Foreign Words That Should be Part of English

microondas – Spanish for “microwave.”  This one needs little explanation, really.  Don’t you just wish you could tell your friend you’re about to go warm up your burrito in the microondas?  Props also go to the Spanish paloma, “dove.”  They know how to make their language poetical-sounding.

deinos – Ancient Greek.  As in dinosaur.  It’s a slippery thing to pin down what this word means, though.  The meanings shade from “terrible” to “great” to something that’s roughly equivalent to the modern English “awesome.”  When something is so cool it scares the crap out of you, it’s deinos.

quamquam – Latin.  Actually I have no clue what this means, but it sounds great.

arigato – Japanese for “thank you.”  English’s “thank you” is adequate for its purpose, but it just doesn’t convey the same depth of gratitude that the Japanese does.  Try watching an anime sometime and you’ll see what I mean.  When somebody looks another person in the eye and says arigato, you can tell they mean it.

Great Primer about Organic Agriculture

Is Organic Food Worth the Cost?

Okay, so the people who left comments on this article can be pretty extreme, but this piece in Mother Nature Network itself does a great job.  It lays out some of the facts about just what organic food is, how it’s produced, and what the labels mean in the grocery store.  And it outlines both sides of the ongoing controversy about organic food.  On the one hand, industrial agriculture does increase yields, which we need in a world with a growing population, but on the other hand, all the pesticides and soil erosion might damage our ability to grow food for ourselves forever.

Anathem by Neal Stephenson

Anathem is one of those books.  A tome.  A doorstopper.  An epic.  It clocks in at a couple of pounds and nearly 1,000 pages, complete with notes on the pronunciation at the beginning and a glossary and three mathematical proofs at the end.

But this is Neal Stephenson.  What were you expecting?  The premise is simple: math monks.  In a universe eerily similar to ours, society decided it would be a good idea to cloister its scientists and mathematicians in “concents” where they live ascetically and get to see the outside world every 1, 10, 100, or 1000 years, depending on their order.  Erasmas, a young fraa of the decennial order, is about to celebrate his first open house since he joined the concent ten years ago.  But as the day of the opening approaches, strange things begin to happen.  He and his scientist monk buddies have to sneak around the Wardens Regulant and the Inquisition to investigate the deepening mystery.  Many gratuitous Platonic dialogs ensue.  The reveal is just too cool to spoil here.

The characterization is decent, but in true Stephenson form, where the story really shines is in all the extra goodies he manages to pack into the text.  Like the title.  In our world, the words “anthem” and “anathema” are not etymologically related.  But what if they were?  What if they both stemmed from the same root, some ancient word still in use by monks who don’t get out much?  When one of the scientists is excommunicated from their concent, the bells ring anathem.

Puns abound.  A smattering of Latin will help you to get the most out of this book.  A good grounding in ancient history, philosophy, geometry, and physics wouldn’t hurt, either.  And don’t miss the reference to Star Trek.

If you’re up for some mental exercise and you don’t mind a rambling “plot”, check this book out.  Stephenson’s little bonuses are well worth it.

 

The equivalent of Jews in this world is the IT department.  I … can’t explain.  You’d just have to read it for yourself.

The Salty Tart in Midtown Global Market

This is me struggling with a new digital camera.

The old one was in a purse along with a water bottle that sprung a leak and … oh, you don’t want to hear the details.  You want to hear about The Salty Tart.  It’s this unassuming little bakery in the heart of Minneapolis that has this reverential following among baking fans.  The lady who runs it has a James Beard award, for one thing (kind of like an Oscar for bakers).  Her ingredients are local, her cakes are all adorable, and people go on and on about the macaroons.

The wonderful Vu in front of a couple of cakes.

I know, I know, cupcakes are supposed to be like bell bottoms now, but I’ve been wanting to try a fancy-pants cupcake from a fancy-pants bakery, so I ordered the Surly’s Chocolate Cupcake (and split it).  And … yeah.  It tasted like beer.  The sweetness of the malt went well with the chocolate.  Good, solid chocolate cake on the bottom and good chocolate frosting on the top, and a little bit of buttercream filling.  All around, it was a good cupcake.

I forgot to take a close-up of the cupcake, but you can see it in the distance there.