After my previous post I received a comment disagreeing with my premise of total absence of good-looking people at the Civil War reenactment events. Well, there may have been one good-looking gentleman at the reenactment but I don’t concern myself with looking at other guys. I will revise my statement to say “rarely you will find a good-looking person at one of these”.

To support my thesis I am posting additional pictures of the Civil War Reenactment in Olathe from one of the previous years. Pay special attention to the one and only “cubic” boy. I wonder how long this boy would have survived in real war conditions.

Created with Admarket’s flickrSLiDR.

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Oh Trader Joe’s, Your Croissants Are Calling,
From end to end with chocolate at heart.
I should have bought a case of those pastries
But I did not, I wasn’t very smart.

The next morning:


Twenty five minutes later:



Oh, Trader Joe’s!

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Preface:

I was going to Paris fully expecting to hate it. According to the minimal online research I did before the trip, Paris was flooded with pickpockets, scammers …  rustlers, cut throats, murderers, bounty hunters, desperados, mugs, pugs, thugs, nitwits, halfwits, dimwits, vipers, snipers, con men, Indian agents, Mexican bandits, muggers, buggerers, bushwhackers, hornswogglers, horse thieves, bull dykes, train robbers, bank robbers, ass-kickers, shit-kickers and Methodists. OK, maybe not Methodists. French people were supposed to be at the least unfriendly, arrogant and condescending.  And it was dirty, trash-covered and filled with people desperate to get to the nearest disgusting public bathroom but forced to tap-dance in hour-long lines in front of it. None of this turned out to be close to the truth.

Face:

Looking back on our trip I think a little more planning would’ve been nice; I did some research but apparently not enough to get us to the right places at the right times. We played it by the ear and I think we ended up fitting as much into the three days we’ve spent in Paris as was possible without it starting to feel like work. We also realized how much we rely on our phones to find our way around, discover places to eat, buy tickets, look at train schedules and subway maps. Since a certain phone company’s charges for the international data plan are incompatible with my sanity, our phones were set to WIFI only, and free WIFI in Paris is not as abundant as I thought. Talk about socialism fail. Having some roaming internet access would’ve been helpful.

People in Paris turned out to be fine. Some of them spoke better English than others, but between their English and the only French phrase I know “I don’t eat six days” (Je ne mange pas six jours) we did fine. There were some things I thought I could’ve resolved better if I knew more French, like I am pretty sure we were screwed by a cab driver but he didn’t respond to my plea about the six days of hunger. Or I wouldn’t have to stare at the chalkboard menus and then just order something so I don’t hold up the line. But mostly we found our way around and with the help of the internet access at the hotel were able to plan our sightseeing and subway trips.

In the end we both loved Paris, its sights, its food, its atmosphere. Three days is not nearly enough to see even a fraction Paris has to offer but it’s enough to make you want to come back.

I am sure every traveler to Paris take a silent oath not to bring back as many photos of the Eiffel Tower as those other losers.  Resistance is futile. From the first glimpse of the Tower on our first day we couldn’t stop photographing it until we left town. There will be about 50 photos of it in this post.

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I always wanted to see the beautiful Pacific Coastline, a frequent feature on travel shows and computer screensavers. My original plan was to drive a part of Highway 1, but one day I had an idea to see an even larger part of the Coast from a rail car window – a much more relaxing and hassle-free way of travel. Since writing about traveling by train in 2008, I’ve become an even bigger fan of Amtrak, riding the rails to Chicago at least once every year. It’s a stark contrast with the air travel, where if it were any closer to the cattle transport they would have to give passengers antibiotics and tag their ears. I didn’t have to think twice about buying tickets on the Coast Starlight – one of the most picturesque routes in the country. In addition to the usual advantages of Amtrak – refundable tickets, no charge for luggage, comfort and humane treatment – this time I paid for a roomette in a sleeping car and automatically became a first class passenger. I knew it right away when an attendant brought a small bottle of (cheap) champagne as soon as the train left Seattle. The price of a sleeping car also includes all meals, coffee, juices and fruit in the car, access to a private lounge car and (on this train) a free WiFi. The roomette is not as roomy as one might think, but it’s comfortable enough and private, so no one is schlepping past you at night and the light is not on. The ride is pleasant, the food is not bad at all (did I mention it’s paid for?), the stops are infrequent and the views are breathtaking. I thought it was worth the money, even though it was not cheap.

These are some photos I took from the train, some of them are blurry, so you will feel like you are on the train…or drunk.

This is the Seattle King Street Station, it’s currently being restored so there isn’t much to see inside.

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This post is about pickles. Not your regular brownish-green vinegary mouth-puckering pickles. It’s about bright-green, crunchy, slightly salted pickles that taste fresh, slightly garlicky and with a hint of dill – pickles of my childhood. The closest thing to these that can be found in your regular grocery store is the Claussen Pickles but they are a far cry from the real thing. Rarely you can find excellent Ba-Tampte Half Sours usually in the kosher refrigerated section. For a better version head on to the Russian Store, they are sold by weight at the counter (grab yourself a couple of pickled apples and tomatoes while you are there).

Sometimes you can find a pickling spice mix at a Russian store, or if you have friends who will smuggle it for you illegally from Eastern Europe.

In the absence of pre-made spice mix I always use dill weed (fresh or dry) or dill seed, lots of garlic, some black peppercorns, maybe a hot pepper (be careful how hot), if you have cherry leaf or two, a horseradish leaf (which I’ve never seen sold here) and a few bay leaves.

Yesterday after a downtown lunch I stopped by the City Market and bought about 5 lbs of fresh pickling cucumbers.

These are not gigantic-looking things sold in Wal-Mart, they are small, light-green,bumpy and crunchy. In this area they are available only during the summer. I brought them home and soaked them in the kitchen sink to let all the dirt come loose. I also cut the ends off and pierce the cucumber with a knife in the middle. This way the brine has more surfaces to penetrate the cucumber.

From there on the process is simple – wash the cucumbers and put them in the jar, adding garlic and spices at the same time. The hard part is to guess the amount of salt. The general rule of thumb is 1 tablespoon of salt dissolved in 1 liter (quart) of warm water, I think it has to be a regular tablespoon heaping with salt. Lately I’ve been using 2 measuring tablespoons of salt per quart of water.It doesn’t have to be extremely salty, maybe slightly saltier than you’d like to taste. The whole point is to keep the fresh taste and crunchiness and not to over-salt the pickles. Fill the jar to the top, cover and leave on the counter. You can start tasting the pickles the next day or two. When they reach desired taste, place them in the refrigerator.

They are good with any food or drink, a hot dog, a sandwich, a shot of vodka or just by themselves.

They are good when you are eating with great friends…

…or when you it’s just you, pickle and this song….

 

httpvh://youtu.be/g266Uwp6ZnI

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