A foggy day…and that phrase reminds me of a song – as does most everything – and while this is Virginia not London…
“A foggy day in London town Had me low and had me down I viewed the morning with alarm The British museum had lost its charm How long, I wondered, could this thing last?But the age of miracles hadn’t passed For, suddenly, I saw you there And through foggy London town The sun was shining everywhere…”
and I shan’t whine about not being able to be out and about. It’s 85º with 46% humidity, not a cloud in blue skies. Yet my feet are like ice cubes. I actually put socks on when I got dressed this morning and y’all know how much I hate socks!
I have an interesting dilemma. There is an artist I follow on social media. She describes herself as an illustrator; I describe her as a fabulous artist. She happens to be Norwegian and she has just recently had two of her books translated into English and published in the United States. One of the books is a children’s book which I have sent to my granddaughters and one is a picture book for adults which I bought for myself.
I can’t afford her original artwork but I can afford her books.
It’s sitting next to me and that wonderful new book smell is wafting my way. I don’t know what I expected but the book is large (think coffee table book large) and weighs 3.5 pounds! But to appreciate her art indeed it must be this big. There is text – one sentence for each picture – telling the story of life. The art, the story – just overwhelms me. (Ok, maybe I’m easily overwhelmed by beauty.)
I love this book – it is so beautiful. I immediately wanted to send copies to several of my dearest friends. Then I thought “What if they don’t like her art? What if this book is just a another ‘thing’ to clutter up their homes? What if they don’t love this book with it’s simple story as much as I do?”
So that’s my dilemma – send the book because I love it, not taking into consideration what their taste might be, or throw caution to the wind, send the book and they can either curse me or thank me.
I’m pretty sure y’all know what I’m going to do, don’tcha?
First off it was a g-d gorgeous day, even more gorgeous than yesterday. It was down right crispy-cool this morning. It pretty much stayed that way all day with brisk breezes, plenty of sunshine, blue skies and fluffy clouds (and low humidity). It should stay like this probably from now on. Overnight lows in the 60’s, daytime highs creeping up to the mid to high 80’s over the weekend but if the humidity stays under 50% then it’s a-ok!
I had to close the windows for a good part of the day because they are re-paving all the parking lot areas around our building. Our apartment faces the rear, and largest parking lot area, and it was our turn today to have the noise directly under our windows with the sweet smell of hot asphalt *gag* wafting in. (I hear the word asphalt and I hear THIS – yup everything is a song including asphalt.)
Anyway I spent the morning clearing out old email addresses and going back and forth with Melissa in the comments on yesterday’s post – that was fun. She’s a bright funny lady – I enjoy talking to her.
Then I thought – since most people hate vlogs when I get the urge to talk instead of type I could use tic-tok. I mean, why the hell not, it’s not like anyone is going to find me there and care. After lunch I made a video and then I tried to edit it in iMovie and boy is that a piece of crap. What I do like about it is you can improve/enhance the audio. I record videos at my desk and with the door closed the sound is muffled and echo-y. iMovie cleans that up really well BUT – I can’t figure out how to save an edited video. Nowhere in any menu is there a “Save” choice. WTH??? If anyone knows how you save an edited video in iMovie please, please please let me know.
So I wasted a lot of time putzing around with various other video editors, none of which I found easy or useful (one watermarked your video with their logo unless you paid – I ain’t paying – Pfft to them.)
So I wound up uploading the original video, done on my phone, just the way it was – not great. But hey, ain’t nobody gonna see it.
I can’t upload videos here because this is a free account. So if you are determined to see/hear me you can go over to the Blogger blog or if you do use tik-tok you can find me @justtawkin.
Let’s start with this –
I cannot even fathom this level of stupidity. But then – look at who said it.
If that doesn’t give you a rueful chuckle then listen to this: Domino’s Pizza, after 7 years of trying to establish themselves in Italy, has closed its 29 stores there. The reason for the closure? Well, Duh! Do you have to ask? What moron thought that was a good idea? That’s a bit like bringing coals to Newcastle. Are there P.F. Changs in Beijing? Do they sell Budweiser in Berlin? Domino’s pizza in Italy – the mind boggles.
Also crazy shit – the weather. We are in our third day of high temperatures in the 70’s and overnight lows in the 50’s and 60’s with – wait for it – low humidity. Heaven! It was so crisp this morning that I adjusted the windows from wide open to almost closed. Needless to say I’ve slept well the last two nights.
Any craziness in your neck of the woods?
After 3 or 4 days of 90+ temps and yesterday’s awesome thunderstorms (yes, I love thunderstorms) Monday has dawned cool and crisp. Not all that sunny yet (I’m typing this at 8:30am, been up since 5:30am), but the sky is a light blue with streaks of light clouds –
Just a heavenly day – if only every day could be like this – weatherwise. I could just sit here and look out the window all day. The trees are crazy full and lush, swaying in a light breeze and the birds are very, very chatty. Usually they are off to “work” by this time of the day but they seem to have decided to stay home and hang out.
I’ve already done the laundry so aside from some cooking in the middle of the day, I’m free and clear. It’s a good day to make cornbread. This will be the fourth week in a row and I finally figured out why the first two batches were not all that they should have been.
First time not only was my baking powder old but I had bought the wrong corn meal (white instead of yellow and some weird brand – my grocery store is still low on stock of everything – that’s been going on now for two years *sigh*). And one other thing.
Second time out I had the good corn meal, fresh baking powder but still – not the best result. Then I had my aha moment. Salt! I was using the wrong salt.
“How could salt be wrong” you say. Well, I’ll tell ya.
I’m not a big salt user, I don’t like it and it’s bad for my blood pressure. I switched to coarse Kosher salt some time ago. When I was making the cornbread the first time around I wondered if Kosher salt would work in baking. 1/2 teaspoon of Kosher salt weighs less than an equal amount of regular table salt. Also Kosher salt is less salty. I had that in the back of my mind and used a bit more but still.
Last batch of cornbread I had the good cornmeal, the fresh baking powder and regular table salt and voilà – perfect cornbread!
I’ll leave you with a glimpse of what’s distracting me this morning –
Subject to Change Without Notice 