April blizzards bring May... um... er...

The Looby-list of good things: A fun mapping game, an inspirational speech, art students in Hell, and soufflé!

Hello again,

What the heck? This is the winter that doesn’t want to end. This week we shivered in our long johns and had this conversation over and over:

“Should we light a fire?”

“It’s April! No, we shouldn’t light a fire. We could just put on extra sweaters.”

“I’m already wearing two … and a scarf.”

“But it’s April. And we’re almost out of wood.”

“But it’s so damn cold!”

“Ok, ok, let’s light a fire in a bit, if it’s still cold.”

Repeat.

There was snow in town and an ice storm in Montreal. Amelia has a hairy tale of a slippery, crazy walk to school punctuated by uprooted trees and flying power lines. Apparently, you can make new friends when you stand screaming with strangers in a park as a trees topple around you.

Also, there is a rustling (largish) rodent in our wall. Is that a sign of too much cold? Or maybe it’s a sign of spring.

Grab a warm drink, another sweater, and maybe even a hot water bottle and enjoy this week’s list:

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(Re)Watching:

I rewatch 9 Life Lessons - Tim Minchin’s University of Western Australia Address every few years. It’s ten years old this year - but still insightful, inspiring and completely relevant.

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Highlighting

I think we all had a Stabilo Boss highlighter in our school pencil case at some point in our lives. I always favoured the hot pink one. Recently I have been enjoying the colourful, spontaneous sketches of Michelle Ding on Instagram, and I noticed that she uses Stabilo Boss highlighters to block in large fields of colour. 

I also noticed that there are far more colours of Stabilo Boss available now - not just the classic fluoro yellow, green and pink. Pastels! In a mad moment, with a handful of birthday money, I bought a set. I just love them sitting on my desk. They are a beautiful thing.

You want them now too, don’t you…

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Reading:

This week I read the graphic novel Wendy, Master of Art by Walter Scott. The book is the third in the series of volumes about hardworking, hard-playing artist Wendy. I haven’t read the first two books, but it didn’t seem to matter. I really enjoyed the messy exploits, art world neuroses, and hilarious anecdotes of a group of students working on their MFAs in the small town of Hell, Ontario. Here’s a mini-doc from CBC about a live performance of Wendy (in the works) in Montreal from a few years ago.

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The Unexpected Lives of Children’s Authors and Illustrators Part 1:

I always find the lives of children’s book authors and illustrators interesting. This week I read about the team that was H.A. Rey in The Unexpected Profundity of Curious George. Margret and Hans Rey were childhood friends in Germany who met again after WWI in Rio de Janeiro. They fell in love, started a business designing large posters and maps together, and kept two marmoset monkeys. They later returned to Europe but were forced to flee Nazi-occupied Paris, which they did on bicycles in the middle of the night. They ended up in New York City with only a few clothes and some drawings of a little monkey, from which they created their lasting legacy, the Curious George books, under the moniker H.A. Rey.

The couple collaborated on most of the books they released. Margaret stated. “We worked very closely together and it was hard to pull the thing apart.” But a long-time passion project of Hans was creating maps of the stars, which he had begun in a German bunker during WWI. In 1952 he published his book of constellations, The Stars, A New Way to See Them, which is still used by amateur astronomers to this day.

The Saturday Review commented in 1952: ‘The Stars is the best book available for its purpose. It is also a brilliant example of the combined use of art and writing in bringing science to the layman.’” 

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Reminiscing:

I spent my formative years working in record shops. The pay was terrible, the work tedious, but it felt like a vocation - Myke Bartlett.

All the cool kids worked in record stores in Australia in the 90s. If you didn’t work in one, you wanted to. Or you had a crush on someone who did.

‘It was the most benevolent form of capitalism. We weren’t stealing your money, we were helping you find something that would make your life better.’ in the Guardian.

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Playing:

The Quiet Year. We loved this game. Three of us played it over a couple of hours last Friday evening, and it was totally entertaining. 

”The Quiet Year is a map game. You define the struggles of a community living after the collapse of civilization and attempt to build something good within their quiet year. Every decision and every action is set against a backdrop of dwindling time and rising concern.

The game is played using a deck of cards – each of the 52 cards corresponds to a week during the quiet year. Each card triggers certain events – bringing bad news, good omens, project delays and sudden changes in luck. At the end of the quiet year, the Frost Shepherds will come, ending the game.

The Quiet Year occupies an interesting space – part roleplaying game, part cartographic poetry.”

This game will take you wherever your collective imagination dares. We made a map of our civilization and our struggles. We had an abundance of the resources of high quality maple syrup and rabbits. There were cannibals invading from the north and tourists flocking to see our exceptionally incredible aurora borealis. You could say we took a more imaginative, nonsensical approach to the tasks at hand… and it was thoroughly enjoyable.

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Crone Cooking: Soufflé

In an effort to cook 52 essential recipes by the time I turn 52 (March 2024), I have started a little list, and this week was dish number four; Soufflé!

Following my great success last week making bagels, I was full of confidence and enthusiasm when it came to the potentially intimidating idea of making a soufflé. I decided to go the dessert soufflé direction and opted for Chocolate Soufflé, care of the New York Times (similar, free to everyone recipe, here). Thank you, Claire Saffitz, for your clear and very helpful video.

I had this video playing along on the counter top while I cooked. My keyboard is now covered in smears of chocolate and egg white, but I MADE SOUFFLÉS!

I am not a food photographer, and perhaps I should have wiped down the ramekin dishes… but check those beauties out. It was an incredibly rich Saturday afternoon tea. Next week, the far less stressful hummus.

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Chime in!

Tell me in the comments…

1. Which of Tim Minchin’s Life Lessons resonate with you?

2. Have you ever made a soufflé? Did it rise beautifully?

3. 90s record store or 90s bookstore? I was always working in bookstores. Record stores were way too intimidating.

That’s all for this week, see you next Sunday (or Wednesday).

xo,

Claire

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What’s coming up on Loobylu (aka The Subscriber Pitch):

In the next paid-subscriber-only edition, I talk about the creative process and hyper-focus; the good, the bad and the ugly. 

What came before:

In the last paid-subscriber-only last week, I drew many pictures of pink pants. Recently, I have talked about brainstorming plot ideas with spider diagrams. Before that, I spent some time musing about creating the most enormous batch of chickpea and squash casserole you have ever seen in your entire life.

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