It's my opinion birthday balls should be held every night.

The past week or so has been filled with productivity, accomplishment, and a general getting-stuff-done attutude around these parts.

Case in point: The house is clean. It took 2 days, but it looks awesome.

Case in point: I spent Monday (had off for dead president day) doing things like culling books and working on Secret Birthday Projects in between the running in the park and the lounging on the bed and the playing with the kitties.

I am definitely feeling better. Saturday's highlight was a surprise from-scratch paella (made by Dan) accompanied by the best appetizer ever (smoked salmon, Humboldt Fog cheese and fancy herb crackers) and 2 amazing Spanish wines. I made dark chocolate mousse for dessert, making a 2/3 recipe from the Joy of Cooking and it still took us 3 days to eat it all. All of our laundry got washed, dried, folded and put away (even the throw rugs!); all of our dishes were at one point washed, dried, and put away. Spending part of Monday in the house felt good instead of oppressive.

An interesting thing has happened recently: I have reconnected with some old friends through one of those social networking sites all the kids are talking about these days. Except these aren't just old friends, they're people who at one point were like my brothers that I wasn't actually genetically related to. The younger one goes by a different first name than how I always knew him, but in his photos he and his brother look just like they did when they were kids, except they also look just like their parents. And like themselves. I might meet up with them the next time we go to California; there is something both nostalgic and immensely satisfactory to trade stories with people with whom one shared one's childhood. We were at each other's houses multiple times a week. We took baths together and had sleepovers. They were my brothers 20 years ago, and now they can be my friends.

Four overdue packages got mailed off yesterday: housewarming, thank-you, and new baby boxes are winging their way to the East Coast and to California. My newest cousin baby (#4 for them) was born in January (and thankfully her name is a real one, Jenna). Here is the blanket I made for her.


(As you can see, it's significantly smaller than the one for Wombat.)

And here is the sweater that I made Dan that got finished in January. He wears it all the time, so I think he likes it. Either that or he is just trying to make me feel better for spending so much time on it!



(He was thrilled that I wanted to take a photo of him in it this morning, obviously.)
I want to share photos of Super Secret Birthday Project, but I think the recipient might see them, so they will have to wait. It's not a knitting project, but it's going to be awesome.

Speaking of birthdays, I have been invited to a 30th Birthday Ball in Southern California for Oldest Friend. I will be attending. What should I wear to a ball? Gloves? Mask? Should I actually try to find a ballgown, or wear something I already have? I'm excited about the prospect of dressing up but I'm already flying and renting a car, so don't exactly have hundreds of dollars to spend on a fancy dress. Ideas?

Beautiful Soup, plus other random stuff.

My contribution to the week's dinners:

Wintery 10-bean and root vegetable soup

1 cup 10-bean soup mix (this is actually mostly a variety of lentils/split peas and barley with maybe 3 or 4 kinds of actual beans in it, from the bulk bin at the hippie grocery store), soaked overnight, water changed in the morning and soaked until I started the soup
1 small sweet potato, peeled and chopped small
1 parsnip, peeled and chopped small
1 celery root, peeled (this is difficult, but so worth the flavor!) and chopped small
1/2 yellow onion, chopped
2 celery stalks, chopped (plus the leafy tops thrown in)
2 medium carrots, chopped
1 can diced tomatoes with jalapeno
2 precooked chicken or turkey sausages (I used part of a turkey kielbasa and one chicken sausage, precooked), chopped into rounds and halved
seasonings to taste (I used 2 tsp ground cumin, 1 tsp ground coriender, 1 tsp mexican oregano)
salt and pepper

Soak the 10 bean soup mix overnight and through the next day, changing the water at least once. About 2 hours before you want to eat, put the beans in a big soup pot and cover with 6 cups of water, heating to a rapid simmer and let it cook for about 45 minutes. Dump in all the vegetables (including the leafy tops of celery stalks), seasonings, and add some vegetable or chicken stock base or boullion if you like. Cook another 45 minutes, checking the largest beans for doneness. Add tomatoes and sausages. It will be done in 15-30 more minutes. Makes mass quantities of super tasty soup. The sausage is optional (the soup is super tasty without it as well) but I like animal protein in my soup. Serve with crusty bread. Very low fat, high protein, and high fiber and so delicious!

