I ducked into the kitchen last night to grab some fruit, and realized that the watermelon stash was getting low. There was still a half watermelon upstairs, so I grabbed it from the fridge and started cutting it up.
My particular approach to cutting watermelon is: quarter the melon, run the knife between the flesh and the rind to separate a big wedge of red deliciousness, and then slide downward from the apex to the base. I then throw these big chunks into a container for later munching.
This sometimes leads to ribbons of what I endearingly refer to as “water melon sashimi”: there is red flesh attached to the rind, which I slice off and often eat while I’m standing there hacking up the rest of the melon.
Well.
Last night, I took a big roll of the sashimi and chucked it in my mouth. I didn’t really chew it. It just kinda slid down. And it got stuck.
The watermelon didn’t cover my trachea, so I was able to breathe normally and talk and everything else. But my body was in fight or flight mode, and it wasn’t a minor annoyance: it was uncomfortable and unsettling. I tried drinking some water and even a hot beverage, at Rhonda’s suggestion. But we decided to go to the ER.
You don’t ever want to go to the ER, but you really don’t want to decide it’s necessary at 9 pm on a weeknight, either. It was pretty crowded. The PA who saw me had me take three meds: Lidocaine, something with magnesium in it, and a third medication that I can’t remember. They were going to do an x-ray as well.
I took the meds and sipped on a ginger ale I got out of the vending machine (while loathe to consume ultra-processed soft drinks normally, in the calculus of choking vs ginger ale, ginger ale will win every time), and in short order I felt the melon slide down. The discomfort receded, and I was back in action. Much to Rhonda’s chagrin, my impish sense of humor returned almost immediately, and I resumed my normal practice of skylarking.
So yeah, the moral of the story is to chew your food. Even watermelon. It too can get stuck on the way down, despite its manifest slipperiness. Live and learn.
Meanwhile, that sound you hear isn’t the hype engine that Disney’s marketing department has ginned up on social media, but the bottom of the barrel being dredged as Marvel Studios exploits a handful of D-list characters before rebooting its proven and most popular heroes. The “dirty half dozen”/“magnificent six” featured here can’t agree on what to call themselves, but have no illusions about one thing: They’re the losers of the MCU.
David Mullen recently posted about some local wines he tried, and he mentioned Hawk Haven’s Cab Rosé. We grabbed a bottle of their Signature Series when we stopped by. Looking forward to uncorking it!
Rhonda mentioned that a student in her class described something as “cringey,” so we were talking about what that meant. She asked Aaron, 18 and in high school, how he used it.
“It’s like secondhand embarrassment,” he offered.
It’s warming up out there! Yesterday was sunny but cool, down in the low seventies. One thing about being a thinner version of myself: it was jeans and sweatshirt weather for me. Today’s a much warmer affair, and I’m about to step out for a Mother’s Day dinner with the fam, and I’m in linen head to toe. Happy Mother’s Day!
Marvel’s Thunderbolts
We were Marvel cinematic completionists for a while, seeing all of the films when they came out. As the kids have gotten older, we’ve been less insistent about seeing each film in the theater. From that list, we have Captain America: Brave New World and The Marvels that we didn’t see in the theater, neither of which I’ve even seen.
Rhonda and I have developed a habit of hitting a winery on Saturdays, which has also limited our movie-going to some degree. Part of the theater diet includes our particular way of seeing them, which is: hit a matinée at our favorite theater in Northfield, NJ (it’s an independently owned venue), then roll back to a nearby shopping area so the boys can check Target and GameStop while Rhonda and I stock up on bagels. We learned that by going in the late afternoon, just before closing, they will often throw in some extra bagels if they’re piling up.
For a while, we’d make a night out of it, taking in the movie and housing some popcorn and sugary stuff we smuggle in from Dollar General (aka Desserts General), hitting the stores, and then having dinner out. But popcorn belly is a thing, and we don’t like to force dinner just because we’re nearby. Plus, I make better cocktails than just about every place we go. So we head home after shopping and I make cocktails, and then it’s out for dinner somewhere.
We stopped at the usual Dollar General, which is on the way to the theater, and I looked at my phone while we were waiting in line and realized that, due to the availability of showtimes on Saturday, I had chosen a different theater in the complete opposite direction of where we were. I went into fight or flight mode to figure out how to fix this problem, using the Fandango app from the parking lot of Dollar General to cancel the tickets (you can get a credit if you know you’re going to see another film). We looked at a few other show times and Rhonda made the brilliant suggestion that we shop first and hit the 3 pm show, which is a perfectly serviceable way to do it, but I wasn’t thinking flexibly in the moment.
