A place called B.L.O.G.

So, I stopped at Bruegger’s this morning and I’m like, “I’ll have an asiago parmesan bagel with plain cream cheese,” and the dude’s like “Do you want round or square?” And I’m like “What?” And he’s like “You can get a round one or a square one.” And I’m like “Square bagels? Listen, just back off, mister, I don’t go in for any of this crazy square bagel nonsense.” And he’s like “Whoah, man, sorry, forget I said anything,” and I’m like “You’d better be sorry, pal, because I don’t appreciate the insinuation that I’d go around eating some kind of square bagel.” And then the other guy’s like “Do you want some coffee with that?” and I’m like “Fuck yeah!”

OK, well, that wasn’t exactly how it happened. But it was something like that.

Square bagels. The bastard of the bagel world.

It’s that time again, people. “Holiday shopping season,” I call it. You might also call it “the month when suckers spend all their money on crap” or “Capitalism Fest” or “The only reason Sears didn’t go bankrupt 20 years ago.” Whatever you call it, it’s going to be crazy. And like every year, people from coast to coast (and I guess in Hawaii, too, probably) are out searching for the year’s hottest holiday gifts. Often it’s the popular new toy or the new DVD box set or the cutting-edge electronic gadget. Well, I’ll save you the trouble of trying to figure it all out and run down for you the list of this year’s truly HOT Christmas gifts. Here they are:

x Hot coals

x A mug of burning diesel fuel

x A space heater with a faulty cord

x Containers of superheated hydrogen

x A flaming iPod

x Antifreeze straight from a running car

x Molten lava

x A one-way ticket to hell

x An oven mitt that’s just been used to take a pan of lasagna from an oven

So, go forth and brighten the Christmases of your friends and family with these gifts that are sure to warm the heart. You’re welcome!

From an AP article I saw today:

This week, Clark, Texas, morphed into DISH in exchange for a decade of free satellite television from the DISH Network for the town’s 55 homes. Residents in Santa, Idaho, meanwhile, are weighing the pros and cons of changing to Secretsanta.com, Idaho.

Across the nation, small communities are being courted by large corporations who say renaming a town provides a marketing buzz that can’t be bought in television ads. Though some worry about corporate America’s increasing influence in local government, many towns seem eager to accept.

OK, so maybe this is another fish-in-a-barrel rant from me, but does it not bother anybody else the extent to which corporations are going to advertise their crap? We long ago resigned ourselves to the fact that our freeways and our bathroom walls and any other square inch of Earth that people might glance at for a few seconds has been surrendered to advertising, but it’s never enough. Now this crap is creeping into public schools and even the names of cities. I don’t know the actual statistic, but I think I read that the average American is exposed to 1.54 quadrillion advertising images by the time he or she is six days old. Something like that. Well, that’s just crazy. Advertising is out of control and it only serves to make this unsustainable, consumption-crazy world of ours even unsustainable-er and consumption-crazier. Enough!

In protest, I am cancelling the vacation I had planned to Clark, Texas. Hear that, members of the Clark City Council? You just threw away 30 WHOLE TOURISM DOLLARS. What do you think of your little plan now?

I was in the grocery store the other day and I was unloading my cart onto the conveyor belt when it struck me: This might be the most impressive grocery trip ever.

You know what I mean. When you go up to the clerk, you look at the items you’ve selected and wonder if your good taste and adherence to healthy eating habits will impress the person ringing up your purchases. There are days when I buy, like, some frozen pizzas and some pop and some potato chips and I think, "Dang, this clerk is going to think I’m some kind of slob. I wish I’d bought some broccoli to even this thing out." Then there are times when I’m in the middle of shopping and I think things are going OK from the clerk-impressing standpoint. That is, of course, because you always do produce first. I get halfway through my shopping and I glance into the cart and see a bunch of fresh fruits and vegetables, supplemented at that point by some bread and some canned veggies and perhaps some olives (I never leave a grocery store without buying olives; it’s just a thing of mine), and I think, "This is shaping up pretty good. The clerk is going to think I’m a pretty good guy." But then I hit the frozen-food and snack-food aisles, and soon I’m standing at the belt unloading popsicles and frozen garlic bread and cookies and things, and I realize that I’ve blown it. The junk cancels out the good stuff.

Well, the other day, I finally did it. I made it through a shopping trip without cancelling out the wise eating choices. I had some organic salad greens, some apples and bananas, a bunch of canned vegetables and tomatoes, some pasta, some fruit juice (100 percent all the way, baby), some fresh veggies, some olives, and a few other odds and ends, none of which were an embarrassment at all. Not a Pop-Tart or package of macaroni and cheese in sight.

So, I stood there, watching the clerk as she rang up my purchases with a completely bored look on her face, waiting for her eyes to meet mine with some kind of meaningful "You sure know how to shop!" glance, but alas, nothing. She finished scanning the stuff and announced "$47.09" just like she would for any ice-cream-and-Doritos-buying schlub. I swiped my credit card and proceeded to bag up my healthful groceries, my deflated body language certainly giving away my disppointment at her failure to acknowledge my brilliant shopping trip.

Sometimes I wonder if I think about this kind of stuff too much.

Three weeks ago, I presented to all of you my dream. It was a dream involving muffins — and really, isn’t that the best kind of dream? — but there was more to it than just muffins. There were also baskets. And peace and love. What do you get when you combine peace, love, muffins and baskets? Muffin triumph.

