Packing Light

Normally, work trips take me somewhat boring places, like Columbus, Ohio or Bethesda, Maryland. That's not to say that I don't find cool things to do there (although that's not really the point of a business trip), but if I had a choice as to where I got to jet off to, it probably wouldn't be there. Well...this time I lucked out, and I'm heading to London tomorrow.

It's a quick trip: fly on Tuesday, arriving at 7:15 pm. Work for two days. Fly back on Friday. But on Friday, my flight isn't until 7:00 pm, which means that I have all day to scoot around London and act like a tourist. 

I learned from my Oslo trip that if you're going to be going around a city, it's best to not have to lug around a suitcase. I'm a light packer - last time I just had one rolling bag - but even with that, it's not fun to have extra baggage along for the ride.

So this time, I'm going even lighter. London, I'm coming to you...with only a backpack. 

I'm pretty sure I can do it, but I'll report from the airport tomorrow, and we'll see then how it worked out...

Quickest Restaurant Review Ever

A most excellent Friday to you! I slept in too late this morning and have therefore used up almost all of my available blogging time, so I'll keep this short.

I was going to write about how my parents came down last Friday and we went to Alchemy for dinner.

We had a wonderful time. But half the point of writing about a restaurant on a blog is including pictures of the food, right? If it's not for Instagram, that's why people take pictures of their food in restaurants. 

Well, the food was so delicious and we were so hungry when it came that we devoured it immediately and there were no pictures taken. All I have to report about the food is that it was worth the trip to Gloucester and all we had left over was one piece of pre-meal bread...

...until my dad ate that too. So you'll just have to take our/my word for it, I guess. Try it out! Good food! Fun atmosphere! Tasty drinks! And if you have room like we didn't, the desserts are great too! 

And now I've officially run out of time, so I'm out. Have a lovely weekend!

Thursday Vignettes, Vol. 2

I decided I like the short list of random occurrences thing, so I declare that it's now a series. If you find them dreadfully boring, I'm sorry. I like having this blog as a stockpile of memories, and while these may not be important in the grand scheme of things, I like to have a record of everyday things too!

1. Gas prices at the best location of all time (Costco...duh) dropped way down to $1.89, so naturally the gas lines are really long. Most cars, including ours, have gas caps on the left side of the car, so the lines were the longest for pumps on that side, and Costco only allows one-way traffic through the pumps. We, however, thwarted the system.

2. Yesterday I walked into the bathroom to start getting ready for the day, and I immediately had "one of these things is not like the other..." running through my head.

3. Like we do on most Wednesdays, we had movie night last night to kick off a six-week series of watching Episode 1 through Episode 6 of Star Wars before the release of Episode 7. (Nerd alert: you've been warned.) Anyway, we had waffles and bacon for dinner, and we decided to do bacon in the oven since making it on the stove would take awhile for four people. Despite the fact that nothing was burning and the vent was on, the fire alarm went off and wouldn't stop until we waved a towel under it. We thought that was the end of it, but last night at 3am it went off again, which woke us up with a start. It beeped three times, and then stopped. Mysterious.

4. When we moved into our house, our realtor gave us a lovely planter of a variety of succulents. They were small, and I put them in the sunniest location I could so that they got plenty of light. Apparently the conditions weren't quite right for them though, because they've grown into monsters. 

That's all for now...happy Thursday!

Business Casual

Last night, Chaz and I were discussing the personal skills that we to work toward while we're in the workforce. For me, that skill is a rather specific one: I want to succeed at looking not awkward while standing and talking to someone. 

I've gone through a variety of poses in my head while thinking about it, and each one seems worse than the last.

Option 1: Crossed Arms

This doesn't seem like a good one, because it can often appear defensive and off-putting. It could potentially be acceptable if leaning up against a wall though, so it gets points for that.

Option 2: Arms at Sides

Probably the most logical option. HOWEVER. Maybe it's just me and my need to go see a chiropractor, but leaving my arms at my sides always makes me look like I have bad posture, but throwing my shoulders back is actually very uncomfortable.  So then I just stand there looking like I'm having an internal battle with my shoulders, and....awkward.

Option 3: Pockets

This is a great option! If...you have pockets. Most of the time I'm wearing a dress, and dresses often don't have pockets. If they do, it looks weird to stuff your hands into dress pockets, so while I will never waver in how much I love dresses with pockets (to the moon and back!), they don't really do anything for me in this case.

So what's left? What secret am I missing? Some people just seem to be born with an innate understanding of how to control themselves to look suave all the time, and I guess I'm just not one of them. Help.

