Chicago: Malort Cocktail

http://3.bp.blogspot.com/_6B8tPuW7TwQ/STD_EXCrndI/AAAAAAAAHsI/n0HYv-UUlI8/s400/malort.jpg

Malort cocktails.

This link is faster.

And of course the flickr Malört Face group grows. Not always quickly, but steadily. Insidiously. Like evil.

I think we should all have pictures on it. Each and every person who has ever posted to or read a Chicago thread.

But certainly the core crew.

Evan, good work watching Battlestar. It will change your life.

I got up early this morning so I could go to some remotely located post office (okay, Lincoln Square) and pick up a package but then realized that I left the package notification slip at work so the question is do I go anyway and see if they'll give me the package? Or do I waste a perfectly good instance of gettin' up early AND a Saturday morning and go tomorrow? What would Bill Adama do?

oh no jenny this is not the chicago thread. i think we need to get a mod to take the chicago: out of the title because malort is for everyone

Oh, I thought it was the Chicago thread.

oh. i am confused. we already have a chicago thread. i thought this thread was just for malort enthusiasm.

I'm confused too. I thought this was the Chicago thread.

Also - I wouldn't bother trying to get a package w/out the slip.

But I think you should so you can let us know how it goes.

I'm not saying until I know whether this is the Chicago thread.

Chicago and malort are inseparable. I know it was premature, but I started this as a new Chicago thread.

Great! Well:

1. I was able to pick up the package, and the ppl at the PO are super nice, and I was reminded yet again that it is my secret vocational wish to work in a post office.

2. Thanks to Obama, I have $33.35 more in my pay check this pay period.

3. Why do all of the You Tube version of "Drop" have Polow Da Don offering to pay people's mortgages in 2009? The version on Rich Boy's MySpace page is much better.

Also, one day when there will be a lot of people around to eat them, I will make these:

http://smittenkitchen.com/2009/01/car-bomb-cupcakes/

Where is this fictional land of "nice" postal workers? All the post offices I use are filled with surly people who can't believe their cushy jobs are interrupted by customers.

I know, right??? It's the Graceland Annex on Lincoln just north of Addison. It's not a customer service PO, but the place where packages go to die if somebody was not available to sign for them. There's a teeny lobby and a door where the top half opens to make a service window and seriously I was there probably about ten minutes because they were having a hard time finding my package and about seven people asked me if I was being helped, and those that did not ask all (ALL OF THEM) smiled and said, "Good morning!"

So clearly, the PO has a policy of putting the most friendly employees in the warehouses and the slowest and most surly employees in jobs that require interfacing with the public. Or, interfacing with the public wears down otherwise kind people and makes them surly and slow.

Also:

http://www.moderncat.net/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/bunny-kitten-identity-theft.jpg

Okay, I think that's all I had saved up.

today isn't a government holiday?

When they legalize gay marriage in IL, I'm going to marry that picture and that tiny chihuahua in the teacup.

xp - nope. It's too religious, I think, to be a govt holiday these days.

jenny, i went to one of those last-stop-on-the-way-down postal offices recently, and everyone was really nice too!

i had a good first date with a vegan last night. :/ i'm not a hater, but i have like the most un-vegan diet ever.

I have a half-day today because of Jesus. I'm always tempted on days like this to go to Hopleaf in the late afternoon and read.

Hopefully, my new computer keyboard will be in stock at the Apple Store by this afternoon, too.

Cool, Jordan!

We* were talking about dating people who had wildly different political views for us yesterday and I wonder if it's hard for a vegan to date an inveterate meat eater because of the political differences as much as the practical issues. But maybe vegans are resigned to dating meat eaters because there aren't that many vegans.

*The Royal We

John go to the Hopleaf and read. That is like my dream come true for a Friday afternoon.

anything happening this weekend? sarah and i will definitely not be making seculeaster this year :(

Maybe there's a pocket of nice postal workers near Lincoln Square, because the small post office on Montrose near Damen is always very easygoing. I've heard hell stories about the one at Division/Ashland.

Don't know what's up this weekend, other that seculeaster. Going to a closing party for an art show in the Fine Arts Building at the end of the day, if anyone wants culture and booze.

trying to figure out brunch on sunday, i'm thinking that a gay bar might be less crowded for easter brunch than everywhere else, y/n?

No thanks, culture gives me heartburn.

If you guys haven't been in the Fine Arts Building, it's worth walking through there sometime. They have an elevator operator. Like, a guy who rides in there all day and operates the thing manually.

