May 2005 Archives

Would you like to say what that silence was meant to intend?
Would you like to see what violence these eyes can send
Send send send send to your heart
From the nursery

I swore off these things (Karl!) but this one is so accurate it's scary.

Apparently I'm a Spiteful Loner. How convenient. I can also see the UT tower from my street. Get the picture?

Click to continue, 'cause the formatting is all messed up if I paste it straight into the main page. I may be spiteful, I may be a loner, I may be a computer genius, but I fucking hate HTML.

I'm skipping across blogs like a frog hopping from lily pad to lily pad. Checked in with Austin Bloggers, which led me to All About E, which made me go all giggly:

Leah: "I went to 7-11 and bought a Slurpee and the cashier-guy checked me out."

Me: "Isn’t that what he gets paid to do?"

which led me to Bookslut, which made me go all giggly again:

The Agony Column has an audio interview with Chuck Palahniuk about, among other things, his new book Haunted. The one question I would have liked him to ask: How is it even possible this book is as bad as it is? It seems to violate laws of physics with its badness.

I don't know how I went so long being oblivious to the existence of such a fine website, something that is so much greater than the sum of its parts, "book" and "slut" (each of which individually is dang fine).

Now I have another place where I can read about books instead of, say, reading a book.

A little over a year ago, one of my very first blog entries was about the paradox of having the house to yourself for the weekend and being unable to take advantage of all that free time.

I work from home a fair amount during crunch times at work, and sometimes when I've got my panties in a bunch about some weird bug, I wish the family would go out of town for a few days so I could concentrate, so I could work at home in peace and be really really productive. Plus there's all the stuff I could get done around the house...clean my desk, tackle that upstairs closet, give the kitchen a good spring cleaning...

But then the family leaves, and they take my work ethic with them. I think there's something about having the family around that stimulates some biological drive to work, to be productive, to be the provider-hunter-gatherer. And when they leave, when they're not around reminding you why it is that you have to do what you have to do, then...eh. What's on TV?

So another weekend alone. I've got too much to do to get this release out the door, I've got all the peace and quiet I can stand, and I am having the damndest time making myself work.

[And I'll tell you what's on TV today: the Yankees getting spanked at home 17-1 by the Red Sox. Who's your daddy NOW?]

Autoblogger.

From Eileen, who gets it.

I finished Burroughs' Running With Scissors yesterday. Finally. Took me a long time since it was my gym book so I only got in snatches of reading on days when I wasn't too lazy to do cardio.

It was good. Not as good as Dry, which I loved, but it was still enjoyable. I think Dry was very easy to relate to for me, since I've been through a lot of the same stuff he has. OK, no gay crackhead lover, but a lot of the other stuff.

Running With Scissors was more alien to me, and for a while in the middle it was starting to bog down...his experiences as a child were SO bizarre, SO twisted, that it started seeming like just a litany of freakishness with no end in sight and no point. But having read these two books out of order, I knew what the end result was. I knew he had to end up as an alcoholic ad executive in Manhattan, because I'd read the second book, and when in the final two chapters the plot suddenly starts racing towards that resolution...it was somewhat glorious. It's like watching American Beauty, and sort of not seeing how all of these tragic and twisted and comical anecdotes have anything to do with each other, and then the ending washes over you and you get it, and it is lovely.

I've got a couple more on my to-be-read stack, and then the following order is incoming from Amazon:

Odd Girl Out: The Hidden Culture of Aggression in Girls - Rachel Simmons

"Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!": Adventures of a Curious Character - Richard P. Feynman

The Price Advantage - Michael V. Marn [I need to read this for work.]

Liquor : A Novel - Poppy Z. Brite

No god but God : The Origins, Evolution, and Future of Islam - Reza Aslan

The Sandman Vol. 1: Preludes and Nocturnes - Neil Gaiman

Mystic Pig : A Novel of New Orleans - Richard Katrovas

Not sure what order I'll take them in. Probably knock off Sandman in a few hours, then what? Karl will say Mystic Pig. Sarah K. will want me to read Feynman. And I definitely have to read the Rachel Simmons before Cassidy starts middle school in August. Any other votes?

The Houston Press article about how I invented the IFR ("Ironic Freebird Request") hit the newsstands today.

The HP link is here.

My original blog post is here.

We are definitely amused.