Pumpkin Bread

We woke up this morning to a cold chill in the air and a light frost on the ground. Chaz wore a thick sweater for the first time this year, and I'm wrapped in a quilt as I sit here and type. While I love the vibrancy of the colors and temperatures in the fall, I will readily admit that I look forward to the deep stillness of winter, the holiness of the holiday season, and the beauty of snow falling quietly out the window. I still get abnormally excited about the first snow fall of the season, and I hope never to outgrow it.

With cold weather always comes a desire to make the house as cozy as possible. If we had a fireplace or a wood stove on the ground floor of the house, it would already be lit. Since we don't, I have to resort to other things. Making pumpkin bread, for example. I was craving it this weekend after having some at church choir rehearsal on Thursday, and so I found a recipe, adapted it a little, and made two loaves. I will always choose chocolate over no chocolate, so I added chocolate chips to one. The other I left without chocolate chips, because Chaz inexplicably prefers plain pumpkin bread. And so it resulted in us eating pumpkin bread on the couch, his-and-hers style.

It made the house smell delicious while it was baking, and just like most homemade things, it tasted best when it was warm and the chocolate was gooey from coming out the oven minutes before. So in case you also want some pumpkin bread, here's what I did:

Pumpkin Bread (adapted from Downeast Maine Pumpkin Bread from the always-useful www.allrecipes.com)

Ingredients

• 1 15oz can of pumpkin puree
• 4 eggs
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
• 2/3 cup water
• 2 cups granulated sugar
• 1 cup brown sugar
• 3 cups flour
• 1/2 cup coconut flour
• 2 tsp baking soda
• 1 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• Scant 1/2 tsp ground cloves
• 1/4 tsp ground ginger
• 2 cups chocolate chips (optional)

Process

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease and flour two large loaf pans.

In a large bowl, mix the pumpkin, eggs, oil, applesauce, water, and sugar. In a separate bowl, mix the flour, coconut flour, taking soda, salt, and spices.

Stir the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients until just blended. Add chocolate chips. Pour the batter evenly into the two loaf pans.

Bake for 60 to 65 minutes. Pumpkin bread is fully baked when a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

A Wedding

I wasted nearly all of my available blogging time this morning reading through the ancient blog. For the most part if just confirmed that I went through a weird emo period after my senior year - all the posts became very short and were apparently focused on random things I found on the internet. Even I got bored, and past-me was the one writing it. My apologies, former blog readers.

Nevertheless, I did find some good material. Namely, I found a couple of pictures of me and Heidi (who got married last weekend) as little kids.

Those were the beautiful days full of everything that childhood should be full of. 

Heidi and I sort of fell out of contact sometime in middle school. I'm honestly not sure what happened, but I have wished ever since that I had had the presence of mind as a middle schooler to run after the good things in my life with purpose, because not doing so was a mistake. Nevetheless, we got back in touch a little bit in college, and that was wonderful. An then last weekend, she got married. 

It was the most perfect of fall days in Vermont. 

Almost cloudless, with just the right amount of chill in the air, with enough sunlight to keep everyone comfortable. The leaves were far more vibrant than the picture above would indicate. 

Heidi was beautiful, the ceremony was perfect, and everyone present was overjoyed to witness it. Phil is a lucky man.

After the ceremony we all headed down the hill to the tent for the reception. Everyone had brought food to share, which I thought was exactly the way a wedding should be. It's a celebration of a sacred event with the gathering and support of family and friends, and because it was so laid back, that's what we were all able to focus on. 

The afternoon finished with cake and toasts, as all weddings do. Such an event was a beautiful culmination of the years of childhood and growth that I'd had the privilege of witnessing growing up, and it was an honor to be present.

And so, to Heidi and Phil, I wish you the very best. May God bless your marriage through all the many years to come!

Vignettes

1. This past Monday - since it was a holiday - we finally took the time to dig out the fire pit that the previous house owners had claimed was present in our backyard. There was indeed something that looked like a pile of rocks topped with a pile of dead wood covered by overgrown bushes back there, but until we dug it all out, I hadn't really believed there would be anything functional present. Lo and behold...it's entirely functional, and it's entirely awesome. Fall campfires with s'mores will no doubt be in our future. The near future...it's getting chilly.

2. Every week we try to do a movie night with some of our friends from work. We make dinner and then eat it while watching our movie. Last night we made spaghetti and meatballs and watched Mad Max: Fury Road. Have you seen it? It's...weird.

