I pride myself on making fresh shiny new mistakes.
I hate making the same mistake twice when there are so many mistakes I haven’t tried yet.
Timing
If your hometown college basketball team wants to break a two game losing streak, a game against the reigning national champions from last season, who already beat them earlier THIS season, seems as good a time as any, right?
There’s nothing more precious than time
Remember this, if you can. There is nothing more precious than time. You probably feel you have a measureless supply of it, but you have not. Wasted hours destroy your life just as surely at the beginning as at the end, only in the end it becomes more obvious.
— Herman Wouk, The Cain Mutiny
George Saunders on writing method
“I discovered that I could make a fairly ambitious story via fragments,” he told me, in the interview.
“I didn’t have to have a through line or a plan, didn’t have to know where it was going… If you trimmed all the fat out of a bit, it would start to thrum with meaning—and then, all of a sudden, it would have something it wanted to cause. So there would be these, like, vital bits on the page, not linked to anything yet. And then structure became just linking up those vital bits, looking for the simplest way to connect them.
So, if you cut all the lazy shit out of a story, what’s left will tell you what structure to put in place so that none of those good bits need to be lost. And then you are trying to arrange them so that they are in causal relation to one another.”
~ from “How to Imitate George Saunders” by Benjamin Nugent
If you knew sushi like I know sushi…
The Flaming Wok, Mattydale, New York
How life looks, from the dog’s perspective
Dog: Let’s go outside!
Human: WAT? WHERE GO?
Dog: Outside. It’s a good night to run.
Human: MUST DRESS
Dog: Oh… OK.
Human: NEED SHOOZ.
Dog: you humans sure are needy.
Human: REDDY!
Dog: Then let’s go!
Human: WHER?
Dog: I don’t know. How about if we follow our noses?
Human: CAN’T SMEL
Dog: Just follow me, then.
Human: * crashes into tree * CAN’T SEE AT NITE
Dog: It’s a good thing I love you.
How times change
I think the first laser printer I bought was around $1500.
Today I saw a compact Hewlett Packard laser printer – with USB cable – for $35.
Lentil soup
I’ve got this New Years family tradition – lentil soup. You eat it on New Years Day to assure prosperity in the New Year. I make it every year. How do I make it? Try this. It’s close to how my father made it, although I’m pretty sure he didn’t add soy sauce, and I think I added the (truly modest amount of) garlic too.
This could just as easily be pea soup if you made it with dried peas instead of lentils, although no guarantees on the prosperity angle if you do THAT, But if you did, it might be fun if you added a handful of frozen peas five minutes or so before you planned to serve it.
Lentil soup
Start with about a three quart saucepan. Pour some oil in the bottom. Place under low to medium heat. Add:
a medium onion or more, chopped
a medium or larger carrot, chopped
a stalk of celery or more, chopped
a clove of garlic, sliced or chopped
Cook until soft. Add:
a quart to six cups of some kind of stock, or water if you don’t have stock. Ham stock is good. Chicken stock is good. Vegetable stock is good. I’ve never tried beef stock. But water is just fine.
a half pound of lentils
Bring to a simmer. While you’re waiting for that, add:
a sprinkling of oregano
a sprinkling of parsley
a bay leaf or two, depending on size
a splash or two of soy sauce
You could also add some chunks of ham, or several slices of bacon, cooked and crumbled, or a smoked pork chop if one wandered by, or none of these if you want to keep it vegetarian. (And when I say several slices, I’m probably talking about a quarter pound. I’d say, whatever you have left over but really, WHO has leftover bacon?) You could also add a chopped potato if you want, and/or a chopped tomato, especially if you have a forlorn tomato that needs to be used for something. Mushrooms might also be a good addition.
If you’re looking to make it a little different for a change, add a little curry, to taste.
I understand there is an Italian variant for New Years called ”New Years Good Luck Soup,” with sliced sweet sausage to resemble coins, spinach to resemble cash, and a handful of ditalini.
Simmer it for awhile. I’ve done this soup in an hour.
You could serve this with a dollop of yogurt or sour cream. Most often I don’t, but it’s pretty and it can be nice.
Laying claim to the future
A promise is a way of laying claim to an uncertain future. It is a way of projecting oneself into the coming months, protecting a commitment that may be impossible to keep. It is also a means of guarding or binding one’s identity—the I in I promise.
— John Kaag and Skye C. Cleary, Advice on New Year’s Resolutions from Kierkegaard and Nietzsche, theparisreview.org
Advice on New Year’s Resolutions from Kierkegaard and Nietzsche
Contingency plans
“Keep your hands where I can see ‘em!” he snarled.
it was then I knew the hours and hours I had spent learning how to do magic with my toes had not been wasted.