I have to admit that last year's attempt was not the greatest. I had some problems with heat management and timing. It was also a bit more challenging because it was slightly rainy and windy, which just made things more difficult. The flavor was good, but there's room to grow there as well. I also ended up throwing the head away. I felt a little bit bad about that, so this year I'm wanting to try to do a terrine with it. (Terrine sounds so much more delicate and sophisticated than the real name...) I don't know if I'll actually do it. I don't know if I'll have the time for it. I'll just have to wait and see how things play out.
I'm going to be setting aside some time this week to re-read a bunch of stuff and make sure that I have all of the logistical details worked out. I'm expecting a 4.5-6 hour roasting time, trying to keep the temperature at around 250 degrees. This is the sort of thing where I'm definitely going to use the thermometer to tell me when it's done because I'm not intending to kill off all my friends with an undercooked pig. I need to make a rub this week, which will be some sort of brown sugar, coriander, cumin, and paprika something. (Dry rubs tend to be pretty forgiving, but I'll still want to look up some ratios.) There are also all the tiny details that I need to track because it's not going to be at my house. This means that there's quite a bit of equipment that I need to have prepped and staged so that I don't have to run back home for them. I'm also going to try to take better notes during the process because this is the sort of thing that I hope I would continue to get more chances to do.
The first couple weeks of the semester have blasted by pretty quickly. Last week in particular was quite busy. I was at UNLV early (7 AM) for Preview Las Vegas and then I had one of those 12+ hour days with our school's Open House that Thursday. Preview Las Vegas is basically a local business conference where they talk about trends that project forward into the next calendar year. I had never gone to this before, but I think it was good to see what the business community was looking at. I don't quite know how exactly I can fit that information into my experience at NSC, but it's also something where I think being ignorant of that type of information may be detrimental when it comes to planning. The Open House event was the largest one I think we've ever had by a non-insignificant margin. It was probably one of the longest weeks I've put in in quite a while.
But in general, the semester has started off well. All classes were staffed on time, and aside from instructors' key cards not functioning correctly, everything looks to be going relatively smoothly. We're starting to feel some bumpiness from the Provost transitions, but I think it was only a matter of time before they were felt. The complexity of the Provost transition (especially with the additional transition between Interim Provosts) was bound to have some difficulties somewhere. I've seen a lot of things start to fall into place (Center for Teaching Excellence, Academic Success Center, Recruiting, and Advising), so I'm not as concerned about the current set of difficulties. In another week or two, I might feel differently. But for now, it seems like the best thing to do is wait for the waves to settle before making a fuller assessment.
The Spring semesters are less fun for me because it's the time we do the annual evaluations. I understand why it's important (not just for legal reasons, but also from the point of view of helping to develop faculty), but it's among the least enjoyable things that I do as part of the job. There's a lot of reading and cross-checking that happens in order to keep everything straight and ensuring that everything is treated fairly and equally for everyone.
Partial 30 is still going okay. I've been feeling tired the last couple days, but I really suspect that has more to do with the previous work week than it did anything about what I've been eating. I've crossed the threshold of "I really just want this to be over." A few things that I've learned:
- Cauliflower rice is an interesting rice substitute, but I'd rather have real rice.
- Eating a lot of vegetables doesn't do a good job of filling me up and keeping me full. I really do need to have a protein source like beans or meat.
- Everything tastes better when browned in clarified butter. Maybe I could have guessed that, but I'm surprised at how much extra flavor there is.
- Potatoes cooked in duck fat is as tasty as people say it is. I know this because I was looking for a different meat and ended up cooking a frozen duck. This isn't really related to the Partial 30 per se, but it's just something I learned.
- It's really tough to beat a good steak. My favorite meal involved roasted a steak in a cast iron skillet on low in the oven and finishing it off under the broiler. This also isn't really about Partial 30, except that the steak probably tasted even better because I had not had as many sweet/creamy flavors in the couple weeks prior to the steak, and that might have intensified the flavors for me.
I've started to get involved at two new things through Grace Church. The first is just a small group that meets every other week. The small group structure is something I've been out of for quite a while now. It's a small group consisting entirely of couples with young kids, but at a small church that's kind of what I would expect to be the best match. I'm also part of a new leadership cohort that's being organized by one of the pastors but extends outside of the church. It's an interesting mix of people, which will make it kind of fun. Just based on the first meeting, it feels like the sort of thing that has a reasonable potential of being impactful in a number of different areas. That's another one where it's going to be a "wait and see" time as I let things develop.
I've got a couple other "wait and see" types of opportunities ahead of me. The Department Chair position is up for re-election, I'm trying to feel out another organization for opportunities for involvement and connection to the larger community, and maybe I've got a patentable (and marketable) idea related to something that I've been doing on campus.
