Food Diary 12/19/18

I got really burnt out cooking this past semester, what with the restricted diet and everyone being out at dinner time, I was flummoxed as to how to feed people.  So I am trying to turn over a new leaf, especially since I am worried about R's health and I really think he should start eating more anti-inflammatory stuff.  He's miserable with his arthritis.  One of my Christmas presents to him is going to be a coupon for a healthy, tasty homemade lunch every day.  He really liked it when I was making him the no-salt lunches, even though then the doctor decided he didn't need no/low salt.  But I fell away from making lunch for him.  But that's a different plan I have to think through in terms of groceries and prep time.

So here's a list of what I've cooked for dinner since Saturday:

Saturday:  brown rice pasta with local sausage, leftover tomato sauce and some goat mozzarella, crudites of carrot sticks, bell peppers and cucumbers.

Sunday:  slow cooker bbq chicken with rice, leftover veggies (I felt pretty inadequate on the veggie front there).

Monday:  homemade salmon patties, homemade cole slaw, roasted potatoes (with carrot, mushroom and onion).  That dinner took a lot of chopping and prep work but was delicious!

Tuesday:  blue corn tacos with local ground beef, topped with grated goat cheddar cheese and homemade guacamole, cole slaw.

Wednesday:  I might try to use up leftover chicken and make chicken fried rice.  I've got celery, carrot, mushroom, leftover bell peppers I can stir fry into it.  I'm going shopping today so I can buy some aminos, which is our soy sauce replacement (haven't had any since the fridge died this summer and we had to throw everything out), peanut oil, maybe throw in a dollop of crunchy peanut butter, as well as buy some baby corn or bamboo or water chestnut or Chinese pea pods.  Something to make it more typical of something found on a Chinese restaurant menu.  Also I will throw in an egg or two.  Maybe we can try to finish up the cole slaw along with it.  I also should make chicken broth today with the carcass. 

Thursday:  I might have oven baked chicken.  I found a package of cut up chicken in the garage freezer.  I must have overbought last time I was making chicken for the homeless shelter.  Usually all my chicken is whole because I got it from the CSA this fall.  Might have sweet potatoes with it and whatever kind of seasonal green/veggie I can muster.

Friday:  Might make veggie chili, topped with goat cheese, corn chips and salsa on the side.  I think Will is coming home that day.

Saturday is Sean's birthday and I have no idea what to do.  Must think on that.

The Cricket on the Hearth- Book 48

The Cricket on the Hearth is one of Charles Dickens' Christmas novellas (the most famous of these being A Christmas Carol).  However, there is nothing about Christmas in it!  It does take place in a cold month, perhaps it was December, though I can't recall if the month was mentioned.

It is definitely a fairy tale, as there is a wise but mysterious cricket who sings when important things are about to happen.  And household fairies visit people in their dreams to set things aright.

As I was reading this for my Christmas Literary Challenge, I realized I had already read it!  I must have long ago because as I read it, it was very familiar to me.  But I had forgotten the ending (as I so frequently do in these cases).  We come into the seemingly happy home of the Carrier (kind of like the UPS guy in our day) John Peerybingle and his new wife, Dot, their newborn baby and their little servant girl.   We also meet their neighbors, Caleb the poor toymaker and his blind daughter Bertha.  Their sour, rather sinister boss who is the Tackleton of Gruff and Tackleton, toy purveyors.  Tackleton, oddly enough, is about to marry the beautiful May Fielding for some reason we cannot discern as the reader.  We also meet an old, deaf Stranger who throws everything into confusion.

You can actually buy a metal cricket to keep on your hearth.

It's a charming story as far as it goes, but honestly, I found it a bit hard to understand and grew impatient with the over the top coyness and the rather cloying sentimentality.  I think Dickens might have been tippling the Christmas punch as he wrote this!

I was googling around to find out more about The Cricket on the Hearth and I came across a really kitschy 1967 animated retelling (which takes great liberties with the story) staring Danny Thomas and Marlo Thomas.  I could only get through the first few minutes but it was a blast from the past!

For more book reviews go to Read 52 Books in 52 Weeks.

Commonplace Book 12/16/18

This is why believing Catholics should be concerned with the environment.

From p. 71 of The Light of Christ by Father Thomas Joseph White:

(He's been talking about the 'names of God' in the tradition of the Church Fathers.  God is simple, perfect, eternal, good, and wise.  He says from this, we can immediately perceive a kind of 'creation mysticism.')

