A day to celebrate the fact that we don’t all have to own cars to live a “normal” life.
A day to get out of your car and walk, take a bus, or ride your bike.
A day to experiment with alternative forms of transportation as a part of your everyday life.
A day to ask your local government to do more to make your city bike and pedestrian friendly.
World Carfee Day is sponsored by the World Carfree Network and is marked by celebrations and events around the world. There aren’t any events going on locally, but I will be celebrating by riding my bike to work and encouraging others to do the same.
Richmond is a surprisingly bikeable city, and with the addition of some bike racks downtown it will be even more so. There is definitely a lot of room to grow, but I am inspired by the small but growing bike community that is already a part of the city and the work that is being done to improve our local transportation plan to include bikes and pedestrians. We have a long way to go before we are a Portland, Or or Boulder, Co, but there is hope.
If you are local and would like to participate in making Richmond a more bike and pedestrian friendly community, attend the transportation meeting tonight at 7pm at the City Building. The Planning department will be presenting the proposed long-term transportation plan to the Planning Commission.
What are ways you have found that your local community is friendly for getting around without a car?
What are ways you have found that your local community is NOT friendly for getting around without a car?
This week’s baking adventure went a lot better than the brownies from last week. I made Cook’s Illustrated’s Perfect Pound Cake, and it really did turn out nearly perfect. The flavor, crumb, and crust all turned out as they should. Needless to say I was very excited. I’ve never made pound cake before, so I don’t know how it typically rates on the difficulty scale, but I thought it was pretty easy. I took the finished cake to Loops of Love on Tuesday, and everyone seemed to really enjoy it. It was a lot of fun to be able to share something I made with all my friends.
Last night, I finished a knitting project I have been working on since April, and I am really please with how it turned out. It is a gorgeous purple shrug that fits quite nicely. I got the yarn and pattern from a shop in Baltimore on my 30th Birthday trip, and I have been working on it between other projects ever since. The pattern itself wasn’t hard to follow; however, I was totally confused when it came time to sew things together. Luckily Vicki and Julie from Unwind Yarn Shop (in Richmond, In) understood the pattern and helped me get it together.
I was so excited to be finished, I wore it to work today. It feels so good to have a project finished, and it’s a project for myself none the less.
I tried my hand at baking brownies from scratch this evening unsupervised, and It definitely felt like my first baking fail. I was attempting to make Cooks Illustrated’s Chewy Brownies. I have had problems with making box brownies in the past, and it seems my bad luck has followed me into the world of from-scratch baking. From the beginning things went wrong:
I used the wrong measuring cup and added a 1/4 cup of cocoa powder instead of the 1/3 cup the recipe called for and didn’t notice until it was too late to add more. I tried to add some anyway.
Once I was well past the point of no return, I realized that I was about 3/4 of a cup short on sugar. After an “emergency” phone call to Matt at his meeting, I substituted powdered sugar for the missing granulated sugar. Who knows what that has done to the texture of the brownies
The bowl I selected was not quite big enough for all my ingredients so by the end I was spilling quite a bit of flour over the edges as I mixed. My shirt is now a lighter shade of blue.
I nearly put in two time more salt than the recipe called for. Just before I dumped it in, I realized I was supposed to add 3/4 of a TEASPOON and not a 3/4 of a tablespoon.
The batter itself tasted pretty bitter before I poured it in the pan. I don’t know if that is because of the espresso the recipe called for, or because I didn’t use the right sugar, or because I added more cocoa at the last minute. But I do know it didn’t taste anything like the box brownie mix I am used to.
When I removed the brownies from the pan using the aluminum foil sling, the whole thing buckled and created a large crack down the middle of the brownies. Continue reading this post…
I got a new pannier for my bike, and I am really impressed! It is a gorgeous purple bag made by Basil that hooks right on my rack. Basil is a great company from Nederland that sells trendy bike accessories that make biking so much more fun.
