November 9, 2016

I am not surprised.

Numb, but not surprised. I did not underestimate the level of venom

Many people resented the fact that a black man was elected and re-elected president. Their support of Trump was a repudiation – not of a Democrat, or of liberal policies – but of a black man with political power.

Headscarf-wearing women and observant Sikh men – be careful out there. As in the aftermath of 9/11, things could get ugly. Some people are that much more emboldened to express what has been barely kept under cover.

Let us look to Standing Rock; let us observe whether there is a significant change in how protestors and reporters are treated, especially after mid-January.

For the past eight years, the goal, the purpose, the raison d'etre of the Republican Party has been to stop Obama. If he says yes, they say no; if he says no, they say yes. Outside of repealing Obamacare, what now? What are their plans? What do they hope to achieve?

Donald Trump is a bigot. That some felt a bigot was best is, well

What do you have to lose? Enforcement of laws that penalize discriminatory practices, such as charging higher interest rates for people of color whose income/credit is same as their white counterparts¹.

What do I have to lose? The dismantlement of systemic discrimination; a re-entrenchment of decades old practices; an acceptance of the concept that I am nothing more than

<quietly> i will fight

1.

https://www.bostonglobe.com/business/2015/12/21/blacks-latinos-still-rejected-for-mortgages-higher-rates/kng3Kuc4v3uIK1pmDqBSjO/story.html

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-toyota-settlement-20160202-story.html

http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2016/02/toyota-car-loans-restitution/459678/

An Experiment in Healthier Eating: Spinach Chips

I used

1 bunch of spinach¹,

Olive oil,

Kosher salt, and

A parchment paper lined large cookie sheet

In an effort to have a healthier snack when I'm at work.

To make the spinach chips, I

Preheated the oven to 325^oF,

Pinched off the stems of the spinach and washed the leaves like I wash collards², then set the leaves on a paper towel lined cookie sheet for additional drying,

Took the largest leaves, put them in a bowl, drizzled them with olive oil, and hand mixed until the leaves were well coated,

Placed the oiled leaves on the parchment paper lined cookie sheet,

Dusted the oiled leaves with kosher salt, and

Baked them for roughly 10 minutes.

First batch - Fresh from the oven

I thought I would eat them like potato chips, but they were thin and delicate. I put them in a plastic container, which may have had the unfortunate effect of amplifying their fragrance. I was afraid to pop open the lid at my desk, lest someone be disturbed by the scent of salty dried spinach.

They melt in the mouth. But the aftertaste is, well,

Spinach.

Were I to try again, I'd

Use the pre-washed salad spinach, cutting down on prep time, and (hopefully) getting more uniformly sized leaves;

Add flavor to the olive oil – maybe a chili oil or sesame oil or even a soy sauce emulsion of sorts; and

Somehow use a lighter touch with the salt.

But I won't. This experiment has taught me I prefer my spinach as part of a smoothie (with frozen banana and a teaspoon of sugar) or as a warm salad with bacon and goat cheese and the right type of vinaigrette.

Ah well. On to the next effort,

1. Well, I bought one bunch of spinach. Some leaves looked too small for the effort, and it was getting late (I started baking at 7pm on a school night), so the rest of the spinach ended up in a pasta dish.

2. I have no idea how to clean spinach – I usually buy the pre-washed stuff. I was trying to save money with this effort.

I now know everyone's names

Lorne Ahrens
Philando Castile
Michael Krol
Michael J. Smith
Alton Sterling
Brent Thompson
Patrick Zamarripa

May you rest in peace
May your families be taken care of, provided for
May justice be served
May you be the last victims of such styles of murder

Loose Thoughts: Struggling in the Aftermath

What would Prince have said?

********************

First there was Pedro Erik Villanueva, a teenager shot to death by CHP officers in unmarked cars. It is unclear is whether the teenager knew they were law enforcement, whether they at any time announced themselves.

Then there was Alton Sterling, and confusion about why the sight of a gun in a waistband, inaccessible to the suspect, justifies drawing a weapon and pulling the trigger. Coming out of the numbness, I concluded the officer involved would use the Mehserle Defense (I meant to pull my Taser) should he be indicted or go to trial.

