stomping grounds

So much of it was different, and so very much of it had stayed the same. I drove into the city with Mona tonight, to pick up a crib in Queen Anne. We took my car which was a good thing because without my gps I don't think we would have ever found the place. Something happens to residential streets in the city and they become completely inscrutable and impossible to navigate. That part was certainly the same.

I moved to Seattle in 1995 when I was another person. Moved into the city because that's what you do when you're a young couple and you don't have a car and you want to experience the fast paced city life. We lived in Queen Anne for two or three years (I can't remember exactly). I have to look at my resume to figure out when I moved. Most of those early years are completely fogged out of my memory. They were shitty years, quite frankly. Working at crappy jobs, grinding through the day to day to pay the bills and never quite doing it, married to a total creep and never happy.

I don't think about those years very often, but tonight it was so very strange. I was driving around on the tiny winding streets that I used to walk on day after day, past the grocery store where I could only buy what I could carry on the long walk home, the bar that my ex got thrown out of for brawling, the awesome independent used bookstore. A lot of it was the same. A lot of the town has gotten glamorous and condo-filled and hip. Familiar, though. There was another person still in my head, because suddenly the overlay of area knowledge was there and I could navigate. Strange feelings too, as if things suddenly smelled different and I was looking out of different eyes and had a list of things to worry about (bills, could I afford fruit, what was he going to make me do tonight) and there it was, the old me that I forgot was there.

And Mona said "go left, you can sneak over into the lane now!" and I did, and my gps told me to make the next right and I did and and I was totally confused and wasn't sure where I was. But my car reassured me we were on the right path, and we certainly were because minutes later we met a bulldog with a name that meant "awesome warrior" or something like that in Japanese and we got Mona's crib and then went and had sushi. Because my life now? It is different and it is awesome.

Tomorrow's bento highlight is the quiche I made with Penelope's eggs. It took five instead of three because they were small, but I followed Karen's most excellent horseradish and sour cream recipe and it was delicious. Then, a container full of halved supersweet tomatoes sprinkled with pepper and golden balsamic vinegar. For breakfast, yogurt. For an afternoon snack, carrots and three precious baybel cheese cubes. They are tiny but my latest obsession. They posses a sharp tangy flavor that makes your mouth hum.

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Eggs laid in the coop today: 1

asdw space bar!

my left hand at work this afternoon

So I have this way that I hold my hand on the keyboard. Whenever I'm browsing idly, or at work just thinking, or when I take a pause from typing I have this *way.* My hand naturally comes to rest and it feels good, like I'm prepared for anything.

Prepared to run is what I am. I habitually return my left hand to rest on the keyboard in a very precise way. Pinky on shift, fourth finger A, middle S, pointer D, thumb on the space bar. My right hand rests on the mouse. I am ready for just about any game ever made for the computer.

And I am a dork. I can't help it! I've been playing games for so long that this particular configuration has surpassed the more domestic "asdf" right hand and "jkl;" right hand resting point. If you know how to type, you know what I mean by that. If you have ever played a game, you know how important it is to have your thumb on the space bar.

I wonder if anyone else has ever noticed.



Tonight's bento had a bit more thought than Tuesday's. I came home from work and spent a vigorous three hours cleaning the house from top to bottom. Oh yes, you could totally drop a piece of jammy buttered toast on the kitchen floor, pick it up, and scoop the jam back on top and then eat it. No cooties! You could also drop it on the bedroom rug, but no matter how clean that is there is still the fuzz factor.

After all that cleaning I made a bit of pasta and sauteed up one of mona's zuchinnis. For dinner, I added a bit of red sauce from a jar. I am not a fan of trying to get that distinctive red-sauce stain out of plastic, so I left the sauce off of my lunch portion. To balance out the lunch, some fresh carrots, seedless red grapes, and tomatoes separated by that oh-so-fun sushi grass. The red tomatoes are from the deck garden, and the orange are from the Duvall farmer's market. They are sweet as candy. On the side, plain yogurt plus a spoonful of homemade seedless raspberry jam (swoon!) for breakfast, and a container of peanuts for When Hunger Strikes at odd times.

