Good morning!
This noon I am meeting my friend Maureen for lunch at Point Loma Seafood. They have very good seafood lunches of the fish-and-chips variety. It's one of those establishments where you go in and, after studying the board, go up to the counter and give your order. When you get your food you can take it outside to a table under an umbrella, or to a large airy room overlooking the water if the weather isn't so good. Today it promises to be hot out, so perhaps we'll eat outdoors.
My favorite food there is the fried oyster sandwich, rich and crispy and huge. But today I'm having the shrimp cocktail if I can hold out for it. That oyster sandwich is so tempting, but I do not really need all those calories. In fact, my body will thank me if I stick to iced tea and a shrimp cocktail and a few crackers.
We'll probably be talking about the book club book, Divisadero, by Michael Ondaatje, for a while. She has long finished it; I can't bring myself to finish it up. If I did , perhaps I could make some sense of it. As of now, I "don't like it." (Not an acceptable book club comment!) After we eat, we may run over to Ocean Beach to look at the antiques. I am on the trail of a particular dealer whose shop I have lost track of. Then I'll try to get home before the afternoon traffic swamps the freeways to the south.
My baby sister sent me a very interesting site in response to yesterday's remarks about the chakras. It's www.eclecticenergies.com/chakras, and it's worth a click.
There's a test to see how your chakras are doing at this moment. Mine are pretty profoundly clogged up, which does not surprise me. There are instructions on how to get them open again. We all know them; we just are not enough self-aware, or conscientious enough with our practice. YAZZYBEL
Thursday, March 31, 2011
Wednesday, March 30, 2011
Music Day from the Brain to the Chakras!
Good morning!
Today is piano day and I should make short shrift of my blog and get ready.
Have I been practicing? Not really, but I have been playing. I skipped a day this week, but have been at it with Sr. Mompou most days. Improvement? What's that? At least I am doing it, even though Jeunes Filles Au Jardin is about as much of a mystery as it was the first day I looked at it. It's a mystery to my fingers. As well as to my mind.
I heard Dudley Moore, movie actor as well as serious piano player, say an interesting thing once on the television. He thinks the memory that enables us to go to the instrument and play something we've learned is not necessarily stored in the brain. He felt that it was somewhere along the spine, I believe, and I agree with him. Just think about it when you sit down to play; your whole body is engaged, your whole person, that is, brain and body. And it probably is the body who remembers and plays the piece, tooth and toenail.
When I was young I might feel that I'd memorized a piece, but sometimes in a recital I'd "come to" and feel a total blank. I think that at those moments I did throw my brain into gear and it said, in the words of 2011, "Wha?" Where was I, in the world, in the piece of music? I had no idea. My body had been playing and my brain should have left well enough alone.
I have had piano teachers, one notably, who said that one should be able to recite the key signature, notes, chords of any spot in a piece at any time, USING THE BRAIN, of course. I don't know that I could ever do that but maybe that is why I never made it to Carnegie Hall. There have been plenty of times when it would have been handy to be able to do that. "Oh, yes--I just played C sharp, A, and E in my right hand and A in the left and that means that next I play ..... because I am in measure 34 of the first section...," ooops, couldn't do that. And the more I might stop to try to THINK my way out of my dilemma, the worse I might do.
I am trying to get Jeunes Filles Au Jardin into my SPINE and actually the chakras thereof. That is probably where the music really is, and Dudley Moore didn't quite think that or say it. I must employ my chakras more consciously and they will let my poor brain trail along in their wake, and I'll have that piece memorized.
I love the chakras. They come in all colors and they make sounds like chimes. The chakras are vortices that are not actually ON the spine; they are just outside it within the aural body. Could we say that they are of spirit AND of flesh together, perhaps just the place where those two essences meet to make us what we are?
Yes, I shall actively involve the chakras today to see what I have been missing. I just need to remember, to think about it every morning, and I know that. I know it, and still I get up, tend to dogs, go out to get the paper, make coffee, read the paper, come to the computer, feed Theodore when he gets up. And the chakras are left to fend for themselves. Thank God, they seem to know what they're doing. And I need to pay attention. YAZZYBEL
Today is piano day and I should make short shrift of my blog and get ready.
Have I been practicing? Not really, but I have been playing. I skipped a day this week, but have been at it with Sr. Mompou most days. Improvement? What's that? At least I am doing it, even though Jeunes Filles Au Jardin is about as much of a mystery as it was the first day I looked at it. It's a mystery to my fingers. As well as to my mind.
I heard Dudley Moore, movie actor as well as serious piano player, say an interesting thing once on the television. He thinks the memory that enables us to go to the instrument and play something we've learned is not necessarily stored in the brain. He felt that it was somewhere along the spine, I believe, and I agree with him. Just think about it when you sit down to play; your whole body is engaged, your whole person, that is, brain and body. And it probably is the body who remembers and plays the piece, tooth and toenail.
When I was young I might feel that I'd memorized a piece, but sometimes in a recital I'd "come to" and feel a total blank. I think that at those moments I did throw my brain into gear and it said, in the words of 2011, "Wha?" Where was I, in the world, in the piece of music? I had no idea. My body had been playing and my brain should have left well enough alone.
I have had piano teachers, one notably, who said that one should be able to recite the key signature, notes, chords of any spot in a piece at any time, USING THE BRAIN, of course. I don't know that I could ever do that but maybe that is why I never made it to Carnegie Hall. There have been plenty of times when it would have been handy to be able to do that. "Oh, yes--I just played C sharp, A, and E in my right hand and A in the left and that means that next I play ..... because I am in measure 34 of the first section...," ooops, couldn't do that. And the more I might stop to try to THINK my way out of my dilemma, the worse I might do.
I am trying to get Jeunes Filles Au Jardin into my SPINE and actually the chakras thereof. That is probably where the music really is, and Dudley Moore didn't quite think that or say it. I must employ my chakras more consciously and they will let my poor brain trail along in their wake, and I'll have that piece memorized.
I love the chakras. They come in all colors and they make sounds like chimes. The chakras are vortices that are not actually ON the spine; they are just outside it within the aural body. Could we say that they are of spirit AND of flesh together, perhaps just the place where those two essences meet to make us what we are?
Yes, I shall actively involve the chakras today to see what I have been missing. I just need to remember, to think about it every morning, and I know that. I know it, and still I get up, tend to dogs, go out to get the paper, make coffee, read the paper, come to the computer, feed Theodore when he gets up. And the chakras are left to fend for themselves. Thank God, they seem to know what they're doing. And I need to pay attention. YAZZYBEL
Tuesday, March 29, 2011
More About Food, and Washing Up Instructions
Good morning!
I seem to be in an eating phase right now, so I might as well write about it too.
Yesterday or the day before I was talking about Tomato Sauce with a Catsup Taste, and I meant to mention that I've recently found, in a book by Suzanne Somers , a recipe for catsup that you can make yourself. Her recipes are good and interesting except for cutesy names like Sommersize, etc. But anyway her catsup makes a lot more than I would want to make (it's a ton of preservatives that keep the commercial catsup stable in our refrigerators for weeks or months) as I am the only one here at present that eats it. But you can go there for a good recipe if you want more precise quantities than "a knife tip."
I do use a knife tip. And it's a pointed caseknife kind of knife. I figure the point is about 1/4 teaspoon. More or less. I have made entire meals (eaten them too) using only this wonderful old old English knife that we bought at an open air market in Oklahoma once long ago. It was once two inches longer in the blade than it now is. It is dark un-stainless steel with a wooden handle that is gradually coming apart. Once we 'd bought it I found my eight-year-old son sawing some copper wire with it, and the blade used to have two little nicks in it for years. Those nicks are gone, now, worn away entirely. The long tip got so thin and dangerous that I asked my husband to go to the garage and cut it down, conforming to the original curvature of the blade. He did a great job. It could hold up for a few more years yet. The blade used to say "Sheffield England" but those letters have been gone years ago. I tell people I know I'm old because I look at the sheets of music of Debussy and Ravel which I bought new and crisp when I was young, and they are limp, faded, and flaking--telling me something about me, folks. Same way with that knife. It was old when I got it but it is a lot older now.
I think I will end this by telling you how to wash dishes. When I was about ten and our family lived in Laredo out on Piedra China, my father was gone a lot working in Mexico, so the adults in the family consisted of my mother, my Tennessee-born grandfather, (this was his family's dishwashing ritual) and my grandmother Annie Bell. The main meal was eaten at lunch, and after we had eaten, all three of them went into the kitchen and went to work in a practiced, expert way. One person brought in the dishes, or maybe they all did. One person washed the dishes, one person dried the dishes, and the third person went about the kitchen setting things to rights, wiping the work areas and the stove, and so forth.
Two enamel pans, each one about ten or eleven inches round, held the wash water and the rinse water. Every household, my children, had at that time a handy implement which was a little wire cage with a handle, and into that cage went all the odds and ends of all the family soap. The wash pan was filled with hot water and the little soap implement was shaken through the water till the water turned slightly milky and sudsy. Not too much at all. The rinse pan was filled with hot water.
First, glassware was washed, rinsed, and immediately dried by the two workers. Second after glassware, the silverware: knives, forks, spoons, were washed and dried. Thirdly, the plates and other chinaware were washed and dried. Needless to say, person number three was putting away each item after it was dried. After that, any cooking vessels were washed and dried, although my grandmother had the habit of washing up skillets and saucepans as she used them in preparation so they were almost always all done. Dishcloth washed out and hung up, dishtowel, likewise. Drainboard, clean and empty. Everything put away. Kitchen, spotless. Workers off to put their feet up for a minute. Actually nobody ever really put their feet up that I saw. They were all skinny and didn't get too tired even in Laredo's hundred degree noontime heat. We kids participated in that ritual from time to time, but mostly the adults did it to get it over with. That was fun to remember. Thanks for letting me go back in time for a moment! YAZZYBEL
I seem to be in an eating phase right now, so I might as well write about it too.
Yesterday or the day before I was talking about Tomato Sauce with a Catsup Taste, and I meant to mention that I've recently found, in a book by Suzanne Somers , a recipe for catsup that you can make yourself. Her recipes are good and interesting except for cutesy names like Sommersize, etc. But anyway her catsup makes a lot more than I would want to make (it's a ton of preservatives that keep the commercial catsup stable in our refrigerators for weeks or months) as I am the only one here at present that eats it. But you can go there for a good recipe if you want more precise quantities than "a knife tip."
I do use a knife tip. And it's a pointed caseknife kind of knife. I figure the point is about 1/4 teaspoon. More or less. I have made entire meals (eaten them too) using only this wonderful old old English knife that we bought at an open air market in Oklahoma once long ago. It was once two inches longer in the blade than it now is. It is dark un-stainless steel with a wooden handle that is gradually coming apart. Once we 'd bought it I found my eight-year-old son sawing some copper wire with it, and the blade used to have two little nicks in it for years. Those nicks are gone, now, worn away entirely. The long tip got so thin and dangerous that I asked my husband to go to the garage and cut it down, conforming to the original curvature of the blade. He did a great job. It could hold up for a few more years yet. The blade used to say "Sheffield England" but those letters have been gone years ago. I tell people I know I'm old because I look at the sheets of music of Debussy and Ravel which I bought new and crisp when I was young, and they are limp, faded, and flaking--telling me something about me, folks. Same way with that knife. It was old when I got it but it is a lot older now.
I think I will end this by telling you how to wash dishes. When I was about ten and our family lived in Laredo out on Piedra China, my father was gone a lot working in Mexico, so the adults in the family consisted of my mother, my Tennessee-born grandfather, (this was his family's dishwashing ritual) and my grandmother Annie Bell. The main meal was eaten at lunch, and after we had eaten, all three of them went into the kitchen and went to work in a practiced, expert way. One person brought in the dishes, or maybe they all did. One person washed the dishes, one person dried the dishes, and the third person went about the kitchen setting things to rights, wiping the work areas and the stove, and so forth.
Two enamel pans, each one about ten or eleven inches round, held the wash water and the rinse water. Every household, my children, had at that time a handy implement which was a little wire cage with a handle, and into that cage went all the odds and ends of all the family soap. The wash pan was filled with hot water and the little soap implement was shaken through the water till the water turned slightly milky and sudsy. Not too much at all. The rinse pan was filled with hot water.
First, glassware was washed, rinsed, and immediately dried by the two workers. Second after glassware, the silverware: knives, forks, spoons, were washed and dried. Thirdly, the plates and other chinaware were washed and dried. Needless to say, person number three was putting away each item after it was dried. After that, any cooking vessels were washed and dried, although my grandmother had the habit of washing up skillets and saucepans as she used them in preparation so they were almost always all done. Dishcloth washed out and hung up, dishtowel, likewise. Drainboard, clean and empty. Everything put away. Kitchen, spotless. Workers off to put their feet up for a minute. Actually nobody ever really put their feet up that I saw. They were all skinny and didn't get too tired even in Laredo's hundred degree noontime heat. We kids participated in that ritual from time to time, but mostly the adults did it to get it over with. That was fun to remember. Thanks for letting me go back in time for a moment! YAZZYBEL
Monday, March 28, 2011
Monday , Thinking About Food and Words and Colors
Good morning!
I was just looking at Saturday's post, about sauces, and it reminded me that there is a great, beautiful book that I have, about Southwest cookery. It is called New Southwestern Cooking, by Carolyn Dille and Susan Belsinger. This is an elegant book, from its red-pepper covered cover to its amazingly varied and ambitions recipes using southwest ingredients. They have many sauces, delicate and precise variations on the tomato-onion-chile theme all. I wish I had six people to cook for when I read a book like this one; I get all inspired. It also has a section of "Menus." I love menus. Love reading them. I used to love planning them, but nowadays I am out of practice for that.
My favorite cookbook for all time--have I told you?--is Perla Myers's The Seasonal Kitchen. There she is on the cover, all young and active, walking along in her seventies' trenchcoat with baskets of FRESH food in her hands. Fresh was a new watchword in those days. Women seemed to make ninety percent of their dinner dishes using cans, really. Especially cans of soup. Perla must be nearly my age by now, hard to believe.
Anyway, I love the book because it is based on seasons, and menus...her food is very simple compared to the cuisine of today. Nowadays, those who cook are condemned to a very rigorous criterion if the recipes of the magazines are to be followed. A simple salad can contain, must contain, at least twenty ingredients at least half of which are from Asian sources.The simple stirfry has had to become "fusion cuisine" with a mish mash of ingredients never heard of by Thomas Jefferson and George Washington. I go for Perla and her simple but good ideas.
The timer has just chimed, telling me it is time to go climb into the waiting bathtub with horrible horrible novel, Divisadero. Why am I having such a hard time reading these novels lately? What is that novel about? and I mean, with what has that novel to do? Maybe it doesn't have to do with anything, but just be readable. Helloooo! I can hardly read it. I am, really am, going to go into art. Three primary colors, plus black,lots of paper, a big glass of water (near a tap). And just spin out. Literature has obviously escaped me now. Three primary colors, lots easier than twenty six letters and all those words. YAZZYBEL
I was just looking at Saturday's post, about sauces, and it reminded me that there is a great, beautiful book that I have, about Southwest cookery. It is called New Southwestern Cooking, by Carolyn Dille and Susan Belsinger. This is an elegant book, from its red-pepper covered cover to its amazingly varied and ambitions recipes using southwest ingredients. They have many sauces, delicate and precise variations on the tomato-onion-chile theme all. I wish I had six people to cook for when I read a book like this one; I get all inspired. It also has a section of "Menus." I love menus. Love reading them. I used to love planning them, but nowadays I am out of practice for that.
My favorite cookbook for all time--have I told you?--is Perla Myers's The Seasonal Kitchen. There she is on the cover, all young and active, walking along in her seventies' trenchcoat with baskets of FRESH food in her hands. Fresh was a new watchword in those days. Women seemed to make ninety percent of their dinner dishes using cans, really. Especially cans of soup. Perla must be nearly my age by now, hard to believe.
Anyway, I love the book because it is based on seasons, and menus...her food is very simple compared to the cuisine of today. Nowadays, those who cook are condemned to a very rigorous criterion if the recipes of the magazines are to be followed. A simple salad can contain, must contain, at least twenty ingredients at least half of which are from Asian sources.The simple stirfry has had to become "fusion cuisine" with a mish mash of ingredients never heard of by Thomas Jefferson and George Washington. I go for Perla and her simple but good ideas.
The timer has just chimed, telling me it is time to go climb into the waiting bathtub with horrible horrible novel, Divisadero. Why am I having such a hard time reading these novels lately? What is that novel about? and I mean, with what has that novel to do? Maybe it doesn't have to do with anything, but just be readable. Helloooo! I can hardly read it. I am, really am, going to go into art. Three primary colors, plus black,lots of paper, a big glass of water (near a tap). And just spin out. Literature has obviously escaped me now. Three primary colors, lots easier than twenty six letters and all those words. YAZZYBEL
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Sunday the Mysterious
Good afternoon! Late breakfast.
