christine-murphy dot net

So I’m not much into talking about food at the moment, being that I was sick all of last week, and haven’t cooked or eaten any.  I’m telling you, who needs a weight loss supplement after a week of being sick like this?  Anyhoo, I’m finally feeling alive again, and was able to go to that beer dinner up in Portsmouth on Sunday night.  But still, no cooking news for a while.

So what do some people do when sick?  Read trashy novels, like this one, called Butterfly, by Kathryn Harvey.  As you can probably figure out from the photo on the book’s cover, this is NOT a nice wholesome G-rated book.  It’s loaded with sex, so if you don’t like this sort of book, then don’t read it.  Srsly.

I first read this book back in the 80’s.  I was working at a bookstore at the time, and one of the other women there had picked it up, and was raving about how good it was.  So I bought myself a copy (we got a 40% discount), and agreed, it was quite delightfully trashy.  I re-read it yet again when I was sick.

Beverly Highland is a self-made wealthy woman who is the mysterious owner of a high-priced women’s “club” called “Butterfly”, located upstairs from a ritzy Rodeo Drive men’s shop.  Membership is restricted to only the most beautiful, wealthy, and powerful women.  At Butterfly, women can experience any fantasies they wish, and yes, they mean sexual.

The storylines alternate between three of Butterfly’s members, Trudie, Linda, and Jessica, each of who has her own reasons for seeking what Butterfly has to offer.  But the main storyline focuses on the life of the mysterious Beverly.

Born Rachel Dywer to impoverished parents, with a twin sister who was given away at birth, the then-homely young girl runs away from home at age 14, after being brutally raped by her own father.  On the roads, she meets a guy named Danny Mackay, who she quickly falls in love with and starts sleeping with.  But Danny is not a nice guy, first, he forces Rachel to live and work at some sleazy whorehouse, while he keeps most of her pay.  He also gets Rachel pregnant, and he cruelly forces her to get an abortion, even though she desperately didn’t want one.  She vows that one day, somehow, some way, she WILL get her revenge on Danny Mackay.

Rachel transforms herself into Beverly by getting plastic surgery, as she begins her climb to the top as a successful businesswoman.  As time passes, she surrounds herself with people who were either screwed over by Danny somehow, or by men like him.  Meanwhile, Danny is on his own ascent to greatness, first by becoming a very successful televangelist, and later, as a Presidential hopeful.  Of course, he’s running as a conservative Republican, speaking out against stuff like prostitution and abortion (two things that he forced upon poor Rachel, what a hypocrite!).

Beverly and her close circle of friends and associates keep a very close eye on the comings and goings of Danny Mackay.  Beverly actually supports his campaign, financially and otherwise; Danny, of course, does not recognize her as homely little Rachel Dwyer.  Beverly is simply setting him up so that he takes his fall from grace from the highest point possible.  As you can imagine, she is seriously pissed at this sleazebag, and it’s well deserved.

You will have to read the book to see how it all goes down…why did she open Butterfly?  Does she succeed in her lifelong mission to destroy Danny?  How did things turn out for Trudie, Linda, and Jessica?  And what about the twin sister?

If you enjoy this book, then you must read the sequel, called Stars.  This book not only continues the war between Beverly and Danny, but the twin sister gets into the picture, as well.  The twin has a rather interesting history of her own, so it’s well worth reading.

If you have kids who can read, do NOT leave these books laying around on the coffee table!  Graphic sexual content, and some violence mean that you should save this for when the kids are in bed.  Enjoy!

Tonight, after the Super Bowl, there will be the debut of a new show on CBS called Undercover Boss.  You can click on that link to learn more about the show, and watch some preview videos.

The basic gist of the thing is this dude who’s the CEO of Waste Management goes to work as a regular employee; he does things like riding the garbage truck and picking up trash, cleaning nasty old porta-potties, stuff like that.  He learns a lot about what it is like to be a regular worker, and comes away from the experience with a new appreciation for his employees.

If I ruled the world, I would create a similar TV show called “Applebee’s Slaves”.  My show would not only feature top-level executives at the Applebee’s restaurant chain working as cooks and servers in their own restaurants…but they would also  be forced to live on their pay.  For six months.

