Sisters In Crime

When we took a field trip to the Norfolk County Jail, the jail admin were amused by the group's name, Sisters In Crime.  We're having a meeting  today, the Sisters, not the jail admin.  We always have a brunch to which everyone brings goodies.  I made a raspberry yogurt cake (2 boxes of fresh raspberries) because I wanted to try the recipe, and you do not ever, ever, bake a whole  cake for two people who are on a perpetual diet.  No!  It must be shared.  We took a taste of it yesterday, to make sure that it was "fit to eat."
It was.  Decidedly.  Possibly more so now, as I put the glaze on this morning.  Here is the link to the recipe. Epicurious rocks!  Good stuff from the late, lamented Gourmet and from Bon Appetit. raspberry yogurt cake

This week I'm cooking for a dinner after a memorial service.  I volunteered for appetizers and desserts for 20-25 people.  The service is in New York, so the cooler on wheels will be put into service.  I have a funny feeling of deja vu that I blogged about this earlier.

The appetizers will be a savory cheesecake with smoked salmon, cheese straws with pimenton, and the retro, always tasty hot artichoke dip.

Desserts are:  Lemon loaf cake, pecan pie bars, and rhubarb crumble cake.  Both the loaf cake and the pie bars can be made will in advance.  The person who would immensely enjoy the food is the one the memorial is for. 

Back to the Sisters.  I recall going to the first event where I heard of the group.  It was a book event at the Boston Public Library and I never saw the then president, J. Danyne Lamb,  since, but she got me going.   Must be close to 15 years ago.     I've met some fabulous writers including the group that published my short story, "Bad Trip," last fall.   Still awaiting "traditional" publication.  And waiting.  Recall the name of this blog.

There was a great article in the weekend Wall Street Journal about Steig Larson and his writing and untimely death.  A writer's worst nightmare.  A long-awaited publishing contract, and then you die before publication, before best-sellerdom and movies and all the hoo-hah.  I really feel for the man.

I'm heading for the showers.  Lovely spring day.  Perfect for a drive thru the countryside to visit with my Sisters.  We're reading works in progress today.  I'm introducing Lotto, the Colombian Drug Lord who plays against all the stereotypes.  What fun.


Toujours,

Grapeshot

       

Dove Sta Amore

Some observations about doves.  Both in our old neighborhood and here, we always had 3 doves hanging out together, a little menage a trois.  A week or so ago, when the snow started, they huddled together under the picnic table on the deck, where I have been throwing out bird seed.

A few days ago, there was a thud against the window and some poor sparrow, according to the book a swamp sparrow, who had been hanging out with the chicadees and juncos came to grief.  I watched and watched and finally he flew away.  Whew!  Did not want to bring him in for the night and plop him into the cat carrier.

Driving along I-495, we saw 40 or so doves on a wire, and fifty yards from there a hawk sitting in a tree top.  Didn't seem to freak out the doves, although one of them would have made a tasty meal.  Twice today I saw them swoop, go into formation and then settle on an electrical wire.  There seems to be some method to this, but I don't know what it is.  You can watch and observe your entire life and still not know the answers to practically anything, at least in the natural world.  I can't even figure out whose footprints are along the edge of the yard.  Not deer, bear, coyote, fox, raccoon, rabbit, skunk, squirrel, etc.  Who be it?  No idea. 

There was a disturbing article in the Wall Street Journal (Friday) about the end of the slush pile, just what a scantily published writer doesn't want to see, and another great article today about the popularity of the Scandinavian detective novel.  I am reading The Girl With the Dragon Tattoo, and after a slow start, it is now so scary that I can't read it before bedtime.   I loved the Wallendar series on PBS, too.  Good stuff.  I don't know who wrote the detective article, but it was thoughtful and well-researched.

I found the link for you, and the author is Laura Miller.  A good read!

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703657604575004961184066300.html

I found a great (so far) calorie counter on the web, googling free calorie counter.  Ye gods, some of them charged.  Since we eat a non-standard diet (no fast food, no takeout, no pizza) but a lot of ethnic dishes and retro faves cooked at home--with few prepared foods, I was dubious about finding the right tool, so I Googled "stuffed pork tenderloin" and "breaded pork tenderlion" and "goulash soup."  Guess what?  They all popped up on the calorie counter I finally picked.

