When it's too cold for jogging...

Ty and I clean the fridge!

                          BEFORE:

                             AFTER:

What to do with too many pomegranates

I don’t always talk about motorcycles, nope, sometimes I can also talk about food.

A few weeks ago I stumbled upon a lot of pomegranates. They weren’t storefront pretty anymore, but they were totally edible and cheap, cheap, cheap, cheap, cheap.  Not wanting to bite off more than I could chew – I bought 6.

I promptly forgot about them for a week and had to throw one out – so I started off with 5 no-so-pretty fruits. Since no one eats the outside of a pomegranate, it didn’t bother me they had a few brown spots. All I cared about was the ruby red pips filled with tart juice.

My method of getting the pips out involves cutting the fruit in half, sticking it in a bowl of warm water and tearing it apart. Its fast, fun and somewhat therapeutic after a long day. The outer pith floats in water while the pips sink to the bottom of the bowl. Easy sorting!

I pour the fruits into a pasta pot and heat them to a low simmer for 10 minutes.

During those 10 minutes I rinse out and heat up some canning jars, lids, and rings. I have a collection of various sized canning jars gleaned from older friends and thrift shops. I like to boil them and keep them on their own special shelf in my pantry. A pantry is a blessing, especially for canning.

Since no one I know goes through jugs of grenadine, I used 1/2 cup jars.

After the jars, lids, and rings have been laid out on a clean cloth to air dry. Turn off the juice, strain out the seeds. You can strain the seeds into some sackcloth and squeeze out the last drops if you like.

Straining little bits of pith off the top: 

Return the liquid to the stove and bring back to simmer. Add ½ cup sugar and 1tsp lemon juice for every two cups of liquid.

Cut the heat, and carefully funnel into the waiting jars. Fill to the ring line, leaving about ¼” of space. In order to seal properly, before you put the lids on make sure that there’s no juice spatter sitting on the lip of the jar.

Lid up!

Time for a bath! You should follow the food safety instructions for your particular jar size – but I set mine for 10-15 minutes.

Enjoy!

 Finished jars of delicious garnet liquid:

A spoonful of this garnet liquid over ginger ale and ice finished with a twist of lime is the perfect pick-me-up after a long day. You can also use this anywhere you might use liquid sugar or agave syrup. Try it in a vanilla bean or strawberry cupcake recipe!

The hazards and benefits of buying gear on Craigslist

So I’m a bit of a miser-  though, I prefer the word spendthrift. It brings to mind images of the “buy it, make it , or do without” posters of WWII.

Imagine ladies darning socks, canning victory garden crops, and all that.

In that vein, if I can’t make it, or do without it, I check Craigslist to see if I can thrift it. I love checking out the weird (and sometimes awesome!) stuff people post on there.

Recently, I’ve been on the hunt for good used gear, and I’ve gotta say, I’ve done pretty well. There’s a pair of men’s textile pants I bought that are too big for me – but I got a jacket, boots, and pants that fit for $235. Not bad.

My helmet and gloves are new, but I was able to save a bit by shopping around and waiting until the prices came down a little.

I did spend of lot of time hunting the gear down. Time I could’ve spent gardening, skating, or painting my nails…although I’m pretty sure there were a few times I did paint my nails while gear-shopping online. Time isn’t a drawback to just shopping on Craigslist though, you could enter a time warp perusing Ebay, Mod cloth, or Fab too. My general idea of  the benefits vs hazards of Craigslist follows:

The start of this great venture

Yay beginnings!

I guess the upside of this is that I can look back and say that, that point right there is where things all started to go wrong...or right..or whatever the case may be. 

That point, the origin of all these shenanigans,  comes from one simple enough question - 

How do you wear long hair under a motorcycle helmet? 

Serious. Google it and you'll get one of three answers: 1. chop it off, 2. get over it, or 3. the low ponytail.

1. Isn't gonna happen

2. How can I get over it?! That's the equivalent of giving up and consigning myself to bad hair days everyday. I want to ride everyday - to work and from it, and I'm not going to get dressed and do my hair in the teensy bathroom stall with bad lighting and spotty sewage. 

3. Is boring. I could do a low pony and get that weird crease at the back of my head with a super flat top. I could swap the pony for a bun in the previously mentioned ladies room - but that doesn't solve the deflated volume issue. I also get super snarly when I ride with my hair in a low pony, braids, or ponytails with extra bands going down to the tips.

So...how do you get sleek supermodel hair to come cascading out of your helmet when you take it off after a ride?  This isn't a manly-rider question, but you can't call it silly unless you either have a solution for the problem, or you dig lady bikers with permafrizz hairdos.

Testing Testing 1,2,3...

Feeding squirrels by hand at Golden Gardens