UCSC Tapas!

Some brief updates on life here at UCSC:

• The giant UCSC campus 4/20 pot festival approaches. Watch the video from last year. This year, the Admin plans to get even more difficult about the whole thing (and I guess it is bad publicity for the U): UCSC has already contacted the parents of first-years. As the email to parents notes:
  

  "I encourage you to talk with your student about his or her plans for 4/20. Ask direct questions about the choices they make and express your expectations regarding marijuana, alcohol or other drug use. Although students may not initiate discussion on this topic, your opinions and expectations can influence their behavior."

  If only UCSC would contact my parents. I would love to have that conversation.
  
• Sad news from budget-cut land: UCSC's uber-liberal Community Studies Department may get the axe. Sure, it's a crazy radical major that creates community activists, but then again, community activists do more good in this world than almost anyone else (especially white trash governors).
  
• This past week, Fosco discovered the beauty of the Porter Koi Pond. Did you know that koi live 25-35 years? That's longer than most dogs, cats, and Community Studies departments. True.
  
  Sadly, there is this old story about two UCSC fratboys who caught and grilled one of the koi several years ago. Luckily, those frat boys are now dead.
  

Aren't they gorgeous?

Getting Fish Wrong

Should "Foodie Friday" be renamed "Fact-checking Friday"? Just a thought.

Ever since Fosco was a small child, his favorite fast-food item has been McDonald's Filet-O-Fish. Of all of the fast-food out there in the world, no single item is responsible for a larger percentage of Fosco's excess body weight than that damned Filet-O. It's kind of the perfect sandwich, really (especially if your goal is heart disease).

So you can imagine Fosco's surprise when he read of the so-called "Filet-O-Fish for grownups" available at an Italian fish restaurant in Manhattan. In this NY Times review, Jill Santopietro describes the sandwich:

Their fried fish panini is a grown-up Filet-O-Fish: a toasted brioche roll filled with large pieces of peppery fried fish fillets, mayonnaise-y tartar sauce, a sad little tomato slice (just like at McDonald’s) and twin leaves of iceberg.

Sure, the sandwich sounds great but did you notice the clear error of fact in this description? Anyone who has ever actually eaten a McDonald's Filet-O-Fish could tell you that the sandwich has never featured "a sad little tomato slice." Part of the point of the Filet-O-Fish is that it ignores vegetables (like lettuce or tomato) entirely.

Fosco sheds a tear for the once-proud New York Times. Is a front page correction too much to ask?

N.B., In the last eight months or so, Fosco has only eaten one or two Filets-O-Fish. When you reach a certain age, fast-food starts to do outsize damage to one's health. Sigh.

Things To Do With Your Otter In Chicago

When it's "Music Monday," Fosco encourages you to caress your favorite animal.

You may recall how Fosco feels about otters (particularly sea otters). Well, based on Fosco's otter affection, music hipster JennyT recently recommended the band Otter Petter. Although JennyT admitted that she

couldn't form an impression after just one song, other than that you might enjoy the name,

you can believe that Fosco was intrigued enough to pick up the whole CD. After all, a band that names itself after one of life's most rewarding activities must be worth listening to, right? Just like you would have to listen to music by any band named "Donut Licker" or "Tom Brady Fellator." But I digress...

Anyway, Otter Petter is a Chicago band that, by their own admission, blends Matthew Sweet with Death Cab For Cutie. Or, maybe we could just call them "indie pop." At any rate, it's sweet, it's sincere, and it's poppy. Falsetto is involved. And Fosco loves it.

You can listen to three of the (better) songs from their full-length debut album, Fireflies and Lamp Lights, here. I am particularly fond of "The Rest of the World."

Or, if you are a YouTube person (and don't mind sketchy sound quality), you can listen to "The Rest of the World" below, accompanied by occasional semi-relevant still pictures (you know the style...):



Otter Petter! How can you go wrong with a band named Otter Petter!

And please, if "otter petting" is some teen euphemism for something sexual, don't tell me.

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Local Wildlife Roundup

Watch out, animal-lovers! Here come some charismatic megafauna:

• Let's start with the good news (well, at least semi-good news). Last week, there were sightings of two different killer whale pods off the Bay Area coast. You can watch the news report here. Did you know that different Orca pods can choose to eat different types of food? As Wikipedia notes:
  

  specific populations show a high degree of specialization on particular prey species.

  One of the pods seen off the coast is a pod of salmon eaters; the other pod was seen killing harbor seals. This is good news because Fosco loves Orcas (he has a stuffed Orca named "Baby Shampu"). Sadly, however, this is bad news, because at least one of these pods is typically known to feed in the waters off Puget Sound and their appearance this far south suggests that food supplies are getting scarce.
  
