Lotus white, tea, braids and ice

This post is linked with: Booking Through, Thursday 13 

"And, the reverse–which actors have been particularly badly cast in roles of characters you first met in the pages of a book? Do you blame the actors or the writers and other film-people for the failure? Who would you have cast instead?"

Ewan McGregor as Carlo Ventresca in Angels and Demons. I thought he was too thin and small as a carmerlengo. They could have cast someone with more body volume and a deep bass voice, but it's just me.

Katharine Schlesinger as Catherine Morland in Northanger Abbey. Too pretty for her character as one who is into horror Gothic stories. Again, it's just me.

I don't care about blaming anyone for the failure. It's not worth the wrinkles. I just go get myself a cup of tea and find other books and movies to enjoy.

Thursday 13: Random quotes that mention white things in photos I took recently

1. The white lotus opens wide to those who know her secrets. ~ Fung and Iroh.

2. I failed to make the chess team because of my height. ~ Woody Allen

3. A picture is a poem without words. - Horace

4. There is not so variable a thing as a lady's headdress. ~ Joseph Addison

5. As lovely as the white orchid, I'll never own this bloom outright. Yet as I dream in my small chamber, faith blooms in ever spreading light. ~ Liilia Talts Morrison

6. Genius is more often found in a cracked pot than in a whole one. ~ E.B. White

7. Curiosity is the wick in the candle of learning. ~ William Arthur Ward 

8. From time to time I'm vilified as the person who cares about the look of a teapot. ~ Stephen Bayley

9. Real nutrition comes from soybeans, almonds, rice and other healthy vegetable sources, not from a cow's udder. ~ Ingrid Newkirk

10. Women eat ice cream. Men toast marshmallows. ~ Diana Hardy

11. Consumers are eating about six ounces of Pangasius per year. Hardly more than a mouthful ~ shared by a member of The Caravan Club

12. A girl without braids is like a city without bridges. ~ Roman Payne

13. I dread no more the first white in my hair, or even age itself the easy shoe. Time doing this to me may alter too my sorrow into something I can bear. ~ Edna St Vincent Millay

Four salad men and a daiquiri poet

Research papers or PhD proposals don't count, right? Yeah, I write those and sometimes a speech to kick off a university business meeting. The rest of the time I play with recreational haiku, and that's that. So I'm no writer, but once in awhile I date some daiquiri. When the calendar showed 1-1-11, I headed off to a beach town, the Thai Royal family's summer home. I did balance the table with something healthy.

Now we don't play with our food but we certainly can have fun:
Guess which writer loved daiquiri: Edward Thomas, Randall Jarrell or Robert Frost 

Clue: "The land was ours before we were the land's..." Read at JFK's inauguration. 

*More on writers and what they love to eat here.*

Someone once said 'it takes four men to dress a salad. One for the salt, one for the pepper, one for the vinegar and one for the oil." 

Can you name which men? Here are your choices:
a. yeoman, barman, monk, gamekeeper
b. wiseman, madman, miser, spendthrift
c. marksman, poet, undertaker, painter

Now have some coffee before finding your answers below

"Robert Frost loved daiquiris. At the Waybury Inn near one of his favorite dining spots - Frost would begin every dinner with a daiquiri. But only one daiquiri." THE AWL

"It takes four men to dress a salad: a wise man for the salt, a madman for the pepper, a miser for the vinegar and a spendthrift for the oil." ~ Anonymous

Leisure research, a memory of celebratory dining and its association with literature are to me sunbeams of joy to a quiet day off work. I hope you had fun guessing. 

Shared with Mellow Yellows * Inspire Me Monday * Color Connection * Food * Food Trip * Share the Joy * Creative HomeAcre * Favorite Things

My first Replay

I want to write a book about shoes that's full of footnotes. ~ Jarod Kintz

My only recollection of noticing Replay merchandise was around 13 years ago when an ex-boyfriend mentioned that he liked the brand. Recently I was browsing in the shoe department of Central Plaza and noticed an attractive sign.

