I don't know if you can see it, but somewhere bottom right is a tiny little face that looks a lot like this author. But enough literature for today, I have to get to the kitchen to help Michiel make the oily balls. We'll hand them out to the poor and hungry tonight. If they turn out really photogenic, I'll upload a photo later. Happy new year!
This is one of the first author portraits I did for the NRC. A year ago now. Strange to work on a drawing this old, I like to think I have gotten better. You may remember that I was only going to do these portraits for one year, but I have been asked to stay on for some more months. Which is more than fine by me, I have grown accustomed to my authors. I will start a new old man tomorrow, stay tuned.
I told my doctor a Picasso story today, but not about the painting above. About one he had hanging over his treatment table. Anyway, he appreciated the story, but that was not what I was going to say. Last night I promised Michele I would blog the recipes of the food I fed her. And I am such a people pleaser, so I do. Warning, this is not food of the christmassy kind, I had had enough of that. Michele too, she is playing the Nutcracker... This is just honest straightforward and wholesome food. Fits the weather. Now Michele is a vegetarian, so I had to turn my chili con carne into something vegetarian, and it didn't even turn out too bad. Which is not to say I don't prefer the meaty version myself. It's a Jamie Oliver recipe, I have to admit. I got it off the BBC food website years ago, and I must have made it a hundred times. I tried other recipes, but always returned to this one:
2 medium onions
1 garlic clove
olive oil
2 tsp chili powder
1 fresh chili, deseeded and finely chopped
1 tsp ground cumin (or crushed cumin seeds)
sea salt and freshly ground pepper
450g /1lb chuck steak, or ground beef, which I replaced by a handful of soaked gray lentils, a handful of chopped mushrooms and a block of extra firm tofu
a jar of sun-dried tomatoes
a big can of diced tomatoes
1 cinnamon stick
2 cans of red kidney beans, drained
Preheat the oven to 150C/300F. Chop the onions and the garlic, then fry in a little olive oil until softened. Add the chili powder, fresh chili, cumin and a little seasoning. Then add the meat or the veggie mix and continue to cook until it has sort of browned. Blitz the sun-dried tomatoes in the food processor with enough oil from the jar to loosen in a paste. Throw in the pan with the chopped tomatoes, cinnamon stick and a wine glass of water. Season some more. Bring to a boil, put a lid on and transfer to oven. After an hour, add the beans. Leave in the oven another half hour. Eat with crusty bread, salad and a blob of yoghurt or guacamole. Lovely!
For desert, Dutch apple pie. A recipe from a Canadian website, mind you. You have to be in Canada for the real traditional Dutch stuff. Never goes wrong, this pie, and it's not a lot of work.
We had a real good christmas. Although Michiel was upset yesterday, when I reminded him we had yet another party to go to. A little too much social life for the husband, and it's not even done today, tonight we'll have people over ourselves. Anyway, I thought I'd just blog a bunch of pictures. The top one is the saddest christmas tree in town. It's a homeless person's spot, in the park where we walk Orbit. Second is our tree. I didn't feel like christmas before Otger's birthday, so I was late. And while in doubt about whether to get one or not, I noticed the neighborhood school had thrown one in their garbage container. Piffin and I took pity on the poor garbage tree, and my dear daughter schlepped it home. Of course it sheds worse than Orbit, so it has to stay outside. We're the only house on the street with a porch tree! The third photo is Zanny's christmas present. It's the scale model of Otger's bunk bed that Michiel made. Piffin and I made the bed linens and she painted it. Doesn't it look just too lovely? Also in the photo is my dear old computer :-( and Piffin and me in pajamas. One down from there the condominium building where we spent christmas day celebrating a birthday. And at the bottom our dear old own neighborhood, vibrant and alive no matter which holiday. Yay chinatown, all shops open.
