It’s Monday and I know I could use some inspiration. Have a picture of a National Park, because wow.
Posts Tagged ‘#ThingsILike’
Inspiration, Because Monday
Posted in Likes, tagged #ThingsILike, awesome, creativity, Glacier National Park, inspiration, national parks, nature, wow, yay on January 30, 2017| Leave a Comment »
A Beautiful Symphony
Posted in Holidays, Likes, tagged #ThingsILike, awesome, history, inspiration, Kid President, Martin Luther King Jr., MLK, Motivation, persistence, quotes, Thoughts on January 16, 2017| Leave a Comment »
Happy Martin Luther King, Jr. Day!
Want to bone up on your history? Kid President is here to help:)
Brownie + Cookie = Gluten-Free Brookies
Posted in Food and..., Likes, tagged #foodforwriters, #lightindarkness, #ThingsILike, 2017, baking, bribery, brookies, chocolate, delicious, food, home, Motivation, New Year, recipes, winter, writing, yay on January 13, 2017| Leave a Comment »
I’m slowly getting back into a writing routine after the holidays. Writing is hard work, and of course glucose is critical to brain function. That means I have an excuse to bake:)
I worked up this cookie recipe for a friend who is gluten-averse. It’s based on a recipe from MasterChef Australia contestant Harry Foster and produces rich chocolate cookies with a satisfying cake-like texture.
Brownie + Cookie = Brookies
- 350g [12 oz.] 70% dark chocolate
- 45g [3.17 T.] butter
- 80g [8.5 T.] cornstarch
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 50g [~¼ C.] chocolate chips (more or less as you like; I use three chips per cookie)
- 225g [1 C.] superfine sugar
- 3 eggs
- 1 t. vanilla extract
1. Preheat the oven to 350F (175C).
2. Melt dark chocolate and butter in the microwave on low (30% works for me). Stir and set aside until lukewarm.
3. In a medium-size bowl, combine remaining ingredients and beat until light and fluffy. Add cooled butter mixture and mix until combined.
4. Scoop ~1-inch balls onto cookie sheets.* Gently press chocolate chips into the tops of each ball.
5. Bake for 12-13 minutes. Let cool two minutes before transferring to rack.
Makes ~33 cookies.
* If your butter-chocolate mixture is too warm, it may look and act more like batter. Pop the bowl into the fridge for a few minutes to chill and you should be able to scoop as needed.
I’d show you a photo of the cookies but, well, I ate them all. Instead, here are some pretty examples of other lights in the darkness.
Enjoy!
Chapter 45. Finally!
Posted in Other, tagged #ThingsILike, 2016election, awesome, free, Motivation, Thoughts, vote! on November 8, 2016| Leave a Comment »
Oh Hey. Canada!
Posted in Likes, Other, Writing, tagged #ThingsILike, awesome, Canada, Hamilton, history, home, inspiration, Motivation, NASA, space, Thoughts, travel, work, writing, yay on October 27, 2016| Leave a Comment »
Every so often I am struck with the realization that I live in what is, to me, a foreign country. How cool is that?
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There I was, about to start up the old treadmill desk and get to work when I looked out the window and had one of those moments. You may know the kind I mean (at least I hope you do), where suddenly everything you see shines with crystal clarity.
Oh, you may think, I hadn’t realized that the neighbor’s maple was quite so magnificent this Fall, and every leaf stands out. I think of it as seeing with a child’s eyes, before “this thing” and “that thing” become a group of “the usual things” that can be ignored without conscious attention.
Do we see each blade of grass when we walk past the lawn? I don’t. In fact, it would be an almost impossible way to live, I think, and I say that with the full knowledge that I am the sort of person who pays attention to the curbs when in Athens. (What? They’re made of marble. And oh yes, The Parthenon;)
I like the everyday, appreciate the curbs and libraries and sidewalk trees that we interact with on a daily basis. The common shapes our daily experience, even as it remains largely invisible. Even so…
I live in a foreign country! Part of my realization was the sudden understanding that I’ve accomplished one of the goals I set when I was a child.
I might have been twelve years old, the details are a bit fuzzy now. There was a group of friends in the room, all of us paging through an atlas (oversized, hardcover, with glossy paper). We argued over where to go, calculated the costs, plotted impossible strategies to get there.
Living in another country seemed the height of adventure. And now here I am.
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Canada is lovely and wild, with an often thin edge of civilization anchoring this vast swath of often frigid territory. Approximately 75% of the population lives within 100 miles of the U.S. border, and the continent looks very different up here at night.
That mostly dark bit mostly north of the U.S.? Yeah, not water. I’m waving!
Canadian history is much different than the version I grew up with. It captures an ongoing friction between very different cultures and the relatively peaceable integration of those worlds into a single entity. No flashy Revolution here. There are reasons for signs that list both French and English versions of the word “street.” There are reasons for the populations’ deep-seated love of Tim Horton’s coffee, and gravy-drenched poutine. This country has its own twists, its own heroes, its own storied and shadowed chapters.
It’s true that I can shop for groceries in my native language, read most of the signage and do not need a plane ticket to visit my parents, but I no longer live in the place I was born. It’s also true that even Canadians can be crotchety, the bread often has too much flour in it, and there really is only one road connecting the East and West halves of the country. (And they still won’t shut up about that time they burned down The White House…;) But for me, here and now, it’s all a bit magical.
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Pay attention, I remind myself. You just might find that the world is a far more beautiful and astonishing place than you remember. You might also realize that in spite of the knowledge that there is always more to do, if you work hard* and you keep moving even when it feels as though you’re going in circles, dreams can come true.
How cool is that?
. . . . . . . . . . .
