Posts categorized “Life”

This was all about a month ago, but durn-it-all I’ve been kinda busy what with Skyward Sword and all, so I never got around to posting about it. But this was a fun day.

Some time before Chrissymiss, we were babysitting our friend who in 2011 was one of those little girls who comes out of that lady’s giant dress during Act II of Tacoma City Ballet’s Nutcracker. Part of our babysitting gig was delivering her to Nutcracker practice. So we decided to make an evening of it by going to some local Downtown Tacoma businesses.

Stop 1: Füdie’s Open House

Although Füdie had been open for about a month already, this evening just happened to be their official open house. Füdie has a really nice selection of not-commonly-seen wines and beers. The graphic designer in me also really adores their logo. They were doing some beer and wine tasting and it was all festive and nice. I’d link to their website but they don’t have one. I know, right? Here’s their Facebook page, though.

Just last night Carrie & I stopped by Füdie again because they were doing a wine tasting of all South American wines. It was good! We got a nice inexpensive bottle of red.

Anyhoo, after we were done at Füdie we walked through a hole in their wall. Yes, that’s right: Füdie is right next door to and connected to Stink Cheese & Meat:

Stop 2: Stink Cheese & Meat

Füdie & Stink are two complimentary and associated businesses, which is why you can walk from one right into the other. Stink is one of those little tiny places that specializes yummy unusual cheeses and salumi. They have a weekly Macaroni & Cheese and a weekly Grilled Cheese Sandwich, as well as other, more-stable menu items.

The three of us had their Antipasti platter for dinner, which has all sorts of yummy pickled things and paper-thin meats and fragrant cheeses. Very good! Unlike Füdie, Stink DOES have a website.

From Stink we walked down to:

Stop 3: The Pantages Theater

Where we dropped off our little ballerina. Carrie helped her change into her costume while I awkwardly waited in the hallway and tried not to seem too much like some creepy guy trying to catch a glimpse of ballerinas in their dressing rooms.

The Pantages is also a notable Tacoma Landmark because that’s where Carrie & I got married.

Anyhoo, then we walked down the hill a couple of blocks to:

Stop 4: Dorky’s Bar Arcade

Dorky’s is one of the best places in Tacoma. A massive, seemingly ever-expanding cavern of classic arcade games and pinball machines. Plus foods and drinks.

Much to my delight I discovered that Dorky’s acquired a standup of Raiden Fighters:

Lemme explain: back many, many years ago when the post-Fools Play ritual included going to an Olympia Red Robin, there was a Raiden Fighters in the little arcade room in said Red Robin. Geoff & I used to drop many a quarter into that machine in 2-player simultaneous action! It’s a pretty crazy SHMUP, with crap flying all over the screen to the point that it often gets nigh-impossible to tell what the eff is going on. Fun! Dorky’s copy had a bit of a wonky joystick, though, and the screen was a li’l washed out. Still, nice to see.

Carrie & I also played quite a bit of the Evel Knievel pinball machine while we were there. 2-Player competitive action! Carrie is quite good at that machine.

Dorky’s is also where they filmed this T-Mobile commercial:

They also don’t have a website! Whatsupwitdat? They only gots da Facebookin’ page, yo.

Stop 5: The Pantages Theater

After Dorky’s we swung back by the Pantages and picked up our li’l ballerina and then headed back to our car to drive up 6th Avenue to:

Stop 6: Metronome Coffee

You might remember Metronome Coffee from an earlier post on this blog wherein it served as the venue for Julia Massey, the Jesus Rehab, and Neighbor Gary. This time it served as a meeting place where we handed off our li’l ballerina to her mother, and were purchased some hot cocoa for our troubles.

Metronome Coffee does have a website!

By the way, the graphic designer in me absolutely adores Metronome’s logo, too.

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Yesterday I finally took down the exterior Chrissymiss lights, the last vestiges of the holidays. It was a bit sad to see them colorful lights go back into the garage.

Fortunately, the sky had its own colorful lights yesterday to make up for it:

Now that’s a sunset.

Every once in a while Carrie & I look around us and realize, y’know, we’re just a little too old for this. Oftentimes those moments happen courtesy of Julia Massey & The Five Finger Discount.

An example: Hempfest. Yeah. We didn’t really feel like we fit in there so much.

