Little Blue Dots

What a fast week this was.  Work deliverables kept me hopping, and I must admit that a portion of me is starting to plan out the logistics of the holidays.  The grass is still largely green.  I wore shorts on Thursday while walking the dog.  Between now and Christmas, our high temps will be well above freezing.  Should I make a tee time on the 25th?

It looks like our boys will both return home some time next Tuesday.  So I better get our bathroom put back together, having had the shower re-grouted and sliding glass doors installed.  If we get through the holidays with all four of us showering regularly and no leaks, I will feel confident in repairing the first floor ceiling that has long been suffering from whatever the source of this leak has been.  Fingers crossed.

Littleton's Market in Upper Arlington opened its doors a week ago Saturday.  Lori and I snuck over for a quick visit on Tuesday, trying to avoid a crowded bunch of looky-loos (we succeeded, there were plenty of customers there, but we were able to comfortably explore everything).  Littleton's is a relaunch of sorts - it is in the Tremont Center where the former Huffman’s Market was located, but they expanded the footprint by about 50%.  It is very, very nice.  They have leaned into preparing lots of ready-to-eat foods for it clientele, but they still have wonderful produce, meat, poultry and fish for those who choose to cook for themselves.  We found a new brand of peanuts from Centerville, Ohio that may become a regular in our pantry.  If you are looking for a unique protein for the holidays, you should definitely visit the Littleton's meat or fish counters.

One item that I was looking for while at Littleton's Market was any sort of unique dried bean.  I was recently inspired by this episode of The Splendid Table, a long-time NPR radio program and podcast about food and cooking.  The episode focuses on the French baked bean dish, cassoulet.  It was a great reminder to me.  I hadn’t thought of cassoulet in quite some time, but it makes for a wonderful cold weather dish.  Lori and I took the boys to Paris in 2012.  The cafe next to our hotel knocked our socks off with their cassoulet - so much so that I abandoned my efforts to cook it upon returning home.  I couldn’t come anywhere close to replicating the dish.  I’m a more experienced cook now, plus the family has had plenty of time to forget just how good it was in gay Puh-ree.  The podcast inspired me to take another run at it, and the holidays will be a perfect time to do so.  Oh, and I found some good beans - Rancho Gordo seems to be one of the most legit online providers of legumes that I have come across (I always welcome referrals, though - let me know if you’ve got a source that you like).

So, the hustle and the bustle is starting to ramp up.  Cleaning, organizing, cooking, socializing.  I’m looking forward to it, and also wary of it.  It’s easy to overdo things, but this isn’t my first rodeo.  Come Tuesday, Lori and I will be looking at the little blue dots in the “Find My” app on our phones - each dot representing one of our children, making their way home.  Checking back in to Hotel Bell.  I just hope we can retain our 4-star rating.  Fingers crossed…

Sunday Supper
I’ve already tipped my hand, haven’t I?  This cassoulet recipe would make for a wonderful Sunday Supper - give it a go.  Here’s a nice Fall Salad to complement things.  No dessert recommendation this week.  I’m sure the cookies and candies are starting to pile up.

Sunday Music
This Sunday I am pleased to share this NPR Tiny Desk featuring the artist called Laufey (pronounced Lay-vay).  Her full name is Laufey Lín Jónsdóttir, she is from Iceland, born of the union of her Icelandic father and Chinese mother.  She is just 24 years old, but amazingly poised and richly talented.  See for yourself!

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

Minimalist Manger

At last weekend’s Candlelight Walking Tour, I witnessed something subtly striking.  

Two people that I know, both a bit older than me, members of the same choir, were performing with the choir as a part of the tour.  The concert was wonderful, the moment special in the way that the holidays are often special in our little town.  Talented people sharing their talents to a group of people who feel privileged to witness it.

Both of these people I was watching sing in this moment had experienced the loss of a loved one not long ago.  For each of them, this is the first Christmas without those loved ones.  Yet there they were, singing beautifully, joyful songs of the season.  If you didn’t know them, you would have no idea how they might be feeling in that moment.  To be fair, even I don’t really know what they were feeling.  But I know they were there, actively engaging in that wonderful communal moment, not long after suffering great losses.  It was beautiful, and poignant.

The term “the holidays” conjures so many emotional memories.  Christmas was magical in my youth, kind of boring in my teens and young adulthood, then re-animated when I had the chance to experience it vicariously through my children.  Today the holidays function as a great time of reunion for family and friends, with a thin but growing veneer of bittersweet remembrances of those who are no longer here to share these times with us.  

Life and food are similar, in that both use the full range of flavors in order to be fully realized.  The sweet is nice, but especially so when balanced with the bitter.  Salty moments born from extra effort are balanced by the savory umami interludes, where everything just feels right.  We need it all, though we wouldn’t always seek some of it out.  That’s OK.  Life delivers it to us, whether we want it or not.  The only question is:  How are you going to incorporate it into the recipe of your life?  I aim to be like those choir members who, although no doubt hurting, lean into the season, understanding that joy and sorrow can operate together and that, if we live and love long enough, our human hearts learn to hold both.

Lori and I have been discussing what to get the boys for Christmas.  The more we talked, the more clear it became that what they needed most, in addition to just being home and nurtured by us, was cold, hard, cash.  So, Christmas morning, as we are eating breakfast casserole, sipping fresh-squeezed orange juice and freshly brewed dark coffee, we’ll have a few small gifts for them to open, and their bank balances will get a little love.

They don’t need more “stuff.”  Neither do we.  We are in Marie Kondo purge/sort/reorganize mode, whenever we can muster the time and energy.  No, this year we’re going to hang out together, eat well, read books, get plenty of sleep, and nibble on some cookies.  I am primed and ready to enjoy the holidays.  We’re keeping things simple this year.

Sunday Supper
This Mushroom Stew is a hearty cool weather menu item that Lori and I enjoyed earlier this week.  Pairing it with this Green Goddess Chopped Salad would work wonderfully.  

Sunday Music
This Sunday I share with you an NPR Tiny Desk performance by the Italian composer and pianist, Ludovico Einaudi.  It is a lovely listen - enjoy!

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

Blank Check

Greetings!

I hope this message finds you well, easing gently into the holiday season.  We have slid into the classic grey Ohio winter mode - moderate temps with plenty of clouds and varying degrees of rain.  Thankfully things were dry and warm for yesterday's Candlelight Walking Tour.  I'm not sure it has ever been so well-attended.

Three recent local restaurant experiences:  The Birria Tacos at Pochos were delicious.  The chocolate milk shake at Seven 4 Zero was yummy, and the Indian food at the Shan E Punjab Dhaba food truck is fantastic (if you commute via I-70, you can call your dinner order in and pick it up on the way home).  All of these operators are wonderful additions to the local food scene.

This past Thursday I had both an endoscopy and colonoscopy.  Ooh, gross, right?  Yeah, whatever.  Get over it.  Both of my parents died of cancer.  Anything I can do to prevent the Big C from getting the jump on me, I’ll do it.  I have the pictures to prove it.

Over the summer I began experiencing some persistent heartburn symptoms, a first for me.  Given my family history, it made sense to take a peak into my stomach to see what we might learn.  This also synced up with the timing of my second colonoscopy.  In terms of convenience, it made sense to do them both in the same session.  To be clear, I feel fine and this was a pro-active attempt at screening for problems.  If you are male, over the age of 50 and have not yet had colonoscopy - get off your ass and have it scoped!

The week of Thanksgiving, I received a call from an administrator at the facility where the procedures would take place.  The purpose of her call was to let me know that I would be responsible for paying a portion of the facility fees.  I asked her how much this would cost, and her answer was…fuzzy.  She made it clear that she could only share the costs associated with using her facility - kind of like a room rental fee.  But these costs would not include the amounts to be billed by the doctors, or possibly the laboratories that might need to analyze any tissue samples that arise out of the procedures.  She also suggested that I call my insurer, to get more clarity on my financial obligations. She even gave me the diagnostic and procedural codes, info the insurance representative would likely need.

I won’t drag you into the minutia of the whole thing.  It will suffice to say that I, a reasonably responsible and intelligent human being, after spending the better part of an hour on the phone, have absolutely no idea what I’m going to have to pay for these proactive, prevention-minded procedures.  If I can’t get clarity regarding the costs of this relatively well-defined situation, how messy would it be if I were really ill, with fuzzier symptoms?  Of course, we all know the answer - I would be screwed.  So would you, probably.  Yet we all just whistle through the graveyard, hoping circumstances don’t call for us to wrestle with this reality.  And if we are in an actual health crisis, we'll just start the meter running and figure everything out later, right?

This 4-year old article from CNBC suggests that 2/3rds of all bankruptcies declared in the U.S. are due to people being buried by the costs of healthcare.  It may not be fully accurate, but it has the ring of the truth to me.  I saw a version of this play out with a friend many years ago when his wife was diagnosed with breast cancer.  They pulled out all the stops fighting it, which pulled him away from work…the double-whammy of massive unplanned expenses and reduced income so that he could oversee her care did not drive him into bankruptcy, but it certainly could have.  No doubt he is working harder today because of this massive life event.

