Socca is a chickpea flour pancake/flatbread.  It's vegan, grain and gluten-free.  Top with your favourite ingredients for a beautiful and wholesome lunch, dinner or snack.  SOCCA WITH TOPPINGS:  Once socca is ready take it from the oven, add ingredients on the top and broil for another 5-10 minutes (until cheese melts/ingredients start getting some colour).  https://vegeregis.com/green-socca/ 

On the winter morning of January 31, 1861, Abraham Lincoln stepped inside a secluded farmhouse seemingly adrift on the vast Illinois prairie.  The president-elect had left his hometown of Springfield only once in the eight months since garnering the Republican presidential nomination—in order to finally meet his running mate, Hannibal Hamlin, in person—but he had one special goodbye that he needed to deliver in person before departing Illinois for his inauguration.  Inside that cozy farmhouse tucked underneath a blanket of snow, Lincoln bent down his lanky frame and embraced the wizened woman he called “Mother,” not the woman who gave birth to him, however, but the stepmother who helped to set him on the path to the White House.   Nancy Hanks Lincoln, who gave birth to the Great Emancipator on February 12, 1809, had instilled the virtues of honesty and compassion in her son and sowed the seeds of his intellectual curiosity.  Although lacking a formal education of her own, Nancy Lincoln impressed the importance of learning and reading on her young boy as they moved about the Kentucky and Indiana frontier.  Fourteen months later, Lincoln’s father, Thomas, returned to his former haunt of Elizabethtown, Kentucky, and called on Sarah Bush Johnston.  The pair had known each other from the Lincolns’ former time in Elizabethtown, and as soon as the widow Johnston, who had lost her husband in an 1816 cholera epidemic, answered the knock on the door, Thomas proposed.  Once he agreed to pay off her late husband’s outstanding debts, Sarah accepted the matrimonial offer.  Widow and widower wed on December 2, 1819.  Thomas Lincoln brought Sarah and her three children back to his small Indiana cabin to live with his two surviving children, Abraham and sister Sarah.  In 1861, Lincoln confided to a relative that his stepmother “had been his best friend in this world and that no son could love a mother more than he loved her.”  When Thomas Lincoln died in 1851, Sarah found herself a widow once again. Lincoln helped to support his stepmother and maintained a 40-acre plot for her on the Illinois plains.  Christopher Klein  https://www.history.com/news/the-two-mothers-who-molded-lincoln 

Homemade candied ginger is WAY better than store-bought, much fresher and more vibrant.  It will bring your baked goods to life, plus they’re fabulous just to snack on!   PLUS there’s the additional bonus of an amazing ginger simple syrup you’ll get at the end of the cooking process that is phenomenal in drinks!   Add it to the following:  Banana bread, sugar cookies, citrus salad, granola bars, cakes, pies, muffins, cupcakes, shortbread, pancakes, waffles, sprinkled over ice cream, lemon bread, pound cake (try my Preserved Lemon Ginger Pound Cake), ginger snaps, cranberry relish, pear or apple crisp, homemade jam, and the list goes on and on!  Or add it to this delicious Healthy Homemade Granola or this phenomenal Pineapple Mango Coconut Crumble with Candied Ginger.  Kimberly Killebrew See recipe and pictures at https://www.daringgourmet.com/how-to-make-crystallized-ginger/comment-page-3/ 
 © 2022 · The Daring Gourmet · All Rights Reserved

 

Books to take on a long retreat:  “The Literary Life,” by Robert Phelps and Peter Deane.  A browser’s paradise  A year-by-year scrapbook of 20th-century Anglo-American literature.  *  “The Art of Eating,” by M.F.K. Fisher. Celebrating the sensual.  *  “On the Shoulders of Giants,” by Robert K. Merton.  A lighthearted “Shandean” history of the dwarfs-perched-on-giants catchphrase.  Read entire list compiled by critic Michael Dirda at https://www.washingtonpost.com/entertainment/books/when-it-all-becomes-too-much-and-you-head-for-the-hills-what-books-would-you-bring/2022/01/11/0fc01f76-6f1f-11ec-a5d2-7712163262f0_story.html

