Happy Buy Nothing Day!

I hope everyone had a lovely Thanksgiving. We sure did! Great food, great booze, great company. Our hosts handled most of the cooking, so we just contributed four items: a green bean casserole, mulled wine (the Admiral's concoction), a pumpkin pie (the tried and true Joy of Cooking recipe) with fresh whipped cream, and a fabulous persimmon cake. The latter is adapted from a recipe called "Fuyu Bundt Cake" that I dug up online last year when we kept getting persimmons in the box from our CSA. The source attributes the recipe to an old Sunset magazine. I wouldn't be surprised, since I've found all the Sunset recipes I've tried to be absolutely delicious. (Did you see the Cranberry Obsession Snow Cake on the cover of the last issue? It looks awesome. I am *so* making that for Christmas.) I'm going to go ahead and post my version of the persimmon cake recipe below.

But first, a word about Buy Nothing Day. I've soured on Adbusters magazine because of their insistence on holding up fat people as symbols of our society's insatiable appetite for energy and consumer goods. But I still acknowledge that they've had some good ideas over the years -- one of them being (in my opinion) Buy Nothing Day. The idea is that on the day after Thanksgiving, instead of running out to Wal-Mart and participating in the orgy of pre-Christmas spending (at the risk of getting trampled), we should commit to going 24 hours without spending a dime. This way, we basically drop out of the economy for a day and we don't contribute to this one big day of retail sales that adds to everybody's crushing credit card debt and basically keeps our unsustainable way of life going for another year. Adbusters suggests some protests that you can stage to celebrate Buy Nothing Day -- for example, you can go to a mall with a pair of scissors and offer to cut up people's credit cards. Another idea that wasn't necessarily suggested by Adbusters, but which they endorsed after the fact, was a mass vomit where people went to a mall and took ipecac and all barfed in unison. That seems a bit extreme to me and I'm not sure there was a direct connection to Buy Nothing Day. I think it had to do with eating as a metaphor for consumption in general, and therefore barfing as a rejection of consumption; but really I think the idea was to gross out the customers so they would leave and not buy as much (unfortunately, the only guaranteed consequence was that some mall employee had to clean up the barf, but I guess a hard-core Culture Jammer might argue that a mall employee is a cog in the wheel and therefore deserves to have to clean up barf, or something like that). So anyway, all this is to say that although I'm not participating in any protests, I'm also not buying anything today. Instead, I'll just stay home and get some reading done, and eat some leftover persimmon cake. And now, on to that recipe.

Persmimmon Bundt Cake

5 fuyu persimmons, peeled and chopped (it's crucial to get fuyus b/c hachiyas can be tart if they aren't ripe)
2 t. baking soda
1 stick butter, softened
1 2/3 c. sugar
2 eggs
2 t. lemon juice
2 t. vanilla
2 c. flour
1 t. baking powder
1 t. salt
1 t. ground cloves
1 t. cinnamon
1/2 t. ground nutmeg
powdered sugar

Grease and flour a bundt cake pan.

Preheat oven to 350.

Blend baking soda with chopped fuyus (this can be done in a blender). Set aside.

In a large bowl, beat butter with sugar. Add eggs, lemon juice, and vanilla, and beat until fluffy.

Stir in fuyu mix.

In a separate bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, salt, ground cloves, cinnamon, and nutmeg.

Stir flour mixture into fuyu mixture until just blended.

Spoon mixture into prepared bundt pan. Bake at 350 for 45 minutes or until toothpick tests clean.

Cool in pan 15 minutes. Turn onto serving plate (preferably a dark-colored one).

Put some powdered sugar into a small strainer and, holding it over the cake, tap the edge of it to create an even dusting of sugar over the top of the cake and the plate.

Eat!

Why, oh why, didn't I take a picture of the cake yesterday? It was so pretty. Oh well, anyway, here's a picture of a fuyu persimmon. This is the kind you want; hachiyas are longer and pointier at the bottom.

It's time for another episode of...

Spot The Cliche!

How many can you count in this CNN article?

Sorry for the lack of posts lately -- I've just been busy. More soon.

Yay! But... ack!

