Patron Saint of Falling Over Things

It's been a minute. I'm okay. Just trucking along day by day in this weird post-COVID world. There has been some major depression. I'm still living in Pelican Town pretty much full time. (Where would we all be without Stardew Valley?)

Every day at work is incredibly frantic and I don't really understand why? It's numerically not much busier, but everything is more difficult. It's like someone turned the gravity up, and all tasks are effortful. Not just for me, but for everyone at work. We're all getting mystery illnesses that I can only put down to stress. Kidney stones and cellulitis and shingles. I've cracked two teeth this year.

In better news, the cats are getting friendlier and friendlier, though they're still acquaintances rather than friends. As of today, though, they're acquaintances who sniff each other's butts. Huge strides in cat society.

( Tenuous cat harmony under the cut )

This is technically a reading post. Reading is a thing I can do while working out or crafting or just staring at the wall, so I've actually read a fair bit!

The Just City by Jo Walton, narrated by Noah Michael Levine (Book 1 of the Thessaly Series)
- amazing premise: Athene creates a planned community based on Plato's Republic, then grabs idealists from all parts of the timestream to govern and raise orphan children in perfect platonic conditions.
- did not stick the landing, and the closer I got to the end, the more I felt the whole story start to collapse.
- was still a worthy read, because wow, what a concept.
( spoilers are a thought experiment )

This Poison Heart by Kalynn Bayron, narrated by Jordan Cobb
- AAAdorable
- a perfect gift for queer nerdy teenagers
- protagonist is a queer nerdy POC teenager
- who happens to have magic plant abilities
- and a weird affinity for poisonous plants
- really creative ideas in this
- tone pitches at the younger end of YA
- without being patronising or saccharine
- kind of a cross between X-Men stuff and magic
- don't usually see mutant/magic kids coming from happy homes
( Keep spoilers out of reach of children )

Velocity Weapon by Megan E. O'Keefe, narrated by Joe Jameson
- Soldier is kidnapped by a grief-mad ship
- Yes, this is a plot in Radchaai dramas
- I think it was probably done better in the Radch
- They would certainly say so, anyway.
( Spoilers saw the target as they went whistling past )

Circe by Madeline Miller, narrated by Perdita Weeks
- gorgeous, dreamy writing
- Real Housewives of Mythology but in a good way
- Circe is compelling, empathetic, a great character voice
- Narration is intimate, enfolding, beautifully done
- Scylla will be in my nightmares forever
- Wtaf happened to Madeline Miller that she thought of this?
- I bet she met something very nasty in the garden, with too many legs and possibly mucous
- Old gods are great and terrible and make the worst relatives
- And new gods are that newly rich family with the big big house and a swimming pool
- while you're stuck in your cave with all your cousins who are also your sisters somehow
- You can tell I devoured this book like it was a big messy delicious peach
( Cut is delicious right up until the last mouthful )

The Goblin Emperor by Katherine Addison, narrated by Kyle McCarley
- First up, I liked this book a lot, jsyk
- but it's not a good one for audio
- not because of the narrator, he was fine. He was great.
- The problem was the abundance of Elvish words
- It took me 2/3 of the book to figure out what was terminology or titles of address, and not actual names
- SO MANY DIFFERENT PARTS OF THE COURT all with different elvish names
- ALL THE SEXY YOUNG THINGS ARE CALLED MIN WHY
- (Min is a pretty sexy name, much sexier than Miss)
- It seems obvious when I write it down
- but at the time I was very confused
- I did enjoy it very much once I realised
- Maia is a true cinnamon roll
- Might go back and relisten now I have a better idea of the language


Gods of Jade and Shadow by Silvia Moreno-Garcia, narrated by Yetta Gottesman
- Ohhhhh lovely
- Okay. I think I found a new author to follow
- (Oooh, she has so much to read!)
- This is set in Jazz-age Mexico
- starring a clever maid on a quest
- alongside an ancient Mayan god of death fighting to regain his throne
- and a supporting cast that will dazzle and delight you
- and yet retain historical context
- it's honestly so fucking good
- cannot endorse more highly
- where are my five seasons and a movie???


