Eric is a cooking maniac - he made vanilla ice cream from scratch (I put up a photo on Facebook). Now Zoe has decided she wants to watch cooking videos too. The funny part is, Eric likes watching a British cook (Cupcake Jemma) so he got a special scale to convert grams to cups, and we always have to convert the cooking temperature to Fahrenheit. For these cupcakes, it's 335 degrees.
Posts
2016's latest loss...Carrie Fisher. A Facebook friend wrote a heartfelt tribute - she grew up imagining she was Carrie Fisher during boring math classes, lulls during vacation, stressful moments at camp. I never imagined I was Carrie Fisher, but I read her books, enjoying her wry sense of humor. There's a popular tweet that says, "Honor Carrie Fisher: normalize mental illness and its treatment, take life a little less seriously, destroy a fascist regime."
We're in Massachusetts and Eric is making some super-complicated chocolate chip cookies that require moscavado sugar, which he made from white sugar and molasses. Now I've got sugar on my toes, which sounds like a super-tactile Maya Angelou poem. Sugar on my toes And don't I know It's never sweet enough
We're staying at a hotel in Danvers...it's amazing! It got renovated since the last time I stayed here, about 6 years ago. And the hot tub is working again. (We often use the swimming pool and hot tub even when we're not staying at the hotel.) Zoe and I went swimming in the hot tub and pool - I preferred the hot tub, she preferred the pool. Now we're watching TV, which is always a huge novelty for the kids because we don't have one at home. We got rid of it after Eric was born in 2008 because we weren't really watching it. I remember before he was born, we were watching "Big Love," but after he was born, we just couldn't keep up with the convoluted plot lines. I think it's off the air now.
Thoughts for how we can resist the Trump presidency... We should focus on winning small battles. Keep the heat on him for four years in every way. Andrea Boccelli decided not to sing at his inauguration because of pressure from us. It will kill him not to have any big names performing at his inauguration. Also turning off the TV on Inauguration Day. Wearing a resist T-shirt on Inauguration Day. Showing him in ways large and small that we will never accept him. The steady drip drip of Chinese water torture.
I'm a little under the weather and I had a baked sweet potato for dinner. It was delicious - 45-60 minutes at 425. It caramelized a bit. Might be good with some marshmallows mixed in. I was at H&M earlier. There's a weird divide at that store - stuff I love and wear all the time, and stuff I wouldn't be caught dead in. I found a jacket in the former category. Only $49.99 with a nice, roomy, faux fur-trimmed hood.
Another good one from Marian Keyes. She has a section in her book called "Saying Goodbye" and how she hates it. She says her social battery is drained by the end of a party so it's hard for her to "give good goodbye." The whole thing reminded me of one of MIL's jokes: "The British leave without saying goodbye; the Yiddish say goodbye without leaving." There's a lot of truth to it, and in this respect I am definitely British! Marian also wrote, "According to a personality quiz, I'm an extreme introvert, which means I can only handle other people in small bursts of time." I think those quizzes only need one question: Would you rather -- 1) go out? 2) stay in with a book?
I'm reading Making It Up As I Go Along by Marian Keyes. It wasn't available on the Kindle or in the U.S. at all (I ordered it from a third-party seller on Amazon who turned out to be in the U.K.). Sometimes when a book isn't easily available, there's a reason - it's not very good. This one, however, is funny. In one section, she talks about her trip to Laos and how she put her "anti-mad tablets" on the "bedside yoke" so she could have them in the morning. When she woke up, however, she discovered they had all been eaten by bugs or "small beasts unknown" who were in "top form" all day. That tickled me.
So Ivanka will be taking over First Lady duties, environmental policy, childcare policy, and run Trump's business. She will move to DC while Melania stays behind. Meanwhile, Trump will continue to be an executive producer for Celebrity Apprentice, which means that NBC will pay him *and* report on him. D pointed out that it would be worse if Trump were paying NBC and they were reporting on him. Still, it seems awfully muddled. I read that the conflicts of interest are simply too many to untangle and eliminate.
Root vegetable soup
I'm making a root vegetable soup from the Times. 6 tbsp butter, onion, celery...saute...then add 3 branches of rosemary, 3 cloves garlic, 2 bay leaves, 3 1/2 cups root vegetables cut in 1-inch chunks, 2 tsp salt, pepper and 7-8 cups of water. For the root vegetables, you can use any combination of sweet potato, potato, parsnips, carrots, turnips and/or rutabaga. I ended up using sweet potato, parsnips and carrots. You bring to a boil, simmer for 30-40 minutes, take out the rosemary branches and puree with an immersion blender. Then you can add the juice from half a lemon and a little more salt if you want. Now I'm wondering whether to puree it or not. I'll leave it for now. Update: I pureed it but left chunks. One of the best soups I've made.
Salad
You can download software on your laptop that will replace Donald's face on the news with images of salad.
Trump seems to be dragging his feet appointing a secretary of state. I think Romney would be great. But some Trumpers are mad at him for criticizing Trump. (But so did Nikki Haley, who still got a cabinet position.) And as my mom put it, "He's not crazy enough." Hopefully Trump will appoint him anyway.
