Dispatch

Well hello,

It's rather late (got back a while ago from shopping at Krogers, and then had to get some stuff taken care of), so I'd just like to talk to you all about a lovely little band called Dispatch. It came to me as I thought about something I could share with you. Some of you might have heard of it before, but some of you might not have.

So, let's play a game.

Let's listen to three of their songs. (I was going to post youtube video links, but those all seem to be live and not quite as good, in my humble and sleep-deprived opinion)

So:

Go to grooveshark and search for these songs by Dispatch:

Two Coins
Flying Horses
The General

Once you're done listening, you can then post a vote for your favorite! Oh, bonus points if you figure out what the flying horses in Flying Horses are!

Enjoy,

Baby socks

I like tea. Especially wild sweet orange. Which I happen to be drinking as I am writing this. It doesn't taste too wild, but yes on the sweet orangish.

Guess What? No, you aren't going to guess it.

I cut my hair.

Yeah.

I cut MY OWN hair.

With the help of Olivia, who did some of the back and let me know if the parts I couldn't see were uneven.

So now it is a glorious 1/2 inch.

I am also having a series of really weird dreams. For instance, last night I dreamed that one of Olivia's friends (not really a real person but a dream person) hated my guts. She then became a zombie and her entire purpose was to hunt me down. It was terrifying and it finally ended when someone beheaded her and ran over the head.

Hopefully this tea will help with the mixing of my brains at night.

And now I have a charger that works, so my computer isn't on life support!

My boss at The River Project this week and most of next, so she gave me the keys. I go in first and let all the interns in (because I come in everyday) and then we do our duties (feeding the fish, checking the traps, checking on the oysters, etc.)

In around 5 weeks I'm going to be on a plane to Kenya. Now is the stressful time making sure I've got everything I need and have everything in order.

Congratulations to Josh and Allison for Harrison Xavier!

In his honor here are two baby songs from the best cartoon ever, Adventure Time!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bjw_PAgvZ34

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_whHKRTi3VY

Tuesday Triumph!

Yay! No more TakeOver Tuesday!
Richard's back!
Yayyyyyy!
....
But he does still have to go to the Candle Caves
Most days, for half of his life.

(It's actually not too bad;
I come home smeeling
fresh and candley!)

However, the candle caves are full during
the morning, with other kidnappees. So I
go in the evening, which means that I sleep
during the day.

Which is why I'm posting at
this ridiculuously early
hour.

So yeah, you've heard it all.
We're moving,
I'm working,
you're being cool,
as usual. :D

And it's 7:11.
Slurpee time :D
I want......
Raspberry.
And how about you?

Oop, it's 7:12, you don't get one :(
Too slow.

It's ok, I didn't get one either.

Today I smeel of vanilla, probably with
a slight hint of perfect winter and fresh linen.

Yummy.

But really, the candle caves aren't that
bad.
You get paid, which is nice.

I'd never heard of
kidnappees getting
paid, but maybe it's
like workers comp
or something.
Whcih makes nooo sense,
because I didn't have a
paying job.
Hmmm...

So yay.
:D

I have run out of things
with which to type.

That made no sense,
as my keyboard isn't flying away.
Lemme try that again.

*Ahem
I have run out of things
to write.

Much better.
Nothing like a triumphal scentence
to bridge your thoughts and others minds.

Wait, what?

Just forget it.


Silly me: Smells like a candle yet to be lit on fire (No, that is not permission!)
Silly Rabbit: [you're awesome if you're the first to complete the phrase by commenting!]

Call if you ever wanna talk
Love you all :D

It is Sunday

You all know what that means: you get to hear from me!
Unfortunately, I don't have much to tell you.

I hope you liked the Tuesday video, though I have to say, no one responded to the ransom request. I thought you all loved Richard more than money or candy bars. Oh well. He was nice to us, so we let him go. But he still has to return to the Candle Caves twelve hours a day for a while (kind of a Persephone situation [He ate the peanut butter cookies I made Thursday]).
Johnny we just kept for the rest of the week (and you all thought he was at youth conference...), then let go when he started dancing to Justin Bieber (kind of a Ransom of Red Chief situation).

