Girl Detective

Rhett Miller, at Paste, on figuring out what one of his recent songs was about:

I realized, you know, “Oh, my God. I think it might be about DFW.” I started going through the lyrics, and there’s the one, “Same time tomorrow I know where you’ll be / same place as always / right here beside me,” and while I was thinking about it, I looked and over and on my bedside table was my copy of Infinite Jest, which is always right there

I fell in love with the Old 97’s when I saw the only-OK movie Clay Pigeons. Miller’s got some interesting insight into his writing that reminded me why I enjoy his music.

Does the photo of this cake mesmerize you, too? I saw this on the lovely food blog Smitten Kitchen yesterday, and was, indeed, smitten. Thank you Deb, for creating what looks to be a go-to recipe.

I showed it to 5yo Drake, who will be 6 in August. He said he would like it for his birthday cake. Which is good, because I was going to make it anyway.

My CSA is a half box of produce every week. Week four had a lot, and I wasn’t finished when the new box arrived, which left me feeling a little stressed. But with a batch of tabbouleh and some cucumber-yogurt soup, I dispatched the last of the previous week in order to face the new kids:

Cauliflower, scallions, snap peas, cabbage, garlic scapes, broccoli, cucumber, lettuce, green beans, yellow squash, and beets with greens.

First up was Braised Tofu and Peas in Curried Coconut Milk from Bittman’s How to Cook Everything Vegetarian that used cauliflower, scallions, snap peas, cabbage and garlic scapes. Not only did it use five things, but it was delicious and pretty to look at. And the fry bread we made to go with it was pretty tasty, too. (Added later: Fry bread DOES NOT KEEP. It turns hard and yucky. Eat immediately, then throw out any leftovers. Another lesson learned.)

For the salad mix and cucumber, I went with Food Matter’s Thai beef salad and Super Natural Cooking’s shredded green beans,an easy, different way to prepare that staple.

On Sunday, though, I hit a wall. I couldn’t face making a stir fry using the broccoli, beets and greens. So we went to Black Sheep Coal-Fired Pizza. It was awesome.

That break left me ready for the stir fry. I peeled and grated the beets, so my hands looked like Lady MacBeth’s. The pan was a lovely contrast of red, orange, green and yellow (the latter only because the broccoli was beginning to turn, though)

before the beets turned everything red. Alas, it is their nature. As I expected, the kids wouldn’t touch the veggies (alas, it is their nature), and my husband G. Grod and I ate it because it was good for us and tasted OK. Thankfully there’s not too much left over, unlike last week’s barley with asparagus and green onion sauce, which is the thing that won’t leave.

Tomorrow I’ll make Super Natural Cooking’s Otsu, a soba noodle dish with cucumber and tofu, then that book’s Sushi Bowl to finish out the week and (I hope) this week’s batch before the next arrives on Thursday. I still don’t know what to do with the yellow squash; I’ll probably throw it in the sushi bowl.

My self satisfaction about being a thrifty home-economist locavore is waning, and we’re not even yet at the height of summer. The break for pizza helped, but I’ve got to keep my veggie mojo going or I’m going to be buried in greens.

And because I forgot to post it, here’s a shot of last week’s Creamy Cauliflower Soup with Pesto, from SNC. I know, I need to work on my food photography.

We’d held off on Toy Story 2, saving it, literally, for a rainy day. I hadn’t seen it since it was released, so I was eager to see if it was as good as its reputation–many claim it’s one of the few films sequels better than its predecessor.

After Woody’s arm is ripped, he’s relegated to a high broken-toy shelf with a squeaker-malfunctioning penguin. When the penguin is put in the yard-sale box, Woody tries to rescue him, but is instead “captured” by Al of Al’s Toy Barn. Woody finds he has a past as a television star, and has to figure out where his loyalties lie–with new friends or his old ones.

I’m a big fan of the first Toy Story; it’s stood up to multiple viewings with the kids. So I was suspicious of the sequel’s ability to surpass it. I was pleasantly surprised. The the animation, the music, the voice talent, the layers of story and the many in-jokes (genuinely funny and not just cheap pop culture throwaway gags) made for a lovely afternoon with our little family cuddled on the couch.

