With the first real snowfall yesterday, the season of winter is effectively upon us. I really enjoy eating soup when it’s cold, but this can be somewhat challenging as a vegetarian, since even “vegetable” soups are often made with either chicken or beef stocks.
Fortunately, making your own soup is actually pretty easy to do and doesn’t take very long. You can store it in your refrigerator to have soup for a few days, even.
Here’s how I make it!
In late May, while Freyja took a nap, Sullivan and I went for a walk down the road. I didn’t really know where we were going to go, or what we were going to do; I think my initial thought was to go to the horse stables.
Along the way, we found a hole, probably 4 feet deep and about 6 or 7 feet across (dug out for some utilitarian purpose, I think) that was filled with a couple feet of water. I saw a giant frog, or maybe a toad, on the other side.
“Sullivan, look!” I whispered. “See the frog?”
When we stepped closer, it quickly hopped into the water, making an audible *PLOP*. And then two other frogs, that we hadn’t seen, jumped in too: *PLOP* *PLOP*. A fourth one jumped from about a foot or two from our feet: hop, hop, *PLOP*. This gave me an idea.
“Hey, let’s go check the pond for frogs! I bet we’ll find some!”
We re-traced our steps back to the pond we had passed earlier, and started to walk around the edge of it. About one-third of the way around, I glanced at the water and saw what I initially thought was some sort of aquatic vegetation or strange bed of rocks, but turned out to be a myriad of tadpoles! They wriggled and swam around. Sullivan didn’t see them at first, so I tossed a small pebble into the middle of one of the tadpole groups, and the tadpoles quickly dispersed in all directions; Sullivan saw them.
We kept walking around the pond, looking for more tadpoles and kept seeing more and more. On the far-side of the pond, there was a convocation of so many tadpoles that you could barely see the earth underneath. Remembering that he had his old aquarium in his closet, this gave me an idea. I sent a message to Melissa, telling her about the tadpoles and asking her if she could bring a bucket to us to catch some. We were going to raise some frogs / toads.
(“Swedish for the win!”)
something about this just feels like home
Recently, I began learning the Swedish language (Svenska), on a whim. It began a few years ago, with some genealogical research done by my uncle that pointed to some of our familial ancestry coming from a small town in Sweden (Sverige), not too far from Stockholm.
Or maybe it was because I love IKEA and their culture. I don’t know. It’s mostly irrelevant. People who hang around with me long enough will often eventually ask “What is it with all this Swedish shit, anyways?” (Vad är det med allt detta svenska skit, iallafall?)
After only studying for a few months (I think I started in March?), I am doing pretty well; I can converse basically, read and write a small amount, and my accent isn’t too bad (inte så dåligt).
Since my approach has been almost entirely DIY, I thought I would share some insight into the process I’ve been using, which balances speaking, listening, reading, and writing, using a variety of different resources. While I will cite my specific experience with learning Swedish (lära svenska), I would think this approach could be used with learning any foreign language (provided it’s not too arcane).
This review has been a long time coming. Partly because of recent life changes, but mainly because I’ve been reluctant to let go of this device. This will be my last review for a few months, while I take a hiatus to work on other projects. Hope to resume again in the Fall.
Introducing the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1 – the tablet that’s so much like the Apple iPad, the courts have granted an injunction preventing you from buying a new one (for now)!
The Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, released early last year, is a recent iteration in the procession of Android Tablet devices. The specs on paper (or screen, as it were), the tablet looks impressive:
Before getting to the details, (SPOILER ALERT) the tablet is really impressive. Many of the reservations I had about the Xoom tablet have been dissolved, partly due to the maturing Apps marketplace and partly just because the hardware is better.
More deets after the jump:
So, a while back, I shelled out $5 for comedian Louis C.K.’s “Live at the Beacon Theater” standup video. He made a button of money, and gave a lot of it away to charity and the people that helped him produce it. Professionally and business-wise, he’s a really decent guy (I only qualify that because I don’t know him personally).
Part of that signup was an agreement that, on a rare occasion, he is allowed to contact me. Well, I finally got an e-mail from him, letting me know about some recent stuff he put up.
But wow. It’s just… this is the best marketing e-mail I’ve ever read. I read through the whole thing, twice even. It just DRIPS authenticity. When I read this, I can actually hear his voice in my head reading it to me. And you know what? It really makes me want to buy his stuff, and makes me HAPPY that I am on his mailing list. This is someone who took 10 or 15 minutes (maybe 20 or 30, he might be a really slow typist, or may have been dictating) to actually compose the e-mail himself. Even though he doesn’t know me personally, I feel more connected to him in our anomymous glory-hole consumer/vendor relationship than I have with most other products.
One thing in particular was his note about:
I’m giving you this long and boring explaination because, as most of you know, I release about an hour or more of new standup material every year and folks can count on seeing a new show every year. This is old material, so I don’t want to be a dick and pretend it isn’t.
The closing paragraph is hilarious, as well. Give it a read. And go buy his shit.
(Full text of e-mail after the jump)
The other day, I saw a recent video in Khan Academy’s Microeconomics series entitled “MPC and Multiplier” which is about the Marginal Propensity for Consumption (at its most basic level: if you received a windfall of $100 how much would of it would you spend). It’s only a few minutes, and I would suggest watching it before reading the rest of the post:
Ok, with that out of the way, I have a few ideas that I would like to put out there. IANAE (I am not an economist) and I welcome any critique of these ideas, but they seem pretty sensible.