"I'm going shopping whether we need anything or
not!"
I thought I'd take a long walk in Lowe's and learn
what's to be had in the way of washing machines,
but I stopped at Lowery's and Marsh on the way,
and then it was one o'clock and a misting rain had
begun.
I did walk the full length of every aisle in
Marsh. And I made two trips back to the
car, having forgotten my Marsh card and my grocery
bags. Which I naturally remembered at
separate times. Hint: when you have
to go back to the car, leave your cart beside the
rest rooms so they won't put all your stuff back
on the shelves. Fortunately, there was
nothing but a bicycle helmet in my cart when I
learned how alert cart boys are. (The bike
was only a few feet from the door the cart was
parked near, so that was *alert*!)
There was a Boss Barbecue in the Marsh parking
lot, but I didn't even go over to see what they
had. Warming up rice at home seemed more
appealing.
I ended up making fried rice, first frying minced
celery, chopped onion, and finely chopped corned
beef. Hardly any of the corned beef is
left, and what there is is mostly fat, but I
couldn't find corned beef at Marsh. Perhaps
I was looking in the wrong place; I don't know
Marsh very well. I can get some at Kroger
on Monday.
I slept late and the meatloaf wasn't even thinking
about getting cooked at suppertime, so I served
sliders and now I have one ready-to-go meal in the
fridge. But I intend to bake a Cornish game
hen tomorrow.
I'd been thinking about giving my snow boots a
coat of paste wax and putting them away for the
summer — but it's going to be more like give
them a coat of wax and put them back into the
snow.
I slept half an hour late this morning and left in
such a hurry that I forgot the bag with my shoes
in it, so I had to wear boots for the
service. Kicking your shoes off under the
pew is a bit difficult when they lace to the calf.
I'm waiting for my fried rice to get hot for
lunch. Celery, minced corned-beef suet,
onion, yellow rice, a bit of sesame oil I put in
before I realized it wasn't tamari sauce, tamari
sauce, and some Aldi giardiniera.
⁂
Had I known I was going to put in giardiniera, I'd
have used less tamari sauce: it came out a
touch salty. But I still enjoyed the
giardiniera.
The instructions on the game hen said to bake it
at three-fifty for an hour. I'm starting to
think that one hour at three-fifty is universal.
I stuffed a quarter of an onion inside the bird
and put the remaining raw pea pods, a carrot, and
three diabetic potatoes in the skillet with
it. I zapped the potatoes a minute and a
half first. No rolling in oil, but I'm
supposed to butter the chicken every five or ten
minutes.
Didn't baste with butter much, but I draped a
square of bacon over a tear in the skin. It
was delicious, and we ate nearly all of it.
Tonight was warmed-over meat loaf. (I
poured a little vegetable cocktail on it and baked
it another hour.) Tomorrow will be corned
beef — I made a special trip to Owens before
starting the laundry this morning. Also
bought a small bag of small potatoes and a bag of
onions. Dave grated some potatoes to make
into hash browns for his breakfast tomorrow, and
discovered that the red ones are red all the way
through.
Began the morning with a little sewing before
breakfast, standing up at the White. (I
don't think I could operate the electric machine
standing up.) Yesterday evening, I tore a
rectangle of white all-cotton rag and boiled it to
be sure there was nothing in it that would cook
out, then hung it over the side of the pot to
dry. This morning I made it into a bag, put
the spices for the corned beef into it, and sewed
it shut. Ever since I started cooking
corned beef (which, come to think of it, hasn't
been that long) I've been annoyed at having flakes
of bay leaf and the like rendering what I filter
out of the broth inedible. Then came the
well-known moment of "well, duh!", and Wikipedia
tells me that I have re-invented the bouquet
garni. It also tells me that I should use
leek leaves, coffee filter, or cheesecloth to
confine the spices. The only leaves
available right now are rosemary, which is no use
for wrapping, and lemon grass, which is more of a
tie than a wrap and probably would taste terrible
in corned beef.
Lemon grass is great in boiled iced tea.
