Author: admin

Indexing

I have created the following index of all the LCC numbers used for comics drawn and posted here between 2009-2012:

The following DDC numbers were also used:

Then I decided I don’t like DDC much and stopped compiling the numbers.

A few  notes about these LCC numbers:

  1. Strictly speaking, because these are all literature (I know) and I’m an author who lives in the 21st century, they should all be classed as follows: PS3612.U68 .[Title Cutter] 201[x].
  2. This is because the point of classifying things is to collate by author (in the case of literature, anyway) so that someone who is looking for an author’s works can find all of them in one place.
  3. However, I decided to class the comics by subject since it’s more interesting that way.
  4. Also I guess “Lupton” should Cutter out as L87 instead of L86, but who’s counting.  What table was I looking at?  Oh man.  If you look at the DDC numbers, you’ll see that I couldn’t Cutter “Lupton” correctly on the Sandborne tables to save my life, so I guess I just got locked into L86 and decided to go with it.
  5. Anyway, I should probably be getting to bed now.  It’s getting late.
  6. Oh, this includes the last comic of 2010 that was lacking a call number.  I haven’t classed the 2011 ones yet, but everything through the end of last year is taken care of.
  7. The most popular comic was: HC79.C63 L86 2010 (#322). Also, incidentally, the most popular post in the last year, getting 78 views in one day.  The second most popular was #289, Conan the Librarian.(It lacks a call number because I didn’t start doing them until 2010.)
  8. “But no other room displayed the meticulous solemnity of the library, the sanctuary of Dr. Urbino until old age carried him off.  There, all around his father’s walnut desk and the tufted leather easy chairs, he had lined the walls and even the windows with shelves behind glass doors, and had arranged in an almost demented order the three thousand volumes bound in identical calfskin with his initials in gold on the spines.” (Gabriel Garcia Marquez, Love in the Time of Cholera)

Further updates:

  1. As of 10 June 2012, all comics currently posted on the blog that have been given an LCC number should be indexed here. There are some comics that weren’t assigned an LCC number and thus aren’t indexed here.
  2. #289, Conan the Librarian in: Book Challenges is still the most popular comic of all time, with 253 views.
  3. #304, The Meaning of Wife (Book Review) is the most popular comic of the last 12 months.

Em oi! #337: Adventures Underground

Two countries divided by a single language.

I am fairly certain that the trouble we experienced in London can be ascribed to the fact that, as native English speakers, we expected words to mean certain things and not other things. Unfortunately, the British don’t seem to subscribe to the same philosophy, as evidenced by their misuse of the word “Subway.”

The other reason for our problems was that many Tube stations/lines were down for maintenance on the weekend and the Monday after our arrival (we came January 2nd, a Sunday), which was apparently a national holiday. In Paris, the Metro was never closed and we could get fresh croissants within a block of our hotel. In London we ate at Indian restaurants a lot.

Classes start tomorrow! Very exciting, etc. I am recovered from my end-of-semester burn out and ready to go do something intellectual again. I wonder how long this will last.

Belated classification: PE1961.A63 L86 2011.

Em oi! #336: Assassin’s Creed II

And then Leonardo da Vinci makes suggestive comments. If only I were making this up.

Happy New Year, everyone!

I’m a bit late, aren’t I? Well, I’ve been away, and…yes, I know, excuses, excuses. This comic was actually sketched out but not yet colored (or, I think, inked) when we left for Europe, and I didn’t exactly have access to my art supplies or a scanner while I was there. All apologies. I do have a couple of comics planned out for the next couple of weeks, though.

Belatedly classed under GV1469.35.A68 L86 2011.

I won’t mislead you by claiming that this game (i.e. Assassin’s Creed II) was all Bryan discussed on our trip…but he did enjoy looking through the Louvre to find some of the paintings showed in the game (without giving too much away, the game features a Da Vinci Code-esque plot in which assassins fighting Knights Templar seek clues in Renaissance paintings. Also stabbing. Lots of stabbing). And he got up at 5:30 this morning to play.

That was mostly jet lag though. I think.

