WWSMD? Or What Would Seth Mnookin do?

A little over four years ago, in an attempt to broaden my reading horizons, I went through a bit of a popular science/philosophy/psychology/economics phase. There were the usual suspects - Jared Diamond (Collapse), Norman Doidge (The Brain that Changes Itself), a little Michael Lewis for light relief, and of course, a generous helping of Dubner and Levitt (AKA the Freakonomics guys).  

One book that caught my eye during this time (I confess it was the cover design that did it – a striking image of a vial against a dark blue background) was Seth Mnookin’s The Panic Virus . The second thing to grab my attention was the name ‘Seth Mnookin’.  I hadn’t heard the name before and two things flashed in my mind:

1.     That sounds like an obscure model keyboard/synthesizer, of limited manufacture, but beloved of instrument collectors. (“Wow, dude, is that a Mnookin P48?” “Nah, this is a Mnookin P49, one of only four left in the world. The other three are in the Smithsonian.”)

2.     Hang on, wasn’t Seth Mnookin the bloke who taught Martin Scorsese at NYU Film School? Oh, no, wait, that was Haig Manoogian, my bad…

Yep, that’s how my brain works.

A quick scan of the book revealed it was all about the history of vaccinations and immunization, the MMR-vaccine-causes-autism controversy (I knew quite a bit already about the dodgy English doctor who started the whole nonsense), as well as the spread of the anti-vaccination movement in America and its pernicious influence in Australia. In short, it looked like a good addition to the other science-y books I was enjoying at the time - but with a mightily serious human-interest element.

I ordered the book through my hubby’s then-employer, a quality Melbourne bookshop and local institution – that’s right, I’m cheap and wanted the staff discount.  It sat on my bedside table for a couple of weeks while I ploughed through a steady stream of Scandi-crime (a girl’s gotta take a break from all the pointy-headed science-y stuff).

Of course, once I got round to starting the bugger, I couldn’t put it down and read it in three sittings over a weekend. It was that good.

This is what ‘popular science’ (ugh, why does that phrase bother me so?) should be: well-researched, elegantly-written, and punctuated throughout with real-life, real-people stories.  

Mr Mnookin’s characterisations of key players puts serious meat on the bones of this story. Key players include hideous myth-perpetrators (Jenny McCarthy, Meryl Dorey), their enablers in the media (Oprah Winfrey, Larry King) monsters (Andrew Wakefield – or as the chatty half of Penn and Teller once referred to him, “Asshole” Wakefield) and victims (baby Dana McCaffery, who died of whooping cough because she was too young to be vaccinated and lived in a region with low vaccination rates).

I loved this book so much, I sent the author a gushy, faintly embarrassing fan-girl email (from my work address no less, that’s how overwhelmed I was by the book…) which I publish below for your amusement:

Dear Mr. Mnookin,

This is a short note to say I just finished "The Panic Virus" (Oz edition published by Black Inc) and needed to tell you it's one of the smartest, sanest, scariest and wittiest books I've ever read.

Congratulations on putting together a book that outlines in exhaustive (but never exhausting) detail, the history of vaccination programs, the MMR/Autism/Wakefield disaster, the ridiculousness of Jenny McCarthy's crusade (does the woman have no shame?) and the irresponsibility of people like Oprah Winfrey and Larry King for giving people like her oxygen.

I found myself fist-punching the air reading the penultimate chapter on the Omnibus Autism Proceedings. Whilst I felt enormous sadness at the plight of Michelle Cedillo and her family, I was heartened by the way good sense and science prevailed in the end.

I'd like to believe the "debate" will now die the death it deserves, people will ignore the lies and young mums will start vaccinating their children again, but I suspect some major damage has been done in the last decade and fixing it will take longer than we like. When the educated classes start thinking this way, I lose hope...

You have set the benchmark for popular science journalism (for lack of a better description of the genre!) and I look forward to your next book.

Best regards...

The recent measles outbreak in the United States has reignited my interest in this topic. I now follow (polite word for ‘stalk’) Seth Mnookin on Twitter. I plan to reread his book. I want him to visit Australia so I can stalk him properly.

I will have a piece of that delicious-looking pecan pie he posted on Twitter.