What happened was, after our guests left, I had an unopened jar of peanut butter in the house and while I was debating whether to keep it or send it to the food pantry, I unaccountably found myself removing the lid and taking a knife and digging out a big portion.  That was last Sunday.  There is one helping left, which means I ate 2280 calories of peanut butter (no crackers, no jelly) this week in addition to my usual food, and the scale heralded the bad news this morning.  Hence the calorie counter.

I am not a person who likes any kind of diet, and the more rigid, the more preachy, the more "sincere" the more I want to race out of the house for a double cheeseburger, fries and a half-bottle of wine.  There is indeed something contrary about my personality.  Just like my dad.  Well, we know about the apple and the tree and how far it falls.

 I washed out of weight watchers either three or four times, until I lost count.  I mean, who had time to count points and you could eat a pile of sh__ but no butter, and I don't do butter substitutes.  Never.

South Beach diet was o.k., good recipes, but I didn't really lose much weight, because I don't do weird non-foods like "fat free half and half."  Ever read the ingredients on something like that?  Cripes, it will kill you. 

Dr. Atkins and I saw eye to eye, all that meat, all that fat, yum, and no boring potatoes or bread.  Except I spent the winter on the road and gained it all back.  Motel breakfast bars are just not calibrated for a high protein low carb breakfast. 

So it stood.  Lost the weight I gained last Christmas and kept it off thru January 5th, and then this week there was the incident of the peanut butter.  It is one of my "no control" foods, so I don't keep it in the house.  Fried chicken is another, but of course, you don't run into the kitchen and quick fry up a chicken and we are far enough away fromt the "Colonel" that this isn't a problem. I permit myself  7 Roche Bros. honey stung drummies for lunch ever so often.  About half a pound and it's mostly bones.  The lovely bones.  Everyone is panning the movie.

This post makes up, I hope, and thanks for sticking with me, for all the posts I haven't done lately.  Many tasks, with people and aggravations I don't want to discuss on the web.  Taking an on-line course on "Revision."  Revising Promiscuous Mode. 

Finally I have 3 ideas, one for each day between Denver and Reno for "In flight" and also my new Drug Lord scene.  So that's coming along if I could just write it.  And a terrible, awful idea for the climax. A really good twist.  Fortunately, no unfortunately, I'm not writing to deadline.  Only self-imposed, and I should get my butt planted on chair.  Actually, it has been, but I've been doing other computer stuff.

I'm learning Garage Band, too.  Not bad for an old broad.  Anyhow, onward to the sorting of the pile of paper on my desk, a few quick tasks, and then dinner.  The stuffed pork tenderloin.  I  just used Pepperidge Farm stuffing, a processed food, but it's a good quality brand.  We buy them the tenderloins as BOGOS, buy one, get one,  and it's good quality lean protein.  I like good quality lean protein, just like the flank steak earlier in the week.  The trick is not to eat too much, but enough so that you don't hit the PB at 11:30 p.m.  There's a trick to everything isn't there?

Such is life.

Grapeshot

Fresh Peach Ice Cream

Basically, except for my workout, all I have accomplished today is to make fresh peach ice cream and clean off my desk. Get web space for an organization. Answer questions. Clean up the kitchen. Get the ingredients out for potato pancakes. Make David Eyer's Hawaiian Pancake for breakfast, download a printer driver for my MAC that didn't work, decide on a new printer, clean the bathroom, medicate the cat, make a shopping list, send a bunch of emails. Figured out (I think) how to migrate from Money (love it!) to Quicken.

Even on a day when you do nothing, you do lots. Now I have missed my favorite food network programs, but I'm drinking good rum, and both cats are curled up and asleep lending an air of quietude to the home office.

Poor Annie seems to be wearing out. No energy. Sleeps all the time. Can barely jump on her chair. Very sad.

I haven't seen the new calf and her mother and suspect their owner has sold them back to where the mother came from. Major bummer. Iris and Maryann are hanging out and the third cow is in the herd but everyone else is gone, baby gone.

The people from the condo association showed up today and dug a trench through the back yard, trying to find out where the sprinkling sysem stopped working. Always something. Many reasons to drink rum.

