Peg Duthie's Blog, page 9

from Masha Gessen's SURVIVING AUTOCRACY

The Trumpian lie . . . is the power lie, or the bully lie. It is the lie of the bigger kid who took your hat and is wearing it—while denying that he took it. There is no defense against this lie because the point of the lie is to assert power, to show “I can say what I want when I want to.” The power lie conjures a different reality and demands that you choose between your experience and the bully’s demands: Are you going to insist that you are wet from the rain or give in and say that the sun is shining? . . .

( Read more... )

Gessen, Masha. Surviving Autocracy (pp. 106 - 11). Penguin Publishing Group. Kindle Edition.

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recent reading

Last week's work week started with strategizing on Sunday and didn't end until 3 a.m. Saturday, with distance choir and chores and a weird foot cramp in the mix, so I was not surprised when brain and body noped out of my plans in favor of binge-reading, starting with a revisit of Jackie Lau's Pregnant by the Playboy (which did at least nudge me into a couple of Mandarin Duolingo lessons), followed by her Big Surprise for Valentine's Day (whose Chinese-Canadian heroine works for the Stratford Festival). Early on, she's at a bar with a dancer and a costume designer . . .

A white dude in a trucker hat approached their table. It was clear who his eyes were on: Gloria.

“You Japanese or Chinese?”

“I’m Canadian, you punk,” Gloria said.

“Hey. All I did was ask you a question. Can I buy you a drink?”

“Nah, I got a girlfriend.” The guy smirked. “And she owns a boxing gym, so I’d watch it if I were you.”

The guy eventually returned to his table of dude-bros at the front of the bar.

“Bet he has some kind of strange Asian fetish.” Gloria shook her head. “Probably thought I’d be sweet and submissive.”

“Pretty sure you’re right,” Amber agreed.

“I love being able to truthfully say that my girlfriend owns a boxing gym. I’ll keep saying it even after we break up.”

After that, it was on to the Rebekah Weatherspoon books in my library queue, including Rafe (mouthy women and inked cookie-baking nanny on a Ducati), Xeni (hex-throwing side character from Rafe gets it on with bisexual cook who plays seventeen instruments, including jazz bagpipes) and Better off Red (vampire lesbian sorority with Asian president). And then Megan Matthews's Boys of RDA series.

In the family-appropriate stack, there's been Yuyi Morales's Dreamers (Nashville Public Library's 2020 citywide read) and Ben Franklin and the Magic Squares, a paragraph book by Frank Murphy and illustrator Richard Walz. The latter features a squirrel wearing a tricorn hat on almost every spread -- and the final item in the Author's Note mentions that Franklin "really did have a pet squirrel named Skugg."

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mistrust our measures

Today's subject line comes from this weekend's Live from Here broadcast, in a reading by Lulu Miller, I think around 1 hour and 40 minutes in.

Today's photo is of a jar full of stars -- a birthday gift recently delivered to me:


I do not like having to multitask as often as I do, but being able to fry bacon and mushrooms while attending my church's congregational meeting is a plus, especially as it trundles through its second hour. The meeting started with an exceptionally good tutorial, and I've been jotting down Zoom navigation tips from other members (new to me: to change your name within the Participants list while in a meeting, put the cursor over your name and click "More ->").

The frying is for a quiche I'm pulling together, since there were carrot and kohlrabi tops from last week's market bag. In looking up how to prepare kohlrabi, I ended up giggling at this bit from Martha Rose Shulman [NYT]:

Every time I work with kohlrabi I wonder why I don’t buy it more often.

If you receive it in your CSA basket and you’ve never worked with it before, you may find the thick-skinned vegetable puzzling, maybe even daunting. As the nutritionist Jonny Bowden describes it in his book The 150 Healthiest Foods on Earth, kohlrabi “looks like a cross between an octopus and a space capsule.” That’s true, especially if the greens are still attached. If they’re not, it just looks like a space capsule.

