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July 20, 2022

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But it is so much worse than that!

The panhandler on Shattuck turns his back on you now, and your money's no good at the anarchist bakery anymore.

Perhaps a grievous but forgivable oversight?

I feel your pain. I’m still trying to hit The Lost Kitchen lottery.

But keep hope alive! You can get in on the Black Truffle and Caviar Dinner tomorrow @ 4:15 for only…

:::checks reservation:::

$1200, per person. Pre-paid.

Now I remember why I didn’t go there.

I just leafed thru my Keller cookbooks and could not find his recipe for Potage de Corbeau.

Just before the Fall 2017 wildfires, I shielded my eyes from the fine, translucent California Brian Wilson sunshine and put my face up against the window of the French Laundry to have a look-see. Then stopped in at the Bouchon Bakery next door for a croissant.

Then off for some free-style winery sipping.

A week later, everyone was running for their lives from the awful ferocious fires that Fall.

I'm thinking of visiting my friend north of SF this Fall and lollygagging in the same area again.

Gotta do Yosemite too, but maybe next year.

Janie's and others' mention of it reminded me.

Perhaps a grievous but forgivable oversight?

Since the USPS is a (quasi)government agency, I'm waiting for Charles to posit that it has misrouting the invitation elsewhere. ;-)

Hmmm, the French Laundry. It's been on my radar for a bit, but jostling up against my increasing prejudice against "fine dining" (which expression seems rather pretentious and precious to my ears, quite apart from the style of cooking). And even the complication of e.g. Heston Blumenthal's Fat Duck, where I ate before he even had any Michelin stars, no longer really appeals to me. (Further to which, and only understandable to ex-hippies I guess, is that when I had to explain his food to people on my return to London I said "he is not cooking, he is playing the Glass Bead Game".) It's hard to explain to people who haven't made this particular transition, but somehow the exquisiteness and complication of much Michelin-approved cooking has started to grate on me, and I never wanted for an instant to go to e.g. El Bulli. It may be to do with Fergus Henderson and his nose-to-tail revolution (I once, with a friend, was served a half of a pigs head, complete with teeth and eye, in broth with turnips, at St John. It was delicious, but the fattiness defeated us quite soon, not to mention the gross-out element, even for people who had grown up in the far east). But this feeling for a more rustic, and robust style of food, represents a competing version of great food with (in my opinion) a very different sort of appeal. And of course, even Michelin has had to adjust to this movement. They give Etxebarri one star, but it is the restaurant I most wish to go to, for the setting, and for the food (despite the subordinate status of vegetables, which are a great love of mine). Maybe one day.

my increasing prejudice against "fine dining" (which expression seems rather pretentious and precious to my ears, quite apart from the style of cooking).

My disinclination has more to do with the typically microscopic portions. Suitable, perhaps, for an appetizer. But for an entree, it would take 4-6 minimum. (Which rather ramps up the already high price for dining there.)

My wife is a bit of a foodie, so I did take her to Chez Panisse for her 50th birthday. But not likely to do that sort of special treat very often.

Chez Panisse - didn't get an invite from those fnckers either!!

:-)

Chez Panisse - didn't get an invite from those fnckers either!!

But they are just so toatlly above lower class things like advertising. You have to find them on your own (the "right people" will know of them). And then make a reservation -- minimum of a month in advance, mostly longer.

Invitations are just so déclassé.

As I think on it, perhaps the lack of an invitation means that, in their minds, you have been promoted to the upper class. And why not?

But this feeling for a more rustic, and robust style of food, represents a competing version of great food with (in my opinion) a very different sort of appeal.

Ok, first of all, GftNC, there were waaay too many references in that comment that I had to look up.

But I think I get what you're getting at. I certainly enjoy "fine dining" and all of the prep and thought and work and talent that goes into it. I don't personally care for being waited on* as a general rule, and there's a competing anticipation and tempered expectation thing I get when going to a "destination" restaurant, if you will. I like to think I appreciate it for the experience that it is. But at a certain point the food becomes secondary to the "experience". I don't know exactly how to phrase it.

For me, and I don't think I'm alone on this, the real joy comes from the Finds.

Finding the hole-in-the-wall pizza joint that makes an incredible lasagna that isn't on the menu. Or the deli that makes an iced tea that I haven't been able to duplicate in 30 years. Or the little tavern that makes mussels with this Belgian Ale/curry/cream thing that has me asking for bread 3 more times - for which I am ashamed - but the greater offense would be letting that sauce go to waste.

