Later On

I thought I should feature my fine Plisson Chinese Grey: The Wife brought me this from her previous Paris trip. She’s there now, and today went to the big Hermès sale. Probably no shaving equipment there, though.

At any rate the Plisson brought up loads of lovely lather, and the iKon did its usual superb job: close, comfortable, and nick-free. I see that Greg has raised the prices to match the Feather stainless razor, which I think is justified: Greg’s razors are made on CNC machines, and each of those comb teeth is made separately: no casting here.

A splash of Irisch Moos, and I’m running a bit late.

I earlier blogged Myra Wald’s Welsh Rabbit recipe from Beer and Good Food. This morning’s Salon.com features a clutch of cheese recipes, including this one by Linda Shiue for Welsh rabbit. Good backstory at the link. The recipe:

Servings: about 12

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons butter
• 2 tablespoons flour
• 1 teaspoon mustard (such as Colman’s, quintessentially English)
• cayenne pepper, to taste
• ½ cup ale or other beer of your choice
• 2 teaspoons Worcestershire sauce, or to taste
• ¾ cup heavy cream
• 7 ounces cheddar, such as Kerrygold, shredded (about 1 ½ cups)
• salt and black pepper to taste
• 1 loaf of crusty bread, sliced into 12 pieces and lightly toasted

Directions

1. Melt butter in a saucepan over low heat.
2. Whisk flour into melted butter and stir for a few minutes until golden.
3. Add in mustard, cayenne, beer and Worcestershire sauce. Whisk until smooth.
4. Stir in cream and bring to a simmer.
5. Gradually add grated cheese in several batches, and stir until smooth. Remove from heat.
6. Spoon mixture thickly onto toast and put under broiler until bubbly and edges of toast are crisp. Serve immediately.
7. Any remaining sauce can be refrigerated for up to three days. Spread onto toast and broil to serve.

Wonderful column by Glenn Greenwald:

Hillary Clinton, speech on Internet freedom, Newseum, Washington, DC, January, 21, 2010:

Countries or individuals that engage in cyber attacks should face consequences and international condemnation. In an interconnected world, an attack on one nation’s networks can be an attack on all.

The New York Times, Saturday:

Over the past two years, according to intelligence and military experts familiar with its operations, Dimona has taken on a new, equally secret role . . . . Dimona tested the effectiveness of the Stuxnet computer worm, a destructive program that appears to have wiped out roughly a fifth of Iran’s nuclear centrifuges. . . . the operations there, as well as related efforts in the United States, are among the newest and strongest clues suggesting that the virus was designed as an American-Israeli project to sabotage the Iranian program. . . . The biggest single factor in putting time on the nuclear clock appears to be Stuxnet, the most sophisticated cyberweapon ever deployed.

Clinton’s Internet freedom speech:

During his visit to China in November, President Obama held a town hall meeting with an online component to highlight the importance of the internet. In response to a question that was sent in over the internet, he defended the right of people to freely access information, and said that the more freely information flows, the stronger societies become. He spoke about how access to information helps citizens to hold their governments accountable, generates new ideas, and encourages creativity. The United States’ belief in that truth is what brings me here today.

Salon, December 6, 2010:

Attorney General Eric Holder told reporters today that he is personally involved in the ongoing criminal probe of WikiLeaks and that he authorized "a number of things to be done so that we can get to the bottom of this and hold people accountable."

Clinton’s Internet speech:

Some countries have erected electronic barriers that prevent their people from accessing portions of the world’s networks. . . . They have violated the privacy of citizens who engage in non-violent political speech. These actions contravene the Universal Declaration on Human Rights, which tells us that all people have the right "to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers."

Huffington Post, December 4, 2010:

Talking about WikiLeaks on Facebook or Twitter could endanger your job prospects, a State Department official warned students at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs this week.

An email from SIPA’s Office of Career Services went out Tuesday afternoon with a caution from the official, an alumnus of the school. Students who will be applying for jobs in the federal government could jeopardize their prospects by posting links to WikiLeaks online, or even by discussing the leaked documents on social networking sites, the official was quoted as saying.

ACLU, September, 2010:

DHS asserts the right to look though the contents of a traveler’s electronic devices — including laptops, cameras and cell phones — and to keep the devices or copy the contents in order to continue searching them once the traveler has been allowed to enter the U.S., regardless of whether the traveler is suspected of any wrongdoing . . . . Documents obtained by the ACLU in response to a separate Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit for records related to the DHS policy reveal that more than 6,600 travelers, nearly half of whom are American citizens, were subjected to electronic device searches at the border between October 1, 2008 and June 2, 2010.