• And now the bad news. According to this piece in the Santa Cruz Sentinel, "an assortment of factors suggests California's sea otter population is in decline." As you may have noticed, Fosco also adores sea otters. Sometimes I wish I could offer Oz's bathtub as an otter habitat.
  
• But one form of local wildlife is in full swing: roller girls. As in roller derby. This week, the Sentinel featured this slide show of a match(?) between the Santa Cruz Rollergirls and "the L.A. Derby Dolls Sirens." Although they are all interesting, Fosco's favorite picture is probably this one:
  
  I think this photo pretty much captures everything that Fosco wants to believe about roller derby.

Another Day in Paradise

Sure, the weather is nice here in California; but there are occasional drawbacks, as this frontpage of today's online Santa Cruz Sentinel makes clear:

Sigh. Even so, it's still better here than in Elkhart.

Luckily, anyone looking for some good news on a day like this can take comfort in this article about a rescued sea otter. Even though "Olive" the Otter was found covered in oil (probably from a "natural" source[!]), she is recovering well and will be released back into the Monterey Bay in another couple of weeks. While in the care of the Dept. of Fish and Game in Santa Cruz, Olive has been receiving a veritable spa treatment:

The young female, estimated to be about a year old, was treated with an olive oil bath and then washed intensively for two hours.
[...]
"She is eating primarily prawns and clams right now because they have the highest caloric content and she likes them," Jessup said. "She will be staying for at least another week, maybe two, before we send her back."

I'm a little jealous, actually. Not to mention that the whole thing sounds absolutely adorable. Aren't charismatic megafauna great?

You, You, You Otter Know.

One of the best things about living on the Monterey Bay is the occasional appearance of charistmatic megafauna. Like sea otters, the world's cutest fish! Here's an absolutely adorable story from the San Jose Mercury News about a sea otter cum cinematographer. That's right: it's a sea otter pointing a video camera! You can thank me later.

Rounding Up the Food

It's "Foodie Friday," so let's talk about food...

Fosco isn't really feeling ambitious on "Foodie Friday" this week, so he's just going with a post of food-related titbits:

• Times food critic Frank Bruni reviewed The John Dory this week. The John Dory calls itself a "British Seafood Restaurant," which should make one ignore the whole thing. However, it is also the creation of a very serious chef, April Bloomfield, so we must take notice of it. Bruni gives the place two stars (which means "very good") and is generally enthusiastic. Fosco was stopped in his tracks by this paragraph:
  

  There are nervy surprises. For a while Ms. Bloomfield served pan-fried milt, which is basically cod semen, its flavor and texture not unlike that of sweetbreads. She blasted it with capers and butter, which is also how she blasts its replacement for the time being, monkfish liver, served not in the pâté-esque way of many Japanese restaurants but as a hulking, meaty, pan-fried lobe. I admire her immensely.

  That's right, my friends: cod semen. See above right.
  
  
• You know what Fosco has been craving lately? A cocktail. Which is strange, because Fosco hasn't been drinking much the last few years (since his body got old). But, for some reason, Fosco has really been jonesing for a Pimm's Cup, like the one he enjoyed last summer at The Slanted Door. It's actually more of a summer drink, best enjoyed around Wimbledon-time (it's an English cocktail, of course), which may explain why it does not currently appear on Slanted Door's online bar menu right now.
  
  The thing about a Pimm's Cup is that it's difficult to make it correctly here in this country (as most bars lack Pimm's). However, as Camper English notes, the Slanted Door makes a very delicious approximation using gin &c. The other ingredient generally lacking around here is borage leaves; however, as English notes as well, cucumbers work almost as well.
  
  Now assume that Fosco doesn't want to try to make his own Pimm's Cup (authentic or approximated). Any ideas on where I could order one in the Bay Area?
  
  
• Speaking of cocktails, did you see that you can now get Sweet Tea-flavored vodka? Now Fosco has been getting tea-infused liquors (especially gin) in his cocktails for a number of years now at several local bars, so this doesn't seem like much of an innovation. But I'm sure that this wider exposure of tea-infused vodka will be greeted with much rejoicing at certain SEC football games.
  
  
• A couple new blogs (well, new to me) that I'm really digging! You may recall Fosco's extraordinary interest in the cuisine of Jean-Georges Vongerichten. Well, it turns out that Jean-Georges has his own blog and it has absolutely gorgeous food pix.
  
