Betsy Devine: Funny ha-ha and/or funny peculiar

Elephant neckties but no donkey neckties are for sale in the Wyndham Hotel gift shop. Ninety-nine kinds of George Bush buttons or cute little heart-shaped buttons with Laura Bush on them.

Well, I guess Democrats don’t have much reason to come here unless, for example, the Swedish Ambassador asks them to drop in for dinner.

I realized something on the tiny plane that bounced us from Boston into Ronald Reagan Airport. The reason Republicans were “conservative” for years was that they were out of power. Democrats were running things and spending government money on programs Republicans didn’t want.

Once Republicans started running the country, after 2000 but with power-ups in 2002 and 2004, they used their new power to make some big changes of their own.

Now it’s Democrats wanting things back the way they were.

Physicists know about lots of phase transitions–“an
abrupt sudden change of one or more physical properties,” says
Wikipedia–for example, ice melts into water–water boils up into
steam–some supercooled substances turn into superconductors….

I’m getting ready for the phase transition from pre-traveling-Betsy to Betsy-in-transit.

I just finished putting our garden to bed for the winter–I know I won’t have another free minute before December 18.
Pre-traveling-Betsy is wearing blue jeans, with one sneaker dripping
water all over the floor. (As I coiled up a garden hose, it soaked my
hosiery.)

In-transit-Betsy, I hope, will look cool and serene. She’ll be wearing a suit in shades of black,
silver, and gray, plus her favorite red
walking shoes. She’ll definitely have dry socks on both feet.

Now, to get past the intermediate state, which seems to be blogging-Betsy….

Pie crust was one of the few things my mother admitted she couldn’t do.
Old New Englanders called it “a heavy hand for pastry.” She said that
in her case, one foot must be heavy as well.

Harold McGee to the rescue! From today’s New York Times:

McGee is promoting the new revised edition of his scientific cookbook, On Food and Cooking. I definitely want one!

My Swedish* “language emergency kit” covers essentials like finding bathrooms or an Internet cafe. Frank will be facing a much, much bigger challenge.

I just found out this morning he’s agreed to give a “little talk” to
some schoolchildren, ages 7 and up. I’m sure he’ll come up with
something interesting to say–in English, that is. The challenge will then be to
extract a few key words or a sentence that he can also say in Swedish.

Translating “gluon” or “asymptotic freedom” wouldn’t make the words any less Greek to a bunch of young Swedes.

At the opposite extreme, Frank could memorize a Swedish version of Churchill’s “Never give up speech“.* *

One can never go wrong with “thanks very much”, but it isn’t very surprising.

I look forward to seeing what Frank comes up with!

Once Nobel Week is over, Frank and I will head north for a week of auroras and anti-midnight non-sun. Swedish physicist Sverker Fredriksson
has been sending us fascinating email about what to expect–today I got
permission to post some. So here he is, my first-ever guestblogger.

The first Thanksgiving I cooked for was the hardest. Amity was a tiny
baby–Frank and I both had flu. I managed to stagger into the kitchen
and heat up a can of Campbell’s chicken soup with rice for us to
celebrate with. We were both thankful we could keep the soup down that
day, a sign that we were finally getting better.

I remember
the Thanksgiving when I was 10, when my Aunt Mary let me help make the
giblet gravy. It was delicious. She and I kept tasting it in the
kitchen, and when it was time to serve it we* had none left.

I remember the many holiday meals I shared with Frank’s grandparents.
Grandma Wilczek would cook an authentic Polish feast with lots of
kielbasa. Then we would all drive over to Grandma Cona’s for an Italian
super-spectacular–turkey plus pans of lasagne, meatballs, and sausage.
It’s a miracle we have any arteries left.

I remember when I
realized, 10 years ago, that my computer could help me stage-manage
Thanksgiving. I created timetables, lists of dishes and recipes. I
don’t know how people did all this before they had printers.

I remember last year, when I blogged the universal veggie pot pie and killer brownies along with the
turkey and gravy for carnivores like me.

Now I better get cooking!

** Heh. Almost 50 years later, I just realized–Aunt Mary was quick to
claim half the blame for the missing gravy, but she probably didn’t
drink more than a tablespoon of it. No wonder everybody loved Aunt Mary!

The first Thanksgiving I cooked for was the hardest. Amity was a tiny
baby–Frank and I both had flu. I managed to stagger into the kitchen
and heat up a can of Campbell’s chicken soup with rice for us to
celebrate with. We were both thankful we could keep the soup down that
day, a sign that we were finally getting better.

