lollardfish

The word of the day is "apotropaic."

davidschroth says it *is* a cool word, and you should all look it up, and I should encourage you to do so.

Curt Schilling decided to spend a lot of time answering questions on NYYfans.com, the Yankees board. The best part:

Re: The Red Sox Thread (cont'd, part 2)
Quote:
Originally Posted by Chacon
Hey Curt do you play WoW?
I heard you were heavy into EQ so I was wondering if you have moved onto greener pastures

Gehrig38:

WoW sucks, EQ2 FTW!
WoW is for people still into Tonka and Playschool.

(If you are a foolish red sox fanatic, you can find the thread around <a href="http://forums.nyyfans.com/showthread.php?t=94438&page=288>here</a> in the middle of the page.

So apparantly ZZ was not called a terrorist, but had his mother and sister insulted (or at least that's the latest). I find it interesting though that the rumor flew around, and that an anti-racism group in France hired a lipreader who mislipread the Italian player's insults. On the other hand, it's also suggested that the insults were racist.

The actual story is Here at the NY Times.

Now for the funnies.

Multicultural perspectives.

During the World Cup final yesterday I made pasta. I've gotten good at assembling the dough on the board by hand (really the best way to get the right "feel" for the dough), then letting the stand mixer do the kneading.

I made regular "white" pasta.
I made red wine pasta that came out too brown.
I made tomato-paste pasta that came out a lovely orange.
I made pesto "pantesco" pasta. (Link for pesto recipe).
I made squid-ink pasta.

I then tried to combine them, and I really couldn't come up with a neat way to do it. Ultimately, I made three small rectangles of lightly rolled out dough from white, orange, and black, then rolled them together a little and sent them through the sheet-press. I ended up with tri-colored pasta which I have cut, put into a bag, and shall eat tomorrow, but it's not pretty. It'd make a great halloween pasta dish though.

For dinner last night at lee_os's apartment, I made ravioli of the pantesco dough, and stuffed them with a little more of the pesto and some mozarella (because we had some in the house). I made a sauce of capers, onion, sherry, and hot giardini (and oil), and some basil and tarragon from the garden. Garnished the plates with parmigiano, more of the giardini, and more of the pesto. Tasty stuff.

There's a fat rabbit in the garden, sitting among the basil, epazote, chives, and fennel. So far, he's not eating anything, but I think I'll put up the chicken wire tomorrow.

I saw birds attacking something like a weasel on the creek bank this morning. Long, dark, sleek, and weasel-like. Do we have weasels? Minks?

A Boston TV station is running a "The biggest 'what if' moments in Boston Sports History."

Here are mine, but mostly focusing on ones during my teenage/adult lifetime. These are not really in order. #1 is clearly #1 though.

1. What if Lenny Bias hadn't died?
2. What if the wind blows in on October 2, 1978?
3. What if Gedman catches that cross-up from Stanley (this in lieu of Buckner. Buckner's error sucked, but the Red Sox had already blown a two run lead with two outs, and the error led to the loss. The pitching stuff was more critical, really)?
4. What if Drew Bledsoe never gets injured, so Brady never starts?
5. What if Dave Roberts is thrown out stealing?
6. What if anyone, whatsoever, cared about the Bruins?
7. What if Grady sits Pedro after 7, pitches Timlin in the 8th, and Williamson in the 9th, like Theo told him to?
8. What if the Red Sox had signed Willie Mays?
9. What if the ref hadn't called "The Tuck Rule?"
10. What if the Celtics had gotten Tim Duncan (as they had the best chance to do)?

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What I like about these is that almost any sports fan, and certainly any Eastern sports fan, knows exactly what these short phrases signify. Also, "what ifs" (or counter-factuals) are fun to do in history, but very difficult to assess. It's fun to imagine Genghis Khan being killed in the internecine squabbles that made him an exile as a boy, or Alexander the Great not dying so young, or the Aztecs killing Cortes immediately, or something. It's a little, but just a little, easier to assess the sports moments.

Free eye surgery for soldiers leads to more pilots, fewer submariners. Interesting.

Link.

I don't really understand Google Earth. I can see Kefallonia on the map, because I figured out that "Cephalonie" in my text was Kefallonia, an Ionian island (or maybe a town on said island). If I find the island and zoom in, I get a little town I can click on with Google Earth. But if I search for it, I get result not found.

Grumble.

I hate videos and adverts that play on my screen when I'm reading, say, the NYtimes. Should I uninstall Flash? Is there a better way?