Last Updated on September 30, 2010 by Dave Farquhar
I didn’t go see Emily on Wednesday night. Instead I went to see From Hell with my friends Jeanne and Tom. The theory it presented was interesting, but anyone who knows anything about Jack the Ripper knows it played awfully fast and loose with the facts. I can’t say much more without spoiling it. I’d have gone to see it just because of my fascination with Film Noir, but From Hell seemed to me like an excuse to show a bunch of closeups of Johnny Depp and shots of Heather Graham dressed up like people imagine turn-of-the-century prostitutes looking. In other words, too much oogle and not enough plot. I think the directors realized this wasn’t enough, so they added a sex scene and a few female-female French kisses. And of course lots of blood. I’d have preferred a less-predictable storyline and a little more intrigue.
Sleepy Hollow played way fast and loose with the story it was based on, but somehow it seemed more compelling to me.
But I didn’t come here to be Gene Siskel.
Last night, Emily was out of ICU. She looked really good. Her color was back, she’d had a chance to wash the blood out of her hair, and a lot of the cuts on her face had healed. To me, it looked very possible that she’d escape this without any noticeable scars on her face. The tubes and wires were gone, and she was sitting up on her own, moving around, and talking. Man, was she talking. She’s been eating solid foods. Someone slipped her some Taco Bell after lunch Thursday, and she had McDonald’s on Wednesday. Apparently they’re having a festival in Millstadt this weekend and she’s a bit bummed she won’t be able to go to it. “Chili and snoots. That really sounds good. Especially snoots. That’s my favorite.”
She turned to me. “You like snoots?” she asked.
“I’m gonna feel real stupid for saying this, but I don’t know what snoots are,” I said.
“Pig snouts,” she said.
I think she enjoyed the look on my face. “They’re good,” she said unconvincingly. “You ought to try some.”
I think I’d rather take up vegetarianism again.
Then her uncle and Norm, one of my congregation-mates, started talking about other–ahem–delicacies. They asked Emily what she thought of pig’s feet, liver, tongue, brain, blood sausage, and head cheese. She turned her nose up at most of them. When she didn’t turn her nose up, she gave commentary instead: That’s just gross.
Then they started talking about their experiences with Rocky Mountain Oysters. “I’ll bet he doesn’t know what those are either,” one of them said, nodding in my direction.
Emily turned and looked straight at me. “Bull balls,” she said nonchalantly. I shuddered and made a face. She seemed to enjoy that.
What can I say? I’ve lived a sheltered life.
I’m mostly glad to have seen her looking and acting like her old self. That’s worth a lot of laughs and gross-outs at my expense.
She gets to go home today.
David Farquhar is a computer security professional, entrepreneur, and author. He started his career as a part-time computer technician in 1994, worked his way up to system administrator by 1997, and has specialized in vulnerability management since 2013. He invests in real estate on the side and his hobbies include O gauge trains, baseball cards, and retro computers and video games. A University of Missouri graduate, he holds CISSP and Security+ certifications. He lives in St. Louis with his family.
"pig’s feet, liver, tongue, brain, blood sausage, and head cheese".
Pig’s feet – well, fine, tastes OK, rich in gelatin. Good nibblies.
Liver – done well, tastes good. Rich source of dietary iron. She may well need a lot of it in the near future. I do – I just spent about a week in hospital with internal bleeding – medication that reacted against me. Turned over more than half my blood in 48 hours – four units of transfused blood. Scarey.
Tongue. It’s meat. Tender. Good sandwich meat. Quite fatty, though.
Blood sausage. OK. Tasty – generally done heavy on onion or garlic. I like onion and garlic, and I’d live on this if I had to, but it’s not my favourite.
Brain. Lamb’s brains used to be a favourite. I wouldn’t eat them any longer outside Australia or New Zealand, though – BSE and related diseases are too scarey. Also, cholesterol is a distinct consideration – brains contain about 400 (four hundred) times the cholesterol content of lean red meat.
Head cheese – another name for brawn. Boil stuff up to produce gelatin, scatter small bits of meat through it, let it set. Good sandwich filling. Love it.
Jack the Ripper. I just saw an old article stating a theory that he had died in St. Louis after the turn of the century according to an expert investigator. So that’s where the St. Louis vampire came from. :-[
You are like Gene, only thinner. Maybe you could be Roger Ebert’s new partner. Now wouldn’t that be a dream job?
It’s good to hear Emily is doing better. Good thing she’s missing the festival so she can really get healthy.
Chili and snoots.
I’m having serious problems believing that folks in MO would know good chili if it came up and smacked them in the face 😉
Of course, I just got done re-reading A Bowl of Red by Frank X. Tolbert and am feeling particularly Texan lately. BTW, if you’d like to recreate your own Texas Bowl ‘o Red, you could do alot worse than Wick Fowler’s Two-Alarm Chili.
Emily and her family are over in Illinois. Missourians call it "the wrong side of the river," and I’ve got a new insight into why.
I don’t know how the chili is over in Illinois because I’ve never eaten chili there. We can make good stuff here in Missouri though, I think.
Oh yeah. Welcome back, Don. Hope you’re feeling better.
With a movie named "From Hell", what would you expect to see except too much oogle, little plot, and sex (which realisticly has nothing to do with great movie making)!
Glad to hear that Emily is fast on the road to recovery. Praise God!
Don’t worry, Dave, I didn’t know what snoots were either until my Grandpa enlightened me.