Tag Archives: Bread

Handle with care

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Southern craker resists appleThe Snake King is dead. Tragically, Ali Khan Samsuddin, a fifth generation snake charmer, died last week in Kuala Lumpur after being bitten by a cobra. He had been bitten many times before and always managed to survive. Not so this time.

Though originally tied closely to religion, modern day snake handling is a trade without much religious significance. The religious practice of handling snakes does still exist, believe it or not, in the American South.

In 1992, a man named Glen Summerford stood accused of attempted murder after forcing his wife to put her hand into a cage full of snakes. He was the pastor of the Church of Jesus with Signs Following. Services at this tiny church, located in the Northern Alabama town of Scottsboro, include speaking in tongues, playing with fire and drinking strychnine from mason jars. But even more exciting is their practice of picking up poisonous snakes.

The faithful at the Church of Jesus with Signs Following interpret literally a passage in the Book of Acts: And these signs shall follow them that believe; In my name they shall cast out devils; they shall speak with new tongues; they shall take up serpents; and if they drink any deadly thing, it shall not hurt them; they shall lay hands on the sick, and they shall recover. When the Spirit moves ’em in Scottsboro, they get out the snakes.

Dennis Covington was a freelance journalist covering Summerford’s trial for the New York Times. After the trial was over, Covington was befriended by some of the snake handlers and other members of the church. He started to attend services at the church out of curiosity and, over the course of a few months, was pulled into a bizarre world of fundamentalist Christianity where “believers” base their entire Christian identity on one or two Bible passages. Apparent lunacy was the result of this type of limited Biblical interpretation.

While mainstream Christian fundamentalism is not quite as zany, nor as interesting, as it is in Appalachia, the practice of carving the Bible up into little passages and verses that serve particular agendas is just as common. Leviticus does say that for a man to lie with another man is an abomination. It also says that shellfish are an abomination. It says don’t cut your hair, don’t wear clothing made with two different materials. It’s okay to own slaves. Just don’t disrespect your father or you’ll be put to death. I say take one verse, take all. Or else step back and open up to a larger perspective, one that doesn’t diminish God or re-create him in our own limited image.by Dennis Covington
Fortunately, Dennis Covington escaped the cult and made it back to New York. He wrote about his experience in an amazing book called Salvation on Sand Mountain: Snake Handling and Redemption in Southern Appalachia. Covington says that the snake-handling experience confirmed his long-held suspicion that madness and religion are a hair’s breadth apart. That feeling after God is dangerous business. That Christianity without passion, danger, and mystery may not really be Christianity at all. I’m with Dennis on this. Let’s not reduce faith in God to a small-minded, verse-picking, powerless and fearful way of life. Gimme a snake.

A sea salt taste test

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I bought some sea salt the other day. Dead Sea Salt no less. I’d heard a commentary extolling the delicacy that is yuppie salt. Who knew you could spend more on salt?
 
Sea salt costs quit a deal more than ordinary umbrella-girl salt. But consumers spend almost nothing for salt to begin with, probably why working the salt mines is not considered a great job. So the price of gentrified salt is half of a passible bottle of olive oil. Anyway I got the sea salt on sale and I was determined to hold a taste test.

I heard there was a texture difference apparently, and I could see that was going to be true. Sea salt was like so many little crystals compared to refined white sand of table salt. But a taste difference? Malarkey. Salt and pepper is like hot and cold or sweet and sour, absolutes. When something tastes salty it doesn’t taste sea-salty, it’s salty or too salty.

As near as I could recall, mother’s home-ec theory taught that salt was what we added to enhance the taste of a meal. We didn’t taste the salt, we tasted the enhanced food flavor, or we had used too much salt.

But that principle never rang true to me actually. It was like having us kids believe that there was more nutrition in the crust of the bread as opposed to the center. My sisters helped mom bake and noticed that the outer edge of the bread was of the same lump of dough. They called her on it when she insisted they eat the crust. Mom’s salt edict seemed more dictum, this time anti-sodium.

