Not OP, but the Lodge seasoning guide is a pretty good starting point. Cast iron being used forever is proof of how resilient it can be, there’s not too many things you can do that are irreparable.

Also, you don’t really need to baby it as much as most people say. Just keep using it and it’ll keep getting better.

banging parties

GIGGITY

Look at Mr. “Can Afford an Old Jacket” over here.

Think of it on a scale of 1-10. High floor means it’s not a stinker, so worst ranking would be in the 4/10 - 5.5/10 range. Low ceiling means it’s not going to be an all-timer, so the best ranking would be in the 6/10 - 7.5/10 range. Basically you’ll never HATE it, but you’re also never going to LOVE it.

Dean Koontz is kind of like the RC Cola of horror/suspense novelists:

• See RC Cola in the store
• “Hmmmm, it’s been a while, but I THINK I liked RC the last time I got it”
• Purchase and consume RC Cola
• “I kind of wish this was a Coke, but it’s not that bad, might as well finish”
• Several years pass, go back to step 1

As a side note, I LOVED Dean Koontz books back in the 80’s/90’s. They were fun and quick reads that are in the “high floor, low ceiling” realm of books.

At a local Italian place called Ozzie’s, they used to have a crab pasta that is easily my favorite dish from any restaurant I’ve ever been to (like lick the plate good). They took it off the menu about 15 years ago, and I was so devastated that I think I actually felt my soul leave my body when the waiter told me. He had to give me a few minutes to mourn, and to this day I still feel sad/hopeful when I go back in and look at the menu. Fuck. Now I’m sad again.

There are dozens of us!

An actual faithful adaptation of I Am Legend. It’s a short as hell book and could easily be adapted almost word for word and still be a reasonably short movie. Hollywood had multiple swings at it without even bothering to try and get the main story arc or the ending right (and no, I don’t think the Will Smith alternate ending was good).

Bonus point : you can generate the menus with an AI.

But why?

Didn’t AI make up a recipe for chlorine gas for someone? I’m with you 100% up to the bonus point though.

It may be recency effect, but My Big Fat Greek Wedding 3 could be one of the worst movies of all time. There’s no plot, no one has any motivation that actually matters, no one wants to be there, the writing is horrid, there is nothing in the film that’s even accidentally funny, & you don’t root for or care about literally any of the characters.

The big story arc revolves around bringing her dead father’s diary back to his childhood friends in Greece that he never saw after he left, then they bring them in for 30 seconds at the end and the don’t even have any lines. It’s like they forgot that they wrote the story about them and pulled in a few dudes off the street on the last day of shooting.

It’s not even so bad it’s good, it just makes you feel sad.

Ingredients:

Mac & Cheese:

• 16oz Lump crab meat (or crab cake mix)
• 2 Shallots (minced)
• 2 cups Half & half
• 4oz Cream cheese
• 2-4oz Aged white cheddar cheese shredded (depending on how cheesy you like it)
• 2-4oz Havarti cheese shredded (depending on how cheesy you like it)
• 1/4 tsp Cayenne pepper
• 1/2 tsp Paprika
• 1 tsp Old Bay seasoning
• 1 tsp Dry mustard
• 2 tbsp Worcestershire sauce
• 2 tbsp lemon juice
• 2 tbsp Butter
• 2 tbsp Flour
• 1/2lb Elbow macaroni

Topping:

• 1/2 Loaf of the bread of your choosing cubed (I use an olive oil and rosemary sourdough from Wegmans)
• 1 tbsp Butter
• 2 Sprigs parsley
• Salt/Pepper

Instructions:

• Preheat oven to 350F
• Bring pot of water to a boil for your pasta, salting the water accordingly
• Over low heat, melt butter and cook shallots for a few minutes until translucent in a large pan
• Add flour and turn up heat to medium, stirring to combine evenly
• Add half and half, paprika, dry mustard, cayenne pepper, Old Bay, and Worcestershire sauce
• Bring the béchamel to a boil and simmer for 5 minutes or until thickened
• While the sauce is simmering, cook the pasta and drain 1-2 minutes prior to package directions (should be al dente)
• Take the béchamel off the heat and add the cream cheese and fresh shredded cheddar/havarti in batches, whisking until fully combined/melted
• Fold in crab meat/pasta and season with salt/pepper, adding lemon juice at the end
• In a separate pan, add reserved butter, salt/pepper and parsley melting until bubbling has subsided, then add cubed bread and combine
• Add Mac and cheese to a baking dish and top with bread mixture
• Bake for 15-20 minutes until the top is browned
• Let sit for 5 minutes to cool then serve and enjoy!

Edit for formatting :/

It’s a ton of fun, and I hope you check it out! As an fyi on the combat, it is very perfect block centric like Seikiro, which I know is not everyone’s favorite Fromsoft game. I think the demo that’s out there gives you a pretty substantial preview though, so feel free to judge for yourself :)

I started Starfield and dropped it after about 3ish hours (happy for you if you liked it, I just couldn’t find anything interesting there), beat Lies of P (could be the best of the non-Bandai soulsbourne games), and just started up The Lamplighters League (a fun X-com style game that’s good, but REALLY poorly optimized, so buyer beware).

Looking forward to Spider-man 2 though, only a few more weeks!

As someone who does it on a regular basis, I cannot recommend it enough. It is DELIGHTFUL.

RecipeBox is another good one that has a recipe search function and a grocery list function that connects to your recipes and populates what you need directly from the recipe itself.

Roguebook. It’s a roguelite deck building game that has really fun new mechanics that is probably my favorite deck builders that’s come out in the last few years. Instead of going node to node in a branching path like Slay the spire, you have to reveal the map via “inks” and “towers” that open up the map piece by piece and you gain cards via stores and wells that can be skipped (though they tie perks to the total number of cards in your deck which gives fun risk/rewards). Additionally, there are multiple characters and you have to take 2 of them on each run which means you have to juggle two decks at once.

The only caveat will lay out would be that it’s not for trophy hunters. About 10% of the trophies are nearly impossible unless you play an upsetting number of runs. It’s a fun game, but it’s not the only game you’ll play for the rest of you life.

That bread looks phenomenal for making sandwiches. Well played!

As I’ve gotten older and had more sporadic time windows to play games (kids, work, life), I’ve gravitated more and more to rogue-like/lites and soulsborne style games. Having games that have a core gameplay loop that is 20 minutes to an hour is perfect for me, and I can kind of pick up and put down whenever I want without losing my place in a grand overwhelming open world that is miles wide, but inches deep (Starfield, I’m looking at you…).

With the rogue-like/lites, I can do a run and just go to bed and say “I’ll get further next time”, while with soulsborne games I can clear out an area and do a boss, then come back to do the next area/boss another time. If the lore seems interesting, vatividya will probably have a video on it some point to catch me up on whatever I missed.

It’s from Montreal Poutine in old town (Rue St Paul) between the St Lawrence River and the Montreal Courthouse. They have a really nice outdoor area and some very solid food.