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Jun. 12th, 2007 09:45 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
which_chickToday I have for you a compendium of the day's events and also what I had for dinner, featuring my astonishingly insightful problem-solving skills and a free recipe.
Morning: Loaded small pickup truck full of black walnut logs. The apartments at 200 have generously provided more fodder for my stove, this time at the entire opposite of the spectrum from willow. Willow is ugly, does not split, weighs a ton, burns too quickly, and has a negative worth. Black walnut is pretty, splits like it was DESIGNED to split, has a reasonable weight, burns well, and is worth almost as much per pound as copper... down to 12" diameter logs, anyway. A lot of a tree isn't 12" in diameter, so that was the part that became firewood.
Drove to Everett. Dunned tenant, went shopping (Zimmerman's), got truck tire fixed, spoke to We Buy Logs people about walnut tree. Drove back to Bedford. Tore up carpets at Heroin Tenant Alecia's. Ate lunch, did some things at the bank. Emptied out little shed back of Alecia's. Painted porch supports. Found three pennies. Threw away concrete blocks by lofting them over the side of the drop box. (That's above-my-head, for people keeping track.)
Drove home, stopping at Heather's (where I stole some asparagus spears and a quarter of a gob) and at the post office (where I probably bought the wrong kind of stamps). Then I picked up the big pickup from Liss's. It is now leaking oil from pan (not fast) and the driver side window does not roll up. I think it needs to be back living at my house again. Hooked truck to big flatbed trailer. Loaded tractor (with bucket for lifting big logs of black walnut that may be worth actual money) onto same aforementioned flatbed trailer. Went home. Unloaded little truck and split and stacked firewood from same. Shifted some leftover firewood from old pile to the new this-year pile. Also began working on the well-dried white oak from Bob and Thalia's house ages ago (no, I haven't burned all of that yet) and that was moving along nicely until the thunderstorm came. I feel good about the wood splitting and plan to keep after that until I've got the woodpile thing fixed for the season.
So, that was my day. It was kind of busy. For dinner I had guacamole and two ears of corn. Dessert was going to be half a quart of ripe strawberries, capped, halved, and lightly sprinkled with sugar but I'm too fucking tired to fix 'em. Instead I'm taking them out of the fridge and putting them on the counter for breakfast tomorrow so that they can warm up. (I don't like cold fruit. I like room-temperature fruit. It's a thing.)
Problem: I had no chips to use to scoop out and eat my guacamole.
Solution: Used a fork.
(Cue studio audience with a card reading Wow, That's Astonishingly Insightful!)
Wow, That's Astonishingly Insightful!
Told you I was good. :)
Free Recipe that I've probably gone over before, but it's summer. This is rerun season. Deal.:
Guacamole from one avocado
1 perfectly ripe avocado
1 large or 2 small cloves of fresh garlic, pressed with garlic press
1 jalapeno pepper, seeded, pressed with garlic press or chopped very fine
2 thin slices of large white onion, chopped fairly small
2 hemisphere-area slices of beefsteak tomato, diced
small handful fresh cilantro coarsely chopped
half of a lime, squeezed over at the end
salt from a shaker
Directions: Peel and de-seed avocado. Mash with fork until mostly smooth. Some lumps are OK. Add the rest of the chopped stuff, down to and including the cilantro. Stir with a fork to mix. Add the juice from the lime and a couple of good shakes of salt, stir again. Taste. If your lime is wimpy, you can add the other half but usually that isn't necessary.
Morning: Loaded small pickup truck full of black walnut logs. The apartments at 200 have generously provided more fodder for my stove, this time at the entire opposite of the spectrum from willow. Willow is ugly, does not split, weighs a ton, burns too quickly, and has a negative worth. Black walnut is pretty, splits like it was DESIGNED to split, has a reasonable weight, burns well, and is worth almost as much per pound as copper... down to 12" diameter logs, anyway. A lot of a tree isn't 12" in diameter, so that was the part that became firewood.
Drove to Everett. Dunned tenant, went shopping (Zimmerman's), got truck tire fixed, spoke to We Buy Logs people about walnut tree. Drove back to Bedford. Tore up carpets at Heroin Tenant Alecia's. Ate lunch, did some things at the bank. Emptied out little shed back of Alecia's. Painted porch supports. Found three pennies. Threw away concrete blocks by lofting them over the side of the drop box. (That's above-my-head, for people keeping track.)