Well I got up and went off to church at the crack of dawn as usual...we are having the Lenten Study now and it is about The Atonement. The whole concept, which appears to have as many centers as a hydra has heads, is a mystery to me. I must say that I am much more at home with the Jewish idea of Atonement, and if they were honest I am sure most of the folks sitting around me would be in accord. That is because the Jewish idea of Atonement is logical. And the Christian idea is--mystical? Magical? I can't say what that last word could be yet, because I have not yet heard what the two teachers are saying yet.
Yesterday afternoon I spent at cleaning out some of my writing. I took it to a stationery store and punched 3 holes in a bunch of it to put into a notebook. Great bales of incidental writing, such as schoolwork and email correspondence have gone into the shredder. And I have boxes and boxes more to go. Shall resume later on.
It takes a long time to go into one's writing because one finds kself reading it, fascinated. Could I really have had the brains to write all that stuff? I just love a lot of it, which, I guess, means that it is pretty bad.
I finally finished up the box of Thrifty Rocky Road Ice Cream which I errantly bought and divided up into many little 1/2 cup portions. Trouble is, one of those little portions is never enough, and it is too convenient to bring out a bunch at once and polish them off. Thank goodness, I have eaten the whole RR bunch, which are especially tempting because here you get a nut, there, a marshmallow, and the choclolate ice cream in between is especially delicious.
I find myself pining for Mexico, a sinecure for retirement for less than wealthy Americans for many years. We cannot now go there for fear of having our throats cut, it seems...and yet, and yet....Given the choice, would you rather have your throat slit in Mexico or die lying in your own pp and bed sores in an American nursing home, goggly on pharmaceuticals and psychotropics?....I have been scorning Brownsville, TX, as a refuge for the elderly, as it is so--what can I say? So near the border, that's it!!! But, if there is any of old gracious Mexico left , I think it may be found in a patio here, a garden there, a cafe here, a sunporch there, in a Texas border city...Hey--I may have hit on something. Go there to live, and if they capture you (your nearest and dearest) and are going to put you into a nursing home on the American side, run quick to el bos, cross the river, get lost in Matamoros or >>>>? city, and await el cuchillo. Whew! Decision solved!!! YAZZYBEL
Well I got up and went off to church at the crack of dawn as usual...we are having the Lenten Study now and it is about The Atonement. The whole concept, which appears to have as many centers as a hydra has heads, is a mystery to me. I must say that I am much more at home with the Jewish idea of Atonement, and if they were honest I am sure most of the folks sitting around me would be in accord. That is because the Jewish idea of Atonement is logical. And the Christian idea is--mystical? Magical? I can't say what that last word could be yet, because I have not yet heard what the two teachers are saying yet.
Yesterday afternoon I spent at cleaning out some of my writing. I took it to a stationery store and punched 3 holes in a bunch of it to put into a notebook. Great bales of incidental writing, such as schoolwork and email correspondence have gone into the shredder. And I have boxes and boxes more to go. Shall resume later on.
It takes a long time to go into one's writing because one finds kself reading it, fascinated. Could I really have had the brains to write all that stuff? I just love a lot of it, which, I guess, means that it is pretty bad.
I finally finished up the box of Thrifty Rocky Road Ice Cream which I errantly bought and divided up into many little 1/2 cup portions. Trouble is, one of those little portions is never enough, and it is too convenient to bring out a bunch at once and polish them off. Thank goodness, I have eaten the whole RR bunch, which are especially tempting because here you get a nut, there, a marshmallow, and the choclolate ice cream in between is especially delicious.
I find myself pining for Mexico, a sinecure for retirement for less than wealthy Americans for many years. We cannot now go there for fear of having our throats cut, it seems...and yet, and yet....Given the choice, would you rather have your throat slit in Mexico or die lying in your own pp and bed sores in an American nursing home, goggly on pharmaceuticals and psychotropics?....I have been scorning Brownsville, TX, as a refuge for the elderly, as it is so--what can I say? So near the border, that's it!!! But, if there is any of old gracious Mexico left , I think it may be found in a patio here, a garden there, a cafe here, a sunporch there, in a Texas border city...Hey--I may have hit on something. Go there to live, and if they capture you (your nearest and dearest) and are going to put you into a nursing home on the American side, run quick to el bos, cross the river, get lost in Matamoros or >>>>? city, and await el cuchillo. Whew! Decision solved!!! YAZZYBEL
Saturday, March 26, 2011
Saturday Sauce Day
Good morning!
Since I never got around to putting my favorite sauce into this blog, here it is. This is the all purpose tomato sauce that I like for anything wanting a slightly Spanish flavor.
Tomato Sauce for Huevos Rancheros
2 T. olive oil--heated to a low temperature
1 small or half a larger onion, braised slowly in the olive oil
1 green pepper if you like it
2 cans (8-oz size) "tomato sauce" a la Hunt's or Del Monte
"Tomato sauce" has the flavor of peppers in it, and onions too, as opposed to "Tomato Paste" which is pure tomato.
Simmer until the onion is soft, add salt and pepper, and pour over the eggs. This is also a good all purpose tomato sauce for vegetables or meat.
If you like, do add a small jar of pimentoes chopped up, or a "roasted pepper" from a jar...this gives a depth and richness to the flavor. The important thing to me in this simple sauce is to have the onions soft and well cooked.
Mexican addendum: a knife tip of Gebhardts chile powder adds a lot of flavor, including that of cumin, which is already in Gebhardts...I like it. I love cumin but the flavor is really quite different when it's in things so decide how you like your eggs for yourself!!
Then, a few years ago I went on an anti-catsup campaign when I realized that our modern day catsup is mostly corn syrup, it seems to me. Very sweet and with that gooey texture. So I went to dear old Fannie Farmer, to her canning pages, and looked up the recipe for canned catsup. I do not want to make pecks'-worth of anything right now, so I just got the tips from the recipe to make:
Tomato Sauce with a Catsup Taste
2 cans tomato sauce
Now, she makes a boiling bag with all sorts of whole spices in it, including black peppercorns, sticks of cinnamon, whole cloves and goodness knows what else.
But I am not going to make a boiling bag, not on your life--just put in a few spices to see how closely I can approximate that pleasant catsup taste a little more healthily that the red bottle does. So, let's try (keeping in mind that you have about 2 cups of sauce up there...)
I knife-tip ground allspice
1 knife-tip ground cinnamon
1 knife-tip ground cloves
a few celery seeds
a good grind from the pepper grinder
(my knife-tips are about 1/4 teaspoon by the way)
dash of cayenne pepper
{1/4 cup vinegar
1/4 cup brown sugar OR artificial sugar sub. whch wont be as tasty }
OK, that bit in the fancy parentheses is the tricky part. You may want twice as much of each, or you may want less. This is where it's up to you. Simmer gently (I'd add a little water so as not to over thicken it at first) and put in your salt with all that, and taste, taste, taste. I think you will like it especially if you use brown sugar. You may have to add a little here or there to get the taste right. In pickles, as in so much else, the exact balance to your taste of salt, sugar and vinegar is essential. So the same, in catsup or sweet-and-sour sauces.
If you are on a low carb diet, this is one way you can have catsup, by using a sugar substitute. Just don't use aspartame, ever. It is bad for us (just look on the web). I have my suspicions about sucralose too (CHLORINE?)...so I use saccharine. Am beginning to use Stevia, also, in the form of Truvia--am not sure I can taste it!!! But it is worth trying.
I probably didn't show you anything you didnt already know or do better than I do today, but it's fun to make sauces and they add a lot to food. My husband will enjoy a sauce, but commercially he is a dud. He eats NO MUSTARD, NO CATSUP, NO MAYO, NO MIRACLE WHIP, NO PICKLES, NO JELLY, NO JAM (the latter two being two of my favorite things--well, I like them all.)NO SALT, NO PEPPER, NO SUGAR... And that's just in the condiment department....You can tell on the grocery bill who's adding to all the cost of our meals. I've decided that I can make my own instant pickles with cucumbers, my own mayonnaise certainly, and my own jam with fresh fruit leftovers. Then nobody can point the finger on the Von's bill and I will be using my skills to everyone's benefit!!! YAZZYBEL
Since I never got around to putting my favorite sauce into this blog, here it is. This is the all purpose tomato sauce that I like for anything wanting a slightly Spanish flavor.
Tomato Sauce for Huevos Rancheros
2 T. olive oil--heated to a low temperature
1 small or half a larger onion, braised slowly in the olive oil
1 green pepper if you like it
2 cans (8-oz size) "tomato sauce" a la Hunt's or Del Monte
"Tomato sauce" has the flavor of peppers in it, and onions too, as opposed to "Tomato Paste" which is pure tomato.
Simmer until the onion is soft, add salt and pepper, and pour over the eggs. This is also a good all purpose tomato sauce for vegetables or meat.
If you like, do add a small jar of pimentoes chopped up, or a "roasted pepper" from a jar...this gives a depth and richness to the flavor. The important thing to me in this simple sauce is to have the onions soft and well cooked.
Mexican addendum: a knife tip of Gebhardts chile powder adds a lot of flavor, including that of cumin, which is already in Gebhardts...I like it. I love cumin but the flavor is really quite different when it's in things so decide how you like your eggs for yourself!!
Then, a few years ago I went on an anti-catsup campaign when I realized that our modern day catsup is mostly corn syrup, it seems to me. Very sweet and with that gooey texture. So I went to dear old Fannie Farmer, to her canning pages, and looked up the recipe for canned catsup. I do not want to make pecks'-worth of anything right now, so I just got the tips from the recipe to make:
Tomato Sauce with a Catsup Taste
2 cans tomato sauce
Now, she makes a boiling bag with all sorts of whole spices in it, including black peppercorns, sticks of cinnamon, whole cloves and goodness knows what else.
But I am not going to make a boiling bag, not on your life--just put in a few spices to see how closely I can approximate that pleasant catsup taste a little more healthily that the red bottle does. So, let's try (keeping in mind that you have about 2 cups of sauce up there...)
I knife-tip ground allspice
1 knife-tip ground cinnamon
1 knife-tip ground cloves
a few celery seeds
a good grind from the pepper grinder
(my knife-tips are about 1/4 teaspoon by the way)
dash of cayenne pepper
{1/4 cup vinegar
1/4 cup brown sugar OR artificial sugar sub. whch wont be as tasty }
OK, that bit in the fancy parentheses is the tricky part. You may want twice as much of each, or you may want less. This is where it's up to you. Simmer gently (I'd add a little water so as not to over thicken it at first) and put in your salt with all that, and taste, taste, taste. I think you will like it especially if you use brown sugar. You may have to add a little here or there to get the taste right. In pickles, as in so much else, the exact balance to your taste of salt, sugar and vinegar is essential. So the same, in catsup or sweet-and-sour sauces.
If you are on a low carb diet, this is one way you can have catsup, by using a sugar substitute. Just don't use aspartame, ever. It is bad for us (just look on the web). I have my suspicions about sucralose too (CHLORINE?)...so I use saccharine. Am beginning to use Stevia, also, in the form of Truvia--am not sure I can taste it!!! But it is worth trying.
I probably didn't show you anything you didnt already know or do better than I do today, but it's fun to make sauces and they add a lot to food. My husband will enjoy a sauce, but commercially he is a dud. He eats NO MUSTARD, NO CATSUP, NO MAYO, NO MIRACLE WHIP, NO PICKLES, NO JELLY, NO JAM (the latter two being two of my favorite things--well, I like them all.)NO SALT, NO PEPPER, NO SUGAR... And that's just in the condiment department....You can tell on the grocery bill who's adding to all the cost of our meals. I've decided that I can make my own instant pickles with cucumbers, my own mayonnaise certainly, and my own jam with fresh fruit leftovers. Then nobody can point the finger on the Von's bill and I will be using my skills to everyone's benefit!!! YAZZYBEL
Friday, March 25, 2011
Dream
Good morning!
Yesterday, I forgot to tell about a dream that I'd had during the night.
I woke up at about two, deeply involved in a clear and active dream. My husband and I were going to do something, (move? re-model?) and we had already started with our project. I looked about me at large bare gray-ish walls, the color of unfinished wallboard probably. I thought about all my hundreds of pictures, paintings and photographs and noted that they must be put away somewhere. There was a hint of moving to a different house, or the house in the dream was a bare house where we had already moved in, but there was the hint of excitement and accomplishment in the air. The time was morning, in the dream. All was a promise of change, but the important thing for a dream analyst to realize is that "change" was not the predominant feeling of the dream. It was accepted as just as ordinary as any other situation. Only upon reviewing the dream in the clear light of day did I realize that all the elements were of movement and change. Bare walls waiting for something to happen to them, that was the main portent and a big visual focus in the dream.
And without thinking, I wrote my blog about my "room", the "room" I'd written about the day before too...there is something there, in that wonderful room.
Yesterday I began cleaning out papers. My, that's hard to do. Lots of old assignments from when I got my Master's. Lots of "creative writing" unfinished, and a few finished stories. Of course, I have to read everything. It takes time but I gotta do it. I really do. There might be a treasure there.
Today is Friday and I have to go to weigh with my weight-loss group. We are constantly told that no one can do this alone, but that is not true. Whatever a motivation a group can offer, it does not really work for me. I don't lose for the approbation of the others. When I have mustered up the grit to undergo a diet, it has been due to some inner change and drive that has nothing to do with a group. I need to pay some attention to myself in that respect. YAZZYBEL
Yesterday, I forgot to tell about a dream that I'd had during the night.
I woke up at about two, deeply involved in a clear and active dream. My husband and I were going to do something, (move? re-model?) and we had already started with our project. I looked about me at large bare gray-ish walls, the color of unfinished wallboard probably. I thought about all my hundreds of pictures, paintings and photographs and noted that they must be put away somewhere. There was a hint of moving to a different house, or the house in the dream was a bare house where we had already moved in, but there was the hint of excitement and accomplishment in the air. The time was morning, in the dream. All was a promise of change, but the important thing for a dream analyst to realize is that "change" was not the predominant feeling of the dream. It was accepted as just as ordinary as any other situation. Only upon reviewing the dream in the clear light of day did I realize that all the elements were of movement and change. Bare walls waiting for something to happen to them, that was the main portent and a big visual focus in the dream.
And without thinking, I wrote my blog about my "room", the "room" I'd written about the day before too...there is something there, in that wonderful room.
Yesterday I began cleaning out papers. My, that's hard to do. Lots of old assignments from when I got my Master's. Lots of "creative writing" unfinished, and a few finished stories. Of course, I have to read everything. It takes time but I gotta do it. I really do. There might be a treasure there.
Today is Friday and I have to go to weigh with my weight-loss group. We are constantly told that no one can do this alone, but that is not true. Whatever a motivation a group can offer, it does not really work for me. I don't lose for the approbation of the others. When I have mustered up the grit to undergo a diet, it has been due to some inner change and drive that has nothing to do with a group. I need to pay some attention to myself in that respect. YAZZYBEL
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Not the Whole Picture
Good morning!
A sister told me that yesterday's blog seemed very sad to her. I guess the description of my big studio room-of-my-own seemed negative in some way. But it occurred to me also that there is more to the picture that I drew yesterday than was written.
A number of years ago, I was feeling depressed, and a counselor suggested to me that I write up a description of my ideal day. It's funny, but that ideal day has not changed. I'd still want the morning in that studio for work and study alone. That is my nature. But, in my ideal day of the past, the picture began to change in the afternoon, and by evening, I put in that I wanted drinks and dinner and music and company with friends. That part of it is just as true as the desire for hermitage, to make reference to Samuel Barber's beautiful song. Another strange thing is that, in the writing up, the drawing up of it, the description became true on its own. It eventually came to pass in its way, and has come and gone with the years. It is good to revisit the ideal room, once in a while, to confirm that it still lives within me, a part of myself.
I heard from an acquaintance who has transformed her life in a drastic way, moving out of the city, out to the country alone. She has simplified her ideas of what she needs and has clarified her ideas of what she wants. She is building her "ideal room" out in real life and I love what she's doing.
I read mention, recently, of another acquaintance who has built the life she wanted out in the world. Adios to husband, wifely cares, family obligations, and even to the house. She moved down to the beach, into the tiniest little apartment I have ever seen, and became a poet. She became happy. She truly did.
I never released myself from "family," with its obligations and ties. Children are supposed to grow up and take off, leaving parents with a new life--something the child never considers. Most of them just go, not thinking of anyone but themselves. But there are those who don't go, or can't, for one reason or another. They shift the balance in the family in a different way.
I like my ideal room and visit it often in my mind. If and when it comes into being in reality, I'll be there. YAZZYBEL
A sister told me that yesterday's blog seemed very sad to her. I guess the description of my big studio room-of-my-own seemed negative in some way. But it occurred to me also that there is more to the picture that I drew yesterday than was written.
A number of years ago, I was feeling depressed, and a counselor suggested to me that I write up a description of my ideal day. It's funny, but that ideal day has not changed. I'd still want the morning in that studio for work and study alone. That is my nature. But, in my ideal day of the past, the picture began to change in the afternoon, and by evening, I put in that I wanted drinks and dinner and music and company with friends. That part of it is just as true as the desire for hermitage, to make reference to Samuel Barber's beautiful song. Another strange thing is that, in the writing up, the drawing up of it, the description became true on its own. It eventually came to pass in its way, and has come and gone with the years. It is good to revisit the ideal room, once in a while, to confirm that it still lives within me, a part of myself.
I heard from an acquaintance who has transformed her life in a drastic way, moving out of the city, out to the country alone. She has simplified her ideas of what she needs and has clarified her ideas of what she wants. She is building her "ideal room" out in real life and I love what she's doing.
I read mention, recently, of another acquaintance who has built the life she wanted out in the world. Adios to husband, wifely cares, family obligations, and even to the house. She moved down to the beach, into the tiniest little apartment I have ever seen, and became a poet. She became happy. She truly did.
I never released myself from "family," with its obligations and ties. Children are supposed to grow up and take off, leaving parents with a new life--something the child never considers. Most of them just go, not thinking of anyone but themselves. But there are those who don't go, or can't, for one reason or another. They shift the balance in the family in a different way.
I like my ideal room and visit it often in my mind. If and when it comes into being in reality, I'll be there. YAZZYBEL
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
Wednesday, Piano Day
Good morning!
I have been pretty good about practicing half an hour a day. The only thing wrong with practicing half an hour is that you can't go on for an hour. And I can't, really. My neck and shoulders get tired, and they hurt. That is partly because I am old and partly because I have a neck and shoulders problem, and partly because I probably don't have the proper posture at the piano. Enough of that.
I know I am old because my music, the actual paper sheet music, has deteriorated so badly. Sheets that were fresh and new in the sixties or seventies are showing definite signs of age. Just from being around.
The music itself will never be old. Thank God for that.
Anyway, I need two half hour sessions a day for any improvement or even any grasp on what I am attempting to play. I don't know where I will find the second half hour, except late at night. And I am not good for much after supper.
I am still struggling with Mompou in my recreational fifteen minutes. I spend about fifteen minutes on JT no. 2, getting my fingers into the position. Then I play for fifteen minutes and right now it's Mompou. My mind would like to go on forever with Mompou. You can't imagine how many subtleties he can introduce into Chopin's Prelude in A Major. And a child could play them, that's the strange part. A child could read them, and play them. Then why are they so difficult?
I wish I had a big studio. In that studio, there'd be a long fairly wide table in the middle of the room. Around the edges there would be bookshelves and narrower countertop-like tables. Knowing me, those surfaces would all be covered and I'd still have to move things over to do any work. There would be plenty of natural light by day, and by night, many many focussed lights so that I could see to work. There would be a space for the piano, and there would be a heater in there too because San Diego is cold, I keep telling you. It is!!! I could have canvases, papers, paints in all the colors of the spectrum and all media. I would like silver clay and a little kiln too. Why not? I could make jewelry. I'd have big empty vases that could be filled with bouquets of flowers, grocery store flowers, florist flowers, wild flowers. So there would be a sink too. And a tiny hot plate so that I could make myself a snack there. And somethere tucked away, there'd be a little soft bed with lots of warm covers, so that I could sleep in there--because I'd never want to leave that room. Never. YAZZYBEL
I have been pretty good about practicing half an hour a day. The only thing wrong with practicing half an hour is that you can't go on for an hour. And I can't, really. My neck and shoulders get tired, and they hurt. That is partly because I am old and partly because I have a neck and shoulders problem, and partly because I probably don't have the proper posture at the piano. Enough of that.
I know I am old because my music, the actual paper sheet music, has deteriorated so badly. Sheets that were fresh and new in the sixties or seventies are showing definite signs of age. Just from being around.
The music itself will never be old. Thank God for that.
Anyway, I need two half hour sessions a day for any improvement or even any grasp on what I am attempting to play. I don't know where I will find the second half hour, except late at night. And I am not good for much after supper.
I am still struggling with Mompou in my recreational fifteen minutes. I spend about fifteen minutes on JT no. 2, getting my fingers into the position. Then I play for fifteen minutes and right now it's Mompou. My mind would like to go on forever with Mompou. You can't imagine how many subtleties he can introduce into Chopin's Prelude in A Major. And a child could play them, that's the strange part. A child could read them, and play them. Then why are they so difficult?
I wish I had a big studio. In that studio, there'd be a long fairly wide table in the middle of the room. Around the edges there would be bookshelves and narrower countertop-like tables. Knowing me, those surfaces would all be covered and I'd still have to move things over to do any work. There would be plenty of natural light by day, and by night, many many focussed lights so that I could see to work. There would be a space for the piano, and there would be a heater in there too because San Diego is cold, I keep telling you. It is!!! I could have canvases, papers, paints in all the colors of the spectrum and all media. I would like silver clay and a little kiln too. Why not? I could make jewelry. I'd have big empty vases that could be filled with bouquets of flowers, grocery store flowers, florist flowers, wild flowers. So there would be a sink too. And a tiny hot plate so that I could make myself a snack there. And somethere tucked away, there'd be a little soft bed with lots of warm covers, so that I could sleep in there--because I'd never want to leave that room. Never. YAZZYBEL
Tuesday, March 22, 2011
OH Dear--off to the dentist!
I don't know why it's so difficult to want to go to the dentist, even though I have no complaints at this time. It's partly the invasion of privacy of having to open one's mouth to strangers, I think, more than the fear of pain and discomfort.
So this is to be short, as I have to go get dressed and out of here pretty soon.
I have been thinking about Laredo since writing yesterday's blog....What an interesting place it is. When I was very young, Nameless no. 2 and I would travel with my parents by car, when my father had business to do in Laredo. As we went through (now non-existant where it was) Zapata, the horizon in front of us would subtly change from flat to slightly rolling, and from quite far away we'd see forming, the silhouette of exotic Laredo.
"I see the Hamilton Hotel," my mother would carol from the front seat, and indeed there it would be, sticking up like a blue sore thumb from the surrounding mass. We stayed at the Hamilton when I was very small, but then switched over to the more luxurious Plaza for several visits. My sister and I found the carpeted halls leading to our bedrooms irresistible, and ran up and down with all our might and main. I don't know why we did that; it seems to be hard-wired into the young human, though hard-wiring had not been discovered yet. I think it was from the Plaza that we could look out our window directly into Nuevo Laredo just a small distance away. I particularly remember one summer rainstorm when I watched out the window and saw the beautiful post-storm light grow around us all, Laredo and Nueveo Laredo both, like a blessing.
Hotel food was good in those days. Delicious, we thought. My mother loved ordering from a nice menu. Nowadays we'd probably find those dishes very ordinary, but then, it was a pleasure just to order a meal. And it wasn't hash nor meat loaf, either!
My father worked for Mr King, then. Mr King lived in Houston, I believe, but came to meet my father in Laredo. He was interesting, as I remember him from the viewpoint of a young child. He was very skinny, and was affable with my mother and us. He had a certain dessert that he always ordered. He ordered a dish of vanilla ice cream, and a cup of coffee. He poured the coffee over the ice cream and ate it from the dish. Mr King's Dessert is still one of my favorite desserts.
Mr King had three sons the age of me and no's 2 and 3 in my family of girls. As time went by we met and liked the sons very much. They were nice kids and I wonder where they are now. Paul, Charles, Bobby, where are you? Mrs King was a most beautiful lady from New Mexico, and we admired her profoundly. Before long, the Kings lived in Mexico City instead of Houston. I was privileged to spend some time in her company as a young adult, and she was a revelation to us. She loved antiques. She had a chauffer. She lived the Mexico City lifestyle to the hilt. She had a concierge ( a portero) who guarded her gate and kept an eye on things. She served me a dessert once, Crepes a la Cajeta...I thought it was wonderful. You'd use Dulce de Leche, as it's called in the USA, warmed with butter and slightly diluted, and pour it over the crepes. Yummo.
Somehow we have jumped from Laredo to Mexico City. It's easier than you'd think, in South Texas. Mexico City is lots closer to South Texas than is, say, San Diego, California. YAZZYBEL
So this is to be short, as I have to go get dressed and out of here pretty soon.
I have been thinking about Laredo since writing yesterday's blog....What an interesting place it is. When I was very young, Nameless no. 2 and I would travel with my parents by car, when my father had business to do in Laredo. As we went through (now non-existant where it was) Zapata, the horizon in front of us would subtly change from flat to slightly rolling, and from quite far away we'd see forming, the silhouette of exotic Laredo.
"I see the Hamilton Hotel," my mother would carol from the front seat, and indeed there it would be, sticking up like a blue sore thumb from the surrounding mass. We stayed at the Hamilton when I was very small, but then switched over to the more luxurious Plaza for several visits. My sister and I found the carpeted halls leading to our bedrooms irresistible, and ran up and down with all our might and main. I don't know why we did that; it seems to be hard-wired into the young human, though hard-wiring had not been discovered yet. I think it was from the Plaza that we could look out our window directly into Nuevo Laredo just a small distance away. I particularly remember one summer rainstorm when I watched out the window and saw the beautiful post-storm light grow around us all, Laredo and Nueveo Laredo both, like a blessing.
Hotel food was good in those days. Delicious, we thought. My mother loved ordering from a nice menu. Nowadays we'd probably find those dishes very ordinary, but then, it was a pleasure just to order a meal. And it wasn't hash nor meat loaf, either!
My father worked for Mr King, then. Mr King lived in Houston, I believe, but came to meet my father in Laredo. He was interesting, as I remember him from the viewpoint of a young child. He was very skinny, and was affable with my mother and us. He had a certain dessert that he always ordered. He ordered a dish of vanilla ice cream, and a cup of coffee. He poured the coffee over the ice cream and ate it from the dish. Mr King's Dessert is still one of my favorite desserts.
Mr King had three sons the age of me and no's 2 and 3 in my family of girls. As time went by we met and liked the sons very much. They were nice kids and I wonder where they are now. Paul, Charles, Bobby, where are you? Mrs King was a most beautiful lady from New Mexico, and we admired her profoundly. Before long, the Kings lived in Mexico City instead of Houston. I was privileged to spend some time in her company as a young adult, and she was a revelation to us. She loved antiques. She had a chauffer. She lived the Mexico City lifestyle to the hilt. She had a concierge ( a portero) who guarded her gate and kept an eye on things. She served me a dessert once, Crepes a la Cajeta...I thought it was wonderful. You'd use Dulce de Leche, as it's called in the USA, warmed with butter and slightly diluted, and pour it over the crepes. Yummo.
Somehow we have jumped from Laredo to Mexico City. It's easier than you'd think, in South Texas. Mexico City is lots closer to South Texas than is, say, San Diego, California. YAZZYBEL
Monday, March 21, 2011
Old Friends
Good Morning!!
Yesterday afternoon, dark and gray (and not just the weather), I decided to look up an old friend. My cell phone can perform miracles if you give it a chance, and I decided to look up a beloved friend from my childhood who lives in Laredo, Texas. I had her last name spelled wrong in my book (I had to go way back in address books to find it at all) but finally was able to get through to her. How deeply exciting. I have not seen this friend since 1960 when she came through Berkeley on her way back from Germany! I have talked to her a couple of times since, and I had a nice long conversation with her mother in 1990 when I called going through Laredo. Otherwise, this friend blooms in my memory, just as sensible and fine as she was when she was ten, and I'll always love her.
She had lots of wonderful news about her city of Laredo. Laredo has a symphony orchestra now, the Laredo Philharmonic. It has a website, which I looked up after our conversation. A wonderful Irish cellist , Brendan Townsend, is the conductor. Laredo Little Theater is thriving and is now putting on The Importance of Being Earnest. I can't tell you how much I'd like to see The Importance of Being Earnest performed in Laredo, Texas. And the city has expanded to a huge city of hundreds of thousands, and many many new million dollar homes. Nobody goes to Nuevo Laredo, of course, she said. Well, of course they do not. Nuevo Laredo, the rich part, has come to them. Has come to them to live, to stay. Just as Tijuana has come to Chula Vista. We don't go to Tijuana either.
I first met my friend in the spring of 1940, when my family moved from San Benito, Texas, in the Valley, where we'd been living, to Laredo. We moved on New Year's Day, and it was an exciting event. My parents were told by their friends that the Laredo schools were terrible and that we should be put into either the Catholic Schools or into Ellis Private School. My grandmother was a very adamant Protestant, and my mother would never have offended her as long as she was around. So into Ellis Private we went, and there I met my friend.
Mrs. Ellis had at some point previously established her school on the second story of her large house. You went up the stairs to a broad square-shaped hall, and the classrooms came off of that. In the front room, which was huge, there were actually two grades. There were ten third-graders at one long table, and seven fourth-graders. I was in the fourth, and my nameless sister was in the third. We were four boys and three girls. I learned a lot of English grammer, a little geography, some math. Mrs Ellis was a whiz at grammar. We also had art. We kids sat at our table along the sides, and the teachers were interchangable and would come in and sit at the head of the table.
Mrs Ellis's house was in the center of a huge yard full of mesquite trees, an ideal place for recess, where we ran around like wild animals. I tore the shirt off Jerome Granoff's back one day at some innocent game of tag. He cried and threatened retribution from his parents. Probably the retribution was aimed at him and that was why he cried. I felt terribly bad about tearing that shirt off; it was the first time I'd committed a sin against another person in the world outside my family, and I felt terribly guilty. I also felt defensive, as I remember.
Every morning we lined up and had flag pledges, singing, and so forth. Mostly this took place outside, but often was inside, downstairs on a linoleum-floored room with a piano for our accompaniment. We sang our School Song to the tune of "Solomon Grundy." "We go to Ellis Private School, right here on ---Street, and here we learn our lessons and everything else that's neat." I shall have to ask Nameless no. 2 if she remembers the name of the street. It's hovering right outside my area of recall. But my friend will never leave my memory. YAZZYBEL
Yesterday afternoon, dark and gray (and not just the weather), I decided to look up an old friend. My cell phone can perform miracles if you give it a chance, and I decided to look up a beloved friend from my childhood who lives in Laredo, Texas. I had her last name spelled wrong in my book (I had to go way back in address books to find it at all) but finally was able to get through to her. How deeply exciting. I have not seen this friend since 1960 when she came through Berkeley on her way back from Germany! I have talked to her a couple of times since, and I had a nice long conversation with her mother in 1990 when I called going through Laredo. Otherwise, this friend blooms in my memory, just as sensible and fine as she was when she was ten, and I'll always love her.
She had lots of wonderful news about her city of Laredo. Laredo has a symphony orchestra now, the Laredo Philharmonic. It has a website, which I looked up after our conversation. A wonderful Irish cellist , Brendan Townsend, is the conductor. Laredo Little Theater is thriving and is now putting on The Importance of Being Earnest. I can't tell you how much I'd like to see The Importance of Being Earnest performed in Laredo, Texas. And the city has expanded to a huge city of hundreds of thousands, and many many new million dollar homes. Nobody goes to Nuevo Laredo, of course, she said. Well, of course they do not. Nuevo Laredo, the rich part, has come to them. Has come to them to live, to stay. Just as Tijuana has come to Chula Vista. We don't go to Tijuana either.
I first met my friend in the spring of 1940, when my family moved from San Benito, Texas, in the Valley, where we'd been living, to Laredo. We moved on New Year's Day, and it was an exciting event. My parents were told by their friends that the Laredo schools were terrible and that we should be put into either the Catholic Schools or into Ellis Private School. My grandmother was a very adamant Protestant, and my mother would never have offended her as long as she was around. So into Ellis Private we went, and there I met my friend.
Mrs. Ellis had at some point previously established her school on the second story of her large house. You went up the stairs to a broad square-shaped hall, and the classrooms came off of that. In the front room, which was huge, there were actually two grades. There were ten third-graders at one long table, and seven fourth-graders. I was in the fourth, and my nameless sister was in the third. We were four boys and three girls. I learned a lot of English grammer, a little geography, some math. Mrs Ellis was a whiz at grammar. We also had art. We kids sat at our table along the sides, and the teachers were interchangable and would come in and sit at the head of the table.
Mrs Ellis's house was in the center of a huge yard full of mesquite trees, an ideal place for recess, where we ran around like wild animals. I tore the shirt off Jerome Granoff's back one day at some innocent game of tag. He cried and threatened retribution from his parents. Probably the retribution was aimed at him and that was why he cried. I felt terribly bad about tearing that shirt off; it was the first time I'd committed a sin against another person in the world outside my family, and I felt terribly guilty. I also felt defensive, as I remember.
Every morning we lined up and had flag pledges, singing, and so forth. Mostly this took place outside, but often was inside, downstairs on a linoleum-floored room with a piano for our accompaniment. We sang our School Song to the tune of "Solomon Grundy." "We go to Ellis Private School, right here on ---Street, and here we learn our lessons and everything else that's neat." I shall have to ask Nameless no. 2 if she remembers the name of the street. It's hovering right outside my area of recall. But my friend will never leave my memory. YAZZYBEL
Sunday, March 20, 2011
Sunday Dank and Gray and Cold
Good afternoon! Running late today, and as soon as I finish this I'm putting on my double nightie and going to bed. Tired of being COLD.
Church was cold today. Nothing new. Dean R. gave a good sermon about his vision of admitting God into his mansion but having all the inner doors locked. We have to unlock all the doors when we let God in. Good thought.
Amusing note for the day: During the service, a solitary young man who sits to the left side of the left aisle just in front of me was TEXTING all during the Lord's Prayer. His lips were moving too so I guess we could say he was multi-tasking during the Lord's Prayer. First time I have seen it. He had his phone semi hidden in his program as he held both up in front of him, but he did not realize that his actions could be seen by both me and God there from the rear. Those little thumbs were just going to town. LOLOLOLOL.
Then I left the sacred precincts and came homeward, stopping at Albertson's on the way. There I purchased a large quantity of dried pintos from the bin, also salsa, also cocoa, also tarragon. I am writing the cost of each one and 3/2011 on each iten so that in a few months I can compare the prices. I spent over fifty bux but, if gloomy predictions are true, I saved as much in future grocery prices. Theodore would think I am a maniac so that is why I purchased these items while by myself.
Now to put on the double-nitie and curl up till I get really warm. Love to all, YAZZYBEL
Church was cold today. Nothing new. Dean R. gave a good sermon about his vision of admitting God into his mansion but having all the inner doors locked. We have to unlock all the doors when we let God in. Good thought.
Amusing note for the day: During the service, a solitary young man who sits to the left side of the left aisle just in front of me was TEXTING all during the Lord's Prayer. His lips were moving too so I guess we could say he was multi-tasking during the Lord's Prayer. First time I have seen it. He had his phone semi hidden in his program as he held both up in front of him, but he did not realize that his actions could be seen by both me and God there from the rear. Those little thumbs were just going to town. LOLOLOLOL.
Then I left the sacred precincts and came homeward, stopping at Albertson's on the way. There I purchased a large quantity of dried pintos from the bin, also salsa, also cocoa, also tarragon. I am writing the cost of each one and 3/2011 on each iten so that in a few months I can compare the prices. I spent over fifty bux but, if gloomy predictions are true, I saved as much in future grocery prices. Theodore would think I am a maniac so that is why I purchased these items while by myself.
Now to put on the double-nitie and curl up till I get really warm. Love to all, YAZZYBEL
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Saturday and Summing Up
Good morning!
It's Saturday, cold and soon to be rainy (we're told by the computer). It's a good Lenten day to be summing up lots of things.
First, how have I done with my Lenten Resolve to play the piano a half hour a day? Pretty good. Only one day did I not play at all. That day stands out with a big vacant spot on the chart I made to X- in the good days. I like to take the timer and set it at a half hour. It's noticeably a chore, five minutes into the time. Soon, however, one is deeply immersed into the process of reading and making the fingers obey. When the bell rings at thirty minutes, you realize the time's been nothing, and you could go on for hours. Given the strength.
I have decided to begin with John Thompson's Book Number Two. What a comedown. But--the pieces are tuneful, JT's harmonies beguiling, and they are harder than you'd think, if you try to play them following the instructions on the page. Then I move to something else. Right now, it's Mompou's Chopin Variations. Mompou is like John Thompson Number Two in that he's deceptively simple at first glance. But Mompou has more. He's almost infinitely deeply pleasing in harmony and innovation. On some of those Chopin variations, you'd swear that, "Oh yes..THAT's the way it was meant to be!" as if Chopin tried but didn't quite make it.
In reading, I am reading two things. No, three. I have the book club choice for this month, Divisadero, by Michael Ondaatje. Am about one-fourth of the way into the book and he has not grabbed me yet. When a quote on the outside of the paperback says that an author "rewards one as one stays with him," more or less, watch out. That is less of praise than of warning. However, loving California, I'll stick with it.
Second book I am reading is by John Banville. It's Ghosts, a sequel to The Book of Evidence. I have not made much of a dent in it yet as am busy in the physical world of sorting (which drives me crazy.) Sorting stuff. Sorting books. Clothes. Too much.
The third book I am reading is by my silver and gold guy and its name is Heiland. This book is sort of a macho self-indulgence, it seems to me, by a very very intelligent and well educated man. And, to its value, it is a statement of belief which is very admirable. As a novel, of course, it is not good. Because it is not even really a novel. But people write all kinds of books and this book has some very interesting observations. If I were a man, I would not be ashamed to believe in all of them. But there is a line drawn there. I am not a man, and I cannot cross over that line. Not because it's against women. It's because women are not there much.
Yesterday I went with friend Margaret out to lunch. We went to the Olive Garden, and I just loved my lunch. Theo is not a fan of the Olive Garden, and does not eat pasta, (though he'd love to) so it's fun to go there with somebody else. Margaret had a super-rich chicken dish of pastry, herbs, cream, and chicken. Yum. I had lasagna because I love it and it is difficult to make lasagne for one. Olive Garden gives y ou a good salad, icy cold and crunchy, served in a cold bowl onto cold plates. Now, that is my reference for a GOOD salad. I noticed that the portion was not as large as previously presented. My lasagna portion also was noticeably smaller than in the past. Let's say, previously you got 4x5, very tall, at least, with tons of meat sauce. Now, more like 3x4, not such deep layers, and really a rather sparse amount of sauce. But it was good and I enjoyed it. I took half home, even so. And the prices have spiraled upwards. And we ordered dessert. I ordered tiramisu, and Margaret had a sort of apple crostini. I took home half of my tiramisu too, and had it at supper time after one heated tortilla stuffed with guacamole. The calorie counts on those foods, now published by regulation on the menu, are astronomical. So it's good to eat half of your meal at one meal and half later on.
I pray daily, momentarily, for Japan. There is a sense of apocalypse in the news, is there not? But I am mostly concerned with the elderly, and the baffled young people too. Well, all of them. They are we. We are they. Prudencia.
So, now I have summed up where things are at this time with me. And with us, things are good. Talks about death, old age, and all that. Cheerful. Then we snuggle down into clean sheets and comforters and sleep like cherubs. . YAZZYBEL
It's Saturday, cold and soon to be rainy (we're told by the computer). It's a good Lenten day to be summing up lots of things.
First, how have I done with my Lenten Resolve to play the piano a half hour a day? Pretty good. Only one day did I not play at all. That day stands out with a big vacant spot on the chart I made to X- in the good days. I like to take the timer and set it at a half hour. It's noticeably a chore, five minutes into the time. Soon, however, one is deeply immersed into the process of reading and making the fingers obey. When the bell rings at thirty minutes, you realize the time's been nothing, and you could go on for hours. Given the strength.
I have decided to begin with John Thompson's Book Number Two. What a comedown. But--the pieces are tuneful, JT's harmonies beguiling, and they are harder than you'd think, if you try to play them following the instructions on the page. Then I move to something else. Right now, it's Mompou's Chopin Variations. Mompou is like John Thompson Number Two in that he's deceptively simple at first glance. But Mompou has more. He's almost infinitely deeply pleasing in harmony and innovation. On some of those Chopin variations, you'd swear that, "Oh yes..THAT's the way it was meant to be!" as if Chopin tried but didn't quite make it.
In reading, I am reading two things. No, three. I have the book club choice for this month, Divisadero, by Michael Ondaatje. Am about one-fourth of the way into the book and he has not grabbed me yet. When a quote on the outside of the paperback says that an author "rewards one as one stays with him," more or less, watch out. That is less of praise than of warning. However, loving California, I'll stick with it.
Second book I am reading is by John Banville. It's Ghosts, a sequel to The Book of Evidence. I have not made much of a dent in it yet as am busy in the physical world of sorting (which drives me crazy.) Sorting stuff. Sorting books. Clothes. Too much.
The third book I am reading is by my silver and gold guy and its name is Heiland. This book is sort of a macho self-indulgence, it seems to me, by a very very intelligent and well educated man. And, to its value, it is a statement of belief which is very admirable. As a novel, of course, it is not good. Because it is not even really a novel. But people write all kinds of books and this book has some very interesting observations. If I were a man, I would not be ashamed to believe in all of them. But there is a line drawn there. I am not a man, and I cannot cross over that line. Not because it's against women. It's because women are not there much.
Yesterday I went with friend Margaret out to lunch. We went to the Olive Garden, and I just loved my lunch. Theo is not a fan of the Olive Garden, and does not eat pasta, (though he'd love to) so it's fun to go there with somebody else. Margaret had a super-rich chicken dish of pastry, herbs, cream, and chicken. Yum. I had lasagna because I love it and it is difficult to make lasagne for one. Olive Garden gives y ou a good salad, icy cold and crunchy, served in a cold bowl onto cold plates. Now, that is my reference for a GOOD salad. I noticed that the portion was not as large as previously presented. My lasagna portion also was noticeably smaller than in the past. Let's say, previously you got 4x5, very tall, at least, with tons of meat sauce. Now, more like 3x4, not such deep layers, and really a rather sparse amount of sauce. But it was good and I enjoyed it. I took half home, even so. And the prices have spiraled upwards. And we ordered dessert. I ordered tiramisu, and Margaret had a sort of apple crostini. I took home half of my tiramisu too, and had it at supper time after one heated tortilla stuffed with guacamole. The calorie counts on those foods, now published by regulation on the menu, are astronomical. So it's good to eat half of your meal at one meal and half later on.
I pray daily, momentarily, for Japan. There is a sense of apocalypse in the news, is there not? But I am mostly concerned with the elderly, and the baffled young people too. Well, all of them. They are we. We are they. Prudencia.
So, now I have summed up where things are at this time with me. And with us, things are good. Talks about death, old age, and all that. Cheerful. Then we snuggle down into clean sheets and comforters and sleep like cherubs. . YAZZYBEL
Friday, March 18, 2011
Good Breakfasts I Have Known
Good morning!
I said yesterday that the best breakfast I've ever had was in Ireland. And it was, for the fresh taste and quality of the pork items. The sausage was sweet and rich, the bacon just cured enough. The eggs were delicious, and believe me, not all eggs taste the same!!!
However, I have known a lot of good breakfasts, breakfasts worth noting. So I thought that today I'd remember some of them.
In 1959 Theodore and I were in Mexico for several months, killing time and spending money. We traveled all over by bus and by train. The train part was when we went down to the south. We went from Mexico City to Cuatzacualcos, where we had to get off the train and be ferried (in a very small boat) across the Cuatzacualcos River to take another train system which plowed through jungles inaccessible by any other vehicle, rocking along on its wide rail bed. As I lay reading in my berth at night, fleas jumped merrily on the pages of my book. On this part of the trip, we disembarked at about 2:00 a.m. near the ruins of Palenque and were carried by a jeep towards who knew where. I'll tell about that part of the trip at another time. Anyway, we traveled on and eventually ended up one morning in San Cristobal de Las Casas, where after consulting our travel book we went to the door of the Bloms. The Bloms, Frans and Heidi, were internationally famous archaelogists who opened their door to travelers. Open the door they did, at seven in the morning when our bus got into town. When we had settled in, I asked about breakfast and Mrs Blom sat us in the kitchen where a cook made us the very best scrambled eggs I have ever had. They were full of herbs, and I did not know what the herbs were. I asked Mrs Blom and she said, surprised that anyone was enough of a nincompoop as not to know, "Fines herbes!" She had an immense kitchen-garden outside the door. Having learned long ago how to compound fines herbes myself, I 'd like to say that I have never equalled the subtle taste of those scrambled eggs.
Another wonderful breakfast was found in Texas just a few years ago, when Theodore and my nameless sister no. 3 and I were driving through. At breakfast time, we found ourselves in a little town whose name escapes me now as so much else does. Wish I'd written this blog three years ago. Oh well. Smoke was arising from a little tree filled hollow by the road, and we saw a cafe. In we went, and ordered "Huevos a la Mexicana." Oh how delicious they were. Well prepared food is such a blessing. I have had lots of huevos a la mexicana, but those were the best. Well--there were some good ones prepared at my house by the brother in law husband of nameless no. 5--they were awfully good too. But there was something about being on the road, hungry, early in the morning, finding civilization, and being welcomed into such a wonderful cafe--matchless.
All the breakfasts prepared by my mother were good. Her menu was almost invariable. Bacon. Eggs. Toast with butter. She used the best bread she could find, which was often Pepperidge Farm white bread. It used to be very high in quality; I can't say that now. Their raisin bread just isn't what it was, sorry. Ditto the white. Anyway, mother's breakfasts were simple and unvarying in my memory, and always worth eating and enjoying. She and my dad would sit in a sunny room, in their older years, and breakfast like kings on this sensible menu. The cat got one piece of bacon out of that, every day. Probably spared my parents' lives.
When my grandmother made breakfast (when we were kids) she was more ambitious with her menus. She was fond of creamed dried beef on toast, and so were we. Many a breakfast of Postum and creamed dried beef on toast was savored hungrily by all of us. Well, the grownups had coffee. My grandmother also made creamed chicken fried steak bits from the leftover pieces of chicken fried steak and this was particularly good. And she made French toast, served with tomatoes, as I have told before.
When I was a child we only had tortillas made of corn, but when the younger batch of no-names came along, my mother was into a frenzy of flour tortillas. They all had them (I was not living there by then) every morning. My mother or the maid would make up the dough and pinch off pieces for the maid to roll and bake on a griddle as the family sat at breakfast. One after another, these hot thin delicious tortillas de harina would be served up, to be consumed with butter and jam. I have never liked commercial tortillas de harina, but I like the homemade kind pretty well. I can make them well enough to suit myself, but have never passed the "Pretty, good--but they need--," test with other consumers. YAZZYBEL
I said yesterday that the best breakfast I've ever had was in Ireland. And it was, for the fresh taste and quality of the pork items. The sausage was sweet and rich, the bacon just cured enough. The eggs were delicious, and believe me, not all eggs taste the same!!!
However, I have known a lot of good breakfasts, breakfasts worth noting. So I thought that today I'd remember some of them.
In 1959 Theodore and I were in Mexico for several months, killing time and spending money. We traveled all over by bus and by train. The train part was when we went down to the south. We went from Mexico City to Cuatzacualcos, where we had to get off the train and be ferried (in a very small boat) across the Cuatzacualcos River to take another train system which plowed through jungles inaccessible by any other vehicle, rocking along on its wide rail bed. As I lay reading in my berth at night, fleas jumped merrily on the pages of my book. On this part of the trip, we disembarked at about 2:00 a.m. near the ruins of Palenque and were carried by a jeep towards who knew where. I'll tell about that part of the trip at another time. Anyway, we traveled on and eventually ended up one morning in San Cristobal de Las Casas, where after consulting our travel book we went to the door of the Bloms. The Bloms, Frans and Heidi, were internationally famous archaelogists who opened their door to travelers. Open the door they did, at seven in the morning when our bus got into town. When we had settled in, I asked about breakfast and Mrs Blom sat us in the kitchen where a cook made us the very best scrambled eggs I have ever had. They were full of herbs, and I did not know what the herbs were. I asked Mrs Blom and she said, surprised that anyone was enough of a nincompoop as not to know, "Fines herbes!" She had an immense kitchen-garden outside the door. Having learned long ago how to compound fines herbes myself, I 'd like to say that I have never equalled the subtle taste of those scrambled eggs.
Another wonderful breakfast was found in Texas just a few years ago, when Theodore and my nameless sister no. 3 and I were driving through. At breakfast time, we found ourselves in a little town whose name escapes me now as so much else does. Wish I'd written this blog three years ago. Oh well. Smoke was arising from a little tree filled hollow by the road, and we saw a cafe. In we went, and ordered "Huevos a la Mexicana." Oh how delicious they were. Well prepared food is such a blessing. I have had lots of huevos a la mexicana, but those were the best. Well--there were some good ones prepared at my house by the brother in law husband of nameless no. 5--they were awfully good too. But there was something about being on the road, hungry, early in the morning, finding civilization, and being welcomed into such a wonderful cafe--matchless.
