Fickle

This week's current (very relative and just as fickle as any other preferences) Favorites Of No Particular Denomination Or Theme:

The combo: Eggs and wine.  (Better as dinner than breakfast.)

The vegetable: Arugula, this perky lettuce holds strong for its second week.  (Augments the eggs better than it does the wine (the wine can stand alone).)

The song: The White Lies latest single, "Bigger Than Us".

The juice: Any scandal that a Conde Nast pub reports on.  (The "Wired" article on crazy murderous Amy Bishop is a nascent example and a sage reminder that scientists earned the moniker "mad" for a reason.)

The animal: Anything with antlers.  (Seems like antlers may be going the way of the waffle maker...a very clever device of cabin-settings past.)

The bonus: As a sixth (i.e., the asterisk), tall, balding, > middle age men who can do yoga better than you can.  (It seems inappropriate to say any more.)

So, Reader, once again, the challenge is extended: take the pick your current five random favorite things challenge.  See what you like this week (but let's keep tall, balding > middle age men doing yoga like Gandhi* out of it).
 
Life sometimes can be fickle.
Fickle: --adjective
  not constant or loyal in affections

*This blog can no better confirm than it can deny whether Gandhi was a yogi, but this blog is pretty sure he was not tall, and entirely positive that he was balding.

Current

Current (very relative and potentially entirely passing) Favorites Of No Particular Denomination Or Theme:

The lyric: "This light looks good on you."

The vegetable: Arugula, much to be said for this perky lettuce.  Goes well with everything; already bite size; adds a splash of European to any dish.

The snack: Roasted seaweed.  Despite extreme apprehension bordering on revulsion prior to purchase, I ate the entire package in the car on the way home from the market.  It's high in Vitamin C, but it will leave sticky green chunks on your teeth.

The visual: Back-sides of waves.  A view from a pier affords the "dorsal" half of a wave.

The animal: Anything on four legs that looks like a fox but isn't actually a fox.  Hey, it's been said...fox is the new black.

So, Reader, take the pick your current five random favorite things challenge.  It's amazing how quickly preferences can pass or be replaced, so in the sense of relative relationship to oneself, a weekly top five could potentially be an interesting/amusing indicator of mindset, or, like this blogger you may just be a mixed bag of...yourself, and that's cool too. 
Life sometimes can be current.

Current:–adjective

  passing in time; belonging to the time actually passing

Spa-rific

There's something to be said for the soothing effects of a traditional bubble bath, be it at the end of a long day racing Ferraris or after an intense debut of singing in the rain (and S.CA can well attest to the latter if not the former) or just because it's freakin' therapeutic and feels good.  Regardless of that unrelenting inundation (that's intentionally redundant to capture the essence of this blog's opinion) of those pushy books, Chicken Soup for the [fill in the blank] Soul, this blog argues vehemently that it is bubble baths that are good for the soul and the psyche; I'll take bubbles over noodles any day.  Only I can NEVER have a bubble bath.  Travesty!  No wonder my soul and psyche are in perpetual decline.  Along with WiFi (which shall be argued at another point in time), bath tubs should be an inalienable right.  Yet...they are not.  Travesty!  Some unlucky souls, this blog has both thumbs pointed bloggerward, do not have a bath tub which is, quite obviously, part and entirely parcel to engaging in a bubble bath.

Some unfortunates are relegated to stand up showers only.  Therefore, it is this blog's self-blogged brilliant idea that someone (open call for mock-up submissions) design a slide in tub structure for showers such as the above.  Ideally, it will fold in and up for easy storage and should be easy to clean.  Visualize an above ground pool (filled with hot bubbly water).  Then, this blog can submit to Kickstarter for lots of pedestrian funding at which point, when inquired what good use the funding shall be allocated to, this blog responds that it will, quite obviously--of course, be put to the implementation of a bathtub for this blogger STAT!  Then, said blogger can blog about edibles from the bathtub instead of the shower which seems a bit more apropos generally speaking.  Win/win.

Life sometimes can be spa'rific.
Spa-rific--blog slang
  of or pertaining to the essence of the most enjoyable of frivolities, hot water on the body

Charmed

Well, shoot...take a big breath and observe breathtaking exhibit 1 (below).  For those of you missing the super car flash card pack, that's the '11 Pagani Huayra.  Yeah.  What's that saying about 1,000 words and a picture and...shoot.  The Huayra, as if it matters what something that looks like that can do, makes its smudge to 60 in 3.2 and has a custom AMG V12 engine (P'ani has a working relationship with Daimler, and it appears to be well oiled).  The aesthetic four wheeled phenom is composed of carbon fibre (P'ani's signature note) and titanium.  Six to one, half dozen to the other...and...alas, all things not being equal: given a titanium choice, I'd take the Huayra over a ring despite the inevitably shortened lifespan.  Done and done; was there even a question?

Observe breath-taking exhibit 2, Ferrari's brand spank your a** with a lightning whip new FF.  It chokes on an atom of the Huayra's dust and clocks in at 3.7...however, it is four wheel drive.  Yes, you can read that line again.  (And, it goes without saying, but I just like to say it, it is a Ferrari).  Four being the magic number, it comfortably accommodates four in the hug you-rub-you-never-let-you-go leather seats; never-let-you-go being the operative phrase, and this blogger has committed to donating her physical remains to Body Worlds, but would accept being buried in the embrace of the FF which is...of course...the risk of having a car that exceeds 200mph at the slightest suggestion of a sneeze.

The acquaintance of the Huayra and the FF has been made, indeed--charmed, for doubly sure.  (Did you notice they're both Italian?  Just sayin'...)

