dru'el the chaotic

Original air date: October 18, 1980

I know there are quite a few Muppet fans out there who aren’t so big on the films Muppet Christmas Carol and Muppet Treasure Island. For them, there’s something about watching the crew take on roles that aren’t themselves, to tell an often already well known story, that just doesn’t work.

And yet, one has to agree that episode 506 of The Muppet Show is really a precursor to those films, in which the Muppets and Brooke Shields reenact Alice In Wonderland in 25 minutes. Granted, there are still backstage segments where everyone slips out of character, but the bulk of this episode is focused on Lewis Carroll’s classic story (or rather classic stories, since this episode draws from Wonderland and also Through the Looking Glass).

This episode does feel a bit odd in comparison to so many other Muppet Show episodes, but for a show that, at this point in the run, is on its fifth season, it’s nice to see them still taking risks and trying something new. And overall, I think this episode works wonders.

We get to see the characters take on the roles from this classic tale. Miss Piggy is (unsurprisingly) the Queen of Hearts, with Link Hogthrob as her King of Hearts. For the Mad Tea Party scene we’ve got Gonzo as the Mad Hatter, along with a Chicken as the Dormouse (and I know it’s supposed to just be a random chicken, but the fact that it’s performed by Jerry Nelson did make me go “IS CAMILLA TALKING??” in my rewatch). We’ve also got Floyd Pepper as the Caterpillar, Scooter and Rowlf as characters in the Jabberwocky poem, Statler and Waldorf as Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum, and Marvin Suggs as the Judge.

There are two other roles I’d really love to talk about in this episode. The first, of course, being Fozzie Bear who gets confused about the source material and spends the entire episode dressed as the Tin Woodsman from The Wizard of Oz. I don’t know what it is, but I find something so supremely charming about this mix up and Fozzie’s dedication to the costume. And finally, y’all, we need to talk about Dr. Teeth.

Dr. Teeth’s head on top of a cat’s body is so incredibly alarming if, like me, you forget that that’s part of the episode. It feels like something from a fever dream. I know we get Floyd on a Caterpillar’s body, but it’s the Dr. Teeth one I really can’t get over.

Brooke Shields is the guest star of this episode, portraying Alice in the story, and overall she’s pretty solid – especially when you consider how young she was at the time. There’s a quaintness to her performance, but there’s also a level of simplicity. She seems like she’s having a good time, but also is perhaps just a little stiff. But again, I think for this episode’s purpose she’s a perfect fit.

Since the episode is a retelling of Carroll’s book(s), there isn’t really a segment that stands out from the rest. Instead, the whole episode just stands out as a unit. There are certainly memorable bits – The Mad Tea Party and the ‘Falling Song’ scenes to name a couple – but overall this episode is a cohesive piece of art and it’s impossible to separate segments from one another, especially since there’s so much bleed over (namely Brooke’s size changing from one scene to the next). The Jabberwocky scene might be the most stand out bit of the entire episode, what with the imaginative characters and beautiful Jabberwocky puppet, not to mention the poem which I’ve always found to be cool.

I’ll also note quickly a moment with Piggy, who’s upset she doesn’t get to play the role of Alice. Piggy finds out that Brooke Shields has shrunk and then attempts to “accidentally” hop on Brooke to smoosh her. When you consider that Brooke Shields was a child at the time, it’s a bit more malicious. There’s also the moment at the end of ‘These Are The Yolks’ where Humpty falls off his wall and then proceeds to be trampled by the Kings’ men and a horse. So I guess this is just a trample heavy episode.

All in all, a stand out episode that I’d put up there with the best of The Muppet Show. It gave us a chance to see that the Muppets were capable of taking on a story and making it their own, which would then lead to the creation of several of their later productions.

Best Joke: Fozzie entering the Wonderland episode dressed as a character from Wizard of Oz and then telling Kermit he thought they were doing Peter Pan.

