12/13/2005

Oagari-Nasai!!

(たまには日本語で。)

とあるレシピ(マカロニカレー)を検索していたら
こんなサイトに行き着いてしまいました:

柏市立旭小学校 給食メニュー

こういうの、ほんと好きー。

で、今日の献立は 
「秋刀魚のみりん干し、柚子香和え」 
だったとのこと、
オゥ・・・ オトナな献立やけど
皆さん残さず食べましたか?

(ちなみにタイトルは給食委員・日番の号令です。
なので へんな命令口調で読まないでください)

12/11/2005

Glow in the Dark


Glow in the dark. Glow in the dark. Glow... Zzz

I knew I'd love the stickers forever, but had never imagined that the mere thought of the words could lull me into sound sleep at night.

Wish list: GITD PJs



「グロー・イン・ザ・ダーク」しかり
(日本語名あるのかな、電気消した後しばらく光ってるシール)
緑系のぼんやりした光をみると
私は落ち着くようです。

蛍、バンカーズランプ
そして
ガラガラ冷蔵庫のライム味Jell-O。
扉開けたままずっと眺めてたい!

11/22/2005

Spilling the Beans


Now that year-end holiday lights are on in town, I thought it wouldn't be too early to announce here one of My 10 Tiniest Yet Most Eye-Opening Findings of the Year 2005, which is...

"Cooking dry-packed beans can vapor away the most stubborn stress."


Okay, here's how it happened:

1. On a debilitating weekend in September, I was cooking dry-packed feijao preto beans.

(instead of S&W cans, to make my first feijoada)

2. As some of the black beans started "dancing" in heating water, I immediately but carefully turned the heat low to simmer, when

3. I felt my face muscles sort of twitching. (Palsy or bug-bite?)

4. Not palsy. Not a bug-bite either. I was pouting and smirking into the pot, like a red-cheeked farmer taming little perky chicks in a barn. (Shhh...! Good, gooood.)

5. "No. Oh no. Finally I've come to that point. I mean, to bean-sit."

6. "But hey, see how my tight frowned uni-brow is going apart back into two brows at the same time? It must be that the bean-induced face-jerk reaction is not a sign of insanity, but a good sign of relieving stress! (Smirk)

And now I even wonder if "coddle your beans" has ever been/will be used as an idiom meaning relax.



写真のは Great northern beans といいます。
乾燥時の大きさは黒豆と同じくらい、けど
なんせ「グレート」なだけに
調理中「アメリカーン!」に膨らむのでは、となんだか不安。
でも結局、仕上がりサイズも黒豆どまりでした。
しかも 色ツヤも味も優しげで。

11/10/2005

Done Nidone


Ultimately, as far as I am concerned, learning a foreign language (English and Spanish. Si, estoy estudiando espanol!) might be all about re-appreciating my own language, Japanese.

That's what I think whenever I come across Japanese words that sound undeniably to-the-point, like Nidone.

Literally, Nidone (nee-doh-nE) means second (= nido) sleep (= ne). But don't you think how easy it is to picture this morning scene by just mumbling the word: you half-wake up to the sound of neighbors/roomies doing their I've-gotta-run stuff, i.e. microwaving, hair-blowing, door-banging... But you are in your own cocoon and you just growl, dully yet nealty pull together blankets, rolling back 210 degrees for another doze.

Well, at least it is for me. And maybe that's why I have Nidone so often, I mean, just because I want to say the six-letter word: Nidone shite (I had second sleep, so...)

No? Not a good excuse for always barely making it in time?


[ネビエちゃん]

あと、「ふて寝」「寝冷え」も
わかりやすい響きだと思います
(し、よくします)。

10/29/2005

Ceiling Gazing

                                  
Saturday afternoon.

Lying flat, no contemplation.

Isn't it sort of dark for 4 p.m.?
Trying to listen to the misty rain.

I know, I've got to get up and do something more productive, but let me just enjoy this ceiling-gazing for a moment...



One more minute, one more minute, and one more of that.


もう少し、もう少しだけ を もう少しだけ

10/18/2005

Sam the Chameleon


Okay, I know nothing about acting. So if I praised an actor for his performance, he might feel humiliated rather than be flattered, like, let's say, a high-school celeb girl (maybe this analogy is humiliating too, though), when she makes a grand late entrance into a lab to show off her new bohemian-like knitted stockings, to find her plain auntie teacher wearing exactly the same.

So please be generous, Sam Rockwell, when I say I think you're a very talented, versatile actor.

