Up Up and Away

Two images, yet it’s the same Maine schooner photographed just minutes apart.  The main difference - the direction of the sun.

The Ram in a Thicket, from Ur, southern Iraq, about 2600-2400 BC.

Courtesy & currently located at the British Museum, London:

It was named the ‘Ram in a Thicket’ by the excavator Leonard Woolley, who liked biblical allusions. In Genesis 22:13, God ordered Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac, but at the last moment ‘Abraham lifted up his eyes, and looked, and behold behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns: and Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead of his son’.

The figure had been crushed flat by the weight of the soil and the wooden core had perished. Wax was used to keep the pieces together as it was lifted from the ground, and it was then pressed back into shape. The ram’s head and legs are covered in gold leaf, its ears are copper (now green), its twisted horns and the fleece on its shoulders are of lapis lazuli, and its body fleece is made of shell. Its genitals are gold. The tree is covered in gold leaf, with golden flowers, the whole supported on a small rectangular base decorated with a mosaic of shell, red limestone and lapis lazuli.

What Cat Food Tastes Like

While preparing dinner at a friend’s apartment a few nights ago, I asked if their cat should eat too. Then someone fed the cat. Then I asked if I should eat cat food too. Then people said “yes” and I did. I think that’s how it happened. I know it started as a joke but then it tasted surprisingly OK. Later at a deli I excitedly selected cans of wet cat food for a taste-test experiment I promised myself I’d do first thing in the morning. After my hangover subsided, I felt more able to seriously consider two futures: the one where I’d never know what wet cat food tasted like, and the one where I would. In both futures I’d eventually end up dead, but the one where I’d eat cat food seemed more exciting. With that said, actually making myself eat the canned reconstituted meat morsels took longer than anticipated. I succumbed to misguidedly productive acts like finding “the perfect eating-cat-food outfit” (pink striped dress: too naive; button-down under a black sweater: too smart; red flannel dress: just right?), photo-testing locations for the best place to eat (a plate on the floor: obvious and kitschy; sitting at a table: unrealistically ordinary; bed: psychotic), and letting “research-based” internet activity devolve into gawking at YouTube videos about cannibalism and falling asleep with a knife under my pillow. OK. Enough explaining, I’m introducing this like I’ve committed a sex crime or something. I ate some cat food. That’s all that happened. Here’s what I thought.

Purina Cat Chow: Naturals Plus Vitamins & Minerals

Packaging: 16-ounce green bag with a Ziploc seal for freshness. Features colorful clip art-like illustrations of vegetables, grains, and a woman resembling Mona Lisa sleepily nurturing a happy, attentive cat on her lap.

Aroma: A little vitamin-y.

Texture: Harder than Captain Crunch, but denser, so it didn’t make those little cuts on the roof of my mouth. Moist enough so there was no fight to combine it with saliva, but crunchy enough to not let me forget I was chewing.

Flavor: I remember saying “it’s like those ‘Chicken in a Biscuit’ crackers” and “it’s ‘umami,’ do you guys know ‘umami,’ that new taste called ‘umami?’” There was a tangy aftertaste. It wasn’t unpleasant at all. Ate a few voluntary handfuls.

Beverage pairing: An affordable sparkling wine. I had been drinking Korbel (Brut, I think) at the time, but a sweeter Prosecco would also fare nicely.

Closing remarks: Could be transformed into larger vessels for humans to spread cheese on.

Gordon Parks, Dr. Kenneth B. Clark conducting the Doll Test, Harlem, New York, 1947