Anyway, we’re happy to be back. I’ll write more about the trip later, when I have a couple of related comics to show you. For now, I’m going to have some dessert and then perhaps take myself off to bed a bit early. It’s back to work tomorrow (very exciting) and I need to be ready to get up early.

Do you have any New Year’s resolutions? I haven’t come up with any yet, I guess I could use some ideas.

Hongdau Baozi

baozi

“Did she really make fresh bao?”
–Firefly

That episode of Firefly (Our Mrs. Reynolds). I’m sure you remember it, and how impressed Wash was by the production of fresh bao (baozi, a steamed Chinese bun filled with…well, whatever you want, basically).  Perhaps in the depths of space, this is a truly difficult feat, but as I’ve recently discovered, here on earth it’s not the least bit tricky.

Ok, that first paragraph was lost on anyone who has never seen Firefly.  See, you try to work some local color into a recipe and where does it get you?

These are hong (red) dau (bean) baozi–meaning they’re filled with sweet red bean paste.  There are a lot of good recipes for this out there.  I got the idea from this helpful YouTube video.  She’s making anko, which is the Japanese equivalent.  This video from Cooking with Dog gives better instructions on how to actually make the paste.  The outside of the bao comes from a recipe I saw on Food Network, specifically a show called “What Would Brian Boytano Make?”, specifically this recipe here.

Red bean paste ingredients

  • 1 c. dried aduzki beans (you can probably get these at the grocery store.  I could, and my local grocery store doesn’t have a huge line in exotic foods — i.e., no semolina flour.)
  • 3/4 c. granulated sugar
  • pinch of salt
  • 2 T. butter (unsalted)

Red bean paste methodology

  1. Put adzuki beans in a bowl and cover with water.  Leave to sit overnight.  In the morning the beans will have swelled up and soaked up most of the water.
  2. Drain and rinse the beans, then put them in a pot with water to cover (about three cups).  Bring to a boil and then reduce heat to a simmer.  Let it cook for about an hour until beans are soft.  Skim off any scum or thick foam with a spoon or strainer.
  3. Drain and rinse the beans and put them in a bowl.  You can put the beans in the fridge overnight at this point.  That’s what I did (I was tired).
  4. When you’re ready, stick the beans in the Cuisinart and chop them up.  You’ll probably have to add a little water to get everything to chop up.  Make sure the paste is very smooth.  It will be kind of a light purple color and not very thick.
  5. Add sugar and salt and mix thoroughly.
  6. Put two tablespoons of butter (or neutral oil) in a pan.  When it’s melted, add the bean paste and stir fry it over medium-high heat until it thickens and darkens.  It will be a dark purple color when it’s done, and quite thick.  Put it back in the fridge and get the dough ready to go.

Bao dough ingredients

  • 1 1/4 tsp dry yeast
  • 1/2 c. water (warm but not hot)
  • 1 1/2 c. all purpose flour
  • 1 1/2 c. cake flour
  • 1/2 tsp. baking soda
  • 3 T. sugar
  • 1 tsp. salt
  • 1 T. melted margarine or neutral oil
  • 1/2 c. warm (not hot) milk (I used skim)

Bao dough methodology

  1. Add the yeast into the warm water along with a pinch of sugar and set aside.  When I say “warm” I mean “less than 110º or you will kill the yeast, but above 80º.  “Warm to the touch” is a good indicator.
  2. Mix dry ingredients (flour, salt, sugar, baking soda).  Add the milk, butter or oil, and water with yeast in it and mix well.  Turn dough out and knead about 5-10 minutes.  There isn’t much gluten in cake flour, so it won’t ever be quite as springy as regular bread dough, but it will get smooth and thick.
  3. Cover dough and let it rise for about an hour, until doubled in size.  Mine rose closer to 1.5 hrs, since I went running and showered before I rolled it out.  No harm done.
  4. Roll the dough into a snake.  Divide in half, in half again, and divide each quarter into thirds to make 12 pieces.  This will make REALLY BIG baozi.  If you want small baozi, halve or even third these.
  5. Roll the dough into a ball between your hands, then flatten and roll out until thin.  Try to make the edges thinner than the middle.  Add a good quarter cup of bean paste and gather the edges together.  Pinch the top firmly.  Let the baozi sit for ten minutes before you cook them.

