kochleffel

For East Meets West Day, here's Fred Small's "At the Elbe." Teams at Youngstown State University in Ohio are called the Penguins. I think that no other team uses that name. I would probably like the suggested meal, but it wouldn't work for anyone who avoids gluten, because gluten is very concentrated in seitan. I don't know what the cocktail is and I'm not sure that I want to know. I have usually not enjoyed Malbec when it's been served to me. I haven't been to Ecuador. I wanted to take today off and work tomorrow instead, because it's not likely to rain today and it is likely to rain tomorrow, but I received the last things for the newsletter too late yesterday to avoid some work today. But trash and recycling first.

I just ordered a Frigidaire, same layout. Delivery can't be earlier than May 2, but I can't stay home either then or May 3, so I've scheduled it for May 5. It was a little funny that the blue store would charge me $40 to remove the old fridge, but the electric company will pay me $50 to let them remove it.

I was glad that I renewed my U.S. passport in 2019, about eight months early. The reason for doing it early was that the machine-readable part hadn't been read consistently during travel that summer. I didn't know then that by the time it would have been due to renew in 2020 the Passport Office would be almost shut down.

That seems to be more common than I would have thought. The daughter of a friend became vegetarian when she was about 9, but to tell the truth, she only ate potatoes.

If it's a real pig in a real blanket, I don't want one. If we're talking about the food item called pig in a blanket, I don't want that, either. It is a matter of shame for me that the North American Jewish community persisted so long in denying the Armenian genocide, I think because leaders feared that acknowledging it would affect the back channel between the governments of Israel and Turkey. That has changed. If Scream Day refers to the Munch painting, I saw one of the several versions of it last year in Oslo. If anyone is actually going to scream, please wait until I leave the room. For registering on a website for work, I had to put down the name of my favorite actress and it took me a while to think of one. I'd be OK with vegetarian eggplant lasagna (btw, I think that all eggplants are vegetarian), but wouldn't it be like eggplant parmesan? No cucumber-melon concotions, please. I would probably like the wine. I haven't been to Puerto Quetzal but you could probably have guessed that. Today I've been working on a publication that was supposed to go to press today, but from the cooperation that I'm (not) getting, you would never know that. Dinner tonight will be the last of the not-beefaroni, plus zucchini.

That made me think of a very strange restaurant called Raest in the Faroe Islands. It specializes in traditional Faroese foods, which were virtually all dried, fermented, or both, and served about a seven-course menu, each course accompanied by a specific wine, beer, or liqueur. If you didn't drink alcohol, you could get it with a different juice for each course, at a reduced price. Dinner there was, shall I say, memorable, especially because fermented lamb is an acquired taste that I didn't acquire.

I was lacking both ingredients and inspiration, so dinner tonight was broccoli and a cheese omelet. Last night's dinner, and today's lunch, would have been beefaroni if I had used beef and macaroni, but I used fusilli and vegetarian crumbles. For the record, vegetarian crumbles are not made from real vegetarians. Friday and yesterday I binge-watched the first season of Home Town Takeover, because the second season was starting today and watching them alternately would have been too confusing. I had some ideas for my kitchen and bathroom while watching, even though there was nothing they did in any episode that I wanted in my own home. Although I watch some HGTV, I've been thinking that it's a pernicious influence. It's become possible to guess which shows people watch with just a glance at their homes. Shiplap? Carrara marble? Mirrors? (That show isn't running any longer.) My plans don't include any of those, other than a mirror over the bathroom sink.

@aliaschief, I feel this way even though I'm of the boomer cohort myself. The first boomers were born in 1946, so our parents all remembered the Great Depression, when no one had money to buy anything, and World War II, when everyone had money but there was nothing to buy, and they never threw anything away.

Dean Martin made "Everybody loves somebody sometime" famous within my lifetime, although the song was written before I was born. I don't have any English muffins on hand; in fact, the only bread in the house is starting to get moldy. This will not be a very good day for a picnic. I don't love macaroni and cheese, even without artichoke and spinach. The drink looks complicated, and I see that the wine steward has rocketed back to New Zealand. I will counter with Fulkerson Winery 2019 Pinot Noir from the Finger Lakes. I haven't been to Papua New Guinea. Today I teach Hebrew at 9:30 and II Kings at 10:30. After lunch, a trip to the hardware store, and I guess to the grocery (for bread).

