Tag: recipe

ICELAND

WheelTug picked up its eleventh airline yesterday — Icelandair.  I know the Arctic is not technically a continent — just frozen water — and that probably the folks at the Iceland Tourism Department would rather identify their country with Europe than with the Arctic anyway. But if the Arctic were the eighth continent, and the island of Iceland were on it instead of just sort of rising up out of the ocean near it, that would allow us to say “11 airlines on four continents.”

QUICK CORN

Just in time for summer, Cooking Like A GuyTM, part 63.  I haven’t posted a recipe in a long time because since we switched to WordPress I haven’t figured out how elegantly to insert the TRADEMARK symbol.  And still haven’t, but I trust you. [UPDATE: Thanks to Mark L., I now do! Cooking Like A Guy™.]

So here, to compensate at least a little, two new recipes.  Starting with corn.

Step one: buy corn.

Step two: microwave to taste.

Seriously, it’s that simple.  If it’s good corn, just three or four minutes, husks and tassles and all, and it should be amazing.  When it cools down a little, shuck, salt, pepper, eat.

INSTANT BAKLAVA

The simplest way to cook baklava is just to buy some.  But who ever thinks to do that?  Instead:

1.  Pour a little granola into a small bowl.  Or corn flakes, raisin bran — whatever.

2.  Dip a spoon into a jar of honey.  I know, honey is not that manly, but everyone should have a jar – it’s honey. How can you not?  Bears love honey, and bears are manly.  You could name a football team after bears.  So just dip the damn spoon into the damn jar and then . . .

3.  Putting the base of the spoon onto the floor of the bowl, push some of the granola on top, and then – still holding the now-honey-and-granola-laden spoon level with one hand, take a small knifeful or forkful of I Can’t Believe It’s Not Butter Light (or actual butter, but I’m trying to delight you, not kill you) and dab it on top of the granola, scraping it off the knife or fork with the edge of the spoon.

4.  Put the spoon in your mouth, close your lips, and, as you pull the spoon back out, leaving all the granola and ICBINBL in your mouth — but just some of the honey to swirl around and just make you crazy it’s so good, just as baklava does, but without having had to bake anything or clean anything (read on).

5.  Repeat until all the granola from the bowl and all the honey from the spoon are gone and you’ve licked the spoon and any honey that dripped onto the bowl, so everything is perfectly clean, as if you were a cat – though, being a guy, you have a dog.  By which I mean a dog – a large, sloppy Labrador retriever or somebody, not one of those dogs that really are so tiny and (let’s just come right out and say it) French, they’re barely dogs at all.

And that, my friends, is how a guy makes baklava.

RELIGION

Tamara Hendrickson (responding to yesterday’s post):  “My mom has a bumper sticker that says ‘Proud Member of the Religious Left.’  I’ve always loved it.”

☞ Blessed are the meek.  Turn the other cheek.  Love thy neighbor.  Judge not lest ye be judged.  Cut taxes on billionaires.  Cut Medicaid.  Bomb Iraq.  Increase corporate power.  Religion confuses me.  All I know for sure is that the market is closed tomorrow for Good Friday.

BRAVE NEW WORLD . . .

I mean really — have you seen the video at the end of this piece about Google’s still-in-development glasses?  I suppose they could become the next Segway — not quite the revolution that was planned.  Maybe people will prefer to wait for the implant: Google Brain.  And maybe the glasses won’t interact with us as effortlessly as the video suggests — certainly Siri on my iPhone is nothing if not erratic in her flashes of  comprehension.  But can you watch the demo and not be intrigued? And excited?  (And perhaps a little exhausted?) What a time to be alive.  We have hot water!  And soon, maybe, these.

. . . IF ONLY WE CAN SUSTAIN IT

The thing is, with all the dazzle and comfort and luxury so many of us enjoy (electricity! zippers!) — many of them all but unimaginable until the last few generations — there’s also the growing risk we will hurtle off the rails.  Here’s one cautionary analysis: MIT researchers predict ‘global economic collapse’ by 2030.  We’re not on a sustainable path.  As a species, we need to take control of our future and make sensible decisions.  Our friends on the right who believe that the free market — unburdened by taxes and regulation, unguided by broad long-term goals — will solve all . . . or who believe that The Rapture is coming, so what difference does it make anyway? . . . and who increasingly distrust science . . . are not the ones to lead the way forward.

