The .Plan

Deliciously understated passages like the following make the new Roberts book an occasionally pleasurable read:

It is hard to be friends with an unrepentant cannibal. Even if he is not at the moment eyeing my musculature with a fond view to the tenderloins, still the fact that my tenderloins are the kind of thing on which he feeds threatens to spoil everything. I may not notice that the relationship is spoiled. For one thing, I may be so crass that I accept this mutual cannibalism with equanimity; perhaps I don’t have an inkling what spiritual friendship is. Dog-eat-dog is just the name of the game; what does it matter if after we’ve had some nice meals together, one of ends up in the other’s pot? Only I’d better watch out that if that happens, it’s me who makes a meal of him, and not the other way around. On the other hand, if I am not so crass, I may achieve equanimity by deceiving myself a little about the mutual cannibalism. I say to myself, “I would never eat him, for he is my friend; and I’m sure he wouldn’t eat me, either. It would never come to that. No, I’m sure it wouldn’t”. But the way to avoid all these doubts and troubles is to give up cannibalism.
–Robert C. Roberts, Spiritual Emotions: A Psychology of Christian Virtues (Eerdmans, 2007)

Two years ago, Arnold Hoon, a chef from Johannesburg, was driving along South Africa’s West Coast in search of lunch. On a whim, he and his wife, Annelise Bosch, followed an old wooden sign to Paternoster, a traditional fishing village about 90 minutes north of Cape Town.

What they found were whitewashed cottages overlooking Paternoster Bay, and a single restaurant, Voorstrandt (Strandloper Way; 27-22-752-2038), near a beach dotted with fishing boats. Soon, they were dining alfresco on fresh oysters and grilled lobsters, served with a crunchy green salad. “We never left,” said Ms. Bosch, a former actress.
–Nadine Rubin, “Cape Town’s Foodie Suburb”, New York Times, March 30, 2008

Apparently, cold water will not reach boiling temperature more quickly than hot water:

This kitchen myth may have started as a way to encourage people to cook with cold water, not hot, which can contain more impurities. It may also have its origins in the fact that cold water generally gains heat more rapidly than water that is already hot, though it will not boil faster.

But under the right circumstances, the reverse phenomenon can occur, and hot water can freeze more quickly than cool water.

Part of the reason appears to be that hotter water loses mass to evaporation, and because it has less mass, less energy is needed to freeze it.
–Anahad O’Connor, “The Claim: Cold Water Boils More Quickly than Hot Water.”, New York Times, March 18, 2008

But… does this mean that hot water reaches boiling temperature more quickly than cold water, or that they reach boiling temperature at an equivalent pace?

Corned beef, check.
Cabbage & parsnips & turnips & carrots & potatoes, check.
Guinness, check.
Boddington’s, check.

The New York Times highlights the results of a study in which volunteers were asked to evaluate 5 wine samples with price labels (ranging from $5 to $90) while undergoing fMRI scanning. They were then presented with the same wine samples 8 weeks later — but this time one of the $90 bottles was mislabeled as a $10 bottle, and one of the $5 bottles was mislabeled as a $45 bottle.

Turns out that people liked the wine samples with the more expensive labels, and the fMRI findings were consistent with this.

We measured the impact of price information on EP by comparing the mean reported liking rating for wines 1 and 2 when administered at a high vs. a low price. We found significant differences for both wines (P < 0.001, Fig. 1C). In addition, reported pleasantness was correlated with wine prices (r = 0.59, P < 0.000). We could not find a similar behavioral effect for intensity ratings (Fig. 1D). To explore further the role of prices on experienced pleasantness, we administered a follow-up behavioral session 8 weeks after the main experiment, during which wines were presented without price information. As expected, in this case, there were no reported differences among the wines (Fig. 1E).
--Hilke Plassmann et al., “Marketing actions can modulate neural representations of experienced pleasantness”, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, January 22, 2008

In West Hollywood there is an Italian restaurant, Al Gelato, where you can eat the world’s best large meatball for $5.95.

Making meatballs, or making a large meatball, is not an exact science. You take ground chuck and Italian sausage, 2:1 or 3:1, and mix it with basil, parsley, oregano, salt, ground pepper, stale bread crumbs, and a few eggs. To help the meatball absorb water, minced zucchini is also an option.

It never looks pretty when you start out:

I think that’s why cooking can be therapeutic. Only in the kitchen do you see the rawness at the beginning, the beauty at the end, and the messy process in the middle.

Maggi Dawn has written, “Repeated, habitual prayer gradually tests and sifts what you believe is really important and what is of ephemeral value. If something doesn’t matter that much, the momentum for prayer will diminish. But if it does matter, an unanswered prayer becomes like grit in an oyster — something that worries and annoys you until you are determined not to take no for an answer.”

Nearly 10 years ago, in the spring of 1998, dinner at Bob the Chef kicked off an evening that still brings a smile to my face when I think about it. That evening would involve martinis, whiny women, dancing, Asian gangsters, slurpees, and lots and lots of Boston Police Department squad cars.

The restaurant - perhaps better known by its previous name, Bob the Chef’s - was for decades a hole-in-the-wall diner that once served the likes of Martin Luther King Jr. and Jesse Jackson. Darryl Settles bought Bob the Chef’s in 1990 and slowly transformed it into a stylish bistro with a new name and a more diverse crowd.

Settles, whose name has been associated with Boston’s jazz scene over the past decade, told the Globe yesterday that he is selling the South End institution to Malcolm Aalders, a 28-year-old Cleveland native who recently moved to Boston from the Netherlands.

Aalders will take over the space in December and plans to rename it Night Town. The menu will feature American cuisine, and live musical performances will range from rock to funk to jazz to “whatever people want,” Aalders said yesterday. “We’ll have the best burger in the Greater Boston area,” he added.
–Suzanne Ryan, “Bistro ending its soulful reign”, Boston Globe, October 30, 2007

So sad.

But on the upside, Night Town is a beloved institution. Is it a coincidence that the new buyer is from Cleveland?

It only gets you so far:

“I was sort of annoyed by my gratitude journal,” said Gretchen Rubin, who chronicled the year she spent trying to become happier in a book, “The Happiness Project,” to be published in 2009, and a blog (happinessproject.typepad.com).

While she acknowledged that journals work for many people — “it’s probably one of the top five things for increasing happiness,” she said — it was a trial for her.

“It’s so limitless,” she said. “ ‘I’m grateful for air conditioning. I’m grateful for living in a democratic society.’ I didn’t find it particularly happiness-inducing.”
–Henry Fountain, “Let Us Give Thanks. In Writing.”, New York Times, November 22, 2007

Better aim at the moon than shoot unto the well.

Your principles matter more to you than any money or success