Lamest Joke: “I’m looking for a hole.” “A whole? A whole what?” “I hate smart Alices.”

MVM (Most Valuable Muppet): In an ensemble heavy episode, everyone really pulls their weight. But I’m gonna give it to Fozzie just because I love the idea of everyone agreeing to do a story-centric production and him showing up as a character from an entirely different book.

Most Classic Moment: Everything to do with the main plot of this episode feels like the most classic moment. Brooke Shields in the Alice dress surrounded by Muppets done up like the Wonderland crew feels so quintessentially Henson.

Should-Be-Classic Moment: The ‘Smiling’ medley the Muppets all sing to Fozzie to cheer him up.

First Appearance Of…: A lot of the Wonderland specific characters (the Jabberwocky, the White Rabbit, Humpty Dumpty, the March Hare, etc.) were built specifically for this episode, most of which we’d never see again!

Missed Opportunity: While the idea of making a chicken the Dormouse is funny, I’m surprised they didn’t make Rizzo or another rat the Dormouse instead.

Coolest Puppetry Effect: The use of the green screen in the Falling Song and Jabberwocky are cool. I love the image of the Muppets falling passed Alice, as well as when the Jabberwocky gets beheaded.

Obscure Character Watch: In the Jabberwocky segment, there are giant stilt-legged birds called Borogoves. One of those Borogoves appeared in episodes 509 and 510 as well.

Musical Highlight: Probably the Falling Song, but I want to give an honorary head nod when everyone breaks out into ‘Off To See the Wizard’ near the episode’s end.

One More Thing…: Brooke Shields was only 14 years old when filming this episode, making her the youngest ever Muppet Show guest star!

Okay, One More Thing…: During its entire run, The Muppet Show received twenty-one Emmy nominations. Malcolm Stone, one of the show’s art directors, would receive his second nomination for this episode, in particular for the backdrops based off of the illustrations of John Tenniel’s classic Alice art.

Click here to mix-up Wonderland & Oz on the Tough Pigs forum!

by Julia Gaskill

The post The Muppet Show: 40 Years Later – Brooke Shields appeared first on Muppet Fans Who Grew Up - Tough Pigs.

Hey everyone! We’re all going to die.

See you next time, when we are dead

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Hovertext:
300 years from now, a young mathematician looks up from a recent biography of Conway. 'What the hell is covid?'

Scott, who knows far far more here than I do, wrote a nice memoriam.

Things in Georgia are a mess right now. Governor Brian Kemp apparently just discovered that people can carry coronavirus and not exhibit symptoms, and a “stay at home order” has just been put in place. That’s all bad but what’s far more pernicious is that the lawmakers in the state say they can’t further delay the May 19th Primary … and refuse to make it more accessible.

Georgia’s primary was already delayed once, and the secretary of state, Brad Raffenspergerm, has said that he lacks the authority under state law to delay it again. Fine. That means the state should pull out all the stops to get out absentee ballots or allow everyone to vote remotely, right?

Oh no. Because that would be bad for Republicans! Every Republican member of Georgia’s congressional delegation has signed on to a letter asking that the primary be delayed, rather than made accessible. This is in contrast to Democrats who want to open it up.  But no, Georgia house speaker  David Ralston, “said Wednesday that widespread use of absentee-by-mail voting in the primary would hurt Republican candidates,” according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

These Republicans are admitting that having higher voter turnout, which vote by mail will guarantee, will hurt them. They’re just coming out and saying it now. And they’re echoing the most odious Republican in the land, Donald Trump. On a call into his Fox Friends, Trump all but admitted that more voting and vote by mail will mean doom for him.

Trump, on expanding voting: “They had levels of voting, that if you ever agreed to it you’d never have a Republican elected in this country again.” pic.twitter.com/ly4LYQqmo8

— Jacques Calonne (@JacquesCalonne) March 30, 2020

Republicans are in power thanks mainly to a three-pronged strategy of gerrymandering, misinformation and voter suppression. Take away any of those things and the Republicans know that their days are numbered.

