I watched about 2/3rds of the Democratic National Convention last week and was very impressed.
Unfortunately, I missed Michelle Obama's speech (though I am intending to watch it online when I get a chance,) but I did see Hillary Clinton speak. I felt she spoke exceedingly well. In that speech she really needed to show her support for Obama, but she couldn't be so effusive as to be unbelievable. She also needed retain her own standing so that if (heaven forbid) McCain wins, she can run again in 2012. I have heard some pundits suggest that she wasn't effusive enough, and others have said that she lacked credibility in her statement of support. Personally, I think she had a very fine line to walk and did so almost perfectly.
As for her famous husband, I think Bill Clinton is one of the greatest orators of our time. As pure, gripping speech, I though he was amazing and nailed all his points. What I wouldn't give to have his charisma.
I've always respected Joe Biden as a thinker and genuine-seeming public servant. In his speech he introduced himself to America well, he took appropriate shots at McCain, and he presented the Obama/Biden ticket with excellence. Not a speech to go down in the record books, but all in all a very fine piece of work.
Finally, Barack Obama's speech was, of course, outstanding. There were points as he moved from broad rhetoric to specific policy statements where I felt like the transitions were clumsy - slightly head snapping like missing a shift in a car. Still, he did have to balance sweeping uplifting statements with real information about policy initiatives and he covered both with excellence.
There was one thing that kinda bugged me that showed up in many speeches throughout the convention - the oft repeated refrain that this is the most important election of our lifetimes. I kept hearing that and wishing that some speaker would stand up and say "No, this isn't the most important election of our lifetimes. It's the third most important election of our lifetimes!"
The first most important election of our lifetimes was the 2000 election, when George W. Bush became president for the first time. Imagine how different the world would be today had Al Gore been president! [I wont say "had Al Gore won the election", since that opens the whole kettle of worms about who actually won. I'll leave it that he didn't become president.] The second most important election of our time was in 2004, when John Kerry didn't become president. That was our second chance to mitigate the damage inflicted by GW, and we screwed the pooch.
This election, then, is our third chance. It is only as important as it is because we blew it the previous two times. Even though I know Obama is going to raise my taxes and institute other policies that may not be in my personal short-term best interests, I fervently pray that we make him our 44th president.
Remember, this is the third most important election of our lifetimes. Let's get it right!
Sunday, August 31, 2008
Saturday, August 16, 2008
Goong
The Culinary Historians of Northern California (aka CHoNC) had their annual Napa dinner party this week. The theme was figs, but I decided to provide a respite from a meal of nothing but ficus by making Goong Waan, Thai sweet shrimp.
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(photo by Jeannette Ferrary)
Here I am with my plate of shrimp, flanked by the impish, and highly prolific, author Ken Albala.
As always, the goon waan, were a big hit.
Here is the recipe for your enjoyment.
GOONG WAAN
Herbed Sweetened Shrimp
From the Thai Cooking School at the Oriental Hotel, Bangkok
Recipe edited and annotated by Andrew Sigal
Ingredients:
2 cups shrimps, cleaned, heads removed, unpeeled.
3/4 cup palm sugar.
3 tablespoons fish sauce.
2 tablespoons chopped-crushed cilantro roots
[Unless you grow your own, cilantro roots are hard to come by. Substitute the bottoms of bunches of cilantro. Cilantro with roots is often available at Whole Foods.]
2 cloves garlic, crushed
1 teaspoon white peppercorns, lightly crushed.
1/2 cup water.
Preparation:
Melt palm sugar, fish sauce and water over heat until dissolved.
Add cilantro root, garlic, and peppercorns.
Heat to reduce to a syrup. The shrimp will give off a lot of liquid when they are added, so you want the sauce to be quite thick. However, this is a sugar preparation, so be careful about caramelizing or burning the syrup as the water evaporates.
Add shrimps, stirring to cover. Simmer over low heat until the shrimp are cooked and glazed in the sauce. If the sauce becomes too thin, remove the shrimp with a slotted spoon and cook to reduce. This is preferable to potentially overcooking the shrimp.
Serve warm.
Monday, August 4, 2008
Plug
This is a shameless plug for my other web sites. After all, my blog ought to be an opportunity to promote myself. This is also a blatant request (aka "beg") that you, dear reader, help me out by putting links to my sites and this blog (http://andrewsigal.blogspot.com/) on your web sites and blogs. Helping promote my sites through social bookmarking (delicious, digg, etc.) would be icing on the cake!
