Darkoshi

An except from daily notes:
I got into my car, annoyed at the waste of my time. I had trouble pulling out the seat belt because even though I felt like I was reacting calmly, the seat belt could tell I was annoyed.

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On some days, there is the feeling that every little thing which can go wrong, is going wrong. (Not big things, just little ones.) But realizing that lets me take the little setbacks more in stride. Oh yes, everything is going to go wrong today, so of course that happened.

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We are doing Christmas Eve on Christmas Day this year. Perhaps for the first time; perhaps not. I'd have to check my notes.

I listened to Christmas music on the radio while baking tonight. I made a package of double chocolate muffins. I also made a veganized version of this recipe; it turned out very good:
Salted Butterscotch Apple Bars

After tasting the "Watkins Original Gourmet Baking Vanilla" which I bought last time as it was a better price than the other vanillas, I realized it is not the same as vanilla extract. I was probably tricked by the label saying "with Pure Vanilla Extract" in bold, but under that it says "with other natural flavors".

I am up way too late again; it's a habit and the "way too late" keeps getting later and later.

heron61 once posted about making a Shaker lemon pie. It looked and sounded quite good, so I looked up a vegan version of the pie. It sat in my bookmarks for quite some time, eventually being joined by two recipes for lemon tarts.

While grocery shopping a few weeks ago, there were very nice-looking organic lemons, so I bought a small bag of them, thinking I'd finally make that pie and maybe a tart too.

(I could also try making my own Moroccan Preserved Lemons.)

After buying the lemons, I belatedly remembered the pie recipes specify *Meyer* lemons which are less sour than regular ones. But eventually I decided to try them in the recipe anyway.

Today I sliced up 3 of the lemons with a mandolin. After stirring in a cup of sugar, I tasted the lemony liquid in the bowl, expecting it to be sour, but it tasted wonderful. So rather than adding another full cup of sugar, I only added half a cup. I stirred up the sugared lemons well and left them in the fridge to sit (to "macerate"). Hopefully on Sunday I'll get around to making a pie from it. (Darn it, I don't have agar nor arrowroot, only cornstarch. Maybe a shopping trip tomorrow.)

Update, 2022/12/10:
Per the website search results of several local food stores, none of them have agar. That probably explains why I'm out of it. The brands I've used in the past were, I believe, these:
Eden Agar Agar Flakes
Telephone brand Agar-Agar Powder - this is from Thailand.

But as agar is both expensive and hard to find, I decided to use tapioca powder instead:
The Tricks to Tapioca, the Other Pie Thickener

I may even still have some tapioca starch, but if not I do have tapioca that I could grind up.

Then again, I'm all dressed and ready to go shopping. So maybe I'll stop by an Asian grocery store after all to see if I can find agar and/or more tapioca starch there.

I did go see "Everything Everywhere All At Once" today with my mom, and it was very good. It made me laugh and may have brought tears to my eyes. Reading one review yesterday, I was curious why someone described it as an "R-rated family flick", ie. what made it R-rated, but now I understand.

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There was a faint fruity smell in my car as I left from my house. I wondered if a clementine had rolled under the car seat last week. I opened the car windows and forgot about it.

After the movie we stopped by Kroger to get some groceries. Mainly corn chips because I'm almost out of corn chips and I need me my corn chips. My mom lingered in the fruit & veggie section, so I glanced around. There were papayas. Say wait a minute, didn't I buy a papaya last week? It was a nice small-size yellowy ripe-enough-to-eat-right-away papaya... I did buy it, didn't I? What happened to it?

Yep, it was under the car seat. I'm surprised it didn't impart a stronger smell to the car; but it helped that the car was parked in the garage and not out in the sun all week. The fruit isn't even moldy. It looks VERY good ripe now though, and I will cut it up after this post.

... brings all the birds (bees, squirrels, flies) to the yard.

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It has had so many figs this year (the first time it has been so abundant) that I've left many on the tree for them to get.

I finished watching the first season of Resident Alien, and quite enjoyed it. It's amusing but also quite touching.

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I stopped watching Mr. Mayor after the first few episodes, as the comedy became too absurd for my taste. I still haven't figured out which (other) child actor the Arpi Meskimen character reminds me of.

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Almond Breeze has a quite good banana almond milk, made with real bananas and no added sugar. It tastes the same as banana milk I used to make myself, but blended all smooth.

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My arm was still a little sore Thursday, but by Friday evening it felt completely back to normal. No other side effects so far.

errant thought:
Is the skin of a banana called a banana peel, even before it is peeled?
Is the rind of an orange called orange peel, while it is still all on the orange?

lalalalalalalala nevermind, don't need to write about that.

Little frogs all over Qiao's back yard. Big ones too; there were two on the back steps last night. Had to shoo them away last night before the dogs saw them. I'm surprised but glad that the dogs haven't been going after the little ones. I worry I might accidentally step on them as they are hard to see when they're not moving. They jump away and then I see them from the motion.

I found a nice plant with grape tomatoes growing in the yard. We didn't plant it. How could it have gotten there? I don't like raw tomatoes; when Qiao sometimes brings me a take-out meal that includes them, I give the tomatoes to the dogs as they like them. The plant is growing in the area where I bury the dog p**p. So that must be where it came from.

