Pocket knives

A friend of mine gave me a pocket-knife several years ago: a Spyderco Endura. Very shortly after I started carrying that knife, I realized why so many of my friends carry knives around. It's just too convenient to have a sharp blade every where you go.

Of course I don't mean it's as weapon. I know a lot of silly people think that: the sorts of silly people that are afraid of guns, big dogs, and their own shadows. The fact is, a sharp knife is one of the most useful tools you can have in your pocket. I find myself needing a sharp blade several times a week.

I carried that Endura everywhere I went (excepting airports: I had to put it in my checked bags every time I flew). That finally came to an end last summer, when it fell out of my pocket at my sister's house and I was unable to find it. She found it a couple weeks after I came back here, but I've not had a chance to go home since August. Next time I'm on the Island I'll claim it.

Of course, that doesn't help me now. I've a backup knife my brother-in-law gave me just before we left the East coast. It's a Browning, but I have no idea what the model is.

From Pocket Knives

The problem is, the Browning is just not a comfortable knife. It's a little block-ish in my pocket, and the clip's a little loose, no matter how I've tried to tighten it. And the knife has a liner lock; I just don't like liner locks.

So I've never really warmed up to that knife.

I started thinking about a replacement for my Endura, and I finally settled on the Cold Steel Rajah III. It's a nice little knife: a folding version of their Kukri. The blade is curved with the sharp edge on the inside. It's only 3 1/2 inches long, but it's very broad. I've always wanted a kukri: this is the closest I was likely to get.

But when my sister found the Endura, I sort of shelved my replacement plans.

But this last Christmas, my buddy handed me a package from Cold Steel. Now that's a true friend.

From Pocket Knives

I've been carrying the Rajah for a couple weeks now, and it's been a great knife. There are some down-sides: it's a little heavy for an every day carry. Not ridiculously heavy, just heavy enough that you can't quite forget it's there. In fact, it's a little bigger than my Browning, but it does feel better.

From Pocket Knives

But aside from its weight, the Rajah is my favourite knife. I love the broad blade, the deep belly, and the drop point. Let's be honest, this is a beautiful knife. Actually, it looks like something Galadriel would give a hobbit.

Still, when I get my Endura back, I think it'll go back to its place as my primary carry knife. It's not that I like it better than the Rajah, but I think the narrower blade and the less bulky haft make it a lot more practical for every day use. But honestly, if I ever end up lost in the wilderness, I think the Rajah's what I want in my pocket.

Back to it

Working in higher ed has a lot of frustrations and aggravations that just come with the territory, but there are some definite perks. One is that my place of work basically shuts down for a little over a week every Christmas. That didn't prevent me getting called a couple times when the campus was "closed", but I still ended up with more than a week off.

It was a nice break: I made some beer, played the guitar and mandolin, cooked, read a little, and watched some movies.

I've been reading The Coming Prince by Sir Robert Anderson: it's well worth the effort.

I might try and actually finish more books this year: it seems I'm about 75% done a dozen books at any given time, and most just end up back on my bookshelf without my actually crossing the finish line.

Every year, my sister Shan sends me something cool for Christmas. Shan's what I might call a very gifted giver. She has a knack for finding that perfect thing you didn't know you wanted. She made my Bodum Cozy, she gave me the CD of Dylan Thomas reading "A Child's Christmas in Wales," and she gave me her own copy of The Grand Sophy. This year she gave me a copy of the BBC's adaptation of North and South.

Yesterday one of the kids was sick and I wasn't feeling the best, so we popped the new DVDs into the player, expecting to watch one of the four episodes. We watched them all in one sitting. Shan describes the story as "Pride and Prejudice for grown-ups." Is it my favourite 19th Century book adaptation? I don't know... I'll need to watch it a couple more times. It's definitely in the running.

I think I prefer it to BBC's famous and brilliant Pride and Prejudice adaptation, solely on the grounds that it is visually more pleasing. The P&P miniseries was really very well done, but the DVDs are awful: they're washed out and colourless. (I hear the Blu-ray version really is much better.) But I'm very fond of the 2009 version of Emma. I don't know if the melancholy brilliance of N&S can possibly overcome the much more cheerful--- but not totally insipid--- E.

Here's a question, if it's not insipid, does that mean it's "sipid"?

Finally, my neighbour bought me the Lord of the Rings, Extended Edition on Blu-ray last summer. We had said we'd watch them together, and we're still not finished. It's hard finding times when we're both free. We've made it through The Fellowship of the Ring and The Two Towers. We were supposed to watch The Return of the King on New Year's Eve, but we got pre-empted.

