Hello, I’m Veronica
The sky is not completely dark at night. Were the sky absolutely dark, one would not be able to see the silhouette of an object against the sky.
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Eggs-asperating Prep
Every now and then I get a hankering to bake something, which nine of ten times means chocolate-chip cookies. That tenth time I’ll venture into breads or cakes but they’re usually too time-consuming for my “taste”. Thus I’ll buy a perfectly prepared croissant before I ever labor to make one on my own. Maybe the same should be said for so-called perfectly prepared eggs.
Eggs-spensive! We’re all talking about eggs these days, the same way we talked about gas during the “Energy Crisis” of the late 1970s. Eggs are scarce and evermore expensive, which translates to being more choosy about how we use them at home. I like eggs for breakfast every other day and I’m not likely to change that habit on account of rising prices. My dog may have to forego the occasional scrambled egg on top of his kibble, but until I pay as much for a dozen eggs as I do to fill my gas tank, I’ll still be buying them.
I prefer mine soft-boiled What I won’t be doing is cooking my eggs any differently than I did last week or last month, even if scientists now claim the “perfect method” (their words) to do so. I prefer my eggs soft-boiled, which means a pot, some water, a $2.99 submersible egg timer from Wal*Mart, and less than ten minutes of prep after the water is boiled. It’s a quick, mindless process I can pull off even before my morning coffee.
Would you prefer a more time-consuming method instead, with only slightly better results? Okay. Take two pots of water and heat one to boiling (212 F for us Americans, 100 C for most of the rest of you) and the other pot to “lukewarm” (86 F, 30 C). Drop your eggs into the boiling water for two minutes, then transfer them to the lukewarm water for two minutes. Repeat seven more times. That’s right, seven more times. On your calculator as well as mine, that’s 32 minutes until breakfast is ready, and you’re too busy to do other stuff while you’re waiting.If I dedicate 32 minutes to egg-making, I’m expecting something much more grand and decadent. An omelette at the least. A scramble with a load of cut-up veggies. “Benedict”, including the hollandaise sauce. Heck, I’d even don my French chef’s hat and try sous vide eggs, which are…. oh, never mind – those take an hour or more.
The second is soft-boiled; the fourth is supposedly “perfect” The thought of “perfect” eggs in 32 minutes instead of soft-boiled in less than 10 is exasperating. If I wanted to go all science on you, I’d explain why 32-minute eggs allow the albumen and yolk to cook perfectly together, even though each has a different composition. I’d also explain why this method retains the maximum nutritional benefit of eating eggs (protein and so on). But c’mon, do you really care about those details when you’re just looking for grub to get your day started? Heck, the prep of my 10-minute eggs even allows me to feed the dog and clean up last night’s dishes while I wait.
The “perfect eggs” news article is interesting enough but I had to laugh when the writer inserted the standard “… be forewarned that consuming raw or undercooked eggs may increase your risk of foodborn illness”…” Wait, I thought these eggs were perfectly cooked. Now you’re hinting the process may cause food poisoning? Sorry Mr. Scientist, I’ll stick to my $2.99 Wal*Mart egg timer method instead.
LEGO Notre-Dame de Paris – Update #7
(Read about the start of this “church service” in Highest Chair)
Maybe LEGO’s engineers got impatient with the construction of the east-end chancel of Notre-Dame de Paris, because Bags 10 and 11… of 34 bags of pieces, laid out the rest of the foundation of the entire cathedral. Indeed, when we finished today’s rather brisk build (24 minutes!) we put down enough marble to allow the capacity 1,500 parishioners to “take a pew”.
24 minutes was barely a French coffee break back in the day when Notre-Dame was actually built. In fact, we’re now twenty years into the construction: AD 1182. With the chancel complete enough to host church services, we’ll spend the next twenty years (or rather, the builders did) rising the transcept (the “cross” bar, remember?) and first bays of the nave (the cross “long” bar).
Speaking of “bars”, note that I added LEGO’s signature “title bar” to the near edge of the model today (photo below). LEGO wants you to know what cathedral you’re looking at, even though I’m teaching you enough detail so you won’t need a title bar. But don’t be fooled; you won’t find a title bar in the foundation of the real Notre-Dame de Paris.
