Willow likes the sun

I think I went overboard with the refrigerator magnets

My plan was to buy a couple of them - one for Manchester and another for Leicester since I didn't snag one last year - but, holy hell, I got one wherever I went.

My first pumpkin pie of the season

It turned out alright, methinks. My ladyfriend opined that it needed more spices and, while I can understand that, I liked it still. A bit less condensed milk meant a little less sweetness, though I did sprinkle some maple sugar leftover from my maple cookie venture on top before I threw it into the oven.

Light texture, nice squash taste. No doubt I'll try again later this season.

Naughty cat

Seasonal decorating

I finally managed to find some Indian corn and it now adorns my seasonal decoration wall.

It won't be long before I'll have a wreath there and snow'll be on the ground.

A Night With Eddie and the Gang

Last week I finally got to see Iron Maiden live despite having been a fan since 1988 or 1989, though I lean towards the summer of '88. I was a junior in high school or preparing to be so and a metalhead friend of mine was attempting to get me into all music fast and heavy. At one point he suggested that I try listening to Iron Maiden.

I cannot recall if he just shoved a tape of Seventh Son of a Seventh Son in my hands or whether he gave me a bunch to choose from and I selected it. Perhaps having a 10 minute title track appealed to my love of progressive rock epics. Regardless, I went home with a copy of the band's seventh studio album.

Now, my bedroom had a bathroom en suite which was quite nice. When big storms rolled through, the bolts of lightning would really light things up as the flashes would come through my bedroom windows as well as the bathroom's. Such was the case the night I gave Seventh Son of a Seventh Son my inaugural listen.

As best I can recall, it was the summer of 1988. A cold front had moved in and its clash with the hot summer air resulted in a fine storm. I decided to listen to the album as I went to sleep that night as claps of thunder shook the house and bursts of lightning rent the darkness. I lived out in the country and so, absent a full moon, the nights were quite black.

The raging storm and stygian darkness outside lent the perfect atmosphere for lying in bed listening to an album with lyrics such as "Be the devil's own, Lucifer's my name" and "Restless sleep, the mind's in turmoil/One nightmare ends, another fertile".

Side 1 ended and I found myself enjoying the album immensely. It was moody yet had a keen melodic sense. The guitars left room for the judicious use of keyboards and the songs had fun twists and turns. The epic title track opened side 2 with its barrage of cymbal crashes and washes of neo-Mellotron choruses that heightened the dramatic guitars which seemed to herald the arrival of Lucifer himself. It all sounded big and Wagnerian to my teenage self.

The thunder outside continued its roar and lightning flashes gave me brief glimpses of my room in its stillness as the song wound its way to a slow, moody spoken word section. A hi hat and Squire-like bass set a tense pace as the words were intoned...

So it shall be written

So it shall be done

The bass drum began pounding out a ritualistic rhythm as that hellish chorus sound returned along with waves of menacing guitar that moved from left to right. The guitar bursts became a steady beat that ratcheted up the tension and then suddenly

CRASH!

What sounded like a small explosion in the bathroom shattered my concentration on the music. The song kicked into overdrive as I slowly rose from bed and approached the bathroom. Trepidatiously I turned on the light not knowing what to expect. Would there be some hideous creature from the bowels of Hell there waiting for me?

As it turned out, no. Instead I found that the glass shower door had splintered into thousands and thousands of pieces.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

And so last Tuesday I and 4 friends hopped into a luxurious rental SUV and headed south to see Maiden at the Credit Union 1 Amphitheatre in Tinley Park, Illinois. Chicago traffic being what it is, it look a bit but we finally rolled into the parking lot of our hotel which was the exact opposite of luxury. No biggie. We were not the only Iron Maiden fans there who would be making do with the mediocre accommodations.

On the way to the venue I was getting excited and hopeful that Maiden would play at least one tune from my beloved Seventh Son of a Seventh Son. Megadeth, another band I'd never seen live before, were opening and I found myself eager to hear them play "Hangar 18".

