The RedMolly Picayune-Democrat

Prepardy!

Because I know you are so utterly dying to know (ahem), here's what I'm doing vis-à-vis preparing for the Jeopardy! audition so far. (Mimi: am totes hoping you and Eddie will join Jim and me for drinks/dinner/commiseration at some point while you're here.)

1. Watching the show! We have a new family ritual to carry out every night at 7 p.m. We settle down on Jim's and my bed ('cause we have no TV in the living room... crazy hippies that we are) and I yell out answers and then every five or so questions I apologize for being so obnoxious about it. Really, I am going to have to cut down on the number of times I yell "Suck it, dumbass!" at an "opponent" who gets an answer wrong. I think that sort of behavior might be frowned upon by Trebek and crew.

2. Making flashcards! Seriously. Names and dates-in-office of US presidents, names and capitals of countries of the world. Wanna hear about Azerbaijan? (Capital: Baku. Government: nutty autocracy.) How about William Henry Harrison? ("Tippecanoe and Tyler, too." Contracted a fatal case of pneumonia less than a month into his term. Some sturdy war hero he was!)

3. Freaking out about math! There's apparently a whole scientific statistics-based procedure to go through when wagering some part of one's score on a Daily Double ("Let's make it a true Daily Double, Alex." How I long to say these words some day! And not to have them come back and bite me in the ass like the woeful shaggy-haired kid who ended up with a final score of ZERO in last week's Teen Tournament. I think zero doesn't even get you the home game.). Slate's Matt Gaffney lays it out for hopeful players, but hell, I can't really comprehend what he's talking about while I'm sitting calmly at my computer, let alone under the heat of the klieg lights with some buzzer-happy mouthbreather lurking near my left shoulder. Let's have "Complicated Calculations I am Virtually Certain to Get Wrong" for $800, Alex!

4. Bemoaning the woeful state of my civics/economics/American history education! There are gaps in my understanding of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries you could drive a fleet of Willys Jeeps through. But that's OK; according to this recent survey, I am in good company, if by "good company" you mean "a majority of American high school seniors." Blargh.

5. Coming up with anecdotes and/or Fun Facts about myself! So far: I homeschool my two insane children; I used to have a radio show which I wanted to call "Audio Quicksand" but which had to be called something else (I think I just kind of referred to it as "The RedMolly Show"); I taught a college class on Vikings and medieval Scandinavia;  I would rather gnaw off my own right arm than vote for a Republican presidential candidate;  and then I'm at a loss. Um, I can eat more mashed potatoes than can anyone else in my family? And live to tell the *urp* tale?

My love's in Jeopardy

Well, not my love, per se, but my sanity for the next thirty-five days. Because that is how long I have to wait until the Jeopardy! live audition to which I received an invite today, after taking the fifty-question online qualifying test about three weeks ago.

Stay tuned for updates from my rigorous training regimen, which may or may not include such highlights as me jogging around Portland while wearing a white terrycloth headband, listening to the theme from Rocky and flipping through a stack of homemade flashcards on the illustrious careers of the American presidents. ("Chester A. Arthur, 21st president, 1881-1885! Best known for signing the Pendleton Act mandating a bipartisan civil service and for, er, his truly spectacular sideburns.")

I need five anecdotes about myself. I am seriously having trouble coming up with any that don't start "Well, this one time I was drinking with my friend...". Your suggestions are welcomed.

Also, I am instructed to "dress appropriately for television." What ought one to wear to strike that critical Jeopardy!-audience-friendly balance between "American Idol" and the six-o'-clock news with Your Weather Authority, Powder von Mascaratufts?

Jeopardy!, internships and soup

Isn't it interesting how sometimes, when you're in the bottom of the bottomless pit (43,000 geek points for whoever can name that tune!), the universe tosses down a rope ladder?

Jeopardy!
Do-dee-doo-doo, do-dee-doo... it's that time of year once again when Jeopardy!'s online pre-test is made available for us mere mortals to try and match our wits against the seething pit of wiliness that is Alex Trebek and his team of question-crafters. And this time I'm registered for it, baby, and ready to go! Cross your fingers for me on the 29th at 4:30 p.m. It could be my ticket to fame, fortune and/or paying off my students loans... or, more likely, it'll just be a way for me to waste yet another valuable half-hour staring at my computer screen.

Internships.
Why, yes, I am really far too old for anything as un(der)paid and smacking of college student as an internship! But I'm going to apply for a science writing internship with the Wild Salmon Foundation anyway. Just 'cause, y'know. Nature. Science. Writing. All them good things rolled into one snackable package requiring 10 to 20 hours per week of my devoted attention for a three- to six-month period.

Soup.
For the last four or five Thanksgivings, my regular culinary contribution has been a curried butternut squash-apple soup from the Silver Palate Cookbook (an oldie but a goodie). After last Thanksgiving, my mom asked for the recipe so she could make the soup for her yoga friends. And last Friday, I brought the soup to share at Elizabeth's wonderful and homey 39th birthday party and two people asked me for the recipe. So without further ado, here it is, with the annotations I sent to my mom:

Curried Butternut Squash Soup
serves 4-6

4 Tbsp butter
2 c. finely chopped onions (in practice, I just chop 2 largish ones)
4-5 tsp. curry powder
2 medium-size butternut squash (about 3 lbs altogether), peeled, seeded and chopped into roughly 1" pieces
2 tart apples (Granny Smiths work well), peeled, cored and chopped
3 c. broth (vegetable or chicken)
1 c. apple juice
salt and pepper to taste
1 shredded unpeeled apple for garnish (I've actually never done the garnish)

Melt butter in a pot. Add oinions and curry powder. Cook, covered, over low heat, until onions are very tender--about 25 min.

Pour in broth. Add squash and apples. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat and simmer, partially covered, unti squash and apples are very tender--again, about 25 min.

Pour soup through a strainer, reserving liquid. Working in batches if necessary, puree solids with a little of the cooking liquid (about 1 cup total) until smooth.

Return puree to pot. Add apple juice. Stir in additional cooking liquid, about 2 cups, until soup is of "desired consistency." (I think I desire it a little thicker than the Silver Palate ladies do.)

Season to taste with salt and pepper. Simmer briefly to heat through and serve immediately, garnished with shredded apple.

Notes on Butternut Squash:
I find it not all that hard to peel them with a regular (non-Grandma style) vegetable peeler and a firm hand. To split them open for seeding, I just use a regular chef's knife as follows: raise knife above head, bring down into squash (lying on its side) with a firm WHACK, push knife the rest of the way through squash by applying firm pressure with both hands to handle and top of blade. (As if it were a stubborn cheese knife.) Once it's halved, it seems to yield to chopping fairly well; just lean into the knife a bit.

Thanks go out to the universe for providing two ways to potentially dig myself out from under some of this crushing debt/pile of mounting bills that's largely responsible for my current crappy-ass mood. (Game show contestant. Now there's a career goal.) And thanks to butternut squash for tasting so inimitably delicious in soup.