Rolling Overcompensation

Size matters. Not to me, and in the scheme of thing I believe not to most people but to some it truly does. I think it’s a matter of perspective. Guys seem to think if their love muscle doesn’t measure up to the previous lover of the one they fancy they are somehow less of a man. Personally I have much more faith in women in general to be less superficial and caring more about character than (ahem)…membership. Not that there aren’t some women whose preference is a larger waving male, but for the most part its how you use a tool, not how big it is. You can’t do precision work with a sledgehammer! But men have been waving their flag poles for years in an attempt to establish dominance. But how is a dude to know if his size is above average unless he is able to study other dudes? Some try sneaking a peek while at the urinal but that seems kind of….inappropriate! So how do those males ensure they are of sizeable content without seeming less male-ish? They don’t. They overcompensate just to be sure.
How did The Existential Baker get on this particular tangent? Certainly not watching cupcakes rise in the oven, or meringues forming stiff peaks. No, its because of what I saw on the road today. I live in the area of the country effected by Hurricane Sandy, and everyone around here has Sandy envy. Not envy, that was a cheap shot for a laugh, Sandy Paranoia. Well there’s another storm a brewin in the area and it promises tpo be a whopper. (I know, more cheap laughs) People are loading up with gas, the supermarkets are jammed packed with doomsayers with cart full of bread, water, and milk, and the overcompensaters of the road are all out showing off their much larger vehicles. Everywhere you look, Hummers, 4×4’s, Rams, pick ups with four huge tires, pick ups with 6 huge tires and the worst culprit, the pick ups with plow extensions. That’s right, extensions. Almost crude and lewd letting their plows hang out for all to see with nary a flake of snow anywhere. Typical of a show off to fly their plows all over town sso everyone can view the sharp strong metal that in the name of chivalry will remove all the snow from the ladies path and shove it in a corner.
I guess what I’m trying to say is I have been around a pretty long time, made my share of mistakes, but I never looked at having a relationship be considered a conquest, even if it was a short lived one time experience. If I need to show off I show off how smart and compassionate I am. Relationships are all worthy of respect and there is no need to shove your plow in anyone’s face. If you need make an impression on your partner your partner do it with care and compassion. It won’t leave any markings to call your own, but it will be a solid foundation none the less. And that’s no small thing!!…………….PEACE

Cosmo, Lifescaper of the planet Earth

Quick update… The God Cosmo got pissed off and threw a meteor at The Garden Earth because his dinosaurs were fornicating openly and killing everything in sight. The pending explosion destroyed his garden and now he has to go in front of the Board Of Co-operative Gods and Godesses and beg them to allow him another chance at growing life on his planet. This is what went down…..

Denial is not yet just a river in Egypt. A deep sadness overtook the creator of the dinosaur. Still smoldering and becoming increasingly covered in dust Cosmo reflected on his once thriving lizard kingdom. Had they not been so enormous he mused, perhaps things would have been different. He wanted to have a way to remember the jumbo Jurassic relics . After some time many of the hearty vegetation had once again begun to sprout, rising up from the ashes. It seemed as though everything reminded him of his creatures. “I shall name this period of existence the cretaceous period in honor of my creatures. In order that no one, especially me, ever forget their magnifigance I shall create a living memorial. With that Cosmo placed very colorful vegetation he called flowers everywhere. At first the flowers were impractical, the only benefit being the ambiance and je ne sais quoi of their beauty and fresh interesting aroma’s. The wonderful aroma’s to cover the stench of scorched earth were amusing. He had no idea what an impact they would have later on. Flowers would become symbolic of love and beauty and figure into a strange talk between fathers and sons some day. People would fashion perfumes and air fresheners form their enticing smells and men would find them a beneficial tool in making up for mistakes. Flowers would proudly display their floral genitalia and bees would find them irresistible. Flowers would come to represent anticipation of sex for both honey bee and honey dear alike. Forever linked with love because that was why Cosmo created them, to remind him of his love for the once utopian behemoths. Beautiful flowers of white pink peach, purple, red, yellow, blue, violet, green and orange. Fantastically designed shapes of bells, funnels, trumpets, tubes saucers, bowls and labia. Brilliantly displayed all over the land masses along with new and tastier vegetation. It was a sight to behold. An arboretum of the grandest scale any had ever seen. This colorful garden alone would have stopped a charging raptor in its path to gawk at the beauty and inhale deeply the scent of passion on this marvel of an orb. An ambush makeover on the grandest of scales.
Now a new task was at hand. “I will take my new plan to the BOCGG and see if they will approve and allow me to once again have mobile life in the garden. It was time to face the rhythms melodies and harmonies expressed through instruments. Cosmo knew it was no use trying to pull the woolly mammoth over the boards eyes. Best thing to do was fess up and submit his urban renewal plan. However, when Cosmo went to request some new life seeds, the board of co-operative god and goddesses were waiting for him. They did not look pleased.
The Board of Cooperative Gods and Goddesses convened in an area of the universe known as District Seven, or The District as gods called it. The District was like the universes capitol. A retreat for any of the gods who wanted some R and R from controlling everything. Restaurants and a few pubs, recreation areas where they could swim in warm liquid methane or play a few rounds of Gomf (Gods Only Mortals Forbidden). They could visit the Library of Everything, catch up on current events in any galaxy, or just relax. It was also where the BOCGG held court to make decisions that effected the entirety of everything. Unfortunately for Cosmo that was precisely why he was here in The District on this day. To go before the Board and issue a plea for forgiveness and the go ahead to start over.
The tallest of the gods spoke first. “Cosmo, you have made a gargantuan mistake in trashing your garden. You broke a law when you interfered. If you check page 7 of the BOCGG codebook it clearly states than no god may interfere with the natural progress of any form of life anywhere. You have deliberately destroyed the entire garden. What have you to say of yourself?” Cosmo knew it was senseless to lie to the gods because they can tell instantly. “Yes its true, I destroyed the giant dinosaurs I was growing but in my defense they where way too massive and ate tons of vegetation each day. And they were destroying each other and all the beauty around them. They would have destroyed the garden in no time. I felt it best to begin over with a much more efficient and intelligent design. If you gaze now upon the garden you will see it is perhaps the most colorful in the universe. I have grown many shapes and colors on earth and it is more magnificent then ever before. It even smells nice.“ Cosmo presented at bouquet of beautifully arranged flowers from Earth to each of the Goddesses. Instantly he had won the lady lords over and he knew it. “All I need to complete this garden is some new life seeds so I may create new creatures, much smaller in stature and less capable of destruction. I have learned much from my mistake. From the ahes of my faux pas I have come up with a cutting edge form of existence I sall the cycle of life. Given the chance it could become a prototype used all over the universe. I would be overjoyed to have the opportunity to institute it on Earth and make a garden more worthy of The Board. I deeply regret having caused such destruction. I promise will not ever mingle in the affairs of what grows within the confines of my garden ever again.” Tall God gave Cosmo fifty lashes with the high beams from his angry eye sockets. “Indeed Cosmo, we all witnessed disaster even from as far away as we are.“ Time to lay on some god charm so with kindergarten eyes and trademark flirtatious grin he said, “Well did you at least enjoy the light show?” He haned him a picture of the new colorful planet and an earth cigar. Tall God visibly softened his stare and playfully rolled his eyes. Cosmo was one of the most handsome and charming of all the gods and was well liked in every corner of the universe. He quickly submitted his new and improved garden blueprint which was in fact quite impressive. This seemed to satisfy the gods who were all nodding their heads in agreement. The Lengthy Lord spoke again. “The Board is impressed and looks in anticipation of this cycle of life. So it shall be Cosmo, you will go back to Solar System 728KJ and replant, but may I suggest you use your new life seeds more wisely. There be no need to rush things.” He shook hid lean angular noggin and threw up his overstretched arms. “Why is it you young gods are all so fucking impatient?” Cosmo agreed that he would indeed secure a well thought out plan this time and thanked each god individually. No slouch at schmoozing was Cosmo………………….PEACE

