I'd show you pictures of the soda bread sliced but once the eating started, well, there just wasn't time between bites and gobbling everything up to snap photos of any of it. DS & DIL1's home-corned beef was so tender and so delicious, it put the store-bought kind to shame. DS chopped the cabbage, blanched it, and sauteed it with a tiny bit of olive oil and some toasted bread crumbs. DIL1 made boiled red potatoes and carrots to go with it. There was horseradish, nice grainy mustard, and pickles for condiments. And then there was the bread. HZ cut each loaf in half (I was in the potty when it was slicing time) and then sliced the halves, nibbling crumbs all the way, and the 6 of us nearly emptied the plate. OMG, that's good bread, moist and flavorful, not dry and crumbly. H&JZ invited us for Easter and I asked what to bring. HZ mentioned the bunny cake I made last year and JZ said that was a good idea... as long as I made the cake out of "that bread." I'll see what I can do. (click the link in the first line for the recipe) (I only took pictures of Porter, she's as good-looking as the bread just not as easy to eat. All that fur gets in my teeth. Get a grip, I'm kidding.)
Neither of us was hungry when suppertime rolled around so 'long about 8 o'clock we made ourselves a chopped salad. Have you ever had a chopped salad? No? You need to make one. It's a revelation in the salad world. At least the salad world of the upper Midwest. In Green Bay, WI. On Mennen Ct. I think so anyway. Here's a recipe. It's from the Pioneer Woman. I like her, she puts a lot of butter in things, cheese too, and her husband's a stone cold hunk. Read her blog or, better yet, watch her Food Network show (her husband Marlboro Man's on it too) for a mix of cooking and cattle ranching and kid raising. Also Cowboy Josh is adorable.
It's supposed to snow about 4 inches on us today--again, so I'll be leaving early so I can go to Walmart to snag some Cheerios. I'm running low and there's no way Durwood will be going out in the driving snow for cereal. I don't really blame him; I'd stay indoors during a snowstorm too if I could but it's Monday and that means it's payday so I'M GOING AND YOU CAN'T STOP ME. And maybe Walmart still has some of that clearance yogurt I got the other day. It's Chobani Flip; it has a second compartment with toppings. I ate coconut yogurt with almonds and dark chocolate bits the other night and have a key lime one with graham pieces and white chocolate in the fridge. I'll buy more at 88 cents each if they're still there. Yum. Wonder how many I can fit in the back of Beverly?
March 18--Lewis Hine, Icarus, Empire State Building. His muscles flexed like the steel cables as he inched his way up. The city was puny in the distance and its heat dissipated so that the air was pleasantly cool. Sweat beaded his face as he grimaced with the effort of the climb. When he reached the turnbuckle joining the cable lengths, he gave one final push and braced his foot on the fist-sized nut of the bolt holding the cable eyes. The wind was gentle that afternoon, playing with his hair and cooling him so that his hands were dry and confident as he reached up over his head to lash the cables together. He had to believe in himself and his ability to work with his hands while not loosing the grip of his legs that held him in place in the sky.
And now it's time to shower and make myself presentable to face the coming snow. I'm thinking I'll wear my boots today.
--Barbara
Going to the grocery to buy ingredients for all that was an adventure. Getting out of the driveway was the real adventure because no one ever told me not to put regular gas in the snowblower, to only put premium gasoline in it (lawnmower too) because the regular makes the engine surge and cut out. I started it and it stuttered and nearly stopped, then surged, then stopped, so I started it again and it rrrRRRRrrrRRR-ed a bunch, and I was standing there in the gassy exhaust, frustrated and gritting my teeth, waiting for it to settle down. If I lowered the choke too soon it died, then when I started it again it went back to surging. Gah! I have some stuff from the small engine mechanic to put in (fuel conditioner or something) and now I have premium gas for it, but I'm afraid that the alcohol has degraded the fuel line and there's little pieces of stuff clogging up the carbetator, uh, carbonator, oh, carbullator, dang it, you know what I mean. (I know just enough about engines to sound like I know something and then, boom, I forget the word and I'm back to being the "little woman" in the mechanic's shop.) The snow was too wet and packy to just drive over it and let it melt and too heavy to shovel so I stuck with it and finally got it running smoothly so I could clear off the snow and GO. Of course my coat was so exhaust smelly that I had to take it off and leave it in the car while I shopped then I hung it on the front door to air out. Stinky.
