Recalling and Building Intensity

I've moved around a bit. It all started when I was an infant. We moved to Washington State when I was a baby so that my dad could attend Gonzaga Law School. I don't remember that move because I was so young, but earliest memories start to take shape there. I do remember leaving and a few subsequent visits that followed.

We came back to New Jersey shortly before kindergarten began. Relatives who remembered me and not necessarily vice versa welcomed us back, acted like people who knew me in a past life. I think that might be where my fascination with reincarnation began. Surely I had seen this kind people before, but where? when? Answer: my infancy.


Through various apartments in Central Jersey to our first house in Kendall Park to our last house in Alexandria Township to now, I have had a lot of practice with breaking my life down to it's basic elements, sorting, filing through, discarding, and neatly fitting it all together. I know that books are heavy and they go in small boxes and that you can use your socks to fill in the gaps in between your fragile items. I know how to configure my personal items together like a jigsaw puzzle. I know that it's a really good idea to be liberal with the packing tape and to reinforce the box on the bottom before even loading it up.

After leaving the family home in Alexandria I wandered over to Phillipsburg and back to Alexandria on several occasions. The last residence I had in P'burg was not half bad actually, one of my better apartments. My boyfriend at the time and I had the top 2 floors of a 3 story home with 3 entire bedrooms, 2 whole baths, a cute kitchen, a balcony overlooking our quiet street, an extra loft-type room, lots of closets, and full use of the basement for laundry and hanging clothes. Oh yeah, plus a garage. And the yard was good.

But even all of that space, for $750/month, no less, couldn't save the situation.

I returned home for the last time. We kind of made it work. I enjoyed cooking dinners for my family and being in a very comfortable house with all the trimmings but try living with your parents after years of carrying on your own stupid life and all of your stupid habits and ways and see how well that all fits together. I dare anyone to try it for one day. You'll look for any reason to occupy yourself outside of the house. Anything.

Shortly before 9/11 I met my husband online and then in person. March of 2003 we were engaged. Sadie and I joined him in Lodi in May of that year. We married in August 2003 and spent the next year in that house as I finished nursing school

We moved to this house in Wood-Ridge in September of 2004 and here we are, a baby, a major surgery, and many bouts of laughter and tears later. We have had 2 tenants under our roof. We have hosted many holidays. I have cooked several turkeys, a prime rib, an infinite number of mashed potatoes, and several birthday cakes. Hundreds of presents have been opened under the Christmas tree that magically appears in the corner after my husband wakes up from a nap, a fake tree that I have lugged up and down 2 flights of stairs, even when I was ready to pop with pregnancy. But in his defense his heart was so bad he could barely maintain a healthy pink color, much less lug around a Christmas tree. And I needed the exercise badly.

So very shortly we are going to be leaving New Jersey for good. I can't imagine ever returning. I have spent most of my life here and I feel like I have absolutely made the most of it. I have loved this state like you wouldn't believe, and there have even been times when I thought that I couldn't possibly live anywhere else.

Most of that feeling came from living so close to the Delaware River for so many years. I have loved that river for a long time. I have fished it, swam it, tubed it, thrown countless roaches into it, contemplated it, fallen in love in it, water skied it, driven along it and over its bridges, skipped rocks into it, dipped Sadie's feet in it when she was just a little tiny baby. I will miss it. I hope I can visit it one more time before we go.

What's another word for update?

Gimme a break, titles are hard.



Next week starts my last week of work at my happy little outpatient mental health center. When I gave notice a few weeks back, I completely broke down during the conversation with my boss. I have poured my heart and soul into this job. And I have had the opportunity to treat myself to some of the most amazing lunch breaks of my career.



I have no idea how I could ever capture this experience somewhere else.



Time marches on. I will find something that brings me great joy in the future. I have to tell myself this over and over to avoid feeling swallowed up by the great, black unknown.



One thing I have decided-if it feels like shit, run in the opposite direction. I had a phone interview that made me feel like shit and I'm not pursuing it. It was not in behavioral health care and it wasn't terrible but it wasn't that typical feeling mommydawg gets when it's meant to be. A feeling that maybe only complete and total flakes like myself feel. Something akin to the stars being in perfect alignment, or the sum of the numbers on my social security card adding up to the address of the future job's headquarters, or some other eerily similar detail that I invent.

