poltr1 | Recent Entries

Some time ago, my ISP (Siscom) moved my web pages and the server they were on in an effort to phase out the domain name of my previous ISP (DNACo), which my current ISP acquired. I did not receive advance notice of this change.

I am now considering changing my ISP. My account expires in June, unless I renew for another 6 months.

I'm considering fuse.net (Cincinnati Bell) and GMail as my ISP and/or email provider. Can anyone give me good and/or bad about either of these services?

Shout-outs: Happy birthday

celticferret!

Current Mood: annoyed
Current Music: Scritti Politti, "Perfect Way"

My eyes have been dry and itchy all day. Last night, I made the mistake of petting the cats and touching my eyes afterward. When I looked in the mirror, it looked like I had pinkeye. I pushed my eyelids open to see if there was any mucus or anything, and I saw something that looked greenish. With the help of a Q-tip, I managed to extract what looked like an eyebrow hair and lots of eye gunk. Despite that, my eyes are still sore. I tried Visine AC, Moisture Eyes, and Patanol. Nothing seems to be working. Maybe I should use cold water. At my next eye exam, which I really should schedule soon, I'll see if I can get another prescription for Patanol.

Shout-outs: Happy birthday

jslove!

Current Mood: okay
Current Music: Total Coelo, "I Eat Cannibals"

What I should be doing today is to continue to clean up and declutter the condo. But I just don't feel like doing it.

I'd like to rearrange the desk by moving it 90 degrees so that it adjoins my computer area. Right now, they're against the same wall.

Or I can go into the storage unit and pull out a box of computer printouts I haven't seen since, oh, around 1986.

Or I can just spend the day doing nothing. It's not easy doing nothing. You never know when you're finished.

Shout-outs: Happy birthday

filkerdave!

Current Mood: blah

Happy birthday

jalapenoman!

Every so often, the urinal in the mens' room on my floor doesn't shut itself off. The valve sticks and it goes into continuous flush mode. Thankfully, it doesn't overspill the urinal and flood the restroom. But it sure is annyoing when it happens. I think it happs to me rather frequently, even though I pull up on the lever instead of pushing down on it. Usually I have to snap the flush lever so that whatever inside is sticking goes back into place. Yesterday, I discovered a new way of shutting it off: flushing the toilet in the next stall.

Speaking of water....I can definitely spend some time in a hot tub right about now.

Current Mood: irritated

Several years ago, I bought a bread maker -- a Welbilt Bread Machine. In the past few years, it's been sitting in the garage, since it wasn't being used and The Ex wanted the counter space for a toaster oven. A couple of weeks ago, while having some beef stew, I had the hankering for homemade bread. So I went into the garage, found the bread maker, and brought it in the house. I then searched for the bread mixes I had in the pantry. I found the mixes, used one of them, and proceeded to make a loaf.

Since then, I've been making my own bread, and not bothering with store-bought bread. I have the ingredients at home; I might as well use them. Two nights ago, I made a loaf of whole wheat bread, with only whole wheat flour, water, and yeast. I didn't have any honey, so I left that and the other ingredients out. As a result, I ended up with a fairly dense loaf (about the consistency of a Brownberry loaf). Last night, I made some white bread using the recipe in the bread make booklet. It turned out great.

I'm trying to think how/why bread making machines went out of fashion. Part of it's the influx of restaurants/bakeries like Panera Bread, part of it's the low-carb diet craze.

Now I'm looking for a recipe for hunza bread. Supposedly that bread will help me lose weight, or so the story goes.

Anyone else have a bread maker? When was the last time you made a loaf?

Shout-outs: Happy birthday

rms_butterfly!

Current Mood: hungry

Despite having nearly 6 quarts of leftover lentil soup, I would say that the "Men Who Cook" event was a huge success. When we repeat this next year, I think we should lower our target amounts to serve half the attendees. (50 tickets were sold, and we were tasked to make enough for 40-50 people.)

Each of the three batches turned out well. What I did differently this time -- as opposed to the last time I made this recipe three weeks ago -- was to skip the sautéing of the onions and celery, cook the soup at high heat for 8 hours, use 1 can vegetable broth in place of 1 pt water, and add spices like coriander and cumin. (Note to self: Ground coriander and dried cilantro leaves are not interchangeable.)

Needless to say, I won't be making lentil soup for a while. And I'll be looking for room in my freezer, or people to help me eat up the soup.

Shout-outs: Happy birthday

redaxe!

....which is what one of my former co-workers called it.

I signed up for my church's first annual "Men Who Cook" night. I'm making three batches of lentil soup, enough to serve 40-50 people (in small servings). Batch #1 is in the slow cooker right now. I'm using Alton Brown's recipe, omitting the step where I sauté the onions and celery in olive oil. (Plus I couldn't find grains of paradise.) Batch #2 will be made tonight, and batch #3 will be made tomorrow morning. The batches will be put into Ziploc bags and (hopefully) hermetically sealed for later consumption.

We got nastybad weather here in these parts today. I thought I'd be slip-sliding away on I-675, but the ODOT crews did a decent job of grooming the road. These are the days I wish I had the capability to work at home. (To do that would require a more powerful computer and high-speed internet, neither of which I can afford right now.)

Current Mood: bouncy
Current Music: Re-Flex, "The Politics Of Dancing"

Happy birthday to

quadrivium and to

bastardcat!

Found out through the grapevine that a chapter of an international college fraternity -- my college fraternity -- in Colorado may be closed because they did something really stupid. I'm not mad about the chapter closure; I think they deserve it. I'm mad at what was allowed to happen there: Pledges (or to use the more correct term, "associate members") were left alone in a hotel room with a keg of beer, and were told to "get to know each other". $10,000 worth of damage was done to the hotel room. Someone peed in the in-room coffeemaker. And other things that I can't remember from the story.