The Great Santa Swindle

A Santa Conspiracy?? STFU (no really, stfu!)
I’m a LIAR. That’s right, I’m a bold faced liar. Not compulsive or pathologic, but a liar none the less. But fuck it man, so are you. In fact every one reading this is a liar. In fact everyone NOT reading this is a liar. Oh you can pretend you’re not a liar if you want but then you’ll just be lying to yourself. We are born liars one and all. Don’t get me wrong, it doesn’t mean we’re not honest, indeed many of us most hopefully are as honest and sincere as the day is long. But truth be told we all engage in non truth and that’s no lie.
We actually believe firmly in lies. Don’t believe me? Tell the 4 year old child of Christian parents that there is no Santa Claus and tell me if they don’t act like you shoved a razor sharp machete right through the Childs heart, then pulled it out and cut of the parents reproductive organs. That’s how hurt and disturbed they will be. The most cardinal of cardinal sins is breaking the Santa code of lies. Trust me I know because I did that once. Okay, that’s another lie, but it did happen to my son. Well not exactly the Santa thing but close enough. I just embellished the truth a little because the Santa thing sounds so much better. Just embellished a little? LOL. That’s a lie. Here’s the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.
My son is pretty mellow. Maybe not as mellow as his pot smoking old man, but mellow. So I was pretty taken aback when he called me to vent in such an angry and aggressive way. “Hey Pops, I am pissed!” Quite different from the usual “Hey Pops, what the fucks up?” He continued. “Daria’s teacher told her class that there is no such thing as magic.” At first I was somewhat perplexed, telling a six year old that magic can be scientifically explained is part of the learning process. My son would have to put it in perspective for me because it’s been a long time since I had to deal with shit concerning children, at least on this level. Truthfully I’m not sure if I would have engaged in so many of the lies I used with him and his sisters growing up in today’s climate. I cautiously asked what made him so angry about it and perspective is what he gave me…..In an unusually terse voice he replied. “One of Daria’s ( probably the most beautiful grand daughter in the world) teachers told her that magic is not real and there is no magic Kingdom. Now Daria is questioning everything I ever told her. I wanna kick his god damn ass!” His daughter is his “princess” and they live in Orlando where Disney’s Magic Kingdom is an icon. She believes in fairytales and my son and his wife delight in spinning fantasy stories to her, especially ones involving princesses. She believes Dora explores, she believes Bob builds, and she believes she can speak Chinese when she says Ni Hao to Kai-Lan . She even believes she will someday figure out where Carmen Sandiego is. (Not true) At least until the other day. Since that day her world has been shattered. Now she doubts everything.
I must admit I was a bit torn. Being a cynical old fart magic kingdoms and fairy princesses have long lost any scintilla of appeal. We have to tell our kids the truth at some point, but he is right, that should have been my sons decision and not a teachers. I had my perspective. What was that dude thinking? If she doubts magic, who in the hell will she believe in .. believe in hell? Or heaven? I mean, if the stories religions tell us aren’t based on magic than what is? So by extension he was hinting to her that god may not exist, or heaven. After he vented for a long while my son and I went off on philosophical theories about lying. We finally agreed that I lie, he lies, his daughter lies, and the teacher lies.
But what about you liars? Ever hear anyone say to you I never lie? Next time look them directly into their lying eyes and say, “You‘re such a liar. Because like it or not, we all lie. When we say” Tell them I’m not in right now.” “Can you call my boss and tell them I’m sick and can’t come in today?” Give me a brake. I was a chef and I heard all kinds of excuses all the way up to I have scarlet fever, complete with sound effects like wheezing an coughing. You may hear “but those are white lies so it’s okay.”
Are you telling me if we color code our lies it makes some of them permissible? Somehow a white lie sin’t a real lie? Maybe it was a purple lie, or green. No matter, its still a lie. Wait. I didn’t lie, it was just a little fib you say? I’m not a liar I’m a fibber you say” Pu-leeze! We are lied to before we can speak. A spoonful of pureed food coming our way, “here comes an airplane, open the hanger.“ “Look at what the Easter Bunny left you.” “Put your tooth under your pillow and the Tooth Fairy will leave you something.” And of course the ultimate most sacred lie,, Santa Claus. I engaged in this sacred lie myself. I used Santa to make the kids behave, at least for the first 3 weeks of December, and I totally enjoyed watching their faces a they opened up presents with glee an reckless abandon. I marveled at how for the most part siblings play along with scam even when they reach the point of knowing the truth. I had 4 older brothers and nary a one of them betrayed the magic of Santa. So my parents not only taught my brothers to lie, they involve them in a conspiracy to conceal the truth from me. Which must be an extremely strong conspiracy because I can’t imaging how badly the brother closet in age would have enjoyed bursting my magic bubble. So this is my girt to you conspiracy theorists out there. Santa Claus, a deep and far reaching conspiracy that goes back to the 1700’s, before Kennedy, before Roswell, even before the Lincoln conspiracy.
Somewhere on a grassy knoll up in the North Pole there was a second elf that fired that evil truth right into the heart of children all across the globe piercing their longstanding belief in the magic of that white hairy bearded man in red pajama’s who, even though looking more like a pedophile than a Saint, was handed millions of young children to hold in his lap. For the promise of being “good” the child would be awarded with a present especially for them. Once they had completely bought into the Great Santa Cabal they were indoctrinated in the ways of the Claus.(A Danish name that translates to Claws in English) When they reach the appropriate age they are given the truth and then sworn to secrecy. If they should tell their younger sibling the truth it would cost them two limbs and an internal organ. Hence the greatest conspiracy in the world has begun. An the new leader of this conspiracy is Daria’s teacher, Mr. Thomas. That’s right Mr. Thomas I am calling you pout here on wordpresss for the world to see. Be afraid, be very afraid Thomas because I’m coming for you. Don’t doubt me Thomas. I will make your life miserable for destroying the dreams of an innocent and once happy child who has been stripped of the one thing she needs. Her Daddy’s trustworthiness.
In the end, to lie is human, to forgive divine. We lie to avoid unpleasant situations, we lie to avoid hurting peoples feelings, and we lie to have our childhood dreams stay alive just a little bit longer. Lies don’t have to hurt, but they can. Choose your lies wisely because the bad ones can come back to bite you in the ass. Honesty is the absence of lies, it’s having the integrity and sincerity to give the proper and necessary information to one who needs it and filter out the unnecessary. That’s the truth!!…………PEACE

Is That All There Is?

Death After Death…part 2
By J. T. Hilltop

I started down the steps I had just recently negotiated in an odd mix of fear and curiosity. Halfway down I stopped and looked back up to ask one more question. Nothing was there, I was alone. The image, my Mom, my daughters, my love, my friends everyone I ever cared about gone. They had all disappeared and I was alone with a notion. The notion that something was at the bottom of the staircase and that something was the truth. What is truth? Is truth law? What will truth reveal? Is truth unchanging or ever changing? Can I choose a dare instead of truth? Will it set me free? Does truth have feeling? Can I handle the truth? Will I find the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? And most importantly, are all these questions even necessary??? I’m just going to go on down to the bottom and find out!
Yes, I had my answer. Go downstairs and find out what truth is. I proceeded cautiously not knowing if truth was an entity, a concept, or a trap. Now that would be just about right, to fall into a trap after all this bullshit. But what else was there to do, ask more questions? So on to the bottom of the stairs.
As I climbed downward I noticed that the staircase was spiral. But it wasn’t a spiral before. Or was it? Whatever, its time to bribe the piper, to face the joyous sounds expressed through musical instruments, time to get on the hippie multiple person transport vehicle and find out for myself. When I reached the bottom of the staircase no one was there, just a huge blackboard with some drawings and equations scrawled across it. There was a picture of a DNA strand, a helix, and a diagram of a Nautilus shell, diagrams of various ferns, flowers and plants all spiral in shape, an some sort of segment worm curled up tight. Tacked onto the top of the blackboard were 3 aerial photographs of massive storms. On the other side of the board was all numbers, or rather symbols numbers and fractions and such. A math geeks dream. There were some I recognized like 3.14159265359, which I knew was pi, multiples of nine showing how each quotient adds back up to nine, (9×2=18..1+8=9,9×3=27..2+7=9..etc), as well as a series of equations that could not possibly be more foreign to me. Perhaps even Einstein would have found area amongst his quizzical locks to scratch his head and ponder its meaning. That said….What the Fuck?? What is all this shit supposed to mean to me? This is the fucking truth? I didn’t understand a single bit of it. But I knew it would give me the answer to my…….Jesus shit I don’t even remember the question. Not sure if it was what is life all about or what is death all about. Something important was in front of me so I decided I should give it a stab with the images and leave the math problem for the end. I looked closely at the image of the giant storms from an aerial view, the nautilus, and the ferns and realized that they were all spiral in shape. Just like the damn staircase. Come to think of it the DNA strand and helix are two spirals intertwined. I looke to the spiral formed by the segment worm all curled up. Then I thought about a milky way galaxy photo I had seen before. Out loud to no one I blurted out, “Holy fuck, its about spirals, like the fucking galaxy. That’s it!! The truth is spirals. Spirals!” I was overjoyed for about ten seconds until the next thought hit me. What the fuck do spirals have to do with anything? Again I spoke to no one. “Yea, that’s it, spirals. But that’s what?? I still don’t get it, and I will never get what the fuck those stupid equations mean.” I stared up at the board and was startled when the no one I had been speaking to spoke in a sort of scratchy and almost squeaky voice.. “You’re right, it is spirals. Even the equation is spiral, the golden spiral. I am quite impressed that your scientists and mathematicians have figured it out. Your people have learned much, and have lost me a lot of bets. This logarithm, Pi, the DNA, all of the math up there is not an accident, it’s more like my signature. Like a watermark you use, or a hologram, the math is like a hidden code that I myself scripted into your universe. It ensures proof to all the other universe makers that this one here is mine. I call my universe ‘Omnia Etares”. The signature spirals appear everywhere. Your galaxy is a spiral, your DNA is a spiral, storms, shells, everything. That’s what happens when atoms collide, the energy shoots out from both sides of the explosion in a whirlpool fashion forming a spiral.. Why even this universe itself is spiral JT. I know common belief is there is no end an the term uni even translate to one, but I assure you, your universe ends and its not the only one. Better term would be multiverse” I was so stunned to hear a voice I barely even processed what he had said let alone had the where withal to wonder how he knew my name. When I turned to see who was talking to me I was speechless.
Not a tall slender long-haired man as one might expect a creator or godlike truth teller to be, this was a rather diminutive and non athletic man with tightly curled short black hair. His nose was too big for his oblong face and he had what seemed a chronic case of chin stubble in a futile attempt at appearing cool. Not at all what I would expect as a creator, he seemed more like a tech geek at a Radio Shack or Best Buy. He was dressed the part of a scientist in a lab coat complete with black glasses, pencil behind the ear, and clipboard in hand.. He stared at me blankly as if he were completely done talking and I should just be assuring him I understood what he had said. But clearly I didn’t get it. “You? You’re God, you are the creator?” The tone of my voice was way too obvious in its incredulousness and cynicism. He did not look the least bit offended however and gave me an all too familiar condescending smile. “Not what you were expecting JT? Tell me what a creator looks like and I’ll see what I can do to make you feel more at ease.” I glared at him defiantly, “Well I certainly didn’t expect the creator to be so sarcastic, nor did I think it would be a nerd. What should I call you anyway, Mr. Grand Creator of everything? That sounds awfully egocentric for a humble End all be all.” This time his smile was more genuine. “Now who’s being sarcastic? My name would be way to foreign to you so when you call me you can call me Al.” I couldn’t resist the Paul Simon reference and I replied with a chuckle, “like I can be your bodyguard and you can be my long lost friend?” He looked at me puzzled and with an air of confusion said, “No.. Al, as in Albert Einstein. I am a physicist too but far beyond any humans abilities. Einstein did come close however, so I just go by Al for you humans. I was the one who collided the atoms that formed the ‘Big Bang’ your people have been talking about.” I stared in total disbelief, “Wait Al, I need to sit down and sort this through.” My new friend, teacher, guru, and I assume Sherpa Al gave me a chair.
Al allowed me about ten minutes to gather my thoughts. “ Maybe I should start at the beginning JT. I am a scientist from a very different universe. In my universe the scientists create universes by colliding atoms. At some point they may even be able to create one here on your earth with one of those, what do you call them, particle accelerators, the Large Hadron Collider.” I was now starting to understand. “You mean like the one in Switzerland for CERN right? Some sort of underground tube ride for atoms that cost a few billion dollars and is supposed to make the scientific community all warm and fuzzy and shit. The Higgs Bosen God thingy. They are gonna recreate the …” It hit me. “Holy shit, the big fucking bang! They are going to create a new fucking universe down there!“ Al rolled his eyes, looking more like a parent than a creator. “Put that way it seems less relevant, but yes that’s where it may happen. I hope they know what to do if they are successful. A universe expanding underground will get pretty messy. Anyway, They actually do a lot more than just that down there, they are gathering all kinds of information they believe will help them understand their universe.” My head was spinning and I was beginning to wonder if this was maybe some weird ass dream or something. “Hold on there Al, your getting way ahead of me here. Lets go back a bit. Back to your signature thing. Are you telling me you created the universe and then invented pi, and those other math equations as a way of claiming this universe as your own? Sorry but this shit sounds ridiculous.”
This creator, this Al dude, had begun pacing by the blackboard rubbing his head and I assumed he was planning his answers. Once a scientist always a scientist I guess. Finally he spoke, “Okay JT, first I’ll tell you about my role in this and then we can get to the truth you search for so you can move on.” The phrase move on was disconcerting. What the fuck did he mean by that? Perhaps I would be better off stalling him, but fuck that, then I’ll have to stay in this…..this classroom or whatever. I shut up and let him continue. “So this is hard stuff to understand and I really don’t think its important to you but here goes. I am a universe scientist. Quantum physics is only scratching the surface. Everything is in constant motion but on such a minute level its imperceptible even to microscopes. Like tiny vibrations. You believe an atom is the smallest thing around, but its not .Energy is. In our labs we create energy and form them into tiny things which you call atoms. It gives the energy mass, or substance. Inside this, let me call it a ball of energy, I placed these math equations to be constant throughout. Placed them in each of two atoms and had them spin at speeds that make light seem slow. When those two balls of energy collided they created an explosion. It starts out very small, but like all explosions grew outwards. That’s your universe, or actually my universe. To one of the energy balls we add some carbon and hydrogen to the other which is how life is formed. So in essence, I created you and every living thing you have ever known. We can’t control life we only create it.Life takes its own direction. Every living thing in this universe began with one single cell. In this single cell oranism was my signature math equations an instructions on duplicating. Sometimes they just duplicate themselves out of extinction and other times, like on earth, two organisms collide and form a multi-cell organism, which creates the male and female structure. After that its all logarithmic growth creating diversity at every split. You are a rather tiny and irrelevant part of it, but all universes experience forms of life and yours happens to be the one with a brain capable of reasoning so I explain to those I think can handle it how it is they got here. For whatever reason humans have an innate sense of wonder and a desire to understand that so strong its driven many of you mad. I believe it was when you left the water and began to form a brain some billions of your years ago. Over time that brain grew in size and became able to actually think and reason. So once I tell you your truth, you can go on and become part of the matter of the universe again. Who knows, maybe part of you will form a new star, or comet.”
Al looked in my eyes an knew much of what he told me was above my pay grade. He shrugged his shoulders an aid, “so that’s that. Now what about that truth you want to know?” Once the confusion subsided anger began to set in. This unworthy looking god pretender claims to have created everything and called me insignificant! This shit can‘t be real. “No way, no fucking way am I buying all this bullshit. This is some kind of bad dream or nightmare or something and you’re not real. I ate something that is fucking up my system and giving me this piece of shit dream. All this shit about colliders and spirals an equations is all bullshit. I live in the mother fucking information age and this is just bacon cheeseburger Google overload. It’s the price I pay for being in the information age, cruising down the information highway guzzling beer and chomping on cheeseburgers and fries. Once I fell asleep this weird ass nightmare began with that happy place upstairs. You must represent Hell.”
Exhausted from my tirade I sat down again. Al stared at me then shook his head. He seemed ever so slightly frustrated with me but kept a cool even demeanor. “ I assure you this is not a dream, there is no Hell, and I am real. Well real in the abstract anyway. My look and mannerism are manifestations you created in order to understand better. If you saw and heard what I truly was it would as you say, blow your mind. Listen JT you were not living in the information age, the true information age began long ago and what you are in is more of an information overload age. Your concept of time isn’t completely accurate so I don’t expect you’ll understand that, but I will explain as much as I can for you. You are not even living at all anymore but that’s beside the point. Because I have grown fond of your species I try to at least satisfy the driving force of questioning that exemplifies your species. You think you have acquired so much information you can just will all you have learned in a dream? That my dear boy is what you call bullshit. You haven’t. Stay seated my boy because I am about to tell you things about dreams and information that will challenge almost everything you think you know. Your species reaching this far is somewhat of an anomaly and does not happen often. It was a series of bizarre and incredible coincidences that got your species to where it is and that’s why your kind fascinate me so much. Put on your safe body fastening strap because your in for an uneven terrain traveling destination.” I did remain seated, and began to worry. “Okay Al, I’m ready, bring on the bumpy ride.