My primary web site is Sigal.org, http://www.sigal.org/, what we used to call my "homepage" in the good old days. Under that site is included my work in culinary history. In particular, I have written the definitive work (to date) on the history and origins of Jambalaya. Unfortunately, Google doesn't realize that my work is the final word on the subject so I show up halfway down the results if you search for "jambalaya history." If you'd like to link to http://www.sigal.org/CulinaryHistory/Jambalaya/Jambalaya.htm, it would help my page ranking.
Though I haven't updated it for quite some time, my "commercial" site is TripTalk.com, http://www.triptalk.com/default.asp. Though the text is getting somewhat long in the tooth, most visitors to the site look at the photos. I hope they find them valuable.
Hopefully this post will increase my page rankings. If you have a site or blog and feel comfortable mentioning or linking to my pages, I would be grateful.
My primary web site is Sigal.org, http://www.sigal.org/, what we used to call my "homepage" in the good old days. Under that site is included my work in culinary history. In particular, I have written the definitive work (to date) on the history and origins of Jambalaya. Unfortunately, Google doesn't realize that my work is the final word on the subject so I show up halfway down the results if you search for "jambalaya history." If you'd like to link to http://www.sigal.org/CulinaryHistory/Jambalaya/Jambalaya.htm, it would help my page ranking.
Though I haven't updated it for quite some time, my "commercial" site is TripTalk.com, http://www.triptalk.com/default.asp. Though the text is getting somewhat long in the tooth, most visitors to the site look at the photos. I hope they find them valuable.
Hopefully this post will increase my page rankings. If you have a site or blog and feel comfortable mentioning or linking to my pages, I would be grateful.
Saturday, August 2, 2008
Anniversary
Today is the 10 year anniversary of my graduating from Microsoft. What a long strange trip its been!
People have been asking me if I can believe that it has been 10 years. The answer is "absolutely not." On the other hand, I can't believe that I am 46 years old. I haven't been able to get over my chronological age since I was 30. I can't believe that there's anything I've done (other than eating and breathing) that can be measured in decades. I can't believe there are friends that I have had for decades (though I am grateful for every one.) I am at once amazed at how much I have accomplished in the last 10 years and at how little I've done. It has flown and crept by; I have done everything and nothing. I cannot imagine what my life would have been like and where I'd be today had I spent that last 10 years in the bosom of MSFT, instead of out here where I create each day anew.
I am frequently asked if I miss working at Microsoft. The answer is always "yes" and "no." Microsoft was an amazing place to work. It was (and probably still is) a place where one can work on really interesting problems with an exciting group of people and product a product that will be seen and used by a vast audience of people. If I had helped to create a program like Access at some other company, the project would have been just as intriguing, but without Microsoft's name, reputation, and marketing muscle, it might have been ignored in the marketplace. Releasing Access at Microsoft meant that within a year it was in use by a million people, and today tens of millions use it directly or indirectly. At the risk of an immodest analogy, it is like being Claude Monet, recognized as a leader in the impressionist movement, versus being Van Gogh, a fantastic painter ignored during his lifetime and dying penniless.
The thing I miss most about Microsoft are the people - in particular the lunchtime conversations. Day after day I recall fascinating company in the cafeteria. People with such amazing brainpower and diverse knowledge and interests that each meal was an education. I recall lunches where people proposed word problems (such as "the island of the blue eyed people") and analyzed answers.
I recall a lunch early on in my career where I exclaimed on the recent increase in the stock price. Sitting across from me was Charles Simony, one of Microsoft's most brilliant "architects." He looked at me and said, "yes, but the third derivative is negative." [What he meant was that the stock price was going up, and the rate that it was going up was increasing (acceleration), but the rate of acceleration was decreasing.] I also recall another lunch with Charles in which we were discussing the price of something over time (gas? GNP? I forget.) I had studied it in college and made some comment about the price movement over recent decades. Charles glared at me, demanding "What is the shape of the graph?"I was stunned. My mind went blank. I couldn't form an answer. "Well? What is the shape of the graph? Is the graph rising or is it falling?!?!" I was frozen. Charles then told me that the graph was falling and proceeded to prove why my claim was wrong. You couldn't swim with these guys unless you had all your facts in a row. Sigh.