Clinton’s Internet freedom speech:

But amid this unprecedented surge in connectivity, we must also recognize that these technologies are not an unmitigated blessing. These tools are also being exploited to undermine human progress and political rights. . . . technologies with the potential to open up access to government and promote transparency can also be hijacked by governments to crush dissent and deny human rights.

The New York Times, Sunday:

Tunisia’s president, Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali, fled his country on Friday night, capitulating after a month of mounting protests calling for an end to his 23 years of authoritarian rule. . . . The United States had counted Tunisia under Mr. Ben Ali as an important ally in battling terrorism. . . .

The protesters, led at first by unemployed college graduates like Mr. Bouazizi and later joined by workers and young professionals, found grist for the complaints in leaked cables from the United States Embassy in Tunisia, released by WikiLeaks, that detailed the self-dealing and excess of the president’s family. . ."Thank you, Al Jazeera," read one sign, commending the Arab news channel for its nightly coverage of the unrest in the past month — long before the Western news media took serious notice. Many here credit Al Jazeera’s broadcasts with forging the sense of solidarity and empowerment that moved Tunisians across the country to take to the streets simultaneously.

The U.S. has spent years warning that cyber warfare is the New Terrorism of the 21st Century; former DNI Michael McConnell even demanded in The Washington Post that the Internet be re-engineered to vest government and the private sector much greater surveillance controls to combat it (without disclosing the huge profits his Booz Allen clients stand to gain from such measures).  All the while, the U.S. was collaborating with the Israelis to engineer the most sophisticated and destructive cyber warfare weapon the world has ever known, one it secretly unleashed last year (and that’s to say nothing of the assassination of Iranian scientists which this weekend’s New York Times article obliquely mentions without expressing any interest in knowing who the culprits are).  Meanwhile, the Obama administration’s always-escalating war on whistleblowers — symbolized by its recent digging into Twitter accounts of WikiLeaks volunteers — is accompanied by sermons about the evils of punishing those who expose government wrongdoing and deceit and of exploiting Internet technologies to stifle transparency and accountability.

But it’s the Tunisia example that is most striking.  Virtually everyone is celebrating this triumph over oppression, with hopes that it can spark similar events in other nations in that region.  The causes of this uprising are complex and difficult to discern; it’s unclear how large of a role, if any, the WikiLeaks cables or Al Jazeera reports actually played in inspiring it.  But what is clear is that cables released by WikiLeaks — which, we should recall, were allegedly first obtained and disclosed by Bradley Manning — graphically detailed for the Tunisian citizenry the opulence and corruption of Tunisia’s U.S.-backed ruling family, and they were amplified by Al Jazeera.  By stark contrast, the U.S. Government — under both Bush and Obama — were steadfast supporters of this regime.

Exposing this type of corruption, oppression and deceit, and spurring these types of reforms, is exactly what Bradley Manning said (if one believes the chats) was his reason for his wanting the world to see these documents.  And using the Internet to promote what Hillary Clinton called "human progress and political rights" is precisely one of WikiLeaks’ primary objectives.  Yet the real agents of harnessing Internet and media technologies to promote freedom and human rights in Tunisia (and elsewhere) are either currently imprisoned by the U.S. (Manning), being harassed and on the verge of being prosecuted (WikiLeaks), or constantly demonized in the American media (Al Jazeera).  And that’s all being done by the same government that stands behind these repressive regimes and punishes those who seek to expose them — all while lecturing the world about the evils of those who seek to stifle transparency and freedom.  It’s hard to imagine anyone outside of the U.S. reacting with anything other than scornful laughter in the face of these American lectures on Internet freedom.

The US seems to be throwing its weight around in a fashion I really dislike:

I’ve written several times about the plight of Gulet Mohamed, the American teenager detained without charges more than three weeks ago in Kuwait by unknown captors, relentlessly interrogated about numerous matters of interest to the Obama administration, and, he claims, severely beaten and tortured.  One of the central questions of this episode has been this:  who is responsible for what has happened to him — the Kuwaiti government or his own country’s government?  From the beginning, it seemed highly implausible that a country as subservient to the U.S. as Kuwait would detain and relentlessly interrogate an American citizen without the assent or at least the knowledge of the U.S.  Those suspicions were heightened by (a) the strange refusal of the U.S. government to act to help their own citizen (instead repeatedly sending FBI agents to aggressively interrogate him), (b) the interrogation focus on Anwar Awlaki, an obsession of the Obama administration, and (c) the placement by the U.S. of Mohamed on the no-fly list, preventing his return.