Remember...
When presidents had a little dignity? Trump has assaulted women, failed to pay his contractors, embezzled from his foundation, has massive conflicts of interest, settled a fraud lawsuit for $25 million (obvious admission of guilt, even though he won't say it), destroyed emails in lawsuits, lied like crazy...yet he has a Teflon effect like I've never seen. Moreover, he won't move to the White House! It costs NYC $1 million a day to protect him. (Actually, that's the one thing I can relate to him about. I like to sleep in my own bed too.)
Today
I spent 3 and a half hours with Zoe's kindergarten class. It was fun, and they were cute, but it was exhausting! I don't know how the teacher does it. Granted, a music teacher & a dance teacher came, so the teacher got to be "off" for 2 hours. But still. My mother in law was a first grade teacher for 5 years before becoming a guidance counselor, and she said it was very tiring.
So Trump refused to meet with the New York Times initially, saying they were "nasty" and accusing NBC of giving him "too many chins." Today he gave in and met with them, and said some things that made him seem more sane/empathetic. He said he is not going to prosecute HRC, "she has suffered greatly." He said he doesn't really like the electoral college and would have preferred to win the popular vote. I agree with him on the electoral college - I saw some math on Facebook - a Wyoming citizen's vote is worth 362% of a Californian's vote. He went on to say that he has "an open mind" about the Paris climate change accord. He disavowed and condemned the alt-right movement, though he wouldn't admit that Steve Bannon was a part of it. So that was disappointing. But it would be amazing if he doesn't mess up the climate.
It's funny, I saw Hamilton a year and 2 months ago. No one had heard of it, and D had to talk me into it. "A play about Alexander Hamilton? All rap?" I wasn't sure it would work. It was very good (and also a little sad; both Hamilton and his son died in duels, which were held in New Jersey, because "everything is legal in New Jersey). There was a haunting scene where Hamilton and Burr got into a boat and pretended to row across the river to duel.
Another good soup
I made another good slow cooker soup. 1 cup dried white beans (I used Great Northern) 1 can diced tomatoes Chopped onion, carrot & celery 2 bay leaves 1 sprig rosemary Drizzle of extra virgin olive oil Water Chopped zucchini (add near the end) Parmesan rind Salt 3-4 cloves chopped garlic Another good antidote to election stress - James Taylor.
Chickpea vegetable soup
I threw together a slow cooker chickpea soup which came out really well, so I'll write it down here. My jumping-off point was a non-slow cooker recipe in the Times. 1 cup dried chickpeas (no need to soak them) Parmesan rind 1 can diced tomatoes (14 oz) 2 bay leaves 1-2 sprigs rosemary 3 cloves of garlic, chopped 1 onion, chopped 2 carrots, chopped 2 celery stalks, chopped Water (you can decide how much to use) Drizzle of extra virgin olive oil Put everything in the slow cooker and cook on low for about 5 hours. Alternatively, you could give the chickpeas and water a head start for an hour or so before adding everything else. The vegetables were completely tender but the chickpeas were slightly crunchy (but still very good).
Knit
I can't help reading the news, but I'm making a point of setting it aside each day and knitting. It helps. I'm making a red sweater for Zoe.
DAPL
A neighbor/family friend was arrested at the Dakota Pipeline protest in New York yesterday. She sent me a video of the "paddy wagon."
Resistance
When Hillary lost, I felt helpless. What I didn't realize was that opportunities would come up every day. Call Nancy Pelosi to ask her to investigate voter suppression in WI, FL, NC. Call your local rep & ask that s/he refuse to work with the Trump transition team until Steve Bannon is removed. Sign a petition asking the electors to vote for Hillary, in deference to the popular vote. (4 million signatures and counting). Help Foster Campbell get elected to the Louisiana Senate (resulting in 51-49 Senate, instead of 52-48). Donate to environmental groups, gun control groups, the ACLU. Donate to Chris Murphy, the senator who vigorously opposes gun control. As Rep. John Lewis would say, #goodtrouble.
I came up with a slow cooker recipe, and it came out well, so I'll write it down here. Olive oil 1 sliced onion 2 sliced carrots 2-3 stalks celery, chopped 1/2 tbsp minced garlic 1/2 tsp each dried basil, oregano, rosemary, thyme Salt About 3 cups low sodium vegetable broth; added a little water 1 can tomato paste 1 chopped zucchini A few handfuls of swiss chard 1 cup dried red kidney beans About 1 cup dried Great Northern beans 1/3 cup soup shells Saute the onion in olive oil until lightly browned. Combine the onions and everything else in the slow cooker (except for the soup shells, swiss chard and zucchini). Cook the soup shells in boiling water for 5 minutes. Set aside the soup shells, swiss chard and zucchini. Cook everything else in the slow cooker for 4-5 hours on low (or until beans are reasonably tender). Add soup shells, swiss chard and zucchini and cook for 20 minutes more.
