Day 28: I'm feeling a bit under the weather* tonight, so I spent the evening catching up on "The Newsroom".  I love Sorkin's writing.  I think the only thing he wrote that I couldn't sit through was "The Social Network", but that was mostly transference; I don't believe that creating anything, at all, entitles you to monies, one way or the other.  If you create, create, and if you don't, then don't.  Create for the sake of creation, if your muse pushes you that way.  If you create with the sole purpose of being rich... I just don't understand your motivation.  I can't watch an entire movie about people fighting over billions of dollars based solely on the fact that one person did a thing and other people feel entitled to benefit from that thing.  It makes me terribly sad.

Anyway, I am LOVING "The Newsroom."  It's classic Sorkin writing.  I think that using recent news stories to make your characters smarter and better is a great conceit.  Sorkin himself pointed it out after the first episode, so it's not that he's not aware of it.  The criticism leveled against the show is that is has, in some cases, years of hindsight to make the exactly right call, but it DOES raise the issue that news, at one point in our nation's history, could be trusted BECAUSE of the integrity of the newscasters.

Now, we call it the bias.  Integrity cannot enter into it, because we throw up "pundits", which is shorthand for "spinners", and not very good shorthand at that.  Everyone has an agenda, and everyone wants to be famous, and everyone wants to be the smartest man in the room.

And that's where they lose me; while it's not always true, it's frequently true that I actually AM the smartest person in the room.

I find that I can quickly suss out the difference between "fact" and "spin", and it's aggravating how small the fact:spin ratio is.

I don't listen to the news much, anymore.  I certainly don't tune in to Walter Cronkite or Tom Brokaw, as I did in my youth.  I read the internet news, and I am depressed by the constant, constant, constant spin.

At the end of the day, "The Newsroom" is trying to address that. 

And with Sorkin's hand on the pen, they're doing a pretty amazing job.

Love you lots, my peeps.

Tomorrow: ADVENTURE!!

----

*There is no actual, you know, WEATHER, in California, so I assume this is an East-Coast expression.

Day 27:

Me: I am not sure that I should put my expensive anodized aluminum pots and pans in the dishwasher.
Maliciously Literal Genie: Oh, don't be silly.  Of COURSE the expensive anodized aluminum pots and pans can go into the dishwasher!
Me: Oh, great!

--- Hours later, I remove the pots, when, suddenly

Maliciously Literal Genie: Of course, it will ruin the finish, and they'll be ugly forever now. 
Me: I hate you, Maliciously Literal Genie.

*sigh* Apparently, they will still cook fine, but they now have an ugly chalkboard finish.  This is apparently irreversible and also voids the lifetime warranty. 

On the other hand, I have a pretty delicious smelling soup simmering on the stove...

Let's make soup!!

Then cook for 24 hours.  The liquid is two cans of chicken broth, and then enough water to cover.

EDIT: and I deglazed the pan with a good chardonnay, and added that to the pot.

Loves!  :)

Day 26: Frisco! San Fran! Baghdad by the Bay! The City of Freedom! Sucka Free City!

Wikipedia is just FULL of weird little things, isn't it?

Yes, today I rented a car and journeyed to Fog City to visit with one of my oldest friends, one IK.  He and I grew up in the same subdivision, and he lived just around the corner and down the hill from me.  Often, we would meet up and head out to have adventures, though we've fallen out of touch over the intervening decades since graduation, during which we'd actually hung out together exactly once, more than six years ago.

Today, I arrived at his (truly magnificent) apartment building, and parked on a side street.  I walked around the corner, and down the hill... and there he was, just arriving on his bike.  For both of us, it was kind of an amazing moment.  Just two old friends meeting up again, after quite a few years and thousands of miles.  SF is an hour-and-a-half trip from Sacramento, but we're basically neighbors again, and it has been kind of shaking me all day how great it is.  I love that guy.

