From Shaker Cheezwiz, who says: "They're very similar to ginger-snaps, only crunchier and without any ginger. This recipe makes a ton, and they're great to share, or if you feel like hoarding them, they will last for well over a month (again, the staler, the better). They're also excellent dunked in coffee, cocoa, spiked eggnog or milk (or whiskey, or rum, or..)."
Pfeffernuesse (aka Pfeffernuss, Pfeffernüsse)
Ingredients
* 1 cup butter
* 4 eggs
* 3 cups sugar
* 1 cups brown sugar
* 5 cups flour
* 1 teaspoon baking soda
* 1 teaspoon cream of tartar
* 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
* 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
* 1/2 to 1 teaspoon pepper (I prefer them with more, it gives a nice spicy flavor to the cookie)
* 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
* 2 teaspoons ground anise (not personally fond of anise, this can be left out if you're not either)
Preheat oven to 350
Cream together butter, eggs, and sugar
Mix in all the dry ingredients - should become vaguely crumbly. (I recommend using a hand-mixer on its lowest setting, if you have one - it can get pretty dense)
Grab a handful of dough, knead to form a ball and roll it gently into a snake. Repeat. Cut the snakes into fingernail-size bits. I recommend cutting the snakes as you go (ie, cut pieces and lay out in the pan, cut, lay out, etc) and refrigerating the uncut snakes in between batches so the dough doesn't get soft.
Arrange on greased baking sheets (they don't need a whole lot of space in between - they don't spread very much) and bake each batch about 10 minutes. If your cookies are a little bigger (mine usually end up about the size of a quarter), then you may need to bake an additional 10 minutes or so.
If you'd like to participate in
Shaker Gourmet, email me at: shakergourmet (at) gmail.com
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Shamsia Husseini, right, pictured here with a classmate, was one of 15 girls and women in Kandahar, Afghanistan, who were splashed with acid two months ago by men who presumably wanted to deter them from getting an education.This is just an astonishing and beautiful and heartbreaking
story of survival:
One morning two months ago, Shamsia Husseini and her sister were walking through the muddy streets to the local girls school when a man pulled alongside them on a motorcycle and posed what seemed like an ordinary question.
"Are you going to school?"
Then the man pulled Shamsia's burqa from her head and sprayed her face with burning acid. Scars, jagged and discolored, now spread across Shamsia's eyelids and most of her left cheek. These days, her vision goes blurry, making it hard for her to read.
But if the acid attack against Shamsia and 14 others — students and teachers — was meant to terrorize the girls into staying home, it appears to have completely failed.
Today, nearly all of the wounded girls are back at the Mirwais School for Girls, including even Shamsia, whose face was so badly burned that she had to be sent abroad for treatment. Perhaps even more remarkable, nearly every other female student in this deeply conservative community has returned as well — about 1,300 in all.
"My parents told me to keep coming to school even if I am killed," said Shamsia, 17, in a moment after class. Shamsia's mother, like nearly all of the adult women in the area, is unable to read or write. "The people who did this to me don't want women to be educated. They want us to be stupid things."
I honestly don't know that I can convey how deeply moved I am by the bravery of these women and girls. Their insistent defiance is exhilarating, and, more than that, quite genuinely heroic. I am in awe of them.
[H/T to Shaker Allie.]
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About a month ago, I wrote about a New Jersey couple with three children named Adolph Hitler Campbell, JoyceLynn Aryan Nation Campbell, and Honszlynn Hinler Jeannie Campbell. At the time, much to several people's consternation, I said: "I suppose it's too much for which to hope that Child Protective Services sees the story (along with the accompanying photo gallery of the Campbell's Nazified home) and removes those poor kids now while they only need a decade of intensive therapy."
Well, apparently it wasn't too much for which to hope after all:
Police say three New Jersey siblings whose names have Nazi connotations have been placed in the custody of the state.
Holland Township Police Sgt. John Harris says workers from the state Division of Youth and Family Services on Tuesday removed 3-year-old Adolf Hitler Campbell and his younger sisters, JoyceLynn Aryan Nation Campbell and Honszlynn Hinler Jeannie Campbell from their home Tuesday.
Harris says family services did not tell police the reason the children were removed. Agency spokeswoman Kate Bernyk says it does not comment on specific cases.
Children can't be removed from homes just because their parents picked their names from the Big Book of Parenting Fuckery, and they can't be removed from homes just because their parents are racists, either. So it's very likely the Campbell children were removed for some other additional misfortune, like malnourishment or abuse. Poor kids.
