~ the evolution of dreams ~
September 30, 2006,11:51 p.m.
alien potatoes and a friggin' mad poster
you know the purple potatoe that officially freaked me out? yeah. well, here it bloody is. since blogger can't upload it into the original post (see below, i am not a cook.) frickin' blogger. i'm gonna move to vox. not that you care. i'll get you abducted by the purple potatoe alien wannabes.
so there.
so there.
September 25, 2006,5:01 p.m.
pics on blogger
i am having difficulty uploading pics to blogger in my posts - either the pop-up window goes to "page cannot be displayed" after i select my photo to upload or it says it's done it but the pic doesn't appear in the post.
can anyone help?
can anyone help?
Labels: au secour
,4:55 p.m.
i have been watched far too much today.
i seriously think pigeons are government spies.
why else would they be landing outside my apartment windows and constantly looking in?
they're driving me nuts!
ugh.
pigeons.
*shudder*
why else would they be landing outside my apartment windows and constantly looking in?
they're driving me nuts!
ugh.
pigeons.
*shudder*
Labels: paranoid, psychobabble
September 21, 2006,10:53 a.m.
i am not a cook.
i have a long, fractured history with the kitchen. i don't remember how it started, but always, as a kid growing up in a household with 5 siblings, i remember being teased and given the metonymic nametag "disaster in the kitchen". whenever i heard that phrase, it meant me. perhaps i took this more to heart than it was meant - which is likely, as i was also always "the sensitive one" - and so, my avoidance of kitchens has followed me since i moved away from home.
being a vegetarian until 2 years ago, i never had any cause to deal with meat. veggies, i can do, to perfection (touch wood!). this talent (especially in creating salads) earned me the moniker of "the assembler". my family seems to have an odd propensity for attaching descriptive phrases to others. still, "the assembler" still meant something essential - i couldn't cook. i could bake, for sure - scones, chocolate cake, cupcakes, muffins...even when i made a lasagna - well, that's really assembling layers, essentially. pasta, cheese, tomato sauce, spinach (yes it was vegetarian), repeat, repeat, repeat.
yesterday, for the first time, i cooked meat.
i was really scared the night before. i was planning to make stew, a wonderful beef stew i remember from childhood (when i still ate meat). the stew my older brothers ate and taught me how to mop up the delicious sauce with fresh whole wheat bread - or the biggest treat of all, being allowed to make Sloppy Joes.
i told toni last night that i was scared shitless of making the stew the next day. i was convinced it would be a Huge, Unforgiveable Mess, and he would come home to me shaking and huddled in a corner of the living room with the Stew on the Stove in the Kitchen uttering menacing gutteral laughter from its burnt, inedible state. i would confirm my metonymic nametag and be whisked into eternal history as a truly undomestic and powerless goddess in the kitchen.
the next day i put off making the stew for as long as possible. until i realized with horror that if i didn't bite the bullet and start it now, toni would come home and the stew wouldn't be even recognizable as an existing dish, because i would still be washing the raw meat.
Raw. Meat.
that was the most difficult part. i've never touched raw meat in my life. i still haven't. i used tongs, darlings. TONGS. oh yes. i rinsed the meat, holding it with tongs, put the pieces on paper towel to drain, and transferred the cleansed Raw. Meat. into a saucepan with olive oil and butter to brown. i didn't touch it once.
Not. Once.
sappho: 1
stew: 0
then i realized in a panic that i didn't have ANYTHING ready - seasoned flour to sprinkle on meat? where?! where?!!! - while i had to monitor the Raw. Meat. that was starting to SIZZLE in its sauce of drippings, olive oil, and butter. what if i burnt it?! quick, start the potatoes. wait, start the turnips. WAIT I CAN DO THIS LATER, I NEED TO MAKE SEASONED FLOUR.
i still have to learn the art of timing when cooking. or rather, planning actions in advance to maximize the fluidity of the act of cooking. so you don't have half-peeled, half-washed turnips and potatoes with their skins lying helter-skelter while you desperately pull down spices and flour and grab a fork while whipping around to monitor the Raw. Meat. browning behind your back because you have the Worst Kitchen Ever.
i rent apartments for their bathrooms not their kitchens i think i've explained enough to make my reasons for [fear of kitchens] understandable?
luckily i got the seasoned flour mixed and ready in time to rescue the meat before it burnt, transferred it and sprinkled it with flour. i still think that's weird. but i did it, the recipe told me to and i know the Hand of the Cooking God would have descended and ripped off my head if i hadn't done what was written in the Joy of Cooking. (HAHAHAHAHAHA, JOY! OF! COOKING! HAHAHAHA)
then i started peeling potatoes and turnips and carrots and chopping onions, calling toni a few times frantically ("how long do potatoes take to cook?" "when do i put the wine in?" "I'M GETTING STRESSED!") while peeling potatoes i became temporarily freaked out when some of the ones toni insisted on buying weren't white inside, but PURPLE:
[i will insert a picture of the Purple Alien Potatoe once Blogger gets its Image Uploading Act together]
i put them in anyway but i was convinced at any moment these weird freaks of nature would develop eyes and mouths with tons of pointy teeth that would proceed to chop off my fingers one by one because WHO DARES TO PEEL THE PURPLE POTATOE?
