Fiat Lux

Looks like a new William Gibson book will be out reasonably soon. Yay!

I had a somewhat rocky weekend, so in an effort to wrap up Sunday on a good note, I pulled out a movie that's virtually guaranteed to make me feel better by the time it ends:

Big Trouble In Little China.

What's your guilty pleasure?

What does he see?

By way of new blogroll member Skippy, this bit of scary news from just up the road in San Francisco tonight:

Elie Wiesel, the renowned Holocaust author and Nobel Peace Prize winner, was attacked and dragged out of a San Francisco hotel elevator last week, possibly by a Holocaust denier who claims to have stalked Wiesel for weeks, police said.

Wiesel, 78, was at the Argent Hotel Feb. 1 for a conference on "Facing Violence: Justice, Religion and Conflict Resolution" when he was confronted in an elevator by a man insisting that he wanted to interview the author, according to San Francisco Police Department Sgt. Neville Gittens.

Wiesel said he would do so in the hotel lobby, but the man insisted on going to Wiesel's room. The man then stopped the elevator at the sixth floor and tried to force Wiesel into a room there.

"That's when the victim started yelling," Gittens said.

Wiesel escaped unharmed, made his way down to the lobby and called police.

I'm relieved that Wiesel is safe, and disgusted that someone should try to use physical force on him. It's bad enough that there are people who refuse to believe the Shoah happened. It's even worse that these revolting examples of personhood are so wrapped up in their hate and lies that they think they can use physical force on the living reminders of the truth.

UPDATE 2/18/07:
A suspect has been arrested in this case:

Montgomery Township police arrested Eric Hunt, 22, of Sussex County, N.J., at 1:30 p.m. EST Saturday. He faces charges that include attempted kidnapping, false imprisonment, elder abuse, stalking, battery and the commission of a hate crime, according to San Francisco police.

He was being held without bail in the Somerset County Jail in New Jersey, awaiting extradition to San Francisco.

I've been very busy (here's why) and have missed a lot of things I normally would be blogging about. However, this is too cute to let it pass unnoted:

Workers at the Meriden Humane Society are marveling at a short-haired mother cat who has willingly adopted a six-day-old Rottweiler puppy that was rejected by its mother.

The tiny pup, named Charlie by Humane Society volunteers, nurses alongside a jumble of black and gray kittens recently born to Satin, who was surrendered to the shelter by an owner unable to care for her.

Charlie's mother was found by the side of the road in Meriden a couple of months ago. She gave birth to two puppies, but one was stillborn. As sometimes happens with a stillborn in the litter, the mother dog refused to accept Charlie.

Volunteers bottle-fed him every two hours, but the effort was both exhausting to humans and insufficient for the puppy, who needs to feed when he wants, said volunteer Chris Chorney.

Research indicated that a suitable substitute could be Satin, who had given birth to four kittens that have quickly warmed to Charlie.

"The kittens scrum up with him and the kittens treat him like one of their own," Chorney said.

Aaaaaw.

Happy Valentine's Day, everyone.

From the archives... Tommy, looking slightly startled.

It's been a long, busy week. Today was a gorgeous, warm, springlike day, though, which was a very nice way to wrap the week up.

And this is some very welcome news too:

The U.S. House of Representatives denounced President George W. Bush's Iraq troop buildup on Friday in a symbolic challenge to his unpopular war strategy that is expected to lead to a mighty struggle over financing the extra troops.

The Democratic-led House voted 246-182 for a resolution that voices support for U.S. forces but opposes the Republican president's decision to send 21,500 more troops to bolster security in Baghdad and violent Anbar province.

[snip]

The resolution passed with support of all but two of the House's 233 Democrats and 17 of its 201 Republicans, many worried about their political fate should they stick with Bush. Polls say most Americans oppose adding troops in Iraq.

That's a very nice way to start the weekend.

In other news, I am going to take advantage of the three-day weekend upcoming to try upgrading the blog to a more recent version of Movable Type. Three+ years on version 2.6x is long enough. With luck, all will go well and I'll finally get some new features and a new look to the blog.

One possible outcome is that I utterly hose the site and get stuck starting from scratch, althought I dearly hope that's not the case. Either way, if you stop by over the weekend and things look a little odd, that's probably why.