All the breakfasts prepared by my mother were good. Her menu was almost invariable. Bacon. Eggs. Toast with butter. She used the best bread she could find, which was often Pepperidge Farm white bread. It used to be very high in quality; I can't say that now. Their raisin bread just isn't what it was, sorry. Ditto the white. Anyway, mother's breakfasts were simple and unvarying in my memory, and always worth eating and enjoying. She and my dad would sit in a sunny room, in their older years, and breakfast like kings on this sensible menu. The cat got one piece of bacon out of that, every day. Probably spared my parents' lives.
When my grandmother made breakfast (when we were kids) she was more ambitious with her menus. She was fond of creamed dried beef on toast, and so were we. Many a breakfast of Postum and creamed dried beef on toast was savored hungrily by all of us. Well, the grownups had coffee. My grandmother also made creamed chicken fried steak bits from the leftover pieces of chicken fried steak and this was particularly good. And she made French toast, served with tomatoes, as I have told before.
When I was a child we only had tortillas made of corn, but when the younger batch of no-names came along, my mother was into a frenzy of flour tortillas. They all had them (I was not living there by then) every morning. My mother or the maid would make up the dough and pinch off pieces for the maid to roll and bake on a griddle as the family sat at breakfast. One after another, these hot thin delicious tortillas de harina would be served up, to be consumed with butter and jam. I have never liked commercial tortillas de harina, but I like the homemade kind pretty well. I can make them well enough to suit myself, but have never passed the "Pretty, good--but they need--," test with other consumers. YAZZYBEL
Thursday, March 17, 2011
El Dia de San Patricio
Good morning!
Today is El Dia de San Patricio, St Patrick's Day. Mexicans feel close to Ireland for some reason. During the Mexican -American War, there was a brigade called the San Patricios, young men mostly of Irish background who deserted the US side and went over to Mexico. These men eventually were mostly captured and suffered horrendous fates of imprisonment and trial. There is a great CD of music from The Chieftains plus Mexican artists which celebrates this brief but unforgettable union of races.
Then, on the lighter side, there's Panchita Lolita Rosita Paquita Anita Lindita O'Toole, a young lady celebrated in popular (commercial) music when my sisters and I were young. (The elders of us)....
Then, on the side of history, I always heard from a geneologist relation that, long ago, the Longorias were Irish and the name was spelled back in those mists of time Longoreaux. They took a hop, skip and a jump down to the Basque Country at some point, I guess, or rather, a sail....Why not? It explains a lot of the gifts in my family like second sight, mysticism, storytelling, visionary thinking, green eyes..why not?
Here in San Diego, I see from morning TV that there are many Irish celebrations to be held today. Mostly at pubs. The Field, a wonderful pub in The Gaslamp Quarter downtown , had a lovely presentation on the news today with dancers and a spread of food on the hood of a green truck. Good food. Shepherd's Pie (made with ground beef, though; not right, it's supposed to be lamb)...Boxty, which looks like a burrito and is a kind of vegetable/meat pie...and other things which the MC had no time to explain. We have eaten at The Field and it is good.
The best breakfast I ever had was in Ireland, just for pure deliciousness. And the best red ale, though I am not a big beer drinker. Makes you feel for the circumstances which must have been bad enough for our ancestors to have left. But, they did leave...on that side, Ireland to Northern Spain, Northern Spain to the New World, ending up in that amorphous misty place of souls called the U.S-Mexico border. Ah--borders! How and where were those lines ever drawn? YAZZYBEL
Today is El Dia de San Patricio, St Patrick's Day. Mexicans feel close to Ireland for some reason. During the Mexican -American War, there was a brigade called the San Patricios, young men mostly of Irish background who deserted the US side and went over to Mexico. These men eventually were mostly captured and suffered horrendous fates of imprisonment and trial. There is a great CD of music from The Chieftains plus Mexican artists which celebrates this brief but unforgettable union of races.
Then, on the lighter side, there's Panchita Lolita Rosita Paquita Anita Lindita O'Toole, a young lady celebrated in popular (commercial) music when my sisters and I were young. (The elders of us)....
Then, on the side of history, I always heard from a geneologist relation that, long ago, the Longorias were Irish and the name was spelled back in those mists of time Longoreaux. They took a hop, skip and a jump down to the Basque Country at some point, I guess, or rather, a sail....Why not? It explains a lot of the gifts in my family like second sight, mysticism, storytelling, visionary thinking, green eyes..why not?
Here in San Diego, I see from morning TV that there are many Irish celebrations to be held today. Mostly at pubs. The Field, a wonderful pub in The Gaslamp Quarter downtown , had a lovely presentation on the news today with dancers and a spread of food on the hood of a green truck. Good food. Shepherd's Pie (made with ground beef, though; not right, it's supposed to be lamb)...Boxty, which looks like a burrito and is a kind of vegetable/meat pie...and other things which the MC had no time to explain. We have eaten at The Field and it is good.
The best breakfast I ever had was in Ireland, just for pure deliciousness. And the best red ale, though I am not a big beer drinker. Makes you feel for the circumstances which must have been bad enough for our ancestors to have left. But, they did leave...on that side, Ireland to Northern Spain, Northern Spain to the New World, ending up in that amorphous misty place of souls called the U.S-Mexico border. Ah--borders! How and where were those lines ever drawn? YAZZYBEL
Wednesday, March 16, 2011
Mentally Gardening
Good morning!
I am mentally going over my son Alexander's garden in Cedar Rapids, IA. It is an absolute mystery to contemplate the arising of so much green growth from the absolute deadness of winter in that climate. Of course, "far beneath the winter snows" all sorts of things are going on. But there is a point when those Northerners can till the soil, plant, and get a huge reward. Last year, Alexander's elderly neighbor Carol lent him a machine to turn the soil over and get things started. In a space about 20 x 20 (that's a guess) he planted corn, beans, melons, squashes, tomatoes, and I don't know what else. Oh yes, a scarecrow, lol.
The plants grew amazingly. I was stunned to see, last June, tall huge-leaved plants waving in the breeze already. "Knee high by the fourth of July," is the rule for corn, and I guess it's true--but by the end of that month things have really happened, and there is--corn! There is a short growing time and during that time all the good things are going to mature and make seed for the future. Imagine that we had to live on the things that came out of that garden last year. We'd have canned and pickled all summer long. Here in dry California we often coddle and work and get meager growth and fruiting, it seems to me. At least, by comparison to that amazing climate of Iowa, where nature says, "Here it comes, and lots of it, so deal with it!"
Alex also studied the internet and learned how to make wooden whirligigs and made a great one of Kruschev banging his shoe on the podium (who knew A. even knew who Kruschev was?) and another one of a busy chef flipping burgers. A stout breeze blows at all times in that back yard, so those figures keep very busy at their tasks. They're very cheery amidst those big green plants.
Alexander also grows peppers of all sorts. He became a devotee of the chili pepper when they lived here briefly in the 90's. He has all sorts. Makes many fine salsas with them all....
He's also always had a hops structure, because he likes to brew his own beer. The wind seems to blow down those hops vines at least once a summer, but he and they go on with it.
I like to think about all my gardeners and their gardens. Here in my own garden are the grandchildren of the last nasturtiums my son Gregory planted long ago. They come up every year, waving their orange and yellow colors to me and I think, "Here's Gregory!" The color orange was his favorite color, and he loved those fancy nasturtiums. YAZZYBEL
I am mentally going over my son Alexander's garden in Cedar Rapids, IA. It is an absolute mystery to contemplate the arising of so much green growth from the absolute deadness of winter in that climate. Of course, "far beneath the winter snows" all sorts of things are going on. But there is a point when those Northerners can till the soil, plant, and get a huge reward. Last year, Alexander's elderly neighbor Carol lent him a machine to turn the soil over and get things started. In a space about 20 x 20 (that's a guess) he planted corn, beans, melons, squashes, tomatoes, and I don't know what else. Oh yes, a scarecrow, lol.
The plants grew amazingly. I was stunned to see, last June, tall huge-leaved plants waving in the breeze already. "Knee high by the fourth of July," is the rule for corn, and I guess it's true--but by the end of that month things have really happened, and there is--corn! There is a short growing time and during that time all the good things are going to mature and make seed for the future. Imagine that we had to live on the things that came out of that garden last year. We'd have canned and pickled all summer long. Here in dry California we often coddle and work and get meager growth and fruiting, it seems to me. At least, by comparison to that amazing climate of Iowa, where nature says, "Here it comes, and lots of it, so deal with it!"
Alex also studied the internet and learned how to make wooden whirligigs and made a great one of Kruschev banging his shoe on the podium (who knew A. even knew who Kruschev was?) and another one of a busy chef flipping burgers. A stout breeze blows at all times in that back yard, so those figures keep very busy at their tasks. They're very cheery amidst those big green plants.
Alexander also grows peppers of all sorts. He became a devotee of the chili pepper when they lived here briefly in the 90's. He has all sorts. Makes many fine salsas with them all....
He's also always had a hops structure, because he likes to brew his own beer. The wind seems to blow down those hops vines at least once a summer, but he and they go on with it.
I like to think about all my gardeners and their gardens. Here in my own garden are the grandchildren of the last nasturtiums my son Gregory planted long ago. They come up every year, waving their orange and yellow colors to me and I think, "Here's Gregory!" The color orange was his favorite color, and he loved those fancy nasturtiums. YAZZYBEL
Tuesday, March 15, 2011
Pruning a Rosebush
Good Morning! Theodore is gone with the car, taking it to be diagnosed by Witt Lincoln-Mercury in Mission Valley. He'll be brought back by the shuttle in an hour or so.
I am here at a loss as to how best to use this alone time. I think when I finish this post, I'll just walk through the house and bask in silence. I 'll have to turn off CNBC first, though. It is still blaring away in my left ear, behind me in this room.
I thought I'd tell you what's growing out in front of the house today. I ran down the list of wonderful plants in front of the garage, did I not? So let's get to the rest. As I stand at the front door, those plants cannot be seen. To my direct right is a large Cape Honeysuckle which is not a honeysuckle (cheval-feuille) at all. Cheval-feuille is goat's foot, which refers to the shape of honeysuckle leaves. This plant is a large bush with dark green leaves and brilliant orange tube-shaped flowers much beloved by the many hummingbirds and the few honeybees we have around here. It has a hard woody trunk due to being so old (planted with the building of the house, I'd guess) and cut back so much....tall thin branches come up out of the hard wood part. It is definitely not a native plant! In its same bed are three rosebushes planted by our former renters the Caballeros. They were languishing when we moved in here, but have been spectacular after my rose treatments which I shall delineate later on.
There were freesias, until this year, when no grasslike sprig of freesia foliage has reared its head. I think I know why. They often get pulled out by my zealous grasspuller, Taterton, and I guess he finally pulled out the last plant. I love the freesia over all bulbs because of its beauty and fragrance. These were all blue-violet or golden yellow. They even look beautiful when they dry out in the neglected vase. I love 'em.
There is quite a lot of kalanchoe, the small ground cover size, with red bloom. I like those in winter but not in spring or summer. There is a large onion-like lily sprung from I know not where (Caballeros?) with long curving stems on the blooms. The blossoms are cone shaped with multiple little white flowers that bloom in stages. Very striking and I like them.
There is a large coral tree which I had for years in a pot. We set it in the ground several years ago and it is now huge. It rarely blooms. This year I did not fertilize before the rains and that is always a mistake. No flowers at all this year. That is the centerpoint of the right side (from the porch view). Underneath that tree are pots of baby oak trees, white lily of the nile, white periwinkle, and white--oh, what are those flowers that are white with black-purple eyes? Those, anyway. I like white flowers under a shady area.
That area is more shady because of a conglomeration of cedars and junipers that we have trimmed and encouraged to arch over a dark area where the garbage cans are tucked away. The trees make us a shelter from the comings and goings of the Picazos, our neighbors on that side, who are generally as quiet as mice except for the constant car traffic going on there in the driveway. And in the trees is a brilliant blue plumbago, huge and airy and trailing and arching, which softens the lines of the cedar. In front of all at the street level is a large pink rose bush which I had transplanted and brought over from next door when we sold that house. That was the best bloomer and rose bush I ever could want. It's still feeling the shock of that move,now five years ago. But it's alive, and blooming periodically. And there's a little clump of verbenas in front of that too--bright pinky lavender in color.
Here is how I prune roses in Southern California. I can't vouch for how I'd do it elsewhere because I have never gardened in any other climate. In the fall I give it its most severe pruning, cutting the green stems way back down. I used to give the bushes a cold winter type pruning (bare sticks) but it is not necessary here. I do not fertilize at this time, but as the winter rains start, I do. This usually results in heavy growth and blooming from the refreshed rosebush. A lady taught me to always cut roses back to the five leaved part on the stem. So I go back that far, and, yes, they do bloom profusely by that process. Even on my little Caballero drugstore roses I get huge, crepe-papery cabbage roses by my method of pruning. The one out in front, the one that's suffering, puts out smaller roses now than it used to, but they are still beautiful pink and I usually leave them on the bush for show. I often cut the ones by the house, pink, yellow, or white, and bring them in a few at a time to look beautiful in the bathroom. The yellow is the most capricious bloomer. I do not know why. Anyway, I call my style of pruning, giving the rose a haircut. This probably wouldn't work in any other climate but it works for me. Aphids? I tap them off, pinch them off, or otherwise physically remove them. If things get bad I'll use a small spray of poison. My roses get earwigs and the caterpillars thereof. They roost inside a bud and dine from the inside out. Again, knock on any door and remove the offender personally and thoroughly. When all the blooms seem to die down and the bush looks straggly, I go through the haircut again, but on these subsequent trims I use fertilizer right after, and water profusely...It works. YAZZYBEL
I am here at a loss as to how best to use this alone time. I think when I finish this post, I'll just walk through the house and bask in silence. I 'll have to turn off CNBC first, though. It is still blaring away in my left ear, behind me in this room.
I thought I'd tell you what's growing out in front of the house today. I ran down the list of wonderful plants in front of the garage, did I not? So let's get to the rest. As I stand at the front door, those plants cannot be seen. To my direct right is a large Cape Honeysuckle which is not a honeysuckle (cheval-feuille) at all. Cheval-feuille is goat's foot, which refers to the shape of honeysuckle leaves. This plant is a large bush with dark green leaves and brilliant orange tube-shaped flowers much beloved by the many hummingbirds and the few honeybees we have around here. It has a hard woody trunk due to being so old (planted with the building of the house, I'd guess) and cut back so much....tall thin branches come up out of the hard wood part. It is definitely not a native plant! In its same bed are three rosebushes planted by our former renters the Caballeros. They were languishing when we moved in here, but have been spectacular after my rose treatments which I shall delineate later on.
There were freesias, until this year, when no grasslike sprig of freesia foliage has reared its head. I think I know why. They often get pulled out by my zealous grasspuller, Taterton, and I guess he finally pulled out the last plant. I love the freesia over all bulbs because of its beauty and fragrance. These were all blue-violet or golden yellow. They even look beautiful when they dry out in the neglected vase. I love 'em.
There is quite a lot of kalanchoe, the small ground cover size, with red bloom. I like those in winter but not in spring or summer. There is a large onion-like lily sprung from I know not where (Caballeros?) with long curving stems on the blooms. The blossoms are cone shaped with multiple little white flowers that bloom in stages. Very striking and I like them.
There is a large coral tree which I had for years in a pot. We set it in the ground several years ago and it is now huge. It rarely blooms. This year I did not fertilize before the rains and that is always a mistake. No flowers at all this year. That is the centerpoint of the right side (from the porch view). Underneath that tree are pots of baby oak trees, white lily of the nile, white periwinkle, and white--oh, what are those flowers that are white with black-purple eyes? Those, anyway. I like white flowers under a shady area.
That area is more shady because of a conglomeration of cedars and junipers that we have trimmed and encouraged to arch over a dark area where the garbage cans are tucked away. The trees make us a shelter from the comings and goings of the Picazos, our neighbors on that side, who are generally as quiet as mice except for the constant car traffic going on there in the driveway. And in the trees is a brilliant blue plumbago, huge and airy and trailing and arching, which softens the lines of the cedar. In front of all at the street level is a large pink rose bush which I had transplanted and brought over from next door when we sold that house. That was the best bloomer and rose bush I ever could want. It's still feeling the shock of that move,now five years ago. But it's alive, and blooming periodically. And there's a little clump of verbenas in front of that too--bright pinky lavender in color.