Little old Neal can’t revise the entire U.S. healthcare system all by himself.  But if I could, one feature of it would include a cost preview for patients - with dollar amounts and probabilities.  If we can get an estimate of the cost to have maintenance work done our cars, we can get something similar for healthcare.  Famed investor Charlie Munger passed away this past week at the tender age of 99.  He is credited with the quote “Show me the incentives, and I’ll show you the outcome.”  The incentives most here certainly are not aligned in favor of the consumers of health care - you and me.  Our calcified system has rent-seekers charging fees at every turn, without adding value to the process of delivering care. 

I believe that Lori and I have good insurance in place, but it certainly leaves open some range of financial doomsday scenarios.  Unlikely scenarios, but not impossible.  The market will gladly sell us more insurance, but I’m skeptical that we can fully eliminate all chances of being wiped out.  There is no such thing as a risk-free life.  We just have to manage the risks as best we can.

As humanity digitizes its information, we are able to see much more clearly so many disjointed patterns.  The U.S. spends more per capita on healthcare than any other country, yet our life expectancy is less than that of many comparable countries.  Obviously something is wrong.  The only question is what should we do about it - but the institutions that benefit from the status quo will fight like hell to maintain it.  I’m sure it’ll all get worked out in 50 or 100 years.  Until then, don’t get sick.

Sunday Supper
Let your oven do all the work this Sunday - this sturdy roasted Oregano Chicken and roasted Asparagus w/ Crispy Leeks and Capers is a wonderful one-two punch.

Sunday Music
I stumbled across this artist recently - Gregory Porter is an incredibly soulful singer, songwriter and actor.  Born in Bakersfield, California, his musical career took off after he moved to Brooklyn, New York in in 2004.  This full concert in Basel, Switzerland was recorded a little more than a year ago.  Enjoy!

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

Carmen Ohio

Hello, Friend.

I hope that your Thanksgiving was whatever you needed it to be.  It sure was what we were looking for in our home - our boys were back under the same roof for almost a week, friends and family gathered on Thursday and we enjoyed some of the best food I've ever cooked.  One of the keys this year, I believe, was the decision to purchase a smoked turkey breast from Ray Ray's here in Granville.  That turkey was as flavorful and juicy as anything I've ever cooked - and didn't require any oven time or space!  This, plus extensive prep work done in the days leading up to Thanksgiving made hosting the event so much more fun.  It was basically an exercise in topping off everyone's beverages and acting as the Oven Traffic Controller, making sure the different items went into the oven on schedule.  Lori made the mashed potatoes and I made the gravy (using turkey stock I prepared on Monday)...other than this, everything else was prepped in advance.  I loved sitting at the end of our driveway at 9:30am, watching much of the community parade by as they ran and walked the five kilometer Turkey Trot route.  I saw so many people that I know streaming past our house - it was fun to chat everybody up.

On Friday we welcomed long-time friends to the house, where we decorated holiday cookies, took Nova for a walk and enjoyed a bonfire in the back yard.  Some pizzas from Harvest added variety in addition to the Thursday leftovers we continue to enjoy.  Saturday had two significant events - the first being the annual rivalry football game between my alma mater Ohio State University Buckeyes and the Wolverines of the University of Michigan.  The second was a wonderful holiday gathering hosted by our friends, featuring the traditional Nordic mulled wine/cider beverage called glögg.  My Buckeyes lost a hard-fought game, and the glögg gathering was superb.  Despite the loss on the gridiron, I enjoyed both immensely.

As I sat down to watch the game, I reflected on how unattached I have become to the outcomes of Buckeye football games.  If they win, great.  If they lose, oh well....  This was not how I felt about Buckeye football as a high-schooler and undergraduate, or as a young adult graduate of the institution.  Buckeye losses would make me sad.  Today, I view it as great entertainment and little else.  It turns out that my attachment to the outcome of the game doesn't influence it one bit.  Kind of like having a flight cancelled - you can yell at the airline employee, but you're still not going anywhere right away.

I attended two Ohio State home games this year - the Penn State and Michigan State games.  The weather was favorable for both, and I enjoyed them.  Walking across campus definitely sparked all sorts of memories.  But I have to admit, I don't feel deeply connected to Ohio State as an institution.  I did a lot of growing up on and around that campus, learned some important stuff, and made a few life-long friends.  But for some reason I don't give OSU much credit for this.  There is something special about young adulthood - we all grow significantly at this time in our life, experiencing lots of "firsts."  Somehow these things are etched a little deeper in our synapses.  For me, they just happened to occur at THE Ohio State University.  :-).  It is curious that I don't feel closer to my alma mater.  Maybe it's a response to all the fanaticism that I witness around the football program - from people who never even attended the university.  I'm not sure...it seems like there may be more to unpack here.

While I marvel at the physical prowess of football athletes, I view the massive compensation earned by the pros and the CTE risked by all who participate in the sport as problematic.  I don't need people shortening their lives, incurring brain injuries for my entertainment.  And I'd rather see school teachers earn more for their contributions to society, as opposed to top draft picks.  I know these two things have nothing to do with each other - false dichotomies are not a new idea for me!  The world's not entirely fair - professional athletes are going to earn more than school teachers, regardless of how much they contribute to the greater good.

This morning we will hug the boys and send them back to school.  In a few more weeks they'll return for what I hope will be a wonderful Winter break.  Have a restful day, and a good week ahead.

Sunday Supper
I have to have something light and healthy after all the eating I've done these last few days.  This Kale Tabouleh Salad, and Salmon with Cherry Tomatoes will make for a great one-two punch.  Give them a try.  

Sunday Music
This week I share with you a live performance by the great jam band, Phish.  Formed in 1983 in Burlington, Vermont, they enjoy a massive following by fans all over the country.  Enjoy!

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

Flow State

Howdy, Neighbor.

I hope this message finds you well-prepared for the holiday week ahead.  The warm weather of last week allowed local farmers to plant their first-ever crop of Winter sweetcorn.  I’m told that with staggered plantings we will enjoy the harvest from Valentines Day all the way to April Fools Day.  I heard a long screech from a hawk, flying high overhead yesterday, and thought back to the baby hawks that were fledged across the street this summer. 

Monday evening I was watching TV with Lori when I received a text message from our friend Denise, who owns Ghostwriter Public House.  It read: “Crazy, but we are celebrating four years this week at GW!!  Would love to offer free cake to all guests Wednesday and Thursday this week.  I’m behind the 8 ball on planning…can you help?”  I love Denise and her husband Dennis, and jumped at the chance to help.  But it was an interesting question…how to quickly produce 200+ servings of cake to offer as a thank-you to patrons?

Denise thought that a German Chocolate Cake would be fun, so I researched recipes and found a couple that looked interesting.  I suggested baking one of each for us to review on Tuesday, and she agreed.  Instantly, I had to clear my calendar to allow time for this.  Not just cooking, but shopping, cleaning, measuring, taking notes, etc.  Tuesday morning I did a two-hour sprint on work for my advertising clients, then drafted a shopping list and went to the store.  As I absorbed more information from the recipes, I realized that I did not have time to cook both, so I focused just on the one that required two 8-inch round pans (the other one required three layers…I only have two pans).

The test cake was delicious, but I identified some issues with it, both from a production standpoint and an allergen standpoint.  Denise and Dennis came over to sample it, and talk further about how we might pull off a larger-scale production of it.  We nixed the toasted pecans to accommodate those patrons with nut allergies, and decided to go with a single layer cake layer rather than two-tier.  Eventually, Denise asked:  “So, are we doing this?”  

It was a bit of a sprint just to get to this decision point.  Saying “yes” meant that Wednesday would be an even bigger sprint.  Of course I took the leap.  From this point forward, I could feel the clock ticking down to Wednesday evening’s dinner service at the restaurant.  On such short notice, we couldn’t order ingredients from Ghostwriter’s established suppliers, so I went back to Ross’ Market and bought 12X the ingredients that I needed for a single recipe (you’re welcome, Nancy).  With so many variables changing (new oven, different baking pans, etc.), at least I would be using the same ingredients.  I also stayed up late, completing an important client deliverable, which I would deliver first thing Wednesday morning.

I was at the restaurant by 9:40am.  When I walked out at 4:40pm, there were nearly five full sheet pans of cake, and more than two gallons of German Chocolate icing, along with fifteen cups of toasted coconut for garnish.  The time flew.  The staff of the kitchen were amazingly supportive and helpful, though I suspect they wondered why I was in their workspace.  I desperately wanted to make something delicious, as efficiently as possible so that I could get out of their way and let them return to "normal," whatever that might mean.  

