Word of the Day #2

seisin (also seizin)
n.
Legal possession of land, as a freehold estate.

The act or an instance of taking legal possession of land.
Property thus possessed.

Word of the Day

pongee

\Pon*gee"\, n. [Of East Indian origin.] A fabric of undyed silk from India and China.

Well, was a bit off with my naming the other day, but not with the reciple. Mixed mashed potatoes and turnips are not called "clashpot" but "clapshot." Or, if you want to use the old Shaker name from 19th Century America, "Alabaster."

Whichever, it's mixed mashed potatoes and turnips, seasoned with a bit of ginger and pepper, with melted cheddar on top. Had the neighbors over last night and they ate it up.

I forgot to add chives as garnish/seasoning but will do that next time. Good stuff, if rich.

Word of the Day #3

reify

To regard or treat (an abstraction) as if it had concrete or material existence.

Word of the Day #2

vitiate

Vitiate \Vi"ti*ate\, v. t. [imp. & p. p. Vitiated; p. pr. & vb. n. Vitiating.] [L. vitiatus, p. p. vitiare to vitiate, fr. vitium a fault, vice. See Vice a fault.] [Written also viciate.] 1. To make vicious, faulty, or imperfect; to render defective; to injure the substance or qualities of; to impair; to contaminate; to spoil; as, exaggeration vitiates a style of writing; sewer gas vitiates the air.

A will vitiated and growth out of love with the truth disposes the understanding to error and delusion. --South.

Without care it may be used to vitiate our minds. --Burke.

This undistinguishing complaisance will vitiate the taste of readers. --Garth.

2. To cause to fail of effect, either wholly or in part; to make void; to destroy, as the validity or binding force of an instrument or transaction; to annul; as, any undue influence exerted on a jury vitiates their verdict; fraud vitiates a contract.

Word of the Day

samizdat

The secret publication and distribution of government-banned literature in the former Soviet Union.
The literature produced by this system.
An underground press.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
[Russian : sam, self; see sem-1 in Indo-European Roots + izdatel'stvo, publishing house (from izdat', to publish, on the model of Gosizdat, State Publishing House : iz, from, out of; see eghs in Indo-European Roots + dat', to give; see d- in Indo-European Roots).]

samizdat

/sahm-iz-daht/ n. [Russian, literally "self
publishing"] The process of disseminating documentation via
underground channels. Originally referred to underground
duplication and distribution of banned books in the Soviet Union;
now refers by obvious extension to any less-than-official
promulgation of textual material, esp. rare, obsolete, or
never-formally-published computer documentation. Samizdat is
obviously much easier when one has access to high-bandwidth networks
and high-quality laser printers. Note that samizdat is properly
used only with respect to documents which contain needed information
(see also hacker ethic) but which are for some reason otherwise
unavailable, but _not_ in the context of documents which are
available through normal channels, for which unauthorized
duplication would be unethical copyright violation. See Lions
Book for a historical example.

Had my Burns Dinner last night. Made far too much food--neeps, taties, mushroom, salmon, scotch eggs and vegetarian haggis, with bannocks and shortbread with apples and cheese for dessert. We used John's poem for the Immortal Memory, "Nine Inch Will Please a Lady" for the address to the ladies, the almanac entry for extra comedy, and then nearly killed ourselves by inventing "The Robert Burns Drinking Game" for a round robin reading of "Tam O'Shanter."

The simple rules of the drinking game: Whenever Burns mentions drinking, drunkenness, thirst or an actual drink, you must take a drink.

We also had a possible first for a Burn's dinner--everyone asking for seconds of the Haggis. It was made of steel cut oats, rolled oats, crushed hazelnuts, carrots, onions, mushrooms and dried wild mushrooms (Pine Spikes to be specific, a California sub-variety that are deep burgundy colored) reconstituted with being soaked in scotch, seasoned with rosemary, parsley, and "spike seasoning" blend, the whole thing toasted in butter then wrapped in banana leaves and steamed.

The Pine Spikes did indeed look like bits of minced lamb lung, but tasted delicious. The general consensus was that we had created an A1 stuffing for goose or duck.

Lee, who'd attended Burns suppers before, piped in the Haggis, and later sang us a parody of "John Barleycorn" called "Non-Barleycorn."

The song can be heard here:

http://www.oakashthorn.com/cgi-bin/Audio.cgi

Thanks again, John, for introducing me to the idea of a Burns Supper. It was great fun.

