July 4th, Not Asbury Park Even A Little Bit

I've only been away from the States on July 4th one other time.  We were in Amsterdam, and had decided to visit the Heineken brewery, where there is a hard-drinking beer sampling at the tour's end.  Around went the mugs and the small bits of Dutch cheese, and there was a Special Prize announced for anyone whose birthday it was on that day.  Ken and I were sitting amidst a group of Very Dazed backpackers (one of whom had actually lit up a joint in the lift on his way up to the tour).  And the Very Dazed backpackers began to chant, "USA!  USA!  USA!" There were a few loud exhortations about how All Americans There should get a Special Prize because it was our National Birthday.  And then more drunken, stoned hooting.

O, Lord.  We stared into our beers.  This was just before the Bush administration ran our Ship of State onto the rocks. That episode also marked the first time I was ever out of the States and really REALLY embarrassed to be an American.  This was before Iraq and torture, though.  This was before Ken and I had our conversations about how we should just let the nice folks at the Edinburgh Festival (our next overseas jaunt) assume that we WERE Canadians, as Scots often will, hearing an accent that sounds like ours.

We spent the rest of that day in Amsterdam pretending we'd never heard of the Fourth of July.

It's different this year in Berlin.

First of all, we have a brilliant statesman for a President.  OK, a lefty like me is going to have some issues with the guy, a man who's essentially a centrist Democrat who divides ideas into smart and dumb instead of left and right--but I refuse to be part of the circular firing squad that has been the American Left Wing for far too long.  Loyal opposition is one thing.  Essentially teaming up with the character assassins on the right without thinking about the results of policy is something else.  But this is no time to get into all that.  

Let's face it--Obama rocked Berlin, not too long ago.  And despite whatever qualms anyone might have about him, America looks  radically different over here than it used to, and it's a HUGE change for the better.  For real.  

Last night, we went to hear an organ concert.  I happen to love organ music, even when it's not mixed into the background of an Arcade Fire track.  Unfortunately, this one was a little bit like watching paint dry until the very last piece, Smetana's nationalistic "The Moldau".  That rocked.  And we walked back to our apartment.  At Alexanderplatz, a Michael Jackson impersonator was moonwalking amidst the roses and candles at the local shrine to MJ. 

Back at our apartment, a cool breeze blew in through the terrace, where we sat outside listening to Randoradio--Treavor Hasting's excellent July 4th show.  It felt good to hear something American and 4th of July-ish.  Treavor put on The Comedian Harmonists for us during voice breaks, and Robyn Hitchcock, of course, who defies national boundaries.  

And you are not going to believe this, but I swear it's true--somewhere in this city last night, there were fireworks.  We didn't see them, but we heard them for sure.

Off to Museum Island today...    

Holiday in Berlin, Full-blown

So I've had the Zappa song on my brain ever since the plane landed...was it only yesterday?  The house sitters are taking care of the cats High Atop The Potter Building (and probably drinking up all our cocktail makings, but that's fine.  They deserve it).

Yes, Rando fans, you are hearing me pre-recorded this month.  And Tom Jones, just shut up about that being redundant.  I KNOW it is, but it's what folks say.  So there.

The good news is that you get to hear about what it's like for this American girl to live for a month just slightly east of where the Berlin Wall used to be, something that would have been inconceivable (not to mention downright impossible) for me as a child.  As a child, I watched movies about people who got machine gunned for sneaking over The Wall, people who were SPIES.  As a child, the kids in my neighborhood played War, which was always WWII, and they were always fighting the Krauts, a word that my parents told me was offensive, but I didn't need them to tell me that.  I knew it in my stomach.  

My grandma was German, and the first time I was ever in Germany and walked into a restaurant serving old-fashioned food, I got a nose full of a smell I hadn't smelled since Nana was alive. I was born in New York. I don't live here. I've been here three times, counting this trip.  I don't speak the language, except to say hello to cats.  But I'm from here.  I am.

Enough time has passed since the War that when you say you are of German heritage, folks think more about the "Do you want to pet my monkey?" skit on SNL than make stupid assumptions about racism and anti-Semitism.