I won’t drag you down the rabbit hole of all the details of this little production run, except to say this:  I was in a complete flow state.  I had to have complete focus, so as to stay one step ahead of the process, and increase the likelihood of a good outcome.    This way of being continued through Thursday and Friday - my focus on productivity on work and domestic tasks kept rolling.  It was a great week.  I got so much done - not dissimilar from the type of productivity one sometimes experiences in the days leading up to a vacation.  My energy level never crashed, either.  I slept like a rock each night, waking refreshed and ready to go again the next day.  I’m not sure how long this can be sustained, but I got on a roll.  It was great to find that extra gear again.  It’s good to know it is still there when I need it.

Denise was just crazy enough to offer me this opportunity, and for that I am very grateful.  It is a perfect example of growth happening outside of our comfort zones.  And how about Ghostwriter, celebrating four years of operation?  Opening just before the pandemic, improvising so completely, and thriving today.  What an accomplishment.

Now its on to Thanksgiving meal prep!  I put sixteen apple hand pies in the freezer yesterday, and a quart of cinnamon spiced honey syrup (a key ingredient in these Spiced Honey Bourbon Old Fashioned cocktails) in the fridge.  Thanksgiving is going to be great.

Sunday Supper
With extra friends and family in this week, it might be good to make something that can feed a crowd.  Andrew Zimmern’s Tater Tot Hotdish is a Midwestern classic. I once heard that the night before Thanksgiving is one of the biggest nights for ordering takeout, allowing people to preserve their kitchen for prepping the big meal.  Don’t hesitate to order out, if that makes more sense for you.  

Sunday Music
I heard this band playing in Ghostwriter kitchen Thursday, and it sparked memories from my college days - here are the Brand New Heavies performing live in 2013. Enjoy!

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

Homecoming

Hey, you!

I hope you are well.  My week has been fantastic, but required a lot of extra energy.  This morning I am pooped.  On Wednesday I attended a gathering of entrepreneurs, many of whom I hadn’t seen in a long time.  Trying to have meaningful catch-up conversations with so many folks was an impossible task, but it was fun to try.  On Friday morning I met a friend at Black Hand Gorge for our monthly walk and talk.  We covered seven miles, and many topics.  After the hike, I needed to do leaf collection because my Saturday would be spent with friends from college, attending the Ohio State football game.  Friday night I met seldom seen friends for food and friendship in Dublin.  We all spent much of yesterday at Ohio State's main campus, culminating in last night's tromping of Michigan State.  So, so fun, but today is mostly about re-charging my battery.

In less than a week, our oldest child will return home for Thanksgiving, followed soon thereafter by his younger brother.  We are hosting this year, so I am planning the menu in earnest now.  For the first time ever, both of our boys have stayed put at school for the entire semester prior to Thanksgiving.  It's going to be a real family reunion.  It’s wonderful to see them so fully engaged in their lives. 

For Thanksgiving dinner, I’m torn between purchasing one of Copia Farms’ great turkeys, and just buying some smoked turkey breast from Ray Ray’s (they also have some wonderful looking side items for sales).  Ordering deadlines for both are coming up soon.

For sides, the mandatory items include my mom’s fresh cranberry sauce.  It uses the same ingredients as this recipe, but instead of bringing everything to a boil and simmering for a while, we throw it all into a food processor, blending it together (we simply throw the whole orange in…the bitterness of the rind is balanced by the sourness of the cranberries and the sugar).  It's almost like a chutney.  A classic Sage & Sausage stuffing is really hard to beat (I’ll use 7/10 Bread if I can get some).  Green Bean Casserole is a must.  This Brown Butter Mashed Potato recipe seems like a fine thing to try…not too avant garde for this traditional meal.  Remember, friends - don’t experiment on Thanksgiving, or Auntie Carmel will be mad at you (this humorous video contains some strong language).  

For dessert, I’m going with fresh-baked apple and cherry hand pies, topped with Jeni’s Vanilla ice cream.  The recipe I use freezes extremely well, making it easy to prep them in advance, popping them in the oven just as you sit down for the main meal.  Then they are hot and ready for dessert.  I have not tested the freezability of a gluten-free version, so I will either prep a few gluten-free hand pies Thanksgiving day, or possibly make a Gluten-Free Apple Crisp instead.  Hopefully you find some of these recipes helpful in your own menu planning.

As I was blowing leaves on Friday, I noticed that the smallest rock of a little rock sculpture that my mother created years ago had fallen off the top of the sculpture.  This happens often, as the rocks are merely balanced on one another and not glued or anything.  Always on the lookout for my little buddy (the rock), I made sure to put him back in his proper place.  And every time that I do, I think of Mom.  So many little reminders of those that are no longer around, but still with us.

As we enter the holiday season, I hope that you are able to reconnect with old friends, enjoy some good meals, and have fond memories of lost loved ones warm you on cold evenings.

Sunday Supper
Before we slide into traditional American foods, like those enjoyed by the pilgrims who celebrated the first Thanksgiving gathering, I offer this Spicy Tuna Salad on Crispy Rice for Sunday Supper, along with this Korean Cucumber Salad.

Sunday Music
This Sunday I share with you this wonderful 3-song set performed by Kenny Loggins and Michael McDonald.  Enjoy!

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

Batali Boomerang

Hello, Friend!

Don’t forget to set your clocks back one hour today.  Walks with the dog will happen before dinner now.  No sense walking in the dark afterward.  Yesterday was a perfect Fall day - warm and dry.  I was able to schlep a whole bunch of leaves out to the road.  Not my last round of leaf collection, but probably the biggest of the season.  The canopy of the trees in my yard has thinned out quite a bit.  It feels nice to have the yard tidied up, without having to wear extra layers and endure freezing temps while working.  I’m sure those low temps are coming, just not yet.  Something for which to be thankful.

A couple of weeks ago, while mindlessly scrolling Instagram, a post from chef Mario Batali’s account hit my feed.  It was a picture of rigatoni in sauce, accompanied by the following text:  “Mario Batali Virtual Events Coming soon…"  I wasn’t sure what to do with this.  Batali’s last post was Halloween, 2017 - two months before allegations of sexual harassment and sexual assault were levied against him in the press, and eventually criminal charges of indecent assault and battery were filed in Boston.  A few more posts, teasing different dishes, have steadily dripped out from his Instagram account these last few days.

Batali was acquitted of the criminal charges in Boston, and his former restaurant company paid a $600,000 settlement to 20 former employees as a result of a civil investigation led by the Attorney General of the State of New York.  It seems reasonable to say that Batali has been a “bad guy,” however one might define that term.  Perhaps he got off easy, but he was forced out of the restaurant industry, and into hiding from the public eye for the past six years.  Now he wants to come back, in some capacity.

I’m wondering how I feel about it.  And in a larger sense, when should society allow those of us who have strayed to return?  Batali was forced to sell all of his business interests to his former partner, primarily.  It is fair to guess that he doesn’t need to work anymore.  Now 63 years of age, should we just put him out to pasture?  Sitting at age 54 myself, this idea bothers me.  I don’t like the idea that I may be 8+ years away from floating adrift on an iceberg somewhere.

I have to think we all have contributions to make to society.  We’re all here for such a short time, every day we’re not contributing to the greater good feels wasteful.  People released from prison typically do not have the resources that Batali likely commands.  As such, they have to find a way to re-integrate.  Sadly, I believe there is a fairly high rate of recidivism, resulting in a return to their more familiar prison environs.  

How much of a penalty is “enough” for Batali?  I’m sure there will never be unanimous agreement on this.  Given that, perhaps now is an acceptable time to try something, and see how the world receives it.  Besides owning one of his cookbooks and seeing him on television in the past, my only other interaction with a Batali business was a wonderful lunch in early April, 2012 at Otto Pizzeria Enoteca in New York City - one of many great experiences during Spring Break, while we were hosting our dear friend Fanny from Finland for the school year.  Fanny is thriving in Helsinki today.  Otto closed during COVID.  I won’t be taking virtual cooking classes from Mario, though.  I already know how to cook reasonably well, and have no shortage of free learning options in this realm.

So, welcome back, Mario…I suppose.  Helping people to cook and enjoy food is something I can’t really object to.

Sunday Supper
All this Batali talk has me thinking of Italian food.  So top your favorite pasta with Michael Symon’s Yia Yia’s Sunday Sauce, and Mario’s Sicilian Meatballs.  Here is a simple Roman Mixed-Green Salad if you feel compelled to have some vegetables.

Sunday Music
This Sunday I share with you a couple of wonderful performances by Rufus Wainwright - the first is a 30-minute show performed in his home during COVID, and the next is a recently-released duet of Cigarettes & Chocolate Milk, with the dazzling Rachel Price from Lake Street Dive.  Enjoy!

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

Moderation

Salutations, Earthlings!

I hope this week’s essay finds you well.  I suspect that we have just wrapped up the peak Fall in Ohio, in terms of warm temperatures and vibrant foliage.  “Warm Fall” is over, making way for “Brisk Fall.”  It's time to shift to soup-making, stews and warm beverages.  It's hard to believe that our last day for the outdoor version of the Granville Farmer’s Market wrapped up this weekend - with the grass still green, no meaningful frost having yet touched area plants.  Starting next week, an indoor version of the market starts at the Universal Church of Granville Annex Building, 9:30am - 12noon on Saturdays.  It looks like our first hard frost arrives this coming Tuesday, the very last day of October.

