Day 14

Not exactly an inspriation of happiness, but an enabler. Benadryl antihistamine. This post brought to you by tree pollen.

One nice thing about Seattle is that the flowering/pollen part of the year is also a part of the year where it rains frequently, which moderates the effects.

Day 12 - Water

Not drinking it - just looking at it. I've been sitting here for an hour - watching the wind form wave patterns across the sound. The ferries pass by occasionally and add their own wake V patterns to the mix. It's serene - and doesn't cost anything more than time.

Day 10 - NPR

The daily voice of reason. I subscribe to a couple dozen RSS feeds which randomly update with an assortment of economics news, automotive stuff, and culture... it is kinda a personalized list of things I'm interested in presently. However even rather large blogs lack the balance of the major news programs on NPR. I appreciate that.

Day 9 - Green Tea

Today's inspiration for happiness: green tea.

In loose leaf form - three steeping cycles per teaspoon of leaves, different flavors in every cup, low on caffeine, and in most cases inexpensive. And the routine of it, as with other things in the list so far, makes me slow down life occasionally. That may become a common idea and I'm still learning how to deal with it, but in the short term at least it's pretty nice.

Day 8 - Rhubarb pie

Thanks Allison!

Day 7

Under a week and I missed Day 6: it was a partly sunny Easter Sunday - we spent it walking around Capitol Hill. The art museum up there had a new exhibit - a collection of Japanese woodblock prints from the 17-1800's. Part of the collection was an early print of the Great Wave ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Great_Wave_off_Kanagawa ) - it is a beautiful print but the other more tranquil nature scenes from the same series were perhaps more interesting to me.

So, to catch up - Day 7 of things that inspire happiness: the short cappuccino.

I think at this point I've sampled this drink from every coffee shop in the greater downtown Seattle area. There are two schools of thought on the cappuccino in this city. Some coffee shops treat it as a short latte, with more actual milk mixed with the espresso than milk froth. (otherwise termed the wet cappuccino) The other is to have the espresso with only the thick layer of milk froth on top. (dry cappuccino) Either way the general idea is to have the primary taste be the espresso, with a secondary taste of the steamed milk, and not too much of either. The result is a very well balanced drink, and my favorite coffee variation.

Day 5 - Wool

Wool - it's like Polartec, but less clingy and better looking.

This post inspired by the cool and breezy day here in Seattle.

Day 4

Today's inspiration for happiness: seasonality.

Walked through Pike Place market after work today to get a couple things for the pizza planned for dinner.

While the corner grocery has a few things year round - potatoes, onions, peppers, mushrooms, carrots... it's the seasonal things that make the market special.

The asparagus has been slowly marching northward. In the winter it comes from Peru, then Mexico, now in spring we're seeing California, then shortly Oregon and then Washington toward the end of April. The local apples are also fading out. California citrus has been big lately. Berries are starting to creep northward as well.

There's something that's continually optimistic about noticing the progression of seasons through what you eat. It's impossible to be bored with food when it is only around for a few months at a time, and it helps pace life. Stock the pantry with a few staples - rice, beans, noodles... and add whatever's interesting as it shows up.

This kinda goes hand in hand with the focus thing-a-day from earlier in the week. Since moving out here and slowing life down it has been far more enjoyable.

Day 3 - Dali Atomicus

Not being an art history major, this was only a recent find, but it is one of the more fun photographs I've seen: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Salvador_Dali_A_(Dali_Atomicus)_09633u.jpg

The photographer, Philippe Halsman, noted that it took 28 attempts to get the best combination of throwing 3 cats through the air, a bucket of water, and Dali jumping. What an excellent use of an afternoon.

Day 2

Things that inspire happiness: focus

Ok, it isn't a thing, but there are those simple things that require absolute attention for a short period of time. Threading a needle, dicing an onion.

There are times when I run a lot through my mind, so shoving it all to the back burner for a minute helps things be more ordered later on.

New Idea

I'm purposefully starting this before April 1 so that I might myself take it seriously.

Daily posts of one thing that inspires happiness. To be accompanied by a photo as often as possible. Sometimes elaboration. Sometimes not.

Day 1:

Pineapple.

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=36322247&id=36620541

Why? Requires use of a fairly large knife to take it apart. And tastes like candy.

Time and Scale - Part 1

This post is NPR inspired. It's not uncommon. The basis is a story about how various researchers are approaching the phenomenon of time apparently going faster as people age.

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=122322542

I wonder how I will be when I'm old enough to officially have these sort of perception issues. To me, childhood was a series of next steps. (School, sports... always something to do, always a new year, new grade, check the boxes, move on) I recognize that is unusual. I'm not sure if there was a goal beyond getting to 'the future' despite not having a clear picture of what 'the future' entailed.

Summers were perceived as slow, because they were. The only things to do were to play baseball/basketball with friends and go on bike rides. (Or later, summer jobs, then going out to movies, etc)

Did I ever envision myself at 28 when I was 8, or 18? Not specifically. Classes were chosen based on what I could do with a reasonable amount of interest and effort, and what would provide the best odds of a job later on. That worked out well enough. The only thing about the present is that the steps are further apart than in school. Jobs are steps, not much different than grades really. They just seem to take 3 years at a time for me to step up to the next one.

