mixalot's Journal

6:54pm: now i want a purple sparkly fitted tuxedo jumpsuit
because fox was broadcasting football instead of simpsons, i found a pbs drive featuring mitzi gaynor's television specials in the 1960s and 1970s which i am now watching. my jaw dropped open and has remained so. my god, i had NO IDEA how fabulous she was/is. and so funny! it looks like the specials were almost totally her doing singing and dancing numbers, wearing some elaborate spangle confection, singing her heart out, kicking her fabulous legs, backed by 100 grinning, choreographed dudes all wearing matching tuxedos with red roses in the lapel. all her costumes were designed by bob mackie, who i knew was a flashy costume designer, but now i see that he is a fucking genius. and whoever her creative director/set designer was, they were brilliant. they're interspersing it with her in the studio today, talking to the pbs people, and i totally have a grandmother crush on her now. she's talking in a hungarian accent, calling everyone 'darling', with perfect posture wearing a chic black suit, and telling stories about frank sinatra and marlene dietrich. i need to get this dvd they're hawking.

in other news, i made red cabbage salad with cherry tomatoes and carrots today. other recent dishes include pot roast made with a gorgeous piece of chuck roast from pcc and lemon sable cookies.

5:36pm: you better hold on, spider monkey!
recently eaten:
salad made with baked potato, cherry tomatoes, corn, bibb lettuce, shallots. specifically the shallots that robin brought back from port townsend are were INCREDIBLE--i could very well have eaten a whole one raw, out of hand.
eggnog cut with milk.
latkes that ez made last night. they fulfill all human need for nourishment on a frozen, icy night.
pear gingerbread with meyer lemon frosting. as usual.
coriander cream chicken wings, oyster po' boys in mini form, and squash soup with jen at the palace kitchen.

on my mind to eat: more extraordinary baklava from mr. gyros, broiled portabello mushrooms with garlic marinade, roast goose with yukon golds, homemade pork and sage sausage, cornbread and ribs, vanilla molly moon milkshake, stop light hot dogs eaten outside somewhere in the snow. there's nothing like biting into a street hot dog when it's cold outside, is there? hardly anything could taste better.

6:04pm: walking, talking, eating
some food from trip:
we had extraordinary pizza in naples: just dough, tomato sauce, basil, mozzarella. 1 fucking euro. how do they do it?
the lovliest meal we ate out was probably celebrating my dad's birthday dinner at trattoria monti, a restaurant that got talked up wherever we went. "monti this, monti that". it definetly lived up to it's reputation as a warm, intimate trattoria with some of the most wonderful dishes in the city. i a had a giant, single fresh housemade raviolo filled with raw egg yolk and herbs with truffle strewn over the top--a liberal dose of truffle indeed. then roast rabbit cooked in pig fat (with the skin still attached, natch) with sage and rosemary. gamey little thing. then ricotta torte for dessert. to an american mouth, it really appeared to be more of a pudding and less of a torte. i have a thing for ricotta, especially in desserts. i especially have a thing for fresh ricotta desserts in rome. it was, in a word, perfect. i could eat one of those every day of my life. just barely sweet, with a light, almost spongy texture and the taste of clean, tangy ricotta throughout every bite. this was all accompanied by two bottles of brunello, nine or ten years old--imagine me shaking my glass to get the last drops down my throat. others had extraordinary food as well. i will add my voice to the throng of admirers and say that next time you're in rome, go to monti.
another wonderful meal we had was on a sunday evening when we decided to cook at home. jen, dad and i went out the the market in the campo the day before and got fresh pasta, big red and yellow mottled peppers, zucchini, reggiano, fat little pork sausages, and a bottle of some kind of red. dad and jen cooked an amazing pasta dish with a very simple sauce made of the peppers and sausages and we had a salad and the wine.
there was, of course, other food that i loved: a dish of roast eggplant and cherry tomatoes during a long, late lunch at a restaurant outside with everyone smoking all around us; a pizza in trastevere that was crisp, toothsome, pure with tomato sauce and oregano only; gelatos of white fig, grape, lemon, and custard; gorgonzola that i snacked on at all times of the day; the fresh orange juice the waiters juiced themselves while they waited for the espresso to drip for my cappucino every morning; jen's lamb's brains, dad's baccala torte, mom's bean soup, all at another dinner at monti (we went back); the mele in gabbia, or apple in pastry, that i sometimes got for breakfast in a bakery by our apartment.
so. that's my little tasting of roman food for you. and for me, i tasted those again as i wrote about them.