BACON!

So I mentioned the amazing carmelized bacon hors d’oeuvres a friend serves (“death on a platter,” as I called them), and one of you, generously describing himself as “my biggest fan,” wrote asking for the recipe.

I refused.  “Why on earth would I want to kill off my biggest fan?” I wrote back.  “The truth is, I have no idea how to make them – just really thick bacon squares baked (I guess) in loads of brown sugar. Truly evil.”

He then went and found the recipe (thanks, Bill!):

Carmelized Bacon via Paula Deen

Ingredients:

1/4 cup firmly packed brown sugar

2 teaspoons chili powder

8 slices thick-cut bacon

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

Line a rimmed baking sheet with aluminum foil. Set a cooling rack inside the prepared pan and set aside. In a shallow dish, combine the brown sugar and chili powder. Dredge the bacon slices in the brown sugar mixture and arrange the bacon on the rack. Bake in the preheated oven until crisp, about 20 minutes. Transfer to a serving plate and serve.

Another of you sent this amazing recipe for bacon taco shells (thanks Kevin).

And yet another of you found this article on bacon coffins (thanks, Mark).

Which – seeing their $2,995 price tag – reminded me that I had been meaning to offer you this sad money-saving tip:

THE FRUGAL EXIT

Aka:  “If the bacon squares do kill you.”

We are conditioned to feel guilty caring whether a casket costs $4,500 or $995; an urn, $350 or $129.  And look: I don’t begrudge funeral home workers a good living — this can’t be easy work.  Still, it’s probably tougher on the owners than the employees, and I’ll bet they get more of the markup.

In any case, bestpricecaskets.com is open 24/7 and advises:

Do Not Tell The Funeral Home About Purchasing Our Casket Before You Get Their Itemized Funeral Price List. Call Us Before Talking to ANY Funeral Home, Because Everything You Tell the Funeral Home Affects Your Funeral Pricing. We will tell you what to say.

It Is Federal Law: Funeral Homes MUST receive our caskets and NOT charge you any extra fees! This cuts your funeral cost by up to 80%. We supply funeral homes and we also sell directly to you! Same Price. Buy Direct.

All because you ate too many bacon taco shells.

THANK YOU, GROVER NORQUIST

Following up from yesterday, may I say one more thing about Grover Norquist?

Things were pretty good in the Nineties: low unemployment and an economy pretty much in balance, with everyone getting richer and our National Debt shrinking relative to the size of the economy as a whole.

But thanks to Grover Norquist, things are even better now. Sure, we’re on the brink of national bankruptcy, politically paralyzed, and a third of us are below, at, or barely above the poverty line . . . but we have lower taxes! And if we’re rich, much lower taxes. God forbid we ever make the mistake of going back to a Nineties-style economic balance. The Republicans are all but unanimously pledged to make sure we never do.

IN CASE YOU LIKE NEWT

The new Republican front-runner. Yes, there was the thing about pressing his second wife for a divorce while she was in the hospital. But this is mainly about hucksterism. Pretty devastating – here.

DEPT. OF IRONY

“We have candidates for President now saying that government can’t create jobs. These are guys with government jobs. They’re ON THE GOVERNMENT PAYROLL. Saying government can’t create jobs. Government created YOUR job.” – Lawrence O’Donnell, MSNBC

APRICOT JELL-O

If you ever find yourself in a situation where you’re allowed to eat JELL-O, but not red JELL-O – or even if you don’t – I have pretty wonderful news for you: apricot JELL-O. It’s really good (lemon-lime JELL-O is punishment no one deserves) and you can go even crazier and mix it with Haagen-Dazs peach sorbet. I know a thing or two about cooking.

ENERGY INDEPENDENCE

Twenty-three thrilling minutes from Amory Lovins.