Now what made me decide to check this pair out? Nah... it's not nostalgia for a past love. The new resolve to treat myself now and then is one. It fits and does not send me waggling on the glazed floor of my playground, a.k.a. lecture rooms, so that's another one. But the number one motivation for this purchase is the 90 percent off factor! I paid just US$13.35 instead of US$135.45. Quite a steal, isn't it?

Sold to shoe lover me.

This post is shared with Momspective * The Creative Homeacre * Mellow Yellows *  Make the Scene * Color Connection * Thrifty Things * Favorite Things

Libraries and cafes

This post is linked with: Booking Through, Thursday 13 and Favorite Things Thursday

How often do you visit a library? Do you go to borrow books? Do research? Check out the multi-media center? Hang out with the friendly and knowledgeable staff? Are you there out of love or out of need?

When I was a grad student I frequented the library out of both love and need. One biggest distraction to thesis-writing was pleasure reading. You know these things that you can't find in traditional or electronic books - databases and repositories that your university or company is subscribed to, are addicting. It's a world you may not mind spending hours or days in. Practically all collection of knowledge you can imagine is there; not to mention the 'scientific gossip.' And they say academic life is boring ;p

Thursday 13: authors and their food and drink. Let's have fun with who ate or drank what? There's a clue after the names. Answers are on the bottom of the list. And - many T13 participants are authors as well. We'd love to know what you like to eat or drink, if you want to mention that in the comments.

1. Daiquiri - Edward Thomas / Randall Jarrell / Robert Frost 

"The land was ours before we were the land's..." read at a presidential inauguration

2. Apples - Charles Dickens / George Orwell / Henry James

“... It was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light..." 

3. Liver sausage - Oscar Wilde / Frank O' Hara / Boris Pasternak

He had "liver sausages in the Mayflower shoppe." He died of ruptured liver. Larry Rivers, his long-time friend and lover delivered the eulogy at his funeral.

4. Claret - Percy Bysshe Shelley / John Keats / Lord Byron

"A thing of beauty is a joy forever..."

5. Champagne - Oscar Wilde / George Bernard Shaw / Frank Harris

"Always forgive your enemies. Nothing annoys them so much."

6. Eggs - George Orwell / Victor Hugo / Charles Dickens

One of his masterpieces was recently released as a musical

7. Vanilla pudding - Jean Paul Sartre / Boris Pasternak / Gunther Grass

recipient of the 1999 Nobel Prize in Literature

8. Soda water - Robert Frost / Lord Byron / George Bernard Shaw

One of his most famous poems was sang at the opening credits of the film Vanity Fair: "...like the night, of cloudless climes and starry skies..."

9. Rabbit stew - Sylvia Plath / Virginia Woolf / Emily Dickenson

She advanced the genre of confessional poetry

10. Plum cake - Elizabeth Browning / Jane Austen / Charlotte Bronte

Her most famous novel is celebrating its 200th anniversary this year

11. Oysters - Vladimir Nabokov / Leo Tolstoy / Anton Chekhov

He once said, "medicine is my lawful wife; and literature is my mistress"

12. Milk - Honore' de Balzac / Frank Kafka / Moliere

 Le Peau de chagrin, Gobseck. "A mother who is really a mother is never free."

13. Espresso - Alexandre Dumas / Marcel Proust / Jules Verne

In the Shadow of Young Girls in Flower. "Happiness is beneficial for the body, but it is grief that develops the powers of the mind."

~Idea: theawl.  The rest of the research is mine~

Answers: 1 Robert Frost  2 Charles Dickens  3 Frank O' Hara  4 John Keats  5 Oscar Wilde  6 Victor Hugo  7 Gunther Grass  8 Lord Byron  9 Sylvia Plath  10 Jane Austen  11 Anton Chekhov  12 Honore' de Balzac  13 Marcel Proust 

Pelican brief dessert

Life is uncertain. Eat dessert first. ~Ernestine Ulmer

Butter pan cake with warm chocolate, green tea ice cream and red bean jam

This dessert plate arrived on my table and I had my nose glued to The Pelican Brief. When I remembered to take a photo, the green tea ice cream had began melting. But who cares? This is one of those feel-good moments when you're doing two things you love simultaneously!

