Alternative Life

People say fall is the season for eating. I would say it's the season when you think about your food.

Because my grandparents used to live in one of the largest fruit production regions, we used to receive boxes full of apples, oranges, pears, cherries. I never thought that was anything special. Your grandparents always send you something (that's what I used to think).
Now I miss those boxes so much, especially the cooking apples.

I ordered a box of apples, my favorite kind, for the first time, directly from a farmer in that region. Then I realized, this is a new generation of consumption style. Surely, a lot of people are already been doing it - buying your food directly from producers.  But it's a revelation.  You don't have to go to the farmers' market, but you can cherry pick everything you eat through online shopping if you are really into it.

I also realized, you can play a far greater part in preparing your food.
For example, I started making my own yogurt (I ended up buying a yogurt making machine for just under $20, extremely useful).

Home made granola is the next?

This particular kind of apple does not last very long.  It's only available in October every year in Japan, and you have to eat them fast.  I tend to bake the most in October due to this very reason. 
The easiest is, of course, jam.

There was a jam recipe with apples and carvados (apple liquor from France), but carvados was really hard to find.  I ended up improvising with leftover red and white wine and spices, so it tastes like the cooked apple in vin chaud.

And the next is, naturally, a tart tatin.  I tried this recipe from Smitten Kitchen the second year in a row.  It's definitely my most favorite, although I don't follow the instruction too strictly.

It turned out soooooooooo good, I could not believe it myself.  It tastes divine, and I am not exaggerating!

And, I learned how to make other kinds of confiture, for example, with grapes.

Beautiful, beautiful purple.

But you see, I am not much into "cooking".  Rather, I am obsessed with "bottling" now.  Baking is also like science experiments and it's fun.  When it comes to "eating", it's less important for me at this moment.  I just want to make something.

As a result, I have plenty to eat at home these days, I really don't want to go out to eat.  If I had time, I will bring lunch to work.  Dinner at home is the best.

Wish I can work from home.

One Dream Down

It was like a dream.
I'd never imagined that one day I would be seeing this painting in person.

I've been holding back most photos from my Chicago trip, in the hope to do some background checking and researching first.  Well, be realistic.  I am not a professional writer, and I hardly have such time.  So here they are, Chicago photos.

Let me first tell you, I am a huge O'Keeffe fan.  She is the only artist I've ever read a full biography of.  I own several books on her, and have seen most of her work in those books.  And this piece is my #1 favorite... (I prefer her landscape and abstract paintings than flower motifs)...  it was right there, on the wall of a big staircase.

Many of you may know, O'Keeffe lived in Chicago area while she was young. She used to study at Chicago Art Institute before she met Stieglitz and became famous.  So when I asked a security staff lady where I might find O'Keeffe paintings, no wonder she knew exactly where to find them.

I wonder how their life together had been.  I understand very well why O'Keeffe didn't wanted to stay in NYC for too long.  On the other hand, Stieglitz was a city person, didn't wanted to move out of New York.

This black cross is another of my favorites.  It's such a powerful painting, like no other.

They have more extensive collection of O'Keeffe painting on display than any other museums I've ever been to (I'm sure the O'Keeffe Museum has more, of course.  Love to visit there one day).  The museum itself is marvelous.  Wonderful curating work.

(Some random works that I liked there.)

整頓

今日の自分へのタスクは「書類の整理」。
小さなようで、大きなタスク。つまりは頭の整理です。

出版社やコンサルから転じて今の会社で働き始めて４年を超えました。
未だに慣れないのは、大量の資料の処理です。
考えてみると、出版社時代は毎号ごとに（つまり毎月）要らない資料は捨て、コンサルではプロジェクトごとに捨てます（取っておいてはいけない）。ところが、事業会社では資料がどんどん降り積もって行きます。プロジェクトも１年とか、永続的にとか、兎に角ずっと続きます。