i boiled the potatoes, purple ones and all, steamed the turnips, chopped up the carrots and ate some, and poured in the red wine.
sappho: 2
stew: 0
then i realized I FORGOT TO ADD THE CHILI SAUCE and i frantically poured half a cup in.
sappho: 2
stew: 1
then toni came home and brought with him red wine from australia (yum yum!) and we left the stew to stew.
it stewed and stewed.
it smelled better and better.
then toni said, as we added the veggies, “what about the celery?”
cue frantic sappho running to fridge pulling out celery cleaning it chopping it up and throwing it in.
sappho: 2
stew: 2
it stewed.
i fretted.
we drank wine.
i felt better.
then i cut up some bread and i ASSEMBLED a salad because that’s what i do best, and we served the stew.
it was good.
sappho: 3
stew: 2
but it was a bit too spicy for my taste (because of the chili sauce i used).
sappho: 3
stew: 3
(damn chili sauce).
but:
toni LOVED IT.
sappho: 4
stew: 3
i won. And i can’t wait to try it again next time, with my mum’s homemade chili sauce.
being a vegetarian until 2 years ago, i never had any cause to deal with meat. veggies, i can do, to perfection (touch wood!). this talent (especially in creating salads) earned me the moniker of "the assembler". my family seems to have an odd propensity for attaching descriptive phrases to others. still, "the assembler" still meant something essential - i couldn't cook. i could bake, for sure - scones, chocolate cake, cupcakes, muffins...even when i made a lasagna - well, that's really assembling layers, essentially. pasta, cheese, tomato sauce, spinach (yes it was vegetarian), repeat, repeat, repeat.
yesterday, for the first time, i cooked meat.
i was really scared the night before. i was planning to make stew, a wonderful beef stew i remember from childhood (when i still ate meat). the stew my older brothers ate and taught me how to mop up the delicious sauce with fresh whole wheat bread - or the biggest treat of all, being allowed to make Sloppy Joes.
i told toni last night that i was scared shitless of making the stew the next day. i was convinced it would be a Huge, Unforgiveable Mess, and he would come home to me shaking and huddled in a corner of the living room with the Stew on the Stove in the Kitchen uttering menacing gutteral laughter from its burnt, inedible state. i would confirm my metonymic nametag and be whisked into eternal history as a truly undomestic and powerless goddess in the kitchen.
the next day i put off making the stew for as long as possible. until i realized with horror that if i didn't bite the bullet and start it now, toni would come home and the stew wouldn't be even recognizable as an existing dish, because i would still be washing the raw meat.
Raw. Meat.
that was the most difficult part. i've never touched raw meat in my life. i still haven't. i used tongs, darlings. TONGS. oh yes. i rinsed the meat, holding it with tongs, put the pieces on paper towel to drain, and transferred the cleansed Raw. Meat. into a saucepan with olive oil and butter to brown. i didn't touch it once.
Not. Once.
sappho: 1
stew: 0
then i realized in a panic that i didn't have ANYTHING ready - seasoned flour to sprinkle on meat? where?! where?!!! - while i had to monitor the Raw. Meat. that was starting to SIZZLE in its sauce of drippings, olive oil, and butter. what if i burnt it?! quick, start the potatoes. wait, start the turnips. WAIT I CAN DO THIS LATER, I NEED TO MAKE SEASONED FLOUR.
i still have to learn the art of timing when cooking. or rather, planning actions in advance to maximize the fluidity of the act of cooking. so you don't have half-peeled, half-washed turnips and potatoes with their skins lying helter-skelter while you desperately pull down spices and flour and grab a fork while whipping around to monitor the Raw. Meat. browning behind your back because you have the Worst Kitchen Ever.
i rent apartments for their bathrooms not their kitchens i think i've explained enough to make my reasons for [fear of kitchens] understandable?
luckily i got the seasoned flour mixed and ready in time to rescue the meat before it burnt, transferred it and sprinkled it with flour. i still think that's weird. but i did it, the recipe told me to and i know the Hand of the Cooking God would have descended and ripped off my head if i hadn't done what was written in the Joy of Cooking. (HAHAHAHAHAHA, JOY! OF! COOKING! HAHAHAHA)
then i started peeling potatoes and turnips and carrots and chopping onions, calling toni a few times frantically ("how long do potatoes take to cook?" "when do i put the wine in?" "I'M GETTING STRESSED!") while peeling potatoes i became temporarily freaked out when some of the ones toni insisted on buying weren't white inside, but PURPLE:
[i will insert a picture of the Purple Alien Potatoe once Blogger gets its Image Uploading Act together]
i put them in anyway but i was convinced at any moment these weird freaks of nature would develop eyes and mouths with tons of pointy teeth that would proceed to chop off my fingers one by one because WHO DARES TO PEEL THE PURPLE POTATOE?
i boiled the potatoes, purple ones and all, steamed the turnips, chopped up the carrots and ate some, and poured in the red wine.
