A Dream of Pizza

Last night I dreamed that I was eating a Beau Jo’s Challenge “Mountain Pizza”.

A word of explanation – Beau Jo’s is a pizza place in Colorado that specializes in “Colorado-style” pizza. What is Colorado-style? Well, it’s your standard pizza but with extra crust on the edges. You eat to the edge of the crust and then dip the crusts in honey for dessert (pictures at http://beaujos.com/mountainpies.cfm).

Their “challenge pizza” is huge, weighing about 12-14 pounds. And if you and a friend can eat one in an hour, you get the pizza for free plus $100 and a t-shirt.

I have never eaten there, but my friend Tom Riggs has and rhapsodized on the experience. (He and his friend failed in their attempt).

Anyhow, in my dream, I was about to attempt to eat one of these monstrosities while the waitress explained that mountain pies were soooo huge, that they actually contacted structural engineers from NASA to design the crust so that it didn’t collapse in on itself. In my dream, the crust had support beams made out of crusty breadsticks that ran across the bottom of the pizza like spokes on a wheel.

Not much more to the dream, unfortunately. Perhaps it's a sign that I should be eating more pizza?

Dale Crawford on MySpace

Been kind of quiet here on the blog front, but I've been busy elsewhere -- mostly setting up a MySpace page for my film, Dale Crawford. If you're a part of that esteemed community, please visit it and make me your friend! http://www.myspace.com/dalecrawford

Because YOU demanded it!

A few months ago, re-reading some of my posts, I came to a bit of an epiphany:

My life is kinda dull.

Disheartened, I kind of slacked off on the blogging for a while. After all, who wants to read about another night at home watching TV?

Well, apparently YOU DO! After a fantastic trip home visiting my friends and family back in Missouri last week, I had several personal requests to continue blogging (and you know who you are!). So...I am easing myself back into the blogosphere.

Appropriately enough, my first blog is about staying at home and watching TV. But not just any TV -- the very definition of Must-See TV!

Yes, Sci-Fi Friday is back! The new Doctor Who and the new Battlestar Galactica, together again for the first time! I've seen the Dr. Who episode already, and rest assured it is a good one -- featuring werewolves, kung fu monks, and Queen Victoria too! Battlestar we'll have to see about; those of you who saw last season know that they threw a pretty big curve ball in the finale which polarized fans. Was it a jaw-droppingly gutsy gamble that paid off or crappiest plot twist ever? Well, I liked it just fine but can see how it could all go horribly wrong in the new season if not handled just right. Will the brilliance of the first two seasons continue or has it jumped the shark? Either way, you know where Jen and I are going to be at 8:00 p.m. EST (7:00 Central).

Oh, and since I'm spouting off on Sci-Fi Original Series, I should mention that both Jen and I had fun with Eureka which just had its big first season finale. It wasn't brilliant, but it had its moments. And gosh darn it, it was a likeable show. Even when the plot wasn't the greatest, I found myself rooting for it -- like your favorite baseball team that never *quite* makes the playoffs. Here's hoping Season Two will see them hit one out of the park.

Oh, and if you haven't seen any of the shows, there are free webisodes on demand for all three:
Eureka, Battlestar Galactica, and Doctor Who. Enjoy!

That's Just the Kind of Guy I Am, I Guess

Yeah, that's right. I made my first substantive post in months about songs on my Media Player, completely ignoring the power outage that has been going on all week in my neighborhood, depriving my apartment of air conditioning in near 100-degree weather.

I don't understand myself sometimes, either.

My Computer's top 10

Yeah, isn't that always the way - you make the big post saying that my life has been too boring to post about, and the few times interesting things have happened I've been too busy to find the time to post about them. And then what happens? You get the idea for the perfect blog post! Too trivial for any big announcement to your friends, yet too juicy to just let it sit and fester away in your brain!

Yes, I'm talking about the "Play Count" on my Windows Media Player!

I am rather fortunate in that I have a job where I can listen to music all day. At first, I'd bring in CDs to listen to, but I soon discovered it was easier to just rip all my music onto the hard drive of the computer and listen to it that way.

Normally, I just set it all to "random" and let it go, so in theory every song should be played about the same as every other, right?

Apparently not - I checked the "play count" and discovered that the computer has been playing favorites! I now give to you the top ten songs in my collection, as selected by my computer (with links, where applicable, so your computer can play the songs as well!):

1. "Main Titles to Conquest of Paradise" - Vangelis. This song was played more than twice as much as its nearest competitor! Computer must really love the seafaring music.

2. "Accordion Song (Ken's Polka)" - the Old 97's. The first of many songs featuring a squeezebox.

3. "I Know I'm Not Wrong" - the Mysteries of Life. A fine cover of the Fleetwood Mac song, available (along with many other equally fine songs) from our friends at the Musical Family Tree.

4. "Ol'man Rossi" - from the soundtrack to Signor Rossi. Of all the Signor Rossi tracks, this is the one it picks?!

5. "Another Saturday" - Marykate O'Neil. This I get. Probably my favorite from Marykate's wonderful first album.

6. "Beer Barrel Polka" - Frankie Yankovic. A barrel of fun, to be sure!

7. "Paralyzed" - Bob Mould. From here on, the rest of the songs are pretty standard fare from my collection. Good, solid, semi-obscure pop music from some of the masters of the form...

8. Tie: "Unravel" - Lynn Miles/"One More Bottle to Go" - the Minus 5/"Go Down" - Sam Phillips.

9. Tie: "Bird Town" - David Thomas/"Oz on 45" - the Squirrels/"Fingertips" - They Might Be Giants (the part that goes "Mysteeeeerious Whisper! Mysteeeeeerious Whisper!").

10. Tie: "It's Not Safe" - Amy Rigby/"Love Met the Devil" - the Januaries/"Honeymoon" - the Muffs/"Road to Nowhere" - Talking Heads/"Mary Jane" - the Vulgar Boatmen

Hope you enjoyed this peek into my computer's musical taste. See you in a couple months when something equally exciting occurs to me...

Please leave a message at the tone...

As you might have gathered, been busy of late and, alas, the blog has been neglected. (And, the way my life is at the moment, this is likely to continue for some time.)

So, while I go off to wander the Earth, feel free to browse any of the other fine sites to the right. I'm outta here (for now)...