Food Friday * Share the Joy * Food Trip Friday

Unknown reasons

What spirit is so empty and blind that it cannot recognize the fact that the foot is more noble than the shoe, and skin more beautiful than the garment with which it is clothed? - Michelangelo

 Why is the Mom in this family picture smiling? Oh, I know. The Dad is wearing shoes.

Old Photo Album

But my mother was also smiling in our family photo. All three of us look about the same age as this family. Mama said she explicitly told Papa that day long ago that we would sit for a family portrait so we were to don something formal. But lo and behold Papa came in flip flops! Mama wasn't very happy about it. She still placed our picture neatly in the family album though. Family is family, slippers or stilettos.

What is unknown to me, besides the identity of this family, is how Father (rest in peace, Pap) ended up in the photo studio wearing slippers when he wore shoes virtually all the time. In fact we only saw him wearing slippers during his retirement.

Ah well, so much for shoes. I have loads of them but I don't want to ramble on about why I have more shoes than umbrellas when I live in a country that blazes hot all year.

I could probably attempt an analysis, but there are more interesting Unknowns to explore this week at Sepia headquarters.

Les Miserables brunch

Les Miserables hit big screens in Bangkok on January 31st, weeks behind Europe. At least that's what I remember a friend in Sweden said to me last week of December 2012- that they're all crazy about the musical. I love buying little treats to celebrate films I enjoy watching. This time I tried the warm chocolate cupcake from Coffee Beans by Dao. I also browsed a sprinkling of quotes by LM genius Victor Hugo:

 "To love another person is to see the face of God."

 

“A man is not idle because he is absorbed in thought. There is visible labor and there is invisible labor.”

"He never went out without a book under his arm, and he often came back with two.”

“It is nothing to die. It is frightful not to live.”

 Food Friday * Share the Joy * Time Travel * Rednesday * Blues * Mellow Yellows

Gifts

In this post: Booking Through Thursday and Thursday Thirteen

Do you like to give books as gifts?

I do, but the whole process can be complicated for many reasons. It's great if I knew what book would be appreciated or wanted or loved. I gifted two nephews a book each once and luckily they liked it, and read it which was inspiring to me. I think a gift certificate to a bookstore is a nice gift for a book lover.

Thursday 13: Quotes from Inkheart by Cornelia Funke. I didn't know about the book then, nor the film. This was random shopping but I bought the DVD in a snap when I read it had something to do with books.

1. “Perhaps the story in the book is just the lid on a pan: It always stays the same, but underneath there's a whole world that goes on - developing and changing like our own world.”

2.“Books loved anyone who opened them, they gave you security and friendship and didn't ask for anything in return; they never went away, never, not even when you treated them badly.”

3. "When you open the book it's like going to the theatre. First you see the curtain. Then it's pulled aside and the show begins.”

4. “Books are like flypaper, memories cling to the printed pages better than anything else.”

5.  “The book she had been reading was under her pillow, pressing its cover against her ear as if to lure her back into its printed pages.”

6.  “The book was spinning a magic spell around her heart, sticky as a spider's web and enchantingly beautiful.”

7.  “You know what they say: When people start burning books they'll soon burn human beings.”

8.  “She always did like tales of adventure-stories full of brightness and darkness. She could tell you the names of all King Arthur's knights, and she knew everything about Beowulf and Grendel, the ancient gods and the not-quite-so-ancient heroes. She liked pirate stories, too, but most of all she loved books that had at least a knight or a dragon or a fairy in them. She was always on the dragon's side by the way.”

9.  “What on earth have you packed in here? Bricks?" asked Mo as he carried Meggie's book-box out of the house.

10. “It's a good idea to have your own books with you in a strange place”

11.  “There was another reason [she] took her books whenever they went away. They were her home when she was somewhere strange.

12.  “Sometimes it's a good thing we don't remember things half as well as books do.”

