I come from a culture where rice is the basis of the three squares a day. And by rice, I mean the white, sticky stuff, not any of this fancy wild/brown/yellow and loose alternates. We'd gotten out of making rice at home because I grew to loathe cleaning the rice cooker pan afterwards. It always needed to soak because the rice had crusted and burnt to it. The lid would be covered in white, hard to scrub froth. The pain had not been worth it since I would just get my rice fix when we ate out. It's especially not worth it when an impatient toddler will not wait until I am done with the dishes and will physically try to push me away from the sink so I can play with her.
But we discovered that she's a fan of brown rice. We try to feed her healthier than I feed myself so I looked into what it takes to make brown rice. Apparently, it's more finicky and harder to cook than white rice, which didn't recommend itself to me. Enter Zojirushi
We were at some friends' house for a barbecue where they served up some brown rice. Their daughter is the same age and I figured that if they could manage making the stuff, maybe I could learn some tips and tricks. It was simple enough - she pointed to a squat, bubble-shaped appliance on the table and declared that it was easy to make brown rice with it. The bubble shaped thing was apparently a rice cooker. I had enough time to note the name emblazoned on its side before my daughter decided she wanted to tackle the steps on the deck by herself and I had to go supervise.
Later that week, I went to look up Zojirushi and see what they had to offer. They have a bewildering array of rice cooker choices, boasting bells and whistles I never knew one needed for a simple pot of rice. But they're a Japanese company and they should know about rice and I was determined to wade through the choices to see if they had a rice cooker that would work for us. Of course, they had the simple standard rice cookers I recognized, but what if I actually needed some of those extra features and I never knew it before? Their comparison chart only sort of helped. I zeroed in on the ones that listed brown rice as a menu option. Ooh, the same rice cookers could also do sweet rice. Mango sticky rice, here we come! Oh and there's a timer function so we can have our rice ready at our preset time? Score! And it also does porridge (read: it can do the good oatmeal that takes half an hour)? With a timer so it can start breakfast before we get up on a weekday morning? Score another point! I don't really need my rice cooker to make cake or use it as a slow cooker. I also wasn't sold on induction heating element or the pressurized system, especially as it added another $100-$150 to the cost. So we ended up with the NS-YAC10 model.
I certainly wasn't expecting to spend over $200 for a rice cooker. I'm a victim of my own self-imposed feature creep and besides I put in all that effort to research the cooker and it was recommended by some friends. Darn it, I deserve that rice cooker now! To get back to my roots! And feed my girl some tasty, healthy rice!
The rice hit the pan last week, and I'm still plotting the list of rice/oatmeal we need to try with it. White rice? Delicious, chewy, better than the restaurant rice! Brown rice? Well, it's not my preferred and we ended up eating it the day after because it took about an hour longer than we anticipated. Definitely a candidate for that timer feature. But still tasty and The Girl shoveled it into her face by the handful (to be fair, it's how she eats most things that she's willing to eat). I need to find some sweet rice and then we try the good oatmeal one morning. The best part? It's a breeze to clean.
Our household has joined the 21st century of rice cooking.
Thursday, August 30, 2012
Back in the Rice Habit
Wednesday, May 4, 2011
Nifty Technology: Photography
This is a DSLR camera clipholder being made by Peter Dering that looks like a better way to have your camera attached to you, so that you can carry it around, ready to take shots while having it more rigidly attached to prevent accidental damage. (Of course, it doesn't take into account walking yourself into objects that could damage your camera, but at least you won't be swinging it into said objects.)
Aside from the actual product, (which does sound nifty, but I'd have to defer to the resident DSLR photographer in the family, Lee, to determine its true user niftiness), I was also intrigued by the method by which this is being manufactured, getting funding, getting advertised. I'd have to look into it further to see how he found his small run manufacturers, but the product clearly has some prototypes but hasn't gone through a larger scale production. He's using the Kickstarter website to solicit funding and generate some enthusiasm out there before he has production going. The marketing apparently worked since I stumbled across this on the internet and I don't know the guy. I know enough people with good ideas for useful designs that could hook into this system for getting that good idea into the hands of more than just their friends and family. It strikes me as somewhat akin to Amazon's self-publishing system only for more than just books. I'll have to keep this in mind the next time I get a bright idea that needs to be made in bulk.
