Aahhhhh!!

The week of Independence Day was incredibly hot and humid here in Wisconsin, but this week has been much better.  Still warm but not so muggy, and it was a pleasure to turn of the AC and open the windows again.  I am grateful for AC for the relief it brings, but I hate having the house all shut up, it makes me feel claustrophobic.

I have not been biking as much as I had hoped to.  I have all kinds of reasons (or excuses) not to– it’s too hot, it’s too late, I’m too tired, I don’t have enough time.  On Sunday, when the hot weather broke, I took a short ride, on the little loop I’d found earlier this summer.  I timed it and it takes about 20-25 minutes to do.  It’s not as long a ride as I would like to do, but 25 minutes is better than 0 minutes. I almost always have 25 minutes to spare in the evenings. So, I am going to commit to taking that 25 minute ride every evening, and will do a longer one when time allows.  So far I have kept it up. I’ve also been doing some strength exercises in the morning.

I went to the doctor for my yearly check up last week, and she made it clear it’s time to exercise and get in shape, so that has been the impetus behind all this.  I’m going to try to eat better, too.  My cholesterol is high.  I’m 49, and if I don’t start making these changes now, when do I think I will?  Plus I want to be in good shape physically when I start my clinical courses in late August.

Time to get cracking!

 

Summer’s bounty begins

I walked up to the farmer’s market this morning without expecting to find much– I’d gone to the market on Wednesday and there were few vendors and none had much. Quite a few vendors were there this morning and I got all kinds of stuff– some absolutely gorgeous beets, new potatoes, leeks, kale, lettuce, two kinds of cheese and some lovely shell peas.  Few vendors have shell peas and those who do pick them too late, so they are starchy and bitter.  Blech.  But these were young and tender and sweet.  When I got home Madeline and I sat on the porch and ate them all.

When I was growing up my dad always had a very large garden every summer– it helped to feed our family of six.  I loved peas, even then, and have wonderful memories of taking a basket, walking down to the garden, and happily picking a basketful.  I would then sit on our screened porch and eat the whole basket, generally without any help from anyone.  I’m sure I was willing to share, and I know I did share sometimes.  I was often home alone– I am much more of a home-body than the rest of my family– so I guess I just got first crack at them. I ate most of the ones this morning, and apologized for being a pig.  My daughter said it was fine, since I love peas so much.  I said she loved them too, but she said she just likes them, but I love them.  So maybe the rest of my family didn’t quite have the passion for them that I do.

We had our first performance of Cinderella last night and it went very well– the house was sold out, or close to sold out.  Some of the cast members are young adults that I first met 8 years ago on the first show I ever worked on, and it is wonderful to see them grown up, still performing.  I’ve said it will be my last show for a while, and it has been such a good one to be my last.

The only thing I don’t like about the show is the music.  Because of our small venue, we couldn’t have an orchestra, but the directors did not want just a pianist– they wanted the orchestral sound.  So we bought the rights to a full computerized orchestration.  In many ways it’s fantastic– the music is very well performed, and the program has a lot of flexibility, it’s actually quite amazing.  But it lacks something– it’s almost too perfect.  It’s much like the difference between studio performances vs. live performance.  Of course, sometimes a live pit orchestra can have its difficulties– I’ve been involved in shows where the pit overpowers the singing, or in ones where they seem to be fighting each other every step of the way.  So we don’t have any of that.  But vamping is a big part of a musical, due to timing, and when the recorded orchestration vamps, it sounds just like a record skipping– it’s the same thing over and over, with no human vagaries or imperfections.  It’s actually sort of horrible, and even somewhat stressful during scene changes– I find myself rushing to make it stop!

Well, we tried it, and it has good points and bad, like anything else.  And as the technical director said, this production is teaching us a lot, including that the venue is not the best one for large, lavish musicals.

Cold Again

March is always a fickle month; the proof of this is the weather today, 34 degrees when I woke up.  It’s been cool, cloudy and windy all day. Maybe the cooler weather will keep the grass from growing so fast– I already need to mow my lawn!  I’m putting it off, because once I start, I’ll be mowing until October.  But if I don’t do it in the next day or two, it will be too long for my reel mower…

Right now I’m sitting at the box office at the theatre guild, and sales are not quite non-existent.  Hopefully they will pick up later this week; our little group needs the money from this show badly . Anticipating slow sales, I hauled along my laptop, and I’ve had some uninterrupted time to work on things.  I’ve written my little essay for my scholarship application, which I hope to mail off tomorrow and be done with.  I’ve also worked on my lesson plans and modified Seder for class Wednesday evening, so that’s almost done. I’m working to keep the focus on how the Seder relates to our own Eucharistic Liturgy, while hopefully giving the kids a taste of how the New Covenant proceeds from the Old.  All this while not running too long or boring them.

