Have you recently searched for a quick recipe for dinner or for a seasonal dish? Did you then have to read a convoluted tale about the author's favourite time of year, the colours of fall reminding them of the sprinkle of cinnamon spice or visions of snow at Christmas being associated with a delicious slice of the cake their grandmother used to make? (Recipe below, just scroll until you find it!). There are a bunch of reasons why popular recipe sites do this, Search Engine Optimization, copyright etc but realistically you just want the recipe and to find out how good it is before putting in the effort. Because in fairness, the worst case scenario is that you go buy a bunch of ingredients and spend time and effort making a dish and then nobody will eat it... Except maybe you, because you're willing to still eat the thing because of the sunk cost fallacy - it may not taste as great as you expected but by gum, you made it so you'll eat it...

Anyway. I found a bunch of written recipes that my grandmother used to make all of the time when I was younger. They were cluttering one of the shelves here. Information wants to be free, so I'm sharing them here. If you read them and attempt to make them, you might just find them delicious. If you don't at least the information is recorded somewhere available to more than just the paper sitting on the shelf.

The measurement units from the original recipes were a mix of imperial (Oz = Ounces, lb = pounds) but with Celsius for temperature, I've added the metric and Fahrenheit equivalents as accurately as I can for you. I've made all but one of these successfully in the past. If I can do it, I'd hazard a guess that anyone can. Anywhere that called for Margarine in the recipes I've swapped it for salted butter instead. The 1980s called and they want their horrible crap Margarine back. They can have it too. It may or may not  be better for you but the taste just isn't for me.

And there you have it, that's how a simple post with some recipes turns into a story completely unrelated to them... Sorry. Here's the recipes, I'll try improve the formatting later.

"Light" Christmas Cake

Make this in November and "feed" it with additional whiskey once a week. It'll store well until halfway through January if it hasn't been eaten by then. It's a heavy cake in my opinion.

Ingredients:

• 12oz / 340g Odlums Cream Flour (cream flour contains less raising agents than plain flour but I think either can be used here if you are in a pinch)
• 8oz / 225g butter (use Kerrygold)
• 8oz / 225g  brown sugar
• The Juice & Zest of 1 lemon (the original recipe calls the zest, "rind")
• Half a glass of whiskey (125ml / 4fl oz... ish. See note below in step 10)
• 6 eggs
• 1oz / 28g chopped almonds
• 1/4 tsp baking powder
• 8oz  / 225g Sultanas
• 8oz  / 225g Raisins
• 8oz  / 225g Currants
• 8oz  / 225g Cherries (I left these out, glace cherries can go live with Margarine)
• 1 tsp almond essence
• 1/2 tsp mixed spice
• A "pinch" of nutmeg
• Additional whiskey to "feed" the cake prior to consumption

Method:

Date Pudding

This is also known as Sticky Toffee Pudding if you add toffee sauce to it. I never knew this growing up. A good thirty years of ignorance! Delicious warmed up and served with custard or toffee sauce. An alternative to the traditional plum pudding.

Ingredients:

Method:

Invest in yourself. Especially if nobody else will.

Some jobs require dry weather, most just require an indifference to getting wet.

You remember the effort you put in more than that of others, take a moment to reflect and appreciate the effort that others put in once in a while. Be thankful.

That's ok, because you can.

I wrote this down after the phrase appearing as a shower thought one morning. I've been meaning to write about it for a while. I'm not sure I even scratch the surface of this thought let alone doing it justice. This post isn't really about motorcycles so if you've never ridden a motorcycle don't worry. If you have you will hopefully understand exactly what I mean when I say that riding a bike for fun is a completely different way of travelling than a car or other ground based transport. Even with a helmet on (ATGATT!) you're more connected to the outside world, more vulnerable. It takes physical effort to change the direction of the bike. Over low speeds you have to countersteer and ignore what your brain knows, that left is left and right is right. After a while on two wheels your body understands this principle and you are unconsciously competent in turning right but pushing left.

There's a lot of people throwing around phrases like "AI won't replace people. But people who use AI will replace those who don't." and "I want AI to do my laundry and dishes so that I can do art and writing, not for AI to do my art and writing so that I can do my laundry and dishes." After a while of all this AI stuff, I get tired of it, anxious, worried for the future of humanity. You know what though, a bot that talks (sometimes talks nonsense while projecting that it's genuine and true) isn't going to ride the bike. Not properly. Maybe one day it can power the "Mind" that makes two wheels go in a certain direction but it will likely never experience what it's like to ride the bike. Not like you can.

AI doesn't experience visceral feelings. It doesn't really tell right from wrong. It doesn't bring clarity after a long ride out either solo or with friends. It doesn't share a story with you about how you dropped your bike at low speed on a gravel car park. It won't nod understandingly when you talk about a moment on the motorway when you wished you had brought your brown trousers or when you felt something was off with the engine and it turned out that feeling was a mechanical problem.

AI, like a motorcycle, may leave you stranded on the side of a road. Unintentionally or otherwise.

I'm still on the fence about what the current most popular AI models actually do for us as a civilisation. There are applications of AI that are decades old that actually make a difference, catch things that humans can't, provide indicators that things aren't quite right that a real person could miss. Actual, objective good. On the flip side recently there has been a darkness as to how AI has been put to use. An excuse to cut a workforce. Generate untold amounts of revenue for a small number of people. Burn up massive amounts of energy for little actual good. AI doesn't reduce poverty or clean up our environment right now.

LLMs are all the rage. They can be incredibly useful if you know what to do with them. Just like being good at using a search engine used to be a thing. They can be damaging too though. Provide you with incorrect information that you don't pick up on. Be built within a framework that uses dark patterns to keep you engaged and "chatting" but not really getting anything done. I won't get into the insanity that is people befriending AIs. Get a pet rock or a stuffed animal. They'll give you the same levels of genuine emotion.

I don't doubt that AI is here to stay. I don't doubt that it can be harnessed and used for the common good but ultimately I doubt that it will ever know the feeling of riding a motorcycle.

 Beware of those who point out problems but are unwilling to try fixing them.

 Keep your tools clean and well maintained. They'll take care of you in return.