Monday, April 6, 2009
Lifehacking
I have a fascination with efficiency and optimization. I'm not entirely sure how or when I developed this fascination. Perhaps it's laziness - I don't want to have to do more than I need to in order to get the job done. Come to think of it, that sounds pretty close to an engineering ethic. Or maybe it's just the way I learned from my mom about how to run errands.
Either way, when given a task or several at hand, my brain usually starts processing different options and methods to get it done efficiently. When I am forced to do something less efficiently than I'd like, I get grumpy. But not angry-grumpy, generally just annoyed-grumpy. This has led to conversations that go something like this:
Me: Why are you going that way?
Lee: We're going to the Best Buy aren't we?
Me: Yes, but we have to pick up the bridesmaid dresses first, so we might as well get those and park near the Pet Food Express.
Lee: Why the pet store?
Me: Because we need kitty litter and I don't want to have to walk across the parking lot lugging it. The Best Buy stuff won't be and we can just walk across the parking lot from there. And by the time we finish with that, we'll probably be hungry and we can head across the street to In-N-Out.
Lee: You didn't tell me there was a whole plan for this.
Me: I know, but I just thought of it.
So when I found Lifehacker a few years ago, it was like finding a secret room in my house I didn't know about with really nifty stuff in it.
Lifehacker is basically a website dedicated to sharing tips on productivity. They have a heavy emphasis on corporate and computer methods on Getting Things Done. When I first found the treasure trove, I concentrated mostly on software, gadget oriented tricks to do stuff.
On Lifehacker, I found the instructions to use my Apple wireless network to play my iTunes songs on speakers in other parts of the house rather than just the office where my computer is. I also found and downloaded a software program called Quicksilver, a keyboard shortcut application launching program for Macs. I also found their post on making the computer desk look neater by corralling the nest of cables underneath. There are also non-gadget, non-computer tips on there. I like that when I have a task or need to set up a system to handle tasks in my life, there's usually other people who have already thought through a similar process and can make recommendations on how they've addressed it. Less research for me and more time to do the thing I needed to do.
Tuesday, March 31, 2009
Encounter of the Robot Kind
Robots made by high school students, that is.
I high-fived a lot of high school students this past weekend. The fun part was that I would have loved being one of them when I was their age. Because they had just designed and built a robot to accomplish a specific challenge - to compete at the FIRST Robotics Competition in Sacramento.
From FIRST's website: "The FIRST Robotics Competition challenges teams of young people and their mentors to solve a common problem in a six-week timeframe using a standard "kit of parts" and a common set of rules. Teams build robots from the parts and enter them in competitions designed by Dean Kamen, Dr. Woodie Flowers, and a committee of engineers and other professionals."
This year's challenge involved building a robot that could play a game and score by putting balls into the opposing team's trailer. There's some added workings that are probably best served with the Lunacy Game animation link. (Clicking the link plays a Windows Media Movie and may take a while with slower connections)
And of course, YouTube has video of the actual event. The following video is one of the playoff matches where the #1 seeded 3-team alliance battles the #4 alliance. The playoff matches took the game competition up a notch from the qualification matches of the previous day. These were robots that had already proven their functionality and performance and were out on the field to use the best strategy of offense and defense. They were competing to win an invitation to the National competition in Atlanta.
I volunteered at the event and got a chance to talk to a number of the teams. In addition to winning the game competition, the teams could win awards based on their robotics program to inspire youth to be science and technology leaders. The teams ranged from high school engineering academies, to Girl Scouts, to teams from brand new high schools. There were a number of awards for technical excellence as well as outreach excellence, in addition to acknowledgments such as team spirit and theme creativity.
What struck me about the experience was the sheer energy and enthusiasm of the kids. It was infectious. You'll get a taste of the sports arena vibe from the video above. I wore a smile for most of my two days there because of their unabashed passion for their work. The adult world can be full of cynicism, but at the robotics competition, I was able to escape that for a little while. Overall, the students played their hearts out and shook each other's hands at the end of the games.
Women in engineering is always near and dear to my heart and I was happy to see a good representation of girls on the teams, not just participating but leading them as well. There were three all-girl teams, 2 of which were in the playoffs and were also in top contention for awards.
