Baldur

Well Baldur must really haul himself off to bed.
Goodnight sheftali, and any of my other faithfil listeners who are paying attention this evening.

'All Baldur, All the Time'

sheftali52

The story about the funeral was interesting, Baldur. Sheftali is convinced Baldur would be comfortable in any setting, as he is confident about himself and obviously openminded. That quality in Baldur endears him to many. Hopefully the listeners here on Channel Baldur are not put off by the Baldur - Sheftali torrent tonight. I thoroughly enjoy the exchange of stories here. Good night, Baldur, and thank you for the interesting chats.

marius

Catching up ...

Robin, I can enable cookies, but that is not the same as knowing how to tell someone else to do it. Sorry. Have you figured it out yet?

Solo, LOVE puzzles. Thanks for the link!!!!

Baldur, great pic of you and Matthew. Also congrats on 3,000+ posts. And, 150% agreement about Seinfeld!

Baldur and Sheftali, thanks for the tour of Germany, etc. Thoroughly enjoyed it over this morning's tea. Made me feel like I was there. And, Baldur, in the states I've met these folks who fill your glass the second you take a sip. Since one glass of anything can put me to sleep at any moment, have learned to say, "I'm on medications." The reaction from them is great pity. For me, tremendous relief.

marius

All this speak of travel brings the mind back to my dear Robert. Marius gave a wrong impression. While it is true Robert does not like to travel, he is much more traveled than many I've met. He's been to Europe several times (loved Germany btw), he's been many places in the US and we had a great honeymoon plus a few other trips.

But when he retired a few years back, he suddenly had time and that is when issues of PTSD will surface, when you have time for them. The first thing marius noted was strange outbursts of anger, then depressive thinking, and it so closely paralleled what a friend of mine went through when her spouse retired that I sat Robert down and said, "Think you have one wild case of PTSD." He agreed.

His PTSD issues are mostly connected with travel (think Viet Nam era - fear of leaving and not coming home). Well, he's working on that and in the meanwhile, we adapt. I now travel solo, with sister, or women friends. I also count blessings. You see, our friends say I got two people when we married, a husband and a wife: Robert does 98% of the cooking, cleaning and half the shopping. This was quite a shock when we moved in together as Robert has routines, days for laundry, days for vacuuming, days for dusting. This is making me think of the first Sunday we lived together.

marius

Robert had finished moving in Saturday night. We were still arranging some things, but most was settled. I awoke on Sunday morning, and mind you, marius is VERY slow to wake up. So, moving through the fog of that space between sleep and awake, I went to the kitchen to make coffee.

It was already made. Okay, not as good as mine, but I'd drink it. However, both the dryer and washing maching were going. (They were in a small porch room off the kitchen.) The radio was on, the dishwasher was going and Robert was vacuuming ... at 8 in the morning!

Well, have already said I have my peculiarities (things about sound and fluorescent lights). So all this activity was a great undoing of the nervous system. As my work schedule was Tuesday through Saturday, Sundays were always the day of no noise. Normal routine was coffee and quiet. Maybe a long bath, maybe watching the birds, anything quiet.

marius

It was July so took the coffee, went outside in the still sleepy fog of having just awakened and marius began to cry. Big heaving buckets of tears. It is a great stress release, so made sense to me. After a while there was some calm and finally Robert came to find me. The poor man, he could see there'd been tears and when I finally explained that I did not think I could have Sunday mornings that started like this he was in shock. He said, "But, I've ALWAYS done the laundry, dishes and vacuuming on Sunday mornings." Hmm - who will change?

marius

Robert changed. But marius too. The thing is, marius is not a slob, but she is also not particularly enamoured of everything being in it's proper place at every single moment. We still laugh about me telling Robert, with tears again, "I don't think I can live up to your standards of cleanliness. As you already know, the joke is that I clean my car once a year whether it needs it or not." (Actually clean it more than that but my standards are - if it doesn't look dirty, it's not.) Spouse's standards are days of the week - if it's Wednesday, you vacuum even if it doesn't look like it needs to be done.