Of course, there's the gnawing fear that a Bourdain (RIP) or a Fieri or that destroyer of all hidden gems, Instagram, will ruin everything. So the quest happily continues...


*The absolute best service I ever had was, perhaps surprisingly, at the awfully-named Ruth's Chris back before it became a fancy Cheesecake Factory. I don't know what kind of psychic training that staff had, but they were invisible until the second you needed them. Like, not when you poured the last glass of wine - but only when you had decided you were ready to order another. Boom. Right there. Then they disappeared again. I don't know how they did it, but they were fantastic.

Or the little tavern that makes mussels with this Belgian Ale/curry/cream thing that has me asking for bread 3 more times - for which I am ashamed - but the greater offense would be letting that sauce go to waste.

Most of what you two are talking about is over my head, or out of my experience. (As is fine port, until recently.)

But Pete's mention of bread reminds me of a story I may have told in my bread posts a few years ago, but in case not....

My Irish girlfriend had a friend who was the dessert chef at a very high end Dublin restaurant. (Yeah, I know, but things were changing.) We went to dinner there one night and they had a surprise for me: the chef made a dish called something like "Spaghetti alla Matriscian'" (which if you have clicked over to my website you will know is my last name, minus one letter). Not a dish I had ever heard of! My people ate southern Italian peasant food....

I wiped up every last bit of the creamy sauce with bread, and more bread, which I guess was kind of peasant-like behavior to the posh folks. But the chef came out to meet us and said he loved to see it, because it meant the food was good.

Check out the “peasant” over here with a dish named after her on another continent. ^^^

I think it might be just a coincidence. ;-)

Which reminds me that I don't know any stories about the origin of my surname. That village is not in the part of Italy my ancestors came from. In fact, one of my uncles found some tale that said the family came from Spain about 500 years ago.

Who knows!

Lobster Napoleon. Oysters Rockefeller. Spaghetti alla Matriscian.

Nice try. I think we all know who we’re dealing with now.

****

I was told my grandparents were from northern Germany, which they were. But I met a German couple (in Italy, as it were) who told me the “ing” suffix is a Southern thing. So I guess my origins are from the south…with the peasants.

;-)

Moules frites isn't really "high cuisine", but it is very good.

Best to get it in Belgium, with a glass of Rocheforte beer (or Leffe, or Vruct Verbot, or Delirium, or St. Bernardis, or... well, you get the idea).

the real joy comes from the Finds.

That, and finding a way to duplicate, or get the ingredients to approximate, said Finds. There was a little cafe here named the Rising Loafer. Long gone (except for an Internet image.) One of their drinks was a "hot orange spice tea". Loved it. After the cafe closed, it took years before my wife found something very close, maybe even identical (although there are a lot of tasteless imitations on offer). Bliss!

My last name is very similar to an often-bastardized-in-the-US Mexican dish and is exactly the same as the first part of a Spanish dessert, as well as the name of a town in Spain, which isn't anywhere near the region where the Spanish dessert is popular (in the context of places in Spain).

The name of the Mexican dish is likely coincidental because of the similarity between my last name and the name of one of the main ingredients in the Mexican dish, but my name is a place name originating in the Spanish town. I don't believe the town was named after food. I have no authoritative explanation for the Spanish dessert from nearly the opposite side of Spain as the town. Maybe someone with the surname moved there and invented the dish (pure speculation).

All this by virtue of a great grandfather from Puerto Rico. Who knows how far back I'd have to go to find an ancestor from Spain? I've yet to do it.

Hairshirt Crunchwrap Supreme?

Sounds regal!

Ok, first of all, GftNC, there were waaay too many references in that comment that I had to look up.

Sorry Pete, but I've been using ObWi to educate myself so long I assumed you wouldn't mind! And I'm guessing you didn't....

Janie: at first I thought you must mean spaghetti all'amatriciana (which I believe is "southern Italian peasant food"), but your mention of "creamy" sauce threw me off the trail (as evidenced by your link). But as for mopping up the sauce with bread, even my rather upper class Italian friends are very tolerant of it. It's called "fare la scarpetta", and shows great appreciation!

https://www.italymagazine.com/featured-story/italian-ritual-fare-la-scarpetta

Hairshirt Crunchwrap Supreme?

Sounds regal!

That jogged my memory. Taco Bell had a menu item with a name that started with the first five letters of my surname and ended with my Puerto Rican great grandfather's four-letter first name. That was really weird.

