Cakes are cool. Period.

Last night, I was on the phone with Sash the Mosh, and we were talking about some of the brilliant ideas that we have collectively had and the statements of fact that we make. Thus, it was only fitting that today's subject be what it is. After all, cakes are cool. That is a fact.

Speaking of cakes, after my Halloween cake is completed and (hopefully) devoured, I am going to start the planning phase for the ten cakes that will make up CAKE-FEST. I am open to suggestions both in terms of flavors and designs. Please feel free to comment with any ideas that you may have. I appreciate it!

On a totally random note, I have been meaning to mention this for a while now; in fact, at one point, I was even going to devote an entire posting to the topic. The Hop-Stepper and I got into a conversation about music, which evolved into some talk about specific artists and left us thinking: Where in the world is D'Angelo? I did a little research and found out that he was in and out of jail (among other things). Check out this link if you're interested -- http://www.spin.com/articles/dangelo-what-hell-happened.

Staying with this random approach, I have not given you my movie ratings of late. This is due to a couple of factors -- one of which is that I cannot seem to get a good rotation going. This weekend, for example, I attempted to watch Flight of the Red Balloon (a foreign film that put me to sleep on more than one occasion) and Standard Operating Procedure (a documentary that lacked the ability to keep my interest at all). It was disappointing.

Nonetheless, here is a (long) list of the other movies that I watched in the past month:

• Sex and Death 101 -- I gave it a 3; it probably deserved slightly less, but you know the deal.
• Birds of America -- The title should have given me a clue; I HATE BIRDS. I should have known not to rent it. The movie actually had very little do with birds, but, still, it was no good. I only gave it a 2, and that is because I managed to sit through the whole thing.
• Tortured -- Despite the fact that it was quite disturbing, I liked it enough to feel comfortable with my 3-star rating.
• Death at a Funeral -- How is that a preview can look so good, but the movie itself can fall so short? This was 2 star-worthy at best.
• The Visitor -- Can I just say how much I miss Six Feet Under? This movie starred the actor who played Nate Fisher, Sr. I gave it a 3, but I may have been slightly biased.
• Run, Fat Boy, Run -- I really liked this. 4 stars -- wooooooo-hoooooo!
• My Sassy Girl -- Surprisingly, this weird romantic comedy was pretty good -- 3 stars.
• Leatherheads -- While I normally think that you can't go all that wrong with George Clooney, you can. This was bad. I barely was able to sit through the whole thing; I wanted to give it a 1.5, but was forced to give it a 2.
• It's a Boy Girl Thing -- This was dumb. How many times can you watch mind-switching tales? You know what I mean... movies where the characters' minds move to the others' body...
• Arranged -- I gave it a 3. I watched this a while ago, and, honestly, I don't have anything to say about it one way or the other.
• The Neighbor -- It was slightly amusing, which is why I gave it a 3. I might have been feeling generous, though.
• I Could Never Be Your Woman -- This was a movie about a couple with an age difference like that of Ashton and Demi (since we're on a first-name basis, apparently). Haha. It was alright. I laughed a couple of times, which translated to a 3-star rating.
• Ballet Shoes -- Duane recommended it, so I gave it a chance. It was not bad, but not as good as I thought that it was going to be. Still, I gave it a 3.
• Felon -- This was surprisingly good -- a 4!!!
• Finding Amanda -- AWFUL! I hated it. Matthew Broderick, come on. Is this what his career is coming to?

I know... I watch too many movies. Mind you, this list includes only Netflix.

If only you knew how much TV (shows and more movies) I watch...

Food is good.

I was very excited about my last entry and the proclamation of my new mantra -- cue the title of today's entry. Despite my excitement, I had to hold off on updating the blog because I was waiting for one person (that I don't even know -- a friend of a friend) to read it. UNREAL. There will be no more of that.

In light of the mantra, I have been thinking about blogging about my love of online menu-reading. As much as I love this guilty pleasure, it's horrible. I usually read the menus when I'm hungry, which makes it worse and much more self-torturous. What is even crazier is the fact that I am not alone in this! Both Jeni Breadsticks and Sash the Mosh both do this! What is wrong with us?

As if that wasn't a good enough example of how food-obsessed my friends and I are, here is a better one: A road trip in the name of food! We are driving to Fort Myers just to go eat at Red Robin. The commercials for Red Robin are always on TV, but the closest and only location in the entire state is in Fort Myers. You do what you have to do for the love of the food -- what else can I say?

Back in the good ol' days when I had a (very crappy) job and was living in NY, we used to have cake parties every weekend. I'm taking that to a whole new level. After my dinner with Merin the other night, CAKE-FEST is in the planning phase. In preparation for the first Cakes by Phone photo shoot, I will have to design and make 10 cakes, which will have to be eaten! How awesome is that?

Speaking of cakes, I finally made up my mind about the Halloween cake. I hope that it looks as good when completed as it does in my mind.

All of this talk about food has gotten me really hungry. I need to eat. I shall blog tomorrow.

Does absence make the heart grow fonder?

Hopefully, it does, and, hopefully, it makes the readers of this silly little blog yearn for more. This is the longest that I have gone without posting since I started this. Rest assured, things have been hectic, which is why I have been incommunicado. The upside of this that there are many stories that need to be told, so prepare yourself for a long game of catch-up...

