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- Mood:
nervous
Not just bringing it home...
If you are so inclined, hop over to my food blog, to see my attempt at curing bacon. I'll chronicle as the adventure continues.
- Mood:
hopeful
Um... those plums that were
BIG mess. Take-the-stove-apart-down-to-its-underwe
Hey, at least my stove is shiny clean.
I am so making pie.
But! On that note - I'd like to just say that over the last two months, I have misplaced about six pounds. Even with a wedding, a two-week holiday, and a BBQ party. And popcorn at the movies.
- Mood: amused
My two weeks out of town coincided with the peak ripeness on our plum trees. I'm just now getting around to them, and we've basically lost the crop. I pulled of a large bowlful of good plums from both trees, and that's going to be it. Everything else is wrinkled and shriveling away.
I'm only slightly disappointed. It's a lot of work to process those plums. They are quite tart, so must be used for jams or chutneys. They make great-tasting pies, but there's no texture to them. Once you cook them, they're nothing but juice. And of course, all of these uses, require huge amounts of sugar.
Lots of calories, in other words. And one jar of jam or chutney will last us a year or more. We just don't eat them very much.
I've got my small batch
- Mood:
contemplative
Yep. See, I'm not hard to please.
After dinner last night, Rick and I decided to walk downtown, grab some ice cream at Stone Cold Creamery, and walk home. Total of four miles. To keep you from counting on fingers and toes, I'll be honest. The walk didn't come close to covering the calories. I figure I still netted a gain of about 500 calories.
And I was good, relatively speaking. I got a small serving, which we all know is twice as large as it needs to be. Cheesecake ice cream, with peanut butter, fudge sauce, pecans, and graham cracker crumbs. In a chocolate-dipped waffle bowl.
We walked fast, too. It was after six when we left, just nicely cool, with a stiff breeze. We wanted to get home before dark, so we didn't dally. But we had fun walking along, singing bits of old rock 'n roll songs to each other, as the conversation seemed to demand. "Downtown" was popular, since that's where we were headed. We can be corny, no doubt about it.
Today, I'm doing a cooking demo at a Safeway in Dublin. That will take up about 5 hours, with driving time. I've got about 2 hours to spend helping my daughter with her schoolwork. In my spare time, I have to get everything ready for our trip to Hawaii, so we can leave the house about 6:30 tomorrow morning and catch our flight.
Did I mention I didn't sleep last night? I woke up about one in the morning and that, as they say, was that. I'm dead tired. Getting everything done today will be a minor miracle.
So I will probably not be checking in much, today. Y'all be good.
- Mood:
exhausted
Life does go on, even after successes, so today I cooked up my vegetables, since it's time to pick up a new box. They turned out pretty good, too: roasted turnips and cauliflower, with just a sprinkling of wheat germ. Crispy and contentedly salty.
The cabbage and chard (along with the leaves from the cauliflower) go blanched, then tossed with butter and olive oil, salt, pepper, and wheat germ (my breading of choice), then baked for about 30 minutes. Yum. I think I'll sprinkle on parmesan cheese when I serve it, but otherwise, it was very good, and pretty too.
Then I slammed my finger in the trunk of my car. I've had ice on it and I'm able to type. It's not horribly swollen, but the bruise on the nail is shaping up nicely.
I need to get the veggies out of the car - the pain drove them from my mind.
I have just a couple of reviews up at ABNA. Please try to go by and leave your own thoughts on the excerpt. I'd be grateful! The link is http://www.amazon.com/dp/B001UG3CKS
- Mood:
sore
Today was a cook day. I started with a batch of oatmeal - raw milk and steel-cut oats in a double boiler. It takes about 30 minutes to cook this, so I make enough for the week. I can reheat a bowl of it in the microwave for a quick breakfast. This is my favorite way to cook oatmeal - no other method comes close to the creamy chewiness of this stuff.
I used the rest of the raw milk to make a batch of yogurt. I'm back on a smoothie kick. This week, I'll be digging into the raspberries I put in the freezer last summer. Whipped up in the yogurt with a banana - it's a great snack.
We had our own private super bowl party - I made pizza, which meant I had to make a batch of bread dough. This dough is great - I make a batch in the Kitchen-Aid, then let it sit for a couple of hours with a towel over it. It makes two loaves of bread, but the dough will keep for ages in the frig. Like a sour dough, it just gets richer and tangier as time goes by.