This is a time when the "new and improved" really is. I watched the same sequences both on the older DVD version and the Blu-ray version, and I can actually see the difference. For example, the threads in Frodo's cloak are plainly visible.

Tomorrow it's back to work. Back to Perl and Java and Unix and Lisp and Spring and Hibernate and email and Oracle and GWT. I'm not really depressed by the thought, but it's been nice to get away from it for a while.

NC Bound

I'm heading out to Raleigh, North Carolina June 20--25. It's a business trip: I won't have a ton of time for hobnobbing, but I will absolutely make some time for what friends and family I can reasonably get in touch with.

Feasting at the Tamarind

So after closing yesterday afternoon, we went for dinner. A family we know had kept the kids for us, and we met them at the restaurant.

We chose Tamarind Indian Cuisine on Carmel Rd.

In a word, it was perfect. The folks at Tamarind were exquisitely courteous, the food was delicious.

We were to meet the other family at 6:00, but we were done with the closing a lot sooner than thought, so we arrived at 5:24. We hadn't made reservations: this might have been a problem on the weekend, we were told, but would be no problem last night. So we stood in the foyer a few minutes while they arranged some tables to sit ten, and then we were seated.

We had a slightly rocky start with the hostess, who was new to Tamarind (and, apparently, Indian food). I asked how the dishes were served, were they mainly rice with a small amount of "main course"? She took that as an insult, but I meant it honestly. My experience with Indians is that they use rice as the bulk of their diet, with the "main courses" almost as condiments. The advantage, of course, is it makes it easier to share meals between people at the table. She seemed mollified by my explanation, and that was the only less-than-stellar part of the night.

Ames and I were seated at least 15 minutes before the others arrived: we were looking over the menu and chatting with the server. I wanted something to sip, and asked about their herbal teas. He assured me the teas were excellent, so Ames and I each ordered one. We asked Shakti, our waiter, to bring us his favourite: he replied he'd bring his two best, so we could try a selection. Ames got one made with lemongrass, I got one whose name I didn't catch. They were astonishing.

With the tea, we ordered a Tamarind's Sampler Platter from the appetizer menu. Shakti assured us it was an excellent choice, and suggested we might also want to try an order of lasooni gobi once the others arrived.

As our friends were driving over to meet us at the restaurant, they called and mentioned they'd never eaten Indian before. They wanted some food suggestions, so we started looking at a menu. A friend in university once told me the best way to eat ethnic food was to ask the waiter to choose a feast; so once everyone arrived, we asked the waiter to do exactly that.

So we asked Shakti to pick a feast for us. I asked if he could include lamb vindaloo done hot. He made some comment about "American spicy, not Indian spicy." That was all I needed to take up the gauntlet: we ordered it "Indian spicy." But the rest of the menu was his selection. We told him about nut allergies, and he was good to go. We got a few appetizers (including the lasooni gobi he had previously suggested) and five or six entrees. In addition, we ordered a basket of naan (eventually Shakti decided we needed two baskets) and some mango pickle (I love mango pickle).

Now, it's entirely likely this strategy wouldn't work with an inferior waiter, but last night it was brilliant. The appetizers were tantalizing, the entrees complimented each other perfectly.

Our menu consisted of:

• Lasooni Gobi: cauliflower fried in some sweet and pungent sauce, with onions and bell peppers. I never thought cauliflower was actually food until last night: I had always thought it was a feminist revenge on men, perpetrated by housewives and mothers across the globe. This stuff was incredible: it didn't last long at all.


• Tandoori Talapia: fish cooked tandoori style. This was the most mild dish of the night, although it was far from boring. The fish came out sizzling on a hot platter and a bed of onions and bell peppers, with what looked like thin-sliced tomatoes.


• Bademia Lamb Chops: lamb chops coated in some spices and grilled, then brought sizzling on a hot platter and a bed of onions and bell peppers (notice a pattern here?). This was basically Indian rack of lamb: it was a huge hit and didn't last five minutes.


• Lamb Vindaloo ("Desi Hot"): vindaloo is a favourite of mine, I couldn't resist ordering it. I love the sauce it comes in.


• Morthal Kali Daal: a daal made of lentils and some other beans. Daal is one of the kids' favourite foods: it was extravagant... delicious!


• Rogan Josh: lamb in a spicy brown sauce. This might have been my favourite of the night.