GftNC -- the chef was an Irishman who did some of his training in Italy. I don't know whether he adapted a dish, made it up, or what. It wasn't made with "sauce" -- which is what we called tomato sauce (aka marinara, though my grandma never used onions in it). There may have been a bit of tomato in the dish I had in Ireland, and I remember onions. Chefs are creative, right?

"Sauce," I believe, is what some people mistakenly call gravy in this country. ;-)

"Cheese" meant grated parmesan.

Taco Bell had a menu item with a name that started with the first five letters of my surname and ended with my Puerto Rican great grandfather's four-letter first name.

Curse you, for drawing me in to your twisted game!

Waitaminute! Was your great-grandfather's first name, by any chance, "Wrap"?

It wasn't made with "sauce" -- which is what we called tomato sauce (aka marinara, though my grandma never used onions in it).

In my (California) experience, a "sauce" can be either "red sauce", i.e. tomato based, or "white sauce", i.e. cream based. Sort of like the difference between Manhattan clam chowder (not a fan) and New England clam chowder (love it!).

Waitaminute! Was your great-grandfather's first name, by any chance, "Wrap"?

No. The menu item had a one-word name. I should have clarified that the last four letters were the same as the letters of his first name, but for the capitalization. It was not a second word.

I'll give you a hint: It's not a very common first name even among Hispanic people, but it is the masculine version of a fairly common feminine name, even among non-Hispanic people. The feminine version is sometimes a shortening of a longer name and is featured in a Beatles song.

is she in the sky with diamonds?

a name that means "light"

tho i can't quite picture the name of the menu item

then again, maybe i can

"Sauce," I believe, is what some people mistakenly call gravy in this country. ;-)

Marinara is sauce. Bolognese is gravy. HTH.

(It's like the "jimmies" versus "sprinkles" debate. Some people use one or the other exclusively while others call the chocolate ones "jimmies" and the rainbow ones "sprinkles.")

I may hafta call in Nicolas Cage and Tom Hanks on this one.

To the Louvre!!!

Aha!

Enchirito!

a name that means "light"

Well, isn't that lovely.

Close, Pete, but not quite.

dammit.

Quesarito?

Got it, but then i have other clues. Google confirms.

Lovely. ;-)

As to Lucy in the Sky, I was thinking something like XXXXXLuxe, but deluxe appears not to come from "lux" but from latin "luxus" = excess -- and i don't know what male name would build off that anyhow. Then again, I wouldn't have known what male name fit with the actual answer.

The first thing that came to mind was Rita, which was workable. Then I went back to the first clue and spent way too much time cross-referencing Spanish towns, desserts, and bygone Taco Bell menu items. Luckily I had the time to spare as my client just showed up... for our 11:30AM meeting.

Quesarito?

Yep. (Janie had an unfair advantage. She knows my real name.) ;^)

I did cop to that, hsh, if somewhat mysteriously. ;-)

There's a sci-fi book by Marge Piercy called "Woman on the Edge of Time" where the main character (female) is named Luciente. I liked that book when I was a young thing, and I loved that name, which in turn made me feel better about Lucy, which I hadn't liked much before.

That's probably why Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds came to mind immediately.

I did cop to that, hsh, if somewhat mysteriously. ;-)

Yeah. I didn't quite pick up on it until after I wrote my comment.

Hawley set to music:

https://www.lawyersgunsmoneyblog.com/2022/07/the-first-annual-josh-hawley-award-for-outstanding-achievement-in-the-field-of-fascist-chickenshittery

They forgot the Three Stooges theme song.

As an otherwise civilized male human being ... YMMV on that view from here ... but having played sports and been exposed to toxic masculinity, and reacted to it in kind, I will say that Hawley, among others could use a punch in the face and a kick in the pants as counter measures to bring him to his senses.

Bullies don't go away of their own volition. They back off and run away after being dealt with on their terms, in many cases.

Trump's sociopathy may well have originated partly from his father's toxic masculinity, but somewhere along the line, some tough non-toxic male should later have cold-cocked him and kept it up as a therapeutic business solution.

Yeah, I know. Don't try this at home.

Watch the Montgomery Clift character in Red River kick John Wayne's character in the face, and then read about the verbal abuse the real life gay and troubled Clift faced from the real-life maybe straight and troubled, but not particularly self-aware Wayne, both great actors in their separate ways, and THEN read Garry Wills' (a former rightwing Buckley conservative who over time civilized himself) account of the toxic male fakery and bullshit in Wayne's public image.