We were herded into the venue where signs advertised beers that cost $17.50. Uff da! Another one noted that this was the Run For Your Lives World Tour 2026 with songs from Iron Maiden through Fear of the Dark - a greatest hits kind of thing. I was mildly disappointed as there are songs post-1992 that I would have loved to hear such as "Ghost of Navigators", "Writing on the Wall", and "Paschendale". I would just have to make do.

I think Megadeth started a bit earlier than the 7:15 start time that was advertised as we could hear them as we made our way to our seats at about a quarter after. Just as we started down our row, they launched into "Hangar 18"!

I sang along to the chorus:

Possibly I've seen too much

Hangar 18, I know too much

Excellent!

They also did another of my favorite Megadeth tunes, "Symphony of Destruction" and so I was very happy.

Dave Mustaine introduced "Tornado of Souls" as being about the ex-wife of an ex-friend. "Bitch," he muttered before striking the first note. This made me think of my ex-wife. Ha!

While the sound for Megadeth left something to be desired, their set was great.

After what seemed a rather short period of time considering the complexity of the stage set, "Doctor, Doctor" by UFO came on. It was easy to hear their sound in Maiden's. When it had finished, the lights went down and the giant screen in back showed a short video which took us through the dingy streets of 1970s London as the bars where they played in their early years went by while "The Ides of March" played. The camera settled on a wall with Eddie on it from the cover of Killers and the band launched into "Murders in the Rue Morgue" as the lights came on a-flashin'.

It was marvelous!

A quartet of Paul Di'Anno tunes came first followed by the initial Dickenson era tune, "The Number of the Beast". Oh, it was glorious and I sang "666!" along with thousands of my fellow fans.

Dickinson then said they were going to play a song they had left out of setlists for 36, 37, 38 years...that was about dreams. Infinite dreams, in fact.

Woo hoo! Something from my beloved Seventh Son of a Seventh Son!

The song started slowly but Dickinson proved his pipes still had it as he screamed and the band kicked into overdrive. It may have taken 38 years, but my dream finally came true.

Basically every song was a highlight. The 3 guitar attack added real heft to several of the tunes such as "Powerslave" during which Dickinson donned his mask. "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" was sublime as it chugged along at the perfect headbanging speed for middle aged folks. We then got a respite for the spoken word section in the middle before things picked up for the finale. A wonderful video of this performance was up at Youtube but has since been taken down.

But "Rime of the Ancient Mariner" wasn't the only epic they played that night.

They also did "Seventh Son of a Seventh Son" which had me in seventh heaven. It was just glorious! It too was up on Youtube but then taken down. D'oh!

Eddie made 2 or 3 appearances and it was a hoot to finally see him in-person.

He looked none the worse for wear. The band were all in their late-60s(ish) and had slowed down but only a little. Steve Harris still wore shorts and ran around the stage until he found a monitor he liked and staked his claim by putting his foot on top of it. Janick Gers was usually found at one end of the stage where he slid his guitar around his thin frame and, at one point, twirled the cable like he had joined his own personal rodeo. He just always seemed to be having the time of his life. Adrian Smith and Dave Murray effortlessly traded solos like they've been doing for decades while new drummer Simon Dawson pounded the skins in deference to Nikko McBrain but not in slavish imitation.

The show came to a conclusion with a rousing rendition of "Iron Maiden" which found me singing, "Iron Maiden wants you for dead" with aplomb, if not exactly in tune. Footage of the Battle of Britain let on what the first encore song was to be and that bit from Churchill's 4 June 1940 speech had me reciting it. As I said, "We shall fight on the beaches. We shall fight on the landing grounds. We shall fight in the fields and in the streets. We shall fight in the hills. We shall never surrender", a tear came to my eye as I thought of my brother. Had he been alive, he would have been here doing the same.

