Of books and even more books

This is good:

This is better:

Of hygiene and headaches

There are very serious discussions happening all around me.  I know, because I read your blogs, your articles, your websites.  I help to moderate a Catholic chat room, and we had a fairly heavy debate on Marian devotions about an hour ago.  I participated in a staff development day today at work, in which weighty matters were addressed such as our ageing population, renovations, and coping with stress.

And yet, I am taking a break from that to tell you that my new deodorant - which seemed perfectly harmless when I chose it from among many on the shelves in the drug store - is giving me a headache because it stinks.  Oh, it is effective - though it was very hot today, I haven't shed a drop in that area.  But it smells something awful,  when it is supposed to smell like ocean breezes or fruits of the forest or something.  It's a heavy, musky scent, and it's wafting from under my arms.  How embarrassing.

Dear Personal Hygiene Product Making People,
Women are not supposed to smell like cheap magazine perfume strips in the under arm area.  A nice light baby powder scent would be more than enough.
Thank you very much.

Tess.

PS, can I get a refund for a used-only-once stick of deodorant?

Wandering bird

This is the Gundersen Family.  How is it that I didn't know about these talented, beautiful voices until just a few days ago?

Of alphabet soup and ice cream cones

Shhhh...

Don't tell anyone I'm writing this.  I'm at work and should really be working, but I just wanted to say hello.

Some of you have come here because of a link elsewhere (I don't know how I started showing up on that website, but it's pretty cool, I think) to a picture of me.  It didn't seem right to post a picture of myself here, so I took it down.  This is my lighthouse, my refuge from the world - a place of solace and solitude.  Though I blather on about the mundane details of my life, the focus really isn't on me.  Does that make sense?

I can feel something struggling to find its way out.  Does it ever strike you that way, those of you who trade in words?  I can almost see the words, like alphabet soup on my tongue - the letters are arranging themselves into coherent thought and will all at once leap out onto paper.  If I happen to have paper on hand, that is.

In the meantime, I'm being rather indolent on this sleepy Saturday morning up on the third floor.  I can hear an ice cream cone calling my name.  Do you hear it, too?



*I am a little bit giddy because Manchester United is currently ahead 3-1 over Fulham, but it's not even half time yet, so I don't want to start celebrating just yet.

Promptly Tolkien

A while a go I read The Fiction Class by Susan Breen. Sprinkled throughout the story are writing prompts the main character gives her class of writing students. I've tackled one of two since then, and here is another:

Think of a person from history who intrigues you. Napoleon? Cleopatra? Martin Luther King?

Write a two- to three-page description of that person eating a meal. What would s/he eat? How would s/he eat? What would s/he be thinking about as s/he ate? Would someone be sharing the meal with him or her? What would they talk about?

Remember: bring your character to life!

Tolkien and Lewis. It is mid to late autumn. The men are walking among Tolkien’s beloved trees nearby, their differences evident in how they walk: Lewis, taller and vital, walks quickly.  Tolkien likes to stroll, stops occasionally to look at the trees, drive home a point, or light a pipe. They debate whether the purpose of a walk is the walk itself, or getting back home again. The evening is crisp, with an edge of oncoming winter chill.  The sun is nearing the horizon, soon to leave their little bit of England in darkness.

Feet crunching through fallen leaves on their approach to a cosy house set well back from the quiet country lane, two men anticipate a good meal to fill their bellies. They stop for final pulls on well-used pipes, looking forward to the warm fire promised by the drifting curls of smoke from the chimney pots on the roof.  Knocking pipe bowls against the sturdy soles of walking shoes, the two friends enter the house, stepping into the hallway where they hang their coats, and exchange shoes for slippers. (Lewis is so frequent a visitor in his friend’s house he has a pair of slippers for his own use kept in the same basket as Tolkien’s own.)

Minutes later, we see them in front of the fireplace in deep armchairs; the fire and evening sun coming through the windows is the only source of light in the room.  There is a warm pocket of intimacy around the two friends as they sit talking in the comfortable room with a drink to fend off the chill of their walk.  It’s a cozy room: deep leather chairs; fire burning in the grate for warmth and light; books neat on shelves, piled on tables, forming towers on the floor.  It’s about 6pm, and falling dark outside.  Tolkien (Ronald) and Lewis (Jack) are sitting with amber-coloured drink in stout glasses, pipes lit, legs stretched out to the fire. A meat pie warms in the oven, left by Edith for their supper.  There is also a basket of hearty bread, and a plate of cheese on the table behind them.

