Restaurant Review

This takes me back to my old days on the college newspaper when my roommate and I would sample the (sometimes terrible) local cuisine and write about it. The silverware at one of the first restaurants we reviewed was utterly cruddy. Also, the restaurant had promised free movie tickets if you ate there, but didn't have any on hand, so my roommate and I drive with the restaurant owner to the theater to pick us some up. Ah Western Pennsylvania!

My experience at the Four Sisters Vietnamese Restaurant was quite different. It came very highly recommended and did not disappoint. While it's located in the boondocks (outside of the beltway), it was worth the drive. It has an enormous (daunting) menu. I ordered #44.: lettuce wraps with grilled shrimp and pork and vermicelli patties. The grilled pork was particularly wonderful--it has a sweet marinade that was really perfect. My favorite iteration of pork (basically ever). My only complaint was that there were only two pieces of lettuce (Wystan: "You have to understand, Emily, that not many people like lettuce as much as you do"). Wystan ordered grilled lemongrass beef, which he was very happy with.

The restaurant was pleasantly full, but even so, the service was remarkable: For instance, one of our dinner companions ordered pho and didn't notice the spoon with it (he was eating the noodles with a fork), and our waiter ever so discretely brought the spoon to his attention). And, one of my favorite parts of the restaurant--there were enormous bouquets of real flowers everywhere! (Oh, and the name: it is a little off in the number, but I appreciate a restaurant named after sisters.)

Yuengling

Gosh, I love Pennsylvania frugality! Washing out Styrofoam cups to reuse them--didn't I grow up doing this! I give you: Yuengling flourishing and expanding. (HT: Hopkins.)

From the instructions of a pre-doctoral fellowship that I'm applying for:

"Scholars asked to review applications in this program are instructed to use the following three criteria:

1. The potential of the project to advance the field of study in which it is proposed and make an original and significant contribution to knowledge.
2. The quality of the proposal with regard to its methodology, scope, theoretical framework, and grounding in the relevant scholarly literature.
3. The feasibility of the project and the likelihood that the applicant will execute the work within the proposed timeframe.
4. The scholarly record and career trajectory of the applicant."

(This is only hilariously funny to me because of all the freaking pressure I feel to make these applications perfect, even though there's approximately a 1 percent chance that I'll get one.)

(The italics are mine. I also think that "timeframe" may be two separate words.)

A Steak Salad for Breakfast

That made Carrot laugh, which is why I'm sharing it with you. It is also what helped me make it through my long day, which has exhausted me, and so I am unable to post anything more edifying than that for you.

Dissertation.3

In a draft of one of my pre-doc applications, I noticed that I called Tocqueville, "Alex de Tocqueville." It's like we're bff, so I had to give him a nickname....

Clarendon

Here are some pictures that I took today (in my neighborhood, more or less) in order to make myself get outside while there was still light:





(There was no hardware store underneath this sign--only restaurants.)





(It clearly wasn't.)




The one thing I will say for Clarendon--it has its own style, a vernacular architecture, as Roger Scruton would say. I think it has a lot to do with the signs on the buildings.


Additionally, I do love the identifying marks put directly into the building--it gives the building a history like a palimpsest.

Saturday in Alexandria

Saturdays in Alexandria are lovely!


The weather today was perfect--cool with lots of sun.


Stearns and I stopped at a used book store and an antique store and Papyrus.



And then we stopped by Hopkins' new part-time job, and drank some very delicious coffee (described like it was wine--cocoa and vanilla bean...).



And then we did a little work in the sun. I was reading Dana Villa's Public Freedom, which is wonderful, because he explains why I'm writing about all of the thinkers that I'm writing about in my dissertation.



And then we met up with Carrot at another coffee shop.




And caught the evening mass.


And then Hopkins made dinner!



And then we watched To Catch a Thief (see previous quotation).



That's all I have to say, so the rest will just be pictures, but the day was grand!:

"I've been waiting all day for you to mention that kiss I gave you last night." --Grace Kelly, To Catch a Thief

Paton's Poem for His Son

Here are some lines from Alan Paton's "Meditation for a Young Boy Confirmed" (the young boy is his son, David, and the poem is first about his confirmation, and, more broadly, about him becoming a man and entering into the world):

IV

"I watch him with old and knowledgeable and very old eyes, I am
aware that he had been indoctrinated,
I am aware that his choice is contingent, that I have allowed him
to commit himself deeply,
I am aware that he is neither a Buddhist nor a Muslim, that his
circumstances have hardly permitted him to consider these religions.
I am aware that the whole world is not confirmed, that the whole
world does not communicate,
I am aware that some climate has changed in the world, therefore
I write these words to him."

(This is my favorite picture of Paton: I can just imagine him writing there, "There is a lovely road that runs from Ixopo into the hills. These hills are grass-covered and rolling, and they are lovely beyond any singing of it. ..." [Of course, I remember that it wasn't until he left South Africa that he wrote Cry, the Beloved Country])

Poetry and Feminism.3

Women

by Adrienne Rich




My three sisters are sitting
on rocks of black obsidian.
For the first time, in this light, I can see who they are.

My first sister is sewing her costume for the procession.
She is going as the Transparent lady
and all her nerves will be visible.

My second sister is also sewing,
at the seam over her heart which has never healed entirely,
At last, she hopes, this tightness in her chest will ease.

My third sister is gazing
at a dark-red crust spreading westward far out on the sea.
Her stockings are torn but she is beautiful.

Today, after reading Jane Addams, my class read and talked about Adrienne Rich's poem, "Women." The students saw the three sisters of Rich's poem as a progression or development--the first two sewing (an activity traditionally associated with women), while the third sister is experienced and worn, but is aware of infinite possibilities.

