Monday, May 31, 2010
Sunday, March 14, 2010
Eurovision Party is go
May 29, catz. This year, it will actually happen, unlike last year. Also, did I not get my shit together for a top ten last year? Let's try harder this year.
Honestly, I'm looking forward to this even if only for an excuse to eat lefse. I shouldn't NEED an excuse for that, but considering I seem to have to import it from Wisconsin...
Honestly, I'm looking forward to this even if only for an excuse to eat lefse. I shouldn't NEED an excuse for that, but considering I seem to have to import it from Wisconsin...
Wednesday, March 03, 2010
5 steps to furthering food education
The end of chapter three of this book has some exercises, one of which is to set 5 food education goals.
1. I have a few cookbooks I could cook through.
2. Some websites I'd like to look at.
3. Try to find some more friends who are really serious about food...
4. Outfit my own kitchen.
5. Volunteer.
It's all kind of vague stuff that I think about pretty often. I had a cooking club, after all. Just the timing is not quite there. Really I think you can put 4900 on that list. We're eating a lot of things and going out of our way for them. This project is opening up just how much the city has to offer. There are still TONS of places in my neighborhood I haven't eaten. It's good to branch out no matter how great your favorite places are....
Soooooo no deadlines. The book says to have deadlines for each of these thing, but right now. I mean the one deadline I can offer is that by February of next year (and likely before then) Josh and I will have completed the 7X7 list. There are some other lists I can already think of to work on, so I may continue in that vein. And it might be good to start a journal about tasty and whatnot, just notes.
I'm tired again. These late dinner are getting to me. Gonna sack out soon so I can try to make it to the pool in the morning. Tonight I had a date but also ended up working late, so I didn't get to go.
1. I have a few cookbooks I could cook through.
2. Some websites I'd like to look at.
3. Try to find some more friends who are really serious about food...
4. Outfit my own kitchen.
5. Volunteer.
It's all kind of vague stuff that I think about pretty often. I had a cooking club, after all. Just the timing is not quite there. Really I think you can put 4900 on that list. We're eating a lot of things and going out of our way for them. This project is opening up just how much the city has to offer. There are still TONS of places in my neighborhood I haven't eaten. It's good to branch out no matter how great your favorite places are....
Soooooo no deadlines. The book says to have deadlines for each of these thing, but right now. I mean the one deadline I can offer is that by February of next year (and likely before then) Josh and I will have completed the 7X7 list. There are some other lists I can already think of to work on, so I may continue in that vein. And it might be good to start a journal about tasty and whatnot, just notes.
I'm tired again. These late dinner are getting to me. Gonna sack out soon so I can try to make it to the pool in the morning. Tonight I had a date but also ended up working late, so I didn't get to go.
Tuesday, March 02, 2010
4900 out-take
My roommate and I are writing a blog called 4900 about eating our way through the 7x7 Big Eat 2010 List (100 Things to Try Before You Die). I bought a book about food writing to see if I could maybe I could improve my offerings as we go along. It has some writing exercises in there, so I figure I might as well do them... The intro sort of suggested that might be a good idea even if you are tempted to skip them. Of course I am tempted to skip them. I don't know if I will do all of them, but some of them might help me out, so I might try a few...like one right now:
Eating a pear is a little like biting into someone's leg. Or at least I imagine it might be. Pears don't have the same snap to them that apples do, not in the skin or in the meat; your teeth are able to sink in a little easier. I just always have this odd sensation when I'm eating a pear, that it isn't entirely natural. They're so tender; all the energy that would have gone into wrestling a dent out of an apple can be spent savoring flavors and marveling how convenient the shape is; don't you love holding the skinny end of a pear while chomping away at the tubby body? Yet another advantage. I guess you can't really count that eerie unnatural leg-bitey feeling as a plus, but luckily it really is just a pear and your fangs help you suck only fruit blood.
Meh, it's different, anyways.
The cheese was as ripe as... the overflow laundry from last weekend that had fermented under my desk for a whole other week.
The donut smelled stale, like a... box of dead bugs in a long forgotten cellar.
The roast beef sandwich tasted as though... "roasted" was its own separate entity, concentrated into a syrup and drizzled generously over the top of the cow on its bed of ciabatta until the bread was also somehow roasty.
I'm really glad that for this exercise we don't actually have to taste anything to write the sentence. I'm not sure I could find a food that would be able to pull those examples off, ha.
