leonard michaels

"And then I awoke as if from a nightmare and it was a brilliant morning. She was standing like a stork on one leg, pulling a stocking up the other. She said, "Hello," and her voice was full of welcome, but I saw she was too much in motion, already someplace else. Her eyes were pleasant, but they looked through mine as if mine weren't eyes, just tunnels that zoomed out the back of my head."
Leonard Michaels - "Making Changes"

the monsters that ate my youth

Our monthly-ish mixtape club, True Religion & Bad Company, met last Thursday. The task was to make mixes based on the theme "highschool".

These are the songs I lovedlovedloved in highschool. I wouldn't want to go back, but somehow, musically, I can't go forward. Not that I'm complaining.

Download the mix (.zip).

Astral Plane - Jonathan Richman & The Modern Lovers
Cherry Cherry - Unrest
The Hickey Underworld - The Nation Of Ulysses
Sunlight - Eric's Trip
Good Things - Sebadoh
Keep The Conversation Going - Black Fantastic
She Fakes Apples - Acid House Kings
Laurie - Evergreen
Fireworks - Aberdeen
Stop That Girl - Vic Godard & The Subway Sect
In Between - Beat Happening
Sno-Cones - Totfinder
Hey, That's No Way To Say Goodbye - Leonard Cohen
The Girl With No Body - Momus
Boys Don't Matter - BLUE BOY
Just A Girl - The Pale Fountains
Girl Daredevil - Bomb Pops
Love Sick - Orange Juice

library dog

tofu turkey ala let's get baked

The best Thanksgiving meal ever is the vegan tofu turkey they made on Let's Get Baked a few years ago. The internet can be a cruel place sometimes, and that's exactly the case with this recipe - it seems to all have but disappeared (can't even find it on LGB!).

I did track it down eventually, after a few frantic good searches, but to make it easier on myself in the future & to give you some motivation to make something awesome for your Thanksgiving feast tomorrow, I'm replicating it here.

Thanks for coming up with something so rad, Mat & Dave!

Tofu Turkey & Fixin's
Turkey:
5 pounds of firm tofu Stuffing:
2 tbsp oil
1 large onion
1 cup celery,
diced 3 to 4 cloves garlic, minced
2 tsp marjoram
2 tsp thyme
3 tsp Herb de Provence
1/4 cup soy sauce or tamari
2 cups bread crumbs 1
cup wild cooked wild rice salt and pepper to taste

Basting mixture: 1/2 cup toasted sesame oil
1/4 to 1/3 cup soy sauce or tamari
2 tablespoons miso
2 tablespoons orange juice
1 teaspoon mustard
1/2 cup nutritional yeast

Mash tofu together in a bowl. Line a Colander with cheese cloth and dump tofu in. Use a plate to press out the excess water from tofu. Leave a heavy weight on the plate for an hour or two to drain as much water as possible (preferably in the fridge). Take colander full of tofu and hollow out a place for stuffing. In a sauce pan fry up the garlic, onion, and celery. When they are sufficiently brown mix in the rest of the ingredients for the stuffing thoroughly and dump it into the hole that you have made in the tofu. Pack it tightly and flip onto a baking sheet. Cover the tofu turkey with the basting sauce and bake at 375 for an hour or so until it is golden brown. If you have the time you can cook it longer and a lower temperature and baste it a couple more times for extra amazing flavor experiences. Enjoy!

bowden

"The matriarch is ill. She can't get up, so another matriarch comes over and lifts her to her feet with her tusks. But in a while she falls again, and this time she will not rise. She dies. Matriarchs from other families visit her. They stand over her giant body, their trunks delicately take in the air a foot or so above her. They nudge her carefully with their tusks.

We call this compassion. But of course we hesitate to say the word because we are speaking of elephants and we draw lines on the earth and we draw lines when it comes to other bloods." - Charles Bowden, Some of the Dead Are Still Breathing

breaker

2009 TC / Richard H. Driehaus Foundation Competition

On the Third Coast International Audio Festival website, you can now stream all the 2009 TC / Richard H. Driehaus Foundation Competition winning stories.

I've heard a number of the pieces (and even wrote about Hamish Sewell's piece almost exactly a year ago) and am excited to dive in and listen to the rest. Join me.