Peebled

0 comments on "Cat toys question — Imma look for the answer"

So I’ve got these two cats now. Well, a cat and a kitten. Which is kind of the problem.

Banjo is kind of a bully. And I’m thinking it’s due to a sense of being usurped. (I’ve seen that Simpsons episode. "Uu-SUR-pER!")

She’s starting to get along with Lemon, but she’s also become kind of aggressive. She’s just all around grumpy.

We try to include her in play, but she just sits and stares. She’s become standoffish. And I think it’s because she feels like she’s losing her place.

I want them to play together.

So I was wondering if there is a toy where they have to cooperate together to get treats. Like a Kong for cats, but forcing cooperative play.

Or are cats not able to relate like that? Would they be able to figure out that the toy only works if they BOTH depress a switch at the same time? Or maybe if they pull at the same time, treats shoot out both ends.

They could become buddies.

Though, maybe I’d regret it if they became hunting pals. I’ve watched stuff on lions and tigers and other big cats:

Two female cats. One a large calico short hair with a kinda smushed face(?) and the other a long-haired tabby (Morris cat). Working together, like lionnesses, they hunt through the house. Pouncing on anything that moves. Bullying the dog. Making everyone regret their life choices.

All Systems Red at Amazon
0 comments on "I’m considering bee keeping"

I’m thinking about buying a beehive.

I want honey bees, but my brother is leaning more toward bumble bees. Either way, I’m hoping to help out my tomatoes and other vegetables.

Plus taking care of a hive of native bees helps with conservation*.

Because bees have really taken a pounding of late. There’s a real concern that we’ll be looking at the extinction of several species.

“We’ve had several end-of-hive events take place recently. And there’s quite a lot of reason to be concerned” – is the mildest way I can describe it.

Really, we’re looking at a potential environmental catastrophe.

1. Without the bees, there’s going to be a lot more biting insects. (There’s a niche for most everything. And if an opening is created, something is always willing to move in and fill it.)

2. With the depletion of a hive’s numbers, they are left vulnerable to predatory insects. (Hornets, yellow jackets, all kinds of things can get inside a weakened hive, kill the queen, and use the bees as a food for their young.)

3. Without bees to do the work, gardeners will have to seek other means of pollinating their crops. (Remember my zucchini plants that didn’t zucchini?)

4. Without bees there won’t be any honey. (And that would be a real tragedy, because who in their right mind doesn’t love the taste of honey? Sweetness that can be cultivated super easily.)

5. Without bees you won’t see a bumbling buzzing body bobbing and weaving from flower to flower, making the world bloom. (The sight of a fat bumble bee with its small wings busily flapping as it dances over a patch of clover is a nostalgic memory.)

Bees are an essential part of the world.

It would be a real tragedy if we wiped them out. The world would definitely be a lesser place without them.

* I might have to switch to buying a bunch of mason bees. I’m pretty sure they’re what’s local, as I saw them being sold at the Little Valley Nursery back in the spring.

All Systems Red at Amazon
0 comments on "[Andromeda] Remember that time a whole human world is transformed into Magog?"

Remember that time a whole human world is transformed into Magog? The crew of the Andromeda Ascendant are racing around, trying to stop the infection/impregnation of the colony. And they fail.

Those people died, but were reborn as a litter of Magog.

Yet due to events that took place and Rev’s presence there to calm the change, the Magog that are born are self-aware. Like every other Magog, they have the memories of their human host. But unlike the others, they also have the compassion and empathy of their hosts.

I don’t know if it’s a change in the body chemistry of the hosts — calming hormones that smooth the change — or if he taught them after they were born, but Rev started a change in the way a whole group of Magog think.

He’s the Magog version of Jesus. They create a religion around him and continue to carry the message of humanity down through the generations. [Tok’ra]

*

The Magog birthed from the people of the World felt that they were the original person transformed. They had all of the memories; the feelings; the loves, lusts, and hates of the original person.

They had been transformed into hideous beasts with disgusting hungers, but they were still themselves down where it counted. In the soul.

Sally and O’Kelley had been in love from the first moment they met. She’d looked at him and thought: He’s kind of goofy, but he’s sweet. I think that I could love him. He’d looked at her and thought: This is the girl I’m going to marry. And both of their visions had come true.

