Trouble in Texas

While driving home from Texas, we made an emergency stop at a rest area on Interstate 20. Nature was calling. Imagine my dismay when walking up to the bathroom door and seeing this:

Yep, both the men's and women's restrooms were closed! The whole family was in a panic, until I noticed a little grafitti in the lower right corner that saved the day.


I am usually against grafitti, but this particular bit of advice really helped us out. We got some strange looks from passersby though...

Merry Christmas!

I'm going to Texas for a week or so. Enjoy the holidays! I'll leave you with a sketch I made, since Photoshop isn't working for some reason. In the drawing, these guys are all looking at the world's largest piece of toast located in Taipei, Taiwan. Unfortunately, I ran out of time before I could draw the toast :(



Happy Holidays!


(tutorial)

Too Young for the Limelight

I went to a Phish concert last night to get some new pictures of hippies. Phish is an old band in the style of the Grateful Dead, but I read that they are trying to appeal to a younger crowd. THEY WENT TOO FAR! I've always believed that Britney Spears and her type enter the spotlight too young. I believe it damages them emotionally and they probably cannot ever recover. But this is ridiculous. Their new lead singer is like 5 years old! I have serious doubts as to whether that is even a real guitar.

The poor kid is being traumatized by learning that hippies are not just in horror stories. They are real. 5 years old is just too young to learn about that horrifying fact, much less sing for them. Boy, if I had any idea who the mother of this child was, I'd give her a smack. Lucky for her, I have no clue.

I'm off to cook up a batch of toast to rest my nerves.

(layer style "color" is good for changing color of masked items, gaussian blur to make her look like other blurry band members. Render->Lighting Effects sealed the deal. If you know this child's mother, don't 'smack her' :) )

Photo ideas

In case you are new to photography, I'd like to make a suggestion. If you really want to make your picture special, always include toast in the photo.



It really jumps off the page at you, making the picture come alive.

(Out of bounds tutorial here.)

Vote for me!

My entry in Iraq the Model's new banner choice has been nominated! I'm the 5th one, with the shiny "the model" lettering. The vote is via email, so you have to choose a number from 1-5 and email it to itmblog (over at) gmail.com. The others are very good :( so I don't have high hopes, but in the spirit of the Iraqi elections, we should all make our vote count.

I submitted a couple of entries. This one didn't make the cut for some reason. It was an attempt to bring in the anti-freedom pro-peace crowd. (click to enlarge)



Apparently, Iraq the Model has no respect for the hippies. Well, I guess I can't fault them for that.

No More Graffiti!

Toast related graffiti is a huge problem in the inner cities of America. In NYC, you can't throw a pigeon without hitting some toast graffiti. I am a toast enthusiast as well, but defacing property is not the answer.




Eat toast. Don't draw it.

Sister doesn't eat enough toast

My sister called me this morning via webcam. She was acting hysterical, screaming that aliens had given her some mutating drug or something. I suggested she calm down and have a piece of toast, and she went ballistic! "Not everything can be solved with toast, you $@^&*@!@#& moron!"

I took a webcam snapshot of her as she was talking. I am a part-time non-degreed psychiatrist, so I wanted to study her facial features to see what was really going on. Notice in the picture how her mouth has no hint of a smile? That tells me she's not happy. You can learn a lot from a picture. Don't feel bad if you didn't notice it; it takes a lot of practice to understand faces well enough to make a call like this one.


So my original diagnosis was correct. She needs toast. You cannot be unhappy while eating toast; it's a scientifically proven fact. If anyone is up in NJ, please give my sister a piece of toast. It will put the smile right back on her face where it belongs.

UPDATE: The problem has been resolved. My brother and mother were visiting and brought her some toast. Her smile is back!

The Father of Toast

Yeah, I don't know his name either, but I'm pretty sure he's the father of toast. If not, I'm going to be pretty mad since I wasted all morning making this bust of him, and granite dust is ridiculously hard to get out from under your fingernails.



UPDATE: I received many emails from Asia saying that toast was actually invented in China by Emporer Ching of the Ching dynasty. I don't have enough information to debate the matter effectively, and I had a little marble left over, so I made a statue of Ching too.





(tutorial here. I'm not very good at it, but the guy who did the tutorial certainly is!)