This also means that realities that spring from God, and that are more manifest to us, are a kind of visible expression or natural beauty and complexity of nature, its immense, intricate order and vast history, are visible expressions of the infinite hidden wisdom of God.  His divine eternity and wisdom are manifest in the unfolding effects of time and creaturely history.  The creation is the written tableau on which God expresses his being outwardly.  

A Beautiful Adoption Story

When I was 7 or 8 my oldest sister went away.  She had been to college for a little bit, I remember, and then for some reason she went to live with my Aunt Jackie who at that time was living in East Lansing, Michigan, at Michigan State University where she (my aunt) worked in their Labor Studies department.  I didn't understand why she (my sister) was living with Aunt Jackie but I was little and didn't think much about it.   And then my sister was back home and then she moved out and then she got married.

Years later, when I was in my teens, she told me that she had had a baby and given that baby up for adoption.  She went to live with Aunt Jackie during her pregnancy and Aunt Jackie had made the adoption arrangements.  Ever since then my oldest sister and Jackie were very close.  I always wondered why because they were as different as any two people could be!  My aunt was cultivated and academic, my sister loved country music and Harlequin romance novels.  My aunt tended toward reticence and refinement, my sister was blunt and sarcastic.  They were an odd mix. But somehow they were very close.  My sister adored my aunt.  And my aunt was always very patient with her, a patience she did not show others.  But once I heard about the baby I realize that they had really bonded.  That there was a terrible rift between my mother and my oldest sister (that much later, and very slowly, healed) and that my Aunt Jackie had been my sister's lifeline and kept her whole and sane while she went through pregnancy and childbirth. Which is funny because my mother bore 13 children and my aunt was a spinster.

My sister had two children with her husband, her now ex-husband as the marriage lasted only ten years.  She never told her own children about the baby she had had when she was 21.

Fast forward to last spring.  Someone on facebook kept trying to send messages to a niece and two of my sisters.  It's funny because my oldest sister changed her married name back to her maiden name after her divorce but they didn't find her via facebook, they found the niece and two sisters.  It turns out one of the daughters of the little baby boy my sister gave up was trying to find her long lost biological grandmother.

And so facebook brought together my sister and her son, Stephen.  A son she'd never known.  He was raised by a loving couple.  He married and had a couple children and then his wife died.  He later married again and had three more children.  On Easter Sunday 2018 my sister got to talk on the phone to her son.  She said the emotions were indescribable.  Both his adoptive parents have passed on now.  I think his youngest is in college.  My sister says his adoptive parents did a wonderful job raising him.  He's lovely.  Kind and smart and generous.

He calls her every Saturday now and for every holiday.  They got to meet in person in June when one of his children was graduating from a college in North Carolina.  They drove through Virginia on the way back up to Michigan.  My niece and nephew got to meet the older brother they never knew they had.  And guess what!   The half brothers look alike!  You can definitely see a family resemblance.

My sister says the father was a Marine she met one night while out.  They drank too much and went too far.  He was going off to Vietnam.  She never saw him again.

Pregnancy is temporary, but a life is real.  It has a lifetime.  It is so precious.  My sister has new grandchildren.  She is writing them Christmas cards this year.  She is so happy.  Her heart is full of joy.  A thing that was a terrible hardship, a crisis pregnancy, has ended, 50 years later, in joy and love and gratitude.

Choose life!

Housekeeping Notes 12/14/18

My housekeeping has been abysmal this week.  Let's not talk about it.  I am so burned out about cooking.  So today I made a page where I am going to organize my food thoughts.  We are on a gluten free, soy free, cow dairy free, nut free diet.  Also, I want to be zero waste. I am not able to stay home for hours cooking.  And even when I am able to stay home for hours cooking, I am not in the habit and always seem to be missing a major ingredient or tool!  Not a foodie but forced into the situation of having to be a foodie. 

So here's the link to my new page.  I just wrote up basic stuff.  I hope to have more recipes soon.

Thoughts on getting a new puppy at the age of 58

I have brought chaos into my family in the guise of a hyperactive puppy named Skipper.  My family kind of resents this.  However, my family is gone much of the time:  my husband to work or if he is home, he's often watching football or sleeping or reading, etc.  My teens are in their rooms or out.  My 23 year old works and is in his room, mostly.  Not that we don't socialize and hang out together.  We all like each other!  But there are long swathes of time when I am by myself.  I'm by myself but I am chained to duties, etc that don't really let me be free to do what I want.  Every time I want to do something there is some kind of pay off.  And that's part of being a mom and living in a family.  I don't really resent it or anything, but those are the realities of my present day living.

