Halloween 06

Gainesville

Example of why I love Neil Gaiman so utterly: this amazing op-ed piece to the NYT. My favorite thing about Halloween ever.

Ah yes, Halloween. We had no action either. Part of it may be that the few kids in the neighborhood are now past the age, and those that are left are carted off to The Mall where it is all stylized and Safe. Also, our yard light has burned out, and I forgot to put on the porch light. Probably just as well: the front door has been sticking lately, and although I can usually wrestle it open, I sometimes have trouble getting it closed again. Five doors in this house, and only one of them is easy to get out of. Not good.

Went in with Bill this morning, and was happy that they'd moved my computer down to Systems-- they've just finished recarpeting the place, and in the process, rearranged the space. It is wonderful!. Instead of a bunch of tiny cubicles, the programmers have opened their space up and it is so much nicer! I have to think that if I hadn't been banished to the Tower in 1999, I might never have done DROP, or if I had, I'd have come back to work as soon as I could. I loved my job prior to that point, and Systems has remained a great place to work. Ah yes, hindsight.

Many of the gang were in costumes, and while backing up my files, I stumbed on a photo of a previous Halloween which I could share.

Had a cappuccino at the new library's Starbucks and saw the newly installed library Art (which I didn't notice until Bill it pointed out). We had lunch at the new Backyard BBQ, which has been getting rave reviews, and we concur. Fabulous burgers-- reminds me of ur-Kirks of old.

Bill dropped me at home, since I was mostly finished, and need to face the fact that I will never want to look at 99.9% of any of it ever again anyway.

Did a nice thing with frozen peeled shrimp: broiled with melted butter, olive oil, garlic, basil and scallions. MMMmm.

Sandy, what a lovely lunch: very nice pictures! But what are the sort of slat-like things blocking my view of outside? Please do post the recipe for tofu.

Mom, what was Ben's costume?? Did I miss something? Was there a costume drama I missed that the rest of the RF clan knows about? Did anyone think to take pictures? Just point your phone and shoot! Or whatever convergence thingy you have to hand that takes pictures.

tiny bites (now with photos)

Yes, you are quite borg, Suze! Our cell phones don't even take pictures!

So now that we have moved back into the house for the winter, I've started to clean it again. In summer it kind of goes to hell, except for the kitchen and the downstairs bathroom. The upstairs toilet is always clean, too (I hate dirty toilets), but the rest slips away. Occasional vacuumage, but the dust and clutter build.

Luckily (reason for that further down the page) I began some random cleaning last week. By the weekend I realized that I needed to organize my efforts, because I find myself not knowing what to do, there is so much. I remembered that many flylady people work, so I decided to break things up into one-to-two hour daily sessions so there's no excuse to do no housework on days I have to leave. In fact, this blog will probably be shorter than I want, since I've already done nearly two hours of housework and I have to leave for Cumberland in half an hour. Anyway, I think this will work. I've assigned one room or area to each day. When I'm pressed for time, I can do it fast. When I have more time I can be more thorough. Yesterday I spent three hours in our bedroom and the upstairs bath, and now they are ready to maintain. Extra time can go into the extra rooms (the off bedrooms are not on my regular cleaning list) and to my list of "special projects," things like cleaning out my dresser or getting rid of the stacks of stuff in Ben's room. Today I worked in the dining room and the downstairs bath. When I first retired, I had very complex daily lists, but once construction began, that ceased. Now I am less ambitious, but this house is so big, it's terrible to let it get out of hand. I congratulate you on your clearing-out project, Suze. About a year ago I cleared out the area around the piano, and that has not gotten messed up again. A good organization often lasts a long time.

So. The "luckily" in the preceding paragraph is because on Saturday morning some clients of Charlie's (who became our friends while he was working for them) called and wanted us to meet them for lunch in RF. They have been renovating a farmhouse they own near RF with an eye to selling it, and Charlie worked on it off and on for a couple of years. They live in Saint Paul, and since the house (with 26 gorgeous acres) did not sell this summer, they were closing it up for the winter. Anyway, since there's nowhere we like to eat in RF, we invited them to have lunch here. This was at 10:30, and they were to arrive at noon. Minimal housework necessary to make the downstairs presentable, so I was able to cook. I made a pasta dish with shrimp (luckily I had a bag of quite good peeled shrimp in the freezer), garlic, tomatoes, a little wine, and orange zest. Out of a bunch of great pasta recipes in an old FC. Had a complete mise en place done before they arrived, as well as the mise for the arugula and grapefruit salad in the fast section of the new FC. By chance I'd stopped at the grocery store and picked up a grapefruit and some sliced almonds when I went for the mail, with the idea that I'd make the salad sometime during the weekend. Had no raddoccio, but plenty of arugula and some little lettuces from our cold frame.
And I even had dessert: the day before I'd made some boston cream cupcakes (variation on a theme of boston cream pie) from a new cookbook Mom just got and graciously leant me. There were just four of them left, perfect. And since Richard and Finette had never been here, we needed to show them around, so it was good to have everything set up. This was a nice little triumph of a lunch; once we were in the house, it came together in about fifteen minutes. They loved it, took seconds on the pasta. (Richard and Finette are in their late seventies, and some of the nicest people we've ever known.)

So that was my little coup of the week. I've been cooking a lot. My biggest cookup was on Sunday, when I made Mario Batali's lasagna. I'd actually made the sauces (béchamel and ragú) on Saturday afternoon, but it still took most of the morning to make the pasta and put it together. This is very similar to the lasagna in the new FC. Mario uses white wine instead of red, and the meats are pork and veal (I used ground turkey for the veal) rather than pork and beef. Anyway, it's wonderful, and makes five meals. A huge effort, but nice to have in the freezer. I don't know why it puffed like this, but it went down quickly. Here are the green noodles I made out of the leftover pasta:
And how it looked in the kitchen when Charlie had siding boards in to warm up prior to painting. Notice lasagna in the foreground.

Other culinary highlights: fried tofu (if anyone wants this recipe, let me know -- it's wonderful) with a quinoa/arugula stirfry. The next day a shrimp curry using edamame (from our freezer!), with sticky rice.

Although I never mention sports, we were glued to the Series, also disappointed that it was so short. And football of course. I agree that Sunday is Football. Monday night is just extra. We went to bed last night when we knew the Vikes were going to be killed (or shredded, as Suzy so nicely puts it).

I am on disc 19 of S/N; should get through a couple more today.

Oops. I should go. This is pretty unedited, so forgive all solecisms, please.

You Will Be Assimilated

Gainesville

Cat on my lap, football on the tube. Doesn't get any better than this-- at least as a situation for blogging. Alas, the Vikes are being shredded.

Instead of the weekly Blessings, I spent the time decluttering the kitchen table and the area under the microwave; this latter had not been done for several years, since we stocked a ton of bottled water during our bad hurricane year. It's not an obvious improvement, but I can notice the difference. Got the towels done too.

Finished The Mermaid Chair. It definitely reads better than the TV movie adaption played. You might like it, Mom.

We continue to have colder than normal weather. When I changed sheets yesterday, I put on the electric blanket. We never plug it in, but Bill likes the weight of the wires. Along with the loose-weave LL Bean blanket as insulation, it makes quite a warm sleep-cover.

I'm going to have to go into work tomorrow. The Systems crew got tired of waiting for me to clear off my computer and relocated it to be "shared" with someone else. Need to do the rescue before the inevitable accident happens. I'm not ready! I don't want to think about going in regularly to work with the comics yet. I don't think.

Dunno what I'll do for dinner-- guess it will be something with frozen shrimp. Tonight I made lamburgers. Couldn't find a print of the recipe, and with no printer, I had to search for it on Leanne's website, then bring the laptop into the kitchen! A new twist on online cooking.

I continue learning my new gadget. It has mini versions of MS Word, Excel, PowerPoint, plus email, IM, wireless web access, on and on. Much better camera than my stand-alone digital camera. Plays mp3's, audiobooks, and video clips. Oh yeah, it makes phone calls too. For that, I have a tiny Bluetooth earpiece with mike, so I don't even have to have the thing in my hand-- it just has to be within about 30 feet for me to use the phone. We are Borg.

Pigskin

Gainesville

Hey, it's Sunday. That's a day to be lazy if ever there was one. And recuperating from a broken bone does not count as being lazy.

Football day here. I don't care what the commercials say: it's TODAY that it's all about the pigskin, not Monday. Jags won (amazingly enough), astonished to watch Oakland beat the Steelers, and glad to see the hated Panthers go down, even it was Dallas that did the job.

