my t-shirts, post #1

Lets start a new series on my numerous self-designed t-shirts* with the one that I wore today.

I didn't come up with the text myself. Berkeley restrooms, on campus or in coffee shops (a moment of silence for the late Wall Berlin), were full of crazy rantings and a few coherent ones (and crazy responses to the coherent ones, etc). In my opinion, nothing tops the spare graffiti in the Moses, the home of the Philosophy department - it's probably written by crazy people actually on their way to Ph.D.s. The tshirt text was scrawled by the urinal in the upper floor men's room in the Philosophy building at UC Berkeley. Years later I have finally memorialized it in print, after testing out the idea in numerous bar conversation. I've no idea if the writing is still there today.

Perusing the world's restrooms, you might see Nietzsche's "God is dead" written here and there - or whatever the local translation of "Gott ist tot" may be. Everyone loves that bit of old Friedrich. And sometimes this will be followed by the bland addition, "Nitzsche is dead (God)."*

The Berkeley version, however, with it's delicious taboo-breaking and associated smells and taste, is incomparable.

God is dead

Necrophiliacs rejoice

When I walk down the street with this on, I often feel like people are ogling my breasts, but then I remember what I'm wearing. Though I'm betting that half the population doesn't know what necrophilia is (make that half the population of New York. Back home in Nebraska, perhaps 90%). Back in Berkeley this spring, I wore this shirt during my sprint from eating to more eating, a girl working at Gregoire said that it had made her day. That was pretty sweet. Also, a professor I work with appreciatively(?) said the shirt was "disgusting."

* only LA hipsters were harmed in the creation of this fitted t-shirt. Printed via CafePress - I think this is the link to my correct storefront (cafepress is down right now).

** it is a good question but perhaps beyond the realm of science to test whether Nietzsche is not dead, but just suffering a nightmare of eternal recurrence. Perhaps he's stuck somewhere between here and Mars?

The mango nectarine

I miss California's cornucopia of fruit oh so much.  But this summer the grocery store on my block - which has almost everything except really diverse produce (they haven't had tangelos for months until last week!) - threw in a few sweet gems that I had never heard of before.

The best so far has been the mango nectarine.  These yellow-green fruits first appeared at $6.99/lb, though, so I definitely avoided them.  Until late one night when I came off the 1 still a bit buzzed.  Even the cashier commented on how expensive the fruit was.  I took my conquest - just one! - immediately to my room.  

This was one of the most luscious, delicious fruits that I have ever had.  Calling it "mango" probably accounted for half of the flavors I thought I detected (placebo flavors), but no matter.  The texture was not like a nectarine, but more like a non-stringy Nam Doc mango - with edible flesh!  I actually kept the fruit's sticker - like this one - stuck to the inside of my wallet as some kind of reminder (I forget names really easily).

I've read that mango nectarines bruise easily, don't preserve very long, and only have a short season, all of which probably accounts for their rarity.  And they seem pretty variable (not unlike most other fruits, pitted or otherwise), as a month later the store had them for only $2.99/lb.  I jumped on this and got a few, but they were more bruised, less flavorful, and a bit stringy.  I'm still hooked from the first one I had, though, so next time they arrive, I'll definitely put out three bucks for another amazing yellow-green half pound.

convention colors

While the last night of the convention was grand because of the speeches, I wasn't in much of a mood to be affected by them or get misty (I can usually get choked up over anything.).  Perhaps a bad mix of beer and caffeine and a so-so experience at a piano recital at Le Poisson Rouge was to blame.  

Anyway.  What really caught my attention Thursday night was the horrible mix of a yellow-orange lit grid facade behind Obama and his skin color.  Imagining the clips of the speech playing later with this anti-designed combination made me cringe.  What about a cool blue?  or pink?  I head that the dems had to get some generic convention planners to throw this together because the primary fight didn't leave much time, but I still assumed that the Obama campaign was omniscient and omnipotent.  Alas.

You can see the faux windows/doors below, but luckily, the nyu at least, in the post-speech front-page slideshow, was also conscious of the problem and avoided any ugly clashing shots.

The savior of the night was the divine use of fucsia.  In Obama's black-striped tie, in Michelle's gorgeous print dress, and in the girls' dresses - especially the little one.  This perceptual harmony just made up for the clashing stage tones.  When they cut to the younger daughter dancing around during the speech in bright pink and fucsia, it put a smile on my face.

It helps that my brain is probably 10% devoted to processing this color, with direct wiring into my dopamine system (this also fuels my growing all-beet diet).  But perhaps subliminally this combination could push a few aesthetic focused Hillary supports back more strongly into the fold?

jobama.net

"Jobama's so phat, they sit on both sides of the aisle."