So, that was pretty heavy, but there you have it.

And it's sort of what's happened here: big shopping centers in what used to be a no-man's zone where the Wall was.  Buildings that stood roofless after WWII now fashionably rehabbed and minus the shrapnel scars I saw even eight years ago, the last time I was back.  And a kick-ass Russian restaurant a few blocks from the temporary home of the Potter building, here in East Berlin.  No irony served with the borscht.  

I had a gin and tonic tonight, for those of you on cocktail patrol.  I wasn't into Visiting My Roots at that moment.  It's hotter than the hinges of Hell here, and nothing's AC.  But that's OK.

We were at the Berlin Zoo today, an old-fashioned people-centric place where you can actually see the animals up close and personal.  It may not be as kind as the more modern zoos where all you ever see is a tail sticking out from behind some authentic African fauna, but it was a fine place to spend a hot afternoon.  There was a blunt, honest sign in the lion house, advising visitors that the big cats will pee on them if they bother the big cats.  Lions can do that.   And in the right mood, I understand the temptation.

Think I'm going to have another sit out on the balcony and then hit the hay.  It's scary late here.

I'll keep you all posted.

 

 

Is Mercury in Thermometer?

...or is it in Retrorockets?  What a week of train wrecks and misery it's been!!  I have little to say in print except to urge anyone reading this to listen to Randoradio for fast, fast relief.  Have a virtual gin & tonic with me today (Friday the 26th) at 4 EDT.

And let me know what YOUR favorite tonic water is!!  Yeah, I'll play some Michael Jackson, even though everyone else is, too...

Two Summer Drink Recipes

So I've been shooting my mouth off on the air about how to mix these things...seems  only fair that I give you folks SOMETHING of a recipe to go on.

First of all: The Frozen Strawberry Daiquiri

A note--Blenderized drinks are just FINE.  Really.  I know the snobs down at Pegu in NYC aren't there yet, but as long as you use decent spirits and fresh fruit, you'll be fine.  So here you go.  This is enough for at LEAST six drinks, anyway.  Probably seven or eight.

Ingredients:

A big (double-sized) box of good, fresh strawberries, organic if possible (strawberries are one of those things that really get nailed with nasty chemicals if you go with the conventional ones; it's worth shelling out)

12 oz of silver rum

4 oz each of  FRESH lime juice and either triple sec or Cointreau

2 or 3 tablespoons Me Oko strawberry vodka OR blackberry brandy

Put the fruit and rum in the blender and liquify thoroughly.  Pass through a fine strainer to try to get rid of as many seeds as you can (not absolutely necessary, but it makes for a more pleasant drink).  Mix in a large pitcher with lime juice and cointreau.  Taste for balance, adding a little more juice or liqueur if it seems too tart or too sweet.

Pour about half the mixture back into the blender and add about two cups of ice--cubed or cracked, either way.  Blend well, stopping to stir a few times, until the texture is very smooth.  You'll hear the blender make a slightly higher whirring sound as this happens.

Pour into whatever festive glasses you have, garnishing with a berry, a slice of lime, or a silly umbrella.  Drink with straws.

*****************

And Second of all:

The Perfected White Sangria

White Sangria is the sort of thing that also gets eyeball-rolls from drinks snobs, but it's a fine drink for a summer brunch or for sipping on a really hot night.  Again, ingredients are all: use decent spirits and fresh fruit and all will be well.  Plenty of drinks come out of this generous recipe, the number depending on how much seltzer you end up adding in the last step--half and half works well, as the wine mix has LOTS of brandies in it.

1 LARGE (1.5 liters) bottle of  white wine--something good enough to drink on its own, and not too light

1 half cup each of the following: 

applejack

cointreau or triple sec

pear brandy

plain old grape brandy--nothing too fancy, here, but don't cheap out totally

One granny smith apple

Two or three ripe kiwi fruits

A good handful of seedless grapes, red or white

One ripe pear

a handful of mint (don't add until you are ready to serve)

Mix the wine with the brandy and liqueur in a large pitcher.  Taste for sweetness.  Some folks add a dash of simple syrup or bar sugar, but I find that OTT.  Slice the fruit, except for the grapes, peeling the kiwis first.  Add to the wine mixture.  Cover and allow to steep for a few hours or overnight.  Add the mint and stir.  Serve, mixed about half and half with seltzer.  You can keep the steeped fruit in the drink--the pears will be soft, but everything else will still be pretty--and/or garnish with a bit more fruit if you have some more around.  DON'T be tempted to put citrus fruit in here--it'll blow the balance.

