Entries Tagged 'at play' ↓
December 23rd, 2008 — at play
A few years back I was involved with a living-history/re-enactment group. Our focus was Scottish history during the early 1600′s, specifically a recruiting camp moving through Scotland recruiting for Gustavus Adolphus for what would later be known as the 30-Year War. We would put on demonstrations on what daily life was like during this period, from the military training down to the cooking of meals.
One of the demonstrations I did was for candle-making, primarily with bees wax, but I also used tallow a couple times. Below is something I wrote up based on my research, and would keep a few printed copies on hand to show to folks that expressed the interest. The following appears pretty much as I wrote it back in early 2005.
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October 25th, 2008 — at play
I decided to take a drive down the Mississippi River valley today. It’s bout one of the last good fall days. I ended up going down to Red Wing, cutting in to WI to follow along Lake Pepin going south and cutting back to MN in Wabasha.
It was a very nice drive… here’s a couple pictures, more on my photo site.
A sailboat at the dock in Red Wing
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September 29th, 2008 — at play, at work
This is my second trip to the Christianburg area of Virginia. Last time, on the way back to DC my dad and I took a drive up the the Blue Ridge Parkway. Yesterday, I decided to head down there and check out the southern section.
I got a bit of a lazy start. didn’t leave the hotel till just after 11. Took a bit over half-hour to go down the winding Hwy8 through Floyd until I got to Tuggle’s Gap. Last time dad and I had breakfast here. Was good food, so I decided to stop again. Lunch this time, a cheeseburger with lettuce, onion, ketchup and pickles. It was a square burger, and better than Wendy’s. Oh yea, side of onion rings along with that – hit the spot and I was back on the road before 12:30.
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August 2nd, 2008 — at play
Well, at least a Christmas treat. This recipe is one my mom has always done as part of her annual batch of Christmas cookies, and other than the spritz cookies is probably my personal favorite. It really doesn’t have to be a Christmas only cookie/bar, but maybe that is part of it’s appeal?
Toffee Squares
- 3 C Quick Oats
- 3/4 C melted margarine or butter
- 3/4 C brown sugar
- 1/4 C + 2 Tbsp dark corn syrup
- 1 tsp salt
- 2 1/2 tsp vanilla
- Food coloring, if desired
- 1 C semi-sweet chocolate chips
- 1/4 C chopped nuts
Pour melted butter over oats and mix well. Add sugar, syrup, salt and vanilla along with a few drops of red or green food coloring, if desired, and blend well.
Pack firmly in a well-greased 8 x 8 pan. (Glass works best) and bake at 400 degrees for 12-15 minutes. (The center will soft, but will firm up when cooling. Do not over-bake.)
Pour chocolate chips on top, cover with a large cookie sheet. Remove cover after a few minutes, when the chips are melted. Spread chocolate and sprinkle with nuts, if desired.
Once set, cut in to 1-inch squares. Store in air-tight container.
Yer not getting any nutritional info, cause well.. these ain’t. Any benefit you might get from the oats is pretty much drowned out by the sugar and butter and well, the chocolate. But so what? They taste wonderful!
July 28th, 2008 — at play
Ok, being sick this weekend has ben a joy. But one good thing to come of it, I’ve been going through my pinned posts from Bloglines and cleaning things up a bit. During one brief period of consciousnous early this morning I came back across the following sites that let you play around with photos.
wanokoto – this Japanese site (with a bit of off kilter English translation) takes your photo and ages it to look like it was taken back in the 40′s or something. The interface is bout as simple as you can get, you browse for a local file or plug in the url of a picture that’s already online and click the “convert” button. Here I took a panoramic shot of the Capital from my recent DC trip, and here’s how it turned out. To save the converted photo you need to right-click and save the image.
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July 25th, 2008 — at play
Since I was out in VA last weekend, I was not part of the record crowds going to see The Dark Knight. I decided to go to a place right near work tonight to catch it.
It started out with a bit of good action, rolling into some things that you can tell are laying the ground work for the big clash between Joker and Batman. Then about an hour into the 150 minute epic, right when we are going to get to see the first real confrontation between Bruce Wayne and Rachel, everything goes dark.
Now, before those who haven’t seen it accuse me of giving away the story – or those that did see it get too confused, let me clarify. The movie didn’t just go black, the entire theater did. Well, at least until the emergency lights kicked in. Granted, I didn’t know it was the whole theater until a couple minutes later when I headed out to the lobby to see what was up.
After about another 10-15 min the employees started letting folks know they were giving refunds (actually vouchers) and aking folks to head out. Last I heard as I was heading to the car was that they were not expecting the power to be back on for 60 to 90 minutes. It was a fairly major problem, power seemed to be out for blocks around the theater. Course, probably won’t find out what happened… with the power.
I’ll have to try and catch the movie again tomorrow.
