At some point during the day, when you’ve simply had too many cherries (yes, this really is the best coast), and way too much coffee, it’s time to take a trip into the meta-meta tunnel, which means screen sharing with yourself.
so rad!
And it gets cooler. You can take a screen shot of your shared screens taking a screenshot with your shared screen!
Since Canine Sherman graced this post with a new photo:
I thought I’d talk about the color purple, and how it looks so good here with a merle coat, but how i’ve always hated the color. Purple, the non-color, the yicko, the bleh. And no, this isn’t a post about me growing older and having a soft spot for that hue, as in that silly “When I am an old woman I shall wear purple” poem, the line of poetry which sums up my life is and will always be:
“I grow old… I grow old…
I shall wear the bottoms of my trousers rolled.”
And so, since purple is not very interesting to talk about, other than it definitely makes you look fat (not red, not blue, just large) and that it’s proof I inherited two recessive genes, as I can’t metabolize the bright betacyanin pigment from eating beets so my pee comes out the color of the ribbons awarded for agility titles…
…let’s talk about the other “P” word: pickles!
About a week ago a friend of mine told me about her recent stay in the hospital where a lot of the workers were immigrants with just the worst stories about getting ditched by their husbands, defrauded by their own people, reamed by their own kids. My friend learned from one Russian woman that if you hollow out a radish and fill it with honey and leave it overnight on a radiator, it was a cure for something, she (my friend) just couldn’t remember what. Turns out some people say tuberculosis, and the Internet says “whatever ails you.”
Having wondered all this time how the hell you hollow out a little radish I found huge black radishes at the farmer’s market this morning! A big throng of women were jostling for them, and in my imagination I heard them discussing all-things-radi in Russian and Armenian, but when I got closer it was just the tone of their westside-liberal voices ordering the guy to take the tops off that sounded foreign.
But I believe pickles have the same curative power, and yes, even the PURPLE ones that I can eat by the boatload from Zankou Chicken, so that will be my next project. In the meantime in less than 24 hours we’ll have tarragon/green garlic and chili-peppercorn pickles.
And this, my dear fellow rockstars, is PINK.
Don’t ask me why it took so long for us to invite the roaster into the household, what with all our other forays into quality beverages, but we finally did it.
We opted for the microwave-sized Behmor 1600 recommended by none other than my fanatic dentist, and started up the machine as soon as we checked to make sure our fire extinguisher was still charged. And the first thing we did was under roast some beans. Whoops.
Though I take full responsibility for being a little too trigger happy on the “Cool” button I have to say my confusion for when to stop the heat was partly due to mediocre descriptions for when “second crack” (the critical point in a roasted bean’s life) is reached. Most people describe “first crack” as loud pops similar to popcorn (basically the bean heating up and emitting CO2, hello—it’s farting) and “second crack” is softer, more like rice crispies (apparently the cellular matrix of the bean itself is getting fractured). Whatever. I just know the cracks started happening and I couldn’t tell whether they were popcorn-y or rice crispy-y, and all I could see was the giant warning in the manual of “Do not go 10 seconds beyond second crack or you will have FIRE!” and little pieces of chaff were flying about and landing on the heating coils and bursting into flames, and one timer was ticking down to zero and another timer was ticking up to infinity and things were just a little chaotic.
And so. There’s nothing like the sour-bellied recoil from an under-roasted coffee and the fact that you have no other beans in the house to help get over that learning curve. All it took was a little practice.
I have to say though, that “second crack” sounds an awful more like sizzling meat than any kind of rice crispies, and, since sizzling meat is the most familiar sound to me second only to the coffee grinder, that would have been a much easier sound for me to spot. In addition, what’s happening to the beans between first and second crack is that the sugars are undergoing the coveted Maillard reaction, which has something to do with deprotonated amino groups, but without which we’d have no browning of meats, toasted brioche or fried onions!
Due to some perverted Hollywood magic and/or karmic what-not, the wonderful folks at CBS asked our little tea company (blush blush) if they could use some of our pots and teaware for an episode of “Unforgettable,” a TV show involving murder, mystery and memory (very appropriate for Aged Pu’er). The tea will be the clue which sparks the protagonist’s memory, leading her to solve the crime. The episode is called Heartbreak, and we think it has something to do with a man being tossed from an airplane. Holy camellia sinensis!
