Pork tenderloin, pineapple and berries

Rosemary, salt, pepper.

Pretending it has four sides, and I am branding a cow. 

Except it's pork, not beef. 

On the fourth side the stovetop is turned off and the pan in placed into the oven pre-heated to 400℉ and the oven turned off. So now the oven has begun cooling down as the pork cooks. For ten minutes. So don't open the door and muck about wasting the stored heat. 

See, that's how we pros do things. And we do it with outdoor grills too. Even a Weber. We bring our pre-used coals up to heat, perhaps with a few new ones,  put on the steaks, then shut the whole thing down as it cook thus saving the charcoal briquettes or whatever we're using. We use the same fuel over and over supplementing as we go. 

Hummingbird-view.

Dog-sniffing-the-table-view.

Buster! Hang on a second and I'll give you some. 

Hashed browned potatoes with bacon, jalapeño and cheese, two eggs over easy

ARTS!

Not just regular bacon. The best bacon.

Not just regular cheese, no, cheese from Ireland. Where the grass is super green all over the place and all the cows are going, "Oh man, this is a LOT better than California." 

Not just ordinary jalapeño, rather, hot jalapeño such as grown in the wilds of New Mexico by freaky native shaman. 

Not just regular eggs, but big fat chicken eggs that come out of a chicken's butt. 

And finally not just a regular potato, but a potato stolen from Peru and hybridized in Idaho where the best potatoes in the whole world come from and where potato-people travel from all over the world to learn the Idaho potato ways. 

My very first legitimate job was a potato picker. In the first grade.

This was in Dushore Pennsylvania in the year of our lord, 1962, the same year that President Kennedy totally goofed on the Cuban missile crisis. He should have legitimately invaded and kicked their asses solid and locked up Castro in Super Max to be forgotten to history.

But n-o-o-O-O-O-o-o-o. 

A local Dushore farmer needed help with gathering his potatoes so he advertised in the newspaper for help. He lived right down the road.

I couldn't read but my parents could. They told Barry and me about it. 

So our parents took us over there we picked potatoes for hours. 

La la la pick, pick, pickity-pick, pick pick pick. Hey Look! I got a big one!

Yeah, so what.

No, come on. This is a BIG one.

It was a regular potato.

Then the guy paid me only half what was promised but I didn't know anything about that. I didn't care. I was not part of the cash transaction. I don't know how that was handled.

But my dad did care.

He was mad as hornet. 

And not just a regular mad hornet, a seriously pissed off hornet. He was  in one his ass-kicking moods, and let me tell you, he was a military dude and those guys can be scary. They think they can walk right though walls. He had no problem starting a fight.

Which later in Japan, walking through walls turned out to be quite easy.

He drove us to the farmer and Barry and I stayed in the car and watched them discuss things.

We were certain we were going to see our dad kick that farmer's ass. 

But he didn't. They just talked. 

Turns out dopey little kids aren't worth half what regular people get paid. And he was right! I worked alright, but that didn't amount to much at all. My potato-production was nearly nothing. I was a worthless potato picker. 

I was a worthless stupid unaware incompetent playful potato picker. I pulled up plants, not separate the potatoes from the clumps already upturned.

I was paid anyway. I don't know if I was paid half or one fourth or the full amount. 

And I spent my money on a Halloween costume. Red pajamas with a pointed devil-tail and a devil mask. 

It's what was available at the Dushore Five and Dime. 

Halloween was a blowout too. For I was worthless at that too. I just wasn't interested in traipsing around getting candy. 

I'd rather go out and get worms. Same flashlight. Same bucket. But I could go fishing with worms and I couldn't go fishing with candy. And I did that one time and it was super duper fun.

I threw away the devil mask because it was ugly and I threw away the pajama top because the buttons were too difficult but I kept the devil pants because I loved LOVED LOVED the devil tail. 

I pretended I was a monkey.

Except the tail had an arrow point sewn into it. 

And they were red. 

I ignored those two un-monkey-like things and went around acting like a monkey with a glorious tail. 

I wiggled my butt all over the place to get the tail to swing around.

I slept in the monkey-devil-pants night after night after night after night after night after night after night after night after night after night after night after night after night after night after night after night after night after night  forever after night after night after night after night. 

Until one night the red flannel monkey-devil-pants disappeared.

"Hey, Mum, I can't find my monkey pants."

     "They must have disappeared."

"What?"

     "Yeah. Sometimes things just disappear." 

"What?"

     "Forget about them, Honey, they're gone."

"What?"

      "Your pajama pants are gone."

"What?"

     "Your monkey pants are gone. Forever. They disappeared. They're never coming back. They dissolved into the air. They used their last fiber. Their red disappeared. The tail broke off and cannot be repaired. They're gone. Gone. Gone. Gone, Gone. Gone. Forever. Forever and ever. Forever and ever through eternity. You'll never see them again. Gone." 

"Oh." 

Man, what a bummer! Those were the best pants I ever had. And I never had another pair of monkey tail pants. It was a once in a lifetime thing.

All because of that Dushore potato farmer. 

Dushore. That name still still cracks me up. 

Beer batter cod tempura style, asparagus and tomato

I'm disappointed. The fish is outrageously expensive here in the middle of the continent and hardly substantial. It's like eating marshmallows except not that heavy. 

You could eat a ton of it and mistake it for five ounces. 

Here, let me draw you a picture.

Sandwich; deli ham, farm tomato, sourdough bread

Colorado Palisade peach

I love these peaches so much when they're in season. And their season is so short. I cannot get enough of them. 

And when the season ends bang they're right back to being mealy and tasteless and dry and terrible. 

So each season comes with anxiety for that moment when you buy a bunch, take one bite, and throw away the whole bunch.

