Merry Christmas!

Well we had a great Christmas season this year and hope everyone else did as well. It all started out with a great set of Disneyland his and hers snowmen. What a cute couple. They sure didn't last long... delicious.

The cats seemed to enjoy the candy canes that were hanging around.

Then we had a great time "wreck-erating" gingerbread at the Lodge. My mini gingerbread house ended up with a grinch/monster coming out of the roof and next to a graveyard/landfill composed of many things (including grahm cracker crumbs). Other contributions were much more seasonally appropriate but equally creative! Many thanks to the Lodge for hosting this holiday extravaganza! The work-in-progress below.

We also had a good time making some peppermint breakup to share with family and friends - white chocolate only. It turned out really good, but I must say tempering the chocolate though definitely worth it was a little nerve wracking.

We also spend all day on Christmas Eve working on our nook. Here we are both standing in it for the first time pretty tired but happy. If it had happened a few days sooner this would have been a fun Christmas card to send out!

Christmas morning came and first things first, the cats got their Christmas presents and fun was had by all!

And, as requested, a picture of me enjoying my Christmas digs.

Merry Christmas to everyone!

Cayenne Harvest Begins

At long last the cayenne pepper plants yielded their first harvest! It's the beginning of the fall pepper ristra. Despite the cold and damp summer, the cayenne seemed to have no trouble. The thai peppers on the other hand are almost microscopic and the bell peppers though huge and beautiful have yet to ripen.

In the picture is also the last cucumber and the tomatoes that we planted. The volunteer tomato plant is still at the beginning of its production. Have not yet watered or done anything to the plant besides hack it back when it takes over other plants and surrounding walkways. If we had not done so I doubt you would be able to leave the house through the front door by this point.

The onions have also had a renaissance as when they were engulfed by the squash plant (a victim of mildew and now in the compost heap)(not that we wanted anymore, the squash were watery and we could not figure out how to cook them without them ended up surrounded by a pool of their own endless wateryness or eat them without stimulating the gag reflex) they could not be sat on by the neighborhood cats.

I also found a better way to dry the peppers. I hung a piece of 3-ply twine between two existing hooks in our kitchen "window" with just the right amount of tension. Then it is simple matter to untwist the twine and insert the stem of the pepper. No more laborious knotting. Then when the peppers are dry they can be taken down and fresh peppers put up. Plus its kind of festive!

Sunshine Birthday CCC Wreck

As part of a birthday celebration we were asked to make a cake wreck. After giving it some thought we couldn't think of anything better than a cup cake cake (CCC) to "wreck"erate. A CCC is virtually guaranteed to be a cake wreck. Given our wide array of food sensitivities I made gluten-free and dairy-free cupcakes from a brownie mix we had in the house. They came out a little salty and burned tasting but I figured once we slapped some homemade frosting on them, no one would know the difference. Mmmmm...butter...

Research on the web about wreckerating technique led us to the idea of waaaaaay too many sprinkles and I picked out the clashiest set from the grocery store: it had neon dinosaurs, primary colored cars and circles, regular sprinkles as well as red and blue sugar. It seemed a cruel thing to do to an otherwise fairly tasty creation, but one must make sacrifices for true art. ;)

When assembly began it quickly became apparent that we had very limited CCC transportation options, well actually exactly one, a green glass brownie pan. That color would set off the sprinkles nicely... in a cake wreck kind of way, but the major contribution was that there was only one way to arrange the cup cakes, in a wierd and squat circle. That gave us the idea that we could pretend that the intention all along was to make a beautiful sun but then the forces of wreckiness inevitably had intervened.

This was about halfway through the sprinkle process...

So once the CCC was thoroughly sprinkled (and then some, there was a dash of white sugar thrown on there for good measure) we carefully piped on what looked like neon egg noodles onto the top.

Thoroughly cake wreck!

The big surprise was that the sprinkles did not ruin the flavor and that it was actually completely delicious, even if you could only eat a few bites before it weighed down the gut like the slug of grease it was.

Hot!

Could all of our summer heat been crammed into one week? Could three long cloudy, clammy and cold months be balanced by one week of way too hot and sunny weather and thunderstorms over the mountains? It should never get to 94 degrees on the coast. Never.

However on the positive side, it felt like living in Maui. It was like being transported to the Hawaiian islands for a week vacation minus the jet lag.

Disneyland Carmel Apple: Jack-o'-Lantern

Just in time for Halloween (ok, waaay too early) the jack-0'-lantern Disneyland carmel apple. The day was piping hot and felt more like the summer we never had than the fall but I'm not picky when it comes to these over-priced delights. This one was made with orange-colored sprinkles over white chocolate over caramel with marshmallow ears and a chocolate face. Yum!

Foggy? Sunny?

