Life of Wry

I’ve been enjoying walking in a whole new part of town. I still love, of course, my walks around the arboretum — feel like it’s part of my own neighborhood — but this has been a pretty good year for new walks… the North Davis ditch being one.

This is the North Davis pond, part of Janet’s view right out her kitchen window! Lucky duck.

And speaking of ducks…

The weekend yielded a pair of winners and one spectacular loser in the kitchen games.

First, the successes:

Kind of a kitchen standard… the roasted whole chicken. Messy as all get out…even if you put down layers of tin foil. The foil works for making the roasting pan easy to clean, but the rack is hell and the chicken carving always turns into a huge messy mess. Still… a good dinner standby.

I’m in love with fingerling potatoes. They may be my favorite of all potatoes (except salt and vinegar potato chips). Stuffed into the chicken’s private parts are wads of rosemary, sage, and thyme (and salt and pepper). The veggies are tossed in olive oil, rosemary, coarse kosher salt and pepper. The chicken came out its usual moist, but we have yet to taste any herb infusion. I mean.. does that really work?

Second 4-star dish of the weekend was this baked pasta, which I made tonight. It’s ridiculously rich, but very tasty… and provides loads of leftovers (especially as you can only eat about a quarter cup of the stuff at one sitting).

It’s a spanokopita-inspired dish. You mix great piles of chopped spinach, arugula, parsley and scallion greens with some salt and pepper, and set aside. Then you prepare the fusilli until a couple minutes shy of al dente, and set that aside. Then you saute in butter some thinly sliced garlic and chopped scallion whites, add cream cheese and a cup of your pasta water, mixing til creamy. You then add the greens, the pasta, grated mozzarella and crumbled feta. (Did I mention this is insanely rich?) Once all this is transferred to a baking dish, you sprinkle the top with more mozzarella and feta and bake until brown. The best bites are those that are crunchy. So so good.

And here’s the failure:

A long time ago, we got a popcorn popper from Matty and Michael, which we somehow forgot about (our loss!). Since it was the first time using it, we followed the directions to the letter. We used only 1/3 cup of kernels — which they indicated would yield 8 cups of popped corn — yet got nowhere near that.

For batch #2, we figured we could easily triple that and not have any problems. That turned out not to be the case. Well before the kernels were done popping, the canister had filled up and started lifting off the base. Just like a classic cartoon, or an episode of I Love Lucy. We were at first immobilized by the shock of it, then overcome with laughter as we tried to contain it. It just kept popping and popping, overflowing onto the butcher block, then onto the floor. The canister fell off which sent popcorn flying, so Jim threw another bowl over the top of that.

I thought the popcorn itself was serviceable; Jim thought it was lacking. We’ll have to experiment with different oils, spices, and other embellishments. The book that comes with the popcorn popper had some great ideas!

The world is crawling out of the pandemic hole. Not fast, not completely.. but steps are underway to bring some relief to this long, scary year of death, loss, and such incredible sadness. We’ve long known we had to have a vaccine to fight the spread and severity of Covid-19. Now we have many! And now people by the millions are getting shots with one of those vaccines.

Such a great development. Such hope for a return to something resembling normal.

And we have such an incredibly long way to go. This is global. There are variants cropping up everywhere. There are class differences in terms of access. There are deniers. Each of those a monumental challenge. Demand will surely outpace supplies for quite awhile. Or at least need will outpace supplies. To be effective, we need a huge percentage of the population to get vaccinated and we are nowhere near that.

But… we are slowly crawling out of the hole.

In our county’s case, we were able to take quick advantage of a window. They’d prioritized the 1As (health care workers, first responders, essential workers, congregate housing folks.. and maybe that designation included 75s and up). Further, they were prioritizing low income parts of the county — Esparto, Knights Landing, parts of Woodland, parts of West Sac. However, there were not enough of those to consume the county’s allotment of vaccine, so, they expanded the pool in order not to lose precious vaccine. We responded to that call (and those slots were scooped up like items at a K-Mart blue light alert. LOL).

