Nothing against cephalopods, but this is disgusting.

This is further proof that meth is destroying this country. Either the designer is a user or those who would be willing to make 3 easy payments of $305.44 are on it. Holy bajeezus, what is that octpus sitting on? A pile of crystal that would even make Tony Montana jealous, if he actually cared for the stuff.

Can you believe it retails for $3,478.72? Thank you ShopNBC, you've saved my pocketbook yet again despite my penchant for useless crap that could only be admired by likeminded junkies.

Green eyes? It's like from a nightmare after a jeweler and a marine biologist went on a bender.

TNT needs help coordinating its website and commercials

Women's health is no laughing matter. Definitely something that should be taken seriously. So during TNT's latest airing of the Bourne Supremacy (awesome movie), TNT (in partnership with Bayer Pharmaceuticals) invited viewers to go to TNT.tv to learn more about women's health, specifically heart health. Unfortunately, there's nothing at the TNT.tv site about women's health. One of the commercials during the movie did mention a Bayer site, I think it was http://www.healthywomen.org/.

So, why would I go to TNT.tv to learn more about women's health? No reason. Except for the fact that during TNT's series of commercials about health they featured a woman who suffered a heart attack but turned her life around (she ran a marathon). I checked the web to see if her story is real. Well, it seems to be real--thanks to a story published at what seems like tomorrow...http://www.womenspress.com/main.asp?SectionID=1&SubSectionID=233&ArticleID=3302&TM=21020.63
As I write this it's still January 31, 2009 but the article is dated February 1, 2009.

It would smack of a contrived media event by Bayer from the TNT commercial to the slightly early article in Minnesota Women's Press. However, this woman used to work for Abbott (according to LinkedIn); back in December, Bayer sued Abbott for its arthritis drug Humira for patent infringement. Would Bayer pay an Abbott employee in this situation? Probably fair game; she now volunteers for the American Heart Association--according to the Women's Press article.

Okay, sounds like the trail runs dry after that. In the end, did anyone watching the Bourne Supremacy actually learn more about heart disease? Hopefully. February is heart health awareness month afterall. Eat your greens.

Video thought for the day

I was thinking of this monkey/dog combo this afternoon. Priceless.

Poor attempts at Internet advertising

Ridiculous...
Is that dude half-man, half-pig?
Hasn't imaging technology (compression, rendering and all that good business) progressed enough that we can get better images?
I guess not.

And what is this dude wearing? Somebody should have told him, "dude, you're going to be on the Internet, wear some cool threads." I think someone told him to sit still and hold a piece of rope. His response, "wha? you want me to hold a rope? Yeah, I can do that. And I'll get free checking? Okay I'll do it." However, note the meticulously styled bed head hair. I can only surmise that he's trying to appeal to the Jack 'RegularCollegeDude' Smith. What college student can't identify with the belle coiffe, poor attire, need for checking and...fear of strings? I'll never understand today's youth.

On a related topic, don't get me started on the bizarre antics portrayed in the LowerMyBills.com ads. This dude has that topic cornered, so I won't even go into any detail. I will note that his blog shows the progression of the ads and it's quite interesting.

slow days (for me) in the blogosphere

I was on a roll this week, eh? Post after post, non-stop baby! Then Thursday rolled around and a few pints with a co-worker and that record is lost. Thanks a lot to that guy.

I finally signed up for the trial membership at 24 Hour Fitness. I found out that the busiest time at the gym is noontime Monday through Friday, a time when I'm unlikely to be anywhere near that area. So this is probably a good thing; when I get off work I'll have no problem finding my favorite machine available. This would be the first time I actually joined a full tilt gym. Back in DC, the building where I worked had a gym but it was tiny and a few cardio machines sprinkled around. The positive to that was that it was cheap and right at work so there were no excuses--it did close at 7pm weekdays and was closed completely on the weekends. Now, I'll have access to a gym that's open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Will I know how to control myself???

A Bitter Melon Cooking Experience

I'm not exactly sure how it was revealed but I mentioned to my ohana at work that I ate bitter melons. I don't believe the word "cook" was ever mentioned (my experience with bittermelon aside from eating it was maybe choppiing it at the most), but somehow this tipped off one of my kuahine and she brought in what seemed like a couple of pounds of the bumby and bitter squash.

