Hungry by Jeff Gordinier

I read a review of this book in The Week a few weeks ago when I was catching up on back issues, which seems to be  the way that I attack a weekly magazine these days--consuming a month or so of them in one sitting, and then adding all sorts of things I want to read to my library hold list as a result.  That is how this book ended up on my list of things to read.
I like reading about food and food preparation, but by and large, haven't got a lot of experience in this arena, and I probably wouldn't have thought that a book about Rene Redzepi's creative  process would exactly be up my alley, but I really enjoyed this book about the architect of New Nordic cuisine, with what might be considered the fermenting bible having come out of his kitchen at Noma in Copenhagen to his credit.
the thing I loved about him to start with is that he loves regional Mexican cooking, and that is undeniably the best complex flavored food i have ever had.  One point he makes in his journey around the world and his return to Mexico is that there really is no improving on the flavors of the foods made all over Mexico, that they harness the potential of everything around them and make it soar.  the book is short and largely sweet, and well worth a read if cooking is your thing.

For The Love of the Game (1998)

In my house, we watch a lot of movies that are chosen by our youngest son.  He watches about 10 movies a week, maybe more, so we do not watch every thing that he does by any means, but we do to a greater or lesser extent follow his lead on choices.  Especially when he is in school and we are in a all hands on deck mode for reading and studying.
This is a Kevin Costner sports movie, but it is more of a romantic drama than a straight ahead baseball movie.  He plays a pitcher who is at the end of his career who is looking back over both his career and his relationship with a woman in a linked sort of way.  He doesn't come out smelling like a rose, as you might imagine, but in the end I enjoyed it.
Baseball is a game that I grew up with and while I follow absolutely no sports, it is the game that I have seen most.  I have no love of professional sports, but I have very fond memories of Dodger Stadium (having not known it's history when I was there as a child).  So it is a warm spot for me.

Green Enchilada Sauce

We came home from a weekend away with a stack of freshly made corn tortillas.  What to do with them?  Green salsa was what we came up with.  Yum.

• 2–3 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 large onion, roughly chopped
• 5–6 cloves garlic
• 2–4 Anaheim peppers, chopped
• 1–2 jalepenos, seeded
• 1 1/2 pounds tomatillos, husked and cut in half
• 1/2 bunch cilantro, coarsely chopped
• 1 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon pepper
• 1 1/2 teaspoon cumin
• 4 cups chicken or vegetable stock

---

1. Place all of the ingredients in the blender and process until smooth. (If the jar of your blender doesn’t fit it all, add all of the ingredients except for the chicken stock. Add only enough stock to allow the blender to process everything until smooth. Add the rest of the stock to the pan before cooking)
2. Add the blended mixture to a large pot. Bring the mixture to a simmer over medium heat. Reduce heat to medium-low and simmer for about 30 minutes. If the sauce is thicker than you like, add a little more chicken stock.
3. Serve inside burritos or pour it over enchiladas for a smothered styled meal. I also use this as part of my liquid in tortilla soup and chili!

The Huntress by Kate Quinn

The core of the plot of this book is a woman who was accused of committing unspeakable war crimes against children in Poland during World War II. The novel begins with this unnamed woman  called The Huntress on the run, afraid that her past has finally caught up with her.

 From there, the novel breaks into three story lines, told by three narrators, in alternating timelines.

The most vivid of these threads begins before the war and centers on Nina Markova, one of the famed Russian bomber pilots known as the Night Witches.  The backstory of this smart, ferocious, unconventional female character is perhaps not characteristic of the squadron, but it may be representative — she was a girl growing up dirt-poor in a nearly savage family on the ice-cold banks of a lake in the farthest reaches of Siberia. In many ways, she was a feral child, learning the harsh lessons of life and survival on her own. After a dark and tragic childhood, Nina finds peace in the air and purpose in fighting. For the first time in her life, she is a part of something that matters to her. But it is after her stint with the Night Witches, when she is struggling to survive in war-torn Poland, that she comes face to face with the female Nazi known as the Huntress.  The search takes them to 1950's Boston, where the rest of the story unfolds.  Interesting and while fiction, is steeped in true stories from the past.

