Next time you get asked to do an encore, come back onstage and say "gosh, we didn't prepare anything for you guys... I don't know what you want to see but, oh, what the hell, here you go..." and then chuck a beer bottle at somebody's head.
He also took pre-submitted written questions, which I've seen done before, but also which he did well. (My last-minute question was "Tacos or Burritos? And why") (Answer: "Tacos. Soft Tacos. Because they're delicious.")
Good times.
Aren't soft tacos basically just unrolled burritos?
3: That's between you and Mike Doughty.
I'm just sayin'. Sounds like he's taking the easy way out. Splitting the difference.
Next up: 300 angry comments about tacos!
My position on Mike Doughty is that if all his songs sound like they took fifteen minutes to write, which they do, he should either release five albums a year, or get back together with those guys who made his songs sound less predictable with the tape loops and Luscious Jackson drum machines and whatnot.
8: Okay, but tacos. How do you feel about tacos?
I used to hate soft tacos, or rather I hated the idea of them. They offended me to the depths of my soul. Then I tried them. They're not bad, but I still prefer crunchy tacos.
Bob Weston took questions from the audience at two (2) discrete points at the Shellac concert I went to. It was pretty amusing.
Yeah, I actually don't mind soft tacos, but they're definitely different from hard tacos, to the extent that I'm not really sure they should be given the same name.
Soft tacos are the only real tacos, and they're nothing at all like an unrolled burrito.
13: So if you roll them up, what do you have?
I am among the angry 300. What is wrong with you people? I thought Teo and eb were supposedly reliable informants about the Southwest? Hard-shell tacos and burritos -- are you secretly from Cleveland?
Also, Mike Doughty is the only rock star with whom I have a close personal connection, but to reveal more would totally kill whatever shreds of anonymity I have left.
You can't roll up a soft taco. It is too laden down with ingestibles.
Soft tacos are the only real tacos
This.
eb were supposedly reliable informants about the Southwest
That's never been true.
In New Mexico tacos at regular Mexican restaurants are always hard. You can now get soft tacos at some Mexican-seafood type places, but when I was growing up the only place that offered them was Taco Bell, and the ones there really are just unrolled burritos. California Mexican food and New Mexican food are actually very different.
16.2: You could e-mail me directly and tell me all about it. I'd be impressed and whoa'd, while staying mum. stanleysparks at the google email service. (The unfogged one seems unreliable.)
I can't see the name "Mike Doughty" without thinking of one song in a particular context, which means I've spent way too much time watching a certain TV show.
In New Mexico tacos at regular Mexican restaurants are always hard. You can now get soft tacos at some Mexican-seafood type places
Wacky! I've had soft tacos in multiple places in Santa Fe, but maybe they were in the "Mexican-seafood" category. I guess they were mostly fish tacos.
The most disgusting tacos I've ever had were soggy, not soft per se, and sealed at the top with melted, no longer liquid, cheese. But I pretty much hate melted cheese in nearly all its forms (exception being on pizza, former exception being grilled cheese sandwiches).
to reveal more would totally kill whatever shreds of anonymity I have left
Dude, you comment under what I presume is your actual name. Lowercasing the first letters doesn't really work as an anonymization strategy.
In New Mexico tacos at regular Mexican restaurants are always hard
I find this astonishing. Are you talking about New Mexico, or Faux Mexico?
When did fish tacos become a thing? I stopped eating tacos completely for a long time - replaced by burritos - and then, when I couldn't keep eating just burritos anymore, noticed that fish tacos seemed to be everywhere. Did I just miss them before? Also, when did Chipotle become popular?
(Also, have you heard of Michelle Shocked? I haven't.)
I've had soft tacos in multiple places in Santa Fe, but maybe they were in the "Mexican-seafood" category. I guess they were mostly fish tacos.
If they were fish tacos, then yeah, those were definitely not traditional New Mexican restaurants. (Was one of them this place?) Traditional New Mexican cuisine does not include fish.
New Mexico is a thousand miles from the ocean, people. People in New Mexico don't each much fish.
(Not that soft tacos are necessarily fish tacos, but they seem to go together a lot.)
There's a "new" Mexico now? Is that near Canada, all tucked away down there?
I pretty much hate melted cheese in nearly all its forms (exception being on pizza, former exception being grilled cheese sandwiches).
Hey, me too. Weird.
But soft tacos are not necessarily fish tacos. IME, softness of taco and fish content have no correlation.
Pwned, and then kind of unpwned.
27: Yeah, it seems like Mexican seafood, with fish tacos suddenly became a big thing a few years ago. That's when soft tacos suddenly became widespread, well, everywhere, including New Mexico.
But soft tacos are not necessarily fish tacos. IME, softness of taco and fish content have no correlation.
Yeah, I tend to think of them together because neither is part of New Mexican cuisine and they both appeared together a few years back, but point taken.
But I totally stand by the hard tacos. If you go to a Mexican restaurant in New Mexico and ask for a taco, you will get a hard taco.
Is it really possible that hard-shell tacos are authentic New Mexican food??
Ok, at least "I love Mexican food, like burritos" remains completely toolish.
And Teo, you've got another thing coming.
Hard-shell tacos and burritos are authentic New Mexican food. I guarantee.
And Teo, you've got another thing coming.
Huh. Clever.
And I distinctly remember soft tacos being presented as something new and different when I was kid. Of course, that was Taco Bell advertising, not authentic restaurants, whatever those are, but then I don't care about authenticity as much as whether I like the food I'm eating (a standard Taco Bell rarely meets, except for a while when I was a kid). The covered-in-cheese taco I had was presented as authentic, for what it's worth.
39: I've been very careful not to claim to have eaten any Mexican food.
Was one of them this place?
I don't think so, but trying to piece together the full set of restaurants I ate at during one week three and a half years ago by staring at Google Maps isn't working out so well. I can't find anything that looks like a good candidate for where I had fish tacos.
I mean, the whole concept of "authenticity" is problematic in general and especially problematic when applied to New Mexican food, given the history of New Mexico. But to the extent that there is a standard set of dishes that qualify as "real New Mexican food" hard tacos are definitely part of it. Not the mainstay by any means, and they probably don't go back more than a few decades, but definitely a part. Every place has them.
Along with hitchhiking, cowboy hats, and women dying their hair black, a distinctive feature of New Mexico life in my five-day-long experience was the soft sopaipillas, far superior to the crunchy chip-like items with which I have been familiar.
Soft tacos are what you get from all Mexican taco stands in California and, IME, in Mexico Mexico, and that's been true for at least 20 years.
Fish tacos come from the Baja coast, at least that's where I had them for the first time.
Interesting. When I think "hard taco" I think "food my mom would sometimes prepare when I was a kid, which was tasty but clearly not 'authentic'" whereas when I think "soft taco" I think "delicious thing I have eaten in divey places in SoCal frequented by Spanish-speakers, hence possibly 'authentic'". But I'm aware that "authenticity" is a tricky thing.
The taqueria four blocks from my house serves the most excellent carne asada tacos. They do not include cheese, the tortillas are soft, and they're a buck twenty-five apiece. And they're made by actual Mexicans, not the American nouveau variety.
A. How is it possible to not like melted cheese? Warm cheese, gross. (Well, unless it's a soft cheese a la Brie). But melted? Food of the gods!