What are we TALKING about, pretending that salt’s a secondary enhancement of flavor?! When we put salt on popcorn, we do it to taste the salt! When we put salt on corn, cornflakes, cabbage or cantaloupe, (I don’t put salt on any of those, I mean when you do) we don’t do it to enhance their flavor, we do it to enhance our eating enjoyment because we enjoy salt.

So let me tell you, when I sprinkled sea salt over steamed spinach like so many croutons, and took a bite, I knew I would never go back. Olive oil and sea salt is all you need to eat anything. I’ll keep table salt to cook the noodles, but I won’t eat it. To eat table salt now, to me it tastes like iodine. Or like drawing a thread up your throat. Or like the second day of an oxygen tube blowing into your nose. Unbearably piercing. Common table salt tastes like poison, and I’m glad to hear people are catching on. No Hellman’s? Forget the sandwich. Or was that Miracle Whip? No matter, imposters all. No sea salt, postpone the meal.

Our prison system

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Returning home from Aspen recently, I drove by the state correctional facility in Buena Vista. My blood sugar was a bit low at the time and I had an epiphany of epic proportions. The individuals incarcerated in those ugly buildings aren’t criminals. No, not at all. They are simply victims of POOR NUTRITION! Show me a man who ate lots of Wonder Bread as a kid and I’ll show you a serial killer. Too much soda pop and Mike and Ike’s? A bank robber. Not enough cruciferous vegetables? Most likely a white collar criminal. Show me a young girl who doesn’t get her full complement of leafy greens and I’ll show you a young girl who has a lot of speeding tickets. And cake eaters? Well, I haven’t been able to discover a direct crime link but I think we all agree that they are, by and large, angry and annoying people.

WHAT? Yes! Trust me on this. It’s all about brain chemistry. It’s about neurotransmitters, chemical substances that cause our brains and our bodies to feel good and function normally. It’s about serotonin and epinephrine and dopamine and adrenaline. They regulate our moods, our thoughts, our sleep, our impulses. When certain substances are in short supply or are overabundant, it is IMPOSSIBLE to be a decent human being. Frequently, those that we lock up are drug addicts and alcoholics. Why? They are self-medicating! They know that they don’t feel quite right, and they are trying to fix the problem. But it’s not the right solution.

So how DO we stay healthy and happy? PROPER NUTRITION AND EXERCISE! This leads me to my proposal. Instead of incarcerating individuals who perpetuate wrongs on the American public, let’s send them to nutritional camps. They can eat the proper foods, get moderate cardiovascular exercise, lots of quality sleep. . .maybe we’ll even throw in a couple days of weight training. As a special treat, probably on Sundays, we’ll bring in a cute Pilates instructor so they can work on their core strength and develop flexibility.

Of course, the retards at the FDA can’t be in charge of my revolutionary program. They, after all, are the douche bags that gave us the food pyramid. Nor can any nutritionist who graduated from the General Mills College of Bullshit (it’s everyone’s alma mater. . .ask ’em). No. I’m going to call my friends, Dr. Julian Whitaker and Dr. David Williams, the most awesome health gurus in the country. They can come up with a diet that includes freshly-milled whole grain products, raw organic produce, hormone-free lean proteins, and lots of distilled water. I’ll call Kathy Smith to put together an exercise program. THE FIRM can be in charge of the weight training. We’ll get these “criminals” put back together in no time flat! We’ll educate the heck out of them and when they’ve completed the program we’ll drop them off at the local Whole Foods market with a couple of crisp $20s. The 400 employees of the prison (a career choice, by the way, which is also closely related to a paucity of necessary neurotransmitters) can run the program, under close supervision.

If you really think about it, you know I’m right. You know that certain foods make you feel great, others not so much. You know that a lack of sleep can leave you unable to cope with the stresses of the day. A nice hike on a beautiful afternoon is a fantastic tension buster. Shouldn’t we give these people a chance to experience all that life has to offer? Is it really their fault that no one taught them how to stay sane and healthy? I think not. I think they are victims.