3. Also last night, I lost one of my earrings forever. I was washing my face as I got ready for bed, and somehow the washcloth caught my earring and shot it forward into the sink. We don't have a drain cover on that sink, and so it fell with a plop right down the drain, never to be recovered. Fortunately, I had made that particular pair, so if push comes to shove, I can make another one...next time I'm in Washington.

4. Speaking of Washington, we're going out there for Christmas. We're leaving in 62 days, and I'm clearly counting down already. Mostly because a vacation is much-needed, and that's the first one in sight (apart from Thanksgiving, of course!). 

5. The brother made it to Sacramento. Hooray!

6. On Tuesday, we drove into the parking lot at work only to find that it was covered in Canadian geese. I thought I had gotten rid of those guys when graduating from Gordon, but apparently they followed me to the office, those accursed beasts. In any case, we got the last available spot. The rest were claimed by the geese as their own.

That's all, folks.

The Send-Off

This kid is going on a grand adventure, starting today.

He's hopping on a plane (two, actually) and flying to the exact opposite side of the country where he'll hang out in Sacramento for awhile with AmeriCorps. At this particular moment at 7:53 am, he's on the way to the Burlington International Airport (which is oddly named, seeing as the only direct international flight you can get is to Canada), where he'll fly first to Chicago and then to Sacramento. 

As a result, today's post is very short on words, but will be extensive in pictures. The following is a lovely montage of pictures of Christopher from his freshman year of high school through last week. It's because we love you, Christopher...

Have an excellent time, Christopher! We'll miss you, and you'd better send more pictures....

The Hike

Well, the wedding was about as glorious as could be expected. The weather completely cooperated - picture the perfect Vermont fall day, and you have it exactly right. Perfectly clear blue sky, vibrant leaves, crisp air, you name it, and it was there. I will recap it in the near future, but it won't be today! Instead, I'm going to reverse the order and talk about Sunday first.

We were heathens. We skipped church. But I might argue that once in a great while, spending your Sunday morning out in nature is just a little bit like church. 

Since we were on a bit of a limited time budget, we decided to spend time outside with the family. Christopher, the only remaining child at home, will no longer be at home as of Wednesday as he's flying out to California to spend 10 months working with AmeriCorps. That, combined with the fact that we were visiting, gave us the perfect excuse to go for a hike and soak in the extraordinary beauty that is Vermont in the fall. 

And thus we found ourselves on our way to Sterling Pond on Sunday, following an attempt to eat breakfast that had us stop at three different places before getting a seat. Leaf peepers...they're the worst.

This particular trail leads the average-paced hiker on a 45-minute trek uphill to a pond, and if you tack on an extra five minutes you can get to the top of a ski trail with an amazing view. (We did both.) The first 10 minutes of the hike are essentially stone steps, and it is hilarious to people-watch. As my dad said, "Well...you can tell just at a glance who's going to make it to the top and who isn't!" We passed:

• A girl wearing sparkly Ugg boots
• A girl wearing ankle boots, a dress coat, and a scarf
• A guy going barefoot
• The real hikers

We can't really judge as we weren't really fully prepared either, but we at least had reasonable footwear. And I guess you can't really tell for sure, because the barefoot guy was actually heading down instead of up.

After a spell, we made it to the pond.

Despite the seeming calm of the picture, the place was actually a bit crowded, so we didn't stay there long. However, it's worth noting that a girl wearing leather riding boots had made it that far. Mad props, riding boot girl. Continuing on the extra five minutes, we made it to the top.

I call this picture "The Hair-Do, the Lack of Muscles, and Usain Bolt."

Behold. Pictures from the peak. 

I expect to see this picture on my parents' Christmas card this year. #photocredits.

After having our fill of both clambering over ski lift equipment and munching some Swedish Fish I'd squirreled into my bag, we turned around and headed home.

All in all, I think it was a fitting parting adventure. On the way back to Massachusetts that evening I thought about Vermont and how lucky I was to grow up there. Being surrounded by that much beauty all the time can't help but encourage folks to get outside and explore, and having a strongly instilled longing for exploration is not a bad thing to claim as my own. I miss living there. MA does have a lot to offer in terms of pre-built attractions - I'll give it that much - but the ever-present sense of wildness at your doorstep is something that can't exist in a place where the land is mostly flat and the houses are a little more squished together. 

We're back at home now (in MA), but thinking fondly of a place where breathtaking beauty is a part of everyday life.

What Not to Wear

We're heading up to Vermont this weekend to attend the wedding of my best childhood friend. This wedding is going to be gorgeous, no doubt - outside? In October? In Vermont? We're basically hitting the fall jackpot with that combination. HOWEVER. October in Vermont is anything but warm. In the words/diagrams of weather.com...

