I put ketchup on my ketchup

Julie pulled through last night and was the coolest grandmother ever.

She brought me cookies (I'm a slave to them) and a "I Put Ketchup on My Ketchup" T-shirt.  Because I have an unhealthy affinity towards ketchup.

It was really good to see a couple of my classmates.  I get really bummed and my brain gets really mushy during the summer when I don't get to see my fellow foodies, who, I am convinced, are among the most interesting and ambitious groups of students within the college.  We all love everything food: food industry, food engineering, processing, manipulating, making/brewing, eating, drinking, foreign, unique, groundbreaking, preservation, microbio, etc.  When I don't get to see and interact with these people everyday, I become lost and often feel ridiculous for being a food nerd.  That's why seeing Dan and Julie gets me all giddy with excitement!

We drank, we talked, we laughed.  Dan told Wes and I, sparing a lot of the gory details I think, about his two months on the kill-floor of a USDA slaughter house.  First they inspect the head and all the lymph nodes within in.  Then they cut out the tongue and hang the head, tongue, and tail on respective hooks to be processed further.  After the head, he moved 'up' to heart, lungs and liver.  Lungs and heart are inspected to make sure there are abnormalities.  Then the lymph nodes and bile ducts (for parasites) on the liver are inspected, followed by a superficial inspection of the outside of the liver (Dan said he inspected livers for an unnecessary-four-hours one day).  From there, the carcass (clean of hair, skin and intestines) gets cut in half by guys with saws, the spinal cord is removed, the 'meat' superficially inspected one-last time, and stamped with a pass for fail.  I forgot to ask, but I believe they check all the lymph nodes of the animal to make sure that they aren't enlarged.  When you go to the doctors and they feel the side of neck right below the jaw bone and ears, they are checking for enlarged lymph nodes that suggest in increase in white blood cell count with is usually an effect of being ill.  So they are, I think, checking all the lymph nodes of the cattle to make sure that that particular animal hadn't been ill before slaughter, in which case, I assume, the carcass is no good.  Unfortunately for Dan, the whole experienced was unorganized and not set-up well and he decided he'd learn everything he could within 8 weeks.  Fortunately for me, that means he's back at the Porter House on Thursday nights.  EEEEEEE!!!

I came to the realization yesterday (not to change the subject or anything!) that since I've gotten rid of my Scion xA and lost my iPod (worse than losing a friend), I haven't been listening to music.  I still hear it, but I don't listen to it.  My Volkswagen, although I do love it, does not have either an auxiliary jack nor a tape deck, which means even if I hadn't lost my iPod, my music listening would have severely suffered... losing my iPod only increased my non-listening time exponentially.  I'm not like Wesley who needs to find a new band every other week to listen through non-stop until it becomes old and then move on.  I enjoy discovering or being steered towards bands, but my favorite bands are the ones that I've been listening to since late middle school, early high school.  Even though I am a different person now than I was then, these are the bands that I will never grow tired of.  I tend to revert back to them when I haven't been listening to anything new and good.  The unfortunate thing about music these days is that everyone is sooooo snobby about what they listen too and are so closed minded to everything else, that it is impossible to have discussions about music anymore... they always turn into arguments, or one person trying to defend what they listen to because the other person has poo-pooed it. 

Music is like wine:  there are experts on it, but the only way to know what you like and what tastes/sounds good to you is to try it for yourself and make your own judgement after you have done so.  Anywho, here they are... the few but potent that I always return to:

Incubus

     - A band that has been around for a looooong time that has found that perfect balance between songs that are radio-friendly but that share the same album as the heavy, vulgar, non-commercial tunes.  They are forever advancing and growing in their sound.  I have seen them play twice and both times were AH-MAY-ZING

Opeth

     - A swedish melodic metal band introduced to me by my high school boyfriend, Greg.  On a level of skill, technicality and the ability to transition from acoustic to heavy brilliantly, there is no better band.  Inspired by 70's and progressive music but sticks to their metal roots.  Delivers both songs that invite you head-bang and melodies that rip your heart out.  Also have been around for a long time.  I've seen them perform twice and yes, I have the Opeth "O" tattoo.

Ben Folds 

     - My parents letting me quit my piano lessons when I was 6 is the only thing I regret.  I wish I'd kept with it.  I picked it up again in my senior year of high school and self-taught some of it, but going to college shat on that ambition.  Thus, I have Mr. Folds.  A hipper, less gay, more angry Elton John.  I adore Ben because he's weird looking, awkward and hasn't always had it easy but can make the best of all those situations.  I like Ben Folds Five, but I feel that he was being  held back by has 'band-mates.'  Saw him at Millersville University a couple of years back... plan on seeing him in Philly in September.

Anathema

     -  Introduced to me from my end-of-high-school/beginning-of-college boyfriend, Steve.  Just the number of albums and songs that this band has available is slightly intimidating, any song from any album that you click on will be good.  Some of them are great, none of them are bad.  Another band that has made leaps and bounds in their sound over the past decade or more.  They have become so refined and effortless, I'm not sure they're still considered metal.  This band puts out songs that I can put on repeat for hours and not get bored of.

Alkaline Trio

     -  Introduced to me by my tenth grade crush, Matt.  Low on my list of skill and technicality, high on my list of entertainment value.  Short, fast, often dirty sounding songs that make the hidden punk in me happy.

Jason Becker

     -  Another musician that I got from Steve.  This man was not only brilliant when it came to music (he's labeled as "neo-classical metal guitarist"), but his story is tragic.  He hadn't yet reached the zenith of his career when he was diagnosed with Lou Gehrig's Disease and was not able to play guitar by the end of year.  He was 20 years old at the time (1990) and was given three years to live.  He's still alive today and is completely paralyzed.  He can move only his eyes.  He speaks with eye movements and records music using a program in which eye movements are notes, signs, etc.  He is a brilliant man.

There is more I wanted to add to this list, but I'm going kayaking right now because I've been neglecting my boat.  I'm putting the list on hold for now.