i have found a new food blog that i absolutely love, so i just had to share - even knowing that i am probably the only person who reads this blog who is interested in food blogs...
it is called Tea & Cookies, and beyond being as much in love with food as i am, she is a fabulous writer, really worth checking out... here is one of her early posts that made me happy ... and here is one that is more recent ...
don't worry, i know that the interest here is less than the sqee-ness that i am feeling... but because of that squee-ness i had to share...
29 February 2008
26 February 2008
life and whatnot...
i seem to have been posting quite a bit of content from other sources recently and, well, that just seems lazy ... even though that is what most bloggers do, really ... so, in an effort, albeit a weak one, not to be lame... i am giving an update on my life... and stuff...
grad school - it's great! i love my classes, even when i don't want to go... theory is not sucking nearly as badly as i was afraid it might... i am actually really liking it *gasp*... i know, crazy, right?... poetics is often very theoretical, as well, but with a direct connection to the poetry we are reading, rather than text in general... and really my classes are made that much better by the rather brilliant people by whom they are populated - the comments of my classmates are something i look forward to as much, if not more than, whatever topic is under discussion for that day...
on a note related to grad school, i am also putting together my reading list... for those not from the world of literary academia, i compile a list of works encompassing at least three categories - in my case, time period, genre, and approach - read them and then next fall i will have to synthesize them in a reading list test, an oral exam given by the committee approving the list... i have decided to specialize in the medieval - probably not a surprise for those who know me - so along that line i have chosen to read medieval french lit, 19th and early 20th century fantasy, and cultural studies theory... my list is not yet complete and approved, but i am excited for it anyway...
work is not so bad... i enjoy the labs and love the internet time... though i suppose i would not be opposed to having the same internet time at home... i have applied for a teaching assistantship for next year, and, should i get it, my lab time will be significantly reduced... and i might get an office... how odd...
in the kitchen... well i haven't actually been in the kitchen that much recently... yesterday was the first time in ages i had cooked, and it was lovely... i suppose there is a combination of reasons for that... my kitchen style tends to be slow food for large groups, and while i am living with a large - relatively - group, the various dietary choices and restrictions of that diverse group make slow food somewhat difficult... most vegetarian and vegan food actually happens rather quickly... and slow food often involves meat of some kind... and timing has also been an issue - time to cook when i don't need to be doing other things has to be balanced with the time that other people want to use the kitchen... it is not a single-butt kitchen, but the flow does not work really well for more than two or three people... as a result, very little of my time has been spent in the kitchen as yet this year ... and that is sad, because i love food, making and eating it...
one of the things that has been taking away my kitchen time is fitness - largely, bellydancing and hula hooping - and i really love it... i am no where near the level of skill that i would like at either of them... but, i am gonna keep working on them both, even though this week is the last week of bellydancing class - no more security of having a teacher to tell me what to do... i am hula hooping a lot and i am finally starting to try some tricks - tricks which will need much more practice before they are made public... the result of all this jiggling is that i have finally started to lose the weight that i want off, though, again, only a start on a much bigger project...
so, overall, life is good... and now you know...
grad school - it's great! i love my classes, even when i don't want to go... theory is not sucking nearly as badly as i was afraid it might... i am actually really liking it *gasp*... i know, crazy, right?... poetics is often very theoretical, as well, but with a direct connection to the poetry we are reading, rather than text in general... and really my classes are made that much better by the rather brilliant people by whom they are populated - the comments of my classmates are something i look forward to as much, if not more than, whatever topic is under discussion for that day...
on a note related to grad school, i am also putting together my reading list... for those not from the world of literary academia, i compile a list of works encompassing at least three categories - in my case, time period, genre, and approach - read them and then next fall i will have to synthesize them in a reading list test, an oral exam given by the committee approving the list... i have decided to specialize in the medieval - probably not a surprise for those who know me - so along that line i have chosen to read medieval french lit, 19th and early 20th century fantasy, and cultural studies theory... my list is not yet complete and approved, but i am excited for it anyway...
work is not so bad... i enjoy the labs and love the internet time... though i suppose i would not be opposed to having the same internet time at home... i have applied for a teaching assistantship for next year, and, should i get it, my lab time will be significantly reduced... and i might get an office... how odd...
