nuxx.net
Making, baking, and (un-)breaking things in Southeast Michigan.

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Walk with me down the trails again…

December 20, 2005


Click for more…

I don’t know if any of you can help me, but I’ve got an old bow of my Grandpa’s here and I’m trying to figure out what exactly it is. I know it is a Fred Bear-brand bow and I think that it was made in the early 1940s. Beyond that, I’m kinda at a loss.

I posted to a Michigan Bowhunter forum hoping that someone there can help me, so I guess we’ll see. If you click the link above or this one (photo gallery retired) you can see the pictures I grabbed of it.

If you can help, I’d really appreciate it. He (my Grandpa) asked me to see if I can find out about how much it is worth, and I’m also curious how rare it is, etc. The wood on it appears to be in great shape, with the only damage on it being to the finish itself. And all that damage looks quite old.

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Lazychili for Work! (chili sin carne)

December 13, 2005

Well, there’s the ingredients for the pot of lazychili (yes, modifications are quite allowed) that I made for the potluck thing at work tomorrow. I hope people like it… It’s pretty damn spicy.

One thing I learned is that the cactus should be cut up before putting it in the chili. Towards the end of the cooking I realized that it would be too stringy, so I stirred as many pieces of cactus (as possible) to the top, pulled them out with a fork, then chopped them and put them back in. Oh, and cactus has a texture somewhere between a nicely cooked green bean and perfectly cooked bamboo shoots. And it comes soaking in a thick vinegar sauce with herbs and onions and a pepper. I pulled out the pepper and onion before dumping it in the pot, though, as I didn’t want those large pieces swimming around in there.

The only ingredients used above and beyond what you see above are a bit of cocoa powder (maybe 1 tbsp), some salt, and a large pinch of black pepper. Oh, and love. (No, not that kind of love. Sicko.)

I should probably note that the bottle of beer is my Rochefort 10 Clone (photo gallery retired) which, unfortunately, never carbonated. It’s very malty and alcoholic, though, and it goes really well in food. So I guess it’ll be relegated to the duty of a nice, malty, cooking beer. Oh well…

Anyway, that’s the lazychili. And here is a photo of the lazychili in the pot, just as it was starting to boil.

UPDATE: I should probably mention that the shotglasses each contain one shot of this tequila. From the chili kit I only used the powder, along with another 2 tbsp or so of some leftover McCormick chili powder I had. Oh, and the chipoltes were chopped up pretty finely. And the obscured Bush’s can contains white kidney beans.

foodmoved from livejournalwork

Inwood Hiking Trails in Snow

December 11, 2005


The path leading from points ‘E’ to ‘F’ in the Inwood Hiking Trails
(Click for more…)

As I tend to do lately, I headed out to the Inwood Hiking Trails yesterday to go wandering around. I haven’t really been hiking in the snow before, but I figured that a not-too-cold day after a nice snowfall would be a good time to wander around one of my favorite local hiking places.

Well, despite almost falling through some ice and ending up with frozen solid pant legs afterwards, it really was a nice walk. It turned out that everyone else who had been there since last week’s big snowfall had turned back after only going a few hundred feet into the park. That meant that all of the trails were covered with nothing more than animal tracks and nice, fresh, powdery snow. At one point I even came across both foot and wing prints from where a bird had landed and what appears to be signs of a small animal being dropped in the snow then running away. Perhaps from a bird or something?

The only part that had me somewhat worried was this pathway which, in the snow, seems innocent enough. However, if one looks at it in the summer time it’s pretty obvious that there is a bunch of marsh and other wet badness which one would not want to accidently fall in. (Although comparing the two pictures, I wonder if they are the same walkway, or similar ones.)

Anyway, it was a really nice time wandering through the woods. The only problem is that my calves, knees, and hips are horribly sore. I’ve realized that walking through 4″ – 6″ snow for a few hours, including up and down a number of relatively steep hills requires one to walk differently. And that walking differently puts a rather unique load on one’s body.

Oh and I also scanned in all four ‘pages’ of the flyer which is distributed near the entrance to the Inwood Hiking Trails: 1 · 2 · 3 · 4

Based on the map of Inwood Hiking Trails I walked about 3.4 miles in the snow. Figuring in little bits of back tracking, wandering a short ways down other trails and other meandering, I’d figure I probably did a total of 3.5 miles, by the end of which I was far more tired than if I had done seven miles on dry ground. Wow.

moved from livejournaloutdoorsweather

Let’s do the time warp again…

December 9, 2005

Okay, so from last night around the time I got home until today just after I got home, I captured 2762 individual frames in an attempt to make a stop motion video of last night’s snow storm. One frame was captured every ~30 seconds, then those were all squished into a video running at 30 frames per second, making each second of cover 15 minutes.

The video is available here if you would like to see it:

08 – 09 December 2005 Snow Storm Timelapse (~12MB, H.264, 640 x 480 @ 30fps)

I apologize about the screen in the window, but it is non-trivial to remove it. Also, it appears the window is much dirtier than I thought, but I was having a hard time telling that last night, so I just ended up shooting through the dirty window. Ah well, at least it’s kinda nifty.

