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United States, North Carolina, Carrboro, English, Paul, Male, 56-60, All Music, All Food.

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Saturday, February 01, 2003

Portabellas, little ones, pubescent cremini, brushed, acclimating in the strainer to dry out ever so slightly before slicing. The tips of the stems will be removed before the mushrooms are sliced and sauteed. They'll be tasty when dunked and lightly coated with the farofa at the table. Right tasty. 6:38:04 PM    comment []

State of the Onion Chopped onion slowly cooking, as for French onion soup, in dende oil, which lends its characteristic orange tint. Within the hour, this will become farofa, with the addition of chopped hard-boiled egg, red pepper flakes, and manioc flour. 6:29:21 PM    comment []

Lord, guard and guide the men who fly Through the great spaces in the sky, Be with them always in the air, In dark'ning storms or sunlight fair. O, Hear us when we lift our prayer, For those in peril in the air. 10:49:44 AM    comment []

Vatican denounces transsexuals Initially, it seemed suffucient to juxtapose the headline and the picture, but now it seems a few words are necessary to hammer home the irony. Here we have a guy in a silly hat who, if he has obeyed his vows, has never gotten laid. He presides over a bureaucracy that has taken the same vows yet, in the past year, has been shown to harbor unthinkable institutional pederastry. Okay, they screwed up, they're basically good, and we should give them a break, right? But now the guy in the silly hat says if some fool with loads of money trucks off to Sweden to have his balls cut off, he is unworthy. Did I miss something? 6:54:44 AM    comment []

High School Hoops Star Banned The 6-foot-8 James is considered the best high school player in the country and is expected to be the top player selected in June's NBA draft. Ohio high school officials reviewed a report that James received two free "throwback" jerseys worth $845 at a clothing store in Cleveland. The association said James received clothing in exchange for posing for pictures to be hung on the store's walls. The association's rules say an athlete forfeits amateur status by "capitalizing on athletic fame by receiving money or gifts of monetary value." "In talking with the store's personnel, I was able to confirm that on Jan. 25 the merchant gave clothing directly to LeBron at no cost," said OHSAA Commissioner Clair Muscaro. "This is a direct violation of the OHSAA bylaws on amateurism, because, in fact, LeBron did capitalize on athletic fame by receiving these gifts." This is, to put it politely, bullshit! There are no amateur athletes anymore. There are two types of athletes: The rare ones, good enough to make it a career, and the the ordinary ones who might be good enough to parlay their athletic skills into a middle management position somewhere. There are no penalties for capitalizing on your abilities in any other endeavor. 6:00:48 AM    comment []

Havel: I want to be free   (a modern day Paderewski, read the interview)                 ZAPPA SHOT DOWN BY BAKER By: Jack Anderson     5:40:11 AM    comment []

Katze Last evening, on my mandatory night out (it's been so bloody cold for Carolina, or lately just drizzly and ugly that there's a temptation to cocoon for weeks on end), the topic of conversation turned to cats. Some people hate cats. At the mere mention of the word, their eyes glaze over and an evil grin takes possession of their facial features as they begin to describe animal tortures that would cause the minions of Torquemada to grab their notepads and begin scribbling notes. Now, I'll have to admit that during the course of my life, I have devised some elaborate methods of cat torture, but they have been mainly psychological, like those in the Confuse-A-Cat skit  of Monty Python. Cats really do have it made if they have a decent owner and their lives are uncomplicated by the basic anxieties that make human life seem, at times, a twisted and unsolvable maze. They don't care a bit about politics and are sheltered from trivial concerns like war and taxes not by lack of intelligence but by an attitude, unique to the species, that they are above it all. It is only natural that even the most compassionate "cat-owner" (a ridiculous expression of human arrogance, you can no more "own" a cat than you can own the sky. If there is a hierarchy of ownership in the universe, the object which gets free food and has its litter box tended is certainly above the slave that buys the food and cat litter) has occasional twinges of resentment, nothing serious, but perhaps enough to devise a "test" for their feline companions to test their mettle and provide a few moments of cheap entertainment. One such test is the bath tub test. Cats have a natural distrust of objects that allow water to move about in what appears to them to be an uncontrolled manner. Water in the commode is safely contained and not perceived as a threat. That's okay. Water in the sink is high above the cat world, which is normally pretty close to the floor, and therefore of no concern. But the bath tub means incredible volumes of water flowing uncontrolled at cat level, right in the middle of the universe, but the view is obscured by a wall of porcelain. Every cat instinctively knows there is something to fear in the bath tub. The bath tub test consists simply of putting your cat in the tub - no water in it, no water running - and observing their behavior. Some will stay in place and sniff the surface, others might panic and jump out, still others might make the foolish mistake of attempting to climb out. They are the ones who fail the bath tub test and they must pay the price of being subjected to human laughter as their invincible climbing claws are repelled by a surface that offers no hold. While it is amusing to inject a crisis into a cat's complacent world, it is something I no longer do. They are my buddies and I treat them with the same respect I would a human buddy. What flashed through my mind last night, sitting at The Armadillo, sipping a draft Bud, were the cat buddies that have shared space and time with me on this long strange trip. I thought it might be fun, from time to time, to write a few words about them here. No big project, just some recollections. They are good critters. 5:15:00 AM    comment []