Michael Offutt's Blog, page 169

The Cold Winds Are Rising

In case you missed it, HBO released the teaser for season 2 of Game of Thrones.  Oooh it has me so excited. We are only four months away from more of the White Walkers!
And yes for those of you that read the books like me, that is the voice of none other than Stannis Baratheon providing the voice over. Rather chilling, don't you think?

Have a great Monday.

TransShifter by Cindy Borgne

I recently finished TransShifter by Cindy Borgne. This is a short story, and boy was it good.

Here's my review:

Five stars out of five.

This story is beautiful. Cindy Borgne is a titanic voice among new authors. Aside from having won multiple awards early in her career, she dares to explore a short story of love between a wounded soldier and an alien (who more often than not) takes the form of another man. This bold direction is refreshing and powerful because it has the courage to ask "Can we choose with whom we fall in love?" And "does sexual orientation actually matter?"

As a science-fiction story, Cindy is in full command of her powers as she weaves a tale of a world where nearly immortal entities travel in the form of electro-magnetic waves. But for all of their omnipotence and their ability to see the wonders of the universe, they choose to spend time with humans. The how and the why are within the threads of this story.

I strongly urge people to read TransShifter. It's quick...probably will take you an hour is all...and should belong on the same shelf as other great science-fiction shorts such as "For a breath, I tarry" by Roger Zelazny (probably one of my favorite short stories of all time-embedded link if you want to read it yourself).

You can download the short story absolutely FREE from Smashwords HERE. Seriously, it's worth an hour of your time.

Have a great weekend. :)

Welcome to the Bah Humbug Blahg Fest by none other than Grumpy Bulldog

Today is my post for the Bah Humbug Blahg Fest created by my friend, Patrick Dilloway. It goes all day long and you still have time to enter if you haven't done so already. If you don't already follow Patrick, please visit his blog and click follow. Then, create your post answering the following question:

What are the 12 things I hate most about the holiday season?
Here are my answers:1. Christmas music 24/7 on every radio station. It isn't so bad now that I live in a city, but boy when I lived in a small town with only three radio stations on FM this got really really old.
2. The bitter cold (it lasts six months). I live in the northern hemisphere and December is miserable. Additionally, where I live, there's always temperature inversions creating smog through the whole valley for weeks at a time.  I'm not a fan of this.3. Hazardous driving conditions. Snow and ice make for difficult driving.
4. No sunlight. On the night of the winter solstice there is more than 14-hours of darkness. That just sucks. Christmas is only a few days after that so it's almost the same. It seems like all I do is live in darkness. 5. Television consists of mostly reruns because its the period following the November sweeps.
6. That Thanksgiving and Christmas are so close together. In order to visit family for both vacations, it requires lots of time off, travel, and you have to turn around and do it again.
7. Finding an affordable gift for someone that already owns everything that is affordable and who has few activities that don't cost a lot of money. In other words, they don't read...haven't read a book ever. They just want to go on vacations, remodel the home, and scheme about ways to buy exclusive cars. Hard to get something under a hundred bucks when what they really want is granite countertops.
8. The celebrity Christmas album that everyone is talking about. I don't want to hear how Justin Bieber sings "Jingle Bells". Sure he's posed here in the snow. In reality he's tanning under lime
trees in California because he too hates the cold.9. Receiving a gag gift from a friend that thought you'd think it was funny when in truth, it's crap.
10. People who make a big deal out of Xmas versus Christmas. Everyone loves Monopoly, right? The Community Chest card "XMAS FUND MATURES"
never got any complaints in any game I played. Why does this always pop up?11. Inflatable yard decorations. I hate them. They're ugly and people keep them in their yard for too long and the wind deflates them and knocks them around. I will always live in a neighborhood with an H.O.A. so I can report
people that let this go on too long. You would either love me as
a neighbor or absolutely hate me. I don't think there'd be an
in-between state.12. Fattening sugary foods are everywhere. No matter where you turn, at the office someone has cookies, pies, cakes, rolls, candy...it's ridiculous. They bring them to work to fatten up the co-workers so that their families don't get fat. And I have a love/hate relationship with food. I'm at my best when there is no temptation. Christmas calories don't count. Yeah, right.ATTENTION YET ANOTHER BLOG FEST FOR DECEMBER 31ST. AHEM.
Before you leave I want you to know about one being run by Heather Arundel at her blog My Demon Spirits. In the contest, she wants you to write a holiday-themed story (it can be scary or whatever) that is 500 words or less, post it on your blog, comment on Heather's blog that you posted it and link back to it so she can see where it is, and then click "follow" on Heather's blog.
You can win a $25.00 Amazon Gift Card, a beautiful e-reader cozy, and a leather writing journal. The cozy's are done by Zizi Rho Designs  by a lady that just happens to write and knit at the exact same time. You try pulling that one off.

