Mighty Horrorshow Reads

This is a side blog (I guess) about the things I read...when I remember to write about what I'm reading...

[purplebuddhaproject]

No artist tolerates reality.

Friedrich Nietzsche (via finegoodsfinefolk)

[clearancecreedwatersurvival]

After seeing the Howl’s Moving Castle musical I am a changed person and I never want to see fanart of Sophie Hatter as thin and white ever again. 

If you weren’t aware that there was a Howl’s Musical, here ya go. Go throw money at this production company and hope they release an album or a recording because the show was honestly fucking perfect. We were in the front row and all five of us flailed so hard that the cast thanked us specifically “for our enthusiasm and energy” after the show. 

This Sophie, played by Seattle actress Sara Porkalob, is your new god. 

She has micro-expressions down to an absolute art and the best comedic timing I’ve ever personally witnessed. She exists and was the perfect Sophie and now you know. You’re welcome.

Sidenote but the night we saw it Howl was wearing a NEON PINK WIG and SPRAY PAINTED SILVER JEANS for almost the entire show and NO ONE will ever be a better Howl tbh.

And Lettie and Martha were also great! The entire cast was great! Their physicality on stage was unbelievable!! The writing was superb!!! I can never see another musical as long as I live because of how perfect this one was!!!!!

You’re welcome. 

[mightyhorrorshowreads]

Want.

[mightyhorrorshowreads]

Foreign Dishes- Kuchen Dough (Dry Yeast)

Ingredients:

2 cakes yeast

2 cups scaled milk. cooled

1/2 cup butter

grated rind 1/2 lemon

1 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup sugar

2 eggs, slightly beaten

8 cups flour

Directions:

Soak yeast cake in lukewarm water for 20 minutes in the evening. Cream butter, sugar and salt; stir in eggs, lemon rind, 2 or more cups of flour, milk and the soaked yeast. Work in enough flour to make a dough somewhat softer than for bread. Knead until smooth. Cover closely, let rise overnight or until fully doubled in size. If possible, keep at 70 F. In warm weather use only 1/2 amount of yeast. Next morning, shape at once as desired, let rise and bake as usual or knead down and let rise again. Use larger amounts of sugar and butter for richer dough.

[mightyhorrorshowreads]

Foreign Dishes - Beet Borscht Consomme

Ingredients:

1 lb. small beet; cold water to cover

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 small onion

1/4 cup lemon juice (or sour salt-crystals to taste)

1/4 cup dark brown sugar, or to taste additional water to make 1 quart liquid

1 pkg. lemon flavored gelatin

1 cup beet liquid, heated

a pinch of ground ginger (optional)

Directions:

Scrub beets, cover in cold water in deep pot and cook till tender. Drain well and save the liquid. Slip off skins, shred or grate beets. Add salt, onion and flavoring, adding enough water to make 1 quart or 5 cups. Bring to a boil and cook only till onion is tender. Remove onion if desired. Dissolve the gelatin in hot beet liquid, add ginger, if used, and stir into cooled Borscht. Chill in refrigerator till thickened. Beat with a rotary beater or fork and serve in small soup bowls. Garnish with diced hard-cooked egg, diced cucumber, minced parsley or any combination desired. Float a spoonful of sour cream on top of each serving for milchig or pareve meals. For  fleishig menu serve plain, with or without garnish. Serves 8 to 10. 

[mightyhorrorshowreads]

Foreign Dishes- Borsch (Meatless)

Boil in 4 quarts of water 1/2 lb. lima beans and one medium beat. Cook for 1 1/2 hours. Salt. Add 2 potatoes (medium), 1 cup tomato juice. Put in a cup of ground mushrooms (hryby) if you like. This, of course, is optional. Add 1/2 medium head cabbage (2 cups). Add a few springs of dill and parsley, bayleaf, 1 onion (small fried in shortening).

[mightyhorrorshowreads]

The cookbook in question

[mightyhorrorshowreads]

Woah

So,

I found a cookbook that my great grandmother bequeathed to my aunt which made its way to me after they both passed away.

It’s recipes from the Iron Range in Northern Minnesota published in 1962.

Some of them are crazy, some of them look good. There are outdated terms, loose interpretations of ethnicity, and some really vague directions.

I have decided to share them with the internet, on this the seldom used blog. Mostly for my own sense of duty to preserve them in the event that I burn my house down while trying to make some of these recipes, but also for you, dear follower, to enjoy.

[unicorn-meat-is-too-mainstream]

Beautiful Journalistic Pop-Up Books by Colette Fu: Capturing the Diversity of China’s Southwest Yunnan Province

Bhakta’s Weblog:  facebook  |  twitter  |  pinterest  | subscribe

[userobiwan]

JOHN

[k-lionheart-deactivated20171126]

award winning author ladies and gents

[sweptoutofmymind]

today I burned my tongue on a piece of pizza and I think that it’s a very strong metaphor that sometimes the things you love most in life will hurt you.

[inthenameofraziel]

augustus, is that you?

[jaceslittlegirl]

no he died

[gracemosley]

[malfascination]

[unterrible]

this makes my heart ache

[peaceofmindshop]

This is deep.

[fhlostonsparadise]

[augustuswate]

When people say these books are children’s books, as if to demean them, I balk. These books dealt with themes that adults do not fully understand or wish to. It dealt with racism, classism, sexism, homophobia, prejudice, and general ignorance. These books taught us that it doesn’t matter how you were raised, but that you get to choose to be kind, loyal, brave, and true. They taught us to be strong under the pressures of this world and to hold fast to what we know to be right. These books taught me so much, they changed me as a person. So just because they’re set against a fantastical backdrop with young protagonists does not mean that their value is any less real.

