Because there IS life outside of this project

I brought in an amazing writer to work on this project and he has TOTALLY delivered. Reshaped everything, made it coherent, and better yet, everyone agrees with the radical surgeries he did to our content! I slept like a baby last night.

Anyway, I'm shoving a bunch of stuff in the direction of my Australian team in the next hour, and then Jrex and I are heading out to Supper Club. What used to be a once a month deal has been shredded by the arrival of children. Now when we meet, it's at 4 in the afternoon and it's a much more thrown together sort of thing. Fine with me. Tonight, in honor of Jrex getting a job, we're doing a BBQ theme. Pulled Chicken BBQ, red cabbage coleslaw (with jicama as the surprise ingredient), Champagne, Beer and Pie for dessert (Don't know what kind yet since we have to buy it on the way there. We're hoping for a sweet potato pie, but doubting that Whole Foods will carry one.)

It'll be fun to hang out with people that have nothing to do with work.

I'm so sorry for how dry and unimaginative my blog has become. I'm not even taking pictures anymore. I love seeing pics and miss posting them here. I hope I can get better about that. Anyway, thanks for hanging in through all the blahness of my current phase of life.

It's party time!

I just sent out my very first evite. SO exciting [note sarcastic tone . . .]. As I think I mentioned, Jrex finally published his paper. Our friends Lovey and Dovey (Dovey HATES strongly dislikes these pseudonyms...) have graciously agreed to let us invade their home. I'm looking forward to doing a party again. Living in a smallish apartment with no spillover zones has cramped our style. We've done a couple supper clubs, but having six other adults in the apartment really filled it up. No way could it handle fourteen (plus two kids).

I'm so proud of him and all the hard work he put into making this paper something worthy of a good journal. It will be fun to honor him.

Of course we're going to do a wine tasting. I'm thinking a contest for who can name the varietal. We'll have a list and they'll just have to match the numbered bottle to the list of wine types (Pinot Gris, Sauv Blanc, Reisling, Gurvertz for the whites). That sort of thing. There's a grill at the house, so we can fire up some flank steak, chicken, portobellos and grilled veggies to add to a big salad. Have smelly cheeses, fancy meats, breads, and crackers.

Any other ideas? I'm feeling a little rusty on the hostess front. Suggestions for prizes for who guesses the most wines? Easy, but fun decor ideas? Best party you ever hosted?

On my way

I didn't feel right just taking off early, so I'm taking a half day of PTO today. Which means I am slumming right now at work and then I'll run home and spiff up before heading north.

I've buffed my portfolio. It's easy to do since it's a Keynote presentation on my laptop; I have a remote controller, so I just click through while talking. The appointment is with three women in an office, so no need for projection. I added two items we'd talked about before, took away the stuff that seemed to create lulls and feel good about it.

After the interview, I'm going to pick up my brother and then we'll pick up his girlfriend when she's done with work. No idea where we'll eat, but knowing my food snob bro, it'll be good. While we were discussing options, he mentioned The Front Porch. I asked, "Is that the one that shows movies in the patio? I've been there." It wasn't, but he was impressed that I'd been to Foreign Cinema. (Smart Girl and I did a night in the city last year. It was SO expensive for me. Blew through a third of my spending money for the month--taxis, drinks before dinner, etc. We haven't tried anything like that since. Our standards for what thriftiness looks like are too different.)

Now I just have to survive the next two hours before I can head out the door!

New connections

Last Saturday, I drove up to the mountains to join my new church for their women's retreat.

One of my goals for the day was to connect with the new pastor's wife. She's a Korean-American married to a Caucasian man. I was tired of people asking if I'd met her. Turns out, she was the main speaker at the retreat, so it was hard to grab her in any natural way. I shrugged and wandered around meeting other people instead. At lunch, I connected with a woman over our shared love of going to the early service in order to get to the Mountain View farmer's market before it closes.

On my way into dinner, I prayed that the Lord would guide my conversations. As I stood in line to get food, I wasn't even aware of who was around me. All of a sudden, the woman in front of me, turned and saw my nametag. Since it included my last name, she exclaimed, "Oh! Are you married to a Korean?" It was the pastor's wife. We started chatting in line and then headed for seats. I asked if I could join her and she was excited to have me. I think the other people at the table were a bit shocked as we compared where my in-laws and her family were during the war. I'm guessing that stories of invasion, child soldiers, threatened execution and 11-year olds wandering alone for 6-months are not the normal fare at a retreat.

