Quiz Results: August 2006 Archives

Five quotes that describe you or your belief systems from the Random Quote Page

If there is anything the nonconformist hates worse than a conformist, it's another nonconformist who doesn't conform to the prevailing standard of nonconformity. --Bill Vaughan

I've had a perfectly wonderful evening. But this wasn't it. --Groucho Marx

If it's true that our species is alone in the universe, then I'd have to say that the universe aimed rather low and settled for very little. --George Carlin

Those who flee temptation generally leave a forwarding address. --Lane Olinghouse

Nobody sees a flower - really - it is so small it takes time - we haven't time - and to see takes time, like to have a friend takes time. --Georgia O'Keefe

And then some sundries I just wanted to keep around:

"Either this man is dead or my watch has stopped."Groucho Marx (1890 - 1977)

"I know not, sir, whether Bacon wrote the works of Shakespeare, but if he did not it seems to me that he missed the opportunity of his life." J. M. Barrie

"A judge is a law student who marks his own examination papers." H. L. Mencken

"The whole problem can be stated quite simply by asking, 'Is there a meaning to music?' My answer would be, 'Yes.' And 'Can you state in so many words what the meaning is?' My answer to that would be, 'No.'" Aaron Copland

"There is no expedient to which a man will not go to avoid the labor of thinking." Thomas A. Edison (And Edison's own association with and sympathy for anti-semites and proto-nazis certainly goes a long way to proving this point.)

"One should absorb the colour of life, but one should never remember its details. Details are always vulgar." Oscar Wilde

"Thomas Jefferson once said, 'We should never judge a president by his age, only by his works.' And ever since he told me that, I stopped worrying." Ronald Reagan

"If you scatter thorns, don't go barefoot." Italian Proverb

Okay, I've freighted your mind with weighty issue enough today. So a poll, answer, if you please in the comments box:

(1) What is the oddest food you've ever deliberately eaten? (We're not counting swallowed flies or accientally ingested spiders here--this is food that you chose to eat.)

(2) What food do you really, really like to eat but many people around you find utterly revolting?

My answers:

(1)This is a tough one. On the plant side I've had stewed nettles, fiddleheads from maidenhair fern, and the cabbage palm "cabbage" and the stewed seeds of a local ground-cover cycad (I think--although it strikes me that they would be likely to be filled with taxine, so perhaps it was something else). On the animal side I've had fresh nautilus, Cassiopeia jellyfish (served as a sort of dried chip), scorpions, a bread made primarily from bees (and yes, surprising it was sweet), and most revolting of all holothurian. Google it and look for a picture. (In grad school we used to have "phylum feasts" to see how many phyla we could cover in one meal and throughout our career. My brave and intrepid little group managed a great many of the more common phyla--we balked at a few because of the rarity of the animals.

(2) Stewed okra, pickled okra, fresh okra, fried okra, gumdoed okra, fricasseed okra. People think of this as a southern thing, but I got into the habit from my Grandma who lived in South eastern Ohio at the time. She took me out to her garden and showed me one of the loveliest flowers I had ever seen and told me it was the flower of the okra plant. And later that season I got to eat my grandma's fresh cooked okra--yum!

Book Meme

1. One book that changed your life: Honestly, I'm not certain there are any, the closest might be Tom Sawyer or Winesburg, Ohio.

2. One book that you've read more than once:
See above and add to it Turn of the Screw by Henry James

3. One book you'd want on a desert island:
(excepting the Bible) Tom Sawyer or perhaps Robinson Crusoe (might be something useful there).

4. One book that made you laugh:
The Wit and Wisdom of Oscar Wilde

5. One book that made you cry:
The Kite Runner and I was on the plane-trip home--how embarrassing.

6. One book that you wish had been written:
A really good ghost story like those of M.R. James--either a collection or a novel.

7. One book that you wish had never been written:
The Kinsey Report

8. One book you're currently reading:
The Book of the Dead

9. One book you've been meaning to read:
Gilead--tried three times now to get enough of a running start to get through it--failed miserably.

And I pass this on to TSO, if He's willing, Brandon S., who could answer in the comments, and Zippy, if he has the time and inclination.