B. Soft tacos seem most prevalent at more "authentic" Mexican restaurants that I've been to. In fact, I don't think I've ever had a hard taco anywhere but Taco Bell. ("Mexican" food has been sampled in CA, OR, NM, AZ, CO, UT, etc, etc but regrettably not Mexico itself.) Also, carnitas soft tacos - yum.
C. I hate encores. All that clapping!
Seafood is a huge part of Mexican cooking generally. It's not surprising, if you look at a map.
Wikipedia suggests that fish tacos pre-date the Spanish and that the hard shell taco first appeared in a cookbook published in New Mexico in 1949. Hopefully, authenticity allows for change enough for hard shell tacos in New Mexico, because it kind of sucks to say things can't change without becoming false.
Soft tacos are what you get from all Mexican taco stands in California and, IME, in Mexico Mexico, and that's been true for at least 20 years.
I have no doubt. New Mexico hasn't been part of Mexico for a long time, and New Mexican food doesn't bear much resemblance to what you would get in Mexico itself or in restaurants or foodcarts in the US run by immigrants from Mexico.
Seafood is a huge part of Mexican cooking generally. It's not surprising, if you look at a map.
Similarly, and for the same reason, it's not a part of New Mexican cooking at all.
Authentic Chinese fortune cookies have a soft shell. And the paper is made of rice paste so you have to be very careful or you'll eat your fortune without ever learning it!
52: Interesting. Assuming that's correct, it means hard tacos are not only authentic in New Mexico, but that they probably originated there. I hadn't known that, but it makes sense.
I think I'm too cranky from being sleep-deprived.
Along with hitchhiking, cowboy hats, and women dying their hair black, a distinctive feature of New Mexico life in my five-day-long experience was the soft sopaipillas, far superior to the crunchy chip-like items with which I have been familiar.
Yeah, sopaipillas are great. I wouldn't say they're anything like chips aside from being fried, though.
"Fabiola Cabeza de Vaca Gilbert" is an excellent name.
New Mexican food is pretty amazing, at least based on my few days in Alb., and also seemingly unavailable elsewhere. You'd think that there would be a market for a good New Mexican restaurant in NY, LA, or SF, but I've never heard of one.
Authentic Chinese fortune cookies
Probably a thread unto itself, but I got a fortune cookie the other day that read, "You laugh now, but wait until you get home."
I think there is one in LA, halford. I just need to remember the name. I'll get back to you in a few years, probably after it is closed.
I had some really highly inauthentic tacos at this place.
61: That's awesome. The New York Times had an article a while back, that we may have discussed somewhere in the archives, claiming that the fortune cookie started in Japan, which may be true as a first origins claim, but the article made it clear that it really became a big thing starting in the U.S.
You'd think that there would be a market for a good New Mexican restaurant in NY, LA, or SF, but I've never heard of one.
I think part of this is that there are so few people who are familiar with it (NM being a small, isolated state), and another part is probably that it's so heavily based on green chile, which would be hard to get in sufficient quantities elsewhere.
California, Texas, and Mexico, on the other hand, have huge populations, and their forms of Mexican food don't tend to use too many uniquely local ingredients (and if they do, immigrant populations elsewhere are often large enough to support specialty stores to import them), so you see versions of them all over the place.
I wonder if the Oriental Mexican Fish Market and Video Store I saw in the Long Beach are about 15-20 years ago still exists.
I think part of this is that there are so few people who are familiar with it (NM being a small, isolated state), and another part is probably that it's so heavily based on green chile, which would be hard to get in sufficient quantities elsewhere.
According to Russ Parsons, this is thankfully becoming less true: "it's becoming so readily available in Southern California. Green chile roasts are now regular fall events here, held at farmers markets and supermarkets alike. And I can even pick up quite good frozen green chile at my local grocery store. After decades of doing without, suddenly I have plenty." Bring on the New Mexican restaurants.
(And halford, I had misremembered this article as a review of a New Mexican restaurant, so never mind.)
Bring on the New Mexican restaurants.
Unfortunately you would still need New Mexican cooks, which are probably harder to find in California than the chiles.
64: Sure you're not thinking of The Fortune Cookie Chronicles? (It's by Jennifer 8. Lee, who writes for the Times, but I don't remember her ever writing an article about the origin of the fortune cookie.)
According to Russ Parsons, this is thankfully becoming less true
Yeah, when I was in Austin at the end of August, Central Market was having a Green Chile Fest. More green chiles (and more green chile products) than anyone could ever need.
71: I suppose I shall have to resign myself to making things at home. The article and accompanying recipes make me hungry.
74: You could start your own New Mexican restaurant.
72: This article. I don't know The Fortune Cookie Chronicles, but Lee wrote the article, so maybe she's mentioned it elsewhere.
It's by Jennifer 8. Lee
I had this overwhelming urge to ask "Why is six afraid of Jennifer?", but Google tells me some familiar people have discussed the issue before.
75: For so many reasons (chiefly that I'm not that good of a cook), that would be comedy and failure. Perhaps I could market it as a reality show.
I got some hatch chiles recently. Yum yum yummy.
This is very simply and tasty, Paren! Plus you can use the Cool Kid beans!
76: You might like The Fortune Cookie Chronicles. It starts off with Lee trying to figure out the origin of the fortune cookie chronicles, but she expands it into a pop history of Chinese food all around the world. Light reading, but worthwhile.
Unfortunately you would still need New Mexican cooks
Nah. If Pueblans can cook classic French food, I'm sure they can hack New Mexican cuisine no problem.
80: I've made those! And, speaking of the Cool Kid beans, just today I bought some more Good Mother Stallards, which, when I had them some time last year were my absolute favorite bean ever from Rancho Gordo. I used them all up in a soup, and I was so sad that I hadn't bought more before they went out of stock. (I have an addiction. I think at this point I've tried 12 varieties. I made a five bean salad with all the odds and ends this summer that was amazing, if I do say so myself.)
24 Don't spend time in the alps, all the local specialties involve melted cheese. Fondue: melted cheese and bread, raclette: melted/broiled cheese and potatoes, croute au fromage: melted cheese and bread only in a dish, tartiflette: ditto but replace the bread with potatoes and add lardons. All very yummy when done right with good cheeses.
On tacos, I confess to a guilty lust for hard shells; guilty because I always think of them as unauthentic.
81: Sounds interesting, light or not. I've always liked how there seems to be a Chinese restaurant everywhere (not necessarily a good one, but one). Now that I live somewhere where with fairly easily accessible Chinese supermarkets, I might actually try to learn how to cook things a few things according to family recipes. And then I will start talking about sharpening knives all the time. (Who am I kidding? It's frozen food all the time for me.)
21 -- done.
On the general theme of 66, I once stopped at what seemed to be a Cambodian/Taco/Doughnut stand in Long Beach, where you could get both Lok Lak and carnitas.
By far the best mexican I've had in NYC is at the Saturday flea market around the corner. Really amazing huaraches, pupusas, and quesadillas. Rather than using any sort of tortilla I'm used to they just scoop a hunk of cornmeal dough, mash it down, grill it, and dump ingredients on it. So good.
If Pueblans can cook classic French food, I'm sure they can hack New Mexican cuisine no problem.