Gotta love humanity - we are all so quirky.

marius

And speaking of beets (Baldur not only spoke of them, but ate them too) many yrs ago had a borscht at someone's home that had cabbage, potatoes, tomatoes, caraway seed and some kind of meat and probably other things. Is Baldur familiar with this kind of borscht? Also, if Baldur likes cabbage, does he have any cabbage favorites to share? Am thinking of cooked cabbage versus cole slaw. Thanks!

Robindcr8l

Marius, I hav enot figured out the cookies thing. It's possible that it's something else wrong, but now I can't get images to show up sometimes. Like on TD gallery, I can see all the pics in the gallery, but if I click on one to see it closer or to watch the playback, it never loads. And my little emoticons can no longer be inserted in emails. And I have to keep logging into facebook, instead of it remembering me. Kind of peeving me, if you know what I mean.

Regarding beets...Robin truly hates them. When Baldur was describing his borscht, I was thinking what a dilemma I would be in if I were invited to someone's house for dinner and the served that. I would never want to be rude, but truly don't think I could suffer through even one sip. When I was a child, I always hated beets. One time, (the only time) my mom and dad left us kids to go on a trip. We stayed at a friend's house. There were 4 kids in that house, a mom, a dad, and a dog. Add us 3 kids to the mix and it was crowded! Anyway, one of the house rules is that you had to eat EVERYTHING on your plate before you could leave the table. This was different than the rules at our own house, where we were required to at least TRY everything on the plate, but could decline if we didn't like it. The mom apportioned the meals, and was not skimpy with the amounts. I suffered through the scrambled eggs and green beans mixture one night, thinking that plate would never be clean. But the night she served beets almost did me in! I sat at the table LONG past the time when everyone else had finished and left. I sat there and tried holding my nose and eating them, but honestly believed I was going to vomit. I tried feeding it to the golden retriever, and even SHE wouldn't have a bite! Eventually I wrapped them in something and buried them in the trash when no one was looking. I think the mom purposely gave me an opportunity to do this, as she realized I just couldn't suffer through them, but she also knew she couldn't budge on the rule just for me, and set that precedent.

Anyway, I associate beets with that trauma, and they indeed provoke a sort of PTSD in me. Thank goodness I've never been to a house that served borscht for dinner while I was a guest!

By the way, I too really enjoyed the Germany tales from Sheftali and Baldur. The farthest I've been from home was Florida! LOL

Baldur

marius, my own family always made a very thick stewish borscht that had lamb, beets, beet greens, carrots, celery, onions, cabbage, potatoes, diced tomatoes,tomato paste, broth, garlic, caraway, dill, marjoram, peppercorns and vinegar in it. It was rather complicated and sometimes when you add too many things the recipe just becomes a mess of things with no distinctive flavor.
When I had Russian style Borcsht last week at a friend's home it was refreshing.
Baldur went about attempting to copy it and thinks he nailed it on his first try
It was a pureed assemblage of beets, carrots, onion, garlic, veggie broth, vinegar and crushed caraway seeds, ground cloves and thickened only slightly with a small amount of tomato paste.
It is slightly sweet, slightly sour and aromatic.

Baldur

A simple yet delicious way to prepare cabbage is to first slice it thinly as if for cole slaw (or be sneaky and buy shredded cabbage in bags, the little bit of carrot in it won't hurt anything).
Then toss it around in a large wok or skillet (use a pair of wooden spoons for tossing) that has a little melted butter and/or olive oil in it.
Season it with a little garlic powder, a little ground nutmeg, salt and black pepper.
Cook it only until it's somewhat wilted and shiny looking, it shouldn't be mushy.
Add some chopped chives for color to finish it.

Baldur

You can also go a bit more deluxe and cut it a little wider to match in width your favorite egg noodles. Cook the cabbage as above and when done combine it with an equal quantity of freshly cooked noodles.
You can serve it as is or toss in a good dollop of sour cream and scatter freshly toasted poppyseeds over it all.

Baldur

Well 2 magazines just came in the mail.
Both are Christmass issues too, 'Teatime' and 'Victoria'. Baldur may just put them aside unopened for a couple more weeks.

solosater

I cannot tolerate beets. Not the root or the greens. Not in soup, salad, or in any other way. I will not eat them in a box, I will not eat them with a fox!

