-Much to my surprise we had a few hours of snow today. Fortunately relatively warm temperatures meant that we didn't see much accumulation.
Fortunately for you, I was able to capture this non-accumulation through the power of time-lapse.
[Embedded video]
-I must be 5 for 19, with a +/- of about three on the total number of cups, in this year's RUTRTW. And to think that this represents only a fraction of my coffee consumption.
-I made a nice batch of breakfast Afghans today. I am really quite fond of this recipe.
-This evening I started making some bread. After about an hour of the bread not rising I realized that adding some yeast would probably help that out. I think I fixed things, but they still aren't perfect.
-This whole Robocall things keeps on trucking along. It seems that today's big news was that the CEO has now 'requested' to appear before a parliamentary committee and discuss the investigation.
Showing posts with label cookies. Show all posts
Showing posts with label cookies. Show all posts
Thursday, March 15, 2012
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Round Four
Well, it only took me four tries but I finally got it right, I finally made Afghans without really screwing up the recipe.
As usual, we have been really ploughing through these things. For some reason (I think it is because of their high nutritional value) I am more inclined to eat these than I am many of the other sweet baked goods that I make.
So if you are looking for a recipe that might eventually turn out well give Afghans a shot. And if they don't work the first time just try again, and again, and again.
Score
Cameron 34
Neil 0
As usual, we have been really ploughing through these things. For some reason (I think it is because of their high nutritional value) I am more inclined to eat these than I am many of the other sweet baked goods that I make.
So if you are looking for a recipe that might eventually turn out well give Afghans a shot. And if they don't work the first time just try again, and again, and again.
Score
Cameron 34
Neil 0
Saturday, January 29, 2011
Round Three
This summer I learned about a type of New Zealand cookie called Afghans through my friend Nicole's house's cooking blog. Almost immediately I was inclined to try the recipe. Almost immediately I managed to screw the recipe up (and then post about it).
A few days after my first failed attempt at Afghans I tried again. This time with a little more success. Actually, eventually I can to accept that this batch of cookies was pretty tasty. After a few more weeks of reflection I began to idealize these cookies. They seemed like the best cookies I had ever made. Why wasn't I making them more frequently?
When I saw whole walnuts on sale a few weeks ago I decided to buy them to encourage myself to get around to baking them again. Obviously, this tactic wasn't immediately effective.
Anyway, as today is a special someone's birthday I finally convinced myself that today would be a good day for me to bake these cookies (particularly as she really liked the second batch).
As the original form of the recipe called for ingredients to be measured by weight and as I received a new electric scale for Christmas that I had yet to use, I decided to weigh the ingredients I was going to use.
As this is was the first time I had ever weight ingredients, the process was slow. I definitely wasn't quite comfortable with how the whole thing was to work. Though with each ingredient I felt a little more comfortable.
Eventually I had some cookie dough and was ready to put the first tray in the oven.
While the first dozen cookies were in the oven I started to work on the icing, which is a nice thick, fudgey chocolate icing. As I was measuring the sugar I noticed that the quantity didn't seem quite right. After a little investigation I realized that I had failed to notice the decimal point and that I was trying to add one tenth the required volume.
In my defence, the digital scale's digital decimal point is a little lower than the base of the numbers. Furthermore, when one has things on the scale and is forced to look at the screen on an angle it can be difficult to see.
p
This discovery helped me understand why I had added so few cornflakes to the dough. Bummer.
I was able to take unbaked cookies and then add the additional cornflakes before baking them.
So, again I managed to screw this recipe up. Bummer.
Anyway, in the end I think they were edible.
At least everyone has been eating them and no one has died yet.
A few days after my first failed attempt at Afghans I tried again. This time with a little more success. Actually, eventually I can to accept that this batch of cookies was pretty tasty. After a few more weeks of reflection I began to idealize these cookies. They seemed like the best cookies I had ever made. Why wasn't I making them more frequently?
When I saw whole walnuts on sale a few weeks ago I decided to buy them to encourage myself to get around to baking them again. Obviously, this tactic wasn't immediately effective.
Anyway, as today is a special someone's birthday I finally convinced myself that today would be a good day for me to bake these cookies (particularly as she really liked the second batch).
As the original form of the recipe called for ingredients to be measured by weight and as I received a new electric scale for Christmas that I had yet to use, I decided to weigh the ingredients I was going to use.
As this is was the first time I had ever weight ingredients, the process was slow. I definitely wasn't quite comfortable with how the whole thing was to work. Though with each ingredient I felt a little more comfortable.
Eventually I had some cookie dough and was ready to put the first tray in the oven.
While the first dozen cookies were in the oven I started to work on the icing, which is a nice thick, fudgey chocolate icing. As I was measuring the sugar I noticed that the quantity didn't seem quite right. After a little investigation I realized that I had failed to notice the decimal point and that I was trying to add one tenth the required volume.
