Quince.

This is a quince.


From this photo, you can deduce that the quince is fuzzy, but you probably you cannot tell that it is hard. Like unto a rock, albeit a rock with a lovely perfume.

I found this out when I embarked on a quince tart today for my writing group. Luckily, I had my chef's knife* back, from when I left it at the cabin in, like, July. I hewed the hard fruit into quarters, after having washed its fuzz away, then cutting it into lovely slices, which I then cooked for awhile in a maple/butter caramel sauce**. The thing about a quince is, you have to cook it to make it edible.

After bathing the quince slices in caramel, I arranged them in a pretty-ish concentric pattern in the fancy tart dough. I lightly poured a little of the caramel over the quince and put it in the oven to bake, whereupon I went to work a little more on my poem, whereafter I kind of forgot about the quince tart.

It baked a little past the point I would have likely taken it out had I not forgotten about it--maybe five to seven minutes longer--but that all turned out for the good: the quince turned pinkish, which it is supposed to do; the crust was perfectly crisp and buttery; the whole thing smelled divine. I whipped some cream with vanilla and a little sugar, and served it up, and it was about the prettiest and most delicious thing ever divined by persons with an interest in tarts, such as myself.

This is a quince tart, half-eaten:

*Here is the trajectory of my chef's knife this summer and beyond:

1. it drove with us from Salt Lake to Idaho, where we used it to make all kind of dinner and deliciousness.
2. we left it in the knife drawer. Perhaps others used it, who can say?
3. we came back up to Idaho and left it in the knife drawer again.
4. I asked my mom and dad to bring it back with them when they close the cabin for the winter. Which they did.
5. awhile later, I went down to Utah County for a visit and a birthday pedicure. I developed a quick-release cold, so the sneezing &c. therefrom prevented me from remembering to take home my knife.
6. my sister brought the knife up to me when we had breakfast, but I left it in my daughter's car when she dropped me off.
7. FINALLY on Halloween, I retrieved the knife and brought it safely home,

where I could use it to make quince tart.

**--ingredients of the maple/butter caramel sauce: maple syrup and butter.

Submit.

This year, for some unknown reason, I have set aside my usual and time-honored antipathy to Halloween. I wore my raven tee shirt for two days running, because it is awesome and because I got compliments the first day I wore it. I bought pumpkins although I did not carve them. The weather yesterday was so sublime, and as the light faded, that spooky All Hallows feeling--go figure--felt kind of delicious. And what's the point of resisting, really. All the reasons I never so much loved Halloween--pressure to make an awesome costume, the balance between being at home and going out, going out in bad weather, general grouchiness--seemed so beside the point. Who cares? Might as well give in.

We split the difference between home observance and family visits, as we always do with any holiday, because there are children and grandchildren scattered hither and yon all over the valley. In this instance, we poured a bunch of cheap candy into a big bowl and made a little sign that said "BOO" in orange oil pastel, taped to a pair of Chinese takeout chopsticks. We put the bowl and sign on the front steps, and headed out to see the scary creatures at four different households.

First, we stopped at the house of Spiderman Will and Batman Van. We also had a little bit of penne and tomato sauce--delicious. Spiderman had a small brontosaurus in hand, which roared, only adding to the scary.

Next, we stopped at the house of a princess, a vampire princess, a ladybug and a cupcake. We were able to witness a little trick or treat action at the neighboring houses. The trees in this neighborhood were ablaze, the light waning, the jack o' lanterns aglow. The cat, Sheen, who lives at this house wanted to be a part of things. He scampered in and out of the shrubberies, venturing up the step on a porch, the little family familiar.

After that, we went to the house of Bumblebee the Transformer, so high spirited in a brief hiatus in his trick or treating that he called the historian Optimus Prime and me Megatron. We had a bowl of minestrone there to sustain us.

Last of all the game, we visited Obi Wan Kenobi (or Kenobio, as a little brother called it), a ninja, Mario, and a tiny frog. Here, too, we assisted briefly in the trick or treating. It was dark. The moon drifted in a cloudy sky. The neighborhood decor flared as we turned a corner or stepped up a walk.