I'm better, still bursts of heroic sneezing, but not nearly so relentless. I did my usual things: changed (and laundered) sheets, cooked dinner, got the kitchen back to fighting shape.

Dinner was a beef broccoli stir fry over cauli-rice. Not particularly memorable. Not planning any heroic cooking this week, since it was such a slow start.

Bill and Carrot are napping, and I'm getting sleepy too. Feels like 1:30, but of course thanks to the semi-annual clock scramble, it's officially only 12:30. Will take another week for this to feel natural.

G'night everybody!

Sixteen (+51) Candles

Gainesville

There was a birthday I'd just as soon forget. Still sick in the morning, better in the afternoon, but not enough to go out. We will go the the play at the Hipp next Saturday, dinner after.

The weather was so bad it knocked out the satellite. We were able to watch the end of the World Series-- sorry it ended after just 5 games, but happy that our local boy Eckstein was MVP. TiVo is fubar without the satellite, so no recording of Battlestar Galactica. Good thing the SciFi channel repeats it numerous times Friday night so I caught one of them live.

The nice part of the day was Bill's gift: a twin to his latest device-- a Sprint 6700 Power PC/phone. It has a keyboard that slides out the side, lets you turn the thing sideways to act like a mini-pc, and basically does everything. As I seem to remember Lucy saying about a new swing/gym set in some long ago Peanuts, I'm scared to death of the darn thing. But I will learn. Okay, so I never completely learned my previous phone, but this time will be different...

I felt much better this morning, and so ventured out in the afternoon to shop. This probably was a mistake: too much too soon. Publix was very crowded and hectic and noisy. It took forever. When trying to get disposable litterbox down from a cramped upper shelf, I managed to knock out the flourescent light fixture above it. Other fun things.

By the time I got home I was sneezing and wheezing again, but had to fix dinner since I had some fresh monk fish. What a drag: wash hands; chop a little; grab kleenex, sneeze; deal with post-sneeze effluvia; wash hands... repeat endlessly. I managed to put a meal on the table, but since I couldn't taste anything, I can't personally vouch for its edibility. Bill and Carrot did not complain, but then again, they're very tolerant.

Your beautiful crocus card arrived today, Mom. They continue to dazzle, and everyone who sees one of your cards can't believe they were done with a scanner.

Last night's long hard rain was very welcome, as it eased the fire danger we're having. Today was in the 60's again, which probably didn't do my cold much good, but was nice, nonetheless.

I finished Strange/Norrell at last, and I loved the way it turned out. Perfect. I'd been annoyed with the way things seemed to be going when I last stopped reading, but need not have worried. Susanna Clarke knows what she's doing, and did not disappoint. Great read! And Sandy, as you suggest, I'm sure it will a great listen too.

Let the record show (there is still a record, isn't there?) that I kept up basic routines this week, and so am not TOO aghast at the thought of entertaining Doug next weekend, or the one after. Bill is interested in some sort of shorts and sandals around holiday time, and that would suit me fine.

Alas

Gainesville

Yeah, I had the same problem with Blogger. Looked like Google and their ad-stuff hijacked them for awhile

I woke up this morning with a bad cold. Spent all day in service of my dripping sneezing nose, and understanding that I could no longer lift things as usual, but did what I could of the routines. (The FL rule is, if you're out of bed, you can put on your shoes and get on with it.)

The new power supply for my buzzing desktop arrived, but does not fit. Another few days of working on the laptop. Not that much of a problem, really. Except that I don't have current email addresses for anyone on the laptop! Please, send me a message to the atlantic address, so I can contact you from the laptop if Blogger is not available.

Will see how I feel tomorrow. Plans are for dinner downtown and play at the Hipp. Here's hoping that's possible.

Still Here

Gainesville

Sorry about the long blog silence-- convergence of Blogger's problems, my desktop computer again having the buzzing problem bigtime, and every single night since Saturday being a major sporting event on TV has made it very difficult to blog. Using my laptop, but it too has problems: needs numerous updates and patches, plus the cat thinks SHE should be my one and only laptop. No sooner did I start to type that last clause than she hopped up here again! I' ve had to put this over onto the little round table-- much harder to type at this height and angle. This may be very short.

We are FINALLY having some cold weather-- into upper 30's last night, and did not make 70 today. About frakkin time. This also explains the cat's sudden burst of affection! Titania and I (covered in the fleece gator blanket Systems gave me) put out enough heat to be of feline interest.

The blog archives came in handy today when the buzzing was so alarming I was driven to attempt an emergency backup. Trying to figure out when I'd last done one, May 27 seemed to be an unusually frequent date. When I checked that date, I confirmed that was when we installed a new 200GB hard drive-- which means I have a VERY complete backup as of that date: my old HD. It also reminded me that since that didn't fix the problem, it isn't the HD anyway-- probably the power supply. Bill ordered me a new one tonight. We'll see it that lets me put off getting a new one for a few more months.

Sandy, I got your new avatar pictures tonight, but have not had a chance to do anything with them. Also, I still have issues to resolve with where my main web server resides now that I'm retired. I've lost my grip on the one atlantic.net (ie, in the last 10 years I've forgotten how to post files to it) and have never tried using the one at suznbil. Should investigate getting space on UF's plaza server.

I can hear that damnable buzzing all the way in here. Have to shut it down at night so we can sleep.

Top of the 9th. Looks like the Cards should take it. No strong feelings either way, but I know St. Louis was the team of our Iowa ancestors, and we had a nice visit there recently. Plus, an ex-Gator player Eckstein, plays for them. Bill and I saw him play several times in the friendly confines of the local ballpark.

I've been cooking mainly out of 15 minutes Low Carb without any real plan. So far so good, but it is stressful. Want to get back to doing a weekly plan, which works much better. Really nice salad out of there tonight though-- note to self-- Not Quite Middle Eastern. New FC came today and has some wonderful-looking stuff.

Almost finished The Lighthouse. After that I'll have to think about what to read next. Probably back to Strange/Norrell, or maybe some of Fragile Things.

Hope I can actually get this posted... edit later. Thanks for soldiering on, Mom, and glad to hear you're making progress with your mobility.

And I hope I can start blogging earlier in the day when it might be easier to deal with the cat asleep under my elbow.

Ben the Bruce

"The day will be Friday. The month will be October." This is what Ben told me in August, the last time he spent the night here, about when his next overnight would be. He's very calendar conscious; no way we'll be able to tell him he'll be five tomorrow and put him on a plane next week! So accordingly, I picked him up at daycare on Friday, and we came here. I'd suggested getting a pumpkin and making a jack o'lantern, but he didn't want to stop on the way (I suspect he had to go to the bathroom, which he did as soon as we arrived.) Just as well, because the pumpkin places (farms) on the way didn't have much to offer.

Anyway, we had a fine time. I was going to make grilled cheese for him for dinner and something else for us, but he wanted pizza, and Charlie certainly was not going to say no to that (I myself had grilled cheese). I made a large pizza for Charlie and about a 7-inch one for Ben. He didn't want mushrooms; both of them wanted pepperoni, which I happened to have. Ben ate every bite of his pizza except for one tiny sliver he graciously gave to Charlie, just so Charlie could taste it (it had a much thinner crust, something I've been working on). While I cooked, Ben played with a bunch of little people and furniture I bought for Julia in Fargo. He talks on and on, making up long dialogues and songs as he plays.

After dinner Ben was ready for a bath. We have a toy here he loves (left over from Julia). It's a little whale with a small fish in its mouth. When you pull the small fish out on an elastic spring-loaded cord (and the thing's in the water), the whale comes after the fish and eats it. It's quite marvelous. He must have played with it for half an hour, again talking and singing. It was hard for me to convince him that it was time to wash up and get out of the tub, but there was no fuss about it. Then after a few stories (including "Cotton Cat and Martha Mouse," a favorite of Marty's, Julia's and now Ben's, a gift from Dan years ago), I tucked him in, telling him he could read as long as he liked. It was about 8:30 by this time. Charlie headed up soon after that, and Ben told him, "I'm not going to bed now." He came down for a little while (it was a little early for him, I think), and we both went up at 9. I'm sure both Charlie and I were asleep before he was, but he stayed in bed. He's really quite easy to deal with. As I was drifting off, I heard him say, "Cotton Cat and Martha Mouse . . . ."