Dandelion trees... Weeds that look like dandelions from their leaves, but grow tall with a thick steam. I was watching one such plant grow tall at my house. It finally got even taller than me, and only then did little flowers start blooming at the top. There was one in Qiao's yard too, similar but different; also taller than me.

There's a sassafras sapling growing out back too. I tasted a couple of its leaves; they didn't taste much like root beer, but they were very mucilaginous. From what I read it is actually dangerous to eat, and so they don't use real sassafras as a flavoring any more.

Although I'm vegan, I don't often buy much fresh fruit and vegetables. Doing so results in needing to wash, peel, cut, cook, (etc.) as well as eat them, and to do so before they go bad, regardless of whether I have the time that day or week. Background stress. Not buying them avoids that. Usually I'll only buy a few easy things here or there. Avocados are good. Occasional fruit. Carrots; they last almost forever in the fridge without going bad.

I felt like cooking something this weekend though, and that fruit would be nice too. So yesterday I bought:

a passion fruit
2 oranges
blueberries
blackberries
jicama (pre-cut sticks, ideal for munching on! such a great convenience even though it comes in a plastic container)
fennel
dandelion greens

The fennel didn't have a bar-code on it. At the self-check-out station, it wasn't listed in the item look-up menu. A Kroger store employee came over to help, but we couldn't find it on their physical cheat-sheet either. Then I said, "It's also called anise, but I don't think it would be listed under that..." Yet it was listed as "anise / fennel".

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My erstwhile flu or cold still lingers a bit. Last weekend, my upper right chest area ached for a day; might mean a slight lung infection. My throat has been phlegmy; I still have a slight cough and occasional runny nose. Otherwise, I've still been feeling ok. Still much better than the usual kind of colds I get, where my nose is runny and/or congested non-stop for days or weeks.

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Kleenex has renamed their "Cool Touch" tissues to "Cooling Lotion". In the store yesterday, I wasn't sure if it was the same product. The ingredient list included polyethylene (plastic!?), which I hadn't remembered it having. So I took a photo of the label and didn't buy any. But comparing that now to a "Cool Touch" box which I still have, the ingredients are the same.

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While walking, I passed a hickory tree and thought of that children's rhyming song, Hickory dickory dock, the mouse ran up the clock. Except I thought the rhyme must be like "Tickety tickety tock, the mouse ran up the clock" (since clocks go tick tock). I recall thinking, well if I *did* put in the word "hickory", how should it go, "Hickory hickory hawk?" I played around with other variations in my mind, "clickety clickety clock", "clippety clippety clop"

Looking it up today, I was surprised that my brain's initial word association of "hickory" with the rhyme was correct. It's interesting that those words "hickory dickory dock" may have come from Cumbric numbers.

I've learned that if you're going to transport a mattress set in the back of a pickup truck, it would behoove you to check the local weather forecast even if you're in a hurry due to other people's needs and limits. Trusting the current weather pattern to hold is unwise. Having a torrential downpour start part-way through the drive is unfortunate.

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Tofurky has discontinued their vegan pepperoni. This disappoints me as I liked using it in my lunch sandwiches. The only other vegan pepperoni I know of, by Yves, didn't taste nearly as good to me back when I was still able to find it in stores. Now neither are available around here. The Yves one is available online, but based on my memory of it, I'm not sure it is worth ordering considering that I'd also need to order a cold pack with it.

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We needed the rain. I wish it had waited another hour though. I worry that the persons I gave the mattress to won't let it properly dry on all sides and that it'll get moldy or mildewy. Pity.

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This vegan "beefy cheddar pot pie" tastes good; the crust is very good too:
https://alphaplantbased.com/our-food/handheld-pot-pies/
https://alphaplantbased.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/01/beefy-cheddar-pot-pie-alpha.png

(Note to self: as of 2019/Dec, WalMart has those Alpha pot pies. Maybe that is also where I originally found them; I don't remember.)

These orange cream ice pops are also good. Nostalgic. The flavor is somewhat mild, but at least they are not so very sweet as some other ice pops are.
https://www.goodpops.com/flavors/orange-n-cream/

These coconut passion fruit ice pops from Whole Foods are also good, also nostalgic for me, and also not too sweet.
https://www.theimpulsivebuy.com/wordpress/2019/06/04/spotted-whole-foods-edition-6-4-2019/365-everyday-value-coconut-passion-fruit-fruit-bars-jpg/

Nostalgic for me because passion fruit juice was something I got to drink at my aunt's house in Germany when I was a kid. It was sold in bottles, usually mixed with other juices. We bought a fresh passion fruit from the fruit market one time. Juicy pebbly seeds inside. The same flavor but not as sweet as the juice. In German, it is called Maracuja, not passion fruit. From the Spanish or Portuguese name.

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why why?

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I take notes at work while testing and researching things. Every once in a while, I end up writing "wtf?!!".

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hey boom dop ditty dop boom bop wow.

how now, how now? one step at a time, one step and then nine.

and then you die, my young apprentice, and then you die.

I've discovered something that's even better than the dried olives I mentioned here: those same dried olives eaten together with salted cashews! Who would have thought that eating something oily and salty together with something else oily and salty would be a thing? Maybe that's the appeal of cheese and olive appetizer plates.

On a side-note, I had tried some unsalted dried olives, and they were one of the most unpalatable things ever. What a difference some salt can make.