FIRST not only encourages the spirit of competition, but it also emphasizes the concept of gracious professionalism. Teams were proud to tell me about what other teams had helped them debug their robots. One example of this ethic came about in the transformation of one of the robots from the first day of competition to the second day. Six other teams, on observing that this robot stayed immobile during the games, took it upon themselves to lend a hand. On the first day, the robot was merely buffeted by the other robots around the playing field. On the second day, it was mobile and contributing to its team alliance.
So I was happy and proud to have been handing out high-fives to a bunch of well-deserving high school students and their mentors. They could both remind and teach me a thing or two about why I went into mechanical engineering in the first place.
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
I Like to Read: Past, Present and Future
One time, shortly after my sister was born, I gave my parents a fright by disappearing for several hours. At the time, I figured with all the hullabaloo about the new baby no one would miss me heading off to entertain myself. I was 10, I had a bike and an afternoon to myself. I'm not sure what horrible, perhaps criminal scenarios entered my parents' minds at the time - maybe they imagined me loitering at the mall, vandalizing neighborhood property, doing drugs/alcohol, trespassing on some abandoned industrial building or somesuch. Alas, I was a much nerdier delinquent than that.
I had gone for a luxurious visit at the local library. I spent hours poring over my favorite sections, doing as thorough a sampling as my attention span would allow of the authors I hadn't read yet in the mystery and sci-fi/fantasy categories. A kid's bike and a healthy anxiety around traffic could only get me so far on my afternoon of freedom. But at the library - the books there could get me to so many more places and situations! When I got home I got in big trouble. (Hey, I was even home in time for dinner.) But it remains a cherished and amusing childhood memory for me.
My family still teases me today about my reading appetite. But their teasing is a little less warranted these days. I only get a chance to read books on vacation or any flights where I know I'll have a lot of waiting around to do. I'm far too easily distracted with gadgetry (computer, PS3, iPod, and other shiny, powered objects) to pick up a book in my daily life.
Come to think of it, most (but certainly not all) of what I'm trying to do on such gadgets is read. Web content provides me news, further information on my latest obsessions, gadget reviews, troubleshooting guides, a whole slew of opinions ranging from well-informed to comedic. Not only can I search for any of these things, I also have choices of sources when I find them.
Right before Christmas, Lee got an Amazon Kindle as a company gift. When I first heard of the e-reader idea, I was skeptical although I'm not entirely sure why. I'm fine with reading on gadget screens and being able to cart around an entire library of books in the size of a single book seems like a fantastic idea. It would make vacation packing easier. I think now it was probably more of a knee jerk reaction to changing the way I've always interacted with books. Despite my love of gadgets, I'm not an early adopter type; I prefer that new things have been proven out for a bit before I latch on.
Now that I've had a chance to interact with the Kindle, I'm less skeptical. I probably wouldn't mind one of my own so I don't have to distract Lee with a Terry Pratchett paperback so I can read a book on the Kindle. In the meantime, Lee was happy enough to share his new toy.
It's roughly trade paperback size and comes in a leather case that makes it look like a Moleskine notebook when closed. It turns out that the case actually helps make it usable. Buttons span the length of both sides where you would conceivably grasp it. And since very few people tend to stick their thumbs on the screen they're trying to read, it makes for some accidental page turning when you first pick it up. This layout makes the case the only thing you can comfortably grasp without hitting buttons. I think they're fixing this in the next generation device.
The Kindle is based on e-paper technology which is much easier on the eyes than the typical computer screen. The text is dark grey on a light grey background - not quite the black ink on paper look but a pretty comfortable approximation. There were a few times I was so engrossed in the story that I forgot I was reading on the Kindle and looked for a page to turn instead of a button to push. The font size is adjustable on the fly. It uses advanced cell phone network to download the things you want to read, both pretty quickly and with no need to find a Wifi hotspot. You can download books from Amazon's store, subscribe to newspapers, blogs and probably some other stuff I haven't thought of using it for. Buying is linked to your Amazon account - so you don't have to fiddle with entering transaction data on the Kindle (even though it's got a keyboard). Battery life is excellent. The e-paper technology doesn't consume power to merely display the image on the screen, only when it changes the image on the screen. As a matter of fact, when you turn it "off" it puts up a random literary image. During a 2 week trip over the holidays, it was charged only once and even then it was more of a due diligence act rather than really needing it.