Enjoy the Obama-Biden site - some folks I know who have great foresight threw it together last week.  It's kindof like "Barack Obama is your new bicycle". You can also submit your own clever phrases to them via the email address on the site if you'd like to improve it.  Spread the word.

Radiohead concert review & photos

OK, I need to get to sleep, so this isn't a review, but here are links to the Radiohead 8/8/8/ concert photos and videos (the date reminds me - I still have not watched the opening ceremonies!)

Photo album I: Ferry, Rainbows, Waterfalls, and All Points West evening photos.

Photos album II: Radiohead concert photos, stills all taken from the Youtube videos - though one of the best from the show, Reckoner, is all crappy and blank (and lower quality than the rest) because I was dancing. Check out people's videos, though, because the lights are mesmerizing.

Recent cooking - BEETS! and pasta

I roasted beets last week, pushed by the nyt week of beets a little while back (it was really like beets 24/7 - even a beetcast). Yeah, following the nyt recipes are a bit boring, and probably everyone else in the city is doing it, but you know, they're easy and good, so whatever. I don't have time to be crazy and unique in the kitchen these days - I'm lucky to make more than pasta + tomatoes + pesto +mozarella. Or eat more than carrots, cucumbers, and hummus for lunch.

First came beet and endive salad with walnuts. Endives are a first for me - tasty, but kindof expensive, as well as tarragon - very unique. In my run of expensive greens buying, the store didn't even have chives, so the recipe was sans chives, and in the final analysis, had too much garlic and salt. But will definitely make it again (if in part to munch on lots of walnuts and feta while cooking).
Above - the remains of the beet and endive salad: the focal color of my brain. Nothing stimulates my visual system more...

I roasted beets last week, pushed by the nyt week of beets a little while back (it was really like beets 24/7 - even a beetcast). Yeah, following the nyt recipes are a bit boring, and probably everyone else in the city is doing it, but you know, they're easy and good, so whatever. I don't have time to be crazy and unique in the kitchen these days - I'm lucky to make more than pasta + tomatoes + pesto +mozarella. Or eat more than carrots, cucumbers, and hummus for lunch.

First came beet and endive salad with walnuts. Endives are a first for me - tasty, but kindof expensive, as well as tarragon - very unique. In my run of expensive greens buying, the store didn't even have chives, so the recipe was sans chives, and in the final analysis, had too much garlic and salt. But will definitely make it again (if in part to munch on lots of walnuts and feta while cooking).

Then Thursday I finally made the mediterranean beet and yogurt salad.
By today, the yogurt in the leftovers had turned a deep magenta purple. I spread it in some warm pita with some tomatoes (to lighten the garlic in the salad), and the results was the most alien purple food I've ever eaten.

From now on, I'm going to cook with beets as much as I can, mostly just for the color. Up next: finally cook some fresh greens (lost this batch to procrastination) and follow the beet breeder's advice and 1) blanch them for a few minutes and remove the skin, 2) slice, toss with olive oil and spices to taste 3) roast until done like roasted potatoes. Mmmm.

Tonight, dinner was pasta with cherry tomatoes and arugula. I've never actually cooked with arugula, either. Pretty tasty, and very simple, but nothing to knock you over with.

Olympic swim trial pictures

Just in time for the, ah, end of Olympic swimming. Here they are.

From early July; it must have been the 3rd. My brother and dad were setting up the town fireworks, so my mom and I went down to Omaha for the trials. They had already seen one night. It's quite a show. And at that time (not sure if the games will beat it), the fastest meet in history, I believe.

Above left is Brendan Hansen, for the first race of the night, the 200m breaststroke. The top two swimmers advance to the games. The crowd was primed for a world-record-breaking performance and he was looking forward to swimming against his Japanese rival in the games. Only, he didn't win. Or get second. He placed fourth, and then slumped against the lane ropes (see the pics). Poor guy. And then the other day he didn't medal in the 100m breast either.

* But Phelps' 8-gold race now depends on Hansen's breaststroke relay leg. Fingers crossed.

On the right is Dara Torres, 41 - she qualified for two races the night I was there and then became a huge sensation.

Left, Michael Phelps swinging his double-jointed gigantic arms before the butterfly. Right, Phelps mid-stroke in the fly. Such a gorgeous stroke.

The water screen was mesmerizing. My brain gets really excited about stuff like this. Dropping water, bright neon green. Have a few youtube videos of it.

After we left the trials, we (ok, I picked, she paid) then bought more stuff at Whole Foods than I ever have. I was afraid there would be nothing edible by my current standards in the state, and I was kindof right. Except PIE!


Feng Li/Getty Images

Also, I would like to express my infatuation with the Water Cube. I really really like it. Das Cube! Look it up. I'd like to live there some day.