We spent the day with his adorable daughter, MK, though his wife (SK) and I only had a few minutes to chat before she headed out for an afternoon with her friends.  IK and MK and I journeyed to the Exploratorium in The Golden City, which is sort of like EdVenture on steroids.  There were HUNDREDS of little interesting science-y things to look at and play with, and I dare say that IK and I had just as much fun as MK. 

There were a bunch of exhibits, but one of the favorites deserves a quick anecdote.  This was one of those tornado-shaped funnels that you find in lots of museums, where kids roll pennies down a slide, and then the pennies whirl around the smooth surface of the funnel, until eventually disappearing into the hole at the bottom, lost forever to the coffers of the museum.  This one had one fundamental difference: instead of pennies, you rolled little hard plastic marbles, and when they dropped through the hole, they popped out at the bottom.  So you could have races, you could release handfuls at one go, and...

IK: I've noticed an interesting thing about this one.  There's an eternal struggle between two types of people.  The first type is made up of those who want to watch the marbles spin around and around.  The second type is the kind who wants to see if they can grab any marbles that come within reach.  The conflict between these two groups leads to much frustration on both sides.

And, once he'd noted that, we spent nearly half an hour howling in laughter as it happened over.  And over.  And over.  One kid would get an armload of marbles, releasing them in a wild torrent of spinning wonderment much to his delight, only to be brought low seconds later when other kids snatched them out of their perfect little arcs... much to their delight!  It was like watching one side trying, patiently, to play a beautiful game of grace and beauty, while the other side was just playing Duck Hunt. 

It was hilarious.

We did so much today, and I'm almost kind of overwhelmed, and I don't want to bore you with all of the details, especially knowing that later on I'll be able to frame them in a really funny, interesting way.  I'll get around to posting up quite a few of the many, many pictures we took, but for now I'll just leave you with this one, which pretty much summed up our day:

MK, IK, and myself.  LOOK AT HOW CUTE THAT LITTLE GIRL IS!!!

I know, I know, I try to make this blog funny, and sometimes I can do it, but mostly I'm just a little emotionally overwhelmed by how happy I am, so I'll save the funny for later, and I'll detail lots of the little adventures we had. 

More than anything, I had a wonderful day with a wonderful friend, and there's just nothing better than that in the world.

Oh, yeah, we also went to the Golden Gate bridge, which, as you know, was made famous by "Rise of the Planet of the Apes".  It was even more impressive in real life.  You could almost feel the horse-mounted super-chimps coming up behind you.

Day 25: In their youth, my father's generation talked about cars the way my generation talks about computers.  They talked about the classic cars they sported in their early years, the hot rods they built later on, and the amazing modern marvels that they delighted in as they reached the truly prosperous years of their lives.  They knew things about cars, Lily.  (Quick aside: "You're looking at a living legend, Lily." is just one of the best movie lines.  Ever.)

When Gus von Gusterson, my stunningly weathered 1996 Jeep Cherokee Sport, arrived in CA on the back of a car carrier, I was delighted to see him again.  The Car Delivery guy asked me to wait patiently while he unloaded Gus (who got a great view of his cross-country journey, as he was the VERY TOP CAR; I still wish I'd taped a camera to his dashboard), and I hopped nervously from foot to foot for fifteen minutes as Gus was patiently, competently, and safely unloaded.

As I approached my old friend, Car Delivery guy said something with the voice of my father's generation.  I will repeat it for you, here, verbatim:

"I wanted to tell you something.  On the trip, somehow the screws for your right turn signal jiggled out.  I've taped it up, but that won't hold if it rains.  No big deal, you'll just need to get a couple of screws and screw it back in."

