August 2023 – Into the Woods

Some recent eats

Egg foo yung with stir-fried sweet-potato leaves

I buy good eggs from pastured chickens and then forget that I have eggs. I think it’s because I’m so content on a plants-only diet, until I start to worry that I might not be getting enough B-12. Then I remember how good egg foo yung can be.

You don’t need Chinese vegetables such as bean sprouts. Plain old cabbage (with a bit of onion) works great. The key to good egg foo yung is umami, and that means brown. The umami is partly in the sauce, with some Better Than Bouillon and soy sauce. But the cabbage and onion also need to be browned. I’ve written here in the past about how I think monosodium glutamate is not harmful in small quantities. It’s made from yeast. Study after study has tried to prove MSG guilty of something, anything, and have mostly come up short. After all, our own bodies make glutamic acid, and it’s found naturally in many foods such as tomatoes and cheese. Like salt, it’s something that should be used sparingly. But its ability to add umani is a kind of miracle. When MSG comes into contact with hot oil, it immediately turns a beautiful brown, revealing what it truly is — pure brown umami (though it’s as white as salt) stabilized with a sodium molecule. Oil and heat transform it back into something brown.

Monday morning, because the day was cloudy and somewhat cooler, I made my periodic trip to Whole Foods and Trader Joe’s in Winston-Salem. I feel pinned down by the weather of July and August, and I don’t get out much. As a kind of mini-vacation, I went to Reynolda Village, where there is a Village Tavern. Reynolda Village is adjacent to the campus of Wake Forest University. The place was built in 1916 as a mansion and working dairy farm for the R.J. Reynolds family (think tobacco, and Winston and Salem cigarettes). But since 1965 it has belonged to Wake Forest University. The house is a museum. The grounds and gardens are a park. All the many outbuildings, all of which have a lot of charm, have been turned into little eateries and boutiques. At 11 a.m., Village Tavern had just opened for lunch. The large patio was empty, with big yellow umbrellas and twinkle lights, overhung by enormous oak trees. The waitress assigned to the patio had no one to accommodate but me. How could I resist a nicely cooked lunch, since I rarely eat out?

Incidentally, what is the appeal of fast food other than that it’s (somewhat) fast? It’s not even cheap. A few months ago, I went to a Chick-fil-A for the first time because I was curious about their cauliflower sandwich (a temporary offering; they no longer have it). As I recall, that sandwich cost more than $11. And yet the grilled salmon plate with healthy fixin’s at Village Tavern didn’t cost that much more — $18 — and in a far more pleasant setting. I might eat out more often but for the fact that Winston-Salem, about 45 minutes away on winding roads, is the nearest place with civilized eateries and trained cooks. Here in the sticks, it’s all country cookin’ with shockingly sorry ingredients, cooked by cooks who couldn’t cook their way out of a ham biscuit.

Please don’t misunderstand me. I esteem country cookin’. One of my grandmothers was a master chef of provincial Southern cookin’, by any standard (and she had a big farm to supply her). But these days few people know how to do it or have even tasted anything that meets the standard. And rural restaurant food is always inferior because of the necessity of sorry ingredients, stingily deployed by untrained low-wage cooks, to keep prices low. Southern provincial cookin’ is like a dying language that a few native speakers are trying to keep alive.

I started out talking about egg foo yung, didn’t I? But of course there are many methods that all good cookin’ has in common.

Grilled salmon at the Village Tavern, Reynolda Village in Winston-Salem

Now let’s stop being afraid of them

A malignant narcissist’s last resort: If you won’t adore me, at least be afraid of me.

Politically, they are doomed. The very devil would have to intervene with some sort of devil-miracle to prevent a wipeout of Republicans in the 2024 elections. Not only are Trump and his operatives politically doomed, their lives are over. Some of them are old enough to die in prison.

These criminals actually occupied the White House. That’s how close we came to fascism. They were off to a good start, but four years was not enough for them to turn us into Russia. That, of course, was their intention. Elections would no longer matter. With a bit more work, the lower courts wouldn’t be able to touch them. The Supreme Court would protect them. Then they’d divvy up the economy, and it would be full steam ahead in the process of looting America, the same way Putin and his friends looted Russia. They’d all fly around in private jets (including Supreme Court justices). They’d all buy fancy properties (as the Russians have done, and including Supreme Court justices) in all the places where the global oligarchy go to live it up on the loot they’ve extracted by turning their home countries into corrupt shit-hole countries.