They had a cozy cottage encircled by floral greenery and all of the sweetness of nature. They married and had a couple of kids, Dante and Thora. They had a great life together and they fell more and more in love with each other the longer they were together.

Their lives were the kind of perfect that modern people refuse to believe in. Nobody could trust that everything would stay so idyllic. There’s no surprise that things would fall apart.

The Magog Worldship passed through their solar system. Every planet was seeded with infestation pods. Inluding their world.

There are times when Sally can still remember the terror of being mauled by a hairy brown beast. All she’d seen was eyes and teeth A quicksilver flash of sharp white while angry yellow eyes glared into her.

And then there were the days of terror when her impregnation was confirmed. She had seven Magog growing in her guts, gnawing on her organs. It would take three days for them to fully mature and burst out of her body.

She wandered around in a daze along with the other infected. There was no stopping a Magog birth. And as their peoples’ religion forbade suicide or kin-murder, once most of their population was infected it was decided to let things happen as they would.

They watched the ships full of the Lucky Ones fly off into the stars. They sent along their last messages for loved ones on other planets, then they settled down to wait.

It was painful.

Sharp, tearing, agony. Transcendental lapse, synaptic resonance. Hormones flooding, rushing, and filling. Synapsis darkening and going black.

It was beautiful.

She was born with her eyes open and her mind filled with the memories of Sally. She loved O’Kelley and their two children, Dante and Thora. She’d spent each day falling more and more in love with O’Kelley and the life they had. She’d been reborn in a new body, with a new sense of vision and smell. She was lither, faster, stronger than she’d ever been allowed to be.

She was Sally Jenkins.

But O’Kelley… When he’d had a human body he’d gotten desperate and tried to rid himself of his infection. Some of the Magog had died.

When his rebirth happened, there were only two O’Kelleys, and one of them was sickly. He barely lived for half a day. There was only one O’Kelley left. Sally vowed that she would have him.
But she had six sisters that thought they were Sally Jenkins too. They all wanted to take O’Kelley — her husband — away from her and each other (she’d never been good at sharing).

She had no choice.

It was a fight to the death. And she won.

She was Sally. She lived in a cozy cottage with her husband O’Kelley and their two children, Dante and Thora. They had no other family left onworld.

*

The ways of their lives had changed, but not the hows and the whys. They loved each other and lusted after the people they’d once been.

Uramichi Oniisan 01 at Amazon
0 comments on "Babble"

I seem to have misplaced a whole day. It’s very disconcerting. There are times when I feel as if I’m stumbling through my days and it’s only a matter of time before I fall.

I forget to do things I should do, I become attached to what should be passing fancies, and I am incapable of being kind when it’s expected. I do not like being told what to do–though I don’t understand why it distresses me so.

*

I ordered an Instant Pot IP-DUO60 7-in-1 Programmable Pressure Cooker from Amazon. I need a new rice cooker and I’ve always wanted a pressure cooker/crockpot. This thing does everything. I’m super excited.

It slow cooks, pressure cooks, sautes, and it has a bunch of preset cooking functions. It even has a yogur function, how cool is that? I’m excited about making yogurt with the Kid, and I’ve even heard there’s a way to turn the yogurt into Greek yogurt in the fridge.

It cost $134.95, so I hope it works well. That might not be a super lot of money to some people, but to me it’s enough that I’m going to be very upset if the Instant Pot doesn’t work the way it’s supposed to. Though I’m not too worried about being disappointed–there’s so many reviews calling it a great slow cooker, that I tend to believe them.

What really interested me about the Instant Pot was the claim that it can be used for small-batch canning. I would love to save the extras from my garden, but there’s not enough for a big ordeal. Plus I have a glass cooktop, which is terrible for conventional pressure cooking.

I was dreaming of canning some of my soups. But there’s so many people pooh-poohing the idea of the Instant Pot being able to get the psi necessary to can low-acid foods.

I don’t want to breed a bunch of botulism. I just want to make my own jams and clear out some of the space in the freezer.

Still, watching someone make stew in the Instant Pot… It’s like magic.

