Chestnuts roasting on an open fire…

Last night a number of us (Abby, Andy, Jenny and Aaron, Tina, and Joel and Hannah) went to the holiday open house on Park Ave. All the little shops on Park Ave were giving away free food and holiday cheer. There were carolers and people in costume for the kids. But most importantly there were roasted chestnuts. All my life I’ve wanted to try them. I vividly remember the smell of them being cooked by vendors on street corners when my family used to go into Manhattan at Christmas time. But I’d never been able to try them. Last night I got my chance. $2.00 and a bunch of junior high level “nut” jokes later, I got my first taste of chestnuts. They were far softer and chewier than I expected (typically roast nuts are kinda crunchy), but I enjoyed them a lot.

lack of segue

George Harrison died yesterday. I knew he wasn’t doing to well but the news came somewhat as a shock. Two down, two to go; and why do I have the strange feeling that Ringo will survive them all? I wish I had a copy of “While my guitar gently weeps” at work.

in other news

Of course I know what all of you are thinking: “Screw this talk of holiday cheer and dead Beatles Matt! Where’s the latest makeover???!!!” Well, good reader, there are two today:

From Jenny:

click for a larger version

Jenny writes: Here is my suggestion for your makeover… A short sort of spikey cut. Keep the blond… but with some darker hightlights. My inspiration was British Ford model “Francis”. They say “He has a look that evokes a privileged British aristocrat from the 1930’s, yet at the same time he is totally modern.” So you could wear cool tweedy argyly things with a black trench coat over them. Prince William with an edge.

and the newly employed Cindy sent:

Cindy writes: Purge the hell out of your clothes. Get it down to 6 good pairs of pants and 10 shirts or so. Save a really nice suit. Get some really cool pants. But get rid of all the older stuff. It will be much easier to maintain, clean, and select what you are going to wear. I think you should focus in on J. Crew. You should go for a cool and adventuresome look. Get rid of anything that looks folksy. Also, try to strive for solid colors and don’t purchase prints anymore.

umm, Cindy, it’s going to take more than a hair cut to pull off that look…

Keep those pictures comin’

GGGGOOOOOOOO CINDY!

Rock on! Cindy has a job!

I always wanted cinnamon buns for hair

Here’s Joel’s entry for my new look… umm… uhhh…. I don’t think this is going to be it unless I go through some major changes or get stuck in a space melodrama. To quote my friend Jai, perhaps the best word for this is Sab-o-tage. Keep the love and new looks comin’! More info on the Matt 2002 look is located below. I’d like to add one more request for anyone sending in a new entry. Could you write a short bit of text (a sentence or two) describing how you came up with the idea for the look or why I should adopt it. You know, so we can understand how your twisted… umm… I mean creative minds work. ;-)

Audience Participation: Design my 2002 look!

I’ve teased about this for a while, now here it is: As 2002 approaches I find myself unsure of what I should do with my “do.” My hair is in its usual floppy, a little longer than it should be, state. I’ve had the same glasses for over two years. For example, here are some examples of old looks I’ve had:

I need a change, to update my image, and I need ideas. That’s where you come in. I’m looking for suggestions from my vast audience. How do you do this you ask? Have some fun with PhotoShop!

Click for a Matt with a lot less hair ready to edit :-)

I’ll provide two pictures, one of me with hair and glasses (to the right) one without (to get to that one click on the picture to the right… I’m not masochistic enough to publish it directly on the page). Download the pictures and go to town. Change the hair, the glasses, throw it on a body with differnt cloths. Then e-mail the results to me. The responses will displayed right here on my blog. And who knows, the best one might become my new look for 2002 (premiering on or about Jan 1). So have fun and get creative (or get serious and help me figure out what to do with my hair ’cause I’m looking for good ideas too!)

traffic and foul water fowl

I’m back in Rochester after a 10-hour drive. The trip from LI to Rah-cha-cha usual takes between 6 (if I push the limit and don’t stop) and 7 hours. Uggg. I was out of the car for maybe 15 minutes max during the trip. Traffic ground to a dead stop at least 7 times during the trip. I sat, not moving, on highways in three states. I realize that more people were driving this year due to the general discomfort with flying. But is it too much to ask that they would at least drive well? I passed 15 accidents over the course of the drive (often the reason that I was moving at 30 miles an hour for most of the trip). I hope Christmas isn’t this bad.

Ok, as for the foul fowl… I got into a fight with a swan while deep-frying the turkey for Thanksgiving. Seriously… My family’s home on LI is located on a canal and we often get visitors in the form of ducks, Canadian geese and swans. Halfway through the cooking of the turkey, a pair of swans came up our boat ramp apparently to say “hi” and eat some grass. Or so I thought. I would discover one’s really mission was far more devious.

I was alone near the fryer, preppin’ some sweet potatoes fries, when I noticed the larger swan starting to move towards the deep fryer. At first I assumed he was just going to munch on the grass in front of him. But he didn’t stop at the lawn. He kept going, getting closer and closer to the fryer. Suddenly I realized that he was making a run at the turkey and stepped between him and the fryer. The swan stopped less than two feet away from me for a moment. Then it moved to flank me to my right. I stepped to counter. The swan paused, sized me up, and then made a move to my left. I countered again and tried to shoo it away. With that the swan puffed itself up, extending its neck and flexed its wings. I suddenly realized how big a swan could get. “Hiss!” said the swan, which translated roughly as “I want some deep-fried goodness! Get outta my way.” Since “Shoo swan” wasn’t working, I shrugged and hissed right back saying “Silly Swan, turkey’s for people. Look, I’m deep-frying a distant relative of yours. You don’t want any of this.” The swan didn’t budge. If the bird actually made it to the fryer (which was less than three feet away from the stand off) it could be burned by the flame, or worse knock over the pot, ruin the turkey and mostly be killed by the 325 degree oil. I didn’t want to spend my Thanksgiving disposing of a dead swan. But there was no way I’d risk rushing this bird and possibly knock over the turkey in the ensuing melee. Finally, after a tense minute the swan retreated back to the ramp.

Situation averted, I turned to head to the back door of our house to call one of my brothers and tell what had happened. No sooner than I turned my back to walk away, the swan made another run at the pot. For the ten minutes I was held hostage by a swan. I couldn’t leave the pot unguarded; I couldn’t get help. Finally guests started to arrive and the swan retreated into the canal. He did fire off a final hiss of “you beat me this time Bernius, but there will be another day. I’ll get you my pretty and your deep-fried goodness too…”

The turkey, btw, was just about perfect. And there was much rejoicing. I think I’ll have to have people over again, to let them taste the difference.