Monday, December 17, 2012

No more, 'kay? Oh yeah! And happy holidays.


Sometimes these days the phrase, "Enough is enough," stays in the forefront of my mind.

I stopped watching media coverage of the horror in Newtown within about twelve hours. We were never fortunate enough to have children, though I very badly wanted to, so I don't have a parent's perspective on the worst loss anyone could ever suffer. But because we were never fortunate enough to have children, I have an acute awareness of just how precious they are. I realize just what it is those families have lost.

And while it's trivial in the larger scheme of things (just making sure you know I haven't lost perspective), I'm also a hockey fan. Love my Dallas Stars. Love going to all the games. And the NHL is about to implode. They've lost half a season and both sides are taking irreversible action against the other. That particular fun, that particular "passion" is about to be gone, with ever-diminishing hope of reviving it.

The thing is, I can only think about the bad things that are happening for so long. The sadness and grief about the tragedy in Connecticut become overwhelming. The frustration and resentment about the NHL lockout grates, and doesn't do anything good for my blood pressure.

Plus I feel like I have an obligation to move along with this pretty great life I have. It is pretty great, and pretty cushy, despite some tough situations that are coming up: We have some family members who are a challenge to be around. Some old people whose health is declining. (I'm back to being afraid every time the phone rings. Sooner or later it will be that phone call.) Rich and I both have gone a very long time without work, and our financial situation is pretty grim at the moment. We have to come up with gifts, we have to pay taxes. And we're about to—again, as always, world without end amen—travel for the holidays.*

So I look at Twitter to get the latest updates. I watch the local news, and change the channel when they start repeating the same old information. I'm not going to get into (at least not right now) the debate about gun control, or reporters interviewing children, nor who's more at fault about the lockout or how they should #fireBettman. Maybe some other time.

For the moment, I'm focusing on the fact that things are good right now. Ten seconds from now it could be different, but right now everything's fine. And that'll have to do.

Yeah, I celebrate Christmas.
Happy holidays, everyone.





*We don't have to worry about the house being empty because we have a fantastic petsitter who very graciously moves in, with her significant other, while we're away.** But I can't help but worry about things here while we're far away. And it's just hard to be someone's houseguest for so long.

**No, you can't have her.

Monday, November 19, 2012

Chicken & dumplings


At my friend Marion's request, here's my absolutely bitchin' recipe for chicken and dumplings. Well, not so much my recipe as Southern Living's, published in their 1981 Annual Recipes (yeah, I'm old). I could have taken a picture of this last night, since that's what we had for dinner, but I didn't. Next time. (Rich will be so disappointed to hear I need to make this again to take a picture. It might be his very favorite thing I cook. Honestly, it may be mine, too.)

Old Fashioned Chicken and Dumplings
Ingredients:

     3 cups all purpose flour
     1 tablespoon baking powder
     1 teaspoon salt
     1 cup chicken broth
     1/4 cup vegetable oil

     3–4 quarts chicken broth

     Cooked chicken, shredded

To cook:

Combine the flour, baking powder and salt. Add the chicken broth and vegetable oil; stir until the dry ingredients are moistened. Turn out onto a large, generously floured surface. Roll the dough to 1/16" thickness. Using a pizza cutter if you have one, or a knife if you don't, cut the dough into 5- x 1-inch strips.

Bring the broth to a full boil. Drop in the dumplings, one at a time. Cover, lower the heat so it won't boil over, and cook for 15 minutes. Stir in the chicken. Add salt and pepper to taste. Continue cooking, uncovered, until desired thickness is reached.

A few notes:

You really ought to use some of the broth to cook the chicken. Just add that broth to the pot with the rest of it after the chicken is done. I normally use a pressure cooker, but you can also stew or simmer it—your choice. I use 5 or 6 boneless, skinless thighs, but you can use whatever pieces you have handy and thawed. You just want to end up with a few cups (or whatever amount you like) of cooked chicken. I'd advise against adding vegetables when you cook the chicken, because it muddies up the flavors pretty quickly, but that's just my personal preference. And using the b/s thighs, I scrape off the visible fat first. After it's done, tear or shred into bite-size pieces (it's not as good if it's cubed).

I use a pastry cloth, i.e., a piece of canvas from my local fabric shop, to roll out the dough. You can also use a plastic or silicon sheet, or just a clean countertop, generously floured. Wherever you do it, make sure you've got a large area. Seriously, it takes a good-sized piece of counter real estate, maybe 2-1/2 feet square. And, yes, really, 1/16". The dumplings swell up as they cook, so if you start with them any thicker than that, you're going to end up with slabs. I like to take the dumplings off the pastry cloth after they're cut and layer them on a plate, sprinkling them frequently with flour so they won't stick together too much. That speeds up the process of dropping them in the boiling broth quite a bit.

If your schedule calls for it, or if you just prefer, after you mix the chicken in you can transfer the whole shebang to a slow cooker. Cook it on 'Low' until you're ready to eat. And, slow cooker or not, if it looks like it's not going to thicken up enough, mix a tablespoon or so of flour with cool broth or water, stir it in, and cook for a few more minutes.

This recipe is not only great comfort food, it's also perfectly suitable for delicate stomachs. No spices, nothing hard to digest…I used it to get over a case of Delhi Belly after returning from India, and fed it to Rich as he recovered from a terrible case of food poisoning a few years ago. An all-around good recipe to keep handy.

I think I'll go have some leftovers for lunch. Bon appetit, Marion!

Monday, November 5, 2012

Espresso, or why my kitchen looks that way


This is like mine. You can buy this one for $17 on eBay
About a hundred years ago, I was given an espresso machine. It was a little Krups home espresso maker. Back in those days, it was considered a nice enough home machine. I had just discovered cappuccino—in Milan, thank you very much—and was thrilled at being able to have it whenever I wanted (this was before Starbucks). But as so often happens with specialized kitchen equipment, it turned out to be more trouble than it was worth, and the machine was hard to clean, to boot. So I stuck it up in a cabinet and forgot about it.

Fast forward twenty years or so. I've recently discovered that the only thing better than coffee made with Starbucks coffee beans, freshly ground right beforehand, and brewed in a best-in-the-world Technivorm coffee maker is a cup of coffee from Starbucks with a shot or two of espresso in it.* The espresso turns the coffee into a whole new experience—bolder but smoother than coffee alone. I know! You'd think very concentrated coffee added to strong coffee would equal something like battery acid, but it's just the opposite.

So for some months now, far too often, I've been going to Starbucks for coffee with espresso in it instead of just making coffee at home**.

Then I finally remembered that little Krups machine. Without fussing with the steamed milk (which was what made cleanup so hard), it might be worth hauling it out and using it. After some effort and a few delays (which is a whole 'nother long story), I now have a little Krups espresso machine on the kitchen counter beside the Technivorm, fully equipped and ready to work.

