Hester

Hey, Capt. Jack: I like your photo-refit. Disney should take note of the marketing potential there! Cheers, Hester

A bowl of rapberries.

This is the photo I use as my Windows desktop: Mmmm ... Stuart Townsend! Cheers, Hester

^Cruise Director and Shanty Mistress < Went on a 3 mile hike yesterday ... and discovered on the downhill portions that yes, my knees are over 40, even if the rest of me still thinks I'm 25. v Fall's approaching this week. Do you have any plans to celebrate the equinox or usher in the new season in some way?

Oh, isn't that too true! After a month of sitting on my deck overlookin' the bay, eating butter tarts and drinking fruit juice-based rum cocktails, I found that my favourite hiking pants were a bit too snug for even a brisk walk. So, from now until the end of October, I've vowed to eat nothing but fruit and fish! (Well, mostly ... that vow be more like a "guideline", if you get my meaning.) Anyhow, since Aurore is championing her favourite gravy liquor, I must mention mine -- port! It's lovely to cook a pot-roast of beef in (with bay leaves and onions). And it is absolutely wondrous as the cooking liquid for rabbit (with rosemary and/or thyme, onions, and prunes or black mission figs for a Renaissance flare). Indeed, I used port as the marinade for some sirloin steaks that I barbecued this summer. I mixed about a 1/2 cup of port with 1 Tb. blackstrap molasses and 2 Tbs. balsamic vinegar, salt and pepper. The steaks didn't get quite as much time to marinate as I'd hoped, but were lusciously moist and tender anyway. And back to the topic of this thread, I have no idea what's for supper tonight. Having just returned from another weekend away, the larder is bare. Guess I need to take a hike to the local fish shop and see what's fresh today! Cheers, Hester

Malibu mango flavoured rum liqueur, mixed half & half with pineapple juice, over ice: Yum! Cheers, Hester

During the hottest days of summer, I usually wear a wide-brimmed straw hat (not garb, just streewear), and keep it secured with a long old-fashioned hatpin. I had a doctor's appointment on a 90+ day in July, and wore the hat. As I sat down in the waiting room, the young man next to me blanched and said, "Wow, that's one serious hatpin!" I smiled and said, "Yes, it's very effective ... in the wind." And, on the topic of wenches, I have a friend who's writing her PhD thesis on medieval English women who were "waived" (the legal term equivalent to "outlawed" for men). She considered using the moniker "Waived Wench" in on-line forums, but decided against it, thinking it would probably attract the wrong sort of attention. Cheers, Hester ... who might call herself a wench in jest, but any stray male who wants to do so should take a look at my hatpin first.

One of the most charming conceits of Gideon Defoe's series The Pirates! is that none of his pirate characters have names, just descriptions, eg: The pirate with a scarf The pirate in red The pirate with a pegleg The pirate with asthma The pirate who thinks he knows a lot about wine, etc. So, if you were a character in Defoe's novels, what would your description be? I think I'd be "the pirate with an extensive collection of silk scarves". Cheers, Hester

25. It stars Jessica Alba in a thong: http://www.sonypictures.com/movies/intotheblue/site/

scrimshaw

Jack, your homemade supper featuring your own garden produce sounds delicious! Exactly right for this cusp of autumn day! We'll be grabbing a quick bite this evening while packing the car to head up to our cottage, so we're going with frozen Jamaican patties, and salad from a bag. But speaking of food in season, I was just at the local supermarket picking up a few last minute essentials (okay, maybe smoked salmon doesn't count as an essential, but I also bought bread) ... anyhow, I was shocked to see that, although we haven't even reached the autumn equinox, or Canadian Thanksgiving, let alone "Stir-Up Sunday", there was a new display of Xmas plum puddings for sale! On September 15th! [Then again, I wasn't too scandalized to pick up a dark fruitcake with marzipan icing from this premature festive display. It will make great trail food for our hike through the autumn foliage in Algonquin Park on Sunday.] Cheers, Hester

Hey, William: How did your night of "Jolly Rogering" go? Did you enjoy the festival? Cheers, Hester

Not really ... but in grad school, the residence administration threatened to evict me because I complained so publicly about the lousy maintenance and vermin problems Yes, but happily I have a high percentage of body fat and can tread water for ages. Aren't we all! Did you know Johnny Depp bought his own island in the Bahamas: http://www.entertainmentwise.com/news?id=19808 I'm hoping I wash up on that shore. Cheers, Hester N[ow] P[laying]: Feist, "Mushaboom" -- slow remix

^ Both! They each fill a different need in my cultural life. Books for when my mind is alert but my senses are tired. Movies for when I want to be bombarded by sound and imagery and just turn the analytical knob on my brain down to "passive". < Thinking I should cut down on the butter tarts, 'cause I have to shop for a new travel wardrobe in October and the lycra in these jeans is stretched to the creaking point (they just came out of the dryer). v Would you rather be a houseguest with your in-laws or stay at a nearby hotel?

