Then we seemed in the clear, bronchiwise, until we jaunted up to Leipzig for a long weekend. And along the way, she caught something else, again, some more, and shared it with me this time. By the time we caught the train back to Regensburg from Leipzig on Sunday afternoon, I could tell something was attempting to take up residence in my forehead cave.

I went to the doctor today, since what I thought was just a mild cold didn’t go away between Sunday and Friday, and in fact got markedly worse over the week, resulting in a rich warm bass speaking register for me and for Sarah some great green gobs of greasy grimy … you get the idea. The doc had a trainee doctor lady at his side and they both got a look at the inside of my face.

I attempted to say AHHH without letting any of my sick breath hit her in the face. “Sehen Sie die Schleimstraßen?” he asked her, as she depressed my tongue and illuminated my maw. I found the expression apt; it certainly felt like the slimy stuff had paved its own thoroughfares on down to my chest. I woke up this morning at 2:30 forcibly ejecting something unspeakable. Die Schleimstraßen bringen den Schleim in die Lungen.

He asked me what color I was bringing up. Greenish brown means bacteria, which means antibiotics are in order, so I got my own dose this time, along with a recommendation to share in her slime solver.

We should both be feeling better next week.

The post Husten, wir haben ein Problem. appeared first on Regensblog.

I’d like pre-paid flat rate GSM service for about 10 days in June in a densely populated urban area in the middle of the USA.  It would be nice if that option included the possibility to retain unused credits and a phone number for use months later when visiting other parts of the country.

I’ll do my own homework too, of course, but I figure plenty of tech savvy expatriate continent-hoppers must have already found the optimum solution.

I seem to recall that AT&T and T-Mobile USA are the only big-name GSM operators in the USA.  Is that still true?

What are my options here?  What (and when) did you try that worked / didn’t work for you on a trip back to the USA with a German-issued smartphone?  (Other than disconnecting my life from the internet, of course…)

The post Cheapo pre-paid USA SIM? appeared first on Regensblog.

I had a few apples sitting around and I wanted to use them up in a baking project. Some googling revealed the inspiration for the Awesome Apple Bread recipe on foodgeeks.com. The big bonus here is that we had everything on hand today, a bank-and-everything-else holiday all day all over Germany.

Ingredients

1 cup (236 ml) oil
3 eggs
3/4 cup (155 g) brown sugar
3/4 cup (155 g) white sugar
2 or 3 smallish apples, diced, optionally peeled (but why bother?)
3 cups (414 g) all-purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. salt
some chopped nuts

The original recipe called for one teaspoon of vanilla too, which I forgot. Surely it wouldn’t go amiss. Perhaps we could have substituted apple sauce for the oil like I’d seen on other recipes, but we didn’t have any on hand.

Instructions

Combine the dry ingredients (flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, baking soda, salt) in a medium bowl. Beat the wets (oil, eggs, both sugars, and vanilla) by hand or with a mixer. Fold in the diced apples and nuts. Pour into two greased loaf pans. Bake at 325°F or 163°C for 70 minutes.

One of our loaves was long and deep and the other was short and shallow. Both finished perfectly at 70 minutes.

The post Apple Bread appeared first on Regensblog.

We took a closer look at what’s going on at the construction site on the parking lot, where the Donaumarkt used to be. I’m still not sure what’s going on there at that site, except that

1. The buildings at the south end have been in disrepair and various stages of disassembly for pretty much the whole time we lived here.
2. There’s some kind of controversy about a subsidiary of the City of Regensburg developing the area (for real estate projects? For energy-producing/saving facilities? I’m not entirely sure.).
3. Whatever they’ve uncovered under that parking lot looks pretty old. Maybe that’s holding up the works. It wouldn’t be the first time for us: the Parkhaus Dachauplatz turned up pieces of the the city wall from Roman times.

And, it looks like our local nobility (now?) has a boat named after herself, the Fürstin Gloria:

The post Flowers and Parking Lot Construction appeared first on Regensblog.

I’d heard about these credit card-sized computers running Linux called Raspberry Pi a while ago. I wanted to try one out. A local pal (the same guy who brought you the Happy Easter Eggbot) was also interested and he graciously allowed me to combine my order with his to save on shipping. It’s a fairly small investment: about GBP 25 gets you started with hardware including: a Broadcom ARM11 700 MHz processor, 512 MB of RAM, two USB 2.0 ports, an SD-card slot, a graphics processor, sound card, and an ethernet port — all on-board. It can do HD-video. It’s powered by a 5V micro-USB port.

There is lots of potential here for teaching yourself more about Linux/Unix, servers, programming languages, and electronics. In fact, that’s the point. The Raspberry Pi Foundation is a registered charity in the U.K. attempting to raise interest in and awareness of computing through low-cost hardware.

Compare it to an old ASUS eeePC (previously the smallest ‘computer’ I owned) and a credit card

Setup

You can provide your own SD-card (the machine’s hard disk) and put the OS on it yourself via Windows, Mac, or Linux. Or you can purchase a pre-formatted SD card to skip the base installation step. You can use an existing 5V micro-USB power supply (perhaps your phone or tablet uses the same connector?) or buy one from the Raspberry Pi distributors. You can buy housing kits and carrying cases for it (it arrived in a flimsy plastic case good enough for transport in a backpack, but certainly not suitable for protection from airliner squishing), or if you’re particularly industrious, you can make your own. The FAQ sadly admits that the form factor is just a little too big to fit into an Altoids tin (give it a couple years…).

Getting started was amazingly easy, even without a spare keyboard or monitor lying around — the base installation enables SSH by default, so you can just plug in the power and network and log in remotely and get going, if you’re cool with Debian-based command-line stuff. Other Linux distros are available too — I chose the Debian-derived one because I’m comfortable with Ubuntu, which is also Debian-derived. Do make sure to change the default password to something secure. I suggest something generated at random, but memorable, like via https://secure.cliff1976.net/pw.

So, what is it good for?

I’m thinking of several projects here. There’s always the usual fileserver, printserver, backups, and LAN webserver stuff. That’s what my Asus eeePC is doing, but the power draw (700 mA) on the Raspberry Pi is less than one third of that on the eeePC. And the 16GB SD card I put in there is four times bigger than the eeePC’s SSD. This thing is so small that it lends itself to being an additional wireless Access Point or repeater to get a stronger signal back in the far reaches of our apartment (if you connect it with a USB WLAN dongle). Or maybe do that, but plug in a USB camera too, and script the snapshots and periodic uploading to webserver and keep an eye on the apartment while we’re out of town.

For the electronics enthusiasts, the real benefit could be the GPIO pins provided on the GPU to practice low-level programming logic using high-level interpreted languages: programming LEDs in sync with Christmas music comes to mind first, but so much more is possible. Mr. Eggbot is thinking of combining his Raspberry Pi with a temperature sensor and some old kitchen appliances to create his own onsen egg machine. I can’t imagine it’d be much of a stretch for him to go from that to a DIY-sous vide setup. Raspberry Pi defines Python as its default supported programming language for educational purposes. I know essentially nothing about Python, but I’d like to learn. This will help.

Look what another guy did with Python and his Raspberry Pi for his dog!

I’m pretty excited about the application possibilities here.

The post Raspberry Pi — credit-card sized Linux appeared first on Regensblog.

That’s a lot longer than I expected.

On the riverbank in the shadow of the auxiliary bridge, it would appear that someone has very carefully planted nice neat rows of daffodils, some of which may have been fooled by that all that glorious sun leading up to yesterday. Fortunately, it looks like a younger (wiser?) patch of them is still holding out for that most elusive of seasons, Spring.

The post Bridge Report, April 2013 appeared first on Regensblog.

You’re going to need: rhubarb and sugar. Yep. That’s it! A pinch of cinnamon and an eighth of a teaspoon of vanilla adds a nice balance to the tartness.

Scale the recipe up as much you need to. You’ll want that tart and sweet rhubarb flavor over ice cream (or maybe this Lemon Mascarpone Gelato) in July. Or November. Or whenever you can’t get rhubarb anymore. It freezes beautifully, so clean out your local rhubarbmonger’s stash and surprise yourself guests in the off-season.

Note: rhubarb leaves are apparently toxic, with a lethal dose set at the inconceivably high 5kg consumption (thanks Wikipedia). So don’t eat them.

Ingredients

• 750 g rhubarb, washed, trimmed, and cubed
• 300 g sugar

Yield

1.42 L (6 cups) of yumminess.

Instructions

1. Wash the rhubarb and trim away the leaves.



2. Coarsely chop the stalks.

3. Combine them with the sugar over low heat in a saucepan. After the rhubarb has softened (easily pierced with a knife or fork), remove the pieces from the saucepan with a slotted spoon to a bowl and set aside.



4. Continue cooking the liquid in the pan down into a syrup. After a few more minutes, it will noticeably thicken. Combine that syrup with the softened rhubarb pieces. Let it cool and portion it out into off-season treat sizes for freezing.

The post Super-easy Rhubarb Compote appeared first on Regensblog.

Happy Easter!

P.S. — CN Heidelberg, beat that penmanship if you can.

The post Happy Easter appeared first on Regensblog.

They’ve been pretty thorough smoothing out the surface here, preparing it for whatever comes next. It’s hard to see what’s been happening under the enclosure.

Now that they’ve ripped up the part of the bridge leading down to Müllerstraße and Alte Linde, you can see that they’re still much less than half way across the bridge. Well, no surprise — we read somewhere a couple years ago that this was to be a 5-year project.

So, if you need to get up from the Oberer Wöhrd into Stadtamhof or the Altstadt, you better be able to handle a temporary staircase — wonder how long that’s going to be in place.

In other news, rhubarb is here, looking too nice to have come from Germany. I suspect it’s an import from some region who knows what time of year it is. We’re waiting for the local crop to arrive before we start getting excited. At this rate, it could be May before we start to get Springy weather!

The post Having some bridge work done appeared first on Regensblog.

I’ve had a hankerin’ for lots of corny things since even before we tried to punk out on this unyielding winter. While enjoying the local fruits, vegetables, and grains in Mexico, we made a batch of esquites, got our hands on a tamal or two. (Oddly, not a drop of pozole this time, but we made up for that in previous trips.)

Maybe it’s thanks to the wintry weather still in full force in Germany (though with not so much snow in Regensburg — the #expatweathernetwork indicates the rest of Germany has been getting pounded while we’ve received a mere dusting). Or maybe we just didn’t get enough corn intake while we had the chance. But I’ve been chomping at the bit for some old-fashion savory skillet cornbread.

