Thankfully Thanksgiving

I thoroughly enjoyed the Thanksgiving holiday. I haven't taken more than one day off since March, to go to Costa Rica, and I can't remember the last time I stayed home for more than a weekend.

Thursday, I spent most of the day cooking. I started around 10am, took a break around 2pm for a run with Erik, and finished right at 5pm, when we took everything over to Erik's parents' house for our holiday meal.

Friday was my day to relax. I stayed on the couch in pajamas for entire morning, watching "What Not to Wear" and "Man vs Wild" marathons. Erik raked the leaves, since our first leaf collection was the next day, and I worked on putting the garden to its winter bed.

Saturday was our shopping day. After checking out Bob's Red Mill for breakfast with Julie, we went to Lowes, Costco, back to Lowes to make returns, Home Depot, Fabric Depot, and Ikea. It was six hours of exhausting shopping, but we investigated and/or bought many things we'd meant to for quite some time.

Sunday I planted spring bulbs while on the phone with my mom, and we put strings of lights up on the house. Erik did more of the light-stringing, as he's better on the ladder and has much better reach. I climbed the apricot tree and lassoed lights around its branches, and worked more on the garden. I completely cleared and then winter-planted a small raised bed with Swiss chard and broccoli. I hope the latter fares better than my summer broccoli, which succumbed to the most incredible plague of aphids I've ever seen.

It was a rare, relaxing holiday, and over far too soon, despite the feeling on Friday that we still have a full weekend ahead of us.

I dream of the fun garage

I'm a bit annoyed with myself for losing the dream I had last night. It was something simple, an idea or impression, something that would have been useful. Oh well.

Friday night I had a very strange dream, strange in its real-world grounding. We took the car ferry down to Newberg or Oregon City in a green station wagon-- like a Subaru-- to look in antique and junk shops. When we got off the ferry, we drove past a parking garage with "fun" somewhere in its name. It had a huge yellow tube slide spiraling down from all levels; that was how you got down to the street after you parked. So I insisted we park there, on the top floor so that we could slide all the way down.

I don't remember the next part of the dream, but when we headed back to the car, one person decided to stick around and walked off. As I was saying goodbye and crossing the road, I almost got hit by a car because the traffic was odd.

Back in the garage, the ground floor had all sorts of interesting knick-knacks for sale, and I spent time browsing although I should have rushed to meet the others at the car. The stairway up was extremely narrow, made from metal mesh, and rather frightening. It was single file, so people coming down would have to step out at a floor, or wait at a landing while one squeezed past.

Then we took the ferry back up the Willamette, and the water was so rough it was amazing that we could even get upstream. It must have flooded, because along the banks rushing water broke windows in the houses lined up there.

TG minus one

The extra-short work week is already coming to an end. Four days in a row to do with as I please-- I think that's the most I've had since taking a proper vacation to Costa Rica back in March. There are so many creative endeavors I hope to at least spend time on, as well as chores and various utilitarian tasks that have been put off in the hope of future chunks of time.

The three main things I plan to do are cook, put up fairylights, and purchase tile for our kitchen backsplash. We've narrowed our tile choices down considerably, although we'll still do some extra research at the huge home improvement stores.

That's about it, really. It's been a week of more-or-less the usual. Making meals, including a rather inspired mac & cheez with fakin bacon, spinach, chipotle salsa, and a dab of creamcheez; leftover kabocha & "ricotta" raviolo, green Thai curry.

Last night Erik met me at a last-hurrah farmers market, which I only discovered because I tried to find the date of the last market of the year. There was free hot cider and donuts, although the produce was a bit sparse, and we bought wood-fired bagels that we saved for breakfast this morning-- they were fabulously chewy and dense, with a lovely, developed flavor. I also had fresh-roasted chestnuts for the first time, and even aside from their wondrousness as hand-warmers, they were quite enjoyable.