And that may be literally true. Nancy Pelosi has stated that vote-by-mail provisions should be a part of the next coronavirus stimulus bill, and Republicans might not have much leverage in removing those provisions, especially now that they’re openly admitting that they just don’t want people to vote.

(image: Element5 Digital from Pexels, via AJC)

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One of my favorite trends in book publishing has been comics that explore the lives of important women throughout history. Soon, that will bring us Noisemakers: 25 Women Who Raised Their Voices & Changed the World from Knopf Books for Young Readers, featuring the work of contemporary cartoonists to discuss women who have used their voices to help change the world.

Noisemakers is the first ever book from Kazoo, the quarterly, indie print magazine for girls, ages 5 to 12, which Vogue calls ‘the magazine for little girls who want to grow up to be president,’ and Roxane Gay calls ‘kickass.’ Kazoo first made history in 2016 as the highest-funded journalism campaign Kickstarter had ever seen and again in 2019 when it became the first and only kids’ magazine ever to win the prestigious National Magazine Award for General Excellence (2019). ‘What sets Kazoo apart is that we celebrate girls for being smart, strong, fierce and true to themselves, and everything we do supports that mission,’ says Editor-in-Chief and founder Erin Bried. ‘Plus, it’s just really fun to read.’ Contributors have included Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Ellen DeGeneres, Misty Copeland, Elizabeth Warren, Dolores Huerta, Shonda Rhimes and many more.

Today, we are happy to share a preview of the upcoming book: the cover and table of contents, as well as an excerpt drawn by Sarah Winifred Searle (Sincerely, Harriet), written by Erin Bried, and covering the accomplishments of Hedy Lamarr, who was not only a Hollywood star but a brilliant inventor—truly, a woman who could do both.

Noisemakers his stores tomorrow, featuring over 200 pages of inspirational storytelling, including:

Mary Shelley by Emil Ferris (My Favorite Thing Is Monsters)
Hallie Daggett by Rosemary Valero-O’Connell (Laura Dean Keeps Breaking Up With Me)
Josephine Baker by Alitha E. Martinez (Black Panther: World of Wakanda)
Julia Child by Lucy Knisley (Kid Gloves: Nine Months of Careful Chaos)
Hedy Lamarr by Sarah Winifred Searle (Sincerely, Harriet)
Jeanne Baret by Lucy Bellwood (Baggywrinkles: a Lubber’s Guide to Life at Sea)
Wangari Maathai by Brittney Williams (Patsy Walker, A.K.A. Hellcat!)
Raye Montague by Yao Xiao (Everything Is Beautiful, And I’m Not Afraid)
Eleanor Roosevelt by Emily Flake (Lulu Eightball)
Bessie Coleman by Shannon Wright (Betty Before X)
Ida Lewis by Rebecca Mock (Compass South)
Rosa Parks by Ashley A. Woods (Tomb Raider: Survivor’s Crusade)
Eugenie Clark by Maris Wicks (Primates)
Mary Anning by Little Corvus (The Bridge: How the Roeblings Connected Brooklyn to New York)
Caroline Herschel by Chan Chau (Jim Henson’s The Storyteller: Sirens)
Emily Warren Roebling by Kiku Hughes (Displacement)
Madam C. J. Walker by K. L. Ricks (Naima)
Annie Londonderry by Kat Leyh (Lumberjanes)
Maria Tallchief by Weshoyot Alvitre (Alice Sixkiller)
Junko Tabei by MariNaomi (Dragon’s Breath and Other True Stories)
Frida Kahlo by Naomi Franquiz (The Unbeatable Squirrel Girl)
Maya Angelou by Shauna J. Grant (Princess Love Pon)
Kate Warne by Molly Brooks (Sanity & Tallulah)
Nelly Bly by Jackie Roche (Escape from Syria)
Mother Jones by Sophie Goldstein (House of Women)

(image: Knopf Books for Young Readers)

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We’re saddened to learn that founding member of Monty Python and British comedy legend Terry Jones has sadly passed away.  You’ve seen him in dozens of roles in Monty Python and the Holy Grail, The Life of Brian, and of course, Monty Python’s Flying Circus.

