Did you know that James Thurber used to throw away his scribbled drawings, and E.B. White rescued and eventually started submitting to the New Yorker? I learned that yesterday, reading a terrific New Yorker interview with Roger Angell.
Angell is 99 years old, and the New Yorker, where he first made his name as a sports writer, is 90. The interview was part of the magazine’s ongoing anniversary celebration, and it put a happy note into my day. I love Angell’s writing and am one of his stepfather E.B. White’s biggest fans, so this piece came to me as a gift.
Church of the Informed Citizen
I wish I could say the same for the news. Church of the Informed Citizen yesterday brought a plethora of for-me unhappy news:
- Our health care system is so messed up that Utah is saving money by paying for its employees to fly to Mexico to fill prescriptions.
- The Trump administration wants to stop funding Stars and Stripes newspaper, but in Kansas City Sputnik Radio is alive and well and broadcasting Russian propaganda.
- And of course the Trump administration also is sending ICE strike-force agents (think SWAT teams) into sanctuary cities through May. This looks to me like a calculated and cynical attempt to suppress the 2020 Census by scaring residents of immigrant-heavy communities to stay behind closed doors.
It all threatened to demoralize me. That’s why the Roger Angell interview was so welcome. It turned the tide on my day and, along with the sun in the sky, probably made the banana cake possible.
Want to know about the banana cake?
Here’s what you do with four overripe bananas and a weekend day: Try a new banana cake recipe and invite friends to help eat it. I’ll happily recommend this recipe, which I happened on at Penzeys.com while looking for spices earlier in the week. It’s dense and moist and delicious and easy.
If you decide to make it (and why not?), it’s worth noting that where the frosting recipe calls for butter softened it might have meant butter melted. I used soft butter and produced frosting paste, to which I had to add more butter and Half and Half to reach spreading consistency. But delicious, absolutely.
What I’m reading
After cake and good company, I was too tired to do anything but sleep, so I saved some reading for today. It’s an older New Yorker essay by Angell, This Old Man, about growing old. He wrote it when he was 93.
Wow.