My experience of the parts of New Mexico where the Hispanic population is almost entirely from Mexico but the restaurants they run still offer New Mexican cuisine implies strongly that this is not true. On the other hand, the Mexican immigrants in NM are mostly from Chihuahua. Maybe Pueblans are better cooks.
Pupusas are Salvadoran rather than Mexican, aren't they?
89 -- I thought so, and huaraches are from Mexico City. Fusion cooking!
Maybe, I had vague memories of reading or hearing that the guys who started the thing were from southern Mexico somewhere. I could be wrong or they could just be serving up their neighbours' specialty.
There could well be parts of southern Mexico where they make pupusas, but I think they're generally identified with El Salvador. Which isn't all that far from southern Mexico, of course, although not adjacent to it.
So now I'm curious, where in Mexico do they make quesadillas on thick fresh open faced corn tortillas?
No idea. I'm not very familiar with the various parts of Mexico cuisine-wise.
I think those might come from Mexico City, too, although most of my knowledge of the regional nature of Mexican food comes from the signs on various taco trucks and stands in LA. Anyhow, the place near my house that has exclusively Mexico City style food offers quesadilas on fresh tortillas that sound like they might be what you're talking about.
most of my knowledge of the regional nature of Mexican food comes from the signs on various taco trucks and stands in LA
Probably not a bad source of knowledge, actually, given the size and heterogeneity of the Mexican population of LA.
I should really go to bed. I have a midterm tomorrow.
65: California, Texas, and Mexico, on the other hand, have huge populations, and their forms of Mexican food don't tend to use too many uniquely local ingredients (and if they do, immigrant populations elsewhere are often large enough to support specialty stores to import them), so you see versions of them all over the place.
I'd tend to think it has more to do with the fact that outside of the Southwest, people do not get 'Mexican' (to cover all variants), so you wind up with a restaurant-based cuisine, much like the 'restaurant Indian' quisine that developed over time. (No one ever mentions Arizona or Nevada in this context either, since they have (or did have) even smaller populations than NM.)
Anyways, I'm going to back teo on the 'authenticity' of hard shell corn tortillas. Soft flour tacos are a California/Baja thing, originally. The origin of all tacos though, is in soft corn tortillas (which I actually like best), since that's what northern Mexico tends to use, and that in turns stretches back to the Aztecs and their corn fetish.
I do note that ground masa wasn't commercially available until this century, when the Mexican government convinced/required the American food processors to start offering it in Mexico. Prior to that, everything was hand-ground, and tortillas made from hand-ground corn are going to require immense effort to make, so it shouldn't be surprising that hard tacos didn't appear until later. Not that they didn't make them, just that there wasn't going to be a lot of energy left over to experiment. (Or, at 8:46 am, to put it another way, tortillas and the like were middle-class a long-time ago. They have since become poor people food. Welcome to rising standards of living.)
Anyways, I disagree with teo that a soft shell taco is a unrolled burrito. They have lots of things in common, but until you actually pack the taco with burrito filling (or the other way around), it's still a taco. Or, 'tortillas are really flexible in usage so don't get overly hung up on the mutability of categories!'
max
['Damn, now I'm fucking hungry.']
That video is not what I expected from a link reading "quite good".
I always get the burrito bowl when I got to Chipotle. I'm not a big fan of authenticity or flour tortillas.
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Sexist Beatdown: The Happy Hooker, Or Why Doesn't Steven Levitt Suck Dick For a Living?
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max
['Awesome.']
Unless sour cream and shredded cheddar are authentic Mexican ingredients, in which case, go Mexico.
Since it apparently wasn't clear, I was kidding about soft tacos being unrolled burritos. They're definitely not.
They're putting in a Chipotle in New Brunswick, across the street from the Qdoba. People at my school are very excited about this. I tend to avoid all those places.
I tend to avoid states with 'New' in the name.
That video is not what I expected from a link reading "quite good".
The whole thing was a put-on, staged for the purposes of inspiring an intimate discussion of tacos.
I'm feeling kind of flu-ish. And 1/3 of my son's class was out sick yesterday. He's had the H1N1 shot, but I only got the regular flu shot.
I endorse teo's expositions on New Mexican cuisine in this thread, and I'm surprised that people seem to have doubted him on the matter. And I really, really wish I were in Albuquerque right now, because I'm hungry.
My favorite Mexican food in New York is the tacos in Sunset Park, Brooklyn. You can stuff yourself on amazing (soft or hard) tacos for <$10, and the places are all BYOB.
Chipotle is probably an improvement over Qdoba, as national-chain food goes. But that's not saying much.
I like Mexican food a lot. According to Jammies, ours is not as good as the stuff in Las Cruces, where he went to school, but it is delicious nontheless. I like mine with lots of green sauce. Green sauce is the best.
I like mole sauce, but not as much as I did before I noticed that you were supposed to pronounce it in Spanish.
I like food a lot. All kinds of food. I also like Mike Doughty a lot. But for listening to, not for eating.
Speaking of authenticity, in London they have a Mexican restaurant called "Wahaca".
You could probably do both, if you wanted to listen to him scream.
I like mole sauce, but not as much as I did before I noticed that you were supposed to pronounce it in Spanish.
In Spanish, mole sauce is pronounced salsa 6.022 x 10²³.
If Mike Doughty screamed, would we be so cavalier about cutting him down? We might, if he screamed all the time for no good reason.
I can keep myself amused for a whole day just thinking about it.
Wahaca!
What did the ninja order at burger king? [Assumes ninja pose] Whoppaaa!
What did he have to drink? [Assumes ninja pose] Wataaa!
Where did he go on vacation? [Assumes ninja pose] Wahacaaa!
Speaking of authenticity, in London they have a Mexican restaurant called "Wahaca".
It's apparently the only good Mexican restaurant in London. And so starved are we of good Mexican food that it has an hour-long queue outside it for tables. No, you can't book one.
There was a restaurant in SF for a while called "Wa-ha-ka". There's nothing insulting about that at all. You're every bit as likely to see a French restaurant called "Praw-Vonts".
Wikipedia shoots down the whack-y thing I just wondered about.
The other Mexican restuarants probably confused mole sauce with vole sauce.
Much of the lingering fondness I tend for my ex-wife comes from the giant bag of frozen Hatch chiles that she left in the freezer. I think I can extract one more batch of sauce from it before the flame goes out.
127: You must have had a good lawyer to get custody of the appliances.
I'm OK with acknowledging an authentic place for hard tacos in postwar New Mexican cuisine, but promise me all you will never actually order them. When traveling in New Mexico, there is no need to order anything other than a burrito slathered in green chile sauce. You can get it "Christmas" style (red and green together) if you need to mix it up visually. Then have a sopapilla with honey for afters.
For breakfast, get eggs with green chile sauce. There are variations on this because you can cook eggs in different ways. One way is called scrambled and another way is called sunny side up. But don't skip the green chile sauce.
As someone who grew up in New Mexico, Teo will have other suggestions. He knows too many things. His knowledge will make you suffer. Stick with me, kid.
Until this thread, I was unaware of green chile sauce and had always thought of green sauce as being tomatillo-based, which sauce I find overly goopy in texture.
I think there is a green sauce-like creation based on the avocado, but I can't think of the name.
What's more authentic? A restaurant spelled "Wahaca" that gets pronounced somewhat correctly, or a restaurant spelled "Oaxaca" that gets pronounced "o-AX-a-ca"?
