I stayed on for both the beginner and the intermediate salsa-for-the-soul classes today. Only, it didn't turn out quite as smooth on my soles. And I mean that in a very literal sense.

I was a whole 15 minutes late for the beginner's class because the HSBC ATM on Elmwood and Utica was out of order. Why does it have to be the one day that I forgot to withdraw cash in the morning?! So I ran around in the snow looking for another ATM and found a random one at some sleazy bar that charged me $2.50 extra for the money. I think the patrons at the bar got a kick out of all my hurry to get the money out and some of them were shouting "welcome to (whatever that bar was called)" as I rushed out. I swear it sounded like welcome to hotel california! So weird. I should have chosen the one at the petrol pump.

I finally stomped into class and then, in a completely miscalculated and misguided move, I tried to put Gaffer tape all over my "dance-designated" shoe-soles to make them spin better. It was as if an evil tiny voice in my coat hood was telling me to delay dancing even further by trying ludicrous things at the last minute. For those not in the know, Gaffer tape is a matté take on duct tape. It is used for residue-free sticking jobs in studios and in the entertainment industry.



It sounded like a good temporary fix for sticky shoes and thus, better spins in theory. Alas, the ridiculously fancy-looking tape reverted and stuck to the floor as I danced. So I had to peel it all off in the end. I am sure I annoyed Sarah and Sean with all my deranged flitting-about near the studio door.

To add to the general stickiness of the dance floor, someone else in the class, quite unfortunately, came in with their street boots (I did not!!) and there was water on the floor near where I put my dance anchor down. As a result, spinning, on the whole, was a disaster yet again. I tried wiping the water off with the tissue I had but some wet spots remained. Thankfully, Sarah took care of them later.

I guess I will need to pick my dance spot carefully next time, move away from anyone wearing street boots and wear heels with suede. I am done wearing flat boots and feeling like.. well a flat waddling duck. This probably means wearing dress socks under the wool socks I usually wear, and then maybe I will look like a duck with boots on?


Anything for salsa!!!!

Apart from all the sticky sole drama, the beginner class was a blast. I met this really cool person who had a lovely name that I just can't remember now. Mariposa? That Alzheimer's must be creeping up on me faster than I think. Thanks to my diminished faculties, we will henceforth refer to her as Mariposa. I think her name was really quite different and I am losing my touch here but let's not squabble over scrabble and get on with the story.

So the point was, Mariposa's whole being invigorated everyone around the studio. I wish I were more like her and less like loony here-but-not-really-there me. I LOVED her energy as she danced... darn it, I wish I could remember her real name. She lighted up the proceedings and at one point, while we were dancing, suddenly swept me off the floor - I honestly have no idea how she did that!!?! Maybe she has trained in martial arts? Apparently, my stick-like forearms and frame have no weight at all and people can't even feel them.


Now, that is some cause for concern - to be so unsubstantial as to be weightless. Maybe I need to do some weight-training and put some muscle on? I wish I had some of the muscle of that enviable wikipedia salsa woman.

Which brings me to another little hitch in my dancing technique. Salsa is very much about dynamics and part of the dynamics are developed through a push-and-pull kind of movement. It's almost like you and your dancing partner are on opposite ends of a huge elastic band and you take turns at pushing and pulling the band as you dance. The beats that accompany salsa music also undulate and then tighten. The music and the synchronous dance steps are the basis to the elastic push-pull-push rhythm of salsa. Something like this - pay attention to the hands..

(Yeah, I don't have a clue what they were on about, either.)

The thing is my push-pull-push technique is frankly, quite awful. I annoyed the hell out of another student in the class, who has been dancing for a while, with all my ineptness at the "elastic band" moves. When Sean or Sarah is leading, I hardly feel as if I am a bad follower but my lack of skills as a follower are magnified with everyone else. This is probably why I can't dance effectively outside of class, yet. I am hoping that things get better with each class... I have faith that they will but dance is like a language. Without immersion and practice, it's going to be an uphill task.

Oh and I learnt this absolutely awesome 70s disco-like move where you almost moonwalk sideways by alternately pivoting with your left heel and toe as you move sideways to your right. It was so cool to be able to do that step that I wished that salsa didn't have to be a partnered dance. There is definitely some scope here for "salsa battles" with individual dances. Maybe I should join the hip hop class and incorporate salsa moves into it. There are some interesting possibilities to where I want to take my sudden interest in salsa. I just feel that, with no current or even future practice partners, my partnered salsa will never really get better - so why not work more intensively on an individual style...