Oh, and when we first arrived in SV, Charlie was outside and had left the TV on. Ben immediately turned it off, not wanting to "waste lightricity."

In the morning he woke up at about six-thirty, telling me that sometimes the sun just doesn't come up. We went downstairs and I made him French toast (the day before I'd made a loaf of sandwich bread; we've been on a homemade pita kick, but that won't make grilled cheese or French toast). These things quickly become ritual. With Julia it was Ted's pancakes. Then Ben found a tiny hammer in his tool kit (tool box is a Dean & Delucca thing from Chris & Kay some years ago; hammer was from the peppermint pig Suzy sent one Christmas -- nothing is wasted) and wanted some nails to pound. Charlie got him out a block of wood, started some nails, found him a more effective hammer, and Ben amused himself for quite some time "bamming nails:"

We did a few other things, including watching a few cartoons on Noggin, Ben's favorite TV station, and then he wanted to know what Charlie was up to. I suited him up, assuming he'd come right back in. It was cold! After a while I checked, and they were down in the garden, Ben having hitched a ride in the wagon of the garden tractor. They were bringing up the juice bottles that we attach to spikes for watering plants in the garden:



And then Charlie took him to the ALLIC! We found all kinds of neat stuff (most of which I'd never seen): some tinkertoy kind of things (not the ones Julia played with -- these have curved plastic pieces and rubber balls as well as the normal shapes), a U.S. map puzzle for the near future (I've bought him a US map placemat, and we did some identifications of places on that at dinner and breakfast), and some other things. Ben was most pleased with a metal job that has a little handle, and when one twirls it, it makes a god-awful noise. A halloween thing (Suzy you may remember these). We let him take this home, though Marty said that there would have to be rules about it. Anyway, when we were coming down the stairs, Ben said, "My favorite place in this house is the Allic!!!!!" It is indeed a treasure trove. Julia probably remembers it as such, too. Charlie didn't take her up there much, but he'd disappear and return with some magnificent toy, just the right age for her.

So we had a great time. We never had any bad confrontations or any other kind of troubles. A most enjoyable visit. One thing we did between dinner and bath was go outside --just the two of us-- with a flashlight to look for turkeys. We knew they were asleep in the pines (which Ben calls the forest), but we went all over the place looking for them anyway, Ben leading the way with the flashlight. He was amazingly intrepid, going all the way up to the pasture gate and all around the house. I think he was ready to go up into the pines, but I wasn't. Too spooky at night, even with young male protection. Anyway, if we'd disturbed the turkeys roosting in the trees, it probably would have scared him, as they make a tremendous flapping as they take off.

So that was Friday. The rest of our week before that was taken up by housework (Charlie did finally vacuum downstairs, and I've done it once since then -- a messy time of year), closing up the garden, working on garage siding, and other such minor projects. I cooked a lot. Notable things were custards made with cheese (a nice lunch, but the leftover ones were horrible cold for breakfast), a tarte tatin, an apple cake, bread, chox chip cookies (today). I made the penne/ricotta/broccoli dish from the latest EDC, and it was extremely mediocre. Not recommended, just very blah. I was using up some ricotta left from making stuffed manicotti (very good, an old favorite) earlier in the week. On Friday night we had flank steak with tomato/shallot vinaigrette, from an old FC. That's really good. We've been trying to use up the rest of the tomatoes; there are about eight left, and we plan salad for dinner again tonight, with some of the bushels of arooogula that are still flourishing in the garden, even when the nights are 25 degrees. I have a yellow squash (gift of Ruth and Dave), and I may try the recipe Suzy mentions. Charlie will eat it when it's put in front of him, but I can't do that very often and have it work.

Some interesting things in the new FC, but I just got it yesterday and haven't gotten too far into it yet.

We've had days of horrible gloomy weather, but there's a little sun today. We're watching football, of course. Curse the lateness of the baseball games; we never get to see the end of one, and sometimes things change at the last. We're enjoying what we watch. We are both pleased that the Detroits and St. Louises are in the Series, since the media is unhappy about it. New York and the Bay Area are much bigger markets, ya know. Anyway, I was sorry that Oakland didn't make it. And we even watched college football yesterday -- some of the Cal game. We've just both read a book by John McPhee, Assembling California, which deals with, among other geologic topics, the faults. One runs right under Strawberry Canyon, but no earthquake yesterday. I wish Marty would immortalize for these pages her experience in the Loma Prieta, when she was in Monterey.

Enough of this rambling. Think I'll have a martini.

My Best Friend

Gainesville

I'm sorry you feel so bad, Mom. No one should have to be force-fed, even by themselves. And I never think of a drink as being "lonely" -- during the 15 years I lived alone, I often considered that solitary drink to be my best friend. I realize that is not politically correct, but it's the truth. A great pain killer (all kinds of pain) and clear proof that some diety, somewhere, loves us. I hope tomorrow is a better day for you.

Hard to believe you are dealing with ice up there. We had our second straight day in the 90's. No, that's not a typo: 9-0+. And much worse than that out on the endless frying pan of asphalt parking lots where I shopped today.

I usually don't cook on Friday, but went ahead with my plan to try a recipe for shrimp cocktail with stuffed green olives, and a re-run of grilled eggplant from an old FC-Q&D. Too bad I forgot my rule of not doing more than one complicated recipe at any one meal: 2-1/2 hours for two relatively light dishes. Made some mistakes with the shrimp -- red onion instead of white, twice as much garlic, and the magic olives probably should have been rinsed, and maybe less of them, as they were overpowering -- but it was worth trying again. The eggplant was as wonderful as before.

I picked up some books at B&N. I've grown bored with The Mermaid's Chair (nice plot but clumsy writing), but need something easier than S/N for awhile. Remains of the Day seems about right, and finally the new P.D. James, The Lighthouse, is out in paperback. Happy to see the latest Complete Peanuts (61-62) is out too. At Best Buy I picked up Altman's Prairie Home Companion, and very much looking forward to it, plus new albums by Dylan, Lindsey Buckingham and a group I heard on XM-radio yesterday, The Concretes.

Managed to cajole TiVo into recording the new Battlestar Galactica episode tonight (a manual date/ time/ channel setting) but just to be sure, watched live while finishing up kitchen routines. What an amazingly good show! Someday it will get the respect it deserves.

All in all, it's been a good week.

Mount Clutter

Gainesville

I followed through on getting up at 9:00, and indeed, the day did seem longer and I felt more productive. Nothing notable to brag about, but several things crossed off the weekly list. The only thing I didn't get to was decluttering (not counting the Zine stack, which I did reduce to 6 inches or so). That is my own personal mountain: Mount Clutter. Mount Washmore was conquered years ago, and seems like a molehill now.

The magic olives actually arrived today, but not until after 6:30, as Bill was arriving home. Too late to shop for the rest of the stuff. I think now I'll cook on Friday, usually a day off, just so I can try a shrimp cocktail that uses green olives and cilantro. I also need to use the eggplant. The Brussels sprouts will keep another few days, cute little cabbages that they are.

Tonight we had broiled lamb chops and assorted leftovers: the TTS slaw, Sandy's cuke salad, the last of the roasted squash and shallots. (Note to self: always reheat roasted squash-- it is not good cold, as I found out at lunch yesterday.) Nothing to brag about, but it was all good, and our lamb-loving cat was in heaven.

Hot and sweaty all day, overcast most of it, with moisture condensing out as fine warm rain by mid-afternoon. It actually rain-rained for about 10 minutes, then went back to drizzle, still going on as I type, and the cat came in wet from her nightly sojourn. It's good, because it's been so dry here for the past month that we're looking at fire hazards with all the dry grass and weeds added to the fall leaves.

So what to do on a dreary day? I re-watched the BG pilot, which after seeing two seasons plus two eps, looked completely different, actually LESS grim than the first time. You see which characters are going to be important, which are red-shirts, and everyone in between-- because this is one of those series where no one is safe, and there are many copies of the Cylons so... but no more spoilers. See it for yourselves.

Good luck with sleeping in your own bed tonight, Mom. And do I have to remind you of the core FlyLady mantra? You are NOT BEHIND (let alone "behinder and behinder"). There is no wagon, you cannot fall off. When you are ready (and not before) you will not jump, maybe, but step carefully in where you are. You are doing great. The fact that you manage to blog every day, let alone transcribe your jottings, is an amazing accomplishment you should be proud of.

Sandy, I'm so envious of your winter stash, and precious little danger that a power outtage would have any effect at all. Good place to be: in the middle of a large continent, extremes and all. And that cuke recipe is a keeper that gets better as it ages-- the peppers become less agressive, but infuse the cukes with subtle sparkle. Many thanks.

