Are you hungry...

[-Sammy-]

...for a great ESPN piece on Pop?

[G R E Y]

Now there's an article to sink your teeth into (I'm sorry...). Yeah I read this yesterday and thought it was a wonderful insight into team building, forging of relationships, and the personalities it takes to make it happen. Bread and brotherhood is a longstanding tradition, even as over time it takes place in different settings and with different groups.

The overall impression was a mix of passion, expertise, precision, and otherness. It's one thing to really be into food and wine, and entirely another to do it with a care and thought about others' likes and needs. That last part is often missing is so many social contexts and celebrations.

Haven't we all been to those Thanksgiving or Christmas dinners where there are 45 people scrambling for food that's a mismatched collection of overcooked traditional staples and those new experiments because someone's on a new food fad and everyone else just has to try it? And you have to either sit there tight elbowed or looking for a random seat while kids hopped up on sugar are screaming and dogs are chasing each other and then you sneak off looking for a quiet corner in the basement? Where's the wine? Maybe that's just me. Maybe others like the messy chaos, and that's fine, it's about togetherness, but there's also an element to a certain kind of togetherness that sometimes has too much of one thing, not enough of another.

"Satisfied" tends to get a bad rap, connote a feeling of 'just ok' but nothing special. But it's root means 'enough'. There's a lot to be said for tending to all the fine details just so, in ensuring that the right wine goes with the right food with the right people who are seated together in the right numbers. And when everything coalesces, a kind of alchemy happens and makes for a magical night. We remember those times fondly long after they're done as many current and former Spurs still do. It's a unique continuation of an often neglected but much needed tradition.

[-Sammy-]

Now there's an article to sink your teeth into (I'm sorry...).

Such claptrap will not be condoned on this forum; pack your things and find your way to the egress. I'm joking.

The overall impression was a mix of passion, expertise, precision, and otherness. It's one thing to really be into food and wine, and entirely another to do it with a care and thought about others' likes and needs. That last part is often missing is so many social contexts and celebrations.

It's pretty awesome and special. it's our social instinct that routinely drives us to center social engagements around meals; it's our lack of culinary expertise and artistry that often causes such efforts to devolve into silent face-stuffing episodes in spite of our good intentions. Turning a meal into a lasting experience is a craft.

Haven't we all been to those Thanksgiving or Christmas dinners where there are 45 people scrambling for food that's a mismatched collection of overcooked traditional staples and those new experiments because someone's on a new food fad and everyone else just has to try it? And you have to either sit there tight elbowed or looking for a random seat while kids hopped up on sugar are screaming and dogs are chasing each other and then you sneak off looking for a quiet corner in the basement?

We don't even have to look as far as a holiday to make the point. How many times have you prepared two dishes you really enjoy because it seems reasonable that if you like them separately, you'll like them more together?

Sometimes it works; usually it doesn't.

"Satisfied" tends to get a bad rap, connote a feeling of 'just ok' but nothing special. But it's root means 'enough'. There's a lot to be said for tending to all the fine details just so, in ensuring that the right wine goes with the right food with the right people who are seated together in the right numbers. And when everything coalesces, a kind of alchemy happens and makes for a magical night. We remember those times fondly long after they're done as many current and former Spurs still do. It's a unique continuation of an often neglected but much needed tradition.

Great sentiments, as always!