I don't knit or do any kind of crafty thing.  I want to be a gardener but seem to be only good at killing plants.  I want to be a bird watcher and hiker but can only do that sort of thing intermittently.  I do like to read.  I like to be involved with parish stuff.  I occasionally like to do civic minded things, but the truth is I've always wanted to have a great dog.

When I was about 11 or so I convinced my tired and busy parents to get me a Labrador Retriever.  We only had him a few months.  He was too much for us to handle as he kept running away.  I'll never forget how my dad labored to build a dog run in our backyard to contain the dog.  The very first time we put him in it, he cleared the six foot gate, no problem.  He kept running after cars and kids on bikes.  This was back in the 70s when people still let their dogs roam around, though leash laws were starting to go into effect.  The big worry was he'd get hit by a car.  So he went to live on a farm somewhere.  And my family went back to being cat people. 

That was my first dog failure.

Fast forward.  At age 28 I got married and started having children at age 30.  At some point after having bought our own house with a conveniently fenced in backyard, I started longing for a dog again.  Now I'm an adult, I said to myself, I can get a dog!  So we rescued this wonderful mutt, named Scout.  He was part Golden Retriever and part some sort of Spitz dog.  He was so smart and friendly.  Apparently he'd just been chained in someone's backyard so he had separation anxiety and the minute you left him alone outside he'd start barking and then frantically jump the fence.  I actually slowly trained him not to do that.  He was highly trainable.  Feeling successful and also feeling that I went out too much or needed too much time off from the dog to take care of my young children, I went out and rescued another dog named Maisie.  She was part some kind of hound and part German Shepherd.  She was very timid which proved to be a problem because she was a fear biter.

I had baby number 3 and Scout got incredibly jealous.  He took to jumping the fence again after three years of not do that.  I literally had to choose between staying with my baby or running after the dog.  One day a neighbor down the street got really angry at me for letting me let my dog run loose and threatened to call the authorities.  So we gave Scout away to a crazy dog lady who sent a photo of her with Scout sitting at her table eating dinner together.  She was an old spinster type and apparently Scout and she dined together in the evenings.

We kept Maisie, but as Maisie aged she got worse and worse about fear biting.  I always had to sequester her off in her crate or behind a baby gate whenever kids came over to play, and this happened frequently.  Then I had baby number 4 and Maisie got incredibly jealous.  One day she was begging for my attention and I literally said to her, wait Maisie I have to finish here with the baby and she turned and just as an older kid was walking out the front door, she bolted out!  She did it deliberately so that we'd pay attention to her and run after her, which the kids did.  And then right in front of their eyes, she ran into the street and was hit by a car and died.  In the wink of an eye.

So dog failures 2 and 3.

Just before we decided to move to our present house, we got a Golden Retriever puppy.  We named him Ranger.  He was the stupidest dog I've ever known.  And he had no personality.  And I was pregnant with number 5.  See, I've never been rational about dogs!  So we gave him away to a Golden Retriever rescue group.  I remember the person came to take him away and she said, this dog is a pain!  That was from someone who loves Golden Retrievers and rescues them as a hobby!!! He was like the 'Marley' of Golden Retrievers.

Failure 4.

So finally about 10 years ago we got a Sheltie, and named her Tillie.  Tillie was a sweet dog.  She was an easy dog too.  She was quite trainable and she didn't run away.  She liked guarding her territory of our yard.  I wanted a Sheltie because I heard they were good for agility and I had this idea that we'd get into that with her.  However, she was so timid around other dogs, she'd freak out at the 4H training sessions.  She also early on developed a weird limp.  We went to a couple different vets who all tested her for Lyme and heartworm, etc.  No one could figure out the problem.  She didn't like going for walks.  She was content to dig a little hollow in the backyard and stay there most of the time.  She had various weird ailments all her life and this past summer she suddenly went into kidney failure and died at age 10.

Failure 5

So now I own Skipper.  I am 58.  This is probably the last dog I'm going to get in my life.  If he lives 15 years, I'll be 73 about then!  The dog is my hobby.  He's a pain now, but if I train him right, I think he'll be an awesome dog.  He is so smart.  But the truth is puppies are pains.  They take a while to housebreak, they need tons of attention, they chew on things, they develop bad habits like jumping on you, grabbing stuff off the table and counters, barking when you don't want them too, etc.  You kind of have to take a long term approach and work on one thing at a time, training-wise.  He'll be an adult at age 2, he's only 4 months now.  It's like with kids.  You have to be prepared for the long haul, except with kids it take 18-20 some years.

