Month: December 2014

For the love of all that is holy, it’s a conversation, not a Mother May I game!

Stone Soup is usually pretty normal in their family relations. However, we’ve started a plot where Val, the redhead is having upheaval because of confusion about the direction her relationship with her longtime boyfriend Phil is headed.  They were both happily plunked in “not getting married” but now the waters have been muddied.
What drives me crazy is her reaction.  She doesn’t know what her feelings are about marriage, which is fine.  But she reverts to the classic “he must ask me” stance that is not in keeping with the tone of the rest of the strip.  
Val, all you have to say is something like, “Let’s have a chat about where we are now with the whole marrying thing.”  And boom!  You and your partner can come to a conclusion together. 

The wit that is contained in the 12 Bottle Bar

I purchased the 12 Bottle Bar book because I’m interested in building a home bar and doing it with only 12 bottles seems like a grand idea.  I had no idea the authors would be so amusing.  They also feature other amusing authors, such as Sam Greenspan, who tells us about “11 Drinks Not to Order for the Opposite Sex.”  This paragraph in particular amused me.

Zoolights

Deborah and I visited Zoolights to see the choir she is usually a member of perform.  They sang Christmas songs and songs from their repertoire.

Then we walked around and took in the lights.  (And the animals.  We saw the baby elephant! He was, predictably, quite cute.)

This is a river with alligators and hippopotamus and other animals.

I grabbed a photo of this kid because he looked too young to have a Letterman jacket.  He struck me as maybe a freshman, maybe.  I looked a little closer and guessed from the early 1990’s dates on the patches on the jacket that it was perhaps first his father’s jacket.
(Letterman jacket side note.  I was checking the spelling and found this Portland Oregon store that made me want to get my own Letterman jacket. I want the all-wool with the sailor collar.)

Self portrait with Deborah. (And lights)

We sat and people watched and chatted under this great dragon.
It was a fun night.

Kombucha update.

Brewing is going well.  I’ve established a rhythm. I brew on Sundays, transfer the scoby to the new jar and drop chopped up ginger in the finished brew.  The new batch goes in the oven with the light on and the finished brew gets a lid and sits for four days to absorb the ginger flavor.  Then I strain out the ginger (and the bits) and pop the finished kombucha in the fridge.  It’s delicious, and so much cheaper than buying bottles for $3.29.
This is a new batch on the right and a finished batch on the left.  The scoby’s grow “mothers” which are baby scobys you can give away or use to start more batches.  I’ve given one away and used one to start a new batch.  You can sort of see the scoby in the jar on the right.  It’s that grayish looking thing floating on the top.

Three sentence movie reviews: The Homesman

Recasting the Western with a feminist slant (as written and directed by men) this was an engrossing movie.  Great acting, compelling characters and the movie balanced funny with tragic.  However, there was a thing that happened in Act 3 that I didn’t at all find believable,* and which sunk the whole film.

Cost: free due to gift card
Where watched: Regal Fox Tower with S. North.

*If you’ve seen it, let me know, we’ll talk.

poster from: http://www.impawards.com/2014/homesman_ver3.html
(I went with version three because it had Hilary Swank in front.)