Category Archives: Whimsies

Saturday Smile: Life is Good

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Last night I took a stab at another treat from my new favorite cooking-for-two website. I made a caramel chocolate cake for two. I’m not clever enough to have thought of this myself, but I found this recipe to be quite ingenious. Using their recipe, you make a one layer chocolate cake, ice it with chocolate frosting, and pour caramel sauce over the top. You then cut the cake in quarters, and lay one quarter on top of another, thereby making two pieces of two-layer cake……

My chocoholic husband,of course, was very happy about this cake. He even took the lead on icing the cake. When he went to open his beer, here’s what he saw…..

“Ah,” he said. “The best of all worlds.”

Have a good weekend.

Friday Book Whimsy: Book Challenge

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While aimlessly perusing Pinterest (which provides recipes that I pin but almost never make, but at least doesn’t get political), I came across something called The Book Challenge. Loving a good challenge almost much as I love a good book, I’m taking the challenge, and sharing it with you for the next few weeks…..

Best book you read last year: I reviewed my post of January 3, 2020, in which I shared my five favorite books of last year. After considerable thought, I decided that my favorite book was Evvie Drake Starts Over, by Linda Holmes. I like how the author empowered the protagonist. I liked the baseball tie-in. I liked all of the characters. I liked the ending.

A book that you’ve read more than three times: I have read very many books more than three times. I read very quickly, which allows me to read many books, but also results in me not always remembering them very well. I can — and do — reread books very often. But there are those kind of books, and then there are the kind of books that I reread because I love them so much. Rebecca, by Daphne du Maurier, is one such book. I guess I love the atmosphere created by the author. Who gets any creepier than Mrs. Danvers?

Your favorite series: Oh, I love so many series. I’m a big mystery reader, and once I read a book that I like that is part of a series, I must read them all, and in order. But if I have to choose, I pick the Inspector Gamache series written by Louise Penny. Gamache solves mysteries in the small town of Three Pines outside of Montreal. There are 15 books in the series, with another book being released in September. Inspector Gamache is kind, fair, loving, and smart as can be.

A book that made you happy: Britt-Marie Was Here, by Fredrik Backman, made me very happy, and gave me a character that I think of very often. Britt-Marie left her cheating husband, and handled it by being very OCD and critical. That is, until she ends up coaching a terrible kids soccer team. She is surrounded by odd characters and a life that is definitely not made for someone who likes things just so. How she lands on her feet was absolutely delightful.

A book that made you sad: I tend to not choose to read books that make me sad. I also avoid movies with sad endings. No thank you to Terms of Endearment or Steel Magnolias, thank you very much. The Light Between the Oceans, by M.L. Stedman, thankfully, didn’t involve death by cancer. But it was a very sad story about a woman who has been unable to carry a child to birth who finds a boat carrying a dead man and a living baby at the lighthouse where she and her husband live and work. They decide to keep the baby, telling no one of its existance. Things don’t work out well. Very sad.

Continued next Friday….

 

Thursday Thoughts

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Heading North
Bill and I have moved forward in making plans to return to Denver. Though things are still rather up in the air, I have made reservations at a hotel in Albuquerque that seems to be open for business. Tentatively, we plan on leaving Saturday, May 2, and arrive in Denver on Monday, May 4. Bill has a doctor’s appointment on May 6, so we are there under the wire. It will be nice to be looking at a new set of walls.

Lone Star State BBQ 
The other morning, Bill and I went for a drive. We didn’t go far, but east of here is a community called Gold Canyon that sort of nestles up to Superstition Mountain. I had walked the Hieroglyphics Trail with a friend before we were in lock-down, and we drove up to the trailhead. The trail, of course, was closed, but the drive to and from was pretty. We had talked about where we would have lunch, thinking probably drive-thru fast food. Suddenly we noticed a food truck on the side of the road…..

The truck is run by a retired couple from Texas. We bought some barbecue from a safe distance. I asked them how business was going. To my surprise, they said it was going GREAT. “We’re sell out every night,” Charlie said. Good for them.

God Bless Technology
Day before yesterday, I got a text from Jen in the afternoon. “What are you doing?” she asked me. I generally don’t do much, but as it happened, I was working on my blog. “Call me when you’re finished,” she said. “I want to have a cocktail party with you and Bill. And so we did. We sat outside. Bill smoked a cigar and drank a beer. I had an ice cold martini. We FT’d Jen, who was drinking a cosmo. And we talked to each other like we were in the same room. It felt good to connect in that way. Bec has dinner every Friday night via FT with her daughter Kate who lives in Las Vegas. We gather as we can.

