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The Ariel Quigley Mysteries & Companion Cookbooks
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Ariel's ViewA Mysterious Newsletter from
ArielQuigleyMysteries.com
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Volume 1, Number 4 |
June 1, 2006 |
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Welcome |
Visit our Online Calendar
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Today in History |
Published bi-weekly, weather permitting.
(We had a HUMONGOUS storm about a week ago,
and the temperature jumped from the 50s to the 90's!)
When you've finished reading, visit our
home page,
for links to photos, contests, recipes,
and other awesome treats!
Please take our
survey,
so that we can make the site and the newsletter as interesting as
possible!
What We've Been Up To (Our Madcap Adventures)
We've been shooting up on the bestsellers charts ...
Amazon keeps track on a moment to moment basis of the standings of every one of the 4,484,752 books on their list. We were at #1,476,000 the first time I checked in, and progressed over the next two weeks to #780,000. Then last Monday I checked in and we were #17,421! It has dropped again since then, but I'm confident we'll break through to the top 10,000 any day now!
Susan - News From My Computer
(If you're looking for the gardening news - it's a bit further down the page!)
I've been busy, busy, busy—slaving away on my computer in the basement office. I feel like a troll! You can see a new touch to the web-site: a drop-down menu bar at the top of every page, and a neat Celtic menu on the pages for the Main Characters and the Characters from "The Chef Who Died Sautéing". I hope this will make navigating the site a bit easier. I'm working on a few other changes - I'll keep you posted. (Sorry - Thgings have changed again--the Celtic menu program created no end of troubles for me!)
I've also been busy booking our July trip to Austin and Atlanta, with a multitude of stops en route. (See our Tour and Events page.) We're still on dial-up internet access here in the booming metropolis of Grayville (pop. 1600), but I'm told we'll be getting DSL sometime late summer. It will certainly make a difference in my work, since it currently takes me about 20 minutes to make one motel reservation, if I want to compare a couple of sites. And if I want to download a 10 meg file, I just go away and read for the 30 minutes it takes to come in!
In addition, I just set up a journal, which will take the place of much of the content of this newsletter. Honora and I will post on a semi-irregular basis, and we expect Ariel, her sisters, Bernice and the twins to hack in occasionally to let us know what they're up to. I'll send out a newsletter when that is live. More information coming your way soon!
Susan - News from the Garden
Well, the garden is proceeding apace. As I mentioned in the last letter, there was a box waiting for me when I got home from the National Arbor Day Society - with 6 fruit trees, 5 Rose of Sharon, 5 boxwood, 1 Rhododendron and 6 azaleas. Unfortunately, several of these (all the Rose of Sharon, all the azaleas, 3 of the fruit trees) were sticks, rather than plants, and I'll have to wait until they replace them in the fall to finish the planting. To fill in some of the holes I'd dug for the Rose of Sharon we bought a couple of hibiscus, and reorganized our plans for the holly and the crepe myrtle that were waiting to move into their new homes.
I've made SOME progress on redefining the back yard (see last month's newsletter.) I get out most mornings for a couple of hours before the call of the computer draws me in to write, or try another bit of promotion, or make plans for our next trip.
When I put up the picture of the house in the last newsletter, I realized I hadn't taken any pictures in quite a while, and the trees and shrubs I planted in 2002 have grown strangely tall!
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| Sunweavers Center -'02 | Sunweavers Center -'06 |
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| Side of the house | Back of the house |
The Tree of Life
The "Tree of Life" that Michelle is building in the backyard early in the novel actually exists - in the backyard of our education center, along with a Star of David!
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| Tree of Life | Star of David |
Click here for general information about workshops at Sunweavers Center.
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| The Hot Tub |
Honora—News From My Recliner
I’m happy to report that my foot is on the mend, though I still have to wear the strange little hospital sandal for a few more days. I’ll see the foot doc again this Friday and am hoping to get the stitches out (it would be heavenly to be able to take a real shower again!)
These past two weeks have been busy in spite of their being my recovery time—no, I can’t stay put even if I’m supposed to because I don’t have good sense! We had an out-of-town guest, Russ Pharis, for a whole week, and it was very helpful having a guy with us for our book signings and library visits who was willing to schlep all our boxes and bags. (Russ is a former creative writing student of mine who won a lot of prizes for plays while he was in my classes and consequently made me look good as a teacher. He’s now a successful antique dealer, but he still has a desire to work in theater, so I tried to talk him into moving to Philly and joining my daughter’s theater company, Vagabond Acting Troupe.)
When Russ left, Susan set me the task of contacting selected former students who might be interested in our having finally published our first novel, a task that took another couple of days. I’ve heard back from a handful of students (those who really liked my classes and wanted to wish me well in this new career of novel writing).