So we got vermouth, bagels, Aaron got an album, and we even managed to browse Old Navy before heading back to the theater. We loaded up on popcorn (by this point, all I’d eaten all day was a banana and some watermelon) and took our seats.
I had seen some good reviews of Thunderbolts, so I was looking forward to the film. I had high hopes, because in the same way that some offbeat titles in the comic-book-inspired moviesphere have yielded great films (Guardians of the Galaxy is an easy example, but I’d include the second Suicide Squad and Rogue One in that list, too.) I never read any Thunderbolts comics, but I was familiar with the title and broader ragtag team trope.
I thought it was a good flick, but not great. Sentry is a great character. Red Guardian is once again a big bowl of comic relief. I was surprised to see Taskmaster taken out of the story so early, but not terribly disappointed. I just didn’t like that take on Tasky in Black Widow. I can see why they didn’t want to make another Deadpool-style character with taskmaster, but whew that was a dry character.
It was a rushed near the end–but captivating. Sentry is a complex character, driven to cure his own mental illness in the same way that Deadpool underwent experimentation to cure his cancer, and emerged more powerful but still not of a piece. Julia Louis Dreyfus as de Fontaine is a good riff on her Veep character: unabashedly opportunistic, on the verge of exile from government service, duplicitous, riveting on screen.
Thunderbolts was not, as I expected, a standalone title in the universe. Mussing from the ending and the obligatory post credits roll, Marvel is undoubtedly planning to replace the iconic Avengers with something. I’m not going to say too much about the plot in case you haven’t seen it yet. But it was fun and the compromised heroes who make up the team are sympathetic in their way.
Thunderbolts Poster on Aaron’s Door
Veal Milanese at Savoy Bistro
As with Vineland’s longstanding Maplewood restaurant, the Savoy has long stood at the intersections of Landis Avenue and Union Road. It’s a venue for events, with the Bistro at the front of the building serving as a mid-tier dining experience. (Outside they’ve added Luna’s, which is a more casual outdoor dining experience.)
All of the storied eateries in Vineland have largely remained the same over their long lives. Savoy has iterated on their menu a fair bit of the years, and we like it most of the time for a local bite out.
Aaron revealed that last night, after the movie, we would be treating him to a night out with his squad (they went to Applebees or some similar Darden property in our local shopping zone), so Rhonda and I hopped over to the Savoy.
I’ve had their Veal Milanese at least a half-dozen times, and it’s always good (one time I had a chewy piece). It’s a paillard of veal, breaded and fried, topped with tomatoes and arugula. They always serve their dinners with very banquet-looking sides, including mixed vegetables and a disturbingly composed scoop of mashed potatoes. (I did’t eat the potatoes.) It was going to be this or their Veal Saltimboca, which I also enjoy at the Bistro. We split the clams casino first; theirs feature Cooper Sharp, which I really like. Clams, bacon, and Cooper: like a salt-lick for boozy adults.
Clams Casino at Savoy BistroVeal Milanese at Savoy Bistro
Mothers
Human beings make strange fauna and flora; fathers, husbands, and sons are blessed to have these women in their lives, a force of love and nurturance. Whether you are a mother, have a mother, or simply appreciate the love and dedication this day represents, let this weekend bring you moments of joy and connection.
I stopped on the way home for a couple of crowlers (great portmanteau) to go with tonight’s smashburgers. I was going to get growlers (they have 32 oz. vessels) but I figured we’d be stuck with the glass if we didn’t like the beer. Plus I like saying “crowler.”
Buena Connection IPA
There was a lengthy queue when I came in, but it moved quickly. The fella who tapped the brew mixed up the styles on the crowlers, so our intention to move from lighter to heavier beers (I got the cream ale and the IPA) was thwarted. It didn’t matter much; the cream ale has a decent hop finish, but is otherwise unremarkable, while the IPA was a more sessionable variation, less malty than Glasstown’s 609 and less juicy than Bonesaw’s Swoosh. Rhonda likened it to Tonewood’s excellent Freshies.
It seems so quaint and obvious now, but in 1998 the iMac was, if not revolutionary, at least rebellious and radical. In an era of beige PCs, it was the color of the water off Australia’s Bondi Beach. In an era where the average computer was shaped like a pizza box or a minitower, tethered to a CRT monitor via a fat cable, the iMac was a clean self-contained unit.
Rhonda got an iMac DV SE at the CompUSA back in 1999 (I may have had something to do with it). It only came in one color–a smoky gray. It was a lot of fun to play games on; she played the Sims and I had a FireWire drive I’d bring over to her (now our) house and play Driver and some other games off of it. She has a green M1 now.
This isn’t a picture of the iMac we used, but it’s the same model.