Today’s build was quick but not without the usual antics. Once again I installed a piece incorrectly – a tiny bit of marble. Once again I reached for the LEGO lever but it couldn’t lever out this kind of piece. So I resorted to my paper clip “crowbar” instead and ZING!!! – the piece went flying across the room and ricocheted (another word with French roots – nice, no?) off the wall. Good thing I managed to find it or several of Notre-Dame’s parishioners would trip on their way out.Running build time: 5 hrs. 56 min.
Total leftover pieces: 24
Some content sourced from the CNN Science article, “Scientists developed a new method for the perfect boiled egg…”.
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Tucked-Away Place to Pray
In trying economic times like these, it wouldn’t surprise me to hear about people using credit cards to pay their bills. After all, when you have more month at the end of the money you do what you must to stay above water. But it’s a bit of a fool’s game isn’t it, creating one debt to eliminate another? Its what we call robbing Peter to pay Paul. And speaking of the Christian apostles, let’s talk about robbing John to pay Peter.
St. John As promised when I began construction of the LEGO model of Notre-Dame de Paris last month (read about how I started this project in Highest Chair), I’d like to pay homage to a few of the world’s prominent cathedrals along the way. These magnificent structures are places of worship at heart but oh-so-much more besides. Each can be completely different in look and location. My goal here is to not have you walk away from Notre-Dame thinking “seen one, seen them all”.
What better place to start than at the most significant cathedral in the world? I’ll give you three hints. It’s located in the middle of Rome. It serves as the seat of Rome’s bishop (who just happens to be Pope Francis). And it’s named for one of the most influential figures in the Bible. Okay, time’s up, let’s have it. Did you guess St. Peter’s?
Cathedral of Saint John Lateran If St. Peter’s was your guess, you’d be… incorrect, and in fact, incorrect three times over. The St. Peter’s you’re thinking of – the “largest and greatest” church in the world – is not even a cathedral (but merely a basilica). St. Peter’s is not even in Rome, since the Vatican is technically its own country. Finally, St. Peter’s is not the seat of the pope (or any other bishop), even though Francis does live close by. Instead, the award for most significant cathedral goes to Saint John Lateran.
The Lateran cathedral is about a 5K jog from St. Peter’s Square. In fact, if you were to make the walk from one church to the other you’d pass by several of Rome’s highlights. The Pantheon. The Trevi Fountain. Piazza Venezia. The Forum. The Colosseum. Eventually you’d be standing in front of the imposing facade you see above.
Click the photo to see the tiny tourists! Saint John Lateran is old – even by Rome’s standards – first established in the mid-300s. It sits on the site of the former Lateran family palace. The cathedral survived several fires, earthquakes, and periods of deterioration, eventually retreating into the shadow of the grander St. Peter’s. In the 1700s the Lateran received a complete overhaul, including the facade you see today. But it has always served as the cathedral of Rome. In fact, a plaque near its ancient bronze doors deems (in Latin): “… mother and head of all churches in the city and the world.”
Apostles guard the cathedral Like Notre-Dame de Paris, the Lateran boasts a lot more than just the structure itself. Giant statues of the twelve apostles line the interior of the sanctuary. Six popes are buried here. The ancient Egyptian obelisk in front of the church is the world’s tallest. Finally, the Lateran claims to have hosted significant relics of Christianity over its many years, including the Ark of the Covenant, the wooden table where Jesus hosted the Last Supper, and (for the less faint of heart) the skulls of St. Peter and St. Paul.
St. Peter’s Basilica and Square It goes without saying; a trip to Rome isn’t complete without a visit to St. Peter’s and its surrounds. The sheer size and elegance of the basilica is unparalleled and worth several hours (if not days) of your time. But now you know; Saint John Lateran also deserves your attention. It’d be a shame to travel all the way to Italy and back without claiminng a visit to the most significant cathedral in the world.
LEGO Notre-Dame de Paris – Update #6
(Read about the start of this “church service” in Highest Chair)
The model-building word of the day, boys and girls, is structure. Bag 9… of 34 bags of pieces, brought us face-to-face with the finished look of Notre-Dame de Paris’s iconic flying buttresses, installed carefully around the walls of the cathedral’s east end. Most of those “pasta bits” I showed you in our last visit amounted to fourteen (or about half) of the cathedral’s buttresses. They look like tiny cannons, don’t they?
before 
after Remember, the structural support of this cathedral is on the exterior, allowing for tall, thin walls, and more uninterrupted open space inside. Someone could come up with the ten coolest structural elements for buildings and I’d have buttresses “fly” to the top of the list.
