The Floating Opera

2010-02-12T14:19:00.000-08:00

This journal and I are quits. If you want the fantastic newness, go here. (If going there doesn't ring your bell, you can subscribe to the RSS feed.) The new blog will be more focused, I promise you. Or more varied. I'm not sure yet.

2009-11-05T11:14:00.001-08:00

Been writing a lot of material over the last few weeks, none of it public. Was going slowly insane so I took up a daily journal again. Turned out to be exactly the cathartic activity I needed. Also in the midst of NaNoWriMo presently and have churned out some 6,500 words for that so far. Though it seems overkill and possibly even dangerous to my art when looked at from the outside, I'm actually finding it very useful. The quotas provide a wonderful excuse to practice the craft for 4-5 hours a night.

2009-06-05T11:53:00.000-07:00

I was tagged by Hannah, so here goes:

1. What is your current obsession?
My current obsessions are my longtime ones as well - I spend a lot of time thinking about design, songwriting, and fiction writing.

2. What is your weirdest obsession?
That's a tough one. I don't find "weird" a useful word, usually.

3. What do you see outside your window?
A large factory, a checkerboard watertower, and a cavalcade of Caltrains. In a couple of weeks, it'll be fences, cars, and the house across the street.

4. What is your favourite colour?
Brown.

5. What is your weakness?
I'm easily discouraged.

6. What animal would you be?
Either a mynah bird or an African grey.

7. What would you like to learn how to do?
So many things! Build a clock from scratch, write an operating system from scratch, sing correctly, play the cello competently, animate competently, convincingly draw/paint people and animals from all angles, take care of my car, build my own guitar pedals...

8. What do you want to never happen in life?
I'd prefer not to have anyone I care about die "before their time."

9. What is on your bedside table?
Cell phone, forgotten cups, mass market paperbacks, postcards, coins, etc.

10. What's the last thing you bought?
A blueberry muffin.

11. What do you think about the person that tagged you?
I like Hannah a lot. She's a very kind, real person.

12. What was your favourite children's book?
From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler by E. L. Konigsberg.

13. Who do you want to meet in person?
Marilynne Robinson. The hell of it is that she actually lives in Iowa City and teaches at the University of Iowa. If only I'd known about her during uni!

14. What did you want to be as a child?
An astronomer and a comic book artist.

15. What did you dream about last night?
The usual stuff. Our parrot Max started tentatively squawking just before I woke up, so my final dreams had a lot of multicolored birds circling around.

16. Which do you prefer, day or night?
Day, if I can be outside.

17. What's your favourite piece of clothing in your closet?
It's a toss-up between my red Wind-Up Bird t-shirt, my blue Banana Republic hoodie, and my brown corduroys.

18. What's your plan for tomorrow?
Dina and I are going to spend most of the day moving. Afterwards, I'm going to try to finish up my graphic design studio project.

19. What would you like to get your hands on right now?
A job I enjoy doing.

20. What is your must have of the moment?
Blood. Water. Eyesight. Hearing. Etc.

21. What's your favourite tea flavour?
Lemon or peach.

22. If you could go anywhere in the world right now, where would you go?
Paris. I wouldn't mind visiting NYC again, either, at least for a little while.

Tagging: I don't think anyone reads this journal anymore, but I know Doug used to. So Doug, if you're reading this, I just tagged you.

2008-07-17T15:07:00.000-07:00

It's a been more than a year since I last posted here at The Floating Opera, so I should probably give my audience (assuming they're still around) some kind of summary/synopsis/update. Here's a short one:

I moved to the Department of Safety in Anacortes, WA, in mid-August of 2007. I was very excited about the place at first, but my always-tentative money situation and the state of the organization crippled that enthusiasm significantly by the beginning of the new year. In November, I started having long phone conversations with Dina, a girl I'd taken a class with at the University of Iowa who I'd stayed in contact with via e-mails and mix CDs. We ended up falling in love with each other and moving in together. We're living in Sunnyvale, CA, right in the middle of Silicon Valley; starting in August, she will be teaching at Fremont High School here in town, and I will be in an entry-level position at Google.

The Google thing is recent. I spent about a month looking for jobs before I got realistic, signed up with a few staffing agencies, and got this gig. It's not glamorous at all, nor does it pay well - unless I get a raise very quickly, I'm going to have to continue to freelance on the side. (This comes as a bit of a blow to me. The main reason I got a "straight job" is so I wouldn't have to freelance anymore.) Still, it's Google, and I'm psyched about that. I'm going to make the best of the situation, and who knows? Maybe it'll be awesome.