I set out to change the world by giving out baskets of muffins. I decided to start with 10 baskets and a buttload of muffin mix — the “changing the world through muffins” starter kit, if you will. And today, I can report that Phase One is complete. The basket supply has been exhausted. Each of those 10 magical vessels has been transformed into a gesture of neighborliness, kindness, appreciation, or all of the above, and delivered to a human being. A human being who, like all of us, carries some kind of emotional scarring, brokenness, deep-seated pain, guilt, or sadness. These things make it a challenge for us to fulfill our potential for greatness on this Earth. Can something as simple as a basket of muffins help to heal some of these wounds and maybe nudge a person a little farther along the path to wholeness and serenity? Perhaps. Can’t hurt, anyway.

So, the 10 baskets have been exhausted, and many of you reading this are among those who have shared in the muffiny goodness. I’ve gone through 13 packages of chocolate-chip muffins, 6 packages of lemon poppyseed, two packages of “three berry” and one large package of blueberry muffins during my pursuit of this noble goal. I have stirred a grand total of 9 cups of water and one cup of milk into the various mixes and baked them for the approximate cumulative total of 216 minutes. I’ve washed my little muffin pans 23 times using approximately 2/3 of a cup of Ajax Lemon Fresh dish soap.

I hope the muffin project has been as inspiring to you as it has been to me. Even if I have converted just one of you into a disciple of Muffinology (as I call it), I feel like Muffin Quest ‘05 has been a success.

The other day I bought a pizza. The package said “Naturally Rising Crust.” That got me wondering: What would an unnaturally rising crust be like?

I can see it now. “New, Totino’s unnaturally rising pizza! We use strange and otherworldly witchcraft, the kind that poisons the souls of mortal beings, to produce a light and fluffy crust! We tamper with the laws of nature to bring you pizza perfection every time!”

I can see a group of naive teenagers recklessly purchasing such a pizza and conspiring to cook it while the adults are in bed. They light a bunch of candles and a hush falls over them as one begins to peel back the plastic wrapper. Just then, a thunderclap rings through the air and rain begans to pound on the windowpane. Outside, the silhouette of a dead tree is illuminated by a lightning flash. As they begin to slide the pizza into the oven, a crusty old man (perhaps with a glass eye and a cane) staggers into the room, scowling and pointing at the pizza. “That pizza isn’t right! You kids don’t know what you’re messing around with!” he croaks. “The way that crust rises … it’s not NATURAL!”

But of course they ignore the old man’s warnings and cook the pizza anyway. As they sit around the table enjoying the thrill of this dangerous pizza and its perfect crust, they feel on top of the world. But by morning, strange things begin to happen to them. Objects around them begin to move of their own accord. One of the teenagers breaks out in boils, and another starts having strange visions of a river of blood and a robed man in black who brings naught but despair on the lives of all he meets. And before long, they are all in the grip of madness, MADNESS, I TELL YOU!

Anyway, the naturally rising crust was pretty good.

I like to be responsive. I figure it’s the least I can do. I certainly don’t want to be an unresponsive person. You know the type: Ask them questions all day long, and they’ll just sit there, staring off into space, acting as if you aren’t even there. I tell you, I’m never going back to that wax museum.

But me, I’m responsive. Ask me anything, and I’ll answer. In fact, I’m taking it to a new level. I’m going to answer your questions before you ask them. That’s how important responsiveness is to me.

Q. If you could add several holidays to the calendar each year, what would they be?

A. Well, first off, I think that we need more excuses for old guys to do 21-gun salutes. Veterans Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day and veterans’ funerals just aren’t enough. So I’d add "Remembering Fighting Military Dead People Day." Let’s make it February 3. That way they’ll have to do it in the cold. Secondly, I think there should be more love holidays. We’ve got Valentine’s Day and the card-company-created Sweetest Day, which never really caught on. But people shouldn’t have to buy cards (or presents of any kind) for this holiday. I think we should keep it simple and just make it "Let’s Have Some Sex" day. There’s a holiday everybody can get behind. And finally, I like the idea of All Saints Day, which is today, but I think it’s a bit overwhelming. As I sat today trying to honor each saint individually, I found it hard to give each of them the attention they deserve. So I propose that we divide it into two annual "50 Percent Of Saints" days.

Q. Are all your answers going to be that long? I’m already bored.

A. No.

Q. Thanks.

A. That’s not a question.

Q. Oh. Sorry.

A. Also not a question.

Q. Fine. Here’s a question: Have you had any brilliant ideas this week?

A. Why, yes, I have. I noticed when shopping for pumpkins that every one has one flat, dirty side. I thought it sure would be nice if the gourd industry could provide us with uniformly round, smooth pumpkins. But it’s so hard because one side of the damned thing has to be on the ground while it’s growing. As someone who tried to grow pumpkins once, I know it’s hard to get them propped upright so the bottom will be the flat part. The dang things can break right off the vine if you’re not careful. So, I suggest that NASA begin a "Pumpkins In Space" program, wherein pumpkins could be grown in a gravity-free environment, floating gently and growing into a perfect sphere without any interference from the hard ground.

Q. OK, last question. Where can I get a good falafel sandwich around here?

A. Ooh, that’s an easy one. There’s a good Middle Eastern deli right across the street from me. It’s called Abu Nader. Right at Como and Raymond in St. Paul. Tell them Dylan sent you and you’ll get a free confused stare, courtesy of the cashier.