I'm going to try making my leftover neeps and tatties into an "Orkney Clashpot" by baking them together with some of the cheeses we had.

Well, just received my latest bit of Republican Spam, as reported earlier, though as an interesting wrinkle, my new Spam-Sorting program identified it as Spam to begin with.

Then again, it also though my Buffy mailing was Spam too, so oh well.

Word of the Day

Kipple

Kipple is a word coined by the remarkable science fiction writer Philip K. Dick. It refers to the sinister type of rubbish which simply builds up without any human intervention. Eventually, one day, the entire world will have moved to a state of kipplization. Castle Gormenghast is doing nothing to help this.

Word of the Day #2

vivarium

\Vi*va"ri*um\, n.; pl. E. Vivariums, L. Vivaria. [L., fr. vivarius belonging to living creatures, fr. vivus alive, living. See Vivid.] A place artificially arranged for keeping or raising living animals, as a park, a pond, an aquarium, a warren, etc.

Word of the Day

klez·mer
n. pl. klez·mo·rim (klzm-rm)
1. A traditionally itinerant Jewish folk musician of eastern Europe performing in a small band, as at weddings.
2. The Jewish folk music played by small, traditionally itinerant bands.

Learned this while finding the words to describe the Squirrel Nut Zippers wonderful song (and video) "The Ghost of Stephen Foster. The video is great, and all the better when viewed alongside the original Betty Boop film of Cab Calloway's "Minnie the Moocher."

Right now, I'm thinking about Thursday. This next Thursday is Burns Day, which means it's a day to celebrate the great poet Robert Burns, drink scotch and eat haggis.

I am thinking I may substitute Scotch eggs and Scottish shortbread for haggis, even if Burns wrote a poem about the later. The idea of leftover haggis.....

Well, then again, it might make the dogs happy.

Well, interesting weekend. Rather than go up to SF for the antiwar demonstration (where I should have gone, I suppose, but I didn't want to waste the gas on just myself) that evening I carpooled up to Greyhaven and attended Diana Paxson's Odin ritual. It was enlightening and great fun, apart from getting an ill omen from my rune pouch.

Of course, with the imminent war and so on, an ill omen is to be expected.

Word of the Day #4

padparadscha

Extremely rare and sought after, padparadscha is the pinkish orange sapphire. The name is Sinhalese for "lotus blossum."

Word of the Day #3

froward

\Fro"ward\, a. [Fro + -ward. See Fro, and cf. Fromward.] Not willing to yield or compIy with what is required or is reasonable; perverse; disobedient; peevish; as, a froward child.

A froward man soweth strife. --Prov. xvi. 28.

A froward retention of custom is as turbulent a thing as innovation. --Bacon.

Syn: Untoward; wayward; unyielding; ungovernable: refractory; obstinate; petulant; cross; peevish. See Perverse. -- Fro\"ward*ly, adv. -- Fro\"ward*ness, n.

Word of the Day #2

louche
adj.
Of questionable taste or morality; decadent: “The rebuilt [Moscow hotel] is home to the flashy, louche Western disco Manhattan Express” (Liesl Schillinger).

Word of the Day

fuxor
"fuh-ksor"

1337 speak for fucker; see also fugger.

That n008 fuxor got no skillzors.


(This word found in Cory Doctorow's short story 0wnz0red on Salon.

Word of the Day #2

fisk

\Fisk\, v. i. [Cf. Sw. fjeska to bustle about.] To run about; to frisk; to whisk. [Obs.]

He fisks abroad, and stirreth up erroneous opinions. --Latimer.


(There also seems to be some new definition that "fisking" is to disect someone's work in an editorial manner, after the anti-American columnist Fisk.)

Hang out with poets, you get vocabulary. New one here:

Word of the Day

synecdoche

\Syn*ec"do*che\ (s[i^]n*[e^]k"d[-o]*k[-e]), n. [L. synecdoche, Gr. synekdochh`, fr. to receive jointly; sy`n with + ? to receive; ? out + ? to receive.] (Rhet.) A figure or trope by which a part of a thing is put for the whole (as, fifty sail for fifty ships), or the whole for a part (as, the smiling year for spring), the species for the genus (as, cutthroat for assassin), the genus for the species (as, a creature for a man), the name of the material for the thing made, etc. --Bain.

