China blue skies and calm breeze. Every year we’ve been here, St. Paddy’s Day has marked the end of the last snow piles…this year we’re ahead of schedule, but it’s been a wild winter, as those following this may remember.
Last night we took Wiishu and Pookie to the Swinging Doors for some quite good pipers and drummers and dancers, followed by a good corned beef and cabbage dinner; we had supper with Tim and Cheryl–who arrived with great news, that they’ve just gotten a house. They’ve been renting. SO it was a celebratory evening all round.
I put on two pounds. But, hey, easy come, easy go on that sort of weight. I just behave myself today and the body will take the cue. The salt level on the corned beef is probably not innocent.
last year at this time, I was still watching the snows around home. I’ve gotten the snow blower out one time this entire winter. It’s been much warmer the past few days, but temperatures have dropped a little bit from the high 60s to the mid- to low-50s during the day.
I’m not one for “traditional” Irish meals….I don’t care for corned beef (sacrilege to my ancestry?). I’d guess that the amount of salt in the corned beef does have some factor with fluid retention, but don’t they usually boil the beef, which would remove most of the salt. If the cabbage was boiled along with the beef, then it’s probably also absorbed some salt, or the salt was carried over in the broth. Does it get served over potatoes? Just wondering..
Glad you had a good time. Congratulations to Tim and Cheryl, too. It’s always a nice thing when it changes from renting someone else’s house to getting one of your own. Not just for tax purposes, but you can decorate at will, no permission needed to drive a nail, hang a picture, or paint the walls…..
Here, we’re 150% of rainfall for this time in the “water year”, going a ways to repairing last year’s “drought”. If it didn’t rain any more until the Fourth of July–our unofficial last rain day–we’d be good for the water year, 36″.
I remember the shenanigans around getting our house, almost 15 years ago, then shortly after, CJ and Jane bought their Spokane house. Home ownership has its benefits and problems, but overall I’ve found it a good experience, particularly when you are paying a monthly mortgage that is cheaper than renting an apartment half the size!
Hurricane Mom is in town — the mother-in-law is here visiting. Unfortunately, Mom is having some serious problems; for the last 2 years, she has been sliding slowly with mental and physical issues, which makes for an interesting trip. It’s getting to the point where she MUST have 24/7 help, which isn’t available in her current situation, and she’s being very stubborn about acknowledging she has to change her lifestyle.
Sympathies, indeed. I’ve heard, but not confirmed, that around-the-world cruises are actually cheaper than assisted care. The ships have a doctor….
I had some TJ’s green (pesto) cheese, and I have some of their Celtic Cheddar, as well. I’m drinking CA Merlot–I’m definitely Californian, probably part Celtic but only slightly, if any, Irish.
I personally vote for Dubliner cheese, available from Costco in 2 pound blocks and slightly smaller ones from Safeway. Not quite cheddar, not quite Gouda, but admirable in its own right.
Today Mom may go home, or she may have to stick around for more observation and care. She wound up in the hospital for the last couple of days, and the doctor says he will give the final evaluation this morning. If we tried to put her on a cruise, at the end of it I’m quite sure she would be returned to us, with a stern lecture from the cruise director “Don’t you ever do that again…!!”
That’s rough. Sympathies.
Re: Pluto studies.
NASA’s released the results of 5 studies. Reading, “Pluto is host to a whole bunch of molecules that spend most of their time on Earth as gasses. When the temperature gets dialed down low enough for methane, carbon monoxide and nitrogen to become ice, things get weird. We’re finally seeing how all of those elements interact at that temperature,” I immediately though of Hal Clement’s “Mesklin” stories, in particular Star Light. His science was very good. Even to a Chemistry student, his exposition of what can happen with “phase changes” was educational and fun.
Our library didn’t have a copy of Mission of Gravity, the first in that series. I had to buy it off of ebay, at half the price the cheapest copy was on Amazon.
Could you have gotten it from inter-library loan?
Our whole library system didn’t have a copy, despite arguably being a sci-fi classic. Going outside the system would not have been less expensive than getting my own copy. Incidentally, the outfit that was selling it inexpensively on ebay reneged, so back to square one. Maybe the person who’s hosting our weekly gaming session has a copy I can borrow.
Nice guy and good books.
Och, alas, I didn’t have corned beef or cabbage. But I may try to remedy this with the next grocery store trip. My attempts at home prep or corned beef have had mixed results, but the last time was better. So we remain hopeful.
It’s odd, when I’ve looked for character names lately, I keep running into either Gaelic or Russian names that keep sounding intriguing.
I’ve had a story idea which, once I outline some, might just have most of a plot to it. This is good news. — But I need to reread and rewatch three or four stories that come to mind that had anything similiar, to make sure I’m not, er, forgetting that’s been done before.