If Notre-Dame’s parishioners felt a sudden sense of security and stability, it’s because the giant hand of Dave was buttressing the very walls around them as they worshiped. And if these structural elements aren’t elegant enough, they also house horizontal pipes to drain the water from the cathedral roof.
Chancel w/ flying buttresses 
Side buttresses w/ low drainpipes I keep referring to the cathedral’s “east end”, but now that we’re starting to see the finished product we should use proper terms for church architecture. We’ve effectively completed the chancel, which is the altar and surrounds to the east of the transept. Picture a giant Christian cross laying on the ground. The top of the cross is the chancel and the crossbar is the transept. The lower length of the cross, where most of the parishioners sit, is the nave. At the very bottom of the nave will be the bell towers.
Gotcha! Today’s build was not without its adventures. A small black piece escaped to my home office floor early on, prompting a prolonged hands-and-knees search. I swear I heard the piece clatter to the floor yet neither hands nor knees made the encounter. I was perplexed. Finally, with the aid of my handy-dandy iPhone flashlight, I found the crafty little devil way, way back in the dark central recess of my desk. This little guy was clearly making a move to freedom. Sorry, bud; it’s time to come home.
Are you lost? Finally, I thought the adjacent photo was worth including. Pretty much every single LEGO piece of Notre-Dame de Paris is unique in size and shape. Except this one. How does a singular “trademark” LEGO block end up amongst thousands of irregular pieces? Sadly, this piece was installed one level below the dark gray roof line of the chancel, which means you’ll never see it in the finished product. So I figured it deserved its moment of glory here instead.
Running build time: 5 hrs. 32 min.
Total leftover pieces: 23
Some content sourced from Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.
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(Not) Making Cents
The other day when I drove into town I felt a sneeze coming on, so I reached into my car’s pull-out coin drawer and grabbed a handkerchief. If I’d wanted a breath mint for my mouth or an eye drop for my contacts I’d reach into the same place. But I wouldn’t find quarters, dimes, nickels, or pennies anywhere in there. Come to think of it, someday soon I won’t find pennies anywhere at all.
You probably caught the headline in your news feed. The population growth of U.S. pennies is about to come to a grinding halt. Our country will no longer mint shiny new “Lincolns” for the first time since their debut in 1787. Two hundred years and change (ha) is a darned good run for a coin but the penny appears to have been done in by compelling arguments. One, the production cost is three times the face value. And two – and perhaps most humiliating – the penny’s face value has descended into, well, obsolescence.There was a time not so long ago when I wouldn’t pass up a lost penny lying in the street. In addition to “free money” there was the old adage find a penny pick it up, and all day long you’ll have good luck. Today you’d better settle for just the luck because you can’t buy anything for pennies anymore. You’d be better off using them for more practical purposes like checking your tire tread depth or turning screws. My brother and his wife turned thousands of their pennies into a beautiful, copper-colored floor for their kitchen.
Losing their shine Speaking of copper (I’m easily distracted today) I had no idea pennies are no longer made of copper. They’re primarily zinc because of the rising cost of metals (yet they still cost three cents apiece?) You’d assume quarters, dimes, and nickels were made from an alloy of silver, lead, or aluminum, but – go figure – those coins are primarily copper.
Enough with the facts. I’m bummed to see the penny put out to pasture. Along with it goes a ton of childhood memories. You could roll pennies into coin wrappers and enjoy the thrill of exchanging the whole lot for paper bills at the bank. You could drop them into handheld banks for untold savings (and my banks were delightfully mechanical). Finally, you could walk into any 7-Eleven or drug store, hit the candy aisle, and find several “penny candy” choices. A chunk of Bazooka bubble gum, hard candies, or licorice whips could be purchased for just a few cents back then.
Three cents each… a long, long time ago Practically speaking I’m on board with the penny’s retirement, because I can’t recall the last time I involved a cent in a financial transaction. If something costs $9.99, are you telling me you’d reach into your pocket and pay the $9.99 in cash and coin? Nope, you’d more likely hand over a ten-dollar bill and then what happens? You get a penny in return. What are you supposed to do with that?