 

FEBRUARY EVENTS  1:  New Moon  *  1:  Chinese New year   *  2:  Groundhog Day  *  4-20:  Beijing  XXIV Olympic Winter Games   * 13:  Super Bowl LVI  Kickoff will likely happen at 6:30 p.m. ET.  Fans can tune in to the game on NBC.  halftime show:  Dr. Dre, Snoop Dogg, Eminem, Mary J. Blige, and Kendrick Lamar  * 14:  Valentine’s Day  *  16:  Full Moon  *  21:  President’s Day 

January 28, 2022  The bidding war for parts of Ruth Bader Ginsburg's library is over, and it's clear that fans of the late Supreme Court justice have deep pockets.  The collection of Ginsburg-iana went for $2.3 million in the auction run by Bonhams, the auction house said.  The sale included more than 1,000 books with inscriptions from fellow justices, some of Ginsburg's old annotated law textbooks and gifts from Gloria Steinem and Annie Leibovitz.  Honorary degrees from Brown and Smith were also available, as were collections on Judaica, opera and women's rights.  Dan Berman  https://www.cnn.com/2022/01/28/politics/rbg-auction-results/index.html 

Scottish food, drink, and verse are celebrated on January 25, the anniversary of the birth of Robert Burns.  Burns is regarded as Scotland’s national bard.  He composed hundreds of songs and poems in both Scottish and English.  Burns Night celebrations run the gamut from simple gatherings of friends to elaborate ceremonies.  A piper may signal the start of proceedings, which soon give way to the Burns Supper.  The star of the meal is haggis, Scotland’s national dish.  Burns’s ode To a Haggis is recited before the haggis is carved and served to guests.  The event traditionally closes with a group rendition of Auld Lang Syne, perhaps the most-famous work attributed to Burns.  Michael Ray  https://www.britannica.com/story/the-haggis-burns-night-in-scotland  Read Address to a Haggis by Robert Burns at http://www.robertburns.org.uk/Assets/Poems_Songs/toahaggis.htm  See haggis recipe serving eight at https://www.196flavors.com/scotland-haggis/ 

Thomas Jefferson sells the bulk of his book collection to the United States government for $23,950, reestablishing the Library of Congress after it was burned down by the British the previous year (January 30, 1815) • Anton Chekhov’s The Three Sisters premieres at the Moscow Art Theater (January 31, 1901) • The first Oxford English Dictionary is published by James A.H. Murray (February 1, 1884) • Great American Iconoclast Ken Kesey’s One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest is published (February 1, 1962) • David Foster Wallace’s prescient Infinite Jest is published (February 1, 1996) • Eugene O’Neill’s first full-length play, Beyond the Horizon, opens at the Morosco Theater (February 2, 1920) • The still-controversial Ulysses is published in Paris on James Joyce’s fortieth birthday (February 2, 1922) • James Fenimore Cooper’s highly influential The Last of the Mohicans is published (February 4, 1826) • Six-year-old Elizabeth Bishop goes with her aunt to a dentist’s appointment; 50 years later, she will publish a life-changing poem about the experience called “In the Waiting Room” (February 5, 1918) • The first issue of Reader’s Digest is published (February 5, 1922)  Literary Hub  January 30, 2022 

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2489  January 31, 2022

The word graffiti comes from the Italian language and it is the plural of the word “graffito.”  They are both derived from the word graffio, which means “a scratch.”  The earliest graffiti was created prior to written language and the first drawings on walls appeared in caves thousands of years ago.  “Cueva de las Manos” (The Cave of Hands), located in Santa Cruz, Argentina, offers one of the first fascinating ancient graffiti.  The painting dates from 13,000 to 9,000 BCE.  In the ancient Greek city of Ephesus (located in modern day Turkey) the first known example of “modern style” graffiti can be found.  Goran Blazeski  See many illustrations at https://www.thevintagenews.com/2016/11/17/the-history-of-graffiti-from-ancient-times-to-modern-days/ 

