This.

The squirrels, indeed, are laughing at all of us.

All the leaves are falling off my bonsai tree. Is it autumn where its heart is? Is it unwell? Is it a metaphor? It gets a nice soak once a week as advised.

(above reposted from "that thread"; below new)

Outside on my windowledge I have two unkillable but unnamed "succulents" I bought at M&S, which need no looking after at all, and a plant my dad gave me years ago which often looks as if I've killed it but has always come back from the brink (I know its name but annoyingly cannot this minute recall it.) (It used to suffer dreadfully from aphids but in one of its periods of drought-neglect they all died and it survived...)

Inside I have a vast droopy cactus -- one of those "red christmas bloom" ones -- which I think badly needs repotting. This is the only thing that has flowers per se. It can go all year without water probably.

I also have kitchen herbs on another window ledge; they wax and wane but to be honest the problem there is they need deeper soil than windowpots allow for...

My peace lily keeps on truckin' through drought and flood, and flowers every few months. It is also droops mournfully to indicate it would appreciate water, which is a useful reminder.

It is not the flowers but the variegated foliage which provides the interest, but we have had a lot of luck with Coleus. It came into the house some years ago as part of one of the kid's biology project and has held on pretty well with widely-varying levels of care. [WARNING: not native to the US.]

As mentioned, succulents as well.

Begonias are good for being flowery and low maintenance.

Coleus is a good idea. You do have to be relatively on top of pinching off their flower spikes when they show up, or else they go to seed and die.

Last year, I inherited an umbrella plant that is going gangbusters--in fact, I need to trim it back--but it of course has no flowers or anything flowerlike about it. It likes to be left a good long while between waterings, which is nice for sluggards like me.

(I killed my peace lily. It had grown huge and ugly and mutant, though. But I feel bad whenever the beloved friend who gave it to me visits.)

Some think fluffiness is synonymous with cuddliness, but kitties can be the former without being the latter.

9: The cat of Mongolia. Now don't try to subvert the thread, Ned.

I have a palm whose parent came over from germany. At maturity, it spits seeds. It can do that droopy-water-me-now thing for weeks without dying and perks up near instantly with a good soaking. Sadly, though, no clue what it's called.

I have a palm whose parent came over from germany. At maturity, it spits seeds. It can do that droopy-water-me-now thing for weeks without dying and perks up near instantly with a good soaking. Sadly, though, no clue what it's called.

Try cheddar pinks, aka "firewitch." They produce lovely blooms, grow to be a few inches high, pot well, like their soil on the dry side and bloom from April through September. However, you will need to deadhead them in the winter.

Another option might be oxeye, aka oxeye daisies, aka false sunflower, aka "summer sun." They come in white and yellow varieties and are very generically bright and pretty.

Finally, there's always salvia, which is very pretty, but it doesn't bloom as long and I've read it can be unpredictable in terms of how big it gets.

I have no idea how these do indoors, though, in terms of potentially attracting insects. Keep that in mind!

(Is the advantage of a new, very busy job that I miss the blow-up threads later referred to as "that thread" by those who were there? I'll take it!)

Dude, we're going for 1000! If your pants were really that mcmanly you'd be pulling your own weight.

Finally, there's always salvia, which is very pretty

...and, if you get the right kind, will get you high as a fucking kite.

At maturity, it spits seeds. It can do that droopy-water-me-now thing for weeks without dying and perks up near instantly with a good soaking. Sadly, though, no clue what it's called.

"Penis plant"

My peace lily keeps on truckin' through drought and flood, and flowers every few months. It is also droops mournfully to indicate it would appreciate water, which is a useful reminder.

It also oxygenates the room, reduces stress and can be used to defend oneself against homicidal trolley boys.

Further to 1: especially, this.

And the most kickass flower ever, I'm not sure what it's called.

African violets, also.

If your pants were really that mcmanly you'd be pulling your own weight.

My pants are tiny and flamboyantly effeminate today. The recession, dontchaknow.

high as a fucking kite

Shhhhhh! We're not supposed to mention that until six months from now when LB posts and says, "I got this salvia plant and it's taken over the northern wall of my office. What should I do with it?" That's when we get her to mail it to us for "pruning."

Butterflies Are Pretty

But this is really ugly.

I'm not sure what it's called.

I think it is some varietal of tiger lilly.

Also (just looking for something with more spark than geraniums (sorry LB)), and semi-related to the topic of the other thread (transracial adoption), this is interesting reading.

Hmm, for NYC you want something that does well when kept in the dark. How about Conspiracy Theory Wingnuttia?

More seriously, I've had good luck with sinningias. I got a glass sphere, about 12" in diameter, with a 3" hole at the top, put a sinningia inside and a lid on top, it's needed no attention for a decade (well, I add water twice a year or so).

A google image search for sinningia turns up all kinds of pretty flowers.

My aunt in Queens did well with african violets on windowsills. However, they require a fair amount of attention and care. But they bloom continuously.

Begonias are hardy. African violets depend on the exposure-- easy in the right light (southern exposure, partial shade) impossible otherwise.

Too bad you primitives are unable to manage the cultivation of horseradish or plums.

I kind of hate begonias, is the problem; they have nasty little succulent flowers. (They're pretty in tropical countries where they can grow and get big outdoors, but I don't like them as houseplants.)

Basically, I don't know a lot about houseplants. But why should that stop me from contributing?

A long time ago in an office I had good luck with an African Violet that we kept directly under a fluorescent desk lamp that was never ever turned off. At the end of the work day I'd lower the lamp so that it was almost touching the plant (there wasn't a window nearby and I'd heard they need lots of light).

Also, hibiscus produces pretty blooms one at a time pretty much continuously for at least a good part of the year, and I've seen it as a houseplant, but don't know how fussy it is indoors.

I have a miniature rose bush in killingly direct sunlight that I've managed to keep alive for a year now. It puts out a rose or two every couple of months.

I used to have three houseplants, but I killed them all somehow (probably didn't keep them warm enough or watered enough at critical junctures.) Now have one jade plant that seems to be doing okay. It hasn't grown at all in 2 months though, is that normal? What are the Unfogged norms for jade plant horticulture?

Just one word: Plastic. There's a great future in plastic houseplants.

When I was a kid, we had one on a windowsill in the shower -- not where water would hit it, but it got steamed by four showers a day. It seemed pleased with the treatment.

I once had a cubicle next to a woman who kept the biggest indoor plants that I've ever seen outside of a conservatory. This included three trees that hit the 12 foot ceilings and several ivy-looking things that easily had 20 foot vines. Not many flowers, but just a wall of green that hit every beam of light coming through the window.

African violets. They are the heartiest plants I've ever owned. They tolerate over and under watering, and bloom all year so long as they have adequate sunlight. Just make sure to pick off the flowers and leaves as they die and dry up, or they start to look a little homely.

33: in a cubicle??

Plastic houseplants can pretty much take or leave the steambath, LB.

Plastic housequeens, though, flock to them.

To BG's 1012 in the other thread:

I don't like the idea of saying that we want people to leave.

Me neither. I feel embarrassingly defensive saying this, and I should probably leave it unsaid, but I don't think anyone asked read to leave. If they had (or if they did and I missed it) I would have been really pissed off.

Wandering Jew is one of the few houseplants that has been able to consistently survive having to rely on me for care.

Any of you locals can head towards Downtown via the Blvd of the Allies. The 13 story, red brick building to your right has a mass of green completely occupying the 4th floor windows in the center - absolutely visible from the road. The city planner responsible is a plant genius, and his jungle has rendered one of the elevators nearly inaccessible. When their time comes, it will literally take hatchets or saws to clear them out.

35: Yes. A cubicle facing floor to ceiling window, but still a cubicle 11 stories up in a 40 story glass tower. The cubicles were on the biggish side (say 8x8), but it was in impressive use of space. She had a three level riser for the smaller plants.

This thread is a farce; LB lied about her interest in germaniums. Everybody who has commented on it has been manipulated in an unspeakably Aryan way.

I want a cubicle with one of these.

I don't think anyone asked read to leave.

Although, such a thing need not be said directly for that message to be conveyed, and it seems reasonable to assume from the "fine, i'm leaving then" comments that, whether such a message was intended or not, it was how read was interpreting various responses to her.

Any of you locals can head towards Downtown via the Blvd of the Allies. The 13 story, red brick building to your right has a mass of green completely occupying the 4th floor windows in the center - absolutely visible from the road. The city planner responsible is a plant genius, and his jungle has rendered one of the elevators nearly inaccessible. When their time comes, it will literally take hatchets or saws to clear them out

I hope I can remember to look for this the next time I am in Pgh.

Sweet, so this is the continuation of the other thread? Yay! Y'all are boring as tar. Also, remember when read threatened to leave after her third comment, I because I called her a spambot? It was a simpler time then.

I own a plant!

Thanks for killing the Harry thread just as I posted the most insightful comment ever on the interblags, assholes! Your loss. You coulda been all enlightened and shit, but nooooo, can't risk the precious commenting crapware!

Just for this I'm going to track down the server and pee on it until sparks come out.

Do sparks usually come out when you pee? You might want to talk to someone about that.

Hey, why the hell haven't we had a mixtape thread recently, anyway?

Selfishly treating this as an open thread. . .

I liked to this video a while back, and I keep coming back to it and finding the iconography of the image really compelling.

You have a white American singing an 18th C (?) sea shanty, accompanied by two East Indian co-workers standing in a generic 20th century corporate break-room.

Watching it I just think, "this is the legacy of colonialism, right here."

You have people from two different former colonies, singing a song out of the tradition that made colonialism possible (the anglo naval tradition), while enclosed in the space of 21st century global capitalism.

Am I reading too much into it, or is it a fascinating video?

</selfish>

I had a bonsai tree once. It took over a year for it to die, which is pretty much a record for me and houseplants.

Now I have some pretty flowers in the window made of silk. They look very realistic.

Yay for mixtape! We want mixtape!

I have baby tomato seedlings by the window in my kitchen and they are not dead at all yet.

I want people to tell me my bonsai is not dying but healthily shedding! It seems very brittle though.

Regarding read I don't think reciting onesided lists of grievances is helpful any more than it is when talking about the middle east.

I think I had a couple of spats with read but I didn't find her more hostile or unpleasant than the norm here. Less perhaps.

Just last night, I kicked over a small potted marigold that came home from pre-school. Did not kill it, thought it was rendered temporarily homeless. It turns out that 2-3 year olds do not pack in the dirt very well.

44. Right, and I really don't want to pick on you particularly, Di, but your But if she really has left, for good, I will, personally, be most pleased. could be read that way, even though Read was already "gone." (Who knows if she was when you wrote it? This is the internet. She could have been lurking)

AWB does get an awful lot of "I have never met anyone like the people you know, and the way you relate to your friends and romantic partners is completely alien to me." I could see that getting old.

While this is true to an extent, I think a lot of the comments are also meant to convey something like, "No, really, it is not a generally accepted norm that your friends will treat you like shit."

Update to 50: two East Indian co-workers

Just to be clear, I have no idea, actually if they're from India -- one of them looks potentially Pakistani to me, but I don't claim to be good at identifying people's ethic heritage, I'm just talking about how I read the image.

50: You know, I actually can't watch that video? I'm not sure why, it's not offensive or anything, I just... can't watch it.

58: that's how I meant it.

But: plant!

Or: soothing, good feelings, up with people mixtape!

I'm there.

I do not find marigolds attractive, and never have. I was resentful when we planted them in nursery school, because I liked them so little. But maybe what I really don't like is the way they look all alone in a pot. Surely there is some setting for them that I'd find appealing.

58: Yeah I have trouble thinking of comments toward AWB that support the "you're a sick alien fuck who's outside The Norms" interpretation.

Hey, if this is an open thread I'll just brag that not only did I attend, write up and photograph an anti-ICE demo yesterday (although the write-up isn't my best at all, at all) but was picked up by another local paper. I'm particularly pleased because I chose that photo to lead instead of the more militant-looking one recommended by my otherwise-very-media-savvy video ninja friend who was also there.

Also, if any of you have been following that Postville IA raid situation, it is so weird. I'm putting together an anniversary of the raid story and wow...Drugs, human trafficking, all kindsa creepiness, and a very strange small town.

40: Any of you locals

Pittsburgh, the hub of the universe.

You know, I actually can't watch that video? I'm not sure why, it's not offensive or anything, I just... can't watch it.

Weird, any idea why?

I didn't like it that much the first time I watched it, but it really grew on me.

57: Totally true. Now, I wouldn't ever presume to say, "[mean person], you should go away!" because this here is not my place and so saying such would not be my place. But seeing as she announced she was leaving, I feel perfectly justified in announcing that this delights me no end. It's kind of mean, yeah, and I think I'm pretty good about not being mean generally. But it is far kinder a sentiment than those she's thrown my way.

More importantly, though, tell me what to wear on a lunch date in the park! Normally I lean toward skirts for a first date situation because I consider my legs to be an asset. But that might be challenging if sitting on the grass. Must also be at least business casual because I have to work that day...

65: We've got an election next week, so consider yourself lucky if a discussion related to that doesn't start.

I blame Ogged (PBUH).

57: And you are right. I should be bigger than that. It just turns out that in this case, I'm not.

http://www.last.fm/music/El-P/_Tasmanian+Pain+Coaster?autostart

http://www.last.fm/music/Patti+Smith/_/Smells+Like+Teen+Spirit?autostart

http://www.last.fm/music/Son+House/_/John+the+Revelator

http://www.last.fm/music/Robots+in+Disguise/_/You+Really+Got+Me

66: Maybe it's the looks on the Indian guys' faces? Like they'd really rather be somewhere else? I dunno.

might be challenging if sitting on the grass.

Just wear clean underwear. Problem solved.

I would wear a below-the-knee/mid-calf length skirt, in a color and fabric that wouldn't immediately make me worry about grass stains. It's not too hard to sit sidesaddle, as it were, on the grass, and not expose yourself.

I have a housekeeping quuestion. I made a curried chicken salad with grapes and mangoes that I got off of epicurious. I've had something similar that I liked a lot, but this was actually too strong.

I spilled either some of the curry powder or the dressing on the white kitchen counter, and it's now stained. One of my nail tips seems to be stained too, but that will grow out. Any suggestions?

I've tried vinegar/water/borax home brew with grapefruit seed extract and lemon essential oil. I also tried some citra-solv diluted. There's some formula 409 in the closet too. Do I need Oxy or something?

They make Soft Scrub with bleach.

Just wear clean see through underwear. Problem solved.

75: Just plain old Lysol or a Magic Eraser usually works.

Right, and I really don't want to pick on you particularly, Di, but your But if she really has left, for good, I will, personally, be most pleased. could be read that way, even though Read was already "gone." (Who knows if she was when you wrote it? This is the internet. She could have been lurking)

The whole "you Americans are degenerates" thing was annoying in general. The "[specific american] is a degenerate" thing naturally lead to lasting hard feelings by the specific Americans. You can't be surprised when the specific Americans bring their knives out; that's what I would do.

For the counter rather than the clothes question, baking soda paste left on overnight?

My experience with fabric dye and bathtubs leads me to believe that many seemingly intractable stains on white surfaces do in fact come off after time and multiple scrubs. But there's not always a lot you can do in the immediate term.

