Georgia on my…Magnus?

Wednesday, February 11 2026
On the road. It's sunny and a bit chilly. Perfect jogging weather, but I’m not jogging. I’m sitting in a motorhome passenger seat, traveling to Lake Bisteneau in Louisiana.

We've been there before but I chose to return--I liked the place. It's old but well maintained, and so far out in the boonies that I wonder why the Louisiana parks department bothers. Maybe they like it too.

Molly and I saw armadillo on our walks and a couple of squirrels. A wren that was probably a winter wren, but I forgot to go back with binoculars and check it. When I tried later, it was gone. There was more water in the lake than last time; I suspect they were doing their annual “draw down” and had just started.

At dusk, which I was talking on the phone, an owl flew by and perched in a tree. Then it started making “monkey sounds” and hooting back and forth at an owl across the way. Barred Owls, of course.  Later, at the end of our nighttime walk, an armadillo so excited Molly that she jumped off the edge of the deck, thru the rails and three feet down. Silly dog.  It didn’t hurt her, of course, sense her leash was attached to her harness and not a collar. I had to tie up the leash and walk over and around the deck to release her. The armadillo had ducked and run—for a change.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Spring here, sort of.

Review: Fly Girl

By Ann Hood

Memoir of the author’s years as a TWA stewardess. They didn’t call them “flight attendants” back then—they were stewardesses with all that implies: lovely, attentive ladies who filled up your coffee as nearly as they filled out the skirts in their cute little uniforms. She put up with the sexism, not to mention the horrible working hours, ridiculous weight checks, assignments to the smoking sections and more, all to achieve her goals—unlimited free flights and a kick-ass salary. Plus, she really enjoyed the status it gave her, to be the person responsible for getting her passengers safely on the airplane, responding to emergencies, and keeping them fed and comfortable. I admire her.

The most interesting part of the book for me was the description of how she gained confidence and freedom as her career advanced. She went from being a girl for whom eating a meal in a restaurant alone was a near-disastrous experience to a mature, capable woman who could travel to foreign countries alone and navigate their streets (and public transit, too.)

And the least interesting part was the history of how the stewardess role was invented and evolved and the story of TWA airlines. And that was still pretty interesting.

So I enjoyed. Much.

Review: Hiking is the Easy Part

by Julia Sheehan

I’ve read way too many books about thru-hiking the Appalachian Trail and I thought I was burned out on the subject. But this one tickled me. Just the right mix of suffering and humor; a healthy dose of appreciation for the beauty around her; and some internal struggles as she found herself kicked in the guts time and again by the trail. She got back up and tackled it again, every time, and that was cool to read.

I’m sure there was some of the endless naming that I’ve come to dislike about trail blogs: who she met, what their trail names were, what they ate, etc.,, but I don’t recall it getting tedious. Sometimes I think every thru-hiker feels they have to name every person they met along the trail so they won’t forget them all. Or hurt their feelings for leaving them out. That’s fine for he/she or them, but boring as heck to the rest of us.

But I don’t remember that here. Good, very good, trail blog.

Review: Is a River Alive

How can you not love Robert MacFarlane? His writing is erudite and interesting and reminds me very much of some of the best of nature writing.  And this book is right up there.

I did get a little discouraged at some of the realistic depictions of man’s atrocities. How could I not?  And I might have skipped at little bit at those points. But then he went on to describe rivers that are being preserved, and those parts were very encouraging. If you can stomach a little reality with your enjoyment, this is the perfect natural history book.

 

Review: All Systems Red

All Systems Red

The Murderbot Diaries #1

By Martha Wells 

Pure science fiction! Loved it. Maybe not the greatest of science fiction—there were some inconsistencies and the “world view” was not completely fleshed out. Which is okay with me—I have a good imagination and plenty of experience with movies that show space travel.  It starts with people (and the Sec Unit aka Murderbot) traveling on a ship to a distant outpost where the people were prospecting for some unknown materials, possibly for future mining. So you had to fill in all the details what the ship’s interior looked like, how the planet and landing area looked and then just guess at what they were looking for out there.  Maybe the author told this and I missed it, but clearly, those kind of details are not what she’s interested in.

