How many of you get the Esquire reference in that title? That is, how many of you have boyfriends who are, er, confident enough to read Esquire? So in case you don't know, Esquire has this thing they do where they showcase the most interesting and intelligent aspects of celebrity women, under the title "Women We Love." Wait--sorry, I mistyped. In place of "most interesting and intelligent aspects" in the last sentence, please emend "boobs."
Now, my sources tell me that the internet is also a boob-loving place, but being a lot bigger than an Esquire it has room for interesting and intelligent too. In my late slackerdom I've had time to find some splendid blogs, all of which happen to be by women, all of whom I happen to be currently in love with. These blogs are of the crafty/kitcheny sort. Oh, dear, does that make me a chauvinist pig? Should I be trying harder to like The Huffington Post? Should I love The Huffington Post?
Well, as a wise woman once said to me, you can't help who you love. So here are my blog infatuations of the moment:
http://orangette.blogspot.com/
http://wednesdaychef.typepad.com/
http://www.thepioneerwomancooks.com/ (and http://www.thepioneerwoman.com/)
http://www.figandplum.com/
http://www.eunnyjang.com/knit/ (seems kind of defunct at the moment)
http://www.masondixonknitting.com/
I wish there were more, and I'm sure there are other bloggers in the sea, but I'm a pretty bad internet surfer. I stick to what I know, and discover new things very slowly (most of those above came from friends' recommendations, actually). So suggestions are welcome--I have plenty of internet love to spare yet!
7/31/07
7/28/07
Ennui and Awesomeness
Once, not long after we'd started dating, Jeff explained to me the guiding principle of his life. That does seem to be one of those things you do when you've just started dating and are having the kind of deep conversations that disappear by about week 3. During our deep-conversation period, I learned that Jeff's guiding principle is to seek out the awesome (to get the real effect, you have to say it like an exuberant teenage boy--or maybe an exuberant thirty-ish boy. Try it: awesome!). Discovering and celebrating awesomeness, said Jeff, was the best way he could think of to spend one's life. There was probably some facetiousness here, but at the time I didn't ask many questions. It was, as I said, early in our relationship, and I was rather intimidated. Secretly, I knew that I spend a lot more time in the worlds of rather-niceness and kinda-coolness than awesomeness. I started to suspect that I couldn't keep up with this guy's standards.
Sometimes I still suspect that, but must somehow have managed to keep Jeff in the dark, seeing as we're still together--look!
I couldn't resist displaying that photo. So it's hokey, but...I'm writing a post on awesomeness! What's the use in trying to be cool? This picture is particularly awesome because it was one of those hold-the-camera-at-arm's-length-and-hope-for-the-best jobs that never come out. Autofocus, by the way, is awesome.
I was thinking about the awesomeness issue recently because I've been missing it. Everything's fine--life is pretty low-pressure right now, and I have plenty of time for the bit of work I'm doing , which is a nice change. I've been staying with friends in Chicago, and am feeling very thankful to have such friends, who are bending over backwards to help me out during this transition (thanks, guys, really). I have lots to appreciate. Nevertheless, I'm having a hard time getting excited about much. I keep trying to read things, or listen to things, or do projects, but I just find myself bored. Maybe it's the humidity, maybe it's the everlasting unsettledness, but awesomeness feels very remote.
One side effect of everything being so boring is that there's nothing worth writing a blog post about. My standard (obviously) isn't so high as real awesomeness, but I can't get interested enough in anything to want to share it. I don't think this is a good state to be in. So I've been pushing myself to find awesomeness to share. Fortunately, since I'm pretty good at blowing off intrinsic motivation, I had some pressure from another source: I was required to find some awesome recipes, to contribute to a recipe box for Elizabeth's shower. (Here she is opening it.)
(By the way, more visual awesomeness is on display at Andrea's photo blog.)
Having had to rustle up my favorite recipes, and in the process being reminded of their awesomeness, it occurs to me that they should be shared more widely. Some of my recipe cards were pretty obvious--the Best Recipe pancakes really are the best pancakes, and their cookie-crust cobbler is the best cobbler of any kind. But by some stroke of luck Tom and Elizabeth don't have the Best Recipe Cookbook, nor Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone, so finding recipes to give them was a breeze. Here are two others that I think everyone should have: the best tomato sauce for pasta (Marcella Hazan's--incredibly easy and simple) and the best pizza crust (Chez Panisse's--this one takes forever, which is something I seldom tolerate in recipes, but it is so good).
