This means so much more to me this time, I don’t know why. I think the first time I hardly felt it because it was all too new. But I want to ‘thank you’ to you. I haven’t had an orthodox career. And I’ve wanted more than anything to have your respect. The first time I didn’t feel it. But this time I feel it. And I can’t deny the fact that you like me…right now…you like me. Thank you. – Sally Field, Academy Award acceptance speech (1984)
Last Friday, May 27th, I was informed by The Naked Listener that he had nominated me for the Versatile Blogger Award (or “Versy” for short). Now, for a woman generally regarded as bright I can be rather slow on the uptake when it comes to pop-cultural stuff; as I’ve mentioned previously I’m actually fairly new to the whole blog thing (reading or writing), so I had never heard of the Versy before and assumed it was a regular award-award that people had to vote on; I therefore waited for further news but did not presume that I would have much chance at winning because IMHO I’m not all that versatile. But after his next email to me the wheels started to turn a bit and I realized that for this informal “award” the nomination was equal to a win, provided one fulfills the rules of acceptance, which are as follows:
1) Thank the award-giver(s) and link back to them in your post.
2) Tell your readers seven (7) things about yourself.
3) Give this award to up to fifteen (15) recently discovered bloggers.
4) Contact those bloggers and let them in on the exciting news.
I knew I’d have no trouble with three of those; it was the third one which gave me pause because I’m actually quite soft-hearted when it comes to my friends and I didn’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings by excluding him! So I thought about it for a few days and decided that I would add two criteria of my own: the recipients should be truly versatile, i.e. post on more than one topic (or at least a broad range of stuff within that topic) and should be relatively new to blogging (established no earlier than 2010). Since as I see it the “award” is really a way of calling others’ attention to bloggers, I feel those who need it most aren’t well-established and popular blogs but rather ones which IMHO don’t get enough attention.
So, first of all, a big “Thank You!” to The Naked Listener, who is a regular reader and commenter here since at least early December; you may not only be interested in his blog, but in his other 15 nominations (he cheated a teensy bit) as well. To my protest that I wasn’t all that versatile a blogger he responded that I deserved it “for being as versatile as anyone could ever be talking about whores and the law.” I reckon I can’t really deny that!
Seven Things About Maggie McNeill
I’m pretty open with saying things about myself in this blog, so I decided to tell you a few things that A) I don’t recall mentioning before, which B) aren’t likely to come up in posts in the near future.
1) I don’t actually have a favorite color; I have various favorites for various things, and sometimes even those change. The only color I never wear is yellow, because it makes my skin seem sallow and results in people asking me “are you feeling well?” I change my nail polish color every three weeks; purple during Carnival, red near Valentine’s Day, green for the vernal equinox, pastels for the rest of the spring, sapphire blue at the beginning of July, metallics for the rest of the summer, earth-tones in autumn, black at Halloween and the shiniest red I can find for Yuletide.
2) My favorite recording artists are The Beatles, Blondie, Heart, Meat Loaf, Joe Satriani and Vangelis; I’m also rather partial to Rush and Blue Oyster Cult, and there are lots of others I like enough to own several CDs of. My favorite composers are Bach and Beethoven.
3) I don’t care much for broadcast media; I stopped watching network television about 1980, public and independent television in the mid-‘90s, and cable about ten years ago. And I haven’t listened to the radio since the early ‘90s. But I have a really huge collection (600+) of music CDs, and a even bigger one (1500+) of DVDs. My secret: I never, ever, ever pay full price; at least 80% of my discs are used, and I burned at least 10% of my collection to disc myself.
4) I don’t know how many books I have, but it’s a lot. Definitely more than the DVDs, and that’s not even counting the cookbooks or the comics.
5) Unless I’m working outside I prefer skirts to pants, and my favorite clothes are these wonderful embroidered rayon dresses which come from India. They come in every color imaginable and a large variety of styles, and are very figure-flattering. When I must wear jeans, I try to get them in colors rather than plain old blue, though that’s much harder nowadays than it used to be (in the ‘80s and ‘90s I could find green, white, purple, pink or magenta with no problem at all). I like spandex but can’t stand polyester, and I won’t wear a nightgown unless it’s made of either silk or nylon.
