Finally

I have finally finished playing an online game that has been taking up my blogging time. My team won tonight, and now I can safely exit the world of the real-time simulated browser war game. Never to return again.

I am so ashamed, but I wasn't ashamed enough to stop playing, so take that for what you will.

What do They Say About the Eye of the Beholder?

I have a new piece of art. It's jewelry, sort of. At least that's how I've decided to treat it. Here it is -- my new bracelet:



I know, it's a piece of bike chain. But you have to understand that it's not just any bike chain, it's the piece that caused so much fun a few weeks ago.

There's nothing like a bracelet with no opening requiring a person to slide it on and off to remind you that the right side of your body is significantly larger than the left side of your body. It's really hard to get this thing over the right hand, but on the left, I'm convinced it will slide off of its own accord. My right foot is half a shoe size larger than the left, and let's not even discuss what that means for brasierre purchasing. Regardless, do you have one side of your body that's bigger than the other? Which side is it?

November Food Experiment Results

I'm going to start to try to catch up on all the posting I should have been doing in the last month. Almost a month ago, one of the most amazing things to come my way actually happened. I became a published writer. Two weeks ago, I even got a check for that. Crazy, huh? I'm a physics degreed programmer with minimal creative leanings, and here I've actually gotten my words affixed to printed paper that I didn't send to my local printer. It's a little surreal, but I'd appreciate it if you click the link to see for yourself. Since I'm guessing the link will go away at some point, so, I'll reprint it below for your future review.

30 Meals, 1,000 Dishes
A Cooking Challenge of Unusual Proportion
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Thursday, December 13, 2007
By Heather Tufts

Out of boredom and the desire to challenge myself with a simple cooking experiment came the idea to test my stubborn persistence: make a unique homemade dish every day for a month. To bring this one zany idea to fruition I needed:
• 28-31 days
• 18 trips to 5 markets
• 9 cuisines from around the world
• 6 new recipes
• 1 spectacular failure
• 2 cookbooks
• salt and pepper with friends to taste
Set aside a few selected meals intended for guests, so you don’t use the prime recipes before their time. Next, head to the store to pick up the necessary items for the next few days. Wash the dishes that are sitting, dirty, in the sink, but only those that you need to make the current meal. Prepare and serve, preferably to adventurous friends who gush over your talent in the kitchen. Stare at the dirty dishes. Vow to do them all tomorrow and get the kitchen all cleaned up. Go to bed, and repeat for one month.

Some of the more notable results followed:

Szechuan Fried Fish — We all must start somewhere, and my roots are in Hong Kong and China. So, in the beginning it was good.

Pork Tenderloin — Again, I showed my roots with a garlic, ginger, and soy marinade. The tenderloin was seared before roasting just to medium. Why do so many people overcook pork?

Taco Stew — This is one of those meals where the hardest part is operating the can opener. It’s really soup, but my husband, won’t eat soup. So, when he’s around, it’s "stew."

Parmesan-Crusted Snapper — This dish was most notable for the fact that it was the most hideously awful meal I made all month. It smelled like feet and I couldn’t stomach more than a couple bites. Of course, my husband ate it anyway, including the leftovers. I guess there’s really no accounting for taste.

Lentil Chili — Since I have relatives from Texas, I would appreciate it if no one told them that I made a meatless chili (with beans, even!), and especially not that I liked it.

Balsamic Vinegar and Oil with Pasta — Two weeks in and I was hitting the backsplash. My husband generously offered to make the meal I told him to make, but only because it has less than five ingredients.

Other — I may have missed a meal in here somewhere. Let’s try not to harp on that, shall we?

Bulgogi — This is an easy meal (literally “fire meat” in Korean) to make, and a terrible one to have to clean up.

Mardi Gras Pasta — All you fusion chefs out there, eat your heart out on my Cajun-Italian entry.

Szechuan Fried Chicken — I know this may look like my entry from day one, but I promise, they are nothing alike. And I cannot tell a lie.

