Current reading

Curry: A Tale of Cooks and Conquerors by Lizzie Collingham - fascinating book. Only a few recipes; this is a history of Indian cooking, not a cookbook. Most interesting thing so far: tea. The British did not get the habit of drinking tea from India - it was the other way around, and not until the 20th century at that.

Culture Matters: How Values Shape Human Progress by Lawrence E. Harrison (Editor), Samuel P. Huntington (Editor) - economic sociology (despite the title that sounds like it's about ethics or something). The book assumes you know without explanation who Max Weber is, and that you understand terms like "marginal product of capital." If you don't, this won't be your idea of a good read. It does have some overlap in concepts with Omnivore's Dilemma, as it happens, since agricultural economic screw-ups are a theme that recurs in the book.

Also the New Yorker media issue.

And I finished revising my score; it should sound better in rehearsal this week now that there are dynamic markings on every part, and cues for some parts, and rehearsal letters...

And assorted stuph

It was really nice having J and L visit us from Austin. Even though they were only with us for one night, as part of their east coast ramble, we got a LOT of talking in. I wish we had known them better in Austin - while we were good band friends, we didn't do any socializing together other than band stuff, and it turns out we have lots else in common.

J's dad was a college professor, and mine was, for 22 years, a high school teacher, and we talked about how different it is growing up with a teacher for a parent - how long it took to realize that other kids do not get taken to the opera, the theatre, the ballet, the symphony, or the art museum for weekends. Let alone taken to a whole 'nother city to see a museum one hasn't been to before, just because. Her dad taught classics (Latin, Greek, Old English) and mine taught Biology and Earth Science, so we both got treated to puns in Latin occasionally mixed in with the incessant puns in English at the dinner table during family dinners. We saw Shakespeare performances on a regular basis, and understood most of the jokes in them, too. The family radio was pretty much always tuned to the classical radio station. I know I was shocked when I got to college and discovered that there were people in my college classes who didn't know how to use the Reader's Guide to Periodical Literature, and LOTS of people who had never read a single piece of poetry that hadn't been assigned in school. Yep, teachers' kids get a different upbringing.

And J's birthday turns out to be the day before mine; I did not know that before. So I quickly made up a gift box of snack bag size samples of tea from 8 or 9 teas from our collection.

That was fun. I really hope we can get down to Austin for ASB's 25th anniversary party in April 2007!