More later.

Ryan
xoxo

2007-06-09T22:08:00.000-07:00

So long, New York City! Hello, reality!

At least, that's what it feels like. You know what happened when I went to Iowa City earlier today to drop off Alena and eat at Z'Mariks and look at trees? I felt so overwhelmed and grateful I almost cried. It was so warm and there were so many people with color in their faces. Couples were sunning in the park. And it kept happening like that... you Midwesterners don't know how green it is here. I keep touching the grass and trees when I'm walking around because they don't look real. They look too alive.

And I have a car! I don't have to stay here all day or wait around to be taken somewhere else. I can get in my car and drive and listen to music and go somewhere. I feel like a newborn.

More later!

Ryan
xoxo

2007-06-06T17:27:00.000-07:00

I carried four 30-40 pound boxes a total of 14 blocks today; my arms, as you can imagine, are rigid with pain. But then, I suppose that's moving. I'm going to have to deliver at least two more similarly-loaded boxes a total of four blocks tomorrow. Then comes loading the car, treating my benefactors (Alex and Alena) to lunch or dinner, driving in shifts, driving driving driving. At the end I'll have to drive Alena home, and then I'll be somewhere new, officially.

Well, somewhere old, officially. But somewhere new comparatively.

It would be ridiculous to claim that I won't miss New York City. It's ridiculous in the way claiming you hate your ex from a long-term relationship is ridicuoous. It's way too complicated. I won't miss the palpable cautiousness people have here - in fact, I'm hoping it's the first attribute I'll shake off. I won't miss the noise, either. What I will miss is the access. I saw some damn fine shows, exhibitions, films, and general events here. I know I won't likely have that level of access again - that is, unless I move back, which is very definitely not in the cards at this point.

Even then, all that access, it's not that good. It doesn't square well with my nature. I like to hunt for my food, so to speak. And I like to savor it.

It's kind of awesome to be moving. I like everything involved with moving. You have to take stock of your situation in a serious way. You have to prioritize. Sometimes, as with this move, you have to travel long distances through lands you rarely ever get the chance to see. And don't forget that fresh-start feeling. When you move somewhere else, you are a blank slate to these people. If you're psychologically equipped to do so, you can become a new and wholly more effective person.

This will probably be the last entry from New York, fellas. Á demain.

Ryan
xoxo

2007-06-01T21:37:00.000-07:00

Anacortes totally won. I move to the Department of Safety in August.
(I'm moving in with Lisa next year, though.)

Exciting? Yes. I'll reprint the details from my other journal later.

Ryan
xoxo

2007-05-30T02:28:00.000-07:00

Anacortes or Olympia? Anacortes or Olympia? It's driving me crazy. There's just so much involved in the decision at this point. I need to talk it over with a good listener.

Anacortes (specifically, the Department of Safety):
1) Immediate opportunities for meeting new people.
2) More likely to build character and provide new experiences as I'll be a worker/resident and thus will be performing maintenance duties, helping set up shows, etc.
3) A very real chance of meeting and collaborating with several recording artists I respect.
4) Essentially a positive environment to learn and grow in.
5) A unique opporunity - I don't foresee myself getting the chance to live in such a situation again anytime soon.

Olympia:
1) I'd be living in a house and thus could unload and set up all of the stuff I have collecting dust in my mom's basement.
2) I'd be able to set up my drumset and amplifier and play more or less whenever I wanted to.
3) I'd have access to theaters, libraries, and so on that Anacortes likely wouldn't have.
4) I'd have relative privacy.

It comes down to my character, I guess. Both places present interesting challenges. If I move to Olympia, I'll have to really reach out in order to succeed. If I move to Anacortes, I'll have to be open and positive near-constantly. Which would benefit me more? What do I want right now? I'll get back to you, I guess.

Ryan
xoxo

2007-05-18T00:08:00.000-07:00

The move became exponentially more confusing since the last entry. I more or less secured that apartment I was talking about, but! two new and alluring options have also come into play:

1) I can/may move to the Department of Safety in Anacortes, WA. The DoS is an amazing community venue/workers co-op chaired by, among others, Phil Elvrum of the Microphones and his wife Genevieve. I sent a resume and personal statement to the Department of Safety in Anacortes, WA, a month or so ago, hoping to move in as a resident/worker. I was/am psyched to move in but I figured it was a longshot, especially after a week or two of silence on the part of their coordinators. Turns out they really liked me and want me to move up in August!

