9-30-2011

It's Friday night and we're doing something fun/stupid. Isn't that what you're supposed to do on Friday nights? Well, with every other post on my blog being about my peppers, I'm sure you've figured out that I like eating spicy foods. And considering that all the other post not about my peppers are about grilled cheese, I'm sure you've figured out that I like eating Melt. Well when I found out that they were making a sandwich that you had to sign a legal waiver to eat, we had to go right? This is the Ghost Chili (Bhut Jolokia) sauce that all the hype was about. As you can tell, the sauce was a lot of hype and just a little bit of ghost pepper since we were dipping our fries in it, but it was still really good.

9-29-2011

Soaking drowning flooded dripping though my clothes drenched. Five miles in the rain at night. Easy.

9-28-2011

I've been telling Nicole about this guy ever since we moved into our house four years ago, but never actually got a picture until now. Every few days I see this guy walking along my way to work. He's lost a ton of weight, but that's not the point. Whenever I see him he's walking with a little stick. I call it a "hitter." Unless he's running a relay and I've never seen the hand off, I'm pretty sure he constantly stays prepared to fend off attackers on his walk around the block.

9-27-2011

Two days down and so far I'm still breathing. I don't normally post a lot of details like this on my blog, but here's another version of today's picture in case they find me dead in the street, and this blog is the only way that they can figure out that my cause of death was massochistic and borderline suicidal. This is going to be a really fun month!

9-26-2011

I don't know who we should really blame for this one. It's easy to assume that it was my running obsession that caused us to make such a rash and senseless decision, but if you look a little closer, you'll notice that this race is at a winery. Clearly someone else may have had some ulterior motives in the selection process. No matter who's at fault, we've made a pact to murder our legs and social lives. The countdown to 13.1 starts tonight. THERE ARE NO REFUNDS.

9-25-2011

I make messes. Sorry, Nicole's car.

9-24-2011

I know I post too much about both running and my peppers, but it was really pretty and sunny today, so my favorite things I did all day were going running in the sun (no pictures) and hanging my peppers to dry in the sun.

9-23-2011

So as much as I complain about this place almost all the time, I'm a born and raised Cleveland person. I think anyone who's lived here for any extended length of time has strong opinions on the city both good and bad, but in the end the good must outweigh the bad or else we would all live somewhere else. In any case, the late Harvey Pekar is unquestionably the iconic person from Cleveland with strong opinions, and someone that this city can be really proud of. To this end, I was incredibly proud and totally blown away when I found out that an illustration drawn directly from something that I painted made it into one of the last novels he wrote before his death. I found out months ago, but couldn't talk about it until it was published, then slacked on actually picking up a copy. Well I got my copy tonight and I'm really excited about it. Cleveland.

Speaking of things to be proud of in Cleveland, we went to one of my favorite places to get food tonight. Yeah, even after traveling across the ocean to one of the premier culinary centers in the world, I'm still super happy about going to a divey bar and getting fancy vegetarian hot dogs. Cleveland.

9-22-2011

That's pretty much exactly what it looks like, though I will point out that the guy in the corner came in pushing a woman in a wheel chair, ended up begging us for money, then left with the woman walking and pushing her own wheel chair.

None of that is as interesting, adorable or delicious as the bear muffins that Nicole made for dinner tonight. Are bear muffins vegetarian? Because I'm sure that barbecue isn't.

9-21-2011

I remember I posted a picture of all out autumn leaves from this same spot last year (10-18-10), but fall is just starting to start to get ready to start again this year, and I thought that this was worth stopping to look at on the way home tonight.

9-20-2011

It's been over a week, but I'm still blaming jetlag for coming home and taking naps before running. I'll probably be jetlagged until next summer.

9-19-2011

I bet you money that my family is crazier than your family.

9-18-2011

Yeah, I have a sewing machine and I know how to sew. I also now have new jeans that are the right length.

9-17-2011

Wow, yeahh...we're definitely back in the Midwestern United States when there's chubby girls unironically dressed up as cowboys at the gas station. I can't save plane ticket money fast enough.

While we're here though, we might as well have fun right? So today, Nicole thought it would be fun to finally go try Flip Side for cheeseburgers. 'Cause she likes meat and stuff. After all the Cheeseburger Touring that we've done, I'm pretty picky, and have a lot of experience to compare places to. So at first, I wasn't too impressed and felt like we've already been to (a little too) similar places...then quickly changed my mind. Flip Side might not be the most original place that I've ever been too, but they have a cheeseburger with wild and fried mushrooms with a truffle mayonnaise. We already know my opinion of truffle anything.

