Fr. Z's Blog

In Rome, the sun rose at 6:50 and will set at 16:57. The Ave Maria is still in the 17:30 time slot. The Moon is full and there are 53 days until the end of the calendar year. It is the Feast of the Dedication of St. John Lateran. Also, we venerate, St. Theodore a soldier martyr in c. 306 and Maria and Neon in the 3rd c.

In other news, I’ve been canceled… again. This time not by a wobbly bishop, but by a hurricane. I had notice today that my flight home was canceled and I’ve been rebooked to tomorrow.

When I left for Rome, there was a hurricane that moved my departure by a day. Coming back, the same. Perhaps I have an unexplored and unexploited superpower! In any event, I am with a friend here in NYC and well cared for.

Yesterday was pretty quite.  We went to a diner for an early lunch/late breakfast.

The coleslaw was quite good.  The soup and the BLT… meh.  I was asked what bread I wanted, which was rye.  Toasted?  No.  So, I got toasted white bread.  Hence, only the coleslaw is on display.

Why pink, I wonder?

Meh… but I do like diners.  I don’t know how they maintain inventory considering the extent of their menus.  In these diners you can get almost anything you can think of.  It’s not always perfect, but you can get some iteration.  Anyway, I am a great fan of diners: they are honest, no pretenses.  “You want that?  You got it.  Not perfect, you still got it. We can bring you somptin’ else or you can go … your self.”

Last night we, with a seminarian, trekked north to Flu Shing for Chinese.  I wanted to go back to a place where I’ve eaten the best Xiao Long Bao you would ever want. Eh-vur.

I was apprehensive about changes during COVID Theatre.  I checked online and the results were as unhelpful as they were for most Chinese restaurants.  I was worried we might not get a table, but, to my dismay, we got one right away.  Why?  We were the only people there.  Not a good sign.

Another bad sign was the “CASH ONLY” sign on the door.  “Hmmm….”

My heart fell as they gave us drastically reduced menus.  They had gone in the dim sum direction and not in a good way.  To my lasting horror… I can hardly bring myself to type… in addition to the several other variations of xiao long bao they were offering, on the wall there was written “chocolate xiao long bao”.

But there we were.  Should we stay or should we go?

We stayed.

We tried some standards… guotie.. jiaozi… meh… the signature xiao long bao were very good but they weren’t as good as they were before.

I asked the two workers if there had been a change of owner and cooks.  Grinning and nodding they said “No!”  I believe I may have been lied to.

Let’s get to the images.

Guotie on a fancy-shaped dish.  Fancy-shaped dishes in a place that is otherwise linoleum and formica are not a good indication.

Good?  Sure.  But I could and have made better.

Again.  They lacked … zip.

The signature dish trailed off the page, I’m afraid.

Again, good but a shadow of their former glory.  And the tops where the gather is were tough, which means that they were made in advance (for an empty restaurant) and injected and steamed later.  Good but … meh.

The seminarian wanted the beef and peppers and it was a good choice.   This was good.

Crispy spicy chicken.

This was also good.  Crispy was surely there.. indeed crunchy.  I think that, in the final analysis, it might have been over fried because it had a hard crunch rather than a soft crunch.  The flavors included cumin, which was welcome.  Good but I think they fumbled slightly with the timing.

This was something they had on the older menu.  The beans were excellent and abundant.

Crispy pork.

Here is a puzzle.  There was delightful crunchiness and sweetness to these shreds.  However the shreds were so fine that one wondered sometimes whether there was pork under that layer.  There was, but pork flavor took a backseat.  This was pretty good, all in all, but it could have been slightly more substantive in a porky way.

Walking back to the car we passed this place.   I asked a young Asian fellow, guiding his elderly cane-wielding grandfather (probably) if the food was good and he uttered an enthusiastic yes, with a nod and smile.  Who knows.  Maybe next time.

There wasn’t much else to the day other than a substantial jet lag induced nap.

Speaking of puzzles.

Black is threatening checkmate in one.   That means we better have a forcing check.  The force helps you discover the solution.  It isn’t hard, but it does have classic tactic.

WHITE to move.
NB: I may hold comments with puzzle solutions a little longer than others so there won’t be “spoilers” for others.

Priestly chess players, drop me a line. HERE

3:16 isn’t just in John.

Please remember me when shopping online. Thanks in advance.

US HERE – UK HERE

Thank for this day, O Lord, even with its setbacks.

Back in Rome sunrise was at 6:49.  Sunset should be at 16:59.

The Ave Maria ought to ring at 17:30.

Today in the Basilica of St. Peter is a Feast of all the Saints and Martyrs whose relics are in the Basilica.  It is also the Feast of St. Adeodatus I (+618) and of the Four Crowned Holy Martyrs (+306), whose church is on the slope leading from the Colosseum, past San Clemente, and up toward the Lateran.  I used to walk by there everyday for university when I was a seminarian.

Before heading out to airport yesterday, I had a couple things left over in the fridge, so this was breakfast.

Behind this wall and up the street is the Casa Santa Marta a certain person lives in humility, which meant that the whole place had to be redone and the street outside the wall, pertaining to the Comune di Roma, had to be secured at the cost of, lets just say very many Euro.  But it was all for humility, so that’s okay.

The Delta planes have a new “entertainment” system, which turned out to be not very entertaining.  There is a new swoopy 3D graphical interface for flight information.   And while there are lots of movies (lookin around the cabin some of them truly fitlhy), they eliminated all the games, etc.

There were problems with the system, too, in zone all over the plane which meant that they had to reboot the system I think six times, each time requiring two things, a) 15 minutes and b) that no one touch their screens.   Imagine how well that went.   So, as we flew along we had to …

…. wait… and wait… and wait.

