Whiteout

SNOW ZONE: It was snowing sideways last night when we went to bed, with winter storm warnings hanging over our heads.

This morning we woke up to a blanket of white - and a truck stuck in the street out in front of our house. There were two guys having no luck whatsoever getting it unstuck. Enter Christian, the hero, heading down the driveway with two shovels and some muscles. They dug out around the tires and then the three of them pushed.

Success! The guys were on their way!

Meanwhile, out back, Captain Kirk was keeping an eye on the depth of our snow.

By mid afternoon, he was looking a little worse for the wear. The snow is significantly deeper than our Kirk indicator, but a lot of it was blown away from him.

The kids had the perfect snowy day dessert last night, big ol' mugs of hot chocolate.

ARTFUL MATH: From a social media post, I learned about a neat-o website today, "Artful Maths."

It has lesson plans about projects where math and art intersect. We haven't tried any of them yet, but I wanted to park this here, so we can come back to it and give some of them a go.

In other math news, we spent a fair amount of our snow day doing math that was decidedly not artsy.

In their current math chapter, CJ and Annabelle are having all sorts of fun with the 'simplex method' and tableaus. Good times (she says, sarcastically).

The textbook they are using doesn't do nearly a good enough job explaning the concepts, let alone the solutions. We turned to YouTube for help. Fortunately, Annabelle found this video.  
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Actually, it was one video in a series of the FIVE videos it took to solve one problem! 

We watched them all and it paid off. Doing the homework problems was no problem afterward.

FINALLY

ON THE HUNT: The COVID. It's so damn overwhelming. We're almost a year into this.  Our only way out is letting it run like wildfire killing those susceptible to a bad out come, or science saving so many. I opt for the latter. 

To that end, vaccines have started to roll out, and the first doses are rightfully intended for the most vulnerable, people age 75 and over. What's really awful though is that individuals are almost entirely left to resource those doses on their own. Not sure what it's like where you are, but in these parts, you need to be online hardcore, network, and have a fair amount of luck.

I have been working all the angles since vaccines came online in hopes of finding my parents an inroad. I was thrilled when I secured them first dose shot spots for late February, but still researched for a better option. I searched independently and built up a data base and some potential inroads, but I quickly realized that there must be others like me trying to do the same thing, and who were willing to share resources. That's how I found this site: https://www.facebook.com/groups/findacovidshotwa/about

It's such a wonderful spot, where good-hearted people are sharing leads on places to secure an immunization opening. I have been on Facebook hours and hours a day looking for a lead and on last Saturday, in a moving car, using my cell phone as a hot spot, I spied a lead on that site and was able to book my parents a slot on Monday. WHAT A RELIEF. Booked them!

What was less of a relief was waking up Monday morning to snow on the ground. Sigh. However, it was a clear 45-minute drive to Mukilteo, but as I approached their place it was snowing like crazy. And as we made the half hour drive to the Evergreen State Fairgrounds in Monroe, we had sleet, hail and all the things. Never a dull moment.

However, once we were there (an hour early), things went so smoothly. A little too smoothly, IMHO. They never even asked for a photo ID or checked their names against a master reservation list. Your average Red Robin has a more secure check in process for getting a table, I do believe.

Anyway, we made the way too lax security check in and were in line to get the jab. So exciting! It is a drive thru operation and we creeped our way toward the vax tent. When it was our turn, the medics gave J&E the shots in short order.

We stopped for a celebratory chai tea on the way back to their place.

Thank gawd #1 is done and here's hoping they actually get #2 in a timely manner. Won't sleep well until that happens.

STUDIOUS: The kids are plugging along with winter quarter. It's a bit of a bear, truth be told. The English 102 class is super scholarly in a good way. Hardcore how-to-write-a-research-paper stuff which will be so beneficial for them going forward. But it's a LOT of work. Intersesting aide: There was a whole class Zoom call on Tuesday this week and CJ was the *ONLY* student who showed up. That blows my mind. But I think it's also a by product of this whole pandemic/everything online time. There's an abject lack of engagement.

The math class CJ is signed up for is terrible. The math is great/important, but there are ZERO lectures. Absolutely NO teaching whatsoever. It's, "Here are your problems. They're your problems," and that's it. We (after the fact, unfortunately) read reviews of his 'professor.' They're horrible. They all talk about how lazy and unresponsive he is. I'd say guilty as charged based from what we've seen. Despite this, CJ and Annabelle (she basically audits all his classes) will meddle through, because they have to. 

