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Thoughts on Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter

I read a biography! That or it was woefully mishelved at Goodwill. I’m inclined to believe the latter, I don’t think Abraham Lincoln was actually a vampire hunter.

It’s a fascinating concept, taking an extraordinary man and adding a supernatural twist to his life. The author, Seth Grahame-Smith, clearly researched Lincoln’s life extensively in order to add a vampire element to every tragedy in Lincoln’s life, beginning with his mother’s death when he was nine.

The vampire mythos has also evolved: young vampires experience severe damage in direct sunlight, but older vampires can endure some time outside with appropriate equipment (clothing, parasols, etc.). They do not, I note, sparkle. They also play an integral in the Civil War, with opportunistic vampires viewing slavery as an easy food source. Lincoln’s view of slavery is directly tied to his hatred of vampires, and the Emancipation Proclamation was a strategic move meant to cripple the vamipres’ easy food source.

Despite a minor in history, I don’t read many biographies. I am tempted to pick up an authentic biography of Abraham Lincoln to see how much reality fed into this book. Meanwhile, I will look into the author’s other books… Pride and Prejudice and Zombies sounds interesting.

Visiting the Blue Box Café

I don’t recall when I first heard about the Blue Box Café (BBC, because that’s a great acronym in context); it seems like it opened ages ago, I kept wanting to go. With a late Saturday afternoon free, we ended up there for an early dinner recently. For anyone not familiar with the source material, “Blue Box” refers to Doctor Who’s TARDIS (Time And Relative Dimension In Space), a machine capable of traveling through time and space that is permanently disguised as a British police box.

Me, a TARDIS door, and some Doctor Who clothing.

There’s nothing particularly fancy on the menu, though some of the items bear Whovian names; what we tried was delightful. The attention-getters are the decor and merchandise, all Doctor Who-related. In addition to the usual collectables (K-9 bobblehead!) for sale, there was a book about the show by a Midwest author, and several pieces on the walls were fan creations. And who can resist taking a photo by the Blue Box mock-up? As we left, employees were setting up for an evening of live music – be sure to check their event schedule before you go!

I normally chat with my companions at meals, but we were both distracted by an episode of Doctor Who that was playing on the televisions. We eventually pulled ourselves away mid-episode (we have seen it before), stopping outside to admire the Blue Box bench before heading home.

Thoughts on Phantom Limbs

Sometimes you discover a book and wonder why you didn’t read it sooner. In the case of Phantom Limbs, I know why, yet I wish I had read it a year ago so I could justify re-reading already.

Last year, a couple weeks before I was scheduled to close on my house, we went to BookCon. As you may guess from the name, they were books involved – in large quantities, and mostly free. With an impending move, almost all of them were promptly packed, where they stayed until I bought (& assembled) bookcases in the fall. At that point, Phantom Limbs was sorted onto the shelf with other G authors, where it stayed until this summer when I went looking for a book I could put down. (Cause I couldn’t write a black belt essay in the bath.)

Oops!

As it turns out, it wasn’t that type of book. It’s more of a stay up late, read snippets at every opportunity type.

After the sudden death of his younger brother, followed by his best friend moving out of state, Otis turned to swimming as a distraction from his grief. He is driven to compete by Dara, an amputee whose own tragedy prevents her from competing at her former level. In the midst of training (Dara is convinced he can make it to the Olympics if he just pushes harder), Meg comes back, and the two of them work to rekindle their friendship while addressing their unresolved issues from Mason’s death.

What makes this book memorable is the level of depth Paula Garner puts into each character. Each of them has issues that are being dealt with – or deliberately ignored – that the others can help them with. They make mistakes, just like any teenager, that seem like the right choice at the time. And there are limits to what they can fix. Most importantly, the main characters evolve throughout the story.

This year’s big harvest: tomatoes

This year’s favorite harvest recipe: tomato soup.

Each year, it seems to be a different crop that goes wild and leaves me scrambling to use it or freeze it. Last year’s tromboncino squash forced the discovery of new recipes (orange zucchini bread is fabulous), the purchase of a food processor, and is still taking space in various forms in the freezer.