Correct answer? Neither! Both would be ludicrously inappropriate for the name of an actual restaurant in Oaxaca itself. Everyone should be ashamed.
132: agreed. But the restaurant isn't in Oaxaca, it's in London. An authentic name would be "Langford's Pie House" or some such.
I'm going to start a New Mexican restaurant called "Lagos".
re: 123
Sounds like Edamame in Oxford [Japanese place]. Can't book, and queues can get silly.
I'm opening a USian restaurant in Mexico. It's called Guáchinton.
136 is awesome to start and will be even better if the name of the cuisine can be pronounced "oozean"
134: I have an exciting idea to help you attain investment capital for your project.
I endorse teo's expositions on New Mexican cuisine in this thread, and I'm surprised that people seem to have doubted him on the matter.
Speaking for myself, I think it's less that people doubted him in regards to New Mexican cuisine, but that I read him to be making a very different claim about Mexican food and hard tacos in general. (Reading back it's more obvious that he was specifically writing about New Mexican food.)
¿Está esta su primera vez en Guáchinton? Usted debe saber que servimos a nuestro alimento el estilo auténtico, que los medios él son llenos de productos químicos deliciosos.
The proposition that hard tacos are truthfully New Mexican cuisine is at odds with the proposition that truth is beauty and beauty, truth. This has led to confusion.
Saying "Aren't soft tacos basically just unrolled burritos?" is obviously specifically writing about New Mexican food?
Reading this thread I developed the theory that the version of Mexican food that first became widely known in the United States was a bastardized version of New Mexican cuisine -- because it featured hard tacos and had no seafood.
Speaking of authenticity, in London they have a Mexican restaurant called "Wahaca".
It's apparently the only good Mexican restaurant in London.
London's short on good Mexican restaurants (and bad ones, for that matter), but there is a weird and wonderful Polish and Mexican place in Mayfair. It's not exactly fusion, it's just that half the menu is Polish and half is Mexican.
144: what's it called? (Hoping for "Gonzalowicz's".)
The question in 60 has long been one of my pet peeves. Shouldn't you be able to find any kind of food you want in New York if you look hard enough? America doesn't have that many interesting cuisines (New Mexican, Cajun, soul food, modern Californian, anything else?) how can one of them be entirely missing?
145: That's the icing on the cake. It's called "L'Autre".
I think most US "mexican" food is an anglicized version of Sonoran food -- no seafood, no mole, flour tortillas.
The polish/mexican restaurant could have its origin in the connection between polka and norteno music.
By the way, is it racist to think that norteno music really, really sucks? This has been troubling me a lot lately.
147: There was a restaurant in NYC in the 80s -- and I will never remember the name, but I think it was on the UWS -- that billed itself as southwestern Native American. It was sort of like Mexican food, and sort of not.
Saying "Aren't soft tacos basically just unrolled burritos?" is obviously specifically writing about New Mexican food?
No, that was a joke. It was his later characterizations about hard tacos in Mexican restaurants in New Mexico. (I believe it was all part of teofilo's cunning plan to make sure this thread did indeed get up to 300 comments on tacos.)
Worth a visit, would you say?
Oh, definitely. The golonka is lovely. That said, I've been fairly pissed both times I've been, so I probably wasn't in the best position to judge the quality of the food.
The original post was entirely correct about encores. There wasn't much else to say.
In New Mexico, a 'hard taco' is called a 'burrito'. What most Americans would call a 'burrito' is called a 'hoagie' in New Mexico. And 'UFO' is New Mexicanese for 'weather balloon'.
The New Mexicanese have over a thousand words for esnow.
154: Really? Musicians don't like to receive applause? They just want to get home sooner?
Tacos al pastor are yummy, and there are a couple of real places (even in Boston) which sell them. Always soft. ALso tacos are convenient when you just need a little bit of food but don't want a lot,, because they'll sell you just one.
There was a place in Davis (small chain) which had a non-traditional salmon burrito with a creamy sauce--different from a fish taco--which was yummy.
I don't miss much in Davis, but I do miss the place that sold salads that were freshly tossed and to which you could add grilled chicken or steak. The steak was always freshly grilled.
Parenthetical knows me better than I know myself.
I've always assumed that standard US "Mexican" food is a bastardized version of Tex-Mex, which is a different cuisine that shares some but not all features with New Mexican cuisine.
I think most US "mexican" food is an anglicized version of Sonoran food -- no seafood, no mole, flour tortillas.
They don't eat seafood in Sonora? It's right on the coast.
(New Mexican, Cajun, soul food, modern Californian, anything else?)
Barbecue. Wherever you want to class country hams. (Did you know Smithfield hams no longer need to be fed a diet consisting only of peanuts?) Can I get a good representative of every kind of chili in NYC? What about the cuisines that I don't know about because they're still quite regional?
By the way, is it racist to think that norteno music really, really sucks? This has been troubling me a lot lately.
Absolutely not. Norteño music is terrible.
There was a restaurant in NYC in the 80s -- and I will never remember the name, but I think it was on the UWS -- that billed itself as southwestern Native American. It was sort of like Mexican food, and sort of not.
Sounds pretty authentic, then.
I just looked it up on a Davis wiki. The salad place is Pluto's.
The taco place with teh fish burritos was Dos Coyotes. For regular burritos the other place is better.
162, 147: Calvin Trillin has written extensively on this subject matter.
Calvin Trillin has written extensively on your mom.
In the style of "In the Penal Colony".
I think part of the confusion in what I was saying last night is that in New Mexico, New Mexican restaurants are called "Mexican restaurants." Restaurants serving cuisine derived from any of the many regional traditions in Mexico itself are rare in New Mexico, but when they exist they are also called "Mexican restaurants."
162: I realized a few minutes later I'd forgotten BBQ. As for country hams I'm saying "cuisine" not dish. There's lots of regional dishes (deep dish pizza, lobster, etc.).
Yabbut country hams must fit in somewhere, right? Is country hamdom part of soul food?
Also, k-sky is of course right that while hard tacos do seem to be of New Mexican origin (a fact which surprised me, as I had always thought they were Tex-Mex or something), and they are a standard option in New Mexican restaurants, there's no reason to order them and I never do. (The only exception would be a handful of restaurants that are particularly famed for their tacos.) I disagree with him, however, that a burrito with green is the only thing to get. Personally I like stuffed sopaipillas and tamales, but there are many other options as well.
Tamales are basically burritos with extremely rough corn tortillas.
Aren't tacos basically savory choco tacos?
Isn't cabbage just cole slaw without mayonnaise?
I would like to eat proper Mexican food.
Anyway, encores. I recently listened to a whole programe on Radio 4 about encores (presented by a bloke from Elbow) - at first I was a bit surprised that they were going to manage to drag this out for half an hour, but it was quite interesting. You can't listen again, but here's the blurb.
176: The show was originally supposed to be 15 minutes. The listeners kept asking for more.
The taco place with teh fish burritos was Dos Coyotes.
I was super bummed that Dos Coyotes gave money to support Prop 8. I liked their food and now I can't go there.
(Although, I read in the news that they were one of a handful of places around town that were being boycotted and then looked up their donation, which I found at the time. But when I went back to check, because I shouldn't be slandering businesses unless I am positive, I couldn't find it again.)
Of all the threads to be late to.