13.   “The books in Mo and Meggie's house were stacked under tables, on chairs, in the corners of the rooms. There where books in the kitchen and books in the lavatory. Books on the TV set and in the closet, small piles of books, tall piles of books, books thick and thin, books old and new. They welcomed Meggie down to breakfast with invitingly opened pages; they kept boredom at bay when the weather was bad. And sometimes you fall over them.”

Chocolate mint ice cream

When I ordered ice cream at a big lunch I hosted in 2004 for (m/l) 300 family and friends at my father's funeral reception, I also wondered how it was made. I like to have an idea of how something I'm eating came to be. The recipe I'm sharing comes from Rita on Food: Home of the Home Cook.

She says her son likes chocolate mint ice cream and she made this for his birthday. In the meantime I can only buy scoops for my son and for a slightly different reason - to bribe him to eat veggies. The plan though is to try this recipe myself when things at work calm down.

Ingredients:
2 ounces unsweetened cocoa powder, approximately 1/2 cup
3 cups half-and-half
1 cup heavy cream
8 large egg yolks
9 ounces sugar
2 teaspoons pure mint extract
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Directions:

Place the cocoa powder along with 1 cup of the half-and-half into a medium saucepan over medium heat and whisk to combine.

Add the remaining half-and-half and the heavy cream. Bring the mixture just to a simmer, stirring occasionally, and remove from the heat.

In a medium mixing bowl whisk the egg yolks until they lighten in color. Gradually add the sugar and whisk to combine.

Temper the cream mixture by stirring cream into the eggs and sugar by gradually adding small amounts, until about third of the cream mixture has been added. Whisk in the remainder and return the entire mixture to the saucepan and place over low heat. Continue to cook, stirring frequently, until the mixture thickens slightly and coats the back of a spoon and reaches 170 to 175 degrees F. Pour the mixture into a container and allow to sit at room temperature to cool for 30 minutes. Stir in the mint extract and vanilla extract. Place the mixture into the refrigerator and once it is cool enough not to form condensation on the lid, Cover and store for 4 to 8 hours or until the temperature reaches 40 degrees F or below.

Pour into an ice cream maker and process according to the manufacturer's directions. This should take approximately 25 to 35 minutes. Serve as is for soft serve or freeze for another 3 to 4 hours to allow the ice cream to harden.

Rewind to (circa) 1989
Miss Rallos, a vintage, fat old maid, very strict you don't want to cross her, was the manager of the dormitory I lived in when I was in boarding college.  My  roommates and  I would queue up for her signature on our clearance slips before we could take final exams.  Once my turn was about five girls ahead; I made use of the time observing things in her lair...err...kitchen. On the wall near the bathroom there was this picture poster of a mommy koala and her baby looking cheeky. I still memorize what it said, and I'm using the words nowadays to make a little story of how the kiddo is so difficult to feed. 

Fast forward to 2008
This chocolate mint ice cream was actually my choice, not the kiddo's. At first he was timid about it. I introduced him to some of life's sweetest things by telling him a story about how that pretty nun Mommy saw in Dalby Forest (England) ate an ice cream just like this one. This was also his reward for trying to eat salad during lunch earlier. By the time he finished eating, the melting ice cream had dripped from his little fingers down to his elbow and soaked his shirt, and I found out I had no more Kleenex in my purse so we rushed home by taking the sky train.

 Kids' Color Connection * Food Trip Friday * Time Travel Thursday * Momspective * Tempt My Tummy Tuesday * Blue Monday * Inspire Me Monday

Screwdriver

This is my screwdriver during a birthday dinner with a girl friend. We ate at a restaurant called Cabbages and Condoms.

Knight's kiss

In a fairytale world, she's the damsel in distress and he's the gallant knight in shining armor who comes to rescue her from the tower of the evil witch.

Enter reality -

CJ in a golden steed green bike and Pinky gallop to the sunset head to the lift of a six-storey apartment building. They speak different languages. They also have different personalities. He is an introvert; she is obedient. And sweet. When asked to kiss him she obliged. Click!  goes the knight's little professor's very first kiss from a girl besides his mom.

ABC Wednesday