Woke up, came downstairs, found that the acting up fridge was same temp as the rest of the kitchen. Again.
Took some perishables downstairs to out in the dorm fridge (that I bought years ago when the main fridge kept failing the first ur we had it) to discover a giant puddle in the garage. Which had formed a river into the storeroom.
So much for my Wednesday.

Today:
C asked me “what’s oral sex?”
As we’re walking down Fell street with L and Max tumbling right behind us.

And just now, L tried to convince me that he shouldn’t take a shower because it’s bad for the drought.

Which is what I originally wanted to call this blog. It’s been a cooking intensive week, though not as butter-intensive as the title would imply. Or nearly as butter laden as I expect Thanksgiving week to be when the Southern in-laws will be here.

Week to date:
Monday:
Roast chicken on bed of tiny potatoes
Brussels sprouts roasted with country ham
Cranberry relish w tangerine and port
Tomato & mozz salad

L sat down and said “why are we having Thanksgiving now?”. then ate almost an entire breast side with not complaints (but slathered in cranberry sauce). Need to make extra in Dec and freeze it before the cranberries disappear. or figure out how to make it can-able.

Made stock with the carcass and extra bones so Tuesday could be:
Chicken pot pie- left over chicken & potatoes, carrots, peas, the stock, lots of pepper
Biscuits

Wednesday is SeaForager Day so:
Mussels steamed in white wine, onions & garlic
Baguette (no, I don’t make my own baguette. I live in SF)
Left over pot pie for the kids.

Thursday:
Haven’t settled on whether this is Sausage Pie (as I’m advertising it to C), or Galette w vegetables and Italian Sausage (when I’m talking to RCE3)
Plus, roasted beets going, because I found a huge one in buried in the back of the veg drawer.
And experimenting with home made granola bars. Mixed up a batch while cooking the bell peppers and onions for the galette, since I had the oven going already (I apparently didn’t read the recipe very closely and thought they needed to bake, turns out no, just heat the binders and mix and let cool).

After dinner report- no only did they like the pie, Clem ate it all with out picking out the veggies. Lib only picked out the red bell peppers; he ate the red onions and roasted garlic w/o comment. So a success.

The granola bars: perhaps if i’d noticed that they aren’t baked, I wouldn’t have assumed I could sub 1/4 cp agave nectar + some butter for the 1 cp rice syrup in the binding mixture. What I have right now is sweet but tasty sticky granola. I’m sticking it in the oven for 20 min to dry it out and see if it’s stick together some.

Also, I’ve been spending entirely too much time farting around the internet in the evenings. While also feeling like I need to be making something more with my time. so coming back to this is a first step.

Struggled to stay awake until 11:00 last night so I could take my next dose of oxy and then sleep for a few hours.  Briefly opened eyes to turn off alarm (for the kids) at 7:00, then woke up at 7:30.  Slept for 8 ½ hours!  It was awesome. 

Then I tried to stand up.  Sleeping for 8 ½ hours also meant that I had no pain killers left in my system.  So when I swung my legs over the side of the bed and hoisted myself up onto my crutches, blood and pain flooded into my right leg.  I wasn’t aware that it could still hurt that much.  Might be worth going back to the 4:30am wake up for an oxy to avoid that.  

Gulped and oxy and a tylenol, then crutched to the bathroom, to find the door shut because Bob was in it.  Seemed too hard to go back to bed before peeing, so he opened the door a minute later to find me leaning on the wall, eyes closed, attempting to breathe while I waited for the drugs to kick in.  

Not sure if I over did it yesterday, or it’s a lingering effect of lack of drugs last night, but it’s been more painful today than the couple of days before Christmas.

Swelling is noticably down in my foot.  It’s kind of sloshing around in the temp cast.  Which I guess is good- the reduced swelling, not the sloshing.  Also gives me more room to move my foot around, which hurts like hell but feels like it gets the blood going again.

I still keep thinking I can cut back on the pain killers.  Then the 3 hr mark come around and my leg aches and skin hurts and I feel like I’m going to fall over if I don’t elevate my leg right this minute.  

Yesterday morning I was explaining to Bob how I didn’t really understand why oxy is so abused as a recreational drug.  I mean, yes, it took the edge off the pain, but it’s not like it makes me feel high, or see pretty colors, or want to float way.  He nodded at me Like, sure Robin.  He waited until we were chatting after dinner to point out that when you take it because you’re leg is broken and sliced open, it does what it’s supposed to do: mask the serious fucking pain.  Imagine if I wasn’t in pain and the drug had nothing else to work on.  Then this morning I had a cup of coffee just after taking one; man was I buzzy.  