5:26pm: nothing lasts forever, even cold november rain
damn, i never knew november rain was practically guns n' roses' magnum opus. the music video is all over the place! i highly suggest youtubing it, even though it's more than 9 minutes long. axl wears these coats that bring to mind (at least to me) napoleon riding to russia--of course he pairs them with sunglasses and a bandana. and stephanie seymour wears a playmate-appropriate wedding dress. and slash rocks out in front of 7 or 8 churches.
classic.
also, i realized after watching this video that i never really knew what axl's face looked like. and even after this video i'm not sure... try to visualize axl in your head. do you get a clear picture of his facial features? no? neither do i. they're pretty fuzzy.
that was my self-indulgent musing for today.

6:10pm: saporoso
i just DECIMATED a hunk of st. andre. and right now i'm roasting beets with shallots in the oven, which smells so good i think it will smell better than it will taste.

my fingers are so brialliantly day-glo pink right now they were described as 'malibu barbie'.
i never thought that term would be used to describe anything physically (or, god help me, mentally) about me, but i guess i don't mind it.

6:56pm: mid-summer reverie
my idea of a perfect summer meal:
mint limeade
ribs
tomato corn salad
purple potato tarragon salad
grilled peaches
pickles
blackberry pie

or it could be the dinner that my family made for me last night:
grilled fresh sardines
lamb chops with rosemary
orzo with cherry tomatoes and cheese
ice cream pizza
accompanied by a delightful brut and lusty sant-emilion.

there are no words to describe the love i feel for my family every day.

9:09pm: going the distance
is it wrong that the only music i want to listen to while applying makeup for a saturday night is the theme song to rocky? IT ROCKS SO HARD!!! and the twangy guitar funk beat pulls me into it's spell until the only rational outfit i can even consider wearing is hot pants, a shirt with a zipper down the front, boots, and hoops.
i didn't come of age with this music, so the only things i associate it with are a mish-mash of late 70s-early 80s charlie's angels/stallone/live and let die/low-riding chevy novas/aviators etc. whateer it is, i like it...

5:07pm: thank you once again, forever 21-sourced booty shorts
um, if anyone hasn't heard, i met bret michaels on friday, after i saw him live at the emerald queen casino. he told me i was beautiful, i told him he was awesome, and he grabbed me in a big bear hug--then did a one-handed grab of my butt.
i don't know why this is so amazing to me, but it is. i still can't get over it.

9:18pm: DTDIWNE part Deux
"Oysters a la Bazeine
or
Honi Soit Qui Mal y Pense:
Prepare a roux of chopped chives, butter, and rice-flour, and set it aside.
Slice truffles paper-thin, and cut into the shapes of dolphins, crabs, and other sea-monsters. Set them aside.
Poach a brook trout, preferably alive, in a court-bouillon made with a good dry champagne instead of the ordinary wine and water. Set them aside.
Make a marinade, using fine instead of wine-vinegar, and in it marinate small cubes of Parma ham for several hours, or until a faint iridescence appears. Drain, and do not set aside.
Prepare croutes by browning thick slices of fine white bread in Strasbourg goose-fat, and do not set aside.
Instead, place them quickly on heated plates. Spread each tranche with Bechamel and then the roux. Set a trout carefully upon it, and coat with Soubise. Over this sprinkle the cubes of Parma ham, and then a thin layer of veloute. Decorate lavishly with the truffle-silhouettes, and serve at once under bells with a modest but well-bred Sainte-Croix du Chateau Pinardino '08."
Mary Frances Kennedy Fisher, Consider the Oyster.

I beleive that's "08" as in "1908".

9:51pm: Devoted to dinners I will never eat
" On one table were the little dishes, the mezze: vine leaves stuffed with saffron rice, tomatoes, parsley and onion; eggplant puree mixed with yogurt with tiny meatballs floating in it; fried eggplant with garlic; eggplant caviar; lamb's brains salad prepared with scallions, garlic, lemon, and cumin; fried ground chicken balls; and artichoke hearts stewed in olive oil. Thin slices of batarekh (pressed smoked fish roe) were set on toast rounds and topped with creme fraiche and lemon zest. There were fried mussels, slices of French pate; baskets of thinly sliced Italian salami; loubiya, a salad of black-eyed peas, one of my favorite dishes; and a celeriac and fennel salad in lemony vinaigrette. Ahmet had slaved the entire night before the wedding making hundreds of tiny hot sambuosaks. A second table held meats, fish, and vegetables. I stared at huge roasts of lamb; Ahmet's famous duck ballottine; tiny squabs stuffed with rice and roasted almonds (a famous dish mad especially for young couples to wish them a sweet life full of love); kofta, small meatballs in an apricot sauce; and countless other delicacies. Dessert included not only the wedding cake but ice cream made from buffalo milk, pyramids of apricot pudding, and Middle Eastern pastries such as kunafa, stuffed with pistachios; zalabia, tiny, light, crisp deep-fried dough soaked in honey and orange blossoms; and paper-thin filo stuffed with chopped walknuts. I ate until I could no longer move, while I listened to the wailing tones of the singer."
-Colette Rossant, Apricots on the Nile.