A thing that happened this week:

We were at the grocery store buying food and a DVD display caught Dan's attention. He found a copy of the Dark Crystal for 10 bucks, and as it's a childhood favorite and a movie I've wanted to own, we threw it onto the conveyor belt. The clerk scanning our foodstuffs asks, "Is that a good movie? I've never heard of it". "Yes it is," I told him, and realized he was likely a teenager and therefore born way after the movie came out. "It was made by Jim Henson," I told him. Blank stare. "You know, the guy who made the muppets?" Blank stare. "I don't know voice actors," he said. "Jim Henson was the guy who invented Kermit the Frog!" I exclaimed. Another blank stare. SERIOUSLY!?!?! Here's a kid who is at least 16 if he's old enough to be a checker at the grocery store and he's never heard of Kermit the Frog or the Muppets? What are they teaching kids in school these days? Sheesh, way to make an almost 30-year-old feel ANCIENT.

Also, Sunday is our 2-year engage-a-versary. 2 years since I said yes and we started planning the Big Event. It hardly even feels like it's been six months, let alone 2 years, but then again we're only 6 weeks away from our first wedding anniversary. Where does the time go?

Winter Adventure, part 2: The only thing missing was the lamp post

You know you're in a cabin in the Rocky Mountains when you get a bone-chillingly eerie coyote serenade at 2 AM and you wake up in the morning to find an elk breakfasting in the yard.

The benefit to staying in the area was that we got an early start for our long hike on Sunday. The guy at the visitor's center had gushed about the wonders of the particular trail we planned to follow, and he mentioned that there were difficult but do-able parts on snowshoes and that the hard parts were worth the payoff.

I'm glad we listened to that guy. We carefully followed his directions and his crudely drawn winter trail map, and started off on a wonderful trek. The sky was blue and clear, the air was crisp and clean (though somewhat oxygen poor, being over 9000 feet in elevation), and we were hiking through snowy woods on several feet (5? 10? 30? no way to tell!) of packed snow, following cross-country skiiers and fellow snowshoers but in such a way that most of the time we couldn't see or hear anyone else. The woods looked so much like my mental picture of Narnia-before-Aslan that I kept expecting to see a faun step out from behind a tree. But the only wildlife we saw were a few mountain squirrels (as opposed to the fat and sassy city squirrels you see everywhere, the ones I hate) who felt the need to chastize us for walking through their turf. Large, lumbering humans, making too much noise.


At one point we came to a fork, and went to the right rather than to the left. We ended up going up the side of the gorge, where the views were amazing and the terrain was difficult. Dan left a message for anyone else coming behind that decided to take the hard way like we did.

Eventually we met back up with the original trail (which went up directly through the gorge) and we could see that the next part was what the guide had been talking about. It was no joke; parts looked almost vertical when we were directly underneath them, but the trail was obviously well-traveled and so we knew we could do it.

And it was worth the climb, every torturous step of the way. Dan said it was the prettiest thing he'd ever seen in RMNP, and I'm inclined to agree.

After we'd taken in the amazing view for a while, and spotted some more mineral-colored falls (blues! yellows!), we snowshoed across the mostly frozen lake, skirting the outside because we could tell the middle wasn't completely frozen. The trail continued past the lake but was obviously far less well-traveled, and after we'd gone a quarter of a mile or so we decided to turn around because the trail continued going Up. Which we had just done a huge amount of, and mutually agreed that it was time for some Down.

In some ways, the trek down the steep parts was far more difficult than the way up had been. Neither of us wanted to do any butt sliding, and by then our legs were already tired, so we went verrrry slowly and carefully. I stopped halfway down to take pictures of the up and the down views.


Not being gluttons for punishment, we took the trail back through the gorge, with a quick detour to another frozen falls. Eventually, we reached the area where all the trails (winter and summer, gorge and hillside) meet and ended up on the summer trail back to the trailhead, which was far more twisty and also far more exposed (and therefore, had far less snow) than the winter trail had been. At least there was signage along the way telling us the distance back to the trailhead.

Finally, we made it back to the trailhead and the car. There is nothing more satisfying than removing your snowshoes and then boots after a four-hour hike; your feet feel so light and free! We opted not to eat lunch until we got a bit further down the foothills and found a place to get calzones in Lyons. For a while, we were directly behind this old Ford, which still had the original Colorado plate. And we got home and were wo out, but it had been a great weekend.