I used some of the dough for the pizza crust, added some sausage, mushrooms, olives, and anchovies (for Rick), along with lots of mozzerella. Oh and tomato sauce, of course. It cooked in about 15 minutes on my pizza stone and tasted great with the Fat Tire.
I have a chicken to roast, but I guess that will be tomorrow. Right now, I'm finishing the laundry and waiting to post my novel to the Amazon contest.
21 minutes, 24 seconds and counting...
Oh, the game? I wasn't emotionally invested in either team, but rooted for the Steelers in honor of my soon-to-be son-in-law, who lived in Pittsburgh for a time. So I'm happy. The Cardinals didn't do too shabby, though. Good game.
- Mood: numb
There's enough there for about 8 small jars of preserves. I know, because I already cooked the other half and they are cooling on my counter, now:
We've never really figured out what these fruits are. They're about the size of cherries, but they definitely look like plums, inside and out. It's not a cherry pit, either - nope, it's a plum. But little ones. So we just call them cherry-plums and let it go at that.
This was my first experience using pectin. I have an extra jar that I didn't have space to boil, so when it cools, I'll have a chance to check out my attempt. I do have to say though, that the jam tastes good!
Today is my birthday, and I'm going to lunch with two of my daughters. I swear I'll get to the gym, and I plan on spending at least an hour writing. I'm working tomorrow, so I have to prepare my paperwork. If I can write more after that, I will, but I also need to review at least one proposal packet for the OWW project. One a day, if at all possible. That's time-consuming, and I'll never get through them all at that rate!
I've been sending Shipbuilder (aka, Dunallon) out to agents. I've gotten a couple of automatic email rejections. Oh well. Must try, right? That's another thing I'm trying to do: send out at least one of these every day. I don't like to have more than 10 or 12 queries out at a time, but I'm not at that limit yet, so I'll keep sending them out.
Since I'm working tomorrow, and going away for the weekend, I don't expect to get much done for the rest of the week. I won't have an internet connection on my vacation and I shouldn't use one, anyway. I'm on vacation, right?
- Mood: calm
Oy, was I tired. I got home after 6:00 (really late for me), I unloaded the car (halfway - I put all the trash on top of the car, it's still there) and fed the dog. Then I sat on the couch and fell asleep immediately. This never happens to me. Rick got home about 10 minutes later and that's what woke me up. My feet - my feet were burning, they hurt so much.
I am NOT too old for this. The idea is simply ridiculous. I wonder if the problem is all this weight I've put on. That makes it harder for me to be on my feet all day.
Then about 2:00, the power went out, followed immediately by a small earthquake. I still don't understand the connection. I'm sure there isn't one, but gee, that was weird. And this morning, we had no internet. It's taken me all this time, to get it back.
I'm going to lunch in a few minutes, with the gang in Berkeley. That will make me feel better.
I sat in bed and wrote a little bit last night. It's pure crap, but at least I got down some necessary points. It's one of those "get from here to there" scenes - you know, where something needs to happen in order for the next chapter to make any sense. I've got the basics. I'll clean it up after lunch.
- Mood: exhausted
So we're off to Seattle to watch my son graduate from college. We are delighted to do it and very proud of him - just a bit trepiditious since he went to a Christian college and we know we're going to be subjected to prayers and sermons. I have a general rule that you'll only get me in church for weddings and funerals. Oh - and maybe those fancy gothic marvels in Europe when I want to take pictures. I was unprepared for a graduation to be held in a church, but it's worth bending the rule for. I know. I suffer so.
But my son is a truly Cool Guy and his wife is great, too. I wished they lived closer and we could see them more often. This is nice excuse to spend some time with them.
The laptop is also packed, with the lates versions of Land and Dunallon loaded up. This trip will be my first attempt to write on a plane. We'll see how it goes. I'm determined to get the first draft of Land done in the next 2 or 3 weeks. Two weeks would be better than three. I'm tired of watching it drag itself out. I want to get it finished, and start posting chapters on OWW so I have some feedback. I think it's doable, but I will have to push myself. So I will.
I also have to critique a couple of stories for the BayCon workshop the end of May. I don't think I'll take them on this trip - time is too short. I'll bring along the current reading book (Dark Mirror by Juliet Marillier) for those truly spare moments.
