How Ya Gonna Keep ‘Em Down on the Farm?

We are back in New York where we belong. There is the clearly filtered bilious green Manhattan sky line, as opposed to the bilious green LA skyline, which needed no filter to achieve that color. There is the Atlas, where Jesus sleeps. He says he hated being in the bottom and he needs to step up his game and get more creative. Oh, lordy, says Miz Shoes, we have ourselves the Cliché Spouter. Check that off your Reality Show Bingo card. Over in the girls’ dorm, there is make up, Neitzche and a general cluelessness as to what this challenge may be.

Heidi glows on the runway as she tells Emilio that he has immunity since he won last week. He also is wearing a hat. It isn’t quite twee, but the season is young. The designers will be taking a trip to somewhere “really out there.” Clueless guesses abound, but in the event, it is a working farm. Tim and the models are in a wet, plowed field. Tim is in a suit and the models are in potato sacks. Tim reminds everyone of the old chestnut about being so beautiful that the person in question would look good in a potato sack. The challenge will be to make party dresses from the burlap sacks. AND the models will have input, being clients. AND they will wear the dresses to an industry party. AND, since they are the clients, the models will get to choose which designer they want to have clothe them. AND it’s a one-day challenge. Whew. That is a LOT of variables.

The nameless models pick their designers, some sticking with the one they worked with in episode one, and others not. Alexis opts to leave Mila (she’s the grim Edith Head clone with the dyed black bob) and try Anthony (he’s your Flamboyant Gay Character on your Reality Show Bingo Card). This leaves Mila not at all happy, and she gets less happy as model after model chooses someone other than her until she is the last kid on the playground and the last model gets stuck with her. They both pretend to be thrilled. But if I were either Alexis or Anthony, I’d sleep with one eye open, if you know what I mean. The designers and models go to the nearby farm stand to grab trim, buttons, dyes, and findings.

Ping (Whack Job with Artistic Pretentions on your Reality Show Bingo Card) wants to play with texture. Mila and Lorena continue their love fest as they decide that they have similar aesthetics. Anthony wishes Alexis had stuck with Mila because she wants flowy and sparkly and he is all: honey, it is a burlap sack. Whatchoo talkin’ bout Willis? Emilio is thrilled to have immunity on this. Ben from Florida is going to make an upside down tulip. The RLA says that the HP sketch pads are cool and tries to talk to me about Apple’s new notepad computer. He stops when I glare at him and point to the tv screen.

Mila just won’t let go, and spends her time in the work room needling Anthony and saying that working with him is Alexis’ loss. Anthony confessionalizes that Mila can kiss his and his whole family’s collective asses. All righty then. Emilio observes that burlap is hard to work with. One of the still-faceless and nameless women is making a print on her potato sack using dye and a sliced potato. OK, points for clever, or maybe we’ve just hit the Twee square.

Tim comes in for his walkabout. Pamela is doing a bustier and skirt, but as a one-piece. Tim questions the time it will take. She says she’s good. Tim loves her ombre dye job. Mila’s model wants tulle around the neck, and Tim says oh, good lord, no, and so Mila turfs the tulle. Jay is dyeing fabric and then adding trim and Tim is concerned about time management. Ping is carving burlap and draping herself again, because the dress form doesn’t let her see movement, or something. The skirt is too short and Tim reminds her that the runway is elevated and we don’t want to be seeing model hoo-ha. Ping says she’ll take care of it.

Amy’s model wants lots of ruffles and Tim is concerned that this is not reflective of Amy’s point of view. Jesus has made a pencil skirt using ribbon applied on the diagonal over the burlap to create a new, not-burlap fabric. Tim dings him for “skirting” the challenge. Ah, that Tim Gunn. He is too droll. Jesus does not listen to Tim. Cross off Stupid Git Who Doesn’t Listen to Tim on your Reality Show Bingo Card.

The models come in and Jesus tells his girl that she needs to sell it on the runway because he totally screwed the pooch. Ping realizes that she may have problems with her skirt. Anthony is still rolling his eyes over his model’s taste and Mila is still gloating that she is glad, glad, glad that Alexis dissed her and went with Anthony. I still wouldn’t let her stand too close behind me. Jay is distressed that his dye has turned his burlap navy blue and not whatever shade he thought it was going to be.

And, crap. That Blowfly skank is still wandering around naked and smug. You’d think they could have gotten another commercial in the can by now, wouldn’t you? Or if Blowfly is all that, couldn’t she have picked something out and gotten it shipped? Oh well. It’s the day of the show. Some dude is dithering over shoes or boots, shoes or boots. Jay is freaking out. Janeane (Reality Show Bingo Card square for Cries All The Time) has lots of work to do and is nervous. Two hours for hair and make up. Use the Blowfly wall,

thoughtfully.