プロジェクトならまだいいのですが、マーケティングとして種まきしている分野の資料はどんどん膨らみます。最初は「カスタマーエクスペリエンス」などというざっくりしたタイトルのフォルダに放り込んでいくのですが、気が付いてみるとテーマの中でも内容が様々あって、非常に雑多なフォルダになって行きます。知識がたまってくるとサブテーマ、さらにその下層のトピックが出来上がってくるのですが、この辺りで一旦頭の整理をしないと、資料が一向に片付きません（捨てるものも含め）。

このサブテーマ出しはつまり、頭の整理。さて。

そして今気が付いたのですが、自分のブログの過去の投稿を探そうと思っても全然見つかりません。検索にも引っかからない。これはつまり、整理が必要なのかも。

Bottled Everything.

After returning from the 2 weeks trip to the States, and a few weeks of quick bites during the busy working hours before that, I got tired of eating fast food and even dining out.  I got tired of lunch boxes, either.
It was that moment when I saw this article in a Japanese magazine, which describes how to make about a dozen of different bottled food.  They are simple marinated ginger, onion, tomatoes, some cooked pork, and such. But when you combine them together, you can easily fix a few dishes for your supper rather quickly.

From left to right, marinated onion slices (used 3 different vinegars), marinated ginger, and sesame oil with ginger.

OK, I needed more bottles.  Thus I decided to go bottle shopping on Sunday. 
There is a street in Tokyo where you can find many many wholesellers of kitchen tools.  The street is about a mile long, all restaurant-related shops.

Bottles and some tools that I bought that day.  Right when I bought the baking mold, I discovered that butter is nowhere to be found in supermarkets.  Oh well.

Anyway, I made those bottled food until late on Sunday night.  It was fun.  I think I was just fascinated by the idea of bottling food than by the act of cooking itself.

書店考

今日は人生で５回目くらいに池袋に行ってきました。ジュンク堂本店で福岡伸一先生の出版記念レクチャーがありました。昼間Googleで新しく出た「フェルメール 光の王国」を検索していて偶然発見。今日じゃん！
面白いレクチャーを聴いて本にサインをもらって、大満足。でもね、ポイントはそこではなくて、ジュンク堂本店がとても良い本屋だったことですよ。さすが本店。理工や歴史教養系の本が大量にあって、通路を歩いているだけでワクワクしました。
最近の私は買った本を読みきる自信が全然ないので、出来るだけ図書館を利用しようと頑張っています。

最近の本の入手プロセス：
どこかで著者や本のタイトルを見る→アマゾンで検索してレビューを見る→図書館のサイトで検索→見つからなかったらアマゾンか本屋さんで買う

図書館を利用し始めて顕著に感じることは、図書館の開架の構成自体が検索を前提に変わってしまったということです。どういうことかというと、以前だったら各自治体ごとに「中央図書館」というものと「分館」というものがあって、分館に探している本がなかったら大抵中央図書館に探しに行く、という構図。つまり、中央には一通り網羅的に大量の本があり、分館はどれも同じような満遍のない書棚の構成だったはず（同じ雑誌がどこの分館にもあり）。
ところが最近気が付くのは、各分館ごとに得意分野があって、本が偏在していることです。 ビジネス書を借りようと思うと、それは区内の特定の図書館にいつもあります。家の近所は理工書やCDが充実しているらしく、逆に図書館に行ってみても小説なんかが少ない。子供の頃のように小説の書棚を左上から順に眺めていって、面白そうな本を順番に借りる、なんてことが出来なくなってきているのです。検索して取り寄せるのが前提になっているから。図書館でセレンディピティ、というのはもう過去の話かなという気がしています。

いくらアマゾンでオススメ機能が発達しても、やっぱり探さないと発見は出てこない。欲しい本がある程度分かってないと買えないんですよね。
今日大きな本屋さんに行ってみて改めて、誰かが意図的に集めて作った本棚はいいな〜と実感（福岡先生の選んだ本のコーナーがあり。OAZOの本屋さんもいいんだけど、洋書売り場以外ちょっとテイストに合わない気がする）。自分が普段なら探さないような本が沢山あって、発見がありました。もちろんアマゾン内のオススメブックリストなんかは可能なんだけど、やっぱり違う。