We were talking about sex-llinked colors and markings in cats. Here's an account of a male calico kitten who turned up at a shelter in Colorado. Only 1 in 3,000 calicos is a male. https://www.coloradoan.com/story/life/2023/04/21/rare-male-calico-kitten-born-in-colorado-cat-rescue-names-him-unicorn/70131661007/

I was thinking along the same line, although I hadn't thought of the non-adhesive bandage to hold it. I was imagining tying a strip of cloth or gauze, but I realized that I couldn't tie anything behind my head. This refers to general klutziness; I'm not saying that it would be impossible.

Social media are full of ads for expensive, supposedly earth-friendly products that serve purposes for which I think nothing is needed. One of my board members was a Girl Scout leader. I would prefer to have as little to do with jelly beans as possible. Ravioli would be OK with me. If it the sauce is white I'd need to find a low-lactose way of making it. I would probably like the cocktail, but don't have the components for it. I'd probably like the wine, too. I haven't been to Falmouth in the UK, or to any Falmouth anywhere. The Weather Channel website says "Thunderstorms likely to continue for the next several hours," but they haven't started yet. It has felt all day as if one were imminent.

In the paper today, Miss Manners answered a burning question: Is it rude to turn off the light while the cat is eating? https://www.washingtonpost.com/advice/2023/04/21/miss-manners-cat-eating-in-dark/

I have read that, too, and that most tortoiseshell and calico cats are female. Did you know that female cats are usually right-pawed and male cats are usually left-pawed? I had not heard that, but it wouldn't surprise me. The fellow who was hanging around here hasn't been around for the past few days.

Back from the recycling drop-off. I also picked up Sasha's ashes and went to a produce market, both farther along the same road. Although this is a hot day, it's still April, so there was no local produce except hot-house tomatoes. They have extensive greenhouses and grow a lot of vegetable starts and bedding plants, which they start to set out during May. I have more cardboard to drop off next week. I seem not to have set any of it out for recycling during the winter; they can't accept it if it gets wet.

My kindergarten teacher was Mrs. Decker. I've already posted about Red Cross Day. I knew about the Battle of San Jacinto but it didn't come immediately to mind this morning. The fish would probably be OK with me, but the cocktail seems unnecessarily complicated. The wine seems not to be widely available in North America but is way beyond my budget anyway. I still haven't been to French Polynesia or any Polynesia. I worked at home this morning and next is to take cardboard to the recycling drop-off. I think I will hold back the Misfits boxes, because they're clean inside (they had insulating liners) and are very sturdy, and offer them free online. Giving stuff away is rather a pain, because so often people want to pick it up at an inconvenient time, or ask one to hold it for them, which would be tolerable if they actually showed up, but frequently they don't. It's going to be 86° today, 75° tomorrow, and the 55-60° next week, but I'm predicting extreme cold and snow, because I washed and put away my winter coat.

TRUE! Many people are moved to donate money after disasters occur, but for the Red Cross and other organizations involved in disaster relief, it's important to have funds in hand so that a response doesn't have to wait for money to be raised. But I don't think that today is American Red Cross Giving Day: The ninth annual American Red Cross Giving Day is on Wednesday, March 22, 2023. Giving Day takes place in March during Red Cross Month, when we recognize the people who make our mission possible — volunteers, blood donors, people trained in lifesaving skills and our supporters — who step up to aid others when #HelpCantWait. https://www.redcross.org/donations/ways-to-donate/giving-day.html I also give blood. They've started informing blood donors about where their blood was used, which felt a bit creepy to me, but I think they want to assure donors that their blood wasn't sent outside the region. I learned yesterday that my March donation was used at Rochester General.

That might be a good thing. When I had my broken nose repaired, it was same-day surgery and I would have liked an overnight stay--the surgery was late in the day and I was slow to come out of anesthesia, but the main thing was that I was going to be alone at home. A friend said I should get someone to stay with me, because I would need adult supervision. I replied that I already had Fergus, the Senior Cat in Charge, which was more than enough supervision for an entire household. .