Winter adventure, part 1: In which we learn why waterproof gear is good for winter sports

Sometimes the only thing to be done to get out of a rut is to do something completely spontaneous. On Friday afternoon, Dan called me and asked what I thought about the idea of going up to the mountains on Saturday, snowshoeing in Rocky Mountain National Park, and staying in a YMCA cabin Saturday night (I get a discount because I'm a Y member). I poked around a little at their website and we talked about it a bit, and ultimately said what the hell. I booked the cabin with the fireplace.

(We went to see Coraline in 3D on Friday evening and it was totally awesome. Go see it!)

Saturday morning we were up and eating homemade pancakes with homemade strawberry sauce, packing and deciding what food to bring for dinner. The Y cabins come equipped with kitchens and cooking equipment, so we knew we could bring food to make for Saturday night and Sunday morning. Amazingly, we made it out of the house by 11 AM and were at Rocky Mountain National Park around 1. We stopped at the visitor's center on the way in to ask for advice on good snowshoeing trails (the park's trail system is a different animal in the winter; we're familiar with the hiking trails but snowy conditions change things). The guy gave us a map and drew some of the winter trails not shown, highlighting his favorite places to go. Since we wanted to do two different hikes, we were glad we'd asked him because he had some great ideas. Into the park we went, greeted by this:


RMNP is gorgeous any time of the year, but I think this was the first time either of us had been there in the winter. It takes a while to drive to most of the winter trailheads once you get into the park, but the hikes are more than worth the trip. Dan and I both love hiking, as I've written about on several occasions here, and snowshoeing is kind of like hiking through snow. While wearing big things on your feet. Our first snowshoeing experience (10 days ago now) was so positive that we knew we wanted a greater challenge, but we got a pretty late start so decided to do a short, easy-ish hike that we'd done before (though in the summer, of course).

Everything was beautiful and awesome. The snow was a soft and velvety white coating on the evergreens, and some drifts looked like stiff-peak egg whites or whipped cream. The trail was relatively populated, at least until the first lake, and people of all ages were hiking with crampons and cross-country skiing in addition to other snowshoers. People in Colorado take their outdoor sports seriously, year round.




When we got to the first lake on the trail, it became clear that the summer hiking trail and the winter snowshoeing trail were two entirely different animals. It was difficult to figure out where to go, and we ended up off the trail entirely, on the side of the mountain, in deep snow. This was somewhat fun but also somewhat nervewracking, since a) we didn't know where we were, b) we REALLY didn't want to get lost, and c) snowshoeing in deep snow on the side of a mountain is HARD. We both fell. A bunch of times. One time I fell when I was taking a photo and my camera got covered in snow. That's why this photo is all blurry.








We could hear voices below us, so we somehow made it all the way down the hillside we were on (partly sliding on our bums, or glissading as Dan tells me is the official term) and somehow we ended up at a completely different lake than we'd intended. Luckily, it was the lake at the beginning of the trailhead where we'd parked. I still have no idea how we managed it, but we did. And there were some cool frozen falls.


Our hike was only around an hour and a half or maybe two hours, but it was long enough for Saturday. We headed out of the park (admission is good for seven days, so we only had to pay the once) and into Estes Park (the touristy little town at the foot of the park), passing stopped cars whose occupants were photographing some of the elk who see no reason to give up their seasonal grazing areas just because silly humans decided to build a town there. Luckily, the residents of Estes are fond of their seasonally resident ruminants and think nothing of stopping for 20 minutes while an entire herd crosses the highway.

In town, we found a grocery store to add to our dinner and breakfast supplies, and found some klassy screw-top wine next door (we'd forgotten to bring our corkscrew and didn't know if the Y cabin would have one). We checked into our evening's lodgings and were presented with a booklet of activities going on at the camp that day and the next (crafts! bingo! chess! church!) but we decided to go with relaxing, drinking wine, playing games and watching movies on Dan's laptop. Our fireplace turned out to be gas (so no need for the firewood we'd bought) but it was still lovely. And, as it turned out, there was no need for the screw-top wine as our cabin was equipped with a perfectly serviceable wine key. Good to know for next time.