There are two smells from home that I really, really miss: creosote bushes after a hard rain, and roasting green chile. The latter fills the valley all through September, and is glorious. But chile country does seem to have expanded, and we've moved into its new fringes; one evening last month I caught a whiff of roasting chile in my neighborhood and just about fell off my bike. That week we started getting good peppers in the farmshare. Hallelujah brothers!
Paren, teo, Bave---have you ever made it to the Hatch chile festival? So delicious.
I wholeheartedly endorse Jammies' position as stated in 111.
Never been to the chile festival. I've only passed through Hatch on the way to other places.
As a rule, passing through Hatch on the way to other places is good policy. The festival is great, though.
That is, it's good policy when Hatch lies on a line between the origin and the other places.
The only thing I remember about Hatch from passing through it on the way to Tucson (it's where you get off I-25 to take the shortcut to Deming) is that the McDonald's has the names of various varieties of chile painted on the walls.
181 is even funnier if it wasn't deliberate.
150 I'm imagining sauerkraut and kasha based burritos, sort of like the first falafel place in Warsaw put sauerkraut and horseradish in their falafel pitas. The place went by the name of 'Texas Falafel' and was located in the grungy maze of passages spreading out from under the main train station - get your pocket picked, fend off the prostitutes, and get your authentic exotic food. It actually wasn't bad, unlike the Vietnamese run 'Chinese' stands filled with mystery meat in sugary sweet ketchup.
104: Since it apparently wasn't clear, I was kidding about soft tacos being unrolled burritos. They're definitely not.
Oh. Sorry. Probably for the best since according to forklore:
Mexican popular tradition tells the story of a man named Juan Mendez who used to sell tacos in a street stand, using a donkey as a transport for himself and the food, during the Mexican Revolution period (1910-1921) in the Bella Vista neighborhood in Ciudad Juárez, Chihuahua. To keep the food warm, Juan had the idea of wrapping the food placed in a large home made flour tortilla inside individual napkins. He had a lot of success, and consumers came from other places around the Mexican border looking for the "food of the Burrito," the word they eventually adopted as the name for these large tacos.On the other hand, they have the timeline of the burrito (!!):
16th centuryI guess there's a bit of a dispute going on amoungst scholars of the burrito.
Cuisine preceding the development of the modern taco, burrito, and enchilada was created by the Pre-Columbian Mesoamerican Aztec peoples of Mexico, who used tortillas to wrap foods, with fillings of chile sauce, tomatoes, mushrooms, squash, and avocados. Spanish missionaries like Bernardino de Sahagún wrote about Aztec cuisine, describing the variety of tortillas and their preparation, noting that the Aztecs not only used corn in their tortillas, but also squash and amaranth, and that some varieties used turkey, eggs, or honey as a flavoring.
1840Burrito created in 1840s American Southwest/Northwestern Mexico. Spiced meat wrapped in flour tortillas made popular by gold miners who worked with burros. Janey M. Rifkin in Hispanic Times Magazine claims this was the original source of meat. If true, it would be out of desperation; burro meat is not considered palatable[citation needed].
max
['Insert smiley.']
Green chile is a distinct taste which will recall NM to me too, if I ever again eat the bizarre jerky that I had there. (is there a word for jerky so dry it turns into dust in the mouth before then being reconstituted with saliva?)
147, how could you forget hotdish and jello salad?!?
Come to think of it, a 'burrito' made with golonka, sauerkraut, kasha, and grated horseradish might be pretty good.
Clearly, I should go to New Mexico to get some hard shell tacos. Because nothing about this thread has made me think "real" tacos are any better than I thought before.
is there a word for jerky so dry it turns into dust in the mouth before then being reconstituted with saliva?
"Jerky."
They have to be better, eb. They're more authentic.
I had about an hour layover in Albuquerque a couple of years ago on the train. That's the only time I've ever been to New Mexico.
I don't like hard-shell tacos because they crack.
198: The solution to which is the tostada, right?
The solution is a carne adovada enchilada with green chile and fried egg.
I do love the influence that the hispanic communities have had on food in my area. We have a lot of El Savadorians. mmmmm pupusas.
teo -- how'd the test go?
It went well, thanks.
They have to be better, eb. They're more authentic.
Eh, they may or may not be more authentic, but they're definitely not better. There's a reason no one orders them.
I'm sure that many members of all hispanic communities have horrible taste in food. Don't be so unwelcoming.
Dos Coyotes gave money to support Prop 8
Having just spent a bit of time on this issue, I find no evidence that the above is true. If anyone has more information on this subject, please let me know.
Encores! Encores used to common enough in opera -- if an aria came off especially well, the singer would park and bark the whole thing over again. This more or less does not happen anymore, or rather, happens only very rarely. The only time I have ever seen it was at the Met -- where the practice is ostensibly banned. Juan Diego Florez nailed nine high C's in "Ah mes amis" of La fille du regiment. The place went absolutely apeshit and he went and did the whole thing over again. (Management anticipated this happening, apparently.) Here's a Times article about it. And here is the adorable Florez singing it.
208: Great comment, oudemia! Encore! Encore!
I, for one, endorse the revival of the claque.
208: Juan Diego Florez nailed nine high C's
I've done that without any training at all.
Wait, was Juan singing those notes or playing them on a piano?
212: Neither. He was strumming a ukulele.
They drink out of juice boxes in the opera? No wonder people have to dress up.
Speaking of pianos, I saw a segment of "How It's Made" on the rolls of music for player-pianos. Apparently, they've computerized the machine that cuts the notes into the paper. They load them onto to an Apple IIe using a 5 1/4" floppy.
If I knew where the company was, I could send them an Apple IIc from my parents' basement. It has 128k of RAM.
207-- I'm pretty sure that Megan's thinking of El Coyote, a very well known, old, and terrible margaritas-and-greasy-enchiladas restaurant in LA that had a big gay following. El Coyote got in trouble when it was revealed owner donated to the Yes on 8 campaign. That was good news for me since the atrocious El Coyote is inexplicably one of my Dad's favorite restaurants, and now I can refuse to go there because of ... politics.
What meat goes in a New Mexico style hard shell taco? I'm having a hard time picturing Al Pastor in a hard shell.
What meat goes in a New Mexico style hard shell taco?
Ground beef or chicken, usually.
In fairness, it was the owner's daughter, not the owner. The food at El Coyote is truly execrable, bordering on inedible, but like Halford's dad and half of the rest of L.A., I truly used to love that place. I haven't been back since the election though.
219: It took a campaign contribution to get you to stop eating somewhere with food bordering on the inedible?
The thing is, I remember my initial reaction and the source, a story on boycotting businesses around Sacramento. I remember being bummed about Dos Coyotes. But when I went back, I found what Ari found: no story in the Bee and no evidence of it in the databases on Prop 8 donors.
I would love if I were wrongly remembering something about Los Coyotes, because I like the food at Dos Coyotes. But I'm still, like, 70% confident about my initial reaction. So I don't know what to do. Stop making accusations I can't back up, probably.
I confess to puzzlement. Why would the denizens of LA, a metro area that presumably has an abundance of quality Mexican food, love a restaurant with food that is "truly execrable"?
I mean, I thought it was a point of pride among Angelenos that they, unlike the NorCalians, know good Mexican food when they taste it.
Some coyotes that everyone can agree are bad.