Rather than the usual pizza snack, I’m having them munch on our little Passover meal while we talk about it.  I spent some time searching for recipes for unleavened bread.  3 years ago, when I first did my much-too-complicated Seder, I found a really nice, tasty recipe for unleavened bread.   I actually used it for the Last Supper scene in Godspell, which our theatre guild was doing at the time.  It’s possible I wrote it down somewhere, but so far I have not been able to find it, though I’ve found a few that look similar.  I also need to get apples and nuts for charoseth, and of course hard-boiled eggs, and grape juice.   Maybe celery for the bitter herbs.  I won’t do the horseradish, last time I did and the kids did NOT like it.  Too hot!

Since I spent so much time on Sunday reading, I was feeling a little stressed and rather behind on things, so having this time to work on stuff has been very nice.  Still, I wouldn’t mind doing a few sales…

Equinox

It’s the first day of spring, but it felt more like summer– temperature in the upper 70′s and sunny.  In spite of having to work I got to enjoy the weather.  I dropped the car off this morning for an oil change so had a longer walk to work than usual.  Then after work I had a long walk to pick it back up.   After I got home I shoved a lamb roast in the oven, got the day’s dishes done (Madeline doesn’t have a lot of time to do them, especially on Tuesdays), then headed outside and spent the better part of an hour on yard work.  I raked enough leaves to fill three big lawn & leaf bags and did some more weeding.  I’ve got at least one bed cleared out, it looks muchbetter.  I’m on my porch now writing.  I love sitting on the porch, especially in the late afternoon/early evening.  It’s my favorite place to unwind after a long day.

One day last week a semi-regular customer came in– he lives out-of-town and comes whenever he’s in town.   He was reading a book and I peaked at the title.  I always do this, or ask right out, it’s fun to see what people are reading and I’ve gotten some suggestions.  He was reading a book called The Robe by Lloyd C. Douglas.  He said it was his Lenten reading. I looked it up and it sounded intriguing, so I downloaded it to my Nook.  It has sucked me right in, I quite like it so far.   Next time he comes in I will have to thank him.

I’ve stayed strong with my Lenten fast from sweets, I’ve only broken it twice, once when I had part of a crisp I made for Madeline, and this Sunday when I had a piece of Jacob’s birthday pie– I kept it to one serving each time, which is pretty good for me!  I also have tasted a dessert once or twice at work, mostly because they were new ones and I needed to describe them well to customers.  Other than that, I’m doing well.  Today was torture, though.  The dessert case was empty and the 3 resident bakers were hard at work all morning to fill it. Pies: Lime meringue, chocolate cream, peach, peanut butter; a raspberry cobbler, two kinds of galettes, pavlova– it was incredible and oh, so tempting.  I’m proud to say I stayed strong, except for one small taste of cobbler– it was a new recipe.  Only a few more weeks to go!  I’ve made it this far, and I intend to stay strong.  It has been very, very good for me.

A Lovely Sunday

On Friday as I walked home from work, the tree branches caught my eye.  I thought I had seen a touch of green or something, out of the corner of my eye, but when I looked closer they seemed as bare as ever.  Yesterday I didn’t really look or notice anything.  But today, the trees are all budding!  Our flowering cherry already has leaves, the silly thing.  It’s too early, of course, but I can’t blame the trees, we’ve had a good week or more of warm, lovely weather.  Even the nights have been warm. it’s so strange (but wonderful) to sleep with the windows wide open.

The kids returned last night from their trip to visit their grandparents (their dad’s parents).  They had a nice time in Florida and enjoyed themselves.   I enjoyed having some time to myself this past week, but it was good to have them home.  Today we had a wonderful family day. with waffles for breakfast.  Then we sat around and talked and caught each other up on things.  For lunch we actually cooked burgers on the grill,  followed by strawberry glacee pie for Jacob’s belated birthday.  This afternoon Madeline and I took a bike ride and Jacob joined us on his push-scooter.  We all felt out of shape (first bike ride of the year!) but we enjoyed ourselves.

In a little while Jacob heads back to college and we probably won’t see him until Easter.  Madeline and I head back to our busy regular lives.  I wish we’d had a little more time together but we certainly made the most of what we had.

St. Patrick’s Day

There are all kinds of St. Patrick’s Day activities in town today but I have no plans to attend any of them. I am making Irish oatmeal for breakfast,  and I am wearing a green shirt.  I might pop up to the cafe for lunch, to get some corned beef & cabbage.  I’m a little less than half Irish, on my mom’s side, and I’m proud to be Irish and appreciate my heritage, but I’ve never been into the whole shamrocks and leprechauns thing, not for a while.

