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READIN
READIN started out as a place for me
to keep track of what I am reading, and to learn (slowly, slowly)
how to design a web site.
There has been some mission drift
here and there, but in general that's still what it is. Some of
the main things I write about here are
reading books,
listening to (and playing) music, and
watching the movies. Also I write about the
work I do with my hands and with my head; and of course about bringing up Sylvia.
The site is a bit of a work in progress. New features will come on-line now and then; and you will occasionally get error messages in place of the blog, for the forseeable future. Cut me some slack, I'm just doing it for fun! And if you see an error message you think I should know about, please drop me a line. READIN source code is PHP and CSS, and available on request, in case you want to see how it works.
See my reading list for what I'm interested in this year.
READIN has been visited approximately 236,737 times since October, 2007.
A beautiful but flawed movie, I think -- the flaw is in the plot, which is not interesting enough to keep me in my seat for 2½ hours. The beauty is (of course) to be found in the dancing, but this brings up a question for me: why is the main ballet sequence shot with special effects that could not happen on stage?
Filming stage presentations seems to me like a great idea; I really like e.g. what Bergman did with it in The Magic Flute. When Craster is conducting the overture and the camera is showing the confusion backstage, that was what I thought was going to happen -- self-aware cinematography of the company's presentation of The Red Shoes. Instead I got a fantasia of what the ballet might look like in a movie, and I'm not sure what to do with it. Is this a depiction of what is going on in the dancers' heads? In the audience's head? In the director's head? It's definitely not what's going on on stage and I think that takes away from the movie.
posted evening of June 7th, 2008: Respond ➳ More posts about The Movies
Werner Herzog's latest movie, a documentary of Antarctica called Encounters at the End of the World, will be opening at the Film Forum next Wednesday. Leonard Lopate interviewed Herzog on his WNYC show yesterday:
Update: A harsh (in a believable way) pan from David Meyer of the Brooklyn Rail. "Grandpa came to town, found what amused and repelled him and looked no further." I'm still looking forward to seeing the movie, but with some caveats now.
Today Mr. Pamuk turns 56 years old. (And it has been nearly a year since I first started reading his books.) I wish him a long and happy life of writing.
posted morning of June 7th, 2008: Respond ➳ More posts about Orhan Pamuk
Wilted spinach salad is one of my old favorites. Tonight, I figured out how to make it without bacon, since Ellen and I are trying to limit slightly, how much fat we are eating. The figs have a similar flavor profile -- sweet and smoky. The mushrooms give a meaty texture.
Vegetarian Spinach Salad
Serves 2
about ½ lb. baby spinach leaves, picked, washed, and dried
a bunch of scallions, washed and chopped
5 dried figs, chopped small (fresh figs would probably be good too)
6 mushroom caps, cut into quarters
olive oil
sherry vinegar*
balsamic vinegar
grated pecorino romano
Combine spinach, scallions and figs in a salad bowl.
Heat oil in a heavy skillet; when hot, add mushroom caps. Season with salt and pepper and saute a minute or two.
Pour vinegar into pan -- about one part sherry vinegar to two parts balsamic to six parts oil. Quickly remove from heat and pour over salad. Toss salad up into skillet so that it gets warm and wilted.
Top with grated cheese.
This makes a very nice, light dinner served with bread and cheese and red wine.
*(I had some sherry vinegar on hand from when I was making Redfox's Onion Jam recipe -- so I thought I'd use it. It seemed to give a very nice flavor in this dressing, though I can't think of any other salad where it would really be appropriate. It's not an ingredient I'm really familiar with.)
posted evening of June 6th, 2008: Respond ➳ More posts about Recipes
Thanks, Shelley! Shelley came along to Sylvia's dance recital last month (Sylvia is a student at Lydia Johnson Dance) and took a lot of pictures, which she gave to Ellen today -- I've uploaded them to our family album.
Sylvia's dance was with two other girls (all of them wore baseball caps for the dance) -- the three of them choreographed the moves together.
Ellen and I were married 15 years ago today, on June 6, 1993. And furthermore: we have been a couple together for 19 years, since 1989. This is half as many years as I have been alive. Happy crystal anniversary, Ellen!
Anniversary plan: send Sylvia to Kaydi's house for a sleep-over; cook a relaxed, interesting dinner with Ellen.
Here are some songs that get played almost every time at the Menzel Violins jam. If I would learn them, I would get a chance to play leads there more frequently.
(A song I did get a chance to play tonight, with a guitarist whose name I did not learn -- Robert maybe? -- was "Somewhere Over the Rainbow", which turns out to be a lot of fun.)
posted morning of June 6th, 2008: Respond ➳ More posts about Fiddling
...So even as I was writing my last post, news was coming out all over the Internet that Hillary Clinton is leaving the race. I guess my initial perception of the speech as a concession speech was accurate on some level.
In comments at Obsidian Wings, Cleek points out a beautiful bit of date synchronicity:
August 28, 1963: Martin Luther King gives his â??I Have A Dreamâ? speech.
August 28, 2008: The first black presidential nominee will give his acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention.
(And read the post to which Cleek's comment is attached; it's a fine one.)
OK, so I'm feeling bad about leaving the previous post up at the top, and want to at least move it down a little. It was intemperate, and saying "Screw you, Hillary" probably contributes to the atmosphere of misogyny they're discussing over at the Edge of the West.
When I was listening to the speech I had a lot of cognitive dissonance going on. I didn't experience the speech as "graceless" and "classless", like a lot of commenters I've been reading today seem to have; it sounded like a really good speech to me, just totally out of place and not suited to the occasion. So anyway. I'm sorry I reacted that way and I just hope Ms. Clinton will leave the race in a civil way and one conducive to Democratic victory.
Sweet -- so I just turned on the TV and Larry King or somebody was saying that CNN projected Obama would secure the Democratic nomination.
Hillary is going to be speaking in a minute... Come on, Hil! You can do the right thing! You can avoid going down in history as the woman who wrecked America!
...Oh thank you, Hillary. Thank you!
...Oh wait, I spoke too soon. Screw you, Hillary. Screw you! ...But it really sounded to me like she was making a concession speech. What's wrong with me?
Ellen and I were married 15 years ago today, on June 6, 1993. And furthermore: we have been a couple together for 19 years, since 1989. This is half as many years as I have been alive. Happy crystal anniversary, Ellen!
...So even as I was writing my last post, news was coming out all over the Internet that Hillary Clinton is 