That's right. Average temperature of 49 degrees at 3pm. Personally, I'm not a huge fan of freezing, so I turned to Pinterest to give me some suggestions of what to wear to an outdoor wedding. In fact, to account for the fact that it will be really cold, I searched for "winter wedding guest outfit" to cover all my bases.

I've decided that the Internet does not understand cold weather. Let me provide a few illustrations.

This outfit was the only one that came even remotely close to being warm enough:

She's wearing tights! She has sleeves! But let me just make a suggestion to this poor model here: if you're wearing heels that tall IN THE SNOW, you have a death wish. I know this from experience - I have tried wearing 4-inch heels to walk across the Boston Common in December, and despite the pavement being salted, it was terrifying. Verdict: while there will be no snow, we will be in a field, so it's a no-go. Plus...it's a liiiiiittle to sparkly/short for this occasion!

Option 2!

Points for trying. There's a scarf and she is wearing a sweater jacket...thing. But negative points for bare legs + strappy sandals. Not to mention the GREEN LEAVES above her head. Ok, ok, that's not part of the outfit, but could they have at least pretended it was not summer? Verdict: way not warm enough for winter weather.

Option 3:

Is this a serious suggestion? I get that it's navy - a more fallish color - but honestly...there is not one thing here that would keep you warm. Clearly, the pinner who found this one lives in a place where "fall" = 80+ degrees. Also, I don't know about you, but I didn't realize that the Keep Calm poster rage spilled into apparel. Whatever floats your boat, I guess.

Which brings me to the last, most ludicrous suggestion of all. It came from an article called "15 Outfits to Wear to a Winter Wedding."

I think all I can do is laugh here. First of all...just no. Literally nothing about this outfit is winter appropriate except for the fact that it's long. But more importantly, that type of V-neck? ::insert flabbergasted emoji here:: Not even close to appropriate, and isn't your outfit at a wedding supposed to avoid taking attention from the bride? Admittedly, I can confidently say that I personally wouldn't given body proportions, BUT STILL. 

So thanks for nothing but entertainment, Pinterest. I'll stick to starting at my current closet, wishing there was a fashionable way to combine a cute dress and a parka.

(P.S. Parka or not, this will no doubt be one of the most stunning weddings I will ever attend!)

Chocolate + Peanut Butter = Heaven

A few days ago, Chaz was reading some blogs after work and stumbled upon something interesting. "Hey, come look at this!" he said, and then he followed up with, "...I'm going to email you something, because it's amazing." 

Within a few  seconds, my phone buzzed and I got an email containing a link to this. That's right. It's a giant peanut butter cup. After looking at the picture I could have started drooling, but I restrained myself and instead swore that I'd make it soon. 

Fast-forward to yesterday. Work had been a constant stream flood avalanche of finish-one-thing-to-find-10-more-things, and baking, at least for me, is the perfect de-stressor activity. Actually, to quote the best movie (Julie and Julia - don't argue), "You know what I love about cooking? I love that after a day when nothing is sure and when I say nothing, I mean nothing, you can come home and absolutely know that if you add egg yolks to chocolate and sugar and milk, it will get thick. It’s such a comfort." She's talking about chocolate cream pie, but I say the principal applies to baking in general. And so I found myself at 8pm breaking out my tart pan, crushing up chocolate wafer cookies, stirring peanut butter into honey, and melting chocolate to pour on top. It was heavenly, until the reality of having a fresh pile of PB-covered dishes happened once it was finished.

Regardless of the dishes, it was 100% worth it. I mean, take a look!

When you get an outcome like that, the dirty dishes are secondary. We haven't sampled it yet - that's on tonight's to-do list - but it served its purpose yesterday. The stress of the day melted along with the chocolate in the double boiler. Too cheesy an analogy? 

Home Alone: A Tale of Momentary Terror

As you are well aware, Chaz was away for 10 days last week and the week before. For the first seven days, I was fine being by myself at home. We live in a small town away from anywhere remotely dangerous, so I had nothing to worry about. However. That all changed on the seventh day. The Sabbath of Chazlessness, you might say. 

