Truth & Beauty

Lucy Grealy was an award-winning poet. For a long time, though, she was more famous for her appearance than her writing. That changed when she wrote Autobiography of a Face, which chronicles her story: as a child she suffered a rare cancer in her jaw. Surgery, radiation, and chemotherapy left her disfigured, and she spent much of the rest of her life undergoing reconstructive surgery after reconstructive surgery. The experience also left her with emotional scarring as well.

Ann Patchett, whose novels include Bel Canto, The Patron Saint of Liars, and The Magician's Assistant, lived with Grealy during graduate school, when they both attended the Iowa Writer’s Workshop. Almost instantly, the two writers became dear friends, and Truth & Beauty is Patchett’s account of their relationship. Patchett tells her story with unflinching honesty. Grealy’s mania and insecurities would test anyone’s patience, but Patchett’s adoration for her is so complete — though never blind — that we come to love her, too.

More than that, I came to love Ann Patchett. I’ve been a fan of hers since my Chicago days. I bought The Patron Saint of Liars on a whim and read it in a single night. I was sick with a bug and couldn’t sleep and made it through my misery with the help of Patchett’s book. Having read Truth & Beauty, I feel like I know her and Lucy. She tells her story as though talking to a friend, and by the end you feel like were there, experiencing the highs and lows of this epic friendship right along side Ann and Lucy.

Friday Favorites: My Tea Mug

To make 30 posts in 30 days easier, I'm going to post once a week about something that is a favorite of mine. I've posted about my love of Adagio Tea before, so I won't bore you with a rehash of that exactly.

Instead I'll get specific. I bought this mug from them a while ago, and I really love it. I had been using their paper filters for the 70 or so cups of tea I drink at work each day. Those work great, but I knew I could be more environmentally-thoughtful in my tea consumption. So now I use this combo mug/infuser. Upside down, the glass cover serves perfectly as a coaster for my wet infuser. And (bad news for Adagio), I now get two cups of tea out of each serving of leaves. I used to just chuck the paper infusers in the trash since they were messy and gross. This mug will pay for itself soon enough, and in the meantime I like that I'm not throwing so much away. I also feel like I'm more officially a tea drinker with this fancy infuser. :)

In case anyone is looking for new teas to try, I'm currently loving Fujian Baroque, Rooibos Vanilla Chai, Bengal Green Chai, and Black Dragon Pearls. The last are especially fun to watch unfurl in your mug.

Worst Day of the Week

Thursdays are hellish. I'm not trying to be overly dramatic here. They really are the worst day of my week.

I have four and a half hours of standing meetings on Thursdays, and one additional always seems to get added to the calendar just for fun. Then I race uptown to attend my market research class at 6:00 and my writing class at 8:00. By the time I'm home a little after 10:00, my brain is fried, my energy is gone, and I just want to watch TV until I fall into bed.

The up side is that Fridays almost feel like a vacation in comparison. I'm excited to have time to actually get work done at work, as opposed to just talking all day. And I appreciate having the evening to myself and a full weekend just beyond. And my schedule will change in January with the start of a new semester, so I only have a few more LONG Thursdays to get through.

Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

This mash up has gotten a lot of buzz, and the plot is pretty much right there in the title, so I'll spare you all a rehash of what this book is all about.

If you're a purist, Pride and Prejudice and Zombies is not for you. While Seth Grahame-Smith has obviously taken pains to keep the broad strokes the same as in Jane Austen's original, he's added new zombie-fighting personality traits for Elizabeth Bennet and her sisters. A secondary character contracts the "strange plague" and becomes a undead herself. Characters debate the warrior training available in China versus Japan. Elizabeth and Jane are still BFFs. Lydia is still a flirt. Mr. Darcy is still proud, and Wickham is still a liar. But there is no mistaking it: this is not the Pride and Prejudice Ms. Austen had in mind.

I went in ready to accept the irreverance, and found myself liking this book very much. I believe a familiarity with and affection for the original helped. Without that, this might have just seemed like a weird combo. With that background, though, I appreciated how Grahame-Smith worked in such disparate elements while maintaining both the sense and sensibility of the original.

Civic Duty

One of the random perks about working at Columbia is that we are always off for election day. There is never any excuse not to vote, since I have the entire day at my leisure to do it.

Today New Yorkers are voting for mayor. I fully expect Mike Bloomberg to win. He's done ok the last eight years, and he has spent about 5 jillion dollars per voter to tell us so. The thing that most people are most pissed off about, and his biggest hurdle in this election, is how he hijacked the term limits law. Voters said loud and clear that we had no interest in changing the term limit law. Bloomberg wanted to run again, though, and — with the power of endless funds behind him — he built enough support in the city council to have the law changed. It sits badly with me, as it does with many New Yorkers. I feel that he used his money to buy what he wanted, regardless of what was best for his constituents. That doesn't exactly make me want to support him. Nonetheless, he'll win today. He'll do it without my vote, though.

