Central Ohio, Land of Spectacle
The First Annual Hamlet St. Peep-Off was held last evening. For those not in the know, this is an idea I ripped off from some punkers in Sacramento with an internet presence. I can't remember how they did (do?) it, but the basic idea is to eat as many marshmallow Peeps as possible. Peeps are well-suited for such ends: they are dirty-cheap after Zombie Christ Day and are absolutely impossible to swallow without chewing first. Our local vintage was a thirty-minute race, whoever ate the most won. Originally, vomiting was to be a mandatory and essential activity for participants, but this was abandoned minutes before the main event. Oh well. Anyways, WHAT HAD HAPPENED was that Yon (a.k.a. Gnarly), the inimitable Susan Cooper, and myself threw the fuck down and ate some damn Peeps. Yon folded rather quickly. After a grueling half-hour punctuated by several mugfuls of Mickey's, Susan and myself had choked down 41 Peeps apiece. Susan and I proceeded to punch each other in the guts for awhile. This seemed quite appropriate at the time. Nobody hurled, which surprised and kind of disappointed me. Other event highlights included late-night intoxicated grilling with the neighbors, good friends throwing money on the floor to gamble on who would win or puke or something, roommate's boyfriend going to bed then coming back downstairs to get a drink of water utterly naked and holding his underwear, shotgunning beer (it'd been awhile!) on the porch with dear Elissa in a frustrated post-contest effort to actually vomit. IT WAS TRULY SPECTACULAR, which was what I relished most when thinking about the Peep-off in the first place. I do love a good spectacle. In sum: I ate lots of gross garbage and drank a lot of malt liquor and won half of an as-yet-unknown prize and hung out with the neighbors and some friends and times were ridiculous, times were good. Then I slept a little bit and went to work.
Waffle experiments have begun in earnest. Last week I tried a prototype recipe for Waffle Week (a week-long planned celebration of the possibilities of the waffle as medium and substance... and probably intoxicants, too). I made a sugarless buttermilk waffle with scrambled eggs and cooked bacon in the batter, mostly as a fairly belated offering to a friend for his birthday. And there was a variation on Welsh rarebit as a sauce - cheese and butter and beer and mustard cooked down into a pungent waffle-topper. I thought it worked out pretty well, especially since I wasn't too keen on the bacon (a favorite of said friend's). Other ideas for Waffle Week include Baked Fruit Pie Waffles, Taco Waffles, Reuben Waffles, Regular-Ass Breakfast Waffles, Gravy Waffles (topped with mashed potatoes, greens, fried-chicken-if-you-eat-such-things, etc.) and probably some sourdough or yeast waffles, too. A different waffle for every day!
I've now made three batches of kimchi/sauerkraut/rottencabbagestuff that have all turned out very tasty. Mead remains hit-or-miss. Sourdough projects are currently in development.
The kitty got worms and remains totally fucking insane. Her total war on all material goods in the house continues. Spilling water on important paper things is her latest favorite tactic, and she's broken one glass light-cover-thingie and one glazed crock in the last week alone.
The weather is becoming pleasant (at last! at last!), with air temperature in the 80s today and an unobstructed sun in the sky. This was the first winter that seemed to get me gloomy simply by being a typical crappy Ohio winter season. I am not entirely sure why this one seemed so tough, but I'm glad it's slithering away. I do think that the pointed seasonality of life here in central Ohio helps create interesting differences between people here v. people in some of the other places I've lived in the U.S. Um.
I continue my adventures in higher education. A new quarter started two weeks ago, and I decided to take a few more hours this time around. I'm in some of the classes that made me decide to go back to school a year-and-a-half ago (based solely on the course titles). It feels like vindication, which I think is kind of funny. But I am finding some of the material fascinating, and I think it will help in my long-term Ultimate Project of dismantling The City and making it into something marginally habitable. Specifically, I'm in a course called "Fate and Impact of Contaminants in Soils and Waters" that's really just a thorough review of all things polluting (Chlorination! Arsenates! The thrills of chemisorption!) and what you can do with them, and another called "Biology of Soil Ecosystems" that's all about lil' critters in the magical soil universe, particularly bacteria/archaea and fungi. It's stuff that I can totally freak out about, so I'm okay with being in school at the moment, even if it seems like it's taking FOREVER.
Work continues apace. I cook and do dishes and catch some of the many and varied loose ends that pop out when working in a small restaurant. At night we do fun stuff like closing early and inventing reasons to do so, then drinking wine and blasting Bolt Thrower while we clean up. And Sunday brunch shifts have become themed. This week we were a spaghetti-Western saloon - cowboy boots and hats and cheap plastic deputy badges, etc. - while last week the staff decorated and wore absurd pink Easter bonnets (though none of us celebrate it). Next week: SURF SAFARI! I fully expect wage labor will help lead to my ruin and unhappy end.
I have ambitious gardening plans this season, and now just have to find a spading fork for a sane price somewhere within a few hours' walk. OKRABEETSRADISHCARROTSCOLLARDSTOMATOPEPPERKALEPOLEBEANS!!!! and a smattering of herbs, too, if I can figure out my nitrogen needs without animal manure and can fend off the squirrels. As usual, I'm about a week behind where I'd like to be, but remain undaunted. I WILL START MY TOMATOES WHEN I DAMN WELL PLEASE TO.
My favorite books read in the last few months include Return to Nevèrÿon and Nevèrÿona by Samuel Delany, The Cyberiad and Peace on Earth by Stanislaw Lem, Possibilities by David Graeber, and Eros the Bittersweet by Anne Carson. More books, please!
I miss the friends who are scattered across the country. I've also made a few new friends at work, but every one of them will be moving across state lines before Autumn. I fully expect to leave Columbus within two or three years, but dearly love a handful of people who live here and who don't have any particular plans to leave. Unresolved.
This post became more self-indulgent than I'd originally intended! Summary: I'm staying busy in Ohio, with the occasional glum funk but usually just through food, books, nerdery, walking around, and a fairly active imagination. Sometimes I do stupid things, but they usually turn out alright and are silly and fun (see Peep-Off). And, as usual, I still love coffee.