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unicorndukeWe only got two inches of snow here, we're too far west of this storm. I hope everyone else has power and can shovel out quick! Jade in NYC still has power and sent me some photos of a lot of snow but I'm waiting to hear back from my siblings on their snow situations. Z should be good, she's in NYC but my brother in MD hasn't responded yet but pictures last night indicated he also got a bunch of snow.
The weather was fairly miserable this week, it rained, it snowed a little, it rained some more. Everything is properly mud and the ground has started defrosting. It's gross. We are preparing to tap maple trees this week, so all the focus has gone there for work.
I baked Wednesday since it was proper nasty and made potato rolls, fig newtons, yogurt and blueberry bars. I ordered more sorghum flour and tapioca flour from Bulk Foods and they had black mission figs on sale, so I got some and made Stella Parks' Fig Newtons recipe. I hope she's doing okay, she left the internet as far as I can tell. The potato rolls are fine, I ate them for lunches all week. I keep trying new recipes in the hopes that I can finally have the perfect gluten free bread recipe but I think I will always be disappointed. I want them to be wheat bread and they simply will not be that. I have had the best luck with delicious flatbreads like the pita which aren't so tied up in delicious bread memories and are reasonably tasty. I do want to try sourdough since I bought a whole book of gluten free sourdough recipes but I think I need to stop getting my hopes up in general. Of course they won't taste like wheat. Sourdough will happen when my parents move out and I have a fridge to myself for experiments. I miss making wheat bread. And eating it.
I signed up for a pottery class in February and I'm thoroughly enjoying it, I went both Wednesday and Thursday night to the studio and have been enjoying it. I don't think I'll continue it, I don't actually need another hobby and one that is so time consuming but it is a lot of fun and the teacher has been reasonably impressed with my progress. I've made a bunch of bowls, a mug and a pot. I think I'm just going to keep making bowls because I need bowls in my life.
As I've been watching the olympics, I've come to the conclusion that I think I need to do a sport for a hobby, specifically a team or social sport or club or something, even if just in the winter. It would be good for me to be around people frequently and possibly with physical touch and to bond. I've been contemplating if I want to try and go back to the martial arts studio that I used to go to in high school, they're wonderful people but I feel like I'm a outwardly different person than I was as a teenager and a lot of people from back then are still there including some folks I was very close to in high school. The only issue with that is the seasonal aspect of work, the martial arts studio does demand commitment. Plus I'm running low on available weeknights and the expectation is you attend class M/W or T/Th or at least that was the expectation when I last went there.
Friday and Saturday morning, I worked on the upstairs bathroom. I built the framing in two pieces and put it up, leveling it slightly away from the wall to account for the variation in the plaster and using the nailgun to secure it in place with spacers. I used 2x3's for the framing because of how small the gap will be between where the sink will go in the right corner of this photo and the edge of the shower which is visible in the left of the photo. Then I put up the insulation. Progress! I think the drywall will go up in two pieces, a bottom and top piece like the framing for ease of getting it in there. I just chatted with my dad about it and we don't think it will make a difference except making the top easier to get in since the ceiling isn't flat. This whole wall of the house doesn't have any insulation, so the framing in and insulating will help a lot. It's literally just plaster and lathe and siding, no studs at all.
I split most of the wood I had on the ground saturday afternoon for another bin. Each bin holds around a half cord of wood, the stakes really help get that extra amount and gravity does its work. I've got probably three cords in bins, plus another four in the bags that I did earlier this year. It was mucky ground to split in. Then yesterday, I chainsawed The Big Log. It is just over 20 inches in diameter because the chainsaw bar doesn't quite go through the whole thing and I have to work it from both sides. It was raining and spitting and snowing yesterday but I fully bundled up and my work coat is so saturated with tractor grease that it has become somewhat waterproof. I have three cuts left on the big log but my hand was starting to cramp from the chainsaw. I also got the chain that jumped off a month or two ago mostly rasped down to usable again. It'll need a little more work but then it'll be nice to have another one in rotation. Hard to tell in the photo, but most of the log is done with only a 7 foot or so section left. I do 18 inch long logs but I'll lop the end off since it isn't squared up. The split logs sitting around are the junk logs that are around knots in the wood and don't stack well, those will all get cleaned up and sent to the outdoor burner.
My laptop keyboard is dying. Something is wrong with it and sometimes it just won't work properly. Hitting keys too fast or lightly will miss them. Playing video games, they simply won't go until I tap again or will get stuck. The enter near the keypad and some other less useful keys simply don't work anymore. I think it's been at least 4-5 years since I got this laptop, so it's probably time for an upgrade but ugh. Maybe I can stretch it some more by getting a separate keyboard. If I get a new one, I'm vaguely debating on whether to go to linux and have a windows emulator to play games and things because of the increasing AI push which I'm pretty sure is causing some slowdown on my laptop but I don't want to dig in and turn code stuff off like some of the guides have shown. I don't really know what I'm doing, I know enough to get in trouble. Of course, computers are expensive now too. Most of what I do on my laptop now is watch videos and play video games and I'm hoping to have a separate work computer in the next month or so. I don't live a desktop life, I use my laptop in at least two places in the house, so that's out. But i've gone back to playing Coral Island now (several months ago) that it had it's final (maybe?) update. There might be one more small update to the game but it's fun to revisit now. I'm super looking forward to the beta of The Legend of Khiimori where you are a Mongolian courier rider in the 13th century which should be out to backers soon. Love a horse game. In a hilarious coincidence, I just looked up the game on steam to spell is correctly and there is currently a horse game sale on steam.
Also I decided to do video gaming stuff yesterday, today and tomorrow because my arms are sore :(
I am almost done with my coat, I can't wait to get good photos of it. I finished the buttons and buttonholes over the weekend and need to do some cleanup. Debating on whether I want to put buttons on the pockets, but all it needs a good ironing and cleanup of thread and it'll be good to wear! Pictures to come in my monthly roundup.
