I’ve made some additions to my household’s list of neologisms.
Newly remembered/added words are:
I was going to add “squiffers,” a word meaning tipsy or drunk (intensified as “squiffer-doodles”) but I learned that “squiffy” is a word in current use, so it isn’t a true neologism. We obviously just bastardized it.
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Posted in Culture | Tagged coined words, made-up words, making up words, neologisms, personal linguistics | 3 Comments »
Doc Maynard had a wife. Two of them, actually, and simultaneously, some say.
David S. “Doc” Maynard, one of Seattle’s more colorful founders, married Catherine Simmons Broshear Maynard, a widow he had met along the Oregon Trail. He married her almost immediately upon divorcing Lydia, his first wife, a decree granted via questionable–and later, contestable–conditions. (Doc may have implied that Lydia was…deceased….)
Catherine Maynard proved to be as legendary as her husband, helping thwart an attack on the settlers of Seattle, accepting for a time her husband’s first wife under her own roof, and traveling the state on horseback, riding from Seattle across the Cascades to Ellensburg, well into her 70s.
But she did one other thing which, 150 years later, affects every single Seattle homeowner.
Catherine Maynard brought the dandelion to Seattle. Continue Reading »
Posted in Seattle, Writing | Tagged Catherine Maynard, creative writing, dandelion, Doc Maynard, historical fiction, novel writing, Seattle, Seattle history, Writing | 3 Comments »
We picked up two “buddy” films this weekend. One was a buddy/fish-out-of-water mashup, and the other was a classic buddy/caper film.
Both were a lot of fun. Continue Reading »
Posted in Movies | Tagged francois cluzet, frank langella, movie review, Movies, omar sy, peter sarsgaard, robot & frank, robot and frank, susan sarandon, the intouchables | Leave a Comment »
There has been a ton of interest for this recipe, and with good reason; it’s a great show and a good recipe. If you’ve landed here from a web-search, please, enjoy the recipe. Please also check out my books. You can read excerpts here, or find the books in the banner to the right and on my Author Page at Amazon.
Now, to the recipe:
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The other day I happened across an episode of “The Mind of a Chef.” (How did I miss this show before?) In this episode (“Simplicity”), host and chef David Chang finds places where the chefs have pared everything back to its most simplistic.
While the episode was great, at one point Chang frustrated me entirely. He gives instructions on how to make a simple chicken noodle soup, but blasts through the process with no detail. Example: at one point he instructs us to “boil the shit out of [the broth].” Not very helpful.
But, always on the lookout for good recipes, I spent some time this weekend reconstructing (or deconstructing) Chang’s method from the brief clip. One innovation is to cook the chicken and vegetables separately. A common problem with chicken broth is that the vegetables can overpower the chicken, but by separating the two, Chang makes it possible for us to adjust the mixture according to personal preference and to account for, say, a particularly strong onion or exceptionally sweet carrot.
The result was, in all humbleness, nothing short of excellent.
Posted in Recipes | Tagged chicken noodle soup recipe, cooking, david chang, david chang chicken noodle soup, Food, mind of a chef, recipes, soup | 23 Comments »
It’s been a difficult week for us all, and continues to be so–nowhere more so this morning than in Boston. In reaction I’ve tried to “Keep calm and carry on” by doing normal things and moving forward with projects. I’ve been able to push the line forward a little in some areas: with this blog, with my gardens, and with the new novel. Continue Reading »
Posted in Culture, Writing | Tagged blogging, creative writing, novel writing, Writing, writing techniques, writing tips | 3 Comments »
There’s never an egg timer around when you need one.
As details began to emerge in the aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombing, one of my Facebook ephemera went toxic on our collective hrm-hrms, asking us all if now Obama was going to require background checks for purchase of cooking vessels. Yes. He went there, and in record time. We hadn’t even finished counting the wounded and he’d already turned this tragedy into a Second Amendment diatribe.
My mind–being the thing it is–immediately went to the satirical end state. I imagined this fellow on paramilitary maneuvers in the upstate backwoods, pressure-cooker at the ready. I imagined him protesting the proposed ban on all pressure-cookers of greater than an 8-quart capacity. I saw him applying for a carry permit, so he could bring his pressure-cooker with him on his travels. I envisioned him, standing proudly before his arrayed collection of WWII pressure-cookers, including his favorite, a Japanese rice-cooker manufactured in Manchukuo. I pictured him as the charismatic leader in a new front against the War on Liberty, ready to lay down his life for the Amendment that read:
A well fed Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Large Cooking Vessels, shall not be infringed.
To him, background checks to purchase pressure cookers were just the thin edge of the wedge.
Then I came back to reality. Continue Reading »
Posted in Culture | Tagged Boston, Boston Marathon, Boston Marathon bombings, Second Amendment | Leave a Comment »
Composing a post for your blog? Writing an email to a colleague? Here are a couple of tips:
The letter “r” is not a verb.
The letter “u” is not a pronoun.
It doesn’t surprise me when blog posts or emails have this sort of embedded “text-speak.” Nor does it surprise me to find them riddled with bad syntax, incoherent thoughts, and errors both typographic and grammatical. It saddens me that those intent on communicating via the written word don’t have the sense (or self-respect) to proofread what they’ve written before they hit “send,” but it doesn’t surprise me.
What does surprise me is when I come across the same in posts on writers’ discussion boards. What does surprise me is when a writer doesn’t catch his own mistake when he writes “Art thou saint or satin?” And it goes beyond surprise when, as I saw the other day, a presenter of a TED talk repeatedly used the letter “r” as a verb in his Powerpoint presentation.
Dude…srsly?
If you want your words to be taken seriously, stick close to the standards of writing. In speech or in the written word, if you consistently flout the accepted standards of spelling, grammar, and composition, your words, your thoughts, sometimes even you as a person, will be discounted, diminished, or totally ignored by the world at large.
I shouldn’t have to use a secret decoder ring to translate a writer’s words into comprehensible English.
In fact, I won’t. And I’m not alone.
I’m not being a grammar Nazi or a writerly snob. I’m not asking for high-falutin’ rhetoric or exquisite imagery. I’m asking for comprehensible grammar and correct spelling. Allowances for hurriedly written texts and non-native English speakers aside, a writer must strive for quality in the written word. You can only blame your iPhone’s predictive spelling function for so much.
In the end, if you don’t mind looking like an idiot because you don’t know the difference between “satin” and “Satan,” fine.
Just don’t expect me to take you seriously at the same time.
Posted in Culture, Writing | Tagged blogging, creative writing, editing, grammar, how to be taken seriously, publishing, Writing | 3 Comments »
Kurt R.A. Giambastiani 