6) I love to cook and bake, and I make EVERYTHING from scratch except phyllo (the premade stuff is actually cheaper and better) and a couple of quick-fixes to be used in dire emergencies. Oh, and it’s just as cheap to buy cheese already grated as it is to buy the blocks and grate it oneself. My favorite appliance is my Kitchen Aid stand mixer, which is IMHO a girl’s best friend.
7) I need three pillows to sleep; two for my head and the third to go sort of between my tits to keep me from rolling from my side onto my stomach (which since my boob job is far too uncomfortable). I can’t sleep on my back at all.
My Nominees for the Next Award (in alphabetical order)
I’m only choosing ten because all the others I might have picked are either not really blogs per se or else they’re older and more established than I’m allowing.
1) A.K. Smith Books (sex work, but versatile topics)
2) Brandy’s Bedroom (the only hooker-blogger I know who is nearly as prolific as I am)
3) Econjeff (practically the definition of “versatile”)
4) FreedomWonk (“Public policy through the lens of liberty…and other stuff”)
5) I Hadn’t Meant to Tell You This… (ruminations on all sorts of things!)
6) Isle of Hemingway (sex work, politics, economics and more)
7) Little Revolutions (“capricious spells of neurotic obsession on various subjects”)
8) Sex Hysteria (far more versatile than its name would suggest, and this award is a shameless attempt to get Dave to start updating it again)
9) Sincerely, Kelly James (sex work, civil liberties, politics, philosophy…)
10) Strippr (mostly about stripping, but with a lot of attention to other sex work as well)
If your blog doesn’t appear here or in my links and you think it’s one I might be interested in, send me a link! As you’ve probably noticed, I often call attention to other blogs I feel might interest my readers.
Woohoo! I made a list! A good one 🙂
What cookbooks do you use? Or… would you share some of your recipes?
Do you make your own pasta?
I’ve shared one recipe before, and I’ll certainly share others in the future. The cookbooks I use most often are The Better Homes and Gardens Cook Book, Best Recipes from the Backs of Boxes, Bottles, Cans and Jars, The Culinary Arts Institute Encyclopedic Cookbook, Pots, Pans and Pioneers and River Road Recipes II. I also have a few ethnic cookbooks and The Joy of Cooking handy, and of course a card file and scrapbook with recipes I’ve developed or adapted myself, found in newspapers or got from friends.
I used to make my own pasta, but nowadays I don’t make my own standard pasta (spaghetti, rigatoni, rotini, etc) because it’s cheap and I don’t find the homemade tastes that much better. But I do make my own ravioli and gnocchi because they’re much better than the store-bought ones.
If you’re looking for a particular recipe let me know. 😉
Good Lord you are a sister from another mister! My favorite recipe book is “Best Recipes from the Backs of Boxes”. I also have the book “Vindication of the Rights of Whores” which if I ever find in my boxes of books, I’ll send to you if someone hasn’t sent it to you from your Amazon list. Oh and don’t even get me started on the music list. With a few modifications my “7” things will just be referred back to this post LOL.
Best Recipes from the Backs… is one of the best cookbooks ever, and its author, Ceil Dyer, is from Baton Rouge. My only complaint about it is that the index sucks!
I’m also glad to hear you’re a fellow connoisseur of fine classic rock! 😉
I’m partial to Mediterranean food. I like to use The Mediterranean Diet Cookbook. The author of that cookbook agrees with you that fresh pasta isn’t worth the effort for the little difference in taste it makes… although there is a restaurant near here (San Fernando Valley) that makes awesome fresh pasta.
I’ve also got an Asian cookbook that covers Japanese, Chinese, Indian, and (probably the best overlooked cuisine in the world) Persian.
I dig the title Best Recipes from the Backs of Boxes, Bottles, Cans and Jars. I’ll have to go check it out.