74: I second RFTS.

They make Soft Scrub with bleach.

Which will ruin your favorite black sweatshirt if you get it on a sleeve. So I hear.

Which will ruin your favorite black sweatshirt if you get it on a sleeve. So I hear.

Yes, it will! Bleach is excellent at bleaching things.

The whole "you Americans are degenerates" thin

I know I am!

Mmm. I had a dull blue sweater that I loved, but was a little raggedy so I wore it cleaning. It's now raggedy and bleach-spotted, and I am sad.

Curry stains are tough. I don't have any non-obvious advice.

83 GETS IT EXACTLY RIGHT.

79: Because of course, the specific Americans must always be read carefully for their sparkling wit, whereas That One must always be read humourlessly and literally, but that's totally not a double standard and everything's copacetic.

I mean Christ, I don't want to drag us back there -- and I can't speak to Di's "suicide" thing since I didn't see it -- but this endless fucking harping on the "degenerates" comment? I can't just let it pass, it's idiocy.

I vote for tight pants, Di. You don't want to have to worry about sitting properly for your skirt when you're out on a first date.

75: I also say SoftScrub with bleach, assuming we're talking about a regular white formica countertop and that you can keep you sweatshirt out of it. Just let it sit overnight. We used to do that all the time before we moved away from out gleaming countertops. I've never tried a Magic Eraser on formica, but they are brilliant on painted walls.

Human urine is a surprisingly good cleaning agent!

Does anyone understand Magic Erasers? They work alarmingly well, but I can't quite figure out if it's a mechanical abrasive or a chemical bleach.

90: And peeing on your kitchen counter is a good way to avoid having people over for dinner.

50:singing a song out of the tradition that made colonialism possible

What, are we blaming the impressed soldiers, with their horrific working conditions and short life spans, for the crimes and profits of the East India Company?

That there's folk music, dude, oppositional to the Handels, Haydns, and Mozarts in form and content.
The modality felt alien, and maybe a little Eastern. Call-and response, too. Do you look at the blues this way, or only white working class music?

Read up the Indian Sea Naval Battles of the American Revolution lastnight, Hughes vs Suffren. Noted that the British & French both had native allies helping with supplies & repairs. Ceylon & Mysore, tho I forget which was which. Local elites often allied with the colonial elites, that's how it worked.

But when you in your dreams meet the peg-legged old sailor with the cup on the street, be sure to give him a kick for his imperialism.

(NB:notice again the cruelty when identity politics superceeds class)

91: I'd like to second that question.

Di, 90 was not what I had in mind when I recommended wearing clean underwear.

Now you tell me.

92: whaaaaaat? What kind of crazy aliens do you have over for dinner?

91: They work by Magic, LB. It says right there in the name. Nobody's told me if it's light magic or dark, and I didn't ask.

(Apparently the real secret is melamine foam.)

Wait, Di, what sort of "date" is this? Is there some reason you'd be wearing underwear?

impressed soldiers

impressed sailors, of course, tho well "High Germany", 93 applies to the soldiers too

That chantey is pretty damn awesome. The white dude leading the call has a great voice for it. The Sikh dude and the Pakistani dude (my guesses for ethnicity) seem fairly into it, I would say. They're a little embarrassed maybe---neither of them has the vocal chops that the lead guy has, and clearly they aren't as used to performing for a YouTube audience, but seriously, I'm not seeing neo-imperial coercion here.

accompanied by two East Indian co-workers standing in a generic 20th century corporate break-room.

You apparently missed the point of the visuals, also, if all you saw was a simple critique of colonialism. Or did I miss the powdered wig on the white guy, and the hostility of the Indians? Looked like solidarity to me.

99: For the thrill of an added challenge.

101: I thought NickS was talking more about unconscious subtext rather than actual coercion.

101: I think Nick had in mind "legacy of" colonialism, not that the guy was actually coercing his coworkers. As in, "This Video and Everything In It Brought to You by the British Empire."

The modality felt alien, and maybe a little Eastern.

A lot of the traditional chanteys use older, pre-diatonic modes. My vague understanding is that many of the Eastern musical traditions resemble, say, Phyrgian mode but are derived from a different musical structure. My honey used to amuse me by improvising Middle-Eastern themes on traditional sea chantey bases.

Magic erasers are sweet. Here is another explanation:

http://home.howstuffworks.com/magic-eraser.htm

My honey used to amuse me by improvising Middle-Eastern themes on traditional sea chantey bases.

Now you're like "dude, knock it off"?

"This Video and Everything In It Brought to You by the British Empire."

Indeed.

As in, "This Video and Everything In It Brought to You by the British Empire."

Well, okay. But that's sort of self-evident?

Now you're like "dude, knock it off"?

Alas, the home front is divided against itself, and the songs of yore do not ring out.

Now you're like "dude, knock it off"?

Alas, the home front is divided against itself, and the songs of yore do not ring out.

Arr.

110: It is perhaps uncommon to see so many popularly-recognizable legacies of the British Empire concentrated into a single YouTube frame, is what I'm guessing caught his eye.

Magic erasers are great--especially on walls. They even have store-brand ones now.

It's just a regular old formica countertop.

I'm wary of putting bleach near it, since my boyfriend gets upset about household chemicals ever being near anything that might ever touch food or human skin EVER. (He uses bleach a lot at work.)

115: If he doesn't like bleach, then I'd go with urine.

I'm wary of putting bleach near it, since my boyfriend gets upset

Every restaurant or food factory surface gets wiped down with bleach every single day, by order of the health department. Your boyfriend has an odd take on bleach.

Indian people and sea chanteys? That's not an overwhelming concatenation of Imperial symbolism.

Where were the teabags and poppies and redcoats and crinolines? The pikestaffs and Corn Laws and bullion and rifles and pith helmets and missionaries? The plantations and John Company and gunboat diplomacy and crusading anthropologists and triangle trade?

Every restaurant or food factory surface getsis supposed to be wiped down with bleach every single day, by order of the health department.

I've worked in restaurants.

I guess I'm cranky---in general, today---but specifically because I'd like our uses of history to be embracing. If these Indian-looking dudes want to sing chanteys, by God, they should be able to. I've known far too many people tie themselves up in knots about what things look like, whether such-and-such is appropriate, whether they are allowed to enjoy x or y experience. Feeling like you have to reject even potential pleasurable parts of imperial culture is another form of post-colonial repression. I'm all for Indian guys singing along to chanteys---even if it's the white guy who has the chantey hobbyhorse.

Damn, I hope I'm not getting a migraine---SO CRANKY.

I've worked in restaurants.

Yeah, me too. Your edit is far more accurate.

He's extremely sensitive to smells. He doesn't want to risk getting any stains on his home clothes. And I think that he worries about fumes. He works with chemicals all day long, but he has a fume hood there. He only wears his oldest clothes at work and washes them in a separate load.

He's also very anal about not wearing shoes in the house. His parents actually have a couple of pairs of shoes that they wear inside only. I believe that if it's not snowing or raining, and your shoes aren't particularly dirtywearing them inside is just fine.

122: Hello sitcom.

I guess I'm cranky---in general, today---but specifically because I'd like our uses of history to be embracing. If these Indian-looking dudes want to sing chanteys, by God, they should be able to.

But... who is saying they are not?

120: I think NickS was implying he found it more enjoyable -- certainly more interesting -- because of the subtext.

He's also very anal about not wearing shoes in the house. His parents actually have a couple of pairs of shoes that they wear inside only. I believe that if it's not snowing or raining, and your shoes aren't particularly dirtywearing them inside is just fine.

I'm pretty sure anyone raised in a shoeless house feels this way. It seems silly to me, too (we have dogs, for chrissakes), but it's a strongly-held, not entirely rational belief for some people.

Ok, I took his comment completely wrong, then. Goddammit. I have to go swim do some shit. Sweet Christ, am I in a bad mood.

What does your boyfriend use to disinfect countertops, BG?

116: That magic water, people. Duh.

I'm pretty sure anyone raised in a shoeless house feels this way.

It's funny -- I don't wear shoes unless forced to by social pressure, and my kids are the same. But I also don't give a damn about shoes in the house or outside dirt. Guests will come into our apartment, notice after a bit that no one else has shoes on, and start getting all apologetic about taking theirs off -- there really must be a lot of no-shoes-in-the-house people who get tense about it.

sorry, I stepped out for a bit.

"This Video and Everything In It Brought to You by the British Empire."

Yes, precisely, and I did think the video was fantastic.

I assumed that my reputation of appreciation for folk music has preceded me.

I also think the co-workers are enjoying the song, but nervous and self-conscious about their performance chops. I think they're great. They make the whole performance fantastic.

I disinfect countertops with bacon grease.

not that the guy was actually coercing his coworkers

You missed the bit at the end where he beats them savagely and takes their stuff, for authenticity.

Brock's response was exactly my thought on reading 117. But adherence to health regulations is an illusion dear to restaurantgoers.

114: Ah, that makes sense. I can't watch the video at work, but just based on reading 50 I was about to make some kind of "true, but isn't everything?" comment?

118: None of those are still with us in recognizable form, though. I don't even know what crinolines are. It would be cool if the video includes a cup of tea in the background, though. And it's not just Indian people and sea chanteys, it's Indian people, sea chanteys, an American person and a place identified with global capitalism. I mean, so I gather.

It's funny -- I don't wear shoes unless forced to by social pressure, and my kids are the same

Going shoeless on Manhattan streets is fairly advanced level shoelessness.

Just to add to that, I think the video is interesting because you have the positive/human/charming side of the performance juxtaposed with the sub-text of imperialism.

Also, Bob, I was careful to not say that shanties are the culture of imperialism, just that the British empire wouldn't have been possible without the British sailors.

AB has converted me to houseshoes. It's a lot less about keeping the floors clean (although it makes a big difference) than about A. keeping larger particulates off the hardwood/out of the carpets and B. keeping your own feet clean.

I disinfect countertops with bacon grease.

I disinfect bacon with human urine. Well, mostly human.

138: well, right. It's all part of nature's cycle.

Going shoeless on Manhattan streets is fairly advanced level shoelessness.

And when you wash your feet, they make their own gravy.

Going shoeless on Manhattan streets is fairly advanced level shoelessness.

You know that LB hates this kind of NYC exceptionalism.

135: I've done it. It's not like there's special Manhattan street dirt that's dirtier than other street dirt.

I mean, I don't usually, but I have.

Truly, isn't clean and dry enough for countertops?

130: The folks I know who are very serious -- although very friendly and with a wide variety of slippers to offer one -- about shoes coming off when indoors are Algerian. Oh wait, and my adviser's apt. in Chicago with off-white wall-to-wall carpeting was shoe-free. At least for graduate students. I wonder if she made *everyone* take their shoes off, or just the grubby kids.

I was thinking that both NickS and Jackmormon misspelled "Shantey", but then I was thinking that the people who invented the Shanteys probably had a million different spellings of it themselves, so hey, harmony!

Also, googling it, NickS seems to have the preferred spelling in this fallen modern era.

Sea Shanty!

True fact: you get a LEED point (you only need 26 total to have a LEED-certified building) for having walk-off mats at your building's main entrance. A walk-off mat being basically a glorified welcome mat. Point being, keeping shoeborne crud out of your building is a meaningful contributor to health and cleanliness.

Why yes, I have been assimilated. Why do you ask?

Also, if you want another video that makes the questions of labor and works songs even more explicit (for me), here is another video by the lead singer in the first one.

I don't think the performance is as good, and it does show that he's not as interesting solo. But the nature and setting of the video jump out even more. As he says in the comments to another video, he will go out to his car, during breaks at work, and record himself singing in his car.

That's awesome, and also just a little disturbing (he does come across as slightly obsessive)

If you add grapefruit seed extract to water, it's a pretty good disinfectant. I like to use vinegar myself.

He's very much against spraying things. I think he'd prefer it if I put cleaner on the cloth and wiped it down.

I have a sunscreen spray made by Kinesys, and he doesn't like the idea of my spraying it in the house, because he worries about the residue. I've never tried to use hair spray.

142: I guess post-broken windows theory it's safer than it used to be.

I knew a guy that never wore shoes. Literally, never, unless he was explicitly forced to. He kept a pair of kung fu slippers with him in case of such an unlikely eventuality. I saw him walk down the strip in Vegas in mid-summer in bare feet: now that is advanced-level shoelessness.

I take it he's a bath person.

I mean, if you're from a different culture it's fine, especially if you have slippers present. I personally am not comfortable asking guests to take off their shoes and won't do it.

If I got a hole in my sock one day, I wouldn't like to have to walk around someone's house in stocking feet.

Since this question has come up before, I want to note that, when I posted 136, there was only one comment (Sifu's 132) between my two comments.

Comments 133, 134, & 135 interposed themselves after what I saw on the page when I posted 136.

It doesn't matter in this case, but I want to offer it as evidence that sometimes comments can show up in sequence before another comment that was posted earlier.

150 to 148.

152: so 136 to 132, is what you're saying?

150: Shower all the way, though, truth be told sometimes the bathtub isn't really clean enough for a bath. He'd need a much bigger bath for a tub to be comfortable. I did find this sealant stuff which makes the water bead on tiles so that less soap scum and hard water stains stick to the walls.

146: Or somebody set up the LEED criteria with an easy point to keep building owners happy?

As for shoelessness in the house, we also do that. Maybe it's a Pittsburgh thing because it sure wasn't my idea.

because he worries about the residue

Does he permit stovetop cooking? Because, you know....

149: When I was younger and working all day in workboots wet from morning dew, I would spend the rest of the day barefoot; I'd keep a pair of sneakers in the car in event of The Man*, but there were probably days I'd go from 2:30 pm to 6 am without anything on my feet.

AB finally convinced me that I should give sandals a try, and now I rarely go barefoot.

* ie, No Shoes, No Service

Sea Shanty!

That is pretty fun. You should get a copy of my friends' album.

Have I mentioned that I saw Cindy Kallet and Grey Larson in concert at the end of February. They were great, if you can see them together (which shouldn't be unusual) I highly recommend it.

155: 150 was a joke. I'm not sure I get the aversion to sprays, but hey, whatever.

We don't make guests take off their shoes in the house, either, nor do we make the dogs wear shoes when they go outside (my wife tried that for a few years but eventually gave up). So we have layers of street filth on our floors, but we take off our shoes in the house anyway (so that we can walk around barefoot in the filth, I guess). I wear house shoes, usually, because I don't actually like getting my feet filthy. (I love being barefoot on clean floors. Or even outside. But not on dirty floors inside.)

Maybe it's a Pittsburgh thing because it sure wasn't my idea.

It's a German thing in my house. In fact, we have a super-awesome felt basket full of 3 sizes of felt houseshoes, labeled Gäste*. We never actually offer them to friends, except the very close friends mentioned in the other thread. No, not that one.

* Guests. Unlike certain other commenters, if I'm going to use a foreign word, I'll tell you its meaning. Without prompting.

Wait, BG is dating Howard Hughes?

120:Feeling like you have to reject even potential pleasurable parts of imperial culture'

See, I'm not buying into the sea chanteys as part of imperial culture, and see the opposition as one of the points of the video. It's the Int'l Workers against the capitalism, is what I see.