Here is how I prune roses in Southern California. I can't vouch for how I'd do it elsewhere because I have never gardened in any other climate. In the fall I give it its most severe pruning, cutting the green stems way back down. I used to give the bushes a cold winter type pruning (bare sticks) but it is not necessary here. I do not fertilize at this time, but as the winter rains start, I do. This usually results in heavy growth and blooming from the refreshed rosebush. A lady taught me to always cut roses back to the five leaved part on the stem. So I go back that far, and, yes, they do bloom profusely by that process. Even on my little Caballero drugstore roses I get huge, crepe-papery cabbage roses by my method of pruning. The one out in front, the one that's suffering, puts out smaller roses now than it used to, but they are still beautiful pink and I usually leave them on the bush for show. I often cut the ones by the house, pink, yellow, or white, and bring them in a few at a time to look beautiful in the bathroom. The yellow is the most capricious bloomer. I do not know why. Anyway, I call my style of pruning, giving the rose a haircut. This probably wouldn't work in any other climate but it works for me. Aphids? I tap them off, pinch them off, or otherwise physically remove them. If things get bad I'll use a small spray of poison. My roses get earwigs and the caterpillars thereof. They roost inside a bud and dine from the inside out. Again, knock on any door and remove the offender personally and thoroughly. When all the blooms seem to die down and the bush looks straggly, I go through the haircut again, but on these subsequent trims I use fertilizer right after, and water profusely...It works. YAZZYBEL
Monday, March 14, 2011
Monday Morning Mid March
Good morning. The year is whizzing past. I am all sad because of the terrible destruction in and of Japan owing to last week's earthquake. Earthquake, tsunami, and now the threat of big danger from the nuclear factories' breakdowns. Pray, pray, pray.
In the meantime, here there are gardens. I have taken snapshots of the threatening tree and am going to send to realtor-caretaker of the property. We have been on about this for several years and it really needs taking care of.
My back patio area contains these plants--off the top of my head. In the ground, cedar and juniper, the last remaining stragglers of the original plantings by the man who built this subdivision. The juniper is cherished in memory as being the climbing place of ingenuous dog Lucky, who would go way up in search of her elusive tennis balls. We have lots of old photos of that. Those plants are directly under the Big Tree--but on our side of the fence. Also in the ground there, Texas Privet and another evergreen hedge plant. Coming around the corner, a great huge epiphyllum with fuschia colored blooms which snakes in all directions with big three-sided leaves. Then the great aloe, Red Hot Poker, which this year gave us lots of pokers after a long hiatus (I fertlized the heck out of it). Then another cedar, tall and gawky. Also in the ground there some echeverria (hen and chickens) that I put down there to await transplanting. A tree-tobacco plant which I love. An angel trumpet which I love with huge blooms of melon-pink and gold. A couple of hibiscus, survivors of huge attacks of whitefly. I attack whitefly as I do aphids: with massive assaults of finger pinching and scraping and cutting off and throwing away. It seems to work as well as anything else. I hate whitefly and the dim and stifled look with the silvery hair it casts over the plants. OK, that is up to the front end of the patio to the right.
Back to the middle of the back area. A gate that Theodore built that goes down steps to the Lower Forty. A beautiful red rose-bush, which would be a climber if it could. It's also a fifteen or twenty year survivor of garden catastrophes, but I looked at it last night and it's budding and blooming away. Gorgeous crimson multiflora blooms. Then on to the left, a hiatus mostly covered by some large pots and a morning glory which is growing true to the threat in the garden manuals--all over everything. I am severe with it too and it is fairly contained. I love that blue so much. More to the left, a contained bed made by Alexander from an old bookcase. It has a large Italian parsley, two large sages, a thriving tasteless jalapeño, a thyme, and about eight aragula plants planted by me some weeks past. They are now beginning to look like plants. Edible. Big enough. I ate some of the crowded seedlings when I plucked them out and they were bitter. Like baby rattlesnakes, making up in strength what they lack in size. Another gate, this one leading to a drop of about six feet, down to nowhere.
Going left around the gate, there's a heavenly bamboo. A lot of big stuff in pots, then a bed, then Mexican Sage. On left, pots pots pots with a few assorted leaflings and things from succulents. That's at the edge of the patio concrete. Shall I list the things in pots? Oh, too many, but let's make a start. Huge round-leafed Leptospermum, exotic. Three chile pequines from South Texas, making a brave well-leafed start on a new season whilst still strugging in a pot with a huge succulent like a fern whose name I do not know. Tomatoes. Sages. Nasturtiums. Geraniums. Ferns. Bromeliads. Exotic geranium type plants from the Canary Islands whose progenitor we bought at Quail Gardens of Encinitas, CA. Beautiful reed-orchids, red and fuschia and one wonderful white. Cacti, one from a Brownsville Texas alley. Succulents of all sorts. Citrus trees in pots: Buddha's Hand Citron, a needy fellow; Mexican Lime, delicate tree; Dwarf Meyer Lemon, a prize; and a Rangpur Lime. No flower, no fruit, beautiful double leaves. Calla lilies. Hurricane plants. Donkey's Tails. Echeverrias. And a huge exotic-leaved Kalanchoe with big stiff furry gray leaves folded like a taco. And that is all I can think of..oh yes, Potato Tree with beautiful purple flowers like potato blossoms. I was going to tell about Alexander's garden in Iowa but that can wait till tomorrow. And I have not told about the side yard, the front yard, nor the Lower Forty at all. And I forgot to mention the plague of grasses which has practically destroyed gardens and made garden care a serious chore...Gracious. Love to all, YAZZYBEL
In the meantime, here there are gardens. I have taken snapshots of the threatening tree and am going to send to realtor-caretaker of the property. We have been on about this for several years and it really needs taking care of.
My back patio area contains these plants--off the top of my head. In the ground, cedar and juniper, the last remaining stragglers of the original plantings by the man who built this subdivision. The juniper is cherished in memory as being the climbing place of ingenuous dog Lucky, who would go way up in search of her elusive tennis balls. We have lots of old photos of that. Those plants are directly under the Big Tree--but on our side of the fence. Also in the ground there, Texas Privet and another evergreen hedge plant. Coming around the corner, a great huge epiphyllum with fuschia colored blooms which snakes in all directions with big three-sided leaves. Then the great aloe, Red Hot Poker, which this year gave us lots of pokers after a long hiatus (I fertlized the heck out of it). Then another cedar, tall and gawky. Also in the ground there some echeverria (hen and chickens) that I put down there to await transplanting. A tree-tobacco plant which I love. An angel trumpet which I love with huge blooms of melon-pink and gold. A couple of hibiscus, survivors of huge attacks of whitefly. I attack whitefly as I do aphids: with massive assaults of finger pinching and scraping and cutting off and throwing away. It seems to work as well as anything else. I hate whitefly and the dim and stifled look with the silvery hair it casts over the plants. OK, that is up to the front end of the patio to the right.
Back to the middle of the back area. A gate that Theodore built that goes down steps to the Lower Forty. A beautiful red rose-bush, which would be a climber if it could. It's also a fifteen or twenty year survivor of garden catastrophes, but I looked at it last night and it's budding and blooming away. Gorgeous crimson multiflora blooms. Then on to the left, a hiatus mostly covered by some large pots and a morning glory which is growing true to the threat in the garden manuals--all over everything. I am severe with it too and it is fairly contained. I love that blue so much. More to the left, a contained bed made by Alexander from an old bookcase. It has a large Italian parsley, two large sages, a thriving tasteless jalapeño, a thyme, and about eight aragula plants planted by me some weeks past. They are now beginning to look like plants. Edible. Big enough. I ate some of the crowded seedlings when I plucked them out and they were bitter. Like baby rattlesnakes, making up in strength what they lack in size. Another gate, this one leading to a drop of about six feet, down to nowhere.
Going left around the gate, there's a heavenly bamboo. A lot of big stuff in pots, then a bed, then Mexican Sage. On left, pots pots pots with a few assorted leaflings and things from succulents. That's at the edge of the patio concrete. Shall I list the things in pots? Oh, too many, but let's make a start. Huge round-leafed Leptospermum, exotic. Three chile pequines from South Texas, making a brave well-leafed start on a new season whilst still strugging in a pot with a huge succulent like a fern whose name I do not know. Tomatoes. Sages. Nasturtiums. Geraniums. Ferns. Bromeliads. Exotic geranium type plants from the Canary Islands whose progenitor we bought at Quail Gardens of Encinitas, CA. Beautiful reed-orchids, red and fuschia and one wonderful white. Cacti, one from a Brownsville Texas alley. Succulents of all sorts. Citrus trees in pots: Buddha's Hand Citron, a needy fellow; Mexican Lime, delicate tree; Dwarf Meyer Lemon, a prize; and a Rangpur Lime. No flower, no fruit, beautiful double leaves. Calla lilies. Hurricane plants. Donkey's Tails. Echeverrias. And a huge exotic-leaved Kalanchoe with big stiff furry gray leaves folded like a taco. And that is all I can think of..oh yes, Potato Tree with beautiful purple flowers like potato blossoms. I was going to tell about Alexander's garden in Iowa but that can wait till tomorrow. And I have not told about the side yard, the front yard, nor the Lower Forty at all. And I forgot to mention the plague of grasses which has practically destroyed gardens and made garden care a serious chore...Gracious. Love to all, YAZZYBEL
Sunday, March 13, 2011
First Sunday of Lent
Bon jour!
This is the first Sunday in Lent. It's also the first day of Daylight Time. For the first time in my career as a practitioner of both Lent and Daylight Time, I overslept. Of course I should have used the alarm clock. But since I'm such a habitual early riser, I had no idea I'd really need it. Mea culpa.
As penance, I am going to make Theodore and me go to Anderson's Nursery in Point Loma, where we shall wander amongst the plants, want all of them, and hardly buy any. As usual. I am particularly going to ask for a Flannel Bush (see yesterday) but they may not have one as there may be no "native plant" section.
In our back yard, directly outside our patio space, there's a fence that delineates the boundary between our property and the neighbor's. Just on that fence, almost literally, there is a huge old eucalyptus, a survivor of the horrible cutting down and tearing out of many huge old trees in what has now been denominated a Flood Plain. I have loved that tree for its shade and its shelter of hawks, before the crows drove them away, and itsshelter for many tiny little birds that twittered a lot at evening before shutting those eyes for the night. The little birds are about gone, but the crows have continued nesting there and I hoped the tree would be gone this year before nesting time. The realtor-manager (Yavorsky) has postponed dealing with the tree, which must be dealt with as it's shedding twigs and small branches at an ever increasing rate (mostly into our patio.) Eucalyptuses have a bad habit of dropping large branches (tree trunk size) and even of falling over completely when their time comes. This tree is in a terrible shape, its major and medium branches twisted and bent, its foliage shaggy and barely alive. Every time a breeze blows, I tremble. The house to that property is maybe seventy or a hundred feet away. We are just beneath it. It's about forty feet tall, maybe taller. What is that to a twenty foot deep patio? Calamity.
I'd like to landscape our patio area a bit, to organize some of the great plants and trees we have sitting in pots, waiting for a permanent home in the ground. My Lenten prayer is that the tree situation gets resolved. I hate to lose it. Would settle for a severe but professional trimming with removal of some of the more unstable limbs. But that would be even costlier. And it's not our decision. Tomorrow, I'll tell you some more about the conglomeration of plants we have back there. It's time to catalogue anyway! YAZZYBEL
This is the first Sunday in Lent. It's also the first day of Daylight Time. For the first time in my career as a practitioner of both Lent and Daylight Time, I overslept. Of course I should have used the alarm clock. But since I'm such a habitual early riser, I had no idea I'd really need it. Mea culpa.
As penance, I am going to make Theodore and me go to Anderson's Nursery in Point Loma, where we shall wander amongst the plants, want all of them, and hardly buy any. As usual. I am particularly going to ask for a Flannel Bush (see yesterday) but they may not have one as there may be no "native plant" section.
In our back yard, directly outside our patio space, there's a fence that delineates the boundary between our property and the neighbor's. Just on that fence, almost literally, there is a huge old eucalyptus, a survivor of the horrible cutting down and tearing out of many huge old trees in what has now been denominated a Flood Plain. I have loved that tree for its shade and its shelter of hawks, before the crows drove them away, and itsshelter for many tiny little birds that twittered a lot at evening before shutting those eyes for the night. The little birds are about gone, but the crows have continued nesting there and I hoped the tree would be gone this year before nesting time. The realtor-manager (Yavorsky) has postponed dealing with the tree, which must be dealt with as it's shedding twigs and small branches at an ever increasing rate (mostly into our patio.) Eucalyptuses have a bad habit of dropping large branches (tree trunk size) and even of falling over completely when their time comes. This tree is in a terrible shape, its major and medium branches twisted and bent, its foliage shaggy and barely alive. Every time a breeze blows, I tremble. The house to that property is maybe seventy or a hundred feet away. We are just beneath it. It's about forty feet tall, maybe taller. What is that to a twenty foot deep patio? Calamity.
I'd like to landscape our patio area a bit, to organize some of the great plants and trees we have sitting in pots, waiting for a permanent home in the ground. My Lenten prayer is that the tree situation gets resolved. I hate to lose it. Would settle for a severe but professional trimming with removal of some of the more unstable limbs. But that would be even costlier. And it's not our decision. Tomorrow, I'll tell you some more about the conglomeration of plants we have back there. It's time to catalogue anyway! YAZZYBEL
Saturday, March 12, 2011
I Like Saturday
Good morning!
The local leaflet otherwise known as the San Diego Union-Tribune has a really good little garden section on Saturday mornings. Included today is a list of all the garden tours that are going to be conducted this spring. Sometimes a neighborhood garden tour can be wonderful. Sometimes just walking down a street can be a garden tour for free.
Near St Paul's Church, on Nutmeg, is a huge Craftsman style bungalow. It has been purchased by someone, I guess, for it's undergoing renovations. The owner has painted the exterior a dark ash-green color. That goes well with the "beams" of wood that criss-cross for decoration across the top of the house. One of the best things so far has been the planting of native-type plants all over the yard, but especially in the parking--the space between the sidewalk and the street. The passerby gets the most rewarding contact with a variety of plants large and small just by walking along the street. I took a little blossom and leaf from a tall airy plant with grey fuzzy leaves and large yellow flowers, and sent it to my son Ben to ask if it were a mallow. No, he wrote back, he thinks it's a flannel bush. I need to go to a Native Plant Nursery to check.
Benjamin lives in the SF Bay Area, in Concord. Concord is so far from the water that it's hard to mention "Bay" and Concord in one breath. However, up to the north he's not too far from Suisun Bay and all that. But in my opinion the climate is closer to that of sundried and winter-frozen Sacramento than, say, Berkeley. Every foot you get away from the water up there is a climate changer. Everyone who loves maps as much as the Yazzybel does should go to an atlas and look at the area where Concord is. Look at the Delta area...that is where the Bay finally goes into lowland and marshland. Islands. Canals. Interesting. Hot as Hades in summer.
Well, anyway, Ben is an avid gardener. He lives in a small condo-type residential area which is traditional (plants of the seventies) and neat and upscale as much as possible. I say condo-type in that his yard ends at the neighbor's wall. He has a nice big yard on that side and a more than generous front yard. He decided to make his front yard all native plants. Not California natives. Real local natives. Those plants should be able to sustain themselves by climate alone, no? Difficult! Plus, nothing is green, much. It is too hot and dry even for natives, apparently. I am in favor of pergolas in such a climate as his and mine. I've found that "full sun" is too much sun sometimes. Tempering with a little shade is often desirable. Like my lemon tree which does much better under some sort of covering, no matter what the Sunset Garden Book may say.
Ben's back yard is wonderful. Last year he had melons, watermelons, cucumbers, peppers, lots of wonderful tomatoes, strawberries, and a variety of fruit trees. Variety is a good word for the fruit trees because hardly any of them bear just one species of fruit. "Fruit Salad" is not a misnomer. Right now he's just put in a cherry that is going to put our five (can that be right? Five? ) kinds of cherries. I'd be happy with just one...
I love people's gardens, and I love the fact that they garden. Right now, I have one heatless jalapeno pepper which is bearing its insipid fruits right now, seven arugula plants which are beginning to look like something...two tomatoes which need a boost for fruiting, and a myriad of blooming plants. The front yard looks nice in front of the garage, where there is climbing rosemary, Cleveland sage, thyme, Mexican sage, Mexican Marigold, and a lot of orange-yellow-gold ice plant to fill in with color. And two thriving Sticks of Fire, which are at their most colorful right now. I need to take a picture and learn how to put it on so that I can show you how pretty it is. The rosemary has blue flowers, the thyme has tiny lavendar flowers, the sages both have purple flowers, the Mexican Marigold has yellow flowers, and there's some white dusty-miller with yellow flowers too. And all that ice plant. And the Sticks of Fire are brilliant rose red with a little yellow and green trim. Lovely color combination. I could go on forever about a garden. YAZZYBEL
The local leaflet otherwise known as the San Diego Union-Tribune has a really good little garden section on Saturday mornings. Included today is a list of all the garden tours that are going to be conducted this spring. Sometimes a neighborhood garden tour can be wonderful. Sometimes just walking down a street can be a garden tour for free.