She's an amazing woman. After college she and her husband-to-be worked for Int3rvars1ty, a Christian organization on college campuses. For making the choice to have to do fund-raising as well as not going on to graduate school, her parents disowned her. For a year she had no contact with them. She co-authored a book for Asian Americans about obeying God without dishonoring parents. Somewhere in there, she married a white guy. They struggled for years with infertility. When they finally were selected as adoptive parents, they got a little boy when he was 4-days old. Two weeks later, he's diagnosed with failure to thrive. From being a national-level speaker, she became a home-bound mother. I asked her if that had made her angry toward God. She said it hadn't, that God had given her some level of mother love that made her prefer being with her son to any other option. "I think it's easier when it's a child that's the tether. If it's the spouse, that's much harder." They now have an adopted girl and a biological child for a lively bunch.

Most of the women stayed for another day, I drove home that night. When I went to church the next morning, I happened to sit a couple rows behind the pastor. During the service I had a thought. When people were mingling after church, I went up to him with one of my personal business cards; on the back, I'd written three menu options.

"Pastor, I'm OTRgirl. I bonded with your wife last night at the retreat."

His face lit up, "She called and told me about you! I'm happy to meet you."

I gave him the card and said, "I would love to have dinner with your family, but I'm guessing it's hard for all of you to get out, so here's my proposal. We'll bring the dinner to you. I can make some Korean food, or my husband can make some non-Korean food. Just let us know what works for you."

She emailed me two days later and we're scheduled to bring dinner in early April. Now I just have to pull out my Mom K recipes and make some kalbi (beef ribs), buy some sides (good Korean market 30 minutes from our house), and defrost Mom K's mahndu (dumplings). Shouldn't be too bad. I don't think I'll get ambitious and try to make much more than that. Maybe I'll do a whole fish? Any kid-friendly Korean dishes I should consider?

I feel like my Mom. She was bold enough, crazy enough and hospitable enough that if we had a Chinese guest coming, she'd make chinese food. For an Indian friend? She made curry. I've never tried to cook for a Korean woman! I'm intimidated.

Happy New Year: your house smells like mackerel

Jrex and I have one day a year where we truly are 'cross-cultural'. For New Year's Day we do Korean for breakfast: a dumpling soup called mandu dok gukk, and then for dinner, I go German and do pork chops layered in the crockpot with saurkraut, onions and granny smith apples. Mom was excited by our tradition and wanted to make the breakfast for us. She added in a few traditional elements of her own, so I woke to the smell of pan-fried mackerel smoke.

Now, I like fish. I'm just not awake enough to eat it first thing in the morning. It's very traditional for Koreans, but even mandu gukk was a stretch for me when we started our tradition (Jrex rolls his eyes at me, but I'm fairly addicted to cereal for breakfast). I let them fish away without my help and enjoyed my soup breakfast.

I ended up picking up Lovey and Dovey from the airport this afternoon. We invited them over for dinner. They came and graced us with a bottle of Dom Perignon they'd received as a wedding gift. What a wonderful way to toast the New Year: good friends, good alcohol, good food.

May this year be full of fresh starts and may our lives bear fruit.

The Weekend Report

Well . . . no camping after all. Turns out the forecast was for rain this past weekend. Anywhere else in the country, you'd just grab your rain gear and head on out. However, in California . . .

Really, the other three families all have young kids so, if no rain is a realistic option, it's worth waiting. I wanted to go anyway, but Jrex (wisely) thought about what a wet dog in a tent might be like. So, we wimped out with the rest of them.

Instead of a camping weekend, we did a Cowboy-themed cookout at one couple's house. I baked cornbread in a skillet! Chili in a crockpot for the main meal. Dessert had nothing to do with cowboys and everything to do with Trader Joes, but it was fun anyway.

Sorry for the boring post. I'm waiting for edits and in the thick of a ton of deadlines. Ugh.

News from the other side.

Pull out the pillow from between my legs, put it on top of the cover. Grab the headboard with my left hand, push myself up enough to get my right elbow digging into the bed, move my feet out to hover over the edge, push/pull/swing all together until I stand with a grunt. Sway slightly. Shuffle to the bathroom. Repeat 3x per night.

The good news is that my kidneys are in great health despite pain meds and ibuprofen!