I'm sure Echinde or some of the other, better bloggers than I out there will have a field day with this:

[Author Laura Session Stepp] writes a letter to mothers and daughters, in which she warns the girls: "Your body is your property. . . . Think about the first home you hope to own. You wouldn't want someone to throw a rock through the front window, would you?"

I've only got two things to say in response.

First off, it's outrageously sexist to suggest that an unmarried woman's body is the property of her future husband, and that sexual activity before marriage devalues her assets. What rock has the author been hiding under?

Next, is that really the best argument she can come up with for why adolescents should delay sexual activity? If so, that's pretty pathetic.

Kathy Dobie, the Washington Post's reviewer of this book, had a good response:

It seems strange to have to state the obvious all over again: ... one's sexuality is not a commodity that, given away too readily and too often, will exhaust or devalue itself.

It's certainly not seen that way for men. A man who's had a lot of sex partners is seen as sophisticated (James Bond, anyone?). A woman who's had a lot of sex partners, on the other hand, is all too often seen as a slut.

And books like this one don't help matters any.

UPDATE 3:10PM
As expected, Echinde has weighed in. Score 1 for my predictive ability. :)

The back-end upgrade from MT 2.64 to MT 3.34 went almost shockingly well. Nothing seems broken, all my old entries & comments are still here, and (what I was most worried about) my templates are all still working.

So far, so good. I'll have to wait and see how the new comment spam system works as compared to my trusty old MT-Blacklist installation.

The next stage .... the front end. I'll be playing around with my Rome travelogue to see how the new StyleCatcher plugin works as far as skinning the site goes. If I can't get it to work & look good over there, I may leave things as-is here. It will depend on how much hacking I need to do to the CSS and templates to make my ancient, customized templates work properly.

UPDATE: 1:56PM
As I suspected, those old templates are causing trouble. I had to completely overwrite them to get StyleCatcher to work. As of now, a new template is up and running on the Rome blog, and I'm going to try to figure out how to add some of the old stuff back in.

UPDATE 2:30PM
I got Sitemeter back on the Rome blog but have not have the nerve to do any more significant hacking. Taking a break for a while. It's a really lovely day and I don't want to spend it all indoors.

UPDATE 6:25PM
The Rome blog's in decent shape now. Once I got the hang of the template widget module system, getting some customization into the sidebar wasn't tough at all. I tried a couple of different skins but for now I'm using a very basic one (Vicksburg Desert) that's not too different in look and tone from my old one.

UPDATE: 8:30PM
I've widget-ized and updated the templates for the main site. And for good measure, I installed a 3rd party plug-in called "Promote This!" to add some social bookmarking links to my entries. I'm thoroughly impressed by how easy it's all been -- easy being a relative term, of course. What's easy for a moderate geek like me would be pretty damn difficult for a non-techie, but then, that's what Blogger and TypePad are for.

It's a little weird not seeing my trusty old templates anymore, but now that I've got the version 3.x templates installed, I can skin to my heart's content. Probably tomorrow, though. I think that's enough work for one day.

I'll be the first to admit that I'm not a real estate expert. But when browsing through the online WSJ today, I was struck by some of the data in their article about the 'subprime' mortgage market. Here's a few tidbits:

- At least 20 subprime mortgage lending companies have either closed, been sold, and/or filed for bankruptcy.
- Almost 1.2 million foreclosure filings were reported in 2006, a 42% increase from 2005. That is a rate of one per every 92 US households.
- "Creative" subprime loans (such as interest-only and no-doc aka 'liar' loans) accounted for 47% of total loans issued in 2006. At the start of the decade, these types of loans were less than 2% of total mortgage loans.

As I said, I'm not an expert, but none of that looks like particularly good news to me. Even Ben Bernanke is starting to mention it as a possible concern.

One thing does make me wonder, though -- this article seems to be treating the market as if each of these mortgages were acquired by individual households. Yet it's also true that this recent real estate boom included a lot of speculation, and at least some of that speculation was financed via these same exotic subprime mortgages. (Casey Serin is a good example; he used a number of different subprime mortgages to unsuccessfully speculate on at least 6 properties). So -- my question is -- is the impact really going to be as broad as this article suggests, or will it be more localized?

I have no desire at all to ride out another recession so soon after that last one, so my hope is that things don't turn out as badly as they could. Whether I'm indulging in wishful thinking or not ... well, we'll see.