1-2-3-4, I Declare A Cupcake War

The EB gives it 2 thumbs down

Near about every day someone will say to me “You guys should be on Cupcake Wars.” Like this is our magic bullet and it will make Jarets Stuffed Cupcakes blow up huge! Well intended advice but total bullshit. But this is something I’m used to. I owned a small restaurant before I began my journey toward cupcake excellence. Everyone unfamiliar with the restaurant industry seems to know exactly what will make a restaurant successful. Owners get advice on a daily basis. “You know what you should do? You need to put this rice lasagna my Mom makes on the menu. I’m telling you, everybody loves it. You’ll make a fortune.” Others offer up their own personal recipes for various dishes. Yet they came to eat in my houe so I believe there should be a presumption that I am in possession of numerous recipes of my own. They freely explain how carrying this beverage or serving that fish on your menu is “what you need.” I wonder if they made suggestions to an electrician, or a carpenter. “Hey, use the green wires more, people really like that. You know if you use copper nails it will last longer.“ Or even worse, tell a doctor how best to treat an ailment. “You know if you prescribe more valiums you will have happier patients.“ (yea, that was my advice but I really think that one will work!) After all now that we have WebMD so who needs a professional? Now we can treat ourselves. The food business is something easy. That’s how they know all about. Why the hell they don’t have their own restaurant? When I had a restaurant I got more advice than Dr. Phil gives in an entire season. So now that I’m a cupcake engineer and no longer a chef, they advise me to get on cupcake wars. Just do that and I will become famous.
The truth is I have been asked, over 3 time now and when first told about Cupcake Wars I was quite naïve about the show . When I was asked to be in Cupcake Wars it conjured up an image of troops of small cakes slugging it out on battlegrounds like wood tables covered in flour, stainless steel tables, and gigunda mixing bowls. The combatant cakes are outfitted camouflage cupcake liners and carrying the appropriate weaponry of any kitchen worth its baking soda. Duking it out with war tools such as knives, spoons, whisks, spatulas, an rolling pins. They engage in fierce battles smashing innocent cakes in the process and await the reinforcement of the heavy artillery. In come the big machines. The food processors, power mixers, batter dispensers, and enormous rotating ovens. The cupcake war escalates into a shock and awe campaign as huge flames arise from the oven hearth and extreme heat takes over the war theater. The sound of forced gasses and flickering flames fill the air and the smell of burning gas penetrate the prep area as wafts of thin white smoke billow off the carbon etched, war torn cupcake pans. Cupcakes have declared war!
What’s next, Teddy Bear Battles? Hello Kitty Conflicts? How can anything as sweet and innocent and so amazingly tasty and satisfying possibly be involved in a war? Obviously I knew it wasn’t really a cupcake war but it did in fact warrant a little investigation. So on to Google and then Wikipedia where I found out that Cupcakes Wars is a reality based competition show on The Food Network. Reality based? What the hell does that even mean? Armed with this information I felt compelled to take it to the next level. The only sensible course of action for me was to engage in an activity that is extremely rare for me. When I got home I turned on the TV and tunes into The Food Network to watch the show.
Watching the Food Channel is rare? Most people are indeed shocked to find out that I so rarely ever watch The Food Network. They get very indignant and question me as if we were in the Culinary Inquisition. “But you’re a chef, how can you not watch The Food Network?” Apparently it’s the responsibility of a chef to watch shows about what they do for a living. It turns out the Food Network is designed to entertain people in all walks of life who have more than a passing interest in food, and not a network designed for chefs to share recipes and ideas. My response to them is “If I was a plumber, do you think that after plumbing all day long I would want to go home and watch shows about nothing but plumbing?” The truth is if the network were really designed to entertain chefs it would be mostly about inept waiters and waitresses during epic fails while the sweat saturated kitchen staff laughs so hard their ass bones begin loosening. That’s something I might watch. When I finish a long hard day in the kitchen and I sit down to relax the last thing I want to see is more kitchen. Give me serial killers, lawyers. Doctors and nurses, detectives, or even makers of meth. (Although techniquely the meth does get cooked!) I want to escape the world that I work in for sometimes 14 hours a day. I look towards TV to take me away from my ay to day an entertain me by allowing me to escape into new realms. But I needed to know what this Cupcake Wars was all about.
Needing to understand the concept of cupcake wars for myself I watched an entire show which fro me at least, was a tedious process. It turns out its not a war at all, but a competition between bakers based on an age old culinary tradition, the Mystery Basket. The mystery basket has been used for years to help teach young culinarians skills and to hone their creative process and resourcefulness. Its even used when a chef goes for a certification. The chef is given a basket, or tray these days, with an assortment of foods on it and they are asked to create complete meal, appetizer, entrée, and dessert using everything on the tray as well as some of the basic ingredients in the pantry. They are given a specific time constraint and they are judged on taste, presentation, and creativity. Quite often these days mini mystery baskets are a stage of the interview process where the potential employer may get a chance to investigate your style of cooking, your ability to prepare and blend flavors, and how well you work under pressure. I have always felt this somewhat ineffective and a waste of time because if your resume will reflect your style and capabilities. I have had to perform a few of these interviews and for me it was easy because improvisational cooking has always been my strongest suit. For many others who are equally as talented but may be the type who prefer to carefully plan an document their course of preparation (like an accountant may) the challenge could present unfair advantage to my loosey goosey cooking style. But is is a barometer of how well one can think on their feet an it is a great learning tool.
The major difference in the game how however is that other factors come into play. Drama and conflict. Without these two gratuitous concepts the show would be of little interest and as fast paced as watching a snail running from a French chef. They pit 4 pairs of culinary bakers, most of which own their own shops, against each other and try to create a diverse cross section of cute young entrepreneurs, grouchy old lifelong bakers, and some serious cupcake makers hoping to create their dynamic business venture into an overnight success via winning the contest. They are judged by 3 wannabe American Idol judges, a European who can be testy and sharply critical, (Le Simon). an everyone wins because I’m okay your okay compassionate woman who hasn’t a mean bone in her body, (Le Paula) and an influential guest judge that has a vested interest in the winner as they will usually hire the winner for a “special event”. (Le rotating Randy)
For me the show is part of a larger sub-culture of entertainment that portrays an industry I have vested way too many years in, and worked way too hard at to see turned into a novelty act. In my day chefs worked their asses off, put in ridiculous amounts of hours in, and earned enormous respect due to their talent and integrity. Now potential chefs graduate culinary school and hope to get a TV show. Granted it is entertaining to its demographic but to me it reduces my life’s work into a slugfest of personalities where its not the most creative and flavorful food that wins, but the best personality or the most manipulative. They attempt to increase the viewer enjoyment by creating challenges through forcing the usage of unusual products. That’s great if the challenge is meaningful, but to put things like tobacco, or nacho cheese and hot dogs is just for sheer enjoyment and not a creativity challenge. I get it, it’s very popular and has millions of viewers, but even if one make a great cupcake, if they have no TV presence they can leave the show scarred as a loser. And even those who win will experience a spike of popularity, and business will grow out of curiosity, but most times it isn’t long lasting. I want a solid business grown on strong principles and hard work. But if you do ever hear of a show that wants to showcase an honest existential cupcake poet, give me a call. Or better yet, I’ll get some people and you can call my peeps……..PEACE

