Hey, Scientists! Need a Theory to Test? #1 Skin Tightness

Hey, Scientists. Here is a well thought out science theory for you to test. 

All I ask is that you make me 3rd or 4th author on the papers that come from it. I really want to go back and get my PhD, and being published will help my application process.

This one is on skin tone - not the color, but the fitness of the skin.

Here's the problem: People who lose a lot of weight have loose skin. It has been stretched out for so long that it is not able to shrink with the tissues under it and it gets floppy. Older people also tend to lose tone and elasticity in their skin. Humans find this a very adverse condition. Except possibly people who have flag or eagle tattoos. They may enjoy the animation.

Here's the question: Is there a way to tone skin and tighten it?

Here's the logic: Human muscles can be toned and tightened by exercise. Human skin has muscles, tiny muscles, but, muscles none-the-less. Therefore, we should be able to exercise skin muscles and achieve better skin tension.

Here's the hypothesis: If people with poor skin fitness are forced to exercise their skin for 1 hour every day, there will be a marked increase in the tightness of their skin after 6 weeks.

Here is the procedure: Have participants come in and experience extreme cold and wafty, moist breezes in a controlled lab condition for 1 hour everyday. Every participant will be monitored carefully to make sure that they experience goosebumps for at least 45 minutes of each daily hour, because it is the little muscles in the skin that contract to warm the body (goosebumps) that are the exercise. (See. This is making perfect sense, is it not?) Measurements of the skin before the trial and after the trial will determine the effectiveness of the skin exercises. Control subjects will come in and shoot the breeze with the testers but will not be subject to actual cold breezes.

Also, for the writeup: Come up with a more technical term for goosebumps.

An added benefit or next step study: Test to see how many calories the goosebumps burn. The goosebumps are caused by muscles, and, therefore, the muscles are being used, right? It makes sense that they are burning calories. And shivering. Shivering should also burn calories.

Potential money making: Market a cooling jumpsuit that gets people shivering and goosebumping for weight loss and skin tightening. We can be rich! (I get 50%).

Gardening Must Do's and Must Don'ts

Here are some things I have learned over the years that are really important to know when you are a home gardener. Just thought you could use the information, as it has been really hard-earned for me.

• Always, ALWAYS, squish up your gardening gloves clear out to the tips of the fingers before you put them on your hands. This is to kill any spider that may have found your glove a happy home.
• Do not plant roses near your air conditioning unit or anything else that may need maintenance at any time of the year, because repairmen will charge you extra and curse in your yard if you do.
• Do not plant wisteria near your house or porch or trees or bushes or wimpy trellis or retaining walls or shed or tree house or playset. It will take over. It will overcome.
• Better yet, do not plant wisteria. Just don't.
• Remember that any convenience the automatic sprinklers give you will be offset by lots of time repairing heads that get poked out by aeration guys and snow blowers and just by random acts of God. It will be a love/hate relationship.
• Do check your sprinklers once in a while, because you never know when that random act of God will strike, and if your sprinklers only come on at night, you will have a devil of a time knowing that there is a problem. At least until your neighbor calls and tells you there's a problem, because his garden is being washed out at night, every night, and has been over the course of the last month.
• Do mutter to yourself when you lift off a lid to a sprinkler control box or water meter, "There might be black widows in the perfect, dark, little square holes on the back of this horribly designed lid." It makes it easier to scream, throw the lid, and run, if you are well-prepared first. And just to make you that much more prepared for anything - though it hasn't happened to me, it has happened up the hill a mile or so - rattle snakes in the water meter pits. Gives new meaning to the term 'pit vipers'. Yeah, I know. 
• Hire help for the sprinkler maintenance from now on.
• Do enjoy the gardening catalogs. 
• Don't think anything you grow will look anything like the gardening catalogs. Remember, they have staff horticulturalists and photo-shoppers making theirs look good. You have, well, you.
• Plants that people give away for free from their garden are going to overtake yours, just like they did the giver's. And that is why they are free.
• Free plants you should not ever accept: iris, daisies, chamomile, horseradish, wisteria, parsley, oregano, horsetail, bamboo, sunflower, aspen trees, and holly hocks. Or anything thistle looking (and not because of the thorns, but because of the propensity of seeds!). If you do want some of these plants, however, let me know. I can get you some for free!
• Do not put black thistle into a bird feeder or allow your neighbors within 30 miles to put black thistle into a bird feeder, unless all you want to grow in your yard is black thistle.
• Do wear a belt and long shirt when gardening. Gardeners get a 'gardener's tan' about the same place plumbers have exposed skin and the neighbors don't appreciate gardener's tans, although the hub might appreciate it.
• Prune like you mean it. Too little and the plants know you are weak and they take over completely.
• Do talk encouragingly to your plants, just not when anyone can see or hear you.
• Don't over-water your grass. Not only does it waste water, it makes the worms crawl out of the turf and all over your sidewalk. Dead worms are really hard to get off the concrete.
• Don't buy materials for a yard project until you are truly ready to tackle it or you will forget what you were going to do with them and they will just sit there taunting you for a couple of seasons.
• And, finally, don't make anything you see on the internet that is made out of chicken wire. Chicken wire is a tool of the devil.

