Monday, February 9, 2015

odds and ends, being back home

 
Leaving the farm of my friends G and S on Saturday morning, I paused to get a photo of the "coos"....

I'm happy to report that G's pancreatic cancer seems to be responding to his treatment!  He was VERY thin, but had good color and reasonable energy and appetite, considering everything!  :-)

If you've never seen Highland cattle, they're very compact and stocky, with long hair and wicked horns.  I understand that they're reputed to be "lower fat," but perhaps that's just the grass-fed version ... so i'll forgive them!  Personally, I find them so attractive, i'd be inclined to forgive them being low-fat even on a diet of grain -- one can always serve them with Béarnaise sauce! 

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"...A high-carb, high-fat diet is really tough to pull off without incurring health problems, like hyperlipidemia or overweight. High-carb, high-to-moderate fat is just about the worst kind of macronutrient ratio for heart health; it’s no accident that the standard American diet is high-(refined) carb, high-to-moderate (refined) fat. It’s notorious for elevating LDL particles, especially the small, dense ones. Professional athletes, high-performance Cross-Fitters, people training hard nearly every day of the week can get away with pairing large amounts of fat and carbs together, but most people cannot."

So says Mark Sisson ... effectively BLOWING OUT OF THE WATER the concept that a high-carb diet is just ducky for EVVVVERYBODY, as a lot of ignorant young things seem to think!  It's about bloody time, too.

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I hurried back home from Texas in order to attend a seminar we booked some time ago -- a mixology class at a local restaurant/bar.  Louise (one of Tess's living-history alter-egos) is a very happy camper, having learned some tricks of the bartending trade, and even some theory when it comes to creating cocktails out of the imagination! 

We learned about some stellar brands of spirits, too;  we made a trip to one of the best shops in town to pick up a few of them -- good thing alcohol doesn't spoil, cuz it'll be a while before we could possibly use them up!

Be on the lookout -- definitely going to have to provide ORIGINAL recipes for low-carb cocktails in honor of Valentines' Day and Mardi Gras....

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I'm happy to say, I've managed to "infect" my daughter with the reenacting bug!  :-D  After we returned from "Cowboy Town" she took a day off, and we visited a fabric store where we picked out some materials to make her two more dresses of her own (she's close enough to my size to be able to wear my things).  ...Oh, and I picked out a fabric to make myself something too -- people who sew can become terrible acquirers and hoarders of yardage!

13 comments:

  1. I wish I had an extra store in my house to devote to crafts, like you have. Grafters are terrible with accumulating yardage and cuts of everything.

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    1. oh, yes, indeed! when we lived in smaller houses, creativity was less spontaneous because i had to get out and set up everything, and put it all away when done. :-) when i used to make costumes for the community theatre, the dining room would be unusable for everything else for WEEKS.

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    2. My coffee table is covered with dancing shoes materials now, and I enjoy having a big dining table in our house - the size comes handy on occasions.

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    3. I took my dining room table down. I tend to pile things on available surfaces. Now, I have a few small tables with short stacks of decorating and fashion magazines (the first for normative cues about what a house should look like) and stay away from craft stores and antique shops and estate sales. I'd have a borderline-hoarder house otherwise.

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    4. Galina, what kind of dancing shoes do you make, something like ballet slippers? :-) i have a reenactor-book called Every Lady Her Own Shoemaker but i've never had the guts to try it.

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    5. Lori, i find it SO EASY to pile up books and papers too! you'd shudder if you saw my sewing room -- made worse by all the STUFF i adopted with my mother AND my MIL moved from their houses to retirement apartments ... and which still don't have an "and everything in its place" place. :-P

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    6. It is my own design, covers only front portion of a foot, leaving fingers free, there are neoprene foot thongs with a suede sole available for modern dancers, but they cover more skin on a front, which is not good for the people who climb a pole, and it is not holding well after several washings.
      Here are
      https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1535409326740278&set=pcb.1535409370073607&type=1
      - the feet of one of pole-fintess instructors with my footies.
      I recently made a product-oriented FB page GaLa footies/half soles which I hope is easy to find, and I am in a process of making a web-site.

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    7. i'm eager to see it, but this dratted ipad won't let me open it ... and i keep forgetting to try it on the laptop. :-) the BEST of luck with your business!

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    8. Thank you, Tess. At least such activity is a great excuse to make otherwise worthless crafts. I also hope my mom will participate in the knitting when she comes to visit soon, and it will help her to feel important and relevant. Old people are often afraid to be a burden and a life interrupter. May be she will consider joining us here. I am not sure US and especially Florida is the perfect place to live for her - it is too hot here, different language and customs, she got used to live by herself, but she is 78 years old.

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  2. I WILL be on the lookout " -- definitely going to have to provide ORIGINAL recipes for low-carb cocktails in honor of Valentines' Day and Mardi Gras.... "

    and if you have a spare moment do please post them on the low carb diabetic forum !

    My dear mum was an avid knitter and dressmaker - she used to make some great stuff ...... when she died she left a huge 'trunk' of material and wools. Such a shame I didn't follow her .... my knitting and sewing attempts were not good.

    I like your "coos" pic :)

    All the best Jan

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    1. I'd be delighted to share the recipes on your forum! :-) i have one in mind already ... just have to test it for flavor.

      like everything else, in hand-crafts we have to have good instruction and start small! my grandmother tried to teach me to crochet but i never could "see" what she was going for -- it was only when i got a book, that the illustrations were more clear than the piece of yarn with which she was demonstrating.

      then there was my only sewing course.... Mrs P was devilishly strict, and didn't let us move on to the next step till we had mastered the one before -- she was very hard to please, but really taught me some valuable things. I've also been lucky enough to work with a couple of highly-accomplished seamstresses in that community theatre.... :-D it's certainly not too late to start, if you'd like to do it!

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  3. I have almost cleaned out the spare bedroom so it's actually USABLE as a guest room again (need to blog; my niece is visiting eeek! THIS WEEKEND...
    I've inherited horrible hoarding tendencies from my mom but trying to declutter.
    I doubt I'll ever find much time for sewing again, so I'm going to reluctantly part w/my grandmother's machine (I'll inherit my mom's anyway, which I'm sure I'll keep for a while but eventually part with).

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    1. :-D when we lived in a much smaller house in Salt Lake City, my sewing-room was the principal guest room, so i understand your pain! what kinds are machines are your mother's and grandmothers'? sometimes the vintage machines are SO breakdown-proof they're worth holding onto!

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