love and marriage

i finished reading dan savage's latest book, "the commitment" last night before bed. i devoured the thing. dan savage writes the weekly sex advice column that's syndicated in most of north america's alternative weeklies, in toronto, you can read it in NOW. for all that he pontificates and offers up sage, considered, and weighted advice on the myriad little depravities that make up the panoply of human sexual proclivities, he's actually a very "traditional" guy: in a mostly monogamous relationship with his partner of 10 years, they have an adopted son, he goes out to earn the money while his partner is a stay at home dad. this book is like a memoir, detailing the year or so when america was whipped into a pre-electiion polarizing froth over the gay-marriage issue, when dan and his partner debated back and forth whether they should take the plunge themselves. beyond that, it's also a bigger rumination on what it means to be married, committed, to build a family with someone, and how one relates to others. it was funny and poignant and fantastically well-written.

in less positive news: my mid-term is a DOOZY. i'm trying to break it down into manageable parts: intensively studying 18 definitions a day, cumulatively day by day. it's just so pointless when i know that i'm only going to be tested on a randomly selected 20 out of the 74. it's even MORE pointless when you factor in that statistical analysis is the ultimate entropic concatenation of bureaucratic noodling. i can sum it up: variables, coefficients, relationships, operationalization, blah blah blah. keeping the "distinct" terms straight in my head is a pain. compounded by the fact that i also have to do my prof's research somewhere in there.

tonight for dinner, i'm making some kind of huevos rancheros variation. i soaked some dried black beans which were subsequently drained, and are now on a low simmer on my stove. i'm going to soak some guajillo and ancho chilis in some boiling water, mixed that with some drained canned tomato and add that to the cooked beans, along with some sweated onion, garlic, and definitely a chili or two. add in the usual chili spices (cumin, coriander, ancho powder, pasilla, mexican oregano, etc), and let them stew a bit. poach/fry some eggs, throw that on top, and serve the resulting yolky slop with a vat of my famous guacamole, some salsa, and full fat sour cream and nacho chips. there's been a lack of food porn up on here of late, so i'll try to remember to take a picture.

the remainder of the tarte tatin for dessert.

now to place my snubbed nose on the proverbial grindstone.

fin.