Kaitsevajadus

Nädal aega paralleelprotsessin kolme keelt korraga, kangetest valudest ja (õnneks) veel kangematest valuvaigistitest rääkimata. Aju teatas just, et asi, millega mesinikud end sutsude eest kaitsevad, on "mesilase ülikond". Olgu siis pealegi, heh.

Aga tegelikult oli mõte, et mul on sihukest sääste vastu vaja - ei saa uksest sammugi välja astuda maasikaid korjama, kui need raiped hoopis mind korjata üritavad.

K tänaõhtuse pargijalutuskäigu tulemus oli igatahes "vilktagumikud" ehk need jupiti helendavad putukad, millede õige nimi igas muus keeles lõpuks meelde tuli, aga eestikeelset ikkagi lõpuks netist otsima pidi. Google translaator, muideks, üritas meile "tulekärbest" vastena pähe määrida.

Cheers,

Hedi

Random snippets

Accidentally made gumbo of the later Discworld novels kind, by getting into a cycle of re-using leftovers of a sequence of previous sauces to make newer and newer iterations. Tasted awesome. I think they do this sort of thing on purpose in some Indian places with their ever-bubbling cauldrons, but I may just be believing an urban myth.

Talking of which, I can not believe what the students feed themselves with in the lab. And I don't mean actual junkfood here - it takes a while for that to kill one, so some here or there - go for it. It's just that all they seem to eat are either pack noodles, spaghetti or huge amounts of plain white bread. Absolutely no protein seems to be involved in any of it, not to mention any (fresh) vegetables or fruit. In some cases large quantities of alcohol and some sweets are also represented in the diet. HOW are they all not sick all the time??

Food on the way from garden this year: all the mints, thymes, lemongrass, sages, oregano, laurel, dill etc herbs, eggplant, tomatoes, peas, radishes, kabocha, butternut squash, lettuce, strawberries.

Growing or even flowering, but low likelihood of getting anything edible out of it: persimmon, peach, kiwi, beans, asparagus, corn, sunflower.

Cheers,

Hedi

Sauerkraut mark II

Have been pickling cabbage every couple of weeks since January - think I've actually got it down pat now, so here're the updates.

My big glass jar exploded. Did exactly the same as before, washed and put into the oven for short period to dry and get sterilised and suddenly kaboom.

So tried a big metal bowl next, with a smaller lidded bowl full of water as the push-down weight, and wrapped in clingfilm. But the cabbage turned bitter and in the end we didn't dare eat it for worry that something or another had leached from the cheap metal into the food due to the acidity.

So by now I have completely given up on any sort of weight system and the drill goes:

• Weigh half of a washed, shredded cabbage + one washed, grated carrot into a big plastic bowl.
• Mix in salt (15g per 1kg) and sugar (10g per 1kg) and mash everything with a rolling pin.
• Scoop the mush into a screw-top plastic jar and press down until covered by the cabbage liquid.
• Close the lid loosely and leave onto the countertop for 2-4 days. 
• It makes a huge difference what the temperature happens to be - in winter when the indoors temperature swung between 6C (normal) and 19C (heater on), it took about 4 days to get to the same level of fermentation, that now, when it's between 15C and 25C, is achieved in 2 days. I suspect that in the summer with temperatures going between the heavily airconditioned 27C and the natural 40C, I might have to move the entire process into a fridge.)
• Mix and taste the mass every day, press the cabbage down into the liquid again every time.
• After sourness preference has been reached, close lid tightly and store in the fridge.
• Best time to eat is two days later, but it keeps for quite long, I believe... we just run out fast. ;)

Cheers,

Hedi

Beer

I have a serious drought (not draught, ha!) of memories when it comes to beer. For a valid reason, I suppose, since most of what is called that in Estonia, is... cat piss. Or so I hear. Disclaimer - have not, in fact, tasted one of those two things. Upon trying three different versions of canned Saku obtained, inexplicably, from a shop in Tokyo sometime last year, I will not argue against that judgement even one bit.

Oh, I just recalled this nature-documentary-survivalist-dude drinking his pee from a mostly! hollowed out snake (yes, that is correct) in a desert (not dessert, ha!). Brain, go home, you're drunk. Except that it really is not, not today at least... Unless one can get drunk off of vapours from a slow-pressure-cooking pot of a mix of beef, lamb and pork that might turn out to be awesome in an hour's time when the pot lets me in again to taste it. Or it might just turn out to have been a bad idea. Who knows. In the meanwhile, however, I have an hour to kill sitting in the same room with said pot for safety reasons, and I've already listened to two complete and two halves of a series of audiobooks today while trying hard not to be in various pains and digging about a hundred staples out of chair legs, thereby acquiring some refreshingly novel ones. Don't even ask... Feel free to guess the author of the books, though - current writing style I don't seem to be able to avoid using is a dead giveaway.

Where was I...

Right, excavating in memory banks (with yellow bulldozers, ha! doubled).

I vaguely recall that H once gave me some dark beer at a sauna evening and that those few sips didn't taste terrible. (And yes, I am aware that there are all sorts of different categories that go under the label "beer", like ales and lagers and pilsners and ipos and whateverthehellnot, but I really have not ever cared enough to learn about these.)

And at another time in a beer bar with A and... and... shoot, forgot her name... this is a bit embarrassing... M? Whatever, name not actually crucial to the story... we drank something that was basically cherry juice with a touch of a kick to it that was actually tasty. (Why on earth we were in a beer bar in Tallinn in the first place, is a mystery, though, because as much as I recall, none of us actually liked neither beer, nor the city.) Also I'm not sure that beverage was technically even beer.

There is also the curious incident of the Octoberfest in April. In Odaiba, Japan. Hmpfffft. I am almost very certain that I have either properly written about, or at least mentioned it before, but just spent 20 minutes looking for it from the borderline-frustrating UI of this blog writing site, and couldn't find a hint of it. In any case, I somehow ended up there (probably Y's fault) oh, perhaps ten years ago? Or five? And just to set things straight, the unclarity here is not due to what one would expect all sorts of unclarities to stem from when it comes to Octoberfests, whatever month they happen to be held in. No, I seem to just be continuously temporally lost. (Blame that wormhole over our roof, if you have to.) But just to prove that it wasn't all (only) in my imagination, here's a link that claims they are still at it. Meanwhile, I spent my time carefully avoiding any beer there, that much I recall. Except for one, uh, thing they called a beer cocktail that came about due to the free drink ticket I got from somewhere (potentially from buying an entrance ticket to the festival area... not that I have any memory of anything like that, but it's just a popular way to do things here. The alternative that someone just gave me one, is equally plausible, though. Comes with the territory of being young and blonde (ha!) in Japan with many drunk, er.. let's call them gentlemen, shall we, around.) ... ... ... What I meant to say is - that drink was disgusting.

Besides those, there was a rather unwanted experience of having to clean out a sauna room after some friends had decided to use beer as a substitute to an aroma oil. (Any worse use-cases and or cleaning-up-needed events I outright refuse to remember.)

And that's it. Those were ALL of the instances where this particular beverage has ever crossed through my life in more than the periphery that I know of. Until, in the beginning of this week, D went for a quick work meeting, ended up having coffee in a park, shopping for used guitars and summer shorts, bumping into a student to give some impromptu counselling, and arriving at home late at night with a couple of imported wheat beers from a discount shop, which, out of morbid curiosity, I tasted, and, as it turned out, liked.

No, for real. Yes, my body's chemical balances are clearly in a complete whack right now (tmi to describe how I know, but an annoyed head toss towards those pains I keep having to try to not be in), so just to keep things interesting, I also keep having urges to eat and drink irregular stuff, but still. I really enjoyed the taste of beer. Beer! Totally absurd.

As was the physical effect of the thing, because everything went noodly. So there I am, flopped on the sofa, almost unable to move a hand, but at the same time being able to keep level with, or even slightly get one up on any and all the witty remarks/puns etc coming from D (which is NOT a typical state of affairs because his ability to connect completely random things to other completely random things in the most hilariously clever manner possible for any and all purposes, is a bit out of this world... hence me keeping a file dedicated to his sayings that have provided hours of laughter cramps.)

Oh, and for reference, none of the "typical" effects of other types of alcohol like a spinning head, loss of coordination, slurring of words, slowed thinking, more talking or sleepiness showed up. So that's a box I didn't know existed ticked in the bucket list.

And then things escalated. Because the next day was a) nice (read: one of the few days of the year here, when it is not hellishly hot, too cold or too wet to get out and about), b) a weekday (read: crowds not quite dense enough to require extreme measures to survive in), and c) a rare instance when neither of us had to deal with an x amount of admin in places where we really would rather not be for reasons utterly out of the realm of logic (read: amazing.) So we went for a bike ride to the same area D had been the day before, aaaaand returned having bought the entire stock of that particular discounted beer the shop had and a couple of other types to try. (And some shorts. And a pair of shoes. Luckily, no guitars.) Still not quite certain why... However, I did get to be "the most attractive sounding girl on the street" due to the loud bottle-clinking emanating from my bike bags (which are a life-saver, by the way, and I don't mean just for carrying large quantities of bottles in). Also - see what I mean by clever sayings?

So, naturally, those new types got taste-tested that evening and [insert crying smiley face here (ha!)] I liked three of those too. For balance there were also two that I would have willingly poured down the toilet, so all is not lost, but still - there now exist four types of beer that I, apparently, drink.

Two of those are mass-produced imported (I think German and Dutch) wheat beers, and the other two are by a small hipster Japanese brewery no one has ever heard of, which I think actually deserves to be linked here for that reason alone. The fact that the brewery turned out to be located a bit upstream on the river that runs through our local park, is... hm... actually not so unexpected, as one might think, considering how strange things keep being around here recently. Anyway - their white barley beer is basically like grapefruit juice for adults and the wheat+barley one is the same with some grape juice mixed in.

So. If it's a weissbeer, preferentially made with wheat and an average hops concentration, cloudy not clear, with the least amount of carbonation you can get, and at room temperature, there is a chance it actually qualifies as drinkable. Huh, never would have guessed.

And then things escalated. Again. Because that second type of European import beer (that confusingly tasted just like caramel lemonade) was also a limited stock item, soooo... D went to the office for a bit and arrived home late at night with two boxes of that. Meaning that we now have a stockroom's worth of beer at home. (Luckily no chance of the same happening with that fancy brewery stuff since it's three times the price...)

