My (almost) fellow Americans

Jeez, it doesn't take much to become a US citizen, does it? I mean, apart from the eight-some years of filling out forms, getting fingerprinted, collecting documents, filling out more forms to replace the ones that were lost, spending interminable hours with the huddled-masses-yearning-to-breathe-free in soulless waiting rooms, writing checks for lawyers bills and filing fees.

But when it comes to the pivotal moment--when it gets to the interview that can affect the rest of your life--it goes like this:

You wait about 45 minutes for an interviewer to call your name. Finally one does, and he directs you and your lawyer to a small office. Desk, computer, printer, paperwork, pictures of the kids, a hand-painted "Best daddy in the world" coffee mug. A small cheap radio playing a local news station.

Your lawyer is instructed to sit behind you; you're told to stand and raise your right hand.

"Do you swear to tell the truth?"

Not swear on God or your momma's life or anything specific. Just swear, vaguely. You say yes, vaguely.

"Do you mind the radio?"

You say it's not bothering you.

You're told to sit.

Ten minutes pass while the interviewer tries to find your record on the system. Then, the questions. The ones you've studied for weeks. The ones you had people test you on. The ones that may possibly include things you hadn't thought of.

Who was the first President?
Who is the President today?
What is July 4?
Can you name one Senator from your state?
How many Senators are there?
What is the Constitution?

That's it? That's it?? Come on, even Americans could get those right! The only tough one would be the last, and that's only because they're looking for the official rote answer: "The supreme law of the land." In a moment of daring, you actually include the air quotes when you answer that one.

Then he whizzes through the others. "Have you ever been a Communist ... Nazi ... terrorist ... member of a hate group? Ever been arrested ... charged ... jailed?" You assume they don't see you as posing a threat to national security, but you'd have appreciated the effort.

And then he asks for a writing sample. He slides your test paper over and says, "Write on the bottom, I love America."

You refrain from laughing out loud and do as you're told, slightly curious as to what would happen if you asked for an alternative statement.

And then you sign your name on five documents, and on two copies of your official photo, and he stamps a big red "APPROVED" stamp in your file.

And you're done.

But you're not American yet.

Back out to the waiting room for another half-hour, to get the paperwork that tells you where and when your swearing-in ceremony will be. Your lawyer says it could be between four and eight weeks.

It's in two weeks. In Lowell.

On December 12, you become an American.

A sign?

My lawyer called today. He won't be at my interview tomorrow because he broke his collarbone biking to work. He reckons he'll be up and around in a couple of days; in the meantime, his partner will be going with me.

I take this as a good sign. Not his injury, of course, but the fact that he's sending a stand-in, because he did the same thing at my Green Card interview and that went very well.

Of course, it could just be me. Is it me? Maybe it's me.

And actually, here's a question: is it appropriate to send one's lawyer a get-well card?

Wish me luck (or at least as many smarts as #24)

On Tuesday morning I have my naturalization interview. I meet my lawyer at the Federal Bulding at 8:15, and then he figures we'll wait for about an hour to be called; the interview itself will take about 20 minutes. "They don't want to waste time," he says. "They'll want you in and out as quickly as possible." So much for the great weight and importance of the proceedings.

I met with him earlier this week to go back over the list of questions they'll ask (the basics such as name and current address, plus the more involved: membership of Nazi party; titles of nobility; habitual drunkardness. As I told my lawyer, I'm not a habitual drunkard. I'm a social drunkard).

He did say something about being "clear and straightforward" with my answers, which I suspect is his polite way of telling me not to be a smartass.

"For the last part of the interview," he said, "they ask you the civics questions."

I figured I was so totally prepared for that; I've been listening to the 100 questions on my iPod every day, and I know them backwards.

Q: What color are the stars on our flag?
A: The stars on the flag are white.

Q: What are the three branches of our government?
A: Executive, legislative, and judicial.

Q: Who is the governor of your state?
A: The answer to this question depends on where you live.

But my lawyer started throwing out other questions. Who is your congressman? Can you describe three Amendments in the Bill of Rights? What were the causes of the Civil War?