It really is kind of a mystery. The place itself -- the building, the patio, the lighting, the tchochkes, the history -- is really pleasant, and the waitresses are incredibly charming. It's a place you go because you feel affectionately towards it, not because you think the food is good. Which is why it was so easy to boycott -- once you learn that the restaurant is associated with bigots and jerks, there is absolutely nothing to recommend it. You were never a fan of the food.
224: Wow, that's really, really weird. And sad.
Well, they do have hard shell tacos. Mostly, though, they have very strong margaitas, it's a nice place to sit, and it has been around since the 30s and has a kind of old Hollywood vibe.
222.Re: EL Coyote. I believe it gained a reputation for "cheap eats and strong drinks". Has been coasting on that rep for years.
224. Nova Scotia coyotes? Must have been lost and therefore very hungry. I'd wager that folk singers leave a bad aftertaste.
I see. And I shouldn't cast aspersions. We've agreed repeatedly that the pizza at that place next to Toronado is not particularly good, but hey, it's 1 a.m., we're drunk, and they're open.
There are coyotes everywhere. They never attack people, though. At least I've never heard of a coyote attack. They usually go to great lengths to avoid people, which is why most people don't know that they're everywhere.
Shit, I didn't even know coyotes could do that.
I wouldn't say "never", Teo. Extremely rare. A coyote attacked a baby in Griffith Park a while back.
Yeah, I mean, obviously coyote attacks happen; this one happened. It just seems so weird.
I've seen several people state that this is the only recorded fatal coyote attack of an adult. Very strange and sad. How did coyotes get to Nova Scotia in the first place?
Maybe the Mounties didn't want to alarm the tourists, and reported the attackers as coyotes, instead of a pack of ravenous wolves. I mean, really, what's so scary about Wil E. and his brother?
Back home, the ranchers would shoot a coyote on sight. I assume they still do.
232: Not to sound terribly callous, but a baby and a full grown adult are pretty different - a baby is much more like their normal prey. Coyote attacks on healthy humans are very, very very odd.
238: Maybe rabies? Or extreme hunger?
There are so many things wrong with comment 238 that I'm glad it was pwned.
http://library.thinkquest.org/05aug/00260/facts/habitat.html
I like the colored pencil look of this map.
239: When I read about it last night, I was wondering if they were sick, yes. I've had many friends lose pets to coyotes so I know they're not exactly innocent fluffy beasts, and I'm sure they could be dangerous if you were threatening them in some way, but it still struck me as so bizarre.
It is also true that the northern coyotes (and New England ones in particular) are somewhat larger in size than western ones. Most coyotes do pack (smaller and less organized than wolf packs--a minority stay in mated pairs) but generally do not hunt in packs, going for smaller animals. They do team up for larger prey on occasion and there is speculation that this behavior has and will continue to increase in the non-wolf but deer-rich forested parts of their range (no wolves in Nova Scotia).
235: They're covering up for the werewolves.
Did I already mention I recently had a Animal Planet/Disney perfect view of a coyote on the way to work in the morning? It was probably within a mile of the busy part of the Sunset Strip. I've seen several before but this one posed for me as the headlights hit that part of the curve. Wonderful.
My favorite coyote pack was the one that scavenged on the beach where I grew up. If you stayed out late enough (this was a beach where fires and camping were allowed), you would see them begin to filter out of the willows around the lagoon that borders the dunes and come down to nose at all the leftovers on the beach. Moonlight, waves, sand and coyotes!
245: Just as a test, you should have tried to feed them roadrunner.
They're covering up for the werewolves
Werecoyotes?
Back home, the ranchers would shoot a coyote on sight. I assume they still do.
Turned a corner one day up in ag land and saw three or four coyote carcasses strung up on a fence. I cried, and probably would again.
Rabies was my first thought. They're apparently going to run some tests on the carcasses, so I guess they'll find out.
It's probably also true that coyotes who see a lot of people around them may become less inclined to avoid people.
248: Would you feel better if I told you they were probably werecoyotes?
I've said this here before I think, but my one face-to-face with a coyote was on the corner of Balmoral and Magnolia in Chicago.
241: I feel this weird comfort when good looking animals do well in human dominated environments. There's nothing ecologically sound about it--and its worse if people get killed--but I still feel better.
The coyote is a really interesting example of successful adaptation to a human-altered environment.
We've agreed repeatedly that the pizza at that place next to Toronado is not particularly good, but hey, it's 1 a.m., we're drunk, and they're open.
Dude, that place isn't "not particularly good". It's terrible.
249.2: It's probably also true that coyotes who see a lot of people around them may become less inclined to avoid people.
However, Cape Breton island and the place where the trail is located in particular is rather sparsely populated.
253: Yes. In general they have done very well adapting to human-dominated landscapes and that has aided the overall eastern expansion of their range immeasurably. The best things humans have done for coyotes is to have pets displace wolves.
250: Depending on the situation, I might have a soft spot for werecoyotes, too. Are they charming when they're in human form?
Everyone has a soft spot for werecoyotes' powerful jaws.
258: The werejaguar is better for that. Other cats go for strangulation, jaguars just crush skulls.
259: Then Diego is fucked once Baby Jaguar gets a bit older.
"Baby Jaguar is playful, ambitious, and close to Diego's heart. He loves joining Diego on adventures, even though his physical abilities have not yet caught up to his youthful eagerness."
Let's hope neither one is prone to temper tantrums.
Yes, let's. And let's also hope that Rescue Pack doesn't develop a love of practical jokes.
I'll bet werecoyotes like hard shelled tacos. May be a weakness, even.
198: I don't like hard-shell tacos because they crack.
Yes, this. What is even the rationale behind them other than easy storage in fast-food racks? Past the initial storage filling phase they are subpar. Marginally OK as you bring them up for the first bite (but don't tilt them too much!), but freaking useless after that. Eating them with a fork and knife sucks too. I think they must be subsidized by Big Casualwear or Big Laundry.
Between ¡Taco polaco! and Big Casualwear, it sounds like we should start the world's most ironic strip mall.
Everyone knows that real authentic tacos are "Walking Tacos"--taco-y stuff mixed into a Fritos bag with the chips. Very popular at high school stadiums around here. I might even have one tonight since I am going to a game! I though they might have originated in these here parts, but apparently they first were sold at the 1982 Knoxville World's Fair (bet you forgot all about that fair). And I guess they really are just variants of the venerable Frito Pie.
The book I'm currently reading informs me that 20% of the coyote scat sampled in the developed canyons outside San Diego contains domestic cat remnants. Because of this, the population of songbirds in those canyons in which coyotes reside is apparently both more diverse and robust and than in those canyons that don't have resident coyotes.
1982 Knoxville World's Fair
My sister was a costumed performer at this event. A racoon, iirc.
Everyone knows that real authentic tacos are "Walking Tacos"
"Frito pie."
I mean, I don't think they're really variants of Frito pie, are they? They're just... Frito pie.
268: between that and the Korean DMZ, it's hard not to think that the solution to habitat destruction issues could be as easy as wide distribution of vicious predators and land mines.
The salad place is Pluto's.
I've eaten there a couple of times. It was good, as fast-ish lunch options go.
272: So, you've been getting mail from Ted Nuggent also.
273: And now it occurs to me that it's a chain, not just in Davis.
