Sunny With Birds & Cooking

The sun came up today!  No, I mean visibly, the clouds were mostly gone and so what came over the horizon around 6:30 this morning was that round, shiny orb that casts shadows and warms the pavement.  Yay, sunshine!

A mob of sparrows came to bathe in the sunny birdbath and a hummingbird came for a noontime drink.  Durwood saw a bunch of crows mobbing one of the neighborhood hawks but I wasn't fast enough to the window.  Drat.

The sunny day gave me the oomph to get off my duff and get some things done.  Yesterday I decided to do some "investment" cooking this weekend (to make suppers a bit easier until Durwood gets his feet back under him so he can go back to fixing supper) and today's sunshine got me making a shopping list while a batch of banana nut bread baked.  Do you know how good a batch of Rudolf's Banana Bread smells while it's baking?  Oh my Mary, it makes me want to butter the very air and eat it.  I've got one of the loaves in the freezer, one on the counter to eat, and the third loaf bagged up to give to our neighbor who mowed our lawn unasked when we were gone a couple weeks ago.  (gah, it's already been more than 2 weeks since we got home from Out West, I can't cope with the speed of time passing)  I picked out two chicken recipes and one beef recipe which should give us close to a dozen nights' worth of eats.

I went to Sam's for a few things and then to Walmart for the long list of the majority of the ingredients (and a pair of new jeans; I deserved them) and finally to Copps for Lemon Burst Yoplait that is my favorite (it was on sale AND I had a coupon), oh and I stopped at the Family Pet Center for some peanuts in the shell for the bluejays.

For supper I bopped over to Tony Roma's because my Happy Birthday certificate from them expired after today so I ate a few ribs and all of the fries (let's face it, reheated fries are nasty and disappointing) and brought home the rest of the ribs and the little loaf of bread and the thimbleful of coleslaw they give you (can they spare it?) to share with Durwood, so we'll have ribs at least one more night.  Yum!

September 13--Paul Wirz, Women of Amboina.  The mud of the river bottom squished between their toes as they stood at the water's edge.  The hems of their skirts absorbed the muddy water like wicks, drawing an uneven brown line up to their knees.  Kaye and Rina walked along every afternoon when it was so hot and still that it felt as if the world stopped turning.  They walked as far as Dogtown where the hobos and gypsy men stayed even though their mamas told them not to.  They kept close together and didn't talk to the men they met.  One of them, a tall, dark-eyed man in a soldier's coat would watch out for them and keep the other men away.  He sent them home if they strayed too far into the camp.

I learned a new mantra from DD last weekend--"Not my circus, not my monkeys"--that she says is a Polish proverb.  I like it, almost as much as I like "it isn't rocket surgery" or alternately "it isn't brain science" which are handy phrases to use when you are teaching someone something.  I love words, don't you?  They're so handy for conveying things.  Handy.  Today's Photo-A-Day theme is "out of place" so I snapped a picture of my car in the garage.  Usually Durwood's van lives in there but it's off getting fixed so I get to park in there.  Seems odd and, well, out of place.
--Barbara