Lavender Butter

Back in 2010, Gourmet Chef Elaine and I spent a week in Napa Valley.  This was her first time in Napa, and I arranged private wine tastings on Monday and Tuesday at 10:00 am.  Monday's tasting was at Matanzas Creek Winery, for which I had made the reservation over six months before.  She did not know, and I had to strain not to tell her, that Matanzas Creek has a large lavender farm, and a tour of the fields and the barn was included in our private tasting.  Getting settled in, our hostess asked if we were ready for the lavender tour, and Elaine looked at me with a puzzled and hopeful look.  I finally had to fess up and admit I had this planned all along.  The tour was wonderful, and scooping up and smelling handfuls of lavender seeds from a large wine barrel was a sensory overload.

One of the products we brought home was the French Lavender Body Butter you see below.  Elaine is in love with it, and I've reordered jar after jar from their online market (link below).  If you have a lavender fan in your life, add this to their gift list.

https://www.matanzascreek.com/lavender-market

Using AI For Paint Color Recommendations

Below is a picture of our kitchen backsplash, and the missus recently asked if we might ever paint the walls in the adjoining dining room.  My reaction was probably not, since I couldn't think of another color that would work.  Turning to AI, I uploaded the picture and asked, "Recommend paint colors for a dining room that would go with the kitchen backsplash in the picture."  Liking the response, I followed that up with "Create an image in the form of a paint strip with the recommended colors," which you see below the backsplash.  The "Saybouk Sage" is a dead ringer for the color the walls are painted now.  The most intriguing is the suggestion of "Whole Wheat", which I wouldn't have thought of in a million years.  

https://gemini.google.com

Cowboy Chicken Spaghetti

Southern Living is our only paid subscription, and it paid off with this recipe for Cowboy Chicken Spaghetti.  Gourmet Chef Elaine's helper (i.e., me) took a Costco rotisserie chicken and carved it up, which he took half of for this recipe.  Its creamy goodness comes from a combination of Cheddar and Velveeta cheeses, and its spicy kick from Ro-Tel and chopped green chiles.  Add spaghetti and the rest of the ingredients you can find at the link below, and the result was a meal that I couldn't stop shoving into my mouth.  If you have some hungry mouths to feed, this could be your winner.

https://www.southernliving.com/cowboy-chicken-spaghetti-11783881

Water Meter

When I remodeled our basement a few years ago, I installed the grey plank flooring you see below.  I didn't like the concrete around the water meter, so after looking for solutions, I landed on using a piece of black foam board.  I measured carefully and cut out the circle at the bottom-right and another at the top-left.   Finally, I cut a slice (which you can't see) so I could bend the foam board around the pipe.  I think I did a good job of making an unsightly mess into a cool cover.

Thankful

Over on my Life Experiences blog (link below), I wrote about six things I'm thankful for during that dreadful year-and-a-half of COVID craziness.  Reflecting back on bad stuff is depressing, and I prefer to look at the brighter side.  Good memories are so much better than bad ones.

https://lifeexperiences.paulishing.com/2026/02/thankful.html

Loose Door Handle

It took me weeks to figure out how to tighten the doorknob you see in the first picture below.  There are hundreds of YouTube videos that purport to help, but it wasn't until I found the video at the link below that I figured it out.  First, I had to remove the handle using an Allen wrench to turn the little set screw you can barely see in the first picture, but which is very clear in the second.  Then I inserted a slotted screwdriver at two different points along the cap, up against the door, and gently pried it off.  I tightened the two Phillips-head screws and put the cap and handle back on.  Seems so obvious now that I know what to do.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lU1cp0JwAdY

Using AI To Find A Specialty Product

Doing traditional Google searches to find an uncommon product can take forever, particularly if you don't know exactly what to call it.  But AI can reduce that search to a single query, for example, "Where can I buy a custom-made window that has a blind between two panes of glass?"  In the response below, you will find that such a window is called "integrated" or "integral" along with several of the top manufacturers and places to buy them.  

I remember the "good old days" when you had an encyclopedia and a library card, and you really, really wanted to know an answer, to spend an hour or two to find it.  Well, it wasn't really all that "good".

https://gemini.google.com

Pork Chops With Apple Sauce

I was searching for a new way to make pork chops and found Pork Chops with Apple Sauce.  Pork and apples seemed to be the perfect combination, so I gave it a go.

The chops are marinated for an hour, pan-seared on both sides in butter and oil, sprinkled with parsley and thyme, and seasoned with salt and pepper.  Slices of Granny Smith apples are sauteed in more butter and oil, and the pan is deglazed with brandy. Add brown sauce and cider vinegar to create a pan sauce, which is poured over the pork chops.  All the other details I left out can be found at the link below.

https://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/pork-chops-with-apple-sauce-recipe-1908736

Drying Mat

The drying mats we bought recently lacked a loop.  Seems pretty obvious that something that gets wet, you would want to hang up to dry.  Fortunately, I had bought a grommet kit years ago, and Gourmet Chef Elaine remembered that I did.  I used it to create a reinforced hole near the top of the mat, and then repurposed the little blue loop to create a solution.  Grommets are really easy to install, as you can see in the YouTube video at the link below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lCfQU32JLDo

Turning Windowed Apps Off

Windowed apps is new feature in iOS for iPads, and it was driving me and the Mrs crazy.  When dragging a finger from the bottom of the screen, it would sometimes create a window instead of returning to the main screen. Some folks like windows and working with two or more at a time, but we never do.  But that's easily turned off by bringing up the Control Center (swipe down from the top-right corner of your screen) and tapping the icon that's pointed to by the white arrow you see in the screenshot below.  You can also turn it off in Settings, which is explained at the link below.

https://support.apple.com/en-us/123635