Certain sayings will have to head out to pasture as well. An expensive item can no longer be described as “a pretty penny”. “A penny saved is a penny earned” literally has no value. A frugal person should now be described as a “quarter-pincher” (in case the nickel and dime are also on life support). And “pennies from heaven” certainly don’t describe good fortune anymore, even if the song of the same name will continue to be sung.
Do you have one of these? For my money, I hope car manufacturers continue to include coin drawers in their dashboards. I keep important things in there and I’d prefer not to change my ways. Then again maybe I should keep a few pennies in the drawer, if only for my childhood memories. Those will always have value.
LEGO Notre-Dame de Paris – Update #5
(Read about the start of this “church service” in Highest Chair)
I decided to have my lunch today while working through Bag 8… of 34 bags of pieces. That was a mistake. I reached for a LEGO piece, grabbed a little block of cheese instead, and Notre-Dame de Paris almost had cheddar in its walls. I immediately vowed food would go nowhere near the assembly ever again. It’s unnerving enough putting in the real pieces.
As I worked on the uppermost level you see here I used a little too much force, and a piece in the level below loosened and scampered down into the sanctuary. I shook, rattled, and rolled the entire cathedral trying to get it out but to now avail. Just before admitting defeat, the little devil finally emerged (he must’ve gone to confession). And here’s where I learned an unnerving truth: re-assembling pieces long after you’re supposed to can be near impossible. I had to tear down an entire wall to get the piece back in place. We’re working in close quarters here, people.
“LEGO lever” Today is also a good chapter to point out the tool to the right. It’s a “LEGO lever” (my words), designed to easily remove a piece from a place it wasn’t meant to go. I didn’t need my lever through the first seven bags, but today? Half a dozen times. My mind’s eye was off just a hair and I kept assembling pieces a quarter or half-inch off from where they were supposed to go. LEGO lever = life saver.
Pasta noodles? Bag 8 started slow and repetitious but finished grand and confident. In fact, I was so full of myself after the mere forty-five minutes of construction, I boldly plunged into Bag 9. Mistake. I mean, look at the pieces in this photo! Are these LEGOs or the little bits of pasta you find in your chicken soup? Seriously, we may be almost a quarter of the way through the bag count but the pieces are shrinking. Some Sunday soon the parishioners will look to the heavens and be burned by the giant magnifying glass above them.
Running build time: 4 hrs. 22 min.
Total leftover pieces: 17
Some content sourced from the CNN Business article, “Trump instructs Treasury to halt penny production”, and Wikipedia, “the free encyclopedia”.
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Adventures in Library-ing
Early each calendar year I look back on the previous year’s expenses to discover areas in the family budget where I can trim. The price of food, gasoline, and other “have-to-have’s” always seems to go up, so I search for items that are not so “have-to-have” to balance things out. A good example is books. I read two or three a month on my Kindle e-Reader. At say, $14.99 a pop that’d be over $500 I could carve out of annual expenses… if I could only get those same books at no cost. But where-oh-where could I possibly find books for free?
You bibliophiles out there (and the rest of you, for that matter) are laughing as I’m about to describe going to the library as an adventure, but here’s the thing. I’ve been e-reading on my Amazon Kindle for so long that the idea of holding a book and turning its pages – let alone checking one out of a library – has become, well, novel again.
I wouldn’t have reached this crossroads were it not for a particular book. Amazon described Frank Delaney’s The Matchmaker of Kenmare just the way I’d hope: an intriguing WWII-era work of fiction. So I went to “try a sample”(where Amazon allows you the first several pages of the book for free) and – horror of horrors – it’s not available in digital format. WHAT? No e-Version? You’re saying, Amazon, I have to shell out $24.99 for the hard copy if I want to read it?A book for $10 doesn’t make me pause but one for $25 sure does. Hence began my library adventure. The last time I spent meaningful time in one was in college (and I don’t want to tell you how long ago that was). The library experience is probably different in every way now, starting online. When I “checked out” my library’s website (ha) I discovered I could get a digital library card almost immediately. With the digital card I could reserve and check out books from the comfort of my home computer. Hurrah, free books here I come!