"Are blues and Gospel part of "slaveholder" culture?" might help to explain my problem.

Of course, I feel the convergence of British trad folk, black rural blues, and the Appalachian bluegrass/country traditional. And I could link to a tube of Terry/McGhee or Piedmont Blues or many others to show the relation.

159: I realized that it was a joke after the fact. Water is supposed to spray in the shower. He just worries that the sunscreen spray (which in this case has no odor) will get on his clothes.

His Dad thinks he's nuts about the sunscreen, but he'll point out that his parents have a laundry/mud room.

I love being barefoot on clean floors.

Oh yes. This is one of our incentives for mopping.

AB has mentioned the idea of dog shoes; I'm never sure if she's serious. We do wipe down our dog's paws when muddy, but that's mostly because we're pretty lax with actual dog-bathing, so toweling is all he gets.

Teach the dog to levitate.

164: our dogs did not like them at all. I think you probably need to get them used to that sort of thing as puppies--try to throw shoes on an adult dog and they sort of flip out.

e.g.

We tried booties on DogBreath -- not for cleanliness, which, um, isn't something we worry about that much, but because we worried that salted sidewalks in the winter would hurt her feet. We couldn't get her to wear them, though.

If you don't wear shoes enough, they become uncomfortable.

Sorry to those who do not connect sea shanties to imperial culture.

Shoeless, almost always. The asphalt does get hot in Texas, though.

Shoeless for decades, and the soles of my feet are amazing with scar tissue.

It's the Int'l Workers against the capitalism, is what I see.

This has probably been said enough, but I'm with you Bob.

Though, in this case, I don't think that's conscious on the part of the singers, just the subtext that makes the video more interesting.

I don't claim to be good at identifying people's ethic heritage

Whereas I can spot a Confucian-Kantian at a hundred paces.

169: I was so sad coming back from the Peace Corps after two years either barefoot or in flimsy flipflops. You put in a whole bunch of barefoot time like that, and you get used to thinking of your feet as an important source of sensory data -- putting them back in shoes all the time felt like walking around in boxing gloves.

I used to only wear kung fu shoes, and I definitely felt for a while like normal shoes were implausibly, unfeasibly heavy.

Sea Shantey

I soon got used to this singing; for the sailors never touched a rope without it. Sometimes, when no one happened to strike up, and the pulling, whatever it might be, did not seem to be getting forward very well, the mate would always say, "Come, men, can't any of you sing? Sing now, and raise the dead." And then some one of them would begin, and if every man's arms were as much relieved as mine by the song, and he could pull as much better as I did, with such a cheering accompaniment, I am sure the song was well worth the breath expended on it. It is a great thing in a sailor to know how to sing well, for he gets a great name by it from the officers, and a good deal of popularity among his shipmates. Some sea-captains, before shipping a man, always ask him whether he can sing out at a rope. (Herman Melville, Redburn: His First Voyage, 1849)

Sea shantys are indeed work songs, and so tied to rhythmic movement that I think the stillness of the workers in a break room is another subtext.

It's a German thing in my house.

And also, of course, a Japanese thing, so WWII was basically in-house shoe wearers vs. in-house shoe non-wearers. Suddenly it all makes sense.

130" Guests will come into our apartment, notice after a bit that no one else has shoes on, and start getting all apologetic about taking theirs off -- there really must be a lot of no-shoes-in-the-house people who get tense about it.

Heh. That I've never encountered. We rarely wear shoes in the house -- barefoot or socks mostly, house shoes/slippers to go down to the basement -- and I mostly notice that guests seem relieved, or feel welcomed, by the fact that they can kick off their shoes.

Now that I think about it, when guests do come who wear heavy-soled shoes for the entire visit, it annoys me just a little tiny bit. Dude, what's with the clompig? You're kind of clomping around, you know! The, er, cats don't like it. (Really, they don't, and run away from the loud person.)

Not that I would ever say anything; these are guests. I just prefer quiet padding about to clomping.

so tied to rhythmic movement that I think the stillness of the workers in a break room is another subtext.

Ooh, I like that. I don't know how significant I think that is, but it's a good observation.

Like I said, I've found myself somewhat obsessed by that video -- in a positive way.

My goddaughter yelled at me once (she was probably 4 or 5?) for wearing shoes in their house.

Formerly colonized people sometimes take on cultural forms from the colonizer and make them their own, as with brass bands in India or Africa. Other times they seem to enjoy them best in their original form and feel no need to produce their own versions. Anglophone Africans love them some countrymusic.

It's a German thing in my house.

I freaking wish. I cannot for the life of me get my husband to take off his shoes in the house (and as a result, the kid doesn't do it either).

I would never ask guests to remove shoes, and in fact when they say "oh, I should take off my shoes" I usually say "no, no, not at all." But ime, if I kick off my shoes as I enter the house (or open the door while shoeless), the guest usually offers to remove his or her shoes.

(Obviously I have different standards for guests than I do for my family.)

I have different standards for guests than I do for my family

Guests don't have to wash their hands.

My goddaughter yelled at me once (she was probably 4 or 5?) for wearing shoes in their house

Once? Did you learn to remove your shoes, or did you learn her not to yell at you?

168: In Canada you actually need them because there's more salt than down here.

And also, of course, a Japanese thing, so WWII was basically in-house shoe wearers vs. in-house shoe non-wearers. Suddenly it all makes sense.

I and my wife differ on the "shoes in the house" issue. I am pro-shoes; she is anti-shoes. I need to get some "This Machine Kills Fascists" stickers for my shoes.(although, I think Koreans and Chinese are anti-shoe too.)

I'm pretty sure apostropher has that comment bookmarked.

I need to get some "This Machine Kills Fascists" stickers for my shoes.

Awesome.

183: I learned not to hang out with those horrible people anymore. But that was mostly not about the shoes.

* ie, No Shoes, No Service

There's a restaurant in town with this on its door:

No zapatos, no tacos
No pants, no problem

128: What does your boyfriend use to disinfect countertops

Also: people disinfect their countertops? This is for if/when you cook with meat, I imagine. Possibly I'm an utter slob, but I don't disinfect the place. Well, also, no kids. Um. I don't really understand this disinfecting thing.

(On the other business, read and dsquared leaving, I hope dsquared won't, or hasn't. I really like his comments. read I have no animus toward, but being around here seemed to distress her quite a bit, and if she wanted to leave to alleviate her distress, I understand that.)

I need to get some "This Machine Kills Fascists" stickers for my shoes.

Awesome, but it would be more traditional to have it hand lettered. You should just write it on with a sharpie.

I'm pretty sure apostropher has that comment bookmarked.

The classics are classic for a reason, Brock. Plus, we have to live up to our reputation.

185: "This Machine Kills Fascists" stickers for my shoes.

< insert "This BikeShoe is a PipeShoe Bomb" joke that actually works here>

The shoes/no shoes thing is an endless source of debate between my boyfriend and I. I grew up in a no-shoes/white carpet/Asian household/with vinyl wrapped furniture. He grew up "normal." Because I was getting OCD about sweeping my floors twice a day and mopping all the time (I love bare feet on clean floors too), I have agreed that when we move in together, it'd be easier for me to relax on this than for him to become more anal OCD.

190: We don't regularly disinfest our countertops either, but there are occasions when it makes sense to do so (raw meat, other especially germy messes, etc.), and I figured that most people have a preferred approach for doing so. I use bleach. I was curious was BG's boyfriend used, since it sounded like he didn't want any sort of chemicals around. I'm not suggesting countertops necessarily need to be disinfected as a matter of course (although I wouldn't criticize as excessively germ-phobic anyone who did so--it's really not a bad idea).

192: ATM! IYKWIM Or so the mullahs would have you believe. Oh, PASIIApo.

We don't regularly disinfest our countertops either,

You know, I really would if I were you. A little dirt is one thing, but infestations?

People with vinyl-wrapped furniture frighten me. I used to think they were urban legends, but then I met some.

195: I'm thinking of switching to those Method cleaners, because cleaning my house (which I do every week or at least two, this is normal and not OCD right?) and cleaning my countertops after each use was giving me a fume-y headache. Has anyone used those Method cleaners? Do they work? I mostly use bleach, baking soda, etc.

there are occasions when it makes sense to do so

I love the feel of cold formica against my bare ass.

My grandmother had plastic on the furniture. She was also on a mission to suck all joy out of the life of anyone she could get within venom-spitting distance of, so.

As far as I'm concerned, if there's a carpet, people need to take their shoes off, and if there isn't a carpet, people don't. When I moved to a place with a carpet I changed my own behavior 100% in this regard, and think it's odd when visitors see me walk in and take off my shoes, and then they walk in and don't take off their shoes. You know, if carpets get dirty, they're kind of hard to clean.

Bacterial infestations, LB.

People with vinyl-wrapped furniture frighten me. I used to think they were urban legends, but then I met some.

Ah, brings me back to summers at gramma's house. Really, such a feel on bare sweaty skin.

Um, in light of 201, I feel obligated to clarify that my grandmother was a warm, lovely woman, notwithstanding the vinyl.

Since HS the only sneakers I've worn when not actually running distances have been racing flats/waffle racers. Very close to barefoot, pretty funky and distinctive, but pricey. I haven't replaced the last pair I wore out. Indeed, I don't have any functioning sneakers right now; I wear bike shoes or sandals for softball, because they've got grippy soles and fit well (not so great for the flex, obvs.).

I have no problem getting dress shoes at Goodwill*, but sneakers seems at least a degree too far.

* Bonus note: Iris was talking the other day about a dress she'd received as a gift, and said, "Rachel was probably at a clothes store, like Goodwill...." We're doing some things right.

204 to 200.

Iris was talking the other day about a dress she'd received as a gift, and said, "Rachel was probably at a clothes store, like Goodwill...."

Heh. My mother rules yard sales -- she finds the most amazing stuff for nickles. Sally, at four or five: "You know how we buy things in stores, but out where Grandma lives people just buy things from each other?"

Yes, in the urban legends it's always grandmothers. I don't think I've ever actually met a grandmother who did this, but I guess they're really out there. The two couples I've met were in their 20s and 30s.

209 to the vinyl furtiture people.

When I was a kid, our next-door neighbours were elderly, devout Lutheran Christians with plastic-wrapped furniture and a house full of knick-knacks.

In Canada you actually need them because there's more salt than down here.

I challenge the first half of this assertion. Actually, both halves: Canada's a pretty big place, after all.

206 to 174. Sorry, I was doing some paying work.

212: Yeah, that assertion isn't right.

Some places in Canada use no salt because it's too cold, others preferably sand because of the damage.

In general, salt usage depends on location and temperatures.

199: We'd used Method cleaners. The soap scum one works fine on the tub, but not as well as SoftScrub. The basic white spray bottle cleaner appears to be the same as any other or it's class (i.e. the mirror will be free of whatever flies out of my mouth when I floss).

On a related note, I need a hobby or something.

202: As far as I'm concerned, if there's a carpet, people need to take their shoes off, and if there isn't a carpet, people don't.

We may need to have a conversation argument discussion about carpets versus rugs, Ned.

If I have (cheap, unfortunately) Asian rugs on hardwood floors, I don't know whether people should be taking their shoes off or not. Man, this stuff is hard to suss out!

I seriously need to clean my floors more often in any event.

They don't use salt in Western Canada. Too cold, mucks up the roads.

I have a poison hemlock plant in my office. It makes a nice memento mori. It's kind of a drama queen plant, though. If I don't water it for a week, it slumps over like it's going to croak, and then perks up pretty quickly once it gets water.

It hasn't put out any pretty flowers as yet.

I just imperialistically and consumeristically obtained a Preethi mixie. It has many more THINGS to it than I had anticipated.

The two couples I've met were in their 20s and 30s.

I have long-ago memories of elderly people's households with vinyl coverings (including vinyl runners on the carpets), and I recall thinking even at five or so that it was weird. I think it would kind of freak me out to see them in the homes of people younger than me.

185:I need to get some "This Machine Kills Fascists" stickers tats for my shoes feet.

I am starting to feel exposed and undressed in public for my lack of tattoos. It could be that I am identifying too much with twenty-somethings, but the Lady (50+) has gotten seven in the last decade.

One problem I have is not wanting to give up my bodyhair. Hairlessness is so amphibian.

One problem I have is not wanting to give up my bodyhair.

You could get one on your forehead.

One hopes

Has anyone used those Method cleaners?

We use them because Rah is all about avoiding the super-caustic chemicals. I like them. They clean well and they smell good. Rah thinks that the smell is a bit too strong on some of them, but I love them.

As for shoes, he longs to go barefoot for the rest of his life whereas I grew up in a house where shoes inside were just fine and people who were obsessed with shoelessness were generally regarded as putting on airs and I find feet in general to be gross anyway.

I take my shoes off for comfort but have zero expectation that anyone else do so. However, the place where mine pile up happens to be by the front door (even though I use a different door to get to the car - I walk all the way through the house to kick them off where it will be convenient to put them on when I walk downstairs in the morning) so guests tend to think we're a no-shoes household. I always end up saying, "You don't have to take your shoes off! Seriously!" No one believes me, though, as I'm usually saying it beside half a dozen pairs of shoes on the floor.

221: Bob! Make up your own mind about the tattooes! They hurt, you know, to get. Plus also money. Do not give in to peer pressure! You know this. Nobody notices if you don't have tattooes, for heaven's sake.

if there's a carpet, people need to take their shoes off, and if there isn't a carpet, people don't.

This is so bass-ackwards. Walking on a fairly dirty carpet with bare feet isn't all that different from walking on a clean carpet with bare feet. But walking on a hard dirty floor with bare feet is disgusting.

My neighbors growing up had precisely one room where all the furniture was wrapped in vinyl with vinyl runners on the carpet. Said furniture was hideous and scrolly and over-the-top Frenchy faux chic. We children were not even permitted to traverse the room. The mom was not yet a grandmother. (And the neighbor kid, one of the very first people that I ever met on this planet, died of an oxy od a couple years ago. Boo.)

As for "disinfecting" counter tops, I think germ-phobia is weird, but salt will work perfectly well to kill germs.

I read recently that Method cleaners don't as good a job as other green ones, or at least no better than cheaper ones. I can't remember where it was, but it was a credible source. I'll look for the reference when I have a chance.

221: I am starting to feel exposed and undressed in public for my lack of tattoos.

My son told ms bill that he'd like to be a tattoo artist. Bob, I'm sure financing could be arranged....

You know, if carpets get dirty, they're kind of hard to clean.

This is an argument against carpets, not in favor of shoelessness.

Also, wall to wall carpet is just the dumbest thing ever. A dirt/dander/germ sponge that not only increases the amount of work needed to keep your place clean, it also can't be readily replaced after the seventeenth time the dog has explosive diarrhea.

Alcohol kills germs extremely dead.

231 is an argument against dogs, not carpets.

If y'all can't bear to go to the hippie co-op for your cleaners, I will point out that Target now stocks all those 7th Generation ones that used to be hard to find. (I assume that the formula is now cheaper, more caustic and more harmful than it used to be or Target wouldn't have them.) They aren't expensive, don't smell as much as those horrible Method ones (if there's anything more repulsive than the green apple dish soap it's the allegedly unscented silvery kind...I've secretly thrown out the unscented silvery kind because it makes me nauseated.)