Making macarons is really hard

This last Sunday, my friend Meg gave me my Christmas present (a little early). We attended a cooking class together at Sur La Table which is at the Gateway Mall in Salt Lake City. What were we doing you may ask? Making a French macaroon. They look like this:
Now, these little delicate pastries may look like tiny hamburgers or perhaps...weird Oreos. But I assure you, they are really really hard to make. I was flabbergasted. What makes them so difficult and temperamental...I'm going to go over the short list with you right now:
Macaroons are really made with three ingredients. Egg whites, powdered sugar, and almond flour. However, these ingredients must be perfect. The eggs that make the egg whites have to be a minimum of two weeks old in the fridge. If you use younger eggs, the chef told us we would fail.  Additionally, the egg whites need to be set out for 24-hours at room temperature before you use them. Any less and it's guaranteed failure.  As for the other ingredients...you have to have 100% pure powdered sugar. There cannot be any contaminants, so you have to pay for the good stuff. No cornstarch. And the same goes for the almond flour (which costs about $15 for a small bag according to the chef). This helps to explain the price tag of charging $2.00 per cookie for these temperamental things.The egg whites must be whipped in a metal bowl with a metal beater. Somewhere between soft and hard peak, you have to add the food coloring. It cannot be liquid or dry because either of these will cause your recipe to fail. You need to use the gel food coloring and it has to have "no taste" on the label because the color you end up with will be less once cooked. If you whip the egg whites to hard peak...you will fail. That's how temperamental these cookies are. There's a narrow corridor of success. It was kind of mind-blowing. Just to give you an idea of what Meg and I went through over the course of three hours...we added a teaspoon of orange flavoring (the recipe called for it) and failed to whip the egg whites enough so our batter was too runny and we failed :(. There is no levener, so the egg whites are everything to this dish.I had to sift the powdered sugar through a chinois strainer three times with a wooden spoon. This is to get air into the powdered sugar. And yes, anything less than three times is failure. Once the almond flour and the powdered sugar were mixed (a delicate act since to do so too violently churns the almond flour and sugar into butter) it needs to be folded into the egg whites CAREFULLY. If you are ham-fisted with it, then you over fold the egg batter and the recipe is ruined. Basically start over (we should have done this).Once you get the egg batter done then you make the stuffing for the middle. Caramel, fudge, or some other buttery thing were our choices. These weren't so difficult...although the caramel had to be done with care.The ones that I made with Meg turned out hollow.  However, people said they still tasted good. Below are some photos I took during the 3-hour class:
So, anyway...macaroons are hard.

Happy Wednesday.  And don't forget, tomorrow is Patrick Dilloway's Bah Humbug Blahg Fest.