The weather has surely been strange this summer. But today's weather has been particularly dramatic. Before the sun comes up, it will be clear, but then the sun starts causing the dew to evaporate on the eastern hills and as the sun rises at about 7:30 it does so with a nimbus of mist curling over the ridge. Then the sun-warmed ocean pushes fog inland so when I walk to work around 8:00 am there is no sun or hills to be seen. But then it starts warming up inland and the higher pressure starts to push the fog back out to sea. We live where these two forces meet and quite often it will be foggy to the south and clear and sunny to the north and fairly stable. However today the fog would push halfway up the valley and then back out to sea in a regular hour long cycle, when you looked out a window you never knew what you would see.

New Couch?

We've been putting up with our love-seat/couch ever since we first got it for free from my Boss's son's ex-wife back in 2004. We never liked the original fabric and it never sat quite right on its caster/foot combination. But when it finally started sprouting holes faster than our garden was sprouting mildew and rust it was time for a change. We picked out the second fabric at the first upholsterer's shop we visited and lickety split, new couch. It fit so well in our space that I didn't even realize the couch was back the first time I walked in the door. Gave some people a good chuckle there! We were surprised how much we liked the clean lines and proportions of our old couch once the chicken wire and roses disappeared. Plus the upholsterer got the frame patched up. It turns out that there were only two staples left holding the frame together in some places. It really is like a new couch but even better because we kept it from the landfill and even saved money and time.

Cashew Curry Dip

I've been looking for interesting dip options an this recipe caught my eye. There's no dairy and just a dab of lemon juice. Basically just cashews, curry, seasoning and fresh herbs from the garden. It took a long time to blend in the food processor but the end result is delicious and creamy.

Happy Birthday to...

...an orange box! Good times. :)

Fair Go BOOM

The nightly home entertainment courtesy of the County Fair. We could watch the fireworks from inside the Little House.

Lemon Cucumber Salad

Today I tried the first lemon cucumber from our garden. It doesn't taste like a lemon, the yellow color and round shape give it its name. I was curious to try this instead of a regular cucumber because we don't eat much cucumber and this way there wouldn't be too much at a time.

It sure looks cheerful!

I had some concerns about the fruit because when first picked it still had a bunch of spikes left over from the flower. Once those rubbed off I sliced in. The skin seemed a little thick so I sliced it thin.

A little seasoned rice vinegar, a drip of lemon juice and some home-grown chili pepper flake. Yum!

Garden Omlette

This yummy omlette was filled with zuchini from a friend's garden and flavored with chives and micro onions from our yard. The eggs and cream cheese were store bought. Maybe someday we'll have chickens and a cow? (probably not...)

Caaaaaaaaaaat

I keep thinking our cats are small. And then they do something like Addy streching out on our couch. Admittedly it is only a love seat but she is still very close to being as long as the couch.

BBQ for Birthday

One of our presents for our birthdays was a BBQ. We'd been talking about investing in one for years and were looking forward to doing some FAST cooking for a change. Our kitchen works quite well but the quick application of intense heat is not one of its strengths.

Here you can see how excited Ben is. (I was too, but I was behind the camera so you can't tell)

Here's our first grill project, some steaks. They turned out fairly tasty but bright pink. It turned out to be a non-toxic combustion reaction.

Then we created quite honestly THE BEST BURGER I'VE EVER HAD. It must have been all the planets in alignment because we've cooked burgers again and they were good but not GOOOOOOOOD, like those were. Ben did some magic with the seasoning which shouldn't be a surprise.

Birthday Beach Nite

Cat in a Bag, Pt 2

It annoyed some to no end, but I thought that it was too cute that Addy was in the bag. I'm not sure how she got in there because when she got out Odessa could not get back in.

Cats in the Bag

Well, its official. Now both of our cats have the same obsession:

Fortunately they each have a distinct preference, Odie for paper and Addy for plastic.

:)

And here's Odessa's Amazing Bag Trick:

How does she manage to turn around in a bag that small?!? The world will never know.

Dodder or War of the Worlds

My parents went driving this weekend and encountered a very strange plant. It looks like halloween fright wigs draped on the existing plants. When I first heard about it I thought of the recent version of War of the Worlds:




And it turns out I wasn't far off:



The plant is parasitic but native to California and called dodder or devil's guts, a member of the Cuscuta genus.

Cauliflower Harvest

When we got back from our vacation the garden had gone bonkers. The cheddar cauliflower had more than doubled in size and it was time to harvest.

I went at it with a small kitchen knife and stripped away all the leaves before hacking away at the stem.

That sucker was bigger than my head! We'll be eating cauliflower all week! It was super sweet and delicious and even though it had some bugs in it (I soaked, sprayed and visually inspected all the nooks and crannies but I'm sure there was some extra "organic" protein in there...) but nothing munched on it unlike the poor cabbage. That thing the slugs loved and it's starting to bolt.

The Singing Bird

So this is the Trader Joe's card I'm always talking about that helped my change my attitude for the better.

