Queen Mediocretia of Suburbia

Busy Week: Doobie Brothers / Chicago Concert 2017

That last Doobie Brothers / Chicago concert I went to was back in 2010 - seven years ago! I went back to read up on how I felt about the last one, and it appears that it was so hot that I took to my bed the next day.

And, strangely, in 2010 I seem to have formed an affection for this member of Chicago:

I said I was going to Wikipedia him. I can't really tell if that's a bass, but if it is, it must have been Jeff Coffey. I must have been captivated by his voice, because we know I love a tenor. This year, he sounded a bit like he'd sucked on some helium before the show.

I was so young seven years ago that I completely ignored the hot trombone player to his upper left in that picture. I was such a child then that my eye was drawn away from the 69 years old founding member of the band, James Pankow.

This man has it all.

Enormous sexual self-confidence. In fact, such self-confidence that Gary rolled his eyes when Mr. Pankow began wiggling his hips in his v-neck shirt, and suggestively thrusting his trombone.

"Puh-leezze" Gary said.
"Shut your mouth. I love him. He is selling sex and I am buying it."
"Seriously?"
"He is FINE."

He is FINE and 69. Sixty-nine years old. This gives him the gray hair I love.

Is in the Rock and Roll Songwriting Hall of Fame. For songwriting, and of course in the regular hall for being in Chicago.

Born in Saint Louis. I don't know exactly where in Saint Louis, though. I'm guessing Baden. NOT born in Chicago. Strangely, though, he is not on the Delmar Walk of Fame of People Who Were Born In or Even Briefly Lived in Saint Louis.

Is of German and Irish descent. This is a heritage I have learned to deal with. (Gary's 25% Irish and 25% German.)

Has a famous sibling. His brother plays the vile Merc Lapidus, the network head/game show host on Episodes.

Has staying power. Been in Chicago since 1967.

And did I mention the suggestive tromboning?

Busy Week: Pride Parade

Every year for the past decade when the Pride Parade rolls around, I want to go, but then I think, "Since I'm not personally proud to BE gay, I'd only be going just to gawk at the fabulous gays, and that's not kind."

Then I saw that TeddyJ as a company was marching in the parade, Gary read that more straight people march in the Pride Parade than gays now, and when I found out Planed Parenthood had a contingent (being a gay parent probably does take a lot of planning), I decided that the Pride Parade had been commercialized by straights and that I should go before it became completely appropriated. When we got there we realized that ship had sailed. 

Then it became a quest to find anyone gay and fabulous. We were there an hour early, so we wandered past the Gay Purina Pet Food float and the Gay Local Electric Company float and finally got off the main drag, to a side street where (possbily) Gay Fredbird was waiting to march, and then finally we rounded a corner to the staging area for the Balloon Brigade.

There are people inside those balloon wads! Non-corporate dancing gay people! It takes them a solid day to blow up all those balloons. We had a nice conversation with one man who confirmed our fears that we'd missed the real Pride Parade. He told us about the time and money they personally invest and then pointed out FedEx's devotion to the cause was taping a tatty sparkled banner to the bottom of a van minutes earlier. I felt bad, because all I did was wear a colorful shirt. Lame.

I also felt bad because the parade reminded me that on April 1st I made an April Fools' joke and I had still not gotten my payoff.

On April 1st we were discussing on Facebook that the creator of the Rainbow Pride flag had died. I commented, "I thought Mr. Roy G. Biv created the rainbow flag," and I bet some of you just remembered that ROY G BIV is the acronym you use to remember the order of he colors in the spectrum, and perhaps you laughed.

Friend #2 (Hot Mom) did not remember, and did not laugh, and suggested that maybe Roy ripped off the rainbow flag creator instead.

I countered by suggesting that anyone unfamilar with.Roy G. Biv's work should go visit Wikipedia right now, because I didn't want to end what was turning out to be an April Fools' joke with "HAHAHAHA STUPID." That's no fun.

But Hot Mom didn't go to Wikipedia. April Fool's came and went. However, Friend #3 got the joke, and added the next Monday that she was familar with both Roy and the work of his cousin, rapper Bell Biv DeVoe.