Runway. Judges are NinaGarcia, Michael Kors looking much less orange and Lauren Hutton, who has NOT HAD WORK DONE and thank the lord for that. She is fabulous.

Anthony’s model walks first. The dress he’s made is sweet and looks soft. Ping’s model exposes her ass crack down and back. She appears to be wearing a lamp shade for a skirt. Uh, not pretty. Ben from Florida has made a pink dress that does look a little floaty. Mila has made something nasty with metal all over it and seams and whatever. The metal strips don’t actually line up in any meaningful way. Anna Marie, whoever she is, doesn’t get a legible note. Is she the potato print girl?

Jesse has made pants and a vest, with color trim peeking out here and there. Seth, who dresses funny but seems a lot nicer human being than the person he reminds everyone of (Jeffrey the Pin-Headed Shmoo, aka the angry little peanut) has done some sort of Judy Jetson dress with an attached hoodie and a lampshade skirt. But this is a boned and bell-shaped lampshade, not Ping’s stiff oval shade. Amy’s dress has a handkerchief hem and the burlap still looks like burlap, but in a good way.

Jay’s dress has a tank top and a full, tutu skirt with the fluffy stuff made of applied and shredded burlap circles. It looks an awful lot like Christopher Straub’s stuff from early in last season. Emilio has done a sheath dress with interest added with vertical stripes of color. We don’t see enough to tell if this is applied ribbon, or dyed, pieced strips. Jesus has a dark brown burlap tank over his acid green ribbon skirt. There is a patch of the burlap randomly applied to one ass cheek of the skirt. Jonathon (who may be the boots or shoes boy) has made a slip dress with a vertical stripe of lace down the middle of the front. Maya has some shapeless thing with color. Pamela’s burlap looks like denim, laces in the back and the skirt makes the model’s butt look huge.

Pamela, Mila, Ping, Jay, Jesus and Amy are the top and bottom designers. Michael Kors loves the shredded fluffy stuff on Jay’s dress. Transformative! Pamela’s dress is too short, too tight and not sophisticated, according to NinaGarcia. MK says that the plain potato sack would look better than this, but allows as how the dye job was spectacular. Mila says that she visualized the color. Heidi loves it, of course, because it is short, tight and shiny. MK has issues with the gappy fit on the bodice, but Heidi says it’s sexy. Ping cries. Heidi clocks Jesus over the percentage of burlap vs not burlap. NinaGarcia says it needs to be cooler and younger. Michael notes that the color blocking doesn’t work and that he gave his model an asymetrical ass. NinaGarcia says that Jesus has awful color sense. Amy has done a cowl neck and an open back. Michael Kors says that it’s flirty and sophisticated, but still burlap! Is Ping really unable to understand English or is it a ploy? Lauren Hutton loves her potential, at any rate.

Amy is in. Jay turned a potato sack into a perfect cocktail dress and is our winner. Mila is called edgy and sophisticated (but not by Miz Shoes, who stands by her opinion that Mila’s piece was poorly constructed and lame) and she is in. Ping is in (and again, Miz Shoes thinks that Lauren Hutton pulled hard for her). Pamela made a mess, and her taste level is questionable, as is her ability to be fashion forward. Jesus missed the point and made a mundane and matronly mess. Nevertheless, Jesus is saved and Pamela is Aufsie Daisy.

Next week, a team challenge and NinaGarcia says “both of these dresses are ugly.”

“He will need to be fed once a day. He prefers feline supplement number 25.”

“I understand.”

“And he will require water. And you must provide him with a sandbox. And you must talk to him. Tell him he is a pretty cat. And a good cat.”

“I will feed him.”

“Perhaps that will be enough.”

- Data and Worf, as Data asks Worf to take care of Spot (Star Trek, the Next Generation)

Saturday, we took Ming to the vet for his final visit. Here we are, sitting in the sun. Ever since that episode ran, I made a point of telling my cats that they were pretty cats. And good cats. I told that to Ming as I petted him.

This is the cairn we built over his grave. There is a blue jay feather, piercing a hibiscus leaf, and some flowers. I put a spool of thread in with him, because he had to have three separate surgeries over the years to remove the wads of thread he’d managed to eat. Where he is now, he can eat all the thread he wants. Ming also has a little bat about toy with feathers. The Egyptians got it right about cats.