Director John Ford could make Wayne cry like a rejected debutante with a few cutting remarks, though I'm sure liquor was involved with the two of them.

Just so, here's a real male human being, tearing all of the armed conservative sissies a new one:

https://twitter.com/MeidasTouch/status/1532030149897486336?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1532030149897486336%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fdigbysblog.net%2F

Hat tip to Digby for that tweet.

Digby having bigger balls than sissy bully Ted Cruz.

Schedule F:

https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/7/22/2111891/-Donald-Trump-s-new-plan-to-completely-destroy-America

Secret Service Agents guarding Pence, that fake Christian stuffed root vegetable who didn't deserve that protection after sucking off Trump for four years and counting, kissed their asses and their families goodbye:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/secret-service-agents-with-pence-said-goodbye-to-family-members-on-jan-6?via=newsletter&source=CSAMedition

Took a day off, less than promised, sorry, and forgot about this guy.

https://juanitajean.com/okay-i-know-im-being-lazy/

In the White House. In my government. In my country.

Walking around completely unshot, despite all of the gunfire across America daily.

Altoona.

All nice people from near where I grew up, I'm sure. But many "nice" Trumpers like the Germans and Poles who gave the finger to Jews passing by their villages on the way East, but who admire Trump that he has "his Jew", the ruthless, despicable INDIVIDUAL, Roy Cohn.

https://www.mediamatters.org/gab/doug-mastriano-consultant-and-gab-ceo-andrew-torba-jewish-conservatives-ben-shapiro-arent

Neither are gays, blacks, immigrants, and all of the rest of we Other, we liberals, welcome.

I don't know what Jewish, gay, black and hispanic conservatives are going to do as they come to terms with the ugly truth that the subhuman Christian White Nationalist Republican Party is the Party of the Big Oven.

Don't look at me, you idiot conservative dupes.

How difficult is it for liars like Ben Shapiro et al to realize that Kapos like him (but unlike him in that that he volunteered for his gruesome work, whereas Kapos in the camps were forced into evil for the illusion of survival) were useful to the Christian fascists, but were fed to the ovens in the end.

Might as well go the whole politically incorrect hog.

Hershel Walker, quoted, explaining global climate change: "Since we don't control the air, our good air decided to float over to China's bad air, so when China gets our good air, their good air got to move. So it moves to our good air space. Then, now, we got to clean that back up."

I could be nice and compare Walker to Chauncey Gardiner from "Being There", submitting innocent slop for consumption.

Forget it. If Walker and the conservative movement want to accuse me of racism or homophobia or anti-Semitism for telling Walker and Shapiro and Thiel and Cohn that the lot of them are right wing hate-spewing dumb shits, who have joined the ORC-Army of right wing fascism, BRING IT ON!

I'll hand it to Walker, however, in that his toxic masculinity, so obvious throughout his life, but his one personal trait white conservative scum admire, they kinda like it that he beat up his girlfriends and wives, is at least capable of kicking my ass, unlike Shapiro and Thiel, who couldn't touch me if they tried, although I'm sure both would resort to gun violence for lack of the real manly (in their eyes) chops.

What makes them dangerous vermin is their right wing conservative hateful creds, their only commonality in hate, nothing more.

They are equal, absolutely, to their white Christian right wing fellow travelers .. all my mortal enemies.

The malignant evil worldwide conservative movement recruits the willingly dumbest, most horribly evil INDIVIDUAL examples of humankind from all races, religions, nationalities, and gender and sexual persuasions ... Dinesh D'Souza comes to mind ... the rightwing racist white women in their ranks come to mind, but so does Candace Owens, who I wouldn't mind going a few rounds with in an alley .... to pedal its fascist lines of horseshit, thereby proving to themselves that these LESSER humans .. in the fascist discriminating eyes of white Christian nationalist conservatives ... are not only inferior but also useful to have it on and put it to white politically correct liberals.

Walker, like Clarence Thomas, are useful pawns for both purposes. Until they get loaded on the trains too, or at least are re-segregated away from whites in this fresh Hell we are living through.

Fuck all that. I say fuck all of them.

I'm not having it.


Principles. Snakes have principles and are true to them.

From the definition below: "struggling to be true to their own principles"

Mein Kampf was principled. John Yoo has principles. Donald Trump and saltwater crocodiles have principles, which we learn when we swim in their waters.