Friday marked the one year anniversary of Elon Musk’s acquisition of the social media platform Twitter (now renamed “X”).  From my vantage point, it seemed like Musk made his purchase offer on a lark.  Then Twitter’s board called his bluff, forcing the sale even after he had second thoughts.  Given that he was leading the world’s most disruptive and successful electric car company AND the world’s most disruptive space transport business, taking on this additional responsibility seemed to be something of a lower-priority distraction.  But he took it on, and I had high hopes that it would result in significant improvements to Twitter and its role as a real-time digital public square of sorts.  

Thus far, those high hopes have not been realized.  The quality of my personal feed has dropped rather dramatically, with many of my favorite “follows” abandoning the platform.  Since it is now a private enterprise, the key metrics of the platform are no longer made public.  Outside observers make a strong case that they have moved in the wrong direction.  Hopefully efforts in the year ahead reverse the company’s trajectory.

In this week’s edition of On Being, computer scientist and professor Latanya Sweeney talks about the challenges of moderating online content at a global scale.  We haven’t yet figured out how to screen out misinformation, disinformation, and garbage content spawned by “bots” and the like.  This is a key challenge that must be overcome before humanity can get on the same page and have a more productive dialog in the "digital commons," I believe.  As we head into another U.S. presidential election cycle, I encourage you to be mindful of the questionable nature of much online content and its sourcing.  

On a different front, moderation appears to be gaining ground.  I saw a report this past week that non-alcoholic beer, wine and spirit sales have jumped 32% this year.  This appears to be reflective of consumers’ desire to be more moderate in their consumption of alcohol.  Sales of this category over the last fifty-two weeks total $524.3 million - a drop in the ocean when compared to total beer/wine/spirit sales across the same timespan of $67.6 billion (growing just 1% this year).

94% of those purchasing non-alcoholic beverages are also purchasing alcohol.  So it appears that the new “pro move” when it comes to socializing is to mix in some non-alcoholic drinks along with alcohol in order to better enjoy time spent at gatherings (and reduce/eliminate the hangovers that come with overindulgence).

This is something to keep in mind as the holidays approach.  My own sampling of non-alcoholic alternatives has been very fruitful - when socializing, I still get to sip away and chat, safe in the knowledge that my sleep won’t be disrupted and I’ll be higher-functioning tomorrow than I otherwise might be.

Sunday Supper
I cook this Texas-Style Chili once or twice a year.  I like the meaty texture provided by cubed ground chuck rather than ground beef. Dried chiles and unsweetened chocolate to give it a totally different character than what we are accustomed to here in the Midwest.  This Fall Harvest Salad is a great complement to the chili.

Sunday Music
This week I am pleased to introduce you to Gregory Alan Isakov, a Colorado farmer-musician (possibly musician-farmer…either way, an interesting hyphenate).  This performance and interview is a wonderful way to spend some time this Sunday morning.  Enjoy!

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

Remote Control Bullying

Greetings, friend.

I hope this message finds you well on this beautiful Fall day.  We are nearly at peak Fall colors, and the leaves are dropping more freely all the time.  Depending on when rain is expected next, I might be doing leaf collection twice a week for a while.  There’s something special about doing yard work in the brisk Fall air, then coming inside to enjoy a hot bowl of soup.  A simple pleasure that never gets old.

This past week the Republican majority in the House of Representatives continued to try and elect a new Speaker of the House.  Those House Republicans who did not see fit to vote in favor of Jim Jordan for this role found themselves and their families on the receiving end of harassing phone calls and even death threats.  On Thursday, Jordan decried the harassment, posting the following to X (formerly Twitter): “No American should accost another for their beliefs. We condemn all threats against our colleagues and it is imperative that we come together.  Stop. It’s abhorrent.”  Perhaps the most noteworthy aspect of this harassment is that Republicans have been directing it at their fellow party members.  Up until recently, such harassment has typically been focused on those outside the Republican Party.

Over the past six weeks, the social media account “LibsofTikTok” has made posts related to the policies of 42 different U.S. school districts - including our very own Granville schools.  The general approach to their posts has been to falsely suggest that the schools’ policies are somehow “grooming” or indoctrinating children into LBGTQ+ identities and exposing them to sexually explicit content at school.  Not coincidentally, eleven schools received bomb threats within days of being featured by LibsofTikTok and virtually all of them received numerous harassing and sometimes threatening emails.  Another common outcome has been that the names, home addresses and phone numbers of school officials and school board members have been made public, thus amplifying the harassment to local leadership.  I'm aware of at least one Granville school board member who felt compelled to get a new phone number after experiencing this harassment.

In addition to these very recent examples, consider the following:

• Voter intimidation and election worker intimidation has been happening in different parts of the country these past two election cycles.

• The storming of the Capitol on January 6th.

• The foiled plot by fourteen people to kidnap Michigan governor Gretchen Whitmer (eleven of them were convicted of various felonies, with sentences ranging from two to twenty years in prison).

This pattern, where one person makes a public post or a statement, and then other people act on that statement in intimidating and sometimes illegal ways - there is a term for it.  It’s called “stochastic terrorism.”  To use a crude example, imagine a mafia boss saying to a group of his cronies “It’d be a shame if Joe Smith got his legs broke and couldn’t walk for a while”  and then two days later Joe Smith is assaulted, resulting in fractures of both of his legs.

One person exercising their freedom of speech in a way that is perhaps critical, but not specifically threatening.  Soon thereafter, numerous strangers with no connection to the speaker engaging in harassment or worse to the person or people being criticized.  Its very disturbing.  It suggests that some people in our society think that they can and should try to intimidate, silence or harm others because they hold different views.  

In the case of the January 6th insurrection, it seems clear that the criminal acts were committed by people who had convinced themselves that they were “patriots” working to preserve democracy in some way.  Of course, when the sitting President on the United States is urging them to do something (a non-specific something, but don’t just sit there), I can see why they might feel that way.

I’ve got news for those who want to hide behind social media accounts and sic the extremist crazies on their fellow citizens:  You cannot bully your way into dominating America.  

Two attorneys this week, both facing felony charges in the state of Georgia for their role in subverting the presidential election in that state pled guilty to reduced charges in return for their complete and honest cooperation with prosecutors as the trials of other people involved in the same conspiracy are ongoing.  Justice may occur more slowly than we might like, but it appears to be happening.

I’m not sure what to do about some of this stuff.  Over time we may see adjustments made, either to how we define freedom of speech, or how we hold people accountable for speech that results in harm to others.  As society changes, our laws need to adjust as well.  Right now it seems very unfair to me that unpaid public servants such as school board members have to change their phone numbers and contemplate personal safety protocols that would never occur to those of us who have not served in such a fashion.

“Stochastic Terrorism” is too fancy a term.  “Remote Control _____” is more appropriate.  Insert the verb as warranted:  Bullying, Harassment, Kidnapping, Assault…however it manifests, it won’t be effective if we recognize it for what it is, and hold the offenders properly accountable.

Stay mindful and observant, friend. 

Sunday Supper
This recipe for Beef Bourguignon from Serious seems like a wonderful option for supper tonight.  This Succotash Salad would be a great compliment, and these Lemon Bars would deliver a finish akin to the wonderful Lemon Curd Tart currently being served at Ghostwriter Public House, in Johnstown.  That crew consistently knocks it out of the park.

Sunday Music
This week I offer a grab bag of musical options:  This wonderful duet by Al Green and Bonnie Raitt, a cover of Jimi Hendrix’s Purple Haze by the late, great Jeff Ray, or this extended live performance of Purple Rain by the one and only Prince.  Enjoy! 

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

History Of Violence

Hello, neighbor!  I hope you are well.  We have officially moved into sweater weather.

The events of the past nine days have made it challenging to draft my weekly essay.  Last Saturday, October 7th, Hamas militants began attacking Israeli civilians, kidnapping some to serve as human shields against the inevitable Israeli response.  The simple, ruthless, horror of the attacks evoked memories of 9/11.  In the days since, the Israeli Defense Forces have been responding, attacking Hamas positions in the Gaza Strip and attempting hostage rescues to the extent they can identify the locations of those who were abducted.  This conflict is so big, so complex, so presently happening right in front of all of us, that it has felt hard to talk about anything else.

But I’m not the person for that.  I don’t possess the knowledge of history required to add insight or context to what we are witnessing.  Johnny McNulty tweeted this past week “I’ve started doing that embarrassing middle aged thing where I sincerely wish for peace on Earth.”  I feel the same way.

I wonder what it will take for humans to become better at disagreeing?  Steven Pinker’s work highlights the degree to which global violence has declined over time, and offers some good ideas as to why this decline has occurred.

