Take a boneless, skinless chicken breast and pound it very flat. Rub one side with Adobo seasoning. On the seasoned side place a sliced jalapeño and a pile of shredded cheese (I used Monterrey Jack.) Roll the whole thing up like a HoHo with the cheese and peppers in the middle. Roll it as tight as possible. Wrap the roll in Bacon. You have to use pork bacon. If you use Turkey Bacon then you are not a man and you should just have a salad while wearing a dress.

Use toothpicks that you have soaked in water to keep the whole thing rolled up.

Put the whole thing on the grill over indirect medium high heat. Cook for 3 minutes, rotate it a quarter turn, 3 minutes, and so on. Keep an eye on it for flare ups. After all sides are grilled turn the heat down and let the whole thing heat through for awhile. It’s done when the temperature in the thickest part of the chicken (don’t push the thermometer into the cheese) reaches 76 degrees C. That’s 170 F for all you jerks who like to use the weights and measures of the common folk.

The bacon and chicken will bond to form a smoky, tender unholy union of meat. The chicken will be very tender because the grease from the bacon will fry it while the heat from the grill simultaneously grills it. The goodness is extended by the fruit of the bovine concealed inside. The peppers just man the dish up by 44%. If you include the seeds in the peppers they man the dish up by 56%.

The ideal side dish for this is corn on the cob brushed with butter and BBQ sauce. Maybe some cole slaw too.

Garnish with more bacon.

My plans to make a mockery of last week’s writing seminar were partially foiled by the dreaded “lunch crash.” We were bribed into the seminar with the promise of a pizza lunch. After said lunch was consumed nobody much felt like doing any writing.

In the past I’ve been the victim of a recurring nightmare in which I’m led into a room and presented with vast amounts of pizza. The grease shimmers on the surface of the pepperoni like a Tuscan lake at sunset. I eat my fill but there are no napkins. All of a sudden the room is shaken by a great tumult. An angry mob has gathered; swept up in a wave of anti-dairy sentiment. I try to call for help but I’m too full to shout. I reach for a pen to write an impassioned plea to the mob but my hands are too greasy to grasp the pencil. I’m swept up in a wave of fisticuffs, sauce, discarded pizza boxes, and inhuman anger. Then I wake up.

So that’s why I negatively associate pizza with writing.

Anyway, we get to the actual “writing” portion of the seminar and are given 20 minutes to bang out a draft. I sit and stare for most of that time. When my pen finally begins moving I write:

The Black Mesa incident, tragic as it was, teaches us many lessons about the intelligent and safe management of interdimentional experimentation

That’s really as far as I got before I set the pen down. I don’t think I can write with my hands anymore. My handwriting has degraded to something that looks like Chinese but isn’t.

We’re having a business writing seminar here at work (3 days x 6 hours.) As part of the seminar each of us are going through the steps of writing an actual business document.  Since my projects are mostly governed by non-disclosure agreements there’s no way I can use the seminar to write an actual report or protocol. I elected to write a “mock” document as part of the course.

The title of my document is “The prevention and mitigation of unorthodox crisis situations at the [name of Brian’s employer, omitted.]”

In the document I’ll be covering things like:

• interdimensional incursion (Black Mesa)
• Xenomorph infiltration (Nostromo)
• Xenomorph infestation (LV426)
• Reanimation viral outbreak (Raccoon City)
• Demonic possession (Twin Peaks)
• Coping with AI Self Awareness (Aperture Labs)

The final product will probably be unimpressive (let’s face it - we’re talking about a business seminar here) but regardless I’ll post the final result here when it’s done.

I realized that maxim holds true long ago when I was trying to get this bitch up and running. I was going through the motions of visiting other peoples’ blogs and leaving polite, insincere comments to drive traffic to this blog. That method didn’t last long because I quickly realized that the internet holds far more worthy enemies than it does friends. The problem with *that* idea is inherent in the supposed “theme” of this blog. I didn’t pick “The Science of Apathy” as a name because it had a nice ring to it. I picked it because my attitude regarding most things is either “that’s nice but I don’t care” or “that sucks but I don’t care.”

