The BLT

If you want the perfect BLT logic will tell you that you need a tomato slice that is equal in diameter as your bread slice. My advice for growing a tomato for such a sandwich is that no amount of fertilizer is too much. Watch a short slide show of my perfect BLT.

Friendship

Friends. The most important people in your life. Treat them well, because you will find that the good things in life are best when shared with the ones you care about. Malt liquor is one of those good things.

Chili

 

A friend from work and I went for a nice ride on our bikes after work. We stopped for chili which turned out to be good enough, no pun intended, Cindy.

Lakefront Brewery

A regional brewery based in Milwaukee has always had the best tour, and a really good line of beers. They've certainly hit one out of the park with their newest edition to the family, this IPA. I give it an A+.

Dependable Pete Classic Clip: Stop motion beer

Bicycle

It's summer, you should get outside and go for a bike ride. I mean, look at you, all cooped up in the house and it's so nice outside.

DependablePete Classic Clip: The IPA

Here's a short clip of a very underrated custom in our culture, ordering a beer.

Poems and Pics

When the days are long,
and your stresses have compounded.
The days of your youth are gone,
And the pressure of a career have mounted.
I shall ask you to sit with me,
and I'll lend you my ear.
You are all you need to be
while you enjoy a frosty beer

I could never have seen this coming.

This is quite simply mind blowing. This photo is of a girl named Gina. She lived next door to my family all through my childhood. Her family is very religious. One day, several years ago, I'm sitting in a bar with my brother (not uncommon) and a free magazine distributed to all local bars intended to advertise drink specials and various events in the area is sitting there and I'm staring at it blankly as I drift off in space (not uncommon). Suddenly I snap out of it, scrunch my face, and mumble "wait". I open the cover to the table of contents and read what I never thought possible. If her family ever saw this they would most certainly disown her. What I felt was particularly unnecessary is going topless behind the guitar. Had she wore a shirt behind the guitar her parents would be proud of her small success and I'd have no fun with this. After my brother and I decided not to drop it in their mailbox as an effort to sabotage her, I saw her in their driveway and delicately asked her about it. The website and magazine state very clearly all modeling is done free, models aren't paid. She made up this bullshit story that they gave her a thousand dollars, laughable, but, honestly, I can't blame her because I would have said that too.

Fireside Folk

Take A quick tour of the folk songwriting room as it nears completion. Exciting things are on the horizon.

Breakfast Pic

Chorizo and eggs on Saturday morning. Too good, too spicy, and oh so filling.

Beer Brat

 

One onion, one brat, one bun, and one satisfied Dependable Pete. MMMMMmmmmm.....I spoke fluent German for a good hour after eating this. Guten Tag!

Pro Bowler.

Here's me out throwing rocks.

Crossing the line

 

Just when you thought you they couldn't take it any farther. Behold the Harley Davidson fertilizer spreader. I'm saving up for the screaming eagle billet wheels. The fertilizer is made out of ground up bikers.

Three pretty little maids all in a row.

 

This is the most beautiful picture I've ever taken in my entire life. Just look at it. I took it with my cell phone and sent it to myself in email, and when I saw later on at home I swear it brought a tear to my eye. Take a moment. Beauty, perfection, and innocence. Mug #62 is in the middle.

Sound Quality (Test Clip)

This post is intended to test several things, video quality, my cameras mic, and how it all works out loading it on the Blog. For the sake of being factual, that's my G&L Bluesboy. If you're wondering why this needs to be tested, well that will be revealed soon enough.

Living the High Life

A few years ago I toured the Miller Brewery to see how the big boys do their thing. You see sometimes we can get caught up in our microbrewery ways. Here's a clip of me delicately sampling a Miller High Life. (Turn the sound down on this one, because some douche bag college kids at another table decide to chime in with "Chug...Chug..")

Our Luncheon Together.

In a previous post I asked a simple question. Do lunch pics ever make you feel like you sitting there with me discussing philosophy while plowing fast food? This pic may help you feel that way. Here's me, Dependable Pete, destroying a beef sandwich at the famous Russell's Barbecue while looking you right in the eye.

It's Another Dependable Pete Classic Clip

Turn the sound on and I think you'll like it.

Lunch pic on a rescheduled afternoon

 

Damn it feels good to be a gangster.

Welcome to the Carribean.

