As a goal for 2011, I want to read 100 books. This should not be very hard for me, as I read pretty fast. So to make it more of a challenge I am not counting books I have read before (unless they are for PSBC, as we read deeply and in depth) or books written for teenagers.
My progress so far, with my notes:
1. The Swan Thieves, Elizabeth Kostova.
2.Year of the Flood, Margaret Atwood. This one is so, so, so good. The Sequel/companion to Oryx and Crake, which I read in December. Margaret Atwood is maybe my favorite author.
3. Faithful Place, Tana French. Sort of sequel to The Likeness and In The Woods, which were beautifully written but bleak as hell. This one is cheerier (although still dark) and a better story, with the same lovely words.
4. The Possessed: Adventures with Russian Books and the People who Read them, Elif Batuman. Funny! Not sure how enjoyable it would be to someone who doesn't read russian books, but I loved it.
5. Purgatorio, Dante Alighieri. I read half of this in december, but it was hard so it counts.
6. The Scarpetta Factor, Patricia Cornwell.
7. Bite Me, Christopher Moore. Also very funny.
8. Devil in the White CityEric Larson.
02 February 2011
28 January 2011
Haiku
My sister and I email (almost) every day. Needless to say, with both of us in big-girl* jobs, they can get a little repetitive. Today we described our days in haiku.
E's day:
Heart Ninth Ward Awards
I have a sinus headache
Macaroni and Cheese
Mine (I did two!):
Woke up late today
Pandora thinks that I love
the crap band coldplay
It is not snowing!
one cara cara orange
was my meager lunch
*postdoc counts as a big girl job, right?
E's day:
Heart Ninth Ward Awards
I have a sinus headache
Macaroni and Cheese
Mine (I did two!):
Woke up late today
Pandora thinks that I love
the crap band coldplay
It is not snowing!
one cara cara orange
was my meager lunch
*postdoc counts as a big girl job, right?
17 January 2011
Things I cooked this weekend
1. Bess Feigenbaum's Cabbage Soup
There's always something about cooked cabbage that I don't quite like-I don't know what it is, it isn't the taste or texture. Anyways, I decided to give this soup a shot and found it pretty good! very filling and rich, despite having no meat or even broth in it. Just a lot of tomatoes and cabbage. I simplified a little by cutting the carrots and onion super tiny in the food processor before I started and using crushed rather than whole tomatoes so I could skip the immersion blender step. I added some chopped dill at the end, and topped it off with creme fraiche. It's deliciously unique tasting, and while there is still that weird cabbagey-ness, it was diminished enough that I had some leftovers for lunch today and froze rest instead of immediately removing all traces of the dish from the house like I did last time I cooked cabbage.
2. Cardamom-Oatmeal pancakes, adapted from here
While they look beautiful in the NYT pictures, and sound simple enough in the recipe, these were a pain in the ass to make. I think the recipe made seven or so pancakes, and I had two that turned out well. Those two were delicious, but the other five were soggy on the inside and burnt on the outside and just gross.
3. Pumpkin bread with chocolate chips and pecans, for my lab. I told them offhand that I baked when I was stressed out, and they have since been threatening to ruin my experiments or sabotage my rig to build stress and induce baking. This will hopefully ward off such talk for a while.
4. Tagine-style Chickpea and fruit stew with cilantro-mint couscous.
My own cobbled together recipe-another vegetarian dish, warm and spicy and filling. Good for cold winter nights!
There's always something about cooked cabbage that I don't quite like-I don't know what it is, it isn't the taste or texture. Anyways, I decided to give this soup a shot and found it pretty good! very filling and rich, despite having no meat or even broth in it. Just a lot of tomatoes and cabbage. I simplified a little by cutting the carrots and onion super tiny in the food processor before I started and using crushed rather than whole tomatoes so I could skip the immersion blender step. I added some chopped dill at the end, and topped it off with creme fraiche. It's deliciously unique tasting, and while there is still that weird cabbagey-ness, it was diminished enough that I had some leftovers for lunch today and froze rest instead of immediately removing all traces of the dish from the house like I did last time I cooked cabbage.
2. Cardamom-Oatmeal pancakes, adapted from here
While they look beautiful in the NYT pictures, and sound simple enough in the recipe, these were a pain in the ass to make. I think the recipe made seven or so pancakes, and I had two that turned out well. Those two were delicious, but the other five were soggy on the inside and burnt on the outside and just gross.
3. Pumpkin bread with chocolate chips and pecans, for my lab. I told them offhand that I baked when I was stressed out, and they have since been threatening to ruin my experiments or sabotage my rig to build stress and induce baking. This will hopefully ward off such talk for a while.
