Have a case of the Mondays? Want to feel smart? Watch this video.
We all know that California has some problems, but this woman has found the answers to them all.
Kids, say thank you to SWTCTW reader Tim, who sent in this gem. Thanks, Tim!
[Posted by Kathleen]
We all have our favorite desserts. Perhaps yours is the pumpkin pie your grandmother used to make at Thanksgiving, the cookies they used to have in your high school’s cafeteria, or just straight up Ben and Jerry’s.
Colonel Henry Moak LOVED the pound cake the Army rationed out during the Vietnam War. After forty years of service to our country, Col. Moak is retiring and he wants pound cake at his celebration, which is being held today at the Pentagon. To be specific, he wants Army C-ration pound cake. Even more exact, he wants the one from one of his old ration kits he saved. He’s planning to eat the old pound cake today… if he still can.
I am dying to know what happens. Regardless, I know I’ll be a tad bit grossed out. The thought of moldy pound cake is nasty, but then again so is the thought of perfectly intact cake 40 years later. Eek!
But let him eat cake. And for his sake, I hope it’s still good. He’s definitely earned it.
[Posted by Kathleen]
Filed under blogging, food, news, pop culture, thoughts
You should know, first of all, that I’m feeling much better today. It took some Kathleen mixed with some wine with a side of chips and salsa and Ben and Jerry’s and POOF, healed. (Well, mentally. The ankle still causes me to go on angry expletive-laden rants in my head as I walk through Union Station: “God damned ankle. You mother fucker. Could you MAYBE stop HURTING you little piece of shit?!” Ahem.) Last night I may have eaten upwards of 200% of the recommended daily value of saturated fat in the form of Peanut Butter Cup ice cream, and Kathleen and I may have been glued to the television for an entire hour-long David Blaine special, straight out of 1997, with Leonardo DiCaprio and his floppy hair hosting. It happens.
I only overslept by a half hour (okay, 50 minutes) this morning, which was an upgrade from the rest of the week, and this morning this song came on my shuffle:
How could my day go badly if it began with that song? I mean…
Any time I need to see your face
I just close my eyes and I am taken
to a place where the crystal mind and
magenta feeling taken shelter in the base
of my spine sweet like a chicka cherry cola
The magenta feeling has definitely taken shelter in the base of my spine. (What?)
HAPPY FRIDAY, KIDDOS!
[Posted by Mallory]
Filed under ben and jerry's, drinks, food, music, pop culture, weird, YouTube
I’ve been on campus for an hour, and haven’t done any work yet. Why, you ask? Because of the Top Five Favorite Foods Game. I’m not sure if I have talked about this game on the blog yet, but today I played with my “bosses.” The rules vary from game to game, but for the purposes of this game, categories (i.e. Mexican food) and drinks were forbidden. So here’s a peek into my life (or just my Gmail):
Subject: i want to play!
————————From: Jen
Date: Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 10:36 AM
To: Mallory, Go
Are these foods discretionary? i.e. Are all of my nutritional needs already met? If so, then my list is as follows:5. Broccoli is tied with Soy Sauce
4. Macaroni and Cheese
3. Garlic
2. Bacon
1. Krispy Kreme donuts———-
From: Jen
Date: Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 10:38 AM
To: Mallory, Go
Crap. I forgot coffee, beer, and mayonnaise.———-
From: Mallory
Date: Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 10:38 AM
To: Jen, Go
Yes, totally discretionary. There is a different game about which foods you would eat if you could only eat five for the rest of your life. Go and I think you cheated because you can’t have a tie. Other than that, good choices.———-
From: Go
Date: Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 10:40 AM
To: Mallory, Jen
HAHAHAHAHAHA, broccoli and soy sauce?!? Ok, just to update you, these are Mallory and my top five favorite foods as of this morning:Mallory
#5 Stuffing
#4 Goat cheese
#3 Pizza
#2 Salsa
#1 Breakfast sandwiches (e.g., sausage, egg and cheese on toast, bagel or English muffin)Go
#5 Chicken wings
#4 Thanksgiving turkey
#3 Choco chip coffee ice cream
#2 Steak
#1 Sushi———-
From: Jen
Date: Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 10:49 AM
To: Go, Mallory
Go,You are so predictable. I expected more. Sushi, steak, and ice cream???
———-
From: Go
Date: Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 10:58 AM
To: Jen, Mallory
Predictable?!? PREDICTABLE?!? At least I listed REAL foods! Broccoli? Soy sauce? Garlic? These aren’t even side dishes! BLAH!———-
From: Jen
Date: Wed, Dec 10, 2008 at 11:02 AM
To: Go, Mallory
Fine, I’ll remove soy sauce and garlic. But broccoli stays. And I get unlimited beer and coffee.5. Broccoli
4. Pot stickers
3. Mac and Cheese
2. Bacon
1. Krispy Kreme Donuts
Perhaps this is why I’m still not done with my paper.
[Posted by Mallory]
Filed under food, humor, post-college depression, random
If I could have any job in the world, I would like to own a candy store or a cupcake shop. Maybe an ice cream parlor. Something along those lines.
I’ve thought this for a long time. There is pretty much no happier place in the world than one of these shops. In high school, I used to work in a WONDERFUL candy store during the holiday season, and I loved every second of it. No one is ever pissed off while they’re buying candy. And if you work at a candy store, you get to nibble everything for free. Helloooo heaven.
The reason this comes up today is that my friends and I just discovered our own little piece of heaven in Georgetown: Georgetown Cupcake. Please just look at their website/menu and be jealous. We were wandering towards M Street to get coffee, and then, like a vision, this cupcake store appeared. I’d heard of it before, but I didn’t know that it was AROUND THE CORNER from our program’s headquarters. Which means I will probably go there every day. Which means next time you see me, I’ll have gained 200 pounds but I’ll be a lot happier.