Last weekend was our 7th wedding anniversary, but there was way too much going on to do anything about it then. So the weekend before that we decided to celebrate. We learned that JM+FFD was going to be doing a little outdoor festival along with The Jesus Rehab and Terrapin Productions. So that sounded like fun. Only thing: it would be a camping trip.

I don’t camp. I’ve never enjoyed it. I worked hard for my amenities and my comfortable mattress, and I’ve never understood the appeal of roughing it. But Carrie loves it, and we gathered enough comforts (like a tent and a cushy air mattress and a sleeping bag) from camping-oriented friends that I thought I would give it a try.

So we set out for the mountains (with a stop at Scott’s Dairy Freeze in North Bend for lunch—yes, the North Bend where they filmed a bunch of Twin Peaks).

When we got to Roslyn (yes, the Roslyn where they filmed lots of that Northern Exposure TV show), we thought we might walk around for a bit. But it was so frikkin’ hot that we decided just to get back in the air-conditioned car and try to find the venue.

The “festival” was very vaguely organized; we didn’t even learn where it was until the night before. There was a guy at a gate who said that the person running this “festival” was supposed to have provided him with a list of guests, but never did. He just let us in and directed us to drive to another point farther into the forest with basically a “good luck.”

So when the pavement turned to dirt we had to back up a bit until we got cell phone reception and were able to call Julia to get directions the rest of the way. This involved driving past a shirtless man named “Troy” who asked us for our email addresses before giving us directions the rest of the way to an uneven clearing with a wooden stage (still under construction) at one end and an outhouse at the other.

This was about when Carrie & I had that “we’re too old for this” moment.

Fortunately it actually turned out to be quite a bit of fun hanging out with JM+FFD and Jared and Neighbor Gary, even though Carrie & I were practically the only people in attendance who weren’t a member of one of the bands… and a lot of the bands were much more metal \m/ than the bands we usually see. And the camping was actually pretty comfortable. Who knows; I might try it again some time.

The next morning we couldn’t wait to get outta there, though. We had breakfast at the Roslyn Café then headed back home.

Here are some very blurry pictures taken from my phone:

Last weekend I went to the Northwest Pinball & Gameroom Expo 2011 with my brother and Neighbor Gary. It’s a very cool event, which you can learn more about at their Website.

I took photos of the games that I played/enjoyed the most while I was there. Click on a photo for more info about that particular machine!

It’s Mardi Gras! This year was the first year of my life wherein I participated in a particular Mardi Gras tradition: a series of King Cake parties. Point of fact: I’d never actually heard of a King Cake party before this year, when a new friend (who just moved here from Austin, TX) decided to start up the tradition.

In a nutshell: You throw a party in the middle of January (it generally coincides with Twelfth Night/Epiphany, though in this case it was later — January 22nd or so). Whoever hosts that party bakes a cake — a King Cake: traditionally a ring-shaped cake similar to brioche, with green-and-purple frosting/sprinkles. Hidden somewhere in the cake is a small figurine, often a Baby Jesus. Whichever guest at the party gets the piece of cake containing the figurine is the “King” for that week and has to throw the next King Cake Party the following weekend. This continues every weekend until Mardi Gras!

I actually probably would not have become a part of this tradition (indeed, I missed the first party entirely) had it not been for the fact that Marvel’s X-Men’s female clone of Wolverine X-23 won the first King Cake Party and got to throw the second one at her place, just up the road from me.

It was a fascinating several weeks. Carrie & I got to meet a tonne of new people, as whoever hosted the party invited not only the people who had been at previous parties, but their own friends as well. We also got to go to some places we’d never been before, and experience fascinating things like wood-fired saunas and hot tubs, and all manner of cooking. Not even the King Cake itself was consistent; many of the participants put their own spin on the tradition by serving the figurine in other types of baked goods — even an Apple pie once.

Carrie & I had to miss the next-to-last King Cake Party, but we delegated our participation, and — guess what? — we won by proxy!

For our King Cake, Carrie decided to go old-school: a northern French Galette des Rois (French for “Cake of Kings”). She used a slightly-modified version of the recipe from Zen Can Cook:

For this recipe you will need:

• 1 puff pastry sheet
• 8 tablespoons soft butter
• 1 cup slivered almonds
• 2 eggs
• 3 tablespoons flour
• 1/2 cup sugar + 2 tablespoons
• 1 pinch of salt
• 1 teaspoon almond extract (optional)
• 1 egg yolk + 1 tablespoon milk for eggwash
• Powdered sugar for glazing

* Preheat oven to 425′F. Cut out two 9-inches circles of puff pastry. Prick one of them with a fork. Place on a tray lined with a silpat. Refrigerate.

