Category: family

No Blogging Tonight

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As a result of our water eater giving up the ghost a few days back, we spent this evening separating the wheat from the chaff in the basement.

The wheat will be picked up by movers and move to storage tomorrow, and the traffic will be trashed out by the clean up crew the day after.

When you do things like this you think about deep philosophical questions like,  “Who in their right mind puts carpeting down in a basement?”, which is what the previous owners did.

I finished the evening sore and stinky, and so had a long hot shower.

Since Sharon joined me, the evening was not a complete loss.

Busy Day

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The water heater gave up the ghost today.

It didn’t stop heating water, but it started to leak.

Had to call a plumber to locate the valve, and I’m now working with a wet-dry vac on the basement.

No hot water in the house until it is replaced this Monday.

What I Did This Memorial Day Weekend

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My old Weber kettle grill having given up the ghost, the vent on the bottom had rusted through, I looked to get a new grill. 

It had to be a charcoal grill, because while I may be a jerk, I’m not a complete git.  Gas grills are for posers.  (They are OK for camp stoves though)

I liked the Weber, and would recommend it, it’s a solid basic grill, but I was thinking.

I actually spent some time debating between just getting a new Weber, and this grill, a “Nexgrill 29 in. Barrel Charcoal Grill with Smoker,” which was about 30 bucks more, but included a thermometer, a side smoker box,and a side table.

The clincher was that I could get this assembled from Home Depot. (It just fit in Sharon’s* station wagon with the back seats folded.)

So, I fired it up empty to cook off any manufacturing residue, and then yesterday afternoon, I grilled some chicken.

I’m not sure if it is as sturdy as the Weber, but it has a thermometer, more grill space, a top grill, its 2-piece grills actually fit in our dish washer, and with careful use of the side box, I can do some relatively low temperature smoking.  

I could hold it steady about 225°F [107°C] on the kettle grill, and I’m figuring that I could reliably go as low as 150°F [66°C] on this.

Made lamb for Sharon* and me, and chicken for the kids last evening.

*Love of my life, light of the cosmos, she who must be obeyed, my wife.

Things That Would Have Gotten My Mom to Disown Me

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I was making a cup of coffee with a Kuerig machine, and the coffee I grabbed was a Newman’s own Pod.

I turned to the person next to me,and said, “I turned to the person next to me, and said, “Paul Newman started this company. I think that he had another line of work before he started making organic food.” 

My mom, whose favorite movie was Long Hot Summer, or as she put it, “Long Hot Summer with Paul Newman ……… YUM!!!” would not have been amused by that joke.

She probably would not have disowned me permanently, but she would have been very unamused by this bon mot.

Certainly she was unamused when her cousin at a political event, was asked to point out a politician’s wife, said cousin said, “She’s standing next to the tall handsome man with the striking blue eyes,” and the person she was pointing the woman out to said, “You mean that she is standing next to Paul Newman?”

My mom though that not recognizing Paul Newman was taking politics WAY too far.

I Kind of Like the Frantically Mating Arthropods

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I am referring to the Brood X Cicadas, of course.

Unlike the last time around, the volume is such that it does not penetrate the walls of my house, we moved a few miles north in the interim, and I find their calls kind of flutey.

When we were down in Northwest Baltimore, they were loud enough to be physically painful at times.

Charlie, on the other hand, finds it relentlessly desperate and filled with dread and .

I explained to him that desperation and existential angst (my term, not his) are why creatures procreate in the first place:  Having a progeny creates a legacy, and meaning.

It’s awfully deeply philosophy for a bunch of frantically f%$#ing bugs, at least for me.

I’m an engineer, I don’t look for solutions to major problems of existence, I just try to get, “Close Enough.”

Some People Cannot Resist Posting Kittens

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For me, it’s farts:

A woman on TikTok has left people in stitches with her story about a time she ripped a fart in a spin class that led to a total evacuation of all people on the premises.

………

“This one time I went to a spin class after a heavy night of drinking and 4am kebabs…”

Then it happened.

“…And I farted a fart that smelled so bad that a girl threw up and they had to evacuate the gym because they thought they had a sewage problem.”

She was apparently glad to finally get it off her chest.

“I was too embarassed to tell them it was just me. So now, eight years later, I’m telling you guys.”

@maximevdd

Tell me your greatest fart stories. Can you beat that? #fyp #gym #gymproblems #fart #spinclass #hangover #embarrassing #ohno #fartsfordays #drunk

♬ Oh No – Kreepa

How is this woman still single?  Not mocking her.  Women who find farts funny are rare and should be treasured.

Also, it beats my story of Prednisone fueled farts, when I let one site slip out silently that violated the chemical weapons convention at the same time that my my dad loudly farted while we were in the car, and he took the blame from the rest of the family for 15 minutes until I fessed up.

What About Turtles Farting?

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A series of studies have revealed that mammals can breath through the butt-holes.

Brought a bit of family lore, about turtles farting, to my mind:

When pressed for oxygen, some fish and sea cucumbers will use their lower intestines to get a little extra out of their environment. Now, a team of Japanese researchers say that mammals are also capable of respirating through their rectal cavity, at least in a lab setting.

The team’s research is published today in the journal Med and describes the capacity for mice, rats, and pigs to survive longer and have more strength in low-oxygen circumstances when given oxygen gas or an oxygen-rich liquid through their rectums, in a process similar to an enema. While fish like loaches and catfish use a similar method to gain additional oxygen in the natural world, this doesn’t appear to be an evolutionary adaptation for mammals. In other words, mammalian bodies can’t naturally do this, but with a little push from modern science, it becomes possible. Previous research has seen oxygen injected directly into mammalian bloodstreams, prolonging the lives of rabbits, but the rectal approach to the low-oxygen problem is novel.

