So my sister was over - we talked a bit about WTVPPLTL She bought it but hasn't started it. However, the review that said you can't meet friends on the intenet now, she thought was , well, wrong. she only found her tribe on the net in the last year or so.

A professor of literature I know who is also interested in the history of cooking, recommends the following:

[link]

Egg Pies, Moss Cakes, and Pigeons Like Puffins DiMarco, Vincent

According to the blurb: "In this comprehensive and historically rich study, author Vincent DiMarco shares three original, never before published cookery manuscripts from eighteenth century England. Taken from the author's private collection, the manuscripts contain over five hundred recipes in their original form, but DiMarco further enhances the text with expert commentary and revitalizes one hundred of the recipes for today's kitchen with modern instructions."

Not my personal area of interest, but I suspect it may appeal to some Buffistas. The link is to a $6.00 ebook version; there is a printed version out there as well.

Is he the guy I heard on NPR talking about what it was like to eat one of those songbirds with the towel over your head?

Dunno. Just passing along a rec from I guy I really trust on this sort of thing. Don't really know anything about either the book or the author, other than if my source recommends it, it is probably a sterling example of its kind.

three original, never before published cookery manuscripts from eighteenth century England

oooooooooooooooooooooooh!

Thanks for the link, Gar.

Once again, the hivemind supplies something you never knew you needed.

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They had the new Wm. Gibson, Spook Country, at the bookstore.

I got sucked into it immediately. Part of it is that he's like a travel writer for the future (even when the future is now). There's a lot of time admiring the luxury items in a Gibson book, especially if they're imaginary.

Anyway, the protagonist reminded me of Gloomcookie a little bit.

I've decided that Gibson's supernow referentiality is always going to create....hmmm, there doesn't seem to be a word for it. Anachronisms in reverse?

Like the infamous line in Neuromancer about the sky being like a dead TV channel (meaning gray and staticky) and the world quickly shooting by that with widespread cable use so that the association would be with a blank blue screen instead.

This book uses an LA reference which would be perfectly apt for any Angeleno two years ago but is now defunct. He uses the location of Tower Records on Sunset as a reference point.

Which makes his book feel So Last Year.

Admittedly, it is set in 2006.

I read Neuromancer this weekend! It was hard to believe it was written in 1984, as it reminded me of Snow Crash.

It was hard to believe it was written in 1984, as it reminded me of Snow Crash.

Well, Snow Crash copied a lot.

Though Gibson never named his protagonist Hiro.