Drove home, stopping at Heather's (where I stole some asparagus spears and a quarter of a gob) and at the post office (where I probably bought the wrong kind of stamps). Then I picked up the big pickup from Liss's. It is now leaking oil from pan (not fast) and the driver side window does not roll up. I think it needs to be back living at my house again. Hooked truck to big flatbed trailer. Loaded tractor (with bucket for lifting big logs of black walnut that may be worth actual money) onto same aforementioned flatbed trailer. Went home. Unloaded little truck and split and stacked firewood from same. Shifted some leftover firewood from old pile to the new this-year pile. Also began working on the well-dried white oak from Bob and Thalia's house ages ago (no, I haven't burned all of that yet) and that was moving along nicely until the thunderstorm came. I feel good about the wood splitting and plan to keep after that until I've got the woodpile thing fixed for the season.
So, that was my day. It was kind of busy. For dinner I had guacamole and two ears of corn. Dessert was going to be half a quart of ripe strawberries, capped, halved, and lightly sprinkled with sugar but I'm too fucking tired to fix 'em. Instead I'm taking them out of the fridge and putting them on the counter for breakfast tomorrow so that they can warm up. (I don't like cold fruit. I like room-temperature fruit. It's a thing.)
Problem: I had no chips to use to scoop out and eat my guacamole.
Solution: Used a fork.
(Cue studio audience with a card reading Wow, That's Astonishingly Insightful!)
Wow, That's Astonishingly Insightful!
Told you I was good. :)
Free Recipe that I've probably gone over before, but it's summer. This is rerun season. Deal.:
Guacamole from one avocado
1 perfectly ripe avocado
1 large or 2 small cloves of fresh garlic, pressed with garlic press
1 jalapeno pepper, seeded, pressed with garlic press or chopped very fine
2 thin slices of large white onion, chopped fairly small
2 hemisphere-area slices of beefsteak tomato, diced
small handful fresh cilantro coarsely chopped
half of a lime, squeezed over at the end
salt from a shaker
Directions: Peel and de-seed avocado. Mash with fork until mostly smooth. Some lumps are OK. Add the rest of the chopped stuff, down to and including the cilantro. Stir with a fork to mix. Add the juice from the lime and a couple of good shakes of salt, stir again. Taste. If your lime is wimpy, you can add the other half but usually that isn't necessary.
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no subject
Date: 2007-06-13 01:48 am (UTC)The soft cookie sandwich thing with cream in the middle?
We used to make those at camp (I worked in a Church Camp Kitchen).
Your supper sounds very good.
Weirdly, Willow logs in Runescape (the online massive player game) are more expensive than oak and supposedly burn longer. I have to be 32 levels higher than I currently am in the game to burn willow. I am 28th level at firemaking, and so may use oak.
firewood in MMORPG
Date: 2007-06-13 02:19 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2007-06-13 03:01 am (UTC)My personal preferences on that front (includes things like "ease of splitting" and "availability" and "how well it burns" and so forth) are as follows:
1. The Red Oaks (smells good, splits well, makes lots of heat)
2. Wild Cherry (smells good, splits well, burns pretty)
3. White Oak (stringy, slow-burning, great coals)
4. Black Locust (stringy, smells funny, tons o' heat)
5. Hickory (stringy, smells good, makes good coals)
6. Tulip Poplar (Splits easy, not a huge amount of heat)
7. Sugar/Silver Maple (Splits OK, not a huge amount of heat)
8. Apple (Not fun to split. Smoke smells good, heat is OK)
9. Green Ash (Splits & burns well, uncommon)
10. Black Walnut (Splits beautifully. Uncommon)
11. Black Birch (soft wood, splits funny)
12. Cucumber Magnolia (Soft wood, splits funny, not a huge amount of heat)
...
...
...
35. All conifers (soft wood, burns too fast, sticky)
...
...
...
64. Willow (heavy when wet, no weight to it when dry. Hard to split, hard to light, burns instantly when you get it going.)
I'm with the ardvaark,here. Clearly Runescape's scoring system for wood was designed by someone who has not logged any hours heating with wood. I've got a bit of experience (ten years of heating my house) on the subject so I feel justified in offering my ratings for the woods I've seen around here.