The Murderbot Diaries by Martha Wells, narrated by Kevin R Free
- caught myself all the way up
- but read the last two out of order, I think?
- didn't matter, I figured it out
- I like Kevin R Free's narration, it reminds me that I have a tendency to slide into a head voice for Murderbot that is distinctly feminine, and kind of pulls me back into an ungendered POV
- Huh, I didn't read them out of order, now that I look on Audible
- Network Effect (the novel) is fantastic, omg, how far our little murderbot has come!
- It still seems to me like Fugitive Telemetry (the novella Audible calls #6 in the series), is set before the novel. There's none of the consequences we see in Network Effect. It's weird.
- I love the series but I am confuse.

The Jasmine Throne by Tasha Suri, narrated by Shiromi Arserio
- *screams in happy lesbian*
- this is very beautiful and very gay
- it has all the fairytale tropes, and an Indian-inspired world
- only gay
- gorgeous gorgeous gorgeous magic system
- I love everyone in this bar novel
- cannot wait for the sequel
( this content warning cut is on fiyah )


The Angel of the Crows by Katherine Addison, narrated by Imogen Church
- First comes the moment when you realise you're reading Sherlock Holmes wingfic
- Then comes the moment when you say 'fuck it, I'm enjoying it'
- Confused as to why names had to be changed
- and frankly, calling Watson 'Doyle' is a little on the nose
- This is not a Jam Watson though
- He will certainly fuck you up a lot if you cross him
- The good thing about Holmes AUs is picking up on which canon stories are being used
- This was well done in the book! Comfy and familiar, but with interesting twists
- Angel society was beautiful and layered and weird
- It was very clear that this came from the hand that wrote The Goblin Emperor
- Narration was a bit odd, with heavy emphasis on the LAST. WORDS. OF. EACH. SENTENCE.
- It took a while to get used to, but fortunately the drama of the book rose to a point that NEEDED. EMPHASIS.
( Spoilers have unexpected twists )

Stories of the Raksura Book 1 by Martha Wells, narrated by Christopher Kipiniak
- Short stories
- These books are always fun
- I love these poly matriarchal dragon folk
- not much else to say? These books are a known quantity to me
- but if you're into found family, non-human dynamics, magic
- you're probably going to like this series
- and there's a bunch of them yay


Welp, this post has taken me a week to write. I'm going to cut it short here and keep going on a new post that will probably take me a whole week again.

It's still nice to post, I have to say. *waves*

ETA: By the time that this got posted, we're out of lockdown. Masks only indoors or outdoors where social distancing is impossible. I am stiff and sorry from not being able to get to the hydrotherapy pool, but I'm otherwise doing okay.

We're slamming back into Stage 4 lockdown at midnight. So far, I've felt the introvert's euphoria of legitimately cancelled plans, and the horror of watching a perfectly balanced roster collapse as leave is called off. I saw someone on FB refer to this feeling as riding the coronacoaster. It seems right.

Poor hospitality businesses, who were all primed for Valentine's Day.

I could do without all the sniping at Dan Andrews, also. In the middle of a crisis, sniping and trolling is worse than useless. He's not doing a perfect job, but he's doing okay. Fuck sake.

*deep breath*

( The Equalizer )

( WandaVision - spoilers for episodes 5 and 6 )

( Clarice ep 1.01 )


Hurt Comfort Exchange 2021
I have four tabs open at the moment specifically dedicated to nomination for Hurt/Comfort Exchange 2021. It's a tricky sign-up! A high degree of difficulty! So many freeforms. I'm nominating The Black Tapes, the new Equalizer series and Person of Interest. Maybe WandaVision? Maybe Captain Marvel? Maybe Star Trek: Discovery? Oh, oh, maybe A Simple Favour, which was really incredibly gay and fun.

ETA: welp, since I wrote that, I got my noms in, and I'm working on my letter. It's still a really hard sign-up for me though? I never know if I should start with the tag or with the pairing or what the heck. Also I worry about ending up writing the fic in the request - the tags are so thorough. But this year, I'm going to be ready. I'm going to get that sign-up done. *cracks knuckles*


Festivids
A few that I really enjoyed from Festivids.