Ultra-lighting saves half the weight and half the fuel – like finding a Saudi Arabia under Detroit. And the stuff absorbs 12 times as much crash energy per pound as steel, so our lighter vehicles would also be safer. The efficiencies in car-making would make the overall ultra-lighting free.

And that’s just the first 10 minutes.

Watch!

KIWI

If you don’t know kiwifruit, today is your day. Granted, I try to “eat local” – it’s mostly about apples this time of year. New Zealand is not exactly next door. But at 50 cents each, and nearly twice the size I’m used to seeing (I just put one on my postage scale: 5 ounces, so 10 cents an ounce, so $1.60 a pound), and soooooo good – well, let’s hear it for the farmers of New Zealand.

And here’s all you do: (1) Buy ’em. (2) Refrigerate ’em. (3) Once they’re cold, cut ’em into quarters “the long way,” from nub to nub. (4) Slurp ’em. Which is to say, hold each quarter in your hand as if it were a tiny watermelon wedge and go to town, leaving only the “rind,” which in this case is the thin brown skin.

Fine points:

• Don’t refrigerate unless/until they’re ripe, which is to say there’s some give when you press your thumb into them. In my experience, they can never really get too ripe.

• They last a long time once you do refrigerate them.

• It’s probably fine, if a little fuzzy, to eat the skin, too, but then you’d have to consider washing them. This is much simpler: cut, slurp, toss, repeat.

• They’re green inside! Isn’t that cool? This is one big berry!

• They’re filled with vitamin C, potassium, and vitamin E. (The skin I just tossed is apparently rich with antioxidants.)

• If you’re allergic to latex, pineapples, or papaya, beware – you may also be allergic to kiwifruit.

• Oh, okay – eat the skin, too. According to this, it’s really good for you.

Now watch Amory.

SHUCK-A-KHAN

Sarah Johnson: “Maybe this is yet more proof I’m not a guy! My shucking method is as follows (works on ALL shellfish): Locate MetroCard, go to Grand Central Station and walk down the ramp to the Oyster Bar. Sit at marble counter and order. Eat when shucked shellfish arrives. Added benefit? I get to watch someone else do hard work perfectly. I love to observe a job well-done!”

Eddie B.: “As a lifelong clammer I have tried many different ways to shuck bivalves. Here’s my favorite: Take an old-style can opener, the kind with a point on it that punches triangular openings in cans. Insert it into the hinge at the backside of the clam. Push firmly while rotating it slightly along its long axis (like you’re drilling back and forth). The tip will work its way into the hinge and eventually the edges will force the shells (valves) apart. Insert the clam knife, or even a butter knife, and scrape the two adductor muscles holding the shells together. Enjoy. Your smashing method certainly works, but you lose the liquor and don’t end up with presentable shells. Also, 5 minutes on the grill will pop ’em right open. Brush with a dab of whatever you like (butter, garlic, salt) and roast for another couple of minutes.”

MORE MUNGER

Skip Sherrod: “You write, ‘He [Munger] is one Republican who favors keeping Social Security just as it is.’ How anyone could favor keeping Social Security ‘just as it is’ is beyond me. The idea was actuarially unsound from the get go and in its present form will be financially unsustainable for future generations. Those I.O.U.s in the Social Security Trust Fund may be counted as assets, but we can’t pay benefits with them. Lord knows there have been enough impending Social Security crisis warnings issued to choke a goat.”

☞ Well, when a super-no-nonsense self-made Republican billionaire takes this view, I’d suggest you not dismiss it out of hand.

The Clinton budget “surpluses” George W. Bush told us were “our money” that we should demand back as tax cuts (mainly for the best off among us) were in large measure not surpluses at all, but cash to be set aside for the Trust Fund. Not as in securities as Merrill Lynch, but as a strong national balance sheet, with low National Debt, that would allow the debt to rise as needed, somewhat, to meet these obligations. Hence President Clinton’s parting theme, as he handed the surplus to his successor: “Save Social Security First.” Meaning: before you spend the surplus on other things, like wars of choice, or squander it on tax cuts for folks who are getting by just fine already. Instead, the Republicans did squander it. Hugely imprudent, huge problem, and I hate that enough Democrats went along to allow it – but tax cuts, once proposed by the chief executive, are very hard to vote against.