Now we know our air date (this Tuesday. February 21—please check local listings for showtimes) so don’t miss it! But if you do, you can always watch the episode online, and pause the video at the appropriate times to see the clues.
During the process we got to talk to their prop master (and isn’t it a sign of quality that the prop master has an insane Brooklyn accent), insert a little authenticity into exactly how the hell the tea was going to be brewed, and, seeing as how the crime hinged on the tea being a rare Chinese Pu’er, we created a selection of special labels for them. This being a real TV show, however, the Brooklyn-accent told us we weren’t going to get very far with our real logo on the labels. Aw, we said, but you gotta have something on the labels… this being… ahem… rare Chinese Pu’er etc. etc. etc.
So the big hats at CBS had a discussion,
and after they realized how small we were, that we were actually as close to being a fake company as you can get, they agreed to let us use our labels. Yippee!
So here we have the total numbers of viewers of the show:
Separate out the chunk of viewers who are into high end Chinese tea:
Then extract the people that are into aged Pu’er,
Allow for the offshoot of people that have read 1000 Plateaus,
and you’re left with this, our dearly beloved fan base. <3 <3 <3.
The east and west halves of New Mexico have always been divided by the Rio Grande rift, and now scientists say the fault line is expanding, making the drive across the state that much… slower.
To stretch out our trip to Santa Fe to visit mom even more, we took a drive through the lowlands of southern New Mexico, where the landscape and the affinity for southwestern-style clothing is quite different from Santa Fe, otherwise known as the Center-for-Real-Indian-Stuff.
Down there, “New Mexican” is a geographical location, not a style. The food, often labelled as “Mexican” or “local,” is truly New Mexican (flat enchiladas, non-fried fish tacos, sopapillas, etc.), but it’s not edged in silver tassels and driblets of turquoise.
Also interesting is that in the south, cactus stands in as the token vegetable, and only as you start climbing north does guacamole start making an appearance. Carne adovada *anything*, however, makes its disappearance wherever you are in the state.
At White Sands National Monument we had a rare sighting of the famous Desert Clown,
did some missile testing,
and stopped to visit some Hatch chile farmers. The roasting season is over and what’s left are the dried husks that get sent away to have their color extracted. Apparently the coloring will be used for things like Gatorade, and then the fully denuded remnants used in some other food form. (Plurine anyone?)
Rift or no rift, the idea of scale in New Mexico is always fluctuating and weird. Near and far become two drastically different states of mind.
It’s Lunar New Year, and there’s no better way for the Chinese to celebrate than deep-frying some ground pork. Better yet, since it’s the year of the Dragon, let’s take what is traditionally known as Scotch Eggs and call them Dragon Eggs, or, in honor of Kim Jong-un, who was diagnosed by Jerrold M. Post “as having malignant narcissism, a personality disorder characterized by ‘extreme grandiosity and self-absorption,'” we can call them Nargisi kofta, which means “Narcissus meatballs.” And since Post goes as far as to characterize Kim’s narcissism as malignant, maybe these eggs—covered in sausage meat and rolled oatmeal—are the form of narcissism that is somehow benign?
True to form, you’ll always find your face reflected in their golden yellow souls.
as a child my family never really celebrated Xmas, though we did send cards (ideally without any mention of God or Jesus) and my Mom sewed some velvet stockings with our names on them for our white brick fireplace, and they occasionally grew fat with things like staple removers, pocket calculators, and… Hanukkah chocolate money (i didn’t realize how funny this was until a few years ago—child-appropriate and shiny representations of money—a great hit with the Chinese). i do have memories of a fake tree with a red metal stand and nice glass globe decorations but presents were optional, especially since my dad (starting on the day after Thanksgiving) stormed about the house ranting on how if everyone agreed to buy presents after December 25th then everyone would save a shitload of money.