For the last one, I started on a detailed explanation of the southern states' determination to hold on to their agricultural economy in the face of what they saw as interference from the industrialized northern states. But the look on my lawyer's face made me think I was on the wrong track. "Um ... slavery?" I ventured.

"You should probably say 'slavery and states' rights,'" he said. "When previous clients have said 'slavery,' the examiners have allowed it only grudgingly."

"Anyway," I argued, "those questions aren't in the official list."

"Doesn't matter; I've heard them asked on occasion. But don't worry, you'll do fine. You only need to get seven questions right out of ten."

And as The Boy points out, if Manny Ramirez can pass the test, anyone can.

Thanksgiving (of course!)

Thanksgiving is my favorite holiday.

(The Boy reminds me that I say that about Hallowe'en. And Christmas.)

Thanksgiving is one of my many favorite holidays, because it revolves around one thing: food. No gifts to buy, no decorations to put up, no annoying songs. And because both our families are a few thousand miles away (and mine doesn't do T-Day anyway), no long and frustrating car trips. One can concentrate all one's energies on preparing and consuming things delicious.

For the first time in perhaps eight years, we didn't buy a turkey. Usually we follow The Boy's mom's recipe for Pavo Borracho: soak the bird in red wine for four days, turning regularly until it turns purple, then stuff it with a tricked-out picadillo of ground beef, almonds, raisins, olives, tomatoes and (more) red wine (though in recent years the beef has been replaced by such alternatives as venison and wild boar). The other lovely thing about this dish is that there are always mountains of leftovers, which allows us to carry out the other Thanksgiving tradition of next-day grilled turkey/cranberry chutney/cheese sandwiches.

This year, we were invited to Casa Jon and Robin for the nosh-fest, and as Robin was doing the turkey, we could turn our attention to side dishes (which usually play second fiddle to the bird). So I prepped a fall casserole in advance, and we took other veggies to throw together later. Final menu:

Hors d'oeuvres
Vegetable terrine
Black olive tapenade
Manchego with rosemary
Sesame crackers

Entree
Roast turkey
Julia Child's cranberry chutney
Stuffing
Scallion quiche
White and sweet potatoes, mashed, with cream, garlic and butter
Brussels sprouts tossed with shallots and olive oil
Carrots with fresh ginger and butter
Apple and butternut squash casserole (which may also have involved a small amount of butter)
Grrraaaaavvvyyyyyy ...
Louis Jadot Pinot Noir

Sorbet
Staring contests, face-pulling and magic spoons

Dessert
Chocolate-orange pecan pie
Tawny port

All in all, a fabulous meal and excellent hospitality. As we were getting ready to leave, Robin and I bagged up and shared out the leftovers, most of which Robin insisted we take with us, including a generous helping of the deliciously sweet-tart chutney.

At home, The Boy looked through the leftovers and gasped.

"Where's the turkey?" he asked.

"Ummm ... uh-oh." I realized what had happened: we'd cleared up all the food still on the buffet, but the remaining turkey was already in the fridge, so we hadn't even thought about it.

We had no leftover turkey.

None.

(Update: Jon stopped by just before lunch today with an enormous bag of birdmeat. Thanksgiving is saved! Huzzah!)

Chumscrubber, Flammkueche

Friday night's dinner plans morphed from "Let's go somewhere like 29 Newbury" to "Let's see if Tim and Peter want to come out" to "We're having takeout at Tim and Peter's." Which, frankly, sounded like a much better way to spend Friday night after what had been a very long work week.

So we went over and drank martinis (lavender, using the simple syrup we made this summer, and limoncello) and ate pizza. The bacon and olive was notable for the fact that it was liberally topped with actual slices of bacon. Not fried, diced slivers or crumbled bits, but entire slices, baked on top of the pie. Why don't more people do this? Why isn't there a federal law to say this is the only legitimate method of bacon presentation when pizza is involved?

