Projects – Thwarted Again

Bottling Day

Bill and I bottled our beer Sunday afternoon. It’s been a long voyage to beer and I suppose it isn’t quite finished yet since we have to let the bottles condition for a couple of weeks before drinking them.

We ended up getting 40 and one half bottles which is less than we’d hoped by 20% but at the same time we’re pretty sure we didn’t contaminate anything and it looks really good so I think it’s ok for a first try. I took mine share home last night and stuck it in the guest bathtub in case any of them decide to lose structural integrity.

Then I did some laundry and went to bed early.

Today I’m back at work. I’ve cleaned up my email so I guess I’m ready to be productive again.

sourdough starter day 3

I decided to make a couple of changes in the starter this morning based on what I’d been reading in the Tartine Bread book last night. I did find a brief mention of what the starter smells like and the sour vinegary smell is because the culture is leaning toward acetic acid production rather than lactic acid. He says that a warmer, wetter starter will move toward lactic acid production and smell more sweet and less sour.

Previously my process looked like this:
Every 12hrs:
30g reserved starter +
30g rye flour +
30g water =
90g (30% starter)

This morning I did this
20g reserved starter +
20g rye flour +
20g KA bread flour +
45g water =
105g (≈20% starter)

This is more like the 50/50 white/wheat mix he was talking about and is ≈110% hydration rather than 100%. It’s Friday so I’m probably getting home later than usual so we’ll see how the starter gets along with an extra three hours or so of fermentation time. If everything goes ok after a day or two of this I may just go ahead and switch to the default feeding schedule in the book.

Also, in the interests of science. The house, in A/C mode, is allowed to get to 80°F and probably has the last few days.

Cooking

A while back (*cough* a year ago *cough*) I participated in the Kickstarter for a home immersion circulator for cooking sous vide called “Nomiku”. It finally showed up this week so I’ve been playing with it. I cooked a steak, broccoli and rice on Monday night and I did Jerk chicken a roasted Brussels sprouts tonight. The meats come out perfectly done. The steak was on the medium side of medium-rare all the way through and the chicken was what I would call medium/medium-well and probably could have been done a two or three degrees cooler with an extra half hour on the clock and would have been even juicier. I’ve been pretty happy with it but I have a way to go. I have learned that it is worth seasoning your meat before you bag and cook it. The steak was lacking something which I attribute to it not being salted and peppered before sous vide where I usually season the meat and let it rest for an hour or so before I grill it. The chicken marinated all day in the fridge and tasted wonderful.

Also, I got the Tartine Bread book for my birthday and it is all about the sourdough starter so I started one of those and it’s going pretty good. The dude is super serious about his bread though and it basically takes more than an entire day to go from a piece of starter to a baked loaf you can eat so it’s the kind of thing where, at best, I’d get one loaf a week for seven days of twice daily feeding. It’s worth a try though and maybe the rhythm will stick with me.

I’ve been putting the pictures of the new cooking in here:
http://thwartedagain.com/zenphoto/cooking/

When I was on my recent diet where in I got down to 160 lbs (normal!) I actually spent a lot of time baking. I didn’t really take any pictures but I made a blueberry pie and a cherry pie from scratch, some banana bread, chocolate chip cookies, some bread and some ice cream. I plan to continue with the baking so I’ll have some pictures of that at some point.

bmi_end

I had a pretty good birthday as far as such things go. I had dinner with a small group of friends (including the charming young lady who I have been seeing :D ) at Hillside Farmacy. The food was good and I got an egg creme soda and an ice cream cookie. I got a bottle of interesting Northeastern Italian dessert wine and a package of books from the aforementioned lady. I’ve read the first one, “The Lake” by Banana Yoshimoto and I really enjoyed it. Her style reminds me of Murakami but it is less surreal and is more concise. I think it’s interesting that characters in the Japanese books I read always seem to have their whole mental state thought out and seem to kind of passively observe their own life in first person. It’s strange. She tells me that it’s part of the Ukiyo-e tradition where the world can only be observed imperfectly through this separate layer (which the Blanton exhibit dubbed “The floating world” in the print exhibit I liked from years back) and that it is extremely common in Japanese literature. The everyday occurrence and acceptance of the supernatural and surreal is another common theme and there is a little of that in the book but not as much of that as Murakami likes to use either. Next up is a thriller / horror book and then I got a couple of silly things when I exchanged After Dark which I’d already read. Plus I have the rest of my To Be Read stack on the coffee table.

