Emerald City Confidential

Apparently Lucas Arts brought out a game in which the player is a hardboiled Private Eye in Emerald City, and takes a case from a strange dame, name of Dee Gale. I've never been that big a fan of Oz, but I love Noir, and especially Noir parodies (I watched Dead Men Don't Wear Plaid again the other day - genius. And Lucas Arts' Adventure games, especially the point-and-click kinds, are my most favorite thing ever (Grim Fandango, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis, Curse of Monkey Island), at least on computers.

Recipes for a Kosher Chick and Veggie Guy

I've been living more-or-less vegetarian for a while. Milchig and pareve, anyway. I decided a while ago to skip non-kosher meat from now on, knowing well that that pretty much rules out meat on most occasions, it being some expensive stuff to get in the wilds of Boise, idaho. Now I'm moving to California, where there are . . . more Jews than Idaho, I've been led to understand. There are even a few kosher options (apart from Hebrew nationals!) at Trader Joe's. It's still spendy, though.

And I'm moving in with a gorgeous vegetarian, so nix the idea of buying any of this kosher meat, because what's the fun of cooking for yourself? I've been looking up veggie recipes and writing down family classics that could be easily altered. But now, glory hallelujah: www.vegeusa.com.

First found out about this at Mai Thai, where we ate Smoked Duck that had never seen a feather, and chicken curry that had never been an contentious jerkface of a semidomesticated jungle pheasant. I'm looking into how much this stuff costs- because then, all of a sudden, so many more options open up.

Chicken with Weeds
Turkey on Toast
Shepherds' Pie
Fish Pie
Meatballs and Gravy
Pot Roast
Cholent
Maybe some sort of Chicken-alfredo Flammekuche

Hmmmmmmm.

Making a move

I like to make things. I like to sew fabric into tubes that go around my body, I like to make yarn into appendage-cozies, dice-cozies, neck-cozies . . . I like to make water and dried leaves into a delicious beverage, milled wheat into delicious cakes and muffins, dried legumes into delicious curries, and an unmade bed into a made bed. I like making my muscles harder/better/faster/stronger. I like making numbers on paper and some oddly-shaped dice into a whole fictional person. I like to make myself into different people with clothes and makeup. Occasionally, I even like making a sinkful of foodstained crockery into clean dishes.

Making a move, though? Oy. Maybe it's the nature of packing. Making all the things I've made and will make into . . . boxes of stuff. That's a devolution, I'd say, since, if anything, I want to make boxes of stuff into all the accoutrements of my fabulous life. I want to decorate, fill, feed, entertain, create, write, MAKE. Seeing my fabulous life in those boxes is disappointing. Not that I forget who I am with my things not immediately visible. Pas de tout! I just . . . kind of want to paint the boxes.

Eshet Chayil, or "A Woman of Valor", is the last bit of the Book of Proverbs, which is written by Solomon himself, so his legend tells. Though apparently the Aggadic Midrashim say it's Abraham's eulogy about Sarah Imeinu. Either way, it's become the thing for a husband to recite this to his wife at the end of the week, to thank her for all the thankless schlepping she's done all week. Which is nice.

Now I'm definitely not saying I'm the poster girl for this thing. I'd rather not rise in the middle of the night to begin my work, I'm rather partial to the bread of idleness, (with some cinnamon and sugar over a cup of tea, or with obscure cheese and red wine, yum!) and I'm not the perfect beam of womanly labour described. I imagine Sarah Imeinu could pack up the open-on-four-sides tent of Abraham, move it, wash and wax the camels (now I'm picturing a camel lying on a table in a spa, with the poor aesthetician looking at it in terror, holding the wax strips- Ha!), set it all back up, have cholent on the fire, bread coming out of the oven, homebrewed beer poured, and guests received without a kvetch. Then again, as the mother of the Jewish people, I expect more of her, and no doubt she managed a few pointed remarks (or at least pointed looks) to Abraham, Eliezer, and Hagar about the division of labor, even if she knew it would never be done as well if they did it. (Love you, Virgo Mom!)

But I seek wool and flax (though I'd say my weakness for yarn stores is not quite what was meant by that), make my arms strong (like ox!), and I smile at the future. I smile a lot. I guess it's worth the packing, my own failings, and seeing those boxes, and the mess surrounding them as more boxes are spawned from the wreckage, knowing that I'm going to be off, heading to a new fabulous life, and I can decorate Sacramento, or at least my corner of it, when I get there.

Teaching Hilarity

Then Jesus took his disciples up the mountain and, gathering them around him, he taught them, saying:

Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven
Blessed are the meek
Blessed are they that mourn
Blessed are the merciful
Blessed are they that thirst for justice
Blessed are you when persecuted
Blessed are you when you suffer
Be glad and rejoice for your reward is great in heaven

Then Simon Peter said, "Are we supposed to know this?"
And Andrew said, "Do we have to write this down?"
And James said, "Are we going to have a test on this?"
And Philip said, "I don't have a pencil!"
And Bartholomew said, "What came after poor?"
And John said, "The other disciples didn't have to learn this!"
And Mark said, "I don't get it."
And Judas asked to go to the bathroom.

And a Pharisee who was then present asked to see Jesus' lesson plan and inquired of Jesus, "Where are your anticipatory set and your objectives in the cognitive domain?"

And Jesus wept.

Shell Game

Ha! Awesome! Turn on the noise for your prize.

Opera!

My geeky pursuits

So this is what I look like when engaging in my second-geekiest of pasttimes: being a SCAdian.