And we watched The Chumscrubber (2005), starring Jamie Bell (Billy Elliott) and Glenn Close. Best described as "Donnie Darko meets American Beauty." Bell (with no trace of a Billingham accent) plays a disaffected youth in an upper-middle-class California suburb who, between taking meds donated by his psychotherapist dad and dealing with the unexpected suicide of his best friend, has to track down the deceased's stash of prescription drugs before the local rich-kid bully makes good on his promise to kill a boy he has kidnapped.

While it handles the theme of "what's wrong with kids today" without much subtlety (no wonder the offspring are twisted when the parents are medicated, delusional, self-involved or violent--and apparently have glasses of red wine surgically attached to their manicured hands), it also features some sensitive and thoughtful performances from the teen actors.

Best work, though, comes from Glenn Close as the mother of the dead kid. Her character moves from intense fury cloaked with sociable politeness (she calls each of the neighbors in turn to tell them "... in no way do I blame you for my son's death") to silently screaming despair to quiet acceptance with graceful ease. Worth a look.

Saturday we took our fat cat to the vet for her annual checkup (the results are in: she's fat. See?)



In the afternoon we schlepped to the mall to start our War-on-Christmas shopping, and found that everyone else in the entire world had the same idea. We spent a couple of hours punching mouthbreathers and then staggered back home, freshened up and headed out to Sandrine's for dinner. Ah, civilization. Or at least as close as one can get in a roomful of flustered Harvard professors the day Yale clobbers their football team.

Once again we were in close proximity to the yellingest table in the room; two middle-aged couples discussing their parents' senility and their childrens' apathy ("He's not ready to declare a major; he's trying to decide between biology and creative writing"), all tweed jackets and assured opinions.

We discussed which comment, spoken at high volume, would cause the most offence: "I agree with Rush Limbaugh; Michael J. Fox was totally faking it" or "Gee, I really hope Santorum runs in 2008."

Food, as always as Sandrine's, was lovely. I had the simple salad (though noted sadly that the tomatoes no longer had the summer's enormous flavor) and the duck-prosciutto Flammkueche with bleu cheese and apples. The Boy started with a baked Crottin de Chavignol, warm and creamy, and then did the Choucroute, which involves six types of meat from the same maaagical animal: pork chop, bauernwurst, weisswurst, ham hock, wiener, plus a single sweet potato wrapped in bacon, and Riesling-infused sauerkraut. Way too much pig for me, but not for The Boy! Oink!

Why are people talking near my food?

The worst thing about eating in restaurants is that they’re open to the public. And at the risk of sounding like Curmudgeon McGrumpy, crowned Miss Anthrope 2006, I have to say it: other diners annoy me.

This isn’t always the case, of course. But the same brilliant luck that has me seated behind Yao Ming at every movie makes sure I get the table next to Megaphone, Party of Two, at many otherwise lovely meals.

Some people have loud voices. They just do. They either grow up in families where everyone yells, or they’re going a little deaf and feel the need to compensate, or else they’ve just never been told to take it down a few notches. Either way, they always seem to end up at the next table.

The worst example of this was about five years ago, when The Boy and I celebrated our anniversary at Anago, back when it was in the Lenox Hotel. Back then, limited finances meant such a meal was a treat reserved for special occasions, and we were really looking forward to an intimate romantic experience. It was just a shame we had to share it with the twelve-top of expense-account yahoos next door. They were so loud that we had to yell to hear each other, and eventually we gave up all pretense of having our own conversation and spent the rest of the meal rolling our eyes at their inane banter.

At one point, one of them noticed us smirking. “Hey,” he said to his buddies, “looks like we’re providing someone with entertainment.”

And I so wanted to lean across the table and say, “Get used to it.”

Mostly, things aren’t so bad. Occasionally someone will feel obliged to read the entire menu aloud (a-loud) to his companion, or make critical comments about everything from the cleanliness of the silverware to the bitterness of the espresso. Or, horror indeed, we’ll be forced to share dining space with (no!) small children who have been raised to believe dinner-time means running in circles around the table and tripping up waiters.

But we have learned to survive these trials.

And really—if I’m forced to take these lemonheads and make lemonade—restaurant dining does make for some terrific people-watching.

