View to a Kitchen

The kitchen peninsula/bar/counter-thingy is currently playing home to a number of items:

1. A giant tray of itsy-bitsy pots in which we hope tomatoes, eggplants, and other green edibles are germinating
2. A selection of hamantaschen recipes
3. The usual crap, shoved further over to make room for the above.

Purim comes at a good time.

Just when I'm getting really impatient to be out in the garden, despite the constant downpour (it's Oregon, after all), we get the distraction of baking and costume-making and grogger-practice. Apparently it takes a lot of practice to get your grogger on. Or so I'm gathering by the Toddler's efforts.

Also, after two days of being sick at home, watching HGTV almost constantly, I am much more fully aware of how much style is lacking from my home decor. My end tables are not faux-finished to complement the draperies. My dining room lacks a cohesive style (unless you count "splatter-stain" as a style). Clearly I have not been using my 15 minutes a day of free time optimally.

But I feel redeemed when I look down to the very bottom shelf of the freezer and discover two full containers of lekvar - that nectar of the gods - preserved from last summer's plum harvest, and all ready for use as hamantaschen filling. See, people? I can do the thrifty housewife thing.

You know, even though I'm not technically a housewife.

Happy St. Markdown's Day!

I'm instituting a new holiday.

Since Bad Cohen and I don't really "do" Valentine's Day, what with its overly-commercial tone and the whole historical-excuse-for-a-pogrom thing, I am declaring that the Wednesday (or Thursday, or whatever) following it will henceforth be known as:

St. Markdown's Day

and will be celebrated with the purchase of attractive yet cheap flowers and chocolates, rescued from the "Sale" carts at the front of the grocery store.

Poor little things, left all forlorn to be repeatedly marked down. Won't somebody think of the poor chocolates?!?

Yum.

Munchy Motivation

I have just found a really good reason to plant some regular-sized tomatoes in the garden this year.

You know, in addition to all the cherry-type ones the toddler and his cousin will eat straight off the vine in the first 10 seconds they grow.

Tu B'shevat - time to plant

Yesterday I planted two varieties of blueberry, Bluecrop and Berkeley. (I really wanted an Earliblue, but they didn't have any other early-midseason bare-root cross-pollinators, so I moved it up to midseason varieties. A Spartan or a Duke would have been nice.)

I'm also plotting to acquire some Seascape strawberries, which are just the most delicious ever, and very prolific at the farmer's market, so they must grow well here.

In the meantime, there's not much else to do. Impatient gardeners have a hard time in January.

Of course, there's always weeding and laying down more stonework for the paths.

Yuck.

Best video of the year

... so far goes to this project against the Prop 8 enforcement. Try not to cry like a little girl.


"Fidelity": Don't Divorce... from Courage Campaign on Vimeo.

Ménage à Trois

No, it's not what you think.

I'm really enjoying this red wine blend from Folie à Deux Winery. Zinfandel, Merlot, Cabernet. Good, cheap, red wine, mellow on the palate, nice by itself or with food, especially a nice sharp cheddar and some salt crackers.

A little concerned that the toddler keeps asking for a taste of mommy's grown-up juice.

I suppose he's seen me and Bad Cohen sneaking too much junk-food as "grown-up food" by now to believe that he wouldn't like these things.