Carpe Alice Waters
Filed in Commerce, July 24, 2008, 9:12 am
Now’s my chance. If I can make it to the Green City Farmers’ Market by 8 a.m. this Saturday, I might be able to meet Alice Waters. From Gapers Block:
Alice Waters will take marker-goers about Green City Market on a shopping trip to prepare for a fundraising lunch. Shopping with Alice from 8 a.m. to 9 a.m., with a booksigning from 9 a.m. to 11 a.m., proceeds benefiting Green City Market.
Whoa boy. Guess who’s going to be in the front of that line, copy of The Art of Simple Food in hand, and dressed to the nines in order to catch the eye of a certain 64-year-old? Take me back to California with you, Mrs. Waters. Take me.
Or I won’t go because that’s pretty early in the morning. More as (if) it develops.
Outrage over New Yorker cover could lead to infinite cycle of satire
Filed in Outside the Kitchen, July 14, 2008, 11:47 am
Outrage over the cover art of this week’s New Yorker has already reached fever pitch, leading several prominent scientists to discuss the possibility of an endless vortex of satire.
The satire vortex, previously only considered theoretically possible, was triggered when the magazine hit newsstands this morning. Its cover depicts a summary of right-wing worries about the Obama family, including a militant Michelle Obama, Barack Obama in traditional Muslim garb, and a portrait of Osama bin Laden hanging over a burning American flag.
A satire vortex begins when the response to a piece of satire is humorless outrage of so great a magnitude that it prompts several more people to produce a piece of satire about that outraged response. If the reaction to the new satire is sufficiently humorless and outraged, it could spawn more satire exponentially, creating a cycle from which the human race may not ever emerge.
“The satire vortex is akin to a black hole,” explained Dr. Sennheimer from the Behavioral Sciences Institute. “It’s an area of intellectual mass that contains an enormous amount of satire, none of which is able to escape due to the gravity of ignorance.”
One of the first affected by the vortex was John Brand, liberal blogger and occasional contributor to the Chicagoist website.
“I thought the reaction to the [New Yorker's] cover was hilarious,” said Brand. “People said they understood the cover was satirical but that they felt the depiction was offensive and damaging. Obviously they didn’t get the satire.”
Brand quickly published a short fictional piece based on a typical “priest and rabbi walk into a bar” joke and the subsequent vitriol from the respective religious communities about their faiths being associated with binge drinking.
“It wasn’t my best work, but I thought it was pretty funny,” said Brand.
Brand’s inbox was then flooded with angry e-mails from people who said they understood his post was satirical but felt that it would make people think that getting angry about a joke is acceptable behavior.
One e-mail read, “However well-intended, your piece may have the consequence of provoking angry, humorless reactions to jokes. This could result in us losing the ability to tell jokes at all. That’s so damaging, I can’t believe you [John Brand] risked that. Shame on you!”
“You’ve got to be kidding,” said Brand. “There’s material here, but trying to parse it makes my head hurt. I need to map this out.”
Reports from all over the Internet indicate that others like Brand have begun the potentially endless cycle of satire.
“John Brand and others like him have already produced satire about the outrage to the original satire,”
said Dr. Sennheimer. ”With the new round of outrage, we will quickly advance to the stage where we will start seeing satire about the outrage to the satire about the outrage to the cover of The New Yorker.”
Brand could not be reached for further comment as he went to his local coffee shop with free Wi-Fi and does not get cell phone reception there.
Dr. Sennheimer did allow for the possibility of extrication from the vortex, but only if the news media get distracted by something else.
“Our only hope is that Fox News will once again shamelessly air comments recorded off camera,” said Dr. Sennheimer. “Or that one of the candidates’ advisors will make an offhand comment that can be blown out of proportion.”
“And it better happen soon. This could be the end of reasonable satire as we know it.”
Obama Alters Campaign Paraphernalia
Filed in Outside the Kitchen, July 1, 2008, 11:25 am
Last week, the Supreme Court handed down a couple 5-4 decisions, yet again showcasing the importance of the upcoming election. Liberal justices John Paul Stevens and Ruth Bader Ginsburg, both appointed during the Taft administration, will probably opt to either retire or die within the next eight years. Also, it’s rumored that David Souter will seek early retirement, presumably to work on self-defense, or at least to move to a safer place than Washington, D.C.
Speaking of, one of the Court’s decisions was to overturn the District’s handgun ban, to which Obama gave his tepid and qualified support. His disagreement with the decision to strike down the use of death penalty on child rapists was much more clear.
In light of these recent policy changes, Obama’s marketing team has been scrambling to update campaign materials, including backdrops, bumper stickers, and t-shirts. Obama announced the new paraphernalia while standing at a podium emblazoned with a red, white, and blue sign that said, “Change…?”
“Red states, blues states, love, puppies,” Obama said. “And don’t forget rainbows, but not the gay ones.”
The crowd responded with thunderous applause and chants of “Sure, I suppose it’s a possibility!”