The weather was fairly miserable this week, it rained, it snowed a little, it rained some more. Everything is properly mud and the ground has started defrosting. It's gross. We are preparing to tap maple trees this week, so all the focus has gone there for work.
I baked Wednesday since it was proper nasty and made potato rolls, fig newtons, yogurt and blueberry bars. I ordered more sorghum flour and tapioca flour from Bulk Foods and they had black mission figs on sale, so I got some and made Stella Parks' Fig Newtons recipe. I hope she's doing okay, she left the internet as far as I can tell. The potato rolls are fine, I ate them for lunches all week. I keep trying new recipes in the hopes that I can finally have the perfect gluten free bread recipe but I think I will always be disappointed. I want them to be wheat bread and they simply will not be that. I have had the best luck with delicious flatbreads like the pita which aren't so tied up in delicious bread memories and are reasonably tasty. I do want to try sourdough since I bought a whole book of gluten free sourdough recipes but I think I need to stop getting my hopes up in general. Of course they won't taste like wheat. Sourdough will happen when my parents move out and I have a fridge to myself for experiments. I miss making wheat bread. And eating it.
I signed up for a pottery class in February and I'm thoroughly enjoying it, I went both Wednesday and Thursday night to the studio and have been enjoying it. I don't think I'll continue it, I don't actually need another hobby and one that is so time consuming but it is a lot of fun and the teacher has been reasonably impressed with my progress. I've made a bunch of bowls, a mug and a pot. I think I'm just going to keep making bowls because I need bowls in my life.
As I've been watching the olympics, I've come to the conclusion that I think I need to do a sport for a hobby, specifically a team or social sport or club or something, even if just in the winter. It would be good for me to be around people frequently and possibly with physical touch and to bond. I've been contemplating if I want to try and go back to the martial arts studio that I used to go to in high school, they're wonderful people but I feel like I'm a outwardly different person than I was as a teenager and a lot of people from back then are still there including some folks I was very close to in high school. The only issue with that is the seasonal aspect of work, the martial arts studio does demand commitment. Plus I'm running low on available weeknights and the expectation is you attend class M/W or T/Th or at least that was the expectation when I last went there.
Friday and Saturday morning, I worked on the upstairs bathroom. I built the framing in two pieces and put it up, leveling it slightly away from the wall to account for the variation in the plaster and using the nailgun to secure it in place with spacers. I used 2x3's for the framing because of how small the gap will be between where the sink will go in the right corner of this photo and the edge of the shower which is visible in the left of the photo. Then I put up the insulation. Progress! I think the drywall will go up in two pieces, a bottom and top piece like the framing for ease of getting it in there. I just chatted with my dad about it and we don't think it will make a difference except making the top easier to get in since the ceiling isn't flat. This whole wall of the house doesn't have any insulation, so the framing in and insulating will help a lot. It's literally just plaster and lathe and siding, no studs at all.
I split most of the wood I had on the ground saturday afternoon for another bin. Each bin holds around a half cord of wood, the stakes really help get that extra amount and gravity does its work. I've got probably three cords in bins, plus another four in the bags that I did earlier this year. It was mucky ground to split in. Then yesterday, I chainsawed The Big Log. It is just over 20 inches in diameter because the chainsaw bar doesn't quite go through the whole thing and I have to work it from both sides. It was raining and spitting and snowing yesterday but I fully bundled up and my work coat is so saturated with tractor grease that it has become somewhat waterproof. I have three cuts left on the big log but my hand was starting to cramp from the chainsaw. I also got the chain that jumped off a month or two ago mostly rasped down to usable again. It'll need a little more work but then it'll be nice to have another one in rotation. Hard to tell in the photo, but most of the log is done with only a 7 foot or so section left. I do 18 inch long logs but I'll lop the end off since it isn't squared up. The split logs sitting around are the junk logs that are around knots in the wood and don't stack well, those will all get cleaned up and sent to the outdoor burner.
My laptop keyboard is dying. Something is wrong with it and sometimes it just won't work properly. Hitting keys too fast or lightly will miss them. Playing video games, they simply won't go until I tap again or will get stuck. The enter near the keypad and some other less useful keys simply don't work anymore. I think it's been at least 4-5 years since I got this laptop, so it's probably time for an upgrade but ugh. Maybe I can stretch it some more by getting a separate keyboard. If I get a new one, I'm vaguely debating on whether to go to linux and have a windows emulator to play games and things because of the increasing AI push which I'm pretty sure is causing some slowdown on my laptop but I don't want to dig in and turn code stuff off like some of the guides have shown. I don't really know what I'm doing, I know enough to get in trouble. Of course, computers are expensive now too. Most of what I do on my laptop now is watch videos and play video games and I'm hoping to have a separate work computer in the next month or so. I don't live a desktop life, I use my laptop in at least two places in the house, so that's out. But i've gone back to playing Coral Island now (several months ago) that it had it's final (maybe?) update. There might be one more small update to the game but it's fun to revisit now. I'm super looking forward to the beta of The Legend of Khiimori where you are a Mongolian courier rider in the 13th century which should be out to backers soon. Love a horse game. In a hilarious coincidence, I just looked up the game on steam to spell is correctly and there is currently a horse game sale on steam.
Also I decided to do video gaming stuff yesterday, today and tomorrow because my arms are sore :(
I am almost done with my coat, I can't wait to get good photos of it. I finished the buttons and buttonholes over the weekend and need to do some cleanup. Debating on whether I want to put buttons on the pockets, but all it needs a good ironing and cleanup of thread and it'll be good to wear! Pictures to come in my monthly roundup.
