Lunamania

Texas tells the Supreme Court to go f*ck itself. We're going to kill this guy anyway.

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For unknown reasons, I have been roaming around the house until the wee hours all week. It's not quite insomnia, but more like some inexplicable resistance to going to sleep. It's weird. I couldn't name anything keeping me awake, but it felt like my head wouldn't turn off. I want to report on the many productive tasks that I've accomplished in those quiet uninterrupted hours. Oh wait...I haven't completed anything. The minimal sleep didn't seem to be affecting my daily functions until today. Very sleepy right now.

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Roz recently sent a lovely update on what she's been listening to and Sunnyjust handed me a trove of music. Sunny has such a massive music collection that it'd literally take 20 years of non-stop listening to get through it all. Actually, that probably isn't enough time.

Anyway, inspired by Sunny and Roz's musical generosity, I'm sharing a tune chosen from one of Sunny's annual compilations. This one from 1974 Be Thankful for What You Got.

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This woman has funnies. Ms.Gomez also graciously endured our collective post-show stalking. If you could use a mid-day comedy break, you can watch snippets here.

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NY does the right thing. Congratulations to the NYCPP, the many immigrant rights groups who made it happen and a special YAY for Amy!

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Spent a sunny day in San Francisco hopping to meetings and catching up with Catherine. San Francisco delivered some delightful surprises today. Above is a picture of park(ing) day a guerilla urban planner project to take over parking spaces with neat patches of green and fun. This is an "amusement park" game that involved tossing wine corks towards some unidentified purpose. The projects were scattered through the city and cleverly designed. Maybe it's the designer element that saved it from the usual self-righteous SF urban political statement. Here's an article by the Wall Street Journal.

Also came across a great used book sale in the middle of the State Department building on Van Ness. $1 books! It's an annual benefit for the Civic Center Children's Center.

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It's feeling like autumn is approaching. Sniff, I'm not bitter or cold--"Summer days, I can't stand the summer days. Frozen cocktails and night fireworks What's so great about them anyway? Summer day, let it be some other day...", says Do As Infinity.

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In the US today is an occasion for NPR devotees and flickr freaks to Do Stuff to commemorate the Dave Barry inspired, Talk Like a Pirate Day. Yar.

No segue.

A little fairy boy rocks his pink polo shirt on the first day of school. Other students call him a homo and make his life miserable. Two older students organize a huge campaign to wear pink shirts in solidarity. Once again I want to move to Canada.

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Unlike the AIDS Ride Monkey, I do not regularly squeeze into spandex and pedal around for days on end. Before this Sunday, the longest ride I've been on is something like 17 miles. (That's if you don't count crazy bike rides of my teen years.) This weekend I undertook a "metric century." That's Ameircanese for 65 miles pedaling on a hard seat. Starting at the Sebastopol Community Center, we coasted through rolling hills of vineyards, vineyards and some more vineyards. I only resisted pulling over and having a tipple at the famed wineries because they weren't open till 11. Yes, we started riding well before 11.

Miles of vineyards were punctuated by cows so large I am convinced they were raised eating other cows. We also saw some ostriches and miniature horses, the bizarre animal accessories of No. Cal. bougies. Unlike the typical bike rest stops this Tour D'Organic ride involved local organic farmers who brought out platters of fresh fruit. It was some of the best fruit ever, but I had to temporarily suspend concern for hygiene as I watched people go from bike to porto-potty to handful of fruit. Very organic. I also scored a loaf of "sprouted wheat and soy crunch organic bread." I am not kidding.

It was beautiful and the course was perfect, but I wasn't feeling the other riders. I'm glad cycling is a solo sport. Click the image to see some more pictures.

Posted by at 4:49 PM | Permalink | Comments (2)

Opening on Tuesday, Apature is the annual month long (what?! there's that much APA art? it is the Bay Area peoples) APA art event that causes many sleepless nights for Sam and other talented artists. Go show some love. Click above for a schedule.

Posted by at 9:40 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

I have never cooked a steak. I make ox tail soup, roast whole chickens, and bbq racks of ribs so it's not an aversion to handling raw meat. In part, my reluctance stems from fear of making $40 of meat unedible.

For reasons that perhaps I will share some other time, I am cooking more red meat. I Live with The Monkey That Must Eat at Peter Luger's Every Trip to New York, so off we went to get us some STEAK specifically, a bone-in rib eye. Pam and Eddie both make excellent steaks so we invited them over for a little cook-off. Each steak was brought to room temperature and cooked 3 different ways.

1. The Alton Brown method. Very easy.
Stick a cast iron skillet in the oven. Heat to 500 degrees. Salt and pepper both sides of the steak (just a pinch of salt.) Make sure you have abestos lined oven mitts. When oven reaches 500, remove skillet and place on range over high heat. No oil/butter on pan. Cook each side of the steak for 30 seconds. Stick the pan back in the oven for 2 minutes. Turn the steak and cook other side for 2 minutes.

This method resulted in a medium done steak. Unlike the other methods, the steak didn't get that nice seared burn that seals the flavor or whatever it does. That said, I did not mess up the meat. Perfectly edible.

2. Pam's Way Even easier and tastier.
Heat a pan range at high heat. Add a touch of olive oil and a pat of butter. Don't salt, pepper or otherwise season the steak. Cook the steaks for just under 2 minutes on both sides.

Even easier than Alton Brown and resulted in a medium rare steak. Perhaps it was the touch of butter and olive oil, but this steak had the most meaty flavor and the right amount of salt--despite using no salt. The pan also made for a nice burn/seal. While Alton's method was good, this was really good. Go Pam.

3. Eddie's Steak Yum.
I know you're not really supposed to marinate a good cut (blah blah), but I love Eddie's steaks. So I stole his recipe. In a shallow pan, mix about a third cup of soy sauce and just enough mirin to mellow the saltiness, but don't make it too sweet. Let steak sit for 45 minutes (any longer and the steak loses shape or some terribly wasteful thing.) Cook the Alton Brown way.

Since the marinade is really just for a light flavor, it didn't overshadow the Essence of Steak taste. This was my favorite, but next time I'm going to cook it Pam style to try to get those juices sealed.

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My peoples...once again champion of a completely useless yet oddly entertaining contest.

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I blame the fruitless hours spent hoping for magical skills on several formative books from my childhood. The Girl with the Silver Eyes, The Chronicles of Narnia, The Xanth and Blue Adept Series...but the very first fantastical book was A Wrinkle in Time. I don't even remember how old I was when I read this series, but I must have talked about it a lot--and I was a chatty kid. I was probably driving my Mom insane and in an attempt to get it out of my system she sat me down and told me to write Madeline L'Engle a letter. It was my first and to date only fan mail. (That is if you don't count my letters to the NY Times to save Circuits.) She (or more likely her publisher) sent me a hand written thank you scribbled on a 3-fold pamphlet with her picture on the front. I wish I knew where it was.
As a tribute to Madeline L'Engle, maybe I'll go re-read the series, or even better convince Amy S. to bake some bunsen burner cookies with me.

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I'm so fashion backwards, originally uploaded by lunamania.

I hadn't realized lipstick had got up ans left us.

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Since I'm getting a ton of spam these days, I might as well invite more by inserting the words gay, porn and well, muppets as many times as I can in a single entry, because really, The Internet is for Porn. Enjoy.

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Fort Funston


Originally uploaded by lunamania

Strolling w/Saguaro, Catherine, Elaine and 900 off leash dogs..

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