But that’s not all – Terry Jones was instrumental in the classic Jim Henson film Labyrinth.  Jones wrote the screenplay for the movie, working closely with Jim Henson and providing most of the humor you see in the film today.  He also co-wrote the book “The Goblins of Labyrinth” with Brian Froud.

Here’s Terry Jones himself to talk about his work on Labyrinth:

The comedy world lost a legend today, and we’re proud to remember Terry Jones as an important player in Muppet history, and that Labyrinth wouldn’t be anywhere near as wonderful without his contribution.

Click here to help us remember Terry Jones on the ToughPigs forum!

by Joe Hennes – Joe@ToughPigs.com

The post RIP Monty Python’s Terry Jones appeared first on Muppet Fans Who Grew Up - Tough Pigs.

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Hovertext:
I need to do a book of just comics that end with God laughing.

Tonight's comic is doing something special for the holidays. 😴💤

Click to enlarge

Rabbit! Rabbit!

This is a continuation of the subject broached cautiously on July 17, 2019. Since the comments were supportive, I’ll continue in the same vein. Perhaps it should first be mentioned that sometimes the line separating language study from the study of history, customs, and rituals is thin. For example, there was (perhaps still is) the British English phrase to hang out the broom. It meant “to invite guests in the wife’s absence,” while in other situations the same phrase referred to a working girl’s desire to get married.   (See the post of February 10, 2016 on it.) There is nothing here for the linguist to do: all the words are clear, and the meaning is known. One has to discover why the custom of hanging out the broom indicated such unexpected things. This is what so-called antiquaries try to do. In fact, most idioms, unless they contain incomprehensible words like brunt and lurch, are of this type.

Consider the phrase blue plate lunch(eon). Wikipedia has an article about it, but I can add something to what it says. Blue plate special first referrred to a low-priced meal that usually changed daily. The name “may well have come from the over-popular ‘willow pattern’ of the chinaware.” (All my quotes have been borrowed from Notes and Queries and American Notes and Queries.) It still remains somewhat unclear “when designers introduced the theoretically excellent, but actually disturbing, practice of dividing a large luncheon plate into compartments.”

A correspondent, who sent a letter to ANQ in 1945, wrote that the source of this expression may perhaps be found in the description of Forefathers’ Day, a New England tradition first observed in December, 1798. It later became customary to eat from huge blue dinner plates specially made by Enoch Wood & Sons of Staffordshire. One can see that here, as in the case of hanging out the broom, we deal with a custom. Yet both phrases are indeed idioms, because the knowledge of their components won’t help an outsider to understand the whole.

Many years ago, we rented a cabin in northern Minnesota. The owner was a handyman who owned an establishment called “Let George do it.” His name was indeed George, and I found the sign ingenious and clever. Only much later did I learn that the phrase let George do it means “let somebody else do this work.” I’ll now reproduce part of the letter from the New York Public Library, addressed to Notes and Queries in 1923. The expression “has in the last ten or dozen years become current in America. Especially during the [First World] War was it in common use. We are interested to learn if there is any foundation to the statement that this phrase is of English origin. We know that the French have employed for several centuries a very similar expression, ‘Laissez faire à George, il est home d’âge’ [‘Let George do it; he is a grownup man’], which they trace back to Louis XII. Has such an expression been used in England, and if so, is there any explanation of its origin known to you or your readers?”