A few good tomatoes — Ripe Glacier and Ananas Noire tomatoes.

This year’s bumper crop is Ananas Noire tomatoes. Cassandra will happily eat them raw, but they’re fairly large, so even she can’t keep up. I’ve been taking extras to work a couple times a week. The stellar find for dealing with the excess harvest is this tomato soup recipe.

I typically make a recipe at least once before tweaking it to my taste, but I don’t usually have plain tomato juice in the house, so I substituted V-8 juice (which is mainly tomato, with other vegetables added) the first time. I’ve worked up from there, adding onions (caramelized one time), green peppers, celery, and what pushed it over the edge to I could eat this every day, leftover beef. Some days I even remember to pick some basil for the recipe.

Tomato soup ingredients in the crockpot, then swirling in the heavy cream, and lastly, in the bowl.

I drop it all in the crockpot first thing in the morning, then run the immersion blender through it when I get home from work. After it’s mostly blended, I add the heavy cream and blend again before dropping the butter in. (Let’s be honest, that’s mostly because I like to watch the swirly pattern as the cream mixes in.) I leave the butter to melt for a few minutes, then stir and serve.

I’m not particular about which kind of beef I include, it just depends on what leftovers I have in the fridge. After a day in the crockpot, it’s all going to dissolve nicely. The first attempt was thin sliced fajita beef; I’ve also tried steak and short ribs (cooking on the grill, of course). They all work nicely.

In theory, we eat a little of it and freeze the rest for delicious soups in the winter. Last weekend’s soup – a full crockpot – never made it to the freezer.

Million Dollar Quartet at the Paramount

We’ve had season tickets to the Paramount Theater in Aurora for a few years now (since the year they had Cats and Les Miserables on the schedule), so I think it’s fairly significant that Cassandra declared Million Dollar Quartet as her favorite so far. It even beat Aladdin, which we saw in Chicago last December.

The Million Dollar Quartet was made up of Jerry Lee Lewis, Carl Perkins, Johnny Cash, and Elvis Presley, and is set entirely in and around the Sun Records recording studio in Memphis, Tennessee, on the one day that the four performers happened to be there. Jerry Lee Lewis was the new face in the studio, the hotshot kid who was (in the musical, at least) impressed by the indoor toilet at his hotel and the famous musicians he was meeting. At the same time, he was eager to declare that his would be the next gold record on the wall. Elvis Presley was searching for happiness at a studio that didn’t understand him, and the other two were hoping for their next big hits.

Imagine, if you can, the amount of talent that was gathered at Sun Studio on December 4, 1956. Then imagine what kind of talent you need to reproduce that sixty years later, including capturing the era in the set design.

The Paramount nailed it.

This show is definitely worth seeing. It’s probably worth seeing again, though I suspect my opportunities to do that – at least during this run – will conflict with my karate schedule.

Time for the Brookfield ZooRunRun!

Or as I prefer to call it, the ZooWalkWalk. That’s what I usually do at Brookfield Zoo’s annual 5k, though this year included a little sprinting as well. Several years ago, we happened to arrive at the zoo as their ZooRunRun was finishing, which is how it came to my attention. By the time it rolled around again, we were already learning karate and hustling up the Hancock once a year; walking a few miles on a fall morning seemed like a nice addition. Consistently scheduled for early September, the zoo has a knack for perfect weather for the event.

The runners start first, split into groups by their expected mile time (self-assessed), followed by the walkers. Everybody is timed automatically based on the bibs, and you can scan the QR code on your bib to retrieve your time. Alternately, you can queue up for the lone laptop (there used to be more) and enter your bib number. In addition to the traditional water and banana handouts, there were two different samples this year to help with recovery – BarkThins and Kind bars.

As a walker, I slowed down occasionally to watch animals that usually rest in the heat of day – both the warthogs and wallabies were unusually active this time. After the race, the wallabies had already settled into their normal lounging by the time we walked by again. In fact, one of the biggest benefits I see to the ZooRunRun – other than supporting their conservation efforts – is the opportunity to wander the zoo before it officially opens. The faster you move during your walk or run, the more time you have at the zoo with reduced crowds.