4. Tagine-style Chickpea and fruit stew with cilantro-mint couscous.
My own cobbled together recipe-another vegetarian dish, warm and spicy and filling. Good for cold winter nights!
12 January 2011
10 January 2011
New Apartment
Life here is good but busy! I started work a week ago, and am loving the new job so far. It is very, very different than my old job, in good ways. My scientific adventures have been thus far limited to safety training, observing the rest of the lab at their set-ups, wandering through the Ivy League's University of Phoenix Online-level bureaucracy, installing stuff and cleaning up my rig and finding creative ways to break electrodes before they make it into my slices. Better luck tomorrow?
So even though I put these on a facebook a while ago, I realized I hadn't posted any pictures here of my new apartment. Which is silly because I LOVE my apartment, even though large parts of it are unfurnished and will continue to be that way for the next few months.
My Bedroom: identical to all of my previous bedrooms. Little but cozy! I love it.
The Office: The last room with unpacked boxes. Wah.
The third bedroom will be a guest room,someday. Currently, it is the cats' room.
Living Room, complete with sunny bay windows! Eventually, I will replace the pile of boxes with a TV, restain the tv stand and endtable, move the ugly chair into the office, paint the walls and buy curtains and real furniture. For now, I spend most of my free time curled up here with a book
Books: arranged by color. naturally. The dning room will also be painted and curtained, and the dining room table (not visible, currently covered in junk) will be refinished or painted.
The kitchen has kindof a stupid layout, with a big empty kitchen proper with a stove, fridge, and rolling dishwasher, and then a little pantry with cabinets and counters and a sink. It's not super efficient but that said I love having all the space and more than 18 square inches of counters. I'll probably get a little island for the kitchen which will give me a place to chop and prep things closer to the stove.
Last by not least, my balcony, currently snow covered...one more thing that makes me look forward to spring.
So even though I put these on a facebook a while ago, I realized I hadn't posted any pictures here of my new apartment. Which is silly because I LOVE my apartment, even though large parts of it are unfurnished and will continue to be that way for the next few months.
My Bedroom: identical to all of my previous bedrooms. Little but cozy! I love it.
The Office: The last room with unpacked boxes. Wah.
The third bedroom will be a guest room,someday. Currently, it is the cats' room.
Living Room, complete with sunny bay windows! Eventually, I will replace the pile of boxes with a TV, restain the tv stand and endtable, move the ugly chair into the office, paint the walls and buy curtains and real furniture. For now, I spend most of my free time curled up here with a book
Books: arranged by color. naturally. The dning room will also be painted and curtained, and the dining room table (not visible, currently covered in junk) will be refinished or painted.
The kitchen has kindof a stupid layout, with a big empty kitchen proper with a stove, fridge, and rolling dishwasher, and then a little pantry with cabinets and counters and a sink. It's not super efficient but that said I love having all the space and more than 18 square inches of counters. I'll probably get a little island for the kitchen which will give me a place to chop and prep things closer to the stove.
Last by not least, my balcony, currently snow covered...one more thing that makes me look forward to spring.
03 January 2011
In Which the P.Sister Book Club compares Ke$ha to Dante
The PSBC is about 1/3 of the way through our Devil and God reading list. We've gotten derailed several times-dissertations, moving, trips to france (Guess which one wasn't me!). But we're back on track and currently reading Dante's Purgatorio. Today's discussion:
Elizabeth: so
am I just not reading closely enough to notice the torture
Elizabeth: or is it just literally like,
you have to climb to redeem yourself.
me: well
to continue your thought
I think it is a sort of metaphysical mind over matter
in that
once you know you are saved and headed towards god
the pain and suffering don't really matter
me: sort of like how an addict will walk through fire for a hit of coke
Elizabeth: I suppose you're right.
Elizabeth: Jesus is your drug?
me: your love is my drug
is a song
about god
Elizabeth: Ke$ha is a prophet
I always said.
me: Ke$ha is the dante of our time
Elizabeth: so
am I just not reading closely enough to notice the torture
Elizabeth: or is it just literally like,
you have to climb to redeem yourself.
me: well
to continue your thought
I think it is a sort of metaphysical mind over matter
in that
once you know you are saved and headed towards god
the pain and suffering don't really matter
me: sort of like how an addict will walk through fire for a hit of coke
Elizabeth: I suppose you're right.
Elizabeth: Jesus is your drug?
me: your love is my drug
is a song
about god
Elizabeth: Ke$ha is a prophet
I always said.
me: Ke$ha is the dante of our time
panda cow!
From my mom comes this: A cow with panda markings! Side note: Mad props to the Washington Post for clarifying that the cow was not, in fact, part panda
My favorite animal mixed with the animal I most feared as a little girl! So many mixed feelings!