In my defence, the digital scale's digital decimal point is a little lower than the base of the numbers. Furthermore, when one has things on the scale and is forced to look at the screen on an angle it can be difficult to see.
p
This discovery helped me understand why I had added so few cornflakes to the dough. Bummer.
I was able to take unbaked cookies and then add the additional cornflakes before baking them.
So, again I managed to screw this recipe up. Bummer.
Anyway, in the end I think they were edible.
At least everyone has been eating them and no one has died yet.
Monday, June 14, 2010
Round Two
A few days ago I posted about my failed attempt to make Afghans, a type of cookie popular in New Zealand. It seems that not only did I draw attention to my failure by writing a relatively long post about it, but my friend Nicole has also linked to the post from the blog that first introduced me to the concept of Afghans.
The day after my failed Afghan attempt my mother pointed out that one of the recipes I consulted had the ingredient quantities available not only in metric, but also in imperial. To prove to myself and others that I am not as bad a baker as the first batch of Afghans would suggest I decided to try again, this time with the imperial version of the recipe in hand.
Fortunately, this time things worked out and the cookies didn't melt into 2-dimensional disks that were too brittle to pick up.
Actually, the cookies turned out quite nicely (even if I didn't have full walnut halves at my disposal). That being said, for any of you interested in trying the recipe I would suggest adding a little extra icing sugar to the icing, without this extra sugar the icing will likely be too runny.
The day after my failed Afghan attempt my mother pointed out that one of the recipes I consulted had the ingredient quantities available not only in metric, but also in imperial. To prove to myself and others that I am not as bad a baker as the first batch of Afghans would suggest I decided to try again, this time with the imperial version of the recipe in hand.
Fortunately, this time things worked out and the cookies didn't melt into 2-dimensional disks that were too brittle to pick up.
Actually, the cookies turned out quite nicely (even if I didn't have full walnut halves at my disposal). That being said, for any of you interested in trying the recipe I would suggest adding a little extra icing sugar to the icing, without this extra sugar the icing will likely be too runny.
Thursday, June 10, 2010
What were they supposed to look like?
This morning, while working my way through the posts that accumulated in my RSS reader overnight, I came across a post on my friend Nicole's house's food blog. The post dealt with the making of Afghans, a type of cookie that is popular in New Zealand. Immediately upon reading the post (and the linked recipe) I decided that given the limited number of ingredients required I would give them a shot.
The first problem that I encountered was that the recipe that I had called for ingredients to be measured by weight and I did not have access to a functional kitchen scale. After a little searching I found a few recipes online that seemed similar in ingredient proportions to the one that I first examined. Eventually I settled on something of a hybrid of a few of the recipes (strangely I didn't choose the one that was entirely in units that I could actually measure).
After a few minutes in the mixer it was clear that the dough that I was in the midst of creating was not turning out like other cookie doughs that I have made. The dough seemed particularly heavy on sugar and butter and light on things like flour (or other ingredients that would diminish the 'melting' effect). Of course this effect was likely compounded by the fact that I, almost consciously, confused ounces as a measure of volume with ounces as a measure of weight (a problem that contributed to to the imbalance between the butter and the flour).
Given my unfamiliarity with the recipe I decided to just trudge along and bake the dough that I had in front of me, even though over-melting seemed like a very real possibility. I guess at this point I could have added a little more flour to stiffen things up, but I decided not to as it seemed likely that this batch of cookies was already beyond repair (it is rather unfortunate when you have written off a baking project before anything has even been put in the oven).
Not surprisingly, my greatest fears about the outcome of my cookies were confirmed when the first tray was removed from the oven. The cookies, which were supposed to be ball-shaped, melted into thin disks that were unmovable while hot. Given my lack of access to magic and my unwillingness to resort to additional flour, when the second tray came out of the oven it exhibited similar problems. Fortunately, once cooled, I was able to get most of each cookie from the trays to a cooling rack (though all cookies showed at least some signs of damage).
Sadly, or maybe happily, the icing I made to accompany these cookies turned out quite nicely. Of course because of the brittleness and poor quality of the cookies I didn't ice all of them, or even most of them.
So now I have most of a batch of good(ish) chocolate icing and similar portion of a batch of poor chocolate cookies. I guess the final upside is that our contribution to this week's compost collection will be larger than it otherwise might have been (though as I am sure that we are the apartment that contributes the most already this additional contribution won't be much appreciated by our neighbours).
Amazingly, though I am not sure if it is because of or in spite of today's failure, I am quite tempted to try Afghans again. The original blog post (and that the recipe calls for corn flakes) is still tempting me as much now as it did this morning. Hopefully in round two, if there is a round two, I will be wise enough to at least use a recipe that provides quantities of ingredients in units that I can create rather than units at which I have to guess. I guess the other thing that I could do is try to convert this motivation to bake into a desire to bake bread (as we all know that stuff is almost impossible to screw up, or at least be in a position where a fix isn't possible).
