![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Shine, shine a Roosevelt dime
I had a doctor's appointment in Brookline this afternoon. Turned out their office is located only a few stops down on the C Line from Mei Mei, so as soon as I got out, I headed up Beacon in the bright cool sunshine and the hope that starting life as a food truck meant the restaurant would sell take-away things in addition to indescribably epic dinners. They were between menus but serving all their sandwiches and drinks, so I left with a Haymaker's Punch and a Porco Rosso. I did not try to eat on the subway. I drank the punch and was so glad that two weeks of acetic acid in my ears four times daily has not removed my ability to enjoy the taste of vinegar.
I caught the Green Line at Fenway. A few stops later, there sat down across from me a young black woman wearing jeans, a denim shirt, a camo-colored jacket, immense tinted sunglasses of a style I associate with the 1970's, and her hair cropped very short except for the front wave of a perfect pompadour, worthy of Janelle Monáe. I could not think of a graceful way to lean across the aisle and tell her she looked fantastic, and then at Park Street everyone instantly dispersed, but she did. If anyone knows a gesture conveying this is not a romantic overture and it is too loud to talk in here anyway but damn, I should like to learn it for next time. I have a related problem when people on crowded public transit are reading books I love.
The Porco Rosso is the meat-based version of Mei Mei's Double Awesome: a scallion pancake sandwich filled with ham and ricotta, cranberry hoisin sauce and fried garlic, and a pile of tart leafy greens that were possibly watercress. The counter staff encouraged me toward it. They were not wrong.
It just occurred to me that Thanchvil is the Etruscan form of the name I knew Latinized as Tanaquil. I should have made the connection before now. I had the sound changes: Tiberius, Thefarie; Tarquinia, Tarchna. Now I may have trouble looking at the sarcophagus in the MFA without thinking of Tanith Lee's Black Unicorn (1991). I thought she'd invented the name until I was in high school.
(I love the sarcophagus in the MFA. I love both of them. They have faces.)
I caught the Green Line at Fenway. A few stops later, there sat down across from me a young black woman wearing jeans, a denim shirt, a camo-colored jacket, immense tinted sunglasses of a style I associate with the 1970's, and her hair cropped very short except for the front wave of a perfect pompadour, worthy of Janelle Monáe. I could not think of a graceful way to lean across the aisle and tell her she looked fantastic, and then at Park Street everyone instantly dispersed, but she did. If anyone knows a gesture conveying this is not a romantic overture and it is too loud to talk in here anyway but damn, I should like to learn it for next time. I have a related problem when people on crowded public transit are reading books I love.
The Porco Rosso is the meat-based version of Mei Mei's Double Awesome: a scallion pancake sandwich filled with ham and ricotta, cranberry hoisin sauce and fried garlic, and a pile of tart leafy greens that were possibly watercress. The counter staff encouraged me toward it. They were not wrong.
It just occurred to me that Thanchvil is the Etruscan form of the name I knew Latinized as Tanaquil. I should have made the connection before now. I had the sound changes: Tiberius, Thefarie; Tarquinia, Tarchna. Now I may have trouble looking at the sarcophagus in the MFA without thinking of Tanith Lee's Black Unicorn (1991). I thought she'd invented the name until I was in high school.
(I love the sarcophagus in the MFA. I love both of them. They have faces.)
no subject
Doesn't a Tanaquil or Taniquil show up in Susan Cooper's Seaward? I don't own a copy, but there's a Janus-faced ?statue and my weak memory wants it to have been female. I'm probably wrong insofar as a web search doesn't turn up anything. ETA What it did turn up is this, for which one need not be logged in, I think.
no subject
Nice. And yes, that's the Tanaquil from whom I realized that Lee hadn't. Not to be confused with Tarpeia.
Doesn't a Tanaquil or Taniquil show up in Susan Cooper's Seaward?
The Lady Taranis, who is death and not evil. There's a Tanaqui in Diana Wynne Jones' The Spellcoats (1979), but I don't think I read that until college.
What it did turn up is this, for which one need not be logged in, I think.
That's cool! Thank you. I've read about the language—I needed it for a couple of poems, also the only alternate history I've ever been able to complete—but a thorough online resource does not hurt.
no subject
Is there a reference you'd recommend?
no subject
I imprinted weirdly on the book in elementary school. I read it before The Dark Is Rising. It's the kind of story it took a re-read in college to distinguish from things I've dreamed.
Is there a reference you'd recommend?
