Today while waiting for jon and toby to return from daycare, I was julienning some vegetables for hiyashi chuka. I very much enjoy julienning, rapidly turning food into tiny, evenly sized batons. And I thought about this as I made my way through a carrot. Then came the cucumber. There are many foods good for julienning (carrot, potato, apple, pear, daikon). And there are many foods that are not (brussel sprouts, kale, artichokes, mushrooms). As I went to work on the cucumber, I felt that it wasn’t trying hard enough. It could have been a great julienned fruit (it is a fruit, right? Because of the seeds?), but instead it seemed content to squander its potential and just be ok, better than all those other foods, that no matter how hard they tried, would never be any good, but not truly great. This filled me with a tremendous sense of disappointment, and I imagined if I got to grade foods on juliennability how I would reluctantly have to give cucumber a B overall, but I would placate myself by giving it a D for effort. It then occurred to me that here it was, Friday night, and I was not thinking about what bar to go to, or about the talk I have to give on Tuesday, or whether we would manage to finish up the rather uneven season 3 of battlestar galactica, or how to spin my job application to sound more cognitive to get a job in Queensland or Vienna, or how to decrease my water footprint, or how to get toby to sleep at night. I wasn’t listening to music or learning french. I was anthropomorphizing a fruit. And was sincerely disappointed that it wasn’t trying harder. This should teach all of you to never ask me what I’m thinking about, because frankly, it’s like peeking into your grandmothers attic; you’ll find a box of dusty doilies, random buttons, a picture of her with j. edgar hoover, a half eaten sandwich and a family of opossums. And then you’ll try to quietly back down the stairs but it will be too late. I don’t know how half the stuff gets up there, and its really best to just leave it alone. Fortunately, toby and jon returned home before I could get to lecturing the cucumber and then all was right in the world again. And the hiyashi chuka was delicious.
Saturday, May 17, 2008
toby of the day, 4.25.2008
Today while waiting for jon and toby to return from daycare, I was julienning some vegetables for hiyashi chuka. I very much enjoy julienning, rapidly turning food into tiny, evenly sized batons. And I thought about this as I made my way through a carrot. Then came the cucumber. There are many foods good for julienning (carrot, potato, apple, pear, daikon). And there are many foods that are not (brussel sprouts, kale, artichokes, mushrooms). As I went to work on the cucumber, I felt that it wasn’t trying hard enough. It could have been a great julienned fruit (it is a fruit, right? Because of the seeds?), but instead it seemed content to squander its potential and just be ok, better than all those other foods, that no matter how hard they tried, would never be any good, but not truly great. This filled me with a tremendous sense of disappointment, and I imagined if I got to grade foods on juliennability how I would reluctantly have to give cucumber a B overall, but I would placate myself by giving it a D for effort. It then occurred to me that here it was, Friday night, and I was not thinking about what bar to go to, or about the talk I have to give on Tuesday, or whether we would manage to finish up the rather uneven season 3 of battlestar galactica, or how to spin my job application to sound more cognitive to get a job in Queensland or Vienna, or how to decrease my water footprint, or how to get toby to sleep at night. I wasn’t listening to music or learning french. I was anthropomorphizing a fruit. And was sincerely disappointed that it wasn’t trying harder. This should teach all of you to never ask me what I’m thinking about, because frankly, it’s like peeking into your grandmothers attic; you’ll find a box of dusty doilies, random buttons, a picture of her with j. edgar hoover, a half eaten sandwich and a family of opossums. And then you’ll try to quietly back down the stairs but it will be too late. I don’t know how half the stuff gets up there, and its really best to just leave it alone. Fortunately, toby and jon returned home before I could get to lecturing the cucumber and then all was right in the world again. And the hiyashi chuka was delicious.
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