All that said, my guess is that Charlie Munger’s off-the-cuff “just as is” wouldn’t preclude a little tinkering around the edges other type I’ve written about in the past. That’s all it would take to get the benefits in line with the demographics. (1) I’d keep 62 as the age for early retirement. But, where currently the full-benefits retirement age rises one month per year to 67 in 2027, I would let it keep rising to 69 in 2051. (Hey: “Seventy is the new fifty-five.”) (2) Where the 6.2% tax rate you and your employer each pay drops to zero on wages above a certain cap, I’d have it drop to 1% instead. Annoying, but not a killer. (And worth paying so that grandma – much as we love her – doesn’t have to move in.) (3) I’d keep raising benefits with inflation. But for higher-income recipients, I’d calculate those benefits based on price inflation, not wage inflation, in years when prices rose slower than wages. Bang: you’re done. A bit of pain around the edges, with plenty of time to prepare for it, and the Social Security problem is solved.

CLINTON GLOBAL INITIATIVE – IMAGINE PEACE

Perhaps the best session was this one you can watch with President Clinton moderating a panel with the Prime Minister of the Palestinian Authority, the Israeli President, and the Crown Prince of Bahrain.

BILL CLINTON ON JOBS

And, as suggested earlier this week, take a few minutes to watch what President Clinton had to say after the Daily Show ran out of time last Thursday – this is the part that only the studio audience (and now you, via the web site) got to see – two 8-minute clips.

DON’T ASK/DON’T TELL

What a disappointment to fall just shy of the 60 required votes. But with the President, the Secretary of Defense, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the House of Representatives, a majority in the Senate, 64% of the Republican electorate and 80% of Democrats all favoring repeal – and with a Federal Disrtrict Court just having ruled the current law unconstitutional – I think we’ll find a way to have open service sooner rather than later. Stay tuned.

TTT

This one only seemed to drop yesterday. Suggested here earlier this month, TTT is now trading ‘ex-dividend,’ meaning that anyone who buys it now will not get the imminent dividend, which in this case is not cash but, rather, a quarter share of KHDHF for each TTT share. So at 6.80, your shares are really worth 6.80 plus 1/4 of 7.60, or about 8.70. I’m holding on.

SHUCKING LIKE A GUY

Finally!

Last Wednesday, we microwaved corn: Zap, shuck, eat.

Today (how much corn could a dumb cluck shuck if a dumb cluck could shuck corn?) we turn to clams.

SHUCKING LIKE A GUY

Here’s how you’re supposed to shuck clams. Simple, elegant – and I totally couldn’t get it to work, so I invented my own method:

1. Be sure to buy cherrystone clams. They’re big and delicious and a third the price of oysters. Little Neck clams are just annoying. There’s a reason they’re called little. Maybe if you’re a seagull they fill the bill*, but not if you’re a human.
2. Be sure they are all happy. The way to know is that they are tightly shut. If someone tries to sell you a clam that’s already open, and possibly smelly, it’s likely a clam that’s passed on to his or her reward. Take no chances.
3. Clean the shells (“with a stiff brush,” say all the guides) because there could be bacteria on the outside that could infect an open wound, like the one you could inflict on yourself trying to open them. And now you are ready to shuck the first one.
4. Wrap it in a dish towel of some sort . . .

“Not my towels!” Charles shouts from the next room.

5. Grab a heavy skillet . . .

“Not my cast iron skillet!” Charles has now appeared for emphasis.

6. Wait for Charles to leave and strike the towel flatly, with authority. [Important: you are not trying to smash the clam, just shuck it. A hammer is too specific; a flat skillet is perfect.]
7. Remove any large pieces of shell, open the now completely acquiescent clam (far too dazed to feel any pain) and enjoy.

That’s it.

Before eating a clam, be sure its liquor is clear, not milky.