over the years my Dad has had a lot of ideas of “getting a pact together,” and though they all have good intentions, they somehow don’t resonate well in a world where not everyone (thank God) thinks like him: in Los Alamos where i grew up in there was only one supermarket, and one day he found green plums for sale, his favorite, a total rarity in that town. he bought several bags worth and then came home and called all his friends to go get them, in order to send a message to the manager that there was great demand for these plums. instead what happened was that after a few days the store ran out of green plums. more often than not his call to arms are political, usually to “clobber” the Republicans, teach the Communist pigs a lesson, or elevate the political power of Chinese Americans (the majority of which—to his dismay—tend to be in the Republican camp).
this year my Xmas weekend started with a bang and ended with a whimper. Mid-morning Xmas Eve i got a call from a client and after a few comments about the holiday and the weather, he asked if “we” had an offsite backup of his computer files. i asked if this was a “if someone were to firebomb the office” type of question and he responded, “actually, more like if the Feds come and raid the office.” he was serious, by the way.
the whimper came Xmas day just as the sun was setting and we were lounging on the deck. Something scrambled up a tree which startled both dogs and even Bing-Bing the cat, otherwise known as Bing-Bing the Brave, who had ventured on the deck to view the farolito lighting,
stepping outside for only the second time since her accidental procedure several years ago which turned her into a Manx, despite knowing that one dog is convinced she morphs from “tolerable roommate” to “prey” the second she crosses the threshold. anyway, if you were a small thing, say a baby possum, and you were in a tree, and down below were two dogs with four front paws on the trunk and it was dang close to dinnertime you wouldn’t go DOWN the tree, would you? would you?
a little about our client. i don’t know what happened and apparently it’s an innocent mistake, (not like the two-year sting operation on rawesome, who did have their computers confiscated) and i certainly hope so. these people are the coolest people on the planet. they have their holiday dinners at places with this kind of art on the wall (faces blackened to protect the innocent, but gawd that world map! that flag! those paintings! and the photos aren’t showing the bowl full of non-dairy creamer, the Sutter Home red or white option, or the other carafe filled with what tasted like bong water)
but i wouldn’t miss their holiday party for ANYTHING in the world. and i am dead serious. if you know me, that means a hell of a lot. plus, how can the Feds bust a company where the Office Manager has to remove this from under her desk, in order to stash things, like…
dead body parts?
in-between dealing with the off-site backup system, i went on a good hike, ate a bucket of latkes with lox and homemade applesauce, became addicted to a fudge called Fungus Amongus, converted a Scotch naysayer into an Islay lover, painted bookshelves, talked to both parents, one of which couldn’t believe you could just email some blogger to ask him what Chinese writing software he used (“i DON’T know him personally!”) and the other said “Guess where i am calling from?” before revealing that she was sitting at L’Atelier at the MGM about to eat a soufflé with a scoop of pistachio ice cream dropped in the middle (“It’s falling into the center of the Earth”), pulled weeds (while on the phone), brined a pheasant, took a recipe for butterscotch budino seriously when it said to finish everything within three days, figured out our New Year’s card (late this year – holler, or rather, send us your address, if you want one), and best of all, got to see the Star of Beeflehem.
when you have a Scottish dog, it’s easy to—say—get into drinking Scotch, speaking “Come by” as if you’ve swallowed a golf ball, and over-romanticizing fog. but to really get it right, you’d have to eat Steak n’ Kidney pie, and when your Scottish dog comes by way of Texas, you have to add that extra Texas oomph.
and what exactly is that Lone Star pizzazz?
well, along with the meat there’s BACON that’s browned to a crisp, a token carrot or two, and the while thing is stewed in broth and red wine. But you must have peas in order to get that authentic dump truck green.
then, before you seal it up with the top crust you pile on a LOAD of buttery mashed potatoes. YES INDEED.
then and only then do you get to simulate a Neil Jenney painting.
and here’s the really insulting part. i just couldn’t cram all those mashed potatoes into the pie. i just couldn’t do it. gratuitous leftover mash.
i’m sorry to lump the Swedes and the Norwegians into the same lump but they share the same chunk of land, have similar languages (if you know one, it’s a snap to learn the other), and are home to cows that produce horribly delicious butter and cream. turns out in Norway this year the unmentionable, the ungodly, the total apocalypse has happened: BUTTER SHORTAGE! apparently a fad diet is the culprit, turning normal citizens away from carbs and onto large wads of fat.