Hurricane Season (2010)

I am someone who does not watch sports much at all.  The exceptions to that are the Olympics and the World Cup.  Otherwise I have opened up vast amounts of time in my life by not following any sport on a regular basis nor do I have a fantasy football team or any such variation on that time sink.
So it surprises me that I very much enjoy films about sports teams and their redemptive power.  This is one such story, where in post Katrina New Orleans, where like many other schools in predominantly black neighborhoods, John Ehret High School, home to the Patriots, was badly flooded.  Unlike many other schools, they did reopen and the basketball coach, Al Collins (played by the ever popular Forrest Whitaker), decides that his team will compete that season, despite all that stands in their way.  He is motivated by the fact that his team has lost everything and been scared as well, that team sports is a way to keep them focused and out of trouble, and basketball does all that and more for them.  Good story mostly well told.

Peperonata

This comes from Six Seasons, and it is a great way to decrease your supply of sweet peppers.

• 4 pounds mixed peppers, mostly sweet, a few hot
• olive oil
• 3 garlic cloves, smashed
• 3 bunches trimmed scallions, chopped
• 1/2 tsp dried chili flakes
• Salt and black pepper, to taste
• 1 pound cherry tomatoes
• 1 Tbs sherry vinegar
• 3 sprigs each fresh thyme and oregano

Saute garlic until soft, then add the chopped peppers.  I used a mixture of colors and added three hot peppers and skipped the chili flakes.  Add the scallions and tomatoes and cook about 30 minutes until everything is soft, then add vinegar, salt and pepper to taste. 

Big Sky by Kate Atchinson

Wow!  After years have passed since the last Jackson Brodie book, here we are, almost out of the blue, another one.
While there haven't been any books in between, the lives of all those we know in Jackson's life have moved on.  His daughter Marlee is on the brink of marriage.  Nathan, his son with Julia, is also getting older and more independent.  Jackson is living alone, and is mostly reflecting on the bad choices that he has made in the course of his life when it came to love, and yet he continues on in that vein as the novel ends.
The book begins a couple of miles north of Whitby. Brodie is living in modest rural digs, sharing custody of Nathan with Julia, getting on with his small life. We are introduced to a trio of golfing mates. Vince is a telecommunication area manager in late middle age going through a  particularly nasty divorce; Tommy is a prosperous bouncer turned hauler who has a trophy wife with a dark past; Andy runs a failing B&B with his formidable wife Rhoda. The narrative circles in its own time around the relationships and disappointments of its characters, but connections start to proliferate and secrets start to emerge.  It all comes together in the end, and then blows apart.  Very good read.

The Restorative Power of a Beautiful Place

I was recently in the Tetons for a long weekend, and on the very first day my thought was that I did not want to leave.  It was not a realistic thought.  First and foremost, it was not my  decision to make.  I was a guest in someone's home for heavens sake.  The other was that I have obligations that I might welcome the chance to shed, I am not likely to actually do so.  Instead I just enjoyed the beauty of the place, and didn't think too far into the future.
The reason this hit me like a ton of bricks is twofold.  It has been an avalanche of daily bad news coming out of the current administration, who are hellbent on destroying everything good that has happened in the last 25 years (maybe going back even further).  the other is that I was reading some hard to swallow literature, one being the Mueller Report, which chronicles just how criminal the guys in charge are and by implication, how corrupt the Republican party is.  The other was even more saddening.  The blow was cushioned by the surroundings in a way that was surprising and enlightening.  An attention to place can really make things better.

Pasta with Fresh Cherry Tomatoes

Sometimes I need a little bit of a fire lit under me, and that is what the Food 52 Cookbook group provided.  I joined in a month where a potpourri of cookbooks were featured, but cooked this as a result of a post.

1. 1 pound pasta
   • Kosher salt
   • 1/2 cup olive oil
   • 2 large garlic cloves, finely chopped
   • 3 pints cherry tomatoes
   • 1/2 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
   • Pinch of sugar
   • 1 cup coarsely chopped fresh basil
   • Freshly grated Parmesan (for serving)

1. 1. Cook pasta in a large pot of boiling salted water, stirring occasionally, until al dente; drain and transfer to a large bowl.
   2. Meanwhile, heat oil in a 12" skillet or wide heavy saucepan over medium-high. Add garlic, then tomatoes, pepper, sugar, and 1 tsp. salt. Cook, stirring occasionally, until tomatoes burst and release their juices to form a sauce, 6–8 minutes.
   3. Toss pasta with tomato sauce and basil. Top with Parmesan.