I've used it four days now. And I'm learning:
  • If you use the same beans for espresso that you use for coffee (and grind them the same) espresso can be bland. (Day 1)
  • It's impossible to get coffee from the grinder to the Krups machine's filter basket without spilling it all over the counter. (Day 1)
  • If you leave the grounds in the filter holder to cool off and forget about them 'til late in the day they solidify into concrete and become a more-or-less permanent part of the filter basket. (Day 1)
  • Just using more of those same beans you use for coffee doesn't help with the blandness. (Day 2)
  • If you try to empty the filter holder as soon as you make the espresso, before the grounds harden, the filter holder is going to be hot. All parts of it. Very hot. (Day 2)
  • If you buy Espresso Roast at Starbucks and get them to grind it, you can fix both the blandness and spilled ground problems. (Day 3)
  • If you flip that little plastic piece on the filter holder closed, it keeps the filter basket in place, so you can empty it while the grounds are hot. (Day 3)
  • Still, you'd better be careful to not touch the metal parts. (Day 3)
  • Unscrewing the lid of the water reservoir doesn't relieve all the pressure in the machine, even if it's completely finished brewing and you think it does. (Day 4)
  • Releasing the filter holder while there's still pressure behind it causes a coffee ground explosion. Literally. It blows coffee grounds everywhere—all over the carafe, the drip tray, the surrounding counter in all directions, the top of the machine and, most significantly, back up into the machine where only a toothpick and bitter, bitter tears will even begin to budge them. (Day 4)

Yeah. At this point, 75¢ a shot is looking like a pretty smart investment.


*For my taste, a short (8 oz) cup needs one shot, i.e., a "Red Eye." A tall (12 oz) cup needs two shots (a "Black Eye"). I don't know what they call three or more shots. I'm guessing "Never close your Eyes again."

**I do have to point out that I just get brewed coffee which, at this writing, is $1.65 for a tall when you bring your own cup. I don't actually spend $5 on coffee, though adding shots does start pushing it in that direction.

Sunday, October 28, 2012

Chihuly, first visit

My sister Linda and her husband Al made a quick trick up from San Antonio this week to go to the Chihuly exhibit at the Dallas Arboretum. We all four schlepped over there (it's a 53 minute drive from our house). It's really spectacular! Well, the Chihuly pieces are amazing, but the Arboretum itself is well worth the drive.

I've seen some pretty great gardens, from Bellingrath on the Alabama Gulf coast to Buchart on Vancouver Island, the Borromeo Palace garden on Isola Bella in northern Italy (where the bamboo had its own gardener) to Fragrant Hills Park and Beihai Park in Beijing.

The Arboretum has lovely formal areas, but is so very appealing because (besides being on the same continent, conveniently reachable by car) it has all these quiet tucked-away spots where I could easily see myself sitting and reading, or sitting and chatting, or just sitting for a while. And a lot of those spots are beside White Rock Lake or near charming water features that include little water falls or things that look like springs or creeks. And I do love me a spring or creek!

The Chihuly show was scheduled to end next week, but is so popular it's been extended through the end of the year. Our good friend Pat is coming up next weekend to go, so I'll be visiting it again. If you're in the area, you should too!
That's the "Dallas Star" piece behind me. And that's me looking
surprised that blue spikes are coming out of my head.

Sunday, October 21, 2012

The wisest hockey columnist

Most of the time I like Brandon Worley and others at Defending Big D, probably my favorite hockey blog. Good information and usually good opinions. (Sometimes their 'doom & gloom' outlook gets to me, or they'd be my unqualified favorites.)

Picture of Benn & Morrow for no particular reason
other than I can and the team can't.
I like Ian Hudson's take on the current NHL lockout. He's a professor of economics at the University of Manitoba, and his views are pretty sensible. (Gee, that's a shock, right?)

I like Jeff Gordon columnist for the St. Louis Post-Dispatch (or, actually, STLtoday.com). He distilled the issues between the NHL owners and players to its very essence, as far as I'm concerned.

But they could both be usurped by Gavin Bard, from the Heckler Spray blog ("Internet villainy & grown-up gossip since 2005") just because of this one quote:
Gary Bettman, the weaselly grim reaper of the National Hockey League, is quite possibly the worst human being in the world.
Yeah. You tell 'em, Gavin.

Saturday, October 20, 2012

A quick note about two things

First, if you bought the most recent Groupon for Classic Cafe, it expires on Wednesday, so you need to get there in the next couple of days. Second, if you get there in the next couple of days and they're still getting okra from their garden, order the fried okra. Yeah, it's not something you'd expect them to have on their upscale menu, but it was incredible. I never thought of okra as being something that would be much better home-grown — I mean, it's not like tomatoes, right? —but it made an amazing difference. (Plus, of course, you probably have to know just exactly how to cook it, which is something Classic Cafe is very, very good at.)

Tuesday, September 25, 2012

This is going to be easier than I thought

Rich cleaned out some bookshelves over the weekend (oy, huge mess in the living room for a few hours). After going through the giant stack he pulled out, he came in and deposited a stack of those Sunset-type books—you know, the big, thin paperbacks that were always some kind of How To guide or basic reference books—on my desk. They were mostly about gardening (flower, bulb, vegetable) and houseplants, but there were a few about canning, pickling and the like. (Apparently we had some big plans in self-sufficiency when we first met, though it could also be that the books were just on sale. At the time, neither of us could much resist a marked-down book.)

One of them was 12 Months Harvest, an interesting book about—duh—preserving food. And making cheese, soap and bread (delicious together) as well as covering a few other Foxfire-type subjects. (It was published in the hippie-dippie 70s, so that might be rather shaping my impression of it.)

Since I've made a tiny little foray into the world of preserving food (boiled cider, aka apple molasses and freezer strawberry jam), I've kind of gotten the bug. I asked for and received a canning starter kit (I had to borrow from Rich's friend Ron to put up the boiled cider), so now I'm really ready to get going. And this is Autumn! It's harvest season. There should be lots of stuff to preserve!

Yeah. I'm still thinking about it.

There is one thing I'm definitely going to try, though. In that stack of books there was also a copy (a hard back copy) of Better Homes and Gardens Home Canning Cook Book. That one contains a recipe that solves a forty-year conundrum for me. When I was in high school (circa the dawn of time), my cousin Mike and his Massachusetts-born wife Kathy gave my parents a jar of cranberry jelly. This is not the same stuff you serve with turkey at Thanksgiving. It's actual jelly, made to spread on toast. It was delicious. I ate it every morning until it was gone. And there was no more.

Now, children, keep in mind this was long before the Innerwebs existed. All I could do in those primitive times was keep an eye out in the grocery store, and hope that my travels might one day take me through cranberry jelly country. Many years passed, and the IETF fellows put together the Internet thing. I used it to search for cranberry jelly. I found (and tried) jam, preserves, spreadable fruit…but nothing was ever exactly right.

Somehow it never occurred to me to look for a recipe for it. The Home Canning Cook Book has one. It's complicated and exotic, requiring many ingredients and painstakingly precise chemistry: You boil cranberry juice cocktail and sugar, add pectin and put it in jars. Whew!

So soon I'll once again have cranberry jelly on my toast. And someone will, no doubt, be getting some via the Homemade Christmas Gift Grab Bag. That makes the book mess all worthwhile, I guess. Who knows? Maybe I'll even try a little soap to go with it.

Saturday, September 22, 2012

When I don't feel like cooking

Cooking dinner can be a challenge. Not that it's especially hard to do, most of the time—particularly for those of us with home offices, who can slip out to put the potatoes on or turn down the oven when we need to. It's the dailiness of the thing. Having to come up with something for your hungry household to eat every single, solitary night that comes along. If nothing else, it gets tedious.

Those of us with a few years' experience at it all have our go-to dishes and recipes for those nights when we really don't feel like cooking at all. Until now mine has been spaghetti and meat sauce. Like my mother used to make—McCormick's sauce mix and a pound of ground beef.

Just recently, though, I discovered that if I realize early enough in the day that I'm not going to feel like cooking, there's an even easier way around it. And it's really good, too.