The question has never been answered. The OED found the first occurrence of the phrase in print in 1909. This is exactly the date the letter writer had in mind. By the way, while working on my prospective dictionary of idioms, I made a list of questions in Notes and Queries that produced no replies. The list is instructive. I still have no idea whether let George do it is an Americanism or whether it only flourished on American soil (if so, why so late?), and what it has to do with its French analog. It does not appear in English dictionaries of familiar quotations. On the Internet, one can find some informative correspondence about the origin of the phrase. But the sought-after etymology is lost. Perhaps some of our readers know something about the matter. Their suggestions are welcome.

If I am not mistaken, the next two phrases are not in the OED. As I read in a 1909 publication, “the American phrase seven by nine is generally applied to a laugh or smile of latitude more than usually benign, as if meaning the length and width thereof and at the same time playing upon the word benign.” (Is the reference to benign an example of folk etymology?) I would like to mention a problem with words and expression called American in dictionaries. They produce the impression that all English speakers in the United States know them. Yet this term is a trap into which unwary foreigners who try to learn “real American” from books often fall. They use such words and idioms and don’t realize that they may have stumbled upon a piece of local or forgotten usage or slang. For example, now, more than half a century after the radio show “Let George do it,” young people seldom recognize the collocation.

In any case, at the beginning of the twentieth century, the American phrase a seven by nine politician existed. Here is a commentary from a Connecticut Yankee, if I may plagiarize Mark Twain. The phrase is said to apply to a man “of too limited abilities, force, or outlook to cut much of any. [It] refers to the old-fashioned windowpanes, before the time when glass filling the whole or half of the sash was common; these were ‘seven by nine’ in hundreds of thousands of farm or village houses…. Its nearest synonym is ‘peanut’ politician, that is, bearing the same relation to large political ideas and plans as a peanut vendor, or huckster of peanuts and roast chestnuts in a pushcart, does to large mercantile activities. Neither name implies a low position or importance: only the pettiness of the issues which can form the staple of the activities…. Similar names are ‘two-cent’ or ‘two-for-a cent’ (‘ha-penny’ comes just between) or huckleberry (‘whortleberry’) politician: the last having the same implication as ‘peanut’—one peddles huckleberries by the quart.”

What a rich display of dated slang! Peanuts do not fare too well in American English: cheap payments are “just peanuts,” and peanut politics, that is, “petty politics” (often with reference to corruption) is a phrase one can still hear around. The explanation quoted above may very well be correct, but I notice with some unease that seven and nine are the favorites of numerous idioms and folklore, and here they occur in what was known a hundred years ago, and in an entirely different context, as entente cordiale. See the posts for April 6, 2016 and June 19, 2019. Does the phase seven by nine really have an ascertainable foundation in reality, or is the use of seven and nine in it as mysterious as in nine tailors make a man and seven-league boots?

The unresolved riddle of the phrase let George do it again reminds us of the fact that many typical American words and expression were coined in England, came into desuetude there, but survived in the New World. That is why the definition of an Americanism is often ambiguous. Compare what I wrote about the idiom to get down to brass tacks in April 15, 2015.

I would like to repeat that, if my discussion of American idioms presents interest, I may perhaps write one more such essay in the nearest future.

Feature image credit: Daderot, public domain via Wikimedia Commons.

The post Some American phrases appeared first on OUPblog.

Our guest this week is Cameo Wood. Cameo is an EMMY nominated filmmaker. She is also a former tech founder, founded an urban beekeeping store, was the first to perform Turing’s Original Imitation Game experiment, and has completed grad programs in Egyptology and Medical Neuroscience.

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Show notes:

Moment Anamorphic Lens ($150)
There’s a company called Moment and what they do is they create incredibly high quality lenses for photography, or for filmmaking. They have this new one called an anamorphic lens which has incredibly high quality glass, and you can just pop this right on your iPhone, and capture beautiful images. An anamorphic lens is a very high quality type of lens. Whenever you see a film and you see this beautiful, incredibly in-depth, sort of rich looking video, and horizontal lens flares in like this widescreen letterbox look, that’s indicative of being an anamorphic lens. With this you can get all the lens flares that you want and this beautiful widescreen letterbox look. They have their own app, the Moment filmmaking app, so you can control aperture, and all different kinds of frame rates to really create cinematic looking video just from your iPhone, and it’s just absolutely beautiful.