I Do - Wedding Chalkboard Ideas

Wedding season is coming up. Kids are finishing a semester and thinking that now would be the perfect time to start their wedded bliss. My hub and I did that. We got married after fall semester, in the dead of winter, in the nearly coldest, nearly snowiest, part of the state, where you had to drive through a nasty, slippery canyon to get there, and where none of the wedding party lived except us. Love makes you stupid.

I also asked my future father-in-law and fiance' to go to the forest and cut down, oh, say ten, yes, ten, cute 6 to 8 foot trees from the forest (since the Father-in-law worked for them) and bring them 200 miles up the road and put stands on them and have them for decoration at the reception. Then we could give those as party favors to all the family members who came and it would be great. Thank you. I was such a jerk and a self-centered twit. Anyway, they did it. And the hub still married me and the father-in-law let him. So those were my decorations at my reception and it was spectacular.

I am amazed now at what young folk are doing for receptions and the amount of money they are spending to do them. Wow. Although, I think opening his wallet may have been easier for the father-in-law than trudging through the forest in the snow looking for ten perfect Christmas trees. It is hard enough to find just one perfect tree.

To my credit though, I didn't make him wear a tux and he was grateful for that.

One of the new trends in weddings and in home decor, is chalkboards. Check pinterest. Chalkboards are a big deal.  Since I made my chalkboard for my front porch a few years ago, I have had friends request chalkboard art for wedding receptions. Here is the basic process for those.

Generally when people ask me to do a chalkboard they have specific things in mind that they want it to say. I get the wording in writing and then start asking questions:

• Is the reception formal or casual? If it is formal I make sure they see my board, which is NOT formal in the least, but can take on shabby chic sophistication, I guess.
• What are the wedding colors?
• Do you have any particular design ideas in mind? Often they do and can sketch the basics out on paper so that I have a better chance at getting what they are after.
• Will it be outside or inside? Hanging or leaning or on an easel? Do you need my easel that I use for firesides? 
• Do you want colored chalk? Do you want colored chalk as an accent or all colored chalk? (like a Hawaii themed wedding or a circus wedding or something)
• When do you need it?
• When do you really need it? (In case I get busy, or lazy, or something)

The instructions for this first one were pretty loose. They had found the quote online and knew basically what they wanted it to say. They left the layout pretty much up to me with just the instruction that they wanted it 'scripty'. It was for an outdoor wedding with blue and pink and other colors and would be displayed on a table, leaning against a wall, outside.

I started with an online search and found the quote already done in computer fonts several different ways. I chose a couple that I thought might work and printed them out so I could play with their layout.

Once I got it on paper the way I liked it, I sent out a picture of the thumbnail drawing to the mom of the bride to okay.

Once she said she liked it (they always do. What can they say when you are doing it as a favor?) I went ahead and procrastinated for a while. Then I did the board and got it to them at the prescribed hour.

You can see the chalk dust both at the top and the bottom sitting on the frame on this one. I was just finishing when I took the photo and I hadn't vacuumed the edges yet and I had turned the frame upside down to fill in some of the letters (thus, the chalk on the top). This was one of my first attempts at chalkboard art at all. I think I have improved over time. Maybe.