French Toast — With my husband out of town for work, I decided I could break the rules and eat breakfast for dinner.

Hoi Sin Chilean Sea Bass — This must’ve turned out well. Two weeks later, my dad is still talking about how good it was. I was just happy that Mom helped me with the dishes.

Penne Arrabiata — I love the irony of serving “angry” pasta to my parents.

Thanksgiving — I made the full traditional spread, from turkey and dressing to homemade apple pie and ice cream. It’s my favorite meal of the year. No planning necessary.

Tortilla Soup — This is really nothing like the Taco Stew, which is mostly beans. It’s just a flavorful broth to spoon over avocados and chips and cheese.

Thai Basil Chicken — Delicious, but its only resemblance to the food of Thailand was the use of native basil.

Shrimp Curry — I made this meal with a can of Yeo’s Singapore Curry Gravy. Really good stuff when you’ve only got 45 minutes to make curry.

Lamb Ragoût — A brilliant success, which will likely make it into the regular dinner rotation in the future.

Ham and Mushroom Waffles — Again, this isn’t a repeat of my French-Toast-for-dinner meal. When you put Swiss cheese and buttermilk with ham and mushrooms and pour it all over cornmeal waffles, it’s dinnertime somewhere.

Chicken Marsala — Twenty-nine days into the month and I was just cooking on autopilot. I’m pretty sure I ate it, but I can’t remember.

Green Chicken Enchiladas — I finished the month with a lovely stacked enchilada done in the Crockpot, which is my favorite kitchen appliance, so it seemed a fitting way to end the month’s effort.

A freezer full of leftovers

If I learned anything from this month of cooking, it’s that I hate to do dishes. We’ve got to get one of those fancy dishwasher things … and a garbage disposal … and maybe one of those water sprayers for the sink. That would be nice. I also learned that I really only use two cookbooks. I’m not sure why I have all the others on the shelf, but I constantly refer to Solomon’s The Complete Asian Cookbook and Hazan’s The Classic Pasta Cookbook. Everything else is either one of Mom’s recipes or an improvisational masterpiece (or a parmesan-crusted disaster). Finally, and most unexpectedly, I found that I don’t really like to eat my cooking. I lost three pounds this month cooking something new every day, and I didn’t have three pounds to lose. I think this has to do with the fact that after shopping and prepping and cooking and tasting, I just am not interested in the meal when it gets to the table. I would love to hear if other people take this challenge and come to a similar conclusion. It could be the next diet phenomenon to sweep the nation — “cook more, eat less.”

But next time, someone else can do the dishes.

Kinda surreal. But it was a lot of fun, and I'm glad I had the opportunity. It's always neat to see how these things sometimes happen. No worries, I haven't quit my day job, but it was a fun little diversion.

Rules are Made to be Broken

I have long known that I am a rule follower. I also create new rules for myself all the time. One of my personal rules is that I read every post by a particular blogger before I decide to add links to them off this page. I've alluded to this rule of mine before, so it's not like this is something new in my brain.

However, in every growing, changing organism, one must step out of one's comfort zone and try new things. So, in my own little way, I've now linked to two blogs without reading every entry ever posted. I'm not sure if Tom and George should be flattered that I accepted their blogs without having to read it all, or offended that I didn't spend the time to read all that they'd spent time to write. All I can say for myself is that some of the politically-targeted posts become a little harder to "get" when you're not in that particular climate anymore, and they've both been posting for a long time. Regardless, you should all go read their blogs. Now.

And while Matt didn't get a whole blog post announcing his arrival to the HIAHS world of link-worthy blogs, I did try to point you to his site when I added his site. And he's only been posting since January, so you have no reason not to be able to read the whole posted history there. And you should, so you can celebrate with them one day when they get to have a baby.

The Last Hurrah

Today, the company client conference starts. There are sessions, sure -- I'm giving one of them -- but mostly the next few days are about wining and dining the customers. This is the reason I've stayed in town, even though my house has sold, and it should be a blast. I'll be incongnito for a while, and when I come back, I won't be living in Austin anymore.