(Adapted from WikiHowHow to Make Crockpot Chicken Tacos)

Slow Cooker Chicken Tacos

This isn't mine. I'll take a picture of mine when they're done.
4–8 boneless, skinless chicken thighs
Chopped onion

1 packet taco seasoning mix
16 ounces (a medium-sized jar or 2 cups) chunky salsa

Tortillas
Toppings (shredded lettuce, chopped tomatoes, guacamole or sliced avocado, sour cream, shredded cheese, etc.)

Mix the taco mix with the salsa. (I use medium heat salsa, usually, because I'm not a complete wimp. Suit yourself and your own pain threshold.) Pour a little in the bottom of the slow cooker. Put the chicken and chopped onion on top of that. Pour the rest of the salsa combination over it.

Cook on high for about 4 hours or on low for about 6. When the chicken can be shredded easily with a fork, it's done. Remove the chicken and do that…shred with a fork. Return to slow cooker and mix with juices.

Serve wrapped in tortillas with whatever toppings you like. Pinto, refried or black beans, plus Spanish rice, round out the meal.

These tacos are so good, they remind me of my very first taste of Mexican food ever. It was 1966, I was nine, and we had just moved from Prichard, Alabama (okay, it's a suburb of Mobile, so not quite as Podunk Junction as it sounds) to San Antonio. We were living in an apartment (another first) while we looked for a house, and went to a drive-in Mexican place down the street. As I remember, my very first bite of my very first chicken taco tasted a lot like these. That taco made me a fan for life.

And these tacos make it very easy (in every sense of the word) to recall.

Wednesday, September 19, 2012

Make do (even if you won't have to do without)


I love making do.

That might not come as a surprise because I'm a knitter. I always thought that the image of someone who knits was kind of a genteel hobbyist, someone who appreciates serenity and has great patience. My clever niece pointed out, though, and quite correctly, that knitters are more closely related to brave pioneers and subsistence gardeners. We know how to do for ourselves. By being involved in the creation of garments that most people never even think of as homemade — like socks — we tend to be a 'get down to brass tacks' kind of group. What does it take to make a thing happen? How do we take something and turn it into that very useful, or even essential, item?

The percentage of knitters who keep chickens, for example, is much higher than in the general population. (I'm basing this on my own casual survey of my knitting friends. I'll conduct a controlled scientific study the minute I have a minute.) We also tend to spin, sew, weave, can, hunt, grow our own vegetables and herbs, brew our own beer, collect rainwater for irrigation and reuse things more than most people.

I'll tell you, there's something extremely satisfying about thinking you'll buy something and realizing that you can make it yourself instead. It's way better.

So I'm actually fine with living on a budget. Of course, I'm also fine with never having to think about money and just buying whatever I feel like. But I find being thrifty rather fulfilling.

And besides, my name isn't Campbell for nothing.

And in that same vein, there are a few kitchen…well, staples isn't exactly the word. Ordinary ingredients might describe them, I guess, or at least not-exactly-exotic ingredients. There are some things you can make yourself that you might not have thought of. One is extracts. After using commercial orange extract to make some really disappointing Creamsicle Fudge, I investigated and learned that it's easy as pie to make your own, as long as you don't need it for a month.

You can slap a label on it. It doesn't have to be straight.
Homemade Orange Extract


What you'll need:
An orange or two, with a nice, bright firm peel
Vodka
Glass jar with a tight fitting lid
To make:
Wash the orange. Zest it (I used my handy Oxo Good Grips peeler), taking care to only remove the orange part. No white. Chop the strips of orange zest into smallish pieces.
Put the pieces of zest in the jar. Add enough vodka to cover the zest. Put the lid on.
Make note of the date. Your extract will be fragrant and ready to use in a about month.

This works with lemons, too. It's much better than most of the commercial brands, and a whole lot cheaper.

You can also make your own sweetened condensed milk. Personally, I'm fine with dropping a few bucks on Eagle Brand, but I also only use it sporadically. If I do buy it when I'm not planning a specific recipe, I all too often end up discovering the can at the back of the cabinet a few years later, after its "use by" date is long past. So it's nice to know I can make it when I need it, instead of having to make a trip to the grocery store. (Thanks to Dish Away blog for the recipe!)

Monday, September 10, 2012

One of Life's Little Condundrums: Laundry Imbalance

I just sorted the mountain of dirty clothes in our bathroom (that's something I tend to let go when I get busy) and I noticed something odd: Rich had two or three sets of underpants/undershirts/socks for every shirt and pair of shorts in the hamper.

I haven't noticed him changing his underwear and socks twice a day but, on the other hand, surely I would have caught him before he actually went out not wearing clothes, right? Or at least I would have heard about afterwards, after he made bail. Right?

Monday, September 3, 2012

Happy Labor Day, part 2 (and more Downton Abbey)

We've discovered, Rich and I, that we really and truly can't stop watching Downton Abbey. We zoomed through the seven episodes on Netflix in two nights, then happily connected a laptop to the TV in order to start streaming the next series/season through Amazon.

We watch it free on Amazon because we're Prime members. Just so you know, I can't recommend Amazon Prime highly enough. We end up ordering a bunch of stuff from Amazon anyway, and Prime gives us free shipping (free two-day shipping). Plus free access to a ton of their streaming video content, like the entire second season/series of Downton Abbey.

So we watched two more episodes from Amazon, and ended at around 1:15am. That's not that big a deal for me, because I'm a night owl anyway, but that's astonishing for Rich. He's Mr. Early to Bed, Early to Rise. And the fact that he suggested, "just one more" at midnight shows you how engaging it is.

We slept late today (duh). We're going for a late lunch at Red Robin, where they have the most fabulous burgers (one of my top three favorite burger places), because they're giving me a free burger for my birthday. (Ah, they know me so well!) In an absolutely brilliant move, Red Robin has a loyalty club, and rather than require members to bring in certificates, they attach rewards and special deals to the loyalty card number. That way, all you have to do is show up and give your card number to get the rewards. So there's a free Whiskey River BBQ Burger in my immediate future.

Then we'll come home and start (early) on Downton Abbey, since we've both admitted we'll simply watch until we've finished them all. We'll break at some point and feed the zoo, and at that point I'll put together some snacky kind of things—deviled eggs, maybe some chips & hummus, and this fabulous Cheddar Tailgating Bread from Rebecca at Foodie With Family. At least it looks fabulous. I've been trying to find an excuse to make it. And sure it'll go just as well with Masterpiece Classic as it does with college football, right?

Again, I hope your Labor Day is as enjoyable as mine is going to be!

Sunday, September 2, 2012

Happy Labor Day!

I can't believe it's September already! I can't believe it's the 2nd and I haven't changed all the calendars yet! (That might be easier to understand when you learn that I have four calendars just in my office, and one of the ones in the kitchen is a rack with little squares the I have to take down and rearrange each month.)

September is special to me, because my birthday is this month. In fact, my dear brother-in-law (the one I grew up with, not the one I married…uh, into) has a birthday almost this month (8/30), my beloved niece's b'day is the 7th, a life-long family friend's is the 1st, my sister's is the 14th, and niece's friend-since-middle-school's birthday is the 18th. And while we're at it, my grandmother, a few great aunts, at least one great uncle, a couple of cousins (first and second) and my late aunt were all born in September. It's a good birthday month. (And to save you the trouble of counting backwards, it's the long, cold December nights that does it.)

So I'm glad it's September. Oktoberfest is getting closer, and I'm finally starting to relax about the volunteer stuff. We're more or less covered, except for the Children's Area and, in fact, we could (and probably will have to) hire people to work there. So…so far, so good. And October getting here means it'll be DONE for a while. (There's next year to look forward to. Huzzah.)