Most days I’m just one Hostess HoHo away from committing an unthinkable act. There, but by the grace of God, and the power of sensible nutrition and moderate exercise, go I.

Inured to war crime.

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US soldiers TOSS a bakery in Fallujah
In a recent harder-than-usual puff piece report, the Stars and Stripes described a day of hunting insurgents in Fallujah.
 
Nevermind that Fallujah was supposed to have been pacified, razed to the ground more precisely, and barricaded to such an extent that only residents with approved retina scans could get back in. Nevermind. Insurgents are planting IEDs again, they’re sniping at our soldiers again, and we’re conducting patrols to stop them again.

On this patrol, an Iraqi sniper keeps popping up in a particular neighborhood. Our intrepid soldiers have become upset with the shopkeepers on the block because not one of them will rat on who’s doing the sniping. One of the shops is a bakery.

Here’s what our GIs come up with their down-home plan. “Toss” the bakery.

They blast the business’s lock, or drive into the door with their Humvee, then “toss the place,” throwing everything to the floor including bread, flour and utensils. The strategy being that maybe the bakery will reconsider collaborating with our soldiers.

Here’s the deal. Are you interested? Expecting Iraqi civilians to take a side is not only bad form, it’s a war crime. The tactic which the Stars & Stripes article paints as affable American ingenuity, is in reality an action that comprises three distinct war crimes. Violations of a code to which the American public has become inured, perhaps because of our media’s repeated pandering.

1. Coercing civilians to be our military scouts is forced conscription, a war crime.

2. Meting out collective punishment is a war crime.

3. Destroying civilian food is a war crime.

Such actions have long been designated as war crimes by international consensus, based on centuries of abuse suffered by civilians at the hands of soldiers. Since forever war makers have improvised many cruelties to visit upon uncooperative peoples, two testaments later there are codes of conduct to stop each one.

B.
For the stubborn faint-of-mind: Yes, the Iraqis are supposed to adhere to the same laws and conventions. Yes, hiding behind non-combatants is a crime. But do you think their actions justify your commiting crimes?

Probably you remember a rule your mother taught you: Just because somebody else does it, doesn’t mean you have to.

MRE garbage trail

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A Meal-Ready-to-Eat is what we feed to our soldiers in the field. It’s a self contained meal, descendent of the C-ration. An MRE features a meat, vegetable, bread, dessert, choice of drinks, and plenty of packaging. Here’s what’s left after you consume the edible bits:
 
pictureHeavy plastic MRE bag
cardboard box enclosing meat
plastic/foil heatable bag for contents
cardboard box enclosing side dish
plastic/foil heatable bag for contents
plastic bag enclosing heat pouch
cloth/chemical heat pouch
plastic bag for spoon
plastic spoon
plastic/foil bag for crackers
plastic/foil bag for cheese
plastic/foil bag for dessert
plastic Fresh Pax pouch
plastic/foil bag for drink mix
clear plastic bag for condiments
clear plastic bag for mint gum
brown paper wrapper for napkin
paper napkin
clear plastic Tobasco bottle
red plastic bottle top
cardboard matchbook
paper/foil bag for tea
tea bag
paper/foil bag for coffee sweetner
paper/foil bag for moist toilette
cloth/paper toilette
3 paper bags for sugar, salt and pepper

29 items total. 10 are biodegradable, 4 are partially biodegradable, and 15 are of non-biodegradable plastic.

Plague upon Iraq

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Swarm of locustsNevermind that this operation appears to have been a diversion.
 
This is a picture of U.S. locusts launching the largest airborn assault on Iraq since the U.S. invasion. The attack upon a suspected resistance stronghold north of Samarra was called OPERATION SWARMER.

Where have you seen this imagery before? How about in A BUG’S LIFE, the nasty grasshopper gang, swarming the little ant colony to terrorize them and take their food.