I've been home since Thursday. I never felt nauseous from the anesthesia, the worst the pain ever got was a 3/10 (I suspect I have a relatively high pain-threshold) and I have the entire Gilmore Girls box set to tide me over to a healthy state. As of today, I'm off the Vicadin and just using ibuprofen and tylenol. The staples come out this afternoon. I suspect that I'd be up for working by a week from today, but I'm not telling work that! I'll wait until my follow-up appointment and decide from there.

My Mother-in-Law calls Every. Single. Day. She couldn't be here, so apparently, telling me what to eat, drink and do has to substitute. It's been very kind of her to be so concerned, but phew! I'm glad we don't normally do a daily phone chat. Honestly, not that much changes in 24 hours. I'm still doing well. Still enjoying my Mom's friend. The dogs still like each other. It's still sunny outside. I'm still not working.

I love having OTRmama here. She's a fun yet comforting presence. As much as I love my family, each of us are high-intensity personalities, so I think we all drain each other a bit. Jrex is extremely grateful that OTRmama can walk the dogs. In an expression of gratitude, he's been cooking for us. Yesterday was pancakes and eggs for brunch and a honey/soy-glazed salmon for dinner.

I can tell that a bunch of people are praying. There's been an overall sense of love, peace and safety throughout this whole experience. I feel a little guilty being the invalid! Jrex cooks, OTRmama cleans up and I lay around on the couch watching DVDs. It doesn't seem fair, but I'm surviving the ordeal despite the guilt!

Now for the photo essay. From there and back again.

A nurse with a sense of humor is great! I was STARVING after the surgery, but couldn't eat anything until I passed gas. Talk about losing all sense of shame! I was never so happy to announce "I farted" to a stranger.

I even had a private room! Right next to the nurses station, but earplugs (and pain meds) cover a multitude of evils.
My 'happy button'. Gave me a shot of morphine whenever I wanted it!

My beloved book pile.

Back home again, the two dogs have settled into a more or less peaceful companionship.


Doggy BFFs.

How we suffer here in the invalid household.

OTRmama and her little Azure shadow.

My throat has been raw and dry in the mornings, so I had to go to Target to buy a humidifier. The one that was ultrasonic and had an adjustable rate of flow, also comes with an elephant head! It makes me laugh every time I look at it.

Bridging the Gap

Saturday night we had dinner with friends. The husband, Korean Scientist, and his wife, Gentle Smiles, moved here to raise their son Curious in the States. We've known them since Baltimore.

They've come to our house as part of group events, we've seen them at other parties thrown by people in lab. At most of those occasions, Gentle Smiles and I pulled to the side to talk for a while. We compared notes on Mothers. Me, discussing my MIL, her discussing her own mother. The dread of saying the wrong thing and ending up with the Mother living with us. The pressure to measure up. What it's like for her to raise a child here.

When our Thanksgiving plans changed, this family was my first thought. Jrex called and they already had plans. The irony was, they'd already asked him what we were doing for Thanksgiving, and made their plans after he said we had a guest. So they invited us over Saturday instead.

I went expecting a Korean feast. Instead, when we got there Gentle Smiles was nervously setting out cloth napkins, forks and knives. Telling her husband he should have offered us drinks. I could tell she was trying to do things the American way. She even had a cheese plate with crackers, along with the more Korean fresh fruit. I was very touched by the gesture, but wanted her to be able to relax and have fun. Nothing I said seemed to calm the anxiety.

As she was getting the food on the table for dinner, somehow the subject of chopsticks came up. I laughed about how I'd grown up eating with chopsticks, but had to learn a new technique when I got married; metal chopsticks require a more efficient method than the child's skills I'd had. Her eyes grew round, "You can eat with metal chopsticks? Show me." She'd been using a pair of wooden chopsticks to mix some of the food. I used them to grab a piece of kimchi and put it on my plate.

I laughed, "It would feel strange to eat kimchi with a fork".

She beamed and bustled to the kitchen, "I'll get chopsticks then."

As we all grabbed food with metal chopsticks, she smiled more and stopped trying to make sure everything was ok. Her husband seemed to relax back into his chair. Conversation flowed more readily. She asked what foods I knew how to make and was impressed (bulgoghi, kalbi, stew, jae jang myun, odicha). I told her about the first time I went to Jrex's Mom's house. She had me help make the jae jang myun. (It's a black bean paste sauce that covers noodles and any ingredients one chooses to include.)