I'm working on getting some socks done. If you check out the earlier post, you'll see that I'd better get on it. I've learned—nay, practically perfected—two-at-a-time socks on two circular needles. I'm still working on two-at-a-time on one circular, which is just another way of saying Magic Loop, which truly makes me crazy. (FYI, for you non-knitters, most people like either Magic Loop or double point needles and sincerely hate the other. I'm in the DPN crowd.) Right now I'm searching for the perfect circular needle, the one that will let me use this technique without getting tangled up in curly cables. No luck so far. I have the whole Knit Picks set of circulars. I spent some money getting one Hiya Hiya circular to try out, thinking that a knitting friend had told me they were tangle-free. (I was remembering wrong.) So now I've ordered one Kollage Square circular needle. We'll see if that smooth, soft cable will do the trick, or if I have to go with socks on two circulars forever (not exactly a crisis, as far as I'm concerned, but it's the principle of the thing).

We'll be continuing our Downton Abbey marathon tonight. We started watching it last night, through Netflix, and kept going for four episodes. I had heard it was good, but really didn't realize how fast we'd get hooked! Does anyone know if the second series/season is available anywhere? (I think I'm going to react the same way I did after I discovered Dick Francis and read all his books, one right after another. When I finished them all, I thought, indignantly, "Well, what am I supposed to do now?")

Hope your Labor Day is going well, too.

Sunday, August 26, 2012

Sunday Afternoon in August

Okay, the sheets on our bed are changed, we have clean towels. The violet farm in the bathroom has been tended to and the extravagant window ledge they sit on cleaned. There's a load of clean dishes drying in the dishwasher, and I'll put them away once they're finished. The last time I made broccoli cheese casserole (one of Rich's favorites), I divided it in two and froze half. It's defrosted now, so all I have to do is stick it in the oven, make a salad (I've got a tomato that's right on the edge), stir up the homemade ranch, cook the Sister Schubert's, and I've got dinner ready. Not bad!

It occurred to me this afternoon that cold weather is coming. This last week has been an absolutely awesome reminder of that: There was one day when the high was in the 80s! In Texas! In August! Unbelievable! Anyway, cold weather will be here eventually, and I threw away most of my socks last spring.

I love Cool Max Gold Toe crew socks. I became acquainted with them, maybe, six or seven years ago, at which time I loved them so much I bought about ten pairs, in black and white. (Some pairs were black, some were white. They weren't pairs of black-and-white socks, 'cause that really wouldn't go all that well with anything.) A year or so later I bought another ten or fifteen pairs. Seriously, I wore these things every day.

But now, all these years later, they're worn out. Really, really worn out. Threadbare, in great big patches. And they don't make them any more.

Isn't that the pisser? You grow to love a product, depend on it, and the manufacturer decides they can do better. No Gold Toe Cool Max crew-length women's socks exist any more. Anywhere.

So I decided I better get busy and knit my own.

Yes, you heard me. I'm going to wear custom knit socks. That used to be the norm, you know. Time was that everybody knit his or her own socks, no matter what their station in life (as I understand it, Coolidge was the last president who knitted his own). Knitting your own, insuring a perfect fit, was the best—and sometimes the only—option. Part of a sailor's (and, BTW, a pirate's) expertise was, out of necessity, knitting and darning [repairing] their own socks.

If Long John Silver could do it, so can I. But I'd better get cracking.

I'm not the fastest knitter in the world. And socks are pretty quick, but they do take some time. In the last few weeks I've learned how to make two-at-a-time cuff-down socks (well, actually, I made mitts, but it's basically the same technique) and two-at-a-time toe-up socks. So I should be all set to zip through some socks. All I have to do is get started.

While we're waiting for the new Fall TV shows to start, we're catching up on the Sherlock episodes we haven't seen. So tonight I'll be watching Benedict Cumberbatch and knitting.

What could be better than that?

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Learn how to knit

In the last few weeks, in addition to dealing with all things Oktoberfest, I've learned how to knit two-at-a-time top-down socks (or, actually, mitts) AND two-at-a-time toe-up socks.

Seriously, what knitting frontiers are left for me, other than lace…which my attention span is much too short to allow.

Monday, August 13, 2012

Dinner

Dinner prep took three sessions today, though it was just because I didn't want to spend too much time at one stretch.

  1. Boil the eggs, make the homemade Ranch dressing.
  2. Assemble the Butter Burger patties and get them ready to cook.
  3. Mix and fill the deviled eggs, chop the olives for Rich's Wimpy Burgers*.

And in between I got stuff Oktoberfest stuff done.

Still to come: Make the green salad, cook the burgers. Get out the chips. (It's hard coming up with menu after menu that doesn't heat up the kitchen, though it's actually only 102° today.) Eat. (I'll post recipes sometime when I'm feeling motivated.)

Oh! And here's my version of the Anthro-inspired Scarflet:


Yeah. Lovely.

Knitting and deviled eggs in one post. What do you expect?


*Yes, he grew up in Chicago.

Thursday, August 2, 2012

It's hot

It's hot. Hot as in 106° in Southlake right now, and the predicted high for today is 109°. It's 3:28pm, so we're half an hour into the high demand period for electricity. Ercot, the people who control these things, are begging people in our area to cut back on electricity usage between 3 and 7pm on hot days like this, or face rolling blackouts. And seriously, I don't want to be anywhere with no AC and no fans on an afternoon like this! So at 3pm, we dutifully reduce our electricity consumption. Our thermostat automatically goes up to 83°, we turn the ceiling fans on, we lower any shades that aren't already lowered, and try to sit as still as possible. And, of course, no stove, no oven, no washing machine or dryer, no dishwasher, no unnecessary lights…no anything electric we can get by without. The lights thing is especially hard, since we have as much glass (windows and doors) as possible covered. We have a bunch of Redi Shades everywhere, little $5 paper accordion window shades that actually come with an adhesive strip so they don't need any hardware at all. (Well, the ones stuck to the sheer curtains in the breakfast nook have a few straight pins in them, but I added those.) They help a lot, but it makes the house—which is designed to let in tons of light—very dark, and makes me feel a little like a mole.

At least all that sitting still means that I get a lot of reading and knitting done. I finished the Anthro-Inspired Scarflet, from AllFreeKnitting.com.

Mine doesn't have the little pearly flower thing. It's made of Lion Wool in Cobalt Blue, to match the Fire on the Mountain Clogger jackets. (Yeah, I danced with them for 16 years, and my sister is still a member. It's for her. If you follow that link above, she's the blonde in the left-hand photo.) It doesn't look nearly this delicate, since it's worsted weight, and the edges are curling like crazy.

I'll take a picture of my version after it's blocked and no longer looks like a big blue tube. (Very curly edges.)

In the meantime, not generating heat in the kitchen is stretching my cooking imagination to the limit. We've had chicken salad two days in a row (first Carol's Sesame then a my own version of DC that doesn't involve the horror of Miracle Whip), and we'll be ordering pizza tomorrow. Slow cookers aren't too bad, but on the extremely hot days (like today), it's best to avoid those, as well.

So no cooking today. Now, if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go finish that novel Tevilla gave me. And maybe dabble in some socks.

Monday, July 30, 2012

Now I'm sad

My sister Linda and her husband Al came to visit for a long weekend (lots of fun!), and just left this morning. I'm getting together with the whole Not-Net group this evening. Well, we are, actually, since our significant others are also invited. It's a reunion of sorts, since Dorothy is back in town for a few days, so the whole gang of five is here. But it's also a going-away, too, since Dorothy actually came back to help Linda* and her family pack up what they're moving and sell off what they're not. They're moving to California, which is good news for them, except that Linda will miss us! And Dorothy will be going back to San Antonio.

