Icarus's blog: "Somantics"

Geeze its a bloggy day.

I think its the research, writing, and reading.

Work an hour, take an hour off kinda thing.

I'm reading the Count of Monte Cristo, and yes there's free downloadable and browseable versions of the book up online
and yes, I'm still opposed to digital books.
But its snowing outside and I has a trapped.

http://manybooks.net/titles/dumasalpetext98crsto12.html

Progress on my gouf is trodding along, I also now have a fuckload of spare plaplate to play with as I cut a strip of .25 mm off (and I have a bunch of .4 from previous applications) sitting around.
Just putting a few geometric doodads on the surface can really make a model pop with doodads and widgets.
I think I'm gonna add some armor plates (very thin granted) to the shoulders, waist and maybe breastplate.
You can even do this effect that's very similar to an antique chest/door hinge with a little quadralateral figure and a rod against another quad.
I..really don't want to cut any more circular shapes though.
Bordering on the "ever again" levels.

So... more ideas is always cool.
I need to find my pin vise and the "right" diameter to drill some holes too.
I'd still like to put a "scar" over the left side of his head.
This might be one of those signature "things" I do, and I might be able to apply it with the plaplate techs I learned from watching DC23 and Toymaker.

I'll probably write more "Another hero?" after dinner. Which is probably this

Ode de Peacey.

"Sizzling Indian rice".

So you may or may not be aware of Peacey's Indian fried rice. I am. It's pretty fahking good.

But I have an abundance of indian spices in my house, and no bacon, so this is an adaptation.

So- you'll require ~ half a cup of onion
~ half a cup of tomato sauce
1 heavy pinch of cumin seeds
2 heavy pinches of fennel seeds
1 pinch of carroway seeds
1 1/2 cups of water (or stock)
1 table spoon of oil (lard or bacon fat would be MUCH better)
1 standard sized uncooked sausage
1 cup of rice
An undisclosed amount of vermouth brine from a jar of olives.

Incidentally if you mixed the aromatics around -IE Green pepper, chile, moar onion, and garlic- this would be very similar to my understanding of jambalaya or if you took out the tomato and swapped the sausage for chicken livers you'd have dirty rice. Also- if you put lamb chunks and gold raisins and a roasted nut [almond] and a bit of cinammon you'd have this bomb indian rice I get at my local restaurant

So anyway

get a medium soup pot or a very deep skillet (mine's cast iron so I don't do much tomatoing in it) and preheat your oil letting it coat evenly on mediuh high heat.

Once the oil is pretty dangerous- chuck the seeds (all of em) into the oil and wait for them to stop popping, once they're done, chuck in the diced onion and sausage in. Leave the heat up, this will go fast.
Let the onions lose some color, and the sausage picks up some, then dump the rice into the oil, and stir until the rice stops hissing (shouldn't take very long, less than 4 minutes).
There will be some sticking, there will be some scorching- this is intentional
pour about enough of the vermouth olive brine from ze jar of secrets (it sounds more fantastical) to coat the rice and let it cook off. Then- toss in enough tomato to coat the rice which I've estimated to be about half a cup.

Stir and let the tomato heat through
when the rice looks gooey but not wet (again, shouldn't take long) you should add the water/stock. Return to a bubble, then put the lid on and let it simmer for 20 minutes on low.

When the timer is done, check if the rice is done, respond accordingly, and serve. Salt/pepper to taste
I've got a man sized hunger, so this serves one.

And dinner is starting soon.

Anyway, wish me luck on these various directions.
And sacrifice a virgin on behalf of my job hunt.