I had to go to 3 grocery stores to finish my list but once I got home I dug right in and made the Ginger cake. I had to buy a bottle of Guinness, just one, and used about half of it in the cake so, oh dear, I had to drink the rest. Even I, a non-beer-drinker, know better than to pour perfectly good Guinness down the drain. (It's not bad, for beer, but some of DS's beer is better.) It took for-freakin'-ever to grate a tablespoon of fresh ginger that, added to the 2 tablespoons of ground ginger, makes the cake very gingery, but with brown sugar, white sugar, and molasses too I think it's a good balance of sweet and spicy/hot. Durwood thinks it's too ginger-y so more for me. I put half of it into the freezer so I don't eat it all up in a week. It's pretty darned delicious with powdered sugar sprinkled over it.
Then after supper I made a vat of curried chicken soup with chickpeas and cauliflower for work lunches the next couple weeks. The recipe suggests adding a can of light coconut milk but I think that makes it not freeze well and go bad fast, so I'm taking a little Tupperware of Greek yogurt to stir into the soup once it's heated up. That should be good.
This morning I got up around 7 o'clock and by 7:30 I had all my ingredients measured out for Irish Soda Bread. Since Durwood's not a fan of caraway seeds I split the batch into two loaves, although I can't imagine having an iron skillet big enough to make it all into one like the recipe says. (Holy jebus, I don't think I could lift a pan like that.) It took quite a bit longer to bake than I was led to believe by the commenter who said she made 2 pans' worth but I stuck with it and kept adding 5 minutes, poking it for doneness, and then adding more until finally, after twice as long as that woman said, they were done. (Maybe she has a fancier oven?) I'm looking forward to slicing into it in a couple hours or so. Mm, maybe I'll have soda bread with a bit of corned beef on the side instead of the other way around. No matter, just be assured that the house has smelled awesome since yesterday. Plus Durwood made some delicious chicken in hoisin sauce for supper last night; that added to the enticing aromas. We are definitely a foodie family.
March 17--Lewis Hine, Icarus, Empire State Building. He hung there in midair. Gale held her breath as he let go of the cable so calmly as if he'd hold his position. His hair rose as he fell straight down and he had the sweetest look on his face. Her fingers hovered over the typewriter keys and her eyes locked on his as he seemed to float for a moment before gravity claimed him. She refused to get up and look. She tried to type loudly enough to cover the sound of sirens and the shouts and cries from the people on the ground.
Eesh. Sorry about that. Have a Happy St. Patrick's Day even if you're not really Irish, like me. They say we're all Irish today, even us hardheaded Germans. Erin go bragh!
--Barbara
That's what I have to do today, go to the grocery (probably Walmart) to buy ingredients for work-lunch chicken soup and Irish Soda Bread for tomorrow's St. Paddy's day lunch at DS & DIL1's, then make some variety of chicken soup. I'm thinking I'll make the soda bread tonight so that it's not too unfresh for lunch tomorrow. I'd make it in the morning but it bakes for nearly an hour... although I'm up before 8 o'clock to watch CBS Sunday Morning anyway so I could easily stir together the bread during the show... I'll think about it. Durwood's got a nice full bag of peels for Henny & Penny and both of us will have a baggie of treats in a pocket for Porter so we won't go empty handed. I'm tempted to buy some fresh ginger too and make a super-gingerbread recipe I saw in America's Test Kitchen's newsletter. I'm gonna do it.
It snowed a bunch overnight. Enough so that a neighbor's out with his snowblower. I'll be out there later brushing off the car and clearing the driveway. I should go soon because the sun's out and that'll melt any stray snow I miss. But I need to shower first because I'm not putting clean clothes on this disgusting body. But I have a sparkling clean shower to shower in because I even cleaned the soap scum off the surround yesterday. Can anyone tell me why the walls of the shower get scummy when they don't really get anything other than water on them? I don't flail around spraying soap all over when I shower and I'm certain Durwood doesn't either, so, what gives? It's one of life's mysteries that I'm sure I'm not destined to know the answer to.
Next weekend I'll be down in Sheboygan with Lala for our annual run-away. We may not write; we may just goof off since both of us are feeling a bit frazzled from the winter's excitements and pressures, but there will be walks along the river and the lakeshore, and pizza, and art, and the history of toilets. We plan to go to Kohler to the museum, it's free and sounds like a fun afternoon. We'll each have our own room and both of us appreciate being alone but like to do stuff too. It'll be great. I can't wait for Friday to roll around so I can drive away.