Fun part is... Since alcohol, carbonated anything and wheat (as well as sugar) are a huge NOOOPE, until my body decides to calm the fk down again, which may or may not happen, like, ever, I can't drink ANY of it.

The slow-cooked meat mix turned out great, by the way - all of it tastes like mutton now, which I do not mind at all.

Cheers,

Hedi

Finally found a group I belong to!

As a random-ass-music-constantly-playing-in-head person, upon seeing it, I thought that this post is one of the most ingenious ideas of recent times. Then I read the comments underneath. :P

On the other hand, pan-frying a day-past-the-expiry-date white fish (not a clue what type it was, even if I could read the kanji, probably wouldn't know... seriously, the fish-related lectures and stuff just ran completely through my brain in uni... multiple puns intended) in also expired buckwheat flour with paprika powder and coconut oil, served with the leftover paprika-flour mixed with some egg-milk and turned into pancakes, is an absolutely terrible idea from start to finish. Like, really really terribly terrible. Like, had to open the small imported Vana Tallinn bottle to make sure the "lunch" didn't reappear terrible.

Cheers,

Hedi

Toit, kuhu kartul kohe kindlasti EI kuulu

Mis on külm, näeb D sõnul välja nagu värvimata junn, sisaldab kaheldavat moosi ja maitseb küünelakieemaldi, sulanud plastiku, rääsunud või, soola, šokolaadi ja vanilje järgi?

Kartulijäätis.

Ja ei, mitte maguskartulijäätis (sest see on väga mõnus asi, iga suvi ikka mõned nii sama kui teiste firmade omad pistab pintslisse), vaid täiesti kartul-kartulijäätis. Nagu päriselt, kartulimugula pilt oli peal. No ei saanud ostmata jätta.

Kartulist "moosi" keetmisest ma saan veel pisut aru ehk, kui pingutan - hulk suhkrut teeb imesid ju. Aga siis tuli keegi ja otsustas, et jäätise jaoks peab kindlasti soola ja võiga kartul olema? Ja siis muidugi vaniljejäätis, sest see on ju klassika. Aga et ikka liiga igav ei oleks, paneme šokolaaditükid ka sisse. No ja siis pakendame selle junnikujuliselt kahe kõige plastikumase libavahvlipaadi (muidugi kartuli "silmad" ka selle massi mustrisse pressitud) vahele, mis seni leiutatud on...

Cheers,

Hedi

Cotlettes

Re-discovered cutlets this year. And no, I have no idea how to spell the word correctly in any language, apparently, since "cutlet" seems to be more of a small steak-with-bone thingy, for the search "kotlet" google claims this to be a Persian dish, I have no idea by this point how many t's the word is spelled with in Estonian, and I have an equally small amount of grasp on why I automatically wrote the title of the post like I did...

Whatever - the fried minced meat patties.

Memo for self about the most recent recipe, because that stuff was yummy!

• 1.1 kg of minced meat (mix of fatty and lean, fully lean tastes dry and is too crumbly)
• 3 small or 3 large onions (keep the peels for colouring eggs in the spring, of course)
• 1 large carrot
• 1/3 loaf of white bread (found a really tasty cake-like one last time, hard to not just eat it as is, tbh)
• enough milk to fully submerge the bread
• 5 small gloves of garlic (minced, no need to pre-cook, or if, then only a bit)
• 3-4 eggs
• 1/3 tablespoon of cinnamon (makes the whole thing awesome, I promise!)
• 2 tablespoons of paprika powder
• 1 tablespoon of dried oregano
• bunch of fresh pepper
• an amount of salt
• butter, coconut oil, rendered pork fat (or whatever other grease)

Peel and roughly grate carrot.

Peel and chop onion.

Optional step: cry like there is no tomorrow, because fk, this is getting to be an allergy-level reaction - I am not even doing the chopping, just being in the same room, and the pain in my eyes is terrible!

Cut the bread into 1-2 cm cubes, put into bowl, cover with milk, leave to soak.

Cook the onion. (Do not use raw chopped onion directly - doesn't have time to cook through and the crunchy is nasty to eat. Pre-fry onions in butter until caramelised, or at least blitz the raw ones into a paste in a mixer. Frying the onions is a better option because it also raises the temperature of the meat mix, so it is not as cold-induced-painful to mix by hand.)

Add carrot and fry that a bit too.

Put all the meat into a biiiig bowl.

Add spices, onion, carrot, soaked bread-milk, garlic, eggs. (But take care about the timing for adding eggs - if broken right on top of the hot onions, will start to cook at a wrong time and place.)

Mix everything first with a utensil (not "an" utensil, by the way because grammar is...), then go hands in and squish until everything is uniformly paste-like and you get bored.

Some grease on the hot pan, fry up a small test-spoonful, break in half to see whether the middle is cooked through, taste and adjust seasoning of the rest of the mix, if necessary.

Fry them all up, layer with paper towels to remove extra grease before eating/storage.

Amounts above are enough for 2 people for 5 meals.

Cheers!

Hedi

Einstein-Rosen bridge

... is an alternative name for a wormhole. According to the google AI summariser, at least, and right this moment I don't have the spoons to dig deeper. But it sure as hell seems like our house has gotten stuck in an end of one...

Not meaning the endless supply of random (usually some vague hobby-related) items that turn up from stashed away boxes I didn't know existed (that is just a side-effect of living with D) or the disappearance of items that either or both of us swear should exist but that seem to have vanished into thin air (or in some cases moved out with some ex ages before said item was ever needed or thought of again).

No, the rapidly growing list that is really starting to freak me the f out is:

• finding a freshly-hatched butterfly outdoors in January when it's -3 at night
• that butterfly then living 3 times as long as the normal life span of that species (which I will try to write about right about when... at one point...)
• the weather going from mentioned -3 C to +22 C and back to -3 with snow over the course of 3 days
• but before that on a +10 C day getting messages from friends from a few kilometers away claiming that they are having a snow storm, only to stare up into the bright blue sky out of our own window
• going outdoors after hearing a sudden crack and discovering a 10cm diameter grey plastic tube with wheels at one end and signs of many many generations of spiders having inhabited the inside of the object in our garden... at first thought this was part of a golf caddy, some research clarified that it is, in fact, part of an old leaf-blower... what is NOT clear is where on earth it came from because judging by the noise, it must have fallen.. except that there is nowhere where it could have fallen from... no car or people noises either prior to said crack, so.. huh?
• put the pipe thingy on the side of the street, two days later a strange red metal contrivance has appeared next to it that I took to be another part of the leaf machine, but D claims is actually the thing you use to lift cars off the ground.. uuh.. jack, is it?... naturally with no explanation where that came from either
• and barely half an hour later tidying up the sofa pillows I come up with.. half a metal key (the half with the teeth that actually open a lock...) of unknown origin.. on the sofa we were sitting on for most of the morning
• I have presumed that the abundance of balls I keep finding in the garden has something to do with the neighbourhood kids and that the completely random and unexpected plants that have popped up out of nowhere in the garden pots can be put down to some normal seed transfer mechanism but now...

Cheers, from the other side?!

Hedi

Värske hapukapsas

Igasugust jama pikalt ja palju olnud ja asjade üles kirjutamiseks õiget energiat puudu kogu aeg...

Aga tegin värsket hapukapsast kaks korda ja täitsa hea tulemus paistab olema nii maitselt kui efektilt seedimisele.

Eriti täpselt ei mõõtnud, aga retsept umbes: 

1 kg kapsa-porgandi segu (ehk 1 keskmine kapsas ja 1-2 keskmist porgandit)

+ 15g soola + 10g suhkrut

Kapsas puhtaks pesta ja pealmised koledad lehed minema visata, porgand koorida.

Paar kihti puhtaid ilusaid lehti eemaldada ja kõrvale panna.

Ülejäänud kapsast juurika osa välja lõigata (nämm!), muu paari mm jämedusteks ribadeks, porgand juustunoaga õhukesteks "lehtedeks".

Kaaluda ja arvutada.

Eraldi kuivas kausis sool (mul kõige tavalisem peensool.. vist.. vbla on meresool ka, ei mäleta, mis purki pandud sai, peen puru igatahes) ja suhkur (mul mingi toorsuhkrupoolsem, aga veel "kuiv" variant, mida tõlkida ei oska õigesti) kokku segada. Esimene kord puistasin mõned köömned ka hulka, aga Aasia köömned on mingi vale kraam ikka - marineeri või küpseta või misiganes, ikka maitsevad vastikult. Erinevalt nendest, mis Eestis leiva sisse pannakse - noid sööks lõputult (kui kõht kannataks, haha).

(Ja järgmine kord katsetan jõhvikatega ka. Kuivatatud variant mul küll, st peab neid leotama ja steriliseerima kuidagi ilmselt...)

SUUR klaaspurk (mul vist 3.5 liitrine) kuuma vee-ahju kombinatsiooniga kergelt steriliseerida.

Kihi kaupa kapsas-porgand-suhkur-sool purki laduda ja iga kihi vahel puust nuiaga tampida - piisavalt tugevalt, et hulk taimerakke puruks läheks ja mahl eralduma hakkaks, aga purk võiks ikka terveks jääda. Nui mul selline peenike 3cm läbimõõduga asjandus, kui purgisuu piisavalt suur, peaks normaalne pudrunui sobima.

Kui kogu kapsas purgis, käed korralikult ära pesta ja mass veel korralikult kokku suruda, et võimalikult vähe õhumulle sisse jääks. Algselt purki pannes saab mu megapurk põhimõtteliselt täis, peale tampimist on ehk 1/4 mahust kapsas ainult.

Enne säilitatud puhtad terved kapsalehed massi peale ja mingi raskuse alla panna. Mul kasutusel tagurpidi väike taldrik ja selel peal puhas vett täis veinipudeli.

Purgisuu plastkilega kinni katta. (Veinipudeliga saab laheda torn-kaadervärgi nii.)

Kolm-neli päeva toatemperatuuril (mis meil talvel siin kõigub +6 ja +20 vahel), tekitab mulle. Kui viitsimist, siis võiks puulusikaga segada ka vahepeal, aga siis peab kõik jälle põhja tampima - tüütu.

