Day: August 13, 2017

I was pretty late getting it again, but I did go ahead and make that stuffed marrow tonight. That squash was big enough that I only used half of it, which was at least a pound.

Pictured here: half of what I cooked. And after it was in the bowl, that still looked big enough that I cut it in half again for the first helping 🙄 Especially eating it with a little brown basmati cooked with veggie broth and olive oil, to soak up more of the tomatoey goodness. (The stuff on top of that is some of the hollowed out squash middle cooked down in the liquid, since it wasn’t too seedy. Unlike with overgrown zucchini/courgettes.)

This batch probably would have been plenty for two people, even considering that my partner can’t stand squash and will only scoop out the meatball part when he’s around. (More left for me…) I’m never great at judging quantities, and it would be a real shame not to cook enough! But, it will definitely get eaten. Probably most of it tonight. And the tomato/veggie broth cooking liquid should make a decent soup base, maybe tomorrow.

A couple of decent-looking recipes for similar (which also work fine with beef, which was what I had):
Spiced-Lamb-Stuffed Zucchini
LEBANESE STUFFED MARROW…AKA ANACONDA

Similar is also really good using something like herbes de Provence or Italian seasoning. But tonight my anaconda was more in the mood for cumin, red pepper flakes, black pepper, and plenty of garlic.

My stepdad is a white guy with an engineering degree who grew up firmly middle-class in NOVA. He was one of the people who ended up moving back near Virginia Tech later on, when he needed a change. And a number of people in similar positions were really surprised to find out he’d married one of the local hicks (not to mention one who was obviously not white), as an indication of some ongoing politics there.

(He’s also an autistic misfit who didn’t do nearly as well for himself in general as basically anyone expected, and wound up under heavy medical debt. Still, I got to watch some interesting dynamics in action there.)

His sister and her husband are still in the DC suburban sprawl, on the Maryland side. And they’ve been doing more what expected of them. Visiting them up there was always an experience. They’re at least not in a gated community, but it was one of the developments with a pretty intrusive neighborhood association, etc.–which I had never encountered before. I’m surprised some of the neighbors never called the cops over our car parked there, at least that we ever knew of.

One visit when I was maybe 12 was also where I got my only exposure to the suburban Evangelical megachurch phenomenon, because of course we had to join them since we were there on a Sunday. (And my parents made sure not to be, after that.) At least half the neighbors were there too, not to mention people they worked with.

(It was also absolutely devastating when their older kid turned out to be bipolar, to the point that Sis kept calling my mother for emotional support. We were 95% sure the younger kid was not straight, and he was obviously having about the level of conflict you might expect. I really hope both of them are doing OK, because they really couldn’t help their family situation and I always kinda liked them both.)

I haven’t talked to them at all since like 2008, when the hubby felt a need to complain about Obama before the election. But yeah, I really doubt those political leanings have changed much in the meantime.

But sure, let’s focus on some lower hanging fruit.

bittersnurr:

torimisu:

c-bassmeow:

basednkrumah:

aljofares:

sinbadism:

aljofares:

Seriously, if you think poor, white, rural folk had the money to fly and drive to Charlottesville, pay for lodging and food and all other expenses to attend a Nazi rally, i don’t know what to tell you

These folk are probably professionals in cushy positions, business owners or public employees.

I mean you don’t have to necessarily do anything but pay for gas and you’re forgetting how damn small that part of the country is. yes a lot of them are not poor but a lot of them are probably poor because the white working class in the south (and all over) is also full of racists.

I’m sure there were lots of folk there from the South, but i’ve seen tweets and reports that people came in from across the country. I think the narrative that this is a poor, working class phenomenon is misleading and a really great recruiting tool so i’m not buying it 

People fixate on poor rural whites when’s there’s been evidence of klansmen/Nazis infiltrating the police/congress/etc. I’ve met plenty of white supremacists with nice clothes and money in college who for whatever reason feel oppressed

Cognitive dissonance is at work here. No one wants to believe that their dentist, teacher, therapist, Ceo of their favorite company, etc can be capable of entertaining what they view as outlier, fringe, “hick” views only promoted in Appalachia or the bayous of the rural south. The truth is that racism and white supremacy have been promoted by the elite since as far back as racism has been a thing in America (hint: always).  

First reply is also bullshit. Have you ever driven through Virginia? It takes 5+ hours to drive through it the shortest way possible north to south. And to the rural west, mountains, farms, what have you, the roads are still garbage.
I can guarantee you that these people are middle and upper class and very likely from all around. Even IF they were just from Virginia, this commonwealth is called the “great suburban state” for a reason. The entire northern half or more is taken over by masses of suburbs and exurbs, gated communities are a staple. This is the part of the U.S. that is the upper and upper-middle. People who live rural here probably are farmers or don’t have any time or money to care, let alone use their leisure to hate others.
The stereotype that ignorance comes from rural areas is so harmful because it ruins the understanding that hate is something that is TAUGHT.

