Awesome picture showing that the end of one problem might just be the beginning of another, found here. I’m enjoying poking around on this guy’s blog, checking out his art. You should, too.
No, not drinking someone under the table. Napping under the table. When I was a kid, I loved to nap. I still love to nap. Now, my favorite napping place is on my sofa with my cozy napping blanket, or maybe on my bed. But when I was a kid, I loved to nap under things. Especially under tables. It felt so cozy, like a little cave, and if there were a party going on, I could hear the adults laughing and talking, and just soak it up until I dozed off. I know, I’m weird. I once fell asleep under a piano on a river boat*, and didn’t wake up when someone started playing it. So when I saw this picture on FB today, I had to share here.
*The link is to a post I did back in early 2008, about my life in Fairbanks. Perhaps one of my most favorite posts to go back and read, actually. And look, there’s a comment from my mom…just a week before she went into the hospital. I like seeing those comments.
Well, I made it to the end of NaBloPoMo, and I only missed one day, when I couldn’t get onto my blog to post. I’ve resorted to memes, Wordless Wednesday, and recipes. Then again, I like all of those things. I’ve enjoyed having that blog part of my brain tuned in. Like when something at least mildly interesting happens, and you think, “oh, that’s great for the blog!”
I missed saying happy blogaversary to Thinking About. I started blogging back in November of 2005, because all the cool kids were doing it, and it seemed like fun. I don’t think I could have guessed that I would make real friends here, some of whom I’ve not met yet in real life.
Grandma is doing better. She is out of the hospital, in a convalescent home for the next month-ish, until she can walk again. She’s going to be using a walker from now on. At least I hope so. She uses a cane, but it doesn’t stabilize her enough, and she loses her balance so easily these days.
Everyone on FB is talking about how pretty the full moon is. It’s cloudy and raining here, which is fine with me. I love a pretty full moon, but I love rain even more.
Ted came down with a cold last weekend, which means that I’ve come down with it now. Blech. I hope Maya doesn’t catch it. I am glad that it waited to infect our household until after Thanksgiving, and after I had a chance to see Grandma, too.
We’re dipping our toes slowly into the Christmas thing. Ted bought some poinsettias the other day, our boyscout neighbor delivered the wreath we ordered, and I’ve put out our little lighted snowmen. I know a lot of people decorate for Christmas right after Thanksgiving, but Thanksgiving was so early this year, it seems ridiculous to put up the tree for at least another week. Maybe in time for Hanukkah. I know, we’re weird.
Speaking of Hanukkah, it looks like the first night is on a Saturday this year, which means I’ll have a little time for cooking. Maya and I are going to make homemade applesauce this year, instead of jarred stuff, for our latkes. You know that local TV show Ted has been directing and editing lately? He just finished working on a Hanukkah episode, and he edits at his desk, which is right next to my desk, so I’ve heard the apple vendor talking about apples and how to make good sauce. I’ll clue you in now: the ratio is 2-1-1. 2 sweet apples (like a Fuji perhaps), 1 tart apple (think Granny Smith), and another tart apple that is a separate variety from the first (maybe Pink Lady). I’ve only made apple sauce once or twice before, and I did know the trick of using more than one kind, but I’d never heard the ratio before. I’ll let you know how it turns out.
I caved and donated money to my local PBS station (it was giving day, after all). I do regularly give them a little money, but this time the gift with purchase was too good to pass up, so I increased by donation. Season 3 of Downton Abbey. Sadly, it won’t get here before Christmas, or before the season starts, but it will get here just after the beginning of the season, so I can watch it quickly if I want to, and tease my friends on FB about what I already know that they don’t.
I’m sure there’s more I could tell you…but my stupid head cold has my head all blocked up and I can’t think. Happy NaBloPoMo to Ally Bean, who soldiered through with me. 
This is a “just-in-case” type of post. I vowed to post every day this week, and such stupid vows sometimes produce stupid posts. It’s a fact of life. I’m writing this on Friday morning, and the plan is to go to Santa Cruz today, see The Fixx perform on the beach tonight, stay the night, and see where Saturday takes us. So I’m sure I can post something on Sunday, but I’m just not sure that I’ll be on a computer Saturday, and I kind of think that’s a good thing.