Did I tell you that I found a brand-new replacement laptop battery on eBay for only twenty bucks with free shipping? I did, and it came the other day. I slid it into the machine and it immediately began charging up. Hooray! Now I can use the laptop for a while when it's unhooked from the wall plug. Whew. I was afraid it'd cost an arm and a leg for a new one so I'd be tethered to the cord.
March 16--Rembrandt van Rijn, Aristotle with a Bust of Homer. Aristotle never saw clothes like those. He's painted wearing the garb of a Dutchman in the 17th century. How unimaginative. How ethno-centric. It's also very dark. Could this be an allegory? I'm no good at inferences and deeper meanings. Just tell me or show me and I'm fine. Don't be symbolic.
Okay, I confess, I stayed up until midnight and this is all that was left when I picked up my pencil. Like I always say, I'm just glad to have written. Some nights are better than others. I'm off to get wet and clean, then shovel, then shop. Sayonara.
--Barbara
Ugh. It isn't supposed to pile up much more than an inch or maybe three, but still everyone's ready for the snow to stop and the warming to start. When I left for work yesterday IN THE SUNSHINE (I'm not hollering at you, I'm hollering at Mother Nature) I noticed that the daffodils are bravely poking their little green noses up not only among the dead mums against the house but also right out in the open down at the corner of the house. Yay, daffodils are coming!
I did have a box of sugar-free chocolate fudge pudding and a sleeve of graham crackers, not enough liquid milk but a box of dry milk powder to make milk, so I whipped up a Pi Day pie before I went to work. When I got home from the knitting guild meeting last night Durwood and I had a piece of Pi pie. It was yummy. I kind of had to chisel it out of the pie plate (I might have overcooked the crust a bit in the microwave) but it tasted great despite its rumpled shape. I've started putting brown sugar into my graham cracker crust instead of white and it really ramps up the flavor. I recommend it.
Today I plan to scour the bathroom for sure and maybe start in this corner of the bedroom and brutally get rid of things. This room is crammed with things everywhere and needs cleaning out badly. It's too cluttered to dust and it really needs it. Can you say pack rat? Or is it just laziness? Nah, it's pack-ratty-ness, I'm sure of it.
March 15--Joan Miro, Potato. In this Suess-ian world the flying clockwork jester clambers up the golden slide topped by a one-eyed dancing dog. A goggle-eyed dragon gaks up his progeny while the mitt-handed potato woman squirts ink from her lone breast. She has a guppy for a heart, a flock of stingrays instead of butterflies in her stomach, and her tiny, non-dominant hand reaches for a bloody blade with acrobatic midgets swinging from it. Now that's art.
That was fun. I am demoralized by the snow. I need a hat with sunshine in it that I can put on when it's like this. Bah. Enjoy your luncheon/bridge party, Aunt B. Those three ladies just better fall back in amazement at your table. I wish I was there (in the warm) to waitress. Oh, that reminded me of Uncle David teasing Grandma about waitressing at one of your Twelfth Night parties wearing an apron like a pad of paper that she could "tear one off" when it got dirty. Its kind of confused but it makes me smile because Grandma laughed so hard. That must have been when Durwood and I were there on our honeymoon in 1976. Good god, that was forever ago. On that depressing thought I'm outta here.
--Barbara
We went to Red Lobster's Lobsterfest last night and demolished a pair of 1 1/4# lobsters. They came with salad and a potato; I declined a potato but Durwood managed to eat the inside of his. I confess that I made 3 of the Cheddar Bay biscuits disappear. We both needed to get the heck out of the house not running errands. We actually talked. About random stuff like work and the new Pope (he's from our side of the Atlantic, amazing!) and just general stuff. Like a real conversation. It was nice.
The sun's out again today. It's cold, yes, but the sun's out. The. Sun. Is. Out. I can't say that enough. At this time of year, that's tantamount for me. The sun is out. My eyes are more open, my spine is straighter, my mood is lifted (somewhat, I don't want to go all crazy and be cheerful, I'd get whiplash, Durwood would think I had a fever or had a stroke ;-}), it's good to be sunny out. Did I mention that the sun's out? The sky is clear and blue and it's sunny. Hooray.
