vital functions

[kaberett]

Reading. Touching the Void, Joe Simpson. I was reminded of its existence by Oliver Sacks' Hallucinations (which I also finished this week), having first come across it via rydra_wong; I was absolutely enthralled and inhaled it. As I mentioned, it helped a lot going in knowing that it was a story of a safe landing (and indeed as was discussed in comments, arguably even a good one). Apparently I should try to remember that even when my brain is being mulish about fiction I am extremely into non-fiction about mountains and time spent among them. Really appreciated the discussion at the end of the book both of working out where things went wrong (ans: before they'd even left base camp) and of the guy wrestling with the concept of PTSD as a real thing that is relevant to his experience.

Continuing to pick at Otherlands (Thomas Halliday) in extremely desultory fashion. There are five pages of introduction left, which are taking me an inordinately long time. I am hoping that I'll develop more interest once I'm into the main text, but I think I'm not going to stick around beyond chapter 1 if it continues such hard work for me. The contrast with my experience of Touching the Void is... notable.

Writing. Some progress on the player-facing Guide to GOD for Admin: the LRP. Had a bit of a crisis of confidence about structure and level of detail, but A sat down with me this morning and we talked it over; I am now feeling more equal to the task of finishing a horrid first draft.

Watching. The Nice Coffee Man Optimises Tiramisu Ingredients, with A, while making MORE NETTING. Questions: 1) oh come ON did you SERIOUSLY just describe one of the coffee options as "decaf"??? really??? is that the best you can do????? nothing about roast or even decaffeination process at all??? 2) WHAT ABOUT THE EGG WHITES 3) oh no is this the flimsy justification I needed for a wee little sous vide wand

Playing. Filament! I have lured A into The Joy Of Making Analogue Notes About Digital Games. We are currently sufficiently stuck on one actual anchor puzzle (one of the "wrap around this pillar exactly X times" series) that we've grumpily gone off to mess around with other things. We have two in-room-not-collectible things we are sure are Clues but are failing to Interpret, and at least on collectible ditto. As yet we have no idea what we're doing with the books. Our suspicions about "Juniper" are burgeoning. We are continuing to Have Great Fun, and A is very kindly indulging my desire to WORK IT OUT OURSELVES >:( even though there's a perfectly good hints system built into the game.

Cooking. Horrid beetroot thing. It is true that I like balsamic vinegar and poppy seeds and browned butter. It is absolutely the case that these days I will happily eat (and possibly even, whisper it, seek out) roast-or-equivalent beetroot. Nonetheless it might perhaps have been helpful if I had, at any point while gathering and preparing etc ingredients, remembered that pickled beetroot is the reason I think I don't like beetroot.

Happily we didn't add the recommended (fake) parmesan to the whole pan, just the half we ate on Monday. This meant that when I came to suspiciously try the leftovers on Wednesday morning, in an attempt to salve my conscience on the topic of But Composting It Would Be Food Waste, it turned out to... actually be food. Not particularly interesting or notably pleasant food, and not something I'll make again, but also not actually So Bad We Ordered Delivery On Tuesday Because We Couldn't Face The Thought Of Finishing It (Or Cooking Something Else).

Soup experiment: carrot + leek, blended, on day 1; grains in to soak overnight; boiled up with grains + vegetable lumps (in this instance potato/parsnip/carrot/bit more celery/frozen pea) on day 2; eaten very happily for the rest of the week.

Eating. Nando's (not my usual order because they were out of beanie burgers, but I was surprised by how into the spiced-grains-and-butternut-squash side + some salad I was). Masala Zone (do not think I could convince myself to spend that much money but would be perfectly happy to be bought a meal again).

Exploring. Whipsnade! MANY ANIMALS. Also a very brief and very pleasant amble in Queen Mary's Gardens at Regent's Park this afternoon.

Making & mending. NETTING. All of the string backlog has now been Converted. (For now.)

Growing. Iiii am really not doing a great job of Getting Things Started, but I have spent more quality time getting woodchip and manure into places they ought to be, and doing more bits of weeding, and poking at infrastructure for beans and peas. (If, you know, I ever get them into the ground...)

Observing. SLOW WORMS. BAT. Everybody is waking up and it is great!!!

Also Whipsnade had Bonus Gold Finches, which are always a joy and a delight.

Comments

rambling

[rugessnome]

hmm I may (out of a sort of contrary curiosity) consider trying the beet pasta once—I do like pickled beets, and roasted ones, just not canned ones, which taste tinny to me. But I know of at least two things I *don't* put the recommended [probably not DOP] parmesan on (smitten kitchen "haters'" salad of pear, fennel, and celery; Crescent Dragonwagon's beans & greens pasta), so I'll probably try it without first if I do try it.

I'm also potentially intrigued by the loose soup description. Just to clarify, it started out as carrot-leek pureed soup on day 1?

(...speaking of a lack of bean burgers and zoos though irrelevant to you, I am somewhat cross with mine recently having changed the menu at their main off season eatery away from the bean burger and chickpea salad sandwich that intrigued me but I didn't actually try. The vegetarian sandwiches now are Caprese, which is pricy and hardly seems seasonal just yet, or an Impossible burger, which being somewhat overpriced zoo food to begin with and having the inevitable upcharge as an Impossible product, is probably fine but just doesn't seem worth the price.)

Also I had a look and there aren't any Nando's close to me but I'm not sure their US incarnation's veggie burger contains beans... *sigh*.

anyway, I am glad that all the animals (and growing things) are waking up and I wish you luck with the beans and peas.

[msilverstar]

I'm impressed by your productivity!

We were very happy with the Anova sous vide wand, with a big pot not anything special. But of all things to have an app controlling, slow cooking seems ridiculous.

[ewt]

There is still plenty of time on the growing front!

[rydra_wong]

BAT:

https://bsky.app/profile/katesheridanart.bsky.social/post/3koox6lauku2f

[kaberett]

AAAAAAH BAT <333