 Here is an example of another wedding board in progress. I did it the same way. This time they had a list of things they wanted it to say. I looked for designs on the internet that had elements in series and found several that used the scroll. The ribbon made a design full of words and thoughts much easier to read and made it more coherent than if it was just a lot of writing.

This is what I drew up on paper for layout ideas for the next one. The mother of the bride told me what she wanted it to say and I looked around the internet for ideas, then combined them and got this. I texted the photo to her and she said it was good enough, so I put it on the chalkboard and delivered it to the reception. If she didn't like it then, it was too late.

As you do your board things will change a bit and that is okay. I am not good at swirly things and so I usually redo those several times before I put the pressure to the chalk. Wedding chalkboards tend to need swirlies. Sigh.*

Here is the nearly finished board - still needs vacuuming.

I don't know if you can see it, but the shading on the ribbon is individual lines drawn top to bottom. A lot of individual lines. This is when a simple pencil sharpener is really handy for sharpening your sticks of chalk. It is hard to draw individual lines without getting dull chalk and fat lines. Or invest in a chalk pencil set, which I am too cheap to do. I do this for fun, and it is not fun if it costs a lot!

I also do this for free for the same reason. If it is free, it is fun and not stressful. If I charged, it would be subject to standards and judgement and I guess maybe I am still too self-centered and twittish to have to deal with rejection. I may never grow up.

Hope you are having fun with a chalkboard. It is a great outlet for stress relief.

Grilled Cabbage, Onions, Chicken, and Focaccia Bread - It's Spring!

I am cooking out on the grill today for the first time since late fall and it feels and smells so good! We are having a big meal to celebrate the hub's birthday, which was yesterday.

Packet cooking on the grill is so easy and so good. Tonight the packets are cabbage and another with a sweet onion. The main dish is honey-mustard chicken breast and for a grain - grilled focaccia bread.

I'll go straight to the recipes.

Grilled Cabbage Packet

1/2 head of cabbage
1/2 lemon
1 Tbls garlic powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
2 Tbls Worcestershire sauce
6 slices bacon, cut in half

Cut a half of a head of cabbage into 1 1/2 inch thick wedges. Lay the wedges closely together on a 12 inch length of foil that you have sprayed with non-stick spray, leaving at least three inches on the sides of the foil. Drizzle the cabbage with the juice of the lemon and the Worcestershire sauce. Sprinkle with garlic, salt, and pepper. Lay the slices of bacon over the top (can be omitted, but, BACON! If you omit the bacon, drizzle about 2 Tbls of olive oil on the cabbage instead).

Lay another piece of sprayed foil on top and fold the edges of the top and bottom foil sheets together to make tightly sealed seams all the way around the outside and up to the cabbage. Mark the bacon side with a marker so you don't forget which side is which.

Get your grill medium hot (400 degrees). Lay the packet, bacon side up on the grill and close the grill lid. Turn down the heat to medium (350 degrees) and let cook for 15 minutes. Flip the packet over and let cook another 10 minutes.


Be careful when opening the packet because it is full of steam that can burn you, badly, like microwave popcorn bags . . .

Grilled, Whole Onion Packet

1 sweet onion
1 chicken bouillon cube
2 Tbls butter
1 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp pepper

Cut off the ends of the onion and peel it. Hollow out a small hole at the top of the onion with a knife just big enough for the bouillon cube to fit in. Carefully slice the onion from the hole down through the onion to within about an inch of the bottom all the way around the onion at 1 inch intervals. This allows the steam and flavors to get into the whole onion. It should still hold together mostly onion-like though because you don't cut all the way to the bottom.

Place onion on a square of foil. Put the cube in the hole at the top. Smear on the butter over the cube and the top of the onion. Sprinkle on the garlic powder and pepper.  Then wrap the foil up from the bottom and tightly seal.

Place on a medium hot grill and close the lid. Lower heat to medium and cook for 15 minutes with the top of the onion up. Then roll it over and cook another 10 minutes. (Same timing as the cabbage!)