I will say though, I probably post about mushrooms a little too often. It's hard not to when I keep having strange experiences involving mushrooms. For example, we came across these today. At first, I optimistically hoped that we came across a free chanterelle garden, but upon closer inspection recognized these as jack-o-lantern mushrooms. They aren't kill-you-poisonous, but they'll definitely make you sick if you eat them. Supposedly they're bioluminescent too, but they didn't glow when we tried to see it. On top of that, Nicole found this little giant puffball mushroom growing in our yard today. Unfortunately it was too old to eat. See, strange experiences involving mushrooms.

I don't think I've posted about Ingenuity Festival on here before because I've been out of town/avoided it the past few years because it tends to be really hyped up and actually pretty lame. Well, we decided to go at least for a little bit this year. It's supposed to be about technology and art doing exciting stuff...but yeah...it's pretty much as artistic and technological as girls with Christmas lights and sparklers. The best part of the whole thing is that they have it at an abandoned subway line inside of a bridge that you can't access the rest of the year. See, bridge. The first time I went, I was super excited about looking down while standing on grates out over the river. This time for some reason even that wasn't quite as exciting. On top of that, we went to see a band that I like. Typical of this festival, the space was awesome (other than the horrible acoustics), but the setup was horrible. They put chairs (full of tired old people who just wanted to sit down apparently) in the front, and left standing room for people who don't even like music to watch from the back. This was literally the singular only lone individual girl that was dancing and looked like she was having any fun at all. In any case, since I went and shot it, here are some pictures from the set.

Spinning keyboard
Lights
More lights
This is the stage
Throwing stuff
Yelling face
Another angle

To save the day, we found a bunch of fair food stands to save the day. It's pretty sad when the best part of an art and technology festival is eating junk food, but to be fair eating junk food is more fun than most activities. This reminded me of Europe. The most interesting parts are the parts that you can't get to. I know I've posted this tripped out punk rock dude on here before because I see him various places dancing by himself for hours at a time. He likes to party. Party!

9-16-2011

Now that I'm back home I have to consciously seek out things that I like about being here and not just think all the stuff that I miss from Paris and London. Clearly, Melt is something exclusively 'merican that makes me happy. Take that, Europe.

Look at this crazy bug I found on my peppers. I has a line for a body.

It took a few days, but we finally unpacked and presented the cats with their presents. They got a prawn, a catnip ball, and a teddy bear guard from Harrod's. We have spoiled cats.

We also unpacked and hung our new knocker that we got in Notting Hill. The fox doesn't have a name yet, but he/she is older than both of us.

9-15-2011

Just like Sienna, you're probably wondering "what in the world is that crazy thing Nicole is holding?!?" We'll I'll tell you. It's a Giant Puffball Mushroom, and I'm super excited that she found it. They're edible, but right now I'm stating a disclaimer that this post is not instructions or a guide, and I'm in no way responsible if it inspires you to eat something dumb that makes you sick. That being said, here are some details. First, you have to cut it in half from top to bottom. It should be solidly dense (kind of like styrofoam) and white all the way though. It's important to do this because if it's yellow or brown it's spoiled and if you can see the shape of a mushroom cap, it might be poisonous. The next thing is to peel off the skin and cut out and bad parts, then cut it up into slices. I also chopped up a bunch of habaneros since I have so many peppers that I don't know what to do with them all. Cooking like this was pretty much pepper spraying my entire house. Nicole cooked it in a more traditional way with just butter and salt. It tasted good like a mild, soft cheese like mozzarella, but warm and not melty. Mine was unnecessarily hot, and if even ate it with the fried pepper bits for good measure. As with everything else, my favorite way that we cooked it was pan fried with parmesan cheese and finished with truffle oil. Truffle oil makes everything better.

9-14-2011

This book was loaned to me in Paris and I'm very excited to read it. I haven't even started it yet though because I decided to just go running instead.

9-13-2011

I was quite happy to find that my peppers were healthy and not dead after my trip. I was also glad to see that Mushroom was healthy and posing in nice light.

9-12-2011

Yeah, I spent close to 20 hours sitting around on trains and planes between Londres, across a big ocean, and through some more airports to get back home. Do you really expect fun and exciting pictures of me trying to sleep uncomfortably?