As I told a friend last night, I'd like fewer bugs (both literal and figurative) and more sleep. I'm saying "no" and "later" to various projects to make the more sleep possible, but the docket still overfloweth. The congregation meeting hit the two-hour mark right before the chalice extinguishing. Up next, in my Franklin-Covey-ish blocks:

[A]
finish assembling the quiche (with a substitute for the heavy cream we don't have on hand)
prep for Monday presentation to interns
mark edits to wills/directives
attend an online birthday celebration
write Postcards to Voters
participate in a CalTwerk or Limon workout
do enough Duolingo to stay in Diamond League
log into an SFEMS workshop (aka getting my butt kicked in both theory and sight-singing to get better at both)
laundry


[B]
pick up batteries, mayonnaise, and other sundries
whale through more work
collect library holds
financial housekeeping
yardwork
some personal correspondence

[C] (aka not tonight but this week)
finish three library books, with a Vary the Line post related to the one on translation
yet more paper slinging and filing
research for a nonprofit task force
dance homework
start learning The Armed Man for Stay At Home Choir. First UU's choir sang it 11 years ago for Music Sunday, but I remember very little about it and may well have jumped in on soprano or tenor instead of alto.
continue working on the pieces already assigned to me
more cards and notes, including to some addresses on the Americans of Conscience list
figure out what to plant in the straw bale:



[D] (aka things I might not have time for but may do anyway if I get too crispy around the edges)
watch Stratford's Love's Labor Lost
improve the peanut-butter-whisky + coffee slushies I started mixing last week. I totally admit that I bought the bottle because of the label. (Netting an appalled look from the BYM was merely a bonus.)

Signal boosts:
The Okra Project
Wiggle Room (disclosure: a friend is on their team)
The SIJS (Special Immigrant Juvenile Status) Project (disclosure: a friend runs this)

Onward, y'all. Stay safe (within what's feasible, especially considering the demands made by both the rest of society and our individual souls) and keep in touch.

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zirconium @ 2020-06-12T21:04:00

Fortuitous timing: started playing Milk Street's June 12 podcast a few minutes ago, with plans to broil a steak in about 15 minutes, and lo, Kimball's interviewing Meathead Goldwyn...

I am at 57 hours and counting work-wise, plus proofreading legal docs, plus a barrow-load of dance and music homework, correspondence (political and personal), plus -- oh, you know, the usual melange of usual and unusual. I was pleased to realize that the prowling noises that had me sitting up shrieking in bed last week were actually branches of crepe myrtle scraping against my roof. The buds salvaged from the Sky's the Limit bush are opening up inside the teacup on my desk. . . .




. . . and the straw bale I'm conditioning for veggies has sprouted mushrooms. . . .



I won't be brave enough to try those, but there are two types of mushrooms in my fridge, and a steak to season now. Onward!

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heart in the weeds

Literally. As in, this turned up when I tugged at a mess of dead and live plant matter (tangled with curls of dried paint and mulch from two or three seasons ago) near the roses:



Once I get that corner cleaned up, I plan to sow mallows there, or zinnias, or marigolds (Rae sent packets of the latter two for my birthday). The Lenten rose (aka hellebore) looks great, and I'll be asking my mom-in-law for more after I finish reading the Emily Carr catalogue I borrowed from her more than a year ago. The fireflies are out, the peppers have started to fruit, and the zinnias are about to pop:



I missed this morning's workout with José both because of imminent deadlines and because my ankles were still twanging a bit from Saturday's samba and CalTwerk double. From the livechat:

YoFit: How r u peg?
Me: the usual: sheltering in place and tryna save the republic. and you?
YoFit: Gurlll SAME.

There will never be enough hours in the day. Some mornings I roll out of bed and steamroll through work and working out and homework in t-shirts and pajama bottoms. Today I put on a corporate-appropriate dress and worked, twerked, and weeded in it (though I did shed the accessories before grabbing my weights). I have it together in some respects, but I also sent this warning before a meeting:

Me: Hey, if you see me choking on my coffee, it's because I spilled Slap Ya Mama in it while prepping dinner. #TeamHotMess
Boss: That's quite the flavor profile.

Harvested: some mint, some spinach, and a bowlful of vetch pods, the last in hopes of beautifying more of the yard with thatches like this one:



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with friends + benevolent strangers

athenais 's mention of homemade pizza guided me tonight when dinner plans changed. The BYM didn't have time for the ribs he'd brought home from Various Artists Brewing, so he heated up a frozen cashew chicken bowl while I continued frowning at Duolingo.