The first problem that I encountered was that the recipe that I had called for ingredients to be measured by weight and I did not have access to a functional kitchen scale. After a little searching I found a few recipes online that seemed similar in ingredient proportions to the one that I first examined. Eventually I settled on something of a hybrid of a few of the recipes (strangely I didn't choose the one that was entirely in units that I could actually measure).
After a few minutes in the mixer it was clear that the dough that I was in the midst of creating was not turning out like other cookie doughs that I have made. The dough seemed particularly heavy on sugar and butter and light on things like flour (or other ingredients that would diminish the 'melting' effect). Of course this effect was likely compounded by the fact that I, almost consciously, confused ounces as a measure of volume with ounces as a measure of weight (a problem that contributed to to the imbalance between the butter and the flour).
Given my unfamiliarity with the recipe I decided to just trudge along and bake the dough that I had in front of me, even though over-melting seemed like a very real possibility. I guess at this point I could have added a little more flour to stiffen things up, but I decided not to as it seemed likely that this batch of cookies was already beyond repair (it is rather unfortunate when you have written off a baking project before anything has even been put in the oven).
Not surprisingly, my greatest fears about the outcome of my cookies were confirmed when the first tray was removed from the oven. The cookies, which were supposed to be ball-shaped, melted into thin disks that were unmovable while hot. Given my lack of access to magic and my unwillingness to resort to additional flour, when the second tray came out of the oven it exhibited similar problems. Fortunately, once cooled, I was able to get most of each cookie from the trays to a cooling rack (though all cookies showed at least some signs of damage).
Sadly, or maybe happily, the icing I made to accompany these cookies turned out quite nicely. Of course because of the brittleness and poor quality of the cookies I didn't ice all of them, or even most of them.
So now I have most of a batch of good(ish) chocolate icing and similar portion of a batch of poor chocolate cookies. I guess the final upside is that our contribution to this week's compost collection will be larger than it otherwise might have been (though as I am sure that we are the apartment that contributes the most already this additional contribution won't be much appreciated by our neighbours).
Amazingly, though I am not sure if it is because of or in spite of today's failure, I am quite tempted to try Afghans again. The original blog post (and that the recipe calls for corn flakes) is still tempting me as much now as it did this morning. Hopefully in round two, if there is a round two, I will be wise enough to at least use a recipe that provides quantities of ingredients in units that I can create rather than units at which I have to guess. I guess the other thing that I could do is try to convert this motivation to bake into a desire to bake bread (as we all know that stuff is almost impossible to screw up, or at least be in a position where a fix isn't possible).
Friday, March 19, 2010
A Few Quick Notes 410
-Today was another beautiful day in Halifax. Unfortunately, I didn't end up leaving the apartment until the temperature was about 7 or 8 degrees below today's high.
-After a few years of neglect I finally got around too looking into the service we use to distribute our post via email. It seems that since the last time I looked into things Feedburner was acquired by Google and is thus now a Google service. The big news is that I have changed the feed from being a Feedburner feed to a Google feed. In theory the transition should be seamless for those who receive the daily email updates and who have used readers to subscribe to the feed, but if things do not go as smoothly as planned it would be great it someone would let me know.
-This evening I made a trip to the grocery store just a few minutes before it was schedule to close. While there, among other things, I picked up some carrots, celery, and more discount diet passionfruit pop. Shortly after returning home I peeled and cut into sticks 3 pounds of carrots (I have subsequently consumed two bowls of carrot sticks). I have also managed to consume a number of cans of passionfruit pop.
-In about 2000, while I was living in New York, I developed a taste for Oreo cookies. I started going through packages of Oreos quite quickly. This course of events took me by surprise as I had never really liked Oreos as a child, actually I was grossed out by the idea of all sandwich cookies that weren't Fudgeos. Almost as soon as I left New York that December my infatuation with Oreos ended.
A few days ago I noticed that on of the grocery stores had Oreos on sale for about half price. This was a low enough price for me to see if I could either re-kindle my relationship with the product or determine if I had really just had nothing more than a brief dalliance with the cookie almost a decade ago. I think it turns out it was the latter. Now that I have had a few I can safely say that they really don't do anything for me. If it wasn't for the fact that I have about 80% of a package left I think that I would probably feel quite comfortable if I never ate another in my life (actually that may not be true, I am somewhat curious to know whether or not American Oreos are different and whether or not they are better than Canadian Oreos).
For those of you who are curious, Fudgeos are still my go-to sandwich cookie. The package I purchased with the Oreos was consumed within just a few days of its purchase.