There are some constants in my life. I'm glad there are friends who have lived life in parallel for a long period of time. It helps provide perspective. Despite the house experiment in Charlotte I don't seem to aspire to anything beyond a small apartment - this makes the job bit easier - no need to work too hard. Travel seems to be a constant as well.

What's the next step? I think the problem I'm running into now is the 'here is a fine place to be, but there has to be a change eventually, right?' mode of thought. More on that later...

Hair Drying - An Engineer's Perspective.

So, while brushing my teeth this morning I noticed that Allison's hair dryer has a power consumption rating of 1875 watts. Not being familiar with hair dryers it appears that is essentially how manufacturers determine which one is 'better' than the next and thus which should cost more - so you get 1000 watts for $10 and 2000w for $25 or similar. (Though in that case you get more watts per dollar for the cheaper one) 

Being an engineer this seemed like an entirely arbitrary measure of the effectiveness of a hair dryer. Thinking about what matters in drying hair: the amount of power it is sucking from the wall does not particularly matter. The amount of it can transfer to the air that is passing through the device is more important. Thus, I propose that an efficiency metric is more of a meaningful 'this hairdryer is better' measure than the ultimate out-of-wall watt rating. 

Take for example two 1500w hair dryers. Measure the remaining energy at say 10cm from the exhaust nozzle where the user's hair typically is. If one is able to deliver 500w at that distance it would be 33% efficient. (33 percent of the wall energy is transferred to your hair) If the other only delivers 150w at the same distance, it is only 10% efficient, and thus inferior. 

This could then get the shopper to value energy efficiency - a very 'green' thing in the current age. And then the hair dryer makers could come up with more efficient heating coils to further increase their efficiency ratings and outperform the competition. It's a win win. Customer's get dryer hair faster, less energy is used in the process.

Soup - Variations on a Theme

Now that the weather has cooled down - lows in the 40's, highs in the 50's - more clouds than sun, it is unofficially soup weather. If you feel the same way, here are some notes on recent experiments in soup:

All are generally calibrated for 4 servings (2 people for 2 nights - a good time to effort ratio imo) and are very forgiving if you want to mess with ratios. Hardware: Stainless steel pot, stick blender, spoon.

Potato Leek w/ Pear:

2ish pounds of white or gold potatoes, cut into approx 1" squares.

2 large leeks or 3 smaller ones - Cut ends off, chop into rings.

1 onion

Sautee the veggies - butter or olive oil - essentially some fat with a bit of flavor, then add:

2 bay leaves

1 qt chicken or vegetable stock

generous amounts of dill, thyme and a bit of rosemary

Simmer for .5-1 hour until potatoes are soft. Meanwhile, dice and sautee 2 pears in a separate skillet.

Puree the soup with stick blender then top with the caramelized pears and aged white cheddar.

Acorn Squash:

3ish pound acorn squash. Cut in half, scoop out seeds, put in 350 degree oven to roast. Meanwhile:

Sautee 4-5 minced cloves of garlic, a chopped onion and either 1 chopped leek or a few stalks of celery in olive or sesame oil.

Once veggies are ready, either scoop out or cut up (depending on firmness) the roasted squash and add it to the pot along with

1 qt chicken stock

2t of curry powder

1-2t of half sharp paprika

Simmer for .5-1 hour then puree with stick blender. Top with blue cheese. A neat trick here which was picked up from a local fancy restaurant is to retain the seeds and roast them, then crush them when they're crunchy and add them as a garnish at the end as well.

Basically, pureed soups can be distilled to the following general formula:

Starchy vegetable at a 1:1 ratio by mass with an onion/leekcelery combination - sautee this

Add stock

Pick a regional cuisine and add the typical seasoning trifecta and add it

Simmer for .5-1 hour then blend

Finish with cheese and black pepper to taste.

It is interesting how many different flavors can be created out of a pretty basic idea. Allison has swapped the acorn squash for butternut and added apple, topping the potato leek with bacon or other pork is tasty. And it still averages out to about a half hour of cooking per day. (one day it's 1 hour and the second day it's no time at all to reheat)

The schedule I've had over the last couple years has helped my cooking immensely - lots of time to experiment with and refine different food ideas that I've found at various restaurants or remembered from the past.

Moving (This seems to occur every two years)

Well, half the apartment is in boxes. The other half will be tonight or tomorrow night. It actually isn't a painful process this time around.

The move from the Charlotte apartment to the house was difficult because Allison and I still had our separate sets of stuff. The house didn't exactly help fix the consolidation issue. Tons of space meant there were still more chairs and random boxes of stuff than necessary.

The move from Charlotte to Seattle was a bit difficult just due to the distance, but it at least led to a serious downsizing of all duplicate or not used stuff.

The current move - well, I still think I have too much stuff, but all non furniture things should fit in a minivan on Saturday for the 4 block trip to the new place. I'd like to consolidate a bit further, and probably will in the upcoming months. I really should just end the whole old computer thing. I'm the cat lady of old computers/computer parts. They multiply regularly. And even though I can make old technology work, that doesn't mean it's actually worth anything. I could clear out a big box and two complete old computers and still only make $20.

The cheapskate part of me thinks it would be wasteful to throw out/giveaway anything with remaining value, but if the value is so small and it's just taking up space... why save it. Or, if the distance between frugality and a bit more efficient life is less than $100... might as well just go for it.