[H/T to Shaker Deana.]
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(Btw, my comment isn't about Liev Schreiber, who's obviously being ironic, but about the fact that the joke was
turned into a newsworthy item and given that
ridiculous headline. H/T to Mama Shakes.)
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Shaker Gravyrug just sent me the link to Amazon's customer reviews for the Playmobil Security Check Point set. Ya know—for kids!
The reviews are, of course, completely hilarious. And I see a review from Gen. JC Christian, patriot ("I applaud Playmobile for attempting to provide us with the tools we need to teach our children to unquestioningly obey the commands of the State Security Apparatus, but unfortunately, this product falls short of doing that. There's no brown figure for little Josh to profile, taser, and detain?"), so I guess this has already made its way around the blogosphere at least once before. But I hadn't seen it, so I pass it on for anyone else who hasn't yet had the pleasure.
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Well, this is certainly a bittersweet birthday for Mama Shakes, as it is the last birthday she'll get to spend with her boyfriend Dick Cheney as vice president.
But, on the other hand, now Dickie-poo will have loads of free time on his hands to spend sexing it up in the romantic confines of any one of the nation's exquisite and charmingly remote
Halliburton Detention Centers, which are currently being converted into Halliburton Bed, Breakfasts, & Fallout Shelters, now that a Muslim crackhead terrorist-appeaser has been elected to the presidency.
In the meantime, there's still one more chance for to enjoy the now-traditional Dick Cheney birthday cake:
"Happy Birthday. Go fuck yourself."I love you, Mama Shakes! Happy Birthday, you wonderful woman, you.
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"Our foreign policy must reflect our deep commitment to help millions of oppressed people around the world. And of particular concern to me is the plight of women and girls, who comprise the majority of the world's unhealthy, unschooled, unfed, and unpaid. If half the world's population remains vulnerable to economic, political, legal and social marginalization, our hope of advancing democracy and prosperity is in serious jeopardy. The United States must be an unequivocal and unwavering voice in support of women's rights in every country on every continent."—Secretary-of-State nominee Hillary Clinton, in her opening statement at yesterday's confirmation hearing.
If you want to feel like the Bush Era is really well and truly coming to an end, read the entire statement.
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[Background here.]
The BART police officer who shot and killed Oscar Grant on New Year's Day, then quit the force to avoid cooperating with the investigation, has been arrested on suspicion of murder.
Johannes Mehserle, 27, of Lafayette was taken into custody in Douglas County, Nev., said Deputy Steve Velez of the Douglas County sheriff's office. The arrest was also confirmed by David Chai, chief of staff to Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums. … An Alameda County judge signed an arrest warrant alleging murder, and Mehserle surrendered without incident, authorities said.
The shooting, which was recorded by passengers in videos widely circulated on the Internet and television, prompted public outrage, and some viewers said that the shooting appeared to be an execution.
Sources said Mehserle was in Nevada because he feared for his safety after death threats were made against him.
Vigilantism is not justice, and no one should be threatening or fixing to take Mehserle's life, if for no other reason than to avoid irreparably screwing up their own lives. But I gotta say, I can't muster much sympathy for a guy who's fearing for his safety after publicly taking the life of another person in cold blood.
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I was riding the El to work this morning, as we're getting another ton of snow dumped upon us. Climate change? Pah! Anyway, Chicago's brown line does a lot of cutting through thickly populated residential areas, which means many people have windows facing very close to the train tracks. Occasionally you'll see someone's taped a sign into their window for the benefit of commuters; "Go Cubs!" signs are common. During the election, there were many Obama messages (and one sad, lone Ron Paul sign that's still hanging. They're not giving up, dammit!).
Today, I saw a cheerful* small sign on an upper window. It said:
"Hi, Train! Love, Tranny."
That made me grin.
(*Yeah, I know I've mentioned my discomfort with using "Tranny" in the past, but this just felt really positive to me.)
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by Shaker BGK, who would like you to know that in addition to reading Shakesville, working as an engineer, and dreaming of David Boreanaz, he finds time to beat as many RPG villians as possible.
Dear Game Crazy/HollyWood Video:
As a video game geek, I really do appreciate getting your emails. It is a vital service to know what new games are coming out each week, and I do appreciate the information falling directly into my inbox, complete with an advert on what will be going on for sale at the local Game Crazy.
That being said, did you review your national advert this week?