The rise of the nation state has reduced violence greatly.  Archeological forensics suggests that 15% of deaths that occurred before historical records came into existence were attributable to violence.  In contrast, in the time spanning from World War I to World War II, at most 3% of deaths were attributable to violence.  Pinker calls this the “Pacification Process.”

Next comes a significant drop in homicides (the Civilizing Process).  Then the Humanitarian Revolution resulted in the abolition of slavery.  The Long Peace that has followed World War II has been disrupted only twice - the Korean conflict, which ended in 1953 and more recently with the Russia/Ukraine war (the first war on European soil since World War II.

The Civil Rights revolutions resulted in the virtual elimination of lynchings, significant reductions in rape and domestic violence, the elimination of corporal punishment of children, and a rise even in animal rights.

In total, human civilization has drastically reduced the expression of mankind’s baser instincts toward exploitation, domination, and revenge.  Ironically, more death and destruction has taken place in modern times in pursuit of Utopian ideologies like Naziism and Socialism.  Somehow mankind found it easier to kill one another when they perceived utopia to be just around the corner.  If only they could rid the world of these pesky obstructionists…

Civilization has created the time and space for humans to develop higher functions like self-control, empathy, moral sense, norms/taboos and reason - all of which make us less inclined to violence.  The state-level monopoly on “legitimate” violence (also know as warfare), the win-win outcomes generated for most people by the rise of commerce all have combined to making the world more peaceful.  Yet violence persists in certain parts of the world.

I suppose the relative peacefulness of the world makes the violence displayed this past week more shocking and disturbing.  I share Pinker’s analysis of the trends in violence not to minimize the current state of the world - and acknowledge that there is no guarantee that these trends toward a more peaceful world will continue.

There is still so much work to do.  As far as we have come, it still amazes me how easy it is for us to get in our own way.  This interview between Krista Tippett and Baratunde Thurston offer some glimpses into a productive path forward for us all.

Sunday Supper
This past week Lori and I enjoyed this Coconut Saag Paneer recipe from the New York Times Cooking section.  I used Halloumi cheese and a couple of boxes of baby spinach, and the result was immensely satisfying.  FYI -  I subscribe to NYT Cooking, and am allowed to “gift” ten recipe links per month.  So I’m giving this a try this week.  Please let me know if the link does not work for you, and I’ll privately email you the recipe. 

Sunday Music
My music recommendation this week is this wonderful duet of virtuoso violinist Anne Akiko Meyers and pianist Max Levinson at the NPR Tiny Desk.  Enjoy!

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

Covered Dish

Hello, fellow human!

I hope your week has gone well.  The most fun of the week for me was dining with my younger child and attending the Margaret Glaspy show in Cleveland on Tuesday.  Magical meal, conversation and music.  On the drive to Cleveland, hints of yellow and red were expanding across the green tree canopies.  The trees in their seasonal burlesque, tempting us with exotic color changes, leaving nothing to the imagination by Thanksgiving.  Warm Fall is shifting to Cool Fall…perhaps temporary, but the cool air yesterday prompted me to make a nice pot of beef vegetable soup.  

Our friend lost her father this past Monday.  I was on standby to cook some food for her whenever doing so would be helpful.  I received the text message on Wednesday, and got to work.  The night before I enjoyed a wonderful Pasta Bolognese at Gigis on Fairmount.  It was so satisfying and comforting, that it made sense for me to make something similar for my friend and her assembled family.

One of my favorite comedians is Rob Delaney.  His early tweets from 2009 or so made me laugh out loud so many times.  It was comedic love at first tweet.  He was able to leverage his social media notoriety into acting gigs, Catastrophe being a wonderful example of his work.  In addition to his comedic sensibilities, I have felt bonded to Delaney because he too named one of his children Henry. 

Henry Delaney died in 2018 at the tender age of 2 1/2.  A brain tumor that formed on his brain stem was the cause.  Last year Rob published a book about Henry, the process of caring for him, grieving his loss and figuring out how to move on without him.  It’s title is A Heart That Works.  Rob was interviewed by NPR this past week to talk about Henry, and the book.  In the interview, Delaney mentioned that people often ask him for advice regarding what to say to people who are grieving.  His response:  “The answer is it doesn't matter what you say because no words are going to help. And that's OK.  Don't be afraid of that fact, because what is going to help is a casserole, a foot massage, that type of thing. Going into their house, forcibly removing them from it, locking them out of their own home and making them go for a walk around the block while you play with their kids and take out the trash. That's what helps. That's what love is and looks like when people go through tragedy.”  It’s an amazing interview.  You can listen to it here (have a tissue handy).

So, I made a casserole Wednesday (and a salad).  Acts of service.  Deeds rather than words.  I’m so lucky to have been in a position to help when the request came.  Words will always fall short.  So will food.  I don’t know if our taste buds even work the same when we are grieving.  It feels wrong to enjoy anything too much.  But I did put love into it, trying to make it as delicious and comforting as possible. 

If you find yourself caring for people with food, this collection of recipes from Pinch of Yum can be helpful.

Sunday Supper
Of course I have to share the lasagna recipe for this week’s Sunday Supper - here is a link to it.  FYI - I did not make the fresh pasta.  I simply substituted no-boil lasagna noodles from Barilla.  In addition to the pasta, this copycat Olive Garden salad is a great accompaniment.  Enjoy!

Sunday Music
I stumbled across a new artist this week that I am so happy to share with you.  Her name is Madison Cunningham, and her artistic range, both melodically and lyrically is really impressive.  Some of her performances remind me of Joni Mitchell, and others evoke memories of the late Jeff Buckley.  This collaboration with Lake Street Dive is what put Madison on my radar.  One year ago, she performed at NPR’s Tiny Desk, and I just couldn’t leave out this cover of the Beatle’s song In My Life.  Enjoy!

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

Getting Back In The Game

Good day to you!

This past week was a bit cloudy and cool, befitting of a transition into Fall.  The leaves indeed do keep falling.  The days ahead look to be sunnier and warmer, though.

Regular readers of my weekly posts know that I’ve been exploring new paths to take with parts of my work life.  As a self-employed “solopreneur,” I’ve been brainstorming and researching a lot of different ways to leverage my strengths and create value.  A conversation with Lori recently crystalized for me the crux of the challenge:  More than anything, failure avoidance has been driving my thinking.  Until this week, this truth has been bubbling below my conscious awareness.  I had listed a number of ideas that have been in my “parking lot” for consideration.  When prompted with the question “Which one do you most want to pursue?” My internal response was “The one that I won’t fail at.”

So, I thought about failure.  What is it, really?  In one sense, any time we fall short of a stated goal we have failed.  But certainly lots of people fail their way to massive success.  As Casey Kasem was fond of saying, “Shoot for the stars, you just may land on the moon.”  I’m OK with this kind of failure.  It might be more accurate to call it incremental success - we didn’t hit our goal, but directionally we made progress.  Let’s try again.

There are two dimensions to failure that I really want to avoid.  The first is financial.  When all was said and done, the Maamos Kitchen project lost a meaningful sum of money.  I certainly do not want to repeat this.  The second has to do with status or reputation.  I care too much what other people think of me.  Intellectually, I know that for most part, very few people think of me at all.  I have high-achieving friends, amazing people who have accomplished a lot.  And in my own way, I feel capable of doing something similar.  Falling short of this high standard is disappointing.

When we were developing the Maamos Kitchen concept, we embraced a phrase introduced to us by Seth Godin:  “This might not work.”  It freed us up to make decisions, execute, and keep moving as we tried to bring our vision to life.  I’m not as willing to embrace the notion of things not working out for whatever my next endeavor turns out to be.

What does success look like?  However crass this may seem, to me success means making more money.  Money creates options.  Beyond this, success means making a difference to other people.  It may also mean the luxury of working with a team.  I’ve been working on my own for many years.  I wouldn’t say it is lonely, but I like the idea of doing something that warrants the effort and energy of more than just me.  I miss that.

If you’ve never heard of Simon Sinek’s book Start With Why, forget I ever mentioned it.  That book has been the bane of my existence for many years.  It convincingly makes the case that figuring out one’s life purpose unlocks the path forward.  This hasn’t been true for me.  The more I wrestle with “finding my WHY,” the more it distills down to: “Helping my fellow man get the most out of their brief time on Earth.”  This has manifested in many ways - by feeding people, by helping them better feed themselves, through laughter, through basic assistance.  It could manifest in many different ways beyond these.  So the notion of thinking about my “Why” has not delivered clarity in terms of determining my next steps.

These past few years I’ve been able to successfully hide from this fear of failure.  Serving as the “flexible parent” during our boys’ last few years of high school and even college, caring for my ailing mother… there have been plenty of good things for me to do for my family, and it is a blessing that I was available to do them.  But it also allowed me to kick the can down the road in terms of deciding what I wanted to do with time and energy.

Now the kids are out of the house.  Mom is gone.  And Lori is in her home office, working away while I wrestle with the question of what to do with myself.  I’m immensely grateful - I have clients I care for, and good work to do for them.  But this does not add up to full-time engagement.  I have more to give.

