Orange Is The New Black

I borrowed this book on recommendation from a friend.

Maybe I'm a bit unfazed by reading about extreme conditions, but reading this, I was constantly waiting for things to get interesting (i.e. more violent).  But it never did.  If one were to assume that prison was like a country club.....  well, it's not - you're still deprived of some very basic needs, but neither is Federal minimum security prison a haven for violence and abuse.  It's probably very different in men's prison.

It was a decent book though, and I learned a little about prison culture, through the eyes of a privileged white girl in possibly the safest prison situation.

The Deftones fucking RAWK

This was a great show!!  Chino's vocals were on point, unlike his vocals on a lot of Deftones live YouTube videos I've seen.

The band was really tight, and their songs are made for a live setting.  Definitely a kick-ass show!!

I just watched a video of G.E. Smith playing Michael Bloomfield's old '63 Telecaster, and discovered that he played on Highway 61 Revisited.  With Dylan's recent Nobel Prize for literature, I figure it's time to finally listen to some Dylan.  I've only casually listened to Dylan on classic rock radio - his really popular stuff, but as with most artists, the greatest songs are deeper in their catalogs.

How America Eats: A Social History of U.S. Food and Culture

I love cooking and understanding the history behind cuisine of different regions.  This book combined cuisine, culture, and history to tell a very interesting story about the development of American cuisine.

The book discusses how pilgrims had food shortfalls and what they did to survive - adapting their European wheat-based diet to America's corn-based diet, and importing African slaves for agriculture.  As a result, early American cuisine was a blend of European, Native American, and African cuisines.

Later in the book, the focus shifts to industrialized food production and women's roles in how food was marketed to people.  There was also discussion of the incorporation of Italian, Chinese and Mexican cuisines, and the perception of those cultures and food.

It was a really interesting book, and shows that American cuisine is as rich as the history that set the foundation for it.

Lying

I read Sam Harris's "The End of Faith: Religion, Terror and the Future of Reason" years ago.  I thought he was an excellent writer, and though I thought some of his positions on the subject of religion were a bit extremely Atheist and staunchly anti-religious (I tend to be more Agnostic), I could appreciate where he's coming from.

Reading "Lying", I found that same style, but appreciate where he's coming from in his view that lying is never acceptable.  The book is a short read, the first half filled with his thoughts on why it's never okay to lie, and the second half being a transcript of a discussion he had with his inspiration for the book (which I only partially read).

Fresh Off The Boat

I first "discovered" Eddie Huang when my son auditioned for the role of Eddie on ABC's "Fresh Off The Boat" sitcom.  A few years later, I started watching his show "Huang's World" on Viceland, and I thought he sounded really intelligent and his worldviews matched mine.

I knew he was heavily into hip hop, and while I listen to some hip hop, I'm not as immersed as he is.  I was interested in reading about his growing up Chinese in America.

As I read through this book, I found that his experiences growing up ethnically Chinese in America was completely different from mine, due to the fact that he was a minority in Orlando, whereas Hawaii is much more ethnically diverse and there really is no minority here.  Also, I think his affinity for hip hop was due to him trying to find something to latch onto that represented who he identified with as a minority, whereas here in Hawaii we've established our own Hawaii identity that's an amalgamation of different cultures.

I've checked out pictures of his restaurant Baohaus.  I actually identified when he said that he didn't like how non-Asian chefs take classic homestyle Asian dishes and Americanize them.  Most recently, I see the poke craze around the nation and hate that they're taking a uniquely Hawaiian dish and bastardizing it with no nod towards authenticity.

But having said that, I thought it was kind of hypocritical that he is irritated at the cultural appropriation of the food of his ancestors by white people, yet he's adopted a very black American culture into his own life.  In all fairness, his use of ebonics (as far as I can tell) doesn't take much liberties and seems pretty "authentic".

Jiro Dreams of Sushi

This documentary came highly recommended to me.  The cinematography and the music was beautiful.  The story was interesting and reflected the Japanese attitude towards perfection, but I couldn't help but be taken slightly aback by the elitism.  Still, I'd be interested in eating at his shop, though $300 for omakase is a bit out of my price range!

Cauliflower

Grilled cauliflower is so good.  It takes the smokiness of the charcoal really well!  When I went through my vegetarian phase, I wish I had tried this.

I think it would be cool to have a whole cauliflower-based meal - maybe a grilled cauliflower steak with a chimichurri sauce, then cauliflower rice with diced tomatoes, onions and garlic, and cauliflower pickled in red wine vinegar.

(Spoiler alert - I reveal a lot about the book below)

I just finished reading this book.  A friend challenged me to finish this book and explain it.

