The farmer's market is absolutely brilliant. I don't know why I never knew about it, because it's year-round every Saturday in Temple Bar (Meetinghouse Square, named after the long-standing Quaker Meeting House there). I circled the entire place six or seven times, bought some coffee (Kenya), a veggie burrito (salsa was good, not believably Mexican though), went to the cash machine, bought more produce (garlic, peppers, parsley, portabellos), natural yogurt with plum compote, organic granola (€7 / kg. -- very cheap), fresh goat's cheese (€2!), and kalamata olive oil (€8 for 75 cl!). Really, my new Saturday ritual. In fact, I'll just try to do all my shopping weekly there.
It feels good getting back into the city when the sun is out and there are people. A huge mix of tourists, immigrants (one cheese stand was speaking Russian, or maybe Polish, while the olive oil girl was probably French), and Dublin natives, just browsing the produce, usually friendly enough. Aside from any environmental issues, farmer's markets are the most social interaction you'll ever get out of grocery shopping, not to mention the health benefits of being surrounded by produce instead of by boxed meals.
That got a bit didactic there. But, then again, I'm cooking my goats cheese and portabello omelet in kalamata olive oil, using organic garlic. And beautiful, beautiful tomatoes.
Update: It was the greatest omelet I have ever had in my life, ever.
Saturday, March 29, 2008
Thursday, March 27, 2008
You can check out, but I have to clean up
Two roommates are gone to Japan, so visitors stayed at my house four nights this past week. Tuesday, someone from Willamette visiting the Galway kids, Friday, Sheila and Colleen, then Saturday and Sunday, Dylan with a total of five friends--three one night, two others the next. Needless to say, the house and I were in various states of disrepair by the time Fiona came back from Denmark on Monday morning.
Thursday, March 20, 2008
Holy Thursday
It's been so long, why apologize. I went to Galway; it was nice; I'm back.
Tonight I was in town to mail a letter (grant acceptance letter) and remembered it's Holy Thursday, so I went to the Quaker meeting house in Temple Bar. Sat in silence for about a half hour, except one time when someone said something. Me, four students from a Quaker college in Iowa (really cool), and two other older Friends. There's something about sitting in silence with a few other people that is just more potent than any structured event.
So, here's a poem for you by Paul Muldoon, on the occasion:
Holy Thursday
They're kindly here, to let us linger so late,
Long after the shutters are up.
A waiter glides from the kitchen with a plate
Of stew or some thick soup,
And settles himself at the next table but one.
We know, you and I, that it's over,
That something or other has come between
Us, whatever we are, or were.
The waiter swabs his plate with bread
And drains what's left of his wine,
Then rearranges, one by one,
The knife, the fork, the spoon, the napkin,
The table itself, the chair he's simply borrowed,
And smiles, and bows to his own absence.
Tonight I was in town to mail a letter (grant acceptance letter) and remembered it's Holy Thursday, so I went to the Quaker meeting house in Temple Bar. Sat in silence for about a half hour, except one time when someone said something. Me, four students from a Quaker college in Iowa (really cool), and two other older Friends. There's something about sitting in silence with a few other people that is just more potent than any structured event.
So, here's a poem for you by Paul Muldoon, on the occasion:
Holy Thursday
They're kindly here, to let us linger so late,
Long after the shutters are up.
A waiter glides from the kitchen with a plate
Of stew or some thick soup,
And settles himself at the next table but one.
We know, you and I, that it's over,
That something or other has come between
Us, whatever we are, or were.
The waiter swabs his plate with bread
And drains what's left of his wine,
Then rearranges, one by one,
The knife, the fork, the spoon, the napkin,
The table itself, the chair he's simply borrowed,
And smiles, and bows to his own absence.
Monday, March 3, 2008
Do you ever get tired of soup? No, I don't.
When I make soup, I make enough for
four people, because I'll probably be
hungry tomorrow. And the day after.
And the day after that.
four people, because I'll probably be
hungry tomorrow. And the day after.
And the day after that.
Friday, February 29, 2008
You know then that it is not the reason
It looks as if the Fates have conspired to make me stay inside and compose all day. I woke up at 9, willingly no less, to slight cold and a drizzle of rain. It looks like Dublin again, finally.
The other night, after scrapping that Node Ensemble stück once I missed the deadline, Ben called me to tell me that they were planning on programming it for their April concert. So, no rehearsals have happened yet; I minimized it to electric guitar, violin, and recorder, hopefully to decrease rehearsal time and make it more precise. Four short movements, less ambition than the original, but I think it will turn out far better. Plus it gives me a chance to use that movement for electric guitar trio, without having to bother with an extra four instruments. It's still the poem "Of Mere Being," by Wallace Stevens; the electric guitar trio movement is the stanza:
Four more days (I hope) of work. This Sunday, and all next weekend. Oh, and I got the grant from Willamette to study the community of living Irish composers, so I'll be here all summer, until late July or early August. Stop by. It's a nice place; I hear it rains all summer. I'm really getting into delicious mushrooms now. The yuppie grocery store (Fallon & Byrne) has all their specialty mushrooms at a mix-n-match price, so I just get a bit of each and throw it into an risotto (two days ago) or an omelet (this morning) or maybe even a pasta dish, with caraway seeds (T.B.D.).
