Friday, October 16, 2015

Three Beautiful Things 10/15/2015: Maggie Recovered, Green Curry Sans Recipe, Back to *Breaker Morant*

1. Maggie was having some kind of difficulty through the night -- up and down -- in and out -- restless, agitated. It was similar to what she'd had happen over the weekend.  At 3:30 a.m., I decided to get up and stay up with her so that her agitation wasn't keeping the Deke awake.  By regular morning time, Maggie was doing fine. Whatever bothered her digestive system had come and gone and I got some early morning work done with pictures and did my daily writing much earlier than usual.

2. I made a green curry this afternoon that the Deke regarded as my best ever. I didn't exactly follow a recipe so I'm going to document what I did right here in my blog.  The crucial part I want to remember is that I used four tablespoons of green curry paste and two cans of coconut milk and one can of coconut cream.  I didn't measure the amount of fish sauce I used nor the amount of soy sauce nor the brown sugar nor the lime juice. I simply shook and sprinkled and squirted until it felt like it was time to stop. I had a few lime kaffir leaves in a jar and dumped them in.  I sauteed the paste in coconut oil before I added the coconut milk and cream.  The rest was all vegetable and tofu prep: I fried the tofu in coconut oil, then the sweet onions, chopped, and then the eggplant.  I blanched green beans and boiled some russet potatoes until tender.   I mixed it all together in the soup pot and let it simmer, turned it off, and simmered again just before dinner time.  The question, as always, is when I succeed, can I repeat it? (By the way, this green curry paste is medium high in heat. This was not a mild curry.)

3.  Through the Prince George's County library system, I ordered the movie Breaker Morant. The movie sprang to mind when I was watching Attack of the Clones because Jack Thompson plays in both movies with 20-25 year gap in between. In Breaker Morant, Jack Thompson plays a soldier, Maj. J. F. Thomas, who is also a solicitor, not in trial law, but in property and tax matters. Nonetheless, he is appointed to defend three fellow Australian soldiers who have been indicted for war crimes and face the death penalty.  The court martial is rigged. The Australians have no chance. The trial ignites Thomas' moral passion. The injustice of the trial transforms him from ill-prepared to an impassioned and sharp-witted interrogator and voice for justice.  The fight he wages in court, against all odds, is moving and demonstrates how extraordinary an ordinary person can become when animated by a sure sense of moral rectitude in the face of institutional and colonial corruption and malice.  There's much more that makes this a movie I love now and have loved for thirty-five years, but maybe I'll reflect on that in another bit of writing.

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