One of our favorite phô places has broken rice on the menu. Rhonda tried it last time we went and raved about the pork chop. Aaron has plussed his phô with a side chop from time to time. They are delicious: thin, cooked to well done, with a sweet and tangy flavor.
Cooks Illustrated for May and June has a recipe for the dish, so we tried the pork chops (I just steamed rice). I marinated them overnight in fish sauce, brown sugar, olive oil, some garlic, and some chillies, and grilled them crispy.
Chris Lawley recently joined Matt Gemmell in stepping back from iPad uniformity. Federico has been using a Mac.
The most recent edition of the Appstories podcast(where Viticci mentions using a MacBook Pro) is a good listen if you, too, question iPad monolithicity. The hosts list what they’re hoping to see in the much-ballyhooed iPadOS 19, which is rumored to feature a menu bar, macOS style, when attached to a keyboard.
A more mouse-forward affordance would certainly be welcome. But I’ll agree with John and Federico in hoping for:
Rethought support for background processes
ChatBot Siri
A clipboard manager
Launcher utilities
It’s not worth repeating that the iPad is, and has been, glorious hardware with an OS that doesn’t satisfy more demanding users. I think people get upset because they see the potential of the device–hence their secular incursions.
I grew up in what is often referred to as the golden age of action figures, as contrasted with the golden age of toys. It was a time when, starting perhaps with the Kenner action figures that accompanied the release of the Star Wars films in the 1970s and 80s, plastic action figures became popular. In addition to Star Wars, there were Transformers, GI Joe, He-Man and the Masters of the Universe, and more. Movie and cartoon tie-ins helped popularize many of the lines.
Both of my sons, now adults, got into action figures, much to my delight (I figured they’d “grow out of it” by middle school, but that has not proven to be the case. Lots of adults collect action figures these days, whereas it was kind of weird when I was younger to see teenagers or adults buying them.) I got a call from Joe, our oldest, letting me know that he found three ROM figures at a Target near his school. I had asked him to grab one for me should he see it.
In 1979, Parker Brothers introduced ROM: Space Knight. There was a backstory and a comic book:
ROM Space Knight, Rom came from the peaceful planet Galador, which was populated by humanoids that look much like Terrans. After the Galadorian space fleet was decimated by the Dire Wraiths without provocation, the call went out to the young people of Galador to give up their humanity to become Spaceknights.
I never read the comic book, and this particular toy was not a modern marvel of articulation. I was also five years old, so while I remember seeing the commercial on TV, I never felt any particular attraction to ROM. I did love MEGO figures and Star Wars and other toy, but ROM seemed like a bleep-bloop robot toy with batteries to manage.
Hasbro, meanwhile, has continued the Marvel Legends line of action figures that ToyBiz started some time in the early- to mid-aughts. As with the excellent DC line popularized by Mattel, Legends has mixed in the must-have and obvious choices– Captain America, Wolverine, Spider-Man–with obscure characters that many of us only know from leafing through the voluminous pages of the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe.
This year, Hasbro did those of us circling their 50s a solid and revealed a ROM 6” Legends figure. I asked Joe to keep an eye out for one: in a fit of nostalgia, and also of curiosity, I knew I would like to have a Space Knight of my own. Today, Joe delivered.
ROM Space Knight
It’s pretty amazing, and as Aaron observed, kind of strange that they lavished the attention to the sculpt and articulation that they did, considering the character’s relative obscurity.
Not the first time I’ve made this. You sous vide a chuck for about 24 hours and then sear it off. This time it was a little more well done than we’d have liked, but it was still really good. Kinda briskety.
Chuck Roast in the Sous Vide TankChuck Roast After 28 Hours in the Sous Vide TankSeared off chuck roast
My younger son, Aaron, is doing the vinyl thing, traveling to record stores and shopping online for records. It’s no secret that vinyl has been a thing again for a while, despite the ubiquity of music via digital subscription (which we have as a family in Apple Music).
Today, he went over to my parents’ house to help out with decorating for the season, and came back with some of my old CDs. Rhonda mentioned to him when he came home that we have some bins in the basement with our commingled collection, and he headed straight down there to have a look.
We both went down with him, and I was as excited about seeing some of my old CDs as he was. (It’s even more fun seeing someone else excited by your collection.) I said something like, “I don’t know why I’m so excited… I have all of these on my phone.”
“C’mon… physical media!” Aaron answered in a flash.
He drug a bunch of CDs upstairs and organized them in his room.
I attended a session on Friday hosted by the New Jersey Coalition for Inclusive Education at the Medford Board of Education building and the presenter was Kory Kutzler from Resilient Edge. He was talking about trauma and developing resiliency, and one of his products that he brought to sell was a journal. Practicing gratitude was a feature of one of his products, and he was going over how you could journal gratitude.