When I was a kid, growing up in Vermont, we used to watch the St. Patrick’s Day parade from NYC on Channel 11 (WPIX, which also had Popeye cartoons and Gilligan’s Island re-runs).  I went to school at the parochial school associated with our church, which was the Irish Catholic one, so we colored shamrocks and such.  I remember wearing little green plastic shamrock pins, and singing “When Irish Eyes Are Smiling”. ( In retrospect I find it interesting that, in spite of the fact that we had genuine Irish nuns at the school, including the music teacher, we never learned any real Irish songs.)

As an adult, I’ve never gone in for the green beer, pub crawl aspect of St. Patrick’s Day. When my kids were younger we’d read some fun Irish-themes picture books and make Irish Soda Bread (of course I get into the food aspects!) .  Beyond that, I don’t do much to mark the day.  My ancestors came over to America to escape poverty, famine, and religious oppression. They faced some tough times in America but prospered through hard work and perseverance.   They remembered their heritage and took pride in it, they remained true to their faith, but they were also very proud to be US citizens.  As am I.  I’d love to visit Ireland someday, though.

Interesting note: I grew up in Vermont, and in the small city I lived in, there were 3 Catholic churches: one built by the Irish Catholic immigrants, one built by the French Catholic ones, and one built by the Italian Catholics. Early on all three had parochial grade schools associated with them; by the time I was in junior high school (as it was still called in those days) only one of the schools was still open– at the Irish one.  It’s still around today.

Snow Day

It’s January 20th, and we are having our first real big snow of the season.  The snow has been light but steady since 8 or so this morning.  I worked today but we closed an hour early, and I walked home on light, fluffy, squeaky snow.  It’s very pretty, and I am liking the thought of being home all cozy tonight–I’m very thankful I don’t have to drive anywhere.

Son Jacob is home for the weekend, he has a short break between January Term and the start of 2nd semester.  It is good to have him here, even if it is only for a few days– I’ll take what I can get! Today he has willingly taken on the snow-shoveling, not just of our sidewalk and drive but the neighbors too, which is very kind of him.

In many ways it has been very nice to have such a non-snowy winter.  No shoveling, no salty roads and cars, the heating bill has been lower than usual.  But snow days have their advantages, the main one being that they are a good excuse to stay home!  There is something fun about stocking up and staying home, baking, working on crafts, reading, watching a movie.  You don’t have to feel guilty or feel like you should be doing something or going somewhere– it’s okay to just want to be at home.  It’s a chance for some respite from the busy-ness of life.

So tonight we’ll stay in, and cook something, possibly using fresh, home-grown shiitake mushrooms.  Madeline’s dad got her a kit for growing shiitake mushrooms and it has been fun to watch them grow!  There are a few that are ready for harvesting.  Not sure what else we will do, but it won’t matter, it will just be good to be together.  The three of us don’t get as many opportunities to be together as we used to, and when Madeline starts college in the fall it will be even harder to find the time.  We all cherish it while we have it.

Savannah

Madeline and I got back late yesterday from our trip to Savannah.  We left on Friday, and were checked in at the hotel by 5 pm.  We immediately headed out to walk around the city a bit.  I’d never been to Savannah before and it is a lovely, charming city.  We stayed in the historic district in walking distance of SCAD– Savannah College of Art and Design.

The first square we saw was lovely Pulaski Square, which has beautiful live oaks spreading their crowns to make a canopy over the square.  The trees are old and absolutely fascinating, with their big trunks and wavy, twisty limbs.  We walked on to Madison Square, where SCAD was already setting up for SCAD Day on Saturday.  We walked around a bit, then headed back to the hotel, rested a bit, and headed out for dinner at Sakura on Broughton Street, which was very reasonably priced and very good.  We wandered around the city after dinner, but we were tired and needed to get up early so we headed back to the hotel early and went to bed.

Saturday morning, after a dreadful and rather pricey breakfast at the hotel, we headed down to Madison Square to check in.  There was quite a crowd there, we were a little surprised and it made Madeline nervous to see so many people wanting to go to the same school.  After the welcome, we met with an admissions counselor, then we toured the department she is interested in (sequential art).   The tour was great, we had an excellent professor giving it and the other parents and students had excellent questions that I never thought of but was glad to hear the answer to.  After a very nice lunch we toured the residence halls, then Madeline was ready to call it a day.

After a nice rest at the hotel, we headed to Leopold’s for ice cream, which was delicious.  Then we wandered down to River Street, which we did not care for.  We enjoyed seeing the river, but it was late afternoon and the bar crowd was starting to arrive.  None of the restaurants caught our fancy so we went back to the hotel, rested some more, then went to the Mellow Mushroom for pizza– it was quite good.  Then back to the hotel and off to bed– we were tired!