Case in point was last night’s meal at Chez Henri. We hadn’t been in a long time—probably more than a year—because they don’t take reservations and there’s usually a wait. So we decided to get there early, arrived just before seven and were ushered immediately to a table.

Our neighbors to the right (my right, your left) were, thankfully, at the point of ordering dessert as we sat down. My reason for gratitude was the man’s question to the waiter: “Could I just ask: is the chocolate Fair-Trade?” It wasn’t so much his inquiry that bugged me as his reasoning: he had just attended a lecture that included a PowerPoint presentation about slave-labor in the cacao-farming industry, and now, full of newfound illumination, he proceeded to educate the waiter on the importance of equitably harvested beans. (As it turned out, it was Valrhona, which is a Fair-Trade label, so the guy got to feel he'd done due diligence.)

When they left, their table was taken by a very Cambridge middle-aged lesbian couple (thin, elegant, ethnic-print-wearing) who checked the price of every vegetarian appetizer and held hands throughout, visibly and sweetly delighted by each other's company.

On the left, meanwhile (my left, your right), we had: a young couple arguing over movies (he hated Borat, apparently) followed by a middle-aged couple in the middle of a real argument (he sullenly perused the menu, lumbered out and reappeared a few minutes later, at which point she grabbed her coat and trailed out after him) followed by a clean-cut and largely unremarkable yupple (yuppie couple) whose conversation revolved around nightmare plane trips.

Oh, the food? Yes, there was food. Chez Henri’s theme is French-Cuban, which translated to a citrusy ceviche of octopus, marlin and shrimp served in a martini glass; steak-frites with chimichurri (beautifully bloody onglet and muy picante pommes); and grilled bluefin with Serrano ham and baby artichokes. For dessert we shared a subtle lemon-cardamom crème brulee that made me realize I need to start experimenting with that spice.

Oh, and we saw a face from the past: former Miracle waitron Leah, who came to our wedding, has been working at the restaurant for a while and is now management. She came over to say hi and catch up (in other news, Sheri, our other erstwhile Miracle fave, is now married to an army guy and living in Colorado) and surprised us by comping our dessert and coffee. Yay Leah!

See? I like some people …

Gastronomy Day

Yesterday was a good day, foodwise. As the weather was unseasonably warm, The Boy and I walked down to Harvard Square to have lunch for the first time at Cambridge 1. We really should have checked it out before now--especially as it's owned by the people who also run two of our favorite bars, Middlesex and The Miracle of Science--but for some reason we'd never got around to it.

Well, now we realize we need to make up for lost time. The menu is small in choice--pizza or salad--but inventive in range (pizza toppings include potatoes, arugula, rosemary, bresaole) and the crust is thin and buttery. Ah, read Robert Nadeau's review. I had the sopressata-topped pie, which went well with a glass of crisp, tart Sauvignon Blanc, and The Boy had the bolognese version and a very soft Chianti.

While we were there, a French(-Canadian?) photo-shoot started happening a couple of tables down. The photog and his assistant were all rumpled, unshaven, black-leather French stereotype artistes; the model was a Charlotte Gainsbourg waif with impossibly long, shiny, chestnut hair. They shot lots of moody, shadowy angles. We pretended to be cool in the corner ...

After lunch, we checked out the leftovers at Tower Records (going out of bidness). I picked up a "best-of" by The Beat (sorry, that's The English Beat) and also the Brazilian Girls album, which I suspect will become a fave.

In the evening, we wandered up the street to our favorite Mexican restaurant, Tu y Yo, which we love because a) it's five minutes away and b) there's always something unusual on the menu. This is not your extreme-fajitas place (there used to be a sign on the door that said, "We do not serve burritos"); many of the recipes come from the owner's family, and date back to the 1920s. They feature a different special every week, and are big into complex sauces, braised meats, and the whole Slow Food concept.

