13-12-30

Home. Is where the heart is? Is where you lay your hat.

Is where you park.

364 days. I haven't missed a day this year. One more to go. I'm tempted to skip it.

Or something like that.

13-12-29

13-12-28

13-12-27

Clear skies and a decided lack of rain typical of Vancouver falls and winters makes for some pretty decent sunsets. I'll take it.

13-12-26

13-12-25

"When the gods wish to punish us they answer our prayers." - Oscar Wilde

I was going to cook a turkey in my kitchen last year. It didn't happen, the kitchen was mid renovation, no turkey. A year later and there's a turkey.

It's the first turkey I've cooked. I've taken part in numerous turkeys, though I guess when you add up the two a year, maybe, by a bunch of years, there really aren't that many turkeys.

I bought a roasting pan, it was $150, and that Henckels carving knife on the left, another $150, and a free range turkey, $70. That's a $370 turkey. Prayers answered indeed.

But it was delicious. The turkey was brined for 12 hours, perhaps a little longer. Did it make a difference? I don't know. It was the best turkey I've ever made.... And theories about temperatures, hot then cold, or just hot and fast, or high pre-heat and then immediate temp drop. Should the stuffing be done in the turkey? Or outside of the turkey in a roasting pan. Breast up, or breast down to stop it from drying out, or breast down for a bit and then flip it half way through. Everyone claims their way is the best.

Brined. Put into a 450 degree preheated oven that was immediately dropped to 325 degrees. A friend sent me a message, said his turkey cooked way quicker in his convection oven, my oven is a convection oven too and so I dropped the temperature a bit but when it wasn't cooking fast enough I cranked it back up to 375. 4 hours of cook time to get it to 170 degrees internal temperature, stuffing cooked inside. And it was pretty stellar.

And now I get to perpetuate the myth of my perfect three temperature cooking method. And a stuffing recipe that was pretty good. I'm not usually a fan of stuffing but this I ate with enthusiasm.

One turkey down.

And one week to go for a complete year of photographs.

Interesting times. I'll be sure to not pray.

13-12-24

Brining a turkey. 12 hours in salt water.

13-12-23

13-12-22

13-12-21

Apple pie. Butter crust. Damn good.

13-12-20

Snow. For real snow. Though it's warm enough it won't stick around for long.

13-12-19

13-12-18

Little bits of summer clinging on to little bits of garden, even in December.

13-12-17

13-12-16

13-12-15

13-12-14

13-12-13

Late night walks.

13-12-12

Decorating the tree.

13-12-11

Steak pie. From scratch. Delicious.

13-12-10

13-12-9

Snow. Vancouver. It's true. Though not a very exciting picture.

13-12-8

The day started with kipper hash, eggs, and other good stuffs.

And ended with Raleigh at the Rickshaw. It was a good day.

13-12-7

13-12-6

13-12-5

Scrawled on the wall of the elevator where I went to University were instructions for life. #6 was "Perpetuate a myth." I think I have done that with this photograph.

13-12-4

13-12-3

I don't know why I remember Ozzy Osbourne's birthday. It's today. This photograph has nothing to do with that.

13-12-2

Another recycled image. Best I can tell I haven't taken a photograph of the Pacific Central station in over a year but I know I've taken it before, from this vantage point even, at least I'm consistent with my perspectives. At least I think I've taken it before, and it would have been from here.

There are others too, the EAST VAN sign, those old high rises downtown, the Woodwards "W". It sometimes feels like the proverbial rat's maze, the scenery never changing, not much anyway, the cheese elusive so you keep looking for it, taking pictures along the way.

13-12-1

It's rare that the skies aren't persistently overcast or raining this time of year but the days have been (mostly) dry. I'd be stupid to not take pictures of yet another lovely sky to the west, especially on the first day of December. If falls were always like this in Vancouver it would be a much easier place to live.

13-11-30

My good friend Johann flies back to Vienna tomorrow. We had a feast featuring lamb, jerk pork, steak, and locally hand made sausage all barbequed despite a persistent though light rain. But the decadence of such a meal had to be balanced by something raw, and vegetable based. Enter the Greeks and the construction of one of their salads. And I got to use a salad bowl I bought in January for the first time.