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Realm of the InterNutter

Thoughts, stories and ideas.

Herbing 'till I plotz...

I promised a photojournal entry, and you're about to get a photojournal entry.

We start with a simple, neglected herb garden:

Pictured, smol child, large rosemary Chaos is looking nervous because there was a wasp on the other side.

Chaos showing off a washing basket full of cut herbs We got a basket full of cuttings. most of them were actually useful.

This is just the LEFTOVER rosemary The leftovers. Some sprigs are bundled with the hope of making decent potential tea.

Finished Rosemary oil. It will be going out in much smaller bottles Heat-infused rosemary oil looks gross when its done, and in bulk.

Mint still being processed I had a freaking LOT of mint. So much that I'm contemplating using the bigger bottles for the gift basket. The house is going to be firkin aromatic for ages, yet.

And we're going to have plenty of leftovers to use or throw out as circumstances decree.

Not pictured: The devastation I left in my wake in the garden, and the brewing rosemary vinegar.

I cut down on the risks of botulism by blanching the rosemary I'm using for the vinegar. In three weeks' time, it's all going to be strained, rebottled, and parcelled up.

I'm going to price sealing wax, today. Going to need it for the presentation.

Challenge #01025-B293: One Near-Apocalyptic Afternoon in Bloomington, Illinois

The speech known as Abraham Lincoln's "Lost Speech" was given at the Bloomington Convention on May 29, 1856, in Bloomington, Illinois.

The traditional reason given for the lack of any written recollection of the Lost Speech is that Lincoln's skilled and powerful oration had mesmerized every person in attendance. Reporters were said to have laid down their pencils and neglected note taking, as if hypnotized by Lincoln's words. When the speech ended no notes existed, so media reports of the day simply

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Post-massacre update

I have successfully mutilated the Rosemary bush and decimated the mint population The house and my hands are redolent with the scent of both.

I tried enlisting some child labour to speed up the process, but Mayhem begged off early [feeling useless and then feeling sick] and Chaos got bored of picking mint leaves.

I have a sink full of unpicked mint, soaking in water and lemon juice to stop them browning whilst I take a well-earned break. And about a double-handful

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Challenge #01024-B292: Don't Let Them Breed

Sara Louise meets Sherlock (the Benedict Cumberach one). they both get bored easily with trouble ensuing. -- Anon Guest

Watson should have known they were in trouble when the suspected alien had vanished from a locked room without a trace. Scotland yard usually handed off such cases to a special military unit, but they were off on a completely different crisis.

Sherlock looked around the room, including the floor and the ceiling. Everything seemed undisturbed. Not to Sherlock's sharp eyes. He touched

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Where has all the money gone?

I discussed money issues with Beloved in the evening. As it turns out, most of the expenses were directly related to bills and paying off debts.

We're relatively debt free, right now. But we're also money poor.

And Christmas is going to be hellishly expensive, even with my frugality in the balance. For example: Beloved suggested using actual sealing wax for the gift basket stuff. Two of the lovely bottle types have corks, and they're going to need a functional seal.

I

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Challenge #01023-B291: No Such Thing as Normal

This poem: http://bonehandledknife.tumblr.com/post/130524095600/if-you-are-a-monster-stand-up-if-you-are-a -- RecklessPrudence

They called it the DevilPurge, and they came for all the creatures of the night. They came politely, with notarised invitations and assortments of red tape.

They helped the vampires move out. They assisted the werewolves. They kindly and gently moved the mausoleums of the undead. They bussed the witches, wizards and warlocks into a faraway place on the very borders of the kingdom.

To make things better, they said. To

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Time for Science!

Today, when I'm done with my writing, I am taking one of the pretty bottles I got for my artisinal rosemary product gift basket[now featuring mint], and I am going to use it... FOR SCIENCE!

These are wibbly wobbly pretty bottles, and I'm doing nine of everything, but for these ones... I am measuring their collective liquid volume.

