10.26.2022 – sound of time ticking

sound of time ticking
Mr. Lincoln’s pocket watch
echoes across ages

It has been 10 years since the movie Lincoln came out.

I am not sure what made me think of it but, if you remember, they made a big deal about trying to get ‘sounds’ that Lincoln heard.

They went so far as to search out Mr. Lincoln’s watches and found that two were available in museums that experts agreed were part of Mr. Lincoln’s daily routine.

One watch was in the Smithsonian and the other was in the care of the Kentucky Historical Society.

The Kentucky people allowed sound technicians to wind the watch and record the ticking.

The ticking is heard in the movie for about 3 seconds.

Like I said, I got to thinking and after thinking about it, I got to work.

I messed around and downloaded a video file of the movie.

I found the scene and removed the audio.

I tried to clean out any other sounds from the background music.

There is an occasional loud clock tick-tock but I let that stay as I learned it was recorded from a clock that had been in the White House with the Lincolns.

But the tic-tic-ticking is there.

The 3 seconds of the sound of time that echoes across ages.

I then copied the clip over and over until I had 70 seconds of ticking.

It was kind of creepy.

It was kind of cool.

Hear it for yourself by clicking here.

10.26.2022 – do what they think in

do what they think in
faithful disinterested
judgement what is right

In a 1955 document titled, Modernisation of the House of Commons – First Report, contributed to by Sir Winston Leonard Spencer Churchill, Mr. Churchill said that:

The first duty of a member of Parliament is to do what they think in their faithful and disinterested judgement is right and necessary for the honour and safety of Great Britain. The second duty is to their constituents, of whom they are the representative but not the delegate. Burke’s famous declaration on this subject is well known. It is only in the third place that their duty to party organisation or programme takes rank. All these three loyalties should be observed, but there is no doubt of the order in which they stand under any healthy manifestation of democracy.

Let me put that in bullet points.

  • The first duty of a member of Parliament is to do what they think in their faithful and disinterested judgement is right and necessary for the honour and safety of Great Britain.
  • The second duty is to their constituents, of whom they are the representative but not the delegate.
  • It is only in the third place that their duty to party organisation or programme takes rank.

All these three loyalties should be observed, but there is no doubt of the order in which they stand under any healthy manifestation of democracy.

Let me, repeat part of that last line.

But there is no doubt of the order in which they stand under any healthy manifestation of democracy.

Change Parliament to Congress is easy.

But then you also have to change the last line to read, There is no doubt of the order in which they stand under this current un-healthy manifestation of democracy.

10.25.2022 – men make their history

men make their history
do not make it as they please
chosen by the past

Adapted from, The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte by Karl Marx  between December 1851 and March 1852, and originally published in 1852 in Die Revolution, a German monthly magazine published in New York City and established by Joseph Weydemeyer. 

According to Wikipedia, The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon discusses the French coup of 1851 in which Louis-Napoléon Bonaparte assumed dictatorial powers. It shows Marx in his form as a social and political historian, treating actual historical events from the viewpoint of his materialist conception of history.

The title refers to the Coup of 18 Brumaire in which Napoleon Bonaparte seized power in revolutionary France (9 November 17s99, or 18 Brumaire Year VIII in the French Republican Calendar), in order to contrast it with the coup of 1851.

Mr. Marx wrote, “Men make their own history, but they do not make it as they please; they do not make it under self-selected circumstances, but under circumstances existing already, given and transmitted from the past. The tradition of all dead generations weighs like a nightmare on the brains of the living.“

Commenting on the changes brought on by the coup attempt, Marx writes:

” … fanatics for order are shot down on their balconies by mobs of drunken soldiers, their domestic sanctuaries profaned,

their houses bombarded for amusement –

in the name of property,

of the family,

of religion,

and of order.

Finally, the scum of bourgeois society forms the holy phalanx of order and the hero installs himself in the Tuileries as the “savior of society.”

Of course, that was then in the 1850’s.

It would never happen here.

It would never happen now.

History doesn’t repeat itself but historians do, still it seems like what goes around comes around.

