• For savory breakfast types

    Eureka! I finally discovered a good use for whey left over from yogurt-making. Add it to the pot when cooking steel-cut oatmeal. Makes for a delicious tangy breakfast. (BTW, the soft-boiled egg and s.c. oatmeal combo is dynamite.) 🍳

  • Fellowship - Christian Wiman
    Tragedy and Christianity are incommensurable,
    he declared, which we’d have chalked to bluster
    had he not, within the month, held a son
    hot from the womb but cold to his kiss,
    and over a coffin compact as a toolbox wept
    in the wrecked unreachable way that most resist,
    and that all of us, where we are most ourselves,
    turn away from.
                                  Bonded and islanded 
    by the silence, we waited there,
    desperate, with our own pains, to believe,
    desperate, with our own pains, not to.
    
  • Hope Springs... You Know

    Started tomato plants by seed today in the garage. Will use grow lights when (if) they sprout, then repot, then into the ground come Spring. Never tried doing it this way before. Fingers crossed.

  • Lovely Breakfast Companion
    a pink amaryllis flower in a vase. 📷
  • from The Great Good Place by Ray Oldenburg /
    ... the third place tavern combines drinking with conversation such that each improves the other. The talking/drinking synergism is basic to the pub, tavern, taverna, bistro, saloon, estaminet, osteria -- whatever it is called and wherever it is found... [J]ust as conversation is enhanced by the temperate use of alcohol, the artful and witty game of conversation moderates consumption of liquor. As Tibor Scitovsky remarked with respect to those who know how to use a public drinking facility, "a half-pint of beer is to talk as bed is to making love -- one can do without, but does better with.”
  • My Turf Club / Tuxedo Cocktail No. 2
    • .75 oz Old Tom Gin
    • .75 oz London Dry Gin (Tanq or Beefeater)
    • 1.5 oz dry vermouth (I prefer Dolin)
    • .25 oz Luxardo liqueur (worth having around for other classic cocktails, such as the Aviation)
    • 2 dashes anise liqueur (absininthe, pernod, etc.)
    • 2 dashes orange bitters
    • 2 dashes Angostura bitters
    • lemon twist garnish (important!)
    So beautifully balanced. [chef's kiss emoji goes here.]
  • Not a bad mission statement /

    “We aim to humanize those who have been objectified.”
       – Jessie Kornberg, Director, Skirball Cultural Center, Los Angeles

  • London's East End in the Last Century
    From the wonderful Spitalfields Life: "In the seventies, while living in Mile End Place ... photographer Philip Cunningham took these tender portraits of his friends and colleagues."


    📷
  • sunny colorful
    a sunny interior of a house with bright blue and orange fabric on furniture

    📷

  • Because You Asked about the Line Between Prose and Poetry
    - Howard Nemerov
    Sparrows were feeding in a freezing drizzle
    That while you watched turned to pieces of snow
    Riding a gradient invisible
    From silver aslant to random, white, and slow.
    
    There came a moment that you couldn’t tell.
    And then they clearly flew instead of fell.
    
  • Whatever Happens This Year /
    I have said these things to you, that in me you may have peace.
    In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart; I have overcome the world.
  • At the coffee shop
    turquoise-colored chest with decorative wood work and plants on top 📷
  • Third Places
    American suburbs provide an excess of privacy, but deny proximity to those places upon which a community life depends.

    Ray Oldenberg, The Great Good Place

  • For 2024

    Ten days in, my theme for 2024 is: “Be attentive”:

    • Pay attention to what I pay attention to, and jettison stuff that doesn’t pay back with value.
    • Improve focus on stuff that is valuable. (Takes practice!)
    • Be attentive and responsive (or least present) to others.

    (NB: They all take practice.)

  • from Symmetries & Asymmetries - W.H. Auden
    Could any tiger
    Drink martinis, smoke cigars,
    And last as we do?
    

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