Unbeknownst to me, that Monday Hot Mom heard our snickering and finally went to Wikipedia, remembered that she was familar with Roy G. Biv, but said nothing. Instead she made me wait until I asked about it two months later after the Pride Parade. She'd better watch out next April Fools'.

Busy Week: Opera

It was a busy week, what with the Doobie Brothers/Chicago concert Wednesday and the opera Friday and the Pride Parade Sunday.

Let's start with Friday. Anne planned the Opera evening, becuase she's been to the opera several times before. I've only been once, with Mom, some time in the early seventies. It was in the days of the St. Louis Municipal Opera, before the current Opera Theater of Saint Louis. Mom and I saw Die Fledermaus. I remember it was funny, and that I was perplexed that an obviously English opera had a funny German-sounding name. (They translate the opera for us here in Saint Louis, and even then they still project the subtitles on the wall. I suppose they do that everywhere in America.)

Anne planned for simply lovely weather, and we took advantage of all the opera trappings: the valet parking, the pre-opera picnic lunch in the garden, the pre-opera liquor, the desserts, and the flunkys who flank every door and open it when they see you headed their way.

Anne also scored us primo seats, Dead Center, mezzanine. Seats so good that the General Director of the Opera came by to schmooze with the people in the seats right next to us.

Lovely weather, lovely company, lovely venue, lovely seats. The opera itself?  Was it Kafka-esque? Why yes, it was, since it was an opera based on Kafka's The Trial. Was it atonal? Why yes, since it was Phillip Glass' adaptation of Kafka's The Trial. Was it elevating? No, but it was interesting. And the music which underlay the meandering libretto was very lovely, and ominous. Anne commented."We can't expect the libretto to have a resolution, since the story probably won't."

And, it had quite a few funny moments, because underwear is funny in any genre. And there was some great work with staging and shadows.  And there were and menacing minor characters that just stood on stage and judged. The costuming went full chiaroscuro: there were seven shades of grey and exactly one gold coverlet.

The work itself was a nice counterpoint to the lovely evening. I will admit, it was hard to buy in to Kafka's rage against the system while the system was working so well for us, what with the lovely cocktails on a lovely summer night at the opera.

Truth March

Latest march? Truth March on June 3rd.

(For some reason, I woke up with the urge to make a sign. Before you jump on me, that's the way Thomas Jefferson spelled it in the Declaration of Independence. Evidently unalienable is not the same as inalienable, and Jefferson went with unalienable.)

Speaking of urges, I didn't get to hang out with other marchers before because I needed to find a bathroom. I'd gone before we left the house, but signals were crossed and I was not really done. I was out of luck until Union Station finally opened at 10.

Union Station, in the past, was a hopping tourist place to be. Now it's deserted. It's a year away from being one of those malls on the internet with weeds growing through the floor in the food court. So, when I saw a couple inside I deduced, "You've been to the bathroom."

They explained the bathroom was to the left, past the sandwich shop, but you had to buy something to use it. People, I wanted to say, I have never blown in anywhere to use the bathroom without buying something after. It's the RULE.

Got to the sandwich shop. No one there. Because, as I said, it's a wasteland.

A security guard was in the vicinity, told me exactly where the bathroom was, and reiterated the rule about buying something.

After I was done with the bathroom (which was ten empty storefronts yards further down the mall, I don't know why this place thought they had dibs on it), I came back and still no one was manning the sandwich shop. I found the guard again, gave him five dollars and said to buy himself a cookie on me.

It was almost - almost - like bribing someone, and you know that's on my bucket list.

As I passed a glass storefront on my way out I realized why people kept explaining the Pay to Pee rule. I looked homeless. My hair was crazy, my jeans were frayed, and I and I had a Cheeto strung around my neck. Plus I was staggering more than usual because I was very hot.

The heat was a topic of discussion on the march. "It's too hot!" "It's June!" "He was supposed to be GONE BY JUNE."

 

Wonder Woman

I did not like Wonder Woman. This follows my dislike of Mad Max: Fury Road, cementing me as a female chauvinist pig for not applauding kick-ass females.