Raskus ja lehed ära, testida, ega mingit veidrat kibedat maitset pole, ega miski ei hallita jne.

Kapsas väiksemasse korralikult suletavasse anumasse ja külmkappi.

Säilib nii päris pikalt, aga halvasti lõhnab igatahes ka. (Huvitav millega ja mis moodi neid poe omasid töödeldakse, et "aroom" teistsugune saab...)

Cheers,

Hedi

Olen sõnatu ja...

... humbled (ei tea, mis õige tõlge on eesti keeles).

Aasta või nii tagasi sahmisin parajasti aias, kui kamp koolipoisse mööda minnes mul aia otsa ronisid ja paar väiksemat savist lillepotti ära lõhkusid. Üsna tige olin tol hetkel ja suurem osa sellest emotsioonist sai paraku verbaalselt ainsa välismaalase pihta, kes selles seltskonnas olema juhtus (inglise keeles väljendumine automaatsem ikka, kui niimoodi äkitselt "vaja", kui jaapani keeles). Kuigi, kui mul mälupilt õige on, ei olnud tema isiklikult milleski süüdi, oli lihtsalt pikka kasvu ja lühemad poisid üritasid temaga selfie tegemiseks kõrgemale ronida. 

Viis minutit tagasi uksekell, tüüp oma väikse õega ukse taga, et tal on endiselt see juhtumine meeles ja paha tunne selle pärast, et potid lõhutud said. Ja et tõid mulle 500 jeeni uute hankimiseks. Sest nad perega kohe Jaapanist ära USAsse kolimas ja ta käib nüüd ringi ja lõpetab kõik kripeldavad teemad ära. Järgmiseks lähevad vabandama majja, mille aiast korra mandariine pätsanud oli.

Mul igatahes kukkus karp lahti ja samal ajal suu oli kõrvuni ja ei suutnud kuidagi piisavalt kiirelt ja selgelt väljendada, kui absoluutselt imeline ja haruldane ja inspireeriv selline käitumine on (come on, kes poleks kunagi õunaraksus käinud vmt). Raha üritasin küll plikale edasi anda, et ostku miskit head endale, 200 võttis, 300 andis ikka mulle.

Aga tõsiselt, sellises (pea olematus) vanuses mingit nii väikest asja nii pikalt meeles pidada, siis piisavalt julge olla, et midagi konkreetselt ette võtta, suvaliste võõrastega rääkima tulla, kuskilt riigist peale pikki aastaid lahkuma hakates piisavalt organiseeritud olla, et kõik lahtised otsad kokku siduda jne...

Ja mina ei suutnud vist vastuseks isegi vabandada, et ma ise halvasti ütlesin tookord - päriselt ei tea, mida ma ütlesin või ütlemata jätsin (aasta tagasi aega lihtsalt ei mäleta ja täna just lõi situatsiooni ootamatus ajju totaalse valge udu), üritasin igatahes väljendada-kiita küll, et uskumatult vinge käitumine...

Kurat, ma pean paremaks inimeseks hakkama...

Cheers,

Hedi

Eriline loomarikkus

Naabruskonnas elab siga. Käib vahel sõraklõbinal ümber maja jalutamas. Paari elamu kaugusel on puhuti kanad. Pesukarud jalutavad vahel üle tee. Ja endiselt ei tea, mis imelooma korra pimedas templisse jooksmas nägin - mingi nirgi sugulane ehk? Campuses mõne minuti kaugusel on mesitarud. (Ja hulk tanuki-laadseid tegelasi, mutte, rebaseid vist jne.) Kassid-koerad ka muidugi. Sellest loomaaiast hoolimata tegin viimase poestiiru ajal kannapöörde, et tervemõistuslikkust kontrollida, kui tee ääres kaks valget kitse rohutuusti närisid...

Huvitaval, tiba morbiidsel kombel olin õhtusöögiks parajasti (elus esimest korda vist) Uus-Meremaa lambaliha soetanud. Rosmariinipõõsas üritab aiaväravat kinni kasvatada, niiet selle pügamisest hulk värskeid võrseid suhteliselt meeletu koguse võiga pannile ja kiirelt steik-stiilis kõrgel kuumusel vaskpannil praadida. Sa nuga, oli hea. (Ja et ikka ausalt üles tunnistada, mina ei praadinud, ei tihanud, ilmselt oleks tallanahaks küpsetanud teise...) Pannile lihast maha jäänud pruunistunud võis veel eelnevalt aurutatud selle aasta esimesed värsked minikartulid krõbedaks ja oiossa!

Cheers,

Hedi

But... but... why?

Violinist, chellist, pianist, accordionist, guitarist, bassist, harpist, flautist, violist, organist, saxophonist, trombonist, vocalist, percussionist, keyboardist, clarinetist, harmonicist...

When suddenly: drummer.

Cheers,

Hedi

May the fourth be with you

Didn't feel like typical dinner, so decided on a bunch of random stuff to snack on. Got back from shop, set it all out, and... coconut, cider, cheese, chicken, crackers... Then spent a while thinking whether I should add some carrots and cucumbers to the pile. (And of course this page exists.)

This coconut, by the way, was a special experience -  not the mature brown hard shelled one we typically imagine and have to hammer into bits with great difficulty to get at anything edible, but a "young" one. In those perhaps only about half of the inner liquid endosperm has (sort of) solidified into the normal coconut "meat", the rest is still in liquid form and super tasty! Today's version was sold with the outermost green layer chopped off, the fibrous white coconut coir part still attached. Which means that after stabbing the nut with a metal straw and drinking the surprisingly large amount of the coconut water, it took a while of hacking to get that layer separated (it is now drying outdoors, because of course I will be using it in the garden). Some more hammering on a throwaway-grade kitchen knife and we were through the next layer - the hard brown shell - and into the generally desirable white centre, which was.. sort of a letdown. Taste was ok, but the texture was somewhere towards the slimy-jelly end of the spectrum. Somehow still kept eating it, though, and am now waiting to see whether the rumors of young coconuts having slightly laxative effects prove true or not.

Cheers,

Hedi

Minimärkused

Läpakavahetusega windowsilt macile vahetus ka komme virtuaalset klaviatuuri eesti- vs inglisekeelse variandi peal hoida - nuppude asetus eelmise (füüsilise) klaveriga võrreldes tiba teine ja selle vähese eestikeelse kirjutamise taustal, mis ma veel teha suudan, ei ole esimene variant enam mõttekas. Mis muidugi tähendab, et kui täpitähti vaja, on totaalne kaos, eriti kui enne kiirelt mingi vastussõnumi tippimist ja automaatselt enter'damist ei märka, et täielikku jama olen kokku kirjutanud. (Sinna hulka veel ka muidugi roteeruvad kolm erinevat jaapanikeelset virtuaalklaviatuuri. Korea ja vene tähestikud mingil hetkel eemaldasin täielikult.) Kirjamärkide muutlike asukohtadega muidugi ka jama. Aga tegelikult on üllatav, kui kiiresti selle uue, pisut teistsuguse paigutusega ära harjus. No ok, uue opsüsteemiga harjumine oli ka hämmastavalt valutu tegelikult, kartsin palju hullemat. Igatahes, iva praegu selles, et iga maakeelne postitus võtab nüüd juba puhtalt füüsiliselt hulka kauem aega, isegi kui aju parasjagu koostööd teeb ja õiges keeles mõelda suudab.

Sattusime nädalavahetusel hanami'le (see kirsiõite vaatamise piknik, mille eri osad tihtipeale harja punaseks ajavad... hmm... mõtlesin, et olen seda kuskil juba kirunud, tahtsin linkida, aga otsing varasemate postituste hulgast hetkel igatahes üles ei leia... näis, kas viitsin mingil hetkel täpsemalt seletada...) Seltskond, kellest paari viimati 4 aastat tagasi trehvas, ülejäänusid üldse ei tundnud, oli selleks hetkeks, kui me kohale jõudsime, juba korralikult... uhhuu. Paarile minutile punasel piknikutekil istumisele järgnes pooletunnine pakkimine, mille käigus Vist ei lõhutud midagi (nõud kõik keraamilised, ei mingit papptaldrikuteemat seekord, much impressed) päris lõplikult ära, üks 1800ml-ne sake pudel pandi küll ilma korgita küllili kotti, ja kogu kupatuse (mõistlikult) lähedalasuvasse korterisse kärutamine, kus pidu sama hooga edasi läks. Kainena kõrval istuda omaette kogemus.

Ja siis tulid mingil hetkel kuskilt välja kaks väidetavalt pikka aega ootel olnud kingitust "abiellumise puhul". (Is that a thing? Pole aimugi, aga hakkab nii tunduma.) Pakend oli väga lahe - kortsuline, ühelt poolt roheline, teiselt poolt punane krepp-paber (jõulukaardiaeg?) mingis origamilaadses voldingus (ÕS'i arvates on see päris sõna, jee). Sisu aga... Kaks erinevat paari kruuse. Mõlemad kujundusega, mida ise eales ei valiks... (If it IS a thing, make it stop!)

Veel veidi hiljem lisandus neile pakk 30 x 5 cm ereroosasid dildosid. Mis tegelikult, tuli välja, olid umbes nagu magusad mõnglid, aga valmistatud mitte maisi- vaid nisumassist. 

Ma olen enam ja enam veendunud, et D'l on mingid erilised üliaktiivsed maitsepungad, mis minul puudu. Üks kõik palju kordi ja kui erineva maitsestusega kastet ma teen, kui supilusikatäit shirodashi't (umm, kalapuljong pmst) sisse ei pane, on D arvates tulemus maitsetu. Ja iga kord kui selle lusika lisan, kiidab. No ei ole võimalik, et lihtsalt kokkusattumus, kui nähtus muudkui kordub, sellest täiesti olenemata, kas kasutan india karrit, vahemerelisi maitsetaimi, eestipärast pipart-soola, jaapani soja-mirini segu, korea vürtse või midagi muud. Mul endal pole aga sooja ega külma, kas on dashi sees või ei, kastme maitsvus sõltub selgelt teistest teguritest ja D hinnanguga eriti ei korreleeru.