Which leaves Rich and me alone in our house, and just Debbie, Barry and myself to keep Not-Net going. Will we manage (the Not-Net part)? Will we keep going? We'll see.

In the meantime, it's a pretty lonely day!


*That's friend Linda, as opposed to sister Linda. It gets complicated.

Sunday, July 22, 2012

Delayed, or the story of my life

I thought I'd be able to make the transition from Blogger to Wordpress by now, but it's not going to happen that quickly. Or, really, not quickly…but even  more slowly than I'd hoped. When it happens, this blog will be at a different URL, and the—ahem—two of you who follow it (Hello? Hello? Are you still there?) may need to do something differently to get to it. I'm not sure what has to happen to make that seamless, but I'll try to find out. For, you know, my fans.

Anyway…

In the meantime, my sister Linda and her husband Al are coming to visit (woo-hoo!). And my big Southlake Chamber of Commerce luncheon at which Dallas Stars President & CEO Jim Lites will be speaking is also this week.*

I have to clean the house, and I'd like to get a few household projects finished before Linda & Al get here. And I have to make a blouse to wear to the luncheon (nope, couldn't find anything I even remotely like ready-made). So my life for the next few days will be: Clean, clean, clean. Sew, sew, sew. Oktoberfest, Oktoberfest, Oktoberfest.

Now you're all envious, aren't you?


*I'm no longer as enraged at the Stars as I was, so I will actually be in the luncheon sitting at Jim Lites' table, instead of outside egging his car.

Wednesday, July 4, 2012

4th of July food, hockey & the Dead Sea Scrolls

First, the hockey, because it's going to be unpleasant. That trade I talked about, the one I was so fearful about? It happened. And I'm so pissed you wouldn't believe it. They traded away the one guy who's been my favorite player as long as we've been going to Stars games, and acquired two forty-year-olds. (Also two players who are 5'9 and 5'10, and one of those is one of the 40-year-olds. The Stars are going to be among the oldest and smallest teams this season.)

I'm not happy and I think it's a bad idea. This is what I think is going to happen*: The old guys are going to get injured and play in fewer than two thirds of the games this season, so the leadership and guidance they're supposed to bring the younger players will be off in rehab somewhere. Jaromir Jagr, the big name player who's so close to the end of his career and who has never, ever played for a Western Conference team, is going to start thinking how much better the East is than the West (before he signed he asked the Stars about how the style of play is different in the two conferences). He'll finish the season, or up until he gets injured, with a general aura of contempt for the West. It's going to do wonders for morale, both within the team and for fans.

*Yes, I'll come back during the season and look at my predictions. If I'm wrong, I'll cheerfully admit it. If I'm right, someone owes me! I'll figure out who, and what, later.

For the first time this year, we didn't pay for our Stars season tickets with one payment in May, but just let them divide it up into three payments. The last one is supposed to go through on July 15th. I'm actually considering canceling and asking for my money back. Oh, sure, we'll go to some games, but I'm honestly not sure I'm interested enough to slog down to AAC and sit through all 45 of them. And, incidentally, I could subscribe to NHL Center Ice for less than 10% of our ticket price and watch all the Stars, Sabres, Ducks, Sharks and Wild games all season long. From the comfort of my own sofa.

I'm going to have to think about it.

In the meantime, on to food. I wanted to make something kind of special for the 4th, and happened to think about this recipe. Strawberry Shortcut Cake. Obviously the recipe is now available online, but I first encountered it in a Pillsbury pamphlet-type cookbook copyrighted in 1980, and I'm guessing that was about the time it came into my possession. The SSC is the only recipe I've ever made from it, I believe, but I've kept the booklet all these years so I'd have access to this cake recipe. It's one of those things that tastes yummy, looks reasonably impressive and yet is so easy you can actually spend all your time on another part of the meal and have two blow-them-away dishes.

You mix up the cake, combine berries and Jello, and spoon it over the batter before you bake it. After it's done, it's got a layer of gooey strawberry goodness on the top (or, you know, on the bottom if you just lift it out of the pan with a cake server).

I've always made it the way the recipe says, with strawberries. Making it today, for the 4th of July, I suggested to Rich that while we eat this red and white cake we hold our breath 'til we turn blue, just to make it appropriately patriotic. He suggested adding blueberries instead. So I faked a blueberry combination similar to the strawberry one, and put it on in diagonal stripes.

I'll let you know how it turns out.

And, finally, the Dead Sea Scrolls. They're here! In the Metroplex! Well, some of them, anyway, and you can see them at the Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary in Fort Worth. They have a pretty extensive exhibit, the culmination of which is actual fragments of the Scrolls. This is the exhibit's website, where you can buy tickets.

The Scrolls were impressive, but they're very dimly lit, of course, to protect them, and the ones on leather (which is most of them) are very dark, so they're hard to see. It's extremely cool having them right there in front of you, knowing the history behind them and thinking about the people who made them and all the hands who have touched them throughout the ages. But for the most part I kind of had to take their word for it. They pretty much look like dark, ragged blobs. (Honestly, I mean no disrespect.)

Tickets are for specific time slots, so visitors won't be bunched up, all trying to look at the same thing at the same time. Unfortunately, you watch a short film right before you go in to see the Scroll fragments, so at the most interesting (to me) point, you get all bunched up again. So be sure and take some patience with you. Don't bother, though, with the sweater they recommend (the Scrolls are kept at a low temperature, also to protect them). I tend to be cold in restaurants and stores, and I just carried mine the whole time. And if you're on Facebook, you should 'Like' See the Scrolls. They offered a discount code just for Facebook friends; we got $10 off our tickets. I bet they'll do that again.

In any case, it was worth the money, and the drive to Fort Worth.

Wow, I've gone on and on, haven't I? I guess I should split this up into multiple entries. And speaking of that…(next time).

Tuesday, June 26, 2012

Three things


Two things household, one thing hockey.

First, Rich has been in Germany for a few days, and will be home in another couple. He's in Friedrichshafen at a "hamfest," a gathering of amateur radio enthusiasts (yeah, nerds) where they buy and sell radio gear, go around looking at radio set ups, and hang out together, talking about radios. Not exactly a laugh a minute if you ask me, but he enjoys it.

He's also enjoying just being in Europe, since it's been a while. He used to go to Europe six or eight times a year and he misses traveling like that. He needed some time away from work (a little hard to find when you have a home office), so all in all this is a very good thing.

I oughta return the favor and bother him 'til he gets up.
It's not all that great for me, though, because Rich is naturally an early riser, which fits in well with our cats' schedule. When he's gone, Rocky spends half an hour every morning convincing me it's time to get up—by biting my hands if he can get to them, or walking all over me if he can't. They, cats and dogs, gradually start sleeping later as the days pass, but it takes a while. In the meantime, I get up way before I want to, stumble around feeding everybody, then collapse back into bed, hoping I can go back to sleep (I can't). I'll be glad when Rich is back to reclaim the breakfast shift.

That will also allow me to return to my normal routine of showering as soon as I get up (instead of stumbling around, etc.). That will reduce the frequency of my looking up from my computer and noticing that it's noon and I'm still in my pajamas.

Secondly, it's going to be 107° today. This should NOT be happening in June! It was like this last August, but not in June! What is August going to be like?!? I should be careful about complaining too much. My in-laws in Denver have been suffering through 100°+ weather for days (plus a few wildfires), and they're much less accustomed to it. But, seriously…it's June!