Tomato Sauce with Onion and Butter
2 cups canned Italian plum tomatoes, cut up with their juice (we use Pomi usually)
5 tablespoons butter
1 medium onion, peeled and cut in half
Salt
Put canned tomatoes in saucepan, add butter, onion and salt and cook uncovered at a slow and steady simmer for 45 minutes or until fat floats from tomato. Stir from time to time, mashing any large piece of tomato in pan with a wooden spoon. Taste and correct for salt. Discard onion and serve sauce with pasta. This recipe makes six servings.
Pizza Crust
2 t. dry yeast
3/4 c. lukewarm water
2/3 c. bread flour
4 c. unbleached white flour
1/4 c. rye flour
1 t. salt
1/3 c. olive oil
Make a sponge by dissolving yeast in 3/4 c. water, stirring in 2/3 c. flour, and allowing to sit until quite bubbly (about 30 min.).
Mix flours and salt in another bowl. Stir 1 c. cold water and 1 c. dry ingredients into sponge. Mix thoroughly and let sit another 30 min.
Add remaining ingredients and knead until dough is soft and elastic (5 min.). Add more flour if necessary, but dough should remain soft and slightly sticky.
Put dough in a large bowl, cover, and let rise in a warm place until doubled (2 hrs., or let rise overnight in the fridge).
Punch dough down and divide into portions of the size you want (7 oz. for a regular-sized thin-crust pizza). Form each into a smooth sphere and wrap in plastic. Allow to rest at room temperature for 1 hr. before shaping and baking. Balls of dough can also be frozen, then thawed overnight when you want to use them.
Notes:
1. I suspect the second sponge step could be skipped without much damage. This recipe really does require an exorbitant amount of rising time, and there's no reason we should stand for it.
2. I've used just all-purpose flour and whole wheat flour in place of the 3 kinds in the recipe, because that's what I had, and it worked fine.
3. This is amazingly good if you make it really thin and bake it at a high temperature--say, 450 for 15 minutes.
4. Did you know that fresh mozzarella now comes in "pearl" form? I suspect that real foodies have gripes about this--not being authentic or something. But not being a mozzarella connoisseur, I think it's marvelous that it comes in little bits, so you don't have to cover the pizza with enormous clumps of cheese, or deal with chopping it up, or settle for the really inauthentic kind in the bag. Mozzarella pearls + pre-grated parmesan=excellent shortcut pizza topping.
Sometimes I still suspect that, but must somehow have managed to keep Jeff in the dark, seeing as we're still together--look!
I couldn't resist displaying that photo. So it's hokey, but...I'm writing a post on awesomeness! What's the use in trying to be cool? This picture is particularly awesome because it was one of those hold-the-camera-at-arm's-length-and-hope-for-the-best jobs that never come out. Autofocus, by the way, is awesome.
I was thinking about the awesomeness issue recently because I've been missing it. Everything's fine--life is pretty low-pressure right now, and I have plenty of time for the bit of work I'm doing , which is a nice change. I've been staying with friends in Chicago, and am feeling very thankful to have such friends, who are bending over backwards to help me out during this transition (thanks, guys, really). I have lots to appreciate. Nevertheless, I'm having a hard time getting excited about much. I keep trying to read things, or listen to things, or do projects, but I just find myself bored. Maybe it's the humidity, maybe it's the everlasting unsettledness, but awesomeness feels very remote.
One side effect of everything being so boring is that there's nothing worth writing a blog post about. My standard (obviously) isn't so high as real awesomeness, but I can't get interested enough in anything to want to share it. I don't think this is a good state to be in. So I've been pushing myself to find awesomeness to share. Fortunately, since I'm pretty good at blowing off intrinsic motivation, I had some pressure from another source: I was required to find some awesome recipes, to contribute to a recipe box for Elizabeth's shower. (Here she is opening it.)
(By the way, more visual awesomeness is on display at Andrea's photo blog.)