Memoirs of a Hippie Chef (an excerpt)

If You Can’t Stand The Heat
It wasn’t as if I wasn’t used to the fecal matter hitting the rotary oscillator, but Cavalieri’s closing was a lot to deal with and the furthest thing from my mind. No longer was I an apostle to a culinary madman, no more waitresses to flirt with, no more free beers. I was now saturated with disappointment and disillusionment. I knew I needed to seek another avenue of employment. I needed to shed the dry snakeskin of the restaurant industry and turn out to something else. I needed to get far away from any kitchen or Chef or waitress. I need a sacrificial rack of lamb. I should do what James did back in his time and work the fields. As fate would have it and timing being everything my brother’s ex boss owned a landscaping company, and needed a laborer. So it came to pass that I had became the new landscaper for Mundies Field and Dreams. More accurately put, I had become the new lawn mowing leaf raking topsoil carrying shit spreader. I had chosen to become a hard working laborer and have my skin scorched everyday by burning threats the sun makes good on, while enjoying the hearty aroma of freshly decayed organic manure. Enough abut the perks though; let me tell you about the downside. Everyday ended the same, my arm and back muscles pound out a rebellious beat building to a painful crescendo. As I reach to cool my aches and pains with a cold beer it seem as though all my muscles tightened up into ball of overworked subdermal tissues and tendons screaming at every movement. My skin radiates a pinkish aura from hours spent unprotected by those relentless threats of the harsh sun. It left my neck and shoulders feeling rug burnt adding to my misery. As if that weren’t enough, the omnipresent stench of decaying crap had implanted its neverending stink carousel deep into my nasal cavity. Out on the field, one of my less enviable jobs was to take compost, Mundies name for decayed animal shit, and spread it across a field. First the smell of evaporating morning dew so earthy and rich comes up off the ground like a wisp of warm steam in a tease just waiting for its replacement. Breathe deep and enjoy nature while it lasts because within seconds comes the dank aroma of compost. Its a blend of some of the most offensive smells I could ever imagined. Once dumped on the ground, the aromas of a horse stable had a meeting with a quarantined bathroom, and then joined forces with spoiled milk to create a cacophony of disgust that slowly crept up my nose and made an all out assault on my entire being.. There it would stay for hours even after my day was done. A rank reminder of my newly acquired hopelessness that was eased, but not eradicated by the beer.
Partying had come to a new intersection as well. Turn right and head up the morphine highway that was one step away from the dreaded H. Heroin, horse, dope. A dangerous path to be sure but as long as we kept just to the pills it seemed okay. To the left was an array of uppers and downers that had become much too routine for us. From the ritual of lighting up to the ritual of popping pills. Ken was in big demand and was spending way way too much time with Artie. As for me, I was required to wake up early 6 mornings a week. But I had every night free to do whatever I chose. I had begun spending more and more money on drugs, supplying not only my head but Carries as well. And many evenings I took care of Sue as well because Ken was always out copping drugs. I had begun doing diet pills every morning to keep me awake and give me the energy to bust my ass out in the shit fields. On days that it rained I would be sent home and not make any money for the day. I quickly went through my savings after a week of solid rain. The summer was coming to an end, I was making less money, and soon it would be too cold to do landscaping. I couldn’t remember how the fuck I got here, but what I did know wad that I needed to get the fuck out soon.