Making macaroons is really hard

This last Sunday, my friend Meg gave me my Christmas present (a little early). We attended a cooking class together at Sur La Table which is at the Gateway Mall in Salt Lake City. What were we doing you may ask? Making a French macaroon. They look like this:
Now, these little delicate pastries may look like tiny hamburgers or perhaps...weird Oreos. But I assure you, they are really really hard to make. I was flabbergasted. What makes them so difficult and temperamental...I'm going to go over the short list with you right now:
Macaroons are really made with three ingredients. Egg whites, powdered sugar, and almond flour. However, these ingredients must be perfect. The eggs that make the egg whites have to be a minimum of two weeks old in the fridge. If you use younger eggs, the chef told us we would fail.  Additionally, the egg whites need to be set out for 24-hours at room temperature before you use them. Any less and it's guaranteed failure.  As for the other ingredients...you have to have 100% pure powdered sugar. There cannot be any contaminants, so you have to pay for the good stuff. No cornstarch. And the same goes for the almond flour (which costs about $15 for a small bag according to the chef). This helps to explain the price tag of charging $2.00 per cookie for these temperamental things.The egg whites must be whipped in a metal bowl with a metal beater. Somewhere between soft and hard peak, you have to add the food coloring. It cannot be liquid or dry because either of these will cause your recipe to fail. You need to use the gel food coloring and it has to have "no taste" on the label because the color you end up with will be less once cooked. If you whip the egg whites to hard peak...you will fail. That's how temperamental these cookies are. There's a narrow corridor of success. It was kind of mind-blowing. Just to give you an idea of what Meg and I went through over the course of three hours...we added a teaspoon of orange flavoring (the recipe called for it) and failed to whip the egg whites enough so our batter was too runny and we failed :(. There is no levener, so the egg whites are everything to this dish.I had to sift the powdered sugar through a chinois strainer three times with a wooden spoon. This is to get air into the powdered sugar. And yes, anything less than three times is failure. Once the almond flour and the powdered sugar were mixed (a delicate act since to do so too violently churns the almond flour and sugar into butter) it needs to be folded into the egg whites CAREFULLY. If you are ham-fisted with it, then you over fold the egg batter and the recipe is ruined. Basically start over (we should have done this).Once you get the egg batter done then you make the stuffing for the middle. Caramel, fudge, or some other buttery thing were our choices. These weren't so difficult...although the caramel had to be done with care.The ones that I made with Meg turned out hollow.  However, people said they still tasted good. Below are some photos I took during the 3-hour class:
So, anyway...macaroons are hard.

Happy Wednesday.  And don't forget, tomorrow is Patrick Dilloway's Bah Humbug Blahg Fest.

Thinking about water conservation

I frequently tune into "Talk of the Nation" on NPR and they had a great topic yesterday yesterday that really got me wondering where humanity seems to be headed. You can find the program that I listened to here. As many of you already know, the world hit a population of 7 billion earlier this year. To comprehend these numbers, here are some staggering facts:

1) It takes 1 liter of water to create 1 food calorie.
2) The recommended daily allowance of calories a person is supposed to eat falls between 1500 and 2000 calories a day.  So per person, that's 1500 to 2000 liters of water that goes into the food that sustains each person each day that the sun rises.
3) Multiply that by a little more than 7 billion, and that's how much water is consumed each day around the globe, and it's only getting worse.
And this doesn't even account for other things that need water (for example, animals need water as well).
There are already 12 major river systems in the world that do not reach the sea.
I'm not trying to be negative, but I think we're screwed. That seems unsustainable to me. I try to create as little of a carbon footprint as I can. But I guess when someone like me chooses to do so, there's another person on the other end of the spectrum (the Duggar lady of 20 Kids and Counting fame is just an example) that just keeps popping them out. Do you know how many resources a family with 20 kids consumes? I think it would be just mind-boggling. A selfish, selfish, selfish family pictured here.And you know what, despite the fact that she had a miscarriage last week, I don't feel sorry for her. Not one bit. I think she's beyond the point of ridiculous, and that she has only herself to blame.
It really makes me question the ethics of this country that we give celebrity status to a woman that has tons of kids.

What about you guys? Concerned at the population on an overcrowded planet? Or could you care less? Do you think that it's all a "liberal agenda" and that people should have the right to have as big a family as they want? Let me know in your comments.
ANNOUNCEMENTS for the blogosphere:
1) If you get the opportunity, please go visit Stephanie Schmidt's website to see her wonderful "The Twelve Days of Bookmas" that she did. She even decorated a book tree and rewrote the lyrics to 12 Days of Christmas to match the pictures she chose. The originality and time she spent on this was epic. Please go check it out.
2) Please join the Bah Humbug Blahg Fest hosted by author Patrick Dilloway. The rules are simple because Patrick likes simple.  On Thursday, December 15th post on your blog the answer to this brain-teasing question:
What are the 12 things I hate most about the holiday season?
By doing this and copying the badge featured on his website to your blog sidebar, you are entered in a drawing for $25.00. That's the easiest $25 I have ever seen.
Happy Tuesday.

