Harry Frankfurt’s little book On Bullshit seems to have been selling briskly. I have seen it listed as a bestseller on some of the lists in any given week. Bullshit is becoming a fertile tool for fashionable social criticism, although it seems to be falling back into its old usage of an epithet. People are jumping on the honeywagon, talking about the things things they don’t agree with as “bullshit”. Do some kinds of bullshit smell worse than others?
A couple of weeks ago, the Free Press published a review of Laura Penny’s book Your Call is Important to Us – The Truth about Bullshit. According to the reviewer, Penny quotes Frankfurt and applies the idea of bullshit to the way companies and bureaucracies treat their customers and clients, and to American politics, foreign and domestic. She is politically on the left, vaguely anti-American.
The book is being promoted like a new book, but it’s actually a quality paperback release, by McLelland & Stewart of a book originally published Your Call Is Important to Us: So Why Isn’t Anyone Answering? published by Macfarlane, Walter & Ross as (ISBN ISBN 1-55199-092-X). Macfarlane, Walter & Ross was a non-fiction publisher, sold by Stoddard to McLelland and Stewart before some of the turmoil in the Canadian book trade in the last decade. M&S announced it was shutting down that division in April 2003. I haven’t been able to find when the original edition of Your Call is Important to Us was published. Most bookstores don’t list it, or list it as unavailable. Some bookstore catalogues have obviously incorrect publication dates – they are in the future. Some pages that say it was published in April or September 2004, which may be more accurate. It’s a nearly dead Canadian book on the back list, revived by good marketing, riding the bullshit wave. The author owes something to some of the business bullshit of her publisher and agent.
Month: June 2005
Wet Butt Paddle
Saturday (June 4) was cloudy and humid, with occasional light drizzle. In the morning, I read a newspaper article about a Paddle Manitoba urban paddling event. Paddlers would be able to put in from the sloping shore on the north bank by the footbridge in Assiniboine Park, paddle to the Forks, and get a bus ride back to the Park. I didn’t want to get involved with the logistics of getting back to the Park to get my car and then getting to the Forks to get my boat, but reading the story was enough to break my inertia.
Pasta Sauces – Clam, etc
Pasta and sauce is a good meal. There are many pre-mixed pasta sauces for sale, packaged in jars, cans and pouches – and the sauces aren’t often either bland or overseasoned. They tend to be sweet and heavy on basil and sweet-smelling herbs.
I found a recipe in the Winnipeg Folk Festival Cook book that pointed the way to making a good homemade sauce. It takes a few minutes chopping vegetables and cooking the raw ingredients – but it’s easy and worthwhile
I followed – and played with – Pierre Guerin’s recipe for clam sauce.
It calls for a can of baby clams. I used the 284 ml/10 oz size. It calls for a can of tomato sauce. I used a 398 ml (14 oz) can and a 213 ml (7.5 oz). I think a 14 oz can would be ok, but I was able to simmer this for a while to get a thick sauce. It calls for a medium onion and 2 cloves of garlic. A large onion doesn’t hurt, and 2 cloves of garlic is too bland. Use 4-6. The onions and garlic should be chopped fine, and sautéed in light oil in a large skillet. When the onions are soft, add the clams. Drain the clams first, rinsing them doesn’t hurt. Cook for a few more minutes. Add the tomato sauce. At this point I added a cup of red wine. The recipe called for unstated amounts of oregano, black pepper and parsley. One teaspoon of oregano is good. Parsley is not meant to be eaten, but it seems to be a standard ingredient. I skipped it. I thought a touch of basil wouldn’t hurt – a quarter teaspoon, and a quarter teaspoon of tarragon. I went heavy on the pepper. I use peppercorns in a grater, and I was liberal with both black and mixed peppercorns, perhaps half a teaspoon each – which may be a little intense. Also, a tablespoon or two of grated parmesan. Guerin also suggested a little sugar to cut the acidity of the tomatos. I thought the basil, tarragon and wine did fine. If I hadn’t used the wine, it would have been an idea.
Simmer on low heat, stirring occasionally. Relax. Have a beer. Heat the water for pasta slowly. Clam sauce is good on linguine noodles. Clam sauce is supposed to be eaten fresh, not refrigerated for too long.
Guerin’s notes suggested the recipe works as a Bolognese sauce with 300-500 grams of lean ground beef instead of clams. He suggested adding the beef to the onions as in the clam recipe above. A different idea – if you don’t mind an extra pan to wash – is to brown the beef in a separate skillet, and remove it with a slotted spoon and add it to the onions and garlic. That leaves some fat behind. However, it also makes for a less robust dish. Bolognese is a tomato and meat sauce, good on spaghetti. Choices, choices.
Claire had been making a similiar dish with spicy Italian sausage – a fresh sausage we get at our local supermarket. She starts with onions and garlic and adds sausage chunks. She uses a can of diced tomatos and a small can of tomato sauce. I think she uses some oregano, but she lets the sausage supply the other spices.
I haven’t tried to cost out the ingredients for these sauces against packaged sauces. It’s not expensive – onions, garlic, tomato sauce, and clams/ground beef/sausage/etc. If you have a good chef’s knife and washable cutting board, it’s pretty easy. It cooks in short stages, and there is time to to do other chores or read as it simmers. it’s hard to go wrong, and you can get something you really like instead of someone else’s idea of Italian.
The Folk Festival cookbook is fun. There are a few recipes from the cooks who prepare the meals for the volunteers just for information, like borscht for 1,500. There some interesting regional dishes and some delightful eccentricities. Queen Ida’s Poulet Gumbo (Queen Ida is a Zydeco musician from Louisiana). Stan Roger’s Hot mustard (start with 3 jars of Keens’ and add Tabasco, cayenne, garlic and Madras curry.) Spotted Dick with Hard Sauce? Visions of Russell Crowe as Jack Aubrey. The less of two weevils.
Voluntary Simplicity
Voluntary Simplicity, has been around for 25 years, the first edition having been published in 1981. The author, Duane Elgin, describes himself as a former senior social scientist connected with an institution in California, and his biography mentions a business degree and an MA in economic history. He seems to presently support himself as a writer and motivational speaker. There is a political or moral dimension to his work, but his metier is self-improvement and spirituality. For a sample of his recent writing, there is an article at a site called Soulful Living.
I read a copy of the 1993 edition of Voluntary Simplicity which incorporates the findings of his simplicity survey, and has an Introduction by Ram Dass, the former Richard Alpert.
1000 Kilometers
Mike and I have each managed to ride 1000 k since we started riding in March, up to Monday night, May 30. We added 34 more on May 31. We thought we were riding less this year than last year. I thought we had a lot more rain this year, especially on the weekends when we would ordinarily take half a day for a long ride. We have had several rainy spells, and have lost some weekend rides. when it has been dry we have been riding almost every evening, for 30-35 or even 40 kilometers, for 3 or 4 consecutive nights.