Watching our morning dose of CNN, and the story was about Iraq. They were talking about ISIS' use of IED's and called them booby traps. Carolyn gave her best Bevis laugh and said "he said booby". Total respect. About 5 seconds later, they throw it over to a military analyst named Dicky Thompson. A look of acknowledgement was all that was needed.
Couple of show recommendations for you...first, check out "Nixon's The One". It is a Harry Sheerer thing and is six episodes that can be found on YouTube. Sheerer portrays Nixon from the early 70's Oval Office and uses the tapes as dialogue to recreate scenes from those days. True story, bizarre and darkly funny. Also have liked the first few episodes of "The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt", which is a 13 episode Tina Fey written comedy on Netflix. The premise is absolutely insane and had me hooked from the start. The the cast sells it masterfully. I also saw the movie Kingsmen recently and enjoyed it at every level. Mindless fun with a familiar premise that was interestingly executed.
We had a long discussion about eyebrows and why they are still on our face. Best that scientists can explain, they have remained while most of the rest of our facial hair has evolved away to help keep rain and sweat out of our eyes. Makes sense.
I can't remember who sent me this, but from CNN, here are 10 things Taiwan supposedly does better than anyone else. I will concede that three of them are true.
# 5 - Animated News. Here is the news announcing the birth of Kate Middleton's first child. They definitely get it right...YouTube Taiwan Animated News and you can get lost of hours
# 8 - National Health Coverage. Have gone on about how well it works and proves to me that the ACA doomsayers should shut up or put up (rooting for a Burwell obviously)
# 10 - Little dumplings. Do the words Din Tai Fung mean anything to you? Their xiaolongbao are truly magical, but have to say that no one else in town comes close to their quality. In fact, have been making the argument recently that Taiwanese food is some of the worst on the planet and have been daring people to prove me wrong. I will make the statement, and the immediate reaction by everyone is that "You're crazy...it's great", however, when pressed to prove it, they got nothing. They all (and I seriously mean all) say Din Tai Fung. Granted, unbelievably fantastic...but that is one place, and I can get them both in Seattle and Los Angeles. After that, it gets kinda quiet. There is a truck near their place that serves some good pancakes, or a place downtown (that has no address, or signage and is impossible to find, that serves a mean beef noodle soup. Invariably, these places are staffed by wife beater wearing, hairy mole sporting dudes cooking the food, and the seating area (if it even has one) is lit with naked fluorescent bulb lighting over particle board pressed tables that have years of oiliness embedded on them. Once they realize the flimsiness of that argument, they will speak of the myriad of wonderful Japanese places around town, to which I reply, "those are Japanese!" So yeah, Xiaolongbao at Din Tai Fung, then...? I am daring you to prove me wrong Hungry Girl.
So that is 3 out of 10...what about the other 7? Number one on this list, and truly, every other list about Taiwan/Taipei that can be found, are the Night Markets. Depends on your definition...have been fortunate to see the Christmas Markets in several European places last few years, and you could pretty much die happy in those. Hand made crafts, sweets that aren't filled exclusively with red beans, and microbrews and booze. Assuming we are throwing them out as they are not year round, I suppose that the ones here compare favorably to those around Asia. You can get a wider variety of cell phone skins, and questionably authentic athletic footwear here. They have a ton of that deep fried chicken/squid that people seem to think is great (not). You can also get what is arguably the best dish in the country...the Oyster omelet. I will argue with you for a while, cause the ones I've had (which is several) tasted bland and rubbery to me, but in the absence of anything else. I will grant that this blah and chewy is the best dish in the country.
Am going to lump 2 (Themed Restaurants), 6 (Mock Meat) and 9 (Hello Kitty Obsession) into the "Fine, but how pathetic that they are 3 of the top 10 things" category.
Number 3 is Free WiFi...if what they say is true, that foreign tourists can sign up for it upon arrival and use it for free while they stay here, that is pretty awesome.
Finally, numbers 4 (Chinese Artifacts) and 7 (Little League Baseball), seem a bit rigged. Do the Taiwanese have the best Chinese artifacts? Most Chinese seem to feel they do...that is because the Nationalists (depending on who is telling the story) rescued/stole them from the mainland in 1949. With the history of China during the Cultural Revolution and the destruction from things intellectual, and currently watching the scum ISIS animals destroying ancient history in Iraq these days, will lean to the "rescue" argument. They present them nicely at the National Palace Museum and it is a popular attraction for mainlanders to visit (I get stuck in traffic every day as empty tour buses by the dozens waiting for their guests line the streets on my afternoon route). But to tout that they "do them better" than anyone else? Not really a fair fight, but cannot dispute that.
As for Little League baseball...I finally got to the bottom of that recently. A fellow I know has a 10 year old boy that is in the local school system. He told me that when his kid was 8, he showed an aptitude towards baseball and was offered to go to an elementary school that focused on the game. While the formal education part is the same as other schools, the kids only play baseball for physical education. A couple hours a day, 5 days a week (and then weekend games). If you aren't in one of these schools, you really don't play baseball in any competitive sense. There is no comparable open Little League tryouts. So you then have these school teams where all the kids are groomed to be baseball players. I suppose it is not much different than club teams in the states, but the kids in the LLWS come from open recreational teams (which might be littered with the club kids), but isn't structured, government sponsored culling of the best talent at the youngest levels. And after the turn 13? Pretty much all over for the vast majority of the kids. So do they "do Little League" best?
I am working on my top 10 things that TW does best and hope to have that for you soon...
My Facebook complaint of the week is to the people that put their pet cause in nearly every posting. A FB acquaintance I have has a son that was diagnosed with Celiac disease a handful of years ago, and it has been a never ending stream of gluten free recipes and how brave the kid is in his never ending battle with the condition. I guess this is also related to my pet peeve of the parents that post constantly about their kids exploits, which always seem like they are looking for some sort of validation because of them, but the reason that this one bugged me this week was the following inquiry I saw yesterday...
"Is anyone selling Girl Scout cookies in Seattle or know someone who is? I would like to buy some gluten free cookies. Thanks!" Why did you have to add the gluten free thing? Wasn't that you were looking for the Do-Si-Dos and Thin Mints enough? Looking for that constant...what is it...sympathy has to be some kind of disorder. Not the mass murderer type of malady of course, but one that I think could easily be treated. I think that these are allowed to fester in women as their kind will give them what they are looking for (you are so brave/thank God the Scouts offer these/etc), while a dude that is a friend will call him out on it every time (Dude...that shirt makes you look like Bruce Jenner). Don't get me wrong, I love you women, but you know exactly what I'm talking about. You say that you are being a supportive friend, but know deep down that it isn't really helping that person (and is likely harming them). I know you can't be mean (like me), but let's just stop with the replies to start and go from there.
And I did receive a couple of replies to my inquiry last time about whether I was the narcissistic guy. Both (thankfully) said that I wasn't, but that I was "kind of a dick"/"bit of an asshole". Kind of/a bit? I will cop to being a total dick and a complete asshole.
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