I was trolling my own blog, and found a post from ‘blogthings’ from back in 2007, which I had totally forgotten about. I had forgotten about blogthings, not 2007. It seemed absolutely perfect for stupid posts like this, when you’ve vowed something that perhaps you should not have. I wonder what all of this might mean about my personality type? And perhaps more importantly, what does it mean that I went in and cleaned up the grammar in the description of my personality?
You Are An ISFJ |
 The NurturerYou have a strong need to belong, and are very loyal. A good listener, you excel at helping others in practical ways. In your spare time, you enjoy engaging your senses through art, cooking, and music. You find it easy to be devoted to one person… a partner who you do special things for. In love, you express your emotions through actions. Taking care of someone is how you love them. And you do it well! At work, you do well in a structured environment. You complete tasks well and on time. You would make a good interior designer, chef, or child psychologist. How you see yourself: Competent, dependable, and detail oriented When other people don’t get you, they see you as: Boring, dominant, and stuck in a rut. |
Trying to think of a quick blog post for today, before I run out the door. So here it is, 13 Things I did (or shall do) on my Summer Vacation. Graphic from the ‘official’ Thursday 13 page.
That’s it…also thinking some thoughts about other blog posts I might work on. Also watched a ton of Buffy episodes. We have them all on DVD, and I’ve been sucked in, yet again.
There are different relationships in blogging. There are people whose goal it is to get as many comments as they can get (and there’s a hint of that desire in all of us, I suspect), so they go out and leave tons of comments everywhere. They do Wordless Wednesday and Book Reviews and all sorts of things where you leave your link so others can find you, and hopefully leave a comment. There is nothing wrong with this kind of blogging. I’ve participated in Wordless Wednesday and Book Review blogs myself, and really enjoyed it. But for me, that’s not where the lasting relationships, the real online friendships, are born. The online friendship requires a bigger commitment, and comes from finding someone who touches you in some way, with their writing, their humor, their story. Sometimes it’s all of these things, sometimes less. I do know that I’ve made some real friends here, people that I genuinely care about and miss when they go away. Sometimes they drop off of the face of the earth, and you realize, you weren’t really friends after all. Sometimes, they stop blogging, but you end up being friends somewhere else, like Facebook.
Heidi is such a friend. I don’t remember when I found her blog, or if she found me first, or how it came about. I know we have a few blogs in common, and that she knows my blog friend Chrissy in person. Heidi doesn’t really blog anymore, but she did for several years, and I loved reading about her life in Hong Kong. Her life with her mother, her teaching, her parties and thoughts on the party lifestyle of a certain set in H.K., her aspirations to be a singer (she has a lovely voice, and tons of heart, which is a deadly combination…I mean that in the best way…deadly in that it gets straight to the listeners heart). She came to my blog often, and left long, thoughtful comments. I went to her blog and did the same. Well, the other day, she said something on Facebook about being at Swan Oyster Depot, and I thought, “Wait, that’s in San Francisco!” And lo and behold, she is here! She came to see a friend with a new baby, and to connect with other friends, and to attend the Outlands Festival in Golden Gate Park. Happily, she and her friend Ken (who also knows Chrissy in person) were available to have brunch with me today. YAY! Really, you only have a few days in San Francisco, and you made time to see ME? I love that, and am so grateful.
So I drove into the City, blissfully cool and crisp after the 100 degree heat here, a mere 40 miles away, and we went to the Cliff House for lunch. The Cliff House is one of my favorite San Francisco restaurants, though it’s changed a lot since I first went there. It has been there since 1863, and has had many incarnations. But the food is consistently good (not as good this time as the last time I went, I think, but still very good), and the view of the ocean, right there outside of your window, is truly lovely. You can watch the waves crashing on the rocks, watch the surfers hoping for a wave, watch the seagulls swooping and flying around. It’s relaxing. So we stopped there and had a lovely meal, and got to know each other in person. When you meet someone in person, whom you’ve only known online, there’s always that brief fear, what if…what if they are different in person than they are online? What if I don’t like them? What if they don’t like me? What if we just don’t have anything to say to each other? Always a fear, but it’s not happened yet. I’ve met a couple of blog friends in the past, and they’ve quickly become real life friends. Heidi was like this for me. I felt that I knew her, and she and Ken were both so warm and real, that I was very comfortable right away. I don’t know when we’ll see each other again, since she lives in Hong Kong, and I live in Walnut Creek, and Ken lives in Toronto. But I hope we do get together again sometime. Perhaps in L.A. Chrissy, want to come along?
