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It makes you wonder why you're here and why you feel so strangely weird
I did not know that cube steak is called chicken-fried or country-fried when you dredge it in beaten egg and seasoned flour and fry it in a skillet, but that's what we made for dinner tonight. I'm not disputing the name: it's exactly the preparation my family uses for chicken breasts pounded thin, although those tend to get served with lemon. I had just never encountered it in the wild, which I suspect just means I have never eaten a meal in Texas. ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
derspatchel made cheese grits to go on the side and his family's pepper gravy to go on top and I confirmed for myself that our apartment's fire alarm works. Autolycus confirmed that he will attempt to eat anything that contains milk, even if it also contains cayenne.
I am very glad that we made it to the town hall with Attorney General Maura Healey. Much of what she was doing was reassuring her constituency that her office is both responding to the daily onslaught of national-level horror coming out of the White House ("You name it, day after day, it's been disheartening and distressing") and keeping on track with its own state agenda (opioid crisis, student debt, healthcare, gun safety, consumer protection, the environment), but she was an entertaining and responsive speaker and I did find myself reassured, so I would say she's good at the public-facing part of her job as well as the part that involves getting sued twice by the NRA and most recently—and unsuccessfully—by Exxon. She was in Logan Airport the night of the first travel ban and she finds the revised version no less unconstitutional, disingenuous, and dangerous. She called 45 a "chaos president" and reminded the audience that she did not believe that his election reflected the true American majority: "And I'm not even going to get into the popular vote." She stressed the efficacy of small daily actions as well as big crowd rallies, the kind of steady pressure on elected officials that has already produced results like the Arizona legislature backing down on its bill to criminalize nonviolent protest; she spoke multiple times of the importance of reaching out to the people who are already being hurt, who are marginalized or marginalized differently from you, the importance of showing love, compassion, and solidarity. The state hotline to report hate crimes or bias incidents—experienced or witnessed—is (800) 994-3228. Topics from the audience included the legal status of sanctuary cities, gun violence, affordable housing and minimum wage, the urgency of Massachusetts' opioid epidemic, clean energy and climate change, the best ways to combat potential ICE action in Somerville and Cambridge, trans rights and Healey's disappointment in Jeff Sessions, the importance of not forgetting people actually using drugs in the focus on prevention and recovery, and the closing big-picture question of what the attorneys general across different states are doing to fight a presidential administration that seems bent on exploiting and exhausting its citizens, for which Healey's answer was "Take your vitamins, drink a lot of water, get up, and go!" and the encouragement that, indeed, state AGs wake up every morning, read the news, and immediately ask themselves "Do we have grounds to sue?" Earlier she had taken a question from an audience member concerned about Baker's budget cuts and her office's ability to handle so many different issues; now she closed with a verbal air-punch, "We got this!" I had not heard her speak before; I am not surprised that she has a huge popular following. She gave the impression of tenacity, energy, and humor without naiveté; she never offered a slick answer to a complicated question without qualifying it, which I appreciated especially given her flair for pithy lines. The thing where she is an out and proud queer woman in politics is also pretty sweet. It was slightly startling and wonderful that the thin silvery man who asked about climate change was Fred Small, beloved folksinger of my childhood, these days Minister for Climate Justice at the Arlington Street Church.teenybuffalo sat in front of us and almost certainly took better notes than I did.
I am also pleased that my hunt for a birthday book for my mother in the basement of the Harvard Book Store bore fruit, but I am taking it as a wholly undeserved reward from the universe that their mystery section contained a remaindered paperback of Elliott Chaze's obscure pulp classic Black Wings Has My Angel (1953) and New Orleans Noir (2007) edited by Julie Smith, complete with Benjamin January story. It opens with a perfectly reasonable incredulous question: "Kentucky Williams owns a Bible?" Hannibal is referencing autochthonous Athenian kings by the bottom of the page, so I expect to enjoy it.
