Non-Location Specific Postcard-Swapping, Menu-Discussing, Workday Recounting and Mother-In-Law-Despairing Yet Somehow Still Affable Thread

Carry on with the bloated corpse of that other thread if you wish, but turkey bacon's on the stove, sizzling now that I've added some oil. Local farm eggs to follow. Green salad, amply loaded with avocado. Lots of wine. Already lots of wine.

How was your day?

That makes me hungry.

And want some wine.

What sort of wine?

Ravenswood Lodi old vine Zinfandel.

Just put my plate on the table. If the Red Sox pull it together it'll be a perfect evening.

Awesome.

My day is endless much like my pregnancy, which seems to last decades instead of months. I will reread this in a couple of weeks and wonder why I did not nap as much as I could have. :-)

Soon I shall turn off the computer and start making dinner. It will be simple fare: salmon patties, steamed rice, some kale and maybe some beets. I will make enough for myself, my wife and some leftovers. No wine, but even if there were, it would be cheap and ordinary wine.

Mmm. Sounds good—esp kale and beets! Only—I need wine. I am a hardened daily drinker.

I looked for Arctic Char, my new favorite fish other than Bluefish, at the fish market today. No luck.

ARCTIC CHAR, people! I can't believe I dropped the name of the most divine orange-fleshed fish and it killed this tender newborn thread!
The thread of exclamation points!

I totally thought that said "Arctic Chair" and assumed it was some kind of cooling chair with ice packs embedded in it or something.

That sounds really good right now.

It's like a cross between salmon and...trout maybe. Thinner fillets than salmon. I douse it with tamari and olive oil and run it under the broiler for 8 minutes or so. Serve with wedges of lime. As I do for bluefish and salmon. Those I broil for a tad longer. Bluefish is so oily and rich, it's almost impossible to overcook. I've had it under the broiler until the flakes blacken and separate, and it's still moist and delicious.

Fucking Red Sox.

LOFTON, YOU'RE OUT!!!!!!

I can't wait to see this thread get 3000 hits in December 2007.

FUCKING INDIANS GOT A RUN!!!!

Squishy pillows! Oh! Oh! Oh!

Are those "memory foam" pillows any good?

The local mattress salesman told me that people with memory-foam mattresses tend to prefer conventional pillows—that memory foam on top of memory foam is too much. At some point you need to forget.

I put a heating pad under my neck and shoulders every night, while I'm reading or watching TV in bed. Mmmm.

I like to keep a carafe of the waters of Lethe on my bedside table.

(aka "vodka")

stupid stupid red sox

Tell me about it. For fucking fuck's sake.

On a positive note, CONCORD GRAPES ARE IN SEASON!!!!!!! IS EVERYONE EATING THEM???? I HOPE SO!!!!!

My tongue is blackish purple all the time from them.
I'm going to bed. Night all.

I totally wish I had some grapes right now.

Hello there.

I've just had a bunch of grapes for breakfast - it's a regular breakfast thing in this house.

time to hijack this paddies/britishes/mcscots

Anyone have any good ideas of a sauce to put with venison?

I cook venison with onions, mushrooms, red wine and juniper berries. No recipe, just fling things in with a bit of stock and a bayleaf, and thicken with cornflour if it's too runny. Maybe a touch of redcurrant jelly as well?

That sounds lovely Ailsa, I might try that if I can locate some juniper berries today.

aisla's recipe sounds like the venison casserole my mother's made before (no redcurrant jelly, possibly throw in some bacon if you don't have much venison), which is v. nice, but I'm not going to pretend I cook enough to know what I'm talking about.

Things I really need this week are for my boyfriend to stop being anxious all the time, me to stop worrying about him until my stomach hurts too, and me to stop thinking how his 60y/o father's going to be in the city where John Peel died on the same day of the year (and a bunch of others too). But I'd settle for some salmon patties, a Hoos-style arctic chair, and a nap.

Hi non-location-specific threaders! Strange times...

end times

Bacon is good to use with venison, especially in a casserole as it doesn't have much fat of it's own and can dry our even in the casserole without some lubricating fat.

it was the strangest of times, it was the end of times... a tale of two no-pants threads.