Karl, you'll be pleased to know that www.moronosphere.com figures prominently in his article. Is this the mo-sphere's first appearance in actual newsprint?

So what do you do when the boy's basketball season finally ends, the girl's soccer season finally ends, the product release you've been working on for seven months is two weeks away from being done and actually ahead of schedule, you've finally got money in the bank from your wife's clients paying their bills, birthday season and party season are over, school ends in three days, and the temperature hits the upper 90's for the first time this year?

Well, duh. You grill something.

Preferably something with eyes.

Whole Foods had some beautiful striped bass today, so we bought a couple of those and stuffed the bellies with chives, parsley, lemon slices, salt and pepper. Made some veggie skewers and also bought a few pre-made halibut skewers. Some potato salad. Wine and Italian soda.

I found some perfect tomatoes for the skewers: organic baby romas. I really dislike cherry tomatoes, but most other tomatoes are too big to put on a kabob, and I'm so happy I ran across these. After marinating them in olive oil and garlic and then roasting them over oak coals, they tasted like homemade spaghetti sauce on a stick.

And the funny thing about grilling something on a whim, is that random people happen to drop by your house on a whim right about the same time, and you can't exactly send them home hungry.

We are living in happiness too, like the Oompa Loompa doompity do.

Clint Hagen has been writing a really interesting series of posts in his blog about the book Looking for God in Harry Potter, by John Granger (who I'm not positive is the muggle parent of Hermione, but the thought has crossed my mind).

Fortunately none of the parents where my kids go to school are possessed with the lunacy that the Harry Potter stories are Satanic or anti-Christian or otherwise dangerous for young minds and souls, but such parents do exist. This being Texas, the suburbs and outlying towns around here are probably thick with them.

I haven't read Granger's book yet, but it's high up on my list (that is, if I can get to it before it's my turn to read The Half-Blood Prince. We have four HP fans in our house so we fight over the books when they come out.)

At any rate, Mr. Granger himself is providing some commentary to Clint's musings. Check it out.

Fuck Texas right in the ass.

I'm so ashamed.

Karl, can we come back to San Francisco?

By: Chisum, Hartnett, Hopson, Howard, H.J.R. No. 6 McReynolds, et al.

A JOINT RESOLUTION

proposing a constitutional amendment providing that marriage in
this state consists only of the union of one man and one woman.
BE IT RESOLVED BY THE LEGISLATURE OF THE STATE OF TEXAS:
SECTION 1. Article I, Texas Constitution, is amended by
adding Section 32 to read as follows:
Sec. 32. (a) Marriage in this state shall consist only of
the union of one man and one woman.
(b) This state or a political subdivision of this state may
not create or recognize any legal status identical or similar to
marriage.
SECTION 2. This state recognizes that through the
designation of guardians, the appointment of agents, and the use of
private contracts, persons may adequately and properly appoint
guardians and arrange rights relating to hospital visitation,
property, and the entitlement to proceeds of life insurance
policies without the existence of any legal status identical or
similar to marriage.
SECTION 3. This proposed constitutional amendment shall be
submitted to the voters at an election to be held November 8, 2005.
The ballot shall be printed to permit voting for or against the
proposition: "The constitutional amendment providing that
marriage in this state consists only of the union of one man and one
woman and prohibiting this state or a political subdivision of this
state from creating or recognizing any legal status identical or
similar to marriage."

Here are a couple of pictures of Gina's brother Larry.

The first is Gina & Larry at Christmas in Fort Worth a couple of years ago, when he was home visiting from Sierra Leone:

And this one was taken this week during his training preparing to go to Baghdad:

I mean, come on, who is he kidding? The guy couldn't hurt a flea. When you look up "calm and understated" in the dictionary, there's a picture of him there sitting in a hammock with his nose in a book.

Watch out, Baghdad. "Crazy Eyes Larry" is coming!

Hee hee!

Karl has been passing around blog memes like the clap lately.

1) What is the total number of books I've owned?

I've got about 400-500 upstairs right now. About a hundred technical books at work. Not counting books I owned as a kid, I've probably sold/lost/given away about a hundred.

2) What is the last book I bought?

I bought a pile a couple of months ago: To Kill A Mockingbird, Running With Scissors by Augusten Burroughs, Invisible Monsters by Chuck Pahlaniuk, Down and Out in the Magic Kingdom by Cory Doctorow, and We Wish To Inform You... by Paul Gaurevitch. That pile and random gifts from people have been keeping me busy.