Hardware is a strange name for a restaurant

That was my first thought when a friend asked if I had tried the place I’d been driving past at least once a week for the last year. “It’s a farm-to-table restaurant.” Wait, what? Really? I just thought it was a brewpub, which I don’t go out of my way for since I don’t drink beer. (Yes, I realize brewpubs have other good features.) So I Googled the restaurant and spent a while ogling their menu.

Last week, I had a chance to go with a friend. We opted for a high-top table, right next to their greenhouse. (They grow their own salad greens in the greenhouse, along with hops for their beers, and fruits and nuts in their micro orchard.) Then the waiter introduced himself and said these magic words: “We have 411 whiskies.” I could go every day for a year, have a different whiskey each time, and not make it through the entire list! I won’t go that often, of course, but I did set up a spreadsheet to track which whiskies I’ve tried there. The Templeton Rye from their Happy Hour menu narrowly beat some of their whiskey flight options for the evening.

Greenhouse, whiskey, wood grilled bread, meat & cheese plate at Hardware — The Greenhouse, Templeton Rye, Wood Grilled Bread, and a selection of meats and cheeses at Hardware in North Aurora

Their food was equally impressive, particularly knowing the greens are grown in sight of our table, and some of the meats are cured or prepared there. After our Wood Grilled Bread with hummus, olives, cucumber, feta cheese, and arugula, the waiter brought fresh baked rolls and honey butter to the table. I had almost finished my roll when dinner arrived – homemade ravioli for my companion, and a mixed platter of meat and cheese for me. The roll came in handy between bites of habanero tequila cheese, and my favorite of the meats was the duck bacon.

I did bring half of my platter home, so we didn’t look at the dessert menu while there. I did, however, look it up afterwards, and suspect that I’ll be ordering just an appetizer and dessert next time. And a whiskey, of course. Only 410 left to try.

The Five Doctors, with running commentary

I’m not a bit fan of talking during movies, especially at theaters where it might disturb other people. When you’re already paying someone else to provide a running commentary, it suddenly becomes appropriate.

I somehow missed the Mystery Science Theater 3000 (MST3K) Kickstarter back in 2015, which brought the show back with 14 new episodes. Having grown up^* on Doctor Who, I was excited to learn about a RiffTrax Live event for “The Five Doctors,” a 1983 special that brought together the first five regenerations and some of his companions. Without commentary, “The Five Doctors” is the epitome of classic Doctor Who – campy effects, BBC set budget, interesting costume choices (“Snuffleupagus pelt”), and some fairly obvious plot twists.

With commentary, you can still enjoy all those things – though some of the original dialogue becomes lost – and appreciate mocking yet another timeless classic. (It also allows you to appreciate just how far Doctor Who – and the BBC’s budget – has come.). But first, we were subjected to a British safety video from the era, with commentary, of course. Rest assured that nobody who watched it will play anywhere near power lines, power stations, or a poorly animated owl who lectures an equally animated bird about the danger without making any effort to stop the children who are about to be injured or killed (poor Jimmy!).

Actually, that was second. The usual pre-movie ads and trivia were replaced with comical ones – obvious anagrams that were translated into entirely different, but related, terms (instead of Cars 3, it read Buy More Toys), fake trivia, and other entertainment. Arriving early was a fortunate choice.

The extended episode itself was a barrel of laughs with the MST3K crew clearly enjoying themselves with a live audience. There were a plethora of comments on the fashion choices, particularly on the Gallifreyans’ parts. The rile of Sarah Jane Smith was reprised by Elisabeth Sladen, with a brief appearance by K-9, perplexing viewers by her ability to fall down a minuscule slope and needing a rescue from it. Sarah Jane is far better written in future appearances. Eventually, the Doctors pulled together and saved the day… not exactly a spoiler three decades and several regenerations later.

The real advantage to a live MST3K performance was the timeliness of the jokes, such as comparing the Tower of Rassilon to the current Dark Tower movie. I’m hoping for a DVD or download release, so my daughter will forgive me for seeing it without her.

