This book had a lot of great suggestions about leadership and how to get people to do the things you want them to do. This does a lot of good explanations on the how to do it, but the part that I tend to struggle with is the internal conflict of whether what I’m trying to get someone to do something that isn’t good for them. I’ll have to learn to convince myself of the great things that people will get from helping me.
This was a decent story, but didn’t have the kind of ending I would have liked. It had a lot of vague parts after Bean left the picture, where everyone just ended up getting along. That wasn’t the best of the stories in the series by far. I liked Ender’s Shadow the most with the rest going downhill from there. I am looking forward to the next book since there won’t be nearly as much baggage and it will be a completely different setting. I think it will have some really good elements.
I biked over to Nima and Caryn’s place and met Steph there for dinner. Caryn had cooked a really amazing spinach stew, and it was very hearty considering it was vegetarian. She also served some cheese and bread, with the cheese being a really good sour feta. They also gave us some really amazing tea and ice cream after dinner. Nima showed us his new toy, a quadracopter. Steph and I were able to do some basic control with it, but Nima had gotten very practiced and was able to show us an inversion trick.
Stephanie’s parents came over for dinner on Sunday and we made tom yom for them. They brought over some dishes from a Chinese restaurant, as well as a really tasty mango pudding. I helped Mrs. Lee set up her new Nexus 7 that Steph got them for Christmas. They talked about their plans for going to Patagonia and Iceland.
This morning I got up very early to meet up with a professional acquaintance. We talked for a few hours, and then I went over to Stephs and we headed to the farmer’s market on Cal. Ave. We got stuff to make Tom Yom for her parents this evening.
It is rare that I see the sunrise.
For anyone who wants to know the recipe it is here, below (1 person’s worth):
- Put 1 cup water and 1 cup broth into a pot and start it to boil. This could also be done as 1.75 cups water and 0.25 cups stock. This is done to taste and more broth/stock can be added later, but some should be added here for flavoring the other ingredients.
- If adding potatoes chop the potatoes and add them to the pot.
- Chop 1 stalk of lemongrass, only taking the bottom 1/3 of the stalk. Cut into pieces that maximize surface area, while still able to be kept in a cheesecloth bag.
- Chop 1 egg size piece of ginger like the lemon grass.
- Tear 3 sets of kaffir lime leaves from their stems
- Smash Thai chilis (or other chili peppers) for spiciness. For normal spiciness use 3 Thai chilis. Smash by putting them under the flat of a knife and pressing hard on the other side, until the chili splits.
- Put chilis, ginger, lemongrass, and kaffir lime leaves in a cheesecloth bag, then add them to the pot. These can be added before the pot comes to a boil.
- Chop 1 tomato into smaller than bit sized pieces.
- Chop 1/2 onion into nickle sized pieces.
- Chop meaty things:
- The meaty things that we found to work are mushrooms of any type, tofu, chicken, shrimp, full garlic cloves, and potatoes (added earlier for longer cooking – Step 2)
- The things we found to not work are sweet things like carrots and sweet potato
- When you can smell the spices in the steam add the meaty things plus tomato and onion, and squeeze in 1 lime.
- Allow the contents to return to boil for 3 to 5 minutes. Make sure the potato is fully cooked through. The only thing to really worry about overcooking here is the mushroom, the rest will tend to get better the longer it is cooked.
- Remove from heat
- Add 1 tablespoon of fish sauce
- Add 1 tablespoon of sugar
- Add 1 tablespoon of chili paste
- Stir and add more of the items in 14-16 to taste, plus more stock/broth if desired
- Add chopped spring onion and coriander/cilantro leaves right before serving.
After dinner Jeremy, Steph, and I went over to Andrew’s place to hang out. Lindsey was there with Andrew making some Japanese Curry. They were doing it the right way as well, so it was going to simmer for days. Andrew showed us his new Lego crane that actually had many working, moving parts to it. I was very impressed. We watched an episode of Myth Busters and then headed back to Beachhead.
Steph, Jeremy, and I went to Zeni for some tasty Ethiopian food. It was very good and we got the three things that we’d found most tasty in the several times that we’ve been there: Foule, Gomen Kitfo, and Yemizir Wat. We managed to finish off the entire dish, which is the first time we’ve done that since I’ve been going there. This is usually because we don’t start on the bottom bread until the toppings are nearly finished, but this time I started digging into the bottom as soon as it was possible, and we didn’t get any refills on the bread rolls. I was getting a caffeine headache, and they didn’t have any caffeinated beverages, since their fountain drink machine was broken.
Michael and Jeremy joined Steph and I at Beachhead. Michael did some work, but Jeremy, Steph, and I played some Mario 3D. It is a well done game that has a lot of fun parts to it. There are also some really annoying parts that are hard to do with multiple players, or hard to do due to the camera angles in the 3D world. We played through worlds 4 and 5.
Amy, David, Angelo, and I played Munchkin on Thursday. It was a really slow start, but once we got rolling, everyone got rolling together. I was so close to winning, but Angelo was able to take down a potted plant for the victory, with no one able to buff the potted plant enough to stop him.
It's an Exciting World 