12 April 2014  9:54a

Kat just made a pot of coffee.  This is the second pot this morning (I made the first pot).  Now, don't go thinking that we're heavy (coffee) drinkers, because our coffeemaker (at least the one I use for coffee) has a 4-cup capacity (I have one that has a 5-cup capacity, but it doesn't have a spring-loaded drip-stopper).  I own a full-size (ie, 10-cup) coffeemaker, but I only use it for heating water for tea.  I ne'er use it for coffee, though, because once it's used for coffee, that taste cannot be eradicated, even with vinegar.

That is really just an intro to today's entry.

I've been thinking, thanks to a Facebook post by my friend, Doug Wright, and my general disgust with officers of the law who think of themselves as holier-than-the-god-they-probably-believe-in when it comes to traffic law.  I had received a ticket for failing to stop at a red light.  On the face of it, it sounds terrible, like I could have killed someone, possibly myself or some young child crossing the street.  However, looking at the facts makes it clear that I was not being an irresponsible driver.  In fact, I was being very conscious of both my driving and keeping my environmental sensibilities intact.  I approached the red light, slowed down, looked up the cross street (there's a daycare center on the corner, with an elementary school next to it, with a goodly-sized yard that allowed for a clear view up the street for at least a hundred yards), and decided to save fuel and keep the inertia of my vehicle (which is, unfortunately, a large one, with lots of inertia) moving around the corner, saving the gas for both stopping and restarting the heavy vehicle.  Apparently, he was watching from up the main road, and didn't see me pause.  He gave me a ticket without even telling me why I was being stopped.  He just said, "You came around that corner awfully fast," to which I replied, "But there was no-one coming."

I think he was just pissed at working on Superbowl Sunday.  I hadn't even realized it was Superbowl Sunday until Peter told me afterwards (he was in the car with me and witnessed the entire exchange).  I went to my hearing, and pleaded not guilty.  I go to trial on the 22nd of this month because I would not let them schedule it past 45 days (why make it easy for them?).

So the case Doug posted about was a situation in which a woman was driving down the road and touched the white line a couple of times.  It's shown on video, apparently.  The officer stops her, and ends up finding out that she's .01 over the allowable blood-alcohol limit, which is .09 in Indiana.  So the issue is really whether his judgment, that she was driving impaired, is better than the camera, which shows everything objectively.  The case was appealed, and the second judge found that it was unreasonable for the officer to have stopped her in the first place.  The state appeals, and is given the green light by the Supreme Court of Indiana that officers' judgments are better evidence than objective camera video.  Doug called it out, and so do I, esp. after having so recently my own experience.  I only wish I'd remembered the officer's name so I can excoriate him publicly, or at least here.

Well, I suppose that's something I can put out of my mind until the trial date gets nearer.  Besides, I've got lots of other things on my plate:  my dive computer's battery croaked, after only about a year's service.  I suspect, and Peter agrees, that there is something wrong with the dive computer that it sucks so much power that it doesn't last for years.  So I'm on the market for a new dive computer.  I also realized, as we were suiting up for our first dive since January, that my backup torch was flooded.  Luckily, Janet Pinterits, who happened to be in the vicinity, had hers and loaned it to me (I returned it to her the following afternoon when I stopped by San Diego Divers, where she works, to pick up the refilled tanks that Peter'd dropped off earlier).  So that's at least been taken care of.  I ordered a new backup torch online and it's on its way.  Until it arrives, no night dives for me.  But until my new computer arrives, I'm dry.  I've got a bid in on ebay for a used computer that's the same model as Peter's.  I decided on that model because Peter said that he can explain it to me inside & out, as he's been using that model for years, and apparently, it's been doing very well.  And it connects with one's computer to download dive profiles, which is really cool (to me, at least).  I just read online that it works with Macs as well as PCs, which is a relief.  Just takes a special command in Terminal to download the dive data.

What else has been on my mind?  Well, yesterday evening, I was bored out of my wits when I suddenly realized that I'd been charged with producing something to take to Carol's tonight when we go to the Phoenix Games Group's monthly gathering.  I made up a mixture for what I will affectionately call "kitchen sink cookies," even though they don't contain any vanilla extract.  They do contain sweet butter (about 3/8 pound),  an 8-oz. brick of neufchatel cheese (I'd run out of cream cheese), molasses (about 1/2-5/8 c., I think), one extra-large egg, about a tablespoon of lemon juice (from concentrate), and about a tablespoon of almond oil.  The dry ingredients are, if I remember correctly, about a cup and a half of a-p flour, 3/4 c. flax meal, the rest of the bag of almond meal I'd had leftover from making something else (probably about 3 T.), 3/4 c. powdered milk, a teaspoon of salt, a teaspoon of baking soda, some cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, and coriander (I'd originally meant to use cardamom but couldn't find any in my spice rack).  Can you tell that I'm trying to clean out my kitchen as much as possible before our building gets fumigated next month?

So, anyway, our condo complex is getting fumigated for termites next month.  The date set for our building is 8. May, which is coming up faster than I'd like, especially since we'll be getting our second delivery from our CSA just a week before, which means we'll either be eating all our fresh produce like crazy, or I will bring it to Peter's when I go to stay with him.  Kat is planning to stay with Kenzie MacDougall for the two nights when we need to have the premises vacated.  I'll be getting bags for putting food into so that it's protected from the fumigation.  That includes refrigerated stuff, which totally sucks because we have so much in our fridge, as we eat a lot of fresh foods, including salads.  I guess this will prompt a fridge-clearing, which probably has been needed since Peter and I returned from Europe, anyway.

So another topic I can cover, at least touch upon, is that of Community-Supported Agriculture, or subscription farms.  I recently joined one that provides all organic produce its farms located in California.  It's not the best solution for us, though, for two reasons.  The first reason is that some of the produce is grown at their main farm, which is located further north, closer to San Francisco, which means the food travels a pretty long distance, relatively, to get to our doorstep.  The second is that the produce is all organic.  I've got nothing against organic farming methods, because I appreciate its sustainability in the long run.  However, I'm not an organic snob, simply because I realize that the nutritional content of "conventionally grown" produce is equal to that of organically-grown produce.  What's more important to me is the local factor, which is where I'm stuck when considering the CSA we just became members of.  Locally grown means that the food doesn't travel as far and therefore (potentially) fresher.  The big advantage, to me, though, is that it uses less fuel to get the produce to market (or, in this case, our doorstep), thereby adding less carbon to the atmosphere in the form of exhaust from the delivery vehicle(s).

So I'll be shopping for another CSA.  Any suggestions?

So, do you think I could start a paragraph with a word other than "so"?

Time to get to the rest of my day.  More later.