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Last week my SCA apprentice/real-world masters student got back from her summer geology/programming course in Italy, so she spent the week with me in the office and lab, which was, as always, fun. On Friday she went out to the new Norrskensfesten site to help me measure the rooms (which was so wonderful easy with that new laser measuring tool I recently blogged about, though drawing the lines on my phone screen did take a bit of practice to become efficient). It was really nice to have her company, and have her to put the tool against the wall and press the button, while I sketched the rooms on my phone, and dragged the numbers that appeared on my screen to the appropriate line.
That evening she invited me and a couple of other friends over for dinner and photo viewing. One of the fun things her summer course included was a trip to one of farms in the area for an Italian cooking class, so, of course,she practiced the recipes again on us. I particularly enjoyed the starter, which was little zucchini tarts (filling of egg, grated zucchini with the water squeezed out, feta cheese, mint, chives, salt and pepper, in a "crust" of sesame seeds sprinkled over butter). The sesame seed "crust" means that one can serve it to one's gluten intolerant friends. I have already suggested this option to my friend who is both allergic to gluten/wheat/several other grains *and* has a dairy allergy. I suspect that some other fat (such as sesame seeds) would work fine in keeping a tart from sticking to the pans (he thinks that he would replace the feta cheese with olives and sun dried tomatoes, which would probably go well, for those of you who like olives).
Her photos were much fun to look at, since they were full of geology and medieval history (such a delightful combination). She had prezzies for each of us. C. got a blank book, covered with hand-made paper in swirls of orange that exactly matched the scarf that she happened to to be wearing that evening, I got a cute little replica of a 14th century little painted ceramic dish (I don't remember what E. got), and she also showed off some of her own loot, including some nice late-period feast gear for herself, and a chunk of marble from the same quarry that Michael Angelo's David came from. She is looking forward to carving something from it, but hasn't yet decided what. I suggested that it be her Golden Egg project, which would give her an excuse to do some research about what she wants to do with it. She is also planning on getting some other marble to practice carving on.
Saturday we helped our friend M. get rid of some furniture. He got a job in Ireland about a year ago, but kept his apartment when he left in case it didn't work out for him in the long run (it being very difficult to get an apartment in Luleå, there being a shortage of them, presumably, in part, because some people don't give them up when they don't need them, as they know how tough it will be to get another if they need one later). The first month or three after he left he did have a friend staying in the apartment and paying him a contribution towards the rent, but that didn't last long, and it has just been sitting unoccupied awaiting his return. He is pretty happy in Ireland, so he flew back for a few days to clean it out and get rid of most things. He packed two (very heavy) suitcases of things to take back to Ireland, packed half a dozen boxes of things to go into storage, and the rest (by far most of it) was to be gotten rid of. So we brought over our big car, and David's brother's trailer (which has been at our place all summer), and took his furniture to the tip. It was as shame to just toss it, when much of it was still reasonably usable, but he only had a couple of days in town, and it wasn't worth his time trying to sell it or even give it away.
In the process of helping him we did wind up adopting a few items, including a dresser, a nice cast iron pot and lid, that he had never even had a chance to use (Christmas gift he got just before moving), a good cast iron frying pan with steel handle (that David wants to use to cook outdoors over a fire), a couple of good pots suitable for induction cooking (we don't have an induction stove, yet, but it is on the long-term wish list), a few bowls, a couple of good knives (can one have too many of those?), a bunch of board games, a solid wooden cane suitable for martial arts training, and several boxes of plastic bags, aluminum foil, etc (that will come in handy now that our household will have two locations). We resisted taking so many other things, because we have no wish to hord things that "might be useful", so we took only stuff that we will actually use (or, in the case of the games, at least try and see if we like them). We took away some of the stuff on Friday, and then returned on Monday to take away the items that had been emptied in the meanwhile. For me the delight of Monday's helping session was when he opened his balcony door to discover that growing in the balcony was a bunch of raspberry plants, with many ripe berries. I, of course, stopped being useful and devoted myself to eating berries till I had eaten all of them from the plants within the balcony walls, and then, standing on a chair to lean over the rail, all the ones that were within reach of the walls. I was tempted to go around the building so that I could reach more berries from the edge of the patch of bushes that grow along the building, but since we had much to do that evening, I resisted.