Oh how I wish it were that easy. Turns out, my library’s software is not compatible with an Amazon Kindle. No digital books for me, sigh. And besides, physical books – like the one I wanted – require a physical library card. So with no other excuse to avoid it, I got in my car and headed off to my local branch. Guess what? Parking at the library is free. Entering the building itself is free (no cover charge!). Getting a library card is free. Even the library bathrooms can be used without having to check out a book first.
Our main (and modern) library branch Yes, this is my tax dollars at work of course, but the illusion of all this free stuff is fun while it lasts. And boy howdy, libraries aren’t what they used to be. Ours has all these rooms and services and people, as if the surrounding shelves of books are merely a carry-over from past generations. You can sit down to public-access computers, attend a lecture, host a meeting, rent DVDs, buy coffee, and even spend time in a room of books dedicated to the history of the surrounding county. Maybe this is all review for you, but it’s a little overwhelming for an e-reader who’s navigating libraries of the new world.
Our secondary (and ancient) library branch There’s more to this adventure in library-ing than I have time for today (including the over-the-river and through-the woods visit to a different and decidedly ancient branch in my library’s network), but let’s close the book on this topic with a “laugh’s on me” conclusion. As I was researching for this blog post I went to the Amazon page for my Matchmaker… novel again. Go figure; it’s available in digital format after all, and even in paperback. How did I miss these options the first time around? Must be the library gods telling me to go old-school and get a physical copy for free.
LEGO Notre-Dame de Paris – Update #4
(Read about the start of this “church service” in Highest Chair)
Click the photo for a more detailed view As Notre-Dame de Paris rises slowly from its foundations, I often picture a congregation of parishioners down there at ground level, sitting quietly in the pews. Startled by the snap of a LEGO block above them, they gaze skyward, see my giant fingers, and wonder, “OMG is that the hand of God?” No, no, little ones, it’s just Dave, working through Bag 7… of 34 bags of pieces.
The little devil was still in the bag Today almost included the long-awaited moment where I realize with mock horror that LEGO left a piece out of one of their model sets. I churned through my piles of pieces, endlessly stirring and turning them over and over, but to no avail. A piece was missing, and that sick-to-your-stomach feeling settled in deep, the way you reach the end of a jigsaw puzzle minus one piece. Then, to my utter amazement, I spied it out of the corner of my eye. The tiny traitor was still in Bag 7. Wow. Good thing that plastic bag wasn’t already relegated to the trash, huh?
“Underfed” buttresses 
On the other hand, with more excitement than it probably deserved, today we began construction of Notre-Dame’s signature flying buttresses. At first I was disappointed in the LEGO pieces, because I thought they looked a little, well, “underfed”. Then I remembered; we’re only beginning the structure of the buttresses. The finished look you see on the outside of Notre-Dame is supported by a complex of arches and columns well below it. Here I thought my “God’s hand” was already working at roof level but in fact, we’re only about halfway up the structure.Running build time: 3 hrs. 32 min.
Total leftover pieces: 16
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Mind Your Mannerisms!
My late father had a habit I always admired. He’d send personal notes of thanks to those he felt deserved his gratitude. His notes were not smartphone texts, emails, or Word documents. They were handwritten sentiments on heavy card stock, his name elegantly embossed across the top. Why did these notes capture my admiration? Because I’ve forgotten how to write them myself. Or more to the point, I’ve forgotten how to write.
America’s Common Core Standards – the guidelines by which most states create curriculums for school grades 1-12 – no longer include cursive writing. Students still learn to write block letters, but the flowing, looping mannerism of cursive has pretty much been left behind. Instead, typing is more Common Core, and probably taught in a grade much sooner than my own middle school years. Frankly, the only remaining argument in favor of cursive writing might be for the signature of one’s name.
Autopen Even handwritten signatures have fallen by the wayside. Ever heard of an Autopen? It’s a mechanical hand, designed to hold a pen and duplicate one’s signature over and over. The Autopen is popular with politicians who want their handwritten signature on countless memos and letters, but without the added task of actually signing them.
I have a sort of Autopen myself but it’s more of a stamp. I sent my handwritten signature to a company and a few weeks later I received a stamp in return. When used with just the right amount of pressure it’s the spittin’ image of the one I’d sign with my own hand. It’s something of a writing “crutch”.