Okay, the US Army has just joined the 4-Roses Casino and the amazing spy cam as the latest new annoying pop-up ad. W. must really be gearing up for this war if he's trying to advertise to the internet generation.

Word of the Day #3

meed

\Meed\, n. [OE. mede, AS. m[=e]d, meord; akin to OS. m?da, OHG. miata, mieta, G. miethe hire, Goth. mizd[=o] reward, Bohem. & Russ. mzda, Gr. mistho`s, Skr. m[imac]dha. [root]276.] 1. That which is bestowed or rendered in consideration of merit; reward; recompense.

A rosy garland was the victor's meed. --Spenser.

2. Merit or desert; worth.

My meed hath got me fame. --Shak.

3. A gift; also, a bride. [Obs.] --Chaucer.



(I suppose this is my meed for reading old poetry.)

Word of the Day #2

misprision

\Mis*pri"sion\, n. [LL. misprisio, or OF. mesprison, prop., a mistaking, but confused with OF. mespris contempt, F. m['e]pris. See 2d Misprise, Misprize, Prison.] 1. The act of misprising; misapprehension; misconception; mistake. [Archaic] --Fuller.

The misprision of this passage has aided in fostering the delusive notion. --Hare.

2. Neglect; undervaluing; contempt. [Obs.] --Shak.

3. (Law) A neglect, negligence, or contempt.

Note: In its larger and older sense it was used to signify ``every considerable misdemeanor which has not a certain name given to it in the law.'' --Russell. In a more modern sense it is applied exclusively to two offenses: -- 1. Misprision of treason, which is omission to notify the authorities of an act of treason by a person cognizant thereof. --Stephen. 2. Misprision of felony, which is a concealment of a felony by a person cognizant thereof. --Stephen.

Word for the Day

creel

\Creel\ (kr[=e]l), n. [Gael. craidhleag basket, creel.] 1. An osier basket, such as anglers use. --Sir W. Scott.

2. (Spinning) A bar or set of bars with skewers for holding paying-off bobbins, as in the roving machine, throstle, and mule.

Slippery Jacks a la Russe (Slippery Jacks Russian Style)

• 1 to 1 1/2 lbs. slippery jack mushrooms (suillus pungens)
  
• 2 1/2 lbs. Yukon gold potatoes, boiled, drained and cut into chunks
  
• 1 large yellow onion, diced
  
• 1 bunch green onions, chopped
  
• 1 bunch parsley, chopped
  
• 1 bunch dill, chopped
  
• 1/2 lb. of butter
  
• 16oz container of sour cream
  
• squeeze of lemon
  
• salt and pepper to taste
  
• beaumonde seasoning to taste
  

Wash and peel the slippery jacks, removing the slimy skin from the cap. Break the caps off the stems. Slice the caps into strips. Cut and dice the stems. Dry saute in a pan to remove the water from the slippery jacks. Once cooked down, remove slippery jacks from pan and reserve. Put 1/4 lb. of butter in pan and fry yellow onion and white portion from bottom of green onions until golden. Return slippery jacks to pan and fry with the onions until they are golden too. Then take out and reserve, adding the other 1/4 lb. of butter to the pan, and fry potato chunks until golden and crisp. Add mushroom-onion mixture in. Salt to taste, adding a dash of pepper, a squeeze of lemon, and perhaps a sprinkle of beaumonde seasoning (French blend of celery salt and dextrose). Just before serving, add parsley and green onions, stirring them just to the point of becoming warm and limp. Take to the table and serve with a sauce of made of dill mixed with sour cream.

We've now attempted to add Blogout instead of Poster Child. Does it work?

Okay, here's an interesting one: Supreme Court Justice Scalia (the terribly conservative Catholic one appointed by Reagan, but source of a good many witty remarks) just said: "It is a Constitution that morphs while you look at it like Plasticman."

Okay, not only is he conversant with comic books (but Plasticman was around when he was a kid), but he's using "morph" in its new form as a verb, popularized by computer graphics and the Mighty Morphing Power Rangers. Points to Scalia for cultural literacy.

Of course, he was slamming church/state separation while doing so, but then again, it was the Knights of Columbus (a group of conservative Catholics) who shoehorned the "under God" into the Pledge of Allegiance, so it's not hard to read his sympathies.

This afternoon, I went to the 29th annual Santa Cruz Fungus Fair. Before that, I went to my local public library.

Not for a book, mind you--the library was closed anyway--but because when I was ten, I noticed some odd mushrooms growing behind it.