(famous black cat image, which I found here)
I’m sorry, little blog, for neglecting you so. It’s not that I don’t care about you, it’s just that I don’t care about you as much as I used to. Harsh? Indeed. And I’ve noticed that many of my friends’ blogs are similarly neglected. Not sure what to do about it, but one option might be to, perhaps, come visit once in awhile, write here, and make more of an effort to go visit my blog friends. Sigh. So, aside from pancakes I made weeks ago, what’s new around here? Let’s see…
Today is St. Nicholas Day. St. Nicholas was known for (amongst other things) secret gift giving, thus being the predecessor of our Santa Claus. And no, he didn’t live at the North Pole. He lived in what is now Turkey. We celebrate by having some Stollen (meant to represent the Baby Jesus, of all things), though we get the more Dutch version, filled with almond paste. Also, dried fruit. Ted says that dried fruit is a work of the devil, and I can’t imagine that Baby Jesus wants anything to do with Satan, can you? We’ll see what happens there. I wonder what Baby Jesus might think of the Dutch celebration, with Sinterklaus being followed around by his slaves, who might take naughty children away to Spain.[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UCUHTDrca4s[/youtube]
My birthday is at the end of this month, on New Year’s Eve. Cherry and I went out for an early celebration on Saturday. She took me to the best crab restaurant around, Thanh Long, which makes an amazing roast dungeness crab, and some mean garlic noodles. It’s a special treat kind of place, because the crab is quite expensive, and also because there’s enough butter and oil in the crab to clog up your arteries for good, and that’s without the garlic noodles, which come in a close second. Finish it off with a deep fried banana with rich vanilla ice cream, and yeah, you might want to have salad for a few days after that. Not that I’m going to. We’re having steak tonight, ala Ina Garten, with Provencal butter. YUM.
My friend Aimee over at Greeblemonkey has got me hooked on Florence + The Machine, specifically their song “The Dog Days are Over”. One inexpensive and hopefully thoughtful gift I like to give my friends for Christmas is a ‘mix tape’ type CD, and this is definitely going to be included. I’m wondering about the rest of the album. Anyone know if it’s good? Any other songs you’re into right now that I might want to consider including?
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iWOyfLBYtuU[/youtube]
Time for a Genevieve update? She’s doing well. She has a bump on the inside of her eyelid that should be removed, but we’re very hesitant to have it done, because she’d have to go under for the procedure. And the thing is, she’s been reacting differently to medications this last year than she did in the past. A pro-biotic she was on for a bit had her totally strung out, pacing the house all night long. An antibiotic she had been on several times before with no issues suddenly had her vomiting. Her vet says she doesn’t want to put her under if we can avoid it, and we’re in agreement. So who knows how that will turn out. But she’s been enjoying the cool winter weather, and while she doesn’t want to go for long walks, once in awhile she’ll start galloping, which is never wise if you’re blind. But on the leash, we let her run a bit, and she seems to really like it.
V-Grrrl mentioned on Facebook how in love she is with SmartWool socks, and everyone who commented on her post said ‘gosh they’re expensive, but I love them so much I’m asking for them for Christmas’, so I bought some for gifts. Anyone else in love with SmartWool? Anyone tried the REI brand, and know if they’re comparable? They looked like they were the same quality of merino wool, but maybe not padded.
Last but certainly not least, today is Richard’s birthday. Wish we lived closer so we could go to dinner with him and Kathy tonight, but since I’m in California, and he’s in Alaska, it’s unlikely. Bummer. Happy Birthday, Richard…I miss you. We’re having steak in your honor. And because we like steak.