This weekend, they were hosting the second annual celebration of Mexican gastronomy. We went last year, and were fed crunchy taquitos filled with crickets in a mole sauce, and soup served in hollowed-out gourds. This year, the prix-fixe menu looked like this:

Cocina de la abuela
~
Appetizer
Picadas (tortillas topped with tomatoes, jalapeños and cheese)
Garnachas (tortillas topped with potatoes, beef, salsa and cheese)
Plátanos stuffed with cheese
~
Soup
Chayote and cilantro
~
Entrée
BBQ pork ranchero style (with tomatoes, chiles and garlic)
Squid stuffed with avocado and cilantro paté
Chicken Queretaro style
~
Dessert
Estela’s dessert

We assumed you had to choose, but no: they brought out everything. The soft corn tortillas were hand-made (you could see where the chef's knuckles had kneaded the dough into circles); the pork was served in tender chunks, sitting in rich, dark, spicy-sweet juices; the tiny squid came whole, three to a plate, their heads full of buttery, intense green sauce.

Dessert was a small bowl of shredded carrot, raisins, almonds, coconut, apples and cream--it wasn't particularly sweet, but worked perfectly to end the meal on a lighter note.

On our way out, the owner asked how we liked the meal, and reminded us that tonight's eight-course menu would be completely different. It sounds delicious, and includes pork loin in huitlacoche and mole with epazote (pork, chicken and beef with Mexican herbs), but frankly, I'm not sure I can eat that much again for a while ...

Noodle alert!

Excellent news: Wagamama is coming to Boston! This was one of my favorite restaurants in London; the design is clean-modern-minimalist, and the food is fresh, healthy and fun. There'll be a place in Faneuil Hall and another in Harvard Square, opening spring-summer 2007.

Zombies, etc

I was a little disappointed by Hallowe'en. Not as many crazily-dressed people as there have been in previous years. And it doesn't help to work in a neighborhood with a high population of college kids, because it becomes really hard to tell who's dressed up for the holiday and who's just being a-haaaaal-tuuurnative.

For instance, the girl in line at Starbucks in the plaid mini-skirt, knee-high socks and pigtails: was she playing Naughty Schoolgirl, or was she just a Berklee student? The guy with the bicycle decorated in bones, topped with a rubber skull: was he going to a party, or was he just a hardcore bike messenger?

On the other hand, I did see:

• A group of six Asian kids on the Orange Line, who suddenly all pulled out V for Vendetta masks and put them on. The masks are creepy enough, but when they're worn in multiples, it's extra-strange.
  
• The driver of a Red Line train--a big black guy--wearing some kind of white Louis XIV wig. I only caught a glimpse of him as the train pulled in, but the wig did appear to be trying to climb down the side of his face. I just hoped he could see where he was going.
  
• Two tall, skinny young guys being zombies: mussed-up hair, whiteface, tattered clothes. They didn't lurch much, but they did maintain an air of silent zombie cool as they sat between tired commuters who pretended to ignore them.

Speaking of zombies, we watched Bubba Ho-Tep in honor of the season. Bruce Campbell (the Evil Dead guy) plays Elvis, who long ago decided he'd had enough of fame and is now a decrepit old guy in a nursing home. Along with his best friend, a guy who believes he's JFK (and is played by Ossie Davis ... think about it ...) they set out to save the home's residents from an ancient mummy who is feeding on their souls. It's cheesy, and silly, and also quite sweet. You can't say that about too many films featuring the undead.

Custard pie in the oubliette

Last Sunday, I was reading in the front room, and everything was quiet. And then I heard a horn--a cartoon squeak--that seemed to be coming from the basement, directly below me. And then silence. And then the noise again. And then nothing.

A little later, The Boy came over, and while we were talking, I heard a bell ring.

"Did you hear that?" I asked.

"Yeah," said The Boy. "Sounded like a bicycle bell."

"Or a clown bell," I said. "I heard something earlier that sounded like a clown horn. I think it's downstairs."

The Boy looked at me. "Are you saying you think there's a clown trapped in the basement?"

"Maybe there's a serial killer keeping them down there."

He stared at me, wide-eyed. "You know what that means. It puts the seltzer in the pants."

And while we're joking about serial killers, here's a lovely little music video by The Greenskeepers called "It Puts the Lotion in the Basket". Sing along!