Chinese New Year falls on February 1, 2022, beginning the Year of the Tiger.  Chinese New Year dates are dictated by the Chinese lunisolar calendar, so it is celebrated on a different date in January or February each year.  The celebration actually begins on New Year’s Eve, the night before, when families gather for a big New Year’s Eve dinner, or nián yèfàn (年夜饭).  https://thewoksoflife.com/when-is-chinese-new-year-2022/  See also https://chinesenewyear.net/ 

Seafood is one of Norway’s biggest exports, with cod as the fishing industry’s highest valued catch.  Dried cod, also called tørrfisk, is to Norwegian fish as prosciutto di Parma is to Italian pigs.  And it’s been produced in northern Norway since at least the ninth century, when the Vikings—who traded it for barley and fur—ventured to Iceland, Greenland, and Canada carrying a supply of the wonder ration.  Norway is cod.  That’s what Lofoteners say.  And the aroma is everywhere.  It’s carried by the ocean breeze that rushes in with the omnipresent, low-hanging clouds.  It wafts along roadsides and slips in through open windows, an invisible salty, fishy mist.  The choice ration for ancient Norse long-distance sailors (e.g., Erik the Red and Leif Erikson) dehydrated cod maintains its nutrition and protein for years.  Stockfish is so treasured, so inherent to this place, that it’s earned a protected designation of origin, like champagne or Parmigiano-Reggiano, the first Norwegian comestible to do so.  Lofoteners beam upon its mention.  Leslie Pariseau   https://www.saveur.com/norway-lofoten-dried-cod/ 

The Ballad of Brunhilde and Fredegund, Part One:  The Royal Rumble Begins   The lives of Fredegund and Brunhilde were defined primarily by a mutual hatred for each other.  For many years these two queens of the kingdom of the Franks feuded, and their political schemes, assassinations, and various disputes would be enough to fill a book (which they did) or to make an HBO miniseries (which they should).  Their story is not only interesting for the drama, however.  It also gives modern students of history insight into the nature of queenship during the Early Middle Ages, and shows us that, despite living in a deeply patriarchal society, women could, and often did, still attempt to act for themselves and could be the makers of their own destiny.  https://sites.owu.edu/trident/2021/03/28/the-ballad-of-brunhilde-and-fredegund-part-one-the-royal-rumble-begins/ 

The Ballad of Brunhilde and Fredegund, Part Two:  The Bloody Conclusion  Last we left off, the state of the kingdom of the Franks was an unsteady one, as the balance of power had suddenly shifted with the death of Sigibert and Chilperic.  In short order, their wives were in charge of their kingdoms as regents for their sons. Brunhilde and her son Childebert II waxed in power, seizing much of the lands once belonging to Chilperic and putting his wife and son on the knife’s edge.  https://sites.owu.edu/trident/2021/05/09/the-ballad-of-brunhilde-and-fredegund-part-two-the-bloody-conclusion/ 

Bob Thompson (1937-1966) was an African-American figurative painter known for his bold and colorful canvases, whose compositions were influenced by the Old Masters.  His art has also been described as synthesizing Baroque and Renaissance masterpieces with the jazz-influenced Abstract Expressionist movement.  He was prolific in his eight-year career, producing more than 1,000 works before his death in Rome in 1966.  The Whitney Museum mounted a retrospective of his work in 1998.  He also has works in numerous private and public collections throughout the United States.  Robert Louis Thompson was born and raised in Louisville, Kentucky.  His father died in a car crash when he was 13, and Thompson lived with relatives who exposed him to art and jazz.  He was briefly a pre-med student at Boston University (1955–56) but dropped out and returned to the University of Louisville (1957–58), where he studied painting under German expressionist artist Ulfert Wilke and Charles Crodel.  In 1958 he moved to New York City, where he formed friendships with jazz musicians such as Charlie Haden and Ornette Coleman while a regular at the jazz clubs "The Five Spot" and "Slugs".  He married in 1960 and moved with his wife to Europe in 1961 after receiving a Whitney Foundation fellowship.  They went to London, Paris (staying at the so-called "Beat Museum" hotel) and to Spain, where they settled on Ibiza.   https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bob_Thompson_(painter) 

