A week back into the routine after a long holiday break! We’re having spritzes and cheese now; I have a pork tenderloin in the sous vide tank for tomorrow (I’ll grill it off before serving after a quick dunk in the tank again tomorrow; it will come out in about two hours and overnight in the fridge), and there are chicken thighs in the oven.

We had a fun weekend: out with the ‘rents for Joe, Sorayah, and Dad’s birthdays (bunch of January babies!) at Maplewood, then hot pot/Korean BBQ with Aaron for lunch yesterday. We made a trip to a vinyl shop he loves in the Hamilton Mall after lunch, too. We fancied going to Guitar Center, but Rhonda and I were meeting an old friend at Bellview for wine in the afternoon, so we had to cut Guitar Center out of the plans. Today was just groceries. I did take the dog for a walk, which was nice.

Bellview’s Dry Rosé

Rhonda and I met a friend at Bellview yesterday, and their new rosé, made with Chambourcin grapes, was on tap! That means it will be bottled soon, but on tap is the way to go. It’s been out of stock for a few months, so this was a very welcome development. I need a few more swigs to weigh in on the difference between this and other vintages, but it was familiar for sure.

FlexTime

In addition to the excellent MarsEdit, Daniel Jailkut’s Red Sweater software offers the very cool FlexTime utility, a “versatile timer for repetitive activities.” I found myself, late last week, feeling especially overwhelmed by a crap ton of of urgent, open loops. OmniFocus is my central planning tool, but the challenge of overload is prioritizing, and sometimes, that means setting some time limits so that you can make some progress on a few projects.

I’ve written a bit here about how I deal with this aspect of productivity, most notably trying to plug into Neil Fiori’s Unschedule technique. OmniFocus’s Planned Dates feature helps tremendously with daily planning, but outside of allowing you to estimate how long something might take, it’s not a tool for timing.

There are no shortage of timers for the Mac and iOS timers, but Red Sweater makes some great stuff. I tried it out a few years ago, and I liked it, but only used it for a spell. I downloaded it again and am planning to try it out again.

FlexTime lets you create a variety of timers and save them for reuse. You can specify a number of different activities per timer, and set notifications for each activity. You can even spit your timers out to Apple Music, which seems like a smart alternative to having the app run across platforms.

Top Pot Hot Pot and BBQ

Aaron and I first (finally!) tried hot pot about a year ago at Kung Fu Hot Pot, after a tour at the University of Delaware. We really enjoyed the experience, especially on a cold day. Our second visit occurred after a visit to Rutgers, also cold and drizzly, and we both agreed that the Happy Lamb was a superior experience to Kung Fu.

Yesterday, we headed to Mays Landing to try out Top Pot Hot Pot and BBQ while Aaron is still home on break. It, too, was exceptional.

Some niggles: the broth situation is such that there’s no easy way for two people to share broth; the pots are arranged such that they’re conveniently near one diner, not in the center of the table. This is to make room, of course, for the brazier, which takes center stage on their tables (and in the experience of having KBBQ at Top Pot). Hot pot or BBQ are $31.99 as of yesterday, but you can combine them Also, the vegetables, rice balls, and other non-meat goodies are ordered from the menu, which we didn’t prefer; it’s a lot of fun at Happy Lamb, for example, to go up to the buffet or ingredient station and pick out different root vegetables and rice balls (and all kinds of other things) that look good, whereas you have to ask for everything at Top Pot.

Top Pot does newbie diners a great service, however, by not only offering a fulsome selection of sauces, but also a display behind the buffet of sauces you can concoct for yourself. Similarly, there are some brief cooking directions and diagrams posted at each table. Like dining on phô, the experience of eating hot pot is different from your standard western dining situation. We are, happily, adventurous diners, but some know-how is appreciated to maximize the experience. To become an expert, learn the rules first.

We had a couple of kinds of tongue, and really loved the version they prepare for hot pot (the BBQ preparation was less exciting), and there was a lemon pork belly we both adored. Everything was good, though. It was a really big lunch.