For the frangipane (almond filling):

• In the bowl of a food processor combine the butter, 1 cup almonds, 2 eggs, 1/2 cup sugar, pinch of salt and almond extract if using. Process to obtain a smooth paste, add the flour and pulse to incorporate (Carrie & I don’t have a food processor, so we just used a Magic Bullet and made the frangipane in batches).

For the galette des rois:

1. Spread the almond frangipane in the center of the pricked puff pastry circle leaving a 1-inch border. Brush the border with eggwash and top with the second circle of puff pastry. Seal the edge with your fingers or the back of a spoon. Brush with the eggwash. Refrigerate for 15 minutes.
2. Bake at 425′F for 15 minutes then lower the temperature to 350′F and bake for an additional 30 minutes.
3. Dust with some powdered sugar. Cool. Serve at room temperature.

Photo by yuichi.sakabura: http://www.flickr.com/photos/skrb/

By all accounts of everyone who was at our party, it was quite delicious. Please, partake… and enjoy.

I saw two major Hip-Hop shows in February: Busdriver at Neumos and Three Ninjas & Tangentbot at Chop Suey!

First off was Busdriver. I’ve talked about him before on my website, and seen him several times at Neumos. I went with Three Ninjas, Tangentbot, and HeartFeltRobots. Before the show Three Ninjas chatted a bit with Busdriver on account of having done a remix of an Open Mike Eagle & Busdriver song. My pal HeartFeltRobots even made Busdriver his very own felt Busdriver Bot!

Busdriver started his set with a very cool visual effect: all the lights were off, but he had a blacklight that also emitted lasers in such a way that they made a starfield on the background. Then he stood in front of the blacklight and starfield wearing all white. He made Tangentbot very happy by rapping over an Aphex Twin song for his encore.

Two of the opening acts were women hip-hop artists, Night Fox and Katie Kate. They were both very good, though I kinda liked Night Fox’s energy a little more. They were unlike many women hip-hop artists that I’m used to, in that they weren’t full of “even tougher than a man” bravado (even though there was a fair share of cussing). Night Fox’s voice periodically had an almost-Billie-Holliday warble in it, and at times sounded like an American Miho Hatori. Plus she was tiny and kinda adorable. Katie Kate was a much more polished performer and technical musician — I learned later that she’s a classically-trained pianist and graduated from Cornish with a music degree! Anyway, the point is they had a really fascinating style of hip-hop. I almost want to call it “Cutesy Hip-Hop” but that sound a little degrading. The point is, it was fun and inviting instead of angry and aggressive.

You can watch a Katie Kate music video here!

As for the Chop Suey show the next week, Threeni & T-Bo (as they will now be referred to in the rest of this post because it sounds awful) were the opening act for the Fake Four tour, which is the same tour that Open Mike Eagle opened for last year. Good company! And Carrie actually got to come with me because for once she didn’t have to teach on a night where there was an awesome music show!

They completely killed their set. The highlight of the whole night was when Threeni and T-Bo performed an absolutely epic cover of Jewel’s “Foolish Games.” For realsz! Ch-ch-check it out!

Like what you heard there? About to commit seppuku because you missed it? Stay your blade, I say! For Three Ninjas & Tangentbot will be performing a Mardi Gras party at the Skylark Café on Tuesday the 8th! THAT’S TOMORROW, HOMESLICE!

Carrie & I didn’t stay for the whole show because:

1. We live in Tacoma
2. I had to be at work at 8:00 the next morning
3. We’re old

But another excellent act that we got to see was Abadawn, a rapper with an extremely young countenance (he looked like he was 15) and a fascinating style. He had two vocalizations: a hip-hop voice that had inflections and flow that reminded me somewhat of Eminem, and a full-on death-metal screech/growl voice. He switched freely between them. Also, his songs were short, which I really appreciated (a couple were only like 45 seconds long, I swear). They were like a little nugget burst of energy, like a hip-hop haiku of rage.

So: February = good month for hip-hop shows.