The first noteworthy interruption in my usual routine was the trip to New York. I can really sum up the whole trip in one word: FOOD. After all, food is good -- just ask Joe. Those three little words, uttered by a stranger, were the constant theme of the trip and became our mantra. ("Our" refers to myself and Jeni Breadsticks.)

Below are the day-by-day highlights (and extreme lows) of the trip.

Day 1:

We settled for not-so-good pizza due to starvation; Jeni actually liked it... correction, loved it. All she talked about was the meatball pizza...

Dinner at Duke's, which was awesome as usual! If you never ate there, GO! It was great food, great company, and we probably should have ended the night there... but we didn't. We went to Fat Black Pussycat, and, mind you, I was stoked to go. Before I moved, this was my favorite place. I should have left the place alone and preserved its memory. Unfortunately, we went, and it was nothing like what I experienced previously. A live band, a bad crowd, need I go on? There were only 3 redeeming factors: (1) Nick and quadruple B; (2) the hybrid; and (3) the fact that the place is around the corner from Joe's Pizza (my all-time favorite). Too bad, I wasn't able to partake in the heavenly delight known as Joe's because my stomach was killing me. A bad club will do that to you. Haha, not really, but it sounded good. (If anyone is interested in further explanation of these other factors, let me know, and I'll come back to them.)

The cab ride home was great. Anyone who knows me knows that I talk to strangers, especially in the situations where you don't expect to have conversations (i.e., taxis, elevators, trains, etc.). Our cabbie was from Ghana. We laughed and had a better time in the cab than at the club. It's all good... live and learn.

Day 2:

We had lunch at Jackson Hole, the place that made me love hamburgers. We went to a location that I had not been to, and I am thinking that was a mistake. I was disappointed. I don't even want to think about it. I could cry.

Then, we went shopping. I HATE SHOPPING.

The highlight of Saturday was dinner at Lobo! I dream about the salsa and the burritos! I wish I was having both right now. The meal lived up to my expectations!

After dinner, we went to Camp, where we encountered the weirdest freak of a woman, who placed a telescopic eyepiece up to the bar's front window to watch the game that was being played on a TV at the back of the bar. Mind you, this freak of a woman was doing this between my cousin and I as we were having a conversation on the other side of the window. Needless to say, it was weird and uncomfortable. Then, Nick, the freak that he is, started taking pictures of her. She FREAKED out. Eventually, she came inside, touched Jeni (the camera-owner), and told her and Nick to GET RID OF IT (in a very demonic voice). IT WAS CRAZY! At that point, I stepped in and said my piece. When I walked away, she called me a B. What the crap. She left and came back, and R.G. discovered that she was worried that her picture would end up on YouTube or something. What a weirdo. If I had the picture, I'd post it right now. (Jeni, this is your cue to to post the picture as a comment.)

If that was not enough excitement for one night, we saw a fire being put out by the NYFD.

After that, we hung out at Hamptons' place and ate some cake.

Day 3:

This day had a lot of promise; it was supposed to be the day of the Harlem Walk -- an 11-mile walk that Hamptons and I had been planning for YEARS. It didn't pan out. Disappointment seems to be common on this trip.

Lunch was overpriced and not that good, so we were hoping for dinner to be much better. We went to Pete's Downtown. The food was good, but overpriced for what it was, and the waitress sucked. Oh well. Fortunately, dessert was at Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory! MMMMMMMMMMMMMMMMM. Talk about heaven in a cone...

That was not the end of the food for the night... we stopped by Joe's to get a pie since I didn't get to have it after the fiasco known as Fat Black's.

Day 4:

Nick agreed to take us to the airport, and we went on a mock driving tour through Brooklyn, so Jeni could take some pictures. Really, all we did was eat. Jeni had a slice of the meatball pizza that she loved before we even headed to BK. We had a late breakfast at Le Petit Cafe. From there, we started the tour, and I got a bagel -- I even got the dude to hook it up and find me the one that was the most well-done. Then, Jeni got biscuits from Popeye's when we were at Coney Island. I had my favorite lemonade from Roll-n-Roaster, and I had corn fritters while Jeni had mashed potatoes. We really didn't stop eating...

Then, we flew home.

On to the next interruption...

After the food adventures of NY were over, I had to get some sleep before driving to Orlando by myself. Can I just say that driving anywhere that takes longer than 2 hours to get to by yourself is just boring? I hung out with a different set of cousins for a few days and even got to spend a day living life as Bean while I pretended to be her to get into Disney World. Hahahaha. Sorry, Mickey.

During our day at Disney, we didn't do much. Despite the fact that we went to MGM (now, Hollywood Studios) and EPCOT, we really didn't do anything. The best part of the day was sitting with Natalie on the boat ride in Norway when, according to her, "the polar bear almost gave us a heart attack." Mind you, she's not even 3. She definitely makes the list of my favorite kids (seeing as I hate kids in general).

After Disney, I drove home. While in Orlando, I had a crazy allergy attack, which caused me to stay in bed for the days that followed. Today is the first day that I don't feel like my head weighs 58 tons and can actually sit up to type this long-winded entry.

On that note, stay tuned....

P.S. Jeni tried to post a picture comment, but to no avail. Alas, here she is, the freak who should learn not to spy with telescopic eyepieces and to keep her hands to herself: