frangipane billions
Shobhit and I finally finished up with the third and (so far) final season of Billions -- and, just in time! My free trial subscription to Showtime expires tomorrow. Whenever they have a fourth season I guess I'll have to sign up for another trial with a different email address. For now, I'm so glad Gabriel finally convinced me to watch that show -- all three seasons are excellent, and the third one ends with multiple things the show had gotten us used to at that point, turned on their heads. The way seasons one and two ended created a certain expectation of how season three would end, and it just goes in a completely unexpected direction.
Also: Taylor, the gender neutral character, basically winds up being a new adversary to Bobby Axelrod. That's sort of a spoiler, but I have to mention it because of the show's integrity in how it has the characters treat them. I'm not sure I believe in its realism, but it's got a sort of element of presenting the world as it should be in this one context: even when people feel betrayed by them, no one in Axelrod's camp ever misgenders Taylor.
In fact, there is one instance in which a single character misgenders Taylor: John Malkovich's Grigor Andolov, the dangerously ruthless Russian. And you know what? It occurs to me just now, as I write this, that this one instance of Grigor misgendering Taylor isn't even a case of Grigor being ignorant. The instance happens while Grigor is speaking to Axelrod about how Taylor has betrayed Axelrod, and I think now that Grigor only did it in an attempt to bait him. In every other context, after all, even Grigor uses gender netural pronouns in reference to Taylor correctly.
Perhaps what fascinates me most about Taylor is that, even though they are the first major principal character in a major cable network TV show who is gender neutral, that fact is far from the most interesting facet of Taylor. In terms of personality, it's much more interesting and compelling that they are clearly on the spectrum, at the very least to a minor degree, with very different ways of understanding and giving social cues. This isn't even really ever discussed on the show, but it's clearly an issue with establishing lasting relationships -- something Wendy finds herself having to mention to Taylor near the end of the episode.
Just consider the way Taylor responds to Wendy in this exchange:
Wendy: The thing that makes it matter is lasting relationships, true loyalty, real trust.
Taylor: [tiniest pause] No, I’m pretty sure there’s only money, and it can buy all those things, or at least the same result. That’s what you and Axe taught me.
Touché.
Beyond that, all I can say is I am really looking forward to the next season.
Before watching Billions, Shobhit and I made kidney beans with rice and vegetables for dinner -- quite a large pot of it. This after considering going out for dinner, and then after further reflection, Shobhit decided against that. I also made us cocktails, mai tais, at Shobhit's request. We ate while watching the show.
Still intent on getting a Social Review point for the evening, though, Shobhit decided he wanted to go out for dessert. There's a new ice cream shop on Capitol Hill, at 10th and Pike, called Salt & Straw, which opened in February, all of one week after they opened their first Seattle location in Ballard. Shobhit and I have considered trying the place several times since, but every time we pass by the line is too long and we don't want to wait.
Well, this time we decided we would wait. We must have been in line nearly half an hour, and this was at 9:30 on a Thursday night. The wait was worth it. We shared a waffle cone scoop of Raspberry & Almond Frangipane, and it was legitimately spectacular.
I wound up talking to Noah about it at work this morning, because Noah was the first to ask me about it, some months ago, if I had been there yet, and I didn't even know the shop existed. I had to tell him now how great it was. Ultimately Kevin joined the conversation -- he went to one of the five Los Angeles locations, in West Hollywood, when visiting down there in January. Knowing that the owners are from Portland but grew up here in Ballard and Shohomish, I'm a little mystified as to why they expanded first to California -- five locations in L.A., two in San Francisco, one in San Diego -- before bothering to open any shops in Seattle.
Anyway, Shobhit really wanted the scoop we got to be Goat Cheese Marionberry Habanero, for obvious reasons, and he kept asking for it after I told him multiple times I would not eat that. He was convinced it would not be too spicy for me, but how can he not see that's not the fucking point? Even if it's tolerable to me, there are countless other flavors I know I would prefer. I started to get seriously annoyed by this.
By the time we got to within about ten feet of the counter, a young lady came to ask if we'd been helped, and Shobhit asked for samples of three flavors: the Goat Cheese Marionberry Habanero, the Beecher's Cheese with Peppercorn Toffee, and Raspberry & Almond Frangipane. I was kind of bowled over by how great the raspberry was, and that's the scoop we ordered -- but, Shobhit got himself a pint container to take home of the Goat Cheese Marionberry Habanero. So, in the end I guess, we were both happy.
We shared the raspberry cone while walking home, and at least three times Shobhit mentioned how good the waffle cone itself was. It really was a very good cone, but to me the ice cream itself was the most impressive. Seattle has countless ice cream shops and I can think of none with better ice cream than this was.
[posted 12:16 pm]