CJ also has a film studies class. Not gonna lie, he signed up for it thinking it would be a pretty easy going class. WRONG. Not that it's bad - it's not - it's GREAT! But, it's a ton of viewing, analysis, reading and writing. Lots of hours of work if you're trying to do it right. We've really enjoyed the movies he's been assigned to watch, however. We'll post a list of them all at a later date.

So all in all, it's a handful, plus we're still filling out all sorts of scholarship apps in hopes of scoring some $ support for CJ's next chapter. Busy times!

And I'll definitely post more about CJ's must-watch films soon!

HEAVY METAL: A big change on the home front this week - The Flair is in the house - literally!

We're big mid-century modern fans from a design aesthetic. We love atomic/space age stuff. In our last place, we had a great old vintage Hotpoint dual oven with a pull out cooktop. We had to leave it behind when we sold the place, and almost certainly it wound up in a landfill. :( 

Ever since we moved to our current mid-century modern house, I have hoped to have a vintage stove to install in our kitchen. Not just *any* appliance, but a Frigidaire Flair - the Cadillac of MCM cooking options.

I found one on Craigslist a couple of years ago. We drove two plus hours in a horrific storm to pick it up. And by pick it up, you need to know that's no small feat. It weighs over 300 pounds. Anyway, we managed to get it home and it has sat in our garage for two years, waiting for its moment.

That moment is now. :)

But getting that 300+ pound beast into the house is easier said than done! It took a lot of talking. More talking than doing, really.

I suggested we take our super heavy duty hand truck and turn it into a cart, almost horizontal on the ground, and then we put one of our kitchen cabinets atop that, with the Flair on top of that. (I didn't want the Flair too low. I thought it would be too heavy to move.) Christian improved this idea by putting 2x4s underneath it all to help act as a level to help move it all. I have no photos of this phase because it was really scary moving it from the garage up and around the house to the back door. It took all four of us, but it went really well. Yay. 

One of the hardest parts was getting the beast up our three stairs to the dining room on the main living level. We did some back-and-forths, but figured it out.

Once it was inside, we had to figureout a way to raise it up onto its base. That was a multi step process, but we talked and talked and then did and got it done.

We  got it up from the lower lot, up the stairs and into the dining room

 

Can't wait to clean it up and start cooking in it !

Bits & Pieces

UPS AND DOWNS: Another busy week here at MPA. CJ's Film Studies class is keeping us surprisingly busy watching a number of movies and analyzing them, his English class is very demanding (in a really good way), and his math class is a bad joke (no lectures whatsoever, just complicated problems and you're on your own). We're also striving to get some exercise daily via "Just Dance" on the Nintendo Switch, continuing baby steps on kitchen remodeling, getting Annabelle enrolled in college for fall, and spending a couple of hours a day online chasing COVID vaccines.

On Tuesday, we had a busy lunch time. At noon, we tuned in to a live presentation by David Buerge, author of "Chief Seattle and the Town that Took His Name" as part of the Lunch-and-Learn program by the Holocaust Center0 for Humanity. His book is the first biography of Chief Seattle intended for adults.

A biographer and historian, Buerge spent more than 20 years researching the Duwamish Tribe and Chief Seattle. One interesting fact we learned from him is that Seattle is the largest city in the world named after a Native American. 

Chief Seattle was multi-faceted. He was a warrior, an orator, and a creative visionary, and Buerge gave examples of each ... but part way through, we cut away to a SpaceX test flight of SN9, a big silvery rocket. Because, well, rocket launches are SO COOL. 

We'd watched the SN8 flight few weeks back, which was also SO COOL until the fiery landing.

Unfortunately, this go 'round was an example of history repeating itself. SN9 crashed even more spectacularly. 

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Back to the drawing board!

Meanwhile, back in Seattle, we tuned back in to the Chief Seattle presentation after the SpaceX launch and crash. But truth be told, we didn't stick around for the whole presentation. All three of us (CeeJ, Bee, and I) were having trouble following along with the kind of freestyle fact sharing by the presenter. But I have to tell you, he really lost us when he TOOK A PHONE CALL during the presentation. I mean, it's one thing to forget to turn off your ringer, we've all done that, but it's another to actually answer the phone (it wasn't an emergency) while you're in the middle of a presentation. 

SAVE THE DATES

The year 2021 is shaping up to be a busy one for spaceflight enthusiasts. 

On the agenda: Boeing and NASA have their second uncrewed test flight of Boeing’s Starliner spacecraft, tentative launch date is March 25. This Orbital Flight Test-2 is a critical milestone for NASA’s Commercial Crew Program, as NASA works with commercial partners to safely deliver crewed missions to the International Space Station.