-We have our final Ultimate game of the season tomorrow.
-Wow, I really should get back to work.
-After a few years of neglect I finally got around too looking into the service we use to distribute our post via email. It seems that since the last time I looked into things Feedburner was acquired by Google and is thus now a Google service. The big news is that I have changed the feed from being a Feedburner feed to a Google feed. In theory the transition should be seamless for those who receive the daily email updates and who have used readers to subscribe to the feed, but if things do not go as smoothly as planned it would be great it someone would let me know.
-This evening I made a trip to the grocery store just a few minutes before it was schedule to close. While there, among other things, I picked up some carrots, celery, and more discount diet passionfruit pop. Shortly after returning home I peeled and cut into sticks 3 pounds of carrots (I have subsequently consumed two bowls of carrot sticks). I have also managed to consume a number of cans of passionfruit pop.
-In about 2000, while I was living in New York, I developed a taste for Oreo cookies. I started going through packages of Oreos quite quickly. This course of events took me by surprise as I had never really liked Oreos as a child, actually I was grossed out by the idea of all sandwich cookies that weren't Fudgeos. Almost as soon as I left New York that December my infatuation with Oreos ended.
A few days ago I noticed that on of the grocery stores had Oreos on sale for about half price. This was a low enough price for me to see if I could either re-kindle my relationship with the product or determine if I had really just had nothing more than a brief dalliance with the cookie almost a decade ago. I think it turns out it was the latter. Now that I have had a few I can safely say that they really don't do anything for me. If it wasn't for the fact that I have about 80% of a package left I think that I would probably feel quite comfortable if I never ate another in my life (actually that may not be true, I am somewhat curious to know whether or not American Oreos are different and whether or not they are better than Canadian Oreos).
For those of you who are curious, Fudgeos are still my go-to sandwich cookie. The package I purchased with the Oreos was consumed within just a few days of its purchase.
-We have our final Ultimate game of the season tomorrow.
-Wow, I really should get back to work.
Saturday, November 14, 2009
A Few Quick Notes 372
-Today (Friday) was quite nice. It was about 10 during the middle of the day, though it has not dropped to just above freezing. For the past few days the weather has been like this, which is nice as it makes for very pleasant walks to school.
-We had pork chops, couscous, and vegetables for dinner tonight. I know that Neil and I were both pleasantly surprised with how tasty and moist the pork chops were. I think our surprise came not because of any inability to cook pork chops that I might have, but rather because the chops were on the thin side (so more likely to dry out).
-My tobacco harvesting has really picked up in the past few days. At the moment I have 13 leaves drying, and a few more basically ready to go into the storage container. At some point soon I am going to have to start figuring out what I want to do with them (a thought that regular readers of this blog will likely find somewhat repetitive).
-A few days ago I made a batch of rum balls. Much to my surprise they have been quite popular. When I was making them I assumed that I would slowly pick away at them for a weeks until they were gone. As things stand now I may actually need to make another batch in a few days if I want more.
-It seems that the German Marshall Fund and Peter MacKay will be hosting a big security conference from November 20-22 at a hotel near our apartment. A week ago I had the pleasure of speaking with a local peace activist who was kind enough to inform me that protests have been scheduled for the conference. While I wasn't to surprised to learn that protestors would be present, particularly when I started to get a better sense of who would be attending, I was a little surprised to learn that this would all be going down within a few hundred feet of our apartment. I guess we will just have to wait and see how things go. Hopefully I will be able to snag a few photos or some video of the events.
-This morning when I woke up I discovered that my shoulder was hurting (I don't think it is enough to worry about it). I guess what surprises me is why this might be the case. What could I have done to myself during the night to have caused such a situation? Hopefully things will be back to normal by tomorrow.
-Today I signed up for a Google Wave account. At the moment I am not really sure if I will have an occassion to use such a service but it seemed that it would be better to have access than not.
-We had pork chops, couscous, and vegetables for dinner tonight. I know that Neil and I were both pleasantly surprised with how tasty and moist the pork chops were. I think our surprise came not because of any inability to cook pork chops that I might have, but rather because the chops were on the thin side (so more likely to dry out).
-My tobacco harvesting has really picked up in the past few days. At the moment I have 13 leaves drying, and a few more basically ready to go into the storage container. At some point soon I am going to have to start figuring out what I want to do with them (a thought that regular readers of this blog will likely find somewhat repetitive).
-A few days ago I made a batch of rum balls. Much to my surprise they have been quite popular. When I was making them I assumed that I would slowly pick away at them for a weeks until they were gone. As things stand now I may actually need to make another batch in a few days if I want more.
