Monday, January 29, 2007

I'm in Love

It's funny, I've said that to two people in a row and their responses were nearly identical:

(1:58:42 PM) Friend 2: Oh yeah? What's it called?
(2:07:40 PM) Friend 1: with what?

So I don't know how to feel about being so transparent that I can declare that I am completely in love and it be known that I am not talking about a human being.

(2:08:51 PM) Me: What do you mean with what? /:) are you saying that I can't love a person?
(2:09:07 PM) Friend 1: no just that u love things

That doesn't make me feel good. Not the bit about being transparent, I'm fine with that, but... that I love things. This is not the first time that I've felt that I use the word love far too loosely, although only in respect to things. I mean, I don't LOVE them... or do I? Do I care about the emotional and physical well being of them? I suppose I have a formula for how much I care about something in my head...

Y=X*n*l, where Y == to how much I care about something, X == to how replaceable it is and the effort required to replace it, n == how intimately acquainted I am with it, and l == how much I like it.

So, represented in percentages... 100% being impossible without ruining the scale, this website/show == 5*80*80, or something like that, I'm not very precise. Sometimes these things are really hard to judge. I'm really curious if that puts it over a starving child in China... It's up there. Is that horrible? I haven't been directly confronted with the choice of saving a starving child in China at the cost of immediately or saving America's Test Kitchen, maybe that's a good thing. But the idea of my loving things... that scares me. Things are replaceable, that should disqualify them, perhaps I attach more feeling to things than the formula says I should?

Oh, yeah, America's Test Kitchen happens to be the site/show in question for today. I absolutely adored this episode that was one this afternoon, and while I was browsing for that episode and its recipes I found this recipe.

Anywho, so, I really think I want to make that second recipe tonight for whoever would like to come over and have some. Just comment here if you'd like to.

Ordered more tea last night. Should be here by Weds or Thurs. I got some chocolate strawberry tea to test and see if it's a good valentines present, if it is, I'm going to give that to my mom.

You know what? I may do the crisp-skin high-roasted chicken tonight instead, depending on which recipe is cheaper to prepare while I'm at the grocery store. If I do the high-roasted chicken, I'm going to use earl grey green to season the butter under the skin.

Sunday, January 14, 2007

*sigh* too good to be true

It would seem that teachef is about half a month out of date, still stuck on dec of '06. Do they no longer function? *le sigh* I really would be sad to see that I'd missed something so good.

And here I thought I'd discovered a cleverly concealed secret just for people like me.


I can at least hope that the failure to update for over a month isn't a bad sign. Please let it not be a bad sign, please let this be a budding and awesome website.

Ha! Twice a night!

So, it's late. I know. What do I do right before bed? I wander down lists in my mind and try to imagine anything I've forgotten. And so, tonight, I had something cool.

I love adagio. It's really an impressive company, I find myself in the beginning of a long time love affair with their teas, I've found other places that intrigue me, but none that really cater to me and my palate quite so deliciously(You like that adjective?). I was showing off some of my teas to my grandma last weekend when I was up visiting family for post christmas cheer, having missed the holidays due to obligations. As it happens, that while doing so, I noticed that there was a web address right there on my tins, and one that was NOT for adagio!!!

My mind began to wonder, is adagio a subsidiary of another company? What IS teachef?

Not having immediate access to the internets, I let it slip my mind. Of course, making tea every day, several times a day, I noticed it on and off again, always at inconvenient times. So odd... so... incongruent.

Until tonight. Sitting here, only moments before sleep, it occurred to me that I should follow up this raging incongruity. Lo and behold! I fell instantly in love:

"TeaChef is a community of people who are passionate about two things: cooking and tea. Or, more specifically, cooking with tea."

Be still my beating, lusting, passionate heart!!! I have heard of cooking with tea before, the idea has always intrigued me, and I have even looked longingly at my teas as I thought of meats that I had not at my immediate disposal. I instantly applied for the sample of this months tea. My mind is already simply smoldering with ideas that rage through my burning sleepless eyes.

So help me... I hope that I am chosen. It would be a thrill to have friends over and test out recipes taking advantage of this exquisite opportunity. To be fair, even if I don't get sent a sample, I will procrastinate no more, my next cook off, I will be making something with tea. It is always like an adrenaline shot to the heart when there is such vast potential in the crossing of THREE passions at once!

It would seem at first only 2...

But I count the passion of having large groups gather to partake of quality food for careful consideration.

Pan's Labyrinth

An awe inspiring movie, brutal to watch, it wrenched my gut observing some of the more brutal parts of the movie that ultimately drew me in all the more and made the scenes more involving emotionally. I couldn't watch that movie a lot though, it could really desensitize me.



So often they say,
Absence makes the heart grow fonder...
And yet so deeply I fear that in a way
Absence makes the heart begin to wander.

I sit here, and I ponder
In the late hour my eyes streak red
My heart with worry to squander
Simply put I should be in bed.

Eyelids drooping though they were made of lead
The object of my desire
In my eyes reflections can be read
Though craving I now retire.

Good night.

New Tea

New tea has arrived today. I ordered a couple of samples mixed in with the meat of the order... chamomile, and earl grey bravo. They are both to die for, I cannot wait to try them. Well, okay, not try them, I've tried them, I ordered them in larger tins because they drive my palate wild, but, I mean... well, you know what I mean.

I've found another property of blood orange that I don't particularly care for... like grape juice, it leaves my mouth feeling...dry. Which, I don't like in a drink. I prefer beverages that wet my mouth instead of giving me cotton mouth. It's the only tea that does that. I don't like that chamomile is so hard to clean out of my tea maker, but wow, it's so delicious that it's absolutely worth every bit of the trouble.

Anyway, back to doing more coding..

It's Dark

I don't usually start posting till this late. I've had quite a bit of work to do at work lately, and that... well, that's a little out of sorts with the norm.

Other than that, today has been a pretty hollow day, mostly just the norm, a little tea, some breakfast, some programming, a few games here and there, earned richetr mode in the new castlevania. When I get home I need to finish writing my review for that, and I also need to do a review for Mario hoops.

So much to do, so little time...


(I am sad, my habaneros, the ones Tim gave me, rotted. Probably one got it and it spread fast to the others, I only had them a week).

Wednesday, January 10, 2007

Story Idea

I want to do an undead story. Something mild... something more emotional that scary, a real ghost story with deeper roots in human beliefs and folk lore instead of a horror story. The idea of the dead walking out of disturbance and need, going places in a deep desire to feel alive again, not attacking people or eating brains.

I have some awesome references, and some great ideas. I think the interaction with the living and the dead in REAL life is fascinating... the different ways that we feel just being in the presence of something so human that is devoid of life. It's chilling. Is it still human if it's dead? Part of me knows it is, science says it is. But somehow, it's not the same if it's dead. If it's dead, then... then... it's really just dirt waiting to be processed... imagine that hollowness walking around, craving life, harmlessly walking among the living.

Imagine someone you love. Imagine someone you love who is dead. Imagine them sitting, as they are now, in that state of decomposition.. just standing there, in teh place that they loved the most... lost among the living.

Okay, maybe that is horrific, but it's not... oh who am I kidding? What is my fascination with this....

*sigh*

I am suffering from what may be only a step down from unrequited love. Higher powers have stepped in and made haste to stay my happiness and withhold from me the object of my desires, and it pains my soul.

*sigh*

I can still pine for her. No one can take that away from me.
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