The potato pancakes will be wonderful. I love potato pancakes. My recipe is from the Wall Street Journal. Go figure.

The market went up on this day or rain and unproductiveness. A productive day is when you write at least a few pages or do major edits. Not today. Not yet.

Tonight we will watch Oliver (1968) and that will be much fun. Good movie, good cast, good plot, good writer. Thank you Charles Dickens.

Amen

The Boston Globe

If the Boston Globe disappears, I'll have to change my life. Every morning, S.O. brings the Globe up to the bedroom with my coffee, and I drink and read until I am awake. This is a 26 year old ritual, and the Globe, like the coffee, is a daily fix. I can't even imagine life without it, and my favorite columnists, the curmudgeonly Alex Beam, the sports write-ups, the recipes and restaurant reviews. All the stuff I read about. Even the Craig's List Killer.

I mean, what could possibly replace the daily paper? I began reading The Denver Post when I was a young teenager, and at college I read the Houston Chronicle, then continued life with the St. Louis Post Dispatch, and the the Chicago Tribune. The daily paper is a part of my life, and I mean the LOCAL daily paper. We also get (hopeless readers that we are) the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times.

But we LIVE IN BOSTON.

Duh!

It would be awful if all those people lost their jobs. People I know. This just can't happen. I blog, I tweet, I friend, but I also read newsprint.

This just can't happen.

Grrrr.

People With Chaotic Lives and Starbucks Nation

A couple of posts ago, I mentioned "Checkout Line Rage," which is something that I apparently experience more frequently than most shoppers. Today at Roche Brothers in M., there checked out a woman so pathetic that my rage turned to sympathy. Well, kinda sorta.

We picked the shortest line, not noticing the the woman in front of us who was almost thru the line was on her cell phone. This appeared to be a super-important, life-changing, earth-shaking call, and when in the dim recesses of her brain she realized the whole process of checking out had halted because she had to, like, pay for the groceries, she went into high gear on the phone call, "I'm caught in a storm, yada yada, can I call you back, no leave a message for me, yada yada, ad infinitum.

Storm, my foot. It was just raining hard. We were all wet.

Damp and disheveled we stood, the clerk stood, the bagger stood, the woman stood. Finally she hung up and in a flurry (with this woman everything must be a flurry) of apologies wrote a check, dug out her Roche Bros. card, picked another card, yada yada, asked for $20 cash, and all the while I gazed at her handbag, a large, but not large enough affair, with money, a hair brush, a wallet so thick with cards that she must shop everywhere in Boston, a cell phone holder, natch, but of course the cell was jammed into the handbag, far from its holder. Wouldn't you know?

Then came another mysterious transaction, because somehow she had written the check for the wrong amount. Whatever. She needed to dig money out of the bowels of the handbag (not the visible money) and finally, finally, she was off to the parking lot. Hope she found her car keys. Wouldn't bet on it.

Meanwhile, I have gone from check-out-rage to extreme interest. Bleached blond with lots of roots, 40 pounds overweight, breathless, $25.00 worth of cigarette on the bill (which in Massachusetts is only three packs), living in total chaos.

I thought for half a second of offering to be her personal organizer. She obviously needed one. Badly. I mean, who makes a very life-changing telephone call in the check out line? Do you? I hope not. Do I?

I never use my cell in the store. What would I say? "I'm standing in the produce section." Or maybe, "do we have any scallions left in the fridge?" No, I make out my (computerized) list and check everything before I leave. Compulsive. Obsessive. Anal. Do not hold up lines pissing people off for ten minutes.

Then there is the other extreme. No not Grapeshot. The Wall Street Journal today had an article about custom built McMansions, or how the other 1% lives. Some people are really organized. A quilting room? I can just see the specialized storage cabinets for the fabric, a big narrow bin for the quilting hoop. Maybe a foldaway table. Likeway, sewing machine. A special thread case, so every color is evident. A place for everything.

And then there was the underwater sound system for the swimming pool. Who even has time to think these things up?