Target also has a cutesy sixties-Victoriana line of cleaners whose name escapes me but that is packaged as being less harmful. And those smell okay too.

233: Just one reason I don't have a dog. One day I will also not have a carpet. Two point safety from the carpet-shitting dog scenario that haunts my dreams.

Hairlessness is so amphibian.

Hairlessness separates us from the other apes.

I don't have any tats either. My wife would dig it, but it's expensive and I'm not sure what the hell's out there that I'm all that keen on having permanently etched into my flesh.

This is so bass-ackwards. Walking on a fairly dirty carpet with bare feet isn't all that different from walking on a clean carpet with bare feet. But walking on a hard dirty floor with bare feet is disgusting.

Oh, I wasn't even imagining a situation where having bare feet was an option. You Californians, my goodness.

||

Dear God, it has been a very long time since I had a "first date" planned out *days* in advance. I am so fucking giddy with all the anticipation.

|>

How do you know the guy?

238: Best of luck, Di! Don't, in all your giddiness, leave your date locked in the back of a hot car.

I usually think of myself as pretty bourgie, but then you people start comparing notes on cleaners and I realize that I really am a dirty hippie. I think the only cleaners I buy are an all-purpose citrus-based spray, whatever environmentally safe dishwashing liquid is cheapest, ditto toilet cleaner (strictly b/c of the bottle that makes it easier to spray under the rim, otherwise I just use the all-purpose spray) and oxygen bleach (which is really good at getting pet stains out of carpets, btw). I can't believe people still use regular bleach for anything.

(Re. bleach, I believe that this *is* an argument I've managed to win with my husband. God it's taken forever, though. The man doesn't care about clean floors, but he cannot give up the old world ways when it comes to the freaking laundry.)

I'm not sure what the hell's out there that I'm all that keen on having permanently etched into my flesh

Your wife will love it.

Saying this gives an entirely false impression of my cleaning habits, but there's nothing like straight bleach on an old toothbrush to clean dirty grout.

(I did this once, months ago, and the bathroom still looks better than it did before I did. Didn't take all that long either.)

241: Bleach is the cheapest toilet cleaner. Its just acid so I don't get how it's bad for the environment when you dump it down the same tube all the water and pee go down.

dump it down the same tube all the water and pee go down

DON'T POUR BLEACH DOWN YOUR ESOPHAGUS.

245: you mean base, not acid, right?

208 is great.

239: Professional association -- but NOT a co-worker, as I have learned my lessons.

240: Don't worry, given the state of my car, I wouldn't let him anywhere near it, at least not until it's been thoroughly detailed.

231, 235:

Also, wall to wall carpet is just the dumbest thing ever.

One day I will also not have a carpet.

I share your consternation. Darn things are so hard to keep clean, especially in the face of incontinent pets; yet they are so comparatively nice and soft when kept clean! You can do your yoga right there on the floor, kick your shoes off as soon as you enter the house, and so on.

Hard wood floors are also hard to keep clean, so there's no easy answer, togolosh, apart from just plain labor.

I am very fond of the Bio-Kleen laundry powder and dish soap, I haven't used their general purpose soap that much.

Its just acid

WRONG.

DON'T POUR BLEACH DOWN YOUR ESOPHAGUS.

But pee is okay? If you say so.

247: According to Wikipedia, my memory of chemistry sucks. Yes, base, not acid.

241: I realize that I really am a dirty hippie.

I'm about the same way. Don't sweat it, babe.

I realize that I really am a dirty hippie.

Some good old fashioned bleach should take care of the "dirty" part. Not sure what to do about the hippie thing though.

But pee is okay? If you say so.

Thanks for making that explicit, M/tch.

. Rah thinks that the smell is a bit too strong on some of them

Man. For the first time in years and years, I used a mainstream deodorant/antiperspirant (free sample). At the end of the day I stank, but with an added layer of perfume. Yuck.

Everything I'm saying in this thread makes me sound like someone who cleans frequently and thoroughly, which I'm not. At all. I'm a slob.

But we have a home carpet steamer, and it doesn't take that much longer than vacuuming, and makes a big difference, especially in terms of getting the giant wads of pet hair out of the carpet. We got it after a couple of dog-vomit incidents, and it's great for that too.

256: If I'd wanted to make it explicit, I would have included a link to a video, apo.

We use Mrs. Meyer's soap for counter cleaning and it seems to do a decent job while smelling good.

If I had my druthers, my bathroom and kitchen would once every few months be sealed airtight and filled to the ceiling with bleach. I love bleach, and am squicky about germs and so on. Since I don't have this magic bleach cube option, I just Mrs. Meyer's the hell out of everything on a semi-regular basis.

258: Mmmmmmmmmm. Steamed dog vomit.

Random question: I am trying to eat healthier, so I eat less meat when I'm not having dinner with my partner. I've followed AWB's advice and have started to make beans a lot (not expensive beans, but I do make a nice black bean soup, pinto bean burrito, etc.). But beans take a long time to cook, and much planning. How often can I eat eggs? How many per day or week? The internets, they tell me different things. I'm in shape and I think I have OK cholesterol, and I've been trying to reduce our red meat consumption to once a week or once every two weeks. I do bake a lot though, so there's some butter consumption. Do I really have to worry about cholesterol if I eat an egg a day?

On the subject of green cleaners, Cook's just did dish soap, and the top 2 were green ones - I think 7th Gen and another one. Regular old Dawn or Joy came in 3rd, IIRC.

I'm pretty excited about the magic eraser.

Do I really have to worry about cholesterol if I eat an egg a day?

No.

Also, you don't need to buy a lot of cleaning stuff, whether it's 7th Generation or anything else. You really can clean almost everything with vinegar, baking soda, hot water, lemon juice, and basic soap (that doesn't have petroleum in it; Dr. Bronner's is cheap, effective, organic, fair trade, pro-hemp, treats its workers decently, and has those crazy labels!).

For scrubbing, use baking soda + salt or Bon Ami; for glass & general countertops, etc., use 1/2 vinegar + 1/2 water (don't like the smell? add a drop or 2 of any essential oil); for disinfecting, alcohol. There are variations on these that involve ammonia instead of vinegar, adding a drop of alcohol to glass cleaner, etc.

264: Oh wait, sorry. I thought you were bjk there for a second.

But still, no.

262: Cholesterol is a completely genetic thing. Not that diet doesn't impact it, but until you know where you are now, there's no good way to estimate what's advisable.

That said, my impression is that, in the context of a not-ridiculous diet, an egg a day is no big deal for the cholesterol-normal.

Also, if you're finding beans a pain, I've heard many many recommendations for pressure cookers. Something like 20 minutes to take regular beans from dry to done. Don't know what the pot likker is like.

people who were obsessed with shoelessness were generally regarded as putting on airs

It's tough growing up in a hobo consultant household.

One of the first things I did after buying our house was tear out the carpet, revealing lovely and easy-to-clean fir floors. Softness be damned.

I buy the same stuff B does, and it does the job just fine. mrh, you might want to retrofit your house like this.

265: We more or less do this, but it really isn't as effective for certain tasks. I was loath to admit this, but it's just the truth, as hard experience has shown.

250: Tile. The houses I grew up in were all tile floors, and it's pretty low maintenance. Also, when it's nasty sticky hot outside you can lie on the cool floor and it sucks the heat right out of you. Bliss.

262: I ate two eggs a day every day for a year (it was a rough year. a breakfast burrito helped) and finally got my cholesterol checked. It was warning-high, whatever's before high. Now I'm down to two eggs minus one yolk every other day, and I haven't had my cholesterol checked, so I don't have any truly useful information.

258.2: I kinda sorta would like to have a home carpet steamer cleaner. A cleaner house makes for increased happiness in general, for me.

Are we going for two stacks?

265: Dilute! Dilute! OK!

I bet belle lettre couldn't eat a hunnert eggs.

273: It's not either more expensive or bigger than a vacuum. If you want one, go for it.

265: The current Dr. Bronner (the grandson, whose position in the company was understated by the documentary) is a Burning Man campmember of a friend. He's a cool, weird dude.

You know, I like this discussion about housecleaning, but I worry it's not liable to hurt anybody's feelings.

Do I really have to worry about cholesterol if I eat an egg a day?

AIUI, no (unless perhaps you've an unusually high cholesterol diet otherwise).

But beans take a long time to cook, and much planning.

I'm assuming you know about presoaking, etc. But some lentils etc. are really pretty fast, also.

Also, you don't need to buy a lot of cleaning stuff, whether it's 7th Generation or anything else. You really can clean almost everything with vinegar, baking soda, hot water, lemon juice, and basic soap

Wait, that *is* a lot of cleaning stuff... now I'm confused.

279: PASIIST. IYKWIM. AITTYD. NTTAWWT. WYSIWYG.

270: But effective for far more than most people would think, and a million times cheaper. (heebie may have to check my math on that.)

But beans take a long time to cook, and much planning.

You know, they also come in cans!

269.2: WANT.

Regarding cholesterol, people should be having an annual physical which checks their good and bad cholesterol, triglycerides, and so on, anyway. I know that younger people don't feel the need to do this, but really: there are straightforward tests out there that will give you an answer. Unless your health insurance plan (if you have one) doesn't allow for an annual physical -- in which case it's an unfortunate plan -- you might as well do this annually, and take the guess-work out of it.

(/ end lecture )

I was just kidding in 279. In fact, a thread about household cleaning products is the most boring thing ever, so much so that I'm almost tempted to watch video lectures about statistical inference instead.

C'mon, let's talk about fighting, or beer, or uh, trucks. Or beer trucks fighting each other! Dude, like BEER TRANSFORMERS? And they could shoot beer cans at each other, like missiles? but they'd totally talk like seventies truckers when they were in robot form? Like, Kris Kristofferson as the voice of Brewbot in: BEER TRANSFORMERS! Directed by Michael Bay from an original story by Charles Bukowski!

That'd be huge.

Oh, are you all turned on to microfiber cloths? Fucking miraculous. Not the crappy, smooth ones, but the ones that are like terrycloth. Pick up dirt, dust, food spills, and grease (think top of cabinets). They have completely transformed the cleanliness of my kitchen, now that I can simply spend 3 minutes after doing dishes and swipe down whatever surfaces seem to need it - no spraying, no rags or paper towels. Amazing.

283: Absolutely true. And Murphy's Soap + baking soda for bathtubs is amazingly effective. Olive oil + water for furniture spray. &c.

How did you get that valium, ShamWow guy, and what have you done with JRoth?

I just imperialistically and consumeristically obtained a Preethi mixie.

Is Preethi the new KitchenAid?

Also: how you like it?

unless perhaps you've an unusually high cholesterol diet otherwise level to begin with. Isn't cholesterol mostly genetic? Get your cholesterol checked and if it's in an okay range, eat what you want. Get it checked again in a year to make sure you haven't gone completely overboard.

273

I kinda sorta would like to have a home carpet steamer cleaner. A cleaner house makes for increased happiness in general, for me.

I believe it is easy to rent one for a day.

I was told that ordinary mayo would get the white 'water rings' out of wooden furniture, so now I clean all of my wood with mayo. When we're out of mayo, I do what I do for burgers and use mustard.

281: It is a hassle to get the hot water trucked in twice a week, it's true.

But we have a home carpet steamer

What kind? We have this crappy little Bissell thing that doesn't actually steam, and it recently has developed a failure mode where the collection tank unseats in such a way that it sprays dirty water all over the place while you're using it.

Since I mainly use it to get cat vomit out of the rug, this means it's like an atomizer for Fancy Feast Tender Beef And Liver instead of for cologne.

Yeah, think about that one for a while.

I need to get my cholesterol checked. I feel pretty healthy, and get lots of exercise, but apparently you never really know about your cholesterol until you have it checked out. I really love buttered toast, cheese, eggs, red meat...sigh. Good thing I really like beans. I do pre-soak, I just have to remember that I want to cook beans and pre-soak for 4-6 hours and then hang out for another couple of hours while they cook further. Lentils are great though. I have a pretty good masoor dal recipe.

I'd try tofu, but the only kind I like is the way my mom makes it--deep fried, then stuffed with meat and sauteed again in a garlic sauce. Sort of like ma po tofu. This, I'm sure, negates the healthiness of the tofu.

295: sell it to BG's boyfriend, just for fun.

295: I actually got a Rug Doctor from Costco and LOVE IT! More effort than vacuuming, admittedly. But since we spill crap all over the carpet all the damn time, it's a godsend.

295: We've actually got a Bissell as well. It doesn't seem to steam, really, so much as spray warm water and then vacuum it back out, but that works fine for my purposes.

Hm. Rug Doctor seems overly bulky. The spiral staircase between the cat's two favorite puking sites favors something very portable.

Anyone want to adopt a cat?

A couple of clowns I roomed with the first year of grad school decided to steam clean our rug, but because it had been kind of a while since the rug was properly cleaned they added bleach. Clean rug, with blotchy stripes everywhere, so let's dye it! Something that won't let the blotches show through. Like black. And of course the best part is that they did this over the course of three days in DC in August, so the rug developed mold so bad you could smell it from the front steps with the door closed.

295: I don't have one, but have heard very good things about Ladybugs. (The brand of steam cleaner, not the beetle.)

296: pre-soak for 4-6 hours and then hang out for another couple of hours while they cook further.

Put them on to soak in the morning before you leave the house, or the night before, then put the pot in the fridge in the morning until you get home.

Rinse and refresh the water before actually setting them to cook.

Assuming they're pre-soaked, it shouldn't take another couple of hours for them to cook. An hour, maybe, during which time you chop vegetables and so on. Sure, it takes forethought, but it shouldn't be prohibitively time-consuming.

My cholesterol was borderline high once, but that was after several months of living in Little Rock and eating hubcap burgers on a regular basis. An egg a day is okay. Eat oatmeal if you need to reassure yourself.

Mark Bittman claims that you can freeze beans in their pot liquor with good results.

You can make lots of extra beans per batch and freeze them!

Preethi is surely the new KitchenAid. I haven't used it yet, just examined and washed all the parts and found homes for them in the cupboard, but I am going to make hell of coconut chutney. I have my doubts about the juice extractor setup, but I'll give it a try and find out.

IF HAVING BLACK SPOTS IS WRONG, I DON'T WANT TO BE RIGHT.

RACIST.

I am plainly a spirit medium for by the ghostly essence of the woman's pages. All domestic sphere, all the time.

305: Oh man I love coconut chutney.

Keep us updated!

301 is the best damn story I've heard here in ages. Bravo for the inept rug-handling scenario resulting in an aversion to rugs in general. It sounds vaguely familiar.

Because of my long-standing, genuine bias against circus people, it took me a couple of minutes to realize that 301 was not a story about actual clowns.

309: George Washington had, like, 30 goddamned moldy rugs.

FUCK YOU, REDFOXTAILSHRUB!

IF YOU CUT US, DO WE NOT BLEED???/?!?

310: There's nothing worse than clowns. Nothing.

I need to get my cholesterol checked.