12 Days of Christmas Blog Hop ends today

Hello everyone.  This is a friendly reminder that all entries to the giveaways for Sarah Belliston's 12 Days of Christmas blog hop will end tonight at midnight. The winners will all be announced on her blog according the schedule posted below. Additionally, for my particular giveaway, I shall name the person on December 22nd. Prior to this (at midnight tonight) I will be notifying Sarah with the winner's name.

Thanks everyone for participating. If you have not entered, you should do so by clicking on the 12 Days of Christmas blog hop button on the left.

DEC 13 - Jaime Morrow

DEC 14 - Tessa Elwood

DEC 15 - Lisha Cauthen

DEC 16 - Morgan Shamy

DEC 17 - Rachel Bateman

DEC 18 - Carrie Butler

DEC 19 - Jess Melendez

DEC 20 - Charity Bradford

DEC 21 - Athena Franco

DEC 22 - Michael Offutt

DEC 23 - Cherie Stewart

DEC 24 - Suze Reese

DEC 25 - Santa

Have a great Monday.

Why I don't give to the Salvation Army door ringers at Christmas

The Salvation Army door ringers are out in full force, and I've always stuffed a few dollars in the little red kettles every year.

However, this year, I'm choosing not to do so. Jeff clued me into this over at his website located here and it just made me a little angry.
If they are going to claim to be a charitable organization, I don't think they should take a stance like this.

As Jeff said in his post on this same topic, it's important to examine a charity before you give to see if they match your values.

See you Monday.

Truth has no agenda

I saw a movie about six months ago called The Invention of Lying, and although it was funny, I kinda wished that I lived in that world. For those of you that haven't seen it, the movie is about an Earth where lying has never been invented. People just tell the truth all the time.  In answer to questions like, "How are you?" The main character gets responses like, "I'm terrible and have come up with a plan to commit suicide tonight in my apartment if I have the guts to do it. I'm a terrible coward."  The response being, "Oh well best of luck then."

I just think people lie way too much. They lie to avoid embarrassment, they lie to avoid punishment, and they lie to prevent hurt feelings.  Sure, I know the reasons of why people lie. I just wish it wasn't that way, and honestly I think the truth makes the world a better place.

Recently, a friend told me a story. She is a Hispanic American whose first husband was a black man. As a result, her beautiful daughter had natural dark skin. She took her daughter to a daycare here in Utah and after work, went to pick her up. The lady at the daycare said, "Please don't bring back your child. I cannot care for your child. You need to find another daycare."

She asked, "Why? Was she bad?"

The lady responded, "No. She's black. I will not care for a black child."

Instead of getting angry, my friend responded as I would have responded.  "Thank you. Thank you for admitting that you're a racist bigot. I will find another daycare for my child. I honestly am thanking you because had you not said something, you could have harmed my child. I'm glad it never came to that."

And she promptly went in search of another daycare asking questions like "Are you okay with the fact that my daughter has very dark skin?"

As a man with mixed ancestry myself, I understand perfectly how even though it is 2011, when you don't look a certain way or act a certain way you will be discriminated against. I appreciate truth.

More examples from life. Wouldn't it be better if people were honest in their interactions with others?

Take Sandusky of the Penn State scandal. If he had the guts, he should have just come out thirty years ago and said, "I like to screw boys. I'm a pedophile." Then maybe he could have moved to Thailand or some other place that doesn't prosecute pedophilia and not be in the trouble that he is in. At least boys would have been protected, and he could have claimed to be a part of the human race by outing himself as a monster. As is, he's more slug than human.

People who don't believe in God or the teachings of a religion yet remain within the ranks of a religion giving tithe simply because they don't want to lose friends or shatter the lives of their families. This is living a lie. And it gives strength to a religion (and their agenda) because you support them with your cash. I manage to eek out an okay existence by being an "out" atheist. I have no family and kids and play a lot of video games and read books. I wish it were different, but at least I don't lie. Lying is for cowards.

