VagueJournal
Jul. 6th, 2021 10:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
taz_39Work was normal, except I spent half of it making lists of all the stuff I've got to do now that Things are Happening.
Gosh, this will be a lot less annoying when I can go into detail!
One thing that I've wanted to do, regardless, is update my passport.
I stupidly let it expire last year, so now I need to send in a form and a check and the actual passport itself and pray that the government actually gets it and turns it around before the end of the year. So I filled out that form at work, and got my new passport photos taken at Walgreens on the way home.
Traffic was shockingly OK for the Friday before the 4th. I made it home just a quarter after five, which was perfect, because I wanted to make lemon bars!
If you have ever visited the NYTCooking website, at some point you've probably seen an ad of theirs featuring photos of beautiful, luscious-looking lemon bars. It's torture! I want them SO BAD! And they're one of Jameson's all-time favorite treats. Tonight it just had to be done.
I assembled the crust, which turned out to be very simple: flour, sugar, lemon zest, salt, and frozen grated butter, blended in a food processor and pressed into the bottom of a lined 9x9. While it baked I made the lemon curd on the stove: lemon juice/zest, sugar, salt, corn starch, eggs, butter, and olive oil. The trick with curds is to continuously whisk or at least stir; to be gentle and patient with raising the heat and waiting for things to boil; and to neither boil too short (runny curd that won't set) or too long (lemony eggs) in order to get that silky, luscious gel texture.
I timed it just right, and the curd was done only a few minutes before the crust. I poured the curd on top and put it all back in the oven for about 15 minutes. Here again things can go wrong; it's easy to see that the middle of the curd still jiggles and assume it's not set. But it is! The edges should start bubbling and turn slightly darker than the rest, and that's when you're golden. Literally.
I let it cool to room temperature, then put it in the fridge for an hour or so until it was completely chilled.
Then I pulled it back out and removed it from the pan, dusted it with confectioner's sugar, and cut it into squares.
HOLY HELL you guys. This is one of the best things I've ever made.
https://instagram.com/p/CQ2VPfoMHmp
They are absolutely PERFECT. Creamy, tangy, silky, with the crisp and slightly salty shortbread a perfect match to the smooth cool lemon curd. Oh my god, I want everyone to have some right now. Very pleased with how they came out, if you can't tell!
Jameson will lose his mind when he has one.
Saturday, I got notice that I've had my sixth month in a row of perfect attendance, so I can look forward to a nice attendance bonus in the next paycheck. Sweet! The rest of the day was normal, with me again distracted making little lists in my head between tasks and trying to work out finances and scheduling and blah blah vaguey blah. It did make the day go quickly, though.
Jameson liked the lemon bars :)
After work I went to Disney Springs because Jameson was performing there with American Martian!
The members of American Martian used to work for Disney as the band Mulch, Sweat and Shears.
Now that Disney is less into full-time live entertainment and more into contracted short-term gigs, the band has reformed and sometimes gets to play at Epcot or the Springs or other locations. They're extremely good, you should check out their stuff.
It was raining pretty hard when I arrived, and the first set was cancelled. I went looking for dinner and found some takoyaki, which tasted very good but had definitely deflated during it's extended time under some heat lamp. I had some chicken lemongrass dumplings that were nice, too.
I walked around and window shopped while waiting to see if the show would go on.
I had brought the Disney umbrella that Jameson's mom had gotten me the last time she was in town, and apparently you can't get this umbrella at the parks any more because no fewer than FIVE people stopped me throughout the night to ask where I'd gotten it! It had been at World of Disney, but I didn't see it there tonight. Sorry guys!
It looks like this:
(photo stolen from Disney's twitter)
Eventually the rain stopped and the show was on!
I found a spot standing in the back for the first set, because I like to hear these things from the back and also see the whole band plus the audience. As usual they sounded fantastic, though maybe a little flustered due to the weather delays and such, understandable. Jameson gave a little circus music shout-out during the sound check:
https://instagram.com/p/CQ4j4FRH6mf
I stayed for three sets, they were only 20 minutes each so each one felt very short! I'm used to hearing these guys play for like an hour straight at least. The crowd was engaged but a little subdued, becoming louder and more rowdy the darker it got. at some point I noticed some of Jameson's friends on a bench and went to join them, where we heckled the band together, that was fun :)
Of course I had to get some clips exclusively of My Favorite Human doing his thang.