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Eggs laid in the coop today: 1
Eggs laid in the coop Wednesday: 1

Urban logging

I was driving to work yesterday and noticed that half of one of our neighborhood streets was blocked off by a huge flatbed. Then I saw the Enormous Logs lying there. I've always got my camera within reach, so I managed to snap a few pictures through the windshield (apologies for the blurry-ness). I know that much of the woods around here are an illusion. Many a wooded copse is actually a plot of land that the owner just hasn't gotten around to building on. Our plot of land looks a lot bigger than it is, because the land directly next to us (behind the shed) is one of these "someday" lots. Our chatty neighbor keeps me updated on when she thinks the owner will start building, because she's known him for years. Our three acres should keep us private for the most part, but I know someday there's going to be someone closer to us than I want. I can only hope that they don't have chicken-chasing dogs.

As I was taking my logging pictures, the guys started looking at me and I realized that I looked like some sort of enviro-nazi, gliding down the street silently in my hybrid car with the strange chicken feathers hanging from the rearview mirror. Perhaps they thought I was documenting their Rape Of The Land so that I could come back later and protest? I admit that every time our Woodinville neighbors cut down a grove of trees I shed a little tear. Sometimes I even get a little angry, especially when one of my favorite forests was cut down about a month ago. One day it was a medieval shady druid grove, and the next the trees were magically gone and raw dirt surrounded the poured cement slabs for mega homes.

But I promise to limit myself to heavy leaflet campaigns. And if you get that joke, I applaud you.

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We had a family evening with great friends, something we haven't done with them in absolutely ages. Watched a boy smear beans all over his lap and crow with glee while stuffing a quesadilla fragment into his mouth. Charlie got bitten by mosquitoes while the boy ran around the backyard wielding a yellow shovel. We bought our tickets for Australia, and will be jetting off in mid-november for two weeks of excitement. After years of planning we're finally going!

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Tomorrow's bento: quick and dirty! Chili beans from a can, with corn. On the top level an amalgam of pickled asparagus, orange bell pepper, smoked cheddar cheese, and prunes. I love all of those items separately, but was kind of raiding the kitchen to figure out what to put in there. Perhaps I'll start eating at the right side and move to the left without mixing flavors.

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Eggs laid in the coop today: 1
Eggs laid in the coop Monday: 1
Eggs laid in the coop Sunday: 0
Eggs laid in the coop Saturday: 1
Eggs laid in the coop Friday: 1
How many days I have neglected this blog: obvious

zucchini birthdays!

First of all, a happiest birthday to my sister. When you get home from your summer vacation journey, there will be a little something waiting for you. A little something that hopefully will remind you of our carefree pre-teen years. I will say no more!

As for the zucchini, let me say that I consider myself an above average speller. I love words. I am quite good at remembering how to spell accommodate, and all of the exceptions to "i after e except before c." But zucchini, that is a tough one. I have to admit that spell-checker usually catches and castigates me on that one. And how many other NPR dorks will remember the broadcast that taught them the difference between castigate and chastise!
Luckily it tastes much better than it spells. I came into some homegrown zucchini this afternoon (thanks, mona!). The most commonly held myth about zucchini: if you have extra, just make zucchini bread. Well, most recipes call for only one CUP of slivered squash. And if you have ever had a plant go wild you know that in the blink of an eye there is a greenish appendage as big as an adult's bicep. Your average "let's just make bread" squash is probably seven or eight cups worth. My gifted wild squash tonight did double duty as half-muffins half-dinner.

King Arthur Flour zucchini muffin recipe. No added sugar!

Which also brings me to tomorrow's bento lunch. On Sunday (when I had copious amounts of time) I smoked a fillet of salmon on a cedar plank. I tossed some of that with squash, and ate part of it for dinner and will have the other part for lunch tomorrow. I also added Ursula's last egg, because I am all about the protein. It was tasty!


Other bento highlights include my cottage cheese mix-up. I didn't want the whole thing to languish all night, so tomorrow I will toss my separately packaged cottage cheese (lower left, and you can tell how much I love fresh ground pepper) with a diced mixture of orange peppers, italian parseley (homegrown) and cherry tomatoes (deck tomatoes are not quite ripe yet. Or more precisely, they ripen one at a time which means that I eat them while standing on the deck). On the upper left side is a small container of organic nonfat yogurt with a nestled spoonful of homemade cherry jam. When you go to work at 8 am, you had better bring breakfast with you.

Sometimes I think that the eating is the best part of working.

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I let Penelope out of the coop today and kept Marge and Gladys inside. They need to learn that the coop is their safe place, and Penelope needed some fresh air, so to speak. At dusk, I opened the door and Penelope went inside to roost. A great sign that they have accepted one another! The three of them were tucked in for the night and no one was fighting. Their friendship has become just a little bit more beautiful.