3) What is the last book I've read?

Last finished? Digital Fortress. Mostly to annoy Doxy.

The last I've read which I haven't finished, my current bedtime book, is Friday Night Lights by H.G. Bissinger. A birthday gift from the lovely Sarah K.

4) What are the 5 books that have meant a lot to me?

OK, a few more than five.

Joseph Heller, Catch-22

William Gibson, Neuromancer

Los Bros Hernandez Love And Rockets (the various anthologies)

The Autobiography of Malcolm X

Charles Bukowski, The Most Beautiful Woman in Town

Walter Miller, A Canticle for Liebowitz

Michael Azzerad, Our Band Could Be Your Life

Tim Pat Coogan, Michael Collins

Douglas Hofstadter, Gödel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid

Alcoholics Anonymous. Not because it was a good book, it actually kind of sucks. But because for some unexplainable reason it worked.

Extra credit question, 'What book would you wish to buy next':

Something about New Orleans. Either Mystic Pig by Richard Katrova or Liquor: A Novel, by Poppy Z. Brite.

Tag! You're it!

Melanie
Rachel
Quinn
Brett & Hiromi
Clint

Ya know what's sad? I have trouble thinking of more than 6 or 7 bloggers who read mine. Some of those I'm tagging just to see who's there.

Most of my hits lately are people googling the purple pope. Sigh.

Updated 5-22-05: I can't believe I left the Hofstadter book off.

I'm in. I just registered for JournalCon. I expect to see some of you in October.

Gina's brother Larry has worked in the Foreign Service of the State Department for many years. He's not one of those career diplomat types who uses his seniority to get the cushy posts in Paris or Berlin or London. Instead he's spent his entire career in some of the poorest, most destitute, most ignorable places on earth. And also some of the most beautiful. Bangladesh. Nigeria. Senegal. Ethiopia. Sierra Leone.

He's an idealist. He still believes that when the U.S. follows its higher ideals, that the right diplomats in the right place at the right time willing to step up to some thankless tasks can make a difference in the world.

And the work is dangerous. The Foreign Service is almost another army from a hazard perspective, incurring more casualties per year on an annual basis than any of the military branches (until the Iraq war, at least).

But after his most recent assignment in Sierra Leone, a post still so dangerous after the civil war there that embassy staff were not allowed to bring their families, he was done. He was going to finally settle down in DC with a high-level desk job at the State Department.

Unfortunately, now he is going to Baghdad.

Now we know how Gregg feels when we see the bad news from Iraq. We are sending a loved one, a brother, into that mess.

This morning he forwarded pictures taken at his firearms training. Gina took one look at Larry aiming an M-16 and the tears started flowing again. I told her it was OK. Better he go over there knowing how to protect himself than having to completely rely on others to do it for him. I told her the target practice looked kind of fun. (Really, who wouldn't want to learn to fire an M-16?) But I must admit, it threw me a little seeing him like that.

I hate this fucking war. I hate that the very people who put us in this war refuse to send their own loved ones into harm's way for the policies that they imposed on the rest of us. Barbara and Jenna Bush are both young, college educated, and healthy, both would make fine 2nd Lieutenants, but neither one of them is in the military. I hate seeing them prancing around on the social pages. Drunk half the time. No job. No cares. No need to work. No need to enlist. That's for poor people. And idealists. And suckers.

That's what we are. A nation of suckers. And George and Karl and Dick and Donald are laughing their asses off all the way to the bank with our money, while our families' blood runs in the streets a half a world away.

From the dailykos diaries comes this gem.

"...and three," he asked, "are you in the military?" "No, but I support the troops and our Commander in Chief," she replied. "Then what's this 'WE' shit? It's not your ass over there getting IED'ed and RPG'ed and shot at and mortared, so who the fuck are you to talk about 'we'?" "Come on, I'm sure the young republicans here all have yellow ribbon magnets on the SUVs their daddies bought them-go easy, man. They support us," I said. (One could, in fact, hear the italics in my voice.)

"He's been there, and got the t-shirt," Richie said, making a twirling motion with his finger to me. I turned around so they could see the image on the back of my shirt.

"Well, with attitudes like yours, we won't win," one of them said.

