Mac n Cheese, though I use sodium citrate for the cheese sauce and it freezes much better than a flour roux based sauce. I'll add a rough recipe if you want it.
Please!
OP I prep a tray of manicotti (only boil shelles for about 10 minutes) and freeze raw. So easy to cover with sauce and pop in the oven from frozen. I also add frozen meatballs.
Meatloaf
chili or any kind of stew/soup
You can buy sodium citrate on amazon, fyi, and you'll need a kitchen scale. The only requirement here is the cheese/liquid/sodium citrate ratio. It can be really flexible with anything else you want to throw in.
Sauce: Optional - A few cloves of garlic Jalapenos Hot and/or sweet peppers butter/oil
Required- 24 oz block of cheese, cubed*. Cheese is your choice, I usually use cheddar but you can use any firm cheese 24 oz of liquid. I usually use water, but you can use milk, stock, or even beer in any combination. Total liquid volume should equal the cheese weight 1.44 oz (weight) of sodium citrate. Calculated as 3% of the combined liquid and cheese weight
Mix in/other stuff Pound of Pasta of choice, dry (ain't nobody got time to par-cook that shit anymore) Optional - one head of Cauliflower, rough chopped, raw bacon, precooked and crumbled chicken, uncooked and cubed up or precooked and shredded, whatever works for you Any other delicious bits you want to put in
(salt and pepper, too, mustard is good if you like it)
Saute garlic, peppers, or other flavor things in butter in a very large pot. When they're soft, add your liquid of choice. Sprinkle in the sodium citrate. Once the liquid is hot but not boiling add the cheese a few cubes at a time, and stir while they melt in. Do not let it boil or the cheese sauce will become grainy. Keep adding cheese as the cubes melt in until the cheese is all incorporated. Turn the heat off, stir in the uncooked pasta and anything else you're throwing in. Transfer to a baking dish. I usually have to split into two dishes. Allow to cool, wrap tightly, and freeze or bake right away. To bake preheat oven to 325. Cover dish with foil, bake like 45 minutes until the pasta is cooked. If baking from frozen it could take up to an hour and a half. When the pasta is soft uncover, top with shredded cheese and breadcrumbs if you want, and bake until that's golden. Let cool and eat. I usually bake over a sheet tray because it cheese sauce bubbles over, just to warn you.
Edit: *I cube the cheese because I'm lazy and I don't want to wash a cheese grater. It takes longer to melt in this way, but it's less washing up. You can use shredded cheese and it will melt in better/faster than cubes. Pre-shredded cheese has anti-caking agents and isn't recommended, better to use a block and cut it up.
Mac n Cheese, though I use sodium citrate for the cheese sauce and it freezes much better than a flour roux based sauce. I'll add a rough recipe if you want it.
EDIT: forgot that meatloaf is another one I make a big batch and freeze. Just pop it in the oven and put rice on for a side. I make mine with a ton of veggies in it so i don't feel like I have to add a veg on the side.
Re: litter boxes. My cat is very picky about the box and will not go if she thinks it's too dirty. Her idea of "too dirty" and mine are vastly different. It took me years to figure out a system that works both for her desire for clean litter and my complete inability to scoop daily. Two rubbermaid totes with holes cut out of one side to walk through, one in the upstairs bathroom one downstairs. Litter is the Dr Elisies (i think that's the brand, Dr. E-Something at least) senior crystal litter. The type that is silica bits, the "senior" is much finer than the regular, more like sand or salt. I use a dog poop bag to scoop solids as soon as I notice them, which is usually twice a day, one is always first thing in the morning. Swirl around the litter every few days with a scooper. Change it about once a month, more often if it's two cats, you can tell when it needs changing cause it starts to look yellow (ew) and my cat will refuse to use it. I don't notice any smell from the urine, but TBF it's my house and I may be nose blind to it. I can not scoop urine clumps with clumping litter, I will avoid it like the plague and never do it. And I hate cleaning the clay litter out. So this is a great system that works well for us. Oh and I'll periodically spray the boxes with enzyme cleaner, too, litter and all.
How old are the kids? If they're older elementary (or high school), I think you can explain that this is a boundary that you will not compromise on and your brother is not a safe person, full stop. I might be in the minority but I think it's 100% ok to put the blame on your parents here. "Grandparents know he is not safe and I will not be around Brother. They chose to invite him anyway." It might also be time to reevaluate any alone time your kids get with your parents outside of this event so they can't control the narrative and make you the bad guy.