For example, I just fall for Rockwell when he, as a puppy-eyed sensitive genius in Charlie's Angels softly kisses Barrymore, walks away, then stretches himself "grrrr" to soul music... and snap! reveals who he really is: half-psychedelic, half-sexy enemy plotting to kill her boss.

Yes, I'd definitely shake-n-bake for you, Sam!


この人好きー!と言いまわりたい、
でも知名度はソコソコでとどまってほしい。
(=「誰やったっけ・・・? いつもいい味だしてるねんけど」くらい)

10/11/2005

I Feel Good!


Had my hair chopped off this past weekend - almost 10 inches - and now I feel so cute!

One problem, if any, is that the James Brown song keeps playing on and on and I cannot get it off my mind: I feel good, lah-di la-di la-di da...


というわけで 今秋のテーマは
「雰囲気のあるショートヘアの女性」
って
そんな歌口ずさんでたら駄目ですよね・・・

9/28/2005

Midnight Fridge


It was another ordinary and orderly Sunday afternoon. I was folding (and sniffing) the laundry, and AFN radio started playing this song that went like, "The weatherman says goodnight... the refrigerator stops, and suddenly it's quiet."

And suddenly, flashback memories of the studio apartment on Landfair Ave.: how the on-and-off whirrs of the pale fridge made me feel so all alone in the dark. And how, somehow, though I really don't want to admit, the howls of those frat guys across the street canceled out the sound and made me feel better.



9/11/2005

Color Spa


Something was so wrong with me the other day when I went to see a gynecologist. Every glass I saw was half empty.

It was nothing but a just-in-case cancer test, but I was all occupied with this imaginative "unfortunately…" ICU scene, and dragged myself back to Shin-Ochanomizu Station past busy Guitar Street, with my AV modes fixed at "display: bw; mute: on".

But easy come and easy go.

The moment I spotted Tools art supply shop and let myself flow into it, the remote was pressed to full color & hi-fi. This is the place that I call the Color Spa: I just deeply breathe in and gaze at an array of Staedtler transparent templates, whisper color names on Faber-Castell colored pencils, take Holbein drawing inks off the shelf, study, and carefully put the bottles back as if to rewind the move, and voila, all the worries are gone.

It'd be a little too much if I said the 1-hour therapy filled up the glasses, but it was truly enough to help me see them half full.



[色彩の効果]

カラーセラピーやら難しいコトは分かりませんが
絵具を見ると、心が洗われ、研ぎ澄まされます。

そういえば小学生のとき
ホルベインのコバルトブルーのドローイングインクを
三宮センター街のナガサワで買ってもらって
時折わけもなく引出しから出しては蛍光灯に透かして・・・
てことをしていました。


相変わらずです。

8/22/2005

The Soup


I think my mind has got a strange mesh filter, which takes away all these big rocks and keeps sand inside; I forget about main events but clearly remember tiniest stuff.

It was this past Saturday that I went to Acty Osaka for the first time in years, to find out that an old sandwich restaurant had been replaced with a not-so-trendy-anymore Asian-fusion diner.

And I started wondering when was the last time I was there, with whom and why.

Strangely enough, the first and only thing that flashed into my mind was the consomme soup they always served for free. Looking back, it tasted like "just add water" kind of soup, but I simply loved it, and suddenly started missing it so much.


(Sorry if I looked a bit spaced-out while we were strolling on the floor. I must've been feeling the taste of that soup.)


[コンソメスープの味  サンドイッチ「グルメ」・アクティ大阪]

最後に行ったのはたぶん姉とで、
エッシャー展の後だったような・・・ すごいあやふや。 なのに
なんでコンソメスープだけこんなにハッキリ覚えてるんやろう?
あと、向かいの丸ビルの天気予報とか。

8/17/2005

Priceless


- Two tickets for Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography: Free

- Mini outdoor bossa nova concert at Yebisu Garden Place: Free

- Getting mesmerized by the breezy sound of Matsumonica's harmonica, and knowing my friend was feeling exactly the same: Priceless

There are some things that money can't buy...


[お金で買えない価値がある]

自分が何に心を動かされるか、自分でも全く予測できません。

先日は、マツモニカさんのサウンドに、キュンとなりました。

「キュンと、って・・・年考えろ」って?

いやほんと、なんかね、
鎖骨の間をレモンソーダがシュワシュワー 
って感覚だったんですよ。
自分が一番びっくりしたわ。

8/07/2005

Chopsticks


I don't know about Rachmaninoff either, but this line really gets me:

Take your potato chips and go.
- The seven year itch (1955)

余計帰れなくなりますよ
そんなキュートなセリフ言われたら。

8/02/2005

The Name


I know it's been quoted too many times, but this is my first time:
What's in a name?

