Just got back from about a week out in Sunriver, Or; limited internet, cabin on the Deschutes River, floating dock and lots of sun.

Was a great way to recharge, relax away some stress, and get to somewhere I had not been before.

If your looking for a cabin rentel in or near Bend / Sunriver, Or check out www.bendcabin.com and go and enjoy the quiet.

Pictures to come (probably on Facebook)

Just a quick note (to whoever) that I am headed to Sunriver this next week.

After 10 years of living up in the NW will finally get a chance to see what everyone else is talking about.

Headed to www.bendcabin.com with a hot tub, river view, and sun.

Cannot wait to decompress, and work on an interview presentation for when I return.

Not sure how I have missed this plugin but a great way to embed a tweet into your WP site

Business blog post on when to post to facebook to get noticed. http://wiese.us/when-is-your-audience-participating

November 5, 2010 11:44 pm via TweetDeck

@dswiese

Sean Wiese

The tweet above was embedded using the search for a user (dswiese) and selecting the tweet I wanted.

I did try the copy and paste of the url into the default field, but did not work. Need to figure out if its WP, Twitter, or other conflict.

WordPress.org > Twitter Blackbird Pie

Quick post today on a great no-bake snack that you can quickly make and frankly, I would eat a whole batch at one time if I was allowed.

SHOE STRING POTATO CANDY

Melt a 6 (or 12 oz package) of butterscotch morsels with a heaping teaspoon (or 1 tablespoon) of peanut butter, stirring constantly.

Add one small can (or one large can) shoestring potatoes.

Mix well and drop by spoonfuls onto wax paper.

Getting into the Holiday season here, and well… I would never eat this. Not ever.

However its in my folder to blog about so here goes.

FRUIT CAKE

Made with Non-such Mince Meat (with brandy and rum)

• Spray tube pan with cooking spray.
• Sift together 1 1/2 cup flour and 1 tsp baking soda.
• Combine in a large bowl two slightly beaten eggs and 28 oz jar of mince meat
• one can sweetened condensed milk
• 1 cup chopped nuts
• 2# mixed candied fruit
• Fold in dry ingredients. If batter is too stiff add 1/4 cup fruit juice, orange or grape is good.
• If the mince meat with brandy and rum is not available add 1 or 2 TBS flavoring.
• Pour into tube pan. Bake 2 hours in slow (300*) oven.
• Cool and turn out on cake plate. It is good ‘as is’, or decorate to suit your fancy.

One of the best times growing up was the warm summer evening, chasing fireflies and picking fresh Concord grapes off the vine.  Having two long rows of grapevines that produced in huge numbers when we did take the time to keep them trimmed, allowed many nights of picking, spitting seeds, and general playing among the vines.

In turn, as the grapes ripened, we were called on deck to pick as many as we could in order to maximize the number of pies that Granny would have to bake. Once picked, the work was not over. Each grape had to be skinned and then the pulp had to be separated from the seeds.

So once that work was complete, it was time to make magic:

GRAPE PIE

For the big aluminum pie pans use 6 or 7 cups of Concord grapes.

Slip skins into a bowl and set aside.

Put pulp into saucepan without water and bring to a rolling boil.

While hot, put through a strainer to remove seeds. Discard about half of the skins.

Mix strained pulp with the skins.

• Add 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 3 TBS heaping tapioca
• 2 TBS lemon juice
• dash of salt

Mix well and pour into pastry lined pie pan..

Pour into pastry lined pie and cover with top crust. Sprinkle with cinnamon sugar.

Bake in hot oven 400* for 35 minites until crust is brown. Serve cool or slightly warm, not hot.

photo credit: opticalreflex

Long time ago, I got a copy of a bunch of my grandma’s recipes in a simple text file.

I am going to start posting these as I can and possibly trying them out when I have the time.

Just a little background to this one.

The roaster in this recipe has been around since, well almost forever. It was originally used (bought?) by Granny, and has been used on a regular basis since then. While it has been used from Sunday dinners to Thanksgiving meals, I think the most talked about use comes from the picture frame hung on my parents wall. It currently holds pictures of me and siblings (the one picture in the gallery below is my son Grant)

So while you may not have a roaster with quite this historic of a background, I am sure your party mix will still taste just as good (maybe).

PARTY MIX

• 1 box pretzel stix
• 1 box Kix
• 1 box Cheerios
• 1 box Cheese Crackers
• 1 box of each kind of Chex, except wheat
• 1 1/2 pound mixed nuts.

Put all of these in the big old roaster

• 1 lb. oleo
• 1 tsp garlic salt
• 1 tsp celery salt
• 2 Tbs. Worcestershire sauce

Melt oleo and add seasonings. Drizzle carefully, while stirring, over the stuff in the roaster.

Bake in a 200* oven. Stir every 15 minutes, until two hours are up.

Spending this weekend at Wordcamp Portland, and have been learning as much as possible in each session.

So far each session has been good, and thankfully there will be video recorded of the sessions I have missed.

The one thing that is different this year is that I havent felt that draw to network as much as I did last year. Not sure if its burn out from the last month or so of really hitting network events etc, or if I feel that my network needs to grow in a different direction.

Something to think about as I review all the technical stuff from this weekend.

UPDATE (yes already): If I didn’t meet you this morning, leave a comment or follow me on twitter and if I did meet you, say hi.

Today was the ‘inaugural’ meeting of the CouveCoolKids and the start of what will hopefully be a regular meetup on the north side of the river. Always good to find a new spot in town and Coffee Villa hit the spot with everyone this morning. Upon first glance it appeared to be a fairly small space, a little exploration revealed a great meeting area in the back of the shop, decent amount of seating and plenty of standing/visitation space. They do seem to be involved on the major social networks, and already offer Foursquare specials to the mayor.

While I didnt get a chance to meet even half of the people there, I did get to reconnect with people and add to the ones I will keep in touch with. Seemed like a great group to get to know and look forward to meeting all involved.

There was some minor discussion around making this a regular thing, and I for one am looking forward to a meetup gaining traction on this side of the river.

Usernames vs IRL name ? Is there a difference? Is one better than the other? how do you prefer to be recognized? Do you put your twitter handle on a name badge, business card, etc?

I have been thinking about this for awhile, and wondering how you know people that you interact with online. Recently overheard someone say that they recognize twitter handles more than real names (and this was at a face to face social meeting). I have also had several people not immediately make the connection between myself and my sister, even though we both use our full last name in our twitter handles.

Personally I have created my online profiles around the use of “dswiese” for those that may not know Daniel is my actual first name while I go by Sean in real life. After a few introductions, people usually remember to ignore the first name initial.

So far Tweetie for iPhone and Mac is the only client I have that allows me to display a users real name. Would this option create a more personal social interaction if it was the default on all twitter clients ? Would this as a default encourage more new users into engagement?

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