Mohamed’s family has been insisting that it is the Americans behind his detention, while State Department spokesman P.J. Crowley denied this and insisted that they have provided Mohamed with consular assistance.  But new facts have emerged strongly suggesting that Crowley’s denials are false, and that it is indeed the Americans responsible for the 19-year-old’s ongoing, due-process-free detention.

When Mohamed was detained, none of his family members knew where he was or what had happened, and learned of it only because — once he was transferred to a deportation center — he was able to use an illicitly smuggled cellphone to call family members and journalists (The New York Times‘ Mark Mazzetti wrote an article about his plight and I posted a recorded interview with him from detention).  Once they learned of it, Gulet’s older brother, Mohad, traveled from the U.S. to Kuwait to work on securing his release.  I spoke with Mohad last night about these new events and the 8-minute interview can be heard on the player below.

On Friday, Kuwaiti officials told Gulet’s family that they had no cause or desire to detain Gulet.  To the contrary, as Mother Jones‘ Nick Baumann reported, the Kuwaits told his family that they would release Mohamed and deport him as soon as his family presented a purchased air ticket back to the U.S. (under Kuwaiti immigration law, foreign nationals being deported must travel on a direct flight by plane back to their country of citizenship).  Following the Kuwaitis’ instructions, Gulet’s family purchased and brought to the detention center a one-way ticket on United Airlines from Kuwait to Dulles International Airport in Washington, which was scheduled to depart last night.

Last night, the Kuwaiti deportation officers took Gulet, along with the ticket, to the airport and were prepared to send him back to the U.S.  But when he attempted to board the plane, he was told that he was barred from doing so.  According to Mohad, no reason was given, but it is presumably due to the U.S.’s placement of him on the no-fly list (which State Department officials, to The New York Times, previously confirmed they had done).  As a result, Gulet — thinking he was finally headed home — instead was returned to his detention facility, where he remains, and his prospects for release are now very unclear.

What’s going on here is a pure travesty.  As an American citizen, Gulet has the absolute right to return to and re-enter his country.  But by secretly placing him on the no-fly list while he was halfway around the world — and providing no information about why he was so placed — the U.S. Government is denying him his right to return.  Worse, they know that this action is not only preventing him from returning, but is keeping the 19-year-old in a state of absolute legal limbo, where’s he imprisoned by a country that admits it has no cause for holding him and does not want to hold him, yet which cannot release him.  The U.S. government has the obligation to assist its citizens when they end up detained without cause; here, they are doing the opposite:  they’re deliberately ensuring it continues.

If there’s any evidence that he has has done anything wrong, he should be charged, indicted, and brought back to the U.S. for trial.  What the Obama administration is doing instead is accomplishing what they could not do if he were in the U.S.:  holding him without a shred of due process, interrogating him without a lawyer present, and — if his credible claims are to believed — using beatings and torture to get the information it wants (or false information:  Gulet told me he was very tempted to falsely confess to make the beatings stop).  This abuse of the no-fly list is a common tactic used by the U.S. Government to circumvent all legal and constitutional constraints when it comes to its own citizens; this case just happens to be extra viscerally repellent.

Interview with Mohad Mohamed:

Click to go to original post to hear the interview.

Joseph Goldstein in ProPublica:

Judge Richard Owen of the U.S. District Court in Manhattan gathered a group of lawyers in his courtroom in 2007 to discuss the possible leak of sealed documents in a business case. As the hearing got under way, Owen, then 84, asked for someone to explain this newfangled mode of communication the lawyers kept mentioning — e-mail. "It pops up in a machine in some administrative office, and is somebody there with a duty to take it around and give it to whoever it’s named to?" he asked.

Some of the lawyers figured that Owen, whose chambers came with a mimeograph machine when he became a judge in 1973, was just behind the times. Others wondered if the judge’s memory was failing him. After all, the most famous case in his long career — the back-to-back trials of Silicon Valley investment banker Frank Quattrone — had revolved around a single e-mail. Yet he now acted as though this was the first he was hearing about it. "He didn’t understand what was happening in his own courtroom," said one lawyer present that day.

