Modernism Makes Me Hungry...

Dear Reader,

Apologies for the silence. Things are very crazy what with my fitness kick, all of the books at the New York Public Library which demand my attention, etc. But I will take this moment to announce a new big plan. Yes, Christoph and I have a little transatlantic cottage industry going on and soon you will be able to view and buy our scrumptious designs, which will in turn finance our wedding celebrations which in turn you will prolly be invited to.

ATTACKED BY ZOMBIE IN PARK SLOPE

So, dear reader, you probably think of park slope like that recent .NYtimes article and as the land that has FARM. But, it also has a seedy side. Last week, when I was biking home from the coop, trying to make it before the downpour, I was attacked by a real life ZOMBIE. There I was, patiently waiting for the light to turn, and this Vicki Pollard-esque teenager on a fitness walk came up to me with blank blank zombie eyes and held onto my arm! She didn't say a thing. Luckily, the light changed and I pried her Zombie hands off of my arm, saying,"Ok, gotta go." Quelle cauchemar!

Toaster Oven? I say Most-er Oven!

Dear Reader,

As a person who does international moves to and from places with diffent voltages and plugs with alarming frequency I have very few electrical kitchen devices. But let me tell you about this rare and ingenius device that is a miracle worker on a hot day: yes the humble toaster oven! The high points of my culinary history have all been toaster oven concoctions- from my earliest experiments with mixing butter and sugar together (mmm!) and spreading the resulting caloric spread on toast and baking it until it caramelizes to the raisin bread with cheddar cheese melt (!!!) to my latest achievment: toasted veggies. Instead of cranking up the oven to a ridiculous temperature to roast my veggies (usually for an omelet or to toss with my farro pasta) I simply arrange the vegetables cut to pinky finger thickness, toss with salt, pepper and olive oil and toast twice. Amazing. But this story is a bitter sweet story. Toaster ovens are unavailable in the UK. Not even at John Lewis! the sadness! and they are a rare beast in France.

Pesticide: Not for Wusses

Dear reader,

Usually, I am all for organic stuff, but I draw the line very clearly with mosquitos. I am so totally not organic, but am actively conventional. There is a point at which public health concerns far outweigh any antipesticide wussiness. DEET! I'd rather bathe in the stuff than risk malaria, yellow fever, dengue fever, epidemic polyarthritis, Rift Valley fever, Ross River Fever, St. Louis encephalitis, West Nile virus(WNV), Japanese encephalitis, LaCross encephalitis, etc.

Air Conditioning is for wimps

Dear reader,

It is summer in NY. This means it is gross. It also means I'm even more swaddled in wool and cashmere than in the winter. This is because of air conditioning. I hate A/C most of the time and think it is only needed a few days out of the year. Ugh. It is killing me. A quick google search suggests that it will also kill your future children, as those chloroflurocarbons will knock out the ozone layer and more people will get skin cancer.

Fruits and Vegetables

So, dear reader, my computer is kaput! It, an Apple, is on its death bed as we speak. I would say it is basically a vegetable. Curses!

A new food challenge

So, dear reader, the $28/week food diet has crumbled. It interferes too much with my social life. If I were a recluse then sure it would be super easy. But I have a new food challenge! One that allows me to go to the market and buy fresh fruits and veggies. The 9 servings of fruit or vegetables a day eating plan. It is so much more fun.

Pajamas: 21st Century Fashion

(Prada Spring 2008 from men.style.com)

So, dear reader, if you've ever read a 20th century fashion book there was probably somewhere between a page and a chapter devoted to lingerie's influence on 20th century fashion (there was probably also a picture of Elizabeth Hurley in that Versace safety pin dress, unless they used that image in the "punk chapter"). Anyway, lingerie detailing is no longer transgressive. But pajamas as discussed in a previous posting are a whole new beast! Nothing says "hrumph and bah humbug" like pajamas. Will nightshirts be next? Paris men week is around the corner!

(Prada Spring 2008 from men.style.com)

Nightgowns: all day! everyday!

Dear Reader,

I love pajamas. I think sweatpants are the greatest invention ever, after cheese and cashmere. One day, I plan on being that successful eccentric that wears cashmere sweaters and sweatpants to work and listens to Radio 4 all day long, kind of like the creative anachronists at IBM in the olden days. Recently, I was listening to my Radio 4 Women's Hour podcast about these women that wear pajamas to pick up their kids from school. (I'll add a link once I'm no longer at a computer that blocks such dangerous sites) Genius, albeit sloppy! So, what I'm doing is wearing glorified nightgowns to work, with some cashmere cardigans.

Soon, I'm going to write about the dress and how I don't think it gets enough credit. But that post will require some thinking.

Consoling Consulates

Dear Reader,

As you no doubt know, I've spent a large chunk of my adult life as an expat. This means I've had all kinds of fascinating visa related experiences and anecdotes. Americans, studying abroad, in France must prove they have health care while Americans, studying in the UK, must prove their prior academic experiences. Most of my dealings with consulates and what not have been a headache at the very least. You try navigating these automated phone systems. But, the German Consulate in NY is the very model of the exception of these things. Not only was it easy to get connected with a real live operator, but this operator connected me to a real person's voice mail. This consular official called me back 5 minutes later! And he was charming and helpful, and once I get my paperwork, I get to stand the the line for "citizens"!