"She plopped a huge pile of squid in front of me, with tentacles. They were the little, red squid, but they still had tentacles. I had to shut down the Midwestern girl in my head who was grossed out and cut them into small pieces. Everything I ate, I just shut that girl down and tried it. I loved all the food."

We ended up staying until 10:30 pm. Unfortunately, I did play the ignorant American and didn't stay to clean the whole kitchen with her . . . but, I think they needed to get Curious to bed and he'd have never settled down if we were there.

I thought it was interesting that after all our previous conversations about Korean culture, she'd assumed she had to do things 'my' way. Perhaps next time, she'll just do a Korean feast! Or, perhaps I will.

Bad Food Porn

Let's just say, it's definitely not Pay-per-View. I'm still saving up for my real camera and tripod. AND, warning to all vegetarians, look away...
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We have a well-designed apartment. The smoke alarm is far away from the kitchen, right next to the bedrooms.

Yesterday, for the first time, we set it off! Fortunately, nothing was harmed, just the drippings burning in the pan. Poor Muttola, she'd never heard that sound before.


I love a sexy man with an oven mitt...
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Riffs on traditional foods

Nothing we made was normal. Instead of mashed potatoes, we made up a recipe. While eating potato salad last week, we started doing a 'what-if' scenario: what if, instead of mayo, you use Blue Cheese dressing? what if, instead of bacon, you broil some pancetta?

This is the end result. To our tastes, it was the best potato salad we've ever had.

1. 2 pounds New Potatoes. Scrubbed. Peeling is optional. Boil until forkable. Chill in refrigerator while chicken cooks.
2. Slice two celery sticks. Add to potatoes.
3. Dice half a red onion. Add.
4. Broil 1/4 pound of super thin slices of pancetta, procutto or other cured ham. Separate slices and broil in toaster oven or oven for 2-3 minutes per side. Just to crisp. Drain on a paper towel, then pick up and crush. Sprinkle on top.
5. If available, crumble in goat cheese or gorgonzola to taste.
6. Add lots of salt and pepper to taste (Korean taste means LOTS of pepper).
7. 1/2 cup high quality Blue Cheese Salad Dressing.

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The 'Greens'

We saw this on On The Road Again. Using a cast-iron skillet over medium high heat, Gwyneth Paltrow toasted pine nuts and currants in olive oil, then tossed and wilted spinach on top. It's SO yummy. If my Mom had made spinach this way, I'd have begged for it.

Jrex also saw a quick recipe by Bitman, from that same show where he grated sweet potatoes. Stir-fried them in olive oil on high heat and then coated with a butter concoction. Also very good.

The Bird

Jrex followed the recipe from Cooks Illustrated for roast chicken. It was juicy and tender. The dripping sauce gravy did NOT work out. As you saw from the top photo, it just tasted burnt. Oh well! It wasn't even missed cause the bird didn't need any moisture to be palatable.

The dinner

The wine was a California Pinot. Jrex is on their mailing list and orders direct. Rhys Vineyards. This was a concoction of various grapes. On the nose, it was mellow with a hint of old shoe at the end. In the mouth, it was a bright, cheery flavor with a lingering finish. Very appropriate for Thanksgiving with it's happy taste blending well with each of the foods.

Dessert: Apple Cranberry Currant Pie

Since I now have a box of currants I need to use up, and since I wanted cranberries, when I saw this recipe in Sunset Magazine, I had to give it a try. I even made the pie crust from scratch. It's edible, but not that good (the crust). The pie itself was tangy and very good. Not too heavy.

In the future, I might just make it as a crumble.

The setting


The candlelight made it easy to ignore all the dishes waiting across the room. Jrex picked Miles Davis' Kind of Blue for the music. We toasted each other and shared what we're thankful for from the past year, and what we're grateful for in our marriage.

The best part was that, without any guests or an agenda, we just relaxed throughout much of the day and cooked little bits here and there. Of course that meant we didn't eat until our usual hour of 7:30, but it was a great day.

Just the three of us...

We had a friend who was going to visit for Thanksgiving weekend. At the last minute, she wasn't able to come. Her reasons were great and I wasn't offended, but I was sad. It feels like the point of Thanksgiving is to pack as many people into your house as possible and visit and feast all day. I tried to find some other orphans, but everyone we could think of had plans already.

At first I was really disappointed. It felt pitiful to not have friends or family for Thanksgiving. Somehow the dinner felt less like a gift and more like work. This morning I spent some time with the Lord and realized that I needed to view the day as an opportunity. A time to celebrate just the two of us. To be grateful for all we've survived together and to dream ahead.