"Then why don't you join up so you can go over there and show us how it's done?" asked Richie. They looked away. "That's what I thought," he said, "so why don't you all shut your fucking yaps since you don't even believe in your own shit enough to stand up for it?"

Some random family pictures on the Flickr page. The last few blurry ones are of Cassidy in the 5th Grade Production of "A Midsummer Night's Dream". She played Lysander. Yeah, yeah, I know, a boy. The thing is it was a double-feature (both somewhat abridged), and most of the boys had parts in "Macbeth", and since there are more girls than boys, the girls took some boy roles in MSND. Not unheard of in the theatre, or so I've been told.

She mumbled her way through a few lines, including "That through thy bosom makes me see thy heart." Said afterwards she doesn't like the word "bosom."

I told her that her Uncle Billy when he was a kid pronounced it "bazooms", and that if she didn't like that word she should have said "ta-tas."

What I really want to do is direct.

This article on MSNBC caught my eye the other day, but it's taken me a little while to put my finger on why it annoyed me.

A group of 20-something drinkers seemed to lose the urge to binge-drink when they took pills made from kudzu, that ubiquitous vine that blankets the South, researchers reported.

The finding, described as groundbreaking by one expert, might one day lead to a way to attack the binge-drinking problem.

Researcher Scott Lukas, with Harvard-affiliated McLean Hospital, had no trouble finding volunteers for the study, which required them to hang out in an "apartment," complete with television, recliner and fridge stocked with beer. This apartment-style laboratory was set up in the hospital, and the volunteers were told to spend a 90-minute session drinking beer and watching TV.

Those who took kudzu pills drank an average of 1.8 beers per session, compared with the 3.5 beers consumed by those who took a placebo.

Lukas was not certain why, but speculated that kudzu increases blood-alcohol levels and speeds up its effects. In other words, the drinkers needed fewer beers to feel drunk.

What seems wrong about this is that Lukas has lost sight of the forest for the trees. He's so focused on a single metric (reducing the number of drinks during the 90 minute test period) that he has forgotten everything we know about the nature of addiction.

Look, alcoholics do not drink until they reach some logical level of buzz and then stop. Alcoholics drink. Period. Until something makes them stop. Either it's too late at night or they run out of booze or the bars close or they pass out or somebody makes them stop. It has nothing to do with how drunk you are. The compulsion to drink will sometimes run out after three beers, sometimes after a couple of bottles of wine, and sometimes only after complete and utter blackout. The only predictable thing about the compulsion is that it is in control and you are not.

A lot of times you'll hear the wish "if only I could drink like normal people". I've come to believe, from talking to other alcoholics, that this wish is more of a mirage. I don't want to drink like normal people. Normal people do it wrong. Normal people say dumb shit like "No more for me, thanks, I'm starting to feel it" halfway through their second glass of wine. I don't want that. I want to get blotto. I want to completely cut lose, take the brakes off and suck the stuff down with abandon, without fear of consequences.

That's because I'm an alcoholic. That's how I drink. That's why I can't drink any more.

I wonder if Dr. Lukas did any follow-up interviews. Because I can guarantee you that at least some minority of his subjects were alcoholics. And of that that alcoholic minority, I will bet good money that some of them, maybe even most of them, when they went home from their 90 minute study, you know what they did? Already with their first taste of the day, with a little lingering buzz still in their system? They went home and continued the drinking. A bunch of them in fact probably got good and hammered.

Because that's what we do. And no pill in the world is going to change that.

Despite what some people think of them, I really liked Dan Brown's The Da Vinci Code and Angels and Demons. Yeah, it's all fluff, but it was entertaining fluff. I steered clear of Digital Fortress, though. Don't know why, I just had a feeling I wouldn't like it.

Well, my darling daughter bought me Digital Fortress for my birthday. With her own money. Because she knew I liked Dan Brown's other books. So when your daughter buys you a book with her own money, you read it, and you like it. End of story.

So what did I learn from this book? A few things (spoilers, some of them):

1. The EFF is a bunch of naive do-gooders who have no clue what kind of carnage would be wrought if the government couldn't spy on us.

2. The NSA clearly needs to be able to listen in on all of the world's electronic communications any time they want to, for purely noble reasons. They would never abuse this trust.