Blue

Sometimes it is difficult to write about things that I really want to write about, because of my blog audience. Needless to say, those of you who read my blog regularly may have noticed that I'm not posting as much as usual and not writing anything of substance. Part of this is because I've been feeling a little blue recently, what with it being winter (though we've had sunny warm days this week, it depresses me more to have that kind of weather when everything outside is stark and brown and bare; I'd rather it snow, honestly) and what with having had a cold now for more than two weeks (Day 18, and still not done being sick) and what with the impending arrival of my Official Descent into Decrepitude. That's right, my 30th birthday is coming up in 5 weeks and I always have a hard time this time of year, but this year is different than most because it's a big birthday.

I haven't done anything for my birthday in years other than maybe Dan makes me a cake and a nice dinner. The parties I've attempted to throw since moving to Denver never seem to work out, but this year I really wanted to do something to mark the occasion of my becoming one of the hordes of women in this country who are unimportant because we are out of our 20s (because everyone knows, women lose their looks and their importance to cultural relevance once they're 30+). For a while, I was tempted to just start celebrating anniversaries of my 29th birthday like someone I know used to do, but my Oldest Friend turns 30 a week before I do and she's embracing the new number in our age so I suppose it would be kind of silly for me not to do the same thing.

I feel like I'm in a holding pattern right now, waiting through the last bit of Dan's schooling, waiting through the next few months at my job (which is another post entirely that I can't write for obvious reasons) until our circumstances change and I can leave, waiting for a sign of spring somewhere to give me hope that the world isn't going to be drab forever. Waiting to see friends and new babies. Waiting to be over this damn cold so I can start running outside again, and refocus on losing a little bit of weight I'd like to lose before we start seriously getting down to the business of baby making. Waiting until our savings account has more padding.

Since there's nothing I can do to speed the passage of time, I've decided to take a page from several other bloggers I've seen, to find grace in small things. Mostly I try to stay positive, stay on the bright side of life, but in the dog days of February in 2009 I'm having a difficult time making this happen. So here's to a recommitment of positivity.

1. I am making a baby blanket for Spats Turkey, and it is going to be awesome.

2. Leftover spaghetti for lunch, so tasty.

3. Finding out the giftmas present we sent for Wombat was received.

4. Renting a cabin in the mountains for the weekend

5. Matching dad and baby 'staches.

Blogging by letter

Thanks, Hillary.

Rules: If you want to participate, leave a comment on this post and I will assign you a letter. You then write about 10 things you love that begin with your assigned letter and post them on your blog. When people comment on your posted list, you give them a letter and the chain continues on and on.

My mission: The letter N. 10 things I love. Hills, the letter N is hard!

1. Narcissus, nasturtium, nigella

Photo by me

I love flowers and bugs and outdoorsy stuff, and these three flowers hold a special place in my heart: narcissus, because they are beautiful and also because the scent makes me think of spring. Nasturtium, because they come in so many different colors and grow even in bad soil, and they're edible! Nigella, because they've always grown in my mom's yard, the seed pods are fun to play with, and because they're one of the few truly blue flowers.

2. Nano

Dan got me a replacement ipod nano for giftmas this year. It is blue and sometimes I want to lick it because it is so pretty.

3. Nerds

I've always found myself attracted to nerdy folk, and I married one. A great big one, in fact.



Photo by Leah.

4. Neil Gaiman's collected works

I've loved Neil Gaiman's writing since reading Good Omens, and have read all of his books save the most recent one. And in the last month I've read the first two volumes of The Absolute Sandman (one I gave Dan a couple of years ago, another he got for giftmas this year) and absolutely loved them. Neil Gaiman, you are teh awesome.

5. Netflix

We don't have cable. Instead, we have opted to use Netflix for the past several years. For the most part, this has been a good working relationship. We can get movies and TV shows that we want to see, delivered to our house, and we send them back without having to pay for shipping. What's not to like?

6. Nectarines

Less fuzzy than a peach, more flavorful than a plum or an apricot, I loves me some nectarines when they're in season.

7. Nuts

Walnuts. Cashews. Pistachios. Pecans. I love them all. Plus, I've discovered that if I eat a small handful of walnuts every day (as in, 5 or 6 walnut halves) my skin stays nearly clear! It's amazing, truly.

8. Names

I've made no secret of my love for names. Some of the names I like even start with N, like Natalie and Nathaniel. And my least favorite name (after Azzzz-pen, of course): Nevaeh.

9. Nautiloids

One of the coolest things about nature is finding math in the least expected places. Nautiloids are sea creatures that use fractals/the fibonacci sequence in the building of their chambered homes. Plus, they look really cool. One day, I'm going to knit one.