As a result, we're going ahead with the meal we'd planned. Of course, everything we're making is a little off-beat and experimental: Roasted Chicken and shredded sweet potato stir fry by Jrex; blue cheese potato salad, wilted spinach with currants and pine nuts, and apple currant cranberry pie by me.
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Yesterday, Jrex went to Whole Foods to get our 'organic, grain-fed, free-range' chicken. The woman in line ahead of him was talking with the worker,

"The 20 pound turkey is the biggest you have? Hmm...well, I guess I'll take that as well as the 15 pounder."

As she waited for them to collect her birds, someone came to help Jrex. They weighed the chicken and then said, apologetically, "It's only 4 pounds". Jrex nodded, "Perfect. Thanks."

The woman looked at him with envy in her eyes, and asked, "Thanksgiving for two?"

Jrex smiled and nodded, "Yup". She sighed again, "Enjoy".

Now that I've adjusted my expectations for the day, we will!

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On cooking days, we call Muttola "Hopeful". As in "Watch out for Hopeful when you step back from the stove!"

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Stay tuned for the food porn photos tomorrow!

The post that will show how indoctrinated I've become

So . . . the fruit of all that Animal, Vegetable, Miracle reading. Our book club decided to do a practical application of the book. Saturday morning, Graceful met me at my place and we drove up to the Redwood City Farmer's market. We bought 10 pounds of tomatoes (recipe called for 30!), 5 bunches of basil and sundry other items.

Animator and Big Smile met us at the apartment when we returned. A vat of pasta sauce, tomatillo salsa and 3 ice cube trays of pesto later, we were ready to make cheese. Yup. We made our own mozzarella. 30 minutes start to finish. (You can find kits/directions at cheesemaking.com) While doing all that fun and games, we roasted a chicken that Big Smile had pre-assembled. Graceful assembled a mozzarella and tomato salad with fresh basil and balsamic vinaigrette.

As the chicken finished, while we were debating whether to make an apple cobbler, Quirky Asian Woman showed up with a lemon tart. Dinner turned into a progressive affair. The chicken and salad were done at 5:30 and the five of us were starving. We started eating. Jrex came home at 6 and we grabbed him a plate. At 7 pm, Hamilton showed up with marinated steak which Jrex cooked (slow oven roast on low heat for 15 minutes then seared on high in an iron skillet). When we finally got up from the table it was 9 pm. We don't have enough chairs for that many people, so two of us were perched on one chair together. It felt really cozy and familial. Old fashioned in all the right senses of the word.

The foods were all locally grown (except the steak. Yes, it was grass raised and free range, but from Uruguay). Jrex bought us wine, but failed the mission. With all the local wine sources, he bought a box wine from Italy. Hey, it's 3 liters of wine that stay good for up to 3 weeks, and its a great drinking wine.

At the end of the night, every one left with pesto, a Ziploc bag of pasta sauce, salsa and cheese.

One funny realization for me was how weird it felt that Animator, a white guy, was helping in the kitchen. I'm used to Jrex helping out, but Graceful and Big Smile are both Asian women and somehow, in a kitchen of Asian women, it felt 'wrong' to have a guy in there. When Mom K is here, Jrex hangs out with his Dad and it's a women-only kitchen. I adjusted quickly, but was surprised to have even had that moment.

Food and other Guilty Pleasures

I've been reading this book for the last two weeks. Barbara Kingsolver and her family made a commitment to live for a year on food they grew, or could purchase from local sources. Part memoir, part sermon, part history, it's been eye-opening and challenging. They moved from Tucson back to his family's farm in Virginia in order to make it possible.

The biggest take-away for me has been renewed commitment to go to the Farmers Market and support organic, regional growers. Of course, living in California means I have year-round access. Which is due to living in an irrigated desert . . . I'm not sure which is worse, carbon footprint or overuse of water.

I've found a market in Redwood City, just north of us. RC is as close to a 'blue-collar' town as there is in the Bay Area. The Farmer's Market is similarly utilitarian--just what I need. I found fresh fennel and English peas, then searched online and found a recipe that called for both. The Tahini dressing is really good.

For the last couple years, I've left the food exploration to Jrex; he enjoys it and I like eating the results. Reading the book and going to the market has renewed the fun of finding something new. It's also renewed some of my desire to be a little more of an Earth Mother 'like my Mom'.