If you missed A Bug’s Life, perhaps you recognize the malevolant silhouettes taking to the air in geometric formation from THE WIZARD OF OZ. The flying monkeys unleashed by the Wicked Witch.

An article from Time about the airborn assault ended with this description:

Before loading up into the helicopters for a return trip to Baghdad, Iraqi and American soldiers and some reporters helped themselves to the woman’s freshly baked bread, tearing bits off and chewing it as they wandered among the cows. For most of them, it was the only thing worthwhile they’d found all day.

Outing the media

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Girlfriend

Tom Cruise is gay. John Travolta is gay. Vin Diesel is gay. I don’t care if you think they are too cute, or have that special tu-ne-sais-quoi that only a heterosexual could exude. They’re actors! And they’re gay!

(If you Google “Vin Diesel”, you’ll see that blog entries abound by guys who’ve hooked up with him at clubs.)

(John Travolta is always the not-easily-placated queen of whichever movie set he’s working on. Ask anyone who works in the entertainment industry.)

(Tom Cruise’s pecadilos stay just outside of the gossip columns. Since the 80s! And so what? It’s fine! He’s gay!)

They’re gay. Nothing wrong with being gay. Nothing wrong with jumping unto a couch proclaiming your love for Katie Holmes. Nothing wrong with staying in the closet…

Unless you are serving a corporate mouthpiece that is simultaneously denying gays equal benefits and human rights, or a corporate media that is advocating homogeneous marriage (pun rejected) and religious worship.

There is something wrong with a media which covers up the normalcy of homosexuality at the same time that it holds gay rights under full frontal attack.

This isn’t about whether Tom Cruise wants to come out or not, it’s whether the media machine which is Tom Cruise the bankable property wants to come out. Very plainly it doesn’t.

Do you care if the media doesn’t want to be outed?

The fight over gay marriage is not about parenting rights or hospital visitation rights, although those are no small things. It’s about benefits, primarily health insurance benefits. If roughly 10% of human males are gay, that’s the percentage of the significant other population which the insurance industry doesn’t want to cover. That’s a lot of money. And outside of the walls of the beancounters in the huge insurance buildings, sitting in Emergicare waiting rooms, or sitting at home because they don’t have a doctor, that’s a lot of people.

If we live in a time when it can be admitted that Alexander the Great was gay, then Tom Cruise can be gay. Perhaps a gay Tom Cruise would still be bankable. Probably not in Asia. Well tough titties.

He can go on boffing Indoneasian hotel stewards to his heart’s content. We just don’t need to see his proto-hetero hystrionics on national TV which the networks use to force-feed white bread religion and marriage down our throats.

When you see such glee on the face of an actress like Katie Holmes, you see her happiness at having signed a fixed term contract to be Tom Cruise’s beard in exchange for the visibility of being the chief accessory to the world’s most bankable star. Tom Cruise is introducing Katie Holmes to Scientology. Could be, he’s not screwing her. Tom Cruise and Co simply set up a contract with the next actress who wishes to take centerstage with him, with specific guidelines and for a specific time period. Nicole Kidman, Mimi Rogers, et al, chose not to renew their options, or vice versa. Nothing wrong with that.

But there is something wrong, Tom, with being used as a tool to oppress others like yourself who do not have the financial resources you have.

And there is something wrong with a media perpetuating myth.

A history teacher less

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In last week’s Independent there was article about the counter-inauguration protestors in Acacia Park. One of the Palmer High School students said she feared expressing herself in class because her history teacher was a Bush supporter. Did you catch that?

It’s one thing to have Republican city officials in the pocket of land developers, or yokels in oversized pickups waving American flags, or pudgy pro-war Christians who condone crimes against humanity, or pro-Bush working poor who never did know on which side their bread wasn’t buttered, it’s quite another to tolerate irresponsible educators in our schools teaching our children -HISTORY no less.

Do we wonder where our so many uninformed, incurious voters came from? We can blame FOX and the rest of the media, but at Palmer we’d have to suspect some pretty curious history lessons.

Reprinted from The Independent