10. Narwhals

I've loved marine mammals all my life, and the narwhal is no exception. It has a horn! Like a unicorn! and it's a mammal that lives in the sea! How cool is that?

Near-Death Experience

Pre-birth: During labor, I get stuck on my mom's bone structure somewhere up in there. They use a forceps to get me out. Had it been 100 years earlier, I probably wouldn't have survived.

Birth-5: Due to a proclivity of putting things in my mouth, I scared the crap out of my parents on numerous occasions (did she just swallow a nail?) and was the subject of multiple trips to the emergency room for x-rays. Also, this one time I was riding on my dad's shoulders and he tripped and fell and I fell off and had the wind knocked out of me but they didn't know if I had a broken neck or anything so there was another trip to the ER.

Age 5-17: None that I can remember. I had an awful flu one year and probably had a mild concussion at one point but never even ended up in the hospital.

Age 17: Nearly hit by a bus in Berkeley coming home from campus (the bus ran a red light).

Age 18-21: Nearly hit by multiple vehicles on multiple occasions in Berkeley (generally, red-light runners).

Age 21-28: Nearly hit by multiple vehicles on multiple occasions in the Bay Area and in Denver (generally, red-light runners and people who don't watch for pedestrians).

Age 29: This morning, along with several other people, I was nearly mowed down in a crosswalk by a driver who ran a REALLY REALLY red light. As in, the walk sign had already turned for us, every other car had stopped, and several people had already started crossing through the crosswalk. He had 2 small children in the car and didn't even appear to care that he'd nearly killed at least 3 people. Bastard.

Internet, I ask you once again: is it really that hard to watch out for people who are walking near where you are driving? Is getting to your destination 30 seconds earlier really worth almost killing people, not to mention endangering your own progeny?

Help me to be a girl

Last year, as a wedding gift (ostensibly to both of us, but really to me), some of my coworkers bestowed upon us(me) a $60 gift certificate to the Aveda Institute here in Denver. It's a short distance away from my work on the 16th street mall here, and it's the place where Aveda trains people to cut hair and do salon treatments like manicures, pedicures, facials, etc. I used $15 of the gift certificate to get my hair cut back in November, but I won't need another haircut for a while and the gift cert. expires in early March.

So, I've got $45 to spend at an Aveda salon and I have no idea what to spend it on. I'm not a product type of girl, and I have very sensitive skin so the idea of getting a facial or buying some fancy expensive shampoo doesn't really appeal to me because I have no idea if it'll make my skin break out or work on my (oily thick fine) hair. My gym friend is the one who told me about the $15 haircuts and she cautioned me against getting a manicure (not that I've ever had one!) saying that the few times she did, the polish came off really quickly.

The Aveda Institute's website shows a "service menu" describing the things you can get there. Some of the things, frankly, scare the ever-loving crap out of me. Disincrustation back treatment? Botanical skin resurfacing? Uh...no thanks.

The idea of spending $30 on a pedicure, even if it's technically free, just sounds kind of over-the-top to me. But tell me, internets, at least, those of you who have had things like pedicures and facials and stuff. What should I get? What should I use that last $45 on? Frankly, the most appealing-sounding things to me seem to be the massage and the waxing - at least I've had both of those before. I wasn't thrilled with the wax job I got at the fancy salon the week of the wedding (I felt like I can do just a good a job or better myself for $7.50 worth of wax) but maybe the fancy plant Aveda wax would be better. I haven't had a massage from a professional (or, I guess in this case, semi-pro) since college. Am I wrong to give up on the idea of a facial or pedicure or (ugh) disincrustation back treatment?

Please help me, girly internet people. (or boyly internet people, if you're still reading this) How should I spend our (my) last $45 at the Aveda Institute?

In which Jive Turkey asks me questions, and I answer them

So over at Jive Turkey, she had to answer some questions another blogger asked her. And I volunteered to be interviewed, because a) I like doing that sort of thing, and b) I don't have any photos from the weekend or of the baby blanket I finally finished or of Dan's sweater that he wore 3 days in a row because either he really loves it that much or to make me feel better about all the time I spent knitting it.

Or something.

Anyhow, Ms. Turkey was kind enough to email me with five questions. If anyone would like me to interview them, please let me know in the comments.

1) What is your dream career?

