Crazy Times

Does your life ever get crazy? I'm sure it does, there's just too much to do and not enough time to do it. Well, my life has been crazy over these last few weeks. A few things that have happened:

1. The boyfriend, while extremely nice and respectful, had driven Kendall senseless and whenever we suggested that she spend time with her family without the boyfriend, she became not-so-nice and very disrespectful. It was very, very stressful. But she has come back to her senses (as much as a 15-year-old girl can) and has been much better. She is going to Homecoming tonight - I have a kid who is going to Homecoming! She also has a skating competition coming up in October, so there have been many trips back and forth to the rink.

2. My friends had a baby. I took them a roast and spent an hour holding this new, sweet baby. The maternal stirrings were quite strong, I must tell you. She is so tiny - I can't remember Will being that little and he was a preemie (so he was smaller). Now Will is climbing, walking, and generally becoming a daredevil. If you turn your back on him at the park he will climb the slide to the top in no time flat. My baby became a toddler. We are also dealing with the pleasant new biting, slapping, and headbutting skills he has developed, but I have to say that compared to other babies I have known he's not that terrible. Just keep him fed and put him to bed when he's tired and William is a happy happy boy.

My baby then

My toddler now

3. Our plumbing has been fixed! We no longer have a waterfall in the basement, and, from what I can see from the old plumbing, narrowly avoided a devastating flood. To save some money I ripped down the drywall covering the ceiling while singing the Chaka Khan version of "I'm Every Woman" (not really, but it makes a nice visual). Our plumber, a man we go to church with, was excited to work on a house with all copper plumbing (we kept it to recycle). The problem with copper, though, is that it rots with oxidation and time. Just touching the U-pipe coming out of the bath tub made it crumble - imagine draining your tub and all of the water ending up in the ceiling above your basement. Yes, it is a terrifying thought, I know. But that has all been taken care of and we now have non-oxidizing PVC pipes (and the ability to use the bath tub - yipee!).

4. Tim's leg has been acting up. I told you how he went out and bought a motorcycle despite my unhappiness regarding said purchase; well, every time he rides the bike his bum knee hurts for days afterwards to the point of moaning and wincing and general loss of function (and not in a wimpy sort of way). He finally admitted to me that he isn't ready to ride. There's only been one time that he's been on the bike that he hasn't been terrified that someone was going to hit him, so there are some psychological issues to work out as well. What that means for Honey is still up in the air, but for now she's back in the garage taking up the space where my car used to go. Yes, I have some issues with "the other woman" as well!

The official Suzuki photo of Honey

Then there's volunteer work, housework, cooking (which I've been a bit off on lately - yucky risotto, not so great chicken and dumplings, etc - although I could be being too hard on myself as I got great feedback for all of the above), my new addiction to building houses on The Sims, laundry (it is amazing how much laundry 5 people make in a week!), not getting enough sleep and walking through the day in a fog, etc, etc, and there's not enough time!

House of Insects

We have fleas. Or rather, our four cats do (one of which has a skin disease and has barely any hair, so why the fleas?). For years I kept the cats indoors until we adopted Foxy, a semi-feral who took up residence in our garage. The other cats saw this cat going in and out (we COULDN'T keep her in, she wasn't having it) and felt the overwhelming need to join her. So for 3 years my previously indoor cats have been indoor/outdoor cats. Which means flea prevention is a must. Well, until recently, we didn't have the $200/month that Frontline costs, and, well, I didn't remember that there was a such thing as flea collars. Dur.

So now there are fleas everywhere. We are going to have to bomb the house

it's so bad. The first sign was when the baby woke in the morning with mystery bumps all over his arms and legs. Then Collin started complaining that bugs kept jumping on him. Fleas. I keep thinking about the commercial with the one flea multiplying into millions. And the episode of Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends where Eduardo gets fleas.

