Random quote #1
Sunday, August 31st, 2008“I am just a lady with a simple lady mind.”
Sarah Haskins in Target Women:Birth Control
Archive for August, 2008
The Omnivore’s 100
Sunday, August 31st, 20081) Copy this list into your blog or journal, including these instructions.
2) Bold all the items you’ve eaten.
3) Cross out any items that you would never consider eating.
4) Optional extra: Post a comment here at the Very Good Taste blog linking to your results.
The VGT Omnivore’s Hundred:
1. Venison
2. Nettle tea
3. Huevos rancheros
4. Steak tartare
5. Crocodile
6. Black pudding
7. Cheese fondue
8. Carp
9. Borscht
10. Baba ghanoush
11. Calamari
12. Pho
13. PB&J sandwich
14. Aloo gobi
15. Hot dog from a street cart
16. Epoisses
17. Black truffle
18. Fruit wine made from something other than grapes
19. Steamed pork buns
20. Pistachio ice cream
21. Heirloom tomatoes
22. Fresh wild berries
23. Foie gras
24. Rice and beans
25. Brawn, or head cheese
26. Raw Scotch Bonnet pepper
27. Dulce de leche
28. Oysters
29. Baklava
30. Bagna cauda
31. Wasabi peas
32. Clam chowder in a sourdough bowl
33. Salted lassi
34. Sauerkraut
35. Root beer float
36. Cognac with a fat cigar
37. Clotted cream tea
38. Vodka jelly/Jell-O
39. Gumbo
40. Oxtail
41. Curried goat
42. Whole insects
43. Phaal
44. Goat’s milk
45. Malt whisky from a bottle worth £60/$120 or more
46. Fugu
47. Chicken tikka masala
48. Eel
49. Krispy Kreme original glazed doughnut
50. Sea urchin
51. Prickly pear
52. Umeboshi
53. Abalone
54. Paneer
55. McDonald’s Big Mac Meal
56. Spaetzle
57. Dirty gin martini
58. Beer above 8% ABV
59. Poutine
60. Carob chips
61. S’mores
62. Sweetbreads
63. Kaolin
64. Currywurst
65. Durian
66. Frogs’ legs
67. Beignets, churros, elephant ears or funnel cake
68. Haggis
69. Fried plantain
70. Chitterlings, or andouillette
71. Gazpacho
72. Caviar and blini
73. Louche absinthe
74. Gjetost, or brunost
75. Roadkill
76. Baijiu
77. Hostess Fruit Pie
78. Snail
79. Lapsang souchong
80. Bellini
81. Tom yum
82. Eggs Benedict
83. Pocky
84. Tasting menu at a three-Michelin-star restaurant.
85. Kobe beef
86. Hare
87. Goulash
88. Flowers
89. Horse
90. Criollo chocolate
91. Spam
92. Soft shell crab
93. Rose harissa
94. Catfish
95. Mole poblano
96. Bagel and lox
97. Lobster Thermidor
98. Polenta
99. Jamaican Blue Mountain coffee
100. Snake
Some meat and fish has sneaked in from my pre-vegetarian days. I had my first Krispy Kreme doughnut about three months ago. I am very unlikely to ever try the alcohol drinks not scored through but I have no objection to them. Carob chips and Lapsang souchong should have their own “tried once” marker.
Ingrid Bergman 29/08/15 - 29/08/82
Friday, August 29th, 2008
This is probably my favourite photograph of her. I hope there is no need to explain why.
When I was a teenager I saw every English language film Ingrid Bergman made from Intermezzo to The Inn of the Sixth Happiness (with the exception of either Rage in Heaven or Adam Had Four Sons, I can’t remember which) and I have seen the majority of the films she made thereafter.
I had never seen even a glimpse of her pre-Hollywood Swedish or German films until I found clips on YouTube. I love the Internet at times like these when the kindness of strangers results in the sharing of rare things.
I chose the second clip of Die Vier Gesellen because it shows Ingrid making sandwiches which I guess is something she loved to do. I hope it wasn’t just the cleaning she liked: This excerpt from Isabella Rossellini’s memoir, Some of Me, is hilarious
Second to acting, Mother loved cleaning, which is not to say she loved even that above me. I’m sure she loved me more than cleaning, but what made her happiest was combining the two. We cleaned together.
She was beautiful. At times breathtakingly so. She was a little gawky and she was very tall (and naturally perfect to play The Small Woman). In the clips from Die Vier Gesellen, she is considerably taller than her female co-stars which is not reflected in this programme cover:
Great play is made of her lack of make-up in her US films and her naturalness. I think the difference between tweaked and left alone is startling in the following two images from the same period:
I recognise now that I had a huge crush on her when I was a teen. She was gorgeous and charming. What’s not to crush on?
I’m not sure about her acting ability although I am hypercritical about people who I like a lot and so tend to over-analyse their performances. However, she was mesmerizing in Casablanca and Notorious and I love her “little brown babies” turn in Murder on the Orient Express (not that it was Oscar worthy!). Many of her films I have long since forgotten the detail of them. What was Saratoga Trunk about? I know I have seen For Whom the Bell Tolls but I can’t remember anything at all about it. The Bells of St Mary’s made me feel queasy, I remember that. Gaslight is a glossy version of the superior British film. Spellbound is excellent while Notorious is a top-notch gripping Hitchcock. The US films she made immediately after her Rossellini hiatus are awful. She must be the only triple Oscar to not actually deserve any of them - I mean Anastasia… She wasn’t even nominated for Notorious which is quite probably her greatest performance. She was nominated for For Whom the Bell Tolls and not for Casablanca. Wev! Oscars mean squat.
She died on her 67th birthday after suffering for many years with breast cancer. I was very upset.
Hmm, glasses.
A woman who enjoyed life.
Oh my.
Penny
Monday, August 25th, 2008
It’s hard to take good pictures of a cat in artificial light with a nearly black face.
Anyway, this is Penny, our new cat and my first ever kitten.
Ahem
Sunday, August 17th, 2008Right now if you type after ellen or afterellen or “afterellen” or, even, “after ellen” in Google the top result is After Elton. Seriously.
Google, I wanted this.
Not victim blaming
Wednesday, August 13th, 2008When one cabinet minister suggested a curfew on women to deal with an outbreak of assaults on women at night, Golda countered, “But it’s the men who are attacking the women. If there’s to be a curfew,” she decreed, “let the men stay at home.”
Burkett, E., 2008. Golda, New York, HarperCollins, p.247