---

PS: I guess the salsa class drawing-muse theory isn't working. My mad drawing skillz are worse than a 1st grader. Pfft. On a positive note, at least they are accurate. If someone is desperate enough to ask me what I look like on film, I can comfortably point at my strikingly-lifelike self-portrait here.

PPS: I also danced with Sarah for a bit today and found that not all people have a hair texture like a street-sweeping broom. I am so used to the texture of my hair as I comb it with my hands everyday that it comes as a sensory surprise when someone's hair feels like silk. Her's does. It took me by surprise so much that I actually said it out loud. And I winked back at Mariposa across the studio a minute later. Two completely unrelated things... that are bothering me slightly right now. Maybe I shouldn't care so much.

Salsa for the soul, indeed.

My classes start once more this new year and I have missed them so much! I have a rather ambitious new year resolution of getting really good at Salsa.

Well... not as good as this pair... but you know what they say.

If you aim for the stars, you will at least put your boots on and get to your roof, or something to that effect.

---

PS: There is something so amazing about that wikipedia photograph of salsa. I love that pose they are striking. The expressions on their face, as they dance, are so charming.

PPS: Come to the Salsa for the soul class at Lexington & Ashland today at 7 PM for the beginner's class and 8 PM for the intermediate class or stay for both. Super-awesome Sarah Hooper and Sean Ortiz will be gliding and shining you into some Salsa awesomeness.

PPPS: You KNOW whatever is on TV or wherever else is so not worth missing Salsa lessons! :-)

is out there.

While (e:paul) is obsessing about smartphones, I have been poring over sewing machine reviews and photos. Currently, I am torn between these two:

The Singer 4411 heavy duty model


and

The Brother XL2600I 25 Stitch Mechanical model


I want to be able to

• hem jeans and trousers
• make duvet covers
• make that winter coat

I don't know if either of these will serve all those purposes...

It's FIVE days into 2011. ALREADY. Seriously, this year is moving even faster than last year! One of my new year resolutions (among, a 1000 others) was to decrease my salt intake. I found out in the last three months of 2010 that I was eating roughly 5000 to 6000 MILLIgrams of salt everyday. That's nearly 5x-6x times the recommended daily amount for someone my height/weight/age.

As I went around work and outside telling people about my resolution, I received many useful tips on reducing salt in my diet. I am going to document them here so that I can refer back to them when I feel like I am slipping in my resolution.

1. Use lemon juice as a garnish. This is an interesting piece of advice and potentially one that might work.
2. Use herb blends instead of salt -- Herbmare is expensive for just some herbs and salt in the long run. I am going to try using a lot more spices in my cooking and lessen the salt instead.
3. If you like salty snacks, try celery -- okay, this is working. Celery is salty. I am going to have to look up the amount of naturally occurring salt in celery. Why should naturally occurring saltiness be any different in its physiological effects than added salt?
4. Do not salt while you are cooking. Add salt in the end. This sounds like good advice. Apparently, "saltiness" gets muted as foods cook and this forces the cook to add more salt. I can actually see this happening in my kitchen because I keep tasting things as they cook and I do salt like the cook in Alice in Wonderland.

Yes, like her. Notice the baton-like salt shaker in the cook's hand.
Well... okay, according to the book, it's some potent pepper mix which makes everyone else sneeze, but that is how I add spices and salt when I cook. If anyone else is there while I am cooking, they eventually end up in a sneezing fit or tell me about how they suddenly have this intense desire to sneeze... or cry (because of all the onions I merrily chopped). Strangely, all this affects me very little or not at all.

---

PS: Someone actually messaged me and asked me if I eat 4000 GRAMs of salt per day. I did mean milligrams but I can't help wondering what might happen if I really ate 4000 grams of salt a day. Would people be able to use me as a salt-shaker at the cafeteria? *Patron flagging down waitress* "Hey miss, could I have (e:tinypliny) come and dance over here please. Thanks."

I started making the Tassajara bread yesterday (e:tinypliny,53377). Unlike the no-knead bread that I can now make with my eyes closed without recipés or measurements, this was pretty involved and required a million rising phases and also, a good amount of kneading muscle (that I don't have, btw).