To cook baozi

  1. Start a pot of water going.  Alternatively, put water in your rice cooker and turn it on.  This is what I did, since our rice cooker has a steamer attachment.  If you don’t have a steamer, you’ll have to improvise — try putting one of those racks for cooling cookies across a pot.  You’ll want it wide enough that you can get a lid on it, but there has to be water boiling and not touching the baozi.  You’ll figure something out.
  2. Each baozi can get its own little square of parchment paper.  OR you can cut out a big sheet of parchment paper in the shape of your steamer and punch little holes in it to let the steam through.  Whatever works for you.
  3. Put the baozi in the steamer and steam for about 12 minutes, until the baozi are shiny and cooked.  They will expand a lot in the steamer, so don’t put in too many at once.
  4. Serve warm!  Be careful, the filling will be hot.

So that was super easy.  You can put basically whatever you want in them.  I will probably try spinach and tofu next.

This recipe made about 13 baozi, enough to feed the four baozi eaters with baozi left over.  I could have easily made the baozi smaller and made at least 16 or so.

Notes:

If you decide to make this with a more savory filling (I used tofu, cabbage, mushrooms, and green onion), be warned: the wetness of the filling will make the dough very fragile.  Don’t roll them too thin, work quick, and consider steaming them seam-side (i.e., thick side) down.

Em oi! #335: The M&M Jar

Ask not for whom the M&Ms toll...

Well, I’m knackered, but my computer is now up and running again (Windows 7) after a reformat, and hopefully it will keep going for a long time. Unfortunately, I’ve lost the password I needed to log into the site (Classification Web) where I could look things up in LCC, so the comics won’t be categorized for a while.  After winter break ends, I can use the hard copy of LCC or the computers in the library school lab.

A few quick notes about the comic:

  • Based on an actual conversation, and I laughed for a long time.  Bryan has a perfect sense of timing.
  • My birthday is actually May 3.  I figure since it’s mostly Bryan and my mom who read this, I shouldn’t bother mentioning it.  But then I thought maybe I should for those random strangers.
  • I have had this drawn for a couple of days and I’ve been waiting on the re-installation of all my various programs before I could process and upload it.  I would have had it up last night, but Bryan’s computer exploded and I went to go play games with him to console him.  The things we do for love.
  • I think that’s it.  I’m really tired now.
  • Oh, the name of the comic was chosen to be similar to The Bell Jar.  Not that I recommend the book, mind.  Unless you are a depressed teenager, then it will be awesome.  Actually, I take that back.  I think it was so depressing I had to stop reading it.  So that’s pretty depressing.

I’m not one for Xmas cheer, but I’ll close by wishing everyone a happy holiday season.  My gift is a trip to Paris and London.  I am so excited I cannot sit still.  I get to go to Paris!  I can run to the Eiffel Tower!  We’ll go to London!  I’ll see Baker Street!

I’m full of exclamation points.

If I owe you an email, I’m sorry.  Still getting caught up on everything from finals.

ETA: Classed as GT2920.C3 L86 2010 for Manners and customs (General)–Customs relative to private life–Eating and drinking customs–Foods and beverages–Beverages–Other, A-Z–Chocolate.

Em ơi! #334: A Short and Pointless Story

Let's talk about socks, baby? Socks it to me? Sufferin' sock- okay, I'll stop.

Bryan’s friend’s dog came over (long story) to go for a run with us tonight. Last week when this happened, Kali (the cat) freaked out, urinated on me to get me to drop her, streaked up the stairs and was not heard from for another three hours. This week she sat on the sofa and hissed quietly when the dog came near. This was pretty distressing for the dog, who wants to be friends with everyone and who was evidently determined to protect his friend Bryan from the mean nasty bitchy cat, but I think it’s a vast improvement.

