Cooking for Engineers

At a young age, I read the Joy of Cooking. Back to Front. I've always had a love-love relationship with food and when I was of an age to be entranced by Mr. Rogers, it was mostly because he came on before Yan Can Cook, the Frugal Gourmet (I don't care, his recipes are awesome) and Julia Child. I read cookbook after cookbook, comparing recipes, writing my own notes and then writing my own recipes, trying to understand the science of it all. Why were my fried eggs soggy? Why didn't my pop-overs pop? I was good at math and science and cooking was like chemistry, there were things going on, food things, amalgams to compound, liquids to emulsify, energy to be released. I bought as many of the Time-Life "The Good Cook" series as I could, because they taught the basics: marinades needed an acid, an immersive, and a flavoring agent; chicken sautés must be seared then tempered with vegetables then finished in a simmer.

Modern cooking shows like Alton Brown's "Good Eats" were such a godsend, because he put the math and science right next to the cooking. Finally, someone else got that teaching one to prepare food should not be about teaching how to follow a recipe, but how to understand food and how to experiment with it.

You don't have to have cable (or a TV for that matter) to learn the same thing. Enter, "Cooking for Engineers", a site built for analytical minds that like to cook aimed at demystifying the science of food preparation. In addition to their ingredients dictionary, catalogue of cooking tests, and notes on equipment and gear, at the end of each recipe is a Nassi-Shneiderman diagram (shown above for New England Style Chowder) which is simply the recipe at one glance. Now why hasn't Alton Brown thought of that?

Embrace the Shoelace

Once upon a time, I was a middle-schooler of the eighties, fond of watching ThunderCats, buying dresses printed with faux paint splatters, and wearing my black Reebox sneakers with wild shoelaces, meticulous threaded during timeless evenings of Gimme-A-Break, Growing Pains, or Family Ties.

Now that the eighties are unofficially back, I find myself pressing my nose against the glass at Lady Footlocker, wondering if I can get away with practicing my basket-weaving skills on the tops of my shoes. You could do it too, you know. And you don't need to scour the pages of Seventeen magazine like I did back in the day. You can just take a look at Ian's Shoelace Site. Which, among other things, has colorful step-by-step instructions on not only how to tie designer laces the envy of any respectable Reebox wearer, but also carries shoelace news stories, tips for teaching children, ways to repair agelets (those shoelace ends) and methods for calculating your own appropriate shoelace length.

Stay Cool

I was supposed to see U2 3D last weekend with some friends down at the Samuel C. Johnson IMAX Theater in the National Museum of Natural History Smithsonian, but the very idea of leaving the apartment and foraging into that horrible hotness that can only be known as DC "weather" caused a swoon that could only be cured by cold beer, soccer games and Xbox.

I also spent some time surfing the web and pretending to be productive, when came upon list after list of interesting websites that I never got around to visiting. Seems like everyone has a listing of what they think are the "coolest" website on the web. But these Ploomy, what men need to know and Time Magazine actual have some street cred. Take a look at Ploomy's "10 Cool Websites" and Times' "10 Cool Websites" when you are cranking up the AC and hiding from the DC heat wave.

Hot Dog, Haute Dog

When summer approaches, hot dog consumption goes up exponentially as the temperature increases. (Not to mention, I'm heading off for my sister's wedding this weekend in Chicago). In honor of such simple pleasures, I would like to bring attention to the Chicago Tribune's article, "Hot dog, haute dog!". You don't have to go to Chicago to experience these creative twists on the old-fashioned dog. Included in the article are fabulous recipes from the Chicago Chefs for making such delicious innovations like the Asian Tuna Dog, or the Hoisin-and-Hot-Mustard-Glazed Tofu Dog in your own kitchen. And don't worry, when asking the five interviewed chefs to put their own spin on the wondrous wienie, they made sure to stipulate it had to be something the home cook could feasibly replicate.

Garfield minus Garfiled

Dan Walsh of Dublin did all Garfield critics a favor when he took the orange lay-about and all of his furry friends out of Jim Davis's cartoons. The result is a neurotic, manic-depressive and frankly hysterical offshoot called "Garfield minus Garfield" showcasing the neuroses of Jon Arbuckle (Garfield's Owner) in all their delirious glory.