Near St Paul's Church, on Nutmeg, is a huge Craftsman style bungalow. It has been purchased by someone, I guess, for it's undergoing renovations. The owner has painted the exterior a dark ash-green color. That goes well with the "beams" of wood that criss-cross for decoration across the top of the house. One of the best things so far has been the planting of native-type plants all over the yard, but especially in the parking--the space between the sidewalk and the street. The passerby gets the most rewarding contact with a variety of plants large and small just by walking along the street. I took a little blossom and leaf from a tall airy plant with grey fuzzy leaves and large yellow flowers, and sent it to my son Ben to ask if it were a mallow. No, he wrote back, he thinks it's a flannel bush. I need to go to a Native Plant Nursery to check.
Benjamin lives in the SF Bay Area, in Concord. Concord is so far from the water that it's hard to mention "Bay" and Concord in one breath. However, up to the north he's not too far from Suisun Bay and all that. But in my opinion the climate is closer to that of sundried and winter-frozen Sacramento than, say, Berkeley. Every foot you get away from the water up there is a climate changer. Everyone who loves maps as much as the Yazzybel does should go to an atlas and look at the area where Concord is. Look at the Delta area...that is where the Bay finally goes into lowland and marshland. Islands. Canals. Interesting. Hot as Hades in summer.
Well, anyway, Ben is an avid gardener. He lives in a small condo-type residential area which is traditional (plants of the seventies) and neat and upscale as much as possible. I say condo-type in that his yard ends at the neighbor's wall. He has a nice big yard on that side and a more than generous front yard. He decided to make his front yard all native plants. Not California natives. Real local natives. Those plants should be able to sustain themselves by climate alone, no? Difficult! Plus, nothing is green, much. It is too hot and dry even for natives, apparently. I am in favor of pergolas in such a climate as his and mine. I've found that "full sun" is too much sun sometimes. Tempering with a little shade is often desirable. Like my lemon tree which does much better under some sort of covering, no matter what the Sunset Garden Book may say.
Ben's back yard is wonderful. Last year he had melons, watermelons, cucumbers, peppers, lots of wonderful tomatoes, strawberries, and a variety of fruit trees. Variety is a good word for the fruit trees because hardly any of them bear just one species of fruit. "Fruit Salad" is not a misnomer. Right now he's just put in a cherry that is going to put our five (can that be right? Five? ) kinds of cherries. I'd be happy with just one...
I love people's gardens, and I love the fact that they garden. Right now, I have one heatless jalapeno pepper which is bearing its insipid fruits right now, seven arugula plants which are beginning to look like something...two tomatoes which need a boost for fruiting, and a myriad of blooming plants. The front yard looks nice in front of the garage, where there is climbing rosemary, Cleveland sage, thyme, Mexican sage, Mexican Marigold, and a lot of orange-yellow-gold ice plant to fill in with color. And two thriving Sticks of Fire, which are at their most colorful right now. I need to take a picture and learn how to put it on so that I can show you how pretty it is. The rosemary has blue flowers, the thyme has tiny lavendar flowers, the sages both have purple flowers, the Mexican Marigold has yellow flowers, and there's some white dusty-miller with yellow flowers too. And all that ice plant. And the Sticks of Fire are brilliant rose red with a little yellow and green trim. Lovely color combination. I could go on forever about a garden. YAZZYBEL
Friday, March 11, 2011
Burnt Breakfast for Lent
Good morning!!
At bedtime I had Theodore take my blood glucose reading and I thought it was rather high. All that Valentine's candy has taken its toll, so I have decided to Cease and Desist for a week to see whether or not that helps. Sometimes we just have to bite the bullet, don't we?
I remember that I had one other period in my life when I did not eat any sugar for months. It was in the seventies. My weight went up to 134, and I was worried about being fat. So ---Dr Atkins had come into being and I went on his diet. I did not make his diet "bread" or rolls, but just ate the foods that had no carbs. I even gave up milk. I did not give up catsup nor sweet pickles but after all they were a very teeny part of my consumption. Otherwise--nada. Just like when I was eleven. Within a month, some man at work commented on my backside when I reached up to my too-high mailbox. I was stunned. Could a noticeable difference have been made in such a short time? I started this diet in October, and stuck to it to the letter until December when I ate a little Mexican rice at the school Christmas party and my weight loss (which was very very slow according to the scale, but constant) came to a halt for a week. Back on the diet. Got down to 124. On Christmas Eve I made tamales, and ate not one. Not one. The secret of a Dr Atkins type diet is that carbohydrates create their own craving for carbohydrates. Once you are eating all you want within the limits, your body has balanced out and you no longer crave sweets. I could look at a giant white-iced cake at school, watch everyone else wolf it down, and have NO DESIRE for it...it could have been made of plaster, for all the hunger it aroused in me.
By January I was down to about 120 and I looked wonderful. My body had thrown off all the "dirty water" around my knees, ankles, hips. My upper back was nice and skinny and I wore a 32 bra. My stomach was flat and the rest of me was in great shape. (I had been exercising a lot before I went on the diet then, I forgot to mention.) My skin was beautiful. Eggs have sulfur and sulfur is good for your skin. I jumped from a 14 size in jeans to a five and don't even know how it happened. Never needed a 12 or 10. I stayed skinny for about two years but gradually the old ways crept in, cheesecake here, a donut there, and it was all over. I was still reasonably thin until past menopause and past hormone replacements. Then--well, it's hard, isn't it?
In that period when I was sticking to the diet, I was cooking for me and three boys; I cooked plenty and my lunch the next day was the leftovers from dinner the night before. Fish and vegetables for dinner, cold fish and vegetables in a plastic box the next day. Cokes and so forth, if artificially sweeted, were sweetened with saccharine. I am here to tell you that that's the only sweetener that I'm sure does not produce a sugar reaction. There was no Aspartame, no Sucaryl, no Ace-P or whatever it is. If you eat diet jello or diet soda sweetened only with saccharine, your body KNOWS it is not really sweet; it 's just fooling you. GOOD. That's what we need. But now just try to avoid aspartame if you are consuming artificially sweetened products. Hah!
So this morning I made a flat flat sausage patty for my breakfast but burnt the dickens out of it while reading the paper. Then I went for bacon but burnt that too. Still reading the paper and watching about the tragic tsunami in Japan. Finally I asked Taterton to make the breakfast today including a scrambled egg for me. I ate a little piece of his bacon and a serving of scrambled egg. Delicious. Tomorrow I shall honor my food and pay attention to what I am doing. Thanks, Theodore! YAZZYBEL
At bedtime I had Theodore take my blood glucose reading and I thought it was rather high. All that Valentine's candy has taken its toll, so I have decided to Cease and Desist for a week to see whether or not that helps. Sometimes we just have to bite the bullet, don't we?
I remember that I had one other period in my life when I did not eat any sugar for months. It was in the seventies. My weight went up to 134, and I was worried about being fat. So ---Dr Atkins had come into being and I went on his diet. I did not make his diet "bread" or rolls, but just ate the foods that had no carbs. I even gave up milk. I did not give up catsup nor sweet pickles but after all they were a very teeny part of my consumption. Otherwise--nada. Just like when I was eleven. Within a month, some man at work commented on my backside when I reached up to my too-high mailbox. I was stunned. Could a noticeable difference have been made in such a short time? I started this diet in October, and stuck to it to the letter until December when I ate a little Mexican rice at the school Christmas party and my weight loss (which was very very slow according to the scale, but constant) came to a halt for a week. Back on the diet. Got down to 124. On Christmas Eve I made tamales, and ate not one. Not one. The secret of a Dr Atkins type diet is that carbohydrates create their own craving for carbohydrates. Once you are eating all you want within the limits, your body has balanced out and you no longer crave sweets. I could look at a giant white-iced cake at school, watch everyone else wolf it down, and have NO DESIRE for it...it could have been made of plaster, for all the hunger it aroused in me.
By January I was down to about 120 and I looked wonderful. My body had thrown off all the "dirty water" around my knees, ankles, hips. My upper back was nice and skinny and I wore a 32 bra. My stomach was flat and the rest of me was in great shape. (I had been exercising a lot before I went on the diet then, I forgot to mention.) My skin was beautiful. Eggs have sulfur and sulfur is good for your skin. I jumped from a 14 size in jeans to a five and don't even know how it happened. Never needed a 12 or 10. I stayed skinny for about two years but gradually the old ways crept in, cheesecake here, a donut there, and it was all over. I was still reasonably thin until past menopause and past hormone replacements. Then--well, it's hard, isn't it?
In that period when I was sticking to the diet, I was cooking for me and three boys; I cooked plenty and my lunch the next day was the leftovers from dinner the night before. Fish and vegetables for dinner, cold fish and vegetables in a plastic box the next day. Cokes and so forth, if artificially sweeted, were sweetened with saccharine. I am here to tell you that that's the only sweetener that I'm sure does not produce a sugar reaction. There was no Aspartame, no Sucaryl, no Ace-P or whatever it is. If you eat diet jello or diet soda sweetened only with saccharine, your body KNOWS it is not really sweet; it 's just fooling you. GOOD. That's what we need. But now just try to avoid aspartame if you are consuming artificially sweetened products. Hah!
So this morning I made a flat flat sausage patty for my breakfast but burnt the dickens out of it while reading the paper. Then I went for bacon but burnt that too. Still reading the paper and watching about the tragic tsunami in Japan. Finally I asked Taterton to make the breakfast today including a scrambled egg for me. I ate a little piece of his bacon and a serving of scrambled egg. Delicious. Tomorrow I shall honor my food and pay attention to what I am doing. Thanks, Theodore! YAZZYBEL
Thursday, March 10, 2011
Lent is On
Yes, I went to church yesterday. My lenten resolve is, to play the piano (call it practice) for one half hour each day. That is the minimum; I could always do more, to my advantage.
Writing the blog is a daily discipline, undisciplined though it is. Just having to come and write something is an obligation as well as a joy. When I learn how to put on photos and so forth I'll be ahead of the game.
Today I came to the computer to find that hardly anything would open up. I could not even get Breakfast with Yazzybel to open up, but I jumped to Internet Explorer and here it is.
I won't write much today. This one is more obligation than joy, until I get the problem straightened out. I need to clean my cache at the very least, but do not remember how to do it. So, that is all for today. I am going to play out of John Thompson's Book 2, for a half hour. Don't laugh; it's not as easy as you might think.YAZZYBEL
Writing the blog is a daily discipline, undisciplined though it is. Just having to come and write something is an obligation as well as a joy. When I learn how to put on photos and so forth I'll be ahead of the game.
Today I came to the computer to find that hardly anything would open up. I could not even get Breakfast with Yazzybel to open up, but I jumped to Internet Explorer and here it is.
I won't write much today. This one is more obligation than joy, until I get the problem straightened out. I need to clean my cache at the very least, but do not remember how to do it. So, that is all for today. I am going to play out of John Thompson's Book 2, for a half hour. Don't laugh; it's not as easy as you might think.YAZZYBEL
Wednesday, March 9, 2011
Ash Wednesday
Good morning! It's Ash Wednesday. I always think that's a beautiful pairing of words, full of mystery and implied meaning. In Spanish it's Miercoles de Cenizas, also beautiful. But since I am a primary English speaker Ash Wednesday falls more strongly on my ear.
As I was reading about Virginia Wolff this morning, a verse came into my head. As follows:
English has a cadence,
El español un son
Se toman las palabras
And gives to them a bone.
That's ungrammatical, but that is what came into my head. I sacrificed grammar for meter. Thanks,Virginia Wolff, for making me listen to what's going on in my head this morning.
Music is present everywhere, in informal everyday spoken language, not just formal writing. In formal writing we struggle to make the cadence perfect. I was just reading about John Banville, who makes music of his sentences before they pass muster.
I was reading about Virginia Wolff in http://www.todayinliterature.com/. That's a wonderful website that I am happy to subscribe to in order to receive a daily compendium of information and excellent writing about literature. Steve King, the webmaster, has a wonderful site with many byways that go off the subject immediately at hand to expand our enjoyment of our world. I once spent a wonderful morning learning about hay-ricking all over the world, and the ceremonies and celebrations that attend that annual harvest. Take Mr King's links for a great ride into worlds you hadn't expected to visit today, perhaps.
Anyway, it's the Christian's day for introspection, prayer, and the asking of humility for individual selves as we prepare for our year's journey into the
Christian year. In some cultures, the spring is the beginning of the Christian year, as Christ, to be born in December, would have to have been conceived in March. I will be going to play the piano with Patricia, I to her up in Mission Hills for a change. We'll play at the Congregational Church and then at noon we are going to go to St Paul's and receive the Imposition of Ashes. She has not done this before and asks if she needs to wear a hat and gloves. Wish I'd said yes. I can ask forgiveness for that mischief later. Or am asking now. YAZZYBEL
As I was reading about Virginia Wolff this morning, a verse came into my head. As follows:
English has a cadence,
El español un son
Se toman las palabras
And gives to them a bone.
That's ungrammatical, but that is what came into my head. I sacrificed grammar for meter. Thanks,Virginia Wolff, for making me listen to what's going on in my head this morning.
Music is present everywhere, in informal everyday spoken language, not just formal writing. In formal writing we struggle to make the cadence perfect. I was just reading about John Banville, who makes music of his sentences before they pass muster.
I was reading about Virginia Wolff in http://www.todayinliterature.com/. That's a wonderful website that I am happy to subscribe to in order to receive a daily compendium of information and excellent writing about literature. Steve King, the webmaster, has a wonderful site with many byways that go off the subject immediately at hand to expand our enjoyment of our world. I once spent a wonderful morning learning about hay-ricking all over the world, and the ceremonies and celebrations that attend that annual harvest. Take Mr King's links for a great ride into worlds you hadn't expected to visit today, perhaps.
Anyway, it's the Christian's day for introspection, prayer, and the asking of humility for individual selves as we prepare for our year's journey into the
Christian year. In some cultures, the spring is the beginning of the Christian year, as Christ, to be born in December, would have to have been conceived in March. I will be going to play the piano with Patricia, I to her up in Mission Hills for a change. We'll play at the Congregational Church and then at noon we are going to go to St Paul's and receive the Imposition of Ashes. She has not done this before and asks if she needs to wear a hat and gloves. Wish I'd said yes. I can ask forgiveness for that mischief later. Or am asking now. YAZZYBEL
Tuesday, March 8, 2011
The Morning After
I have always been an early riser. In my own family, I was the first one up, even including my busy-bee grandparents, Annie Bell and "Mack" Temple. When first light appeared, I jumped out of my bed refreshed and ready to see the world. I would wander around the house, or look out the windows, or sometimes get our my water colors and paper and paint or draw all by myself. I cherished that time on my own, as I was fortunate enough to live in a multi-generational home where there was always someone keeping an eye on us children.
Once, in Laredo, when I was about ten years old, I saw a startling animal which I've never forgotten. I was first up, and the sky was fully light. I saw the paper outside and thought I would run out to get it, as I often did (and still do.) We lived out on the edge of civilization on Piedra China Street (and that house, so big then, so small now) is still there. When I opened the door and started to push the screen open, there lay at my feet on the small space between big door and screen door, the strangest lizard I have ever seen. He was about ten inches long, and, instead of being sleek and sinuous like most lizards, he was fat and rough-looking. He looked, in fact, to my ten-year-old eyes, like a Mexican Beaded Lizard or a Gila Monster--except that he was green. Grass green. Lizard color. I was horrified, and stepped back inside and closed the door.
I never told anybody about seeing that lizard, or if I did, nobody believed me. I can hardly even believe myself, as I've never seen or heard of a green lizard that looked like that. I now guess that he was some kind of chameleon or anole--but that big? And what was he doing in hot, dry, brown Laredo? Ah well, just another of the things that happened to me in my life that I never told anybody about. Until now.
Last night I presented my presentation, none too smoothly, I'm afraid. My best points were weakened by my not eliding my thoughts ahead in a serene and secure style. Too bad. Sometimes you're on, and sometimes you're not. But I was in a good mood, and enjoyed a couple of glasses of wine. I wish people would quit putting out bowls of nuts; they do nothing for a speaker's throat. I know--I should just say NO.
