Good news! I have started posting the Nerd By Northwest comics up on the Steem-blockchain social networking site, Steemit. I’m putting them up in order of publication (mostly) every weekday until caught up to the present. Once caught up, I will probably be posting the current webcomics one or two days after being published here (so you faithful readers still get to see them here first!).
My comics are posted under the ‘webcomic’ Steemit tag, or you can find them by looking up my Steem username, ‘northwestnomad’. So if you’re already a Steemit user, look me up and give me some votes while you can relive the oldies but goodies! So far my webcomics have consistently made the ‘Trending’ and ‘Hot’ categories in the webcomic tag, and with your help I can grow this webcomic’s readership and just maybe help pay the rent! 😉
Yes, the Halloween tradition is taking root in Mongolia of all places! In my first visits to Mongolia between 2010 and 2012 I rarely saw any Halloween costumes or decorations, but as of the past couple years that appears to have changed. I first noticed it in 2016 and 2017…
And this year is no exception, with the local E-mart having expanded their costume selection and adding more decorations…
Just off to the right edge of the photo above they even had a Halloween-themed photo cutout board where one can put their face through to take pictures. The irony is that E-mart (and most stores here in Ulaanbaatar I’ve been in) doesn’t like or allow customers to take photos inside the store… they wouldn’t even let me take a picture of a Christmas tree in the store last year (I had to be sneaky to take this and the first two pictures from last year, which is why the quality isn’t great). So given there’s no pictures allowed, who’s supposed to use the cutout boards?!? 😛
This year the Shangri-La Shopping Center in Ulaanbaatar even had some Halloween festivities last weekend for the kiddies, with decorations throughout the mall…
My daughter would have LOVED it if I could have taken one of these big boys home…
… as well as actors in full costume wandering through the mall, giving
adults opportunities for photos and some younger kids a big fright.
American kids tend to be jaded and unimpressed with such costumes, but some of the Mongolian kids there were FREAKED OUT…
Mongolia’s popular culture seems to be inundated with American pop culture and traditions, and Halloween seems to be just another example. Even my daughter’s kindergarten had a Halloween costume day! Interestingly enough, a few have adopted another time-honored American tradition… denouncing Halloween as a day of evil. Some government official in charge of the public schools made a statement telling Mongolian children not to celebrate Halloween because it’s a ‘day of ghosts’ or something like that (my Mongolian is terrible but I think that was the gist of it). The more things change, the more they stay the same, huh? 😉
I will
be on vacation in the wilderness of Mongolia until July 17th, far away
from the nearest cell tower and internet access (I can handle it better
than Pete… maybe). So the next comic will be posted four days later on
the 17th instead of the usual Friday. Hey, you want to get closer with
nature, sometimes you gotta make some compromises 🙂
UPDATE, 7/17: Heck with it, I’m calling this a REAL vacation and pushing back the next comic for Friday the 20th instead. That’ll give me a couple days to get some stuff in order…. like cleaning out the back of our car where my wife’s big bottle of airag (fermented mare’s milk) exploded on the last day of our trip. (No amount of air fresheners in the world can put a dent in THAT funk…)
After the rather clunky and disappointing experience that was “Batman v. Superman”, IMO “Justice League” was enjoyable overall and did a good job in restoring some cred to the DC Comics movie franchise.
Ok, so on to some of the things I liked. The visuals and effects were great, and I thought as a 3D movie it did a good job incorporating the 3D element without being either lackluster or totally going overboard. I rather liked Ezra Miller as “The Flash”, who I thought had by far the most interesting character and pulled it off nicely. I never read the Flash comics so I don’t know how true to the comics the character was (I suspect not very much), but regardless his character gave the movie a nice touch. I also have to give Jason Momoa (as “Aquaman”) and the writers a small tip of the hat for making that character a little more interesting than it otherwise would have been. And lastly there is Gal Godot; sure she is doing a respectable job as Wonder Woman, but I just can’t get over how HOT she is. 😉
Now to the negatives. There were two things that I thought held the movie back. The first was that the story itself; it seemed to lack that little something special, and in certain parts just didn’t feel all that convincing. On one hand I think the some of the story elements did a great job in tying this movie with the previous films in the franchise, but some of the rest felt like a rather typical ‘epic saving the entire world’ superhero movie plot (strange to think such stories have become so ‘routine’, right?). The second is that the villain, Steppenwolf, just didn’t seem all that interesting or frightening for a villain that can supposedly threaten the world. I’m willing to entertain that these two things might be because the comic storylines and characters the movie is based off of are so old and a bit cliche’ these days, or maybe just because the Marvel franchise has been doing the ‘saving the world’ bit so much recently that it’s getting a little repetetive. The movie was still enjoyable to be sure, but for me it just felt somewhat incomplete in those areas.
My final rating for the film: “Is There a Matinee?”. Part of me wants to give it the next higher rating, but for me it fell just a little bit short of that. Perhaps I would have liked it even more if I were a DC fanboy and appreciated all of the comic references. Perhaps. I’ve heard that the extended director’s cut version of Batman v Superman is a lot better than the one played in theaters, so perhaps this time around the director and screenwriters were less constrained by the Hollywood machine this time. Whatever it is, I’m liking the improvement and hope it’s the start of as a positive trend for the DC franchise.