The fact is that these higher-ups, who do nothing but sit in their ivory offices all day, pressure their store managers to cut costs in any way they can.  This includes forcing employees on the closing shift to work for free.  I am NOT making this up.  I worked as a cook for that hellhole years ago, and they did it to me.  The restaurant closed at midnight, and that’s what time the managers were told to clock us out.  But we were not allowed to go home until the kitchen was cleaned to the manager’s satisfaction.  This could often take as long as two hours, depending on how busy the place was close to closing time.

I was paid ten bucks an hour.  So if I had to close every night, as was usually the case, and worked five nights a week, I was basically cheated out of $100 per week.  Money that we desperately needed.  At the time, Mike was still going to school at MIT, and the only money we had to live on were from my pay and his student loans.  It wasn’t much, that was for sure.  We couldn’t even afford a car at the time…after Mike’s old Ford Bronco II died its final death, we sold it to a junkyard for $75, canceled the insurance, and took the bus.

$100 a week may seem like peanuts to these hoity-toity higher-ups, but for us, it was a lot of money.  These people make millions in salary and bonuses for doing very little hard work; they can afford to buy diamonds, fancy cars, and other expensive toys whenever they want to.  They never have to worry about how they are going to pay their rent and buy food.  They think nothing about taking food out of people’s mouths, in order to be able to afford to pay themselves high salaries.  It is truly sickening.

What they did to me and my co-workers is illegal, but Applebee’s covered it up well enough so that none of us would have any way to prove that we worked until 2AM, while only being paid for no later than 12AM.  I have no idea if they still engage in this practice or not; even if they stopped doing this, I will still never patronize another Applebee’s restaurant ever again.  They stole thousands of dollars in pay from me and my co-workers during the time I was there, they will never get another penny from me.  Ever.

If the people who made these financial decisions were forced to live our lives, on what they paid us, for six months…no dipping into bank accounts or anything…maybe, just MAYBE, they’d understand and change their ways.

I finally had enough, and walked out on my shift one night, after the manager, in his usual cost-cutting ways, cut the entire kitchen staff for the night except me and some new guy who was on his second day, and wasn’t fully trained yet.  They even sent the dishwasher home.

Then it got busy.  Very busy.  The new guy behind the line was almost useless, so I pretty much had to work all three stations.  I was getting yelled at by the manager and servers for not getting all the tickets out within the 15 minute time allotment.  Yes, they had a rule that all food had to be out within 15 minutes of the ticket coming in.  They didn’t care if the kitchen was understaffed or not..dammit, MAKE that food magically appear on the plate!

I was getting very tired of being yelled at over circumstances I had no control over.  It was the manager’s fault for cutting most of the kitchen staff, but did he offer to come behind the line and help me?  Nope, he’s too good for that!

But as I saw more and more dishes piling up at the dishwashing station, I snapped.  I realized that I’d be working until 3, maybe 4AM, doing not just the regular cleaning behind the line, but dishes as well.  For not pay once the clock hit midnight.  I said, screw this, I’m not going to take it any more.  I’m not a slave; I expect to be paid for all of the work I do, especially if I’m doing the jobs of two or three other people in addition to my own.  As the tickets kept coming in, I walked off the line, went into the back room and got my bag and my jacket, and walked right through the crowded dining room toward the door.

The manager chased after me, begged me not to go, promised he would help me if I’d stay.  Where was this offer when I needed it, when I was literally begging for help?  Screw him. let him work the line by himself and see what it’s like!  I turned around, flipped him the bird in front of all of those customers, and walked out the door.

And it felt SO GOOD!

I found another job about a week later.  I simply told the truth as to why I left Crapplebee’s, that I was being overworked and not being paid for some of my time.

This is why I have so much resentment toward overpaid executives who do little work, while they allow the ones who do most of the work to suffer.  This is why I hate companies like AIG, who take OUR tax dollars to get bailed out of a mess that THEY caused, and still hand out hefty bonuses to people who already make plenty.  For once, I want to see these people walk a few miles in our shoes, and see how they like it!

Good news for Emeril Lagasse fans!  Come March, he will be hosting a brand new prime-time show, to be called The Emeril Lagasse Show.

It won’t just be a cooking show; it sounds like it will be a combination cooking and variety show, as it will feature celebrity guests and musical acts.  As with his former Food Network cooking show, Emeril Live, there will be a house band.

Hopefully, it will be entertaining, and not have too many lame segments on stuff such as maxoderm reviews.  It’s being put out by Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, which of course puts out Martha’s own excellent show, so I’m expecting a lot from this!