Surreal and a touch dark (they way I like 'em) Jon's antics are still touchingly human and laughably ridiculous. In Amy Orndorff's article, "When the Cat's Away, Neurosis Is on Display" in the Washington Post, she noted "the futility in making everything turn out right every day". I for one, love the Walsh's refreshing pandering to the lonely, absurd and desperate conditions of office workers and stalled dreamers everywhere.

Thesaurus.com's Lexico sued by Roget's Thesaurus

If you use thesaurus.com as extensively as I do, you'll notice that on or about May 1st the website became drastically useless. Here's what happened.

Around April 8th, 2008, Jezebel.com made a snuff about synonyms for the word "weaker" at thesaurus.com, which came up as "female" and "lady". While disgusting, synonyms like these don't particularly surprise me since they are slang for the concept of female as the "weaker sex". (Yes, while males get stuck with synonyms like "soul" and "humanity", feminine synonyms run a gamut of derogatory slanders. Welcome to being a lady. But that is another post.) Many of these synonyms can be found in Roget's Thesaurus (indicated as slang, just like I said). I know because it is on the bookshelf above my writing desk (sometimes I like to drift among the words, like a thirsty man in the desert, so sue me. Oops, did I give away the post?). The people these synonyms surprised the most, were the people at Roget's Thesaurus.

The attention and outrage garnered at Jezebel.com lead to someone at Roget's realizing that Thesaurus.com was lifting their words and infringing on the copyright of their 21st Century Thesaurus. They are now suing Lexico, the owners of Thesaurus.com in "The Philip Lief Group, Inc vs. Lexico Publishing Group" dated May 7th, 2008.

Apparently in 1990 and 1998, Roget employed a Barbara Ann Kipfer, PhD to create the 21st Century Thesaurus and the Revised edition. Roget retained the copyright and its agreement with Kipfer prohibited her from participating in the preparation of another English language thesaurus without Roget's permission. In 1999, Thesaurus.com requested a license for Roget's Thesaurus for its (then) fledgling internet based reference business. Citing that the business was not profitable and would be used mainly to educate people, they offered Roget's $3,000 smackers. Roget's declined.

Meanwhile, Thesaurus.com entered into an agreement with Dr. Kipfer to buy a thesaurus for their online site called "Roget's New Millennium Thesaurus". Roget's is charging that Kipfer's "New Millennium Thesaurus" is actually their "21st Century Thesaurus" copied verbatim, complete with misspellings and nonsense words.

Oops.

From 2002 to 2008 Thesaurus.com has increased in business value by creating a significant web based advertising supported business replete with pay for use premium features. In July of 2007 Lexico (declined) an offer of 100 million dollars for its sale.

Around May 19th, Thesaurus.com apparently removed all the words from their database that could only be found in Roget's new Millennium Thesaurus. The result is fewer returns, non-existing antonyms and some that words no longer have thesaurus entries. Since each word is cross-referenced through hyperlinks, this has drastically reduced the overall effectiveness of their on-line tool. Cries across the web have ranged from complaints about the "massive reduction" of hits and the "newly degraded" format to less detailed epithets ("suddenly sucks" and "now worthless").

Other discussions on the subject have disintegrated to a lot of finger pointing. Thesaurus.com's parent company, Lexico, has remained mum on the subject (foolhardy in my humble opinion) but court records serve as the herald of the awful truth.

Commuters with Empty Pockets

Forbes Magazine has published a couple of studies, "America's Most Expensive Commutes" and "Cities With the Worse Pain at the Pump" which take a look at the rising cost of gas and the effect on the average commuter.

In "Pain at the Pump" Forbes.com took the country's 50 largest metro areas and looked at congestion, fuel costs, use of mass transit and carpools and commuting distances to determine which metropolitan areas were paying the most for gas and burning the most in their commute. My beloved Washington D.C. taps out on top with an average of $13 a day to commute into the city.