I spent the morning Skyping with Chaz, cleaning the house, and getting ready for the day. Friends were coming over for dinner in the evening, so I was rushing around getting everything ready for that. Eventually, I had to leave the house to go to a baby's first birthday party (loads of fun! good apple crisp! wonderful people!) and I departed through the door that goes out to our garage. Important note: I left this door unlocked, since it required going through the garage, which had its own locked door. See? Unlocked - the lock in the middle is sideways:

I came home after the birthday part full to the brim of apple crisp and joy, because that's what birthday parties do to people. I came in through the garage, grabbed the doorknob, turned it, and....nothing happened. It wouldn't turn, and I was locked out. Had I locked it on my way out, this wouldn't have been anything. But I had purposefully left it unlocked, because I knew I was going to come back in this way. Ergo...someone else must have locked it, and NO ONE ELSE WAS HERE. Cue internal panic.

I raced around to the front door and opened it cautiously, assuming I was about to see my house ransacked. But when I opened the door, everything was in its place and the whole house felt eerily silent. I started creeping around looking for any sign of the Someone in the house, but I left the front door wiiiiiide open in case I needed to make a quick getaway. In retrospect, it would have been smart to have grabbed a weapon of some sort (shovel? garden hoe? cast iron frying pan?) from the garage, but I guess I wasn't thinking that clearly. The door was indeed locked (the lock in the middle is upright):

Eventually, I determined there was no one downstairs, so I tiptoed up the staircase and froze immediately. 

See that black thing through the doorway? I believe my exact thoughts were, "I'm going to die. That is the leg of a well-dressed bandit wearing black slacks, and he is about to murder me." At this point I was shaking a little too much for my own good, and as I silently made my way back down the stairs to the open door, I suddenly remembered I had hung a dark hoodie on the doorknob of the bathroom closet, and that there was not, in fact, a hell-bent marauder hiding in my bathroom.

I subsequently searched the rest of the house, and after convincing myself that no one was actually there, I finally went and shut the front door. The friends came over later and told the story with a laugh or three, but that night I locked my bedroom door and spent the entire night like this:

We'll see how long it takes me to recover my initial home-alone confidence....and I never did determine how that door locked itself in the first place.

Curried Chicken and Thyme Rice

Growing up, I had two favorite meals. The first was tacos, and I have since mastered the art of making them at home. I mean, come on...it's not like it's hard. Brown meat; stir in spices and water; boil off water; stuff into taco shells with other toppings. That's it! 

My other favorite meal was curried chicken with my mom's rice. That meal in particular took a bit more effort, so we didn't have it as often. Then one day in college I remembered that it was the best meal ever, so I decided that needed to make it that week. I called home, and my mom read me the recipe over the phone. I made it, burned it a tiny bit, but ate it anyway.

The next time I made it was about a year into dating Chaz. Downside: he despises curry, which was not a dealbreaker, but was/is very sad for me. Fortunately, I realized I could stop a step ahead of where the recipe ended, remove some for him, and then continue on with the curry for me. Since it was 1.5 years after asking my mom for the recipe the first time, I had lost it and I called her again. This time, she emailed it to me.

The third time I made the recipe was last year for some friends with a family member who had had major surgery. I couldn't find the email my mom had sent, so I asked her for it yet again.

Which brings us to yesterday, when it had come time to make the recipe a fourth time (for friends with a new baby!). I had lost the email/recipe AGAIN. It's time to stop this cycle, because what if my mom is on an international expedition with no internet and I have to make curried chicken that night? Thus, here is the recipe. Mostly for me, but you can have it as well if you're interested in having a delicious meal.

---

Curried Chicken

Ingredients:

• 1 lb boneless chicken breasts (NOTE: most chicken breast in the store comes in 2 lb packages. If this is the case with yours, just double the recipe!)
• 2 eggs
• Italian breadcrumbs
• 1 Tbsp butter
• 1 Tbsp olive oil
• 3/4 cup chicken stock
• 1/4 cup honey
• 1/2 tsp curry powder

Process:

Slice chicken breast in half lengthwise so that you have thin pieces. Then use a meat tenderizer (or any other blunt kitchen utensil) to pound the chicken thin, somewhere between 1/4 and 1/2 inch thick. I usually also cut mine into smaller pieces, because pounding the meat makes each piece very large.

Dip the chicken into scrambled eggs, then in the breadcrumbs and set aside.

In a large frying pan, melt the butter with the olive oil on medium heat. When the mixture is hot, add the chicken and brown on each side (about 2 - 3 minutes per side). 

When the chicken is browned, cover and reduce heat to low. Cook for seven minutes. When time is up, remove chicken from the pan and set aside in a warm place (i.e. in the oven at the lowest setting). If you don't like curry, stop here.

After removing the chicken, add the chicken stock, honey, and curry to the pan. Turn the heat up to high, and let the sauce boil until reduced by 1/3 (note: sauce does not thicken). Once reduced, pour sauce over chicken and serve!

