Entropic Words from Neilathotep
This week’s community, while no epic Dungeons and Dragons episode (oh yeah, RE a previous entry, Freaks and Geeks also had a D&D episode, although no cast member dressed as a Drow in it :(), featured everyone’s favorite blind engineer/book reader – Levar Burton.
And also on the subject of community, it turns out that Donald Glover (Troy) has an alter ego, the rapper Childish Gambino. Please use headphones to listen at work:
I recently read How to Live Safely in a Science Fictional Universe: A Novel by Charles Yu. I actually read it on my iPad, which I will discuss a bit more about below.
The book itself is a novel, loosely, in that it is fictional and has a story. However, it’s not a very traditional novel, even for science fiction. It’s pretty much an excuse to play around with the ‘what ifs’ that we’ve all thought about time travel. The sort of things that made Fry immune to the Brain Spawn on Futurama. But also what happens if you do something to your future self – that will also get done to you when you are that future self.
The point is, it’s a novel, but it’s more of a bunch of musings on time travel, encased in a novel and world that are crystalized enough to contain it. It’s a very funny book, and I enjoyed its humor almost as much as the philosophical musings.
As I mentioned above, I read this on my iPad, using the kindle reader application. This is the first time I used the iPad for that purpose, and I’ve found that its pretty great for reading in bed, and also for taking on a plane trip (save for the no reading until 10,000 feet and during landing). The version of the book for the iPad reader in particular had additional content (color pictures and a link to a pretty sweet youtube video about the apparent lack of free will).
Mackenzie and I have been watching the tv show “Freaks and Geeks” (1999-2000) on DVD via Netflix lately. I never saw the show in the first run, but when they reran it soon after I started watching, and enjoyed it a lot. The show has held up well over the past 10 years, and while it’s sad that it was cancelled so quickly, the good news is that it never got a chance to get less than awesome.
There are so many awesome guest stars on the show – Rashida Jones, Shia Labeouf, Jason Schwartzman – so many people that would later get much more notoriety. And of course, the Jason Siegel, Seth Rogan and James Franco all had their first appearances in this show.
If you’ve not had a chance to see the show, I recommend giving it a watch.
Both the AC and Heat are on at the same time. And even though the AC vent is right over my desk, and the heat vent is about 10 feet away, it’s way too warm in here. And I wore a long sleeve shirt over a tshirt. Good day!
Basically, I am posting to get a post in, since I doubt I will have time to later today. Up next on my planned agenda is a book review!
Yes, three in a row.
So, I roasted a chicken tonight, using World’s Most Difficult Roasted Chicken Recipe from Michael Ruhlman. Highly recommended as a lazy Sunday roast dinner. Smashed celeriac (which might be the second best vegetable of 2011, by the way) was the side.
Mackenzie made the leftover meat into chicken salad (yay lunch tomorrow!), and the carcass is in the fridge ready to be turned into stock later this week. But this got me thinking two things:
1) I should roast chicken more often, this is good (and easy and economical)
2) If I do so, what are other recipes for the leftover meat?
As promised, one of the subjects I am blogging about this month is bread. I have posted about bread a couple times in the past – once to ‘pan’ the infamous no-knead bread recipe that’s been floating around for a few years, and at least once to sing the praises of kneaded bread. Well, rest assured this is a kneaded bread. Kneaded in my KitchenAid.
To start out my bread making for the month (I plan on baking bread at least a few more times), I made some Challah. Challah, of course, is Jewish Sabbath/Holiday bread. It’s a very rich dough made with eggs and butter, and slightly sweetened. It’s great for eating slice with some butter, and even better for french toast.
The recipe I followed is from Baking Illustrated – if there is interest I can post it, but for now I will just paraphrase a bit. After kneading in the standing mixer, you do a double rise, then divide it into pieces so you can braid it. Traditionally, one might use a six braid pattern to create a tall loaf, but this recipe cheats by making two separate braids, and stacking the smaller on top of the larger using an egg wash to bind them.
This seems like a pretty good idea, but the way it rose in the oven caused the top braid to fall sideways a bit. I also over cooked the bread by a couple of minutes – of course, last time I tried to make bread in my flat (using my own starter) I righteously burned the bottom, so this is a step in the right direction. A little more practice and I’ll have the oven down.
It might not be the prettiest bread anyone’s ever made, but it looks OK. And the crumb is fantastic. We had some with dinner tonight, and I predict breakfast tomorrow will be french toast!
Now the question is, what kind of bread should I make next?
The year is early, but there is a strong contender for vegetable of the year already. It is:
Roasted Romanesco.
For those that don’t know, romanesco is a cultivar of cauliflower, or broccoli. It’s more like the former, but not completely unlike the latter. And since those are both cultivars of the same species, I think the specifics aren’t important. What is important is that roasting it creates a delightful, and healthy vegetable side dish.
Approximate recipe:
Of course, I’m sure there are many other things you can do, this is just what I’ve done so far, and immensely enjoyed.
Also coming soon: A post about bread!
A while ago, as you probably don’t remember, I wrote a post about white athletic socks almost a year ago. Well, I’m back to talk about some other socks. Because I need to make a post since I didn’t get around to one yesterday.
In addition to oodles of white athletic socks, I also had a few pairs of rather nice hiking boot socks. Socks that are designed to wick moisture away from your skin, and provide extra padding in hiking boots which are, you know, not as comfy as sneakers. But the moisture part is more important, since hiking boots tend to be waterproof, which works both ways – water doesn’t get in, and sweat doesn’t get out. When sweat stays in, and you are wearing normal cotton socks, the sweat stays close to your feet, and you end up with wet, and sad feet at the end of the day. Also, there is sometimes some squeaking. Also, I’m getting the feeling that my small readership will be dropping off here…
The above is important because for the past couple of months, post ankle surgery, I’ve been relegated to wearing only hiking boots, for added support and protection. The boot socks of course get worn whenever they are clean, but it’s hard to keep 3 pairs of socks clean at all times. So I’ve been wearing white socks more than I’d like to. Well, the other day I got an email coupon for free shipping and 40% off clearance items (or such) from landsend, a company which I’ve been ordering a bunch of basic clothes – solid tshirts, sweaters, button down collar shirts from in the past few months. I do recommend them for reasonably quality clothes at a pretty good price, particularly on sale, but that’s not the main review here. Instead, I shall be reviewing their Ragg socks of which I purchased 4 pairs of recently.
I am wearing the light grey heather sock today, and so far it’s rather comfortable. The sock is a bit longer than I expected (very much over the calf) and longer than my other boot socks. They are definitely not as nice as my $25 dollar a pair smartwool socks, but they are nice and soft. So far, and it’s only been a few hours, they’ve done a good job at keeping my feet dry, despite being warm and thick. I might have to update this review tonight, but right now, I am definitely endorsing these socks, particularly if you can get them on sale – but even at full price, they are a good deal.
OAK – great parking. I can’t say much about the services here, but at least I was able to get coffee and a donut of decent quality before my flight. The free wifi seems to be only normal http ports, which is a pain.
BUR – free wifi that works almost right (no success in setting up a vpn tunnel through it). Very fast security. Awful food choices.
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