Having had to rustle up my favorite recipes, and in the process being reminded of their awesomeness, it occurs to me that they should be shared more widely. Some of my recipe cards were pretty obvious--the Best Recipe pancakes really are the best pancakes, and their cookie-crust cobbler is the best cobbler of any kind. But by some stroke of luck Tom and Elizabeth don't have the Best Recipe Cookbook, nor Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone, so finding recipes to give them was a breeze. Here are two others that I think everyone should have: the best tomato sauce for pasta (Marcella Hazan's--incredibly easy and simple) and the best pizza crust (Chez Panisse's--this one takes forever, which is something I seldom tolerate in recipes, but it is so good).
Tomato Sauce with Onion and Butter
2 cups canned Italian plum tomatoes, cut up with their juice (we use Pomi usually)
5 tablespoons butter
1 medium onion, peeled and cut in half
Salt
Put canned tomatoes in saucepan, add butter, onion and salt and cook uncovered at a slow and steady simmer for 45 minutes or until fat floats from tomato. Stir from time to time, mashing any large piece of tomato in pan with a wooden spoon. Taste and correct for salt. Discard onion and serve sauce with pasta. This recipe makes six servings.
Pizza Crust
2 t. dry yeast
3/4 c. lukewarm water
2/3 c. bread flour
4 c. unbleached white flour
1/4 c. rye flour
1 t. salt
1/3 c. olive oil
Make a sponge by dissolving yeast in 3/4 c. water, stirring in 2/3 c. flour, and allowing to sit until quite bubbly (about 30 min.).
Mix flours and salt in another bowl. Stir 1 c. cold water and 1 c. dry ingredients into sponge. Mix thoroughly and let sit another 30 min.
Add remaining ingredients and knead until dough is soft and elastic (5 min.). Add more flour if necessary, but dough should remain soft and slightly sticky.
Put dough in a large bowl, cover, and let rise in a warm place until doubled (2 hrs., or let rise overnight in the fridge).
Punch dough down and divide into portions of the size you want (7 oz. for a regular-sized thin-crust pizza). Form each into a smooth sphere and wrap in plastic. Allow to rest at room temperature for 1 hr. before shaping and baking. Balls of dough can also be frozen, then thawed overnight when you want to use them.
Notes:
1. I suspect the second sponge step could be skipped without much damage. This recipe really does require an exorbitant amount of rising time, and there's no reason we should stand for it.
2. I've used just all-purpose flour and whole wheat flour in place of the 3 kinds in the recipe, because that's what I had, and it worked fine.
3. This is amazingly good if you make it really thin and bake it at a high temperature--say, 450 for 15 minutes.
4. Did you know that fresh mozzarella now comes in "pearl" form? I suspect that real foodies have gripes about this--not being authentic or something. But not being a mozzarella connoisseur, I think it's marvelous that it comes in little bits, so you don't have to cover the pizza with enormous clumps of cheese, or deal with chopping it up, or settle for the really inauthentic kind in the bag. Mozzarella pearls + pre-grated parmesan=excellent shortcut pizza topping.
7/23/07
Parodic genius
I must direct you to Michael's amazing composition, called "Epithalamion." I don't know how to pronounce "epithalamion," but I do know that it means a poem for a wedding. This one is for Tom and Elizabeth, whose wedding approaches apace. And it's hilarious.
7/17/07
The blog way-back machine
Now for more of what happens when knitting and blogging get together.
Remember my very first blog post? Here it is:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Well, I did give up on the fish and made stripes instead. They ended up like this:
As it turns out, the boy already has these sandals:
Fish--in the very same colors! So my fishy socks would have been over-thematic anyway. Personally I don't think children should have their own themes until they're at least two-and-a-half (and that means you, princesses).
Having recovered from the fish episode, I'm hanging about in Chicago and trying to learn what "embodied cognition" means. Any ideas?
Remember my very first blog post? Here it is:
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Aha, now, you didn't see that, did you? It was actually my first blog post, but it only existed on the internets for a couple of seconds. That's because just after I published it I sent out an email to announce the debut of my blog, and somehow included the people I was supposed to be keeping a secret from. (Keeping secrets is not my forte, it may behoove you to know.) I realized this, and immediately deleted the post. I'd already written post #2 (I published the first two at the same time) so I had to come up with another reference to the Widow Wadman on the spot. (The result was this post.)