Think you can escape the rising gas prices by being a good citizen and taking the metro? Think again. "Most Expensive Commutes" illustrates the skyrocketing price of public transportation where the cost of the daily commute is proportional to the size and extent of the rail system. More extensive infrastructures means cheaper commutes. However, inexpensive commutes were inversely proportional to the cost of housing. Take New York City, it was the second cheapest commute in the country, but has some of the highest housing expenses and least affordable housing markets in the nation.

You know, I usually like to end these kinds of posts on a positive note. Ooops.

The Great Big Lie

Well my loves, vacation seems inexcusable in the land of blogs and I really did mean to keep up my love of trivia while I was away in Italy, Germany, and the Czech Republic. But I didn't, did I? I'm back now and I learned all sorts of things and saw all sorts of sights in "foreign" countries (I mean, the landscape did change quite a bit in Germany and the Czech Republic, but all the people stayed rather the same, except I couldn't understand them). Which leads me to one of my favorite sites in Prague.

It’s the Prague Astronomical Clock. This fabulous display of medieval artistry and science is still ticking away in the city's Old Town Square. While I was pointing out with appreciable geekiness to my husband and sister-in-law, the meaning of all the golden dials, whirring knobs, and mosaic illustrations of zodiac constellations, my husband noted that the sun could not possibly be in the constellation of Gemini as the clock was indicating. After all, it was only May 10th. And he should know, since he's a Gemini.

Welcome to the Great Big Lie.

I told him how on my first day of Astronomy 101, with no small amount of glee and (a certain degree of pity) my astronomy teacher told us of how the astronomical dates for sun signs were set by the classical Greeks about 2000 years ago. And due to the precession of the earth's axis (don't ask, but basically it's the same reason why Polaris wasn't a pole star for the Greeks either) over time, the positions of the constellations have actually shifted about 25 astronomical degrees. "That's right", I explained to my husband, "you're actually a Taurus."

If you too would like to find out what your "real" astrological sign is, you can visit, the Live Science Article "Your Astrological Sign may Not Be What You Think It Is".

Or like me, if your horoscope seems just a little off today, try reading the one before it.

The Birds

I sat down in Dupont Circle today with my Well-dressed Burrito in hand, all ready to catch up on some blogging while chowing down in the sun. All of DC seemed to be having the same idea. There were young female coordinators eating salads in sun-dresses and chatting over the shouts of the rowdy chess players, two homeless guys were lazily fanning themselves on a couple of benches, and quite a few young men in shirts-sleeves were gossiping good naturedly by the fountain.

A few birds landed near by me as I started my lunch and all seemed right in the world. That was until five minutes later, when I looked up and counted nineteen (wrens? wood thrushes? chicadees?) flopping down near me and pretending to burrow or look for worms in what was obviously bone-dry, over-worked dirt. After a few minutes, they gave up all attempts at pretense and blatantly glared at me for handouts while a couple of hefty pigeons waddled over like bouncers. The thrushes reacted by trying to muscle morsels out of me by buzzing my shady spot with dives and swoops. I didn’t know whether to ignore them or run for my life.

Know thine enemy I say, and since I was a 30 minute walk away from my Boy Scout manual, the “North American Bird Photo Gallery” came in pretty handy. Turns out the bullies in Dupont Circle are “Spizella arborea” or American tree sparrows. You’ve been warned.

The Dead Worm

Well, hello there, candy addicts. Been a while since I posted some poetry. So, here's a bonus post! Vastly appropriate, regarding the Washington, DC weather.

Indeed it is a skinny death, without the

bend of bone,
When tears have splashed their meager

life upon the empty stone.
To wither and concave oneself in the

shadow of wrinkled earth.
And be sucked and crinkled to a soaked brown,

from the beating red of birth.

The dead worm -- Anika Ismel

We're Powerless Against Data Grazing

Sound like the first step in a new addictive behavioral support group? Not exactly. Take a gander at Lee Gome 's article in the Wall street Journal, "Why We're Powerless To Resist Grazing On Endless Web Data" that explains why surfing the internet activates the same centers in the brain we get in the snack aisle, the buffet table, or (worse) the sale section).

Like a cat with a laser pointer, surfing the web can become and endless, ahem, rat chase. But by recognizing are own human attraction for abundance, we maybe able to do a better job learning what is useful information and what isn't.

