Shatterscape

Just got back from a two week vacation. More stuff from the vacation later, but this is a great picture I took of a Mini Cooper School Bus that I saw on my Grandmother’s street in Germany.

Is it really a school bus? I don’t know. I certainly like to think so, though.

 

Check out my friend the sunflower!  Grew it in my backyard from just a little seed.  It’s probably about seven feet tall or so.  The bees like it!  Now, to follow them home to their secret honey stash…  You just can’t look at a sunflower and feel anything but happy.

Air just shouldn’t be so thick that you have to chew it before inhaling.

 

So this weekend, my block had a huge yardsale.  We didn’t put anything out, ’cause most of the stuff we’d want to get rid of is still in boxes.  But that didn’t keep us from looking around.  One of my neighbors had this awesome classic Model 500 in a very attractive mustard yellow.  He gave it to me for free!  I wired it up and it works great!  Very exciting! 

After reading about it on The Gothamist, and noticing it was only a block and a half from where I work, I decided to go check out a new joint called “Burgers and Cupcakes”.  I bet you can’t guess what they sell.

I got a medium-rare burger with cheddar cheese, an order of fries, and a vanilla-and-buttercream cupcake.  With tax, it set me back $11.87, which is not exactly cheap, but worth it for a fun lunch treat during an otherwise unexciting work week.

They were pretty busy, and it doesn’t seem that they have their whole to-go customer flow quite worked out, as it was a little difficult to find somewhere to stand while waiting for my order.  The burger was pretty good.  The fries were pretty good.  The cupcake was pretty good.  All definitely better than their standard counterparts.  The price might be a little steep for what it was, though.  I don’t think I’m going to be rushing back, but I certainly wouldn’t mind going back, either.

Mostly, it’s just neat that someone put Burgers and Cupcakes together and gave them their own storefront.  I can hardly wait for a Fish and Ice Cream place to open up around here…

So last weekend for Father’s Day, my wife and I went down to Philly to visit her dad.  We all went to the Philadelphia Zoo.  I’d never been there before.  Having grown up in North Jersey, we always went to the Bronx Zoo (and a few times to the Turtle Back Zoo, and, uh, even once to Space Farms.)

But anyway, the Philly Zoo was very nice.  Obviously smaller in scale than the Bronx Zoo, but it was clean and kept up-to-date and we had a very nice day there.  We managed to see a good part of the zoo in an afternoon.  It happened to be quite a hot day, and shortly before leaving we had Icees, and man, I don’t think I’ve had one since I was ten, but it was exactly what we needed.

Unfortunately, I forgot to bring my camera with me, so no pictures.  Sorry!

Went to see “Cars” at the Warwick Drive-In this evening.  It was fun.  Then again, going to the drive-in is always fun.
The movie was ok.  Not bad at all, don’t get me wrong, but not quite as much fun as some of the other Pixar films.

I give it a B-.  But I think Waldo, my vee-dub, gives it four honks.

I’ve been playing a lot of Mr. Do on MAME lately.

What’s the backstory here, I ask you? How exactly did Mr. Do wind up in his peculiar situation?

Seems like a rotten thing to do to a clown.

Spent most of the long weekend on a trek to Ohio for a cousin’s wedding.  Never been to Ohio before.  It was really nice.  We were out near Toledo.

There’s a great John Gorka song called “I’m From New Jersey” and one of the lines is “I’m from New Jersey / It’s like Ohio / But even more so / Imagine that.”

I’m still not sure what that means.

WNYC apparently broadcast this bizarre two hour show on April 1, 2005.  “Hawaiian War Chant Extravaganza“  Two hours of different versions of a catchy little ditty called The Hawaiian War Chant.  I am now about an hour and 20 minutes into it, and I think I’m going to make it all the way through.  I highly encourage you to listen to a little bit of it.  It’s very weird, and yet strangely compelling.

Found this show linked from The Sneeze artcles here and here.