2) My ex-roommate Lisa wants to room with me in Olympia. Despite our tempestuous past, Lisa and I are still basically best friends, so I'm very, very tempted. To sweeten the deal even more, she has a car and wants to rent a house. A house! I could record instruments with impunity! Lisa + a house.

So, to recap, I will either 1) live cheaply amongst a community of artists in a lake village, b) live alone in a 1-BR bedroom at the center of Olympia, or c) live in a house with one of my best friends somewhere in Olympia. I. am. ambivalent.

Weird, dreamy. That just about sums up where I'm at right now.

Haircut happening tomorrow.

Ryan
xoxo

2007-05-08T00:29:00.000-07:00

I may be moving to Olympia sooner than anticipated. I discovered an apartment building that is apparently the Holy Grail of apartment buildings, right in the center of downtown Olympia, and I've been spending most of my spare time trying to secure it. It's tricky - I don't have any direct contacts in Olympia to check out the place for me nor do I necessarily have the credit for this kind of thing. (I lost most of the former in the big Kill Rock Stars change-of-hands last year and most of the latter in this year's taxes.) I do, however, know people who know people, and I'm pretty sure my mom will help out if things get serious. Her basement's storing 90% of my belongings right now and as far as I know she's not loving it or anything.

Allow me to briefly expound on how great this place is. It's on the bus line and it sports an on-site washer/dryer and free wireless internet. It's right around the corner from what Hannah informs me is "the best bookstore in the city" and right upstairs from "the best coffee in the city." It's in front of a lake and has a view of the park. It is one block from KRS and three from K. I want it I want it I want it.

I've been suffering from designer's block the last few days. I don't know where it's coming from. It's an issue of focus and motivation, I think; this is commercial work, so there can't be any real artistic despair to speak of. Hopefully I'll be able to get back on track tomorrow.

Ryan
xoxo

2007-05-04T00:02:00.000-07:00

~~I changed my profile picture. This one's more accurate. Enjoy.~~ In deference to Doug, who knew straightaway that the pic I put up was substandard, I'm substituting in the infamous "Ryan as David Foster Wallace" pic.

DFW, as seen on the back of Infinite Jest.
It was a good day. I woke up in the afternoon and decided that I probably wasn't going to get any work done, so I left for Manhattan and bought some books. I ended up with a few French translations - the Radiguet was a real find, if a bit costly - and some books by Latin American authors I'm not familiar with, Jorge Amado and Machado de Assis. I also picked up a copy of Alice's Adventures in Wonderland & Through the Looking Glass, which I've never read before. Something in Calvino's Six Memos suggested that a working knowledge of Carroll would be desirable, and I've never been one to disagree with Calvino. He's my main man.

Worth mentioning: Julian Barnes and a colleague were perusing at East Village Books at the same time as myself. Judging from their conversation - "Have you read this? The style is wanting but the story is interesting." or "I could see that, but that's what the writer was shooting for, I think. You should try reading the dialogue aloud." - I took them at first for professors of creative writing, but at some point the name "Julian" slipped out and I immediately became suspicious. A Google Image search confirmed it. This is of course apropos of nothing. I never could get into Julian Barnes. I'm told his stuff is excellent, though. Maybe he suffers from that too-good-for-his-own-good syndrome that people like Nabokov and Martin Amis sometimes suffer from.

Dina received her mix (mentioned last entry) and seems to be enjoying it. The cover was a pencil sketch I drew of me thinking of her wondering where her mix was. I drew her from memory, but apparently it was accurate enough that her coworkers remarked on it. Pretty cool. The previously mentioned "Miscegenation" mix (now untitled) is nearly finished, and I'll probably send that along to her as well.

This evening I spent the bulk of my time spring cleaning. I've reduced the clutter in my room significantly, but without proper shelving there are still messy spots and piles here and there. I think I might pick up some cardboard boxes tomorrow and start packing the stuff that I never use but would like to keep. Maybe a pile of boxes will look slightly less disorganized than several piles of books and CDs.

