Cucumber smoothie

K.'s very kind parents have a profusion of cucumbers. In the global cucumber market graph, they are a source. Luckily, just a short distance away (2 edges), I form a cucumber sink.

K. gave me a bunch of cucumbers and the challenge to make a cucumber smoothie. Here's what I did:

1. Wash the cucumber.
2. Slice it into smaller pieces (so that it will fit into the blender later).
3. Freeze.before freezingafter freezing
   
4. Blend with yogurt and cilantro. (N. suggested melon, which would be good -- alas! I had none. Something sweet would add a more traditional smoothie taste.)before blending: heterogeneousafter blending: homogeneous
   
5. Drink/eat, depending on consistency.

My default Test Eater R. didn't like it, but I did. With cilantro and no sweetener, it was a mild, refreshing icy drink. I can imagine other cucumber smoothies with a more traditional sweetness and maybe some more flavorful fruit. Frozen cucumber chunks can substitute for ice in other, more fruity smoothies.


This post's theme word: salmagundi, "a heterogeneous mixture," or "a mixed salad of various ingredients, such as meat, eggs, anchovies, onions, oil, vinegar, etc."
I wrote this post like .

Meaningful additions to human knowledge

For the first time, I have read a reference, in a work written by another person, to my own research. It feels good. It feels like I've done something real and of significance. It feels like maybe I am actually attached at some wispy peripheral spoke to the great web of human knowledge.

I wish I could keep this feeling and recall it in times of grad-school-induced despair, in "dark places when all other lights go out." But this delight, and that despair, will fade as all things do, back to my baseline curiosity about the world. And yet now, for a moment, it is good.


This post's theme word: countervail, "to counterbalance or to neutralize."
This post is written like: Vladimir Nabokov.