I collected those, as well as the mushrooms from my front lawn (in separate bags), then went and had them identified.

The ones from the lawn were called "poison pies." They went in the trash. The two from behind the library, however, were Chroogomphus vinicolor, aka. "pine spikes," and Suillus pungens, aka. "slippery jack." The later two were edible, and upon returning home, I prepared the second and ate them for dinner.

Slippery jack has a very nice flavor, but is a bit on the chewy-slimy side. Next time I will dry saute them longer to remove more water, then use the Escoffier method. A Russian woman at the fair told me how they prepare them in Russia, and I've found similar recipes on the web. Tomorrow, the leftovers will be fried up with potatoes and served with sour cream and dill.

Third try. If this does not work, will have to contact Nic...

Second try....

We have just attempted to install Poster Child. Let's see if it works....

• Hazily, crazily,
  
• Witchfinder General
  
• Ashroft’s afraid to see
  
• calico cats.
  
  
  
• Seventeenth century
  
• witchpricking Puritan
  
• ailurophobia?
  
• Now it’s just bats.
  

Another Word of the Day, this one after having watched "The Surreal Life" and watching the ex-stars eat (or not) sushi off the body of a naked woman. Actually off of the stratigically placed banana leaves and chrysanthemums, but whatever.

Anyway, my trained anthropologist's eye noticed that the woman was Asian, and this was something so bizarre and elaborate that it could only be one of those fun foreign customs we Westerners don't do anymore, or if we do, we're either embarrassed by it or else claim its shockingly naught. So a web search turned this up:

nyotaimori

Nyotaimori is a Japanese ritual, the practice of eating sushi served on the body of a naked woman. nyotaimori means "female body plate."

I should quit reading 19th century poetry if I want to stop adding to the list of words of which I'm ignorant. However, it is being remedied. Here yet another Word of the Day.

contumely

\Con"tu*me*ly\, n. [L. contumelia, prob. akin to contemnere to despise: cf. OF. contumelie. Cf. Contumacy.] Rudeness compounded of haughtiness and contempt; scornful insolence; despiteful treatment; disdain; contemptuousness in act or speech; disgrace.

The oppressor's wrong, the proud man's contumely. --Shak.

Nothing aggravates tyranny so much as contumely. --Burke.

Sometimes one word of the day gives you another word of the day to look up. Here's the other:

Felly \Fel"ly\, n.; pl. Fellies. [OE. feli, felwe, felow, AS. felg, felge; akin to D. velg, G. felge, OHG. felga felly (also, a harrow, but prob. a different word), Dan. felge.] The exterior wooden rim, or a segment of the rim, of a wheel, supported by the spokes. [Written also felloe.]

Break all the spokes and fellies from her wheel. --Shak.

Note: There's nothing like a formalist poet questing for an uncommon rhyme to unearth odd vocabulary. This new Word of the Day from a nautical poem.


strake

\Strake\, n. [See Streak.] 1. A streak. [Obs.] --Spenser.``White strake.'' --Gen. xxx. 37.

2. An iron band by which the fellies of a wheel are secured to each other, being not continuous, as the tire is, but made up of separate pieces.

3. (Shipbuilding) One breadth of planks or plates forming a continuous range on the bottom or sides of a vessel, reaching from the stem to the stern; a streak.

Note: The planks or plates next the keel are called the garboard strakes; the next, or the heavy strakes at the bilge, are the bilge strakes; the next, from the water line to the lower port sill, the wales; and the upper parts of the sides, the sheer strakes.

4. (Mining) A trough for washing broken ore, gravel, or sand; a launder.

Okay, when all else fails, read the documentation.

I'm contacting dm.net to see if a free PHP based program called "Poster Child" will run on this server. If it does, comments should soon be enabled.

Trying the script in a different position here....

I'm currently attempting to add the possibility of feedback to comments on this weblog. This is a test post.

Well, must recant on the WWI donuts. Other people liked them. A lot.

After having my friend Mickey over and feeding him a few, I took the rest to my weekly live action vampire game, this held outdoors at UC Berkeley just after rain. Hardly the green fields of France in wartime, but it was still cold and damp, and the grease and sugar were just the ticket to fuel chilled gamers. My friend Michael mentioned that he'd had this recipe before and they were supposed to taste like that and he happily munched one.

