Falling in love with Renaissance Park

2007-04-07

Tonight Crystal and I left the house on a brief errand. I needed ginger for the kombucha that I was making, and our fresh ginger had grown mold. Guess that makes it less than fresh, huh? So anyways, the local Asian grocery store has ginger. So off we went! We walked down Orange Street to Main Street and then headed along Main Street towards University. At the Asian grocery, we bought the ginger that I needed, plus some tea and some delicious aloe drinks. Oh, and a ginseng drink of some kind, with an actual ginseng root floating in it.

So, for the entire trip, I was buzzing with excitement. Finally I figured out why. I was really excited to be living in my neighborhood. I walked out of my front door to an Asian market and bought fresh ginger! There was fresh ginger in my neighborhood!

I’ve said for a while that I’m really excited to live where I do. My neighborhood is somewhat isolated from automobile traffic, yet a fairly busy commercial district with a variety of local businesses is just a couple of blocks away. And today I was able to experience that yet again.

And I realized that I’m falling in love with where I live. I love where I am, and I am very happy to be here.

I still stand by the other things that I have said about Renaissance Park. And yet, flaws and all, I am glad to be here.

Categories : Peoria/Local Businesses   Peoria   Peoria/Renaissance Park   Thoughts About My Life
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SCOBYs!

2007-04-07

So, in the course of pursuing my indie RPG publishing (seriously!), I came across a fellow designer who also works with kombucha. Crystal had made kombucha a while back, and I recalled that it was okay. However, my tastes in food have shuffled around a bit in the interim, and I began to wonder if I might like kombucha.

Then my fellow designer mentioned having made a batch of kombucha with ginger.

I love ginger.

So today, I find myself the happy owner of four SCOBYs. Tea is brewing, even as I type, and, God willing, in a week, I will be the proud owner of a couple of gallons of kombucha. Including one with ginger. Fresh grated ginger, from the Asian market right around the corner….but that’s another post.

Sometime after the SCOBYs showed up today, it occurred to me that these things belonged to me. Not Crystal, the microbe wrangler. Me. I am now the proud owner of several clumps of yeast.

Life is weird.

Categories : Food   Thoughts About My Life
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