Northern bigotry is finding out years later that most people close to you of voting age voted against gay marrige. Northern bigotry is most trump voters seeming liberal in public and you having to watch people with power over you lie about not supporting him. Northern bigotry is everyone acting like things are outrageous in public then complaining about the illegals ruining the state behind closed doors.

Like I live in Massachusetts which is one of the most liberal states, liberal i guess means “whatever is popular”. Because as soon as this shit gets more socially acceptable, well to put it bluntly I’ve been in public spaces and forced to listen to outright hatespeech aimed at people like me.

Meanwhile my norther redneck hick family in nh is mixed race and my old white grandma has spent many a christmas raving about a cousin’s husband who was a Somalian muslim refuge because he was the best father she’d ever seen…. and my family that lives here voted for trump despite that. Bet my hick family would be disgusted but you know, they don’t tell anyone who they voted for so you’d never know they are racist.

I’m sorry but hiding bigotry is imo, scarier then people who are up front. Like this is the kind of shit that was probably why my lesbian friend in high school was caught off guard by her parents kicking her out for it, people act like you can trust them, but they are just being performative. They are “tolerating” you due to social rules, not because they actually respect you, and I bet a LOT of people are dealing with right now with this shit happening, getting a rude wakeup on what people around them in blue states Actually Think.

torimisu:

c-bassmeow:

basednkrumah:

aljofares:

sinbadism:

aljofares:

Seriously, if you think poor, white, rural folk had the money to fly and drive to Charlottesville, pay for lodging and food and all other expenses to attend a Nazi rally, i don’t know what to tell you

These folk are probably professionals in cushy positions, business owners or public employees.

I mean you don’t have to necessarily do anything but pay for gas and you’re forgetting how damn small that part of the country is. yes a lot of them are not poor but a lot of them are probably poor because the white working class in the south (and all over) is also full of racists.

I’m sure there were lots of folk there from the South, but i’ve seen tweets and reports that people came in from across the country. I think the narrative that this is a poor, working class phenomenon is misleading and a really great recruiting tool so i’m not buying it 

People fixate on poor rural whites when’s there’s been evidence of klansmen/Nazis infiltrating the police/congress/etc. I’ve met plenty of white supremacists with nice clothes and money in college who for whatever reason feel oppressed

Cognitive dissonance is at work here. No one wants to believe that their dentist, teacher, therapist, Ceo of their favorite company, etc can be capable of entertaining what they view as outlier, fringe, “hick” views only promoted in Appalachia or the bayous of the rural south. The truth is that racism and white supremacy have been promoted by the elite since as far back as racism has been a thing in America (hint: always).  

First reply is also bullshit. Have you ever driven through Virginia? It takes 5+ hours to drive through it the shortest way possible north to south. And to the rural west, mountains, farms, what have you, the roads are still garbage.
I can guarantee you that these people are middle and upper class and very likely from all around. Even IF they were just from Virginia, this commonwealth is called the “great suburban state” for a reason. The entire northern half or more is taken over by masses of suburbs and exurbs, gated communities are a staple. This is the part of the U.S. that is the upper and upper-middle. People who live rural here probably are farmers or don’t have any time or money to care, let alone use their leisure to hate others.
The stereotype that ignorance comes from rural areas is so harmful because it ruins the understanding that hate is something that is TAUGHT.

euripidesredux:

lunulata:

raptorific:

lunulata:

I think my favorite panic-fueled response to a petitioner was when someone came up to me in Union Square and said “Hi, would you care to sign our petition for LGBT rights?” and I just blurted out “I’m already gay” and the person, taken aback, said “Well, that’s… nice.” and I said “It really is. Goodbye.” and just walked into the closest store to escape.

one time I was on my way to a final and this clipboard person was aggressively trying to stand in my way and saying “excuse me sir, can you take just one minute?” and I was like “I’m sorry I’m on my way to a final” and they said “just takes a minute to save a mountain” and I panicked because clearly the truth of why I had to go wasn’t working so I just said the first thing that came to mind which was “Sorry I hate mountains”

This is maybe my favorite response to this post, holy shit.

My favorite of these from the other side of the clipboard—back when I was canvassing for GreenPeace, I had a co-worker that would switch back and forth between “Hey, you want to help save a whale?” and “Hey, you want to help fight global warming?” – and at the end of a very long, hard day on the Magnificent Mile in Chicago, he blurted out to someone “Hey, you want to help me fight a whale?”

Honestly, there are also things to be said about some of the types of people that (Jefferson’s baby) UVA has attracted from the get-go. I would be surprised if Richard Spencer were the only alum there to take the place “back” with their tiki torches.

Also reminded again of Scalzi’s too-apt observation:
The “alt-right” are basically those assholes from your college dorm who were always “just playing devil’s advocate” about the topics of slavery and women’s rights.

Yeah, I remember them a little too well. That’s hardly limited to UVA, of course. And it remains a much less comfortable discussion, compared to blaming some other demographics with a lot less actual power. They like it that way, too.

//www.instagram.com/embed.js

baku:

thenatsdorf:

Baby gator feeding frenzy.

handler: whose next?

these babies: :V :V :V 

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V

:V :V :V