The leaders of this conspiracy to turn the United States into Russia are finished. But the big problem now is that we are left with the fools who not only supported them but who continue to support them. That’s no more than 30 percent of the voting population. At the national level, there are not enough of them to be dangerous — at least, not unless one of the many wannabes succeeds in becoming the new Trump and some stupid “independents” fall for it, as they did for Trump. Right-wing Republicans can continue to do damage only in the red states where they are in power. It’s going to take years, unfortunately, for them to die off. Most young people detest them, which is a major driver of right-wing panic and their attempts to lock themselves into power, legally if possible and illegally if they think they can get away with it. They are terrified of the future, because there is no place for them there.

What amazes me is that the hometown deplorables thought they had something to gain from the corruption and criminalization of the American government. The deplorables seem to actually believe that criminals like the people in these mug shots somehow care about them. Or maybe it’s that the deplorables are so motivated by such pure spite that they’d be OK with even greater marginalization, and ever-smaller pieces of the pie, as long as the people they’ve been taught to hate are kicked around even worse than they are themselves.

Though the fascist dream of a fascist America has been crushed for now, their propagandists are still active. The dreams of the propagandists seem to have been reduced to violence. With elections now beyond them, violence is their only hope. Sarah Palin said yesterday that a civil war is going to happen if the prosecution of Trump continues. Dream on, Sarah Palin. Tucker Carlson wanted to ask Trump about civil war. That’s a pretty dream if you’re a fascist, but the truth is that the troops are no longer available for the civil war they dream of. I’m reminded of the Vietnam era, when the peaceniks often said, “What if they gave a war and nobody came?” Today it’s, “What if the fascists gave a civil war and nobody came?” The cream of the fascist crop went to the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021, and they got neutralized by justice. The deplorables now know that they’ve lost, though they’re still in the rage and denial stage.

The courts are dealing with the criminals. But it’s up to us to deal with the hordes of hometown deplorables and their rage. They’re all around us. But there’s nothing they can do now with their rage, other than go after school boards and harass their scapegoats. Some true believers with lots of guns will, as usual, go on shooting expeditions that they won’t survive.

As recently as August 2, David Brooks wrote a piece in the New York Times with the headline “What if we’re the bad guys here?” He’s reviving yet again the terrible idea that it’s Democrats and other decent human beings who are somehow responsible for Trumpism, rather than the deplorables. Even if life for the deplorables isn’t fair (it isn’t), that’s no excuse for fascism. The deplorables might benefit from studying the history of African-Americans (rather than erasing them from the history taught in schools), whose lot was — and is — far worse than the deplorables, but who chose good leaders and a rational path to progress. I just saw a new and very true meme on Facebook — that those who deny history fully intend to repeat it.

I very much believe that there is something cognitively and morally broken — deranged — in those who still see Trump as a hero. They are just not decent human beings, and they are not fit for decent human company. Yet there they are, and we have to deal with them. That’s why civility is more important than ever. We’re surrounded by them. If they’re civil to us, then we can be civil to them. (Start preparing yourself now for the next Thanksgiving and Christmas gatherings.) Most of them will never change, and it’s going to take years for them to die off. Economic justice — better lives for working people rather than more billionaires, the very thing that Republicans most oppose — is a major part of the longterm solution. Educating their children is one of the biggest challenges, because the deplorables (and their leaders and propagandists) don’t want children educated. They want children to be deplorable.

We’ve avoided disaster. Now we just need more time for the arc of the moral universe to continue its course toward justice — until, someday, as their numbers dwindle, as their children catch on, and as their churches serve the devil and go bankrupt, we leave these ugly souls behind forever.

Update:

It’s not just me. Anyone with a moral IQ above 98.6 can see it.

“Trump has ‘moral compass of an ax murderer,’ says Georgia Republican.

Yep … I’m in the woods

A drone 235 feet directly above the abbey. Click here for high resolution version.

I’ve been interested in photography drones for a long time. But only recently did drones become halfway affordable. Smaller and smaller computer chips, improvements in battery technology, and smaller and better cameras have made it possible to build drones that weigh less than half a pound but which can shoot excellent 4K video. The drone I bought is a DJI Mini 3.

