What is is good for? ABSOLUTELY NOTHING! (Say it again!)

This is wonderful: CBS has made the landmark 1960 CBS Reports documentary “Harvest Of Shame” available for viewing on YouTube. (they’ve disabled embedding or you can bet your ass I would have embedded it here)

“Harvest Of Shame” was produced and reported by Edward R. Murrow along with his usual co-producer Fred Friendly and field producer David Lowe. The plight of the American migrant farm worker was far from the minds of the public in the late 1950s and early 1960s, and the documentary was seen as groundbreaking. It would be one of the last big achievements of Murrow and Friendly at CBS; their “See It Now” show had been supplanted by the more occasional “CBS Reports”, and Murrow would leave CBS after the election of John Kennedy to head up the USIA. Now, more than 50 years after its original airing, perhaps the most remarkable thing about it is that so little has changed for the people who work bringing agricultural products to the American marketplace.

I posted this on Facebook yesterday, but it’s too good not to share again here. Watch the video and ask yourself if maybe the guys from the Alan Parsons Project should have gotten some credit at the Grammy Awards a couple of weeks ago.

The YouTube video above is a series of film clips shot by the late Russian filmmaker, Vladimir Shevchenko, who was allowed complete access to the Chernobyl nuclear power plant site in the days immediately following the reactor accident, which occurred 25 years ago this April 26. It is terrifying and appalling at the same time: the clips document dozens of Soviet Army troops working cleanup detail in the middle of the worst nuclear accident in history, wearing absolutely no protective gear other than surgical masks or passive respirators. In one scene, footage of men clearing debris from the roof of a building is accompanied by some broken-English titles that explain that even 40 seconds of exposure to the massive radiation in that location was enough to kill men virtually on the spot. In another, men dig tunnels and pour concrete directly underneath the reactor, wearing nothing but miners’ workclothes.

Shevchenko compiled his footage into a brief film entitled “Chernobyl: A Chronicle of Difficult Weeks”, which was immediately suppressed by the Soviet government for over a year after the accident. In that time, Shevchenko himself succumbed to radiation poisoning, as he, too, had no protective gear and was exposed to the same lethal levels of radiation. Other than these scenes, which apparently were not included in the final cut, the film is not available online but can be purchased on DVD.

The entire region of Pripyat has been sealed off from the world for the last quarter-century, although trespassers have explored the area and have shared countless haunting photographs of the abandoned towns and villages. There was also a later documentary made in 1999 (a trailer is also on YouTube here). Now it is possible to book day tours to the region, including a visit to Reactor #4, where the accident occurred — the website says lunch is included in the excursion, but hastens to add that the food comes from outside the Chernobyl region. Bring your own dosimeter.

The DM post collected a whole slew of YouTube clips of Pitney singing several of his hits, but his best remembered song, “The Man Who Shot Liberty Valence”, isn’t among them. I took a look around YouTube and found several videos, but all of the “here is the song with some still photos” variety, which is probably why DM didn’t bother including one. Still, it’s a great song, and so here’s one such YT clipjob, which has some photos from the movie made from the song, starring John Wayne and Jimmy Stewart:

I’m not sure if a bacon-poptart sandwich qualifies as actual food, but I’ve saved up enough assorted links for another foodie post, so here you go:

You know, there’s not much a fella can do in outer space except kick Klingon ass, bang alien babes and drink himself silly in between shore leaves. Those wussbags on the Enterprise-D only ever drank synthohol, but James T. and the boys liked themselves a bender now and again. BuzzFeed came up with some Star Trek-themed cocktails that might suffice when you’ve run out of Romulan Ale (and I don’t mean this vile concoction). I think I like the “Dammit Jim, I’m A Doctor Not A Mixologist” martini the best. And someone at Duke University took time out from poring over that lacrosse team sex guide to post a Star Trek drinking game you can use as an excuse to try them out.

After you’ve sobered up, or maybe to help you sober up, you might consider making a little home-made mustard. It’s actually dead simple to make a basic mustard; all it takes is cold water and ground mustard seeds. This post on The Atlantic’s food blog explains the things to try, things to avoid, and a little history of the origins of prepared mustard.

Molecular gastronomy continues to dominate the forefront of cuisine, but, as the New York Times reports, Harvard University has turned the discussion around to use the precepts and techniques of molecular gastronomy to teach principles of chemistry and physics to undergraduates. World-renowned chefs such as Wylie Dufresne and Grant Achatz participate in the classes, and at the end of the semester the students will stage a sort of culinary science fair demonstrating their projects. Best of all, the class is being posted to Harvard’s YouTube channel for anyone who wants to follow along.

If the high-falutin’ world of molecular gastronomy and Harvard Yard is a little too chi-chi for you, maybe you should just stick to Kraft Macaroni & Cheese. But alas, dear proletarian, even that humble fare has gone upscale with a new line of “homestyle deluxe” mac-and-cheese dinners, which are helpfully reviewed in this YumSugar post. I have to say, having read the review, if it takes half an hour to make this packaged product and it STILL tastes like salt and cardboard, you might as well make it from scratch.

One more reason not to bother with non-stick cookware: Teflon gives you high cholesterol. Lucky for me, I gave up eating Teflon right after they told me it would kill my parrot. I don’t have a parrot, but if I did, he wouldn’t have to be nailed to the perch because I had Teflon-coated pans, PLUS his cholesterol would be normal.

Lastly, if you are old enough to remember the cooking shows of the 1980s, you might remember Southern cuisine expert Nathalie Dupree. Before Paula Deen threatened to kill us all with butter and cream, Nathalie was one of a group of TV chefs who rode the wave of popularity of Southern cuisine on the strength of the Cajun food craze. Though she hasn’t had a regular TV gig for a while, she’s still writing cookbooks and teaching cooking, and now she’s decided to throw her hat into the political ring and run a write-in campaign against Evil Republican Jim DeMint in her home state of South Carolina. The official Democratic candidate running against DeMint is the weird and possibly dangerous Alvin Greene, so Dupree is actually one of several write-ins hoping to cream DeMint (see what I did there?).

Well, at least NOW I can sing along thanks to this captioned version on YouTube. I’d hate to think I was singing “trolololololo” when I was supposed to be singing “ya ya ya ya yeh aaaaaaaaaaaaaaiieeeeeeeeee!”