When I asked Obama to comment on this recent trend of moving towards popular positions rather than clearly explaining his principled viewpoint as he has done in the past, he yelled out, “Yeah! What that guy said! Here’s some candy!” Then, after handing me a piece of hard candy with a ribbon attached that said “Obama ‘08, Pretty Please,” he grabbed a torch and a pitchfork and ran off to join a crowd, murmuring something about monsters as he sprinted away.
Another National Pastime Ruined
Filed in Outside the Kitchen, June 26, 2008, 7:09 am
Here we go again.
Salute the Count, an eight-year-old gelding, tested positive for Clenbuterol, a drug that increases lung capacity. Any of this sound familiar? An athlete beyond his prime doping in order to prolong his career? These guys are all the same.
And don’t try to play the liberal blame game, accusing everyone who’s so much as watched a horse race of complicity. “Oh,” you’ll whine, “Rick Dutrow, the trainer of Salute the Count as well as recent Triple Crown hopeful Big Brown, has been caught giving steroids to horses every year since 2000!”
Or maybe you’ll say, “IEAH Stables, co-owner of Big Brown, just recently publicly stated its horses would stop taking steroids, an announcement that conveniently occurred right before Big Brown’s trainer got suspended, thereby implicitly acknowledging that their hands are dirty, too!”
Or else you crybabies will whimper, “There’s so much money in horse racing, particularly because of its marriage to gambling, that it should be surprising if horses WEREN’T found with all sorts of insane stuff in their systems!”
Whatever. Let’s lay accountability where it ought to be.
Who has more to lose? Some crappy trainer? Or a horse who has access to the finest medical care and nutrition America has to offer, gets to bask in the cheers of drunks and gambling addicts, and gets to walk around victoriously with a bunch of flowers draped over his overheated, frothing body?
So let’s air out this whole business and send the ones mucking up this beloved sport to the glue factory. We almost lost baseball. Let’s not lose horse-racing, too.
New Page Up - Restaurant Map!
Filed in Commerce, June 25, 2008, 11:55 amI was reading my girlfriend’s former boss’s blog, Fat and Happy, and Monique had a great idea for keeping track of which restaurants you’ve been to and which ones you mean to go to: Make a Google map.
So I did, and then I decided to throw it on this site. It’s located under it’s own page called Restaurant Map, which should be at the top of the page right under “The Smoking Kitchen.” As of now, it includes information about the restaurants as well as what was ordered.
Please comment on the restaurants or add suggestions of your own.
As a brief sidenote, the bulk of what I do on my computer - e-mail, word processing, spreadsheets, reading blogs, calendar, etc. - is done via Google. I suppose it’s too late now, but are we sure Google isn’t evil? They could cause vast amounts of my personal resources to disappear in an instant. This is something I actually worry about, though not enough to make any changes. So, if you’re scoring at home:
Conveniences of Google > Personal anxieties
Another Cry for Help: Out of Control Herbs
Filed in Gardening, June 24, 2008, 9:22 amAfter a slow start, my herbs have really taken off. The trick to their rapid growth has been the improved weather, and me realizing they need to be watered regularly. However, all is not well in my window box. Check them out. Clockwise from the top left is cilantro, dill, and marjoram:
Farmers’ Market Trip and Recipe Request
Filed in Commerce, June 23, 2008, 12:25 pmI woke up early this past Saturday morning and hopped over to the Green City Market, which I mentioned in my last post. The selection is still somewhat limited, I assume because of the extended winter and sopping-wet spring, but it’s getting there. Here’s what I got:
Pan-fried Rib Eyes with White Beans and Leeks
Filed in Dishes, June 20, 2008, 2:31 pmIt’s been a while since I posted, and it’s been even longer since I’ve posted about cooking. So here we go, I’m getting back to the meat and potatoes of this site.
The good news is that I haven’t been completely disengaged. I’ve been cooking and occasionally taking pictures.
The bad news is that I can’t really remember when I made the dish in this post, so the details about cooking this meal are hazy. The recipe is from my Jamie Oliver cookbook. I’ve actually made this once before, but I don’t have much of a memory of cooking it that time, either. Wait, what was I talking about? Maybe that story about when I fought in WWII? Hey you damn kids, get off my lawn!
Jamie Oliver calls this “Grilled fillet steak with the creamiest white beans and leeks,” which I think it is a little wordy. Also, in this case, it’s inaccurate because the cut of beef I used was rib eye. Continue reading this entry »
Red Round, Plum, and Roma Tomato Salad
Filed in Dishes, June 13, 2008, 3:09 pmYou know how sometimes you get a craving for a particular food? And you know how sometimes that craving is just so overwhelming you have to go out and do something about it right away? Well, that’s how I felt a week ago about tomatoes, so I went to the store and bought a ton of my favorites: red round, red plum, and red Romas!
Hillary for President
Filed in Outside the Kitchen, June 6, 2008, 12:44 am
Over the course of the long primary season, I’ve had trouble deciding which candidate I wanted to become the next president of the United States. I never seriously considered any of the Republican candidates, not after I realized John McCain is fundamentally a conservative and Ron Paul is a racist. For the past five months, the Democratic field has been a pitched battle between Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. I’ve waited and waited, and it is with great care and deliberation that I’ve finally decided who to support. Today I declare my endorsement of Hillary Clinton for the presidency of the United States of America.
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