• Hyderbadi Dum Biryani: a rice dish, with meat in it. One of Ames' friends is from Hyderbad, so we ate this one with some real curiosity. It contained, to our surprise, pieces of chicken and a whole boiled egg. Very tasty, although the egg made serving it somewhat tricky.


• Vegetable Jalfrezi: this was a vegetarian dish with a white cheese sauce. I ate little or none of it, mainly because it was at the other end of the table. I'll try it next time.


• Tamarind's Murgh: a house speciality. Chicken breasts in apricot and spinach sauce. This was actually served as an American-style entree, with rice and vegetables on a single plate. Everything else was served family-style.
  

The first thing I noticed about the food at Tamarind was that it tasted like home-made food I've had from Indian friends and acquaintances. This was not the standard Americanized fare that's been sitting on a buffet: it was fresh, spicy, and complex. One nice touch was, the family-style dishes were served on small candle warmers, so the food was always hot. The pickle was pungent, the sauces were rich and spicy, the food was altogether excellent.

It was very cool to be there with a family who'd never tried Indian before. It was as enjoyable to watch them cautiously taste something and start smiling, as it was to taste the food myself. And before you ask, I'm no expert in Indian food: I've just had enough experience to want more.

The owner stopped by our table twice, once to check on us as the food was arriving, once when we were finished. He explained that he was aiming at a higher-end dining experience: he had already opened a couple Indian restaurants in Charlotte (which are doing well), but they were the more typical buffets. He's trying to get a place for people who are willing to pay more for food that's better.

All in all, I enjoyed our excursion to the Tamarind even more than I've enjoyed the last few visits to (expensive) steak places. Don't get me wrong: Tamarind is not cheap. But the experience was worth every penny. We won't be eating here very often---we've been spending far too much money on dining out and have chosen to cut back---but it will certainly be a place we visit every other month or so.

I don't like talking about my flair

Well, the really big news since my last post has been all very personal stuff. So call this self-absorbed if you will, but I've very little of general interest or significance to report.

Of course, the most significant event in the last week has been meeting back up with my closest friend from way back when. That is, my closest friend in high school and most of college. At some point 12 years ago or so, we ended up losing touch with one another, and Google was of no help reuniting us. Facebook to the rescue: we're suddenly back in contact and finding that our friendship appears to be quite strong enough to overcome little things like more than a decade of neglect.

All this reuniting with people has gotten me thinking. I mentioned this earlier, but it's striking how easy it is to neglect people. I never do so maliciously, but I frequently get caught up in day-to-day life and reponsibility, and then suddenly it's been several years since I spoke to someone.

Part of that is just my personality. Like my father or my uncles, I am quite willing for someone I haven't spoken to for years to just appear, and I will drop what I'm doing to help them out or whatever. Well, I suppose there are limits on that sort of thing; but I'm quite willing to welcome a friend back in (so to speak) to whatever place they once held, with no hard feelings about the years of silence. I don't assume that a lack of contact is indicative of offense given.

But to look at it from anyone else's point of view, that's exactly how it's interpreted. So I'm now endeavouring to maintain what long-distance relationships are still active.

The fact is, I have been very priviledged to meet a great many interesting friends in my short life; and frankly, I've been blessed to have made several friends that become fast and intimate friends very quickly. Trev is no doubt the foremost of these, but there have been four or five people like that over the last twenty years. And that sort of friendship is worth a lot more than a curmudgeon like myself is prone to think.

But enough introspection!

I honestly wonder whether that sort of friendship is precisely what's missing in this degenerate society. Why are close friends always assumed to be lovers? It's exactly the same problem with people who like kids: society assumes they're paedophiles, just because the vast majority of the culture are philistines who can't comprehend a genuine interest in another person's well-being without some sort of self-interest. Sadly, the North American culture in which I live is aggressively, almost offensively individualistic. Self-centeredness is a virtue; genuine concern for other people is a flaw.

Oh sure, you can have the politically-correct general philanthropy of the political left wing. But that's not genuine concern: those same bleeding-heart liberals are generally unable to actually quote the names or personal details of the victims they so vigilantly advocate. I am positive that's because they're not interested in the person, but in some sort of abstract ideal the person represents. A real person who has real problems is not the concern of the political activist: he or she is interested in the Single Mother or the Iliterate Man or the Native American as an ideal, not as a real person. They ignore the fact that people are individuals, and see them as statistics.

Well, that turned into a rant.