Here’s what I did — with thanks to the Homesick Texan for the inspiration.

2 cups (396 g) of cornmeal (yellow or white)
½ cup (69 g) sifted flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 egg lightly beaten
2 cups buttermilk*
2 tablespoons bacon drippings or vegetable oil
1 tablespoon or so of cracked pepper (thinking about additional spices here — maybe some cayenne?)

Preheat oven to 450 °F / 232 °C. Put the drippings or oil in a large (10-inch) cast-iron skillet and place it in the oven for a few minutes until it’s sizzling. Mix together dry ingredients. Set aside. Beat the egg into your beaker of buttermilk. Mix with dry ingredients.

Take cast iron skillet out of oven, and pour hot oil into batter, and mix. Pour batter into cast iron skillet, bake in oven for 25 minutes. Cornbread should be brown on top and pulling away from the sides of the skillet. There may still be some oil bubbling away on the top of the loaf. If it passes the toothpick test though, it’s done.

*Oh no, you live where the Pope is was from and it’s Good Friday and you forgot to buy buttermilk? Don’t fret. Add a tablespoon of plain white vinegar or lemon juice to a cup (237 ml) — minus one tablespoon — of milk. Scale up or down as necessary. Stir it around. It’ll get good and chunky right quick.

The post Q. What’s wrong with cornbread? appeared first on Regensblog.

It can’t be long now, before rhubarb starts dominating the farmer’s market scene. Please, don’t let it be long now. Our frozen little tubs of compote have lasted almost the whole year, providing us with toppings for our crêpes and the tangy flavor in the batter of Rhubarb Sour Cream Cake.

We need fresh stocks stalks to sound the death knell of this winter.

The post Two MORE great tastes that taste great together appeared first on Regensblog.

We think they switched out the bulb in the streetlight across the street from our bedroom while we were away. It seems MUCH brighter than what Sarah and I remember. What a dirty trick!

I noticed the effect ambient light has on my sleep schedule and quality a couple years ago. I’d trained myself, or so I thought, to get up pretty much every day at pretty much the same time (barring extreme situations like 34 hours of airports and airliners). Then we stayed the night in the guest room at some friends’ house where the rising sun could not gradually cast light into the room. I misjudged my sleep time and got moving about 3 hours later than I expected. The difference became clear fairly quickly: that room was insulated against sunlight like a tomb. When I stepped out into the hallway, the streaming broad daylight nearly knocked me over.

Add this apparently pretty strong light dependency to an unusually stressful February with multiple business and personal trips near the end of a long, dark winter, and time zone shifts galore both at home and abroad in March, and I suppose it’s no big surprise that my sleep schedule is screwed up. I’m going to try lowering our shutters completely to tombify our bedroom and relying on alarm clocks and/or Sleep Cycle again to get me back on track — at least until the light-sensitive parts of my brain get used to that big glowing artificial moon* outside our bedroom.

Here’s to a solid night’s rest.

*

The post Midnight Sun appeared first on Regensblog.

We were in Rome for the first time last month and it left quite an impression. Actually, it started leaving an impression before we even got there – shopping for accommodations took my breath away. I knew that it would be expensive, but the types of places that I usually look for were well beyond what I will spend per night. It quickly became clear that hotels were out of the question, so I started sifting through B&Bs and vacation rentals. That’s how I found St. John’s Terrace.

It’s located on the 7th floor of an 8-story building in the San Giovanni neighborhood, a 5-minute walk from the San Giovanni subway stop. The building is kind of dark, with an Art Deco feel, which made walking into the bright, freshly renovated B&B quite a surprise. The terrace in the name refers to a large balcony on the south end of the building. When the weather is pleasant, they serve breakfast out there. It’s a small operation, only 5 guestrooms. Our room was quite generously proportioned by European standards. The bathroom had a shower cabin with two shower heads (one rain shower, one removable nozzle) and a brand new tile job.

Breakfast was served from 8-10 am in the small breakfast nook/entryway. Since we were there in the off-season, the weather wasn’t cooperating for terrace use. A variety of salumi, sweet pastries, fruit, yogurt, cereal, milk and juices were on offer daily, as well as a freshly prepared cappuccino. This was also the area where Giorgio, the proprietor, greeted us upon our arrival. He then made us a couple of espressos (espressi?), grabbed a map and asked us what we planned on doing in order to give us an overview of where we were and where we wanted to go. It was an enormous help and allowed us to make realistic plans for our limited time. In addition to being near public transit, the B&B is very near the San Giovanni in Laterano church, the Porta San Giovanni (a fabulous old city gate) and very scenic 20 minute stroll to the Colosseum and the Forum.

The price was 89€/night (breakfast included), a great value for the area and level of service. Again, we were there in the low season, so prices will be higher if you go at a more desirable time.

The post St. John’s Terrace appeared first on Regensblog.

Or maybe these familiar grocery store items will bring a smile:

And if all else fails, lay out by the pool and watch the birds:

The post Feeling crabby? Come to Puerto Vallarta. appeared first on Regensblog.

…looks like this. Including the goofy guy experimenting with his flash bouncing around the balcony.

We haven’t done much outside the condo complex yet, aside from a couple grocery runs and a trip downtown for lunch and trinket shopping on one of the overcast afternoons. Apparently it’s been cooler and cloudier here than normal; next-door neighbors here since November asked if we brought that weather with us from Germany. I hate to think so!