Because it's just not worth trying and constantly failing to recapture the glory of the season. It's gone. For a whole 'nuther year. 

So just buy canned peaches instead.

I must now write a poem to peaches.

Oh Palisade peaches how fulsome thou art upon thy turgid stem
Kissed by morning sunlight
Dew drops glistening. 

Shut up, Ma. I'm writing a poem!

How I want to shove you right into my peach-hole.
And swallow your chunks as your juice drips down my throat
Into my stomach where I coat you with my own acid.
Then pass you through my upper and lower intestines
And then poop you out.
Just look at you down there in the water.
Flush. 

Okay, maybe I can re-write that last part. 

baked chicken, asparagus, watermelon

I had three packages of chicken from different places in the freezer. Each package is very different. Boneless breasts, boneless thighs, bone-in thighs. Different sizes and thicknesses. Different cooking propensities. 

Marinated forty-eight hours just like the lady at Royal Rooster said. 

One day in tarragon-brine and one day in buttermilk. 

And then no more salt after that. 

I baked it instead of deep-frying it and mine is a little bit worse for that, but boy oh boy, wheee-doggie, it sure is tender and moist. 

Moist. People say they hate that word, but they don't say why. 

I don't understand it. Maybe they have natural pornographic minds and they want us to respect their one-track dead end. 

Moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist squish moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist drip moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist squeak moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist damp moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist moist. 

That there's what you call immersion therapy. 

Wow, that watermelon is really good.

Omelet; flavor bomb

This bacon is so good OMG it's a national treasure. It cost a million dollars a pound and a lot of its flavor is in the oil that rendered. So it's a sin to waste one molecule. All the oil is used in place of butter. 

Because butter is for sissies.

And smoky bacon fat is for cowboys. 

And cowboys top sissies. Just like Bareback Mountain. 

I meant to say Brokeback Mountain just now. 

Except those were both cowboys. 

Forget it. It's an analogy, aw-ight? 

The size of the jalapeño and its strength disqualifies it from polite company.

I know a smatter of fact most people would not like this.

Do a little shake

Make a little move.

Get down tonight.

Get down tonight. 

Well, I’ve never been to France

But I kinda like their tower.

Say their omelettes are quite sane there.

They never add in any power.

They don’t abuse it.

Never do infuse it.

Don’t Santa Cruz it.

They would consider this omelet an abomination.

La la la I don't care. 'Cause this is 'Merica!

Not Yurp.

And my omelet punches your omelette in the face POW right in the kisser. 

'Cause we got Mexicans over here. And they got chiles! 

Whole Foods, cherry turnovers

These have to be the best deal at Whole Foods. Six per package for $6.00. 

I wish they were made with butter. 

Whole Foods breakfast burrito

Another trip to the clinic so another trip to nearby Whole foods.

I should never go grocery shopping when I'm starved. 

And I got there a bit late. Just before lunch time it seems. I must have been at the clinic longer than I thought. They took four vials outta me. Can you believe those bloodletters? And two other dudes came out bragging about the bandaids on their inside elbows. And that made me feel a lot better because up to then I thought I was the only one who got the bloodletting treatment. The breakfast burritos were already moved away to make room for a salad bar and there were only a few left. This one is dry scrambled eggs, potatoes and black beans. It's not as good as the previous two. 

Dry, dry, dry, dry, dry, dry, dry. And sauce cannot help it. 

I can do better than this myself without even trying. No brag. Just fact. 

This guy standing next to me can make a better breakfast burrito than you do.

And I can make a better breakfast burrito that he can.

And I can make a better breakfast burrito than both of yas, and a better breakfast burrito than Whole Foods does. No hyperbole. Just counter-narrative. So stick that in your pipe and smoke it. 

     I don't smoke.

Stick that in your breakfast burrito hole and swallow it. 

Stick that in your esophagus and poop it. 

Stick that in your lawn and mow it. 

Stick that in your gas tank and drive it.

Stick that in your garden and grow it.

Stick that in your hang glider and fly it.

     Shut up, Old Man.

You get my point.

     I got your point fifteen points ago.

Well, stick that point in your dart-gun and blow it.

     I said, shut. Up!

You can take that point and put it on your head and wear a dunce cap over it.

     I said, shut up!

 You can take that shut up and stick it in your family crypt and lock it. 

     ))) BANG (((

))) BANG (((  ))) BANG (((  ))) BANG (((

U-u-u-g-h. You can take that bang and stick it in your Chitty-Chitty. No gasconade. Just observed and verifiable reality u-u-u-g-h.

large salad; rice, tuna steak

Red bell pepper, lettuce, scallions, rice vinegar, olive oil, 4-year soy sauce.

My brother James and his wife and one their two kids held a soy sauce taste competition between regular table-Kikkoman, 1-year old, and 4-year old soy sauces. The 4-year old soy sauce won. Except the 6-year old boy preferred the 1-year old soy sauce and I think I agree. The 4-year old soy sauce is a bit too mellow for me, nearly sweet. But I don't have a side-by-side comparison myself.

The 7.5-year-old boy didn't play. He has a bad soy sauce attitude. 

If I was the kid's parent I'd be going, "Mmmm. Boy this 4-year-old soy sauce sure is good. I am glad I didn't miss this. I never thought soy sauce could be this good, but I was sorely mistaken. I am glad I wasn't stuck in my original bad attitude or else I'd miss how great this is. A whole new wold opened up that is wonderful. This isn't anything like the regular stuff. It's a whole different thing." Not hamming it up. Just regular speaking. And never even look at him. Just make him think by his overhearing that he's missing something great.

Kids can be little thick heads and their tastes change as they grow.