And I answer:
That which we call an oakleaf hydrangea by any other name wouldn't have made me and my mother feel as sweet.
(Look at the leaf, it's too oaky.)

Ref: Floridata, USDA Plants Database


[7/24(日) 実家の庭にて]

母: アジサイ、先月綺麗かってんけど。(房、)もう切ってしまった。  
   (葉っぱを指差し) これもでしょ、それからこれも・・・   
   あ、実はこれもアジサイやねん。

私: え、そうなん? でも アジサイぽくないね。   
   なんか 柏餅の葉っぱみたいやん。

母: そう! だからね、名前は・・・ カシワバアジサイ。

植物を知っているということ。
衒学的、と思いもするけど、
少なくとも「カシワバアジサイ」という名前は
母と私を純粋に幸せに、そしてちょっと得意げにしてくれました。

7/25/2005

Joy Ride


It was right after my Nozomi 68 super express passed Shizuoka, when, out of nowhere, a crazy idea came up to my mind, which turned out to be a magical way to enjoy the remaining 1 hour ride: Close my eyes and imagine I was driving that flying car I saw in the Episode II. It felt so real and even thrilling - another geeky pleasure of mine.

のぞみって時折、
プォーンっていう、ワープみたいな音を出しません?
あれがまた、なかなかの効果音でして・・・

7/24/2005

Xiphophorus


So I'm always fascinated by people who can explain to me some things that are entirely new to me, in a few crisp words, like kids' newspaper headlines, and with respect.

For example, 'Ogg.'

We were sort of market-studying i-pod and the like at Yodobashi, when I got naive enough to ask this engineer how come 'Ogg' mattered to him, and his answer was "Because it's the format that goes with my PC, which runs not with Windows but with so-called Linux." (did I hear it right?)

To general people, he might have used more technical words, but to me, who still sharpens pencils with a knife, I don't believe there would have been better answers than that.

Moreover, I like this "headline" information because of the space it gives to me: if not interested, I can opt to skip to other topics with no bad feeling at all; if interested, I can go on to read further on my own will -I was, and now I know Ogg is an audio compression format that is open, free, and unpatented. What a progress in a day.


何それ?何で?と聞いた私の図太さも凄いですけど
それに簡潔に答えられる文脈力はもっと凄いと思います。

ちなみにOggには
「(あとのことを何も考えず)強引に押進める」って意味もあるらしいです。 
でもまあそういう行動も時には必要よね
(と言うことが既にoggy?)

7/20/2005

Emotion


7/17 (Sun), 13:30: I was at Musashino with a friend of my sister waiting for our baguette, when she started flipping the Noritake knife and said, "This just reminded me of a ... whale."

The behavior and remark could have turned out to be nerdy or I'm-trying-hard-to-be-a-cute-woman-ish, but it was so her, natural and artistic, which I thought was undoubtly adorable.

Then, three days later, I found the cutlery is called "emotion."


Aptly-named, I thought, because what she told me the Coward Lion at the end of the lunch was that the most important thing (in relationships), after all, was to be true to myself and never be afraid of expressing my emotion.


素直がいちばん、ね。

7/01/2005

Foxy Brown


Self analysis: One of the minor reasons why I like cooking is because it has so many words and phrases which I like the sound of, such as blend until smooth, drizzle (nuts) over the cake, and golden brown that is used to describe when cooked food (e.g. pies, muffins, chicken wings) is ready.

Golden brown. So lovely, especially when pronounced with a British accent. But what I like more is the Japanese term used for the same doneness: kitsune-iro, literally meaning fox color.

I don't know what people associate a fox with, but for sure this expression has no sly, negative implication at all (and has nothing to do with 1974 Jack Hill film).

In fact, it reminds me of a beautiful kita-kitsune (northern fox) I once saw in Hokkaido, and every once in a while during my holiday cooking I fantasize about him:

He's young and proud, gazing at me quietly with his sharp spine line nobly shining under early autumn sunlight. He nears me, as if to show off his pearly white paws, and stops 1-1/2 arm-length away from me. Minutes of silence, looking at him and looking at me. And finally, not knowing what to do, I just exhale "hi..." when he suddenly but gracefully leaps a half axel and slaps me with his brush. I blink my eyes, and he's gone. I just stand still, keep staring at the light scar he's left on my knee.

Have I read this kind of story somewhere? At Prof Ukai's English class back in college? Was it "The fox"? I'm getting oblivious...


And that's when my custard pudding is ready.