Soon my parents will be arriving and I’m sure we’ll find some less lazy ways to spend our remaining time here. But the lazy feels awfully nice, too.

The post Nearly Every Evening appeared first on Regensblog.

Want to make it meatless? Be careful. The bacon provides salt, smoke flavor, and fat to keep the beans from going chalky on you. So if you’re going vegetarian here, you might consider adding pimenton (smoked Spanish paprika) or even liquid smoke flavoring, salt, and plenty of olive oil to compensate.

Ingredients

1/2 pound bacon, diced or in postage-stamp-sized slices
1 large onion, peeled and diced
2 celery stalks, diced
2 medium carrots, peeled and diced
4 garlic cloves, peeled and coarsely chopped or smashed
1 pound dried pinto beans, soaked overnight
1 tablespoon coarse kosher salt, more to taste
2 cups dry red wine
1/4 teaspoon chili powder
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
Shredded cotija cheese, for serving (optional)
generous bunch cilantro leaves, coarsely chopped

Instructions

1. In the bottom of a large pot over medium-high heat, brown bacon until golden, about 5 minutes. Stir in onion, celery, carrots, garlic and rosemary. Cook, stirring occasionally, until vegetables are tender, 5 to 7 minutes.

2. Drain beans and add to pot along with 1 tablespoon salt. Pour in enough water to just cover the beans (about 7 to 8 cups). Bring liquid to a boil; reduce heat and simmer gently until beans are just tender, 45 minutes to 1 hour.

3. Meanwhile, in a small pot over medium heat, simmer wine until it is reduced to 2/3 cup, 20 to 30 minutes.

4. Pour wine into beans, mix in the cumin and chili powder, and bring to a simmer. Cook for 10 to 20 minutes longer to meld flavors and thicken broth to taste. Sprinkle with cotija cheese and chopped cilantro.

The post Bean Stew with Red Wine Syrup appeared first on Regensblog.

The post Kicking back for a bit. appeared first on Regensblog.

Finally, a little sunlight for Regensburg this weekend! This winter has felt particularly dark and dreary. It doesn’t seem to be just my impression — I’ve had work stress and family stress (thanks all for the kind words of support), but EVERYONE we talked to seems to be down in the dumps. But maybe the bright sun today will help counteract that.

The renovation work on the bridge is apparently moving along as well. So much so that we got a little surprise late in February — the auxiliary bridge suddenly was closed to pedestrian and bike traffic upon my return from a business trip. But it should be back in working order soon.

In the meantime, let’s hope for more days like these.

The post Bridging the Gap into Spring appeared first on Regensblog.

Sarah found this recipe a few days ago, and we’ve been drooling about it ever since.

We don’t have two round 10-inch cast iron skillets, but we do have a 10.5-inch squarish one. Since the recipe is intended for 2 10-inch cast iron skillets, and the area of a rectangle is l×w (or l² for a square) and the area of a circle is πr², the ingredient downscale factor can be expressed thusly:

( 10.5² / 2( π(10/2)² ) ≈ 71%

Thanks, Mr. Birch, for 9th grade algebra, and Mr. Krumwiede, for 10th grade geometry.

Ingredients

281 g bread flour
7 g kosher salt, plus more for sprinkling
12 g instant yeast (about 2 packets of German instant yeast)
193 g water
6 g (a little less than a tablespoon) Extra-virgin olive oil, plus more for coating
1/2 recipe pizza sauce
240 g Full-fat, dry mozzarella cheese
Other topings striking your fancy
1 small handfull torn fresh basil leaves
40 g grated parmesan or pecorino romano cheese

*Yeast note: Empirical evidence suggests that German instant yeast is wimpy. So in American recipes, I have begun to quadruple the amount of yeast it calls for. That’s where the 12 grams comes from here.

Combine flour, yeast, water, and oil in a large bowl. Mix with a wooden spoon until no dry flour remains — I read about an enzyme on some people’s hands that inhibits the yeast metabolism and wonder if I am the source of my low-rise breads. The bowl should be at least 4 to 6 times to volume of the dough to account for rising. Not that my dough ever rises as much as it should.

Cover bowl tightly with plastic wrap, making sure that edges are well-sealed, then let rest in a warm place for at least 8 hours and up to 24. Dough should rise dramatically and fill bowl. Then add in the salt and work it in thoroughly. I read somewhere else that salt inhibits yeast metabolism. Or maybe I have salty, enzymey hands.

Form the dough into a ball by holding it with well-floured hands and tucking the dough underneath itself, rotating it until it forms a tight ball. Or as close as you can get it — this is a high-hydration recipe, so it’s going to be gloopy.

Pour 1 to 2 teaspoons of oil in the bottom of a 10.5-inch square cast iron skillet. Place the ball of dough into the pan and turn to coat evenly with oil. Using a flat palm, press the dough around the pan, flattening it slightly and spreading oil around the entire bottom and edges of the pan. Cover tightly with plastic wrap and let the dough sit at room temperature for two hours. After the first hour, adjust an oven rack to the middle position and preheat oven to 550°F, or as close as you can get it. Ours only goes to 250°C (482°F).

After two hours, dough should be mostly filling in the pan up to the edges. Use your fingertips to press it around until it fills in every corner, popping any large bubbles that appear. Lift up one edge of the dough to let any air bubbles underneath escape and repeat, moving around the dough until there are no air bubbles left underneath and the dough is evenly spread around the pan.

