he said, mew said

You may remember that last year I reported to all of you the heartbreaking story of the poor but unadoptable feral cats at JFK. Well, the story continues.

Setting:
JFK Airport

Characters:
The Port Authority
Feral cats
Mayor's Alliance for NYC's Animals

Synopsis:
Feral cats are running amok at JFK and the Port Authority is up to it's old hijinks again! The Port Authority claims the cats are a danger to the airplanes and air traffic at the airport, and they want to run them out of town. The cats don't think they're doing anything wrong. Oh, no! Who can save the cats now? Will the Mayor's Alliance for NYC's Animals be able to help the cats? Will the Port Authority have a change of heart and let them be? Will the cats pick up and move to LaGuardia? Who knows what's in store, when you pit a bureaucratic agency and an unhousebroken gang against each other.

Where's Bob Barker when you need him?

take me to your leader

For those of you who did and didn't already see it, I want to share a comment left on my blog. In response to my post regarding a specific act of recent procrastinating, laurenj said:

"what are you going to do when you don't have any other papers or assignments to procrastinate over? you're entering a whole new world - suddenly the things you do to procrastinate are just...the things you do."

How wise. That should be in a fortune cookie.

I have finally found my spiritual leader.

you don't know dick about pie

I was going through some of my old archived e-mails this evening and I came across a recipe that I would like to share with all of you. It covers 2 of my 3 favorite things... alcohol and pie.

And now, for your culinary pleasure:

Dick Taeuber’s Brandy Alexander Pie

1 ½ cups graham-cracker crumbs
1/3 cup melted butter
1 envelope unflavored gelatin
2/3 cup sugar
1/8 teaspoon salt
3 eggs, separated
¼ cup Cognac
¼ cup creme de cacao
1 cup heavy cream
Food coloring (optional)
Chocolate curls, for garnish.

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine the crumbs with butter. Form in a 9-inch pan and bake for 10 minutes. Cool.

2. Pour ½ cup cold water in a saucepan and sprinkle gelatin over it. Add 1/3 cup sugar, salt and egg yolks. Stir to blend. Place over low heat and stir until the gelatin dissolves and the mixture thickens. Do not boil. Remove from heat.

3. Stir the Cognac and creme de cacao into the mixture. Then chill until the mixture starts to mound slightly when nudged with a spoon.

4. Beat the egg whites until stiff, then add the remaining 1/3 cup sugar and beat until peaks are firm. Fold the meringue into the thickened mixture.

5. Whip the cream, then fold into the mixture. Add food coloring if desired. Turn the mixture into the crust. Add garnish, if desired. Chill several hours or overnight. Serves 6.

This recipe was created in 1975. I found it in the New York Times Magazine in late October of 2006. I'm not sure why I still have it as an e-mail to myself, but doesn't it sound decadent and retro? If James Bond were to be represented by a pie I'm sure this would be it. And I'm talking Sean Connery's Bond, of course. Who knew that there was a alcohol-desert predecessor to the ever popular liquor filled chocolate bottles.

The most important piece of information regarding this recipe is Dick. Taeuber that is. According to the Times article that accompanied this recipe, Mr. Taeuber was a statistician who "discovered that you could use a simple formula to make the pie in the flavor of almost any cocktail you wanted (3 eggs to 1 cup cream to 1/2 cup liquor)."

Today's lesson: Yet another reminder that math actually has real world applications.

melodic change of heart

Dudes, I know I totally dogged the upcoming Stephen King-John Mellencamp musical in Atlanta (that is sure to be some kind of Flannery O'Conner-esque southern gothic thing), but that won't stop me from commenting on other upcoming musical attempts.

I became giddy when I heard that there will be a Bruce Lee musical in the 2010-2011 Broadway season. I didn't excited over the source material, I mean, can you imagine him filming Enter the Dragon and then breaking out into song? Come on! But, I almost wet myself when I saw the names attached to this show. Bartlett Sher to direct, David Yazbek to pen the music and lyrics, and David Henry Hwang to write the book. Sher is HOT, HOT, HOT right now because of South Pacific and I loved his direction of Awake and Sing!. Yazbek totally got snubbed on his 2 Tony nominations for Dirty Rotten Scoundrels and the Full Monty. And I love Hwang by default because he's my playwright boyfriend (David Mamet is too weird even for me and I happen to not be Isaac Oliver's type).