See you on the flip side!

Saying Goodbye to Favorite Places

We've sold the house, one of the cars, and lots of furniture. We've packed up both offices and everything else we have. The utilities and gym membership are cancelled. We've said lots of good-byes, and then it was time to hit up most of our favorite restaurants for the last time for a while.

It's important to find these favorite places early on in your time in a city, so if you're new in town, let me give you that info so you can discover them while you have time to enjoy them. For seafood, I love Truluck's and Gumbo's. It's hard to get good seafood so far from the ocean, but these places do well. Near work, I had to hit up Silhouette for sushi happy hour. Other types of happy hours were completed at Saba Blue Water Cafe and Speakeasy. For Mexican food, we've said good-bye to Curra's and Chuy's. We've grabbed burgers and corn dogs at Top Notch. There were last Indian meals at Taj Palace, Vietnamese food at Tan Tan, and Singapore curry noodles from Din Ho. Cake from Bakerman's Bakery was consumed. Today I'm headed out for the best dim sum in the city at T&S Seafood. This evening, it's barbecue at The Salt Lick. It's been a couple of weeks of Mmmmmmmm.

I guess the loose ends are pretty well tied up, and the pants are tightened up (who needs a belt!). I think we're ready to drive 1500 miles across the Southwest United States. When we get to Santa Barbara, we'll be hungry again, I would imagine. If you have suggestions of great places we'll want to eat, let me know in the comments -- return the favor of all the great suggestions I've provided above! We're starting over and there will certainly be hits and misses as we look. We just want to find good new places soon, so we can enjoy them as long as we can, and hopefully as much as we've enjoyed the food here.

Hour Long Commute

This past week, there was a day where it took me an hour to get to work. Generally my commute is more like 15-20 minutes, and when traffic gets really bad it might take 30 minutes, instead. But this particular day, it wasn't a traffic problem that delayed me. However, I was a traffic problem delaying some other folks in their commutes.

I was waiting at a stoplight in the right-hand lane, but a ways back in the line. As I sat there, my car sputtered and died. I tried to start it again, but it wouldn't go. And then the light turned green, and I was blocking traffic. Had I been moving, I could have coasted into a parking lot, but there's not much coasting to be done from a standstill. So, what does a person do next in this situation? Turn on the flashers, put the car in neutral, and try to push it. Now, I don't have a small car, but a massively heavy car. I didn't make much progress -- maybe a centimeter or so. A man got out of his car and helped push. We made more progress that way, but still not enough. Then another man emerged to help, and then another, and then another. With four folks pushing and me just steering at that point, we got the car into a parking space in just a few minutes. One of the guys offered to call a tow truck and a woman pulled over and asked if I needed a ride. I politely declined both offers, and gushingly thanked everyone for their help as they were all running off to get to their own jobs, no doubt. I have to say that I was completely overwhelmed by the number of people who stopped to help a stupid girl who ran out of gas a block and a half from the gas station. I just would never have expected that to happen. Certainly was a nice surprise. Thanks, Austin!

Cowboy Mouth at Antone's

Tonight I went to see Cowboy Mouth at Antone's. I'd never been to a concert there, though I've walked by it numerous times (it's near a club I visited during our customer conference last spring), and it always sounds like good fun is going on inside. I had seen Cowboy Mouth before, but last time it was at La Zona Rosa, which has some similarities to Antone's as a venue. I think the stage is higher at LZR, which worked well with CM. But I digress.

The opening band was called Johnny Sketch, and they were amazing! I love to see band members that look like they are enjoying themselves, and this was definitely the case with this group. Add to that fact the non-standard instrumentation including a tenor sax and a trumpet (they said flugelhorn, but it wasn't that big), and you find yourself in one rocking ensemble. We were a little late arriving at the show, so we missed probably 15 minutes of their set. Regardless, they were a lot of fun (you know that's the case when you remember the name of the opening band at the end of the show).