No time to breath because Philando Castile. My fear of being shot when obeying a directive came true in his death. He did everything right. They did everything right. And the officer was willing to put a child in danger by shooting into the car, willing to shoot someone who was obeying the law and respecting his authority simply because

Three, no four, no five Dallas law enforcement officers murdered in the midst of peaceful protest. Damn it, this is not helping! The heartbreak. One more giant step backwards.

********************

I understand if your Facebook posts and Twitter feed and what not are all puppies and kittens and rainbows and children and recipes and whatever seemingly benign things and have nothing do to with the tragedies of the past few days

the past few weeks

the year to date.

I get it.

Every time we begin to grieve, every time we start to move down the familiar paths of healing, we are slammed again. We can't breathe.

********************

Ugh. First I had to add locking my door to the list. Now I have to figure out how to use Facebook Live in the event I'm pulled over. <sigh>

********************

I see how you felt about the week.

How in the aftermath of Alton Sterling's murder, your posts were kvetching about politics.

How in the aftermath of Philando Castile's murder there was silence.

How in the wake of the Dallas law enforcement murders, you posted condolences and outrage at regular intervals. For Dallas and Dallas alone.

By this you have shown me that you believe not all deaths are equal, that some are more tragic, some people more worthy than others.

By this you have shown me you don't believe #AllLivesMatter. You have shown me you don't value me or my life.

********************

If Micah Xavier Johnson is a terrorist, then so is Dylan Roof. If Dylan Roof is not a terrorist, then neither is Micah Xavier Johnson. They are the same side of the same coin.

********************

This is where I am at the moment: The sadness and pain of seeing people I know who had previously been silent speak/post/meme solely about Dallas, ignoring the other tragedies as if they did not happen.

It's not a betrayal, really. Just a recognition, a remembrance of how unlovable and unworthy most of the world believes me to be because of my ethnicity.

I had forgotten. There are people I know

people I went to school with or worshipped with in church or worked alongside,

people I see regularly on Facebook or Twitter or in person,

people who know my name

who will hug me on sight

and yet see me as less than.

**********

I know what you're going to say - it goes both ways. There are some who talked and talked about Sterling and Castile, but said nothing about the Dallas law enforcement officers.

Not quite.

The history of unjustifiable murder by law enforcement is deep; the ramifications of which comprise the egg shell dance floor many of us still tiptoe upon, despite our freedom. This is the weight of history, a hay bale teetering ominously on a dromedary's back.

Sniper attacks on law enforcement? No hay bale, no dromedary in sight. There is not that kind of history; there is not that kind of pain. The two types of tragedies are not equal in this regard.

Where they ARE equal is their horribleness. None of these deaths are justified. None of them.

********************

It was never going to be easy

Boston and San Bernardino

terrorist attacks carried out by foreign nationals

were not the same as

Orlando and Charlotte and Oklahoma City

terrorist attacks carried out by American citizens

which were not the same as

Sandy Hook and Aurora

attacks carried out (as far as we are aware) by mentally ill individuals

which were not the same as

Disgruntled ex-workers

remember the term 'going postal'?

or

Angry ex-partners

restraining orders be damned

or

Angry students

<sigh> Columbine

or

The violence that appears to be part of daily life in many places

the current example being Chicago.

There is no one solution to fit all scenarios. Exploring and implementing ways to reduce and/or prevent the violence is not going to be easy. It was never going to be easy.

But

Because of our tendency to take the easy route

if we venture down a path at all

I am confident it will not get done.

Chocolate Coconut Goodness

How did we get to this place of mushroom-top chocolate goodness with silky smooth creamy icing?

Well, I saw someone on TV make frosting out of coconut cream (set a can of coconut milk in the fridge overnight (don't shake the can!), and the cream will rise to the top),

And I had leftover chocolate from when I last made a chocolate cheesecake (two chocolate vanilla swirl cheesecakes, to be precise),

So I tried to make chocolate cupcakes with coconut cream frosting.

