Cold today, maybe down to almost freezing. And chilly to start. It was mid 40sF when I went to bed. Sunny and mostly around 60-70F yesterday, which was nice. Not so much today.
I didn’t get much of the original plan done yesterday. I started laying out everything, and getting it together, but came up short on bathroom fans. So, I put that task further down the list and kept cleaning and organizing, since I was already well into that. I did do a couple of structural notes, that were minor, but needed attention before they got major.
Today, I’m going to pull some dang wire. Should be cold in the attic, so I can’t use the heat as an excuse. I’m still probably going to take breaks by doing more sorting and organizing, but I really need to pull some wire. And I need to unload the truck. And spend at least a little time chatting with my buddy.
I didn’t see him yesterday so he must not have been feeling good. I hope I’ll see him today, if not, I might ping him or go by his house.
I missed the Hamfest, and feel conflicted about that. I’d have liked to have gone, and I will probably have time next month, if it was at its normal time… oh well.
I’m working to improve my situation. And putting stacks to good use. Can’t do much more than that.
nick
Sunday. Good morning!
It rained all night, and the forecast says it will rain all day too. Indoor things today. I’ll be working, whatever the weather.
“The weather is frightening,
The thunder and lightning,
Seem to be having their way,
But as long as I’m with you, work,
It’s a lovely day!”
Peter Skellern‘s was my favourite rendition of that number.
I mentioned, I think, that I didn’t manage to have pancakes on Shrove Tuesday. Breakfast today might be a good time to catch up…
Wishing you all a lovely Sunday.
I just read Paul and Buddy the Beagle’s chicken goujons adventure. Sounds delicious. I wonder if I need to get myself some chicken and an air fryer… and a Beagle, of course.
If I understand it correctly, an air fryer is a tiny countertop forced-air convection oven. Is that right, or does it do something additional I don’t know about?
That’s about the size of it, Denis, though the size on the countertop is anything but tiny.
We have an air fryer. It sure takes up a lot of space. I’m not sure of the purpose of it, given that we already have a convection oven and a multifunction toaster oven. And we live in a cold climate, so for 8 or 9 months of the year the excess heat from using the main oven is not wasted. The air fryer does not seem to be notably faster than the convection oven, even taking into account warm-up time, and it’s slower than the toaster oven for heating up a teen-size tray of tater tots and chicken bites.
I’ve never used the air fryer for reasons unrelated to the above. I don’t clean up after others (except for small children I have accepted responsibility for beforehand).
Thanks, SteveF. That about confirms what I thought. We have two ovens already, and I don’t want another appliance standing around on the kitchen counter with the coffee machines. Putting the toaster away after use is bothersome enough, and oddly enough, I seem to be the only inhabitant of the house who ever does it.
Here are some love letters for Mr Ray, whom I hope is feeling better.
My wife bought an air fryer a year or so ago. Yes, it is basically just a convection oven, but it must move the air a lot more/faster than a normal oven. For example, “oven fries” in a normal convection oven do not really get crispy, but they do in the air fryer.
It also serves the purpose of having an additional oven, so that you can cook more different things at the same time.
Um…why is Puerto Rico responsible for the entire national debt?
Better math comes to about $100k per person throughout the US and territories. Which is still an absolutely stupid amount of debt to have accumulated. Me, I would be all for a special law that says: In any year with a deficit, the property of all current politicians (Congress, President, VP) and top-level bureaucrats (SES) is confiscated.
Brad, try this trick for fries and such: put a cooling rack on a cooking sheet and cook the fries on the rack. They’ll get a lot crisper than cooked straight on the sheet even if you turn them halfway through.
Because I’d been up since 0100 and forgot to make it a pro rata share.
44 F and cold this morning at 650 am. The solar heater has yet to show up.
I got back from the land of casinos, aka Oklahoma, late Friday night. It was 30 F there Friday morning. The 480 mile drive was gradually warming until it hit 70 F about 49 miles away from home in deep south Texas.
I stopped in North Texas and visited my wifes sister and her two boys. We went to go see her husband in his group home. He has stage 4 Alzheimers and has dropped below 150 lbs. Pretty light for the big 6’4″ guy that was hefty all his life. However, he actually recognized me and my SIL was overjoyed since he had not talked in weeks.
I sold moms 2024 Mercedes yesterday. Took a bath on it but now she does not have to make the $1900 monthly payment just to have it sitting behind her assisted living.
Of course, the stupid thing turned on the check engine light. Turned out it was griping that my driving it once per month was not enough to keep the battery charged. The guys figured that out for me when I took it to the place.
Now I am down to 99+ items on my task list to get done.
I managed to gain 5 lbs on my 5 day trip. Food was all over the place and open bars are very detrimental to the waist line.
Going south through Dallas at 4 pm was horrible. Millions of cars and trucks everywhere, all trying to keep moving in the gridlock.
Sol is peaking over the neighbors roof now. I wish that we save some of this cold for August and September.
This really bad crud is on the downhill slope. I slept all night without horking up a lung. I still had to clear my lungs this morning with a lot of coughing, so progress.
When I make the annual journey to Texas I try to avoid Dallas. I take even greater pains to avoid Austin by traveling through the hill country via Marble Falls to avoid that bottleneck bridge over the river. That annual journey is coming up in about a month. I like to plan it around the blooming of the flowers along the highways in Texas. Thanks Lady Bird. And the Blue Bonnets.
I=40/I-75 through Knoxville is almost as bad as Dallas. It is the joining of a major north-south and east-west highway. There are more trucks than cars many hours of the day. Being a local I know how to avoid, and when to avoid. There was talk of a bypass, but NIMBYs you know. Also Knoxville fought hard against the bypass which would move a lot of travelers away from Knoxville and have an economic impact. The state abandoned the plan because of the money influence from University of Tennessee and Haslem oil. Corruption rather than intelligence was the deciding factor.
Hew Choob occasionally pops up a gem of a recommendation. It persisted with this one, about undersea cables, and I eventually gave in and watched some. Turns out it is fascinating!
https://youtu.be/RMveiKaXtQw
Exit fee.
A brisk 23F this morning in the California high desert, two degree’s warmer than sunrise yesterday.
Yesterday was reasonably productive;
@edh, sounds more productive than my day.
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WRT air friers, I picked one up in an auction, to see if anyone would use it. It’s a very simple thing, aimed at people who don’t know how to cook and are intimidated by ovens or pans. My opinion. The microwave convection oven does the same thing in the same time, without heating up the ‘big’ oven. And when someone insists, I have an air frier head that goes on the Instapot that works well, and doesn’t seem so flimsy that it would burn the house down.
they really do a good job on fries.
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I’m not a fan of the instapot either, I don’t think it’s quicker for most things.
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50F and clear, sunny, blue sky.
Trying my new, larger moka pot for espresso coffee this morning. Most of the backup coffee I have up here is espresso, so it doesn’t taste as good in the drip machine for some reason. Probably operator error. I don’t want to make multiple small moka pots, so I got a bigger one. We’ll see how it goes.
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If you’re getting a winter storm, make your preps and ride it out… let us know how it goes.
n
Road construction is another area where state government in Texas is swimming naked.
Compounding the problem in Dallas is that the whole planet seems determined to move to the stretch of I-35 between McKinney and the San Antonio suburbs. Austin is the Colonist preference, but they will accept Dallas or Houston.
As for North Dallas problems AT&T announced last year that they are moving out of Downtown Dallas to corporate HQ row in Plano.
I told my wife that she’s driving the next trip to UT Dallas/Plano for anything kid related. I’ll sit in the passenger seat and read.
I banned video in the car on long trips for all family members several years ago.