Also on the appliance topic: oy oy oy oy oy. Kitchen remodeling is not imminent, but the refrigerator I want is on sale through next week. The trouble is that it's taller than the space. I'm going to see how hard it would be to remove the cabinet above it. The reason the cabinet is too low is that there's also a soffit. One of the remodeling goals is to eliminate the soffits.

Several years ago in another forum, a retired RN posted a comprehensive list of medical things that she packed, including not only many different medicines, but also instruments and equipment that an average person might not even know how to use. She said that she often traveled with a large extended family and everyone expected her to take care of everything. I have no medical training, only long experience of hypochondria. I pack small amounts of most of the OTC medicines that I keep on hand at home, and when travel resumed in 2021 I added a digital thermometer and a pulse-oximeter.

It wasn't formally approved until Wednesday.

I went to college with many Chinese majors. It was a specialty of the school. I also had two look-alikes in college, another student and an assistant professor. The volunteer recognitions that I have received were all lame, but that's not an argument against them. Tortellini with asparagus and lemon would be OK with me, so please let me know when I can pick them up. I'm slightly ashamed to say that I would probably like the drink, although I might not be brave enough ever to order it. I would probably like the wine and it seems to be available in New York. I haven't been to New Zealand. Today I need to buy groceries, possibly at both Aldi and Wegmans, and do some outdoor work. An additional covid booster, already available in Canada and the UK, has been approved for people over 65 or immunocompromised. I will wait to get one, since I've had covid too recently to need or want one now, and probably get it about a month before Rosh Hashanah so that it will be effective during our fall holidays and the November cruise.

I don't know about Aruba, but most of the drinking water on Curacao is produced by Aqualectra, which is also the electric company, through desalinization and reverse osmosis. I have experienced rainfall on Curacao, but there's not much. From Wikipedia: The ABC islands have an atypical hot desert climate seen in hot pockets of Australia, Köppen climate classification BWh and BWk, with some notable rain but an excess of evaporation over precipitation. Surfaces on these islands hold little moisture and evaporate the little rainfall they receive. In addition, Aruba–Curaçao–Bonaire cactus scrub is the most common vegetation on these islands. Furthermore, the ABC islands are very dry as they lie north of the Intertropical Convergence Zone. Only in their short rainy season from October to December or January are they exposed to showers or storms formed from the northeast trade winds.

Sometimes that is what resulted in the shortest run of wiring, or what best balanced the loads on different circuits. Or not. The outlet under my desk upstairs is on the same circuit as the kitchen, downstairs but not below the study. That will all probably have to be changed when work on the kitchen starts (not imminent; bathroom will come first) because code no longer allows it. The kitchen might require as many as three new circuits, and the panel is full. I'm hoping that the bathroom, where the work is essentially cosmetic, is grandfathered. Today was my day off, but I didn't have the energy for any outside work and did office work at home instead. My current plan is to do outdoor work tomorrow, and I am pleased to have remembered to find and plug in the chargers for the lawn mower, hedge trimmer, and reciprocating saw. The only thing that was already charged was the drill, which I don't plan to use tomorrow. I wrote ca. 2006 in an Apartment Therapy forum that it's sensible to fix all the small things that annoy you, because they will continue to annoy you day after day until you do. I'm finally taking my own advice, although some of is just upgrading products that have never worked the ways I wanted them to.

I'm all in favor of garlic, but maybe not in ice cream. I don't have an outdoor clothesline but I often air-dry laundry on hangers. I don't have a bicycle; a friend here who used to ride one to work stopped because the crazy drivers in cars made it too dangerous--it's impossible to go much of anywhere in our town without using the main streets, which are state highways. I'm not very fond of tilapia, although a piccata sauce might improve it. I'd prefer Roy's alternative. No, no, no on pineapple drinks. I would probably like the wine. I haven't been to Flam. It was 39° when I got up (rather late) and will probably reach 59° this afternoon. Tomorrow will be warmer and on Friday it could be back up to 86°. The board meeting last night wasn't horrible, but I woke up at 4:00 a.m. and couldn't get back to sleep until 6:00. They want to know whether I want red wine or white at my retirement lunch, but I'd prefer that the event not take place at all.