Me vs. the bird: a story in tweets

Act I: Prelude

@kellyhudson In my shopping cart tonight: tomatoes and tallboys. Spaghetti for tonight; beer can chicken for the rest of the week.


Act II: Tragedy!

@kellyhudson It is now official: God does not want me to roast chicken.

@kellyhudson Seriously. My beer can chicken tipped over in the oven, filled the kitchen with smoke, and just now suddenly EXPLODED. You win, bird.

@GoMariaGo @kellyhudson exploded? Now I have a new cooking fear.

@kellyhudson @GoMariaGo I heard a loud BANG, and my chicken, which had been sitting atop the stove, was on the ground with a big gash in the back.

@kellyhudson Stupid chicken. http://yfrog.com/h5l7abypytj

Act III: Hilarity

@ejaygee @kellyhudson God does want you to roast chicken, it's Sarah Palin that is sabotaging your efforts. Damn you Sarah Palin

@kellyhudson @ejaygee THAT's why my chicken exploded! Sarah Palin shot it from a helicopter!

@ejaygee @kellyhudson She can see your oven from her house

...

@mikerrr @kellyhudson more evidence to support my controversial theory that God is a chicken.

@kellyhudson @mikerrr God likes to launch Himself from my stove and commit seppukku on my not-so-clean kitchen floor.

@mikerrr @kellyhudson mysterious ways indeed

...

@jenlkessler @kellyhudson I know it's not funny and a huge mess but I def laughed out loud. Chkn 1, Kelly 0.
...

@Megebee @kellyhudson Seriously, show that damn chicken who's boss!

@kellyhudson @Megebee Clearly, the chicken is the boss.

@Megebee @kellyhudson The chicken got the best of you tonight. But you'll come back stronger.

@kellyhudson @Megebee It won the beer can battle. I'll win the lean protein war! I shall fight on the beaches, I shall fight on the landing grounds ...

...

@kategaible @kellyhudson that steel reserve was the death of the chicken!!! That beer can knock even my dad down:)

...

@tcallinan @kellyhudson Positive attitude: The beer looks tasty, if a bit warm. TC

@kellyhudson @tcallinan I drank half the can as part of my prep. Not bad!

@tcallinan @kellyhudson As always, Kelly I love your 'tude. Now if you would have eaten 1/2 the chicken before the beer-butt challenge I would worry.

Act IV: Advice

@davisdanae @kellyhudson I have a stand for beer can chicken if you want to use it

...

@adorkandhispork @kellyhudson ive been trying whole chix since oct or so. I like my old way (cut up, sear, finish) much better.its pc vs mac (control v ease)

@kellyhudson

@adorkandhispork The only luck I've ever had with a whole chicken is in the slow cooker.

 

@adorkandhispork @kellyhudson I did THIS a few times and lliked it. http://www.adorkandhispork.com/?p=281 (sorry, the recipe is from a mag)

...


@GoMariaGo @kellyhudson whole chickens are evil.


Act V: Bedtime

@kellyhudson Twitter makes me feel better about exploding a chicken. Thanks, guys.

You are an obsession, you're my obsession

It's been a while since I've posted a music video review up in here, but this one TOTALLY merits the revival of the feature.



Notes:

• OK, first of all, the song itself is genius. ("I will have you. I will have you. I will find a way, and I will have you." Poetry!)
• The very first shot is of a giant jester shoe tapping out the beat. Conceptual! (0:00)
• The hair, the shoes, the keyboard, the outfits, the lighting - everything is SO VERY '80s that it makes my hair crimp a little just watching it. (0:05)
• Antony and Cleopatra are just hanging out with their backup band at their friend's pool overlooking LA. Which makes total sense, but what's with the pirate? (0:56)
• OMG ELECTRIC HEXAGONAL DRUM KIT MANNED BY DUDE WITH TWO-TONE MULLET my hair just spontaneously permed itself. (1:17)
• Hang on, now two-tone mullet guy is the guitarist, and he's providing the soundtrack to some sort of epileptic seizure? (1:30)
• Even though the video was obviously thrown together in a day, using a friend with a pool's home and whatever costumes the band could scrape up, it kinda looks like male singer guy isn't in on the joke. (various, but especially 1:35)
• Now a spaceman is having the seizure, and he's being watched over by a man with plants growing out of his hat. ... Cool. (2:03)
• The jester is clearly the hero of the piece - he has the courage to drum on Cleopatra's head, and he's rewarded by having his foot appear in the opening scene. (2:16)
• Silver Venetian blind shades at night FTW! (2:52)
• Someone thought the shot of the pirate raising his eyebrow was GOLD, Jerry! (3:34)
• And then, all the crazy characters disappear, leaving their costumes behind. Maybe ... they transcended matter and evaporated into pure states of awesome? (This is definitely what happened.) (3:52)

Sorry, all other '80s music videos. The bar has been set, and I doubt you can pole-vault that well, seeing as how you don't have arms.

Elements of a Hudson/Carson/Drilling/Forrest/Clark Christmas

• Board games
• Card games
• Football games (watching, not playing)
• Boy-girl harmonica-kazoo battle
• Gift exchange presents including "Anti Monkey Butt Powder" and "Omega-3 Krill Capsules"
• Entire extended family forced to fend for selves when homeowners flee to Florida on the 27th
• Entire extended family piling into homeowners' bed, then shower, to take pictures to send to traveling homeowners
• The garage being turned into a makeshift refrigerator when turkey AND ham AND pot roast AND ribs AND all the sides for each become a little unwieldy
• Bottles and bottles of wine
• Glasses and glasses of beer
• Jugs and jugs of OJ (for screwdrivers, natch)
• Entire family begging anyone who leaves (like, say, a girl who's got to be at work the next day) to come back as soon as she possibly can

All in all, not a bad way to spend a weekend.

