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A couple of weeks ago my daughter called and asked what I was doing today and could I take a couple of hours off this afternoon for a surprise? I thought it would be for something like graduating from her Master's program or maybe she was getting married or(hopefully) helping her move out of the house into her own place. So I said sure, I'd be happy to. Then I find out my surprise was a ticket to a book signing by Bruce Springsteen at a local bookstore. I'm a long-time fan, it isn't something I'd go out of my way for but I'm now committed. I run a small business so I busted ass yesterday to get my people paid and called in some favors so I could put enough money in the bank to cover the checks. The event was scheduled from 12:00 - 2:00 and they were running shuttle buses starting at 8:30 AM. I'm not a big fan of standing in line for hours so I figured if I got there around 1:00 or so I'd be good. So I show up at the location around 1:00, find a local place to park, go into the Starbucks next door and get my Nicaragua Clover. I hit the line abut 1:15, line is moving fast and there aren't a lot of folks behind me. About 45 minutes later it's my turn: I step onto a low platform, Bruce says "How are you?", puts his hand on my shoulder and the employee that took my iPhone 15 seconds before takes a pic. 5 seconds later it's over and done, I pick up my pre-signed book on the way out and that's it, I'm out the door. Never got a chance to tell him my favorite song was "Racing in the Streets" or that while I liked "Born to Run" my favorite albums were "Nebraska" and "The Ghost of Tom Joad" or anything like that. Just "I'm Here, You're Here, We're Done". Didn't even get a "have a nice day" in parting. But I did get my 5 seconds of fame and a crappy iPhone photo to commemorate the moment. I'd post it but it seems my iPhone and Yahoo Mail aren't on speaking terms at the moment.... Wait a minute, it looks like they kissed and made up, here's the pic. All in all, it was a good day. Just not what I expected from a "book signing" event at all. Hope all of you had a nice Friday or whatever day it is wherever you are. Bill

And the 'roos can thump out the bass line to Thunderstruck with their tails!

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Why not lol can't wait till you try the quandong sauce. Come to think of it because it's a native peach. I might try to get some wood for smoking Sent from my SM-P600 using Tapatalk

Before grilling cocktail. Of course I had to test out the picture first so I made a test cocktail using my 3 oz Bistro shot glass. It took 3 tests before I was ready to pour the drink and take the picture. Needless to say I had a nice buzz by the time the picture was done and I fired up the KK's - LOL

Awesome can't wait for it all to come. We're going to have an Aussie Christmas this year

Was out and about today a spotted all these boats moored together I think they had a barge behind them all I could hear was AC/DC being played really loud and heaps of cheering lol Sent from my SM-P600 using Tapatalk

Delicate balance between the pre-dinner cocktails and nailing the dinner! Nailed it, Charles!

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Hmmm, I figured everywhere you went in Australia you could hear AC/DC blaring. I figured the birds even whistled Back In Black.

Exactly. I have one of these on each coast. My wife Laurie uses the western one nearly daily, for any flour-based dessert, pasta, bread. I use the eastern one for pasta and bread. I'm sure this is most of the reason my bread tastes so good. As always, sourcing makes the cook. The poster child for the issue here is headphones. One spends $25 then $50 then $100 then $200 only to realize one has already spent nearly the $400 for the headphones one wants. All less expensive grain mills are loud, prone to static, messy, ugly, and don't grind fine enough. One can do better, but this mill is good enough. The burrs are replaceable, once a decade depending on usage. For efficiency I prefer to sieve using a 12" diameter sieve. The two essential sieves are a coarse sieve for mixing, and a fine sieve for partial extraction. Inexpensive fine sieves are too fine; I went with a lab grade test sieve to choose the exact fineness, going with #35 which gives me 75% or more extraction (yield by weight). Great for whole grain pasta with the technical properties of white flour. I'd be curious to go coarser for bread, though I am happy now. Vollrath makes a 12" bowl that fits beautifully under these sieves. I have sets of 3, 4, 5, 8 quarts in this heavy duty 690xx series on each coast, and they get used for everything. (3,4,4,8,8 west; 3,4,5,8,8 east; the west bowls store nestled in wooden drawer pull knobs screwed into the front of pantry shelves, for easy access.) A friend admired these but cheaped out buying for his house (to save money for wine I can't afford), and his wife is continually aware of the quality differences. We are pleased every time we touch ours. VOLLRATH MIXING BOWL, STAINLESS STEEL 8QT - 69080 Stainless Steel Flour Sieve, 12 in. (roughly #17) Gilson 12in Round Test Sieve, All Stainless Steel - #35/500um Laurie prefers a 10" sieve. These fit nicely into a five quart Vollrath bowl. One can find these hit-or-miss everywhere with unspecified screens, for example in Chinatown kitchen supply stores, or online cookware sites. I noticed one source that specifies #40 or #50 fine sieves; the #40 would yield very refined whole grain products. Vollrath (69050) Heavy Duty Mixing Bowl (5-Quart, Stainless Steel) Flour sifters Finally, Chad Robertson inexplicably makes no mention of the perils of "green" flour, in his books. (Flour needs to be aged to behave as we expect, and one doesn't want to age freshly ground flour, because the germ will go rancid.) He may be opposed to any additives, or he simply might not know. This is not widely understood, and it took me forever (dozens of loaves flattened like flying saucers) to learn what to do. Michel Suas, in a bread book meant strictly for professionals, discusses the use of 20 to 40 parts per million of ascorbic acid, to compensate for this and other issues. (For comparison, in The Banh Mi Handbook, Andrea Nguyen calls for roughly 1000 parts per million; she has no idea. After feeling what 30 ppm ascorbic acid does to bread dough, there's no way I'm taking a gram of Vitamin C for my health, ever again.) How does one measure such small quantities of ascorbic acid, commercially or at home? Thoroughly mix ascorbic acid 1:20 with white flour, and save in a labeled jar. Thoroughly mix some of that 1:20 with white flour, for a 1:440 mixture one can actually measure with a gram scale. I'm trying to figure out how to ask Chad Robertson about this. Cookbooks are often an unlabeled mix of what the author knows and what the author surmises. For example, Paul Bertolli's Cooking by Hand got us started grinding our own flour for pasta (thank you!) but we quickly concluded that he had restaurant experience with very fresh flour from local mills, but no actual experience with home-ground flour. Here, Chad Robertson has tight relationships with artisanal suppliers, is that the same as grinding at home? Are his suppliers sneaking in flour conditioners, knowing what he'd say if they asked, but not wanting to lose his business? Or has he, and he alone, mastered the delicate puzzle of working with green flour without experiencing the usual perils. Dunno. As usual, beware any comment that translates to "I don't do that, but the best I do is the best I know!" Adding 30 ppm ascorbic acid to green flour makes a difference.

