'Atsa Lotsa

TTHFCIF

So did you like that tease yesterday?

Didja spend many happy hours daydreaming about the possibilities†... over-the-top cocktails, ten-course gourmet dinners, celebrity parties, a meeting with the King of Burundi, wild naked romps?‡

I should've been a marketing major.

This weekend, I am...

*drumroll*

[SUMMARY: The suspense is killing you.§]

...making cheese.

Mozzarella, to be exact.

Did you just what-the-fuck and smack your computer? Sorry 'bout that. I know it's not glamourous, but it's sufficiently odd enough to blog it.¶

A couple of months ago, The Book Club that Changed the World# read Animal, Vegetable, Miracle by Barbara Kingsolver.

Barbara makes cheese.

Now I want to make cheese.††

So I sent away for the beginner's cheesemaking kit% and book^ and Annie and Tani and eBeth and I are going to make cheese on Sunday.

The first big object lesson in making your own cheese is finding the only way to get milk that isn't ultra-pasteurised is to buy a local brand.

I think there's a "duh" in there somewhere.@

The nice man‡‡ at Robinson's Dairy asked me why I wanted non-ultra-pasteurised milk. I told him you can't make cheese with ultra-pasteurised milk.

I could almost hear the lightbulb go off over his head.

"We've had a few calls lately about that and I had no idea why people were looking for it. That makes sense."

Which means maybe we're not the only people in Denver making cheese this weekend.

Small world.§§
*************
I did my push ups last night. I did ten extra. My butt is killing me.

By the end of this thing, my butt is going to be a veritable stone globe. Not only do I work my butt really hard in the interest of keeping my alignment correct for push ups, I spend roughly 48 hours during football season clenching and doing reverse squats as I drive my team to victory.

I may not play football, but never let it be said I don't participate.

*************

Wanda - BPAL (oil)

Marin says: I'm trying to teach myself not to be surprised when there's a roll-out on oils. I had convinced myself that the primary difference between the BPAL oils and "real" perfumes is the lack of construction. But I guess anything that has more than one ingredient is subject to those ingredients degrading at different rates.

The first blast of Wanda smelled very strongly of a deep, sour red wine before turning into a rose-and-sandalwood sort of smell.

Funny, from an impressionistic distance, it weirdly fruity, like Fruit Stripe gum. What is the alcohol and fake fruit thing?¶¶

Up close, I'm getting an unpleasant licorice and ylang-ylang## I can't abide. If it doesn't improve in a few minutes, I'm washing my arms.

For the record, it did mellow out, but too strong and too sweet for my taste. Enough that I forgot about it and left it until late that night, when it was a ho-hum sweet smell clinging tenaciously to my wrists.

One thing you have to say about the oils: they do stick.

BPAL says: Along with Loviatar, she has become something of a Patron Goddess of all Dominatrixes, Wanda is the breathtakingly beautiful sable-wrapped marble queen of Sacher-Masoch's fantasies. Her scent is a deep red Merlot$ with a faint hint of leather, sexual musk and body heat over crushed roses,$ violets and myrtle.


†FOOTNOTE (crossed): That's me, centre of your universe.

‡FOOTNOTE (double-crossed): In order of probability.

§FOOTNOTE (swerved): You may kill me when you see how far I've led you astray.

¶FOOTNOTE (paragraphed): Keeping in mind that I thought tennis racquets as party favours was good enough to blog. It's a slow season for everybody, isn't it?

#FOOTNOTE (pounded): Not as grandiose as it sounds. I made them read The Map that Changed the World early in our history and it was almost universally reviled. This led to the tongue-in-cheek name and the very serious rule that we never, ever read a geology book again.

††FOOTNOTE (ddouble-ccrossed): See, the book problem doesn't just cover a life overrun with books, it covers the collateral damage my checking account takes with every new book-driven whim I chase.

%FOOTNOTE (percented): Which I think of as Fisher Price My First Mozzarella.

^FOOTNOTE (careted): Naturally.

@FOOTNOTE (atted): 'Cause, y'know... the book is about eating locally.

‡‡FOOTNOTE (doubble-crossssed): Pat.

§§FOOTNOTE (stir your curds): Still wouldn't want to paint it.

¶¶FOOTNOTE (heads up!): See: One Leaf Clove

##FOOTNOTE (lb lb): I generally like licorice. Maybe in conjunction with ylang-ylang it becomes bad.