Aasta võttis aega või nii, aga jõudsime lõpuks Suzie-Q nimelisse "US diner" stiilis restorani, mida M kogu aeg taevani kiitnud on. Njahhh, mõistan. Väga väga hea, mis siis, et umbes seitsmel tasemel ebatervislik toit. Hiiglaslikud portsjonid (mis ilmselt on umbes 1/4 nendest, mis USAs päriselt), vahvlid ja burritod ja krõbekanamäed ja friikad ja burgerid jne. Omanikeks-kokkadeks-teenindajateks on enamvähem meievanune väga muheda olemisega jaapanlastest paar. 4 lauda + mõned letiäärsed kohad, seinad ja letid täis kõikvõimalikku ameerika pudipadi, millega ooteaega täita. Raudselt läheb varsti tagasi. Aga seekord katsub veidi väiksemate portsjonidega piirduda, päris keeruline oli pärast lõunat koju veereda.

Cheers,

Hedi

Totaalne temporaalne segadus

Kaks nädalat tagasi olid miinuskraadid ja sadas rahet. Üleeile, 31. märtsil oli väljas 28.1 C sooja (kogu ajaloo rekord, jah). Pole ime, et lisaks taimedele (tulbid ja hüatsindid mul kõik nt 50cm asemel 10 cm pikkused, aga sellest hoolimata sujuvalt õitsevad, aastaringsetest maasikatest, roosidest ja saialilledest rääkimata) on ka enesel juba täiesti sassis, mis aastaaeg parajasti on. Kuuldavasti olid munadepühad just. Aga tänane õhtusöök sai... noh...

Aurutasin kartuleid ja tegin karrimaitsestusega liha-aedoa jahukastet, värskelt valmistatud soolakurgid kõrval. Ja kogu kokkamise aja käisid neelud köögiaugus poolkogemata tallel oleva jõuluglögi järgi. Möödaminnes, plaanimata tegin ingveriteed (keev vesi, sügavkülmast värske ingver ja lusikatäis mett), sest kellaaeg päris tee jaoks liialt hiline ja tahtmine oli millegi maitsekama, kui palju kuuma vee järgi (mis enamasti õhtusöökidega kaasub). Alateadvus vist tegutses ka omapäi, sest kastme maitsestus klappis selle ingverijoogi ja lõpuks ka päriselt välja kaevatud vürtsiveiniga ideaalselt.

Ja kõigest eelnevast täiesti teadmatuses oli D meile söögikõrvaseks meelelahutuseks Kongen befaler'i spets-jõuluepisoodi välja otsinud. Niiet nüüd mul kummitavad lihavõtete ajal, kui siin lapsed (üli)kooliaastat alustavad, ligi 30 kraadises kuumuses ja kirsiõite meres surfates jõululaulud...

Cheers,

Hedi

Completely off topic

Goodreads is seriously lacking the functionality to make up shelves with ranty descriptions. What I would have needed goes sth like:

"Memo for self. NEVER CONTINUE! Aka book series that beat even the OCD that usually manages to make me finish stuff once started. Entry in the list is whichever book I managed to read before reaching the point of actually setting the whole thing on fire, had I had a physical copy. No one-shots, only series that my fail of a brain might at one point feel compelled to complete."

No choice but to de-tox (and have an extra memo) here now. Because somehow there have been a few of these in a row, and I'm pissed. List in read order goes:

• Renegade's Magic (The Soldier Son #3) - never been so disappointed in one of my favourite authors than with this fatfatfatfatfat... luckily no hint of the series continuing so far.
• The Wide Window (A Series of Unfortunate Events #3) - works ONLY to create childhood depression, nothing else.
• Freya and the Beast (Fae Twisted Fairytales #2) - there is ZERO grammar, praying to high heavens this never continues, made my brain bleed.
• Unraveled (Steel Brothers Saga #9) - got to 9 only because all of it was in a single mindless-scroll file, each book is a torturous copy-paste.
• Saved (Honor Bound #1) - list of the wrongs is endless but mixing up a sadist and a masochist in a book supposedly heavily focused on bdsm summarises enough.
• Court of Bitter Thorn (The Fae of Bitter Thorn #1) - no logic, no grammar, no story, no characters... why has the world decided to torment me??

No authors, no links, DO NOT look the names up, these deserve no clicks / internet traffic.

Cheers,

Hedi

Feelin' fancy

Had a seriously classy "dinner" by accident the other day.

Wasn't feeling like proper food (blame the spring, would just keep munching cucumbers if I could), but had picked up some fresh red and green grapes that morning. Along with some properly delectable apples and tomatoes, both of which seem to have returned from whereever they spent their winter holidays hiding at. Added the last chunk of hard Estonian cheese and a disk of Camembert and dug up some whole-wheat crackers from the long-lasting-stuff-kept-in-the-hole-just-in-case. (Yeah, we have an actual food hole in our kitchen floor.) Complimented the pile with the dregs of a white and a red wine left from the recent Miau taste-test. Awesomeness achieved!

Fun facts. A slice of (that particular) fresh apple on a salty cracker somehow managed to taste exactly like apple pie. Wine'n'cheese is a tried and tested combo, naturally, but our personal preferences, frequently aligned, went in the exact opposite directions in this instance - I basically refused to let go of the glass of CabSav, while D was only happy about that in order to get at the Moscato.

Those kinds of testings, as well as any sweets, will have to stay on the shelf again for a while now, though, while doing yet another round of "will there be less pains while avoiding certain foods". Sad face.

Cheers,

Hedi

Rule of thumb, maybe?

After the long-long lists of dietary restrictions of the past couple of years, we once again occasionally have some wine in the house. Of course, since the source is, unavoidably, some random grocery store, the available options are not especially... appealing. But through trial and error have succeeded in finding a couple of palatable, as well as reasonably priced, options. 

Combining the recent experiment notes with memories from earlier years has sort of led me to form a mental guideline of "Avoid ALL wines from the most common grapes and go for whatever is the rare one in any given shelf of bottles." I guess the logic is that many people who buy wine here just go for a name they have heard before, so the makers can bottle absolute garbage, get paid for it and the people then pretend that what they are consuming is great, because that's what they say in books, movies or tiktok... Meaning that Chardonnay and Sauvignon Blanc (from the whites), Merlot and Pinot Noir (from the reds) are to be completely avoided, while Moscato and Syrah have some likelyhood of being drinkable, depending on the maker. Special cases: two of the Sauvignon Blancs I've found work better than anything else for cooking (whereas the rest are simply paint-removers) and (if one gets through the nasty ones) some goes-nicely-with-meat Cabernet Sauvignons also exist. Tempranillo and Garnacha need further taste-testing, should I find any anywhere at all at any point. 

And that's about the limit of what grapes one can find here - forget about the rest of the "world top ten wine grapes" lists, not to mention the other 10'000 different varieties that the original Vitis vinifera has been bred into so far.

Disclaimers:

All of the above is valid for 2024 Tokyo suburban setting, probably not so much for other, more wine-knowledgeable countries, nor central parts of the city, nor specialty wine shops.

I am still seriously missing the two limited edition bicycle-wines (whatever the real brand name was) we could easily get 4 years ago from shops near the then-home.

Cheers,

Hedi

Jubedus ja mitte

Võta maguskartul.

Keeda koorega ära.

Lisa soola.

Keeda kokku lääge munakreem (custard).

Purusta kartul ja pane see volditud paberist korvi.

Kata sentimeetrise kreemikihiga.

Sinna peale kalla pruunikas veidi kalamaitseline kallerdis.

Kõrveta veidi pealt ära.

Sildista asi creme brulee'ks.

...

Ja keegi geenius kuskil arvas, et see on HEA idee?? Täielik õudukas oli. See hinnang minult, kes muidu nii maguskartulit kui custard'it alati igast asendist sööma on nõus.

Kartul polnud läbi küpsenud vaid kohati krõmpsus, pool kallerdisevedelikku polnud kallerdunud vaid paberivoltide vahelt vedelikuna välja imbunud, paber oli läbi vettinud ja muutus söömisürituse käigus pudruks, mis suurema enamuse selle külge kleepunud kreemiga ära tuli visata, ühtegi head maitset polnud kogu kupatuses järel. Ja "Crème Brûlée"??? Tahan "dislike" nuppu!!

See siis nädalake peale seda, kui aastapäeva puhul sama poe kõrvalletist samanimelise uudistoote - koogi sedapuhku, ehk kah mitte õige nimi õigel magustoidul, aga see selleks - haarasin, mis täiesti pingutamata viimasel ajal tarbitud toidu (nii vana tuntud kraami kui uute katsetuste) nimekirja tippu lendas. Igavesti nämmu.

Ühtlasi paistab, et mulle on karamellimaitseline kraam kohe päriselt meeldima hakanud. Varasematel aastatel pigem eemale hoidnud, aga viimastel kuudel tükki neli-viis karamellitoodet super head olnud. Huvitav nihe maitsemeeles. (Ja ei, selles tänases õuduses ei olnud karamellist haisugi.)

Cheers,

Hedi

Timers

It takes serious effort to find a time keeping device worse than the Windows Explorer "time remaining" predictions. But, well, I succeeded.

Our not-fancy but waterproof electronic bathroom clock, you know, the device with the singular task of telling the correct time, gets delayed by 5 minutes every couple of months. Right, ok.

The electronic living room clock is supposed to radio-wave sync to some central time-keeper somewhere and always stay accurate. Except that I have to manually set it a few days after every battery change after waiting for it to try and fail to accomplish this task.

There are also timer functions on some of the kitchen appliances. 

The cooking ovens that most of the developed world is used to having under their cooking surfaces (be it gas-, electric or wood-fuelled for all I care) don't really exist in most of Japan. No idea why. What are quite common, though, are smaller "fish-grills" (essentially sideways toasters) and microwave ovens with the additional "real oven" functionality. And best of luck to you, if you mix up the programs and put a metal cooking tray in the microwaves or try to quickly warm up a plastic bento tray of rice but click on the "grill" button by accident. Anyway, ours seems to be timing things relatively normally, or at least closely enough that I've never been triggered to properly re-time the thing.

Likewise, I haven't checked the food drying cupboard timer, because it really doesn't matter when the ON periods are several hours at the least in any case. However, judging by the many-tens-of-degrees-wrong thermometer of the same machine, I wouldn't place bets on the timer making sense either.