I care about the most important issues such as family, friends, the environment, the election, the economy and the least important issues such as gaming, undead crisis mitigation strategies, painting little plastic soldiers, feline psychology, and mayhem. I figure the stuff in the middle of those two extremes is all fluff.

The internet is mostly about fluff. My efforts to write a reactionary blog were largely destined for failure.

I need to sit down and make a list of 20 or so topics that I want to write about. I definitely want to do a series of posts/illustrations that explore various courses of action that a person might take in the event of an unplanned xenopregnancy. For all you laypeople a xenopregnancy is when an alien implants some kind of embryo inside of your gut. Alien and Eraserhead are two examples of films that explore the subject.

I’d much rather write about that than anything in the news. There are plenty of other blogs covering the important issues much better than I ever could. I might do ONE post about the election but that’s all.

I might resurrect the site if I overcome a considerable amount of laziness. I discovered that I only like contemplating things like zombies, aliens, evil clowns, hot dog stands, pizza, time travel, and other staples in the existence of over-fed nerds everywhere.

So we’ll see.

In November my DVD player crapped out and I decided it was time to make the jump to Blu-Ray by getting a Playstation 3. With the holidays around the corner and cash running low I decided I’d drop the hint to my parents that I wanted the PS3. My email to them read something like “my DVD player broke and we can’t afford another one so for Christmas I think Best Buy gift cards would be good. I want to get a Playstation 3.”

I was hoping they would simply read between the lines there and get me the PS3.

My parents have never, ever bought me a game console for Christmas. When I was a kid I asked for the NES once, the Genesis once, and the Ill-fated Dreamcast once (OK so maybe I was in college for that last one.) In all cases I ended up saving my money and buying it myself. In the case of the NES that was no easy task considering I was 9 years old. In fact my parents were so dead set against me getting one that they told me I had to buy my own TV if I wanted to set it up (as there was only one TV in our house at the time.) I mowed dozens of lawns that summer and got the TV and NES. It’s a damn good thing I didn’t wait until the summer of 1988 because that year was one of the worst droughts on record and there were no lawns to mow.

Anyway they didn’t get me the PS3 but I think I scored enough gift cards and cash (grandma is too old to shop so she gives cash) to get the PS3. I guess things never change.

Also, killed.

That really sucks

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chi-pigeonman_20dec20,0,7325168.story

1 Shot Gin

1 Shot Beef Stock

Vermouth to taste

Drop of Worcestershire Sauce

Mix in a shaker, shake with plenty of ice. Pour through a strainer and serve in a Martini Glass. Garnish with a slice of roasted red potato on the rim of the glass.

It’s funny to me that people reading this think I’m joking. Also, I need to add that Ed at work made most of this up. He always accuses me of stealing his material for my blog.

My locker combination from high school (although I still remember my gym lock combination. It was 12-20-35.)

My first phone number. It was 312-429-67something. It changed to 708 when the suburbs got their own zip code back in the 80’s.

My address from senior year of college. It was on Healy St. in Champaign across from the Burrito place. I can’t remember the building number or apartment number but I do remember that my neighbors were sluts. They might as well have had a revolving door on their apartment.

The password for my first AIM account. It’s still there but it’s unused. Oddly enough I DO remember the password for my first email address. The address was GHXQ80C@prodigy.com. The password was the name of my pet at the time.

The LAST Nintendo game I bought for the original NES. I know the first game I bought was Bionic Commando. The last game could have been NARC or Mega Man 4.

The name of the teacher who taught the 2nd half of the year when I was in Kindergarten. The teacher who started the year was Miss Jackie (although that could have been her first name, I have no clue) but she got preggers and left halfway through the year. The lady who replaced her was kind of a mean old bitch with messy hair. She yelled at me when I brought my Die-Cast Space Shuttle to school.

Where I left my Die-Cast Space Shuttle

The path through Bowser’s castle in Super Mario Brothers.

The armor penetration value of a plasma cannon in Warhammer 40k 2nd ed. I know the Lascannon was 3d6+9 and the Krak Missile was d6+d10+8.

That’s the alternate name I thought of for Thanksgiving. It’s more descriptive than “Turkey Day.”

Happy Turkswillings Day!

Or Thursday

Or Thanksgiving

Whatever the hell you’re calling it.