Archive for Life, Meaning, & Selfhood

Endeavoring to write again

May 4, 2008 at 8:59 am · Filed under Life, Meaning, & Selfhood

Haven’t written here in a while — since February it looks like. Been a busy March/April:

• Vacation with family in Taos NM: Earthships! Los Alamos! Vistas! Kite flying! Jackrabbits!
• Gearing up for Maker Faire: New NifNaks business cards! collateral! more collateral! packaging!
• Taxes and other stuff that I can’t remember but has certainly kept my life busy!
• Listening to RadioLab podcasts! …Seriously you must listen to RadioLab.

Anyway, I’ll be writing again soon with a real post as the ache to write has been building within.

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Ow the resemblance it hurts

February 20, 2008 at 6:16 pm · Filed under Life, Meaning, & Selfhood + Blogging about blogging

I do this way too often.

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My Bountiful Bento

February 20, 2008 at 2:59 pm · Filed under Life, Meaning, & Selfhood

My wonderful partner Nifer got me a fabulous gift of a steel Zojiruchi Stainless Bento Lunch Jar. It’s pretty slick. It’s not something I ever asked for but it fits right into my desire to start bringing lunchs from home rather than buy the crap from the food court here at work.

To kick it off I picked up a Bento cook book over the weekend. Inspired by one of the recipes, I picked up some ingredients at the store and last night dove into making dinner with plans to leave some aside for lunch. My concoction differed from the actual recipe, and I don’t cook often (mostly I’m the prep cook/cleanup crew), so I was a bit crossing my fingers. However, happily turned out delicious! Nifer scraped her plate clean last night and I had more than enough for an incredible lunch today. I gotta say it was as good today for lunch as it was last night!

Papaya Ginger Beef with Sliced Daikon on Brown Rice and a Side of Sautéed Shredded Potato, Daikon, and Red Pepper.

Main Dish Ingredients

• 1lb - thin sliced beef (I sliced up an inexpensive tri-tip steak which turned out great)
• 1 1/2 cup - daikon radish sliced in long 3-4″ strips
• 2 tbl - soy sauce (I used a garlic soy sauce marinade but normal soy sauce will do)
• 1 tbl - sake
• 1 tbl - ginger juice from a freshly grated ginger root (it’s fine to have some pieces of ginger in there but avoid big chunks)
• 1/2 cup - pickled papaya (with juice)
• olive oil*
• sesame oil
• salt and pepper (I use a fancy white pepper but normal pepper should do)
• 1 cup - brown rice

Side Dish Ingredients

• 1/2 cup - potato (about 1/2 of a potato)
• 1/2 cup - daikon (about an equal amount of daikon to the half potato)
• 1 whole - red pepper
• olive oil
• sesame oil
• salt and pepper (I use a fancy white pepper but normal pepper should do)

*Note: all my oil measurements are approximations as I just kinda added what seemed right. When I saute I use oil kinda like a spice: add a bit at first then maybe more if it seems like it needs it.

Cooking Instructions

1. Make the brown rice; Don’t start the rest of the cooking till this is nearly done

Side Dish (it’ll keep so we make that first)

1. Shred potato and daikon into thin strips using food processor
2. Shove the red pepper though the food processor (it’ll just kinda grate it rather then make strips which is fine)
3. Mix potato, daikon and red pepper together and drain/squeeze most of the water out of it
4. Add ~1/2 tbl olive oil* and a drop of sesame oil to pan and heat
5. Add potato, daikon and red pepper and saute for about 10minutes
6. Add salt and pepper to taste

Main Dish

1. Pore about ~1/2 tbl of olive oil* and a drop of sesame oil into a pan and heat it
2. Throw daikon strips into the pan and saute for about 1-2 minutes (they should be only slightly softened)
3. Pore another ~1 tbl of olive oil* and drop of sesame oil into the pan
4. Throw sliced beef into the pan and cook till it’s about browned but still slightly rare
5. Pore in soy sauce, sake and stir
6. Add pickled papaya and ginger juice and stir
7. Cook for about 10 minutes till beef is fully done and all the flavors are nice and infused together
8. Add salt and pepper to taste

Serves enough for three, or in my case two people for dinner and enough left for a nice sizable amazing lunch.

