Cake or Death?

"Every really good creative person…whom I have ever known has always had two noticeable..."

Sun, 06 May 2012 21:45:26 +0800

“Every really good creative person…whom I have ever known has always had two noticeable characteristics. First, there was no subject under the sun in which he could not easily get interested-from, say, Egyptian burial customs to modern art. Every facet of life had fascination for him. Second, he was an extensive browser in all sorts of fields of information. For it is with the [creative] man as with the cow: no browsing, no milk.”

- James Webb Young, writing in his 1939 guide to producing ideas, articulates a timeless truth about the relationship between curiosity and creativity. (via explore-blog)

I opened the dishwasher mid-cycle and was blasted with steam and dripping water. I felt embarrassed,...

Mon, 23 Apr 2012 20:43:39 +0800

I opened the dishwasher mid-cycle and was blasted with steam and dripping water. I felt embarrassed, like I’d pushed open an occupied bathroom stall, and I slammed it shut and hurriedly pushed start again and found myself apologizing out loud.

A selection of subject lines from the neighborhood listserv

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 10:22:20 +0800

Offered without comment:

Re: Compilation of Dog Trainers Who Make House Calls

FS: Preggle (preggers pillow) $15/obo

ferrett cage best offer

Earth Day Kids Poetry! (fwd)

Best video game ever made?

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 07:41:37 +0800

Best video game ever made?:

karmcity:

The objective of the game is to drive a bus from Tucson, Arizona to Las Vegas, Nevada in real time at a maximum speed of 45mph. The feat requires 8 hours of continuous play to complete, since the game cannot be paused.

The bus contains no passengers, contains little scenery (an occasional rock or…

Things the New York Times Has Recently Described as an Adventure

Mon, 26 Mar 2012 07:41:00 +0800

airhen:

Having gout

Parenting

Eating (in the Blogroll)

Social media

Speaking several languages

Polling in primaries and caucuses

Blast from the past: the cheat sheet I wrote on the late-night...

Fri, 28 Oct 2011 11:31:18 +0800

Blast from the past: the cheat sheet I wrote on the late-night shift at the Richmond T-D. (Taken with instagram)

"RSS “is like a magic spell that calls together knowledge from the winds of the Internet into a..."

Sat, 22 Oct 2011 02:24:31 +0800

“RSS “is like a magic spell that calls together knowledge from the winds of the Internet into a swirling, dancing chimera that sits in your hand and shares with you the whispers of more people than you’ll ever meet in your life - on demand at any time. RSS readers are instruments of magic. When you use them you become a magician. May they proliferate across the land.””

- Very unhappy about the Google Reader/Plus changes coming.

World’s Youngest Leading Social Network Eats World’s Last Major RSS Reader: Google Reader Gets Plussed

Myke said the other day that my dad as a CEO reminds him of Steve Jobs, particularly in...

Thu, 13 Oct 2011 04:07:00 +0800

Myke said the other day that my dad as a CEO reminds him of Steve Jobs, particularly in conversations and interviews he has watched of Steve.

I text my dad this and add, “High praise!”

24 hours later, my dad writes back: “Who’s Steve Jobs?”

…

My question: Who lives in a bubble, us or him?

"We ought to be able to construct a narrative of our lives that transcends the trail of data exhaust..."

Thu, 29 Sep 2011 05:25:59 +0800

“We ought to be able to construct a narrative of our lives that transcends the trail of data exhaust we leave behind us on our trips down the information superhighway.”

- Daily Dot: The Storify of our lives, and why we’re more than a Facebook Timeline

brokenformat: Your new obsession: Doodle or Die. My...

Wed, 28 Sep 2011 22:49:50 +0800

brokenformat:

Your new obsession: Doodle or Die. My illustration of “please goldfish with donut” above.

My doodle chain began with “devil in a windfork.”

Save a pretzel for the gas jets, and try my Kwanzaa...

Wed, 28 Sep 2011 05:38:35 +0800

Save a pretzel for the gas jets, and try my Kwanzaa CDs.

“Rick Perry” — A BLR Soundbite (by BadLipReading)

Things I've been making

Sun, 18 Sep 2011 23:13:55 +0800

Grilled banana peppers stuffed with spicy goat cheese. I had two of these beauties growing in my mostly sad garden, and I found the idea on this thread.

That was breakfast.

With more of that goat cheese, I made quiche. Real men ate it.

Then there was orzo risotto with homemade vegetable stock.

I had a single, small butternut squash, and I mashed it and spiced like a sweet potato casserole. It made three very tiny servings that probably should have been one normal-sized serving.

I can’t get enough lemony kale salad. Instead of hazelnuts, I use pistachios. Instead of Parmesan, I use Pecorino. It’s still a lemony kale salad, I promise.

And there has been a lot of “artisan” bread. Make enough dough for four loaves, leave it in the fridge for up to two weeks, and cut off a chunk when you’re ready to bake.

