Monday, April 20, 2009

A Friend of the Poo--guest blog blurb

I just added a new feature to a View from the Poo, called, A friend of the Poo. We will feature guest readers' blurbs on a weekly basis. So, if you're interested, and have written some good stuff, please submit a piece of your poo or commentary to me.

Now, sit back, read, enjoy, rejoice and empathize from a fellow blog reader...

We went to the Landmark and saw "State of Play" and I swear, I could write a guest post on your blog about the experience. The man sitting next to me actually burped out loud at least 5 if not more times, in addition to sucking popcorn out of his teeth, clearing his throat, moving around in his seat and hitting my leg with his foot. (Those very comfortable and roomy seats were not enough for this man, he needed to invade my space as well.) Oddly enough, I believe he was at the movie with a woman (he spoke during the movie several times to her) and I think they were married. I thought that the Landmark would be too high-end for this kind of riffraff, but I guess not. I have very acute hearing so all of the noise that this man made during the movie was very frustrating, to say the least. I wanted to say something to him, but what do you say to a middle-aged man who has no manners? I didn't want to cause a commotion in the theater or get Kenny involved, either. SIGH. I was really waiting for him to lift his leg and let out a really loud, smelly fart!!!!

Thursday, April 16, 2009

Snot Shields

I remember my grandfather sitting on the black, vinyl recliner in my dining room, reading his Newsday newspaper, the TV on, spewing the news for many hot New York Sunday afternoons. I think all of us have those grandfatherely memories like some sort of sick Matrix memory installed from the evil bots. My grandfather is not alive these days because of the Matrix.

He was old then, his hair grey and his ears, large and bent. Why is it that old white men get huge ears when they grow older? Our noses too! During those hot summer afternoons when he sat and read for hours, he would pick his nose. Maybe he thought I couldn't see him behind the newspaper? Now, as a 40 year man, I too pick my nose. I do this in private. We all do, right? But what is it about getting older that we pick our noses more and more? For me, it's an inverse relationship between that and farting. I actually fart less but I have no one to vouch for that except me and would you trust a nice nose picker like me? If you fart a lot, then, the law states, you don't pick you nose that often. Please observe your farting and nose picking habits, kind reader and you'll see why this is a law!

In New York, when the summer is hot and you feel like you're in a pizza oven, you breathe in lots of dirty, humid air. As a result, you get these enormous Snot Shields. They must be one inch in diameter!! You could defend your family with these green sticky shields. En garde you evil bots!

In Los Angeles, it's rare to have such girth and weight to your snot but on occasion, you can pull one out, full of nose hair like one of those rubber cement balls you made as a kid--and dropped on the floor--picking up dust and dirt.

These days my hair line is receding making my face look long and oval like a horse. As the law of inverse relationship states, when your hair recedes your nose hair grows...my nose hairs are getting longer! Sometimes those Snot Shields grab nose hairs! They're like sharp swords! En garde you evil bots.

I really wished that my grandfather shared with me the secrets of snot. All those Sundays he sat and read, picking away at his bulbous nose, when he could have been instructing me on Snot Shields.

Summer is approaching fast and that means snot. So, when you're reading the Sunday paper on a hot, summer afternoon, and you're lazily digging for gold, pick up the phone and call your grandfather and ask him. Be sure to tell him that you love him and ask him about his fights against the evil bots.

Monday, April 13, 2009

Korean Waffles--total munchie food

Over the past weekend I made Suwon style Korean Waffles. These were as good, if not, better than the waffles you get at the food court next to the Coffee Bean in HomePlus. Not that those are bad. Suwon sells these waffles in every large department store, with some exceptions. I know this because I've spent days riding my bicycle, drinking coffee and eating 500 waffles in six months.

Korean waffles are: large, round and hot, spread with some whipped cream on one side, while the other, clover honey is drizzled down from some middle aged ajuma (older lady) wearing a chef's white uniform. After the condiments are added, the waffle is served, folded in half. All for a buck ($1). Cheap and good. This is total munchie food. Can you imagine? Yum!

On Saturday I bought some fresh heavy cream, whipped it up, added some sugar, vanilla and a teaspoon of dark rum, bought some Trader Joe's wheat-free waffles, and for Palmer style variation, added some maple syrup. Instead of serving the waffles folded, I cut them into quarters. You can use honey or maple syrup; it's up to you. Delicious.

Thursday, April 9, 2009

Maple Bear Suwon--from bad to worse?

I hear through the grape vine that Maple Bear in Suwon is turning into a real Korean hogwan by churning out teachers. Part of the bad rap Korea gets from many ex-pats is that the school owners are dishonest and work you like dogs. This is true. If you are thinking about going to teach there or in Japan, do your research! Before I left L.A. I did my research and choose Maple Bear but I learned that you never really get the full cover of things until you live and work there.

Now my sources say there are more parent-teacher meetings and more bull shit then ever at Suwon's Maple Bear. Though the curriculum is well developed and good for incorporating ideas/projects into your own lesson plans, it is too difficult and unreasonable to implement sequentially due to the huge differences in the English speaking abilities of the kids and the school's rigid insistence of following the curriculum as outlined exactly in the books.

