こんにちは！
Hellos and welcome, dear readers!
鋭意次の英訳して歌ってみた動画を
準備中のタカペンです！
This is yours truly, chipping away diligently at my next English translation and cover song video!
今日は先週溜め込んだネタの
お話し諸々です♪
In today's blog entry, I will mainly be talking about stuff I meant to write about last week. So here goes nothing!
- 諸々リベンジしたくて / If At First You Don't Succeed, Try, Try Again
- アメリカお役立ち道具：お酢 / Something Very Useful: White Vinegar
諸々リベンジしたくて / If At First You Don't Succeed, Try, Try Again
リベンジのお話し用の写メ４枚 / Pics showing my retry attempts
リベンジその①マンハッタンの夜景 / Retry Attempt 1 - Manhattan Night Scenery
なんとか、こう、
遠出しないで
これがマンハッタンの夜景だ！
と一目瞭然な写真を撮りたい、と
思ってるのですが…
Me, being the lazy person that I am, I'm trying my best to get a great shot of the Manhattan night scenery without having to stretch my legs too far in order to get that shot...
中々そう上手くはいきませんね（笑）
Which, of course, doesn't really work out that great. lol
１枚目の写真は、歩いて多分10分弱？
にある橋から撮りました
The first pic is one I took from a bridge that's about less than a 10 minute walk from my place.
通勤路で、いつも通る度に
ここから写真撮れたらきっと
良い「マンハッタンの夜景」が
撮れるに違いない！！！
It's a bridge that I cross over on my way back from work, and I always think to myself if only I could take a pic from the bridge, that'll be such an awesome Manhattan Night Scenery pic...!
と思ってたのですが、
肉眼では綺麗なのですが…
スマホのカメラさんには
ちょっと遠すぎるようで
遠くのマンハッタンよりも
手前にある倉庫の建物のが
綺麗にライトアップされて
写っています（笑）
or at least so I thought... until I actually went out and tried to take pictures. The scenery is great and the Manhattan lights are pretty to the naked eye, but unfortunately, it looks like the spot's too far away from the city. My smartphone camera isn't quite able to get a great shot of Manhattan. Instead, the warehouses in the foreground looks great all lit up... lol
これじゃダメだ！ と
次はほんのちょっぴり
マンハッタン側に近いところ
まで行ったのですが、こちらは
残念ながら、ただ単にぼやけて
あまりうまく撮れませんでした
So there's another spot that I know I can see Manhattan from which is a tiny bit closer to the city, so I walked there and tried to take some pics, but it was still too far away and too dark so that the pics just came out all blurry.
2～3枚目ですね（笑）
Those are the 2nd and 3rd pics... :)
ぼやけてるけど一応
真ん中のちょっととんがってる
建物がエンパイアステートビルです
They're blurry and hard to see, so in case you can't tell, the pointy and lit up building is the Empire State Building.
いつかはもっと近いところで
「これがマンハッタンの夜景だ！」
とわかりやすい写真を
撮れたらと思います
One of these days I'm hopeful that I might go to a closer location where I can take pictures with my smartphone and it'll look like the Manhattan landscape.
でもタカペンは面倒くさがりなので
いつになるかはわかりません（笑）
But again, me being me, dunno if that day'll ever come. :P
リベンジその②種無しブドウ / Retry Attempt 2 - Seedless Grapes
そして4枚目の綺麗な黄緑の
ブドウさんは！！！
The last pic is the beautiful looking green grapes.
今度こそオーガニックではない
種なしのブドウを買いました！！
I went out and got myself NON-ogranic seedless grapes!!
前回の種無しブドウについての
お話しはこちらの記事にある
「オクラとグレープ事変 / Okra and Grapes Incidents」
の後半から読めます
Regarding my past stories of the seedless grapes, you can go read it here under "オクラとグレープ事変 / Okra and Grapes Incidents" section. It's the latter part of that section.
（その部分への直接リンクを作ろうと
したのですが、どうしても記事の
トップにしか行かないです＞＜；）
(I tried to create a direct link to the section where I talk about the grapes, but the html tag isn't working correctly and it only jumps to the top of the article...)
さて、そんなこんなで、なんとか
そのまま食べられる種なしブドウを！
と先週オーガニックではない
シードレス・グレープを買いました
So anyway, this was another attempt at trying to buy seedless grapes that didn't have seeds in them...!
結果
And the results...
種がない！ やったー！！
ヾ(o´∀｀o)ﾉﾜｧｰｨ♪
No seeds! Finally!!! HURRAH!!!
