Cover your Aslan
Fun reading this morning in the New Yorker (December 12, 2005): film critic Anthony Lane dishes on “The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe”:
It was only a matter of time before a major studio got its talons into C.S. Lewis. The only thing delaying any attempt to film his Narnia novels was the lack of technology; until recently, for example, there was no computer-imaging program powerful enough to re-create a wholly convincing wardrobe.
. . .
And so to the conceit that, for decades, has stirred both the souls of the faithful and the loins of professional Freudians: first Lucy, then Edmund, then all four children feel their way uncertainly through the folds of a deep, furry passage and into another world.
I read all seven Narnia books as a kid, not because I liked them (I preferred science fiction, surprise surprise, although when it came to fantasy, Lloyd Alexander’s Prydain series had my vote as best runner-up to Tolkien), but because I had pre-pubescent obsessive compulsive disorder and I had to finish any series I started. I remember enjoying only one of the books — The Voyage of the Dawn Treader. Can’t remember a single thing about it, though.
I tried rereading Alexander’s books recently, and found them to be thin gruel compared to Tolkien. Anthony Lane comes to the same conclusion regarding C.S. Lewis:
When, as a grownup, I finally opened “The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe,” it struck me as woefully thin soil, with none of the gnarled roots of lore and language on which Tolkien thrived.
Well, we can’t all be Tolkien, even if we’re C.S. Lewis (or Lloyd Alexander).
My favorite fantasies written in the last 20-or-so years, not counting Terry Pratchett’s work: David Gemmell’s Legend and Glen Cook’s The Black Company, both of which taught me a lot about writing. They would both make splendid movies, too.
Neither of those novels ripped off the Tolkien universe. I am soooo sick of elves and dwarves.
D.
Editing update and a quote source
Lest you think I’ve been a lazy boy: yes, I’ve been working on my big mothah manuscript. My NaNo month left me a bit rusty as regards my novel, so I started over from scratch. I met and passed the 1/8 mark just a moment ago. Yippee!
Thumbnail description of The Brakan Correspondent, for those of you who aren’t intimately familiar with it already:
A respected newspaper journalist’s quest for the truth pits him against imperialistic aliens, his oppressive government, and cannon-wielding semi-intelligent pigs.
Sucks, doesn’t it? I prefer the blurb I gave over at pbw’s site once upon a time:
Del.icio.us Fo.cacc.ia
Technological sophomore that I am, Del.icio.us remains a mystery to me even after I checked it out. Yahoo bought Del.icio.us today. I gather they are some sort of Web 2.0 search engine. But is it a search engine, or a “social bookmarking service”? (Which is what, pray tell?)
Content drives web traffic, so my ignorance puts me in a bind. Still . . . while I may not know much about Del.icio.us, I do know plenty about Del.icio.us food. Del.icio.us Fo.cacc.ia, to be exact.
While the ingredients are simple enough, there are a few toys which make this recipe sing: a good mixer, a rubber spatula for scraping down the sides of the mixer, an open-ended cookie sheet, a pizza stone, and parchment paper. Of these, the last three are indispensable.
2 cups all purpose flour
1 cup room temperature water
1/2 to 1 packet of yeast
1 tsp salt
1 tablespoon olive oil
More olive oil to brush the focaccia
A variety of goodies to sprinkle on your focaccia (details below)
Sprinkle the yeast on the water; stir to dissolve.
Combine flour, salt, and olive oil. With the mixer on the lowest speed, add water/yeast mixture in a stream. Use the spatula to scrape down the sides. Keep stirring until the dry and wet ingredients are combined, and the gluten has begun to develop (about five minutes max).
Coat a bowl or 1 Quart measuring cup with olive oil. Turn the dough out into the cup and cover with plastic wrap. At room temperature, the dough will take 1 to 2 hours to rise*. At least 30 minutes prior to the end of this rise, turn your oven on as hot as it will go (450 to 500).
You’ll have a VERY wet dough, so don’t even think of kneading this baby. Using the spatula, scoop the dough out onto a big square of parchment paper (about 14 inches by 14 inches). The parchment paper needs to be on the open-ended cookie sheet (or use a pizza peel, if you’re a real pro).
Using your fingers, spread the dough out as thinly as you can. It doesn’t need to look pretty — focaccia is supposed to be rustic, okay? I shoot for 13 inches by 13 inches.
Paint the top with olive oil. Now it’s time to add goodies. I like to top my focaccia with freshly ground black pepper, coarse salt (the stuff you would use on a pretzel or salt bagel), and onion. To keep the onion from burning, I chop it finely and mix it with some olive oil.
Fresh herbs are great on focaccia. Rosemary, thyme, garlic are all great additions. Once again, mix these additions with a bit of olive oil to discourage burning.
Using your cookie sheet (or pizza peel), slide the focaccia onto the hot stone. Bake for about 15 to 20 minutes, but keep a close eye on it. It should turn a nice golden brown.
If you cut the cooking time short by about 5 minutes, you can use this as a killer base for a pizza.
Easy!
D.
*Depends on how much yeast you use, how warm your kitchen is, how active your yeast is, etc. The original recipe called for only 1 teaspoon of yeast, but that sometimes ended in disaster (cold day or old yeast = flabby dough). That’s why I increased the yeast to a full packet. If your dough goes crazy and is ready before you are, no problem. Punch it down with an oiled spoon and let it rise again.
Richard Pryor, 1940-1965
Way too young to exit the stage.
Per CNN, he died of a heart attack. The CNN article has several links to video clips, including a 3 minute bit from an interview with Larry King. Check it out, and drink a toast to Richard.