---

Thyme Rice

Ingredients:

• 1 cup white rice
• 2 cups water
• 1 chicken bouillon cube
• 1 Tbsp butter
• 1/2 to 1 tsp thyme (I don't usually measure)
• 2 bay leaves

Process

Add everything but the rice to a saucepan and turn heat to high until boiling. When water is boiling, add rice. Turn heat to low and let the rice simmer for 20 minutes. 

---

So there you have it. Anyone else have favorite childhood recipes? Bring back the tastes of home, I say!

Re-entry to the World of Auditions

Yesterday, I did an audition for a local orchestra. I had learned about it from a few different people the week before, so I had started practicing some orchestral excerpts each night after work. After a few nights of practicing, I got to a point where I felt I could reliably play the two excerpts I had picked.

And so yesterday found me driving to a mysterious building in Salem. I warmed up a little bit, told them I was ready, and then fumbled my way through the two excerpts. I made bizarre mistakes that I'd never made before, and eventually asked to try it again. The second attempt went much better, but even with that, I definitely didn't play it as well as I did back at home. Needless to say...in general I left thinking that I hadn't best represented my playing at all.

They didn't tell me anything on the spot (though expecting that would have been too much), and - naturally - I'm assuming the very worst. So much so that I had a dream last night about a different orchestra sending a terse email informing me that "unfortunately, we will not be offering you a position in our orchestra this year" while simultaneously listing the names of people who had been given a chance to perform a concerto with the orchestra along with winning the seat. I woke up feeling utterly disappointed, and I had (or let's face it: am still having) a hard time shaking that feeling off. And who knows? Maybe the distance between the audition and now has inflated the ineptitude of the performance in my mind and it actually went better than I'm recalling...but for the moment I'm sitting on pins and needles, waiting for the cyber guillotine to drop with the arrival of an email telling me I just wasn't good enough. Dramatic? Such is the life of an amateur musician, I suppose. 

A Random Assortment

I inadvertently took three days off from blogging. Life got in the way and I lost track of how fast days were passing. But that's not to say that I didn't have things going on! For one thing, there was a supermoon lunar eclipse, which I of course stayed awake for. 

I think it ranks up there as the coolest astronomical phenomenon I've seen to date. The only thing that might have ranked above it would have been seeing northern lights when I was about 11. My parents ran outside with my brother (the other one stayed asleep) and they tried to get me to come out too, but I had a migraine and elected to stay in bed. Now, 16 years later, I wish I had sucked it up and gone to see the northern lights, because who knows when that will happen again in my lifetime + in my range of vision? As a result, this eclipse wins the award. 

In other news, Chaz made it back from India all in once piece! Here's an old, unrelated picture of us in case you forgot what he looked like since he was gone for so long.

I started the scooter while he was gone, which is why that picture is even remotely relevant. 

In more unrelated news, I finished all of Parenthood. I am simultaneously devastated that it's over and very satisfied with how it ended. 

I could also mention making pumpkin ice cream and/or taking a business trip and realizing that I had forgotten my wallet at home, but I'll save that for another time. That's all for now!

What if...

Scattered throughout my 26 years are some things that I did because no one ever told me they were hard. Most of them involve food. For example, one night while I was in 9th grade, I decided that I needed to make a pie that very evening. I whipped out the Joy of Cooking, found a recipe for pie crust and then pie, and made both. Later my mom said, "Wow, you made the crust? Pie crust is hard!" I looked at my pie and shrugged. I didn't know it was supposed to be hard, and therefore it wasn't. Months later - the next time I decided to make a pie - my pie crust was a struggle because I knew it was "hard" and I didn't trust myself to be able to replicate what I'd done the fist time.

Angel food cake is the other one that comes to mind. Supposedly, it's one of the more difficult things to bake. Yes, it does require that I follow the instructions so that I can consistently get it to turn out the same way every time, but when I made it the first time, the "hard" label didn't pop up until after it had disappeared after a group dinner.

Angel food cake: the only baked good that I can think of that takes a full dozen eggs.

Last example - and no food involved! Oboe. I picked it up in 6th grade at my dad's suggestion. I wanted to play flute or clarinet, but my dad said, "What about oboe?" I didn't know what it was, but we loaded up the good ol' World Book Encyclopedia on our household computer and watched the little video demo that was on there, and I was sold. It was only years later that people started saying, "Oboe...that's, like, a really hard instrument, right?" 

I never knew how to respond, because I had no context in which it might be a hard thing. It was just the way it was, and I either rose to the occasion or didn't, and whether it was hard or not had nothing to do with it. 