So, chalk one up for my cooking skill, and also my somewhat snobbish taste. I don't like the donut recipe much at all, but other people do. Seems like something to make for a donut party if there is one, as one of the variants. Or I could just buy donuts of some sort I actually like.

Word for the day:

farrow (noun) -
1. the production of a litter of pigs
Synonyms: farrowing


farrow (verb) -
1. birth; of sows
Synonyms: pig

Well, here's the verdict on the WWI donut recipe:

1. It is quite possible that vegans lie and man was not meant to substitute hazelnut milk for regular milk, especially in things requiring a chemical reaction.
   
2. If I were dieing of the Spanish flu in the rain in the green fields of France, being served these by well-meaning Salvation army "lassies" would be a preferable alternative. Certainly they're hot, they're greasy, and a reasonable source of calories. They also aren't as disgustingly sweet as Krispy Kremes, which I don't like either.
   
3. They taste suspiciously like the donuts I made as a kid in the "Daisy Donut Maker," a teflon contraption I got for two bucks at Service Merchandise. Those were raised with baking powder also, and I didn't like them either.
   

I was raised up on Winchell's, Dunkin Donuts and variants, and my conception of an "old-fashioned" donut is not "Middle Ages meets WWI."

They are, however, a hit with the dogs. Not that they should have that much sugar.

This experiment will not be repeated.

Today, since I still have the deep fryer out from the piroshki, I'm going to try something traditional: The Salvation Army's donut recipe from WWI. Except I'm going to add a medievel/vegan/lazy-Californian twist: I'm out of milk and can't be bothered to go to the store just to get one cup for the recipe. But I have a medieval recipe for almond milk, and a jar of crushed hazelnuts, which should work just fine and add a nice flavor to donuts.

Here are the recipes:

WWI Donuts - Makes approx 15 - 20 donuts

Ingredients:

• 4 cups plain flour
  
• 1½ tsp salt
  
• ½ tsp butter
  
• 4 tsp baking powder
  
• 1 cup sugar
  
• 1 cup milk
  
• 1 egg
  
• ¼ tsp cinnamon
  
• ¼ tsp nutmeg
  

Method:

Put flour in shallow pan, add salt, baking powder, nutmeg, cinnamon and sugar. Rub in butter with fingertips. Add the well beaten egg and milk and stir thoroughly. Toss on floured board, roll to one-fourth inch in thickness, shape, fry, and drain. Dust with a bit more sugar.

Almond Milk

In the Middle Ages, milk would not stay fresh, especially in the summer, so this basic was used as it kept for longer and was not prone to curdling. It is high in fats and can even be churned to produce a butter. There are a number of references for it throughout literature which refer to the use of both almonds and walnuts.

• 225g (8oz) Ground almonds
  
• 450ml (16 floz) Boiling water
  

Combine almonds and water.
Steep for 5-10 minutes, stirring occasionally.
Sieve the mixture or use a blender until all of the ground almonds are combined.
Produces: 450ml (16 floz) almond milk.
To make Walnut Milk simply substitute walnuts for almonds.

Okay, more spam from the Republican Party.

Two days ago, they called for their minions to bombard newspaper editors with support for Bush's economic package. Now they're declaring that there's a mandate from the people for it because they managed to get four favorable editorials.

What about the negative editorials?

I'd love to see what Lincoln would say if he could see his party today.

Damn. John Halverson is dead.

He was my professor for Chaucer back at UCSC. Great teacher, nice man, and now in an attempt to look up his email, I find that he died of cancer five years ago.

Backstory on this: I'm a mythology buff, and back when I was freshman taking his class, the topic of discussion was Oedipus, and I mentioned Oedipus's mother-wife Jocasta's magic necklace that kept her forever young and beautiful, one of those reasons why Oedipus had decided to marry her. John laughed, saying the tale of the magic necklace was a new one on him, and then went on to talk about marrying the queen after killing the king and other good ways to consolidate power.

I was embarrassed, and more than that, pissed at my junior high school for having had the textbook where I read the story, which until now I had assumed was some stupid Bowdlerization, like the expurgated "Romeo and Juliet" which we'd thankfully skipped over (and I'd read the original years before).

Except now, it turns out, I was right in my mythology, my junior high school was blameless (at least in this instance), and Professor Halverson had missed an important mythological detail of the Oedipus Cycle. And I can't even tell him, not even to touch base. The man was a great scholar and always up for a new interpretation or detail.

