Saturday, June 09, 2012

Preface To Toast & Jelly & Jam: Breakfast For Dinner?

Hell yeah!

In the past couple of years I've been doing most of the cooking in the household.  It is something one needs to turn to when one is vegan & lives in a town with few vegan/vegetarian options.  I've heard of vegans who can't cook but I believe being a passable cook (if I am that) is mostly a matter of time & will.  If you want to cook something well, you probably can - but you did need to want it & you need to have the time.

I have no idea how housewives of yore - & today - manage it.  A tasty meal, night after night?  Astounding.

Being vegan, I don't eat eggs, & as such I miss one of my favorite Tex-Mex dishes: migas.  You can click the link to see what those are.  In the United States, I haven't been able to find migas outside of Texas.  Vegans often make a similar dish - really, though, they're just trying to make a version of scrambled eggs - called tofu scramble.  The ubiquitousness & mundanity of tofu scramble makes some people feel the need to update it or zazz it up.

With my knowledge of both migas & tofu scramble, I've created a hybrid which would be great for breakfast - though I make it usually for dinner.  I call it scrapple.

But wait! you say.  There's already something called scrapple - & it ain't vegetarian.

Sue me.  That's what I call my tofu scramble/migas mash-up.  I fill it full of vegetables - green bell peppers, onions, carrots, jalapeños (pickled & fresh) - I add tofu & I add potatoes - I even crumble up tortilla chips in it like they do in migas - I add tomatoes at the end so they're extra fresh - mmmmmm.

There's spices & oats & nutritional yeast, too, but this isn't a cooking blog.  It's for a radio show.  Silly.

& one day I'll master pancakes & make them for dinner too!

Thursday, June 07, 2012

Twitster

So I listen to Marc Maron's WTF podcast a lot - not obsessively, since sometimes I don't know the guests or they're just not interesting to me - & he's always going on about Twitter.  I really don't know a whole lot about it, but it seems to work for him (of course, he's a famous comedian - I'm just a guy in Kentucky who does a little radio show) & he talks about how everyone should be on Twitter.  He's talking about comedians, not guys in Kentucky who do little radio shows.  It just kinda got into my head.

You know what that means: I've started a Self Help Radio Twitter account.  It's @SelfHelpRadio.  It's going to end badly.

I know I just started it today, but I so far have only two followers, both people who happened to read my post on the Facebook, & I've "followed" many more.  That's the trick, I am told: have a lot of people you're following, re-tweet stuff, be active.

A few years ago, pretending it was ten years before, I added a "guestbook" to my web site.  I hoped people would write nice things about my show.  But bad things happened, which I talked about here.  Eventually the guestbook had to go.

Will bad things happen with the Twitster account?  Oh, I am expecting them to.

But  I suppose I'll be trying to write clever & witty every day or so.  Do you want maybe to follow me?  If you, I'll follow you.  Seriously.  Anywhere.

Monday, June 04, 2012

A Show Full Of Ups & Downs


Self Help Radio's possibly inappropriate exploration of elevators & escalators had several double entendres of the sort one might expect when talking about things that go up & down.  Being run by a naive fellow who's really only a danger to himself, Self Help Radio apologizes for "sexing it up" on Monday mornings without properly contacting a ratings authority.  In case such things exist.

The show has its ups & downs, ho ho ho.  The show is stuck between floors at the Self Help Radio web site.  Should you wish to access the mp3 files directly, the first part is on the up escalator & the second part is on the down escalator.  The list of the songs on each level are below.

(part one)

"Elevators & Escators" PBNJ Buchanan _Ups & Downs_
"Elevator Hopper" Kid Koala _Some Of My Best Friends Are DJs_
"Elevator Love Letter" Stars _Heart_

"Elevator Man" Roy Nelson _Northern Soul Fever, Vol. 2_
"Elevator" Hannibal Buress _Animal Furnace_
"The Elephant Elevator Operator" Sesame Street _Sesame Street: Silly Songs_
"Escalator Of Life" Robert Hazard _Just Can't Get Enough: New Wave Hits of the 80's, Vol. 5_
"Elevator Baby" Frankie Starr _Western Dance, Vol. 1_
"Up The Down Escalator" The Chameleons _Script Of The Bridge_

"Elevator Papa, Switchboard Mama" Butterbeans & Susie _Please Warm My Weiner: Old Time Hokum Blues_
"Elevator Girl" Rainbow Red Oxidizer _Recorded Lies_
"The Crystal Escalator In The Palace Of God Department Store" Bill Nelson _The Love That Whirls (Diary Of A Thinking Heart)_

(part two)

"I'm Gonna Be Your Elevator" The Fresh & Onlys _Grey-Eyed Girls_
"Elevator Operator" Gene Clark _Echoes_

"Escalator Over The Hill" Talulah Gosh _Backwash_
"Elevator À Go-Go" Die Fünf Freunde _Inspektor, Inspektor_
"Hit H" Bitesize _The Best Of_
"Escalator" Holly Golightly & The Brokeoffs _Medicine County_
"Elevator" Eugene Mirman _God Is A Twelve-Year-Old Boy With Asperger's_
"Hippy Elevator Operator" W.C. Fields Memorial Electric String Band _Where The Action Is! (Los Angeles Nuggets 1965-1968)_
"Elevator Boogie" Bill Johnson & His Musical Notes _The Jive Is Jumpin': RCA & Bluebird Vocal Groups, 1939-52_

"Elevator Boy" Laid Back _Keep Smiling_
"Elevator Man" British Road Runners _The Super K Kollection, Volume 1_
"Elevator" Grapefruit _Lost Jukebox, Vol. 8_
"Elevator Man" AstroPuppees _Little Chick Tsunami_

Sunday, June 03, 2012

Whither Elevators/Escalators?

The place I used to work - at the University of Texas - sort of doesn't exist anymore.  It's called Batts Hall & while this is what it looks like from the front, the inside is totally different because of a renovation that happened a few years ago.  The halls I used to walk down every day for a decade no longer look the same, & the rooms in which I worked are not there.

I miss two things most of all.  One is the marble foyer that stood outside an old auditorium.  I had several classes in that auditorium when I was a UT student.  In one psychology class, I fainted.  In another government class, I slept - a lot.  The teacher had to stand at a lectern at the stage right - there was a stage there - & I enjoyed, when there were no classes, wandering through the barely-used-anymore dressing rooms backstage.  The auditorium was fine, but that foyer was lovely.  I liked walking through to get to my office.

That's all gone.

& the old Otis elevator is gone too.  Toward the end, I seem to remember seeing the Otis repairman around several times a year.  The building had four stories (I suppose it still does) & the elevator went up to the third.  I used the elevator most days - some days I felt I should take the stairs (I worked on the second floor) - & I loved one thing about the elevator: you could stop it, pry open the doors without much trouble, & then get out (after opening the doors at the floor) & leave the elevator stuck.

I know, it's a little dickish, but I only did it once.  In some cases, it's just nice to know that something is possible.

That elevator, of course, is gone.  The one that replaced it is as impersonal as all new stuff invariably is.

Speaking of impersonal, Self Help Radio is of course having a show about elevators & escalators tomorrow morning from 7:30 to 8:00 am on 88.1 fm WRFL in Lexington & you can of course listen online at wrfl dot fm.  I don't use any elevator at the University of Kentucky, but assuming I don't get trapped in an elevator, I'll post the show later on at self help radio dot net.

Going up!