  Also, if you're a silly Top Chef aficionado (like Fosco and Oz), you should be reading Skillet Doux. The Top Chef power rankings on that blog are pretty helpful. And there are also useful reviews of various Top Chef contestant restaurants.
  

Joke of the Overnight

Fosco isn't quite sure how to feel about comedian Demetri Martin. On the one hand, he's working partially in the cerebral tradition of Stephen Wright--a tradition that Fosco enjoys. On the other hand, he's sometimes too cutesy by half.

I guess he has a new show (premiering tonight) that I probably won't watch. However, I did catch part of an old standup special last night and he had several really great lines. My favorite:

"I went whale watching once, it was very similar to watching people on a boat become disappointed."

That's kind of a great joke. To me, at least.

UCSC on Colbert Report

UC Santa Cruz researchers have named a local elephant seal after Stephen Colbert. You can read all about "Stelephant Colbert" in this UCSC press release--humorously titled "I am elephant seals (and so can you!)" Well, the shameless bid for publicity paid off because last night on "The Colbert Report," Stephen led off the show by acknowledging UCSC (sort of) and his eponymous elephant seal:

The Colbert ReportMon - Thurs 11:30pm / 10:30c

Stelephant Colbert the Elephant Seal

Colbert Report Full Episodes
Paul McCartney Appearance

Funny Political Videos
More Funny Videos

True, Stephen does actually call us the "University of Santa Cruz"; but that's close enough, right? And how about the graphical shoutout to the Santa Cruz Sentinel? This may be the most national exposure Santa Cruz has had since it was "Murder Capital of the World" back in the 1970s.

You know, last year Fosco had tickets for the hike to the beach at Año Nuevo State Natural Reserve to see the mating elephant seals. Sadly, it was pouring rain on that day and Fosco just let the ticket go to waste (as if he would hike two miles in the rain!). Maybe he should try again this year--especially since it no longer seems to rain in Santa Cruz. Imagine the great pix of Stelephant Colbert that he could get (because I'm sure that elephant seals all look very different from each other--just like Jonas Brothers...).

Golden Delicious

"Foodie Friday" continues here at Fosco Lives!

This past week was the annual Bocuse d'Or competition in Lyon, France--a sort of "culinary Olympics" for the best French-style chefs in the world. The competition is named for legendary French chef Paul Bocuse, who with typical Gallic modesty, also lends his name to the eponymous award. Interestingly, the literal translation of bocuse d'or is "golden narcissist," which seems appropriate when you see the winner's trophy:

Yes, that is the actual figure of Paul Bocuse standing atop the globe. In gold. This guy makes Donald Trump look like Mother Teresa.

But despite Bocuse's Rick Warren-like self-regard, the competition is still a deadly serious event, with many European countries following it as closely as sporting competitions. The competition takes place over two days and is something of an endurance test. Each country that participates is allowed one team, led by one chef. This year, the American chef was Timothy Hollingsworth, the sous-chef at the best restaurant in the US, Thomas Keller's French Laundry in Napa. Hollingsworth won the privilege last September and has worked full-time since then with his team to prepare for the competition. Like I said, this is serious.

The New York Times covered this year's competition quite well (how will we live when they no longer exist?). You can watch this short video explaining the competition and describing its strange football-game atmosphere.

If you prefer your culinary competitions to have a bit of a Top Chef twist, then you will definitely appreciate this report from the competition that describes how the first day's ingredient (Norwegian prawns) were given to the chefs frozen. As the Times notes,

“It was the surprise of the day!” said Christian Têtedoie, a member of the official organizing committee, who once won the Meilleur Ouvrier de France, considered the most prestigious cooking award in France. He offered no other comment except to shrug his shoulders, tap his clipboard and walk away.

Eek! What would Tom and Padma say?

The good news is that, unlike previous years, all of the chefs lived through the ordeal. The bad news (for rabidly patriotic Americans like Fosco) is that the American chef, Mr. Hollingsworth, came in sixth. The winner was Norway. Or Sweden. Or something like that. Luckily, you can read about why Mr. Hollingsworth failed. It turns out there was a minor snafu with plating (I told you this thing is serious):

“It was very difficult to plate the fish,” he added. “This was the first time I was with these servers, it was very difficult. They were working a different way from the way I’m used to working.”

He said he was used to plating all the dishes for one course at one time, but his servers at the competition did it in sets of four.

Nor did things go any better for the home team:

The biggest disappointment was felt by France. Philippe Mille, the 34-year-old Frenchman who is the sous-chef at the three-star Paris restaurant Le Meurice, was a strong candidate, and many expected him to win. But his fish dish came out a minute late, which cost the French team 12 points in the scoring.

