Better Late than Never

I'm late to the party on Slow Horses, but better late than never.  If you subscribe to AppleTV and haven't watched, it'd be a lot cooler if you did.

Based on the Slough House series of novels by Mick "don't call me Gil Scott" Herron, the show follows the adventures of a small group of MI5 agents from London's Slough House station.  Unlike a typical spy series where agents are practically superheroes, Slough House is a land of misfit toys nicknamed the "Slow Horses," hence the show's title.  All these agents have at least one fatal flaw that prevents them from being real MI5 field agents, so when they do try to solve case or catch a criminal they fuck it up and sometimes hilarity ensues.  It's a proper spy show though, so sometimes there's tragedy instead of hilarity.  People die.

The Slow Horses are captained by Jackson Lamb, a legitimately bad-assed field agent, at least when the spirit moves him to crawl out of the bottle and off the sofa.  Gary Oldman is amazing as Lamb, playing him as a cross between Roy Kent, Perry Cox, and Roger Sterling.  

Only gassier.

Other great quips include "You're about as useful as a paper condom" and, to a recovering alcoholic, "You wouldn't have lost him if he was a bottle of gin."  Each season is only six episodes, each of which is about 45 minutes long, so it isn't as much of a commitment as trying to watch Lost.  Give it a go!

zTravelogue: Another must-try restaurant in Osaka, alternatively titled "Mm.. Food"

I went back to Osaka a few weeks ago and did two things for the first time that were post-worthy (no TR, not those kinds of things). I will regale with each in separate posts. Suspense!

I'm good friends with two guys in Osaka. The last time I went they took me to the Swimming Squid (which is still my favorite restaurant in Osaka). This time they took me to Umapero, a horse meat spot. The menu is all horse all day. For real.

It turns out horse is really good! And Umpero is really cool! As I should've expected from the Google translation of their website and the horse pinatas mounted over the door.

Fun drinking party girls' association! Reasonable horse meat! Homemade sangria and grilled wine glass! What could go wrong?

Our first course was horse sashimi. The white stuff on the right comes from the horse's neck, right under the skin below the mane. The stuff above the neck meat is skirt steak (which is the diaphragm). I think the thick pink meaty stuff on the top left was tenderloin. The stuff below that was cured tongue. The stuff below the tongue was sirloin, I think.

The neck meat wasn't particularly flavorful, but the other selections had clear, clean flavors. The tongue, skirt, and tenderloin were all lean and different from beef but not gamy or cloying like venison can be. The sirloin was fattier but not not nearly as fatty as Japanese beef.

After that was horse sushi. It was good but after that sashimi platter it was just more of the same and the rice actually detracted from the flavor of the meat.

I ate cooked food too, like this horse steak frites (which was completely indistinguishable from American beef).

We had a bunch of other cooked and raw courses, but the most interesting (at least to me) from a cultural perspective was the pastrami and pepperoni platter.

The ambiance is great too. The waitresses are friendly, cute, and speak serviceable English. Their uniforms include a golf shirt with one of those giant Polo logos, except instead of a mallet the polo guy has a giant fork. I was the oldest person there. Everyone was knocking back malt liquor and/or sake and you can smoke if you want. There were several tables of ladies that definitely made the place seem like "Fun drinking party girls' association." The tables are close to foster conversation between parties, and if things go well you don't have to go far--during a conversation about Japanese politics and societal norms, my friend Soichi pointed out the window to a building and said "That is a place for sex. If you meet a girl and want to have sex you don't have to take her home, you just go to an hourly place like that. They are all over the city." Umapero even has an adjacent hourly sex hotel! But be sure to bring some Alka-Seltzer and be prepared for strange smelling farts.

Umapero gets a 5 out of 5 spur rating. You should absolutely check it out if you're in Osaka. And if you need a reason to visit Osaka you should read my next post ...

This Test Goes to Eleven

A short episode of The Test this week, on current events. Cunningham does fairly well, but current events are definitely not my forte-- probably because I don't watch TV or read the newspaper . . . I tend to get my breaking news from the comment thread on Gheorghe.  My performance is not particularly impressive. Perhaps you will fare better.