Today is a day quite unlike the days in Nachoem Wijnberg's serene poetry. I woke up. Replied to some emails. Made breakfast. Put out the garbage. Walked the dog. Took Otgers high school application to the high school in question. Tried to buy cinema tickets online, but the website didn't accept my postal code. Made lunch for Otger. Went to the cinema and bought the tickets there. Went to the supermarket with Piffin. Did I already mention it never stopped raining today? Made apple pie with Piffin's help. Girls with disgusting rooms do help making apple pie. It's in the oven right now. The first guests for Otger's birthday party are arriving. Michiel promised to be home by the time the pie comes out of the oven. After that I will walk the dog. And then I will make pizza. And after that we will all go see Casino Royale, and I will probably fall asleep in my chair.
I never knew Leonardo wrote fabels:
The Flea & the Sheep
A flea, who lived in the smooth hair of a dog, one day noticed the pleasant smell of wool.
"What is going on?"
He gave a little jump and saw that his dog had gone to sleep leaning against the fleece of a sheep.
"That fleece is exactly what I need," said the flea. "It is thicker and softer, and above all safer. There is no risk of meeting the dog's claws and teeth which go in search of me every now and then. And the sheep's wool will certainly feel more pleasant."
So without thinking too much about it, the flea moved house, leaping from the dog's coat to the sheep's fleece. But the wool was thick, so thick and dense that it was not easy to penetrate to the skin.
He tried and tried, patiently separating one strand from another, and laboriously making a way through. At last he reached the roots of the hair. But they were so close together that they practically touched. The flea had not even a tiny hole through which to attack the skin.
Tired, bathed in sweat and bitterly disappointed, the flea resigned himself to going back to the dog. But the dog had gone away.
Poor flea! He wept for days and days with regret for his mistake.
From Windows to Mac, from Mac to Windows. To Mac. To Windows. I am getting used to it, it's like working in two rooms. I need to take a picture of another room in my house, to use as a Windows wallpaper. Piffin's room on Mac, and maybe my bedroom on Windows, that would be cute. It's good exercise for me, I have to think through everything I want to do, and then decide which things to do where. And I make funny mistakes. I had to make the web page I always use for sending off work to the newspaper. But the html was on the Mac. So I went there, printed the html, and back to Windows where I typed the html from my print onto notepad. And I didn't even think of all those pages still being online. Anyway, I did get it done.
Otger is 13 today! His grandfather sent him an incredible watch, he is so happy. But I don't have time now, I am trying to send this sketch to the editorial desk. And I am bootcamping to and fro between Windows and Mac. I am stupid, but the only way I can think of to get a picture from here to there is using a draft blog entry, open it in Mac, and attach it to an email. It's kind of creative, but somehow I'm sure there must be a better way.
My life has changed dramatically. Last Saturday my computer refused to wake up, motherboard gone. We spent all day finding a new one, which was a very frustrating business. Especially in the week before christmas. You want to spend a fortune, but the shop attendants aren't impressed in the least, they hardly have time to answer questions. And when they do, their answers are wrong. No, there is no keyboard in the box, or mouse. So we bought those extra. And took them back to the store after opening the box at home. And that was only the first problem. Every fucking thing is different, from squeezing the mouse, to screen dumping from WMP, and even the keys on the keyboard are different (I do like the little light on the caps lock key), and I searched for ever for the file-edit-etc bars on my windows, until Michiel pointed out they are always glued to the ceiling. We can't get a microphone to work, so I can't Skype, apparently it needs a pre-amp! The scanner doesn't work, and HP doesn't know yet whether they can sell us the driver software. I still have to do the scanning under Windows so I am restarting the thing a dozen times a day. And I really dislike the typography on my blog, I had never realized it looked this shitty on a Mac. But I do have a lovely desktop don't you think? It's our dear friend Zanny visiting Piffin in her attic loft.
