Best Experienced With: Hum; Stars
(Please right click on the link below to open the suggested background music to this evening’s gathering in a new browser window. That’s a tasty little song with a significantly cool opening riff.)
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rfbn3ieVUYU
The Random sent a big ole school of krill off the coast of So Cal this past week. The krill attracted a whole passel of massive blue whales and their respective dolphin and sunfish posses. My friend Eb was out stand up paddling off of Hermosa Beach this morning with his camera and took the photos you see below.
When you combine millions of krill, a tasty song by Hum, and fifty foot long blue whales, what do you get? An easy recipe for Shepherd’s Pie and an old school poem by Sidd Finch, may God rest his soul. That’s easy arithmetic, even for those of us born and raised in public schools in The Land of Cleve. Shall we begin?
Dream Undertaker
I am an artist of the mind
With words as pastels and chalk
And thoughts of canvas
Never fully drying or framed.
I am a gardener of the soul
With feelings as trowels
And pain and joy as fertilizer
Always growing and dying.
I am a magician of the heart
With rage and lust as canaries
And love and hate as the hat
I hide them in.
I am an undertaker of dreams,
Neatly cleaning the dead,
And tucking them into their space
Until they bloom anew.
Sidd Finch (1937-1985)
Shepherd’s Pie
Ingredients:
1 cup quick cooking oats
3/4 cup milk
1 Tablespoon crushed beef bouillon
1 egg
2 teaspoons parsley
1 Tablespoon onion flakes
1/4 teaspoon thyme
1/4 teaspoon pepper
1 pound lean ground beef
1 cup diced, cooked carrots
4 cups hot mashed potatoes
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
1 teaspoon onion powder
8 oz. shredded cheese
Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350F. Drink a Pilsner while waiting.
2. In a large bowl, mix together the oats, milk, egg and soup mix. Add the parsley, onion flakes, pepper, thyme, beef and carrots. Mix all this up while drinking a Pilsner beer.
3. Place this mixture into a pie plate and bake for 45 minutes. Drink a Pilsner while waiting.
4. While the beef mixture is baking, mix the onion powder and 1/4 teaspoon of black pepper with the mashed potatoes. Drink a Pilsner while waiting.
5. Remove the meat pie from the oven and drain the fat. Sprinkle the meat crust with 6 oz. of the cheese.
6. Spread the mashed potatoes on top, sprinkle remaining cheese on top of them. If you have bacon bits, douse entire thing with seven or eight pounds of bacon bits. Mmmmmmmmmmm! Bacon!
7. Eat it while drinking a Pilsner beer. When appropriate, share with blue whales and their posse.
“she’s not at work, she’s not at school, she’s not in bed…I think I finally broke her”
“i thought she’d be there holding daisies.”
“she always waits for me”
“a crumpled yellow piece of paper. seven nines and tens”
Okay…not sure about the Shepherds pie recipe but those pictures are unbelievable!!! I’d love to hear what your friend was thinking/saying/swearing during picture #2!
That Shepherd’s Pie is MONEY and far better than the Mac n Cheese you serve each evening to the family. Next time I am rolling through Utah, going to bring a case of vodka over there and you, Phil, and I are going to eat massive helpings of that Shepherd’s Pie. And you’re going to like it, lady.