Earlier in the afternoon, I gathered my wits and mailing supplies about me to put my manuscript again into play. Here's how that went: I submitted to two competitions online, and four IRL, which necessitated the following analysis of supplies:

• four manuscript-sized kraft brown envelopes. Check.
• four long regular envelopes, for notification of results. I had three.
• four stamps for long regular envelopes. I had three.
• four binder clips, except that as of late, three competitions specify that they would like the manuscript to be submitted in a folder with no other binding implement. Did I have folders? I did not.

This meant going to the Office Max to

• copy the manuscript;
• buy envelopes;
• buy folders.

Then, I wrote checks for each of the entry fees; figured out how to fit a folder-enclosed manuscript into a slim-fit manuscript-sized envelope (here's a clue: you have to fold the folder); binder-clipped the one manuscript for the competition that allowed binder clippery; made sure all the parts of the submission were matching; then used all available saliva (just my own--sorry, gross) to seal the envelopes.

AND THEN at 9 p.m., we went to the P.O. to engage with the P.O. robot, so that the manuscripts can be sent. But first we had to buy stamps, so the one envelope for return of results could have a stamp on it.

That's how it goes, though. What's the point of resisting these steps? You just make the trips, buy the stuff, copy the manuscript, and send it off, all the while trying not to allow the pointlesspointlesspointless mantra to take hold. And why think about pointlessness, anyway? All the reasons--the overwhelming negative odds, the expense, the hassle, general grouchiness--seem, today, so beside the point. Who cares? Might as well submit.

The show.

This week felt like a long, very busy one, but we found time to watch the World Series. I can't remember how long it's been since I watched baseball--maybe that series in 2001, right after September 11. I was in an artists' colony in Vermont. There were a host of New Yorkers who made the argument that it would be so important for the Yankees to win--it would lift the spirits of the city. Churlishly, I did not agree, though I mostly kept that sentiment to myself, I hope. I remember being taken by the freakishly long-bodied Randy Johnson, who threw like some kind of ancient raptor (that's how I thought of it, in any case), and I was stony-hearted against the charms of young Derek Jeter.

The historian has always tracked the Cardinals, if he is not an active fan. That's because his favorite player ever is Stan "the Man" Musial, who was a great player to be sure and also "a good lefty," as the leftist-and-a-half historian likes to point out. So we were, of course, rooting for the Cards. It was fun to watch, for me, since I had really no stake whatsoever in the game, and nonetheless a team to root for. In sports, there's not much more beautiful than a great pitcher hurling the ball, than a great hitter settling into his stance, then connecting with the ball. That sound is a wonderful sound (much like the sound of a basketball going through a net--heaven.). And I have a special admiration for a great fielder--the absolute attention he gives to the ball arcing toward him, the way he moves to be under it, the stillness just before the ball hits the pocket of a glove, or the lateral dive to snatch it before it hits the ground. And I love feeling the vicarious elation of a winning team, and more, a winning town, since St. Louis clearly loves that team; simultaneously, I find it a little heart-rending to see the dejection of the losing team. It's a great spectacle. I was glad to reconnect with it.

This weekend, after something of a movie hiatus--several weekends with illness, more illness, social engagements, fall break--we saw a double-header, 50/50 and The Rum Diary. (In between, in case you're wondering, there was curry.) There was no good reason to see The Rum Diary, and the reasons we did see it can be summed up by the names of movie stars, and also the fact that it was at the same theater in which we saw 50/50, and we wanted to see two movies. Back to the movie stars: honestly, it wasn't the acting that did this movie in--it was a story that begged to be told with more verve and brevity, and instead it was made with slog and long-ass-ery. Sad. But not that sad. Again, no stake in it. It was a movie. Although it must be admitted that one of us turned to the other at about the three-quarters mark and said, "Is this long?" Okay, it was me. Point being, I don't know how long the movie actually was, but it felt long.

But 50/50 was actually not half bad. In fact, I would say it was pretty good, and very good if you minus out an unnecessary romance. There were passages in this movie when I wept (big surprise)--cancer is scary, more scary in real life than in movies, and there was a lot of this movie that got that scariness pretty close to right, both the historian and I agreed. The movie also got this right: that we have the chance to show up for each other in all kinds of ways. That it's worth it, both the showing up and the noticing.

