Debauch

Meat-free debauchery.
Meat-free debauchery.
Post-feast meat-free debauchery.

Terry, on a slow and controlled Orwell kick, quoted a couple of paragraphs on debauchery. I guess considering it was 1946, Orwell can be excused for excluding vegetarians from the pleasure. We can debauch as well as the rest of them. But to quote Terry quoting Orwell,

… vegetarians are always scandalized by this attitude. As they see it, the only rational objective is to avoid pain and to stay alive as long as possible. If you refrain from drinking alcohol, or eating meat, or whatever it is, you may expect to live an extra five years, while if you overeat or overdrink you will pay for it in acute physical pain on the following day.

Which made me think of the Danes. I can’t remember (or find) where I read this recently, but the article said that the Danes are among the happiest people in the EU, have the shortest life expectancy, and are among the biggest smokers. Their attitude? Live life to the max. Debauch! Who needs a few extra years?

A 1995 abstract (Institute of Risk Research, University of Waterloo, Canada) measured smoking in three principal dimensions and applied it to the Danes:

…Danish data on smoking; the cost for a typical pack-a-day habit is equivalent to a 57% reduction in personal income, 8.6 years loss of life expectancy, or a 4% drop in the Life Quality Index.

I’m going to have a glass or Ricard while I cook dinner now. Hmmm… think I’ll make a rich linguine with clam sauce, French provenÏ‚al baked butternut with tons of garlic and parsley, arugula and tiny sweet tomatoes, a New Zealand Sauvignon Blanc, and fresh mango for dessert. I’ll have my feast and five extra years, too.

©copyright 2000-2008. All rights reserved. Bambi Vincent

Feeding security-types

From left: Bambi, Bob Arno, Lieutenant Bob Sebby, Cynde Beer, Detective Kim Thomas, Jo Allison, Willy Allison.
Dinner at Bob & Bambi's house
Dinner at Bob & Bambi’s house

Ever the facilitators, Bob and I hosted dinner for a few security types the other night. Attending were Jo and Willy Allison, who put on the annual World Game Protection Conference in Las Vegas, at which Bob presented last month; Lieutenant Bob Sebby, who runs the quintessential fraud detail at LVMPD’s Financial/Property Crime Bureau; his wife, Cynde Beer, who is a mortgage fraud investigator; and LVMPD’s Detective Kim Thomas, an international authority on forgery. Kim’s also written a damn good book, Vegas: One Cop’s Journey. I reviewed it here.

Among us, we pretty much cover the gamut of theft. But on this night, the featured topic was how high-tech theft is moving into casinos. There’s nothing new about abusing credit cards, the magnetic data on them, shared-value cards, and washed or stolen checks. But bring those into the virtual money palace of a casino, and security-types begin to quake. With Eastern European organized crime gangs getting more sophisticated than ever, a cop’s gotta be well-fortified to stay on top. Or keep up. I’ve done my part:

Menu

  • Neon cocktails (Campari, Aperol, Midori, Absinthe, Ricard)
  • Aunt Diane’s special spinach salad
  • Grilled snapper filet on sweet potato mash, with
  • Orange-avocado-onion-cilantro-chili salsa
  • Watercress
  • Black rice
  • Garlic broccoli salad
  • Fresh melange of pomelo, pomegranate, jackfruit, mango,
    and strawberries, with jackfruit-flavored coconut milk

©copyright 2000-2008. All rights reserved. Bambi Vincent

Maui and Majuro

Pacific O

Pacific O

Pacific O
Yuzu diver scallops at Pacific O, Maui

Chef McDonald had a farm, EIEIO. We had a gorgeous dinner in Lahaina last week, outdoors, on the beach, hibiscus blossoms in my hair (still attached to the shrub, which we were snug against, having begged the last outdoor table). A tacky tourist luau was taking place next door, but it was hard not to enjoy the music which visited us on the breeze. We’d only just arrived on Maui, and from the taxi, we watched whales spouting just offshore as the sun set. Lovely.

Our hotel receptionist, when asked for dinner recommendations, said “They’re all the same in town, and none are any good. The only place I eat here is Ruth’s Chris.” Then we found the quintessential local, a grown-up surfer on a bicycle, a food enthusiast. He pointed us to Pacific O, among other interesting options. Its chef, James McDonald, runs an organic farm for all the produce at Pacific O and his other restaurant, IO’s. We walked there and got a table right away, but it was under a roof next to the bar. Noisy, and not outdoors enough. I pushed hard and the manager created a spot for us on the patio out of nothing. We rewarded him with a hefty bill.

Bob and Bambi in Majuro, Marshall Islands

The following week we came ashore in Majuro in the Marshall Islands, by small boat. Only lightly touched by tourism, the jungle island was a delight in all its ineptness. The airport was mad with well-wishers, send-offers, and children running around as if it were the county fair. Almost every flying islander checked in an ice chest, and each ice chest (as each suitcase) was emptied, inspected, and repacked. The ice chests contained plastic baggies of frozen food, lobster, crabs, and frozen fish. Much of this was unwrapped. Just frozen and thrown in the chest.
©copyright 2000-present. All rights reserved. Bambi Vincent