Monthly Archives: January 2016

Midori Passport

  
I’ve run across talk about the Midori Travelers’ notebooks lately. It’s probably because I’ve been reading some analog sites that I haven’t visited for awhile. I seem to have missed this fad. I think I have my Moleskine reporter sorted out. I am using a 1920s mechanical pencil, so the paper is okay. And I like having a notebook I can archive. Still, I like nice letter and there were so many rave reviews, I gave in and ordered the Passport size. Spent the time waiting for it, wondering if I should have gotten the full sized one or maybe just order it and have two. 

It arrived today, so I did a little customization. I used a brass bead on the bookmark and a mother of pearl button on the band. I don’t have any additional inserts yet. I ordered the Tomoe River paper insert from Etsy and an additional blank insert. And I got the vinyl pouch and the bands to add notebooks. I’m resisting the rest for now. I have a Pilot Metropolitian and ink samples that should be here in the next day or so. 

I don’t have a purpose for this. I have a journal that I write in at night. I decided to use an old, partially filled Moleskine for morning pages. It’s nice to be doing those again. I also have a small Evernotes Moleskine that I’ve been using for planning. And I have lots of Field Notes. This may not see a lot of action this year, but I’ll carry it anyway. 

And I have been baking bread today, from The Homemade Kitchen book. I did the Honey Oatmeal bread yesterday. It rose well, but we went to Winco while it was rising. I had to do an extra rise, so it wasn’t as tall as I’d like. 

This morning, I did the Cinnamon Swirl bread, which looked like this:

  
I have the rye bread on the last rise now. I ran out of bread flour, so may not be as light as it should be. And I have turkey soup started. I think I need a break!

How’s your January?

This has not been a fun month but we will live through it. Still fighting problems with the truck. It goes to the shop tomorrow. The grocery bill was outrageous as I couldn’t get in to do a proper shop. We finally have a bed to use at the river place. The plan is to camp out a bit, and start to move a few things in. I hold that we will be resistant until we make some cozy places. Right now, it’s just an empty rundown shell. I would love to have the wood burner part of the stove going. 

Jake managed to hit me under the chin, while I was leaning over combing Loretta. Fortunately, he did not put my teeth completely through my lip, but it was bruised. It’s finally healing up. 

I have a goal this next month to cut the food budget in half. “The Homemade Kitchen” is a great resource. I have cranberry orange bread in the oven. I have a turkey carcass boiling for stock. And I am trying Mystie Winckler’s bread recipe. I need a reliable sandwich bread. We eat better when we eat at home. I still have some potato leek soup leftover from this week. 

Let’s celebrate every small success we have this year!

Rough Start to a new year

We drove the truck to the river right  before Christmas. The starter died. We thought it was the battery, but no. Finally got it running well enough to get it home. Found someone willing to put in a starter for us. We used it a few times and it’s down again. This time, it’s either a fuel relay or fuel pump. We are having problems finding someone that will work on it. Taking it to a shop is more than we can afford right now.

Lon used a cab to go to the parts store. I’ve used Uber for a trip to the grocery store and back. Uber worked out well and is definitely cheaper than the cab. I also used Safeway delivery. I’d prefer to go in and shop, but it’s better than being out of food. (And I don’t mean we were completely out of food. When I am out of honey and cream for my tea, we are out of food. And we truly were out of dog and cat food.) At the rate we are going, I may have to do another shop next week.

We bought a Christmas tree but never got it up and decorated. We got each other a few things we really needed, like warm robes. It was nice. I would have liked to drive around and look at the Christmas lights but it didn’t happen. Oh well. And we got a bit of snow the other day, so that was nice. And I bought myself a Kindle Paperwhite. I’m happy with it and it was nice to have a new gadget for the books that I don’t want to own. It’s hard to read books on the phone. And I totally forgot…we replaced both computers. Lon’s old one finally died. My old Mac started having problems too. Got two from Free Geek, a desktop for him and a Thinkpad for me. Both running Linux Mint. I had to use the KDE desktop for him, as there seems to be a driver issue with Cinnamon. Mine works fine and it even has a webcam!

I hope we can finally get moved out this year. This house is very comfortable and lovely in its own way. But we truly need to have more income coming in and we can’t do that the way things are.