Technicians observe Boeing’s Starliner crew module being placed on top of the service module in the Commercial Crew and Cargo Processing Facility at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Jan. 14, 2021. The Starliner spacecraft is being prepared for Boeing’s second Orbital Flight Test (OFT-2). As part of the agency’s Commercial Crew Program, OFT-2 is a critical developmental milestone on the company’s path to fly crew missions for NASA. Photo credit: Boeing/John Proferes

NASA and Boeing are targeting no earlier than Thursday, March 25, for the launch of Starliner’s second uncrewed flight test as part of the agency’s Commercial Crew Program. Boeing’s Orbital Flight Test-2, or OFT-2, is a critical developmental milestone on the company’s path to fly crew missions for NASA to the International Space Station.

About a month later, SpaceX has a launch date for Crew-2, on April 20. This second crew rotation mission with astronauts launching to the International Space Station. This mission is carrying a pair of NASA astronauts, as well as two international partner crew members.

Members of the SpaceX Crew-2 mission to the International Space Station participated in training in Hawthorne, California, on Jan. 11, 2021. Pictured from left are ESA (European Space Agency) astronaut Thomas Pesquet, NASA astronauts Megan McArthur and Shane Kimbrough, and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) astronaut Akihiko Hoshide. Photo Credit: SpaceX

Back from Beyond

THERE IS ANOTHER: A Sunday stop at our mailbox brought a double dose of good news. "There's a purple envelope in there!" I told CJ as I peered in the box.

We pulled it out and the envelope was from the University of Washington Tacoma. The flap had "CONGRATULATIONS" in all caps.  That was encouraging.

Sure 'nuff, he opened it up and there was a letter letting him know he'd been accepted for admission for the school year starting this September. 

That was really good news, because CJ is keenly interested in attending UW-Tacoma, as they have a history major and a museum studies minor.

There was also a nondescript #10 (business) envelope from Eastern Washington University in the box. CJ opened that up and found a letter letting him know he'd been awarded a (renewable!) $3,000 annual scholarship, should he choose to attend there. (He's looking at the EWU at Bellevue College program.)  That was some nice news.

So now, he's heard from every school he applied to, and received a 'yes' from each. Now, we wait for financial aid/assistance offers from each. We're not sure when those will show up, but hopefully sooner rather than later. It would be nice if he could make a decision.

One thing I did toward that decision day end today was make a spreadsheet listing his five options, the tuition rate there, financial aid offers, scholarships offers, location and what getting there would look like, degree programs he's interested in at each, and notes. It took me about three hours to chase down and compile all that info, but it's good to have it all in one place.

DOWN TIME: There was a dearth of posts last week, in large part because I made the terrible mistake of getting a flu shot and the shingles vaccine on the same day.

I don't think it was the flu shot that did me in. I've never had a reaction to one before. But that shingles vax, yowza. I had the immunization on Wednesday, and Thursday morning woke up feeling like I'd been hit by a truck. I started Googling side effects of the shingles vaccine on the Shingrix site.

Check, check, check, check, check, check and check. I had ALL the things. Bummer. Thursday is a blur. Friday I was still puny. By Saturday I was pretty OK. It would have been good to have that information about the side effects before I got the shot, because I'm here to tell you, if I had to work on Thursday, I would not have been able to, no way.

SNACK PACK: Today's special delivery was a box full of treats from South Africa.

The gift was part of a SnackCrate subscription Kennedy got for CJ for Christmas. CJ is looking forward to a taste of South Africa, a destination a little more than 10,000 miles away from us, as the crow flies.

RED PLANET READY: We're just a couple of weeks away from a really big deal, spaceflight wise. NASA's latest mission to Mars is set to touch down on the Red Planet on February 18, 2021, with a rover named Perseverance on board. "This robotic astrobiologist will search for signs of ancient life, pave the way for human exploration, and collect rock and soil samples for future return to Earth," NASA noted in a press release.

                    Illustration: NASA

NASA is inviting people to a virtual NASA Social event due to track the mission's big milestone. It happens on Thursday, February 18, from 11:15 AM to 1:30 PM PST. To participate, you can follow this link: https://fb.me/e/cKrbdHVXG  It takes you to a Facebook page where you can ask questions and get answers from NASA experts, connect with other space enthusiasts, watch live as Perseverance lands, and you even get a NASA social badge to share online or print out. 

Tuesday to dos

CAKE DAY: First thing this morning, we were firing up the oven. It was time to bake a cake, a Birthday Dreams donation. 

The birthday girl wanted a chocolate cake with vanilla icing, so we whipped up our favorite rich chocolate cake recipe. We cooked four 6-inch rounds, with the aim being a columnar cake.

We snuck a few mini chocolate chips in between the layers. 

