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Author: kate

brrr

brrr

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i was doing a little poking around to see if there were some weird word origins for word wednesday, and i ran across “give the cold shoulder”, which we all know. like the silent treatment. passive aggressive ignoring. we’re minnesotans. we’re good at this.

but, turns out the origin also made me think of another minnesota thing: the long, minnesota goodbye. you know. ok, gotta go! but first, it was great to see you. do you want anything to take home? when will i see you next? gotta hug 40 people 3 times each. oh, maybe i can stay for another 15 minutes for some ice cream (my dad hahaha). yeah. we’re NOT good at goodbye.

the origin of giving the cold shoulder comes from medieval england when people would visit eatch other. when the host was like, hey, you gotta leave, now. s/he would give the guest a cold piece of meat from the shoulder of beef, pork, or mutton. it was actually a polite way to say “get out.”

so i can see where it’s a little similar, but also different? i would also like to know more. was the lunch meat a way of saying “hey i don’t like you that much you need to go”? or was it “ugh you offended me with this thing get out of my sight because i can’t look at you right now and i’m mad”? and did these medieval peeps give the cold cuts to their loved ones just whenever? can you imagine in the middle of a serious fight, a wife just starts flinging pieces of meat at her husband! or what if poor people just show up at houses so they can get some food?

this just opens up so many more things i want to know about this saying.

all the birds in the sky: a book review

all the birds in the sky: a book review

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i just finished up “all the birds in the sky.” have you ever read a book where every time you set it down, you think, man that’s a weird little book. and then you continue to pick it back up because you want to see what on earth happens in this weird little book? that’s how i felt with “all the birds in the sky.”

it’s a melding of two genres and somehow, it works. it’s got the old-school fairy tale vibe going on with the female character in the natural world and witchy powers, and then it’s got a techy/futuristic vibe with the male character holding fast to his intelligent AI he’s built and a 2-second time machine on his wrist. somehow, the two end up falling in love in a world that’s creeping closer and closer climate disaster (oh yeah, it’s also borderline environmental apocalyptic genre too!), but when disaster strikes, the way they deal puts them at odds.

i wouldn’t give this five stars. i think i’d be hard pressed to give it four stars. it’s an entertaining read and fascinating how the different genres come together, but the story didn’t compel me like other stories have. i’d recommend it for how it messes with your preconceived notions of how storytelling genres work and to get your mind to wrap around how storytelling can shift between them and still work.

ice ice baby

ice ice baby

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growing up in austin didn’t afford a lot of opportunity for culinary excursions, but the one thing that was always a summertime trip was a visit to the dairy queen a couple times during the hot months. one thing you must know about my dad: he loves ice cream. like, dreamily so. he will poopoo pizza for its fatty content and then slurp down a big bowl of vanilla ice cream in the same evening. while his reasoning isn’t sound, at least the man knows where to spend his caloric intake.

so a trip to the DQ was not out of the question in the summer months when it was open. it didn’t happen very often, so when it did, it was a real treat. (don’t take this to mean that we were deprived of ice cream growing up. see above about one NL wallace. we ALWAYS had a gallon bucket of ice cream in the freezer. since we rarely splurged for anything beyond vanilla [and if we did it was usually gross neopolitan], we became deft at mixing our ice cream with a teaspoon of cocoa powder to create a sense of chocolate soft serve. liz was especially the expert at this, probably because she was the only one patient enough to wait to eat the ice cream.) the DQ in austin was on the west side near the old-school mcdonald’s, so it was always a trip to get over there.

the menu was always so appetizing, with the meal options and all the different ice cream options. but we never went there to eat a meal; it was always ice cream. and since there wasn’t much money, it was almost always a dipped cone (sugar cone – never waffle). ah, how i longed for a peanut buster parfait or a reese’s blizzard. BUT the dipped cone was better than homemade chocolate soft serve.

we always got ice cream on hottest of days and sat outside on the blistering red picnic tables, hauling our cones and handfuls of napkins out with us. ice cream started sliding out of the space between the chocolate shell and the cone as soon as we stepped outside, and either you had to be vigilant with eating the ice cream or watch the melty goodness run down your fingers. my favorite was when it was so hot, water beads started to form condensation on the shell and ice cream started breaking through in little white pinpoints.

of course it was a giant mess, trying to keep up with the meltiness of the ice cream in the heat. it wouldn’t be odd to see one of my siblings covered in ice cream and give the cone up to the trash (yeah, probably charlie cuz he was 1. young and 2. distracted). but it was always fun and it was always a treat.

