infryq

Vacation log part two!

Tuesday I finished the hems, and we played the best damn game of scrabble of our lives to date with a board score of 822.

Wednesday P went out for a last grocery run before Christmas.

Thursday I made two more attempts at butter tarts, the second successful. They need a little bit of blind baking, just not as much as I did the first time. Cornstarch makes for a better texture than roux.

Friday we did a porch swap with F&A to relieve them of some mistaken lamb and chicken wings, and got bonus cinnamon pastries. We opened gifts (Rejected Princesses from P, a nice marble mortar and pestle from D, the best hoodie I’ve ever worn from M; the socks for P were a hit).

Saturday we did a video chat with P’s folks, then with mine, and P made fesenjan (a sour Persian meat stew with nuts). T sent me progress photos from the infinite lizard torus puzzle so that seems to have been a win as well.

Sunday I woke up with mega neck pain, so spent most of the day propped up on pillows, doing gentle exercises on a timer. I made a start at the annual zine.

Monday was better. P helped me make another batch of lentils and grits, this time with a parsnip thrown in, an excellent addition.

I started a workout plan on the 20th called “Couch to Crushing it” and it’s going well so far.

I’ve been reading Kill The Farm Boy by Delilah S Dawson and Kevin Hearne. It’s a bit like Shrek in its frenzied comedic tone but otherwise standard D&D theater. Enjoyable enough to finish but I wouldn’t bother recommending it unless you are hard up for lesbian representation in sword and sorcery.

Over the weekend, I finished clearing out the sewing room(well…enough), vacuumed, took apart the spare work table, then P helped me move the sewing cabinet back in there. I assembled the new wee desk for me to work at, and it is pretty and lightly industrial. We went to the farmers market and I meant to just get fruit since the veg drawer is packed full of squash and beans and peppers, but they had gorgeous gigantic okra and tomatillos and I managed to fit it all in there somehow.

Fried okra is unbelievably delicious. Wash, dry thoroughly, slice into rounds about half as thick as the pod is wide, then fry in a bit of oil with a touch of salt until crisp and brown on both cut sides, about six minutes total. The texture contrast of dry caramelized outside and soft unctuous inside is wonderful, and the small pieces and dry cooking method prevent sliminess.

P’s folks weathered the dregs of Henri alright, just the usual amount of water in the basement and no major damage to the house. The challenge will be electricity, since the power company is saying they won’t have everything back online for a week, and it’s meant to be excessively hot on Tuesday. They are considering their options.

I had a nice chat with A about window-shopping as a coping mechanism for cooling areas of psychological risk. Was good.

Yesterday I finished the remaining diagrams for the process mapping final report, did a shitton of tiny tasks I’d been putting off, reported some problems with the data exporter, sent off our MSE proposal, and chatted briefly with D about the HR policy bullshit that drove our hiring decision.

I did a turn through the garden over snack (trying a new meal bar for those, they’re okay but have enough nutrition to be worth the disappointment). The beans are starting, and the squash has invaded the other trellis. The borage will bloom soon. I’ll need to do another round of arugula carnage this weekend to give the marigolds and cucumbers some air.

Dinner, did a gut check for A looking at a response to a transphobic article our uncle posted (she did great), crossword, Expanse, snack, sleep. Dreamt of an epic search for a very wily cat.

Yesterday I made another batch of lentils, this time split between wild rice and millet. We did the crossword after lunch, then I made some progress on the gearbox modifications for the White. I drilled the four new holes for shafts, and made one new shaft. I think I want to dry fit the whole assembly before I cut spacers though, since I don’t remember where all the screw clearances need to be.

Snack, then called my folks. They’d set up a sortof portable gazebo to do some furniture refinishing without having to worry about insects or pets (two of the cats came to say hello). We got cut a bit short by my internet, but it worked out.

Dinner, picked blueberries for this morning’s oatmeal, scrabble (675, 1 bingo, and a double-double with the Q), Lucifer, snack, sleep. Dreamt of military officers school, an automated mining puzzle, college groceries, a manor house big enough to have an infirmary, an amusement park ride gone wrong.

Yesterday I figured out the purpose of a mystery piece of the knee lever assembly: it’s retaining clip that holds the lever up out of the way when it’s not in use. It attaches with a pair of screws of the same diameter but different pitch to ones used elsewhere, and they’re both quite wee, not long enough to go in over the brass speed controller housing. Instead, I took everything apart and cut holes in the housing big enough for the heads of the screws to pass straight through. Cleaned everything up, and started reassembling.

Crossword after lunch, then I intended to start some pepper seeds, but it turns out I didn’t order them. So, no peppers in the house garden this year, unless we get starts from somewhere else.

Did a FaceTime with mom and dad while they were on their way to jar return (?) over the Hood Canal bridge. Things are well with them, aside from unseasonably low rainfall this spring.

Snack, then wasn’t in the mood for grimdark so I picked The Good Place back up. I wasn’t sure where I’d left off so ended up re-watching several episodes. Excellent details, very amenable to a second time through.

Dinner, then more Good Place, snack, and sleep. Epic dreams of space flight, research, civilian/military conflict, ecosystem conservation, elementary school art classes, spooky perfume.

Yesterday I made crispy roasted fava beans. They’re extremely good, though occasionally you get one that’s more hard than crispy. I plan to repeat the experiment but fuss with the cooking time (this time: 12 hour soak, 7 minute boil, 45 minute bake).