Life sometimes can be charmed.
Charmed: –adjective

  marked by good fortune or privilege

Mutable

This "pimped" out canine-themed bicycle, totally reminded me of...

...the Mutts Cutts mobile from "Dumb and Dumber". 

Presumably, the "tails gone wild" creator was actually walking dogs because the hangy-eared, perky tailed two-wheeler was solitarily parked along Hermosa's green-belt.

Probably fair to assume that a bike (or a van, for that potentially creepy matter) decked out to resemble a baby wouldn't be as savvy as a marketing endeavor for an entrepreneurial babysitter.

Life sometimes can be mutable.

Mutable: –adjective

  liable or subject to change or alteration

Simple

I like Ferrari's a lot.  I'd say a good 5-10% of my daily brain power is dedicated to visualizing myself in a Ferrari; (how hot would it be (that's rhetorical; you know it would be) to read a blog post that you know was written from the driver's seat of a Ferrari?  Cause when (note the active qualifier) I have one, I probably won't leave its lush embrace, so blogs will be generated from steering wheel helm).  Obviously, considering the title of this post, Ferrari's will not be further discussed (although they will further be thought about).  There is a lot of pleasure to be found amidst the virtual stacks on amazon.com, especially the dusty stacks of used media.  In particular, I find it pleasing to order and receive used DVDs of movies either forgotten or too good to be among the common findables elsewhere (i.e., obscure and/or foreign and/or bad (in the way that it requires a particular taste)).

I get a really decent buzz off finding a padded envelope crowding my mailbox.  I don't have a TV or a laptop with a DVD drive on which to watch these acquired cinematic jewels.  However, it's nice to get them and then...have them (and being as I've already seen them, I know they're good (I have excellent taste in case the Ferrari persuasion hadn't given that away already)).

Other simple pleasures that bring me inordinate pleasure include: fresh sheets (who wouldn't get with that? (only a dirty person); new socks (I usually splurge on vacation by way of 99% of the time forgetting to pack the old ones); and checking daily blog stats to see that more than 2 people have viewed (this indicates that my fanbase is greater than my genetic donors (i.e., my mom and dad aren't the only readers).

Life sometimes can be simple.
Simple: –adjective  

  not elaborate or artificial; plain not ornate or luxurious; unadorned

Phantasmagoric

Roald Dahl wrote, in the BFG, "The witching hour, somebody had once whispered to her, was a special moment in the middle of the night when every child and every grown-up was in a deep deep sleep, and all the dark things came out from hiding and had the world all to themselves."  I read about Dahl's big friendly giant quite some time ago, as in maybe two decades ago, but the strange allure of the "witching hour" stayed with me.  Depending on the source consulted, the witching hour is at 3am (or midnight to 3am) because 3am is the Devil's hour.

Outside of a run in with a paranormal something or other in the stock room of the panty palace (aka, Victoria's Secret), this blog does not promote the existence of ghosts or goblins.  Yet, this blogger has consistently been waking up at 3am (on the button), Devil be damned, at least a few nights a week.

Rob Thomas lamented in his song "3am" on Matchbox 20's first album that it was 3am, so he "must be lonely".  Well, in accordance with the witching hour, it may be entirely unlonely.  At 3am it's pretty easy to confuse any lurking shadow with an otherworldly goblin.  So, what does this all (all being Roald Dahl + the panty palace + Matchbox 20 = strange awakening patterns at 3am) add up to?  It adds up to that which is shown added up in parenthesis; it means that this blog must commit to some nocturnal investigations.  The night vision/phantasm view lens shall be set in advance on the camera and the next 3am awakening shall be explicitly documented.  Stayed tuned (assuming the blogger lives past 3am to blog about presumably bewitching encounters of the devilish kind).

Life sometimes can be phantasmagoric.
Phantasmagoric–adjective

  a shifting series of phantasms, illusions, or deceptive appearances, as in a dream or as created by the  imagination; a changing scene made up of many elements

Futile

How hard can it be to snap a picture of a big a**, presumably slow-moving, blimp...

out of the big, broad, presumably wide-open, sky...

while driving, presumably slow'ish, down this such untraveled street while hanging a long, presumably capable, arm out the sunroof?

It's hard, Reader.  Very hard.  This is the same street on which previously posted hawk siting was an indisputable photographic miss.  But this...THIS was a freakin' blimp.  Blogger/unskilled in the most photographer even turned down a side street to actually bring vehicle to a stop to snap picture.  CA Edison man in his big overbearing truck thwarted that attempt.  By the time Blogger had feet on ground and eyes to sky, the blimp was gone, as if by magic, as if it had never been.  How does a blimp simply disappear from an endless expanse of clear blue sky? 

Look, it's not as if this Blogger doesn't have a history with blimps, specifically the Goodyear variety.  That's why yesterday's sighting was of particular note.  It was NOT the Goodyear blimp.  Repeat: it was NOT the Goodyear blimp.  Who knew the Southbay sky was open territory for other blimps?  Well, this was no "other" blimp.  This was the Farmer's Insurance blimp.  Having just read that they bid the highest bid of all times, $700M, to put a name on a sports stadium (the anticipated AEG football stadium slated for downtown Los Angeles), it made sense, in an elusive zephyr sort of way.

[Sigh.]  There are train chasers.  Fair to assume there are blimp chasers.  Sadly, how does one fail at blimp chasing?  It's practically impossible.

Life sometimes can be futile.

Futile: –adjective

  incapable of producing any result; ineffective; useless; not successful