Secret Project HALIBUT

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There was a rainstorm forecast for today, a big one. Because of this, Carin and I went up to Rick's mid-day instead of in the evening. Because of our different timing, we ended up in some confusion as to where to eat--the Indian place we usually go was closed that early, for instance. We ended up getting some mediterranean food at this little place above the package store. It was nice of Rick to shift around his schedule for our benefit; we didn't get to visit much, but we did touch base.

I spent the rest of the trip with Carin in the library, looking around for some sources I had to write an essay about. She found a spot in the computer lab while I searched literally from the top floor to the bottom floor, finding not much of anything--a book that was in the library's catalogue was actually in its acquisitions office, making it useless to me, since security wouldn't fetch it. I did, in the process, discover that the library has in it the complete nonfiction of Cordwainer Smith, or rather, Paul Myron Anthony Linebarger. All of these should be Rule 6-clearable; I'll just have to grab title pages and versos in order to clear them.

When we got back--just in time for the storm to really start going apeshit--I read some recipes and whipped up some latkes.

Latkes
4 medium potatoes
1 onion
1 egg
A lot of oil
Salt and pepper
Cut potatoes and onions into medium-sized chunks. Blend until a thick, mushy puree. Beat an egg, then combine with potato-onion mix and stir. Add some salt and pepper. Put oil into a pan (I used soybean oil), and fry a heaping tablespoon of the mix at a time. I used about five minutes per size, but mileage may vary.

The results were crispy and delicious, but unfortunately, they were super-greasy. I think there was about a quarter-cup of soybean oil in there, all of which was absorbed into the latkes, and which Carin and I have now consumed. I look forward to my impending rich, lustrous coat.

Comments: Pharyngula

wrestlemania. also, home fries, and worries. [Apr. 2nd, 2007|01:46 am]

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I learned to make home fries today. I thought I was doing it wrong, but they came out quite well.

Home Fries
2 medium potatoes
1 red onion
1/2 pound portabella (or similar) mushrooms
Splash of red wine
Spot of grease
Dice onions, shrooms and potatoes, and put into a pan with oil. Once it's sizzling, pour wine over the ingredients. Stir with spatula and cook until the potatoes are edible.

I thought I had to cook the potatoes separately, but no, they cooked right there, and the results were excellent--even the shrooms.

Today's banner event was Wrestlemania 23 over at Ben's. We got there early to meet up with the Cat, who was going to do my taxes. He brought some cookies from Katie (who couldn't make it, due to being swamped with work) as a thank-you for me telling one of her friends that the reason she couldn't see her website was because she had to create a public_html directory under her home directory. The Cat did my taxes, which ran into the beginning of the show, because, well, they're more complicated this year. Because I got a refund last year, I changed my withholding, and now I owe the government a fat wad of cash money, which I hadn't expected. I don't have much to complain about--I'm essentially complaining that I did well this year, too well to score any of those nice deductions for my tuition payments--but it's yet another in a series of... well, it's not a disaster, but it's unexpected and it's troubling. File it alongside my am-I-or-am-I-not transition to part-timer status at work due to a lack of clients.

There weren't that many people around; I shot the breeze with the Cat when not glancing at the wrestling every so often. It's just not compelling without Rey Mysterio, or some other high flyer. Rob Van Dam was there, but it just wasn't the same. Yes, it's like the circus--and I go to see the acrobats, not the strongmen. Still, there was plenty of amusement to be had, enhanced by the warm glow of light beer. (Since when does Bud Light come in a blue plastic bottle? Man, I'm old.)

Carin got tipsy and cuddled up to Hillary, who doesn't have a mullet. (I thought she did, but it was just tucked behind her ears.) I certainly didn't mind, but at least I was more polite about it than another of Ben's guests, who kept trying to direct them. Aside from thinking (about Hillary), "I like the way she's shaped; it reminds me of the way Carin is shaped", I hazily understood that it was, of course, a performance, but was tugged into enjoying it by my gonads. So, a reminder: I am not better than this, I am not above this, and I enjoy watching girls shamelessly flirt (honest, that's all it was) for the amusement of a male crowd. Sure, I'm polite about it, but since when has that absolved anyone?

I make it sound doomy. Honestly, I had a really good time. Good show, good friends, good times. Also, it's Ben's birthday next weekend, so I have that to look forward to as well. Maybe I'll bake the brownies this time. (Carin made her famous chocolate chip with chocolate icing with yet more chocolate chips in said icing brownies, which went over quite well.) I'll have to think of something to get Ben, too. Hrrm.

I should point out that I missed Rick-day today. He's not going to be around on Monday, either, due to going home for seder. Damn choices--I have such an empty social calendar, but I still manage to have collisions.

On the way back, I vented to Carin about... well, about a lot of things. I vented about my uncertainty in employment, about feeling ambivalent about my participation in the evening's "women! perform for us!" show, about how I'm going to be sending out a lot of money in the next week to pay for school and taxes, and about how I'm even feeling ambivalent about school--it's expensive, I haven't been really captivated or inspired by any of my classes, and it's not going to nudge up my earning potential. On the second item, Carin explained that she wasn't bothered, and that while there is a creepiness threshold, she never felt that she wasn't in control of what was going on, and thus the creepiness threshold stayed safely unreached. As for the rest, well, everything seems worse in the middle of the night. It was sweet of her to listen.

No comments; I was busy being sociable. If anyone reading really misses me commenting on something instead of recounting my day, I wrote a three-part (1 2 3) series about The Sandman when I first read Season of Mists.

victory at work. alfons maria mucha.

[Mar. 24th, 2007|03:14 am]

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did you know, recipe

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Last night was a very long night. I don't have anything to say about it here; I just want to note that it was a very long night, and leave it at that.

I was productive today. I was so productive. Jay "played defense" for me by answering questions, dealing with nitpicks and trying to figure out what Steve wanted, while I got more accomplished in one day than I had all week. Amazing, that. I think there's a lesson here for how to maintain productivity while still being responsive to the customer's wants. By the end of the day, I was able to go walk over the the conference room and make "touchdown" hands at Jay, letting him know that the configuration file had generated the view and its dependent tables. There's more testing to be done, but I ended the week on a victorious note.

(Thanks, Jakarta Commons Digester, for making XML configuration files ridiculously easy to parse!)

I spent an hour and change circumnavigating the mall repeatedly. I don't get to walk often enough, and it was really nice to be able to do so. Carin was working the until-closing shift, so I paced the mall before heading in to absorb some reading at Borders, and come up with an idea for dinner.

Fried Rice
1 cup rice
3 cups water
1/2 onion
2 eggs
Spot of grease
Set a timer for fifteen minutes. Chop and fry the onion in the oil while you cook the rice. Beat the eggs. When the timer goes off, pour the egg over the onions, and wait about thirty seconds before putting the rice in as well. Break up the egg with a spatula as you stir the rice around for about five minutes.

Did You Know that despite being made in the 1890s, the works of famed Art Nouveau artist Alfons Maria Mucha are still in copyright? Because he died in 1939 (hauled off by Nazis, terribly tragic), his works are still copyrighted in France, where he created most of them. Now, I'd thought that the rule for copyright here was "if it was published before 1923, it's public domain", but it's a bit more complicated. Since the Uruguay Round Agreements Act of 1994 took effect, copyright was restored to works published in other countries;this was challenged in Golan v. Gonzalez, the response to which ("of course we can pull things out of the public domain!") drew on the earlier asinine decision in Eldred v. Ashcroft.

So, everyone mark January 1, 2010 on your calendars as Alfons Mucha Liberation Day, as long as France doesn't extend its copyright term again in the next three years, which is by no means guaranteed.

However, Mucha took a tour of the United States between 1906 and 1910, where he made some posters (that one's from Chicago in 1909, according to the Metropolitan Museum of Art), and may have painted a self-portrait during that time period. Because these were published in the United States, they may be in the public domain as of now. My legal staff (read: the Cat) is looking into that, and while it's ridiculous that nineteenth-century art is still bound by copyright, at least it's not all like that. And at least we get something on Public Domain Day here in America.

No comments. I was feeling apolitical, and sad about Mucha. So very sad.

an ice storm, and guests.

[Mar. 17th, 2007|01:25 am]

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I worked today, but it was from home. I got a call from Brian last night, telling me that, due to inclement weather, I'd be working from home. I'd thought this was a charity, but by midmorning, I realized that it was a necessity. It wasn't as bad as it had been when there was a sheet of solid slick ice atop everything, but it was pretty close. Carin when out with Caitlin, Kristy and Zack in the morning, and had planned to tour the area, but came back midday, vowing not to go out on the roads again until they were cleared. I even got off work early, because they closed down the office to make sure everyone could get home safely.

On the negative side, dinner with the folks was cancelled, so they didn't get to meet Caitlin and company. I stayed in and made vegan pancakes for dinner--they're surprisingly easy and delicious to make; the incompletely-squished banana makes for a sort of fruit-in-the-pancake effect. No wacky vegan items are needed.

Vegan Pancakes
1 1/2 cups flour
2 cups water
1 banana
1 packet instance oatmeal, unflavored
Half spoonful of baking powder
Spot of grease
Mash banana. Add other ingredients and mix until only slightly lumpy. Grease a skillet, or use a nonstick pan. Pour pancake-sized amounts of mix into skillet; cook on medium heat. Flip when you see bubbles coming up, though beware that these don't brown quite the same as standard pancakes do. Repeat.

They were excellent, and I appreciated the cooking challenge.

Carin had planned to go to New York tomorrow to see her mother, who would be doing a field trip with some of her students. Alas, all flights into New York were cancelled due to the weather. She was pretty broken up about it, and also conflicted over whether or not she should go with her sister anyway out of obligation since she already has tickets to go see Avenue Q.

