R-I-D-E I wanna ride

Bike ride after 2 days of rain. Paths cleared, cars wiped of bird leavings. The ghostly golf course soon to be turned into condominiums. We talked brightly and exchanged views on appropriate bike gearing. The temperature was on the right side of cool. The wheels rolled free of friction, spinning for their own contentment. The handlebars felt solid in my hands. The brakes squeaked as I slowed down the hill. The minivan gave us a wide margin as it slowed down. Everything was in harmony.

And would you like me if I stayed forever young?

What do you call a Nikon that has trouble getting coverage in the mainstream media?
-Camera Obscura

Herman Cain and Abel - Am I to be my Godfather's Pizza deliveryman?

What's the difference between Mitt Romney and a silverback gorilla?
-While they look exactly the same, the gorilla enjoys the respect of his peers

So they did a study recently to see if membership in the British Royal Family was statistically related to higher intelligence levels. Turns out the researchers were foiled by that time-honored maxim known to Psych 101 students everywhere: Coronation does not equal causation

I heard that Manchester City is thinking of splitting up its famous Togolese sibling midfield partnership (the Toures). They thought they had a transfer done in August, but all the pundits said it would be like sending Kolo to Newcastle

I heard that Facebook has a new avian mascot. Yeah, they're calling it the Mark Zuckerbird. So...I don't know what that's all about

Ask me no questions

Q. Why did it take the French pastry chef so long to get to work?

A. He had to 'croissant' a busy street.

If you don't like my joke, say it to my face. Don't go behind my back and trash me on message boards. You know I hate that. And make sure you keep a straight face the entire time if you tell the joke. That's how it's done, with two apostrophes.

Sometimes a blog is just a blog

For the next month or so, you can find me in the gym or applying for jobs. I'd like to schedule some eating, but there may not be time. I will probably have to find time to sit in unexpected places in my room, in chairs, contemplating. I'm just that crazy. Crazy like a fox. An Arctic Fox. In a snowstorm. In the Arctic Circle. Where am I? Behind that snowbank? You won't know. Because I'm white. And I blend in with snow.

I Ate My Father-Pig

Imagine wrestling the Asian Black Bear. It is strangely human, and tries irresistibly to tousle your hair with its claws.

Get a stew goin'

I love cooking, but sometimes the prospect of all those ingredients having to be put together by just me, working against time and hungry bellies, is completely daunting. Daunting enough to make you give up. This is why I always make soups or stews.

Nothing has to be timed or perfected, or cooked just so. Everything just comes together in a big, soupy mess. The soup is the most forgiving dish known to cooks, save grilled cheese. No doubt there's an art to getting the broth to taste good (or appropriate?) and getting the vegetables to have just the right bite, but what tastes better and is so consistently easy to assemble, if not soup. If not soup, then what?

I will spare you the answer. It's soup or nothing. The joy of the warm, savory broth. The satisfaction of adding some arcane ingredient which won't actually figure in the taste, but makes you feel like an expert all the same. Soup, which nourishes our bodies and contains enough salt, when done right, to pickle our organs. Soup, the signature dish of fall, the autumnal enterprise of slightly shivering city-dwellers. It does a body good.

[Also, a good part of the conception of this post was how much I like to hear my fingers clattering on the keyboard while the words simultaneously appear, marching ahead on-screen. Strunk and White advise that you should delete or heavily edit things you write for these reasons, but they were writing before the existence of blogs. So I will have my cake and post it too.]

[Brackets are so much more entertaining than parentheses]