The hard truth is, over the years my cursive has devolved from “Dave, you have beautiful handwriting” to “Uh, what is that supposed to say?” I can’t even read my own writing anymore. To add to this misery my hands shake a little, which means my formerly elegant loops and curls are now jiggly, scribbly lines. Filling out the tip, the total, and the signature on a restaurant receipt is now a legitimate challenge in legibility.It didn’t occur to me until recently that my illegible handwriting is simply the product of no longer writing by hand. I’ve always believed this degradation was the result of aging fingers, hands, and the associated muscles required for cursive writing. To a certain extent this is true. But more importantly, my writing muscles just don’t remember what to do anymore.
Beginning of the end of cursive The first day I walked into typing class was likely the first day my cursive writing went downhill. The manual typewriter, followed by the electric typewriter, followed years later by the computer keyboard ensured I could create quick and perfectly legible documents in myriad fonts. Cursive writers average only 13 words a minute. Typists? 40, 60, sometimes as many as 80 words a minute.
But the pursuit of writing efficiency comes at a somewhat alarming cost. You lose the connection between mind and matter. Cursive writing is slow-w-w, which translates to more focus on what you are writing about as you form the letters. Typing feels more like a sprint to the finish, to get your thoughts through the keyboard as quickly as possible. Think of cursive as “in your own words”, while typing is “verbatim”.
Here’s an interesting experiment for you bloggers to consider. Write your next post in cursive before you take to the keyboard. See if your “voice” doesn’t sound a little more thoughtful than the one from the keyboard. Now here’s an experiment for me. What if I were to spend ten minutes a day trying to restore my handwriting? Would it eventually be described as “beautiful” once again?
Side note: I’ve somehow retained the dexterity of playing the piano, even though I don’t sit down to the keyboard very often. I’ve noticed my fingers hover over the piano the same way they do over the computer keyboard. Maybe this is muscle memory at work, no matter what the fingers are doing?
Someday it wouldn’t surprise me to see a famous quote, penned in beautiful flowing cursive, framed and displayed as artwork in a museum. The piece would bring us back to simpler days, back to the times when a physical hand put deep thoughts on physical paper. Of course, the question then would be, will anybody still be able to read cursive?
LEGO Notre-Dame de Paris – Update #3
(Read about the start of this “church service” in Highest Chair)
Click the photo for a more detailed view There were moments in the build today where I would’ve preferred to be laboring on the real cathedral. Bags 4, 5, and 6 – of 34 bags of pieces – were loaded with some of the tiniest pieces I’ve ever seen in a LEGO set. As I spilled out one of the bags a determined little square tile dashed away to the deep, dark recesses underneath my desk. If it weren’t for my phone’s flashlight I might never have rescued him.
The east end of the sanctuary (and altar beyond) We built a lot of round, structural columns today. I’ve never seen a step in a LEGO instruction manual asking for 48 identical pieces, but there I was, stacking them in my hand as I counted, “33, 34, 35…”. Those 48 pieces assembled to the 24 columns you kind-of sort-of see here.
The altar from above (before this is all covered up!) We also reinforced, filled in, and rose to new heights the curving east end of the cathedral. This assembly brought new levels of frustration, in that the installation of some pieces caused others to promptly dislodge. Indeed, at one point a very tiny piece skittered onto the floor of the cathedral (hidden within those 24 columns) and the only way to get him out was to rock the whole assembly back and forth in my hands the way you would a marble maze.
I spy an upside-down LEGO logo 😦 I need to do a better job of taking photos as I build, because the fruits of my labor are already being covered up by the higher structure of the cathedral. Maybe it was no different with the artisans of the real Notre-Dame de Paris, who crafted in very small spaces knowing almost no one would ever see the detail of their work. At least I have a camera. Back then they’d have to make a painting of what they created just to show off their accomplishments!
Running build time: 2 hrs. 50 min.
Total leftover pieces: 11 (!)
Some content sourced from The Guardian article, “Signature moves: are we losing the ability to write by hand?”
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The sky is not completely dark at night. Were the sky absolutely dark, one would not be able to see the silhouette of an object against the sky.
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