What is “calling” to me?  What “resonates,” or “glows more brightly?”  Of course I love food, but I’ve never found a way to make money in this realm.  I love entrepreneurship, and have a lot of experience facilitating meetings of business owners, helping them wrestle with the every day challenges.  I love dogs, and think that non-veterinary pet service businesses are likely to enjoy a tailwind for some time, given the spike in pet ownership that occurred during the pandemic.  And I love to write, and speak with others about issues and ideas.  Perhaps there is a path forward in content creation, but I’m still searching for a premise that feels like it has legs.  My brain is buzzing.

If reasonable success was certain, which of these would I most like to have manifest?  I reject the premise of this question.  I think a better question may be this: “What game would I enjoy playing, that I can afford, where I can bring my existing talents to bear while also learning and growing?  

Stay tuned, friends - and thanks for sharing in this journey.  I would love to hear stories of how you have wrestled with this type of challenge.

Sunday Supper
I decided to get my COVID and flu boosters yesterday afternoon.  In case I didn’t feel like cooking afterward, I made this wonderful Chicken & Rice soup.  It’s wonderful.  This Greek Salad is a good way to keep enjoying the abundance of in-season tomatoes, too.

Sunday Music
Men I Trust is a new group that one of my hip, in-touch-with-culture fiends put only radar.  Here is a sweet little garage session of theirs.  Also, check out Margaret Glaspy’s Get Back, off of her new album, Echo The Diamond.  Margaret is performing this coming Tuesday at Grog Shop in Cleveland Heights (an excellent excuse to go see our younger son) - come join me at the show! 

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

What If Everything Goes Right?

Hello, Friend!

I hope you’ve been able to get out and enjoy some of this fantastic weather we’ve been having.  We haven’t had a stretch this nice in quite a while.  I’m starting to detect some red and yellow hues in the tree canopies around town.  Of course, more leaves drop each week.  About a month ago, I wrote about the concept of Good, Bad, Who Knows?  A great example of this concept played out for me this past Wednesday.

I’ve been doing some volunteer work, driving older people to doctor’s appointments, running errands, etc.  Last Wednesday I took a lovely 91-year old woman to a dentist appointment.  It was so nice that I rolled the windows down on my car and waited there, reading and writing.  After about an hour, she walked out of the dentist’s office and got back in the car.  I went to start it, and was met with just a repetitive click-click-click sound.  Hmm…what to do?  This was the first time I worked with this particular person, and I’m a little embarassed that my car is not cooperating.  I quickly decided to hail an Uber.  The car arrived in less than ten minutes.  I accompanied my charge back to her home, then had the Uber return me my car.

On the way back, the Uber driver said “I have a friend who drives a tow truck.  He says that most tows could be avoided.  The issue is often just a battery problem.  I have jumper cables - maybe we should try to use them to start your car, then you can get your battery tested.”  So that’s what we did - he attached the jumper cables, and my car started up immediately.  There was an AutoZone store just across the street from the dentist.  I cruised right over and had the battery tested (it was dead).  Within just a few minutes I had a new battery and was able to grab some lunch before visiting my 1pm “client” to take her to the post office and grocery store.

In a span of thirty minutes, I went from thinking my whole day had been turned upside down, to being back on track.  It was a great reminder that sometimes things go better than expected.  I’ve lived long enough to experience real setbacks.  It probably has made me a bit defensive, scanning the horizon too much for adversity, and not enough for good fortune.  Wednesday’s experience reminded me to ask “What could go RIGHT?” in addition to “What can go wrong?”

This isn’t to say we should go through life with blithe optimism.  I’m suggesting something different - we should think through the best case scenario, just in case it happens.  To not walk our minds through best-case situations might leave us unprepared when they present themselves - and they sometimes will appear.  We could botch it for lack of imagination.

It sure can’t hurt to consider best-case scenarios.  Just ask the Ohio State football team - who manufactured a 65-yard touchdown drive to win their game at the end of last night's game against Notre Dame.  Sometimes, through some combination of grit and luck, things work out.

Sunday Supper
This week I’m sharing a dish that I cooked this past Tuesday - Sloppy Jais.  Think Sloppy Joe, with Indian flavors and some spicy Serrano pepper (easily omitted if you don’t like spicy food).  I served this with sweet potato wedges coated in a little olive oil and some of Monika Arora’s Indian spice blend sprinkled on them - these were a perfect complement to the sandwich!  Give 'em a whirl.

Sunday Music
This Sunday I am happy to share with you this recently-released trio performance of Why Am I Treated So Bad, a song I first heard performed by the saxophone great Cannonball Adderley.  The performers are all-stars:  Questlove on drums, Christian McBride on bass, and Norah Jones on keyboards and vocals.  Enjoy!

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

Media’s Messy Middle

Greetings!  The weather in Central Ohio has been fantastic, and the days ahead look wonderful too.  Let’s enjoy it while it lasts.  I don’t know where this morning’s early rain came from, but the day ahead should be fine.  A cadence of weekly leaf collection is now upon me.  

Two weeks into this latest edition of empty nester living, things are settling down a bit.  We’ve rearranged some furniture, and re-established a cooking cadence that makes sense for the two of us.  I made a batch of jambalaya on Tuesday that was super-satisfying.  I’m sure the long absence since we last enjoyed it contributed to its impact.  It was like a mother’s hug.  

Cooking two or three times per week really seems to work for us.  This makes the non-cooking nights shorter and sweeter - simply re-heat some leftovers, and spend a little time cleaning up the few dishes.  When I do cook, I don’t mind cooking a bit extra, or spending a bit more time, since I know that tomorrow I will have the day off, more or less.

It should go without saying just how disruptive technology has been on so many areas of our lives.  It feels to me like it's been happening gradually, and now all at once - at least in terms of how it is playing out in Hollywood.  I’ve written in the past about the news media, and how misaligned its profit motives are with the notion of reporting on important news without being sensationalistic.  Something bigger is happening in the world of movie and television production.

Consider the following:  Technology made it possible for Netflix to shift from being a mail-order movie rental business to streaming movies right into our homes.  Technology has created artificial intelligence.  Large language models are now generating competent drafts of stories, requiring only a few smart prompts from a human.  Technology is now making it possible to digitally replicate the images and voices of our most popular actors and actresses - and also our world leaders (nefarious actors are virtually certain to promote chaos by creating and distributing realistic “deep fake” videos of world leaders in the near future).  Lastly, technology is making it possible for companies like the Walt Disney Company to sell its video content directly to customers, no longer reliant on cable systems to distribute its content.

Any one of these changes would be significant.  In total, they are tectonic in scale, and happening rapidly.

This past Monday, Disney and Charter Communications (which owns Spectrum Cable) came to a retransmission fee agreement just in time for Disney-owned ESPN to air Monday Night Football.  The Writers Guild of America (WGA) has been on strike since May 2nd.  The Screen Actors Guild / American Federation of Television & Radio Artists (SAG-AFTRA) has been on strike since July 14th.  In dispute is the question of how actors and writers can be fairly compensated by production studios for creating television and movies in a world where these things are digitally streamed into peoples’ homes, rather than broadcast over the air.  And there is also the question of how to value digital reproductions of actor’s likenesses and voices for potentially unlimited use in future productions.

It’s a crazy world.  There is quite a reckoning going on in the world of media.  Certainly something similar is coming to an industry near you.  Stay light on your feet, friend!  Use these emerging tools to your advantage.  Surf this wave, rather than having it crash down on you.

Sunday Supper
I have had these Jamaican Beef Patties on the brain ever since I tasted them on a food tour in Toronto five years ago.  (If you find yourself in Toronto, I highly recommend Chopsticks + Forks, a great provider of food tours in the city.)  The only things that have stopped me from making them at home is 1) they take a bit more time to make the pastry dough and 2) my bride doesn’t eat gluten.  But they are a perfect Sunday Supper project!  This Grilled Corn, Tomato, Feta and Herb Salad would be a great accompaniment to the patties.

Sunday Music
My Sunday Music selection this week is this recently-released version of Jackson Browne’s legendary classic, Doctor My Eyes.  It features musicians from all around the globe as part of Playing For Change.  Playing For Change has created many different global collaborations of popular tunes, it is well worth checking out their YouTube channel.  Enjoy!

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

End Game

Good day to you, friend.   I hope this finds you well.  After some bayou-like heat and humidity, things have cooled off a bit.  Cloudiness is the price we pay for the increased comfort.  The days ahead look to be moderate and mostly dry.

Yesterday we had the privilege of celebrating my father-in-law’s 93rd birthday.  That is twenty-nine more years than my father walked this earth, and fifteen more than my mother.  My dear mother-in-law passed away earlier this year.

He is still mentally sharp, and physically able to move about, puttering around his shop and doing yard work.  He still lives in his home.  If I could strike some agreement that ensured I would be this high-functioning at the age of 93, I would likely take that deal.

Not knowing how long we are going to live makes it an interesting challenge to decide how to use our time.  Across any normal time domain for a human life, every second is precious.  Whether I live forty more years, or just four, is there any difference in how I should live day-to-day?