The Pioneers by David McCullough

When it comes to historians, they are more likely to be long winded than not, and David McCullough is no exception.  My husband recently pulled his Truman biography off the shelf and was about to send it to a Little Library when I vetoed that destination because I had not read it. Then I lifted it and thought maybe I should get it on the Kindle.  It was almost unliftable if you think about it as a book that you would need to hold with your wrists.  it is more bench pressing weight than dainty read in bed weight.
So the length of this (a mere 250 pages if you skip all the notes and such at the end), is inviting in and of itself.  The story is of the first settlers to the Ohio Territory, where there was the tenet of no slavery, and what befell them.  As with all tales about first arrivals, there are a number of obstacles to be overcome, and truthfully, the book starts off a bit on the slow side.  The story starts to come together, though, and is a very interesting story of the first wave of westward settler, these being in the early aftermath of the Revolutionary War, and setting the stage for those who followed.  Whether you are from the Midwest or not, it is a good story told by a master story teller.

Takers (2010)

This is an elaborate heist movie, where there is a talented cast of young bank robbers who are pitted against two cops who are dedicated to bringing them down.  So you know right from the get go what you are getting into.  The bad guys are very unlikable when it comes to the robbery aspect of their work.  They yell, swing around big assault rifles, and are generally unpleasant.  The cops are just a teeny tiny bit more likable, but it is really neck and neck when it comes to personality, which is how it should be in a decent heist movie.
Then superimpose the plot of the gang member who went to prison.  he has a serious chip on his shoulder about being left behind, and it is clear to everyone except for the bank robbers that he is out to get even.  Some of them suspect that to be true but they don't quite see what his angle is.  Then it unfolds, there is a lot of shooting, and while i won't say what happens, but not everybody gets out alive.

Carrot and Fennel Salad

This comes from Allison Roman's first book, and I was inspired to make it by the the Food 52 Cookbook Facebook group.  So much material there!

1 large fennel bulb, halved lengthwise
1 bunch smallish carrots (preferably with their tops)
1 bunch scallions, halved crosswise
5 tablespoons olive oil
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice, plus more as needed
1 cup cilantro, tender stems and leaves
3 ounces feta cheese, sliced into ⅛-inch-thick slabs (if it crumbles a bit, that’s fine)
¼ cup pistachios, toasted and chopped (see page 50 for more on toasting nuts)

Preheat the oven to 425°F.
Slice half the fennel into ½-inch-thick wedges and place them on a rimmed baking sheet.
If your carrots have tops, remove and set them aside. Scrub the carrots (no need to peel) and place half of them on the baking sheet with the fennel. Add half the scallions and toss with 3 tablespoons of the olive oil. Season with salt and pepper, and roast, tossing occasionally, until the carrots and fennel are browned and the scallions begin to char, 20 to 25 minutes. Remove them from the oven and let cool to room temperature.
Meanwhile, thinly slice the remaining carrots and fennel lengthwise and place them in a large bowl. Thinly slice the remaining scallions on a strong bias and add to the bowl with the vegetables.
Once the roasted vegetables have cooled, add them to the bowl of raw vegetables. Toss with the lemon juice, cilantro, and some chopped carrot tops, if you’ve got ’em (if not, use more cilantro, parsley, dill, or mint—whatever you have). Season with salt, pepper, and more lemon juice, if you like.
Drizzle with the remaining 2 tablespoons olive oil and top with the feta and pistachios.

Dopesick by Beth Macy

My parents are reading this for their book group and I try to stay more or less up with that.
The first think that I will say is that while it is a bit more up to date on current events, that this book would be second to Dreamland for me in recommendations for books to read to understand the current opiate crisis.
There are a couple of things that it does a better job at explaining when compared to Dreamland.  The fist is that there is a brief but convincing history of opiate abuse as it pertains to the United States at the front of the novel.  It doesn't delineate the power of opiates across time to have a devastating effect on mankind, but it does alert the reader that while the Sackler family lied, cheated, and profited from criminal activity, they did not create man's love of opiates and it's ability to cripple people is nothing new.  Just the means have changed.
The other is that it does address the problem of young men in rural America not working.  Idle hands are the Devil's playground, and disability is more rampant in red counties than in blue, so in addition to being susceptible to drug abuse, they are also in danger of losing their barest hold on life, because another Republican administration is going to be the death of safety nets.  It is a freight train that they have set in motion heading straight at them.