As I got through the first third of the book, I found that it was alternating between the author's narrative of his motorcycle trip with his son and friends, his struggling recollection of a person that he referred to as Phaedrus, and his chautauquas - his musings on philosophy.  As his memories of Phaedrus become clearer, the chautauquas start overlapping his recollection that Phaedrus is actually the younger version of himself, who was so frustrated by his inability to reconcile philosophical dilemmas that he drove himself insane.

I had to suspend my attempts to make sense of his philosophizing, because doing so would require me to spend a lot of time reading and pondering, and I wasn't about to make that commitment given that I might still not understand what he was talking about.  At the core of his philosophical division were the realms of classic vs. romantic understanding of life, reflected through the maintenance of the motorcycles that they were traveling with (hence the title).

At the end, he rediscovers his insanity and is about to go off the deep end again, when a dream about his relationship with his son shocks him back into reality and he's able to connect with his son.

Upon finishing the book, there was mild satisfaction that he seems to connect with his son.  But through the book, I not only didn't feel like rooting for the main character, I actually thought he was a pompous douchebag.

I don't know if he had decided to embrace a more romantic notion of fatherhood.  But to see someone convert from an asshole to less of an asshole wasn't terribly satisfying to read.

I don't feel like I am any better for reading this book.

Things I am interested in for future reference and planning

(Jiro Dreams of Sushi - watched)
(The Art of Happiness - the Dalai Lama - listened to)

Eating Culture:  An Anthropological Guide to Food - Gillian Crowther
Soul of a Banquet - Wayne Wang
Do Hollywood - The Lemon Twigs
Dispatches from the Edge:  A Memoir of War, Disasters and Survival - Anderson Cooper
Stiff:  The Curious Lives of Human Cadavers - Mary Roach
DJ Shadow
The Untold History of Ramen:  How Political Crisis in Japan Spawned a Global Food Craze - George Solt
Lawrence of Arabia
The Tale of Genji
The Bible

Oktoberfest

I love food (doesn't everybody?).  I also love cooking - learning techniques and applying them to solve "problems" is pretty much the foundation of all creative endeavors, from engineering to music to cooking, all things that I love to do.

I wanted to prepare a dinner for Oktoberfest.  I sauteed some bratwurst in beer, and made a sauteed cabbage dish called rotkohl.  It's a sweet and sour cabbage sweetened with sugar, apples and caramelized onions, made sour with vinegar, and then enhanced with a huge douse of cabernet.  I served this with a side of traditional German potato salad, which is made without mayo.

I had just assumed that Oktoberfest ran through the month of October, but in fact it typically starts in the middle of September and concludes during the first weekend in October!

Sapiens: A Brief History of Humankind - Yuval Noah Harari

This is a highly engaging non-fiction book that spans history/religion/philosophy/sociology/psychology/anthropology/political science/economics, and explains how Sapiens transitioned from  small social units to huge societies via (imaginary) concepts of money, religion and imperialism.

Though much of the author's hypotheses can't be substantiated and can in fact disputed, these hypotheses nonetheless make a lot of sense and are certainly plausible explanations for the order of the world.

Twenty One Pilots - Vessel

This is Twenty One Pilots' debut album on Fueled by Ramen records in 2013 but is actually their third album.

It's a great album from start to finish and is fairly diverse, ranging from the almost Train-ish ukulele based "House of Gold", to the anti-suicide "Guns For Hands", the Eminem-styled rap of "Migraine" (minus the misogyny and violence), and the anthemic "Trees" that sounds as big as anything Chris Martin has ever written.  In fact, if they can keep writing material as good and diverse as this, they are poised to be my new Beatles or Queen.

Though piano, synth and ukulele dominate the songs instrumentally, the prominence of drums in the mix, and the beats propel this album with a funky swagger that matches the rapping perfectly and keeps this metalhead's head bobbing instead of banging.

It's a very positive and upbeat album, though it has it's screamo moments.  Definitely a classic, and an album that cheers me up when I sometimes need it the most.

Confessions of a Heretic - Adam Nergal Darski

I'm a huge fan of Adam Darksi, aka Nergal from the Polish blackened death metal band Behemoth.  Adam has had an interesting life, growing up in a highly religious society, founding his band Behemoth, battling leukemia, and finding somewhat unwanted fame by dating a famous Polish pop star.

This book offers insight into the development of his philosophies on life, religion, love, and self empowerment.  It's very inspiring, and reflects his quest for knowledge.  After reading about his desire to learn new languages, it reminded me to research learning to speak Japanese, something I've wanted to do for a long time.