This week, I have been thinking about how hard it is to pay attention to what is there, right in front of us. For a month now, we have had one car between us, and there are moments when what feels like dependency and constrained mobility and, you know, lack of freedom has grated sorely on not just my nerves but my sense of self. It has felt so trying to me. But it's also the kind of thing that makes me ask myself: it's a car, so what? You can't stop at the store on the way home, you don't have that buffer of solitude between home and work, between work and home. Can't you just adjust?

My daughter, on her blog, wrote this week about longing for something missing. But ultimately, she finds, what she has is enough: ultimately, she says, "I do not want to spend my days longing."

I have been thinking about her words during these golden autumn days, days so blessedly beautiful, full of light and warmth and a splendid chill in the mornings and evenings. This morning we planted tulip and daffodil bulbs together. We took Bruiser to the playground for a romp. I made us oatmeal. I want try harder to just be there for whatever fills these days, for all the days we--all of us, beloveds and friends--have together.

One thing at a time.

Today I took direct action like a Wobbly, as opposed to working through the system: I bought a new printer. But that's actually (almost) the end of the story. Let me start over.

Have you ever felt like the odds against you--the forces armed against you--the lack of inner resources that you bring to an almost insurmountable task--might slay you before you even get out of bed in the morning?Well, that is exactly how I've been feeling with regard to readying my house for winter. And by "house," I mean my whole life, obviously.

Here are some things that need to happen:

• tulip bulbs: plant them.
• perennials: trim them.
• apples: sauce them.
• grapes: juice them.
• mice: eradicate them (this will never happen. Obviously. We live by a field, and we will not poison them. Hello mice my old friends, I've come to send dark thoughts your way again.)
• kitchen table: for the love of heaven, keep it free of stuff!
• poems: write them, revise them, publish them for the love!
• grading: get caught up.
• weatherstripping: put some on so the wintry drafts do not veritably chill our very souls come December.
• blog: write more regularly.
• spending: whip it into shape. And conversely,
• buy: this one thing that is *obviously* an exception to "spending" above.
• car: OMG get one before I lose my everloving mind.
• vacuum cleaner: fix it.

As you can see, there is enough on this list to flummox a person of regular powers. Or, you know, maybe a person of regular powers would just start with the items on the list and do them. In an orderly fashion. Whatever. Maybe I am just lame. I certainly feel that way.

For instance, I did a little book review project this summer for a little cash. A nice little piece of cash that could aid in any number of the above projects. Or I could spend it. Whatever. But because I did this project in the summer, and because my printer was acting like a prissy little diva, and wouldn't print, and because I did not want to go into work just to print, or at all, it is now OCTOBER and I have still not sent in the forms so I can get paid.

Not to mention that I do have a few poems in progress that I could be working on. But because I am sick sick sick of screens--online teaching you are my nemesis!--I thought, I just want to print them out. But did I print them out before leaving work? No. Did I have a car so I could go somewhere to print them? No. Did this make me feel like giving up on life and simultaneously pitching a huge fit like a child? YES.

The people: I got up this morning and went to Target directly upon its opening hour, bought myself a printer, set it up LIKE A BOSS and now I can print, and wirelessly. And all of a sudden, everything else seems manageable.

THE END.

The facts.

The thing about October is, it's different wherever you go.

Idaho Falls, where my father was raised and my grandparents lived, is about 10 degrees cooler, generally, than Salt Lake City. And Island Park is generally 10 degrees cooler than that. In Yellowstone, the days are in the 40s. The sky is quilted with cloud.

Because of this general sinking of the year, which is further along the further north you go, the roads and byways of Yellowstone are blissfully unbusy.

The same beautiful rivers, forest, flumes of thermal steam and geyser. The inveterate fisherpeople, who must have to catch and release, but still stand for hours, hip-deep in the Madison. But almost no one else.

Everything is slower.

We're going a few places we haven't gone--the Porcelain Basin, with its siliceous sinter which makes everything opalescent and the pools a serene, rather chilly blue.

The road between Canyon and Tower is closed. There was snow earlier this week and the Dunraven Pass is just too high. Tomorrow we hope to get up early and drive to the Hayden Valley, and see what we can see.

The sick, which is the enemy of going to the movies.

