What have we been reading, watching, listening to, playing, and eating this week? Read on!
Marian
An allergic reaction to all wheat-based alcohols – distilled or otherwise – leaves me with very limited options when it comes to the enjoyment of cocktails and spirits. I’ve gotten pretty cozy with the classic dark-n’-stormy (equal parts ginger beer and dark rum), but I worry that I’ll still be drinking them in a retirement home at 85. Enter Madison’s own Old Sugar Distillery. While their Cane and Abe rum is nothing to sniff at, I’ve taken a special liking to their Honey Liqueur, a velvety spirit distilled from beet sugar, with just a bit of the eponymous honey (local to Wisconsin) mixed in at the tail end. It’s smooth and elegant, but not too sweet, and it holds up just fine on its own or over a couple of cubes. And it turns out the other Old Sugar spirits are wheat free too. Who knew that sorghum whiskey was a thing? I didn’t. I’m just glad I don’t have to ride out another summer on mojitos.
Tom
This week I’d like to endorse spending some time with public-restroom hand dryers. I know that may sounds nuts, but hear me out. This is not an endorsement of using dryers as opposed to pullable paper towels or the no-longer-in-fashion rotating cloth towels. Nor is this endorsement of using any particular type of hand dryer (though as far as high-powered dryers go, I prefer the Dyson to the Xlerator). This is an endorsement of what I think is one of life’s simple pleasures: leaving your hands below the dryer’s hot air for far longer than the time it takes them to dry completely. If you rub your hands together under a dryer for long enough, it eventually feels like you’re warming them over a campfire. It’s a luxurious feeling, and it only takes about 30 seconds more than you’d normally spend drying your hands. Like taking a bath it’s not something I indulge in frequently, but when I do I’m always glad I did. So next time you’re in a public bathroom, relax and enjoy the warm air.
Dave
I heard about Wendy Schneider’s Stripper Project about a year ago, when Wendy started recording local Madison, Wi. musicians with a single microphone. But I must confess I didn’t check it out until noticing that singer-songwriter-historian Charles Hughes had recorded his terrific song “Space.” Wendy’s on-line project is a beautiful testament to simple music making, and her life-long connections to a remarkable collective of Wisconsin musicians insure that her site will be growing for many years to come. Check this out now, and come back to it in a few months.
Keith
This is a boat dock on a lake several hundred feet underground, part of a salt mine in Romania. We get salt from the ground or from the oceans and either way requires a lot of work. The Atlantic has a truly fascinating collection of photographs showing not only the often gorgeous colors of salt flats, salt pans, and desalination facilities, but also the surprising things that occur in salt mines. There are lakes, ponds, chapels, mosques, symphony concerts, radioactive waste facilities, ornate sculpture, and an extreme bicycle race. You can find it all here.