Top the dough with 3/4 cup sauce, spreading the sauce with the back of a spoon into every corner. Spread evenly with mozzarella cheese, letting the cheese go all the way to the edges. Season with salt. Add other toppings as desired. Drizzle with olive oil and scatter a few basil leaves over the top (if desired)

Transfer pan to oven and bake until top is golden brown and bubbly and bottom is golden brown and crisp when you lift it with a thin spatula, 12 to 15 minutes. Immediately sprinkle with grated parmesan or pecorino Romano cheese. Using a thin spatula, loosen pizza and transfer to a cutting board (it should loosen and slide out with little effort). Cut into slices and serve immediately.

The post Pan Pizza at Home appeared first on Regensblog.

What’s WEBMU? Read on: http://www.expatbloggersingermany.com/webmu/

The post WEBMU — is it not just for bloggers anymore? appeared first on Regensblog.

A perfect record is pretty difficult to sustain. Even my favorite airline for business trips to Romania let me down pretty hard last week. A trip with eight hours of planned travel ballooned into 19 hours, thanks to Carpatair.

Not all of the travel time was their responsibility, of course. It takes a solid hour and a half to get to the airport from our apartment. Figure on twenty minutes from the airport in Iași to the office or hotel. But I’m chalking the other 17 hours — instead of 6 — up to them.

I was supposed to depart Munich at 09:30 and, after a brief layover in Timișoara, arrive in Iași at 14:40. Check-in, boarding and taxiing all seemed to go as planned. The first indication that something was going to be different about this trip was during the take-off: suddenly the engines throttled down and we veered off the main runway, rolling to a stop out the flow of air traffic. The pilot told us there was a routine technical concern, nothing for us to worry about, but that some tests would be required before he could decide whether the flight could proceed as planned or not.

Turns out not. He canceled the flight. We re-entered Germany, and claimed our bags. The baggage claim representative of aerogate — Carpatair’s contractor at Munich Airport — instructed us to head to their ticket window in the departures section for further information. Chaos awaited us there. Three squawking women sharing a single telephone and trying to answer questions from and instruct a planeful of dismayed passengers — at least partially German passengers, which means we were not queueing patiently and orderly, but rather trying to surreptitiously climb onto the shoulders of the next guy (or outflank him) without being noticed, while glaring at and muttering about the dude flanking us or breathing down our neck.

They seemed incapable of answering questions coherently — like “How will I get to my destination? Who will give me the boarding pass? When will I arrive?” I heard a rumor while standing in line that the transportation for the last leg of the trip would be via ground. But all these aerogate ladies would tell was “Lufthansa” (in answer to “Who will give me the boarding pass?” and “tonight” (“When will I arrive?”).

I made my way across the airport to the other terminal, tired and frustrated, and a kind Lufthansa ticket agent confirmed that I was rebooked on one of their flights to Bucharest, but nothing beyond that. I told her that my destination was Iași. She called aerogate and they confirmed to her that I would arrive in Iași via ground transportation, but not when that would be. I shrugged and decided to go with it, knowing I did not want to face the company travel department with unplanned flight costs for reimbursement.

I still had more than a handful of hours to kill at Munich airport. I figured it couldn’t hurt to put some maps on my phone for offline use to track my progress across the country if I get bored on the way up from Bucharest. That was a prescient move on my part.

When we landed in Bucharest passengers for Craiova, Bacău, and Iași were separated off from the rest of the passengers. It was then that I found out that I was the only person headed for Iași on a van full of passengers to Bacău. I found out later — much later — that that is not such an unusual route. There are a few routes from Bucharest to Iași, and the one with the best roads goes through Bacău. But it was two additional hours beyond the other passengers’ destination at night, in the fog.

And along the way I found out our driver had never been to Bacău, or Iași. And didn’t speak any of my languages. And didn’t know the route. And didn’t have any maps with him. I got all this from the lone Romanian speaker in the vehicle (a passenger to Bacău). The other guys all wanted to stop for dinner after a few hours on the road, but I managed to convince them to press on. I had packed a box of granola bars and sacrificed them as bribes to the other passengers so we would not have to stop for dinner.

A few times I noticed, after entering a roundabout, that we weren’t heading the direction I thought we should be. I fired up Google Maps and showed the Romanian speaker (until he got out, with the rest of them, in Bacău) that we were obviously heading away from our destination. When I was the last remaining passenger, I notified the driver directly, pointing and gesturing.

He didn’t always believe me. A couple times, leaving Bacău and entering downtown Iași, he paid a local taxi driver to let us trail behind in the right direction. Eventually, just before 2am, 20 hours after awaking the day before, I mumbled “mulțumesc” and stumbled my way, groggy, stiff and sore, into the Unirea without looking back.

Three morals of the story, I guess:

1. Think REALLY hard before accepting ground transportation instead the travel you paid for. Don’t let the counter clowns brush off your concerns about travel time and method.
2. Get the maps before you start roaming on your data plan — I’m sure glad I did. Kinda glad I didn’t get the iPhone at work for that reason (or is there an offline maps option for them now, too?)
3. Keep individually wrapped snacks around. They could be more useful than you think.

The post Be prepared: granola bars and Google Maps save the day appeared first on Regensblog.