Put the grass and a tile sliced off a brick (using
a band saw) into a glass saucepan, fill with cold
water, boil, strain off, refill with water, boil
again, allow to cool in pot, strain into the first
boiling. Guaranteed to keep you
awake. The lemon grass tempers the
bitterness of the tea. A little fruit juice
helps a lot too.
I found a website that says that if I bring my
lemon grass in next winter, I'll need a pot four
feet wide.
But it also says that I can break off a little
piece of root and pot that.
It further states that if I plant it in the
garden, it will crowd everything else out.
If I planted lemon grass next to mint, Who Would
Win?
Probably the mint, since it gets another round the
following summer. But this winter, the
lemon grass probably would have survived in the
herb bed — that spot has been under a
snowdrift ever since the weather turned cold.
It's thawing out there now. 32.3°F
seems just right; I hope it holds there for a week
or two. But the weather service predicts
highs in the forties. At least it doesn't
predict any rain in the next seven days —
there's a chance of snow on Saturday, but that day
the predicted high is 35°F.
I was so *liberated* when I first started riding a
bicycle; it was like getting out of jail.
I've learned to drive since then, but driving is
limited when you have to find a spot close to the
door instead of parking a up to a mile away and
walking, and there are places where you can't go
in a car at all.
I have discovered that if you chop a fresh kumquat
small, it makes a great relish on meat.
Tomorrow we're going to Mad Anthony for Po Boys;
tonight we had canned soup.
Today I decided to cook some rice for the fridge,
and the first packet that came to hand was "black
& mahogany field blend" from Marsh. Since
it was a fancy rice, I seasoned it simply:
two hot-pepper pods that had been boiled before a
few times, and a cup of corned-beef broth for
salt.
It's delicious just plain, and I snacked a
substantial amount of it before it was cool enough
to put into the fridge.
The corned-beef broth is weird. I had half
a gallon of it in the freezer, and assumed that it
would cook down and I'd have to add water.
Instead, I couldn't get all of it into a
half-gallon container to put it back into the
freezer. Can one cook that much juice out
of half a head of cabbage?
So that's why there was still some broth in the
fridge when I put rice into the cooker. I
don't know what I'll do with the rest.
That broth has cooked so many pieces of corned
beef that I suspect that it would float an
egg. The cabbage and onion were very salty,
which Dave liked a lot. The potatoes and
carrot didn't take up a detectable amount,
presumably because I didn't peel the
potatoes. (They were fingerlings.)
I'm planning to get another piece of corned beef
after St. Patrick's day.
Dave wants to get rid of the sofa in the living
room and buy one the Roomba can get under.
We are shopping for a futon, so we might soon have
beds for two guests.
I should look harder for folding screens.
All they have at Reinholt is art works, but there
are lots of furniture stores in town.
The rest of the broth was just enough to salt the
brown rice I cooked this evening, after eating the
last of the mahogany rice for supper. I
didn't put quite enough water into the brown rice;
it came out a little firm.
I'd like to try again, using one cup of rice, one
cup of broth, one cup of water, and one cup of
tomato juice or vegetable cocktail. (Plus
italian herbs and a stalk of celery.) But
there's only half a cup of rice left and the broth
is frozen.
For my bedtime snack tonight, I warmed up the last
of the rice in vegetable cocktail (which doubled
its volume) and added a little onion fried in
sunflower-seed oil with a dash of sesame oil.
A post on SFF Net titled "The Shrinking Mountains
of Madness" turned out to be about snow banks.
SFF Net is like Usenet, but it's a private server
for a club of SF writers.
Andy posted on Facebook that he thinks Nature is
off her meds.
We were running low on milk and sweet mini
peppers, so I went to Owen's this morning and
spent forty-three dollars. I stocked up on
frozen meals; we had been down to one pot
pie. It was a nice day for it, but when I
crossed the parking lot, I had to watch where I
was stepping to keep my feet dry.
