Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Exploring an Obsession

It's pretty well known that I have an addiction to Youtube. It's probably my number one time waster. Music videos, holiday specials, Wings (all seasons are available) gag reels..You name it, I will waste time watching it on YouTube. Earlier this week, I spent some time searching for a Today show segment that I had seen while I was home on maternity leave. While I was looking for the demonstration of how to make crab carbonara, I stumbled across something infinitely more interesting.

If you do a search of The Today Show on Youtube, you will find, in ten minute pieces, most of the broadcast from September 11, 2001. The beginning of the show (discussing Michael Jordan), the shots of people assembled on the Plaza, and the interview that Matt Lauer was doing at 8:46, and the interruption of that interview at 8:51 when he first mentions a problem downtown. (In case you are wondering, he's interviewing some guy who wrote a book on Howard Hughes) I spent the majority of my child's afternoon nap watching video after video from that day. Having been working three stories below Cascade Plaza in a currency vault when the incidents actually occurred, I had never seen any of this before. Documentary after documentary sure, but never the actual coverage as it happened.

I'm moderately obsessed with 9/11, particularly the World Trade Center. I've watched all the documentaries and every year read every article that runs in the New York Post. To be frank, this obsession bothers me. I'm a normal, well adjusted person, I should not be so interested in one of the biggest tragedies our country has ever seen. So after spending an entire afternoon watching "live" coverage of the day from New York, I had to stop and wonder what might be wrong with me.

My conclusion is nothing. I think the reason I am so interested is that the majority of the people who died that day were doing the same things I do every day. They commuted from a suburb and paused downstairs for coffee. They went to their desks and checked the futures on CNBC. They answered emails and returned phone calls. When the first plane hit, was a MetLife staffer on hold trying to find accumulated cash values of a VUL policy? Was a Cantor Fitz associate trying to track down a missing trade blotter? I don't think I am so much obsessed with these unfortunate people as that I identify with them. Safety forces around the country cried at the loss of their firefighter and police brethren, it is only normal that I feel the same towards my trader/ broker/administrator brethren.

I feel better now that I have sorted this out. And will feel much better if someone manages to get into my Youtube account!

Tuesday, September 27, 2011

Vegetables

I'm not a foodie. My tastes are simple, and if I am feeding just myself, I'm way more likely to hit West Point Market or have a bowl of cereal for dinner rather than cook. Single Kate...well, let's just say my dinners were not something I would ever admit to..

Then I got married. My husband, though a firefighter by trade, has a true passion with food and cooking. He takes notes watching the Food channel and has stacks and stacks of cookbooks. Half the kitchen stuff on our wedding registry I couldn't even identify. When my sister in law walked into my baby shower with three big boxes wrapped in Williams-Sonoma paper (it was a baby food maker by the way) my cousin turned to me and whispered "That's the kind of paper that Bill's stuff comes in...."

Food can be a battle in our house. I do not see the point in making tortillas from scratch when you can buy them at Acme. I don't think salad needs red onions to be appealing and I do not like my meat to be oozing blood when I cut into it. The biggest struggle in our house, however, has been the vegetables.

Food in my house growing up was not a battle at all. My parents are the type to pick their battles. If we got good grades, behaved in church, were polite to adults, and were home on time, they really didn't care what we ate. Since my sister and I were as healthy as they come, the fact that we skipped any vegetable besides corn was easily overlooked by mom and dad.

Eventually my husband kind of gave up and ignored the fact that I wouldn't touch his brussel sprouts with hollandaise. My friends nodded knowingly every New Year's Eve when I would resolve to eat more vegetables. But my hate-hate relationship with vegetables was about to come to a sudden halt.

My sister in law, God love her, is the poster child for healthy eating. If I could eat like she does, I would never have to spend another minute on a treadmill or worry about whether or not my pants fit. One evening at dinner, I found myself in front of a bowl of fresh steamed green beans. (haricots verts to you foodies.) And suddenly something inside me switched on. Almost without thinking about it, I helped myself to the green beans and to the utter amazement of my spouse (who kindly did not make a thing about it) I ate them.

And I enjoyed them. Those green beans were the gateway to vegetable harmony. Broccoli followed, as did cauliflower (yum with curry) peas ( I honestly think they taste just like corn) spinach (fab with a vinegarette) asparagus (amazing with olive oil and garlic)....the list goes on. I was shocked by my new liking of veggies in almost any shape and form, even the dreaded brussels sprouts!

Which leads me to wonder why I ever had this problem to begin with. I have thought about it at length and have traced it back to the early 1980's. Think with me, friends, to the dinners of our childhoods. The chicken made with Campbell's Cream of Mushroom Soup, the boxed Au Gratin potatoes, and the green beans. The green beans that went "slluurrpppp" out of a can into a saucepan on the stove, and then were served soggy and mushy and room temperature. Now, I am certainly not blaming my mom or any of the women of the 1980s who fell victim to mass marketing and convenience. After all, these women had to cook and provide a dinner around 4 different schedules. But compare the canned green beans of 1980 to the fresh, crisp steamed beans of 2010. Which, knowing my sister in law, were probably purchased no more than a day or so earlier at one of the local Farmer's Markets. Can you blame me, or any person of a certain age, for not wanting to eat their vegetables?

Not convinced? Think of the aforementioned chicken dish (if you are a child of the 80's, I know your mother made it...) If there were additional mushrooms added besides the ones in the can of condensed soup, they were probably slimy and from a can that might have been in a pantry for months. Now I am certainly not suggesting you go out in the woods and pick your own mushrooms, but fresh (even fresh ish) mushrooms from the local grocery store would be more appealing than the mushrooms of your childhood.

I can go on... Carrots? Cooked carrots that made from a can or thawed from a bag are smelly and squishy. Cooked carrots bought raw and steamed stovetop? More than tolerable. Frozen broccoli? Blah. Sauteed broccolini? Amazing.

So I ask you, fellow children of the 1970s and 1980s.... As my husband's idol Alton Brown says "Give peas a chance.." (haha) I'm by no means a perfect vegetable eater. I still run screaming from peppers and onions and my beet experience still gives me nightmares. But if you are a 30 something who still won't eat your vegetables, find someone who eats enough for all of us and have some of what she's having. You might be glad you did. They aren't what you remember, I promise. :)