The evening was spent shooting the breeze with our guests. I cooked some rice and corn with celery seed, which was well-received. (Even though it's ridiculously easy to make--seriously, that shouldn't count as cooking.) It might be considered disappointing to be stuck inside with only a few other people for company... but really, it's exactly what I'd been hoping for. Caitlin glued herself to one of my Strangers in Paradise volumes (I still haven't read the last three; maybe it gets better), btu Kristy was very, very talkative. I asked about living in the south, and do they really have Southern Baptists, and what is it like being in a place where people take Christianity so seriously.

Carin drew on her guests, too; we're almost out of gentian violent ink, but she did get some good designs done. I was going to get one, but I was last in line, any by the time she got to me, she was all drawn out. I'll get it done another time; no big.

Comments: Exile from Groggs

cold skiing.

[Mar. 7th, 2007|12:46 am]

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Work today involved yet more testing and tweaking of the component that Jim left us with. It's not that it was broken, it's just that it's so brittle as to be nearly useless, as he did literally no testing that didn't follow the 'correct' way of doing things. The test plan is quite long, and every time I pore over it I'm struck by how nice it is to be able to perform unit tests on the non-GUI components. Jay's hopeful that we'll get it all out the door pretty shortly.

Before my father picked me up for skiing, I tried making blueberry pancakes again. This time, I nuked a half-cup of frozen berries for about thirty seconds, and mixed them into the batter. It does help, but next time I'll take the blueberries into account when I add the liquids, so as not to get slightly watery batter as I did this time. Still, they were honestly good blueberry pancakes, and I was pleased.

Shortly thereafter, my father picked me up, and we went skiing. On the trip up, he told me a more extended account of what had happened with Linda. It was a series of catastrophic mishaps, botched surgeries and misery. Now her kids have kicked Gene out of their house, despite him having lived with her for "ten or fifteen" years (as my father put it; I don't know exactly how long they'd been together). It was a terribly, terribly depressing story, and I feel pretty sorry for Gene. Some things can't be helped, but a lot of this sounds like it was pure malice on the part of Linda's kids. Who would do that kind of thing? Ugh.

It was cold out tonight, very cold. (Around zero, plus quite a bit of wind.) We both bundled up under double gloves, wool socks, helmet liners and the like, and we were still chilly. On the positive side of things, this meant that the mountain was pretty much empty, so we got a lot of skiing done. I learned how to go much faster--it's all about leaning down the hill--and nearly kept up with my father. Nearly.

In good news, his blood pressure's back down, probably lower than mine now; they have him on more meds. I was worried for a bit, there.

Comments: Telic Thoughts | Slashdot 1 2

valentine's day.

[Feb. 15th, 2007|01:32 am]

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It's been forever. I have backdated entries sitting in my Yahoo Notepad, which I may or may not get around to filling in.

Valentine's day, today. It hailed and rained all day; I didn't go anywhere, but Carin went for a day of job training. She showed up in the early afternoon, disappointed. The job had promised no sales; they wanted her to do sales to her family. The job had promised that they would just be talking about products to people who already wanted to buy them, and would not be actually closing the sales themselves; it turned out to be the exact opposite. They were to hawk nineteen-hundred dollar Kirby vacuum cleaners. It's the fucking Cutco scam all over again. And they had her drive through the ice for that. I have an urge to harass them until they pay her for the wasted "training" day, but that would be sticking my nose in. Still sucks.

This evening, she blew up a large number of balloons and put them in her room while I wasn't looking, in homage to one of my favorite xkcd strips. We shuffled around in the balloons and played volleyball with them. It was awesome. For my part, I made pancakes. If I'd known they were this cheap and easy, I'd have been making them a long time ago.

Pancakes
1 cup flour
1 cup milk
2 tsp baking powder
1 egg
Spot of grease
Beat egg in large bowl. Add flour, milk, baking powder. Mix until no longer lumpy. Grease a skillet (I used olive oil, but my father uses butter.) Pour pancake-sized amounts of mix into skillet; cook on medium heat. Flip when you see bubbles coming up. Repeat.

Carin was quite enamored of them; I have some ideas about how to improve the pancake process, though these were quite acceptable.

We didn't buy any soon-to-be-chucked plastic shit, so we may not have, strictly speaking, been in the spirit of the holidays. We did consume media, in that we watched the recent remake of The Ladykillers, which was first weird, then a bit of a downer... but that was on out gifty Netflix subscription. Still, for staying in and not putting on shoes all day, I think this was a pretty solid success.

I'm trying something new here--I'm going to link to comments I leave around the internet. As many of them are uneditable, they may contain embarrassing typos, factual errors and so forth. Given that I link back here when I comment, I may as well make a point of linking in the other direction as well.

A disclaimer, added because I just assured someone that I'm not intolerant of their religion, and because I write differently here than I do when I'm dropping comments. I may be rude, confrontational and indeed blasphemous in some of these comments. If you think I'm insulting you personally, whoever you are, please ask me--it's almost certain that I'm not.

Today's comments: Pharyngula 1 2 3 4 | Slashdot 1 2 3 4 5 6 | Telic Thoughts | Pandagon | Ezra Klein (from yesterday, but I'm pleased with it)