Further spring news: Yesterday I hung a
load of pillowcases and dish towels out in the
sun, and today I carried the garbage bucket out
and emptied it onto the compost heap. A
misplaced pile of garbage from the last trip
before I started emptying the tidy into a bucket
in the garage reminded me to be careful, but the
sitzmark is long gone. On this trip, I
learned that my sheepskin slippers leak.
When it was colder they didn't!
The latest prediction is for three to five inches
of snow tomorrow. I'm planning to stay home
and make pizza. I've already put oat bran,
red-wheat flour, white-wheat flour, yeast, salt,
and ascorbic acid into the big mixing bowl.
I haven't decided whether to make the left-over
dough into mini-muffins or freeze it.
Dave has hit every furniture store in town except
the new one on Market Street. Which
probably doesn't sell futons, but he does plan to
check them out before buying the one at
Reinholts. Which is longer than he would
like, so we may be looking for a home for our
Ethan Allen "doughbox" end table.
Awwww. I'd take a picture of Dave asleep in
his chair with Al asleep on his chest, were it not
that I'd almost certainly bump him getting the
camera out of the drawer.
The only exercise we get from our dumbbells is
moving them from the bedroom to the hallway and
back again. So I guess the Roomba is
helping us keep fit.
The three-kilogram weights are just right for
wrist extensions, but I ought to have a
six-kilogram pair for curls. I looked in
the sporting-goods store once, but they pasted
stickers over the kg marks and I can't convert
pounds to grams without a copy of the Rubber
Bible. Not to mention that all the handles
were too short to keep all fingers on the same
side of the bar, as old arthritic people are apt
to prefer.
I wish the pizza was ready *now*, but I've just
turned the oven on, and that's for the muffinlets,
which I plan to bake first. Take two
chocolate chips and call me in fifteen minutes.
To muffinlet or to freeze? I pinched off
twelve little balls of dough to make one tray of
muffinlets, and formed the rest of the left-overs
into one big ball and put it in the freezer.
At which point, says I to me: "Do I
remember putting salt in this dough?" I
have an uneasy feeling that I didn't. I
like unsalted bread, but Dave can't eat it.
The bad news: it takes a lot longer to thaw
a batch of bread dough than to mix up, raise, and
bake a fresh batch. But thawed dough will
keep in the fridge for days.
The muffinlets are very good — and
definitely unsalted. There are so many
toppngs on the pizza that you can't taste the
bread, so I don't think Dave noticed.
So what do I feed him *tonight*? The
eternal question. [spaghetti]
There is no sheath of ice on the clothesline this
morning. The north sides of the trees are
still frosted white.
Ice on the clothesline was so thick yesterday that
Dave went out and bought five gallons of gas for
the generator. Later on he turned it on,
plugged a heater into it, and left it running for
a while to make sure it still works. (This
should be done every month or so.)
And no, we wouldn't run an electric heater off a
generator — it was a convenient load.
⁂
About sunset, it started raining geese, and the
thawed pond at the mouth of the creek is pretty
crowded. I presume; I can't see them any
more, but I hear honking.
I bet they are all gone when we get up in the
morning. We plan to go futon shopping right
after breakfast "at the crack of noon".
Being retired rocks.
I woke up, walked to the window, said "The geese
are still here", and two or three skeins took
off. Didn't make a dent in the number of
geese left. Then I saw one coming in for a
landing, but it veered off and perched in the
willow — a hawk or a crow.
At 9:43, there are none left.
When the creek gets a little way out into the
lake, it makes a right-angle turn for the purpose
of dumping sand under our pier, and one can see
signs of the current as far south as the boat
ramp. When I looked out yesterday evening,
I thought that the lake was starting to thaw along
that track, but this morning there's no sign of
it.
The ice looks rotten all over. I suspect
that it still has a little way to go before it's
unsafe to go ice fishing. I don't think
there was one skater all winter, but I haven't
been anywhere near the canal.
The goose pond is significantly bigger, but I saw
only three geese at sunset. There were
still three when I woke at eight, but there are
none now.
Yesterday morning, we went to Reinholt's and
ordered a futon, dark brown suede-like
fabric.