It's a good thing you didn't send us the candy bars anyway, because we really wouldn't have anywhere to put them at the moment. Things are kind of all over the place in the bandit cave (our room), half-packed/half-not (in other words, my stuff/adri's stuff). We're going to have a busy week! We'll let you guys know the new address and stuff when we figure it out. Phone number should stay the same though.

Well, I've got to get up early for lawn mowing, so I should go to sleep. As should anyone who is reading this any time past midnight. I LOVE YOU ALL!!!!
goodnight!
Ruth

Tuesday has been taken OVER!!! - The Bandits ^^

Ronnie the Bear

Hello all,

So last night we went to see Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2. I dressed up as Harry, of course, wearing my Gryffindor tie and a nice swooshy black cloak which billowed at all the appropriate moments. I even shaved in order to go in character (yes dri, I am sorry, the beard is no more [at least for a few days]). We were a sizable group, Erin (as Hermione), Ashley (polyjuce potioned person), Jason, Kohei (slytherine student), Kendra (Luna), Margaret, Arena (ravenclaw student), and Elizabeth, making up a group of muggles and wizards. We went to dinner together and then arrived at the midnight showing.

Was it a good movie? I'll let you decide that for yourselves whenever you happen to see it. I will say that I loved it more than any other of the Harry Potter movies, and enjoyed myself immensely. I've never been a big fan of the movies in general (much preferring the books), but I was pleased with how this one turned out. Maybe it was simply the going with friends, the re-reading of several of the books, and the general air of anticipation and excitement for the last finale of a chapter of childhood, but I had fun.

Other developments will be posted when I am less sleep deprived, i. e. not this week.

Wednesday again

Warning: below follows unedited stream of consciousness as usual.

I hope everyone is doing well. Johnny and I are on our way to West Virginia for today and tomorrow. I'm going in pursuit of a couple of job opportunities and Johnny is going to take care of some business in Summersville.

Thinking about what to do for this post, I realized I had already written a bunch of stuff in the last week. No, I'm not talking about the novel I have been working on at a snail's pace. I've spent more of my non work seeking time researching for the book rather than writing it. So on that front I have dabbled in Origin of the Species, and the Hope, Hype, and Reality of Genetic Engineering.

Getting back to the point. When Grandad Tom was here a couple of weeks ago, he suggested that I read Captains and the Kings by Taylor Caldwell. I read it. Caldwell can seem pretty over the top when stating her views directly, but when she weaves her ideas into a fictional narrative she is very compelling. Caldwell's views on the nature of man and government are dark, cynical, and insightful. Yes, all of the above. She is someone who thinks. This is not to say I always agree with her conclusions.

I ended up putting together an analysis of the ideas she espouses and my response to them. Rather than posting it here, I'm sharing it as a Googledoc with those of you I know regularly read this blog. Feel free to ask, if you don't get a copy and want one.

The reason for this, in part, is that many years ago, as part of having a security clearance I agreed that before publishing anything relating to certain subjects, I would get Department of Defense approval. Now to be clear, while I certainly don't discuss anything that is or was classified in the analysis, and don't express any views that would be worrisome, still I did give my word. Caldwell for one would find irony in this.

Today is Tuesday

And have a jolly good Wednesday all of you :D

They're made out of meat--Of meat?!

I have a funny story for you all today!

Well, first things first: I am not sick. My stomach is just mad at me. So I thought I would spend this post introducing you to a story by Terry Bisson. It is good (I promise). I apologize to all of you (Johnny and Dad) to whom I read this the other day. You can read it again if you want:

THEY'RE MADE OUT OF MEAT


"They're made out of meat."

"Meat?"

"Meat. They're made out of meat."

"Meat?"

"There's no doubt about it. We picked up several from different parts of the planet, took them aboard our recon vessels, and probed them all the way through. They're completely meat."

"That's impossible. What about the radio signals? The messages to the stars?"

"They use the radio waves to talk, but the signals don't come from them. The signals come from machines."

