Scientific Ink

Author: Dunrie

  • Not having to blow dry my hair – the power of a well-placed complaint (gratitude #39)

    Hair Drier...!, originally uploaded by murrus

    I really dislike blowing my hair dry. My hair is wavy, and drying it makes it flyaway, but its really about the boredom of drying it more than the end product.

    When I was a kid, I remember going out in the winter with wet hair. Now, my hair was inches below my shoulders, and so the Michigan winter would freeze it into little icicles and then it would unfreeze when I got to school. Little popsicle-dreadlocks. Probably not a good look for me, and I dimly realized that was probably socially unacceptable so I’ve been trying to fit in ever since by using a hairdryer.

    To this day, I can think of little more boring than waiting for my hair to dry under a loud hot blowing thing. Well, I always assumed I had to deal with it, and I suppose in the winter time I do. This summer, I finally thought to mention this to the one person who could do something about it – the woman who determines my hairstyle – my “beauty operator”. Maureen let me off the hook. She assured me that the simple application of some styling goo could free me from the obligation to blow my hair dry. I could style it wet and not look like a resentful 9-year-old.

    It’s funny. I’ve noticed in work that sometimes things that are really basic might feel too basic to be expressed. Yet, expressing them can unlock a thing or two. It’s the little things, I suppose.

  • Canning – a direct experience of the abundance of summer (gratitude #38)

    It’s that time of year, the Ann Arbor Farmer’s Market is a study in abundance, and my summer reading, Barbara Kingsolver’s Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life, has inspired me to can. Animal, Vegetable, Miracle: A Year of Food Life

    So, I took a perfectly good Saturday and Sunday and made two trips to the Farmer’s Market, a trip to the hardware store, two trips to a grocery store, burned many BTUs of gas on our gas stove, and taught myself to can following the Ball Blue Book of Preserving and an article on canning in the October 2008 Bon Appetit.

    This was my discovery:

    • $15 of organic roma tomatoes plus
    • a few dollars of organic shallots plus
    • a few dollars in organic lemon juice plus
    • $30 in canning supplies (jar lifter, magnetic lid lifter, pint jars, canning funnel)
    • labor peeling, seeding, stirring, ladling, and then boiling the jars of sauce

    makes about six pint jars of fresh tomato sauce, something which when purchased would have cost many dollars less than what I spent. Yet, I didn’t burn myself, had some fun cooking and learning, have some lovely jars of pinky-red tomatoes lighting up the shelves of my basement, and I have stored a bit of this lovely summer sunshine for later.

    I realized that canning is kind of like knitting a sweater. It’s not that I saved any money, it’s that I got to enjoy the process and engaging with something concrete – beautiful yarn in the case of a sweater, beautiful produce in the case of canning. That level of absorbtion and attention is almost intoxicating, while my hands were slicing the 50th tomato, my mind was wondering at the variety of shape and color and detail in the box of romas. Plus, I experienced a distinct sense of abundance when processing a big pile of tomatoes- their weight, their texture, their color, bounty. So, after I finished the tomatoes on Saturday, I was up for another round on Sunday. With dinner guests arriving at 6PM, I carefully planned my day of cornbread-baking, coleslaw-making, peach cobbler-baking, and my husband’s slow cooking of the spare ribs with more canning. I discovered that

    • $20 in fresh figs plus
    • zest of two lemons plus
    • sugar and brandy

    makes six 1/2-pint jars of drunken fig jam. It’s tasty, though I’ll have to arrange to get myself invited to sophisticated dinner or wine tasting parties where I can bring this as an addition to a cheese plate…Dear reader, let me know if you’re hosting such an event. I have the housewarming gift ready to go!

    I loved it, I’d do it again, and I realized just how much I love my dishwasher, which I think ran about 6 times this weekend, no fooling, and that’s even after I hand-washed all of the pots.

  • Out on a limb – a friend helps rescue me from myself (gratitude #37)

    I like computers. I have worked in IT since before I left graduate school. I’m comfortable around really technical people: software developers/coders and the like. I am usually careful to say that I know my way around technical folks, but I’m not technical myself. I have an iPhone, I use my laptop wirelessly at work, at home, and even at the “cabin”, but I rely on smart colleagues and family members to give me access.

    All that to say, I’m not really all that technical. I’ll readily admit this, or at least that’s what I thought. A few weeks ago, friends called and asked if I’d help them get one of their computers onto the other’s wireless network. I tried to beg off on the phone, I made excuses such as “my husband takes care of that for me”. They instantly said it was fine if he came too. Sigh. Knowing I’d never get him over to their home, I gave in and went to their place to play computer admin, knowing better.

    Merrivale range, DartmoorYeah, right.

    So, it all started innocently enough. I messed around with their computer and indeed verified that they weren’t talking to each other. At that point, it would have been wise to raise my hands and say, “wow, I’m stumped, I really don’t know how to help. Gotta go!”

    Instead, drawn in by their faith in me and their desperation, I kept trying. You see, the one that wasn’t communicating was a PC, so I looked up various “my PC won’t talk to my AirPort network” and hacked around. Eventually, I had hacked around enough that the AirPort network was completely inaccessible. At that point (thanks to the iPhone) I learned how to reboot an AirPort Extreme network with default settings.

    At the end of the evening, after having torched and then re-setup my innocent friends’ wireless network without having given the PC access, I retreated home. Relieved to have gotten myself out of it.

    That is, until the support phone call. “Hey, so I can’t print anymore, and I’m leaving in 20 minutes to go up north and I need the directions that are in my email”. Ummmmm. Wow. Yeah. Whoops. I tried to help, she elected to just hand copy the directions and said she’d get back to me when she returned from vacation.