After we were done at his place I helped him drop off the boxes to be stored at the homes of the two different friends who had agreed to keep his stuff for him, then we came back to our house for the night, where he enjoyed a late dinner, I did my yoga, we all looked at his photos from a trip to Ethiopia for the wedding of a friend (and where he met his new girlfriend), then got a few hours sleep before I took him to the airport at 05:30 so he could return to Ireland.
Tuesday I mostly recovered from helping him move the day before, and David did some stuff for work, even though we are both on vacation this week, since it should have been done the week before, but he didn't have a chance to get to it with all of the other things that he had to do. By Tuesday early evening I was still feeling low energy and unmotivated to go anywhere. Which is why I forced myself to head out the door for the first session of the "Avancerad Motorisk Träning" class at the Luleå Gymnastics Association, since I remembered that attending that class pretty much always gave me energy last term. Sure enough, it did. I love that class--they keep us moving and doing fun (and challenging) things. I can often keep up with the others on the easier stuff, but the serious gymnastics stuff not so much so. I can manage a decent cartwheel, and have even learned to do one with the wrong hand first (though that still isn't as graceful), but it turns out that I don't (yet!) have the power to accomplish a cartwheel with my hands on a thick mat (perhaps 35 to 40 cm tall), though, by the end of the evening of alternating between trying that and trying all of the other stations they had set up, I was getting closer to managing it. It was easier (though still beyond me) when they set up one of the big foam blocks next to the mat, so that we had to get our legs all the way up if we didn't want to hit the foam block, yet I still couldn't manage to get my arms to stay straight, nor could I manage to get enough power to get my feet all the way past the mat and onto the floor after the cartwheel--instead I landed on my knee on the mat.
Today David and Caroline moved some of her big things to the apartment--shelves, her bed, etc., and I brought in that new dresser we got from M's place and put all of my projects in progress that had been living on her shelves into it. I also accomplished several loads of laundry and drying the first of this year's black currants. Tomorrow will also be a moving day for D&C, but we are hoping that this weekend we will accomplish some work on the framework for the earth cellar roof.
That evening she invited me and a couple of other friends over for dinner and photo viewing. One of the fun things her summer course included was a trip to one of farms in the area for an Italian cooking class, so, of course,she practiced the recipes again on us. I particularly enjoyed the starter, which was little zucchini tarts (filling of egg, grated zucchini with the water squeezed out, feta cheese, mint, chives, salt and pepper, in a "crust" of sesame seeds sprinkled over butter). The sesame seed "crust" means that one can serve it to one's gluten intolerant friends. I have already suggested this option to my friend who is both allergic to gluten/wheat/several other grains *and* has a dairy allergy. I suspect that some other fat (such as sesame seeds) would work fine in keeping a tart from sticking to the pans (he thinks that he would replace the feta cheese with olives and sun dried tomatoes, which would probably go well, for those of you who like olives).
Her photos were much fun to look at, since they were full of geology and medieval history (such a delightful combination). She had prezzies for each of us. C. got a blank book, covered with hand-made paper in swirls of orange that exactly matched the scarf that she happened to to be wearing that evening, I got a cute little replica of a 14th century little painted ceramic dish (I don't remember what E. got), and she also showed off some of her own loot, including some nice late-period feast gear for herself, and a chunk of marble from the same quarry that Michael Angelo's David came from. She is looking forward to carving something from it, but hasn't yet decided what. I suggested that it be her Golden Egg project, which would give her an excuse to do some research about what she wants to do with it. She is also planning on getting some other marble to practice carving on.