But for everyone else, here are the fragments of research, pulled from the web after I read Patrick Nielsen Hayden's blog listing for today, January 9, 2003, regarding New York bowdlerizing the literature in their tests, which made me think about my own annoyance at bowdlerization.

However, before posting on that, I decided to fact check just to make certain there wasn't a magic necklace somewhere. And there was. Here are the fragments regarding Jocasta's magic necklace I first read about in junior high:

1. Oedipus accepted, even though Jocasta was much older than him, because she wore a magic necklace that the gods had given Harmonia, one of her ancestors.
   
   
2. HARMONIA
   
   Harmonia was the daughter of Ares and Aphrodite. She married Cadmus. At the wedding she was given a necklace made by Hephaestus which confered irresistible beauty upon the wearer.
   
   
3. Harmonia received from Cadmus, as a wedding present, a Robe and a Necklace. The only certain about the origin of these items is that they came from the gods. It is said sometimes that Hephaestus wrought the Necklace, and that he himself gave it to Cadmus. Others say that it came from Europa (perhaps they knew of each other after all), and that she had received it from Zeus. Still others affirm that Athena provided the renowned Necklace and Robe, and also a flute. But there are those who assert that the golden Necklace was the present that Aphrodite gave Harmonia.
   
   

   The golden Necklace has been described thoroughly, but, briefly stated, it represented an amphisbaina, which is a two headed serpent, with open mouths as if hissing. The two mouths on each side enclosed with their jaws a golden eagle upright, its wings covered with yellow jasper and moonstone. The whole clever work was set with sparkling gems in masterly refinement.
   
   

4. her marriage with king Cad mos, she received a necklace made by Vulcan for Venus. This unlucky ornament afterwards passed to Semelê, then to Jocasta, then to
   
   
5. They received many gifts from the gods. Among the wedding presents given to the couple was necklace that was cursed. The necklace of Harmonia brought disaster to owners in later generations. (See Seven Against Thebes).
   

There is also this useful illustration:

Polyneices bribes Eriphyle with the necklace of Harmonia in order to win the support of her husband Amphiaraus against Thebes. Attic Red-figure oinochoe by the Shuvalov Painter, 420 BC

Today I also went to eBay, to do a "usability study." They had me sign a non-disclosure agreement, which means I don't get to talk about the secret wonders or horrors they're about to unleash on their customers, but they gave me free Coke and I got to see one of those fabled one-way mirrors they use to spy on police suspects and eBay usability study people.

eBay is high tech. When I did a focus group for the Rosicrucians ten years ago, we got to sit around a council table and make merciless fun of their ads. The ad agency guy was terribly embarrased, but the head Rosicrucian was pleased to find out which ads were terminally lame. The lamest was one that said, "Is there something missing in your life?" with this woman in a dingy cubicle staring at an ADM3A computer terminal. We answered, "Yeah, a new computer." But the Rosicrucians gave us all $40 cash.

eBay gave me a $50 gift certificate, which I will probably use for books.

The piroshki turned out well. Score one for stroganoff as a filling. My mother mentioned that the dough tasted much like what her mother had called "krepfeln" (sp?) in Germany years ago, which are sort of jam-filled German donuts. I tried filling the dough with apricot jam, but it was too runny, and I had a mess which I fried anyway.

Notes: In the future, use chunkier jam and to not attempt to use the plastic "dumpling makers" my sister gave me for Christmas. Also, dust the krepfeln with powdered sugar, like beignets.

Today I'm going to make piroshki. I found someone's family dough recipe on the web, then cut it to proportions that work in my bread machine on the dough cycle. I put the ingredients in the pan, turn it on, and a couple hours later roll it out and use a bisuit cutter (actually a large easter egg cookie cutter) to get pieces the right size, then put the filling in, let them rise again a bit (about as long as it takes to fill the rest of them), then deep fry them.

Today, I'm going to try filling them with a hamburger and mushroom stroganoff that I think should work well. Won't work for my vegetarian friend Barbara, but oh well. Here's the dough recipe:

Piroshki Dough

Original Recipe

• 1 (.25 ounce) package active dry yeast
  
• 1/4 cup warm water
  
• 1 cup milk
  
• 3 eggs
  
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
  
• 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
  
• 1 teaspoon salt
  
• 4 cups all-purpose flour
  

Bread Machine proportions

• 2/3rds a package active dry yeast
  
• 1/6 cup warm water
  
• 2/3 cup milk
  
• 2 eggs
  
• 1/3 cup vegetable oil
  
• 1 1/3 tablespoons granulated sugar
  
• 2/3 teaspoon salt
  
• 2 2/3rd cups all-purpose flour
  

Okay, I've received my latest piece of creepy spam. Not silliness like penis enlargement or Russian farm sluts, or things like Colonel Mukti in Nigeria wanting to send me 50 mil, but spam from people who I have to take seriously. Sort of.