After that, it was time to stack. There are four little posts under a mid-point cake board to help support the weight of the top two layers. 

We were told the party was for a 17-year-old who loves the color black. There's one problem with that request. Cakes with icing tinted black taste terrible, and turn party goers' mouths black. So, we came up with a work around. We decided to stud the sides of the cake with (mostly) black candies.

There's really no way to do that without winding up with a whole bunch of those little black rounds all over the place, but oh well. 

Once the sides were done, we topped the cake with 17 dollops of homemade marshmallow icing, one for every candle she'll need on the cake. We also found some nifty tall, thin black candles. 

We hope she likes it!

LUNCHEON: Today was the last in a series of Lunch with Staff for Connections (middle and high school) student members from The Museum of Flight. 

Today's guests were Robin Webster, development and membership, Bill French, human resources, Clark Miller, facilities, and Michael Graham, education.

Once again, the kids (and I) learned a whole lot about who and what it takes to run The Museum of Flight. And, once again, we were just one of two groups of people who linked in on the Zoom event. A shame more people didn't join, but we were happy to have the opportunity.

IN THE OTHER WASHINGTON: I've been meaning to make mention of the fact that during the White House's remodeling to accommodate the new administration, a super cool artifact
has been added to the Oval Office. Officially known as Lunar Sample 76015,143, it's a moon rock.

                                                       Photo credit: NASA

According to a NASA press release, the artifact is on loan "In symbolic recognition of earlier generations’ ambitions and accomplishments, and support for America’s current Moon to Mars exploration approach, a Moon rock now sits in the Oval Office of the White House." 

According to an inscription on the artifact's housing, "The Apollo 17 astronaut Ronald Evans and moonwalkers Harrison Schmitt and Eugene Cernan, the last humans to set foot on the Moon, chipped this sample from a large boulder at the base of the North Massif in the Taurus-Littrow Valley, 3 km (almost 2 miles) from the Lunar Module. This 332 gram piece of the Moon (less than a pound), which was collected in 1972, is a 3.9-billion-year-old sample formed during the last large impact event on the nearside of the Moon, the Imbrium Impact Basin, which is 1,145 km or 711.5 miles in diameter."

If things go as planned (and that is a pretty big 'if' at this point), NASA plans to return to the moon in 2024 (with the help of some commercial partners). That mission, Artemis, can be tracked here: https://www.nasa.gov/specials/artemis/

Fixing and Feeding

MS. FIXIT: Saturday morning, Annabelle and I sat down at the dining room table and pretty much didn't get up for the next 2.5 hours. We were super focused on fixing her cell phone. Specifically, replacing its broken screen. She bought a cute new astronaut 'protection' case last week. One day after she got it, she dropped her phone and learned the cute case offered almost zero protection. The phone's screen shattered in one corner. 

I told her to look up her model number and that we'd order a replacement screen. It came mid-week, and I advised her to find a video or two about how to perform the repair. She did find a couple of videos, each were varying degrees of helpful (showing most of the process step-by-step) and ridiculous (tinny voice overs, bad photography, awful canned music). 

Christian is Mr. Fixit around here, of course, but he was busy doing some drywall. I told Annabelle that I thought she and I could tackle the fix, and that's just what we did, with zero intervention needed by Christian.

The first steps, were removing the sim card holder and popping the back off. Then, Annabelle had to remove the battery. That was a bit of a bear. The finger print reader and phone's speaker, charging port, and antenna had to be temporarily removed. That wasn't too bad. We worked slowly, and methodically, watching both videos during each step to make sure we were proceeding properly.

The repair kit came with all sorts of objects, most of which we never used. When it was reassembly time, we did use tiny double-sided sticky tape to refasten the repaired phone.

Annabelle handled all the hands-on work. I was impressed by her determination and confidence. 

The 'scariest' part of the process was heating the phone up so that we could pry the old screen off the phone's body. These screens are super glued on, and both videos said you needed to heat the phone to get the glue to soften, so that you could remove the screen. 

One video used a heat gun and warned viewers to be very careful not to get the phone too hot. But how hot is too hot? No temperature or time was mentioned, whatsoever. 

The other video recommended using a heating pad, and their phone was on what was clearly a commercial phone repair person's custom heating pad. Yeah, we don't have one of those. Annabelle suggested one of our food warming trays. We were about to fetch one from the basement, but then spied our pancake griddle in the pantry upstairs. We put a silicone mat atop it and then did some math. We spied the temperature of the heating pad in the video was 39. We figured that must be Celsius. So, we converted that to Fahrenheit (102) and fired up the griddle. We kept a careful check on the temperature with a good kitchen grade thermometer. We'd heat the phone for a minute, then she'd pry for about a minute. Heat and pry heat and pry. This went on for about 20 minutes. 

