Category: General

The Unix timestamp value is the number of seconds since Jan 1, 1970 00:00.
Today at 6:31:30 PM EST, the Unix timestamp value is 1234567890.
(from one of my coworkers. this totally made my day. yes, i am a giant nerd.)

and I don’t even smoke. Have you SEEN the current issue of Gourmet? Sweet Jesus, the bread porn in there is beyond belief!
For real, I think I am going to cut out the page with the full-bleed closeup of cracked-wheat rolls dusted with flaky sea salt, and frame it to hang on my wall. Good grief. I am a monumentally incompetent baker, and I want to run out right now and buy yeast so I can make these things. I won’t, because I am actually turning over that new leaf I’ve been meaning to turn over and climbing back on the slim-down bandwagon, but I assure you I have been sorely tempted. Dang.

it is good when your friends throw a brunch and you get to go home with a baggie full of cocktail shrimp.

I am disgruntled. Saveur magazine has finally jumped the shark in a way that I can’t ignore or explain away, and it feels a lot like it did when they bulldozed my favorite 24-hour Korean restaurant in Las Vegas: something that used to be lots of fun is just gone, replaced by some corporate snooze.
The Saveur 100 issue just arrived, and usually I jump on it with glee and scan through the list to see which exciting treasures I already knew about, and what new things I might learn. This one I read through and shrugged. This one is the “Home Cook Edition,” which is apparently code for “pandering to boring wanna-be foodies who can’t find their ass with both hands but love to shop at Sur La Table.” BLARGH.
5 must-have sugars, 6 cooking oils, how to make your own mustard, fancy condiments and salts. Yawn. The Saveur 100 should not be about what you should buy to feel like a “real home cook” — it should be about bizarre treasures found, hidden gems celebrated, and forgotten simplicities rediscovered. I am about a third of the way through the magazine, I’m already annoyed, and I may not even bother reading the rest of it. And this is on top of the appallingly pedestrian graphic redesign (oh how I miss those white covers framing one jewel of a photo), and the alarming tendency toward mass-market, lowest-common-denominator content both in the covers and the articles (a turkey on the cover for November? 14 amazing pastas? give me a break — if I want that stuff, I’ll buy Food & Wine or Good Housekeeping, and sometimes I do). I never thought the day would come, but I’m actually entertaining the idea of letting the subscription lapse.
Saveur of old, I miss you.

It’s been a particularly difficult holiday season, being as it was the final days of our (dear, adorable, elderly) kittycat. We miss him, as we miss his companions who went before him, and we are sad.

Everything is weird. There’s no yowling for attention when we walk in the door, no paws in the neck or snaggletooth poked in the face when we wake up in the morning. It’s a good thing we have this week off from work, because we have been holed up at home, not really dealing with much of anything at all.
In the middle of all this, one night we looked in our fridge and couldn’t stand the idea of anything in it, so we decided to go out. But we couldn’t quite muster the energy to drive to the city, or really to drive at all, so we walked to Asian Grill on Moody Street — that same Asian Grill that in the past had been so abominably wretched that it pained me just to walk past the place. But it’s had a big sign on the front the past few weeks, proclaiming a new Korean and Japanese menu, so we figured we’d give it a chance to redeem itself, and if it was too horrible, we’d pay, leave full plates behind, and walk a little further to Sushi Yasu.
We ordered soon dooboo chigae and tofu kimchi bokum, and both were, dare I say it, excellent. The kimchi bokum was super spicy and vinegary, but I liked it very much, giving it second place in the roster behind the best one, now and always, from Wu Chon. The chigae was well balanced and chock-full of tiny minced octopus and squid and so forth along with the silky tofu. The pan chan were all more than decent as well, and hot barley tea came in heavy diner mugs as we sat down.
So we’ll go back, on the strength of the new Korean kitchen, and maybe next time we’ll be braver and try a dish or two off the rest of the menu as well. It’s nice to know some things can change for the better.

“I must commend you for the great civility and refinement you show in suggesting a 1pm brunch. Various barbarians insist on 11am for brunch while a wide range of cretins and assorted morons feel that 2pm (or even later) is appropriate. They are all wrong and you are right.”
from an email thread re: New Year’s celebrations. i love my friends.

i hate it when i don’t post for over a month. my site looks crappy, you guys are sad, no love for anyone. so, while i am getting my shit together over here, i will share this, just because it assaulted my eyes today while reading an otherwise compelling webcomic:

Oh. My. God. EEEEW.
People, highwaisted mom-jeans made of shiny stretch fabric are NOT SEXY. They are not fashionable. They are hideous, and they are not flattering even on the skinny ol’ teenagers who model them. They were NOT CUTE THE FIRST TIME AROUND. What is going on here? I do believe I am becoming a crotchety old bag who goes on and on about the depravities of Our Modern Age. But I mean, come on. Eeeew.
(and btw, these horrid trousers go for 99 euros. the mind bends.)

Enough of my countrymen regained their grip on reality and common sense and genuine love of country yesterday to elect Barack Obama President of the USA. I feel like I’ve been released from prison. I started to cry, I was so relieved. In 2000, it was a mistake. In 2004, it was an embarrassment of global proportions, not to even mention the voting irregularities. In 2008, another misstep would have been unforgivable.
Now we have to all get to work and help him fix this mess.

Cogito Ergo Nom
while you’re over there looking at the picture, check out the Questionable Content comic itself too.

This is an open letter from Michael Pollan to the President-elect of the USA, and lays out a number of steps that can, and really must, be taken in order to maintain a healthful and safe and adequate food supply for America in the coming years. (These policies have similar benefits for the world overall too, but being an American, it is of primary importance to me that we be able to trust the food we buy here at home.)
Plant a garden, shop a farmer’s market, make a cheese sandwich instead of a burger: we can all do a lot of little things to fix the problems.
And send this article to as many people as you can. This is not just a foodie thing anymore.