Thanksgiving menu

Just when I worked out the bare minimum four dishes I would prepare for Thanksgiving dinner, a new recipe comes along that I cannot ignore. Candied Lime Sweet Potatoes! Oh gawd. It certainly doesn't help my willpower that the author is a great food photographer.

So here's my menu:

• cranberry sauce, based loosely on Alton Brown's recipe


• maple-walnut greenbeans-- a flavor idea I had while driving to White Flint mall, visiting my hometown last weekend


• Candied lime sweet potatoes from VeganYumYum


• plain stuffing from a bag, which I always crave, and probably some gravy from a mix


• Tofurky


• a variation of Curried lentils with pumpkin/butternutsquash, emailed to me by Julie


• Gingerbread cupcakes from the PPK, with creamcheez frosting

your mind is racing like a pro now

Our plane landed at 2:30am last night, so we took the shuttle to the economy lot, drove home, tended to the frantic cats, and took out the trash before going to bed. By all rights, I should have been sleepy all day. But much as I often get little sleep during the week, the occasional truly grueling night almost always refreshes me. The sign of a true insomniac or alien, I suppose.

Besides all of that, I also left work early for an acupuncture appointment, went to the gym, then made a Thai green curry for dinner.

To counter that, though, I didn't do much at work. I barely remember how I spent the hours. It wasn't writing or catching up, as I should have done.

And there's a first time and a second time, you've got to hold on

Today is crazy. After cleaning up a downed plant from the kitchen sink, which one of the cats must've knocked over in the buzz of an exciting bug hunt, I noticed that my kitchen begonia a) was completely dead, and b) had crawly gnat creatures all over the soil. I took the pot out to the front porch, which is when I noticed that it was warm outside-- tropically warm and damp.

I'd love to be out in it, but it's such a odd and frenzied day. My brother left at noon for DC, and Erik & I follow at 10:30pm tonight. Besides that, my tiny department is slated to move at 3pm today, just two floors straight up. I only have fifteen more days on my contract, but I'll have a cube for those working days. My boss is working from home today, trying to remove a tile backsplash before contractors come to make a template for her new countertop. The other coworker in our department is out sick, so I packed up her cube for her. She had so many decorations and knickknacks that it took me the better part of an hour, including the three trips worth of things that couldn't fit in the provided boxes-- of which she needed eight. My office stuff fit in one, with room to spare.

So I'm off early to try to fit in a trip to the employee store, Ann Sacks to look at tile, my favorite running store to buy new shoes before I do more damage to my knees, and hopefully the gym. Then I'll go home and pack. Maybe even throw together dinner.

Perhaps I'll see you tonight at the airport. If not, rest assured I'm thinking of you, friends.

welcome in, shame about the weather

Yesterday evening on my run, the sky pulsed pink and murky-- what I think of as a snow sky. It hung low and ominous, pushing me forward on my leaden legs. This whole week has been a tough one for workouts. I've felt weak, tired, and slow, but I've kept on because it is only by showing up that I can keep clinging to the good, healthy habits.

After my run, I cooked up a simple alfredo sauce for the ravioli I had previously made. The effect, as a whole, was wonderful. Of course, I would've liked some extra kale in with the sauce, but I just didn't have time to wash, trim, and sautée it.

Aspen & Mae came over before 8pm, and we met Julie at the Teardrop Lounge for fancy drinks. This bar deserves the moniker "lounge," as it was a lovely, simple take on industrial modern that gave the place a warm, clean vibe-- encouraging us to sit around for a while and relax. We each had two different drinks, and shared sips around. The conversation was by far the best part of the evening. You know how amongst really smart, funny and comfortable friends you start to riff off of each other and pull in past themes even as topics leap onward at a dizzying pace? It was that sort of evening.

now it's said and done, say goodbye to the people we don't know

There was a point yesterday during which I despaired that Monday would never end. In fact, that point was more of a set, encompassing most moments of the day.