3. Bits, bytes, alphabetic characters, alphanumeric characters, and ASCII characters are, oh, pretty much all the same thing, right? For instance, this is an 8-bit key: "APQRDX34".

4. The villian is named TANKADO. His shadowy accomplice is called "NORTH DAKOTA". All of the most talented cryptographers at the NSA will fail to recognize the obvious anagram here until the last chapter. Anagrams are hard, I guess.

5. Computers at the NSA have this futuristic feature where with a couple of keystrokes, the user can "lock" their terminal so that nobody can use it unless they enter the user's password. This technology is so mind-bendingly high-tech that it requires a half-page of explanation.

6. Passwords at the NSA are all fixed-length keys of 5 alphanumeric characters, case-insensitive.

7. The NSA is an overwhelmingly male-dominated organization. However, if you are a female who is also the most brilliant code breaker who ever lived, you can work there if the director thinks you're hot.

8. If the power in the NSA Crypto division goes out, the backup power will only be sufficient to keep the main codebreaking computer running. All other power, including doors, door locks, and lights, will be unusable.

9. However, if the power door locks are not functioning, all doors in the most secure facility in the world can be forced open with a little muscle. As a general rule, all men in the NSA are strong enough to open them. The lone woman is not.

10. If the main NSA database loses power, all data contained within it will be lost forever.

11. Given a cryptic phrase written by a scientist including the words "prime" and "difference", a room full of mathematicians and crypographers and scientists will not notice that these are mathematical terms until disaster is less than 10 seconds away.

12. When riding a Vespa scooter across oil-slick pavement at 50 miles an hour, frantically pumping your brakes will allow you to stay upright for dozens of yards and then continue riding once you are through.

13. In Spain, all punk rockers are dumb, illiterate stoners, but they speak flawless English with an American accent.

My girl bought this for me, so I read it, and I thanked her. I'm such a good daddy.

And you know what else? It was still better than Cryptonomicon.

This is such bullshit. What a boy scout. Just because I want to do it with my sister.

I'd rather be the Jedi knight whose light saber says "Bad Muthafucka".

A couple of months ago I laid out my case claiming that I was the first guy to yell Freebird at a concert as a joke.

Today I got a call from John Lomax at Houston Press, who's going to do a little blurb about it in next week's issue.

Finally the truth will be told.

Needless to say I think this whole thing is hysterical.

By the way, I don't know if I've ever mentioned this before, but I believe I may have invented the phrase "Beer...it isn't just for breakfast anymore." Mardi Gras 1987, in the elevator of the Marriott hotel on Canal Street at around 6am, heading down to try to get a good spot to watch the Krewe of Zulu. With my friend Bill, cracking open our first beers of the day, after only 2 hours of sleep.

But that's a whole other story.

I finished What's the Matter With Kansas? a few weeks back, and I can't recommend this book highly enough. Thomas Frank explains how Republicans have taken control of the Red states by political swindle, a Jedi mind-trick in which the GOP signs up working-class Red Staters to an anti-elite populist uprising, while at the same time convincing them that 1) rich Ivy League Republicans are not part of that hated elite, and 2) economic issues have no rightful place in any populist uprising.

It's brilliant how this switcheroo has been executed.

I'm going to quote at length here from the final chapter (without permission) not because I want to steal Frank's words, but because I want to convince you to go out and buy this book now.

American conservatism depends for its continued dominance and even for its very existence on people never making certain mental connections about the world, connections that until recently were treated as obvious or self-evident everywhere on the planet. For example, the connection between mass-culture, most of which conservatives hate, and laissez-faire capitalism, which they adore without reservation. Or between the small towns they profess to love and the market forces that are slowly grinding those small towns back into the red-state dust -- which forces they praise in the most exalted terms.

...

Behold the political alignment that Kansas is pioneering for us all. The corporate world -- for reasons having a great deal to do with its corporateness -- blankets the nation with a cultural style designed to offend and to pretend-subvert: sassy teens in Sketchers flout the Man; bigoted churchgoing moms don't tolerate their daughters' cool liberated friends; hipsters dressed in T-shirts reading "FCUK" snicker at the suits who just don't get it. It's meant to be offensive, and Kansas is duly offended. The state watches impotently as its culture, beamed in from the coasts, becomes coarser and more offensive by the year. Kansas aches for revenge. Kansas gloats when celebrities say stupid things; it cheers when movie stars go to jail. And when two female rock stars exchange a lascivious kiss on national TV, Kansas goes haywire. Kansas screams for the heads of the liberal elite. Kansas comes running to the polling place. And Kansas cuts those rock stars' taxes.