ALTERNATE MOLLUSKATION

Here’s how you steam them. Mmmm, mmmm! No shucking required.

But you could also freeze them – just a little, for less than an hour, so their muscles go numb (again, don’t worry: for them it’s like getting stoned) – and they should open enough on their own for you easily to insert the shucking knife as demonstrated by Legal Seafoods’ head chef in the very first link, above.

Or you could do the really smart thing and arrive at the Ocean Grill bar Sunday through Thursday night at 9:30pm, after which the oysters, clams and shrimp are shucked to order, half price.

*Da BUM bum.

DEMOCRATS.ORG

Check out the revamped democrats.org, launched yesterday. There’s a lot there, including links to articles like this encouraging report from Time on the stimulus:

. . . Yes, the stimulus has cut taxes for 95% of working Americans, bailed out every state, hustled record amounts of unemployment benefits and other aid to struggling families and funded more than 100,000 projects to upgrade roads, subways, schools, airports, military bases and much more. But in the words of Vice President Joe Biden, Obama’s effusive Recovery Act point man, “Now the fun stuff starts!” The “fun stuff,” about one-sixth of the total cost, is an all-out effort to exploit the crisis to make green energy, green building and green transportation real; launch green manufacturing industries; computerize a pen-and-paper health system; promote data-driven school reforms; and ramp up the research of the future. “This is a chance to do something big, man!” Biden said during a 90-minute interview with TIME.

For starters, the Recovery Act is the most ambitious energy legislation in history, converting the Energy Department into the world’s largest venture-capital fund. It’s pouring $90 billion into clean energy, including unprecedented investments in a smart grid; energy efficiency; electric cars; renewable power from the sun, wind and earth; cleaner coal; advanced biofuels; and factories to manufacture green stuff in the U.S. The act will also triple the number of smart electric meters in our homes, quadruple the number of hybrids in the federal auto fleet and finance far-out energy research through a new government incubator modeled after the Pentagon agency that fathered the Internet. . . .

☞ And speaking of the government-seeded Internet, democrats.org has a link to the iPhone app I’ve been mentioning that lets you join our army of door-to-door canvassers, tells you which doors to knock on, and receives your report on the results of your door-knocks to enhance our database (and keep people from having their doors knocked on too much). Pretty amazing grassroots tools, neighbor to neighbor. All in an effort to keep the country moving forward toward a brighter future.

RANDOM COOKING TIPS

Just because ketchup turns brown and is a couple of years past its expiration date doesn’t mean it’s not basically fine. It just means you have been unaccountably restraining your ketchup consumption. (Why? Ketchup makes almost anything better! Try it on salmon! Try it with peanut butter and bacon! Try it on tomato slices!) Or else it means you bought several cases at once, on sale, as an investment. Nicely done.

You could shuck an ear of corn, spend a whole lot of time waiting for a pot of water to boil, drop in the corn and wait a few minutes more. Or you could just zap it for two minutes, shuck and eat. (If God did not intend corn to be cooked this way, why would He have invented microwaves?)

Tomorrow: Shucking Like a Guy

SAVE INK

Who’d a thunk. According to these tips, some fonts – like Ecofont– use a lot less ink than others. (Try Century Gothic?) Using readability to print web pages will save the expensive color ink required to print ads you probably didn’t want to print anyway.

THE BEEP

AARP reports that only 15% of hearing-aid shoppers ask for a deal; yet because the markups are so high, most of those who do ask for a deal get one. Tell Gramps.

I’m not going to say I actually receive the AARP Bulletin. But those who do tell me that this list of 99 money-saving tips includes some good ones. And most are not age-specific. For example: Did you know that – whatever your age – you can by-pass maddening voice mail instructions by dialing (in this order) 1 (which by-passes Sprint), * (which by-passes Verizon), and then # (which bypasses AT&T and T-Mobile)? Dial all three in quick succession and one of them should take you straight to the beep.

CORN PUDDING

Maureen Welch: ‘Sounds good. any chance you could post the recipe?’