Season's greetings

Again the Ghost sped on, above the black and heaving sea — on, on — until, being far away, as he told Scrooge, from any shore, they lighted on a ship. They stood beside the helmsman at the wheel, the look-out in the bow, the officers who had the watch; dark, ghostly figures in their several stations; but every man among them hummed a Christmas tune, or had a Christmas thought, or spoke below his breath to his companion of some bygone Christmas Day, with homeward hopes belonging to it. And every man on board, waking or sleeping, good or bad, had had a kinder word for another on that day than on any day in the year; and had shared to some extent in its festivities; and had remembered those he cared for at a distance, and had known that they delighted to remember him.

...

Much they saw, and far they went, and many homes they visited, but always with a happy end. The Spirit stood beside sick beds, and they were cheerful; on foreign lands, and they were close at home; by struggling men, and they were patient in their greater hope; by poverty, and it was rich. In almshouse, hospital, and jail, in misery’s every refuge, where vain man in his little brief authority had not made fast the door, and barred the Spirit out, he left his blessing, and taught Scrooge his precepts.

Hee Haw and Merry Christmas

A couple weeks ago, the Al & Al show came to visit my parents' house to screen It's a Wonderful Life, No. 11 on the AFI's top 100 list. I happen to know a little about the movie, so I volunteered to host.

Cati came bearing cheese. Bob and Tracy arrived with cocktail knowledge. Alex and Allison brought some excellent speechifying on future cool Watch This events. And I provided the DVD and the liquor. (It's a Wonderful Life is a far drinkier movie than one might suspect.) Good times were had!

And now the Watch This post about the evening is out, so you should go read that. You should also try to attend one of their screenings before the year is up!

We endorse, you decide

So, there are two stories this week that are kind of enthralling to me from a journalistic perspective.

This week, we learned that MSNBC host Keith Olbermann has been suspended for breaking his employer's ethics code.

The line for what constitutes unbiased journalism is hazy and always moving. Each news organization decides for itself where that line is - as Olbermann's colleague Rachel Maddow points out in this clip.



The other story is, of course, about Cook's Source, the cooking magazine whose entire business model appears to be based on the assumption that "the entire Web is public domain." This would be hilarious if it weren't so infuriating. NPR's Monkey See blog has a pretty good roundup of the situation.

People believe ridiculous things about content on the Internet - everything from "if I change some of the words, that makes it my own original work" to "if you didn't want it stolen, you shouldn't have put it somewhere where I could copy it and remove all the Creative Commons invisitext." (For an example, let's turn to Cleolinda, who writes funny things on the Internet and is sometimes paid to do so - and therefore runs up against this issue ALL THE BLOODY TIME.)

The truth is that "copyright flows from the pen," which means that your original content is yours from the moment you create it, whether it's on the Internet or not. Isn't that comforting? (And it's so much more cut-and-dried than whether journalists can contribute to political campaigns!)

Fall fun

Peripatetic

per-i-pa-te-tic (adj) : of, relating to, or given to walking

So last weekend I did the Reggae Run, and having dealt with the crazy traffic surrounding that event, I decided to just walk to the starting line. Cati came with me.

We forgot that, while we live close to Ault Park, once you actually enter the park you have another mile or so to walk in order to reach the pavilion where the race festivities were taking place. Good thing Cati suggested getting an early start!

The Reggae Run is a 5K that goes downhill for the first half and uphill for the second half. Another way of saying that is, "The Reggae Run is a 5K where I run for the first half and walk for the second half."


Everyone in this photo is like, "I hear that."




And everyone in this photo is all, "Exactly."

But the real reason you do the Reggae Run is for the after-party! Free food and copious drink tickets!


Notice the number of people with hoods up, huddling over their beers and grilled corn? That's because it was chilly and drizzling the entire evening. Too bad - usually the first weekend in October is still pretty warm before sunset.

At one point, my friend Danae came up holding a tiny cup of Yagoot. I concluded that she was crazy. She came to the same conclusion after about five minutes of clutching a freezing dessert in her bare hands.

At another point, Cati said, "You know, we could just go somewhere warm and I'll buy everyone drinks."

But hey - it was an adventure, right? And Cati and I even got Danae to drive us home!

Sunday dawned, which meant it was time for Cati's and my weekly walk to the farmer's market. But this week was special - it was the Hyde Park Art Show, which meant we also spent some time wandering the booths and browsing ceramics and photography.



It also meant that the square, and several roads around it, was closed to car traffic. So Cati and I got to see some crazed drivers acting in a way you just wouldn't think necessary for a Sunday morning. The chill in the air persisted, but we were pretty glad we chose to walk anyway, because it would not be fun to try to navigate that mess.


Crepes for breakfast! I love how they have a little squeegee for the batter.

I walked home with my haul of produce and a reminder that once I get my current poster stash properly framed, I should consider new artists.

That evening, I headed over to Chele and Stacie's place for their weekly walk around their neigborhood and through the park across the street.

(No pics of this, so instead please enjoy this photo of Stacie and Chele pretending to fall off a bridge in Canada.)



(Corrie came too, but I don't have any photos of her falling off a bridge in Canada.)

What a fab weekend of friends and walking!

Jane Lynch should win all the Emmys y/y?

Happy Breast Cancer Awareness Month!

Are you aware yet?