This comic…Bryan and I have had a couple of conversations about it.  The first one was like this:

Em: I’m going to do a comic about your socks.

Bryan: My…my socks?  That won’t be funny.  Aren’t you afraid people will think you’re all domestic?

Em: It’ll be fine.

Second conversation:

Bryan: The comic is funnier now that I’ve read  it again. (pause) I’ve been finding mis-matched socks in my drawer for the last two weeks.

Em: See, I’m helpful.

We’ll file this comic under PN6231.S634 L86 2010, for Collections of general literature–Wit and humor–Collections on special topics, A-Z–Socks.

I usually don’t class my stuff in PN (literature) because, well, everything would go there, and part of the point of this exercise (if there is a point) is to get to know the LCC in general.  But I’m only finding one other topic related to socks, and it’s about knitting, which isn’t right.  So literature it is.  This is, of course, the problem with an enumerative classification (all categories listed out, as opposed to an expressive classification like Dewey which allows a cataloger to create numbers on the fly).  But don’t get me started…

I’ve noticed that most bloggers end with questions to try to engage their readers in a dialog and garner comments.  So how about this: Do you have any opinions on enumerative versus expressive classification systems?

No, wait.  Don’t go.  Let’s start with something easier, like “How was your day?”  I myself swam 2100 yards, cleaned a heinous virus off my laptop, and made truffles out of bad fudge.  What did you do today?

Em ơi! #333: Sucks to be Me

CERTAIN DOOM.

This was meant to be a follow-up to the comic from the week before last, #332, about giving up sugar.  But even though the comic was finished last week, the week itself was a total write-off in terms of getting things done, so it didn’t get scanned until today.

I just burned the fuck out of my hand failing at fudge making, so excuse me if I’m not as apologetic as I should be about completely missing an update.  Ugh.  I’ll have an amusing illustrated essay up Friday or Saturday to make it up to you.

Not eating sugar/candy was a weird experience.  I basically wanted to eat the biggest most chocolate-y and fat filled cake I could imagine.  Instead I think I had some low fat frozen yoghurt.  But whatever.  While I was not eating candy, Bryan and I were planning a big dinner party, so basically every time we were out running or driving around or whatever, it devolved into a case of, “So, what should we make for dessert?”  Bryan thought for some reason we should focus on the main course.  I don’t get it.

Anyway, I wish I could say I’m eating less sugar or something now that I’ve had my time off.  But I’m not.  I am eating more dried fruit, which I guess is a plus.

So my hand.  I usually don’t fuck up recipes this badly, but I just threw away like five cups of burned crystallized sugar and peanut butter.  All I can say is, “Go fuck yourself, Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook.”

This comic is filed under TX553.S8 L86 2010a, for:

Home economics–Nutrition.  Foods and food supply–Examination and analysis.  Composition.  Adulteration–Dietary studies, food values, experiments, tests, etc.–Special constituents, A-Z–Sugar

Compound Butter: Maple

Considering that almost everything I cook is pretty low in fat, making compound butter was a weird experience for me.  But just like I wouldn’t dare to use fake maple syrup, I couldn’t very well make this with fake butter.

Let me warn you in advance that it is delicious.  I licked it off my fingers and had to forcibly restrain myself from eating it out of the bowl with a spoon like cookie dough.  Is that gross?  I would think so, but it is so delicious, I’m not sure I care.

Ingredients

  • 3 sticks of butter (sweet butter, or else omit the salt)
  • 3/4 tsp. salt
  • 1/4 c. plus 1 T. maple syrup
  • 1 T. powdered sugar
  • A pinch of cinnamon

Other equipment: piping bag, if desired.  Jars for storage.