One of the stranger aspects of cleaning was rooting through my clear plastic trunk. This trunk has been through a lot and is worse for the wear. It was lugged from Jasmine's bedbug-ridden Greenpoint residence across Brooklyn, evacuated from my doomed South Park Slope sublet in midday to Josh's, used as my sole shelf during my three somber months in Williamsburg, fitted with effort into the far corner of my 6x6 lofted bedroom in Hell's Kitchen, and finally deposited beside my dresser for over a year here in Ridgewood, so completely disfigured by this point that the lid would barely stay on. To rummage through it was to be suddently confronted with my not-so-distant Situation as a newcomer to New York City.

(Plus I found $3 and some change that included quarters.)

There's a certain amount of intelligence hiding in one's history, I think. The last two or so years are more than an good adventure story. They reassure me that I have been and always will be capable of taking control of my life. The important thing to remember is that I needn't wait for crises to strike in order to do so.

Yours,
Ryan

2007-05-01T20:26:00.000-07:00

I've been just stupidly skint the last couple of days. But things are swell. Last week was an extremely effective week for Ryan M. I was completing projects right and left: I averaged a card a day, sent off a mix to Dina, sent off a resume to the worker's co-op up in Anacortes that I'm angling to join. I wrote or recorded or re-recorded three songs.

So the Other Plan, if this worker's co-op deal doesn't pan out, was and is to move to Olympia, WA. My roommate-to-be has copped out for lack of fiscal power, but I have an Other Plan (B) and even an Other Plan (C). Other Plan (B) involves moving up with a friend of mine who just graduated from Vassar. She, too, has at least three potential plans going on, so it's not a very dependable plan. Other Plan (C) is a pretty heavy one, though I could hack it if I had to. It involves me moving up to Olympia alone and renting a small studio, alone.

I think I'm gonna send the Department of Safety folks some brownies and maybe a few mix CDs. I could send them the mix I made for Dina, and I'm working on a second mix that I've tentatively titled "Miscegenation Celebration." Is that sort of reappropriation of a vaguely perjorative term considered "black humor"? Maybe I should reconsider.

Ryan
xoxo

2007-04-28T10:14:00.000-07:00

First things first: my phone's been partially shut off. In a mischievious twist, Verizon has made it so I can receive text messages and phone calls but I can't make them myself. In the words of the Pharcyde, "Aw, shit!"

Last night I saw the devil's own show at the Silent Barn. Chrissakes. Fact: the Dirty Projectors, when performing as a band, are actually mindblowing. I was shocked. Easily the best thing all night. The Shape of Folk to Come, all derelict guitarwork and intricately askew stomps and unbelievable female harmonies. Fact: Awesome Color were also the best thing all night, but for completely different reasons. They basically played four riffs ("songs") for about thirty minutes, but energy-wise it was comparable to Les Savy Fav. Slam-dancing, crowd-surfing, little girls being thrown into drumsets. The speakers almost toppled over several times. Crazy shit.

Black Moth Super Rainbow also played, and they were pretty alright. I missed Deerhunter.

The thing about this show was that the venue only comfortably holds 150 and there were 400+ in there. Without any windows open or anything. It was like being in the hold of a slave ship, only with good live music and less scurvy (though equal vomiting, probably).

What else: I finished my mix for Dina and sent it off yesterday. I put in an app for an artists co-op in the Northwest as well. I saw Altman's The Long Goodbye on Thursday and must emphatically tell everyone who will hear me to rent it. Oh yeah, and my phone was shut off. But you knew that already.

Ryan
xoxo

2007-04-17T23:52:00.000-07:00

I can't remember if I complained about taxes in here. If not, I'm complaining now. After writing two checks totalling $611.48, I still owe the government $1416.74. Where'm I gonna get $1416.74? This self-employment stuff is for the birds. It's like normal work only you have to be "responsible" and keep "records" of your "business expenditures." Just give me some goddamn money and be done with it, people.

I keep hearing about the death of things lately. People dying (Virginia Tech), idealism dying ("Slouching Towards Bethlehem"), venues dying (Tonic). Evem the weather is rather withering. I could've sworn this was springtime. We haven't had a blue sky in a few weeks.

Oh yeah, it seems I'm gonna be in the Midwest in mid-May.

Ryan
xoxo

2007-04-13T16:26:00.000-07:00

A new Elliott Smith record - that is, a new record of Elliott Smith sides - is shipping May 1st from KRS HQ. The tracks are mostly old news, b-sides and demos that've been floating around ad nauseum since the dawn of P2P, but there are several there I don't recognize as well - "New Monkey", "Riot Coming", "All Cleaned Out", and a few others. The art looks bizzarely friendly, mostly because Elliott's meek, lonely visage doesn't figure prominently as is usually the case. I'm not gonna pretend I'm not psyched by this thing. Elliott Smith is a big musical hero of mine. I'm thinking I'm gonna pick it up on vinyl and grab the MP3s from somewheres in the meantime.

