Whole hog
Instagram: Whole hog
Whole hog
FINALLY!
My first “real” girlfriend – the first woman I totally flipped for – was a slightly older woman named Beverly. On one of our first dates, she took me to the Virginia-Highland neighborhood of midtown Atlanta. It was my first time there, and we spent a rainy afternoon going through all the cute lil’ shops in the area. I felt all grown up and glamorous, as if I were so much more sophisticated than other kids in my school who were taking their dates to the local cinema or the Chinese restaurant next to the mall.
I bought a cheap pair of browline sunglasses while I was on that date. They were tortoise shell with green lenses. And they were my favorite pair of sunglasses. Sure, part of that was because when I bought them I was head over heels in love with a sexy, cosmopolitan older woman. So yes, there was an emotional attachment. But I mostly loved them because they were cool. I imagined Hunter S. Thompson wearing similar sunglasses, and I hoped to channel some of his gonzo through them.
About a year later, one of my friends accidentally dropped something important – car keys, I think – into a big drain next to one of the buildings at my school. I, being a complete idiot, had the sunglasses in my shirt pocket. So when I leaned over to look, the sunglasses slid out of my pocket and fell through the grate and into the drain, lost forevermore.
I was oddly heartbroken. Yeah, they were just a stupid pair of $5 sunglasses. Beverly and I had split a long time prior, and I’d totally moved on by then. But still.
I looked and looked for a similar pair of sunglasses, but could never find ones exactly like the pair I’d had before. Maybe the frames were black instead of tortoise shell. Maybe the accent metal was silver instead of gold. Maybe the lenses were black instead of green. And towards the end of my high school life, I developed a problem with contact lenses, and couldn’t wear them any more. So I had to wear prescription sunglasses. And since this was the suburban America in the 80s, my options were limited to whatever LensCrafters or Pearle had… which wasn’t all that.
I got my last pair of sunglasses in 1999. I thought they were super-cool, like something Neo would wear in The Matrix… an illusion instantly shattered when I came home and my then-girlfriend said I looked like Paul Shaffer from the Letterman show (so… thanks, Sheila!).
I still have my Neo\Paul Shaffer sunglasses, but they’re really falling apart. They’ve been folded closed so many times that the black has rubbed off the sides. And the tint is starting to bubble around the edges, something I became painfully aware of on my last trip to the beach: Lisa asked if I had sand all over my glasses. Nope, it was spots where the tint had come off.
So recently I stepped up and got the sunglasses of my dreams: a genuine pair of Ray Ban Clubmaster sunglasses in my prescription and everything:
Maybe I look like a big dork in them, but I don’t care. I’ve wanted a pair of sunglasses like these since 1987 and I finally got them… 27 years later!
A big thanks to Dr. Mike at Advanced Family Eye Care for helping to make my dreams come true!
Instagram: Yum!
Yum!
Instagram: Comfort.
Comfort.
Instagram: South.
South.
Instagram: BBQ
BBQ
Quote of the Day
Seriously, folks… Justified has the BEST dialogue of any show on TV, period:
“Disposing of murder victims for money, why that leaves a bad taste in a Christian’s mouth. A small town don’t run on a 24-hour news cycle… a small town NEVER forgets. Now word’s goin’ burn through these hills and hollers like a wildfire. People o’ Harlan County, rich and poor, will marvel at your debasement and venality. They will spit venom when they speak your name and they will take your suicide as the last act of a coward. Now your reputation is ruined, your good word worthless, but death will not be the end of your suffering. For generations, your children and your children’s’ children will have a mark against their name, and THAT will be your legacy.”
– Walton Goggins as Boyd Crowder
in Justified, “Shot All To Hell”
Instagram: Super Bowl Steak!
Super Bowl Steak!
SIMON’S PICKS – SUPER BOWL XLVIII
Hey, y’all! Simon here! So… this is it, huh? The hour is almost upon us: SUPER BOWL XLVIII! Hard to believe the season is over so quickly… Time flies when you’re almost 8 years old! I finished the season (and playoffs) at 166-99… let’s see if I can keep the losses in double-digits this weekend! I love y’all and hope you have a GREAT off-season!
SUPER BOWL XLVIII – Seattle Seahawks at Denver Broncos: Well, this should be a heck of a battle, huh? This is the first time that a #1 offense has net a #1 defense in the Super Bowl. Ever! Denver is averaging an amazing 37.9 points per game (PPG), almost 15 points higher than the league average. On the other hand, Seattle is allowing only 14.4 points per game, which is 9 points lower than the league average. The difference – 23.4 PPG – is the largest for any Super Bowl… by far. But enough with all the numbers higgeldy-giggledy… who’s going to actually win this thing?