The "girls' section" of the ad curiously features only one platform, the Nintendo DS, a system which, in addition to the distinction of having released a
girls' line with a
pink metallic rose option, is a handheld console and therefore does not have the graphics engine of the big seventh generation consoles, making playing something as massive as "Elder Scrolls: Oblivion" impossible on the platform. I know that the Nintendo DS suffers from a dearth of cutting edge games.
However, I'm stunned to find that your company thinks the only games that would qualify for female consumption are games related to fashion design, exercise, child-rearing, and animal care, none of which make the Top Ten Nintendo DS games on your frontpage. With the addition of "Happy Cooking," you would have created the ultimate sexist Nintendo DS video game collection of all time.
While I understand that sexism runs rife through the video game industry, you should not further the stereotype.
It's not as though your company doesn't offer games that would appeal to many women gamers. "Guitar Hero: On Tour" comes to mind. Who would not love to escape to a fantasy land where you can rock out? Wouldn't women like the opportunity to pretend to be the next Joan Jett or Liz Phair? Plenty of women would love to play the "New Super Mario Brothers" or "Mario Kart" games. After all, they bought the next console by the company who constantly reimagines these games. "Brain Age 2," a puzzle and mental challenge game would be a boon to any gamer who picked up the title.
These are all your best-selling games, and I don't understand why you are picking the games at the back of the bus to market to women.
In all honesty, I bet a male member of your staff selected these games, probably with good intentions. The lack of representation for women in these ads can be pervasive, and I imagine he thought about what games were out there that would market well to women and give the appearance of inclusivity. I know, that if I had not yet taken the Red Pill, I would not even have registered the sexism inherent in these choices because of the limitations they ultimately express.
Games are tied to fantasy. People play games like "Rockband" and "FallOut 3" to escape reality into an imaginary world. We, for a moment, can pretend to be a huge RocknRoller or a Gun-Toting Hero. By choosing only games about fashion, exercise, and nurturing, it communicates that girls should not dream of anything beyond a 1950's "career" choice, a horrifying thought, even if unintentionally proposed.
I would like to suggest a solution: Next week, run ads for feminist games. If you will run the big two platforms, I'd suggest the following:
PS3: Heavenly Sword --> Woman avenges the murders of her family by kicking ass in an Eastern Mythological Setting.
Xbox 360: Portal --> Chell uses cutting-edge teleporation technology to save the world, and kill a few baddies on the side.
Thanks for listening,
Shaker BGK
Game Crazy MVP Member
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What's the worst haircut you've ever had?
Once when I was in college ('93), I went in asking for a layered bob and came out with a Janet from Three's Company mullet.
Not good.
I would love to provide you with photographic evidence of this tragedy, but I did not allow any pictures to be taken until it had all grown out and I no longer resembled a hideous Frankenstein's monster made from the spare parts of Campbell's Soup Kids and '70s sitcom stars.
Sixteen years later, if I got a haircut that heinous, I'd be blogging it from every angle: "Check the fuck outta this monstrosity! lol my hair clusterfucktastrophe!"
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So, I just got a press release from Ms. informing me that soon-to-be-President Obama will grace the cover of their upcoming inaugural issue revealing, superhero-like, a t-shirt he's "wearing" (where "wearing" means "poorly Photoshopped to look like he's wearing") that reads: THIS IS WHAT A FEMINIST LOOKS LIKE.
Stand back, ladies. The Man is here to rescue feminism.
According to the press release (and a note on their site
here), the cover was conceived after
Ms.' publisher, Eleanor Smeal, and chair of the Feminist Majority Foundation board, Peg Yorkin, met Barack Obama and "he immediately offered 'I am a feminist'.”
Which is nice to hear—in fact, I wish I'd heard it from him myself, at any time during the campaign, ahem—although I'm not sure his private admission to feminist women whose support he was courting warrants the cover, particularly when there are prominent female politicians who have never been given such glowing treatment, despite being authentic feminist champions who are quite willing to
publicly identify as feminist.
And would enthusiastically wear the actual shirt on their actual bodies in the actual physical world in actual reality.
That Obama has not regularly and unapologetically identified himself as a feminist makes this image problematic—as does the reality that, while Obama is clearly better on women's issues than the retrofuck lunkhead and his band of misogybag miscreants who've been leading the country the last eight years, he's not been what might fairly be deemed a leader on feminist issues.