Ugh
I've never felt this bad about election results. I feel actual fear that we will become a fascist nation. But there was a call with Hillary for her supporters. She said that we should get involved with defending the causes that Trump is a threat to, the causes that are important to us. So I donated to an environmental group and a gun control group. It did make me feel better.
Coexist
I guess we're going to have to coexist with people who voted for Trump. But I feel for Obama too. I saw a closeup of his face as he was shaking Trump's hand, and it was bleak. This was not what he wanted. His staff looked like someone had died. I guess something did - the American dream. At least for four years. Whoever runs in 2020, I'll campaign hard for them, and if he wins again, I'll go ballistic.
Some of my male cousins voted for Trump. One of the same cousins is crusading to end the pipeline. Um, Trump's personal investments ride on the completion of the pipeline. http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/11/10/what-trump-victory-means-standing-rock Did my cousin really think Trump was going to be a friend to the environment? Only comfort is, my male cousins all live in Massachusetts, so their votes for Trump meant diddly-squat.
This election is pissing me off! She won the popular vote. A coalition of working-class whites elected Trump. Why do they think he will help them? He refused to negotiate with his Vegas hotel union. He is NOT a friend of unions or the working class. It's abundantly clear that Trump is not interested in anyone but himself. He is a textbook narcissist. What are these working-class whites rebelling against? 8 years of prosperity and 30 million jobs added? Why don't they thank Obama for the auto bailout ?
A few more calls
I made 20 more calls today so far. One woman said, "Of course!" when I asked if she was voting for Hillary.
Stamina
Hillary's schedule today: Noon - Pittsburgh 4:00 - Michigan 7:30 - Philly with Bill Clinton, Barack Obama, Michelle Obama, Chelsea Clinton, Bon Jovi, Bruce Springsteen Midnight - North Carolina with Bill Clinton, Lady Gaga, Bon Jovi Wow!
Pantsuit Nation
I was invited to join a secret group on Facebook - Pantsuit Nation. It's a collection of posts, stories from mostly women and some men, about voting for Hillary and the excitement of voting for our first woman president (I hope). Some people waited for 3-4 hours to vote early. One woman's Clinton yard sign was stolen, so she mowed an H into her lawn. One woman's mother told her, shortly before dying, "If you don't vote for Hillary, I'm going to come back and haunt you." One guy wrote, "I'm a guy who voted for Hillary because Trump is evil, and by the way, I'm single" - followed by a winking smiley. Overall, the page is just so positive and life-affirming, in the midst of great anxiety.
200 calls now. And it was a great day for it. Everyone I spoke to was a Hillary supporter, and many had already voted. I always call Ohio, they're very polite...and an important swing state. There was a New York Times article where you could play with outcomes. I figured out that if Hillary wins Florida and Pennsylvania, she's basically safe. If she wins Florida and Pennsylvania, plus one other swing state (like Ohio, North Carolina, Virginia, etc.), she's 100% safe. So I looked at the list of phone banks to see if there were any in Florida or Pennsylvania, but I didn't see any. So I will stick to Ohio for now.
Fingers crossed
Just made some more calls for Hillary - apparently I have made 37 calls now. Keeping my fingers crossed for next Tuesday. (I got a Blogger app that is compatible with iOS 10, but it makes me title every post.)
Comey
I'm so annoyed with James Comey right now. His timing couldn't be worse. 11 days from the election, he makes this announcement. And it will probably be nothing.
Zoe just got a bunch of early birthday presents from my mother and sister. She was thrilled. "I love all my presents!" she said. 'They wanted to give me presents before my birthday. That's nice!" It made me kind of nostalgic for childhood, when presents make you ecstatic. Most adults are kind of "eh" about presents.
I don't like the iOS 10 update on my phone. It requires an extra step to unlock your phone and it's not compatible with the Blogger app. So I'll have to blog from my laptop like a Cro-Magnon; much easier to include photos when I'm blogging from my phone. Now I have to email them to myself, download them, and attach them. (First world problems.) I went on a field trip to Governor's Island with Zoe's class today. They have the longest slide in NYC; also good views of the Statue of Liberty. I also made white bean soup in the slow cooker today. Very simple, but tasty. You use 2 cups dried Great Northern beans (no need to soak them), a bay leaf, a chopped onion, 6 cloves of garlic and 6-7 cups of water. Then you cook it on low until the beans are tender, and you can use an immersion blender to puree it, and add a little extra virgin olive oil and salt. I added about a teaspoon of salt and a drizzle of oil. I also left some chunks in when I pureed it, becaus...
Last night I saw Alexander McCall Smith at Barnes & Noble. He spoke for over an hour to an appreciative audience. I've read most of his books and the others seemed to as well. It was a nice community. Finally he said, "I'm getting concerned looks from management," and started to sign books. He wore a kilt and bowed at the end of the reading.
Pinterest is the best for slow cooker recipes. I'm currently cooking this white bean vegetable soup . This kale soup and veggie pot pie are on deck. (I learned that expression from my old ob/gyn when Zoe was about 37 weeks. I asked, "How much longer?" and my ob/gyn said, "She's on deck." The ob/gyn also did stand-up, hopefully not mentioning any of her patients). The veggie pot pie in particular is intriguing. I've tried several iterations of it, all of which involve making your own dough, and this version looks good and not labor-intensive.