I’m sure there will be plenty of other snow storms this year. Next time I really want to have a camera that can be controlled by Apple’s Image Capture and have each photo taken automatically downloaded to the local machine. Now that could make for some nifty time lapse video.

making thingsmoved from livejournalweather

Tonight’s photos…

December 9, 2005


Greasy, greasy three cheese bread from Hungry Howie’s.

Anyone want to see photos of a BTX machine? This Dell Dimension E310 (photo gallery retired) is the first BTX machine I have ever worked with, and I have to say that I rather like the layout. It allows the machine to be cooled very quietly.

Second, here are two photos of portions of tonight’s dinner:
· A bottle of Hennepin partially poured into the glass from which I drank it.
· Hungry Howie’s Three Cheese Bread with cajun seasoning on it. (Yes, it was really greasy.) The Hennepin is really nice, but the three cheese bread is (and should be) simply a food of desperation. Yes, that’s what is pictured above.

Also, when I stopped by Red Wagon Wine Shoppe yesterday at lunch I picked up a bottle of both Dogfish Head’s Pangaea and World Wide Stout, and Aecht Schlenkerla Rauchbier (Marzen). A photo of those three beers can be seen here: Aecht Schlenkerla Rauchbier (Marzen), Dogfish Head’s World Wide Stout, and Dogfish Head’s Pangaea

Finally, I also got some photos of last night’s dinner. The first part was Trader Joe’s Roasted Vegetable Enchiladas: 1 · 2 · 3 · 4. These are kinda iffy, and I’m not sure if I’d buy them again.

The second part was Trader Jose’s (Joe’s) Wild Mushroom Quesadilla. They are $2.99 each, seem to store well in the fridge, and taste quite nice. I have to highly recommend these.

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Snow!

December 8, 2005

I am trying out an experiment. If things go according to plan, I’ll have a timelapse movie of tonight’s (forecasted) massive snowfall. At the same time, the image up above should update with the current captured frame. We’ll see how that goes.

Oh, and yes, that is the best image I could get without a bunch of CCD noise. And no, I don’t have an easy way to remove the screen, and the only window I have without a screen (the doorwall) doesn’t have enough light outside of it for one to be able to see the snow. Ah well. :)

If you want to view this on it’s own page refreshing every 30 seconds or so, visit http://www.nuxx.net/webcam.

moved from livejournalweather

KLEENEX Anti-Viral Tissues (Revisited)

December 8, 2005


KLEENEX®-brand Anti-Viral Tissue Box
(Photo of anti-viral layer.)

Okay, having looked more into the KLEENEX®-brand Anti-Viral tissues, I figured I’d add some more info about them.

First off, the copy from the back of the box:

Because cold and flu viruses are often spread by hand contact, KLEENEX® Brand has developed a tissue for your whole family. KLEENEX® Anti-Viral* tissue has three soft layers, including a moisture-activated middle layer that kills 99.9% of cold and flu viruses* in the tissue within 15 minutes. This product has not been tested against bacteria, fungo or other viruses. See below for anti-viral* details.

ACTIVE INGREDIENTS:
Citric Acid 7.51%
Sodium Lauryl Sulfate 2.02%
INERT INGREDIENTS 90.47%
Total 100%

Directions for Use: It is a violation of Federal law to use this product in a manner inconsistent with its labeling. Use only as a facial tissue.
*Virucidal Agent: Rhinoviruses Type 1A and 2 (Rhinoviruses are the leading cause of the common cold); Influenza A and Influenza B (causes of the flu); Respiratory Syncytial Virus (RSV – the leading cause of lower respiratory infection in children).
Storage and Disposal: Store in a dry area. Dispose of used tissues promptly. Do not reuse empty container.

Okay, so now I am just confused. If one takes all the directions on the package into account, one should never handle the used tissues and therefore the anti-viral agents should be unnecessary.

That said, I can think of the following things which these tissues could allow one to safely do:

· Drying (possibly by hanging) of used tissues for future reuse, as they no longer contain cold-spreading virsuses.
· Recycling of used tissues into a food product. (Perhaps just a filler to provide extra bulk?)
· Behaving like a stereotypical OAP (older aged person) and carrying a tissue around and constantly reusing it.
· Non-infectious performance art prop. But what is the point then?
· Garbage can (bin) of used tissues can safely be used along side hair (human and/or animal) as rustic pillow stuffing.
· Reusable (leave-in-place-all-day) toilet seat liner.

Hrm. Still, I think these are technology and marketing going where they shouldn’t go. Despite the new possibilities, I’ll personally just stick with toilet paper roll when it comes to blowing my nose.

UPDATE: If I’m ever really mad at a girl who may be at my place, I’ll just run out of toilet paper and change to boxes of these on the back of the toilet.

healthmoved from livejournal

Anti-Viral KLEENEX

December 8, 2005

Anti-Viral KLEENEX taste, as expected, sour and bitter. They contain citric acid and sodium laureth sulfate which, I can only imagine, work with the wetness created when one’s nose is blown into them, and supposedly kills viruses. And yes, they taste just as I expected them to.

healthmoved from livejournal