Cheers!

Spring and a Rando-versary

How did all this dust get on this blog again?   I'm sneezing--safely--into my elbow-pit.  And ick.  Sorry, but sneezing into your elbow-pit is kinda gross...

 OK, OK! I digress.  Could it be that I haven't written here since February?

Yeah.   It could be.  It could be indeed. 

And so much has happened!  Swine flu--or as Rando DJ Tom Jones likes to call it, Hini (pronounced high-knee) flu--!  The stock market pointing (a bit shakily) in an upward direction!  Spring!  And the first year anniversary of Randoradio.com!  

If we're talking about the viral spread of something, could we have it be Randoradio?  I mean, that would mean a Better World For Us All, I think.  

Why don't I just tell you about the GAGA arts festival and the Randoradio open studio stuff we did this weekend?  I did three (count 'em, three) shows in three days, more daily broadcasting than I have done since the 1970's.  That was cool on a purely ego-trip level, but  I was babbling by the end of it all...

The real heroine of the weekend was Blue, who charmed the crowds coming through our radio station, loaded programming onto the Randopods (which we've taken to calling Creatures, after her suggestion), and rocked an amazing show on Sunday afternoon, putting up some pretty nice numbers of streams running.  

It was rainy and cool, and there were a number of great moments, like the guy who used to play with The Left Bank who wandered in, and the guy who'd played with Pharaoh Saunders.  Folks materialized and became Randoradio members, just like that.  Plenty of people signed our email list.  And we watched the number of streams we were running climb during the weekend.  All in all, most gratifying.

I interviewed the marketing director of Me Oko vodka, which is made in the same arts complex where we have our studios.  His name is Jeff Cohen, and we talked for some time about the pleasant libation that is his business these days--an interesting quaff made of vodka infused with huge amounts of either strawberries or ginger.  The stuff is almost liqueur-sweet, but not quite.  It's not fake-y tasting, either; it simply tastes like strawberry or ginger.  Works well as a cocktail ingredient, and a little glass is also nice after dinner, with ice.   

Other artists in the GAGA complex put our station on their computers for their guests to listen to, and suddenly, we were a local station as much as we have been a world-wide one.  I closed my show on Sunday announcing a bathroom make-over raffle over a B-52's record.  Now, don't get me wrong--we LOVE it when the ice station in Antarctica listens to Rando, and when our servicefolk in Iraq tune us in, and some of them do.  But local buzz is just fun.

I'm listening to Tom, The Logovore, right now, and he's playing the Traffic cut I meant to get to on Saturday and didn't have time for.  So it's all good.

Happy Birthday To Us.

And time for me to finally read the Times Magazine that I never got to yesterday.

 

Groundhogs and Men Forcing Things

I cannot get enough of the videos on Youtube of Mayor Bloomberg getting bitten by Chuck G. Hogg, the Staten Island Groundhog.  They delight me.  It is so fitting to watch Mayor Michael Bloomberg get chomped.

Now, don't get me wrong.  I don't hate Mayor Bloomberg.  Up here high atop the Potter Building, we happen to like him tons more than we liked Rudy (except for about three hours after the attacks on 9/11, when we weren't thinking too clearly).  But Bloomberg acted--forgive me, men--like such a  old school GUY yesterday. Face it: men force things.   If something doesn't work, men tend to shove it as hard as they can.  And then it breaks and they have an opportunity to get out the power tools and make a real mess. 

So the men who were obviously in charge at the Staten Island Zoo yesterday (Christine Quinn, who was also present, had the sense to stay out of the way) had decided that The Groundhog Would Not See His Shadow and Spring Would Come Early.  They already had a little banner all made up for the TV cameras announcing this fact.  