Peak Design Black Slide Camera Strap ($65)
I really like Peak Design’s other products like their backpacks, and bags, they’re very popular here in the Bay area, but I found this thing called the slide. So, it looks like a regular camera strap, and where you would connect the strap to the camera, instead of having something that is permanently attached, it just has these clips. The clips are basically strings of incredibly strong material that attach to your camera using these little circular dongles hanging off your camera. When I was recently in Egypt, I was bringing my iPhone, and a mirror, this camera, and a DSLR. So rather than just having numerous camera straps which I’ve done in the past, I decided instead to just have one strap, and all of my cameras have the these little dongle clips attached to them, so that I could just pull the camera out of my bag, snap it into my strap, and go. And again, it only takes 10 seconds or so to just clip them in, and I found the entire system incredibly easy to use. I never had any problems with being able to get the clips on, or off, and I never had any failures where the clip failed. So, I found this incredibly useful.

myCharge 10050mAh portable charger ($90)
I understand that everyone has their favorite charger. I just happened to randomly get this charger while I was in an airport, and I had forgotten whichever one I usually had at that time, and now I have two, or three of these. So, this particular charger looks sort of like a small silver brick that we’ve sort of become familiar with. It’s silver, it sort of has the shape of a book, and it is a 4.6 inches, by 2.8 inches, by around one inch, and it weighs about one pound. I love this thing because one, I don’t need to find a plug, it doesn’t have anything extra, it just has a little flip down wall plug. I just plug it into any wall, it has two cables built into it, so it has an iPhone cable, which I use an iPhone, and it also has a micro USB, so I can charge other people’s stuff, and in the bottom of it, it has just a regular USB plug, so I can plug any kind of USB device into it. It’s 10,050 milliamp hours, so it can charge my iPhone, my iPad fully, multiple times. I’ve been in film festivals where I’ve been waiting for the next film, and everyone’s phone is dying, and so I’ve been able to charge like three phones at a time on this while we’re all waiting in line. So, especially on things like international flights where sometimes the in-seat charging isn’t working, I’m able to watch movies, and do all kinds of work just using one, or two of these. I find them just massively useful, especially when I’m traveling in the outback.

Folding heavy-duty bags ($25/3pk)
I’ve been using these folding heavy duty bags for about three years now, and these are super low tech, but they are amazing. They’re sort of almost cubes, they fold incredibly small, they have a solid piece of plastic built into the bottom that folds down, so that it has a solid bottom. They can carry up to about 45, 50 pounds in each. I can use these for carrying heavy liquids around, I use them at home, because they’re rectangular enough that you can sort of stack them, and whenever I have donations, I can load those in and fill them with cans, I can use them for absolutely anything. Every time I go to the grocery store, all the packers are like, “These are amazing. These are the best bags I’ve ever seen.”

Also mentioned:

EMMY nominated short film Real Artists
I made a film about two years ago now called Real Artists. Real Artists is a film about a young woman who is interviewing at her dream job at an animation studio, and finds that films are no longer made entirely by people. It touches on artificial intelligence, and memory erasing drugs.

We have hired professional editors to help create our weekly podcasts and video reviews. So far, Cool Tools listeners have pledged $400 a month. Please consider supporting us on Patreon. We have great rewards for people who contribute! If you would like to make a one-time donation, you can do so using this link: https://paypal.me/cooltools.– MF

Dork Tower is updated Tuesdays and Thursdays. For as little as $1 a month, you can join the Army of Dorkness – and help bring more Dork Tower to the world! We’re nearly 80% of the way towards three comics a week! Become a Dork Tower Patreon backer – you get everlasting gratitude. Oh, wait – and also swag!