The instigator

Last night Tim wanted me to go out to the garage and see the engine guard he had put on Honey. As we walked out into the garage, I heard a chirp that sounded suspiciously like that of our friendly neighborhood bats. (The bats like our home. Pest control people can't figure out how they get in, but about twice a year, we get a visitor. The most unfortunate incidence was when I fell asleep on the couch to awake to a bat perched on my shoulder. If you can avoid them, I would recommend staying as far away from rabies shots as you can. They hurt more than they tell you. And there's lots of them). Being the vaccinated one of the bunch, I bravely ventured into the garage, only to find that the culprit was a big, green chirping insect that I had never seen in my life. There was much debate over the identity of said insect and whether it would, in fact, kill us. I was of the camp that the green guy was probably harmless, yet gigantic and strange nonetheless. I deftly removed the insect from our garage using the "put something over it and a piece of cardboard under it" technique and then got to work on the internet to figure out who our nocturnal visitor was. Well, can you believe that I had never seen a katydid up until that point? I guess we have them in Ohio, but they can't be that common, because I was one of these "pick up the log to see the insects scamper" kids. I loved pill bugs and was always poking them to get them to curl up. I have a thing for praying mantis. I felt like I had to go tick "katydid" off of the "insects I have seen in my life" checklist.

Later that evening, my favorite of the insects made a stop in our house. Cicadas look like prehistoric monsters that most surely will disembowel you, but they are gentle giants. I love finding cicada exoskeletons on trees (I was a biology major, which, now that I think about it, makes the fact that I didn't know what a katydid was even more sad). Anyhow, one was hanging out by our porch light and decided to check out the house when I opened the door. Kendall went running and screaming. The cicada gave good chase but finally took up a post behind my great (x4) grandmother's picture. This was my second insect rescue of the evening.

A few years ago, the 7 year cicada breeding cycle hit Ohio. When you drove into wooded areas, hundreds of cicadas would land on your car. It was loud with a capital "L." But it was so cool. When I was a kid, my family and I took a trip to Pipestem State Park in West Virginia. It was the 16 year cycle breeding season for the West Virginia cicadas (like the one above, ours are just black). When you walked outside, they would land on you. My sister had over ten on her at one point. They terrified me then, but when one landed on me and it didn't kill me and it chirped and chirped, I fell in love. Be kind to your neighborhood cicada. What would summer be without that buzzy chirp?

Computer Madness

So the kids misplaced my iPod that I have had since the beginning of time. It is a first generation white iPod classic, I believe it holds 250 songs. No videos, pictures, podcasts, yadda, yadda, yadda. It is gone. I looked for it for a week, and I even enlisted the help of the kids (Collin now can have it if he finds it, but it takes A LOT to motivate him and he hasn't done much searching yet).



So why does Collin get my old, misplaced iPod? Because Tim gifted me with an 80G iPod Classic. Tim married a nerd. While jewelry is nice, gadgetry is the BOMB! My man knows me. The iPod can hold 20,000 (!!!!!) songs, videos, it may even babysit, but I haven't figured out that feature yet. So, all excited, I hooked up the new, shiny, crazy expensive iPod to my iBook - and nothing happens. Nothing at all. Not even a message that something new has been connected to the computer. Get on the internet and find that I have to upgrade to the new version of iTunes. No big. iTunes is downloaded, upgraded, plug in the iPod and get the message that if I want to ever use the picture and video capabilities, I have to upgrade my Quicktime program. So I do a general "what needs to be updated on this computer?" check, and a list of some 13 items pops up.

I should disclose at this point that my beloved iBook has been out of my possession for 2 years (for reasons too crazy to go into). A lot can happen in the life of a computer in two years. Obviously, everything gets outdated. And nothing works because of it, despite that fact that when I ordered it I put all of the RAM, memory, and processor that I could put in it at the time (that's all still pretty good, thankfully).

OK, so I do the updates. It all took 2 hours even with the superfast processor and connection speed. Now I have a super up-to-date computer that should be able to do anything.