It just struck me that when I started this blog in 2005, I had no idea I'd eventually be writing most of my blog posts on my phone. And I think my first entry was about Tom Cruise and Katie Holmes! I made Tuscan white bean soup from Pinterest today. It was a kitchen-sink soup with tomatoes, celery, carrots, onion, zucchini, summer squash, cannellini beans, kale, broth, olive oil, garlic, rosemary, thyme, red pepper flakes, sugar, salt, pepper, and white wine vinegar. I liked it.
I like using the crockpot to cook steel-cut oats overnight, but they do tend to catch on the sides of the pot. That's what happens cooking on low. So last night I decided to cook them on warm (the lowest setting). It worked perfectly. They cooked, and have a nice nutty flavor, but they didn't catch. (I put in 1 cup of steel-cut oats, 4 cups of soy milk, and 3 Tbsp brown sugar.)
I stayed up way too late watching the debate last night. We all did. Eric said he didn't want to miss a minute. The boys stayed up later, watching the post-debate commentary. Even after Zoe was asleep, though, I had trouble falling asleep because of all the adrenaline from the debate. It was riveting TV, but Trump is a huge a--hole.
Just read an article in the Times, very disturbing, about the horrible torture of detainees in secret CIA prisons post-9/11. Many of them were held without explanation, and one out of four were wrongly detained. Trump wants to bring back "waterboarding and worse." Another reason not to vote for him...as if you needed one!
The soup was good. Next time I make it, I would use less water (1-2 cups less). I would also purée less of it - though I got to use the immersion blender, and that was fun. It's actually pink (the blender, not the soup). I cut the potatoes in smaller pieces than the recipe required, and I'm glad I did that. Not tiny pieces, though.
I just finished Winter Storms by Elin Hilderbrand. It was the third book in the Quinn family trilogy, set on Nantucket (like all of her novels). She is one of my favorites. A couple of fun things from the book: a local band called Four Easy Payments; and a scene where a character "sabers" champagne (slicing off the top of the bottle with a saber). Don't try this at home...
Eric got home from school and made guacamole and hot chocolate from scratch. Guacamole: ripe avocado, chopped red onion, chopped tomato, salt. Hot chocolate: 1/3 cup hot water, 1/4 cup cocoa powder, 1/2 cup sugar - bring to a boil. Boil for one minute, stirring. Lower heat and add 3 1/2 to 4 cups milk - heat through, but don't boil. Remove from heat and add 1 tsp vanilla extract.
We all stayed up too late watching the debate last night - the kids got into it too. Trump interrupted Hillary 29 times (NYT counted) and once Zoe looked at me and asked, "When is Hillary gonna talk again?" I thought she was masterful. Calm, focused, determined, a leader. And not shrill - many have criticized her voice - something they would never do to a male candidate. She has to do everything a male candidate does 20 times better. And she certainly did in this case! Trump is a joke and the scope of his lies is unmatched (LA Times). My favorite part was when she called him out on his chauvinism near the end - he tried to deny that he called women pigs, slobs and dogs; that he said pregnancy was an inconvenience to an employer; that he said women should only get equal pay if they work harder - and Bloomberg TV was fact-checking the whole thing live.
We went to a fancy restaurant for D's birthday. It was all vegetarian and very delicious. Zoe and I had the Yukon potato fry bread (thin, crisp bread with potato filling and cheese and sour cream and radish. Very delicious but not low carb. I have a date with the exercise bike when we get back.) We also shared crudités with hummus. Eric had gnocchi and D had cauliflower tempura.
I just got Zoe's class list and I've been thinking about where to have her birthday party. She wants to have it at a kids' chain that has several locations in the city. I also just got an email from this chain offering me $115 off anything I do there (including a birthday party). So that is good. The question is, which location? I'm planning to invite her old class (they all live on the Upper West Side), a few neighborhood friends, and her new class. The new class is scattered through the city, but the most popular zip code (the class list gives zip codes but not full addresses) is the east side, 27th to 41st Street. The chain has a location near the old class (Upper West Side) AND a location near that popular zip code. I don't know which one to pick. The old class is a small group (9), but it's nice to see them; one of them had a birthday party earlier in the month. The new class is a larger group (24), but I don't know them too well yet. The rest of the ...
The Hill says that Hillary regained her 5-point lead over Trump nationwide. Democrats are nervous because it's so close. But we don't need a big lead, necessarily. JFK beat Nixon by one half of one percent in 1960 - about 300,000 votes. And Gary Johnson is revealing himself to be an idiot (no idea where Aleppo is and wants to abolish the Department of Homeland Security), so hopefully he won't divert too many votes from Hillary. And Jill Stein only cares about legalizing marijuana.
So now Trump has suggested that Hillary's bodyguards disarm themselves and "see what happens to her." Why is this chump still in the race? Actually, I'm beginning to think he's something more dangerous than that - a full-fledged sociopath. And definitely a textbook narcissist, with inflated self-worth and no empathy. Is America so deeply sexist that we can't see what's wrong with him and what's right with her?