The Confederacy had principles.

Natch, for all of the above, if you like their principles, they have others.

1.
a fundamental truth or proposition that serves as the foundation for a system of belief or behavior or for a chain of reasoning.
Similar:
truth
proposition
concept
idea
theory
postulate
assumption
basis
fundamental
essence
essential
philosophy
a rule or belief governing one's personal behavior.
"struggling to be true to their own principles"
Similar:
morals
morality
moral standards
moral values
ethics
code of ethics
beliefs
credo
ideals
standards
integrity
uprightness
high-mindedness
righteousness
virtue
probity
rectitude
sense of honor
honor
decency
conscience
sense of duty
scruples
morally correct behavior and attitudes.
"a man of principle"
Similar:
morals
morality
moral standards
moral values
ethics
code of ethics
beliefs
credo
ideals
standards
integrity
uprightness
high-mindedness
righteousness
virtue
probity
rectitude
sense of honor
honor
decency
conscience
sense of duty
scruples
2.
a general scientific theorem or law that has numerous special applications across a wide field.
a natural law forming the basis for the construction or working of a machine.
"these machines all operate on the same general principle"
3.
a fundamental source or basis of something.
"the first principle of all things was water"
a fundamental quality or attribute determining the nature of something; an essence.
"the combination of male and female principles"
CHEMISTRY
an active or characteristic constituent of a substance, obtained by simple analysis or separation.
"the active principle in the medulla is epinephrine"

Victor Orban is a principled reptile:

https://digbysblog.net/2022/07/23/the-orban-system/

The Nevada conservative insect and his "mathematicians" (see cite below) are principled and adhere to the new math of Orban's fascism.

https://digbysblog.net/2022/07/23/losers-cant-lose/

All of the above will be removed from the face of the Earth on their principled terms and without mercy.

Here are some bedrock principles:

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/heres-a-harsh-reality-check-on-using-trees-and-carbon-capture-to-fight-climate-change-11658339204?siteid=bigcharts&dist=bigcharts

I'd wager there are roughly one billion subhuman genocidal conservatives infesting the globe who have halted all attempts at amelioration of this catastrophe, particularly via government effort, and will continue to do so via subhuman Citizens United corruption here and plain old graft and bribery abroad from the ominous look of the darkening violent shadow of conservative fascism purposefully heating up the world.

They must be destroyed.

The coming Civil War engaged in all 50 states, DC, and US territories will be brutal, savage and this time final in its conclusions, unlike the last one which had as its conclusion unending and catastrophic ambiguity over whatever fucking principles we tell ourselves we uphold:

https://talkingpointsmemo.com/news/supreme-court-executive-branch-agency-dhs-immigration

Gavin Newsom has the right idea, albeit with perhaps one percent of the required ruthlessness:

https://juanitajean.com/turn-about-is-fair-right/

This is a thing:

https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/school-shooting-greeting-cards-parkland-florida-video-a8700066.html

I could go on. It's too early to be satirical.

Remember the U.S. Government's Helium Reserve, held up as a federal tax and spend wedge issue by every dumbass government-hating Christian Republican Libertarian and Conservative Movement shithead back in the 1990s, the early deplorable fuckwads. My God, conservatives at Tacitus and the early Moe Lane OBWI couldn't shut their gobs about it and how it would be the beginning of the end of all federal spending ... like Social Security and Medicare, and natch got the triangulating Bill Clinton go along with the hornswoggling dog shit.

Here's a TASTE:

https://balloon-juice.com/2022/07/23/no-more-squeaky-voice-for-you/

I'll write more about it next week

Though I'm thinking about just surrendering and giving up and working on emigration plans.

Colorado will go the way of subhuman fascism too.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/us-district-court-judge-grants-restraining-order-to-prevent-superior-from-enforcing-new-gun-control-ordinance/vi-AAZTNzY?rc=1&ocid=winp1taskbar&cvid=4d9f3a1aa744463afdf91dbedf099962&category=foryou

I feel my life is personally threatened by that Gun Owner's of America murderer who vomited into the mic regarding his declaration of a win for genocide.

What to do?

The town of Superior Colorado best get crackin on securing the doorways in their local schools. The public ones, natch, the private ones are immune to bullets.

Gavin Newsom has the right idea, albeit with perhaps one percent of the required ruthlessness:

Thereby demonstrating that even an empty suit can get it right occasionally.

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