Owen’s memory lapses popped up at critical moments. A month after his e-mail query, the judge stumbled badly when handing down a life sentence to drug dealer Darryl Henderson for his connection to a robbery crew that murdered three people in a Bronx apartment. The prosecutor had previously called Henderson "the key into that apartment," because Henderson was sleeping with the apartment’s female tenant and conceivably helped the murderers get past the front door. In Judge Owen’s mind, the metaphorical key became a literal key. He announced that the tenant had given Henderson "a key to get into that apartment," and seemed unperturbed when the prosecutor explained there was no such evidence.

Then Owen expressed confusion over the relatively limited counts the jury had found Henderson guilty of and grew exasperated when the defense and prosecution tried to set him straight. Lawyers questioned whether Owen’s mind was working well enough to be deciding matters of life and liberty. "Do I think age was a factor in some of his cloudy thinking? Yes," said David Patton, a defense attorney for Henderson. "There were many times when he seemed confused and exhausted.” Owen declined repeated interview requests.

Life tenure, intended to foster judicial independence, has been a unique feature of the federal bench since the Constitution was ratified in 1789. Back then, the average American lived to be about 40 and the framers didn’t express much worry about senile judges. "A superannuated bench," Alexander Hamilton said, is an "imaginary danger."

No longer. Today, aging and dementia are the flip side of life tenure, with more and more judges staying on the bench into extreme old age. About 12 percent of the nation’s 1,200 sitting federal district and circuit judges are 80 years or older, according to a 2010 survey conducted by ProPublica. Eleven federal judges over the age of 90 are hearing cases — compared with four just 20 years ago. (One judge, a Kansan appointed by President John F. Kennedy, is over 100.) The share of octogenarians and nonagenarians on the federal bench has doubled in the past 20 years. . . 

Continue reading.

This one is surpassingly stupid, and of course the US is right in there, being as obnoxious, stupid, and bullying as it can be. What has happened to this country? A press release from the International Drug Policy Consortium, including a couple of updates to the original post:

The following press release and advocacy note were issued by the International Drug Policy Consortium (of which Transform is a partner member) on Jan 13th

Update Sunday Jan 16: Diplomatic games to oppose lifting unjust ban on coca chewing

TNI detail latest developments as a number of countries withdraw objections, whilst the US continues its manoeuvring to push the objection through.

Update Tuesday Jan 18: The U.S. Moves to Block Bolivia’s Request to Eliminate U.N. Ban on Coca Leaf Chewing TNI cover latest developments as US prepare to lodge their objection 

Correcting a historical error: IDPC calls on countries to abstain from submitting objections to the Bolivian proposal to remove the ban on the chewing of the coca leaf

Several governments led by the United States are mobilising to block a request by the Bolivian government to remove an international ban on the centuries-old practice of chewing coca leaves. The 18-month period to contest Bolivia’s requested amendment ends January 31, 2011.

In 2009, Bolivia’s first indigenous President, Evo Morales Ayma, sent a request to the United Nations to remove the unjustified ban on coca leaf chewing. This would amend the 1961 United Nations Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs and bring it in line with the 2007 UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples.

Mr Morales sought to correct a historical error. He stated in his letter to the Secretary General: "Coca leaf chewing is one of the socio-cultural practices and rituals of the Andean indigenous peoples. It is closely linked to our history and cultural identity.” This ancestral practice "cannot and should not be prohibited.”

In the 1990s, a study conducted by the World Health Organisation concluded that chewing coca causes none of the harmful health or social consequences as cocaine use.  The US blocked the publication of this evidence.

The US and a number of other governments including the UK, France, Germany, Italy, Sweden, Denmark, the Russian Federation, Japan and Colombia are now planning to stop the right of Bolivians to express their own culture. They are planning to lodge formal objections to the amendment prior to the deadline on the January 31, 2011 which would result in the UN rejecting the Bolivian request.

Jeremy Corbyn, a UK Member of Parliament and the Secretary of the All Party Parliamentary Group on Bolivia, said,

At a time when drug prohibition has enriched and emboldened criminal cartels to such an extent that they are attempting to violently annex the state in parts of Mexico and Guatemala, the US is expending considerable effort in blocking the Bolivian government’s legitimate and democratic right to protect and preserve a harmless indigenous practice. The international community needs to get its priorities right and resist this culturally ignorant attempt to dictate to indigenous people in Bolivia.

The International Drug Policy Consortium (IDPC) calls on countries not to oppose the amendment. Ann Fordham, the Coordinator of IDPC, stated,

Bolivia has made a reasonable and democratic request to the international community. The fact that predominantly Western countries are unwilling to allow even the slightest amendments to the drug control regime, even where they conflict with the cultural and indigenous rights, is a very worrying development.”

ends

IDPC Advocacy Note (available in pdf here)

The advocacy note is rather lengthy, so it’s below the fold.