gobo (plural gobos or goboes) (originally US)  noun  (film, photography, television)  A screen (often in disc form) placed between a light and an illuminated actor or object in order to diffuse the glare. [from early 20th c.] quotations ▼ (sound engineering)  A device used to shield a microphone from extraneous sounds. [from early 20th c.]  (theater) A template inserted over a light source to control the shape of the thrown light. [from early 20th c.]  The taproot of young edible burdock plants (Arctium lappa), eaten as a root vegetable.  [from early 19th c.]   Borrowed from Japanese.   https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/gobo#English 

To a poet, silence is an acceptable response, even a flattering one. - Colette, author (28 Jan 1873-1954)

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2488  January 28, 2022

 

lovely jubbly  noun (British slang for money), interjection (fantastic)or adjective (fantastic).  A modification of the 1950s slogan “lubbly Jubbly” advertising Jubbly, an orange-flavoured soft drink.  The term was coined by the English television scriptwriter John Sullivan (1946–2011) as an expression generally used by the character Derek “Del Boy” Trotter, a market trader from London, in the BBC television comedy Only Fools and Horses (first broadcast 1981–1991, with Christmas specials in 1996 and 2001–2003).   https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/lovely_jubbly

Despite her celebrated place in children’s literature, the exact identity and origin of Mother Goose herself is still unknown.  Some believe that the original Mother Goose was a real woman who lived in Boston during the latter half of the 17th century.  After being widowed by Isaac Goose, a woman named either Elizabeth Foster Goose or Mary Goose (depending on sources) moved in with her eldest daughter, entertaining her grandchildren with amusing jingles which quickly gained popularity with the neighborhood children.  According to the legend, her son-in-law, a publisher, printed her rhymes, and thus the reputation of Mother Goose was born.  However, literary historians often dismiss the possibility of a Bostonian Mother Goose, as the existence of various French texts that refer to Mother Goose at a much earlier date make the American legend improbable.  These texts, dating as early as 1626, even show that the French terms “mere l’oye” or   “mere oye” (Mother Goose) were already familiar to readers and could be referenced.  The figure of Mother Goose may even date back as the 10th century, according to other sources.  In an ancient French legend, King Robert II had a wife who often told incredible tales that fascinated children.  Regardless of Mother Goose’s origins, Charles Perrault was the first to actually publish a Mother Goose collection of rhymes and other folk tales in 1697, essentially initiating the fairy tale genre.  With the subtitle Les Contes de ma Mère l'Oie (Tales of my Mother Goose), the collection quickly gained popularity all over France.  By 1729, Perrault’s collection had been translated into English, in the form of Robert Samber’s Histories or Tales of Past Times, Told by Mother Goose.  Samber’s volume was eventually republished in 1786 and brought to the U.S.  English publisher of children’s literature John Newbery later focused on the nursery rhymes, publishing Mother Goose's Melody, or, Sonnets for the Cradle, which helped Mother Goose become further associated with children’s poetry.  https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/mother-goose  You may borrow Not Your Mother Goose https://www.notyourmothersgoose.com/ and The Legal Guide to Mother Goose https://archive.org/details/legalguidetomoth00sand from your local library. 