***

Just back from the Thanksgiving dinner event for my department at work. The fairy lights are on the trees around the building with the cafeteria and coffee shop, and leaving the noise drift behind for the cool air of the main courtyard feels like waking up.

***

Midnight is fast approaching, and all of the pasta dough is used up in ravioli-making. This is the time of day when my body seems to rally against all sense and I fear for ever again falling asleep.

I've been thinking of Thailand recently.

On the way home from work, I dashed into the hardware store, slipped between the merchandise pulled into the aisles, and grabbed a handful of picture hooks. When I got home I hung a couple of the large prints I ordered, rearranging a few other photos on the walls. Erik and I walked to the European market, where I couldn't resist the canned hummus I used to eat when I was poorest, living in London. Upon returning home, we swept leaves from our walkways, worried that a slippery accident was in the making. Then I set up the light table for my most tender potted plants, which are now arranged by height and receiving twelve hours of timed light. Finally, I made ravioli in time to the Shout Out Louds and Travis, while Erik played the new Mario videogame and drifted off to sleep. Hopefully the latter awaits me, as well.

we'll dance off time to the songs we've never liked

Erik and I went to the coast this weekend as a late celebration of our wedding anniversary. It's also close enough to the rather unclear time that we started dating that it acts as a double anniversary.

We took his parents out for dinner on Friday night, to the fanciest Indian restaurant in town: Plainfield's Mayur. It was decent as far as food goes, but the service is old school, which makes for a pleasant experience.

Saturday morning I went for a ten mile run with Erica and Bob, around the waterfront loop. It was surprisingly warm and beautiful out, clearing up to be a golden fall day.

When I got home I cut Erik's hair, then packed up to leave for the coast. We stopped at Pratt & Larson before heading out of town to look at tile for our kitchen backsplash. We actually found something we both liked, but at $64 per square foot, it's not likely what we'll end up with.

I think we got to Lincoln City around 3:30pm. Our motel, the Ester Lee, had the most magnificent view of waves crashing on rocky outcroppings on the wide, sandy beach. After walking along the beach til dark, taking photos, we went back to our room to enjoy the fireplace. For dinner we went to Aunt Mary's, a vegetarian restaurant in the Central Coast Vibrator Museum/ adult store. You had to be 18 to even eat there, and a group of kids got kicked out while we were hanging out waiting for the cook/owner to return. After chatting while the owner cooked our food, petting her dog, and poking around the shop, we ate what would be our best meal on the coast.

Our next stop was the Chinook Winds Casino, which Erik wanted to see. We thought we'd have a drink, play a few slots, and have a look around, but it turned out to be so smoky and bright and crowded and intense that we zipped through and left right away, giving us time to go see a movie. Dan in Real Life was the only thing of any interest playing, and it was okay. Back in our room, I turned up the fire and read for quite some time while keeping half-tabs on a wild, windy storm that battered the window in shifts.

Sunday morning we read the paper for a while in bed, then tried to find a place to eat. Sadly, the doughnut shop was closed, and we ended up snagging odd bits of food before heading to the Drift Creek Falls trailhead. South of Lincoln City, we wound up ten miles of single-lane logging road, dodging large salamanders (for which, sadly, we never got to stop to get a closer look). The hike was amazing, ending at a suspension bridge and surprising, sudden waterfall.

We had to rush back from the hike and hightail it down to Yachats for the spa appointments I made. I hadn't realized that the place I booked was 45 miles south of Lincoln City, so the extra trek really put a strain on our time. Facials have been our anniversary tradition, though, and the Overleaf Lodge was perched on a lovely rocky beach for wandering while we took turns with our treatments.

As dusk settled, we drove through Newport to finally have a meal-- and the word only applies loosely-- at Taco Bell, before the three hour drive home.

Roll my die, Change this life

All I can do is be vague. It's Friday night again. I'm at home, listening to the National on my ratty second-hand headphones. Taking photobooth pictures and wondering if my face will ever show emotion. The facial tic-- my lower lip on the left side, where I pull it down in a little "eep" move-- has finally abated after forty-eight hours. I think it came about from trying to control my expression in meetings, to appear what I hope looks like positive neutral.