On that bread, I’ve added carrot cake jam.

And it was good.

I ran the other night, sprinting in my jeans and boots in the rain, weaving through traffic, to the...

Mon, 12 Sep 2011 08:09:34 +0800

I ran the other night, sprinting in my jeans and boots in the rain, weaving through traffic, to the drugstore a few blocks down. I snuck out of dinner after we ordered drinks; it was an emergency. Five minutes later, I returned in the middle of the same story, flushed and sweaty and grinning, my foot lit up and throbbing. I’d forgotten about my injury for those few free moments.

I haven’t run in two and a half months. It’s not the first time I’ve had an extended break before, but taking a pause from running has always been my choice; it has never been taken away from me before. I have a tumultuous history with running, more downs that ups, but I’d made some form of peace with it this year and had been covering some pretty good mileage with a group of ladies who had their own running struggles. I’d gotten used to icing my knees after the long runs, but when my IT band snapped audibly and I couldn’t stand on my foot, I knew I had to stop.

On that night last week, I had an extra glass of wine at dinner, tightened the orthopedic band around my foot, and called the doctor the very next day. This has to end somehow. I need to move.

"Several years ago, I was a committee chair for a local charity function at M&T Bank Stadium to..."

Fri, 15 Jul 2011 21:16:11 +0800

“

Several years ago, I was a committee chair for a local charity function at M&T Bank Stadium to benefit Baltimore’s homeless.

Midway through the evening, Sheila Dixon graced us with her presence, making an appearance in one of those now infamous full-length mink coats.

I remember thinking at the time there could be no greater example of brazen temerity. But having just read that Ms. Dixon is considering a run for mayor in 2015, I stand corrected.

”

- Reader Richard Crystal, in a letter to The Baltimore Sun

My Air Force sister, over IM, on what she is up to in Romania: “i am sorry i have to go to the...

Thu, 14 Jul 2011 20:49:36 +0800

My Air Force sister, over IM, on what she is up to in Romania:

“i am sorry i have to go to the grocery store here to buy a bunch of food for orphans who are coming to visit the jets”

Approved.

"Words that traveled through these electronic lines, then wirelessly, grew to feel less like sermons..."

Fri, 24 Jun 2011 04:17:38 +0800

“Words that traveled through these electronic lines, then wirelessly, grew to feel less like sermons and more like chants.”

- Nieman Reports

"Doilies are made for eclairs, aren’t they?"

Fri, 10 Jun 2011 08:27:50 +0800

“Doilies are made for eclairs, aren’t they?”

- Myke, after doing an impression of a Bridezilla who yells, “I want doilies for everyone!”

Beyond the Melting Pot of Kuala Lumpur

Mon, 06 Jun 2011 00:09:10 +0800

Beyond the Melting Pot of Kuala Lumpur :

“KL is still something of an experiment in urban living. Looking out of my hotel window on my last evening in Malaysia, when rain and mist veiled the tall, silvery buildings and the thickly forested hills behind them, I could imagine the land to be as empty and untenanted as its first explorers may have found it. The illusion disappeared as I walked through the old entertainment hub at Bukit Bintang. Now colorfully seedy with backpacker hostels, massage parlors and malls, it crackled with all the languages I can recognize, and more: Bahasa Indonesia, Filipino, Urdu, Bengali, Arabic and Persian, as well as English spoken with a variety of accents, from the broad Australian to the singsong Sri Lankan and the lovely Malay lilt. I left Kuala Lampur convinced that here in the heart of the new Asia, the city is working out a way of being reflexively cosmopolitan, truly Indochine.”

I just got caught up in my words and referred to a Neanderthal as “an old-fashioned...

Sun, 05 Jun 2011 11:45:12 +0800

I just got caught up in my words and referred to a Neanderthal as “an old-fashioned guy.”

A Neanderthal who wears seersucker suits! A Neanderthal who holds doors open for women. A Neanderthal who drinks mint juleps and listens to the radio on Saturday nights.

We can feel the humidity as soon as the doors open. It seeps into the jetway and through the empty...

Mon, 30 May 2011 15:06:00 +0800

We can feel the humidity as soon as the doors open. It seeps into the jetway and through the empty airport, even though the sun’s been down for hours. We take our coats off as we wait for our bags, the bus, to pay. We are parked by a booted car, temporary tags, blankets covering the backseat.

And then we’re flying down the quiet road, the windows are down, the air smells like honeysuckle, and we don’t have to be anywhere, for anyone.

It feels like the edge of so many summers before, up and down the East Coast. The trees are familiar, the crickets are familiar, the men buying Cokes at the gas station, surely we have seen them before.

At home, we bang upstairs and the house is stuffy, the smell of warping wood and decades that slipped past. We run around, opening windows, turning on fans, finally giving in to the air conditioner.

Summer. I’ve been waiting.