Random musings plus Kanchans Rasoi=phenomenal

Last night I went out with Nicola, Alice, Jinna (sp?) and Julianna to Kanchans Rasoi, which serves perhaps the finest and most delectable North Indian I have ever had (and I mean food, not people...Lookin' at you, Federico! After a 35 minute bus ride from Mile End to Manor Park (the restaurant is actually outside Greater London, in Essex: to get really good Indian food you have to get waaaay far to the East) we were greeted by the exceptionally genteel waitstaff who recalled me from a previous visit and asked after my girlfriend, Zoe, who was absent. After a round of crisp and spicy papodums and the selection of fantastic chutneys, our main dishes arrived. Perfectly spiced, beautifully presented, and served with a flourish, none of our choices disappointed. Particularly excellent was the Channa Masala. The chickpeas were the largest I had ever seen, and one single bite revealed why: they had soaked up loads of the succulent sauce of garam masala, chili and cardomum, yet retained a delicate and refined texture. The Saag Aloo, also, was near perfection: punchily spiced without being overwhelming--a failing in so many Indian restaurants--the fusion of potato and spinach was carried off without a hitch. Excellent in service and cuisine, and very affordable (average prices are about £15 for starters, two mains, rice, nan and drink) I highly recommend Kanchans to any afficionado of Indian food willing to venture a bit off the beaten path in search of that perfect curry. I have also been told that there is another, more expensive branch of Kanchans where rather than using ghee and oil everything is slow-baked in a tandoor. I assure you, once I find a fitting occasion, I will report back from my meal there.

On another note, yesterday was (perhaps) my last day working for Phil Willis, MP at the Houses of Parliament.

Phil in action

As the election has more or less been called, all of the parilamentary offices are being cleared out and moving up to the consitituencies. I would only return after the elections if I so choose and if Phil wins his race, which seems as likely as for any Lib Dem candidate save Charles Kennedy. Anyway, it was sort of a sad time as most of my co-workers were not around, and I shuffled out of my internship anonymously, with little fanfare or even farewells to speak of. The highlight of the day, in fact, came when the security staff made me get someone in my office with a pass so I could go to the cafeteria and get my lunch, despite the fact that I had passed that very same officer at least ten times during my time there. Beyond that, I accomplished very little on the day, only managing a brief spurt of activity as my time was coming to a close. However, I did manage to track down an elusive rarity for my music collection on Amazon.com: Mozart Piano Concertos, Nos. 11, 15, & 23 with the London Philharmonic accompanied by master Derek Han, the father of my friend and collaborator, the afore-mentioned Fedward Hyde.

A review of this fine collection will also be forthcoming. However, in the meantime, I found this review of an earlier recording of Chopin's piano concertos:
As for Derek Han, well, he is a smooth operator, playing with technical sureness if not always uncovering the depth of soul that is in the music. Sometimes his playing is almost too showy and lacking in muscle and weight if not facility; he relishes decoration. Pianists such as Arrau and Weissenberg have displayed the soul and passion that this music contains; Han prefers something lighter and more dazzling...

Not that I'm really one to criticise, as I can hardly play chopsticks (though I can do a rousing rendition of the Batman theme). I do think, however, that many of the qualities of the father in this review are so blatantly manifested in the persona of the son. "Too showy...relishes decoration...etc." Of course, as I have not heard the music yet, I am not prepared to judge, but the parallel does seem rather striking thus far.

...and in other news, der Papst ist tot. RIP John Paul Dos. Peace out

They popped a cap in his ass but he just wouldn't die...

The pain of having a name like Zeitgeist: Schadenfreude

With heavy heart, for the first time I must admit that I have been bested by my nemesis, Mister Fedward Hyde. Of course, this has nothing to do with any long-standing arguments, for, as any regular denizen of this site and his would know, his hyperbolic rants from the fringe require little in the way of rebuttal. However, it turns out that, despite a few weeks head-start, despite my more lucid and less maniacal, shamelessly self-promoting entries, his blog, Chez Fedward, has found it way onto Google while my site only does so through the reference to his. This kick to the groin is only bearable in light of the nature of the name of my site: while both zeitgeist and schadenfreude are rather obscure words, together they turn up on tons of sites devoted to odd words of Teutonic origin. Chez Fedward, on the other hand, is not the sort of thing that search engine crawlers see every day and thus has found its way onto Google much quicker than the lugubrious "Zeitgeist Schadenfreude." So, in response to this travesty, this cruel twist of fate, I utter the following cry from the wild:

Fick dich! Mach es dir selber unt leck mich am arsch du verdammter arschficker. Dein vater ist der Sohn einer mutterlosen ziege! Ahem. Congrats, sincerely.

Signed,

Julius

Respeck due

To my homeboy, Mr. Peter Martin Jaworski, the 2005 recipient of the Felix Morley Journalism Competition. I got this bit of good news a few days ago, so sorry for the delay...

From the Institute for Humane Studies website:

Peter Jaworski is a Humane Studies Fellow completing an MSc in Philosophy and Public Policy at the London School of Economics. He received an MA in Philosophy from the University of Waterloo under the supervision of Jan Narveson, his BA(H) from Queen's University, and will be pursuing his PhD in Applied Ethics, Social & Political Philosophy at Bowling Green State University.



Peter has been published in the Reader's Digest, the National Post, Najwyzszy Czas (Poland), the Western Standard, amongst others. For three years, Peter was a columnist with the Orono Weekly Times, writing under the banner 'The Peter Principle,' and, later, 'As I See It.' This past summer, Peter was a reporter for the Western Standard newsmagazine in Calgary, Alberta.