I am better now. However, in the gift economy that is unique to marriage, the historian was stricken with the very same sick. This means that for two successive weekends: no movies. The horror.

The sick has also given me, us, our pack of three, opportunities to contemplate things like:

• how much dust there is everywhere.
• how much money I have spent on stuff.
• how things like buying a car to replace the smashed Camry or grading seem completely monumental when considered from a prone position.
• that I am mortal and we are all going to die.

It is good to be on the upswing from the sick. Really good. It's good to take a walk in the afternoon with Bruiser and admire the weather, which itself is on an upswing from the rain/snow of earlier in the week. We have figured out how to buy the car, or The New Camry, as I like to refer to it. I am grading, or blogging, same thing, right now, and it seems possible that I can dig myself out of the grading hole, or hell, same thing, that I am in now.

Maybe that's the best thing about being sick--when you get better, you just feel grateful for what is. Getting back the ability to not feel defeated by your life.

Complaint: a litany.

I feel sweaty and sniffly, and am nonetheless in my office, hiding behind a firmly closed door so that I can get some online grading done, because

the internet at my house is out.

OUT.

I called the helpful folks at my ISP, and they said

"unfortunately Ms. HTMS, the red power light means your modem is broken. It's what we call "a hardware issue," and no amount of phone-based troubleshooting will alleviate what ails you. However, we can send you a new modem, which will be $99. And it will arrive far too late for you to stay home and nurse your cold for one more day, because you will have to go into your office to use the internet there, since you really, really must get on that online teaching you didn't do this weekend because you felt sick, and you wasted your Friday going to a meeting."

Thanks, helpful folks at my ISP. No, seriously.

Sweaty, sniffly, hot-eyed. Internetless. Broken modem'd. Be-Dayquil'd. Vicksed up.

Also, my e-mail box is possibly at its limit of over-fulness.

Uncomfortable chair.

Way, way behind in my work.

Adventures in British television, starring Idris Elba.

We've been watching Luther, a darn good police procedural in the vein of the troubled detective who wrestles with the existential moral dilemma of the thin blue line, not always being sure if he's so much better than the violent, murdering criminals he must bring to justice.

My friend Ann recommended it, and the historian and I have watched an episode each night this week, and two on Friday, aka tonight (streaming on Netflix!). We have enjoyed it. Note: British TV gets away with a fair amount of gore in the pursuit of justice. It stars Stringer Bell, or Idris Elba if you prefer, and he is very good. There are an assortment of psychopaths, dirty cops, and unfinished romantic business. Very good stuff.

One of the great things--as with The Wire and Mad Men--there are amazing and always perfectly apropos songs to end each episode. Here's the song that ended Episode 6:

Now, when I heard it, I couldn't figure out who it was. Also, it took a minute, and also a tiny Google search, but who's counting? to remember that the version I had heard of this was done by The Animals.

The historian: Who's singing this?

Me: Dunno. Let's see who did the original. (google google google). (pause:) Huh.

Turns out, this song was written expressly for Nina Simone, who recorded it in 1964. And The Animals recorded it the following year. So, see? Television + Google: they're for educating minds.

Dear my uninspiring lunch,

Is it you or is it me?

Thanks for keeping me alive, I guess.

htms

TAGS: ungrateful

Dear grading.

Dear Grading,

I am in the middle of you, and I am not speaking metaphorically.

As a bonus thought, I will be in the middle of you until December. And then it will be Christmas, and there will be Christmas stuff to be in the middle of. And then, January, and by January 20th, say, I will be in the middle of you again. Until May.

Grading, you have a large, all-encompassing morass of a middle.

Sincerely,

htms

Notes.

I am writing. As in, this morning, I wrote. A poem. I am still working on it. Also, there is a new poem percolating in my brain.

*

At night for the last month, we've been hearing the crickets singing away.

*

I bought a little earring--a brass wasp, a tiny stud. I had it in my earlobe last night while we were walking Bruiser. In checking it obsessively, I brushed it away and it is gone. Tiny little brass wasp, gone.