So today, Jim and I got shot #1 (of two) of the Pfizer vaccine. We qualified as 1Bs — 65+ year olds. It’s not widely available for everyone in our 1B cohort yet, but at least the light’s green! We are all told “get the vaccine as soon as it’s available.” So we did. Doing our part to save the world. (And feeling quite privileged to be able to do so.) Hoping like hell these vaccines get wider distribution.

So, here’s what it looked like today:

We reported to Sutter Health Park (formerly and forever Raley Field… site of one of Peter’s best ever pitching outings!) (But that’s another blog post.)

Here’s what it looked like upon entering the vast parking lot.. the Tower Bridge and downtown Sac in the background:

Hilariously, I believe this West Sac site probably served a predominantly Davis clientele. I hope West Sac residents got in on the act… but I’m certain it was Davis dominated. To wit, one of the volunteers giving us directions immediately post-vaccine was Mrs. Jolanda Blackwell, one of Peter’s junior high teachers, and her husband, Mr. Blackwell, also volunteering, was Peter’s high school calculus teacher. So funny. We covered a lot of ground in our short conversation!

Here we are getting directions from one of the volunteers (who’s training another volunteer), early in the process. I must say, there were ample volunteers, many redundant, and it was so very well organized!

Here is the moment of truth:

I heard somebody calling it a Fauci ouchie today. The shot itself did not hurt. Not even a little. Didn’t feel the needle at all. As I write this, my arm’s starting to feel sore, like it always seems to with vaccines. But I’m a-ok with that.

And finally, here we are:

You can’t tell, but those are two insanely happy people. This is what over the moon looks like. Giddy. Thrilled. Relieved. Grateful.

Came across this funny thing this afternoon… it perfectly describes the unfortunate state of vaccine distribution at this early point in the process. As I said… I feel fortunate, grateful and.. privileged. I am assuaging my guilt at getting it relatively early by accepting the fact that 1/ we are 1Bs by definition, and 1Bs’ number came up; 2/ we were presented with an unexpected but legitimate opportunity; and 3/ when it’s your turn, take it. All for the greater good.

So… I got a two-fer when I turned 65 twelve days ago: medicare and IB status. There’s gotta be something good about getting so old.

Our second shot is scheduled for Feb 28 at 1:10. We’ll be there!!!

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Postscript: After I’d closed out this blog post, I read Heather Cox Richardson’s entry for today’s “Letters From An Amercian” (which is an excellent series and has been a daily lifeline for me for the last couple years). Thought it was worth posting here:

A year ago today, February 6, 2020, 57-year-old Patricia Dowd of San Jose, California, died suddenly after feeling ill for several days. She is the nation’s first known victim of coronavirus.

Now, a year later, on February 6, 2021, the official count of coronavirus deaths in the United States is more than 460,000, significantly more Americans than died in World War Two.

An interesting day to get one’s coronavirus vaccine shot.

I’m not swearing this year (or weening myself from it, anyway) (or trying to, that is). But now, over two weeks into Biden’s so-far fantastic presidency, we have this wonderfully satisfying, f**k-filled image — a mountain of executive actions to undo the horrors of the guy before.

So happy.

I rate this day a 10. A relaxed, unrushed start on the day; a leisurely, beautiful drive (and new route); a sparkly sunny day; gorgeous snow; comfy company w/ lots of laughs; great exercise; and stunning views in every direction that just make your heart sing.

Here’re some pics:

The commute promised great things ahead:

Had a Sno Park permit and decided to go to the one at the junction of the Morman Emigrant Trail and Hwy 88. MET is closed in the Winter (who knew?), which is why we chose the 16–>49–>88 route through Sutter Creek.

First thing that happened when we pulled into the Sno Park: we got stuck in the snow (more like 2″ of slush):

You can see the small slab of plywood they put behind the front wheel. Those and a little push got us right out. So grateful for the assistance. It was just the silliest thing.

Once out of that little pickle, we booted and shoed up and were on our way.

Look at this perfect snow, weather, sky (and hiking partner)!

Within 50 yards, we were looking right at the Crystal Range and Pyramid Peak, covered in snow.

Ambled around for a while then decided it was time for lunch:

Made a snowman!