Nothing busts up a morning quite like discovering that your less-than-six-months-old Melitta coffeemaker has given up the ghost.

I suppose that's what you get when you buy discontinued merchandise from Woot!, but the other stuff I've gotten there hasn't had problems, so maybe it's just bad luck.

I had some vague plans of heading over to a car dealership and starting the long process of looking for a new car, but instead a trip to buy a new coffeemaker is definitely in order. Yes, the coffeemaker has a warrantee, but I don't want to wait several weeks to get it repaired. I want a coffeemaker now.

One of the big issues with converting from old-style Edison light bulbs to compact fluorescents is the cost. I wonder whether the news today that Australia intends to ban old-style light bulbs will help drive down CF prices over time.

The Australian government on Tuesday announced plans to phase out incandescent light bulbs and replace them with more energy-efficient compact fluorescent bulbs across the country.

I'm all for saving energy and reducing greenhouse gases, but I have to say that this news also makes me feel a bit sad. "Old-style" light bulbs give off a warmer glow than CF bulbs, and I like the feel of that warmer light.

Ah well.

Because sometimes, you need to crank up the tunes really loud to get you over the hump.

While There's A Candle Burning - Steve Winwood
Honey Bun - Mandy Patinkin
Walking Down Your Street - Bangles
Bomday Dreams - Bombay Dreams - London Cast
Mandolin Rain - Bruce Hornsby And The Range
Chimes of Freedom (live) - Bruce Springsteen
Gloria - U2
Warrior - Matisyahu
Hold What You've Got - Carly Simon
ndependent Woman - Destiny's Child

The news this morning that Britain's Prince Harry is heading to Iraq does raise the question -- what do the Bush twins do with their days? They don't seem to have jobs or post-college academic commitments. I don't expect them to follow Harry's lead here, but (as Joe from AmericaBlog points out) you'd think they could at least get off their butts and volunteer at Walter Reed once in a while.

Becasue you can never have too many pictures of Da Boyz on the office couch.

Or can you?

When the Starbucks Gossip blog posted this memo a day or so ago, it was roundly rejected as a fake, but apparently a leaked internal e-mail to Starbucks senior managers was the real thing. And it's fascinating reading. Here's a snippet:

...we desperately need to look into the mirror and realize it's time to get back to the core and make the changes necessary to evoke the heritage, the tradition, and the passion that we all have for the true Starbucks experience.

Hopefully, this will mean less of a focus on selling books and DVDs at Starbucks and more of a focus on good coffee.

I've always thought that it's not so much making mistakes, but whether or not you can learn from them, that's the true sign of a company that's going to succeed. Howard Schultz has done a tremendous job building Starbucks over the years, and this latest report would suggest that, any missteps notwithstanding, he's still on the right track.

Lately, I've been having a real problem with some WordPress blogs. For reasons that I do not understand, comments I leave seem to vanish into the bit bucket as soon as I press the Submit button. This is getting very frustrating and makes me feel like not reading those blogs anymore, because I don't want to waste my time writing up comments that just go 'poof'. I suppose it just goes to show how much the ability to comment has -- at least for me -- become an embedded part of the blog experience.

The blogs in question are all run by different people on different servers, and possibly even with different versions of WordPress, although I haven't checked to verify that last point.

I know about comment moderation, but I've been assured by some of the site owners in question that my comments were not moderated out. Apparently they're not even making it into the moderation queue.So the question is, why? What else could be wrong?

It's occurred to me that the problem could be on my end. I use Firefox almost exclusively, and it could be that this is some subtle browser glitch. Scott has told me to try using Internet Explorer instead of Firefox to see if that's the problem, but frankly, if it is, that's not going to be a helpful solution; I don't want to go back to IE just so I can leave comments on some blogs.

A quick search of the WordPress FAQ and Forums doesn't provide any easy answers, and I haven't done an in-depth dig into other possible sources of answers yet. I'll be looking at this question a bit more over the weekend. If I come up with a good answer, I'll update this post.

For an upcoming dinner party, Scott wanted to start with a dish we really enjoyed when we had it last year at a local restaurant: roasted tomato and fennel soup. Today, we set out to replicate it. February probably isn't the best time of year to be trying recipes that depend heavily on the freshness and quality of its vegetables, but we're lucky enough to live three blocks from a fantastic market where you can get top-quality, fresh produce year-round. The results were an unqualified success, and the dish is quite easy to pull off. We're definitely serving this to our guests next week.

