Sometimes you go to a picnic...

...with a group of vegans and spend 5 hours at the park. It was fun. We made the tofu salad and took some tortilla chips(salted doritos lol). There was tiny sausages, raw zuchini tahini noodles, kale crisps, bean pate, raw granola, hummus, pitas, roasted red peppers, potato salad, pizza, salads, and and I am sure I am forgetting something.  There was plenty of awesome vegan sweets also. Fruit cake, lemon cake, Jen's cupcakes, flapjacks, apples, bananas, and some awesome hazelnut chocolate and oat "balls" lol.

Sophie made some friends, ran around like a dog, then a horse, and played with ladybugs. All in all, we had an awesome time...

Sometimes you zoom out while taking the picture...

...and it looks like this:

 

I was just messing around. No photoshop(or GIMP lol) involved here. This is the actual pic. Manual zoom ftw! If you leave a slightly slow shutter speed(1/3 sec in this case) and zoom while you take the pic, it records the movement in the image. And the results can look kinda cool...

Sometimes you got nothing...

...so you post 2 pictures of Plaza Puerta del Sol in Madrid.

On a rainy night. I don't even know why...I saw them, and that's what I thought I would put up. Also, I like coffee. And biscuits.

Sometimes you sign a petition...

..and your name looks out of place, with a UK flag next to it. Doesn't it?

This one was about a 16 year old that was arrested at a peaceful demonstration and the mother was looking for him, and the army told her not to look anymore or her other son might "disappear" too. Wtf?!

I mean, I live here, but that looks odd to me. Anyway, I "sign" like a dozen of these daily. I am not sure how much it helps, apparently some do though. Because they always spam me with "now send these to your friends to sign too!"(And as you can see, I don't spam you with that), and "Look what you've accomplished" emails with stories of the ones where the pressure worked. It isn't hard for me, so I do it, and I agree with the causes of course, else I wouldn't bother...

Sometimes you take a walk...

..at "lunch" and thoroughly enjoy it. My lunch for work is at 3pm here, so it's not exactly lunch time. But I had to go get rent money out of the ATM machine, and get some limes, avocados, and I also found some of those awesome honeydew melons, and got some crushed cashews. This is where I went:

A. House
B. Co-Op Grocery store and ATM
C. Produce market stand in the town centre

All while blasting some awesome music in my earphones...I enjoyed it. It works wonders for breaking up my day...

Sometimes you crave tofu...

...in all its forms! This week's form:

Pic courtesy of Geli :)

Tofu Salad! We eat it with tortilla chips, and mexican red rice + salsa. I am looking forward to it, like most dinners. But Geli noticed that I have this thing with food where I like to have something to scoop with. Tostadas, tortillas, bread, something to use as a scoop(other than a spoon lol). And it is true. It is one of my favorite things to do.

And also, a little over four years ago I would never have expected to like tofu. I don't even think I knew what it was. And I was missing out. It is the foodie's dream! Incredibly versatile, like a sponge it just grabs the flavors that you cook it with so well. It is fantastic!

Sometimes you get disconnected...

...When you're trying to play with someone 5000+ miles away. I mean, how dare technology not allow me to shoot some computerized zombies with someone on the other side of the world? It's not fair! haha I am totally kidding, to me that was expected. I couldn't play with Mari. We would be able to setup and join. As soon as the game starts, we get this screen:

Oh well :) Maybe it will work with sergio. Else, no biggie. I want to cut down on that anyway. I was just curious if we could play. Especially since my game is european(PAL), or at least I assume it is, since I got it here in the UK.

And here is another before/after shot:

Clearly, overexposed. And we can fix that using the RAW file :) Apparently, we like dark pictures. Because I feel that the camera almost always overexposes when it isn't on manual(although not as much as in this example).

Sometimes you go to a familiar place...