I could, of course, have been unfairly influenced because 3yo Guppy let me snuggle with him for nearly the entire movie. But I think my favorite moment was when Al drives from his office to his apartment–catty-corner across the street. 5yo Drake looked indignant. “That’s not far; he should have walked!”

Apparently he DOES listen to me, even if pretends otherwise.

I am nervous, though, about the sequel. Third movies tend to break franchises, not make or better them. There are a few exceptions, though they likely prove the rule. I can think of The Bourne Ultimatum and Harry Potter 3. Others, anyone?

From Infinite Jest, which I’m reading as part of the Infinite Summer challenge, an example of the late David Foster Wallace’s weird, esoteric humor, ongoing sentences, vocabulary gymnastics and unique phrasing:

Wednesday is the U.S.A. weekday on which fresh Toblerone hits Boston, Massachusetts U.S.A.’s Newbury Street’s import-confectioners’ shelves, and the Saudi Minister of Home Entertainment’s inability to control his appetites for Wednesday Toblerone often requires the medical attache to remain in personal attendance all evening on the bulk-rented fourteenth floor of the Back Bay Hilton, juggling tongue-depressors and cotton swabs, nystatin and ibuprofen and stiptics and antibiotic thrush salves, rehabilitating the mucous membranes of the dyspeptic and distressed and often (but not always) penitent and appreciative Saudi Prince Q—. So on 1 April, Y.D.A.U., when the medical attache is (it is alleged) insufficiently deft with a Q-Tip on an ulcerated sinal necrosis and is subjected at just 1800h. to a fit of febrile thrushive pique from the florally imbalanced Minister of Home Entertainment, and is by high-volume fiat replaced at the royal beside by the Prince’s personal physician, who’s summoned by beeper from the Hilton’s sauna, and when the damp personal physician pats the medical attache on the shoulder and tells him to pay the pique no mind, that it’s just the yeast talking, but to just head on home and unwind and for once make a well-deserved early Wednesday evening of it, and but so when the attache does get home, at like 1840h., his spacious Boston apartments are empty… (34-5)

This sentence was preceded and followed by five lines apiece that I haven’t included, and followed by one other sentence in its large paragraph. I’m not sure which part I find most amusing: the Prince’s Wednesday Toblerone binges, the phrase “febrile thrushive pique”, or “it’s just the yeast talking.”

After reading, and being transported by, Michael Chabon’s Amazing Adventures of Kavalier and Clay, I added David Hajdu’s Ten-Cent Plague: The Great Comic-Book Scare and How It Changed America, to my reading list. Even though it was the last of my K & C related reading (and thus a likely candidate to be pushed off the TBR list), I not only read it, but enjoyed it immensely.

Churches and community groups raged and organized campaigns against comic books. Young people acted out mock trials of comics characters. Schools held public burnings of comics, and students threw thousands of the books into the bonfires; at more than one conflagration, children marched around the flames reciting incantations denouncing comics. Headlines in newspapers and magazines around the country warned readers: “Depravity for Children–Ten Cents a Copy!”…The offices of one of the most adventurous and scandalous publishers, EC Comics, were raided by the New York City police. More than a hundred acts of legislation were introduced on the state and municipal levels to ban or limit the sale of comic books…Soon, Congress took action with a set of sensational, televised hearings that nearly destroyed the comic-book business…

Page-one news as it occurred, the story of the comics controversy is a largely forgotten chapter in the history of the culture wars (7)

Hajdu’s coverage of comic-book fear and censorship to the 1940 and 1950’s is well-researched, filled with compelling personal accounts and anecdotes, and eminently readable. For readers who want to explore the history embedded in Chabon’s Pulitzer-Prize winning book, for pop-culture history buffs, for those interested in youth culture and censorship, or just anyone who likes a well-written account of a little-known phenomenon, I highly recommend this book.

I have hit all the page counts thus far reading Infinite Jest for Infinite Summer, and am paused at page 169. I’m flat out loving this book, even while knowing that tons of stuff is sailing over my head. I’m so boggled by all the little things that match up , e.g. Hal’s uncle’s modified tennis academy motto, “The Man Who Knows His Limitations Has None” (81) with the section on Schtitt’s take on tennis play a few pages later (83-4). I’m curious but not (yet) obsessively so about the seemingly (though I seriously doubt it) random divisions marked by an icon of what looks to be a crescent soon after a new moon.