My parents didn’t have the patience to teach me to cook so I have to depend upon cookbooks (The Joy of Cooking is my main reference cookbook) and YouTube for how to cook.
I love gnocchi but it’s probably over my skill level.
Check out my comment above on Best Recipes…, which is probably the best cookbook in existence for its price. I have a good Mediterranean cookbook, but I mostly use it for the Greek and Middle Eastern recipes like hummus and moussaka; the Italian stuff was largely worked out by trial and error to meet my husband’s very high standards for that particular cuisine (I count my reverse-engineering of a panettone recipe to be among my greatest culinary accomplishments).
The Joy of Cooking is IMHO overly enamored of complication and tends to be very snobbish with ingredients, so I only use it when I can’t find a recipe anywhere else. But as it turns out, my gnocchi recipe came from its pages. And actually, it isn’t as hard as you might think. Read the recipe in JOC and I think you’ll agree. And don’t bother baking the potatoes in an oven; they work fine in the microwave as long as you use regular russets (not those gigantor “baking potatoes”), wrap each one tightly in plastic wrap (trust me) and set the microwave to one extra potato than you actually have, then let them sit in there for 5 minutes after the power goes off. Remove the plastic carefully with a fork (it will be very hot) and voila!
The version I have was published in 1993. Do you know if there was a more recent one published?
Which one, Joy of Cooking or Best Recipes?
Best Recipes…
That’s the same edition I have, from Galahad Books. It was first published in 1979. 🙂
Darn. I say we write this Dyer person and demand (aka ask nicely) an updated version!
Well, she had adult children in 1979 and no publications I can see since 1987, so I suspect she’s either passed on or is quite elderly by now. 🙁
I’m going to have to learn to scald milk and poach. 🙂
Not for gnocchi! That’s pretty much just bake, mix, knead and boil. 🙂
Ah-ha!
Recipes I and II for gnocchi called for scalded milk… and they don’t use potatoes.
Hmm… recipe III uses potatoes and doesn’t called for scalded milk. That one looks easier… boil, stir, beat, flour, roll & cut, boil, and (optionally) bake.
“Gnocchi” in Italian just means “dumpling”, but colloquially it refers to “gnocchi di potate”, i.e. potato gnocchi. But “roll and cut” isn’t the authentic method of shaping; one pulls pieces off with one’s hands, rolls them quickly between the palms and then slightly presses them to flatten. The resulting gnocchi should be about the size of the first joint of a woman’s thumb, i.e. a bit smaller than the joint of your thumb unless your hands are small.
My husband likes them with a gorgonzola cheese sauce (you can use blue cheese if you prefer); I’ll be happy to share my recipe for it if you like.
A story I wrote went into quite a bit of detail about what the main character ate (perhaps because I couldn’t spend any time describing what she was wearing 😉 ). So I included recipes at the end.
One of these recipes was for a cheesy tuna pasta sauce a friend had given me. The only thing I changed was that the tuna was fresh instead of canned, because I felt that my character’s parent would insist on it.
One of the many Italian words my family did not teach me… my great-grandfather used to say, “You’re in America now, you speak English!”. But I did learn to say “mangia, mangia”. 🙂
I have kind of big hands… I can hit an octave and one step on a standard piano. How big should they be?
A gorgonzola cheese sauce sounds interesting… what’s in it? Is it like an alfredo?
Since your hands are large, probably the size of the first joint on your index finger or just a tad bigger; definitely not as big as the joint on your thumb! Call it maybe an inch long and 3/4″ wide.
The sauce isn’t hard to make; do you know how to make a roux? In a medium saucepan combine 1/4 cup flour and 1/4 cup olive oil; stir them together over medium heat until all the lumps are gone (this shouldn’t even take a full minute). Then add 3 cups of whole milk and stir well; add 1/2 teaspoon of salt and 1/4 teaspoon each of pepper, granulated garlic, basil and nutmeg. If you haven’t got granulated garlic, squeeze one clove of garlic in a garlic press and let the fluid run into the sauce, or else chop the clove VERY fine and add it to the oil and flour (before the milk). Keep stirring over medium heat until the sauce thickens and starts to bubble, then stir it for one minute more. Reduce the heat, add 6 ounces of Gorgonzola and stir until the cheese completely melts, keeping it warm until the gnocchi is ready.
