random Sunday ramblings
Dec. 4th, 2016 08:36 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sarea
Wow. Words can't express how sad I am. Earl Thomas, my fave Seahawk, had to leave tonight's game early due to a broken tibia, and he tweeted that he's considering retirement. Honestly, he should do whatever's right for him... I love watching him play and there are certainly more important things in life than football. However, I also know how much he loves the game, and for him to say that, it probably hurts him more than it hurts me, which is what makes me sad. He's so passionate and crazy and I love that about him. I also think that whatever chances the Seahawks had in the playoffs just went down dramatically. They just aren't the same team without him; that's the plain, unvarnished truth. Look how horrific they were last week without him. And now the most important part of the Legion of Boom might not be back (certainly not for this season). :( Get well soon, Earl!!
I had a pretty productive day. It really helps when the Seahawks game is in the evening, because then I have all day to do what I need to do, and then watching the game is like a reward. When it's in the morning or middle of the day, it not only takes out that chunk of daylight, it also can affect my mood for the rest of the day, depending on how they do! Sometimes I'm too depressed to do anything than sit around like a slug!
Anyway, so I:
1) Made Pad Thai! I used Pailin's recipe from Hot Thai Kitchen (watch the video). She's like the Maangchi of Thai food. Other than fish sauce and peanuts, sooooooooo many of the ingredients were not a part of my pantry. It was worth it though; home run on the Pad Thai! I was eager to try her recipe, because a number of years ago, I had authentic Pad Thai -- which wasn't red, from ketchup or tomato paste or paprika or whatever it is that American Thai restaurants put in it to make it that color -- and it was so amazing that I'd always wanted to have it again. Making it seemed super arduous, and yet it's been surprisingly/depressingly difficult to find a Thai restaurant that actually makes authentic Thai food that doesn't cater to American tastes. The best place I've found in Seattle (actually, recommended to me by a Thai coworker) is Thaiku. But it's alllll the way in Phinney Ridge, so I can't get there regularly. Most Thai restaurant food is way too sweet for me. I mean, Thai food should be a little sweet. It's got a very well-rounded flavor profile, where everything is supposed to have elements of salty, sweet, sour, spicy, etc. But sweetness seems to be the predominant flavor of most Thai food in restaurants. :/ ANYWAY, after getting Pailin's recipe book and watching her video, I realized that Pad Thai wasn't hard at all; it was just a matter of getting the right ingredients. It was simple after that!
2) Made Vietnamese spring rolls! Okay, so this I've done before. It's also really easy and a matter of having the rice paper and all that. What I hadn't done before was make the peanut sauce that usually comes with them, from scratch. I made both nước chấm (a fish sauce-based sauce) and the peanut sauce... surprisingly -- though really, it shouldn't have been -- the peanut sauce was far more savory than I'm used to from restaurants, and it was delicious. I was a little meh on the homemade nước chấm; the recipe I used didn't call for any lemon or lime juice and I think it needed that element.
3) Built a cat washroom! :)) WTF? you might be thinking. Well, this was one of those things I ran across during Black Friday, and I was like, omg, this is brilliant! Must have! It hides the litter box, and I also bought a really good litter mat to put in it to help with not having bits of litter scattered all over the laundry room. At the same time, I also got a Litter Genie, which I wish I'd known about before. I always have issues with litter bags, and this thing supposedly even masks the smell of the litter, so bonus if that's true. The only problem is... it's wider than I expected. (This is what comes of not measuring before you buy something.) I was originally going to put it in front of the washer/dryer, with the Litter Genie and box of litter in the "hidden corner" next to the dryer. It would have been a nice setup, because from the doorway you wouldn't have been able to see any cat litter paraphernalia at all! But it juts out further than expected, so there's danger of hitting your hand on a sharp corner when loading the dryer, which means now I've put the washroom in the corner (with just enough room for Jaime to get in and out), with the other stuff exposed like they were before. :/ And now it's going to be (even more of) a pain clean the litter box, because I'll have to pull out the bench in order to open the door to pull out the litter box. >< Me and my great ideas...
I also woke with a sore-ish throat. It's not like my typical sore throats, it just... feels funny. Don't know what that's about, but I hope it clears up by tomorrow. :/
I had a pretty productive day. It really helps when the Seahawks game is in the evening, because then I have all day to do what I need to do, and then watching the game is like a reward. When it's in the morning or middle of the day, it not only takes out that chunk of daylight, it also can affect my mood for the rest of the day, depending on how they do! Sometimes I'm too depressed to do anything than sit around like a slug!
Anyway, so I:
1) Made Pad Thai! I used Pailin's recipe from Hot Thai Kitchen (watch the video). She's like the Maangchi of Thai food. Other than fish sauce and peanuts, sooooooooo many of the ingredients were not a part of my pantry. It was worth it though; home run on the Pad Thai! I was eager to try her recipe, because a number of years ago, I had authentic Pad Thai -- which wasn't red, from ketchup or tomato paste or paprika or whatever it is that American Thai restaurants put in it to make it that color -- and it was so amazing that I'd always wanted to have it again. Making it seemed super arduous, and yet it's been surprisingly/depressingly difficult to find a Thai restaurant that actually makes authentic Thai food that doesn't cater to American tastes. The best place I've found in Seattle (actually, recommended to me by a Thai coworker) is Thaiku. But it's alllll the way in Phinney Ridge, so I can't get there regularly. Most Thai restaurant food is way too sweet for me. I mean, Thai food should be a little sweet. It's got a very well-rounded flavor profile, where everything is supposed to have elements of salty, sweet, sour, spicy, etc. But sweetness seems to be the predominant flavor of most Thai food in restaurants. :/ ANYWAY, after getting Pailin's recipe book and watching her video, I realized that Pad Thai wasn't hard at all; it was just a matter of getting the right ingredients. It was simple after that!
2) Made Vietnamese spring rolls! Okay, so this I've done before. It's also really easy and a matter of having the rice paper and all that. What I hadn't done before was make the peanut sauce that usually comes with them, from scratch. I made both nước chấm (a fish sauce-based sauce) and the peanut sauce... surprisingly -- though really, it shouldn't have been -- the peanut sauce was far more savory than I'm used to from restaurants, and it was delicious. I was a little meh on the homemade nước chấm; the recipe I used didn't call for any lemon or lime juice and I think it needed that element.
3) Built a cat washroom! :)) WTF? you might be thinking. Well, this was one of those things I ran across during Black Friday, and I was like, omg, this is brilliant! Must have! It hides the litter box, and I also bought a really good litter mat to put in it to help with not having bits of litter scattered all over the laundry room. At the same time, I also got a Litter Genie, which I wish I'd known about before. I always have issues with litter bags, and this thing supposedly even masks the smell of the litter, so bonus if that's true. The only problem is... it's wider than I expected. (This is what comes of not measuring before you buy something.) I was originally going to put it in front of the washer/dryer, with the Litter Genie and box of litter in the "hidden corner" next to the dryer. It would have been a nice setup, because from the doorway you wouldn't have been able to see any cat litter paraphernalia at all! But it juts out further than expected, so there's danger of hitting your hand on a sharp corner when loading the dryer, which means now I've put the washroom in the corner (with just enough room for Jaime to get in and out), with the other stuff exposed like they were before. :/ And now it's going to be (even more of) a pain clean the litter box, because I'll have to pull out the bench in order to open the door to pull out the litter box. >< Me and my great ideas...
I also woke with a sore-ish throat. It's not like my typical sore throats, it just... feels funny. Don't know what that's about, but I hope it clears up by tomorrow. :/