(It’s only 11″ tall)

Here are some pretty shots of our post lunch walkabout:

At first we thought: Kokopeli.. then we saw hooves…and thought more like a pig…

Always missing this guy…

Couple things. One, it was a beautiful day, once the gloomy morning gave way to a sparkling blue sky. It felt warm sitting outside at Crepeville having lunch with Jim. I was a visitor to his standing ritual.

I took bunches of photos on my walk home.. I love the confusion of seasons… wintry and springy at the same time. Here’s one:

That flowering blob in front is a “blue bush germander,” and is native to the Mediterranean. It is drought tolerant. So says the sign next to the plant. So pretty.

Two, I made a neat thing tonight… a sweet potato dish. This is what you do: first, bake a couple of sweet potatoes (lightly oiled and salted, wrapped in foil) for about an hour at 450. While they are baking, make two things: first, mix some greek yogurt w/ olive oil and lemon juice to make a base that your sliced, baked potatoes will sit on. Then make a salsa of roasted sesame seeds, olive oil, lemon juice, red onion, garlic, parsley, salt and dried red chili flakes that will go on top. They ask you to bake the potato, then remove foil and char it under the broiler, then cool it, then slice it, then warm it back up. I didn’t do all that and it still came out fine.

Here ’tis… first the salsa and the yogurt base…

And the final.. served with the last of the birthday meat loaf and some steamed spinach… so, so, so GOOD!

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Oh, and I guess I have one more thing to mention. January 30 marked a full year since I’d re-started blogging (this round). In my 12+ years of blogging at Life of Wry (who knew that name would live this long.. man, if I’d known, I’d have been way more thoughtful about it), I’ve had some years where blogging was a daily ritual, some years I took off completely, and some years were hit and miss. Going forward, I’m planning to continue daily writing… but with one change: I’m going to remove my blog from public view (as soon as I figure out how to do that). I think that will free me up to write more genuinely, without concern for how people react (whoever they are… I don’t know who all reads LOW, though I know some… and they are all over the map of family, friends, acquaintances, and total strangers.. not to mention people with a variety of perspectives and political beliefs). I’ve maintained all along that I write this for myself not for anyone else. That said, this will end up in Peter’s possession at some point. While I’m a bit behind, I have every intention of doing blog –> print, for all 12+ years (and forward). Some years are in print already (these are huge volumes). And, with that in mind, I will be just a mite circumspect, since Peter must may read these at some point and I’ll want him to have a fair idea of who his mom is/was, and especially what some portion of his life was like, from my perspective anyway. But I’ve always tried to relax into my blog and just write with honesty, without varnish. My writing has to reflect my heart, my true experience of life, otherwise why bother? Lately, my heart has been pretty scrambled — what with pandemics, politics and a new phase of empty nesting — and my ramblings sometimes quite intemperate. I don’t mind that for me, nor even for the printed versions of these that Peter may eventually read.. but it does give me pause when I think of the various folks reading my blogs here and there. I guess I am uncomfortable with whatever judgment they — whoever they are — might have toward me. And I don’t really want to deal with that concern anymore. Even as I am so delighted knowing certain people I like take the time to read my blog. I’m moved by that. And yet I feel the weirdness of others’ judgment. And the creepiness of strangers who don’t need to know what I think. So I think it will be more relaxing to remove the public option, as it were. So gonna do that. At some point. Perhaps without warning! Though I want Jim to keep reading them… so not sure how to set it up. As I say… when I figure all that out…

Soap frugality! Not something I ever expected to write about. I’m not frugal about much, I’m sorry to say. But, here’s evidence that maybe I’m changing my ways.

This photo was actually taken two days ago — two showers ago. And my soap is still a going concern. Today, my soap is so tiny it’s hard to keep in my hand while lathering. But it does still lather! It’s been cracking me up for about the last two weeks. How long can I make it last?

~ ~

Not as funny as a teeny tiny soap flake that I’m trying to squeeze a few more showers out of… but still funny:

This is the first sentence in the impeachment defense brief filed today by the ex-president’s lawyers, who seemed not to proofread their document before submitting it for next week’s impeachment trial.

I mean really.

Just a few pics of some wintry clouds ’round town recently.

From yesterday in a couple northern parts of town:

And this afternoon, this very cool cloud formation over the track at Toomey field, corner A St and Russell:

Note to self: Look up. Look up more. And then look up again.