A Ginger's Jewish Holiday Adventure, a terrible movie, and Solving Cat Crimes

Egg Nog and Candy Cane flavored coffees, festive lights everywhere, various tools and other Hanukkah-based betting devices strewed about the coffee table, protein powder practical jokes, and slumbering drunks on the sofa.  If these things don't seem like the holidays to you then.... well, you're just plain wrong (youcan'tsitwithus!).  With the holidays upon us I would like to take a moment to appreciate some wonderful things:

1. Books, none specifically, but books in general.  Without books we wouldn't have anything to carry around to make us look smart or brag about to stupid people, libraries would be extraneous government buildings, and there'd be no vampire/werewolf craze.
2. The ability to grow facial hair, notably a mustache if I so choose to.
3. The Bruins are kicking ass and everyone knows it.
4. You, notably for reading this nonsense.  (Note, I don't know how wonderful you actually are, but on a scale to 1-10, give yourself at least a 6, unless you're just awful, then start with a 3...)
5. Dogs, some cats, and most farm animals
6. Various kitchen appliances (blenders, soda machines, waffle makers, etc.), sippy cups, and new angry bird levels!
7. Friends, family, and B!

Nick Does Hanukkah: While the finer points of culture may not interest me, let me start out by at least pointing out that my guess for what Hanukkah is about was not "when Jesus lit candles for 8 days...".  (Also, I still would like to argue that when you fly to the west coast, flying over the north pole is not the fastest way.  Maybe if you're flying to Russia or China, but not California.)  Nonetheless I was allowed to participate in roommate Hanukkah night, even though I like to pronounce the holiday with a C, as in chanukkah.  While I refrained from live tweeting the event on the interwebs, I made no promises about keeping this festival of light to myself.  Here are some highlights from a Ginger's Jewish Holiday Adventure:

mmmm, Latki

• Despite my best efforts, my attempt at repeating the Hebrew lines when lighting the menorah definitely came out as word vomit
• Potato latkis (I don't have a clue how to spell that) and applesauce are the shit (good shit, not actual bad shit (that's gross, get your head out of the gutter))
• There is now a shake weight in our apartment, which means this year's New Years Resolution=get fantastic looking arms guns while looking ridiculous.
• I managed to win the high-stakes dreidel match and not knock over the lit menorah at the same time, I make it rain chocolate money!
• Manischewitz is an alcoholic juice box that may cause diabetes

Movie Review of the Week: MacGruber- Let me emphasize that you should only see this movie if you like laughing at movies because they're super awful or have an IQ lower than 80 (we're talking Forrest Gump level).  The way I look at it is I spent an hour and a half with Juan and some buffalo wings enduring this waterboarding of a viewing experience to be able to tell you that I'm not entirely sure how this was released to theaters or promoted by major film/distribution companies.  The SNL skits with the song and explosions and only 2 minutes long=great; feature length film=doesn't really work.  Highlights include an upper decking joke and.... that's about it?  Also, don't choose the unrated version unless you really like grunting sex scenes... None of this can take away from the fact that I still enjoy yelling MacGruber song occasionally.  Rating: No claps and two Mike Ditka's "STOP IT!"


This Week in Bear News: A Ford Mustang and a black bear played a game of chicken in Alabama the other night... the Mustang cheated and murdered the bear.  All I can say is at least the bear died American?  In other bear news, the numbers are in for bear hunting results in New Hampshire, and the number of bears "harvested" or "managed" is down 44% from previous years, meaning the bears are getting smarter, watch out New Hampshire.  These hunters went out there not to hunt bears, but to "manage" them.  The old "you can't stop them, you can only hope to contain them" tactic.  Dubiously, results were not posted of the number of hunters killed by bears (biased much liberal media?) which I estimate to be at least 25.

Bad Cat Update: On my trip to Denver in October, I met a cat named Bad Cat.  I recently was told of Bad Cat's latest exploits that I thought were worth sharing, which I will frame in hypotheticals (I apologize if I get this wrong or butcher it, I got the story through a game of telephone, literally through telephones...):

Bad Cat in her natural hiding spot

Imagine you're famished and need nourishment right away!  The only thing you have to eat are hot dogs.  You cook up said hot dogs and having no buns to eat them in, you put them in a bowl and cut them up, 4 year-old style, and douse them with ketchup.  Upon inhaling half of your cuisine, you immediately fall into a deep, hot dog induced slumber.  Later you awake to find your roommate furious with you.  Why, you may ask?  Because Bad Cat, finding you asleep, had a feast, chowing down on the delicious hot dogs, and upon needing a drink from its water mug (Bad Cat exclusively drinks water from a mug, true story), scurried around the house leaving paw imprints of ketchup everywhere.

My theory is that Bad Cat tainted the hot dogs with some type of sedative and left the paw prints in ketchup (most blood like condiment available) to intimidate the dog.  But that's just my theory, I'm no cat crime detective, I can't actually prove anything... but that's how Bad Cat planned it.

Happy Holiday's!