I obviously don't want to go too far and put a blanket statement out there (i.e. always trust yourself, things are only hard if you make them hard, etc.) because there are things that really are hard in life. Like calculus, for example. That is one thing I will never be able to just do. But it does make me stop and think about how many things people stop themselves from doing because they assume they don't have the skills to do it or because they're afraid of failure. What if we could just somehow take that away? 

One thing that IS hard? Staying awake when you kept yourself up too late the night before. That is no good. Don't do it to yourself. Pick other hard things, ok?

Home Alone

As I mentioned in at least one (if not multiple) previous post(s), Chaz is currently traveling for a usually extended period of time. 10 days? No good. He's in India, so it's not just a quick phone call away. 9.5 hours time difference is a beast, I tell ya. So here I present to you a most definitive* guide: Five Ways to Occupy Yourself While Your Husband is on a Business Trip!

*Definitive if and only if you're me. 

1. Fill the House with People

So far, since Chaz has left, my family has visited and I've hosted a movie night. Tomorrow night I have choir rehearsal, then Friday night I'll have dinner with a friend, then Saturday contains two separate social gatherings. This schedule makes me sound like I just have this overwhelming social calendar and can't you tell I'm just so popular?! I promise you this is not the case, and I don't think I've had this many social events in a single week since...oh, college. But that would just be called "life in a dorm." 

Dominoes with my brother. So social!

2. Costco

I could devote a whole post to Costco. Next week! Look for it! Costco might just be the best non-human thing to emerge from Washington (state). The best human is Chaz, but that is not what we're talking about here. Costco is a magical land where you can find everything from a giant package of toilet paper to the world's best muffins to a 100000000-inch TV (false - just a huge one) to fresh flowers to mattresses to a hot dog and drink combo for $1.50. They also have samples. It is the ultimate place for people of all ages, and we got there at least once a week. Usually after church on Sunday. Yesterday, I went there for bacon. Because bacon.

3. Parenthood

No, not parenting. Parenthood the show. Ok, ok, I know I'm several years late to this party, but honestly, there's no better time to binge watch a show than when you're home by yourself. And season five? SAD. I do not cry at movies. I do not cry at shows. I do not cry almost ever...EXCEPT for during pretty much every episode focused on Julia and Joel with legitimate tears. This is a whole new world for me. Anyone else want to 'fess up to doing the same?

[source]

4. Cook

It's not that I don't cook when Chaz is at home. But experimentation is so much easier when you're the only person that has to deal with slash eat the consequences. And we already know how that turned out.

5. Practicing a long-neglected instrument

It's true. The oboe made an appearance, and it wasn't horrible. A little Brahms, a little Tchaikovsky, a little Bach...it's making a comeback. Heck, if it can happen to a blog, it can happen to an oboe, right?

The overly-dramatic instrument shot. It's a classic.

So there you have it: the guide to what I've been up to for the past four days. What else should I add to my routine? Knitting? Parkour? Shape Note singing? Skydiving? This is my chance to live large, obviously. Can't let that go to waste...

Fulfilling a Dream

The other night, I had a marvelous, memorable dream. Well, caveat - the storyline of the dream is lost in the mists of my subconscious, but one thing remained very clear: I made Brussels sprouts and steak tips and woke up just before I got to eat them.

So for the next two days, I craved Brussels sprouts like I have never craved Brussels sprouts before, which is to say that I thought about them often. I don't think I've ever craved Brussels sprouts before.

Finally, I decided to bite the bullet and do it, because I was tired of my mind constantly telling me that I needed them. Fun fact: this is not the season for Brussels sprouts, or at least Trader Joe's failed me and didn't have any fresh ones. They DID have frozen ones though, so I figured those must be a little less than as good and bought them anyway. Next I stopped at the butcher and got myself some steak tips to have as a side with my sprouts.

The next day, I got to work. Another fun fact: Brussels sprouts smell BAD. They're delicious, but if you were going by smell alone, you'd avoid them entirely. Nevertheless, I pressed on.

I knew I was in trouble when they felt a little squishy before they were cooked, but I abandoned all logic and thought, "Well...maybe cooking makes them more crunchy!" Hey self...cooking vegetables doesn't work that way. 

I followed the recipe to a T, because everyone said they were great. And in a way, they were right - the flavor turned out to be really great. BUT. They were squishy, and because the recipe included maple syrup and bacon + grease, they were caramelized. Again, not bad in theory, but when I found myself with Brussels sprouts stuck to my teeth, I decided that this particular recipe needed to be banished to the far corners of recipe exile. Either that or I need fresh Brussels sprouts.