C'mon, you know you do that shit too. Everyone does. Everyone looks for similarities, things we share in common with the things we really want.

*****

Sidenote: Blogger NOW will autosave your post as you type it. This is genius. Thank you, Blogger. You read my mind.

*****

Carl Hiaasen writes a very sharp column for the Miami Herald. It's really just Florida news, but Florida is blessed to have such a great journalist and author exposing it's sordid details and making art of it all. If you haven't read any of his books yet, not only should you, but you should also just read one or two of his columns to get a flavor for his attitude and his stance on things. He's definitely one of the good guys. And then you should rush out and get one of his books. They are kind of a quick, easy read but incredibly entertaining without being...I don't know...commercial-novel fluff.

*****

So yeah, we're moving. And this takes a lot of figuring out, but we're getting there.

*****

Next time-pics. I am on the wrong laptop and it's not configured to share files with the other laptop. Which husband is playing Boggle on at the moment. He's sitting next to me finishing a bowl of ice cream. I am finishing a glass of Pinot Grigio. The baby is sleeping. Sadie is talking on the phone. Life is good.

3 Months

I've been so bad about keeping up with this blog for the past three months but I've been pretty pre-occupied with Sparkpeople. I am amazed that this website is free. If you are like me and you have absolutely no will-power, very little self-control, and love to lay around and eat cheese and drink wine then you should give it a try.

Can I also just say that we are having some really annoying problems with the connection in our house? It makes it so very hard to log in all of the food I eat and exercise I get, plus anything else fun I might want to do through the internet. One second you're connected the next *poof* the connection is GONE, baby. I was wrongfully accused for many week over doing something "wrong" with the computer. Excuse me? I have been on the internet since, like, 1996 or something. I think I know how to click a damn link by now. Silly me, I didn't know that there was a wrong way to DO that.

My husband now believes that it is the router. Yippee. We are not getting a new router any time soon. We have a house full of everything to pack up and move to Florida.

Let me just say that I wrote a good post yesterday that I was unable to upload due to the problem I just mentioned. It told of my weight loss, dietary changes, exercise, and a few other things with some funny stuff thrown in. Part of the entry was bulleted and, I like to think, mildly amusing.

Sorry. Sorry for taking so long to write and sorry that the network administrator in this house is failing miserably at his job.

Still, we have done SO MUCH in the last 90 days. We have sold a house. We both gave notice at work. We have watched Sadie graduate from eighth grade. We have had a lot of fun and been under a lot of stress. We ate lots of good meals and we did some yoga.

Good times.

illnesses, meltdowns, and dogfights

It seems like forever since I've written in this blog. About a month has passed. You can imagine from my lack of entries that it probably hasn't been the best month on record. We're having big problems with our dogs and trying to sort out what to do. We've all been sick off and on and for a working mom that's always a really rough deal.

Ugh. Forget about that for a second though. What are the good things that have happened?