The sound of the fire is soothing, familiar, homey background noise. The men talk about their students, and their writing; about Hugo Dyson who had been invited but was unable to join them. They critique and tease each other about current projects, argue the use of allegory in fiction, and debate liturgical norms - Roman verses Anglican. Their conversation has the rhythm of long familiarity, as if these topics have been gone over often and often between them. With perfect good will, they accept the shortcomings in the other’s arguments, each knowing their own to be the right.

The two men move to the table, and eat leisurely, talking all the while. The room is now lit by the fire and a lamp on the sideboard – Tolkien’s home has electricity, but he prefers leaving most of the room veiled in darkness. Between them is a lot of laughter, many drinks – true, deep friendship.

The meal draws to an end, evidenced by crumbs on the table, a decimated pie, one heel of bread. Tolkien goes to the kitchen to brew a pot of tea, returning with a tray set with sturdy mugs and the brown betty teapot. They remain at the table smoking a pipe and continue talking until Edith comes home, entering with a bluster of wind blowing open the door. At some point in the evening it has begun to rain. She has spent the evening at cards with friends, as glad for the feminine companionship as the men are to be able to smoke at the table, tongues running free without thought for feminine sensitivities.  Her arrival calls a close to the evening, but slowly, none of the three eager to have it end.

A compass would be handy, if I knew how to read one

What do you do when you don't know where you are or where you're supposed to go? How do you plot your course when you don't have the coordinates?

I recently saw very adorable - though horribly overpriced - little compasses, tucked inside a half-marble of glass, and very antique looking.  Charming.  And useful, should I ever learn to read a compass and find myself lost in the wilderness.

It's good to know your place on the earth... I am here.  The question I have, though, is where am I in life?  What comes next?  I think maybe I'm on a layover, waiting for the boarding announcement, only the voice on the PA is like the teacher in Peanuts, all "wuh wah wuh woh" and I might not understand when it's my turn to go.

Edit:  I may not know where I'm going next, but I am enjoying watching the sunset from where I am tonight.

Rerunning the grape

The Coronation grapes are out!  They are tiny little jewels of juicy lushness, bursting with Welch's grape flavour goodness.

I was delighted when I saw them offered at the market today. They are forever linked in my mind to a rather disastrous pie-making attempt in my past, which I will repost for you here.

From The Lighthouse, September 2009
The Grape Pie Incident


Shortly after I moved here, one of the local papers featured grapes. Not surprising, considering this is wine region, meaning grapes abound in plenty. The article included a couple of recipes, one of which was for a grape pie. Being a fan of pie, I thought it was a good idea: love grapes; love pie -- perfect combination! Only things have been busy, so that from day's end to day's end, I hadn't yet got around to making an attempt at the perfect grape pie.

Til this weekend. I had promised to make dinner for when my family returned home late this afternoon and after dithering over the menu I settled on pancakes and (turkey) bacon with fruit melange and whipcream. This seemed suitably Yom Kippurish, for which we are meant to eat something sweet, and taste new fruit (Pomegranate, in our case). And I thought for dessert I'd make the famous grape pie.

I am a competent baker of simple, straightforward, non-fussy recipes. I make a mean sticky oatmeal coffee cake (not a bundt), and a yummy mince pound cake (in a bundt), as well as assorted cookies and scones (nary a bundt among them) (Sorry...I got bundt on the brain after the first mention of 'cake'... kekk... cack...) but I have never mastered the art of crust. My sister, JB is so good at crust, she's blase about it. Most people have a secret crust weapon: frozen butter; marble slab; cold utensils; brand-specific lard... whatever.  JB? Meh - toss around some fat, flour and liquid, and presto! Perfectly beautiful crust, everytime. She would have shrugged at the notion of grape pie. Me? It was like a neon light flashing over my shoulder all weekend long, as if I were in a film noir: "Pie!" "Pie!" "Pie!"