When I was there, parents got mad and complained incessantly to the Director if your class was not in sync with the curriculum and the other kinder classes taught by other ESL teachers. Now, the Korean Director will get mad if you jump forward in the curriculum from the books they provide. If you ever taught ESL, you would understand that native 3rd graders in the States have a huge language base than 3rd or even 5th graders in Korea. It is unreasonable to use the vast curriculum they developed in the West to teach the kids in the East at the same pace and level the school dictates. It sounds like things in Suwon are more uncomfortable than ever.

About seven months ago, before I left, they recruited a new male teacher who found out about Maple Bear from one of the other teacher's blog. I am still trying to figure out if he didn't ask her right questions or she really PR'd him into thinking it was an excellent hogwan for the $300 referral fee. Later, I heard it was $100. In any case, if you compare Suwon's Maple Bear with other hogwans, it's pretty good. The owner is accommodating and from what I've experienced, a good person. Whatever rules and regulations that come down the pipe line from Canada and the new director, however, must be hell.

Wednesday, April 8, 2009

You determine your time

Yes, we determine how we spend our time on this here planet. My theory is: if you have money, lots of it, you spend less time on the mundane, and more on the meat. I do not mean to belittle the chores of life, which for me are sometimes nice and relaxing, but if I had a personal cook I took everywhere, like Tim Barrack, a live-in maid like my high school friend, Seth Kupchick, or a nanny or two like the rich do, time would open up for me and bleed slowly like an overdose on hemoglobin!

I am waiting for that day when laundry and dishes is done by my illegal Oaxacan maid; my food is cooked to exact nutritional standards by my on-board traveling CIA chef, and my shopping done by my personal assistant slave.

Last night I waited 40 minutes to be seated at Fritto Misto in Santa Monica. It's a yuppie style restaurant over on Colorado Ave and 6th that serves up California Italian cuisine. It was 8pm on a Tuesday night and the line was deep!! Our chances of finding a comparable restaurant at 8:30pm in L.A. was not too good; these west coast types get scared about having fun past 7pm. When there's a line, this usually stops me but it was a special night which didn't stop any of us Westsiders from queuing up for 40 minutes for a plate of $14.50 pasta. If I had lots of money, I would have eaten at a really expensive restaurant where they have "stand-ins" for those queing up outside.

If I was an android I would not require food or sleep and other secondary things like pooing. This blog is about poo so it makes sense to talk about the benefits of not pooing. Think about all that time we spend eating and pooing and sleeping. That's like half our lives! I know if we lived on Mars, those problems would be solved.

If we didn't eat, we wouldn't have all those pig farms in North Carolina pooing up the riverbeds. We would have enough switchgrass to grow in the fields to burn in our ethanol engines, we wouldn't need $1,200 spring mattresses to sleep or work eight hour days...we could spend more time fucking too. We can't become androids but we can determine how we spend our time.

Tuesday, April 7, 2009

The Big Blue Bus...is calling us...

Palmer here, reporting from the stinkin bowls of the big blue bus. Last night, I almost went postal with the stench, the stop and go, and the noise of our most beloved and infamous big blue bus, the one immortalized by jim morrision of the doors. And a side note here, Jim Morrison and the Doors are over played and over rated! If “Jim” (using quotes because our culture makes him bigger than he really was) could only could see the improvements! The big blue bus...is calling us...

Last night, Palmer in the Poo was close to making a huge scene; an ugly embarrassing roar of a fuss...on the bus. You know the kind, when you’re tired and frustrated and you yell at the uneducated and uninspired clerk at the 99 cent store—we know you Westsiders have nothing else to do, so, own up to it! Fools!

I’m sitting there, hot and sweaty next to the window. The bus is filling up and the air is dead. Every minute or so, a disgusting smell waifs across my left side reeking of halitosis and some other undefined funk. Thankfully the air circulates when we’re in motion but not enough for us to alleviate our feelings of being like roast chicken in the metal oven of the old number 12.

Pretty soon I spot trouble: an old lady of about 70 slowly walking by and seats herself across from me. The Chinese lady next to me is eyes closed and meditating. Om! Within a minute the old lady takes out her 90’s style slim cell phone and calls someone. You know what, blog readers? Every day I fantasize about hearing an elaborate and articulate phone discussion of anything, but instead, I always get the opposite: a hard of hearing old bitty yelling into her cell phone at a pronouncedly slow and slurred rate about something mundane. It’s excruciating! It’s painful, like being constipated and sitting on the toilet for twenty minutes; you legs fall asleep and you sit there, squeezing and squeezing until your eyelids become swollen and sweat forms on your chest. It’s so hot in that damn stall, that you have to open up your dress shirt and take deep, slow yoga breathes just to pinch that puppy out! Yows-za!

Everyone on the bus just starred at the old bitty. I was already plugged into the radio and my ear drums bled. The Chinese lady next to me concentrated w/ some Zen like composure while the stench, the stop and go and the noise ebbed and flowed like blood in a syringe left to drip on the sidewalks of Skid Row. It’s times like these when I yearn for the buses of Korea! So fast and efficient and clean and quiet. They are a quantum leap from the big blue bus jim morrision sang about stoned out of his mind forty years ago. Maybe if I lit up a big fat one, and passed it around, my bus ride improve. Until next time, this is the view from the poo, riding north to UCLA.