I cribbed a chocolate cupcake recipe from the internet,

Chopping up my leftover baking chocolate (~ 4 squares) and adding it to the cupcake batter before putting it into the muffin tins. Which I overfilled (hence the mushroom tops). I haven't checked, but perhaps the recipe is for two dozen cupcakes instead of one,

Because after filling my muffin tin, I had enough left over to make a thin square of cake.

It came out super chocolaty. Makes you thirsty for a glass and a half of milk level of chocolateness.

The recipe for the coconut cream frosting is also from the internet.

My frosting never formed stiff peaks because I can't hold an active hand mixer for 15 minutes. And while the stuff firmed up a bit after I put it in the fridge, I think one needs a stand mixer to really make the recipe work.

All in all, not a total fail. Not what I was aiming for, but still very much edible, if not tasty.

A Social Media Fast

It got to the point where some days, I was checking my Twitter account every 3 minutes or less. A fast was in order, and Lent was right around the corner.

No checking Twitter, Facebook, or Pinterest from Ash Wednesday to Easter Sunday¹.

Pinterest was the easiest to avoid. Their suggestion algorithms had been getting on my nerves for some time now. Before Lent started, I removed the app from my phone and tablet. The most I saw of Pinterest were the What's New emails in my inbox, and half of those didn't interest me.

Facebook turned out to be tougher to avoid than I expected. Prior to the fast, I had gone a day or two without checking it.

But by Day 2, I had excluded my friend's cancer recovery page from the fast. Because cancer sucks, and how could I commiserate with her if I didn't know what was going on?

Then there were the notifications. That number encircled by an orange or red dot telling you who tagged you in a photo or invited you to tea or whatever. Those notifications had to go.

Which meant every time I cleared them out, I peeked at the post at the top of my news feed.

And sometimes clicked Continue Reading on whatever post was at the top of my news feed.

And once clicked the article that was shared in the post at the top of my news feed.

As for Twitter, one of the blogs I read includes a bit of the author's tweet stream. I would purposely go to their site, first to read the tweets, then to read the blog. Pretty much a violation of the spirit of the fast.

<sigh> 

1. Well, Easter Sunday-ish, I suppose. According to the Internet, Lent ends on Saturday.

Adventures in Crème Brulee

The burnt sugar crust looked good

It cracked nicely

Into a liquid

Crème Brulee Fail

Béchamel Gravy

When you watch enough Food Network and Cooking Channel, you get the courage to try what you see.

Case in point: béchamel.

I decided to try to make a béchamel based mac & cheese. The final product would include Italian sausage and frozen mixed veggies. The full list of ingredients included:

Large elbow macaroni, cooked (I don't know how much, but I have more than half a box left),

Shredded cheese (I used a gruyere from the $5 or less bin at my local supermarket),

2 ½ links of Italian sausage, cut into bite size pieces and cooked (Basically half of a 5-link pack),

A regular sized package of frozen mixed vegetables, and

The Béchamel sauce.

I get a lot of recipes from a cookbook so old¹, its recipe for baked custard recommends scalding unpasteurized milk, as if unpasteurized milk was easily accessible and available.

Their recipe for a basic béchamel called for

2 tablespoons of butter which you melt in a skillet, to which you add

2 tablespoons of floor and whisk until well mixed, to which you add

1 cup of milk and continue whisking until it thickens.

What I did was start with the skillet in which I had cooked my Italian sausage. After pouring out the excess grease, I added

2 tablespoons of butter, melting it in the pan, to which I added

2 tablespoons of flour, whisking until well mixed, to which I added

1 cup of milk, whisking as it thickened

Which is when I realized I'd just made gravy.

béchamel + meat drippings = gravy

Oops.

Soldiering on, I added the cheese, whisking until it was melted.

Now I had cheesy gravy. Delightful.

I put the noodles in a dish, added the sausage, poured in my cheesy gravy, mixed it up, put the dish into the pre-heated to 350^oF oven, remembered the mixed veggies, pulled the dish out of the oven, added the mixed veggies, mixed it up, added a little bit of milk to help the veggies cook, and put the dish back into the oven for 30 minutes or so.