Next is the rice cooker, that, when first turned on, happily claims to need 33 minutes to cook whatever amount of rice and water on whatever program one selects. After it has had a while to ponder, it is anyone's guess where the number displayed on the screen comes from or what it means. I've seen the count go up as well as down (despite the contents of the pot being identical when starting); I've seen quite logical down-by-one-minute-at-a-time counting; I've seen the thing stop at 9 or 13 minutes for 5 minutes at a time; I've seen it drop instantly from 22 down to 15 or to 3; I've seen it get stuck at 1 minute for 10 minutes etc. Regardless, the longest it takes to get the food is a bit over half an hour + it does keep the rice warm after it's finished, so whatever the electronic synapses think they are doing doesn't really interfere with life much.

And then there is the washing machine.

It technically has an overnight timer function - load the laundry and detergent, set the program and wake up in time to hang everything out to dry to catch the longest rain-free period possible. Except that the bloody thing manages to miss the target time by hours. On either side, unpredictably. So much of plannability. Oh, and the timer isn't based on the actual time of the day (let's call this the absolute time), it is subjective, so the whole thing depends on first knowing the time you happen to be setting it up, then calculating hours until the morning, then adding a couple as buffer and then still having to either wake up at a wrong time, wait for an x amount of time for it to finish, or suffer from the too-long-wet-in-the-machine-now-smelly-and-wrinkled clothes. On top of that the "running timer" behaves in all the ways the one in the rice cooker does - jumping back and forth, getting stuck on random numbers etc. An especially peculiar situation tends to occur when setting the machine for a 10 minute blow-dry function, only to be presented with the error of "load too heavy to blow-dry", followed by the machine blow-drying while still blinking the error, for exactly 10 minutes before unlocking the door. Wait... eh??

And don't get me started on the temperature regulation of the thing. Because one can not simply set the washing water temperature to the desired number. Noooo, one can activate the function to add +0 up to +40 degrees of warming to whatever temperature water happens to come out of the pipes. The pipes that, like the rest of the house, has no insulation. In a climate that in the winter is at 0C and in the summer is at 40C. Who the f thinks this is a good design decision... Well, at least we have a washing machine that does, in fact, warm the water a bit. Because like some Japanese person proudly told me a while ago, washing clothes in cold water is good, because their laundry detergents are also good. Followed by wearing a shirt three times and then throwing it into trash, because it stinks to high heavens due to the biohazard that has, obviously, not been washed out with this magical cold water of theirs. The number of people in public places that stink like wet dishrags, is also absurdly high, I might add. By the way, did I mention that wearing perfume is considered rude here?

All in all, if the relatively simple electronic devices cannot manage an accurate timer, I shudder to guess what havoc all the smart-home and AI appliances can/will cause.

Random side-note, time is also behaving strangely with regards to books... read total of February at the moment with a week still to go is 23, with 2 half-read and at least 2 more to be added before the end of the month due to them being sequels. So at least 27 then. But that is how many days there are in the entire month. Am I imagining things or? Not a clue how I managed all that. Well, maybe a bit of a clue - got the notion of putting on random audiobooks as background to exercise or housework, but even disregarding those 9, the count seems a touch absurd.

Cheers,

Hedi

Ringiga tagasi

FYI. One 500 gram pack of Forte hard cheese makes five batches of pasta carbonara (that is, five meals for two persons). No, that food still doesn't contain cream, and yes, I was terrified to make it again after a break of several years. (That last due to the constant array of limitations and outright bans on random foods in the interim time + the complete overhaul of available foodstuffs after moving and having to switch grocery stores.)

The far-travelled cheese from mom finally triggered the impulse to make it again, though. Trouble was, literally ALL the other ingredients, with the exception of eggs perhaps, were also completely different from the ones we were using for the so-well-tested-that-don't-have-to-think recipe before.

Well, managed to make food, memo for the next batch:

• Used fresh fatty pork, instead of a block of smoked long-lasting bacon that the original (and by that I mean the actual historic recipe from the coal mines) calls for. I suppose fresh meat might be healthier, at least prof. K claims so. In any case, works ok-ish, but has less depth to the final flavour.
• Forte seems to be more acidic than the whateveritwas cheese we were using before, as well as the combination of the original two cheeses that are actually supposed to be in the dish. Therefore - can use a bit less, and
• Must NOT add any white wine while rendering the bacon. Used to always add a few splashes to get all the bacony taste off the pan, but in this combination of ingredients the sauce gets just too sour.
• Also might have overdone on the garlic paste today. Since the tube I can get here has a much larger opening than the one I used to use, the autopilot keeps messing things up. Boo. And anyway, should just not be lazy and use actual freshly minced garlic... it's not like I didn't have it right there in the fridge...
• Pasta changed too, from normal durum wheat (or sometimes random gluten free) penne to what is supposed to be spelt wheat.. uh.. whatever the little bowl shaped pasta pieces are called. Again, allegedly healthier (prof. K). Cooks pretty much the same way, tastes nice. Whether what the ads on the package claim are true, god knows, of course. NB, though - four handfuls was clearly too much... Oh shoot, or did I end up boiling five? Literally just finished eating before starting to write this (in an effort to struggle out of the writing slump of the past, uh, too many months), and already forgot. Anyway, will try 3 handfuls next time and see. Al dente.
• Oh, and used two eggs, but just now looking up the link to the older recipe saw that we used to use one. Oh well, worked either way.
• Pepper was broken today. Kept grinding more and more, but the taste just got lost in the rest of it. Strange.
• No added salt - plenty in the cheese.
• And had a bit too much liquid today. Can either drain the pasta more, or the problem will solve itself when skipping any wine.
• Also, I'm being asked to get bread on the side next time. Don't really miss it myself, but, well, habits.

Oh yea, and a general note. Each batch needs to be made fresh: cheese mix in a few minutes before eating. This is one food that really really cannot be stored.

Cheers,

Hedi

Väljas praegu

• õitsev saialill
• õitsev roos
• 10 cm lumekiht
• punased maasikad
• äikesetorm

... ei, loodusega on kõik korras... riiiight.

Cheers,

Hedi

Marinaadikaste

Meelespea, jälle, eiteamitmendat korda, iga natukese aasta tagant ununeb täiesti ära:

Jääsalat + kurgid-tomatid-seened-jne + mingi lihakraam on väga mõnus õhtusöök!

Ühtlasi, see kaste ei pea tingimata lihaetappi läbima, et nt salati peale super hästi sobida. Viimasel ajal korduvalt lihtsalt tonkatsu, balsamico, mee ja musta pipra segu pannil või ja veiniga kuumutanud ja otse tarvitanud. Ei ole muidugi nii vinge maitsega, kui originaal, aga hapusust taluvatesse situatsioonidesse klapib kenasti.

Cheers,

Hedi

Notes from a BBQ

25C and blooming cherry trees on the first week of November - are you for real, climate??

Turns out that our local big park has a massive rentable-plots BBQ area - book a time-and-space slot, get a number on a stick, arrive early in the morning to claim your preferred spot with the stick and plenty of blue plastic sheets, have your couple of hours of event, clean up every scrap, return number and pay up.

I've never even SEEN so much awesome wagyu, not to mention eaten it. For a totally reasonable price to boot. Some other good/interesting food too, but... I mean, the world's higest rated beef, straight from a charcoal grill, cooked by a semi-professional chef!

Vinegar-marinated raw onions and cucumbers were, despite all common sense, really good - need to try to make it for sure. So were salty potato chips with chocolate. But I'd rather leave the Indian-origin dish containing whole cardamon and anise seeds, cloves, bone splinters and a million other, actually edible things, to someone else.

Did not expect someone to whip out a canteen of water, gas burner, freshly ground coffee, kettle, paper filters and a fold-out metal funnel and start making hot coffee under the table, but woah, it did smell nice. Someone had also brought a made-that-morning pumpkin pudding, guess all the Halloween leftovers had to go somewhere. Bit of a flop, haha, that one, though, I thought it too bitter, D, too fatty.

Having every other person present be a tennisomaniac puts somewhat of a restraint on the conversation topics. But it feels like despite a loooong time of not actually using the language, my Japanese ability has improved a bit. At least the understanding, if not the speaking part. And at least for the middle part, where brain had sort of gotten into gear, but not exhausted... yet.

Murder-wasps apparently understand Estonian, listen to what I tell them to do, and go pester some other group of picnickers (had to google the spelling of this) for the rest of the event. Hint: flapping hands at them really doesn't do a thing except potentially piss them off. Neither does spraying aerosol poison towards the completely innocent hawk moths that happen to be passing by (because you cannot tell one insanely different bug from the other, I presume). The trigger-happy people (from another group, luckily) did succeed in spraying said poison all over themselves, their friends, things and food, though. Oh well, natural selection.

Time behaved funnily - first 1.5 hours took aaaages, the rest disappeared in a blink, and suddenly everyone was jumping up cleaning and packing stuff. And ohhh boy, that was a moment I wish I'd been paying more attention, because apparently one (or two) of the Japanese guys just upped and threw away all of the still uneaten food from the table. Neither us nor the organiser, originally from Fiji, could believe our eyes, and I suspect some of the more sensible Japanese couldn't either. The actual fuck, there is actual wagyu and grilled chicken left on the trays and you throw it into a trashbin??? No, really, days later, I still can't get over this... Anyone who has EVER been under the misconception that the Japanese culture is not wasteful - here you go then...

After the clean-up started, time slowed down again, though, and it took ages to finally get out of the park, because a million rounds of standing around, thanking eachother, clapping, preceeded by practicing clapping, speeches, packing the car, photography (an undertaking shared with the neighboring group of veryveryvery drunk people on their highschool reunion or sth), bowing etc. just do not end at that kind of event in this country. Consider yourself warned.

Cheers,

Hedi

Eestipärane tiramisu

... ehk küpsisetort kausis.

Kuna D oli, nagu ikka, sünnipäeva tähistamiseks hommikust õhtuni koosolekutel jne (sellest kõigest rääkimata, mis nädala jooksul toimunud oli), tegin vähemalt kiire küpsisetordi, millega teda lühikese pausi ajal turgutada. Viimati ehk 15 aastat tagasi selle tegevusega rinda pistnud, ja voh, andis tunda.