Interview with the President

I had the opportunity to interview President Bush this morning! We mostly spoke about gas prices. Although dropping in recent weeks, energy prices are still taking a big bite out of my budget. Mr. Bush made a lot of sense on the subject, so I'm just going to let him speak for himself.

"Hell yeah, gas prices are too high", he said. "We all need to do whatever we can to use less energy. I'm not suggesting a law or anything, as people just find ways around them. I'm talking about morality. Are you an American? Well, help your country out! Use less energy whenever you can. That and our wonderful market economy will solve the problem."

Indeed, it always has in the past. But I was curious what specific efforts he was making to lower his energy consumption. "Well for starters, Air Force One is a huge gas guzzler. I no longer ride in it unless I'm going overseas. Heck, I don't even use the limousine anymore!"


I also spoke to the President's driver, G.C. McGirlinson. G.C., nicknamed 'Blondie' by the White House staffers, didn't have a problem with the limousine replacement vehicle. "You can't pop a wheelie in a limousine. Believe me, I've tried. And nothing gets attention like riding down Pennsylvania Avenue with your front wheel in the air, and the President in tow." Blondie also enjoyed the fact that the 'prez' could fix her numerous speeding tickets. "I love the President, but the speeding ticket thing is the real reason I work for him. That, and he loves toast."

Don't we all, G.C. Don't we all.

(I can't figure out how to change the direction a person is looking, even with the tools available in Photoshop's 'transform' menu. If anyone knows how to do it well, please comment or email me. Until then, I'll look for a better angled view of Bush to corrupt :) . Check out this link to my liberal friend. He's liberal, but he uses reasoning just like the rest of us! I'm trying to raise awareness of people like him to replace Kos and Atrios, so we can have meaningful dialogue between the parties.)

Washington Underwater

I read on the Drudge report that Washington DC was under water. All I can say at this point is, "I'm sorry". You see, I stayed at the prestigious Watergate Hotel in DC last night (Watergate is known around the world as having the highest water flowrate out of their faucets). I was too lazy to take a shower, and decided to just take a bath. I turned on the water, but unfortunately fell asleep. When I woke up... well, you know the rest of the story.


(Used the "Flood" plugin from here. Originally I just lowered the opacity on a picture of the ocean, but I could not get it to look as good as the plugin. You have to purchase the plugin after 30 days, so only expect 29 more days of flooding.)

What happened to Ann?

I love Ann Coulter (a popular cooking show hostess in the states) and pretty much agree with the things she says. But something has changed about her lately. I heard that she had started the Atkins Diet. The diet is low-carbohydrate, and toast is not allowed.

I tried to explain to Dr. Atkins before he passed away that the toasting process removes all carbohydrates from bread, and therefore should be allowed on the diet. Before having me escorted out of the building by two security guards, he had the audacity to question my scientific study. Imagine that! The man has no toast-related degrees at all (I have 2) and yet he was questioning my knowledge of the subject.

That's water under the bridge though. What is not water under the bridge is the effect Dr. Atkins is having on Ann. I tuned into her cooking show the other day (on CookingNBC), and it was clear that the lack of toast in her diet had affected her mind.




Everyone knows that the first step in the progression of insanity is piercings, tattoos and weird hair color. You learn that in Psych101. If she doesn't get toast soon, there is only one possible outcome. Hippification. Please sign my off-line petition asking Ann to eat some toast. Otherwise, she will become a hippie for sure.




(Using hue/saturation layer, tattoo tutorial here. I could not get the face patch on the hippie to blend well. Rather than say it's because I haven't figured out how to do it yet, I'm going to blame society. It's Society's fault!)

Lunch in South Carolina

This has nothing to do with toast, but I snapped this photo in Charleston, SC harbor this morning, and thought it was pretty cool. Apparently these people really enjoyed the movie, "Titanic".



I searched the web, and found out that these two people can be seen here in the exact same pose! I wonder what the odds of that are. Oh well, time for a toasted sub from Quiznos.