My bag is the Jada-Shopper XL. It is adorable and water resistant and has bottle-bands, adjustable carrying straps, a large front zipper-pocket, side pockets, inner pockets, and side hooks that hide away in a zipper pouch when not on the bike. It is perfect for commuting to work or running to the market to pick up a few things. Matt and I took it to the farmers market, and I was able to get a load of veggies and a box of donuts inside. The inner pockets are also quite nice and allow for slipping in my wallet and phone if I don’t need my whole purse.
I have another Basil bag in the same pattern, but it is not quite as spacious. I struggled to fit my purse and lunch bag in it when I biked to work. With the new bag, that won’t be a problem at all. The adjustable cloth straps on the new bag also make it much more usable. The old bag has stiff, narrow handles that are just barely long enough to fit over my shoulder and cut in if any significant weight was in the bag.
Another plus to my new bag is the look. It looks nothing like a pannier. Instead it looks like a stylish tote bag that I am not embarrassed to carry anywhere. The purple pattern is subtle but attractive, and the material is flexible so it is easy to carry. There are also subtle reflective strips on either side of the bag that provide visibility in low light, while not getting in the way of the design. The zipper pouch also hides the rack hooks nicely, so I have no problem with the hooks digging into my side even with a heavy load. I can see myself using this bag both on and off the bike for a number of different activities, including trips to the gym, farmers market, grocery store, work, and my knitting group.
I would recommend this bag to any female bike commuter looking for a versatile and attractive pannier.
I have been trying some new things on my bike commute to work the past week, and it is working out pretty well so far. I have started biking down US40, which is a four-lane main road, instead of taking Main Street. While US40 has a lot more traffic, the hills are less steep, the extra lanes give cars space to safely pass me, and there aren’t parked cars lining the street blocking my view and boxing me in. I have been afraid of riding on US40 in the past because of the heavier, faster moving traffic, but after riding it on the tandem a number of times, I realized its benefits outweigh the challenges. It has gotten to the point where I dreaded my ride down Main Street knowing I would be climbing steep hills squeezed between a parked car and a car passing me with oncoming traffic. I have also enjoyed the change of scenery. The new route still has that spark of novelty that makes it more interesting. Continue reading this post…
Matt and I went to the Red River Gorge Geological area this weekend and spent the weekend camping and hiking with his parents. It was a wonderful weekend, and we really enjoyed ourselves. We did quasi-car camping in a primitive site. There were bears in the area so we had to carry all our food back and forth between the car and the campsite everyday and there was no water available, but we had a pretty nice campsite. Our huge Coleman tent was especially nicely decked out. Matt’s parents have a double height air mattress that looked like a real bed and we even had throw rug to keep our feet clean.
For this week’s baking adventure, I made chocolate chip cookies. Now before everyone starts protesting that anyone can make chocolate chip cookies and surely I have made them before, these were not just any chocolate chip cookies. These were Cooks Illustrated’s Perfect Chocolate Chip Cookies, which roughly translates to amazingly tasty chocolate chip cookies with a lot of complicated steps added in. Not only that, but I had the added complication of trying to bake while Matt simultaneously made salsa. This means I had a lot less space than normal, and Matt wasn’t as readily available to grab things for me or check my progress. Both of us trying to use the kitchen at the same time is not something I would enjoy repeating.
The internet is flooded with cute kitty videos everyday. We all watch them. We all have our favorites. But what if a Steve Jobs like figure was generating all those videos for profit:
My baking this week was directed much more by ingredients on hand (or not on hand) than a desire to make any particular dish. We were very low on flour and a few other key ingredients. It also just so happened that I wanted to share my cookies with a group of friends, one of which is gluten intolerant. So meringue cookies were the perfect solution.
September 22 is World Carfree Day:
I tried my hand at baking brownies from scratch this evening unsupervised, and It definitely felt like my first baking fail. I was attempting to make Cooks Illustrated’s Chewy Brownies. I have had problems with making box brownies in the past, and it seems my bad luck has followed me into the world of from-scratch baking. From the beginning things went wrong:
I got a new pannier for my bike, and I am really impressed! It is a gorgeous purple bag made by 