A-X-L (2018)

I watched this with my youngest son, who is on a stint of watching bad action movies, of which this is one.  This is not what I would call a good movie.  It has all the elements of stereotype that you can squish into an hour and a half.  The taleneted young dirt bike stunt racer is poor and has trouble competing with the over resourced boy, but the rich kid has an overbearing father, so no winners there.  The rich kid is a total jerk, taking pleasure in controling the other kids in his sphere, making them choose between becoming like him and doing the right thing.  The rich kid pines for the house cleaners daughter, and she is the only one who stands up to him, but even that comes at a price.
The plot that is overlaid on this well worn story line is that a private company is developing a battlefield robot in the form of a dog, man's best friend for the modern soldier (so a version of Small Soldiers, where the corporation loses control of their weapon, which has to be brought back under cover at any cost).   The only reason that I bother to write about it at all is that I think that it is definitely a notch above the Transformer movies.  And while there is a fair amount of bullying and a couple of people shot, as these things go it is not too violent when all is said and done.

Peach Upside Down Cake

I am not a huge fan of skillet based desserts, but my husband made this earlier this week and it was delicious. 

• 4 medium peaches (about 1 1/2 pounds/680 grams), unpeeled and cut into 1/3-inch-thick wedges
• Juice of 1 lemon
• 1 cup/130 grams cake flour, not self-rising
• ¾ teaspoon baking powder
• ¼ teaspoon baking soda
• 1 cup/200 grams granulated sugar
• 5 ounces/140 grams unsalted butter
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 2 large eggs
• ½ cup sour cream

For the bourbon whipped cream (optional):

• ½ cup heavy cream
• 1 tablespoon bourbon 
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract
• confectionery sugar to taste 

1. Heat oven to 350 degrees. Line a rimmed baking sheet with a nonstick baking mat or parchment paper. (This is in case the cake bubbles over during baking.)
2. In a large bowl, toss the peaches with the lemon juice. In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder and baking soda.
3. In a 10-inch cast-iron skillet, cook 1/4 cup of the granulated sugar over medium heat, stirring occasionally with a wooden spoon, until the sugar melts and turns a deep amber color, about 10 minutes. Remove from the heat and immediately add 2 tablespoons of the butter, stirring vigorously. The mixture may appear curdled and broken; don’t worry, it will smooth out. Arrange the peach wedges in concentric circles over the sugar mixture, overlapping as needed to make them fit.
4. In a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the remaining sugar, butter and the vanilla bean seeds (or vanilla extract) on medium speed until smooth. Add the eggs one at a time, beating until blended after each addition. Add the sour cream and beat until blended. With the mixer running on low speed, gradually add the flour mixture, beating just until blended and stopping to scrape bowl as needed. Spoon the batter over the peaches in the skillet and spread to cover.
5. Place the skillet on the prepared baking sheet. Bake until golden brown and a tester inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean, 40 to 45 minutes.
6. Make the whipped cream, if desired: In a large bowl, preferably metal, combine cream and bourbon. Refrigerate, along with a metal whisk or mixer attachments, for at least 15 minutes. Once chilled, whip the mixture until it holds soft peaks, 3 to 5 minutes.
7. Let the cake cool in the skillet on a wire rack for 10 minutes. Run a knife around the edge to loosen. If you see liquid around the edges of the skillet, carefully pour off into a measuring cup and set aside. (It’s O.K. if you don’t have any excess liquid — it all depends on how juicy your fruit is.)
8. Carefully invert the cake onto a serving plate and drizzle with any reserved liquid. Let cool about 10 minutes more, to set. Cut into wedges using a serrated knife and serve, topping each slice with whipped cream if you like.

