Shoesday: Spring Wedging

Remember how I said I was going to buy these? Well, I did. I am nothing if not a shoe addict of my word. In fact, I even had a good reason*: This weekend, Mom and I are heading off to Spring Training**, and what is a weekend in Arizona without attractive and comfortable sandals. And they are comfortable, surprisingly so, given their height. (Though less surprisingly because they come from the same line that two separate people described to me as "the holy grail of shoes.") The only downside is that it seems like this level of comfort was reached by installing tiny whoopee cushions in the sole of each shoe, causing my every step to be accompanied by a series of discreet foot-farts. But I don't care, and do you know why? Because this weekend, when the forecast here looks like this:

My farty shoes and I will be looking (if possibly not sounding) fabulous in a place that's a little more like this:

*"excuse."
**Viewing, I mean, not joining. Mom's minor league contract wasn't picked up this year.

The Naked and the iPhone

So, I got an iPhone. This would be thrilling news if it was 2007; as it is it's really only exciting to me, because now I will always know what direction North is.* Other benefits of joining the second decade of the 21st century: readily available maps, directions and train schedules, immediate answers to virtually any question*** and the ability to send desperate tweets when what I thought was going to be a Caltech alumni get-together after work turns out to be some sort of combination high-tech entrepreneur networking event/pickup scene where I don't know anyone there, and the only Techer I meet graduated in 2008, and a shocking large number of the people are wearing very unflattering jackets.**** So it truly is a wondrous device.

But, as life teaches us all, being special just isn't enough; you have to look special. So with that in mind I have come up with a list of possible cases to buy for my new best friend, and I am hoping you can help me pick one.

First up we have this one, which may be too bulky for my needs, but I like the old-time craftsmanship and enjoy the fact that it comes with a notepad, positioned directly across from where you can see the notepad app on the phone. This may be the iPhone case for people whose grandchildren bought it for them.

Taking things in a more modern direction, we have this, which costs five dollars more despite being made of felt, instead of steer leather, and being basically the kind of pouch you made at summer camp when it was raining. A similar, slightly cooler version is available in denim for less than half the price.

On the other hand, maybe the case shouldn't just be decorative: maybe it should provide a function that no app so far has been able to do. Maybe it should be a bottle opener:

Or perhaps it should wear a nice tweed suit:

If I was an irritating hipster, I could buy it a hoodie:

But I'm not, so let's move on.

We have the status option, complete with logo, that I like more than I should:

Maybe I'll pick one up when it goes on sale.

Or the clip-on cases that protect the phone while being arty. This site has a collection of (logo-free) designs by prominent fashion designers; I think this one is my favorite. But I also like the idea behind these, particularly the rosewood one. And this site, which allows you to upload your own design or buy someone else's if you, like me, have no artistic talent whatsoever, has some really great stuff, like this and this and especially this:

So, I don't know. What do you think?


*iPhone compass + spinning chair=hours** of enjoyment.
**Okay, minutes.
***For example: Are platypuses mammals? (Yes.)
****On the other hand, if you are in the market for meeting single guys with a decent amount of education and at least the potential to have a job, I suppose you could do worse than your local high-tech entrepreneur networking mixer. There isn't a lot of competition, though prepare your self for the quality of the jackets and the potential that someone will try to impress you by the fact that he once worked with a guy who co-founded a company with Mark Zuckerberg's***** best friend.
*****Excuse me, "Zuk".

Thurscheese: Brillat Savarin

Tell Me What You Eat and I'll Tell You That It's Cheese.

I'm not sure if I should be feeling pleased with myself or cheated, but I've had this cheese before. It showed up on a cheese plate at a restaurant a few years ago, and I liked it enough to remember the name and find it in the store. Actually, remembering the name was the easy part, because I was already familiar with it. Brillat Savarin was a French lawyer, essayist and gastronome and, more to the point, he was prominently quoted in the opening of every episode of the original, Japanese, Iron Chef, with which I developed a long-running and only somewhat ironic obsession with in the early 2000s*. I even threw an Iron-Chef-themed party at one point, during which I burned my hand trying to cook satay on the barbecue grill.

Which brings me to the really important news: Don't tell the cable company, but we have somehow gotten a free upgrade to the better cable package, which includes, among other things, The Cooking Channel, which appears to be basically the Food Network before they discovered reality shows and they show the old Iron Chef episodes. So I am reintroducing myself to those simpler times, not to mention the wide wonderful world of premium cable that has suddenly become available.**

Oh, and also we had some cheese. I recommend it.


