Now here's a reason to go on living -- a case, which when affixed to your iPod Nano, makes it look like the finest grade of Kobe beef! Now I'm even sorrier that I did not follow through on my plan to make foie gras terrines shaped like 1st gen iPods. Still, somewhere Jean Baudrillard is high-fiving himself.
A few odds and ends that escaped initial online perusal thrust themselves forward during and actual perusal of the actual fishwrap:
1) With close ties to the pickle community, I guess I'm happy that the tide of brine lifts all boats, and suchlike, but seems like the pickle sickle either got a raw deal from Flo Fab or needs to tweak its marketing material. I'll blame the "deconstructed" headline on the Times -- my lonely struggle against retarded misuse of this term is well-documented, but it's not as clear where this idea "fresh-squeezed" pickles come from. To clarify, these are preserved vegetables, (i.e. not fresh) shipped by mail order (i.e. not fresh either) -- "fresh" here is not so much inaccurate as irrelevant.
2) Sort of nit-picky and a little bit trainspotty, but this is a blog after all -- in the print edition, the image accompanying the lamb is the only one without a photo credit. Interestingly, this image also turns up on Dean and DeLuca's site, I imagine this thing happens frequently, but had not noticed it quite like this. Someone with a keener journalistic and visual sense than I would be better equipped to address this question, but it seems at least a tiny bit dubious to run a foto of a food item that was styled and shot by the vendor. Considering that the other 3 items in this week's Food Stuff are credited to Tony Cenicola, would it be that hard to get a shot of the actual lamb, rather than relying on D&D?
3) Finally, and continuing yesterday's gripe -- read the damn Pure Food and Drug Act, the legislation (putatively) inspired by Upton Sinclair's The Jungle. What The Jungle has to say about animal welfare is what the PF&DA has 
to say about animal welfare, which is what Daniel Plainview has to say about animal welfare, which is to say, sweet fuck all. So if actually "someone gave Upton Sinclair a video camera and a Web link," the chances are that he would probably use it to find ways to talk about how capitalism sucks balls, that is to say, chews up families, etc.
To clarify, there are things about the meat industry that are bad for its material (animals) and things that are bad for its labor (people) these are not the same. The dude in the video waltzing the downer cow with a forklift might have a sick dental plan, for all we know, and conversely, there could be some poor undocumented soul getting RSI slaughtering heritage turkeys that got to spend a year at Wesleyan before they got shanked by some poor undocumented soul. Ironically, the article concludes with a hint at its own betrayal of Sinclair with its penultimate graf:
So, its hard to go undercover to help save the cows, because PETA folk have a hard time passing as meatpacking laborers, because all of the laborers are "often a Spanish-speaking immigrant"? Is there not more than one problem here? I care about humanely raised meat, but I also think that Upton Sinclair was onto something when he showed how Packingtown chews up families and spits them out. I care about cows, but I care about Mexicans, too.
Not my usual domain, but as I live with someone with an ANTM problem, I did catch last night's episode. For those who missed it, or are not familiar with the program, America's Next Top Model seems more and more like a really shitty cult with every cycle. Girls with no legitimate shot at modelhood are humiliated by Tyra and a cadre of minions who seem focused on reinforcing the idea that gay men are innately misogynistic. But last night, the panties and neckpieces of meat seemed to plumb a new depth. The only followup I can imagine is a trip to the Windy City and an exclusive photo session with R. Kelly!
I have not looked to see if Kim Severson has an Amazon wishlist, but if she does, now would be the time to add the handsome new edition of Upton Sinclair's The Jungle on it. It's a lonely crusade against a century of misreading this novel has endured, but Sinclair's point is the cruelty to people inherent in capitalism, circa 1906, not icky meatpacking plants. An undercover vegan with a concealed video camera does not a socialist reformer make. The Pure Food and Drug act was a red herring. It's not that hard to suss out. Read the book, see all the other bad stuff that happens to Jurgis and his family, and decide for yourself.
Via TFS, news of the world's first vegan strip club.
Let's not book that flight to Stockholm just yet, Mr. Diablo. First of all, with the possible exception of Frank Bruni, who goes to strip clubs to eat? The okayness or notokayness of strip clubs in general aside, what puzzles me is the implication here that the lack of animals on the menu makes it okayer to tuck one single after another into the g-string of some nineteen year-old kid from Medford. In all, this don't-call-it-a-publicity stunt seems to be another example of what I'm calling the New Indulgences. Instead of remitting sins by giving alms to build the cathedral, this new economy of virtue suggests that pursuing social justice in one arena allows for less than progressive behavior in another. The pope of this movement is Dov Charney, who created a laudable sweatshop-free textile business with American Apparel, which he advertises with crotch shots of emaciated teenagers. Hard not to see the same moral economy here. In this vein, any day now, I'm expecting a new car rental business, featuring an all-Prius fleet, and rental agents wearing Daisy Dukes and tube tops, called the Electra Complex.
In other raw news, Pepsi Raw. Somewhere, Big Daddy Kane is smiling.
Reports of my demise, that is. I gave up Deadspin for Lent, so I'm sure there's stuff there, about in re the ruffled feathers in re Pedro Martinez appearance as a soltadore, what Molly said. Especially the part about KFC. Fuck TMZ, viva Pedro!
The cinetrix passed along the picture at right, and wondered if you could catch Hep C from greens. I am not actually a medical doctor, and as such am not qualified to make such determinations. I can say, however, that I do have several questions of my own. First and foremost, why? It is, uh, exposure for Pammy, but what aspect of the message of the folks for treating animals nice (hi, Google) do airbrushed cabbages on a Reagan-era starlet hurtling towards Wildensternian levels of plastic surgery represent? Does Pammy keep on offering to do these, and on one has the heart to tell her to stop? Even a cursory trawl of the internets reveals no shortage of vegans willing to go sans clothes to promote the animal free lifestyle (NSFmostW). There appears to be no rival web presence for those who favor multimodal carnality, as the first hit for "carnivore porn" involved Bruni and pork butts, and left me too discouraged to continue.
I was glad to see an article about the Jamie Oliver chicken business in the DI/DO yesterday. Inevitably, it has a degree of stunt to it, and lotsa p to the r for Jamie, but for all that, I think well worth doing. In a variation on "if you can't do the time, don't do the crime" we need something like "if you can't slit the throat, you can't eat the goat." I am an unapologetic meat eater, but I try to be mindful about my meat. When so much of the food industry works to obfuscate where meat comes from, this, and the slaughtering photos at the beginning of the River Cottage meat book, are important reminders. However, a phrase in Moskin's lede suggests she didn't get it:
Surely, Moskin does not mean "snuff film," unless she feels that Oliver killed the chicken on camera to titillate his viewers.
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A new ad campaign from the National Cattlemens' Association is taking the peculiar tack of combining surreal visuals with a name that's as gay as all outdoors. Ladies and gentlemen, Beefscapes*:
*If nothing else, "beefscape" does finally offer the hitherto elusive word to describe the experience of watching 300. (Via Chow.)
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