We did the laundry, and hung it out on the line for the first time this year. Gorgeous weather. I did a turn around the garden and watered the peas, which seem to have weathered the frost just fine but are less far along than I’d like. We did a Zoom call with P’s folks; they’re all doing well, although it seems Simon the pomsky turns out to have a slightly underdeveloped brain for being 2 years old. Poor pup.

Afternoon crossword, Atlantis after dinner, then snack and sleep. Dreamt of some kind of socially distanced math puzzle hunt held in a weird conference space inside a Costco, a trip through a Sears/IKEA hybrid looking for decor ideas, grandma giving a seminar on grow lights and baseboard heating, and running into mom while shopping. Yes, subconscious, I miss my family, I miss visiting shops, I miss working in groups in person. It’ll come back, we just need to wait.

I finished The Thousand Dollar Tan Line, very tidy, some good foreshadowing without giving away the ending. I bought the next one, hopefully this keeps up.

Yesterday I slept in. I finished hemming a dish towel over Atlantis, and did a face time call with mom and dad. Crossword after call, scrabble after dinner (639 and no bingo, pretty good!), then more Atlantis, snack, and sleep. Dreamt of school trips on public buses, replacing the frat on the corner of Forbes and Morewood with a really prestigious ballroom dance sudo, sailing ships delivering cargo in bad weather, a spiteful child breaking toys just to see if she could.

Yesterday P slipped on the icy steps. He’s fine, just bruised; he still has good falling reflexes from martial arts. I washed my hair, did a load and a half of laundry, and P finished them up. We did the crossword after lunch, I ordered more laundry detergent, then spent the rest of the afternoon watching SG-1 with popcorn. I had a call with my mentee, who is doing much better with her new job and figuring out how to be glue without losing the appearance of technical competence. Dinner, then I had a call with mom and dad, then more SG-1 and sleep. Dreamt of carpooling to a weird New England version of the strip district, a really amazing steamed rice bun/dumpling, a street fair, making clandestine hard cider, spindling, a year’s worth of super-low tides.

I finished Where Late and started reading Hell’s Rejects by MR Forbes, a space military heist.

Yesterday was Christmas. We did a Zoom call with P’s family, gifts between us (a Chinese cleaver and sand ginger for P, books on Japanese knitting patterns and Lakota recipes for me) and what had arrived from family (grippy oven mitts, a trivet, nice coffee, local corn grits). I spent the rest of the day getting grouchy and hormonal but managed to declare it and shield P from the worst of it. Crossword after lunch. The afternoon went to roasting the enormous tromboncino: sliced the neck into short lengths, peeled, diced; cut the seed cavity in half lengthwise and then did the same, scraping out the seeds with a grapefruit spoon. Surprisingly spaghetti-squash like texture around the seeds. Roasted with olive oil and salt, four sheet pans total. Roasting was a good call, since they reduced in size so substantially that I suspect boiling or steaming would’ve resulted in something watery and tasteless. As it is, the resulting tiny cubes are delicious. A+ will definitely repeat the experiment next year.

Dinner, talked to my folks, scrabble (563), SG-1, sleep. Extensive dreams about pandemic mishandling in schools.

Started reading An Absolutely Remarkable Thing by Hank Green. The autobiographical content is pretty uncomfortable, but the plot is legit and the characters are sticky and imperfect. People solving problems in groups. Recommend.

On Thanksgiving, we did a Zoom with P’s folks and M & A, which was lovely. A mostly chill day, and late afternoon started prep for popovers and a stuffed pumpkin. We are both out of practice; the popovers didn’t pop and the pumpkin was still not bubbling after an hour, but we ate anyway (I had extra stuffing going on the stovetop) and everything was delicious. Called my folks after for a nice long chat, played some scrabble, a very relaxing day.

For the pumpkin: use a small pumpkin or squash meant for eating that sits nicely with the stem at the very top. I used a UFO squash, dark green shell and dry rich flesh something like a buttercup squash. Take the top off the pumpkin and clean out the guts. 1/3 cup each lentils and wild rice, soak in 2 cups boiling water with a healthy pinch of saffron. 2T each chopped marcona almonds, red bell pepper, mushrooms, and dried cranberries, and sizzle in olive oil until the mushrooms brown. Mix everything up, add thyme and sage. Use a measuring cup or tiny ladle to fill the pumpkin no more than half full of solids, then top up with liquid to a finger thickness short of the bottom of the cap. Bake uncovered at 350 until boiling (I did not uncover for this step and that was a mistake; squash is an excellent insulator), then cap and bake 30 minutes or until liquid is absorbed, wild rice is beginning to split but not curl, and pumpkin is soft. Meanwhile, simmer remaining mixture on stovetop 30-50 minutes until wild rice is done. Reduce away any remaining liquid. Serve to normal people with crispy garlic and shallots or to Katies straight up.

Yesterday we ate leftovers (the stuffed squash made great soup) and puttered around. I transferred the pattern for the gearbox to a sheet of brass and started learning how to/how not to drill holes in it (do put something behind it; do use a power tool; do back off frequently; do drill more sizes of pilot holes than you think you need). We went through the FedCo seed catalog, and started looking online for missing bits (we want to grow rue so we can try some of the ancient Roman recipes from one of the historical cooking channels we watch). I finished Avatar and started hemming another dish towel. A good day.