Impromptu Nonsequiturs

Conficker and Windows Updates

This is a little out of date, I meant to post it two days ago, but got busy. But anyway - I didn't know anything about this conficker worm until Tuesday when all the headlines on the internet started blaring information about it, due to its imminent uprising on April 1. Since I run protection software, I wasn't too worried about it. Till I read that one of the things it'll do is try to disable your automatic Windows updates.

Funnily enough, a month or so ago I noticed that when I turned the computer on in the morning, I was getting a little error bubble telling me that Windows could not check for automatic updates. (I have my computer set up to automatically do Windows updates every morning at 8:00 a.m.) It offered me the option of manually updating, but when I tried that, it wouldn't download any of the updates. I always got an error message.

So when I read that conficker doesn't like to let you update, then I got nervous. I went to the Microsoft website and ran a comprehensive scan they offer for free there. (The fact that I could do that was a good sign, though - according to what I read, if you have the conficker worm, it will block you from doing things like that). The scan turned up no conficker, although it did turn up three trojans picked up from trying to download from Limewire. (I know that because when it gave the names of the files in which the trojans were located, they were the name of a song I'd recently tried 3 times - unsuccessfully - to download from Limewire; I detest Limewire and only go there when desperate, and after that last bout, I uninstalled it from my computer and don't intend to ever put it back).

Eventually, after slogging through the convoluted help sections of the Microsoft site, I was able to find some information on my particular update error code. Turns out there are three lines that get inserted in the registry (Microsoft doesn't know how they get there - interesting) but if you delete them, it doesn't "seem to" cause any unwanted side effects, and often fixes the update problem. I tried it, it worked, updates are back on schedule.

Interesting.

Chicken and Biscuits
It's been awhile since I had a foody post. I'm starting to really like to cook, to search out new recipes and then experiment and tweak them. I'm no gourmet cook yet, but I get by. My favorite site is allrecipes.com, because there are thousands of recipes to choose from, you can search by main ingredient or even just what you have in your cupboards, but more important are the reader's reviews. That's where you get the really good information for ways to make a so-so recipe even better, or tweaks that people did when they didn't have one or more ingredients the original recipe called for, and useful stuff like that.

I found a great recipe recently that I tweaked a bit and will pass on to you.

Chicken & Biscuits
3 boneless skinless chicken breasts
some (about half a bag is what I had on hand) baby carrots, cut into 1" pieces
3 or 4 potatoes, peeled and cubed into 1" pieces
2 stalks celery, chopped
1 can condensed cream of chicken soup
1/4 tsp thyme (or so; more to taste if you wish)
1/4 tsp black pepper (ditto above)
salt to taste
some frozen peas
all purpose baking mix
milk

(I hope you remember that I'm one of those "a pinch of this, a bit of that" kind of cooks ... measurements are all relative).

This is a crock pot recipe - I've been searching out a lot more of them because now that I don't get home from work till 5:30, I'm not in the mood to start dinner the second I walk in the door - and if I do take half an hour to unwind first, then I stand around cooking for an hour or more, and have dinner at 7:00 or 8:00 at night. And the 'quick' stuff just isn't as good to me any more.

Whenever I'm cooking meat in a crock pot, I prefer to brown it first. It's a little time-consuming, and takes away some of the convenience of just tossing things in the crock pot before work, but it's worth it. It not only looks more appetizing, it tastes better.

So here's what I did.

Brown the chicken breasts in a little oil olive. Have the oil hot and sear it quickly, don't try to cook it through. Cool it, then cut into approximately 1" chunks. (I browned it the night before and left it in the fridge overnight, then cut it up in the morning; have you ever tried to cube hot chicken?) (Yeah, you could cut it up first and then brown it, but I don't think that would be the best way to proceed ... but try it if it floats your boat).

Place the celery, potatoes, carrots and cut-up chicken in the crock pot. Stir the soup, about 1/2 a cup of water, the thyme, salt and pepper in a bowl, and when mixed, pour over the stuff in the crock pot. Cover and cook on low 7 to 8 hours. When you start the next step, toss some frozen peas in and stir it up; they'll thaw and heat up by the time the biscuits are done.