"So who made the machines? That's who we want to contact."

"They made the machines. That's what I'm trying to tell you. Meat made the machines."

"That's ridiculous. How can meat make a machine? You're asking me to believe in sentient meat."

"I'm not asking you, I'm telling you. These creatures are the only sentient race in that sector and they're made out of meat."

"Maybe they're like the orfolei. You know, a carbon-based intelligence that goes through a meat stage."

"Nope. They're born meat and they die meat. We studied them for several of their life spans, which didn't take long. Do you have any idea what's the life span of meat?"

"Spare me. Okay, maybe they're only part meat. You know, like the weddilei. A meat head with an electron plasma brain inside."

"Nope. We thought of that, since they do have meat heads, like the weddilei. But I told you, we probed them. They're meat all the way through."

"No brain?"

"Oh, there's a brain all right. It's just that the brain is made out of meat! That's what I've been trying to tell you."

"So ... what does the thinking?"

"You're not understanding, are you? You're refusing to deal with what I'm telling you. The brain does the thinking. The meat."

"Thinking meat! You're asking me to believe in thinking meat!"

"Yes, thinking meat! Conscious meat! Loving meat. Dreaming meat. The meat is the whole deal! Are you beginning to get the picture or do I have to start all over?"

"Omigod. You're serious then. They're made out of meat."

"Thank you. Finally. Yes. They are indeed made out of meat. And they've been trying to get in touch with us for almost a hundred of their years."

"Omigod. So what does this meat have in mind?"

"First it wants to talk to us. Then I imagine it wants to explore the Universe, contact other sentiences, swap ideas and information. The usual."

"We're supposed to talk to meat."

"That's the idea. That's the message they're sending out by radio. 'Hello. Anyone out there. Anybody home.' That sort of thing."

"They actually do talk, then. They use words, ideas, concepts?"
"Oh, yes. Except they do it with meat."

"I thought you just told me they used radio."

"They do, but what do you think is on the radio? Meat sounds. You know how when you slap or flap meat, it makes a noise? They talk by flapping their meat at each other. They can even sing by squirting air through their meat."

"Omigod. Singing meat. This is altogether too much. So what do you advise?"

"Officially or unofficially?"

"Both."

"Officially, we are required to contact, welcome and log in any and all sentient races or multibeings in this quadrant of the Universe, without prejudice, fear or favor. Unofficially, I advise that we erase the records and forget the whole thing."

"I was hoping you would say that."

"It seems harsh, but there is a limit. Do we really want to make contact with meat?"

"I agree one hundred percent. What's there to say? 'Hello, meat. How's it going?' But will this work? How many planets are we dealing with here?"

"Just one. They can travel to other planets in special meat containers, but they can't live on them. And being meat, they can only travel through C space. Which limits them to the speed of light and makes the possibility of their ever making contact pretty slim. Infinitesimal, in fact."

"So we just pretend there's no one home in the Universe."

"That's it."

"Cruel. But you said it yourself, who wants to meet meat? And the ones who have been aboard our vessels, the ones you probed? You're sure they won't remember?"

"They'll be considered crackpots if they do. We went into their heads and smoothed out their meat so that we're just a dream to them."

"A dream to meat! How strangely appropriate, that we should be meat's dream."

"And we marked the entire sector unoccupied."

"Good. Agreed, officially and unofficially. Case closed. Any others? Anyone interesting on that side of the galaxy?"

"Yes, a rather shy but sweet hydrogen core cluster intelligence in a class nine star in G445 zone. Was in contact two galactic rotations ago, wants to be friendly again."

"They always come around."

"And why not? Imagine how unbearably, how unutterably cold the Universe would be if one were all alone ..."


See? Didn't I tell you?! In other news, Johnny has been teaching me how to play the guitar. Hopefully I can convince him to let you guys see some of his playing this Saturday.
Also, I love Adrianna and her grilled cheeses. It pains me that Richard and I are going to have to eat her.

