Friday Rattle Bag

• My taste in sushi is childlike, so bear with me, but: excitement! My local Japanese "fusion" joint (sort of pan-Asian, with a big dose of Cocktailian and thumping techno) makes my favorite sushi, kappa maki, in a way that turns out to improve on it tremendously. Which makes sense, as it is very simple, so differences loom large. I love plain cucumber maki, but have always found it a little unwieldy, with the nori/wrapping tension on the outside helping the insides to shift precipitously and hurry the eating--not experience the cucumber--the way I want to. This place makes kappa maki with the rice on the outside--sort of like this photo. I don't know if it's kosher or not (uramaki [?] style I mean, for just cucumber), but I've never seen vegetable maki made like this. The cucumber is cut very small, and the sushi pieces themselves are not too thick, so the whole thing has better physics: it falls apart more sensibly in your mouth, and the sesame seeds on the outside are the perfect touch. And the cucumber/rice ratio is better this way too. A small thing, but delicious. I had two orders of it with some chicken gyoza yesterday for lunch, and it made me hum.

• Air & Water Show is on this weekend. How weird (as ever) to live with the sound of jets and booming technology overhead and be so blase.

• I'm sure it's been remarked upon before, but it's interesting to watch Doris Day's first film and the snappy, Ginger Rogers-y character she plays--so different from all the various later Doris incarnations--especially as she sings "Put Em in a Box," which I think she debuted in this film, and directly references a song that would be the title of a later film of hers. It has a funny feel, to almost see her commenting on future Doris:

You know what to do
With good old "Tea for Two"
And the girl for you, the boy for me
Put 'em in a box
Tie it with a ribbon
Throw 'em in the deep blue sea
'Cause love and I we don't agree

• Martha Stewart Living seems to have discovered the Midwest (from a design POV). Tis interesting to watch.

• Success: Makeshift pasta sauce using a knob (MFK) of Irish butter, a small amount of white cheddar, pepper, and a decent spoonful of Dijon mustard to help the non-emulsifying dairy emulsify. I heated the mixture in the bowl (mostly over the boiling pasta water itself), stirring often, then added a fair amount of whole wheat spaghetti. YUM. It had a sort of carbonara-like feel. I really like pasta dishes that aren't heavily sauced and let you taste the pasta--this was about the perfect ratio and a good match for the whole grain.

• Fav King of the Hill character these days: Ted Wasonasong. He makes me so happy.

• The word "literally" is being misused to the point of no recognition (exaggeration inflation management!), but abused in an even worse way is "iconic." OH MY GOD! It's used constantly, in every possible medium, relevant or not. ICONIC ICONIC ICONIC. This has a wild effect on the word itself, as it seems to be employed to mean "important"/"pay attention to this"/"whitecaps in a media tsunami"/whatever, and any literal (hah) or relational meaning it might have is diffused. It's just...feeb. All this over-codifying. I can't explain this right, but oooongh! (is the point)

• I am more or less a whole-hearted believer in integrative medicine, but some part of me can't help noting that the main functional difference between it and conventional medicine might just be lighting. Either the absence of serious flourescent lighting or a delay until it appears in the examination process.

• Unbelievably delicious: Stephanie Blythe's version of the cards scene from Carmen. My current goofy high-repetition yootoob opera-snippet. Her control and smoothness in the "en vain pour eviter les reponses ameres"...cor! Heartbreaking.