Trump has asked gun owners to kill Hillary, continues to deny that Obama was born in the US, has questionable business dealings overseas that would put US national security at risk, wants to deport Mexicans and break up families in the process, urged Russia to look for Hillary's missing emails, stolen thousands of dollars (possibly millions) from thousands of people through the Trump University scam (including a couple who had to short-sell their home to avoid foreclosure), won't release his tax returns, calls women "pigs," says that women would get paid the same as men if they worked harder, accepted the endorsement of KKK leader David Duke, has read Mein Kampf and adopted many of Hitler's principles, etc. WHY IS THERE EVEN A CONTEST? Some people think that Hillary "lies," but saying that bullets were being shot near your plane (when they weren't) is a bush-league lie compared to the massive-scale fraud perpetrated by Trump University. Thousands...
As one of Hillary's "strongest supporters," I was invited to take part in a conference call featuring...Bill Clinton! It was surreal to hear his voice coming out of my phone. His Southern accent is strong and the connection was weak, but he said things like, "It would be easy to choose anger over answers, but it would be a mistake. It would be easy to choose resentment over empowerment, but it would be a mistake." He also talked a bit about voter suppression. Feeling starstruck right now...
I took Zoe to the Central Park Zoo with a neighborhood friend and her kids today. Sadly, the polar bear I saw with Eric in 2009 is no longer there. He died 4 years ago, at age 30. I have a photo of Eric pressing his hand against the bear's paw through the glass. We did get to feed the alpacas and pose with a seal... And some bunny rabbits...
I just saw an email that said, "New York Greenwich Village Preschool Registration Now Open," and I thought, "That's cute." Then I remembered my kids are too old for preschool. We found out who Zoe's kindergarten teacher will be. I had heard about the intense, neurotic teacher and the nice, nurturing teacher. She got the nice, nurturing one.
It's funny how kids can surprise you. Before Eric was born, I had a mental list of books I would get for him, books that I really liked when I was a kid, and hoped he might enjoy also. He has liked a number of them (Anastasia Krupnik, Laura Ingalls Wilder), but Beverly Cleary, Judy Blume, and Anne of Green Gables didn't grab him as much (though he's read some of them). A lot of stuff he reads, I've never read - Pippi Longstocking, the Boxcar Children, the Wizard of Oz series.
I can feel myself calming down about the election now that things seem to be going Hillary's way (KNOCK ON WOOD LOUDLY). Seriously, though, he seems to be the biggest disaster that ever ran for president. I can't remember this much negative coverage on any presidential candidate. I remember the Dogs Against Romney, when Romney put his dog on the roof of his car for 650 miles or something like that. But that's the most damning thing I can remember. Also, George W. Bush saying "nucular" instead of "nuclear." He was a disaster too, of course. But somehow no one comes close to Trump. The former head of the CIA is endorsing Hillary, warning that Trump could be a threat to national security. This morning, I finished Heroes of the Frontier by Dave Eggers. He wrote about a single mother and two children gallivanting around Alaska. I got the sense that Alaska was the literal frontier in the book, but parenting was the symbolic frontier. He wasn't too heavy-...
You don't need the X-rays
I just read a New York Times article about bite wing X-rays at the dentist's office. The article said that dentists tend to overuse them. According to the American Dental Association, you only need them every 2-3 years unless you are unusually susceptible to cavities or gum disease. My dentist does them every 6 months! I turned them down when I was pregnant. The level of radiation in a bite wing x-ray is relatively low, but the effects of radiation are cumulative, so each x-ray is an unnecessary risk, increasing the chances of cancer down the road. Brain tumors are more prevalent in those who have frequent bite wing x-rays. This was all very interesting to me because my mother always asked for fewer x-rays for me. My Massachusetts dentist said, "You would get more radiation walking through Danvers Square." Turns out he was wrong...what matters is the cumulative effect, not the level of the individual dose. My mom was right.
I re-followed The New Yorker & The New York Times...I don't want to be uninformed...but it really is a lot of bad news. The first thing I saw was an article about the nightclub shooting in Fort Myers, Florida. It's really high time for meaningful federal gun control. Hawaii is the hardest state in which to get a gun, with strict background checks and a registry of gun owners. Of course, it helps that Hawaii is very isolated and they can control their borders. But I believe the nation as a whole should follow its lead.
I'm trying not to obsess about politics too much...but I find it outrageous that David Duke, former KKK leader, enthusiastically endorses Trump and praised his speech at the convention, claiming "it said it all." Why is anyone voting for this man???? And don't get me started on the third party candidates, Gary Johnson and Jill Stein. If you vote for them, they are not going to win (they have a tiny share of the overall vote). So if you vote for them, you are voting for Trump. Even if you don't love Hillary, you have to acknowledge that Trump is a nut and a fascist, and keeping him out of office should take precedence over everything else. So vote for Hillary!!!! She's the only one who can keep him out of office.
