siglinde99

I started to do this yesterday, but got sidetracked (stupid early work meetings) and not much has changed, so here goes:

The Friday Five for 13 May 2022

1. Where are you right now? In bed.

2. Where would you like to be right now? In bed and asleep (it’s 5am).

3. Where have you always wanted to visit (but have not yet)? Machu Picchu. Samarkand is more recent on my wish list - only the last 6 years or so.

4. What is the most peaceful place you’ve ever visited? There was a beach in Malaysia that I had completely to myself for hours. It went on as far as I could see in either direction. The water was calm and it was just delightful.

5. Where do you want to visit in your dreams tonight? I’m not much for dreams. I would rather have a good night’s sleep.

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Quick update because occasionally I think I am pretty darned funny. I am proud of this post. https://fitisafeministissue.com/2021/11/24/donating-my-vagina-to-science-the-dubious-science-of-winter-vagina/

These questions were written by mesotablar on dreamwidth.

1. What are your top 5 favourite foods?
Spaghetti, butter chicken, feijoada, plov (or pretty much any pilaf), cherries. Ask me again tomorrow and I might give you a different answer as I like lots of things.

2. Is there something similar between them? Most have multiple elements and lots of spicing options. They are generally what I would consider comfort foods.

3. Can you cook them yourself? Yes.

4. Pick one, and tell us why it is so special. I learned to make feijoada while living in Brazil. It is practically a national dish there now, but it originated as food of the slaves, for their special Sunday meal (often the only time they had meat. I love the blend of flavours, and the different textures that come from the accompanying collard greens and farao, a kind of manioc porridge. Every time I eat it, I remember a very interesting time in my career and the lovely people I got to know there.

5. Have you eaten your recommended servings of 2 fruit and 5 vegetables today? Not yet. It’s not even lunch time. I did have some vegetable soup, so I’m well on my way, though.

What's your favorite color this week? Some variation of blue or turquoise, same as always.

What job would be very unsuitable for you? Garbage collector. I couldn’t deal with the smells in summer.

What's your favorite Olympic sport? I don’t have a single favourite. Basically, I love anything that doesn’t get a lot of love outside the Olympics. Swimming,track, equestrian, rowing, anything the women are competing in.

Have you ever found yourself stuck out in the rain? Very frequently.

What does the tooth fairy do with our teeth? Turns them into piano keys.

Here it is, Wednesday already. My boss has said that I can keep working from home forever if I want. I am liking that idea a lot. It would mean just going to the office one day a week or so.

It has been a very long day - I had to be up and at the barn for the farrier at 7 am. I was worried about catching her because she has been a brat lately, so I was awake by 5 am. She was an absolute angel and she was done and back in her field by 7:11. I missed my lunchtime yoga class because the boy child called just as it was getting going. It was nice to hear from him, but now it's 7 pm and I feel a desperate need to get up off the couch and do something. Maybe I can do a bit of yoga or the gentle movement class before bed. Or I could cut out some fabric or sew something. It all needs doing.

At least I got my blog post done for this week. It took me until almost midnight last night because I had so many things I wanted to say. All the sexism leading up to the games has made me really grumpy, and I wanted to focus on some good stuff. I still managed to rant a bit, and include an excellent YouTube video, so I'm pretty happy with it. I just pulled it up so I could share the link and I see that the video link is now blacked out as age-restricted and only available on YouTube. Hilarious! Videos of women in beach volleyball uniforms are readily available. The sexism continues. https://fitisafeministissue.com/2021/07/28/things-to-celebrate-at-the-olympics/

1. What sign marks the end of the summer for you?

The autumnal equinox and the changing colours of the leaves, and the slowing of the summer harvests. Late summer is actually the best part, as it is a little cooler and less humid, and most of the biting bugs have died off.

2. What plans, if any, do you have for the rest of the summer?

I am training for a 10k swim, so lots of swimming. Plus doing things with garden produce, of course.

3. How would you describe your summer/winter so far – too hot, too cold, too wet, too buggy or what?

Summer is almost always too hot and buggy for me. This year it has been unpleasantly humid too, without the refreshing rain most evenings.

4. Summer often means open windows and the sharing of conversations, music, games and so forth with everyone. What sort of neighbor are you? Loud or considerate?

I think I am pretty considerate, though tidy gardeners may not agree with that assessment. My garden is pretty scruffy, and I mostly like it that way.

5. Aside from spouses and pets, have you had any trouble with pests recently?

I had a groundhog under my sun room in the spring, but it went away after I put the trap outside it’s hole (no food inside, and not open for business because I never got around to that part). Passive-aggressive pest control for the win!


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If you'd like to suggest questions for a future Friday Five, then do so on DW or LJ. Old sets that were used have been deleted, so please feel free to suggest some more!

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1) What are you doing this spring that you weren't doing 1 year ago? Cycling more on weekends, starting to train for a marathon swim distance.

2) What pandemic precautions are you still taking? All of them. All my family and the few friends in my bubble have been vaccinated, but I still visit only outside except with one couple and my parents. I wear my mask whenever I am indoors and when I am outdoors on a relatively busy street. I work from home and minimize shopping trips. I keep a close eye on the infection rates and trends in my city, province, country and (to a lesser extent) globally. None of that will change for the foreseeable future.

