Darcy's Avocado Trick

On Darcy's technique:
Hopefully this is stating the obvious but I really like her alot.
Anyways, she invented a new (to my knowledge) technique for getting the flesh out of an avocado!
I'm no culinary whiz and by no means an avocado intellectual but I'd never thought of this before.

Cut the avocado in half around the pit and sliced each half into sections with a knife. Those things are essential. But normally my next step would be to scoop the flesh out with a big spoon. No more.

I'd been burned by the spoon technique more than once. After I'd scored out my perfect little lines to form perfect little wedges in the perfect little green flesh, I'd scoop it out with the spoon, which almost always would somehow glue the seams of the avocado slices back together, undoing my hard work, and make it difficult not only to get apart again but to remove from the spoon.

In comes darcy. No spoon doth she need. She scores out her slices and with a firm pinch and roll (all dudes have perfected this technique already!) the avocado slices fall out and right on top of my burrito innards in nearly perfect form! Excelsior!

Love you Darc.

Speaking of avocadoes.

EDIT: Are most girls unfamiliar with the "Pinch and Roll" technique? Surely you've all met a dude before... Surely you've all grimaced as he scratched his nuts without taking into account the presence of a female in his proximity. Darcy was confused when she read "pinch and roll". I figure she's just sheltered. But I know she used to hang out with Jordan and Julian and those guys and they play puppet games with each other's naked members. Maybe they're just not subtle enough dudes to utilize the pinch and roll. It's a pretty sophisticated maneuver, after all...

I left home early today

to pay a speeding ticket before work. It was the final day for me to take care of the ticket before I would receive a warrant. I got up, took Charlie outside, got dressed, washed my face, brushed my teeth with my new tube of Tom's cinnamon clove whole-care toothpaste, ate a bowl of strawberry vanilla hemp granola with Silk while Charlie tried to eat it too, then kissed Darcy goodbye and left at about 8:07.

At about 8:11 I was driving west at the corner of McKinney and Jannie at the posted sped of 30mph when I saw a Little Guy's Movers truck driving east swerve from the right lane to the left to avoid a man who had stepped onto the street from a bus stop in front of the County Court House. I saw shattered glass fly across the street and the man was thrown backwards by the truck which seemed to stop on a dime.

I swerved from the confusion, thankfully there weren't any cars next to me. I passed the cars that were trailing the moving truck and pulled a sloppy 3point u-turn in the middle of the street, put on my hazards and parked my car not remembering to turn it off. I called 911 while I ran up to the moving truck and told them what was going on. I told the driver of the truck that I had called 911, that they were on their way.

I saw the man lying in the street, motionless. He had his jacket hood pulled up over his head. I could only imagine the worst. It took what felt like forever (but was probably only seconds) to muster up the courage to approach him. He was lying on his side facing the courthouse. I knelt in the street and lifted his hood enough so I could see his face. There was a trail of blood coming from his head but he seemed relatively intact. I tried and talked to him. I felt foolish like I didn't know what to say to a dying man to try and keep him alive. "Hey mister, can you hear me? If you can hear me, say something." I grabbed his hand and asked him if he could feel it. He didn't respond. He was moaning and spitting like he was having trouble breathing.

Police cars, ambulances, and firetrucks began to arrive in no time at all. I gave the officers my statement and so did another witness who had been tailing the moving truck. Apparently I was the only one who really saw what happened. The other witness was asked to move his truck because a care flight helicopter would be arriving soon. While I gave my statement I was asked where I work, I told them I worked at AIDS Services of North Texas. When I couldn't remember the phone number at the office, the driver of the moving truck stepped in and gave it for me. "My wife is Misti", he said. She is my coworker.

I looked behind me and saw Ghandi, who works at the UPS store next to Lenny's where I used to work. I went over to talk to him on the courthouse lawn. It was really cold and I had been standing in the wind for about 45 minutes when the helicopter arrived and chilled me to the bone.

They loaded the injured man on the helicopter while I gave my statement to traffic officers, firemen, and paramedics. I was then told that I needed to come to the police station to give my official statement. I followed Sergeant James Brett to his office and recounted the whole story.

*I'm at work right now and have to go*

Active Denial System ready for deployment?

Army, Justice Department to Field “Pain Ray”

"The Active Denial System emits electromagnetic radiation (radiofrequency waves) at 95 GHz. The system stimulates nerve endings and causes discomfort but does not cause permanent injury – the radiation penetrates less than 1/64th of an inch into a person’s skin. Symptoms dissipate quickly when the device is turned off or the person moves away from the radiation beam..."