So the critiques are on the list for next week. I also have to write a presentation for a public speaking event later in May. That's about food and I'm basing it on an outline I already use for cooking classes. It just needs some tweaking. I don't get paid for the presentation. Sigh. But at least, I won't have any expenses for it, either. I'm preparing a couple of demonstration dishes, but someone else is paying for them. And it's good advertising.
- Mood: mellow
Next time, I'm tripling my price.
- Mood:
busy
I didn't write a lot, because I spent some time organizing my story. I'm an organic writer - I don't sit down and plan out the story. I sit and type and let it come. Scene by scene, as I think of them. It's never begin-at-the-beginning. Even if I did that, I bet I'd go back later and change it so that something else was the beginning.
But, true to nature, I'm not all one thing. Meaning I'm not all organic (don't let them read that over on my Food Blog). So after a while - say 30 or 40 thousand words, I start to get frustrated. I lose track of what I'm doing or I can't figure out what to write next. Because, being blessed with a middle-aged memory, I can't remember what I've already written.
Time to get organized. Out comes the timeline. Out comes the form for listing scenes and how many pages each one is and notes about what should happen first or next or (gasp!) not at all.
It's a bit like cooking actually. Sure, you can run in the kitchen and open a can and throw it in a pan on a burner and have dinner in a few minutes. This works for most things. But if you're doing something special, or if you're like me and you cook for a living and must make up to 6 or 7 complete meals in one day (all different), then you need a method.
First, one must assemble ingredients. Then there is mise en place. The preparation of everything. Me - I like to go through the recipe and determine what happens, in what order. So if the first thing is "brown the meat in a little olive oil," I put the meat on a plate and make sure it's got salt and pepper. If next, I am to "sautee the onions, carrots, and garlic together for 3 minutes," then I chop the onions, carrots and garlic and put them together in one bowl.
If I am then supposed to add mushrooms, rosemary and a couple teaspoons of broth, I chop those up and put them together in another bowl.
A cup of broth and a bottle of beer go in next? They are mixed together in a bowl or large measuring cup, so they're ready to go.
Then I can put the pan on the stove and turn on the burner. And it all goes together and comes out perfect because of the outline. I don't have to think about it or worry about it. I do have to keep an eye on it, of course. Mustn't let the onions and carrots burn, you know.
So I consider the time spent outlining my novel as my own version of mise en place. The scenes are the ingredients. The outline prepares them in the order they should go. And hopefully, the finished product is good enough to eat.
- Mood: pleased
Newest mammogram is fine. Didn't even have to do the ultrasound. Off the hook for another year.
Work is picking up and I have menus to make out and client packets to prepare. I'm cooking on Wednesday, have a new client interview on Saturday and then cooking again on Monday. The new client will probably be scheduled for next week sometime, too. I have an 'interactive cooking class' in March and a cooking class I should schedule with the Parks department.
I suppose everyone was waiting for the holidays to end and I'm part of their New Year's resolutions, or something. Hope I can keep some of them as regular clients. It's fun to get to know people and leave them good food on a regular basis.
- Mood: hopeful
Must vaccuum...
- Mood: tired
But first - grocery shopping. I need spinach and broccoli and cheese for the quiches and pumpkin for the bread. About 100 other things, too. And I almost forgot the eggnog!
Good times, indeed.
- Mood: content
Working on Galaxy Farmers, my second WIP. No writing yet, just world-building. I'm having trouble switching gears from one WIP to another. How does one learn to do this? I get totally immersed in whatever I'm working on - thoughts, daydreams, concentration, all on that novel. How do I just turn it off and switch everything over to the other novel?
It's kind of strange. This is nothing but multi-tasking, which I do all the time without a thought. I guess that means that I've never been really committed to any particular task before, so it was easy to do several things at once. Now that something has my Attention, I find I can't just set it aside.
But - I've had some luck. Dunallon is truly DONE and I'm just waiting for comments and working on a query letter. So the thoughts are turning to my farmers and they're talking to me.
Ouch - I hurt my back somehow. I think it's a result of being on vacation. I know most normal people can go on vacation and sit on the beach and read or sleep late everyday and veg out by the pool, etc. I can't do that. Bad Back. Too much sitting/lying/resting puts me over the edge. It's been hurting for a while and steadily getting worse. By this morning, I could hardly move. So I have the back brace on, which has helped immensely. Gentle stretches, gentle walking (for miles), and LOTS of motrin and ice. I'll be back to normal, soon.
- Mood: good