I hurt my back while exercising on my diet and ended up re-injuring it several times through bad form, muscular imbalance, lack of flexibility and not enough healing time. As a result I ended up at the Orthopedist and he sent me to Physical Therapy which I finished last week. I have been given a laundry list of PT homework that I am to do from now on to maintain my core strength and posterior chain flexibility. I’m getting better at it but it’s slow. My goal now is to complete the entire set of homework three times per week for all of October. If I can stick to that I’ll allow myself the opportunity to resume lifting in a limited and cautious aspect. Also it’s time for the LiveStrong Challenge so I’ve been riding my bike again. Oddly enough I’ve been able to keep a decent pace even though I haven’t been riding much but the rides have been short so that’s not terribly surprising. I am quite a bit lighter than I was. I think this weekend I’m going to try to do 30 miles since it’s going to be nice out.

I suppose that’s it for now. There’s been more going on but I need to be better about just putting stuff in here as it happens instead of always waiting months and then trying to cram it all in at once. Anyway, so far, so good.

ping

This is mostly just a test post. I’m going to post this and then export all of the posts and also save a zip of the whole directory. Wish me luck.

beets

I planted some beets this year. This is a bad idea because they don’t do well here but screw that. Nothing does well here so I might as well try to have some beets. I planted them at the end of January which is basically like spring everywhere else and they’re supposed to be “mature” in something like 60-70 days. So as long as it’s not 100 freaking degrees before mid-April there’s a chance it could work. I also have some Brussels sprouts since we’re being optimistic.

Lots of little things

A few weeks back my 2001 Honda Accord that I bought new crossed 200,000 miles. It has been a fantastic car but I told myself I would start shopping for a new one when it got to 200k and so I have been. So far I’ve driven a BMW 335d, a Lexus CT Hybrid and an Acura TSX wagon. I have been dreading the car shopping experience. I’m not a particularly assertive person. More of a go along to get along which means that I’m basically sure I’m going to get taken advantage of at the dealership. However, it’s turned out to be not as bad as I thought. The BMW dealer was excellent. They let me take the car out with just me and my friend. The saleman didn’t pressure me at all and just asked if we had questions when we got back and then wished us a good afternoon. The Lexus dealer was a little more pushy and the Acura dealer a little more than that but all of them were polite and I wouldn’t say I got the hard sell from anyone.

The 335d is very fun. It’s 265hp, 425lb-ft and is otherwise very sporty. It is, by far, the most expensive of the three and you have to pay for every little thing option wise but it definitely stands out in terms of driving experience. It does get 23 city / 36 hwy which is fantastic.

The TSX wagon is basically my Accord ten years later. It has a nicer interior and a Nav and a lot of little improvements here and there and the wagon part is nice because I could just toss my bike in the back. It does want premium gas though which is kinda meh considering that it gets 22/30

The CTh is not really for me. It’s completely gutless and the center console is like this giant wall between you and the passenger seat and the “NuLux” interior is plastic. I’d rather cloth than that stuff or at least a real leather option. Leather is actually a fantastic material and not just because it’s fancy.

Anyway, the 335d and the TSX are candidates right now. I figure I should go try a Chevy Volt and maybe like a VW Jetta TDI. Need to check Consumer Reports on that last one because I have a lot of apprehension about VW reliability.