Monument Valley
A lovely, ticky-tocky vid for a beautiful game:
Sacred Geometry by findmeinthealps (General)


Mallory Towers
This vid is full of pluck! I haven't seen the series yet, but gosh, I really want to now.
try everything (sometimes we come last but we did our best) by itsanizzyb (General)


The Old Guard
Lovely vid with found-family themes. Oh, I love this movie so much!!
Never Look Awayby kaydeefalls (Teen)


Jelle's Marble Runs
This is marble runs and the William Tell Overture. It's a perfect match, and the timing is spot on.
The Marble Overture by cosmic_llin (General)

The Strange Case of Starship Iris
I love vids for non-visual media, because they're usually so clever. This one uses a particularly memorable scene in Season One, and gives you an external POV that somehow makes you feel like you're inside the cockpit of the Rumor. It's really good and made me love the podcast all over again.
Space Bees by cupidsbow (General)


Repair Shop
Two vids for Repair Shop, a show which was my favourite 2020 reality TV discovery. They're both by odessie which surprised me, because they're very different. The first is energetic and full of movement. The second is full of love for the making of things, and I love it.
Back It Up by odessie (General)
Time to Make Sawdust by odessie (General)


Vids!!

I will finish with this excellent kitty photo, with big demon/angel energy:

Pandemic stuff is ongoing and tiring, but I'm alive and lilacsigil is alive. We are both alive.

We adopted two adult tonkinese cats. It was an exhausting round trip drive into Melbourne before the second lockdown, but it was entirely worth it. Their previous owner was rehoming them because they were not a good mix with the toddler, and now it seems the owner is moving back to Queensland. The kitties are six and five.

( cat spam )

I don't know when I'll have time for another update, as work has been really frantic since the pandemic hit, and doesn't show signs of slowing down. But this was important! And I wanted to note it.

Stay safe. Wear a mask, if you can.

Still not on fire! The air quality is garbage, it's smoky as hell. I'm really glad my GP changed my inhaler up, because I don't think I would be managing this well on the Seretide. Symbicort is surprisingly good. I have it in Rapihaler form instead of the turbuhaler (the dry powder version), and I think it's working well for me.

Things continue medical: I had a chest x-ray today (GP wants to make sure the asthma is just asthma), and dropped off the forms for my own colonoscopy (as opposed to the one lilacsigil is having next week.) I'm going public, because our private hospital is Catholic. lilacsigil doesn't get a choice because the Catholic hospital is the one her specialist works out of, but they were okay last time.

Ugh.

Baggins did some kind of soft tissue injury to his back knee, and because he's old with dodgy kidneys, he can't have his NSAID painkiller anymore. This is a bummer because it was honey-flavoured and he liked it. He's currently on gabapentin mashed into butter, to which he takes great offense, but is too sleepy to fight us off. (Also he can't bite us anymore. I would laugh but it's so tragic.) He spends most of the day stoned out of his gourd, but he's obviously in less pain, and incidentally doing less over-grooming. He put on 400g in a week too. It's not all bad.

Linkspams

- From muccamukk
Dirtbag Catullus
AND YES DEATH IS COMING OR WHATEVER
BUT WE HAVE TIME FOR A THOUSAND THEN HUNDRED MAKEOUTS BEFORE THEN

- Via sorchasilver - a Leverage rewatch is happening, and I love the comm name so much: the_rewatch_job
From the intro post, here are a couple of fandom primers, in case people who do not know the love of this show are considering it:
This one doesn't have images anymore (thanks LJ) but it does have good and non-spoilery character rundowns: Leverage: Fandom Overview
This one goes into more depth than is needed for a beginner, and it's on LJ so it has become messed up with ads, but it has lovely pic-collages:
Leverage Primer (part 1)

- From dine - a whole lot of animal diagrams that are hilarious when viewed out of context. (CW: one of them is Schrodinger's cat, which I find less hilarious because dead cat.)
Science Diagrams Featuring Animals Is Inexplicably Bizarre

- goodbyebird is hosting a Mandalorian friending meme. I don't watch the show (yet) but I do love some baby Yoda:
Come get you some foundlings!

- homemade2homemade is running again this year - it's a fandom handicrafts exchange. Do you think people would like handmade journals with painted pages and so on? Because that's a thing I could make and make fannishly:
Round Three starting soon!

- rthstewart will be running the Three Sentence Ficathon again, yay!! This is so much fun - you write a fic in three sentences:
Three Sentence Ficathon -- Beginning February 1

- I really enjoyed this Stumptown Fandom Primer from enemyofperfect (I'm so nearly caught up on this show - every episode has new shippy potential. So many f/f ships!):
Stumptown!

