Razor Clams to the Rescue 1/04/11

RAZOR CLAMS TO THE RESCUE

Hoping to add some punch to your January menu? I don't blame you. Things can get dreary and bleak after the holiday craze comes to an end. I'm talking about the short days and long cold nights all alone in your frigid apartment (stop being a miser and turn the heat up already). There you are frozen, stiff as a popsicle, crying to your long distance girlfriend via "Face-time" on your new iphone-4 she bought you as a belated-Hanukkah / sorry-I-couldn't-help-myself-but-cheat-on-you-with-the-sexy-new-upstairs-neighbor-from-Italy present:

"WAHHHHHHH!! How could you!?!, I thought I could get over this, but I SOOOOOO CAN'T you heathen wench!! I don't care how many ipods you buy me, nothing will make up for you being an icy, mean and heartless devil-woman!"

Then you hit the street and decide that in order to punish that beastly knave for her wrong doings you will drink yourself into a frenzy. You look to the right and see Joe's Saloon. "Perfecto" you say to yourself, this will do. You order 18 shots of whiskey and 18 Pabst Blue Ribbons. You order 18 rounds for everyone in the bar. You max out your credit card and they kick you out onto the frozen sidewalk. You are drunk, sobbing and weak as a woodchuck. Although you know you should go home and sleep until April, you utilize your Iphone to buy a one-way ticket to your girlfriend's apartment in L.A (Brilliant idea, by the way). You hitch-hike to JFK airport and somehow make it there without getting mugged or killed. You board the aircraft, promptly barf on the red-head in the next seat over, and pass out. When you wake up you have landed in L.A. and you have no idea why or how you got there. Still behaving like an alcohol induced zombie, you cab it to your soon-to-be-ex-girlfriend's place and start ringing her doorbell incessantly. When she doesn't respond, you climb the fire-escape, perch on the awning of the small eco-friendly laundry-mat below her second floor apartment window and scare the living daylights out of her. The cops come, you get arrested, bada-bing-bada-boom, you are in jail.  Don't let this happen to you. Buy some razor clams and don't lose your mind to the "winter-blahs".

Actual Important Facts Below:

Razor clams are from Long Island. They are hand dug from the sand by clam-diggers. This must be done when the tide is very low; hence an abundance of razor clams around the full moon. The speed at which a razor clam reburies itself is very important to the clam digger because the faster it burrowS, the faster the digger must dig. Razor clams are "cold-blooded" organisms. Low temperatures make the clam sluggish and slow, that's why clam diggers love months that end in "R".

Clam Digging Nuns in Long Island

Don't worry about me: I'm Still Alive!!!

Holy hoochie on a halfshell, I am back from the dead. Between the stress of moving and the evil energies of an alternate universe, now, almost a fortnight ago, an acute illness manifested itself in my poor, weak bodily temple. This past week was, to put it lightly, Dante's Inferno in Chinatown. In fact, during this time, I  was in such a miserable state of affairs that I failed to accomplish some of my most important human duties on this earth. For example, I haven't been showing up for my job at the fish house nor have I been brushing my teeth on a regular basis. To be honest, my brain still feels like pudding after what seemed like an eternity of little more activity beyond REM sleep, rolling around in agony and reading the occasional text message from a neglected associate.
My hair has morphed into a greasy, straw-like pigeons nest, my armpit hairs are long enough to braid and I have reason to believe that my muscles are entering a state of atrophy.
Despite this complete lack of personal grooming and a general sense of self-loathing, I'm feeling positive. I am "upbeat". Want  to know why? Because considering what I have endured the past week or so, I can look forward to the next week-month-year-century feeling like an absolute grand stroke of luck no matter what happens.
I get attacked by a stampede of rabid squirrels in Steward Park? No biggie, I love nature!
I get thrown into the freezing and PCB ridden currents of East River by my angry boss? Cool!
Just, please please please God or whatever is up there looking down upon my mortal soul, let me be healthy.
A wise one once said: "One does not realize what one has until one no longer has that thing." When I tell you that I look forward to returning to work at my cold-ass, fishy trailer tomorrow, I kid you not. Where I used to have the luxury of driving my car to work I now must take a train and then walk twenty-five minutes every morning this winter in order to get to my job. Two weeks ago, this was stressing me out. I thought to myself, how the heck am I going to pull this off? I will contract a cab driver to take me everyday, yes. I will make a deal with a cab driver and it will only cost me seven dollars each morning. It will be worth it.  I am no longer singing that song. I don't give a rat's patoot. I will happily train and walk and bike and run if I must, come rain or shine. I plan to change my hedonistic ways. You will find me at yoga class 4 or 5 times a week from now on. No more hangovers. I will cease to pass judgement on my fellow man. I refuse to stress out about anything. I will be patient, calm and kind. Everything is beautiful, and one day I will visit India and study ancient meditative techniques in a green mountain temple at mind-alteringly high altitudes. I will never be hard on myself again. I will write for my blog every day. I will work hard. I will get eight hours of beauty rest each and every night. A pinnacle of health; an embodiment of perfection, harmony, finesse, and manners. Just please, please,please don't ever let me get sick again.