But actually, it follows my dislike of The Shop Around the Corner, In the Good Old Summertime, You've Got Mail, and any other movie where the woman is oblivious and it's "cute" that she's not informed. I know some of the humor was supposed to have come from her chirping at Chris Pine about how the Greek god of war was responsible for WWI. It just made me grind my teeth. Perhaps in Wonder Woman 2 they can drop the fish out of water business and she can nail the trifecta: beautiful, strong, and actually smart, too.

Of course, I generally don't like action movies. Unrealistic, staged violence, where the evildoers line up and politely set upon the good guy one at a time. I start drifting off during action scenes because seriously, what's going to happen?  Character growth? Plot advancement? Never, nothing but noise and violence. (Except -  spoilers - for the Star Wars movies. Those movies kill off beloved characters and chop off hands and interrupt the swordplay for big DNA announcements.)

I did nap a bit during the climactic action scene. After the credits, the guy next to us didn't leave his seat, and when I looked over he was dead asleep. Head 90 degrees to the side, arms and legs all splayed out. I didn't wake him up. I suppose the cleanup staff must have done it. (I did Google "Dead body St. Charles 18 cinema" the next day and nothing came up.)

There were some good points, but the pros of the movie did not outweigh the cons.

Pro: Robin Wright's aging skin folding around her metal armor. She was strong and savvy and attractive AND old  - what's a trifecta plus one? Is there a quadfecta? Con: Robin Wright and all the Amazons speaking with an accent. Why? Because the female lead has an accent? Wouldn't it make more sense to coach the lead than to have all the other actresses adopt an accent?

Pro: Costumes. They actually covered her up for a good part of the movie, yet she could throw off the Edwardian garb when it got in her way. The bookended it all with a very nice red coat / turtleneck combo. Con: Eyebrows. I'm sorry, eyebrow wrangler, I don't know if you were trying to show us Eyebrows Through the Ages, or if the eyebrow evolution was supposed to mirror changes in the character, or if you were just committed to realism, but you don't let a child's GIANT TEN FOOT eyebrow go unplucked like that. I can't find a still but there was a hair on her EYELID. Then when the character grows up there was no continuity around the WWI eyebrows, and just when I accepted that's just the way the lead's eyebrows look, she's all tidied up when we return to present day in the last scene.

Eyebrow continuity. Get to work on that, Hollywood, along with filling out the trifecta and keeping me awake.

Angel Food Cake

A month or so ago I bought some cake flour and made this excellent black and white angel food cake.

I thought, sure, it looks good, but let's just see how it tastes. I cut into it ... ah, people, it cut clean. It was not rubbery. I put the slice on my tongue. It was delicate and sweet. It was like eating a cloud. That's when I took the photo, to commemorate a successful angel food cake.

I had made angel food cakes from scratch before. All hideous. I've made it from the box mix. Fine, but not heavenly.

Of course, back then I didn't know about bleached flour. Did you know they didn't even make angel food cake until they invented the process to bleach flour? Evidently gassing flour with chlorine bleach does something to to the protein content so it's almost gone, so ... so ... some magic happens. I don't know. All I know is that bleached flour that's been milled superfine is close enough to air that it will make an angel food cake.

The idea that some flours make better foods compelled me to expand my flour palette.

That's whole wheat pastry flour (for Wheat Thins knock off crackers), bleached white flour (for pie crusts and cookies what won't spread), oatmeal flour (oat cakes), a bag of almond flour (leftover from a cookie recipe) on top of the tub of all-purpose flour, bread flour, and the magic milled cake flour for the angel food cake.

I wish there was a happy ending for this post, but since the cake above I have made four additional angel food cakes. None of them have been as good. They've been presentable, but nowhere near what the first one was. Rubbery, fallen, distorted, no better than store-bought.

That make two things I've made perfectly only once: one perfect angel food cake, and one perfect batch of meringue cookies in the late '70s with my Mom. Believe me, every day that the humidity in St. Louis drops below 50% I consider trying those meringue cookies again. Strangely, the humidity on the day I made this cake was 90%.

I'm going to give it one more try. I didn't use baker's sugar with cakes 2-5. I could just run regular sugar through the food processor, but why, when I could have five types of sugar in my pantry?