[take-my-eeveelution]

This. First book: Starts with the double murder of a pair of twenty-one year olds who were much missed and leaving their baby son a war orphan. A child growing up in abusive conditions that would give Cinderella the horrors. Dealing with peers and teachers who are bullies. The fickleness of fame (from the darling of Gryffindor to the outcast.) The idea that there are things worth fighting and dying for, spoken by the child protagonist. Three children promptly acting on that willingness to sacrifice their lives, and two of them getting injured doing so. Second book: The equivalent of racism with the pro-pureblood attitude. Plot driven by an eleven year old girl being groomed and then used by a charming, handsome older male. The imbalance of power and resultant abuse inherent in slavery. Fraud perpetuated by stealing something very intimate. Third book: The equivalent of ableism with a decent, kind and competant adult being considered less than human because he has an illness that adversely affects his behaviour at certain times. A justice system that is the opposite of just. Promises of removing an abused child from the abusive environment can’t always be kept. The innocent suffer while the guilty thrive. Fouth book: More fickleness of fame. The privileged mistreating and undermining the underprivileged because they can. A master punishing a slave for his own misjudgment, and the slave blaming herself. A sports tournament which involves mortal risk being cheered by spectators. A wonderful young man being murdered simply because he was in the way. A young boy being tortured, humilated and nearly murdered. Fifth book: PTSD in the teenage protagonist. Severe depression in the protagonist’s godfather, triggered by inherited mental health issues and being forced to stay in a house where abuse occured. A bigoted tyrant who lives to crush everyone under her heel, torturing a teenager for telling the truth in the name of the government (and trying to suck his soul out too). The discovery that your idols can have feet of clay after all. An effort to save the life of someone dear and precious actually costing that very same life. The loss of a father-figure and the resultant guilt. Sixth book: The idea that a soul can be broken beyond repair. Drugs with the potential for date rape are shown as having achieved exactly that in at least one case, resulting in a pregnancy. Well-meaning chauvinism trying to control the love life of a young woman. Internalised prejuidce resulting in refusing the one you love, not out of lack of love but out of fear of tainting them. The mortality of those that seem powerful and larger than life. Seventh book: Bad situations can get worse, to the point where even the privileged end up suffering and afraid. More internalised prejudice and fear hysterical terror of tainting those you love. Self-sacrifice and the loss of loved ones, EVERYWHERE. Those who are bitter are often so with a reason. The necessity of defeating your inner demons, even though it’s never as cool as it sounds. Don’t underestimate those that are enslaved. Other people’s culture isn’t always like your own. Things often come full circle (war ending with the death of a dearly-loved pair of new parents and their orphaned baby son living with his dead mother’s blood relative instead of his young godfather). Even if ‘all is well’ the world is still imperfect, because it’s full of us brilliant imperfect humans.   So… still think that Harry Potter is a kid’s series with no depth?

[bipolarfenris-deactivated201610]

[brigantii-deactivated20150208]

J. K. Rowling practically raised me with these books and I am currently a well-informed adult so if you call them juvenile I will fucking set you on fire.

[hazellvesque]

this week on tumblr: everyone realizes how much of a badass neville was all along 

[totally-sonic]

some of us have known all along :)

[facemask12-deactivated20130729]

[leftblankonpurpose-deactivated2]

Two years he walks the earth. No phone, no pool, no pets, no cigarettes. Ultimate freedom. An extremist. An aesthetic voyager whose home is the road. Escaped from Atlanta. Thou shalt not return, ‘cause “the West is the best.” And now after two rambling years comes the final and greatest adventure. The climactic battle to kill the false being within and victoriously conclude the spiritual pilgrimage. Ten days and nights of freight trains and hitchhiking bring him to the Great White North. No longer to be poisoned by civilization he flees, and walks alone upon the land to become lost in the wild. — Alexander Supertramp    May 1992

[hodgman]

Visit Original Link

In late summer, eight years ago, I had the chance to talk to Elmore Leonard. If you listen, you will hear how unbearably nervous I was.* 

As a storyteller, craftsperson, and plain hard worker, he was and will always be an inspiration to me, as he should be to YOU and EVERYONE ELSE. 

Elmore Leonard died this morning, at the age of 87. I don’t know if there’s rest or peace after death, but I wish them both for him, and my thoughts are with his family and friends. 

That is all. 

* If you do, in fact, listen, you will also hear Jonathan Coulton, who is only pretending to play the pipe organ. This was part of a series of podcasts we did for The New York Times Magazine when I was helping to edit their “Funny Pages” section. We recorded it in Jonathan’s spare bedroom back when no one knew what a podcast was and we all thought we were going to live forever. 

POST SCRIPT: This conversation was facilitated graciously by Greg Sutter of elmoreleonard.com. Greg recorded a number of great conversations with EL around this time which you can listen to HERE. 

Now that is really all. 

[huntingtonlibrary]

These illustrations of beautiful leaved plants are from the Huntington Library’s rare copy of the fittingly titled Beautiful Leaved Plants (1861) by E. J. Lowe. These woodblock illustrations are the work of the talented Benjamin Fawcett (1808–93). Working from his business in the village of Driffield in East Yorkshire, England, Fawcett carved the designs (after the work of the naturalist artist A. F. Lydon) in relief on woodblocks. The designs were then printed in black and white, and elements of the design were then meticulously hand-colored. Fawcett was such a perfectionist that he even made his own colored inks! And wowie, LOOK AT THESE COLORS!!

[riddlemetom]

[mightyhorrorshowreads]

I have been everything from a wizard to a demi-god to a shadowhunter. I’ve battled dark forces, led revolutions and saved worlds beyond our own. I’ve lived in the past and far off in the future. I have loved and I have lost, laughed as well as cried. All without even leaving my bedroom.