☞ We had it again last night – to raves:

Charles’s Corn Pudding

Two ears of corn per person
Butter or olive oil to taste
Salt
Pepper
Jalapeno (optional)

Preheat oven to 350°

Husk and thoroughly clean all the silk from the corn. Cut ears in half so they are shorter and easier to manage on the grater. Grate corn on a box grater into a large bowl. I leave a couple of ears ungrated, and, instead, cut the kernels off with a sharp knife to add some texture.

Season however you like. I generally use plenty of coarse salt and black pepper and a very finely chopped fresh jalapeño but tonight I did not have the jalapeno so I substituted a small amount of finely chopped pimento and flat leaf parsley.

Blend thoroughly and then pour/push the seasoned corn mixture into a baking dish, smooth out and dot the top with several small pats of butter pushed into the batter. If you don’t want to use the butter you can drizzle olive oil on the top instead.

Dust the top with a bit more black pepper and course salt. Bake until done – the top should be golden and a little bubbly and the sides start to pull away from the dish. Cooking time will depend on just how much you are making; anywhere from 30 to 50 minutes.

Instead of a baking dish, I usually use a greased cast iron skillet, serving family style but it works just as well and is a bit more formal in individual ramekins baked in a Bain Marie. If it hasn’t gotten as brown as I’d like, I put it under the broiler for a minute or so to crisp up.

☞ If you don’t love it, you must have missed a step. Do it again.

STAND-UP GUY

This all started with the news that the longer you sit, the shorter you live. (Here is corroboration, just published yesterday, from a 14-year study of 123,000 people.)

So some of you suggested standing desks . . .

Clark Cole bought one . . .

And (if I remember his phrasing correctly) “Oh, Mamma” does his back ever hurt now.

He requested your help and you, shall we say, rose to the occasion:

Karen Tiede: “On what is Clark standing? My back feels much better when I have a resilient mat – look at what cashiers stand on in the grocery store.”

Margie Power: “I don’t proselytize about many things in this life, but Pete Egoscue’s books, Pain Free and Pain Free at Your PC, took me from debilitating back pain to no pain back in 2002. Just 15 minutes a day of simple postures makes all the difference. If I get the slightest twinge of back pain nowadays, I do his exercises for a couple of days and all is well.”

Jeff Cox: “Standing properly is fairly easy. Definitely, definitely, have a rest for one foot, a rail or a box or something to keep one foot off the floor. The next time you are in a pub, look at the rail at the bottom of the bar – serving this very purpose. Lifting one foot takes some strain off the back. Resting one’s elbows is probably also a good idea. Others: Work in the middle of the desk, not at the edge. Move around a bit. (Walking is less tiring than standing.) Consider not believing every bit of health advice that comes free from a financial advice website.”

Steve Margerum: “ . . . Maybe he should just take his computer down to his neighborhood bar instead.”

Tom Anthony: “It took me almost three weeks (at age 69) to get used to standing up at my computer all day, especially if I did a long hard run in the morning and was worn out before starting a six-hour computer session. I found it initially very tiring since I had never stood in one position for so long before. But your standing muscles adapt and strengthen. Now, four months later, standing in front of the computer all day long does not bother me at all. It helps to shift your weight about and stand on one leg now and then. I sometimes go through some Yoga positions, e.g Tree Pose, while reading a long article.”

☞ Like Jeff, Tom also mentioned the “bar rail” – and installed one he made from some two-inch Home Depot PVC tubing he had left over from a project. “The bar rail seems counterintuitive,” he writes, “but it is surprisingly effective.”

And he goes on:

“If you go barefoot around the house like I do, you might want to put a soft pad in the area where you stand because bare feet on a hard floor for long periods can be uncomfortable. My pad is an old exercise pad folded over twice so that there are four layers under me. The give of the pad may make you unconsciously keep adjusting your leg and back muscles and that may help avoid fatiguing them. Clark’s problem may be related to the table height. I noticed that his IKEA model had a maximum height of 38 5/8″. I adjusted the height of my table to 40 5/8″ so that my forearms were level with the keyboard – I’m 5′ 10″. If my table were 2″ lower like his, I might be bending forward some to accommodate the lower table height and that would strain the back muscles. He might consider putting a book or two under his monitor/keyboard to raise it and also to tilt the monitor upwards.”