I used the poem to highlight two possible ways of reading Addams: first, you can understand her as simply offering pragmatic arguments for an expanded role for women; or, you can read her as concerned with a particular role for women, one still connected to women's traditional role, although also changed. The first Addams would be thrilled with Rich's poem; the second would have reservations, especially with the third sister, I think. The students noted affinities between Rich's poem and Addams's thought, including the praise of experience over naivete.

Shoes!

So pretty! (via Manolo)

Plus: they remind me of the necklace my friend brought me from Kuwait (which is my initial in Arabic)!

One problem: the website shows no prices (that I found). If that bears any relationship to restaurant menus, it's a bad sign...


Also:

The Wire.2 or Localism and The Wire

Stearns and I have just started season 2 of The Wire (thanks to Wystan's uber-clever birthday present!).

Localism is a significant theme throughout the first season of The Wire: Wallace returns to the low rise because he doesn't fit in the country--in fact, he knows almost nothing of life outside of the low rises. Even the sounds of crickets confuses him.

D'Angelo wants out of the business of drug dealing and promises to aid the police if they put him in a witness protection program to start a new life. His mother shows up in jail and convinces him to change his mind--she convinces him that family is the most important thing, that drugs are what their family has depended on for generations.

At one point, two of the drug dealers are driving from Baltimore to Philly and they begin to lose the Baltimore radio station. One of them had never left Baltimore and so had no idea that radio stations changed from city to city. He heard Garrison Keillor on the radio and said, "Is this what Philly radio is like?"

Writing about The Wire focuses on its similarity to Greek drama--people are fated, except that the gods as forces of fate are replaced by institutions. The tragedy of The Wire is that people recognize the problems of the institutions that they cannot escape, whether it be the drug gangs or the police force.

D'Angelo's mother's argument for why he should be loyal to his family and their drug trade strongly resembles the arguments of many localists in and around political theory--this is the way you've been raised, this connects you to past generations, this is the practical skill you've learned from people who've come before you. D'Angelo's at least passing discomfort with the drug trade and the evils associated with it, however, point to the existence of an ability to know and reason outside of his upbringing. He is able to critique the institution itself (although, in the end he gives in to his mother's arguments, and Wallace, who also wanted out of his involvement with the drug trade, is shot).

While The Wire offers little hope for escaping the institutions in which people find themselves, it does maintain that you are not entirely restricted by the circumstances in which you're raised. It offers an important critique of localism--affirming something simply because it is your own is not sufficient; loyalty or patriotism in themselves are not good. Rather, we must reflect on the things to which we are loyal, in order to determine that they are good in themselves.

I share this with you primarily because Sterns makes endless fun of my fairly constant mixing of metaphors. This was an instance of not quite mixing.

Me, in class earlier this week (talking about, I think, Margaret Fuller): "She was just pushing...she was pushing...What is it that you push?"

One of the students: "You push the envelope."

Me: "Ah yes, she was pushing the envelope!"

From a (quite interesting) obituary of the moral philosopher, Philippa Foot (who evidently married, on the rebound, Iris Murdoch's jilted lover), on Elizabeth Anscombe:

"'She wore trousers,' Philippa Foot recalled, 'smoked a cigar and occasionally used foul language – but she was also a very high-minded Catholic, so you could be caught both ways.'"

Dissertation.2

Today I met one of my dissertation committee members to talk about my progress. We also swapped back exercises and complained about the way that this profession is bad for your back. In addition, he complained about interfolio (administrative centralization) and told me that he's happy to write do the extra work sending letters if it means he's able to avoid interfolio! (I think that Tocqueville was less concerned about administrative centralization and more concerned about governmental centralization, but I was so happy to have someone who was happy to do the work that I created for him, that I didn't bring that up.)

Rant

I know, it's too lovely of a fall day for rants, but this is just a mild one:

Really?! Three-ish weeks (or more) of no lines painted on the (thankfully!) repaved roads of Rosslyn! I saw something that was literally inches away from being an accident there today due to the lack of lines on the roads (No! It didn't involve me!). Does Virginia have budget deficits and just decided that no one actually needs the line on the roads?!

I love this umbrella!

Confession

Every time I use the word "affect" or "effect," it's just a stab in the dark.

My Birthday: A Recap

(Retold with random Williamsport pictures interspersed.)


Welcome Emmaline! For my birthday, I went up to Williamsport to see her!


The trip was perfect: Saturday was lots of football--Michigan won, so Wystan was happy.



We watched the Penn State game at my grandparent's house and had brownies and ice cream.



And I got to see my cousin and his wife and two little kids.



We even stopped by the Hepburn carnival, although there was no Fat Albert Rat Game this time.



On Sunday, I went to church and got to see the kids I used to babysit in DC. Eleanor (6) gasped in the pew when she saw me!



And of course, I got to see loads and loads of people at The Door!



Then Wystan took me out for a birthday lunch--I don't know any brunch places in Williamsport, so we went to the Bullfrog Brewery, which had nice sandwiches and sweet potato fries and fun music.



Then (finally!) we got to see Emmaline and her mother and father! (And grandparents and great-grandmother, actually--there are four generations living in that house now!) Emmaline is so pretty, and so, so good!



After that, we were invited elsewhere for cake and ice cream, but I was pretty tired at that point, so we had cake and ice cream with my parents.




I always ask for Angel Food cake, but more because that's what I had as a child than that it's my favorite cake now. I need to remember to ask for apple dumplings next year!



And, for the second year running, we've had a game of Password with my parents on my birthday.


And somewhere in the whirlwind tour, my father and I found time for our five-mile walk, and Wystan and I made it up to the graveyard.


Fall in Pennsylvania is the best--the weather is lovely, and the air is a little crisp. And so, as you can see, it was perfect.