I love duck and venison, but why do people so often accompany it with a jammy, oversweet fruity sauce? I don't mind a hint of fruit, but prefer sauce on the savory side. It's not like these meats are nasty and gamey and you need a spoonful of sugar to help the medicine go down.

I don't like fruit sauce either, but juniper berries are very much not oversweet, and you only throw maybe 4 or 5 tiny berries into a giant casserole dish to darken the flavour a bit.

Orange sauce is a waste of good duck. Plum sauce is just about savoury enough for me. (Strange, normally I have the sweetest tooth ever.)

i find venison very gamey indeed beth, is it something i'm doing wrong?

controversal

no, this is the non-controversial thread. stop it.

The venison I've had is not gamey. It must depend on location, diet, etc. Here the deer are all fattened on hostas and daylilies.

Red Sox have a better logo.
Indians have Ryan G@rko and Gr@dy Sizem0re (cuties).

I like the Red Sox.

http://www.gradysladies.com/

Around here, the subject of Grady's cuteness would be impolitic to bring up for the next couple of days, at least when my son is around. He takes these things hard. But yeah, as I said on the ILB Sox/Indians thread, the does eyes and the luscious lips.
Garko looks like a face on a Roman coin.

fruit sauce has to be more tart than sweet. That is why a redcurrent jelly fits nicely or a damson sauce is good too. (One could try sloes in a sauce I never have but it would be worth a go)

DOE eyes. Like a deer in the headlight. Except the Sox were the ones in the headlights, or at least in the waving hanky-lights. Quite rude, but effective. All fans should do it. Maybe different color hankies could be passed out, according to seat location, so things could be spelled out.

Garko isn't amazing in uniform, but it was cute when he was reading out the line up.

I can't help with meat sauces.

I was making a waffle last night and it popped clear out of the toaster and wedged itself between the counter and oven.

just wanted to share.

I hope you spared its life.

I did not eat it, I will tell you that.

I might get booted from the thread for this, but the Indians have a better team this year. Plus as a non-coastal baseball fan it's nice to see someone else get some attention for once.

Last time I had a good venison steak it had been marinated in beer!

I still like my mother-in-law.

http://i43.photobucket.com/albums/e391/marthasminions/TheRot812.jpg

The Rot.

http://i43.photobucket.com/albums/e391/marthasminions/highrot834.jpg

http://i43.photobucket.com/albums/e391/marthasminions/middlerot829.jpg

http://i43.photobucket.com/albums/e391/marthasminions/lowercornerrot813.jpg

http://i43.photobucket.com/albums/e391/marthasminions/close-uprot828.jpg

Why we may not be vacationing this fall.

ROT: THE THREADKILLER.

Wow Beth, that is nuts.

Sympathies.

It is very sad. But actually looks worse than it is. The rotten sills have been fixed already. And it's a treat to see the post-and-beam bones of the house. According to my mother-in-law, the main roof-ridge beam—that's probably not the correct term—is an old ship's mast.

are you going to have to turn your house into bionic house

Yes, it will have an adamantium skeleton now, like Wolverine.
We just had a bottle of wine beside a bonfire of our house's burnable cast-off parts. The worst excised parts are just wood-pudding in a 30-gallon barrel. Not good kindling.

I can see daylight through my office walls now. I scotch-taped it.

that's pretty sucky, beth :(

in my own godawful news: i got two lovely letters from the tax dept yesterday. i opened the first one to find out i owe $450 in unpaid tax (from having the wrong tax code).

then i open the 2nd one to find out i owe $550 in student loan repayments (because i somehow managed to earn over the repayment threshold).

a $1000 might not seem huge, but that's a month of tight-ass saving for my overseas move, gone :( :( :( :(

but something good: i got a voucher for a one hour massage, as a bonus for having reached the target budget at work for the last couple of months.

Well, then everything will be fine!

The Red Sox, dudes and dudettes.
Even though the Indians are from my ancestral home and also have some very cute players including Gutierrez who is like, MY SON'S TWIN, they must lose. It's sad.