It's been almost a week since the election, and I still feel happy and glowy. About most of what happened, anyway. Not this so much. At least Ohio came through, as promised.

But here's a question: will President Obama be proactive about taking care of this little problem? This is some scary stuff, people...

Cookies

It's no secret that I love cookies. You've all seen my mom's sugar cookie recipe (scroll to the bottom), and if you've had the pleasure of trying it, you must know that my family and I are not fucking around when it comes to cookies. Hell, I even had the nickname "Cookie" when I was in the marching band, back in the day.

But now I am here to tell you that cookies hold the key to our future. Just check out the results of the Busken presidential cookie poll. Busken is a bakery in Cincinnati that makes cookies with each candidate's face on them every election season (FYI, they do ship, though I don't know whether you can still order in time for election day), and according to this post, the Busken poll has correctly predicted the winner in Ohio in every election since 1984. Which is significant enough in its own right, but remember also that Ohio has gone for the winner of every presidential election since 1960. Yes, people, Ohio went for Bill Clinton both times, so quit acting like it will be such a miracle if Obama wins it too.

Returning to my earlier point about family pride, I just wanted to share the fact that my parents are both working for Obama in Ohio. On Monday my mom is going to go to the homes of people who've said they're for Obama to encourage them to vote and give them flyers with information about their polling locations and hours. And on Sunday my dad is going to go around to the local churches to see if anyone is putting nasty flyers on people's windshields during church (and, if so, to take them off). This is actually just his own idea (not organized by the Obama campaign) inspired by the fact that in 2004, the Bush campaign someone who I'm sure was acting alone and had nothing to do with the Bush campaign went to my mom's church the Sunday before the election and flyered everyone's windshields with a bunch of extremely nasty anti-Kerry flyers with gross lies and smears about how he's a baby-killer. That kind of crap worked last time, but it's not going to work this time.

Cookies, people. Cookies!

A cure for Depression?

Nifty article here by Steve Almond (author of Candyfreak, which I highly recommend) on "recession gardens" (soon to be upgraded to "depression gardens" if Sarah Palin is to be believed -- though I'd argue she isn't to be believed about much of anything).

The Admiral and I were just talking yesterday about whether people could (or *would*) grow enough food in their gardens to make a dent in their monthly grocery expenditures. I was thinking no, because I've been discouraged this year by the ratio of effort to yield in our own garden (we got some great stuff out of it, but not in large quantities, and lots of stuff either never sprouted or got eaten by birds and/or grasshoppers). It was so hot this summer that we had to water the garden every day, and even then some things clearly did not get enough water, and if we ever forgot or watered too late, things died. All things considered, though, we were pretty on top of things, so I was thinking that others who weren't willing to be as diligent about the garden or didn't know as much about growing stuff as we did (which admittedly isn't a ton, though I do pretty well with houseplants when I apply myself) would fare even worse.

But Almond's story is encouraging. He didn't know anything about gardening, but he was motivated by the high cost of groceries to research it and to get help and advice from others who do know about gardening to get his garden going. In the end, the garden was highly successful and yielded a whole lot of good stuff. He did admit that his house is on land that used to be farmland. But still, with enough compost and whatnot, anybody's yard ought to be able to produce *something*. So now I'm inspired. I'm thinking that next time we just need to (a) rent a rototiller, (b) install a drip system (we never got around to setting up our soaker hose, but people tell me they don't work that great anyway), (c) put up some nets around our tomatoes and maybe over the seeds to keep the birds out, and (d) think of some non-poisonous way to get rid of those damn grasshoppers.

In ironic twist, animal advocacy organization beats dead horse

You guys are going to love this Newsweek article by Karen Springen about "flexitarians". Are we still seriously having a debate about whether it would be good if everyone reduced their meat consumption? Well, no, actually, *we* aren't having that debate -- *we* concluded a long time ago that of course it would be a good thing. *PETA*, on the other hand (as well as VegNews, I might add, but I'm not gonna go there today), isn't so sure. Their spokesperson thinks that being a flexitarian is like "pouring a pint of gasoline down a drain." Um... how's that?