Crater Lake is a crater lake in south-central Oregon.  It is the main feature of Crater Lake National Park and is famous for its deep blue color and water clarity.  The lake partly fills a 2,148-foot-deep (655 m) caldera that was formed around 7,700 (± 150) years ago by the collapse of the volcano Mount Mazama.  There are no rivers flowing into or out of the lake; the evaporation is compensated for by rain and snowfall at a rate such that the total amount of water is replaced every 250 years.  With a depth of 1,949 feet (594 m), the lake is the deepest in the United States.  In the world, it ranks ninth for maximum depth, and third for mean (average) depth.  Crater Lake features two small islands.  Wizard Island, located near the western shore of the lake, is a cinder cone approximately 316 acres (128 ha) in size.  Phantom Ship, a natural rock pillar, is located near the southern shore.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crater_Lake 

An apostrophe is a punctuation mark that appears as part of a word to show possession, to make a plural number or to indicate the omission of one or more letters.  See examples at https://delmar.edu/offices/swc/_resources/grammar/Apostrophes.pdf 

Jack Daniel's is a brand of Tennessee whiskey and the best-selling whiskey in the world.  It is produced in Lynchburg, Tennessee, by the Jack Daniel Distillery, which has been owned by the Brown–Forman Corporation since 1956.  Jack Daniel's home county of Moore is a dry county, so the product is not available for purchase at stores or restaurants within the county.  The Jack Daniel's brand's official website suggests that its founder, Jasper Newton "Jack" Daniel, was born in 1850 (and his tombstone bears that date), but says his exact birth date is unknown.  The company website says it is customary to celebrate his birthday in September.  The Tennessee state library website said in 2013 that records list his birth date as September 5, 1846, and that the 1850 birth date seems impossible since his mother died in 1847.   In the 2004 biography Blood & Whiskey:  The Life and Times of Jack Daniel, author Peter Krass said his investigation showed that Daniel was born in January 1849 (based on Jack's sister's diary, census records, and the date of death of Jack's mother).  Jack was the youngest of 10 children born to his mother, Lucinda (Cook) Daniel, and father Calaway Daniel.  The Jack Daniel's Distillery was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1972.  In 2012, a Welshman, Mark Evans, claimed to have discovered the original recipe for Daniel's whiskey, in a book written in 1853 by his great-great-grandmother.  Her brother-in-law had emigrated to Tennessee.  While it is legal to distill the product within the county, it is illegal to purchase it there.  However, a state law has provided one exception:  a distillery may sell one commemorative product, regardless of county statutes.  Jack Daniel's now sells Gentleman Jack, Jack Daniel's Single Barrel, the original No. 7 blend (in a commemorative bottle), and a seasonal blend (on rotation) at the distillery's White Rabbit Bottle Shop.  See graphics at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jack_Daniel%27s 

Donna Barba Higuera has won the 2022 John Newbery Medal for the most outstanding contribution to children’s literature, for her novel The Last Cuentista (Levine Querido), edited by Nick Thomas. Jason Chin has won the 2022 Randolph Caldecott Medal for the most distinguished picture book for children, for Watercress, written by Andrea Wang (Holiday House/Neal Porter Books), edited by Neal Porter.  Firekeeper’s Daughter by Angeline Boulley (Henry Holt), edited by Tiffany Liao, has won the 2022 Michael L. Printz Award for excellence in literature written for young adults.  It was a first-time win for all three recipients.  Diana Roback and Emma Kantor  Read titles of all winners at https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/childrens/childrens-industry-news/article/88358-barba-higuera-chin-boulley-win-newbery-caldecott-printz-awards.html 

http://librariansmuse.blogpost.com  Issue 2487  January 26, 2022

Mr. Wilson's Cabinet of Wonder:  Pronged Ants, Horned Humans, Mice on Toast, and Other Marvels of Jurassic Technology by Lawrence Weschler  EBOOK  Finalist for Pulitzer Prize for General Nonfiction  Finalist for National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction   Pronged ants, horned humans, a landscape carved on a fruit pit—some of the displays in David Wilson's Museum of Jurassic Technology are hoaxes.  But which ones?  As he guides readers through an intellectual hall of mirrors, Lawrence Weschler revisits the 16th-century "wonder cabinets" that were the first museums and compels readers to examine the imaginative origins of both art and science.  https://nypl.overdrive.com/library/worldlanguages/media/1238706 