in the kitchen... well i haven't actually been in the kitchen that much recently... yesterday was the first time in ages i had cooked, and it was lovely... i suppose there is a combination of reasons for that... my kitchen style tends to be slow food for large groups, and while i am living with a large - relatively - group, the various dietary choices and restrictions of that diverse group make slow food somewhat difficult... most vegetarian and vegan food actually happens rather quickly... and slow food often involves meat of some kind... and timing has also been an issue - time to cook when i don't need to be doing other things has to be balanced with the time that other people want to use the kitchen... it is not a single-butt kitchen, but the flow does not work really well for more than two or three people... as a result, very little of my time has been spent in the kitchen as yet this year ... and that is sad, because i love food, making and eating it...one of the things that has been taking away my kitchen time is fitness - largely, bellydancing and hula hooping - and i really love it... i am no where near the level of skill that i would like at either of them... but, i am gonna keep working on them both, even though this week is the last week of bellydancing class - no more security of having a teacher to tell me what to do... i am hula hooping a lot and i am finally starting to try some tricks - tricks which will need much more practice before they are made public... the result of all this jiggling is that i have finally started to lose the weight that i want off, though, again, only a start on a much bigger project...
so, overall, life is good... and now you know...
21 February 2008
a poem
poetry speaks to me in a way that prose just can't, no matter how thrilling i find happily-ever-after ... it is on a level so much more elemental, visceral - proceeding from instinct rather than intellect ... and it frustrates me that i can't accurately explain what it is about certain poems that is so powerful to me, even knowing how rarely one can explain instinct...
anyway, a poem...
The Dream
I dream an inescapable dream
in which I take away from the country
the bridges and roads, the fences, the strung wires,
ourselves, all we have built and dug and hollowed out,
our flocks and herds, our droves of machines.
I restore then the wide-branching trees.
I see growing over the land and shading it
the great trunks and crowns of the first forest.
I am aware of the rattling of their branches,
the lichened channels of their bark, the saps
of the ground flowing upward to their darkness.
Like the afterimage of a light that only by not
looking can be seen, I glimpse the country that was.
All its beings belong wholly to it. They florish
in dying as being born. It is the life of its deaths.
I must end, always, by replacing
our beginnings there, ourselves and our blades,
the flowing of history, putting back what i took away,
trying always with the same pain of foreknowlwdge
to build all that we have built, but destroy nothing.
My hands weakening, I feel on all sides blindness
growing in the land on its peering bulbous stalks.
I see that my mind is not good enough.
I see that I am eager to own the earth and own men.
I find in my mouth a bitter taste of money,
a gaping syllable I can neither swallow nor spit out.
I see all that we have ruined in order to have, all
that was owned for a life time to be destroyed forever.
Where are the sleeps that escape such dreams?
~Wendell Berry, 1968
i wonder if this is how god feels looking down on creation, sometimes...
anyway, a poem...
The Dream
I dream an inescapable dream
in which I take away from the country
the bridges and roads, the fences, the strung wires,
ourselves, all we have built and dug and hollowed out,
our flocks and herds, our droves of machines.
I restore then the wide-branching trees.
I see growing over the land and shading it
the great trunks and crowns of the first forest.
I am aware of the rattling of their branches,
the lichened channels of their bark, the saps
of the ground flowing upward to their darkness.
Like the afterimage of a light that only by not
looking can be seen, I glimpse the country that was.
All its beings belong wholly to it. They florish
in dying as being born. It is the life of its deaths.
I must end, always, by replacing
our beginnings there, ourselves and our blades,
the flowing of history, putting back what i took away,
trying always with the same pain of foreknowlwdge
to build all that we have built, but destroy nothing.
My hands weakening, I feel on all sides blindness
growing in the land on its peering bulbous stalks.
I see that my mind is not good enough.
I see that I am eager to own the earth and own men.
I find in my mouth a bitter taste of money,
a gaping syllable I can neither swallow nor spit out.
I see all that we have ruined in order to have, all
that was owned for a life time to be destroyed forever.
Where are the sleeps that escape such dreams?
~Wendell Berry, 1968
i wonder if this is how god feels looking down on creation, sometimes...
14 February 2008
february...
as readers and fellow flock members know, february and i have a mutual distrust and hatred for each other - i try my best to endure and the longest month of the year does its best to defeat me... as an antidote to the dismay imparted by this interminable month i have complied a list of moments...
happiness is...
...cooking with my grandmother
...the perfect glass of pinot grigio
...medieval french poetry
...blood oranges
...a hot cup of tea on a cold day that i don't have to be out in
...shopping with my sister
...summer stars in the high desert
...slow food
...my mountains
...the sound of the ocean
...dancing until i can barely move
...hula-hooping
...soup and sourdough
...happily ever after
...the sound of the rain
...late night conversations
...green growy things
...visiting someplace i have never been before
...heirloom roses
...ripe, summer peaches
...other peoples stories
...red carnations
...old, character-filled houses
...cooking for the people i love
...a list as fleeting and incomplete as happiness itself...
happiness is...