What do I think it’s about, at 169 pages in? Getting out of one’s head and relating to people in person, among other things. And the irony, deliberate I’m sure, of that theme ensconced in a huge book that requires concentration and shutting out of distractions, is not lost on me.

This week’s vocabulary search was much helped by the Infinite Jest glossary, though I did have to use other sources as well. Note to self: looking up words later in a clump? Not helpful. And yet, jumping on the computer each time I don’t recognize a word? Unhelpful in a different way. Reading and ignoring the words I don’t know? Ooh. Crazy.

incunabular, annular, raster, synclinal, uremic, leptosomatic, quincunx, bradykinetic, varicoceles, tympana, aleatory, somatic, pedalferrous, fulvous, halation, ephebes, agnate, erumpent, vade mecum, rutilant

This week, our box of veggies from Foxtail Farm included the following: broccoli, cauliflower, basil, lettuce, garlic scapes, radishes with greens, green onions, cuke, sugar snap peas and a cabbage.

I grilled the broccoli, then sprinkled it with salt, lemon juice and flax meal, from the recipe in Super Natural Cooking. I also made espresso banana muffins from that book. While it didn’t use any CSA ingredients (no local bananas in MN) they were tasty, and photogenic.

I plan to make cauliflower soup with pesto and barley (subbed for farro, which I couldn’t find at my grocery co-op) with green onion sauce and asparagus from this book as well.

From Mark Bittman’s Food Matters, I made a cabbage salad, using several suggested additions and variations: sugar snaps, radishes, garlic scapes with sesame oil and lime juice as dressing. It keeps for days, and has been a great vehicle for leftover grilled chicken.

I’ll also make Bittman’s tabbouleh, since it’s a kind of catch all for leftover garlic scapes, green onions, radishes, greens and the cuke. I’ll also try his yogurt soup with cuke and radish.

And the sugar snaps will go in salad with the lettuce, or raw out of hand, or dipped in a batch of hummus I plan to make. The boys aren’t eating a lot of this, but my husband and I are eating really healthfully lately.

Nemeses: small trees
are volunteers no longer
victims, you are now

This morning and afternoon, I worked on this side bed. I cleared a blanket of weeds and about a dozen volunteer trees, digging out roots from 18″ and 24″ down, then pruned the peony. Archeology: I found three matchbox cars from previous homeowner(s?).

Here’s how we came to watch The Third Man again. First, my husband G. Grod re-read The Long Goodbye by Raymond Chandler. Then we watched the film adaptation of that book by Robert Altman. Then I insisted on watching The Third Man, because I suspected the endings were similar.

Narrator: Oh, I was going to tell you, wait, I was going to tell you about Holly Martins, an American. Came all the way here to visit a friend of his. The name was Lime, Harry Lime. Now Martins was broke and Lime had offered him, some sort, I don’t know, some sort of job. Anyway, there he was, poor chap. Happy as a lark and without a cent.

The pleasures of The Third Man are myriad. There’s Joseph Cotton as the ugly American, Trevor Howard as the constabulary, Alida Valli as the femme fatale, and Orson Welles as the dead friend of Cotton, Harry Lime. Add to those amazing black and white shadowed images, evocative zither music, the cuckoo clock speech, the sewer chase and a bitter coda that is indeed referenced not only in Long Goodbye but in many more films, including one of G. Grod’s favorites, Miller’s Crossing. (Aliens? We just watched that, and I can’t think of the reference. Anyone? Anyone? Bueller?)

We own the 50th anniversary Criterion Collection edition; it has a lovingly restored print as well as great extras. But in 2007 those double-dipping rat bastages at Criterion put out a two-disc Criterion edition that features a commentary by Steven Soderbergh and Tony Gilroy, screenwriter of the Bourne movies. I think I’m going to need that one, too. Hey, I own six editions of Bronte’s Jane Eyre, why not two of The Third Man?