Why yes, I am blogging from the middle of the ocean. I have to purchase some Internet time here on the ship at the luxury rate of about a bajillion dollars a minute so that I can do a little work, so I figured in for a penny, in for a pound---you get a piece of me, too. Lucky you! Yesterday was a VERY long day. It turns out that the business of getting to the port, meeting up with eight other people in your party, getting through security and check-in, and then finally boarding the damn ship takes quite a while. And then just as you're thinking to yourself, "Wow, I'm on a floating city and...
My my my. Y'all had a lot to say about beets. Some of your comments made me laugh out loud. It appears that no one is neutral on beets; they're one of those love-em-or-hate-em foods for most of you. Interesting. Naturally, I took this as a sign that you wanted a whole 'nother post mostly about beets, so that's what I did over at Five Full Plates. Feel the love! Or revulsion! Your choice! What, you don't like beets? Okay, how about a peek at this year's garden? MAH BABIES! MAH BABY SQUASHES! The garden is slow going this year, because I got the brilliant idea in my head to grow everything...
Friends, Romans, fellow Farmer's Market nerds: I need your input. One of the things we do when we go camping is prepare a bunch of food ahead to make meal prep in the wilderness as easy as possible. So---just for example---the second time I attempted falafel, it was delicious and I froze half the (cooked) batch and then we threw it in a pan and heated it up in our wee little camper oven for dinner one night. Easy peasy. Also, I made a trip to the Farmer's Market before we left and got some beautiful beets, which I roasted and made into this amazing salad concoction with caramelized sweet...
So things have been pretty uneventful for the last 24 hours. HAHAHAHAHAAAAAAAAAAAAA! I am funny! When we last left off, we were busy packing up to head to South Carolina, gosh darnit, sickness and goopy eyes be damned. There was just one thing we had to take care of before we left, and that was an exterminator visit. It took a few days to schedule, but Licorice continued to be haunted by the mystery creature under the house even though Otto thought he'd sealed up all access to the crawlspace, and I remained convinced that there was a very crafty possum, and possibly crafty possum offspring,...
I would just like to apologize proactively to... uhhhh... well, I guess the entire state of South Carolina. I'm sorry. But maybe that's the wrong place to start. Where I should start is with this: Hey, for MONTHS we've been looking forward to this weekend's camping trip! Yay! We load up approximately enough food, clothing and sundries to last us for a month in the desert, and then we drive a while and set up in the wilderness and then... sit around and read. (When Nerds Camp: The Boringness, coming soon to a really crappy theater near you!) But, see, camping is DIFFERENT than being at home,...
I am becoming a damn hippie in my old age. One of the things I like best about working from home is that it gives me the flexibility to do lots of things I could never do when I spent the majority of my day out of the house. Things like cooking and baking stuff that requires a lot of time between steps (even if not a lot of actual effort). Really, I thought I'd reached the pinnacle of hippiedom when I started making my own granola on a regular basis. Because... CRUNCHY GRANOLA HIPPIE, right? But I was wrong. That was just the tip of the hippie iceberg. In the spirit of this month's Get Your...
Hi, would you like to buy a Funk? It's used---I used it quite a lot the last few days, to be honest---but it's got lots of moping left in it, I'm sure. It's available, cheap. I'm trying to quit. By the time the kids got home yesterday, I had my feet back under me. There is a certain arrogance in being unhappy when leading what is fundamentally a good and blessed and lucky life, isn't there? I mean, that's not to say that my (or your) problems aren't real and challenging, just that the Right and Mature thing to do, after a while, is to say to yourself, "Self, time to suck it up and deal."...
My skin-flint-ed-ness (totally a word) is so legendary, that back over the holidays when we sprang for a new television set, everyone I told thought it was a joke (including my own children). Because I don't spend money like that. Ever. So when Otto's mom gave us her car three years ago, I (predictably) said "Oh! Free car! YAY!" and gave up any thoughts of replacing the car I'd sold before I moved down here. Because free is my very favorite price, and my favorite kind of car is the kind with four wheels and a steering mechanism and a working engine. Now, I'm not a car person. Otto IS a car...
I am coming to you live from the new and improved Woulda Coulda Shoulda, which was redone to match the new and improved Want Not, which pretty much makes me squeal with glee every time I look at it. If you're looking for a crack team of web designers, I heartily recommend the folks over at LEAP. They not only made everything gorgeous, they totally put up with my truckload of neuroses while they did it. And I'm pretty sure they didn't even charge me any extra. Anyway, I spent about twelve hours yesterday sitting here at my desk, programming stores into Want Not's new little mini-marketplace...
