works of wanderlust

The Artful Joy of Splitting Sourdough

A friend of mine killed her starter.

Dead.

I didn’t ask how. Vacations. Life. A summer heat wave.

It happens.

So a few days later I just split mine and delivered one half it to her in a plastic pouch.

Problem solved, and she could go back to baking loaves.

This marks the third time I’ve split my mother dough into some giftable offspring.

Sharing starter starter seems to me to be almost a core tradition embedded deep in the subculture and shared process of breadmaking.

Starting a new starter from scratch is not difficult, of course, but neither is it a quick process.

Even if your newly gathered and grown starter is ready to use in a couple of weeks, there are countless feedings of wasted flour during that span and even then I’ve found that a good, productive starter takes many more weeks (or months) to mature and hit peak efficiency.

So instead we share. Half for me. Half for a friend.

I did this by scooping half of my starter from its home with a spatula from the little plastic tub where it has lived for the better part of two and a half years. That half went to my friend. Shared, the travelling half got a new home, a fresh feed of its own and a chance to bake bread for another family.

The remainder got a feeding and returned to its corner to enjoy the fresh dosing of flour.

Such a simple act…. but at the same time a clever and marvelous way to spread a bit of sourdough joy with friends and neighbours.

September 4, 2021
(Sub)urban Sketching

It will come as no surprise to readers of this blog that I take a lot of photos while travelling.

Often with multiple cameras in hand or slung over a shoulder or stuffed in a pocket, it has become a slight obsession to try for an amazing photo while out and about on a the local adventure or far-away excursion.

But this summer I’ve put my camera down a few times and have been honing my artist skillset as I dabble in a travel trend known as urban sketching.

It would be fair to say that my interest in sketchy art was renewed about two years ago when I spent a week in Dublin. Having travelled a few days in advance of my family (who were nearby in Scotland) to participate in a half marathon in Ireland, I travelled light and left most of my camera equipment with my wife. I had naught but an iPhone.

I arrived, picked up my race kit, and was left with two days to wander around the city.

I happened to wander into an art store and before rational reminders of my limited talent could creep into my brain and dissuade me, I had bought a sketch book and a pack of art markers.

I spent the rest of those days and the week following settling into cozy situations to attempt some urban sketching around the amazingly sketchable city of Dublin.

All that said, I wasn’t new to art.

Over the summer I found that Dublin sketchbook amongst a pile of other old art supplies. Since the mid-90s when I was in college I have been dabbling in pencil and ink drawing and have collected a small stack of coiled paper books stuffed with a lifetime of mediocre art. I don’t abound with any particular talent, but some of the work I rediscovered over the last month wasn’t half bad, and was often brought back more fluid memories than any photograph ever could.

Urban sketching is a catchall term for a kind of situational, in sutu art. It’s the slow version of a travel snapshot. A moment, a scene, a building, a space, a crowd, or anything memorable is captured by pencil and ink, colour and shadow, in the same way a photographer might snap a pic. Much more deliberately. Much more slowly. Sitting on a bench or a cafe table, just drawing the scene rather than that microsecond of thought to photograph it. It is vastly different in approach but with identical sentiment.

I set myself the goal of sketching daily about a month ago.

I spend some time each day drawing something, even if that just means pausing for fifteen minutes to rough out a scribble of my car keys or some other random item from around the house. But that same goal has prompted me to read up on some techniques, to dabble in experimenting with media and subjects I haven’t sketched before, and think more seriously about putting away the camera more often and honing my sketching plans for some future vacation to be captured in ink and watercolour.

Or like today, to sit in the sunny backyard and bring my apple tree to life on a blank page of a sketchbook.

That’s less urban sketching and more suburban sketching.

September 3, 2021
The Hot Pan of Endless Convenience

This is not the first time I’ve brought up my mushroom grilling wonder pan on this blog, and it is unlikely to be the last. A summer of backyard grilling and open-flame cooking has done nothing short of cementing my resolve celebrate a years-long (if accidental) effort to season a chunk of generic cast iron into one of the most useful pans in my cast iron collection.

Behold, the barbecue beast.

In fact, one of the first posts I wrote in this space referenced a chance purchase by a naïve young cooking enthusiast a decade prior.

A new gas stove in the kitchen prompted an experimental foray into cast iron.

Frugally, I bought a small pan from a discount department store, a generic import that had no pre-seasoning but a cherry red enameled outer finish.

Cast iron was cast iron, I thought. Tho my lack of experience with the product left me floundering with messes and ruined meals. I struggled.

Admittedly, there is a learning curve when switching from an everybody’s non-stick basic cooking tool approach to a tool that requires care and preparation. I had jumped in the deep end and with minimal research immediately sunk to the bottom of the metaphorical swimming pool.

Years passed.

Further research and interest blossomed a casual cooking fascination into a mild obsession and I quickly expanded my collection of newer cast iron items.