Read the rest of this entry »

I happened to read this post by Joseph in Edinburgh on Shaving 101 this morning:

It is common to hear an experienced wet shaver refer to a particular brush as a “good soap [or cream] brush.” Although any shaving brush can be used to create lather, some work better and create lather more quickly than others.  Shaving brushes that are filled with a dense concentration of badger hair do a much better job with soaps because they have the extra “backbone” required to quickly agitate the surface of the soap and combine the product with water to create a rich lather. This is especially true for triple-milled soaps, such as D.R. Harris Arlington, which has a harder surface texture than other shaving soaps. On the other hand, shaving brushes that are softer, often referred to as “floppy,” are better suited for creams because they hold more water and the softer bristles are efficient at mixing cream into a thick lather. Floppy brushes can work for soap as well, but they take more work and a longer time to generate lather. If you frequently use both soaps and creams and only want to use a single shaving brush, then I recommend purchasing a dense brush, such as a Simpsons Chubby. The Chubby has a firm backbone helpful for hard soaps, but also has softer grades of badger hair suited for shaving creams, so it works well with both types of products…

My own experience is totally contrary to the above, but it is possible that Joseph’s lathering difficulties are due to working with hard water, and Monterey has soft water.

I simply don’t understand how anyone, working with reasonably soft water, can believe—based on experience—that a soft brush cannot efficiently (and with little effort) generate a fine lather from a hard, triple-milled shaving soap. My own experience is this:

There is an odd notion about, unsupported by experience (at least, unsupported by my own experience), that a soft brush cannot generate lather from hard shaving soaps—e.g., triple-milled soaps. I fully understand that some may prefer a brush that’s on the stiff side—we all have personal preferences—but a preference for a stiff brush does not imply that a soft brush doesn’t perform equally well in generating lather.

I think the mistaken notion arises simply because some men fail to load the brush with soap—they brush the surface of the soap briefly, then try to make a lather. Surprise! You cannot make a good lather with insufficient soap. But a soft brush can pick up plenty of soap through this technique: Wet brush with hot tap water, shake the brush, then brush the surface of the shaving soap briskly for 30-45 seconds. Move the brush to your wet beard and brush vigorously. Voilà! Lather.

Except maybe not: If you follow the above instructions and still get miserable lather, I suspect that you may be a victim of hard water.To check, go to the drugstore and buy a gallon of distilled water (sometimes called “purified” water—it’s sold for use in steam irons and humidifiers and the like). Heat some of that and try making the lather with that water. If that works, you pretty clearly have hard water.

So, having read Joseph’s note, I picked for my shave today my softest brush and a triple-milled soap:

The result: loads of lather generate quickly and easily. I loaded the brush for probably 15-20 seconds, brought it to my beard, and enjoyed wonderful lather. The Progress with a Swedish Gillette blade did three very nice passes, and a bit of the Castle Forbes Lavender aftershave balm set me up.

I surely hope that this strange notion about soft brushes being unable to perform well with hard soaps dies quickly.

Take a look.

Don’t those look great? Sound easy, too—so long as you know the trick (at the link).

Okay, I finally found something that fits the way my mind wants to approach this book: OneNote. I have OneNote 2007, and tonight I opened it, created a new notebook (for the book I’m writing), named the first section "General" and wrote on the first page of that section a paragraph on how I planned to use OneNote. Then I created a section "Recipes" and each page is a recipe. If I copy a recipe from the blog to OneNote, it automatically appends the source URL. It also date and time stamps the last modification to each individual entry on  a page. (OneNote pages can be somewhat freeform if you want, as most do.)

Of course, much of the stuff I’m writing, I’ve been thinking about, but it’s great to find a program that accepts it comfortably as I’m comfortable in presenting it.

I’m still greatly enjoying the Edith Grossman translation of Don Quixote (link is to hardbound edition—I would not want to read a book this size in paperback; YMMV), though I’m surprised and regretful that the publisher failed to include a bound-in ribbon bookmark. In this sort (and size) of book, I think that is de rigueur.

But to the point: if we were in a St. John’s seminar, I would definitely ask, “Why does Don Quixote mistake windmills for giants and flocks of sheep for armies, but the terrible fulling hammers remain fulling hammers? In fact, in talking to Sancho Panza after they learn that the terrible noise was caused by fulling hammers, Don Quixote comments on how they might pretend that the fulling hammers are giants, etc.—this from the guy who attacked a windmill thinking it was a giant.” Then I would read this comment made by Don Q (page 150-151 in the Grossman translation).