Time to bag it.

Recipes, etc. (R)

Gainesville

Great couple of recipes, Sandy. Now, along with with Marty's, I have three new things to try with those ingredients, which I usually have to hand. And I'm embarassed to say I can no longer remember exactly what I did with them (!), but I know it ended up with the sauteed chicken pieces topped with a slice of tomato and a slice of cheese melted over it all, the avocado slices added to the plate when serving. I don't think the oven was involved, but I can no longer be sure.

Alas, I don't have a great recipe for crab cakes. I have several, but none of them live up to what I could get at any lunch counter in Baltimore, let alone at Memorial Stadium or restaurants in Fells Point or the Inner Harbor. It's an art, plus it's the insanely fresh crab, neither of which I have.

Here is the Slaw Recipe I've been making for 8 years now:

Texas Two-Step Slaw

"This easy slaw recipe won $10,000 for Betty Schroedt of Wisconsin in the 38th Pillsbury Back-Off contest earlier this year [1998]. It took top prize in the single side dishes category -- and will turn your picnic menu into a winner, too." [Yeah, whatever.]

4 cups shredded green cabbage
1 cup shredded red cabbage
1/4 cup chopped red onion
2 jalapeno chilies seeded and finely chopped
2 T chopped fresh cilantro
1 (11-oz) can Mexicorn
1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese (about 4 oz)
Fresh cilantro springs, for garnish

Dressing:
3/4 cup bottled ranch saladdressing
1 T fresh lime juice
1 t ground cumin

Combine green and red cabbage, onion, chilies, chopped cilantro, corn and Cheddar chese in a large bowl. Mix well

For dressing, combine ranch dressing, lime juice and cumin in a small bowl. Mix well

Pour dressing over slaw; toss to coat. Garnish with cilantro springs, if desired. Serve immediately, or refrigerate until serving time.

--Gainesville Sun, 21 May 1998

I am waiting (-ting) for the shipment of Magic Olives to arrive before making a shrimp cocktail recipe that calls for them. They didn't arrive today, but I expect them Any Day Now. Too late for this week, though.

Tonight I made Sandy's Cuke/ Jalapeno salad, and it was lovely. Made some forgetable 2-alarm chili to go with it.

You are already making baby step progress, Mom. Don't push yourself too hard. Your main job right now is to love yourself (take good and careful care of yourself) and heal. It's way too soon to "get serious" about FL. If I were you, I'd make it a goal to sleep in your bed again. Then take it very slow getting up and going. VERY slow. It's not a race. There is no wagon you've fallen off of-- when you're ready, you will step back in where you are. This wagon/train moves at variable speeds and leaves no one behind.

Didn't post last night as I got caught up in Monday Night Football, then, in the 4th quarter, had to watch Battlestar Galactica, since TiVo can no longer be trusted. In retrospect, I made the right choice. Really.

I will post that image of me from 1967 eventually, but my scanner is not working. Need to get Bill to do it for me, and then do the good old sneakernet transfer, as our LAN does not work properly either.

Now then. If only I can stop the hiccups, I'll think about heading to bed. Sleeping til 11:00, as I did this morning, makes for an all too short day, especially this time of year. Nine seems like a respectable hour, don't you think? Then, when we go back to real (solar) time in a few weeks, suddenly I should find it easy to wake up at... 8:00 AM!

ruminations

Here are the flowers Suzy sent Mom in the hospital in Alameda;

Random reactions to Suzy's earlier blogs. Bill eating your about-to-be-tossed chicken stir-fry reminds me of once when Ted told me he'd finished up the beef in the fridge here. "What beef?" "It was in the back of the fridge." He lived, but after that I had to be careful what I left in there and for how long. Before going away on a trip and leaving Charlie here I always check carefully, too.

What is Texas two-step slaw? I have some cabbage I need to use forthwith. Do you have a good recipe for crab cakes? I love them but have never tried to make them. I once had a really good fish cake recipe, wherein some of the fish was blended up with other stuff and some was in chunks, but I've lost it. A newspaper item.

I have mixed feelings about Nora Ephron, but I must admit that I liked Heartburn. How could I not like a book that includes recipes? I've read about the new one, and will probably read it too. I liked your recipe for landfill surprise. We could have made quite a nice one out of Mom's fridge last Saturday. I keep up with fridge and freezer stuff, particularly in the summer, since there has to be room in the freezers for the new food (Mom and Marty get a fair amount of year-old-but-still-fine frozen vegetables), and the fresh stuff from the garden has to be kept under control, if only to guarantee space for new things. The fridge slips away some in the winter, though.

On Sunday I made (for noon dinner, an undying Sunday tradition in this house) a small pork roast, mashed potatoes, beets, and cooked cabbage. Yesterday I made a recipe out of the Star Tribune (Mom's paper) that was chicken breasts marinated in a blended mix of shallots, ginger, jalapeños, a little brown sugar, soy sauce, turmeric, coriander, oil and a little water. After a few hours of marinating, the breasts are gently sautéed. Then one is to make a glaze by boiling down half a cup of passion fruit juice. All I could find was passion/citrus drink (with a lot of water added), so I boiled down a cup of that to a syrup. Flung this on the breasts, served with sticky rice and a cucumber/jalapeno/peanut salad. The last of the season's cukes. It was all quite good. Took no prisoners, except for a few cukes. (In case it's not obvious, "took no prisoners" is my expression for "no leftovers.") Also made a tarte Tatin which was pretty good. Forgot to send some with Charlie to Mom's this morning, alas. Still have a fair number of apples left, and they're a kind that doesn't keep, Harrelsons.

I'm still trying to get on top of housecleaning. Got the downstairs bath yesterday, finally. I prefer to do big vacuuming on a sunny day (much easier to see), but we used up our sunny day planting garlic. Now it's misty, foggy and rainy (as it was yesterday, as well), but I'm just going to have to do it. Charlie has been spending a lot of time painting. He's painting the siding (one coat on the back, two coats on the front) before he puts it up. It's a huge job, particularly because each piece of cedar needs to be sanded on the front before painting. And the temperature is an issue, too. The primer coat is oil-based and requires 24 hours of temperatures above 45, not so easy to come by right now. He painted all day yesterday (in the garage), because we had a 24-hour window that included a warm night last night. Now a burst of Canadian air will put an end to that for a while. He can put the final coat on in the basement (water-based) because it doesn't have too much odor, but the oil paint is terrible. I got woozy every time I went into the garage yesterday, but it doesn't bother him too much. Don't know what the project for today is. If I put it off long enough he'll vacuum, and he does a much, much better job than I do. He puts on the brush and the crevice tool and gets the corners. I just want to be rid of the major dust and dirt.

Only one student visit this week (Wednesday); snow is predicted, but not much. Woodbury, which is not terribly far (an hour) and well traveled. I don't have to leave early, so it shouldn't be too bad. I am curious to know how Red is going to perform in snow. My last front-wheel drive, the '81 Omni, had very good traction. And if I really have to go somewhere in the snow, both of our pickups have 4-wheel drive. Charlie is also very nice about driving me places I absolutely have to go in the snow.

Oh, and as for reading. Do you know the books of Carolyn See?

Cape Quack

Gainesville

Overload! Great to hear from you, Sandy. But can't respond tonight, especially since your interest in the Barks image on the invitation sent me off on a quest to track it down. When talking the woman who did the invitation, I found she'd just been told "Barks Donald Duck" and did the best she could on the net-- since Disney actively protects online images, she had a hard time-- and the image she found was in Swedish!

What a great stroke of luck it was that she found this particular image. I have a lot more Barks-specific info at hand, so was able to do some convoluted calculations and searching. WDC 256 was January 1962, called "Northeaster at Cape Quack." I managed to find scans of the whole story, and it is classic Barks. I absolutely love it, one of my favorites ever, and living proof that his greatness has nothing to do with nostalgia, and that it went on well beyond when I stopped paying attention. There is something wonderful in every single panel, let alone every page. Here is the original first panel:


Meanwhile, it's too late to do a proper blog, let alone respond to the rest of Sandy's post. Let the record show that I did the Roasted Rosemary Butternut Squash & Shallots from FC #81, and it was wonderful. However, it only took half (the narrow end) of a fairly small squash, and I peeled the whole thing. Will have to do one of the other treatments to use up the rest. Had this with a desperation chicken recipe, "Seriously Spicy Citrus Chicken," which I must type in here someday, as it is so easy (really takes not much more than 15 minutes) and is Seriously Good.

