A migrating flock of sparrows roosts in Omaha, NE from August through late September.  They gather at dusk in the skies and school like fish as they twist and turn chaotically until one of them leads the rest down into the trees.

We found this recipe in Cooking Light’s October 2003 issue.  Use low-fat ingredients and oven-ready lasagna noodles.

• 4 C torn spinach
• 2C sliced mushrooms
• 1/2C pesto
• 3/4C shredded mozzarella
• 3/4C shredded provolone
• 15oz ricotta
• 1 large egg
• 3/4C grated Parmesan, divided
• 25oz tomato-basil pasta sauce
• 8oz tomato sauce
• 8oz pkg oven-ready lasagna noodles

1. Steam/defrost spinach, squeeze dry, coarsely chop.  Combine with mushrooms and pesto in a medium bowl.
2. Combine mozzarella, provolone, ricotta, and beaten egg in medium bowl, stir in 1/4C Parmesan.
3. Combine pasta sauce and tomato sauce in medium bowl.
4. Spread 1C pasta sauce in bottom of Crockpot, then layer noodles, 1C cheese, 1C spinach.  Repeat layers, ending with spinach, then put 3 noodles on top followed by remaining cheese and 1C sauce.  Put another 3 noodles on top of that and top with remaining sauce and remaining Parmesan.
5. Cover and cook on low for 5 hours.

There was an article in my home-town paper about the founder (Evan Williams) of Twitter, who is from my home state of Nebraska, is coming to give a series of talks at the university.

Some of the initial comments to the article were of the sort I hear alot: What is Twitter?  Isn’t Twitter a waist of time?  Why do people use Twitter?

Well, I posted my own comment that sums up what I think Twitter is, and at least one other commenter said it helped him grok Twitter:

Twitter is like having your best friends sitting near you.  If you’re physically near your friends, there are things you would tell them that seem insignificant, too insignificant to warrant a telephone call for instance, but that make you happy or sad or excited, or that you just think they’d be interested in.

Without twitter, without a way to communicate to your friends quickly en mass about ideas that fall below the significance of something you’d call to tell them, there is a lot of funny or weird things that you and you alone experience.  Twitter helps fill the niche of sharing those lower significant events and thus brings us closer together.

You can follow my tweets on my Twitter page.

Before

I love autumn and Halloween is my favorite holiday. There is an energy in the air from the season changing, the smell of leaves turning and falling.

This year I found a welder at the farmer’s market who had turned an old propane tank into what I thought would make a great permanent jack-o-lantern. When I mentioned it, the idea hadn’t occurred to him – that’s a great thing about art though, people find new meaning in your work.

I used a can of spray paint to give it the characteristic orange of a jack-o-lantern. Then I wanted to make it a little scary, so I searched google’s images for pictures of warriors with painted faces and African masks. I’m very happy with how the project turned out!

After

This bread recipe comes from a magazine we subscribe to, which I’d recommend to everyone, Cook’s Illustrated; the Jan 2008 edition.  I’ve been making this bread once a week for months now and it has fast become our favorite bread recipe because it is so easy and has a professional crust.

Perfect Loaf

One requirement is having an oven-safe pot with a lid; a dutch oven.  We use an aluminum one, but cast iron and other flavors would work just as well.

Ingredients:

• 3 C all-purpose flour
• 1/4 t instant yeast
• 1.5 t table salt
• 7 oz water (room temp)
• 3 oz Budweizer
• 1 T white vinegar

Preparation:

Mix the dry ingredients in a big bowl with a whisk.  Pour in the wet ingredients and fold with a rubber spatula until all the flour is absorbed (about 1 min).  Cover and let sit overnight at room temp (8-18 hrs) (this replaces kneading found in most recipes).  Punch down and then knead 12 times on a floured surface.  Line a steep-sided bowl (similar size to your dutch oven) with tinfoil or parchment paper and put dough in there, cover, and let rest 2 hours.  Preheat oven to 450 with the dutch oven and lid inside.  Reduce oven temperature to 425 and carefully remove dutch oven and transfer dough with liner to the pot, replace lid, and bake for 30 mins.  Remove lid and bake another 20 mins, then remove from oven and place dough on cooling rack for a couple hours before slicing.

Transcript:

Last weekend I took a roadtrip with my parents and got to meet maker-elite named Paul Boyer at his museum in Belleville, KS. 

Paul, who will be 78 this year, has been carving since he was a boy.  His museum showcases his art from the past 30 years, which includes many incredible animatronic pieces like this display of a horseshoe factory. 

Paul dropped out of grade school and later served in the military in Korea where he was known for carving and making art with whatever supplies he could get his hands on.

When he was 35, he lost one leg in an accident and contracted Hepatitis C from a blood transfusion.  The doctors gave him just 5 years to live.

Paul didn’t go back to work after the accident, and instead focused on his art to keep his mind busy.

When he starts a new project, he comes up with the concept and thinks it through, but never does any blue prints – he just uses his instincts to guide him.

He’s made many interesting kinetic art sculptures, but his talent isn’t limited to that.  He sketches caricatures, paints, and even mined diamonds in the rough then created a machine to grind them according to their crystal structure into a beautiful necklace for his lucky wife.

I asked Paul where his artwork was showcased, thinking “Smithsonian” would be an appropriate answer.  He said that there was some here and there in some towns around, but that was all!

I also asked him if he ever made anything like a pinball machine (my passion), but he said he hadn’t – maybe he will now though!

He was such a pleasant and humble man to talk with and I’m really glad my parents took me on the road trip down to see his museum.

This museum is a must-see if you can make it:  1205 M St. Belleville, KS  66935 (785.527.5884)

Somm and John fly their RC Jet Turbine Airplanes at the Lincoln Sky Knights club.

Happy 9th anniversary, Dana! 

Which way is it to the Office of Renouncing my Citizenship?

Our last hope?  “The Al-Haramain case is likely to become the last — the only remaining hope for a determination of the legality of the president’s extrajudical spying program and for Supreme Court review of the “unitary executive” theory.”

We just spent a week in Ireland.  We stayed in Dingle, Kilkenny, and Dublin – here are some of the photos from the trip.