Don Quixote’s remark seems surreal, given the earlier events and happenings. OTOH, we do know that DQ is mad.

Still, it’s something I’d like to have a little seminar discussion about.

UPDATE: It’s as though the fulling hammers have some stronger kind of reality, a reality so strong that DQ’s madness cannot cloak it—i.e., the reality of the fulling hammers is stronger than the reality of the windmills and sheep, stronger in the sense of being resistant to DQ’s madness.

So why? Is it that the fulling hammers made him afraid? No—hasn’t he been afraid from time to time in earlier adventures? — Now I need to go skim over the earlier stuff.

UPDATE 2: Right after the strange fulling-hammers episode, where DQ not only gives no fantastic interpretation of the fulling hammers, but even talks about “pretending” they were giants—right after that episode that Don Quixote encounters Mambrino’s magical helmet, which is in fact a shiny brass barber’s basin. Sancho Panza points out that it’s a barber’s  basin, and DQ says, in effect, “Yes, I see what you mean: it looks exactly like a barber’s basin. Some rogue must have melted down half and reshaped the remainder to look like this.”

That is, DQ does indeed see the same physical thing now that SP does (unlike the windmills or the sheep), but he interprets it differently. The physical object has become, in effect, a signifier, and DQ’s interpretation of its significance is…, well, special. But isn’t it odd to see some physical thing acting like a word? (Like a word iIn that it points to an actuality that is beyond itself.)

UPDATE 3: And what is especially odd is that the entity signified by the physical object (the basin) is itself fictitious, being a magic helmet in a novel about knights errant.

The idea is this: roast sweet potatoes until done, mash with butter, and add chipotle powder.

You may want to look at her post. She boils the potatoes – to my mind, that means pouring water-soluble vitamins down the drain.

This GOPM is cooking now:

4 scallions, sliced thinly
1/2 cup converted rice
1/2 lb lamb shoulder arm chop, cut into small pieces, fat removed
1/2 tsp turmeric
2 tsp Penzey’s hot curry powder
4 cloves garlic, minced
1/2 red bell pepper, sliced into 12 (3×4) or 16 (4×4) little chunks
3 large domestic mushrooms, sliced
1/2 bulb fresh fennel, cored and sliced thinly
1 package frozen peas and pearl onions
good sprinkling of crushed red pepper flakes
1 head cauliflower, florets removed and sliced
1/2 cup low-fat coconut milk
juice of 1 lime

Those are the layers, bottom to top. I’m cooking it now. I’ll update with results. As always, this constitutes two meals.

I have to say that I prefer the shape of the Texsport 2-qt Dutch oven (tall cylinder; $24.47) to that of the Cajun Classic (squat cylinder; $33.60). The Cajun Classic is enameled, but for quite a few things that will make no difference. [UPDATE: The Texsport turns out to be, in actual measure, 2.5 quarts---i.e., 2 quarts plus 2 more cups. The extra room just is filled with vegetables, so no problem---I do measure starch and protein carefully. - LG]

Of course, there’s also Le Creuset, at $140. Too much.

Lodge makes a pre-seasoned cast-iron 2-quart “serving pot” that would work as well, but it looks like the squat cylinder type. $30 for this one.

More expensive (retail at $187, on Amazon for $100), Staub’s 2.25-quart round enameled cast-iron cocottes would be an excellent size and comes in some great colors. (I don’t want to go to 3 quarts, though that size is easily found, because I will be maintaining my target weight, and cooking larger quantities for a meal doesn’t seem the direction to go. But an additional capacity of 1 cup would often be handy. (Of course, the food cooks down in the oven.)

UPDATE: The dish is excellent and nicely spicy. I probably could have added two servings of the coconut milk (i.e., a total of 2/3 cup), but it really wasn’t necessary.

I am figuring out why I like this approach to meals:

1. The 2-qt pot size keeps the meal from sprawling out of control—and, because you cook exactly two meals (e.g., half the pot of the lamb dish was my lunch and the other half will be dinner): thus, no leftovers.

2. I immediately get out of the way the two parts of the meal I have to be careful about: the starch (goes at the bottom, right on top of the onions, so added at the beginning) and the protein (goes right on top of the starch).

3. Once I have the starch and protein in the pot, I can cook the way I enjoy: adding things that catch my eyee until the pot is full. “Things” refers to vegetables, spices, herbs, and condiments. Obviously, I observe a theme that directs the selection, but I pretty much just look around the kitchen for whatever might fit the theme.

