cookies, chocolate, and sony reader
This weekend I will be celebrating the upcoming holidays in my manner of preference: baking things. D wants either ginger-molasses cookies or gingerbread men (which in our case means either Ninjabread Men or airplanes given our cutter selection), so he will likely be in charge of those, and I found a very interesting recipe for clementine rum balls which I've been itching to try. Obviously the two of us can't eat all those cookies so we'll be fattening up the people in lab again. Yay!
Speaking of tasty things, it's been kind of a landmark month for me in terms of chocolate. D had a layover in Frankfurt and, aside from fulfilling my request for him to bring back some fresh brez'n, picked up some of the Ritter Sport flavors that are only available in Germany. The orange marzipan was one of the winter flavors this year and was very good, the espresso was like chocolate-covered espresso beans but in chocolate bar form, and the hazelnut (not the chopped-nuts kind you can find here) tasted like Nutella injected into chocolate squares. Amazing. Also I participated in the Reddit Halloween gift exchange and received...Endangered Species chocolate bars! The bars were sent directly from their online mail order service, and shipped in this massive styrofoam box containing several gel cooling packs to ensure my chocolate would not even think about melting. Save the endangered lemur; feed the landfill. The chocolate is delicious though! I also sent chocolate to my giftee in the exchange (pumpkin chocolate from Godiva...MMMmmm) so my karmic chocolate balance is stable.
I've been using my Sony Reader Wifi for about a month now, and I'm very pleased. The e-ink display is perfect and causes no eye strain. The battery life is long, as advertised. I've been checking out books from the Toronto Public Library via Overdrive. Calibre (cross-platform e-book management software) works perfectly with it. There are some small interface issues related to the touch screen. When swiping a finger to turn a page, if you swipe with two fingers (or if the device thinks you did) then you get into a fast-forward mode which very rapidly flips through to the end of the book. I'm not sure why that mode even exists, given that you can very easily pull up the 'navigate' screen and manipulate a little slider that does the same thing with greater control, or you can go to a page number of your choosing. I prefer using the page turn buttons anyway, so it's not really an issue. Also the Reader seems to run into a little trouble when the wifi is turned on but it's searching for a network; input to the touch-screen doesn't register until it finds a network to join or gives up. Also not really an issue since I keep the wifi turned off to conserve battery. Overall though I'm very happy with it; it's perfect for my commute downtown and for curling up with in the evenings, and I'm loading it up for the holidays in Ottawa as well. D tells me there is a cushy spot by the fireplace with my name on it.
Speaking of tasty things, it's been kind of a landmark month for me in terms of chocolate. D had a layover in Frankfurt and, aside from fulfilling my request for him to bring back some fresh brez'n, picked up some of the Ritter Sport flavors that are only available in Germany. The orange marzipan was one of the winter flavors this year and was very good, the espresso was like chocolate-covered espresso beans but in chocolate bar form, and the hazelnut (not the chopped-nuts kind you can find here) tasted like Nutella injected into chocolate squares. Amazing. Also I participated in the Reddit Halloween gift exchange and received...Endangered Species chocolate bars! The bars were sent directly from their online mail order service, and shipped in this massive styrofoam box containing several gel cooling packs to ensure my chocolate would not even think about melting. Save the endangered lemur; feed the landfill. The chocolate is delicious though! I also sent chocolate to my giftee in the exchange (pumpkin chocolate from Godiva...MMMmmm) so my karmic chocolate balance is stable.
I've been using my Sony Reader Wifi for about a month now, and I'm very pleased. The e-ink display is perfect and causes no eye strain. The battery life is long, as advertised. I've been checking out books from the Toronto Public Library via Overdrive. Calibre (cross-platform e-book management software) works perfectly with it. There are some small interface issues related to the touch screen. When swiping a finger to turn a page, if you swipe with two fingers (or if the device thinks you did) then you get into a fast-forward mode which very rapidly flips through to the end of the book. I'm not sure why that mode even exists, given that you can very easily pull up the 'navigate' screen and manipulate a little slider that does the same thing with greater control, or you can go to a page number of your choosing. I prefer using the page turn buttons anyway, so it's not really an issue. Also the Reader seems to run into a little trouble when the wifi is turned on but it's searching for a network; input to the touch-screen doesn't register until it finds a network to join or gives up. Also not really an issue since I keep the wifi turned off to conserve battery. Overall though I'm very happy with it; it's perfect for my commute downtown and for curling up with in the evenings, and I'm loading it up for the holidays in Ottawa as well. D tells me there is a cushy spot by the fireplace with my name on it.