Which Sweat Pants Should I Wear? 
As part of our preparation to go home, we needed an oil change. We did some research and learned that Jiffy Lube was doing oil changes in which you just stayed in your car. Boom. It felt good to be out. In fact, I texted my sisters and said We’re at Jiffy Lube. I put on earrings. I feel like I’m on a date. Bec’s response? I did a curbside pickup for some bird seed yesterday. I thought about putting on formal attire. 

Very Grand Granddaughter 
We always have someone mow our grass just before we get home. That way Bill doesn’t have a jungle to face. In the past, we have hired a lawn service to do the work. But on a whim, I called Jll and asked if any of the kids would like to mow our lawn. Within an hour, I got this photo that was sent to me by Maggie Faith of her sister Dagny mowing our back yard. Hip hip, hoooo-ray!…..

Ciao!

Boomer Sooner

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Little Miss Muffet she sat on a tuffet eating her curds and whey.
Along came a spider who sat down beside her
And frightened Miss Muffet away.

Little Miss Muffet she sat on a tuffet eating her curds and whey.
Along came a spider who sat down beside her
And frightened Miss Muffet away. — Peter George Sullivan

 

I was trying to recall the exact words to one of the nursery rhymes I grew up hearing that mentioned curds and whey. I googled it, and they sent me to a lyric site that indicated the lyrics above. I copied it exactly as it was written. Apparently Mr. Sullivan liked his first verse enough to make that be his second verse as well. I’m pretty sure he didn’t make an album.

I will admit that it reminded me a bit of the University of Oklahoma’s fight song, with words that go something like this: Boomer sooner, boomer sooner, boomer sooner, boomer sooner. Boomer sooner, boomer sooner, boomer sooner, OK U. Sorry University of Oklahoma fans. I grew up in the 70s in Nebraska, and while you can take the girl out of Nebraska, you can’t take Nebraska out of the girl.

Anyhoo, the reason I was looking for the nursery rhyme is because in my utter boredom, I was looking for something to challenge my cooking chops. As I was perusing Pinterest for meal ideas, I came across the Lasagna-for-Two recipe that I pinned some time ago. Lasagna sounded good, but making a giant casserole wouldn’t be prudent. After all, we have plans to leave for Denver sometime in the next week-and-half or so. But this recipe is made in a small bread pan. PERFECT.

Except I didn’t have any ricotta cheese. I couldn’t decide if the Shelter-in-Place police would allow ricotta cheese as an essential item. I would argue that it is indeed essential should you plan on making lasagna. Nevertheless, I remembered pinning some time ago a recipe for homemade ricotta cheese. I also recalled that it was very easy, provided you have the proper ingredients: cream, whole milk, salt, and vinegar.

I had them all. Well, I didn’t have white wine vinegar (or as Ina Garten said in the recipe: good white wine vinegar. As it happens, I had neither good nor bad white wine vinegar. But I had regular old vinegar. “What could it hurt? I asked myself. I’m pretty sure Ina would have had an out-of-body experience if she knew.

Anyway, I poured two cups of whole milk, one cup of heavy cream, and a teaspoon of salt into a saucepan. I brought the mixture to a boil, and removed it from the heat. I then dropped in a tablespoon-and-a-half of vinegar to the mixture and let it sit for a couple of minutes. As I watched, the mixture curdled, and the “curds” began separating from the “whey.”

Once that happened, I poured the mixture through a sieve lined with cheesecloth, and let it drip for 25 minutes…..

…..until it looked, well, like ricotta cheese…..

A bit later, Bill asked me, “What are you up to?”

“Oh, just making cheese,” I answered, expecting him to be impressed. He didn’t even look up from his computer.

I used it to make my little lasagna…..

So, just like Miss Muffet, I too ate my curds, though not the whey. Yuck. There were no spiders present, and I didn’t sit on a tuffet because I don’t know what that is.

Oh-Oh, Spaghettios

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Here’s how I know I’m coming close to hitting rock bottom. Yesterday, it was all I could do to convince myself to get dressed. Spending the day in your pajamas is probably something many of you do during this quarantine. After all, what really is the need for anything other than your fleecy bottoms and a shirt that says Don’t Bother Me Until I’ve Had My First Cup of Coffee? Unless you have a Zoom call and then you need to change your shirt.

But every single day of this Shelter-At-Home-to-Infinity-and-Beyond, I have gotten dressed. I carefully choose my pants and a shirt to match. I put on some nice earrings. I even change the band on my Apple Watch to coordinate with my clothing. And then I go and sit in my chair and watch Father Brown solve mysteries in his little crime-filled English village where apparently he doesn’t need to bother with saying Mass or hearing confessions and can spend all his time figuring out who killed Mrs. Westover. I prepare a few meals. Sometime in the neighborhood of 9 o’clock in the evening, I remove these clothes and jewelry, put on my pajamas, and sleep until the next day when I do the same thing.