--

Most of the time, I love being self-employed. The freedom is extremely satisfying - I could never suffer working under someone else at this point. However, there are some drawbacks. Health insurance, for one, is more or less an impossibility for a relatively inexperienced freelancer like myself. "Spending money" isn't always there - hell, it's hard to even save for anything. But perhaps the worst is the tax situation.
<!--begin complaining--!>
I didn't save a solitary nickel for taxes this year, which means I'm gonna get real fucked. Not only that, but I worked a normal job and two separate "self-employed" jobs, so I have to fill out like ten forms.
<!--end complaining--!>

--

Ryan
xoxo

2007-04-12T21:09:00.000-07:00

When do I write in this blog? When Kurt Vonnegut Jr., dies, that's when. I suppose my experience with Vonnegut has been similar to many other curious, searching types' experiences with him. For one, the man more or less taught me how to Read. He made me feel more certain of my own ideas and reassured me that it was okay to question and investigate any and all things, even (perhaps especially) "common sense." Etc. etc. In short, he made me care. It's good that he's finally at rest.

Elsewhere in my life: Todd P recently began booking shows at a venue not three stops from me, a hole-in-the-wall artists' loft off of the Halsey L known as the Silent Barn. It's a really cool place - it's supremely painty and dressed up and makes me feel like there's something small and good happening in Brooklyn still. What's more, I met a cool couple of girls from NYU last time I was there, and I even discovered an okay band, this sampler-perc-vox duo called High Places. Live, these two come off a bit like a placid suburban antidote to Gang Gang Dance - lots of thrum and hitting contact mic-ed things with drum sticks, but with lazy no-frills vox and not much attitude to speak of. On record, they're more just simple kitchen-sink electro pop. The fact that they regularly open for YACHT makes a lot of sense to me.

Speaking of music, I finished a pretty good track today. The track, you'll probably notice, is shot through with the sounds of trains passing by. This is because I live on the M line - I could reach out my window and touch the M train as it passed if I wanted to, it's that close - so I'm including it, even if I don't much like it. It's like writing a short story on candy bar wrappers or toilet paper, I guess. You get to experience the author's terrible prison, where niceties such as clean paper and unpolluted silence are few and far between.

On that note, adieu for now! Feel free to comment on the track. I doubt that anyone reads this journal 'sides my brother, but hey, it's possible.

Ryan
xoxo

2007-04-08T15:09:00.001-07:00

I was reading the NYTimes Magazine a month or so ago and came across this interesting article. The article addresses a ton of stuff, from the dubiousness of any preprocessed product making health claims to the adverse effects caused by meat industry lobbyists in 1977, but the sentiment that most stuck with me is - and I'm paraphrasing 'cause I'm too lazy to go back through the whole article and find it - "Don't eat anything your great-grandmother wouldn't have recognized as food." Stupefyingly simple, obvious, and great advice.

In other news, just got back from Baltimore a few days ago. I didn't do much down there other than work, play music, and watch Seinfeld, but damned if I'm not feeling totally refreshed and refocused.

Ryan
xoxo

2007-03-26T07:06:00.000-07:00

I just discovered a couple of lists I'd made on Amazon.com a good long while ago, "Love early post-punk (as much as Amazon will allow you to" and "Various pop-rock gems - power-pop, twee, etc.". I'm happy to say that now, about four years later, these lists hold up. My favorite of the descriptions is that of the Shins' first album - "An excellent summer record released in 2001 from some random band that's taking their sweet time releasing a new album. Hurry up, guys!" Ha!

Ryan
xoxo

2007-03-15T15:45:00.000-07:00

I caved and bought a George Foreman grill today, in part because I like George Foreman. He just seems so excited about the whole thing. This model, the "Family Size in Grilling Colors", has a "bun warmer" atop it. Even though it's significantly larger than the "Champ" model is and only $7 more, I still feel ripped off because of that "bun warmer". It's a profoundly useless feature. I guess I value economy - that is, I believe that which can be safely removed should be. If it had been the same price but sans the "bun warmer", though, I'd be singing a different, happier tune. Surely this reveals something about me as a person.