Then she got us a gig on the radio station 17 miles to the south of us in Carmi, IL, so we had a book talk on the Bob Miller show last Thursday. Later that same day we were also interviewed for the Carmi Times newspaper about a book talk we will be doing at the library there next Saturday.
But the biggest high of the week was when we went into the Borders Bookstore in Evansville to take a poster and some bookmarks for their pre-signing display, and there was a woman from our hometown who’d gone to the store especially to buy our book! The shipment had just arrived, so they brought a book out and we signed it on the spot. I cannot convey what a thrill it is to go into a bookstore and have someone actually standing there ordering our book and being so excited that we were going to sign it for her—it really made us feel successful!
Where We're Going...
Book Talks & Book Signings
(We have sent out 400 emails this week!)
And yes, we do put on our chefs' costumes for book talks!
Carmi Library, Carmi, IL - Saturday, June 3rd, 2-4 pm
Borders, Lloyd Expressway, Evansville, IN - Sun. June 4th, 1-3 pm
Places
Two of Honora's grandchildren (she has 5!) are visiting her next month, so we thought we'd take them on a bit of a holiday. We have access to timeshare property in Nashville and Branson, and have talked about visiting Hannibal (the birthplace of Mark Twain) for years.
If you're local to any of these places, let us know!
And I've updated the Tour and Events page to reflect a very busy July!
Check our Tour and Events pages to see where we're heading for the rest of the year - we will update it regularly as we figure out just where we're going to be. And if you'd like us to head to your area, let us know where you live, and what bookstores or libraries we could do a signing in, and we'll try to get there at some point. Nowhere on the continent is totally out of the realm of possibility, even though some places may be a bit hard to reach!
A Recipe from Bernice's Kitchen
Contrary to what Ariel might tell you, I don't ALWAYS have instant success with my cooking experiments - that's just for fiction! Last week I tried my hand at cooking sweetbreads, a dish I often enjoyed at The Riviera, done as only Chef Daniel could do it!
The results were a bit shaky though, because unless you know exactly what you're looking for, it's hard to look at a piece of totally white meat (after 2 hours of soaking followed by blanching) and determine what's the outer membrane you're supposed to remove, and what's the edible meat.
The Galloping Gourmet wanted me to add truffles, but the only kind of those that I keeps around the house are chocolate, and I didn't think that was what he meant! Another one of my wonderful cookbooks advised soaking the meat, and then pressing it between two plates under a table leg for 2 hours! Can you imagine trying to keep Freud the Cat away from that!
I accidentally over floured the sweetbreads before sautéing them, so when I added the red wine, the whole mixture was rather thick, and as I thinned it with stock, the sweetbreads lost all the coating I had just finished browning! Anyway, I opted to keep most of the gravy aside for a dish that garnered considerably more praise--oxtail stew.
Ox-Tail Stew
Cut the visible fat off 3 lbs. of ox-tail pieces, and brown them in a bit of olive oil a heavy (preferably cast iron) Dutch oven. Add a chopped onion and as much garlic as you like, and continue to cook until all sides of the meat are nicely browned.
Add 2 tins chopped tomatoes, complete with the juice, and a 'mire poix' of 1/2 cup of chopped carrot and celery, along with some crushed bay leaf, some thyme, and a few peppercorns.
Add stock to cover the meat, and simmer for 2-2.5 hours, until the meat is fork tender.
Turn off the heat, and remove the tail
pieces from the stock.
Take 1 cup of stock, and keep it aside.
Add 1 tablespoon tomato paste, 2 medium diced potatoes, 10-20 baby carrots to the stock (if the carrots are not really 'baby' carrots, you may want to chop them), and 1/4 - 1/2 c chopped celery and simmer for 15-20 minutes.
While the vegetables are cooking, remove the meat from the bones, and cut it into bite sized pieces.
Now, make a roux with 3-4 Tbsp butter and 1/3 cup flour. Melt the butter, and add the flour a bit at a time until it forms a thick paste. Slowly add the reserved stock to the roux, stirring constantly to be sure there are no lumps. Add 1/2 cup red wine and let it cook for 3-5 minutes.
For the last 10 minutes, add 1 cup of cauliflower pieces.
Finally, return the meat to the pot, then add the gravy a bit at a time, stirring it in to be sure it doesn't lump.
Adjust the seasonings with salt and pepper, and serve with a small green salad with balsamic vinaigrette dressing, and sliced pumpernickel bread with butter.
Enjoy!
Ariel's Metaphysics Corner
Part 3 - The
Magician
© 2006 Honora Finkelstein
The Magician
If the Fool card represents the Divine force or potential in each of us before we have taken on the trappings of physical form, and if the step he is about to take off the mountain top is his descent into the material world, then the card of the Magician must represent our ability to make something of ourselves once we have made that descent.