The Mueller Report

OMG, you have to read this.  It is not so much that there is information in here that you haven't already heard or known about, but being carefully walked through it page by page, is very damning. While Derchowitz is no hero, he makes a case for why the Special Counsel approach couldn't yield the result that was hoped for, that it was doomed from accomplishing that from the get go.  I would also contend that this is well written, that it was not painful to read through, all in all.
The report lays out in meticulous detail both a blatantly illegal effort by Russia to throw the 2016 presidential election to Donald Trump and repeated efforts by President Trump to end, limit, or impede Mueller’s investigation of Russian interference. Trump’s efforts included firing or attempting to fire those overseeing the investigation, directing subordinates to lie on his behalf, cajoling witnesses not to cooperate, and doctoring a public statement about a Trump Tower meeting between his son and closest advisers and a Russian lawyer offering compromising information on Hillary Clinton.
The Mueller report focused on the question of criminal conspiracy. It found no evidence that Trump campaign officials conspired with the Russians’ disinformation campaigns or hacking of computers belonging to the Democratic National Committee and the Clinton campaign, however it describes extensive contacts between the Trump campaign and the Russians, many of which Trump campaign officials lied about. And it finds substantial evidence demonstrating that the Russian government perceived it would benefit from a Trump presidency and worked to secure that outcome, and that the Campaign expected it would benefit electorally from information stolen and released through Russian efforts.  Russian intelligence agency hackers targeted Hillary Clinton’s home office within five hours of Trump’s public request in July 2016 that the Russians find her deleted e-mails. And WikiLeaks, which was in close touch with Trump advisers, began releasing its trove of e-mails stolen by the Russians from Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta one hour after the Access Hollywood tape in which Trump bragged about assaulting women was made public in October 2016.  Draw your own conclusions.

Landline (2017)

As one review I read pointed out, nobody dies in this movie.  It is set in the mid-nineties and is a light musing movie on adulthood and monogamy and sisterhood, washed in nostalgia for a time period where the landline was the main source of communication.  No distracting scenes with cell phones that occupy much of the conversation--both as a source of information and the center of it. The revelations are gentle, but worthwhile.
It is a two sister Manhattan family, one daughter is late in high school and the other is early in her post-college career.  Their parents have significant conflict, and while it isn't new, when the sisters discover their father's long standing infidelity it really rocks their already gently swaying boat.  They act out in their own ways, causing a ripple effect of discord across their own lives, and their ability to support each other in the end is a nice homage to the enduring nature of sibling support.  Never minimize the effect that an unstable marriage has on the family, and be nice to your siblings because they may be what you end up relying on in the end. 

White Supremicist Terrorism

I continue to be overwhelmed by the fire hose of bad news that spews from this corrupt administration and the efforts of foreign assets within our own government, like #MoscowMitch, who continue to block efforts to make change in government, or to even have a vote on it, so that the voters can see where their elected representatives stand.
Here is the thing though.  You reap what you sew.  When the administration is run by a misogynistic, xenophobic white nationalist who constantly spews hate speech meant to incite violence, why is anyone surprised when that happens?  The characterization of Central Americans as being beneath human, caging them, separating children from their families, allowing sexual abuse of minors on a scale that I do not remember in my lifetime, it matters not that he denies that is what he meant. 
And there is another thing: our border with Mexico is one that we made through war.  It is an artificial border of our own creation, with the people born above it being here entirely legally, going back to before the Civil War.  It is has been more theirs than ours for centuries, and yet this hate and violence spewing from White Supremacists continues unabated and even encouraged from the highest reaches of government.  It is patriotic to question government when it breaks the laws of man and god.  There is evil afoot and it must be called out.