I fell asleep halfway between the sponge-phase and the "1st" (technically second) rising phase. As a result, the bread rose for nearly 5 hours and resembled an intimidating massive football in the morning. The whole flat smelled like a yeast factory. I managed to punch it down for the third rise, reshaped it, allowed 20 more minutes of rising, scored and baked it at 350 F for 75 minutes and this is what I got.


Not bad at all. But it doesn't even remotely smell or taste like any chocolate - even though it has 2 glasses of spicy chocolate in the dough. Oh and it's not spicy either. I suspect that the yeast polished off all the chocolate and the peppers.


Strange little creatures.

I am making a modified version of the Tassajara Bread right now.

I got tired of the chocolate pepper shake I made and poured it all into the bread dough. The bread is in the initial sponge stage now. It could be a total disaster or a pleasant surprise... who knows.

I really wanted to do something fun to start the new year and learnt a ton of R analysis the whole day. But I guess I was a bit too ambitious when I decided to end the day with a new bread-making technique. I don't see this bread reaching it's final pop-it-in-the-oven stage anytime soon. I have already made too many changes to the recipé to be confident about what will eventually come out.

I am hoping the yeast like all the chocolate and the bread doesn't turn into a sedimentary chocolate-flavoured rock.

Fine. I will document the boring highlights of my year, just because I want to test out the exciting new list feature. (I am like (e:paul)'s list-guinea pig!)

• Where were you when 2010 began? At the ((e:PMT)) Party.

• Who were you with? A bunch of ((e:peeps)), having a great time drinking some pink stuff and then realizing that it was pink because I had switched glasses with someone. The pink stuff was insane.

• Where will you be when 2010 ends? At ((e:PMT))'s... maybe if I don't fall asleep like I did before the Halloween party.

• Whom will you be with when 2010 ends?

• Was 2010 a good year for you? What is "good" exactly?

• What was your favorite moment of the year? Definitely that one dance at the salsa class when I was absolutely amazed at how body dynamics clicked into perfect synchrony during dance.

• What was your least favorite moment of the year? Looking at my experiment results and finding inconsistency everywhere. :/

• Did you keep your New Year resolutions of 2010? Yep. Got rid of some more stuff from home. Finally let go of old clothes that were never really my size, gritted my teeth and went shopping for new ones almost my size. Picked up a new resolution of maybe sewing a winter coat all by myself someday. Joined salsa class and had a blast. Didn't draw as much I wanted to though... but that might change this year, considering my salsa class is like an ever-evolving muse.

• Do you have any New Year resolutions for 2011? Oh absolutely. I believe in new days, new years, new re-inventions, new research, new ideas, new wishes and new resolutions! Some mundane ones are to reduce salt in my diet. I think I will leave drawing to fate and hope that my muse gets more interesting. I really can't resolve to do things that are somewhat out of my power but I hope I graduate this coming year.

• Did you fall in love in 2010? I acquired several new impractical crushes. I am forever crushing on someone or something totally inappropriate or unattainable. Does that count? :-)

• What was your favorite month of 2010? I am not sure I remember what month it is sometimes.

• Did you travel outside of the US in 2010? No. I can't. I have to graduate first.

• How many different states did you travel to in 2010? Hmm... let's see. Cali, Florida, DC with a stop at Atlanta - so 3 or 4? And of course NYC many times.

• Did you lose anybody close to you in 2010? Well... yes, and no. Maybe?

• What was your favorite movie that you saw in 2010? Haha She is SO out of my league.

• What was your favorite song in 2010? Are you kidding me? How could I possibly have a favourite song when I listen to like 500 artists on an average and love them all every year and the next year and forever?

• What was your favorite album in 2010? I can't choose. It's impossible. I could point at around 50 albums that I heard for the first time and swooned over this year, even though some of them were produced several decades back or were released yesterday. I discovered a whole new world of salsa music. This question is really the most unanswerable out of the lot.

• What was your most exciting moment of 2010? Salsa class. Several moments but probably when I found that I could actually dance the basic step and it was not confusing. It was awesome.

• What was your proudest moment of 2010? These little devils didn't die on me.

• What was your most embarrassing moment of 2010? Um. So not telling you. Because all of them would probably take up several pages. If I don't get embarrassed any given day, I begin to suspect that something went wrong and I hadn't done anything interesting or worth writing about that day.

• If you could go back in time to any moment of 2010 and change something, what would it be? Ahhhhhh... why struggle with the hypothetical. They haven't perfected the time machine yet.