You just chop everything up and throw it in the pot. Hit the button. And 30-minutes later you’ve got dinner and some lunches. This thing is 6-quarts–that’s 3 jars of homemade chicken chili (dinner for 1, or lunch for 2)–and you can buy extra cook bowls, so you can switch them out as needed. (Make a whole batch of yogurt. Stir in strawberry gelatin to add flavor. Use the yogurt for yogurt, granola/graham cracker, raspberries, blueberries, sliced strawberries, and whipped cream parfaits. Or if the bowl’s freezeable, make frozen yogurt.)

I can imagine making a spicy soup, switching out the bowl’s to make rice, then right before serving putting the soup bowl back on and heating it back up. FOR THE SOUP: I’d make a base of bonito, miso, soy sauce, sugar, garlic, vinegar, white onion and crushed red pepper, and I’d throw in different ingredients. Good things would be: tofu, brussel sprouts halved, sliced zucchini, chopped onion, potato chunks, udon noodles, green onion, sliced carrot, bean sprouts, chicken, beef, pork, potstickers, sliced rice cake, kimchi, bok choy, spinach, clams, mussels, fish, seaweed, sliced mushrooms, daikon radish.

I found this recipe for pressure cooker pho — Vietnamese Pho Pressure Cooker — from Steamy Kitchen. I can’t wait to try it. I love pho. Though I’m a little worried about where I’m supposed to get the spices. (Someone needs to value bundle the ingredients together for easy purchasing. I don’t want to spend a ton of money, but I have the potential to be a valuable customer.)

I also love oxtail soup, and the Instant Pot seems perfect for it. Delicious oxtail soup served over rice and topped with chopped green onion and served with kimchi. Mm, I can’t hardly wait.

Recipes I’m planning for my Instant Pot:
*whole chicken with potatoes, carrots, and miscellaneous vegetables
*beef stew
*Italian wedding soup
*navy bean soup
*clam chowder
*chicken chili
*red beans and rice
*roast beef with carrots, potatoes, and radish
*ham with sweet potato chunks and pineapple rings
*cornish game hen
*chicken noodle soup with bok choy
*minestrone
*jambalaya
*gumbo (no okra!)
*fresh jam (I figure I can pressure cook/slow cook/simmer my way to some awesome fresh fruit jam. I’ll pack it in jars and make batches whenever we run out.)

My mouth can’t wait for the Instant Pot to come. I will be cooking the hell out of everything. It’s going to be great. And I’m sure it’s going to save the family a lot of grocery money.

When you can throw a bunch of ingredients into a big pot, put on the lid, and pressure cook your way into deliciousness… why wouldn’t you do it all the time?

—

My next kitchen appliance: a small blender.

I’ve been buying different sized regular-mouthed mason jars. They’re great to cook in and store things in, plus the blender blade should fit on the mouth of the jar. This allows personal blending directly in the jar. That’s super cool to me.

I’ve also been grabbing up mason jars for single servings of salad, pasta, all kinds of stuff. I’m probably going to buy more jars tomorrow.

Mason jar recipes:
*chicken chili and a glob of cornbread mix — microwave to heat chili and cook cornbread
*cubes of cookie dough, cubes of fruit — microwave or bake, then top with vanilla ice cream
*cake or muffin mix, cubes of fruit, dark chocolate chunks — microwave or bake
*layered salad — lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, carrot, black olives, mushrooms, croutons
*lasagna jar with sauce, noodles, cottage cheese, mozzarella cheese, and spinach — bake to cook
*parfait of yogurt, granola/graham cracker crumbs, fruit, whipped cream, syrup
*smoothie ingredients cubed (frozen yogurt cubes, frozen berries, frozen fruit or vegetable juice cubes, frozen milk cubes) and layered — blend in jar

I like the idea of being able to store ingredients in a jar and either freeze it, fridge it, or shelf it. I mean, it seems amazing to me that I can pull a jar off the shelf, add egg, vegetable oil, or milk and shake it up to blend, then I can bake a cake/giant muffin/big cookie/fudge brownie right in the jar. It ends up being me, a jar, and a spoon; it’s perfect.

—-

Check out “Allies & Enemies” at: All Romance Ebooks, Amazon, Barnes & Noble, BookStrand, Goodreads, iTunes, Kobo, Less Than Three Press, Smashwords. — superhero, urban fantasy, mm, drama. Darkstar x Blue Ice.