This drawing is 150 centimeters high. Otger made it in our first few months in Canada, when he was eight, or just nine. The day after we saw Toronto from up on the CN Tower. He made two of them, maybe I'll scan the other one tomorrow, it's a lot of work, I have to do it in parts. Michiel had them hanging in his office for the longest time, but he brought them home today. He is working on some sort of cubicle island now, no walls to hang drawings. I thought these two masterpieces were worth digitizing.
I indulged in kitsch, another parental advise column. Almost done, I realised I was drawing the Liga girl, but I hadn't seen her in years. So I looked her up, but she is quite different. What would we be without the internet. Yesterday I read that Wim Noordhoek was looking for stripes, so I sent him some. And now look what he has blogged! In other words, watch out with commenting on the Sellotape Files, we can get turned into proze before we know it. Wim did quote our names a bit wrong, but who cares. Yay for my commenting audience!
I hadn't been to my drawing class since October, and I felt it. I get out of shape too quickly, I am going to make sure to attend more regularly next year. Today was the last class of this year. I drew sitting down instead of standing up at the easle, I am just too tired at night to stand for three hours. So I bought myself a sketchbook and I draw a bit smaller. I hope that will make it easier for me to go, even after a day's work. A woman has to compromise at everything.
My old high school friend Dorine -who is not in the picture because she was the photographer- sent me this photo today. Such fun to see myself after so many years, this must have been 1974 or 1975. Yvonne -top left- was a big fan of Kamahl. The Elephant Song, remember? How tragic, it's almost the only thing I remember about her. I remember much more about Wilma, she is seated on my left. I used to pick her up in the morning, I rode my bike to the back of her house and went into the kitchen where her family was having breakfast. Wilma ate very little, and she was skin and bones. Her mother always tried to persuade her to eat, I remember her warming up some yoghurt. I think I have a tendency of remembering gory details about people. Wilma even had a steady boyfriend. To Wilma's left there is Myriam, she was a lovely girl. She and her family took me with them on holidays to Switzerland, while my parents were doing a divorce attempt. But the attempt failed, and that was the start of my independent life, at fifteen. One day much later I met Myriam in the hospital, as my dad lay there dying. She had four children! And next to Myriam is Maryam, but I didn't know her very well. And I think the girl bottom left was also in our school, but she is the only one I know on the front row, all those girls were in a choir with Dorine. And Dorine became a musician later in life.
Orbit often puts his head on our knee like that, his master fortunately isn't as dramatic. Orbit sent us a christmas card today. Or rather, all the 2006 adoptees of the Dog Rescue sent it. All of their names are on the card, Orbit's too. And once again, we are grateful for his civilized name. Imagine having to call out "Einstein" in the park. Or Sweetie, Bonita, Herbert, Zeus, Pudding, Finnegan, Beckett, or Shakespeare. How embarrassing would that be. Michiel told me that a dog owner calling out "Sherman" already got laughed at in the park today. We can't have that, now can we. But I do hope all the other adoptees are doing as well as Orbit. Orbit is much much fitter than he was. I remember we even wondered about his legs, they didn't move evenly when he ran. They certainly do now. And he is much better with other dogs, he is confident and happy. Almost off his meds, and completely off his diet. He allegedly was allergic to meat, for crying out loud, and had to eat special fish dog food. But he doesn't even like that junk. He is chewing bones now, I buy them in bulk from the butcher. Fish, what nonsense. And all the anxieties and syndromes he had. All cured, the dog is perfectly fine. If there is one thing that I have learned so far from owning a dog, it is that a dog is even more of an emotional mirror than children are. Dogs are hypersensitive beings, and they so badly want to submit to you, to obey, to be good dogs. They will do anything. And if you are afraid, the dog will be afraid. And if you tell the dog he is sick, he will be sick. This is true for kids, and even more so for dogs.