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Hovertext:
Honestly, do brains ever actually help with anything other than breathing?

Sake is a captivating beverage. For me, part of its allure lies in its diversity of style: sake can taste rich and savory or delicate and fruity, can be served chilled or piping hot, and is equally at home in a crystal wine glass or an unassuming ceramic tumbler. It can even be aged (called koshu), made into a dessert beverage (called kijoshu), or see a cedar-barrel finish (called taru-zake). Getting comfortable with sake is highly rewarding, as there is much to appreciate in this underrepresented category.

Whenever I share my love of sake with friends I hear two common views: “Isn’t sake only drunk with sushi?” or “I’m curious about it, but the Japanese labels and terms are intimidating!” Sake and food pairing principles are for another post, but for now I’ll say that sake is one of the most food-friendly beverages on the planet. Try a warm kimoto junmai with lasagna or pesto sometime, when you do it’s hard to go back to wine. It’s also amazing with cheese, as evidenced here and here.

Today’s post will focus on remedying some of the frustration of interpreting a sake label. The first thing to know is that reading the label is not hard once you know a handful of key words. But before I define these terms, it is important to understand that too often people equate them with a quality pyramid. For example, don’t think of junmai ginjo as “higher quality” than junmai. These are two different styles of sake, like white wine and red wine or stout and pale ale. While the lines are blurry, it is best to think of them as distinct.

I think of sake styles in terms of the “old-style” and “new-style,” like old-world and new-world wine. Old-style sake tastes savory with grainy flavors and has been around for centuries, while new-style sake is fruitier has been on the market for only about four decades. The key word to tip you off that you are drinking the new stuff is “ginjo.”

Ginjo Sake encompasses four terms: ginjo, daiginjo, junmai ginjo, and junmai daiginjo. You’ll notice that the permutations stem from the presence or absence of “dai” and “junmai,” so let’s unpack their meanings:

Ginjo translates to “scrutinized fermentation,” a reference to the fastidious methods used to brew the style not employed with old-style sake. It is made from rice polished more heavily than old-style sake, to a minimum of 60%, and fermented with modern yeast varieties that ferment cooler over a longer period. The result is a sake with fruit-forward aromatics and a delicate structure to be served either room temperature or chilled.

Dai translates to “greater.” Legally a Daiginjo sake must use rice polished to a minimum of 50%, but philosophically a brewer’s Daiginjo is the pinnacle of their craft. It is like the “family reserve,” to make another wine analogy. If you are unfamiliar with rice polishing and why it is important, consider this: sake rice varieties have an opaque white center that is almost all starch, which is what is needed for fermentation. Surrounding that starchy center are fats, proteins, and minerals which can cause off-flavors and a rough texture if present in high quantities. Before brewing commences, these non-starch components are removed by running the raw rice through a milling machine that polishes them away. In short, the more the rice is polished, the cleaner and more refined the sake will taste.

Junmai translates to “pure rice.” This term refers to a decision made in the brewing process; after fermentation but before pressing, a brewer is allowed to add “jozo” alcohol to the sake. Jozo alcohol is a neutral spirit, usually distilled from sugarcane. If ginjo sake is brewed without this alcohol addition, it is called Junmai Ginjo. Why add jozo alcohol? It does not contribute flavor nor does it increase the sake’s alcohol content, as almost every sake is diluted with water before bottling. What it does do is help extract flavor from the rice while thinning structural elements such as acidity, amino acid content, body, sweetness, and length of finish.

Now that you know all about ginjo, I encourage you to try a couple examples. Tedorigawa’s “Lady Luck” Daiginjo is light-bodied with a crisp finish, a perfect example of the style. A great contrast is Kikusui’s Junmai Ginjo, which is pictured above: it’s fruity with flavors of cantaloupe, banana, orange, and sweet mochi. It will taste fuller and sweeter than the Tedorigawa, which is to be expected when comparing a Junmai Ginjo to a Daiginjo.

