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Note #72: Mountain after mountain (2012.9.27)

There is a phrase in Korean, “mountain after mountain,” that means things seem to get more and more difficult. If you’ve ever been to Korea and seen how mountainous the country is, you’ll understand where the phrase comes from; a cross-country walk would literally be mountain after mountain.

Recently I’ve felt this way—not necessarily because things are bad, though. I just happen to be really busy. I won’t bore you with the details, but let’s just say that I’m going to have quite a lot on my plate through the month of October at least (and probably through November as well, although I expect things to ease up somewhat). This week in particular was a difficult week, and even though it’s not over I’ve gotten a couple of major items off my plate. Chuseok, the harvest moon holiday, is coming up, but I won’t be going anywhere. I’ll be here clearing more things off my plate.

But I don’t feel like dwelling on that now. I guess that’s just a preemptive excuse just in case I don’t end up posting here as much as I would like to. Today, though, I’ve got a bit of breathing room, so I thought I’d write a bit.

I wanted to share two things today, the first being a follow-up of sorts to my last post. Yes, I know it might seem odd that I would write a follow-up, seeing how I ended that post, but I couldn’t resist this. If you read the post, you’ll know that I linked to what I called “the best piece of art to come out of this whole craze.” Well, now I find myself torn, because a friend of mine recently posted a link to something that I might like better. It combines... well, no. I don’t want to spoil it for you. I’ll just say: I had no choice. They arrived right before you did.

OK, now I’m done. I promise that will be the last you will hear from me on “Gangnam Style.” Probably.

The second thing I wanted to share was what I had for lunch today. It’s funny, because just last week I explained the term “signal-to-noise ratio” to my students using the internet as an example, and I’m pretty sure I said something like: “For every page of useful information on the internet, there are eight thousand pages of people talking about what they had for lunch.” Oh well. Embrace the noise, I guess.

Actually, I probably wouldn’t be posting this if it weren’t for a kerfuffle on Kevin’s site a little while ago. Since then, I haven’t been able to look at this particular lunch item the same way.

If you’re the sort of individual who needs close-up shots for full enjoyment, I’ve got you covered. In fact, you can click on this next picture and see an even bigger version in all of its melty cheesy glory.

So what is this? It’s honey deli ham (from Costco), Beecher’s Flagship cheese (from a sadly dwindling chunk we brought back from New York), and fig preserves (made from local figs), all nestled between two slices of homemade carrot bread (this is an actual yeast bread—made with pureed carrots and flavored with nutmeg and molasses—not a cake). And then grilled, of course (or fried, if we want to be completely accurate). I got the idea for the fig preserves when we visited the Beecher’s shop in the Flatiron District. One of the grilled cheese sandwiches they sold was made with fig preserves, and I was so intrigued that I had to try it. It ended up being really good, and this was my attempt at recreating a little of that goodness. The original sandwich didn’t have ham, but I thought it made a good addition. The original sandwich also wasn’t on carrot bread, but that just so happened to be the last bread I made. It turned out surprisingly well. I think I might have gone a little overboard with the preserves, but I scarfed that thing down like it was going out of style. It made me a little sad, because I probably have enough cheese left for one sandwich—although I think I will save it and just have it on crackers.

And that’s all for today. This will probably be my last post of the month, and October’s going to be busy, but I will try to carve out some time because there are some things I want to write about (Black Flower, for one). We’ll see how it goes.

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