• I inherited my husband's old iPod since he got a new one. I listen to this in the car during my fairly short commute. I like it well enough but I've found that I actually have too many songs on it. You know me-hate superfluous anything and like everything super-duper organized. So every single morning when I start up the car, with the way things are configured, I hear the opening bars of Blackened by Metallica. This in itself isn't a bad thing, but if I feel lazy for a minute...well, I wind up hearing 50% of this song twice daily. Or if I switch to Playlist mode and get caught up with, say, watching the actual traffic around me, I wind up hearing California by Tupac Shakur at least once daily. Don't ask...I have eclectic tastes...
• Just remember this...California...knows how to party...Cal-i-for-ni-a...knows how to paaaaar-tay-ay...
• Other than that, I only have these playlists created: All songs (blah), Dave Matthews Band (about 5 zillion songs that I just DON'T NEED-do I honestly need a 16 minute version of Dancing Nancies?), Reggae (no complaints, a good mix), Sublime (fine), Tori Amos (way, way, way too many songs), White Stripes (no complaints) and that's it. I need more time to whip this little iPod's ass into shape!
• Organized by artists, we have lots, lots, lots more that are mostly contained in the All Songs playlists, but dammit!-why in the hell did I let my husband convince me to retain all of his old crap that I hate??? Scorpions? Fucking Styx? Hello? I'm NEVER going to listen to that stuff! It's all immediately GONGED as soon as it comes on when randomly shuffled onto my stereo! Barry Manilow? GONG! Gap Band? GONG! Do you know how long it takes me to queue up something I truly want to hear, such as Snow by RHCP? I'm practically in Hackensack by the time I get this song going.
• Buddhism-even reading about it makes me feel more relaxed and optimistic. Cannot commit to not eating animals, but most of the rest makes sense to me. Don't lie or exaggerate, don't be a douchebag to others, avoid promiscuity...I agree!...well, now that I got all of that shit out of my system and realize that it totally sucks in the long run...
• Exercise...been getting my abs on lately. And dieting too. Although today was a total dietary meltdown which I will expound on in a second...For the most part I have been so good about dieting and exercising and have even lost a little weight. Yay!
• Cooking-holy shit, you should've eaten at my house tonight. Baconless Clams Casino? Yeah, we had that tonight. Cod cakes? Yep. Freakin' shrimp cocktail? Check! (I even de-veined those raw buggers myself and poached them in court bouillon-same court bouillon that poached the cod.) Can you say Braised Baby Bok Choy? We can. How about fresh strawberries on the side? Maybe some Gavi di Gavi with that?
• Chuck steak-made this twice. It is extremely cheap which is VERY important in our house right now. Cook it for an hour in some liquid and root vegetables. Sear it first. Delicious.
• McCormick & Smick's-kind of a rip-off but oh so good. Consider this for an annual splurge. Do not expect a large portion when it comes to the seared Ahi tuna. They made a nice dirty Martini though. Very olive-y. For dinner I got 2 crab cakes, broccoli rabe and rice pilaf and it just shouldn't have cost close to $30 for the plate.
• Bonefish Grill-LOTS of bang for your buck. Spaghetti squash? Nice... Lots and lots of seared Ahi tuna with this order. Crusted in black and white sesame seeds too. Very lovely. Dirty Martini just as good as M&S's and the wine list is pretty broad. I got the salmon pan-Asian style (teriyaki marinade, grilled, wasabi cream) with vegetable sides for way less than my crab cakes at the other place, a glass of white, the Martini, shared some sides, and it was all delicious.

Enough about food...but seriously...that's kind of been the best thing going lately between the illnesses, meltdowns, and dogfights.

Turned out to be...

...pneumonia.

But she seems to be a lot better.

Along with the antibiotics she got a lot of hands-on tender loving care. For 3 days straight we pretty much just held her in our laps and coddled her. She wouldn't let us lay her down for a nap for a couple of days, insisting on sleeping in our arms, fitfully tossing herself around periodically. Her breath was hot, heavy, stinky. I did a lot of clapping and cupping on her back to break up the rattling mucous. Clearing your own mucous by way of coughing is a skill that's lost on an infant/toddler.

A day or two ago she sneezed up this huge blob of mucous that I'm still swooning over. It was sort of a huge thing that seemed to have a life of it's own. I couldn't believe it came out of such a little person. It dawned on my that this was the pneumonia, the physical manifestation of the infection, and that she would probably be a lot more chipper having shed it.

And she was! She took a great nap a little while later and woke up with SO much energy. She was all over the place. I couldn't sit still on the couch for 2 minutes without her bolting not only upstairs to the bedrooms, but all the way up to the attic. She did this, like, 5 times that afternoon. She was into everything.

Something about it made me miss working at the hospital. I haven't seen a booger that big in a really long time. It made me remember doing suctioning on my patients, and the satisfaction I felt when I helped someone clear their airway, breathe a little bit better.

So yeah, the biggest booger has been strangely inspiring. Go figure.

Seems like...

...the little one has some kind of illness. For the past two days she's woken up in a fairly decent mood and then slid into big, pile of tired, feverish, crankiness. She was tugging at her ear a few times today so I'm wondering if it's an ear infection. Poor thing.

So it looks like tomorrow is another day off for me, getting her to the pediatrician and probably filling prescriptions for antibiotics or what have you.

Watching a couple of minutes of Edward Scissorhands. The part where they show the montage of weird hairdos he does for all of the neighborhood ladies. Good movie.

Superbowl Sunday

It's about so much more than just football.

It's about gathering together with friends and family.

It's about good snacks.

It's about the entertainment.


It's about cute babies and the dogs who love them.

Meatloaf Muffins!

Wish I had a picture of these cuties, but they're gone already.