The Greatest Story Never Told

In The Garden….Yea, that one
It’s an inevitable question from near about every child. “Mommy, where do we come from? Daddy, why are we here?” Of course these burning questions festered in my head and heart and the flames of curiosity would not die down without an answer. So many questions I had as a kid and only two people I knew and trusted to give me answers. But It didn’t stop there because it made me wonder where Mom and Dad got their answers? Turns out they got their answers from a place called church. So the answers came from some dude they saw once a week every Sunday. This dude stands up in front of everyone and talks, sometimes even scolds everyone. Then in an apparent attempt to make my parents feel better he makes everyone sing songs and repeat phrases like “and with you“ and the like. Afterwards he waits by the door to talk to everyone. Not very convincing to a young boy. Especially when the dude dresses so damn strange, in a black jacket with a funny looking collar. But this is the guy with all the answers to all the questions in the world. This is the dude who told Mom where I came from, and told Dad why we’re all are here. So how the fuck does he know so much? I needed to find out.
I watched closely to see how it all works. First there is a huge room. A gigantic room actually, and this odd guy stands up on a kind of stage they call an alter, and lectures everyone in the room, all of whom are sitting on these Hard wooden bench like things. I don’t believe the designer gave any thought whatsoever about how peoples asses would feel just 5 minutes after sitting. I could physically see most all of the kids and half of the Dads squirming around trying to find a position that doesn’t leave bruises on the cheek. That must be what they really mean when they say turn the other cheek. So this funny looking dude stands up there and tells stories about a long long time ago, tells us to open our hymnals, and makes us sing songs. Then he gets mad and tells the adults how to live, which for kids is the best part because its Mom and Dad getting some of the shit they give us constantly. But still, its boring as hell, which apparently is a word I can’t say even though its in that book of theirs. That black book, is that where he get his info?
As it turns out he knows the story of everything because it tells him so in that special black book. The name of this book is “The Bible” and it is considered by just about everyone to be the end all and be all of everything. They call it the holy bible. Funny word, if I heard a story with lots of holes in it I would think it’s a lie. Why people even put their hand on this book and swear to things and everyone else accepts that as absolute truth. It made me wonder what the fuck could make one book so damn powerful. If this book has the answers to everything and I read it myself I will know everything. So I took a copy, which didn’t seem like a bad thing to me until Dad screamed when I got home and he saw it. Now I know its stealing and that’s wrong and results in an ass whooping, so you see, that book taught me something right from the start.
I finally did read this Bible though, and what I did read absolutely amazed me. This book, this holy bible is filled with some very strange stories, even stranger than green eggs and ham. It was quite hard to read because even though the words were English words many of them made no sense. So I read it over and over until I could finally understand it. I had to wonder who wrote it and why so I asked the Sunday dude with the funny collar how and when it was written. I have to tell you I was rather shocked when I found out. This shit was written thousands of years ago, and it is a kind of history book written by god. But of course that makes no sense, why would god waste his time writing such a long story. Turns out, he didn’t actually write it himself, he had his people write it for him. The first five books were written by this like 4 thousand year old clown named “Mosey”. Not only did he write it, but he had a starring role in the second through fifth chapters. The rest was written by some out of work history teachers called scribes. That is until this Spanish guy named Jesus comes along, then all the different religions have different history books. But my interest was in the beginning. In the beginning when man created god in his own image. But wait, do I have that backwards? Is this the dyslexic version? More importantly, was it a GRAVEN image? These are important and serious questions that need serious….well it needed answers! When the funny collar dude said some like four thousand year old fucker named Mosey wrote the first five stories something didn’t seem right. I think its about time this whole crazy story gets straightened out. And I know just the right person to spin these fables out of biblical proportions. Yours truly of course!
So I started by thinking back to a time when my Mom and Dad would read me stories. All these wild fairy tales of ladies with hair so strong and long that a man could climb up her hair and save her, or a little girl that ventured into the house of a family of bears. Bears who ate porridge and slept in beds! There were cross dressing wolves dressed as grandma’s, houses made of candy, and even three little pigs who each made their houses from different things, one straw, one wood, and one was apparently a mason and built it with bricks. All the stories were quite harmless really, and very entertaining to a young child. And I had no clue at the time, but these stories had more than just entertainment values, they taught me something. They taught me what my parents called morals. Like, so the moral of the story is don’t steal, or the moral of the story is to be considerate of others and be good, or whatever, the point is they taught me what’s right and what’s wrong. As I got older of course I realized that pigs can’t talk let alone build brick houses, and bears live in caves, not in beds, and they don’t even like porridge. My point is I learned things from these stories even though they were completely made up. It was just a way to get me to understand right from wrong in a way I could understand at the time. But now suddenly they want to believe in a garden with the first two people ever and some evil talking snake., a man building an ocean liner called an ark and grabbing two of each animal, insects,’ birds all of them, and got them rooms. Some kind of floating creature hotel filled with honeymoon suites. It floated around with them for forty days and forty nights while it rained continuously. Somehow they all ate, but not each other. The lions played with the lambs and the crickets and the birds and none of them gave into the temptation for forty days. It got me thinking about these bible stories. What if the funny collar dude is wrong? What if it was just stories written by his mom and dad to help teach him right from wrong? I mean it makes sense, right? Just like Rapunzle, or Rumplestiltskin, or Goldilocks. Maybe these stories of Adam, and Eve, and Noah, and Cain and Able were just fairytales to teach him morals.. What if they are really made up stories written to explain to the children of thousands of years ago how to behave and how to treat each other? And of course how everything came to be?
It brought me to an internal understanding. This bible, this holy book, is nothing more than the history of humans as told by the people who first learned to write. So much of the beginning is a recounting of stories that were told in household through out the land we call the fertile crescent. So I re-read this bible only this time I tried to read between the lines. I also decided to make up some new lines of my own to read between. This then is what Justin Thyme Hilltop came up with as the true explanation of how we got to where we are. So in my own twisted way, this is my story of everything.
Part one: Genesis
Evolution is the key. Just as animals evolved into other animals, so did we evolve from some sort of animal. Bipeds they call us. We walk upright on two legs and use our hands as tools. So the original peoples of the earth evolved from animals and grew up in tribes. Each tribe or community took care of itself, its only purpose was to reproduce thereby keeping the tribe alive. Survival. That was the key. Most tribes were hunters or scavengers, either killing and eating animals, or scavenging the vegetation already here on earth. However, in an area we now call the Middle East, the so-called fertile crescent, two tribes stood out amongst all others. They had become far more advanced than most other tribes. These two tribes used reason and logic, and figured out a way to survive working together as a colony. One tribe, The Aggies, learned how to manipulate the vegetation and grow it at will using soil, sun and water. They were prolific growers. The other tribe, The Shepherds, learned how to manipulate the cattle and sheep, and penned them up creating a seemingly endless supply of milks and meats. They were prolific manipulators. These two tribes habituated a very large area called the Garden of Eden. They did not like each other, but they used their logic and reason to devise boundaries which they agreed not to cross. So the Aggies lived in the North section of Eden, and the Shepherds the South. The tribes kept to themselves and all was peaceful until one incident set of a series of events that would change the world.
One of the Aggies, a young male decided to take a walk in the area that no one used to see what was there. He came across a small waterhole in which a young lady was bathing. He did not recognize her so he knew she must belong to the Shepherds. When he looked closely at her, he noticed something that struck him. She looked much like he did, only fairer in skin and hair. She had a pale complexion and long colorless long hair filled with curls. She had eyes of turquoise which seemed to sparkle like evening stars. He found her oddly attractive. He became entrances as she bathed with water glistening off her white full breasts. It made his stomach a tad queasy. More than that, there was something intriguing about this woman. He spied her with great delight and even began to wonder if she was like the women of Aggies in other ways. Okay, let me spell it out for you. He began feel that all too familiar tingling of the loins that cause men to lose control. He began to wonder if she enjoyed the pleasures of sex in the same manner women of his tribe had enjoyed him. Basically, he thought about making wild unbridled passionate love to her. Considering the times, perhaps it was bridled sex, but whatever, she made him horny as all….. For lack of a better term, all Hell.
He began wandering down to the waterhole every day and watched from the trees as she bathed herself getting more horny each day. He stared in awe until he got up enough nerve to confront her. “Young maiden of the Shepherds, why do you come here each day by yourself?” The young maiden pretended to be alarmed even though she had been aware of his hiding and staring since his first visit. Frankly, she was just as curious as he was, also experienced a tingle and perhaps just as interested in sex. “I come here to bath myself, not to be stared at by an Aggie. Why do you come here and stare at me?” The young Aggie gave this some thought, because quite frankly he wasn’t sure himself why he was here. “ I come not to stare at you but to explore the area and determine if the land is fit for growing” he lied. The young maiden blushed slightly when she saw the lust in his dark brown eyes. “Are you sure it is the land which explore? It seems to me you are looking at my body and I believe that is not vegetation I see growing under your loincloth” The audacious young maiden gave him a look that offered more a challenge than a venting of distain. She blinked her eyes at him and something strange happened. He felt a Funny feeling in his stomach as though the seeds he used to grow things themselves were festering from within. He boldly chose to accept the challenge. “It is true that have gazed upon you and appreciate the…..unusual beauty you possess. Indeed I was hoping perhaps you were an Aggie and would be my maiden.” The Aggie could feel his entire body shaking and the young Shepherd maiden did not back away. She moved closer to the Aggie. “I am a Shepherd woman, not a dirt laden Aggie maiden. And you young Aggie, you are filled with dirt from your farming. If I were to ever consider being a maiden to the like of you I would expect you to be clean. Why don’t you come in here and allow me to bathe you?” It was more of an order than an invitation but that was of no consequence because he had already made his mind up as to where he was headed. He approached the watering hole with a mere modicum of trepidation. She held out her hand and he accepted, and the both of them shuddered ever so slightly. He dropped his loincloth and revealed the growth underneath it was indeed ripe for the picking. He stepped naked into the waterhole beside her. For five minutes they stared and cleansed each other, eyes sparkling with curious wonder. The Aggie closed his eyes and allowed this maiden, this Shepherd woman to touch him all over. When she got down to washing below his waist he was surprised to discover how eagerly his body was responding. The maiden held his solid manpole in her hand. “Methinks my Aggie that you have something other than bathing on your mind.” Unable to form an actual word, the Aggie grabbed the maiden in his arms and laid a big fat spit swapping kiss on her using his tongue muscle very skillfully. This was something new to the maiden, and at first she wanted to pull back. However, once she realized how good the tongue tango felt, she greedily sucked his tongue into her mouth and allowed the saliva filled dance to continue. Well I don’t have to tell you what happened next. Sparks flew and fluids oozed, and soft moaning was the only form of communication. Of course the two lovers understood they braved the scorn of their fellow tribe members by allowing their naked bodies to exchange these biological fluids. But it felt so crazy good they did indeed continue to explore each other and exchange passion and bodily fluids. Four times. It wasn’t until after the fourth round of carnal explorations led to exhaustion that they even introduced themselves to each other. “I am called Adam, which means man.” To which the maiden replied, “Indeed Adam, you are quite the man. More so than any Shepherd I have ever known. My name is Eve, which means life.” With a big fat satisfied grin Adam replied, “Indeed Eve, you have breathed life into me unequaled by any other Aggie I have ever known.”
So Adam and Eve began to meet each other every day and made love like a couple of school kids. But all was not so good back at the tribes. The other Aggies were beginning to get suspicious because Adam never ever seemed to be dirty. How could anyone work the soil all day yet remain free of dirt. And back at the Shepherds they began to get suspicious because Eve was always whistling and showed no interest in even the most handsome of Shepherds. Now it just so happened that the leader of each tribe sent someone to follow their respective suspected tribe violators on the very same day. Once at the watering hole, the Aggie spy hid in the north woods, and the Shepherd spy hid in the south woods. At first the spies were appalled and shocked. But Adam and Eve were both so very sexually talented, and each brought new tricks specific to their tribes that it became more of a show. I believe at least one, perhaps even both had become so excited while watching that they pleasured themselves before retuning to the tribe leaders to give the reports.
The tribe leaders were livid. Furious! How could this possibly happen? It was the most outrageous act that had ever occurred. They both paced, in different colonies yet somehow in unison, until the sinners returned to their folds. The minute Adam returned to the Shepherd village he was grabbed by the biggest and strongest Aggies and brought before the leader. “Adam, I am quite disappointed”, he said, “You have disrespected every member of our tribe by engaging in this disgusting act with a Shepherd woman.” Adam didn’t answer, he just stood there looking sheepish, which for an Aggie was another no no. “You’re despicable act has left me with no other choice. You shall be banned forever from the garden of Eden. Go now, get out and never return. Take your Shepherd slut with you!” Adam sadly walked to his hut to gather his belongings. Inside he saw his best and now only friend. “How did he find out” he asked of this friend. “Well Adam, you were spied on by Cain. He followed you and reported back to the leader.” Adam shook his head and mumbled, “Cain, of course. I should have guessed. That shit spreading farmer is gonna pay for this someday.” And with that, Adam left towards the waterhole hoping to see Eve there one last time.
Eve of course had a similar experience, and she too was permanently banned from the Garden of Eden. Eve was certain it was Abel that had spied on her as Abel had always tried putting the moves on her but she forever denied his advances. Reluctantly she too had to leave, and also chose to have one last look around the sexually charged waterhole in hopes that somehow Adam might be there. As luck would have it, which luck often does in tales, they met at the very same moment and exchanged stories of banishments.
So hand in hand Adam and Eve left the Garden of Eden forever, Eve holding in her free hand the apple Adam had grown for her, and Adam holding his snake, which Eve had so totally and completely tamed, in his free hand.