ck, that delicious pre dinner cocktail was just the start of things to follow.:)

Just pulled my first shot of Wote Konga as espresso. Sublime! Used my standard Redbird grind and PID settings with 17.1g in the basket and nailed it. Great shot!

Every time Bruce comes on the radio... Ckreef got to scream his name.. I finnally learn to hold my ears when he comes on... Lol

I believe it being Aussie, looking like a kanga...

Plus it starts with "KoMo..."

Chances are new owner will show it off and talk it up to friends and generate a sale...

What great family fun and your son even catches a puck. Those memories will be with everyone forever.

Different taco. That a great price to win Sent from my SM-P600 using Tapatalk

Looking good! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Looks like a ton of fun! Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Ask and ye shall receive.

Why we do this...

This was today's loaf done in the oven.

Roti cradle and Motor install

He picked it up today. It was pretty much a perfect situation. We are both happy. Heck of a nice guy. Alls well that ends well. Thanks for letting me list this here, guys. Much appreciated.

Aussie, dinner looks lovely. I need another tool like I need another hole in my head, could you send me some of those air fried chips please, just enough to taste?

Beautiful, and as dstr said, don't peek too much, lift that lid as little as possible.:)

Tasty looking ribs.

Sweet. A big fan here, as well. I much prefer his later material, too. Sounds like they knew that it would be a big crowd and just went with a plan to manage it the best that they could. If everyone chatted him up, think how slow the line would have moved.

Well, this thread sent many of us reeling into the internet cosmos. Hopefully most of us spent a mere few hours Googling, and returned home safe, without the radiation exposure inherent in, say, a trip to Mars. I have a pre-Millenium La Pavoni Europiccola lever espresso machine, as do many people I know. We're not about to change machines; two of us learned recently to service these machines, and found that paid overhauls rarely clean the parts you can't see. What a difference, doing it yourself! We're sticking to this machine to conserve cognitive load for fourteen similar obsessions. Like devising smoke pots, steam pots for the Komodo Kamado, ... Yet one review site realized they weren't reviewing the machine, they were reviewing the basket. My Pavoni portafilter takes a 49mm basket, and many (not all; buy a bottomless portafilter if necessary) portafilters from this era are deep enough to handle the 49mm Elektra double basket. This is a great price for this basket; we've bought eight so far to distribute in our circles. Big difference! Using my Pharos grinder and dosing with a digital scale and the Lyn Weber Blind Tumbler, each basket takes 19g of grinds, up from 15g for the regulation Pavoni double basket. I don't fully understand why this makes as much of a difference as it does, but a "stuck lever" now seems virtually impossible; one is well into over-extraction territory long before the grind gets fine enough to freeze the lever. Take a few slow, easy pulls, and the result is more deeply flavored espresso than my Pavoni yielded before. If one likes predictability, dosing each basket, rather than fiddling by eye with unpredictable results, the Lyn Weber Blind Tumbler is a very nice accessory. One can buy it without buying their grinder.

It would be me and you in that dingy mate lol we I'll just have to see off a flare when we are close that way they have to save us lol Sent from my SM-P600 using Tapatalk

rutland starters are fireplace starter cubes - sawdust and paraffin. https://www.amazon.com/Rutland-50B-Safe-Starter-Squares/dp/B00138MO16 Not familiar with the Bento lighter? Bosco will have to enlighten us.