I grew up in Danvers but never really learned my way around Boston. I knew the basic T stops. But my niece, who goes on long jaunts with my brother, is already comfortable parallel parking on Newbury Street (for ice cream). I was impressed! I never really learned to parallel park. It's on the New York driver's test, but not the Massachusetts one. We just had to do a three-point turn.
I just made the chilaquiles from the Moosewood Lowfat Cookbook. Now I wish I had made them before. I made some changes (less cheese, skip the second layer of salsa), but they're really good. (I also used pinto beans because I like them better than black beans.) I've had that cookbook since 1998 or so, and I never tried that particular recipe. I wish those recipes were flagged somehow..."psst, don't flip past us."
I just finished Siracusa by Delia Ephron. Some people compared it to Rashomon because of the shifting viewpoints. It reminded me more of The Bad Seed (an old, campy, yet chilling movie about an evil child) or a Hitchcock movie (To Catch a Thief comes to mind...set in France, not Italy, but had a similar feel).
She was wearing sandals!!
So D's friend J had a low-key bachelor party tonight (something called Escape the Room, where a team has to follow clues to escape a room, then a meal at a restaurant where we used to go a lot, but haven't in a while, so the waiter was asking D where he had been). Anyway, J had been married once before, but it ended badly. When we went to his first wedding, I apparently wore a dress and sandals, and his wife privately flipped out, saying to J, "She was wearing sandals!" I can't even remember what sandals they were. Maybe Birkenstocks. That seems like the only kind of sandal worth flipping out over. And I used to wear them all the time until they started hurting my feet. I'm wearing sandals to the 2nd wedding, too, though they are black and a little fancier.
I'm reading First Women, about First Ladies in the White House. Lots of interesting details. LBJ proposed to Lady Bird the day after they met, but she wasn't sure. (She was smart and shy...she purposely answered questions wrong on tests at school so she wouldn't have to be valedictorian or salutatorian and make a speech.) So he kept writing her letters and finally showed up on her doorstep with a $2.50 ring from Sears Roebuck. I guess that did it. Then he was a jerk for a while, criticizing her appearance and telling her not to wear "saddlebag" clothes. He changed his tune after she nursed him back to health after a heart attack, and she also became more assertive (handing him notes that said "That's enough" during a long speech, and when that didn't work, tugging on his lapel to make him sit down.)
Well, I just watched FBI Director James Comey's statement about Hillary's email. I was quite worried especially because of Bill's ill-advised meeting with Loretta Lynch and the fact that Comey is a Republican. Fortunately, he seemed tough but fair. He said that Hillary and the DOJ as a whole were careless about classified emails, and some of her emails were top secret, but there is no evidence that "hostile actors" got a hold of it (though they may have without our knowledge) and there is no evidence of intentional misconduct, and therefore no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case. I was immensely relieved. I really do think Hillary would be good...she's the only candidate with a strong, consistent gun control record. Bernie voted in favor of the Charleston loophole, which enables you to purchase a gun after 3 days regardless of whether your background check was completed, and his vote helped make the Charleston church shooting possible. He also vote...
Well, that helped me relax. The Poconos aren't glamorous or exciting like Miami, but there are a lot of tall shady pine trees and winding streets that are good for biking. It helped me forget the whole possibility of a Hillary indictment (based on Bill's bad judgment). Maybe I should just not read the news. We went to the pool today and will probably go there again tomorrow. And then we'll take a train back around 5pm.
Just saw an article saying that the attorney general will accept the FBI's recommendation re: whether to press charges against Hillary for the email. The FBI is seen as stricter than the DOJ. I wish everyone would shut up about the email. Don't they realize the alternative would be President Trump, the biggest disaster the country has ever seen? (Second only to W.)
I'm going to the Poconos tomorrow. My in-laws have a house there. It's in the middle of nowhere. But the kids love it. Or at least Eric does. It will be Zoe's first time. She's looking forward to scooping her own ice cream. I haven't been there in 7 years. It's a little isolated for my taste, and there's always the chance that a Shining situation could develop. (Kidding. Mostly.) But D bought a bike which I can ride (his father drove it over there today). And I have the option of coming back early. I'll try to take some pictures.
I just finished They May Not Mean To But They Do by Cathleen Schine. The title is a reference to Philip Larkin. Anyway, it was a book about an 86-year-old woman living in New York City, and her family. I really liked it. It struck me I haven't read many books about getting older. And there was this gentle humor throughout.
We went to my brother's house yesterday for my nephew's graduation party. It was fun (we all went in the pool) but Zoe got 3 splinters in her foot from the deck. One of them was sticking out so I was able to pull it out easily. The other two were embedded. I googled "remove splinter" and found out that you can make a paste with baking soda and water and put it on a band-aid. It's supposed to make the skin swell and the splinter pops out.
Just read a short story that I really liked. A bunch of quilters were discussing the possibility of a ghost. One of them got scared and left. One of the remaining quilters admitted that it was she who picked her sister's stitches out at night after everyone went to bed - not a ghost. Then one of the other quilters revealed that the stitches came undone each night after the former stitch-picker moved out. She was unbothered, saying that if any spirits haunted the house, she was sure they were benevolent ones.