The Story of Everything, by JT Hilltop

Part 1…In The Beginning

It’s an inevitable question from near about every child. “Mommy, where do we come from? Daddy, why are we here?” Of course these burning questions festered in my head and heart and the flames of curiosity would not die down without an answer. So many questions I had as a kid and only two people I knew and trusted to give me answers. But It didn’t stop there because it made me wonder where Mom and Dad got their answers? Turns out they got their answers from a place called church. So the answers came from some dude they saw once a week every Sunday. This dude stands up in front of everyone and talks, sometimes even scolds everyone. Then in an apparent attempt to make my parents feel better he makes everyone sing songs and repeat phrases like “and with you“ and the like. Afterwards he waits by the door to talk to everyone. Not very convincing to a young boy. Especially when the dude dresses so damn strange, in a black jacket with a funny looking collar. But this is the guy with all the answers to all the questions in the world. This is the dude who told Mom where I came from, and told Dad why we’re all are here. So how the fuck does he know so much? I needed to find out.
I watched closely to see how it all works. First there is a huge room. A gigantic room actually, and this odd guy stands up on a kind of stage they call an alter, and lectures everyone in the room, all of whom are sitting on these Hard wooden bench like things. I don’t believe the designer gave any thought whatsoever about how peoples asses would feel just 5 minutes after sitting. I could physically see most all of the kids and half of the Dads squirming around trying to find a position that doesn’t leave bruises on the cheek. That must be what they really mean when they say turn the other cheek. So this funny looking dude stands up there and tells stories about a long long time ago, tells us to open our hymnals, and makes us sing songs. Then he gets mad and tells the adults how to live, which for kids is the best part because its Mom and Dad getting some of the shit they give us constantly. But still, its boring as hell, which apparently is a word I can’t say even though its in that book of theirs. That black book, is that where he get his info?
As it turns out he knows the story of everything because it tells him so in that special black book. The name of this book is “The Bible” and it is considered by just about everyone to be the end all and be all of everything. They call it the holy bible. Funny word, if I heard a story with lots of holes in it I would think it’s a lie. Why people even put their hand on this book and swear to things and everyone else accepts that as absolute truth. It made me wonder what the fuck could make one book so damn powerful. If this book has the answers to everything and I read it myself I will know everything. So I took a copy, which didn’t seem like a bad thing to me until Dad screamed when I got home and he saw it. Now I know its stealing and that’s wrong and results in an ass whooping, so you see, that book taught me something right from the start.
I finally did read this Bible though, and what I did read absolutely amazed me. This book, this holy bible is filled with some very strange stories, even stranger than green eggs and ham. It was quite hard to read because even though the words were English words many of them made no sense. So I read it over and over until I could finally understand it. I had to wonder who wrote it and why so I asked the Sunday dude with the funny collar how and when it was written. I have to tell you I was rather shocked when I found out. This shit was written thousands of years ago, and it is a kind of history book written by god. But of course that makes no sense, why would god waste his time writing such a long story. Turns out, he didn’t actually write it himself, he had his people write it for him. The first five books were written by this like 4 thousand year old clown named “Mosey”. Not only did he write it, but he had a starring role in the second through fifth chapters. The rest was written by some out of work history teachers called scribes. That is until this Spanish guy named Jesus comes along, then all the different religions have different history books. But my interest was in the beginning. In the beginning when man created god in his own image. But wait, do I have that backwards? Is this the dyslexic version? More importantly, was it a GRAVEN image? These are important and serious questions that need serious….well it needed answers! When the funny collar dude said some like four thousand year old fucker named Mosey wrote the first five stories something didn’t seem right. I think its about time this whole crazy story gets straightened out. And I know just the right person to spin these fables out of biblical proportions. Yours truly of course!
So I started by thinking back to a time when my Mom and Dad would read me stories. All these wild fairy tales of ladies with hair so strong and long that a man could climb up her hair and save her, or a little girl that ventured into the house of a family of bears. Bears who ate porridge and slept in beds! There were cross dressing wolves dressed as grandma’s, houses made of candy, and even three little pigs who each made their houses from different things, one straw, one wood, and one was apparently a mason and built it with bricks. All the stories were quite harmless really, and very entertaining to a young child. And I had no clue at the time, but these stories had more than just entertainment values, they taught me something. They taught me what my parents called morals. Like, so the moral of the story is don’t steal, or the moral of the story is to be considerate of others and be good, or whatever, the point is they taught me what’s right and what’s wrong. As I got older of course I realized that pigs can’t talk let alone build brick houses, and bears live in caves, not in beds, and they don’t even like porridge. My point is I learned things from these stories even though they were completely made up. It was just a way to get me to understand right from wrong in a way I could understand at the time. But now suddenly they want to believe in a garden with the first two people ever and some evil talking snake., a man building an ocean liner called an ark and grabbing two of each animal, insects,’ birds all of them, and got them rooms. Some kind of floating creature hotel filled with honeymoon suites. It floated around with them for forty days and forty nights while it rained continuously. Somehow they all ate, but not each other. The lions played with the lambs and the crickets and the birds and none of them gave into the temptation for forty days. It got me thinking about these bible stories. What if the funny collar dude is wrong? What if it was just stories written by his mom and dad to help teach him right from wrong? I mean it makes sense, right? Just like Rapunzle, or Rumplestiltskin, or Goldilocks. Maybe these stories of Adam, and Eve, and Noah, and Cain and Able were just fairytales to teach him morals.. What if they are really made up stories written to explain to the children of thousands of years ago how to behave and how to treat each other? And of course how everything came to be?
It brought me to an internal understanding. This bible, this holy book, is nothing more than the history of humans as told by the people who first learned to write. So much of the beginning is a recounting of stories that were told in household through out the land we call the fertile crescent. So I re-read this bible only this time I tried to read between the lines. I also decided to make up some new lines of my own to read between. This then is what Justin Thyme Hilltop came up with as the true explanation of how we got to where we are. So in my own twisted way, this is my story of everything.
Part one: Genesis
Evolution is the key. Just as animals evolved into other animals, so did we evolve from some sort of animal. Bipeds they call us. We walk upright on two legs and use our hands as tools. So the original peoples of the earth evolved from animals and grew up in tribes. Each tribe or community took care of itself, its only purpose was to reproduce thereby keeping the tribe alive. Survival. That was the key. Most tribes were hunters or scavengers, either killing and eating animals, or scavenging the vegetation already here on earth. However, in an area we now call the Middle East, the so-called fertile crescent, two tribes stood out amongst all others. They had become far more advanced than most other tribes. These two tribes used reason and logic, and figured out a way to survive working together as a colony. One tribe, The Aggies, learned how to manipulate the vegetation and grow it at will using soil, sun and water. They were prolific growers. The other tribe, The Shepherds, learned how to manipulate the cattle and sheep, and penned them up creating a seemingly endless supply of milks and meats. They were prolific manipulators. These two tribes habituated a very large area called the Garden of Eden. They did not like each other, but they used their logic and reason to devise boundaries which they agreed not to cross. So the Aggies lived in the North section of Eden, and the Shepherds the South. The tribes kept to themselves and all was peaceful until one incident set of a series of events that would change the world.
One of the Aggies, a young male decided to take a walk in the area that no one used to see what was there. He came across a small waterhole in which a young lady was bathing. He did not recognize her so he knew she must belong to the Shepherds. When he looked closely at her, he noticed something that struck him. She looked much like he did, only fairer in skin and hair. She had a pale complexion and long colorless long hair filled with curls. She had eyes of turquoise which seemed to sparkle like evening stars. He found her oddly attractive. He became entrances as she bathed with water glistening off her white full breasts. It made his stomach a tad queasy. More than that, there was something intriguing about this woman. He spied her with great delight and even began to wonder if she was like the women of Aggies in other ways. Okay, let me spell it out for you. He began feel that all too familiar tingling of the loins that cause men to lose control. He began to wonder if she enjoyed the pleasures of sex in the same manner women of his tribe had enjoyed him. Basically, he thought about making wild unbridled passionate love to her. Considering the times, perhaps it was bridled sex, but whatever, she made him horny as all….. For lack of a better term, all Hell.
He began wandering down to the waterhole every day and watched from the trees as she bathed herself getting more horny each day. He stared in awe until he got up enough nerve to confront her. “Young maiden of the Shepherds, why do you come here each day by yourself?” The young maiden pretended to be alarmed even though she had been aware of his hiding and staring since his first visit. Frankly, she was just as curious as he was, also experienced a tingle and perhaps just as interested in sex. “I come here to bath myself, not to be stared at by an Aggie. Why do you come here and stare at me?” The young Aggie gave this some thought, because quite frankly he wasn’t sure himself why he was here. “ I come not to stare at you but to explore the area and determine if the land is fit for growing” he lied. The young maiden blushed slightly when she saw the lust in his dark brown eyes. “Are you sure it is the land which explore? It seems to me you are looking at my body and I believe that is not vegetation I see growing under your loincloth” The audacious young maiden gave him a look that offered more a challenge than a venting of distain. She blinked her eyes at him and something strange happened. He felt a Funny feeling in his stomach as though the seeds he used to grow things themselves were festering from within. He boldly chose to accept the challenge. “It is true that have gazed upon you and appreciate the…..unusual beauty you possess. Indeed I was hoping perhaps you were an Aggie and would be my maiden.” The Aggie could feel his entire body shaking and the young Shepherd maiden did not back away. She moved closer to the Aggie. “I am a Shepherd woman, not a dirt laden Aggie maiden. And you young Aggie, you are filled with dirt from your farming. If I were to ever consider being a maiden to the like of you I would expect you to be clean. Why don’t you come in here and allow me to bathe you?” It was more of an order than an invitation but that was of no consequence because he had already made his mind up as to where he was headed. He approached the watering hole with a mere modicum of trepidation. She held out her hand and he accepted, and the both of them shuddered ever so slightly. He dropped his loincloth and revealed the growth underneath it was indeed ripe for the picking. He stepped naked into the waterhole beside her. For five minutes they stared and cleansed each other, eyes sparkling with curious wonder. The Aggie closed his eyes and allowed this maiden, this Shepherd woman to touch him all over. When she got down to washing below his waist he was surprised to discover how eagerly his body was responding. The maiden held his solid manpole in her hand. “Methinks my Aggie that you have something other than bathing on your mind.” Unable to form an actual word, the Aggie grabbed the maiden in his arms and laid a big fat spit swapping kiss on her using his tongue muscle very skillfully. This was something new to the maiden, and at first she wanted to pull back. However, once she realized how good the tongue tango felt, she greedily sucked his tongue into her mouth and allowed the saliva filled dance to continue. Well I don’t have to tell you what happened next. Sparks flew and fluids oozed, and soft moaning was the only form of communication. Of course the two lovers understood they braved the scorn of their fellow tribe members by allowing their naked bodies to exchange these biological fluids. But it felt so crazy good they did indeed continue to explore each other and exchange passion and bodily fluids. Four times. It wasn’t until after the fourth round of carnal explorations led to exhaustion that they even introduced themselves to each other. “I am called Adam, which means man.” To which the maiden replied, “Indeed Adam, you are quite the man. More so than any Shepherd I have ever known. My name is Eve, which means life.” With a big fat satisfied grin Adam replied, “Indeed Eve, you have breathed life into me unequaled by any other Aggie I have ever known.”
So Adam and Eve began to meet each other every day and made love like a couple of school kids. But all was not so good back at the tribes. The other Aggies were beginning to get suspicious because Adam never ever seemed to be dirty. How could anyone work the soil all day yet remain free of dirt. And back at the Shepherds they began to get suspicious because Eve was always whistling and showed no interest in even the most handsome of Shepherds. Now it just so happened that the leader of each tribe sent someone to follow their respective suspected tribe violators on the very same day. Once at the watering hole, the Aggie spy hid in the north woods, and the Shepherd spy hid in the south woods. At first the spies were appalled and shocked. But Adam and Eve were both so very sexually talented, and each brought new tricks specific to their tribes that it became more of a show. I believe at least one, perhaps even both had become so excited while watching that they pleasured themselves before retuning to the tribe leaders to give the reports.
The tribe leaders were livid. Furious! How could this possibly happen? It was the most outrageous act that had ever occurred. They both paced, in different colonies yet somehow in unison, until the sinners returned to their folds. The minute Adam returned to the Shepherd village he was grabbed by the biggest and strongest Aggies and brought before the leader. “Adam, I am quite disappointed”, he said, “You have disrespected every member of our tribe by engaging in this disgusting act with a Shepherd woman.” Adam didn’t answer, he just stood there looking sheepish, which for an Aggie was another no no. “You’re despicable act has left me with no other choice. You shall be banned forever from the garden of Eden. Go now, get out and never return. Take your Shepherd slut with you!” Adam sadly walked to his hut to gather his belongings. Inside he saw his best and now only friend. “How did he find out” he asked of this friend. “Well Adam, you were spied on by Cain. He followed you and reported back to the leader.” Adam shook his head and mumbled, “Cain, of course. I should have guessed. That shit spreading farmer is gonna pay for this someday.” And with that, Adam left towards the waterhole hoping to see Eve there one last time.
Eve of course had a similar experience, and she too was permanently banned from the Garden of Eden. Eve was certain it was Abel that had spied on her as Abel had always tried putting the moves on her but she forever denied his advances. Reluctantly she too had to leave, and also chose to have one last look around the sexually charged waterhole in hopes that somehow Adam might be there. As luck would have it, which luck often does in tales, they met at the very same moment and exchanged stories of banishments.
So hand in hand Adam and Eve left the Garden of Eden forever, Eve holding in her free hand the apple Adam had grown for her, and Adam holding his snake, which Eve had so totally and completely tamed, in his free hand.