In response to the inappropriate comments made regarding the arrest photo from my trip to the dragon (Deals Gap), here's a photo taken during my career in logistics (smuggling). The officers hats seem out of place, wouldn't you agree?

Sold Out.

After a lengthy and equally heated conference call between my manager, agent, and myself, my name has been legally changed to "U.S. Cellular Presents Dependable Pete". So, per my new contract, if you don't mind, thats what I'd like to be referred to as until further notice. Sometimes we do things outside of what we normally would to further our careers as local celebrities especially when a writers guild strike ends and my contract is up.

(Thats me on stage)

Lunar Eclipse

Last night I watched as the moon (Luna) was eclipsed by the great almighty Earth. The Sun in all its glory passed behind Earth casting one hell of a shadow upon the face of our beloved moon. I can't help but wonder what it might be like to stand on the surface of the moon. What would I do there, I ask myself? The only thing I was sure of was to simply look back at earth. Why is it that astronauts in there wisdom spend all that time and energy working toward space travel only to reach the farthest place ever before, jam a flag in the sand, and look back at home. Seems silly to me. Go to the moon just to look at earth in the same fashion. Life. Grow old just to recollect on your younger days. Discontent seems to be something of a problem affecting all of us. Me, I look forward, soon I (lady friend included) will be a homeowner.

Candy Cane

Since I've figured out the feature that allows me to post video clips I've received overwhelming demand to post this classic clip. This is me and my brother putting a candy cane in a cordless drill. Enjoy.

DependablePete Classic Clip: The Pocket Bike.

This is what my work days look like.

Rock N Roll

Dependable Pete is in the Combat Zone. (Promo pic for Brutally Handsome)

Danger!

There's a lot of jobs out there with an inherent level of danger. Some of these jobs are obvious like; logging, and tug boat captaining, but an incredible amount of others go unrecognized. Imagining some possibilities you can't help but realize the people doing these jobs will inevitably become desensitized to the danger in these situations. It's especially funny when you envision the dialogs between the workman getting home and his wife asking how his day went. Here's an example I think puts my point a little bit more in focus, the job title would be, Department of Corrections Bus Driver. I have to assume this guy gets punched in the face on a daily basis by the obvious felons regardless of any fence he may sit behind. There's the background, now lets get to the experiment. Dude gets home from work and his wife asks innocently "How was work Honey"? Dude casually replies "I was held hostage for like two hours until Officer Coharsky stepped in and shot the guy, and then we got lunch at Wendy's. It was OK, I got a #2".
Here's another. Indoor Shooting Range Attendant, I'm guessing the close-calls can get a little nuts. Dude gets home from work and his wife poses the same question. Dudes answer "Some idiot with a .45 almost smoked me so I kicked him out. Oh and the Ham sandwich was good. Is that new mustard"?
Think of your own examples, it's kind of funny to imagine.

Quilt

This is a quilt I made for Nick, Katies brother, as a Christmas gift.

Fur Real

Can you believe this. This is a real-live-no bullshit Cat, and its bigger than the golden retriever currently living at my parents house.

MLK

Today I had lunch with my future brother-in-law. In celebration of our diversity, we went to Portillos. In speaking with several people I posed a simple question; "Is Martin Luther King day the anniversary of his birth or death"? The first answer was usually birth, it was however, strikingly easy to convince otherwise as most Americans are relatively uncertain of our history. Which would then pose the obvious question, why the hell would anyone celebrate an assassination? Here's a photo of Nick destroying a jumbo dog with everything on it (sorry it's blurry, try squinting when you look at it).

Lunch Pic!

Guess what? I had lunch today. I went to this Italian joint called Nana's Cuccina. It's like a really good Italian food and bakery kinda place. I had a most delicious meatball sub and coke, and to my surprise the lid to my cup had no hole in it for my straw, see, I took a photo of that too. What a great lunch on what will be one of the last Fridays I'll have off in a long time due to a pending schedule change next week.

Interactive Post

I haven't had any good blog posts in a while and this leaves me feeling empty and inadequate. As of right now I'll take comfort in the simple fact that no one reads this malarkey. I'm considering falling back on an old formula for success, which is any one of the following post models I've had positive feedback from or really any feedback. For instance; The Philosophical (Previous post titled "Ancient Greeks"), Humorous Memory ("Donuts"), Educational ("Brewhaus"), The Lunch Pic (countless examples), and the Down right Insane ("TSA Play set"). So I was thinking I'll let you the reader decide the next post. Simply write your request in a comment and I'll do my best to come up with something truly groundbreaking.