these days i don’t get to DQ much, but i do frequent the ice cream shop in town a few times a summer (which has some delicious flavors and excellent waffle cones). i have an ice cream maker so i can make my own ice cream whenever i like, and any ice cream i buy is a flavor that i enjoy eating by itself, no cocoa power mixing necessary.

masterclass

masterclass

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my sisters got me a year subscription to masterclass for my birthday so i could watch neil gaiman’s class on storytelling. unfortunately, all i’ve learned so far is that my camera and lens game is on point, and i now know how to make a killer chocolate mousse cake like the french make.

next up is mr. gaiman, which i am stoked about, if only because i am looking forward to listening to him talk to me for a few hours. of course i’m also interested in what he’s going to say, and i’m hoping to apply some of what i learn to my blogging. because i feel burnt out with blogging. i sat here, fingers to keyboard, for about 5 minutes before i actually started typing anything, and i’ve been wondering what to write for about 6 hours now.

so, someday, i’m hoping that my storytelling game will be a little more on point. i hope that i look forward to storytelling as much as i do researching and distilling some weird topic that i’m really interested in. ultimately, anything in this blog is storytelling, whether it’s photos, recipes, reminisces, fiction, social commentary. but i think my fiction game could be bumped up a little bit. i hope the masterclass helps with that!

(ps: that killer chocolate mousse cake just made me super excited to make my christmas buche de noel. mmm mmm.)

a last hurrah

a last hurrah

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today was halfway productive! nate and i put the lawn mower away after putting some gas saver junk in it. i, of course, had grand plans to mow the lawn one last time and failed, but not before i filled the tank with gas. then we hauled out the snowblower, cleaned it out, and got it ready for snow. i had to order a replacement part, which should be here in the next week. then it should be at least a little more workable when the snow comes down. (things were not working right toward the end of last summer.)

it was mid-40s today, so i figured why not take advantage of it and go for a run, which may be the last outdoor run of the season. it was really windy, so i headed out to st. john’s in hopes of the trees cutting the wind a little bit. no leaves, so it wasn’t a great windbreak, but it was probably better than if i’d’ve run on the road. and oh man, it was rough with the hills but i got in 4 miles! i’ll take what i can get. unfortunately, it’s probably back to the treadmill tomorrow.

my battle with yeast

my battle with yeast

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it’s foodie friday, folks! on our way back from mexico, we gals had some pan de muerto at the puerto vallarta airport restaurant, and it was DELISH. so i decided to give it a go!

(not my pic. thanks https://www.wideopeneats.com/recipes/pan-de-muerto/)

i found a relatively reasonable recipe online that called for orange zest and anise seeds, which they almost all did. i used quick rise yeast, but since i’m so impatient about yeast (and i started making this at 7 p.m.), i’m sure i didn’t let it rise enough. either time.

the dough is similar to kuchen dough, except more eggs and butter (an enriched dough, as paul h. would say), so it was more brioche-y but not quite at that level.

i was able to make about 8 “rolls” that varied in size from about about 4″ in diameter to maybe 7″ in diameter. i didn’t make the fancy bone decoration on top, but i did sprinkle with sugar after i got it out. if i attempt this again, i will do an egg wash on top before putting it in the oven. and hope that my patience levels increase so i can let the yeast do its thing.

results? it was dense, due to me not letting it rise enough. i’m pretty sure that paul h. would call it claggy at its best. no handshake for me. but the taste was delicious. i was REALLY hesitant about the anise seed, but it was great with the orange and didn’t overwhelm it with a licorice-y taste. if i try it again, i’ll start earlier in the day and maybe make a half batch. and just let the yeast work.

remember when

remember when

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hey, remember when it was summertime? that’s my throwback thursday for today. remember when the trees were just starting to get their full-time leaves, and they were sort of neony green? remember when the grass was still sort of squishy because the snow had melted and the dirt was saturated with water? remember when tulips were blooming? remember when it was 65º and the sun was in the middle of the sky instead of looming above the horizon for the entire day? remember when it didn’t hurt to breathe? remember when you could just go outside without it being a production because you didn’t have to worry about being cold? remember when the sun was still in the sky at 5:30 p.m.? remember when you didn’t feel like it was time for bed at 6 p.m.? remember when you didn’t head to work in the dark and head home from work in the dark? remember when you could go barefoot outdoors, or just slide into some sandals or other flimsy shoe? remember when you weren’t depressed due to the time of year?

so over this axial tilt.

word wednesday: crapulous!

word wednesday: crapulous!