Fortunately in the end Springen seems to come down on the side of common sense, despite giving a disturbing amount of space (and the subtitle of the article) to the PETA side. But on the topic of that subtitle ("Advocates call it flexitarianism, but critics say being a little bit vegetarian is like being a little bit pregnant"), a commenter on the original Newsweek post rightly points out that the analogy to pregnancy completely misses the whole point of the "little bit pregnant" concept -- namely, that it is *literally* impossible to be a little bit pregnant -- it's not just impossible if you're some asshole from PETA and you assert that pregnancy has to be an all-or-nothing thing. Of course, we don't know if the PETA asshole is the one who brought up the pregnancy idea or if it was Springen or just some moron headline writer.

But we do know that Springen is an unthinking zombie in at least one respect, namely, FAT = BAD... WEIGHT LOSS = GOOD... ARTICLE ABOUT FOOD MUST FIND WAY TO WORK IN REFERENCES TO WEIGHT LOSS AND "OBESITY"... Not just any reference to "obesity", mind you, but even better: "globesity"! For those who haven't heard of "globesity" before, this is the idea of "obesity" as a worldwide epidemic. You know, like that super-scary "obesity epidemic" we've all heard about, but even scarier! Because it's global! Get it? Global + obesity = globesity! This charming concept is mentioned in the article as a topic in a forthcoming book by Mark Bittman, which apparently discusses "how our diet affects global warming and 'globesity'." Is Bittman (and/or Springen) actually putting "globesity" on a par with global warming as a problem facing the world? Wow. I mean, wow.

Before a troll lumbers over here to inform me that "obesity" is in fact a serious health problem and I am responsible for it because I am spreading all these lies about how it's OK to be fat, let me just say that I don't deny we have a serious worldwide problem with food production and distribution, such that a lot of people in developing countries who aren't starving still can't eat a healthy diet, and that no doubt leads to a whole ton of serious health problems including diabetes, high blood pressure, heart disease, etc. that are often what people have in mind when they refer to "obesity". But can we please, please just take fat out of it? Plenty of thin people have health problems caused or exacerbated by diet, and plenty of fat people don't have health problems at all and have a good diet. Guess what? There are even fat vegetarians. I know that's a shocker, so I'll just let that sink in for a second.

Got it? OK, good. Back to the PETA thing. I just want to say one last thing, which is that no good ever came out of a "purity" movement. I don't know if these PETA fucks truly believe that reducing meat consumption isn't something to work for or feel good about, but they sure sound convincing when they say it. I guess to them, the protection of animals from human exploitation is the very most important thing -- even more important than saving the planet from global warming (which, btw, is killing a lot of animals...). These are the same people who wring their hands over whether it is OK to eat honey since it exploits bees. They shouldn't be taken seriously. If you're a meat eater and you're thinking about reducing your meat intake, do it. If it helps to give yourself a label like "flexitarian" or even "vegetarian", do it. There are a lot more important things than taking what PETA considers to be the high road.

Even people who get it don't get it

Saw this article in the LA Times today and got encouraged, then read the article and got unencouraged.

In a nutshell: Mary McNamara has just noticed that TV actresses are, like, really thin (no, like *really* thin!) (no, seriously, you guys!), and it's bothering her because it's interfering with her viewing pleasure.

I do think it's good to point out the very extreme average thinness of TV actresses as sort of a reality check, to guard against young women thinking that size 2 is the norm. Too bad they seem to get that idea anyway. But that's OK, according to Mary McNamara, because the thinness of TV actresses doesn't contribute to eating disorders. Her evidence? "We are in the midst of a childhood obesity epidemic." Oh. But, I mean, isn't it possible that there's still a real issue here and that we could start to alleviate some of the societal pressures leading young women to develop a poor body image if we had some size diversity on TV (and not just via fat villains, but maybe some real, complex, sympathetic characters in a range of different shapes and sizes)? Apparently not, according to Mary McNamara; after all, "even the Gap carries size 16 nowadays". Thanks a lot for your insightful analysis, Mary.

