Friday Five

1. What was the last song you heard?

Black Sabbath, The Mob Rules

2. What were the last two movies you saw?

Master and Commander
X-Men II

3. What were the last three things you purchased?

A Pepsi. A bagel. Gas for the car.

4. What four things do you need to do this weekend?

Clean out one of my hard drives. Re-install Windows. Get the last of the materials for the retaining wall. Finish my Japanese homework.

5. Who are the last five people you talked to?

Omaha. Kouryou-chan. Yamaarashi-chan. Liz. Omaha's pharmacist, Mike.

A quiet day so far...

It has been a quiet day for us. Yamaarashi-chan arrived early this morning, and was in a miserable, sleepy mood when she got here. She also complained of being hungry, so we fed her some of Omaha's home-made breakfast muffins and a bowl of mini-wheat cereal. She curled up in my arm for most of the morning, then fell asleep around 11 and slept until almost 1pm. We had to awaken her for eyedrops and codiene and lunch, which she also made disappear. She wasn't allowed any food before surgery and she didn't want any after, so other than some soup last night this is the first solid food she's wanted.

Someone said they weren't sure for what Yamaarashi-chan was in surgery. She had (hopefully, past tense) strabismus; her eyes did not line up properly, resulting in a "lazy eye" appearance. The surgery involves moving the outer orbit eye muscles back a bit and re-attaching them to the eye; once healed, she'll re-learn how to use them and, with therapy, gain stereo vision.

After she woke up, she wanted some television and, against my better judgement, I let her watch her usual favorite shows even with Kouryou-chan in the house; definitely don't want Kouryou-chan getting hooked on the mental candy that is Pokemon. She also chowed down the hotdog we made her for lunch. I also bathed her and washed her hair and made her change her clothes, so she no longer smells like pancake syrup and mildew.

I'm really glad I didn't have to give her the anti-nausea medicine. The stick-figure "how to" illustration shows a man sitting on an arrow-- that should say it all. (If I could get the damned Windows box working properly, I'd scan it in and show it to you.)

Well, it looks like it could be up to six months before I have a working laptop. We simply don't have the money right now to afford a fix for Lain. Guess the Journal Entries are going to be on hold for a while. This just sucks.

( Anime Reviews: Daphne In The Brilliant Blue and Uninhabited Planet Survive. )

Popcorn for geeks

Okay, I need a little help from the audience. Here's the recipe:

25g popcorn
2.0g vegetable oil
1.1g salt
4.2g butter
0.3g baking soda


Put the vegetable oil in a heavy-bottomed pot and turn stove to medium-high or high heat. Add three kernels of corn. Wait until they pop and the oil is ready. Put in the rest of the corn, cover, and shake until all the kernels pop. Remove from the heat, let cool slightly, add the butter and shake. Add salt and baking soda.

This is, according to Nature magazine, the perfect popcorn recipe. I tried it. It is actually a damned fine recipe, definitely getting up there on the perfection scale, and doing serious damage to previous recipes I've collected. It also makes a nice, snack-sized batch.

The problem is, "0.3g baking soda" and "4.2g butter" is damnably hard to calculate. Other than "multiply by four" (1/2 cup of popcorn is about 100g) and figure out what the equivalents would be (and do harm to my waistline), are there any suggestions from the audience?