OT - What are you doing right now?

YukonRon said:

Used a thermometer on my indoor gas range today to find out the therm characteristics regarding the temperature maintaining performance.

Using the old daisy wheel on my BGEggs is more consistent than my indoor oven.

I have seen 75⁰F temp swings (below to above), set at 225⁰F, where measurements and recorded data reveals the XL and the mMx only waiver about 30⁰F (below to above).

Kind of cool data to share.

Yeah, even the best ovens vary +/- 50 degrees. They just don’t give you the feedback. People think that the temp is what it says on the display, it ain’t. I’ve told customers this for years. 

pgprescott said:

YukonRon said:

Used a thermometer on my indoor gas range today to find out the therm characteristics regarding the temperature maintaining performance.

Yeah, even the best ovens vary +/- 50 degrees. 

I almost posted my comment on the "Anova" thread but it wasn't quite appropriate there, nor is it here, but I'm gonna post it anyway before I forget  (and it's about the Brevilles):
I had to keep readjusting the "Dark" control on my toast, in the Breville oven, until I noticed that I had been using three different brands of Sourdough bread (depending on what grocery store I was in when I bought the next loaf)!  
They were all sliced about 3/4" thick, but each brand would brown a different amount (Perfect on 4, 5, or 6!)  It must depend on the residual sugar, or possibly the moisture, in the respective brands.  
I now re-adjust the Darkness depending on the brand of bread, and I get perfect toast, EVERY time.  [/bread nerd]  
FWIW.  

Botch said:

Boneless leg of lamb

It just occurred to me: when they butcher up a lamb with boneless legs, what do they do with the tiny crutches?  

Lame lamb jokes.

Put together my new electric pressure washer. Then spent an hour or two blasting 40 years of crude off of the sidewalk and drives. Probably a good couple of days work to get it all done ahead of me. Got to have it all good looking before the hurricane comes in next week and trashes it all.

We’re off to a great start.

Botch said:

pgprescott said:

YukonRon said:

Used a thermometer on my indoor gas range today to find out the therm characteristics regarding the temperature maintaining performance.

Yeah, even the best ovens vary +/- 50 degrees. 

I almost posted my comment on the "Anova" thread but it wasn't quite appropriate there, nor is it here, but I'm gonna post it anyway before I forget  (and it's about the Brevilles):
I had to keep readjusting the "Dark" control on my toast, in the Breville oven, until I noticed that I had been using three different brands of Sourdough bread (depending on what grocery store I was in when I bought the next loaf)!  
They were all sliced about 3/4" thick, but each brand would brown a different amount (Perfect on 4, 5, or 6!)  It must depend on the residual sugar, or possibly the moisture, in the respective brands.  
I now re-adjust the Darkness depending on the brand of bread, and I get perfect toast, EVERY time.  [/bread nerd]  
FWIW.  

Anne makes sourdough, various flour types / combinations plus some moisture variation. There is no fixed toaster setting that works every time.

Hot outside , no problem, roast peppers inside 

Boileregger said:

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. – Purdue University announced today (Aug. 12) that more than 99% of students who have been tested thus far before their arrival for Purdue University’s Fall 2020 semester have tested negative for COVID-19. Of the 15,444 results received, 133 have tested positive for COVID-19, for a 0.86% positive rate. Close to 40,000 students are expected to be tested before the semester begins Aug. 24.
https://www.purdue.edu/newsroom/releases/2020/Q3/purdue-reports-over-99-of-students-are-covid-free-thus-far.html

Gotta love the difference in spin - Notre Dame shuts it down with 146 positives, Purdue has 133 and says look how great we are doing.  Love my alma mater but they are getting this wrong.

The real question of course concerns how that positivity rate changes as the semester progresses, if they plan to do random testing, etc.

There have been a lot of discussions about this, but my own view is that holding in-person classes really isn't necessarily the issue.  I suspect in class people are being reasonably disciplined about wearing masks, etc.  While there may be some spread from that, my guess is that the real problem is the students congregating in groups outside of class.  Whether it be just hanging out together in the dorms or attending parties, whatever, that those kind of interactions are what tends to drive things.  

Duke is still holding some classes on campus but it's very few, and this fall we're only allowing freshmen and sophomores in the dorms.  Juniors and seniors have to stay home or live off-campus.  Like Purdue, we insisted that everyone be tested before arriving on campus, and we have a dedicated quarantine dorm.  Duke is also taking the step that I think is a little unusual, of implementing random testing for students and faculty/staff who are on campus.  

Even with all of those extra precautions, I won't be surprised if at some point we have an outbreak that spins out of control and forces us to go back to only holding classes online.  

Ozzie_Isaac said:

What is the endgame for this?  Is it a vaccine?  In the beginning it was "flatten the curve".  Now it seems like "avoid at all costs".  I am not advocating for in-person classes, I am also not a proponent of keep everything shut-down.  All of the spin from people makes it hard to track our endgame, or to even know if there is one.

The Osterholm podcasts really are a good resource for these questions if you’re genuinely interested.

If you can get your local case load to look relatively small (I forget what the precise number is here, but most US counties are nowhere close) you can do testing and contact tracing effectively.  Of course that assumes you can get the test results back relatively quickly.  Right now there’s a real backlog and so that’s just not an option.

The reality is that we have no real good options in the US for managing this right now, in no small part because we have managed it so poorly up to this point.  I know people view that as some kind of political statement but it’s not. It’s the obvious truth.  

lkapigian said:

Hot outside , no problem, roast peppers inside 

I am a little disappointed in you (they look a lot more like yours do now)