So I'm back to keeping the shades drawn, covering the glass in and around the doors, cranking up the thermostat, sitting under the ceiling fan with a cold drink, and only using the microwave to heat up whatever absolutely has to be hot for dinner. Huzzah! (Everybody, now: Come on, autumn!)

Thirdly, the hockey note. The Stars traded Mike Ribeiro a few days ago. He's been one of the mainstays of the team, though I haven't especially been a fan. (He sometimes gets too fussy and tries for the perfect shot, resulting in him fooling around and not taking a shot at all.) The fact that they traded him, though, has re-ignited all the Steve Ott trade rumors. Ott is my favorite player. Always has been. If he's traded, I'll not only be very depressed, I'll have to cancel out of the Southlake Chamber July luncheon, at which Stars President and CEO Jim Lites will be speaking. I'm the one who arranged that, and I'll be sitting at his table. Unless Ott gets traded, in which case, I'll be the one outside egging Jim Lites' car.

Anyway, there are reasons that Ott being traded is less likely than Ribeiro being traded, but it's hard not to dread it. Worry about it, even. Get a sinking feeling in my stomach every time I look at Twitter or Facebook (FB is where I learned about the Ribeiro trade).

So whether it happens or not, I'm experiencing the angst. Smart, no?

I'm trying to keep a positive attitude. And stay cool. Now, since it's almost noon I guess I'll go shower and get dressed.

Tuesday, May 29, 2012

I need some encouragement


or…

Am I Really That Bad at This?

I'm working on another Konnor hat, this time the Jacques Cousteau Hat (named that, I think, because there are photos of the man wearing one that looks like it). I'm making it out of some lovely Patons Silk Bamboo, in Plum, which is a soft wine color. I cast on and knit the bottom five inches of it just fine. Then I started on the crown, which I've knitted now four times.

If you're a knitter: I keep screwing up the decreases. The first two times I attempted it, I put one of the markers in the wrong spot. (Yeah, okay. But it was the end of the round, and just two stitches away from the beginning-of-round marker, so apparently I thought it wouldn't matter. It did.) That caused a kind of cascading failure. I finally realized the problem, ripped it out and placed all four markers correctly. Now all I have to do is work up to two stitches before the marker, SSK, slip the marker and knit the knits and purl the purls until two stitches before the next marker. But, apparently, I just sail past markers at random intervals without doing the decrease, because when I stop to count the stitches between the markers, it's rare that there are the same number in all four sections.

If you're not a knitter: I keep screwing it up. It appears I have the attention span of a gnat, and just stop paying attention. Frequently.

So I rip it out to that same bottom five inches, then re-knit it. Occasionally I drop a stitch in my struggles and have to get out the crochet hook and painstakingly thread it up to the knitting needle again, hoping I keep all the knit stitches as knits and the purl stitches as purls. I was doing really well last night, counting every few rounds to make sure all four sections were even, when I got over confident and went a few rounds without double checking. Yeah, you guessed it.

So I'm here to freely admit this stupid hat is kicking my butt. It shouldn't; it's just not that hard. But…

If you're a knitter: …I can't seem to pull off four evenly-spaced decreases for ten rounds in a row.

If you're not a knitter: …I keep screwing it up. (I know, I said that already. But it bears repeating.)

So please give me some encouragement, if you've got it. Or suggest a new hobby.

Thursday, May 24, 2012

Yarn 'ho'

Yeah, I think that's actually how it should be punctuated. I'm not saying "ho" like it's in quotation marks. It's not like "ho-ho-ho" or as in, "Land ho!" I'm saying I'll, you know, do things for yarn.

There's a contest going on. I should be ashamed (but I'm not very).

Speaking of knitting, I've been making hats. Give me a day or so and I'll post some pictures of them.

In the meantime, the hockey playoffs continue (Go Devils!), basketball playoffs continue, and I continue, myself, to refine our baseball game bag (it's a process, and has taken more time than any reasonable person would expect).

And you thought this would be all about knitting!

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

Need a new knitting book (a post all about knitting)

First I made this. (The panda one. I never could make their ear pattern work, though, so I ended up just making up my own. It looks fine.)
From Stitch Nation Yarn
I'm ready now to make the little mitts.

I thought it would be a good idea to make them two-at-a-time. For any non-knitters, there's a problem knitting socks and gloves or mittens, in that after you've made the first one, the thrill is sometimes gone. You've risen to the challenge, climbed that particular mountain, and you're no longer inspired by the pattern or the yarn. It's sometimes referred to as Single Sock Syndrome. (Really.) So two-at-a-time seemed the way to go on these little mitts. I wasn't sure how to do it, but I thought it wouldn't be any big deal. There are all kinds of books about knitting two socks at the same time (Single Sock Syndrome is not an uncommon problem), and mittens (and gloves, too) start the same way as socks, as long as you begin at the cuff. I recently learned how to use two circular needles to knit two-at-a-time socks (and let me tell you, that's the only way to go for two-at-a-time), so I thought I'd do it that way. I just needed to know how to cast on.

…and that's where the problems started. How is it done?

I've got this book, which explains how to knit socks on two circular needles, but only one sock at a time.
I've also got this book, which explains how to knit socks two-at-a-time, but on only one circular needle.
I've got this book, which explains two-at-a-time and two circular needles—but only from the toe up, which doesn't help at all with the cast-on, the part I'm not sure about.

I'm still looking through my library, but I may have to look instead for new parents who are only concerned if one of their baby's hands stays warm.

Wednesday, May 2, 2012

Is it incestuous to direct you to my other blog?

If I suggest in my personal blog (this one) that you read a post on my business blog (that one), is it incestuous? Cannibalistic? Unseemly?

The truth is, I kind of like the wording of that post, and I certainly don't want to just duplicate it here. But I do, oh, I do want everyone to read the 15 Grammar Goofs infographic!

Let's see, I could add something here…maybe talk about what I've been writing lately. Um, do you want to know how fiduciaries of employee retirement plans can mitigate their risk? Anybody…?

Okay, then. How about a picture of what I've been knitting? I just made this, really, really quickly. My beloved niece has a godson, 16 years old, who is being treated for testicular cancer. (Yeah, that is in the vicinity of the worst thing I've ever heard.) He's losing his hair from the chemo and she contacted me to see if I would knit him a hat. He wanted a beanie, skullcap kind of thing, "like the Zac Brown Band wears." How'd I do?


The light-colored yarn is camel, special to me because I bought it in Beijing. (Seriously, there was a yarn shop right down the street from our hotel, can you believe it?) I bought the yarn as a souvenir, a special memento, and I was saving it to make something for myself. But it's incredibly soft (who'd expect camel yarn to be soft, right?), and that's pretty important in a chemo cap. And using part of that yarn to make a cap for Rebekah's godson makes it even more special. I found a pattern, adapted it, knitted the thing, blocked it and got it in the mail in three days. (Be impressed with that. I'm a slow knitter.)

Or you can listen to what I just bought on iTunes. Yes, the official video is on YouTube, too. But, uh, it's the song I like.



All right, all right! Now I'm just yammering. See, I didn't really have much to say…except go look at my other blog! (Unseemly. Definitely unseemly.)

Monday, April 23, 2012

Update


First, the clementine cake was just okay. Nothing special, and a little heavier texture than I care for. I'm not sure the problem was one or more of the mistakes I made, or if I just don't like this cake. Well, whatev. So it's not bulletproof. The clementines did smell nice while they were boiling, though.

Second, and more importantly (I have my priorities), all the teams I wanted to win in the first round of the Stanley Cup playoffs (except, you know, Dallas, and they were handicapped by not actually being in the series) did win:

     Not-Vancouver  —  Won!
     Not-Pittsburgh  —  Won!
     Not-Detroit  —  Won!
     Absolutely-Not-San Jose  —  Won!