Wow, you really don't pussyfoot around, do you? I go back and forth on this one, especially because I think there is more than one career I'd ultimately be happy doing. But here are some of the things I'd like to do if money were no object and I could easily complete the education needed to work in these fields:

Genetic Counseling
Physical Therapy
Corporate Training
Someone who takes difficult information and transforms it into an easy-to-understand format and then teaches the information to other (adult) people using that format

In a nutshell, it's really difficult for me to answer this question. I like working with people (but not "the public", like a customer service-type job). I like science. I like teaching in a non-academic setting. I like how bodies work.


2) What movie/scene from a movie has left you a complete, sobbing,
emotional mess?

There are some movies that you watch because you want that emotional catharsis, and some movies you watch knowing you'll only see it once because it's too damn hard to deal with otherwise. I always cry at the ending of Beaches, I sometimes cry at the end of Big Fish, I'm sure there are other ones if I sat and thought about it for a while. Movies I have seen only once (and they made me cry plenty): Schindler's List, Requiem for a Dream, Million Dollar Baby. Movies I haven't seen at all because I know they would be too much: Boys Don't Cry, American History X.

3) What kind of behavior/attribute is an absolute deal-breaker when it
comes to a romantic partner?

Smoking. Hard drugs. Bigotry. Condescension. Arrogance. Stupidity/lack of intelligence. Someone who makes me feel like less of a person or less valuable than I really am.

4) You're on death row. What is your final meal?

Wow, the last meal I'll ever eat. And I get anything I want? No matter how well it doesn't go together?

Crab cakes, salad with freshly picked greens and veggies, grilled portabella mushrooms, fancy cheeses, at least 3 different wines, and cheesecake with dark chocolate and raspberries.

5) If you could go back in time and erase one thing you did or said,
what would it be? Assume that erasing it wouldn't substantially alter
the course of your life.

Of course there are things that I wish I'd done or said differently, but mostly I try to go through life without regrets. And I try to make decisions that I think will lead to positive outcomes rather than negative ones (maybe it's just my lifelong proclivity for being a Good Girl). I think if I could go back and do it over again, I would NOT have spoken with The Chef (I met him while waiting for a BART train back in the fall of 2000). This led to dating him, which led to me breaking his heart, because a) I wasn't over my college boyfriend yet, b) I wasn't that into The Chef, because c) he wasn't very smart. And he was a lot older than I was (which, at the time, was kind of a big deal - he was 27 and I was 21). Also, I found out later he was both a liar and a drug user. And possibly an alcoholic. But I learned stuff from the time I spent around him, namely a) how to make my own salad dressing from scratch, b) how to do pan-flipping when sauteeing something, and c) how to play competitive scrabble. I also learned that I wasn't over my college boyfriend, that I really needed to be involved with someone long-term whose intelligence I could respect, and that if I'm not that into someone I shouldn't let it get past a date or two. Ultimately, I probably would have learned those lessons in other ways, so to go back and undo the whole Chef incident probably wouldn't have altered the course of my life.

Here are the meme details:
If you'd like to play along, just follow these instructions:
1. Leave me a comment saying, "Interview me." (And realize I might take
a while to get back to you.)
2. I will respond by emailing you five questions. I get to pick the
questions. (Eventually!)
3. You will update your blog with the answers to the questions. Be sure
you link back to the original post.
4. You will include this explanation and an offer to interview someone
else in the same post.
5. When others comment asking to be interviewed, you will ask them five
questions.

Poo-ish

I have succumbed to my annual January cold, and so was out sick all yesterday. I came in to work for a few hours just to wade through my email (darn this no internets at home thing!) but I'll be leaving shortly and going home for a nap.

There's nothing to say about being sick except it sucks. At least it's not 3 infections at once, like last year.

We saw Slumdog Millionaire (finally) over the weekend. It was awesome. And I found 4 new pairs of shoes for less than 80 bucks. Including a pair of boots that fit over my calves! (barely)

Food on Friday, Vegetarian edition

One thing that I like to do when we visit people and they let us stay in their house is to make food for our hosts. This becomes more difficult when people have food allergies and aversions or special diets, and while staying with our friends in CT last weekend it proved to be nearly impossible for us to devise a meal that would both taste good and fit the requirements for all four diners.

Kent is a vegetarian who is deathly allergic to all peanuts and peanut products, plus highly allergic to all legumes, peas, and beans.