I have chosen to not worry about it. We all have to go sometime and if I go because of a diet of delicious steak I can accept that.

I gave up on cholesterol after taking my seven year old sister to the doctor and finding out she had high cholesterol. That shit has got to be genetic. 'Sides, I'm vegetarian. 'Sides, not-attending-to-cholesterol is a small subset of not-going-to-the-doctor.

If you want to like tofu (and I don't know why that would be someone's goal), I suggest a serious regime of muscle building. It was eerie how thoroughly it changed my tastes. Any form of protein tasted so much more delicious than it had before.

NO FAIR, RFTS.

Assuming they're pre-soaked, it shouldn't take another couple of hours for them to cook. An hour, maybe, during which time you chop vegetables and so on. Sure, it takes forethought, but it shouldn't be prohibitively time-consuming.

We nearly always presoak overnight, but how much soaking and post-soak cooking they take seems to vary a lot both by type and by freshness. I've had some old, really dried out beans I just gave up on. It seems as they get older they take longer and longer to actually cook. Buying them from somewhere with lots of turnover helps a lot, here.

trick: if you're in a rush and forgot to soak, bring the pot to a boil then off heat immediately off heat ans sit for an hour --- roughly equivalent to 4 hours just sitting, ime.

also: canned beans work, but really are a poor substitute. the bean water (swpl tranlation pot liquor) is amazing then, don't put too much water in initially.

314: Mimes

314: VE AGREE!

if not obvious, 318 me.

also, frozen beans works well (keep them in the water)
couple days in the fridge fine for many things, too.

we pretty much always make extra chick peas, and make hummus then next day or day after. you really can't have too much hummus, ime.

Early in our relationship, a clown (as in, guy who worked in a circus with a red wig and big nose) moved into the apartment above Buck, and was really annoying. We took endless delight in complaining about "That clown upstairs." We're easily amused.

If you want to like tofu

tofu is good, but really neutral so you need to have some `tricks' to cook it. yummy though (and it is really not all created equal, brand and freshness matter a lot)

Great. First ari drove off dsquared. Now he's driving off all the circus folk. Damn Canadians.

321: Bring. It. On.

a clown (as in, guy who worked in a circus with a red wig and big nose) moved into the apartment above Buck, and was really annoying.

Was it the sound of those huge shoes tramping around everywhere?

True story. I had high cholesterol when I was young. And then I stopped giving a shit, started drinking whole milk and eating whatever I damn well wanted to, and now my cholesterol is fine.

Clowns are creepy, aren't they?

C'mon, let's talk about fighting

Jose Canseco's going to fight a 7'2" Korean guy.

329: oh dear. At least nobody's going to be testing him for steroids!

329: The Korean guy is a Beer Transformer. His name is "Kegalon".

318: how much soaking and post-soak cooking they take seems to vary a lot both by type and by freshness

Definitely. I actually buy kidney beans and chick-peas (garbanzo beans) canned because they take a hell of long time to soak and cook. Also just don't tend to use them in soups anyway.

Things like black beans, pinto beans, various white beans and other more so-called heirloom beans don't take longer than an hour to cook provided they're well-soaked. Buying bulk at the health food store allows for fresher beans in quantities that make sense.

I would avoid buying pre-bagged packages of beans from the regular grocery store.

Canseco, 45, does have some celebrity combat experience. The six-foot-four 240-pounder fought former child star Danny Bonaduce to a draw in a celebrity boxing match in January in suburban Philadelphia.

The bout featured only three one-minute rounds.

Canseco was soundly beaten by former Philadelphia Eagle Vai Sikahema in a previous celebrity bout last year.

This does not augur well for Jose.

331: now that's more like it! I wonder what Korean trucker CB lingo sounds like?

This Korean guy.

332: huh. fwiw, we cook garbanzos/chick-peas/chana/whatever from dry pretty much every week. Soak them overnight and then sit in the fridge all day, but they don't take that long to cook after. So good compared to the tinned ones, ime.

anyway, all depends what you're using them for too...

Why's everybody always pickin' on me?

I'd say Hong Man Choi is a step up in competition from Danny Bonaduce, yes.

321: also, frozen beans works well (keep them in the water)

Someone else mentioned this upthread, too. Thanks, I didn't know that. I've always drained cooked beans and did my best to freeze them in an airtight container. Leaving them in their broth didn't seem right somehow.

Soak them overnight and then sit in the fridge all day, but they don't take that long to cook after. So good compared to the tinned ones, ime.

YOU CAN PUT PICKLES UP YOURSELF.

I actually meant to type "or not" in there somewhere.

again, fwiw, I tend to freeze the cooking water separately but that's just 'cause of the way I use it. I've had some luck with together, but think it may change texture a bit.

IF I APPEAR TO BE CAREFREE, IT'S ONLY TO CAMOUFLAGE MY SADNESS!!!!!

335: holy crap. I liked the head kick that very nearly reached his crotch.

That looked like how I imagine the "how many five-year-olds?" fights would.

YOU CAN PUT PICKLES UP YOURSELF.

You can, but you really should try and find pickles with flared bases.

Clowns

344: Safety first! Also, avoid open wounds and pickle juice.

Those are great, soup.

336: fwiw, we cook garbanzos/chick-peas/chana/whatever from dry pretty much every week.

I feel a little badly about this. I use them almost always for hummus, and a couple of times I've soaked/cooked them fresh, not had time to use them for a couple of days, and they'd gone slightly funky in the fridge on me. I developed the impression that chick peas go bad more quickly than other beans.

I should just do a cost comparison for canned vs. dried/fresh, and see whether I should try this again.

Also, avoid open wounds and pickle juice.

WHO YOU CALLIN' FUNKY, WHITEGIRL???

I should just do a cost comparison for canned vs. dried/fresh, and see whether I should try this again.

We switched based nearly entirely on taste, although I suppose it's cheaper than `fancy' tinned ones. Combination of hummus, and perhaps more so chana masala I think. There was no contest, really.

Rancho Gordo says don't change the soaking water. Some sites say this reduces the gas-producing qualities if you change and rinse before cooking. Other sites say this makes you lose flavor and nutrients. I don't know who to believe! I do know that my black beans look more black if I use the soaking liquid than if I change though--they look downright eggplant purple after soaking strips off some outer color.

345: That is some quality Photoshopping.

Kool-Aid pickles.

352: I've heard mixed reports on this, too, but don't have any real conclusions.

If they aren't that clean, your soaking water will have dust in it so easier to dump it.

Mostly I dump it and refill because i can't be bothered to measure too carefully when soaking, but want to measure carefully when cooking (because too much water makes the broth watery, rather than tasty). I realize this doesn't make sense, I could just measure the earlier amount.

although I suppose it's cheaper than `fancy' tinned ones.

Basic dried are cheaper than even the barest-of-bones canned varieties.

Also, if you're broth's too water, you can just cook it longer if you don't mind really soft beans, or strain out the beans at the desired degree of doneness and cook the broth down a bit by itself.

355: Measure?

I've never considered the soaking liquid to be so valuable that the taste/nutrients of the beans depends on it. The *cooking* liquid, yes, of course.

As soup says, the soaking liquid is quite likely a bit dusty or dirty; rinse that away. The soaking procedure is just prep-work.

Basic dried are cheaper than even the barest-of-bones canned varieties.

Well yeah, it's cheaper, but the cheapest canned ones are cheap enough most people probably don't worry about it (60c can or whatever). I just meant that I've never thought of it as a cost saving measure, because it's a small percentage of food budget to start with.

But the cheap ones taste bad. Some of the `fancy' ones taste pretty good, but not as good as from (good) dry beans -- and cost several times as much. So vs. them I might think of it is cost savings.

I've strained out the beans before and reduced the broth, that's just what you have to do with watery broth. It's a pain in the butt, though so rather avoid it by measuring at first.

355: Measure?

just roughly (e.g. 3:1 dry) , so I get the right amount of cooking liquid left over. For soaking, i tend to just fill whatever vessel up after the beans are it, which can be way too much to cook in.

For those of you cooking your chickpeas from dried: do yours come with the dark husks still on? Mine did and I gave up on them in disgust.

REMEMBER ME?????

360: Racist.

I don't understand why beans would have broth? I bought some of those silly rancho gordo beans when they were recommended here the other day, and now I'm worried that I've gotten myself in deeper water than I realized. (I've never cooked dried beans before--it's been canned all the way.) I just want beans. No broth.

360: Dark husks????

All the chickpeas I've ever found have chickpea colored husks/shells. Which some people take off but I've never bothered (and my hummus doesn't seem to suffer for it)

There are another type of chickpeas, called chole/chola in India if I'm recalling correctly. That's the only thing I've seen with what I'd call dark husks.

363: you know how, when you open a can of black beans, they're packed in water, but the water has, like, bean gunk in it? There you go, broth.

I don't understand why beans would have broth?

Cooking them in water creates a broth, like it or no.

Of course, you can just discard this yummy broth if you're insane, but we'll judge you.

More seriously, while it's often a very tasty addition to whatever, for dry beans you just strain.

erm, in 366 i mean `dry beans' as cooked, but not in liquid. sorry for any confusion.

364: These, but darker looking. I clearly should have ordered the garbanzo beans, which are labeled "no skin."

maybe I'll change my pseud to bean gunk.

Right. The water you boil the beans in becomes magically delicious.

(Does anyone have a baked beans recipe they love? Buck likes them. I never have, but I've only had canned, and there's something about the canned baked bean texture that I find really gross. Mmm, pasty! But this Desert Island Sampler of RG beans I got has a variety described as good for baked beans, and I figure I'll give it a shot.

If no one has a beloved recipe, I'll just take what comes off Epicurious.)

360: Gosh. I don't think so? Uh, actually, they have skins that float off in the soaking/cooking process. Maybe that's the problem.

363: I don't understand why beans would have broth?

Brock, this is supposed to be a comity thread.

I figured the bean junk in the can was, roughly, the "broth" of which you speak. I've never done anything with this but rinse it all away. Out of curiosity, if I wanted to do something else with it, what would that something be?

370: this one was the first google hit is really terrific.

372: eat it?

Just straight?

If so, the shit that comes out of a can must be vastly inferior, because that sounds gross.

372: I've actually always found canned-bean broth gross. But the broth you get from boiling good dry beans has me mopping my bowl clean with bits of bread so I get all of it.

I wouldn't do anything with the canned version. The kind you produce in the course of making beans from dried can be used as you would other kinds of broth, in soup or to moisten things.

376 to 375, despite the fact that I hadn't read 375 yet.

If so, the shit that comes out of a can must be vastly inferior, because that sounds gross

There you go. That's why people don't like the stuff in cans; its bean gunk is gross.

I've got a carpet washer thing - upright, easy to use. I did the entire house when I got it, in a fit of enthusiasm - the dirty water was amazingly disgusting. The dirty water from the hallway was pitch black. It also picked up an astonishing amount of sand. I'm still convinced my mum knocked over a glass of red wine just so my dad could see me use it. Haven't used it for about 2 years, and I really should. There's a stain in my hallway from where the dog was sick a couple of weeks ago when he ate half a pound of butter. Yeah, I'm not one of these houseproud pristine motherfuckers. And I go barefoot as much as possible and my feet are permanently dirty too.

or to moisten things.

IWKWIM, and come to think of it, I'm not sure at all that I do.

If so, the shit that comes out of a can must be vastly inferior, because that sounds gross.

It is, and that would be.

380: Pretty much, I am Asilon.

the dog was sick a couple of weeks ago when he ate half a pound of butter

It was worth it, though.

And Sifu is apparently Asilon's dog.

Brock: Oh, it's a totally different thing. The goop in a can is typically full of salt (and maybe other preservatives), and has a tendency to leach metals too. You just wash that gunk off.

You just wash that gunk off

A home carpet steamer works pretty well for that.

Hardwood floors and/or tile seem like a pretty good alternative to needing a carpet steamer, come to think of it.

387: or bathe it in the cleansing robot beer urine of KEGALON!

383 - you are welcome in my grotty house anytime.

384 - it was so gross. It looked like that fake plastic joke puke - a bright yellow near perfect circle. I do wonder about dogs, I really do. Today one of the kids was careless and let him grab the last of the cheese, still wrapped in clingfilm. A couple of hours later, he puked that up, clingfilm and all.

390.2 oh like you didn't eat sticks of butter as a kid.

I know that wasn't just me.

I... it wasn't, right?

Does anyone have a baked beans recipe they love?

e-mail me, LB, and I'll scan you the fantastic, easy one from CI.

I can actually one-up you -- pieces of butter rolled in white sugar. I don't think I ever ate a full stick, though.

you had butter when you were a kid? damn.

392: Curse you, anonymous taunter!

Does anyone have a baked beans recipe they love?

How do you feel about chipotle (yeah, i know, overused these days). I've got a nice baked black bean recipe somewhere than relies on them....

When I was in HS and would stay up late to watch Letterman, I'd eat canned split pea soup and float thin slices of butter on top. So good.

393: I didn't have that much of a sweet tooth, even as a kid. Bouillion cubes and microwaved olive loaf were more my speed.

392: Unfogged all-star.

383: We are all Asilon now.

395: Oh, sorry. That was me. Weird.

Bouillion

What the fuck?

396: No, this is for Buck, who wants New England baked beans. The stuff you get in a can labelled 'baked beans', not some funky black bean chipotle frivolity (which sounds delicious, but isn't my immediate need).

Yeah, this is yummy (and pretty simple, not frivolous at all). But New England it ain't.

The pork fat is key. And delicious in its own right!

I've also got a montreal style recipe somewhere too, but I'm pretty sure that's nothing like new england (but I'm having trouble pinning down what new england style should be, so i could be misremembering)

405: see 373.

404: Oh, maybe it's not so different then. I'm recalling salt pork and maple syrup as defining ingredients. Maybe a bit of mustard, too.

Small white beans, brown sugar, pork fat. The kind of beans you'd expect elderly Protestants to eat.

but no molasses.

Although that may be more complicated than strictly necessary. Pork fat, molasses and brown sugar are the keys.

yeah, montreal style is navy beans (exclusively? at least ime), and always maple syrup. so different, but not wildly so.

411: yeah. Traditionally, I imagine it was whatever thick, sugary substance was available in your cold-ass town in the middle of winter.

also ime, québécois mosly eat this as breakfast food. True in NE?

I think of it as (like the link above) a sunday dinner kind of thing, but who knows where I get that from.

sweet. managed to kill the thread.

I had baked beans for breakfast in England. It was pretty good.

Nonsense. People are just letting us sit back and drop the baked bean science.

"sitting back and letting us", rather. Okay, now the thread's dead.

Back to... BEER TRANSFORMERS!

Heston Blumenthal has a baked bean recipe online. It's pretty good, I've only made it once but it was nice.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/food/recipes/database/bakedbeans_80441.shtml

That's a version of it, but I have vague memory that the one I made was slightly different -- he seems to modify his recipes a fair bit and depending where you find them online they vary. He's often written the same recipes for the Times, the Guardian and the BBC and they are usually slightly different each time.