And yes…cable-less me is going to be able to watch this!  It won’t be on Food Network or any other cable channel.  It will be on ION Television, which is available as a digital TV channel in most markets.  This is one of the great advantages of last year’s switchover to digital TV…more channels available!  Kudos to Emeril and MSLO for realizing that not all have or want cable, and putting this show on a channel where nearly everyone can see it for free!

Emeril’s new show will air on Sunday nights from 8-9PM Eastern time.  It will make its debut on March 28.  Can’t wait!

At least I think so. Makes me all the gladder that we don’t have cable. The only time we get to see it is when we stay at a hotel, which is where I am right now, as I type this. We are at the Hampton Inn in Mystic, CT, we spent the day at the Mystic Seaport Museum.

Anyhoo, I’m getting some work done on my netbook (yay for free wireless!), and I have Food Network on in the background. I swear, it seems that every time I turn it on, I see either Guy Fieri or Ted Allan on one show or another Nothing against either one of these guys, but soetimes it seems like overkill, that Food Network is very much into making their popular hosts be on so many shows. Can’t we see someone else for a change? Do we have to see back-to-back episodes of “Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives” almost every night? Or back-to-back “Chopped” and “Iron Chef America” (Ted hosts the former, is a frequent judge on the latter)?

I also think they are going overboard with too many *reality* competition type shows. I like “Chopped” and “ICA”, but they are now coming up with some really dumb concepts. I’ve been seeing promos for some show about the “Worst Cook”. I think it’s a dumb idea, because it’s much MORE of a challenge to compete to make the BEST dishes. But anyone can screw up a dish on purpose, and that leads to otherwise perfectly good food being thrown away, because not even the camera crew would want to eat it.

And don’t even get me going on Sandra Lee! At least she doesn’t get as much screen time as Guy, Ted, Rachael or Giada. But I still wonder what FN exec she boinks in order to stay on the air. All of her processed food is just nasty, and those *tablescapes* are ludicrous. I haven’t seen her new show “Money-Saving Meals” yet, but I hear it is almost as bad as “Semi-Homemade”

She makes me want to throw something at the TV and destroy perfectly good electronics. I can’t shut her off fast enough shen she comes on.

Anyhoo, as I type this, we are on the third consecutive eppy of DD&D, with the promise of another one coming up next.  Guy is very entertaining, i’ll give him that, but why so many eppies in a row almost every weekend?

Also, looking at all of the stuff he eats on that show, Guy is going to make some cardiologist very rich someday!

All in all, I prefer PBS cooking shows, even if they only come on once a week.  I wish they had the Create channel in this hotel, but they don’t.  They have a block of cooking shows on every day, useful ones, that have good info and stuff that I would actually want to make.

I guess FN wants to be more into entertainment than education, because that’s what most people want to see.  But it won’t make me pony up for cable!

So I’m in Portland, Maine right now, at the Inn at St. John. We’re here for the Maine Brewers Festival, which takes place tomorrow. Right now, we’re just chilling out, and resting up for the festivities tomorrow. We were too tired to go out to eat, so we went to the Pizza Villa joint across the street from the hotel, and got some pizza to take back to our room. Mike is asleep now, and I’ve been watching TV and playing around on my netbook. Free WiFi rocks!

We don’t have cable TV at home, so I mostly just get to see the Food Network when we’re staying in hotels. After Mike got to watch his Friday night PBS news shows, I flipped over to the Food Network to see what was on.

Diners, Drive-Ins & Dives was on. I’m telling you, if host Guy Fieri always eats the kind of stuff he eats on that show, he’s gonna make some cardiologist very rich someday! Tonight he went to these places that served ginormous burgers…I could almost feel my arteries hardening just looking at them! You could almost gain weight by just looking at this food, as well…made me want to search the web for the best weight loss pills out there!

Then some other show came from, I forget what it was called, as I wasn’t paying much attention.  My ears perked up when I heard somone talk about cooking and eating bugs.  I looked at the TV, and sure enough, they were showing someone cooking what looked like breaded, deep-fried crickets or grasshoppers.  EEEEEUUUUUWWW!

Now, I realize that some cultures eat bugs regularly, and once, in a bookstore, I saw a bug cookbook written by some guy who taught bug cuisine as a college course.  But I think I’ll pass…I get squicked out when my cats catch flies and spiders and then eat them.  I appreciate them doing this, but that doesn’t mean I have to look at them while they are doing it.

I changed the channel super fast, before it got any more disgusting.  I was just glasd I’d long since finished eating when that show came on!