The new sofa is a tad longer than we would have
liked, and there is storage in the arms, so we may
be looking for a home for our Ethan Allen
"doughbox" end table. It's only a
depository for "where can we put *this*" anyway;
the ammo box I use as a step stool in the sewing
room is a more-logical spot for the curtain hooks.
We also looked at dining chairs. Evelyn's
need re-caning, and we're getting to the age where
we need arms and wheels. We'll only get
two, as they take up a lot of room in our small
kitchen.
⁂
Later, there were ducks swimming in the goose
pond, seagulls on the ice, and geese in the park,
but the geese took off soon after I noticed them.
It looks as though the boys from Reinhold will be
able to get at the patio door by the time our
futon is ready.
10:26 — the geese appear to have chased out
the ducks. Still seagulls around.
There are daffodils or something in the fern
bed. The ends of the leaves are curled up
as if they had been pushing against the snow.
⁂
A milestone. I was coming home along Park
Avenue, walking in the street because the sidewalk
is still intermittent. I saw a car coming
toward me, and the walk beside me happened to be
clear, so I stepped up on the curb — leading
with my bad leg *and* not using the cane, and it
didn't hurt a bit.
So however slow progress has been, there *has*
been progress. I still intend to go to
Trailhouse tomorrow to look at the flat footers.
Then I've got to go to Owen's to pick up my
pills. <pedant>Which are two tablets
and one capsule, not a pill in the
bunch.</pedant>
Probably not on a flat footer. I want a
luggage rack and two wire panniers, and they may
have to hunt around to find them. Not to
mention that my trial run should be once around
the parking lot.
The goose pond is much bigger. I don't see
anything but sea gulls at the moment, and those
are mostly on the ice.
The dilemma of the cell phone: I kept
forgetting to put it into my pocket, so I decided
to store it in my pocket. Now I forget to
turn it off and the battery is low the next time I
want to go out. But it charges really fast;
if I put it into the charger before I finish
dressing, it gets enough to last a few hours.
The Roomba also charges quickly; one can run it
several times a day.
⁂
I don't recharge quickly; it was nearly suppertime
when I got up from my nap. But then, I
don't know how late it was when I lay down.
No wash tomorrow: right after breakfast,
I'm walking to the Trailhouse to look at
bikes. And they are also having a clearance
on winter clothing.
A noxious critter who signs his snarks "jimbino"
annoyed me so much that I looked him up a few
minutes ago. Thank God he's "childfree",
and I pray that that means that he's had his tubes
tied. (I wouldn't put it past him to mean
that he abandons his bastards.)
And now I'm going to look up something else just
to get his pollution off my screen.
⁂
Sunset: the goose pond is full of
geese. Not near so many as before, and it
isn't raining geese, but I did see one pair come
in for a landing. Uh, splashdown?
Right purty sunset.
Went to Owen's, forgot the pills. Dave
picked them up later.
I think I have a flatfoot selected, but have yet
to ride it around the parking lot to make sure.
It's called a "Trek Pure". No place for a
frame pump, but I won't be going so far on a
flatfoot that I can't walk back. One can
get a basket that simply lifts off for shopping.
Forgot to wear my green scarf on both trips.
Dave wore his green sweatshirt today.
Wanted to read Alex a little earlier than usual,
checked the UTC clock to see whether tomorrow's
London Telegraph would be up yet — more than
an hour before midnight. Oh, DST.
Bought the bike yesterday, also a bottle cage,
rack, basket, and helmet. Then I got home
and realized that the helmet doesn't perform a
helmet's primary function: there is no way
to attach a rear-view mirror. *That* is why
I've been wearing a ratty old helmet I never liked
in the first place all these years!
But it *is* possible to adjust the chin strap
while the helmet is on your head.
Riding the flatfoot back from the Trailhouse was a
lot easier on my knee than walking back. So
tomorrow (it's raining today) I'll check out
whether I can ride up Chestnut Street.
Chestnut is fairly strenuous on the Fuji even
though the Fuji still has its Albany-County gears,
but the Trek's chainwheel isn't much bigger than
the Fuji's smaller chainwheel, its biggest cog
might be a tad bigger than the Fuji's granny, and
one can switch to walking without actually getting
off. (I just went out into the garage and
checked. Have to be careful how one
arranges the pedals, but it works.)