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Why I Bicycle

February 7, 2008 at 10:21 pm · Filed under Life, Meaning, & Selfhood

I eek over the crest of the hill. Out of the corner of my eye a driver creeps left, looking to try and pass me. I grin knowingly — he’s got no chance.

I switch into high gear, the push of muscle combines with the pull of gravity, acceleration quickly transforms to velocity, and I take the whole lane. A fleeting feeling of weightlessness catches me as I whip over the speed bump; in a blink, I’m down the hill. Faced with the threat of a raised bump of asphalt, the car slows down to a crawl and has barely moved from where I left it.

The drivers don’t realized how bulky and slow they are in their cumbersome metal carriages. Their slowness contrasts with my own agility and my moment by moment connection with the road — reminding me why I enjoy riding these streets, and making me feel alive.

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Colin, a User Guide

January 18, 2008 at 7:35 pm · Filed under Design & Web Geekery + Life, Meaning, & Selfhood

I am a creative person and like many of that ilk, my level of organization is also creative — to put it kindly. Productivity is a trait that I admire and occasionally accomplish quite well, but it is often hampered by the fact that I seldom have much of a plan. For instance: at some point near the end of this month, I will sit down and pay the bills. I will probably approach this task differently then the last time I did it. It’ll all get done but in a different order and manner, which is not the best way to approach finances.

To solve this problem I’ve decided to create a document, a User Guide for me and my life. Also, in order to make this productivity project interesting, this User Guide will be more than just about how to pay the bills. It will be a self-portrait.

It’s been a while since I’ve created a self portrait. In some ways this blog is a self portrait; however, mostly it is just a stage. A real self portrait involves honestly peering into one’s self and painting, drawing, sculpting, or writing an representation of what you find.

“Colin, a User Guide” will be my self-portrait, an non-chronological autobiography. It will be a reference guide to every thing I do from paying the bills to the blogs I read to the daily tasks at work to the routes I take on my bicycle. It will be a detailed description of how I approach life, death, politics, beauty, art, culture, and friendships. It’ll be a catalog of all the hopes, dreams, regrets, and desires that shape me and propel me through life.

I will be designing this as an actual user guide with easy to follow instructions and call out tips. If anyone were to need to become me this document should get them pretty far. Which may come in handy if I get hit by a bus one of these days. [note to self: include a Living Will as part of the book’s appendix]

In order to make this a true self portrait, I will be honest with myself as I write this. Which means that there will be parts of the book I won’t want people to see. As such, I will be creating two editions: the public version with sections redacted and the private edition encrypted under lock and key which includes the personal and financial details I’d rather not share with the world.

Initially, this book will be developed as a PDF; however, I am also interested in actually getting this printed. A private edition for myself and a short limited edition run of the public edition. I have already designed a cover and started on an outline. The process of creating this book should be interesting, and I will post updates to this blog as I work on it.

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All quiet on the catcubed front

November 14, 2007 at 11:22 am · Filed under Life, Meaning, & Selfhood

Been a bit crazy in my world lately, and I haven’t had much of chance to update this blog in a while. Actually have started on a few posts, but haven’t had time to finish them. They are just sitting there in my drafts staring at me.

So what have I been up to you ask?

• Normal work has been keeping me busy
• I had one week of a bad chest cold (the same one everyone else got)
• I’ve been working on new logo designs for interpretive arson
• I’m working on a new event (more on this later)
• I’ve been poring lots of time into helping Nifer with NifNaks.com (check out her new datawormz flashdrives they’re awesome!)
• And I’ve been trying to work in some social life in order to keep myself sane (went to the Maze Party in Half Moon Bay which was a whole lot of fun)

I miss my blog writing so I hope to squeeze in a bit more time for this soon.

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