]]> http://www.regensblog.com/2013/02/09/be-prepared-granola-bars-and-goolge-maps-save-the-day/feed/ 5 http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/27/homemade-pasta-a-series-of-tubes/ http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/27/homemade-pasta-a-series-of-tubes/#comments Sun, 27 Jan 2013 07:10:58 +0000 cliff1976 http://www.regensblog.com/?p=7749 In our continuing quest to make more food ourselves where feasible (and fun!), I bought a(nother) pasta making attachment for our KitchenAid mixer on eBay earlier this month. This one extrudes dough into tube shapes! Here are some of my … Continue reading →

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In our continuing quest to make more food ourselves where feasible (and fun!), I bought a(nother) pasta making attachment for our KitchenAid mixer on eBay earlier this month. This one extrudes dough into tube shapes!Download audio file (Series_of_Tubes_-_Senator_Ted_Stevens.mp3)






Here are some of my impressions:
• The suggested recipes call for straight Tipo 00 flour, not a mixture of all-purpose and semolina flour, like the recipes included with our pasta roller and cutters. I imagine that has something to do with the final texture or tensile strength of strands of gluten or something like that. Anyone know for sure? And, while we’re at it — is there even a difference between Italian Tipo 00 and German Typ 405 flour? Wikipedia seems to imply there is not!
• Preparation is bit simpler than cutting flat noodles, because there’s no need to flatten the dough first. Knead it, mostly in your mixer with the kneading hook, and a little by hand, then form into balls for extrusion. Don’t flatten them. There’s simply no need!
• Mixer speeds are necessarily higher than for rolling and cutting flat pasta, I guess, because it takes more force to squish the dough through intricate openings than to flatten it out along an axis.
• It’s slower — probably for the same reason as the above. Don’t be discouraged the first couple of minutes with the extruder; it takes a while for the dough to auger all the way in. Likewise, there will be more dough than I would have thought longer after adding the final ball to the hopper.
• Cleaning will be more complicated and involved. Like the rollers, you’re never supposed to dunk the extrusion plates into water. Unlike the rollers, you pretty much have to wait overnight until the remaining dough has dried enough to brush away or pry/poke out with a toothpick.

Our “large macaroni,” as KitchenAid calls them, cooked quickly and easily and were quite tasty in Sarah’s Amatriciana sauce. I am looking forward to making our own elbow (“small”) macaroni, fusilli, and rigatoni in the near future, especially after some great pasta in Rome last weekend. Details on that are forthcoming!

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]]> http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/27/homemade-pasta-a-series-of-tubes/feed/ 7 http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/26/airborne-slave-to-fashion/ http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/26/airborne-slave-to-fashion/#comments Sat, 26 Jan 2013 08:56:32 +0000 cliff1976 http://www.regensblog.com/?p=7739 Traveling back from Rome to Regensburg last week, I spotted this shirt on the back of an Asian dude (from Asia? From Europe? Who knows?). I don’t get upset about national symbols appearing in fashion, and I even kind of … Continue reading →

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]]> Traveling back from Rome to Regensburg last week, I spotted this shirt on the back of an Asian dude (from Asia? From Europe? Who knows?).


FLIGHT FOR FREEDOM
WITH
THE STRENGTH OF AIRMAN
THAT FOUGHT IN ALL THE GREAT
BATTLES OF THE AIR WAR.
FROM BULL RUN TO APPOMATTOX

I don’t get upset about national symbols appearing in fashion, and I even kind of enjoy reading engrish.com, but I am enough of a stickler to be annoyed about historical inaccuracies.

Can you spot what’s irking me?

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]]> http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/26/airborne-slave-to-fashion/feed/ 7 http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/13/more-anthropomorphic-body-fluids/ http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/13/more-anthropomorphic-body-fluids/#comments Sun, 13 Jan 2013 18:43:58 +0000 cliff1976 http://www.regensblog.com/?p=7689 A few years ago we reported on these welcoming guys appearing in Regensburg in mobile facilities. Turns out that wasn’t the end of the anthropomorphic depictions of bodily fluids. Fun! It’s the pharmacist’s favorite time of year: everyone knows someone … Continue reading →

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]]> A few years ago we reported on these welcoming guys appearing in Regensburg in mobile facilities. Turns out that wasn’t the end of the anthropomorphic depictions of bodily fluids. Fun!


It’s the pharmacist’s favorite time of year: everyone knows someone who’s sick, and constant temperature differentials between indoors and outdoors make all your facial membranes feel extra gooey. So maybe everyone wants to retard their runniness with these capsules? Or at least maybe has kids with Monsters, Inc. on DVD at home?

Just one question: was Ghostbusters not a thing here?

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]]> http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/13/more-anthropomorphic-body-fluids/feed/ 5 http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/07/selfies/ http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/07/selfies/#comments Mon, 07 Jan 2013 18:28:19 +0000 cliff1976 http://www.regensblog.com/?p=7672 I bought an adaptor some time ago for using old Canon FD-series lenses with my Olympus PEN E-PL2 Micro Four Thirds. Then a few days ago, I bought an f/1.4 50mm (prime, from back that was standard) lens potentially older … Continue reading →

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]]> I bought an adaptor some time ago for using old Canon FD-series lenses with my Olympus PEN E-PL2 Micro Four Thirds. Then a few days ago, I bought an f/1.4 50mm (prime, from back that was standard) lens potentially older than I am to put it all together.

It arrived today. Here are the requisite selfies.