I had gotten into that a bit a while back, writing “Three Goods” in Day One from January through March of 2024. I had Todoist remind me each night to make a list, and I enjoyed it, although sometimes it was a stretch to dig up something. That stretch, though, was helpful in that it assisted me in finding even small things that I could appreciate. I knew it was time to stop when I found the reminders annoying.
Kory’s discussion of this practice reminded me of my own short practice of gratitude, and I thought for a moment that maybe I should do that again, even if it were just a quick list in Apple Notes or an index card. But then I thought about Sunday Serial. Each week, I sit down and pick out at least three things that you can consider or check out, and they are some things that brought me a moment (or more) of joy, however ephemeral or forward-looking. So in that way, I am still very much practicing gratitude, albeit not daily.
Orthogonally related to practicing three goods–another thing I tried out when I was not looking forward to the day ahead was to write down three things I was looking forward for the next day on the evening before. These things were usually pretty small, like rowing in the morning, having a banana, or making a cup of coffee. I still do this from time to time.
What’s to look forward to about rowing before dawn, you might ask? It’s hard to find something that’s good for you that you can stick to, that helped you solve a problem or improve yourself, and to be well enough to do, and be able to tread down into the basement without a drive to a gym or waking anyone up. Rowing has very much been that for me.
We can’t delude ourselves that every day is going to be a fun, light, and carefree. We also can’t dedicate our lives to small pleasures. But there’s a special place for them in our hearts.
Bellview Winery’s Sunset Red Wine
Rhonda and I hit our usual spot for a growler refill and the Serafina we enjoyed (mostly me) last time kicked while they were filling our half-liter growler, so I went with the Sunset. We’ve had it before, but it’s been a while. I asked for a quick summary and the associate described it as a “light dry red,” which sounded perfect for a warm spring evening with dropping temps, and a chuck roast in the sous vide tank for tonight’s dinner. The website describes Sunset as “29% 2020 Chambourcin, 18% 2021 Chambourcin, 15% 2019 Syrah/Merlot, 14% 2021 Cabernet Franc, 13% 2019 Chamby/Cab Franc, 5% Blaufrankisch 2021, 5% 2021.” I’m more of a red wine fine but I’ve really gotten into whites since we’ve been trying wineries. I usually drink up all the red when we get it.
Bellview Wine and Nachos, Sunset on the Right
Somewhere I got into drinking Cabernet Sauvignon, which I like plenty, but I have always enjoyed lighter reds, notably cutting my teeth on Beaujolais and especially enjoying the fleeting availability of the nouveau variety. Wine is fun because of the remarkable variety of styles, even if you only prefer reds or whites.
MailMaven
I don’t know that I’m going to move my Mac-based emailing to MailMaven, but upon first blush, it checks off many of the boxes that I look for in an email application. Smart Folders? Check. Gmail and iCloud support? Check. Mac-assed Mac app? Check. Support even emailed me back… on a Sunday. Which is wholly unexpected.
MailMaven
Watermelon Season
I love watermelon. I’ve always liked watermelon, but my weight-loss journey found me eating more fresh watery things that aren’t very processed, and a rediscovery for me was watermelon. I think a bit part of why is the water part: I was rowing a lot, and intensely, and was often thirsty peripheral to my efforts. The structure of watermelon is such that large chunks of it are still low in calories, so it’s a good thing to eat when you’re hungry but trying to be careful. This isn’t the first watermelon of the season, but it’s the first (of many) full-size melons I’ve gleefully toted out of our local Shop Rite.
Watermelon
Tarragon Omelette
Rhonda and I picked up three pounds of bacon at the butcher during spring break, and we’re loathe to waste it, so I usually make a bunch on one morning each weekend. Eggs are made to order, and Aaron asked for an omelette.
I’ve been around the horn with omelettes, making French-style in stainless steel pans and country-style in the cast iron. Most recently I’ve been making them on the Blackstone griddle we have.
I was hustling out to the garden for some chives to juke the dish and spied the tarragon. I asked Copilot if tarragon goes well in omelettes, and it was most enthusiastic about the pairing. Aaron said it was great.
Take Control Books’ Joe Kissel posted the other day about a new email app for the Mac, MailMaven. I’m trying the beta out now, and it really looks great. I’ll write up more soon.
Besides all that, Maven offers deep customization. If you’re the sort of person who loves tweaking things and squeals with delight every time you uncover another checkbox in Settings, you’ll be thrilled. Every aspect of the windows and message display, every keyboard shortcut, tweaky attachment options, and even the color, shape, and position of the unread message badge on the icon can be adjusted to your heart’s content.
I’ve written a lot here on Uncorrected about email apps. This is pretty exciting.