I'm discouraged that 56 Senators voted against gun violence prevention last night. But Chuck and Kirsten voted the right way (yay, New York!) And Everytown (gun control advocacy group) is talking about regaining control of Congress in November (entirely possible) and putting gun control on the ballot (as a referendum, taking Congress out of the equation entirely). And I love that Trump has what the New York Times calls a "crippling money deficit" - $1.3 million to Hillary's $42 million. Before he realized how much campaigning costs, he bragged about how he was self-funding and doesn't need help - not the best approach to campaign finance.
Cygnets
A Scottish woman likes to post pictures of cygnets on Twitter. It was hard for me to download her pictures, so I found one on Google. Aren't they adorable? It looks like they're saying, "Fancy a cuppa?" or something like that. Today I'm going to see Love & Friendship, a Jane Austen adaptation based on Lady Susan , with my friend T from college. It's supposed to be excellent - 99% rating on Rotten Tomatoes.
I cut Zoe's hair and then I got worried that I gave her a mullet. "Business in the front, party in the back." I was trying to layer the sides but it didn't quite work. Then I trimmed a few more pieces and things seemed to improve. The takeaway: it's easier to cut boy hair! Eric's hair is both short and curly enough to cover mistakes. Zoe's hair still looks cute though.
I finished One True Loves by Taylor Jenkins Reid tonight. I always like her books, and the titles are always written in a fun retro font. Anyway, this one was about a woman who was engaged, and then her previous husband (thought to be dead) shows up. It ended the way I thought it should. And then I read a little bit of the acknowledgments (at the end) and put it aside. That brought back a memory...when I was a kid, reading books, I didn't feel I'd truly read them unless I read the foreword, copyright page, everything. That kind of tickles me.
This morning, I got an email from Eric's teacher, saying that they were going on a field trip to the High Line today (near our house) and they only had one chaperone. So of course I went over, and suddenly there were six chaperones (including two grandparents). Eric was very happy to see me, and it was fun to be with the class, though it was hot at times and a little long (two hours total, most of which was spent walking).
We just had a party for Eric on a boat! I was worried it would be a dismal failure, because it was pouring rain in the morning and we got a couple of panicked cancellations. But it was a smashing success! Zoe yelled, "We're gonna die!" when we went to the top deck of the boat. (I don't know why, it wasn't particularly turbulent or anything.) But everyone just laughed. A lot of the grownups said it was the best birthday party they had been to. Eric's friend Bella said, "Great party!" There was music, entertainment, balloon animals, the Statue of Liberty, and karaoke.
Zoe graduated from preschool today. I was a little sad. The school was kind of far away (though not as far away as the private school Eric once attended, which is now closing). Anyway, I feel like she will never get this much attention again (9 students, 3 teachers). She did get into Eric's gifted and talented program across the street (no more commute after this summer - her camp is uptown). It's funny the things you feel nostalgic about. A few minutes ago, I actually thought, "I'll never send a class parent email again."
I'm getting a little annoyed at Bernie Sanders for dragging it out. A Times article says that he is planning to stay in the race *after* California. (He also feels confident he will win California, though Nate Silver feels differently.) Anyway, he's planning to campaign until the Democratic convention, hoping to woo superdelegates away from Hillary. *Eye roll* I can't help wondering if she's getting all this resistance because she's a woman. Supposedly Bernie and Hillary have a bigger gap between them (in terms of delegate count) than Hillary and Obama ever did in 2008. So in ordinary circumstances, Bernie would have dropped out. But I guess it could also be because he has an agenda he wants to push.
I just got an email from my daughter's school saying that someone at her school (in a different class) came in with lice today. So they are going to check every kid in the entire school. I remember being checked for it in fourth or fifth grade, and the school nurse huffing, "This is a waste of time." I never had lice in elementary school, but then I got it unexpectedly in tenth grade (at age fifteen). I never found out who I got it from, but I was in a school play (Camelot) where we all shared hats. I remember my mother driving me to CVS, and then I insisted that we go to a different one in a neighboring town, because I knew the girl at the cash register. (You can't buy lice treatment from someone you know, especially not in high school). When my mother had lice as a child, her oldest sister's husband plucked them off her scalp and dropped them in a frying pan. I remember my mother combing out the nits when I was fifteen. It was a long process, especially since my...
Yesterday we went to Coney Island. At one point, a woman suddenly sat near me on the sand and hid a couple of mangos there. (True story.) Nearby, a young kid, maybe sixteen, was being handcuffed by a couple of cops. He didn't resist, but it was still shocking. A small crowd gathered. Then the woman sprang up and said, "That's my baby!" I couldn't hear most of it, but D was closer to them. It turned out selling anything on the beach is illegal. However, they gave him a summons instead of arresting him, because it was his first time selling mangos. You can't make this stuff up.
I just watched Pride and Prejudice and Zombies. It starts a little before the regular Pride and Prejudice, which begins when Bingley moves into Netherfield Hall. In the movie, the Featherstone family lives in Netherfield Hall, but they turn into zombies, leaving the hall vacant for Bingley. Darcy is a zombie hunter, and all five Bennet sisters have Shaolin training to fight zombies. Lady Catherine de Bourgh is the fiercest swordswoman in Britain, and wears an eyepatch. Mr. Collins is as unctuous as ever.