I looked at him for a moment, realized that that was all of the information he was going to provide to me, and subsequently did not ask ANY of the obvious questions:

1 - How do screws jiggle out?
2 - What can I do to prevent future screw jiggling?
3 - Where does one purchase right-turn-signal screws for a 1996 Jeep Cherokee Sport?  Is there a right-turn-signal screw store?  Is there (in the interest of not being completely stupid) a turn-signal screw store?  Is there a special section in some store that contains screws for automobiles?  Should I go to an automobile dealer, purchase a new Jeep, remove one screw, then simply default on the loan, allowing them to repossess it, knowing I've had the last laugh with a good, usable screw in my pocket, assuming that the new screws are compatible with 16 year old models?!?!?
4 - TELL ME YOUR MAGIC CAR SECRETS, MAN!!

Ahem.

So, today, R and I set out to fix this.  Fortunately, for reasons passing understanding, R has a HUGE collection of screws.

That sounds dirtier than it is, but the man is set should you or anyone you ever meet needs to fasten one thing to another thing using a variety of wood screws.

We charged up his drill (because, I swear to God, we couldn't find an actual, you know, screw-driver), and ventured to my garage.  After much back and forth, and drilling and undrilling of the good turn signal, and then trying various screws in the bad turn signal, and then noting that the bad signal was actually missing a relevant bit, and then finally settling on a solution, something just wonderful happened:

WE FIXED IT!!

Yeah, we're basically mechanics.  We're car people.  We know cars, is what I'm saying.

And so, to all of my new friends, and all of my old friends, I say unto you: let me know if your "check engine light" is on.

I can probably figure out how to disconnect it.

R and I finally saw "The Dark Knight Rises" (in iMAX, no less!), and I honestly, deeply want this post to be about "The Dark Knight Rises", but I realize that a number of you may not have seen it yet, and I'm allergic to spoilers myself.

Consequently, I'm going to say here, clearly:

SPOILERS

If you'd like to continue reading, feel free.  If not, I guess we'll see you tomorrow.  :)

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THE GOOD

Anne Hathaway - Now, I know what you're thinking: this is just a subtle way of letting Miss Hathaway know how much I enjoyed her performance, in a not-too-subtle way of convincing her that we should, you know, hang out, and stuff, and that I totally dig her, and stuff.  And stuff.  But she actually played the Catwoman from the comics, and was the only character that was pitch-perfect the entire movie.  I kept thinking, "Yep, that's what Catwoman would do there."  Also, if Anne Hathaway HAPPENS to be reading this, wants to come over and snuggle, she's more than welcome to.  And stuff.  Ahem.

The Batmobile... I mean the Batbike (Batpod is a stupid name for that thing) and the Bat-Other-Thing, which is just called the Bat (which is also stupid) - Naming conventions aside, the vehicles were pretty much universally fun to watch, and featured in some of my favorite parts of the movie.  I don't know why the Batbike turns like that, but it's cool as hell.

Gary Oldman - Once again, he's the strongest member of the cast, and does a great job of playing the unafraid, resourceful, dedicated everyman who is fighting the same fight as Batman, but armed only with being awesome.  And it totally works, for the third movie in a row.  I was convinced he could hang with Batman, which is the only way Gordon could possibly fit into these stories.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt - Leaving aside his character's story for a moment (we'll get to that below), he played his character well and truthfully in every scene.


THE BAD

EVERYTHING ELSE.

- Bane is a dumb character, in both the comics and the movie.  Tom Hardy does his level best, but his mask gave him no way to communicate any nuance of the character to the audience, and it was just tortuous listening to him speak.  He's big and strong and WAAAAY smarter than Batman.  Well, that WILL be fun to watch, given that we've established Batman as the World's Greatest Detective in... oh, right, in his first appearance in Detective Comics

- Everyone on EARTH knows that Ra's Al Ghul's child is Talia.  She's been a major character since all the way back when DC first did Who's Who in the DC Universe in the early 90s.  She's part of the DCAU.  The reveal of that was dumb, too, since we established in the last movie that the Bat Armor was specifically designed to resist knives and dogs and... Ugh.

- What happened to, you know, every freakin' cop from the previous two movies other than Gordon?  Who are all these clowns?