Method

  1. Let the butter come to room temperature.  Mine was out of the freezer and in the fridge for a couple of hours, then on the counter for about two or two and a half hours.  You have to plan a little bit ahead, is what I’m saying.
  2. Cut the butter into small pieces and put it into the food processor.  If you have a stand mixer, that will also work.  Or one of those electric egg beaters is also good.  By small pieces I mean about tablespoon-sized.  You don’t have to be too precise.
  3. Beat the pieces of butter until relatively smooth.  It will still be kind of lumpy and weird at this point.  Add the maple syrup and beat until smooth.  You will have to stop from time to time to scrape down the sides.
  4. Add the salt, cinnamon, and powdered sugar.  Mix and taste.  Adjust flavors as desired.
  5. Using a spatula, transfer to an empty, clean jar (like a peanut butter jar).  Alternatively, load up your piping gun/bag and pipe the butter into the jar.  Very pretty.
  6. Put jar in fridge until butter is firm.

How to Truffle

Peanut Butter Truffles

Bryan went out of town on a business trip.  I wanted to make him some peanut butter cups (because he loves peanut butter cups), but it turns out PB cups are kind of complicated.  Truffles, on the other hand, are easy.  And when B got sent home two days early, I decided the easy route was the way to go.

I’m not entirely satisfied with the truffle centers — they needed a little more PB to hold them together, or they needed to be frozen before coating or something (a couple of them started to fall apart while dipping).  And they’re definitely not pretty, but I’m not actually sure how to make pretty truffles.  I will leave that to professionals.  This recipe comes from Chow Hound, but with a few changes (I cut it in half and added some dark chocolate).  They note that the cups will keep up to three weeks in the fridge.  That is a lie–they kept a bit less than 24 hours (because B had eaten them all.  Well, I had a couple.  They were delicious).

Ingredients

(Makes 24 teaspoon-sized truffles.)

  • 1/6 c. graham cracker crumbs (I used cinnamon graham crackers crunched up in the food processor.)
  • 1/3 c. powdered sugar (sifted)
  • 1/3 c. + 2 T. (approximate) peanut butter (I used a smooth,  “natural” pb, not JIF or some crap something like that which is full of sugar.  If you’re using pre-sweetened PB, consider adjusting the amount of powdered sugar downward.  Chunky should be fine, and you can probably use almond, cashew, or sunflower seed butter.  Whatever floats your boat.)
  • 1 tsp vanilla
  • A pinch of salt – I forgot this.  But it would have been nice.
  • 1/2 c. plus a handful milk chocolate chips
  • 1/2 c. plus a handful semi-sweet chocolate chips

You’ll also need a saucepan, some heavy glass bowls, tin foil, and an ice cream scoop or large spoon.

Procedure

Part I — the middles

  1. Put the graham cracker crumbs, powdered sugar, and peanut butter in the food processor and mix it together until it has the texture of cookie dough or similar — it will clump together readily.  If it seems crumbly, add more peanut butter.
  2. Using a teaspoon, scoop mixture into teaspoon-sized balls and place on a cookie sheet or baking dish lined with foil.
  3. Put these into the fridge or freezer for at least an hour.

Part II — Tempering the chocolate

There are a lot of discussions on this–here is one of the better ones.  Basically you have to maintain the crystal structure of chocolate as you melt it, otherwise it will not solidify correctly.  People don’t want truffles to get all over their fingers.  If you’re thinking tl;dr or just don’t care about the science, I’ll tell you approximately what I did.  Otherwise feel free to use your favorite tempering method for melting the chocolates (melt them separately and keep them warm over a pot of water–don’t let the water touch the bottom of the bowl they’re in).

  1. Place chocolate in a heavy glass bowl (like Pyrex).  Put it over a pot of water and bring it (the water) to a boil.  Keep an eye on the chocolate during this period.  After a while, it should begin to look melty, but still be in the shape of the chocolate chips.
  2. Remove the bowl from the heat and mix the chocolate.  All the chips should mush together into a smooth mixture without lumps.  At this point, add a handful of chocolate chips (of the same type, milk or dark chocolate) to act as seed crystals.
  3. Because we melted the chocolate at a fairly low temperature, the seed crystal step may not be necessary, but it can’t hurt.  The residual heat should melt the newly added chips; otherwise, scoop out anything that doesn’t melt.  Put the bowl back over the boiling water briefly if the chocolate gets stiff.  You are now ready to dip.