Ingredients:

1.25 lbs of ground meat, either beef, turkey, pork, or any combination thereof
1 egg
1 cup of seasoned bread crumbs
2 tbsp of bbq sauce, ketchup, or a combination of both
pepper to taste
seasonings to taste
6 cubes of cheese such as cheddar, mozzarella, gouda, swiss, 3/4" by 3/4"

(Yesterday I used turkey, cheddar cheese, and fresh thyme leaves. Awesome!)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Spray a 6-muffin tin with cooking spray. Mix all of the ingredients in a medium bowl, except for cheese cubes. Add more bread crumbs a little at a time if the mixture seems too moist to hold it's shape.

Divide the mixture into 6 equal pieces and form the pieces are one cheese cube each into ball shapes. Place the meatloaf muffins into muffin tins and bake for about 40 minutes. When the muffins are done they will be sizzling and firm to the touch. The tops of some might break open and a little bit of cheese might ooze out. This is another good sign that they are done.

Allow to cool slightly for a few moments before removing. If they stick, slide the back of a butter knife around the muffin.

Serve with ketchup, mashed potatoes, and a warm vegetable such as stir-fried broccoli.

Enjoy!

Butternut Squash Soup

Soup is good food, especially when it's a fresh, homemade, pureed vegetable soup. Lately I've been experimenting a little bit with leftover vegetables as soup The baby especially enjoys velvety smooth veggie soups. Sadie will reluctantly agree that they are Ok.

Using a handheld immersion blender makes this recipe very easy to make. You can certainly use regular blender or food processor, but you'll wind up with some extra dirty dishesIf you don't have a handheld blender, consider getting one. It's a really fun gadget and you'll find a million reasons to use it.

Without any further ado:

• Bake an unpeeled butternut squash in a 400 degree oven. Prepare the squash by bisecting it lengthwise and chopping the halves into 4 equal pieces. Drizzle with olive oil, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Bake for about 40 minutes or until pieces are tender.


• Allow squash to cool and then scoop the soft flesh away from the skin.
  
• Place the squash meat in a large saucepan or small pot over low heat or flame. Begin using the immersion blender to break down the squash while slowly adding chicken stock.


• When enough stock has been added to reach the consistency of thin mashed potatoes, it'll be the right time to add the milk. Add enough milk to reach the desired consistency, a thick soup.


• Nice seasonings for this soup are salt, pepper, thyme, and cumin, all to taste. Less is usually more as far as seasonings go.

Some afterthoughts:

• I quartered an onion and added it to the tray of squash. This resulted in the onions getting a little charred and some of them had to be thrown out instead of incorporated into the soup. A tiny amount of charred bits turned up in the soup, but it sort of just looked like coarsely ground pepper. This was fine for my own personal consumption, but it didn't add much to the soup and will be avoided next time.


• Baking time for the squash might vary. Just keep an eye on it.


• It doesn't take long for the squash to cool off enough to comfortably handle. However, premature squash handling could cause burns so do use caution.


• It wouldn't be too hard to adapt this recipe to blender usage. Just put some or all of the squash in the blender, add some chicken stock to thin it out, and blend. Transfer squash puree to a large sauce pan or pot over low heat and continue to add stock, milk, and seasonings as described above.


• Let your imagination and taste buds be your guide when seasoning!


• Enjoy!

Other possible pureed soups:

• Potato-asparagus


• Potato-spinach


• Carrot


• Corn (very good with a small dollop of pesto)


• Fresh artichoke (delicious but EXTREMELY high in fiber-enjoy in small portions on a Saturday or Sunday that you plan on spending at home)

Penny's B'day Bash!

Happy happy, Joy joy!

The Spread

Having a swell time being the birthday girl!

Birthday Gift Radar

There were real live gangsters at our house too, you know, making gang gestures and what not. It was sort of intimidating.

A little help from a very adorable cousin is always appreciated.

Family Shot

Nothing Like It, No Sir-eee

There's nothing quite like being pregnant to remind you that we are, in fact, animals...

And nothing like an emergency C-section to give you the opportunity to get your head on straight in a real hurry...

But there's really nothing quite like the heart-melting warmth, the sweet smell, the softness of a newborn baby.

Happy first birthday day Penelope Lynn!

Posting-Latest, Not Really Greatest, But Here It Is...

So in between doing interesting things like complaining, procrastinating, feeling sorry for myself, getting irritated with everything, bitching, and just being a waste of space I've been doing some reading. Both on and off the internet. And that has been good.