It was tedious, but it worked! Hooray! Once that was off, putting the new screen on was pretty straightforward. Then it was a matter of carefully reassembling the phone.

The moment of truth was firing it up. We held our breath as it booted up. ... It worked! She did it! Definitely a great feeling of accomplishment. 

TEEN TIME: This Saturday was the fourth Saturday of the month, and for our family, that means cooking up a whole lot of food for Teen Feed.

We came up with a main dish menu idea we'd not attempted before: Casseroles. Volunteers could sign up for a slot and then bring enough casserole to feed 10 really hungry homeless teens. I purposely left it entirely up to them what kind of casserole they wanted to provide. I find volunteers are more willing to help if they're given choices.

We made four lasagna pan sized casseroles on Friday. Two were corn dog casserole I wrote about a couple weeks back, and the other two were chicken tortilla, a recipe we test drove a week or so ago. 

On Saturday, we did things like get containers and condiments ready and pick up donations from others in our group on our way to the Teen Feed kitchen.

We were in the University District by 4:45. Christian and CJ handled receiving the drop ofr donations curbside from 5 to about 5:20, while Annabelle and I were in the kitchen getting things in order. 

The casseroles started rolling in. So many, so good! There were two terrific turkey casseroles (one with mega veggies, the other a gluten-free tetrazinni). There was a big, beefy hot dish from Kennedy. There was piled-high lasagna, a classic tuna casserole with lots of cheese (yum!). There was a clever breakfast tortilla casserole, a spicy tamale casserole, and two vegan masterpieces. The ovens - and our dining guests - were absolutely stuffed! 

Below is a collage of a few of tasty options.

And below is a shot of me trying to keep track of what was what in the various aluminum pans (that all looked the same when they're covered in foil).

We also had an abundance of healthy fruit and veggies, cases of sparkling water and, of course, desserts. The sweet treats included brownies, snickerdoodle and Oreo cheesecake bars, apple crisps, vegan and gluten free treats, to boot. Notice Annabelle holding one of our Rice Krispies treats. It was so big, it required two hands. :)

"They were running for seconds," Teen Feed staffer Austin said of the hungry diners.

The night was not without its challenges. The basement kitchen Teen Feed is temporarily housed in is *SO HOT.*  I mean like you're purple and sweating if you're just standing in it, not to mention if you're running around trying to make dinner for 80. 

Also, can I just say that it's an adventure trying to serve up casseroles without a spatula. :(  I did manage to find a pancake turner, but those are inelegant when you're trying to scoop out a square portion from a rectangle shaped container. Ugh. Next time I'd know to bring my own. Just really didn't think a commercial kitchen wouldn't have spatulas. 

New Beginning

LAST/FIRST: Today we got up and turned the television on early. That's something we rarely do. However, today was special. The end of one "administraton" and the start of a new one.

We've been counting down to inauguration, and this morning, before breakfast, the kids had their final candy. 

We proceeded to watch inauguration coverage all day and into the evening. The pomp and circumstance was a little different given the global pandemic, and the recently fresh insurrection activity in the capital. It was, nonetheless, a sight to behold. There were lots of high lights, including Lady Gaga singing the anthem, 22 year old Amanda Gorman, inaugural poet,  and seeing Sonia Sotamayor swear in Kamala Harris. 

The enormity of the first female vice president struck me at an unexpected moment. President Joseph R. Biden and V. P. Harris were approaching the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier. "Look!" I said to Annabelle. "Look at them! That is not the president and his wife. That is the president and the vice president!"

I wish it weren't such a novelty, that moment, but it was. Finally, that glass ceiling shattered.

KITCHEN DOINGS: This weekend is Teen Feed, and casseroles are on the menu. We've been test driving recipes. Last night we cooked up Turkey Tortilla casserole. Um, except I used chicken because I didn't have turkey. We got the recipe from Nonnie/Victoria. Christian remembered it as being very tasty.

All four of us worked on it.

Christian stripped the corn off frozen cobs, CJ crushed chips, Annabelle and I worked on the innards.

in the end, it won rave reviews.

We can't wait to share some with the Teen Feed crowd!

IN STITCHES: We're closing in on a damn year of this pandemic and mask wearing. We were due for some new shields, so we picked up some fabric and got busy.

I thought the project would be a good opportunity to get Annabelle back behind the machine.

She did great, and was very happy with her new dinosaur mask!

CJ was busy working on a paper for his film studies class. (We watched "North by Northwest" last night.) Since he was busy, I made him a couple of new dog masks.