I'm sorry to say that some of the measurements and cooking times given below are my best approximation, not exact. This was a seat of the pants operation done by people who know their way around a kitchen. However, this is a soup, not a soufflé, and as long as you don't burn anything the end result should turn out just fine. When in doubt, let common sense and your taste buds be your guide.

Ingredients:

1 1/4 lbs heirloom tomatoes
1 bulb fennel (about 3/4 lb)
4 cloves garlic
2 cups chicken stock
1/4 cup heavy cream
3 tablespoons olive oil
2 teaspoons kosher salt

Preparation:

First, we cut off the leaves and fronds from the fennel, de-seeded the tomatoes, arranged the cut pieces on foil-covered trays, sprinkled all the pieces with oil and salt, and then roasted the fennel and tomatoes in a 375 degree oven for 50 minutes. The garlic cloves were left in their skins, wrapped in a separate piece of tin foil, and roasted at the same time.

Next, everything (except the garlic skins) went into the blender, along with the chicken stock, and pureed. This puree went through a medium-mesh strainer and heated over low-medium heat for about 45 minutes to reduce. We then put the soup through a second, finer mesh strainer and reduced again for another 45 minutes or so. In went the cream, and simmered again for maybe 30 minutes.

Although straining and reducing the broth down multiple times is a trick we borrowed from Thomas Keller, it felt counterintuitive to me and I was unsure how the result would taste. The pulp sitting in the strainer tasted good, after all, and I was hesitant to toss it out. But after tasting the strained liquid in the pot, I realized that I was wrong. Straining really does clarify and intensify the flavor.

We used no additional salt other than what went onto the veggies during the roasting stage. If you feel the need to add more seasoning, I strongly recommend that you wait until you're at the final stages to make sure you don't overintensify the flavors as the soup reduces down.

We were unsure what was going to be better to finish off the soup, so we tried two different toppings at the end: we topped one serving with a little grated Parmigianino Reggiano and diced fennel fronds, and a second with a drizzle of black truffle oil and fennel fronds. Both were good, but the truffle oil was definitely better.

The end product was four small portions of a very intense, flavorful soup. As we're planning on serving this as an amuse bouche at the beginning of a meal, that's just fine. However, if you want to make this dish a more central part of the meal, you're probably going to want to at least double the recipe.

The whole set of photos from today’s kitchen adventure is up on Flickr.

This is kind of cool: Three former big leaguers are going to help start-up a pro baseball league in Israel.

Former pitcher Ken Holtzman, outfielder Art Shamsky and baseball's first designated hitter Ron Blomberg will manage three of the league's six teams during the inaugural 45-game schedule that begins on June 24.

The brainchild of Boston businessman Larry Baras, the league boasts former [Expos and Red Sox] general manager Dan Duquette as its director of baseball operations, and former U.S. Ambassador to Israel Daniel Kurtzer as commissioner.

Organizers said they believed Israel was ripe for another professional sport besides soccer and basketball.

[snip]

While the majority of players drawn to the venture are of Jewish lineage, the league has no restrictions. About 15 Israelis have made the league, a number that is expected to grow as the country is more exposed to the sport.

"We're going to build up the infrastructure of the sport, so we can perpetuate the growth of baseball," said Duquette, who said the league has already applied to compete in the 2009 World Baseball Classic.

Well, that was .... not pretty.

I'm not even remotely qualified to guess what's going to happen next. Go check out Ritholtz's site if you want a prediction.

And the good news of the day is: one of my favorite food writers, Michael Ruhlman, finally got bad-boy chef Tony Bourdain to officially be a guest blogger on his food blog.

His first official guest-blogging post is not as accessible as his recent rant on the various Food TV celebrities; rather, he's weighing in on a recent spat between a NY restaurant owner and the NY Times food critic. Nevertheless, it's worth a read just for his choice of imagery:

Maybe I'm being cynical here but the Message seems to be: "Even a freakin' strip club--where you get lap dances offered between courses is better than your soulless, overpriced meat-emporium. I'd rather spend time in a hot tub with Bob Guiccione than you!" Subtext? "Don't Fuck With Me!"

Welcome to the blogosphere, Tony. Enjoy the ride.