July 31, 2002  The New York Public Library has recreated a Renaissance-style "cabinet of curiosities" in an unusual display of objects from its vast trove of rarely seen oddities and treasures donated by collectors over a period of 150 years.  The exhibition was inspired by the Wunderkammerns (Wonder Cabinets) that proliferated in royal and noble palaces throughout Europe in the 16th and 17th centuries.  These cabinets were reborn in the U.S. in the 19th century as the curio museums established in Philadelphia by Charles Willson Peale, who exhibited a mastodon fossil, and in New York by P.T. Barnum, who displayed an "authentic" preserved mermaid.  Frederick M. Winship  https://www.upi.com/Odd_News/2002/07/31/Library-opens-door-to-curiosity-cabinets/45491028127871/ 

In France, galette des rois translates literally as “cake of kings,” and is a flaky pastry cake made from puff pastry that is typically filled with a frangipane almond cream (or occasionally fruit or chocolate).  A decorative pattern is scored into the top of it before baking, and sometimes the finished cake is topped with a paper crown.  Traditionally, there is a “fève,” or bean, hidden inside.  The king cakes of New Orleans more closely resemble those of Spanish-speaking countries rather than the king cake that originated in France.  Dana Hatic  Link to recipes at https://www.eater.com/22268353/king-cake-history-tradition-mardi-gras 

December 28, 2021  The New York Public Library Cabinet of Wonders  contains an oversize handwritten copy of the Bill of Rights, one of 14 that George Washington ordered made during the debate over ratification.  It lists 12 amendments, rather than the 10 that were approved.  “This shows that history isn’t set in stone,” said Anthony Marx, the library’s president.  “It’s something that’s always being debated and argued, even as it’s being imagined.”  The exhibition, which is free but requires timed admission tickets, includes cases dedicated to exploration, religion, performance, childhood, visual arts, social activism and other themes, whose contents will rotate regularly.  There are striking juxtapositions and surprising sightlines, and objects that tell different stories depending on the angle you look from.  Look through a display of the conductor Arturo Toscanini’s batons, suspended in space, and you catch a glimpse of a spotlighted case across the room holding “Political Prisoner,” a 1971 cedar sculpture by the African American artist Elizabeth Catlett.  From the front, the figure—a woman with a Pan-African flag cut into her torso—looks exhilarated, regal.  From behind, you see that her hands are chained.  The library is really a “collections of collections,” whose own history is traced through the show.  The core sections are heavy on treasures donated by the 19th-century philanthropist James Lenox, like an early 16th-century copper globe that includes one of the earliest cartographic representations of the Americas.  (It’s also one of only two surviving Renaissance or medieval maps with the inscription “Here be dragons.”)  https://theindiestimes.com/2021/12/28/the-new-york-public-library-opens-its-cabinet-of-wonders/ 

Carl Sagan (1934-1996), astronomer and book lover:  “What an astonishing thing a book is.  It’s a flat object made from a tree with flexible parts on which are imprinted lots of funny dark squiggles.  But one glance at it and you’re inside the mind of another person, maybe somebody dead for thousands of years.  Across the millennia, an author is speaking clearly and silently inside your head, directly to you.  Writing is perhaps the greatest of human inventions, binding together people who never knew each other, citizens of distant epochs.  Books break the shackles of time.  A book is proof that humans are capable of working magic.”  excerpt from the 11th episode of Carl Sagan’s 1980s Cosmos series, titled “The Persistence of Memory”  https://lostandfoundbooks.wordpress.com/2013/01/12/a-book-is-proof-that-humans-are-capable-of-working-magic/ 