Märkmed järgmiseks korraks:

• Full-grain aga suht maitsetud küpsised käravad kenasti. Kandilised.
• Üks kõik, kui kaugele poodi minema peab, et leida, küpsiseid leotada tugeva earl grey-piima segu asemel piimaga lahjendatud Bailey's'es või Kahlua's või Vana Tallinnas.
• Mitte kasta, vaid leotada! Kaua aega (või kuumaks aetud vedelikus), kuni küpsised veel vaevu koos püsivad, või peale poolpehmete küpsiste kaussi ladustamist vedelikku juurde lisada.
• Mitte unustada kõrgete seintega koogiküna küpsetuspaberiga vooderdada (sest see võimaldaks ehk koogi pärast kätte ka saada, ei peaks tulemust barbarimoel lusikatega ründama... kuigi see ka omaette lõbus tegevus.)
• Meie kausi kohta kulub 2 pakki küpsiseid ja vähemalt 2 totsikut hapukoort, aga 3 oleks parem.
• Hapukoor peale kakao ja suhkruga de-klombistamist värske koore või piimaga vedelamaks segada. (Jaapani oma on täiesti tahke. Tüütu.)
• Ahjaa, ja mitte kuu aega üle tähtaja hapukoor oleks parem variant - vähem hapu teine.
• Ja vahukoort pole kaunistuseks vaja, kreemisust selletagi piisavalt, jube jebimine ainult. Tumeda šokolaadi ja marjajahuga üle riputatud kreemipind on ilus niikuinii, marju või puuvilju võib ka lisada.
• Aga kihtide vahele igatahes palju-palju rohkem mustikaid, banaaniviile ja šokolaadihelbeid!
• Ja siis kõvasti kauem seista lasta, kui 2 tundi.

Cheers,

Hedi

Potiaiasaadused 2023

Aastaringsed: nelja sorti tüümian, majoraan, salvei, rosmariin, kuumaasikad, nelja sorti mündid, redised, komatsuna, oregano.

Suvised: basiilik, shiso, baklažaanid, minitomatid, kurgid, murulauk, küüslauk, saialilleõied, kartulid, päevalilleseemned.

Idee poolest on kolm luffakõrvitsat ka kasvamas, millest loodetavasti nii seemneid kui švamme saab, kui veel natuke aega ilma peab. Jaburarbuus hakkas normaalselt kasvama septembri lõpus, sinnamaani kidus.

Puud ja lillekesed ja suvalised lahedad kõrred ka muidugi igal pool, mida süüa vist ei tasu.

Järgmise aasta plaan, mille suunas põhimõtteliselt töö juba käib: asparaagusevõrsed, normaalarbuus, paprikad ja tšillid, naistepuna, raudrohi, rabarber, butternut squash.

Ja siis muidugi tahaks veel tervet hunnikut muud toitu kasvatada, kui ainult aega/liigeseid/ruumi oleks.

Cheers,

Hedi

Rasvapirdele

500g peekonilaadset liha

2 porgandit

2 muna

1/2 küüslauku

1/2 tassi piima

1/2 tassi kaerahelbeid

2 supilusikatäit cajun maitseainesegu

värsket musta pipart

soola

... kokku annavad kotlette üheksaks eineportsuks.

Tiba jabur saamislugu küll. Pahkluu käitub pahasti jälle, st viimase poeskäiguga tuli ühe jalaga rattal vändates hakkama saada. Tulemusena oli pea väga laiali otsas ja järgneva päeva toidukraami unustasin hoopistükkis ostmata. Tagasi supermarketisse põrutada jalg ei kannatanud; idee parajasti 3 km kaugusel pargis toimuvale festivalile minna ja sealt miskit söödavat hankida kukkus samal põhjusel läbi; D'd ei saanud ka poodi saata, sest ta oli parajasti suutnud sama lombakaks hakata, kuigi saavutas selle minust erineval meetodil; ja konbinitoit, mis lähemal saadaval, kõlas ka mittesoovitavana.

Seega kaevasin sügavkülmast mingid paksud 'peekoni'viilud välja, mis aga hilise stardi tõttu lõunat valmistama hakates alles pooleldi jääs olid. Mis seal ikka, munadega koos köögimikserisse, et teeb libahakklihaks... Pole päris õige masin selleks tegevuseks, tuleb tunnistada. Kohati oli tulemliha suurte kamakatena puutumata, osaliselt muundus aga heleroosaks pastaks, millest hästi vorste teha saaks, ma kujutan ette. Noh, ja siis jäi kogu kraam sisuliselt mikserikannu kinni. Ilmselt peaks tänulik olema, et ilmad külmemad ja seega toas jahedam, kesksuvel oleks see värk mikserisse ära ka veel küpsenud (jah, meil piisavalt võimas vitamix, et pmst saab erituva kuumusega selles toitu kuumutada - püreesupid on soovituslikud). Igatahes, peekonirasvane liha + mikser ei ole parim kombinatsioon.

Kui suurem enamus sellest siiski konteinerist eemaldada õnnestus, viskasime porgandid, küüslaugu ja veidi piima asemele, et järelejäänud massi veidi vedelamaks ja koostööaltimaks (aldimaks?) muuta. Toimis, võitsime toidu tagasi. Ainult see jama, et lisatud juurikad said nüüd kaugelt liiga lühikest aega mikseriteradega tutvust teha ja jäid lõppproduktis ka suurte jurakatena.

Igatahes, lihakraam sai kaussi ja maitsestatud; tekstuurilisajaks/niiskushoidikuks paar minutit piimas leotatud kaerahelbeid sinnasamasse. Lisaõli nende kotlettide praadimiseks vaja EI olnud, sa nuga, see peekon ikka...

Aga kokkuvõttes kukkusid väga mõnusad välja! Ja said järgmiste päevadega söödud a) riisiburgerina b) praeriisiga c) riisikausis d) naaniburgerina.

Pidevmuundumises kokandusprotsessi jooksul omandas toode ühtlasi rekordilised neli nime, millest praegu paar päeva hiljem meeles pealkirjaks kasutatu - ju oli siis kõige õigem.

Oh, ja paksust külmast rasvakihist, mis lihamassist mikserisse maha jäi, sai lahti superlihtsalt: nõudepesuvahend ja soe vesi kannu, minut aega mikserdada ja voila. Oleks kööki pannilt laiali pritsunud õli, porgandijuppe, küüslaugukesti jamidaiganes ainult nii lihtne kasida olnud...

Tagantjärgi tark versioon, mis tegelikult suurema jamata samas situatsioonis toimima peaks: suurem mikserikonteiner, alustada aedviljadest, siis lisada väiksemateks juppideks lõigutud !väherasvane liha, kaerahelbeid leotada pikemalt või soojemas piimas.

Cheers,

Hedi

Aeg lendas ära

Saabus taipamine, et septembris sai selle blogi esimesest postitusest kümme aastat mööda. Uskumatu. Ei tea kas oleks pidanud tähistama? Või kogu asja algusest peale mingi reaalse poindiga pidama, publitseerima, marketeerima vne? Ei klapi nagu selliseks otstarbeks küll need suvalise ajastusega suvalises keeles suvalised mõttejupid. Oh well.

Cheers,

Hedi

Nasumince for rice

Slightly brown chopped eggplants in butter on a non-stick pan. Season with salt-pepper. Add some white wine and steam the veggies until soft.

At the same time lightly oil a copper pan and fry the mince with chopped garlic until slightly crispy, season with cajun spice.

Mix everything on the first pan, then shift the solids to the side to reveal any liquid (wine, eggplant juices, oils). Tilting the pan poach an egg in that for 1-2min.

Eat on brown rice.

Quite fast, simple and very very tasty :)

Tamarind (a.k.a "turds growing on overgrown ferns", as some people have put it) for dessert. Found an unexpected cheap half-kilo box on sale the other day, D had never eaten any, so for once I got to show off my botany-classes-garnered knowledge. Is a tree, is a legume, nothing to do with ferns, can be eaten fresh, although maybe not too much at a time, is supposed to be mildly laxative. Taste is sort of a mix of dried dates, sour citrus and something else. Frequently used in savory cooking, which sems like a total waste to me, because the fresh ones are so tasty and tons of fun to eat. Procedure:

• Take dried pod, rinse and gently dry.
• Thoroughly dry hands to avoid causing extra slimy/sticky mess.
• Squeeze until the pod breaks into shards and essentially drops off.
• Remove all of it and reveal the even turd-ier looking pulp inside.
• If any parts have molded or been eaten by worms, toss those segments.
• Hold by the nub on the tip where the tentacles meet.
• Peel off the tentacles (like a banana).
• Bite off one turdblob at a time from the narrow connecting part.
• Eat the pulp and inner shells as you would a cherry.
• Avoid biting into the pit, spit it out.
• Be amazed how much the shiny seed looks, feels and sounds like a piece of stone.
• Keep the seeds, because...
• Toss the tentaclecage.
• Repeat.
• Wow everyone who has never heard of this thing before with the experience.

Cheers,

Hedi

Smack in the middle of the 'meh' category

Doorbell about a month ago. P, having had a random idea, dropping off a couple of left over books written by a friend. Actual books, made of paper, so, of course, I read them. Eventually. Wasn't the easiest task, though. Non-fiction scenes about life in Tokyo, author basically lives down the road from our place. Got awards and everything. First one written in 2005, published 2014, read 2023. Which was a problem.

Picture how much life has changed in the recent years. Now double that, because Tokyo (and even Japan will eventually be forced to enter the current century, I'm sure). Meaning that a large part of the book induced cringing over the outdated "This is so and that is so" statements. Turns out 18 years are nowhere near long enough to be able to read and dismiss the stories you've been living in yourself as irrelevant pieces of funny history, so instead they spawn a swarm of thoughts like "Oh god, if someone who hasn't lived here for at least ten of those years reads it and actually takes this stuff at face value..."

A few "snapshots" apply even after the time warp. Vending machines and nigh magical postal delivery, anyone? The chapters about ways of holding on to train handles, the Donkihote shopping experience and a few others were very good throughout. On the other hand, if those pearls hadn't existed, perhaps I wouldn't have had to spend my time on the rest of it. (Nah, who are we kidding, I can't not finish a book once started, even if bad.)