I'm slowly coming to accept the fact that I am a pessimist. It seems like every few years my natural mental habits lead me to a place where all I ever think about (and stress about) is what can go wrong next. When I get like that there is no break, no down time and no peace. "Think Positive" has never worked for me because it feels as false and as forced as my own predominantly negative thinking. The words on this card crystalized for me what I had been doing wrong in my thinking: not leaving room in my perception of the future for the possibility of positive things to happen. So I don't have to think positive (that will probably never happen unless I have a mental breakdown) but to pause and acknowledge that for all the negative things I just got done envisioning in the future there's at least that many positive things that COULD happen as well and I don't have to try to figure out what they might be. Very meta-thinking I know. :) I think other people must do this naturally.

I especially like that the thing promised is not a cheesy happy thing or even a lucky break but alludes to establishing a natural relationship (between branch and bird) and the imagery of creating a place within me to attract positive thinking.

Enjoy the card!

Green Day

This morning I participated in C4's USGBC float trying to help promote Green Building in the area and just generally enjoy the beautiful day! It was a very long parade and unfortunately our electric cart didn't make the whole route. :( So we pulled off the parade route a little early.

Ben got to see the Saint Patrick's Day parade from Main Street hoping to catch me by surprise since he hadn't told me he'd headed down. But since we left the parade route we totally missed each other. We both got back to the house about the same time where we discovered the parade had left its mark on me!
After we slept off the fresh kettlecorn Ben picked up at the farmer's market we made our first spinach harvest.

Wilted spinach salad with carmelized onions. Yummy.

Music in River City

We had the privilege of viewing one of the best high school productions of one of the best musicals ever! Worth every penny.

Chains

Yesterday Ben and I headed for the slopes to go snowboarding for the first time since April 20th, 2008 (I found a receipt in my jacket pocket). On Friday we had tried using our old Prius snow chains on the new Prius and found that the new Prius no longer has freakishly small tires. The tires were just outside the range for the old Prius chains and we thought we'd try the chains from the Tacoma and the tires were just under the range of those chains. No big deal, I thought, we'll just pick some up today before we leave town. HA! After half a dozen phone calls and visits to two auto parts store we found out that people in Ventura only want to buy cheap almost impossible to install chains nothing like the great ones that we had.

So we hit the road the next morning to ominous but gorgeous skies and crossed our fingers hoping to find chains closer to the mountains. I had finally had some luck with a Kragan and a Napa Auto Parts near San Bernardino. Napa was closer to the freeway so we tried there. When we got to the Google specified address it wasn't there, but we stopped by a Napa service center who said that the store had moved about 15 minutes away. When we got there the didn't have the chains I wanted but something similar (not as grippy or as easy to install) but we were running out of time so we got them anyways.

Heading up the mountain it felt pretty silly to have had to have gone through all that hassle to get the chains. Not a spec of snow anywhere on the road or margins. But it's always better to be safe than sorry.

We had a great time on the slopes and headed back to the car around 4:30 so we could make it home decently early and let the cats have some fun before calling it a day. Before we got done packing up the car it had started snowing a little but it was still at least 42 degrees out and plenty light. But we hadn't gotten more than 10 miles down the road before that all changed.

All that snow on the car and around it is about 5 minutes old. The temperature had dropped to 30 degrees and the road had turned into wet slippery slush. We stopped to put on chains because everyone in front of us had stopped because a Volkswagen SUV was spinning their wheels like crazy and only sliding sideways. By the time we got them on (5:30) the Volkswagen had somehow managed to make it around the corner and the snowplows had rocketed past. Traffic was barely moving between 5 & 10 mph. About 75% of people didn't have chains or else we would have been going AT LEAST 15 mph. That snowmobile definitely wasn't holding anyone up.
6:00 - The defrosters on high and wipers on the windshield and rear window are barely cutting it. The snow was falling so fast you wouldn't even know the snowmobile had gone by.
6:30 - By this point in time we had passed at least 10 cars that had spun out or crashed into other vehicles. Still averaging 7 mph with frequent stops when someone looses control. Honestly it was like getting stuck in horrible traffic on the freeway. When you get up to where the trouble is you get some satisfaction from seeing a horrible pile-up. It give some meaning to all the wasted time. So every set of skidding tracks heading towards the guard rail, every 4-wheeled SUV thinking they didn't need chains sliding sideways, every fancy BMW spun around backwards was satisfying on a fundamental level.
7:00 - here the snow was falling so thickly we couldn't see the sign to go from the 18 to the 330 and ended up on a narrow, unplowed residential street about 10 feet from another sliding Volkswagen this time trying to pull a U turn and instead sliding straight towards us. We got turned around and back on track.
7:30 - We finally dropped below the snow line, took off the chains and were able to "speed down" the rest of the mountain at 30 mph. There were so few people going by that we started to wonder if traffic got completely stuck behind us. There was a Hummer behind us with no chains that spun out right behind us at one point.

We didn't hit the freeway until 8:15 a solid 3 hours (took about a half hour heading up the mountain) after we left the ski resort parking lot. That's the left over snow on the car there.

I guess those chains were a good idea after all.