I love you all! (Don't do anything crazy [like jumping off of cliffs into rivers and such]!)
Ruth

Joseph is Beardful!!

Due to requests from various persons (mostly Dri) today's post is focused on one thing only. The Beard.



So why grow a beard? Well, I've always thought it would be fun to try, and now that I have, I can give you some seriously legit reasons why you might want to consider if growing a beard is right for you.


Reason 1. It's fuzzy It's like having a pillow glued to your face, only comfortably. Who wouldn't want that?

Reason 2. I don't have to shave anymore
My life is all the sweeter now when I wake up and can concentrate my befuddled senses on putting food into my mouth, instead of scraping sharp metal blades on my face.Reason 6. I lost my razors when I moved and didn't buy more.

Reason 3. It looks pretty nice
I think you would all agree, anything that hides my face is a step in the right direction.

Reason 4. People no longer think I'm a first year.
As nice as looking youthful is, it's hard to be taken seriously sometimes when others assume you're fresh out of high school, instead of half a decade out of high school.


These are just a couple the reasons I decided to try it out, and there are a bunch of others, less face acne, increased UV protection, childhood dream of becoming Tevye etc.

Stroking a beard can make you look thoughtful instead of clueless.

Serious face is more serious with a beard.

And crazy face is way more crazy with a beard.

Those statements now being made, this rather narrow blogpost comes to an end. I'll probably shave before too long. Right now, the beard's a little long to tell the truth. Eating smores through a beard is an interesting challenge.

Here are some links if you like silly beard-related things.
One
Two

The Lilac

So today we had a sudden shower. It came out of nowhere, little pebbles of water from the sky. Bullets hitting kevlar waves. When this happened I happened to be on The Lilac. The Lilac is a 1930s lighthouse tender for the New York City Harbor. Its paint is like scales with rust in between from the years of floating in the Hudson River Estuary. The water poured onto the lower deck where my boss and I were checking the traps, which look like two wire trash bins placed together whose bottoms are inward facing funnels, and the crap traps, like chicken wire squares with an entrance. We throw the blue crabs whose back legs are paddles onto the deck and press our feet on them. When they admit we are dominant I grab right behind the claws, measure them, and drop them in the bucket. There were toadfish as well, all head and tail. They have spines behind their heads that you can't see but you can feel. The rain started real bad when we had finished checking the traps and were replacing a broken trap and one that was missing, gone from the end of its leash. Because of the rain we had to dodge waterfalls from rust holes in the upper deck and pipes with gaps. The water didn't fully go through the holes in the side of the ship, instead pooling at some points. It had stopped by the time we had gotten to the broken trap and there was a rainbow on the water of the Hudson. Upon leaving with our catch I saw parents and children coming out to play again in the sprinklers of the playground, playing in the water after hiding from the rain. Upon stepping on the concrete I felt like it was moving with the river underneath, and even now I can feel my flesh move up and down with invisible waves, as if one leg was lead and the other dead. When we got back to the wetlab we checked on the crabs from yesterday. The big one had killed one of the smaller ones, pulling its legs off for a meal, but the one we had feared would be eaten, the one with only one claw, was fine, scowling at us in a corner. His claw was regrowing, a miniature seemingly held close to the body with a mucous spread. He was better off than one of his fellow prisoners, placed in with the horseshoe crab, a helmet, nearly the definition of protection, due to lack of defense. A double amputee, hiding under the oyster trays.

Questions about Google:

1. Is Google turning into what Microsoft was in the 1990’s—a giant technology corporation that provides unparalleled services? Well yes of course that’s true and the comparisons below show why. (Yes, I know they are opinions—no one said this was scholarly.) What do you think?

Google vs Bing=Google

So far no one has done a better job of internet search than Google.


Googledocs vs MS Suite=Googledocs

Reasons: price, ease of sharing, multiparty simultaneous editing, and platform independency beat MS's more full single user only features.


Buzz vs Facebook=Facebook

Facebook may have poorly executed chat, messaging, and video features, but Buzz has nothing--and WAVE? What was that? Google+ looks like it may be promising challenger though.