..and still end up taking over 100 pictures! Today Sophie and I went to a few stores for some laundry detergent, flax seed, and bread crumbs, and then I took her to Castle Park. We have been there countless times before. But it is a beautiful park, and well, new camera, 2 lenses, and what I would call a photogenic child = 100+ pics. After getting rid of the very similar/defective ones, it was down to 37, so not bad. I just really like taking pics :) I won't put many of them, or big ones, since most are for the weekly sophie next week. But here are some:

We fed some squirrels, pigeons, ducks. She played in the fish pond. She played in the playground. She rolled in the grass. We walked around. It was fun, I enjoyed it. Geli didn't want to come with us, she was tired. I was too, but we told her since yesterday we would take her to the park, so I took her. We were there for well over two hours.

The war memorial, or as Sophie calls it,  the "monsters". And the monster has a "cuchillo". That's what she calls swords.

This makes animals into your friends.

Feeding the squirrel AND taking a picture! bam!

Sophie and I, on our way back, this is a window of one of the shops on the way home. She's so big!

Sometimes you make cheese...

...at home, and it is fantastic(and vegan!). Geli, as usual, follows countless vegan blogs and sites, so she always has new recipes to try. This time, she wanted to make cheese. I was skeptical, as usual(you would think I would learn to just accept her food propositions without resistance, but I don't!).

We didn't make it today, but I didn't get around to talking about it till now. So the interesting thing, is that you can take things like oatmeal, soy milk, nutritional yeast, tahini(ground sesame seed paste), onion powder, corn starch, salt, and lemon juice and make a very tasty "cheese" out of them!

It isn't hard at all, and except for the letting it cool, then letting it harden part, doesn't take long at all. You pretty much mix then blend everything well, then cook it to thicken, then cool it, and then harden it in the fridge overnight. Then you have very rich tasty slice-able block of vegan cheese...we ate grilled cheese sandwiches(w/spinach) with a tangy tomato soup this week, and the cheese was perfect in there.

We also made bagel sandwiches with it, and on toasts, by itself, I mean, you get it, it's versatile, like cheese.

Sometimes your spanish fails you...

...and you assume a translation that was completely incorrect. Since I grew up talking spanish, this is what I knew a "sombrerito" to be in futbol:





So when I heard the term "Hat-Trick" in English, I assumed they meant a "sombrerito". But then I kept seeing that they counted how many "hat-tricks" people had, and when the last one was and so on. Which at first, I just thought it was weird, because, well, it is pretty, and embarrassing for the defender, but it doesn't really count for anything in itself. Then I was compelled to look it up when I read that thanks to Ronaldo's hat-trick, Real Madrid beat Chivas 3-0. I was like wth? How can 1 "sombrerito" mean a 3-0 win? So I wiki'd it, and I was waaaaay off. This is what it said a hat-trick is:

So one player scoring 3 times in one game is a "hat-trick"? That makes no sense to me! At all! What does a hat have to do with 3? Oh well, at least I know what a hat-trick is now, in English...

Sometimes you spend more than 3 hours...

..fixing one issue. 

So yesterday work kicked my ass...today was not much better. But I said I would explain what sucked yesterday, and this one call was a huge part of it. Over 3 hours working on this one issue, and I had worked on it many times before and had put it off because I just had no idea wtf was going on...The initial issue was that she claimed not to have access to her intranet pages...which she did, it was just asking for her credentials when she went to it, but she didn't want to enter them. To make matters worse, everything worked in the Citrix desktop(a virtual computer), she just didn't want to connect to it. She wanted everything to work locally, which is why I blew this one off for days. 1) I seriously didn't know what to do about it. 2) It was no emergency, she could work in Citrix, she just didn't want to...anyway, I could seriously write like a whole report on why that call took so long and all the things I tried. But out of consideration to you, I will summarize it with this:

Remote users(not on our network, at home usually), sometimes have issues sync'ing their passwords when they change them, since the local PC has no way of knowing when they change the network password on the interface. Anyway, I know how to fix that, but that didn't work for this, and it was acting really strange...Here are some of the barrage of errors and issues I was getting:

At this point, normally, locking the PC, and unlocking it with the new password, once they are on VPN, usually sync's it..not this time...