Simon’s money is on the Broncos. Yes, the Seahawks have a great defense that’ll keep the game fairly close. If it were a shootout, the Broncos would have the definite edge, and I think Denver’s defense is “just good enough” to keep Seattle in check. Don’t get me wrong – Seattle’s offense is pretty good – and that Russell Wilson is ABOUT HANDSOME, am I right ladies? – but when it comes to Super Bowls, age and experience matter, and Pey Pey has that in spades. Like, a LOT (in case you missed it, Peyton is almost 13 years older than Russell Wilson). And now that Simon’s close to the 8 year mark, he’ll go with experience over raw beauty (although WHAT BEAUTY it is!). Also, daddy sez I have to pull for Denver because Demaryius Thomas went to Georgia Tech. Hey, he’s also handsome! WHY DON’T YOU COME SAY HEY TO SIMON, DEMARYIUS?
I hope y’all had fun reading the picks this year! The Simon is going to bone up – wink! wink! – on some football during the offseason, and promises to do EVEN BETTER next year!
Love y’all!
XOXOXOXOXO
– The Simon!
NIFTY GADGET: Mountek Universal CD Slot Mount
A couple years back, my girlfriend bought a 2002 PT Cruiser from her brother. It’s the car I usually drive when I’m by myself. Despite all the guff the car gets in pop culture (“PT Loser!”), it’s actually a fun little car to drive.
But there are a couple of issues when it comes to using a GPS with the Cruiser.
The first is a design issue: the windshield is so far way from the driver’s seat that if I use Garmin’s windshield mount I almost have to squint to read the GPS, and if I want to interact with it, I have to lean all the way forward in my seat and fully extend my arm.
The second problem is a defect in the plastic used in the PT Cruiser’s dash. There’s a vent at the bottom of the dash, near the windshield, for the defroster. The plastic used to make the dash becomes extremely brittle with age, and can crack; when it does, it’s usually around that vent. And, like a crack in a windshield, the crack can grow over time. We have a crack in our dash, and it goes all the way from the vent to the front of the dash by the passenger seat, effectively splitting the dash into two pieces (here’s a Google Image search for “PT Cruiser dash crack”; here’s just one company that offers various plastic and carpet covers to hide the cracks). Anyway, the point is, because of the crack I don’t want to use a dash mount, for fear of making the crack worse.
So… how to mount a GPS or smartphone in the Cruiser that doesn’t involve a windshield or dash mount? Mountek has you covered! Ladies and gentlemen, here is the “nGroove Universal CD Slot Mount for Cell Phones and GPS Devices”:
As the name suggests, the mount fits in to the CD slot of your car stereo. There’s a screw you turn on the underside of the unit which expands the mount in the CD slot, locking it in place. You then put your phone or GPS into the unit and squeeze the two sides to close it. The device mount swivels, so you can use your phone\GPS in portrait or landscape position (and, if you look closely, you can see that the side on the “bottom” of the unit is open, allowing you to charge your phone\GPS if that’s where the charging port is). To free your device, just press the rounded button on the top of the base and the sides pop open.
It’s a good solution to the problem of where to mount a device in my car, and it’s especially cool because it works really well with my Samsung Galaxy phone. We have a dedicated GPS unit (a Garmin Nuvi), but Google Maps on my phone gives much better directions 9 times out of 10, so I’ve come to prefer using my phone over the Garmin.
Of course, this mount makes it impossible to listen to CDs in the car; this isn’t a problem for me: thanks to iPods and smartphones and tablets, I haven’t listened to a CD in a car in at least 5 years. In fact, I’m almost certain that I’ve never even tried playing a CD in the Cruiser!
One minor annoyance is that the mount covers up the clock. Of course, if I have my phone in the mount then it’s not a problem, since I can see the time on my phone. But if I’m running a routine errand – like going to the grocery store – then I normally don’t mount my phone. And while taking the mount down isn’t a big hassle, it is too much work just to see what time it is. So I have to get out my phone and check there [note to self: take watches to get the batteries replaced!]
I also wish the mount was able to tilt “up” more. In the picture, the mount is titled upwards as much as it will go. It’s not a “bad” angle, but it is a bit more “straight out” than “up towards me” than I’d like.
Still these are minor quibbles. The mount is really pretty cool, and easily solves the problem of where (and how) to mount a device in my car. The mount is around $24.95 and is available from Amazon.