As a social system, the backlash works. The two adversaries feed off each other in a kind of inverted symbiosis: one mocks the other, and the other heaps even more power on the one. This arrangement should be the envy of every ruling class in the world. Not only can it be pushed much, much further, but it is fairly certain that it will be so pushed. All the incentives point that way, as do the never-examined cultural requirements of modern capitalism. Why shouldn't our culture just get worse and worse, if making it worse will only cause the people who worsen it to grow wealthier and wealthier?

Put down the laptop for a couple of nights and read this book, and make your friends read this book.

I never got to eat at Uglesich's, and now after an eighty year run, it's gone. Closed for good on Friday.

When I was growing up in New Orleans, I was too clueless to have eaten there. Actually, I was completely clueless about food. Not that I didn't eat well. I ate great, I appreciated the great food in New Orleans, the big New Orleans-style Thanksgiving feasts my step-grandmother would put out, and of course the fantastic Yankee cooking of my mom.

But I took it all for granted. I thought everybody ate this way all the time. It wasn't until I grew up and moved away that I found out that 1) my mom is a better cook than almost anybody, and 2) once you leave New Orleans finding good food gets a LOT harder.

So I never ate at Uglesich's while I lived there, but for most of the 90's, I've been trying to get back there to finally try it. When friends went to New Orleans and asked me for recommendations, I'd say "you HAVE to go to Uglesich's, and get there early", and they'd come back and they'd tell me how awesome it was.

But every time I was back home, I couldn't make it there. They were only open for lunch, Monday through Friday, only in the winter and spring, and the only time I was ever there on a weekday was either Christmas or Mardi Gras and our schedules, as they say, just never matched up.

And now they're gone forever.

Anyway, Chuck at the Gumbo Pages was there for Uglesich's last day, and has some great food porn from the event, here and here. Do check it out.

I'm glad the smoking ban passed, even if I wasn't sure right up until Election Day if I was going to support it. The anti-ban side was starting to remind me of Bill Hicks' anti-non-smoker's rant turned on its head:

"I realize now that I don't smoke for one reason, and that is spite. I hate you smokers with all my little black heart, you self-righteous, annoying, whiny little fucks. My biggest fear if I take up smoking is not cancer, emphysema, bad breath, stained teeth, or clothes that stink. My biggest fear is that I will become one of you."

If the Austin music scene completely collapses the way the Austin restaurant scene did and the San Francisco and New York music scenes did, I will gladly eat my words and you can all come over to my house and smoke in my bed.

Tomorrow is officially No Pants Day. So celebrate in style.

I can't decide between the Scooby Doo boxers or the Crawfish boxers.

This news leak was forwarded to me.

As I understand it, Ratzinger was not the Cardinals first choice. That was, interestingly, Cardinal Hans Grapje.

Grapje was raised in a Catholic school in The Hague and, as a young man, aspired to become a priest, but was drafted into the Army during WWII and spent two years co-piloting B17s until his aircraft was shot down in 1943 and he lost his left arm. Captain Grapje spent the rest of the war as a chaplain, giving spiritual aid to soldiers, both Allied and enemy.

After the war, he became a priest, serving as a missionary in Africa, piloting his own plane (in spite of his handicap) to villages across the continent. In 1997, Father Grapje was serving in Zimbabwe when an explosion in a silver mine caused a cave-in. Archbishop Grapje went down into the mine to administer last rites to those too severely injured to move. Another shaft collapsed, and he was buried for three days, suffering multiple injuries, including the loss of his right eye. The high silver content in the mine's air gave him purpura, a life-long condition characterized by purplish skin blotches.

Although Cardinal Grapje devoted his life to the service of God as a scholar, mentor, and holyman, church leaders felt that he should never ascend to the Papacy.

They felt that the Church would never accept a one-eyed, one-armed, flying purple Papal leader.

My sister taught me how to make these a couple years of ago, and now they're a staple at our parties. She brought hers to the crawfish boil this past weekend, but the week before that at the TILF happy hour, I documented the making of some half-decent ones I made myself. Not as good as my sister's, but still a crowd-pleaser.