However, also reported in the announcement I found on Playbill.com, the same producers of the musicalized version of Bruce Lee's life are also producing an Addams Family musical for the 2009-2010 Broadway season. Oh well, I guess you can't win them all in the good idea department.

blah

Well, I've been procrastinating on writing my theatre final paper. I'm kinda like, "I don't care," and then I'm also kinda like, "I'm not going to try that hard." Angst and apathy are my friends at the moment.

what the f*** is your hang up?

I think it's a real shame that I don't get good reception on tv when it comes to the basic channels. It's even a bigger shame that I don't get NBC channel 4 clearly on my tv. Why, you ask? Two reasons. 1. Because I love 30 Rock and Law and Order: SVU more than I love most of my relatives. 2. Channel 4 News anchor Sue Simmons and her potty mouth.

Monday night Ms. Simmons and her co-anchor Chuck Scarborough were taping a promo for the 11:00 evening news. Ms. Simmons didn't realize that they were taping live. She read from her prompter and then said one of those 5 words you can't say on local tv. Click on the link above if you want to hear the actual promo with the f-bomb. What's even better (and when I say better I mean worse) is that a former colleague of her's says that she "likes the sauce." After you watch the promo, scroll down that page and look at the video that shows her falling off of her seat. Oh yeah, she's a lush.

Personally, I don't see what the fuck's the problem with saying f***. It's such a great word. It's a noun, verb, adjective, and an interjection. I can see why you wouldn't want your kids to use it, or why it's not appropriate in a business context, but in many other social situations it's totally acceptable. I guess unless you are talking about f***ing, as in a sexual sense, and that topic is still pretty iffy for lots of people, you might not want to touch that word with a 10 foot pole. But I say fuck it all, and use that word gloriously and proudly. Our fore-fathers brought forth a something and a something else, so we can say what we fucking please. Did I get my fucking point across?

ask and ye might receive

I check my horoscope on several sites (what if one of them gets it wrong? I've got to cover all of my bases). Today, I found this on one of my usual haunts:

"The universe can give you whatever you need, but you will have to ask for it first!"

For starters, that sounds an awful-lot like the Secret, doesn't it? And secondly, I do ask... often. I ask my other if we can get along and I'm not getting that. I ask that my 'rents get off my case about certain issues and I'm not getting that. I ask for certain things spiritually and physically and I'm not getting that. What in the hell am I doing wrong?

I am a firm believer that I have to make things happen rather than ask for things to happen. I know that there are certain things that are within my control and others aren't. And those things I can't control I must have patience with. And I am trying to, god knows I am.

So, fuck you anonymous horoscope site, for giving me such shitty advice today!

See you tomorrow?

artistic nightmare

Literally and figuratively.

I was reading the Times online and inside the Theater section I found this. For those not interested in clicking on the link, the article announced that the Stephen King-John Mellencamp musical that was in development for an Atlanta premier at the Alliance Theater was running into script problems and has now delayed its opening.

????WTF??????

Stephen King and John Mellencamp making musicals together? There hasn't been so unholy of a union since Bob Dylan and Twyla Tharp. Whyyyyyyyyyy??????

There are so many other interesting proprieties that deserve to be made into musicals. Why is someone spending their time trying to meld the King of Horror with "a little ditty, 'bout Jack and Diane?" Next you'll be telling me that Kenny Rogers and Jerry Mitchell will be doing a musical together. Or that a series of Jerome Robbins choreography will be created into a show using music from The Who. Just stop it, please, for the love of god, stop!

pie wishlist

...which is what Kansas saw when she read my text analysis paper that had the title "play worksheet." But a pie wishlist sounds so much better than a play worksheet. So, here it is...my Desert Island Top 5 Pie Wishlist:

1. Key Lime. Only my grandmother's recipe though. It's one of those secret-I'll-take-it-to-the-grave type of things.
2. Chocolate Cream. Topped high with whipped cream and chocolate shavings.
3. Pumpkin. Classic. Never gets old. I'll eat it anytime. Breakfast, lunch or dinner. With or without whipped cream.
4. Sour Cream Apple Walnut. This is a very particular pie. Only found at the Little Pie Company. If I were to have a cake substitute it would be this pie.
5. Pecan. I'm southern, so by law I have to love this pie. And not just any recipe. The only one that will do is the recipe found on the back of the Karo syrup bottle. I made a gluten-free version for Kansas for her last birthday (using a pre-made gluten-free pie shell of course) and cut back on the sugar by a 1/3 and it was a pretty darn tasty pie, if I do say so myself.

Mmmm, I know what I'm having for lunch today!