Monday's revenge and more interesting things

[treeskin]

I didn't find out until almost 10:30 this morning that my 9-9:30 tree delivery had been rerouted until "midafternoon". Which was 2:30, midafternoon by most workplace's standards, but late in the work day for me. But the delivery driver had particularly toothsome calves. There are compensations. *grin*

Managed to zing the lead groundskeeper today. We were out picking up a new water tank for the big truck (as in, 525-gal tank for watering trees next year), and had stopped at Wendy's for munchies on the way. We walked back out to the truck, each slurping on our Frosties, and J says, "I always forget how much trouble it is to suck these things through a straw." And I replied, "Funny, I've never had much trouble with it." J stopped, almost choked on his straw, gave me the best wide-eyed startled look I've ever gotten from him, and muttered, "No, I bet you don't." Color me very amused.

Fetched more wine yeast for the pears. Also acquired a pair of pear butter recipes, one basic and changeable, one diabetic (I have visions of a Yule gift for my grandmother). I will need more pears.

Also got a new--to me, anyway--cleaning product for my brewing equipment. The gal at the shop refered to it as "one step", basicly you make a solution of this stuff (a peroxide of some sort), and rinse everything in that, rather than the grand bleaching of the kitchen I've been doing. It's not supposed to leave a residue or flavor in the wine, like bleach can. For $2, I thought it worth trying.

A quick inventory of the freezer reminded me that I have enough strawberries for 2 or 3 batches of mead, at least (plus a bag or two left over for some pear-strawberry butter), and many containers of pulpy apple juice, from when we rescued all those apples from Robyn's show decorations (a year ago? two? I forget, but they need used). I also have new and tempting recipes for kiwi apple honey preserve (a sort of kiwi and apple and honey butter, looks sooooo tempting in the recipe book), and apple cider jelly.

So, I have yeast, I need sugar (for the wines, and for the preserves), and I need jelly jars. By will probably stop and fetch those at Big Lots one of these evenings. They tend to carry canning stuff cheap this time of year.

Odd, for all that I disliked canning as a child, how much I miss it sometimes as an adult.


And in other news, we are stepping back a bit from the XYQ drama for a little while, to catch our breath and attend to some business we've let slide the last few months. Not that we don't care, but we have to caretake for ourselves for a while. I'm still working on some things for various participants, letters and such, but I have some very specific things I want to say, and my creative energies are dry, and it's slow.

Comments

[noveldevice.livejournal.com]

You'll have to tell me what evenings are good for you...I think that probably a weekend would be best for me, in the interests of not staying late and having to be up early the next morning--which is where I think the rub will lie, since my days off and your days off don't coincide well. :P

[treeskin.livejournal.com]

And further complicated by the fact that we were planning to drop the HSA meeting Sunday, and go to Fest one more time, and I may have other activities that evening. (I was going to call Pet tonight and see what he had planned *grin*)

Friday or Saturday nights doable?

[sidhe612.livejournal.com]

Would there be any objections to kiddo and I tagging along if you're going to fest? I'd like to take him this year and I'd prefer adult company while I'm there.

[treeskin.livejournal.com]

Well, we'll have to talk about that. Depends on how busy Pet's going to be; I admit my main motivation is to go hear him play, since I didn't get to last time. And then to play with him a bit. I was going to call him tonight and see what his plans were; I'll let you know.

[noveldevice.livejournal.com]

Yes, either. Just let me know. I'm homework-light this weekend, even.

[treeskin.livejournal.com]

How does Sat evening sound? By asked me to give him a day or so notice, so he could fetch propane. We're going to experiment--it takes sooooo long for my stovetop to get the big pot to a boil to seal the jars, we thought we'd try that part out on the deck over the propane stove. Can't be any slower.

[noveldevice.livejournal.com]

Saturday night sounds great. :) What time?

[treeskin.livejournal.com]

Sixish? That would give me time to get cleaned up after work, and we'd till have plent of time to do our cooking. It's only supposed to take 20-30 minutes to cook the pears down.

If the boss is, as I suspect, "sick" today, I may sneak out a little early. We shall see.

BTW--how do you feel about chili for dinner?

[noveldevice.livejournal.com]

Does it have onions in? :) Can I bring a saucepan and we separate out some chili before the onioning stage?

[treeskin.livejournal.com]

By changed the menu--mild Italian sausage, red sauce, pasta. Mushrooms, no onions.

[(Anonymous)]

My friends who are avid brewers of beer, mead, and other scrumptious goodies swear by onestep. They say it does the job well, and truly does disappear when done - you don't even need to rinse your container before using it. It apparently also is very useful for the cleaning out of coolers after camping events. Again, no rinsing needed, and no concern about food contamination the next time you use the cooler. Haven't used it myself, as the brewing store is all the way on the other side of the metro, but it is on my list of things to try when I get the opportunity.

I envy you your long Fest season - ours closed last month. *sniff* Would have been nice to go on a day that didn't leave me roasted and crisped. It was so hot, even the pickle sellers were too wilted to put much effort into making their traditional off color comments (a major pet peeve of mine, that i've yet to figure out). However, the one nice pickle guy, when I gave in and went to buy their $$ water, said "no, don't grab one from on top. You want one from the bottom." Why, are they colder? "Marginally, perhaps. But you'll sure feel better for having dived into the ice water, won't you?" :-) I thought that was really sweet. And, before you ask, I was not even wearing a light colored tee shirt. :p
m.

[treeskin.livejournal.com]

That makes me feel better about the stuff. The gal at the store really talked it up, and it sounded good, and wasn't too expensive to just try, but it doesn't come with much of a label.