derspatchel made cheese grits to go on the side and his family's pepper gravy to go on top and I confirmed for myself that our apartment's fire alarm works. Autolycus confirmed that he will attempt to eat anything that contains milk, even if it also contains cayenne.I am very glad that we made it to the town hall with Attorney General Maura Healey. Much of what she was doing was reassuring her constituency that her office is both responding to the daily onslaught of national-level horror coming out of the White House ("You name it, day after day, it's been disheartening and distressing") and keeping on track with its own state agenda (opioid crisis, student debt, healthcare, gun safety, consumer protection, the environment), but she was an entertaining and responsive speaker and I did find myself reassured, so I would say she's good at the public-facing part of her job as well as the part that involves getting sued twice by the NRA and most recently—and unsuccessfully—by Exxon. She was in Logan Airport the night of the first travel ban and she finds the revised version no less unconstitutional, disingenuous, and dangerous. She called 45 a "chaos president" and reminded the audience that she did not believe that his election reflected the true American majority: "And I'm not even going to get into the popular vote." She stressed the efficacy of small daily actions as well as big crowd rallies, the kind of steady pressure on elected officials that has already produced results like the Arizona legislature backing down on its bill to criminalize nonviolent protest; she spoke multiple times of the importance of reaching out to the people who are already being hurt, who are marginalized or marginalized differently from you, the importance of showing love, compassion, and solidarity. The state hotline to report hate crimes or bias incidents—experienced or witnessed—is (800) 994-3228. Topics from the audience included the legal status of sanctuary cities, gun violence, affordable housing and minimum wage, the urgency of Massachusetts' opioid epidemic, clean energy and climate change, the best ways to combat potential ICE action in Somerville and Cambridge, trans rights and Healey's disappointment in Jeff Sessions, the importance of not forgetting people actually using drugs in the focus on prevention and recovery, and the closing big-picture question of what the attorneys general across different states are doing to fight a presidential administration that seems bent on exploiting and exhausting its citizens, for which Healey's answer was "Take your vitamins, drink a lot of water, get up, and go!" and the encouragement that, indeed, state AGs wake up every morning, read the news, and immediately ask themselves "Do we have grounds to sue?" Earlier she had taken a question from an audience member concerned about Baker's budget cuts and her office's ability to handle so many different issues; now she closed with a verbal air-punch, "We got this!" I had not heard her speak before; I am not surprised that she has a huge popular following. She gave the impression of tenacity, energy, and humor without naiveté; she never offered a slick answer to a complicated question without qualifying it, which I appreciated especially given her flair for pithy lines. The thing where she is an out and proud queer woman in politics is also pretty sweet. It was slightly startling and wonderful that the thin silvery man who asked about climate change was Fred Small, beloved folksinger of my childhood, these days Minister for Climate Justice at the Arlington Street Church.
teenybuffalo sat in front of us and almost certainly took better notes than I did.I am also pleased that my hunt for a birthday book for my mother in the basement of the Harvard Book Store bore fruit, but I am taking it as a wholly undeserved reward from the universe that their mystery section contained a remaindered paperback of Elliott Chaze's obscure pulp classic Black Wings Has My Angel (1953) and New Orleans Noir (2007) edited by Julie Smith, complete with Benjamin January story. It opens with a perfectly reasonable incredulous question: "Kentucky Williams owns a Bible?" Hannibal is referencing autochthonous Athenian kings by the bottom of the page, so I expect to enjoy it.
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It's what the internet told me!
I miss it terribly, but I probably shouldn't indulge in that much fried food.
Well, just don't have it every night. It was very straightforward to make at home, barring the bit where I didn't put enough butter in the pan and the flour on the third steak caught on fire.
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Thank you for the write-up of Maura Healey's town hall! That sounds like an excellent event, and she seems like an excellent public official. Reassurance is in short enough supply these days that it's always extra welcome.
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People are coming out of the woodwork on both Dreamwidth and LJ to tell me where in the continental U.S. they have eaten chicken-fried steak. I'm really enjoying finding out!
That said, I'm not sure whether I'd still love it, or if my memory of it has the soft filter of nostalgia (and younger tastebuds) that wouldn't carry through to nostalgic fondness for the genuine article.