On the internet-is it just me or is McSweeney's website just chock full of good reading? I'm positively addicted to it.

Off the internet-shame on me for never reading any work by William Faulkner earlier in my life. I've just started Light in August and I'm enjoying it a lot. It's much different than the books I usually read, which are, well, easier to read. I do not mean to imply that I am a dolt who reads romance novels every chance I get. I mean to say that the books I read are usually fast-paced, frenetic jaunts through a plot which reveals itself in the first 20, 25 pages (think Tough Guys Don't Dance, Vonnegut, Sedaris). This is not that kind of book. It is slow, deliberate, painstakingly detailed. It's got it's own mood and pace that you must surrender to. And I'm finding that I enjoy that.

Off the internet and through my ears-I am currently enjoying the audio CDs of John Hodgman's The Areas of My Expertise. ITunes was running a promo or something, offering it for free. It caught my eye and now my ears are hooked! I've been listening to it during my commute to and from work and in between different places I go during the day and it's just the best. He's done work for The Daily Show and McSweeney's. Most recently he has played the personification of the PC on the new Mac commercials.

The Sweet Art of Procrastination

Plan-

-Instead of preparing for work I am going to sit here on the couch and make another very important list. The blog muse is whispering in my ear and I just can't bring myself to enter the real world until I get a few things off of my chest, out of my head, and into my blog-

Small List of Male Vocalists Who I Believe to be Smackalicious*

1. Chris Cornell of Soundgarden and Audioslave
2. Mark Wahlberg (was the vocalist for The Funky Bunch)
3. Billie Joe Armstrong from Green Day
4. Chester Bennington of Linkin Park

*******************************************************************

Well, thank God I got that off of my chest. I had better get ready for work now.

*Smackalicious=Attractive

Ways to Amuse Babies

• This Little Piggy
• Pretending to Eat Various Body Parts (hands, ears, toes)
• Smelling Their Bare Feet and Saying "Peeeeee-yooooooooh" in a very exaggerated way
• Blowing Raspberries Where the Neck Meets the Shoulder
• Letting Them Grab and Throw Around Two Loads' Worth of Clean Laundry While You Fold Said Laundry (Over and Over Again)
• Facilitating Sock Removal (and Subsequent Sock-Tasting)
• Singing Various Songs with Much Enthusiasm and Clapping (Bingo, Peas Porridge Hot, On Top of Spaghetti, etc.)

Happy New Year to You!

On New Year's Eve...

~The baby had her very first pony tail~

~And~

~I survived my first raw oyster experience with the help of Sadie and JH~

(and they were actually quite good with a martini)

A Merry Christmas Indeed

Some pics from our holiday

Welcome in, 2007

1. What did you do in 2006 that you’d never done before?

Most notably, had a C-section. My first surgery ever!

2. Did you keep your new year’s resolutions, and will you make more for next year?

I didn't make any resolutions in 2006. Too exhausted I guess. My new year's resolutions this year are simple-be nicer, gossip less, and simplify everything. Sort of vague, but I think I can actually stick with it!

3. Did anyone close to you give birth?

Ah...yes, I gave birth this year, 3 people at work did too. Most notably, Free had a baby 2 days before me and we didn't even know about it until September. Very amazing!


4. Did anyone close to you die?

No family, but a handful of patients.

5. What countries did you visit?

No foreign travel for me in 2006. Boohoo.

6. What would you like to have in 2007 that you lacked in 2006?

Patience. An exercise regimen.

7. What dates from 2006 will remain etched upon your memory, and why?

It would have to be January 20th, the day Penny was born. Also January 18th, which was my due date. Just sitting around feeling sorry for my big, fat, pregnant self...feeling the lack of contractions or any other unusual activity of the uterus and just knowing that I was going to be pregnant for the rest of my life :-P

8. What was your biggest achievement of the year?

Surviving day to day life as a mother of an infant and teenager.

9. What was your biggest failure?

Sheesh, I don't know. Letting the laundry pile up? Not saving as much money as I would've hoped. Having another bad hair year in my bad hair life...

10. Did you suffer illness or injury?

Well, I recovered from my C-section. No major illnesses, thank God. I come from a hardy Slavic stock of people, so generally we are resistant to disease until old age :-P

11. What was the best thing you bought?

Best thing I bought? Probably the Medela breast pump.