When I was ready to deal with dinner for myself, I looked at the greens I'd harvested from the yard this afternoon (goosegrass, mock strawberries (including berries and a yellow blossom), and radish tops) and remembered that the goosegrass had tasted like straw when baked on a pizza, so I instead looked for recipes for creamy green soup, and used the one by Gena Hamshaw as a starting point: sauteed maybe a 1/4 cup chopped onion with maybe a tablespoon of chopped ginger, and then dumped in the greens (around 2 or 3 cups?). After a few minutes, I added some chicken bouillon powder and two cups of water and let it simmer for a while. I stuck a Bob Evans tub of mashed potatoes into the microwave and then scooped half of it into the soup pot. Pureed it all with an immersion blender and poured in into a mason jar for tomorrow or Monday.

The pizza: ready-to-bake crust from Kroger, with leftover pasta sauce on one half and goosegrass pesto on the other. I sprinkled parmesan-mozzarella on the tomato side and added onion and bacon to both. I continued nursing the Hi-Wire Belgian Stout I'd opened before heading into the yard.

The notecard I put in the mail to mrissa today featured Kenneth Koch's "Spring," which lists both pizza and beer among the season's joys. When I got tired of weeding, I sat on the porch with a copy of Into English: Poems, Translations, Commentaries, a book I'd heard about from Marissa back in January. I also read Emily Makowski's profile of Joanne Chory, the geneticist who has dedicated much of her life to studying how plants interact with light -- or, as marymary put it, "how plants can grow in the dark."

Some of the mint had hopped the original border of the bed it's in, so I moved the rocks and pail to enclose where the mint is now. I am not paying as much attention to either horse racing or tennis as I used to, but I still poke my head into TalkAboutTennis now and then, and one of my favorite people there owns 1% of three two-year-old horsies trained by Saffie Joseph Jr. (jockey Paco Lopez) at Gulfstream Park: Bold Article (filly), Tiz the Dude (colt), and Run Brother Run (colt). Tiz the Dude is descended from Tiznow, whose Wikipedia page was a hoot to visit, as it included observations like these:

Tiznow is known as a quirky horse. Especially towards the end of his career, he was sometimes reluctant to work in the mornings, including one occasion before the 2001 Breeders' Cup where he spent 40 minutes resisting jockey Chris McCarron's urging to break into a gallop. In the WinStar stallion barn, Tiznow learned how to unlatch his door to let himself out into the main hall. He does not like the feel of concrete on his feet and will adjust his steps so he doesn’t have to walk over it. Tiznow also does not like cold weather and is usually kept inside if the temperature goes below freezing. "He's a California horse all the way," said Amy Nave, a bloodstock assistant at WinStar.

Horses named Roddick and Nadal have recently won races, and that's added to the fun.

One year ago, I was working at times literally around the clock to clear the decks so that I could attend a wedding in Cancún without dragging my laptop along. This afternoon, I grabbed the fan from that wedding when it came time to practice ballroom moves. (Other classes this week: 2 Zumba, 2 samba, 1 Danzatone, 1 hip-hop. We are finding a rhythm, so to speak...) Next week I will paint my face (assuming I don't meet with another mishap like this morning, when I gave myself a spot burn from flying pancake batter) and wear something more videogenic than the oversize housedress I didn't change out of today. I did put on heels -- something I hadn't done since March 13, the last day I was at the office. (That said, did I resort to dry shampoo and eyeshadow when prepping for my third video meeting yesterday? You bet.)

At Wednesday night's virtual chamber choir gathering, we opted to dance to "Turn the World Around" instead of the sing-together-with-all-mics-muted thing.

This week's mail included both the here's-what's-new kind and the early-birthday-greetings variety. It all delights me. I kept Rae's package on the dining table all week so that its shiny good wishes and promises (embodied in the marigold and zinnia seeds) were within my line of sight whenever I walked toward the front yard:



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dry and dormant

Seed inventory, page 1


Some of the containers



It was chilly and windy today, and I still didn't feel like focusing on anything requiring precision, but I addressed 53 postcards, updated my gardening journal (with some receipts from 2016), and cooked 3 meals: for breakfast, pancakes. For lunch, a riff on chile rellenos, using Anaheim peppers and leftover bulgur-carrot mush. The mush was fortified with red pepper flakes and parmesan powder from a long-ago pizza order.



For dinner, last night's chicken, re-roasted with the remaining hunk of zucchini and fingerling potatoes. I had half a sample of packet of Forward seasoning in the spice bin, so I used it on the veggies. (I am not a huge fan of paprika on potatoes, but hunting for the coriander yesterday reminded me of how much my pantry is out of whack: I am down to two bay leaves and not even a doll's thimbleful of cinnamon, but the bbq rubs, steak blends, hot sauces, and bags of paprika would fill a basket, and I should bake something with nutmeg and/or mace soon, since it's now clear that my day-to-day cooking rarely involves those flavors. It's a pleasant problem to have . . .)

