One More Reason to Buy a Kindle

As many of my friends know, I covet the Amazon Kindle. It’s not that I don’t love actual paper books. Far from it — my ownership of books borders on the pathological. But I love the idea of buying books literally anywhere, anytime. And I love the idea of saving a bit of money. And I’m beginning to think I’d be better off buying a Kindle than buying another half-dozen or so bookshelves.

The only thing stopping me? The fact that instead of lowering the price, Amazon instead came out with a new, fancier model. Mind you, I did the math last week, and if I had enough self-discipline to stop buying books for a couple of months, I could afford a Kindle easily. Unfortunately, I have more willpower when it comes to food than books.

Yesterday, though, when getting my daily dose of webcomics, I found yet another compelling reason to own a Kindle. After reading this from xkcd (“a webcomic of romance, sarcasm, math, and language”), I may just have to bite the bullet and save up for one of my own:



(Click on the image to see the full-size version.)

I hadn’t thought about it before, but the Kindle probably is as close as I’ll ever get to owning the Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. That and a nice towel, and I’ll be all set.

In the meantime, I’ll keep looking at webcomics, since they’re free. If you’re a complete geek like me — the kind of geek who appreciates references to Hitchhiker’s Guide and enjoys the occasional Microsoft bashing — check out xkcd. You’ll be glad you did.

Website Explores “Deliciously Gross” Food: thisiswhyyourefat.com

Please note: What follows in this post is NSFL!

No, not “NSFW.” It’s totally safe for work. It’s “NSFL.” Not Safe for Lunch.

Some of the images that I’ve included (and definitely those I’ve linked to) may contain graphic scenes of food abuse. Don’t say you weren’t warned.

Generally, I don’t spend a lot of time reading the local newspaper. But while I’m not happy with the majority of their coverage, I do occasionally breeze through their website to check out local food news. While poking around this morning, I ran across the most wonderful website, entitled This Is Why You’re Fat.

Our local food reporter described it as “revolting… in a train-wreck, can’t-look-away way.” But really, it’s so much more than that. Billing itself as “where dreams become heart attacks,” it doesn’t really answer the question of why anyone is fat — mainly because most people wouldn’t eat the majority of these foods, and certainly not on a regular basis if they did. I looked through all of the entries, and just couldn’t help sharing. I found that the food pictured mostly falls into three categories: things you can’t believe a human would eat voluntarily, things that really aren’t so bad, and things you would only eat at the fairgrounds. (I know that last bit may not make sense if you’re not from around here. But southerners know that all bets are off at the fair, at least in terms of civilized eating.)

Granted, there are some really horrifying things shown — this website is not for the weak of heart (or stomach). People have done some really, truly evil things with food, including chocolate-covered bacon and hot dogs topped with macaroni and cheese. One of the most horrifying was the “Big Mac-Chicken” — a frightening Frankenstein of a sandwich, cobbled together by replacing the bread on a Big Mac with chicken patties from McChicken sandwiches. (Yes, sadly, you read that correctly.) The version shown on This Is Why You’re Fat is horrifying enough:

Picture © 2008, Grocery Eats

I’ve stuck with the tame version here. But if you need real carnage, check out the original article, complete with a picture of this monstrosity in its half-eaten form. If you dare.

On the other hand, there were a few things that didn’t sound half bad. Taking poutine and topping it with bacon? I’d totally do that. Chocolate covered cheesecake on a stick? Doesn’t sound like it would be horrible once in a blue moon, especially shared with someone while walking down the carnival midway. Bacon-flavored mayonnaise? Honestly, doesn’t sound so bad.

(I did begin to wonder what the fascination with bacon is, though. You will, too. Out of the 87 current entries, at least 25 use or misuse bacon. I say at least, because you just can’t tell from some of the pictures whether bacon is included or not.)

There were a few odd items that I didn’t realize would bother anyone. I’m not sure what’s exactly disturbing about welsh rarebit. And I thought apple pie topped with cheddar cheese was pretty common, although maybe not so much here in the south. King cake isn’t necessarily pretty, but totally traditional. Even the tongue-and-pastrami sandwich didn’t seem terribly outlandish, although admittedly not my cup of tea:

Picture © 2008, The Phenthouse

I think my ultimate favorite, though, was the Frito pie. Come on, if you’re from the south, you’ve probably had it before — Fritos topped with chili and cheese, amongst other things. There’s even a chain in East Tennessee, Petro’s, that sells them as its main offering. Generally, they’re not too bad, if somewhat unhealthy. But the reason this was my favorite was the picture, specifically because of how the Frito pie was assembled:

Picture © 2008, Drunk Brunch

Um, just so you know... I think you’re doing it wrong.

What I’ve shown here is only the tip of the disgusting culinary iceberg. Go see for yourself, and take some time to explore the links and see how some of these people explain their crimes against food. (Although I don’t believe there is any justification, at all, for a “Happy Meal Pizza.”)

Just PLEASE don’t go looking if you happen to be eating in front of your computer. Trust me on this one, y’all.

Blog — Version 2.0

You know how you keep thinking about how you need to start working on something, and you even have a few good ideas, but then you realize you really aren’t going to be able to concentrate until you get something else done that’s been bugging you, but then you realize that you don’t really know where to start on that either, and it’s very frustrating and doesn’t go well when you try to get started, and the whole thing starts giving you kind of a headache, and then you decide to just go play sudoku instead?

Oh. Just me, huh?

Anyway, I haven’t been so much intentionally not posting as spending way too much time trying to redesign the blog. (I heard that! I was not procrastinating. This time.) The old layout had really been bugging me, so much so that every time I even considered writing, I’d start thinking about how much I didn’t like it and how I really needed to fix it before I posted anything else.

So, after a lot of starting and stopping, several completely failed ideas, and quite a bit of time considering how badly I hate Blogger sometimes, I’ve finally done it.

So, loyal readers, let me know if you love it, hate it, didn’t notice, don’t care.... Seriously. I expect to hear from both of you.

And stop back in soon. I’m going to get back to work, I promise.