Tom offers these suggestions from an exercise physiologist for people who sit all day.

Michael Choquette: “I don’t think there is any single proper way to stand at a stand-up desk for the same reason that an entire day of sitting is bad: a body doesn’t like to be forced into any single alignment for hours on end. I stand: at attention; at ease; on one foot (for ankle strength); and, to shake things, up occasionally I pace around while composing emails or writing code. I have been using an upright employer-provided desk at work for three years. My desk accommodates sitting as well as standing by way of an electric motor that raises and lowers the top and also displays the current height to the tenth of an inch. With that display, I always know exactly where I stand. (Sorry.) I have the desk because my orthopedist said my severe leg and low back pain from years of desk sitting would go away if I didn’t sit so much. (He was right.) I don’t think many people can afford the setup I have, and I am fortunate to have it at work. I am not tall, only 5’8”, and for full comfort and straight back while standing at my desk, I set the table height at 40 inches. This is the table height that works best for both my keyboarding and monitor viewing. Now, to Clark’s specifics: According to the Ikea web site, the maximum height of the Fredrik desk is only 38-5/8 inches. I would think this height would be good for only those who are shorter than me. This could be Clark’s problem – the Fredrik is simply not at the height he requires. Something else to consider: 8 hours of standing might be okay for some, but I find that mixing up the standing and the sitting throughout the day works best. Fredrik does not provide this flexibility.”

EAT LESS MEAT

Manish Bhatia: “I read a lot about the actions that we all need to take to reduce the impact of global warming (and avoid it – if we are not already too late!). You have advocated efficient light bulbs, solar energy, hypermiling, and myriad other things. The one thing I don’t remember you advocating is going vegetarian. There are countless articles on the internet about the high carbon footprint related to eating meat (like this one). Hope to hear you talk about this too.”

☞ Here, here! It’s amazing the impact of a hamburger on our environment.

(And so, with Memorial Day barbecues around the corner, I suppose I should reprise the Andy Burger, with serious apologies for naming it after myself. A quick search of the archives did not return any hits, but I’m almost sure I’ve told you before, because it’s such a staple. In any event, here it is. You walk up to the burger-flipper, who I assume is your brother-in-law, and ask him to toast your bun on the grill, so it picks up some of the taste and smell and greasy residue of the prior burgers – and hold the burger. You then add lettuce and tomato, pickle chips if available, and tons of ketchup – and that’s it. Mmmm, mmmm! It contains no burger, yet has the burger smell and taste from the grill, and all the taste of the ketchup, which is, let’s be honest, the whole point of the burger in the first place.)

THE SIXTH OF MARC’S 12 MOST USEFUL THINGS

So far, I’ve given you the first through fifth (well, Marc has given them to us). And at the end of this series, I’ll give you the link to all 12. But for now . . .

6. Transform voicemail.
PhoneTag will send you very accurate transcriptions of all your voicemails. At $30 per month it is more expensive than the free Google Voice (which also does transcriptions), but it’s far more accurate since it uses human transcribers. PhoneTag saves me a lot of time; it is handy in situations when you can’t check your voicemail (for instance, when you’re in a meeting). Thanks to PhoneTag, I always know right away whether a call is important or not. It creates more peace of mind, which is priceless. PhoneTag, $29.95 per month for unlimited messages.

Last week I missed a day, ostensibly to eggnog.

Richard Theriault: “Eggnog is the best of reasons. None other is required. William Rainey Harper, first president of the University of Chicago, drank a quart of it every day with his lunch (and though it was a Baptist school, it did contain rum or brandy; I have the recipe). It did not cause him to miss his lectures but he was inured, unlike you, who are exposed only to seasonal excess.”

From Richard’s alumni magazine:

Eggnog was considered a “strengthening” drink at the turn of the 20th century. According to Young Man in a Hurry, Milton Mayer’s biography of William Rainey Harper, eggnog fueled the “busiest man in America.”

