Music Friday: "The New Year"

I'm late I know, but for the past three days Mrs. Nasty and I have been renovating our downstairs common area, which entailed stripping wallpaper, painting wood paneling, and putting in new chair rail boards. 

It's still not done. Finishing will take another day or two. 

I'm not going anywhere for New Year's Eve this year. And as I've done before, here's that tune from Death Cab for Cutie. 

I will drink some Asti Spumante later though. 

Music Friday: "Up All Night (Frankie Miller Goes to Hollywood)"

I haven't featured Counting Crows in a good while, and this song came across my iPod shuffle when I was making pancakes for my family this morning. 

Random Notes from a Crank

If Twitter declines dramatically in use and influence because of Musk's negative influence, I wonder which online platform/s will fill the vacuum for quickly sharing information in a non-cesspool like setting? 

Well, Twitter has been a cesspool for quite a while, but at least they seemed to be taking steps to quash lies and misinformation during the previous organizational regime. 

Based on some cursory research done via the InterWebs, some of options look like Mastodon and Counter Social. 

I joined Mastodon to check it out. If you are on the platform, my handle is Quintilianw@masto.nu.

My daughter, who is home from college, asked me the other day if I went to Woodstock. My immediate answer was, "How old do you think I am?" 

I was confused obviously because she was asking about the one in 1999 because she watched the documentary Trainwreck: Woodstock '99. Mrs. Nasty and I got married during the summer of 1999, and that was the summer before my second year in my Ph.D. program. No concert-going was happening. 

I was at my local CVS, and they had a manner of bourbon called Jethro T. Boots for sale for $7.99. Hell, at that price, a fifth of that bourbon is cheaper than a six pack of craft beer. 

Fumbling Toward Culinary Talent: Golden Chicken Vegetable Soup

I found a recipe via "Our 10 Most Popular Recipes of 2022" from The Washington Post, and I modified a bit to fit my tastes. 

Ingredients

1 lb. boneless chicken thighs (I used three of them), cut into small pieces

1 yellow onion, diced

2-3 carrots, cut thinly into full and half moon slices

1 stalk of celery, chopped

1 half of a bell pepper, diced

2 quarts of low sodium chicken stock

1-2 TB of freshly ground ginger

1-2 TB of turmeric

1 can of chickpeas, drained

2-3 cups of baby spinach

1 teaspoon of roasted garlic powder

1 TB of smoked paprika

Extra virgin olive oil for sautéing aromatics

Salt and pepper to taste

Process

In a Dutch oven, season the chicken and brown for ten minutes or so on medium-high heat. Remove the chicken to a plate and let rest. The chicken doesn't have to be cooked thoroughly through. 

Heat the olive oil on medium and dump in the onion, carrots, celery, and bell pepper. Add salt and pepper and sweat them down for five to ten minutes. Add the chicken, stock, ginger, turmeric, other seasonings, chickpeas, and half of the spinach. 

Partially cover and simmer on medium low heat for an hour. Then add the rest of the spinach and simmer for another 20 minutes or so. Check on the taste and adjust seasonings as needed. 

Music Friday: "The Perilous Night" & "Billy Ringo in the Dark"

The Drive-By Truckers are touring this spring, and I might finally go to either their rock show in St. Louis or Champaign. 

In anticipation of that event, here are a couple songs from two of their more recent albums. 

Music Friday: "Heartbeat of America"

It's Sunday I know. But here goes a Music Friday post nonetheless. 

I had heard good things about Billy Strings for a while now, so I downloaded his Renewal album from last year. I've only gotten about three-quarters of a way through listening to it, but this song stood out to me from a first listen. 

Random Notes from a Crank

Since I watch We are Tottenham TV and Alasdair Gold videos on YouTube, I've gotten used to some of the words British folks use when talking about world football. 

One that doesn't make any sense to me is the when they say that someone is playing really well, they describe the player as "unplayable." The prefix "un" is typically used in a negative way, so if a player were truly unplayable, it stands to reason that person is not playing well in that one shouldn't play him. 

On a more positive note, when someone is exhausted, folks like to use the term "knackered." Going by the dictionary, the word is classified as British slang. 

However, knacker also is a noun for someone who removes road kill that is not fit for human consumption. 

And apparently the word is also a derogatory term for someone from Ireland who is of lower class or from the hood who has a certain look and thick accent. At least that's what I found on Urban Dictionary. 

As many times as I see drivers in their cars with their phone in their hands, it's surprising there are not more accidents because of people's addiction to their phones. Dangerous. 

Speaking of dangerous: Herschel Walker.

As much as I am happy that Warnock beat Walker in the Georgia Senate runoff, almost half of the Georgians who voted did vote for a candidate who is obviously not fit for serving in the U.S. Senate. 

That's a dangerous sign. 

Fumbling Toward Culinary Talent: Slow Cooker Cubed Steak with Mushrooms with Mashed Potatoes

I have some cubed steak in the freezer, and the last time I made it, the dish did not come out that well. So I found a recipe on the InterWebs and modified it.

Ingredients

2 lbs. of cubed steak

1 packet of Lawry's Beef Marinade

1 can of cream of chicken soup

1 can of French onion soup

1/2 cup of water

1 cup of beef stock

1 package of mushrooms, sliced

3 TB corn starch

3 TB cold water

Freshly cracked black pepper

Process

In the past when I worked with cubed steak, it was just too thick, so I trimmed off any excess fat and tenderized it even more with a mallet, so the steak was super thin and tenderized. 

In the slow cooker on low, add the cans of soup, water, and beef stock. Whisk it all together and then place the cubed steak into the gravy. Cook on low for roughly eight hours. 

When it's around the last hour of cooking, make your mashed potatoes. I prefer Yukon gold potatoes. And then put in your sliced mushrooms. Liberally apply cracked black pepper. 

Toward the end pull out the cubed steak and mushrooms. 

Whisk together three tablespoons of corn starch and cold water and place that into the gravy. Set it on high to thicken, and the dish should be good to go. 

Music Friday: "Better Living Through Desperation" & "Learning While I Lose"

One of the three albums I bought recently is Extreme Witchcraft by the Eels. 

I like all the songs, but here are a couple I'm particularly fond of.