It’s late in the day to be writing an entry, and I almost forgot that I hadn’t written anything this morning. But then the first round of cooking came to an end — it came to an end because the dishwasher was full of pots and pans, and I decided to go do something else for a while while it ran, such as, what? I wondered. As you can see I am not firing on all cylinders, or, to borrow a favorite line from Miranda, I’m a few pashminas short of a wardrobe. (Quoting Miranda, are we?)

The plan was that I would shop this afternoon and then tidy up the living room and the blue room. Then, I would cook tomorrow. I’m making a trio of pâtés for my birthday party on Saturday, plus a few other items — nothing fancy, just hours and hours of using up all the pots and pans in the kitchen and endlessly running the dishwasher. But then I got home from my three shopping trips and there were bags all over the foyer full of things that had to be put away, and the blue room was kind of a wreck, never mind tidying. Plus it suddenly made sense to poach the salmon right away. Pretty soon I changed the plan. I’ll do most of the cooking this evening, and put things away that shouldn’t be lying about (not for a party, anyway). That way, tomorrow, I’ll have only the tidying to think of, and maybe I’ll take care of the liquor after that’s done. Liquor is going to be an important part of this party. The “part” part.

Meanwhile, I find that I am reading a history of Russia, Lionel Kochan’s The Making of Modern Russia. The book itself is not, strictly speaking, modern; it’s a Pelican book from 1963. While shuffling books in order to return Fire in the Lake to the shelf, yesterday — the original one, even though it can’t be read, it’s falling apart so — the blue Pelican spine caught my skeptical eye. Was The Making of Modern Russia even my book? Yes! There’s a note in red ink on page 44. There’s another two pages later. It appears that I (or someone) took up yellow highlighting on page 43 and got tired of on page 47. It must have been me; the highlighted passages are the least important ones. That’s why I never write in books anymore.

Anyway, I’m thinking that a history of Russia from 1963 is prime HousingWorks material, but then I open the book at random and come to the beginning of a chapter entitled “Russia of the Nobles.”

Peter the Great died in 1725 from stone and strangury. He was unable, without great pain, to retain or discharge his urine. This was a consequence of syphilis, probably contracted in holland and aggravated by drunkenness. He left no successor. From a combination of personal and political motives, he had already caused the death of his son Alexis, and had excluded Alexis’s son from the succession. By a decress of 1722, Peter claimed the right to nominate his successor in much the same spirit that had animated Ivan III “to whom I will, to him I shall give my throne.” But when the time came, Peter was unable to sweak. One of his daughters waited at his death-bed for the word that never came.

Well, who could stop reading that? Not me-mo. I set the book aside and later brought it into the bedroom. Do I need to be reading a history of Russia right now? Apparently, I do. One of these days, I will not have to think twice about whether Ivan III or Ivan IV was the terrible one (IV). As vivid as Kochan is about the demise of Peter the Great, he is oblique about the destruction of Novgorod, which according to one account that I read, long ago, was razed to the ground. (Which, I’ve just learned from Wikipedia, is not what happened.) I’m almost up to the Time of Troubles.

A much thicker book, one that I would never consider getting rid of, is James Billington’s The Icon and the Axe, which (I’m too lazy to get up just now) dates from about the same time as Kochan’s book. Later, Billington was the Librarian of Congress; I wonder if he was a “Kremlinologist,” one of those analysts of the inner workings of the top echolons of the Communist Party in Russia who were desperate to find tea leaves to read (“Kremlinologer” would be more apt). Both Kochan and Billington argue, I think, what I have always believed, which is that Russia is Russia, Communist or otherwise. Events have certainly borne them out. Billington’s book is a cultural history rather than a political one. I wonder if I’ll read it next. I wonder if it will hold up. As a Vintage Book published in 1970, it is three years older than my disintegrating copy of Fire in the Lake.

So you see why getting rid of books is so hard. If I like a book the second time through, I’ll never give it away.

***

I’m making another batch — a double — of the chicken-liver pâté that Sam Sifton and Mark Bittman published in the Times Magazine a few weeks ago. It’s great, but there are two drawbacks. It’s quite hideously grey — exactly the color of a Weimaraner (“liver dog”). And it smells awful while the wine boils down. Well, not awful, but not like something that you want to spread on a cracker and wolf down with a cocktail.

I’ve already made a double batch of herbed pecans. Herbed pecans are a popular treat at my parties, and they’re easy to make; you just toss pecans in melted butter to which cayenne and rosemary have been added, and roast them in the oven. I got the recipe from a Junior-League-style production called Ravinia Cookbook. The thing about these books is that the recipes aren’t tested. What I need to do is write out the correct recipe for herbed pecans, or at any rate the one the works for me (longer time in a hotter oven, most notably). As soon as I do, I’ll share it with you.

Drop me a line at rjk@dailyblague.com
This entry was posted on Thursday, January 3rd, 2013 at 6:41 pm.