Richard and Julie, early 1970s
(lovely art, titled ‘Regret’, found here)
and would like to never do again. I saw this over at Suebob’s blog, and I thought it was genius. So here goes…a list of things I’ve done, and would like to NEVER do again. Warning. This may get gross.
How about you?
I was alerted by my blog/Facebook friend, Simon, that this weekend was Sandwich Party #5, which is pretty self-evident. Make a sandwich. Share on your blog. Well, I went to Stockton and took Grandma and Aunt Flo to Sizzler on Saturday, and dined on cheese and crackers on Sunday, so I didn’t get around to making a sandwich for the party until Monday. I thought about trying to do something fancy with arugula and brie or something, but decided to go retro instead.
When serving spaghetti, some people mix the noodles together with the sauce in one big serving bowl, while others serve the noodles plain, and top them individually with sauce. I find that doing things the latter way tends to make gloppy noodles, but that’s how I was raised. Serving your sauce separately leads to lots of leftover sauce, and no leftover pasta. What to do? I discovered one day that if I took some of the sourdough bread that we had, slathered it with butter and garlic powder, and fried it, it made a delicious garlic bread, which is the perfect place to put a bunch of warmed spaghetti sauce. It’s a lot like a sloppy Joe, actually, though I like the flavors of spaghetti sauce better. My mom thought this was a disgusting idea, until she finally gave it a try, and became an instant convert. She always said that sane people are willing to change their mind when they are given the proper evidence, which this sandwich clearly is.
For this sandwich, I started with a lamb ragu, which I made for the gnocchi we had last week. I tend to mix my sauce and pasta, to avoid the gloppy noodles, but this recipe makes more sauce than a pound of gnocchi can accommodate, so we had some left. I’ve updated the recipe a bit, in that I now mix the meat in the Cuisinart with a slice of bread and a couple of tablespoons of milk before browning. It keeps the meat from getting hard or too chewy, which is a trick I learned on America’s Test Kitchen. Luckily, we had one really nice sandwich roll in the freezer, so I took that out, thawed it in our handy toaster oven, and then sliced it, and slathered it with butter and garlic powder.
Bread, butter, garlic powder, and lamb ragu. Mmmm.
Next, I toasted the bread by frying it, butter side down, over medium heat.
J's favorite way of making garlic toast
It comes out slightly crispy and smelling fabulous.
Mmmm. Garlic Toast
Then you cover one piece of toast with some hot spaghetti sauce, and if you have it, a sprinkling of fresh Parmesano Reggiano.
Getting hungry at this point...
Finally, cover with the other piece of toast, slice in half, and enjoy. A perfect sandwich. I was torn between a glass of milk and a diet coke for my beverage. I had the diet coke, but I think it would have been better with a glass of milk. Oh well.
Looks a lot like a sloppy Joe, no?
That’s it. Next time you find yourself with some leftover spaghetti sauce, give this one a try. Truly yummy, esp if you make your own homemade sauce. If you’d like to see what other participants came up with, you can find more over here, or here.
(graphic found here)
I’ve been cleaning up the old blog a bit lately. Still need to find a few missing friends for my blogroll, I think. Interesting to me to look at it, and see how few of these people actually come here and comment anymore. I don’t know if they’re too busy to comment, but still read, or if they don’t read my blog anymore, or if they read me on a reader, or what. I thought of taking a few off for that reason, figuring that blogging is sort of a reciprocal thing, a community. Then I thought, no, I’m not in it for comments, I’m in it because I love to come here and write, and I love to go and read what you all have written. So I won’t pull anyone that doesn’t know I exist. Not that they’d notice.
I used to keep my book reviews on my sidebar, but that got lost when I updated my theme. I didn’t even update to a new theme, just updated to a more recent version. But anyway, the sidebar was getting unwieldy, so I decided to make a whole new page for my book reviews. There’s a tab there at the top, and if you’re interested in seeing what I’ve read, and if you might be interested in reading some of the same books or not, that’s where you’ll find the easiest access. Of course, you could also just select the ‘books’ category, but then you’d have to page through all of the book blog posts, so this is a lot easier.