I never get tired of this brilliant movie, and I always enjoy the sight of Rick working a chess position with his cigarette and cocktail glass.

Someone should do a count of how many drinks were ordered in Rick’s Café Américain and then not drunk.

The flight was boring, which is how you want flights to be, and everything from the taxi at my front door to airport check-in at FCO and customs and luggage collection on the ground at JFK went without flaw.  I skipped the meals on the plane.

A friend picked me up at JFK, where everything is a half mile walk away, and we got supper.   Cheeseburger, of course, with American cheese, of course, and onion rings.

The beer had the irresistible name of Delirium Tremens.

As I glanced out the window of the guestroom in Brooklyn, I saw a sight that wove the two ends of the day: the American flag and the trees, which are plane trees, the same as line the banks of the Tiber and other boulevards in Rome.

In the following, there is material to be won.  This is easy.

WHITE to move.

NB: I may hold comments with puzzle solutions a little longer than others so there won’t be “spoilers” for others.

Interested in learning?  This guy helped my game. Try THIS.

Your use of my Amazon affiliate link is a major part of my income. It helps to pay for insurance, groceries, everything. Please remember me when shopping online. Thanks in advance.  US HERE – UK HERE

Today the sun dawned upon Rome at 6:48 and it will slip below the horizon at 16:59.  Shorter.  Ever shorter.  The Ave Maria is at 17:30. Today is a dies non on the Roman calendar, and so priests do well to celebrate a Requiem Mass.

We are still in the octave during which people can obtain the plenary indulgences.  Though we remember the dead in a special way today, one could take a saint from the Roman Martyrology such as St. Willibrord.

Black to move.

White has a couple of serious threats but is overworked.  Black has options, and the bishop pair and a wicked looking Queen Rook battery.  It is important to move carefully to avoid getting checkmated.   The first move is fairly straight forward, but… then what?

Please remember me when shopping online. Thanks in advance.

US HERE – UK HERE

Thanksgiving might be more pleasant with excellent beer or wine, both made by traditional Benedictine monks.

I leave Rome today.  It has been fruitful.

I would like to return for Holy Week.

Thank you, benefactors.  You’ve had a lot of prayers and Masses here during this sojourn.

The Roman sunrise was at 6:46 and the sunset is due at 17:01.  The Ave Maria is still slated for 17:30.  It is the 22nd Sunday after Pentecost and the Feast of St. Felix, of happy memory, about whom St. Augustine wrote in his Expositions of the Psalms.

Thank you for this day, O Lord.  It is my last full day in Rome.

What to post?   People had questions about my chalice.  I had brought it back to Rome to the shop where it was made, over thirty years of wear later.

I brought my chalice with me to Rome to have it restored.  I was going to do this for my 30th anniversary but, you know, Covid and Vaxes and Masks, oh my.  I took the precious thing to the shop where it was made.

Here are a couple of photos of them working on it.

In this, the goldsmith is opening up the settings of the stones on the node do allow more light to bring out their color.

This patently is work on the paten.

A based shot.

Years ago it was determined by the Sacred Congregation for Rites that the re-gilding of a chalice required re-consecration.

I found a bishop whom I highly respect to do the honors.  I will now have the pleasure of thinking also of him when I use the chalice.  We all win!

Things laid out and ready.  I won’t show too much of the lace, because I know that it upsets some less-than-sturdy minds as being restorationizing backwardist nostalgia and therefore “YOU HATE VATICAN II!” stuff.

That’s one pretty chalice, all in all.  Fully restored it is sump’n.

After the consecration, I immediately used it for Mass for the intention of the consecrating bishop, who was so kind.

In my conversation with the goldsmith about cleaning the chalice – FATHERS! SACRISTY PEOPLE! LISTEN UP! – I was told to use only very high percentage white alcohol to clean the chalice.  Everything else will damage, “eat”, the gold.   He told me that in the shop.  I wrote a note to him to ask if anything else could be used, some sort of polish or soap and water.

His answer:

“Pulire esclusivamente con alcool puro bianco. Tutto il resto potrebbe danneggiare la doratura…  Clean exclusively with pure, white alcohol.  Anything else could damage the gilding.”

This doesn’t apply to silver, but it WOULD apply to the gilding inside the cup of a silver chalice.  It would apply to a monstrance or paten or pyx or anything else that is gilded.

So, there should be bottles of 90%+ alcohol in sacristies, and not just to make limoncello.

In the USA we have “Everclear” at 95%.  There are other brands, too.  I saw one in an Italian store the other day: 96%.   I bought it and used it to clean the chrism and smudges from the consecration. It worked like a charm.  I’ll leave this bottle with the sacristan at Ss. Trinità.  They’ll either use it for chalice or The Great Roman™ will make limoncello out of it.  Either way is a good way.

™

Meanwhile, I was supposed to go to see the Van Gogh exhibit in Rome at exactly the time when morons interfered.  HERE  Another one of these climate change idiocies.  They threw vegetable puree at a painting and then glued themselves to the wall while shouting slogans about carbon and climate.   The contempt I have for these nitwits is nearly complete now.   How on earth did they get that stuff in there, given what has been happening?  ANSWER: It was probably an inside job, someone on the inside letting them into the gallery with their stuff.

Here’s another kind of puzzle.

BLACK to move.  You should get this one pretty quickly.

NB: I may hold comments with puzzle solutions a little longer than others so there won’t be “spoilers” for others.

Interested in learning?  Try THIS.

Meanwhile, the mighty Robert Card. Sarah has a new book, Catechism of the Spiritual Life.

US HERE – UK HERE

Chess and Card. Sarah.  It’s a good day.