We were at my aunt's (small town near Toronto) when our eldest was 20 months. One day we wanted to give her something easy for dinner, so we thought, "baked beans!" Must be able to get baked beans, Heinz, they'll be just like home and Violet will be happy. So we went down to the store, looked at the baked bean aisle, and said what the fuck! Ten million different types of baked beans, no nice familiar green Heinz can, and we had no idea what would taste 'normal'. I guess we had Swiss Chalet again that night.

420: so when they said "Heinz...there are no other kinds" , I guess they were wrong.

I like pulses, but I hate Heinz baked beans. But people do eat them for every meal of the day.

There were a lot of different kinds. Boston baked beans seemed popular.

419: Tomato fondue? Again, I'm not looking for some frivolous recipe with newfangled 'vegetables' like tomatoes in it.

Damn straight.

Come to think of it, I don't know that I've ever had tinned baked beans.

re: 422

The Blumenthal one is like a posh Heinz bean recipe. More 'gluey' tomato and much fresher tasting, but essentially beans and a slightly sweet/spicy tomato gunk.

I like Heinz beans, though.

re: beans in general

I made a Tunisian chicken and haricot recipe the other day, and it was dead easy, and delicious.

http://www.celtnet.org.uk/recipes/miscellaneous/fetch-recipe.php?rid=misc-poulet-aux-haricots

I didn't have any tomato puree so used some peeled and diced fresh tomatoes instead.

I don't think I've ever met anyone irl who would think that making baked beans was even an option. They come out of a tin. A green one preferably, supermarket own if you are on a budget.

re: 428

We're eating a lot of pulses at the moment, and I think I was bored and looking for something to do with some haricots I had soaked -- re: the Blumenthal thing.

I wouldn't make a habit of it. A lot of his recipes are like that. Really nice, but you can make something 80% as good in about 10% of the time.

Oh that looks nice ttaM.

I am bored tonight. C is only just on his way home (11.30 here) - has been at some working dinner at the hotel we stayed at for our honeymoon. Don't see why I couldn't have gone too, I'd just have sat quietly at the end of the table and enjoyed my food.

428: It's not something we had as kids (if we did, it would have been tinned I'm sure). No idea why, probably one or both parents didn't like them.

I've since made them a couple of times (dead easy really), and I've had them a few times at friends, but I'm pretty sure they had made those.

It was just one of those moments when you realize you've never really had something that's a staple for lots of people.

That's mostly true here too -- I'm overgeneralizing, but the kind of people who cook dry beans don't overlap much with the kind of people who eat 'baked beans'. Cooking dry beans is a slightly hippieish or "I am a serious cook" thing to do, and baked beans are the reverse. (But in the US, they don't have tomatoes in them.)

427: That looks good -- did you have the harissa premade, or did you have to make it for the recipe?

This is both awful and funny, depending on your sense of humor and the fact that you are not the professor mistaken for the Wesleyan shooter:

http://scatter.wordpress.com/2009/05/07/breaking-news/

rethinking it, it's really quite probably i did have the tinned ones at some point when I was a kid, just don't remember it. They do seem rather too ubiquitous to miss out (especially with added `hotdog' wieners)

and I think I was bored and looking for something to do with some haricots I had soaked

I'm assuming you have some sort of standard tuscan-ish white bean thing in your mix, if you're eating a lot of them recently... some are really yummy, so worth a look if you don't yet.

re: 432

I had a jar of harissa in the fridge.* We always have caraway seeds and the like because they are used in Czech good.

* a friend who lives in France sent me a couple of tins of really good north african harissa a few years back and I stupidly let them go off in the cupboard without using them. So it's been UK supermarket harissa since then, mostly (Bart's).

re: 436

That should be 'food' obviously.

Don't see why I couldn't have gone too, I'd just have sat quietly at the end of the table and enjoyed my food.

You could have asked for beans - a cheap date! When I was growing up in Pittsburgh, a tour of the main Heinz factory was a must as a school trip. We went two or three times through middle school. The first time I remember, they served a small lunch, featuring Heinz cole slaw, baked beans, and (yes apo) pickles. The second and third times, no meals at the factory, but we got samplers of Heinz products to take home. Sad to say, we never toured the nearby Clark candy bar factory.

I like Heinz beans and Boston baked beans from a jar.

We too are eating beans tonight: pintos cooked with some chopped up leftover roasted tomatoes with garlic, beer, cayenne, and a little mustard. For on top there will be avocado and queso fresco, and I have some spicy pink pickled onions I brought home leftover from dinner last week at a chichi "new mexican" place.

I apologize for killing everyone.

DAMN STRAIGHT YOU SHOULD!

441: HOMOPHOBE!!!!

442: +S!!!!!!!1!!!

Death is an end to trouble.

Oh, hey, I made faux-Cuban black beans for hippie May Day. (For actual May Day I attended an immigrants' rights demonstration where there was no food at all.)

Once, a happy child, I caroled...and had a really good Cuban black bean recipe which I did not bookmark and which has disappeared from the internet. So I made it up.

It involves cooking black beans (I never soak first, Cooks Illustrated says it doesn't really speed things up much) very slowly over a super low flame with half an onion, four bay leaves and a little salt, then adding dark rum, tomato paste, chopped tomatoes, tabasco sauce, cumin and cayenne to taste, removing about 1/2 cup of the beans towards the end, mashing them and adding them back to the pot to thicken things up. You get a very rich dark result that looks alarmingly like the good, wholesome mud of the midwest.

See, with baking I'm an obsessive recipe-follower, regularly mocked for my pernickety ways by my friends. But with beans I seldom really have a recipe. I just boil 'em and add things. Oddly, most bean recipes I have tend to turn out tasting about the same. I get better variety when I wing it.

I'M GOING TO CRUSH KEGALON LIKE AN ALUMINUM CAN!

When beans are about done, I'll sometimes poach an egg or two in the simmering bean pot. The poached egg ends up tomato-ey and yummy and then I have glorious protein with my other protein.

445: I'm kind of the opposite -- I'm a secure baker (I mean, I'll mostly follow recipes, but I'm comfortable screwing around with them) but an insecure cook once you get more complicated than Meat+Hotness -- I tend to cling to recipes in the belief that if I do something wrong, I will have wasted hours on nasty food.

Mostly, I just don't cook enough.

I'M GOING TO CRUSH CHUGALON LIKE AN ALUMINUM CAN!

||

WHAT THE FUCK PEOPLE

|>

448: I think it's because since all my food is vegan (although "that tastes awfully vegan" is a bit of an insult at my house)....I have to be really meticulous with baking because I'm already compensating for the missing milk, eggs and butter, but most of the other things I cook are protein things that get simmered a lot, so there's lots of time to correct the seasoning. I salvaged some uppuma that I made where I used cinnamon in mistake for garam masala, for example.

The main thing with beans is getting enough fat into them, since I'm not using meat or adding cheese later.

Those specialty beans AWB mentioned are just heart-stoppingly expensive, aren't they? I'm still awfully tempted.

450: I love that. Some of the most desperate barrel-scraping I've ever seen from the Wastosphere.

This caught my eye: Cornell law school professor William Jacobson has been obsessively chronicling what he has dubbed "dijongate" on his blog.

Why so many law school professors with these inane, sub-moronic blogs? It's bizarre.

(The foodies I can give a pass, their hobby is no more ridiculous than a thousand others. It's the wingnuts who apparently think this is going to be a political gotcha who are the real comedy gold.)

452: "Jacobson, however, insists that alleged efforts to cover up Obama's choice of mustard this week are newsworthy."

From the sidebar on Jacobson's blog: "I take it Jacobson teaches at the cow college part of Cornell, and not the elite section where Coulter attended."

So it's almost like he's aware he's ridiculous.

You know, ludicrously expensive for beans (which they kind of are) is still pretty cheap for food. With shipping, it worked out to maybe $5/lb? And a pound of dry beans is a lot of food. I'm delighted with them, because they were so much better than the beans I usually make, and so I'm overselling them, but they really were good -- a completely simple, vegan pot of beans (do I mean mirepoix? Onion, celery, and carrots cooked in olive oil, anyway, then add the soaked beans, a couple of crushed cloves of garlic, and some cumin) was all luscious and rich.

I'm lying -- with shipping it was more like $6 or $7 per pound. Still not crazy expensive compared to other things you might get that many delicious calories out of, rather than to other dry beans.

The mustard thing isn't serious, right? People know they're kidding?

At the last minute, I made our beans into gourmet frito pie. (The fritos were ordinary fritos.) It was a good move.

There's a bit in one of the Oz books, Dorothy and the Wizard in Oz, that often comes to mind when I am packed full of food as I am right now. In that book, Dorothy is visiting relatives in San Francisco, and an earthquake opens up a crack through which she falls into the center of the earth. One of the many countries she and her compatriots pass through on the way back is inhabited by vegetable people who "are quite solid inside [their] bodies" when you cut them in half, "like a sliced turnip or potato". Me too.

The mustard thing is such a vortex of WHAT? that it has made my parsers shut down.

Butterflies are pretty. And baby animals are cute. But baby butterflies...

Please tell me that mustard thing is a joke. I mean, nobody could be serious about that, could they?

I love Heinz baked beans.

457: People know they're kidding?

FWICT it's sort of a "just kidding, but not really" thing, because they also seem to be kinda hoping it gets some traction as a "who among us does not love NASCAR?" sort of meme.

$5, $6, or $7 per lb. for beans is really crazy. Sorry.

Frowner's cuban black beans at 445: It involves cooking black beans (I never soak first, Cooks Illustrated says it doesn't really speed things up much) very slowly over a super low flame with half an onion, four bay leaves and a little salt, then adding dark rum, tomato paste, chopped tomatoes, tabasco sauce, cumin and cayenne to taste, removing about 1/2 cup of the beans towards the end, mashing them and adding them back to the pot to thicken things up. You get a very rich dark result that looks alarmingly like the good, wholesome mud of the midwest

makes me feel slightly badly about the wholesome mud of black bean soup I made last night which included weird vegetables like carrots and red and green peppers. And onions and garlic, cumin and cayenne. I just kind of threw it all in there, at measured times. But none of that funny stuff like dark rum. Something like this, which just happens to be vegan, doesn't need an apology of any sort, obviously!

Does Apo have an issue about pickles for some reason?

Lastly! My country cousins up in New Hampshire will not eat beans any way, any how, except in the form of Boston baked beans, which they have homemade and seem to take hours to make. Otherwise they find beans to be disgusting unpalatable.

458: That's ok, RFTS -- our vegetable love will grow!

$5, $6, or $7 per lb. for beans is really crazy. Sorry.

Eh, it's pretty spendy, I admit. But I wonder how it compares per pound to canned beans -- I bet it looks a lot more reasonable then. I'd have to figure out what a pound of dry beans weighs after you cook it to do the conversion.

makes me feel slightly badly about the wholesome mud of black bean soup

Why would Frowner's recipe make you feel bad about yours? There's nothing weird about carrots and peppers in beans, as far as I know.

I just thought "Wow, a 400+ comment thread on how butterflies are pretty." But I see you're hopelessly off-topic.

I found a site suggesting that a pound of dry beans is four 15 oz cans of beans, which sounds reasonable.

465.2: I was fooling around. My soups tend to be throw-it-together. When I hear a proper receipt for something with a name, I feel like I've just been messing around in my kitchen. Which I am. No big deal.

465.1: Eh, it's pretty spendy, I admit. But I wonder how it compares per pound to canned beans -- I bet it looks a lot more reasonable then.

Compared to canned beans, quite possibly. I wonder if you, or one, might not be able to find equally tasty, reasonably fresh dried beans at your local health food store for a third of the price. I'm pretty satisfied with my own local bean source (health food store). No slur on Rancho Gordo by any means, but it's weird to me that people might think they can't make something mouthwateringly delicious, yet simply prepared, from dried beans obtained from a local shop. For a third of the price.

There aren't good health food stores in a lot of places, of course.

467: I bet that measurement is pretty fluid. Some of those Rancho Gordo beans puff up like wood ticks (runner cannelini I am looking at you). Easily 5 cans of any other kind of cannelini -- and they aren't any other kind. They are wildly superior.

But I see you're hopelessly off-topic.

Uh, are you new here?

||
Hey Pittsburgh, thanks again for Jason Bay. Srsly.
|>

1. Google "chlorine environment" to find out why you shouldn't be using bleach. It's awful stuff.

2. My parents have no history of high cholesterol. I have borderline high cholesterol, and I am accustomed to thinking of my diet as pretty healthy. Get your cholesterol checked, dummies.

470: You're welcome. Who is Jason Bay? Srsly.

470: On second thought, if this involves the Pirates, just don't bother.

But baby butterflies..
More amazing than cute.

473: Well, it doesn't involve the Pirates anymore, if that makes you feel any better.

If you live in a city where people put salt on the sidewalks, you've just got to take your shoes off before entering the house. If you have Persian carpets that cost an arm and a leg to clean properly, you want guests to take their shoes off. If you sleep low to or on the floor, you want that floor to be as clean and dust-free as possible: shoes off!

However, as an amiable hostess, I wouldn't ever make guests take off their shoes. The shoe-rack at the front door makes it pretty clear what the norm is, though.

Nobody wants to argue about the price of beans. Well, poo. No doubt I have stated my position.

dsquared isn't coming back, huh?

475: It does. Baseball is in my zone of disinterest (along with the usual suspects like hockey, golf, tennis, the rest of North America when there isn't a disease there, etc.). I only notice when they set-off fireworks after the game. I'm probably seven miles from the park, but the fireworks are very clear.

470: I am new here. I came for the international adoption flame war, and stayed for the baked beans recipes.

Nobody wants to argue about the price of beans. Well, poo. No doubt I have stated my position.

I have previously advocated a brand of raisins that sells for 2-3 times the typical price, and I can tell you that every single person that I have gotten to taste them has been surprised at how good they are, and most have asked me to order cans for them the next time I place an order.

My theory is that if you like something you aren't going to go broke paying 2-3 times standard rates for a staple.

I wouldn't want to pay 2-3 times standard for something expensive, but for beans or raisins or pasta, it probably isn't going to add much to the total grocery bills.

BREWBOT SIR, I WILL ALERT WALT SOMEGUY TO THE CURRENT TACTICAL SITUATION WHEN I'VE TAKEN OUT THESE PILSNERBOTS.

NOW, SHOTGUN IN READ POSITION AND.... gluGlugluG

whooaa haha... im a robot, good buddy! haha. smokey can hit this hot metal mess! i love you guys.

Oh, Chugamus. I think you meant "ready" position. Way to reöpen old wounds.

I had never occurred to me that other people might also discuss raisins. I didn't even know how much I wanted to talk about raisins. NickS, have you had Peacock Farms raisins? Man alive.

I recently realized I eat enough raisins that they are probably a significant source of calories for me. I never thought about it, because they're supposed to be healthy and all, but if you eat a thousand calorie bag in three days, well. (I don't count calories; it just struck me.)

HEY THERE MEGANTRON COME HERE OFTEN? I...

*clang*

WUH... I'M OKAY! YEAH, NO WORRIES. WHAT WAS I SAYING?

480: I sometimes pay almost twice the price (over plain old raisins) for something called Red Flame raisins. It's worth it if you're really wanting to adore your raisins (which you will, the Red Flame) instead of just having them in whatever way you use them.

