Oh! I'm counting on you, Mr. Staples

First of all, the mushroom mystery: I was only joking about there being a mycologist out there, but apparently my blog audience puts me only one degree away from a real live doctoral student in fungi at Berkeley! Pat Michels (who has done some really beautiful documentary and photo documentary work on competitive eating) sent me a note saying he passed along the photo to his fungi-studying friend and that "the people in his lab agreed it's prob a dried-out one of these, a dictyophora (the eggshell thing where it comes out of the ground is apparently a telltale sign). Don't eat it!" Go ahead, click on that link. That creepy mushroom? Is even creepier! I'm glad J didn't see it with that crazy white mesh on it or he might really have lost it. Thanks, Pat!

New York was great. There were roof parties, margaritas with Real Girl, time by the pool, and lots of eating and drinking. It's only a real vacation if you are always a little hungover and either eating something or planning what to eat next. Of course there was the Nathan's competition, which was completely amazing. Highlights include: receiving a pair of knee-high Crazy Legs socks from the bun fairy, Badlands Booker dedicating his performance of "She's My Bunnette" to me and Dani, recognizing Joey's bunnette as Sara from the second season of ANTM, and getting to watch a re-broadcast of the competition with the eaters when it came on around midnight at the bar. That last one was really the best. All the eaters got really excited and everyone cheered when someone present came on screen. Of course, you couldn't hear much and there had been several tequila shots passed around by that time, so I don't know how many details of the broadcast were absorbed, but the excitement was palpable. And as far as my future as a bunnette goes, it is still up in the air. I was told in some veiled conversations that I shouldn't hang up my dreams just yet, though I'm not entirely sure what that means. Obviously, now that I'd be joining the ranks of past ANTM contestants, I want it more than ever. Man, between this and and the pretzel competition she hosted on her show, if Trya and I ever cross paths we'll have SO MUCH TO TALK ABOUT!

Do you realize there are two karaoke game shows on television right now? There are. I was reading while J was watching one and it took me almost half the show to realize he wasn't watching the same one I had seen. Really, television? This is what we've come to? Though last night's contestant's "back up singer" was named Mr. Staples and that was about the best thing J and I had ever heard. The back up singers are friends or family that can come to help out a contestant in need, and this contestant needed Mr. Staples. At one point, he filled in the words and they were debating how sure he was about them, which led to maybe the best exchange on television ever:

Wayne Brady: How sure are you, Mr. Staples?
Mr. Staples: About 90% sure.
Contestant: Oh! I'm counting on you, Mr. Staples.
Wayne Brady: That's a lot of pressure for Mr. Staples.

I really wish I knew someone named Mr. Staples.

There have also been a lot of repeats of "Man vs. Wild" on, which I love. My friend says he started watching it because his boyfriend loved it and told him to keep watching because "sometimes Bear gets naked!" Which is about every other episode. Sometimes he gets naked and does push-ups on pointy rocks, which is pretty awesome, too. There are certain words Bear likes to say a lot, like "crevice" (cre-VAHS) and "civilization" (civil-eye-SAY-shun). The one we were watching a couple nights ago had him in a desert and the only way he was going to survive was by drinking his own urine (this was after fashioning a head wrap out of his boxer shorts). He not only peed in his canteen and drank it, he did it like 20 times during the show and commented on it every single time. I get the survival thing, but I could not watch this man drink his urine and talk about it. Yes, okay, drink your urine, but I only need to be told once that it is urine in your canteen and you are drinking it. The next time I see you with that canteen, I will remember. I promise. Though I guess to be fair, if I had to drink urine to survive and there was a camera crew around, you can bet that would be the prime subject of my confessionals.

Willow is in town this week! Expect stories of mayhem and debauchery to come. Or movie watching and brunch, one of the two.