incite a riot
not really
Show Menu

day off

June 1, 2005   

I took the day off today, just to recover from yesterday’s marathon puking. I ate a bunch of porridge, browsed a bunch of websites, and, uh, I… tried on my wedding dress, wondering if this meant I was on the slippery slope to bridezilla-dom. I think not yet. Hopefully, this will not come to pass. I only got sick once today, but I think it was because I kept trying not to get sick and kept thinking about getting sick at work, and the fact that rice porridge looks semi-digested, despite being delicious. Oh! Seppo’s mom came by yesterday upon hearing that I was sick to bring over green tea and ume to help with the upset stomach. It was so sweet that it almost made me cry. But maybe because I was weakened by the illness and not because I’m a big baby that cries at the drop of a hat. No wait, that sounds about right. But it was really sweet of her. I wonder if I should write her a thank you note.

I watched the TiVoed premier episode of Hell’s Kitchen, a reality tv show based around getting bossed around by Gordon Ramsay and surviving to the end in order to get to run your own restaurant. And you know, it wasn’t half bad. I wish they would focus more on the craft of cooking, but the peek into the kitchen of a restaurant — as staged as it must be for the show — is pretty cool. The website seems to give out the recipe for a different signature dish every week. Awesome.

My friend is in town! I got a call from another friend in Philly telling me that I should call her, as she is stuck at the airport without a ride. Hahaha. She eventually met up with her ride, but I gave her hell for not telling me when she was gonna be in town.

I have yet to take a picture for the latest flickr challenge, which topic is “speed”. I don’t have any good ideas for it. It occurs to me that trying to get a pic of a druggie shooting up (or whatever it is you do with speed) would be somewhat difficult to obtain.

4 Comments
A_B
June 2, 2005 at 8:14 am

Re: Hell’s Kitchen

I thought it was mostly bad. The highlight of the show, other than satisfying my curiousity about Gordon Ramsay, which was piqued when I saw some of his schtick while in London, was when he told off those obnoxious blond twits that came to his counter.

On The Restaurant, which I thought gave a better (very much relative) view of restaurant life, Rocco DiSpirito would have been socializing and entertaining them. I liked the fact that Ramsay, literally, told them to “fuck off.” I thought it was the only genuine bit of his personality to show through.

Throughout the rest of the show, his behavior seemed pre-planned. Like the opening “your singature dish” segment. His remarks were predictable and his purpose of knocking down certain people and raising others up was clear. As well as the (probably producer induced) hard-core introduction of Ramsay’s style.

Of course, I thought Ramsay pulls off the asshole act better than his chefs, who came off even more forced. Especially the woman who looked like she was shaking when she tried to be tough. Ramsay is probably a dick, so he can turn it on, but I’m not sure about those two.

I also didn’t like the fact that most of the people aren’t chefs. I know why the contestants were picked (better television for most people), but I find it boring. I’d rather have a crew of talented people working their asses off rather than a bunch of incompetents. I know what incompetents look like. I want to see what skilled practitioners look like when pushed. It’s the same reason I don’t watch high school basketball, but don’t mind pro basketball.

Of course, cooking is too obscure for most people, so the producers did it their way.

PBS has a relatively decent show like Hell’s Kitchen, but more PBS-like with Ming Tsa (great; sp?) and Todd English (who comes off like a hack next to Tsa). There, all the contestants that have cooked, even if some of them aren’t very good.

I’m hoping Hell’s Kitchen gets better now that the tone and style of Ramsay has been established and we don’t have as much producer inspired nonsense.

I just hope they don’t have too much fake challenge crap. The preview for the next episode seemed pretty idiotic: they’re turning off the air conditioning.

A_B

Anonymous
June 2, 2005 at 8:15 am

“Could you snort this coke for a photo op? Thanks.”

– Mike

casacaudill
June 3, 2005 at 11:55 pm

For the photo, what about standing on Market Street while the F car “zooms” by.

ei-nyung
June 7, 2005 at 3:56 pm

I think I’ll give “Cooking Under Fire” (the pbs show with Ming Tsai) a shot on the TiVo. I really like Ming, even though the face he makes when he talks (which is, er, pretty much all the time) weirds me out.

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *