Why I don’t use the Oxford comma

If you want to use the Oxford comma, that’s fine with me.

Academics and stuffy people all over the world use it, and while it really annoys me because it makes your brain pause more often than necessary when reading something, there’s nothing technically wrong with it.

But if you use it, don’t delude yourself into doing it because it’s somehow more correct than not using it. It isn’t.

This meme has been circulating on Facebook:

Now come on. This business is just silly. Anyone foolish enough to construct a sentence that ambiguous needs a course in rhetoric.

I admit, I used to be a grammarphile. As a writer by career, I took pride in being a “grammar nazi,” and displayed my knowledge of what I called proper punctuation and use as often as I could. I adored the rules and followed them religiously.

But then I started reading and thinking about what other people have to say on the subject — people like linguists and cognitive scientists. Why is Strunk and White the definitive word on our language? Why do there have to be different uses for the words “fewer” and “less” if there’s only one word for “more”? Why can’t you end a written sentence with a preposition if it would be laughably esoteric to say it that way out loud?

If my beloved husband, a linguist, hadn’t been so accepting, our relationship might never have gotten off the ground. Mistaking what linguists call generative grammar for the grammar of grammar school, I said to him, “Oh, you study grammar? That’s awesome, we’ll get along great, I’m a grammar nazi!”

He just smiled at me. He could have destroyed my entire idea of proper rhetoric at that moment, but he didn’t. Instead I picked little things up from listening to him and others over the years. And now in my writing, I think first about making intelligent decisions about words and punctuation instead of blindly following rules.

Because language evolves, people. Just like African American Vernacular English — also known as Ebonics – is indeed a true dialect that conforms to the structure of any other legitimate language, so the written word evolves as well.

The real answer here is to construct sentences intelligently. If you do that, then the comma (or lack thereof) really doesn’t matter. How about this?

We invited Tom Brady, my love-child, and the highest-paid quarterback in the NFL. 

Just as much as the comma in the drawing removes ambiguity about Stalin and JFK, in this sentence it creates ambiguity about Tom Brady when one considers what the sentence is actually trying to say.

It’s very unlikely that Brady is my love-child.  But do we know if he’s the highest-paid quarterback in the NFL? Possibly. Maybe even probably. But unless we’re super-fans of Tom Terrific and pro football, we don’t know, and we’re counting on the sentence to make that clear. Here, it doesn’t.

But, you might say, if you remove the comma, it’s not clear either.

We invited Tom Brady, my love-child and the highest-paid quarterback in the NFL. 

Yes, you’re right. It’s not clear. This sentence suffers the same issues. Why? Because it’s constructed poorly in the first place.

When it comes down to it, this sentence just needs to be rewritten.

We invited Peyton Manning, who is the highest-paid quarterback in the NFL. We also invited Tom Brady and my love-child. 

Just like the other one.

We invited Stalin and JFK, and we invited the strippers.

We invited Stalin and JFK. We also invited the strippers. 

We invited JFK, Stalin and the strippers.

Thank you for reading my diatribe. And don’t get me started on “over” and “more than.”

Snow and pancakes

I woke up to a beautiful blanket of soft snow this morning.

Just a few inches, but steadily falling. Husband went off to campus to work, and called when he got there to say “don’t go out!” Apparently they’re not really plowing yet, waiting for the snowfall to die down.

So, I did what any woman would do stuck at home on a wintry Saturday morning. I made pancakes. :)

When I was single, pancakes were a drag because one egg makes so many of them. I’d either end up eating the whole batch, practically my weight’s worth of pancakes, or trying in various ways to save the batter/leftover cakes. Having the willpower NOT to pull them out and eat them again for lunch/dinner took a bit of doing, and wasn’t always successful.

But now I can say, self, these extra pancakes are for husband, either when he comes home or tomorrow morning. It’s amazing that it’s easier to control myself for his sake than for my own.

Here’s my recipe. There’s nothing extra special here. You can beat the egg white to soft peaks and fold it in for extra fluffiness, but they’re just as tasty if you don’t bother. I like hearty, firm pancakes anyway.

Everyday Pancakes

Makes 4 3-pancake servings

per serving, not including syrup: 243 calories * 1.8g fat * 1.5g fiber 9.8g protein

225 g. (~1 3/4 c) all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1 1/4 c milk
1/4 c water
1 egg
Pinch of salt

 

1. Heat skillet over medium heat. Grease with butter or cooking oil.

2. Stir all ingredients together in large bowl until moistened. Don’t worry about lumps.

3. Pour 1/4-cup rounds into pan (you’ll get three in a large pan) and bake until bubbles are even across whole pancake.

4. Flip and cook 30 seconds to one minute more, or until golden. Buon appetito!

 

Measuring flour

Since I’ve started baking, I’ve learned the value of exact measurements.

When cooking, my husband calls me a “tinkerer.” I usually look at a recipe, decide what I like and don’t like about it, and adjust accordingly. When cooking, that’s not such a big deal: more peas or cayenne pepper won’t destroy a dish, and more can usually be added later.

But baking, of course, is another matter. I’m sure expert bakers can tinker with amounts of flour, leaveners, etc., but not me. I’ve learned the value of a precise measurement.

When I first started learning to bake, I’d scoop flour directly from the bag into a measuring cup, packing it in tightly. Or I’d dump it in and eyeball the top to see if it looked approximately even.

And I wondered why my bread wasn’t coming out well!

Measuring flour is a place where I’ve learned to be very exact. Here’s the deal: A correctly measured cup of all-purpose flour should weigh about 125 grams. So with my trusty counter scale, I conducted an experiment.

Turns out the scooping and dumping methods I use overestimate flour by as much as 25 g. That’s about 20 percent too much flour. When I instead spooned the flour in small doses into a measuring cup, I was able to get pretty darn close to 125.

Since this technique is pretty time-consuming, in the future I think I’ll simply be weighing my flour instead of measuring it. It’s the most precise, and it could be less of a hassle too – if I know exactly how many grams I need, I can measure just once.

It’s the little things, people. The little things you learn!

Whole wheat bread

I’ve been struggling a little with making a good 100 percent whole wheat bread. What makes whole wheat flour good for you is that it’s not refined – the bran and the germ of the bread haven’t been removed, giving it more protein, fiber, iron, Vitamin B’s and good fats.

But leaving the bran and the germ in addition to the endosperm also make wheat flour heavier. The oils in the germ make the flour more dense, and their high moisture content means that the higher the proportion of whole wheat flour in a bread, the softer it (and its crust) will be. So, it’s really hard or impossible to make a 100 percent whole wheat bread with a flaky, crispy crust.

The bread books I own are pretty sparse on the whole wheat breads. I guess the real “artisan” ones are white breads. Besides, it’s a little more work to make whole wheat bread: more ingredients, longer rising time, the dough loses its shape more easily, etc.

Today was my first successful attempt at a whole wheat bread. I didn’t use vital wheat gluten (more on that in a later post), but the bread rose well, tastes great and even has a bit of a crunch to the crust – not light and crispy, but thick and crunchy. It’s got great flavor, too.

I followed the recipe for 100 percent whole wheat sandwich bread in the Artisan In 5 book. Here’s what I did.

Mix water, milk, yeast, salt, oil and honey. Then add whole wheat flour and stir using the dough hook on a stand mixer until combined:

Set in a warm place and cover. I’m still working out the best way to “cover” – some recipes warn against making an airtight seal, while others say to use plastic wrap. This is my solution for now: a kitchen towel with a rubber band around it.

Let the dough rise for 2-3 hours.

After the rise, shape the dough into a ball by pulling the surface of the dough down to the bottom, creating a smooth surface all around the dough. (One day I’ll get a photo of this – tough to do on my own :) I noticed that the smoothness was hard to achieve with the whole wheat – the dough kept getting hole in the top. But in the end I shaped it into a long-form loaf. Place onto a pizza pel covered in cornmeal.

Let rest for at least 40 minutes. About a half hour before baking, preheat the oven to 350 with a stone and a pan for water. Slide the dough onto the stone and pour about 1 cup water into the pan. I baked it for about 50 minutes. Here’s the end result!

This bread is DELICIOUS. Crunchy crust, lots of flavor. This one could have used a shake or two less salt – the Artisan In 5 book tends to go heavy on the salt, which makes the bread delicious by itself, but has a little too much saltiness if you want to put butter, jam, cheese, etc. on it.

A word of warning – this bread is very dense. The heaviness of the flour makes for a low rise. I personally love a good dense and crumbly bread, but it’s not the kind of thing you want to use for sandwiches. Stay tuned for a future blog on making lighter whole wheat bread!

DENSE WHOLE WHEAT BREAD

12 slices * 111 calories/slice * 2g fat * 2.5g fiber * 4.5g protein

(The measurements are a little wonky because I divided the original recipe in a third. After you do it a few times and know what consistency you like your dough, you can estimate the measurements.)

1/2 c lukewarm water

1/2 c lukewarm milk

1/2 tbs. granulated yeast 

up to 1 1/3 tsp. Kosher salt, depending on how salty you like your bread

2 2/3 tbs. honey

1 2/3 tbs. neutral oil (I use grapeseed)

2 1/8 c whole wheat flour (or one flat cup and one heaping cup)

 

1. Mix water, milk, yeast, salt, honey and oil in a large mixer bowl.

2. Add flour and mix with dough hook on medium speed until blended.

3. Cover with kitchen towel and let rise for 2-3 hours, or until the dough flattens and/or collapses.

4. Sprinkle cornmeal on pizza peel

4. Using wet hands to avoid dough stickage, shape the dough into a ball by pulling the surface around to the bottom. Do this as you turn the dough in your hands, trying to achieve a smooth surface. Then stretch dough into the shape you like – I did a long-form loaf here.

5. Set dough on pizza peel and let sit for 40-50 min, uncovered.

6. About a half hour before baking, preheat the oven with the pizza peel on the middle shelf and a pan or broiler pan on the bottom shelf.

7. After dough has risen 40-50 min, slide it onto the heated stone. Pour 1 c water into steam pan.

8. Bake for about 50 min or until firm and makes a hollow sound when tapped on the bottom.

9. Let cool almost completely before cutting.

Little beebe bread baker

Recently I started attempting to make bread.

Maybe it’s that I’m not willing to go very far to find it (or spend very much on it), but good bread is a rare commodity. It just doesn’t exist at our supermarket. Even the rustic-looking seed-covered ones which say “Berkshire Bread” in brown and green leafy writing have a list of unpronounceable and completely unnecessary ingredients.

And because I live in the middle of nowhere, the nearest good bakery is a good 20-minute drive. Just not something I want to do twice a week.

So I decided: how hard can it be? I’ve made pizza dough before. I’ve baked cakes and cupcakes. I can do this.

The only part I was skeptical about was the kneading – I have a finicky back and don’t want to knead forever.

But my husband bought me the Artisan Bread in 5 Minutes book. Plus I already own the How to Cook Everything Vegetarian book by Mark Bittman. Both of these books advocate a non-knead bread. I had no idea! Maybe if I had known this I would have started making bread years before getting a stand mixer.Yes, the two preceding photos are of a bread I made. But that is definitely not the first one I made. And even after I made this one, I completely botched not one but several batches. It seems to be that I hit it right about 1/3 of the time, making a beautiful and tasty thing like you see here. The other 2/3 of the time I couldn’t miss more – my kitchen has seen lumpy, non-rising, not-even-worth-baking, scratch-it-and-try-again-tomorrow doughs.

But even when I forgot the yeast (yes, it happened, but I’m not posting a photo of THAT), things weren’t all for naught. That non-rising wheat bread actually turned out to be a very flavorful, dense, quick-bread-like concoction that held its own, especially with some butter and jam.

Anyway, you may start to see more chronicles of little Beebe the bread baker. Beebe is my husband’s pet name for me and he’s taken to calling me his bread baker.

I promise I’ll try to post the hilarious ones, too. :)

Red velvet

Look, how versatile I am. I can switch from talking about climate change to an almost-as-serious topic — the best cream cheese frosting I’ve ever tasted — in a matter of one post.

I could even say that they’re the best red velvet cupcakes and the best cream cheese frosting I’ve ever made. But that’s because I’ve never made either.

The velvet cake recipe came from iambaker and the cream cheese-whipped cream frosting from Vegetarian Times’ Ultimate Carrot Cake recipe.

Now. If I could just stop sneezing and coughing (should have gotten that flu shot), I might make it up to one of my favorite places this afternoon to share some time with some of my favorite people.

My father and his family have a homestead in upstate New York. There are stories behind that door that go far and deep (and wacky). Stories for another time.