He’s a dead-set legend of science journalism. Read him. Follow him.

(I used to work with a man who believed the earth was a few thousand years old, had not vaccinated his daughters, and whose wife was a chiropractor who performed “adjustments” on infants and children. I’m so glad I hadn’t read The Panic Virus when I worked with him. I would have kicked him in the nuts until he was unconscious.)

RIP Malcolm Fraser (1930-2015)

Former Australian Prime Minister and co-founder of the Australian arm of CARE International Malcolm Fraser died earlier today.

The circumstances in which he came to power are mired in controversy. People who remember the dismissal of the Whitlam government and Malcolm Fraser's ascension  will tell you how toxic Malcolm Fraser was to his enemies and how revered he was by those who loathed Gough Whitlam. The events still ignite passions within my immediate and extended family to this day.

I can't do justice to this very complex and interesting man, so I'll let this wonderful obituary by the Sydney Morning Herald do it instead.

And a final lesson for those among us who like to brood and fester, and nurse ancient hatreds, carrying them around like steamer trunks on our backs, check out this wonderful photo below taken on the day of Kevin Rudd's Apology to Australia's Stolen Generation.

If Gough and Malcolm can set aside their 'issues', what's stopping the rest of us from doing the same?

Less than thesping - Game of Thrones bad acting roll-call

Warning: Spoiler Alert! And by that, I mean not only will I allude to things that happened in Season 4, but my churlishness may lead to accusations of being a spoil-sport.

Friends of ours who are fellow fans of Game of Thrones are divided over Season 4.

“It was filler. It’s setting the story up for later seasons.”

“It was boring.”

“It had too many scenes of women being abused. More rape than I was comfortable watching in a TV show – even if it IS HBO.”

“Best fight scenes ever.”

“Joffrey gets it. Awse.”

“There were too many stories competing for our interest.”

Having just finished watching Season 4 on DVD (yes, Muddy and I are the only people left who buy and watch TV shows LEGALLY), I concur with all of these comments. My love for the show hasn’t diminished at all, but it was difficult to stay focused some of the time because of the strange ebb and flow of the story and the introduction of sidebar characters. Season 4 was the proverbial mixed bag of nuts – some salted roast cashews mixed in with the stale raw hazelnuts.

One thing I noticed, and not for the first time, is how unreliable the acting is throughout the show. Some actors are consistently good while others are consistently awful. In this regard, Game of Thrones is not unlike Rome or The Tudors – people are cast according to acting skill, OR how they fill out (or fall out of) a toga/caftan/starched neck ruff/full body armour OR their sheer physicality OR to satisfy the local actors’ union equity rules. In small roles, it’s not really an issue, but when you have a pivotal character played by an oxygenated mannequin, you’re in trouble.

So, here is my list of the Top 5 Best Actors on Game of Thrones and the Top 5 Crappiest Actors on Game of Thrones (who aren’t bad enough to bring down a whole show, but bad enough to warrant making it to this list).

Top 5 Best Actors

1.       Charles Dance (Tywin Lannister). Whether skinning a deer while lecturing his shallow pretty-boy son about his responsibilities, or quizzing his dumb-arse grandson about what makes a good king, Dance makes acting your pants off look easy. He has presence, a steely blue-eyed gaze and the automatic respect of the other characters in the show, as well as the audience. But even when he’s not reminding everyone who’s boss of King’s Landing, Dance exposes his character’s weakness and vulnerability just as effectively – and more subtly. In Season 1, when he faces off against Tyrion (Peter Dinklage) over a long table and carafe of wine, you see Tywin’s dawning awareness that this ‘imp’, this monster he despises, might actually be the smart, strategic son Jaime will never be. In Season 4, when Cersei confesses she’s been shagging her brother and her children are not Baratheons, you can sense the split-second of hesitation before Tywin remembers who he is and hits Green on his Denial Button. Face it - who else but Charles Dance could look dignified while getting killed on the bog.