    I am guessing her printer was trying to talk to the wireless network I torched, and wasn’t electing to switch to the new network. How to fix that was completely beyond me. I complained to my husband, regretting and lamenting my own foolishness. He recommended I call a friend who actually is good at this kind of thing, and see if I could wheedle him into helping me. Eric agreed to help. The two of us went over, I stayed for a while, and then I left while I got it sorted out. I am grateful I didn’t do more harm, and grateful for Eric to have saved me and my innocent friends from my “helpfulness”.

    I think the lessons I learned were:

    1. Be more clear about my limits.
    2. Ask for help.
    3. Eric rocks.

    Thanks Eric!

  • A seed inside a peach pit

    So, today I got a 1/4 peck of peaches at the Ann Arbor Farmers Market. I wanted to make something with them, wasn’t sure what. A year or so ago, my brother-in-law put a tiny bottle of bourbon into my husband’s Christmas stocking, and it’s been sitting in our liquor cabinet ever since. I decided to make a bourbon peach cobbler. The dish (and I) received accolades from my husband. Eating it was fun. Also fun was prepping the peaches for the cobbler. I don’t think I’ve ever seen inside a peach pit before, but one of them opened in my hand. Reminded me of my more botanical days – Prunus persica, has a drupe or stone fruit. Pretty cool.

    Peach pits and a peach seed

  • Add to calendar “apologies”

    I really do like how Google Calendar works, and I like the fact that it tries to interact smartly with my gmail. I’ve been amused at some of the entries it has tried to make. This might be my best yet. Add to calendar "apologies"The funny thing is, it wasn’t a particularly abject or obsequious email thread, but there we have it, apologies, scheduled for 9/12. Funny.

    Particularly as I contemplate moving from being a project manager to becoming an account/engagement manager, I wonder if I’ll have apologies scheduled on my calendar more or less often…I would hope not, but moving into a more customer service role may require a different skillset.

  • Fishing boat improves a marriage (not in the way you might think, gratitude #36)

    This year, my husband bought a fishing boat. "new" boat

    It started a few years ago, when my cousin’s husband Rob brought his boat up to the cabin and they went out on one trip and landed several trout and salmon. Dave was hooked. He always needed to know whether Rob was coming north, and whether he was bringing his boat. Well, this year, he finally just got a boat himself. He is an engineer, and so by nature analytical and thoughtful. He did a thorough analysis of all of the boats available on Craigslist, picked a few, and then passed them by the fishermen in the family for approval.

    One boat made it through the approval process – a 17-foot Monark with two outboard motors (a fast one and a trolling motor) and with all of the equipment he’d need. Of course, that didn’t stop Dave from acquiring additional items from eBay (lures, poles, you name it) and from taking trips to Cabela’s to further outfit the boat.

    Well, he works hard and deserves his fun, so I didn’t complain. And, when we’re both at the cabin without my uncle Bob or my cousin’s husband Rob, I’m his fishing partner. I help him get the boat into and out of our garage (non-trivial, given we have a lovely tree right in the way). I help him get the boat launched from the dock at Dyers Bay, and I help him on the boat itself.

    Now, Dave and I are a great pair. I’m typically wracked with nervous energy and he’s Mr. Relaxed. I married him because I needed him around to calm me down and help me enjoy the moment. Well, the fascinating thing is that on the boat, I’m Ms. Relaxed and he’s Mr. Energy. It’s weird, its as if our roles are reversed.

    As soon as we’ve launched the boat, I’m content to just loll around on deck, even better if I can bust out a flotation cushion, put my hat on my face, and go straight to sleep. I am willing to help steer while he’s fussing with the poles and the lures, but I’m relieved when it is his turn to steer, watch the fish-finder and the depth-raider and have his fun. Too many little screens to watch, too much underwater topography to navigate, when there’s all this lovely water and and a great cushion to which to attend.

    Here’s the important part: I’m happy to be on the boat, watching the shoreline and the homes and the other boats. I’m happy if we don’t catch a fish. In fact, I’m happier if we don’t catch a fish because boating makes me incredibly lazy. I love how lazy it makes me, I’m content to just bob in the water, apply another coat of sunscreen, and hope we don’t catch a fish because that will entail actual work.

    Unfortunately for me, but good for him, we’ve been doing well, fishing-wise. In our last two trips, we’ve landed an 8-pound and a 12-pound king salmon respectively. He hauls them in and I net them. These fish have given us way more lovely salmon than two people can eat. So, we’ve made gravelax, given some to neighbors, and we’ve vacuum-sealed and frozen some.

    But, I had no idea what the boat would do for us – give us some quality time together and give me a chance to catch some zzzzzzzzes under the sunshine while Mr. Relaxed fusses with lures (Kevorkian? Monkey Puke? Always have to have a watermelon in the water, the salmon seem to love that one). He loves getting out there and landing a fish, and I think the infrequent rewards reinforce his ardor.

    Now, I would have thought that a fishing boat might improve a marriage based on the “absence makes the heart grow fonder” adage. Not in this case. For me, it give us time together and a welcome reversal of roles. Now and then it is fun to be the relaxed one, while he does all the work of catching and then fileting the fishies we bring up. So, although I laughed when he bought the boat, and laughed when he got the tow rig for the car, and I laughed when each and every package from eBay came filled with lures and rods and what-have-you, I’m thrilled about the boat. I love seeing the Georgian Bay shoreline of the Bruce Peninsula from the water. I love watching the loons dive and surface, I love seeing the rocky bluffs and forest I couldn’t get to on the land, and I love the time with my husband. Of course, if we caught fewer fish, I might be even more content (and relaxed) but he’s happy this way, so I can’t complain.