With perfect knowledge of the future, I would live differently in those scenarios.  With just four years left, I would probably travel - a lot.  There is the matter of financial resources.  I sometimes joke that I want my last check to the funeral home to bounce.  Another old chestnut of mortality humor:  I want to be the strongest pall bearer at all my friends’ funerals.  I like this one, because it connotes both longevity and robustness.

An interesting article on one of my favorite websites, The Marginalian, made me aware of a compelling story about art and mortality.  Back around 2014 - 2015, Bay Area artist Susan O’Malley posed the following question to one hundred people, their ages ranging from 7 to 88:  What advice would their future 80-year old selves give to their present self?  The answers were transcribed and converted into public art installations throughout San Francisco.  They were also encapsulated in book form by O’Malley.  But before the book was published, O’Malley fell unconscious and died before she could give birth to the twin girls she was carrying at the time.  Both of the babies perished along with their mother.  The artist’s sudden, tragic death lent the whole project an even stronger sense of immediacy and poignancy.

O’Malley wrote the dedication to the book shortly before she passed.  It was to her husband, and read as follows:  “To Tim, Today, until we’re 80, and then some.”

I don’t know how long I’m going to live.  So I’m going to keep working and saving money for a while longer.  But I can see the finish line.  Most of my life has been split between living for tomorrow, and living for today.  With each passing day, the ratio is inching more and more toward living for this day, right here and now.

Sunday Supper
As we tiptoe into Fall (yes, the leaves are dropping now), I'm going to keep leaning into my grill.  These Sweet & Spicy Apricot-Glazed Pork and Pineapple Kebabs look fantastic.  And this Sweet Corn Cucumber Salad in a Buttermilk Dill Dressing is the perfect complement.

Sunday Music
This Sunday I share a live performance by one of favorite singer-songwriters - Mr. John Hiatt.  This particular performance is about nine years old, and took place at the Milwaukee Summerfest.  Enjoy!

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

False Dilemnas

Hi Friend!

I hope that you had a chance to enjoy this amazing weather we’ve been having.  I snuck out to Virtues Golf Club Wednesday night, hoping to play nine holes before dark.  Surprisingly, I was able to play all eighteen holes in just two hours!  I got there at just the right time…amazing experience.  I continue to revel in the glory of locally grown tomatoes this time of year.  I have a recommendation for you:  Add guacamole to your Bacon, Lettuce & Tomato sandwiches.  It’s a game-changer.

This past week I noticed a post from one of my Facebook connections (a former high school classmate of mine).  It was all text. Here is what it said:

The World: “Trust Your Heart.”

God: “You’re heart is deceitful, therefore you need to guard your heart and trust in me alone.”

Neither The World nor God could be reached for comment regarding the accuracy of these quotes by press time.

My mind immediately began drafting an alternative to both options presented.  Here is what I came up with:
Listen to your instincts, trust your intellect and don’t let occasional mistakes hold you back.  

With few exceptions, these types of A/B comparisons oversimplify complex, nuanced situations.  They are either lazy or bad-faith attempts at swaying opinion.  

An example:  Black Lives Matter v. Back The Blue.  The concepts of appreciating and supporting law enforcement, andexpecting them to treat all citizens in a similar fashion are not mutually exclusive.  They work really well together, actually. 

I get it, we humans need to create shortcuts, to minimize the demands on our brains’ processing power.  Some rubrics really can make life easier.  But buying into false dilemmas such as these is not one of them.

The more I observe our society, the more I think we should have all participated on the Debate Teams in our high school years (if not earlier).  Many of the weak sauce arguments that seem to whip up polarization these days would fizzle out if more of us were clued in to their poor structure and typical purpose.

We need civil, informed, debate.  Of ideas, not popularity contests.  I almost wrote “We need to get back to…” but no.  We just need it.  Now.  Regardless of whatever past may have existed of noble, well-mannered idea exchanges for the common good.

I am now one week closer to the grave than the last time I wrote to you.  And I am feeling antsy about how inefficient we are at all of this.  But it may be true that we are more efficient today than any society has ever been.  Maybe Julius Caesar got more done back in his day, relatively speaking.  Attilla The Hun was pretty effective.  OK, so maybe I should qualify my statement to democracies…that is now stipulated. 

But there is so much room for improvement.  Getting hip to false dilemmas, and refusing to participate in Us/Them games would be a step in the right direction.

Sunday Supper
Its Labor Day weekend, so let’s get our cook on!!  This week I recommend this Grilled Beef Short Rib recipe, paired with Grilled Avocado & Peach Salad w/ Goat Cheese, and these Lemon Bars for a sweet finish.  Enjoy!

Sunday Music
I really like Imogen Heap.  She is one of one.  A bit eccentric.  Very brilliant.  Here is a recent live performance by her at the Royal Albert Hall.  The set list was selected by her fans, and spans over fifteen years of her career.  Enjoy!

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

Many ‘Me’s

Hello there!

I hope you are well.  It was another robust week in my world.  We got child #2 settled in to his apartment at college, so now the home nest is emptied of offspring and in some disarray.  A fair number of furniture items have wandered off to serve the lads, leaving Lori and I with some re-arranging, re-organizing and re-imagining to do on the home front.  Step #1 is to simply regroup, which we have done reasonably well this weekend.  

I continue to ponder how we all make sense of the world.  The word “polarized” is thrown around a lot these days, certainly with some merit.  But even in less polarized times, we humans can and do hold a wide range of views and beliefs.  

Thanks to social media networks, I have noticed something that perhaps you have too:  There seems to be regional tendencies toward holding certain views.  My Texas friends tend to mirror each other in certain ways, as do my East Coast friends and my West Coast friends, and us Midwesterners.  This is not to say that folks regionally follow each other in lockstep - just that there are tendencies… have you noticed this?

To the extent this observation is accurate, I wonder just how different I might be if I lived somewhere else.  What views might Texas Neal hold that Ohio Neal does not?  The degree to which these versions of me might differ probably depends on how much time I spend in a different culture.  Maybe it works something like sun-brewed tea:  the longer you steep yourself in it, the more culture infuses into your views.

I guess this doesn’t have to be exclusively geographic - I can see a similar effect on people based on their involvement in faith communities, organizations like the military, or even professional/industry involvement. 

How much of our makeup is firm inner core, that remains unchanged regardless of our whereabouts?  How much is a softer, more malleable outer covering, influenced by the people and broader community in which we live?  

I’m sure this all varies from person-to-person, but it raises an interesting question:  What views are we holding today that might be different if we lived in a different community?  How we form our views, and how we revise them over time is fascinating to me.  Maybe I’m drawn to these questions due to the overall cultural climate in America right now.  Maybe it’s just the stage of life that I currently occupy.

I’m not sure about any of it, but I am thinking about it.  This week’s thoughts are not as cohesive as some I’ve shared in the past, but this is what I’ve got this week.  I could have pivoted to some food-centric topic and avoided this blurry missive, but decided to share it.  I think its important to consider why we hold our views, and what conditions are necessary for us to revise them.  This essay on The Backfire Effect speaks to this.  I guess I will simply leave it at that for now.

Sunday Supper
Since we are in the sweet spot of late summer, I recommend grilling a nice piece of poultry, meat or fish and pairing it with this Cheesy Broccoli Rice Casserole.  Enjoy!

Sunday Music
This Sunday’s musical recommendation is a concert performed by the electronic pop duo Sylvan Esso.  (The fact that they hail from Durham, North Carolina is purely coincidental.)  Enjoy!

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

Good, Bad, Who Knows?

Hello, friend!

I hope this week treated you well (and if it didn’t I hope you had the good sense to treat yourself well at least).

My week was a whirlwind, shortened by it starting in Durham on Monday (I got home Monday night from the “big move” of our older child to Durham, North Carolina).  It was further compressed by the preparations we are making to relocate our younger son to Cleveland.  I’m thankful that Cleveland is a bit closer to Granville. 

By the time I was “wheels up” on the direct flight to Columbus from Raleigh-Durham, I had the strong sense that our son is truly in the catbird seat.  A great little apartment, within walking distance of the downtown scene and a quick commute to Duke’s campus.  But I then I thought of the parable of the Chinese Farmer, and I checked myself a tiny bit.

You may have heard of it, but I’ll share it briefly.  A farmer in China had his only horse escape the corral and run away.  All of the neighbors expressed their sorrow for him, saying “We’re so sorry you suffered this misfortune.”  The farmer replied “Good news, bad news, who knows?”  A few days later, the horse returned to the farm - bringing with it a wild stallion it had befriended.  The neighbors rejoiced, saying “What good luck!  Congratulations.”  The farmer replied “Good news, bad news, who knows”. The following week, the farmer’s oldest son broke his arm while trying to train the stallion, so that they could use it to do farm work.  The neighbors again commiserated with the farmer, who replied “Good news, bad news, who knows?”  A couple of weeks later, a commander in the Chinese army came to conscript all able-bodied men into the army, to go and fight a war for the emperor.  Because the farmer’s son had a broken arm, the army did not take him to the war.