12. Whose behavior merited celebration?

Let me pick some unsung heroes-social workers.

13. Whose behavior made you appalled and depressed?

George W. Bush.

14. Where did most of your money go?

Mortgage, daycare, car payments and insurance, the usual.

15. What did you get really, really, really excited about?

Whenever we took advantage of rare opportunities to get out for the night, just the 2 of us.

16. What song will always remind you of 2006?

Crazy by Gnarls Barkley.

17. Compared to this time last year, are you:
a) happier or sadder? 
b) thinner or fatter? 
c) richer or poorer?

Happier, Thinner, Poorer (but only because we've both been on disability 3 months a piece during the past year!)

18. What do you wish you’d done more of?

Chilling out, not being a tightly-wound ball of nervousness.

19. What do you wish you’d done less of?

Worrying

20. How will you be spending Christmas?

We had it at our house.

21. Did you fall in love in 2006?

With Penelope.

22. How many one-night stands?

This question is just ridiculous. None. Would anyone even answer this truthfully if their answer was yes?

23. What was your favorite TV program?

The Office leads the pack of favorites, but I also love CSI Las Vegas, House, and every single program on Food Network and HGTV. I can't get enough of those real estate shows. Oh, wait, the ones where they go into total pig-sty houses and make the occupants throw out a bunch of crap, and then rearrange everything so it actually looks like it's not inhabited by bums or squatters? Those are MY kind of shows. I love when they tell the people that their junk isn't doing anything positive for them and it's time to get rid of it, thin it out, let go of the past.

24. Do you hate anyone now that you didn’t hate this time last year?

Ain't no time to hate, barely time to wait! Oh ho what I want to know, where does the time go?

25. What was the best book you read?

Unfortunately I didn't read enough new books (re-read a few old favorites, as I am apt to do) but I guess The Bonesetter's Daughter by Amy Tan is the first one that comes to mind. It was a gift from JH last Christmas and I read it on my maternity leave.

26. What was your greatest musical discovery?

Rediscovering Metallica. (Sounds like the title to some MTV show 20 years in the future where they resurrect Lars, James, and Kirk, all balding and paunchy, and launch a contest to appoint the "next" bassist, who will probably be a female this time around."

27. What did you want and get?

A healthy baby, teenager, and husband.

28. What did you want and not get?

Horseback riding lessons.

29. What was your favorite film of this year?

Well, since I don't usually see any movies until they hit Blockbuster, my favorites weren't from 2006. Most were 2005 or earlier. And the winners are:

Crash, 40 Year-Old Virgin, Batman Begins, Wedding Crashers, Sin City, Everything is Illuminated, V for Vendetta, Jarhead, Brokenflowers, Transamerica, The Jacket, The Matador.

30. What did you do on your birthday, and how old were you?

Went to work-it was a Friday-injection day, which is my favorite. Went out to dinner. Had a nice evening. I turned 32.

31. What one thing would have made your year immeasurably more satisfying?

Less obnoxious traffic.

32. How would you describe your personal fashion concept in 2006?

Hide the flub as much as possible.

33. What kept you sane?

Humor.

34. Which celebrity/public figure did you fancy the most?

Fancy as in think was hot as hell? I've already gone over that. Or fancy as in admire? I liked the former acting governor of NJ, Richard Codey. He tried to do a lot for the mentally ill of our state, including his war on stigma. He came to work to speak, but I didn't get to hear any of it because I was stuck in the back doing injections. A lot of the clients got to hear him speak, so it was nice for them.

35. What political issue stirred you the most?

The politics of health (i.e. stem cell research, Medicare "reform,"), women's rights, the war.


36. Who did you miss?

Everyone I care about who isn't part of my day to day life.

37. Who was the best new person you met?

Some really interesting clients, but I haven't really "met" anyone new in my personal life in a long time.

38. Tell us a valuable life lesson you learned in 2006.

Less is more, especially when I'm the one who's talking, especially if I've had a couple of glasses of wine and the audience just doesn't get it.

39. Quote a song lyric that sums up your year.

In another time's forgotten space
your eyes looked through your mother's face
Wildflower seed on the sand and stone
may the four winds blow you safely home
~Robert Hunter

Black Pepper Ice Cream

So I'm here by myself watching/listening to Iron Chef America on the food network. The special ingredient is lobster and it's a French chef against Iron Chef Morimoto, who specializes in Japenese cuisine. It's a good battle.