Our culture has become weird. Below is a link to a "Starbucks" post that tells more about the way we live.
A side note: We were in Berlin on a cold drizzly November day craving a cup of coffee, and found a Starbucks. Big line outside, no seating, natch, inside. Walked down the street and found a Dunkin' Donuts. No line, plenty of chairs, good coffee, even donuts. They had some local flavors you would never find here, like filled with plum jam. There did not seem to be any local coffee places like Tschibo in this neighborhood.


Read this. http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121685606602379105.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Grapeshot

The Gargoyle

Today's lesson is that you don't have to do everything right--in fact you can do everything wrong and still come out on top. Of course you must write a good book. Eventually.

The Wall Street Journal has the story of a young novelist who wrote a 195,000 word book and sent it off to agent Eric Simonoff along with a cheeky query. The novel was Gargoyle. Parts were good, parts were bad, but the good parts were good enough that Eric Simonoff sent back a detailed critique (almost unheard of) and much later the writer presented Simonoff with the much edited, much improved manuscript.

The POD technology allowed the author to actually send Simonoff a printed copy of the book, with blurbs, a dedication and all that good stuff. Even cheekier.

Cut to the finish. Author gets one million plus, and Simonoff gets fifteen percent. Copies translated to every language you ever heard of and some you didn't.

The author is Andrew Davidson of Winnipeg and he is to be congratulated for his originality, persistence, and creativity. What rules did he break?

1) Your first novel is supposed to be 80,000 words of less. Hmmmmm.

2) Query respectfully.

3) No gimmicks.

4) Took years to write. No pumping it out in twelve months.

I love it. I love it. I love it. Love people who break the rules and get away with it. The novel, Gargoyle, sounds riveting. You can catch the article here.

Small worries that the book may not play in Peoria, but so much of that sort of speculation is hogwash. Great word, that. Hogwash.

http://investing.wsj.com/article/SB121392716313490945.html?mod=fpa_editors_picks

Sidebar: I love gargoyles, especially the ones on Notre Dame and St. Stephan's church in Vienna. We found a tiny church with a Tiffany window in Georgia's Sea Islands that had a few very cool gargoyles. My youngest son used to amuse us by crouching like a gargoyle, holding the position for a long time. But then we are easily amused, "too soon made glad," as you recall.

Trekked to West Newton Cinema to see The Counterfitters, an excellent foreign film. See it if you get a chance. We watched (and watched and watched and watched) Barry Lyndon last night. Interesting. Langorous. Another good word. So many good words. Note to self: use them in interesting ways.

Grapeshot

Best Selling Books

Normally, I look at the New York Times Bestsellers everyweek in the Sunday NY Times Book Review section. Today I took a look at the Wall Street Journal's list and said, "huh?"

I didn't know most of the authors. How can this be? O.K. Lee Child is a given, and apparently his new book is really good. I came from Colorado and so I'm anxious to try to figure out where the book is set.

Lucky Stephanie Meyer has 3 books on the list. I googled her and she writes vampire/romance stuff which isn't on my radar. Wow! Three books. Must be doing something write, I mean right.

Didn't recognize Emily Griffin either. Looks like chic lit or mom lit or baby lit. Probably cute.
Laurel K. Hamilton was another writer I drew a blank on. Sci-Fi Romance. Jeez, vampire romance, sci-fi romance, mommy romance. Hmmmm. Lauren Weisburger I had heard of, but I saw the movie, didn't read The Devil Wears Prada. Maybe I should.

Dean Koontz, sure, a perennial best seller, as is James Patterson and whoever he's writing with. Steve Martini, another new one for me, writes legal thrillers.

Chuck Palahniuk has a new book. Snuff. Eeeww. Nuff said.

Patricia Cornwall. Yup!

Sebasian Faulks didn't ring a bell, but he is writing the new James Bond books, which I did read about. Shaken not stirred.

W.E. B. Griffin and a co-author are writing military adventures, that kind of thing. Sounded kind of like Clancy, but I am just doing a quick Google on all these people.

So: maybe a vampire, chic-lit romance with elements of law and some army adventures? I dunno. Nothing I will be writing soon.

Onward.

A Recipe Obsession

First it was Gourmet. Then finally, a cheap subscription opportunity to Bon Appetit. A relative recommended Cooks Illustrated. I got a free companion air ticket if I subscribed to Food and Wine. Of course the Globe and the NY Times and even the Wall Street Journal have recipes.

