Obligatory pop culture update

Listening to:
- She and Him. Zooey Deschanel is obviously a fairy tale, because without the benefit of fairy godmothers, no one can be this talented at this many things, or that enchantingly pretty. Damn her.

- Deke Dickerson. Go on, roll your eyes. I dare you.

-The Phenomenauts. Because I am still a convention-going, card-carrying, costume-wearing science-fiction non-apologist from way back. Word.

Reading:

-The Canon, by Natalie Angier
This is kind of science lite, an overview of various disciplines by a non scientist for people who are frightened by science. I still got stuck on the probability chapter. My only real beef with Angier is her tendency to insert herself into her writing. It worked well in Woman: An Intimate Geography, but only because it was her personal experiences that prompted her research. Here, I wish she had let her voice speak for her.

-Natural Acts, by David Quammen
Quammen comes right out and says what Angier will not: he is not a scientist, and he writes about natural history and the social sciences because it is the only way the world makes sense to him. This collection, which is published in its 25th anniversary edition, is more noticeably magazine articles than his later collections of essays. Still, he never fails to inspire me when he wryly makes an observation about, say, octopus eyes, or the evolutionary path of mosquitoes, and in doing so makes a larger point about our own place in the world and how frail it, and we, are.

-Louis Armstrong's New Orleans, by Thomas Brothers
This was not as well written or as insightful as I wanted it to be. I haven't finished it yet, and it has to go back to the library this afternoon. Prospects are not good for its completion.

Watching:

-Leatherheads

Whither hast thou gone, Spencer Tracy? And why the hell should we accept Renee Zellweger in place of our beloved Kate Hepburn?

-BSG
Alright, already! Okay! I give up! Look, Netflix is winging this to me as fast as is humanly possible, okay, so no revocation of my aforementioned sci-fi geek card. You people are fucking RUTHLESS.

Eating:

Nothing of value in Las Vegas. But here at home, I am very fond of dried apricots stuffed with goat cheese, and also bacon pie, which I understand is a breakfast delicacy found in New Zealand. You make it thusly: chop and fry three or four rashers of good bacon with some diced onion, and some mushrooms if you like. Line a pie plate with puff pastry. Throw in your bacon. Scramble six or eight eggs without milk. Pour that on. Toss in a handful of shredded cheese. Top with another sheet of puff pastry. Seal your edges, cut vents, egg wash. Bake at 375 for 35 or 40 minutes. Rest it for a few, then slice and enjoy.

You may now return to your regularly scheduled snark. Suggestions for this list for next time?