Gchat/Google Voice vs Skype=toss up

Both have features the other one doesn't. Google still has free calls to phones, free call forwarding, free texting to cell phones, and a free local telephone number. Skype has free multiparty audio conferences. If Google+ works out with multiparty video conferencing as advertised it may turn this into a clear Google victory in the end.


Gmail vs anything= Google

No comments necessary here.


Google Reader vs Stumbleupon= ?

This is a slight mismatch, but of the two personally I prefer Google Reader when it is hitting on all cylinders. When it works it works. With Reader, stuff shows up that I’m probably interested in. I don’t feel like I’m engaging in a time wasting crap shoot like I often did back in the days when I used to click the Stumble button.

Most of the time Google Reader suggests articles that I really like about science, economics, psychology (yes I know econ and psyc are sciences), politics (okay it’s a science too…jeesh), literature, clothes folding robots, and just plain weird stuff as evidenced in the link above to articles from Reader that I enjoy. But then occasionally there are the strange short periods when Reader decides I’m into women’s fashion, wedding planning, Glen Beck and/or legalizing marijuana for a few days---Where did THAT come from??


This leads to question #2: What is being done with all this data, power, and dominate market share? Is Google starting to use all this goodness for nefarious purposes the way Microsoft used its stranglehold on operating systems to crush WordPerfect and to attempt to destroy Netscape?

The FTC thinks so. I haven’t seen evidence of Google using search placement and algorithms designed to kill competition and increase profits, but I haven’t been looking for it. What makes me wonder is the following:

Google Music Manager vs. Grooveshark=Grooveshark

Music Manager is Grooveshark minus content. Why would anyone switch to that? Oh, I know! Because just before launching Music Manager, Google disabled the ability to use Grooveshark on all Android mobile devices. What happened to 'Don't be evil.' ?

Of course net neutrality is NOT required by law for mobile networks, so it is legal and the FTC and FCC won’t look at this situation. It may be legal to dump Grooveshark from Android OS, but that doesn’t mean it isn’t evil. Read Grooveshark’s response here.


Question #3: Google vs. NASA and the Pentagon??? Is Google spacing out?

Okay seriously? Where are you going with this?

Let me 'splain... No, there is too much. Let me sum up. Buttercup... I mean JFK, set our sights on the moon in 1961 and the nation became enthralled. We replaced Gemini with Apollo, went to the moon and eventually started the Space Shuttle program. That brings us almost up to the present. In 2004 GW Bush said he wanted NASA to go back to the moon and then on to Mars. The nation promptly forgot about it. (Would that the rest of his tenure was so easy to forget.)

But NASA is still working on manned space flight. Now the pentagon is offering a $500,000 prize to whoever can come up with the best 100 year spaceship plan. In other words they want a plan that will allow multigenerational manned space flight! Additionally there is a recent proposal in the peer reviewed Journal of Cosmology outlining a reportedly viable plan for a manned mission to establish a permanent Mars human colony by 2030. Pete Worden of NASA says this kind of colonization is exactly where NASA and DOD are going with the 100 year starship program. Buzz Aldrich likes the idea and so does Larry Page (This is where Google comes in.). Worden explained a conversation he and Google founder Larry Page had about the starship program and Mars: “Larry Page asked me a couple weeks ago how much it would cost to send people one way to Mars and I told him $10 billion, and his response was, ‘Can you get it down to 1 or 2 billion?’ So now we’re starting to get a little argument over the price.” For more detail on the DOD and NASA Mars idea you could look at this story.

Okay, so now we have independent scientists, The Department of Defense, and NASA looking at a Mars Colonization mission with Google asking questions about finances. Google asking finance questions? Weird yes, but billionaires are allowed to be weird. I mean Google even bid Pi billion in a recent patent auction. This doesn’t mean they are going to try to take search engine dominance to Mars completely independent of government does it?

http://www.google.com/virgle/

Okay. Maybe it does…


Explore the site and enjoy. Maybe apply for a job while you’re at it. *Extensive travel required.

P.S. Don’t forget to check the FAQ thoroughly before you’re through.

