He did a beautiful job and was really good at it. Then he moved on to making furniture and buying old tools. Must have spent the next 10 years going to flea markets all over Texas and California buying ancient planers and other tools of the trade. He did a wonderful job and built up quite a collection. I got some awesome wooden boxes, a couple of tables and a set of Adirondack outside furniture. Beautiful. The single malt scotch collections, music, books and audio books are still ongoing and of course guitar making. I am really proud of him.
Please see www.powguitars.com for a step-by-step guide on how to make classical, Spanish and Les Paul electric guitars.
Back to the workshop:There is a particular place for every single screwdriver, nail, dibble & jig. And he knows exactly where everything is. Of course when blackfamilyo need something, (cause the rest of the house is insanely untidy) we go down to the workroom (bomb shelter) and oi va voi if it is not put back in exactly the same place as before. He will know. It’s uncanny. ugh.

So where is the problem you say, what’s your issue? Wellll the guy is obsessive. The real problem is that I share a closet with him. Here is a photo of bpo’s side of the cupboard.


Please note the color of every single item in there. Please also note the black sock back hanging up. He ties his socks together and they get washed in the bag, like on a kibbutz, cause he doesn’t trust me with the laundry. (He is totally right, I suck at laundry, but still…) I was considering putting in a photo of his undies and sock drawer, also all black, but thought that was going a bit too far. (bpo does own one white running shirt for night time plus white running shoes, cause he cannot find good ones in black but that's as far as his tolerance for non black items go.)

Last week we had a major calamity in the house o'black-o. The black Nike running shorts were nowhere to be found!!!! The moaning and wailing was not believable. Of course it was “my fault”, cause I suck at laundry but I contend that how can you possibly find anything in a closet like that? It’s all fucking black. It all looks the same. It is all the same. It’s insane. No worries dear reader, the shorts showed up (of course- I think he is just going blind or something) somewhere on the shelf and all is calm again in the blackhousehold-o. I miss you. come homeeeeeeeeeee."