9-11-2011

We've been in so many train stations and looked at so much art in museums that it's all running together at this point. I do know that we went to see the grand and illustrious London Bridge. The thing I liked the most about it was the sign. Specifically the dragon on the sign. Look, another fancy random church. And another boat discovery. I guess you can sleep on this boat. It would probably be more comfortable than our hotel beds. Nicole looks mysterious. Where could we be going other than looking at more bridges How about to go look at the Globe Theater and to look at another bridge. A very Modern bridge. Yeah, we're looking at more art at the Tate Modern. Modern art. I actually "get" this one. It's not hard to get this one. Ohh, after the museum, since we already had one bottle for our checked back, we might as well find it some company right? I would love these ones, maybe I could opt for something a bit more expensive? Yeah...if I spent that much on booze, Nicole would probably push me down these stairs.

So by total chance, our end of vacation day was the same as the Thames river End of Summer Celebration Day. I don't know why anyone would celebrate the end of summer, but I figured it would still be fun anyway. This year's theme was Korean people (I'm serious...people were acting like they've never seen a Korean person before). Now even if I've never seen a Mexican person before, I know better than eating "Authentic Mexican Street Food" from a little blonde girl in a truck that looks like this. Instead, to go with the Korean excitement, we chose an authentic kimchi cheeseburger. Made by white people. I think white people should stick to making things like vegan cupcakes. That's totally authentic white people food. Jamaican jerk chicken on the other hand is probably better this way. I don't care who made it where or how authentic it is or isn't, the cured meats this guy was selling was literally one of the best things I've ever eaten in my whole life. I found coloring and got bummed out I didn't know about it until our last day in town. Yawn. We saw Lil' Wayne and I had fun taking more people pictures. Some how, no matter where we go, Nicole and I always end up finding stuff like this going on. Which is good because I like street performers. Now this whole trip, whenever Nicole would wander off or get separated, I would threaten to get a leash for her. She mostly would give me dirty looks and think I was kidding. I wasn't.

Did I mention that we liked walking along the river? We ended up here a lot. It was WAY too cold to end up here. I would have been a sad crying baby if someone made me go into the fountain. Look at this guy, and this lady, and this guy too.

Awee, sadly our trip is coming to an end. We took our last Underground ride then returned our Oyster cards back for a refund. It's ok though because we can still just walk to a pub for my last fish and chips and roast with yorkshire pudding. The last night of the fair. I'll miss you, London and your giant eye. Since tonight is the End of Summer Festival thing, and as Nicole so poignantly pointed out "they don't have Fourth of July here," we got to end our vacation with fireworks before taking one last look at the fancy buildings everywhere.

Oh! One last thing! Our hotel was two doors down from where Winston Churchill used to live. Yeah that's totally voyeuristic and borderline creepy taking pictures in people's windows like that, but what are they going to do? Extradite me?

9-10-2011

So I've developed a pretty ridiculous habit of running. This trip has actually been kind of hard on my obsessive compulsiveness since I only found the time/energy to run twice the whole time with the lack of routine. Well, those two runs got me super close to my 300th mile with the Nike+ app on my phone, and I figured where better to break 300 miles than somewhere far away? So, I picked Hyde Park as the perfect place. It really is a perfect place for running. Being in two really big cities made me really miss seeing green and trees. That picture is of Nicole considering trying to climb said tree. For the sake of being nice, I'm keeping the pictures of her attempt for myself to laugh at, but this is her deciding that it was a lost cause. It was a lot easier for me to climb in my silly runny clothes. Hyde Park is pretty awesome though, I would totally go there to sit on benches or to feed birds if I lived there. I was always under the impression pigeons were dirty birds, but this one took a bath in front of me to show me that they do care about hygiene. Lots of people run in Hyde Park too. Lots of people run in London in general, but it's so good in the park that they were setting up for a huge 5k while we were walking around. I asked Nicole if Adidas would let me run their Woman's 5k Challenge, but she didn't think that they would. I called discrimination. Look! We saw an animal. Coming from an area where deer sleep in our yard and they've seen bears in the woods, it was weird not seeing animals the whole trip. This park has lots of organized birds.

After the park, we decided to go visit another animal that I'm fond of. Look at these trains. Lots of trains. What kind of animal could we find at such a station? Yup, we're at Paddington Station, and we found the bear. The story of Paddington Bear pretty much sums up Nicole and my relationship, except she's the bear and she looks after me. I did however buy a very expensive coat last year specifically because it reminded me of the one that Paddington Bear wears.