well that’s the way the cookie crumbles. i’ve always thought the Scandinavians to be a one-extreme-to-the-other lot, and i’d always figured it was because they have all-sun part of the year, and no-sun part of the year, but then i met a bunch of really intense-all-the-time Russians from St. Petersberg and that blew my theory out of the water.
many years ago i visited a friend who lived in Stockholm and we decided to have a dinner party (“can you cook Chinese food?”) while i was there. my friend was at work but he gave me directions to get to the wine shop, which, by the way, was government controlled (heavily taxed), and they kept a detailed list on who buys what and have quotas to cut people off. i asked him how many bottles to get and he replied “two each,” meaning two bottles for each of us, which meant four bottles total. in addition to my friend having a really funny Swedish accent he liked to exaggerate it, so what i heard instead of “two each” was “twelve.” so off i went to the store, worrying more about my name being on some list then how i was going to drag a case of wine home by myself.
i managed to get it all back to the apartment, and my friend was plenty surprised to see so many buddies waiting for him when he got home, but he was even more glad when he realized the name on file for all this booze was mine and not his. turns out these Swedes liked vodka before dinner, and dinner involved pork dumplings (skins made from scratch – come on, i’m in Stockholm) and cutting up a whole chicken and so on, so by the time dinner was actually served the crowd was rowdy and drunk as hell. i actually have no memory of whether or not we managed to open even one bottle of wine, but it’s been so many years since that trip i think my quota must be refreshed by now.
i always knew at some point i would end up owning my own WOPR.
our kitchen sink clogged up a few days ago and our plumber came out to send in the snake. no, he didn’t have the rotating camera head with the LED lights, but he did say we had need of some cast iron pipe replacement, and also suggested putting in a water filtration system. because 2011 seems to be the year of the giant house expenses we agreed to install these two fat boys in the back, adding an industrial touch to our recent plantings of a straight Meyer lemon tree (just because it’s a Meyer, don’t be afraid to get rid of it if it’s all wonky—lessons from the lemonless), English lavender, Canna lilies, and white sage.
supposedly the system gets rid of chlorine and other chemicals in the water, and it descales the hard deposits that clog shower heads, ruin copper pipes and make your hair fall out and give you skin rashes. plus the water tastes amazing! yes! softer, rounder, not minerally, and it makes a fabulous espresso. now for our tea tastings, we can heat our fat boy water in a Lin’s ceramic pot, brew in Yixing, and drink out of purion… dreamy!
after the install a field specialist came to test our water. he put some white reagent powder into a little vial and filled it with water. the water stayed clear. if the water had chlorine in it, it would have turned pink. we probably didn’t look convinced so he tested water from the hose, which is not filtered, but that stayed clear too. then we sneaked some water from our neighbors and damnit, still clear.
the guy was pretty frustrated, and couldn’t believe that our street would have no chlorine in the water, so he he opened a new batch of reagent, thinking his current powders had expired, and looky – it turned pink! (that’s the neighbor’s water)
being a good specialist he did a second test, which was sticking a vacuum sealed pipette into the water and then breaking the tip so that the water went up into the glass. i think there must be a gas in the pipette, which turns the water pink in the presence of chlorine.
it all felt a little Chinatown (the movie)-ish, because he was full of useful water information. he said Los Angeles used to get water from 200 miles away, and now we get it from 400 miles away, which means we go through 4 chlorinating plants, not to mention the extra miles of pesticides and poop seeping into the H20. he said that Dasani comes from the Detroit River, and though Fiji Water does come from Fiji it has to travel so far in plastic bottles that’s not a good thing either. he also gave us a run down of how filters actually work. water needs time inside the filter in order for the unwelcome particles to wander into the little avenues and get stuck. if the water pressure is too high, or if the filter is too short, like a fridge filter, or a Brita, the bad stuff doesn’t have time to uncling from the water molecule. also, over time the water creates channels in the carbon so that after awhile when you run water through it just goes through the channels it has made, rather than through the filter. big sigh.