I’ve been stuck for a while, and have decided I really need to put in some reading time too, to get my creative juices going, for fonts, stories, you name it. — So I’ve got to locate my paperback copies of Tripoint and Finity’s End, and see if I did get a copy of the Alliance Space pb, since my pb copies of the two or more novels in there are old. I also really want to reread a couple of Vonda McIntyre’s books which I haven’t reread in ages: I think I’ve only ready Dreamsnake once, and really liked it, plus her Star Trek: The Wounded Sky is a favorite, which grew on me with the second reading, and the first novel in a starship series she did, Starfarers. — There are new books on my To Read Pile, ebook and paper, but for some reason, these are very much on my mind to reread right now. Hmm…I need to find my copy of Visible Light, too. Way too long since I reread it. 🙂
Uh, The Wounded Sky is a Diane Duane Trek novel. I hunted down a HB copy when my PBs started to fall apart 🙂 Vonda McIntyre did some other Trek books, though; Entropy Effect and Enterprise: the first adventure, as well as novelizations of some of the movies.
Yup, my mistake, and I should’ve known better. Besides The Wounded Sky, Diane Duane also wrote a few other Star Trek books, including a Romularn (Rihannsu) seris and at least two with sailing ship knowledge that informed the Trek books. Heh, my apologies to both Ms. McIntyre and Ms. Duane for confusing their books. 😉
Hmm, I do have Wounded Sky on my Kindle, but I’ll have to get Vonda’s books on there.
The sailing-ship ones are Diane Carey. They’re okay, but too! many! exclamation! points!
Oh dang, this is what happens when you haven’t reread in a long time. Or when you’re over 50 now. Sheesh.
My bad. Yes, Diane Carey. :headdesk:
Much like the sign seen lately on the interwebz: “If I haven’t managed to offend someone yet, please be patient, I’m getting to everyone.” … Yes, I’m sure that’s a paraphrase.
Heh. — The thing is, I did love reading those books.
Hmm, I attempted to transfer some 3rd party ebooks by Vonda McIntyre to my Kindle, but it looks like sending several at once via Amazon’s email transfer method didn’t do it. Either I got the wrong email address for myself (they give you two) or I’m supposed to send individual files. Sigh.
I still have to locate two PB of yours, CJ. They’re here, but they’ve gone walkabout inside the domicile. Luckily, the other two are now on my headboard.
Yes, some book reorganization is in order. Bookcases cannot happen for a while, but I may be able to solve it another way.
No biggie. I got stuck with a pornographic memory (‘so good it’s obscene’). It has its uses, but can be annoying. I don’t know if I kept Carey’s novels; the best part of them, for me, was the throwaways like the Jesus clips (which I think are based on Fahnestock clips.
😀 I love your quip about a memory so good it’s obscene. Gave me a fantastic chuckle. 😀
In honor of the beginning of Spring, I’d like to share this — a live cam of a pair of Bald Eagles – one baby eaglet hatched, the other well on its way. http://dceaglecam.eagles.org/
Yay iggles! I forwarded this to FiL; the nesting baldies he regularly watches have apparently decided to move house this year, so this will give him his eagle fix.
“Awwwww”
I suppose you all know eagles were the first followers of the “heir and a spare” tactic? The second egg to hatch is an “insurance policy” in case something happens to the first–it doesn’t hatch, freezes in a snow, etc. In normal circumstances, if both survive the first couple weeks the first will outcompete, and even attack its younger sibling. Success in an eyrie is fledging just one, two is a rare bonus. That’s the way Mother Nature runs things!
One of the memories I cherish of our first digs in Spokane was our 3rd floor balcony overlooking a deep streamcut for Latah Creek. Eagles and osprey fish it and the Spokane, and there was handsome bald eagle who’d ride the updraft near that balcony—I could stand on a level with him no more than five feet away and watch how his whole body would flex and shape itself to the wind he was riding, as if he were constantly a part of it.
I’ve enjoyed watching ravens doing that kind of thing – for them, it’s apparently entertainment. Sailing back and forth along the face of a building, about one wing-length from wall, as if it were just another cliff. Except it’s a thirty-story office building, or a shopping center.
Less than three weeks to go before Visitor arrives. I’ll have to get all my tax stuffs done so that I can be ready for the initial dash through read and then the leisurely re-read that first week of April.
Yay, located my PB copies of Visible Light and the Alliance Space pair (Merchanter’s Luck and 40,000 in Gehenna). Sort of odd to put those two in a single edition for publication as an omnibus, but it gets those out there for people still, and that’s good. Neither book is yet in ebook format, though Alternate Realities is, and At The Edge of Space may be.