Also, therapy is hard and fucking sucks but is also worth it, so far at least. From one "always put last" person to what sounds like another.
Frequently. I do wash my work dishes in the utility sink, but even if you discount those dishes, we use it a lot for washing shoes after hiking and for Big Kid's rock tumbler (to get water to rinse, waste water from the rock tumbler goes in a bucket and outside not out the drain).
Current goal that has been shared is to have a channel that is 35ft deep open by the end of April, and have the full 50 ft deep channel open by the end of May.
Oh me too! I don't mind them at all, I even make soap with the shed exoskeletons.
I did not see that one coming!
Ha! Snake shed, too. It gets dissolved in the lye solution before making the soap, which hydrolyzes the keratin/chitin/proteins and makes a really mild soap.
People here in central MD are freaking the F out about double broods emerging this year...... it seems they forget we had ours what, 2 years ago?, and the double emergence isn't anywhere near here. And only have a very small overlap. But noooooo, it's going to be terrible in MD! /s
I think they're all traumatized because we did it once so recently. People have been very comforted when I remind them it's not going to be here. Just normal cicadas this year!
FWIW - I thought it was cool when it was happening. It was LOUD sometimes, and it was less cool when I was trying to do covid spike outdoor @ stuff with giant bugs flying into the sides of people's heads and some people chasing other people with casings in their hands and the shrieking, but all in all they're really not annoying bugs. They don't bite, they dont' want to come in the house, they don't want your food, and the sound is kinda cool honestly...they can hang out. I'm down with cicadas.
Oh me too! I don't mind them at all, I even make soap with the shed exoskeletons.
People here in central MD are freaking the F out about double broods emerging this year...... it seems they forget we had ours what, 2 years ago?, and the double emergence isn't anywhere near here. And only have a very small overlap. But noooooo, it's going to be terrible in MD! /s
Ok I snapped a 2 second video from the park on my way home. And apparently our neighbor’s willow leafed out at its not visible inside the house anymore. But, I’d say this video is at least a quarter mile away (based on how long my Apple Watch says my dog walks are).
This one is longer, but I think the compression lost some of the blinks. I only see one flashing light in the YouTube version, but there are 2 on my phone. H says there are 6 total around the house. Only these two face where I walk at night. youtu.be/FpJbrYWi-kk?si=Kj6B0ytxVBsqzp4y
Edit wildrice The videos were taken from the parking lot at the barn. Said house is at the far end of the lake. I don’t know if anyone else knows which lake I live on. But… initials WL near the malll.
I see two blinks in the second video.
Also, DUUUUUUDDDEEE. If the HOA doesn't take care of it isn't there's gotta be someone in [city redacted but yes I know where you live now in a not creepy way I promise] who will intervene. Probably call the non-emergency line and make a complaint too. Does the [Redacted] Association handle resident complaints? I'll have to check in with H, he keeps more up to date on county politics. Maybe even get you neighbors in on the outrage.
EDIT: Association probably doesn't handle complaints but someone might give you a clue who to talk to.
I'll link the article (https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/2024/03/29/dali-ship-crew-baltimore-bridge-collapse/?utm_campaign=wp_main&utm_medium=social&utm_source=reddit.com&utm_source=reddit.com) but I can't actually read it since I don't have a Washington Post subscription. Was linked and summarized on reddit. The Dali crew are still on board the ship and will remain as such since they don't have clearance to be in the US. It's common for shipping crews to never leave the ship at port, so they don't have the visas. (And someone needs to stay and maintain the ship.) I wonder if they have power and/or running water, though. The snippet I could read was unclear.
One of the big things I took from the videos is that the Dali is now resting on the bottom of the bay due to the weight of the bridge on top of it. We knew it wasn't going to be moved until the bridge was moved, but it's going to be really complicated and we still don't know the state of the hull under the water. Thankfully the bay is mostly silt and mud so it may be undamaged from being run into the ground. The bridge is also over the hazmat cargo, which further complicates things.
Those large ships are staffed by such small crews that it's amazing what they were able to do in that time period. I'm certain since they had just left the dock that their full crew was awake and on deck so to speak. It must have been insanely stressful for them as well.
An absolute disaster.
They stage crew at the anchors while traversing in and out of port & bridges so they can drop an anchor and try to arrest momentum in an emergency. It sounds like the crew were where they were supposed to be and did what they were trained to do in an emergency. It just wasn't enough this time.
He shows maps which will show just what is accessible and what isn't and you can extrapolate why it would be incredibly difficult to just relocate 695 and build a new bridge in a different place. It does include footage of the collapse itself, just to warn anyone who doesn't want to see it.