The cherry red pan lacked for a home in my bursting cupboards and for one reason or another migrated to a more permanent home on the backyard barbecue grill, hiding under the lid from rainstorms and winter snow.

Year after year after year.

Back to that accidental effort: it was just sitting there taking up space on my grill, so alongside a steak, some seasoned chicken, or just a stack of hamburger patties I got into the habit of oiling up the cherry red pan, tossing in some veggies or sliced mushrooms, and grilling up a side aside the main.

Year after year after year.

Now that at least half a decade has passed, and my understanding of cast iron cooking has blossomed into a kind of enthusiast-level expertise, countless heaps of potatoes have been browned, numerous broccoli fry-ups have been enjoyed, and endless bowls of garlic mushrooms have topped homemade burgers, the pan is matured.

This cherry red generic cast iron pan still sits inside my barbecue, of course, waiting patiently for the next outdoor cookout, but now as a perfectly seasoned cooking vessel and a prime example of the potential of a little oil, time, heat, and patience has on a black iron surface.

The potential is bountiful and amazing in this barbecue beast, my hot pan of endless convenience.

September 2, 2021
Whirls Clear Water

by powerful strokes
levering solid against fluid
an oar pushing on crystal water
delving deftly and deep
by muscular heft against molecular drag
plunging paddles
scooping by effort to counter friction
blurring stillness into motion
unseen effort into swirling chaos
below the calming tranquility
of a kayak drifting upon the lake
– bardo

I have reserved some space on this blog each week to be creative, and to post some fiction, poetry, art or prose. Writing a daily blog could easily get repetitive and turn into driveling updates. Instead, Wordy Wednesdays give me a bit of a creative nudge when inspiration strikes.

September 1, 2021
Inflatable Summer

Our adventuresome summer is nearing an end as the last day of August brings that calendar page flip into sharp focus. The final third of the year is upon us once again, a time when the days turn shorter and crispier. And as hoped my writing and posting reprieve has given me a healthy backlog of blogging fodder which I’ll be dishing out over the next month or so.

Case in point: for us it took an unexpected turn into the summer of inflatable adventures.

Early summer, we bought two inflatable kayaks.

Mid-summer, we received just one.

Therein is a whole other story about the modern state of the supply chain and the demand for recreational equipment these days which I am mostly unqualified to write about. But if you’re reading an adventure and lifestyle blog, more than likely you are already familiar with the undersupplied market for bikes, skis, PFDs, things that float, things that grill, and all manner of consumer sporting goods.

We managed to snag one kayak from that panic, so for that I am grateful because the kayak we did receive quickly became a driving fixture in our weekend and holiday plans, stuffed in the back of our small SUV and pulled out at a dozen opportunities, both planned and emergent.

We inflated that bright yellow tandem boat beside multiple lakes, lakes in the mountains or on the prairies, out on open beaches, or pebble scattered shores, or on the grassy, wasp-swirled picnic areas while picnickers looked on curiously.

We bought the dog a floatation safety vest and she seemed to have found a curious comfort nestled between my knees as we rowed across the still waters of many random lakes.

We bought life vests, paddling gloves, and started talking seriously about things like paddle length and water clarity.

That first kayak has turned out better than I had hoped when I held my nose and clicked the “buy” button. After all, I had been comparison shopping kayaks for a few years, weighing the pros and cons of higher-end inflatables versus simple hard shells, comparing costs, transport and storage realities, quality, price, and a hundred other little things. The first kayak was us settling for something “cheap” because of those supply chain issues I alluded to earlier. We took what we could get.

The second kayak, the one for which the stalled shipping status never did change to a tracking number (and is still sitting in a vendor fulfillment queue somewhere!) is a kayak of marked superiority in both quality and function at least compared to the basically-a-toy rubber first kayak we did receive.

Yet the first kayak has brought us a heap of entertainment over the last month or so. I still check the delivery queue for the second almost daily, even as the days get colder and the kayak opportunity dwindles alongside the wait, but I’m all-but resigned to the one we have.

If I have learned anything of note from the experience of “settling” for a lesser product (and I don’t intend for that to sound entitled, merely that putting good money into bad equipment has always sat poorly with my frugal mindset) not getting the one you thought that you wanted after a couple years of thinking, planning, saving and eventually buying something, it is this: mediocre equipment is better than no equipment.

It is better to be sitting upon the water of a gorgeous mountain lake rather than standing on the shore watching. It’s better to have that inflatable summer than not.

August 31, 2021

about

Welcome. I’m one of those weirdos who still writes a personal blog. In fact, I’ve been writing meandering drivel online for decades, and here you’ll find all my recent posts on writing, technology, art, food, adventure, running, travel, and overthinking just about anything and everything …since early 2021.

I write regularly from here in the Canadian Prairies about just about anything that interest me. Enjoy!

There are currently 436,015 words in 576 posts.

8r4d-stagram

collections

archives

topics

tags