(no subject)

Today, in a fit of boredom, I hot-smoked some chicken thighs.

(As opposed to the roast-with-smoke I did before. In short, this time I brined the bone-in, skin-on thighs with orange juice, lit the gas grill on one burner only [on high], put the packet of woodchips over that burner, put the chicken on the farthest side away from the heat, and let it cook, very slowly, for hours and hours and hours, well past 'well done.' This was perfectly tolerable even with the high heat because, of course, the grill was outside. The thighs turned very tender and very smoky-flavored indeed.)

(When I have a smoking method more precise than 'throw some stuff on the grill and see what happens,' I'll post more comprehensively about it.)

Neither the boy or I are hungry tonight for anything but maybe ice cream, and we're pretty well covered for dinners until Sunday or Monday, so I'll ask now: what would you do with some homemade fruitwood-smoked chicken thigh meat? Inquiring minds want to know!

on mathematics

I have a lot of people on my friendslist who like math and appreciate the beauty of mathematics. I would like to appreciate the beauty of math too! This is a gradual change for me, because through high school I haaaaaaaaaated math, and I was positively gleeful when I got to college because my major and minor of choice required no math classes whatsoever. (I could fulfill that part of my general education requirements with either math or science GEs, and so I went with biology, mostly. Biology and paleontology.)

Anyway.

Here's my background in math, in case it helps. (I get long-winded.) The reason I haaaaaaaated math was that I was no good at arithmetic. (I can hear you all saying, as has been said to me before, 'but arithmetic isn't all there is to math!' I know. Bear with me.) This started all the way back in, like, first grade, and it started because while I have an excellent memory, I am bad at memorization. (They're not the same skill at all, in my opinion.) I remember, distinctly, being tested to find out what math group I should be in toward the beginning of first grade, and being asked 2+3, and then being penalized for counting on my fingers, because I should have had it memorized. I remember, a year later, being so bad at timed multiplication tests that they actually tested me to find out if I had a learning disability. (I didn't; I turned out to be gifted, with no learning disability in math and in fact a very good grasp of the theory behind multiplication and etc. I was just not good at memorizing multiplication tables.) That sort of set the tone for everything: I wasn't much good at memorizing multiplication tables, and I wasn't meticulous enough, and so even though I had no problem with the concepts, I struggled a lot with the arithmetic.

The problem is that if you're not so good at arithmetic, you'll have trouble in pre-algebra; if you're not so good at pre-algebra, you'll have trouble in algebra; and if you're not so good in algebra, you'll have trouble with... everything. By the time we were allowed to use calculators in Algebra II, it was too late: my association with math classes was that they were the classes in which I could totally understand the material and study for the test and still get not-so-good grades because I made arithmetical errors. And that's probably fair, because you actually do need to be able to calculate as well as understand the material, but it put me off the whole topic.

I actually got As in math in high school, partly because yay for graphic calculators, and I did trigonometry (I actually rather liked geometry and trig) and calculus, but I didn't enjoy it: because I had associations that math was the classes where I'd get poor grades without knowing why or how to fix it, they were the classes I liked the least and feared the most, even though by this point I did reliably well at them, and I was relieved to be done with the whole topic when I got to college.

However.

Reading the posts of mathy people on my flist, and having mathy friends in my discipline (being a technical writer means I spend time around lots of mathy types), makes it clear to me that I Missed Something in my desperate attempt to flee arithmetic and its descendants.

So. If you were to recommend a course of math study to an adult who still loathes arithmetic but wants to learn more about the rest of mathematics, what would you recommend? Any particular books? Where would you start?

I would love to learn more.

(Feel free to link your mathy friends to this post, if you think they might have ideas. although not if you think they will mock my lack of arithmetical prowess, because then I will a) ask how their medieval Welsh is these days, and b) bite their faces. ahem.)

Friday Poetry Blogging

It's Shakespeare, and it's a cliche, but the man could turn a beautiful phrase. I won't pretend he was without problems (hello, Taming of the Shrew! hello, The Merchant of Venice!), but I love this piece from Henry V as pure poetry, and also for its commentary on the limitations of art and the commensurate powers of imagination.

O for a Muse of fire, that would ascend
The brightest heaven of invention,
A kingdom for a stage, princes to act
And monarchs to behold the swelling scene!
Then should the warlike Harry, like himself,
Assume the port of Mars; and at his heels,
Leash'd in like hounds, should famine, sword and fire
Crouch for employment. But pardon, and gentles all,
The flat unraised spirits that have dared
On this unworthy scaffold to bring forth
So great an object: can this cockpit hold
The vasty fields of France? or may we cram
Within this wooden O the very casques
That did affright the air at Agincourt?
O, pardon! since a crooked figure may
Attest in little place a million;
And let us, ciphers to this great accompt,
On your imaginary forces work.
Suppose within the girdle of these walls
Are now confined two mighty monarchies,
Whose high upreared and abutting fronts
The perilous narrow ocean parts asunder:
Piece out our imperfections with your thoughts;
Into a thousand parts divide on man,
And make imaginary puissance;
Think when we talk of horses, that you see them
Printing their proud hoofs i' the receiving earth;
For 'tis your thoughts that now must deck our kings,
Carry them here and there; jumping o'er times,
Turning the accomplishment of many years
Into an hour-glass: for the which supply,
Admit me Chorus to this history;
Who prologue-like your humble patience pray,
Gently to hear, kindly to judge, our play.

               - William Shakespeare

(no subject)

So the boy and I were watching Chopped (a cooking contest show where the cooks have to make dishes incorporating a variety of items from a basket) a few weeks ago, and one of the items in the basket was rhubarb. One of the chefs said, "Of course, with rhubarb, you have to peel it, and that takes time."

The boy and I looked at each other.

"I never peel rhubarb," I said, "and neither did my mom."

But my curiosity, it was piqued!

Poll #3766

Open to: Registered Users, detailed results viewable to: All, participants: 12

View Respondents

Do you peel rhubarb before you cook it?

View Answers

Of course not, why would you?
6 (50.0%)

No
0 (0.0%)

Sometimes, depending
3 (25.0%)

Yes
0 (0.0%)

Of course I do, why wouldn't you?
0 (0.0%)

I don't cook with rhubarb
3 (25.0%)

I don't cook at all
0 (0.0%)

I don't eat, I photosynthesize
0 (0.0%)

I would like to complain about this poll
0 (0.0%)

(no subject)

So the boy and I were watching Chopped (a cooking contest show where the cooks have to make dishes incorporating a variety of items from a basket) a few weeks ago, and one of the items in the basket was rhubarb. One of the chefs said, "Of course, with rhubarb, you have to peel it, and that takes time."

The boy and I looked at each other.

"I never peel rhubarb," I said, "and neither did my mom."

But my curiosity, it was piqued!

[Poll #1590276]