10:48am: they sparkle still, the right promethean fire
so last night, due to the extreme generosity of an old freind of mine, i went and saw anthony bourdain talk at the moore theater. now, i know people go absolutely crazy over him, and think he's the sexiest motherfucker alive, think he's a food god, etc. but i had no idea there were so many people in seattle who were so in love with him and took his word to be absolute gospel. the moore was packed, but we got to sit way down in the third row center--pretty sweet. i only know him through his writing and read kitchen confidential (and liked it alot) years ago, but the majority of people there were clearly those of the food network/travel channel junkies. he kept referencing names of chefs on the food network and insulting them and i had no idea who they were. he did mention his unrelenting hatred of rachel ray (at least twice, as a "charging rhino" and a "bitch from hell"... i was waiting to hear him call her "one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse", heh), whose name i know. people were just lapping it up and hanging on his every word. they came to hear the acerbic, new york gutter wit that he apparently displays on his show, and they got it. i enjoyed the descriptions of food in china, laos, vietnam, and japan, but these seemed to be minor details.
and, because my freind is awesome, she sprung for passes to the "VIP" after-party as well, so we hung around and watched people ogle him close-up. there was also food and, had you been there with me, you would have rubbed your eyes in astonishment because, holy god, i actually drunk a beer. moretti--not bad.
the food was "anthony bourdain-style street food" as one of the caterers described to me. i actually don't beleieve bourdain had a hand in planning what we ate, because someone had blatantly chosen the menu to benefit these high-spending food geeks, to enable them to go home afterwards and brag about what they had eaten that night. it was extraordinarily unbalanced. there were tiny morsels of rich, fatty, greasy, salty, sugary, pork-y food: all things that i adore, of course. but you needed some plain honest bread with all that stuff. after sampling deep-fried headcheese corndogs with salsa verde, lamb's tongue skewers with mango, pig's trotter's spring rolls with chili sauce, beef marrow toast points, mini ice-cream sandwiches (one olive cookies with tarragon ice cream, the other gingersnap cookies with peach ice cream), and hot maple and bacon donut holes, i was desperately looking around for some plain starch of some kind to soak up the pig's fat. so i saw mini-bags of popcorn, grabbed one, ate a few handfuls, but still, it tasted too good... i looked at the label for the popcorn and THEY MADE IT WITH FUCKING DUCK FAT! at that point i threw up my hands in resignation and promptly took two tums. eventually we made our way over to mr. bourdain, and i told him that he "absolutely rocked" and took my freind's picture with him.
so... it was fun, i guess. i had some completely insane dreams last night in which i was the lover/high priestess of the leader of a cult (this part of the dream came with a deep sense of shame), and then later determined to write a letter to hillary clinton to praise her campaign, and then i think she appeared later on. i've no doubt the dreams were due to the food and alcohol. thanks, fried headcheese. i'm not going to be skimping on the ginger ale today.

10:53am: i want you to shake dat ass for me
shake dat ass for me.
shake dat ass for me,
shake dat ass for me.

mmm mmm MMMM! thanks, kube.

8:56am: das vidanya
caught my attention last night that pacino must be wearing a hell of a lotta black eyeliner in scarface. which is a great movie. 
just felt like i wanted to make that a lj observation. 
in other news, i dreampt in three languages last night. english, italian, and arabic. when that happens, its not that the dreams are so much better or happier, its just cooler when i wake up and recall a conversation in one of my dreams and then realize, 'hey, those aren't english words...' 
my language skills are alot more proficient when i'm alseep.

11:41am: not to alarm anyone, but...
KANYE WEST
BUMBERSHOOT 2006

...i think i need to sit down.

1:09pm: must find job.
i'm slightly hungover. and right now i'm really missing having a hungover saturday, as in most of my weekends last spring: brunch, hashbrowns, ketchup, and coke, huffing and puffing back up the hill to nap and watch a movie with the ladies while inhaling their second hand smoke. then doing some bullshit work in the library and quitting at 4 to have dinner, then watch tv together, then go out again.
i really miss that.
on the sunnier side, though, i found an awesome place last night called el chupacabra where they have margaritas and a lot of mexican food, and where the bartender comped us a bunch of drinks. there was also the soundtrack of my dreams (journey, bon jovi, motley crue, the darkness, etc), and dogs running around inside. hello, can i be your most devoted regular?