I'm talking about the Republican Party.

You see, about six years ago, someone set up a website at www.dole96.com that said "Dole For Pineapple--Not for President." Viagra and Pepsi commercials aside, I'd almost rather have Dole in office than the current guy, despite the fact that Dole took over the parody site, either by suing or buying them out, then proceeded to use porn-spammer tactics to gather email addresses. And send campaign literature.

Once his political carreer crashed in flames, he willed that list to the Republican Party. Who've been spamming me since.

I know, I could simply ask them to take me off the list, but it's more amusing to get the ads for the George W. Bush mousepads (I kid you not) than to bother with an unsubscribe.

Now they're asking their supporters to spam newspaper editors with letters of support for Bush's economic package. Yes, that's right--they're making a concerted effort to skew the press. And they somehow don't grasp the fact that newspaper editors will likely get a copy of this email.

Right now I'm thinking that Colonel Mukti's economic package is more attractive. Or at least more believable.

Hmm, I wonder if Bob Dole sold my address to Colonel Mukti too.

Well, it's getting near midnight and it appears the Alchemist's Arcanabulum is open for business.

I've been recently getting back into poetry and have been doing a lot of formalist work, which is a fancy way of saying stuff that has rhyme and meter.

The world of formal poetry is...how should I put it? Both weird and terribly familiar. Weird in that there's a huge amount of prestige. Everyone's one or two degrees of separation from presidents, governors and other luminaries who occasionally open checkbooks (for tiny amounts, but hey, it's the honor of the thing, right?) It's terribly familiar in that it's like science fiction fandom. The prestigious little journals, quarterlies and new poetry websites are edited by a relatively small circle of people who know each other, and with rare exceptions, pay something like a couple copies. In the SF field we call those "fanzines."

A few days ago I went to my editor, Debbie Notkin's, New Year's Day open house. She remarked that the budgets in the poetry field made science fiction look lavish. I have to agree.

Of course, writing is done because you have to, and if my muse says it's poetry today, then it's poetry.

The other fannish thing that I've found about poetry circles is that like SF, there are groups who actually critique stuff. The one I'm mainly hanging out at right now is Eratosphere, specifically in the Deep End forum. Learning a lot there.

On that end, one thing that I think will be a regular feature here is the "Word of the Day." Not one of those artificial things where I go out of my way to find a funky word, dandle it in front of everyone and say, "Wow, aren't I cool? I know what this means and you don't." Heck, I'm an author, and part of my business is knowing obscure words.

No, what's more fun is admitting my own ignorance and reporting the words I just encounted. The poetry field is a great vocabulary builder, so here's the word for the day:

Bassarid

I encountered this in a poem by Terese Coe, then finally found the definition listed in "A Dictionary of Greek and Roman Mythology" by Michael Stapleton:

Bassarids: Another name given to the votaries of Dionysus. Scholars give the meaning as "wearers of fox skins."

Think of a bunch of blood-drinking drunk Grecian matrons wearing fox-fur stoles (imagine Zsa-Zsa going postal) and you've got the general idea. Also known as the Maenads, the Bacchante, the Bacchi and so on.

No numbers for the day, but hey, this is a new blog.

Okay, the blather of the past couple days has been the result of me attempting to configure this program into something that will work happily with dm.net

It appears to be on sociable terms now.

Okay, we're trying this again....

Scooby Snacks

You want a Scooby Snack,
Scooby-Doo? Marmaduke?

Secret ingredients?
Vegemite, bandicoot.

Any preservatives?
Mummy dust, vinegar.

Where do you keep the box?
Chiffarobe, candy-jar.

Okay, more blog stuff.

Blogger. blog blog.

Okay, we are going to add new text. New text here.

[1/6/2003 5:16:23 PM | Kevin Murphy]

Antimony, Cinnabar,

Verdegris, Vinegar

Okay, it's the seventh, and it appears that new text is going up.