4. I enjoy using small amounts of vegetables, as dictated by the pot dimensions: using 4 mushrooms, for example, or 6 spears of asparagus, or 1 carrot: I get more meals from the same amount of food. (In the past, of course, I cooked much more and ate much more and was much bigger.)

5. Cook once, eat twice—or, One prep, two meals.

6. Clean-up is one easy-to-clean pot.

7. Food tastes great—at least the ones that I think were real successes, including this lamb curry (and I want to try it with red lentils, too), the chicken-mushroom-spinach dish (which was also exceptionally colorful), and the Chinese-ish pork dish with rice and cabbage, though that needed more soy sauce and more crushed red pepper.

8. I’m eating more vegetables and a greater variety of vegetables.

The bell peppers, BTW, add excellent color to the dish. I’d use them for that if for no other reason.

States are starting to plan, but I guess the idea is that we’ll just let global warming happen and see how it works out, rather than take steps to halt or reverse it. Guts or stupidity or both, I’d say. Bruce Henderson reports for the Charlotte Observer:

The sea that sculpted North Carolina’s coast, from its arc of barrier islands to the vast, nurturing sounds, is reshaping it once again.

Water is rising three times faster on the N.C. coast than it did a century ago as warming oceans expand and land ice melts, recent research has found. It’s the beginning of what a N.C. science panel expects will be a 1-meter increase by 2100.

Rising sea level is the clearest signal of climate change in North Carolina. Few places in the United States stand to be more transformed.

About 2,000 square miles of our low, flat coast, an area nearly four times the size of Mecklenburg County, is 1 meter (about 39 inches) or less above water.

At risk are more than 30,500 homes and other buildings, including some of the state’s most expensive real estate. Economists say $6.9 billion in property, in just the four counties they studied, will be at risk from rising seas by late this century.

Climate models predict intensifying storms that could add billions of dollars more in losses to tourism, farming and other businesses.

While polls show growing public skepticism of global warming [thanks to the GOP – LG], the people paid to worry about the future – engineers, planners, insurance companies – are already bracing for a wetter world.

"Sea-level rise is happening now. This is not a projection of something that will happen in the future if climate continues to change," said geologist Rob Young of Western Carolina University, who studies developed shorelines.

Nobody knows how high or fast the sea will rise. Water isn’t likely to submerge all the state’s low coastland because landowners will fight back. But the coast we know, with its fringe of salt marshes, its fluffy beaches and old harbor towns, might look like a different place a few generations from now.

That won’t be the work of rising water alone, but of quirks in North Carolina’s coastal topography. The flat ground means even a small increase in water level will spread far inland. The coastal plain is also sinking, the geologic legacy of the last Ice Age.

Sea-level rise magnifies two other powerful forces . . .

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Ed Brayton:

My friends at Americans United for Separation of Church and State have filed a very interesting lawsuit against Johnson County, TN, for refusing to approve a display about the history of the separation of church and state in America. You can read the complaint here and it’s a very interesting legal strategy that uses the religious right’s own legal tactics against them.

The county had originally put up just a plaque of the Ten Commandments. Faced with legal action, they then put up a larger display that included the Ten Commandments and other plaques with quotes from the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, Supreme Court rulings and other historical sources. This is similar to what is done with nativity scenes — throw some secular symbols around the religious core and the courts will let it slide by.

But in doing so, the county also explicitly declared the courthouse to be a public forum:

After receiving complaints about the Ten Commandments plaque, Defendant did not remove it. Instead, Defendant adopted a Policy Governing Placement of Displays in the Lobby of the Johnson County Courthouse ("Policy"), which purported to create a "limited public forum" for displays that "directly relate to the development of law, the universally-valued principle of equal justice under the law, the history and heritage of the law of Johnson County, State of Tennessee, or the United States, and/or the specific function of the Courthouse itself."

So a local resident took them up on that policy and submitted a display taking the opposite position but citing the same sources. You can guess what happened:

Pursuant to the Policy, Plaintiff Ralph Stewart, who served five years in the Marines as a commissioned reserve officer, subsequently submitted a written proposal to display two framed posters, entitled "On the Legal Heritage of the Separation of Church and State" and "The Ten Commandments Are Not the Foundation of American Law." These displays consisted of quotations from the U.S. Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, U.S. Supreme Court cases, and other law-related historical sources. Although Defendant denied Mr. Stewart’s request on the ground that the posters did not fall within the subject-matter of the public forum created by the Policy, Mr. Stewart’s display covers the same subject-matter–and quotes from many of the same sources — as does the Second Ten Commandments display. The only material difference is the viewpoint expressed.