...cooking with my grandmother
...the perfect glass of pinot grigio
...medieval french poetry
...blood oranges
...a hot cup of tea on a cold day that i don't have to be out in
...shopping with my sister
...summer stars in the high desert
...slow food
...my mountains
...the sound of the ocean
...dancing until i can barely move
...hula-hooping
...soup and sourdough
...happily ever after
...the sound of the rain
...late night conversations
...green growy things
...visiting someplace i have never been before
...heirloom roses
...ripe, summer peaches
...other peoples stories
...red carnations
...old, character-filled houses
...cooking for the people i love
...a list as fleeting and incomplete as happiness itself...
13 February 2008
Breaking News AlertThe New York Times
Tuesday, February 12, 2008 -- 5:55 PM ET
-----
Senate Votes to Broaden Government's Spying Powers
By a vote of 68 to 29, the Senate gave final approval to a
bill that expands the government's spying powers and gives
legal protection to phone companies that cooperated in
President Bush's warrantless eavesdropping program.
Read more here...
09 February 2008
economic stimulus at the expense of reading...
i have to admit, i haven't really paid attention to the economic stimulus package that has been in the news so much in the past few weeks - other than to think election year bulls**t... however today while i was reading my blogs i had to sit up and take notice...
apparently the only way to stimulate the economy is to make sure that the future of at-risk kids is even harder, because they can't read... he probably thinks what's the point, they aren't going to have time to read anyway - what with flipping burgers and shooting up their neighborhoods - no point in cultvating skills that would help them improve themselves and thus the country and the economy... arg! this administration makes me so mad...
269 days left... if another republican is elected i think i might move to europe... or canada...
apparently the only way to stimulate the economy is to make sure that the future of at-risk kids is even harder, because they can't read... he probably thinks what's the point, they aren't going to have time to read anyway - what with flipping burgers and shooting up their neighborhoods - no point in cultvating skills that would help them improve themselves and thus the country and the economy... arg! this administration makes me so mad...
269 days left... if another republican is elected i think i might move to europe... or canada...
06 February 2008
02 February 2008
for my fellow labbies...
and anyone else who may work in a tech support related job...
medieval tech support...
medieval tech support...
26 January 2008
raks sharqi...
i love belly dance... i know, it has only been one lesson, but it is so much fun!!!! and i am not as sore as i thought i would be... it is really hard, lots more so than i expected, but soooooo much fun... i can't wait till i am good... g-fresh and i are going to practice every night...
i only wish i was as good as this girl is...
24 January 2008
mass media...
so, as descriptions of mass media, i find this one to be very entertaining... and somewhat true...there is a ton of information, much of it i don't care about, on the internet - just as i imagine the drunk librarian in the corner at the cocktail party... and like the librarian, once one gets it started, it sucks you in with information to places you never wanted to go... like facebook, myspace and random forums that suck the soul from the ideas they may have been founded on... and occasionally you get a gem - a well-edited wiki, an educational website, friends blogs - but more often you lose hours of you life that you can never get back... and i love it...
i must be perverse, because i would rather talk to the drunk librarian in the corner than most of the other people at the party... the internet is where i get my news, talk to friends, organize my life... and i really love the random places that the drunk librarian leads me... beautiful, brilliant, fun places... even though there are some places that you can not un-know, no matter how much you may wish to - like some of the places you can find kittens...
still, it beats the hell out of "fair and balanced"...
19 January 2008
culture, in brief...
i have discovered a lovely new(to me) site that will inspire horror in those of a serious literary persuasion, possible confusion in the rest of the population, and general hilarity all around...
please go visit Book-A-Minute Classics and see for yourself - they are truly brilliant...
my favorite so far is this one, of The Odyssey ...
please go visit Book-A-Minute Classics and see for yourself - they are truly brilliant...
my favorite so far is this one, of The Odyssey ...
14 January 2008
i posted a general update on the status of my holiday break on flock hall 2.0, so if you are interested go there to read it...
i have to say that i am not a fan of new year's resolutions - in my experience no one follows them anyway - but there are a few things in my life that look like resolutions...
~ i have set up a fairly rigorous (by fleur standards) work-out schedule with my sister - both gym time and belly dancing and pilates classes
~ my roommate's vegan lifestyle is spilling over into my eating habits - i think about them more than i have in the past, anyway
~ my master's program reading list is going to force me to read some of the things that have been in the to-be-read pile since before i started college
~ the massive amounts of reading which i have to do this semester will require a schedule to keep on track - more planning than i have ever really done for homework before this year - grad school is much different from undergrad
~ tighter-than-planned money situation will require better budgeting skills and more fiscal responsibility
you can probably see how these items have the flavor of resolutions, but i prefer to see them as life changes not dependent on a date cycle to come into effect (besides that, i am listing them a couple weeks after the new year- where did the break go?) - and also they will hopefully have a longer life span than mid-february, unlike the average new year's resolution...
i have to say that i am not a fan of new year's resolutions - in my experience no one follows them anyway - but there are a few things in my life that look like resolutions...