Kindle Fireも出て益々eBookと騒がれるいま、とてもノスタルジックなのは自覚していますが、この「検索とアナログのバランスと狭間」をどう見極めるかというのをつらつら考えています。
アメリカではもう本当に書店がないんですよ！いつもNYに行くと寄っていたWall StreetのBordersも無くなってしまったし（Central Park SouthのショッピングセンターにBarnes&Nobleがかろうじてある）、Bostonに行ってもBordersの抜け殻ばかりが目について、ついに小さな書店を１軒見かけただけでした。もちろんAmazonは便利なんだけど、でも日本人の書店好きはずっと維持されて欲しい、と切に願うこの頃。（やっぱりAmazonが日本では値引きしてないからだろうなー。とは思いつつ。）


おまけ
先日OAZOの丸善でカバーに惚れ込んで買いたくなった小説たち

 いや、Emersonは今読みたいと思っているところ。

以下は今日見つけて読みたいと思い、パシャッ。本屋さんで写真を撮り、常に周りの人に白い目で見られる。池澤夏樹さんの文学の本。

それから、福岡先生セレクションコーナーの面白そうな本たち。これから図書館で検索するのだけれど。でも２冊はちゃんと買いました。やっぱり本をちゃんと買って文明の存続に貢献しようという気持ちになってしまう。

SAW Photos

I promise, this batch is going to be the last of woody lakey photos from this trip. These are the remaining photos. As you might remember, this blog is for myself as much as for my friends. I want to post everything so that I can check back and see all the photos in one place. Yey.

This was our cabin, Sommers.  One of the best?

The day we arrived was the very last day of summer in New Hampshire.  The very last chance for us to swim and enjoy the sun. (Although some friends went into the lake on freezing, literally freezing nights, on the following days... )

Until I walked to the very end of the dock, I wasn't sure if I was going to swim.

I went into the water, merely on a dare, to be quite honest.  I am from the city, live in one of the biggest city in the world, and nobody swim in the lake.  Not a single person.
I listen to my mom's story from her childhood, that she used to swim in the river, and that is already like a fairytale to me.

So, into the lake I went.  And it was absolutely terrifying.

I realized that I had never been into a body of water which depth I didn't know.   I couldn't help swimming from dock to dock, didn't trust myself swimming out in the open water.

But it was beautiful.

In the evening, we went to a labyrinth drawn on a lawn, designed by Elizabeth.  It looked like a small maze, but it turned out to be a long walk.  And a very therapeutic one.

The other day I watched a TED talk by Abraham Verghese on how doctors' touch creates human relationship between doctors and patients.  He talked about examining patients as an important "ritual".
Arriving at SAW, seeing the sign, hugging everyone at the registration, seeing the lake for the first time in months, seeing something unusual as this labyrinth, and gathering around fire at a big barn for the welcoming event - these are the rituals to get ourselves into the amazing world of SAW.

So long, until next year.

SAW Class IV - Hand Lettering

This year, I was very lucky to take 4 very different and equally inspiring classes at Squam Art Workshops.  Hand Lettering was another fascinating class, not in the least conventional as what you would normally imagine by hearing the word "lettering".

We spent an hour hand lettering alphabets in all 26 different ways.  It was the toughest thing!  Everyone ran out of ideas after 10 or so, start running around the studio to check what classmates were doing.  Everyone was so inventive...!

Actually, an hour was way too short!

So many different ways, so many colors.

Below is actually mine.  Ah, I know, it's a mess. But it was so much fun.

The second exercise was to create a page with our favorite quotes or poems.  First we created swatches for quick study.  I ended up creating 8 swatches like below, and ran out of time to do the actual thing. 

Although the class was only for 3 hours (way too short), it opened our eyes about using many different media and really be inventive about drawing letters.