The singer/songwriter/actor/artist Tom Waits tells a similar tale.  "My kids are starting to notice I'm a little different from the other dads. 'Why don't you have a straight job like everyone else?' they asked me the other day.  I told them this story: In the forest, there was a crooked tree and a straight tree. Every day, the straight tree would say to the crooked tree, Look at me… I'm tall, and I'm straight, and I'm handsome. Look at you. you're all crooked and bent over. No one wants to look at you. And they grew up in that forest together. And then one day the loggers came, and they saw the crooked tree and the straight tree, and they said, 'Just cut the straight trees and leave the rest.' So the loggers turned all the straight trees into lumber and toothpicks and paper. And the crooked tree is still there, growing stronger and stranger every day.”

You get the point - any given event might seem good or bad, but life plays out across a longer timeframe.  So, it is indeed wonderful that we got our son settled in to a good situation at school.  We’re going to to do it again this weekend with his brother.  We are so fortunate to be doing these things for them.  We all work hard, and plan ahead.  And sometimes, despite our best efforts, things don’t pan out.  So, who knows?  Let’s just keep growing stronger and stranger each day.

Sunday Supper
I must admit I cut quite a few corners on the food front this past week.  Today’s Sunday Supper recommendation is what I should have been cooking and eating.  These simple Thai Chicken Zucchini Curry Meatballs make for a comforting, healthy meal tonight - give them a try!  A next-level finish to the meal would be this Thai Rice Pudding.  It looks amazing.

Sunday Music
It is easy to take super-talented people for granted.  This NPR Tiny Desk concert from twelve years ago features the British diva Adele with minimal accompaniment.  It is a rare opportunity to see just how much mastery she has achieved with her vocal instrument, without all those fancy production techniques.

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

Gratitude Pies

Hi there!

What a whirlwind week this has been.  As I mentioned last week, my friend John delivered two pecks of Red Haven peaches last Sunday.  This propelled me into a glorious two-day baking frenzy, juggling all sorts of other responsibilities at the same time.  

I made a bunch of hand pies on Monday, but they are fairly time-intensive.  So on Tuesday I kept things simple and made four large tarts to make use of the rest of my dough and fruit.  It was so fun to surprise people with these treats.  As I type this, I’m thinking of everyone I didn’t get to with this effort.  Somehow my brain is able to find an opportunity for self-criticism even in the course of doing something generous.  I recognize this for what it is - just a monkey chattering in a tree at me.  Any friends who might read this and didn’t get in on the action - please know that I love you, and will do something nice for you soon.

This little baking diversion could have been better-timed, given everything else going on in my world - especially the fact that we are preparing to move our oldest child off to grad school in North Carolina.  As you read this, we are down there, settling him in.

Because I am frugal, I waited until the movie Everything, Everywhere, All At Once was available for online rental.  I watched it last Sunday night, and wow was it great.  It’s a beautiful, surreal story told in a unique fashion - one that requires something extra of the viewer compared to more traditional movies.  But the extra investment is very much worth it.  What a lovely, lovely story - I highly recommend it.  Hang in through the first 1/3rd and you will be glad you did.

An extra element of sweetness comes from the fact that many of the actors were also in a movie that was released about five years ago called Crazy Rich Asians.  

In 2018, when we were taking this same child off to Butler University to start his undergraduate studies, you could cut the tension in the air with a knife as we drove to Indianapolis.  It was as if we all were counting in our heads the number of times he had slept somewhere other than his own bed, and let me tell you, I didn’t need both hands to do this.  Now he would be living three hours from home, with a strange roommate…the reality was sinking in and intimidating him something fierce.

After we got him settled into his dorm, the three of us retreated to a nearby movie theater and watched Crazy Rich Asians as a diversion.  For a couple of hours we were able to relax in brisk air conditioned-comfort, delaying our eventual departure.

So it was especially poignant to see these same actors give amazing performances in a much more sophisticated film.  It’s as if they all grew up and matured, just like my son.

Sunday Supper
While all the local produce is fresh and abundant, let’s keep leaning into it!  Serious Eats offers up three great recipes for this week’s Sunday Supper.  First is this Grilled Tarragon-Mustard Chicken Skewer, complemented by this Spicy Summer Tomato Salad and Creamy Corn Dip with Feta, Mint and Tomatoes.  Enjoy!

Sunday Music
My Sunday Music recommendation this week is this wonderful acoustic jazz trio performance from 2018 by Chick Corey (piano), John Patitucci (bass) and Dave Weckl (bass).  

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal

(In)Appropriate

Hello again!

Local tomatoes went into turbo drive this week.  Friday night I made a big bowl of fresh salsa, Saturday’s lunch was BLT sandwiches, and Saturday supper included a fresh Caprese salad.  My thumb is still numb from working gloveless with the jalapeños, and my mouth is already starting to resist too many bites of acidic tomatoes.  But they are SO fresh.  SO delicious.  SO of the moment, right now at their peak.  Before too long they’ll be gone, and I’m sure I will be partly relieved to have a break from them.  But for now I’m heaven.

Later today I expect my friend John to return from his annual pilgrimage to an orchard near Port Clinton, where he buys as many Red Haven peaches as he can fit in the bed of his truck for friends and family while they are at their peak.  I’ve blocked a good portion of my calendar out tomorrow, to ensure I have the time to preserve them at their best.  Peach Day is kind of like a snow day - you drop everything and change your plans to accommodate them.

Sinead O’Connor died on July 26th.  The Irish artist lived a passionate life.  Though not confirmed, it is discretely presumed that she took her own life.  She was open about her mental health struggles, especially since the death of her 17-year old son by suicide eighteen months prior.  Earlier in July, she had posted on Twitter: “Been living as undead night creature since.. He was the love of my life, the lamp of my soul," she wrote of her late son. "We were one soul in two halves. He was the only person who ever loved me unconditionally. I am lost in the bardo without him.”  

Two words frequently used to describe O’Connors life are “passionate” and “defiant.”  In 1992, on live television (Saturday Night Live), O’Connor tore up a picture of Pope John Paul II after singing a rendition of Bob Marley’s song War, with new lyrics related to child abuse, saying to the screen “Fight the real enemy” as she threw the pieces of the picture to the ground.

The actor Joe Pesci hosted SNL the following week, and in his opening monologue suggested half-jokingly that if he had been in the studio when O’Connor’s protest occurred, “I would have gave her such a smack…” I say “half-jokingly” because he was obviously playing the tough mobster-style character that he often portrays in movies.  But it stands out to watch his monologue, and the audience's response to it, today.

At the time, the general response to O’Connor in the weeks and months following this defiant act of protest was pretty negative.  She took a real risk, and paid a real price in terms of her career.  But she also engendered a lot of support.  And from the perspective of today, knowing what we know about the scope of the abuse she was protesting, its hard to think anything about her other than she was a canary in a coal mine, singing to warn us of danger.  May her memory be a blessing.

As news broke of a new set of criminal indictments against our former president Donald Trump this week, I couldn’t help but think about it through this same lens of time.  He is another example of someone whose actions are viewed as either appropriate or inappropriate, with no middle ground.  In thirty years, I wonder what the consensus view of him his actions will be.  I hope I’m around to observe this.

As humanity keeps stumbling into the future, I generally think we are getting better.  But it can be a bumpy ride.  Two steps forward, three steps back, one giant leap for mankind…if we don’t blow ourselves up or make our habitat uninhabitable, I think things will continue to get better for all of us, everywhere around the world.  It will be a long time before opportunities and standards of living are evenly distributed, but we tiptoe in this direction.  Even in the span of three generations of my family, I see massive progress.  Granted, this all took place in the most prosperous society on Earth.  But if we can’t make such progress here, there’s not much hope elsewhere.  

I have hope, and wish the same for you.

Sunday Supper
On Tuesday I made a great salmon recipe from the New York Times Cooking section:  The fish was poached in coconut milk with dill and green beans, then topped with freshly shaved sweet corn and halved cherry tomatoes.

Since NYT Cooking has a paywall, I will share this salmon recipe instead, and suggest adding some green beans in with the fish, then separately you can make a side salad by whisking together a half can of coconut milk, one tablespoon of brown sugar, 1 tablespoon of sherry vinegar, one teaspoon of Dijon mustard and some fresh chopped dill (salt this mixture to taste), then adding in shaved sweet corn (4-6 ears) and a pint of halved cherry tomatoes.  Enjoy this mixture as a side salad, or simply top the cooked fish with it and it will be very similar to what we had this past Tuesday.  It is a great way to enjoy the freshness of the moment.  Enjoy!

Sunday Music
This hour-plus live concert of Sinead O’Connor in Brussels, Belgium was recorded just three years ago, and displays her in all her signature fierceness.  

Have a great week ahead!  Offer support to others.  Make good use of this day.  And let me know how I can help.

Peace & Love,

Neal