Because scattered throughout were views that I can't but describe as narrow-minded ignorance of a trueborn 'Murican. To clarify, during most of the book I did not know the author was American, but the inherent, probably-not-conciously-meant-in-a-bad-way-but-nevertheless-insulting-to-everyone-else aura of entitlement the writing gave off was just unmissable. Newsflash - not everything in the whole world works/looks exactly as in the States, from things to people to motivations. Which, based on the list of countries-lived-in printed in the final chapter, the author should know extremely well. So how exactly one manages to lead a life wandering the world and still be (or at least pretend/claim to be) shocked to their core about cultural differences, I couldn't guess.

Perhaps stemming from that, a bunch of the claims were just plain wrong. A rant about the Japanese people always walking fast, as a random example. No, they really don't. If I tried hard, I could come up with a couple of people who may think so, but the most typical foreigner complaint is, and has always been, that the locals move so goddamn slow, it's a total headache to keep having to swerve around them to ever get anywhere. Apply thought equally to walking, biking and driving.

(Note: in case of the last, I don't suggest anyone should be speeding, but I do wish they'd actually teach proper car control here instead of how many times one needs to point and nod at things before even starting the bloody machine; I do wish that people would stop holding up traffic and drive up to the speed limit, when it is clearly safe to do so; I do wish that drivers would stop watching TV while in control of hazardous metal monsters (Noteinanote: if you own a car, you are required by law to pay the insane monthly fee to the local TV network); and I do wish that the millions of very elderly wouldn't automatically get their licence extended way past when their health situation should put a stop to that, if any common sense applied.)

Then there was the constantly repeated obsession about banners, signs, maps, ads, kanji etc. NO, the average Japanese does not mean a thing with whatever nonsense is written on their T-shirt in broken English. Simply because they can't read it. And this in 2023, not to mention twenty years ago. Forcibly attaching witty meanings to this blatant fast fashion consumerism is just revolting.

Which sort of illustrates the rest of the book - the absolute Japanoworship. Like, serious blind hardcore belief, that ANYTHING Japanese is pure and holy with the deepest of deep meanings and the best it can ever be. An example that really drove me up the wall was the outright orgastic section about chopsticks. Not a usage manual or any interesting historical info, oh no. The way the chapter read, if the author doesn't get off on watching the blessed chopsticks in use as opposed to the oh-so-base, disgusting and dreaded Western cutlery, I'll eat my hat.

In that light, the fact that only minuscule mentions of the massively important food culture of Japan were included in the book was probably a good thing. Then again, I've still got the second one to go...

Right. So. Leaving that questionable approach aside, the topics were mostly well chosen. Language usage-wise the text was pleasant to read, the amount of typos wasn't too bad and most sentences made their point clear. The best part, though, were the intermittent Japanese terms, that were all also completely correct! (Also relevant and spaced apart enough to not be overwhelming.) Why it was decided to only add the explanations of those as a list to the back of the book, and not mention neither that fact nor the meanings earlier, is beyond me, though. Attempt to make a non Japanese speaker who has managed to reach the end without understanding any of the key phrases to go read it again, this time with the newly discovered glossary? (Which raises the question about the target audience of the book, but whatever.)

But, clearly, reading it made me personally write this post. To be honest, brain also started auto-compiling excessive lists of good-vs-bad-vs-weird about life in Japan, but writing all of THAT down is a project a bit too big to tackle right now.

Cheers,

Hedi

Tibud

Isehakanud päevalill on viimaks õitsemist lõpetamas. Kust algselt aeda tuli, ei tea, aga leidis ilmselgelt omale sobiva niši, kui arvestada, et õisi on suve jooksul mesimummude rõõmuks kõvasti tootnud. St 200ni pidasime seemnepäid kogudes järge, pikemalt ei viitsinud, kuskil 50 on endiselt küljes ehk, täielik ulme. Taignakausitäis seemneid oli tulemuseks igatahes, paraku muu taimse pudiga läbisegi. Tuulisel päeval õhku loopimine aitas aga terad sõkaldest eraldada ja protsessi käigus tänavale lennanud seemnete üle olid paar müstiliselt välja ilmunud imeilusat tuvi (mitte tavalised hallid linnalinnud, vaid mingi värvilisem metsikum liik) väga rõõmsad. Uskumatult julged tegelased - ei pilgutanud silmagi, kui kõigepealt jalakäia, siis rattur ja lõpuks veoauto 30 cm kauguselt möödusid. Varem samu tegelasi paar korda ehk näinud, niiet muidugi oli huvi, kas tulevad peale pidusööki tagasi. Yep, täna hommikul olid jälle platsis. Nüüd muidugi tunne, et tahaks neile veel kraami sööta, et korduvateks aiakaunistusteks jääksid. Pole eetiline tegevus, muidugi, niiet hoiab end tagasi, aga lahe kohtumine igatahes.

Päevalilleseemned muidu väikest sorti, st otse süüa sisuliselt võimatu. Kas plaan neist õli pressida välja tuleb, näis.

Cheers,

Hedi

I'm being haunted

Despite it, according to the nice and accurate random youtube videos or automatic "news" feeds, being one of the easy go-to party snacks that everyone knows and likes, I've never actually made devilled eggs. Have had a pin in the plan for ages, but keep postponing. Looks like I'm being pushed into making the food happen in the near future, though.

Because basically every book (8 just-read, resurfacing thoughts of 4-5 others), tv show (4 different ones, I believe), computer game (all 3 that I've touched at all in the past year) or other media that I've come into contact with over the past month or so could directly be copied into a word cloud looking (in a completely random order and ignoring capitalization to be fair) something like this: devil, demons, hell, apocalypse, four horsemen, antichrist, 6-9 circles, dante, death, angles (and angels), heaven, satan, monsters, eldrich, underworld, vampires, seven deadly sins, witches, magic, fire, lucifer, god, temptation, candle, red, ...

Yeah, sure, moving from one supernatural movie or video to another, even if subcontiously, makes sense taking the million suggestion algorithms ruling us into account. But to have this spread into every type of media over several separate accounts. Hmm. Or to click on a totally random e-book in a library without knowing anything AT ALL about it beforehand, and it turning out to be yet another story about hell. Or for example to have my main playlist of over 9000 songs on shuffle for it to just constantly pick and play yet another song with the devil in its name. Completely unrelated gameshows or drum lessons have the references, IT newsletters and random interviews with people do too. The already ongoing Halloween madness in shops fits right in.

But when it starts coming up over and over again in daily conversations with D when I know that he hasn't consumed ANY of the same or related media (nor have I mentioned anything about it due to his complete disinterest in any fantasy stuff), that's just bizarre. E.g. I've been making oven-grilled potatoes the same way for several years. And now, out of the blue, he goes and renames them into "potatis satanus".

Cheers,

Hedi

Specializations

(Edit: Not actually "yesterday" by the time I managed to finish this post - not sure of the reason, but just could NOT write words down in any sort of sensical order for loooong, despite rolling with the easier language from the getgo. Seems to be a touch better at present, though. Yey.)

The brightest point by far of the yester-sucks-on-all-fronts-day (the kind that in the morning gets up to speed by me waking up in serious all-over pains, continues into lunchtime with a malfunctioning toilet, a broken microphone/camera, the garden having been dug up by the resident mole, and another typhoon making landfall straight on Tokyo, having a five o'clock tea with a university-wide flu warning at D's workplace combined with him already having a fever, and ends up with a massive work-related fail and the resulting mood from hell) was T describing how the vegetable soup that M had made got put to great use by an albatross (cue song here!), who, passing by the open kitchen window, had proceeded to un-lid the pot and eat the whole thing. Her periodically feeding the birds scraps on the balcony might have something to do with setting up this sitcom to be fair.

I'm extremely tempted to try to become friends with the couple of crows that occasionally patrol our own balcony or make ghost-noises on the roof. So far haven't actually taken any steps towards that, though, seeing as we go through quite many plastic bags every week already, because the crows of the campus seem to gain huge satisfaction/entertainment from removing/breaking every single one of those they come across, which means that keeping the bike saddles covered from elements whist parking has become a bit of a Sisyphus struggle.

Meanwhile, there is a butterfly farm happening in our garden thanks to the efforts of one (at least, I've never seen more than one at a time, so I choose to believe that rather a clan of many, it's the same one that just really really likes our place, heh) persistent Madam, most likely of this persuation, periodically (as in several times every day) flopping around the house, each time laying some fresh eggs on our lemon trees (cue next song). Which, (the eggs, not the trees nor the song) shortly hatch into rather ugly spiky poop-like larvae. A couple of days and a bunch of leaves-turned-into-memories later those grow and morph into rather cute bright green 5cm long caterpillars that a) threaten you with biiiiig orange "horns" should you bother them and b) are able to decimate a tree in a few days. Sure, these particular trees are really young (tallest about 80cm, smallest 20cm, kept in much too restrictive pots), but still, the speed with which the munching goes - if I hadn't seen it, I wouldn't believe it possible. And, of course, the bastards have specialized and refuse to eat anything else... Yeah, it's wonderful to have butterflies around, but, but.. my poor small seed-grown treelings really can't with this... So every few days we keep having to escort the caterpillars of all sizes over the fence into the neighbor's old large citrus tree in hopes that they get themselves fed there and manage to survive until the next life stage.

The even hungrier near 10cm hawk moth caterpillar with a funky tail from last autumn at least chose an abundant weedy vine as its prey and ate half of our back fence-ful, before climbing into a pot of previously-orchid substrate, cocooning up, almost getting itself killed when I tried to empty the pot out for winter, then spending the cold months on my office desk in the relative warmth of 6-10C at night, followed by wriggling about just in time to avoid being terminated again when I went to check the pot in late spring due to the lack of any life signs up to that point, resting a few days in a box in our living room, obtaining wings, pooping on my hand and flying away. Just saw one of them a few days ago - so maybe our Hippo finally made it back home... Species-wise might have been this one? Coloration of the caterpillar on the wiki page doesn't really match, however the adult form does + the species name search does bring up more familiar pictures... But in summary, uhh, I really am absolutely terrible at recognising non-plant species. Scrap that, have gotten bad at plants too. Can recognise butterfly and ladybug eggs now, tho, guess that counts for something?

Cheers,

Hedi

Kardulad

Tegin hakklihakastet. Tekkis tõsimeelne küsimus. Miks on kraanatoit kraanatoit?

