A friend just sent me the link to AnyClip, a site that indexes movie clips for your viewing pleasure. The site just launched at SXSW, so expect a few bumps initially, but really, what an awesome idea. When you find the clip you’re looking for you can view, share on Facebook or your blog, and even mark the film in your Netflix queue or buy it via Amazon or iTunes.
I’ll be sure to let you know when I find my favorite scene from Hitchcock’s Man from the South. Those Zippo lighters aren’t so reliable now are they?
Woman Aims to Become World's Fattest
Donna Simpson, from New Jersey, weighs 273kg but told the Daily Mail newspaper she had her heart set on reaching her goal weight of 1000lb (450kg) in two years. The 42-year-old already holds the title of the world’s fattest mother after giving birth to her daughter in 2007 when she weighed 241kg. ”I’d love to be 1000lb … it might be hard though, running after my daughter keeps my weight down,” Ms Simpson told the Daily Mail.
In order to pay for the enormous amounts of food she is eating — her weekly grocery bill is $815 — Ms Simpson makes money by running a website where men pay to watch her consume fast food.
If you find this fascinating/nauseating check out the British documentary “Fat Girls and Feeders.” It focuses on a subculture of American men with a fetish for feeding their morbidly obese mates. Many of the women run websites where would-be feeders buy them food and pay to watch them eat it.
I saw it in 2004 and swear to god not a week goes by that I don’t think of it. Those images haunt me. (I also like to tease M. about being a feeder. How else do you explain this when I insisted I wasn’t even slightly hungry? Ate nearly every bite, anyway … of course. :)
(Link via fullcredit.)
The woman is a poet.
Yet to imply that feminism was all about dungarees, do-it-yourself sapphism, collectivism and alternative herstory is to miss the full quilt. Feminism changed my generation’s world more than any other movement or political impulse. Far more than any political party, feminism retooled the West, as it were, for the better. Unquestionably, the best thing that ever happened to the lives of men was the women’s movement. Living in a country of misogynistic paternalism wasn’t that much fun for us, either, unless we wanted to be marines or run ironmonger’s stores and marry silent, neurotic, unhappy girls. Gaining equal partners and colleagues was the greatest plus for my generation, and however much I enjoyed parts of Engle’s programme, fundamentally it did a disservice to feminism and to women. That said, it left me with the best quote of the week. Someone said, with an earnest emphasis: “You can fake an orgasm, you can’t fake a movement.” How very, very true, on so many levels.
Love him.
M’s perfect roast chicken & the first asparagus of the season. It’s what’s for dinner.
NYC taxi drivers overcharged by more than $8 million
They switched the meter to double the rate, $0.80 per fifth of a mile, the rate they can charge in Westchester and Nassau Counties, but not in New York City.
Pretty sure I’m one of the poor schmucks they ripped off. There were times — always late at night, after I’d had a few — when I was sure the meter was ticking up way too quickly.
Taxi drivers tick me off.
Macaron lovers of New York City, next Saturday is your day! Get a free macaron from these fine retailers.
PS: The slogan, “Macaron — the new cupcake,” makes me gag. NOOOOOO! Cupcakes are just so … America circa the Bush years. Macarons are the exquisite marriage of centuries-old craftmanship and unusual ingredients. (Give me a free macaron and I will forgive that ridiculous motto.)
Breast milk cheese. Seriously. Created by Chef Daniel Angerer with his wife’s milk. He served it at his restaurant until the NYC Health Department shut him down.
But Gael Greene got a taste. She writes:
After tasting his wife’s milk from its natural vessel—“I was breastfed myself so I have that taste for it”—his mind went immediately to fromage. A little rennet. A clean cloth. Some aging. Simple, like any cheese. “It’s not like I was making Reblochon,” he wrote. “That would be trickier.”
His confession drew fans and bitter attacks on his blog. He was even accused of cannibalism.
That ultimate taboo in my head, the cheese arrives. I contemplate the tiny cream-colored square—doll size, barely enough to satisfy Minnie Mouse. It rides in on two house-made pickle rounds nesting on a thin slice of bread. I take… a bite. Eeeeew!
Surprise. It’s not the flavor that shocks me—indeed, it is quite bland, slightly sweet, the mild taste overwhelmed by the accompanying apricot preserves and a sprinkle of paprika. It’s the unexpected texture that’s so off-putting. Strangely soft, bouncy, like panna cotta.
Of course, Angerer’s ultimate critic is the food source itself. He wanted his wife to try her cheese, he tells me when I call him after my human lunch. “I gave her a taste but I didn’t tell her what it was.” And she liked it. “Well, we had a bottle of Riesling,” he adds, “and it worked very well with that.”
There’s room for experimentation: His wife is a vegetarian. If she ate meat, her cheese would have a different flavor, we agreed.
(Via @elizabethbard.)
New Math
A family makes a big donation, inspired by their 14-year-old daughter.
One day in 2006, Kevin and Hannah pulled up at a stoplight. To their left was a homeless man, to their right a guy in a Mercedes coupé. Hannah said, “Dad, if that man didn’t have such a nice car, then that homeless man could have a meal.” Kevin said, “Yes, but if we didn’t have such a nice car that man could have a meal.” This sank in rather more deeply than he’d intended. By dinnertime, Hannah was all worked up. She didn’t want to be a family that just talked about doing good, she said. She wanted to be a family that actually did something. Kevin and Joan explained that they did a lot: they volunteered at the food bank; they wrote big checks to charities; after Hurricane Katrina, they let a family of refugees stay in their basement. Hannah rolled her eyes. That was annoying, so Joan said, “What do you want to do, sell the house?” And Hannah said, “Yeah! That is exactly what I want to do.”
They gave $800,000, half the value of their house, to charities in Africa.
← Previous
The Great American Cooking Project