Friday Roundup #43
Y’all, I needed that weekend.
Shannon and I spent last weekend at a VRBO near Tallulah Falls, and it was everything I wanted it to be. Friday night we stayed up until almost 3 in the morning, sitting out on the deck in the dark while what was left of Hurricane Isaias rained down all around us. Saturday it just poured, so we stayed put. Shannon did my nails, we talked about our businesses, and mostly we just hung out. Dinner was my green chile chicken enchiladas, and Sunday we drove home.
It was a fabulous girls weekend, and we’ve already committed to doing it again. The house was charming and scrupulously clean, and the owner was very communicative, so I’m happy to link it and recommend it.
Now that I’m home, the Halloween decorations go up this week. More about that next week.
- Cool Thing I Found Online: Any Human Ever. You click a button and it hands you a year, a place, and a sourced sketch of one ordinary life, right down to what that person ate. You can’t pick anything. Not the century, not the region, not anybody’s heritage. It’s a total crapshoot. The lives are composites, and the site says so up front: for almost everybody who ever lived there’s no diary and no recipe card, so the best anybody can do is build a life out of what we know about that time and place. That’s exactly why I can’t leave it alone. My first two draws were a girl born in the central Mexican highlands in 1489 and a woman born near Gbongan, in Osun State, Nigeria, in 1937, and now I’m reading up on what those kitchens looked like and hunting for recipes I’ve never cooked. Consider yourself warned.
- Coming on the blog: Sunday is the pumpkin spice deep dive: how a spice blend turned into a whole marketing season, what we’re actually being sold, and a DIY syrup. Monday’s a bonus for Sweatshirt Day. Tuesday is Sharon’s pecan cheeseball, and Thursday is the ham stock that got bumped this week.
- This past week: Sunday was Creek House Wildlife #3: The Ones You Sometimes See, Monday was the night the northern lights came to North Georgia, and Thursday was homemade mushroom powder, or what I found wandering Super H Mart.
- World Food Day: Today is World Food Day. I’ll save the soapbox for Sunday, but it’s a good day to remember that somebody grew, picked, packed and hauled everything on our plates, and that plenty of our neighbors can’t count on having enough of it. If you’ve got a few dollars or a few hours, your local food bank can use either one. Here in metro Atlanta, that’s the Atlanta Community Food Bank.
- Garden Update: WE HAVE SAFFRON. Well, saffron crocus. Last week I said I was trying not to take it personally. Turns out they were just waiting for me to leave: they came up while I was gone, and I got home to tiny green shoots in the planter. No flowers yet, but I’ll take it.
- What I’m Reading: The Africanfuturism bundle is still waiting on me, because this week’s reading is for my business. I’m working through Data Driven Nonprofits by Steve MacLaughlin [Bookshop.org*] and Impact & Excellence by Sheri Chaney Jones [Bookshop.org*]. I’ve got a meeting with Sheri coming up, so consider this my homework.
- What I’m Watching: Carrie [Rotten Tomatoes], Mike Flanagan’s new eight-episode take on the Stephen King novel, over on Prime Video. It’s been remade for modern times, and I’ve got a few issues with how they’re representing Carrie herself, but overall I’m enjoying it. I’ll have more to say once I’ve finished it.
- What I’m Eating: Orzo with Texas smoked kielbasa, enchiladas, and a pot of beans and ham. The ham stock recipe is coming Thursday.
What are y’all reading/watching/cooking/dealing with this week? Let me know in the comments.
P.S. Shannon and I are already talking dates for the next one. Ideally without a hurricane.
P.P.S. A few Fridays ago I said a watched planter never sprouts. I think I’ve been proven correct.
This post contains affiliate links, marked with an asterisk.