と思ったのも束の間
But that joy lasted only for an instant...
すっぱ・・・！！！
Bleh! How sour can you get!?
あと皮厚すぎでしょ！？
And the skin is way too thick!!!
orz
C'mooooooon...
と言うことで、種なしは
種なしだったのですが…
結局厚すぎる皮を食べることが
できなくて、そのまま美味しく
と言うわけにはいきませんでした
And so, at least there were no seeds in the seedless grapes, but because the skins were too thick to eat, I couldn't gobble them up like I wanted to.
結構すっぱかったですし（笑）
And they were a bit more sour than I expected. lol
うーん… 春先だったか、一度だけ
皮も薄くて、種もなくて、甘くて
ジューシーなブドウさんを
買ったことがあるのですが…
I think maybe last early spring or so, I bought the most delicious seedless green grapes which had no seeds, the skin was thin and tasty, and they were sweet, tangy, and just plain yummy.
次はいつお目にかかれるのやら
Wonder when I'll be able to get another bunch like those...
タカペンのブドウ探しの旅は
終わらないのでした☆
And so, my quest for yummy seedless green grapes looks like it's going to have to continue...!
アメリカお役立ち道具：お酢 / Something Very Useful: White Vinegar
さて、今日の最後のお話しは
お酢です！
Lastly, I get to talk about white vinegar!
タカペンはお掃除が苦手です
Yours truly sucks at cleaning.
お風呂掃除もめちゃくちゃ強い
洗剤を使ってるのですが
カビはとれても、なかなか
水垢とか石鹸のかす？なんでしょうか？
が落ちません
For the bathroom, I use a cleaner with really strong chemical agents which is great at getting rid of mildew, but they seem to leave residues which combine with water residue and soap suds to make a pretty unpleasant caking in the bathtub.
むしろカビ取りの洗剤を
遣えば使う程
なんか洗剤の残り？
だか何か白いものが
こびりついてます
The more I use the mildew killer, the more white residue it seems to leave...
取れる、みたいなのを読んで
リンゴ酢で挑戦してみたのですが
全然とれませんでした
I read somewhere that a mixture of vinegar and baking soda paste works great at cleaning, so I tried with apple cider vinegar, but it didn't work at all. (Kind of just turned the caking a slight pink. lol)
リンゴ酢は体に良いからと
買ったは良いものの、すっぱすぎて
飲めなくて残ってたものです（笑）
The apple cide vinegar was in my fridge because I'd gotten it because it's supposedly healthy, but it was too sour for me to drink up.... :)
でも最近再びお酢でお掃除に
挑戦してみようと、思い立って
洗濯機の横に隠れてた
ホワイトビネガーがあることを
思い出して、重曹すっ飛ばして
お酢を浴槽に吹きかけて
スセミでごしごししてみたところ
But I recently just randomly decided I wanted to give it a try again, and this time, I remembered that I actually had a bottle of white vinegar by the laundry washer, so I poured it into a spray bottle and sprayed the bathtub like there was no tomorrow. After letting the vinegar soak for a bit, I tried scrubbing with the susemi sponge.
の記事の最後にあります）
(You can check out my story with the susemi sponge at the end of my blog entry here.)
今まで何やっても全然とれなかった
水垢っぽいものやら白いものやらが
半分ぐらい落ちました！！！
And whaddaya know! Some of the residue caking actually scrubbed off!! They never did that with any other cleaning solution I've tried before!!!
なので次もまたお酢で
浴槽を洗うぞー！ と
I was low on the white vinegar, and I wanted to use it again to scrub the bathtub, so...
お酢を買ってきました
that's why I went to buy more white vinegar.
お掃除にもとっても便利だし、
お料理にも使うらしいし
この量だときっと高いんだろうな
と思ってたら＄４ぐらいでした
There are many usages for the white vinegar. You can use them for cleaning and cooking, and you can even use them as a softener for your laundry, so I was braced to buy it at maybe around $16 or so, for the gallon sized vinegar, but when I actually went to buy it, it was like $3.29 or something.
なんてお得なんでしょう！！！
I was like seriously...!? Wow!
とことあるごとく
お風呂場でお酢を
吹きかけている
タカペンなのでした☆
So ever since, I've been spraying vinegar frequently in the bathroom for the tiniest little thing. lol
以上、諸々リベンジ編でした
And that's it for my retry attempt stories!
今日もしょうもないお話しに
お付き合いいただき
ありがとうございました！
Thank you for reading this far as usual!
また次のしょーもな記事で
お会いしましょう！ ではではっ！
See you again in my next entry! Taka, out!