[きつね色になるまで]

英語では golden brown というのですね。
(例:bake at 180C for 20 min, or until golden brown)
でも「きつね色」のほうが表現として好き。
きりっとした、でもしっぽフワフワの
若いキタキツネを思い起こさせるから。

ドレミファ ソ ソ ラファドラソ。

6/24/2005

Egg-ology (2)


So my father, born on the Pearl Harbor Day, has never cooked hard-boiled eggs. That's a critical domestic issue to address.

But now I wonder, what about me, then? What makes me so sure I'm any better?


So I googled as usual, because being egg-headed is the last thing I want to be. But I must confess I was beaten more or less this time, to find out merely in minutes, my complete egg-norance of the situation abroad.

As far as I know, most people in Japan make boiled-eggs by keeping eggs simmered just until cooling them with running tap water (unless they've got a microwavable egg-cooking gadget.) However, apparently that's not a universal standard. For example, Betty Crocker's cookbook and American Egg Board, which I think are influential in the US, recommend the following:
1) turn off heat as water comes to a boil
2) let stand for minutes
3) then cool with water

"Remove from heat?! Um, okay," I bitterly smiled and nodded... until AEB proudly called it's let-stand method "more energy efficient."

EFFICIENT.

"Hey, do you mean I'm an inefficient person?"


Calm down, calm down. (I have a tendency to overreact to the word.)

Then self defense:
"Actually, I strongly believe 'keep-simmering' is more prectical here in Japan, considering the nation's family size, pan size and so on. Moreover, it agrees with our perfectionism or sophisticated sense of beauty: would rather gently stir eggs while heat is on, in order to get the yolk just right in the middle…" And eventually, my imagination went so far as to picture US-Japan secretary-level talks over which is more civilized in the way of cooking eggs.

But all in all, it wasn't that bad to get all these eggs on my face. Actually, it, uh, egged myself on, to enhance my egg-ability.


[一般的な ゆで卵のつくりかた]


日本では「沸騰してから5-10分ゆでる」だと思うのですが
参照:NHKきょうの料理 ゆで卵のきほん

米国では「沸騰したら火からおろし、余熱で凝固」がより一般的なのでしょうか?
参照:
American Egg Board 米国鶏卵委員会

しかも「より省エネで効率的です」みたいなこと書いてるし。
なんかいやですねえ・・・ 

「あなた非効率、要領悪い」って言われてるみたいで。(考えすぎ)

じゃあなぜこの「効率的」な方法は日本に浸透しないんだろう、と
ふと実践してみました。

2個目むきかけた時点で、自分なりの答えは出ました:
黄身、思い切り片寄ってました。しかも5個とも全部・・・
これが、日本の美意識に反するのかな、と。

ちょっと、アメリカ人に勝った気がしました。

6/16/2005

Egg-ology (1)


Surprising fact about my father that I learned this past weekend:

I called my mother and he got it instead.

"Oh, she's gone on a trip… to Iceland or somewhere, I guess. (okay, that doesn't surprise me any more) …By the way, you called me at the right moment. Tell me, how do you make boiled eggs?"

What? I mean, how could a 63-year-old man manage to spend his whole life without knowing such a thing?? I even felt shell-shocked.

But as I gave him directions, I realized that boiled eggs ("cooked eggs" according to American Egg Board) are not so simple at all:
- Start with water or hot water?
- Need to add salt to water?
- Boil at high/low & how long?
- SOS: What if egg white starts leaking out of a shell crack?
…and more.

Besides, I found the talk so pleasing, because he was listening earnestly, apparently jotting down all I said, just like a Cub Scout kid with his senior telling him how to spot a perfect site for a tent, or how to keep snakes off at night.

Maybe I should visit him this Father's day so we can make egg sandwiches together (then hopefully move on to egg Benedict).


「ゆで卵ってどうやって作るん?」と父。
「はぁ? ゆでたらいいだけやん。」と言いかけましたが
いや、もう全然「だけ」の話じゃないわってことに気づかされました。

電話切ったあとも、気になって調べてみたら
自分の信念揺るがす事実が次々と・・・(続く)

6/14/2005

Extraordinarily Ordinary


Vetiver Extraordinaire: my Saturday perfume.
I don't want to disappoint Dominique Ropion by describing this way, but the perfume reminds me of breezy LA afternoon, when I sit on grass under a big pine tree, flipping a textbook with fingers that still have a hint of the smell I got from lunch: orange & pumpernickel bagel w/ caraway seeds.
editionsdeparfums.com


「非凡」なほどに 「私の日常」な香り。

ふと一句:
草わかば 色鉛筆の赤き粉の ちるがいとしく 寝て削るなり
(北原白秋)