Let the arguments below begin!

OtherNews Tuesday

Hullo all!

There are some seriously awesome people in this world.
I think there's a family of them in every area.
You know, those ones who are so nice and cool, and
they have little kids,
who are equally awesome,
and always are the
funniest little guys ever.
Yeah, those kind of people?

I like them.

....

So, in other news, I got a job.
working third-shift.

something about moving
boxes from point A to point B.
Yay!!!! :D

Think Tetris at 4 AM,
but in 3-D.
In a packaging company
warehouse.
You're getting there.

And in more other news,
there are two groundhogs out and about
Outback.

(No, not the steakhouse.
The backyard)

I'm sure there is more other news,
so please post it, and make it funny too....

'Cus that's how we roll.

:D Love you all alot.
I hope to get to see you all soon.

Oh yes, silly things:
Silly me: Almost forgot about this post, and so has had to cut it short, and not go on about silly funny stuff going on in life.
Silly Johnny: got highfived in the face at least ten times today :D

Love you guys

Happy 4th of July! - Dri

I have striped fingernails! And they're amazing! :D I just got back from work and I'm really tired. So, my blog will be really short again ^^ fooorrrggiiivvvveeeeee meeeeee!!!!!!! :D
something funny ruth wanted me to tell you --> I swallow my rubber bands from my braces sometimes

Yay! 100th Post! Now let's get serious.

So, while I was trying to think about what would be momentous enough to discuss in this post, I thought, what better way to spend the 100^th post than in an attempt to use neuroscience to SAVE YOUR LIVES?

We've had our share of apocalypse scares the past year, and there are only more coming. Everyone's so hyped up about 12/21/12 (when Andrew will save the world!), but there is a much more eminent threat that needs our attention.

What I'm talking about is the emergence of Consciousness Deficit Hypoactivity Disorder. This disorder is characterized by "the loss of rational, voluntary and conscious behavior replaced by delusional/impulsive aggression, stimulus-driven attention, and the inability to coordinate motor linguistic behaviors" (Voytek et. al., 2011). Little attention has been given to the spread of CDHD, outside the occasional reference in popular media. Due to this apparent lack of interest in the scientific community, not much is actually understood about the disorder itself, though its effects are devastating. All the more so for us, because it has struck so close to home.

Yes, some of you might have began to wonder when he stopped posting regularly. Those of us at home with him may have been surprised by his occasional absences at various “scout camps” and “activities,” especially when he returned groggy and unresponsive. We all assumed he was just physically exhausted from a long week of hiking, rock climbing, white-water rafting, and being stuck in contained areas with certain scouts all day. The self-confirmation bias warned us, but we didn’t listen. We used whatever we could find to explain away the signs. We couldn’t have been more wrong.

At this point you may be thinking: Stop being melodramatic Ruth. Johnny’s always been a little weird. It can’t be that bad.

But it can, because there’s one major symptom that I left out:

an insatiable appetite for human flesh.

O.O

That’s right, our beloved brother, Johnny Thomas Glass Jr., has become a zombie.

:<

But do not worry. There is hope. When I said there is "little" attention given to this disorder, I did not mean "zero." A pioneering group of neurologists has begun neuroimaging research in attempt to understand the Zombie Brain. This brave group of men and women has risked their lives to further the cause of scientific inquiry (it is, as you can imagine, a delicate procedure to lure a zombie into an MRI).

This research does have a practical application as well. Voytek, a cognitive neuroscience post-doc at the University of California, suggests that "by closely examining zombie neurology and behavior, we can leverage our knowledge of the physical limitations and behavioral susceptibility of the zombie to our survival advantage" (2011). With this in mind, I have included the following guide to dealing with the undead.

Research (Voytek et. al., 2011) also suggests damage to the prefrontal cortex (affecting judgment and planning) and possibly the Broca's and Wernicke's areas as well (resulting in zombie's inability to communicate verbally). As you can imagine, these many neurological differences manifest themselves in the extreme behaviors exhibited by zombies in general (i.e., eating people) and our brother in particular (Luckily he's not at that stage yet).