On the other hand, working at Microsoft was incredibly demanding. To do well there one had to give one's all; there was very little life outside of work. I got up in the morning, drank coffee, and drove to Redmond. I worked, ate, and played at Microsoft for the next 10 to 12 hours, then drove home and pretty much went to sleep. Those were my days. During "crunch" times that often included one of the two weekend days. Later in my career I refused to work weekends and insisted on taking an hour or two in the evenings to ride my bike or go to the gym. I needed the time to myself and often got a lot of good thinking done while away from the office.
Microsoft is not good for relationships. Most people, male or female, were single. Many were divorced. I recall a number of divorces that occurred while I was there. People were married to their work. Microsoft was a place full of "A-Type" people, that attracted A-types, and encouraged them to be as A-type as possible. It would bring in kids straight out of college, give them the coolest technology, interesting problems to work on, all the soda they could drink, and burn them up. I was lucky -I came in as an "adult," refusing some of the bullshit. I also came in early enough in the company's history that by the time I burned out I could afford to leave.
I expected to be there at least 10 years, but only lasted seven and a half. Now I've been gone for 10. Happy Anniversary!
People have been asking me if I can believe that it has been 10 years. The answer is "absolutely not." On the other hand, I can't believe that I am 46 years old. I haven't been able to get over my chronological age since I was 30. I can't believe that there's anything I've done (other than eating and breathing) that can be measured in decades. I can't believe there are friends that I have had for decades (though I am grateful for every one.) I am at once amazed at how much I have accomplished in the last 10 years and at how little I've done. It has flown and crept by; I have done everything and nothing. I cannot imagine what my life would have been like and where I'd be today had I spent that last 10 years in the bosom of MSFT, instead of out here where I create each day anew.
I am frequently asked if I miss working at Microsoft. The answer is always "yes" and "no." Microsoft was an amazing place to work. It was (and probably still is) a place where one can work on really interesting problems with an exciting group of people and product a product that will be seen and used by a vast audience of people. If I had helped to create a program like Access at some other company, the project would have been just as intriguing, but without Microsoft's name, reputation, and marketing muscle, it might have been ignored in the marketplace. Releasing Access at Microsoft meant that within a year it was in use by a million people, and today tens of millions use it directly or indirectly. At the risk of an immodest analogy, it is like being Claude Monet, recognized as a leader in the impressionist movement, versus being Van Gogh, a fantastic painter ignored during his lifetime and dying penniless.
The thing I miss most about Microsoft are the people - in particular the lunchtime conversations. Day after day I recall fascinating company in the cafeteria. People with such amazing brainpower and diverse knowledge and interests that each meal was an education. I recall lunches where people proposed word problems (such as "the island of the blue eyed people") and analyzed answers.
I recall a lunch early on in my career where I exclaimed on the recent increase in the stock price. Sitting across from me was Charles Simony, one of Microsoft's most brilliant "architects." He looked at me and said, "yes, but the third derivative is negative." [What he meant was that the stock price was going up, and the rate that it was going up was increasing (acceleration), but the rate of acceleration was decreasing.] I also recall another lunch with Charles in which we were discussing the price of something over time (gas? GNP? I forget.) I had studied it in college and made some comment about the price movement over recent decades. Charles glared at me, demanding "What is the shape of the graph?"I was stunned. My mind went blank. I couldn't form an answer. "Well? What is the shape of the graph? Is the graph rising or is it falling?!?!" I was frozen. Charles then told me that the graph was falling and proceeded to prove why my claim was wrong. You couldn't swim with these guys unless you had all your facts in a row. Sigh.
On the other hand, working at Microsoft was incredibly demanding. To do well there one had to give one's all; there was very little life outside of work. I got up in the morning, drank coffee, and drove to Redmond. I worked, ate, and played at Microsoft for the next 10 to 12 hours, then drove home and pretty much went to sleep. Those were my days. During "crunch" times that often included one of the two weekend days. Later in my career I refused to work weekends and insisted on taking an hour or two in the evenings to ride my bike or go to the gym. I needed the time to myself and often got a lot of good thinking done while away from the office.
Microsoft is not good for relationships. Most people, male or female, were single. Many were divorced. I recall a number of divorces that occurred while I was there. People were married to their work. Microsoft was a place full of "A-Type" people, that attracted A-types, and encouraged them to be as A-type as possible. It would bring in kids straight out of college, give them the coolest technology, interesting problems to work on, all the soda they could drink, and burn them up. I was lucky -I came in as an "adult," refusing some of the bullshit. I also came in early enough in the company's history that by the time I burned out I could afford to leave.
I expected to be there at least 10 years, but only lasted seven and a half. Now I've been gone for 10. Happy Anniversary!