I haven't been up this early (willingly) in ages. I don't know what to do with myself.
The other night, after scrapping that Node Ensemble stück once I missed the deadline, Ben called me to tell me that they were planning on programming it for their April concert. So, no rehearsals have happened yet; I minimized it to electric guitar, violin, and recorder, hopefully to decrease rehearsal time and make it more precise. Four short movements, less ambition than the original, but I think it will turn out far better. Plus it gives me a chance to use that movement for electric guitar trio, without having to bother with an extra four instruments. It's still the poem "Of Mere Being," by Wallace Stevens; the electric guitar trio movement is the stanza:
You know then that it is not the reason
That makes us happy or unhappy.
The bird sings. Its feathers shine.
Four more days (I hope) of work. This Sunday, and all next weekend. Oh, and I got the grant from Willamette to study the community of living Irish composers, so I'll be here all summer, until late July or early August. Stop by. It's a nice place; I hear it rains all summer. I'm really getting into delicious mushrooms now. The yuppie grocery store (Fallon & Byrne) has all their specialty mushrooms at a mix-n-match price, so I just get a bit of each and throw it into an risotto (two days ago) or an omelet (this morning) or maybe even a pasta dish, with caraway seeds (T.B.D.).
I haven't been up this early (willingly) in ages. I don't know what to do with myself.
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Red Rice Risotto; Deutschland
It was 4 a.m. and I couldn't sleep, so I bought tickets to Berlin (26 euros, return). I also got tickets to a chamber orchestra performance of some Webern, Berg, and Schoenberg works at the Berlin Philharmonic hall (18 euros) and a performance of Wagner's Tannhauser at the Berlin Philharmonic (16 euros). All in all, a productive evening. I also read all of Philip Larkin's collection The Whitsun Weddings, which mostly just made me think about death and still not be able to sleep. More about that another day. Today is light-reading Wednesday.
And what's lighter than a cookbook? With no plot, no characters, and the self-consciousness of itself as a text to be interacted with, there's a fine line between a cookbook and a postmodern novel. So, think of this post as whichever you feel more comfortable with.
You start with 2 to 3 cups of water, I can't remember which. Maybe it's somewhere in between. You boil it, anyway. While it's coming to a boil you consider what it means to boil. To boil over, after all, is to fail to boil. To boil over is to spill all over the stove, cooling the water, and preventing it from reaching its premium state. So, don't boil over. Boil steadily, and as the boil begins add some salt and about a cup of red rice. The boiling should stop; the simmering should begin. We are in the grey area between boiling and not boiling. This is where we want to be. We're going to simmer for a while, so start chopping some mushrooms. We've got some shiitake, some oyster, and some other strangely shaped mushrooms. We're going to thinly dice the gouda that is still in our fridge, because it's about time to get rid of it and we don't have a cheese grater. We also bought some Parmesean, which is pretty good, so let's chop some of that up. We're heating up a second saucepan now, throwing in some butter and garlic and black pepper (ground). We toss in the mushrooms and let them simmer for longer than seems prudent, but trust me it's worth it. We add olive oil, take the thickness off of the butter and give it this strange interplay of flavors, the animal and the vegetable combined into one bubbly oily mess. Add the cheese. Add the white wine, maybe about a 3-4 second pour. Really let it get in there. The rice should be done, if it's been about 30 minutes. You used extra water than you thought was necessary, but that's because this is risotto not just standard white rice. You've also been stirring the whole time. So, now I add the rice to the mushroom mixture, stir for a while. Taste every one in a while, because I'm really hungry at this point and just want to eat. Finally, while it's still chewy, take it off the stove. It is the best thing I've cooked all week, which includes last week.
I have another jazz gig this Saturday, Ballsbridge Court Hotel. Also, I quit my job.
And what's lighter than a cookbook? With no plot, no characters, and the self-consciousness of itself as a text to be interacted with, there's a fine line between a cookbook and a postmodern novel. So, think of this post as whichever you feel more comfortable with.