John Dory, Beausoliel Oysters, Pemaquid Oysters11/16/10

John Dory Story of Glory:

"Zeus Faber" was an ambitious John Dory that lived off the coast of New Zealand. He was always easily distinguishable with his minute sharp scales and a large black dot on the side of its head. All of the other fish made fun of Zeus because of his pathetic swimming capabilities and his funny scientifical name.  The only thing he really had going for him was his olive green camouflage coloring, sharp spiny fins for defense against predators and long expandable snout used to capture his prey. One day Zeus was meandering around his favorite reef munching on sardines, cuttlefish and the occasional squid when BAM! He was caught, packed into a box on ice and shipped off to New York City. When he arrived he was pronounced dead as a doornail, in a state of rigor mortis.  From fish heaven his soul peered down upon his lifeless mortal cadaver. Instead of feeling depressed about leaving this world, he was thoroughly psyched about having ended up at the market. At first he was a little worried that whoever tried to fillet and cook his delicate flesh would screw up, forever foiling his fish legacy. However, upon reminding himself that all chefs who buy his species are highly capable of such a feat, he calmed down. Finally he could "rest in peace" knowing that he would be forever canonized as a prized and beloved morsel. Breaded and lightly seared, plated next to diver scallops and organic asparagus, his body ended its stint on this earth. He was then served to an overworked and underpaid female attorney on the Upper East Side attending a slightly awkward first date with a dude she met on Match.com.


Pemaquid Oysters: Another brilliant oyster from the deepest holes of the Damariscotta River, Maine.
This briny and lemony delight of an oyster is sure to turn heads this season as it struts its stuff down the runway. Have you been looking for a exciting East Coast oyster that will leave your patrons saying "HUZZAH!"?  Well, here it is.

Beausoliel Oysters: New Brunswick, Canada
The so-called "pinnacle of perfection" among oysters. This East Coast bi-valve can't really be blamed for constantly one-upping its brethren. Chicks dig the perfectly formed, adorable little shell of the beausoliel. The firm, not-too-briny and not-too-sweet meat of this oyster tastes so balanced and harmonious that after only one, you will find yourself living in a world of underwater nirvana.

Maneater.

Hall and Oates minus Hall plus fat drunkard in front row: The excellent adventures of Paul and Gabe in Gowanus a.k.a  Coming clean about what I did last night.

There is nothing I love more than to walk around underneath a dark deserted overpass in the middle of the night. That is the shit that keeps me young and spry. That said I have to hand it to my dear friend Paul for coming up with the brilliant idea of going to see John Oates unplugged at The Bell House in Gowanus, Brooklyn. To be fair, John still has his Jerry curls in springy abundance that fall ever so softly around his crow-magnum mug. His soul patch still drives the women wild. Woman is wild, woo hoooman is wild! That’s right, he certainly was driving the man-eaters who were sitting (yes, sitting) in the front row nearly to tears. They begged and prodded for rich girl, they squirmed in delight as he recounted sarah smile, and even when he invited a rando ( bus boy?) to sing the entire song for him as he strummed away on his acoustic ax, they cheered him on. Well, the show wasn’t all bad, the dude to his left also playing the guitar had a MV sticker on his guitar case. Granted he had no idea what I was talking about when I screeched to him “Marthas Vineyard, Yeeaahhhh boy!” from the audience, he still seemed pretty chill. Chill is actually a great adjective to describe what was going on up on stage last night. Oates is probably the chillest dude I have ever seen in real life. Even when a big fat drunk man upstaged him in the front row by lumbering through the chairs of seated patrons muttering his requests for various unidentified song titles, Oates kept his cool. He didn’t even flinch in regards to the man having an even more ridiculous soul patch than the master himself.

Oates talked a lot, he went on and on. As much or more than he sang, in fact. He told us several times of his inspiration for the queued song coming from Philly, being on a bus, seeing a girl, the girl leaving the bus, him missing his chance and so on and so forth. All very interesting, but really Oates, I came to hear Rich Girl and you didn’t deliver. And you know what else Oates? We are in New York City. We don’t really care about Philly, or Colorado. Nope. We like our city, that’s why we are here and not in Atlanta (which you also happen to be so fond of) so please do us a favor and try sticking to the script.

