Golden

Put the golden biscuit in the basket ...

Happy Birthday, Ansel Adams

Adams, Clearing Winter Storm, Yosemite Valley National Park, 1937

We all move on the fringes of eternity and are sometimes granted vistas through fabric of illusion. Many refuse to admit it: I feel a mystery exists. There are certain times, when, as on the whisper of the wind, there comes a clear and quiet realization that there is indeed a presence in the world, a nonhuman entity that is not necessarily inhuman.

How high your awareness level is determines how much meaning you get from your world.  Art is both the taking and giving of beauty; the turning out to the light the inner folds of the awareness of the spirit.  Simply look with perceptive eyes at the world about you, and trust to your own reactions and convictions. Ask yourself: "Does this subject move me to feel, think and dream?"

Ansel Adams, born on this day in 1902

Anchovy.

Bagna càuda, which translates to "hot bath" in Italian, is a warm omaggio (thanks, Anna) originating in the Piedmont of Italy, where it was a peasant meal among wine farmers and vineyard workers. It was often prepared and consumed outdoors during cold harvests or to celebrate the production of new vintages.

Its origins are tied to the salt trade routes from Provence through the Alps. In the Middle Ages, salt was heavily taxed, so traders reportedly hid it in barrels under layers of anchovies to evade duties.

Ingredients

• 3 heads fresh garlic, peeled and thinly sliced
• 1 jar Ortiz anchovy fillets in olive oil, drained, and chopped 
• ¾ cup high-quality extra-virgin olive oil
• 6 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into small cubes
• a shot of bold, dry red wine
• 3-finger pinch inch of red pepper flakes 
• black pepper to taste
• chunks of crusty sourdough, salami, pecorino, raw cabbage

Instructions

1. Combine the olive oil and garlic in a cold saucepan or skillet. Turn the heat to the lowest setting possible.
2. Cook gently for 10–12 minutes. The garlic should soften and become fragrant but must not brown or fry, which would make the sauce bitter.
3. Add the chopped anchovies. Stir continuously for 5–10 minutes, using a wooden spoon to mash them against the side of the pan until they completely melt into a paste.
4. Emulsify the butter one piece at a time until melted and the sauce looks creamy.
5. Transfer immediately to a warming dish to keep the sauce from congealing. 
6. Dunk bread, salami, cheese, veggies into the mélange and repeat as needed

Bagna càuda also does well tossed with spaghetti (look for Martelli in the bright yellow bag) finished with a heavy hand of Pecorino Romano (there is no substitute for the famous Locatelli brand).

Happy Birthday, Luigi Boccherini

Unknown, Luigi Boccherini, 1767

Luigi Boccherini was born on this day in 1743.

The Ritirata performs the Trio in C-Major, Op. 35, No. 5 (G 105) ...

Happy Birthday, Wallace Stegner

Something will have gone out of us as a people if we ever let the remaining wilderness be destroyed.  We simply need that wild country available to us, even if we never do more than drive to its edge and look in.

Wallace Stegner, born on this day in 1909, from The Sound of Mountain Water

Moved.

Howard, Corelli with the Muse of Music, 1698

A [artist] cannot move others unless he too is moved; he must of necessity feel all of the affects he hopes to arouse in his audience.

Arcangelo Corelli

Big.

Today's a big day in our house ...

Excellent.

Excellent albums ...

Laissez les bons temps rouler!

Happy Birthday, Arcangelo Corelli

Arcangelo Corelli was born on this day in 1653.

Transverse flutist Anna Besson performs the Allegro from the Sonata in F major, op. 5 no. 4 with Louna Hosia, and Jean Rondeau ...

Beethoven, Sonata in C Major, Op. 102, No. 1

Erica Wise and some guy perform the Andante-Allegro vivace ...

Released.

The Church released Starfish on this day in 1988.

"North, South, East, and West"...

According.

Each one of us should make a surveyor's map of his lost fields and meadows.  In this way we cover the universe with drawings we have lived.  These drawing need not be exact, but they need to be written according to the shapes of our inner landscapes.

Gaston Bachelard

Björn Meyer, "Gravity"

Aufschnaiter, Dulcis fidium harmonia, Op.4

Gunar Letzbor and Ars Antiqua Austria perform a selection of Sonatas ...

Excellent.

An excellent album ...

The title track ...

Done.

Done and done.

Pond.