But the action is cool and the thoughts in the Sec Unit’s head as he gradually learns to cope with humans in such close proximity are very interesting. That’s the meat and bones of the whole story, and I loved it. Plus the mass destruction, of course.

Disclaimer: I listened to the audiobook, which often improves this sort of book for me.

Cooking…for the halibut – The Summary

My goal was to eliminate all the recipes in my To-Try folder in one month, the month of January. And thanks to some cold-ass weather that kept me indoors, I succeeded! 

It came to 22 recipes in 27 days, from January 3 to the 30^th. And the winners are:

1. Honey Mustard Dressing  - keep
2. Butternut Lentil Curry NOT InstaPot - maybe
3: Easy Vegan Aquafaba Mayo - yes
4. Oat Bread - I dunno, maybe
5. Japanese Egg Sandwich - no, but
6. Tofu Lettuce Wraps - very good, maybe do again
7. Spinach Ohitasi – keep for sure
8. Coconut Fish Tomato Bake – keep and make lots
9. AppleButter - no
10. Shrimp egg foo yung – yes but improve the recipe
11. RoastChickpeas - no
12. Eggplant salad pita - keep
13. Japanese Cucumber Salad – not really
14. Vegetable Sushi Bowls – no way
15. BlackPepperChicken - discard
16. sweet potato fries with the vegan mayo - keep
17. CoconutAndSpiceChickpeas (half recipe!) - discard
18. Sticky Miso Salmon Bowl - horrid
19. AfricanVegetables – keep until I get it right
20. Teriyaki egg – keep for a bit
21. Eggplant, Red Pepper and Spinach Curry - no
22. Shashuka-EggTomatoBake - keep 

So I was able to throw away 9 of them, keep 11, and still need to make a final decision about 2 of them.  Not bad, but it could have been better.

The two huge successes of the endeavor were the Honey-mustand dressing and the Coconut Fish bake.  The dressing is something that will prevent me having to buy these bottled dressings that (a) come in small plastic non-recyclable bottles, (b) are full of fake sugars and preservatives and “binding” agents that I really don’t want in my body, and (c) don’t taste as good as what I can make.  The only issue is that even though I make it with ingredients I always keep in the house, using them is depleting my supply at an unprecedented rate.

It was a fun exercise, but I’m glad it’s over. And I still have leftovers from it in the freezer.  Yummy leftovers!  Success

Cooking…for the halibut

To-Try Recipe #21: Eggplant, Red Pepper and Spinach Curry

I made this one a long time ago and had written down that it was, “delicately flavored and dreamy.” Bah!  It was neither and I don’t know why I ever thought it was good. I must have been really hungry back then!

Although it’s called a “curry”, it’s the kind that you spice manually instead of using pre-mixed curry paste or curry powder. But I like pre-mixed curry paste and curry powder!  Either one would have been an improvement over this one, which had cumin, cinnamon, cardamom, coriander, turmeric, and cayenne pepper for the spices.  And even with all those spices, it still came out bland.

Keep or Discard?  Discard, definitely

 

To-Try Recipe #22: Shashuka Egg Tomato Bake

This is from Good Housekeeping magazine, which I wouldn’t expect to be a source of good recipes for my taste nowadays. It used to be, but I’m not into heavy use of oil or salt or sugar, plus I like more spice than their recipes typically call for. But I was wrong, happily so.

It’s simply a little onion and garlic sauteed, then cumin and tomatoes added.  You add some baby spinach leaves, then crack an egg in (okay, they said crack eight eggs in, but I made do with one), and bake it for about eight minutes.  Delicious!

Keep or Discard?  Keep and treat myself from time to time