Appalachia Reckoning Edited By Anthony Harkins and Meredith McCarroll

In 2016, J. D. Vance’s Hillbilly Elegy defined Appalachia for many, and the book was held up as a way for the rest of America to understnad what Appalachia is all about.  But it isn't that at all.  It is one guy's take on his growing up experience, and guess what, it is pretty much rehashing old tropes about the region.  He pulled himeself up by his bootstraps.  His family is violent and uneducated and in some cases drug addicted, but that is on them, in his mind. The fact (unknown to me when I read the book) is that he is a conservative, reinforcing conservative lack of acknowledgement of the impact that industrial take and never giving back in the community has contributed to the poverty.  The under current of racism in Vance's book is also addressed.
For Appalachian locals, Elegy is troubling. It hinders so much more than it helps.  This response is a multifaceted review that critically examines the assertions in Vance’s book and the reception thereof while redressing the current and historical complexity of Appalachian experience, which are more plural  than monolithic.
The contributors share Appalachian heritage, and their perspectives demonstrate the scope of Appalachian experiences and identity, covering a range of political persuasions, socioeconomic backgrounds, racial identities, and sexual orientations, among others. Their approaches are also multifaceted. Divided into direct commentary (mostly scholarly) and personal, artistic, and autobiographical reflections on Vance’s work, each contribution earnestly wrestles with Hillbilly Elegy‘s juggernaut effect, whether it’s from a perspective of dissent, appreciation, or reconciliation.  This book is a must read--skip Elegy if you are only going to read one.

Mr. Church (2016)

This is a very odd story that is told only from one side, so in the end, while I enjoyed the telling, I just didn't get what I was supposed to think about it.
Mr. Church (played by a very quiet Eddy Murphy, without any sense of humor what so ever) has been a cook for a man we never meet named Richard.  He shows up in Marie's kitchen one day, telling her that Richard, who has now died, has sent him to cook for Marie and her daughter until Marie dies, which is going to happen sooner rather than later, because Marie has breast cancer.
So where the money comes from and how it flows through Mr. Church is a piece of the mystery that we never find out.  Marie dies just as her daughter Charlotte is off to college, but that soon comes up wonky and she is back on Mr. Church's doorstep.  Charlotte has no family and Mr. Church was a victim of verbal and physical abuse as a child and they are damaged in their own ways, limited in what they can do by the trauma of their past.  It is interesting, if not altogether satisfying.

Remember by Joy Harjo

We finally have a National Poet who is an American Indian, and we can rejoice that, even while we are saddened by racism.

Remember

Remember the sky that you were born under,
know each of the star's stories.
Remember the moon, know who she is.
Remember the sun's birth at dawn, that is the
strongest point of time. Remember sundown
and the giving away to night.
Remember your birth, how your mother struggled
to give you form and breath. You are evidence of
her life, and her mother's, and hers.
Remember your father. He is your life, also.
Remember the earth whose skin you are:
red earth, black earth, yellow earth, white earth
brown earth, we are earth.
Remember the plants, trees, animal life who all have their
tribes, their families, their histories, too. Talk to them,
listen to them. They are alive poems.
Remember the wind. Remember her voice. She knows the
origin of this universe.
Remember you are all people and all people
are you.
Remember you are this universe and this
universe is you.
Remember all is in motion, is growing, is you.
Remember language comes from this.
Remember the dance language is, that life is.
Remember.

Blackthorn (2011)

There is a list of people whose deaths remain "unresolved." Jimmy Hoffa. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Amelia Earhart. People who disappeared and were never quite found.  They all must be dead by now anyway, but we have a need for closure. Such cases also provide an excellent inspiration for movies.
Sam Shepherd play James Blackthorn, an alias assumed by Butch Cassidy after his alleged death in a shoot out in Bolivia.  He has settled in the mountains and lives among the people.  The scenery in the movie, and the native weavings and clothing are spot on from my visit there in the the early 1980's.  That and the brief time filming the Bolivian Salt Flats high between the Andes ranges is definitively the best part of the movie.  The plot is on the thin side--Butch decides to go back to the United States to help with a child he has left behind, and a lot of mishaps fall into his path.  

The Dictionary Wars by Peter Martin

He who creates the dictionary, so follows the language.  I never thought about it before, but it is a fascinating avenue of great influence.
This book recounts the patriotic fervor in the early American republic to produce a definitive national dictionary that would rival Samuel Johnson’s 1755 Dictionary of the English Language. What began as a cultural war of independence from Britain devolved into a battle scholars, and publishers, all vying for dictionary supremacy.
The overwhelming questions in the dictionary wars involved which and whose English was truly American and whether a dictionary of English should attempt to be independent from Britain. There was an intense rivalry between America’s first lexicographers, Noah Webster and Joseph Emerson Worcester, who fought over who could best represent the soul and identity of American culture. Webster believed an American dictionary, like the American language, ought to be informed by the nation’s republican principles, but Worcester thought that such language reforms were reckless and went too far. Their conflict continued beyond Webster’s death, when the ambitious Merriam brothers acquired publishing rights to Webster’s American Dictionary and launched their own language wars. From the beginning of the nineteenth century to the end of the Civil War, the dictionary wars also engaged America’s colleges, libraries, newspapers, religious groups, and state legislatures at a pivotal historical moment that coincided with rising literacy and the print revolution.