• What are your plans for 2010? How are plans different from resolutions? Do you plan to take over the world but you resolve not to kill everyone while doing it? Is this a trick question?

I was about to do the where-were-you where-was-I end-of-the-year list, but I am somewhat concerned that my fridge is out of control. So I am going to do a what's in my fridge and freezer at the end of 2010 and hope to goodness nothing spoils or gets ignored.

Let's see.


In my freezer is

• a big can of Nido, a super-delicious whole-milk in powdered form. Many uses, but mainly to spike the chocolate.
• Scharffen Berger Cocoa. Latest cocoa. I might be slightly addicted.
• 6 different types of coffee - one of which I almost like. What can I say. I think I am compulsive coffee trialist. I buy coffee because I like the smell but later find out I don't like the taste so much for many brands. I really liked Melitta. I should have just stuck to it. Some Colombian coffee in a green bag - I have no idea where to ge this anymore. Not that I want to. Its decent, not great though. Dallmayr is just okay, not so great. I don't like the starbucks, world blends european, and the Hacienda Juanita so much...
• One slab of firm tofu - could last a month but maybe I will make stir fry this weekend and it will exist no more.
• Dried chinese dates. Random discovery of 2010. Tastes like surprise-I-have-tasted-this-somewhere. That's as close as I can get to a description of what it tastes like.
• Trader Joe's unsweetened cocoa. With the grand entrance of S&B, this is getting super-ignored.
• 10 pounds of raw almonds - my ~6 month supply of Vit E and general deliciousness.
• 1/2 a stick of butter from god knows when. This needs to go maybe into a cake?
• Fresh frozen galangal
• Some boxes of homeground spices that I grind obsessively when I am stressed or when I need to think clearly or when I feel like experimenting. I guess the number of boxes shows a good amount of stress, lack of thought and failed experiments...
• MANY boxes of 1-serving homemade soup. 4 kinds. Also an indicator of level of stress and experimentation. Instant comfort breakfast, lunch and dinner.

class="tb">
1. Swiss Chard and French Lentil Soup with Ginger and Garlic
2. Butternut Squash and Carrot Soup with Split Yellow Peas
3. Spicy Zucchini and Green Bell Pepper Yellow Split Pea Dal
4. Zucchini, tomatoes, kale and Moong dal soup with galangal.

• Yeast. Some lady at the store told me to freeze it and I did.
• Chickpea flour - no immediate plans. It can hibernate for a while there.

So what's in the fridge, you ask (or maybe you really don't want to know but I will tell you anyway).

Going from bottom to top.

• Green bell peppers!!
• Hot green chili peppers!!!!!!!!!!
• Drying curry leaves for the next 2 months!!!!!!

(Yeah, the exclamation points exclaim that I am really happy about these!!!!!!!!!!!!)

• Cabbage. Stir fry this weekend? Maybe not... They last forever anyway and this one is a few days old.
• Apples, Oranges, Grapefruit - my trio of perfection.
• Some more latest kind of soup - a fifth kind that will soon move to the freezer.(Carrot, ginger and lentil soup with red hot peppers.)
• Almond milk - Gone!! Just finished the last dregs.
• Celery - soup maybe? Stir fry? Maybe? Maybe not? But it still has a week.
• Soy Sauce -- Hmmm.. I am not sure it spoils.
• Cider vinegar... I don't know what else to do with this other than dress salads... Cider quandry.
• Balsamic vinegar from Guercios - not sure I have been using this too much.
• Skim milk gallon - Half down. Milk is never a concern anyway. It goes fast.
• Whole wheat flour - trader joe's. Make spectacular bread, maybe I should make some?
• Rolled oats from the coop. I sometimes use it in bread... or make granola, but I need bananas to bind the granola and I don't have ripe bananas now.
• Wheat bran - bread making supply, another reason to possibly make bread this weekend?
• Some cooked lentils
• 2/3rds of a red onion from a lentil salad I made today
• Fresh Ginger!!!!!!!!!!!
• Fresh Limes!!!!!!
• Garlic!!!!!!!!!
• Lowfat Yogurt - just opened this but this need to be finished within a week.
• Toasted almonds. My present snack-stash.
• Toasted sunflower seeds. Almost all gone except maybe a few tablespoons. Another reason for bread.
• Carrots - maybe next soup with celery... and pomegranate?
• Pomegranate... I want to make salad with tofu, but maybe soup? Or maybe just a fun salad with apples, grapefruit and with a dash of lime and spices?
• Coconut powder
• More curry leaves - current stash
• Bottled Galangal
• Egg whites - I am experimenting with this. I think I really like scrambled eggs whites with kale, zucchini, tomatoes, ginger and green hot chili peppers. The major discovery is that there is NO eggy smell with these egg whites and they give me a whopping dose of protein.
• Black currant jam - makes an excellent sweetener for fun cakes.
• Homemade banana bread with raisins - only 4 slices. Will go away soon I hope. Having this bread in the fridge is mentally preventing me from making any more.
• More oranges - need to be juiced into a smoothie pretty soon.. maybe tomorrow. Getting some shrivels I am not happy about.
• Cedar heavenly spice hummus. Need to finish this soon as well... Maybe a salad with onions, tomatoes and cabbage?
• Kerala vadu mangai pickle!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
• Asafoetida powder
• Tamarind block
• Homemade Thai green chillie paste. I need to finish this soon..
• Zucchini - gone! Just mixed it with the lentils and yogurt.
• Chocolate-red-pepper shake. Just made this. Super spiky and fun!