sappho: 2
stew: 0
then i realized I FORGOT TO ADD THE CHILI SAUCE and i frantically poured half a cup in.
sappho: 2
stew: 1
then toni came home and brought with him red wine from australia (yum yum!) and we left the stew to stew.
it stewed and stewed.
it smelled better and better.
then toni said, as we added the veggies, “what about the celery?”
cue frantic sappho running to fridge pulling out celery cleaning it chopping it up and throwing it in.
sappho: 2
stew: 2
it stewed.
i fretted.
we drank wine.
i felt better.
then i cut up some bread and i ASSEMBLED a salad because that’s what i do best, and we served the stew.
it was good.
sappho: 3
stew: 2
but it was a bit too spicy for my taste (because of the chili sauce i used).
sappho: 3
stew: 3
(damn chili sauce).
but:
toni LOVED IT.
sappho: 4
stew: 3
i won. And i can’t wait to try it again next time, with my mum’s homemade chili sauce.
September 20, 2006,2:28 p.m.
between the 14th floor & the basement
i carried my two empty laundry baskets - previously full of towels, sheets, t-shirts, all our dirty clothing from the trip in croatia, everything now clean in the dryers downstairs - to the mirrored hallway in front of the elevators. as i arrived one of my neighbours who owns a beautiful black and brown skittish dog, is asian and was wearing a t-shirt, jeans, and backpack, was leaving his own place. i pressed the button after we smiled at each other and we waited for one of the three elevators to open.
the middle one did and he went in first. i followed, maneuvering the baskets (one inside the other) so i didn't bonk him as there was another person, an elderly man with a beard, wearing a beige coat and grey pants, already inside the elevator. i got in and as the elevator doors closed the asian guy reached forward and pressed the "B" button for me. the elderly man laughed, looking at me and the baskets, saying "guess we know where you're going, huh?"
i smiled back and agreed. he continued, "don't have much there, do you?" nodding towards the empty baskets. i explained i was going to pick up all the clean laundry downstairs.
"do you go to school or do you work?" i figured he was asking this because i was doing laundry at 10 AM in the morning on a wednesday. thoughts flashed through my brain - how i couldn't explain the program i had just graduated from, too complicated even if it was interesting to know about - and i said, simply, that i worked, and had just finished a contract with a theatre company.
"with a what?"
a theatre company, i repeated.
"what did you do there?" again, a complicated question. i explained, as we got to the 2nd floor, where he was presumably getting off, that i worked in development, which was fundraising.
"oh," he said, smiling and leaving the elevator. "well, it sounds like you've got brains." i smiled back and said, "take care". he replied, as the doors closed, "i'll try."
the asian guy and i grinned at each other and he said, "so friendly." i said, "i know, it's refreshing," and caught his surprised look. the doors opened at the 1st floor and we wished each other a good day.
later, in the laundry room folding warm, clean towels, i thought over the conversation, how the asian guy was surprised by my choice of the word "refreshing", when what i really meant was the kindness and the ease with which the man struck up conversation, was refreshing.
i thought of the man's words, "well, it sounds like you've got brains." i smiled to myself, and thought "maybe i do," circumspectly, in the sense that perhaps i might be able to accomplish things that make toni and i happy.
and i thought of his last words, "i'll try." i hope he does.
the middle one did and he went in first. i followed, maneuvering the baskets (one inside the other) so i didn't bonk him as there was another person, an elderly man with a beard, wearing a beige coat and grey pants, already inside the elevator. i got in and as the elevator doors closed the asian guy reached forward and pressed the "B" button for me. the elderly man laughed, looking at me and the baskets, saying "guess we know where you're going, huh?"
i smiled back and agreed. he continued, "don't have much there, do you?" nodding towards the empty baskets. i explained i was going to pick up all the clean laundry downstairs.
"do you go to school or do you work?" i figured he was asking this because i was doing laundry at 10 AM in the morning on a wednesday. thoughts flashed through my brain - how i couldn't explain the program i had just graduated from, too complicated even if it was interesting to know about - and i said, simply, that i worked, and had just finished a contract with a theatre company.
"with a what?"
a theatre company, i repeated.
"what did you do there?" again, a complicated question. i explained, as we got to the 2nd floor, where he was presumably getting off, that i worked in development, which was fundraising.
"oh," he said, smiling and leaving the elevator. "well, it sounds like you've got brains." i smiled back and said, "take care". he replied, as the doors closed, "i'll try."
the asian guy and i grinned at each other and he said, "so friendly." i said, "i know, it's refreshing," and caught his surprised look. the doors opened at the 1st floor and we wished each other a good day.
later, in the laundry room folding warm, clean towels, i thought over the conversation, how the asian guy was surprised by my choice of the word "refreshing", when what i really meant was the kindness and the ease with which the man struck up conversation, was refreshing.
i thought of the man's words, "well, it sounds like you've got brains." i smiled to myself, and thought "maybe i do," circumspectly, in the sense that perhaps i might be able to accomplish things that make toni and i happy.
and i thought of his last words, "i'll try." i hope he does.
Labels: ponderous