The experiment, while disturbing, was designed to find new ways to save the lives of people whose lungs are failing.

It’s a valuable study, but all I can think about turtles farting.

 

Got Vax?

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Got my shot


It kind of went like this (Not really)


Not kidding about the liquor store

I just got my vaccine, singular, as in the Johnson and Johnson vaccine.

We got it because it was the only vaccine which would definitively tell us it was corn free, and Sharon* and Nat have some fairly severe corn allergies. 

No issues to speak of, except for the fact that the Rite Aid Pharmacy is right across the street from the Rite Aid Liquor Store. 

I was in the door, got the shot, and was out in less time than it takes to read this article and laugh at the Peanuts strip. 

Of course, then I had to cool my heels for 15 minutes before leaving.

Then we all went and got rolled ice cream (Thai: ไอศกรีมผัด or ไอติมผัด), except for Nat, who got sushi because the ice cream place did not have anything non dairy.

Rolled ice cream is created by taking liquid ice cream adding fixing, and mixing it and spreading it out on an anti-griddle to freeze, and then peeling it off in a roll and adding toppings.

I had never heard of the stuff before, but I liked it.

Mine had lots of caramel, and, of course, whipped cream.

I think that going out for an ice cream after doing my part to vanquish a scourge upon the world is a good arrangement.

*Love of my life, light of the cosmos, she who must be obeyed, my wife.

Busy Day

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It turns out that the phone that I wanted to bring from Sprint to Verizon was simply not compatible.

So this evening, with the aid of Craigslist, I got a cheap phone so that I have something that I can use at the office.  (No phone, but I have a phone number and voice mail, not figured out why, but it’s more convenient to use the cell phone, at least until I couldn’t.)

All back to normal now though.

Went through ads, found a phone with more computing power than the entire Apollo program new for 70 bucks.

It’s not ruggedized, but it does have a removable battery, and it’s new in the box, a Moto E6.

So I gotta phone, and my Bluetooth so I can go hands free during meetings.

Royal PITA though.

Also, It appears that I have about a dozen updates to download.

Things that Remind Me of Mom

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My mom died over 44 years ago, when I was 14.

One of the things that I recall was her deep affection for turtles.

At one point, we had 17 turtles as pets in the house, roughly divided between Red Eared Terrapins and Eastern Box Turtles, (Separate habitats) with a few others thrown in. (Also iguanas and cats, but that’s another story)

Well, this story has me wondering how she would have reacted to this picture.

A listener in Medina, Ohio messaged to tell me that her local fire department rescued 10 turtles from a blaze and they made LIL TURTLE OXYGEN MASKS for them!! My heart truly can’t handle this ❤️🐢❤️ pic.twitter.com/idhAO9q9W6

— Michelle Collins (@michcoll) February 25, 2021

Just the Time to Fire Up the Grill

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It was a nice pan

Not!!!

So, the oven has finally broken, and the chicken that I made, with a mustard and vinegar marinade, could not be cooked.

I figured, “What the F%$#?  I can just fire up the grill and put the pan in there.”

It was a Glass Pan.

The chicken was salvageable, the pan was not, so a 27 year old pan that Sharon* and I got it when we went on a date to the Corning Museum in Corning, NY is now shards.

Sharon took it all in stride.  

As I’ve told her many times, “It’s like ‘The Chicken” said, you knew the job was dangerous when you took it.”

*Love of my life, light of the cosmos, she who must be obeyed, my wife.

Mostly, I’m Posting this to Screw with My Son

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Seriously?

I just had to share the spectacle of the communications director for the Repuclican National Committee invoking Twilight Sparkle from My Little Pony to excuse apparrent plagiarism by Melania Trump last night:

A Republican National Committee spokesman used a popular children’s toy franchise on Tuesday to defend Donald Trump’s speechwriters against allegations that they plagiarized portions of Melania Trump’s speech at the GOP convention.

 “When it comes to the speech, let’s actually put this in perspective,” RNC communications director Sean Spicer told CNN Tuesday afternoon. “In a 2,000-word statement, we’re talking about 70 words [and] three passages. Melania Trump said, ‘you work hard for what you get in life.’ John Legend said, ‘work hard to be anything you want in life.’ Kid Rock said, ‘work hard to be anything you want in life.'”

 Spicer continued, “Melania Trump said, ‘the strength of your dreams and your willingness to work for them.’ Twilight Sparkle from My Little Pony said, ‘this is your dream. Anything you can do in your dreams, you can do now.‘”

My son is a a proud Brony, and when I told him, he smacked his head ……… Hard.

I told him that it just shows how universal the My Little Pony franchise is.

His response was to tell me to go Cheney myself.

Exhausted

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We went to an SCA event today, a historical cooking competition called Trial by Fire.

So, I drove there and back, and spent 5 hours on my feet wrestling with a balky camping oven and dough.

I was making various forms of pastys, both fruit and the Cornish variety.

The dishes went well, but took longer than expected, so only one dish was entered.

But I’ve spent the day in the sun cooking, and I am completely wiped.

I will post recipes tomorrow.

Posted via mobile.

Quote of the Day

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Today, we went to the Ruckus Festival, a 7 hour long mmusic festival with about a dozen bands.

One of the bands was there was Parallel Heights, which put on a fine show, but they had some technical issues.

Specifically, one of the band members, in addition to backup vocals, played ukelele, saxophone, and bagpipes.

There were some technical issues, with the clip on mic for the Sax not working, and the bagpipes had a similar problem, and so it was downed out by the other (amplified) music instruments.

On the way home were talking about the concert, and when we discussed Parallel Heights’ set, and Charlie said, “That’s the only time that I wished I could hear the bagpipes better.”

Heh.