Meanwhile, the steak tips! I don't have a grill, and I'd never done steak tips by myself before. I also don't have a broiling pan, so I ended up with a cookie sheet covered with a sheet of aluminum foil. And thank goodness for the foil, because halfway through the cooking time, I saw smoke pouring out of an oven vent. 

I'm not someone who generally screams, and that held true, but it might be safe to assume that there was a litany of milder curse words running through my head. Turns out, the steak tips were delicious, but the juices on top of foil don't do so well when sun tanning themselves under a broiler. 

Never fear! My cookie sheet remained unscathed, and the steak tips emerged perfectly. And yet...I say it's time to buy a grill. 

So the verdict is that this dream remains only half-fulfilled. Please, I beg of you, help me out - what's the best way to cook Brussels sprouts??

What about second breakfast?!

Hobbits, they say, eat several large meals per day. While I am not a hobbit myself, I did try out their many-meals philosophy on Saturday. My friend Beth and I got breakfast after I dropped Chaz off at the airport. She lives just outside of the center of town in Beverly and it was a beautiful day, so we walked into town and went to our quasi-normal breakfast place of choice. As usual, the food was your average breakfast food: eggs, bacon (me) or sausage (Beth), home fries, and toast. 

I guess you could say there was nothing notable to mention there, but the food was good and like almost all New England breakfast places, the price was cheap! Side note: did you know that breakfast places are mostly an East Coast thing? Chaz at least says that they are, and he would know, being from Seattle! You can find breakfast on the West Coast, but it's normally more expensive. So there, West Coast! You can have your public beaches, big mountains, and more mild weather. WE have breakfast.

I digress.

Amidst the ingestion of our eggs + bacon + other assorted breakfast items, we talked about other breakfast places in the area. Specifically, a place called Waffle Hauzz (yes, with an A and two Zs) that served gloriously delicious waffles adorned with a number of toppings. It was irresistible. So we finished up our meal, paid our bill, and hightailed it a quarter mile down the road to get ourselves a waffle to share. 

The decor of the place is a bit...unusual. There are snowboards on the walls, which is hilariously out of place on the North Shore of Boston where there are zero mountains. Below the snowboards there's a picture of trees, a painting of a boat, and a poster with R2D2. If I were to throw out one word to describe it, the only thing that comes to mind is "eclectic."

Obviously, the decor is not the point of a restaurant. The point is the food. So since the great they declares that a picture is worth a thousand words, here's the picture:

Or in other words, you must have one of these waffles in your life. Immediately. We split ours, which was the perfect "breakfast dessert" finish to our earlier breakfast. And yes, I think I did gain 10 pounds that morning. WORTH IT. 

Siblings: the Key to your Inner Child

This weekend, two important things happened:

1. Chaz left for India for an infernally long time. We left for the airport at 5:45 am on Saturday and he will return until 1:30 pm on September 30th. The level of detail included there was for no other purpose than to emphasize that it's a long time to have the queen-sized bed to myself figure out what to do with myself when he's not here.


2. My family came to visit for the weekend during his absence, which gives me a chance to stop acting like a responsible adult.

Here's the fam's next album cover, pre-Photoshop:

I don't know how I managed to avoid getting my toes in that picture. Miracles DO happen, I say. 

During the course of their visit, I have done the following:

1. Sung along with a Brahms symphony at top volume to prove that the melody was singable.
2. Climbed a tree.
3. Eaten far too much chocolate.
4. Played dress-up in a store.
5. Bought a bouncy ball out of those machines that you think hold not-so-buried treasure as a child.

Siblings bring out the weirdest side of you imaginable. It was glorious. And I know for a fact that we inspired a child, because a dad and his three-year-old were walking by as I cranked the magical wheel, and five seconds later she had her dad digging a quarter out of his pocket.

So if you ever feel like setting your burdens and cares aside for a few hours, call me up. I'll lend you either of my brothers, because as the oldest, I clearly own them. They'll teach you all sorts of useful things, like how to play video games until 4am and not fall asleep, or how to dress like a trendy pre-college fashion icon (key point: wear a "mid-thigh or higher skirt," according to the one pictured above). Due to their advice, I even became a world-class hipster for the duration of the three takes it took to get this photo to an acceptable state.

If they really think you're cool, they might go so far as to dress up for you. At least one of them knows how to tie a bow tie.

I guarantee that they'll make your day. And heck...you might even find yourself smiling like a kid on Christmas morning while hoisting yourself into a tree.

Happy Monday, y'all.