Replete

I finally made the boeuf bourguinon recipe from Mastering the Art of French Cooking last night. I can see why it sold the editor who bought it on the whole book. A little work intensive, but intensely flavorful and rich.

What are the odds I can keep my mouth welded shut until Christmas morning?

Wow Redux

Just reread coffeeem's Territory. Damn, that woman can write. And having gotten a tour of Tombstone at her hands, as it were, I now have reference imagery.

I'm feeling vaguely inspired now. Drat.

And in History of Mankind News...

If you're interested in anthropology, here's a Christmas present: a bone discovered two years ago at a dig in Russia has been identified as belonging to a 6- or 7-year old girl who died 30,000 years ago. A whole new group of hominids they're calling "Denisovans." But this is the really cool part:

The 3 billion-letter nuclear genome derived from the child's finger shows that the ice-age population of early humans was more diverse than previously thought. Also, a comparison of the genome to modern humans indicates that Melanesian inhabitants of Papua New Guinea and various South Pacific islands inherited as much as 5 percent of their DNA from Denisovans.

Well I think it's neat, anyway.