Saturday we helped our friend M. get rid of some furniture. He got a job in Ireland about a year ago, but kept his apartment when he left in case it didn't work out for him in the long run (it being very difficult to get an apartment in Luleå, there being a shortage of them, presumably, in part, because some people don't give them up when they don't need them, as they know how tough it will be to get another if they need one later). The first month or three after he left he did have a friend staying in the apartment and paying him a contribution towards the rent, but that didn't last long, and it has just been sitting unoccupied awaiting his return. He is pretty happy in Ireland, so he flew back for a few days to clean it out and get rid of most things. He packed two (very heavy) suitcases of things to take back to Ireland, packed half a dozen boxes of things to go into storage, and the rest (by far most of it) was to be gotten rid of. So we brought over our big car, and David's brother's trailer (which has been at our place all summer), and took his furniture to the tip. It was as shame to just toss it, when much of it was still reasonably usable, but he only had a couple of days in town, and it wasn't worth his time trying to sell it or even give it away.
In the process of helping him we did wind up adopting a few items, including a dresser, a nice cast iron pot and lid, that he had never even had a chance to use (Christmas gift he got just before moving), a good cast iron frying pan with steel handle (that David wants to use to cook outdoors over a fire), a couple of good pots suitable for induction cooking (we don't have an induction stove, yet, but it is on the long-term wish list), a few bowls, a couple of good knives (can one have too many of those?), a bunch of board games, a solid wooden cane suitable for martial arts training, and several boxes of plastic bags, aluminum foil, etc (that will come in handy now that our household will have two locations). We resisted taking so many other things, because we have no wish to hord things that "might be useful", so we took only stuff that we will actually use (or, in the case of the games, at least try and see if we like them). We took away some of the stuff on Friday, and then returned on Monday to take away the items that had been emptied in the meanwhile. For me the delight of Monday's helping session was when he opened his balcony door to discover that growing in the balcony was a bunch of raspberry plants, with many ripe berries. I, of course, stopped being useful and devoted myself to eating berries till I had eaten all of them from the plants within the balcony walls, and then, standing on a chair to lean over the rail, all the ones that were within reach of the walls. I was tempted to go around the building so that I could reach more berries from the edge of the patch of bushes that grow along the building, but since we had much to do that evening, I resisted.
After we were done at his place I helped him drop off the boxes to be stored at the homes of the two different friends who had agreed to keep his stuff for him, then we came back to our house for the night, where he enjoyed a late dinner, I did my yoga, we all looked at his photos from a trip to Ethiopia for the wedding of a friend (and where he met his new girlfriend), then got a few hours sleep before I took him to the airport at 05:30 so he could return to Ireland.
Tuesday I mostly recovered from helping him move the day before, and David did some stuff for work, even though we are both on vacation this week, since it should have been done the week before, but he didn't have a chance to get to it with all of the other things that he had to do. By Tuesday early evening I was still feeling low energy and unmotivated to go anywhere. Which is why I forced myself to head out the door for the first session of the "Avancerad Motorisk Träning" class at the Luleå Gymnastics Association, since I remembered that attending that class pretty much always gave me energy last term. Sure enough, it did. I love that class--they keep us moving and doing fun (and challenging) things. I can often keep up with the others on the easier stuff, but the serious gymnastics stuff not so much so. I can manage a decent cartwheel, and have even learned to do one with the wrong hand first (though that still isn't as graceful), but it turns out that I don't (yet!) have the power to accomplish a cartwheel with my hands on a thick mat (perhaps 35 to 40 cm tall), though, by the end of the evening of alternating between trying that and trying all of the other stations they had set up, I was getting closer to managing it. It was easier (though still beyond me) when they set up one of the big foam blocks next to the mat, so that we had to get our legs all the way up if we didn't want to hit the foam block, yet I still couldn't manage to get my arms to stay straight, nor could I manage to get enough power to get my feet all the way past the mat and onto the floor after the cartwheel--instead I landed on my knee on the mat.
Today David and Caroline moved some of her big things to the apartment--shelves, her bed, etc., and I brought in that new dresser we got from M's place and put all of my projects in progress that had been living on her shelves into it. I also accomplished several loads of laundry and drying the first of this year's black currants. Tomorrow will also be a moving day for D&C, but we are hoping that this weekend we will accomplish some work on the framework for the earth cellar roof.
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