- The editing was atrociously bad, and big huge chunks made no sense.  How did Bane get Bruce Wayne out to that prison in Nowhere-istan, exactly?  Did he teleport, or is that just the next city over from Gotham?  How did Wayne get back?  And how did he get back onto the island that was laboriously and painfully indicated to be a "no one in, no one out, at all, even little kids" situation?  Sure, you could say, "Because he's Batman," but this is a MOVIE, and if you don't show it, then what are we doing here?  When Catwoman rolled out of the window of the Wayne mansion, how did she not splat on the ground?  Seriously, she rolls out of the window, and then we cut to her walking along the grounds.  What happened between those two points?

- The ending, while absolving Alfred of his guilt, and showing Bruce and Selena to finally be at peace with the world, misses out on the most important part of the Batman mythos: GOTHAM WILL ALWAYS NEED HIM.  Some might argue that that's what JG-L's character was there for, but come ON!  The last shot HAS to be:

External - Night

Batman looks over his city.  Below, sirens wail.  He's heavy with responsibility, but he knows that Gotham needs him.  Again.  He's not happy, but he's not paid to be happy.

He's the Goddamned Batman. 

Plus he's already rich.


- Oh!  Oh!  Making Batman poor is just stupid, especially if he never figures a way out of it, and more especially if he never suffers in any way for it.  Which they do, and he doesn't, and he doesn't.  He never lacks for toys, even after they "get him".  Soooo... why is that part of the story, exactly?

- One more about the ending: why does Bruce straight-up LIE to Selena about the auto-pilot?  He's not lying to her, as we see at the very, VERY end, he's ONLY lying to the AUDIENCE.

- I understand that Heath Ledger's passing made the Joker off-limits out of respect for his family (and I quietly think that's actually a pretty damned nice thing to do), but it did seem weird that no one noticed or referenced that Cillian Murphy was the Scarecrow.  Good to see him again, for sure, but a bit lame to not see him Scarecrow-ing up the proceedings.  If he's going to be there, man, BE THERE.

- The Batman needs a throat lozenge, and that's exactly as annoying as it has always been.

- Back to the editing again: it's three hours long, and exactly NONE of what Bane does is material to the story.  Do the Catwoman stuff, then cut the next 120 minutes, then have the guy say "it's been 8 years", then do the last forty minutes.

I will say, in closing, that Nolan has given us almost 9 hours of really well-filmed Batman, and that some amateur editor out there is going to churn through the unnecessary chaff and create an absolutely BRILLIANT three hour edit of the trilogy. 

I can't wait.

Occasionally -- and I mean once in a blue harvest moon, if the good Lord is willin' and the crick don't rise -- a human being will experience something that is just sublime.  A moment that touches your soul, waaaaaaay down deep, and makes you wonder at the glory of life itself.  How noble, precious, and magical every day is, and how we fritter every moment away in meaningless toiling, little realizing that around a corner, just a few minutes from now, we will encounter nothing less than pure, joyful magic.

Come with me, friend.  I know the way.

First, a little background:

Today is the day all of the travelers in the office pack up and head home.  It's weird for me not to BE one of the travelers, scrambling to get all of the work done before dashing off to the airport, turning in the rental car, patiently waiting for your flight to be canceled... Oh, the joys of the business traveler.

And most of the travelers do this at least twice a WEEK, you understand.  Madness, certainly, but 'tis the way o' the consultin' world, shiver me timbers, skiddoo!!

Yeah, I got a little lost there, but let's get back to the moment of magic I have to share with you, shall we?

We decide to have lunch off-campus, to say a fare-thee-well to our departing friends.  So we all pile into cars, and head down into South Sacramento.  Yes, on purpose. 

Our destination: a little place called JR's Texas Bar-B-Que, which E had suggested.  To be clear, this is not pork; it is, instead, beef brisket, cooked 12-18 hours.  We learned this from the internet as we drove to our place of dining, guided the entire way by a completely different handheld device, which was talking to us ("Prepare to turn left.  No, your other left.  Do you just want me to remotely seize control of the vehicle and you can take a nap or something?").

