Winding Down For A While in a Room With a View
I’m up here at my brother’s place in Placerville. View from my office window this morning.
As you can see, it comes completely decorated and includes a resident Shih Tzu named Kobe.
Arrived last evening after a day and night at the cabin in Arnold, where “Groker” (Jaime Perez), “Nicole Ocampo,” and “Stark Soze” amused themselves trolling Wooo’s blog (Who? Wooo. Who? Wooo. WoooWho). Jaime was the avoid conflict, understanding, peacemaker, questioning kinda dude. Nicole’s mom knew Richard in Olongapo, PI way back. Stark is an asshole misogynist who always gets carried away and in that vein, blew up the whole deal. I was saving it up for a YHBT (you have been trolled, in ASCII art) post, but Soze always ruins everything he touches.
Plus, I didn’t bother to light up a proxy server to spoof IP addresses. Clever one, that Who. Oh for the USENET days, where nobody with an AOL account knew the Unix shell commands to find out that stuff. On the other hand, the whole troll did have the desired result of keeping a bunch of hens cackling about what an evil and loathsome man Richard is.
Bea—who has nothing but sympathy from cackling hens—is still in San Jose, last day of school, headed up here tomorrow AM with the two rat killer brats. Then, we head to South Lake Tahoe for three nights with my parents.
…I made another batch of Horchata de Chufa, my version. Soak the Tiger Nuts for a couple of days, until they swell up and have a water chestnut consistency, then dump in blender, add more water, pulverize, strain through cheesecloth. No sugar. Plenty sweet as it is. This is 12 oz bag of nuts to a full quart of water.
Funny thing about that sediment. I think it’s mostly raw resistant starch, RS2 to be more precise. You know, that stuff that’s so bad for you while RS3 is manna from heaven—in spite of the fact that human ancestors have been eating raw Tiger Nuts for eons before RS3 was even possible from cooking and cooling. Baboons are chowing down on them to this day.
If you were to take a few tablespoons of raw potato starch, add water, shake it up, let it settle and turn the bottle on its side, it’s going to look a lot like this. Non-Newtonian Fluid time.
I Googled for ‘spaniards drop dead from horchata consumption.’ No hits. Nonetheless, be very careful out there, in spite of admonitions that it’s probably safe to go in the water.
…I took a 5-minute hang glider flight vicariously this morning. Among the best vids I’ve ever seen, professionally shot by the Red Bull team from a helicopter. The scenery is breathtaking—wish I knew what location. Oh, it’s done to Pink Floyd music. Hard to go wrong: hang gliding and Pink Floyd. Oh, there’s great aerobatics, too
Louder than words from Matjaz Klemencic on Vimeo.
I may blog some more substantive stuff over the next couple of weeks but not going to worry about it if I don’t feel the compelling urge.
Happy festivities, wherever you may be.
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Shhhh, with all this talk about how evil RS2 is you might give me some indigestion from all the RS2 I eat.
As much as I love horchata, I can’t shake the feeling that I’m tossing a lot of beneficial plant material in the trash.
“As much as I love horchata, I can’t shake the feeling that I’m tossing a lot of beneficial plant material in the trash.”
I hear that, which is why I don’t make it often. I’m sure they could be saved, dried, added to stuff, though.
I save mine and mix it in to my Starch Smoothie. I mix my scraps in to my banana flour, inulin, psyllium husk and ORAC morning drink.
No waste
In truth she may have a valid point in so much that people with autoimmune issues taking potato starch may pose an issue, not because of the starch but because of the protein cross re-activity. It is been proven after all potatoes, peppers, tomatoes, egg plant etc… can cause such issues.
But knowing that rice, tapioca, eggs, dairy, coffee, chocolate may also cause issues. For some they may not notice those issues until they load up substantially on those foods. Now, if I start taking 4tbs of PS a day I will ache from my arthritis. Why, because it is raw and concentrated. It is not the starch that is causing issues but stuff mixed in with the starch causing the issues.
I seem to recall a post you put up several months ago where a gentleman came up with a process to remove the “toxins” so us sick folks can use the PS.
A great video and a Pink Floyd song I haven’t heard before – bonus!
I especially like the bit at ~ 3mins where he flies backwards – a neat trick if you can pull it off.
The horchata de chufa seems interesting, I must give it a shot. I’ve turned into a bit of a fermento the last year or so. I’ve been making jun, kombucha, beet kvass, water and milk kefir, as well as lacto-fermented veggies. Making this seems up my ally.
I’m thinking since the horchata sits for 12 plus hours there would be some probiotic develop in there? So if the starch it’s kept, and the probiotics grow it’d be great for one’s microbiome I’d imagine…
“I’m thinking since the horchata sits for 12 plus hours there would be some probiotic develop in there?”