On to more British stuff. This road is named after mushrooms, or maybe mushrooms are named after this road, or maybe our cat is named after mushrooms. Whatever the case may be, we've arrived at the Portobello Street Market in Notting Hill (like the movie). This was fun because it was more affordable antiquey stuff. Lots of stuff. Even weird stuff. Nicole found stuff she liked, and I found stuff I like. I like how this woman looks very much. I was also fond of the side streets and the more daily life looking parts of the market. Most of all, after the market, I was the most fond of more treacle tart. Since we stay living like kids with no parents, we can have desert before dinner and not get in trouble.

9-9-2011

I posted previously about the factory from the Pink Floyd album cover. Well today we got really exploring (read lost), and ended up really close. It's kind of cool that there's so much stuff to see everywhere that you can go sight seeing even when you don't know where you are. This is back along the Thames as the street performers were getting ready for the day. We found a photobooth. It was here right by the London Eye. We also found stuffed cupcakes.

Stuffed cupcakes would normally be the strangest thing I would see in a day, but not today. This is Camden Town market. It reminds me of the Troll Market in Hellboy II. They have Taxidermy, vendors with metal signs (hi, Tiff!), and collections of strange British toys. They also have fish that eat your feet, and crazy gothic kittens. This area actually used to be horse stables, but now it's home to a weird mix of every obscure subculture you could imagine (including a store that was like going back in time to a rave set in the movie Hackers), plus an antique mall, plus a flea market all at once. It makes for a very eclectic and interesting experience. The space is really cool and old feeling, and they have tons of street food. If you've even heard about my blog before, I'm sure you already know that street food is a pretty big deal to me. I managed to dodge a bullet with the punk rock leather jacket pins on Carnaby street, but finding first pressing 2Tone singles was more than I could say no to. I'm pretty sure it shocked the aging skinhead dude running the shop when a scrawny Asian kid with long hair that looks 12 started actually talking to him about obscure ska records and artists. Shocking like finding a pirate castle.

Oh, so I posted in Paris about how tourists love seeing the hiphop dance and street performers upside down. Well, this guy wins. I actually though about giving him some of my coins, but I though it was too cool that we had a variety of four totally different pound coins. I think we ended up spending them on pub food though. This may look like fish and chips, but don't let it fool you. After going out of our way to eat the most authentic local foods we could find, Nicole broke down and ordered the "vegetarian fish and chips." That's battered and deep fried haloumi cheese, and may be one of the best things we ate on our trip. Without a doubt one of the best things we ate on our trip was treacle tart. This is Harry Potter's (and my) favorite food, and within a few nights of returning home, I was literally talking in my sleep to Nicole about it. Nicole and I talk to each other a lot.

9-8-2011

So I showed our hotel from the street, but this is what the back of it looks like. Here's a picture of the room. Total dive right? My undeducatedness pictured this bridge when I thought of the London Bridge. It's not the London Bridge (more on this later). This picture is however from the London Tower, and this is me defending it. Nicole didn't realize she had mud on her paws and got the crown jewels all dirty. The guard didn't really care. If he did, he probably would have shot us with this gun. I think it's sad that they clip the raven's wings so they can't fly, but that sign in the background explains that ravens bite, so maybe it's good that these ones couldn't fly. When I was a little kid I would always want to go to the art museum to see the armor, then get bored and tired when my mom wanted to see the paintings. I still think that armor is cooler than paintings. Especially with crazy disco lighting. This is Nicole and my armor. Hers is on the right. James Bond guns. Whatever, even after five years in art school, if you don't agree that armor is cooler than paintings, this will persuade you. Agree with me or we'll chop your head off. This is so much money you have to weigh it. This was Sir Walter Raleigh's stuff before he got beheaded. He didn't think armor was cooler than paintings. This is ancient graffiti that prisoners carved into the walls. None of my spots run this long.

We found a boat! We actually got lost and found lots of boats, but I really liked this one. I liked getting lost and seeing different parts of the city. We actually kind of did this a lot in a lot of places. Our lostness was productive however because it led us to this pub. I really like pubs. Every one we went to was very different but similar. They all had food though and this was a really good meat pie. I would also have said that this was the best fish and chips we had, except there were bones in part of it that totally skeezed me out.

There are two Anthropologie stores England. Nicole found them both. This three level one with plants growing on the walls was pretty worth seeing though. This chair is pretty cool, but not nearly as cool as this broom. We found Hamley's, an amazing toy store and home of the most extensive collection of Harry Potter wands we found in all of London. More than just wands, and the life sized broom, they also had the Sword of Gryffindor and some of the Horcruxes. If I were rich with no decorating sense (single), my house would be full of stuff like this. This is a squid that swims in the bath. I'm still pretty shocked that I didn't bring one home with me.

