awakening

It's warm. The grass is green and the trees are blooming. My mind is beginning to stir from the winter doldrums.  Here's what we've been doing lately:

Marley, Hunter, Jenna and I went to the creek and found some

good fossil specimens.

We celebrated Burk's birthday...

...as well as Dorothy's and Jenna's.

I made this bed for Jenna's doll.  Dorothy made the mattress,

blanket, and pillow.

Dorothy dug out her old family pictures and arranged them

on the wall. I put some of my photo editing skills to work on

the oldest and most time damaged photos.

Before                             After

Before                                             After

Then I took the picture above

and the one below...

And made this one:

And the same thing for the followig:

                                                :

                                         

    

Quote of the Day

When you look at the structure of the brain it's made up of neurons.........There are 100 billion of these nerve cells.  Each of these cells makes about 1,000 to 10,000 contacts with other neurons.  From this information people have calculated that the number of possible brain states, of permutations and combinations of brain activity, exceeds the number of elementary particles in the universe.

--V.S. Ramachandran

Out and about

I'm having trouble keeping my blood pressure under control these days. My doctor is doing his part in prescribing stronger doses of medicine and I'm trying to do my part by meditating,  losing weight. and getting plenty of exercise.  Usually, I walk a mile or so along the highway that runs in front of our house but yesterday, just for a change, I walked the perimeter of our ten acres. If I walked along four straight lines to form a square ten acres that would be a little more than half a mile, but I stretched it out to almost a mile by...

walking down this lane and back...

then around the north end of the pasture....

down this trail to the creek....

up the gravel bed where I found the bear scat last December...

I paused long enough to check out the swimming hole. The grand

kids will have fun here this summer.

I walked to the south end of our woods. The only sounds were birds

fluttering in the brush and the wind in the trees. To paraphrase a poem

 I once heard,  "In February when  south winds pierced my solitude,

 I found  peace on Peach Eater Creek."

Around the south end of the pasture and back to the house. Not

a bad cardiovascular workout.

Birthday Party

Our family makes a big deal of birthdays, especially a baby's first.  Saturday we had a grand party for our great grand daughter Gracen.

Dorothy made cupcakes for the occasion

Cherry Chocolate

Red Velvet

Everyone brought dips, chips, melted chocolate for dippng marshmallows, salsa, quacamole.

The birthday girl

Now to wash the cake off.

Quote of the Day

The most fatal illusion is the narrow point of view. Since life is growth and motion, a fixed point of view kills anybody who has one.

--Brooks Atkinson

Hot Pastrami

Pastrami sandwiches have always been a favorite around our house. When we lived in California we bought them served on French rolls but in the eastern part of the country the traditional way is on rye bread with mustard and pickles.  Since Dorothy gave me my new smoker I've been wanting to attempt to make that delicious, spicy meat.
So, hear are the details:

I bought  a 5lb corned beef brisket in brine, rinsed it thoroughly and cut almost all the fat off. (I left about 1/8 inch layer.)  I prepared a dry rub consisting of 3 Tbs ground black pepper, 2 Tbs ground coriander, 1/2 tsp red pepper flakes, 1 tsp garlic powder, and 1 Tbsp paprika.

Then I rubbed all sides of the brisket with the dry rub mixture.

 I placed the brisket on a length of heavy duty aluminum foil drizzled with vegetable oil then wrapped it tight. Then I wrapped it two more times in foil, placed it in a roasting pan then into my smoker set at 240 degrees. It cooked for five hours.

Next, I removed it from the smoker and let it sit on the counter until it cooled to room temperature, then into the refrigerator over night.

The next day I used an electric slicer that I borrowed from my sister Rita and produced a pile of deli thin slices of pastrami.

We served them on rye bread with mustard, pickles, and banana peppers. This photo is of Dorothy's sandwich. Mine had twice the amount of pastrami.

I also made an apple pie.  Dorothy tells me I added too much shortening because the crust wouldn't stay together. As you can see the top crust is just a patch work of dough. Not very pretty but we ate it warm with a scoop of ice cream and it was quite tasty.

Quote of the Day

"We begin to find and become ourselves when we notice how we are already found, already truly, entirely, wildly, messily, marvelously who we were born to be."