Bagels

Stinky over at YoToast blog believes that bagels are better than toast. I have an opinion on that, and pictures are worth up to 1,410 words, so:

Ode to toast - Heywood Banks

All around the country and coast to coast
People always say what do you like most?
I dont want to brag, I dont wanna boast
I always tell them, I like toast.
YAY TOAST!
YAY TOAST!
YAY TOAST!
I get up in the morning about 6 am
Have a little jelly, have a little jam
Take a piece of bread and put it in the slot
Push down the lever and the wires get hot. I get toast.
YAY TOAST!
YAY TOAST!
Now theres no seceret to toasting perfection
Theres a dial on the side and you make your selection
Push to the dark or the light and then,
if it pops too soon, press down again. Make toast.
YAY TOAST!
YAY TOAST!
When the first cave man drove in from the dregs
He didn't know what would go with the bacon and the eggs
Must have met a genious got it into his head
Plug the toaster in the wall buy a bag of bread make toast
YAY TOAST!
YAY TOAST!

Toast is part of a complete breakfast. Here's mine.

(Listen to the song here.)

What can We Learn from Toast?

Toast is a lot like color in photographs. I like it, but in moderation it is more enjoyable. Here is a picture of Jane Falsin, my next door neighbor. She is very pretty. But her beauty bubbles to the surface even more when some of the color is removed.











Finally adding a light, blurry background makes her look even more spectacular. Where did I learn that? From toast! I found out early on that if you butter toast, it is better when the butter does not completely cover the toast. It brings out the individual flavors of both the butter and the toast. The same goes for picture detail. Where did those pretty eyes come from? If it weren't for the husband and three kids, I'd ask her to marry me right now!

There is so much that we can learn from toast, if we only take the time. Thanks toast.




(Many adjustment layers, closest tutorial I can find is here. I went high on the green eyes because it wasn't showing up in the small picture. I also patch tooled the left eye. I didn't bother with the right 'cause hey, it's just a blog. You get the idea. Here's a link to a liberal guy who uses logic and reason instead of name calling. It's a good read.)

The Church of Toast

You probably don't know this, but I have a degree in Toastrology and Toastonomy, so I am a firm believer in both the physical and metaphysical aspects of toast. But I don't think I can follow the Church of Toastieology. It just seems to be more about the toast-eater than the toast itself.

I was watching Oprah one day and she was interviewing the famous bookwriter Tom Cruise. He is a Toastieologist, but he wasn't talking about it. He was explaining that it is easier to dance on a couch than the ground, because you get that "spring" action going for you to give you extra bounce. Fair enough, but what happened next was appalling.

Tom noticed that Oprah was eating some toast during the interview. With a cry of, "Gimme Gimme Gimme", he pounced on her. At first she was reluctant to part with it, as it had already been buttered and was in the prime of it's life. But at this point, toast was flying every which way, and the buttered piece landed buttered side down on the floor. Oprah said, "Take the damned toast!"





Tom Jumped for joy,did a quick little prayer to the now flipped over buttered slice, and would not finish the interview until he had eaten every piece of toast on the set.


I agree that great reverance should be shown to toast, but to me it looked like Tom was just being greedy. As everyone knows, Toastrology is mostly about the sharing of toast. I think I'm gonna pass on Toastieology.


(Transform (lotta distort), used some glow in prayer. Self-explanatory I think. Unrelated link here.)

Trouble in Paradise

After visiting Akron for a couple of days, I decided to extend the vacation a bit and flew to the Seychelle Islands (just off the east coast of Ohio). It' was a beautiful day. The sun was out, there was a warm, gentle breeze, and the ocean was stunning. As dinnertime approached, I started wondering where I would eat, and what type of toast I would include in the meal. I had just settled upon rye toast, when suddenly the air all about me started to shimmer. Camera ever in hand, I started snapping off photos.
Then this weird lady's voice said, "All are welcome, all are welcome. Cross over children. There is peace and serenity and toast in the Waffle House." Well, I've seen the "Poltergeist" movie, so I was extremely hesitant about entering another dimension. On the other hand, I did want some rye toast, and Waffle House has some very good toast... I hopped through the wormhole, and came out in the Waffle House entrance. It was like they were expecting me to appear! The food was great (especially the toast), but it took a lot of questioning before I found out what really had happened to me.

