Richard Thompson

Just got home from a concert. It's hard to believe but Richard Thompson played Bloomington, Indiana. Apparently he's come here on tour a few times before, years ago. Perhaps that fact that it's a university town means there's enough fans to make it worthwhile. They did sell-out a 600 seat theatre; luckily I bought tickets weeks ago.

It was just him, no band, with an amplified acoustic guitar, which he played with a ferocity normally reserved for fully electric guitars. It was fantastic to see him there actually working the instrument, watching him live gives you an appreciation for his skill that CDs can't convey. He played mainly classics, nothing from his latest album. At one point he offered to do a Fairport Convention number, letting the audience choose which one. Alas, he was deaf to my cries of "Meet on the Ledge" and played "Matty Groves" instead. But everything he played was fantastic.

Self Deprivation

I've decided that this is the year I give up chocolate for Lent. I thought it might be worth trying to test my self-control and make those Easter eggs taste even better.

I've never done it before but I think I can last, what is it, forty days?

Plenty of Precipitation

The day before yesterday was stinking hot, +2˙C! The snow started to melt, that counts as hot. Yesterday morning it was still hot and so we got rain instead of snow. Which is really inconvienient when there's still snow on the ground, it's like walking through a giant, white, non-potable squishee. But around the middle of the day the temperature dropped below freezing again and the rain turned to sleet! (At least, I think "sleet" is the correct word for when ice falls in tiny spheres (~0.5 mm), as opposed to snow-flakes or hail-stones, but Americans also use the term "frozen rain" and I can't quite work out the difference.) By the time I went out last night, around 8pm, it had turned into normal snow. Three different kinds of precipitation in one day!

But the really cool thing is that when the temperature dropped so suddenly the trees were still wet from the rain. So now the trees all look like they're still dripping water, but really they're encased in crystal-clear ice. It's so clear that the small drops at the tips look so much like liquid water that you expect them to be wet when you touch them. Unless you're looking you don't notice that the ice goes beyond the tips with a thin layer covering the whole branch. The forest on campus is quite spectacular when the sun hits all those sparkling trees!

Addendum 2007-2-15
Last night I had another new cold-weather experience when my car was snowed in. I figured that reverse gear would be low enough for me to get over the little mound of snow that Mr Plow had left behind my car. But what I hadn't reckoned on was the layer of black ice that had been forming under my car. After burning a little rubber a good samaritan passing by offered to lend me his snowshovel but by then I realised it was more about traction than the piles of snow so I didn't need the shovel. After about 10 min of pissfarting around I finally managed to point the wheels at the right angle to get myself out of the spot.

Some things just aren't meant to be deep-fried

I would never have thought it possible to make unhealthy something inherently healthy like green beans. Then last night I went to TGI Friday's. I was foolish enough to order bean fries for my "appetizer", as part of a set menu deal.

I soon regretted my choice, despite the "cool creamy Cucumber-Wasabi Ranch dip" being almost as good as it sounds. No, some things just aren't meant to be deep-fried (cf. deep-fried mozzarella, available in Oz from Chili's). This may seem obvious to you at home but time and again I find that this is something Americans fail to grasp.

Go the Blues!

Last night was the Super Bowl XLI - the Chicago Bears vs the Indianapolis Colts. Indianapolis is the closest city to me and Chicago is the next closest so Bloomington is full of fans of both teams.

The Colts won, so I think there'll be a lot of happy fans around here this morning (possibly a lot of sore heads, too). This is the first time they've won the Super Bowl since coming to Indiana so they'd normally have a ticker-tape parade for them. But today it's -19˙C outside, so I don't know what they'll do.

Ethnic Food

Last night Cindy and I went to a birthday party for a couple of her friends. It was a pot-luck dinner and we were asked to bring a dish traditional to our home country or family.

I decided to to take a pavlova. I had never made one before but I had a pavlova magic egg, which meant I didn't have to separate egg-whites. I really like passionfruit on my pavlova but couldn't find any anywhere in Bloomington, even in the ethnic food stores, so I settled on strawberries and kiwifruit. I had planned to just mix it with a hand whisk but after about half an hour of whisking with very little change we looked at the clock and realised that I would not be able to cook it, cool it, dress it and still get to the party on time at that rate. So, having already started, I resigned myself to going out and buying electric beaters ($7 from Target, bargain!). After it had cooled I saw that the centre had shrunk away from the outer shell but when I put the cream on top the shell cracked and fell on top of the centre. So there was no more gap but it was not at all a pretty shape. Nevertheless, when I arrived with it I was showered with praise by Americans who had no idea what a real pavlova was supposed to look like!

But the real coup of the evening was the dish Çîndy took - frogs' legs! Of course they're impossible to find in the Midwest (and I'm not too sure if I'd eat them of we did find them) so we just cut some chicken wings into the right shape, cooked them in garlic and labelled them "frogs' legs". Everyone was amazed and asked where we got them, to which we nonchalantly replied, 'Lake Monroe'. Somehow we got through the whole party without anyone calling our bluff! (Although, it was a close call when a Chinese guy said, 'I didn't know you could catch them this time of year.') I just hope they see the humour in it when Cindy tells them the truth on Monday.