In 2008, I got a lot of it off Mysterious Etruscans, but most of their links are now dead. I've been looking for Larissa Bonfante in used book stores.
no subject
Thanks very much for the suggestions!
no subject
My this is not a romantic overture but you're awesome! gesture of choice, when I am sufficiently moved to make one, is to do my best to indicate their book/hair/outfit/everything, give a thumbs up with a smile either conspiratorial or impressed, and then pointedly turn my attention immediately back to my book or phone or whatever. (This is basically an adapted version of the hey you're awesome, fellow cosplayer thumbs up and/or nod I do at costuming-heavy cons.) The last part is, of course, important so as not to come across as trying to hit on them. And, of course, if they seem harried or closed-off or like they might be sketchy at me in turn, I don't.
no subject
Huzzah!
And also inspired me to crave a Double Awesome until with Sandry's aiding and abetting I ended up making a sort of cousin of it myself: onion paratha, cheddar cheese, leftover curtido from Maya Sol, and fried eggs over medium. Not as good as the Double Awesome, but nonetheless extremely satisfying.
Hee. That doesn't sound bad at all. Your reverse-engineering kitchen skills are mighty.
to do my best to indicate their book/hair/outfit/everything, give a thumbs up with a smile either conspiratorial or impressed, and then pointedly turn my attention immediately back to my book or phone or whatever.
Thank you. That sounds pretty much exactly like what I want, with additional evidence that it works.
The last part is, of course, important so as not to come across as trying to hit on them.
Yeah. I really don't want to creep on strangers on the subway any more than I want strangers on the subway to creep on me.
no subject
Hee. That doesn't sound bad at all. Your reverse-engineering kitchen skills are mighty.
Ha, thank you! I'm not much good at reverse-engineering things that include complicated baking chemistry, but "stack of deliciousness with an egg on top" I can manage. And the sort of onion paratha one can buy frozen at some Indian/Pakistani/etc convenience stores turns out to work quite well as a substitute for Mei Mei's scallion pancakes, in case that's of interest to you.
That sounds pretty much exactly like what I want, with additional evidence that it works.
Well, I think it does! I haven't gotten the impression that I'm creeping anybody out, at any rate, although I possibly my success level at non-confusingly communicating what exactly I'm giving a thumbs up for is more variable. It seems to work well enough to be going on with, at any rate.
no subject
I have a vested interest in returning while their lunch menu is still active.
It seems to work well enough to be going on with, at any rate.
Yay!
no subject
Sound-changes really fascinate me.
no subject
Same. I love comparing words and names.
no subject
no subject
The name in The Spellcoats is Tanaqui:
"I come fourth, and I am called Tanaqui, which is a name from the scented rushes that line the River . . . I wove the two signs of my own name: Tan-aqui. I weave it here to show. See: together, rushes; apart younger-sister."
But I suspect the answer is yes.
no subject
no subject
no subject
I visit the Etruscan sarcophagi every time I'm at the MFA. They're two generations of the same family. The restoration has meant that for the last year or so, the whole Etruscan room has been shut down and turned into a conservation studio, but I've peered in at them through the glass. Someday the jewelry and the pottery and the urn with the siren on it will come back into view.
I'd eat the hell out of the Double Awesome.
It looks like late-night drunk food par excellence to me. Especially after the Porco Rosso, I really want to try it. The magical kale salad ("Leafy local kale with sea-brined feta, garlic panko, rice wine vinaigrette and a slow-poached-then-fried egg") also looks like it might live up to its name.
(Come and visit! There are good restaurants here, if probably not enough canals for you.)
no subject
*(Come and visit! There are good restaurants here, if probably not enough canals for you.)*
Sold! I've burned out my canal obsession for now, anyhow.
no subject
no subject
It was indeed! (I think there was a note about it in the menu.)
no subject
That sandwich is astounding.
Nine
no subject
Mei Mei is just a great restaurant. I'm pulling for them to make it through the first critical year and then keep it up. They make five-spice snickerdoodle cookies.
no subject
If she refuses a complement, you answer, cheerfully, "Thank you. You have a great day." Make sure that you break body language.
As long as you are a class act about it, this usually works out fine.
no subject
no subject
I like that the article linked behind the name Thanchvil is written by someone named Sebastian Smee. What a great name that is, too!
no subject
Interesting. I wonder if it was on Tolkien's mind.
someone named Sebastian Smee. What a great name that is, too!
Yes! And he writes well about art.