Reading

Zach gave me a Kindle for Christmas. I love it now. I did not at first. At first, I was confused.  Upon opening the box, my reaction was something like, OH! oh. Ohh? Hm. So many mixed emotions. Did this mean the death of books? Was I crossing over to the dark side? Zach explained that it would be awesome for traveling because it is small, lightweight, and I'd always have something to read. That makes sense, but I was still wary of this little machine, this little destroyer of the publishing world.

Turns out, I love it and not in the fake, I love this sweater set you got me for Christmas because you're watching my reaction sort of way. I have come to love it. I wouldn't say that I am an ebook convert because I have not abandoned books, but now have another reading option. I love the dictionary function and not having to take out my phone while reading to look up a word (can you imagine lugging an actual dictionary around?). You just tap the word and it tells you. Genius. I love that you can have a new book within seconds.

I hate that you can so easily spend money (la di da, just pushing some buttons on my kindle, forgetting that this is hooked to my bank account, do de do). I have to figure out the whole lending part of it.

I love the kindle when I have an awesome book on it. I don't love it when I have an okay book on it or a boring newspaper article on it. Makes sense right? I suppose that is exactly how one feels about whatever reading material is in one's hands.

Recent books I've enjoyed:
*Molokai by Alan Brennert (heart wrenching)
*A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson (hilarious)
*All the Pretty Horses by Cormac McCarthy (gripping)

Recent books I have not enjoyed:
*Walden by Thoreau (too preachy, sorry T)
*The Fallback Plan by Leigh Stein (couldn't stomach the narrator)

Reading To Do list:
*The World According to Garp
*A Visit From the Goon Squad

I'm also looking for a good biography and adventure/travel writing (in the vein of Bryson or Krakauer, but not actually either one of them). Any suggestions?

SURPRISE!

After taking a month long hiatus from making jewelry, I am back at it. My two current projects are a tie pin and a ring. I'll post pics when I finish them. While I may have been inactive, I found to my surprise that my materials have been rather active. My acid bath crystalized and made a cool crystal frisbee thing.

Acid bath in my crockpot little dipper

 I heated up the crock pot and was able to pry out the frisbee, which doesn't look as cool and sparkly as it is in real life.

Oxidized metal is so cool. Perfect ROY G BIV around the edge
of the bezel.

Science rules!

The Botanical Gardens in the winter. Who knew?

I signed up for 7 science professional development workshops this winter/spring. My motivation for signing up was because they pay. I wasn't exactly psyched to get up at 6:30 on a Saturday am, but did and schlepped up to the middle of the Bronx, dragging my feet through the gray slush that was last week's snow. However, I was pleasantly surprised yesterday, when at 8:30 am I arrived at the Botanical Gardens museum, which is a beautiful, super quiet building. I can't believe I have never been. I think its a kind of, I work in the Bronx, I'm not going there in my free time. I'd rather go explore Brooklyn.

The morning session was a discussion of sunlight, temperature, precipitation and biomes. Everything we did was geared toward 10 year old kids. Except that it was a bunch of teachers doing the simulations and experiments, so we laughed a lot. After a lunch, we headed to the Conservatory. We were just about the only people there (because who goes to the  Botanical Gardens in January? Other than the handful of old people) and it was like being transported to another world. In order to keep the cacti alive, the room has to simulate the appropriate biome. It was sunny, about 60 degrees and like a wonderland of huge, bizarre plants.

The American Desert room. So much sun!

New appreciation for cacti. So many kinds!

Our teacher was enthusiastically spewing information for the next two hours. I wandered in and out of the conversation, exploring corners of the green houses and talking to old people. I almost felt as if I were on a really good museum tour, which is something that I only ever do on vacation in other cities. Even then though, I'm more of a self guided kinda gal. I didn't even notice that it was time to go, which is something that I've never said before about a Professional Development workshop.

This one made me vacation-sick for Hawaii. Something like
this grew all around the volcano. 

I can't wait for the next one :) 

A Culinary Sneak Attack

Zach got me the Sundays at Moosewood Restaurant cookbook for my birthday and working through this book has quickly become my new favorite hobby. It is organized into regional cuisines, my favorite of which have been Armenia (tapas and Mediterranean, mmm!) and Africa South of the Sahara. Each section is written by one of the chefs at the restaurant and gives a brief background on the family and cultural significance of the food, which has allowed me to appreciate the importance of these dishes to other peoples.

Last night I decided to make Capetown Fruit and Nut Curry. Surprisingly, I had most of the ingredients except for green beans, green apples and zucchini. As I was lining up my troop of spices that were going into this curry, I felt a sense of pride in my spice cabinet. Finally! After years of purchasing obscure spices like Cardamom seeds and recovering from the devastating divorce from my former roommate, Elise's wonderful spice collection, I was able to reach into the cabinet without having to purchase a new member of my spice family!


Zach was home early, so he jumped in for garlic mincing and brown rice duty. I always love kitchen experiments, but it's always more fun with a sous chef :) As we began dumping the ingredients into the pan, the kitchen blew up with amazingly fragrant spices... ginger, curry, garlic, onions oh my!


The rice was simmering and the anticipation brewing... Zach looked into the pan and asked, "Did we just make a vegan dinner?" Bah! Vegan! "Vegans are silly," was my immediate reaction. A minute passed. "I think it's gluten free too." Gluten free?! That's even more ridiculous. But alas, we accidentally made a Vegan, Gluten Free dinner. And it was the bomb.