 

 

The dough drizzled with oil, ready for 15 minutes of rising, then grilling

Grilled Focaccia Bread

3/4 cup very warm water
1 heaping tsp yeast
1 Tbls sugar
1 tsp thyme leaves
1 tsp garlic powder
2 tsp freshly ground dried rosemary leaves
1 tsp Italian seasoning
1/4 cup dried onion, minced
1/8 cup olive oil
Up to 2 cups bread flour
1 tsp salt
1/4 cup Parmesan cheese, shredded

In a large bowl, mix the water, yeast and sugar. Let sit for a couple of minutes. Then add the spices and onion (but not the salt). Let sit another 5 minutes. Stir in the olive oil. Then, add a cup of flour and the salt. Stir and add more flour until you get a sturdy but moist dough. Once it clings together and not to the bowl, knead it on a counter for a minute. Knead in the cheese just barely - you want to leave pockets of cheesy goodness here and there in the dough.

Flatten the dough into a circle and put into an oiled pie tin - or for a really good crust, put it in a small Dutch oven or cast iron skillet. Cover with plastic wrap and let rise for an hour. When it has risen to the top of the pan carefully poke it down with your fingers. Let it rise again for 20 minutes and make indentations with your fingertips in the top. Drizzle with more olive oil and sprinkle with coarse salt.

Let rise another 15 minutes and then put the bread on a medium high grill over indirect heat (not over the burner). If you have a couple of stray bricks, put them in the grill to get hot and put your bread pan on top of those. Close the lid of the grill and let the bread bake for 15 minutes. (The first 15 minutes of the foil packets time.) Check it for browning on the bottom. I like some color on top too, so when the bread is almost done (15 minutes) I flip it out of the pan onto the grill itself and let it cook on that side for just a couple of minutes to give it grill marks. Let cool slightly before eating for best flavor.

Balsamic vinegar for dipping is optional.

Honey Mustard Grilled Chicken

2 chicken breasts, cut into 6 fillets (Cut off the thin end of the breast half way up the meat - 1 piece. Then, on the thicker end of the breast, slice through it horizontally to make 2 thinner pieces. You should now have 3 very similar sized chicken fillets).

Marinade:

2 Tbls prepared mustard
2 Tbls honey
2 Tbls Worcestershire sauce
dash of ground pepper

Mix up the marinade. Stir in the chicken pieces to coat. Keep covered in the refrigerator for at least 2 hours before grilling, stirring occasionally.

Cook on a medium hot zone (375 degrees) on a greased grill. Pour the leftover marinade on the chicken when you put it on the grill, that way it will cook when you flip the chicken over and it will not kill you. Cook about 8 minutes on the first side for fillets that are 3/4 inch thick. Then flip over and cook the other side of the chicken until done (about 5 minutes). Always cook chicken thoroughly; using a thermometer poked into the thickest part of the meat is the best way to make sure the chicken is safe. (Start the chicken during the last 10 minutes of the packet time.)


So that's dinner. Yup. Gotta love spring.

And happy birthday hub!

See the oozy cheesy goodness coming out of that piece of bread? That is why you just lightly fold it in the dough.

Death By Gretchen's Burritos

This is going to be a short post. But I just want it on record, in case someone finds me sprawled out on my kitchen floor, dead.

It will be a sad and solemn scene. I will be laying there on my back, all dead and my limbs splayed across the linoleum that I have always hated. My head will be about where those purple paint drops that I have not been able to remove since we moved in are. The dishwasher door will be gaping open. There will be a storage container lid near me on the left side of my stiff, cold corpse just beyond my curling, gnarled fingers. On the other side of my body you will find a used, plastic container with remnants of a great leftover meal clinging to the sides. My lips will be parted slightly with my front teeth touching, frozen on the last word they spoke: it. As in, "I knew it!"

Question the hub. Question him hard.  Make absolutely certain he did not do it on purpose just to be rid of me.

I hear you all saying, "What?"

Well, here it is.

I make larger meals than we can eat every night so that the hub can take leftovers for lunch. He likes this arrangement a lot. In fact, last Thursday he actually texted me when he ate it. "Yum. Gretchen burritos for lunch." That is what he said.