*

Moneyball is here. I can't think of a recent movie I have been more excited to see. There are also worthy movies showing currently at the Broadway. By "worthy movie," I mean the kind of movie that will make you feel like a better person, a more virtuous person, if you see it. Tonight, we are going to see a worthy movie. It will probably be pretty good. I will, I'm betting, in fact feel like a better person for seeing it. But tomorrow night, we're going to see Moneyball. I'm thinking of it this way: if we wait one more night, that's one more night I can look forward to seeing it.

*

Last week, rather than see Drive, we went to see The Guard again. I really, really love that movie. Anyone who has seen Drive--was I wrong?

And there's a barrel that I didn't fill.

Autumn is my favorite season, I'm pretty sure. Paradoxically, autumn makes me anxious.

We went to the farmer's market today, and it was the very essence of the season: peaches everywhere, and tomatoes, and all the things that go with tomatoes--basil, eggplant, peppers, garlic. Corn. And grapes, berries of every imaginable variety, the beginning of the onslaught of apples. It's utterly beautiful. You can smell everything, too, there's that much of all of it. Brilliant, heaped in baskets and boxes and on tables.

We bought a box of tomatoes, for roasting. I am thinking about peaches--if I want to make more jam; if I want to bottle some. Or if we should just eat them as they are, as many as we can, until they're gone.


There are two poets for autumn, or maybe just two iconic poems: Keats' autumn ode, and Frost's "After Apple Picking." Both of these poems I read when I was much younger, though they have more power for me now.


Frost says,

I could tell
What form my dreaming was about to take.
Magnified apples appear and disappear,
Stem end and blossom end,
And every fleck of russet showing clear.
My instep arch not only keeps the ache,
It keeps the pressure of a ladder-round.
I feel the ladder sway as the boughs bend.
And I keep hearing from the cellar bin
The rumbling sound
Of load on load of apples coming in.
For I have had too much
Of apple-picking: I am overtired
Of the great harvest I myself desired.
There were ten thousand thousand fruit to touch,
Cherish in hand, lift down, and not let fall.

"Anxious" seems to mark things these days. Weary, too, but also anxious: how shall I spend these days? What shall I put by?


The last stanza of Keats:

Where are the songs of Spring? Ay, where are they?
Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,—
While barrèd clouds bloom the soft-dying day
And touch the stubble-plains with rosy hue;
Then in a wailful choir the small gnats mourn
Among the river-sallows, borne aloft
Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;
And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft;
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.

The music is beautiful. It is wailful, it is rumbling, there's nothing for it but to let it sing.

I am in the middle of these books.

I am reading Great House for my book group. I'm about halfway through it, and so far I am finding it rather brilliant. Each new chapter brings you up short, because it is in the voice of a character you haven't met before, but whom you will discover to be linked to the threads of the other chapters/characters in some unexpected way.

I am also reading this book about Mary Frances Kennedy Fisher's several years spent in Dijon, back in the late 20s and early 30s. Her style is desultory and devil-may-care, and she apparently ate and drank like a wolf and a fish, respectively. And I can respect that. The historian gave me this book for my birthday. This may be the closest I get to living in France sometime. I hate to be pessimistic, but there you are. However, I think I can say without a trace of pessimism that this is the closest I will get to living in France in the late 20s and early 30s, and for that fact, I want to express my gratitude to this book and its giver.

I am also reading this book, another birthday book. Actually, I have only read the preface to this book. I am afraid that this book is going to make me cry.

I am also reading this book, given to me by my mom and dad for my birthday. I love its author. She is a true original.

I am also reading this very interesting account of several family journeys to the places on the American map (lower 48) that seem to have the least human habitation, as evidenced by a nighttime aerial map, which shows where there is artificial light. The places include a stretch of the St. John river in Maine, central Pennsylvania, southeast Oregon, and part of the Gila Wilderness in New Mexico. It is very interesting, as I too have a fascination with what is vast and empty.

This is a lot of books to be reading at one time. I am finding, though, that picking up nonfiction, particularly, a little at a time means I end up finishing more books than if I insist that I plow right through. I also have some books waiting in the wings, such as A Gate at the Stairs by Lorrie Moore, and Kraken by China Mieville, and some things I am supposed to read and watch, such as Andre Agassi's memoir Open and The Pianist, and the last season of Saving Grace and the first season of The Sarah Connor Chronicles, which I would very much like to do. I would, however, like to find an uninterrupted, oh, month, to do that reading and watching. A month in another dimension. Can't we, in this modern era, come up with the Uninterrupted Month Dimension?

recollected.