Otherwise, football, mostly disappointing. Routines. Sheets. Cool weather. Spozed to be back to 90 again by Thursday. Yuck.

Sunday night, way too late, but hey! I don't have to get up early tomorrow! How sweet it is.

More manana. (It's good enough for me.)

brutally cold

So much to catch up on. I'll just have to plunge in.

First of all, I was wildly excited about every aspect of Suzy's retirement reception. The invitation was a killer (I don't place the story right off, but what a great picture!), the Barks cover wonderful (mud lake indeed!), the Latina girl asking the names of H, D and L in English, the big number of people who came, the old photo (scan, please!). I'm so glad it was a great occasion, richly deserved!

The recipe challenge: I have two takes on it. I might peel and chop the tomatoes, cook them down some with a little garlic. Brown the breasts lightly, then put them in a small baking pan, cover with the tomatoes, top with cheese, and bake for about 20 minutes at 350. Avocado slices as a garnish.

Or I'd sauté the breasts (shake in a little seasoned flour first) and serve with a salady mélange of finely cubed cheese, tomatoes and avocado, dressed with lime juice and a little ex-virgin olive oil.

What did you do, Suzy?

ArOOOgula indeed. We have bushels, barrels of the stuff. It goes to seed so quickly in the spring that one hardly gets to eat it, then in the fall those seeds have sprouted and it's much better than earlier in the season. Despite some hard freezes now, it's still thriving. I should find ways to use it other than in salad. I know it can be cooked like spinach. I can't bring myself to cook and freeze any of it; the freezers are all at capacity. Our fall crop of spinach actually succeeded this year. Charlie picked a lot of it before he came out to CA, put it in the fridge, where it kept nicely while we were gone. What was left in the garden survived a few light freezes, and so we ate a couple of salads, a couple of meals, and added about 15 packages to the freezer stash. The fall spinach, this year at least, was more flavorful and tender than what we grew in the spring (most of which bolted when it was pretty small).

Most of the garden is torn out now, and today (a beautiful day!) we planted and mulched the garlic. We still have some tearing out and cleaning up to do, but the garden work is truly nearing an end. Mom once asked me when we could just sit back and enjoy our garden rather than working in it all the time. "November" was my answer.

And we are now facing the luxury of simply reaching into the freezer for a frozen vegetable rather than going through a lot of preparation of them. We still have fresh carrots, cabbage and leeks in the downstairs fridge, though.

We came home from California to a world transformed; the fall color was beautiful, but it's gone now. We had two days of high winds, rain and some snow in the middle of last week, and that pretty much took care of it. The grass is still green, but we've had some very cold nights (under twenty a couple of times), so that won't last long. We've had fires every morning and night pretty much since we got home. I love to come downstairs to a fire and coffee in the morning (bless Charlie).

I've been terribly busy: eight school visits and a meeting in the nine school days since I got home. Some of these were able to be doubled up on the same day, but it kept me running (well, driving). I'm totally engrossed in Strange/Norrell on 26 CDs. I've just started disc 10. I like it a whole lot. It's wonderfully read, too. I'll interrupt it for a few days when the library comes through with the last Snickett on disc. Of course I'm on tenterhooks for that, but I'll wait; I was surprised to be able to reserve it on the first day it was out. I love our little library network!

Some good cooking ventures. I found a recipe in an old FC (I don't think Marty and Suzy have MS office, but there's a killer Excel FC index that I downloaded) for a pasta dish that was made of roasted fennel (the last big one of our crop, which had been in the refrigerator for at least a month), tomatoes (we're at the bitter end there, too), and garlic. After this stuff is roasted it's poured over spaghetti, then one adds cubed real mozzarella, grated parmesan, and torn basil leaves. It was really good. I also made a beef stew in the crock pot that succeeded (I've had several failures in this direction). I think the trick is to keep the ingredients simple. Adding wine or too many aromatics overpowers it. I think this is what I did:

Sandy's Slow-cooker Beef Stew

1 1/2 to 2 pounds stew meat in 1 inch pieces (I cut up a piece of bottom round)

Brown meat on all sides in a little olive oil. Throw into crock pot. Sprinkle on:

2 T flour, and some salt and pepper

Stir.

In the same skillet, cook slowly until soft and slightly browned:

1/2 cup chopped onions
1/2 cup chopped celery
half a leek, chopped, if you have one

Add to crock pot.

Add:

4 small carrots, peeled and cut into 3/4 inch slices
2 or 3 potatoes (I used russets, I think) in 3/4 inch dice
2 1/2 cups low-salt chicken (or beef) stock (Swanson's is the way to go.)
A couple of big sprigs of parsley

Stir it all up. Cook on high for 3 hours, then on low until you feel like eating it, about 4 hours more. (I think it'd take 10 hours all on low.) Half an hour before eating it, thicken with 1 1/2 TB flour and 1 1/2 TB butter, kneaded together (beurre manié) and dropped in in pea-sized chunks. Correct seasoning.

I don't know why this turned out so good, but it really was good. It's very plain. The carb-challenged could leave out the potatoes. I don't know if I'd dare substitute rutabagas or turnips, since they have such a strong flavor. But they, or cabbage, could be cooked separately and served with this.

There's much more to say, but at least this is a start!

Taste of Fall

Gainesville

Good to hear of the help Sandy and Charlie were able to provide. I know that having your fridge purged will make a big difference in finding things you want to eat. I spent some time doing that myself, though just dealing with leftovers. Since I'd done it recently, it wasn't so bad, only about 2 weeks worth of stuff-- 8 containers, only one of them gross. Bill snatched a 9th, a chicken stir fry I was ready to pitch, miked it, and wolfed it down. So far, he is alive and well. I know I toss lots of perfectly good food, but I'm of the better safe than sorry mindset.

Haphazzard day here. Never did get a weekly menu planned, went out to shop with only a list of what we were out of and a vague notion of restocking the freezer with Plan B's. Grabbed what looked good fresh, so we'll see what comes of an eggplant, Brussels sprouts, a butternut squash and an English cuke.

Since it was so late, I was looking for something in Publix's ready-to-cook area of the meat counter and drawing a blank. One of the fish counter guys who knows me came around and advised me to get the crab cakes, told me how to fry them in garlic butter, and said he'd be happy to come around and eat any leftovers. And they were pretty good, for industrial prefab stuff. But it makes me want to make some REAL crab cakes. As a Maryland expat, I know what those are. Needed to use a bag of cabbage, so made Bill's fave, Texas Two-Step Slaw. Had thought one of the squash recipes in latest FC would be perfect, but too late to do that. Found a viable can of sliced peaches in my decluttering, so had that with cottage cheese, which I've been eating lately with salt, pepper and Cholula spice mix.

We are having another tantalizing taste of Fall-- upper 50's last night, clear and dry today, lower 50's tonight. And suddenly the yard is covered with dry leaves, only three days after the yard guys were here. Supposed to last only another day, then get warm again. Such a strange season-- we still have not had the sudden dramatic cold snap that I love so dearly and celebrate so ecstatically, remembering my first year in Gainesville. Maybe it's the AC that blunts the contrast and makes the change seem more gradual than it actually it. At any rate, I put away the brand new short sleeved light-weight blouse I was planning to wear in favor of a mock t-neck, about right.

Before I forget, I want to remember that Sonia, a gregarious latina and long-time staffer friend looked at the Barks print during the party and said, "There's Hugo, Paco y Luis!" -- then asked me what their names were in English! This made me quite unreasonably happy.

Enough, Already

Gainesville

Here's the image they had made into a beautiful and gorgously framed print for my retirement gift. This dumbed-down version is just to give you an idea-- the scan was way too big for Blogger to cope with. I can't wait to get it hanging on the wall here in my study. (As always, click to enlarge.)

One of the unexpected gifts was a copy of Nora Ephron's latest, I Feel Bad About My Neck. I read it yesterday, practically straight through. It is wonderful. I chuckled a lot, sometimes out loud. I've always loved her. Heartburn introduced me to the idea of cooking as a competive game (and thereby saved me from getting caught up in it). Of course, Sleepless in Seattle is one of my very favorite movies ever. She manages to be witty and wise in equal measure, and I wish I knew how she does it. The new books is highly recommended to Sandy and Mom. (Marty, you're a bit too young for it, and Chris is way too male.)

