Brad Sondahl's blog

Brad's Blog

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March 6, 2018
Last month spring was looking to come early, then there was a full reprise of cold and snow, and the lake is more solidly frozen than a month ago... But we're going above freezing again this week.
This is hard cabin fever time, so I've done a couple things to entertain myself, like this quick video of glazing a kiln load of pots
Also our area is threatened with a smelter moving in and polluting the air and water, so we marched against it and I made this video...
We also attended a film fundraiser for the anti smelter group...
I've been attending jams, as well as performing in a local pub, twice a month.

March 8
There are the dog days of August, then there are the dog and cat days of March:

March 13
The robins are back, and the highs in the 40's are dwindling the snowpack... We walked down part of Birch Creek and could see the thickened ice forms along the creek are getting thinned by spring...

Here's a link to a 50's song Jonathan and I recorded last weekend: Hello Marylou

March 19
Spring marches along in advance of its technical release date next week, in the form of spotted towhees returning also...
Here's the link to photos and videos I took while running sound for the last weekend's music showcase http://www.sondahl.com/events/INBMAmar2018.html
On the way in to the showcase I stopped at Wheeler's Fruit Stand (which has been around probably longer than Sondahl Pottery), because they were advertising 39 cent cabbage for St. Patrick's Day. The price was even better, since they had a bin of cabbages that had split open, so I bought 6 heads and made sauerkraut today. I'm putting down the details for future reference. The 6 heads made 10 quarts of kraut, after adding the recommended 2% by weight of sea salt to the shredded cabbage. I topped off the quarts with extra 2 tsp./quart brine solution, and put a curled over leaf on top, and added a little pot I made for the use to weigh down the cabbage into the solution. Each quart is then topped with a coffee filter held tight by a rubber band, and set in an aluminum or plastic shallow pan to catch the drips that tend to occur as the fermenting process starts. Two weeks is usually needed to complete the souring, at normal room temperatures.
Springtime is not the normal season for kraut, but I've become very attached to a sprinkling of kraut on eggs for breakfast, or with meat or other vegies for lunch... Combined with our homemade salsa, they are the two main condiments we use...

Books read and other media of note

The Saturday big tent wedding party / Alexander McCall Smith. Another good one in the series...

The Witches of Karres by James Schmitz One of my favorites from 1966, well worth rereading regularly...

The Reluctant Assassin by Eoin Colfer. I guess YA is a rating for violence, which it starts out being rather violent. But a good suspense novel if you're not reading it to go to sleep...