4:54pm: regulate
been trying to find out a way to post yemen pictures here, but that's only something you can do if you pay. so, a bunch of pictures from the trip are up on my facebook profile, in "the yemen" album. look for the one where i'm about to make out with a hermit crab on socotra.
www.thefacebook.com

11:31am: me against the music
is it wrong that i want to see curious george just to hear the sweet, dulcet tones of david cross's voice? 

is it also wrong that i am not interested in hearing any new music that tries to imitate belle and sebastien or any other sad, timid little existensial band that makes up quiet songs about sad skinny chain smoking girls from cinncinati and how he wanted to love her bust just couldn't 'deal with it' because he was too sad and skinny?
no, i don't think that's wrong. 
i rediscovered a new loverboy song thanks to jen. and i know she agrees with me.

8:17pm: when she says hello to the world
top 5 favorite....ever:

movies:
1. 8 1/2
2. lawrence of arabia
3. singin in the rain
4. three amigos
5. its a mad, mad, mad, mad world

songs:
1. life on mars?
2. x-defect
3. try a little tenderness
4. that aria i love from 'carmen'
5. thriller

foods:
1. blackberry/huckleberry pie
2. salt n vinegar chips
3. pasta marinara
4. lemon granita (only purchasable at one place in the world, caraibe, florence, italy)
5. biscuits

clothing items:
1. my (improvised) tuxedo
2. the original pair of betsey johnson jeans
3. dries van noten gown
4. old black velvet poet's jacket i used to have in 8th grade
5. black daryl k. pants

places:
1. my house
2. beach 69/hapuna
3. rome
4. taormina
5. havana

destinations:
1. SOCOTRA! IN TWO DAYS!
2. maldives
3. lampedusa
4. st petersburg
5. saigon

i guess that's all. i'm sweaty. yuck.

2:17pm: silent city
saveur, gourmet, nytimes wednesday food section all arrived pristine in my second package. i've been driving myself crazy with all this food literature...gourmet was a special issue on montreal and subsequently there was foie gras, bacon, cider, pork rillettes, crepes, ginger cake, cassoulet, gracing nearly every page. i beleive maple syrup was approximately every 5th word. saveur was also a special issue devoted to ireland. and truffles in the nytimes...
meanwhile, here i am eating rice and lamb the consistency of granite every day for lunch here, and i can't buy flour. or any pork products, or powdered sugar, or wine, or much of anything. vegetables here are very good and so cheap its almost stealing when i think of how much i pay for heirloom tomatoes in august at pcc. but their selection is limited. tomatoes, potatoes, onions, zucchini. a few string beans once in a while. no broccoli, no asparagus, no peas, no leeks. no herbs besides sagging parsley. for fruit, apples, oranges, and bananas. i have yet to see a single lemon here. and yet i was able to unearth a box of funfetti cake mix and a dusty can of authentic funfetti frosting...oh yeah i wrote that already.
where is my university farmer's market in summer, with melons and artichoke and lettuce and bursting tomatoes and farm cheese and sweet peas and bleeding raspberries? where is my sant'ambrosio market in florence with 12 kinds of citrus from calabria and fava and strawberries that they would weigh by the kilo? where is my garden with endless tarragon and chives and lavender, with more wild strawberries and grapes and the baby cherry tree?
what do people GROW in yemen?
aaah, but of course...qat.

12:37pm: why did it take 2 days for one single bra weighing 1/2 a pound to get from secaucus, new jersey, to hodgkins, illinois (distance: 795 miles), when it took 4 days for my package the size of a small vacumn cleaner to get from the mailbox in magnolia to my room in sana'a (a journey of more than 12,000 [this is a guestimate because i just tried for ten minutes to get the mileage between seattle and sana'a through mapquest, travelocity, british air, and google earth])?

1:22pm: this my freind is the only modern piece of machinery i will touch
there is a man here who works at the school who looks like the yemeni version of david cross. he also sounds like david cross doing an old woman's voice.
i smile and want to pinch his cheek and do mr. show lines whevever i see him.

