Lèse Majesté

Dept. of corrections

Well, it's a good thing the New York Times cleared this up:

An article last Sunday about Broadway trivia that is referenced in the musical “[title of show]” referred incorrectly to Pia Zadora’s appearance in “Henry, Sweet Henry” (1967). It was her third role on Broadway, not her first. (She made her Broadway debut in the short-lived 1961 run of “Midgie Purvis.”)

Sarah Barracuda for VP?

Let's see if I can be wrong twice on this subject. I got the Democratic pick wrong, so might as well go out on a limb on the other choice. But it's starting to look like Sarah Palin may be McCain's pick. Chartered jets are rumored to have flown her to down to Arizona Wednesday and her family to Dayton yesterday. (Rather ironic given her story with the state's biz jet.) And her website as governor of Alaska has gone dark.

Perfect. It was inevitable we were going to get a Bible thumper of one sort or another to shore up Capt. Cranky's base. Palin fits the bill. She should appeal nicely to the PUMAs. Her husband works in the oil fields of Alaska, so we can expect lots of blather about drilling in ANWR. Stories of Trooper-gate should be entertaining, though. And at least we'll have to listen to Joe Lieberman less than if he were the pick. Should send Ted Stevens through the roof too, not a bad side-effect.

Olbermann over the edge

Last night's speeches at the DNC were good, but man did MSNBC's coverage suck. Chris Matthews and Keith Olbermann were strident and partisan beyond all belief. Matthews has long been a blustering fool with a completely tone-deaf ear when he talks about race, but now Olbermann has officially crossed over into Bill O'Reilly and Rush Limbaugh territory. I've enjoyed his ranting on Countdown, but this was supposed to be news coverage. I could never imagine saying this before, but Pat Buchanan was the most impartial and objective person on MSNBC's pundit panel last night. Sad.

They've gone too far now

Bad enough they're messing up traffic throughout downtown St. Paul. Now the RNC organizers have closed off the River Parkway in Minneapolis from my driveway all the way east to 11th Ave, and they're constructing a giant tent from the driveway most of the way to the Guthrie. I have to look out on this crap. Must be even more of an insult to Walter Mondale, who lives next door - the tent is directly outside his place.

Anyone wanna bet they're going to try to exploit the 35W bridge for political purposes? And just think - if Capt. Cranky picks Pawlenty as his running mate and, heaven forbid, they win, we'll end up with the woman who presided over the collapse as our governor.

It's a gas, gas, gas...

So every time I saw that massive Olympic torch in the stadium in Beijing, the first question that came to mind was: what is its carbon footprint?

The footprint of the torch relay has been widely reported. The torch was flown around the world on an Airbus 330 which all by itself added about 11 million pounds of carbon to the atmosphere. That's 5,500 tons.

But what about the big torch in Beijing? It ran on a 40/60 mix of propane and butane, and it sure appeared to be burning a lot of it. But so far I haven't been able to find any hard statistics on it. Anyone? Bueller?

Bacon is the new black

Can't swing a dead pig without references to bacon somewhere these days, whether it be maple-bacon doughnuts, gummi bacon, bacon brittle, or even a bacon bra. So naturally the new foods at the Minnesota State Fair include bacon items this year. I paid them a visit last night on opening night, trying to avoid the weekend crowds, and had to give these two a try:

Piglickers: This invention from Famous Daves BBQ combines bacon and chocolate. Right. The actual presentation is five half strips of crisply fried bacon in a conical paper cup (like a snowcone cup), with one end of each dipped in dark chocolate. The unfortunate thing is that they're served cold out of a mini-cooler on the counter. Bacon bits on a salad aren't bad, but a long cold piece of bacon is just off-putting somehow. The taste combination wasn't bad, but it's seriously overpriced at $5.

Big Fat Bacon: In keeping with the fair's theme of hicks, chicks, and food on a stick, this is bacon on a stick. They claim it's a quarter to a third pound slab of bacon. Maybe precooked. What it really is is a nice thick-cut slice of bacon threaded on a stick. Some reports have claimed they're deepfried. From what I could tell, they were par-cooked in some fashion, probably an oven, and they then finish them for serving by frying on a griddle. They're described as having a maple glaze. Well, there's some kind of syrup coating because the bacon and the stick are both very sticky and messy, but I didn't particularly notice any maple flavor. Which is a good thing as I generally don't care for the flavor. There were also sqeeze bottles of sauce to apply at your discretion. The orange-chipotle was quite yummy. In fact, the whole item was delicious, if seriously unhealthy. But that's fair food for you. Be prepared to have to clean up afterwards, though. And it's a bargain at only $3.