I would like to give a shout out to the guy in the front row. Good one with stick on mustache and the shitty attitude! He was also pissed about the “songs from my new album”. Oates, when has it ever worked out in a shriveled up old timer’s favor to play songs from the new album?  Bob Dylan, Mic Jagger, John Lennon, need I say more?  When in doubt, remember: Nobody came here to hear your new jams.

Wrapping things up here,we did have a good time (after like 5 tecates and a round of SHOTS). The Bell House is a really cool venue and I highly recommend trying it out as long as no shaggy deadbeats from the 80’s are there to meddle with your intentions of having a good ol’ time.

Is this really mean? Whatever.

Ramona and the man of her dreams.

Ramona has a sliding scale rating system for the men she meets. 10 points for convicted felon. 3 points per kid, various baby’s mommas signals multiplication of this total by 2.  Armed and dangerous? Check. Add 3 points to the top. Subtract 8 points to the total sum if his haircut doesn’t fall into any or all of the following three categories: dreadlocks, fade w shaved lines in part/eyebrows, doo-rag.

Let’s just say he is a top scorer

Does he have a nice car? Yes, he does. Is it paid for? Um, no. She doesn’t care if he’s living way out the hizzy inside of a veritable shoe box. The car has a bangin sound system and she loves her sum Pitbull every now and again.

Does he get drunk and throw shit at her window until she comes downstairs? Does he push her up against the wall? It’s as much passion as it is pain. It is all the same. Does he love her madly? He says so. Does he treat her mean? Yes! He makes her head spin until she can’t concentrate on anything else. He makes her cry and even though it hurts, at least she feels something.

Ramona loves walking down her block and hearing the calls of the wild. Snowbunny, U too hot white gurl. Mami ven pa’ca. It makes her feel not-at-home. Acción.

And then she finds out, oh goody, he has four kids.

Ramona knows all of his evil tricks. When he calls her on the phone it means no babymomma in earshot. She looks back on the time when he called, freezing his ass off outside. For what? She didn’t even question it at the time. Looking back, a light turns on in her brain. That makes sense now, Dickhead.

He’s got the cockswagger. He knows what he’s got. What he’s got is what she wants.  If he didn’t have it he wouldn’t have come up to her like this. Confident as hell, or at least an excellent faker. Drop it down, push it up, look her in the eyes. Sweet smooth light dark skin.  Big lips, funny teeth. Bright evil sexy eyes.  Nice horrifying tattoos. Big bling, with his baby momma’s ring around his chain.  Baggage dangling from every limb. She melts in his presence. All logical impulses numb to his touch and his glance. Behold a man who packs heat and works the street. She wants to be his next victim.

Bolivia: Part 1

My headache is pounding to the beat of loud Incan music. I can still hear it resonating from my neighbor’s house. I vaguely remember stopping there on the way home from the bar and dancing some kind of traditional cueca with the locals. I take a quick inventory of last night’s drug and alcohol consumption. As I allow the committee in my head to beat me up, I focus intensely on major issues. For example:  Do I still have my passport or did I lose it in the taxi? Did I manage to burn any bridges during my escapade? My mouth is so dry it feels like I was chewing on a Bolivian guinea pig in my sleep. I catch a glimpse of the dried llama fetus that I was gifted by the neighbor. I feel my gag reflex trigger. I am supposed to be getting on a bus in an hour. This gypsy bus will supposedly take me out of La Paz, I cannot miss it. I have been stuck here in Satan’s hideaway for the past three weeks. I have been told that there are protesting campesinos blocking all major roads due to some big politician’s threats to resign. Frazzled from last night’s festivities, I consider falling back into my hostel bed and taking one for the team. Then I realize this might be my only chance to leave this crazy ass city until who-knows-when. I force myself awake.

I throw all of my shit into my dirt-encrusted-and-partially-dilapidated backpack. I remember the day my brother lent it to me before leaving Cape Cod. That was almost a year ago now. The red pack was still pure and unscathed. Now, after a whirlwind of hair-raising adventure in the southern hemisphere, I am beginning to resemble a very lost carny with some kind of sick attaché on my back.

I race to meet the bus.  I am suddenly haunted by the memory of telling some creep-show guy from the bar where I was headed today. Rule number one, destroyed. I remind myself that I am in Bolivia, which in and of itself breaks rule number one for most. Following my usual routine, I throw caution to the wind and board my absolutely unsafe and unregistered chariot.

Now on the bus I take into account my surroundings. Unsurprisingly, I am the only non-Bolivian here. Everyone stares up at me in obvious and uncensored bewilderment as I shuffle towards a seat. I am accustomed to this kind of treatment now. As we take off I securely latch my arms through my backpack (theft prevention) and drift into dreamland.