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grindin' on

After dedicating 60+ hours to the museum this week, compounded by 3 days of missed workouts, I did not try to persuade brain or body into executing any should-dos today, other than a few maintenance rounds of Duolingo (Day 169) and dealing with food on the edge of going bad. So, for breakfast, a bruised and nicked Envy apple got paired with Kunik cheese (from a box received last month). Lunch included the last of the chocolate pudding I made ten days ago.

Late in the afternoon, I split the package of ten chicken drumsticks from last week's K&S run into two batches: one is marinating in the spice paste from Jody Adams's recipe for Roasted Rock Cornish Game Hens with North African Flavors (in In the Hands of a Chef), and the other I cooked tonight in a variation of Adams's Ginger-Turmeric Chicken with Lime Yogurt and Coconut Rice. We have only green onions on hand, so I used the white bits for tonight's dinner and put the green bits into my jar of shrimp stock. I did not bother with chicken stock or cilantro, but a limp crown of broccoli had reproached me all week from its shelf, so it got added to the roasting pan. The result looked and tasted fine (though I gather from the BYM that the coconut rice is the real keeper):



Discovering that Jody and Ken had revived their blog (their last pre-pandemic post had been in 2015) was a pleasant surprise. I've also been vegging with a slew of Grub Street Diet entries, which I came across while looking up discussions of Jody's Soupe de Poisson. I really like Margalit Cutler's illustrations, and the people interviewed say relatable things like "I am always doing something, it’s just rarely the thing I most need to be doing" (Julia Turshen) and "cut fruit is Asian parents’ love language" (Priya Krishna). [The day/week-in-the-life genre is a species of Pegnip, I guess, even when I think the metrics are nonsensical (cf. Philly's Sweat Diaries, where the accounting of money spend rarely factors in food already on hand).]

Also from the "Back after a long break" Department: David Handler took like 20 years off between Book 8 and Book 9 of his Stewart Hoag series, and has since produced 3 novels and a short story I didn't know about until recently. So those are part of the escapism party pack, along with dance videos, such as this performance by the Still River Sword troupe.

Speaking of performing, I appeared in a balcony scene Thursday night (it starts at around 59:30, with at least two cats and some verrrrry Southern accents in the mix). This week's mayhem also included pitcherfuls of wintermelon-rum-campari slushies and sober-yet-daft conversations about chive reproduction (occasioned by the below salad). Dull doesn't stand a chance around here.



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inventory

3 hours of sleep

15-hour shift

dinner at 11:30 p.m. (leftovers: wild Minnesota rice mixed with brown Thai rice; a quarter pound of shrimp with heads on; mayonnaise)

3+ wintermelon-rum slushies



(The glass was a gift from my big brother and his husband.)

1 amused and sympathetic spouse

1 power outage

1 professional performance gig in limbo

2 refunds expected

1/4 radish cake remaining. The source radish was so big (3+ pounds) that the BYM jumped back a foot when he opened the fridge:



1 emotional hangover from Monday's spate of correspondence and quasi-poetry blogging

2 fresh Christmas cactus blooms

1 workout with José skipped (too much work + twanging shoulder)

a half-dozen spotted rose leaves pinched

1 horoscope side-eyed

3 Zoom backgrounds tested

1 joke about my fat/big head suppressed

1 board invitation declined

95 XP points in Duolingo

4 red bean paste buns consumed for breakfast, before 7 a.m.

1 hot bath awaiting me

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No snowflake in an avalanche ever feels responsible.

[Today's subject line quotes Stanislaw Jerzy Lee. I forget where I first encountered it.]

A morsel of lagniappe: working at home all day means I get to see these tiny starry flowers when they are open. They close up as night falls, which means I'd previously seen them only as buds.



Our governor says the safer-at-home order will expire on April 30. For those of you tracking my dithering about the Y: if the centers reopen on May 1, that will be the last straw for this camel. I will cancel my membership faster than you can chant "To the left, to the left..."

For those of you not on my Twitter TL: bacon coffee jam, y'all! (And other uses for coffee dregs and grounds) https://www.myrecipes.com/ingredients/leftover-coffee-and-coffee-grounds-uses?utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=social&utm_campaign=social-share-article (via the https://littlewaves.coffee/ newsletter)

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