You would be right. Bubbly. First time, I discarded the soak liquid but this time, I used it and added water. About the same taste wise, and in both cases, every time I pop the stopper, bacteria farts.
Richard, those photos aren’t good my man. Fix things soon eh? For your own sake.
“The scenery is breathtaking—wish I knew what location”
On YouTube he wrote that it was over his home valley. He’s from Tolmin, Slovenia. Nearest airfield…
Aeroklub Bovec
Rupa 15
5230 Bovec
Slovenia
I don’t know anything about this flying around business but that video was mesmerizing. So, okay, there’s two flying things attached by a cord. The first one has an engine? The other doesn’t? Then when it’s just one flying and doing the loop de loops and other incredible manoeuvers, does that one have an engine of some sort (the smoke coming out?)? The way he lands is really gorgeous. Such control. Wow. I’d crash.
And the guy who is hang gliding in the second glider… how hard is it to balance like that holding on with the hands for long periods of time? Looks like it takes some considerable strength.
I know, I sound totally naïve but I’ve never watched anything like this before and it is fascinating.
@Duck
Thanks for that info.
@Gabs
This is aero tow hang gliding. Yes, the one in front is motorized and when the guy being towed get to an altitude he wants, or has good thermal lift, he pulls the release. The smoke coming out the keel is just for show, it’s not a propellant.
You’re not hanging on. You’re in a harness which is suspended from the keel. It’s about 10,000 pound test nylon webbing. What you are holding onto is the control frame, which is attached at the apex to the keel, and each corner via a wire, to about midway down each wing. in this way, treating the control bar roughly as you steer a shopping cart, and by virtue of your suspended weigh causes the flexible wings to warp, and so you can precisely control for turning. And, you can vary speed by pulling in (faster) or pushing out (slower).
Here’s more:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hang_gliding
While I’ve done some aero tow in Florida, I’m mainly a foot launch guy, off a mountain.
Here’s a flight just over a year ago, just some bits from the launch and flying around, then the landing.
http://youtu.be/CcYHOl1q-Mc?list=UU2okFVY2L0VOCb9IlvBaluw
And here’s a 1-minute version of a 30-minute flight, set to Led Zeppelin.
http://youtu.be/bjDCvfhc-9c?list=UU2okFVY2L0VOCb9IlvBaluw
It can be awesome. Most memorable flight perhaps was at Indian Valley, Greenville, CA. over 3 hours. I launched from 4,000 ft elevation and the landing area is at about 2,000 ft. I caught good lift off launch and flew the ridge for an hour or so, usually between 5 – 7,500 ft. Decided to find some sink and land, but when getting set up for approach, just 300 ft over the field, it was dammed unpleasant with thermals kicking off, wind direction changing substantially, etc. So, I thought, if I hit a good one I’m getting out of here. And I did, and the thermal was so big, fat and smooth that I circled in all the way up to 12,000 ft.
….Oh, a lot of guys do cross country as well. It’s a logistic hassle, though. Record XC flight is from Zapata, TX way up into Texas, starting as soon as there’s whiffs of lift between 9-10 am, and landing right at sundown nearly 12 hours later (you just unzip a little and let it hang to go—why they really call it “hang” gliding). Anyway, distance was about 450 miles. Lots of guys do 100+ mile flights on the weekends for fun, but logistically tough. You have to have a driver, the whole radio deal, etc.
I once launched from Chelan Butte in eastern Washington and after gaining altitude to about 10,000 ft, crossed the Columbia River gorge and headed east over the flats. However, I had a head wind (there’s nowhere to go west except into unlandable and inaccessible territory) so only made it about 16 miles, setting it down in a fallow wheat field next to the highway.
Oh, just remembered this other of my favorites, from the 2010 Worlds in Monte Cucco Italy.
http://youtu.be/lEjJmlEmnds
By coincidence, Bea and I were at Cinque Terre for a week right before the competition and ran into some HG folks I knew, on their way to the comp.
OK, one more. Girls fly too:
http://youtu.be/xwaTmY1XyaM
hi Richard ,,the Bulk Barn franchise in Canada started selling tiger nut flour a couple months ago,it really surprised me to see it there,bought some used it went for more to find out that it was discontinued because of lack of interest,,they had sold the remaining lot at 1/2 price,,visited Mom in another town and went to the local Bulk Barn and and surprise, they had some left at the discounted 1/2 off price and scooped 10 lbs,what a score ..brought it home packaged it and froze it,,To all Canadians go to tour local Bulk Barn to check for discontinued tiger nut flour