Think about that for a moment.  Think about how far we've come with this technology since, you know, Mesopotamia.  We're really kind of awesome.

But this, I understand, is not magic to you, or me.  We're used to it.  It is everyday.  It is common.  We do not experience it with the wonder it deserves. 

When we get to the true magic in our tale, however, you will feel it down deep.  It will tickle a part of you that you thought had disappeared.  And it's going to be awesome, in the traditional sense of the word.

We arrived at our destination, and I initially assumed we had incorrectly arrived at their warehouse.  It may also be their warehouse, but there is clearly a restaurant as well.

The place smelled amazing, and it really is both a great value and delicious food, which is so rarely true.  If you get to Sacramento, and for some reason find yourself hankering for some delicious thick-cut brisket, this is definitely where you want to go.

We even met, honest-to-God, JR himself.  Our good friend J was packing up some leftovers into styrofoam boxes, when JR came over and said, (I swear this actually happened) "What are you doing with them there wimp boxes?"

He was absolutely awesome.

And, as I sat looking amongst the collected treasures that decorated the place from old TX license plates to the odd framed jersey to what appeared to be an actual covered wagon, I spotted it.  I stared, transfixed.  I would never have... Who would... There's no WAY I would have predicted... I mean... How would...  Is that really... Of all the... What?  WHAT??

I have been positively giggling to myself all day, waiting to share this moment with you.

Are you ready, friend?

Take a deep breath.

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Yes, that is in fact an autographed picture of Jethro from The Beverly Hillbillies.

And I will bet everything I own that NOT ONE OF YOU thought, "It's going to be an autographed picture of Jethro from The Beverly Hillbillies." 

Because you can't predict magic, gentle reader.
 
THAT'S WHAT MAKES IT MAGIC!!

Day 22: The campus here has six or seven cafeterias (which, given that it's got roughly 6,000 employees, is just about right).  The one up front has a rotating thing, where one day is mexican, one day is italian, etc.  Today was asian, and you get to make your own stir-fry, which was AMAZINGLY good.  I just pointed at the veggies and meats I wanted, and a few minutes later, VOILA!  A huge plate of lovely, delicious stir-fry, with none of that yucky stuff I hate (seriously, who eats eggplant or zucchini on purpose?  I ask you!!).

I also had the opportunity to join the EDR Tea Club (ETC, because we like our TLA's), and someone mentioned math jokes.

"What's yellow and equivalent to the Axiom of Choice?"

"What's purple and commutes?"

I got a LOT of blank stares on the first one, and a few good laughs, notably from P, on the second one.  She had studied group theory in college.  It's perfectly find if you don't understand these jokes. They're like jokes about the differences between Vermont and New Hampshire: if you get the joke, you're from the region, but if you don't, no one judges you.  In this case, the "region" is being a math nerd. 

And almost NO ONE is from there...

R invited me over to have steak, and I offered to provide a Greek salad.  He agreed, and we retired to our respective apartments to prepare our dishes.

And now, a pause while I have a little kid moment:

My mom had a set of mixing bowls.  The biggest one was red (white on the inside), and the smallest was blue (white on the inside), and the medium one, the perfect one, was yellow (white on the inside).  It's the JUST RIGHT bowl.

As a child, this bowl making an appearance meant one of two things: salad (which I love) or popcorn (which I love).  We'd fill that thing with popcorn and plop down to watch whatever came after this:

The Special

I loved that intro.  It meant we were about to watch Snoopy, or something equally awesome.  SNOOPY!  At least one of you has him tattooed on your body, and you're dead sexy because of it.  You know who you are.

Tonight, making up a quick Greek salad, pouring it all into that bowl, and walking it over to R's place, I didn't really think about the significance of that bowl. 

At the end of the evening tonight, after watching quite a lot of Justified, and enjoying quite a lot of steak and salad, R asked me if he could just run it through his dishwasher and give it back to me later.