Nick, this: My theory is that if you like something you aren't going to go broke paying 2-3 times standard rates for a staple is written from the perspective of someone who's financially comfortable. These days, I wouldn't assume that.

Do you have any sources for really superlative prunes? I love prunes.

NickS, have you had Peacock Farms raisins? Man alive.

No. Should I? I don't like raisins treated with sulfer, but do you have a recommendation between the flame or thompson black raisins?

What I tell people about the Sunview Farms raisins is, "it doesn't taste like a raisin, it tastes like dried fruit." Raisins are, of course, dried fruit, but they have the density of flavor of a prune or dried apricot. They aren't just sweet.

Nick, this: My theory is that if you like something you aren't going to go broke paying 2-3 times standard rates for a staple is written from the perspective of someone who's financially comfortable.

I know. Certainly there were long stretches in my life when I wouldn't have paid the money for them.

But it doesn't take that much disposable income to spend $6 a month on raisins, or beans if that's what you want.

Do you have any sources for really superlative prunes? I love prunes.

I haven't looked very hard, but the best prunes I've had were the St Dalfour prunes in a glass jar.

I admit, though I liked them, they were expensive enough that I didn't get more of them.

They were really good.

I see Max is a happy robot drunk.

Oh. I have to confess that I prefer the sulphur-treated fruit, which makes me feel like an inadequate hippie.

Definitely Red Flame, which are incredibly sweet. I Peacock Farms at the more upscale Farmers' Markets around the state.

488.last: Oh. I eat a lot more beans than that. Per month? I'm vegetarian, and love beans. I make way more beans than that per month, and possibly more raisins as well.

I understand your point, though.

My honey really likes Hunza raisins, which are a golden raisin varietal sold in our co-op.

four bay leaves

BAY LEAVES! Shit! I knew I forgot something! And it's too late now—luting.

Peacock Farms

Looking at that website, I would really like to try their Dried Persimmons, but they are currently out. I should check back in the summer.

494: Yeah, I forgot about bay leaves in black beans too. It's a little counter-intuitive.

Hunza raisins

I recently got a bag of the transition nutrition Himalayan raisins at the local health food store. I'd been eying them for a long time, and decided that I should try them.

They're good! A totally different version of a good raisin. The Sunview raisins are large and plump and flavorful. The Himalayan raisins are small, and surprising. They have a flavor sort of like a dried apricot which I like.

I think I need to travel to Agen, world capital of the prune. Also: "Moist and delicious, these prunes are pitted and filled with a smooth cream of prune." Forty dollars for twelve!

This is easily the biggest news week since the election. The Miss USA pageant contestant who came out against gay marriage because of her religion is about to lose her Miss California crown because she posed for semi-nude modeling photos. Plus the guy who made his fortune from Blackberrys is about to steal Phoenix' professional hockey team in bankruptcy court, which points to an even-more-surprising fact: Phoenix has a professional hockey team.

Nobody wants to argue about the price of beans.

Okay, I'll argue it.

No question LB's beans are a bit pricey for beans, but it seems like a harmless indulgence, and hardly the sort of extravagant luxury item that would make LB the Marie Antoinette of Dry Goods/Mercantile shopping. Moreover, by purchasing the slightly more expensive bean product, LB is helping to stimulate the economy! Also, when it comes to items that are grown/produced/packaged somewhere else, I don't really see the virtue of shopping locally. Shopping locally for locally grown produce, yes, I do see how/why we should support that if we can. But if it has to be shipped from out of state anyway, what difference whether it's shipped to your home, or shipped to your local health food store?

Yeah, I forgot about bay leaves in black beans too.

"too"? My bay leaves were to join four pounds of pork shoulder, four bulbs of spring garlic with some stalk attached, thyme, salt and chicken broth (made from tough old hens).

Since it's possible to get perfectly decent if not amazing beans for under $1/lb, it would be foolish to deny that the RG beans are expensive, but they're still pretty cheap per serving, since, you know, beans.

Beans ... beans to you, Jack! Beans!

Okay, so in the other thread there was mention of how I used to think Read was fake or a troll or something, and because this seemed to be brought up as evidence as of some sort that Read was some kind of suspect character, I just wanted to say that yes, I used to think this, and it was incredibly stupid, and I was a huge dick about it, and I'm really really sorry for treating Read the way I did back then, and I really wouldn't want anyone to use a moment when I was being a total asshole as a cudgel against the person I was being an asshole to.

Anyway. I have to get back to my pig flu.

477.2: The Welsh are a mercurial people. You never can tell.

||
At long last the time has come. The clowns are officially sick of your shit.

"Fuck you, clown." "Fuck me? No... fuck you!"
|>

What a mensch!

I've never paid that much for beans (anything near the Rancho Gordo prices). The usual is more like pick up a couple of 5lb bags at the east asian grocer along with 15lb of rice or whatever. Bought that way, legumes etc. are really really cheap. And really good.

On the other hand, we easily spend 3x what we `have' to on dry pasta, because none of the domestic stuff can hold a candle to good italian pasta. At least none that I've found, and I've looked pretty hard. So I can see both sides of above.

As for Rancho Gordo though, wasn't a big part of their thing revitalizing rare types? We cook a lot of beans, but not so much variety. If they're doing smallish production of hard to find varieties, and they are high quality, I can see it being spendy.

Maybe one day I'll have to try some as a treat.

The Miss USA pageant contestant ... is about to lose her ... crown because she posed for semi-nude modeling photos.

I know I already said this but WHAT THE FUCK PEOPLE

501: You know, I figured that. I can't imagine how you forgot the bay leaves there.

in other words 500 and 502.

500

... Shopping locally for locally grown produce, yes, I do see how/why we should support that if we can. But if it has to be shipped from out of state anyway, what difference whether it's shipped to your home, or shipped to your local health food store?

I imagine it makes a difference to your local health food store.

I can't imagine how you forgot the bay leaves there.

The bay leaves are upstairs on my desk and the kitchen is downstairs being the kitchen.

504: Hey, very cool.

504: hey, it's zombie stras! can zombies get pig flu? on noes.

504: Hi Strasmangelo. Nice to see you.

The bay leaves are upstairs on my desk and the kitchen is downstairs being the kitchen.

Well sure. But, you know, bay leaves.

I know!!!!

Yay zombie stras!

508: Maybe hypocrisy is the point of beauty pageants. It's like a publicly-enacted sexual fetish.

What I can't get over is how much loads of people are obviously willing to spend on perfectly mediocre quality staples (rice, beans, whatever) just because they are in near serving size bags or boxes in the grocery store aisle. Those RG beans above sound about the same per pound as stale kidney beans (that weren't anything special to start with) you can buy in 200g or whatever packages all over the country.

Dry goods. It's not like you need to refrigerate them.

511: OMG I agree with James B. Shearer. Who's not a bad sort.

I imagine it makes a difference to your local health food store.

Hard to argue with that.

521: Wait, did the Age of Aquarius just start? Do we have to love everyone now?

If I had my druthers, my bathroom and kitchen would once every few months be sealed airtight and filled to the ceiling with bleach.

This is how I am. Rah likes to be able to feel his skin after he gets done cleaning the bathroom but me, I'd be just as happy shaking up and emptying two bottles of bleach and a drum of nuclear waste and throwing a match through the door before slamming it shut.

523: It's about the health of the local health food store, Walt. You must understand.

Meanwhile, Stras doesn't actually have swine flu, I hope. It was never clear to me what field he works in; perhaps he's a public health person or medical researcher.

Yay, stras!

I have to confess that I prefer the sulphur-treated fruit, which makes me feel like an inadequate hippie.

Sulfur is your friend. It's been used to control powdery mildew, to which grapes are highly sensitive, for centuries. It's also allowed in organic farming.

But if it has to be shipped from out of state anyway, what difference whether it's shipped to your home, or shipped to your local health food store?

Virtuous middlemen are virtuous too!

Also, I am sad that the complaint about lack of on-topic comments came six comments after my 460, possibly the only on-topic comment in the last four hundred. Be the change you want to see in the world, Walt Someguy!@

I suppose 520 isn't worded well --- of course I know why this works, it just gives people a very distorted view of the pricing unless they dig a bit.

But I was reacting to all of us agreeing with how expensive RG beans were, without noting that it's in the ballpark of what many people pay for random beans. Not what they have to pay, obviously, but what they actually do.

Also, is this the thread where we can confess to kitchen failures? A few weeks ago I pulled a pork roast out of the meat drawer and whipped up a semi-improvised basting sauce thhat was mostly curry powder, honey, white vinegar and mustard with some spices thrown in. I coated the roast, roasted it and the next morning we noticed that the foyer smelled like the roast was still warm and sitting out in the middle of it. What a great way to learn that our foyer is a scent collecting space. That smell hung around for weeks. It is only in the last few days that Rah has been home and able to keep doors and windows open and get rid of it. I was ready to just sell the house to the first noseless person I could find.

We usually come and go through the side door of our house but a few nights ago we went out for dinner and came back in through the front door for some reason and when we did I called out, "Hello, cats! Hello, pork smell!" Gods, it was like having that fucking basting sauce shoved right up my nose every morning on my way to work and every night upon my return. I wound up using the same stuff, more or less, when grilling at some friends' house the other night but only because I knew we would be outdoors and thus it wouldn't cling forever to the surfaces of our friends' home. Christ.

Also, the discussion above means that LB can ignore my email asking what kind of steam cleaner she got and confessing that I had just last night wished vaguely for a steam cleaner and then wondered if that were a weird thing to want.

Stras! If ever there was a time for a southern New England Unfogged meetup, this is it.

It's prefectly normal for a young man to want a steam cleaner, Robust.

it's in the ballpark of what many people pay for random beans

I'd pay good money for truly random, as opposed to pseudo-random, beans.

530: I don't understand what's bad about that.

It's prefectly normal for a young man to want a steam cleaner, Robust.

Is that before, or after, a stand mixer though?

I failed to honor your singular contribution, Mr. Ned. I salute you!

You know, if we ritually sacrificed one commenter every month or so, we could have constant comity. For next month, I nominate ari.

534: by "kitchen failure" he doesn't mean "cooking failure", he means "kitchen architectural design failure".

Semi-related to Miss California the homophobe, this hetero couple got married as part of an anti-gay marriage protest. Assholes.

The law that D.C. just passed doesn't even actually allow gay marriage, it just says that D.C. will recognize gay marriages from other states. Of course, Congress will likely invalidate it.

Dry goods. It's not like you need to refrigerate them.

but they get eaten by insects

539: Ugh. Assholes is right.

Steam cleaners are after stand mixers, in that I already have (and love!) a stand mixer.

Thanks for the validation, people - unless what Sifu is saying is that he wants his house to smell like curried-mustard pork, in which case he's an unwholesome freak. At the time that this thought occurred to me I wasn't even sure steam cleaners were something a person could just go out and buy as opposed to renting them, and I figured that if the market hadn't tried to solve my problem then I must be way off the deep end.

539: Wow, that is vile.

but they get eaten by insects

Sure, if you don't store them properly. And that's probably a good reason for not buying everything in 20lb bags. I'm not suggesting a barrel of salted pork in the basement, either. Going to far the other direction is crazy too, though.

539: That couple is enough to make anyone reconsider marriage, gay or straight alike.

539: Wow. How mean-spirited would you have to be to turn your wedding into a protest against other people's weddings? I hope they got crappy presents and end up divorcing when they find out they're actually gay.

"As Gay Issues Arise, Obama Is Pressed to Engage"

Ho ho ho.

unless what Sifu is saying is that he wants his house to smell like curried-mustard pork

You're damn right!

539: wow. just wow. what mean, pathetic human beings.

but they get eaten by insects

One word: bleach.

What's important is that they're standing up to the trivialization of the institution of marriage.

We must defend the institution of stunt marriage.

537: I laughed at that, for which I apologize.

Wow, that groom is a dead-ringer for my LDS brother-in-law.

The couple in 539 are smiling and happy and good-looking and absolutely lily white and I want nothing so much as a time machine so that I can travel back to their wedding ceremony and write on the back of their car, in soap: JUST PRIVILEGED.

550 -> 539.

Steven Colbert has a bit where he says that gay marriage would totally invalidate his marriage, because he only got married to taunt gay people.

And once again, satire has become reality.

[Unless that wasn't a real binding marriage, but a piece of theater by two people who are already married to dress up the protest.]

553: It's because you love me now.

Parsimon is just buttering up Walt so she won't be thrown off the island once we're done with Ari.

1 -- 559:

No.

558, er, the apology was to ari in absentia.

People are talking about the asshole marrying couple now, so I will not say anything further about beans, their storage and consequent freshness, bugs in beans, quantities of beans purchased, or anything like that. Even though soup biscuit is absorbed by dry goods as well.

stras, huh? Good to see ya, man!

The souk in old Sana'a is a great place to buy raisins.

Should I read the other thread? Should I read this one?

soup biscuit is absorbed by dry goods as well

Soup biscuit is apparently more soup than biscuit.

561: Beans and assholes aren't mutually exclusive, pars. You were going to say?

Stras!

Love means never having to say you're sorry, parsimon.

On the topic of food, a friend gave me some Australian Pink Salt, which I thought was ridiculously over the top. Until I ate some on some delicious fresh bread with olive oil and decided no, it's really kind of delicious and fun. I will not be buying more anytime soon, though.

Backtracking to the cleaning topic, did this get properly refuted?
Bleach is the cheapest toilet cleaner. Its just acid so I don't get how it's bad for the environment....

I am not a chemist or an environmental expert, but AIUI, "regular" (chlorine) bleach produces dioxins, which persist in the groundwater supply and build up in fatty tissue. This is a problem for humans in a number of ways, such as accumulating in the flesh of fish etc. that people eventually eat.

Household use obviously has a lesser impact than industrial use, but still I avoid using chlorine bleach unless it seems really, really necessary.

Is this wrong? Corrections on the science are welcome. (I did find the link to the Clorox website; I'm not willing to trust them.)

"Tell me about your special day, Mommy!"
"Well, Mommy had a beautiful white gown that made her look like a princess, and her grandmother's pearls, and a pretty flower in her hair, and she made sure it was extra-special by ensuring it was a symbol of hate."

Hi Stras. Glad you're back.

Ah, all is well. Really, I'm not going to carry on about dry goods. 'night. Hope stras gradually finds his way back to commenting here from time to time as he sees fit.

this hetero couple got married as part of an anti-gay marriage protest.

What a couple of barbarians. But some people are crazy.

The Miss Cali the Homophobe story bothers me, though, because I think she's being held to a higher standard than we typically demand of high-level Democratic politicians, and she's, you know, not even a public official, and not accountable to any meaningful segment of the public on matters of policy in any meaningful way.

I support gay marriage; I do not support beauty pageants (oh, I don't actively oppose pageants, I guess, or I wouldn't waste much time or energy in opposition, but I certainly do not see them as a stellar example of human flourishing for the female half of the species in this our modern world).

That said, given the unwritten rules of the beauty pageant, I believe that Perez Hilton violated a tacit, unspoken norm (that norm being something like, 'Don't ask difficult questions about politically contentious issues, but rather rely on such gems as "Are you for or against world peace?"') when he asked her a question that, let's face it, most Democratic politicians don't like to answer, and they're the ones who are responsible to significant segments of the public on matters of meaningful public policy.