Speaking of books, Mom, I'm about to order Adri's new book for you as a belated birthday gift. It doesn't come out until October 31, so expect it sometime shortly thereafter. Since I'll be ordering from Amazon to your address anyway, what were the books you were planning to order? I can very easily include them with my order.

[begin lecture] Please don't demand so much of yourself while you are convalescing. You are NOT expected to get all your routines back immediately! Don't even think of jumping back in where you are. The thing to concentrate on at this point is Baby Steps. If you can do 15, 10, or even 5 minutes per day of anything, that is enough. And eat anything you want, whenever you want, as much or little as you want: just EAT. [end lecture]

Yesterday I finally got back to finishing off the stuff from the single shelf I'd decluttered in the kitchen a month or two ago. I hadn't been able to decide whether to just dump it all in the garbage, or empty the cans and bottles for recycling, so just left it all in a plastic garbage bag on the floor, where it got kicked around a bit. Unfortunately, one of the things in there was an opened jar of sun dried tomatoes in oil. It had tipped over. The oil seeped out. The plastic bag leaked. Horrible mess, which I'd been putting off. Made myself do the recycle thing, emptying each and every container. It took 45 minutes. While putting the stuff into plastic bags to trash (we don't use the garbage disposal, since it ends up in the septic tank), I got to thinking of recipes:

Landfill Surprise

Take one large can pork and beans, one can Harvard beets, one can spinach, two bottles black olives (one pitted, one not), one can stuffed green olives, one bottle artichoke hearts, one bottle sundried tomatoes (with or without oil).

Place in large plastic ziplock bag, and squish to mix well.

Place in microwave for 10 minutes, or until explosion occurs.

Enjoy the hilarity that ensues.

Anyway, that's a mere sampling of what I tossed yesterday. Today I tackled another shelf, and it was much easier. Nothing nearly as evil as that, and only 8 cans need to be pitched. I picked a much sturdier plastic bag to hold the cans, and no open anything are in there. I learned, to my dismay, that low sodium soy sauce is supposed to be refrigerated after opening (others should be, but just "for quality") Let's hope I actually open those cans and make a new Landfill Surprise before another month or two go by. Not exactly exemplary progress in this week's Zone, but better than nothing.

Only sporadic success with keeping the other bathroom swished /swiped and hand towels changed daily. Baby steps.

Tried something new at Outback last night, can't remember the name of it but it involved chicken breast, shrimp and an amazing corn cake thing. The place was jammed, for reasons yet unknown, and neither Mel nor Angie were there. The novices running things knew us, though, so we were well cared for.

Today was a short day for me: since it was a long day for Bill, he left so early that I didn't get the usual wake-up signals, and so slept til [blush] 11:00. I know I must have accomplished something other than reading several days-worth of papers, opening and reading the mail, in addition to the usual routines, but I'll be gosh-darned if I know what it was. Maybe that was enough.

Brutally Cool

Gainesville

Marty, you are in the early lead for the recipe challenge-- it sounds wonderful! I'm definitely going to try it. Thanks.

Mom, if I've never heard a better testimonial to the virtues of FlyLady's fly-washing -- the very fact that you identified your very understandable feelings as a "Pity Party" obviously made all the difference: you couldn't get that particular party started, seeing it for what it really was. I've had the same experience, on a smaller scale, several times. As soon as I think, "Oh, here comes a Pity Party," the emotional energy just dries up. The recognition and the naming defuses it. Emotions are great fuel, but better if we can channel them into enthusiasm and passion for what we love. Yeah, some venting, some grief is to be expected. But the PP is something beyond. I'm proud of you for recognizing it. I hope you can cut yourself some slack, ease back into routines, and keep on eating anything that seems at all appealing.

And speaking of parties, I got through the retirement party this morning, and it wasn't all that bad. As expected, thanks to Bill, the theme was Barks' ducks. I am the Duck Girl. They had the area decorated with Donald pictures and a cake featuring Disney characters. The usual gift these days is a nicely framed picture, usually of some rustic Florida scene from Special Collections: my picture was a Carl Barks cover! Donald relaxing in a hammock, reading a book, smiling at the kids who are playing with a hose, making Mud Lake on the lawn. I was overwhelmed with the gesture, and the perfectly chosen image.

I stood, smiling, not able to eat or drink any of the lovely breakfasty stuff offered, for about two hours. By the end of it, my voice was gone, and my feet (I was wearing a short skirt and heels) threatening to sever diplomatic relations with the rest of my body. There were over 100 people there, and I didn't get to even speak to all of them. And quite a few I knew wanted to be there but couldn't. A couple of out of the blue gifts that I didn't get a chance to respond to. One included a priceless photo of me, in 1967, just hired in my first professional job as junior humanities cataloger, along with my first teacher/mentor, Mrs. {Frances} McDonald. I had never seen the picture, never knew it existed, and it is a treasure. I will post it to the blog, along with some of the memories it provoked, but not tonight.

Tomorrow my first order of business will be to start on the 15+ messages I need to send to the wonderful, thoughtful gestures people made.

Went to lunch with Bill and Barbara afterwards at Applebee's, and had something new: a Bruschetta Burger, possibly the best burger ever: topped with pesto, minced tomato stuff, over mozzerella, on foccacia, served with real potato fries done with a bit of garlic and slivered parmesan. Heaven! I had to ask for a box, which I never do, but it was worth it.

There was a baby shower scheduled in Cataloging in the afternoon, so I knew there was no way I could get any work done in the afternoon, so had Bill and Barbara drop me off at home. Still time enough to get the country pork ribs started in the crock pot on high and have it done in time. Something I'd made before and knew was good. And it was again. Steamed some sugar snap peas and miked some hubbard squash. (This latter needs more work.)

Bill came home with a magical new toy-- I call it The Convergence, and will write more about it when there is time to explore it further. Just say for now, it is brutaly cool. As was the whole day, now that I think back upon it.

Recipe Challenge

Gainesville

One of the problems with pricey jeans is that they demand shoes that, while not equally pricey, are at least new and stylish. I wore them out shopping today, and they picked out two pairs they liked.

While taking them shopping, I stopped by Best Buy, usually very quiet on a Tuesday, and discovered a local radio station blasting away in the parking lot, plus Domino's giving away pizza, plus a huge fancy tour bus, and all the employees guarding the door. I sneaked past all this, only to see that the store was crammed with people gathered around a rock band setting up to give a performance in the store-- what the...? I turned around and left. Still have no idea what was all about, and care less.

Spent the extra time (and money) in B&N, picking up Scott McCloud's latest, Making Comics (looks like great fun!), Neil's latest, Fragile Things (ditto, but totally different kind of fun, short stories and his whimsical poetry), The Mermaid Chair (to check against the TV adaption), a new NFL guide, and -- best of all -- the latest For Better or For Worse collection: She's Turning into One of Them! Of course, I immediately zero in on things that I could use to update my paper, although of course I never will; just some sort of scholarly twitch.

Tomorrow I have to be at work at an early hour for one last time-- and it's my own damn fault: I asked for a morning event, hoping to keep the hoopla to a minimum. But I was thinking it would happen in my last week of work. Oh well. I have a list of errands and computer-related loose ends that still need tying, so I'll need to stay the whole live-long day. Poor pitiful me! A whole day at work! How come Bill isn't more sympathetic?

Tonight I invented a dish, since I couldn't find a menu that suited the ingredients I wanted to use: frozen ch breasts, Roma tomatoes, sliced pepper jack cheese, an avocado. Okay, bloggers: What would YOU do with those four ingredients? My solution, while not elegant, actually drew praise from man and cat. (They had not been tipped off that it was an experiment.)

Bill downloaded an episode of South Park tonight that was about World of Warcraft. We watched it on his laptop, and I know just enough about WoW for it to be hilarious.

Mom, I'm very glad to see you post, however short. And those after dinner drinks are called "nightcaps" -- a lovely concept that helps you kick back at the end of the day and get ready for sleep. The pre-dinner drinks work fine as long as someone else is doing the cooking and the clean-up.

Time to sleep. Time to wake up early, one more time. And yet another unedited post gets flung into the blogosphere. Oh well, better than nothing, I guess.

Ah-ROOOOO-gula

Gainesville

What good news, Mom! I know how glad you must be to regain your domestic independence and have time genuinely to yourself. It's also good that you have such a good local support system-- not just family but also service people you've turned into friends. And congrats on graduating to one crutch/cane in record time. I guess experience matters...