Then CM came onstage. They have a new bass player since I last saw them, but they seemed like they've been playing together forever. Fred (the drummer/lead singer) will not allow the crowd to just listen -- the audience is part of a Cowboy Mouth show. You have no choice but to get involved: singing, jumping, clapping, screaming -- it's all expected. Fred threw a half dozen sticks into the crowd, and Johnny even threw out his pick. It was tons of fun, especially watching the people who were there. After two solid hours of "Southern Louisiana Rock" I walked back to my car trying to learn how to hear again. And we didn't even stay near the speakers where we started out.

Ah, good fun. And all the better to enjoy with your girlfriend when both husbands are out of town. It's mostly nice just to pretend we aren't normally in bed by 9:30.

Jars of Clay at Stubbs

This weekend I went to see Jars of Clay at Stubbs. Now Stubbs is one of my all-time favorite venues, and I've gone to see bands I've never heard of there. Jars of Clay is one of my favorite bands, and the only band I've seen more than once. So, when I heard they were coming to Austin and playing Stubbs, I had no choice but to attend.

The first time I saw them was at a church in Fort Worth while I was in college. There couldn't have been more than 300 people there, and they did a fully acoustic set, including a violin and cello on a couple of the tracks. After having been involved in a church band for a while now, I have a real appreciation for how much harder it is to make a quiet acoustic song sound good than a really loud, rocking song. But even then, I realized how talented these guys were to make that intimate setting work.

The next year there was a new album, a new tour, and a grammy under their belt, so they had a bigger venue. That year, I saw them open for Michael W. Smith at the Astrodome in Houston. I'm not generally a big MWS fan, but he is a talented musician, and can certainly draw a crowd worthy of the Astrodome booking. And Jars sounded amazing in the big place, too. Their second album was generally passed over, but I think it's been their best so far. It was a reflective album, but it concerted well. I doubt "concerted" is a word, but I have a documented knack for making up words when I need them.

This weekend they were promoting their sixth album, which is a rocking look at the juxtaposition between the good and bad in all of us. Much higher energy than previous albums, and the show was, too. It was like they're all grown up now. They have a more robust sound, but they still stay true to their talented roots. Some of the vocals were muddied through some of the songs, but on the whole, it was a great show. Lots of fun, and I'm glad I went.

Latest New Toy

My latest new toy is like a heartrate monitor with a GPS in it. I've taken it out running the last couple times I've run, and I love it.

I love it because I can run anywhere and know how far I've gone without driving it in my car afterwards. It's all the information that the treadmill gives you that I really like to have (pace, distance, heartrate), with the flexibility of running on the road. And the road is a much more interesting place to run.

As I've been running on the road, I've found that it's surprising how much detail I see in my surroundings. And, more surprising, there is a ton of detail that is different depending on the direction and side of the street that I'm running on. I just wouldn't have expected it. I sort of thought that since I'm moving so much slower that that would determine how much I'd see, but that perspective thingy does a lot to that.

Anyway, better get out to my morning run.

Trying Out New Products

When my sister came to vist in June (the crazy one, not the one that's still in high school), she brought an enormous suitcase for two nights, and we made fun of her. Only slightly kidding, she pointed out that it was lighter when she went back home. See, she's that girl who expects to leave things behind when she visits someone.

This visit, among the things she left were a razor and 4 unused blades. When I called her to get her address to send them back, she assured me she had four others, because she tends to leave them places, and I didn't need to mail it to her. So I didn't. And, being the frugal girl that I am, I decided to use them. I didn't use the blade she had been using -- I used a fresh one. But I figured there was no need for those four brand new blades to go into the trash can, when they'd never done anything to anybody.

So, I present to you, my findings on the Gillette Fusion -- it rocks. I've never had a razor that I could use on a regular basis without cutting myself at least every other time I shaved. I have no idea whether that's the extra blades, or whether there is any benefit of the battery-powered massage action (it feels good, so I've never tried shaving without turning it on). It's just shocking to me that I now haven't cut myself shaving in nearly two months -- and not because I stopped shaving for those two months.

