Serious Eats - seriouseats.com

@renzata - in terms of an 'arrogant' attitude, it's possible I've shown it in this thread at times. If you look at the first response to the topic you might see why I would do so. If the charge is that I'm arrogant in general, so be it. I've heard that chefs have a high number of arrogant people in the profession. And as a woman chef if you are unable to summon arrogance you'll last about a week on the job (if even that long). That was even more true when I first entered the field. I've heard that the most successful lawyers generally have this aspect of personality also.

As to my arrogance as displayed at times on SE, two things happen that start it. The first is a lack of content that really interests me. The second is a focus on posts that seem sort of useless-in-general. My foul for getting upset about it. Honestly it is just better to walk away.

A lot of SE is the Talk section. And the people who post are actually providing content for the site, though in no way are they specifically linked to SE or paid for providing it (as far as anyone reading knows, anyway). The content providers that have been making up the bulk of the Talk section in the past six months or so have been developing a certain style that is not to my own taste at all. Whatever. Again, my problem not anyone else's. :)

As a chef I have no terribly deep interest in reading how someone followed a recipe from a book at home and how it came out. I'm personally not interested in restaurant reviews, though they are useful. And as someone interested in food culture and history, the only consistent parts of SE I can find that will day after day provide something new to read and interesting to read are the editorial sections written by Erin or Robyn, which are time and again excellent.

As far as the foodvox thing goes, I took that name when I started the blog (which for the moment actually has been stopped as I'm simply too busy doing other things). It was the use of a corporate name more than a personal name that was the goal in the shift online here, and SE understood that and approved it. There are other people on site who have done the same thing.

As far as the characters on my blog go - they were actually created through being inspired by the people who post online. What a variety of life is shown! I tweaked the types a bit to make them parody - though it is possible that they may be read as some people as "real" for whatever reason the reader has.

One has to wonder at times how many people posting online using aliases are actually 'real' - or whether they might be plaything personalities created by someone for whatever reason. One has to wonder sometimes (if one is not to be simply naive about the online world) whether the use of aliases allows the creation (without admission) of multiple online people by one person, again for whatever reason. I can think of more than one reason, some just due to nuttiness or desperation, some due to good business sense (good business sense used in a rather strange manner, true, but whatever . . .).

foodvox did sound male rather than female . . . and instantly upon posting with the name I got replies from people that showed that. What was interesting is that the tone of reply to the things I was saying (which all come from me and which tone was not shifted with the name shift to the corporate/male sounding one) were different. Things were 'taken' differently and replied to differently. People responded differently to someone they thought was a guy which of course is not surprising but to see it in action is fascinating.
...........................

Too verbose again? Well, that's okay. I'm done now and won't try this again, for the white noise in terms of posted replies is simply too much
for me to want to wade through.

@huneybumper - again, if you've waded through all this verbosity, my apologies. From here on in, maybe the topic will simply shift to all boobs and burps, etc.
The topic was not just as you summarized it in your desire get rid of the apparent verbosity, though. There are two large important components in this topic beyond the question of 'vomitorium' and those two components were MFK Fisher and the world of professional writing.
................................

Lots of free space to go on about hot-dogs-to-impress and boobs and burps, guys. Go for it! I'm outa here. :)

So the word can mean either the passageways used as exit from a building or this particular sort of room, producestories? The references I've found only mention the first definition.

That would make sense, if true. And all would end well, with MFKF in the right. :)

Thanks for the information, very much.

PerkyMac - You have one alias only and no real name displayed to the public. The characters on my blogs are defined as fictional characters and I don't remember them ever going on about how wonderful and talented I (Karen) am - though they do have a lot to talk about.

Shocking that Moira is a cat, isn't it. No, wait. You wrote it CAT.

On the other hand, I remember your first post on SE - the one where you insulted a young woman's Thanksgiving meal she posted a link to a photo of . . . saying that it looked like cat puke.

You've shifted your comments a bit since then, haven't you. That's good.

I also realize (since you've noted it before) that you still shake with anger at the fact I once dared to post that I wasn't crazy about the morbidly obese who smelled bad who seemed to be quite apparent in some numbers at Wal-Mart. Tsk tsk. Whale away, Perky. What you think doesn't matter in the least to me. :)

And that is probably how it should be for you, with me. What I think shouldn't matter all that much, really.

Probably every person on earth could use therapy, BTW. Some pray instead. Some overeat. Some follow others around online haranguing them. Whatever. To each their own.

If I were searching for fame, posting this topic on SE would not be my methodry, Pavlov. And the thought of wanting to be thought a philosopher by anyone, specifically or in general, in this virtual world or in the real world, never crossed my mind. But I'm happy to listen to your own philosophizing in Latin posted within this topic.

thepictsie, point taken. But every published food writer I've ever known of has been sure to let their public understand that what they write is journalism - not fiction - and that their writings are to be respected as such and therefore subject to the same rules as any other journalistic writing.

wookie - I'm looking for comments on this. If I posted it twice it's because I thought I might be able to write it with a better heading that would attract people that would be interested in it. That it has attracted people who want to tell me they are not interested in the topic not is not surprising. That's the way of online commentary.
That I choose to answer their comments in a similar level of tone to theirs might not make me one who is above it all, but then I never said I was. :)

izatryt, you're one incredible person! Just look at what you've managed to put together there! Almost as fun as a barrel of monkeys!