Sunday morning we went to breakfast at J. Christopher’s, very busy but good.  Then we headed to 10:00 Mass at the Cathedral of St. John the Baptist.  The Cathedral is tall and magnificent, and the Mass was beautifully done.  It was fun to be in a large church that was full, and was all ages– a nice experience for Madeline!  We spent the rest of the day exploring– we gave River St. another chance but didn’t like it any better by day, just too touristy for us.  We also walked through City Market and felt the same way about it, though we very much enjoyed our lunch at Vinnie Van GoGo’s, which is a very cool place.  Dinner we tried Sakura again but were a little disappointed this time, it was not quite as good as Friday’s dinner had been.  After more walking and exploring we went back to the hotel, and off to bed.

Our trip home was uneventful.  We enjoyed Savannah, and Madeline feels she could be quite happy at SCAD.  Now we just need to see if she can get accepted, and what kind of financial aid they offer.

Weekend

Just came off a pretty good weekend.

Madeline left Friday with her dad to do her first-ever college visit, at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design. She liked it and will definitely apply.

Friday was super busy at work, and we were short-staffed.  I ran my butt off, but the tips were good. Right after work I had to run to South Wayne and pick up many pounds of pork from the 1/2 pig I bought from a friend.  Now I have lots of locally raised meat in the freezer.  I was tired Friday evening, and the small glass of wine I had with dinner made me feel awful, so I went to bed a bit early.

I worked Saturday, another busy day and again short-staffed, but again the tips were good.  I had Mass at 4 and I was the lector.  We started the new songs, from the new translation of the Roman Missal.  It was a little rough going but we’ll catch on!  Fr. David gave a great sermon on evangelization.   It was lovely out when I left church, and when I got home I changed into some comfy clothes and headed out to the nearby dog park, where I used to take my beloved dog Toby when he was still alive.  I hadn’t been there in quite a while.  It was wonderful, a lovely fall evening, a bit cool, the sun low in the sky.  I took a brisk walk through the woods and fields, and it smelled so good– that rich,moist, slightly decayed smell of autumn fields.  I felt so much better after that walk.

I made myself a nice dinner at home, then vegged a bit in front of the tellie, then to bed early.

Sunday I headed over to Dubuque to see Jacob.  The house he lives in is old and very cool, just sort of rambles on.  He says he doesn’t feel at home there, yet; hopefully he will soon.  It was good to see him, he’s doing well and very busy with classes and activities– flight team competition is coming up soon.

I left Dubuque and headed to Madison to pick Madeline up at her dad’s.  The weather took a turn for the worse, and it was a stressful drive– I ran into some heavy rains, and even hail.  At one point I had to pull off the road, the hail had covered the road and it was very slippery.  White knuckle driving, it sucks.  I made it to Madison, and by the time I’d picked up Madeline and was heading for Monroe, the sun was out and we saw a rainbow.   Autumn in Wisconsin.

So– into a busy week.

Plugging along

I started this week tired, and when I start a week tired I know I’ll be tired all the way through.  However– I did catch a break, since I don’t have to work tonight.  I usually work on Wednesday evenings but didn’t need to.  Other than the lost income that is a good thing.

After work today my daughter and I went to the farmer’s market and I bought some raspberries.  We made raspberry jam from it, the only jam I made this year.  So it isn’t much, but it is something.  I made an apple pie tonight– my daughter has been absolutely craving one.  My son is the pie maker in the family, but he is away at school so I did it.  I used an oil crust, as he does, and I don’t recall ever making one before.  My son’s are always fantastic, and his secret is that he really emulsifies the oil and water combo.  I do not have the patience he does, so I used my hand-held blender to do it, and it took about 10 seconds.   The pie looks and smells great, we’ll see how it tastes when my girl gets home.

I’d been promising to make this pie for a week and didn’t really have time till tonight, but it will be good,  Madeline has been stressed this week, for two reasons.  One is that she took the PSAT this week,  Since we homeschool, she has never taken any kind of standardized test before, so she was nervous.  She thinks it went well, and is glad to have it over.  We get the results in December.

The other reason is that her dad had a bad crash on his bicycle- he broke a vertabrae in his neck and suffered a concussion.  This happened on Saturday, and my daughter found out about it on Monday morning, when she saw a picture of her dad, neck brace on and face scraped up, on her uncle’s facebook page (her dad’s brother).  It was a shock for her, and not the way to find out.  I won’t lie, I am angry that neither he nor his wife called her about it before then– if they had the time and ability to take a picture and send it to his brother, they had the time and ability to call or email his daughter.  Well, anyway, yesterday I drove her up so she could see him, and she was so happy about that.  After something like that,  you just need to see the person.

Last week was the kind of week where I had to schedule myself a bit and really stick to it or I’d be doomed.  The weekend was busy, from Friday night to Sunday night, and then the new week began.  I am really looking forward to this weekend.