Yep. I'm filling a bottle nine times and emptying it into a measuring cup so I know how much high-quality vinegar to purchase.

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Challenge #01022-B290: The Thirteenth House

Haunted House? So what. http://bonehandledknife.tumblr.com/post/131049565560/tbonechessor-leftbouquetarbiter-listen-ok -- RecklessPrudence

It was, of course, a fixer-upper. With their credit rating, the Smiths could afford little else. Callie looked up at the looming heap of crumbling Victorian glory and sighed. "It's another haunted one," she monotoned.

"Come on, Callie... The odds have to be in our favour, one time."

Callie just sighed. This was the twelfth such house they'd lived in. She was beginning to see the pattern. "There's history,

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We've started on our supplies...

My goal for this week and next week is to spend as little as humanly possible so that we have more money to save for Christmas.

The artisinal rosemary products are going to crap on that, more than a little. Mostly owing to the fact that I will have to purchase some tools and find a source of bulk white wine vinegar. Might have to discuss that with Beloved.

I'm doing nine bottles of dried leaves, eight of rosemary oil and six

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Challenge #01021-B289: You Know What You Did

You can be villainous all you like, little AI, but if the people writing the safeguards are competent, you get this: http://weirdlet.tumblr.com/post/131323113905/furious-peridot-witchoil-devilishdescent -- RecklessPrudence

[AN: Another one I must reblog to notify that this is a thing. Also, I am trying very hard not to channel Bender Bending Unit Rodriguez]

"Welcome to transit station Eighty-Six, the asshole of the universe," droned the alleged welcoming committee. "If you've been assigned work here, then you've made some really

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A breath of fresh... meat?

We got paid, we got paid! Kaloo kalay, O frabjous day!

I was not about to turn around and spend it all in one place, dear readers. I went to every last cheap zone I knew to get hold of some cheap noms. And some equally cheap plastic containers.

The golden circle factory outlet does some marvelous deals, and I took advantage of them. I now own a metric fuckton of rice, some juices for the kids, and more beetroot than I

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Challenge #01020-B288: Feel the Burn

This post: http://babblingbug.tumblr.com/post/131643642080/xtremecaffeine-copperbadge -- RecklessPrudence

[AN: Reblog that post with a linkie]

"The jingles, O my Powers, the jingles..." complained Wayne, apprentice of the Darkening Arts. "All night! It just kept singing them all night... I can't get them out of my head."

"But you got it in your head, right? You can remember all this shiz?" asked Davies.

"It's a terrible price. I thought a music demon would be harmless. I did all the cantrips.

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Holy fuck, I have an itinerary

Busy day today. At least, for my standards of "busy".

Gotta take Mayhem only to school, then turn around and take the cat to the vet. With the potential for UNEXPECTED BILL$$$$. Then I have to drop the cat back home before I take Chaos off to faraway Caloundra for a pediatric appointment.

Said appointment is free - yay!

BUT it will also decide how much financial assistance we get, if any - booo.

And the nice people I was advised to

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Challenge #01019-B287: Tough Assignment

Another one of these, please: http://thepreciousthing.tumblr.com/post/121702150607/finding-flight-okay-but-imagine-a-medieval -- RecklessPrudence

He went where he was summoned, of course. Demons did not have much in the way of free will. He did not question why.

What he did question, after he appeared in several appealing guises, was why it was not working. He was the living embodiment of hot, muscular temptation. He could even do doughy, fuzzy temptation. And he did, just in case.

He could not get a

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Squeaky bum time...

We get paid tomorrow afternoon. Right now, we have about $70 collectively to get us through until then.

We have resources. A metric fuckton of tinned tomatoes, loads of pasta, loads of rice. No cheese. Or at least, no cheese that we know how to cook with.

We do have a wedge of the famous Wensleydale, but we need crackers to try it. And the kids might yet turn their noses up at it because some Americans went and put cranberries in

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