We're Making Sourdough! (Day 1) -- Seventy Second Post

I'm just going to pretend like this is the 72nd post even though it's somewhere in the sixties.
Anyway, I'm all moved and unemployed and stuff. Goddammit.
This leaves me with a lot of time to watch TV. I've watched all the seasons of the new Doctor Who (bow ties are cool and Matt Smith took the reins very handily, although David Tennant was definitely awesome) and Sherlock, the BBC modern-day show (really, really well done adaptation of the stories). Having run out of TV shows, it gave me a lot more time to think about how stupid it is that I can't find a job and even more time to grumble to myself about how I WOULD have something to do if someone would frigging HIRE ME.

ANYWAY.

With all this free time, I've decided that I can make sourdough starter, no problem. It's not like I have anything else to do, and if I can't remember to have a look at it every 12 hours, then I'm stupid and deserve for it to die. I'm following the instructions from Sourdough Home because it seemed fairly comprehensive.
Since I have a balance, I can do it by weight. Yay for being slightly non-american, I guess!

Day 1: Mixed about 50 g each of unbleached safeway brand white flour and tap water at 21:30.
I put it in a clean (large) applesauce jar, covered it gently with the lid (to keep out bugs, dust, and housemates), and put it on top of the refrigerator. I'll be scraping the sides and doing most of my mixing with a trusty red spatula.

I'll put up some pictures when I get batteries, hopefully tomorrow.
Right now, it's just a thick paste of flour and water. Woo hoo.

Oh, and, incidentally, I'm thinking about starting up yet another blog, this time for baking and for cooking in general. Name ideas include cranberryfairycakes, accidentalvegan, thebrokevegetariancooks, and bakeroutofeggsandbutter.
But I have one for study abroad, crafting, ranting about randomness, and even a defunct one for computer stuff; do I really need a fifth?
My train of thought here is that I could stick with this blog as a conglomeration of my university life, which definitely does not include anything crafty or remotely interesting, maintain my crafty blog over the summers, and continue ignoring the computer blog, while dumping everything that's not crafting or studying abroad here. If, by happy chance, I find myself abroad again, the study abroad adventures will start back up with quasi-regular updates. As it stands, it might be simpler to keep everything on this blog.
If you have thoughts, I'd love comments, but I'm really not expecting anything. Input would be valued, but ultimately ignored. Welcome to life.

Thirty-First Post

I'm never sure whether there should be a hyphen in numbers like "thirty first". So I put one in this time. 

I would like to say that my summer was not too horribly boring, in spite of my blog title. I hung out with friends, read way too many books, ordered and rekindled my hate for overpriced textbooks, developed a passion for designing knit and crochet scarves and bags, got my wisdom teeth out and a crown in, and learned how to shoot various and sundry firearms. 

Really, it was a great summer, other than the fact that my arm is really, really sore today. It was totally worth it; I love guns now. I mean, I still flinch every time one goes off, but I like the feeling of holding something that powerful in my hand(s). I have terrible aim, and I also learned that I need to be doing waaaaay more pushups in the morning, but it was great! I can load guns, I can be safe around guns, I can fire guns... I'm totally getting a concealed weapons permit as soon as I'm legal and looking into a handgun with a nice safety that I can keep in my purse, possibly in a knit or crochet bag-thing. (It will need a good safety because I'm now paranoid about guns that don't have safeties, and I want it not to discharge in my purse. I can picture it now... *Me walking along/being at work/being at the doctor's office/you get the picture* *BAM!* *Screams from surrounding people* "Oh, sorry, that was my gun." "Your WHAT?!" "My gun. I keep it in my purse or pocket at all times. You know, like mace... but a gun." *Screams of horror* *Me being arrested/losing job/causing heart attack/losing gun permit/you get the picture*)

Anyway. 

I also mentioned that I got my wisdom teeth out. Now, my friend had his wisdom teeth out a while ago, but he was told that recovery was better with topical anaesthesia and laughing gas. I was told that as well, but I have a hard enough time dealing with cleanings, so I ruled out being conscious as a method of extraction. I've never been under general anaesthesia, so I was rather excited. My friend apparently hasn't either, or he wouldn't have told me to email him whilst incoherent (he was abroad at the time, so I couldn't text him). My incoherence consisted entirely of being unconscious. 

It was really cool, going under... I'm sitting there, busily not looking at the freaking needle in my freaking hand (because my elbow vein is too skinny for needles lately), waiting for the anaesthesia to hit. The nurses or whatever they are are busy ignoring me, putting creepy metal tools on my chest, and waiting for the oral surgeon. He comes in, finally, and informs me that he's putting medicine in my drip, as if I couldn't figure out what "anaesthesia" means. At this point, he stabs the IV bag thing with a syringe. Then he tells me that I will feel like I'm floating, and that it's normal for the ceiling to move. 

I'm totally on board with this whole unconsciousness thing. I get dragged out of bed at an ungodly hour, all so I can go get put back to sleep. Cool! In any case, my arms started floating, which reminded me of my former roommate on NyQuil, and then I realised that the chair was gone, which reminded me of being on a roller coaster at the bottom of the drops, when your feet won't stay on the floor of the car, and I kind of panicked, but then I started laughing, and then they woke me up. 

I was not pleased to be woken up. I wanted to keep sleeping. I had gauze packets in my mouth, top and bottom, and I could hardly stand, and I was sleepy. FYI, those chairs are quite comfortable. 

I got home without falling asleep, then promptly fell asleep on the couch. 

When I woke up, I discovered that my shirt had been inside out the whole time. Then I took hydrocodone and vomited up the meager contents of my stomach immediately. As it turned out, I'm allergic to hydrocodone, which meant that I staved off massive amounts of pain with acetaminophen. Joy!

It was only supposed to take two sets of gauze packet things to stop the bleeding. It took all the gauze we had, plus about four sets of earl gray teabags because my mom was totally out of english breakfast. I hate the taste of earl gray at the best of times; it doesn't improve with blood. I still had to spit the blood into a bowl because I was bleeding that much. 

But now I'm better, other than a weird zit-like thing with lots of lovely blood and pus on one of the sockets caused, according to my dentist, by the gum healing faster than the bone, but that cleared up pretty quickly. I do have a superpower, though, and that's that spicy food doesn't bother me any more. 

Spicy food has been the bane of my existence as a vegetarian. Half the vegetarian food in the world is overly spicy, and the other half is overly bland. The other, other half is about right, but I have trouble finding it. Now, however, I can eat whatever the heck I want. 

And, as this is one heck of a post, I'm just going to end it there.