The Labatt Blue UP Pond Hockey Championship is in full swing.  Normally held on St. Ignace's Moran Bay, warmer temperatures have unfortunately forced the tournament into local indoor rinks.

Treasures.

Having worked in food service for over 25 years, a word that best encapsulates the eating experience for me is satisfaction.  When it comes to products like cheese, it's the difference between Kraft and craft.  The sliver of aged, cloth-bound farmhouse cheddar that is need to provide the most pleasant gustatory fulfillment is minuscule when compared to the number of pieces of individually wrapped cheese-product required to achieve the same vilely-satiated result.

The highest quality cheeses are not produced in industrial settings, but rather on farms, generally those that have been in families for generations, if not centuries, by cheese makers who have their own herds, and who created their art by hand, under increasing oversight and artistic encroachment by government regulation.

Whether it's estate-bottled wine or olive oil, extravecchio balsamic vinegar, or an honest loaf of handmade sourdough, it is impossible to get high-quality products from low-quality processes.  These processes take time and expertise to perfect (a word that's hard to believe in, but in this realm it exists), taking generations, even centuries of technique create such results.  This is the secret ingredient that never shows up on a nutrition label: time.

Find a Mom and Pop cheesemonger, talk to them, ask about their relationship to producers, listen, taste, explore.  Avoid the kitsch of espresso pecorino, hot honey prosciutto, and infused oils.  You'll get what you pay for ... guaranteed. Unless you find such examples at merchants of neglect like Whole Foods, who should be flogged for what they've been able to get away with from decades at their cheese counters (or maybe it's Hell Foods customers who deserve the lash).

Academy of Cheese has Harvey & Brockless' Tom Badcock ...

One of the most striking aspects of Tom’s worldview is his deep affinity for Japanese craftsmanship – an ethos rooted in shokunin and monozukuri, where devotion, precision, and a lifelong pursuit of mastery are not only expected, but revered.

Tom’s understanding of this philosophy was cemented during a three-week visit to Japan last year, travelling with his wife and immersing himself in a culture that places extraordinary value on craft. He speaks with real passion about witnessing how artisans dedicate their entire lives to perfecting a single product, striving to do their work to the very best of their ability – every day, for decades.

What struck him most was not just the commitment of the craftsmen themselves, but the response of society around them. In Japan, mastery earns respect. Craftsmen are treated as living heritage: valued not only for what they produce, but for the cultural continuity they represent. Some are even formally recognised as Living National Treasures.

For Tom, the parallels with British farmhouse cheesemakers are unmistakable, and deeply frustrating. “Their skills are irreplaceable,” he says. “Once they’re gone, they’re gone.” He believes cheesemakers here embody the same devotion and mastery yet are too often undervalued by the society they serve.

The Academy's Cheese Library.

Their blog is an outstanding resource for ...

• Cheese Buying and Distribution, Industry Knowledge, Language & Communication, Regulation & Good Practice
• Tasting
• Iconic Cheeses
• Affinage
• Milk Production & Cheesemaking
• Presenting and Serving

Happy Birthday, Woody Hayes

Wayne Woodrow "Woody" Hayes was born on this day in 1913.

In 1977, the BBC went to visit Coach Hayes ...

If you only pick up one word today and learn to avoid that word [apathy] like the plague. You'll see him all over the campus.  He'll be all over here and he is never the guy that's done one damn thing to civilization, not one thing ...

Whither leadership?

Excellent.

An excellent album ...

Life.

I cannot exist without you - I am forgetful of every thing but seeing you again - my Life seems to stop there - I see no further.

John Keats, from a letter to Fanny Brawne, 13 October 1819

Excellent.

An excellent album ...

Happy Birthday, Hooky

Peter Hook was born on this day in 1956.

New Order giving a go to "Isolation" ...

Listen.

Happy Birthday, Giovanni Battista Piazzetta

Piazzetta, The Glory of St. Dominic, 1727

Giovanni Battista Piazetta was born on this day in 1682.

Listen.

Thanks, Kurtastrophe.

Real.

Perhaps a man's character was like a tree, and his reputation like its shadow; the shadow is what we think of it; the tree is the real thing.

Abraham Lincoln, from an 1879 remembrance by his friend, Noah Brooks

Excellent.

An excellent (clangerless) album ...

Happy Birthday, Abraham Lincoln

Gardner, Abraham Lincoln, 1865

I know the American People are much attached to their Government;--I know they would suffer much for its sake;--I know they would endure evils long and patiently, before they would ever think of exchanging it for another. Yet, notwithstanding all this, if the laws be continually despised and disregarded, if their rights to be secure in their persons and property, are held by no better tenure than the caprice of a mob, the alienation of their affections from the Government is the natural consequence; and to that, sooner or later, it must come.