-It seems that the German Marshall Fund and Peter MacKay will be hosting a big security conference from November 20-22 at a hotel near our apartment. A week ago I had the pleasure of speaking with a local peace activist who was kind enough to inform me that protests have been scheduled for the conference. While I wasn't to surprised to learn that protestors would be present, particularly when I started to get a better sense of who would be attending, I was a little surprised to learn that this would all be going down within a few hundred feet of our apartment. I guess we will just have to wait and see how things go. Hopefully I will be able to snag a few photos or some video of the events.
-This morning when I woke up I discovered that my shoulder was hurting (I don't think it is enough to worry about it). I guess what surprises me is why this might be the case. What could I have done to myself during the night to have caused such a situation? Hopefully things will be back to normal by tomorrow.
-Today I signed up for a Google Wave account. At the moment I am not really sure if I will have an occassion to use such a service but it seemed that it would be better to have access than not.
Thursday, September 10, 2009
A Few Quick Notes 355
-Today (Thursday) was another pretty nice day, though definitely on the crisp side of things. The unfortunate weather news for the region is that we have our first frost warning of the season. I am hoping that this warning is really more for more inland areas than where I live, but I guess I might have to wait and see to learn whether this is really the case or not.
-I just baked a batch of oatmeal chocolate chip cookies so that I will have something to snack on in the coming days. Tomorrow morning it seems likely that I will have to back a batch of bread so that I will have breakfast food for the coming days.
-I don't know what it is about me, but I can't seem to scale main dishes particularly accurately. For instance, the stir-fry that I made for dinner tonight was huge, I couldn't even fit it all in our largest serving bowl. As I was chopping vegetables, which is where the problem likely lies, I felt that I was only preparing reasonable portions of each vegetable. Two cups of celery seemed totally reasonable. I guess that the fact that in total I added over 10 cups of vegetables was probably most of the problem lay. I presume another part of the 'problem,' if we want to call it that, is that I really don't mind leftovers, so I probably allow myself a little more lee-way than I might if I absolutely despised leftovers.
-For the past few weeks we have been experiencing some strange traffic patterns on the blog. All of a sudden we have seemingly doubled our daily readership (from about 5 to about 10). Though I don't really know why this has happened, I do think that some of it can be attributed to the traffic that has been coming our way from the Google Voice Blog because I have linked to a few of their posts recently. Presumably the 30 or 40 people they have sent our way wouldn't mean much to most blogs, in our case it has been quite dramatic (though I am not sure that this really means anything in the long run).
-Earlier today I made my way to the grocery store. I imagine that I surprised the cashier with my purchases.
Carrots are hard to pass up when they are less than $4.00 for 10 pounds, so hard to pass up that I had to buy two bags.
-I just baked a batch of oatmeal chocolate chip cookies so that I will have something to snack on in the coming days. Tomorrow morning it seems likely that I will have to back a batch of bread so that I will have breakfast food for the coming days.
-I don't know what it is about me, but I can't seem to scale main dishes particularly accurately. For instance, the stir-fry that I made for dinner tonight was huge, I couldn't even fit it all in our largest serving bowl. As I was chopping vegetables, which is where the problem likely lies, I felt that I was only preparing reasonable portions of each vegetable. Two cups of celery seemed totally reasonable. I guess that the fact that in total I added over 10 cups of vegetables was probably most of the problem lay. I presume another part of the 'problem,' if we want to call it that, is that I really don't mind leftovers, so I probably allow myself a little more lee-way than I might if I absolutely despised leftovers.
-For the past few weeks we have been experiencing some strange traffic patterns on the blog. All of a sudden we have seemingly doubled our daily readership (from about 5 to about 10). Though I don't really know why this has happened, I do think that some of it can be attributed to the traffic that has been coming our way from the Google Voice Blog because I have linked to a few of their posts recently. Presumably the 30 or 40 people they have sent our way wouldn't mean much to most blogs, in our case it has been quite dramatic (though I am not sure that this really means anything in the long run).
-Earlier today I made my way to the grocery store. I imagine that I surprised the cashier with my purchases.
Carrots are hard to pass up when they are less than $4.00 for 10 pounds, so hard to pass up that I had to buy two bags.
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
A Few Quick Notes 257
-It seems that today was a pretty passible winter's day, though I can't say that I spent all that much time outdoors. More importantly, it seems thaw Environment Canada has issued a Winter Storm Watch for Tuesday evening.
-Since my return I have seen very little (or no) activity in the apartment across from my bedroom window. This stands out because prior to our departure the inhabitants of this apartment were on the loud side and frequently were kind enough to make me aware of their presence. I am curious if they have left the apartment, or are taking some kind of extended holiday, or some unfathomable third option.
-This evening, with hopes that it would keep me awake, I decided to make a batch of Oatmeal Chocolate Chip cookies. While I am pretty pleased with results of the baking, I can't say that the experience woke me up as much as I had hoped (though I do think that the physical activity was better than nothing).