And because I swore I would do this this year, and because even in sadness there is always brightness, here is the afghan I’ve been working on. Not bad for only two weeks of knitting.

Who knows, maybe I’ll even get my Project Runway recap up before the second episode.

So much for photodocumenting my weekend output. So much for blogging regularly. I have to say that it is so much harder to blog when one’s actual job requires actual work. Not to say I miss the old pointy haired boss, because that would not be true. I just miss sitting around on the company dime, working on my personal blog. Which I am doing right now.

My little cat, Ming the Merciless, is terminal. We are doing hospice. By we, of course, I mean the RLA and myself. We let him eat what ever he wants. We carry him around outside for fresh air. I’ve been giving him sub-Q fluids twice a day to keep him hydrated. I take him in the shower room and run the water as hot as it gets, with Kiss Your Face cold and flu soap on a sponge until the room fills with steam, and Ming and I sit there and have a vaporizer session. He’s allowed to sleep with me under the covers.

He’s just a little guy, and every day with us is a good day. I’m in no hurry to send him off to the other side of the rainbow bridge. When the time comes, we’ll all know.

Of course, there is some trepidation over this in my own superstitious heart. My old cat developed leukemia at the same time as my father, and I had to put him down (the cat) a month before my dad passed away. Now Ming has a neurological problem and has gone blind in one eye and is living day to day. My mother is blind in one eye and living day by day with end-stage Alzheimer’s. You see where I’m going with this, I’m sure.

Anyway, the boss has entered the building. Time to work for the man. Photos later, I promise.

The RLA and I have a tradition: on New Year’s Eve, we stay home and cook together, then lock the animals inside and hide from the falling bullets. We watch movies and go to bed after we watch the ball drop in Times Square. On New Year’s Day, we listen to the Moody Blues. All day and all night and probably the next day.

This year, we went to see Avatar in 3-D on an I-Max screen. I’m still conflicted. I loved the movie, and yet, it was an empty enjoyment, like the popcorn I ate. There were visuals that were magic. The flora and fauna of the imaginary Pandora were believable and beautiful. But that was it. Such plot as there was was lifted wholesale from Dances With Wolves, Pocohontas, Moby Dick and Apocolypse Now. Sort of. Toss in a handful of “noble savage” mythos and a shake of anti-war (specifically anti Bush’s war) and you have it. Not that there’s anything wrong with any of that, it was just… tissue. Disposable entertainment that left no mark in my mind, except for the visceral and visual. The RLA compared this to seeing the original Star Wars for the first time, and the feeling that you were in the presence of a new era in film making. And yeah, I can see that, but no. Star Wars, for all of the bad dialog and recycled mythos, had a much deeper soul and resonance than Avatar.

That doesn’t mean I won’t want to own a copy for home. But there has to be more than just a two-hour trip to another world. There have to be characters that you care about and frankly, the only ones that I wanted to see more of were the Etruscan-style horses. I would love to see a coffee table book on the planet that the animators created, but the buffed up Smurfs? Meh.

Over the long weekend, I spun up another five yarns. I made a lasagna, and a pot of cabbage soup (it’s still simmering as I type). For the coming year, I decided to try and photograph everything I make each weekend, from fiber to food, and post the results each Monday. We’ll see. In May, I have a spinning workshop in Sarasota. Later in May, the Surrogate Daughter Number Two graduates college, and I am expected to be in attendance (and will be proudly). In June, we have the annual week at the shore. In August RJ and I are scheduled to go to New York for Blogher 10.

I am determined this year to launch Mild Burning Symptoms, with or without the assistance of the RLA. I am determined to reduce the fabric stash in my studio, whether by selling it off on MBS, or by making quilts, I just need to empty the space.

We’ll see how that goes.

Finally, I went to see my Mummy today. She held my hand tightly and said “baby.” I didn’t stop crying for five minutes. And that is why tonight, I am making cabbage soup. It was one of my favorite dishes that she’d make in the winter. It’s a pure peasant dish: cabbage, onions, beef bones, carrots and tomatoes. There are brown sugar, sour salt, lemon juice and raisins. It is deep and sweet and sour, all at the same time. I can smell it simmering in the kitchen.

Happy new year to all, and may the second decade of the 21st century suck less than the first.

Tante Leah, Tallis Maker to the Stars

Or, you know, I would be if I could just get a star to accept the gift of one. I’m not going to name names here, but a certain Rock & Roll Hall of Fame drummer (or more likely, his agent) just refused this one.

