Being counter-cultural: morning coffee

@BookOfTamara said #countercultural is now overused (imp: meaningless). Sad fact.. Case in point: don't buy your 'coffee' this morning. Your 'coffee' is not coffee, it's sugar; you didn't make it, and you are giving your money to The Man, and not using it to better yourself. You're making yourself sick (obesity and diabetes are now epidemic) and, if you HAVE to have your coffee, ... it's simple $sbux owns you. You want to be #countercultural? Buy a coffee/espresso machine, NOT from $sbux. It'll pay for itself in a week, and that coffee? YOU made it.

"My mom has cancer; hard times; pray for me"

You ask but do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your passions. – James 4:3

People asks wrongly: "I'm scared; I'm having a bad day; my mom is dying." Don't ask for the bad that is. Ask for the miraculous good! GOD!

I was asked: "Why do you care that Catholics read the Bible?" BECAUSE THEY SAY STUPID EVIL SHIT! THEY NEED TO SPEAK ARIGHT!

God will NOT bless the evil that comes from your mouth. God will NOT be mocked. Speak truth, speak right, speak life.

"Oh, my mom has cancer, pray for me"...that what? that she has more cancer?

Pray instead: "Please pray for healing for my mom and her peace and happiness"

DO YOU SEE THE DIFFERENCE?
Dwell on bad, think about the bad, guess what you get?
Pray for a miracle, think on the good you are working to!

My mom had cancer. SO WHAT! Is God bigger? Is her faith bigger? Does she know I love her, no matter what? My mom is fine, thank you.

Oh, and one more thing:
Do you pray harder when things are going great?
Or do you pray harder only in the desperate hours?

Think about that.

Azaleas in Spring

Spring. Azaleas.

 ...and s'more azaleas (we like pink here, 'cause it's #manly ... wut?)

Ramen for breakfast

Breakfast.
Sometimes it's a conundrum to me.
Eat something healthy and yummy? Skyr, oats, cranberries.
Coffee. Of course, coffee!

Breakfast.
Never a conundrum for my 13-yo daughter.
Ramen noodles.
Next question?

Cool story, bro:
My daughter schlumphed out of bed, looked at me blearily and said: "Ramen."

You want proof?

My Schedule

So, here's my day.

My day starts at 9 pm:

9 pm: post solution to today’s @1HaskellADay problem

9 pm: post tomorrow's @1HaskellADay problem

9 pm: curl google.com/finance

9 pm: scrap that, run system, record orders, place order execution for tomorrow’s opening

10 pm: eat a banana. brush teeth. go to bed

…

6:30 am: reveille, pack breakfast and lunch, weigh in, take vitamins, record

7:05 am: depart for 7:14 am bus

8:30 am: work, give them your best, every day

noon: lunch, record actual order executions placed last night, audit returns

5:30 pm: commute home, write, ignore people clipping their fingernails on the bus, ignore people who have the need to share their phone conversations publicly and loudly and for the whole bus ride home.

6:45 pm: walk home from bus stop, pray rosary

7:30 pm: supper

Prayer for healing

For the homeschooling mom of three who has a cancerous tumor in her kidney, may she be healed. For MisYvo's niece, that she have Your love and consolation, I pray in the Name of Jesus, the Christ.

Amen

Skyr

A recipe to make skyr, Icelandic yogurt-cheese.

It's really easy (and I messed it up really badly the first time, so don't give up after the first try)

So many different ways to do this, but the best-best way for me is as follows:

prep: double-boiler, so outer pot fill 1/3 with water, that is, high enough for medium-sized inner pot to fit into the outer pot and have the water up to the lip of both. Half-gallon of organic, fat-free milk, yogurt starter (any probiotic yogurt will do, I use 'siggi's skyr'). Yes, you need yogurt to make yogurt.

Turn your oven light on now, which is late evening, after supper.

1. Bring water to a rolling boil with the inner pot inverted over the outer pot. This sterilizes the inner pot.
2. Seat inner pot into boiling water, pour milk into inner pot, bring heat down to a light boil, heat milk this way for 30 minutes (it will not boil), bringing and maintaining milk temperature at 180 deg F. (it just does this, some say use a thermometer, but there's no need to fuss over this)
3. remove from heat, empty outer pot of hot water, then, in your sink, refill outer pot with cold water, stirring the milk and bringing its temperature down to 120 deg F, which takes 5-10-15 minutes of stirring. Don't overcool it, as it slows the fermenting process too much. You'll get a feel for this eventually.
4. 'Pitch' the yogurt. That is mix a tablespoon of yogurt with a half-cup of milk completely, then pour that mixture into the heated milk.
5. Cover the pot of milk with a towel, place in oven next to your oven lamp, close oven.
6. Walk away.
7. LEAVE A NOTE ON THE OVEN FOR YOUR DAUGHTERS NOT TO PREHEAT THE OVEN FOR THEIR LATEST RECIPES! (lesson learned the hard way)
8. The next morning, the yogurt is ready if you like runny-silky. That's fine for most.I make skyr, however, which is Icelandic yogurt/cheese, so:
9. Place a cheesecloth (I use a sturdy cloth napkin) over a strainer big enough to hold the yogurt, place strainer over big, outer pot, and pour the yogurt into the (cheesecloth-covered) strainer. Stow in the refrigerator. Walk away.
10. The next morning, you have skyr above the strainer and pure whey below. You can discard the whey or make whey-berry-soda if you'd like, but that's another recipe.

A cup of skyr is small, but it's equivalent to 4 cups of yogurt, protein-wise, and with no added sugar. I like to serve my skyr with home-made granola (oats, almonds, dried cranberries, honey) and with a teaspoon of lingonberry preserves. Yummy breakfast!

* need, v: 'need' as in, yes, eventually the milk will generate the bacteria that will consume the sugars and produce yogurt, but an infusion from already-made yogurt gets things moving along very nicely (like, the fermentation-process just takes overnight, not days).