*It is one of the great failures of our times that we never managed to come up with a decent nickname for that decade.
**BBCAmerica! Which shows Star Trek: The Next Generation reruns in primetime for some reason! But also Top Gear, so all is forgiven.

Shoefinder: I Believe in Summer

I know that right now, for many of us, hot and dry weather seems like a dim and distant possibility, but I believe that the time will come*, and when it comes we are going to be wanting to spend as much time as possible in sandals.

I also believe that Nordy's has a pretty decent selection in their sale section right now, so in the interests of keeping this simple I'm going to be drawing only from there. Maybe next week I'll go on and do another retailer. Maybe I won't.

First up: Some comfortable flats. Because sometimes when it's hot and your feet are sweaty, you just don't have the bandwidth to deal with a heel.

Then again, sometimes you do. After all, there are evenings in the summer, aren't there?

(Disclaimer: Despite the name, nobody in Berkeley has ever worn these shoes.

Of course, in some places it's sweaty at night too. If you can handle the little bit that goes between your toes, these are a nice flat-but-still-dressier option.

I'm not typically a fan of the platform wedge, but these have a kind of appealing breeziness. Is this what people wear in the Hamptons?

Would the chains on these rattle irritatingly and possibly chafe? Very likely. Are they cheap and trendoid and intended for someone half my age? Almost certainly. Do I find them appealing anyway? I think we both know the answer to that.

These are mine. No touching.

*Also, I'm going to Spring Training with Mom in two weeks.

Thurscheese: Grassland Blue

Cow's milk, Minnesota

Can anyone actually tell different blue cheeses apart? We've had three now, because that's how far behind I am in keeping up with my cheese shipments, and I've enjoyed them all, but I couldn't really tell you the difference between them. I mean, sure, they don't all taste like blue cheese dressing, or blue-cheese-flavored Laughing Cow cheese, and I suspect I could tell them apart if I had them side-by-side, but tasted a month apart I honestly don't think there's much I can say to distinguish one from another.

I'm starting to suspect that I may not be a very good cheese-blogger.

Thurscheese: Hoch Ybrig

cow's milk, Switzerland

The tasting notes say "washed in white wine brine, aged by 'master affineur Rolf Beeler near Zurich.'" I say "Raclette!" because that's what it tasted like.

Thanks to my mom's Swiss heritage, we would have raclette occasionally when I was growing up, cooked on a lethal-looking contraption that melted the entire side of a quarter-wedge of cheese with an exposed heating element that is probably the reason they don't sell them here anymore. (Although a similar item does seem to be available from Europe.) It's a wonderful thing-- who doesn't enjoy a dinner of melted cheese?-- but the downside was that just when the melting process really got going was about the time when everyone was too full to eat another bite. Which is part of the reason these newfangled models are less fun; there's nothing Swiss about portion control. Also: no giant cheese wedge.

I wonder if there's such a thing as a Giant Cheese Wedge of the Month club?

Shoesday: Typecast

Everyone has a type. Sure, you think you're a wild and unpredictable free spirit, but one day you're going to wake up and realize that every guy you've ever dated has a speech impediment and all of your jeans are light-wash bootcuts with an 8.5 in rise. You can't escape it, and neither can I.

Exhibit A is these shoes. And these are B and C.* Yes, it's true and I'm ready to admit it: I have a serious thing for Sigerson Morrison pointed-toe wedges, and I am not ashamed. Why would I be ashamed? These are awesome. Don't believe me? Well, here's a close-up of the texture in the leather and the detail on the backs:

I'm right, right? Total subtle badassery. Plus, unlike a lot of ankle boots, they're cut low enough that it doesn't look like my calves are swimming awkwardly in a pair of shoe-buckets. Which is good, because even the best pointy-toe can't save shoe-buckets.


*And if I wasn't on a buying freeze and they weren't sold out in my size, these would be D, E and/or F.

Well, What Is It Then?

Also, the toaster oven is not a dust mop and the refrigerator is not a banjo.

You're welcome.

Shoesday: Does It Float?

I bought these on an impulse, because I thought they were waterproof. There was nothing in the product description that actually said they were; they just looked like they might be. Unfortunately (or not) we've been having a very warm and dry spring, and it hasn't rained since they arrived*. With any luck, I won't have a chance to really test them until winter, by which time I will almost certainly have forgotten that I meant to.


*Except for that one day the weekend before last when we were out at Costco and bought a wine fridge, and were trying to figure out how to cram it into my tiny car when the storm entered the phase technically known as "vertical swimming pool." But I wasn't wearing the shoes then.