- Via my little sister dishing me the hard facts on how eating bananas makes you more prone to mosquito bites. "That's got to be an old wives' tale," I said to her. We looked at each other and we both turned to google because we're both pharmacists who are used to debunking old wives' tales. It turned out to be an actual, repeatable effect:
Impact of Consumption of Bananas on Attraction of Anopheles stephensi to Humans

- Via The Guardian, a nice beginner's explanation to using they/them (which might be a more useful resource than smacking someone on the head and shouting "DOES IT HURT YOU TO JUST BE KIND TO PEOPLE? USE THEIR PRONOUNS!" which is how I feel sometimes.)
So your friend came out as non-binary: here’s how to use pronouns they/them

- Via my software update for Firefox (which I'm still using, because I fear change more than I want rows of tabs), and because it is endlessly entertaining:
50,000 Most Common Passwords
For example, a list of incomplete nerdery titles: spiderma, wolverin, daredevi, wonderwo, doctorwh and darthvad

- Via chinashop - angeloftheneorth is hosting a Language Café
Café des Langues | Caffi Iaith | The language Café post
Some time ago I had this idea that I would once or twice a month host a post where people could practice their languages, or encourage learners to mingle with experts. There would be a subject, and a question to get people talking, with one thread for each language.

- seasonofkink is still hosting their holiday challenge:
Welcome to the Holiday Season!
*Choose at least three (3) kinks from our long list of kinks here, and create one fanwork that incorporates all the kinks you have chosen.

- Via fail_fandomanon - the fabrics for these custom pokemon shirts are adorable! You have to select a shirt style to get to the fabric choices. I really like how the designs are tailored to each pokemon:
Original Stitch: Pokemon shirt

- I made some Person of Interest icons, hopefully so that the mostly-discord side of fandom feels a bit more comfortable posting on the Dreamdwidth discussion post for bookclub. They're just cropped and coloured bases, but it was fun to work through the screencaps and find some characters that I know are faves of people on discord, like Leon and Fusco and Mark Snow:
Icons!

(The discord is here, by the way: The Subway. It's a very friendly, not terrifically busy sort of place.)


Now I must go to bed, because I have to work all sorts of weird days this week. (Much like Baggins, I take great offense. I do not like change. Rosters should remain stable at all times. Stuff me full of buttery gabapentin, please.)

I got a last minute treat in the Exchange of Interest, it's Lionel Fusco and his actual literal moral compass, and I want the whole world to read it:

True North (4680 words) by livenudebigfoot
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: Person of Interest (TV)
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Relationships: Lionel Fusco/John Reese
Characters: Lionel Fusco, John Reese
Additional Tags: Magical Artifacts, Dubious Morality, Fusco is Slightly Magical and Annoyed About It AU, Treat
Summary:

Lionel Fusco has a moral compass. But, like, an actual one. He keeps it in his pocket and sometimes he argues with it.

Linkspams
- sholio is hosting a Defenders Prompt Fest, in celebration of Jessica Jones Season 3.

- Signup are open for Multifandomdrabble 2019 Round Two

- Nominations are open for Everywoman 2019

- corsetsandlemons is a Classic Literature Anonymous Kink Meme, omg. The current post is here: Corsets and Lemons Kinkmeme
I loved the description on fandomcalendar: So if you want to see those Jane Austen heroines have a nice orgy with each other, or if you have untold wtf fantasies about Rochester (who hasn’t), or if you really want that Bingley/Darcy hurt/comfort fic this is the place for you.

- seasonofkink is open for business. You can ask for a card here: Sign-up for 2019 Season of Kink!

- I grabbed this link when the GoT finale was going down (my condolences on that, people who are fans and did not enjoy it.) I've saved it to my writing resources tag because it's an excellent explanation of the difference between pantsers and plotters, and the benefits of each method. I'm blown away by the idea that pantsing might even have benefits. I've always thought of pantsing (ie, writing by the seat of your pants, with little or no plan) as a really bad idea and something I should try to avoid and yet never can. But in this series of tweets, it describes pantsers as people who write to find out what happened, which is EXACTLY what I do. And maybe I should be viewing that as a form of first draft, something that gets my story down. The link is here:

Want to know why Game of Thrones *feels* so different now? I think I can explain. Without spoilers.

It's talking in context of Game of Thrones and the way GRRM writes, and what that meant for the showrunners, but I found it really interesting for the way that I write.