Manually? Like he pulls the elevator up w/ a crank and pulleys and stuff?

Maybe there's a pocket of nice postal workers near Lincoln Square, because the small post office on Montrose near Damen is always very easygoing. I've heard hell stories about the one at Division/Ashland.

i can verify both of these points

http://www.filmdope.com/Gallery/ActorsT/17337-9011.gif

^ love that dude - he's a big-time steppenwolf THEE-AY-TURR actor and was also prez on the wire but the elevator operator in hudsucker proxy is still my favorite role of his "SAY BUDDY"

Is that where the old Fine Arts movie theater was?

Could not find a photo of Lauryn Hill as the gum-chewing elevator operator in King of the Hill (the movie, not the TV show).

i always thought the people at division and ashland were really nice! i guess you guys haven't been to the hinterlands post offices. the lady at 7000-something N. Clark is a beast.

Last week I stopped in the post office to buy some stamps and their automated machine thing was out of order. So I waited in line and went to the counter to ask for stamps, the lady sighed like it was quite possibly the biggest inconvenience she's ever had to deal with and said "you know, you can just go buy these at the Jewel down the street instead of bothering us" as she slapped the stamps down on the counter. I told her I would do just that next time, but resisted adding the "and hopefully you'll be out of a job" after it.

Post offices are so last century. I can't remember the last time I went to one for actual "post" reasons, aside from renewing my passport. I bought a postal money order a few months ago too.

The PO at Broadway just north of Argyle is infuriating because it has space for like ten clerks and there are usually only two there. The PO here in this building is staffed by reasonably pleasant people, but they have absolutely no sense of urgency, and at least in the case of the woman who processed my passport application, are pretty damn dumb, too. (Although I did get my passport, so I should give her credit for eventually doing something right.)

Post offices are so last century.

I totally thought Jeff posted this comment. It's a very Jeffish thing to say, like last night when, during a commercial for some new cop show starring Captain Mal Reynolds, I disgustedly commented, "I hate banter."

I had to go to the PO earlier this week to mail a crossword puzzle to Will Shortz, since I was short on stamps. And I used to have to visit the post office frequently to mail C4n4st4 CDs to people who had ordered them. Other than that, though, it's pretty rare. I drop off rent at my landlords' house (they live by Nick and Sarah), Netflix doesn't require postage, and I pay all my bills online.

I thought Jeff posted that too!

How the hell did you get $33 more on your paycheck? Are you paid bi-weekly? Maybe I don't understand numbers in even the most simple ways.

battlestar is definitely changing my life

So say we all.

yeah, for the nerdier

corrosive to my, uh, studies

j/k i love BSG

or at least i did for the first couple seasons

Hahaha
"Marital sex tends toward the boring end," (Cameron) points out. "Generally, it doesn't deliver the kind of sheer sexual pleasure that homosexual sex does."

I got Borders and Amazon gift cards for my bday and I'm under pressure deciding what to get with them. I like to use gift cards to branch out and buy stuff slightly out of character or more intellectually/aesthetically challenging for myself but so far I've got a new book about Brian Eno in my Borders cart and I'll probably get a new DS game from Amazon. What else should I get? Some kind of coffee table art book? Dunno.

problems

I use gift cards like that to buy the overpriced movies at Border's that are usually difficult to find anywhere else. Good way to stack up on Criterion stuff.

In Defense of Food: An Eater's Manifesto sounds interesting. John Barth has a new book (The Development). And there's a book about Andrew Jackson that looks like it might be good.

Why isn't "Get a Life" on DVD?

http://scage.web-log.nl/photos/uncategorized/chris_elliott_get_a_life.jpg

I don't know Nick.

Get Little Britain on DVD instead.

naaaah

Borders is sending out coupons every week if you get on their mailing list. Yesterday it was for 40% off one item, so maybe sign up there before buying.

Thought of you, Nick, because the Borders on Michigan Ave. had this nice coffee-table book of complete Paul Simon lyrics (including unreleased songs) for $5.99, and all the $5.99 were two-for-one, so it was really like $2.99.

nice

I ordered the stuff mentioned above, plus a Cook's Illustrated subscription from Amazon. Slightly adventurous. Still got a little Borders $$$ for later.

Oh! You should get that proportional cookbook. I forget what it's called. Do you know what I'm talking about?

michael ruhlman's ratio cookbook or something

i just read "the making of a chef: mastering heat at the culinary institute of america" by him, really good

Yes, that's the one.

