BBQ: Hell. Yes.

This guy knows how to BBQ. Like a pro, he's even using implements of torture.

I love BBQ'ing. There's something so immediate and primal about reducing cooking to the basics: Gather food, apply heat, eat. I love it. It's simple, it involves things on fire, bits of animal flesh, and, of course, eating.

The BBQ'ing season is upon us. This summer, I plan to smoke, cook, and consume my own bacon. No, not bacon made out of Matt, just regular bacon made by me out of pork. As much as I'd love to eat Matt Bacon... mmm... Matt Bacon.

It turns out that it's not that complicated a process. To do it, a person needs a smoker, some raw pork belly (complete with piggy hair that needs to be shaved prior to smoking), plastic bags, and curring agents (mostly salt and sugar).

Here are few links that suggest different methods of preparing the bacon.

• The origional bacon blog that got me thinking about it
  
• Basic Bacon (this is the Meat Man... bad name)
  

I am going to check with the butcher down the road about procuring the necessary pork stomach lining this weekend, and report back with pricing and some pics.

Francis Bacon. Known as the catalyst of the scientific revolution in England. Also: First mayor of Baconsville.

It's all coming together....

The past weekend was strictly working time. Saturday we spent the day cleaning and organizing the loft. It is amazing how much crap you can accumulate over the years....what am I a saying, we just moved into this place last December! Anyhow, we had many things that we moved that we were going to "deal with when we get there"....Saturday was the day.

Sunday we took a drive over to an unmentionable large store. Although we felt very dirty walking through it we had no other choice as they were the only place in town that carried the items that we liked and needed: end table, small dresser, and wardrobe. We assembled the wardrobe and end table last night while we watched Henry VIII on Masterpiece Theater.

The next three weeks will be busy as we are having people visit from Michigan. The Valentine's will be in Denver this week - we plan to spend Wednesday and Thursday with them. Jess and Mike are coming out next Tuesday and staying for about atweek. Mom will be coming out the day after they leave and staying for almost a week. Then her and I hit the road (with Nikki in the back seat) and drive back to Michigan for the 4th of July festivities. I will be in GR the first couple of weeks in July. If you want to hang out you can either write me email or call my cell phone (or my parent's phone after June 29th).

Matt has bestowed upon me luscious gifts for our Anniversary: KitchenAid mixer and a Cuisinart Food Processor. We made pizza last night. I used the mixer to make the dough and Matt use the Food Processor to make the sauce. The pizza turned out fantastic and we had a lot of fun creating it. More info to come on the creations from the new appliances!!!

(Nikki's feet don't even touch the bottom of the fountain.)

The science of cooking?

I am tired, so this will be short. Earlier this week I found this article on Discover and it totally blew my mind with strange possibilities so I thought I would pass it onto all of you too.

All I have to say is fried mayonnaise. It sounds gross, but what other ideas will they come up with?!?!?1

Cooking and Waiting

We had a fun potluck last night. Some work friends came over and we all shared food. Most of the people were Indian women, so the food was amazing and diverse. Mandy and I made egg fried rice with veggies, some basmati rice, cinnamon bread, and focaccia bread with sun-dried tomatoes and mozzarella. They made idly with coconut chutney, tandoori chicken, golab jamun (little deep-fried donuts in a single sugar syrup), onion pakoras, and Kentucky Fried Chicken... yes, KFC. It was cool to hang out with everyone and swap stories about cultural differences, movie likes, and recipes.

I've received by new monitor, Final Cut Studio 5.1 software, and 320GB-friggen-hard-drive for $79. The only thing that's missing is the Mac. The tracking number was last updated on February 1st and it places the date of arrival here around February 7th, but I think it will show up before that--hopefully tomorrow.

I've been hard at work on my demo reel. I created a cool 10 second intro clip and another 8 second conclusion clip. I started splitting the scenes out that I want to use, but with a Mac on the way, and having to convert everything from MPEG2 to Quicktime when it arrives, I've been dragging my heels. I figure one long weekend push will get into a form that I wouldn't mind showing to potential employers. Taking Josh's advice, I'm going to put just the video clip, my resume, contact info up on a basic .html page while I work on the more in-depth flash site that will showcase my writings, photography, and audio work.

After the reel is done, I'm going to move full-force into working on Mandy's parent's cross-country bike trip video diary. I'm going import that footage, break into sizable chunks, and figure out how to pace it based on notes that Casey left me. I think that's going to be fun since it will give me an opportunity to relearn FCP, Soundtrack, and Motion - the Mac apps I haven't really been playing with since I left school.

This week we're packing up and getting ready to head North to see the premier of Chad's documentary "Little Thumb" and to see our nephew, Zach, for his fourth birthday. I'm really anxious to see Chad's film. He's been working on it for a over a year. I've seen various drafts of the outline, shot some of the footage, and debated the theme over many a pint. It's always so gratifying to see people accomplish the goals they set for themselves. Woot!