So see? Rock Bottom. Nevertheless, I managed to convince myself to get dressed. But first I sent a text to my sisters to whine. They both admitted they have their bad days as well, though they both are dressed when I FT them each morning. Bec said she manages her mood by forcing herself to walk each day. Jen admitted that she is having trouble getting herself to cook dinner. Nothing sounds good. Bec needs a companion dog; Jen needs a cook to prepare her meals; I need a ladies’ maid to force me to dress.

Here’s another reason that I know I’m hitting rock bottom: Yesterday, as I was looking around for something to prepare for lunch, nothing looked appealing. I allowed Bill to use the leftover steak for a sandwich. I rooted around the refrigerator to no avail. There was food there, but nothing that appealed to me. Because what I really wanted to eat for lunch was….are you ready for this?….Spaghettios.

Yep. If I wasn’t trying really hard to limit my trips to the grocery store, I would have walked over to Basha’s and bought myself a few cans of Chef Boyardee Spaghettios. But if the crabby neighbors on Next Door are going to complain about people buying nonessential things at Home Depot like flowers, there’s no way I’d be able to convince anyone that Spaghettios are essential.

Frankly, it’s my belief that both flowers and Spaghettios are essential. If I am confined to my house and yard, I need to have flowers to enjoy. I’m not kidding. Having my yard look pretty is critical at this juncture in my life.

Even I’m willing to consider that Spaghettios are not quite as essential as flowers. Still, given that I don’t remember ever craving Spaghettios before, I can’t help but think that my mind and body is telling me that it’s yearning for simpler times. Like when Court was two years old and Spaghettios were his favorite lunch. Or when my mother would heat up a can for my own lunch.

The good old days. Oh oh, Spaghettios.

Flattening the Curve

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When this coronavirus quarantine first started (was it nine or 10 years ago? I can’t remember), the objective, as I understand it, was to flatten the curve. We all stay home in our pajamas watching streaming television programs and working on puzzles that we’ve finished twice already, and the bell curve of new cases will flatten, thereby making it easier for medical professionals to do their job.

But is it working? Is the curve flattening? Admittedly, I avoid the news like the plague. Or I guess nowadays I should say like COVID-19. If I do watch the news, it’s only the last five minutes when I’m pretty sure they are only talking about funny things like grandmas crocheting masks for their parakeets. It’s all my heart can handle.

Maybe every night, Lester Holt is telling all of you who are brave enough to listen that staying home and watching our pedicures peel and trying to think of one more thing to make out of the 20 lbs. of ground beef in your freezer, that day by day, the curve is in fact flattening. Our boredom and loneliness are paying off.

Just throw me a bone — a dibble of good news. Are we flattening the curve?

On the first Sunday after Easter, the Catholic Mass always offers St. John’s gospel passage about poor old doubting Thomas. I love that gospel. I heard it twice this weekend because I watched two different Masses online — one offered by the pastor at our Denver parish of Risen Christ and the Mass offered at St. Patrick’s Cathedral in NYC. Each of the celebrants offered a homily with his own personal take from the gospel. Every year, my take has focused on the fact that Jesus told Thomas (after he saw and felt the wounds) good on him that he now believed, but the real heroes are those who don’t happen to be able to put our fingers into the wound, but still believe that Jesus rose from the dead. Yay me, right?

But this year, I found myself thinking about another thing that Jesus said in that gospel. He enters the locked room where the disciples (minus Thomas) are hiding from their enemies and says, “Peace be with you.” And he doesn’t say it just once; he says it twice. And he says it again a week later when Thomas is present. “Peace be with you.”

In other words, no worries. Stop freaking out. I’ve got this. You’re safe. Which, of course, didn’t mean that there weren’t rough roads ahead for the brand new Christians. Catholic Christians believe that all of the apostles except John died as martyrs for their faith. So when Jesus greeted them with that beautiful phrase, he was suggesting that they believe that things are going to be okay at the end of the day.

I guess this is how I need to approach this quarantine. I’m getting frustrated and I will admit to having some anger at what seems to be unending restriction. I know that God is with us even though it’s hard to see. And I have to make myself believe that the curve is flattening, even if it doesn’t seem like it to me.

Peace be with us all.

Friday Book Whimsy: Ask Again, Yes

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The ability to forgive: We might think we can do it, but should someone do something to someone we love, could we actually forgive them? I would like to say yes, but I can’t promise. Ask Again, Yes, a novel by Mary Beth Keane, is the story of broken families and forgiveness that is almost beyond imagination.