The California Supreme Court today upheld Proposition 8's ban on same-sex marriage but also ruled that gay couples who wed before the election will continue to be married under state law.

What a sad mess.

Please say no to Michael Pollen. Seriously, he is the Antichrist that is going to starve all the poor people.

Seriously? I think he has some excellent points. Though I do take the point that if you took away subsidized corn and soy, we would have a serious food problem in this country. But isn't that kind of fucked up? Shouldn't there be another way to go about feeding people?

And anyway I find him far less grating than Alice Waters, who is like the Hillary of eating.

they're both annoying because they want us to eat turnips all winter

I love the grocery store lately. It exploded with strawberries and watermelon.

Jesse, I'm six hours in the future and I've seen you die. It was at the hands of Michael Pollen. You were just too good and organic to ignore.

Pollan, not Pollen. I want that wing bag to google this crap up.

Michael P is too preachy to individuals. Focus on the systemic issues, definitely, but this pious "Eat food, mostly vegetables" edict wildly oversimplifies, well, everything.

I read part of Omnivore's Dilemma and while I generally agree with his ideas, I also think Jenny's right in saying that he tends to oversimplify. I dunno, though, I'm not completely informed obviously.

I think it's a good and useful simplification, though. Like if you remember nothing else about eating healthy, "eat food, not too much, mostly plants" is a solid foundation and pretty hard to argue against.

I am not going to argue about Michael Pollan on the Internet while I am on vacation.

Yeah I was going to say it makes sense as a motivational tool, but it also overlooks all the obstacles, so then people feel shitty when they can't stick to such a "simple" regimen.

Well, I think he's pitching it as a philosophy more than as a regimen or diet plan.

Except to say: unless the only food you can access logistically and financially happens to not be vegetables or meet MP's very privileged definition of food.

Chicago: Eat Food, Not Too Much, Mostly Brats

I'm not sure how a philosophy about what you're supposed to eat is different from a diet regimen, unless you're just supposed to think about eating mostly vegetables and not actually do it.

i had roughly 8 brats over the weekend, not too bad

okay 6 brats and 2 kosher dogs

Well, for one, he's a journalist, not a nutritionist.

It's 4:15 on Tuesday and there are no trivia titt..er titles here.

I like the way that "eat food, mostly plants" is almost anti-nutritionist. As if he's saying, deciding what to eat should not be about getting individual nutrients or staving off cancer or whatever, it should just be about eating things that are meant to be eaten. I also like his rule to avoid food products that make health claims about themselves. Though I give a pass to products that make hilarious, unnecessary health claims, like a bottle of V8 that trumpets that it's fat free.

Oh, did you see this?
http://blogs.wsj.com/health/2009/05/12/fda-warns-general-mills-cheerios-is-a-drug/
If Cheerios is going to continue claiming that it's clinically proven to reduce cholesterol, the FDA says it will have to register as a drug. That's funny to me.

Also: love Eric's thread title idea.

I had a Poachers Pie the other night. It contained: pheasant, venison, wild boar, bunny rabbit, bacon, oranges, and port.

It's 4:15 on Tuesday and there are no trivia titt..er titles here.

Tonight I'm going to see C4n4st4 play a fundraiser for the Evanston/North Shore YMCA that Kr helped organize.

If you're in an anagramming mood, however:

1) No Coitus Tint 11 pts
2) Slim Ogre Girl 12 pts
3) Match- Where They Served 13 pts
4) Bizarro World 16 pts
5) Dead or Canadian 11 pts
6) Pictures 15 pts
7) General Knowledge 22 pts

1) = Constitution

xxp oh my god. Yeah, that's definitely food.

Holy moly, Jeff, where did you get that Poachers Pie?

and 2) = Gilmore Girls

sounds like famous British cuisine to me

Michael Pollan tried to steal my wallet too. But I had it in a money belt.

xpost. London

I would not be good on either of those two de-anagrammed topics.

I've watched a fair amount of Gilmore Girls, actually.

If I know Dave, one of the answers will be "Sebastian Bach."

Jesse, I'm six hours in the future and I've seen you die. It was at the hands of Michael Pollen. You were just too good and organic to ignore.

― Jeff, Tuesday, May 26, 2009 3:48 PM (29 minutes ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

This made me L and L.

xxxp I can't believe I'm wanting to go to England to try food.

New thread...