I became insane with long intervals of horrible sanity.
The trouble with fighting for human freedom is that one spends most of one's time defending scoundrels. For it is against scoundrels that oppressive laws are first aimed, and oppression must be stopped at the beginning if it is to be stopped at all.
Many people would sooner die than think; In fact, they do so
What I have been telling you, from alpha to omega, what is the one great thing the sigil taught me — that everything in life is miraculous. For the sigil taught me that it rests within the power of each of us to awaken at will from a dragging nightmare of life made up of unimportant tasks and tedious useless little habits, to see life as it really is, and to rejoice in its exquisite wonderfulness. If the sigil were proved to be the top of a tomato-can, it would not alter that big fact, nor my fixed faith. No Harrowby, the common names we call things by do not matter — except to show how very dull we are ...
February 19, 2012 - 12:30 p.m.
For no good reason I went to bed late last night, after 2 AM. Then for the first time I slept late, after 10. It's good that I got eight hours sleep but I missed most of John Platt's show. I have not been able to sleep that late in months. Now I have to get back in the habit of being in bed by midnight and up at eight.
I did not get enough sleep yesterday which meant that I spent much of the day as a slug. I didn't do much. I went to the supermarket, watched TV and read the paper. The only excitement was culinary. I invented a completely new dish for dinner; plantain-kielbasa soup. It's a main course. I didn't get this from a recipe though I got some of the basic ideas and cooking times from the bacon potato soup I've been eating. At first I was going to use breakfast sausages and I still might do that some time. Then I decided to use something more exotic. The dish is supposed to have a Caribbean influence so I'd love to use some sausage from that area but I didn't think I'd find one at key food. I settled on andouille but that was too expensive at key food. I'll pick some up next time I see it cheaper. I got the kielbasa because that was what was on sale.
It came out amazingly good but I'm not sure I should call it soup. The plantain turned to a much and the entire dish thickened into a sort of paste. Is there a special name for a super thick soup like that? Is it more like a stew? I can't decide. I just know that I loved it. Here's the recipe. It makes two servings.
1 can beef broth
1 yellow plantain
½ lbs of kielbasa
½ a head of garlic
¼ cup of shredded cheddar cheese.
Splash of olive oil
1 Dash of salt
3 dashes of jerk seasoning
1 dash of cayenne pepper.
Peel the plantain then cut it into quarter inch slices. Cut each slice into at least four wedges. Cut the thicker ones into eight. Separate, peel and dice the garlic cloves then sauté them in olive oil right in the pot. Don't bother to measure the oil. You'll see how much you need. I don't actually measure anything. Sauté them till they are brown.
Stir in the broth then the plantain. Turn up the burner and add the salt, jerk, and pepper and stir.
When it comes to a boil turn down the burner to low and cover. Cook for 15 minutes. I might try it a bit less next time and see how that affects the consistency.
While that's cooking take the kielbasa and grill it. It comes precooked, just make sure it's browned. Then cut it into small pieces and add it to the soup. I did this just before the 15 minutes was up. Then add the cheese. I don't measure it. I just use four pinches. Stir till it melts in. This is where everything gelled.
Turn off the heat let it cool for a few minutes and serve. It was very hot. It takes that few minutes. It made a very satisfying dinner. I'm proud of myself. Of course what I did to make this "original" dish is simply make substitutions in the original potato and bacon soup. I actually replaced every ingredient except for the salt and cheese.
If you make it with other types of sausage let me know how it comes out.
When I started writing Wise Madness I never imagined that I'd give recipes. Maybe I'm turning gay. Oh stop looking at me like that. Can't you see that I'm joking? I needed a segue into discussing same sex marriage. I'm not going to discuss the morals or justice of allowing gays to marry; I'd be preaching to the choir. I want to talk use it to make a point about political dynamics.
Thirty years ago there was not only no support for same-sex marriage, the possibility was not even discussed. I was not something were for or against, it was something that wasn't considered. If someone brought it up in general conversation it would have been taken as a joke. Now it's entered the main stream. It isn't being done by the courts now but by the legislatures. Last year New York's legalized same-sex marriage and this year Washington and Maryland. New Jersey's legislature did but the governor vetoed it. Though the votes are not there for an override there's a good chance they will get the needed votes in the two years they have for the override.
So what happened? Did the American people listen to reasoned arguments and let logic change their minds? How did something go from the unthinkable to the fringe to being debatable to the accepted?
I call it the penumbra effect. The penumbra is the partial shadow that surrounds the umbra, the full shadow. If you see a partial solar eclipse you are in the penumbra of the moon's shadow.
Beliefs have a penumbra too. People believing in something makes it easier for other people to at least consider the possibility. The more people that believe the larger the umbra, and the penumbra grows even more. Then more people can consider it and more people can start to accept the belief and join the umbra. If this goes on long enough it can become accepted wisdom. This is what's going on with same-sex marriage. Young people growing up in an era when it was at least debated have much less trouble accepting it than older people who grew up with it as unthinkable. They don't have to do the heavy lifting of thinking for themselves and going against the crowd. People like to let other people do their thinking for them.
On social issues the left has done a good job of spreading the penumbra. There are core groups with have a lot at stake in the issues that do the work of advocating positions that elicit hostile reactions. Look at the advancements in my lifetime in the rights of blacks, women, and gays. There was a time and place where sharing a drinking fountain with a black was unthinkable. There is still plenty of racism but we've come a long way. Anyone objecting to dealing with blacks knows that he will likely be scorned for what he says so is less likely to say things or says them filled with qualifications, and so the penumbra of racism shrinks.
The right has done a better job of spreading their economic penumbra. It started with Reagan and grew. By the nineties Clinton, a democratic president ended "welfare as we know it." Deregulation became the norm. It took bravery to speak of raising taxes. We didn't speak of economic inequality and the government helping became more and more unthinkable.
I was highly dubious of the Occupy Wall Street movement but they accomplished something. They brought the idea of the fairness of the economic system back into the debate. The plutocrats are fighting this with all their wealth and power but they are going against the tide. The interests of the rich are no longer totally confounded with the interest of the country.
It goes back and forth. Now the religious right is getting ready to refight birth control. 98% of women use it but we are actually debating its morality now. They are doing the work and making the effort to make the accepted the debatable.
Now I have to make the effort to finish this and make brunch. Thanks to Jeremy Lin Time Warner and MSG made a deal and I'll get to watch today's Knick game on TV. They've been blacked out since this year because Dolan, the owner of the Knicks and MSG, does not work or play well with others.
I signed the Pro-Truth Pledge:
please hold me accountable.
Memories: Not that Horrid Song - May 29, 2018
Wise Madness is Now In Session - May 28, 2018
The NFL and the First Amendment - May 27, 2018
On The Road Again - May 26, 2018
Oliver the Three-Eyed Crow - May 25, 2018
creative commons
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 License.
Horvendile February 19, 2012
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