Except sync with my new expensive iPod. You see, I have Mac OS 10.3 on my computer. The new iPod uses OS 10.4 or higher. Of course it does. Because why should I be able to actually USE my new iPod without spending another $140 on an operating system upgrade? (And for that matter, it it really necessary for Apple to come up with a new, improved, absolutely necessary or you'll die operating system every month? - ok, so I'm exaggerating, but don't get me started on the new Apple laptops that don't even have a replacable battery!)

Gah. Got on my "I'm a nerd" soapbox there. Anyhow, went out to the garage to tell Tim that I had to take back the iPod because I didn't want to spend another $140 just to get this thing working (that I totally love and have been gazing at adoringly since I got it). I don't like to spend money on myself. Money has been so tight that even when we have a little breathing room I get nauseated at the thought of spending excess cash. Tim was stroking Honey, his other-woman-motorcycle as I was telling him this (yes, she has a name). The motorcycle that, if you recall, he can't even ride yet due to a major leg injury that now has him on crutches (we are going on month 5 now). "Erin," he says,"I bought a motorcycle that I can't even drive. When you sing, you smile. And you always sing with the iPod. Spend the money."



Some of you may have gathered from that fact that I used to write a blog about depression that I may actually suffer from it. Well, I've been particularly bad what with having problems finding a job, not getting enough sleep (what mom with a teenager and a 15-month-old does?), and some unknown other factor that I have never been able to identify. When stress happens, the "thing" rears it's ugly head. So the comment about singing making me smile made me particularly gooey because I knew that my husband was paying attention to the things that cheer me up and doing what he could to make those things happen. Thus the gifting of the ridiculously expensive iPod and the additional operating system. I have a great husband.

So, in 3 - 5 days I should have a working iPod. I will have the most up-to-date operating system that a mac can have with features that make my head spin and I most likely will never use. But I'll be singing. And smiling.

Ohio Luau / Super Delicious Pineapple Upside Down Cake

Today was the celebration for the 10th anniversary of The Wings Enrichment Center. I have been volunteering at Wings since November of 2007 and have met wonderful, amazing people. At Wings "Union County residents facing mental health issues make plans, achieve goals, and have productive, happy lives. Wings provides a place to turn for groups, activities, and support." Volunteering there really has been one of the best experiences of my life. So anyhow, to celebrate, we had a luau. A luau in Ohio is an interesting affair; for starters, it was held in a Baptist church that was a former steak house/bar, and still houses a beer distillary (yes, I am aware of the irony of a distillary being in the same building as a Baptist church - I grew up Baptist). The food was great, your typical Midwestern church potluck with shredded pork and chicken sandwiches, scalloped potatoes, baked beans, and endless salads of various mayonnaise variations. There was Beach Boys music and leis and beach balls and various beach accoutrements and much hilarity and a good time had by all.


If you guessed that this isn't Ohio, you were right

I volunteered to take a pineapple upside down cake, which I had never made, but, as you may have gathered by now, I'm up for trying anything at least once (click the link for the recipe). This cake is superb. If I hadn't have been expected to share, I could have possibly eaten the whole thing myself. And it really is easy to make, once you get past the whole making caramel step (which really is simple). The only variation that I made to the recipe was that instead of using water as instructed on the cake mix box, I used the drained pineapple juice. Can you say "Yummy!?" And one other great thing; my son (who I have mentioned had a thing for cookbooks) has finally decided he wants to learn to cook and bake. So he made the large portion of the cake. My husband and I have told Collin that if he truly learns to cook, the girls will be amazingly impressed; Collin has duly noted this (he is already a ladies man).



I've been running for days; I am tired. I am going to find some mind numbing entertainment on TV (Hollywood's Most Expensive Real Estate, anyone?) and veg. Have a great weekend!