If I can climb the hill, I'll work out how to ride
in my Sunday clothes. I expect my best bet
would be to wear jeans instead of a slip, and put
my skirt in the basket. Since I'm the only
cyclist in the church, I can park in the ramp
room.
Probably would be room for several of us in there,
if nobody else is using the room. It was a
greenhouse the last time I noticed.
Hrrm. I've parked the Fuji in there several
times, but the Trek is bigger.
There was a brisk fall of partly cloudy a while
ago, but it faded back to token flakes before
there was any visible accumulation, and the radar
map says that we're on the tail end of it.
But I used the garden hose to rinse out the
infuser after dumping Dave's tea leaves on the
strawberry bed.
I finished reading "Sour Puss" by Rita Mae &
Sneaky Pie Brown yesterday evening. (It's
up for grabs now, by the way.) It ended
with Harry making Fair a cheese omelet with capers
in it, which made me want scrambled egg with stuff
in it for breakfast.
I forgot to put in the cheese, and put in too many
capers, so I'll have to have it again
tomorrow. I ate it with a couple of the
breadsticks I made from left-over pizza
dough. In the pizza, I couldn't detect the
"italian herbs" I added to the dough at all, and
the herbs were rather subtle in the hot bread
sticks, but they are very pronounced in
warmed-over bread sticks.
It's beginning to look as though I'll have eaten
them all before I get around to making garlic
butter and splitting one to make garlic toast.
So guess what I'm having for lunch?
I put too much salt in the garlic butter.
Too cold for a rehabilitation ride today.
Sliders for supper. I'm going to have to
buy more soon.
I took a quick spin a while after eating supper
and reading yesterday's paper. (When I was
about halfway through today's paper.) A
few observations:
Upon returning, I was careful of the mirror I
haven't got while placing my new helmet into my
new basket.
The chain guard does not obviate the need to pin
my jeans at the ankles. I didn't notice my
jeans rubbing on my knees, but I was wearing them
over a pair of sweat pants. I may yet need
the strings.
The Trek's lowest gear is not adequate to Chestnut
Street, but might be if I were at normal strength
and not afraid of straining myself — and if
I could assume a less inefficient position.
One *can't* walk without dismounting entirely, but
walking beside the Trek is much easier than
walking the Fuji. The bars are so high that
one can tip the bike until they are more-or-less
in front, so one doesn't have to bend to reach
them.
Being able to push with your feet does not make up
for not being able to lift the pedal, unless one
can coast for a while after pushing off.
But I don't think I'll be going back for pedals
that accept toe clips.
The bike is getting a little less antsy.
⁂
I have praise for RevereWare tonight. I
think; the logo has long since worn off the pot.
I put a rag just big enough to make a bouquet
garni sachet into the stainless-steel pot I plan
to cook corned beef in tomorrow, added a very
small amount of water so it would come to a boil
quickly, turned the fire on high, and went to read
the paper. After a while Dave said "are you
cooking something?" One sniff and I knew
the pot had boiled dry — when I dashed to
it, the rag was black and sparks were crawling
around in it. I took it outside, then
opened the patio door, the door into the garage,
and the garage door. Dave suggested that I
turn on the big squirrel-cage fan he has been
using to dry the garage floor, but the wind was
from the right direction and quickly cleared out
the haze — after I moved the pot away from
the door. But I suspect that if I were to
go outside and come in again, the house would
still smell of hot muslin.
The rag was gone entirely when I went back to hose
out the ashes, but aside from requiring a very
thorough scrubbing, the pot wasn't injured in the
least. When I pulled a similar stunt in
Hawaii, the bottom melted right out of the pan
even though the food was only scorched, not
ignited.
I looked up Revereware in Wikipedia to check my
spelling, and learned that Corning stopped making
Revereware in 1998.
Ugh. The hallway, under the air intake for
the furnace, still smells of scorch.
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