It turns out there is a very simple explanation for what I considered quite an odd experience. Newspaper advertisements were no longer yielding results for them, so the Waffle House execs changed their advertising company. The new company had a space-time collapsing device (most do), and were using it to mass-market advertise directly to the consumer.

Long story short, I was suckered in by real world spam.

(wormhole tutorial, check out this unrelated topic as well)

Pro-toast Rally a Success

Hippies. Everyone hates them. They are the tiny minority that wants to ruin it for the rest of us. When we here at the toast blog heard about the anti-toast march the hippies were setting up, we sprung into action. We set up a Protest Warrior style counter-protest. For those of you who don't regularly read this blog, we've been asking readers to show up at the rally for months now. And it was a smashing success. Thanks to all who showed up.

Here are some of the pictures I took as our rally was setting up. To compare eating toast to murder is beyond the pale. And "Make Lego, not toast"?!? I stopped eating Legos when I was 3, and I didn't like it even back then. These people need to grow up. I even saw a hippy carrying a sign that said , "You can't hug your kid with nuclear toast". I was too stunned to snap a photo. Do they even read these signs they write?
They also use unethical methods to swell their numbers to make their side look like it has more followers. I asked this child why he was carrying a Mercedes-Benz logo'd poster. "My mother told me this was national Mercedes appreciation day. I only came to show off my new radio-controlled 560 SL. I would not have shown up if she had told me the truth. I love toast!"


When our pro-toast march finally started, our protest totally dwarfed that of the hippy toast haters, by almost 20 to 1. A friend of mine snapped a photo as we arrived on The Mall. I blew up parts of the photo so you could see my poster (right side), as well as my brother's (left). It's pretty grainy, but you can kinda make us out.


I have to be honest and admit that I had no idea so many people read this blog! Once again, thanks for coming out and protecting our right to eat toast. Whenever. Wherever. God bless America. With toast.

AMA - "Toast Saves Lives"

The American Medical Association unveiled the finding on the long awaited study, "The Benefits of Toast". It turns out toast is even more important than previously believed. Toast contains a special chemical related to bone and cartilage growth. Dr. J. Hastenburghersteinafrompsonjon goes into more detail.

"The chemical is a newly discovered protein called toastycine, which we have dubbed vitamin T, and is only found in toast. Some say that trace amounts occur in toasted bagels as well, but the jury is still out on that one. Anyway, in double-blind clinical tests, it became clear early on that vitamin T is essential for normal cartilage growth.

"Here we have a test subject before the trials. After only a week without toast, there is not much change, apart from the expected anger from being denied the wonderful taste of toast. But after a month, the changes are clearly visible.
"The cartilage is distorted almost beyond recognition, and the bones are starting to decay as well. If allowed to continue, the result is truly horrifying. Hair loss, tooth decay, horrible skin aberrations, and mental disorders resulting in blind rage or even hallucinations about a magical ring or something. They really get whacky."
At this point Dr. Hastenburghersteinafrompsonjon got up to make some toast for us to snack on. I thought it was a great idea. As I sat there dining on a sublime slice with butter, I knew I was making the right decision. Not eating toast might get you a job as an extra on a movie, but you will certainly be going to bed at night alone.


(liquify, can't find a tutorial. Just hold down ctrl-shift-X and play around with it. It's very cool.)

Too Much Jelly!

While not illegal except in Canada, putting this much jelly on your toast is certainly frowned upon in most circles. It clearly puts a smile on this man's face though!




(desaturate background, faded skin. 0riginal)

Mysterious Totem's Meaning Lost

Often called the "Stonehenge of the West", these gigantic metallic structures can be found in Carmel, Texas. They were created by the Ashuke indian tribe (rough translation: "The Grillers of grain products") almost 3,000 years ago. They prospered in the region for hundreds of years.

Unfortunately, the race died out in 200 BC in a massive fire caused by some sort of cooking machine run haywire. It is very likely that we will never understand the meaning of these strange symbols, or what the great Ashuke nation was trying to tell us. People still come by the millions to visit and stand in awe of the massive structures. How they stay so shiny after thousands of years is a question asked by pretty much every American. They are an engineering feet that would still be difficult to reproduce today.

Strangely enough, Carmel is also the largest per-capita consumer of toast. No one really knows why.