I shopped for the required grapes, and this might be where it all began to go wrong. The recipe used the Coronation variety - lovely, bright and green-skinned. We've been eating Concord grapes which we've loved, so that's what I bought. They look like bunched blueberries, so round and...blue. They are of a sort of grape which have a 'slip skin', meaning the juice resides between the skin and the flesh. You can pop them, and the skins slip off. Get it? (This I learned from the informative article which got me into this situation in the first place)

Bear in mind that I am about to attempt this pie while also cooking up enough pancakes and bacon to feed an army. And just for fun I'm baking applesauce cookies as well. Oh, and seeding a pomegranate.

The first step in the Great Pie Undertaking was to wash, then mash the grapes. Basically, I had to separate the flesh from the skins - which were to be reserved for later. Three cups worth of grapes did I have to pop, one by one, into a saucepan for boiling. Not nearly efficient enough for me! I grabbed handfulls of the fruit, squeezing grapes in my fist which caused the solid little centres to shoot out in all directions, all over the kitchen. Even now, I know there is one grape carcass at least, hiding behind the fruit bowl on the counter. Nevermind! On to the boiling! This was a cinch, only it made the house smell like it had been washed in Welsh's grape juice. Adding the skins...this too was easy. It should have all been good actually, except the pie maker and the unflavoured gelatin provider don't speak the same language. The recipe just said "add gelatin and stir until dissolved" but the gelatin people (who should know of what they speak, no?) laid out this routine of boiling water, adding gelatin, stirring, adding more water, stirring again...then adding it all "to the recipe as directed". I did all the stirring and adding and stirring, bringing both concoctions together, and placed it tenderly in the fridge for it to set, in preparation for folding in some whipping cream. Yum!

Did I mention that I bought a frozen pie crust? It seemed reasonable, what with the pancakes and all. And I went for the cheap, store-label one, too. Which just might be a wee bit smaller than your average store-bought pie shell. This will be an important point very shortly.

First of all, the grapes themselves were very very juicy. Lots of liquid. Then, with the gelatin stir-and-add fiasco, I added maybe another cup of fluid to the mix. Over an hour in the fridge found the goop - which was bright purple, by the way, not the tender green of the pie in the picture - still runny. I thought it might be a good idea to add more gelatin, only this time I used maybe half of the boiling water suggested. Still.... more volume.

Happily, the purple sludge seemed to be setting a bit, so I undertook to whip up the cream for folding. This, I have done many times before. I am a whipping cream literate...I know my way around the heavy cream, let me assure you. I used a hand mixer, and the nifty tall measuring container that came with it...which I thought was meant for mixing things in. This worked rather well, until I lost my grip on the measuring thing, and it starting spinning around like a top, and cream went everywhere. Not easily deterred, I scooped up what I could, and started again, only to have the same thing happen. Again. By this time, my white t-shirt was covered in purple dots from the grape-squeezing episode, I had whipping cream in my eyelashes, not to mention covering the wicker bread basket and the little frog lamp. (Note: cream cooks rather quickly on a 40 watt bulb)

And this is when my family came home. I had imagined myself like Betty Crocker: calm, composed, in control, dinner piping hot and ready to be served, while wonderful smells greeted them at the door, with me in my single strand of pearls. Nevermind. Again I scooped up the mess, and made a third attempt, which this time - thankfully - was sucessful. In that whipping cream was produced. And so I folded. And then... I poured. And a lava-like slide of pale purple ooze overflowed all over the counter, for the pie crust was far too small to contain it all. During this time, whipping cream and now grape goop was being dripped over the bacon which was patiently waiting on a cookie sheet to go in the oven to be kept warm... yummy!

Rather than the smooth, sophisticated pie, elegantly decorated with grapes, I will have to present my family with a lumpy, purple and white frothed horror, onto which I threw a handful of purple grapes in a fit of pique.

After all of that, I am left with a kitchen that has purple blobs on the cupboard doors, whipping cream decorating the underside of the cabinets, grape corpses hiding in nooks and cranies, and pomegranate jewels popping underfoot as we walk around.... and a family too full of pancakes to eat pie!