272: The weird thing with this research is that the habitat is still compromised; there are big-ass exurban developments covering the landscape. But the presence of what passes for an apex predator in that ecological niche seems to be cleaning out the cats, the legion of smaller predators unwittingly introduced by people, which means that the birds can thrive.
273: essear, you're not here, are you?
275: Yup, there's one down the street from me. Good salads for a fairly reasonable price. "Fresh food for a healthy universe." I didn't go in there for a couple years, though, because I was put off by multipart "Instructions" sign that greets you at the front of the restaurant and by the seeming requirement to decipher and fill out a complex card in order to order. I later learned you can just walk up the bar and order by looking at what's on offer and then asking for it.
276, 277: I was thinking that we really need to have a Murder Burger meetup one of these days.
273: essear, you're not here, are you?
No. I was there for a conference.
1982 Knoxville World's Fair
I was there! I was like three and adorable.
See? Don't make me think so hard. Just feed me. And what's with the outer space theme, anyway?
But I will forever have a soft spot in my heart for Pluto's because of the time when I left a box containing a year's worth of contact lenses there (so, ~$200 worth probably) and the fine folks there found it and kept it stuck away in a safe place for me.
278, 282: Yeah, I think I had to be guided through the process by a regular the first time I went to one. On top of the complicated menu, there are like three or four different stations to get food at and a mob of people moving in different directions. Disorienting!
I know someone who did research on noise effects on wildlife on bombing ranges. The results were that the noise effects from screaming overhead jets and being bombed regularly were trivial compared to the benefit to wildlife from the fact that people are shut out of bombing ranges.
And what's with the outer space theme, anyway?
Their salads are <announcer voice>OUT OF THIS WORLD!!!</announcer voice>
(I've never eaten at one, actually.)
screaming overhead jets
The sound of freedom, baby. Or so say the zoomies.
271: I mean, I don't think they're really variants of Frito pie, are they? They're just... Frito pie.
I thought the "innovation" was mixing it right in the Frito package, but otherwise yes same thing.
284: Apparently Snowy Owls have extended their range south to colonize the MSP airport. The jets don't seem to faze them, according to airport people.
266: It amuses me that "Walking Tacos" is a false cognate for "Wakȟáŋ Tȟáŋka", unfortunately I cannot figure out how to transmorgify that observation into an actual joke. I guess you can only expect one of those "Rufus Wainwright" moments once every six months or so.
268: between that and the Korean DMZ, it's hard not to think that the solution to habitat destruction issues could be as easy as wide distribution of vicious predators and land mines.
It's become something of a cliche that one of the most wildlife-rich places in the UK (OK, I realise that's not saying much) is Salisbury Plain, the army's artillery range.
If by cliché you mean matter of fact, this book suggests that's right.
So is the problem with encores that they've tended to become de rigueur, in much the same way standing ovations are apparently just the done thing at nearly every theater performance I've attended in the last 10 years? The latter is, certainly, annoying.
in much the same way standing ovations are apparently just the done thing at nearly every theater performance I've attended in the last 10 years? The latter is, certainly, annoying.
I especially like the ones where not giving a standing ovation gets you dirty looks from your standing neighbors. (I remember this happening, in particular, at one Chicago Symphony Orchestra concert I went to....)
They have absolutely undeserved standing ovations on the East Coast too? I thought it was just a crass midwesternism. (It seems to be dying back a little bit here, but that might be only because my choice of theaters has been improving.)
294: I wondered about that: whether the principal reason I see this more or less constantly is that I'm attending relatively amateur productions (i.e. we're not talking the Met), so that the audience either has lower standards, or really wishes to applaud the players in the most enthusiastic way possible, and there's nothing wrong with that!
I hope it's not dreadfully stingy to mention it, but I confess that I sometimes think that this automatic standing-O business strips the act of meaning, if you see what I mean. Ahem.
No, it's totally right to criticize it. I know theater people. Theater people are my friends. And Senator, theater people do not approve of automatic standing ovations. It's like the dictionary definition of "middlebrow". Used to see it all the time in Omaha, and far too often in Mpls, where you'd think the constant pretension to NYC-oscitude would prevent people from humiliating themselves that way. But, sadly, no. It has been getting a lot better here in the past few years. You have to watch out for rep theaters with a high quotient of bussed-in audiences though. They're the worst.
When one's standing O's become automatic, some would say, keep up with that, but personally I disagree: it's time to try one sitting down next time, or even on one's tummy.
Also, why have I never seen a production of "The Lieutenant of Inishmore"? It totally sounds like the only McDonough play that I would actually grok.
Theater people are my friends. And Senator, theater people do not approve of automatic standing ovations.
Friends don't let friends accept ovations.
Man I gotta find a taco truck round here. Anyone in NoVa have one?
Also I am thinking of 'walking tacos' as a phrase being like 'walking around money.' I need to carry some just in case!
299: You know, some of my theater friends do occasionally stage interventions like that. Until I've really acted though, I wouldn't feel comfortable fucking with someone else's standing ovation (other than by not participating).
297: I'm glad you're here, text. I wasn't sure anyone would be willing to run with that.
Somebody probably already did this, but here's something white people like.
And another by the same pair.
text and Parsimon, sitting in a tree, O-R-GASM-I-N-G.
Or perhaps I could better encourage people to follow the first link by saying that it's one of the best videos of all time. OF ALL TIME!
Aggh, why did I write that. I was trying for risque and jocular but sounded like the TOS.
Mostly you just needed another dash between GA and SM!
Yeah - they frown on S&M in Georgia.
max
['They always say it's so wonderful though.']
Vaguely on-topic: I was talking to a friend today about his friend whom he irritably described as "fussy," because said friend didn't like -- wasn't enjoying -- a performance of [mumble, something or other] they recently attended together, such that the friend excused himself early before intermission and didn't come back until late after intermission ended ... not that he actually left the hall and their evening, just sort of left for a while.
For some reason I felt the need for a note of caution, and observed that, Well, after all, I might leave an hour-and-a half-long punk concert. An hour and a half is pretty long if you really don't like something very much.
My friend agreed, of course of course, but this [mumble, whatever] wasn't like that, was a lyrical soaring interpretation of [uh-huh].
I kept at it for some reason: I might feel inclined to excuse myself for portions of a lengthy opera, I said.
My friend at that point made a vaguely sneery/hostile face and burst out: "Well, maybe you're fussy!"
Huh. Hours later, this is annoying me. I was quite mild in response at the time, just said that some things can feel like fingernails on a blackboard. I was right not to start a fight, though, right?
What I'd like to say now [in a fightin' mood]: Yo. I do not necessarily like what other people like just because they say I should like it. All this garbage "How can you not like {thing}" is for the birds. Also plus, cut it out with the messages I've been hearing lately that I'm staid.
I think I just need to make the friend in question in this particular scenario listen to the last few Jeff Beck albums.
Unfogged: From Mexican, food blogging to Mexican food blogging.
312: Huh. I do hate when people insist on you liking something just because they like it. But I'm also thinking that if I went to a show with a friend and he disappeared halfway through for an extended time, I'd be annoyed.
314: To clarify, it was a group of them at the show. A foursome, I think. Also, it was a show calling for a seated audience.
Yeah, I see the annoyance factor, certainly, but what's wrong with a response like: Wow, turned out Friend was not into it at all, and he turned silly-weird and left; and then you shrug and note that Friend is ... Oh My God. Fussy?