Surreal press release quote of the day

"The opportunity for synergy between Sears and LL Cool J has been phenomenal," Craig Israel, svp/president of apparel at Sears Holdings, said in a statement. "It stems in large part from the authenticity of the campaign. Sears was a fixture in his life from the time he was a child. He is committed to bringing that same relevance to families today."

Two swings, two misses

In my never-ending search for excellence in pigsicles, i.e. pork ribs, I've tried two relatively new places lately. Both were highly reviewed online, but both were sad disappointments.

First was Brickhouse BBQ in north Minneapolis. I had high hopes for the place after reading Jeremy Iggers' review. It was a bad sign when I walked into their large dining room at 8:30 on a Saturday night and there was only one table occupied. I should have taken the hint. At least the green salad was fresh. The ribs are served dry-rub style as Iggers described, sauce on the side, which is how I prefer them. It lets you see the pitmaster's work without distraction. In this case, the rub was mild, there was no distinguishable touch of smoke. Not bad as pork goes, but not what I'm looking for in ribs.

The sauce was downright awful. Thin, translucent, no texture at all, and no complexity at all. The sort of thing you'd use to decorate a plate out of a squeeze tube, spiked with some kind of pepper oil. About all it was good for was dipping the fries in. And the fries were generic crinkle-cuts. They had chili cheese fries on the menu, which are one of my favorite guilty pleasures when done well, but I can't imagine they would be very exciting built on those fries. And get this - they're open for breakfast. Who ever heard of an authentic BBQ joint open for breakfast?

Then tonight I let Coolleen talk me into driving all the way up to Champlin to check out Q-fanatic while she tried a place I told her about. At least I got good mileage driving up there from the office in downtown St. Paul. 46.1 MPG according to the onboard computer. Cause I would hate to think I wasted too much fossil fuel driving that far for those ribs.

Q-fanatic had a while bunch of highly positive reviews on UrbanSpoon, so I was hopeful when I first heard about it. But then I looked at their menu, and I was immediately skeptical. First off, the ribs seem almost an afterthought. OK, that's fine in some serious BBQ country. Like Kentucky or North Carolina, where pulled pork and mutton are king. But served with grilled foccacia slices? Everyone knows the only appropriate bread for BBQ is either cheap Wonder Bread or Texas toast. And sides of gratineed Parmesan potatoes, grilled seasonal veggies, or Asian cole slaw, among others? This place has pretensions in the wrong place.

I should have listened to my gut feelings. The ribs can be ordered dry (sauce on the side) or wet (sauced). As above, I went for dry. They were dry in that sense only. These ribs have been exposed to serious moisture in cooking. Steamed off the bones, practically. Basically, it resembled do-it-yourself pulled pork with some bones to discard. Pull shreds off, dip them in sauce. They serve them by weight - one pound or two - not as a rack or half rack or number of bones. Only place I've ever seen do so.

They have quite a variety of sauces here, served in little plastic cups. I tried the chipotle and vinegar varieties. The one high spot was that chipotle BBQ sauce. Quite yummy. The vinegar variety is not really a rib sauce, but I wanted to try it in case it was worth coming back for a pork sandwich. I might do that if I'm in the neighborhood and hungry. But I won't bother with the ribs again. The baked beans on the side were nothing to write home about it either. Seemed like canned beans spiked up with some chopped meat and liquid smoke. As a final blow, there seemed to be some serious microwaving going on here to prepare the items for service.

On my way out the door, I noticed their sign encouraging people to plug them on UrbanSpoon. Now I know where all those raves came from. This might be Hennepin County, just barely, but everything about this place says Anoka County to me. Anoka is literally right across the bridge...

Sigh. My favorite local ribs remain Baker's Ribs with Big Daddy's in second place. There's another new BBQ joint in Eden Prairie I want to check out, located in a car wash of all places. But it's right down the road from Baker's so it will take some serious self-discipline to skip Baker's and try the new place. Some day...

AP gets one right accidentally

Lovely little typo calls Joe Lieberman a prick.

Is Wesley Clark Obama's VP pick?

The announced theme for Wednesday at the Democratic National Convention is "Securing America's Future." Wednesday night is the traditional night the VP nominee makes his or her acceptance speech. And what is the slogan of Clark's political action committee, WesPAC? See here.