How will these e-readers affect how we read books in the future? With Amazon, a main-stream distributor and store, and Sony, one of the largest electronics manufacturers jumping into the fray, the e-reader has definitely entered general consciousness. It's still an expensive gadget, but within the same range as Apple's iPods. Will books end up like vinyl records - accessible and wanted only by the uber bibliophiles? People have been predicting a similar destiny for newspapers for some time now and indeed, the newspaper industry has been struggling and making cutbacks for years in an effort to stay alive.
I think we'll still have books on paper in the long run. In the vinyl record/book analogy, I think there's one important distinction. With music, each format needs a player to enjoy the content. Vinyl records need turntables, CDs need CD players and mp3s need mp3 players. E-books need an e-reader. However, books in their current printed form don't need a specific gadget to deliver content. Nor do they need battery power. I think that alone will stave off any pending demise. It's actually easier to consume book content in its current form than the new, emerging form. But as e-readers, handheld computers (Blackberrys, iPhones, Google phones of the future) become more prevalent, the issue of ease of consumption changes. On the other hand, it's easier for content providers to provide many copies of content (books) in electronic form than in physical form. If the money starts coming from electronic content rather than physical content, that's where the providers will focus their efforts.
Which brings me to the other side of the equation: the source of the reading content. With the internet came the advent of the new information model. It used to be only a few providers would funnel information, entertainment, etc. through to the masses. Compared to the numbers of consumers of such information, such providers were very few. Only the few television networks, movie studios, newspapers, magazines, publishing houses could provide content to the masses. If you wanted to get out your message, you needed to go through these gatekeepers to access the consumers. The internet has changed that to open up the content sources to anyone with a computer and an internet connection. Youtube serves up user created mini-movies. Wikipedia serves up definitions of people, places, things as defined by many people. Bloggers have served up everything from news to opinions to obscure hobbies and much more. Self-publication in terms of providing electronic reading content is trivial. There is a button at the bottom of this Blogger window that says "Publish Post". Obviously I've hit that by now, or you wouldn't be reading these words on my little blog.
Self-publishing has been encroaching into the book publishing world as well. Many authors, frustrated with the process of trying to get agents to represent them to publishing houses and possessing a lot of self-promotional enthusiasm and skills, have published small runs of their own work and sold them to book stores. A small percentage of these self-published authors have garnered enough attention that a publisher decided it wasn't so risky to take them on and publish their work in larger runs. Which seems like a win-win situation. The book publishing business isn't particularly lucrative in the average book's life. Obviously, at the Harry Potter level of bookselling, there's a lot more money. But that's more of a dream realized every once in a while rather than the norm. Agents and publishers wade through thousands of manuscripts searching for the next Harry Potter and are unwilling to risk publishing and advertising costs to something that will sell only hundreds of copies. Which makes the chances of getting published seem miniscule. Authors who have taken on the cost of that initial small publication and advertising and have proven successful enough to gain a wider audience represents less of a risk for the publisher.
Common wisdom among author wannabes is that self-publication doesn't get authors street cred. "You're not a real author until someone else has judged your work and deemed it worthy of publication." But recently, I talked to a fellow Nanowrimo writer who had attended a writer's conference. She told me that there were some agents at the conference who expressed the opinion that self-publication may be a legitimate future for the book publishing industry. So perhaps this common wisdom is softening and turning around.
Which brings me back to Amazon and their Kindle adjunct system, the Digital Text Platform where anyone with an email address and SSN can publish their work to be bought on the Kindle. They don't charge you for publishing, but they need a bank account to deposit your earnings into. I plan on looking into this system more closely if/when I have work that I feel would warrant digital publication. Perhaps even multiple things that would warrant publication. After all, if a reader likes an author, they tend to want to read more things by that author. At least I do. Judging by my content producing pace (glacial), it might be good for me to have a couple things ready in that happy event people actually like my novel/writing to want to read more.
Regardless of what format my reading takes, I know I'll still hopelessly be addicted to it in the future, even if I write my own stories in order to read something!