Almost without thinking about it, I muttered, "Sure. Wait, no, that's my mom's."

This bowl has survived quite a few decades of me bouncing around the globe.  It suddenly seemed important to me to make sure that I got it home.  I mean, honestly, I don't expect R would break it or ruin it, and I'm quite sure that if I left it with him it would be perfectly fine (and, for the record, this is a man I would trust with my BROWSING HISTORY), but leaving the bowl seemed just weirdly wrong to me.  He gave me a nice towel to wipe it out, and I set out for the apartment.

Walking home, I wasn't sobbing.  I wasn't misty-eyed.  I wasn't teary.

But I was carrying my mom's bowl.

Take a second today, and tell your mom I love her.

Er... you know what I mean.  Ahem.

Loves to all of you, my peeps, and tomorrow: ADVENTURE!!  :)

Dinner at Ten22, a nice little place in Old Sacramento, which deserves a proper right up, but I'm spent, and off to bed.

Also, bowling is always way more fun than you think it will be!

---

EDIT:

Okay, I've learned something today: once you start writing, regularly, your brain won't let you sleep until you do it properly, so I'm here to tell you the story, which, simply by the virtue of following this blog, you so richly deserve.

I picked up J after work, and she navigated us to Old Sacramento, where we joined R, E, W, J9, JudoMike, and SacB for dinner.  Ten22 is a little bistro in the middle of Old Sac, and it's worth a moment to describe what this is like.

It's very much like going to South of the Border, and finding Gervais & Vine. 

There will be those who read this who don't understand that particular analogy, so I'll briefly explain.  Old Sacramento is, at it's dirty little heart, a tourist trap that would make my Grandfather throw up his arms in disgust.  I vividly remember that when he took us to St. Augustine, he steadfastly avoided the "historic" district, as it was a place that was designed only to sell plastic pirate swords to tourists.  Instead, he took us into the old fort, and, of course, to the Largest Alligator Farm In The World, which I still love to visit.  I have a soft place in my heart for tourist traps, but, owing to Grandfather's guidance at a young age, I clearly recognize what they are, and what they are not.

What they are is a way to get money from tourists.

What they are NOT is an accurate look into the past.  They are the Hollywood version of history, and they give us what we expect, rather than what actually was.

I love them and hate them, and I avoid them like the plague and am drawn to them like a moth to the flame.  I haven't properly explored Old Sacramento yet, but I know that I will.

In the middle of this false historical district, there is a truly wonderful bistro, like a shining diamond that has somehow found its way into your Play-Doh. 

It features a genuinely knowledgeable staff who have a real passion for both food and drink, and a really interesting menu.  I had the BLT tart, which was exactly as wonderful as it sounds.  LOVE.

After dinner, we made our way to "PITO BOWL"; it's apparently supposed to be "CAPITOL BOWL", but quite a few of the letters are burned out.  Having painted a picture of the worst bowling alley ever, let me immediately correct that by mentioning that they have recently renovated the bar/food area, and it is just wonderful, and easily the classiest bowling alley I have ever visited.

The best (read: funniest) of these blog entries are the ones where I'm having a hard time, so I'm afraid there is a paucity of funny here, because I had a WONDERFUL time.

Beautiful, charming, intelligent women, and fascinating, charming, intelligent men included me as a member of the group, and I haven't felt so warm or welcome in a long time. 

We bowled, some of us badly, some of us magnificently (due props to E), but all of us with a sense of nothing more or less than having a blast.  We laughed, loud and long, and we cheered every single ball, and we high-fived and fist-bumped.  We sang, and we danced.  The best moment of the night was R literally dancing up to the line, with E dancing up to the line next to him... and R rolled an EFFORTLESS strike!  We all went nuts!