Chefs have Deep Thought Too (an excerpt)

COSMO AND THE GARDEN EARTH
(A guide to cosmic gardening)

PART 1. NOT JUST DUST IN THE WIND

In the beginning there was a vast empty space with atoms flying around everywhere when suddenly two overly aggressive atoms collided causing a huge explosion. The Big Bang! Right. First nothing, then all of a sudden a Universe so huge it has no end. Wait, even better, first there was nothing and then the one and only god created shit to keep him busy. A massive universe with one teeny little speck where he created human beings to be just like him. Now that’s even funnier! As a matter of fact both of these theories are a source of great humor and hilarity and the butt of many jokes at The Board of Co-operative Gods and Goddesses in District seven. At a cosmic cocktail party you will hear no less than one hundred jokes about various theories of how life came to be, but the Earth stories are by far the most numerous. The “monkey trials” keep the gods laughing for hours on end at inter-galactic get togethers. There is not a god worth his sodium that hasn’t heard of Darwin, Moses, Mohamed, Elijah. Or the Talmud, Koran, The Bible or even The Upanishads. Stories of a pure evil horned devil with blood dripping from its hands and fear bolts being shot from its eyes keep them rolling in the anti-matter with tears of laughter. Satan, Lucifer, Serpent of Evil, all such knee slapping names. Oh yes, the earthlings grown by Cosmo are a source of great amusement to all the gods. All the gods? Am I saying there really are many gods? Does a pope defecate in the woods? Is a Polar Bear catholic? Can white bears jump? Of course there are many gods, and many galaxies supporting forms of life. Did you really think you were the only living beings in the entire universe? Jeez, and I thought Wookies were dumb. Well sit back you Vader naysayer and let me tell you the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. Well maybe a fabrication or two along the way because YOU CAN’T HANDLE THE TRUTH!
In the beginning there were many gods and goddesses with varying responsibilities. Each god had a particular purpose. Gods to make the planets spin, gods to make and enforce the law of gravity, gods to create laws of physics, gods to ponder deeply the laws of the universe and how they should be applied. These were the most intelligent gods and they held court to make decisions about everything. It is still known today as The Board of Co-operative Gods and Goddesses. (BOCGG) They made the decisions that effected the farmer gods who were expected to grow and experiment with the various galaxies across the universe. Each galaxy was tended to by its own god. There was great and clever Simon in the Tolkien Galaxy, Mychrighton in the Andromeda Strain Galaxy, The red haired beauty Lucille who watched over the Bobaloo Galaxy, Luke-ass who presided over The infamous Jedi Galaxy that was far far away, and so on. Here in our Milky Way galaxy, the farmer was and is the god Cosmo. Such a good farmer is Cosmo that they named the entirety of space after him. The vast space of the universe came to be known as “The Cosmos”. Travel was known as Cosmic travel, knowledge as cosmic knowledge and any left out odds and ends in space became known as Cosmic debris. I’m not jiving you bout that Cosmic debris! Cosmo is indeed an accomplished cosmic gardener, in fact he is somewhat of a legend among the other gods. In Solar system 728KJ he had cultivated nine grooving spinning garden orbs he called planets. From the tiny and excruciatingly hot mercury, to the equally tiny but totally frozen Pluto he tended to all nine magnificently. He had the giant Jupiter (which for some reason had red eye in all the family photo’s). He put some cool looking bangle bracelets around the lovely and mysterious Saturn, and named two of the planets after his own Mom and Dad. The entire universe was touched at the naming of Venus and Mars. Yes Cosmo had really taken pride in that particular solar system. But his pride and joy and claim to fame is most assuredly for his work done on one particular planet, known throughout cosmos as garden earth. Garden earth is a rather insignificant looking planet in solar system 728KJ. It is the third planet from Sun 728, and has the benefit of the perfect amount of sunshine. Earth also has a considerable amount of water on it which is the other essential ingredient in growing things. Sun and Water in abundance makes for a smashing garden. Cosmo wants to make planet earth, in solar system 728KJ the most prolific and successful garden in all the universe. With a vast ocean to create clouds which would in turn drop water back into the garden a system of synergetic energy is created. Cosmic irrigation! Garden earth is a thriving ever-growing populace world. A wide variety of vegetation and many roaming creatures inhabit the garden.