1 Turkey, 14-22 pounds and COMPLETELY THAWED OUT BEFOREHAND (should be obvious but this is apparently a common screw-up)
2 Pounds of bacon, uncooked (if you have a smaller bird you may only need half that)
2 or 3 Apples, chopped in medium-large chunks
2 or 3 Onions, also chopped in medium-large chunks
5 or 6 Celery stalks, chopped in 3-4 inch chunks
1 Large bulb of garlic, all cloves separated and peeled
4 Tablespoons of extra virgin olive oil (what the hell, regular olive oil works fine too)
Sage, 1 small bunch chopped (if you don’t have fresh sage, dried sage is an ok substitute)
Kosher Salt & Pepper, whatever you feel is a modest amount
For the Gravy:
Giblets from turkey
1 Onion (small/medium size), peeled and quartered
1 Large carrot, peeled and cut in large chunks
3 or 4 Celery stalks, cut in large chunks
1 Small parsnip, peeled and cut in large chunks
3 or 4 Garlic cloves, peeled.
2-3 bay leaves
1 Teaspoon of Thyme
2 Teaspoons of Sage
3 Tablespoons of corn starch
Instructions:
Take out the giblets bag and neck and such from inside main cavity and/or neck cavity of the turkey, and put it into a medium sized pot with the vegetables set aside for the gravy. Fill with about 5 cups of cold water, add bay leaves & sage & thyme, and simmer this on low for the entire time you’re prepping and cooking the turkey.
Rinse the turkey with lukewarm water (or cold water if it will be a little while until you put the bird in the oven), and dry with a paper towel. Put the bird on the rack in your roasting pan.
Mix the olive oil, chopped sage, and salt & pepper in a small bowl. Then give that bird a good rubdown of that mixture on the outside and then the inside of the turkey cavity. Leave any of that extra fat and skin around the cavity on the bird so it can add to the drippings (fat adds to the flavor!).
Loosely stuff the cavity with all the chopped apples, half of the onion and garlic cloves, and a little bit of the celery. Spread the remaining vegetables evenly on the bottom of the pan under the turkey (where it will cook and mix with the drippings). Tie up the turkey’s legs/drumsticks together with twine, or that turkey leg-cuffs doohickey that sometimes comes with the bird. The turkey should be breast-side up, with the wings tucked underneath the turkey.
Drape the bacon slices across the turkey. You can lay the bacon strips more or less in parallel rows that overlap each other slightly. You can also lay the bacon criss-cross fashion on the bird if you like, though this would require more bacon than the first option. Ensure the breast of the bird is particularly well covered. For the legs, wings and sides of the bird too, lay the bacon in rows or wrapping around the parts as appropriate, using the wooden toothpicks to secure it as necessary. You want to cover the top and sides of the bird, leaving only the cavities and bottom of the turkey bacon-less.
Heat the oven to about 400 F.
Put your meat thermometer in the inner thigh. It should be deep in the inner thigh, but without coming into contact with bone.
Pour a little water in the roasting pan so water covers all the metal on the bottom, but isn’t high enough to touch the turkey on the roasting rack. If you’re in a dry climate, you may need to add a little more while the turkey is still cooking.
Cover the bird loosely with aluminum foil, so loosely that it barely touches only a few parts of the turkey. You can leave a little space so you can see the thermometer, but since the foil won’t be on the whole time it’s not really an issue.
Put the turkey in the oven, and then lower the oven temperature to 350 degrees F. Basting the turkey is unnecessary; the bacon and olive oil do just fine for keeping it moist, and IMO it’s better to maintain a more constant temperature in the oven. As for cooking time, the 20-21 pound birds usually are done in a little bit more than 4 hours, but there are many cooking time charts like this one where you can get a reasonable estimate based on your bird’s weight. These times are just guidelines though, and it’s the internal temperature that will tell you when it’s done.
Take the foil cover off about 2/3 of the way through the anticipated cooking time (about an hour and a half before the estimated cooking time ends). This is just so the turkey and the bacon can get some color. If the bacon or turkey skin already looks pretty dark, keep the foil on longer.
When BOTH the thigh meat and the breast meat reaches at least 160 degrees Fahrenheit (typically the inside of the thigh takes longer), take it out of the oven. Tilt the turkey so some of the juices drain into the roasting pan, then put it on a platter or grooved cutting board that won’t let the remaining juices leak over the side. Take that foil you removed earlier and loosely cover the turkey with it, and let it sit for 20-30 minutes while you make the gravy or attend to any other cooking tasks that need doing (like drinking a cold beer!). The internal temperature will continue to rise well above 165 degrees (a very reasonable threshold of ‘doneness’) as the turkey sits.
Remove the bacon and the toothpicks. The bacon will be really crispy, almost crumbly in texture. Use the crumbled up bits to mix into the mashed potatoes (if you like), and put the rest on the side of the turkey for people to snack on. Prepare to see some competition for who gets the pieces of turkey skin, because that bacon grease just does something wonderful to the taste of it.
Finishing the gravy:
Take the vegetables and garlic out of the turkey cavity, and put them in the roasting pan with the rest of the vegetables (throw away the apples from the cavity). Pour the drippings and vegetables into a large strainer over a pot, and use a masher to squeeze the juices out of the vegetables and through the strainer into the pot. Discard the vegetables and solids from the strainer.
Take the pot with the simmering giblets and vegetables and pour the stock, giblets, and vegetables into the strainer over the same pot with the turkey drippings. Use the masher to squeeze out the juices like before, then remove the giblets and vegetables from the strainer (you can save the neck; it has a fair amount of meat on it). Bring to a low boil and let simmer for 5-10 minutes or so.
Mix the corn starch with an equal number of tablespoons of water, and with the gravy just barely simmering (not boiling) slowly stir in the corn starch & water slurry into the gravy. Turn off the heat. If you want a thicker gravy, feel free to add more corn starch & water.