So please: don’t stay out late at night, wear a lot of leather, stay alert, carry an aluminum baseball bat. But most importantly, stay informed. Additional resources include:

CDC Preparedness 101: Zombie Apocalypse
Voytek's Survival Tips
The Zombie Research Society
The Zombie Survival Guide

I'd like to leave you on a slightly different note.
CDHD is a serious disorder, one that hurts not only the people surrounding those infected, but the infected individuals as well. Though it is certainly important to contain the epidemic and keep from being eaten, it is equally important that we are sensitive to the plight of individual zombies and that we work to combat the misconceptions and stereotypes present in popular culture that dehumanize them.

It is true that WHAT YOU DON'T KNOW CAN EAT YOU, but it is also true that UNDEAD PEOPLE ARE PEOPLE TOO.

I love you all!
Ruth

(Also, thank you to Johnny for being a zombie, Adri for making Johnny a Zombie, and Richard for the emoticons :)

The Food Cycle

The Food Cycle

I am certain that you have all heard of this natural cycle by which various nutrients, calories and those toxic poisons which are essential for life in small doses endlessly cycle through plant and animal life.

But there is another, lesser known food cycle.
I call it, the Joseph Food Cycle.

The Joseph Food Cycle is driven by certain fundamental forces of nature, the first being a Small Budget. This factor limits and directs the Endless Hunger and Insatiable Appetite, which are the two motivating forces of the cycle, and determine its intensity and period. A predilection towards experimentation allows a intense variety and range of combinations within the cycle.

It begins with Grocery Shopping day. You have just gone to the store, and have purchased your food in bulk so as to maximize your pound per dollar ratio. Now that you are in possession of numerous calorie-laden goods, you think to yourself: I have tons of stuff. What do I want to eat first? The answer, of course, is obvious. TACOS!




You want to eat tacos. Thus begins the cycle.



You make enough taco meat for 5-8 days, and dice up several tomatoes, onions, and a head of lettuce. Then open a bottle of salsa, sour cream, package of tortillas, and shred a pound of sharp cheddar cheese. Add refried beans and season to taste, and viola:

Stage 1, the Taco Consumption, is now in motion.

You now eat tacos for 5-8 days. Lunch and dinner. Breakfast could have some cornflakes or toast (if you really want it), but for the most part, it's tacos and burritos there too.

After 5-8 days, you now have a problem.

No, you're not sick of tacos. That is a stupid idea.

The real problem is Oh dear, I'm running out of taco supplies, I should switch to something else to conserve some of the tacos for later when I'll crave them even more.

Enter Stage 2 of the food cycle.

Stage 2 is the Sandwich Stage. It begins when the loaf of bread is first cut, and ends when you run out of bread. The sandwich stage actually envelopes a plethora of varied and exotic foods. Each meal consists of two pieces of bread with a [sandwich filling] between them.

Sandwich fillings may include but are not limited to:
Ham
Egg
Lettuce
Peanut Butter (crunchy, of course)
Tomato
Cheese
Hummus (another name for bean paste)
Potatoes
Sauerkraut
Turkey
Onions
Bananas
Vegemite
Steak
Honey
Tuna
Bean Paste (another name for hummus)
Chicken
French Fries
Gravy
Cucumbers
Chocolate Chips
Mashed Potatoes
Bacon
Corned beef


As well as:
Any and all leftovers, side dishes, or edibles which can fit between two pieces of bread.

My personal favorite sandwiches include BLTs, PB&J, Ham sandwiches, Rubens, Turkey mashed potatoes and gravy. Banana with peanut butter and chocolate chips isn't bad either, if you want something sweet.

We don't even have time here to go into the vast realms of condiments such as Mayo, Ranch dressing, Mustard, salsa and the like. Nor, as much as I desire to, can I make room here for the volumes that should be written on the varieties of breads, both homemade and store-bought, toasted and soft, that could be described. Let me just say that experimentation and ingenuity provide endless opportunities for entertainment and discovery.