I very seldom am impressed with a product, so I just wanted to share my findings. Take them with a grain of salt, but don't plan to cut yourself on them.

And the Winner is.....

One week!

The appliances have been installed as of Wednesday night -- one week from the day of their appearance on our garage-step. The dishwasher was harder than the range, but then plumbing always involves a bit of voodoo and we had trouble finding fresh chicken blood. Regardless, all is well -- the dishes are clean, and the wok burner is hot.

New Arrivals

Today, the new appliances we'd ordered arrived in our garage. Now, normal people would have had them installed, but we're not normal, so we paid to have them delivered, but my husband wants to install them. So, now what do we have sitting in the garage?

We have a new dishwasher. But instead of a regular dishwasher, we got dish drawers. This is basically two separate one-rack dishwashers sitting on top of one another. When your whole household is only two people, half a dishwasher is generally sufficient.

We also have a new stove. This is one of those fancy ones with a wok burner. Based on my family's history of living in Asia, I love to cook various Asian foods, and regular ranges just don't get hot enough for good stir-fry. Instead, with the current stove, I tend to end up with boiled food rather than stir-fried food. Most unsatisfying. But this should fix this. For my husband, the Baker, it also has a convection oven. I have never used one, and can't really envision what will be better about it, but my husband assures me the cookies will be cooked more evenly and the bread will rise better. I figure if I can have my fancy burner, he can have his fancy oven.

With the new stove, we had to get a new vent hood (the old one hadn't worked in years). It's pretty strong, and is likely to pull my hair off as I cook.

Anyone wanna make any bets on how long it will take to get these installed? One week? Two months? Longer?

Kitchen Improvements

The long-awaited kitchen remodel is finally ready to almost be underway (did I hedge enough there?). We tend to plan things like this a bit much, so it takes a lot longer than it does for normal people to get going on a remodel effort. Of course, normal people hire someone to do it for them. Or at least to supplement the work that they want to do themselves with work done by professionals. But no, not us.

See, my husband is pretty competent with mechanical things. He basically has a PhD in them, and his dad did woodworking as his career for most of his life. So, he's more than competent -- he's quite good, and this makes the work done by most professionals seem shoddy to him. True, he's only doing something once, and has a lot of motivation to do it the right way, but he's also not getting paid by the number of jobs he completes. It all comes back to that old adage -- you can pick two of the three: quality, speed, cheap. Since most people are concerned with "cheap", either quality or speed have to be compromised. And most contractors need the speed for their businesses to succeed. Now, I'm not saying that contractors do a poor job, just that my husband is such a perfectionist that he notices every little gap or nick or thing that just wasn't done the way he would have done them.

As an example, a couple of months ago we had French doors put in to replace the ailing back sliding glass door that had been there forever. We looked at lots of doors, and settled on an unfinished wooden set. We really wanted them to open outward into the back yard, which required fancy security hinges which were backordered and delayed multiple times, but finally arrived, and were installed as agreed. However, one side of the door hole wasn't completely plumb, so they lined everything up, and put the jamb over it. This completely hid the fact that there was a gap, but he wanted it to be shimmed, and he complained about it for weeks, even deciding to boycott the establishment where we got the doors. I've never worried the door wasn't solid, but I do think my husband wants to be sure it's hard for someone to bulldoze our house one day.

As a result, it's actually easier to let him do these things himself. It just means things take forever. So, when he decided he wants to build his own kitchen cabinets, I expressed the concern that we would be without a functional kitchen for a year or more. He agreed that was a valid concern. However, for his mental health, and for preservation of my ears from having to listen to the complaints about someone else's work, I have resigned myself to a long remodel effort. At the end, though, it should be seriously nice.

At this point, we have floor plans, and lots of drawings of various stages of cabinet design. We have new appliances ordered, and they are arriving this week. That will really force us to start making some serious progress.

Pictures may follow, if can remember to pull out the camera for various parts of the process.

This weekend, we went out and ordered a new dishwasher