I have a list of Kindle pre-orders on my computer and I was excited to see that I have a good one coming out on May 10! It's the newest book by Katie Finn. She writes YA - a series about two girls who started out as friends, but one wronged the other, and then they seek revenge on each other in ingenious ways. Very gossipy and fun. The last one ended with the girls (frenemies) finding out that their parents are getting married (one girl's mother is marrying the other girl's father). So now the frenemies will be in the same house (presumably). They are definitely fun books if you are looking for a lively, light read.
There are a lot of musicians (and dogs) in our new apartment building. One of them is playing a saxophone right now. We have a pianist too. I ran into one of my neighbors from the old building. She had hip replacement surgery and was using her umbrella as a cane, but seemed in good spirits. She was telling me how handsome her son is, "a cleft in his chin and dimples", and people say he looks like Tom Cruise, but she's met Tom Cruise and claims her son is better looking, though Tom was "very nice." I've read Leah Remini's Scientology memoir, including the segments on Tom, but I just smiled and nodded. P.S. Now the piano is kicking in! I prefer it to the saxophone.
There was a New York Times article today about a 2-year-old shooting his mother. Sadly, it's not the first article like that I have read. And because the gun manufacturers have immunity (thanks to senators like Bernie Sanders who voted for that), they have no incentive to make "smart" guns that can only be used by their owners. The technology is there, but the political will isn't (yet). Hopefully Hillary will change all this...or at least try. It's definitely part of her platform. (Unlike Donald Trump, who wants "open carry" everywhere.)
On Facebook, a college friend (now living about three hours away) was talking about a cat she's about to get. But I thought she recently got a new cat, named Dexter. So I asked, "What happened to Dexter?" She wrote, "Ohh, Dexter. He had to go back to his foster home because he hated us. Seriously! I'll tell the story when I get the chance." I love this. I love cats, and wish I wasn't allergic. I feel like I might have been one in a past life.
More book recommendations...both of Mindy Kaling's books are good. One essay in the second one was possibly the funniest thing I've ever read (an alternate, parallel existence where Mindy Kaling is a Latin teacher at Dalton instead of working in Hollywood...told entirely in emails and texts. Another writer who's good at that is Lauren Myracle.) She's supposed to be writing a third book, with her former Office co-star and erstwhile boyfriend, B.J. Novak.
I suspect I have mild OCD. I suppressed it since my mother got nervous when I was little and she saw me lining up stacks of magazines on the coffee table. It is definitely the kind of thing you can overcome. It did pop up again later when I would find myself turning off the oven dials at night, all the way, one by one. I made myself stop doing it. The funny thing was, at a fundraiser, this woman whom I would NEVER have suspected of having OCD told me that she did, and when I told her about the oven dials, she said, "YES!" with genuine, unfeigned recognition. It's funny how you can have unexpected things in common with someone. A guy on Twitter even has it, tweeting photos of his immaculate home and saying he cleaned it because he has OCD. Unfortunately, I don't have that kind of OCD. I try to sweep if there is food on the floor, but it's only because I don't want bugs.
I'm waiting for a 70s revival to happen...for example, I'm going to a gala/fundraiser for E's school...basically an auction with nibbles and wine in a loft near the river. I'm sure everyone will be wearing black and listening to trendy music. The whole thing could be improved with avocado green and disco.
Hillary seems to be winning everywhere except possibly Illinois, which hasn't released any results yet. Unfortunately, Trump won a bunch of delegates as well...but I read that if Kasich wins Ohio (which he is expected to do), Trump will have trouble getting enough delegates to secure the nomination.
I really felt the transition to Daylight Savings Time this year. Maybe it gets worse as you get older. I saw this cute article about it. A guy bought a dinosaur filled with dinoflagellates (microorganisms, basically) that light up at night. However, the dinosaur came from San Diego, and it needed to adjust to East Coast time. So at first, it didn't light up the way it should. He was drawing an analogy between Daylight Savings Time and jet lag - they both disrupt your circadian rhythms.
Today we saw Zootopia, a children's movie where every character was an animal. The main character was Judy Hopps, an enterprising bunny who became Zootopia's first rabbit police officer. The funniest part was a visit to the DMV, where every character was a sloth. By the time they emerged, it was night.
I just finished a book called Yolo. Yes, I can't believe I read a book called Yolo. But it was really good. It was about three girls, going to different colleges, who have been friends for a long time. (In fact, they were three earlier books about them, which I read about 10 years ago.) And the author unexpectedly wrote this sequel. Anyway, it was good, and I hope she writes another one.
We are going to Miami on Saturday. I was dreading packing. I pack for myself and the two kids, a few days in advance. D packs for himself, typically half an hour before we have to leave. Anyway, Zoe said, "I love packing! I want to help!" With a little guidance from me, she helped me pack almost everything (except last-minute items like makeup, toothbrushes and electronics). It was a big weight off my shoulders. I'm really happy she helped.