First, some background. I've been eating bitter melon for what seems like most of my life. As a young'un growing up in Texas, I dreaded having to eat it. I tried it again after a long haitus and somehow, someway thought it was delicious. My mom cooks it with her special mix of spices, which are basically turmeric, hot peppers and salt. Served with rice and a dollop of yogurt, this is probably one of the most basic dishes to prepare, but so complicated for the senses.

Perhaps it was during the time my father raised bitter melons as a cash crop that I began to appreciate the gourd. My dad would construct large trelises and grow the vines of the bitter melon across these structures. Even the pugent odor of the vines was so strong that you could pick it up some ways away from the vicinity of the actual plant. Just thinking about the smell recalls such fond memories such as hot oppressive Texas humidity, mosquitoes and other flying insects and my canine pal, Bosco. Enough of that for now.

So last weekend I decided to cook up a few bitter melons. I was actually spurred on to do this because I heard a cooking contest was coming up--the next day actually--I figured I could give it a shot. A few of my friends were gathering and everyone was preparing some international dish. Alas, the contest was cancelled, but still the cooking was a worthwhile experience.

So to detail the experience. FYI, I followed my mom's recipe. First, I cut the ends of the gourds off and chopped the rest of the vegetable into quarter-inch rounds, which you may be able to see in the photo to the right. One of the squashes literally "exploded" since it was too ripe; one end of it was curled wide open exposing it's red seeds, hence why the yellow pieces are not intact. I cut up some small Hawaiian hot peppers that I also received. I chopped up two thinking these little buggers ain't going to intimidate me...

I proceeded to "blanch" the bitter melon slices. However, I believe I put too much water in the pot so I probably created a mild stew of bitter melons in the process. When I attempt to cook these again, I will use way less water (maybe a 1/4 cup for each 1/2 pound) and will probably salt them at this point too. I should have also probably used a larger cooking vessel.

Next, I actually had to run to the grocery store since I found out that I didn't have ground turmeric. After returning from the store, I fired up the stove again and proceeded to sautee the sliced bitter melon and hot peppers.

At this point the details get a little fuzzy. For some reason, I decided that the dish needed a whole lot of turmeric, I added a little salt but not enough to complement the bitterness of the squash. As you can see, the consistency of the squash and spices is rather wet. This should not be the case; it's most likely a result of the poor blancing I performed. Also, the non-stick pan that I used probably required less oil than I added. I don't like using these types of pans, but that's all that was available. In hindsight, I probably should have done everything in the stainless steel pot I used in the previous step.

Well, it was a fine experience like I said. It was good and pretty hot thanks to those hot peppers; they may be small but they carry quite the punch. Combined with the monster portion of turmeric, the dish probably could have cured someone of the cold in a matter of seconds. When cooking with bitter melon, don't underestimate the need for salt...I didn't have any rice (doh! I was suppossed to buy some when I went to the store) so I ate it with bread. There was brown rice available, but I didn't have time to cook rice for 50 minutes. Next time, I'll do it up right with rice and yogurt.

An abode of one's own

I'm deep into my first house hunt. Deep as in almost a month into it and hardly anything has come up. The problem is that house prices here haven't really backed off from the huge spike the market experienced awhile back. Compounding that is the fact that there's a slight décalage between when economic events strike the mainland and when those events are felt in Hawaii; almost as if the news travels by boat across the Pacific to get here (actually that might be too speedy a timeframe), but for some reason it takes forever.

When I first set out for Hawaii, I was set on buying a house. I found a few on the Internet and figured finding a home would be easy. Unfortunately, when I came to the island the first time to check out said houses, I found that they were in the worst parts of Honolulu--information not quite conveyed in the ad. So I've settled on buying a condominium.

What is a condominium? Even the word sounds strange. Apparently it's a hodge podge of Latin meaning joint ownership and the word was not widely used until 1962 to mean "a privately owned apartment."

Aside from price, location is the most important decision to make when buying. In Hawaii, and depending on your budget, you have the choice of living in downtown or out in the hills far from bus routes and other signs of civilization. Since I'm trying to avoid buying a car, I'm trying to live in town, near bus routes, grocery stores and work. That means Chinatown, Kakaako, Punchbowl (stretching it) or Makiki. That's a large swath of area that has many condos, but few in my price range.

So, I'll keep looking and keep hoping something good turns up.