For years, the fraternity's leadership has been trying to teach their members that hazing and alcohol abuse is bad. Most of the brothers over the years have listened. And a chosen few have not.

The story is making the rounds in the press. It's unfortunate that the press like to reinforce the "Animal House" stereotype. And despite all the good things that have been done by greek-letter societies over the years, an incident like this will be remembered for years, if not decades.

As for the perpetrators, they are my brothers, but they will be held accountable by the court of law, the fraternity's leadership, the university's leadership, and their parents.

Current Mood: pissed off
Current Music: Mercury purring

It's been a while since I've done a "That Was The Weekend That Was" post. Since I received no feedback on them, I figured people weren't interested in my day-to-day goings on.

( So,what did I do while everyone else was at either Capricon or Boskone? )

Current Mood: content
Current Music: Amethystium, "Odonata" CD

I've been tagged by

dragon_pet!

A. List seven habits/quirks/facts about yourself.
B. Tag seven people to do the same.
~~C. Do not tag the person who tagged you or say that you tag 'whoever wants to do it.~~
It's my meme and I'll do what I want now. :-P

1) I have perfect pitch.
2) I chew on ice cubes and my fingernails.
3) If my grandmother was alive when I was born, I would have been named after my grandfather.
4) All 4 of my grandparents were dead before I was born.
5) I was pushed up a grade in elementary school.
6) I made up for (5) by spending 7 years in college.
7) I started off as an electrical engineering major, but soon defected to computer science.

I'm not tagging anyone because they've probably already done this meme.

Current Mood: thoughtful
Current Music: The Columbus Blue Jackets as they lose again :(

From MSNBC: Gunman injures as many as 15 people at Northern Illinois University.

How do we keep guns away from people who would use them to harm other people?

I don't think a total ban on firearms would work.

We haven't learned the lessons from Columbine or Virginia Tech.

Discuss.

(Aside to

catalana: Please check in!)

Current Mood: sad and angry

One of the things I like about Marketplace is that they play songs apropos to the news items. Today they played the opening to Roxy Music's "Love Is The Drug".

Love is the drug I'm thinking of.

Your mission: Post a line or two of a song that has the word "love" in the title of the song.
[Updated 12:45] Yes, this is a twist on the rules of Encore, in which a player sings a lyric that contains the word in question.

Current Mood: mellow

Oh, what the hell....

( my valentine postbox )

Current Mood: blah

moar funny pictures

Current Music: Rammstein, "Herzeleid" CD

While I'm waiting for my project to rebuild, I think I'll mention my latest computer project: looking at Linux.

( I've known about Linux for years. Finally I'm doing something with it. )

Current Mood: geeky
Current Music: Bjork, "New World"

One of the kitchen appliances I "inherited" from my parents was an old Veg-O-Matic manual food processor. This past month, it's been getting some use. Last week, I made lentil soup, and used the Veg-O-Matic to dice an onion and to slice the celery and carrots. Today, I have beef stew in the slow cooker (I believe "crock pot" is a registered trademark). I'm using a co-worker's recipe, which doesn't list exact amounts of most ingredients, so I had to guess at the amounts. Once again, the Veg-O-Matic came in handy in dicing the potato and onion, and cutting up the carrots and celery. (Oops. I didn't mean to include celery in my stew, but it's in there.)

The hardest part about cleanup is picking out the vegetable pieces from the top of the unit.

As far as I know, Ronco no longer makes the Veg-O-Matic.

The only thing I'd change would be to make the body and "hammer" of the unit out of high-impact plastic. Even though they may have used the best and strongest plastic at the time, I have a feeling that it may break someday. At least I can get another one on eBay.

Tell me about some of your favorite kitchen gadgets.

Last night, at the Florida Panthers-Buffalo Sabres hockey game, Panthers forward Richard Zednik fell on his teammate's skate blade, which slashed his neck. (Story from FoxSports.com here.) He was rushed off the ice and taken to a local hospital in an ambulance. He's in stable condition now. I wish him all the best.

Several years ago, Sabres goalie Clint Malarchuk suffered the same injury. (I believe there's a video of it available on YouTube, but it's NOT for the squeamish.) Since then, goalies have had to wear neck protection. But skaters haven't had to wear the same type of neck protection. I wonder if that will change as a result of this incident.

It's sad that this is about the only time the local TV news even mentions hockey.

Current Mood: concerned

Profile

poltr1

July 2025

S	M	T	W	T	F	S
		1	2	3	4	5
6	7	8	9	10	11	12
13	14	15	16	17	18	19
20	21	22	23	24	25	26
27	28	29	30	31

Syndicate

Page Summary

Style Credit

Style: Neutral Good for Practicality by timeasmymeasure

Expand Cut Tags

No cut tags

Page generated Feb. 5th, 2026 04:15 pm

Daily Doings at the Line of Death Bar & Grill

(A Virtual Tavern)

Recent Entries

To Gmail or not to Gmail?

Which way to the eye wash station?

A recharge day for me?

Today's shout-out.....

Jane! Stop this crazy thing!

Adventures in breadmaking......

Another successful recipe!

Meez too!

It's George Birthington's Washday.....

Shout-outs for today....

Undergrads do the stupidest things......

TW-3 for Feb. 15-18, 2007......

Seven facts meme......

Just what we need. Another campus shooting incident....

A quick round of Encore....

My Valentine Postbox....

Aromatherapy.....

Giving Linux a test drive.....

It still dices and slices.....

An injury I don't want to see.....