Hope you had a nice birthday. You didn't mention it, so I assume it wasn't a disaster.

I did almost all the weekly Blessings today. It feels so good to have them done, but to also see how good the house looks, despite the remaining clutter. Just the magazine stack and the kitchen floor away from having them ALL done. A load of laundry in addition to the towels.

Saw a message today that said hotels in San Diego are already filling up for the next Comic-Con-- in July! The other comics scholars recommend making a contingency hotel reservation now, then trying to get a conference-rate room when they become available in January. This is about as likely as getting a ticket to Springsteen in NYC via TicketMaster, but maybe worth a try. I did score a fall-back hotel reservation-- at a Comfort Inn in the Gaslight district, near where we stayed two years ago. The 10-day stay would set us back a mere $3,300 and change-- plus airfare, car rental, food, etc. We could have quite a nice cruise for that, including all meals and entertainment, and zero stress. Unless we get incredibly lucky in January, our first Comic-Con trip will probably prove to be our last. I would like to visit SD again sometime, but trying to do this during this zoo/frenzy is insane. I could feel my stress-level rise the longer I worked on it.

Made a very nice dish tonight with the unpromising name of "Skillet Pork Chops #3." It was a keeper, though a bit complicated in execution. Shoulda started about 45 minutes earlier. With it I ad libbed a salad of arugula dressed with lemon juice and olive oil topped with sliced avocado and tomato slices. Quite good-- a new brand of bagged arugula turned out to be wonderful, and I still have half the bag left.

Now to come up with two more meals. I HAVE to go on a liquor run tomorrow or I'll be drinking Sandy's Bombay, then Mom's Gilbey! Think I'll get another case of half-gallon Tanq. If Bill doesn't continue requesting Chris' Gin & Tonic when the weather gets cold, I'll have a good supply for the winter.

Speaking of which, the season may finally be changing. Today it was in the low 60, and didn't reacy 70 til around noon. I put on a mock turtleneck plus a sweatshirt, and it felt good, even when doing the Blessings. It almost qualifies as the Official Sweatshirt day I always celebrate-- but not quite. Plus, the AC is running tonight, and the air is dense with mosquitos-- I've dispatched at least half a dozen tonight alone.

Football tonight was grim-- 3-3 tie most of the way, then Baltimore went down to Denver. Boo. Decided to watch the new Sorokin show (Studio 60) instead of the third quarter (on live network TV) and it was very good. Need to figure out some way to at least be able to videotape from the cable feed until it all gets straightened out.

I just cancelled the SD hotel reservation when I realized they were going to charge my credit card for the full amount-- nine months in advance! To hell with that-- I was expecting to be charged for only the first night, as is standard practice in the civilized world. Yeesh.

Forgive yet another un-edited entry. It's 1:00 AM tomorrow, and both brain and fingers are out of gas. Time to hang it up.

Media Limbo

Gainesville

Started this once before on the laptop, but had to abandon it.

Fall Sunday = Football. That pretty much consumed the day, but in the background I kept thinking, "It's Mom's birthday!" and hoping you had a happy one. I figured a call from me would just add to the confusion, and besides, you hear from me most days.

It was all to enjoyable to watch Jax pound the Jets into powder, 41-0. But sad to say that the Fish and Bucs lost close ones. And was glad to see San Diego get a football win on the same night they got knocked out of the baseball playoffs.

How sweet it is to have the Invincible, Best Line-up Yankees, at least the best money can buy, wiped out once again. This just in: it's the best TEAM that wins, not a collection of over-paid super star egos.

Also sweet: having TiVo back in action with beautiful clear vid. Programing info all in place and up-to-date. However, the problem with displaying regular broadcast networks (which we have to get from cable, still) has not been solved, so my plans to sample a few new shows are on hold. Gainesville is both too large and too small a market to interest the satellite provider, so we're caught in media limbo for now.

Made a skillet stroganoff with flank steak-- it turned out well enough, but was very tough. I shoulda cut it in smaller strips.

New week starts tomorrow. Can't remember how long it's been since I had two whole weeks off. Maybe after this one, I'll actually believe that this vacation may go on longer than usual...

But Wednesday morning I have to go in one more time as employee, for the official so long, plus a few clean-up errands on my computer. Then I'm FREE... free fallin'!

Oh, TiVo

Gainesville

Good to have your catch-up blogs, Mom. It sounds like you're making great progress toward regaining independent living. It seems eating right could be a problem, though. You should consider stocking up on complete frozen meals -- NOT store-bought TV dinners (very unhealthy) but some of the gourmet health-conscious kinds. Don't even think about cooking for yourself for a few days. You know how to use the net, so you can shop around for what would work for you.

How nice to have Kay's help in the kitchen, not only with cooking and clean-up, but also doing some organizing. Wish someone would do that (organizing) for me! I'm counting on next week being the Kitchen Zone to spur me back to dealing with pantry mess. Although I must admit that I didn't do much in the way of tackling the catastrophe in the Great Room last week.

I did do all my daily and weekly routines, though, plus added the master bathroom to the daily swish/swipe routine, something I've been wanting to do. I also Got everything on my to-do list checked off. Not bad for Week One of the new life.

Yesterday was a Gainesville-wide holiday: Homecoming. Always before, the Library has had to remain open, even though there were no classes and all the schools are closed. Last year they gave us the afternoon; most people took the morning as annual leave, because the parade made it impossible to leave at noon. This year they FINALLY gave us the whole day off, so Bill got a well deserved holiday.

We went shopping at the mall in the afternoon, and had a late lunch at the Macaroni Grill. My quest was for NYDJ jeans-- the ones FL's Ms. SmartyPants has been raving about. I'd discovered Dillard's carried them, and managed to find a pair that fit. By far the most expensive pair of jeans I've ever bought, but my god, they're right: they look fabulous, AND they are incredibly comfortable. Usually any pair of jeans that looks good on me requires choosing between breathing and sitting-- only one or the other at any one time. (And don't even think about bending over...) If these hold up for more than a few months of wear and washing, they will be well worth the $$.

And the rest of yesterday was consumed by Battlestar Galactica-- the season 3 premier was at 9:00, and I ALMOST finished watching the DVD of season 2.5 in time-- missed it by 15 minutes. Ordinarily this would be no big deal, but with TiVo out of commission, it was difficult. Fortunately, the SciFi channel reran it again immediately, at 11:00, but I had to watch it the old fashioned way-- wretched picture, no pause or rewind, glued to the tube until commercials. This last interferred with the barmaid service Bill has come to expect, so...

Today he tackled installing the "new" TiVo box we bought in February 2003. That is an eternity in electronics time-- the box is now obsolete, and Bill had a hard time finding anyone at TiVo that knew anything about it, so nearly an hour on the phone getting the info needed to make the transfer. (We'd bought it to take advantage of an offer to move our "lifetime" subscription over to newer software, but then never seemed to find a good time to make the change, and as long as the old box worked okay, kept putting it off-- way too late to do that now.) Then the fun of downloading the software and programming info over the phone line. It took an hour or so for the former, over 6 hours for the latter, and dozens of manual re-starts/re-dials. It finally finished about 15 minutes ago, at midnight. You do not want to know the gruesome details. Still another 4-8 hours for the programming info to be unpacked and loaded (and in TiVo time, that could be days) so recording can be done, but at least that part is local and doesn't have to go through a creaky modem. Moral of the story: if you buy new electronics hardware, do not wait 3.5 years to install it. Well, duh...

Oh and by the way, the BG season opener was awesome, but terribly depressing. This is NOT escapist fare. And five hours of it yesterday was too much of it in one day. I woke exhausted after terrible dreams. Scary stuff, and all too close to present day reality.

Tonight's dinner was a fairly dishonorable defeat. The Gator football game didn't start until 3:30, so had to wait to shop til then. Bought things that would go quick-- salmon fillets preseasoned with cajun spices, a spring greens salad with apples, raisins and nuts, and sushi. Instructions for the salmon said to broil it, but the top blackened, one piece was overdone, the other underdone in spots. The salad was so far past it I couldn't rescue it, though I wasted a lot of time picking out the yucky stuff, and even put dressing on it before deciding, after tasting, it was inedible. The sushi, at least, was fine. Note to self: dial back on the pre-fab stuff. Not worth it.

And, let the record show, yesterday's online 4-star Sudoku has thus-far defeated me, despite spending way too much time on it. Today's 5-star, though, I did easily in one pass. Go figure. They keep them online for about 6 weeks, so I'll get it eventually.