I'm not sure I've ever actually tasted them but the smell is enough to make my stomach turn and in fact when my mother is cooking them I have to leave the house for a few hours until the smell is completely gone.

As for the greens, I'm just not a fan of most greens anyway. I do like turnip greens, will tolerate mustard greens and LOVE kale but generally won't venture beyond that. Greens are very earthy and I like the idea but quite frankly when they actually taste of DIRT I don't see the point.

I had a terrible experience with tomatoes at a friends home and actually did vomit right at the table (I was just a small child and I believe I was enjoying them up to that point). Now the smell of a fresh tomato is past my ability to tolerate. I love tomatoes IN things: marinara, soups, ketchup, even sun dried tomatoes in pestos and spreads. NEVER on sandwiches, in salads or God forbid just slices and served!

I too enjoyed last nights discussion of Germany and the people ya'all met there, I kept thinking it was rather how I felt when I moved to Vermont. People are just different there than here, a little slow to warm but if you get in you are in for life. The bit about dressing to go to the grocery store was something I encountered for the first time in Vermont as well. I imagine ya'all would not see it that way but here we routinely go to the store in our lounging around the house clothes sans makeup or even a hair brush most of the time. To see people dressed in professional clothes and in makeup in the grocery store always startled me.

When Baldur was talking about the Funeral I thought about many times I've been a kind of peripheral guest at a party or gathering and been the most welcoming person there. I am often mistaken for a family member when in fact I am a friend of a friend or some such. I've known no strangers since I was about four years old, before that I was quite shy and reserved. Being the life of a party can be a lot of fun but I find it a huge responsibility when I am expected to be the one to get everything going and am feeling like being a wallflower that day.

solosater

I do a fried cabbage with yellow (sweet) onions, minced garlic and dill weed, salt and black pepper. I like to first caramelize the onions in butter and then add the cabbage and seasoning with the garlic going in toward the end. I like the cabbage a little soft but certainly not mushy, there should still be a bit of a crunch to the spines. I use a heavy cast iron skillet but a wok would work too. I have a heavy cast iron wok but find it is too small for most things I make, I am a huge lover of left overs!

Baldur

Yes Sir, Yes Sir
Solosater
do not be a
veggie hater
You can eat them in your socks
You can eat them with a Fox
You can eat them on a stool
You can eat them in a pool
Chill them
Boil them
Grill them up
Eat them with your yellow Pup
There will be some you just like more
But never show the rest the door
If you hide them in a box
You might catch a dreadful Pox.

Dragon

Baldur and solo have an aura about them which says "I'm a friendly, intererstin person."
Dragon has an aura about her which says "Yes I'd love to hear about your pyramid scheme business, please try to recruit me."
All in all I'd much rather have the friendly aura.

Baldur

Baldur has been thinking about restringing some of his beads, but hasn't done so yet.
There is definitely an improvement to the way I've been ordering them in strands over the past couple months. Now there is an interesting progression of sizes to each assortment.
The earliest examples did have beautiful beads, but they were all roughly the same size. The new look has the tiniest seed beads interacting with those as large as a dime. It's more complex and exotic looking.

Baldur

The assortment of the past few days has been:
light honey
amber
tortoise shell
topaz
metallic gold glass
metallic copper glass
metallic bronze glass
orange honey
root beer
deepest cobalt blue
ivory toned glass pearls
and small shiny brass filigree beads

Dragon

We like to use cabbage in Tin Foil dinners. You chop up carrots, onions and potatoes. Then slice of narrow wedges of cabbage. Wrap all this up in tin foil with some butter and salt and pepper (we like to throw in a little chipotle seasoning and some Mrs.Dash as well) and throw it on the BBQ for 45-60 mins. I like it best when the veggies on the bottom get just slightly black. You can also throw in some ground beef and my friend uses packaged vegetable soup mix (I personally can't stand it though). It works great for camping too, you can just throw the whole package into the hot coals and cook it that way.