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Monkey Monday: welcome to hot mess week. 20 April 2009 8:29 am

Posted by Tracy in : cooking,eating,hot mess,meta,news,nutrition,politics,school , View Comments

So last Thursday I mentioned cooking up a hot mess, and considered a series of posts (with pictures) about meals I’ve cooked that tasted way better than they looked. This week, as I attempt to wrangle together my big project for Research Methods, hot messes sound like a fun way to take what I’m sure will be much-needed breaks. BUT. Before I get to all that lighthearted fun, I need to write something about the food politics of a big hot mess in last week’s news.

All the Pepto-Bismol (or store-brand/generic equivalents thereof) on Earth would not be enough to get me through reading the CIA “interrogation technique” memos released by the Obama administration, but here’s a link to the ACLU page with the full documents just in case I develop some seriously hardcore intestinal fortitude. However, I did manage to read excerpts from the memos in in Friday’s New York Times, and that’s how I spotted a bit of food politics so grim I had to reread it repeatedly before circling it in black marker to etch it in my brain as something to write about. So here I go, (more…)

Foto Friday: Unicorn chaser edition. 17 April 2009 5:40 pm

Posted by Tracy in : consumerism,cookies,dessert,eating,food snobbery,pictures,silly , View Comments

I started composing this Foto Friday post after the Monkey Monday following it was such a hot mess of a downer about the food politics of torture, but I’ve dated it to Friday so people can find it after scrolling past the bad news. After a story like that, it’s time for comfort cookies:

I know they're not very good, but I love them.

If you spotted the guilty secret about these cookies, give yourself a gold star for eagle eyes. Otherwise, read on for the terrible truth. (more…)

In which I am silly. 16 April 2009 11:15 am

Posted by Tracy in : cooking,hot mess,meta,random,school,silly,writing , View Comments

Silly is an okay mood to be in right now, since I’m supposed to be writing the introduction to a research paper that doesn’t exist. It’s for my research methods class; I’m supposed to pretend like I’ve done all the background readings and interviews and participant observations and so on, and all that’s left is the writing, but it turns out it’s really hard for me to write when I haven’t done the research to figure out what to write about. And that’s all the whining I’m going to do on that subject, because this post should be a quick one, so I can get back to the writing that’s going sooooo wellll (not). Anyway.

I had a silly idea for a tattoo the other day, maybe Tuesday night, when I was concocting (more…)

A Thank You Thursday — and here’s to many more. 9 April 2009 9:38 pm

Posted by Tracy in : Michael Pollan,friends,interviews,meta,school,thank you Thursday , View Comments

Thank You Thursdays are a regular feature over at Feministing, and this week I’m taking a page from their playbook to shout out to my awesome friends. Maybe it’s an early April thing with me, I don’t know, but you are all fabulous, each and every one of you. Anyway. Here are just a few recent specific examples of the awesomeness of my friends:

First of all, last Friday’s shout-out to Wednesday dinner is sort of an early entry in the “yay my friends rule” category, well worth a mention. We’re up to twelve straight weeks of collaborative gastronomic goodness, and counting — so awesome. Go team!

Next, I started this week’s Monkey Monday post on a bit of a down note, and Cj stepped right up to read things in a more positive light. (more…)

Monkey Monday: odds, ends, and closing browser tabs 6 April 2009 4:06 pm

Posted by Tracy in : chocolate,geekery,monkeys,random,reading , View Comments

I don’t want to complain.  I’m sure all this rain is awesome for the garden we planted last week. Still, it sure does an Oregon winter on my brain, so I am cuddled up to a nice big mug of hot chocolate and reading a lot. I needed the chocolate comfort after Michael Ruhlman’s advice to aspiring food writers. Encouraging, it was not.

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On a much more optimistic note, Growing Power is awesome, and (more…)