My so-called TV life.

What's that?--you want to know what I watch, week to week, on television? I thought so. Well, I am happy to oblige.

I feel like I'm maybe the only person in the world who still watches TV, as opposed to watching television shows via the internet, and likes it. This makes me feel a little like an old person, but the habit of regular TV watching can be explained: I believe it is due (a) to having come of age when watching TV was your only option, as there was no interweb, and (b) to liking the rhythm of a week being paced, in part, by the show that's on each night, if there is one. (I can feel your horror radiating all the way over here, through the tubes and onto my screen, because of how much TV you surmise I must watch. Well, horror away. I do watch that much TV. And I like it.)

So this means that, if the world is good, there's a show on most nights of the week that I like to watch. This is especially important for week nights. The world is most in balance if I can get through my working day on a Monday, for instance, and there's an episode of The Closer awaiting me at its appointed hour. That episode redeems whatever drudgery or difficulty or simply the long hours of the day that preceded it. On Tuesday, The Good Wife; on Wednesday, Modern Family; and on Thursday, the glory that is the NBC lineup, but especially Parks & Recreation. And 30 Rock.

Well, I have just named the television shows that are my mainstays at the moment. Like every other thinking person, I am awaiting the new season of Mad Men. I have several little DVD things lined up, because I either didn't have HBO, or I wasn't able to finish the series in real time (The Wire/In Treatment and Saving Grace, respectively). And I am about to go into mourning because The Closer is winding up its current stint, which will lead us inexorably into its very last episodes ever.

This summer, I started to watch Criminal Minds with my daughter, who is a huge fan of the show. I myself love a police procedural, and I came to appreciate the show. I am looking forward to the new season, which I will have to DVR so I can watch it later, as it is up against Modern Family, and the historian and I watch that one together. The DVR is hooked up to the downstairs TV. Currently, running son is residing in the downstairs lair, so it's possible that there may be a whole slew of Criminal Minds for me to watch sometime, when I don't feel I will be intruding on the whole lair-ness happening down there. Who can say.

I would like to have a bunch of new awesome shows to watch. I wish I had started Breaking Bad when it started. Ditto Men of a Certain Age and other stuff, like House. I guess. I guess I should have watched Downton Abbey, so maybe I'll try to catch up on the first season before new episodes start.

But I need to get this whole project organized. The television routine is part of what keeps everything else in its proper place, and I need that, the people. I need it, or everything else, and I, will feel crazy. Or maybe I might have to, what? do something else, like something productive. Write, or read.

But I don't want to get ahead of myself. I will be checking out a few things in the new season. And if you have something you think I should watch, something that's still broadcasting in the real world, in real time--on television, and not on my DVR--please let me know. I will consider it an act of generosity, and a kindness, which I shall never forget.

(thanks to Amelia, who pointed out this post on every day I write the book)

The good news is,

And lo, there was pie.

Archival research, the people.

I know of no one, and I mean no one, who is better at it than my husband, known to you as The Historian, whose book is now a real thing, printed on paper and bound in cloth, with a dust jacket and dedications, historical photographs and captions, fat chapter titles, footnotes galore, and an index that his co-author did himself.

Did I mention the archival research? This meant looking at microfilms of newspapers and minutes, then searching newspapers online, not to mention looking at all manner of other dusty documents with their relevant secrets well hidden. It meant trips to Special Collections and the LDS Church History library. It meant reading more socialist writing than you can shake a stick at.

It required patience and diligence and persistence and invention. It is the completion of a many years' long task, and it tells a story that almost no one knows about.

And it is a damn book, the people, and that--that is something to celebrate.

Find out more about it here. And the authors will be at the Book Festival on Oct. 22 (more information here).

Cooking & cleaning.

Well, mostly cooking. With a little laundry and dish-washing on the side.