I love the analog focus (no autofocus possible anyways). I love seeing the focus distances on the ring, and setting the aperture there, too. I really love how much light this puppy sucks in. All these were with no flash — just mild incandescent lighting in our dark-as-a-cave living room at ISO 800 and 1/40th of a second. Probably f1.4, but who nose knows?

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]]> http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/07/selfies/feed/ 4 http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/06/italian-grocery-roadtrip-price-comparison/ http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/06/italian-grocery-roadtrip-price-comparison/#comments Sun, 06 Jan 2013 14:57:12 +0000 Sarah http://www.regensblog.com/?p=7650 We did a road trip down to Northern Italy in December 2012 primarily to visit the grocery store(s) there. We ate like royalty in a fantastic agriturismo and spent the day with the best weather of the weekend exploring cute … Continue reading →

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]]> We did a road trip down to Northern Italy in December 2012 primarily to visit the grocery store(s) there. We ate like royalty in a fantastic agriturismo and spent the day with the best weather of the weekend exploring cute towns in the area…but to be honest, those are just perks. The whole point was to stock up on wine from Castello di Roncade and supplies — hopefully cheaper or of better quality or variety — for the coming year. Along the way down, as we approached our destination, we made note of signs for hypermarkets and followed up on them using the WiFi in our room. We settled on the Iper in Castelfranco as the closest in the area.

Hmm. How’d we do?

Item	Castelfranco	Regensburg
Risotto rice (kg):
Arborio Carnaroli	€1,25 €1,35 €1,59 €3,19	€7,58
flour for pasta-making (kg):
Tipo 00 Semolina	€0,59 €1,70	€2,99
dried pasta (500g):
Tubetti Ditali Ditalini	€0,39 €0,55 €0,84 €1,14	€1,39
Olive oil (L):
Various medium-grade local and house brands	€3,45 €3,49 €3,99 €4,83 (in a 3-l jug)	€3,59 €3,72
Cheeses (kg):
Asiago Grana Padano (10 months) Bella Lodi Parmigiano-Reggiano	€9,99-11,99	€19,00 €19,90 €22,50

Okay, so we can see that olive oil was not such a big win, price-wise. But we loved perusing the selection and choosing between cold-pressed cloudy unfiltered and extra frooty fancy foil-wrapped varieties. And the freshly-baked wood-fired oven pizzas and arancini at the in-house rosticceria and pizzeria were motivation enough to stop in, even without the bulk staple purchases. Can’t wait to see how those stack up against supplì later this week.

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]]> http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/06/italian-grocery-roadtrip-price-comparison/feed/ 7 http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/04/homemade-lasagna/ http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/04/homemade-lasagna/#comments Fri, 04 Jan 2013 17:10:09 +0000 Sarah http://www.regensblog.com/?p=7632 This was a labor of love. I’ve learned to make a bolognese sauce that is pretty outstanding, but takes a few hours to make and at least one overnight to develop. We’ve had a pasta roller for about a year … Continue reading →

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]]> This was a labor of love. I’ve learned to make a bolognese sauce that is pretty outstanding, but takes a few hours to make and at least one overnight to develop. We’ve had a pasta roller for about a year now and Cliff is getting pretty skilled at its use. If I was really a go-getter, I would have made my own ricotta and mozzarella, but I’m not happy with the texture of my homemade stuff (yet), so I just bought those. This is not a saucy lasagna, and the ultra-thin noodles combined with a conservative hand filling the layers yields a surprisingly light-textured product. Just FYI, we boil the lasagna noodles prior to assembly. I know that lots of people don’t, but I prefer it this way.

1/2 recipe fresh pasta, rolled into sheets on setting 7 (second to last – very thin)
8 oz/225 g frozen spinach, thawed and squeezed very dry
1 egg
1 c/250 g ricotta cheese
2 T cream
salt and pepper to taste
1 recipe bolognese sauce
2 small balls fresh mozzarella (preferably buffalo), drained and roughly chopped
1/2 c grana padano or parmesan, grated

Preheat oven to 375° F/190° C.

Take your sheets of pasta and cut them into lasagna sheets, roughly 6in x 4in/15cm x 10 cm. Don’t be too exacting – it helps to have a few small or odd-shaped ones to get complete coverage. If you have a rolling pizza cutter, it’s great for this task. In a large pot of rapidly boiling water, boil 3-4 noodles at a time for no more than one minute. Then remove to colander, run cold water over the cooked noodles and lay noodles flat on damp paper towels until it’s time to assemble. We ended up with about 20 noodles and used them all.

Put the spinach in a large bowl and add the egg, whisking until well-combined. Whisk in the ricotta and cream until mixture is smooth and even. Add salt and pepper and stir.

In a 9×13 pan, spoon a little of the bolognese on the bottom and spread it into an even layer.
1) Place the first layer of noodles on the bolognese, making sure they completely cover the bottom of the pan, overlapping to seal the seams (noodles will stick to each other). Next, spread bolognese on the first layer of noodles, starting with 1/2 c/125 ml and adding more if needed to cover the noodles completely.
2) Add another layer of noodles, then top with half of the ricotta mixture, spreading it evenly to the edges of the noodles.
3) Another layer of noodles, then another layer of bolognese, this time with half of the mozzarella sprinkled over it.
4) Another layer of noodles, then the other half of the ricotta.
5) Another layer of noodles, then the bolognese and the other half of the mozzarella.
6) The last layer of noodles, with more bolognese spread on top and the grated cheese sprinkled on.