I remember the Thanksgiving when I was 10, when my Aunt Mary let me
help make the giblet gravy. It was delicious. She and I kept tasting it
in the kitchen, and when it was time to serve it we had none left.

I remember the many holiday meals I shared with Frank’s grandparents.
Grandma Wilczek would cook an authentic Polish feast with lots of
kielbasa. Then we would all drive over to Grandma Cona’s for an Italian
super-spectacular–turkey plus pans of lasagne, meatballs, and sausage.
It’s a wonder we have any arteries left.

I remember when I realized, 10 years ago, that my computer could help
me stage-manage Thanksgiving. I created timetables, lists of dishes and
recipes. I don’t know how people did all this before they had printers.

This year, we’ll be 12 around the table (pardon my elbow!) No canned
soup, but plenty of veggie pot pie and killer brownies along with the
turkey and gravy for carnivores like me.

Now I better get cooking!

Killer brownies aka caramel-chocolate squares

Preheat oven (350).
Heat caramels and 1/4 c milk over medium heat, stirring constantly undil melted and smooth.
In bowl, combine dry cake mix, melted butter, and remaining milk. 
Spread half this dough over bottom of ungreased 9 x 13 pan.
Bake 6 minutes.  Remove and sprinkle with chocolate chips.  Drizzle caramel mixture over the top.
Drop remaining dough by teaspoonfuls onto caramel layer, spreading
evenly.  Bake 15 – 20 minutes, until top is dry to touch.
Cool.  Refrigerate until firm, then cut in squares.

Vegetables:  broccoli, carrots, celery, onion, red potatoes cut
into bite-sized pieces and cooked in herb-seasoned broth about 15
minutes or until tender but not mushy.  (The time to cook depends
on how big the pieces are.) Save 1 quart broth to make gravy (add water
and bouillon if necessary to vegetable cooking water.)

Put vegetables into ovenproof casserole/bowl with pie bird. (You can
use an inverted jelly glass or similar heatproof object instead of the
pie bird.  The idea is to vent the heat and steam from the bottom
of the casserole in a gradual way.  What you don’t want is a solid
slab of crust holding the steam in until it bursts out with a big
splash inside your oven.)

Gravy:  Melt 1/4 cup
butter in saucepan and gradually stir in 1/4 cup flour.  Use
flat-bottomed whisk to stir until lumps are gone. It will quickly get
very thick, so have broth ready to add.
    Slowly stir in vegetable broth, so that it blends
smoothly with the thick flour/butter paste.  Pour some gravy into
casserole to cover vegetables; save the rest to serve in gravy pitcher.

Crust:  Preheat oven to 425.

Mix dry ingredients, work in butter with your hands.  
Stir in milk to create a soft biscuit dough.  Arrange all dough on top of vegetables in casserole.
Put in 425 oven and reduce heat to 350.  Cook 45 minutes to 1 hour.

I just listened to Tony Kahn‘s Thanksgiving podcast*, something to make us all feel extra-grateful today.

I’m also grateful to Tony for treating me and Halley to lunch at WGBH, where we enjoyed not only conversation but several  meta-conversations too…

Now I’d better get back to the stove and Amity’s killer caramel-chocolate brownies. I just posted the recipe as a story–your tastebuds will thank me but your
bathroom scale won’t!

Packing is always a challenge, but for Nobel Week? Its many events line up under three different dress
codes:

• “casual”
• business suit/cocktail dress, and
• white tie/ballgown (three different events require these).

Frank can get away with a couple of suits and two pairs of
black shoes–it’s easy to rent the white-tie-and-tails in Stockholm.
I’m bringing a few more options for all this dress-up. We’ll each need
a grown-up black coat, plus mittens, boots, mufflers, longjohns, etc.
for sub-zero Sweden.

But then, in the early morning of December 14 (after the
late-late-night party with Jumping Frogs), we’ve been invited to visit
the Arctic Circle for a week that requires layers and layers more
clothing! Forget the wimpy lightweight Capilene longjohns, so usefully invisible under a suit. Bring on some expedition-weight fleece,
and never mind the bulges! The dress code is stuff for hiking or riding
in dogsleds–for hanging out in the midnight anti-Sun and chasing
auroras!

Now this is starting to add up to way too much luggage….

And then, we schlep it all to the Ice Hotel?
Guests sleep in a room made of ice, on top of a bed made of ice
(sleeping bags and padding in between you and the ice), surrounded by
sculptures made of ice…. The door and the toilet are not made of ice,
because the room has neither. It also has no space for luggage, which
gets stored all night in a locker somewhere. That’s too bad,
because I might want some ballgowns round about 2 a.m., to pile up on top
of my sleeping bag to keep warm…