Antiphonal

Reality TV ahoy

catrinella@insanejournal.com — Mon, 27 Aug 2007 13:37:18 GMT

I know lots of you are reality TV watchers. slash_reality is the IJ incarnation of slash_runway, the LJ comm that thermidor and I set up last year. The focus of slash_reality is a lot broader, mostly because there are plenty of us who watch Top Chef, ANTM, and other ~~brilliant Andy Cohen ideas~~ stuff and want to talk about it. YOu don't have to slash the shows - it's just that Therm and I tend to view reality TV from a slashy perspective and figured most of our f-lists do too.

Join us, won't you? Top Chef is getting very interesting, the new cycle of ANTM starts in a few weeks, and admit it - you're probably going to watch Tim Gunn's House of Style just for Tim.

What your vet means when...

catrinella@insanejournal.com — Fri, 17 Aug 2007 21:30:18 GMT

Nico had dental work today: a cleaning and an extraction. His vet honestly looks like a sort of skinny Charlie Weasley, Animal Doctor, complete with humongous numbers of freckles, and he's got a midwestern good-naturedness. So, when he called to say the work was done, I said that I hoped Nico hadn't been too grumpy. "Oh, he wasn't that bad." Hm.

So, I went to pick him up and got a lesson in pet dentistry which I was able to cut short by saying "I used to have a greyhound" (ex-racers have notoriously bad mouths). Then I waited, and heard some yowling, and waited some more, and then cute young perspiring vet tech came out and said "Nico was - um - a little fussy? He didn't want to get into his carrier?"

I think that's code for "Lady, your tabby cat is an asshole."

He's fighting with Philip now, since Pip wants to know why Nico's mouth smells funny. Later, adventures in antibiotics.

Unholy loves

catrinella@insanejournal.com — Wed, 15 Aug 2007 20:57:51 GMT

I admit it. I looooove reality competition shows: Project Runway, ANTM, Top Chef, Top Design...and I even read the recaps for shows I don't watch, like Shear Design and So You Think You Can Dance and *cough, embarrassed* Mission: Man Band (which isn't technically a competition, but come on - it's cheesetastic).

I don't write RPS, mostly because it seems like hard work without a text in front of me to provide a relatively canonical character interpretation, but I admit I'm one of the people who asked for Project Runway in Yuletide last year.

In anticipation of the new season of ANTM (September 17), MTV has been running marathons, and not just of the Caridee and Yoanna seasons like usual. Of course, my TiVo does not catch them in complete sequential order, so it's a bit jumbly and sometimes it takes a minute to figure out WHAT I'm watching (I mean, besides His Orangeness and His Wackadoo-ness), but it's been nice to pass the time while I've been editing/revising horribly written documentation this week and not sleeping a hell of a lot.

What I need is a nap, but what I want are Almond Thins and a cup of tea. Given that it's 102F outside, I don't think I feel much like going out and getting some. :)

Recipe: Panzanella

catrinella@insanejournal.com — Sun, 12 Aug 2007 03:03:41 GMT

It's August. It's hot and humid here in Atlanta, and I think I'll go crazy if I have to turn on my oven for very long (which I will have to do as I didn't think far enough ahead). I'm making panzanella, an Italian salad that incorporates stale bread, or at least a home-cook version that involves fridge clean-out ingredients (which, I think, is the entire POINT of panzanella, so there). And so, a narrative recipe without much in the way of amounts or whatnot.

My salad started with a couple of day-old ciabatta loaves and some heirloom tomatoes from Whole Foods 'cause I didn't have a garden this year (a Black Krim, and one red & one yellow Brandywine). I chopped the tomatoes into a big dice, not quite an inch, and dumped them to marinate in a balsamic vinaigrette (2:1 ratio with extra-virgin olive oil and lots of salt/pepper), then tore up one ciabatta into about the same size and dried it in a 250 degree oven for 40 minutes. [Make lots of vinaigrette - at least 2x as much as you would think is excessive - the bread soaks it up! Mine was 2/3 cup oil and 1/3 cup balsamic and I needed about half a cup more.] If you like capers, add some here - I did not, as the landlord visited for supper and he is allergic. Oh well.

Later, I tore some fresh basil into a box of baby romaine leaves, then mixed in the marinated tomatoes and dry bread, along with some fresh mozzarella and some prosciutto torn into strands over the top. You could add red onion if you wanted. Extra ciabatta on the side to sop up vinaigrette/tomato juices.

~~Bing cherries~~ (lunch tomorrow for me!) and vanilla gelato for dessert.