Time is short, true. I've valued the several thoughtful answers posted but enough of the rest of the nonsense. Carry on with it, those who have the time. As I noted, the balance of typical answers in any given environment is interesting in itself.

Pavlov and Perky. You are so cute!

I think there's a medicine called beano or something that might help with that, dearrie. Or maybe not. Maybe that fixes something else.

And finally - to make an even three comments (such a nice number, don't you think?) if there is no response, no commentary from SE readers on whether they should be reading things written that are true or rather things written that are not true (whether the author is someone in their daily realm of life or not) then I'm going to have to assume that the general readership here just does not care to be careful as to whether what they read is true or not, from their experts. I'll have to assume that the general readership simply eats and digests their media without thinking.

It is entirely possible this is so.

I'll be interested to find out.

Chomp chomp. Is it butter or is it Parkay?

No, I don't, izatryt. If others do within the community, then of course they are free to ignore it and move on to something that interests them more.

Certainly if there is low or no response it would hint to me that this particular community is interested in other sorts of discussions and I could move on to another place where people were interested in discussing these things. :)

Chacun sa gout.

Let me go look for a hot dog and think about varieties of mustard as I wait to find out. Mustard, mustard, mustard. Or should it be ketchup. Will the question ever be answered? I don't know. It is vital to do so, though, obviously.

How completely exhausting, buffy. I guess modern industrial distillery methods would be thought of as the greatest thing since sliced bread by those ancient guys, huh? Not that they knew sliced bread in the intimate way we know it.

Beer seems to be responsible for so many things. Civilization, even, perhaps.

the beer theory, which holds that the pleasures of drinking beer together persuaded people to settle down in sociable little villages, so that they could drink more beer together. Forty per cent of the ancient Sumerian wheat harvest went to the distillery.
Link

I live in a college town and it often seems as if beer is responsible for college. Would people even go to college if it were not for beer?

Come to think of it maybe that's why Latin is never remembered correctly. Beer.

Let me just interject into this explosion of comments that actually I've never eaten at one of those buffets.

Now just one more thing for I fear to take the time of readers that need to get back to the commentary required on the four out of seven self-referential topics listed today on the front page that are headed with 'foodie': If you don't know who MFK Fisher is and call yourself a foodie you need to hit your wiki. If you haven't read MFK Fisher in her entirety then to call yourself a foodie is like putting on a false nose. Go for it! But do know that under any good questioning or nose-pulling it will be discovered.

Any linguists here? Any food historians? Anyone who knows what book publishing is like? Anyone who has actually read MFK Fisher?

MFKF's name is often attached to a feeling of "hallowed be thy name". With damn good reason.

Never mind. I've enjoyed ranting to myself as the keys click merrily away here, whether there is anyone here who knows or cares about MFK and this "error" or not.

If you do not have a copy of the book and are curious to see exactly what she wrote, let me know. I'll post it (with caution as to copyright requirements).

In the meantime this is a great diet. No cookies. The pounds are just sliding off I tell you.

Ha, ha, yes you can sailordave. Even after swallowing your chewing gum which will not sit in your stomach for seven years.

And hopefully you won't have to use a vomitorium after all that exercise on a full stomach (if there were such a thing to use).

mepolo - I thought the same thing originally but MFK was not an unknown little read author like the one mentioned in the link. She also was provided with an excellent higher education (or so I seem to remember. Now I'll have to double-check that too for fear my little brain was not working when reading her once again due to the richness of the prose). Not that that means anything, being provided with an excellent higher education - except for bragging rights. But it does lead one to presuppose that things are learned in Latin class and History of Ancient Rome 101.

How on earth did this get by the editors and publishers who are supposed to check sources and accuracy?! Since . . . 1937? !

I mean - in the grand scheme of things it may be more important to be able to recite the cookie recipe from the latest best-selling cookbook but still I am stunned.

So did those fine overfed Ancient Romans throw up at their banquets where they ate as if the best Chinese All-You-Can-Eat Buffet opened right in their hometown but free of cost or not? And if not, where on earth did MFK get the idea that they did? And what source did the idea that a vomitorium was something other than what it is come from? Did she read the word somewhere and read that the Romans were purging and just put the two ideas together, making whole cloth out of half-assed cloth?

It's a fine bold picture, the vomitorium thing as she writes it - one of the things I like about her is that she reads like fiction though supposedly she is not writing fiction. But where does the real thing end and the other begin?

Questions. I've got 'em.

The entire thing is rather Seussian.