Some New Favorites

I've had the pleasure of having a couple days off after barricading myself in my Unabomber cabin last weekend and cranking out about 20 pages of writing for this website and another Vegas travelogue for the degenerates at Travel2Vegas.com. Of course I also worked a couple of days in that span, so basically I spent four days straight either dealing blackjack or staying up all night writing whatever nonsense popped into my head. So when I finally got home early Tuesday morning, I hit the bed hard and caught up on some much needed sleep. It's been nice to sit around doing nothing but surfing the net, watching ESPN, and sampling the various flavors of Haagen Dazs on sale at the nearest Von's. Since I've been trying to eat healthy stuff at work all the time (chicken, salad, cottage cheese every night before I hit the tables), I figured it would be ok to have some ice cream for the first time in a couple months.

Had to go with the old reliable mint-chip for starters, and of course that was excellent, but then I took a chance with Bananas Foster (but really, when you combine two of my favorite treats--rum and ice cream--how can you possibly go wrong?). Living in a town with dozens of fancy-schmancy restaurants that offer Bananas Foster on the menu, I felt it might not have held up to the competition, but it was still an excellent choice. So if you find yourself in the frozen-foods aisle at your local foodmonger's, give it a try. That being said, I still think my all-time favorite is Vanilla Heath Bar Crunch offered by them two old hippies from Vermont. But since I don't want any of my hard-earned cash going into the Hillary for Prez war chest, I have decided to forego that pleasure for now.

Speaking of food, I have also started dabbling in the mysterious new world of designer mayonaise. Yep, grilled chipotle pepper mayo, wasabi mayo, herb mayo--it's all there for the taking. First I discover lime-flavored ice cubes, and now garlic mayonaise! Is this a great country or what? And here I thought food evolution had peaked at chocolate milk or mac & cheese. It's great to know that greater minds than mine are working on this stuff, doing their part to keep my pantry on the cutting edge. Anyhow, the next batch of tunafish sandwiches should be especially tasty. A full review shall be forthcoming.

Now that I've got a fully-functional digital cable box, I can also get back to enjoying favorite stuff like the National Geographic channel, the NFL Network, ESPN News, and all of the movie channels. Normally I'm right there with the whole popular culture thing, but I never quite got on the Desperate Housewives bandwagon, and although I tried to sit through a couple of episodes of Lost, it just doesn't hold my rapt attention like it seems to do for the rest of the civilized world. And although I came to the party almost a year late, I absolutely *love* Entourage. I consider myself a competent writer, so it's a real joy to see the product of someone so talented at their craft. I only wish I were half that good. Just because your aunt ran numbers out of a deli it doesn't make you a made man, Drama... Great stuff.

As good as Entourage is, my favorite show has got to be Pardon The Interuption on ESPN every afternoon. There is nothing on tv today more entertaining that watching Wilbon and Kornheiser banter back and forth about the current events in today's sports world.

Wilbon: Tony, doesn't it bother you that Brent Barry kissed the Commissioner David Stern last night before the game?

Kornheiser: (deadpan) No, not at all--David and I haven't been an item for years.


I swear I laughed about that all afternoon.

Mikey