It's a lesson in humans using machines to show their feelings

[sovay]

Christmas in my family has come in two parts for the last couple of years, Christmas Day when we hold an open house for eggnog and make a roast for Christmas dinner and Boxing Day when my brother and his family join us for waffles. Both this year went very well, I think. We had friends and family and small children and a firetruck, the plastic kind, enthusiastically zoomed around in the house in company of a garbage truck and an ambulance by Fox. My niece brought her stuffed Olaf and tried plum pudding for the first time. We watched the 1951 Scrooge with Alastair Sim. spatch and I had vague plans to see Mel Brooks' Silent Movie (1975) at the Brattle, but we came home and collapsed instead.

My mother and I did not succeed in cooking all of the lost Christmas recipes of Gourmet, although in one case we were thwarted mostly by not having a second refrigerator in which to store a marinating roast, but we did make the potato and leek gratin, the citrusy haricots verts, and the candied kumquats, which I can recommend even without the extra roll in sugar at the end; they taste like tiny soft marmalade bombs. The orange-ginger pickled baby carrots were a mysterious disaster that came out smelling like turpentine—which we're pretty sure removing the chiles from the recipe shouldn't have done—and were binned without delay. The pudding mold of my childhood gave up its tarnished and suet-polished ghost at the end of last year, so this year's plum pudding was dome-shaped instead of bundt-ish, but it caught on brandy-blue fire just the same.

Having come into the holiday direct from a hell-cold and a performance, I feel somewhat trampled now that it's over, but also in possession of many books, including Gemma Files' Drawn Up from Deep Places (2018), Cyril Hare's An English Murder (1951), Robin Robertson's The Long Take: A Noir Narrative (2018), and a titanic omnibus of Daniel Fuchs' Brooklyn novels—Summer in Williamsburg (1934), Homage to Blenholt (1936), and Low Company (1937). Rob got me an annotated edition of Raymond Chandler's The Big Sleep (1939) and all three Lowriders graphic novels by Cathy Camper and Raúl the Third. I got him a biography of Alfred Jarry and a book about the real murder cases behind the play/musical Chicago. Also we got socks, but that's actually great. My feet get cold.

According to Locus' listing of New & Notable Books, I am a celebrated poet and story writer. I hope "celebrated" in this case means "drowning in royalties come February," but I'm pleased with the notice regardless.

Did I mention I'll be in D.C. this weekend? For about twenty-four hours. On Friday, I am traveling once again at aaagh o'clock in the morning in order to meet selkie for Arena Stage's Indecent. 'Tis really the season of ignoring my internal clock for the sake of art.

Maybe tomorrow I'll just stay in bed and read.

Comments

[selkie]

I feel if we had better rail in this country, you could have taken the blergh-o'clock train instead of the aaagh-o'clock train, but I am squeakily excited to have you as a theatre buddy all the same. (And Spouse is relieved.)

Of course you are a celebrated poet and story writer. May you ALSO drown in royalties come February. I will remind you your first edition sold the fuck out, modifier apropos in this instance, and some of us had to content ourselves with the second edition, which I should in fact find on the bookshelf so you can inscribe it. Preferably while you completely ignore the clutter shudder that is our apartment. (N did vacuum the main room so whatever you sleep on, you will not be sleeping on hockey tape and cat hair.)

[movingfinger]

DM is visiting me; we made the roast, and we slow-roasted it at 250 with the hot finish for a crust (excellent results, will do that henceforth), the porcini popovers (will be our standard henceforth, they're mysteriously delicious), the beans, and the potato-leek gratin, which we ate again last night with sable, for dinner. Essentially it is in the baked chowder class of dishes I love (add ansjovis and get Jansson's Temptation!). I would love to do it with some flaked smoked haddock as a casserole.

On the carrots, I suspect the vinegar; ginger and vinegar can combine for a turpentine effect. Not using the chilis removed a savoriness/warmth that the pickle needs to balance the acridity of the vinegar (and orange oil, which can have overtones of cleaning product). Adding some whole cumin, allspice berries, juniper, or cracked cardamom pods should give the under-note that a good pickle needs.

It sounds like we'd better pick up some kumquats though! Yummmmm.

[roane]

Congrats on the Locus mention, may we both rake in all the royalties in 2019. :D

[cmcmck]

Bed & read sound like my sorta combination! :o)

[jesse_the_k]

by not having a second refrigerator in which to store a marinating roast

Doesn't living in winter near the ocean provide you with the chance to store things on top of the entryway or on the fire escape?

Hooray for an excellent dinner.

[gwynnega]

Congratulations on the Locus listing! I'm glad you got such an impressive holiday book haul.

[coraline]

the leek gratin is SO GOOD.
now i want to try the porcini popovers.

[gilana]

We made the kumquats for part of our New Year's feast and they were fabulous! Thanks for the pointer.