2.       Iain Glen  (Ser Jorah Mormont).  I will confess to being a long-time fan of Iain Glen since watching him in the television show The Fear. The very pretty, feline blonde 80s hottie has morphed into a ruggedly handsome and weather-beaten middle-aged man. The leading man potential he showed in the 80s has dimmed, relegating him to supporting status in television and independent films. No matter, he still possesses more actorly authority in his little finger than most actors working today – or the ones on Game of Thrones. Ser Jorah’s guilty feelings over his initial deceit, his open admiration for Dani as he gently coaches her in the ways of Realpolitik and his suppressed love for her are wonderful to watch. Glen mines the character’s ambiguity to great effect. It was heartbreaking to see the dismay (followed immediately by stoic acceptance) on his face when he was finally exposed and confronted for his betrayal at the end of Season 4. How does one face convey so much conflicting emotion so well?

3.       Dame Diana Rigg (Olenna Tyrell). No explanations required. Dame Diana’s matriarch makes all the pretty young things look amateurish and strained. Only Natalie Dormer’s Margaery can hold her own in a one-to-one with this talented old bird. Watching Diana Rigg and Charles Dance do their joint thesping thing is a joy to behold.

4.       Aidan Gillen  (Lord Petyr "Littlefinger" Baelish). The part of King's Landing’s chief pimp and money-grubber is the tastiest one on the show (with Varys the eunuch a close second), so theoretically, the worst actor in the world couldn’t fuck this up. Thank God then for Aidan Gillen, who most certainly can act and put on a flat, regionless BBC accent that cleverly conceals his Irish brogue (as thick as just-poured Guinness), but only some of the time – his ‘r’s have that lovely Celtic drag. Scumbag procurer, betrayer, casual murderer and bullshit artist of the first order, Gillen’s Littlefinger is really just the emotionally wounded little boy channelling his childish fury at Catelyn Stark for failing to notice him. Could the whole problems of Westeros be sheeted to one tiny nerd who hasn’t got over being ignored by the most popular girl in school?

5.       Liam Cunningham  (Davos Seaworth). A wonderful presence and great foil to the also terrific but woefully underused Stephen Dillane (Stannis Baratheon). Where Dillane is expected to do no more than scowl 24/7 (proving Stannis is little more than a cipher and giving Dillane nothing to work with), Cunningham’s Seaworth is the wily, scrappy, second-in-charge who has to use everything in his arsenal to convince his boss to stop being a dickhead. His scenes with Stannis’ adorable daughter Shireen in Seasons 3 and 4 provide warmth and much-needed light relief – they’re two wise old souls shaking their heads at everybody else’s stupidity and susceptibility.

Special mentions: Peter Dinklage (Tyrion Lannister); Peter Vaughan (Blind Maester Aemon Targaryen) and Natalie Dormer (Margaery Tyrell).

Top 5 Worst Actors

1.       Lena Headey (Cersei Baratheon nee Lannister) There’s no doubt this woman looks great in a quasi-medieval gown – she’s tall, has good posture and a graceful neck. She wears her wig of tresses with aplomb. But Lena Headey is a seriously crappy actress. It’s easy to say Cersei is a straightforward evil conniving bitch - all Headey has to do is deliver her mean lines in a mean voice and take mean slurps of wine in between mean pauses. Wrong. Cersei’s also a clever, strategic woman justifiably bitter at being underestimated by her father, husband, brother and just about every other bloke she comes across. There’s complexity in the character - but absolutely none in Headey’s performance. Hell, there’s more complexity in the red cordial she sloshes around. To paraphrase Homer Simpson, her acting ‘has two moves’: Eyebrows Knit 1 and Eyebrows Purl 1.

2.       Emilia Clarke  (Daenerys ‘Dani’ Targaryen). Oh boy. From her Season 1 performance as a stunned mullet child-bride to her Season 4 performance as a stunned mullet child-queen, Ms Clarke has displayed the complex range of emotions expected from someone hired because she looks great in cut-out dresses. These emotions consist of “Blink”, “Don’t-Blink”, “Dead-eyed Stare” and “Vaguely Worried”. Her uber-femininity set against the physicality of the Dothrakis highlighted her vulnerability in Season 1, but Dani’s evolution from scared pawn to scary Empress needs a defter actress – especially someone who can hold her own against two acting stalwarts Iain Glen and Ian McElhinney (Ser Barristan Selmy).

