Carrot Top

Have a look at the rest of this New York Times article. Can anyone explain how this makes any sense, other than for a small number of American farmers, one of whom is quoted as saying that many would like to see the price of corn go to zero in order to receive increased subsidy payments? It's so wasteful. ← What were the specific forms of waste that you were speaking of, Michael? Great topic.

Daniel. Your sandwich post in the gallery of regrettable foods was awesome. Awesome. But don't try to take away from Shalmanese's fantastic attempt at glory in this thread of threads where the regrettable is adored. His latest effort was inspired, I think. Inspired. By what I don't know. But inspired! Glorious. I can tell a clear-cutter winner when my throat makes a choking noise upon opening the screen. Yes. It happened with this post. Congratulations, Shalmanese, and thanks again for all!

I dunno. They say that ignorance of the law is no excuse. Perhaps. But a "law" created by a man based upon studies of man and things does not always an accurate reality make, even if it *is* posted in The Great Wilkipedia. (An online reference. "Virtual".) Let's hear some more about that real hay, jsolomon, and all that goes with it. Heh. Seriously - no matter how the words hit the page here there's a lot we can learn, I think.

It looked rather like my eleven year old son's science project actually. One of them, anyway. Can't remember for the life of me whether it was the one on Geology or the one on Germs, though.

The 'nugget' exists and we will either digest it or kill it. If destruction is the plan, the we must discuss it and become educated in its Ways.

I agree with judiu. The term also used to be used for Jewish delis in NYC - you would go get something from the "appetizing". Probably derives from the idea of having lots of "little things" to "take out" which could be added to a meal as appetizers.

This is surely a difficult thing to sort out and understand. Heavily laden with the worst sorts of bureaucratic jumbles that have double-jumbled themselves into a bad macrame over the years that is impossible to unknot. . .requiring a good up-to-date knowledge of local, national, and global economics to understand what possiblities and dangers do or do not exist in the program or in ending it or in altering it. . .knowledge of farmed food production. . .knowledge of agribusiness and knowledge of the real-life workings of small farms. . . Most Americans across the country that I've heard voice opinion on this subject are *against* the subsidies. It sort of embarrasses them, this idea of subsidy. It seems almost Socialist in shape, un-American. But I don't think that *most* Americans know the reality of where our food *does* come from (when it comes from American farms). There is sort of an idea that the Dust Bowl ruined the small farmer for good, for the most part. Of course - this is what we are taught in our suburban and city and rural schools. But the kids in the rural schools look at the pages where this is written that there are no longer small farms and screw up their faces, trying to make the words change into something different by the sheer act of imaginative will upon the page. Because it looks like fiction, to them. They know that there are still small farms, because they live on them. Their families survive (often to not-too-great financial rewards) on these farms. Their friends and their community all live this same life, too. The true "small farm" still exists, and in greater numbers than those living in crowded places can imagine. Do these people get subsidies? Some yes, some no. As jsolomon said, "What is small?" A lot, I think, depends on those words. And as russ said - the subsidies go to growers of certain crops - again, knowledge of how these farms operate, understanding their budgets and their challenges (weather and seasonality?) would seem to be vital before one could really speak with knowledge of the level of correctness that exists in the way the things *are* being done. The emotional content that sits heavy and quiet in a mountain of corn, though, when we know that hunger resides in other places, that it resides in the bloated stomachs of babies approaching death from malnutrition or starvation in their mother's bone-thin arms, is tremendous. As it should be. And lord knows nobody loves a lobbyist. It would be great if *those in the know* could do something better and finer about this conundrum which has existed throughout time in every place in different guises. Will they? Will the exhausting attempt be made to unravel the twisted macrame? I don't know. But this is America, and we are much given to hope.

Is there any support whatsoever in the real world for these astonishingly sweeping claims? jsolomon is onto something. I grab my daughter's McFries because they're tasty. Not because of "subliminal" messages, whatever those are, nor because there's "snob appeal." McD's has a great marketing strategy: their salty, fatty food tastes good. ← Sure there's support for these "astonishingly sweeping claims". The supports to these claims lay somewhere in the endless varieties of studies that universities offer those in search of Ph.D's. If you are curious, do some research. Even the internet should provide some information if you do not have access to Lexus/Nexus.

Corporate marketing is responsible for many of the decisions we each make each day. In a subliminal sense. And it is responsible for which products are even *available* to us in the marketplace. Corporate marketing is responsible for the fact that the book "Eats, Shoots and Leaves" is sitting on a shelf of my bookcase. But corporate marketing is ultimately not responsible for what I eat. Or read. I am.

It is the Panda Within Us.

Well you don't want to meet one in a bar! ← I guess it is possible that one person's gross and funny sex joke is another person's metaphor. Nope, don't want to meet anyone in a bar. Not even if they own stock in McDonalds.

I am sorry to speak the way I do (often metaphorically) for it might seem as if it were not connected to the topic. Therefore I will attempt to explain the connection. jsolomon spoke of pandas in reference to a post that spoke (again indirectly but linked) of how McDonalds makes pretense to being something that it is *not*. McDonalds is selling "quality". The claim made in the post was that their form of "quality" is a false claim. The word "quality" then was linked in jsolomon's post to the concept of making money. The word "panda" (being part of his post) could therefore be guessed to be a metaphor for "something that eats without ethical thought". My posts using the word "panda" were written using the original metaphoric comment. Sorry if it was confusing. Standard rhetorical form does allow for the use of metaphor. The questions raised in attempting to find "truth" in whatever claims are being made (in this case by McDonalds in its "makeover") are often those of credibility of source. It was this credibility of source that I was discussing.

