SaltShaker

 As Jupiter reached opposition earlier this week, it put on a spectacular show of cannibalism for anyone viewing with modest telescopes. Planetary specialists around the world have been watching with bated breath as a cataclysmic encounter between Jupiter’s Great Red Spot (GRS), Oval BA (Red, Jr.), and the newly discovered Little Red Spot (LRS) unfolded [...]

 O human race born to fly upward, wherefore at a little wind dost thou fall.”
- Dante Alighieri, The Divine Comedy

Buenos Aires - It’s amazing how time flies. It’s been more than two years since I posted a little walking tour along Avenida de Mayo and mentioned some of the beautiful Beaux Arts style buildings, including [...]

The collection of A.C. Gilbert toys at A.C. Gilbert’s Discovery Village features a few items that would shock the modern parent, like a chemistry set that contained the poison sodium cyanide and an atomic energy kit that included a small sample of radioactive material. “He also had a glass blowing kit for boys,” says Vorachek, [...]

 A CARTOON in The New Yorker many years ago depicted a disgruntled little girl confronted with a mysterious substance on her dinner plate. Though assured by her mother that it was broccoli, she remained unconvinced. ”I say it’s spinach,” she insisted, ”and I say the hell with it.”
- Marian Burros, NY Times, 12/22/82
Buenos Aires - [...]

 In the greatest confusion there is still an open channel to the soul. It may be difficult to find because by midlife it is overgrown, and some of the wildest thickets that surround it grow out of what we describe as our education. But the channel is always there, and it is our business to [...]

 Whoe’er has gone thro’ London street,
Has seen a butcher gazing at his meat,
And how he keeps
Gloating upon a sheep’s
Or bullock’s personals,
as if his own;
How he admires his halves
And quarters–and his calves,
As if in truth upon his own legs grown.”
- Thomas Hood, 19th century poet and humorist
Buenos Aires - One of the most common areas of [...]

 Mrs. Adams: Malena fell down the cellar stairs!
Virgil Adams: Did she break any of our things?
- from Alice Adams, 1935
Buenos Aires - Though he appeared, and often starred, in more than one hundred films during his career, Fred MacMurray is probably best known as Stephen Douglas, the patriarch of the My Three Sons family [...]

 He who has no bread has no authority.
- Turkish proverb
Buenos Aires - More recent bread experiments…

Light rye bread direct from the NY Times Bread and Soup Cookbook - flavor great, a little denser than described or expected

My own mix of wheatgerm, wheat bran, whole wheat and bread flour - came out beautifully

Mashed Potato Chive Bread [...]