I managed to roll two strikes followed by a spare, which was the best three frames I'd bowled in a long time. JudoMike switched to his left-hand (no, for realz!) for the last game, and bowled his best game of the night.  J9 dominated.  J had some really amazing strikes, given that she was bowling with an 8 pound ball.  W knocked down 9 of 10 pins so often that it started to seem like he was allergic to that last one.  SacB soundly thrashed all of us, despite not really wanting to join in in the first place.  R and E did the best on the night, with E just edging R for the highest total score, with J9 right there with them. 

I want to tell you about a million little moments, but, honestly, I'm just high on the sheer amount of love that our group shared.  They are, all of them, old friends I've just met.

And I could not be more grateful.

G'night, gentle reader, and remember that tomorrow, as always, holds ADVENTURE!! :)

Day 20: There's been an... incident with the stew.

The plan was to host R and J and maybe some other folks at my apartment tonight; this was why I was going to such great lengths to slow-cook the beef stew (read: leave it over really low heat for days, and not actually go to any lengths at all).  Last night, it occurred to me that I probably wanted to reduce it a bit, just to thicken up the sauce.  I turned up the heat (slightly!  I mean, barely at all!  You could hardly tell that --- okay, I turned it up from Low to Medium), and then I sat back to enjoy a lovely evening of half-watching Nadia G's "Bitchin' Kitchen" while I worked on some important research on the internet. 

Did you know that the voltage potential from the base to the emitter controls the current from the collector to the emitter in a bipolar junction transistor*? 

And that there are kittens on the internet? 

And that some of those kittens will, hilariously, sit in boxes??

Hours pass.

"... hey, what's that SIZZLING NOISE?", my sleepy brain said to me, as I rested comfortably in my great big fluffy bed.

Sizzling, for the record, is NOT a noise you expect to hear from a stew.

I dashed to the kitchen (it's a short dash -- it's, like, four steps total -- but I was moving with some urgency, so let's preserve the dynamic language for the sake of a dramatic interpretation of events, shall we?), and immediately realized that the stew was, tragically burned.

I then wept like a small child. 

I then captured my salty tears and put them in the pot, after removing it from the heat.  I actually just tossed in a couple of cups of water, but whatever.  Dramatic interpretation!

So my stew was ruined, and I was in a foul mood all day today (largely owing to a lack of sleep, largely owing to a PROFOUND smell that kept reminding me that I had burned the stew).  When I got home, I opted out of evening festivities, sat down to feel sorry for myself...

...And then I got up and rescued my stew!

"I can do this!" I thought, as I reached for the ruined mess.  Some of you may be asking yourselves why the ruined mess was still on the stove, nearly twenty-four hours later. 

Some of you, however, might not.

I reheated it, bringing it to a rolling boil.  I added more water, and scraped around with a wooden spoon to unstick the really burned bits.  I made up a quick cup of couscous (seriously, couscous is the easiest thing in the world to make**), and pulled the oh-so-tender pieces of beef from the pot, which were now deeply infused with the merlot, the beef stock, and the lovely veggies.  A little vinegar, a little oil, a pinch of salt, a few grinds of pepper, et VOILA!!  A delicious dinner, rescued from the slag heap of failure!

(heroic pose!)
(cue dramatic trumpets)

Being entirely honest, I would never serve it to, you know, people, because it really was pretty much burned, and "burned" is not a delicious flavor.  But I did enjoy it well enough, and have put the leftovers aside for lunch tomorrow.  And dramatic interpretation.  And all that.

And, gentle reader, what is the moral of all of this?

That's right: those kittens will sit in th boxes!!

A merry evening to you all, and tomorrow: ADVENTURE!!  :)

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*Note: I didn't look that up.  I dredged it up from Electronics Technician "A" School, from nearly two decades ago.  I can't keep Snooki and Sookie straight, but I can remember technological arcana, and, frankly, when the EndTimes come, the one kind of knowledge is really going to be better than the other, no?  Aren't you glad we're friends??  I will TOTALLY be able to keep your plasma rifle in fine working condition...