Erik's gone to bed and I've used up all the phyllo dough wrapping triangular packets of the roasted pumkin, ricotta, and kale filling I made during that cooking jag Tuesday night (the other dishes I made were lettuce wraps with a PF Changs-copy filling, and stuffed peppers). I also used the chocolate ganache-- left over now that the chocolate cupcakes are all eaten-- as filling for a vanilla-snap cookie crust pie with peanutbutter warmed and drizzled on top. The kitchen is tired of me.

It is often that I wonder how I got here. In the past few days alone, I've had the age-flash no less than three times. This first was thinking about some of the clothes I have, including the first thing I bought in my favorite color green. I don't quite have a handle on which thriftstore I found it in, but it was 1996, and I saw the color and fell in love. I haven't worn it in years, though, nor the army pants I bought some time in high school which still grace the pants shelf. The flash is what came next-- thinking of my glittery things, especially all of the new socks I bought. Will I get looks for wearing sparkly things in another year? It's generally looked down upon to go in for glitter after 30. But why should I even care? I walked out of my closet with those thoughts, my doubts left behind.

The next flash was seeing the birth year of my favorite contestant on a reality tv show: one year before mine. But he seems so old! I can't believe he's only a year and a half older than me. He's such an adult. And mentally my nose wrinkles and I know that's not me at all.

Wednesday night at Oba, ordering wine for Erik and I, the bartender is cute and has a full sleeve on his right arm, and he says to me something like "We can say you're 21, right?" Well yes, honey, I'm pretty sure I'm older than you.

I harp on this theme, I know I do. Call it my age-orexia, my bul-year-mia. Or stop me before I make up these terrible puns, that would be preferable.

What I feel is: there's a fine line between childish and childlike. I am dancing on that line. Some days I'm pretty sure which side I'm on, and other days the fire in my belly will demand a switch of sides. What I've determined is that there are more times to be quiet than there are to expound.

I may well be the most actively social hermit in the Pacific Northwest.

tostones de plátano

The tales to tell have been more or less yanked from my guts, after a nearly two hour meeting during which I had to present the user interface for the project at hand. Preparation had been laborious, since the project manager is dim but well-meaning and so keeps meticulous over-organized tabs on everything. I've had more meetings leading up to this meeting than for all of my other projects combined.

Last night I ran up Terwilliger to the Chart House, the highest point of that route. Sometimes as the path wove away from the road and through stands of trees, I couldn't see the blacktop path at all. There's something invigorating about running at top speed (granted, for me that's about the same as regular speed and rather slow at that) downhill when you can't see where your feet are. And then the handful of utterly different pine scents in the clear night air. Before I moved to Portland, I don't even think I knew there were so many different variations of the smell of pine.

Erik and I met Julie and Brian at Oba, afterwards. We had some food arrival issues, but they didn't charge Erik for either of his dishes, nor our three total glasses of wine. That makes up for it. I liked the warm atmosphere, and some of the bartenders were playful behind the bar. It's nice when you can tell that coworkers get along. Did I mention they had plantains? Tostones, not my favorite sweet preparation of them, but hey-- the sauce was non-dairy and delicious.

how can such a Nordic city make me sweat

For how much longer will these leaves last? As the days compress into an almost unbearable sliver of sunlight, and I calculate how much shorter they have yet to become, I think that I could make it til the solstice if only these colors stuck around. Snatches of piercing blue sky and the preponderance of yellow alders, fallen leaves tessellating in the grass.

The leathery smell of oak leaves, their perfume deepening as they nestle into the damp soil. It's so perfectly autumn, but also par for the course: my heart aches with the beauty of these fugitive moments, every single time. Oh, but I'm a sensitive soul.