Well, he worked from home on Friday and then was home through the weekend. This morning, a Monday, he got out a new container of fresh leftovers from the fridge (chicken pot pi - from pi day which we celebrated on Saturday with the whole family) for lunch and put it into his back pack. At the same time, he removed the empty, but unwashed, sealed container from Thursday's lunch and put it on the counter.

When I open it to put it in the dishwasher I will die. The fumes that are trapped in there are noxious. It is beginning to bulge a little. Just want you to know. I love you all.

Goodbye, cruel world.

Growing Carrots from DIY Seed Tape

I have tried and failed at times with growing carrots. Little seeds are tough to get a good start in really cloddy clay soil like we have had at times in our gardens.

One thing that worked was sprinkling a lot of seed on my patch where I wanted carrots and then covering the area with wet burlap bags. The bags kept the seeds damp and dark until they sprouted. Once they began to grow, you carefully pull the burlap back and leave the carrot seedlings to grow. Once up a few inches tall thin them to the desired space apart.

Planting carrots is easier for me now, because I put in raised beds a few years ago with the square foot gardening 'soil' in them. I get nice smooth planting surfaces now. So I adopted a method that doesn't use tons of seeds.  It works quite well.

I took a class by the local university Extension office about how to get kids interested in gardening. They taught us to use paper towels as a base for seeds for square foot gardens. It was awesome.

With carrots I went with toilet paper squares, but it is the same concept.

First, roll out a strip of toilet paper the length you need for where you are planting. I used three foot strips for the edges of my deep bed.

Using regular school glue - water soluble - put dots on your tp squares an inch in from each corner. Then I followed with a row halfway between the dots and all along the middle so that my dots were about 2 1/2 inches apart and staggered. I harvest my carrots quite small. If you raise big carrots, leave out the middle row.

Then while the glue is wet, carefully put a carrot seed into each glue dot. Let the glue dry and you have a seed tape.

To plant, smooth out an area the size of your tape in the garden, depressing it just a little. Put the seed tape in the depression and cover with an eighth to a quarter inch of soil. Keep well watered. Carrots are slow sprouters, so be patient. And keep them moist. Did I mention that? It is really important not to let them dry out.

Sourdough Garlic Croutons from an old loaf of bread

 I had a loaf of sourdough bread that needed to be used, and soon. Here's a recipe for croutons that are really tasty, easy and make that loaf taste fresh again.

I will share the recipe for the bread at some point for those of you who like to bake EVERY week. Sourdough is a lifetime commitment.

Here is the leftover bread ready to be made into something fresh again.

Here is what I did with it. It was maybe better than the bread itself!

Cut the bread into 3/4 inch cubes. I sliced it lengthwise down through the top in slices. Then I sliced horizontally in slices lengthwise and finally cut it into "slices" which made cubes.

The cubed bread.

 Then, put the cubes into a large plastic bag or bowl. Throw away the tiny crumbs (or put them in the bird feeder).

In a small bowl, combine 4 tablespoons olive oil, 1 teaspoon dried Italian seasoning, 1 teaspoon dried thyme leaves, 1 tablespoon garlic powder, 1 teaspoon onion powder, and 1 tablespoon prepared mustard. Mix well and drizzle over the bread cubes shaking to get on as many as possible. Continue to gently shake and roll the bread crumbs around for a couple of minutes until well distributed around the cubes.

Pour the cubes out onto a large cookie sheet. Put into a cold oven and then turn it on to 425 degrees. Bake until just starting to brown. Mine took about fifteen minutes. Shake the pan or stir the croutons and put them back in the oven for a few more minutes to get a golden brown on most sides. Remove from the oven and cool on the pan. Use on salad or make a stuffing to go with chicken with them.

Here are the finished croutons - about 5 cups from a smallish loaf of bread. Not bad.

DIY Sourdough Garlic Croutons

Dressing/Stuffing for Chicken 

To make dressing you need 2 1/2 cups of croutons. Slightly crush them so about half are broken up.

Bring one cup of chicken bouillon to a boil. Add 2 tablespoons butter, 1/4 cup of chopped onion, and 1/4 cup chopped celery. Then add 1 teaspoon poultry seasoning spice. When onions are translucent, remove the soup base from heat. Put the croutons in with the sauce and stir well. Then cover with a lid. Let sit 10 minutes.

Fluff with a fork and serve.