Here then, is one point at which danger may be expected.

The question recurs, "how shall we fortify against it?" The answer is simple. Let every American, every lover of liberty, every well wisher to his posterity, swear by the blood of the Revolution, never to violate in the least particular, the laws of the country; and never to tolerate their violation by others. As the patriots of seventy-six did to the support of the Declaration of Independence, so to the support of the Constitution and Laws, let every American pledge his life, his property, and his sacred honor;--let every man remember that to violate the law, is to trample on the blood of his father, and to tear the character of his own, and his children's liberty. Let reverence for the laws, be breathed by every American mother, to the lisping babe, that prattles on her lap--let it be taught in schools, in seminaries, and in colleges; let it be written in Primers, spelling books, and in Almanacs;--let it be preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in legislative halls, and enforced in courts of justice. And, in short, let it become the political religion of the nation; and let the old and the young, the rich and the poor, the grave and the gay, of all sexes and tongues, and colors and conditions, sacrifice unceasingly upon its altars.

While ever a state of feeling, such as this, shall universally, or even, very generally prevail throughout the nation, vain will be every effort, and fruitless every attempt, to subvert our national freedom.

When I so pressingly urge a strict observance of all the laws, let me not be understood as saying there are no bad laws, nor that grievances may not arise, for the redress of which, no legal provisions have been made.--I mean to say no such thing. But I do mean to say, that, although bad laws, if they exist, should be repealed as soon as possible, still while they continue in force, for the sake of example, they should be religiously observed. So also in unprovided cases. If such arise, let proper legal provisions be made for them with the least possible delay; but, till then, let them, if not too intolerable, be borne with.

Abraham Lincoln, born on this day in 1809, from his "Speech to the Young Men’s Lyceum of Springfield," 1838

Happy Birthday, Thomas Edison

The most necessary task of civilization is to teach people how to think. It should be the primary purpose of our public schools. The mind of a child is naturally active, it develops through exercise. Give a child plenty of exercise, for body and brain. The trouble with our way of educating is that it does not give elasticity to the mind. It casts the brain into a mold. It insists that the child must accept. It does not encourage original thought or reasoning, and it lays more stress on memory than observation.

Thomas Edison, born on this day in 1847, from an interview in the New York Dramatic Mirror titled "The Evolution of the Motion Picture,” conducted by Frederick James Smith

Edison's ...

• Mental Models
• Journaling Habits
• Napping Techniques

Excellent.

An excellent album ...

First.

Pitchers and catchers report today!

Matched.

George Blanda retired in 1975 with 236 career touchdown passes, which matched the number of kills he scored during the Civil War. pic.twitter.com/4KHWaFbHmZ

— Super 70s Sports (@Super70sSports) February 11, 2023

Home.

Justin Verlander is coming home.

Therapy.

Gastronomy is the greatest form of therapy any misfit can be exposed to.

Thanks, Kurt.

Archetype.

Home is not occupied only by us: it is inhabited by the ghosts of our ancestors, and by the premonition of children who are yet to be. Its essence is continuity, and it provides the archetype of every experience of peace.

Sir Roger Scruton

Pictured: Carl Robert Firchau, 1st Upper Silesian Field Artillery Regiment "von Clausewitz" No. 21, 1907

Excellent.

An excellent album ...

Return.

The RETREAT

Happy those early days! when I

Shined in my angel infancy.

Before I understood this place

Appointed for my second race,

Or taught my soul to fancy aught

But a white, celestial thought;

When yet I had not walked above

A mile or two from my first love,

And looking back, at that short space,

Could see a glimpse of His bright face;

When on some gilded cloud or flower

My gazing soul would dwell an hour,

And in those weaker glories spy

Some shadows of eternity;

Before I taught my tongue to wound

My conscience with a sinful sound,

Or had the black art to dispense

A several sin to every sense,

But felt through all this fleshly dress

Bright shoots of everlastingness.

       O, how I long to travel back,

And tread again that ancient track!

That I might once more reach that plain

Where first I left my glorious train,

From whence th’ enlightened spirit sees

That shady city of palm trees.

But, ah! my soul with too much stay

Is drunk, and staggers in the way.

Some men a forward motion love;

But I by backward steps would move,

And when this dust falls to the urn,

In that state I came, return.