And then Chuck G. Hogg decided NOT to come out of the little birdhouse-looking thing they'd put him in, not for food, and not for kids chanting his name--this even though EVERYONE knows that lots of seven-year-olds chanting in their maniac Lord-of-the-Flies way is JUST what makes groundhogs long to display themselves to glaring TV lights.  Some fool went for the standard grown-up hubba hubba joke: "C'mon out!  Your girlfriend's out here!"

The mayor, a man of action, offered the groundhog some corn on the cob.  The groundhog twice pulled it back into his house.  The mayor took the corn away from the groundhog to tease him out with it.  Predictably, the groundhog bit the mayor, hard, right through his fancy black leather gloves.  And so, in true alpha-male fashion, the mayor Forced Things: grabbed the groundhog, who was by then attempting to escape, and held him up to the cameras.  The miserable beast squirmed.  His real handlers hustled him back into the safety of the cat carrier in which they'd brought him to the event, poor thing.  And the Spring-is-coming banner was unfurled.  

Mayor Bloomberg appeared later in the day with a band aid on his finger, cracking jokes about terrorist groundhogs and courageously keeping the city safe from same.  News reports later noted that since the Chuck G. Hogg had been raised in captivity, that there was no rabies risk to the mayor--and that his tetanus shots were up to date.

I would like to note that it is snowing in New York today.  Pretty hard, in fact.  I love it when a plan comes together.  

Mollycat, The Inauguration and A Winter Noontime

The house is empty, and I have a few minutes to blog away.

Perhaps I should start with the mundane and work towards the profound.  This morning, my cat Molly jumped up on the table next to me and attempted to steal a piece of bacon off my plate--a brazen and rude act of bad-kitty-ness never before attempted in our kitchen.  I dumped her off the table, she glared at me from the floor, and I wondered what kind of metaphor that was.  And then I suddenly thought of the chopper bearing the Bushes up, up and away from the White House.

Looting.  I have been thinking about what looting means a lot lately.

So here's what I decided: the nation has dumped Bush down onto the kitchen floor because he was looting and it took the stock market crash and the waves of misery spreading out from it to make us realize it.  Lots of us could deal with him lying, but stealing--looting--that's when you buy a gun and stand in front of your hurricane-ravaged house with it.  That's when you finally make the politcal phone calls and drag  your friends to the polls.

In our case, in America's case, it had to get as brazen as Mollycat's bacon-grab before we finally got off our asses.  But how gorgeous and inspiring and heartening that awakening, that rising to our national feet has been!

It hasn't hurt that we have an extraordinary, brilliant, and highly disciplined leader in Barack Obama.  He ran a fabulous campaign, and he is setting up a dream team of an administration. He will certainly do things that will piss me off in the next four years.  I wasn't nuts about the Rick Warren pick for the opening prayer at the Inaugural.  But I understood where he was coming from and why he did it.  He's everyone's President, not just mine. 

I know there are folks who believe that my kind of thinking--looking for symbols and portents and metaphor in all manner of places--is irrational.  And it is, but I believe that there are many kinds of wisdom, and that the intuitive can be as important as the logical.  I think that the intuitive can dance in front of the logical, in fact.

The other big metaphor lately has been the Miracle On The Hudson, much derided by hard-nosed types who call it just good flying and good luck.   But it all seems to be part of the same story: a disaster narrowly averted by a serious-minded, highly trained leader who did the right thing at at the right time.  Maybe there was a bacon-grab here, too; perhaps the plane was stricken by cost-cutting by the airline as much as it was by a flock of birds.  We'll know more about that in the weeks to come.

But it was like the Inauguration and the election.  People, inspired by the captain's leadership AND because of their better angels, Did The Right Thing.  They drove their ferryboats out to the plane and got other people off.  The passengers mostly helped each other, although there was some folly and panic (hardly to be wondered at).

It feels like some vast corner has been turned, like we can all breathe a bit easier.  And it feels like there are all these little portents, like love notes left around from God, it really does.  Happy landings.  A quiet house.  The cat, seemingly penitent, purring in my lap.