The Lincoln–Douglas debates (also known as The Great Debates of 1858) were a series of seven debates between Abraham Lincoln, the Republican Party candidate for the United States Senate from Illinois, and incumbent Senator Stephen Douglas, the Democratic Party candidate.  Until the 17th Constitutional Amendment of 1913, senators were elected by their respective state legislatures, so Lincoln and Douglas were trying to win control of the Illinois General Assembly for their respective parties.  The debates were designed to generate publicity:  the first examples of what later would be called media events.  For Lincoln, they were an opportunity to raise both his national profile and the burgeoning Republican Party, while Douglas sought to defend his record—especially his leading role in the doctrine of popular sovereignty and its incarnation in the Kansas–Nebraska Act of 1854.  The candidates spoke in each of Illinois's nine congressional districts.  Both candidates had already spoken in Springfield and Chicago within a day of each other, so they decided that their joint appearances would be held in the remaining seven districts.  Each debate lasted around three hours; one candidate spoke for 60 minutes, followed by a 90-minute response and a final 30-minute rejoinder by the first candidate.  The candidates alternated speaking first.  As the incumbent, Douglas spoke first in four of the debates.  They were held outdoors, weather permitting, from about 2 to 5 p.m.  There were fields full of listeners.  The debates focused on slavery:  specifically, whether it would be allowed in the new states to be formed from the territory acquired through the Louisiana Purchase and the Mexican Cession.  Douglas, as part of the Democratic party, held that the decision should be made by the residents of the new states themselves rather than by the federal government (popular sovereignty).  Lincoln argued against the expansion of slavery, yet stressed that he was not advocating its abolition where it already existed.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lincoln%E2%80%93Douglas_debates 

On January 24, 1862, Edith Wharton was born Edith Newbold Jones in a brownstone in New York City.  (As you may have inferred from her novels, her parents were quite well off—some even say the expression “keeping up with the Joneses” referred to her family.)  Wharton would not publish her first novel until 1902, when she was 40—though by that time she had published two short story collections, a book of poems, a novella, and the seminal The Decoration of Houses, an anti-Victorian interior design manual she wrote with architect Ogden Codman. However, it was The House of Mirth—“a devastating examination of life in a terribly unequal society not so different from our own”—which was serialized in Scribner’s Magazine and then published as a single volume in 1905, that made Wharton into a literary star—140,000 copies were in print by the end of the year, reflecting, as Charles Scribner himself wrote, “the most rapid sale of any book ever published by Scribner.” She would go on to have a long and illustrious literary career, writing novels, novellas, plays, poems, short stories, and nonfiction, including the publication, in 1920, of The Age of Innocence, which was the first book by a woman to win the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction.  Literary Hub  January 23, 2022 

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2486  January 24, 2022 

 

A.Word.A.Day with Anu Garg

habitus  (HAB-i-tuhs)  noun   1.  The physical characteristics of a person, especially as relating to disease.  2. The way someone of a particular social group perceives and responds to the world.  From Latin habit (state, appearance), from habere (to have).  Ultimately from the Indo-European root ghabh- (to give or to receive), which also gave us give, gift, able, habit, prohibit, due, duty, habile, and adhibit.  Earliest documented use:  1886.

Habitat Ready:  Disaster preparedness for homeowners   The safest place during a tornado is a storm shelter or underground room, such as a basement or cellar.  If going underground is not an option and you do not have access to a storm shelter, the next safest place is a small interior room (such as a bathroom, hallway or closet) on the lowest floor, away from windows and exterior walls.  Know the difference between a tornado watch and a tornado warning:  Tornado watch:  A tornado is possible. Stay tuned to a National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration weather radio or TV for more information and be prepared to seek shelter quickly if necessary.  Tornado warning:  A tornado is expected or occurring. Take shelter immediately.  https://www.habitat.org/our-work/disaster-response/disaster-preparedness-homeowners/tornadoes

 

Wild Mushroom-and-Red Wine Risotto by Grace Parisi  https://www.foodandwine.com/recipes/wild-mushroom-and-red-wine-risotto  See also https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/giada-de-laurentiis/red-wine-risotto-with-peas-recipe-1943940

 