Mom was a farmer's daughter, and in the midst of living in the inner-city, she maintained a garden. You've all heard of community plots of course, but ours was in the cemetery! As the second largest cemetery in the country, Spring Grove had lots of, how should we say it? Undeveloped Land. I hated gardening as a kid: hours of boredom in the sun. We couldn't tell what was a weed and what was a plant, and she couldn't figure out a way to show us, so she'd send us off to play. Then, once harvested, I didn't like the results either. Mom was from the boil it school; being forced to finish a mound of dark green, slimy spinach was my worst nightmare. I didn't eat a Spinach Salad until high school, and didn't really start eating salad as a regular thing until getting married.

I don't aspire to impatience with children or veggie murder, but I would like to be the kind of woman who gardens, who bakes, who creates feasts for family and friends. It may not be how I'm wired long-term, but Jrex is enjoying my current trend toward the Farmers Market and cooking (though I don't think he enjoys how much I spend at the grocery store! I'm always buying the cool gadget that we don't really need...).

Next weekend? Citrus Honey Scones...

For the last two weeks, I've been in an annoying mode where I just want to avoid my life. No time with God, minimal time with Jrex, minimal time or effort at work. It felt like a relentless pursuit of false rest to the point where my spirit felt as dry as the local creek beds. On Friday as I rode home, I threw up a flare prayer, "You've got to change this! I can't stand how I'm acting!"

No fireworks or bolts from the blue, but Saturday, I woke up and wanted to spend some time with the Lord before launching into my busy day. Again, nothing profound. Just a reminder through Psalm 27 to hide in him and to find real rest in his presence.

Then the rest of the day flowed along on well-oiled wheels. The woman who started our women's group, Only Child, would be having a baby shower in the evening. The women from Super Group (NOT a name I coined, but it will do for now) pooled our resources to get a shower gift for her. I went on-line yesterday to check their registry only to find that the two items in our price range were backordered indefinitely. Yikes! Fortunately they mentioned that they'd be happy with gently used items as well. I jumped on Craigslist and actually found the stroller and carseat from the registry. The posts were a couple days old, but when I emailed, they were still available.

Bought the carseat Saturday at 9:30 AM and then drove up and over the pass to Scotts Valley to buy the stroller. It was in as-new condition. Used once just to determine that it was too small for their toddler. After loading the loot, I stopped off to do a run with the dog (the new harness is working well). Then home for laundry and getting ready.

The shower was fun. We took over part of the back yard at Vino Locale, a local wine bar where Singer Girl works once or twice a week. Our favorite couple from supper club was there. We even had a gang war (verbal only) with Smart Girl, member of a "Foodie Club". Nope, we're definitely lower brow in our supper club. However, one of OUR people made the orzo dish that had the restaurant owner begging for the recipe. Ha!

What I loved about the day was how much I could sense the Lord wanting to bless Only Child and Hedonistic Outdoorsman. They've truly been the reason we have as much community as we do here and they are generous with their time and in offering hospitality. It felt right to be able to bless them with both car seat AND stroller for the price of the car seat. It was SO much fun to just be the Lord's hands for the day. All the details worked out seamlessly and I had fun in the process. I can't even put the right words around it, but it felt like I was in the midst of joyful Bigness.

I'm considering bulemia as a viable solution

For a client presentation on Monday, we had to assemble six 'flavor' sets. From jelly beans. Meaning, we had to taste Jellie Bellies. Dozens of combos. By the end we were biting them in half, then in thirds. We made some fun combos: for example, to represent the creative department we found red, blue and green jelly beans (pomegranate, blueberry, margarita) and called that blend "The Spectrum".

I have a client presentation here in another forty minutes and I don't know if walking in with a green face will be acceptable...

The Evening: A Different World

My sister’s friends came over to watch the kids so we could go out. We’d already decided that part of what we want to do this weekend is remember Mom in honor of the 10th anniversary of her death. She died at the end of September, but we won’t be together then.

For dinner my brother and sister took me to a fantastic Morroccan restaurant. From the outside it looks a bit sketchy, but inside? Wow.


The whole meal involved communal plates and fingers as utensils.


Before the meal each of us were given a gleaming white towel. Then our host brought over a metal container to catch the water he poured over our hands. A guy seated next to us was eating alone. I wondered what he thought as we toasted Mom with our water glasses and reviewed what our parents had done, both wrong and right. Mostly right and often quirky, but each of us are grateful for our parents and for each other.