To be clear: I've no doubt that Ms Prejean adheres to a homophobic worldview, and she may well be personally, and actively, homophobic in a manner that I would decry. She may also be a religious nutjob or something, for all I know. But she's not a politician but a beauty pageant contestant, and last I knew, it wasn't the role of beauty pageant contestants to advocate for or against matters of controversial public policy. And the amount of spite and vitriol directed against this young woman, who is not a politician and not a policy-maker, after all, just really creeps me out. It seems ludicrously misdirected from the get-go, and it also seems to support the idea that Miss America really does represent the full flowering of American womanhood or something icky like that. And there's a 'kill-the-witch' quality to it that I find quite unsettling: there are so many other more appropriate targets out there, why focus the outrage (against opponents of gay marriage) against this one young woman (who is probably a homophobe, yes, admittedly) who was competing in a beauty contest? Again, I don't agree with her stance on gay marriage, quite to the contrary. But there are political actors and political parties out there who are much better, or much more appropriate, targets.

I'm guessing that Perez Hilton didn't sign up for the unspoken, tacit norms of beauty pageants, and that he would ask the question of Democratic politicians.

Also, I don't know what the reaction was like in the Castro or wherever you live, but 100% of the reaction I heard here in my Red State Hellhole was *outrage* that the mean gay guy was so mean, and that cute Miss California was just offering her heartfelt opinion. The fact that she, unlike most Democratic politicians, has since appeared in an anti-gay-marriage TV ad undermines the innocent victim narrative.

There's something so scripted about the Miss California affair that makes me uncomfortable. It's as though Perez Hilton and very possibly the producers of the show decided to play by reality TV rules, and the contestants weren't informed. Now of course she's been embraced as a Christian martyr and both sides of the outrage wurlitzer is fired up. It's just pathetic that she's now enough of a Public Figure that her semi-nude pictures are coming out of the woodwork. It's like listening to an NPR story on a high school performance of Angels in America: meaningful for the people involved but sort of inappropriate and second-rate, yet you feel obliged to pay attention because the topic is Important.

On the harsh and punishing plains of the Canadian Steppe, I have personally met the chief justice who first ruled in favour of gay marriage in North America. He's one of those old-fashioned 'Red Tories' who make contemporary Canadian 'conseratives' (wannabe members of the GOP, so: not conservatives at all, really) look like intellectual lightweights, and true idiots. He didn't need to resort to a character assassination of Tinkerbell in order to rule the right way on same-sex marriage. Just saying.

I met the chief justice who first ruled in favor of gay marriage in the US. I don't think she's a Red Tory or has any problem with Tinkerbell, but I guess I couldn't say for sure. She was very nice.

who make contemporary Canadian 'conseratives' (wannabe members of the GOP, so: not conservatives at all, really) look like intellectual lightweights

Are you suggesting that they need assistance in being made so to look?

I never knew about Red Tories. My god, that explains so, so much about my father.

Are you suggesting that they need assistance in being made so to look?

Dear God, no. They don't need any assistance from me (nor from anyone else, for that matter) in order to be made to look like idiots. Their stupidity speaks for itself, and quite eloquently.

JM, where's your father from, anyway? From out west, maybe?

The left-wing Farmer-Labor Party in Minnesota ca. 1920-1948 had a Red Tory wing as well as a Red Communist wing. They got along fine until 1938. Two different kinds of communitarianism.

Whitehorse, YT.

579: Minnesota really does strike me as the most "Canadian," or "similar-to-Canada," or "not-actively-hostile-to-communitarianism-as-found-until-recently-in-Canada" state of the Union.

I recently learned (through genealogical-geekitude studies of the Canadian and US federal census returns) that I have a bunch of cousins in Minnesota. So I cold-called this 85-year old lady in Cloquet, and told her I was her cousin, and she invited me to visit at any time, which I thought was quite accommodating. I have chased her ancestrals back to Co. Cork, which surprised her a little bit.

Back in the day Cloquet was pretty Communist, so be careful, MC.

Hey, stras!

I of course forgot to mention the most critical aspect of the story: that she got breast implants paid for by the Miss California beauty pageant itself.

I'm guessing that Perez Hilton

Between Carrie Prejean and Perez Hilton, it's really hard to decide which one is less likable. Or interesting. It's like watching a cockroach and a dung beetle battle for supremacy.

So Perez Hilton is a man, huh?

I'm paying vague attention to this story because, you know, titties, but I had just assumed that Perez was a name for a woman.

I suppose I should make my reservation at gender reëducation camp.

585: You have got to be kidding! Dung beetles are awesome! Cockroaches are nasty!

It's like watching a cockroach and a dung beetle battle for supremacy.

Dude, don't tempt me. I've got work to do!

That reminds me, I had an imaginary production company / record label in undergrad and after called Bug Doubt Productions.

The logo was this drawing of a becapped insect in that classic unsmiling arms-folded b-boy stance, but of course with two sets of folded arms.

I would put it on party flyers and invitations and stuff: "This Event Sponsored by Bug Doubt Productions." I had a rotating cast of such entities.

588: Which reminds me, insert the following into my earlier presidential effort:

I'm William Henry Harrison and I'm here to say,
"I'm William Henry Harrison and I'm here to stay."

590: Eh, I think it was perfect that way it was.

Re: salt in Canada and dog booties (ari and Cala):

I should have been more specific. Obviously British Columbia doesn't get much snow and ice, and they seem to use sand in a bunch of places in Canada a lot more than they do here. I should have restricted my statement to Ontario. My main point was that I had always thought of dog boots as affected and twee, but it seems that there are places where it's really necessary

Re shoes inside and carpet:

Frankly I don't understand wall to wall carpeting, unless it's very low mat and you pur rugs on it. I just don't get why anyone would want white floors. I can't stand having houses painted entirely in white.

My preferred WASPY look is hardwood floors with oriental rugs. In the Southwest I'd be inclined to use tile.

Re: chlorine bleach

All of the natural cleaning websites say bad things about the toxic nature of bleach.

Re: Cleaning Tips (sorry, Sifu)

BioKleen's BacOut is really good for getting out certain types of stains. A 1/4 cup down the shower drain overnight helps to keep it clear.

All of the natural/inexpensive cleaning websites say that you can but vinegar in the toilet bowl to clean it. Soak, then put some baking soda on your wand thing and scrub. You can also leave baking soda or borax (somewhat more toxic than BS) in overnight to deodorize.

DENTURE TABLETS--not just for denture cleaning anymore. You can put one or two in the toilet overnight or before you leave for the day, then swish it around (but I'm lazy and don't bother) before flushing. I've only tried the regular ones, but I'm thinking of getting the ones for smokers with extra enzymes to whiten teeth.

589: And actually, the insect wasn't really unsmiling, he had this skeptical look on his face.

And stras, it's good to see you. What you said is awesome.

So, wait a second. I've been away. There was an argument? On Unfogged? The Unfogged on the Internet??

595: Way to open old wounds, asshole.

then put some baking soda on your wand thing and scrub

But once I'm done masturbating, how do I clean the toilet?

597: With your copious tears, dummy.

598: That's "tears" as in "I'm crying", not "tears" as in "I scrubbed too hard".

Also, 'Smasher, we don't invoke my name anymore around here for multiples of 100.

I'm paying vague attention to this story because, you know, titties, but I had just assumed that Perez was a name for a woman.

Perez is a good old Biblical boy's name.

527: Any pesticide they used hundreds of years ago is fine by me. I prefer the arsenic apricots to the sulfur ones though.

602: Seriously though, sulfured dried fruits are not bad for you. The hysteria over sulfured fruits is akin to that over vaccines, science-wise (although less harmful since it doesn't endanger others).

Carrie Prejean can't compare to
The Other Prejean . Prejeans Of The World Unite!

Hey, did I miss a blowup? I hate missing a blowup.

605: Yep, you missed it. We banned you for the greater good of the blog, PGD.

Here you go.

Someone can't stand it when I win a rap battle.

Why so many law school professors with these inane, sub-moronic blogs? It's bizarre.

it's because law school attracts douches, and so there are a high percentage of pretentious douchebags among law professors. (Although many law professors are very nice, I'm sure!).

588 to 608.

Seriously though, sulfured dried fruits are not bad for you.

I just don't like the flavor.

I like to be able to taste the after-taste of the fruit, and too often with sulfured fruit, the sulfur flavor is the last flavor to linger in the mouth.

I like to be able to taste the after-taste of the fruit, and too often with sulfured fruit, the sulfur flavor is the last flavor to linger in the mouth.

This is precisely my complaint with nuts in sweets.

I know I've said this here before, but Nick'S formulation captures is very nicely.

-s, +t

612: It's just not the same.

This is precitely my complaiint with nutt in tweett

WTF?

Anyhow.... I must say I was very impressed with LB's handling of the blow up (no, not *that* blow up). Her refusal to be drawn into the sniping and her dedication to finding a reasonable middle ground were humbling. She'll make a great judge, if lacking a frontal cortex does not disqualify one from the bench (evidence suggests: no).

lacking a frontal cortex

What the?

Lizards don't 'em, bub.

I think W. Breeze just called LB flat-chested.

have. have 'em.

619: yes, but does their breath?

616, 617: I was kind of letting that one sit there, but the clarification is welcome. And aw, shucks, but I'm not feeling all that self-congratulatory.

You want humorless, I was about to go off on a tangent about how, in fact, the very brain regions most implicated in rational evaluation of emotional circumstances are found in the frontal cortex.

621: why not? I've been congratulating myself on (largely) not reading that thread for over 24 hours now.

623: Coward.

Oh, don't tease us, Sifu. We're all waiting with bated breath.

Wasn't LB's perspective mostly "I'm annoyed with everyone at the moment."?

Not that I know what a better approach would have been.

626: I think we need a pair of fresh eyes to really decide. Sifu?

A better approach would have been to settle things once and for all with a good, old-fashioned lather fight.

625: uh, well, big chunks of the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex are implicated in the integration of emotional stimuli into decision making. Then the orbitofrontal cortex helps you anticipate future negative consequences of your actions (see here, for instance). People with orbitofrontal lesions -- including, presumably, lizard people, but apparently excluding LB -- are notably terrible at correctly evaluating the potential negative consequences of their actions, even if they can tell you what those negative consequences to those actions would be, and are prone to e.g. going to Vegas and marrying a prostitute on the spur of the moment.

628: I fear the development of truly effective lather weapons will have to wait until DADT is repealed.

I'm glad I wasn't trying to sound smart or anything in 629, because if I was fucking up the tags would be pretty embarrassing.

630: We'll have to make do with feces, then.

627: Although come to think of it, you don't really need to read the thread to make a pronouncement. This is Unfogged, dammit!

A better approach is not to care.

634: We'll have to make do with feces, then.

617: LB is a lizard!? I thought she just *ate* lizards, hence the breath. Presumably in times of shortage she's drawn to things that look like, but are not, actual lizards. IOW Newt is insurance against collapse of her lizard supplies.

Hey! Guys! Look what I made!

635: I have tasted the maggots in the mind of the universe.

637: OMG, that's gorgeous. Who's Gryphon to you that you make such excellent things for him?

634: Feign non-chalance all you want. I know it's really because you're scared.

daughter of a friend. So, her. But yes. Mainly I made to avoid some other things because I am mad at a professor. I'm pretty proud of myself. Also in real life it is all glittery and iridescent and kind of looks like it's glowing.

Man, graduate school is stupid. I should get a job as Ridiculous Cardboard Project Maker.

(also, thank you!)

Holy shit. Wow.

I have room in my house for a Ridiculous Cardboard Project Maker.

I can't view it here at work for some reason. Can't wait to get home to check it out!

That is so, so cool.

I kind of want to keep it. My roommate would probably be annoyed. And Gryphon's mom.

Ridiculous Cardboard Project Maker

Do it outside, call the cluster of castles Heathered Glen, get a bank loan up front, and retire to the tropics after selling them.

Oop, 2 years late for financial viability. Nice castle, though.

Sweet castle and I like the paint job (nice hardwood floor, by the way -- oops that was earlier in the thread). Don't architects make/need cardboard models for their projects? I sense a career change in your future...

646: They'll have to make do with feces, then.

Glittery And Iridescent Castles Are Pretty!

Very nice.

Do you have any sources for really superlative prunes? I love prunes.

I wonder if these people are good. It looks potentially promising.

That is an awesomely impressive dissertation procrastination procedure. My hat is off to you.

Awesome, Cecily! It was worth the wait.

I was going to post a comment on how that castle was terrible, because it's completely indefensible against trebuchet attack, blah, blah, blah, when I realized that I know absolutely nothing about what makes something a good castle. Like true love, obsessive knowledge of triva is something you just can't fake.

I was going to post a comment on how that castle was terrible, because it's completely indefensible

What, and alert Cecily before our raid?

Whose side are you on, Walt?

Give Walt a break, M/tch. He's lathering as fast as he can.

656: Put some soap in it, JRoth!

What, the Age of Aquarius is over? I thought we were all one big side. Of love.

Very impressive, Cecily.

658: Put a hippie in it, Walt!

Unrelated: this Danish guy, found via Cecily's fine blog, also makes some amazing castles and whatnot. Amazing, I tell you. So amazing I'll bet he never finishes his dissertation.

658: Put a hippie donk in on it, Walt!

661: Link suboptimal.

Internet is hard. Pretend I'm not an idiot.

stras!! yay!

People finish their dissertations? I thought that was one of those internet jokes, like pirates versus ninjas and the Flying Spaghetti Monster.

Thanks a lot, M/tch. The hippie didn't fit all the way in, and now I can't get him out.

You want a hippie with a flared base.

That's what the bellbottoms are for.

There was Someguy, who inserted a hippie
I don't know why he inserted the hippie
Perhaps he'll stirfry.

There was Someguy, who inserted a pig
As in a policeman, dig?
He inserted the pig to chase off the hippie
I don't know why he inserted the hippie
. . . . . .

He inserted a riot to off the pig
Not very quiet, inserting a riot.
He inserted the pig to chase the hippie,
I don't know why he inserted the hippie, perhaps he'll stir fry.

See LB? You've got some rhyming skillz!

It's specifically the rap idiom where I make myself cringe. I'm so, so far off the right tone.

Finally went back and read the law firm/Supreme Court rap* thread. Man, slolerner had some damn fine skills. Some other great entries too. The sole contribution from Ogged (PBUH), was just terrible though. And man I hate hate hate that comments had to be redacted.

* The rapping stuff starts at comment 33, but comment 29 is so classic that all Unfogged readers should be aware of it.**

**Back when I was writing the final entry in the Orca vs. Lion rap battle, I thought it would be cool to construct a canon of all the posts and comments required to have a well-rounded understanding of Unfogged. I was even going to embed links to the appropriate comments in the rap itself, but quickly decided it was too labor intensive.

Joe Drymala, a nation turns its lonely eyes to you:

"Gap-tooth Yellowcake Rose of Texas
G to the O to the P, that's for life,
Look at the boss and pretend you're his wife"

Condi Agonistes.

674: Word.

Anyone know what Joey D is up to these days?