Then more recently, I’ve noticed that I’ve been coming here to find recipes, rather than hunting around in my cupboard or trying to squeeze in to the closet behind the carpet cleaner, vacuum cleaner, and paper towels to find a recipe. I can no longer remember which cookbooks were destroyed by our leaky bathtub, and as I find more recipes online, I have a file full of printed webpages, which is not the least bit organized, so finding a recipe can be a pain in the butt. So I decided to make a page here on my blog, where I can find all of my old recipes in one handy place. Good thinking, no?
Not sure what other changes I’ll be making. I’m kinda fed up with this admin side of it. Maybe I’ll take a break, now that it’s not looking quite so crappy.
Any readers who access my blog via Google Reader have surely noticed an abundance of prescription drug ads in my posts lately. It appears my blog was hacked. Joan told me about it over a week ago, and I looked around but the power was out that day and it seemed like a Google issue, so I forgot about it. Then today, Michelle emailed me about it, and I thought, hmmm, maybe I should look into this some more. So I searched around about WordPress/Goodle Reader issues, and found a page with some solutions, but they were above my technical ability to execute…so I asked Ted’s friend, Rahul, and he fixed it lickety split. I just had to go and refresh my reader, and the pesky prescription drug ads went away. Whew! THANK YOU Rahul! You’re my hero.
So…if you came here via Google Reader…does the issue seem to be resolved to you? Input would be most welcome.
Thanks.
~J
Hi All,
I don’t use a reader, I’m old school and click the blogs I want to read from my sidebar. One of my bloggy friends, Joan, told me that my blog is coming up in Google reader with a bunch of pharmaceutical drugs next to it. Once she clicks the link to my blog, all is well…
Has anyone else had this issue? Any idea of how to fix it? I’m on WordPress, but hosted on our own domain. I updated to the newest version, but it made things kinda wonky, so I reverted back to my old version of WordPress.
Help? Anyone?
UPDATE: It looks like this is a Google Reader issue, though clearly it isn’t affecting anyone. Maybe later I’ll do some research and try to suss out if it is only affecting people on WordPress, or if it’s random folks on all platforms. Our power is going to be out all day today, so no research today (Thursday).
Where does our responsibility as bloggers sit, with regards to one another? Is it enough to be polite, to not insult or slam those whose blogs we visit? Should we be honest above all else? If a blogger that we like starts another venture, be it an online magazine or an etsy shop, or a real, brick and mortar store, should we support them in their endeavors, with clicks or cash or both? Are we obliged to support them by putting a link to their other endeavors on our sidebar, if that will help them? Does it depend on how well we feel we know them? On if we feel like we can get behind what they’re selling? On whether they come by and comment and seem like a real friend, or if they are just someone whose writing impresses us?
And what if they’re sick? Or may be sick? Is it our responsibility to be honest with them, there in the comments, and tell them, “Um, you may be in real live trouble here, you may need to seek help. Your family, your husband and parents and siblings, all think you need some help. Listen to them.” Or is it enough for us to stop by and say, “I’m thinking of you. Hang on.” And what if what we say is, “F-them, they don’t know what they’re talking about, you’re fine.” Are we then assisting in their denial that something may indeed be wrong? Are we doing them a disservice then, and perhaps even harming them?
The thing is, I think that sometimes in the blogisphere, we mistakenly think that we truly know each other. That we understand someone truly and wholly, based on what they present for the world to see. And for some, that’s more true than for others. Some people pretend to be something they are not, perhaps they pretend to be single and hot and female, while in reality they’re married men in an office park, living out some weird fantasy. Call me naive, but I suspect that the majority of bloggers out there, at least the ones I have come across, pretty much present themselves as they are. “This is me”, they say, “and I’d like to tell you my story, my side of things, the story of my life as I live it.” But even with that, it’s still just their side of things. It’s not true any more than it’s true that beets are yummy. Beets are yummy to me, so to me, that statement is true. But if you hate beets (like Ted and Maya do), then it’s a lie. But my blog=my truth, not yours. I think we’re all like that, to some extent or another.