3) What's a safety rule that's very important to you? Know your limits and be safe in the water. As an open water swimmer, the details are a bit more complicated than they were when I learned to swim in a pool. Depending on the circumstances: swim with a buddy; wear a swim float for visibility; stay close to shore; keep an eye on the weather and be prepared to get out if a thunderstorm approaches.

4) What plants are blooming where you live? Lilacs, lots of flowers. Most of the flowering trees are done already and some summer fruits are well advanced.

5) What was your most memorable summer job? The summer I drove vehicles for the military was fun. The most memorable part was probably the time I happened to drive by some workers just as a piece of equipment fell and cut one of them badly. I stopped the truck and performed first aid (no thanks to the soldier I was with, who could barely bring himself to get the first aid kit out of the back). The cut was deep enough that I could see the man’s femoral artery but thankfully it wasn’t damaged. I closed the wound and applied pressure until the ambulance arrived. Then I went back to work. I must have been more shocked than I thought at the time, because I remember the next stop was for lunch and I realized I still had blood on my hands. It was a different time - bare hands when blood involved, no taking of statements, no videos or photos on your phone.

Copy and paste to your own journal, then reply to this post with a link to your answers. If your journal is private or friends-only, you can post your full answers in the comments below.

If you'd like to suggest questions for a future Friday Five, then do so on DreamWidth or LiveJournal. Old sets that were used have been deleted, so we encourage you to suggest some more!

**Remember that we rely on you, our members, to help keep the community going. Also, please remember to play nice. We are all here to answer the questions and have fun each week. We repost the questions exactly as the original posters submitted them and request that all questions be checked for spelling and grammatical errors before they're submitted.**

1. What are you going to do this weekend? I will swim, of course. There will probably be a bit of gardening, and I may go on a bike ride or two. Plus I think I am supposed to do some on-line classes today.

2. What’s your favorite way to spend time? I don’t have one favourite, but swimming, reading and crafting are all important to me.

3. What’s the most useless thing you own that you would never get rid of? That would probably be the 60 year old teddy bear that is so fragile he never leaves the shelf. Even so, I have to add some patches every couple of years as the threads of his fabric deteriorate constantly.

4. Have you started planning your next vacation? Not exactly. I’m working on a plan to do a 10 km swim, so my vacation plans are focused on my training plan for that.

5. Are you very active, or do you prefer to just relax in your free time or is it one and the same to you? I am fairly active.

There are lots of good questions today. I’ll try to get caught up on the daily word prompts tomorrow, and my recipe list for last month.

1) What is your favourite food? Spaghetti. Pasta in any form, really.

2) What is your favourite food preparation method? I don’t have a single favourite. I’m a serious omnivore, so I need to use many different preparation methods.

3) What is your favourite cuisine or style of cooking? Does mid-Century menu count as a cuisine or cooking style? I also enjoy recreating dishes from medieval recipe books and cuisines from Lebanon and Turkey through to Malaysia (especially Central Asian, Persian and North Indian). But there is also room in my heart for the German foods I grew up with and the Brazilian and Central American cuisines I learned to love while living there.

4) Do you have any dietary restrictions and if so what are they? Cast iron stomach and immune system. I eat street food while traveling and don’t get sick.

5) If you could introduce the whole world to one ingredient to improve their culinary experience, what would that be and why? My current love is cumin. I use a lot of it in everything from my breakfast eggs to curries, burgers, and sauces.

These questions are swiped from spacefem.

What have you done lately for improving or maintaining your mental health? What more would you like to do? I have stopped working so hard. I do what is essential, but I no longer work long hours trying to do all the things and I definitely don’t bother feeling bad about not getting all the things done. Instead, I am trying to spend more time on things for me - various classes (both for my brain and for fitness), riding my bike for fun instead of to commute, going for walks.

When did you last eat something specifically because it was good for you? Today? I have been making a conscious effort to get more fibre into my diet, so today I had a serving of casserole made with beans and veggies, and some corned beef and cabbage (so much cabbage and carrots with just a little beef), plus a whole wheat bun at breakfast.

These days, what are you learning about, and what would you like to learn about next? For the last couple of days, I have been learning to write in a German script used for handwritten correspondence from the 15th C. It’s a fairly useless skill in many ways, but combined with my German lessons, I now want to take another crack at reading the facsimile editions of some 15th and 16th C German cookbooks I own. I may need to work on the printed alphabet for that, but I’m pretty sure the books I own were hand written.

What’s positive about your physical appearance lately? I weigh less than I have in many years (probably 15 years, at best guess). As a result, my jeans fit better, and I am starting to be less uncomfortable with how I look in leggings or workout gear.

What will you do this weekend to bring joy into your life and a smile to someone else? I’m going to pick up dirt for my dad. He wants to fill in some holes in the garden. He really shouldn’t be lifting them, so if I get the dirt I can also spread it. He will be happy to have the garden repaired and my mom will be happy he didn’t injure himself doing it. My sister’s dog, who dug the holes in the first place, will be happy she has fresh dirt to dig in. I enjoy finding practical things I can do to help my parents.