We eventually ended up on Carnaby street again for some weird Fashion Night Out thing. The event was actually pretty lame (other than the the really good DJ spinning northern soul at my favorite store), but it was fun because we saw all sorts of fashiony people getting ready for it. There were fashiony people everywhere. They all liked to pose but pretend they weren't posing. Pretending not to pose real hard. I'm not sure if this is fashiony or not, but pink hair is definitely a thing that's happening. I like this random snapshot of a random street because it reminds me of what we saw the most when we were randomly wandering around everywhere. There's not much that I can say about this snapshot, but whatever it is, I really like it. I can't say much about whatever the hell the BBC has on the outside of their building either, but I can't say that I like it. I might like this. We ended up back at more fashiony model stuff. I don't know that I would call this fashiony or modely.

9-7-2011

Continuing the documentation of our daily free breakfast, in addition to toast and jam, today I discovered that there are also digestive biscuits! It's important to eat a good breakfast before going sight seeing all day. Taking pictures (with other people's cameras) is hard work. Horses. This is Buckingham Palace by the way. I just didn't want to put the typical touristy building pictures on here.

Messenger hipsters look the same no matter where you go. This is Trafalgar Square I was a little bummed out that there aren't swarms of pigeons there anymore, but I guess I'm happy that I didn't get pooped on (I'm speaking from experience). The monument is too tall for one shot. Oh yeah, we had just gone to the National Gallery and the National Portrait Gallery, but ironically for a place all about pictures of people, you aren't allowed to take pictures in there.

Now you are allowed to take pictures in Hackney, but considering it's recent news making as the cool place to riot and go looting, I was a sissy and kept my camera in my bag. Well, really I wasn't a sissy for being dumb enough to go there in the first place, so maybe I was smart enough to keep my camera in my bag. In any case, the only picture I took was of the Burberry Outlet Store which ended up being a big let down. Kind of like the lack of rioting and looting in Hackney that we went to see.

I mentioned before that both Paris and London are full of shops full of things I'm specifically interested in. This one was pretty extreme. I didn't really take any pictures of the cases full of every kind of camera I've ever wanted, mainly because I was shy, but also because I was seriously considering selling organs to buy a Leica (I'm still not sure I made the right decision). To try and distract me from my camera lust, Nicole took me to the British Museum. The Musee d'Orsay is in a cool converted train station, but equally cool architecturally, this museum has a giant glass ceiling that connects its separate buildings. The buildings are full of ancient old stuff like holy cats, fancy hieroglyphs, statues that are this tall, and more holy cats. People in Paris and London both like drawing sculptures. In preparation for Paris, I really wish I ordered one of these from the late night infomercial that promises to teach you other languages. I don't think that this is the French version though. I liked how this room looked, like we should be smashing the floor with Indiana Jones or something. I bet this would have fit me since it's sized for Asian people.

I've already forgotten what this fancy building was, but I'm pretty sure it was just a random fancy building that we passed while chasing dragons and walking down Fleet Street. Johnny Depp made a musical about making meat pies out of people on this street. I tried not to think about it when I ate my meat pie yesterday, but it was pretty cool to think about while we were walking down the street today.

We did a lot of walking this trip. We rode trains or walked everywhere, which makes you very tired and hungry. I'm understanding this pub thing more and more every day. They're the best place around to sit down and eat food when you're tired. And there's beer there. I had more beer even though I don't really like it since I still think that's the right thing to do in pubs. Another thing I don't really like to do that I figured was the right thing to do since we were at a pub was eating fish and chips (with my beer). I really don't like fish. I eat sushi because it's raw and tastes good, but I'm pretty sensitive to any form of cooked fish as being fishy. Well, much like rude French people, and London only having gross food, I was pleasantly surprised to find that I really really like fish and chips. I like fish and chips way more than I like beer. These guys sitting next to us liked hearing themselves talk way more than they liked beer. And they liked beer a lot. I should point out that this was all at a super cool pub called the Cheshire Cheese that's been around since forever.

This is a literal tourist trap. The whole time we were in London, I felt that traffic was out to kill us and sang Nicole the Smiths song about ten ton trucks and a double decker bus killing the both of us pretty much every time we crossed the street. This is the only solid proof I have that this theory is valid, but it's pretty solid. I was going say that I wished Cleveland had a river we could walk along at night because I really enjoyed the Thames and the Seine, but well...yeah, Cuyahoga...step your game up. All three places have rivers and I have 20s from all three places.