Peppered with Crazy

I had a minor triumph today.  For several weeks I have been trying to figure out how to reuse my store bought pepper grinder.  This oughtn't be an issue, I agree, but McCormick has designed their grinders as one-use going so far as to type on the label, "do not reuse".  Being told what to do by McCormick's (and that is to buy something I already own) has for some reason possessed me and insulted my sporadic thriftiness because ever since, when reminded of pepper by a recipe or some such, I have tried to coax the top off the grinder in a rebellious attempt to flout McCormicks.  This is much more difficult than it should be because when McCormick says one time use, they do their damnedest to make sure it is one use.  Allow me to paint the picture of increasing frustration as we have whole pepper in one bottle and a steadily decreasing supply of pepper imprisoned in a bossy and wasteful One-Time-Only grinder.  Anyway, the pressure was on this morning, as I had a bison brisket to get together and the grindable pepper had finally met its bitter end.  Clearly you cannot make a brisket without pepper.  After several minutes of various attempts, the use of kitchen scissors, leverage, and a bruised tummy (don't ask...OK fine, I managed to pinch myself with the scissor handles.  I told you not to ask) I was able to pry off the top of the grinder and refill with the whole pepper, thus saving my brisket from a pepperless existence.  I told you it was a minor triumph.

In conclusion, while a creative career from home may be fine still, corporate work as a technical writer from the home seems to be melting my brain like plastic-ware accidentally left on the stove.         

Violet Cow

Our weekends are usually cut from the same pattern: sleep indulgence once free from the tyranny of the alarm clock, a few requisite errands to maintain order, a movie from the Film List, leisurely conversations over beers,  etc.  This is how we recharge and we are very fortunate as a couple in that, even though he is a total extrovert and I am an introvert, we naturally fall into the same daily rhythm for our free time: sleep + music/film/literature + booze + conversation.  That commonality is not a requirement for a happy couple, but it sure is pleasant.  This weekend was especially great, not because we did anything out of the ordinary, but because the awareness of our good fortunate was heightened.  It's funny how something like the drudgery of work can be thrown over perception like a wet blanket.  For whatever reason, all those distractions were brushed away and we could just experience how happy we are.  Things are of course far from perfect, as they always will be, but it's amazing how different your life can look from two different angles: focus on money struggles, job less than perfect, friends and family far away, missed opportunity in your career, a plan falling through, buttons missing from your coat versus being newlywed to your soul mate, employed in a difficult economy, living in a pretty apartment, having two great families, blessed with wonderful friends, inspiration.  It's amazing how much that can change your perception.

I browsed through my blog from five years ago and found this Chesterton quote from the William Blake biography that is just perfect:

Impressionism is skepticism. It means believing one's immediate

impressions at the expense of one's more permanent and positive

generalisations. It puts what one notices above what one knows. It

means the montrous heresy that seeing is believing. A white cow at one

particular instant of the evening light may be gold on one side and violet on

the other. The whole point of Impressionism is to say that she really is a

gold and violet cow. The whole point of Impressionism is to say that there

is no white cow at all. What can we tell, it cries, beyond what we can

see? But the essence of Mysticism is to insist that there is a white cow

however veiled with shadows or painted with sunset gold. Blessed are they

who have seen the violet cow and who yet believe in the white one.

~William Blake by G.K. Chesteton 

Completely Random Post

Let’s say hypothetically that I was in a situation in which I could not change the radio station and had to listen to the mismatched, non sequitur play list typical of Billboards's Top 100 stations -- for instance, if I was driving on the east side of Dallas on 35E during rush hour and too scared that I would be sandwiched between a tool shed-sized truck and a concrete median to reach for the radio knob. Yes, I am turning into a skittish, old lady driver.  Anyway, two songs by Detroit natives contrasted back-to-back made me notice that quite a few singers sing like they are on the verge of hyperventilating.  (The only reason I notice this at all is because that was a pet peeve of my college choir director and she constantly reminded us that our audience did not want to be able to count per breath our oxygen intake; it was that and: "chin up, hips forward, mouth open to release the notes."  Apropos of nothing, that choir teacher was awesome.  She teaches with the belief that music is a gift that everyone should explore, and being around her was the first time I consciously realized how powerful a Lady is: she really makes people want to be better, and not only better musicians, just better.)  So first, Mike Posner’s “Cooler Than Me” is a particularly horrible example of gasping-singing.  Every time I hear the song, which I actually don’t hate, he sounds like he’s seconds away from passing out after being held under water.  Even singers who have lovely voices start to sound ridiculous when they add that huffy breathiness.  Then right after that song, while navigating a particularly exciting turn where two lanes merge into one with about 25 feet of warning, a Marshall Mathers song came up (seriously, what is with Detroit and music?  Is the Detroit River radioactive and instead of turning victims into the Hulk or Spiderman, they turn into commercially successful musicians?  That’s cool, but Detroit could probably also use a crime fighting super-hero in addition to an impressive musical reputation.  Not the Hulk though, it already looks like he rampaged through the downtown area).  I don’t think Eminem was ever formally trained, but, whoa.  My choir director would have been impressed with his breath distribution if nothing else about his music.  Boy doesn’t inhale for, like, ever, and if you’ve never tried it, that is difficult!  I myself have puny asthma lungs, and I learned to avoid the annoying audibly breathing thing, but am hopeless with that kind of iron lung flourish.  It sounds amazing though.  I wish there was some way of brainwashing other musicians into giving up the Marilyn Monroe's "Happy Birthday, Mr. President", chain-smoker running up stairs gasping thing.