Sadly, M. Mille will now be deported to Belgium.

News Roundup: Gov. Sunshine, Man-Goblin, and the Bluth family

Governor Sunshine's post-impeachment press conference was absolutely thrilling, especially the desperation that sneaks into his voice as he offers to play basketball with some local kid. This is fun of the highest order.

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

But, there were actually loads of other neat items in the news today. Here's a roundup:

• File under "good news." As per Defamer, Jeffrey Tambor assures "Arrested Development" fans that Michael Cera will definitely participate in the AD movie. Cera's participation had been in question, but Pop Pop has confidence that he can persuade Cera if necessary. Fosco once saw Mr. Tambor live (when Fosco was a member of the studio audience of "Regis and Kathie Lee"--don't ask) and his personal charisma is considerable. I believe he can make this movie happen.
  
  
• You may remember Fosco's admiration for Brenda "Wire-haired Man-goblin" Warner. Well, Brenda and her husband, Arizona quarterback Kurt Warner, are the subject of an inspirational email that is making the rounds of all well-meaning middle-aged Christian women who don't understand the meaning of the word "spam." You know, like Fosco's Aunt Bonnie.
  
  According to Deadspin, the email tells the heart-warming story of "Kurtis and Brenda," two crazy kids with little in common except an inexplicable physical attraction and a burning love for Christ. The email plays up lots of more Christian-y aspects of the couple's courtship (yet is curiously silent on the subject of saddlebacking). The best part of the story, however, is all the basic facts that it gets wrong, and usually in such a way as to make the story less interesting (oddly enough). Here's a quote from the Deadspin piece:
  

  Brenda was never a checkout girl. She met Kurt when he was still in college and before his career took its unfortunate turn for the worse. (She actually stuck with him, despite his many football failures.) They were together five years before they got married, not one. Her son, Zachary, is actually her oldest child and he doesn't have Down's Syndrome. His birth father dropped him on his head when he was an infant, leading to brain damage and blindness. (The trauma of that incident let to the father leaving Brenda, while she was pregnant with her second child.) Also, left out: the tornado that killed Brenda's parents in 1996; the spider bite that cost Kurt a tryout with the Bears; and Brenda's first career as a freakin' Marine.

  Wow. Put that all together and I think you have the best white trash epic since The Grapes of Wrath.
  
  
• And that Steinbeck reference provides a nice segue to this bit of local news from the San Jose Mercury News. A restaurant war on Monterey's Fisherman's Wharf has erupted and it's gotten nasty. Apparently, the hosts at one restaurant have been dumping another restaurant's pagers into the ocean. It happens like this (now follow along here, it gets a little complicated):
  
  1. Prospective customers go to Restaurant 1 where they are placed on a waitlist and given a pager.
     
  2. Prospective customers walk along the wharf while they wait for their pager to summon them.
     
  3. Prospective customers are accosted by the host at Restaurant 2 who notes that they can be seated immediately at said Restaurant 2.
     
  4. When the prospective customers agree to be seated at Restaurant 2, the host at Restaurant 2 claims that he/she will return the unneeded pager to Restaurant 1.
     
  5. Restaurant 2 host does not return the pager, but rather drops it into into Monterey Bay, where it immediately becomes a choking hazard for curious sea lions. Okay, I made up the sea lion part.
  Believe it or not, this sequence of events was established in a sting by two undercover police officers (Monterey doesn't have drugs or murder, apparently). A diver(!) "reportedly discovered seven pagers on the sea floor under [Restaurant 2]. During another dive, three more pagers were found."
  

Surfing the Times

Someone on the New York Times editorial staff has a hard-on for surfers lately. In the last week, the Times has had two online front-page feature stories on surfing. However, Fosco doesn't really blame them. After all, Fosco lives just a few blocks from one of the most famous surf spots on the West Coast and he finds the whole sport/pursuit pretty fascinating (although the physical attractiveness of most surfers has been greatly exaggerated).

Fosco's favorite surf story in the Times actually dates from 2006. It was this article on the intrepid surfers of Lake Erie. Fosco is a Midwesterner by birth, and so he finds it fascinating that surfing is possible on one of the Great Lakes. And here's an image that has stuck with Fosco for over two years:

It was the kind of day that lives mostly in Cleveland surfers’ fantasies. Pushed by the storm’s winds, water the color of chocolate milk rose 10 feet in the air before slamming onto a beach of boulders and logs. The temperature was 40 degrees and falling. One surfer, Vince Labbe, climbed onto his board only to get blown backward by 40-mile-an-hour winds.