In the cooking department, though, in a grand flourish, commensurate with the great wealth of fruits and vegetables at the market of late, I:

• roasted some squashes, some just on the verge of being not quite good anymore, along with some garlic, onions, and peppers;
• steamed some yellow beans;
• roasted some green beans with olive oil and garlic;
• made some corn salad;
• made some caprese salad;
• made a quinoa salad with some beautiful Rancho Gordo beans, and various herbs, greens, etc.;
• and roasted some potatoes, to eat as they are in their olive-oil-and-garlicked state, or with leftover harissa.

And what did I learn from this cooking extravaganza? Some things:

• you need a vat of olive oil when you start a cooking extravaganza.
• having already-made food in your refrigerator, the result of a cooking extravaganza? A truly excellent state of affairs.
• we buy a lot of food at the farmer's market, and it takes a detailed logistical plan to eat it all.

For instance, I have a giant bag of basil in my refrigerator right now. (Me, to farmer: Is that whole bag for sale, for real? Lady Farmer: The Pesto Bag? Yep. Man Farmer: We call that "the pesto bag," because that's about how much we use when we make pesto. Me: Gimme that.) I'm going to make pesto out of it. But I need to get on that right away, and after my cooking extravaganza, I might not have quite enough olive oil up in here.

I would also very much like to make, or at least have, a pie--and I have got the peaches, blackberries, and blueberries to do something pretty spectacular in neighborhood of pie. But I need to make pie crust, and you know--logistics. What I mean by this is, I wish there were already a pie crust made. But what with having extravaganza'd around in my kitchen for hours, my desire to make a pie crust is kind of diminished, from my formerly ambitious state. Can't have everything, I guess. Although, having now whined for awhile about this, I feel strangely in the mood to actually make a pie crust. Check back for further information on this very important topic!

(I should add to the "cleaning" portion of this post that I also cleaned out some sad greens and herbs and a handful of leftovers and whatnot from the refrigerator. So now the fruits of my cooking extravaganza labors fit in there. Barely.)

Three songs.

Yesterday, my son and I ran to breakfast (at Virg's, radagast, in case you're reading--it was dang good, so thanks for the recommendation!). Whilst driving there, we were listening to The Unauthorized Biography of Reinhold Messner, the last studio album of Ben Folds Five. The last controversial studio album of Ben Folds Five. Anyway. It has a great two-song sequence, beginning with "Army,"

which contains, near the end, these lines:

"and my ex-wives all despise me
try to put it all behind me
but my redneck past is nipping at my heels"

a song which is followed immediately by "Your Redneck Past":

which begins with these sharp lyrics:

"choose from any number of magazines
who do you want to be?
billy idol or kool moe dee?

if you're afraid they might discover your redneck past
there are a hundred ways to cover your redneck past"

(My son and I agree that those first three lines are some of the best beginning lines of any song, ever--"Billy Idol or Kool Moe Dee?" Ridiculous.) But all of this talk of rednecks reminded me of another song, called "My Redneck Friend," by Jackson Browne, from the album For Everyman, which I loved when I was in high school:

All of which made me think of how many ways we weave the connections between the things we loved in the past--I listened to this Jackson Browne countless times when I was young--and the newer things we encounter. Also, is there a thing about rednecks in popular music? Is redneckery the guilty secret of rock? Something to think about.

Here's a little sequence I have been mentally connecting:

Rolling Stones - Paint It Black by SamFisher037

I'd be interested in hearing about your little three-song chains, the connections you make between your past and present through song.

Dear Bruiser,

Today, in the mail, I found the following:




I once believed--when I thought about it, which was not, truthfully, very often--that you could not read. But who knows? You're now getting mail, addressed to you. With some news for you, Bruiser!

I'm sorry to say, though, that the news is a little presumptuous. In this newsletter, there's a coupon:

I don't know what "senior" means in Dog, but around here, when we hear "senior," we demur. We protest. We flat out deny. I am speaking of myself here, obviously.

And when we were out walking today, I thought, how can they say "senior"? to Bruiser? Because you were cantering and prancing and, in fact, took me for a little drag when a small, yappy dog behind a wooden fence had a thing or two to say. It was impressive, B, I just want you to know I felt your vigor--was, in fact, moved by it--and I thought, I don't know if a so-called senior dog would have that kind of gumption.

I say, let the people keep their labels to themselves. Labels cannot contain you. (I am speaking of myself here, obviously.)

love,

htms