Identical twins Francis and Freeland Stanley produced the most famous steam car in the world.  Their first project failed, but in 1897 they produced a steam car that could run at 27 miles an hour.  A Stanley race car that could go 128 miles an hour was advertised as the “Fastest Stock Car in the World.”  Car production continued through 1927, and a liquidation sale was held in 1929.  See picture at https://www.herald-dispatch.com/news/recent_news/vintage-autos-stanley-brothers-made-their-mark-with-steam/article_37aae36c-f328-51bc-ab1d-514f939e1d83.html

 

Dragon fruit, also called pitaya or strawberry pear, looks like something straight out of a Dr. Seuss book:  On the outside, it’s a pink oval with green scales (hence the “dragon” name).  Inside, it has white flesh with tiny black seeds.  It’s indigenous to Mexico and South America.  If you can’t find dragon fruit in your local supermarket, try a specialty food store or Asian market.  Eat the flesh and discard the skin.  Dragon fruit may be grilled.  https://health.clevelandclinic.org/get-to-know-the-incredible-edible-dragon-fruit/

 

Sherlock Holmes is the most portrayed literary human character in film and television history, having appeared on screen 254 times as of 2012.  Additionally, many actors have portrayed Sherlock Holmes in audio dramas and stage productions.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_actors_who_have_played_Sherlock_Holmes  The Albuquerque and Bernalillo County Public Library explores literary universes including Holmes, Poe, Lovecraft, Dickens, Dracula and Burroughs.  https://abqlibrary.org/sherlock 

The Cinque Terre, five towns, is a string of five fishing villages perched high on the Italian Riviera in the region Liguria, which until recently were linked only by mule tracks and accessible only by rail or water.  An ancient system of footpaths is still the best way to visit the five villages:  Monterosso, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola and Riomaggiore.  Over centuries, people have carefully built terraces to cultivate grapes and olives on the rugged, steep landscape right up to the cliffs that overlook the Mediterranean Sea.  The Cinque Terre, recognized in 1997 by the Unesco Mankind's World Heritage, are today a National Park and Protected Marine Area with the aim of protecting this great cultural heritage and natural environment.  https://www.cinqueterre.eu.com/en/

 

Tuscan Shrimp with White Beans  four servings   recipe courtesy of Michael Chiarello   https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/michael-chiarello/tuscan-shrimp-with-white-beans-recipe-1945270

                                                    

Little Old New York is a 1923 American silent historical drama film starring Marion Davies was based on a play of the same name by Rida Johnson Young.  The film was produced by William Randolph Hearst's Cosmopolitan production unit.   In her 17th film, Marion Davies stars in a dual role as Patricia and Patrick O'Day.  This was Davies' first teaming with silent actor Harrison Ford.  This lavish historical drama was filmed in New York City and directed by Sidney Olcott.  Hearst had an exact replica of Fulton's Clermont built and staged the famous river race on the Hudson in January.  On February 18, 1923, a fire swept through the Cosmopolitan Studio, basically destroying the studio and all its contents.  The film's negatives were saved (it was about two-thirds completed), and production began anew at several other local studios.  All of the sets and costumes had to be re-created.  The film premiered at the Cosmopolitan, a movie theatre owned by William Randolph Hearst, located at Columbus Circle in New York City. The film was a triumph for Marion Davies, and she was named "Queen of the Screen" and the #1 female box-office star of 1923 at the annual theater owners ball (Rudolph Valentino was named #1 male star).  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Little_Old_New_York_(1923_film)

 

The high cost of wine in Ohio has become the subject of heated debate after a Cleveland newspaper reported that Buckeyes pay more for a bottle than anyone in the country.  Liquor laws in Ohio add at least 135 percent to the cost of wine, according to a study by the Cleveland Plain Dealer, which means that consumers pay between one-quarter to one-half more for a bottle than wine drinkers in other states.  Tim Fish  https://www.winespectator.com/articles/irate-ohio-consumers-ask-state-to-lower-wine-prices-21215 

http://librariansmuse.blogspot.com  Issue 2485  January 21, 2022