"Tests have shown that the effects can reach through cracks in and around concrete walls and even through the glass of automobiles"

"At a cost of $25 million [to US taxpayers], five truck-mounted NLWs will soon be shipped off to Iraq for heavy-lifting in Iraqi cities for use against militant oil workers and citizens should U.S. energy multinationals finally get their greedy little hands on that nation’s oil wealth. A slimmed-down version of the Active Denial System (ADS) is sought for deployment in the homeland."

"A new report by Deutsche Stiftung Friedensforschung (DSF, German Foundation for Peace Research) physicist Dr. Jürgen Altmann, states that the ADS may be highly-damaging or even lethal"

"Model calculations show that with the highest power setting, second- and third-degree burns with complete dermal necrosis will occur after less than 2 seconds. Even with a lower setting of power or duration there is the possibility for the operator to re-trigger immediately."

"Particularly handy for deployment in American cities should “rioters” object to a stolen presidential election"

SOURCE LINK

Please allow me to slide back into my love of film for 5 seconds...

Ridley Scott, Director of two of my favorite films of all time ALIEN and BLADE RUNNER, has finally revealed his third Sci-Fi installment after 25 years. This is a pretty big deal for me. And the choice of his subject has me even more excited. THE FOREVER WAR by Joe Haldeman revolves around a soldier who battles an enemy in deep space for only a few months, only to return home to a planet he doesn’t recognize some 20 years later. It was written by Haldeman after he returned from Vietnam in the 60s and (as with everything that happened in Vietnam) is extremely relevant to our current situation. I hope everyone will go watch it with me on opening night (whenever that might be).

http://www.variety.com/article/VR1117993856.html?categoryId=13&cs=1

My Story

Hey guys. If you haven't been reading my new blog then you might not know that I have recently (this wednesday) decided to become vegan. I stumbled upon a message board called veggieboards and decided to make it the first message board I've ever joined. Hopefully it will give me some of the support and information that I need to make my new life choice a little easier.

Anyways, here's what I posted in the "Intorduce Yourself" section. I thought you guys might like to read it:


Vegan for approximately 14 hours...
Hey guys. I'm really glad I found you.
I came across this site because I was researching the elusive Subway veggie max patty that I came to love while on tour with my friends in the west coast. It looks like there's really alot of great information to be learned here so I'll just go ahead and introduce myself to get things started.

My name's Jesse. I'm 22 years old. I live in Denton, TX. I attended the University of North Texas for three years studying Film Production before I decided that wasn't really the course I wanted my life to take. After discovering my deep-seeded love for "mother nature", I was set on a course of environmental consciousness and responsibility.

It was in February or March of this year that my anarchistic beliefs culminated in an attempt to literally get back to nature. I packed a backpack and gathered in it the necessary items for me to survive until I got on my feet, living in the wild. I emptied my bank account, tied my cellphone to the living room wall, and said goodbye to my friends and girlfriend. Then when my roommates weren't home, I headed out on my bicycle to never return.

Less than a mile later, the skies opened up and it began to snow.

I pulled my bicycle into the local goodwill thrift store to see if they had any goggles I could purchase because the snow was impairing my field of vision. I bought some goggles that they happened to have and stepped back outside the store to find that the snowstorm had worsened exponentially. But I was going to set out anyways. So I went to pull on my goggles to protect my eyes...when the goggle strap snapped.

Discouraged, I pulled my bike to the side of the building and under an awning where people pull their cars up to donate items. I sat there for a while, huddling from the chilling wind behind a donated book shelf. A man who worked there came out to admire the white landscape that had appeared out of nowhere and saw me shivering there. We talked for a while about generalities and eventually, when the snowstorm refused to let up, I admitted defeat and headed back to the warmth of my home.

A few days later, my friends Mike and Andrew from Chicago came to visit me and my roommates at our home in Texas. I told them my story and they seemed completely baffled as to how the person that they had lived with in the dormitories and even played Xbox 360 (LOL) with could now refuse to use electricity and denounce all of society and it's trappings. When Mike and Andrew had to leave for Chicago a few days after arriving, the only thing that kept me from leaving with them was the fact that my band had a show coming up and I didn't want to abandon them or any of my other friends.