All Hail to the Immigrants

Toni Morrison died this week.  A lioness of literature, who we should mourn by reading the works she wrote that we have yet to open.  She is painful to hear at times, but always beautifully put together and eye opening.
The current rage against immigrants really baffles me on a number of levels.  The thing I love about the United States, a country that my family came to in the 1600's in order to escape persecution at home (sound familiar) with a vision of a more perfect union.  A city on the hill, where the needs of the many are more important than the wealth of the few.  Of course, that vision was a bit distorted to begin with, but our nation has grown, in size and stature, through the richness that diverse cultures bring to us.  So putting people in cages at the border is not only inhumane and cruel, it also weakens us as a nation in every way.  We are becoming the people we historically loathed.  The terrorists on our soil that I fear the most are angry white men and we are doing nothing to stop them.

Riding Giants (2004)

The thing that is driven home in this documentary about surfing is that in no way do I get this obsession, but it is just that.
The movie is about altogether another reality. The overarching fact about these surfers is the degree of their obsession. They live to ride, and grow depressed when there are no waves. They haunt the edge of the sea and are like the modern day mariners Melville describes on the first pages of Moby Dick. They seek the rush of those moments when they balance on top of a wave's fury and feel themselves in precarious harmony with the ungovernable force of the ocean. They are cold and tired, battered by waves, thrown against rocks, visited by sharks, held under so long they believe they are drowning -- and over and over, year after year, they go back into the sea to do it again.  From the early surfers of the 1950's, who camped on the beaches of Hawaii for weeks on end, living primitive existences in order to catch the next big wave, to the Laird Hamilton's of today, who take a jet ski to get toed into monster waves to ride, they have the bug and they have it bad.  Really fascinating.

The City State of Boston by Mark Peterson

I read about this book in the New Yorker, and for some reason, while I read almost entirely fiction, I feel like I have a non-fiction book a week within my reach for the time being.  This was a rough way to start, though, because it is an almost 700 page book that is even denser to read than it is to lift. 
Drawing from vast archives, and featuring unfamiliar figures alongside well-known ones, such as John Winthrop, Cotton Mather, and John Adams, Peterson explores Boston’s origins in sixteenth-century utopian ideals, its founding and expansion into the hinterland of New England, and the growth of its distinctive political economy, with ties to the West Indies and southern Europe. The most interesting and unknown to me part was the 1600's when Boston rose to a powerful and rich city-state through Atlantic trade.  They even had their own silver currency!
By the 1700s, Boston was at full strength, with wide Atlantic trading circuits and cultural ties, both within and beyond Britain’s empire. After the cataclysmic Revolutionary War, the city aimed to negotiate a relationship with the American confederation, but through the next century, the new United States unraveled Boston’s regional reign. The fateful decision to ratify the Constitution undercut its power, as Southern planters and slave owners dominated national politics and corroded the city-state’s vision of a common good for all.  A situation that we are still emerging from as a nation.

Peach Cobbler

Here is the before and after picture of this recipe, which we made for my two year old granddaughter's second birthday party.  I lean towards cakey rather than biscuity cobbler, so this method, where the batter goes on the bottom and the fruit on the top, and then switch in the cooking avoids the dryness that cobbler can sometimes have.  Yum!