Not at all clear to me whether the heart attack had anything to do with his other illness, multiple sclerosis. I can’t make a connection, but the news agencies aren’t releasing many details. I know this much: late adult onset MS is a bitch, far worse (on average) than young adult onset MS.
Here’s the Wikipedia biography on Pryor. Woefully absent is any tangible glimpse of Pryor’s humor. I hope that in the coming days, some kind folks will step forward and edit the Wiki entry to correct that deficiency.
D.
Interlude
One of those weeks.
I’d wanted to blog last night, but I had to go in to see someone who didn’t want to see me, and . . . well, doctor-patient confidentiality must be respected.
I don’t think it’s unrelated that I dreamed last night of throwing it all in. “Let’s sell everything and move down to Mexico,” I told Karen in the dream, and amazingly, she went for it.
Next thing I knew, we were packing up for the move. We must have gotten rid of a lot of our junk, since we managed to fit everything into one of the smaller U-haul trucks. I felt exhausted that we were moving AGAIN, but I also felt exhilarated. I’m a wandering Jew at heart, and I’d been in one place far too long. We were moving on.
Then a wasp flew into my ear and I had that awful plugged sensation layered with batshit-crazy hindbrain terror whenever it buzzed its wings, and the dream became a nightmare, just like any other nightmare. And then I woke up.
Well, at least the sea is still as pretty as ever.
D.
Re: Butt implants
Hey, check it out: Monica Jackson gets a shout-out at pop culture site YesButNoButYes for her October 25 blog on some blonde bimbo with a big butt. Follow the ass-man link.
Go Monica!
Me, I’m pro-natural. I once felt some oooooold breast implants* and boy howdy those felt like croquet balls in there.
D.
*General surgery internship — breast examinations are a mandatory part of training. Really.
Viral Videos Part 1: Phazer blast from the past
I can’t get enough of this: a striking young Leonard Nimoy sings “The Ballad of Bilbo Baggins” while five mod hipsters provide accompaniment.
I feel a little bad for Nimoy. Typecast as Spock, his acting career never really went anywhere. IMDB has the details. Lots of voice acting, few meaty roles. I thought he was great as the prophet Samuel in the 1997 TV production David, and as pop psychologist David Kibner in the 1978 Invasion of the Body Snatchers. I hear him several times each week, whenever I play Civilization IV.
A more painful video — watch it once, and you’ll probably not feel the need to do it again: William Shatner sings “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds.” He brings to the song all the subtlety and understatement he employed to great effect as James T. Kirk. Go on, watch it, and cringe.
While you’re at it, don’t forget that Nichelle Nichols (Uhura) is an accomplished vocal stylist. The Star Trek theme has words — who knew?
D.
Saving Gotham
D r i f t g l a s s has a stirring meditation this morning on the State of the Union, with reference to the Batman mythos:
And if one were inclined in that direction, one could also see it [Batman Begins] as a Lost Liberal Parable for the 21st Century.
Thomas Wayne, who “nearly bankrupted Wayne Enterprises fighting poverty during the Depression†as the only-dimly-remembered Good Liberal Father (or perhaps even a genuine Compassionate Conservative, a species long gone extinct in our dark lands.)
A city that has lost faith in its own vision of itself.
A government where good men still exist, but corruption has so riddled its bones that even if the wanted to clean it up, “in a town this dirty, who’s there left to rat to?†When the President and all of his Men are rotting this nation from the head down, that sentiment could not be more apropos.
Read the whole post (link above).
I feel the darkness closing in, but I, too, refuse to give up hope.
D.
Grow a pair (or buy one)
No, this is not a Bertie Botts Jelly Bean*, but you are welcome to eat one, if you’d like. Here are some recipes.
It’s the “NeuticlesNatural,” to be exact, which is “FDA medically-approved solid silicone. Not gel filled or saline filled but a soft solid rubber-like material that replicates the pets testicle in firmness once implanted.” (Um . . . who, exactly, is checking their dog’s balls for firmness?)
Neuticles came to my attention when the inventor of neuticles, Gregg A. Miller, won the 2005 IgNobel Prize for Medicine. Fake dog balls (and kitty balls) have made the rounds of the blogosphere of late, including this rather longish but interesting discussion at Pandagon, regarding men so nervous about their own manhood that they won’t get their dogs neutered.
I think Pandagon is right. The good folks at Neuticles would like you to believe that a new pair of rubber cojones will help your neuteree’s self-esteem, but whose self-esteem is in jeopardy here?
I’m reminded of one of cultural anthropology’s more notorious treatises, Clifford Geertz’s “Deep Play: Notes on the Balinese Cockfight.” I read it in college, and one line has stuck with me to this day (and thank heavens for the web, cuz my memory would have mangled it):
To anyone who has been in Bali any length of time, the deep psychological identification of Balinese men with their cocks is unmistakable. The double entendre here is deliberate. It works in exactly the same way in Balinese as it does in English, even to producing the same tired jokes, strained puns, and uninventive obscenities. Bateson and Mead have even suggested that, in line with the Balinese conception of the body as a set of separately animated parts, cocks are viewed as detachable, self-operating penises, ambulant genitals with a life of their own.
Which brings me to the core question of tonight’s post: what are the ambulant genitals of the 21st Century?
I really don’t know. I’m just askin’.
D.
*My advice? When eating Bertie Botts Jelly Beans, stay away from Vomit.
Holiday gift ideas for your Neocon friends
Props to Falafel Sex for finding Baby Bush Toys:
And much, much more.
Happy HannuChristmaKwanzakah to you.
D.