Hey! It's after midnight, so let me be among the first to wish you a

HAPPY BIRTHDAY, MOM!

Day 3

Gainesville

I'd say you did more than just make an effort today, Mom. You are indeed lucky to have a PT person you already know and have good rapport with. And aren't you glad you did all that Nordic? Comes in handy now. Thanks for making the effort to blog. Being so far away, I do appreciate the reports on how you're doing, as I think about you often throughout the day.

Day 3 of my new life went well-- the very best part is being able to actually relax for a change. No deadlines. No impending meetings or business trips. The usual free-floating anxiety is reduced dramatically. Like being on a cruise, except this one is not scheduled to end in 10 days.

Since the time is now mine, I find myself willing to get up earlier (around 9:00), get my morning routines out of the way, get a few things done, then enjoy the rest of the day... what a concept!

Baseball again today, during which I wrote bills and get a load of laundry done. Getting caught up on some magazine reading (both paper and online) too.

Dinner, alas, was a failure. I should know better, having tried something similar before: there is no such thing as "Noodleless Lasagne"-- a contradiction in terms. What we ended up with was baked Jeff-Goop (Sandy will remember this) -- tasted great, but so gloppy it had to be served in bowls, like soup. Bill and Carrot were dellighted with it, but I was appalled. Oh well, at least the week of cooking is done. And I've had great lunches every day so far.

When the Yankee/Tigers game was finally called off due to rain, I watched two Battlestar Galactica episodes-- only three more to go and I'll be caught up in time for the start of season 3 on Friday. It will be the first time I've watched this series live. I've had to censor my entertainment press reading to keep from being spoiled-- so glad that part is finally at an end. Very dense and engaging drama on many levels.

And so to bed.

Whole Lotta Baseball

Gainesville

Welcome home, Mom. Although, to a very different home experience than the one you left. I'm glad you have an onsite helper there to get new routines established. It's good that you have the motivation to do your PT and exercise also: regaining your much-prized independence. Just take it slow-- if ever there were a good time to apply the baby steps metaphor, it's now.

Marty, we both love hummus. I used to make it long ago. I look forward to a transcription of your by-feel recipe. That would make a great changeup from the endless variations on the sour cream/cream cheese theme we know and love.

I was assuming that as the Barks expert, Sandy, you would know the story in that invitation image. I see in the lower left hand corner that it was WDC 256, but that would have been long after I stopped reading them as a kid. I might have it somewhere in my various reprint collections, but have not looked yet. My favorite part of the panel is the depiction of the weather-- the beautiful fog bank off shore, and the way the wind has blown back the tassel on Donald's hat, and bent back the bills of the kids' caps. I can almost taste the sea air, and of course, the lighthouse imagery is powerful on many levels. Bill was complicit in this selection-- when asked what kind of comics I was into, he said, "Barks' Ducks!"-- but someone else chose the panel, and obviously it's somewhere in the Library's holdings.

Got the paperwork dropped off this morning, picked up the dipping veggies, got them processed, finished the Blessings, and watched a whole lotta baseball on my severely fubar AV system. (Will spare you the details of this tale of woe, for now anyway.) The only game that went my way was Oakland winning, but I know that was probably a major bummer for all you you-- I do like the Twins, and wish they'd drawn either the Yankees or Detroit so I could root for them too.

Made Grecian Skillet Ribeyes (an old favorite) along with Fauxtatoes and sauteed zucchini. It's so nice to have the time to do a relaxed mis en place, and not have to do everything at breakneck speed at the last minute. I could get used to this...

More to say, but the yawns are intervening. Gee, it's not even 1:00 AM yet.

The Donald

Gainesville

I've been dreading the delayed farewell party, until this morning, when I saw this.

(click on image to enlarge)

How delightful! I don't know who chose the image, but it's goddam PERFECT. Maybe, with comics as a theme, it won't be as hateful as these events usually are.

Felt like a normal vacation day-- up around 9:30, morning routines, 4 loads of laundry (including sheets and towels), comics reading (takes about 45 minutes per day online), various email monitoring, shopping at Publix. Spent 15 minutes in The Zone taking 4 armloads of catalogs out to curbside recycling, and (alas) bringing in the 4 armloads of files that escaped three separate triage operations from Blue's cab.

And I wasn't even all that achy-breaky backed today; probably more hauling was the right thing to do. Tomorrow morning will tell the real tale, though.

Got two of the weekly Blessings Done: floors and carpets. All in all, a pretty good start. Plan to add to routines slowly, in the approved baby-stepping manner. No crashing and burning.

Accidently came home with freshly steamed (rather than raw) shrimp due to a misunderstanding with the fish counter guy. I ended up peeling the cooked shrimp and serving them as is instead of the Greek Scampi I had planned. Fruit salad. Regular salad. No cooking involved, which is good, since it is still ridiculously hot here. I burned my fingers badly opening Blue's door in the Publix parking lot, blisters and all. Feh. This is October?

Will need to go out tomorrow also-- drop off a retirement form, and get some Dipping Veggies (his term) for Bill-- he's addicted to dipping carrot, celery, zucchini, etc., in any and all dips-- perfectly legal under Atkins. (Forgot to pick them up today.) So farthe dips are mostly store-bought, but now that I have some slack, I plan to explore the wonderful world of dips that Mom has so thoroughly mapped. So, what's everyone's favorite dip?

Very glad to hear that the West Coast Gang made it back to Wisconsin safely. I hate traveling eastward, as it thwarts my bio-rhythms, but it should help that none of you has to get up what will seem ungodly early tomorrow. I hope. Good luck with the re-entry. Look forward to hearing how it all goes.

Time to play bartender again (second round) and watch a little more football, the duel of happy quarterbacks.

Amazing Techno-Woman

Gainesville

Love your idea for a book, Mom-- it can be the follow-up to your best-seller, Hotels I've Known and Loved (with chapters for sitting rooms, kitchenettes, bedrooms, bathrooms (a special section for "trickies"), and of course, views out the windows. Maybe a separate section for balcony sunset shots.

Look forward to a continuation of the adventures you started relating last night-- but I bet you won't have time tonight, what with getting ready to head home tomorrow. I hope all goes will with this complicated venture. It's going to be an interesting few weeks for you. Not surprising that you are amazing your care-takers with your technological prowess. I love the image of them standing rapt, looking at your laptop slide show. They'll be talking about the Amazing Techno-Woman for a long time to come. Maybe there will be songs and legends.

Sandy, so happy you got to meet [the person I call] EJ, and experience his Tiki Bar. I hope you'll do a blog post about it, for posterity, as it'were. Kathy is wonderful too, and they've been very kind to me over the years. I should post some of my writings from that era when we met, which was nearly 30 years ago.

I had another day of playing stevedore-- I know it's going to catch up with me, probably tomorrow. We took Blue to work in the late morning, and loaded the unboxed books into Blue: each booktruck load had to be arranged by me, kneeling in Blue's corregated bed liner, into long stack-ready rows. Amazingly enough, all of about 9 shelves-worth fit into a single layer of Blue, standing on end.

Of course, that left getting them all OUT of Blue-- staging them in stacks in the kitchen table, then moving them into the Great Room armload by armload, on my own. (Bill had to go back to work.) They took about 3-1/2 rows in front of the windows. I truly hope this represents the bottoming out of the tidal wave of clutter that drowned us recently. It took a long time. My back was aching, and I'm sure I'll be in agony tomorrow if I don't do some stretching and other exercise, despite inevitable pain. I need to get out to shop for food, too.

I created another meal tonight out of nothing much at all: an unmemorable stir fry (had two sweet peppers I needed to use, a single frozen chicken breast, a large sweet onion, and plenty of celery. I also had 4 spare oz of low-carb linguine, and an unwashed head of frilly green lettuce. I'd forgotten what a pain in the butt lettuce in the raw can be! How lazy and spoiled that pre-washed stuff has made us. The meal was forgettable, but it was adventure creating it, and a bitch to clean up after. All done, though.

Somewhere in there was some football. I listened while doing other stuff, averting my eyes while the 49ers were demolished by KC, and agonizing as the Jags shot themselves numerous times to manage a loss to the 'Skins. Nice to see the Bears win, though I like Seattle too, so bittersweet.

The Little Nemo book was indeed mind-blowing when I opened itlast night. Despite all the hype, it is probably the single most beautiful book I am lucky enough to own.

Tomorrow is, quite literally in one sense, the first day of the rest of my life. We'll see how that goes.