Ah yes.

As some of you may know I don't work on fridays. So what I did today (as if you give a F@#*) was something I think I do best, destroyed an amazing sandwich, mayo glob on the side, and a Pepsi. It was a refreshing lunch. After this I will play the guitar for hours.

"Ride the lightning"

I know what you're thinking Dependable Pete supporter; "whats Pete doing buying an electric guitar"? I know I've said before (previous posts, also at Emmett's) that I'm a loyal acoustic guitar player and thats where my heart is. I'm not going back on my word it just makes sense to have a good acoustic and a good electric. I ordered a custom G&L Bluesboy (photo above), I got it in the three tone sunburst, rosewood fretboard, hand rubbed gun oil neck with a glossy finish, and a semi hollow body with the F hole. I bought and paid for it (a shit load) some time in early August and I picked it up second week of October. I will say that this guitar is the nicest, smoothest, incredible sustain, most jaw dropping electric guitar I've ever experienced. To quote Dee Snyder of Twisted Sister, "Have you ever seen Paul Simon plug into two Marshall stacks and ride the lightning"?

Mondays off.

I took monday off, and here's what I ate. Living the dream.

Slayed The Dragon

I slayed the dragon, also known as Deal's Gap. I rode all 318 curves in the short stretch of 11 miles on my Harley. The police were notably friendly. I also bought a T-shirt. Enjoy this photo taken while discussing evasive riding techniques with a state trooper.

Advice

how do I start this? (rhetorical question)

Recently my friend Danno and I had a conversation about guitars, not uncommon. After the said talk I thought to myself whether I had given good advice or not, which led me to think about advice more generally. As I think of all the advice I've given in my life , maybe 1% was ever taken. Why? Well, what is advice is the root issue here, Danno looked it up, it's "an opinion or recommendation offered as a guide to action". With that I would say about sums it up. My thought process is more like this. Someone approaches me with a dilemma I respond with what I would do, emphasis on I, and tell them that. The problem is that it isn't me with the problem it's them. Who's eyes am I looking through while I'm formulating a solution, and if they are asking for advice or simply looking for someone to be a listener or even just a different perspective on the situation. I would like to make one additional point in that unsolicited advice is really annoying. I shrug my shoulders. Listen if you want, my advice will always be free if you want it.

Also if you see Danno tell him his best course of action is to buy the American strat or tele, either way it's a cool guitar.

Coming to terms with life itself

There are many things in life we will inevitably be forced to deal with, both good and bad. One thing everyone experiences, and can be difficult, is the way we lose touch with close friends over time. I can't even count all the really wonderful people I've known over my life, most of them I couldn't begin to think where they may be or what they may be doing, or even if they are alive. We take comfort in the idea that they are fine and miss us too. View this cheesy portrait of me with some friends taken several years ago. (I'm still very much in touch with these idiots)

Wide Glide

Here's a photo of my wide glide, enjoy.

Strange coincidence.

Parallel dimension

I've spoken through both time and space to a 50 year old self. Through the Internet some friends of mine found, me. Or at least someone of the same name, both first and last. I never thought my name would be synonymous with such success, figures it's somebody else. Anyway, check out his impressive art on his website. http://www.petermangan.com/ Maybe sharing the same name he could give me a deal on a cool chandelier.

Wish for things

In a three wish Genie situation the only one I can be sure of would be;
Mind blowing piano skills.

New entry

It's been a while since I've posted anything and I do apologize for that, so here's a little advice for the weary.


All (your name here) needs to be is (your name here). If you can do that, everything else will fall into place.


Here's a photo of riley sleeping under a blanket on the couch, he'll be there all day. Thats riley being riley, now you do the same.

Nickel and Dime

My most Favorite Brewery/restaurant on earth has recently made some strange changes. The new menu, which is really the same menu of another restaurant they own, boasts a two dollar burger on Tuesday nights. Myself and my brother included were all too skeptical, so we went and ordered two burgers half expecting microwaved white castle burgers this is what was presented to us. Un-fucking-believable, $2.

Closing Doors

There's something humbling about watching a micro brewery go out of business, especially one I've enjoyed (puked at) many of occasions. I saw the Wind Gypsys there for the first time. Myself along with my wrecking crew friends have known for a while now they were shutting down to make way for a crappy steak house that I'll never go to, but saturday it was all too real when we were served undrinkable beer in a building with the heat turned off, it was 45 degrees in there. I bid you Fair well Praire Rock. Salute.

