Saturday, March 18, 2006

More updates

Six new book reviews are now available on the books page. Enjoy.

Fire up the grill

I don't have anything against vegetarians. Really, I don't. I will occasionally give the vegetarians I know some good-natured ribbing, but ultimately, I'm a live and let live kind of guy. You respect me and leave me alone, and I'll do the same for you.

Which brings me to the vegetarians that I don't like -- the ones who are on a crusade to recruit me into their ranks. If you're one of those, let me make things real simple for you -- not gonna happen. In the words of the great philosopher Ron White, "I didn't claw my way to the top of the food chain to eat carrots."

What brings this to mind is the Great American Meatout on March 20, which I've been getting press releases about that tell me how unhealthy, insensitive and evil I am for eating meat. Sorry, I've never been big on guilt trips, and you're not going to lay one on me.

Let's put aside, for a moment, the fact that, to me, the title of the event is a bit of an oxymoron, and just talk about the menu at the "lifestivals," which includes items like veggie-burgers and veggie-hot dogs. Having tried a couple of veggie burgers over the years, I've got to say I'd rather eat the box they came in than the burger. It's always been odd to me that these people are so dead set against eating meat, yet what do they fashion their own cuisine after? Meat. Seems to me, if you're craving meat, then perhaps you're not quite as vegan as you'd like to think you are.

Like I said at the beginning, I've got no problems with vegetarians. If you're a vegetarian and you're happy that way, I'm happy for you. If you feel healthier, if you feel better about yourself, then that's great, keep doing what you're doing. If you don't want to eat a real hamburger or hot dog, I'm certainly not going to try to talk you into it or force you to do it. All I ask is the same consideration in return.

As far as the Great American Meatout goes, I plan to celebrate it in the best way I know how -- with a nice, big, juicy, medium rare steak.

Sunday, March 12, 2006

Back from the dead

Just trying to get this place updated a little bit. With the new kid and trying to balance two full-time jobs at the office, I haven't had a whole lot of time to devote to the place (or anything else for that matter). But I've finally gotten around to getting some fresh content up. Nine new album reviews posted tonight -- and some pretty good stuff at that. I'm also working on updates on the book side. I've got six reviews ready to go up there as soon as I have time to get them posted.