* Need some motivation? I recommend the PBS Great Performances documentary Hamilton’s America. Both Alexander Hamilton and Lin-Manuel Miranda are inspirational as heck. It’s available online for U.S. viewers. The rest of us may be lucky enough to catch it on our PBS stations. (See? Not the 51st state after all;)
2016, The Cakening!
Posted in Food and..., Holidays, tagged #ThingsILike, birthday, cake, chocolate, creativity, food, fun, home, yay on October 12, 2016| 1 Comment »
Target: Caaaakkkkeeee!!!!!
Another year, another cake:) For this year’s birthday I wanted a little visual contrast, plus a way to use the last of summer’s fruit. Also, pretty. I went with that classic good time, chocolate, and a buttercreamcheese frosting.
Two layers, baked and cooled and torted to make four. To shake things up a bit, I added a thin coating of raspberry jam before frosting the first and third layers, to bring out a touch of fruit flavor. Crumb coat. Thick frosting top. Chocolate ganache trim, topped with blackberries, raspberries, blueberries, and mint, with a buttercream flower to wrap it all up.
Cutting it was scary, but worth it.
So tasty!
Summer’s End
Posted in Writing, tagged #ThingsILike, creativity, equinox, fall, Fiction, inspiration, Motivation, persistence, pie, speculative fiction, summer, work, writing on September 15, 2016| Leave a Comment »
Nights are cool, maple leaves are touched with red, and while a mosquito recently gifted me one massive and very distracting bite, the pesky little blighters are all but done for the year. It is 46F as I write this, and this year’s fall equinox will take place on September 22nd.
It’s time to come to terms with the fact that summer is on its way out.
/insert brief pause for distraught handwringing… or not
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Actually, I think I’m ok with that. Why? Because fall is a terrific season. Because I love pie (mmm, pie:). Because if you were raised on fall as I was, its absence is missed. And because the nagging feeling at the back of my mind tells me that it’s time to get back to work.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I didn’t take the summer off. I’m still working, still writing, but I haven’t had much of a presence here. My schedule has been more erratic than usual, as fishing or family or other excursions called me away. And much of the writing I’ve done is tweaking, fixing, editing or otherwise sorting out existing material.
Fall is a great time to dig in and embark on new adventures. To make big plans. Use those extra hours of darkness to dream of the new, and on waking, make those dreams real.
I hope your summer was as fun as mine, and I hope that you, too, are ready for a change. It’s time to get to work.
Popcorn Means Love
Posted in Entertainment, Likes, tagged #C3PO, #ThingsILike, entertainment, family, food, history, home, old tech, science fiction, sff, speculative fiction, star wars, Thoughts, writing, yay on June 10, 2016| Leave a Comment »
I had a post in mind for today that I thought would be cool but, sadly, it’s not ready. Rather than go with something that’s not right, I’m setting it aside until I can do a good job or come up with something better. So in the end, what did I choose as Today’s Thing I Like? Popcorn:)
Here’s an excerpt from the family cookbook to tell you why.
Popcorn
My whole family can make this with their eyes closed, but Dad really deserves credit for setting new and higher standards for butter and salt consumption. He is blessed with a genetic tolerance for such unhealthy behavior; his blood pressure and cholesterol levels are lower than mine.
For years he’d head to the kitchen after dinner, and a few minutes later I’d hear pop pop! as hot oil turned the first kernels inside out. A few minutes more and we’d be piled on the couch with huge bowls of popcorn and masses of paper towels.
There was no television in the house growing up but at some point we acquired a copy of Star Wars and a video monitor. This was back before Blockbusters popped up down the street (or closed down, for that matter), and there were certainly no DVD players.
The tape was black and white and we watched it on a Beta machine. (Don’t remember Beta? That’s funny, no one else does either.) My brother and I watched that tape until it died, literally came apart from use. To this day I can still reel off an annoying amount of dialog and get excited when I see Star Wars in color. What could be better than a cold drink, a hot bowl of popcorn, and reciting C3PO’s lines with people you love?
Nonfiction in General
Posted in Entertainment, Likes, Science!, Writing, tagged #ThingsILike, books, creativity, Giulia Enders, inspiration, John Maguire, Mars, Mary Roach, nonfiction, science, Seth Shostak, space, Steve Squyres, Thoughts, Writers, writing on June 3, 2016| Leave a Comment »
Today’s Thing I Like is nonfiction writing in general, and author Mary Roach in particular. If you aren’t familiar with her work, check out the books linked below or this interview with Seth Shostak at SETICon 2012.
Nonfiction can be a fiction writer’s best friend. At its best, it includes detailed, character-driven explorations of real-life situations and challenges, and can provide the sort of solid foundation a more speculative piece needs to succeed. I’ve mentioned this before, but avoiding abstractitis is key to good writing.
Specifically:
No matter how abstract your topic, how intangible, your first step is to find things you can drop on your foot.
— John Maguire
Nonfiction helps you do that, and Mary Roach is a great example of a quality nonfiction writer.
I have yet to read all of Roach’s books but Gulp: Adventures on the Alimentary Canal and Packing for Mars: The Curious Science of Life in the Void were terrific. Her books take a somewhat off-beat topic and delve in, deep. She’s also funny. The level of detail is satisfying and succeeds in painting an engaging portrait of her subject that is also educational. Packing for Mars, for example, is a great way for writers to familiarize themselves with the nitty gritty of space exploration, how we got to where we are now, and how we’ll get to where we’re going.
To note, if you’re interested in popular nonfiction about the intricacies of digestion or Mars exploration, check out Giulia Enders’ excellent Gut: The Inside Story of Our Body’s Most Underrated Organ, and Steve Squyres’ Roving Mars: Spirit, Opportunity, and the Exploration of the Red Planet.
Read, then write:)
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