Tuesday, February 17, 2009

Sophocles is awesome

So I have just finished reading the Sophoclean tragedies of Oedipus the 3rd time through. Honestly the first time two times through they didn't really mean anything to me. Probably due to the setting in which or the speed at which I read them. But this 3rd time, the story just really came to life for me. I absolutely love these plays. I think I may have actually cried a few times while reading them. I think I'm going to be a lifelong fan of Sophocles now. I don't think I've encountered any other plays written as powerfully as these. I hope I find time in life to read these again some time soon.

Saturday, February 14, 2009

LDS disability website

The Ensign has been putting a lot of emphasis on disability awareness and acceptance over the last year or so. There's just been one good article after another. Just taking a peek at this new March Ensign, I noticed they were officially announcing the disability section of the church website, disability.lds.org. Though I personally might make a variety of small text changes and remove a link to an organization more interested in demonizing children for fund raising than promoting acceptance in its advertising, all in all I find the website to be very good. I've been very pleased to see the church put such an emphasis on acceptance and accommodation. Though I typically do not consider myself as disabled, but just different, and almost never bother trying to tell anyone that I have Asperger's syndrome, just seeing such articles and websites makes me feel more welcomed at church. If I ever feel a need to tell a church leader about that part of myself instead of having to come up with an entire presentation on the subject I can just say, "Go look at your own website to see what it says about me," and leave it at that. Saying it like that forces a link between allegiance to official church statements and acceptance that despite aparent strengths I also can have not so apparent weaknesses. Plus it refers them to official statements saying they have to try to be accepting and accomodating. All in one convienient package. I love it!

Sunday, February 8, 2009

Turkey bone soup

I learned tonight that marjoram flavored homemade pasta fresh out of the pan is heavenly.

Friday, February 6, 2009

Many happenings

Well life has been interesting the past few days. First off, low prices on ebay were too hard to resist and I have replaced the palm pilot and so far the new set up is working marvelously, though its been a learning experience getting the bluetooth stuff working since I've never used the technology before. The current model Ipaq I bought is much more sophisticated than the palm I had before.

My new bike helmet finally arrived. Not the most stylish thing in the world, but it got top ratings on consumer reports for safety testing. The old helmet had been through its share of crashes and had developed a few cracks running through it. At that point you know its time to replace because if it gets hit instead of crushing it'll just split. So I'm glad to have the new helmet.

And, tonight I tried a new Indian recipe. The technique was different than I've seen before. Boil potatoes, poke them full of holes and deep fry them, then create a spicy cream sauce and boil them in that for a while. BJ says it ended up like baked potatoes. I was really impressed by this recipes ability to actually get the spice flavor into the potato, which very few recipes do. Probably one of the most delicious potato recipes I've ever done. I would never have though to combine ginger, garam masala, cinnamon, coriander, cloves, fennel, chili powder, and cumin in the same dish. In any case it was absolutely amazing tasting