Oh, also it's Pi Day. Happy 3.14! I should whip up a little pie before work... I'm sure there's a box of pudding out there and I know we've got graham crackers.
March 14--Egypt, Lion Furniture Leg. When she was a little girl Sienna was afraid of the old lion that stood in her grandmother's library. It wasn't real, it was carved wood and plaster but it stood in the shadows and she was sure that she saw it blink or breathe more than once. She knew it wasn't real, she was young but not foolish enough to think that her grandmother would keep a real lion around. Besides there was a zoo not too far away so Sienna knew what real live lions looked and sounded like. Her cousin Tim had been caught more than once astride the carved lion and been punished. She didn't tell on him either. Aunt Gertie was the one who saw him and got mad about it.
Damn that Aunt Gertie for spoiling Tim's fun. There's always some spoilsport to squash a kid's imaginings, isn't there? There's not enough playing pretend in this world anymore. Nobody uses their imagination much. What a waste. What a pity. Hey, did you hear? The sun's shining. Woohoo. And tonight's the Knitting Guild meeting and I've got my "homework" done for the program so I can learn some new stuff. That should be fun. Bye for now.
--Barbara
One of the cutest baby hats I've ever made--or seen for that matter. This is one cute hat, and I am confident that the dark teal will make its intended recipient look fantastic.Now to cast on a second baby hat in a different pattern and the next bigger size so that this baby has more than a few weeks' worth of hat from me.
See? Durwood noticed it the other day and yesterday Chester (that's what Mom named him/her) was perched on the patio step surveying his domain and rooting out errant birdseed. I thought he was sooo cute so I put a handful of peanuts in the shell in the planter for him. That's before I saw that he is digging his hole right in my ferns. Tsk. Too late to take the peanuts back.
I need to get some energy, some gumption back. I've been sitting on my duff EATING everything that isn't nailed down for some time now, and it has to stop. I need some sunny days, sunny days in a row. I don't really care if it's warm, of course I'd prefer warm days, but right now, right this minute I'll take any sort of sunny days left in the bin for March. It looks right now like today will be sunny and I'm thrilled. I can already feel that I'm sitting up a little straighter.
I went for a haircut to a new person yesterday. She was okay, I mean my hair is cut, I won't be able to judge how I like it until I shower later but she was a nice person and seemed to do an okay job. I don't have the hairdo gene, don't have the ability to style my hair, only comb it so there's not a lot they can do for me or to me that I can replicate. It was thirty bucks. My old stylist was twenty. I'll be looking for someone more in the twenty dollar range. Thirty seemed like a lot. Am I old? Out of touch? Probably.
March 13--Joseph Mallord William Turner, Venice, from the Porch of Madonna della Salute. She could tell the time of day by the sounds outside her window. The chiming of the rigging on the anchored sailboats lulled her to sleep on warm nights. She imagined that the summer sun crisped the ripples with its heat and searing light and the brittle sound of the water on the pilings in winter made her shiver. That day it was soft early spring with air as warm as a mother's caress. She wore a new dress in pale yellow lawn with tiny blue flowers embroidered on it and pale bone-colored flats. butterflies must feel like this on their first day out of their cocoons, she thought.
It's another work day. Yay! Maybe I'll have customers. Maybe I'll be busy and productive. Maybe I'll stay awake. See ya.
--Barbara
I'd show you pictures of the soda bread sliced but once the eating started, well, there just wasn't time between bites and gobbling everything up to snap photos of any of it. DS & DIL1's home-corned beef was so tender and so delicious, it put the store-bought kind to shame. DS chopped the cabbage, blanched it, and sauteed it with a tiny bit of olive oil and some toasted bread crumbs. DIL1 made boiled red potatoes and carrots to go with it. There was horseradish, nice grainy mustard, and pickles for condiments. And then there was the bread. HZ cut each loaf in half (I was in the potty when it was slicing time) and then sliced the halves, nibbling crumbs all the way, and the 6 of us nearly emptied the plate. OMG, that's good bread, moist and flavorful, not dry and crumbly. H&JZ invited us for Easter and I asked what to bring. HZ mentioned the bunny cake I made last year and JZ said that was a good idea... as long as I made the cake out of "that bread." I'll see what I can do. (click the link in the first line for the recipe) (I only took pictures of Porter, she's as good-looking as the bread just not as easy to eat. All that fur gets in my teeth. Get a grip, I'm kidding.)