~ i have set up a fairly rigorous (by fleur standards) work-out schedule with my sister - both gym time and belly dancing and pilates classes
~ my roommate's vegan lifestyle is spilling over into my eating habits - i think about them more than i have in the past, anyway
~ my master's program reading list is going to force me to read some of the things that have been in the to-be-read pile since before i started college
~ the massive amounts of reading which i have to do this semester will require a schedule to keep on track - more planning than i have ever really done for homework before this year - grad school is much different from undergrad
~ tighter-than-planned money situation will require better budgeting skills and more fiscal responsibility
you can probably see how these items have the flavor of resolutions, but i prefer to see them as life changes not dependent on a date cycle to come into effect (besides that, i am listing them a couple weeks after the new year- where did the break go?) - and also they will hopefully have a longer life span than mid-february, unlike the average new year's resolution...
12 December 2007
my two geeks...
so my literature geek and my tech geek both sqeeeeed a little when i saw this article about the One Laptop Per Child program and UNICEF teaming up to create a database of oral tradition stories, so as to preserve them... yay for the preservation of culture!
here is the stories database...
here is the stories database...
03 December 2007
a holiday list...
tacky or not, the holiday wish list is making an appearance - it is by no means a complete list of my desires, and if you feel inspired to get me something not on here, feel free... and if you don't want to give me anything at all that is fine, too... but several people have asked what i want, so here it is in all of its greedy glory...
fun, writer-type stuff:
anything from here, cause they are fun: http://www.ninthmoon.com
Scrivener
Curio
kitchen stuff:
le creuset cookware
a digital kitchen thermometer
a mandolin slicer - talk to squid first, though cause she said she might =)
and the ubiquitous book category:
Pure Dessert by Alice Medrich
Will Write for Food: The Complete Guide to Writing Cookbooks, Restaurant Reviews, Articles, Memoir, Fiction and More by Dianne Jacob
The French Laundry Cookbook by Thomas Keller
More Great Good Dairy-free Desserts by Fran Costigan
Rejection, Romance and Royalties: The Wacky World of a Working Writer By Laura Resnick
any of the Andrew Lang Fairy Books
this category could go on indefinitely, so i am stopping...
that is more than enough greediness for the year... and really i don't need presents from anyone, but honestly, who doesn't like presents...
my nod to the commercialism of the season has been fulfilled...
30 November 2007
mfa, anyone?
wow ... some bright future prospects with a my degree (kinda - i will have an MA not an MFA - not sure what difference that one letter makes in this case, though)
http://www.marriedtothesea.com/
http://www.marriedtothesea.com/
24 November 2007
politics and literature...
in a publicity-hounding world it is really not that much of a stretch to combine book tours with campaigns, and what a prolific bunch of candidates we have... if you are unfamiliar with the literary politicos, Salon has reviewed the candidates' books here... some i have seen some i had not heard of... will this supposedly candid look at their lives and their views (the books are all "non-fiction") give you a better insight during the 2008 election, or does it just drive home the lack of good options? by the way, Colbert's I Am America (And So Can You) was not reviewed... =(
14 November 2007
a matter of heart...
so this is a subject that is close to my heart on many levels... it just plain rocks...
Suzanne Brockmann, a bestselling author of romance novels, is donating all the profits of her latest book, All Through The Night, which was released on 30 October, to MassEquality... you can read more about it here... as a note for all my gay friends, who may not normally be interested in such a book, it features a gay wedding, possibly a first for mainstream romance and all the profits go to a great cause...
i have not yet read the book, but i plan on it... and i am going to buy it first, not something i generally do with new authors, as the public library system here rocks... but is supports such a good cause and, well, i love romance, so...
05 November 2007
02 November 2007
referals... reading rules my life...
my life has been subsumed by grad school so here are some other cool places to go read stuff... cause i am not posting here...
cute overload
postsecret
ironic sans
suicide food
the sneeze
wonkette
they are in no particular order, but they are all fascinating to me for one reason or another ...
they are all found on PC Magainze's Our Favorite 100 Blogs 2007 though i had seen some of them before...
enjoy...
cute overload
postsecret
ironic sans
suicide food
the sneeze
wonkette
they are in no particular order, but they are all fascinating to me for one reason or another ...
they are all found on PC Magainze's Our Favorite 100 Blogs 2007 though i had seen some of them before...
enjoy...
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