From the Department of Warning Signs

If you at any point find yourself shopping for a Valentine's Day gift for your dog, it's time to step back and take a really serious look at the direction your life has taken.

Look, I'm Sorry, Okay?

To be fair, I did warn you.

Thurscheese:

Rocky Sage (goat's milk, New York State)

(Please ignore the label, that's from the last one. My skills as a set decorator are sadly overrated.)

What is it with cheesemakers and plants? Last time it was vegetable rennet and wood ash, this time it's Salvia* under the rind. It doesn't make a lot of sense to me-- when you are after some cheese, the first thing on your mind is not generally, "I hope it comes with vegetables."

That said, this one was nice, and I wouldn't have noticed the plant-aspect if the HSoP hadn't pointed it out to me. It's a young goat cheese, fresh and quite light in flavor, a little crumbly for spreading but nice with bread. And wine.

Any psychoactive properties went entirely unnoticed.


*I was wondering why that plant name sounded familiar to me. Then I remembered.

Is It Chilly In Here?

Of course not, I'm in California. But I do feel a freeze coming on . . .

That's right, economic observers, time to kiss the recovery goodbye, because Daisy's going on another buying freeze.*

No particular reason for this round, except that tax time is coming, and it felt like a good moment for it. But there's a twist-- I'm not giving myself a firm end date. Instead, I have decided to give up shopping until I finish the first draft of Land Squid. That's right, until I write The End on the last page of land-locked tentacle-y mayhem, there will be no cute skirts, no patterned coats, no bags with birds on them, no fancy cheese serving plates. And, laugh if you will, but I am going to say it: There will be no shoes.

(Okay, you can stop laughing now. Seriously. It's not that funny.)

The way I figure it, if anything is going to get me to keep my butt in the chair and my mind on new ways to describe dismemberment, it is the knowledge that if I don't I will never have a new pair of earrings again. Also, if I ever do quit my job and go to writing full-time, there's no way I'm going to be able to afford any of this, so I might as well get used to it now.


*For those of you not familiar with my powers, please be aware that the first time I did this, I crashed the entire global economy.**
**I said I was sorry.

Needs Ranch Dressing

Breaking: Fennec foxes don't like diet food any more than you do.



(Via @weirdimals)

Just no.

I mean it. No.

Proven: That Everything Exists On the Internet

That's not the surprising part. The surprising part is that the proof comes via Martha Stewart.

Last night I dreamed that I was at a party where they were serving delicious home-made marshmallow Peeps. (No, I don't know why. I don't even like Peeps that much.) Today it occurred to me to wonder if such a thing actually existed.

It does.

Peeps: The new cupcakes? It could happen.*


*No, it couldn't.

Schrödinger’s Cat Lady, Now Available

Listen or read it here.

I wonder what I should do for a follow-up? Occam's Razor Case? The Millikan Oil Drop Vinaigrette? Fermat's Last Theorem Before Bedtime, I Mean It Mister?

Thurscheese: The First Shipment

In my last post before the holidays I mentioned that I had fulfilled a life-long* ambition and joined a cheese-of-the-month-club, with shipments to begin shortly.

They began:

This is the December shipment-- four cheeses of varying hardnesses and intensities and a handy tasting sheet so you know which is which and what to drink with it. For whatever reason I decided to start with the second one on the intensity chart:

According to the Handy Sheet of Paper (HSoP), it is a raw sheep's milk pecorino, made with a wild artichoke vegetable rennet, with its rind covered in wood ash. Which probably combine to explain a flavor to the cheese I could best describe as "green," not in terms of age or maturity but more along the lines of tasting like vegetation. Still very tasty, but I think it's telling that this is the only one of the cheeses that we didn't entirely finish.**

Also, that ash on the rind gets everywhere.




*At least, for the part of my life when I knew that cheese-of-the-month-clubs existed.
**We did come pretty close.

The Tempura Grail

Way back, lost now in the mists of blog, I was on a mission to find the best tempura in San Mateo. I was thorough, nearly exhaustive, but though I had some decent examples of the dish, nothing rose to the level of the tempura of my dreams. Which was a disappointment, if not really the kind that kept me up at night. But it turns out that great tempura, like love or ants, turns up when you least expect it.