For a collapse of this magnitude, do they scrap it all and start over? Work with what remains?
Would they consider rerouting the road so the bridge can be built in a new location and start construction sooner?
I'm guessing if there's anything at all salvageable they'll do what they can to use it, but I could equally see them saying might as well start with 2024 tech. Like how people buy teardowns because renovation is more difficult and costly than new construction sometimes
I don't think you can guarantee that the remaining pilings are in good condition after the forces exerted during the collapse. They may be able to salvage the road on the ground, but anything over the water will need to be redone. We won't know for sure though until it can be inspected, including underwater and that is not going to be an easy task. The bay water is really murky even in good conditions and to dive and inspect is very challenging in the best of times. Usually they have to bring is specialists for any dive work in the bay. As for building it in a different spot, I guess it's possible but I don't see how. It's a major city, there isn't anywhere they can go, no easy empty land anywhere near there. It's a lot of city property, the port, and a lot of private industry, including coal.
And, frankly, I think rebuilding ASAP is unlikely. Maybe they can start within a year, but even a rebuild needs to be planed and checked over. They can fast track some of it, but design and then sourcing materials can still only go so fast.
jlt19, that span of the bridge is something like half a mile long. The entire bridge is a mile and a half. Plus no way to get a message to them easily. I doubt there was time to get them evacuated.
Also of note for this board (I'd not bring this up right now in a different place because it feels mercenary, but this is what we talk about here) our state transportation budget was already facing cuts. So just add that to the pile of suck.
I think it's 100% valid to note. Forget money to rebuild, the strain this is going to put on the other roads is going to be noticeable, and that is going to increase wear and accidents. Add in loss of revenue from the port and it's not going to be an easy time. Plus if they think it will take 6 weeks to remove the debris and dredge the channel, there's a good chance many of the port workers will get laid off and then unemployment gets to pick up the slack so to speak. The ripple effect this is going to cause is going to be staggering.
Fucking hell the conspiracy theories are unhinged. (EDIT: on the greater internet, not conspiracy theories here on GBCN)
The longer answer on tugs: There weren't any tugs escorting the ship at the time, no (As far as I and H are aware). Tugs are usually used at the docks to get the ships moved in and out of the port itself. They can be used to go through the bridge and other spaces that are tight. They aren't usually used at this bridge AFAIK. The Dali DID have a Chesapeake Bay captain piloting, as is required by law. So a local expert who navigates the area professionally*. He did call a mayday which allowed the bridge to close and undoubtedly saved lives. Initial reports say that the ship was going 8 knots which I believe is above the speed limit around bridges which if my memory is correct is 5 mph (about 4 knots). Whether that was a factor is not known. The current could be responsible for the speed and without power it may not have been able to compensate. At that speed, even if there were tugs they may not have been able to provide enough force to prevent this.
*the Evergreen/Everfoward what ever it was also had a Bay pilot . He was confirmed to be on his phone texting and missed where he should have turned to follow the channel.
Also, boats need forward momentum to steer. If you loose your engines, you're pretty much dead in the water and and the mercy of both the wind and the current. There are secondary steering mechanisms, like smaller thrusters, but again they won't work in a power failure, and they can only provide so much force.
They may be able to use tugs to get the Dali out of where it is now, but they need to get the portion of the bridge off it first and assess the hull. To do that they need a barge with a big crane to lift the piece off. There's only a handful in the world capable of it, apparently one is close-ish but it's still going to take a few days to get here. Then they have to determine what it's resting on, whether the piling, sea bed, mud, rock, etc. If the hull is comprised that's a whole other level of complexity. The parts of the bridge itself will need to be removed, and that's probably going to involved underwater crews to cut it into manageable parts, cut the steel trusses off, grind through the concrete, and then pull it up with the big barge crane and haul the parts out. You can't leave it since it will take up space the ships need to pass through, not to even mention the environmental impact of leaving it in the bay. Maybe you could pull it to the side and make an artificial reef, but again, environmental impact.
And speaking of the environmental impact, that 100% did some damage to the seabed. Most of the bay is mud and muck and silt, it undoubtedly kicked up a ton into the water that needs to settle out. It's going to make visibility awful down there. It's going to impact all the fish that live not only in the river but the larger bay as a whole. Plus lord known what it's going to do to blue crabs and oysters. And it won't stop impacting them because it's going to stir up the bottom even more as they pull it all back up.