Sadly, they played no songs from No Prayer for the Dying (I'd have loved to have heard "Running Silent, Running Deep" or "Mother Russia".) but we did get the title track of Fear of the Dark as a second encore. Dickinson donned his Victorian coat and hat along with a lantern for the occasion. And it provided a chance for Gers to solo for one of the few, if not only, times.

The night ended with the admonitions of "Wasted Years" and twenty whatever thousand people went home happy. Or mostly so. It's funny how quickly fans can start complaining about the songs that weren't played.

Personally, I was thrilled to hear a couple songs from the album that got me into the band on that stormy night all those years ago along with many other classics. And I got to do so in the company of my wonderful friends.

Lap of Luxury: Savoursmiths Desert Salt and Vinegar Crisps

Savoursmiths is such a quintessentially English name. It conjures visions of posh gentlemen and ladies eating them with their tea as they discuss the latest cricket scores and lament the loss of the empire. There was no way I could sample all the salt & vinegar snacks I had bought over in the UK on my trip so these were chosen to make the flight home as they were housed in a tin and not a sack because posh people deserve a durable container for their junk food.

I purchased these chips at Heathrow at the beginning of our trip and the lovely light blue tin tempted me the whole time we were in England. That blue crisp containers indicate salt & vinegar in the UK as they do here in the States tells me that the color is a cultural universal and that David Brown should add it to his list.

Sadly, I no longer have the tin these came in to see if it noted from what desert the salt on the crisps came from. Yet another posh indicator - as if the use of "luxurious" wasn't enough. Sea salt is just too pedestrian for them.

The tin also notes that the crisps are made from British potatoes. On my 2 trips to the UK I've done a fair bit of crisp sampling and I have eaten the occasional potato in a different form such as chips or in a pie and I've tried to ascertain if British potatoes have a different flavour than America ones. How to describe the British tuber terroir?

When I take a handful of American potato chips, shove them in my maw, chew them to paste, and really taste them, I get that wonderful fried potato flavour - that mix of oil and spud with the spud having a certain sweetness to it. The closest analogy to it that I can think of is malt powder. Chips are much less sweet but their sweetness is akin to malt.

Doing the same with British crisps, the flavour is, of course, very similar but they taste less sweet to me. The earthy flavour of potato is much more prominent. I wonder if this is because UK crispsmiths use potato varieties that are more or less unavailable to American chip makers or if the same spuds have high availability on both sides of the Atlantic and companies just choose different varieties.

Sticking my nose into the tin, it was almost assaulted by the aroma of sunflower oil. Earthy potato and vinegar tang were also present but in much smaller doses. The crisps were yellow with an occasional patch of dark yellow and had their skin around the edges. They were definitely thicker than your normal American chip and their surfaces were littered with bubbles of all sizes.

My mouth was greeted by a hearty crunch biting down on a couple of the crisps. My tongue caught a firm dose of vinegar tanginess and perhaps a tad of extra salt. As expected, the potato flavour was quite earthy with just a hint of sweetness.

These were some very fine crisps. I couldn't discern that the salt was from a desert but appreciated very much the good, firm vinegar (white) tang. These crisps were delicious to this prole.

Zip-a-dee-doo-dah, zip-a-dee-ay

My, oh my, what a wonderful day!

I got not one, but two new albums courtesy of MadCity Music - the latest by Rhiannon Giddens and Son Volt. What would it sound like if Giddens and Son Volt teamed up and made some tunes together?

The first apple crisp of the season

Here she is.

It was made with Haralson apples from Lapacek's Orchard using one of their pre-hoolied apple crisp kits. Haralsons are a nice, tart apple and worked perfectly here leaving the oat topping to provide the sweetness. A delicious taste of autumn.

A Salt & Vinegar Miscellany XXIII: Fully Loaded

Gah! I cannot recall exactly where I bought these. My best guess is that they were procured at the Aldi in a mall (a.k.a. - shopping centre) on Market Street or High Street in Manchester. As I recall, they were nestled in amongst lots of candy on a shelf that you walk by as you are making your way to the register.