• 5 peaches , peeled, cored and sliced (about 4 cups)
• 3/4 cup granulated sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

For the batter:

• 6 Tablespoons butter
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 3/4 cup milk
• ground cinnamon

• Add the sliced peaches, sugar and salt to a saucepan and stir to combine. 
*(If using canned peaches, skip to step 3) 
• Cook on medium heat for just a few minutes, until the sugar is dissolved and helps to bring out juices from the peaches. Remove from heat and set aside. 
• Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Slice butter into pieces and add to a 9x13 inch baking dish. Place the pan in the oven while it preheats, to allow the butter to melt. Once melted, remove the pan from the oven.
• In a large bowl mix together the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Stir in the milk, just until combined. Pour the mixture into the pan, over the melted butter and smooth it into an even layer. 
• Spoon the peaches and juice (or canned peaches, if using) over the batter. Sprinkle cinnamon generously over the top.
• Bake at 350 degrees for about 40-45 minutes, until some brownness and carmelization occurs. Serve warm, with a scoop of ice cream, if desired.

Colette (2018)

This is yet another movie about a man taking credit for a woman's work, then trying to force her to produce more because of the large amount of money her work generates, and all the while never giving her credit, neither publicly not privately.
The film is based on the life of the foremost female French novelist Colette ,and the gorgeous cinematography of it all allows us into the lush, candle-lit world of late 19th century France.  There are  contrasting the thick greenery outdoors of the countryside with the highly decorated interiors of Paris. Both locations are seductively lavish, not in terms of the money spent by the people who live there, but in the wealth of lived-in detail bathed in soft, golden light. Colette herself is in increasingly stark contrast to both settings, too curious and independent-minded for the quiet life of the country, too honest and unconfined for the conventions of the city.  Her husband, whom she adored as a much younger than he girl, is increasingly disillusioned with him after the book she writes and he publishes under his name becomes a raging success.  She wants to be her, and he wants her locked up writing so he can make money.  Beautifully filmed and told story.

Traitor in Chief

There is something very odd going on, whereby people who really do seem like they could be decent people are not only defending the current administration and it's assault on people of color in general and immigrants in general.  I mean for gosh sake, a white dude with a gun just drove to a Texas border town with the explicit mission of shooting people of color, and yet, cloaked in the office he holds rather than the man he is, the actions of the president, a man who chuckled when at a campaign rally when the shooting of immigrants was brought up, continues to not just be defended.  No, that is not the limit of the amorality afoot here.  They are telling those who protest it that we are the problem, that we do not revere the office the way they do.  These same people were calling Obama a Muslim and calling his presidency illegitimate because he was from Kenya.  They want the country to be white, and they will close their eyes to the atrocities around them as we slip into a country that perpetrates and continues to perpetrate state sanctioned evil.  More on this later.

Hillbilly Elegy by JD Vance

It took me a very long time to get through this book.  The hardest part was getting started.  My local library will allow you to have a book out for up to 9 weeks at a time if nobody else wants the book.  I did that five times before I even cracked the book open.  Then a couple more times before I got to around page 50 and the whole thing started to make more sense and get into the weeds of why rural southern communities are really different and challenged in the 21st century.
This is one of the most recommended books for those who want to try to understand people who vote against their self interests.  I would say that there is a bit of that here, but it is really a clear look at what people who grow up in poverty see and so not see about the world around them.  The main problem for me is that it recycled old tropes about how people are responsible for their own actions, and doesn't acknowledge the things that industry have foisted upon the region.  It is written by a Republican would be my guess.
Be that as it may, the short answer is that there are no short solutions, it is much more food for thought than a blue print out, and maybe it isn't even that.  It wasn't as good as I hoped, but better than I feared.

The End of the Tour (2015)

My youngest son and I are on a streak of watching movies that are very good, but ultimately painful in the truths that they reveal.  This is a movie based almost exclusively on an interview that Rolling Stone reporter David Lipsky (played by Jesse Einstein) had with David Foster Wallace (played by Jason Segal).  The setting is this.  Lipsky is a want to be author, having just published a book himself, who is almost incensed when he reads a review of Infinite Jest, Wallace's then current book.  He is railing against it to the point where his exasperated girlfriend says that he should just shut up and read it.  He does, and then he is like those who used to smoke but no longer do.  He is an evangelical when it comes to Wallace, and he convinces his editor to send him on a five day end of the book tour meeting with Wallace and write an article about it for the magazine.   The script for the movie comes almost entirely from those tapes, which never made it into an article, but after Wallace's suicide, did become a book, upon which this movie is based.  A glimpse at the angst of genius. You leave convinced it was hard to live within his psyche, and he left us with what he could.