"Water the color of chocolate milk"! I love that image. It's absolutely disgusting. But at least the waves must be nice, right? Well, not really.

The strongest winds and waves come in winter, just before Lake Erie freezes. Waves up to 10 feet have been surfed, but the largest swells are usually chest-high. Instead of curling into a vertical wall, the waves are round like haystacks, and they collapse onto the shore like soggy paper.

Wait. It gets even worse.

Surfers learn to avoid ice chunks the size of bowling balls. Some wear goggles to surf through freezing rain, which can sting their eyes like needles. That is a bad idea, Mr. Labbe said, because the goggles freeze to their faces.

Surfers watch their friends for signs of hypothermia, urging them to leave the water when their eyes glaze over and their words slur. Ear infections are a common affliction.

And you thought Pacific "surf bums" were deluded... Surfing in Cleveland is clearly an insanity on par with something out of the DSM-IV (or Mormonism).


Happily, the Times published a second article on the Great Lakes surfing scene last week, with an article on surfing Lake Superior. Believe it or not, surfing Superior is actually colder than Erie.

“It’s warmer in the water,” said Markus Barsch, 21, a tree trimmer from Ashland, Wis., and one of a dozen surfers who had shown up to shred on a 20-degree day.

Surfing in a snowstorm may sound like a direct route toward hypothermia or certain death. But on Lake Superior, where surfers ride all months of the year, thick wet suits, gloves, hoods, booties and petroleum jelly smudged on exposed skin all form a protective shell against the crushing cold encountered by wave catchers in what is one of the world’s most unlikely surfing scenes.

What do you even say about something like that? Except "jeez."

Yet if you prefer warmer waters for your surfing, there are other dangers, according to today's Times article on the surf gangs of Oahu. It seems that the famous surfing sites on Hawaii's North Shore are under the control of a surf gang called the "Wolfpak." Seriously. However, before you laugh too hard, you should know that these are guys to take seriously:

The most notorious member is the group’s enforcer, Kala Alexander, a professional surfer with muscular tattooed arms and “Wolfpak” inked across his knuckles. In 2007, Alexander starred in “The 808,” a reality television series about the Wolfpak and the North Shore, and appeared in the films “Blue Crush” and “Forgetting Sarah Marshall.” But he has also gained fame for YouTube videos that show him pummeling surfers on the sand several years ago.

“The code is to respect other people,” Alexander, 39, said. “People come over here and don’t respect other people. You’re going to run into problems if you do that.”

That is what happened to Chris Ward, a 30-year-old professional from San Clemente, Calif., and runner-up to Kelly Slater last month at the Pipeline Masters. In November, Australian publications reported that Ward cut off a local surfer while riding a wave at Pipeline. He was banished to the beach, where a Wolfpak member smacked him in the head. Without providing details, Ward confirmed that the incident happened.

Dude, you so can't cut off another surfer. Yet while all of this may sound either a bit silly or a bit dangerous (depending on your temperament), there are those who argue for the necessity of gang control of the best surf spots as a way of keeping order:

As surfing has become increasingly popular, some say fear of violent reprisal ensures order and safety at congested and perilous surf spots like Pipeline.

“It’s a dangerous environment, and without a self-governing control pattern it would just be chaos out there,” Rarick said.

[...]

“It was crowded when I came here,” Alexander said about Pipeline. “A lot of people in the water, not much respect. Where I grew up on Kauai, you respect everybody in the water, especially your elders. Don’t step out of line. We just brought that mentality over here.”

Hey, remember the episode when Paulie said that about the Newark garbage business?

Actually, Fosco's favorite part of the article was his discovery that his (recently-married) college roommate Derek Ho was actually a surf star in Hawaii before Harvard:

At the time there was a void in the Pipeline lineup as those who regulated the waves during the 1990s, like Derek Ho, Johnny Boy Gomes and Marvin Foster, had grown older and moved on.

You know someone for fifteen years and this kind of thing still comes as a surprise.

Pictures of 2008: Under the Sea!

Fosco recently realized that, by only blogging for three months last year, he never got to share tons of pictures with you from the rest of the year. So, for the next week or so, Fosco will offer a series of brief posts with some of his favorite pictures from his adventures in 2008. Check out the whole series here.

Last summer, Fosco's extended family visited and we all took a trip to the (surprisingly expensive!) Monterey Bay Aquarium. While there, Oz took these great photos. I don't think you're ready for these jellies:

Just call me "Mr. Barnacle Hands!" Yarrr.

One thing I learned at the MBA? Almost one out of every three fish is delicious!