Risotto as Meditation, Daisies

Risotto as Meditation

In an exciting development, I located arborrio rice at our local Kroger. I have never made risotto, but I really wanted to give it a try, and I have been dreaming about a wild mushroom risotto that I had at San Francisco's Puccini & Penitti. It was rich, creamy, and the most wildly delicious risotto I have ever tasted. The kids were at a water park with their grandfather for the day, so the stage was set for mommy and daddy actually being able to have an adult dinner.

I found a recipe for the risotto on Recipezaar (I sound like a broken record with the Recipezaar, but it is my go-to recipe site), but I ended up modifying it so much that I'm just going to record what I did here.

I took a few pictures of the cooking, but my photos are nowhere near the photographic genius of those on Taste Spotting, et al. In fact, they aren't great at all, but I took them, so you have to look at them.

You'll need
1 cup dry white wine (yeah, wine!)
around 8 cups of chicken broth (I used 2 cans low sodium and 2 regular)
2 yellow onions
10 - 12 ounces of wild mushrooms (shitake, baby portabella, crimini, etc)
2 tbsp chopped garlic
2 cups arborrio rice
3/4 cups good grated parmesean cheese (plus some extra for a garnish)
butter to taste
salt and pepper to taste
fresh chopped parsley for garnish

I found making risotto to be a very meditative experience. I loved it. When I first saw a chef make it on TV I thought "Stand and stir rice non-stop for 30-45 minutes? You gotta be nuts!" But it was the fastest 45 minutes I've experienced in a long time. It was wierd, it was like I became one with the process and my mind was cleared and all I though about was the stirring and adding broth and perfecting the dish.

So to make the recipe, here's what you do:

1. Pour all of the broth in a stock pot and bring it to a simmer.
2. While the chicken broth is warming, finely dice the onion, slice the mushrooms, and chop the garlic (if you do that and don't use the prechopped stuff in the bottle).
3. Heat a little olive oil in a deep skillet, then add your onions, saute until they start to appear clear, add the mushrooms and garlic and saute for around 8 minutes.


Good enough to eat now, but restrain yourself!

4. Add the rice, stir it around in the pan for about 2 minutes to lightly toast it.
5. Add the wine (yeah, wine!) and stir until the wine has been absorbed into the rice.
6. Now start adding your chicken broth about a cup to a cup and a half at a time and stir constantly until the broth is absorbed. Continue in this fashion until you have used all of the chicken broth. Rest assured, all of the broth will be absorbed.


You don't think this will absorb, do you? Well, it did!

7. Stir in the 3/4 cup parmesean cheese and a little butter. Salt and pepper to taste.
8. Serve immediately. Garnish each serving with freshly grated parmesean cheese and chopped parsley.
9. Die from the deliciousness.

A couple of notes. I believe that the risotto that I had in San Fran may have been made with red wine, perhaps a merlot. There is a possibility that beef broth was involved as well. It was so rich and the end product was actually a dark brown dish. This one is a little grey when completed.


I didn't take this picture. Gobitapi on photobucket did. But mine tasted better.

Daisies

I have a 70 ft border that is a combo of roses, catmint, veronica, thyme, and daisies. The daisies were so pretty this year. I have hundreds of them, but I have such a difficult time cutting them because when they are all in bloom, they look like this:



Now I have purple and golden coneflowers in bloom, but the purple coneflowers seem to be afflicted with some sort of mystery virus, so, unfortunately, I'm going to have to dig them out and dispose of them with the lawn clippings. Fortunately, it's not difficult to come across clippings of purple coneflowers, so all is not lost. The golden coneflowers look exactly like black-eyed Susan's but flower for much longer and get that great tall cone that all coneflowers produce. I'd recommend them for any sunny garden spot.

I'm still struggling with late summer, fall flowerers. Everything seems to quit blooming around the middle of August. I'd like to try some Boltonia, but I can't find it anywhere. I'd also like to plant some of my empty spots with goldenrod - it is so showy and does not produce allergenic pollen (a vicious myth). Next year I'd like to plant some cosmos and cloeme as well - I generally stay away from annuals, but they are so cottagey, no?