Henry Vaughan

Baskerville.

See.

To be taught to read—what is the use of that, if you know not whether what you read is false or true? To be taught to write or to speak—but what is the use of speaking, if you have nothing to say? To be taught to think—nay, what is the use of being able to think, if you have nothing to think of? But to be taught to see is to gain word and thought at once, and both true.

John Ruskin, from "Of Kings' Treasuries"

Blast.

What a blast to watch, I'm sure they had a blast playing ...

Perhaps.

For "crooked trees" everywhere ...

Here, where I am surrounded by an enormous landscape, which the winds move across as they come from the seas, here I feel that there is no one anywhere who can answer for you those questions and feelings which, in their depths, have a life of their own; for even the most articulate people are unable to help, since what words point to is so very delicate, is almost unsayable. But even so, I think that you will not have to remain without a solution if you trust in Things that are like the ones my eyes are now resting upon. If you trust in Nature, in what is simple in Nature, in the small Things that hardly anyone sees and that can so suddenly become huge, immeasurable; if you have this love for what is humble and try very simply, as someone who serves, to win the confidence of what seems poor: then everything will become easier for you, more coherent and somehow more reconciling, not in your conscious mind perhaps, which stays behind, astonished, but in your innermost awareness, awakeness, and knowledge. You are so young, so much before all beginning, and I would like to beg you, dear Sir, as well as I can, to have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don't search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer. Perhaps you do carry within you the possibility of creating and forming, as an especially blessed and pure way of living; train yourself for that but take whatever comes, with great trust, and as long as it comes out of your will, out of some need of your innermost self, then take it upon yourself, and don't hate anything. 

Rainer Maria Rilke, from Letters to a Young Poet

Consequential.

The culture loves the simplicity of labels. 

Like its sibling catch-alls passionate, awesome and kind, smart is a word that is misunderstood, misused, and inappropriately labelled.  

We have surrendered one of our most consequential words.

“Smart” once described a rare and admirable combination of quick pattern-recognition, sound judgment, deep understanding, and intellectual courage. 

Coffee makers are smart.  Doorbells are smart.  Thermostats, scales, toothbrushes, refrigerators, and even trash cans are now smart.  Today it is a hollow compliment applied to almost anything that moves, sells, or flatters our self-image.  A toddler who stacks two blocks is “so smart!”  An adult who can parallel-park receives the same adjective.

When everything is smart, nothing is.

Worse still, we have begun to use “smart” where intrinsic value is lacking.. Calling someone “smart” now frequently substitutes for saying they are good, wise, honest, or brave. The implication is clear and corrosive: intelligence (or any cheap counterfeit) is the only virtue that really matters. Decency, integrity, humility, and perseverance have been demoted to secondary traits—if they are noticed at all.

The result is an overvalue of discernible cleverness. We celebrate people who are quick, shiny, and rhetorically flashy while growing blind to those who are slow, deep, awkward, and true; I admiringly call this group the "crooked trees."  We have convinced ourselves that being “smart” is the same thing as being useful. It's not.

Language is a tool used to shape reality. When we continue to culturally degrade language that once pointed toward something difficult and valuable, we devalue the very thing it pointed toward. We no longer have a reliable way to name genuine excellence because we have spent the word on light bulbs, algorithmic patterns, and passive-aggressive comebacks.

It is time to retire “smart” from this type of casual drivel.

Let it rest until we're able use it to describe a mind that sees the wonder others dismiss, holds conclusions lightly but courageously, changes its mind when the evidence demands it, and remains humble in the face of what it does not yet understand.

I move that we abolish the cult of smart.  Instead, especially where kids are concerned, try using ...

1. Hard-working
2. Enthusiastic
3. Determined
4. Poetic
5. Perceptive
6. Shrewd
7. Discerning
8. Experienced
9. Well-read
10. Critical
11. What else?

These still carry weight. They still cost something to say, a reminder that not every convenience, not every quick reply, not every small optimization deserves to be canonized with the same adjective we once reserved for the keenest forms of understanding.

What matters for recognizing high levels of performance is that a person is challenged, requiring attitudes that are perceptive and receptive to being challenged, if not actively seeking out challenge and eagerly facing and admitting the prospect of misadventure, even failure. 

That may be the most important thing a parent, a mentor, or even a teacher can impart.

James Hamblin explains ...

