22 March 2025

Miscellany



 

21 March 2025

Hamster's Household Hints: In a Jam

For quite some time now, I've been exclusively using only one brand of jam, because of it's supreme quality:  Rigoni di Asiago's Fior di Frutta.  It is organic, produced with much less sugar (especially compared with American brands), and has the most incredibly intense and delicious fruit flavor I've ever tasted.  The raspberry is positively angelic, in the strawberry & wild strawberry you can actually taste the wild strawberry - a flavor I have not tasted since I was a kid.   Flavors that are rare in the US are available, like lingonberry, wild blueberry, cranberry, pear, and black currant.  Really, I can't say enough about this stuff; divine is too weak a description.
 
Depending on where you live, you may be able to find it in an Italian grocery.  I mail-order it online, several jars at a time.  You're more likely to get the full panoply of flavors online.  They also have an incredible cocoa/hazelnut spread called Nocciolata, which puts Nutella to shame, as well as Italian varietal honeys (Oh Honey!) 



20 March 2025

An Early Spring Walk

 The weather yesterday was just gorgeous.


 

19 March 2025

Hamster Physiology

Over time, I have learned that my superior hamster physiology makes me susceptible to various conditions that do not occur amongst the general population. Happily, when I am concerned about this, I always have David as a reality check. For example, the other evening:

Hamster: Do your cuticles itch when they get dry?

David: No

Hamster: Probably nobody's do; it’s one of those hamster things isn’t it?

David: Yeah…


 

17 March 2025

Happy St. Patrick's Day

created by GOTTE (https://www.hamgotte.com)

 

15 March 2025

Ides (lest we forget)

 


Scenes from Domestic Bliss

David and I will mark 33 wonderful years together this year.  We are in many ways compatible, which contributes to longevity, but our brainworks and habitual behaviors are often quite the opposite--which frequently makes for amusement (and bewilderment).  I was reminded of this the other morning.  David usually gets up before I do (indeed, most of the universe wakes up before I do).  So he gets the coffee working and often has a toasted item of some sort. Now here's the point. Sweetie that he is, he leaves the butter out so it will be soft for me when I get there since I loathe tearing toast with hard butter.  I like to smooth the butter evenly and to the very edges of the bread.  David, on the other hand, prefers to carve slabs of cold butter and lay them atop the bread in a form resembling rustic tile.  For this, he requires a sharp knife, which he leaves by the butter.  For me, at least, sharp knives are rubbish for applying soft butter smoothly and evenly, so I put the sharp knife in the sink and get a dinner knife to slather the butter appropriately.  I am convinced that this operation holds the secret of how we've lasted this long.


 

14 March 2025

I think I Might Be Short on Interesting Blog Material Today

1965 GM Frigidaire Rollermatic washer