Part III — Dipping the truffles

  1. Dip an ice cream scoop or large spoon into the chocolate.
  2. Shake it off so it is coated with chocolate.
  3. Put the truffle center in the ice cream scoop/spoon and rotate it until it is covered in chocolate.  Then put it on a foil-lined baking sheet.
  4. Do 12 in milk chocolate and 12 in dark chocolate, then use the remaining chocolate to touch up the bald spots (use the semi-sweet here on the milk chocolate truffles and vice-versa).
  5. If one of the centers starts to break up while you’re dipping it, don’t panic.  Just put it on the baking sheet and put a big dollop of chocolate on to hold it together.  It will harden into a truffle.
  6. You can top the truffles with: powdered sugar, sugared walnuts, honey-roasted peanuts, whatever strikes your fancy.  I went with a little of everything on the off-chance that if they were ugly to begin with, becoming really ugly would somehow make them cute again.
  7. This strategy was unsuccessful.
  8. When all the truffles are coated, put them into the fridge for another 30-60 minutes, until the chocolate is hard.  Because you tempered the chocolate, you shouldn’t have probTruffles!lems removing the truffles from the cookie sheet and putting them on a plate.

That’s it.  Not too hard; the active parts of the recipe only take about 30-40 minutes all together.  If you’re really patient you should make a big batch with different flavors and give them to people for Hannukah.  I’m not really patient, so I only make truffles for people I really like.

Em ơi! #332: I Think He’s Serious

"Maybe we can go to Cold Stone and I can just...stand outside and inhale..."

In the last panel there, B is actually making fun of me–that’s something I would say.  He has never shown any concern for what he eats in conjunction with how much or how little he runs.

EDIT: So originally I had the above sentence phrased differently.  B protests that he does care about staying svelte, which is why he runs several times per week with me, lift weights, and so on.  Which is totally fair — I don’t mean to imply that he’s a slouch or not fit or something.  He’s quite fit.  Mm.

Sorry.  I got distracted.  Anyway, my point was not that he is unfit or spends his entire life eating frosting out of a canister with a spoon (which is something I have possibly done in the middle of a sugar craving, ugh), but that he doesn’t freak out when he eats too many sweets.  If I eat a lot of candy, I feel like I have to run more to run it off.  He just shrugs and eats less the next day.  Both systems work in terms of weight maintenance…but his is definitely more relaxing.  So that is how he’s making fun of me.  He’s not a monster or anything.

Anyway, I found it amusing.

Things that count as “candy”: ice cream/frozen yoghurt, candy, chocolates, flavored syrup that goes in coffee, granola bars that have chocolate chunks in them, honey-roasted peanuts, sugar-coated pastries such as cupcakes or donuts or chocolate-chip muffins.

Things that don’t count as candy: sugar or hot cocoa mix in my morning coffee or afternoon tea (I need sugar and milk to drink coffee, and without coffee I cannot function, probably.  And Bryan said he would move out.), cough drops, dried fruit.

Today is actually day two of this experiment.  It runs until the end of the day Sunday (meaning “when I go to bed”).  I drew this picture to indicate how the first two days have been:

"Meh."I had a presentation today that was quite terrifying (I hate presentations generally, that’s why I want to be a novelist and sit in a cafe and not talk to people).  Most of my energy has been directed toward that and not to thinking about the sugar I am missing out on.  I notice I want some (for example, I usually have a small sweet after dinner, and I missed that today), but it isn’t overwhelming.  Since I still get sugar in my coffee, I don’t feel totally deprived.

I probably won’t have dramatic weight loss (all the running means my weight fluctuates a lot depending on my hydration), but maybe I can restructure my diet to have fewer cookies and more apples.  Not a terrible idea.

This comic is filed under TX553.S8 L86 2010, for (you ready for this?):

Home economics–Nutrition.  Foods and food supply–Examination and analysis.  Composition.  Adulteration–Dietary studies, food values, experiments, tests, etc.–Special constituents, A-Z–Sugar

LCC almost never fails.  Amazing.

Am I the only one who does crazy experiments-of-one like this?