Short answer on tugs is no. Longer answer will wait until I get to a real keyboard. Also the environmental impact here will be huge, which i dont see anyone brining up yet.
www.charts.noaa.gov/PDFs/12281.pdf & www.charts.noaa.gov/PDFs/12280.pdf I was trying to find a map that shows just how narrow the cargo shipping channels are, this is the best I found so far. The white channels in the water are the cargo lanes, where these ships will fit. They are incredibly narrow, especially if the current is strong and the wind is up. And ship sizes increasing only make them more difficult to navigate.
H and I discussed this too. We're kind of just assuming it's because of increased traffic in the shipping channel combined with the fact that the channel in the bay is very narrow and hard to navigate. But yeah, seems like something needs to be investigated so these kinds of incidents don't continue.
It seems from video that this ship had a power issue, resolved it, then continued under the bridge where it had a second failure which then caused it to hit the bridge. H is livid; as soon as the first failure happened they should have stopped/returned to port and not continued to the bridge. If that is indeed the case, this would be pilot error, same as Evergreen, and jumping to conclusions I'd say the shipping companies are too focused on profits to respond appropriately to accidents like this.
Ships like that don't have brakes. There's a good chance that they were trying to slow down and maneuver but had no chance of stopping the forward movement of the ship. I will be interested to see if they had alerted authorities ahead of the crash. I feel absolutely terrible for the workers on the bridge and the drivers. What a disaster.
@villianv I was just prepping to leave the house when my nephew texted me that “Francis Scott Key bridge collapsed.” I was so confused because no one local calls it that, just the Key Bridge. It was just disbelief and he must be talking about another FSK bridge somewhere. The H sent what would have been a cryptic text with the key bridge context.
We moved about 3 year ago. But we’re close enough I suspect we would have been woken up, if not from the crash from the helicopters. Or at least the dogs would have been. And I would have tried to get to work and likely given up within a mile bc of the traffic mess. We were at Quarantine Rd.
I’m still in shock and can’t process. But also, I did think about the pilot that ran aground in the Evergreen 2 years ago. And it’s weird to have two pilot mishaps here.
H and I discussed this too. We're kind of just assuming it's because of increased traffic in the shipping channel combined with the fact that the channel in the bay is very narrow and hard to navigate. But yeah, seems like something needs to be investigated so these kinds of incidents don't continue.
It seems from video that this ship had a power issue, resolved it, then continued under the bridge where it had a second failure which then caused it to hit the bridge. H is livid; as soon as the first failure happened they should have stopped/returned to port and not continued to the bridge. If that is indeed the case, this would be pilot error, same as Evergreen, and jumping to conclusions I'd say the shipping companies are too focused on profits to respond appropriately to accidents like this.
H is caught up and coherent, 7 construction workers on the bridge, 4 cars**. 2 ppl rescued.
Going to be a week before they can even move the cargo ship. Likely months to get the debris clear, despite everyone saying weeks, it's likely to close the port for much longer. And then years to rebuild the bridge. The entirety of the bridge is 1.5 miles long, and an entire footing/piling is now compromised. It's probably going to have to be redesigned and rebuilt from scratch (that's my assumption not an official statement).
**I'm going to add that this is now like third hand info, so don't take it as gospel, though the 2 rescued is being reported by the news.
I gasped, it literally was like a scene from a movie.
Do we know what the deal is with the ship? I saw something that said they had no power, but nothing confirmed.
I havent seen anything yet, but it's true that the lights on half the ship appear to cut out shortly before it starts going off course. I did read that the hull is breached and theres a smell of fuel. The article noted it wasnt yet clear if the breach was below or above the water line. Now that its light we should atart getting more information.
Just watched the video. Do not recommend if you have anxiety driving over bridges. It's BAD. It's a significant portion of the bridge that just falls into the water. Heartbreaking. I did end up waking up H and I heard him call into work just to see if they needed him. He didn't get out of bed so I'm assuming it was a no. Today is the opposite shift day from his so it was unlikely but still possible.
Looking forward, it's going to take so long to rebuild and affect traffic so bad. For those not local, the bridge is part of 695, which is the highway that rings Baltimore. It's also a major shipping route for trucks that aren't permitted on other routes in Baltimore. Any ships going into the port of Baltimore have to go through that part of the River, too.
donutsmakemegonuts, I do not understand people who let their dogs bark and bark and bark, and I'm a dog person! The minute Anna would start barking we'd be bringing her in (except if she was barking at solicitors, then she was just doing her job).