Blurt!Sben

My pile.org redesign for 2023 is changing the botanical iconography from black pepper to coffee. Still a little wonkiness with how the coffee beans are centered, but it’s acceptable for now.

Mar. 15, 2023, 9:34pm (edited)

Added a bit of nuance (?) to last night’s screedlet.

Mar. 15, 2023, 8:36am (edited)

Simultaneous self-deprecation and skepticism.

Mar. 14, 2023, 9:46pm (edited)

This weekend’s kitchen victory: butter chicken for us and the kids’ friends.

Mar. 13, 2023, 9:45am

Finished reading The Terraformers by Annalee Newitz. I almost put this one down unfinished: The setting and story are incredibly inventive, and the characters’ portrayal and motivations very one-dimensional and clumsy. I actually found myself skimming parts, which I almost never do with fiction.

Mar. 12, 2023, 10:32am

Current earworm: “Change of the Guard” by Kamasi Washington.

Mar. 10, 2023, 6:37am

Finished reading Babel by R.F. Kuang, about the translators’ college at Oxford in the 1830s that worked magic based on the tension between imperfectly-translated terms, and thus fueled the British Empire. About empire of course, and appropriation and systemic racism and such. I enjoyed this.

Mar. 6, 2023, 8:08pm

Tonight’s kitchen victory: carbonnade à la flamande with homemade fries! (I used Joël Robuchon’s cold fry technique, which worked great.)

Mar. 4, 2023, 7:06pm

Tonight’s kitchen victory: roast chicken, skillet-roasted potatoes, and charred green beans. Lots of rosemary and garlic. The house smells pretty good.

Feb. 26, 2023, 6:43pm

Got a couple inches of snow overnight, already melting by the time I got up.

Feb. 26, 2023, 9:14am

Had Mom over for dinner.

Feb. 25, 2023, 9:39pm

Finished reading Sea of Tranquility by Emily St. John Mandel, about plague, time travel, and the simulation hypothesis. Includes some more-mature forms of her standard tropes, plus links to other parts of the St. John Mandel Literary Universe. Quite good.

Feb. 22, 2023, 4:59pm

Have gotten to the point of fasting where basically any food I think of sounds incredibly delicious.

Feb. 21, 2023, 9:12pm

Finished reading Joan by Katherine J. Chen, historical fiction about Joan of Arc. Chen, properly, wrote her own interpretation of Joan, one who’s less a holy maid with visions and more “the Thomas Edison of handing a dude his ass” (note: not a quote from the book). The final part of the book was difficult to read — it’s a tragedy after all — but at least we don’t get to her being (spoiler for approx. six-century-old history) burnt at the stake.

Side note / content warning / complaint: In the book, Joan’s sister is raped (offscreen, and handled delicately, but). I hope someday we can find a better plot point to motivate the main character.

Feb. 21, 2023, 9:11pm (edited)

Walked down the Burke-Gilman trail today: about 3 hours, 21K steps, 11 miles.

Feb. 18, 2023, 8:13pm