And here's what I have to say about that.


Rich asked me which teams I'm going to be supporting in the next round (I think he might have been planning to place a few bets). Dunno…nobody, really. Now that the teams I really disliked are out, I'm good. (Yes, I know. Professional sporting events don't always bring out the best in me, okay?) Actually, I'll be pulling for Phoenix if they make it through. (That series has gone to Game 6, which is tonight. Go 'Yotes!)

In the meantime, I bought whipped cream for the clementine cake, which then led me to make the banana pudding we had for dessert last night. So that kind of worked out. And we're going to our first Texas Rangers game this week, so I can focus on a sport besides hockey.

All in all, a good start to a new week!

Saturday, April 21, 2012

Bulletproof Cake

.
…or What Happens When You Buy Food Because It's Cute

Okay, so we've been eating Cuties lately. Cuties are clementines (or sometimes Mandarin oranges) that are small, easy to peel, seedless and sweet. I had seen them in the grocery store but had never tried them. After reading Pioneer Woman's blog singing their praises (and their addictive quality), I bought a bag. Rich and I devoured them just as fast her family did. So I started buying them regularly—sometimes Cuties, sometimes Sweeties, sometimes Clemmys, whatever variation I came across.

As I mentioned, they're small. Well, the last time I was shopping for them, my local grocery had some of the tiniest ones I had ever seen. Really, the larger ones were the size of golf balls. Tiny. And, gosh, they were just so darn cute! So instead of buying normal-sized Cuties (wow, that's a phrase), I bought the tiny little miniature ones. Because they were cute.

But, cute or not, they were kind of a pain to eat. They weren't harder to peel or anything, it just took the same amount of effort and there wasn't as much return. We started to not bother with it. And, so, three weeks later, we still had a big bowl of clementines, only they were starting to look a little tired. As I always do in these circumstances,* I went looking for something to do with them, i.e., a recipe that would use them up, and found this. It's been decades since I attempted a flour-free cake, but it looked interesting, not too complicated and it would use a whole pound of aging clementines. Perfect!

Well. Maybe. First I forgot to cute the cooked clementines in half, and they do contain the occasional seed. Shrug that off; extra fiber, right? Secondly—and this one isn't my fault—how much exactly is a "heaping teaspoon?" Baking is chemistry. It's precise. Even if you never, ever measure anything in the kitchen, you have to measure when you bake, and pretty carefully, too, unless you're not all that concerned about the results. So how much, exactly, is a heaping teaspoon?

Heaping tsp
This?                                            That?
But none of that was as much of a problem as my unfamiliarity with my own food processor, the big one. To be perfectly honest, I hardly ever use it. I've got this fabulous Oskar that sits out on the counter, chops onions and makes bread crumbs like nobody's business, and takes maybe fifteen seconds to rinse clean. I love it, and use it for all except the really big jobs, such as chopping twelve tiny, boiled clementines. I hauled out the big processor and set it up. I dumped in the clementines (still whole, since I forgot about removing the seeds), put the lid on and hit the switch. For some reason, the bottom layer just sat there, untouched, while the top half was perfectly chopped. Hit pulse again. The top was chopped even finer, but the whole clementines on the bottom were still intact. After a few more tries, I finally looked really closely and discovered that my food processor has a smaller bowl stored inside the full-size bowl. I don't know if it's intended to be used that way for some application, but the smaller bowl kept the blade from fitting against the bottom of either bowl. So the fruit on top was gradually turned to liquid while the stuff on the bottom sat undisturbed.

Food processor together
Doesn't look suspicious.
Food processor apart
Surprise!

Plus, each of those pulses had spattered and splattered the now-liquified top layer all over the inside of the bowl. It coated the lid, the plunger, every nook, every cranny—and some of the space between the inner and outer bowls. That fact came into play once I realized what I had done, and stopped to take the freakin' bowls apart. Just so you know, that's impossible to do when everything is coated with slippery, orange goo.

Eventually I got it done. I mixed the clementines, more pureed than "finely chopped," with everything else, put it in the oven and baked it. It cooled overnight, and considering the whole comedy of errors—which I started shortly before midnight, BTW—it appears to have turned out okay.

Uncut cake
It looks more or less like Nigella's, right?
I haven't cut it yet because Rich has been out all day and it was such a big deal to make, I need a little fanfare. But I did learn a few things through all this.
  • I should use my big food processor more often, or at least look at it more carefully.
  • Boiling clementines smell delicious and, oddly, just like cake.
  • Almond meal is dang expensive.
  • Little tiny clementines, cut in half and squeezed, contain exactly the perfect quantity of juice to add just the right touch to a Blue Moon beer.

I wish I had realized that last one a little sooner.

*I'm cheap. I don't like wasting food, or the money it took to buy it.

Friday, April 13, 2012

The post season is here


It's Stanley Cup playoff time, and since my beloved Stars are already on vacation I have to pick other teams to support (temporarily). So here's who I'm rooting for:

     Not-Vancouver
     Not-Pittsburgh
     Not-Detroit, and
     Absolutely-Not-San Jose.

I'd just as soon see the NY Rangers not progress very far, though Brad Richards has been much too gracious (dang it!) to root against. And I'm torn about wanting Not-Boston to win, since Boston did bring Marty Turco on board at the end of the season and he is still my boy. Speaking of Marty, I'd love for Chicago (who didn't re-sign him this year) to bite it early, and since they're playing Phoenix in the first round, and Phoenix (and nice guy former Stars coach Dave Tippett) happens to be the only team I'm actually supporting directly, that's the win-win I'm hoping for.

Yeah, it gets complicated.

Tuesday, April 10, 2012

Pass me that hanky


The last few days have been a little odd. For no reason I can see, I've been really emotional. Teary, weepy, start-sniffling-without-warning emotional.

I'm not sure what the reason is. This emotional roller coaster has seemed downright hormonal but, frankly, it's been a few years since I had to worry about that. There must be some explanation, though I can't figure out what it is, for why my mascara doesn't make it through the day.

I got all weepy (several times) thinking about the Dallas Stars and the fact that they didn't make the playoffs again. Actually, that's not correct—I'm disappointed about the playoffs, but that's not what makes me so sad. It's the terrible feeling the full season tickets holders were left with after the last game of the season, Saturday night. We couldn't celebrate success because there wasn't any. We should have been enjoying watching our favorites players one last time, but the Stars sat out a bunch of the guys we know and love, several of whom probably won't be playing in Stars uniforms next season. Instead, we got to watch a few "NHL debuts," and let me just say I couldn't have cared less.

Plus that game was Fan Appreciation Day, celebrating all the fans…except us.

All season long we were there, approximately seven thousand of us, for every freakin' game, good or bad. We showed up, filed in, spent money on concessions, filled our seats and cheered. Every game. And during the dark days when we were the only ones showing up, they told us, over and over, "Bring your friends! Let's fill the place up!" Yes, we knew we weren't enough. Yes, we knew they wanted to fill the arena. We wanted to fill the arena. And when attendance started booming, we were thrilled—no more cheering in a vacuum. No more staring across the ice at banks of empty seats.

But the fact is that when attendance was down, the number it was down to was us. We were still there, no matter what. Maybe what the Stars meant to say was, "Thanks for coming, for being serious, hard-core fans we can always count on to show up. Thanks for supporting us through thick and thin." Yeah, maybe. But that last game left us with a bad feeling. (For the record, section 310 STHs just shrugged—well, that's over—and left quietly.)

