23 July 26
Scallions For Stirfry
At some point I learned that the combination of scallions, ginger, and garlic is considered the holy trinity of Chinese cooking. Maybe that is so — at any rate it is a key part of a favorite dish of ours that I made for lunch today, called deliciously spicy tofu. The recipe is from Madhur Jaffrey’s Eastern Vegetarian Cooking book (page 201): basically one takes the ginger, garlic, and scallions and stirfry them, adds tofu, and mix in a chili-bean sauce.
As a bonus, scallions, ginger, and garlic are all fun to sketch.
22 July 26
Best Cat Toy
Predicting what toys your cat (or dog, or child) will like is the stuff of multi-billion dollar industries. I picked up this leather cord in Portland, Oregon over ten years ago and found it recently in my sewing box. It’s become the absolute favorite of both Esme and Winston, the latter sitting patiently above the toy box hoping one of us will pick it up and start throwing it around.
21 July 26
The Old Church
I didn’t get a chance to do my urban sketch on Sunday until after the World Cup final. It was hot and I did not want to wander too far so I sketched the old Newman Catholic Center church at C and 5th. This church was declared structurally unsafe a few years ago and is unused; the congregants meet in newer buildings on the same grounds.
It was advantageous to sketch the church in the late afternoon because I had shade while I was sitting on my stool in a parking lot across the street. I think this is my favorite sketch I’ve done of the church.
20 July 26
Rhoticity
As someone fascinated by language, I find my YouTube feed often contains sometimes quite arcane posts on linguistics. Dr. Geoff Lindsay is a linguist originally from Manchester. I just came across this piece on rhoticity (the pronunciation of the letter “r” in places other than before a vowel) in the northwest of England. There is a small slot that runs from Blackburn and Darwen (east of Preston) down to about Clitheroe, where “r” is (or was; this is a disappearing linguistic feature) pronounced in words like “park” (where most of England, including Lancashire, pronounces this word as “pahk” or even “pohk”). This small pocket is shown on the map at right. It’s worth noting that 60 years ago, a lot of the region and much of the West Country would have shown up as bright red, not yellow as it is now and shrinking.
Rhoticity in England is devalued, made fun of by us schoolkids who said “ooh arr ooh arr” in the 70s to mock a Somerset or Cornwall accent, slow country bumpkin Worzel-Gummidge types. But rhoticity in Blackburn is given high prestige in the community (according to the linguist interviewed by Lindsay); it’s fascinating.
My father was from Blackburn, but moved away to attend university in Leeds (still in the north but in Yorkshire on the other side of the Pennines), then to London as a management trainee and finally to California via the Antipodes. Growing up, I always imagined his rhoticity to be an American contamination, but it turns out it wasn’t. He did incorporate some American expressions into his speech which you’d expect, but “that’s a right load of tripe” and “I wouldn’t give a tin of beans for it” held on throughout his life.
I must have been eight or so when he said — discussing the first world war and his disgust with incompetent military personnel — that “Earl Haig was a butcher.” Rhotic “r” in Earl and butcher; the “but” in “butcher” pronounced like “but” the conjunction.
19 July 26
Campeones
It has been a long five weeks of watching World Cup football, but PIca and I are very happy with the final result, Spain winning the tournament with a 1-0 victory over Argentina in extra time. It was a dire final match — Spain dominated possession both sides of the pitch and Argentina falling back on their trademark dirty play. This did not help them however: by the end of regulation they had no shots either on or off goal. We were relieved when Ferran Torres finally got a goal for Spain in the 106th minute, though feared this would inspire Argentina to come back in a final flurry of action as they did against Egypt or England. But Spain held on.
The final was reminiscent of Spain’s victory in the 2010 World Cup final over the Netherlands, with Spain having a beautifully precise passing game and the Netherlands resorting to brutish fouling. Unlike Argentina, the Netherlands did manage to get some shots on goal in that game. Spain won in extra time 1-0 in that match as well.
(I was happy to read that the Netherlands were given the Fair Play Award in this year’s tournament. This is given to the team with the best disciplinary record that reaches the knockout rounds. The Netherlands only received three yellow cards all tournament. It looks like they have redeemed themselves, and I don’t mind rooting for the Oranje again. Their nation has been so important for how football developed, and the Spanish system directly evolved out of what the Dutch built in the 1970s.)
This was a tournament where the big stars predictably got all the hype — Lionel Messi, Kylian Mbappé, Erling Haaland, Jude Bellingham — but it was won by a group that played incredibly well together as a team. Spain’s biggest star, Lamine Yamal, did not dazzle but he absolutely contributed to their victory. He is only 19, and has a lot of time to grow as a player.
It has been thirty-two years since the World Cup was last in this country, and soccer has grown tremendously in the United States since then. I am hopeful this World Cup will mark another upward inflection point in the growth of the game here.
I’m looking forward to the Women’s World Cup in Brazil in 2027! Spain won the Women’s World Cup in 2023, so for the first time in history, the same country holds both the men’s and women’s titles.
18 July 26
Lining the Cardigan
I finished my sweater last week and have started to line it with orange silk. The problem is this: knit fabric is stretchy, woven fabric is not. So you have to build in some ease puckering up the quilting every 2”. The good news is, it’s lining, not meant to be closely scrutinized, and Jean Frost, author of Custom Knit Jackets, discourages overscrupulosity with straight lines in the quilting, arguing that Coco Chanel didn’t bother with that sort of thing.
I am basting the silk to the jacket first before doing a small running stitch in matching orange thread, which might be a bit overscrupulous, but it’s much easier for me this way. This is all quite a laborious process but not difficult, and I’m enjoying how it feels so much that I’m given ample motivation to keep going. Hiding the somewhat unsightly wrong side of the stranded colorwork (and, more important, cutting out the danger of snagging stitches) is an added bonus. But the silk habotai I bought at Stonemountain and Daughter in Berkeley is delicious. Too hot to wear this garment now but I’ll love it in the winter!
17 July 26
(Not) Sharing The Grapes
Grapevines overhang the path on the south side of the house, and Pica today noticed a rat raiding the grapes outside the kitchen window. This was not to be allowed, so I collected a grape bunch and later drew it as my sketch of the day.
16 July 26
Graphic Medicine Conference
The Graphic Medicine Conference takes place next week in Baltimore. My colleagues at VEOLI (Visualizing End of Life Issues) will be in attendance. We’re all making zines that will be available to participants. I’ve made three: one on Medical Aid in Dying (pictured at right); one on Advance Care Planning; and one on environmental costs of body disposition after death.
15 July 26
Cat Grass
There’s no more footie for several days, it is too hot to sketch outside, and I don’t feel like discussing the latest evil machinations of the Heritage Foundation, so here is my sketch of the day. We like to provide wheatgrass for our kitties, and pick up some from the produce section of the co-op every couple of weeks. Winston especially likes to graze on it.
14 July 26
Summer Socks
When we were growing up in Spain in the 1970s, white cotton lace ankle socks were a thing. I have no idea whether they still are, but my sister, recipient of a pair of wool birthday socks every year, asked me to design a pair of socks that could replicate these Spanish ones. I made her a pair last year and she was thrilled. So I’m working on a second pair. The yarn is a bamboo-cotton blend. The lace pattern is gull wings, which is easy to remember and does the required ventilation job.
Spain beat France. Wow.