I wonder if they will make lobster ice cream. Probably. Someone always winds up making a really weird flavor of ice cream that the judges usually hate. They're given an ingredient like sea urchin or jerusalem artichoke and expected to make 5 dishes including a dessert. Actually, I sense an undercurrent in the culinary world to create savory ice creams anyway. I've heard that black pepper ice cream is good, but I haven't tried it.

Hippy music is playing in the background. Words like lobster medallions, tomalley, stock pot, lemon verbena are rising above the music. Phish is going bananas covering Prince's Purple Rain via Lime Wire.

Life is good in our house.

***

Rob and Sadie went to see the Nets this evening. He got a ticket for free and best friend is in AC. So I get a night to myself and everyone is happy.

***

I've been strongly trying to convince Rob to switch our family website over to a blog format, which he has been slowly warming up to. This way, we could both add to it, contribute to it, daily. It would be kind of nice to update it weekly and just let the grandfolks and others know what we've been up to. Also, to receive their feedback and ideas via comments would be really great too.

***

Back to the Iron Chef, the first chef, Morimoto, made vanilla ice cream with lobster sauce. The French chef made lobster ceviche with olive oil ice cream. Talk about yummy! These dishes wouldn't go very far in our house. Too bad...

Oh, and...

...the baby peed on the toilet again yesterday after our shower!

Wrapping up the Year

I have been strangely calm through most of this holiday. I had a small meltdown in mid-November, probably related to my birthday. If I had to blame it on something. Maybe it had more to do with the activity in our household at that time. At any rate, Free sent me an email entitled "Negative Energy Cripples the Human Spirit" or something to that effect. It wasn't the easiest thing for me to read since saw a lot of myself in that essay and realized that I was crippling my own spirit. Anyway, kudos to Free for keeping it mad-real.

Sometimes the things that are hardest to hear are the things we need to hear the most.

So after I got over myself in November I got really into things for the holiday as you can tell some of my last couple of postings. I wouldn't say I went overboard at all, and I'm quite happy with the way the holiday turned out for us. I just tried to simplify and I feel like this method made me succeed at enjoying the season.

Some things that were more low-key this year

• Gift buying-I began slightly earlier than usual, some of it in November, some of it very early in December. I only bought for those closest to me and decided in advance just to give one or two people cash only. I went with a lot of first instinct purchases that were within my budget. I used some coupons.
• Wrapping-As soon as the gifts started coming into the house, I wrapped them all and stored them in the attic. To make this possible I cleared off the dining room table and set it up as a gift wrapping station with the tape, the paper, name tags, etc. It made my life so much easier to do this.
• Cooking-rather than take on the daunting and impossible task of cooking the perfect turkey again, plus cooking a million different side dishes, I focused on 4 really good foods that pleased the gang. For Christmas Eve we had stuffed shells. And bread. And butter. The end. And everyone enjoyed it. And for Christmas we had filet mignon, sea scallops, mashed potates, asparagus, and carrots. Five simple foods that don't need sauces, accoutrements, complicated cooking techniques, just a little bit of attention. The result was delicious.
• (A side note about the filet mignon-we went to BJ's and got a whole 5 1/2 pound tenderloin that I carved at home into about 5 different meals, reserving the best, most uniform steaks for our dinner. So in the end I saved about $5 per pound, which is a lot of money.)
• Cookies-picked a handful of easy recipes and just went to town over the course of a few days. Wouldn't have been possible to enjoy this much time in the kitchen baking if I hadn't taken care of the gifts and everything else the way I did.
• Delegate-I actually shared a little bit of the duties with others this year. I normally don't do it, it's a habit, and I'm trying to reform myself into a person who will actually accept the help and kindness from others. Kinda still makes me feel funny, but...

There you have it. These few changes and improvements helped me enjoy the holiday, Rob, the girls, my family a bit more. Now I'm at the point where I feel like we wrapped the year up really nicely and I feel comfortable with life for a change.

The tree is down and I don't think I took a picture. Hmm, I'll have to see what I have if anything. The tree was nice, same artificial tree we've had for a couple of years now. It's a good enough tree. I actually didn't jam every single ornament on this year, but I think it looked better that way. More tree, less crap.