Hilary vs. Obama vs. ABC

Did you catch the Hilary vs. Obama debate last night on ABC? Even if you didn't, you should read these scathing reviews of the network broadcast "In Pa. Debate, The Clear Loser Is ABC" by the Washington's Post's Tom Shales and Greg Mitchell's account, "The ABC Debate: A Shameful Night for the U.S.Media" in the Huffington Post.

Shales calls out mediators Charlie Gibson and George Stephanopoulos for behaving like "newsniks waiting for mistakes or foul-ups like dogs panting for treats after performing a trick". And (to quote them both) Greg Mitchell, in the Huffington Post article, calls out the mediators for spending unconscionably brief moments on the "wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the health care and mortgage crises, the overall state of the economy and dozens of other pressing issues" in return for [Shales] "dwelling entirely on specious and gossipy trivia...in the hope of getting the candidates to claw at one another over disputes that are no longer news."

Just wow.

Apparently, even the crowd began to boo the commentators near the end. Is it possible some members of the media are beginning to call out The Media?

Solve a Rubik's Cube

My husband and I were lamenting the wanton bling and unexpected bright pops of color on the Metro Saturday night, before we realized that the teeny-boppers we were watching weren't wearing bright pops of color. They were wearing NEON. It all became clear on the shuttle bus from Trusty's Bar to RFK stadium for the DC United game, when we spotted two pairs of high-top sneakers. "The 80's aren't coming back," must husband warned me. "They're here."

As disturbing as that is to someone who lived through the 80's, there is some encouragement this time around. That is, that someone is willing to share how to solve a freakin' Rubik's Cube. And I don't how to figure out how a network executive could think that a cartoon based on a rhomboid puzzle would entertain children on a Saturday morning, I mean the actual puzzle.

Check out Instructable's instructions on "How to Solve a Rubik' s Cube," (they have pictures!) and amaze your friends.

While your at it, check out other neato instructions from Instructables, how to turn plastic bags into "yarn" and how to make your own hoodie.

Dactylonomy

Heavens, how long has it been since I gave Candy readers a really delicious word to chomp on? Too long, says I. Dactylonomy (think "pterodactyl" with out the "ptero") is the science of counting on your fingers. That's right, I said science. Nice try, haters, who think I am just bad at simple math.

If you think I'm just trying to get off not admitting that I never remember the sum of 7 and 3 with looking at my, um, dactyls, then you should read this explanation of the art of dactlonomy from World Wide Words, which notes the historical significance of the art based on descriptions of methods from the Middle East, Asia and other places (and by the Venerable Bede from the north-east of England in the eighth century AD if you must know). Paintings exist from more than four thousand years ago showing Egyptians finger counting and we know it was common in classical Greece and Rome so it can't be too good for you.

The word is from Greek "daktulos" meaning "finger", plus "-nomia" which is related to nomos, "law", that we use to mark some specified area of knowledge. Which leads me to a very similar, but little recognized science that I just made up, "Grammenomy", from Greek "gramme" meaning the stroke or line of a pen or mathematical figure, plus "-nomia", well you know the rest. It's the science (or art if you have it) of counting on the brush strokes of mathematical figures. Here's the system I devised in the third grade, mostly to keep my fingers out of the eyes of datylonomy bigots (haters).


Now, the next time someone gives you the evil eyeball for counting on you fingers, just turn up your nose and say, "I'm a dactylonomist, actually. It's very difficult to be a good one."

Fishtown

CandyBuffet had the exquisite opportunity to hang with her brother-in-law in the sound booth for the Lifehouse concert in DC. The thing is, I went to the tailor with a friend earlier in the day and told her I would be going to a concert at the 9:30 Club. She was driving on busy U-street and was a tad distracted. "Who's playing again?" she asked me. "Fishtown?"

All night, I kept thinking how Fishtown would be an awesome name for a band. Screw Lifehouse, I'm going to see Fishtown! Don't worry, you don't have to expend brain power on thinking up cool names for your band (imaginary or otherwise), just use Band Name Maker.com to generate cool band names for rock, punk, emo and basically any musical style you can think of. Type in your optimal word of choice, and the generator spits our ten possibilities. Toad the Wet Sprocket, watch out!