A muffuletta, in case you don't know (and you need to know these things, so put that thing down and pay attention!) is a sandwich invented in New Orleans by an Italian immigrant. The birthplace was Central Grocery, which is still there in the French Quarter on Decatur Street. Along with the po-boy it is the quintessential sandwich of New Orleans.

Note: it's not Cajun food. It's not even Creole food. (Yes, sweetie, there is a difference. Sit down and shut up.)

It's New Orleans food.

You start a day ahead of time by making the olive dressing. There are dozens of recipes for this, but the one I use is pretty much Emeril's recipe off of foodtv.com.

Chopped green pimento olives and chopped nicoise olives, minced garlic, shallots, celery, parsley, and extra-virgin olive oil. Mix it up real good, and taste it. It'll be OK, but what you want to do is cover it with plastic wrap and put it in the fridge overnight:

The next day, get it out and taste it again. After all those flavors have been mushing together all night you'll have to restrain yourself from getting a fork and polishing off the whole bowl right then.

The rest of the ingredients are some good Italian bread:

and a selection of Italian sandwich meats and cheeses. I like to use provolone and mozzarella, with Genoa salami, capicolla ham, and mortadella:

Slice the bread and lay on a generous helping of the olive salad:

and then just build up the sandwich with the cheeses and meats in alternating layers:

until you run out. Then more olive salad and the top slice of bread, like so:

It looks even better close up:

Now this next bit is somewhat controversial. The original muffuletta was a cold sandwich, but some places (like Napoleon House, my favorite) serve them warm, and in recent years it's gotten trendy to really bake them so the cheese is all melty and gooey.

I myself like them warm but not baked. Once the cheese starts melting you've turned it into something that's no longer a muffuletta. If you want a fancy Italian grilled cheese, fine, but that's not what we're after today.

So wrap the sandwiches tightly in foil:

and pop them in the oven at 350 for about 20 minutes.

Take it out and slice it however you like:

I like to make two or three of these before a party and just pop a new one in the oven when the last one is almost gone.

Like most Louisiana food, it's totally easy once you know how, but people will go "ooooh, aaaah" because they think New Orleans is some mystical place where the cooking requires mastery of mysterious voodoo arts and a secret stash of gris-gris. (Well, yeah, actually it does, but that doesn't mean it's hard to do at home.)

I Blame the Patriarchy is good good reading:

But the basis for state legislation in Texas in the year 2005 is not, alas, foolish interpretations of the works of Shakespeare, but rather foolish interpretations of the works of misogynist homophobic anti-Semites from the Roman Empire chronicling the adventures of a dead Jewish superhero. Although there is no evidence to support them, many Texans base their beliefs on these stories. They are convinced that their unprovable beliefs are more right than anyone else’s unprovable beliefs, and that these unprovable beliefs are especially more right than provable facts.

Then something woke you, didn't it? Was it a dream? What was it?

I heard a strange noise.

What was it?

It was... screaming. Some kind of screaming, like a child's voice.

What did you do?

I went downstairs, outside. I crept up into the driveway. I was so scared to look, but I had to.

And what did you see, Clarice? What did you see?

Crawfish. The crawfish were screaming.

They were slaughtering the spring crawfish?

And they were screaming.

And you ran away?

No. First I tried to free them. I... I opened the cooler, but they wouldn't run. They just wriggled around and tried to pinch me. They wouldn't run.

But you could and you did, didn't you?

Yes. I took one crawfish, and I ran away as fast as I could.

Where were you going, Clarice?

I don't know. I didn't have any food, any beer. I thought, I thought if I could save just one, but... he pinched me, the fucker. I didn't get more than halfway to Waller Creek when the sheriff's car picked me up. Ray was so angry he sent me to the store for more ice for the beer.

What became of your crawfish, Clarice?

They boiled him, and ate his tail and sucked his head.

A lovely day yesterday for our annual crawfish boil. About 60 people, lots of kids, over 100 pounds of crawfish, muffalettas, cake and cheesecake and brownies and tons of other food, and lots and lots of beer and wine. A good solid nine hours of fun.

I didn't get a ton of pictures, but there are a few if you click through to my flickr page over on the left there.

If you were there, thanks for coming. If you weren't, you should have been, so next year try harder, m'kay?