UPDATE from when I first wrote this.

Well, Skipper is now almost 7 months.  I see hope but I also see problems.  For instance right now he's chewing on a chair cushion.  Skipper, no!  Aw, but now he's curled up in a ball and looks sweet!  Good, Skipper!

There's been progress.  I moved his crate from the family room to the mudroom, which means that I can stick him back there and his incessant barking doesn't interrupt football watching like it did when he was right in the room.

He's also gotten quieter during the day, so I don't have to put him in the crate every time I need to go upstairs or even out to run errands for a short while.  That's really good.

He's completely housebroken.  That's good!  He's been housebroken for a while now.

This is a terrible picture, but Skipper and Dylan are a volatile combination!

Things I love:

I don't exactly love this, but it is a very good thing.  I used to stay in my robe unless I had something I had to run to.   I just never bothered getting dressed until later in the a.m.  I did this for years raising small children and then I was in the habit.  But with this dog, I get up and get dressed in the dark and make my way downstairs because one of the very first things I have to do is take the dog out.  I know it is crazy but for some reason I love being outside early in the morning.  I'm too lazy to actually do it without a reason and I hated having to do it say when I had to drive someone somewhere early.  That's stressful!   But just getting outside for a few minutes while Skipper does his thing is a pleasant wake up for me.  Even if it is raining or cold, there's something refreshing about getting outside for a few minutes.  Weird, I know.

I love taking Skipper on a mid-morning walk.  He's kind of hard to walk still.  He's part hound so he wants to sniff everything.  I let him do some sniffing but then after a few minutes, we walk.  I feel like I am getting good exercise.  I love seeing the sky, the trees, the birds and any other possible wildlife I might notice, and all the people coming and going.  Walking your dog is very neighborly!  People recognize you and wave!  You get to know other dog walkers.  Skipper is stubborn though and sometimes he balks because something has spooked him.  He's easily spooked.  Some lawn guy starts up a leaf blower?  He freaks.  A sudden gust gets some wind chimes playing loudly?  He freaks.  Some guy jogging?  He freaks.  He also sometimes catches a scent and absolutely wants to follow it and tries to drag me after it suddenly.  I remind myself I weigh more than him and then use my weight to hold him back. 

I love when he sits quietly on the couch with me.  He likes to snuggle.

He does however do many annoying things:

He constantly counter surfs
He jumps on people
He barks a lot
He chews things up

Slowly but surely, he'll get better.  I am remiss in not training him more though.  I'd better get my act together and do that.  He still only comes when he wants to.  However, he's accidentally gotten off leash a few times and he never ran away. 

Anyway, enough going on about my dog!

Today's To Do List

Already done:
6:30 a.m.
Up and dressed
Make coffee
Fed cat
Took dog out to do his duty (or should I say doody??) using my environmentally friendly flush puppy bag.  It is very frosty out this a.m.
Feed dog and give water

(Doing this now as dog scampers back and forth frantically chasing toys.)

To Do:
CZW Laudato Si' Post
7:30 a.m. B up and breakfasted (sausage and eggs I think)
Carpool this a.m. to get B to 9:00 a.m. classes; leave here at 8:10
Home again - clean kitchen, walk do (30 min) and shower, maybe some dusting
Take S to class in Annandale, drop off by 12:20
Drive back through Vienna to drop off library books (overdue!), pick up pet food (fish and dog), drop by Maple Ave. Market for eggs, any veggies and some ground beef
Put groceries away and take dog with me to pick up B.  Skipper likes car rides and he gets this one every week.
P/u B
Drive home; leaving dog with her.
Drive back to Annandale to p/u S.
The thing that makes driving tolerable is I'm listening to a great audio book right now.  Can't wait to listen!
Home again around 3 p.m.
Take dog for another walk
Rest and read for a bit
B needs to be dropped off for early choir practice carpool though by 4:30
Make some kind of dinner so people can eat (tomato sauce and ground beef will be involved)
Feed pets
Drive through awful traffic to listen to B sing (I better reserve seat this a.m.)
S says he will watch D while I am gone.
Drive home with B (I hate driving at night.  Please don't rain!)
Collapse into bed