So, that’s cars. I also finally got the TR6 running enough to back it out of the garage a few times in September which means that I got a little work done on the eternal bookshelf project. Of course I managed to aggravate a radiator leak badly enough that now I need to get a new one of those so I stop leaving big green puddles on the rubber mat under the damned car. There’s a guy on Ebay that sells new ones for ~$270 + s/h which beats the hell out of the $450ish that the resto catalogs want. But anyway, bookshelves. I found a paint that I like for the final finish. Sherwin Williams ProClassic Acrylic Latex. It’s water based so painting and cleaning isn’t awful and it dries fast and hard so it will be reasonable to use on something I actually use regularly. I’ve milled the face frame pieces and dry fit them and they look good. I have also milled the map drawer pieces and they are awaiting priming, painting and assembly. Basically the big obstacle right now is the top. I still don’t know what I’m going to do about that. Good news is that a sheet of bamboo plywood similar to the floor in the office is down to $270 from $400 so I’m more likely to do that now since it isn’t a huge deal if I mess it up and have to try again.

I rode the 60 mile route in the LiveStrong Challenge a couple of weekends back and that was good. It was a lot harder than it should have been because I basically didn’t ride the bike at all in August because of the 106 F median high temp for that month and September wasn’t really enough to get back into shape. I have been riding a little more in October though and it’s been good to be back into it. It’s been cooler too which really helps.

I joined www.fitocracy.com this last week. It’s basically Facebook + WoW for exercising. You log your activities when you do them and it awards you points which causes you to “level-up”. I put quotes around that because there’s basically no point to it. You don’t get anything for your levels. There are Achievements and Quests too. Quests are sort of progress indicators. Like for bicycling there is 10k, 50k and 100k that I know of and you have to do the first one to unlock the next one and so on. Achievements are more like milestones and you can earn them whenever. There are Achievements for various lifts 0.9x body weight bench press, 15 pullups, 1000 career miles run, that sort of thing. I expect that the list of those will grow because there aren’t any for a lot of different thing that people commonly do for exercise. It’s a pretty good idea and is responsible for me riding my bike to Mighty Fine today rather than driving the car so I guess it’s working.

Finally, the “Power Ball” lottery was up to like $208M last night so I bought a ticket because why-the-hell-not. And I matched one number and the power-ball which got me FOUR DOLLARS WOO! So now I have another ticket for the $245M drawing and a Big Red soda and $1.39 in change. Not bad at all.

Oh! One last thing. Apparently the clothes that I had tailored for my birthday present to me are finished and are ready to ship. The charges were declined by the card company but I got that sorted today so when they try again it should go through and then they’ll mail me my new duds.

Behold

The last week has seen dramatic changes around the house. The new bedroom floor was installed and the new bed, chest of drawers and mattress arrived as well. There are many more details that will be addressed but all of the big stuff is in and done.

Before:

After floor installation:

New Furniture:

And finally, with the mattress and new bed set. Wonder at it’s majesty for it shall nevermore appear thus. Eight pillows is a bit much really and you can’t even see the headboard with all of that stuff on there.

I’ve been having a hard time finding frames for the pictures I want to put on the big wall. I’d like something that matched the furniture but only one place had anything that even remotely matched and I wasn’t really excited about them because I’d have to pay full price. I’m thinking now that I might just go for silvered wood to try to match the forthcoming silver accents. I think I’ll probably end up with the lamps I saw at Loft. They’re a bit spendy but no more than I’ve seen for reasonably nice things on the internet and I don’t need them until the night stands come in anyway. I need to decide on curtain hardware too.

I also went on vacation but I didn’t take any pictures of that.

The enemy

This little guy thought he was pretty smart. When the fingers get close he moves around to the far side of the vine he’s sitting on. What he doesn’t handle well is getting flicked against the stem he’s on and having various bits of his insides become his outsides. It reduces mobility, having the insides on the outside. Mobility is important if you want to avoid arrest, photography and being wadded up in the means of your capture and thrown into the garbage. I don’t know if this is a squash bug variant or just some random critter who was in the wrong place at the wrong time but it has paid the price for its lack of vision. The garden is doing as well as can be expected. More cherry tomatoes today including three that were a bit too close to the netting and were savaged by something that should instead be eating the bugs off my cucumbers. Still, the nets seem to be doing their job for now so the computerized sentry guns can wait.