The NRC is late with the Heere Heeresma review, I found several in other newspapers when researching for the portrait. I was struck by how mixed those reviews were, so I could have expected Elsbeth Etty to add to the confusion. But I was still surprised to find her ecstatic about the book: "Heeresma's version of the many K-characters known to literature since Kafka, is an outstanding achievement." (If anybody out there has better translating skills: "Heeresma levert met deze variant op de vele K-figuren die de literatuur sinds Kafka kent, een bijzondere prestatie.) And now the for the contrast. Arie Storm in Het Parool: "This novel, Heeresma's first in years, is not surrealist, but crazy and the idea is not original, but already chewed up completely by others. And more in particular, it is all so childish." I could cite from more reviews, but I have already thrown them in my grey bin, and my grey bin is in my back yard, and everything in it is frozen stiff. The Maarten't Hart article on the left is available on the NRC website.
I found these author portraits on this weblog. From left to right: Jef Last, Jan Engelman, Maurits Dekker, Hendrik de Vries, Albert Helman, A. Roland Holst. The only legible signature reads "Rafa", but I have no idea who he is. Still, ancient Dutch author portraits, such a lovely find. Do any of you in my dear readership know more?
My husband works for a very dog friendly company, but I do find their dog biscuits a bit pricy. Orbit hasn't yet tasted the corporate cookies. On our morning walk there is a lady with two Beagles who always gives him a cookie. Orbit recognizes her from afar, and he is not at all interested in her Beagles. Orbit is very intelligent, for as far as dogs are. Do something with him for two days in a row, and it is law. And I thought Otger was extreme at that. Orbit even poos at the same spot every morning. In the Don Jail Parkette. I always wonder whether I am being watched by prisoners while picking up after him. But the one foot square windows don't look very transparent. It is a strange feeling, Orbit and myself alone in that parkette, and hundreds of prisoners just on the other side of the wall.
And we did have a little heerlijk avondje, the evening of Saint Nick. He brought Piffin a book of Diane Arbus photo's, and Generation X. But she has to read that for school, that was a little mean of Saint Nick. And he brought Otger two Michael Crichton novels, and V for Vendetta. And chocoladeletters for all of us. Have a safe trip back to Spain, Saint Nick!
Now I only have to take care that his expression is not going to be sad, it has to be tough. But I'll get that done. And he has to cheerfully speed through the air somehow. It was either that or prison. Such a shame to go through all the trouble of drawing a face, and then put it behind bars. Or on a tandem, but I already did a motorcycle last week. (Orbit is enjoying the snow, he eats it. And he chews on ice.)
Why on earth they had to make the page yellow, I don't know. But I do love reprints. This drawing finally made a decent hourly fee. It is in De Stem today, the same newspaper I do the parental advisory columns for. And as for my own experimental garden, a typical lovely Saturday. I cleaned the kitchen and went shopping with my offspring. Shoes, pants, socks, sweaters. And horrible horrible line-ups at the check outs. My feet are hurting. But not as much as the fitting room lady's knees. I always chat with her while waiting for Michiel or Otger to come out of the fitting room. She is going to spend the holidays in the hospital, getting a new knee, she injured one knee in a motor cycle accident some forty years ago, and now the other one is going bad too. She takes eighteen pills a day, just to be able to walk without crying. She hopes to be out of the hospital and back at work quickly, because she is paying off her husband's 5000 dollar funeral, and she is afraid he will be dug up and repossessed. (I warned her they might even resuscitate him.) In Holland she would totally be on disability benefit, wao. But our society here is a bit harder than the Dutch one. Still. This woman would be off worse, spending her days at home, I am almost certain. She seems to really enjoy chatting to all her co-workers and customers. And now for our daily giggle: my brother just sent me this photo, he was enjoying a typical Saturday as well, clearing away his mess. It's me and my two brothers, god knows when.
Neither of the articles is positive about the books they review. Both seem highly-wrought struggles, one full of make-believe 18th century Dutch, and the other one a Ulysses remake about the Dutch town of Assen. No shortage of ambition, our authors. I think I would rather read Maarten 't Hart than Marcel Möring. Even Pieter Steinz admits that Maarten is at least a garanteed laughing-out-loud.