Mikrolainekartuliaurutussiga on endiselt super - "keedukartulid" 9 minutiga. Ja kuna avastus, et netist saab otse farmeritelt korralikku (aktsepteeritav sort tuvastatud peale kõigi saadavalolevate läbi proovimist... ei võtnud eriti kaua aega, kartulite valik tõesti EI ole Jaapanis teema... riisi on küll sadat sorti saada, millel kohalikud väidetavalt vahet ka teevad, oeh, mõnda asja ikka ei õpi nii lihtsalt) värsket kartulit tellida, on neid viimastel kuudel hulka süüa saanud.

Paraku sai ka selgeks, et Tokyo suvine kliima on kartulite surm. Isegi keldris, muu majaga võrreldes jahedas ja kuivas (seda viimast ainult tänu elektrikuivatile), pesemata ja pimedas kastis, saavad värsked kartulid paari nädalaga kolmesentimeetrised kasvud külge. Niru.

Ühed teist sorti kunagi suve alguses poest hangitud ubinad... ehh, oot, nood on õunad... ?mugulad kukkusid ka kapinurgal kasvama, niiet sai neist viis oma mullaruutmeetrile istutatud. Katsetuse lõbu peamiselt - temperatuur ja "kasvuperioodi" ajastus ei sobinud üldse, ruumi- ja valgusepuudus ka mitte. Noh, ja siis veel see pagana uncle-infestation (tõsiselt peaks lõpuks välja uurima, mis nende "trilobiitputukate" päris nimi on, ah, misiganes..).

Ja muidugi - meie muttelukas. MIKS see tegelane võrdlemisi lähedaste suurte parkide asemel meie ruutmeetril elada otsustas, või kuidas imemoodi ta ümbritsevatest asfaltteedest hoolimata üldse siia sai, ei tea. Aga parajalt tark paistab teine olema - kolmandat aastat vähemalt siin (kui muidugi mingi järgnevusega tegu pole, ei tea tegelikult, kaua nad elavad) ja lõksudest hoiab 100% eduga eemale (eluslõkse ainult katsetanud, millegi karmimaga ei raatsi läheneda probleemile, loodust niigi vähe ju). Ühtlasi toimib tormihoiatusena - ehk kui kogu peenra üles kaevata otsustab, saame üldiselt nii päeva pärast järjekordse taifuuni selga. Tekitab ilmselt õhurõhkude muutusele reageerides vmt lisaventilatsiooni ja kuivendust omale korterisse - protsess, mille käigus ka mu vaesed kardulad korduvalt mullast välja said nügitud.

Ehk et, ei olnud rõõmsad need konkreetsed kodukasvatatud kartulid, aga söögikorra jagu sai nahka pistetud ikka.

Cheers,

Hedi

Drink, confused in the temporal sense

Gin + hot water + honey + lime makes for as nice a cold-weather drink as mulled wine or minttu hot chocolate. Why the idea of this, essentially hot gin'n'tonic, came into being in the middle of the persistently 38C August, I have no Clue.

(Sentences written: 2. Unintentional refs snuck in: 3. Re-read. Make that 4. And I did deliberately stay my hand from inserting all the obvious ones. Oh. Jeesh...)

Cheers,

Hedi

Ainult Jaapanis... ?

Oleks pea panti pannud, et olen kohalikest müügiautomaatidest varem midagi kirjutanud, aga jupp aega otsisin ja üles ei leidnud. Veider.

Igatahes, Jaapani ise-teenindusega tänavamüügiautomaadid on... mitmekülgsed. Kuuma-külmajoogimasinad on tõsiselt igal nurgal, vahel täiesti keset pärapõrgut mägede otsas vmt. Mõned skaneerivad klientide nägusid ja "soovitavad" tooteid (kuigi päris kindel ei ole, kas noid lõpuks isikuandmete kaitse raames kinni ei pandud...) Teatud tüüpi restoranide uste lähedalt leiab enamasti toidupiletiautomaadi. Šokolaade või muid näkse pakkuvad masinad on muidugi ka sagedased. Jäätisemasinad. Kuuma suppi müüvad masinad. Kümnekiloseid riisikotte müüvad automaadid. Kapslimänguasjade masinad muidugi (ja lõputu valim mängusaalide masinaid, aga nood klassifitseeruvad pigem mängurluse alla vist.) Põllulappide kõrval värsket aed-ja juurvilja müüvad masinad. Puuviljamasinad. Võileivamasinad. Kuuma toitu serveerivatest olen ka kuulnud, aga näinud vist ei ole ühtegi. Alkoholi ja sigarette müüvad masinad, mis mingist hetkest alates isegi ID'd küsima hakkasid, varasematel aastatel loodeti puhtalt alaealiste hirmule ja kuulekusele, kui jutte uskuda. Hügieenisideme- ja/või kondoomiautomaadid tualettides. Hädatarvilike riideesemetega varustavad automaadid. Kasutatud aluspesu müüvad masinad (don't think about it...) Kanistriveemasinad, jäämasinad.

Peale mitut aastat samas kohas poodlemist (illustreerimaks, et kui asja oodata/otsida ei oska, lihtsalt ei näegi), avastasin ühe neist viimastest selle suve alguses oma kohalikust toidupoest. Peale seda märkan muidugi muudes poodides kah. Asja idee, et kui mingit külmutatud kraami ostad, saad selle õues põrgukuumuses minutiga sulamast/riknemast päästa, kui jääga kotti pakid. Tasuta teenus muuseas. Mega, eks?

Täna aga hüppas asi sammukese kõrgemale tasemele, kui kassiir jäätisepakkidele osutades miskit arusaamatut küsis, mu segaduses näo peale paar mündisuurust metallkettakest pihku pistis, ja käega seina poole lehvitas. Läksin kuulekalt uurima, et mis teema on, kas jäämasinal mingi uus kontroll peal, et mittekliendid tänavalt sisse ei jalutaks ja jääkottidega minema ei kõnniks, või mis. Nope, selgus et: kas uus sugenenud või ajus registreerimata pikalt juba seal olnud, tavalise jäämasina kõrval elas nüüd maagiline kuiva jää masin. Metallkettad pilusse ja muudkui tuleb, täitsa lõpp! Ja kui lõbus sellega pärast kodus veel uduvulkaane ja seebimullimasinaid simuleerida oli. :D

Vot ei usu, et selline asi peale Jaapani mujal toimiks, correct me if I'm wrong.

Cheers,

Hedi

Tõsine nõmedus (toiduvaba)

Cannotcannotcannot think/write in Estonian, mis tähendab, et on ilmselt aeg end just täpselt seda tegema sundida. Kas see lausejuppgi on korrektsepoolses keeles kirjutatud? Kuus+ korda muutsin sõnastust ja ikka pole kindel... Juppgi? Juppki? Appi :(

Igatahes, sattusin eile tõsiselt häiriva uue "kirjandustrendi" peale. Nimelt avaldatakse sama raamatut eri kirjastuste / levitajate poolt eksklusiivsete autorilt tellitud lisapeatükkidega. Mingil määral olevat sellist müügitegevust ka varem esinenud, aga, nimesid nimetamata, kõvahäälne poleemika läks lõpuks lahti ühe vaieldamatult populaarseima YA kirjaniku teoste üle, kel kolme seeria (8 raamatu) peale hetkel "mööda ilma laiali" 12 ekstrapeatükki. Ja tegu ei ole mitte ainult paragrahv-kuni-lehekülg-või-nii mahus lisanditega, vaid 15+ leheküljeliste tervikpeatükkidega, millest suur osa lugejatest, kes oma raamatukoopia ühest allikast ja ühes eksemplaris ostnud, seega täiesti ilma jäävad. NB! Tegu ei ole ka  netist vabalt autori õnnistusega legaalselt kättesaadavate lühinovellide vmt'ga, nagu Pratchetti kettamaailma lühijuttudega näiteks seis. Lisaraha ei maksa, jääd ilma.

Okei, idee poolest peaks need spetsiaalmisiganesed olema ainult padufännidele suunatud ja raamatu põhisisu kohapealt ebaolulise lisainfoga. Ja kui maailm meeldib, kes ei tahaks veidike midagi lisaks saada, eks? Noh, spoiler alert... (ehhh, tõlkeprogramm väidab, et see olla maakeeli spoilerihoiatus.. päriselt? Muuseas, mul läks juba arvepidamine sassi, mitu korda praegu kirjutades sõnastikust inglisekeelsele sõnale eestikeelset vastet otsima olen pidanud... paanika keeleoskuse üle punases...) kuna konkreetse autori raamatud kõik ammuilma (ja osad korduvalt) loetud, kontrollisin ise järgi - no EI klassifitseeru lisainfoks miski, mis mõne peategelase kogu olemuse ja interaktsioonid paari leheküljega pea peale pöörab! (Et õiglane olla, tõsiselt kriitilised olid ehk 3/12, aga ka see on juba liig!)

Aga pole viga, läheb hullemaks.

Eelkirjeldatud autor nimelt teatas hiljuti, et tema järgmine raamat, mis oh no nii muuseas seob tema kaks varasemat seeriat ja mõlema tegelased samasse juttu / maailma (loe: miljonid fännid on hullumas), avaldatakse viie erineva lisapeatükiga, müügil viies erinevas USA raamatupoes. Ehk: tahad kõiki lugeda, osta sama raamat viis korda. Oh, ja kui USAs ei ela, F.U.

Noh, ja siis on üks teine kirjanik, kelle kraami lugenud ise ei ole, kelle raamatul pidi neli totaalselt erinevat lõppu olema. Ei, mitte ühes köites ajuharjutusena / vali-oma-lemmik koos. Lõpp, ja seega ka raamatukogemus, mille keegi saab, sõltub sellest, millise variandi peale ta parajasti juhtub. Ropendama võtab.

Ei tea, palju sellest õudusest autorite ja palju kirjastuste või turundustegelaste ahnuse süü on. Aga väga väga loodan, et lugejaskonna selgelt negatiivne reaktsioon sellisele käitumisele on piisav, et asi hullemaks ei lähe ja et tulevikus raamatuid kogumiskaartide kombel peatükk haaval kokku korjama ei pea hakkama. Seniks aga käsi südamel lubadus, et oma raha, aega ja närve sihukese ebardlikkuse peale ei kuluta - kui netist kätte ei saa, kerigu sinnasamusesse.

Cheers,

Hedi