Doug's Project 365

We went to the Somerville Theater this evening and, of course, visited the Museum of Bad Art in the basement. This one’s for Moth in honor of the recently departed Runt.

The Year in Review, as recorded in corks. Green Newton accepts them for recycling at our local farmer’s market, and I took a year’s worth down there today.

That’s 88 corks: 67 wine, 16 whiskey/vermouth/liquor/wine vinegar, 4 beer/champagne/prosecco, and the remaining half of one I cut down for some other purpose.

Dinner tonight is extra authentic: lamb kebabs on skewers brought back by my Aunt Beth from Turkey in the 1970s. And Near East rice pilaf, of course.

For those who wonder what their “oil-rubbed bronze” finish knobs & fixtures are supposed to look like, these handles are the real deal.

Here’s my dad in about 1990, holding the physical manifestation of a device he co-patented.

https://patents.google.com/patent/US4892629

These are the camera lenses I’ll be taking to Alaska: 10.5mm fisheye, 16-85, 70-200 f/4, and 300mm f/4 lenses, all stabilized except the fish; 1.4x & 1.7x teleconverters; and a tripod ring that will fit either long lens. That’s coverage from 16 to 500mm plus fisheye. With camera all told it’s 9 pounds.

But first a bonus photo: 500mm handheld has never been this easy.

And here are the lenses:

Barista made me a phoenix this morning.

After 20 years, I am retiring my old gas grill. The new one has more bells & whistles — infrared rotisserie burner, built-in smoker box, etc. — and is enough bigger that I don’t have to remove the grates to spit a chicken, and can fit my full-size cast iron frying pan in there besides. If I get 20 years out of this one too I’ll be more than pleased.

I did some tree pruning today. These sections of maple branch should provide some good BBQ smoke. (Hard to tell from the photo but the largest is about 1 1/2″ diameter.)

Toasted flour & ground almonds for our version of Carlos’s famous cookies for tomorrow.