Christine is a notoriously picky eater (her list of things she will eat is far easier to relay than things she won't); plus, as a result of ongoing treatment for thyroid cancer, had to be on a low-iodine diet while we were visiting.

Here is what we made:

Spanish Tortilla, garlic bread, plus regular salad with tasty lettuce and veggies(for us) and iceberg lettuce/cucumber/carrot salad with homemade dressing (for Christine). She made her own pasta with olive oil and garlic and timed her main dish to be done with ours. Had we had more time to prepare, we could have made the bread for the garlic bread ourselves and she could have had that, too.

Spanish Tortilla (recipe adapted from one Dan's mom makes) (serves 4 large servings or six medium-sized)
4 eggs, scrambled, plus a bit of milk mixed in
2 medium or 1 large russet potato, scrubbed and chopped into small dice
1/2 large sweet onion, chopped
seasonings to taste - garlic powder, salt, pepper, chili powder, herbs, whatevs.

In a large nonstick skillet (you use a lot less oil this way) pour some olive oil. Sautee potatoes and onions with seasonings of choice until pretty well cooked. When po's are done, add scrambled egg, turn heat down, and cover the pan to let the egg cook, 10-20 minutes depending on your pan and your stovetop. When egg is set, use a cookie sheet or pizza pan to cover the skillet, flip the tortilla over, and slide it back in the pan so the top is now on bottom and cook a few more minutes. Serve with salsa and sour cream (or nonfat greek yogurt, which is what we use instead of sour cream).

To convert this recipe to a low-iodine diet, we would have had to use egg whites, no milk, non-iodized salt, and peeled the potatoes. Christine told us not to bother; she was happy with her plain pasta.

The Strykers Take Manhattan (and New Haven, CT)

Saturday: Up early and up to Times Square again in the frigid TKTS line. Avenue Q is our first choice of shows, but we'll take Chicago or Gypsy. Turns out Gypsy is the best deal. We find a great spot to have bagels with lox as we walk back down Broadway; the sort of place I've never seen outside of NYC - a full service deli, plus salad bar and hot food bar, almost like a cafeteria. They sell groceries and flowers, and we warm ourselves with hot chocolate seated upstairs while looking out at the bounty below. Back down through Union Square's farmer's market and our first ever apple cider donuts, The Strand bookstore, more exploration of the village and it's time to change for the show.

The neon lights are much brighter at night. But then again, there are far fewer people at 9 AM on a Saturday in January.


Mere blocks from the place we stayed.

Words cannot express how awesome the experience of watching Patti LuPone play Mama Rose and the rest of the incredibly talented cast perform Gypsy was for me. This show has been near and dear to my heart since I was wee, and getting to see it both live and on Broadway was phenomenal. Our seats were in the orchestra, second row, far to one side so the view was a bit obstructed, but it didn't matter a bit. I was high for hours afterward and completely forgot that I hardly ate anything all day.

Dan went back to get our bags; I subway'd to Grand Central to buy train tickets up to New Haven. He made it back and we got on the train with no time to spare, but the ride up was quiet and peaceful.

Our friends bought a house recently in a town outside of New Haven, surrounded by land and trees. We spent a quiet evening enjoying delicious pizza, meeting kitties, touring the house, and watching Wall-E in Blu-Ray projected onto a wall of their living room.

Sunday: Lazy day, stayed in our jammies until 2 and then went out for a quick frolic on the snow-covered beach. I discovered the joys of crunching through crusty-soft layers of snow and laughed at the things they call "waves." We toured Yale campus and took a quick jaunt through one of the campus libraries, which looked like a church but wasn't. Shopped for supplies, made dinner, and played Scene-it - a lovely visit with our friends who came through this last trying year with flying colors.

There were a billion shells on this beach.


And far less seaweed (and tar) than the last beach we were on (Santa Barbara).


Old lighthouse


Library at Yale. The inside is even more church-like, except instead of Jesus they worship knowledge. Or something.

Monday we took an early train back to Manhattan, and spent the day walking with all our stuff (luckily we packed light) from Grand Central all the way up through Central Park (saw my very first cardinal ever!), to Fifth Avenue and Museum Mile, up to Harlem and 125th street. We found another deli-type place and finished our time in New York with tasty, tasty food. The only notable thing about the journey home was that the teenager sitting next to me spent the ENTIRE 4.5 hours biting his nonexistant fingernails, methodically, one finger at a time, then starting over again after finger 10. After an hour I wanted to slap his hands; after 3 hours I wanted to throttle him like Bart Simpson. Note to teenaged boys everywhere: compusive nail biting is NOT SEXY. Wanna get laid? DON'T DO THAT.


