Jan 29 2008
also
we made amazing buttermilk biscuits and cream gravy last weekend – albeit with finely chopped mutton rather than sausage.
Jan 29 2008
status report of the day
I think I’m getting a cold
The internet still doesn’t work at my work computer
I will go soon to remove the stitches of Jason’s dog with Doug, as I am dogsitting said dog and the word has gone out that it needs to be done.
I may have a thesis topic
I have tuna fish!
Jan 23 2008
new morning rituals?
1) Listening to old NPR podcasts
2) Thawing the box of milk that was sitting overnight on my (indoor) window ledge
Jan 22 2008
US visit brief recap
FYI when cutting into the biscuit top it looked like I was renacting the sinking of the titanic…
About my trip – I suspect it’s very apparent that I had a wonderful time and was very busy laying around and eating given I haven’t posted anything. We went one weekend-like time to a beautiful beach near Hearst Castle and stayed in a room with big sliding glass windows that looked out onto the ocean…you could actually lay in bed and see it from there…We also ate large quantites of food, including the following:
sushi, non-vodka, seafood (oysters rockefeller, whitefish, shrimp scampi, scallops), a frozen hot chocolate as big as my head with a shot of espresso and with spices that was probably my caloric intake for the day, peking-ish duck, cannolis, tiramisu, eclairs, scones, latte after latte after mocha, philly cheese steak, salads (omg, at least 4 times), brats, chorizo and eggs, lamb stew, the best tacos in LA, a chili relleno that looked like a jelly donut and was sad, other mexican food, garlic naan and chicken tikka masala, pizza, goat cheese, juices, spanikopita, a gyro, smoothies, americanized chinese food (orange chicken, crab rangoons), chinese bbq (and chinese broccoli!), dim sum, bubble tea, cuban food, calzone, pad thai, popcorn, multi-layer bean dip, baklava, and bunches of christmas cookies sent to us.
Aaand…I’d say virtually all of that is not available in Khovd, and maybe 3 of the above items are available in UB. It was *amazing*. Sadly, though, I ran out of time to eat either donuts or in-and-out. And of the above, I pretty much only ate each item once when I was capable of eating em so much more often…
Much of this food list comes from the ALA conference in Philadelphia. There is a market downtown next to a metro station that is unreal – thus how I could eat spanikopita, peking duck, and cannoli in one meal then a philly cheese steak and an eclair in the same day later. They also sold produce and every sausage, dry and fresh, known to mankind, I think, and there were Amish stalls on saturday. People there don’t seem too mean like further north, and the downtown at least is cute, historically beautiful, and walkable. And I don’t think it’s that cold all things considered. Bonnie thought so too, so maybe we’ll visit again sometime to just check things out.
We saw the venice beach’s new year’s fireworks from her rooftop patio while sipping champagne. Very cool.
I also got to ride my bike a lot – from Bonnie’s place down to Marina del Rey and back, which we guessed was about 15 miles. But my ass certainly hurt afterward. I’m afraid I kept Bonnie from jogging too much, so I hope she can get back up to speed for her 10k, but we found out there’s a marathon and half-marathon in the Gobi in Mongolia, so maybe Bonnie will do that around the time I wrap up 
Random note: the cut-out cans I use for biscuit cutters could double as crumpet cooking containers as long as I didn’t mind making only 2 crumpets at a time…
I also saw UCLA’s campus, which is really neat and has cool features – like, say, an arcade with DDR Supernova 2 or Extreme or something. Across from the Jamba Juice, no less. Bonnie’s coworkers are nice and competent, and thus it was nice to meet them too. I’m glad she’s working somewhere where they encourage working beyond the status quo and I think she’ll have some great mentors there. Plus some of em bake cupcakes.
Overall the time went by far too fast – with my 2 day delay from even getting out of UB, I think I could’ve really had more quality time, but even then I bet I’d wish I could stay longer.
Jan 22 2008
Return to Mongolia
Back in Khovd and of mixed feelings – it was really nice to be in the US to visit Bonnie and talk to many friends and family, but it was a pretty rough first few days back here. I probably should have given myself a little more padding before getting back into the grind, but it was literally 24 hours after getting back from Philly I was en route to Seoul, then a 7 hour layover there, then overnight in UB and out from the guesthouse at 6am to catch the 8am flight to Khovd. Bleh. But! I am better now and dislike fewer things in the world compared to 72 hours before.
So, random things here – for example, my eyelashes freeze and stick together when I walk the 5 min or so from home to work. However I’ve been told by another PCV that January is the coldest month so I know I don’t have to expect more than this. A teacher I know told me that it was -35C overnight (morbid curiosity trivia: the C and F scales converge at -40) and I haven’t quite picked up my space heater yet for my house. That will definitely be remedied tomorrow. In the meantime I have worked on pseudo weather stripping some of my more ginormous drafts and nailed the equivalent of outdoor carpeting to the inside of my balcony door. I have also taken to the habit of sleeping early – as it’s coldest it seems right about 8-10pm and I’m definitely warmer if I wake up at 6am.
Other random thing – drinking vermouth and pretending it is both tasty and wine, which it sure isn’t. Once again, the requirement that you leave no bottle half-empty has punished me. Also random – currently vodka is not available due to over a dozen people dying during the new year from poisonous vodka. Some joker thought they could use wood alcohol in lieu of, oh, alcohol for human consumption, and thus many people became ill. Apparently at first you couldn’t buy any alcohol, and in some places still you can’t, but in Khovd the beer and vermouth/wine are selling well. This also means I can’t attempt to freeze vodka then take a picture sadly looking at it (or, I suppose, attempting to shoot it (ugh)) to show how cool it is here.
Finally, the stainless steel water bottle substitute for my dearly departed nalgene is working like a trooper. I’m not using it for drinking water much, mind you, but it makes a hot water bottle bar none for when I go to bed lately – it’s just a smidge away from being too toasty/burning when I have all my layers on in my sleeping bag. It’s also done well at rolling out biscuits and generally not getting easily lost.
Speaking of biscuits, looks like my biscuit-covered mutton stew is done. This is course #3 of stew, as I accidentally made too much. I meant to take a picture of my horrifically large carrot but was hungry and thus just chopped it up. It was about 2 1/2″ radius at its largest point and dwarfed the 3 potatoes it sat next to (malevolently).