Here is my project du jour: I'm trying to knit a sock with fish on it. It didn't seem like it would be that hard; even my very limited representational skills can handle fish (OK, this fish is kind of scary and deformed, but it's a first attempt). However, it turns out that it's well-nigh impossible to knit shapes like this when you're knitting something like a sock, which goes around and around instead of back and forth. Which is why the inside looks like this:
Nobody wants a sock like that. Your toes would get caught on all the threads--especially little two-year-old toes. And the sock (along with its brother, ideally) is indeed a gift for a two-year-old, who as such is unlikely to look past his tangled toes and just appreciate all my time and care.
I was going to post a photo of the almost-two-year-old in question, but I don't really know the rules of blogging yet and I thought maybe one shouldn't post pictures of other people's children without asking the parents. And I can't ask without ruining the sock surprise (hopefully Alex and Lisa will manage to miss the media sensation that will surely result from the publication of my blog...if I don't tell them about it, at least). Perhaps I should give you a blank space so you can imagine a cute blue-eyed almost-two-year-old.
Next episode: if Lawrence Sterne had a blog...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Well, I did give up on the fish and made stripes instead. They ended up like this:
As it turns out, the boy already has these sandals:
Fish--in the very same colors! So my fishy socks would have been over-thematic anyway. Personally I don't think children should have their own themes until they're at least two-and-a-half (and that means you, princesses).
Having recovered from the fish episode, I'm hanging about in Chicago and trying to learn what "embodied cognition" means. Any ideas?
7/16/07
Knitting Revelation!
A couple of weeks ago I wasn't feeling so good about my knitting. I couldn't figure out why everyone else's knitting seems so much more even than mine. I've been knitting awhile, and I've certainly done enough of it in the past year to keep in practice, so you'd think I could keep an even tension. And I could, when going around in a circle, but when I started going back and forth there were problems. You can see this in a sweater I made for Dana and Chris's forthcoming baby:
See how the bottom couple of inches have a different texture? This sweater is made mostly in the round, but there are slits at the bottom so it's knit back-and-forth, and that's when I have problems.
So there I was, feeling bad about myself, when I was saved by the mysterious appearance of a Stitch-n-Bitch book at my grandmother's house. I don't know how it got there, unless I have a guardian knitting angel after all. I decided to look at the very basic instructions to find out if I was knitting all wrong. And as it turned out, I was! Actually, the knitting was fine; the purling was the problem.
I learned to knit back in high school, but only the knit stitch--which is the regular right-side one. When you're knitting back and forth, you have to do one row of the right-side stitch, then a row of an opposite stitch for the wrong side. That's purling. I discovered this all on my own, around 10 years ago, when I bought some nice yarn and decided to knit a scarf for my dad. It wasn't coming out right, and I figured out the right-side/wrong-side thing. I had a lot of time on my hands but not many resources, so I went ahead and tried to figure out how to do a backwards stitch. Basically I took all the parts of the knit stitch and reversed them--put the needle the opposite way, wrapped the yarn the opposite way, and so on. Weirdly, it worked, and I've been doing it that way every since.
Turns out, though, that you're not supposed to wrap the yarn the opposite way. It goes the same way. If you go the opposite way it makes the stitch all twisty, and the texture of the fabric gets uneven.
So now I know! If only I could go back and redo everything I've purled in the last decade. But the future is bright.
I have another knitting-related mishap to tell you about. In this case, it's more of a blogging mishap, actually. But you'll have to wait for next time.
See how the bottom couple of inches have a different texture? This sweater is made mostly in the round, but there are slits at the bottom so it's knit back-and-forth, and that's when I have problems.
So there I was, feeling bad about myself, when I was saved by the mysterious appearance of a Stitch-n-Bitch book at my grandmother's house. I don't know how it got there, unless I have a guardian knitting angel after all. I decided to look at the very basic instructions to find out if I was knitting all wrong. And as it turned out, I was! Actually, the knitting was fine; the purling was the problem.