I don't know why it would go to this screen when locking the computer, instead of the windows one... I still have to look into that. (PCs are encrypted with McAffee, but still, this isn't the windows log on screen).

Prompting for credentials when trying to map or open network drives, again related, and normally, takes the passwords, not this time....

I wrote some BAT files/scripts to map the drives...again, usually works, even if it asks for credentials, not this time.(Check out the username! atheis ftw!)

I seriously wanted to just get this PC re-imaged...I tried soooo many things.

It ended up having to do with the encryption password not sync'ing with the Active Directory/Windows login. So I reset the windows one to match the old encryption one, and after several reboots, and force sync's it worked...I didn't even expect it to, but at that point, whatever! haha

So yeah, today was not much better. I still worked until 3pm(I get out at 2pm), and there was some other messed up issues as well. But I won't bother you with those.

Sometimes work drains the life out of you...

...today was one of those days. And because of that, I don't have any energies to blog about much.

Maybe tomorrow I will tell you why.

Sometimes it rains...

...everyday.

...And then you realize, Oh! You're in England! Seriously...rain, rain, rain the last few days. It stops for a  bit, the sun peeks through, then rain again!

Sometimes you summon the dark lords...

...into your dish! And it is awesome!! This guy kicks ass! So far, he has 3 episodes, and they are all awesome!! haha "You must summon the heat of SATTAAAAAAN!!" I can't stop laughing, brilliant! Singing a recipe! Just brilliant! Vegan Black Metal Chef ftw! And the food looks awesome too!





Here are the other two, in case you have time to listen to them! They are long, but they are hilarious! And totally worth it!







His knives are totally awesome too! You should like them Sergio! haha

Sometimes you wake up early...

...to go get some vegan cupcakes! And by early, I mean like 4pm! haha We have such a hard time getting ready and out of the house by a reasonable hour on the weekends. Partly, because Geli and I stay up very late hanging out(5am last night), but also because we can't seem to move fast on the weekends(or ever really). We found out that there would be coconut macaroons at the cafe today, and so I "rushed" out of the house immediately to try to get there before the cafe closed.

By the time I got there, all they had left was strawberry vanilla and blueberry lemon cupcakes. They are fantastic, but those macaroons are something else! So Geli was sad that I couldn't get any.

Strawberry Vanilla

Blueberry Lemon!

So yeah, 4pm...that's the earliest we could get out today. We have a serious problem! And that was literally, like this:

Geli: "Oh man! They have coconut macaroons at the cafe today! Too bad we won't be able to make it" (She makes a sad face)
Me: "It is 3:30pm, I can just run over there right now before they close, just let me put some pants on real quick!"(I was wearing my shorts).

So I just found out about this, and ran out. Had we all had to get ready first, it would have been like 5pm!! What is wrong with us?!

Sometimes you buy strange fruit...

...called Green Gages? It doesn't look that weird, but it was something we had not tried, so I had to get it.they look like plums.

Produce street market ftw!

Green gages. Now you know what they look like...

They were tasty. Very similar to plums, less sour I would say. Nice, sweet, softer than plums too. I like them.

Sometimes Sophie gets a package...

...and she loves it. She is almost like Pavlov's dogs, in the sense that when the bell rings, or a package gets shoved into the house, instead of salivating, she expects it to be for her!

It seems that Martha and Gustavo are addicted to sending her things. Candies, toys, clothes, you name it, they send it! And she already kind of understands the process. They show them to her on skype, then she tells them "mandenmelos", and then they "get on the airplane" and then they "knock, knock, knock!" and then she gets them...

By far, most of her toys were sent by Martha and Gustavo. It's cute....

Sometime you are in a British pop band...

...or someone with your name is! This was pointed out to me by a member of a vegan group on FB that Geli put me in. When I "joined" the group, a girl pointed out that I have the same name as a member of the pop group Starman. I had no idea what she was talking about, so I had to look it up, and this is what I found:

Well, I don't look like him, but there is no denying the similarity in the name. This is odd, I would never have thought there would be another Jesus Ruiz in the UK. Much less one that is apparently somewhat of a celebrity, even if a minor one. I would have linked to the music, but it said it was a "mix between pop and 80s electro" and well, that stopped me right there....