Where I've been of late

It’s been a perfect storm for non-blogging. My new job is high-intensity with very low privacy. My project manager can watch what I’m doing from her desk. The train only stops at the San Carlos station once an hour, so I have no wiggle room to linger and read a little bit o blog before riding off to catch my train. In the mornings I’m trying to crank out some work before that same project manager arrives with her questions, whines and rants. Obviously, on the good side, it keeps me honest, but sheesh, I miss the occasional break to read about ya’lls lives.

The other factor has been that we’ve had a LOT of socializing this summer. No time to read blogs while driving two hours north to a wedding reception on the beach in Marin County.

Last night we grabbed dinner with a buddy of mine from grad school. He’s Indian and used to REALLY late hours. We met him at 8:45 pm, drove 20 minutes south into Seoul/Dehli and wound up at a hole-in-the-wall Pakistani restaurant. Great food, the best tandoori chicken I’ve ever had, but as my friend said, “It’s a very third-world atmosphere”. It was. We had to ask for tea at least six times before they brought us two cups (for the three of us), he had to ask for what he ordered twice. There was a crying baby, lots of loud chatter and not a single white person in the room. I loved it.

It turns out he’s really lonely. Most of his co-workers are older or married and none of them drink. He’s really excited to reconnect and has offered to have us join him and a manager from his job for flights around the Bay area. Apparently it’s only $25/person since the guy is part of a flying club. Hmm…fly down to Monteray for lunch? OK! Lake Tahoe for an afternoon boat ride? I’ll fit it in. The down side is, of course, it definitely won’t help my blogging.

New Year Food

Being a fourth generation American on my Mom's side and a DAR on my Dad's side, it's hard to claim any particular traditions. As a 1.5 generation Korean-American Jrex has a clearly definied culture. Out of self-defense, I claim random items as being necessary for my 'German' cultural identity (mostly dessert and beer). The only other specifically German tradition I have is pork and saurkraut for New Years day. Koreans tend to eat duk-gook (a dumpling based soup) for New Years. Most years we have soup for breakfast and pork in saurkraut from the crockpot for dinner.

I think he's fully corrupted me though. This year we had duk-gook for brunch and then Jrex made a FANTASTIC New Years dinner. He ad libbed a recipe involving rosemary and thyme encrusted chicken breasts on a bed of wild rice surrounded by steamed veggies. For dessert we had mixed fruit with honey and almonds. As my friend and I cleaned up after dinner, Jrex played piano in the living room. Ms. P turned to me and exclaimed, "If I'd known it was this good here, I'd have been here months ago!"

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I provided the key ingredient for dinner. A couple days ago as I walked the dog past the retirement home, I realized the bushy hedges separating the cars were rosemary. I brought some home and used it for dinner.

As I started out on a dog walk yesterday I heard someone calling my name. I turned back to find my husband. When I got closer to him he said, "Could you pick up some rosemary while you're out?" I looked confused, "But I don't have any money and the stores are all closed?" He gave me a look that signaled I'd had a DBM. "Oh!" I exclaimed "You mean 'pick up' some rosemary!"

Those poor bushes are going to be stripped by spring.

Merry Christmas to us!

One of my best friends is coming tonight to stay with us for a week, so we did our personal Christmas celebration yesterday. Three things made me cry while overall the day was wonderful.

• I read this article over breakfast. It’s about a building in Chicago that’s impacting one of the worst neighborhoods in the city.
• We watched this show on PBS about an intergenerational housing solution for seniors and foster kids.
• For our movie selection we saw The Pursuit of Happyness. Powerful, thought provoking and very well done.

For dinner, let me just say that I like to learn a new skill by jumping off the deep end. I’ve never roasted a turkey, or even a chicken, but I decided to make Cornish hens coated with a balsamic glaze and stuffed with porcini & shitake mushrooms, veggies and wild rice. Jrex walked to the wine store around the corner and picked a smooth, slightly earthy Pinot Noir for our wine.

I almost forgot to take a picture of dessert. I managed to make a delicious crème brulee.

Thanks to this cook book, the hens were tender and juicy while the crème brulee was crusty and smooth!

Jrex wrote me a great poem about home and us. All in all, the perfect Christmas. We hope each of you enjoy as wonderful a day tomorrow and for the rest of the Christmas season.