You start with 2 to 3 cups of water, I can't remember which. Maybe it's somewhere in between. You boil it, anyway. While it's coming to a boil you consider what it means to boil. To boil over, after all, is to fail to boil. To boil over is to spill all over the stove, cooling the water, and preventing it from reaching its premium state. So, don't boil over. Boil steadily, and as the boil begins add some salt and about a cup of red rice. The boiling should stop; the simmering should begin. We are in the grey area between boiling and not boiling. This is where we want to be. We're going to simmer for a while, so start chopping some mushrooms. We've got some shiitake, some oyster, and some other strangely shaped mushrooms. We're going to thinly dice the gouda that is still in our fridge, because it's about time to get rid of it and we don't have a cheese grater. We also bought some Parmesean, which is pretty good, so let's chop some of that up. We're heating up a second saucepan now, throwing in some butter and garlic and black pepper (ground). We toss in the mushrooms and let them simmer for longer than seems prudent, but trust me it's worth it. We add olive oil, take the thickness off of the butter and give it this strange interplay of flavors, the animal and the vegetable combined into one bubbly oily mess. Add the cheese. Add the white wine, maybe about a 3-4 second pour. Really let it get in there. The rice should be done, if it's been about 30 minutes. You used extra water than you thought was necessary, but that's because this is risotto not just standard white rice. You've also been stirring the whole time. So, now I add the rice to the mushroom mixture, stir for a while. Taste every one in a while, because I'm really hungry at this point and just want to eat. Finally, while it's still chewy, take it off the stove. It is the best thing I've cooked all week, which includes last week.
I have another jazz gig this Saturday, Ballsbridge Court Hotel. Also, I quit my job.
Wednesday, February 20, 2008
The text shows the inability of leaving Ireland
I went to a talk on Irish writing in the 50s this evening, and one main topic was the problem of emigration. The best, they say, leave Ireland (usually meaning go to London or Dublin, which doesn't qualify as "Irish") while the slackers stay behind and drink away their inheritances on the ruined family farm. Now, Claire Wills (wrote a good book on Paul Muldoon as well) did a fine job deconstructing that monster of a commission--something about population policy--but she also did a fine job of making me want to get out. So, going to Galway next weekend. I feel like that's a start. First Galway, then maybe Vienna. Ich bin aus Österreich.
I've taken to learning German online. It gives me something mechanical to do, anyway. I probably should have learned Italian or something, but I have less of a desire to go to Italy. Too warm, too sunny, too delicious. I almost bought tickets to the Dresden music festival, but I'm not sure when my exams are. We'll work on that.
In other news, I finished four of my nine movements for this desert suite. They are, played by my computer:
1. Presto (score)
2. Allegro Pizzicato (score)
5. Geese (score)
9. Very Slow (score)
The first two movements are meant to be directly conjoined--the first, slowing down from presto to allegro, also becomes pizzicato.
In case you missed it, they get slower as the suite goes on. That haunting chord you hear the cello and viola play (and the two violins outline) at the beginning of Presto is (I know you're sweating with anticipation, sweating everywhere) a perfect fifth, D and A, in the viola, played as a double-stop on strings III and IV, and a very, very flat (49 cents flat, almost halfway to the next lower note) G#. Pretty mad. A vicious 3/4-tone leap there in the violins; you think it's a leading tone but oh you are so wrong. It's so flat it wants to pull you down to the G, not up to the A. It's almost exactly between the F# and the A, even, (the F# being the major third of the elusive triad) so it may as well just suck it up and pretend it's an out-of-tune 4-3 suspension.
I finished applying for the summer grant as well. Something changed a bit, so it's more community-oriented. Probably make things easier to get a grant than some esoteric ethnomusicological project practiced by one or two other people.
And, as a plug, our community blog slaughter and laughter is back, thanks to Alyssa. I'll throw up a new color scheme some time. I'm thinking rot und schwartz.
I've taken to learning German online. It gives me something mechanical to do, anyway. I probably should have learned Italian or something, but I have less of a desire to go to Italy. Too warm, too sunny, too delicious. I almost bought tickets to the Dresden music festival, but I'm not sure when my exams are. We'll work on that.
In other news, I finished four of my nine movements for this desert suite. They are, played by my computer:
1. Presto (score)
2. Allegro Pizzicato (score)
5. Geese (score)
9. Very Slow (score)
The first two movements are meant to be directly conjoined--the first, slowing down from presto to allegro, also becomes pizzicato.
In case you missed it, they get slower as the suite goes on. That haunting chord you hear the cello and viola play (and the two violins outline) at the beginning of Presto is (I know you're sweating with anticipation, sweating everywhere) a perfect fifth, D and A, in the viola, played as a double-stop on strings III and IV, and a very, very flat (49 cents flat, almost halfway to the next lower note) G#. Pretty mad. A vicious 3/4-tone leap there in the violins; you think it's a leading tone but oh you are so wrong. It's so flat it wants to pull you down to the G, not up to the A. It's almost exactly between the F# and the A, even, (the F# being the major third of the elusive triad) so it may as well just suck it up and pretend it's an out-of-tune 4-3 suspension.
I finished applying for the summer grant as well. Something changed a bit, so it's more community-oriented. Probably make things easier to get a grant than some esoteric ethnomusicological project practiced by one or two other people.
And, as a plug, our community blog slaughter and laughter is back, thanks to Alyssa. I'll throw up a new color scheme some time. I'm thinking rot und schwartz.
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