Between the hook and the line I took

[leahbobet]

July 25, 2008 Progress Notes:

Saturnalia

Words today: 450.
Words total: 1700.
Reason for stopping: It's late, and I'm tabbing away to look at other things more often than I'm putting down words.
Munchies: Leftover rooibos, mac and cheese.

Darling du Jour: The chopping runs candle-long, hours-long, and for hours he works contrapuntal, then sliding in, then step-and-shear in rhythm with the grind of the machine at the heart of the city. He would hate it if he noticed. He would hate the parts of his body and blood that respond to its cradle-hum, when he has come down here for breaking. The lower levels are musty chill and the machine at its heart is warm, and warmth calls to its own, and Janus no longer wishes to be warm and would kill at the suggestion, now that he has learned killing and the ease of it, metal into skull, metal denting ribs. He feels cold, so he is cold. He is cold straight through.

Mean Things: Whatever it is that makes you quite quietly and implacably want to break everything. Failed dumpster-diving. Not even having any ramen to eat.
Research Roundup: Mostly photo references. It is a bitch to try and find an adjective to replace "Mediterranean" when you don't have that particular ocean in this world.
Books in progress: M.T. Anderson, Feed.
The glamour: Bookstore follies. And my air conditioning appears to be fixed, although there is no word on the floor tiles.

---

Constructing sentences for this book is like feeling around a room you don't know in the dark: fiddly and careful and you keep thinking you're going to stub your toe. The first sentence of that darling took about six drafts and ten minutes. I remember Above being like that for a good long while though, until I got used to Matthew and his rhythms and...his way of thinking about the world, I guess? So I'm not hugely concerned. Patience, patience catches the voice-cats, just as it catches the character-cats and tags them with their names. I will figure out Zeke and his grumpy quiet idiosyncracies, and I will figure out Janus.

African violet is blooming today, in the two-part violet pot that I've owned over a year and not had a violet to take up residence. Three flowers, and looking like two-three more on the way. I may take pictures tomorrow.

And now, to start some sourdough to percolate overnight and head to bed.

Comments

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Love the darling-du-jour. Love it.

How do you start your sourdough?

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

Thanks. :)

The first step of my sourdough recipe is to stick a cup and a half of the starter in a bowl with three cups of flour and a cup and a half of lukewarm water, and let the starter process the flour for eight to twelve hours. So usually I schedule a bread day in advance, and do that eight-to-twelve-hour thing the night before, so I can do the relatively quick (three hours) rest of the kneading and rising and more rising and baking bits the next morning or afternoon.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

So is the starter a piece of dough held over from the previous batch, or do you start anew, as it were? And if so, what are the constituents of the starter...?

[leahbobet.livejournal.com]

Sourdough starter is...sort of this goopy bacterial culture/flour/water mix. It's the bacteria that make the sour taste (whatever they're putting off when they munch the flour), and so you keep a container of the stuff in the fridge and feed it at least every two weeks, and give it a name because you're together for the long haul. Mine is Lucinda, daughter of Elmer, who is matociquala's sourdough starter (Lucinda also has one child, who belongs to ksumnersmith). I think the original that the Line of Elmer goes back to came to North America on the Mayflower or something. *g*

I get the feeling this is generally how you get one: when you feed your starter it expands, so you either use half of it for bread or you section it off and give it to someone else (baby starter). You can also try to capture wild yeasts and make your own starter, but that's harder. But they are purchasable on the internets, and the bread is wonderful.

[desperance.livejournal.com]

Ah, thank you. I kind of half-knew most of this, but I needed it spelled out for me. Except the names, of course, I didn't know those; or the source.

And it hadn't occurred to me - for I am slow of study - that you could buy cultures on the internets. Of course you can buy cultures on the internets.

On the other hand, you can also find how-to-start-your-starter methods on the internets, and I think I might try that first, just for the hell of it...