Crushingly Expected Pupdate.

Bill and I lost Happy last night.

This means that 2018 has already kicked us in the face; I was hoping it wouldn’t do that.

I was unable to get to bed until about 1:00 am PST, and I’m writing this a mere four hours later. I was only able to sleep about three hours before I woke back up and tossed and turned for an hour. Once I realized it’d been an hour of tossing, I’d somehow wrenched my shoulder in my sleep, and my head was hurting from exhaustion and dehydration I gave up and took Kiki outside and started whatever amount of day I’m going to have today.

I started dehydrating spent grain. I turned on the electric kettle for water for tea.… Continue reading →

Snapshots of the Space Between

Content Note: Mental Illness, Suicidal Ideation.

Guys, 2017 was a giant garbage fire for me in a lot of ways. I have repeatedly wanted to bring this blog back up and repeatedly not been able to do so. My first 2017 post literally says that I need encouraging and have been struggling to write.

I need some encouraging these days. I have had a lot that I’ve wanted to write about, from the dogs, to the breakfast nachos I made this morning (inspired by Isis’s tendency to make amazing breakfast nachos), to why the beer industry needs to change their phrasing around nomadic brewers, to how fun it was to do a beer photo scavenger hunt with Leslie. I even have taken some great photos and started framing out posts in my head.

Continue reading →

Strawberry Mermaid and Sea Smoke – Story

When she’d walked up to him & announced she was a mermaid, he’d responded that she looked like neither Darryl Hannah nor Ariel. A furrowed brow and cocked head were her only response. As the silence had stretched, with her mouth twisting into a small frown, he’d found himself compelled to break the silence.

That had been a mistake too, he thought, sipping his effervescent bitters. He should have ignored anyone weird enough to tell a complete stranger her delusions of fishiness, but he had hoped it was simply a unique come-on. And when he was incapable of ignoring, he should have bolted away from anyone who didn’t know some very mainstream mermaid references.

But, no. He’d been entranced from the moment he’d laid eyes on her a half an hour or more before she had approached him.… Continue reading →

This year is just not what I expected in food.

A few years ago, I discovered I actually like tomatoes. It took me a few years to totally come around on them (for awhile I thought it was just “orange” ones I liked), and the moment I did is totally my friend Corrine’s fault. (Thanks, Corrine!)

On Tuesday I’ll be taking a class on how to can tomatoes. I’m actually not sure I really need it, since my handy “Ball Book of Preserving”:http://www.metacookbook.com/permalink/ball-book-of-home-preserving.html makes it seem pretty damn easy. However, the class is fairly inexpensive, I’ll get a chance to see Logan Square Kitchen in person, and I’ll get to meet some people who are also interested in canning. So, why not?

Putting up tomatoes was a big goal for me this year, earlier in the year.… Continue reading →

14 August 2011 Market Report

The weather report said yesterday was going to be a nice “partly cloudy” day in the mid-70s. There was a 10% chance of rain1.

The skies out our window, admittedly at about 5:30am when neither of us is at our best, were lovely. So, we got ready, but on shorts & t-shirts, hauled out our water bottles & food to be composted & we walked to the bus stop.

As we walked, the dark, dark clouds rolled in. The skies stopped being lovely. Drizzle started happening. We were not terribly thrilled with this turn of events.

We were pretty thrilled, though, that we caught our bus. That early on a Sunday morning, the buses only run about every 20 – 30 minutes, which means that we’re more often better off walking than waiting for a bus.… Continue reading →