However, my radical anarchistic views leveled off in the following weeks and eventually I was back to playing computer games and eating Whataburger once more. I became aware of my complacency and the fact that I had fallen back into everything I hated and desperately needed a change.

So when Andrew told me that a room was opening up in his Chicago apartment I told him I was in.

I sold everything that couldn't fit in my 1997 Honda Accord sedan, I kissed Darcy goodbye and headed North on Highway 35. I got to Chicago around 11pm and took the scenic approach along Lake Shore Dr to get a feel for the city. As I neared Andrew's apartment, I slowly began to feel the buildings leaning over me as if bending at the knee to observe this strange, tiny creature who had just ventured into a habitat where he obviously didn't belong.

That night was the worst night of my life. I couldn't sleep. My cat was going insane. The train roared by every 15 minutes, shaking the floor I was sleeping on; the street lights glared through the curtainless windows and into my restless eyes. I began to grow more and more panicked. Having driven for fourteen hours that day, I finally passed out from the stress of it all.

I woke up very early in the morning. Earlier than Andrew or his other roommates. I rolled up my sleeping back, grabbed my cat, and got back into my car, headed back to Texas, fearful that if I said goodbye, I would be convinced to stay by a friend who just couldn't understand.

When I got to Oklahoma eleven hours later, my mom called to ask about my first day living in Chicago. I started to bawl and, worried, she demanded that she would meet me in Oklahoma City to drive me the rest of the way back to my parent's home in Sherman, TX, which she did.

I spent the next few weeks living with my family. I watched alot of tv and spent alot of time feeling depressed in general but getting better. One day I was watching Sundance Channel and discovered a BBC syndicated show about a family from the UK who moves to a country home in Cornwall to live off of the land in a more sustainable and responsible existence.

It had seemed so impossible before. What sort of life could any of us possibly lead that wouldn't depend on consumer goods, foreign oil, and the suffering of others. The dream finally seemed real and attainable.

Since then I have compiled a collection of books on the subject of sustainability and getting back to the basics of living off of the land. Yesterday I began a blog to teach my friends some of the things I have learned.

As of now however, the blog consists of a series of emails that I have sent to my family, urging them to think more ethically and responsibly about the food they are eating. Just as Americans have suppressed the indigenous people of this continent and brought other cultures from other continents on so that we may oppress them more locally, we have oppressed the entire animal kingdom in one of the greatest injustices of all time and history.

I have been a vegetarian "officially" for the past two months or so. Last night, as a culmination of my research efforts to persuade my family, I made a promise to myself and animals all over the world to become properly and entirely vegan. My motivation to step further was in finding that the dairy industry directly supports the veal industry.

I cannot sit with such injustice on my plate. It's time to stand up from the dinner table and cry for change!

New Blog

I've begun a new blog on the subject of sustainability.

http://jessebacktobasics.blogspot.com/

It will be my main focus and any random, unrelated thoughts can still be found here on my personal blog. Go ahead and check it out. I'm trying to get organized as fast as possible but I really want this to be something really wonderful that all of you will really enjoy. So it might be a while before I make my first informative post but keep and eye on it anyway. please.

Another ounce of hope

I never thought that this new philosophy could ever lead me to go back to school. But the more I think about how utterly impossible it would be to disappear into the woods and never be disturbed by civilization, the more I feel like I need to make a difference in the entire world just so that there will be woods for future generations to dream of escaping into.

I've spent the last two and a half weeks reading books and watching movies and television shows about self-sufficiency and green living. I've never been more excited or devoted to anything in my life. I've been dreaming of a perfect farm life, with animals, a garden, etc. However, having not been raised into such a life, I'm going to stick with what I know, try to do my best to limit my carbon footprint and work to find simple ways that everyone else can do the same (even if they don't know they're doing it)

This is what I want to do:
Environmental Resources Engineering

and this is where i want to do it:
http://www.humboldt.edu/admissions/discover/movement4.html
http://www.humboldt.edu/admissions/discover/studentvids.html

In order to attend HSU in Arcata, California, I would have to either pay out of state tuition or live there for a year prior to attending. In order to attend in the fall of 2009, I would have to move there...right about now. However, in light of my recent cross-country residential adventure, I'm going to give myself more time to sort things out before committing to another move. Obviously, it will be very difficult to leave my friends and family here as I realized a few weeks ago. I'm going to try to move by this coming spring in hopes of attending in the spring of 2010.