I would go to Nombe every night it weren't for extenuating social circumstances. My friends will not be dragged to my favorite restaurant every time, and sometimes they should be given the opportunity to drag me. So it happens that I escape the mercury poisoning, for the moment, at least. A fish special is averted now and then, so I live another day or two. Once to watch the chalkboard for is the tuna temari.
The first day I ordered this dish and the tuna balls came rolled in toasted nori and sesame seeds instead of powdered aomori I was surprised and intrigued. This perhaps seemingly insignificant change (from seaweed to seaweed, after all) actually turned out to be the work of a chef inspired. Where the aomori tended to make the mouthful feel too much like a paste, the bits of crisped-up nori actually added texture instead of taking it away, and highlighted the individual flavors of the fish and the seaweed rather than muddling them. Dipped in whatever ratio of wasabi to soy sauce serves you best, the number of flavors double and your tongue is on a pleasure cruise that will make you forgot all the mediocre tuna you've had in the past.
Dang, I got tired and it got bedtime. When did that happen? Think I will get up early tomorrow and walk to work...
Eating a pear is a little like biting into someone's leg. Or at least I imagine it might be. Pears don't have the same snap to them that apples do, not in the skin or in the meat; your teeth are able to sink in a little easier. I just always have this odd sensation when I'm eating a pear, that it isn't entirely natural. They're so tender; all the energy that would have gone into wrestling a dent out of an apple can be spent savoring flavors and marveling how convenient the shape is; don't you love holding the skinny end of a pear while chomping away at the tubby body? Yet another advantage. I guess you can't really count that eerie unnatural leg-bitey feeling as a plus, but luckily it really is just a pear and your fangs help you suck only fruit blood.
Meh, it's different, anyways.
The cheese was as ripe as... the overflow laundry from last weekend that had fermented under my desk for a whole other week.
The donut smelled stale, like a... box of dead bugs in a long forgotten cellar.
The roast beef sandwich tasted as though... "roasted" was its own separate entity, concentrated into a syrup and drizzled generously over the top of the cow on its bed of ciabatta until the bread was also somehow roasty.
I'm really glad that for this exercise we don't actually have to taste anything to write the sentence. I'm not sure I could find a food that would be able to pull those examples off, ha.
I would go to Nombe every night it weren't for extenuating social circumstances. My friends will not be dragged to my favorite restaurant every time, and sometimes they should be given the opportunity to drag me. So it happens that I escape the mercury poisoning, for the moment, at least. A fish special is averted now and then, so I live another day or two. Once to watch the chalkboard for is the tuna temari.
The first day I ordered this dish and the tuna balls came rolled in toasted nori and sesame seeds instead of powdered aomori I was surprised and intrigued. This perhaps seemingly insignificant change (from seaweed to seaweed, after all) actually turned out to be the work of a chef inspired. Where the aomori tended to make the mouthful feel too much like a paste, the bits of crisped-up nori actually added texture instead of taking it away, and highlighted the individual flavors of the fish and the seaweed rather than muddling them. Dipped in whatever ratio of wasabi to soy sauce serves you best, the number of flavors double and your tongue is on a pleasure cruise that will make you forgot all the mediocre tuna you've had in the past.
Dang, I got tired and it got bedtime. When did that happen? Think I will get up early tomorrow and walk to work...
Sunday, February 14, 2010
Tuesday, February 09, 2010
Too early
I took on more work than I could feasibly complete, especially since I have been trying to cut OUT time so I can actually do my Japanese homework in a timely manner and study in addition so everything actually sticks. This resulted in me having to wake up very very early (about quarter to four) and work like a maniac before actually going into work. I think things turned out ok, but I was just very tired all day, drinking coffee, etc. etc. It's not a good situation.
That said, what else happened today? Had some meetings at work, helped some people out, good news, bad news, trying to refind my niche a bit.
Incidentally, I have a new emo blog (which you will not read), so this one should remain refreshingly free of bs regarding, oh, insecurities about work, insecurities about food, insecurities about my social life, insecurities and insecurities ;)
After the teleconference with Japan I went to dinner at probably now my second-favorite restaurant, Gracias Madre. OD'd on spinach a bit, but it was tasty.
Came home, practiced guitar for a bit (sore fingers), and have been meaning to get down to business with Japanese, but I may just sack out early and see if I can't wake up a bit before normal to do some then. I would do a bunch during lunch tomorrow except that I have lunch with a co-worker tomorrow...
