IT'S ALIVE, IT'S ALIVE!!

Fartagus-Maximus (Gus) lives! Not only that, man does he stink!! Fermentation is one stinky hobby! My reading tells me that Gus will go between smelling like stinky cheese and sweet milk. Now, I loves the stinky cheese, but that's an understatement! Haven't gotten to the sweet milk part...



Wedgie-The-Oven decided it needed a break so she stopped working...again. Mike, my new best friend and oven-guy came out to pay her a vissy. He thinks it's the sensor that detects the heat of the pilot light. So he turned up the pilot light and all was good, until he left and then Wedgie took another break. She's a tired old girl! So I called Mike-The-Oven-Guy back. He said "This is serious problem." Did I also mention that Mike-The-Oven-Guy has a very thick Russian accent? I enjoy listening to him talk. He said he would try to find a refurbished sensor. Oddly enough, they don't make parts for my 1920's Wedgie any longer. If he can't find one, then one will need to be fabricated. He said "I have other customer waiting for same thing...after two month, she give up."

Let it be known, I will not give up on Wedgie. So let it be written, so let it be done. Besides, I've got the convection oven. Speaking of which, I made more bread yesterday. Depression-Era-Poppy really likes the denseness of the bread. I suppose it reminds her of the old days before electricity and Active Dry Yeast were invented.

Anyhow, in the original recipe for the bread, I read it wrong...it called for baking soda. I used baking powder. Oopsie! But after talking to MomJean-The-Chemist, she told me that since I used the beer instead of the buttermilk that I achieved the same results had I used soda. By the way, if you add a tablespoon to and enough milk to equal a cup, you have buttermilk. Who knew? MomJean, that's who!

So I decided I'd make a loaf with baking powder; one with baking soda; one with the 50/50 mix of flour and some rye flour; one with 50/50 mixture, rye flour and some polenta. Is this the proper use of a semi-colon?



They all turned out dense; I think loaf #2 was the best. Loaf #4 should be given to the National Hockey League. They can market is as a sustainable hockey puck.

Alright, let's move on. Monday, Typhoid-Poppy wasn't feeling well and stayed home from work. While I was working, she decided she wanted to install the last of the two light fixtures we bought. We had discussed this before and I really didn't want her playing with electricity; besides this is why we hired Thomas-Not-Tomas-The-Electrician. But, Depression-Era-Poppy likes to save a buck (and a paper towel) wherever she can so when I came home on Monday, she'd put the lights in. I'm very proud of her and her work...and that she's still alive!

This is the light in the landing:



This is the light in the bedroom:



I guess this means I have to finish the touch-up work in the dining room and touch-up the rest of the rooms in the house so we can hang some art work and call this place done.

Well, time for Sleeping-Poppy-Beauty to rise and shine and for us to get to work. Bye bye.