--Anne Lamott

What I'm reading now

Have you ever heard of the word "homogenocene"? Neither had I until I read this book by Charles C. Mann. It describes the ecological era we are now living in where biological diversity is diminishing and the world's ecosystems are beginning to resemble each other. In his first book 1491 Mann describes the world before Columbus "discovered" the Americas and in this tome we learn how the world has changed since the voyage of Cristobal Colon. Can you imagine Italian cooking without tomatoes? or the Irish without the potato? Both these foods were introduced to Europe as a result of the Colombian Exchange, a phenomenon that occurred as  ships began to ply the oceans in a quest for gold and silver to fill the coffers of European monarchs. While precious metals were being plundered and New World civilisations were being destroyed a process began that altered the world as it was known  then. This book explains how the Spanish not only took silver from South America back to Spain but also sailed to the Philippines where they met Chinese merchants who traded silk and porcelain for the silver. The silver became the basis for the Chinese economy.  The most interesting thing about the book is how it explained that the biggest changes occurred from the plants, animals, and diseases that were often transported in both directions across the seas. Coffee came from the Near East to South America, potatoes from the Andes to Europe, Sugar from Asia to the Caribbean. Diseases killed millions after being introduced to people who had no natural immunity to them. 1493 is an interesting read. Over 400 pages but it will hold you interest to the end.

Southwestern Bean Soup

Yesterday was a cold and windy day so I thought a pot of chili would be good for dinner. I put on some beans in the morning and let them cook most of the day. In the past I've let the water cook out of the beans and was left with a big burned mess. So, yesterday I made sure to add water to the pot from time to time to prevent that from happening.  I browned some ground beef in a skillet along with some chopped onions and garlic. After pouring off the grease I added a can of diced tomatoes with green chilies, an 8 oz. can of tomato sauce, 1/3 cup of coffee, 1 tsp of beef base, 3 tsp brown sugar, 1 tsp cumin, 3 Tbs chili powder, 1/4 tsp cocoa powder, and 1 tsp oregano. I stirred all that together then added it to the pot of beans. I learned that in my effort to make sure the beans didn't boil dry I had added too much water and the result was a very soupy chili.  So when Dorothy came home I told her that I had made some Southwestern Bean Soup.  She loved it.

So now I have two recipes: one for chili (with a tightly controlled amount of water in the beans), and one for Southwestern Bean Soup ( water added with abandon).

quote of the day

Your problem is how you are going to spend this one and precious life you have been issued. Whether you're going to spend it trying to look good and creating the illusion that you have power over circumstances, or whether you are going to taste it, enjoy it and find out the truth about who you are.

From her graduation commencement address to Berkeley."
— Anne Lamott

What I'm Reading Now

It seems like I've been laughing at Bill Cosby all my life. I've laughed at his TV shows, his stand-up comedy routine, his LP records, and his books.  This latest offering by Mr. Cosby deals with everything from his childhood, the book of Genesis, teenage dating, husband and wife relationships, to grand parenthood. I laughed out loud on every page. That's as good a review as any funny writer can receive.

quote of the day

Poverty is not wholly a personal failure.  It also represent the failure of an economic system. And the remedy is not wholly one of charity, but of political and economic action.  Poverty is a reflection also on those who are not poor.

--Brooks Atkinson

What I'm reading now

It’s an age old theme, the hero against the villains, good vs. evil, but with a twist. In the literature of the Western world the protagonist (hero) has mostly been male. The role played by females was generally the damsel in distress who depended upon a male hero to slay the dragon for her. In modern American culture men are no longer heroes to women and now we have this story that has as the protagonist a young female who is competent and possesses the skills to slay her own dragons. I always wanted my own daughters to grow up as independent women and I think this is a good story for young girls. After all, boys have always had their own stories with strong male heroes to set an example for them. John Wayne movies always filled the bill for me. So, I think the modern young woman will find that this story strikes a chord within her psyche that feels right to her.

fire in the sky

Dorothy and I were sitting at the table this evening looking out across the pasture. The clouds in the west were dark grey as the sun was setting. Within a few minutes the underside of the clouds turned pink and then this fiery orange.

Christmas Pajamas

Every year everyone gets pajamas for Christmas.  We take an annual photo. Here is the one for 2011.