-As we had a turkey yesterday we are now firmly in the midst of a rush to consume our turkey leftovers. This evening I prepared turkey potpie, and later in the week it is likely that I will prepare some kind of turkey soup. With a few sandwiches thrown in it is likely that we should be able to get through everything before we get any spoilage.
-Not surprisingly, now that I have been back in class for a week I am back in the midst of assigned readings. As much as I approve of the concept of assigned readings (what a great statement to make), I was somewhat disheartened to learn that the stack of papers shown below would be the readings I would be responsible for (along with about 14 articles) in the next 6 weeks of one of my courses. Though I am one week in I still don't feel as though I have made much of a dent.
-It seems that my complaining about podcast withdrawal was a little premature, or at least a little unnecessary as at least three of the previously mentioned podcasts (Stop Podcasting Yourself, Jordan, Jesse, Go!, and This American Life) released new episodes last night or today. I should also mention that The Moth (a podcast I forgot to include among my favourites yesterday) released a new episode today. It seems that the only hold outs are The 40 Year Old Boy and Radiolab.
-Since my return I have seen very little (or no) activity in the apartment across from my bedroom window. This stands out because prior to our departure the inhabitants of this apartment were on the loud side and frequently were kind enough to make me aware of their presence. I am curious if they have left the apartment, or are taking some kind of extended holiday, or some unfathomable third option.
-This evening, with hopes that it would keep me awake, I decided to make a batch of Oatmeal Chocolate Chip cookies. While I am pretty pleased with results of the baking, I can't say that the experience woke me up as much as I had hoped (though I do think that the physical activity was better than nothing).
-As we had a turkey yesterday we are now firmly in the midst of a rush to consume our turkey leftovers. This evening I prepared turkey potpie, and later in the week it is likely that I will prepare some kind of turkey soup. With a few sandwiches thrown in it is likely that we should be able to get through everything before we get any spoilage.
-Not surprisingly, now that I have been back in class for a week I am back in the midst of assigned readings. As much as I approve of the concept of assigned readings (what a great statement to make), I was somewhat disheartened to learn that the stack of papers shown below would be the readings I would be responsible for (along with about 14 articles) in the next 6 weeks of one of my courses. Though I am one week in I still don't feel as though I have made much of a dent.
-It seems that my complaining about podcast withdrawal was a little premature, or at least a little unnecessary as at least three of the previously mentioned podcasts (Stop Podcasting Yourself, Jordan, Jesse, Go!, and This American Life) released new episodes last night or today. I should also mention that The Moth (a podcast I forgot to include among my favourites yesterday) released a new episode today. It seems that the only hold outs are The 40 Year Old Boy and Radiolab.
Thursday, February 07, 2008
A Few Quick Notes 153
-Today is another standard winter’s day in Montreal. If I recall correctly, temperatures have been below zero and we were blessed with a few flurries.
-Last night, while laying in bed reading I heard the building power down and saw lights flash off. After a brief investigation I noticed that the Hydro Quebec truck was stationed outside our apartment building, seemingly working on things. This suggested to me that we would be without power for some number of hours (as was the case last time they worked in the same way).
My main concern was how I would go about waking up the next morning as my alarm clock was plugged into a non-functional power outlet. After a few minutes I decided that I would bank on the power being back on by 8:30 AM.
I set my iPod alarm and then hooked it up to my speakers, making sure that both were also plugged in. My desire being that the power would be back and that the speakers would be powered by the time I wanted to wake up.
Fortunately, by about 5:17 AM the power came on and I was able to ensure that my normal alarm was properly set so that I would be up for class.
-Tonight I made some short bread. It came out a little differently than I expected, so I hope it is edible. One of the surprising things about most of the recipes that I came across was that they called for brown sugar when I would have expected white sugar.
-The several times that I have tried to buy beef for roasting this week have failed. It seems that the stores either don’t have, or are out of the appropriate sale cuts of beef.
-Last night, while laying in bed reading I heard the building power down and saw lights flash off. After a brief investigation I noticed that the Hydro Quebec truck was stationed outside our apartment building, seemingly working on things. This suggested to me that we would be without power for some number of hours (as was the case last time they worked in the same way).
My main concern was how I would go about waking up the next morning as my alarm clock was plugged into a non-functional power outlet. After a few minutes I decided that I would bank on the power being back on by 8:30 AM.
I set my iPod alarm and then hooked it up to my speakers, making sure that both were also plugged in. My desire being that the power would be back and that the speakers would be powered by the time I wanted to wake up.
Fortunately, by about 5:17 AM the power came on and I was able to ensure that my normal alarm was properly set so that I would be up for class.
-Tonight I made some short bread. It came out a little differently than I expected, so I hope it is edible. One of the surprising things about most of the recipes that I came across was that they called for brown sugar when I would have expected white sugar.