I found the Chrysler Building far prettier than the Empire State Building.


I wonder if someone puts roses here every day, or if this was a one-time thing?


My favorite thing in Central Park (other than the free public bathrooms at the boathouse).

All in all, it was a terrific trip, with enough time in the city to get a good taste, with some downtime and friend time, with the promise to return when the weather is better and Central Park has more in it than fences, snow, and barren trees. Because while a few days is enough to get a taste, the city of New York deserves a far more thorough exploration.

The Strykers Take Manhattan, part 1

Wednesday: Arrival in NYC, disorientation, tasty falafel/gyros, meet a new friend, meet the other people staying at the same place, deep slumber. Thus far, I like the West Village.

Thursday:

Walk downtown through Tribeca, past the WTC site, church yards, to Battery Park and the Staten Island Ferry (it's free!) My facial orifices run like crazy and my hands freeze into painful claws while attempting photos of the Statue. We have set foot on 3 boroughs in less than 24 hours, though our time on Staten Island was limited to the three minutes between departing the ferry and boarding the ferry back to Manhattan. We walk up through the Southstreet Seaport area to Chinatown and a mediocre lunch but the best egg tarts ever. Canal street; back to W.Vil to rest for a few hours and then dinner (coal-fired oven pizza)/drinks with Laura and Jimi. We end up in Brooklyn after dinner; that is borough #4 by hour 26.



$20 to take the ferry to the statue/Ellis Island or $0 to take the Staten Island Ferry and get good photos. Free wins.


At South Street Seaport


One of the things I love about traveling with Dan is that he remembers things he learns in art classes and explains them to me. This time, I learned of the history and significance of the design of the Brooklyn Bridge.


I heart them.


Friday: Walk uptown through Chelsea, the Garment and Flower districts, giant Macy's. Up to Times Square to find a deli much beloved by our friend Julie; it's nowhere in sight and we finally manage to ask a local. It's 12 blocks farther and about a million times more expensive than we were expecting (and not really a deli; more of a restaurant where the sandwiches are named for famous people and my lousy texas toast and velveeta sandwich, the cheapest thing on the menu, is $12!). We make up for it later by passing by the MOMA and discovering free Fridays, exploring Rockefeller Center, watching the ice skaters, happening upon hot chocolate and cupcakes at Magnolia Bakery that are far more reasonable. The MOMA contains significant awesomeness but by far my favorite thing is the installation of a huge circular couchlike object with squishy carpet inside, surrounded on 3 sides by soothing sound and video. It is trippy, it is womblike, we remove our shoes and vegetate after a long 2 days of walking in the freezing cold. 4 more floors of modern art and I have had my fill.


I imagine the flower district is far more flowery in the spring. In January, there's not a whole lot to see.


Can't sleep. Giant Macy's Bear will eat me!


My very first wooden escalator, somewhere in the upper floors of Macy's.


MOMA had a whole room of stuff that was both interesting and functional. This is a chair.


An installation at MOMA, consisting of linty fibers and mirrors.

Dinner is reasonable sushi back in the West Village; we walk down Christopher street and pass by bars with happy hours full of men all interested in each other. At dinner, I profess a craving for a small amount of fried food and girl beer. Luckily, there is a tavern across the street. Our familiar-looking server turns out to be someone who worked at the late, lamented Walnut Cafe. We all reminisce and she brings us free beers.


PS. Don't forget to check out Dan's trip report and NYC Alphabet!

I'm such a tease

A few photos to tide you over while my posts are prepared.

Good things

*Tomorrow we go to New York City. I've never been. I am thoroughly excited, and will get to meet up with a few different friends while we're there. We plan to see a broadway show and eat some pizza and spend hours walking around and saying hey, I've seen that before!

*I finally finished knitting Dan's sweater, and have only some finishing touches to add (grafting the armpits together, weaving in ends, etc.) Photos forthcoming.

*After 2 solid years of looking, I finally managed to find acceptable work pants to buy. NY & Co, a store I've never actually shopped in before, had a great sale and I got 3 pairs of well-fitting work pants that don't make me look hoochie for 40 bucks this weekend. SWEET.