I wake up to the bus keeling to the left and right. Looking out the window I realize that we are nowhere near an actual paved road. We are travelling over sheer dirt and bramble patches, over large rocks, mowing down all shrubbery in our path.  It is dark out, people around me are tense. I scream and the others tell me to be quiet. We go over a large and profound bache in the ground and we lurch to the left. It feels as though we are about to topple over. Now everyone is screaming. The bus driver is yelling in Spanish for everyone to get off the bus as we are about to cross a treacherous area. As if what we have been crossing was not a big deal. As I step off the bus I see ten or fifteen bolivian mamitas, the ones that wear what I call the “pointless top-hat “. It is usually a black bowling or square silk hat that sits right atop the coconut. I don’t know how it stays on. Their beady eyes peer into the night as they hike up their thick layered skirts and urinate publicly, encouraging their children to do the same.

As much fun as this all sounds I decide to use the bathroom. I give some pesos to a little boy cum bathroom attendant and proceed around the corner. This is where I find the “toilet”.  It is a dugout hole in the ground with a lit candle right behind it. It almost resembles a Mary in a bathtub shrine so commonly seen roadside in Latin America. This hole must be where you can make a small sacrifice to God. It is very dark in the stall. I am afraid of missing the hole, I am afraid in general. I can hear the chirping of unidentified creature very close to me. I think that I will be lucky to make it the hell out of here without contracting some deadly plague from a poisonous rodent or snake bite.  In an instant said creature reveals himself, meanwhile I am mid-stream. A huge horny toad lumbers across the top of my foot pushing me to my absolute limit. I shriek out loud and fling myself out of the stall in a moment of temporary insanity. The little boy who so kindly took my pesos charges around the corner followed by three nosy mamitas. I see the fat warty rana hobble off to its next unsuspecting victim. “Que paso? !!!“  Once the Bolivian bathroom brigade realizes why I literally just freaked, they crack into peals of laughter. So now I, the crazy gringa, have caused another major uproar. My popularity on this bus ride is dwindling…

Junk to Monk.

Before the mid to late 1980’s the Italians were already eating monk fish and the Japanese were enjoying Ankimo (monk liver) as a delicacy. Before it’s time, monkfish was known in America as the poor man’s lobster, a junk-fish. It was frowned upon for an ugly mug and unsightly gelatinous flesh. Its lazy way of catching its prey, by dangling long antennae in front of its giant gaping mouth didn’t exactly help the animal’s image either.

Thanks to Julia Child and other American chef pioneers who weren’t afraid to cross borders and try new things in the name of culinary delight, the monk became a staple on our menus and we now relish in its glory.  So much, in fact, that it’s monetary value has increased dramatically over the last 10 years, selling out to restaurants at unheard of prices. Strict fishing regulation has also been put in place to protect the monk bio-mass index making it a tough catch for fishermen. My own father made an attempt in the monk industry about 10 years back with the F/V Morue, only to decide it was too hard to make money in consideration of all of the rules.

So my point here is that times change. Things go in and out of style and generally we must stay open minded to keep abreast of our chosen industries.

Things I eat while intoxicated.

I am pleased to say that I attended my childhood neighbors wedding reception while I was home visiting Woods Hole this weekend. If you have yet to recognize, I come from this very scientifical town located on the southern armpit of Cape Cod. It is the home base of fancy bug-hunter haunts such as NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration), MBL (Marine Biological Laboritories) and WHOI (Woods Hole Oceanographic Insitute).
Anyways, back to the wedding, it was fabulous. The bride was like an angel. The band was led by the local post office worker who is known to masquerade around town wearing a kilt and tooting on some bagpipes. They were awesome and we danced like idiots.
I saw all the local yokels dressed in their finest, or as fine as they can muster up. I saw some former babysitters, some windsurfing old timers, and an ex-clown.
I also drank copious amounts of free wine and got even crazier at the local watering hole.
Then I did the only thing I possibly could, went home and ate a giant feast. Standing in front of the refrigerator at 2 in the morning I shushed my mothers 130 lb american bulldog Ringo by feeding him cheese. I stuffed my little drunken face "like a woodchuck" as my mother has been known to say.

But this all turned out quite serendipitously. I invented a delicious meal whose recipe I am willing to share with you.

Alcohol Soaker Upper:

Two pieces of whole wheat bread, the regular kind
Some genoa salami
One and a half slices of scary yellow cheese comes wrapped individually.
some shreds of iceberg lettuce.
plain yellow mustard.
One cold side of a garlic roasted eggplant skin on with some cloves still in it

Oh man that hit the spot. Then in my feeding frenzy I caught a glimpse of some apple pie left on the table. Considering my resources I decided that the yellow cheese was good on everything so I added it to the cold pie, ate it with my hands and then passed out.