A blogger friend of mine has been having a passel of trouble lately. Real trouble, and more than her fair share. (Since when is life fair? Never.) She has lost a lot, and is having trouble coping with those many and significant losses. She is not coping with it well. Perhaps as well as she is able, but really, she seems to be spiraling out of her own control, and she needs some help to get back where she wants to be in life. She has been very public and honest and forthright about her battles, and it’s been somewhat scary to watch. I do not know her in person. I have never met her. She writes the truth, but again, it’s her truth, no one else’s. She has never claimed that her truth was anyone else’s, just that it was hers. Really, truly, all hers. So another blogger mentioned on her blog that while the first blogger clearly needs help, the only comments she is seeing are ‘you go girl’ type comments, and not anything more constructive. While I have been worried about her, and think she may be in real trouble, and that she most certainly has a hard path ahead of her, my comments have stayed at the ‘I’m worried. Take care. I hope you can get back to O.K.’ variety. I kinda felt like she already had it coming at her from her husband, her parents, her siblings, the authorities, etc. That she needed to feel safe on her blog, like this was a place where she could come for support. If she didn’t already have all of those people talking to her, perhaps I might have said something along the lines of, “I think you need to get help. I care.” But I didn’t.
Would you? If you see someone in real honest to god trouble, someone you like, but don’t really know, how much should you say? Is it enough to tell them you care, or do you think that a blogger, one who claims to be a friend, should say more? And if so, how to say it without chasing them off, if they’re already in a fragile state?
KarenMEG over at A Day in the Life was tagged for this meme, which got me thinking. It was started by Her Bad Mother, who wants to know about 5 things you love about being a mom, at the same time acknowledging that it’s not all buttercups and milkshakes. That many of us feel ambivalent about the day to day frustrations in parenting, while at the same time deeply understanding the gifts that it bestows upon us.
Like KarenMEG, and I suspect many parents, I am much more interested in my own child than in yours. Sorry, it’s just true. I wasn’t really interested in kids before I had Maya, except that I desperately wanted one of my own. Sort of like a southern belle in Gone With The Wind, working so very hard to land a husband and get married, without any real understanding of what marriage means.
Examples of the struggles of my parenthood can be found here on my blog. Like here, where I lost my temper and scared her, because she thought I was going to hit her. Others occurred before I started blogging, like her 5 months of colic. The teething. The missing out on movies because getting a babysitter can be a pain in the butt. The changes to marriage, some good, some not.
But the joys of being a mom overwhelm the frustrations. I could probably write a book on things I love about being a mom. Or, at least, about being Maya’s mom. I’ve never been mom to anyone else, so I can’t speak to that.
I’m supposed to tag five other moms, and we’re supposed to see if this little meme can travel the world in 80 clicks. I’m going to take a more organic approach, and say, if you would like to participate, tell what you love about being a mom (or dad!), and go tell Her Bad Mother, as they are tracking the geographic progress of this meme. Especially go tell them if you’re participating, and you don’t live in the United States or Canada.
Yummy package of cookie goodness!
Imagine my surprise when I came home yesterday to find a box of yummy cookie goodness on my doorstep! I opened it up and found a delicious package of cookies and a sweet note from my pdx bloggy pal, BMC, aka Bite My Cookie. Maya was generous enough to model for me, both the anticipation of pre-bite into some chocolate chip gooey heaven,
Anticipation...
but also an action shot of an actual bite. Notice the very cute new top she bought herself with a gift card from Auntie Janet, as well as the fierce pink streak in her stylish new hairdo!
Yummy bite!
The cookies were pretty big, and mighty rich and buttery, so we started off by splitting a chocolate chip cookie, and then we moved on to a white chocolate chip cookie. We’re not big white chocolate folks around here, so I was thinking I would ‘pay it forward’ by giving them to our white chocolate loving neighbor, but then we tried them and YUM. Sorry neighbor. Your loss. I can’t decide which ones I like more. I may have to try again tomorrow, and I’ll let you know. 
Thanks SO much, BMC. You totally rock. And the rest of you, if you’re ever over at BMC’s place, be really really nice to her, because this is some action you want to get in on, k? Word.