He's so freaking talented *swoon*
Seriously though.
https://instagram.com/p/CQ4lZdZHptY
I felt bad leaving before the last set, but fireworks are usually between 9 and 10pm and I wanted to beat the traffic out.
And eat a lemon bar.
I got my chores done and went to bed just an hour or so before Jameson got back.
Sunday, now that I've had time to wrap my head around the life changes coming my way, I'm starting to be concerned about some of the details. What's the solution? Make a list of course! There's plently of time yet, but I'm definitely a worrywart. On one hand I'm excited and think this could be a really awesome life change, on the other it feels like I just got derailed and somehow have to get things back on the tracks without losing half the cargo. Yes, metaphores and vaguejournaling abound this week, I'm sorry. Soon, people, soon.
Work was fine, nothing to report.
Dinner with Jameson, then we marathoned the last few episodes of The Mole 1st season, then Jameson gamed while I steno'd.
Meanwhile the neighborhood sounded like a war zone with all the fireworks for the 4th.
It was definitely more subdued than last year, though. Maybe because fireworks are more expensive this year, or because last year was still Covid and we all needed to blow off more steam. Either way, it seemed pretty chill for the 4th of July.
Monday, work was pretty straightforward and the day seemed to drag.
I got home, we had dinner, I practiced steno, he fell asleep on the couch because depression had kept him up all night.
I worked through some Stuff for my upcoming Thing, not actually doing anything but reading along with a track, which is a good first step to finding out what you're in for. I also made timestamps for the youtube video I was referencing.
Tuesday, working from home. Tropical storm Elsa is rolling through, maybe I'll get lucky and lose power (but I doubt it).
And in any case I want to start the chocolate babka bread dough tonight so would rather not lose power.
I had an interview at the end of my shift for an HR position. It went well...not to toot my horn, but I am good at corporate interviews. Perhaps this comes from my retail background, and being able to "sell" myself as a useful cog. Anyway, the interview went over an hour, and something really funny happened near the end.
I was asked something like, "Describe a time when you faced a situation at work that was challenging, and how you dealt with it."
I decided to use an active situation at CapTel to illustrate this. Our current way of "grading" captionists, in my opinion, is unfair, and I said so. I described how it was unfair, and the frustrations that had been expressed to me by the captionists on my team, and the things I'd observed myself that I knew to be unfair. And then I descibed what I was actively doing to bring these things to the attention of upper level management and engineering. I detailed the steps I had been taking, and the meetings I'd had, and the persistence I'd kept with vocalizing the problems with the current system every time my bosses checked in with me.
Partway through my diatribe I noticed that two of the interviewers had funny expressions on their faces, like they were trying not to laugh or smile. I ignored it and plowed ahead because it was almost the end of my shift.
When I had finished one of them said, "When this interview is over you may want to check your email. We literally just now got a company-wide notice that we will no longer be grading captionists using the system you've just been describing!"
LOL!!
Gotta admit that was pretty satisfying, both for interview purposes and because I'll thankfully no longer have to grade captionists using an unfair system. Glad that I happened to use that particular issue as an example...what amazing timing!
Too bad I'll probably have to turn the job down :(
I was asked to interview for this position, so I'm sure there's an interest in having me.
But...argh. Why is it that for better or worse, when it rains it pours?
I can't complain about having opportunities, I'm very grateful. But I don't want to disappoint anyone. I don't want to brush off the company that has truly saved my ass during this pandemic. I don't want to have to start all over. What to choose? Arrrrrrrrrrrgh.
For now, it was a good interview and I'll be interested to see if I'm offered the position.
After that Jameson and I went for groceries and Pub Subs, then came home to watch LEGO Masters.
I started my chocolate babka dough, and had it in the fridge around 9:30pm.
I should be able to finish the loaf tomorrow.
The "tropical storm" is here, but it's only rain. Which we would have gotten anyway.
Hopefully I'll be able to share what's going on with me in the next week or so, because it's annoying to not be able to say anything.