The Sandwich Stage ends for reasons similar to the Taco Consumption. You run out of bread, and need to make something else. (Running out of ingredients is a recurring pattern in almost every stage of the cycle).


Stage three: the Infinite Soup.

After two stages have depleted your initial grocery reserves, you can now see the cans stored in the back of your tiny cabinet. Pull them out, open them up, and pour them into a pot. Then throw any vegetables you have in as well. Toss some chunks of meat and some flavory plants in too, if you feel like it. Over time, whichever ingredient ends up being most prevalent in your soup gets to determine the soup's name. That's how you know whether you have potato soup, tomato soup, chicken noodle, or anything else. Oh! Make sure you use a lot of cilantro too. Cilantro is always good!

As you eat your soup, keep throwing in new ingredients, and adjust the seasoning whenever you feel like it. This is a great idea, because you can get dozens of flavors and textures out of the same (broad interpretation of "same") dish.

And if you feel like it, you can adopt the Ecuadorian tradition of adding olive oil, ketchup, mustard, and/or lemon juice to your soup once it's in your bowl. And more cilantro, of course.

Stage Four: The Baker aka Oh, I have an oven?

As novel as the infinite soup can be, you inevitably start to crave solids again after a while, and start to wish you had maybe saved some bread during the Sandwich Stage. Then it hits you. You have an oven! Bread is made out of flour, right? So you can make some bread, and then you'll have it. You pull out your grandma's amazing bread and roll recipes, and start mixing and kneading. You watch as the dough rises. And rises. And continues to rise. Then you start to worry. As the dough rises like the Russian proletariat to Karl Marx's Manifesto, you realize that your grandma was not cooking for one person. Reflecting on that realization, you wonder if she had ever cooked for one person in her life. Sure enough, a quick check of the recipe reveals a "yields 48 rolls". Well, you wanted bread, right?

You fill your small roll pan, and your roommate's small roll pan, and his bread pan, and then you freeze some of the dough, and put the rest of the dough in the fridge only to bake more when the pans are empty.

You then inhale fresh bread by the pound.

Stage Five: Leftovers, Scavenging and Barter System

The time to return to the grocery store for another shopping run has come. But you don't go. You only have a bike, and there's that ginormous hill in front of your apartment. Then, when it becomes absolutely necessary to go shopping again, you get a flat tire. And then it rains so hard that if you did go shopping, your ingredients would just skip the start of the cycle and enter the Infinite Soup stage.

So what do you eat in the meantime?

Answer: Anything you can find.

Now is where resourcefulness and ingenuity really pay off. First, you go for the leftovers. Search through the fridge, open tupperwares, and ignore expiration dates. That's just the start. Make sure you scrape off fuzzies, (unless you're trying to find some penicillin) and no matter how desperate you get, don't drink the fermented stuff (unless you want to go blind). Hit the food storage if things get really desperate. If that makes you feel guilty, just remember that food storage is for exactly this kind of emergency (i.e. the emergency of no food). Crackers, pretzels, and dry ramen noodles that you opened a week ago to get the seasoning packets will now form the majority of your nutrients. Make them last as long as you can. Mooch off of friends. Personal food reserves can be augmented by finding free food in various places, such as club-sponsored social events, random neighborhood children's birthday parties, and soup kitchens. Certain restaurants will secretly give- err- "throw" expired food away at closing time by putting it in your hands if you are friendly and look sufficiently emaciated. Alternatively, animals living in residential areas with a Bodos Bagels are surprisingly trusting (and plump), due to a steady diet of bagels people throw at them because they are "just too cute". You are not cute enough to have bagels thrown at you, but eating the animals themselves is almost as good. Squirrels, groundhogs, rabbits, ducks and geese are only a few of your friendly fuzzy neighborhood edibles.


Grocery Day

Hooray! You bought groceries! Restock those shelves! Fill up that fridge! Rebuild your fat reserves!

You now have groceries, and you know what that means. It's time for Tacos again!!




Welp, now you know how to feed yourself. Or maybe how you shouldn't, but already do.