10.23.2022 – finding fresh udon

finding fresh udon
can be an impossible task
for many people

Even though, truth be told, I am not familiar with the name, Kenji López-Alt, I was attracted to recipe/article with the headline What Kenji López-Alt Makes His Family for Dinner.

What caught my attention was the sub headline, If you can boil water, slice an onion and use a strainer, you can make niku udon, a Japanese beef noodle soup that is the cookbook author’s go-to weeknight dinner.

It caught my attention because I can boil water.

It caught my attention because I can slice an onion.

It caught my attention because I can use a strainer.

I am not un-at home in the kitchen.

(Typing un-at home immediately brings to mind the once-upon-a-time 1950’s Republican created House Un-American Activities Committee, better known as HUAC … apple don’t fall far from the tree now does it, but I digress)

As I was saying, I am comfortable in the kitchen.

Give me a pack of boneless chicken thighs, spuds and some flour and in one hour I’ll conjure up a southern fried chicken dinner with mashed potatoes, biscuits and gravy that will make you cry ur eyes out it’s so good.

Honor bright!

Still, any recipe that starts off with if you can boil water is a recipe for me.

But as I read through the recipe it was evident quickly that If you can boil water, slice an onion and use a strainer, you can make niku udon was not exactly the case.

Turns out that Mr. Kenji López-Alt is a renowned chef.

According to Wikipedia, … often known simply as Kenji, is an American chef and food writer. His first book, The Food Lab: Better Home Cooking Through Science, became a critical and commercial success, charting on the New York Times Bestseller list and winning the 2016 James Beard Foundation Award for the best General Cooking cookbook.

This is not to say that you need a superior skill set beyond boiling, slicing and straining.

What you DO NEED though is a fridge full of leftovers and other supplies not found in my kitchen.

The skill set to boil water, slice an onion and use a strainer is not in question.

But what you boil, what you slice like an onion and what you strain is.

I grew in Grand Rapids, Michigan and once I tried to make the signature soup at a local restaurant. Charley’s Crab, called Charley’s Chowder.

I drove all over Grand Rapids looking for clam juice.

Then I relocated to Atlanta, Georgia.

Little known fact about Atlanta is that is one of the largest Korean cities in the world and they have the Korean stores to prove it.

They have H Mart, the Korean version of Walmart.

If you can cook it, you can find it at H Mart.

Now I live in the low country of South Carolina.

It isn’t Podunk.

To get here, you go to Podunk and turn left.

I am, at this moment, working the local Kroger to carry Black Cherry Kool Aid, the best flavor of chemical created non-fruit related beverages ever developed by the laboratories of General Foods.

If I can’t black cherry koolaid in my neighborhood, chances don’t look good for the other ingredients.

The article admits this.

The writer states “For a dish that’s so technically easy, finding ingredients like kiriotoshi outside Japan is the biggest barrier to entry.“

Kiriotoshi?

I kept reading past this to find if there was some other easy secret to this dish.

It has to be simple somewhere along the line if Kenji López-Alt makes this for his family for dinner.

Then I hit the line, Finding fresh udon can be an impossible task for many people, even in major cities.

I mean this is a dish, I imagine, that after a long day in the food lab, Mr. Kenji López-Alt looks at the wife and says, I am so tired. Is it okay if I whip up a pot of niku udon and just go to bed?

Finding fresh udon can be impossible for many people!

Oh

Please tell me the people who CAN find fresh udon and we can go from there.

Why doesn’t the headline read If you can find some udon, boil water, slice an onion and use a strainer, you can make niku udon?

Finding fresh udon can be impossible for many people, for me is metaphor of today.

I think as I go forward into this year and I watch the news and read the headlines, I will say to myself, yes and finding fresh udon can be impossible for many people!

Anyone else remember Steve Martin’s claim you could make a million dollars (back when that was a lot of money) and not pay any taxes?

It starts with “First, make a million dollars. Then …”*

At least I know what a million dollars is.

Even if I was in Atlanta and could walk into H Mart, I don’t know what udon is.

Finding fresh udon can be impossible for many people.

No kidding.