Observing my lab behavior would not reveal a scientist

"The opening of more tabs than one can read is nothing less than the soul reaching towards infinity, and this passion is the only thing that raises us above the beast that perish." Alfred Edward Newton

Radiohead in rainbows. All Points West 8/8/8

A view of Eliasson's waterfall under the Brooklyn bridge, with a rainbow, on the ferry to All Points West. More to come, but enjoy the short videos from Radiohead from Friday that I've uploaded to YouTube.

Read: London Fields, Martin Amis

Reading: papers, and no longer The Man Without Qualities - it was pissing me off with all this history and "great man" silliness

Super bodega

I returned last week from a two-week brain imaging training course at UCLA which was, most important for posting, followed by a drive up Highway 1 to San Francisco. Setting out from LAX in my little red Toyota Yaris, I drove by Santa Monica beach, where the ocean air first hit me, and then followed the coast as best as you can going around the base by Ventura. By Oxnard I was hoping for a supermarket stop to stock up on necessary delights.

So I stopped at the only place I saw, the Vallarta market.

Little did I know, the market was a supersized bodega, with everything you'd ever need to cook like you were in Mexico. A meat counter with all the delicious weird bits white people won't eat. Mexican sodas and juices. Fresh-baked conchas - a wall of pastries. Produce. And of course, a taqueria.

I was pretty hungry by this point, so I got a plate of three tacos, rice & beans, and a big horchata. Mmm delicious horchata, perfect after a morning drive. And the tacos were the best I'd had in a while. Spices even made my eyes water a little.

Though they were lacking in one thing I was searching for, because I'd been deprived for two weeks: hummus. A guy looked pretty confused when I asked him if they had any. No loss, though.

Apparently this is a chain with most stores of its stores surrounding LA, but alas none south of Mulholland Dr. If you're going to be stuck living in SoCal, this is at least one thing I'll envy. Maybe we need a store like this in nyc. A big box family-run Mexican superstore. With tacos.

n.b. - I finally finished making notes about my copious 4th of July pies and truffles - check it out below.

Freni e Frizioni

The most amazing bar in Rome (in my small experience) and the time I had there makes it the best I've been to. Freni e Frizioni translates as "Brakes and Clutches"; apparently it used to be an auto shop.

Some friends are in Italy right now, and I wanted to send them to this bar which we found last summer thanks to our trusty little pink book for new money / posers, Wallpaper City Guide: Rome (which actually led us to some cool and cheap eats; the bar's website posts the page from the guide).

We sat on the wall around the little plaza, with me trying to fit in with the very fashionable crowd in my constant attire of t-shirt, shorts, sandals, and backpack. When I got the drinks I noticed a huge buffet of Italian appetizer-like food inside, but was afraid to ask how much it cost. After a trip to the restroom I dared to inquire, timidly approaching an uber-hip bartendress, who looked a bit taken aback as she replied that it was free. Free! Appears that this is how Rome works. Ah, Rome. So I brought some select bounty to the plaza.

Later we headed inside, where the bartender corrected my pronunciation of Caipirinha (the drink, delicious, but all alcohol). The bartenders were rocking out to some South American hip-hop and their drink-making was like a dance. We were so very much intimidated and not at all cool enough to be there. So we thought. But after a heavy buzz set in, who cares? Before we were too drunk to make sitting on the high wall precarious, we set off for dinner to get lost in Trastevere.

n.b. - perhaps a close competitor for best drink I had on the trip, but not best bar, came from the small city of Lecce, in Puglia, the heel on Italy's boot, at Prosit. Some kind of tasty pink melon-infused mojito concoction, if memory serves.

(map pic from google, top pics from flickr)

SoCal & joke conspiracies

So I was at this little party of SoCal locals near UCLA and overheard a few kids talking about the so-called 9/11 truth movement ("Are you a truther?"). My first instinct was to give them the benefit of the doubt, that they weren't serious. Then I realized that they might be seriously into it, which scared me - was the movement a hell of a lot more popular than you'd think? But finally, I had the realization that these guys must be in on the prank - I had a vision of bored MIT undergrads running 9/11 truth as a huge joke, putting their minds to "discovering" clever evidence, dragging along unsuspecting folks (those too dim to suspect...) by playing to the mind's natural conspiracy bent.

This was a joke I respected, and for a second one thought I might want to join. Also, it's comforting to think that rouge hackers are running these crazy groups around the globe instead of genuine crazies.

Scientology pervades LA. Perhaps old Hubbard was just playing a huge joke. But he should have let everyone free after his death. Not funny to let the joke play on.

Cambria beach sunset video

A little bit of the sunset I saw on the beach in Cambria on my way up the coast to SF from LA. I love the way the water mirrors the light, but that isn't well captured here. Unedited audio, for now.