I don't know if this makes it better or worse, but prepared in a kitchen rather than a truck stop it was pretty delicious. I am sorry that no suitable vegetarian replacement exists!
Thank you for the write-up of Maura Healey's town hall! That sounds like an excellent event, and she seems like an excellent public official. Reassurance is in short enough supply these days that it's always extra welcome.
You're welcome! I'd known almost nothing about her beforehand except for a couple of cases she was involved in and now I am actively glad that she is our attorney general. More people like her in office would be a good thing for the country. I wish we did not have to hang on until 2018 to make it happen.
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To be fair, I'm not 100% vegetarian always; I'll eat meat once in a while if the animal lived well and died well and the meat didn't get shipped hundreds of petrochemical-fueled miles. So I could technically make my own sometime! I just have never gone to the effort. But you've reminded me now that it's possible, so perhaps we'll see.
I'd known almost nothing about her beforehand except for a couple of cases she was involved in and now I am actively glad that she is our attorney general.
Same, but based on this so am I now!
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I was really happy to find out she's part of our state government.
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You're welcome! She is a completely reasonable person to be a fan of.
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Lucky! I never saw him live; we just had his records in the house. No Limit (1985) was the one I learned by heart.
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Thanks for the status report: good to know that the opposition is in office as well as on the streets.
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I hadn't actually realized it was a specific cut rather than just a preparation before
Thanks for the status report: good to know that the opposition is in office as well as on the streets.
You're welcome. I wish more of the opposition were in office, but I guess that's what surviving until the midterm elections in 2018 is for.
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I think I just grew up in the wrong part of the country for it to be a common dish.
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AG Maura Healey sounds quite impressive.
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Okay, now I think that's silly.
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It is clearly a very popular and well-loved dish that I in New England just didn't meet until now! It was not complicated to make (except for the brief incident of kitchen fire, which was complicated mostly because we then had to get the fire alarm to shut up) and it tasted great.
AG Maura Healey sounds quite impressive.
I was really glad to find out she's one of my elected officials. I want more like her.
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Thank you! It was a really good thing to go to, especially right now.
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If I see a second copy, it's yours.
And that's a place you'd find chicken-fried steak: cheap cube steak fried the same way that your mom fries her chicken. Yum. (My mother and extended family are from Texas.)
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Thanks!
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And I'm so glad you found a copy of New Orleans Noir! I'd forgotten that story had a publication that wasn't electronic.
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Because of this post, I have been slowly putting together a mental map of where chicken-fried steak can be found in the wild, and it's really cool. Thank you for adding your data point!
It makes me think of time I tried to explain the name to a non-native English speaker, and couldn't come up with anything better than "I guess when Americans think about fried things, we think of chicken".
It is true that I associate that particular kind of dredging-and-flouring with chicken, as opposed to the battered deep-frying of fish.
And I'm so glad you found a copy of New Orleans Noir! I'd forgotten that story had a publication that wasn't electronic.
I think it's the only one of the short stories I can read at the moment, unless I can get hold of an eleven-year-old issue of Ellery Queen!
(Have you read the others? How are they?)
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Yeah, I've read them all – of course, I have the advantage that I often prefer ebooks to physical copies.
The short stories tend to be much more focused on the mystery itself, with little time for characterization or setting, which is probably just inherent to the limited space. I'd happily read a story without a mystery plot! But Hambly hasn't written any, alas.
That said, there are some nice moments in them. Several are written from Rose's POV, which is a nice contrast to the books, which are limited to Ben's POV. There's a fascinating conversation with Livia in "Hagar", and "Death on the Moon" has some very cute scenes between Rose and Hannibal.
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It's not like the audience for this series isn't all about the curtainfic anyway.
Several are written from Rose's POV, which is a nice contrast to the books, which are limited to Ben's POV.
Oh, nice. What does Rose look like from inside when written by Hambly?
There's a fascinating conversation with Livia in "Hagar", and "Death on the Moon" has some very cute scenes between Rose and Hannibal.
Argh. Maybe I'll borrow somebody's e-reader sometime. (I hate reading off screens!)