In taking on physical form, of course, each of us takes on a specific personality. At our core, each of us is still one with the Divine nature, which is what Jesus seems to have meant when he said, “The Father and I are One,” and what his atONEment is really all about. But once the Divine spark has descended into a material body and taken on a personality, the human nature takes over, and it begins to think it is separate and apart from the Source from which it came. Real magic, therefore, is seeing through that illusion of separateness and consciously learning to draw on the energy of who we really are—which is a part of God.
The personality we take on can be pretty stubborn, especially after we’ve lived a few years in a particular physical body, with particular parents, in a particular part of the world—and especially with the influences of a particular natal astrology chart. That personality is what we really mean by the word “ego.” And because every physical body and every ego personality is unique (never seen before and never to be seen again in the entire history of the Universe), we get caught in the illusion of separateness.
And yet Unified Field Theory of modern physics tells us we’re still all part of the great Oneness—that every thought we think has an influence on us and on everyone and everything around us. Edgar Cayce, the great 20th-century psychic channel said frequently in his readings, “Thoughts are things, and mind is the builder.” This is why it’s important to learn self-control of our thoughts and actions. (Well, nobody ever said learning to be a Magician would be easy!)
So the Magician stands in a garden (representative of the symbolic Eden each of us can return to when we learn to exercise our powers properly). His right hand is raised to the heavens, and he holds a wand in it, while his left hand is pointed down toward the ground. The wand, as we’ll see often in symbolism, is a channel for energy—zap, we can turn lions into bunny rabbits if we can just exercise our energies properly! And the energy travels through us, picking up our dreams, desires, thoughts, and wants, and manifesting a result of those influences into something in physical form. E=mc2! And notice, too, that above the Magician’s head is an infinity sign—the power we have to draw on is infinite. It’s all the power that ever was or will be, and it’s here now.
The Magician is the soul, just descended into physical form—the Adam Cadmon, or prototypic human being—who can’t help creating the universe around him. It’s what he does, because that’s what human beings do by their very thoughts. One can try to avoid responsibility and say, “It’s not my fault, I didn’t do it,” whatever it might be in any given circumstance. But the truth of the matter of matter is that each of us has created the material surroundings in which we find ourselves, using whatever talents we receive when we take on a physical body and an ego personality and molding the matter of the physical world into that which our thoughts direct.
So this card really stands for Talent, and what we can do with it when we take on a physical body and an ego personality. Jesus told a parable to his disciples about a master who gave each of his servants money in a form known as “talents.” Two of the servants failed to do anything positive with this money, but the third went out and through application of everything of which he was capable, he multiplied the amount. One might say that through his talents (abilities) he increased the number of talents (money).
The Magician is dressed in a white robe and wears a red cloak. And the garden is filled with white lilies and red roses. In Tarot symbolism, white is always the color of purity, while red represents the desire nature. And these two qualities are at opposite ends of the emotional spectrum, also suggesting that a conscious exercise of control over our thoughts is requisite if we’re to be responsible as human beings for the productions of our creative minds.
On the table in front of the Magician are four implements—a coin, a cup, a sword, and a wand. These are the symbols of the four suits of the Lesser Arcana. The coin, made from the metals of the earth, represents the element of earth and the physical nature of human beings. The cup, because it holds liquids, stands for the element of water and also symbolizes our emotional nature. The sword, which is double-edged and often held aloft rather than sheathed, stands for the element of air and is symbolic of our mental nature—which if left uncontrolled can harm us and others. And the wand on the table, like the one in the Magician’s hand, is a device for channeling energy. It is made of wood, and wood burns, so the wand represents the element of fire (like the fire of the Holy Spirit). It symbolizes the spiritual nature of the human being. In the science of the time when Tarot was developed, these four elements and these four aspects of nature were believed to be all there were. So symbolically, what we have to work with while we’re acting as Magicians in a physical body is merely everything that is, was, or ever will be!
Therefore, the card of the Magician says, “You can’t afford the luxury of a negative thought. So use your talents wisely, not haphazardly. Make the most of your magical abilities to co-create the universe around you. Turn Earth back into Eden. And above all, take responsibility for your thoughts and learn to control them, because what you think is what you get!”
Fan Corner
Please sign our GUESTBOOK and let us know what you think of the book, our website, this newsletter - what ever!
We're hoping more people will try out our little "survey" - so we'll run it for a few more issues. Click on the link to vote on some truly momentous issues.
Also, please feel free to chat with us regarding anything at all. We'll reply to all our email, and try to answer all your questions, share some adventures, have some fun.
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by email: authors [at] arielquigleymysteries.com
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