High Tech Hell

Los Angeles Metro Rail E-Line Train

Yesterday, I took the E-Line train to downtown Los Angeles, encountering on the way a whole slew of tech gremlins that threatened to put the kibosh on the trip.

To begin with, I parked my car at the Expo Bundy station lot. Payment was by credit card at a parking machine which featured an LCD screen. Since Los Angeles summers are extremely bright, and the sun was shining onto the screen, I had to guess what the machine was trying to tell me. Eventually, I made it through the process—even though, for some reason, the system did not remember the car license plate number associated with my TAP card.

Then I had to go through the turnstile. Whoops! The system didn’t recognize my TAP card, so I had to sneak a free ride on MetroRail. After spending time at the Central Library, I took a DASH bus to Union Station, close by the headquarters of the Metropolitan Transit Authority (MTA). They checked my card, told me I still had $2.00 in stored value on my card, and added an additional $20.00 at my request.

I had tried to re-charge my TAP card the day before in Santa Monica, but “the system is down,” so I was directed to a machine at the Santa Monica MetroRail station. Of course, it was down.

Whatever happened to those days when high tech held such promise? Now doing simple everyday things lead to unwelcome interactions with badly designed machines programmed by people who have no idea how to interact with a human being. Did no one ever think of checking that LCD screens are illegible in direct sunlight? Did no one think at all?

Keema

I did not use Swasthi’s Recipes for my own keema recipe, but I chose the picture because it kind of looks like my own recipe. Generally speaking, Martine does not like the dishes I cook to please myself, probably because hot chiles are involved; and her digestion is too delicate to admit any hot peppers to the mix.

So, from time to time, I cook what looks and sort of tastes like an Indian curry, but without any of the hot stuff. This is one such recipe, and it’s actually good enough for me to like it. On my personal serving, however, I add red pepper flakes to give it some heat.

Turn the flame on your range to high. I begin with about a quarter cup of sunflower seed oil into which I have dropped some black mustard seeds and some coriander seeds (jeera) when the oil is hot enough to sizzle.

I slice one large or two small onions and add them to the oil.

For meat, I use one pound of Kroger’s ground turkey, preferably 80% fat free. (If it’s 90%+ fat free, it doesn’t taste as good.) Break up the ground turkey.

Salt to taste. At this point, I add a couple of large dollops of combined Indian garlic and ginger paste. Also: several tablespoons of turmeric, ground cumin, ground coriander, and Hungarian Szeged paprika.

While that mix is cooking, I wash a cup of Thai Jasmine long-grained rice from Trader Joe and drain, repeating the process until the water is clear. Dump the rice into the meat and onion mixture and add 2 to 2½ cups of water. Stir well.

Cut up a few ripe tomatoes and chop them coarsely.

The rest of the ingredients are frozen: I like to add several handfuls of frozen mixed vegetables, frozen peas, frozen lima beans, and frozen Potatoes O’Brien.

Cover, lower the flame, and stir every few minutes to keep the mix from sticking to the bottom of the pan.

Seven Men at Hamnavoe Market

A Street in Stromness on the Orkney Mainland

George Mackay Brown (1921-1996) spent most of his life in Stromness, Orkney, which he always called by its original Norse name of Hamnavoe. If you want to go to the Orkneys, either you fly to the small airport at Kirkwall from Aberdeen or Wick; or you take the ferry from Scrabster (just west of Thurso) to Stromness.

I have been to Orkney twice. The first time, I stayed in Stromness at the house of an old couple named the Linklaters. Dinner consisted of potatoes prepared two or three different ways. At that time, I met George Mackay Brown after I stepped outside from the local Stromness bookstore bearing several books by him.

Here is a poem about seven men who, years ago, went to the market in Hamnavoe and what happened to them.

Hamnavoe Market

They drove to the market with ringing pockets.

Folster found a girl
Who put wounds on his face and throat.
Small and diagonal, like red doves.

Johnston stood beside the barrel.
All day he stood there.
He awoke in a ditch, his mouth full of ashes.

Grieve bought a balloon and a goldfish.
He swung through the air.
He fired shotguns, tolled pennies, ate sweet fog from a stick.

Heddle was at the market also.
I know nothing of his activities.
He is and always was a quiet man.

Garson went three rounds with a negro boxer,
And received thirty shillings,
Much applause, and an eye loaded with thunder.

Where did they find Flett?
They found him in a blazing circle,
All flame and blood, a new Salvationist.

A gypsy saw in the hand of Halcro
Great strolling herds, harvests, a proud woman.
He wintered in the poorhouse.

They drove home from the Market under the stars
Except for Johnston,
Who lay in a ditch, his mouth full of dying fires.

Astonishing Strides

Food Vendor at a Bangkok Night Market

It is strange to be suddenly confronted by truth in places that one had not thought to look for it. Such was the case this evening when I encountered it in a little-known mystery novel set in Bangkok. The Sonchai Jitgpleecheep novels of John Burdett have been a recent preoccupation of mine during this hot and seemingly endless summer in Southern California. Then, like a Buddhist burst of contemplation, there it was a fifth of the way through Bangkok Asset, the sixth novel in the series:

Man has made astonishing strides recently in all things inessential. The price we’ve paid is enormous. Stuck with an infantile description of reality that cannot come to terms with death or even lesser challenges, the eternal infant must torture himself for lifetime after lifetime, probably without end.

This is what happens when one is a serious bookworm. The truth is out there, even in seemingly unusual places, like genre series novels.

Sometime this month, I’m going to tackle the Collected Stories of William Faulkner. For some reason, I’ve always liked to read Faulkner during the hottest month of the year. I might suddenly find some pearl of wisdom that stands out, or I might not. On the other hand, I might read some arrant piece of trash an find myself at the edge of a cliff that stretches to the horizon.