Watermark710

The bacon ones are so fucking bad. Way too much fake smoke flavor.

One of my guilty pleasures is frozen White Castle sliders. I get stoned, eat a 16 pack in one sitting, and then go to sleep.

I used to get them at a local gas station back in like 2005. They were 99 cents, and you could microwave them right there in the store. They weren’t good, but it’s a cheap and quick way to get ~800 calories in you.

I feel like straight applies. I’m a straight dude. Trans women are women, so I don’t need a special term to point out that I don’t care if a woman is trans or not. Hot women are hot. Cis, trans, whatever. Pre-op, post-op, doesn’t matter. Women are pretty.

finsexual

Cuz I’m a motherfuckin’ gay fish.

I watch old school NFL games all the time. I don’t remember who won a game from 1986.

I used to work in a prison (I was a civilian kitchen supervisor, not a guard), and I encountered a lot of gang members from a variety of gangs. Kitchen jobs are highly sought after by inmates, because not only are they among the highest paying jobs an inmate can get, but the job also comes with essentially unlimited food. Normal inmates walking down the chow line would get 2 pieces on fried chicken day, but some kitchen workers would down a dozen or more. I say that to say: The gang members I worked with were on their best behavior so they didn’t risk losing their sweet gig. All feuds were on pause in the kitchen. Gang members who would otherwise be at each other’s throats were laughing and joking with each other, playing Spades during breaks, and eating at the same table. They all treated me with respect, and I didn’t have any issues.

The ones who didn’t work with me, genpop inmates, well sometimes things got very violent. I saw more stabbings/slashings than I can count on both hands, and I didn’t even work there very long.

Living in the USA seems harrowing

It depends heavily on where you are in the US. I grew up in a crime/poverty stricken area, and gun violence was pretty much a daily thing. But the town I live in now has literally never had a single act of gun violence. We all have guns, but we use them for target shooting and hunting. Moving to the woods from an inner city was like night and day. Growing up, if I heard gunshots I knew that someone was getting hurt/killed. Now if I hear gunshots, it’s just the neighbors practicing for deer season.

They’re only real if you’re a journalist. The random sheep who pre-ordered them are never gonna get theirs. Mark my words.

ridiculing her for going to a barbeque and just getting beans (and other sides).

Then that person doesn’t understand how it works. See the tray closest to the camera? Pretty much nothing but meat. Can’t fit the sides on there, so they go on a separate tray.

Like, fuck that lady, but she didn’t go to a BBQ spot and just get sides. The huge pile of meat is right there.

If it wasn’t for my wife and her investment skills, I probably wouldn’t have gotten to where I am this quickly (or maybe at all). I have to credit her for that. I swear she has a demon in her pocket that tells her what to invest in. She’s like a machine that turns money into more money. We’ve been together for almost 38 years now, and she’s been my rock for that whole time. All my passion and hard work might have added up to nothing if she didn’t sit down next to me in the cafeteria one day and say “Hey, we should date.”. And her mom is an amazing person. Not many moms would open their home to their 14 year old daughter’s boyfriend when his mom kicked him out for dating outside his race.

Zandi Holup is a pretty “new” artist who sings a lot about “struggles or over coming demons”. My favorite song of hers is “Gas Station Flowers”, the official video for that song is intense. She releases pretty much nothing but bangers, IMO (not a fan of “Mary Jane” personally, she kinda missed the mark on that one). “Go Find Less” is another great one, straight up feminist anthem. “Dirty Wings” is a good song as well.

This is gonna be a long one.

When I was 8 years old, my mom took me to our favorite fish shop, as one does on a Friday during Lent. I remember sitting there, eating my fish cakes and fries. A man walked in, and everyone said hi, and greeted him by name. Handshakes all around. It was clear that this man was well loved and appreciated by the community. I asked my mom who he was, and why everyone was so happy to see him. She said “He’s the owner.”. That moment put me on the path that I have followed for my entire life. My goal in life was to be “The Owner”.