With all of the nice Jewish boys out there who are currently hot comedic stars, you would think that at least one of them would like to upgrade his tallis from the one he got when he was Bar Mitzvah’d. Steven Spielberg has how many kids? Surely one of them is turning 13 and needs a tallis. Why not a Tante Leah custom design?

Why? Because nobody knows I’m out here, making the most elegant, individual and did I say beautiful tallit around. I’ve decided that the way to fix this glaring omission is to get myself a celebrity endorser.

The question is who. Adam Sandler? Andy Samberg? Paulie Shore? (Is he even still around?) Sarah Silverman? Who represents the quality and sophistication of a Tante Leah product? Tim Gunn? Well, yeah, probably, but he’s not Jewish and I don’t think I could afford him anyway.

After much thought and deliberation, I am convinced that the celebrity endorser Tante Leah’s Handmades needs is Ben Stiller. So here’s the offer. In exchange for Mr. Stiller allowing me to use a photo of him in a Tante Leah tallis, with an appropriate and enthusiastic endorsement (ex: Round for round, and pound for pound, there’s no finer tallis in town) I will donate 10% of my gross to Mr. Stiller’s Stillerstrong charity. (This could add up to bupkis, or if Mr. Stiller does his job well, it could make a decent donation, say $250 a year.)

What seems like years ago, but was really only a month, I joined the Cobaya Gourmet Guinea Pigs, and underground foodie affair here in Miami. I grabbed Star and the two of us signed on for the VIP (Very Important Pig) Roast, starring the culinary stylings of Chef Jeremiah Bullfrog. It was advertised as an Iron Chef-style affair, with a main course of roast whole pig and five other dishes made of various and sundry pig parts. Well, I am all about the pig, so I was first in line for that. Literally. Star and I were the second and third to arrive at Harvey’s on the Bay, a fabulous and undiscovered neighborhood bar housed in the back side of an American Legion Hall up on Biscayne Bay in the still-ungentrified 60s.

The feast began with chicharones, or cracklins as we call them in the Deep South. Rendered and fried tidbits of pig skin. In my culture, we do the same thing with poultry skin and it’s called grebenes. Same thing, different animal: fried heart attack on a plate.

The cracklins were accompanied by little cocktails made of organic cherry syrup, seltzer and moonshine. Tasted like Dr. Brown’s Cherry Soda, but left you face-planted on the concrete.

We then all trooped outside to meet the guest of honor, and watch as Chef Jeremiah prepared the caja china and loaded up the pig.

Back inside for some Chinese/North Carolina char sui bao. Chinese pork buns, but with a very un-Chinese bar-b-que style filling.

More like a Carolina, vinegar-based pork butt. Syringes of soy sauce were provided, and there were a couple of hot sauces as well. The prawn-chili sauce was particularly lovely.

These little guys were followed by something described as a Mexican/Viet Namese fusion. It was a soft taco, filled with the most gelatinous thing I’ve ever eaten. I was already started to head into a pork-induced coma, and so I missed the details. It was trotter meat or pork cheeks or something. Whatever. It was, taste-wise, one of the purest flavors of pig imaginable. This may have been my favorite dish of the afternoon, despite the icky mouth feel. The tacos were topped with a carrot and cabbage slaw, very sharp and vinegary and healthy splashes of those chili sauces.

After that, we moved on to pork bellies, and that is where I drew the line in the sand, pig-part wise. While I found the images of the pig nipples fascinating, and couldn’t shoot enough frames of them, the amount of fat and soft skin were beyond me to even attempt to eat. Chef J sliced up the bellies and made Cuban-style sandwiches, with pickles and mustard and crusty Cuban bread.

By now, the pig in the box was getting done, so we went out to check.

Yep, as the old Coppertone ads reminded us, it was Time to Turn. The pig got turned, coals were added and back we went for the next round of parts. Baby brauts or hot dogs? The skins were crisp and the meat juicy and the spicy mustard was a perfect compliment. I skipped the bun. Why waste time with bread when there is that magnificent pig roasting out back?

Finally, the pig was done. Chef Jeremiah brought it in and carved it up.

Plated, and with a side of sweet potato flan, this was the best roast pig, ever. (Except, and I’m sorry, Chef, but this is true, for the one that my friend’s father roasted all those years ago, on a set of old bedsprings, over a fire pit. Said piglet was the product of a wild boar getting to a domesticated female on a flower farm up in Stuart. That is the roast pig gold standard.) Still and all, I couldn’t have asked for more or better food and company. I’ll be back for more of the Cobaya Guinea Pig events. Next time, I’ll bring my own, titanium spork.