figment

This week, as another Year of Adventure event, Pat Wrede and I (at Pat's suggestion) took a road trip to Kellogg, Minnesota to visit Lark Toys. I'd never heard of the place before, but it was an enjoyable jaunt indeed. It was started by a man who was interested in creating a market for his carved wooden toys, and over the years it has grown to be a remarkable place. Besides being a toy store, it is a toy museum. It was great fun to wander down the corridor of "Memory Lane" and identify old toys that I had as a child, that I haven't thought of for years: Spirograph, the game of Life, Chinese Checkers, Operation, spin tops, etc. There was an impressive little bookstore, too, with thoughtfully curated books for adults as well as children.

The centerpiece is a truly extraordinary carved carousel, created by the original owner. There was a cafe, and a fudge emporium, and had we been inclined, a miniature golf course.

It was a lovely drive, and Lark Toys was great fun and well worth the trip. Highly recommended I came home with a wee giftie for M, which I look forward to seeing her enjoy.

Image description: Background: a corridor of Lark Toys, lined with display cases. Top: a sign with the words "Memory Lane." Upper left: the logo for Lark Toys, the silhouette of a bird with a wind-up toy key on its back. Below the silhouette: the words "Long Ago." Below the "Memory Lane" sign, another sign which reads: "As once the wing'd energy of delight carried you over childhood's dark abyss, now beyond your own life buid the great arch of unimagined bridges. -Rainer Marie Rilke." Below this sign: a stylized tree, over a pillowed reading nook. Right: a lamp past with directional signs jutting out of the post. Left: a wooden stand filled with lollipops. Lower half: a rabbit and a swan each wearing a saddle (figures from a carousel). Bottom: a family of toy bunnies and a group of Matryoshka Russian nesting dolls.

Lark Toys

38 Lark Toys

Click on the links to see the 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.

elisem

( today's argh chorus, because silly body is silly in ouchful ways )

pegkerr

I have been steeped in everything science fiction and fantasy for decades, but there is one thing I've had no experience with whatsoever:

I have never tried Dungeons and Dragons gaming.

I'm not quite sure why. Heaven knows I have dozens of long-time friends who have been gaming for years, and I've heard peripheral conversations on the topic at many a science fiction convention. Even around my own dinner table, as Fiona has long enjoyed gaming.

So when I sent out my call for ideas for Year of Adventure things to do, one friend,

lydamorehouse, hit upon the obvious: why not join her group for a gaming session?

I went over to Lyda's house to consult, and she walked me through the process of pulling together a character to play. I was pretty lucky with my rolls, and Lydra graciously set me up at Level Four. After an hour and a half of questions and answers, I had a new character, a ranger, with a respectable level of skills to test out.

And that's what I did last Saturday over Zoom: I was invited to join the troupe of motley characters by a rather glittery dragon and came upon the assembled company at a windmill, where they were regrouping after their last adventure. I had to follow Lyda's prompts and ask a lot of questions, but I had a general idea of what to do. I spent a fun three hours playing with the others. We stashed some magical pastries, examined a magical rune book in a Bag of Holding, and tangled with a vampire. I took out my bow and quiver, stuck a garlic roll onto the end of the arrow, and shot it into his chest. This gave me the satisfaction of staggering him a bit--although I didn't have much of a chance to savor my victory since he promptly turned me into a frog.

I got better eventually and exited, following a wolf. But the experience was deemed a success for all concerned (and apparently I didn't grossly offend anyone), so I was invited to return for the next session.

I think I'm going to enjoy this.

Image description: Background, bottom layer: a Dungeons and Dragons character page. Overlaid over it: Center: an old-fashioned windmill building. Left: a darkly sinister male figure dressed in black, a wolf at his side. Right: a woman pulls back the string of bow loaded with an arrow aiming at the man, a bread roll (a garlic roll) affixed to the tip. At her feet: a frog. Upper half, semi-transparent: a screenshot of several people in Zoom conference. Hovering over the vanes of the windmill: a miniature dragon.

Gaming

37 Gaming

Click on the links to see the 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022 and 2021 52 Card Project galleries.

elisem

In the course of dealing with silly body stuff with which I will not bore you, my sleep cycle got turned upside down again, so I am busy with various attempts at precessing back to a more manageable situation.

Somewhere in some book or other, a character said something about the phrase for having a hangover in a certain language was "my eyes are not opposite the holes." It's not a hangover, but when my sleep schedule is deeply out of synch and I'm trying to do stuff connected to the outside world's schedule, I kind of feel like my life is not opposite the holes.

How's your life matching your hours of access lately?

elisem

So a little while back, for. my birthday I got various tasty things to nibble. One of them was salmon skin and salted egg crisps, with curry leaves in the mix, and some spice. Extremely tasty. When I got down to the bottom of the bag, there were a lot of little shards and crumbs that were particularly spicy. A mental note was. made for possible future uses.

Today was a future use. There wasn't a fresh vegetable in the house, but I wanted something with both softness and crunch, and wanted it to be in something that had umami plus. The last of the bread gave me toast. There was some braunsweiger (liver paste, Nueske's in particular) which went onto the toast, cut pretty thinly. (I am from people who like thick slices of braunsweiger on toast or bread, and normally I do too, but this was a special application, part flavor and part structural adhesive.) Then I spooned out some of the fragments from the bottom of the bag of salted egg and salmon skin crisps, laying them on top of the liver paste and pressing them in with the back of the spoon, and had it open-faced.

Big win. Big tasty win. Especially the way the curry leaves went with the braunsweiger.

Must remember this and make it again.

Part of the idea for this one was looking at the braunsweiger and wishing I could magically make a banh mi from the place in Global Market appear. So some of the taste combo came from that. Lettuce or bok choy or other green or variously colored thinly sliced vegetables, with vinegar or not, would have been great, but there was no such suppy in the house, alas. Although hey, there is a little new kraut in the back of the fridge which should get eaten up. Hmmm. Although we are out of bread now. Hmm. I wonder how it would be on top of ramen noodles. Pity that the boiled eggs are all et up.

Do you have any tasty kludged-together food that you are fond of? What gave you the idea?

(My term for kludged-together food is "cream of refrigerator soup," which explains the tag. No actual soup was generated in this particular instance.)

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2025 52 Card Project: Week 38: Lark Toys

health natter: argh, says the complainy beast here

2025 52 Card Project: Week 37: Gaming

silly body continues to be silly, yet I trudge forward, for I am frikkin' stubborn

Om nom: food combinations, or, playing with what's here

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December 2015

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