- Also an excellent writing resource, this article talks specifically about Scottish Gaelic, but is applicable to using other languages in the body of you work, how to make good decisions about those words and make them mean something in the narrative:
How to Use Scottish Gaelic in Your Novel, Part 2: An Example

Baggins got sick at the end of May, but he's better now: ( head cat is just a head )

In the tradition of pets becoming like their owners, lilacsigil's cat is bossy, and my cat is an anxious bag of nerves.

State of cat:
BAGGINS IS A FREE ELF! He's off sub-q fluids, he's got, as far as vets could tell while he was fully perfused, good renal function and low CK, and seems fit to make a full recovery from the snake bite. We are very lucky. So very lucky. Now we need to build him up and get him well, but he's doing a lot of that work himself, as cats do (MOSTLY BY JUMPING ON THE KITCHEN BENCH TO LOOK FOR HUMAN FOOD GRRR.) We think we found the site of the original bite - back right leg - because the skin got pink and raw there, but it's healing up. And as the vets said he would, he's doing his own physio, working on those damaged muscles in his wheel and playing with his brother. He's the best of cats. Champion of cats. Most cat of cats. <3


State of me:
Prednisolone is a beast, and it's slowly frying my brain, so I'm currently resorting to pink wine in the early afternoon. I'm not at work or anything, so I feel like that's a valid decision.

My concentration window has been appalling so I've barely read any Yuletide, beyond my wonderful gift fics, which has been sad-making because I love the process of reading and reccing and commenting. I'm hopeful that as the pred dose drops, my ability to get my eyes to stick to the screen will improve. I've got a doctor's appointment upcoming where we can review the rate of decrease and make some kind of long term plan. In the meantime, I'm average four-five hours of sleep a night, getting up at 5:30 with a weird unfocused mania that has me running around the house ~doing things and ~making plans. And crochet. Crochet is a life-saver at the moment. I still have knees, though right knee is making a whispered reappearance on the pain scale, possibly because I'm doing as much movement while I still can.


State of the Yuletide:
I wrote this for The Black Tape podcast - when my brain is up to it, I'll post it here properly. And answer comments, oh, gosh.
A Child's Path to Clarity (4672 words) by st_aurafina
Chapters: 1/1
Fandom: The Black Tapes Podcast
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Characters: Richard Strand, Alex Reagan, Nic Silver
Additional Tags: Bookstores, Conversations
Summary:

"Almost certainly," said Alex. "Is most definitely not certain."

State of Livejournal:
I'm lucky/sheltered/Australian enough not to feel too threatened by the move of servers to Russia, so I'm not going to delete or stop cross-posting at the moment. I've got a permanent account over there, so I won't be giving them more money in the future, and basically Dreamwidth has been my homebase for a long time now, so I'm going to sit tight and see what changes. If you guys want to defriend over there, though, go for it. I totally understand, and I want people to feel safe.

More information about LJ and Russia:
From mamculuna: CONFIRMED: LJ Servers moving to Russia, now with all kinds of links and shit
From umadoshi: Sooooo...about Russia and LJ (unrelated links, related links, and personal notes)

Cat update
( Generally good news! Some vet medical stuff )

Snake Update
We found experts! They came up from Geelong on the day that I called them, it was awesome. They were massive nerds like us, loved our nerdy bookshelves and the nerdy names we gave our cats and considering they had to go right through everything in the house, it actually felt much safer and familiar than you would think. Social anxiety and snake anxiety aside, it was about as good as that experience could be. If anyone of my Aussie flist needs a rec for a local snake team, drop me a PM because I'd rec them.

( more snake specific than some people might want to read )

Quick Recipe Friday
You'd think I'd had no time to bake, wouldn't you? Ha! Every time I picked up a spatula, drama did happen. It was eerie. (Or I pick up a spatula very frequently.)

Something I cooked recently:
Ottolenghi’s Lemon-Semolina Cake

I made it in muffin form, I made the olive oil variant, and they're really good. But my oven cooked the tops really, really quickly, so next time I'm putting the temp down and the time longer. I will never learn, with my terrible, terrible oven, but I can't stand the idea of having tradies in the house right now to put in a new one, so I have to suck it up. Under the over-brown top though, they're nice and moist, are keeping for longer than muffins would, and the lemon taste is really good. Definitely a good GF option for a small, snacky/tea time cake or muffin thing

ETA: After lilacsigil said that the muffins were a little grittier in texture than she expected, I have discovered that semolina is not polenta. I like the slightly gritty texture, but perhaps next time I'll try actual semolina flour rather than polenta. But I thought they were the same!!