I took the photo above by putting the drone on its landing mat in the driveway in front of my house. There are trees all around me, so the driveway is the safest area for avoiding trees. I flew the drone straight up to an altitude of about 235 feet, then pointed it southwest to shoot this picture. The low mountains are the Sauratown Mountain chain, a small chain of mountains in Stokes and Surry counties (of North Carolina) about forty miles south of the Blue Ridge Mountains in Virginia. The three bumps to the right include Hanging Rock State Park, and the bump to the left is Sauratown Mountain.

It will certainly be a while before I have the skill to shoot any dramatic video with the drone. Learning to fly drones takes a lot of practice. Some of the YouTube videos shot with drones are amazing. There are lots of people who have been flying drones for years and who are very good pilots as well as good photographers and video editors. And it seems that a great many of them live in picturesque places such as the coasts of the U.K. (including Scotland) and Ireland. I have a lot to learn. But I’ll certainly have drone videos, and more drone photos in the future.

Will we finally get a Trump mug shot?

Source: Wikimedia Commons

A big problem with posting about current events is that it’s almost impossible to find photographs that are in the public domain. For a long time now, the world has been waiting for a criminal indictment of Donald Trump that comes with a mug shot. Police mug shots are public record and are therefore in the public domain. For whatever reason, no mug shots were provided with Trump’s previous indictments. But now, in Georgia, we’re promised that that will change.

According to Axios, the sheriff of Fulton County has said that Trump will be treated the same as any other person charged with a crime. “Unless somebody tells me differently, we are following our normal practices, and so it doesn’t matter your status, we’ll have a mugshot ready for you,” the sheriff said.

Time Magazine wrote a piece back in March saying that a genuine Trump mug shot would be a fundraising boon for Trump. That may be, since some people are that stupid. But for the rest of us, a Trump mug shot will lead to a grand outpouring of memes like nothing ever seen before. There will be a great feast and festival of snark and schadenfreude.

We know that Trump has until August 25 to turn himself in, but so far there has been no word on when his arraignment will happen.

I can’t wait.

By the way, speaking of feasts, the media have been feasting on polls saying that the Trump indictments cause Trump’s popularity (among Republicans) to rise. This is bunk. Trumpists are still in the anger and denial stage. Those who respond to polls of course say that the indictments make them more likely to vote for Trump. It’s the only way they can register their anger and denial. Polls fifteen months before an election are meaningless anyway.

I closely monitor the Facebook group of the Republican Party in my county. This county voted 78 percent for Trump in 2020. That Facebook group provides some insight into the state of mind of Trumpists in red, red counties. Mostly they’re not even talking about Trump. Very few Republicans even post anymore — only the most radical and angry ones. My impression is that it’s all starting to sink in. They’re figuring out that they’ve been deceived and taken for a ride by a con man, and that they’re now accountable for everything they’ve done and said in the past. The smarter ones may have started reaching the depression stage of grief, which I would call demoralization, when the grief is political. There is absolutely nothing in sight for them to lift their spirits or give them a win. Their future is lose, lose, lose, as far as the eye can see.

Scapegoats 2, Republicans 0

The political death wish of the Republican Party is mind-boggling. Why do they go on fighting battles that they’ve already lost and that accelerate their slide toward permanent minority status and the contempt of history? — at least, in civilized places as opposed to places such as Florida, Texas, and Tennessee.

Banning books, and threatening librarians with prison sentences, can only backfire, given time. According to the Washington Post, at least seven states have passed laws that impose criminal penalties for books that Republicans deem obscene. Arkansas threatens librarians with prison sentences of six years, Oklahoma ten.

Don’t Republicans know about the internet? Young people have always found ways of finding out about things that adults don’t want them to know. Because of the internet it’s easier today than ever. Schoolchildren in Florida no doubt know that there are some subjects that their teachers aren’t allowed to talk about. The kids will work twice as hard to educate themselves on such subjects. They’ll also learn another lesson — that Republicans are hateful and contemptible. Florida’s law originally applied only to grades K-3, but earlier this year the state board of education expanded the ban to include grades 4-12.