Last year a new Japanese restaurant, Izakaya Ginji, opened in downtown San Mateo. Which was a bold move, considering how many Japanese restaurants are already here, but this one did at least promise something different. Izakaya is, as far as I can tell, a small-plates style of restaurant, with an emphasis on things to be eaten with sake, beer, and/or shochu. This one features a  very large, very hot grill at the bar, where a chef prepare a variety of things, mostly chicken, on sticks, which you order from a slip of paper on your table. We had been there several times, ordering mostly the things on sticks (I cannot recommend the chicken hearts highly enough), when at one point we decided to try something more substantial, and got the tempura.

They do the vegetables and the shrimp separately, hence the two plates above. But the important thing is that they do them very, very well. Light, crisp batter, perfectly cooked ingredients, nothing that got heavy or soggy, even as they cooled. This was the tempura I was looking for, and no old guy waving his hand in my face was going to convince me otherwise.

We will go back, of course, but I may not actually order the tempura every time. It's enough just to know it's there.

Josh Ritter: "Stuck to You"

One of my favorite singers performing an awesomely nerdy love song. So great:

A Product and A Problem

Product:

The Juicy Couture Rubik's Cube:

Problem:

The Top Five Lies I Tell Myself While Cooking

5. It'll cook down.

4. That looks done.

3. I can totally pull off green eyeshadow.*

2. If I put enough sauce on it no one will notice.

And the number one lie I tell myself while cooking:

1. I'll do those dishes later.


*Not cooking-related, just in general.

The Most Unlikely Thing to Come Out of a Cruise Vacation

And if not, it's right up there.

I think I mentioned that the cruise that Cameron and I went on last month was a little on the rainy side. Which hardly ruined it, but it did limit us from participating in some of the more standard cruise activities, like sitting out in the sun and trying to avoid being dragged into "hilarious" on-deck activities. And since the room we had was very nice and quite comfortable, with an interesting if rather eccentric selection of TV channels, we ended up spending some of our time just hanging out there. Which is how we happened to come across this documentary, about Ruth Berg, the creator and star of a seminal radio play and sitcom I had never heard of, called The Goldbergs. Which was all very interesting in and of itself, but what really stuck with me was the mention of the fact that she had written and published a cookbook, purportedly by her character, Molly Goldberg, and I ended up wondering how I could find a copy of it. I figured it would take a hunt on Ebay, or at least through some possibly sketchy Amazon reseller, but no, as a matter of fact, it's still in print.

I'm going to get a copy as soon as I have enough items for free shipping.

Twenty-Four Thousand Eight Hundred and Seventy-Three

That's how may words I have to write in the next five days to make my (set months ago) goal of making it fifty-thousand words in the book I'm working on by the new year. (That should get me up through the Italian restaurant dinner, the people who think they're hunting vampires, the reality show celebritard,  and the guy from the EPA. Also, at least two more squid attacks. Maybe three.) I have the entire week off from work and I plan to spend every day latched to my computer*, writing my little heart out, chasing down my artificial deadline.

I'm pretty sure I'm not going to make it.


UPDATE: I'm not going to make it.

UPDATE II: I didn't make it.


*Except for tomorrow afternoon, when I'm getting together with Abigail in the city. Also, lunch.

I'm Not On a Boat

Unless you're reading this at some point in the future* when I am. But for the moment I remain landlocked.

The cruise was a lot of fun, if a little on the cold and wet side, and I will get into that presently** but it's almost Christmas and it doesn't seem like the time. So for now I'll just leave you with the knowledge that the trip has been completed, and that spiced rum combines quite nicely with Coke.

*Or, less probably, the past.
**Also, the rather significant issues I have with Princess's approach to customer service, but that's a Whinesday all its own.

I'm On a Boat

Or at least I will be by the time you read this. We're leaving this morning* for a short pre-holidays cruise out of Los Angeles, where it is projected to be raining steadily for the next four days. But that will be okay because, as I mentioned, we will be on a boat. (Or we already are, see above.) If you're good, I'll take lots of pictures and bring them back here to show you.


*Side note: Nine-thirty seems like a perfectly reasonable time for a flight, if you don't think about how early you have to get up to make it to the airport.

Random Product Endorsement: CoverGirl Smokey Eye ShadowBlast

It's like being a corporate shill without all that annoying money!

As an international supermodel* and renowned beauty expert,** I am often asked what products I favor.*** So I thought I would say you all some trouble and tell you about this one before you tired yourselves out asking.