For now, I think I need some sleep.

Fear of climate change

Here’s a really interesting take, and one I never thought of.

We who believe that climate change is man-made and is destroying our world have already taken a leap, one that we expect conservatives and climate-change skeptics to take with us overnight. From Climatebites.org, a summary of a talk by Jeff Kiehl, a climate scientist and psychologist, at the American Geophysical Union meeting:

For many skeptics, resistance to accepting climate science stems primarily from fear, not ignorance or misinformation.    Fear of what could be “taken away” from them if government mobilizes to address this problem.    This came up in session after session on climate communication.

The corollary:     We can never make progress with ardent skeptics by arguing endlessly about scientific nuances, because scientific quibbles are so often defenses against deeper fears.  We have to acknowledge and address directly the fears about solutions.

Fear of what? Well, many conservative worldviews. What would you do if suddely someone told you something you’ve always believed in is wrong, and they have really good evidence to prove it? Says the Climatebites author, it can threaten conservatives’:

• identity, defined by their worldview and expressed by consumption patterns
• peace-of-mind and sense of personal security
• self-esteem; admitting error is hard for anybody
• relationships, if friends and colleagues become alienated
• consumer choice and freedom (e.g. light bulbs)
• prosperity and economic security for future generations.
• personal freedom and liberty, if government controls more areas of life.

If instead of getting angry for not seeing the truth, we instead put ourselves in their shoes and see everything that they stand for being turned on its head, maybe we can forgive them a little anger. And we can’t “scare them out of their fear,” either, so scare tactics aren’t going to work.

Of course the psychologist shows us the psychology of the conservatives — but then what? How do we combat this fear? If I was in their shoes — angry, bitter, blind to facts — how could someone effectively convince me to change sides?

That I don’t know.

Christmastime

A few photos that sum up my exquisite Christmas experience over the past week. Enjoy. 

Francoed

Even though the American Dialect Society is supposedly an archaic and lame group according to my linguist husband, I still think it’s neat that every year they pick a “word of the year”: a word that skyrocketed in use and importance in the public eye during that year.

They’ll announce the 2011 word in January at the Linguistics Society of America conference, which ironically my husband will attend.

This year, some rumored top competitors are occupy, Arab Spring and Tebowing.

But I didn’t come here to talk about the word of the year. I was simply reminded of it by a phenomenon I’m going to name using another proper name-turned-verb: Francoed.

Getting Francoed means you’re a well-meaning college professor, likely at an expensive college. A student gets mad at you for not passing him, or even for giving him the grade he doesn’t want. But if you stick to your guns, saying, sorry kid, this is the grade you earned, your university smites you with its mighty wrath.

This apparently happened recently at NYU with none other than the actor James Franco, who was enrolled in a directing class at the college’s prestigious Tisch School of the Arts. After the actor missed 12 of 14 classes, professor José Angel Santana gave him a D. A very generous thing to do, in my opinion – how can you expect to pass a class that you attend less than 10 percent of the time?

But Franco got pissed, NYU kowtowed to him, and now Santana has been fired. Francoed!

Laurie Essig at the Chronicle of Higher Ed explained it well:

Prestigious College Inc. raises its tuition to prices that only the super-rich could afford. Little Billy or Sally takes out $100,000 in student loans to get a degree from Prestigious College Inc. Or maybe they don’t take out the loans, but their parents refinance their house or take on debt in other ways. Once higher ed is turned into a luxury good financed with debt, the relationship shifts. The students “deserve” to get good grades. After all, they’re paying good money. And so Prestigious College Inc. creates a system in which students, like the banking industry, become too big to fail. A variety of barriers are put into place to stop professors from failing or even giving D’s to students.

Most commonly, the students in this situation are student-athletes. Schools with great football and basketball teams will bend over backwards for these students. And being at a school with one of the best basketball teams in the country, I have seen it happen: professors pressured to the point of breaking their own classroom rules for these kids.

If these same professors have to fear for their jobs if they don’t give the right grade? That is a sad state of higher education.

Outdoorsy chic

Fashion websites and blogs are everywhere on the web. But no matter how hard I search, I can’t seem to find one that fits my style, or what I think is my style: casual and outdoorsy, yet with a stylish flair. I don’t like to admit it, but I guess I’m an Eddie Bauer and J Crew type.

Some examples.