He's (marginally) pro-choice and supports the Ledbetter Act and believes that women should have access to birth control and emergency contraception, all of which certainly speak to a feminist sensibility, but he has not been out front on major feminist issues over the past couple of years—no major statements about South Dakota's attempt to criminalize abortion, no leadership on the HHS Rule Change, on which Senators Clinton and Murray led the charge, no courageous and trailblazing redefinitions of abortion, but instead the customary Democratic rhetoric about necessary evils and "safe, legal, rare" blah blah blah.
Yet he's represented here as a superfeminist, which reinforces the same old narrative we see played out over and over again when it comes to men's participation in a "women's domain"—the women of feminism (or parenthood, or housecleaning, or rape prevention, or early childhood education, or nursing, etc.) are doing What Women Do, but the men who engage strongly in these areas are ZOMG SO SPECIAL AND BRILLIANT AND SELFLESS AND HEROIC!!!!11!
Rarely does an image so perfectly, depressingly capture this phenomenon, this reflexive tendency to over-reward men for doing what, in a just world, would be the bare fucking minimum to be considered a decent person.
Jezebel's Megan, in a post scolding dumbass feminists like yours truly for taking issue with the image, explains why the image is not merely innocuous, but cause for feminist celebration:
Mild-mannered Clark Kent has a secret, world-saving identity that he wore under his clothes — and the image is communicating the idea that, under Barack Obama's workaday clothes lies a man who believes in gender equity, promotes women to prominent positions in his Administration and is working to advance a feminist policy agenda. Yes, God forbid.
I can understand why that reading is appealing; really, I can; but we mustn't misread guerrilla feminism into an image actually casting feminism as a secret identity, the latter of which risks tacitly communicating that feminism is best covertly practiced to be acceptable, to be effective, to be heroic—a message already built into every criticism of a feminist's tone, or a feminist's appearance, or a feminist's stridency, or a feminist's refusal to capitulate and be silent.
And this reading ignores that it is a privilege unique to men that a clandestine support for women's equality can be considered heroic. No one would celebrate me—nor should they—were I to wear my fervent belief in my equality and autonomy under my clothes.
There's ultimately nothing particularly feminist about an image that shoves feminism underground and reinforces male privilege.
To be clear, I don't take issue with the assessment (his or anyone else) that Obama is a feminist; if he identifies as a feminist, I'm genuinely glad—and I'm not in the business of telling someone who supports women's equality, vanguard or reluctant ally, that s/he isn't a feminist. We all want all the willing teaspooners we can get, I think.
And if the cover had been a photo of our president-elect, really wearing a t-shirt with that phrase, without the superhero reference:
—I would be writing a very different post indeed.
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Coming soon to the small screen, "a half-hour comedy based on the true story of Kathleen Holtz, who ... at age 18 to become [California's] youngest lawyer." And the title of this show:
Barely Legal.
I shit you not. Way to go, NBC. I bet you think you're really fuckin' clever, don't you?
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A bunch of people have sent me this story, about 22-year-old Natalie Dylan, who's auctioning off her virginity, the bidding for which has reportedly reached $3.7 million. Dylan says she conceived the idea after her sister paid for her college education by prostituting herself for three weeks. The proceeds will help the women's studies major (!) pay for "an advanced degree in family and marriage therapy."
I suppose it's too much to hope that this is an elaborate ruse that will serve as the basis for a thesis on the commodification of women's bodies.
I also suppose it's too much to hope that the highest bidder is a raging feminist who will tell Dylan to get her education and keep her cherry.
I have, by the way, thoughts on the sort of dude who would pay $3.7 million for a fuck, as well as thoughts on a culture in which a young, intelligent woman's most precious asset is her unsullied cunt, but I'm going to wager I don't need to waste my time typing them out for you clever lot.
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Hillary Clinton's confirmation hearing is going on right now, and I just heard a brief clip on the radio in which she was listing all the things that have happened in the world just since the election, and included on her list was (paraphrased) ongoing widespread rape as a tool of war in the Congo.
Our next Secretary of State just cited epidemic rape as a pressing foreign policy concern.
Blub.
And Shaker Kathy emailed me: "When asked about (mis)treatment of women around the world, she responded that the issue will be central, not adjunct, to US foreign policy. Have I mentioned that I love this woman?"
Blub.
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Shaker BGK requested a fresh open thread on Israel and Palestine, so here it is.
Recommended Reading:
CNN: Israel tightens grip on Gaza City; Hamas stays defiant
New York Times: Olmert Says He Made Rice Change Vote
More on that from Think Progress.
I'd be ever so grateful if we could have as interesting and civil a thread this time as we've had in the first and second open threads on this subject.
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Kandahar Heroes