12:17pm: how i feel about you
i have discovered on this trip one of the handful of songs that jenny put on the mp3 player before she gave it to me. it is 'how i feel about you' by curtis mayfield and it is absolutely soul-lifting. everyone go get it right now. it goes into the category of cinematic, romantic instrumental songs that i adore. along with all that ennio morricone music and 'always forever now' by the passengers and...and...and...
because i've been so bored i have caught up on my music listening. some songs of late have been:

crimson and clover - joan jett
cinema paradiso - ennio morricone
if ever i would leave you - aretha franklin
summer wind - frank sinatra
i wanna be like you - louis prima
all the young dudes - blur
good vibrations - beach boys
be good to yourself - journey

and a shitload of ludacris.
dad and jenny have been angels (as they always are) and are putting together a care package for me. jenny is picking out clothes for me and making sure i have lots of underwear (i have always wanted to substitute a different word for this term, but i hate 'panties' even more. for some reason saying 'underwear' bugs me.), plus mr. show and some like it hot. dad is including the cd of our hawaiian music concert, a mini french press and peets coffee, and a new saveur. i have also ordered a new pair of jeans with a skull stitched on the back pocket (they're sevens, blah, but whatever).

i think i've decided that what i really want is to live in italy again as soon as possible. may, bring me seattle, and september, bring me rome...

8:45am:

such idiots in europe right now. especially that italian minister who wore that tshirt. what the fuck was he thinking? i thought governments were supposed to be for peace. how do i feel about the cartoons? (pause. grunt. frown.) in certain countries people have the right to say pretty much whatever they want. good. being american, i feel this is essential for any sort of democracy, of which i am a staunch beleiver. however, when you go so far as to make fun of what people consider to be sacred, you must be ready to defend your views. if you want to get into a dialogue about mohammed and some ridiculous association with suicide bombers, fine. but you better have a damn intelligent reason for whipping up the fires across the islamic world. you cannot introduce these statements in a bubble, a world you beleive has no consequences for your actions simply because you beleive you're protected by that ultimate, 'free speech'. if you draw or publish cartoons simply because you can, because you like being snarky journalists who enjoy insulting religions that you don't understand, do not attempt to defend yourself with the 'free speech' mantra. that is a selfish, arrogant viewpoint. assuming that you can say whatever you want, even to the detriment of international relations, and stick your tongue out at your critics. if you don't have anything thoughtful to add to the myriad conversations between the west and the islamic world (even though i cringe as i inflict those definitions here), then shut up and listen. don't give a bad name and association to yourself, your profession, your country. as you could probably tell from the reactions occuring in the islamic world, this is fucking serious. 
now how many people, for how long, are going to have to clean up the mess you've make?

bahh. stupid cazzi. you've insulted me with your ignorant cartoons as well. 

in other news, i was so bored yesterday that i read a list on amazon.com telling people how to become paris hilton.

10:57am: retrospecticus
well, today's the day. the day i leave one reality behind, the reality of seattle greyness and wamu atms and the gaggia macchina and sunday night tv and cappuccio and capitol hill saturday nights behind.
i have no idea what kind of reality will embrace me once i wake up in muscat on the 27th. did you know that it will technically take 3 days to travel there? i get on the plane tonight (jan. 24th), get to heathrow tomorrow morning (25th), spend the night there, then fly to oman on the 26th. i don't suspect there are enough vogues and elles to get me through those flights, but thankfully i'm counting on really trying to sleep tonight in my reclining bed (BUSINESS CLASS BITCH)...i packed jammies for the plane.
i feel like i've written this ten thousand times already, but i feel more anxious about yemen than about oman. if i was only going on the expedition, to be back home in three weeks, i think i would have less bad apprehensions and be a little more...no, MUCH more happy-feeling. but i keep telling myself that this trip, as amazing and wonderful as it will be, is not being taken for the purpose of fun. it will be fun in many parts, but this is a serious opportunity that hopefully will challenge me, push me, expose me, and help me move towards the place that i want to be in life, i.e., being part of the 'solution', whatever it is, in the various current issues the united states now has with many middle eastern countries. i say to myself, those magical words, "arabic (knowledge of)."
"masters at the school for oriental and african studies, university of london."
"living in italy again."
"state department."
those are only words floating around in my head today, but in 6 months, or a year, they may be another reality.
my own personal safety net is the fact that i can come home if i want to, whenever i want. i don't want that to have to happen, but my parents were vocal in that they don't want me to feel that i have to prove something to myself or anyone else by staying if it's not going well. i really have no idea what this school in sana'a will be. it might be awful. it might be incredible. the best thing that i can say to myself is that with my passport and credit card and a backpack, i can just get on a flight to europe or dubai or cairo and get home somehow.
i want to do this. so here i go. i'm not sure when i'll be updating again. it might be later this week from muscat, it might be after i'm settled in yemen.
yes, the mystery and the magic is in the not knowing...

5:09pm: SHIIIIT I LEAVE THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW HOW DID THIS HAPPEN