Cover the pan with foil and bake for 40 minutes, then uncover and keep baking for 15-20. After removing it from the oven, let it sit for at least 10 minutes before cutting into it.

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]]> http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/04/homemade-lasagna/feed/ 3 http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/01/pseudo-random-observations/ http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/01/pseudo-random-observations/#comments Tue, 01 Jan 2013 17:20:16 +0000 cliff1976 http://www.regensblog.com/?p=7591 I’ve been building a password generator the past few days. It takes words from the dictionary at random* and then combines them with punctuation and numeric characters. I have elaborated on a few methods of personal information security before (here … Continue reading →

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]]> I’ve been building a password generator the past few days. It takes words from the dictionary at random* and then combines them with punctuation and numeric characters.

I have elaborated on a few methods of personal information security before (here and here). I still prefer to

• never use a password for more than one site/service/login, and
• not even know most of my passwords, and
• let software generate them for me

But I guess I can see a need for passwords that are memorable, or at least easy to visually read and type in on another screen (perhaps a miniature one, or a computer you don’t own). That’s when passwords made out of words my brain knows, like


Sideswiped7-preparedness's

have an advantage over a more random string of characters like


hyV%<m-Wtfa,8I5V$paAObW6gj

…Try reading that off your phone and typing it into someone else’s computer!



Click it for the whole comic. Thanks, xkcd!

I was inspired by the Password Strength edition of the xkcd comic, but:
• Lots of services I use require a capital letter, a numeral, and a punctuation character, and
• Most of them don’t support password lengths high enough to permit the “correct horse battery staple”-style of passwords.

And, I see that I’m not the only one — visit http://correcthorsebatterystaple.net if you like. The reason I decided to build my own generator, instead of using that one: the site’s not available via HTTPS. It doesn’t make much sense to me to generate passwords — presumably for securing stuff you care about — when that connection is snoopable.

So, I made one, secured it, and while testing it, some really interesting combinations have come up — at pseudo-random:

• 9pickers$Negotiate
• advert's~Dishonesty's4
• 9Inbred/mulishness
• 1Quibblers(guesstimate's
• 8monkeys-Propagandizing
• Sodom's=1visit's
• 4Sacerdotal:chaplaincy
• Equivalence|physics9
• 1Kiddies!matriculation
• detested(Altruists5
• organisms>Pantries5
• insouciant~Corrupter5
*Well, as random as possible, given the pseudo-random number generator I’m using. I consider it random enough.

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]]> http://www.regensblog.com/2013/01/01/pseudo-random-observations/feed/ 3 http://www.regensblog.com/2012/12/31/winding-down-2012/ http://www.regensblog.com/2012/12/31/winding-down-2012/#comments Mon, 31 Dec 2012 17:00:33 +0000 cliff1976 http://www.regensblog.com/?p=7613 Couple nice shots with my phone as the year winds down. Looking forward to sunsets happening later in the day again — these were at 16:40 Saturday.

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]]> Couple nice shots with my phone as the year winds down. Looking forward to sunsets happening later in the day again — these were at 16:40 Saturday.



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]]> http://www.regensblog.com/2012/12/31/winding-down-2012/feed/ 0 http://www.regensblog.com/2012/12/31/herbed-poultry-dressing/ http://www.regensblog.com/2012/12/31/herbed-poultry-dressing/#comments Mon, 31 Dec 2012 11:55:51 +0000 Sarah http://www.regensblog.com/?p=7588 I’ve been trying to get standard Thanksgiving dressing (or stuffing, if it’s in the bird) right for a long time. Unfortunately, it’s sort of a hard thing to test out in a two-person household. We had friends visiting a few … Continue reading →

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]]> I’ve been trying to get standard Thanksgiving dressing (or stuffing, if it’s in the bird) right for a long time. Unfortunately, it’s sort of a hard thing to test out in a two-person household. We had friends visiting a few weeks ago and did a fake Thanksgiving with them. The turkey was a spectacular bust (didn’t adequately defrost it), but the sides were enough to make the meal. And the dressing was a real winner! The original recipe is from Saveur, but I made several changes listed below.

3 T butter
1 T olive oil
3 ribs celery, finely diced
onion, finely diced
bay leaf
salt and pepper, to taste
1 T sage, finely chopped
2 t rosemary, finely chopped
1/4 c parsley, finely chopped
2 t thyme, finely chopped
1 t marjoram, dried
1/2 t poultry seasoning
pinch nutmeg
5-6 c cubed dried 1/2 in white bread
2 1/2 c chicken stock
1 egg, beaten

Preheat oven to 400° F/200° C. Grease a 9×9 pan with 1 T of the butter.

Heat 1 T butter and 1 T olive oil over medium heat. Add celery, onion and bay leaf and cook for 15-20 minutes or until golden brown. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Add sage, rosemary, parsley, thyme, marjoram, poultry seasoning and nutmeg to skillet and cook until fragrant, about 2-3 minutes. Discard bay leaf and transfer onion mixture to a large bowl. Add bread cubes, chicken stock and eggs to onion, mix well and season with salt and pepper.

Transfer to baking dish, press down and dot top with remaining 1 T butter. Cover with foil and bake 30 minutes. Remove foil and keep baking until deep golden brown, 20-30 minutes.

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