Mosaic

The reason my soybean plants look so sad is that they have the bean mosaic virus. Many of my soybean plants are losing or have lost their leaves. There’s not much you can do about the virus unfortunately so I may not end up getting to eat any of the soybeans on those plants as they may die before the pods are ready. It looks like the green beans also have the mosaic virus but are more resistant to it so are still growing. In fact several of them started blooming this week. The wrinkly leaves and mottled coloration are the indicator. Gardening hard. I’ve had some tomatoes off the cherry tomato plant and they were good (for tomatoes (not my favorite)). When I got home on Thursday evening the five farthest along had each developed a split down the side so I picked them off, cut out the split part and ate the rest. I had another one yesterday and it looks like four or five more will be ready tomorrow or Tuesday. The squashes are coming along. I have some yellow squash now which is nice. One of those might be ready to eat late next week. The cucumbers have already reached the top of the fence I put up last week. I expect they will try to take over the world some time next month. I also have the silk from two ears of corn on the farthest along corn plants.

edit: On an unrelated note, while 0 is a valid list index it also tends to evaluate to False. :|

Becoming food

I have two things to write about today. The first, of course, is the garden. Everybody except the yellow squash and green beans are making food. As annoying as it is that the two I want most are being recalcitrant the rest seem to be trying to curry favor by producing. There is one acorn squash that is set and growing and at least two other female flowers that will bloom this week. The thing I find interesting about the plants with distinct male and female flowers is that the female flowers have the fruit / vegetable / seed pod / whatever already in the stem behind the flower and it looks like a miniature version of the end product even before the flower is fertilized.

Tasty squash

Male and female acorn squash flowers

Female cucumber flower

It turns out that the edamame plants I thought were going to bloom were actually already blooming and they just have tiny flowers. This week every single plant developed little bean pods. I am going to have a lot of soybeans to eat. Om nom nom.

Beans!

Edamame forming in the flowers

The three corn plants that are actually growing and not being pathetic have produced flower stalks. And the cherry tomatoes are starting to ripen. I’ll probably have tomatoes to eat starting at the end of this week. I don’t know if you’re supposed to wait until an entire bunch is ripe or if it’s appropriate to pick off ones that are ripe and eat them.

Oh no! The corn!

I’m planning to learn how to make pickles since I’m going to have a ton of cucumbers (fingers crossed) and I like pickles. One of my favorite things when I was little was eating the pickles my grandmother made. I don’t know if its within my abilities to make pickles like she did but since this whole thing has kind of been done with an eye looking back at my grandparent’s garden I think it’s appropriate to at least try.

Finally, a non-garden related thing. I picked up a book to learn how to program in Python since several of the applications I play with in my free time have Python scripting interfaces. Of course playing with Python became more interesting than being able to script things in those programs so I’ve been writing a little menu application with my free time. It actually works now though it has a long way to go before I could call it useful with a straight face but it displays icons and launches programs and can understand and navigate through submenus. I’ll put a screen shot of it here though that’s not terribly useful since the neat part is when you’re actually moving the mouse around in it. The icon behavior is similar to the Mac Dock magnification except that it’s in a circle and the magnification actually permanently pushes the icons around where in the Dock when your pointer exits the active area all of the icon return to their original locations. Maybe I can work out a animated gif file to give an idea. It uses the wxPython wrappers for wx Widgets. It works pretty well but there is no way to make the background transparent without (possibly and I don’t even know if it’s possible) some OS / window manager depended shenanigans. Also, the the icon set I’m using is called Legendora and was made by someone called Raindropmemory on deviantart. It’s super cute and she has a lot of icon sets which are all just adorable.

Pie Menu animation