I also had a mammogram yesterday. My breast cancer, in 2005, was discovered in a routine mammogram, just like that one. I've told the cancer story elsewhere, so I won't go through it again, but the fact is that I never think these mammograms are going to be a big deal. I sincerely don't think it's going to bother me. But I get there and it really, really does. Somehow just being in the quiet room with the machine, sitting and waiting, brings it all back. I was sniffly and intermittently teary while the technician was having the radiologist look at my images. After she came back, said nothing had changed (that's good news) and escorted me back to the changing room, I just sat and boohooed for a few minutes, trying to get myself under control. Then I texted Rich, telling him this was the last one I'm doing by myself. (First-class husband that he is, he just replied to let him know when the appointments are. He's a sport, that man of mine.)

And, last but not least, my mother-in-law in Denver has been sick. Weird sick. Slurring her speech, acting strange, sounding for all the world (from the info we're getting over the phone) like she's had a stroke, but then not having signs of it on the MRIs they keep doing. And she resists seeing a doctor at all, much less going to the emergency room. We have to wait for texts from Rich's brother (FIL gets pissed if the brother calls us, because "it's nothing to worry about, she's fine") to see what's going on, just waiting and hoping for the best.

I thought after both my parents were gone that I was done with this particular torment. After all, I love my in-laws but they're not my parents. But no. I worry just as much, but have considerably less influence. (Even though my MIL loves me, she only tolerates so much butting into her business.) So thinking about that triggers the waterworks, too.

Maybe it's something seasonal. Springtime. The pollen count. Or, I don't know, another lingering side effect of those steroids I took a few weeks ago. In any case, it can't last forever, right?

Please?

Sunday, April 1, 2012

Tweets

Last thing on Sunday night I thought I'd share some of my favorite tweets. I thought these were especially funny or at least entertaining. Plus one link at the very end to a remarkable and very cool video clip.


@SportsSturm (Bob Sturm):

  • And now with more insight on the Tebow trade let's bring in our NFL insider, Pat Robertson. Pat?
  • I get home and my wife is watching the Bachelor. No dude in the history of the universe needs a cross checking quite like him.


@joshgroban:
  • When I die instead of burial or cremation I wanna be chopped with avocado, is that unhealthy?
  • Last nights solar flare changed the key of my dial tone, turned my electric toothbrush timer to "infinity" and set me up a hotmail account

@Alyssa_Milano:

  • ~GROUPHUG~ Get in. The whole damn lot of you.
  • Just pulled the mommy-move of peeing while holding the sleeping baby. You can file this tweet under "T" for "talent" & "TMI".

@alydenisof (Alyson Hannigan):

  • If I had invisibility as a super power I think I'd use it to sneak bites of people's food at restaurants.

@QuiltingMuriel (Muriel B, 92 yrs old):

  • NY temp is 20 degrees, then 60, then snow, then 60. Mother Nature is finally going through menopause.
  • I made a Trump joke and lost 10 followers. I can only assume they have very bad hair.
  • Remember 2 turn back your clocks tonight. I'm going to try for 30 yrs. :)
  • Yes, and I'm sorry I ate the peppers. It's all moot. RT @TomDahn Ron Paul: I Would Not Have Ordered Bin Laden Raid
  • I don't like the term "ripe" old age. Sounds like I'm getting soft and too mushy. Oh, wait...
  • Time is precious. I'm at the point now if a young salesgirl is on her phone & ignores me, I just start putting items in my purse.

@michaelmuhney:

  • My daughter tells me 10 times a day, "I love you Daddy." About twice a day she says, "Daddy, I farted on you." #prettyGOODratio

@OldSpice:

  • Should we form our own political party? Key platforms: chicken-fried lobster 4 all, dinosaurs in the military & more explosion-related jobs.

@alyankovic:

  • While I think it’s unlikely that we’re the only forms of life in the universe, I’m pretty sure we’re the only ones that deep-fry Twinkies.

@juliebenz:

  • I have a window seat...ugh! I will be the one giving climb-over lap dances today.

@TheTweetofGod:

  • I believe meat is murder. And that vegetables are burglary, bread is mail fraud and dairy is impersonating a police officer.

@katesmithlaw (Kate Smith, a friend and local attorney):

  • So, it is now legal to carry a concealed handgun into a bar in Ohio. No one order shots!

@gublernation (Matthew Gray Gubler):

  •  How funny would it be if the statue of liberty was really just the slowest Trojan horse ever.

@wfaaweather (Pete Delkus, last August):

  • i'm trying to figure out the forecast for tomorrow. i'm thinking about going with HOT. i hope it's accurate.

@GarretDillahunt:

  • Finding myself strangely attracted to @missmoronmagnet....wait.

@Razor5Hole (Daryl Reaugh):

  • This is awesome - “@wyshynski: New Puck Daddy: Video: Watch 25,003 stuffed animals fly in a hockey rink http://yhoo.it/scTw8x
Let's call this a cheerful start to a good week, 'kay?

Sunday, March 25, 2012

Don't you wish you were eating with us tonight?

After two weeks of only minimal cooking (and sometimes less than that), I'm finally feeling like I'm rejoining the living. and we're having a leftover cleanup night. I'm about to:

  • Try to reduce the chicken pasta red sauce that was way too thin
  • Throw together some rice patties (my first ever) from the leftovers of last night's Chinese takeout
  • Heat up the glazed ham steaks.

Should be interesting, though probably more so in the abstract than on the plate.

I'll let you know. Unless I decide I just can't talk about it.

Tuesday, March 20, 2012

I don't mean to be so boring

Sorry for the long periods of dreary dullness, but the fuzzy parts of my mind that are conscious are pretty much absorbed with thoughts of inhalers and pills and cough syrups and nasal sprays, and their corresponding schedules. Seriously, I don't know why what should have been a plain old cold has wiped me out so completely, but it has. Either that or I was silently struck stupid and limp sometime last week and just haven't realized it yet.

Today I have two main goals. Well, three. First, to sort the giant pile of dirty clothes piling up in the hamper before there's an avalanche in the bathroom. Second, to arrange a meeting later in the week with a couple of people I'm hoping will take on the Logistics Committee for the Southlake Chamber Oktoberfest*, thereby removing it from my plate.

The third is to get to the end of the day feeling healthy enough to go to the Stars game tonight. Stop thinking that. Stop it! It's not what you think. It's not just that I can't stand to miss a game. I had decided last night I would tell Rich I didn't want to go, and find someone to use our tickets, when I saw that tonight is Kari Lehtonen Bobblehead Night. We have to go. I've mentioned the bobbleheads before. The only way to get them is to go through the doors at American Airlines Center before game time and show the people just inside your ticket. They mark through the barcode and hand you a bobblehead. That's the only way! And we have all the others! If we don't get this one, our set won't be complete! We have no choice, I tell you!

Okay, so we do have a choice, but I really want that bobblehead, so we'll be going.

One set of our bobbleheads are still boxed up, waiting for a place to live (when Rich has a real office set up, I guess). The other set resides on one of the high Elfa shelves above my computer. I'll post a picture when the set is complete. It's pretty cool, if you're kind of a rabid Dallas Stars fan.

I hope this rainy Tuesday is going well for those of you who aren't insane. Please…wish me luck anyway.



*I did Logistics last year. I'm co-chairing the event this year and, yes, it was stupid to agree to that. I had good reasons, I'm sure I did, but they seem faded and far away right now. I'm getting pretty desperate to get all the committee chair positions filled, and I'm afraid people are going to start ducking my phone calls. (They shouldn't; I'm promising them some pretty good stuff….)