Lunch

For lunch today I am enjoying the finest of leftover chicken enchiladas, exquisitely pair with a Pepsi cola.

Donuts

In the past i've expressed some interest in blogging some of the funny stories from my past expieriences in the coast guard. I thought of this story while watching, what I'll assume was a co-worker, doing donuts in the snow covered parking lot at work this evening.

After 9/11 at Station Oak Island they went to an armed gate guard, meaning someone had to be sitting at the front gate to the station (in shifts) 24 hours a day, armed. They didn't have a little out-house thing like most military bases so the guards sat in the Chevy suburban they had. Now this guy Mike goes out there on watch from midnight till four in the a.m. and gets so bored and pissed off about the whole thing he started doing donuts in the lawn, needless to say the officer of the day heard the truck roaring in a dusty circle. But that wasn't all, after the donuts and the officer of the day just figured he'd yell at him tomorrow, Mike drives off to go to the gas station on the corner for a pack of smokes. He got in sooo much trouble, it was hilarious. Especially the donut marks in the lawn that are probably still there.

my quilt

So I decided to make a quilt for me. Just me. Deep chocolate browns and rich tan colors in a traditional log cabin quilt style. What that means is, a red center referred to as the hearth or chimney, and logs or dark and light colors in a log kind of pattern around the hearth. I finished the first block after several hours of cutting the strips. Here it is in the photo, only 47 more to go.

Destiny

Tonight on my way home I, of all people, ran out of gas. I believe it may have been destiny. While waiting for my parents to arrive with the much needed petrol, something remarkable happened, no, my wildest sexual fantasy didn't come, although countless pornos start this way, I shattered my previous record on Bejeweled (on my cell phone). I shall leave you with a picture of the frozen pizza I made once I got home, enjoy.

lunch pic.

I need to start by mentioning the fact that I got a new cell pnone and have the ability to send photos from the phone to my email. What this means for you and I, well, the lunch pic is going to be alot easier to post on my blog so look forward to many deliscious lunches together. Do you ever, when you look at a lunch pic, feel like you're sitting there with me, enjoying lunch with me? Anyway, here's the wonderful gyros I had at zippy's this rainy afternoon.

The Pipe

The best gift I've recieved in a long time. Gifts that you know will be with you through a signifigant portion of your life to come are always the best. With the exception of herpes of course. My brother gave me this pipe for christmas. It was hand made in denmark by a company called Bjarne.

Christmas

Anyway, christmas yadda yadda..... what does it have to do with jesus.....yadda yadda....

I made my girlfriend this quilt for christmas by hand, myself. My mom (expierienced quilter) showed me how to read the pattern. Here's my dog Riley giving it his doving off seal of approval.

Lunar Rover

Think about this in a mind-set outside your norm and you might see why conspiracy theorists love to call bullshit.

NASA sends a rocket to the moon so Armstrong can walk around, post a flag, and drive around in a cool dune-buggy. Billions of dollars so some guy can drive a dune buggy on the moon, how do I apply for that job. Here's the training, get drunk (simulating reduced gravity) drive your little brothers go-cart in the dessert (lunar surface). Did you flip the go-cart over? No. You pass, welcome to NASA. I can only hope that going to the moon did something more than give society the phrase "If they can land a man on the moon, they should be able to...." You might be thinking "Well where would we have gotten moon rocks?" I'll tell you where, at a gift shop on your next vacation. In this situation, bullshit is plausible. Note: The real reason conspiracy theorists call bullshit is because of the cold war. Kennedy made his famous speak about space travel being a priority and within a year we were there. Russia had sent Copernicus into orbit and America wasn't going to lose that battle, so it came down to principle. Do it or fake it. Thats the short version.

Tiss The Season of Gift Giving

Some time in my life I would like to take a gift given to me for Christmas by someone close and put it in the basement. Then the following year re-wrap it and give it to them and act like I didn't know. I would do that to my friend Mark but he doesn't buy me anything, maybe if I reiterate the Christmas card he sent me last year.

Success!

For the first time in my life my family is seeing success in all its' members. My brother was recently hired on as a full time employee at the local K Mart. At 29 years old, his job is to assist any customers in the digital media department, and get Albert when he needs to take his break. Next thing you know one of us might move out of our parents house. (This is all a joke)