From the Memoirs of a Hippie Chef

When Life Give You Lemons Take Some Pills
With just a month left of school before our last official summer vacation we had become psychedelic travel agents. We tripped on Acid, Peyote, and our favorite, mescaline. Mesc. Ken was selling a lot of mesc lately and one particular batch was cut into Nestles Quick and half the student body was buying little containers of milk to make “chocolate mesc.” It was so cool, drinking chocolate milk that exercised your laugh muscles to near exhaustion and stretched the boundaries of your mind. We laughed and tripped for two weeks straight drinking chocolate milk mescaline everyday. You could tell who was tripping and who wasn’t just by looking in their eyes. Ken and Artie had become closer and closer and Ken had become his number one salesman. Anyone wanted pot or pills or hallucinogens went to him. I was beginning to get just a little worried because he was not as careful about it as he had once been. Its not good for too many people to know, but he was making pretty good money and he always had plenty of buzz. He bought a scale to keep in his room and now he was weighing the drugs out himself. He had become a full fledged dealer and people were getting more and more demanding of him. I was really glad summer was coming because school had just become to dangerous. Carrie and I had completely cemented our relationship and everyone was sure we would get married after school. Marriage wasn’t in my immediate plans because everything would have to wait until Ken and I cruised across Rt. 66 and documented the journey. Maybe then I would send for Carrie. She knew this and was not happy about it, but she also knew Ken and I had planned this long before we started going out. For now we would enjoy the summer baking our bodies in the sun at the beach, water skiing, swimming, and just cruising the Long Island Sound by day, and partying our asses off at night. Cavalieri’s slowed down for me as well because the managers son worked there part time in the summer so my days got cut. It didn’t bother me too much, of course I had less money, but I had more playtime.
Carrie and I had gotten very serious and I felt like she was the love of my life. So funny that someone who has been a female friend for years suddenly becomes the most important part of your life and you begin to make your plans around them. But that was exactly what I did. We tripped together, went to concerts and movies either high from pills or so stoned we sometimes forgot where we were. I had become a cooks assistant and head suds buster at Cavalieri’s. This was promising to be the best summer ever, and it was just about to begin. Still, I was looking forward to going to work on this warm spring evening if only to get away from the chaos of daily life. At Cavaliers I was in a separate world which had a total different set of characters that somehow seemed somewhat refreshing. I had become a central figure in the restaurant and had achieved the enlightened feat of reaching a new plane of visiting a parallel universe. It was a culinary Mecca which absorbed my inner spirit and astral projected me to another world.
I had learned quite a bit at Cavalieri’s, Jimmy had sort of taken me under his wing and shown me his paternal side. He had become my sensei, my benefactor of cooking. Even Andre had begun teaching me although I suspected his motives were more about getting me to do his work. But I had become the kitchen protégé in line to one day have dominion of my very own kitchen. All the basics plus some tricks on soups and sauces. The more he taught the more I absorbed. I became a gastronomic sponge soaking up the “tricks of the trade”. I was learning as I was earning.
When I walked up to the back door of the kitchen I was surprised to find it locked. I peered in the grease smeared window but it appeared all the lights were off. I double checked my watch then looked to the parking lot. Jimmies car was parked in front with a few other cars so I walked around to the front. Fuck man I hope Jense isn’t gonna yell at me again for using the front door but what else was I to do? I opened the door and what I saw was rather perplexing. Across the dining room at the bar sat Jimmy, Andre, Didier, and even Rod the bus boy all getting served by the bartender John. I walked up and noticed an almost deathly glumness in the room and on their collective faces. “Hey, whats up? The back door is locked.” Jimmy broke the ominous silence and said “Zeet down JD. We gots some bad news today. Johnny, give JD a cervesa .” My happiness was rapidly being replaced with worry as John poured me a cold beer. It was Didier who spoke up next. “Jense and Laura have run off with all the restaurant’s money. They broke into the safe, took all the cash, emptied the cash registers and disappeared.” I felt my face turn a whiter shade of pale. “WHAT??” If I told you I was stunned I would have been doing the emotion a terrible injustice. More accurately I was shocked, flabbergasted, bewildered, in a funk and totally blown away simultaneously. My entire world and every world within a hundred light years had been rocked! I looked intensely from face to face hoping one of them would reveal the fact that they had played a fabulous joke on me but none offered a scintilla of a smile. “Jeeeeesus fucking shit! When, what, how did, did you call the cops?” Didier being the manager took control again and explained everything as the news slowly seeped into my cerebellum. He had come into work this morning and found the front door open and the alarm shut off. The cash register was open, there was an empty bottle of Dom Perignon Champagne on the bar with two empty glasses. He ran to the office which was also wide open as was the safe door. He called the cops first, then Jense. Jenses wife said he left for work early and should be there by now. Didier started doing the arithmetic and called Laura whom he had expected of having an affair with Jense. The cops came and took away the champagne bottle and glasses but it was pretty obvious what has happened.
It was a lot to digest. So many things raced through my mind. “Wow! Laura and that fucking airhead asshole Jense? They took all the money? They took ALL the money? Wait, what does that mean?” “It means JD that we ain’t got no more restaurant. No mas trabajo amigo.” I looked at Jimmy with an empty confused stare. So that was it man. No more job. No more Laura. No more money coming in. No more Cavalieri’s. It was painful. Didier explained that the restaurant would have to withhold my paycheck until the investigation was over. The six of us sat at the bar and drank for hours until finally it was time for everyone to leave. We said good bye to each other, and Jimmy and I talked at his car for another 30 minutes as he assured me when he found another job he would call me. But I knew this was the last I would ever see of Jimmy, or any of the other people who had become such an integral part of my life. My restaurant family was getting divorced. Now they would all just be a speck in my memory bank. Feeling sad and somewhat broken I walked home. Actually I sort of stumbled home having consumed more than my share of the free flowing beer. The summer was barely beginning and Cavalieri’s was done, over! I stopped off on the way at Kens and scored some ludes to help me forget all the bullshit of the day.
When I got to Kens room he was flying high and slurring even worse than me. “Hey bro, what’s the matter? You look like you been crying or something. Here, take 2 of these.” Ken had handed me two white tablets that looked like huge aspirins. “Jesus shit man, what the fuck are these monsters?” I trusted Ken to the end so I downed the tabs without waiting for a reply, but still I was curious. “Those were morphine tabs bro, gonna kick your ass six ways to Sunday.” Artie crushes them and snorts em up his nose. Says it gets him way fucking high. I think he shoots them in his veins sometimes too, but fuck that man, none of that shit for us.” I was beginning to wonder how much he really meant that or of he was only trying to convince himself, but that shits for another time. “Hey man, fuckin’ Cavalieri’s closed. That chick Laura ran away with the dickhead floor manager and took all the fuckin’ money. They even downed some Dom Perignon before running off. Now I ain’t got no job. Sucks man!” Ken seemed shocked but had a hard time convincing his face to respond that way. Almost vacant. “Whoa! Holy Jesus fuck man! Oh you are really gonna need those fuckers tonight. Here, take some weed home too.” As always Ken knew what I needed and he lit up a bowl and handed me a small baggie of preamo weed. We puffed the weed in his chamber pipe and in the middle of talking I saw Ken nodding off and falling asleep. I couldn’t help but notice some fresh bruises on Kens arm and it made me sad. I snuck out of his house quiet as a mouse and walked home. I had no doubt his old man was beating him now. Man things were changing way too fast. But for now, I’ll just head home, smoke another bowl, and dig this new morphine high.
……………………………………PEACE

When The Saint Comes Marching In

Don’t Pee On My Parade and Tell Me Its Rain
There’s a parade coming to my town Saturday and I don’t want to be the one to rain on anyones parade, but someone has to do it. So as they elected the Grand Marshall of the Saint Patrick’s Day Parade, I have elected my self the Grand Marshall of questioning what all the shenanigans are about. More importantly just who is this Patrick dude, why is he a saint, and why are we celebrating him anyway?
The Feast of Saint Patrick. Celebrated in many parts of the world, The UK, Canada, Argentina, Australia, New Zealand, and of course here in my county, America. Even more localized the parade in my town of Nutley New Jersey will be this Saturday, because that’s the only day the bagpipers had open. Apparently here in America there is a shortage of men in skirts squeezing a bag with various pipe sticking out of it that makes haunting sounding music. New York City has the monopoly on pipers due to the huge going-ons in the city. It’s an official celebration here in New York every year beginning with the famous St. Patrick’s Day Parade. They love their parades in Manhattan, and more than that they love the party and revelry that is mistaken as a free pass to exercise extreme inebriation and tomfoolery. “Step out of the road my dear lady there’s a parade coming through.” Every Irish pub is filled to the rafters with either Irish or temporary Irish folk singing Irish tunes. Maybe I should say slurring Irish tunes, many in manbraces swaying to the country sounding tunes of Ireland. People come in buses, trains, and cars from all around the area to get drunk and share overplayed jokes like “More like Erin go Braless,“ or “Kiss me I’m drunk.” After the parade the city is packed with people who celebrate the day by excessive drinking which somehow translates into being Irish. The bars serve green beer which as I’ve heard it told, turns ones urine a pastel lime green. But allow me to back up a little and investigate why March 17th became such a decadent celebration here.
Patrick is the patron saint, or heavens advocate, for the Republic of Ireland. He lived from AD 385-461 and passed away on March 17th. That explains some of the heavy drinking and carousing and basic mayhem surrounding this day as it’s a ginourmous multi-country funeral repast. If you’ve ever been to an Irish funeral you know what I mean. When a friend or family member passes away we throw a party and instead of sitting around crying we have copious amounts of raisin‘ the glass. I guess it a kind of last hurrah and we get drunk, sing songs, stuff our gullets with food, and remember all the great times we had with the deceased. Clearly Patrick is more than just a passing acquaintance because the party returns year after year. What makes him so special?
Not much is known about this mysterious saint, but from what I was able to find out he was born a Deacons son in an area once known as the Romano-British culture and not in Ireland at all. This has led to all kinds of confusion, the Romans claiming he is Italian, and the United Kingdom assuring he was a Brit. Whatever! He was kidnapped by some Irish raiders and held prisoner. While in prison God talked to him and told him to escape and go back to his home which he did. There he became a bishop. As a Bishop he went back to Ireland, moving diagonally as Bishops do, and was told by God this time to help convert the Irish into Catholicism. In a vision he was asked to be the “Voice of the Irish”.
So it was that Patrick headed into Ireland and began what today would be called “Bishop Patrick’s Catholic Revival,” He set about baptizing, ordaining, and basically teaching the doctrines of Christianity to the Irish people. One particular lesson was the teaching of the Holy Trinity and its rumored he reached down and plucked a three leaf clover as a visual aid. So impressed were his students they embraced the shamrock as a national symbol and it remains synonymous with Ireland to this very day. The wearing of shamrocks on their clothes and patches strengthened the resolve of that symbol and long after Patrick was gone in 1798 Irish soldiers took it a step further and wore all green uniforms. That gave us the famous “wearing of the green” ritual. Patrick had become the icon of Ireland. One of the more dramatic claims of Patty was how he banned the snakes from Ireland. Truthfully, snakes would find it difficult to migrate there so its true there are no indigenous snakes, so methinks it was a metaphor for evil assholes. Anyway, according to Eugene O’Neil, St. Patrick tossed all the snakes of Ireland into the Atlantic Ocean where they swam across to New York an became cops… What? It could happen!
Here in America along with the drinking and parade we also celebrate St. Patrick’s Day with a traditional corned beef and cabbage dinner. This I find amusing because there is not a huge following of this meal in Ireland. It’s about as Irish as apple pie. You will however find it very often in a New England Boiled Dinner. I believe it is jut a small touch of confusion. Ireland is largely a farming and herding country. That means hours and hours in the fields working hard. The women folk worked even harder, taking care of all the chores around the house as well as some of the farming or herding tasks. They were responsible to have food on the table at the end of the day and like many hard working women completed it by making a slow cooked stew or boiled meal. Dinner was created in a one pot vessel on a stove. One pot meal. A casserole. The meat in first, later the potatoes, then the carrots, and so on. Like Goulash, Tagine, Duchie, Bourguignon, Cachupa, and tons of cultural stew dishes were born this way. Corning, or curing was popularized during the industrial revolution but even before that meats had to be preserved somehow on the long boat trips across the Atlantic to America. So early colonist in America likely ate a lot of cured and pickled foods. A more traditional Irish dinner would include seafood like prawns and salmon around the area of Dublin Bay, or lamb with potatoes and sausage in the farmlands. I imagine Patrick himself would get a kick out of watching us celebrate being Irish by drinking green beer and eating corned beef and cabbage. I’m relatively certain he would more likely have some advice for us along the lines of kiss my Irish ass but we party the way we party.
Or maybe he would prefer the wise Irish advice I got from my Mum and Dad. My dear old Dad always told me to celebrates it with an Irish seven course meal. A six pack of Guinness and a baked potato. My Mum told me the Irish are exceptionally good at one of two things, loving or fighting. At six foot four you might think I would be a good fighter, but alas I am not. But lover? Many would be green with envy but that’s a horse of a different color!…………………PEACE