So now the AU has filed suit on Stewart’s behalf. This is a brilliant strategy. The county established a public forum so they could then say that whatever is on display is not government speech. But once you establish a public forum, the law is clear that you cannot restrict access to that forum based on the viewpoint being expressed.

And ironically, the line of cases that establish that law is one that was created by religious right attorneys seeking access to public forums for religious groups — Mergen’s, Lamb’s Chapel, Rosenberger and other cases. This was Jay Sekulow’s brilliant strategy to use the free speech clause and the concept of viewpoint discrimination to gain a place for religious speech on public property (and it’s the constitutionally correct position as well). And now it’s being used against them. I like it.

Recipe from Myra Waldo’s Beer and Good Food. She has several variations and is one who uses “rarebit” because the joke flies over her head.

2 Tbsp butter
4 cups (1 pound) grated Cheddar or Swiss cheese
3/4 cup beer
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp dry mustard (and wouldn’t you use Colman’s? – LG)
1 tsp Worcestershire sauce
1 egg

In the top of a double boiler or chafing dish, melt the butter. Place over hot water and add the cheese; let melt. Mix the beer with the salt, mustard, and Worcestershire sauce; gradually add to the cheese, stirring constantly until smooth.

Beat the egg yolk; add a little of the cheese mixture, stirring constantly to prevent curdling. Return to balance of cheese mixture, mixing steadily. Serve on butter toast. Serves 4-6.

Variation: Buck Rabbit

Place a lightly poached egg on top of the Welsh Rabbit for each serving.

UPDATE: Sounds like an excellent recipe here.

UPDATE 2: The Eldest offers this one:

Scottish Fondue
1 clove garlic
1 1/2 cups dry white wine
1 pound grated mix of cantal, cheddar, Swiss, and/or Muenster cheese
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour (or cornstarch)
3 tablespoons Scotch whisky
Salt and pepper

UPDATE 3: Mark Bittman’s recipe sounds good.

An extremely pleasant shave, sandalwood throughout. Terrific (and fragrant) lather using the Rooney Style 2, then the Hoffritz Slant Bar (looking quite spiffy in its rhodium plate) with an Swedish Gillette blade removed the stubble very smoothly. On the final pass, I did pick up the Eclipse Red Ring and used that. A splash of Sandalwood, and I’m on my way.

This book on my fitness project is difficult to organize because it has lots of parts in complex relations. A mind-map sort of approach sounds good, but the intention is to emerge with a book, and a book still is linear: you read from beginning to end, without hypertext or leaping about. An outline is a great tool not just because of the hierarchical aspect, indeed quite useful, but also because it is linear: once the outline is complete, you have the sequence of your book as well as how the contents are structured.

I’ve been going through the Scrivener tutorial, and I think it will be uncommonly helpful in this effort. It will allow me to write little sections and then, in the corkboard view, treat each section as an index card to rearrange, put into different stacks (folders), and so on. And you also have an outline view.

Thus I can start figuring out the pieces of what I want to say now, and Scrivener will help me organize and outline those later.

This is from Dan Colman’s Open Culture:

Colman adds:

Every year, The New Scientist sponsors an illusion contest, and, above, we have the winner of the 2010 edition: A contraption created by Koukichi Sugihara (Meiji Institute for Advanced Study of Mathematical Sciences, Japan) that appears to defy gravity, allowing wooden balls to roll up slopes. But, in actual fact “the orientations of the slopes are perceived oppositely, and hence the descending motion is misinterpreted as ascending motion.” You can now make submissions to the 2011 edition.

I blogged earlier about Scrivener. I’m now using the (free) beta version for Windows, and I’m liking it a lot. From the Scrivener tutorial:

WHAT IS SCRIVENER?
Scrivener is aimed at writers of all kinds—novelists, journalists, academics, screenwriters, playwrights—who need to structure a long piece of text while referring to research documents. Scrivener is a ring-binder, a scrapbook, a corkboard, an outliner and a text editor all rolled into one. It is primarily intended to be a first draft tool – although it is possible to complete a project that requires only basic formatting – such as a novel or short story – in Scrivener, often you will want to take your draft to a dedicated word processor or layout program for final formatting. Scrivener is intended to be a kind of “writer’s shed” for those of us who don’t have a spare shed.

If you do much writing—on Windows or Mac—take a look at Scrivener. The tutorial is quite useful.