The original recipe was for chicken and dumplings, with the dumplings being biscuit mix dropped onto the top and left to cook another half an hour. But I had used a small crock pot and knew that I wasn't going to have enough dumplings if I did that. So instead I followed the directions on the package to make up a batch of biscuits, then served them split with the chicken mix poured over top.

This sounds kind of mild. But I'll tell you what, it was phenomenal. Really really good. Of course you could always tweak the spices a bit to your liking. And make homemade biscuits if you're good at that sort of thing (I happen not to be, yet).

A note about chicken in the crock pot. I had read dozens of times that if you cook chicken pieces in the crock pot, 7 to 8 hours is too long, they'll overcook and develop some weird texture, or something. Some allrecipes.com reviewers suggested putting the chicken in the crock pot frozen to avoid that problem. Others said you should never put frozen meat in a crock pot, but I didn't want to do it anyway, because I wanted it browned first - and browning it, then re-freezing it was more trouble than I was willing to go to. I was in a dilemma - because to make any chicken dish in the crock pot, I had to let it cook at least 8 1/2 hours as that's how long it is from the time I walk out the door for work till the time I get home - I have no way to cook it any less time.

I decided to try this anyway, and can tell you I had no problems with it at all. Even with cut-up chicken, which would cook faster; and even considering that when I browned my chicken I cooked it just a tiny bit too long, until some of the pieces were already almost cooked through when I put them in the crock pot, even so - after about 9 hours in the crock pot (the last half hour being turned down to "keep warm" while I made the biscuits), the chicken was delicious, and not at all overcooked. I don't know if some people have crockpots that just get hotter, or whether mine is somewhat defective (although it's relatively new), but regardless ... cooking unfrozen chicken in the crockpot for more than 8 hours didn't cause me any grief. And this was just one of those recipes that was way better than the sum of its ingredients.

Vacation!
I'm on vacation effective immediately! I finally did it. For the past several years I'd been taking a vacation at the beginning of August (for Pennsic), then the end of September (my annual birthday trip), then had nothing from the first of October all the way through till the following end of July. Was not working for me at all. I do have a third week of vacation, but it always got divvied up in little chunks, a day here, two days there. And that long stretch was killing me.

So this year we took the week of spring break off, so the Dread Reverend can have the kids all week. Initially we were going to go to North Carolina again (once a year just isn't enough), but with the move and all, we decided to stay home instead. I'm just thrilled to get a week off work. While I don't want to spend my whole vacation working on "the move," I am hoping to putter around putting some more things away, and fixing up the Imaginarium - which will be fun, not like 'work.'

I have several imminent projects for the Imaginarium. I want to paint the insides of the kitchen cabinets, and decide what I'm doing to the outside (painting all, painting part, some other decor), then get some more of my stuff put away in them. I want to get the Christmas decorations that are currently living there put away in whichever cubby is going to become their home. I want to get a dresser that's been in the living room since we moved in, moved upstairs where it goes, so I can put my material and things away. And I want to find a sewing table ... so I can start working on projects! That's the last step to beginning some sewing, is finding a place for the sewing machine to live and room to do that work.

Because I have new sewing projects I want to try ... curtains for some of the rooms, decor-stuff like that.

I'd also like to start working on the bookshelves for the library. Right now all the books are still in their boxes, and I'd like to get them out. I haven't decided whether I'm building the shelves from scratch, or buying pre-made ones. That would be expensive, but far less time-consuming and easier - I'm sure the finished product would look better. I'll put some thought to that in the coming week.

I'd still kind of rather have the library in a more accessible place ... either in the main living area of the Imaginarium, or even downstairs in the living room. But the main area of the Imaginarium doesn't really have room for the library - the wall spaces are all small, broken up, and oddly shaped, so I think if I filled all that area with custom-built bookcases, it would just look cluttered. And we had initially said no bookshelves in the living room, because we had that at the old house and got really tired of it. Of course, one difference there was we really didn't have room for them, so they were making the place look cluttered. In this living room, we do in fact have room for them. It's something I'm still considering. Fortunately, there's time, as we haven't done anything with the living room yet anyway.

I almost regret getting rid of those 20 or so boxes of books in the last few years ... now I'd have room to have that much library!

I think that's all the news that is news (or passes for same around here) tonight.