Sometimes Sophie builds a house...

...for her animals!

A house for her goat!

another one for her lion!

another one for her elephant!

Okay, so these are old pics, but you hadn't seen them. So they're new to you! lol

Sometimes you fail at bike repairs...

...really, really bad. You know you failed at it when you end up with 2 broken bikes, and you started with only 1 broken one.

Geli's just needed air. And I ended up breaking it. It has a weird air nozzle. A super small one, that you have to use an adapter on for the pump, and when I was trying to figure out how, I unscrewed a part that I apparently wasn't supposed to, and it blew out the little screw that went there with the air pressure and we couldn't find it...

So I still don't have brakes on my rear tires, but it's ok. I still went for a ride like that. I missed bike riding. Wind in your face...your surroundings passing you by. I really missed it. I just went for a ride to the nearby park.

I got tired quickly(badly out of shape), so I pulled over and laid down on the grass for a bit...

Took some pics of course...

Looked around...

Abbey Fields...like a quarter mile from our house.

Then headed back to the house. I just wanted to go out for a ride. I had been itching to for a loooooong time, but Geli hates bikes now, so we never go. Now she has an excuse since I broke her bike. I need to take them both to the shop for fixing.

On another note, this weekend we found this:

Can you believe that?! Fresh jalapeños in England!!! So clearly, we had to make this: Guacamole and salsa. And eat it with tostadas. Salted plain doritos is the closest thing we have to tostadas here in England lol I told Geli it was a must to make guacamole, salsa, and eat it with tostadas if you find jalapeños in England. She didn't believe me. It is a rule! Is it not?

FANTASTIC!!! (the guacamole was almost a disaster, since I added too much "milk", yes I add milk to the guacamole, it makes it creamier, and I like it.

Sometimes you wish you had a TV...

...with mexican channels on it. This stream thing has been a bit annoying last few games. The streams I find are weak. They keep breaking up and chopping up the game, lagging, freezing, etc.

And I used to be able to watch them directly from Televisa and Azteca, but now they block them here in the UK.. oh well. Mexico is up at halftime!! They better hold on!!

Sometimes the bees just leave....

and that can't be good...I finished watching a documentary called "Vanishing of the Bees", and it was very interesting.

I had no idea that bees were shipped all over the place to pollinate crops. Like I knew that they were needed, and essential to biodiversity and whatnot, but I didn't know that if they didn't take bees to an apple orchard, or an almond tree field, or a watermelon farm, etc. etc. there would be nothing to harvest. And that we have to take them there, and take them away after a couple weeks because since we grow everything in mono cultures, there is only food for them there while that particular crop is flowering. After that, they take them to another field, and repeat..A bee has to individually pollinate every piece of fruit we eat!! And they are all dying at alarming rates!(60%-80% of bees die each season, and pesticides seem to be at fault, along with many other factors) But yeah, I had an idea that we "need" bees, but no clue how helpless we are without them. Without bees, we starve...

Sometimes you see Jesus Christ....

...on twitter! haha and the best part: Check out the "Similar to" section! Satan! and Obama!!

On another note, I've been playing football with Sophie in the tiny yard, she really likes it! And this is her rendition of me and her playing "football" as it is properly called here:

Notice the ball with the black spots :)

Sometimes fruit reminds you of videogames...

Don't these cherries look like the pac-man cherries?!

Real cherries!

Pac-Man cherries

I didn't even know they actually looked like that! (2 cherries on 1 stick) haha Oh, and seriously, I hadn't tried fresh cherries, until we moved to Milwaukee probably, they are fantastic! The only cherries I had tried before that were the ice cream cherries, maraschino cherries or whatever. Totally inferior to fresh ones! They are awesome! Cherries are totally my favorite fruit! When I have a garden, I want a cherry tree in it!

But seriously, right now is cherry season, get some!! fantastic!