For once, though, I'm also not voting for the democratic nominee. Bill Thompson really doesn't impress me, and since it's not at all a close race I feel no pressure to support him. Another option is to vote for Jimmy McMillan of The Rent Is Too Damn High party. He looks like he's straight out of the WWF, and the party name is hilarious. Still, I'll be voting for Green party candidate Billy Talen, aka Reverend Billy. He doesn't have a shot in hell, but I'm rooting for him anyway.

Go Reverend Billy!

NaBloPoMo is here

Check it out: I'm blogging two days in a row! The NaBloPoMo wind is at my back. :) I'm excited that Rena and Shannon are doing it with me, and I think more of you should join in.

So, to celebrate my month of blogging, I've given A Blog Of One's Own a face lift, as you can see. A big shout out goes to Rena for turning me on to Aqua Poppy. Her designs are so easy to implement that I now have a hankering to change the blog's look all the time. I think I'll keep this through the month and then shop around for something festive for the holidays.

My weekend was filled with happiness at Todd's return. He's been out of town on business for the last two weeks, and I am thrilled to have him back. I'm disappointed that he has to fly back to Dayton, Ohio in the middle of this week, but I'm soaking him up as much as I can in the meantime. It was also really fun to see the kids again, who I haven't seen since he headed out. We spent a little of Halloween with them carving Jack-O-Lanterns.

Yesterday was supposed to be all about work for Todd and homework for me, but we got a very slow start to the productive portion of the day. Some work got done, but there is — sadly — plenty more to do.

November Challenge: Coconut Cake

November is my month to pick what we bake over at Have the Cake. Check out what I'm proposing, and please feel free to bake along with us!

I know November's baking line up is often filled with pumpkins, and I wondered whether you'd all be hoping for something of that nature that you could bring to Thanksgiving dinner. All I can say is: I hope your relatives also like coconuts.

I've been wanting to make coconut cake for a while. My birthday was in September, and I almost baked myself a coconut birthday cake. Instead I got lazy and baked nothing. So this one has been on my to-try list for quite a while.

I first fell head-over-heels for coconut cake at Billy's Bakery in Chelsea. Any of you who are close to NYC should really check it out. While I'm partial to the coconut, you really can't go wrong there. And they are extremely generous with their cake cutting!

Below is the recipe I'm going to try, which is from butter lover extraordinaire, Paula Deen. There is also a really tasty looking recipe in this month's Jamie.

Happy baking!

Cake:

• 1 cup (2 sticks) butter, at room temperature
• 2 cups sugar
• 4 eggs
• 3 cups sifted self-rising flour
• 1 cup canned unsweetened coconut milk
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

Grease and flour 3 (9-inch) cake pans. Using an electric mixer, cream butter until fluffy. Add sugar and continue to cream well for 6 to 8 minutes. Add eggs, 1 at a time, beating well after each addition. Add flour and milk alternately to creamed mixture, beginning and ending with flour. Add vanilla and continue to beat until just mixed. Divide batter equally among prepared pans. Level batter in each pan by holding pan 3 or 4 inches above counter, then dropping it flat onto counter. Do this several times to release air bubbles and assure you of a more level cake. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes or until done. Cool in pans 5 to 10 minutes. Invert cakes onto cooling racks and cool completely.

Filling

• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 cup sour cream
• 4 tablespoons milk
• 1/2 cup flaked, sweetened coconut

Stir together sugar, sour cream, milk, and coconut in a bowl until well blended.

Using the wrong end of a wooden spoon, poke holes in the first layer of the cake, approximately 1-inch apart until entire cake has been poked. Spread 1/3 of filling mixture on cake layer. Top with second layer, repeat process. Top with last layer and repeat process again.

Frosting:

• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1/4 teaspoon cream of tartar or 1 tablespoon white corn syrup
• 1/8 teaspoon salt
• 1/3 cup water
• 2 egg whites
• 1 1/2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract

Place sugar, cream of tartar or corn syrup, salt, water, and egg whites in the top of a double boiler. Beat with a handheld electric mixer for 1 minute. Place pan over boiling water, being sure that boiling water does not touch the bottom of the top pan. (If this happens, it could cause your frosting to become grainy). Beat constantly on high speed with electric mixer for 7 minutes. Beat in vanilla.

Frost top and sides of cake. Sprinkle top and sides of cakes with additional coconut.