Now everyone go eat a cupcake and get excited that it’s almost Friday.
[Posted by Mallory]
According to a recent study, I could place the blame on Law and Order and all 17 of its spin-offs for the fact that I eat a lot. I’m not kidding. Law and Order, and other crime shows, apparently makes us eat a lot. I am an avid Law and Order fan–uh oh.
In the study, titled “The Sweet Escape,” researchers conducted four experiments revealing that “consumers who have been recently reminded of their own impending mortality” spend more on groceries — and actually eat more of those groceries.
Oooh, clever title. Anyway, Law and Order and others are the catalysts for reminding us of our own impending mortality? What? Whatev.
“We found that when people think about the fact that they’re going to die someday — not now, but someday — they want to consume more of everything,” says Naomi Mandel, co-author of the study and an associate professor of marketing at Arizona State University. “We find this with snacks and drinks but also all kinds of different foods: frozen foods, meats, vegetables, everything.”
And they connect this to Law and Order. I can’t believe they spent money on this study. I have, in my opinion, a better theory to explain the connection between snacking and Law and Order. None of this “impending death” mumbo jumbo.
Let’s look back to the experiments of scientist Ivan Pavlov. He is known for his work with dogs, making them salivate at the sound of a bell. Basically, it has to do with mental association. He would ring a bell and give the dogs food. Eventually, they would salivate at the sound of the bell with or without food present.
People like to snack when watching TV, right? So swap out a bell for the signature Law and Order gavel DunDun noise and take away the food…voila! We have been trained liked Pavlov’s dogs to feel hungry while watching Law and Order. And being that Law and Order is on 22 out of the 24 hours in a day, this training does not take long to do. Really, all it takes is one week of being sick and watching TV all day every day, or just a few weeks of watching one or two episodes a night.
That, my friends, is why we eat when we watch Law and Order. That is why Law and Order makes us fat.
Just for fun, here is Sesame Street’s parody of Law and Order: SVU, Law and Order: Special Letters Unit.
Oh, and just because The Office is the BEST SHOW EVER and Jim is dreamy, dreamy, oh so steamy and smart, here is his Pavlov’s dogs trick on Dwight:
[Posted by Kathleen]
Filed under animals, definitely not politics, food, humor, news, pop culture, random, TV, Uncategorized, YouTube
As much as I like to promote my own blog (and wittiness), I must give major kudos to this blog, http://cakewrecks.blogspot.com/. They have truly combined some of my favorite things and turned it into a heeeeeesterical bloggy. Frosting, cake and snark. Yummy. Highlights include bad punctuation, horrible spelling, colors that make you want to have a seizure and just general grossness. Here’s a picture to tempt you. Enjoy.
[Posted by Kathleen]
My dog (pictured above, looking saucy) is definitely not a skinny bitch. Well, actually, he’s pretty damn skinny, but he’s not what you might call a “light eater.” For some time now, I’ve been meaning to start regularly posting about the random shit that Copper eats, because man, it’s impressive. In the past, he has eaten half of a huge nutella/white chocolate cake, a jar of honey, a bag of Chex Mix, brownies that were in a Tupperware, a can of Hansen’s soda, a bag of Snickers (wrappers included), a container of rat poison, etc. etc. As you can see, he’s not particularly discriminating in his culinary choices.
Today, Copper ate an entire loaf of banana bread. That we were giving to our friend who has cancer. NICE ONE, Copper.
[Posted by Mallory]
I recently got an email from my grad school requesting some information for an internal “facebook” that will be passed out to faculty, staff, and other students. It asked for all the basic, easy stuff — undergraduate university, undergraduate major, favorite food — and then it hit me with a doozie: it asked for my hobbies. Uhhh…
I mean, who has hobbies anymore? In a perfect world, I’d be able to write “calligraphy, birdwatching, knitting, table tennis, and volunteering with refugees from Kazakhstan.” But folks, it ain’t a perfect world. If I were to be honest, I’d list “lounging, blogging, watching Jon & Kate Plus 8, drinking outdoors, eating, hanging out with friends, and, uhh, sleeping?” among my hobbies. Those don’t cut it, either. I turned to my sister for advice:
Maddy: Well, you like sitting.
Mallory: Maddy, I KNOW, but that doesn’t count. What about baseball games? I like baseball games! I’m watching one right now!
Maddy: You only like baseball games when you are eating a hot dog and drinking a beer and sitting in the Rockpile, where you don’t even have to watch the game.
Mallory: Touche. Ummmm…I’ve been, uh, running a lot lately…
Maddy: “A lot” might imply that you run marathons. You occasionally run for 20 minutes, and you hate every second of it.
Mallory: Concerts! I like going to concerts!
Maddy: [Rolls eyes.]
You see my dilemma. I settled on the following list of hobbies: reading (I really do like that! It’s generic, but whatever, beggars can’t be choosers); writing (I blog, and email my friends a lot); biking (well, see, I biked tons last summer and I think that if I put air in the tires, I’d actually use my bike a lot!); swimming (I used to be a swimmer in high school; now I enjoy sunbathing); and spending time with my friends (read: eating and drinking. A lot).
Sigh. Maybe my grandma can teach me to needlepoint.
[Posted by Mallory]
In case you hadn’t noticed, I’m a big fan of the New York Times, and in between important receptionisty phone calls, I like to peruse the website in an effort to make myself feel smarter. Because I’m a huge health nut (HAH!), I was drawn to this article on “The 11 Best Foods You Aren’t Eating Yet.” Let’s play a little free association game with the list:
That was fun, but now I’m hungry.
[Posted by Mallory]
six words to change the world. 