Neptune Oyster= totally delicious, sharp, happy and unpretentious tiled little space, good wine list according to Molly, great oysters, buttery perfect lobster roll and fries. mmmmmm. Forgot my camera.
Posted in eating out
Thank [whoever is responsible for my life] that I get to read to children. It is one of the only times that the awful chitter chatter in my skull ever stops. And for a whole hour at a time. I read to a “bad” class of 3rd graders this morning- to get their attention I said I could read them something from this book that would probably be too scary for them. And too grown up. It terrifies me. The evil warlock keeps his heart in a crystal coffin and it gets so weird that it grows long bristly hair all over. When his new bride asks him to put the heart back, he cuts open his chest but it has grown too perverse. Their families find him crouched over her dead body licking and stroking her pure heart. Wildly inappropriate for third graders. 
boredom and disappointment are useful tools. i think.
Beverly Post Office Lamp Post
Nina and Owen have adopted a lovely rescued golden retriever named Ben to keep their Penny company. Ben is from Queens and has no idea how to swim- he manages to keep his entire head and neck out of the water and makes huge splashing movements. I think he’s walking along the bottom, cheating like a little kid.
We had a very good brunch by the Hudson. She could see the house in Nyack she shared with my grandfather for fifty years. I could see the hazy skyline of New York City down river.
found with grandma in rockefeller park
Reading this 2009 winner of the James Beard award for best cookbook, is like being stuck entertaining an obsessive condescending relative. It is “larded” with distracting magazine style fat factoids, likely found by having some intern do internet searches- Did you know in Tibet they drink butter tea???
It begins with the saga of how Americans lost their way from real food, a tale well told elsewhere, and from a fat evangelist this story is disingenuous. Foodies never gave up on fat- so the justification of the topic seems self congratulatory because that is clearly the audience of the book.
That said, the photos are gorgeous, I particularly like the marbled endpapers. And the recipes are clearly written and not overloaded with ingredients or fussy techniques. However, I don’t think organizing the book around the fats used in the recipe makes it very versatile. How often will I say, oh the Grenhams are coming for dinner, let’s make something with Leaf Lard?
One in thirty-one adult US citizens is either in prison, parole or on probation. This is absolutely fucking crazy. Some of my colleagues back in Brooklyn are doing amazing work with prisoners, in juvenile detention centers, even doing storytime on Riker’s Island. But, as was pointed out in an excellent training session we had- Everyone who works with the public works with prisoners and their families. That’s where we’re at as a nation.
This book is a quick thriller about one historian’s discovery of the real John Henry, mythologized in the song. He was a freed slave, imprisoned for ten years on trumped up charges in Reconstruction Virginia. To satisfy the need for laborers for grueling work on the railroad, prisoners were provided at one quarter the going wage. They died by the hundreds of black lung and were buried in hidden graves on the grounds of the penitentiary. Some survived and they spread the song and the story of John Henry (and how the system screwed him.) I had never thought before about the history of the disproportionate number of African Americans imprisoned that started once they were freed.
What does this have to do with Michael Vick? (Former quarterback of the Atlanta Falcons, now in disgrace) Well, he’s a black man who’s been to prison. What does his story tell us about our culture? Football has some disturbing parallels to dog fighting itself, the way it uses up its athletes, leaving them physically wrecked and with brain damage if they play too long in the league. How do you think the media would be talking about this if he had been convicted of hurting his wife? The media is debating whether he should be allowed to play again, as if it were something that pundits could decide. I’m very curious to see where he ends up playing and how it’s spun.
Posted in book review, football
Tagged Ain't Nothing But a Man, book review, Scott Reynolds Nelson
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