Here in the States Aldi is a downmarket place yet the one where I got these is smack dab in the middle of Manchester's shopping district in the city centre. Is it a bit more upscale over there? I'd expect the UK equivalent of Trader Joe's/Whole Foods to be in that mall. Has the UK fallen on hard times? 

Snackrite appears to be one of Aldi's house brands. With the words "FULLY LOADED" on the label, I had a slight hope that these would be nice'n'tangy.

They smelled, well, like peanuts with a hint of vinegar. They were tan which I presume means they were dry roasted and had white dust on them - magic vinegar dust, I hoped.

The nuts had a nice, mild roasty taste along with a slight sweetness and a mellow tang. No extra salt was applied, as far as I could taste. For those familiar with Planters peanuts, these were closer to their lightly salted variety rather than the normal salted one. The ingredients list had barley malt vinegar powder which gets bonus points from me. But the vinegar flavor is faint enough that you need to throw a bunch of these into your mouth at once to get a decent zip and discern the barley malt taste.

More vinegar flavor would have been nice, especially since it was malt vinegar, but these peanuts were fine. A tasty diversion from my normal peanut diet.

A Portrait of Willow, 28 September 2026

Song of the day, 27 September 2026

"Rime of the Ancient Mariner" was a highlight of the Iron Maiden show earlier this week. So much so that I've put a hold on a copy of the poem at the library.

Sadly a nice audience recording of it that night has been pulled from the Youtubes so this will have to suffice.

I dare sport thus with bread

With the cooler weather I have been doing more cooking inside. Last night I made chili and einkorn bread.

The chili turned out well. I think I'll add more coriander next time. I used a couple freshly picked serranoes from my plant which is still bearing fruit despite the change of season.

I tried my hand at einkorn brot because my ladyfriend has a mild allergy to normal American wheat. During our trip in the UK, she ate bread and pastry shells aplenty without getting the joint pain that she experiences eating the same things here. I figured I'd try to find a flour to make tasty things that wouldn't cause her any discomfort.

The bread machine recipe at the jovial website gave a custom bread machine cycle to accommodate the grain's weak gluten bonds. Apparently the typical third rise would break them and make for a deflated loaf. My machine being a more basic model, I used the Dough cycle which, I believe, allows for a final manual proofing outside the bread machine. Feeling like the Dr. Frankenstein of bakers, I threw the resulting dough into a loaf pan to see how it would turn out. Not bad.

Not, perhaps, the most aesthetically pleasing loaf but it tasted good.

I am told that a well-buttered slice drizzled with honey was a fine way to break a fast. So far no aches.

Cheese!

Willow has now annexed the undershelf of the coffee table

Willow investigates my tea

Dad's not here! Who shall feed me?!

Song of the day, 25 September 2026

I've been listening to a lot of post-Jon Anderson Yes lately and becoming familiar with Oliver Wakeman's playing which, along with his singing, is on full display here.

Happy Autumn!

The autumnal equinox around these parts is tonight around 7 or 8, I believe, but it feels like fall now with the outside temp in the mid-50s and a smattering of trees having begun to change color. Fresh apples are to be had everywhere and welcome corn from last month too. I believe that I have mulling spices on hand so mulled cider is not far off. And pumpkin pie as well. Ooh! Can't forget Pan de Muerto.

Happy autumn!

In Between Days (Go see some art!)

The significant other of a friend of mine has some of her paintings on display at the Overture Center. Her exhibit is called "In Between Days" and is in the Rotunda Gallery. Learn more about her work at her website and head down to the OC for some fine art.

Song of the day, 22 September 2026

Up the irons! This afternoon some friends and I head south to see Iron Maiden. It'll be my first time and I am hoping for at least one tune from Seventh Son of a Seventh Son, the album that got me into them.

Willow wishes you all a happy autumn 2026