-The several times that I have tried to buy beef for roasting this week have failed. It seems that the stores either don’t have, or are out of the appropriate sale cuts of beef.
Sunday, February 03, 2008
A Few Quick Notes 151
-Today was another relatively standard winter day, not too far below zero, but with a little snow to remind people that it is definitely still winter.
-It seems that today is Stupor Bowl Sunday. I am surprised at how many of the people I know in Montreal have plans that related to watching this event. Particularly surprising is that I can’t see most of them as sports fan (but that may just be because I have a hard time understanding how anyone can be a sports fan).
-After completing a little work on campus I returned home. On my way back I stopped at a grocery store. Though I had originally intended to pick up one or two items, I eventually purchased almost $25.00 worth of goods (most of which were sale items). Unfortunately, I didn’t forget to buy a few cans of water chestnuts (as they will only be on sale until midnight tonight).
-Though I was a little worried about my shift last night, it turned out to be nothing to be scared of. We ended up with about 250 McGill residence dwellers for just over two hours. In part, that this party was tolerable may have been because of the brevity.
One of the more impressive sights at the party (which was to be a New Year’s Eve party) was a table covered in about 250 glasses of sparkling white wine. Not surprisingly, there was somewhat of a feeding frenzy type atmosphere surrounding the table. After talking with one of my co-workers who was more closely involved with the filling of the glasses, I am pretty sure that this was likely even truer that I was able to tell from my few quick glimpses of the scene.
In part because of the number of glasses used for the sparkling white wine, but also just generally it seemed as though it was a good night for stemmed glassware. We seemed to switch from our typical focus on pitchers of beer to glasses of wine.
The downside of the shift is that I didn’t make it back to the apartment until well after 3:00 AM.
-If people are interested, the recipe for oatmeal chocolate chip cookies in the Joy of Cooking is pretty good.
-About three different types of sirens are currently being used to alert car owners in my neighbourhood that snow ploughing is about to take place. After the siren phase, a team of tow-trucks removes any remaining cars and the ploughing begins.
As you may imagine, these are not ideal circumstances for studying or concentrating.
-I should eventually try to prepare some dinner this evening. It is likely that I will have something with a can or two of freshly purchased tuna.
-It seems that today is Stupor Bowl Sunday. I am surprised at how many of the people I know in Montreal have plans that related to watching this event. Particularly surprising is that I can’t see most of them as sports fan (but that may just be because I have a hard time understanding how anyone can be a sports fan).
-After completing a little work on campus I returned home. On my way back I stopped at a grocery store. Though I had originally intended to pick up one or two items, I eventually purchased almost $25.00 worth of goods (most of which were sale items). Unfortunately, I didn’t forget to buy a few cans of water chestnuts (as they will only be on sale until midnight tonight).
-Though I was a little worried about my shift last night, it turned out to be nothing to be scared of. We ended up with about 250 McGill residence dwellers for just over two hours. In part, that this party was tolerable may have been because of the brevity.
One of the more impressive sights at the party (which was to be a New Year’s Eve party) was a table covered in about 250 glasses of sparkling white wine. Not surprisingly, there was somewhat of a feeding frenzy type atmosphere surrounding the table. After talking with one of my co-workers who was more closely involved with the filling of the glasses, I am pretty sure that this was likely even truer that I was able to tell from my few quick glimpses of the scene.
In part because of the number of glasses used for the sparkling white wine, but also just generally it seemed as though it was a good night for stemmed glassware. We seemed to switch from our typical focus on pitchers of beer to glasses of wine.
The downside of the shift is that I didn’t make it back to the apartment until well after 3:00 AM.
-If people are interested, the recipe for oatmeal chocolate chip cookies in the Joy of Cooking is pretty good.
-About three different types of sirens are currently being used to alert car owners in my neighbourhood that snow ploughing is about to take place. After the siren phase, a team of tow-trucks removes any remaining cars and the ploughing begins.
As you may imagine, these are not ideal circumstances for studying or concentrating.
-I should eventually try to prepare some dinner this evening. It is likely that I will have something with a can or two of freshly purchased tuna.
Saturday, February 02, 2008
A Few Quick Notes 150
-Though we had a fair range of precipitation types yesterday, today seems to have been pretty pleasant. My only concern is that that some of the slush that accrued yesterday has frozen and turned into ice.
-After a few of us punched out last night, to take advantage of the snow a few of us decided to try and go sledding on McTavish. We originally thought that we could use shovels, but ended up settling for black garbage bags.
Initially I started by sitting down and then trying to just slide. As this didn't really work I realized that I would have to take a slightly more aggressive approach.
I then tried running while holding the bag in front of me and then jumping and landing on my chest. While the speed I achieved wasn't all that great, I did manage to travel about 60 feet. Even after a few attempts, I wasn't able to really beat this mark.