The Frugal Bride

Dear reader, you probably already know that I am getting married to my überdreamy fiance. Weddings and marriage are a wonderful distillation of my favorite things: food, shelter, and clothing. However, as Christoph and I are in the depths of poverty, I am trying do this as much frugality and sensibility as possible. I'm trying to channel the kind of wedding that is only found in young adult literature, like Laura Ingalls when she married Alfonso Wilder wearing her best black cashmere dress or Betsy from Betsy, Tacy, & Tib or Anne of Green Gables. So, with farm girl pluck let me share some of my hints:

1. My dress cost $40. It is the second dress I bought, but that one cost $100. So, I'm still 1/10th or 1/100th of what plenty of wedding dresses cost.
2. My shoes. I intend to spend an obscene amount of money (a paycheck) on a pair of shoes. These shoes are going to be exceptionally lovely and I will only buy a pair I can also wear with jeans to work.
3. Our honeymoon will be short and in Prague. We will be staying at this place; if you scroll down that front page you will see they make omelets all day long!

How bored are you?

Sometimes, dear reader, I have a lot of free time at work. And to cope with this problem, I have invented a super fun game:
1. Go to wikipedia
2. Click the "Random page" link on the left.
3. Use internal wikipedia links to navigate you to the wikipedia article on "scientology"
4. repeat until it is time to go home

Stop the presses! Absolutely not the sorrel loser!

Dear reader, I was very wrong. I did not buy sorrel, but rather something called "tetragonia." This stuff, also called New Zealand Spinach, is actually super healthy! According to wikipedia, Cap't Cook noticed it and made his crew eat it to prevent scurvy.

This sorrel loser

1. The $28 a week food challenge crumbled 36 hours into it. I was so good until I dragged Annie into Farm. I was exhausted and it was rainy. What is the answer? Wine and a scrumptious bacon, cheddar and tomato sandwich with fries and fresh herb mayo. Scrumptious, but certainly not within the budget unless I refrain from buying food all week. Hmmm.

2. I am the sorrel loser. So, there is this herb called Sorrel and for some reason I buy it in copious quantities. Which is not only expensive but actually DANGEROUS. Sorrel apparently contains a large quantity of oxalic acid which is toxic (according to the Joy of Cooking). So the question remains, what do I do with this vaguely delicious vaguely poisonous plant?

$28/week food challenge

I know it is totally played out and I'm way behind the bandwagon, but I'm starting the $28/week food challenge tomorrow! I see it as a fun culinary challenge that will leave me rich and thin (the social consciousness angle is important too, but lets be honest, something that makes you richer and skinnier is much more interesting.) This means no more brunches, lunches, etc, no more unless I can work it into the budget. I'm not going to include alcohol because that is boring. Other people can cook for me. And when I have people over it will be out of the budget. What is already in my kitchen (the farro, the bonito flakes, etc) I can use with impunity or budgeting.

How I plan on making this work:
-I don't eat meat, so that makes it easy.
-I will do all of my shopping at the Co-op to maximize quality for my price.
-My breakfasts of oatmeal cooked with water and salt are already super cheap.
-I will make my own breads. I'm more than partial to the world's most amazing bread recipe.
-I will buy local and organic produce when possible.
-I will keep thinking about how much money I will save (for new clothing, plane tickets to weddings- my own and other's) and how much thinner I will be (for new clothes and making plane flights to weddings- my own and other's- more comfortable).

Xenophobes make me really angry!

Every morning, rain or shine, summer or winter, I walk past a line of women I assume are day workers. These women are queued up even in the bitterest of winter mornings. It looks miserable, and I can't imagine how tough their lives must be. So this morning there were 2 women holding signs saying "illegals go home" and video taping the women. I don't know if I've ever witnessed such cruelty. I have a plan, though.

Adventures in reading over people's shoulders: Erotic literature and Bowhunting magazine

Dear Reader,

Rarely is there a morning that the A train doesn't whizz past my rinky-dink C train. The worst is when not one but 2 A trains in a row cut my train off, leaving us in the tunnel waiting. Often this feels like a much larger metaphor for all of the, perceived, injustice in my life. When I don't have a seat (tip of the injustice iceberg) it is worse. When I do have a seat, I can at least read my neighbors' reading material. Every week or so, somebody is reading something racy which is always good fun. But this morning, a man was eagerly reading and rereading his resubscription card to Bowhunting Magazine. He'd better not mess with my cashmere goats!

Food, Shelter & Clothing

Welcome to my new blog. I'm going to write about the above topics, of course, and some other things that strike my fancy like: kittens, epidemiology writing, and immigration law.

My dream

I recently dreamt that Christoph and I decided to move away from our busy city lives and start a cashmere goat farm. It was like reading a very exciting article in Vogue. Christoph and I were rosy cheeked and lean from our labors with cute farm kittens and chicks were running at our feet and (human and goat) kids in our arms. We'd eat our meals, hello goat cheese!, in the farmhouse at the big wooden table. From the house, we could see our goats, swaddled to keep their hair clean, gamboling in the fields. The fibers would be harvested, spun into yarns, and dyed with herbs from the garden. Then in our surprisingly high tech work room, cardigans would be whipped up on our Stoll machines (These machines are basically knit printers. You input your design, and a sweater prints out. Amazing!) These cardigan were available at Barneys and Takashimaya. And then, we'd make sure the goats were butchered halal and their hides were turned into gloves, available at Dover Street Market. It would be this magical slow food/fashion existence.