As dean of Yale Divinity School, Harper’s typical day went this way: “His schedule took him to his first class at 7:30 in the morning. He taught until 11:00, and went to his office to work on his mail, discuss perhaps a dozen matters with each of his five assistants, and drink a quart of eggnog at his desk. Catching the 1:00 o’clock train to New York or Boston, he would deliver a lecture in the afternoon and another in the evening. The midnight train took him back to New Haven and his study.”

When he became president of the University of Chicago in 1890, Harper’s to-do list lengthened—but his lunch of eggnog remained in force.

INGREDIENTS
1 egg
¾ tbsp sugar
A few grains salt
1½ tbsps sherry or 1 tbsp brandy or rum
2/3 cup cold milk
A few gratings nutmeg

DIRECTIONS
Beat egg slightly. Add sugar, salt, and, slowly, liquor; then add, gradually, milk.
The nutmeg may be used with or instead of the liquor as flavoring.
Serves one.

INCY

Suggested June 11 at $3.40, sold July 28 near $6 (though guru still liked it), suggested again at $5.62 in a basket of three stocks October 29, and now just sold half Christmas Eve at $9.26 (guru likes it for the long term; thinks it might give back some gains in a bad market).  The other two items in the basket are up only slightly, but guru still likes them, too.  Remember: these are bets to be made only with money you can truly afford to lose.  Because – as long-time readers know all too well – we may.

VSP

It’s a little late in the year to be reminding you of this, but if you bought a stock at various prices – as I’ve bought INCY, for example – then you own a variety of “tax lots.”

When you go to sell, each gets its own tax treatment as to gain or loss and holding period.

If you sell all your shares, you just recognize the appropriate gain or loss on each separate tax lot.  But if you sell just some of your shares, it becomes a matter of some interest just which shares they were.

In the real world, of course, it makes no difference – it’s like asking which water you drank from a glass, the water that came out of the tap first or the water that came out a second or two later as the glass was filling up.  It’s all the same.  Water.  INCY shares are INCY shares.  But for tax purposes it does matter, and if you don’t specify, the IRS will assume the shares you bought first are the ones you’re selling.  That’s why it can make sense to specify.

So far, all my INCY is short-term.  But come April 25, the first shares I bought, at $2.09, will go long-term.  So last Thursday, I didn’t want to sell my $2.09 INCY shares and be liable for tax on a big gain (especially as, in just a few months, that gain will qualify for lighter, long-term gain tax treatment) – I wanted to sell the shares I bought at $6.90 just a few weeks ago and be liable for tax on a small gain.

Different brokers have different systems of “specifying” the tax lot you are selling.  In the days of rotary phones, you would call your broker and just say, “Hey, please sell 200 shares ‘versus purchase October 12, 1975’ and your printed confirmation slip would arrive in the mail noting ‘VSP 10/12/75’ in case the IRS ever wanted to see it.  Many full-service brokers still work that way.  Others, like Fidelity, automate the process (so it’s easier and much cheaper).  Ameritrade lets you make the trade on-line and then either call a human to specify the lots you sold or email your instructions through their on-line messaging page.

It’s not too late to realize some tax losses for 2009 to lower your income tax.  Then again, because so many folks have been selling for this purpose – driving some low-priced, thinly traded losers down even further – it might be smarter to wait.  We may see quite a bounce next week  once the tax-selling pressure is removed (and sometax-sellers, having taken their losses in November or December and waited the requisite 31 days to avoid the “wash-sale” rule enter buy orders to reestablish their positions).  This well known pattern – a New Year bounce in stocks killed the previous year – is the well-known “January effect.”  But because it is well known, a lot of people try to take advantage of it, beating the January crowd by buying beaten-down shares in late December.  Which could leave you at the station waiting for the January effect, not realizing that it came early and has already passed you by.  That it has already passed you – “Bye!”  That it has already passed you – don’t buy.  See what a challenging game this is?  Sometimes, for some stocks, the January effect works in January, sometimes in December, sometimes not a all.

VSOP

And we’re back to eggnog.