Maybe this is me overcomplicating things, but I'm thinking that To Do lists should maybe include how. Or maybe you just need a separate How To list. You could do one of them on paper that is a little see through and then line up the To part in the middle for dramatic effect.
That said, what else happened today? Had some meetings at work, helped some people out, good news, bad news, trying to refind my niche a bit.
Incidentally, I have a new emo blog (which you will not read), so this one should remain refreshingly free of bs regarding, oh, insecurities about work, insecurities about food, insecurities about my social life, insecurities and insecurities ;)
After the teleconference with Japan I went to dinner at probably now my second-favorite restaurant, Gracias Madre. OD'd on spinach a bit, but it was tasty.
Came home, practiced guitar for a bit (sore fingers), and have been meaning to get down to business with Japanese, but I may just sack out early and see if I can't wake up a bit before normal to do some then. I would do a bunch during lunch tomorrow except that I have lunch with a co-worker tomorrow...
Maybe this is me overcomplicating things, but I'm thinking that To Do lists should maybe include how. Or maybe you just need a separate How To list. You could do one of them on paper that is a little see through and then line up the To part in the middle for dramatic effect.
Monday, February 08, 2010
ギターブラザー
Nicole is the one helping to perpetuate this voice in my head (re: title of this post).
Anyhow, guitar is going well. I need to find more time to practice, but that is the general state of all things I do.
I think I might turn this into a real journal again instead of just an emo "I need to exercise" blog.
Today I:
- woke up and had an Americano at Borderlands
- had a great guitar lesson. My teacher is really great, has lots of good advice, ultra patient.
- missed my favorite restaurant because they were closed for brunch due to Super Bowl holidayness.
- worked on a freelance project.
- didn't have enough time to study kanji : /
- went to the name of that store we can never remember.
- learned some things about Japanese cuisine that I had never heard.
- treated myself to a fantastic Sardinian Italian dinner.
- got sort of lost in the wide world of Internet, which was pretty relaxing.
Hopefully in the future this will be less of a list and more of a paragraph. I'll try to keep it short and sweet. I sort of miss being able to look back at a day 2 years ago and see what I was doing. Or rather, I know I will miss it in a couple years when I can't look back.
Anyhow, guitar is going well. I need to find more time to practice, but that is the general state of all things I do.
I think I might turn this into a real journal again instead of just an emo "I need to exercise" blog.
Today I:
- woke up and had an Americano at Borderlands
- had a great guitar lesson. My teacher is really great, has lots of good advice, ultra patient.
- missed my favorite restaurant because they were closed for brunch due to Super Bowl holidayness.
- worked on a freelance project.
- didn't have enough time to study kanji : /
- went to the name of that store we can never remember.
- learned some things about Japanese cuisine that I had never heard.
- treated myself to a fantastic Sardinian Italian dinner.
- got sort of lost in the wide world of Internet, which was pretty relaxing.
Hopefully in the future this will be less of a list and more of a paragraph. I'll try to keep it short and sweet. I sort of miss being able to look back at a day 2 years ago and see what I was doing. Or rather, I know I will miss it in a couple years when I can't look back.
Sunday, January 31, 2010
Yeahhhh, I didn't do any of that stuff (but I bought a guitar)
For a brief time I tried wushu, but eventually I decided I needed less obligation and not more. Plus I decided I would rather get serious about guitar (to be able to play はっぴいえんど songs -- yes, the ones I am translating at my Japanese blog) instead of spending money to work out. So I did that.
Had my first lesson today. Think this teacher is going to work out. He's interested in teaching me more than just how to strum, which is cool. We'll be working in plenty of theory and stuff, too. We did six chords today which I can't really remember, and my fingers are sorrrrre, but if I do a little every day hopefully I will have them down by next Sunday.
I say that about kanji, too, and then get busy, so I'm gonna have to implement a little more discipline here! Gotta build up calluses. My fingers are sore...
Had my first lesson today. Think this teacher is going to work out. He's interested in teaching me more than just how to strum, which is cool. We'll be working in plenty of theory and stuff, too. We did six chords today which I can't really remember, and my fingers are sorrrrre, but if I do a little every day hopefully I will have them down by next Sunday.
I say that about kanji, too, and then get busy, so I'm gonna have to implement a little more discipline here! Gotta build up calluses. My fingers are sore...
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