Also, googling "endtimes" and "snooki" yields more than a million results.

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**Note 2: Put 1 cup of water, a healthy pinch of salt, and 1 tbsp of butter in a pan, and bring it to a boil.  Dump in 1 cup of couscous.  Stir vigorously, and immediately remove from heat and cover for five minutes.  Then fluff it with a fork, and stuff it in your face. 

You can also season it to the moon and back, and it will take whatever you throw at it and just be even more delicious.  You should always have this in your pantry. 

Also, googling "couscous" and "snooki" yields only about 340,000 results.

So, that's a solid win for "snooki" and "endtimes", frighteningly...

Sleep tight!

Day 19: It is raining in Sacramento.

Hand to God, raining. 

It's not REALLY raining.  It's not a summer thunderstorm, or a hurricane, or anything.  It's more like the sky is leaking.  Slightly.  But it remains a fact that moisture is dripping (slowly and sparsely) from the clouds above.

Or, possibly, someone is mis-using a hose on the roof.  But I *think* it's raining.  My plants are happy, and I wanted to tell you that I've actually started to see green things growing up out of the planters!  Hooray!!

UPDATE: It has stopped raining. (seriously, it stopped in the time it took me to write this.  *sigh* )

I did nothing of particular note today, and yet still experienced adventure: 

I went to the grocery store. 

"Oh, come now, you're really stretching.  How is THAT adventure?"

I hear you, gentle reader, and I ask you the following:

When you head to your local grocery store...

No, wait.  Let me rephrase this.

Let's say you are constructing a grocery store to service the local peasantry.  You, mighty mogul of foodstuffs, have decided to construct a grocery store, and you set about considering what you should include.  A deli counter?  Certainly.  A bakery?  Obviously.  Adequate parking? ... Well, I'm sure you'll do your best.

A giant statue of a horse covered in shards of broken mirrors?

Oh!  Didn't think of that, now did you?  Of course you didn't, for you are not an insane crazy person.  However, at some point in history, someone in Sacramento said, "You know what this grocery store really needs?  And, I mean, right out front?"

Behold:

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I could NOT make this stuff up.  The next time you are in your local Publix, or, better yet, Bi-Lo, ask if and when they are installing a giant horse covered in shards of broken mirrors.  THINK of the looks you'll get!  The stories you'll have to tell?!

Adventure, I say!

I also had dinner with R, and I prepared a charcuterie plate, with meats, cheeses, and olives, showing here:

I wrapped it up, carried it to R's place (conveniently exactly one block away), and we enjoyed this as we waited on our steaks to come up to temperature.  We determined that the steak filet might require some additional flavoring, and we'll be exploring this in the coming weeks.  I'll keep you posted.

I should mention at this point that R has a wonderful technique for steaks:

1 - Freeze them solid.
2 - Put them, frozen, into a small amount of oil, and char the sides, well.
3 - Put them into a low temp oven (180 - 200 F) and slowly cook them up until the internal temp is 131 (use a probe thermometer, and the alarm will pleasantly ring to notify you when your steak is ready; note that this can take hours, but is worth it).
4 - Remove from the oven, and rest for five minutes.

The resulting steak is perfectly crusted on the outside, and a uniform pink on the inside.  Delightful in every possible way.

Food can be an adventure, too!

And from now on, every story that I ever write ever will probably include the hero riding on a giant horse covered in shards of broken mirrors. 

Because it's awesome.

I also wanted to take a second and put in a plug for "The Name of the Wind", by Patrick Rothfuss.  It's the first of a trilogy (the second book is recently out, and I'm starting it tonight) of a fantasy series that is sort of like if Harry Potter went to a school designed by Tolkein; even that is selling it short by several miles.  It's just completely wonderful, original, and great, great fantasy.  I'm twelve years old again, honestly.  You'll enjoy it, I promise.

Good evening, gentle reader, and I find myself once again wishing, for us both, that tomorrow brings ADVENTURE!!  :)