Yesterday I saw a tiny dead bird on my way out the door of my office building, and then on my run I saw a stiff, laid-out squirrel. Both appeared to have died without trauma. Is that the signal of winter's onset? Duly noted, Nature.

Last night during my run, one of my makeshift buns caught resonance, and bounced uncomfortably. I finally pulled it out and ran with my hair down, which I would normally never, ever do. But it was cold and still out, and the shadow of my hair flapping behind me under the streetlights made me feel like a warrior.

Today I walked the best long route on campus, which I've been avoiding for two weeks. The fountain was turned off, so I could climb the rocks back into it. Absolutely no one was out, save the kids at the daycare center.

superheated chocolate disaster

Last night I experienced my first microwave misadventure; at least the first that I can remember.

You see, our [cream cheese] frosting supply from the chai spice cupcakes I made a while ago ran out, and-- much like the dilemma of the hot dogs (ten to a pack) and buns (eight to a pack)-- I had made a batch of chocolate cupcakes to use up the extra frosting from the previous cupcakes. I decided to make chocolate frosting this time, something light and airy. In order to try something really different, I got out the cookbook most likely to have a good frosting recipe: Sinfully Vegan. "Whipped chocolate frosting" really seemed to fit the bill.

This is the point in the story where I give the disclaimer that I don't often use cookbooks. I have a difficult time following recipes. Usually I don't gather the ingredients first, or even check to make sure I have everything (which happened with the cupcakes this frosting was for. I was out of sugar. And then I just assumed they needed baking powder, as that's what most vegan baking recipes call for, but it was baking soda... and by the time I realized that, since I only ever write down the barest bones of a recipe and it just read "1t bs," it was impossible to remove the baking powder from the flour and cocoa in the mixing bowl. Then the whole thing sat in the fridge for a few days til I bought sugar. At any rate, back to the frosting saga...). I try to read all of the directions first, now, but what can I say. I'm really not good at following any directions.

So I had dumped all of the ingredients into the blender, except for the two cups of chocolate chips which were to be melted in the microwave. With the power at 50%, I nuked for one minute, checked for melting, another minute, checked, another minute... until they had been in there for five minutes. That seemed a tad long for something as meltable as chocolate, but the chips were a little old, so who knows. Finally, I microwaved it for a minute at full power.

When I opened the door, there was smoke coming from deep within the chocolate mass. I poked it with a spoon, and the smoke increased. I poked around more, to try to smother the... superheated mass. In the center of the still-not-melted cup of chocolate chips, hard black chunks sizzled and spewed. I ran cold water into the pyrex cup, thinking that would cool it down and put out any possible fiery-type stuff. Smoke-filled bubbles buzzed angrily to the surface. For a while I continued to poke, hoping to dampen more of the smoldering, superheated, black, crunchy mess.

It didn't work. I added more water, and left the whole thing in the sink, thinking that a good soak would loosen it up to be cleaned in the morning. In the meantime, I went on to make the frosting with a fresh batch of microwave-melted chocolate chips, this time stirred every thirty seconds. The frosting came out more like ganache. Oh well.

The next morning, the chocolate-microwave disaster had somehow subsumed the water into itself. Again, I left it and went about my morning. Imagine how impressed I was, then, when Erik set to washing dishes and took the time to scrape out the pyrex cup and clean the whole thing up. My hero! I made sure that the cupcake for his lunch had extra ganache on it.

the empire is melting like ice cream

This weekend was cut from a new pad of construction paper. The colors were fresh from the light of the low-slung sun, perhaps working harder than usual to cut through the atmosphere at such an angle.

Erik and I hiked to Latourell Falls, the Columbia River Gorge waterfall closest in to Portland. It was a beautiful little hike, full of Bigleaf Maple leaves littering the path, exposed Devil's Club branches, rickety bridges bridges over tiny streams, and enough glowing moss to satisfy even my moss-hungry heart.

Erik and I discussed the idea of "creating" every day, so I'm back to writing and kicking it out the door, as short and as cryptic as it may be.