Brian Stanhope and Francis Gleeson are New York City police officers.  Francis and his wife Lena have three children, one after another. She is struggling with motherhood and loneliness, and is happy to learn that Brian and his wife Anne are moving next door in the small NYC suburb in which they reside. Unfortunately, Anne doesn’t have any interest in the friendship that Lena craves.

However, from the time they are little, Brian and Anne’s son Peter and Francis and Lena’s daughter Kate are the best of friends. As their friendship grows, tensions rise between the families, culminating in a major tragedy that understandably splits the families completely apart.

Though Peter and Kate no longer live near one another, they don’t forget about each other. Eventually, they reunite and marry. Unfortunately, the events of the past make it difficult to move forward. Both Kate and Peter were severely impacted by what happened.

Ask Again, Yes is filled with hope and love and the grace that comes from forgiveness. It also paints a clear picture of how mental illness impacts more than just the immediate the family.

I enjoyed this book very much.

Here is a link to the book.

 

 

 

Thursday Thoughts

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It Feels Like We’ve Met Before
For the first time I well over a month, I saw my sister Bec yesterday. I mean like, IN PERSON. Face to face. It’s true that we never were closer than six feet, and were outside on her patio all of the time. But we had the opportunity to talk without aid of a screen. It was awesome. We took advantage of the new pandemic drinking rules and enjoyed a martini at 1 o’clock in the afternoon. We talked about friends and food and the fun we used to have in the olden days before there was a quarantine to keep us apart. The new normal.

Eating Irish
Every year, I prepare corned beef and cabbage for St. Patrick’s Day, and invite Bec and my brother Dave to share the meal with us. This year we were in Denver on March 17 because Bill had a doctor’s appointment. My plan was to have dinner the following Sunday after we returned to AZ. Except between buying the two corned beef briskets and March 22, coronavirus changed our lives. So I put the briskets in the freezer to be served another day. My freezer is very small, however, and since I’m trying to limit the number of trips to the grocery store I make, my freezer quickly filled up with meat, etc. So, yesterday I put the smaller of the corned beef briskets into the crock pot with some carrots and potatoes and, of course, cabbage, and Bill and I were Irish for an hour…..

Cookie Bar
I will admit that I’m getting tired of cooking three meals a day, even if “cooking” one of the meals only involves pouring cereal into a bowl and throwing in a few blueberries. In addition to preparing meals, I need to keep Bill supplied with cookies. A day or so after eating the last cinnamon biscotti, I would see him peer hopefully into the cookie jar, only to once more be disappointed. But I didn’t really feel like scooping cookie dough onto tray after tray and run the oven for an hour. Suddenly I thought Eurika! I could make chocolate chip bars. The dough would fit in a sheet pan, and in 20 minutes I would have two dozen or more chocolate chip bars. Much easier, and just as tasty…..

Paint Me Satisfied
Bill finished his project of painting our patio, and it came out great. We love the color. We are very happy that the weather cooperated until the paint dried. Now what’s Bill going to do to keep busy?……

Ciao.

Corona 20

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One of the perhaps unexpected outcomes of our seemingly endless stay-in-place world of late is that while we might flatten the curve, at the end of the quarantine we will all have enhanced our own curves.

We will have diabetes from eating anything that resembles fat and carbs and isn’t moving. After all, when you’re bored beyond imagination, you don’t feel like nibbling on carrot sticks. And while toilet paper is harder to find than Sasquatch, there was apparently no interest in hoarding Cool Ranch Doritos. Potato chips are easy to find. Try munching on your toilet paper oh ye hoarders.

And the few who manage to moderate their intake of Double Stuffed Oreos are enjoying adult beverages, from the bloody mary at 7 a.m. as they sign on to their computers to the snifter of cognac before stumbling into bed at night. What your bosses don’t know won’t hurt them.  And hey! Just put the red wine in a coffee travel mug while home schooling the kiddos. I’ll bet real teachers wish they could do that. Some probably do!

While our dearest hope is that the smart and brave people who understand the coronavirus a lot more than me will save most of the people who are infected, it’s possible that there will be a enormous increase in the number of people looking for a way to rid themselves of the results of repeated trips to the refrigerator or cookie jar. My niece Maggie calls our inevitable weight gain the Corona 20. If you think the health clubs and gyms are busy on January 2, you ain’t seen nothing yet. The lines of people waiting for the treadmill will be out the door.

And while it’s probably not true that most people are starting their day with a bloody mary, I’m guessing that many are drinking more — or at least earlier — than usual. After all, why wait until 5 o’clock? The It’s Five O’clock Somewhere policy has become the It’s Three O’clock Somewhere policy. Three o’clock seems like the perfect time for an ice cold martini, at least here in AZ where the weather is lovely and each hour feels just like the last hour. At least mixing a drink gives me something to do.

Perhaps we’re just picking our poison.