I think that's about it. Not as grand as you thought it might be, huh? I really need to work on finishing 3/4th of everything before I buy any more things...

PS: I will justify all this fridge craziness by pointing you to a fridge of *real chef*

They say that the first step to kicking an addiction is to own that you have one in the first place. I am owning it. I am addicted to salt.

I have tried to rationalize this in the past with various reasonable-sounding excuses such as:
-- Food without salt is like dimensionless tripe. Eating tripe is bad enough, but eating dimensionless tripe sounds ghastly.
-- I don't eat processed food so much and it is the "processing" that does you in and not the salt.
-- Salt has added iodine in it. I totally need it for my thyroid gland.
-- True story. I bought iodine-free salt by mistake and my brain stopped working for a week.
- HOW ELSE can I get iodine??! I don't want to eat fishy smelling kelp.

Other dubious excuses have included...
-- It's just salt. At least it's not sugar!
-- I drink a ton of water, surely it must wash it all away
-- Everyone needs to die someway. I choose hypertension.
-- Hypertension has genetic roots and no one in my family has it.
-- Wait, I think one of my grand parents died of a kidney failure. Does that mean there was a possibility there of an incipient hypertensive process at work? Oh well.. shut up. Everyone knows kidney failure is clearly multifactorial.

And some completely bogus ones:
-- Other people also like salt, as do I. It proves that I am not a mutant alien.
-- Salt is like the national food where I am from. It would be so unpatriotic to consume any less. No-one wants to be unpatriotic. I don't! Do you?

But everything really boils down to one truth.
-- Mmmmmm salty... OH SO SALTY!!!!

I don't like pretzels too much. I am not a big fan of peanut-butter either. But around thanksgiving, I somehow acquired a box of Anderson's peanut-butter filled pretzels.

(FINE. I intentionally bought it!).

Because all those perfect crystals of salt on the pretzels were too hypnotizing to resist. Needless to add, not only did I relish the crystals, as a bonus, I also ate the COMPLETE box of nearly 681 grams - all by myself, in ONE week. (That's 1.5 pounds, you non-metric heathen.) You know how much of salt that is? 8000 mg or 8 grams of salt. And of course, I didn't just eat these pretzels the entire week. I also ate other things also heavily laced with salt. And I go through 1 cylinder of salt in roughly 1.5-2 months.

I decided to finally own it and honestly tracked my sodium intake over the past three weeks. Turns out I consume more than 5000 mg (5g) of salt every day. To put it in context, my daily requirement of salt is around 1200 mg ~1.2g. That's more than 4x times over the healthy limit. It is starting to look like I am the druglord of all salt addicts across the planet.

So I guess one of my new year, new decade resolutions would be to cut down on the salt. They tell you to go easy on yourself when you make resolutions. But going easy might still mean around 3x salt consumption. I am going to have to tread the hard path strewn with rocksalt.

may not make me taller...



but by the looks of it, might just make me laugh.

These is something so entertaining about absolutely inane fluffy pointless rudderless movies that are sheer stupid fun (and zombie movies of course... but maybe they belong in the same bin). And the team that made pineapple express definitely sweeps the prizes in this category.

Can't wait! :-)