3.       Kit Harington  (Jon Snow). He rocks a beard and a mane of hair and wears his armour well, but I will continue to call him “Fifty Shades of Frown”. He broods and he fumes. He does fuck-all else. He and Lena Headey should challenge each other to a brow-off.

4.       Gwendoline Christie  (Brienne of Tarth). I don’t want her on this list, really. She’s such a one-of-a-kind presence – huge at 6’3” and built like the proverbial brick shithouse – and has been mentored by the likes of acting legend Simon Callow, but she is a severely limited actress. To be fair, not much is asked for her except that she look impressive in her gear and ride a horse convincingly, be honourable and steadfast and all that chivalrous shit. But still, her acting arsenal consists of frowning, fuming and clenching her jaw. Not unlike Kit Harington (Jon Snow).

5.       Nathalie Emmanuel (Missandei). She keeps excellent company with Emilia Clarke which is probably why she was cast as Dani Targaryen’s scribe/interpreter. Proof you can land an acting gig on any tits-and-toga / sword-and-sorcery / butts-and-battles HBO epic provided you can go bra-less.

Special mentions: Isaac Hempstead-Wright (Bran Stark) and Sibel Kekilli (Shae). 

My Top 5 current taste sensations - or Flavours ‘White People’ Might Like.

Food festivals, high-end restaurant openings, food trucks, open-air farmers’ markets, casserole contests, craft brewery tours, wine weekends, cider nights and “tasting flights” - you can’t open the weekend papers without stumbling across some food-related event in Melbourne’s lanes, some far-flung suburb or depressed country town trying to reinvent itself as a tourist destination. You could be forgiven for thinking we are a culture that places food and dining above all other entertainments – even sport. Crazy, right?

I don’t mind a posh restaurant experience, a lazy and luxurious brunch, a whiskey and cheese pairing or a long drive to a 2-day food and wine festival, but sometimes I like to bring the odd exotic ingredient home for a spot of culinary experimentalism, enjoyed solo in my jim-jams or with Muddy K in front of the idiot box. So, let me share with you my current top 5 taste obsessions:

1. My mother’s dried oregano. She grows it, dries and preserves it according to the traditional method from her childhood.  This stuff is great on lamb, in a bowl of oil for bread-dipping or sprinkled on pita bread before being toasted in the oven. Makes the store-bought stuff seem stale and pale.

2. Truffles – and that includes truffle oil and truffle honey. A whole truffle isn’t cheap, so be strategic - go ‘groupsies’ with a couple of other people and share the earthy goodness of this fabulous fungus. Use truffle oil very sparingly and only when you can’t get/afford the real, fresh thing – truffle oil is amazing on cheesy pasta or scrambled eggs. Truffle-infused honey is delicious drizzled over blue cheese or Brie and makes a change from fruit pastes on a cheeseboard. Again, use sparingly.

3. Salt – pink Murray River salt, chilli-and-lime infused salt, black salt from Cyprus or plain old Kosher salt. Since doing sugar-free Febfast, I have rediscovered my love-affair with salt and reignited my “savoury tooth”. Suitable on EVERYTHING.

4. Ras-el-hanout – a Moroccan spice-blend, which translated means ‘top of the shop’ or ‘best of the market’.  Spice merchants in North Africa sell their own special blends and guard the ingredients and proportions jealously. It traditionally contains no fewer than 12 separate spices – a standard blend includes cumin, coriander, cardamom, cinnamon and ginger. You can make it yourself or buy a good quality pre-mix from a specialty food store or deli. This is a fantastic spice rub for lamb or chicken, is great in casseroles, in sautéed meatballs or in a warm rice salad.

5. Rice syrup or rice malt syrup – a low-fructose alternative to honey or maple-syrup, for those last vestiges of a sweet-tooth and baking. Be warned, the jury is still out on the overall health benefits – it actually contains more calories and has a higher glycemic index than other sweet syrups. The low fructose factor is what it has going for it.

Febfast is over!

Howdy Peeps.

I did it! Yay! Febfast is well and truly over. I did not lapse or slip. I lost 2cms off my waist and have taken the edge off my sweet tooth. I have rediscovered my love for salty, spicy foods, Greek cheeses and plain sparkling mineral water with a lemon twist.

I am also heartily sick of avocados.