* It’s a relative term.

Kitchen Tip: Preparing Artichokes

Sometimes I learn a kitchen trick and wonder why I ever did it differently. That’s certainly the case with freezing sliced bagels and toasting them straight from the freezer, and freezing overripe bananas for future baking. I recently learned a different way of preparing artichokes, and can’t imagine I’ll go back to the old way.

Growing up, we ate artichokes occasionally as a special treat, always prepared the same way: top of leaves and stem chopped off, spiky bits of remaining leaves trimmed, then boiled for 25-30 minutes. I had already modified that to steaming in recent years, I rarely boil vegetables anymore – and the stems are left longer to get to the bit of heart in them. (Sometimes I save the stems after cooking to make a single serving of artichoke dip.)

Artichoke preparations — Upper left: unprepared artichoke, steamer, and dish with lemon juice. Upper right: artichoke cut down the center. Bottom left: split artichoke with fuzz removed. Bottom right: cooked artichokes.

When I started grilling this season, I went looking for a grilled artichoke recipe. What I found quickly became my favorite way of preparing them; it eliminates stopping halfway through eating to clean out the fuzzy bits on the heart. After the prep that I’ve always done, I slice each artichoke in half, top to stem, dip each side in lemon juice to reduce browning, then loosen the artichoke fuzz with a knife before scooping it out. It gets another dip in lemon juice, then set in the steamer basket while I prepare the rest.

The artichokes can be eaten steamed, with a dipping sauce – mayonnaise or garlic butter are traditional options – but we’ve settled on grilling them while it’s warm out. I pour a marinade of olive oil, minced garlic, salt, and pepper over the artichokes before placing them sliced side down on the grill for 10 minutes or so. (This will vary based on the type of grill; as mentioned before, the cooking time on a Big Green Egg is shorter.) My grill can easily hold four artichokes. Inconveniently, my steamer only fits two, and that barely if they’re massive ones from Costco, so I steam two batches before grilling.

Taking a trip back in time

“It’s hot, over-priced, and historically inaccurate.”
“But it’s fun.”

I went to my first Renaissance Faire in Ft. Lauderdale during college. We borrowed my Dad’s minivan for the hour drive from Miami, spent a good part of the February day at Faire, then went home and had a pool party. Because you can do that in Miami in February.

When I moved to Chicagoland and discovered there was a nearby Renaissance Faire that lasts two whole months, I was delighted! So delighted, in fact, that I’ve only missed it one year since I moved here; my daughter was born mid-season.

Dirk & Guido, the Swordsmen — Dirk & Guido, Bold & Stupid Men

Cirque du Sewer, during a rat’s performance

Bristol Renaissance Faire has so many choices, you can’t possibly cover it all in one day. I think the perfect day at Bristol includes seeing a classic performance and trying something new. Examples of Bristol classics would be The Mud Show (dirty, yet kid-appropriate), Dirk & Guido, the Swordsmen (Bold & Stupid Men! I have the button that says so), Adam Crack’s Fire Whip show, or even the Joust. (By no means is this a complete list.)

Which shows we see varies on each visit, partially dependent on who we’re wandering the Faire with. Last year, the new act (for us) was The Dread Crew of Oddwood, and oddly entertaining music group that describes itself as “Heavy Mahogany debauchery from Southern California.” This year, as we wandered between lunch and shopping, we encountered a lady with a rat, hawking her Cirque du Sewer show. It was delightfully amusing to see how well the cat and rats have their human trained.

Bast's Garden — Bast’s Garden, a menagerie of winged plush

Twisted Spiders — Beautiful spiders dangling from the ceiling.

And then there’s the shopping. The shopping opportunities are extraordinary, from apparel, jewelry, decorations, books, games, and more! We always visit our friends at Bast’s Garden, which usually results in yet another winged plush coming home with us, and I like stopping at the game store (just in case I need more dice). This year’s new find was Twisted Spiders, a booth dedicated solely to beautiful spider jewelry and adornments.

It’s never a dull day, and if you’re lucky, you get perfect weather too.