Yes indeedy. The Panda Within Us.

There are some very tricky and extremely greedy pandas around in the world of human endeavor. But who expects a panda to have any ethics? They are merely cute fuzzy bears. So adorable. Sort of like Ronald Mcdonald.

In response to your post just above this one, SB, I will show you the reasons for my post you quoted and are confused about. My post was in answer to the quote above that was directed at me. It would seem to me, that my posts on this thread did show a presumed level of interest in customs, gestures, and culture. It was fun to write of history in a manner which I hoped would be enjoyed by whomever happened upon it. And it was fun, though time-consuming, to google for things of interest to add to the thread. It would seem from the post above that my entire intent during this thread was mis-read - at least by the forum host that is writing above. The humor was not caught by him. Hopefully it was caught by most people reading. Though I may be a little nutty - and although this nuttiness is something I accentuate for the reason of entertaining others, finally - if it is felt that I am "smug" - well, that is a rather strong word and not a friendly one. Therefore my retreat. I'm not out to prove anything here. Hopefully we will hear more about this idea of Americans and forks and their "self-aware" approach - this idea indeed could be expanded upon for some time it is to be imagined.

Au revoir to discussions of forks and googlings of interest in forks. Apologies to anyone that I have offended. K

Dear me. Maybe I should have added a non-classist gesture in the form of or maybe or perhaps to my post. Of course the ultimate non-smug gesture would have been but I don't do that much. Sorry. Indeed if we *are* speaking culture, seems to me that IHOP deserves a mention. Let us get down to some real smuggery here, shall we?

Mira ici for The World's Largest Knife and Fork. (Clickey on "Grosstes Estbesteck der Welt".) Lotsa good essen and trinkin goin' on.

Sorry. Got confused. Still am confused. I am speaking of course, of that restaurant that represents the Best We Have To Offer that gleams from every highway exit. But it is named The International House of Pancakes. Are they American? Are they International? Are they the bastion of our interest in food as intellectual process? I must look up the word "refinement" in the dictionary. Yes. I am confused.

Why yes. I do believe this is quite apparent in The House of Pancakes.

Don't forget the spoon, Pontormo! Nothing has the delicate taste of egg on fine silver! K Ah. So neglectful of my manners - do allow me to apologize for that short man in 1796. So rude, really! Poor Nappy did not have the common sense God gave a goose. It was his sweet-talk that fooled us all to our final regrets.

His walking pattern has always seemed a bit strange to me, personally. Confusing-like. But at least in the organic farming business he seems to be able to see the path for the trees.

Pontormo, It was a mere yet so telling! slip of the tongue, my use of the word "bannock". Many years ago I had a consort who loved to sing as he ate. We dined upon blini and caviar (of course at that time caviar was *not* de rigeur for our classes. It was a mere lowly dab of food yet at that time rising in cost and popularity by each day that passed). Nevertheless we enjoyed it while slumming as we hid together in our rented garret. He would throw a bit of blini through the air towards my eagerly open mouth, singing: You say a blini, I say a bannock You say le caviar, I say le fish roe Blini! Bannock! Caviar! Fish roe! Let's call the whole thing offfffff. Jean-Baptiste (Marie and I used to guffaw behind closed doors at that man - "Baptiste" indeed!!! with his roving eye and insatiable hunger for fish eggs) had started making a bundle in the French caviar business, which never existed before his public relations campaigns, so indeed the rented garret was neccesary - a cheap yet desirable economy so that more and more caviar could be afforded. *We* watch our sous, too, in manners of love and food! I daresay you have heard the tune in these modern times sung with the words "tomato" and "potato" in place of the lovely tastes we ate. Ah! How low we have fallen, my dear Jacobo. My ancestry is vague, as so many of these things are. Now, and then. Suffice it to say that I was merely a twinkling in my fathers eye when my conception occurred on an unlaid! table. No forks. No spoons. No fish plates. You might deduce from this that I was born "on the wrong side of the tablecloth", my charming correspondent, and indeed you would be entirely correct! But the tablecloth was fine linen, so society naturally decided to ignore this small confusion of desire and birthright!!! We name ourselves to best suit our complicated lives (as you so well know, Carrucci.) Time to break fast! Let me raise my glass of lager to you, Pontormo/Carrucci! Please forgive the idea of beer for breakfast but yes indeedy those brute English did endow me with some strange ideas!!!! To the regime! Katerina

It might help if you think of the pleasure that someone else could possibly find in the books that you do not *really* love or use, as they go to their new home(s). I often go through the bookshelves and take loads of books either to the library or to the thrift store as donation. Books are meant to be loved. If they are simply sitting on the shelf, not being opened for years, truly they deserve better. Someone out there *will* love them.

No, no, Rebecca. It is only something to do inbetween *searching* for where the children have hidden their Halloween candy from me, knowing that I will eat it. It is unfortunate that they will not leave the house for then I could search their rooms.