At the dentist the week I read Saveur, and tempted, told myself, no way. For a person who is always dieting, why do I put temptation front and center. It's not like I'm subscribing to Cooking Light.

And of course there's the web recipes: Epicurious that has a reprise from Bon Appetit and Gourmet. There's the Weber Kettle recipes, the smoker recipes, the this, the that.

I have 5 of my own "cookbooks" and 10 or so folders labeled "chicken" "salad" and well, you know, these folders are growing and I need to separate the stuff I've made from the stuff I want to try.

If we live into the next century I'll never make all the cakes I've clipped. Yesterday, in anticipation of company, I made a coffee cake like affair, with a thick yummy crumb topping. It was from Food and Wine and a photo follows. The day before we had enchiladas verdes, and were they ever good, both the chicken and the cheese.

It's hard to find tomatillos in New England. Tried to grown them once and it was a miserable failure: huge plants, no fruit.

See the next post for a photo of the cake.

Grapeshot

Narrative Trope or Narrative Tripe?

This morning Steve Almond has an instructive article in The Boston Globe about the faked memoir business.

If agents and publishers and the reading public want "true" stories, then writers are up against the wall and wanting to be published, they cave and pen fake memoirs as Margaret Seltzer did in Love and Consequences. "Truth and Consequences" might have been an apter title.

The Wall Street Journal weighed in with "would you rat out a relative?" and most people would indeed, if said relative lied about the family. (Sara Schaefer Munoz) Denying your life is ugly, the opposite of memoir.

Everyone has an opinion, and as someone who has been trying for years and years with only small (very small) success to publish my novels, I can sympathize with these authors, although their comuppance is deserved.

Reality TV rules, but I never watch that, either. Right now I'm mesmerized by "In Treatment" which seems so real one feels like a fly on the wall of the psychiatrist's office. But it's a story. Story. What a good word!

What is real? Spring approaches! I heard a peewee calling in the woods today and spied two robins by the cemetery. The squirrels were playing tag, and I got so inspired I cleaned off the leaves over the storm drain. The chives are up an inch, and I could get thyme,oregano and sage if I wanted to.

Write something good. Write something true and write the best way you know. Truthfully.

Grapeshot

In relaxation mode in robe du chambre

The Wall Street Journal had a long article yesterday about how hotel guests are trekking all over the hotel, esp. to the public rooms in the robes provided for use in the spa. Other guests do not take to the sight of hairy male legs, cellulite, exposed bellies, etc. during their brunch or cocktails. Some hotels are trying to be strict about this--others are apparently throwing up their hands and yet others are trying to find less revealing designs for the robes.

For years it has been de riguer to wear shoes and a coverup between the pool and your room, and not stroll about in your bathing suit. The idea that anyone would wonder around, and even sit in the bar in a bathrobe causes wonder in my (all right) somewhat conventional brain.

One guest told the reporter: "it alerts the world that I am in relatxation mode and that I am pampering myself becaue I believe I'm worth it. " So as always, it's "all about me." What Bullshit!

It's the Sonny B. syndrome. In suburban Chicago, we had a neighbor, Sonny B., who was very overweight and wore a too, too short bathrobe. Sonny B. used to sit on his freezer in the garage (door open) in his robe, a weird if familiar site. He also wandered out to pick up the morning paper in his robe, with nothing underneath, or course, and when he bent over, well, you get the idea, a horrible sight that the entire neighborhood knew and chuckled about. I guess he just thought WTF? It wasn't about Sonny; het just didn't care. Or as the Journal quotes, "It is about overtly displaying that you are 'at home' in such a luxurious environment, and therefore relaxed enough to be seen in public in your robe.'" More B.S.

I dunno. Or as Noel Coward asks, "Why Do The Wrong People Travel?"

I have to confess I have been known to nip out and retrieve the newspaper in my jammies, which are modest, and I'm not in the freaking hotel lobby, in fact I'm not in a luxurious environment at all, but in the front yard. Early in the a.m. But I am overtly displaying that I am at home, because I am at home.

Toddles on A Plane, The Day of the Killer Bathrobes, the Relentless Robed Ones. What do you think?

Grapeshot