What is it? Basically it's a two-ended eyeshadow stick, with a paler base color on one side and a darker accent color on the other. It's easy to use and the colors come pre-coordinated for your convenience, which is handy for someone who would have flunked out of freshman art***** if art teachers held with any bourgeois notions like grading. There are detailed instructions for the titular****** eye on the back of the package, but I throw those out, since I've ripped them trying to get it open anyway and besides, they're too complicated. Instead, I just slap the base coat over as much area as I feel like covering and smudge the darker color near the lashline; exactly the same way I have been applying eye makeup since the nice lady at Sephora managed to restrain her laughter at the fact that I had made it into my twenties without any clear idea of what makeup was for long enough to explain the basics to me and sell me a bunch of stuff.

So, in summary: easy to use, nice colors, cheap, not a model, also not artistic, late to the party on the makeup thing, summary, footnotes. I think that pretty much covers it.

Any questions?


*Not true.
**I have a mascara wand and I'm not afraid to use it.
***Typically phrased as, "You want fries with that?" But I digress.****
****A lot.
*****Taken as a senior.
******Ha! I am, apparently, twelve.

After a Fashion

Even for professionals, the world of fashion can be confusing sometimes. For example, recently a trend for "bib necklaces" cropped up, and has been doing brisk business among people who, when they wear a necklace, have no interest in doing the thing halfway. They vary from the cute to the ridiculous, but they do have one thing in common: They are all clearly necklaces. However, this:

Is not a bib necklace. This is an actual bib that has been attacked by someone with a bead store, a glue gun and no taste whatsoever*; the sort of thing that a person without a clear idea of how babies work would put on one for a dinner out because it matches their purse. If you wore it, you would look like, well, you would look like this model, only not as happy because you wouldn't be getting paid for it.

On the plus side, if one of your dining companions became enraged at your ridiculous devotion to overpriced trendy junk and tried to stab you with a fork, you would probably be safe.


*I think I just came up with my idea for an Etsy store.

Shoesday: Fasten Your Shoe Belts

Oh Sigerson Morrison*, why can't I stay away from you? I have lovely flats, as many as any rational person could possibly need, but then you have to go and release a style with cool buckles and a sweet rounded toe, and it's all I can do to wait for them to go on sale. But it ends here-- it's this pair and nothing more. At least until these reach further markdown. Or these. But not these.



*And your diffusion line, Belle.
*Also, while I would probably not personally wear them, these may possibly be the sexiest boots known to man.

Air Squid II

I'm not saying why I keep posting links to stories about squid that propel themselves through the air. I'm just saying: plot point.

Merry and Bright

I don't know about you. but where I am it is cold and gray and rainy, and someone is out of Trader Joe's frozen lunches, so she has to walk all the way across the parking lot* to go to the cafeteria. So let's look at some lovely things to cheer ourselves up, shall we?

Pretty!

Shiny!

Sparkly!

Feathery!

Spiky!

Insanity!



*It's a big parking lot.

Shoesday: Jingle Shoes

If you happen to have visited my twitter or Facebook or have been within about ten feet of me in the last couple of weeks, you may have heard about how I just sold my short story "Schrödinger's Cat Lady" to the fine people at Escape Pod, for publication as a podcast and text in mid-January. That would be excitement enough all on its own, but making it even better is the fact that they have become successful enough to pay professional rates for their stories which is very exciting indeed. So, of course, I did what I always do when faced with an unexpected financial windfall, and spent it on shoes.


I love these shoes. They're a great shade of candy-apple red, there's a hidden platform that keeps them from being too high and padding in the footbed to make it possible to stand in them for more than ten minutes at a time.

But the best part (and the problem) is what's on the back:

Awesome, yes? I could never bring myself to get any additional piercings on my body, but I love them on my shoes. And the metal heel is just the right touch of basassitude for the holidays. But there is a problem.

You know what happens when a metal charm hits a metal heel? Clinking. Jingling, even. But that's okay. I figure either I'll where these to a Christmas party and the noise will be blamed on someone else's novelty sweater, or a club and pretend it's just part of the music.

Because, jingling be damned, with imaginary cats as my witness I promise you this: I will wear them.

New Camera!

Rumpole, Pensive

That's right, I'm using the fact that my poor, elderly Canon Powershot s410 finally gave up the ghost as my excuse for why there has been no Shoesday/Thurscheese/etc in the last week, and totally denying that it has anything to do with me being completely lazy. But now I have a new camera, an SD1300, which is a whole 890 plus a D better, so at the very least you can expect a 1000% increase of cat photos.

Although sometimes he moves:

He's coming for you

And his ideas of posing are not necessarily traditional:

Hey, if you could scratch your neck with your foot, wouldn't you?

And, like any good model, he doesn't get out of bed without a sufficient payday:

Kill. Kill. KILL!

(You think this is bad? Just wait until I figure out how to upload from my video camera.)