new post

new posting. posting new stuff. alert! attention! actual use of weblog may occur below this announcement...


er, or something near that.

so let us see. now outside of city. renting part of large-ish professor on sabbatical house. lovely yard. greenery everywhere. walk to work. life could be worse.

but what is there really to write about?

made a chocolate pudding over the weekend:

3cups milk
1/2 cup sugar
1/3 cup cornstarch
1/4 tea salt
1 capfull vanilla
2 tab butter
1/2 bag chocolate chips, melted


whisk sugar, cornstarch and salt in pan. add milk and whisk. keep on medium heat, stirring occasionally with increasing vigil as liquid thickens. melt chocolate in separate pan, put aside to cool slightly. when milk mixture has thickened remove from fire and add vanilla, butter. stir until butter is melted. stir in chocolate. continue with an occasional stir until pudding is cool, refrigerate.

to have vanilla pudding omit chocolate. almond extract can also be used in place of vanilla or really any extract.

depending upon the quality of your ingredients this can taste like box mix or something extraordinary.

farm life

i suppose the only way to start writing again is to write.

i've spent the past week at a sheep farm upstate in genoa, ny. a coworker and her husband own the place. it's also a woolen mill with pre-WWII equipment. this place is just loaded history and cool stuff. sheep, a goat, chickens that try to steal the dog food. a cat with brain damage that is as sweet as can be. oh and chicks! little baby chicks that have to be cared for and checked up on.

we go to diners for breakfast and drive around in a vegetable powered old benz. on memorial day the town of moravia had a parade that had more people following it than in it.

barn swallows with their forked tails are in the barn and lizzy, the dog who protects it all has killed at least two groundhogs and maybe a baby skunk while i've been here. every time she's awfully proud of herself.

one of the sheep is due to lamb any day now and her newborn will add to the boy triplets and a girl lamb named thistle.

i got the idea that i wanted to make ethiopian food and looked online for recipes. you be surprised how limited and awful some of the recipes are. when i looked for ethiopian cookbooks on amazon there was a total of one book. a book that is out of print. so i've pieced together some dishes and any day now the injera will be fully fermented and i'll attempt an ethiopian meal. if i don't fall over dead i'll post here about it.

things are pretty alright. still haven't found out if i'll be going to sea for the summer but hopefully i'll know soon enough. i'll either be spending six weeks in the middle of the pacific or i'll do some timesharing between berkeley and baja. i would love to be in new york for summer, with all its free cool outdoor activities but the heat, humidity and general stink make me miss berkeley all the more.

so we'll see. if my boss is fine with the telecommute then i'll put my stuff in storage, bow out of my month to month lease and live the rent-free life of home and baja.

tagged, i guess

i suppose this might be a nice way to start writing in this again...

4 jobs i've had:
fresh wild salmon vendor
trader joes team member
cashier at la cascada, burrito eater
research assistant

4 favorite movies:
dangerous beauty
in the mood for love
m*a*s*h
breakfast at tiffany's

4 places i've been:
frankfurt, germany
juneau, wisconsin
baja, california sur
melbourne, florida

4 places i've lived:
berkeley, california
syracuse, new york
chicago, illinois
new york, new york

4 favorite tv shows:
house
law & order
weeds
dexter

4 favorite radio programs:
radio lab
this american life
the leonard lopate show
across 110th street

4 favorite foods:
burritos
burgers
blackened catfish
anything castiron cooked

(plus pudding, pizza, beer, bbq, ethiopian, indian)

4 places i'd rather be:
1920's chicago
1950's new york city
1960's california
swimming in warm ocean water

tagging:

nobody x4

i <3 lee pace. and i wouldn't mind babies.

i get to go to sea!

so i'll be flying out of jfk on wednesday and flying into houston! then we'll, i think, be spending the night in galveston before boarding a launch that will take us out to the langseth which is somewhere off shore. there are then two possibilities. one, on the ship doing 3d seismic stuff until the 17th or two, on the ship doing 3d seismic stuff until the 24th. either way, we'll be on the ship and doing 3d seismic stuff. also checking up on the multibeam bathymetry acquisition.

this should all be pretty cool. that is if i have sea legs and am not puking all over the place. supposedly there is internet aboard the ship (via satellite) and so if anything super cool happens i'll be sure to attempt to blog.