Published: 2023-02-16 12:00 |
Category: Journal | Tags: antarctica, roofball, tesla, syrup
Midwest is best
- YouTube recommended what is probably the most midwest video I've ever come across. It's the 2008 Roofball World Championships and is just as homey and midwestern as it sounds.
- Upon further research, Roofball was created in Oregon, which is even more hipster.
- Tesla recalls 362,000+ vehicles for safety issues like "driving straight through an intersection while in a turn-only lane." 👀
- Chris O'Donnell posted about a great blog from Antarctica with an even more amazing domain: https://brr.fyi.
The Sweetness
My brother-in-law collectes maple sap each year to make maple syrup. This year's sugar flow was so early that it overlapped with a vacation they thought would be well ahead of the main flow. As a result, I spent most of a glorious weekend outside with the family managing sap collection and the initial boil. Some fun facts about maple syrup:
The fireplace has two evaporating pans. The lower is the full boil pan and the upper takes care of preheating. A float valve keeps the bottom pan full.
The main job - aside from collecting from the buckets attached to taps - is keeping that fire as hot as possible.
- It takes ~40 gallons of sap to make one gallon of syrup.
- Early run syrup is lighter in color and taste while late sap is darker and much more sweet as the tree ramps up sugar production to come out of dormancy.
- Tea brewed in hot sap is delicious. So is bourbon added to a hot mug of sap.