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crapulous. what a great word!

not to be confused with crappy, crapulous is what your head feels like the morning after a long night of drinking. crapulous is a craptastic hangover.

of course it has roots in greek, from the work kraipale (not to be confused with crap, which has roots in german and has to do with detritus). romans took over crapulous and ran with it, using it to mean just being drunk.

and there are several variations: crapulent (a very cromulent word), crapulence, crapula (not to be confused with a cupola).

(now that’s a crappy cupola.)

this has been your word wednesday. let’s bring back crapulous!

a mix of some electronics reviews

a mix of some electronics reviews

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today disneyplus debuted, and being the sucker i am, i signed up for the free trial. to whit: i am currently watching “the three caballeros.”

i am streaming it via my chromecast (named chromecats haha) from the app on my phone.

WHY, you ask?

i stream netflix, amazon, hulu, etc. through my playstation 3 to my tv. but guess what? playstation stopped supporting the PS3 in march. and so disney isn’t releasing a PS3 app, which is only slightly annoying.

so i have two options to throw disney up on my TV: stream through my browser to my chromecast or from the disney app to the chromecast. the problem with this is that i’m not sure if i would use disneyplus as much as i would if it were on my ps3 as an app. but we’ll see what happens. i’ve got 7 days on a free trial to make up my mind!

OK boomer

OK boomer

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oh lord, as a tail-end genX/xennial (cringe), i kind of don’t want to tackle this one, but as part of meme monday, i thought it might be apropos of the current climate we’re struggling with.

plus, i feel like “ok boomer” is sort of something genX might get behind, in a sort of “whatever” eye roll, cynical way. i liken ok boomer to my version of “you do you”: i have laid out everything that might be wrong with this decision you want to partake in, and you’re going to do it anyway. you do you.

ok, a few things to go over before we dive into the proverbial hornets nest.

  • silent generation (of great depression era): 1928-45 (my dad is in this gen)
  • baby boomer (of ok boomer):  1946-64 (my mom is in this gen)
  • genX: 1965-1980 (i am in this gen)
  • millennials: 1981-1996 (all my sibs are in this gen)
  • genZ: 1997-present

(just a note: please stop calling everyone under 25 a millennial. millennials are 24-38 for crying out loud. the majority of them are in their 30s and some nearing 40.)

here’s how ok boomer started: an older man was in a video in which he said, “millennials and Generation Z have the Peter Pan syndrome, they don’t ever want to grow up; they think that the Utopian ideals that they have in their youth are somehow going to translate into adulthood”. in early april, the phrase ok boomer started in reaction to this as a retaliation and criticism of baby boomer-shaped politics, economics and the environment policies.

the big thing about ok boomer is that genZ is fed up with baby boomers and their views on racism, climate change, technology, the economic state, pulling yourself up by your bootstraps, etc. and that millennials and genX should be right on board with them in the disgust. or genX (the forgotten generation) would be on the sidelines watching the fight, eating popcorn (maybe with the silent generation).

“The older generations grew up with a certain mind-set, and we have a different perspective,” Ms. O’Connor said. “A lot of them don’t believe in climate change or don’t believe people can get jobs with dyed hair, and a lot of them are stubborn in that view. Teenagers just respond, ‘Ok, boomer.’ It’s like, we’ll prove you wrong, we’re still going to be successful because the world is changing.” (source)

but here’s the problem with this ok boomer generalization: no matter what generation you’re in, there are idiosyncrasies. my mom is the furthest thing from a racist or climate change denier, and she’s a boomer. the majority of genZ guys at my school to get a trades degree are trump voters. the top end of genX is mid-50s and is most likely economically stable and won’t understand this whole avocado toast/home loan thing. millennials are in their 30s and have responsibilities just like everyone else. (meanwhile, you do realize everyone is burnt out?)

i think anyone can be on either end of the ok boomer meme. my mom could walk into the welding lab and say “ok boomer” to the dude wearing a trump hat, and it would fit. it’s just that looking at generalizations of each generation, that’s where it falls.

of course, the baby boomers have taken great offense to this, saying it’s ageism and denigrating. to which i say, check yoself. you were the ones crying about how awful millennials are for not buying your superlarge homes and getting joy from owning plants. eyeroll*. (*classic genX!)

i’m not sure where to take this from here. i do have to react to the original older gentleman in the video about growing up, because who really wants to grow up? and what is wrong with bring a few childlike fancies into the world as an adult? sure makes it less boring, more inviting, and kind of fun^. but if this ok boomer craze is the start of something that will effect some change, i guess it might be ok.** i’m going to stick with you do you.

^ whoa, there’s the xennial in me peeking out!

**back to classic genX hahaha