In recent events...

[aome]

Ugh, I've been having a really hard time focusing, lately. All I want to do is read, knit, and randomly surf the Internet in a brainless sort of way. And then I'm tired. :P Meanwhile, there are other knitting projects I also need to finish, quilts I need to finish, NaNo to work on, a house to clean, other upcoming events to plan for ... and I

Comments

[piperki]

I put sweet potatoes in chili instead of beans. They are also fabulous cut into thin wedges or french fry shapes, coated in olive oil and a little salt, and baked until they start to brown.

[aome]

Don't think I could convince anyone but my daughter to eat sweet-potato chili, but I like the idea of using them in place of beans. Too many legumes = blood.

I've never been good at making baked fries of either regular or sweet-potato varieties. They just always seem kind of ... meh. But I can always try again.... At what temp (approx) do you tend to roast yours?

[vix_spes]

Great that Two enjoyed the trip and lol at the questions they were asking the guide. The one about having to be in bed at a certain time made me laugh! And great news about their report cards as well!

[aome]

Thank you!

The very first question someone asked was the one about "Why are there so many buildings?" It hadn't dawned on me that our public schools, at all levels [elementary/K-5, middle (grades 6-8) and high schools (9-12)] are all, each, a single building. The high school is a LARGE building, with several connecting wings, but it's still a single building. So, anyway, it was startling to see a university through the kids' eyes, that having multiple structures would be strange to them!

The bit about bedtime did make me laugh, too, though. :D

[loupnoir]

I am very envious about your sweet potatoes. It's too cold here for them to grow. We participated in a quasi-experiment last year. A neighbor bought a bunch of them and then parceled the slips out to various folks. Of the lot, only the ones grown inside a greenhouse did much of anything, and those didn't produce many tubers.

[aome]

I didn't stop to think that they were among those veggies that would be affected so much by temperature. I mean, I know my dad can't really grow tomatoes and peppers where he is by the OR coast, but somehow, underground items seemed like they'd be more immune. It was my first time growing tubers, and so I had absolutely no idea how to tell when it was time to dig them up. By the time I *did* dig them up, some of them had grown to be monstrous, like, larger than two fists put together.

[sheron]

Yay for MiniPlu!

I had bracers too (which I hated, but mine were different style than I've seen in north america, meaning you could take them off if you wanted to yourself, and also they were practically invisible unless you grinned....the north american style huge bracers weird me out tbh! I'm confused about how they work and can't imagine how kids handle wearing them all the time?) so I can very well relate to not having to wear them being awesome :D For me it wasn't the food, it was the ability to not have things in my mouth that was ridiculously wonderful and freeing. :)

[aome]

Did you have something like Invisalign? Clear plastic moulds that fit almost invisibly over your teeth and were changed every few weeks to keep moving things around, as appropriate? They're not considered good for all times of issues here, and are usually more expensive than traditional treatments. I've known some people who had them, but they had to have clear but non-removable brackets glued to their teth so the moulds had something to snap into, which kind of defeats the purpose of avoiding traditional braces. :P

It really didn't bother me to have the braces in my mouth, once I got used to them (the insides of your lips and cheeks get a little cut up, initially but after that you really don't notice). Still, it was definitely better to get them off again! :D

[sheron]

I had something that probably doesn't exist in north america. It was metal but the way it worked you barely saw it because it was at the top of the teeth rather than middle like most of the ones I've seen online. IDK how to explain it and frankly don't want to revisit the memories *g* (I -loathed- every second of having to wear it. At some point I actually used to take it off at school and put it back on before I got home which is probably why it took longer to fix the issue than it should have.)

[hamsterwoman]

Congratulations to them on the report cards, especially to Two!

And yay for MiniPlu being done with braces!

I've only read the first couple of chapters of Magnus, just after I bought the book and was waiting for MUNI to get home with it, but I liked them, and both rodents have finished and really enjoyed it. L had been disappointed by the Kane Chronicles and the Heroes of Olympus (or whatever the second PJO series is called) and wasn't looking forward to this one, but told me how relieved she was to see it was back to first person smartass narration, which was one of the reasons she'd loved PJO so much.

[aome]

Ah, yes - I can see why the multi-POV approach might annoy her, then. It only bothered me for the first part of the first Heroes of Olympus book, and after that I got used to it. Will be interested to hear your thoughts if you do read it!