People are born with some innate cognitive differences, but those differences are eclipsed by early achievement, Boaler argues. When people perform well (academically or otherwise) at early ages and are labeled smart or gifted, they become less likely to challenge themselves. They become less likely to make mistakes, because they stay in their comfortable comfort zone and stop growing. And their fixed mindset persists through adulthood. The simple and innocent praising of a smart kid feeds an insidious problem that some researchers track all the way up to gender inequality in STEM careers.

From Inc. ...

Our society is obsessed with the label of being smart. Even more so, we're obsessed with how smart you are compared to others. Historically, these measurements started in early education as a way to place children in the "right" class levels. As a result, our society has become overly focused on intelligence, so much so, that in the business world it's common to innocently describe others as smart without much thought. Being smart is defined in the dictionary as having or showing a quick-witted intelligence. This just tells someone they're fast thinking, but what value does it ultimately provide in the workplace?

The proclivity to use this label can cause long-lasting damage. Below are some reasons why being labeled "smart" is actually a hindrance rather than a help.

Hamblin continues ...

At whatever age smart people develop the idea that they are smart, they also tend to develop vulnerability around relinquishing that label. So the difference between telling a kid “You did a great job” and “You are smart” isn’t subtle. That is, at least, according to one growing movement in education and parenting that advocates for retirement of “the S word.”

The idea is that when we praise kids for being smart, those kids think: Oh good, I'm smart. And then later, when those kids mess up, which they will, they think: Oh no, I'm not smart after all. People will think I’m not smart after all. And that’s the worst. That’s a risk to avoid, they learn.“Smart” kids stand to become especially averse to making mistakes, which are critical to learning and succeeding.

“Mistakes grow your brain,” as the professor of mathematics education at Stanford University Jo Boaler put it on Monday at the Aspen Ideas Festival, which is co-hosted by The Atlantic. I wondered why, then, my brain is not so distended that it spills out of my ears and nose. I should have to stuff it back inside like a sleeping bag, and I should have to carry Q-tips around during social events as stuffing implements. Boaler notes, more eloquently, that at least a small part of the forebrain called the thalamus can appreciably grow after periods of the sort of cognitive stimulation involved in mistake-making. What matters for improving performance is that a person is challenged, which requires a mindset that is receptive to being challenged—if not actively seeking out challenge and failure. And that may be the most important thing a teacher can impart.

Psychology Today looks closely at the culture's neutering obsession with "smart"...

The other aspect of "smart" is an evaluative one. It says, roughly, that this display of intelligence is one that the speaker considers praiseworthy, or which accords with the speaker's values. If there is a cleverly worded advertisement in favor of a political cause that I support, or a thoughtfully posed objection that supports my point of view, that is "smart." But if there is a cleverly worded advertisement in support of my political opponent, or an objection which undermines my favored theory, that is not smart at all.

This account of the meaning of "smart," if it is on the right track, encourages a degree of caution. Thick concepts are notorious for the way they build evaluative views into purportedly neutral language. Consider "chaste." This term has a certain descriptive content to it, but it also tacitly accepts a certain view of gender and sexual morality, one which many of us would now reject. We are therefore rightly reluctant to describe people as "chaste," and I think we should show a measure of reluctance toward "smart" as well, which is not as descriptive as it seems to be. 

Let’s stop using smart.

Thinking.

Understand this clearly: you can teach a man to draw a straight line, and to carve it; and to copy and carve any number of given lines or forms, with admirable speed and perfect precision; and you find his work perfect of its kind: but if you ask him to think about any of those forms, to consider if he cannot find any better in his own head, he stops; his execution becomes hesitating; he thinks, and ten to one he thinks wrong; ten to one he makes a mistake in the first touch he gives to his work as a thinking being. But you have made a man of him for all that. He was only a machine before, an animated tool.

John Ruskin, from The Stones of Venice

Washington.

Young Washington is to be released for Independence Day ...

Accordance.

Steve points to the Friedmans on the concentration of power ...

We have been forgetting the basic truth that the greatest threat to human freedom is the concentration of power, whether in the hands of government or anyone else.  We have persuaded ourselves that it is safe to grant power, provided it is for good purposes. 

Fortunately, we are waking up.  We are again recognizing the dangers of an overgoverned society, coming to understand that good objectives can be perverted by bad means, that reliance on the freedom of people to control their own lives in accordance with their own values is the surest way to achieve the full potential of a great society.

Chopin, Prélude No. 6 in B-Minor

Sara Alice Ott performs the Lento assai ...