I learned to knit back in high school, but only the knit stitch--which is the regular right-side one. When you're knitting back and forth, you have to do one row of the right-side stitch, then a row of an opposite stitch for the wrong side. That's purling. I discovered this all on my own, around 10 years ago, when I bought some nice yarn and decided to knit a scarf for my dad. It wasn't coming out right, and I figured out the right-side/wrong-side thing. I had a lot of time on my hands but not many resources, so I went ahead and tried to figure out how to do a backwards stitch. Basically I took all the parts of the knit stitch and reversed them--put the needle the opposite way, wrapped the yarn the opposite way, and so on. Weirdly, it worked, and I've been doing it that way every since.
Turns out, though, that you're not supposed to wrap the yarn the opposite way. It goes the same way. If you go the opposite way it makes the stitch all twisty, and the texture of the fabric gets uneven.
So now I know! If only I could go back and redo everything I've purled in the last decade. But the future is bright.
I have another knitting-related mishap to tell you about. In this case, it's more of a blogging mishap, actually. But you'll have to wait for next time.
7/6/07
Update
Remember back when I didn't have my camera and had to post things I found online? Well, now I have my camera, and it has some damn cute pictures on it from the 4th of July, but I can't find the cord to connect it to my computer. So it's just like the old days, in effect. For consistency, here is another photo of me at my computer:
I just can't seem to avoid the deer-in-the-headlights look with this thing.
Anyway, I thought I'd make sure everyone was on board with the reason I can't find my camera cord, since I can't remember whom I've explained things to and who is still in the dark.
A long time ago, i.e. May, I thought that Jeff and I would be spending the summer in an old farmhouse in Kennebunkport, ME. This was a less charming situation than you might expect, unless you find bugs and rodents charming. However, it was to be our home. We did a lot of work to move into it (thanks in part to aforementioned critters), but before we got finished we found we'd have to leave again. This was the result of a situation involving an oral agreement, a month-to-month lease, and a divorce--all of which, I would now say, are best avoided.
Well, we started packing up again. This, too, took a long time, even with the help of Mom and Dad's wonderful van--can I plug the Toyota Sienna without a total loss of dignity? I guess admitting that you're jealous of your parents' minivan is kind of like discovering that you're always stopping the radio scanner on the easy-listening station. Alas, for me, both are true. But thanks to the minivan we finally got most things (minus the critters, as far as possible) into storage, and everything else into our own woefully compact cars. And the reason I can't find my camera cord is that it's in one of those places, but seems not to be in my car, which is the only searchable one at the moment.
So for now, it's the gypsy life for me and Jeff. We're going to be moving to Chicago sometime this summer--I'll be going in the next week or so, and Jeff will follow sometime later this summer. And then we will never, ever move again.
For awhile anyway.
I just can't seem to avoid the deer-in-the-headlights look with this thing.
Anyway, I thought I'd make sure everyone was on board with the reason I can't find my camera cord, since I can't remember whom I've explained things to and who is still in the dark.
A long time ago, i.e. May, I thought that Jeff and I would be spending the summer in an old farmhouse in Kennebunkport, ME. This was a less charming situation than you might expect, unless you find bugs and rodents charming. However, it was to be our home. We did a lot of work to move into it (thanks in part to aforementioned critters), but before we got finished we found we'd have to leave again. This was the result of a situation involving an oral agreement, a month-to-month lease, and a divorce--all of which, I would now say, are best avoided.
Well, we started packing up again. This, too, took a long time, even with the help of Mom and Dad's wonderful van--can I plug the Toyota Sienna without a total loss of dignity? I guess admitting that you're jealous of your parents' minivan is kind of like discovering that you're always stopping the radio scanner on the easy-listening station. Alas, for me, both are true. But thanks to the minivan we finally got most things (minus the critters, as far as possible) into storage, and everything else into our own woefully compact cars. And the reason I can't find my camera cord is that it's in one of those places, but seems not to be in my car, which is the only searchable one at the moment.
So for now, it's the gypsy life for me and Jeff. We're going to be moving to Chicago sometime this summer--I'll be going in the next week or so, and Jeff will follow sometime later this summer. And then we will never, ever move again.
For awhile anyway.
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