One of the frequently banned books is Casey McCuiston’s Red, White, and Royal Blue. The book was a New York Times Bestseller. According to Wikipedia, translations have been published in Argentina, Bolivia, Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Costa Rica, Czech Republic, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, El Salvador, Finland, Germany, Guatemala, Honduras, Hungary, Mexico, Nicaragua, Panama, Paraguay, Peru, Poland, Portugal, Serbia, Sweden, Puerto Rico, Romania, Russia, Spain, Israel, and Uruguay.

Republicans might as well stand in front of a speeding train and wave a crucifix. Publishers must love it when a book is banned. For many books, a ban creates a sharp increase in sales.

A movie version of Red, White, and Royal Blue was released this weekend by Amazon Prime Video. The film is more serious than it appears to be in the trailers. There is an immigrant element (Mexico) as well as the gay element. Texas gets the middle finger. Only just now did I realize that “Royal Blue” is a double entendre, as one of the characters sets out to make Texas not just a blue state, but a royal blue state.

The cast includes Stephen Fry and Uma Thurman. Thurman was born in Boston, but she does a pretty good Texas accent.

The sound track is clearly meant for people younger than I am. That’s as it should be. But upon hearing a few lines of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s “If I Loved You,” (1945), sung by a voice and in a style that just doesn’t work for someone my age, I had to pause the video and go listen to a proper performance. I’ve included a link to a video below, from Royal Albert Hall.

Young people have another internet hit to stream right now, the second season of “Heartstoppers,” on Netflix.

Oxford India paper

Click here for high resolution version.

Once again, unable to find any newer fiction that interested me, I’m reading another Sir Walter Scott. It’s The Fortunes of Nigel, and I believe this will be the eighth or ninth Walter Scott that I’ve read. Though Scott’s works are available at Gutenberg and can be read on Kindles, I like having nice old editions of 19th Century classics. I bought this copy of Nigel on eBay from a seller in the United Kingdom.

The book was not expensive, but I was immediately impressed by the quality of the binding and, in particular, the quality of the paper. Though the paper is 111 years old, it is bright white and has hardly yellowed at all (though the heavier paper used for the illustrations has yellowed somewhat). The paper is remarkably thin and opaque. There is no brittleness. It wasn’t too hard to figure out what kind of paper this almost certainly is. The clue is the name Henry Frowde on the title page, over the Oxford University Press imprint.

Henry Frowde, it seems, was not a scholar, but he was a genius at printing and binding. He must have been a bit of a religious fanatic, because he printed a lot of Bibles. One of his innovations was the use of Oxford India paper, which was made from bleached rags and hemp. It was often used for Bibles, and as you’ll see in the Wikipedia article, Encylopedia Britannica used it for their 1911 edition.

So now that’s another item for my next visit to the U.K. — visiting some bookstores that sell old books. I’m guessing that there are several of those in Edinburgh. I am not particularly interested in rare books, nor would I be able to afford them. But I am very interested in beautiful books that are beautifully printed on good paper and beautifully bound. There are many cheaply printed old editions of 19th Century classics. It’s nice to see that the Oxford press adhered to a higher standard.

⬆︎ Click here for high resolution version.

To heck with the news. Let’s talk about food.

Barley biscuits with pinto beans, okra-tomato sauté, and green beans. Click here for high resolution version.

The news is exasperating. Even as Trump makes madman threats, including threatening people such as Mike Pence, who is sure to be a witness at Trump’s trials, the media are doubling down on the horsewash idea that Smith won’t be able to prove the charges against Trump and that Trump will get back into the White House in 2024. Never mind all that for now. In time, it’ll all get sorted out. Eating well is the best revenge. But never forget how the media have tried to scare us to keep milking Trump for clicks and ratings.

For barley biscuits, you can adjust the proportions of unbleached wheat flour with hulled barley flour to suit your taste. At a ratio of one part barley flour to five parts wheat flour, all you’ll notice is some some extra (and delicious) flavor. With five parts barley flour to one part wheat flour, the biscuits will be a bit crumbly, and it will be hard to keep them moist (using buttermilk will help). Everything in between is worth experimenting with.

Until this summer, I didn’t know that sweet potato leaves make good greens. But you can eat them either cooked or raw, as a salad green. No wonder the deer like them so much. And though most lettuces don’t like high summer, sweet potato greens love high summer, even though the sweet potatoes won’t be ready until fall.

Sweet potato leaves stir-fried with garlic; fried rice with cashews and summer vegetables; and tofu. Click here for high resolution version.