Bob was supposed to go with Allen to dinner and the Christmas Show at The Family tonight.  He’s thinking about joining; Allen’s recruiting him.  good business connections, etc.  

I was eating dinner with the kids (casaulet & salad dropped off by the ever awesome Kelly) when he called from a cab to tell me that he was worried about me and skipping the show to come home early.  My sweet honey.  

He walks in to find me in the kitchen, leaning on one crutch and the counter, helping Liberty pack his lunch for tomorrow.  Looks confused then tells me “I can’t decided between “Awesome, you’re up and moving around” and “You should never do that again”.”  Which I have to admit I was close to myself, as I was close to telling Lib I needed to sit down for a minute, and yet so happy to be off the couch for a bit.  

4:45 pm  Lib closed the laptop, walked over to the couch, gingerly laid himself across my lap & gave me a hug, pushed himself up & kissed me on the chin, smiled at me and walked back to the computer.

that was awesome.

In the last week, I’ve made apple butter, apple sauce, more apple butter, and more apple sauce, tomato sauce, roasted tomatoes, roasted sweet peppers, roasted halapeno peppers, pickled eggplant with walnut sauce, steamed eggplant with dukkah, eggplant parmesan, another batch of baked apples.  I had used all the produce from last weekend’s trip to Terry & Abby’s except a huge yellow crook neck squash and an overflowing bag of herbs.

Yesterday, Bob and HBG went back to Healdsburg for the day so Bob and Terry could tackle the mountain of apples that remained in their garage.  Several gallons of cider later, they returned with at least 3 more bushels of apples, a bag of beets and carrots, a bag of beet greens, and a large apple worm crawlign up HBG’s shirt.  Fortunately, I noticed the worm just before he jumped on me on the couch.

Just back from a week in North Carolina with the inlaws and am attempting to stay awake for another hour to be roughly in the correct time zone.  When I was there, I never fell asleep before 3am (except for the night I took 2 tylonol pm’s and managed to sleep at 1:30).  Now I’m back in SF and am struggling to remain upright at 9:54pm.

I declared it a screen free week to the kids (progressively less successful as the week went on, esp once The Grand It restored internet service to the house.) on the grounds that they were spending too much time watching Marvel videos on Netflix and we were flying to the back of beyond to spend time with their cousins and grandparents, no stare at a screen.  So I left my computer at home.  

We ate pork products and fried food instead.  So much for getting back into my clothes after 6 weeks of too many fried foods and ice creams in Hilo.

Friday:  Amazing fried chicken at Rocky’s Hot in Asheville.  With, count em, FOUR sides:  run of the mill collard greens (run of the mill), slaw (mayo based, not my thing), fried okra (what better veg to go with fried chicken than battered and fried?), and corn pudding (Bob attempted to steal it, then declared that I must learn how to make it).  AND an order of the Mac and Cheese poppers — scoop the m&c into golfball-sized balls, roll in flour, deep fry.  For those 20 seconds when they have cooled off enough so you don’t blister your tough, but not so much that the cheese has congealed, pure heart clogging addiction.

Saturday:  What did we eat Sat?  

Oh right, in last moment of self preservation (and once we discovered that the cafe didn’t serve biscuits and gravy after 11am), I ordered granola with yogurt and fresh fruit.

Dinner with newly arrived Ema and Grand It:  Worked our way through the small plates at the Seven Sows downtown.  Fresh tomato salad, cantilope and ham (with, for some reason, popcorn strewn across the plate), cracklings, .  C & L shared the fried chicken with m&c.  Both declared Rocky’s Hot better.  Lib was of the opinion that we should eat every meal in Asheville there.  

Sunday:  Breakfast at Sunnyside Cafe.  Popular enough to issue those flashing pagers when you put your name onthe list.  Smart enough to have coffee available in the garden.  Eggs, sausage and grits all around.  didn’t need lunch.  

Trekked to rental house in Highlands.  The Grand It had prepped the entire week’s menus and associated shopping list.  Opened with ???

Monday:  Ignored Lib’s brief fascination with the idea of Meatless Mondays.  Countered with hamburgers with grilled onions, cheddar and bacon.  Or hot dogs for the kids.                   

tuesday:  Bob and Jeannie arrive with coolers full of boudin and andouille.  Plus lemon bars and brownies.

Wednesday:  Dinner out at The Smokehouse.  platters of food just kept arriving.  fried okra and pickles too start.  so much meat that I laid in bed for hours thinking “I can’t keep doing this”

Thursday:

Friday:

Saturday:  Our night to cook:  Spicy dry rub baby back ribs.  Honey & ginger ribs.  Mac & Cheese with pepper bacon.  Garlic bread.