Don't know about the nutritional content of the shells, but the innards of both clams and oysters are packed full of dietary iron -- the heme kind that your body can easily absorb (without all the saturated fat of liver). No wonder mermaids are so frisky! They never have to worry about anaemia. Cheers, Hester

John Wesley Harding, Trad Arr. Jones: http://www.johnwesleyharding.com/home.html ... a collection of traditional British ballads (many with nautical themes), which this American indie-folk singer learned from the singing of Nic Jones, a stalwart of the British folk scene who was seriously injured in a car accident in 1982 and can no longer perform. Most of Nic Jones' studio recordings are OOP, and his record label has refused to either reissue the albums or give him the master tapes. [bloody Pirates! -- and an interesting aside to the discussion of copyright in the "Ok i'm pissed... theiving newspaper!" thread in the Rabble Rousing section.] Ironically, fans who had made illegal bootlegs of Nic Jones' performances have given him their tapes, enabling his wife and friends to issue two "live" CDs of his work: http://www.nicjones.net/ Cheers, Hester

Wow, Chloe! Your Blue Dawg is wonderful! I see some creative use of duct-tape there. Red Green would be in awe. Cheers, Hester

cycle

Well, I did intend to make Pasta with Clam Sauce tonight (very easy, and there's terrific iron content in canned clams, for those of us who are anaemic) ... but instead I think we'll probably just go to Harvey's for a hamburger & fries, on the way to doing our grocery shopping for the weekend. But speaking of comfort food, today at the local deli I picked up some gourmet goodies for our weekend at the cottage: Ilchester Beer Cheese (I was once in Ilchester, when we got lost on our way to Bath). Wild Boar & Apricot pate Grand Marnier carmelized Poached Pears (still warm from the poaching process). Chocolate Butter Tarts. Should be a doozy of a picnic! Cheers, Hester

^Going to the cottage, "sailing" my battered but refurbished paddle-boat to the pub for lunch on Saturday, driving up to Algonquin Park and picnicing on the East Beach of Lake of Two Rivers on Sunday. (Weather predictions are glorious.) < Voted in a by-election, and had the dermatologist check my moles today. (I wore my pretty underwear for the event.) v What are your plans for the weekend? ['S a darn good Q!]

Crud! Target won't ship across the border. Canuckaphobic, they are! 'Sprobably just as well ... I still haven't got around to getting a chessboard to accompany the pewter Robin Hood vs. the Sheriff of Nottingham chess set that I ordered from England 2 years ago. Besides, the dice game seems pretty noisy. When I was a teenager, my grandma used to come for dinner and afterwards she and my mom would play Yahtzee for the rest of the evening. The sound of the dice rattling in the cup used to drive me crazy! (Of course, my boyfriend at the time thought this was a hilariously petty thing for me to complain about, since his family had much nastier habits than Yahtzee.) As an aside, Yahtzee apparently has nautical Canuck origins: Anyway, I was very pleased to see that a couple of my houseguests at the cottage this past summer discovered the plain old chess/checkers set in the folding box that I left in plain sight on a shelf, and happily amused themselves with it on the beach, without my even having to suggest it. Cheers, Hester

I first learned this song from the local Toronto cow-punk band the Lost Dakotas in the early 90s. I didn't realize at first that the song was traditional, so I was quite surprised to hear the house band at the Black Rose pub in Boston playing it, with the crowd singing along and pounding on tables. I was thrilled to be able to join in. [Also ate my first whole lobster there, and managed to squirt the juice all the way to the next table, accidentally hitting a German tourist who was thankfully too deep in an animated conversation to notice. Fun night!] Here's the Lost Dakotas version to download (and don't give me any rag, Jack, about pirating copyrighted material, as the song's traditional, the CD's long OOP, and the band's defunct, so I'm calling it "fair use", arrghh!): http://tinyurl.com/gfcuu Cheers, Hester

pink

63% ... much higher than my "Zen" score ~H.

My "pirate ship" of the moment is a decidedly antiquated paddle-boat that I accidentally scuttled this summer after joking how "unsinkable" she was. Oh, well, at least she was only in knee-deep water at the time, and "like the Mary Ellen Carter", she rose again (with the help of my neighbour's teenaged daughters who gamely bailed her out and helped me heave her sodden carcass up on shore for some overdue careening). I was going to name her the Molly Brown before she submerged, but now that she's been raised, and patched up yet again with Bondo fiberglass, I'm thinking of settling on the Die Hard. Cheers, Hester ... not sure what to call the other vessel in my "fleet" -- a banana-yellow fibreglass canoe to which the neighbours used to attach Chiquita stickers in order to tease me about the colour.