I taught myself basic cooking skills. Before I was even nine years old, I was making full meals. By the time I was a teen, I was writing my own recipes. I got kicked out at 14 (long story), and the woman who took me in (now my MiL) helped me level up my knowledge by teaching me all about authentic Mexican food. We would spend a lot of time in her kitchen, cooking together and just generally having a good time.

Fast forward to 19, and a broken condom meant that my wife and I had to get Serious about being Adults. I saw a Help Wanted sign in a restaurant window, and I walked in and asked for an application. The manager asked me if I could cook, and I said yes with confidence. He went into the back, and when he came out, he threw me an apron, told me to get to work, and that was it. This was my time to sink or swim. And good God did I swim. Within a year I was running that fucking kitchen. I was making good money, and I loved my job. Cooking is my passion. I love watching someone take their first bite of a meal I made and smile.

I used the income from that job to put myself through culinary school. I used that education to jump up to a better restaurant, with better pay. I worked my way up to Executive chef, and my wife (who is basically an investing wizard) put every extra dollar we had into the market. We bought our first house. Our money was stacking up. The real estate market where we lived exploded and suddenly, our house was worth a lot more than we paid for it. It was time.

We bought some land in another state, with a much lower CoL, and built a bigger house on it. We sold our old house and bought a failing restaurant nearby our new house. I had done it, I was The Owner. I turned that failing business around, and business was booming. We were packed every night for dinner, and weekends were a blur of plates flying through the pass.

I could have retired a decade ago. My wife’s investing magic has made us more money than we can reasonably spend. All of our kids and grandkids have/had college funds and some money in trusts. But I am still driven to do what I love, and that means working 12 hour shifts in my restaurant every Friday, Saturday, and Sunday. It means knowing our regulars by name. It means getting excited to see new faces walk through the door, and turn into regulars. Feeding people. Turning fresh, high quality, local ingredients into beautiful delicious meals that bring people joy. Providing my employees with a fair income, health insurance, and a genuine pride in what they do.

In short: I don’t cook to live, I live to cook. The day I can’t cook anymore, take me out behind the barn and shoot me. I always joke that I will work in that kitchen until I drop dead on the line. Many people have inspired me, too many to list honestly. But it all goes back to that day when I was 8 years old, eating my fish cakes and fries, when I met The Owner. He was my first inspiration to get into the restaurant industry. RIP Frank Grubie. My life would not be what it is if not for him.

Nooch provides 2.2mcg of B12 per serving (5g), according to the jar in my hand. So just make sure you’re eating about 6g a day and you’re good enough on B12 (recommended 2.5mcg/day). So a bit more than a tablespoon of nooch is enough to get your B12 for the day, and you can split it over all your meals/snacks.

One of my friends from High School posted that meme about how school didn’t prepare him properly for life, because he doesn’t know how to do taxes, but at least he knows that the mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell.

I had to comment: “I sat next to you in civics class, where we literally filled out fake tax forms to prepare us for doing taxes.”.

It’s ridiculous.

I am 100% not kidding, none of the farmers in the article mentioned trans people. I don’t understand where OP got that “quote” that they seemed to make up out of thin air.

Where did you find the quote you posted in the body text, since it’s not in the article? Not a single one of the farmers even mentioned trans folks, let alone by that slur. Are we just making things up now?

There’s a reason her nickname is ATM, and it has nothing to do with money.

It was 36C where I live last week. If I didn’t have AC I’d be dead. Luckily, we’re only looking at ~30C this week. But I’m still gonna be running the AC.

The weather has been so nice that I’m spending a lot of my free time outside, so I’ve really only been playing idle games that I can ignore for a few hours at a time and then pay attention to for 5 minutes.

Reactoridle is my favorite, but I also play Swarm Simulator and Shark Game.

I do have an appointment to play Minecraft with my grandson on Thursday, so I’m looking forward to that.