Trail Mix Energy Bites
I made these on Sunday, and Baggins started getting sick right in the middle of it, so I forgot to put the rolled oats in. They actually came out okay - but more of a confection than a snack food, if you know what I mean. They're nice! They're not technically a FODMAP friendly food, because of the honey and the fruit. And the pretzels, of which I had none so I smushed up some Ritz instead, but when we needed something sweet for our shocky little selves after the vet visits, they were awesome. Salty-sweet and satisfying. I will be trying them again with the oats in this time.



Something I have concrete plans to cook soon:
It is gnocchi weekend! It's nice and cool today, so I'm going to be roasting potatoes and making... Omg, I didn't bookmark my gnocchi recipe. *freaking out* It was a roast potato one, it worked really great, omg, I shouldn't even need a recipe! But I am a bad granddaughter and do not know it by heart, ohnoes.

I will use this one from the Guardian: How to make the perfect gnocchi though it be filled with terrible copy.

And I'm going to scoop out some of that potato mash and making this potato focaccia I linked last Friday.

I've got a bottle of passata that I'm going to oomph up with some fresh herbs, and bake the gnocchi in that - eat some, freeze some for Christmas meal time, and hopefully all will be good.


Something I'm idly planning to cook in the future:

Shredded chicken, cucumber and noodle salad
I'm still craving weird things, and single-ingredient foods, like, apparently cucumber. Also this looks nice and summery.

Walnut pesto
I have a bulk bag of walnuts, and I'm still looking for a good sandwich condiment that I can keep the garlic out of.


Yay getting back on track with posting, yay for a better cat, yay for a (probably probably) snake free house.

Sneaking in a happy birthday to the three other fangirls who share my birthday: eumelia, thisbluespirit, and lurkingcat. And to muccamukk, who pipped us all at the post by a day. Mine was yesterday, because of datelines, but it's still the 14th on the other side of the world.

I had a good day, considering that birthday season is a little like duck season in my family. But I baked a plaited fruit bread and a blueberry muffin slice, had an awesome freaking work out with my personal trainer (I mean, one of those ones where she says "And it's time to stretch!" and you don't want to stop because everything feels so good.) lilacsigil bought an electric blanket for my old bones, and I got to snuggle with Baggins who felt so safe he could tuck his nose under his paw. It was adorable.

( Hobbit cat is cosy )

We still haven't moved - there's tradies going everywhere, and right now the driveway is being concreted (because the gravel was deep and horrible to walk in.) We had the pleasure of talking to a guy who makes bookshelves, and after much arm waving and showing of pictures on the internet, he is going to build us a bookshelf that has steps on the side so the cats can get to the top and run around. I am not ashamed to be that cat lady.

It's so much cooler now. The sky is eerily orange from the fires in the Grampians, but there's nothing close to us at the moment. It's nice to be able to open up the house and get some fresh air into it. Now I'm watching lilacsigil play Lego Marvel Super Heroes. She's driving in New York. We couldn't figure out why everyone was on the wrong side of the road. Hopefully, they will just assume that Tony is wasted. It seems reasonable.


We ventured into the garden for the first time this week, and holy cow, the zucchinis are coming. THE ZUCCHINIS ARE COMING! Fortunately I have been stashing zucchini recipes on Pinboard, so I am ready. The basil is looking awesome. There are tomatoes everywhere but all still green. The pumpkins have gone ballistic in the heat - huge leaves, lots of buds. Watermelons are looking a bit sad; I think they were still a bit small when the heat came, and even though we had plastic over them, they've suffered a bit. The cos lettuce has bolted, but the other lettuces are doing well, and so is the spinach. Peas everywhere! So many peas! And beans! And the eggplant tree is looking alive, at least, even if there are no blossoms. We just can't eggplant here, and it's so sad.


Recipe Friday! Let's make it happen!

