I think I’ve finally come to a conclusion (albeit a temporary one) for the homepage design. I don’t know that it fully meets the objectives I was hoping to meet, but I think it’s a reasonable first step. I wanted the music to be upfront, so I don’t know that the blog post works so well but there’s the featured piece in there and the music-only tweets from @caitlinrowley (a music-related subset of those that go on @minim)  and if I push myself to post more often and more music-related posts, then I guess something will have been achieved. Um… that seems like a lot of ifs.

I’ve spent a chunk of time this evening peering about at other composer’s blogs and they seem to fall into two camps: 1. blog upfront, 2. bio or credo upfront. Well, 2 was never really an option, not as primary focus – I had the credo in there before but it was the first thing to go – I think it’s a useful thing to have in the site because it helps people understand the focus of my music and gives it context (something I’ve had some issues with recently) but it’s probably not the first thing people need to see. If they want to know about my music, then they’ll be clicking into the Music section anyway, so they’ll find it, but it’s probably more important to have the changing content upfront so there’s something fresh for people to (hopefully) come back to. The ‘blog post’ area I see as more of a general new content area – whether that’s an actual blog post, an announcement of a new performance or a new piece added into the catalogue.

So there it is. Not perfect, but it’ll do as a start, so now I guess it’s time to code!

Tagged with: completion, design, thinking, web | 1 comment

So after chatting with Broken Haiku last night about baking, bread and cinnamon rolls in particular, and after he introduced me to a Japanese Animé series called Yakitate!! Japan, I figured that perhaps now was the time to have a go at making my own cinnamon rolls. I’ve always avoided them because of the high sugar and fat quotient – really not great for someone with no gall bladder who has an insulin resistance – but I’ve been wanting to get into bread baking a bit more while I’m off work and it seemed a fun place to start.

So this afternoon after my physio appointment, and craving a little sweetness after the agony of having her remove a TON of tension from my feet and calves (apparently I store tension in my feet. My masseuse says I store tension in my shoulders. My osteopath says I store it in my back. The scary thing is that I think they might all be right!) why not give them a go?

I was quite surprised to find that Rose Levy Beranbaum actually doesn’t have cinnamon rolls in her inimitable The Bread Bible – shock! horror!! – but Nigella Lawson came to the rescue with the Norwegian Cinnamon Rolls in How to Be a Domestic Goddess. And they were surprisingly easy, really. I mean, bread is a lot easier than a lot of people think, but this was super-simple. And with a limited rising time (25 minutes, then 15 minutes) the whole thing was actually pretty fast to produce. The main surprise was just how sticky the dough was. Nigella talks about “kneading” it, but really it’s a case of prodding at it and wondering how the hell you’re going to get enough off your fingers later to actually be able to cook! But the result was well worth it and with the judicious application of plenty of flour when rolling out, it all worked a treat.

I do suspect I may need an oven thermometer though as the tops burned quite quickly. Not totally charred, but darker than preferred, and definitely darker than the ‘slightly caught edges’ Nigella indicated may happen. But the inside was quite perfect – light and buttery and not too sweet. Scarily moreish. I have packed up most of them and deposited them in the freezer to prevent instant snacking…

Tagged with: baking, cooking, experimenting, play | Add a comment