A lot of people don't seem to understand that insulting thin people isn't really helpful, in much the same way that insulting fat people is also unhelpful. In this article you get insults a-plenty. You get adjectives like "horrifyingly thin" and "frightening," lame cliches, and nuggets like this: "The ladies of 'Desperate Housewives' are so far gone in terms of resembling humans that it's almost laughable to mention them." Yes, the women mentioned in the article are extremely thin. But there's no need for insults. And furthermore, some LA Times reporter has no idea (and no business speculating) on whether a person has an eating disorder. Yes, you might say, but so many actresses are thin that it can't be a coincidence, so they must have eating disorders! Well, some of them undoubtedly do. But let's not forget that very thin women are more likely to get TV roles than larger women. That doesn't mean the thin women all have eating disorders -- there's an element of biased selection going on as well. Correlation does not equal causation. You've heard it here before, folks.

But getting to the main premise of the Times article (I think), the big problem with super-thin actresses is that Mary McNamara isn't enjoying 90210 as much as she would like to, because she is too distracted by the thinness. I'm just going to put an idea out here, as an avid watcher of an awesome show with an awesome lead actress who happens to be really thin (season finale tonight on USA; be there or be square): Maybe Mary McNamara finds it difficult to "concentrate on the drama of the story" on 90210 because 90210 sucks.

You know how sometimes you just don't like a person, and then only later do you figure out why?

I haven't really commented much on the presidential race here, mostly because I haven't been all that excited about it. My candidate from the beginning was Dennis Kucinich, and since he dropped out of the race before the California Democratic primary, I didn't even bother voting. I leaned towards Obama because Hillary voted for the war, but didn't really care which of them ended up with the nomination. After Obama voted for the FISA bill in July, I was pissed off but figured I'd probably vote for him in November anyway, given the alternatives. I did enjoy the Democratic convention -- especially Bill Clinton's speech, but also Obama's, which I thought was really good though somewhat lacking in specifics. But the thing that is finally starting to get me fired up about Obama (and the reason I'm posting about it) is the Republicans, and in particular, Sarah Palin.

In a nutshell: she sucks. She's super anti-choice, doesn't believe in evolution, and is pro-drilling. Worse, she is nasty, sarcastic, and smug. I can't even bring myself to watch her convention speech because the clips I've been have been so deeply offensive -- of particular note would be the crack against community organizers, and her blatant lie about saying "thanks but no thanks" to the "bridge to nowhere" (in fact, she supported it very publicly). There's nothing in her record to suggest she has any business being vice president, and yet she actually has the gall to question Obama's qualifications. When I first heard that she was McCain's running mate, I was reminded of Harriet Miers -- here's some random woman who's super right-wing, totally unqualified for the job, and pretty obviously chosen because she's a woman. But now that I've seen how people are reacting to her speech, I'm thinking she's more like Dick Cheney to McCain's Bush. It's like a wink and a nod from McCain -- don't worry, I have to keep saying this "maverick" bullshit to attract independent voters, but now that I've chosen my VP you can be reassured as to what kind of president I'll be. And unfortunately it looks like it may be working.

But something else was bugging me about Sarah Palin and her fans, apart from her obnoxious speech, and it had to do with her kids. For one thing, she is having her cake and eating it too -- in order to deflect attention from her pregnant teenage daughter, she says people's kids shouldn't be made into a political issue, but then she flat-out *used* the announcement of her daughter's pregnancy to quiet a rumor that threatened to undermine her image of integrity (to the extent she had an image at all). And I don't know how much she's said this explicitly herself, but she is certainly benefitting from all the talk about how great it is that she chose to bear her fifth child to term after finding out he had Down syndrome (here is one nauseating example), and nobody can deny that she's used him as a prop. The Daily Show had an awesome bit last night with Samantha Bee with commentary on how hypocritical it is to praise Palin for making this particular choice when she wants the government to prevent women from having any "choice" at all. But there's another troubling issue here, and Sweet Machine has an awesome piece that puts into words what I was feeling, over at Shakesville. A summary: all this rhetoric about Palin's "choice" is blatantly ableist because it assumes that a child with Down syndrome is inferior and a terrible burden for a parent to bear, so any woman who chooses not to have an abortion "even" if she knows the child has Down syndrome is obviously some kind of saint. I won't go into any more detail, because you should just go over and read Sweet Machine's post.