(Metallic text. Tutorial)

Matrix, Retoasted

A lot of people who saw The Matrix missed the many tributes to toast spread throughout the movie. Here's one of them where the computer screen shows a digital representation of toast being eaten by someone (or 3 people?) inside the matrix.

I recently got a chance to interview the directors of the film, Andy and Larry Wachowski. When I asked about all the toast tributes in the trilogy, Andy replied, "It's obvious, really. Toast is such a big part of our lives, both on and off the set. Larry has a Quizno's toasted sub almost every day for lunch. Sure, he puts meat and lettuce and stuff on it, but we all know the truth. The toast is the meal, the rest is just condiments".

They said some other stuff about movies, actors, and special effects, but I did not bring a notepad, so I can't remember the specifics. It didn't matter though. I remembered the important part.
(Matrix tutorial. The tutorial does it better. I got bored with the Matrix look halfway through and did not finish with the tutorial.)

Some People are Completely Selfish

This is a picture of Marie Antoinette. She was a queen of France in the late 1700's. She was beheaded by the French! Why? The picture tells it all. It was reported that there was a famine in Algiers, then under French control. Marie immediately set into motion a plan to send two boatloads of freshly made toast to the starving people. Unfortunately, the French are notoriously stingy when it comes to their toast, and did not want to share it with the famine-stricken Algerians. They ransacked Queen Marie-Antoinette's castle, and chopped off her head, rather than part with the delicious toast.

Even more unfortunately, they decided that no one else in Europe should have toast. They proceeded to attack neighboring countries and deny them any access to toast. With the battlecry "Vive la France, et notre pain grillé" (long live France, and our toast), they detroyed many european countries. They were finally defeated by the English in Waterloo (so named because that is where they first to think of putting a sink in the loo (bathroom) with running water). Thus ended the great "Toast Wars" of the early 1800's, bringing to an end the horrible toast-hoarding of the French. Toast was again available to the common man.

I for one am grateful to the English and thank their toast-loving masses often.

Update: I'm getting a lot of emails about the accuracy of my historical information. I'm not completely positive about the details about this war. But I'm relatively sure I depicted it accurately.

Toast, It's what's for Dinner

Here is a good dinner idea that my sister taught me. Place a piece of buttered bread face down in a skillet. Then add the following layers:

1 pretty thick slice of buffalo mozzerella
4 fresh basil leaves
Enough tomato slices to make a layer
salt, pepper, and a tiny bit of vinegrette
1 slice of buttered bread, face up.

Grill on both sides until golden brown. It tastes wonderful, and the grilled bread counts as toast!

I know what you are thinking. "How can it be good, blogagog, when there is no meat in it?" The short answer is, "I don't understand it either." The long answer is "I don't understand it either, and why did you call me blogagog? That's not my name."

My camera batteries are dead, so here is a drawing of what the final result should look like. Enjoy!

Toast in History

I found an old photo taken in 1896. The location appears to be in present-day Yosemite National Park. Even back then, toast was considered a tasty treat.

This child likes her toast au naturel. I like it better with something on it. That is the beauty of toast. No one can tell you how to eat it. Just do your thing.

Here's a good combination:

2 slices of toast
2 slices of smoked turkey
lettuce
italian dressing
1 slice of provolone

I prefer it with the toast on the outside, but to each his own.

Recognition in Space

This constellation near the Crab Nebula is called 'The Bow of Diomedes'. It recognizes that Diomedes was a key player in the sacking of Troy, as told in the Iliad. But as you can clearly see from my superimposition, the constellation accurately delineates a piece of toast.

There are many references to toast being eaten near the walls of Troy in the Iliad. Google doesn't seem to bring them up, but I'm pretty sure they are in there... towards the back. Anyway, I'm starting an off-line petition to get the name of this constellation changed to 'Diomedes toast'.

I've only gotten one signature so far, but I expect that number to double by the end of the month.

Celebrity Toast Eaters

Avril Lavigne is a singer from Canada along the lines of Brittney Spears or NSYNC. But don't hold that against her. She is a big fan of toast. "I once ate two pieces of toast... In one day!", she said. Here's a shot of her eying a piece right now. I bet she can't wait until the shoot is over to get at that toast!

(If anyone knows how I can make the toast shiny like a reflection, lemme know.)