Okay. I was probably being argumentative after all by taking issue.
Actually, that version of "Single Ladies" is way worse than the original.
Well, I won't insist that you like it, neb.
I liked it, Merganser. The first one, that is. Watching the second one now.
320.1: But didn't you hear? It is way worse than the original.
Apparently, they produced local blog hero Julia Nunes' record.
I don't like the affectless delivery. She robs the song of its energy. (Is that the point? It might be.)
Portlanders are very much into the automatic standing O. It's one of those mindless habits, like not using one's turn signals, that I'm convinced we exported to more sophisticated people. Since I'm usually reviewing when I'm at a concert, I stay seated to maintain an air of professional disinterest. Actually, I stay seated unless something really great has motivated me to get up off my ass.
You know what'll really get you dirty looks? Staying seated during the Hallelujah Chorus during a performance of Messiah, especially at an Episcopal church. Fuck off, royalists, I think, your silly custom is interrupting the flow of the music. I don't say it, of course, preferring instead to sneer at their un-Christian hostility in smug silence.
Dude I know like Handel wasn't even British :D
326: I know what you're saying. I only stand to applaud if the top comes all the way off.
I don't even really like any amount of applause. Why would you want to chase the music you just heard out of your ears by slapping your hands together like a complaisant seal?
I like applause. Otherwise, I wouldn't be able to unwrap the Twix bar until after the music.
329 offers a great image, as we all shuffle about, greet friends, and/or file silently out the door. Kind of like going to a movie.
332: People clap at movies. It's kind of weird, but they do it.
I've only seen that once, but I actually can't remember what movie it was, just how strange and fairly natural it seemed. Not Do the Right Thing -- that was notable for the entire audience remaining seated and silent through the entirety of the credits, and then some.
The movie crowds I've seen clap have been on the rare occasion that I've gone the day the movie opened. But there were no people there to clap for.
I saw Poles clapping and cheering for the Nazis against the heroic allied spies in the worst movie ever. That takes some doing. Talking about weird clapping, anyone else find the custom of clapping after a landing a bit annoying?
I clapped when the second set of penguins came to switch places with the egg-sitting penguins. And then one of the eggs got dropped and froze in like two seconds. Then I felt foolish for clapping.
Talking about weird clapping, anyone else find the custom of clapping after a landing a bit annoying?
You mean a commercial airplane landing? That sounds like it would be a nice communal thing to do, actually.
I was on a flight where some people starting clapping for the landing without realizing that the pilot had only just leveled out for the landing, not landed. They were in the middle section and it was foggy outside. It turned out to be a bit of a rough landing and they were quite surprised.
I think that might be the only time I've heard people clap for a (presumed) landing.
I was on a flight where they did an announcement about an unspecified "minor issue" meaning that emergency crews would be on the runway at the landing. People clapped for that. I made a mental promise to give more to the poor and to not fly that airline.
Yo Nataly, Ima really happy for you, and I'm gonna let you finish, but Beyonce had one of the best videos of all time.
I don't see any reason for clapping for a routine landing, the only time I chose to go along was when we first lost one, then a second engine. The one time I've been seriously scared on a plane.
[cabin announcement: "We will be landing in Paris instead of Geneva due to the loss of a second engine, but no reason to worry we still have one left"]
The only movie theater with applause I know of is one where they show the insignia of the projectionists' union before the film, and people clap for that.
341 Was that the 'we're having a problem with our landing gear' minor issue? Nothing like seeing the runway lined with firetrucks and ambulances.
Jesus lives in the People's Republic of Portland. Except for that whole Hallelujah Chorus hang-up they have.
I was on a flight where they descended for the runway in a storm and then pulled back up when it was clear - to the pilots and those of us with window seats - that they were not on line and likely not going to be level with the ground. So they pulled up and tried again. People were starting to freak out, mildly, before we landed fine a few minutes later.
Has christwire.org been discussed here before? I'm being sent into paroxysms of disbelief, in particular by this and this. Please, someone tell me it's all a joke.
Clapping when a pilot lands at Wellington is pretty normal; mind, that's a bit of a special case.
And when you land on international flights sometimes, but that's a bit different I think.
345: The landing, if they hadn't have mentioned anything, would have been completely unremarkable. But, yes, the runway was lined rescue vehicles.
348: The cat one seems accurate in general, if not detail. The Golden Girls one is really, really strange.
It's gotta be parody "Soviets create Berenstain Bear porn to lure our children into sin" or "The Demonic Soviets have once again threatened our Christian nation. As we speak, Soviet dictator Vladmir Putin and his dog Medvedev are meeting with Iranian terror leader Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. [...]Putin's greatest dream is to see the flesh seared of the bones of your children"
Though MH is right, they do have a point about cats (cry, sniff, sneeze, cry)
353: It probably dates back to the conflict with Laud.
Uh, 348, not 353. Anything that doesn't acknowledge in that context that dogs aren't exactly clean is absurd on its face.
I have to admit that the part about the cat using its purr and meow to brainwash childless women into doing their biding hits a bit too close to home.
The question in 348 has been asked before.
The implied question, that is. Not the actual question with the question mark.
30: Would you like a lake trout fajita ?
Answers differ, however.
I think I should get back to my required reading now.
I'm a little puzzled at there being any controversy-- There's sidebar links to only liberal blogs labeled "axis of evil" and a post titled "I Am Extremely Terrified Of Chinese People". I have to admit the "How Is Baby Formed?" reference cracked me up.
From the second link in 348:
Most gay relationships last a week. It is no coincidence that this is the amount of time between Golden Girl episodes when they first aired on primetime.... Sadly, with the Golden Girls in weeknight syndication, the youngest gays have confused this timetable to mean they need five new boyfriends a week.
Yeah, I'm going with "joke".
I'm a little bit in love with the phrase (from the "About the author" section) "Motivational Children's Party Entertainer."
360, 361: Glad to know that tonight I was just extra-gullible.
And thanks, eb, for the links!
I'm a fan of 308 and can comfortably subscribe to 317. I saw the second link first and was smitten, then found the first link a clever application of their schtick to a surprising song; I can see if you saw the Single Ladies cover first, you might not be as charmed.
The puppet on the drum kick is funny.
Also, while I'm being helpful, 222:
Why would the denizens of LA, a metro area that presumably has an abundance of quality Mexican food, love a restaurant with food that is "truly execrable"?
LA has an abundance of quality Mexican food, but a paucity of quality Mexican restaurants. The best Mexican food is from taco trucks or restaurants with outdoor seating areas. Changes are coming -- Babita's in San Gabriel is supposed to be excellent, and Rivera downtown has gotten great reviews -- but we still have a long way to go to catch up to Chicago when it comes to full-service restaurants.
We do have plenty of festive joints with ass-smackingly powerful margaritas, though. I used to hang out a El Conquistador a nice chunk.
I'm increasingly convinced pomplawhatever sucks.
I have no idea what pomplawhatever is, but I now think it sucks in solidarity.
Putin's greatest dream is to see the flesh seared of the bones of your children
By contrast, eight out of ten coyotes said they'd much rather consume your children's flesh in taco form.
284: to the benefit to wildlife from the fact that people are shut out of bombing ranges.
Sheesh, how PC is that? You're not allowed on the bombing range just to protect some wildlife.