We also tried card board. Unfortunately, this didn't work at all. This failure was likely due to the texture of the snow, rather than the idea. If we had had a little more ice on the street I am sure that this would have worked.
-I will be heading back into work this evening. Thomson House will be playing host to some sort of month late New Year's Eve party. Hopefully everything will proceed smoothly, though I am somewhat skeptical.
-On Thursday night I made the oatmeal chocolate chip cookie recipe from the Joy of Cooking. I was pleasantly surprised with the results, particularly as the recipe calls for only as many chocolate chips as I typically use in recipes that have much more dough.
-After a few of us punched out last night, to take advantage of the snow a few of us decided to try and go sledding on McTavish. We originally thought that we could use shovels, but ended up settling for black garbage bags.
Initially I started by sitting down and then trying to just slide. As this didn't really work I realized that I would have to take a slightly more aggressive approach.
I then tried running while holding the bag in front of me and then jumping and landing on my chest. While the speed I achieved wasn't all that great, I did manage to travel about 60 feet. Even after a few attempts, I wasn't able to really beat this mark.
We also tried card board. Unfortunately, this didn't work at all. This failure was likely due to the texture of the snow, rather than the idea. If we had had a little more ice on the street I am sure that this would have worked.
-I will be heading back into work this evening. Thomson House will be playing host to some sort of month late New Year's Eve party. Hopefully everything will proceed smoothly, though I am somewhat skeptical.
-On Thursday night I made the oatmeal chocolate chip cookie recipe from the Joy of Cooking. I was pleasantly surprised with the results, particularly as the recipe calls for only as many chocolate chips as I typically use in recipes that have much more dough.
Saturday, November 10, 2007
A Few Quick Notes 129
-The temperature has definitely dropped. It seems that we are now at about -4, and scheduled to go as low as -6 (what a change). More surprising was that while out this afternoon I saw several iced over puddles. Why this is surprising is that according to Environment Canada we were above freezing for most of today’s sunlight hours.
-On Friday I was named replacement judge for a mustache contest held at the library school. As I did not have time to prepare my judging criteria, I decided to go with only two categories, size and style (shortly after announcing the criteria and starting the judging I realized that these were horrible criteria). Hopefully the contestants and spectators were pleased with the affair, though in retrospect I realize that I could have talked it up a bit more, made more of a show out of the whole thing. I guess in this case I will blame my lack of preparation.
-The director of libraries was not able to make her scheduled appearance at the library school on Friday. Unfortunately, there was a death in her family that required her to leave the country for some number of days. Under the circumstances her staff filled in as best as possible, though it made the question and answer session a little less heated then I expected.
-After work last night I was able to have a few drinks with some library school (and archives) types. Upon leaving Thomson House we went to Bifteck (sp?) on St. Laurent. While at the bar on St. Laurent I witnessed some of the most aggressive tip demanding that I have ever seen, though to a more limited affect than had the people at my table been completely sober. Thinking that people who had been drinking for 8.5 hours could reasonably do math in a loud bar was expecting a bit much on the waitress’s part.
-After a hiatus of a few weeks, I once again did some baking today. Though I originally planned on baking some cookies, I ended up baking two loaves of bread. Maybe while taking a break from school work tomorrow I will try to bake some cookies or some other form of dessert (though I think that chocolate chip cookies are really the most likely dish).
-On Friday I was named replacement judge for a mustache contest held at the library school. As I did not have time to prepare my judging criteria, I decided to go with only two categories, size and style (shortly after announcing the criteria and starting the judging I realized that these were horrible criteria). Hopefully the contestants and spectators were pleased with the affair, though in retrospect I realize that I could have talked it up a bit more, made more of a show out of the whole thing. I guess in this case I will blame my lack of preparation.
-The director of libraries was not able to make her scheduled appearance at the library school on Friday. Unfortunately, there was a death in her family that required her to leave the country for some number of days. Under the circumstances her staff filled in as best as possible, though it made the question and answer session a little less heated then I expected.
-After work last night I was able to have a few drinks with some library school (and archives) types. Upon leaving Thomson House we went to Bifteck (sp?) on St. Laurent. While at the bar on St. Laurent I witnessed some of the most aggressive tip demanding that I have ever seen, though to a more limited affect than had the people at my table been completely sober. Thinking that people who had been drinking for 8.5 hours could reasonably do math in a loud bar was expecting a bit much on the waitress’s part.
-After a hiatus of a few weeks, I once again did some baking today. Though I originally planned on baking some cookies, I ended up baking two loaves of bread. Maybe while taking a break from school work tomorrow I will try to bake some cookies or some other form of dessert (though I think that chocolate chip cookies are really the most likely dish).
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