Let us know what you think, while we work on part 2 of this deep dive into sake.

The post How to Read a Sake Label, Part 1: Ginjo Explained appeared first on Drinkhacker: The Insider's Guide to Good Drinking.

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I like to imagine Jesus has tried a second coming literally hundreds of times and it just keeps getting thwarted.

Today marks 25 years since the controversial comedian Bill Hicks’ death. Let’s celebrate his life with some of his best bits.

Bill Hicks is my favorite comedian and will probably always remain so. Some of his now-fabled “comedy” monologues, like “It’s Just a Ride,” are required viewing if you know me. It’s through Hicks’ sarcastic yet ever-honest lens that some of the harsher truths about humanity are exposed.

With insights that were brutal, sensitive, abrasive, uncompromising, brilliant and clear-eyed, Hicks had something for everyone—and the capacity to offend as many. Yet sentiments that urge us to pick love over fear as “It’s Just a Ride” does are as timeless and important now as they were when delivered more than two decades ago. The more things change …

There is a point.  Is there a point to all of this?  Let’s find a point.

Is there a point to my act?  I would say there is.  I have to.

The world is like a ride, in an amusement park.  And when you choose to go on it, you think it’s real, because that’s how powerful our minds are.  And the ride goes up and down, and round and round.  It has thrills and chills, and it’s very brightly coloured, and it’s very loud and it’s fun.  For a while.

Some people have been on the ride for a long time, and they begin to question: “Is this real, or is this just a ride?”

And other people have remembered, and they come back to us, and they say, “Hey, don’t worry.  Don’t be afraid, ever.  Because this is just a ride.”

And we . . . kill those people.  Ha-ha!

“Shut him up! We have a lot invested in this ride! Shut him up! Look at my furrows of worry. Look at my big bank account, and my family. This has to be real.”

It’s just a ride.  But we always kill those good guys who try and tell us that, you ever notice that?  And we let the demons run amok.

But it doesn’t matter, because it’s just a ride, and we can change it any time we want.  It’s only a choice.  No effort.  No worry.  No job.  No savings and money.

[It’s] a choice, right now, between fear and love.  The eyes of fear want you to put bigger locks on your door, buy guns, close yourself off.  The eyes of love, instead, see all of us as one.

Here’s what we can do to change the world, right now, into a better ride:  Take all that money that we spend on weapons and defense each year and, instead, spend it feeding, clothing, and educating the poor of the world – which it would do many times over, not one human being excluded.  And we can explore space together, both inner and outer, forever.  In peace.

[It’s Just a Ride Transcript]

Hicks died at 32 in 1994 from pancreatic cancer. There were times during the George W. Bush era when things in America looked so bleak I would often stop and think what sort of sharp-edged, spot-on, acerbic treatment Hicks would give Bush’s war and fear-mongering. But I can’t even begin to imagine how he would react to the Age of Trump.

Since we can’t know what a present-day world with Bill Hicks would be like, we can at least be grateful that the wonders of the Internet have preserved some of Hicks’ finest material.

Here’s his controversial 1993 appearance that was banned on Letterman because the segment contained material CBS found objectionable, including jokes about religion and the anti-abortion movement. Letterman finally aired the banned segment in 2009 with Hicks’ mother Mary as his guest.

A personal fave:

Oh, and this one:

As Comicbook.com points out, comics fans might recognize Hicks from his depiction in Garth Ennis and Steve Dillon’s Preacher.

Hicks’ unique brand of humor wasn’t universally beloved, and it surely will not be to some people’s taste if you’re just discovering him now. But there’s no doubt in my mind that the world is much poorer without him, and that I’ll always wish we could hear his distinct voice on the absurdities of our time.

(via Comicbook.com, images: HBO/screengrab, Preacher by Garth Ennis & Steve Dillon)

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