How about going up for a promotion at work? Here's the situation. You have more experience than the other guy. You have more education. Yet the other guy gets the job. Wouldn't it be nice if the boss just said, "Hey, the other guy is more attractive and even though he's married, I'm hoping I can screw him once or twice despite the fact that he's married." Don't laugh...I've actually seen this happen. I no longer work there...but yeah...I saw exactly that. Being the guy that didn't get the job, I would have liked to have had the truth. I could have quit sooner.

How about people who follow you in social media exclusively because they want to sell you their stuff?  The lie is that they are interested in you.  The truth is that they have no intention of ever actually being interested in you. They just want your money. Wouldn't it be nice to hear the truth?

Another example: a man I once knew gives his wife a doughnut every day after working midnight's. He knows that the wife has been trying to lose weight but says, "She loves the fresh doughnuts. It's a way I show that I care." The truth is more sinister: "I'm an insecure man and think my wife will leave me for another man if I don't fatten her up and make her feel ugly." I've seen this in action...it really did happen. I called the guy on his bullshit, and he 'fessed up to it.

A person says, "I will read your book." The truth is they have no intention of doing this. Just be honest. "I don't read and won't buy a copy of your book." I'd be fine with that and would say, "Thank you. I never expected your support anyway. It's not like we exchange Christmas cards."

A person gets to be friends with you so that they can befriend a friend of yours that they want to have sex with.  Just be honest, "I find this person attractive and want to warm up to you so that the other person will like me and we can screw. But I really have no intention of being your friend and would prefer if you dropped off the face of the earth once I get what I want."

I like truth. I rarely get upset at truth. If someone finds me uninteresting, they should just feel free to say it. "Mike, I find you uninteresting and frankly, don't ever want to interact with you again." My response, "Thank you for being honest. We shall never interact again. Bye."

Occupy Wall Street is a movement that I've watched with fascination. It's people banding together over simple truths and they are not afraid to let people know that they are upset.  The truth is that some people are living lives that are so much better than others and work far less for it. The truth is that 1% of the people control 99% of the assets. And the truth is that many in that 1% could give a crap about anyone in the 99%. I bet if poor people died by the millions or got gassed, they wouldn't shed a tear. They'd say, "At least I don't have to support deadbeats anymore." They should just tell the truth. Let people see them for the assholes that they are.

Funniest truth I heard all week came from a Catholic. I respect what he said. "Go through life and sin a lot. Otherwise, Jesus died for nothing." I was stunned given his beliefs but laughed my ass off.

Most people are so fake. I'm kinda sick of it. Do the world a favor. Next time you find yourself wanting to tell a lie...just stop. Come out with the brutal honest truth. Let people see you for who you are. Be true to thyself.

I'm Insecure and interviewed at the same time in one day.

It's time once again for the monthly "Insecure Writer's Support Group" that Alex Cavanaugh started on his blog four months ago (wow 1/3 of a year gone just like that).

Today, my insecurity is just wondering if I suck or not. As my publishing date looms, I almost feel like bagging the whole thing and stuffing my book into a box somewhere and never letting it see the light of day. I just don't have any confidence in myself. However, against this cowardly inner voice is that of my friend Kathy.  Over Thanksgiving I gave her an ARC to read and she's already finished it. She told me she thought it was incredible which made me feel really good.  It was the right kind of random input given at just the right moment to make me shake off my issues with my writing.  Do any of you hear those voices? The kind that whisper to you that you suck? I hate those voices.

The other part of today's post is an interview. I was checking my inbox the other day, and I came across an email addressed to moi asking if I'd like to be interviewed. I instantly thought, this is going to be fun! I've never been interviewed before. So if you'd like to check it out, please go visit the lovely >>> click>>> Leigh Covington at her amazing blog.

I'm just tickled because I got to talk about my book. No one ever wants to talk about my book. I'm not saying that's a bad thing...that's just what writers are like, you know? They talk about their books, and expect you to listen.  I'm content doing that because someone has to listen, you know?  I try very hard to be a good listener because I don't think people get listened to enough (not even Alex and he has a whole lot of people listening to him).

Finally, I want to say that I appreciate all the support from the "to read" clickers on my goodreads sparkling cookie gif featured on the right.

Now for some Wednesday witchcraft.

On the gif below, place your hand in the center of the image and the dots will appear to move faster.

You're welcome.
Happy Wednesday!