Peter was a 2002 Charles G. Koch Fellow interning at the Cato Institute. He has interned at the Fraser Institute, and is currently a Research Assistant with the International Policy Network.

He is an editorial board member of Ama-Gi: The Journal of the Hayek Society at the London School of Economics. He was an editorial board member of Eidos: The Canadian Graduate Student Journal of Philosophy, and was an Issue Editor for an issue devoted to the political philosophy of Robert Nozick (2004). He was a Graduate Reader for Pensees: The Undergraduate Journal of Philosophy published out of McGill University.

Peter has several publications forthcoming, including an article ("Cooperation through Reputation: The role of Gossip in social reinforcement"), interviews with Gordon Tullock and Chris Matthew Sciabarra in the Ama-Gi (2005), as well as a review of Edward Feser's "On Nozick" in the Journal of Ayn Rand Studies (Fall 2005).

For a collection of Peter's articles online go here: http://www.peterjaworski.com/articles

Awarded yearly by the Institute for Humane Studies at George Mason University, the prize honors the Pulitzer Prize winning journalist, Felix Morley...with cash prizes to outstanding young writers whose work best demonstrates and communicates an appreciation of classical liberal principles...[such as]: inalienable individual rights; their protection through the institutions of private property, contract, and the rule of law; voluntarism in all human relations; and the self-ordering market, free trade, free migration, and peace.

The hallowed London School of Economics and Political Science represented hardcore here, beating out a number of Ivy Leaguers.



Number two in the competition was some dude at the Kennedy School at Harvard, and number three was another LSE student, Daniel Friedman, whose columns in the school rag, while bombastic, likely led to the bragging rights for our esteemed institution, so I will forgive him. So, mad phat crazy props to Peter and the LSE. Bow down Harvard. Word to your mother.

Guess who's back...

"He's back from the dead, with a shaved head
Don't start to trip, dip, I brought my lead
Just in case you wanna fuck around
I'll stare ya dead in the face, and then I'll buck ya down"



-Everlast on "Guess Who's Back", by House of Pain, from: Fine Malt Lyrics
(Praise be to Greg Barrato for always singing that idiotic line and embedding it into my long-term memory)


Yes my adoring public (meaning probably Federico, Bill Bong, most likely Milner and Millahpleese, and the odd internaut on the "Next Blog" function), I am back from my lethargy-imposed hiatus from the blogosphere, bemoaning yet another Wisconsin loss heard over tinny internet radio in some dank European nation when I could have been watching it live at State Street Brats flanked by phalanxes of buxom Midwestern females while downing copious amounts of Spotted Cow. No, I would probably go with the Rose Bowl (SoCo and red kool-ade if I'm not mistaken) out of nostalgia.



Anyway, the Badgers lost a close one in the Elite Eight tonight to the heavily-favored Tarheels of North Carolina. It was a hard-fought game throughout; at times in the first half, UNC's big man, Sean May, seemed like he could score at will, and led a number of scoring runs that led the 'Heels to eleven point leads at two different junctures. The dogged defense of the Badgers and pinpoint shooting by former walk-on Clayton Hanson kept the boys in red in the game. With a few nifty defensive stops and a heap of inspiration by Alando Tucker, Wisconsin managed to tie it up just before the half, and headed into the locker room with a ton of confidence and all the momentum. For a few seconds after the interval, it seemed as if the Badgers would continue their run, chalking up five quick points, but UNC came right back and maintained a solid 7-9 point lead for most of the half. The Badgers would manage to whittle the Tarheel lead to one or two points, but never could overtake them. As time ran down, the 'Heels traded threes with the Badgers until the latter were forced to foul and, to their credit, the well-disciplined boys from Chapel Hill sank every one of their chances at the stripe. All in all, we fought tooth and nail and ran with one of the best teams in the nation for 40 minutes, a team that was bigger, stronger, faster, and more talented than ours. And, sadly, this was the final game in an illustrious career for Mike Wilkinson, our all-Big Ten C/F who'll likely go back to the old family dairy farm after graduation.



I can only imagine what the outcome would have been if we had Devin "Riding the Pine in Dallas" Harris or Boo "Leaving the Team for Personal Reasons" Wade at the point for us.

In other news, Arjen Robben, the nasty Dutch winger for Chelsea, is injured for the third time this year.



The inspirational midfielder, who led an offensive renaissance at a somewhat stolid Chelsea attack after recovering from a broken bone in his foot early in the season, was sidelined again for seven weeks after a small break and chipping in his other foot following a nasty tackle against Blackburn. Now, after missing a handful of Premiership matches as well as the phemonenal tie with Barcelona, Robben, playing for his national side in the WC qualifer against Romania, injured his ankle and calf and will be out ANOTHER few weeks. This means that he will almost certainly miss both legs of the showdown with Bayern Munich on 6 and 12 April, though there is some hope that he might make the second game. But Joe Cole has been inspirational in his absence as well, netting a number of important goals and making important contributions not only for the Blues but also for the national side, for whom he scored the opening goal against the Ulstermen yesterday. So, all is not lost, but my deepest sympathies to poor Arjen Robben, who surely doesn't deserve such a cruel series of debilitating injuries.


(Anyway, I know I've not written much lately, so more is soon to follow, ladies. Including my response to the the idea of scrapping the UN in favor of bilateral and multilateral contractualism.)