Something I've cooked recently:

Braised leg of lamb:

Basically, you get a leg of lamb, preferably with the bone in, stud it with garlic and sprigs of rosemary, and rub it with olive oil and sea salt. Then put it in a cast iron pot. Add a brown onion peeled and cut in two. Chop a head of garlic in half and throw that in, with a bunch of rosemary and thyme. (And maybe some peppercorns, maybe a bayleaf, maybe some brown sugar or honey, but this time we didn't bother because we'd left it too late in the day to be fussy.) Pour white wine over the lot, cover and cook it in the oven at 150C for five hours. Check it occasionally to make sure there's still liquid in the pot. Take the lid off for the last hour. It's done when it can be flaked with a fork.

We did this ahead of the heat, knowing we'd be unlikely to cook this week. The lamb, and some pumpkin rolls from the bakery did us for lunches, and with rice and veggies for dinner on a couple of nights when we were really flaked out from work.


Crispy Roasted Chickpeas:

I was totally inspired by the chickpeas in my Harvest Box last week - all the toasted lentils have been really tasty, and we always have a can of chickpeas to throw in curry, so it seemed like a good option. They were terrible! I don't think it's the fault of the recipe - the spices tasted great, but the chickpeas tasted like ass. I think I'll try soaking my own, maybe? Or a different brand of chickpeas? The problem is that the canned ones always smell really bad to me, and I could totally smell that bad smell, even covered in a billion spices and salt. I need to figure this out, because I love chickpeas, and I want to try hummus again soon.



Something I've got concrete plans to cook soon:

Well, we're going to chargrill the first zucchini tomorrow. The Weber barbecue is working out great! We bought outdoor furniture to go with it - I sit there with my iPad, reading fic and grilling like a boss, while lilacsigil potters in the garden. We chat over the balcony. It's really nice.


mergatrude's Super Easy Butter Cake:

Part of my quest for an easy cake - that recipe I linked last week was actually pretty complex, so I abandoned it. I will have cake that is tender and has a nice rise and doesn't taste like dry paste. I will achieve this. I will be precise. As ducened said, "Cake is your finicky English teacher who marks you off for forgetting the Oxford Comma."



Something I'm idly thinking of cooking in the future

Homemade Vanilla Bean Chai Syrup

This could be nice, right? You basically grab a can of sweetened condensed milk and stir in a whole bunch of spices to make a spiced syrup, then when you want chai, you stir some of the syrup into some black tea. It sounds like a good idea on paper, and I've got everything I need to make it on hand, so I'd like to give it a go.


Panini bread

We've got the sandwich press out, and I'd forgotten how nice it is to just squish good things into bread and toast it. I'm going to make some nice panini-style breads to toast. To follow on with ducened's analogy, unlike cake, bread is your mellowed out art teacher who wants you to get your hands dirty and feel for the right texture.



I've been trying to get this into a post but keep backing out of it: our elderly cat is on the decline. ( Cut for talk of ailing pets )

- Today with my personal trainer, I got down on the ground! Like, on my side, and on my back, and (most miraculous) on my stomach. I normally work either on my fitball or (more and more as my knee recovers) on my feet, but she tentatively suggested it last week as an option, and I said that as long as she didn't mind me flailing inelegantly to my feet, that I'd be willing to give it a try. This is testament to the amount of trust I have in her - I have quite a lot of belly, and lying on it is a weird, uncomfortable experience, but she wasn't phazed, and suggested different ways of arranging all my bits, and how to feel for the right muscles engaging, and it was awesome. Definitely felt it in my abs. Hopefully won't feel it in my back tomorrow.

I did a kind of a pushing up, arching my back move that she said was called "the cobra". Next stage: ( Namor's nimble-footed flutters )

- Baggins ran in the cat wheel! It's strictly been Chewie's territory up until now, but today Baggins jumped in the wheel, and lilacsigil patted it up high, and Baggins took a flying leap at the carpet and pulled the wheel into action. He got all bug-eyed in amazement as he rolled back and forth in the wheel, then he did it again and again. Chewie is quite put out. He's up on top of the bookshelf, gargoyling at us.

- Yuletide nominations are open. I haven't thought about it very much yet, but I'm thinking Dance Academy, maybe Sleepy Hollow. Death By Silver, because I'd love to read fic set in that universe.

- Not sure if good, but one of my elderly customers invited me to her house to talk crochet. I think that could be fun? I think I'd like a crochet buddy in town. But if I don't come back, you know where I was going, okay?

- One more thing! I can think of one more thing! (There are so many bad things happening in politics right now, here and in the world. I've had to drop so many people off my Facebook since the election.)

Okay. France is moving to ban child beauty pageants. That's a good thing.