Bill Buford in The New Yorker:

Never in our history as a species have we been so ignorant about our food. And it is revealing about our culture that, in the face of such widespread ignorance about a human being’s most essential function—the ability to feed itself—there is now a network broadcasting into ninety million American homes, entertaining people with shows about making coleslaw.

I highly recommend Buford’s recent book, Heat, by the way.

From an interview with Wanda Sykes in this month’s Believer:

WS: I know that whole “sassy” thing still bugs me.

BLVR: It’s such an easy tag.

WS: Not only that, but I don’t like to be called anything gender-specific. You don’t call a man that. You know? If I did Shakespeare one day, I’d still get “sassy.” “Sassy Ophelia!”