The best thing about this sauce is it’s all-purpose; by changing the cheese and the spices you can make a variety of different flavors. Sometimes I add chopped, cooked chicken to a Parmesan sauce (heavier on the basil) and serve it over penne rigate. And I even use a variation on it for nachos (using cheddar cheese and Mexican spices, of course). 🙂
The Way to Cook by Julia Child is a masterpiece. And when I tried her recipe for puff pastry (to top a pot pie), it was magnificent! Worked perfectly. It seems fussy, but it was remarkably simple. I’ll probably never buy phyllo again.
I know those dresses you’re talking about, and I love them. There is nothing more feminine than the feel of soft cotton brushing your ankles. So sexy!
I have at least a dozen of those dresses in a number of colors – pink, rust, green, blue, grey, brown, white – and almost as many style variations (spaghetti straps, sleeves, separate top and skirt, wraparound), and I get compliments from both men and women (including, on occasion, whistles and catcalls!) But you know that picture was the only good one I could find on the internet? Every other one was very tiny or showed the dress folded or hanging shapelessly on a mannequin.
Absolutely Brandy, it is a great list! Thank you to Maggie and will be following up with awards of my own ASAP 🙂
Wow! Thanks, Maggie. I’m very flattered. 🙂
It’s well-deserved. And the same goes for Brandy and Kelly. 😀
About dresses: have you played around with kanga, sari, pareo, or other wrapped clothing? I think they would look good on your figure, and there’s something innately feminine and sexy about them.
Of course, there is an art to it, so you’d want to make sure you’d perfected it before going out in public (unless you’ve just been wanting an excuse for undressing in public: “Darn it! my dress fell off AGAIN! I guess I’m not as good at tying those knots as I thought I was.” 😉 ).
I have a couple of sarongs, but I’ve never found a sari for sale at a price I liked. 🙂
Maggie, at the risk of having my knuckles wrapped for going off topic, there’s been a debate raging on some blogs about the “daughter test” proposed by economist Steven Levitt with Ross Douthat in agreement. Levitt wrote that he wouldn’t mind his daughter gambling but would mind her whoring, so the latter should be illegal while the former shouldn’t. This seems like the sort of thing you could tee up and knock into the upper deck.
Yeah, I saw that on some blog the other day and I wondered how anyone could buy into such an obvious fallacy. Would he approve of his daughter being an alcoholic or marrying an idiot, gaining 300 pounds and spending the rest of her life sitting in front of the TV set? I’ll bet he wouldn’t, so does that mean we should prohibit alcohol and TV, put the government in charge of marriage and install forced dieting for those over the mandated weight? How about all the racists who wouldn’t approve of their daughters marrying black men? Or members of weird fundamentalist sects who don’t think their daughters should be educated? How about radical lesbian feminists who don’t approve of their daughters wearing makeup or marrying men? And I’d be pretty peeved if my daughter became a cop, so let’s ban all marriage, makeup, education and the police as well.
I may end up doing a column on it, but I’d honestly be embarrassed to because it’s like shooting ducks in a barrel.
That was my feeling too. I have a daughter and wouldn’t want her to be a prostitute (no disrespect). But a) that’s not my decision; b) I *do* want her to grow up in a country that believes that she owns herself, her life and her sexuality and that no government can tell her what do with any of them unless she’s harming someone else. And I want her to grow up where whores are not treated like second-rate citizens.
I googled this “daughter test” thing you people are speaking of and had to stop after reading the commentary on http://reason.com/blog/2011/06/01/online-poker-and-steve-levitts#commentcontainer
So much material there, and my daughter is looking at me strangely because I am cracking up at some of the comments there.
[…] June 6th I was nominated by Maggie McNeill for The Versatile Blogger Award. What the hell is that? I asked the same, having never heard of it […]