Ain't no shame. Ain't no shame at all.

1. Rombauer, Irma S. and Marion Rombauer Becker. Joy of Cooking. New York: Plume, 1973. Print

Grease Live! – A Review

Grease Live!, Fox's first foray into the live staging of classic musicals, is more edgy than NBC's offerings, an excellent fit for the network.

Mind you, I very much dislike the basic story in Grease. I expected to cringe and groan and be irked by the enterprise, but

Surprise! I was entertained.

The script had me giggling – Patty & Eugene arguing over space for the Rocket Club flyer; Coach's pep rally speech; anything the Principal said over the PA system.

There was good acting – Vanessa Hudgens inhabited Rizzo; it's always a pleasure to see Wendell Pierce (Coach Calhoun); props to Jordan Fischer (Doody), Kether Donohue (Jan), and Ana Gasteyer (Principal McGee). Loved loved loved Haneefah Wood (Blanche), who made me laugh every time she was on screen.

Using both soundstages and a backlot, Fox did a nice job of combining the good of theatre with the good of television. I gave a small scream of delight when the end-of-show bows started (a theatre thing) – very happy to see the ensemble get their due.

The addition of the live audience energized many of the scenes (especially the dance off), and getting peeks of the behind-the-scenes scurrying didn't make the production any less magical.

Those peeks were often hosted by Mario Lopez, who, unfortunately, was unimpressive as Vince Fontaine. There's more to being the charismatic but skeezy bandstand host than competently speaking set of rapid-fire lines.

Overall it was a fun time. The songs are catchy, the drama sufficient, and there's no floating car at the end. I'd call it PG-13, where parents should probably have a conversation with their children in the aftermath (or during commercial breaks). What does he mean when he says, "Did she put up a fight"? Talking to your kids is not a bad thing.

A few other notes as I was watching:

·         Boyz II Men doing a little bit of Motown Philly during the title song. Yeeessss.

·         Commercial: It's a German luxury sedan. But it's still an Audi
Wha? (Audi's are German luxury cars.)

·         I love Didi Conn. Can I just say?

·         More Boyz II Men, please. Temptations/Pips moves and all.

·         I like how Vince Fontaine was shut down by Marty (I believe in the movie, the two end up making out).

·         No, Mario Lopez does not look old. We look the same age, right? Which is not old.

·         Joe Jonas – that's the middle one, right?

·         And no attempt to make his band look like they fit into 1959. <shrug> okay.

Re: Oscars So White

One thing bothering me about this discussion is that it seems to focus solely on the lack of nominations for black actors and directors. What about the dearth of nominations for Asians? For Latinos¹?

**********

Would The Martian have been just as good if Chiwetel Ejiofor was in the lead role? Or Irrfan Khan? Or Jessica Chastain? I haven't seen the movie, but I imagine so.

This is one of the aspects of film diversity we're talking about, one of the aspects which frustrates. Revered for their creativity, film producers generally seem to lack the imagination to have a universal experience/inspiration/whatever presented by someone other than a white man.

It's as annoying as a screaming toddler on an airplane².

**********

I'm not clear on how boycotting the Oscars will affect the pocketbooks of the producers who perpetuate the problem. Because that's what we want to affect, right? The money?

**********

Remember when you saw your first black NFL quarterback or head coach? And you might have rooted for that team because it was so rare to see either? Now we don't even blink.

That's where we're trying to get to, and not just for black artists. A place where there are so many works to choose from it would be impossible to avoid nominating non-whites in any acting category. (Or several women in the director category – but that's another branch of the Oscar diversity ire.)

**********

I wasn't surprised by the nominations, or the backlash. I wouldn't be surprised if most of the articles were written in November, waiting to be published.

**********

And then I remembered Chris Rock was hosting.

1. Yes, I know Iñarritu was nominated, but two nominations (director, best film) does not an abundance make.

2. No shade intended to the parents of toddlers. I'd still prefer the screech of a toddler being denied an indulgence than the whine of a child who has never been told "no". I got your back, parents.