The household is abuzz this week with talk of moving. Paul is looking back towards Colorado - he's itching to return to academia. Brian might be moving in with his buddy Anthony in Chelsea, the lucky bastard. Hilary has no clear plan and may yet stay here, and as for me, I'm looking for a cheap studio in a safe neighborhood. A studio or, if I can rope in a roommate, a two bedroom. I'd rather not pay $1000+/mo. for rent if I can help it, especially since my business isn't the stablest of all businesses.

In other news: allergies have me all mixed-up lately.

Ryan
xoxo

2007-02-26T23:01:00.000-08:00

Recently I ended up at this bizarre nexus where an Ian Svenonius one-off disc, my nascent fascination with late-60's cult films (esp. those that rep specific "underground" cultures), Simon Reynolds, and the death of Arthur magazine all led me to the same exact book - an obscure (leastwise in America) 300+ pg. tome by Richard Neville entitled Playpower. It's weird that I've never heard of this book. Apparently it's seen as a UK analogue to Abbie Hoffman's Steal This Book, and Neville (whom you and I've also never heard of) himself was a similar sort of mischief-maker. All I know from the meager research I've done is that 1) he was involved in at least two major censorship cases, 2) he helped spearhead Oz, one of the most reknowned of 60's underground rags (perhaps second only to the East Village Other), and 3) that he's a self-described "Futurist", however he's chosen to interpret that term.

I love old texts from the front. I read once that Bob Dylan, during his unknown days, used to head up to the NYPL to read newspapers from the Civil War, and I totally understand where he was coming from.. Documents made during the time-in-question are almost always more interesting and human than the thin, reflective stuff that comes after. It's why Greil Marcus' Mystery Train was so good, why Mencken's essays are entertaining. It's why people get obsessed with old blues 45s or, hell, the first Beat Happening record. It's the difference between a museum and a zoo, you know? Death vs. life. For me, what I often get in my investigations is a sense of possibility. These old texts, they have a way of sending ripples through your reality simply by coming from a different one. It's... reassuring.

(And moreover, I love outsized personalities and spectacularly flawed alternatives to the status quo, so I'm hoping I'll get a whiff of that here as well.)

So anyway, I bought that book for like $17. What else is going on in my life?:
1) It looks as though I'm going out on what could be reasonably called a "date" later this week. Details forthcoming, maybe.
2) I'm getting a free haircut - a free professional haircut, I should add - this Thursday.
3) I'm designing Fanatic's advertising for SXSW.

And that's it.

Yours,
Ryan

2007-02-04T02:44:00.000-08:00

Today I saw Children of Men, the latest film by Alfonso Cuarón, with my friend Carmiel. Cuarón's directing was magnificent, but I'm still in deliberations about the story. The movie - and this is completely reducing it, of course - is a sort of magical-realist dystopian what-if, with all of the good and bad that would attend such a description. I'm not going to get into specifics, but what I especially admired in the film was Cuarón's effort to make it seem real. It did the trick. It's worth a viewing.

After that, I headed down to Park Slope to pick up my guitar. I've been stashing it, along with my amplifier, at my friend Anne's house. It's nice to have it around again. Hopefully I can start making some use of it tomorrow. I'm in this weird almost-demoing-but-not-quite stage right now... I practice piano occasionally and I play with Ableton, but I haven't turned out anything like a song lately.

I came home and made some soup with my roommate Brian (also known as Tom). I'm taking steps to get more comfortable with the kitchen right now, as it will both make my roommates happier with me and save me some money. The soup was a hodgepodge, but it worked exceptionally well for my debut homemade soup (the first I've ever made, I might add). It consisted of carrots, potatoes, celery, scallions, red onions, parsley, garlic, ginger, bay leaves, cumin, and of course liberal salt and pepper. We used vegetable oil in lieu of olive oil as it was unavailable. The resulting mix had a nice amount of crunch - crunch is essential in soups - and bite, which I believe derived chiefly from the ginger. After two bowls apiece we still had several containers of it left, so it should last a few days.

More generally, I've been under the weather lately. My allergies are acting up for reasons unknown, leaving me a sniffly vacuum-sinused mess. In fact, the activities detailed above were largely to "soldier through this," with the soup in particular designed as a possible curative. (Thus the ginger and garlic.) All in all the tactic worked, I think. I do feel better. Hopefully this marks the falling motion of the illness.

Yours,
Ryan

PS. If you're reading this, you should check out the new album by Panda Bear. It's really phenomenal.