My favorite animal mixed with the animal I most feared as a little girl! So many mixed feelings!
31 December 2010
Goodbye 2010
Lots of people seem eager to bid 2010 adieu, but I don't know, it hasn't been the worst year for me. It's been a weird year. I published two papers, wrote a dissertation, got a job, lost a grandparent, graduated, reached a point where I finally felt at home and secure in a routine and group of friends in Birmingham...and then moved 1100 miles away by myself with two cats in a Uhaul. I did a lot of things I've never done before (see: dissertation, uhaul), which makes me feel like 2010 made me braver and stronger. It was maybe a more deeply felt year than most-more sweetly happy times, more intensely sad times, longer stretches of nearly unbearable stress. At any rate: for me, 2010 was one for the books, and soon it will be done. Bring it, 2011.
PS: new year's eve in a new city with no friends or acquaintances or even a TV=drinking a little bottle of champagne by myself (with the cats? does that count as not drinking alone? The cats don't get champagne, though. They have not been good today/ever in their lives and I don't think wine is good for cats anyways), reading The Blind Assassin and going to bed at 11! This somehow makes me nostalgic for my early teen years, when I spent NYE drinking white grape diet rite soda in a champagne glass, watching Dick Clark and trying hard to stay up until midnight while my mom and dad dozed off on the couch.
PS: new year's eve in a new city with no friends or acquaintances or even a TV=drinking a little bottle of champagne by myself (with the cats? does that count as not drinking alone? The cats don't get champagne, though. They have not been good today/ever in their lives and I don't think wine is good for cats anyways), reading The Blind Assassin and going to bed at 11! This somehow makes me nostalgic for my early teen years, when I spent NYE drinking white grape diet rite soda in a champagne glass, watching Dick Clark and trying hard to stay up until midnight while my mom and dad dozed off on the couch.
30 December 2010
Holidays
Back in Providence after a long Christmas with my family in Ohio. There was snow and wine and food and family and friends, a good time was had by all.
In my family, many of our holiday traditions revolve around food. My parents are among the last of a kind of solid midwestern type- a generation away from a factory or family farm, with hobbies that include saving money, sticking to a low-cholesterol diet, and paying their bills on time. Christmas has always been a time to let loose, at least in the solid midwestern sense of the word. For us, that means a parade of indulgent food that we only eat once a year. My mom makes six kinds of cookies (a total of 25 dozen), including sugar cookies which we frost as garishly as possible. The highlight is the angel of death, my dad's annual masterpiece
Christmas Eve is Carolina BBQ Pork, Hush Puppies and Coleslaw, followed by church then basically another dinner.
That's Trail Bologna (a local "delicacy"), cheese, apples, pears, crackers, almond cake with cherry filling, and a new addition, gelled cosmopolitans. We tried to make the cosmos in festive holiday molds, but when that failed we put it in a bowl and cut it into wedges. Because we are classy.
Christmas morning involves getting showered and dressed before anyone touches presents. We have fruit salad, Stollen (a german cake-bread thing) and Peach Fizzy, which is actually a recipe for a Bellini with Ginger Ale instead of Champagne. I was about 24 when I figured this out. This year's stollen was a little less bread-like and more sheetcake-like due to my dear sister forgetting to add 1/2 the flour. oops!
To work off all these extra calories, or at least atone for them, Dad and I went on a little hike at a nearby park. It was lovely, and cold.
Even the taxidermied coyotes got in on the holiday spirit.
All in all, a nice restful break. I'm glad to be back in my new home with a few days to organize my life, and excited to start my new job on monday!
In my family, many of our holiday traditions revolve around food. My parents are among the last of a kind of solid midwestern type- a generation away from a factory or family farm, with hobbies that include saving money, sticking to a low-cholesterol diet, and paying their bills on time. Christmas has always been a time to let loose, at least in the solid midwestern sense of the word. For us, that means a parade of indulgent food that we only eat once a year. My mom makes six kinds of cookies (a total of 25 dozen), including sugar cookies which we frost as garishly as possible. The highlight is the angel of death, my dad's annual masterpiece
Christmas Eve is Carolina BBQ Pork, Hush Puppies and Coleslaw, followed by church then basically another dinner.
Christmas morning involves getting showered and dressed before anyone touches presents. We have fruit salad, Stollen (a german cake-bread thing) and Peach Fizzy, which is actually a recipe for a Bellini with Ginger Ale instead of Champagne. I was about 24 when I figured this out. This year's stollen was a little less bread-like and more sheetcake-like due to my dear sister forgetting to add 1/2 the flour. oops!
Even the taxidermied coyotes got in on the holiday spirit.
All in all, a nice restful break. I'm glad to be back in my new home with a few days to organize my life, and excited to start my new job on monday!
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