The main presentation of "eats" was spectacular, caterer's food, with a delicious fresh raspberry tart, a chocolate mousse cake, bowls of cut fruit, lemon squares--something for everybody and it was all good. Next month, April 4th, we will be listening to Lee present Divisadero, by Michael Ondaatje. I voted for that because I love San Francisco, northern California, and the first pages of The English Patient. And I look forward to reading the book. I'm mad at Amazon.com, because they've somehow thrown me off of "Buy With One Click," which was so convenient. I should be thanking them, of course. I have saved a small fortune in the last month or so, not buying those one-cent books...But anyway I will go to eBay, because I can pay easily there with Paypal. And there shall I look first. YAZZYBEL
Once, in Laredo, when I was about ten years old, I saw a startling animal which I've never forgotten. I was first up, and the sky was fully light. I saw the paper outside and thought I would run out to get it, as I often did (and still do.) We lived out on the edge of civilization on Piedra China Street (and that house, so big then, so small now) is still there. When I opened the door and started to push the screen open, there lay at my feet on the small space between big door and screen door, the strangest lizard I have ever seen. He was about ten inches long, and, instead of being sleek and sinuous like most lizards, he was fat and rough-looking. He looked, in fact, to my ten-year-old eyes, like a Mexican Beaded Lizard or a Gila Monster--except that he was green. Grass green. Lizard color. I was horrified, and stepped back inside and closed the door.
I never told anybody about seeing that lizard, or if I did, nobody believed me. I can hardly even believe myself, as I've never seen or heard of a green lizard that looked like that. I now guess that he was some kind of chameleon or anole--but that big? And what was he doing in hot, dry, brown Laredo? Ah well, just another of the things that happened to me in my life that I never told anybody about. Until now.
Last night I presented my presentation, none too smoothly, I'm afraid. My best points were weakened by my not eliding my thoughts ahead in a serene and secure style. Too bad. Sometimes you're on, and sometimes you're not. But I was in a good mood, and enjoyed a couple of glasses of wine. I wish people would quit putting out bowls of nuts; they do nothing for a speaker's throat. I know--I should just say NO.
The main presentation of "eats" was spectacular, caterer's food, with a delicious fresh raspberry tart, a chocolate mousse cake, bowls of cut fruit, lemon squares--something for everybody and it was all good. Next month, April 4th, we will be listening to Lee present Divisadero, by Michael Ondaatje. I voted for that because I love San Francisco, northern California, and the first pages of The English Patient. And I look forward to reading the book. I'm mad at Amazon.com, because they've somehow thrown me off of "Buy With One Click," which was so convenient. I should be thanking them, of course. I have saved a small fortune in the last month or so, not buying those one-cent books...But anyway I will go to eBay, because I can pay easily there with Paypal. And there shall I look first. YAZZYBEL
Monday, March 7, 2011
Book Club Blues
Good morning!
Yes, dear readers, a month has passed since I was wrestling with the onerous duties of hostessing, making a rich dessert, and finding a place for fourteen people to sit in an eight-person living room.
Now it is time for me to go to someone else's house tonight, where I shall as the "presenter" be parading mostly my ignorance, I fear, before the same fearsome gathering. The book chosen was The Book of Evidence by John Banville. Last year I presented The Sea, by the same writer. The Sea was published some twenty years later than The Book of Evidence, but has the same protagonist: a bumbling, selfish fellow who is now coming to grips with the picture of himself that is rapidly impinging upon his consciousness as he works toward becoming (at last) self-aware.
Banville is a wonderful writer, with a near-mastery of his craft. His command of words is truly awesome, his vocabulary astounding. Christopher Derrick, in his book, The Writing of Novels, describes the novel as both a thing TOLD, (the story), and a thing MADE (how it is done.) You can see in The Book of Evidence the hand of a newer, clumsier craftsman. His potter's wheel is a little more erratic and less under control, the clay slapped on a bit more crudely. That book was Banville's "breakout" novel, but it is still unmistakeably the same hand forming it.
When I am reading a book to talk about, I read it through and then I read again looking for what I might have to say about it. "Wonderfully descriptive passages about scenery," or "startlingly brusque descriptions of human physical existence" won't cut it.
I found what I was looking for when I found the dialogue from Powell's books on the web. You can see it on Youtube.com if you wish. But since I have about thirty to forty five actual minutes to be onstage, it's best for me if I pick one little thing that leads me to some insight I might not have inferred for myself. Here is the gist of the thing that Banville had to say. He seeks to "make the familiar unfamiliar, showing us how the ordinary is in turn extraordinary." He mentions Freud's essay on the uncanny. Bringing back the familiar in unfamiliar shapes and thus showing things to us in a "terrifying" way. Banville is aiming at clarifying the simplest, most routine aspects and attitudes of our lives into a truly terrifying intensity. Of course, nobody will have liked the book, probably. How intense does vomiting have to be, or masturbation, or mites strolling on our skins have to be? For his art, the view must be very intense. And from this intense scrutiny may arise "delight." Art.
Then Banville speaks about looking at a thing until it "blushes." As you concentrate on something it begins to glow with the same light that illuminates the loved one...well, he said all this off the top of his head but he means it. The protagonist, Freddie, is very taken with an old Dutch painting of a woman. His stealing of this painting begins the series of events which this book is dealing with. He stares at the painting, but the painting stares at him. He blushes. The artist's way. Freddie imagines the old painter who did the portrait (Franz Hals? Steen? Even Vermeer?) whose gaze at the subject is uncannily invasive. The whole portrait is gazing back at Freddie in the same way. Freddy blushes. Art has transcended reality and made art of the viewer.
Intermingled with all that are wonderful descriptive passages...."the muslin light of evening," and "girls with faces as frail and blank as flowers," the achingly true and sad sex scene with Foxy in an empty room at Charlie's house when Freddie is truly at the end of his rope....wonderful reading. Delight.
And as for the tale, the author wraps it up in a couple of tossed-off sentences toward the very end of the book: "Oh, by the way, the plot--," for those who have to have one. I thought it was a good book. I don't know, by reading this little posting I have just written, that I'll do justice to it in my critique this evening. YAZZYBEL
Yes, dear readers, a month has passed since I was wrestling with the onerous duties of hostessing, making a rich dessert, and finding a place for fourteen people to sit in an eight-person living room.
Now it is time for me to go to someone else's house tonight, where I shall as the "presenter" be parading mostly my ignorance, I fear, before the same fearsome gathering. The book chosen was The Book of Evidence by John Banville. Last year I presented The Sea, by the same writer. The Sea was published some twenty years later than The Book of Evidence, but has the same protagonist: a bumbling, selfish fellow who is now coming to grips with the picture of himself that is rapidly impinging upon his consciousness as he works toward becoming (at last) self-aware.
Banville is a wonderful writer, with a near-mastery of his craft. His command of words is truly awesome, his vocabulary astounding. Christopher Derrick, in his book, The Writing of Novels, describes the novel as both a thing TOLD, (the story), and a thing MADE (how it is done.) You can see in The Book of Evidence the hand of a newer, clumsier craftsman. His potter's wheel is a little more erratic and less under control, the clay slapped on a bit more crudely. That book was Banville's "breakout" novel, but it is still unmistakeably the same hand forming it.
When I am reading a book to talk about, I read it through and then I read again looking for what I might have to say about it. "Wonderfully descriptive passages about scenery," or "startlingly brusque descriptions of human physical existence" won't cut it.
I found what I was looking for when I found the dialogue from Powell's books on the web. You can see it on Youtube.com if you wish. But since I have about thirty to forty five actual minutes to be onstage, it's best for me if I pick one little thing that leads me to some insight I might not have inferred for myself. Here is the gist of the thing that Banville had to say. He seeks to "make the familiar unfamiliar, showing us how the ordinary is in turn extraordinary." He mentions Freud's essay on the uncanny. Bringing back the familiar in unfamiliar shapes and thus showing things to us in a "terrifying" way. Banville is aiming at clarifying the simplest, most routine aspects and attitudes of our lives into a truly terrifying intensity. Of course, nobody will have liked the book, probably. How intense does vomiting have to be, or masturbation, or mites strolling on our skins have to be? For his art, the view must be very intense. And from this intense scrutiny may arise "delight." Art.
Then Banville speaks about looking at a thing until it "blushes." As you concentrate on something it begins to glow with the same light that illuminates the loved one...well, he said all this off the top of his head but he means it. The protagonist, Freddie, is very taken with an old Dutch painting of a woman. His stealing of this painting begins the series of events which this book is dealing with. He stares at the painting, but the painting stares at him. He blushes. The artist's way. Freddie imagines the old painter who did the portrait (Franz Hals? Steen? Even Vermeer?) whose gaze at the subject is uncannily invasive. The whole portrait is gazing back at Freddie in the same way. Freddy blushes. Art has transcended reality and made art of the viewer.
Intermingled with all that are wonderful descriptive passages...."the muslin light of evening," and "girls with faces as frail and blank as flowers," the achingly true and sad sex scene with Foxy in an empty room at Charlie's house when Freddie is truly at the end of his rope....wonderful reading. Delight.
And as for the tale, the author wraps it up in a couple of tossed-off sentences toward the very end of the book: "Oh, by the way, the plot--," for those who have to have one. I thought it was a good book. I don't know, by reading this little posting I have just written, that I'll do justice to it in my critique this evening. YAZZYBEL
Sunday, March 6, 2011
Sunday, March 6th
Yes, I will write some more about Laredo.
Another early memory from Laredo is, like all early childhood memories, brief. An image enshrined in memory forever. My mother took me with her to buy tortillas. We went to a busy small plaza-like area (I was too young to know where, exactly) and an old woman draped in black shawls sat in the cold winter evening, with a huge basket of warm tortillas, wrapped by the dozens I guess. I remember the iconic old woman, the dark, the cold, and the pleasure of Going Somewhere alone with my mother, a rare treat. I have always loved going somewhere.
Another: my little sister (only one, then)and I are riding in the dark as my mother drives us. You may not realize how dark the dark was, in those days. Nowadays there are lights everywhere but then it was not so then, even in a big town like Laredo. Ahead in the headlights, there is a little old man with a "Nieve" sign on a small cart. My mother stops, asks him, "What flavor?" I guess she asked him in Spanish, because I can hear his answer: "Canela, Señora." My mother impatiently shook her head and drove off, to our disappointment. "What is canela, Mama?" we asked. "Cinnamon! It's always cinnamon! Why don't the Mexicans make some other flavor?"
In the years since, I have had a few blissful bites of helado de canela, and now I am sorrier than ever that she didn't get us one cone, at least. Cinnamon ice cream is best made with real cinnamon, that is, Ceylon cinnamon bark. There are many cinnamons going around out there now, as my latest little bottle of harsh McCormick's Ground Cinnamon can attest. I am reluctant to even put it on cinnamon toast, it's so strong. And even Spice Islands cinnamon bark is as hard and woody as--tree bark. Good cinnamon bark is soft and thin and ragged, and it smells and tastes like heaven. I have found it mostly in little cellophane (plastic, now) packages in third world type markets. If you can find some, put a few sticks into some milk and cream,and simmer. Or boil it in sugar syrup and add it to milk or cream--perhaps that is better. Taste. Don't add any powdered cinnamon unless you know your source is the real thing. Freeze that ice cream in any freezer method and you will have a delicious ice cream, even if you do it in an ice tray in the refrigerator freezer. My mother made us lots of delicious ice cream (vanilla) by that method. It just takes a fork and plenty of beating at intervals.
The interesting thing to me now is that my mother was doing all that gadding around at night. Dark as it was, and wild as Laredo was thought to be, she didn't hesitate to walk alone into a strange almost deserted marketplace, or to stop to address a little old man on the street. She spent plenty of time alone in those border places while my dad would be working in Mexico, she alone in charge of everything. At night, she would sometimes fill up the window sills with toys and such so that she hear an intruder. The windows had to be open because of the weather. And she sometimes had a baseball bat beside her bed. I wonder if she slept, with those little kids dreaming there in the house, but I guess she did. Brave mama. YAZZYBEL
Another early memory from Laredo is, like all early childhood memories, brief. An image enshrined in memory forever. My mother took me with her to buy tortillas. We went to a busy small plaza-like area (I was too young to know where, exactly) and an old woman draped in black shawls sat in the cold winter evening, with a huge basket of warm tortillas, wrapped by the dozens I guess. I remember the iconic old woman, the dark, the cold, and the pleasure of Going Somewhere alone with my mother, a rare treat. I have always loved going somewhere.
Another: my little sister (only one, then)and I are riding in the dark as my mother drives us. You may not realize how dark the dark was, in those days. Nowadays there are lights everywhere but then it was not so then, even in a big town like Laredo. Ahead in the headlights, there is a little old man with a "Nieve" sign on a small cart. My mother stops, asks him, "What flavor?" I guess she asked him in Spanish, because I can hear his answer: "Canela, Señora." My mother impatiently shook her head and drove off, to our disappointment. "What is canela, Mama?" we asked. "Cinnamon! It's always cinnamon! Why don't the Mexicans make some other flavor?"
In the years since, I have had a few blissful bites of helado de canela, and now I am sorrier than ever that she didn't get us one cone, at least. Cinnamon ice cream is best made with real cinnamon, that is, Ceylon cinnamon bark. There are many cinnamons going around out there now, as my latest little bottle of harsh McCormick's Ground Cinnamon can attest. I am reluctant to even put it on cinnamon toast, it's so strong. And even Spice Islands cinnamon bark is as hard and woody as--tree bark. Good cinnamon bark is soft and thin and ragged, and it smells and tastes like heaven. I have found it mostly in little cellophane (plastic, now) packages in third world type markets. If you can find some, put a few sticks into some milk and cream,and simmer. Or boil it in sugar syrup and add it to milk or cream--perhaps that is better. Taste. Don't add any powdered cinnamon unless you know your source is the real thing. Freeze that ice cream in any freezer method and you will have a delicious ice cream, even if you do it in an ice tray in the refrigerator freezer. My mother made us lots of delicious ice cream (vanilla) by that method. It just takes a fork and plenty of beating at intervals.
The interesting thing to me now is that my mother was doing all that gadding around at night. Dark as it was, and wild as Laredo was thought to be, she didn't hesitate to walk alone into a strange almost deserted marketplace, or to stop to address a little old man on the street. She spent plenty of time alone in those border places while my dad would be working in Mexico, she alone in charge of everything. At night, she would sometimes fill up the window sills with toys and such so that she hear an intruder. The windows had to be open because of the weather. And she sometimes had a baseball bat beside her bed. I wonder if she slept, with those little kids dreaming there in the house, but I guess she did. Brave mama. YAZZYBEL
Saturday, March 5, 2011
Subdued Saturday
Gracious!! It's already twelve-fifteen, and too late to tell you good morning.
I slept late (rare for me) and got up with pressing errands on my mind once I got breakfast out of the way.
Then, my husband and I had words. He had more words than I did, so I guess he won.
Next week, I was going to have a surprise for you. I was going to go up to the Bay Area, and visit Benjamin, our youngest son, and go to a recital in San Franscisco. Theo never did commit to going, and yesterday or so he bowed out almost entirely. Then I belatedly got on with Ben for last-minute confirmations of dates, etc., and it turned out that he wouldn't even be in town (Concord) until Saturday...I guess I should have gotten that little detail into my head before I planned a Wednesday departure....So, since I am sometimes a reader of Signs, I decided that the Signs were negative for this trip at this time, and donated my ticket back to the SF Symphony Orchestra. Too bad, I was going to listen to Bronfman play the Chopin Etudes and tell you how he did. I am sure I would have been kind.:) I just love to watch Bronfman play.
Also I was going to see the spring-time emerald green hills of the Bay Area. If there were such a color as Blinding Green, that would be the name of that color. It is unbelieveable. And the oaks are almost black-green, and it's a glorious combination. Something so wonderful from this little brought-up-in-South-Texas denizen, that color. Ah well, perhaps next year. If the Signs are right. YAZZYBEL
I slept late (rare for me) and got up with pressing errands on my mind once I got breakfast out of the way.
Then, my husband and I had words. He had more words than I did, so I guess he won.
Next week, I was going to have a surprise for you. I was going to go up to the Bay Area, and visit Benjamin, our youngest son, and go to a recital in San Franscisco. Theo never did commit to going, and yesterday or so he bowed out almost entirely. Then I belatedly got on with Ben for last-minute confirmations of dates, etc., and it turned out that he wouldn't even be in town (Concord) until Saturday...I guess I should have gotten that little detail into my head before I planned a Wednesday departure....So, since I am sometimes a reader of Signs, I decided that the Signs were negative for this trip at this time, and donated my ticket back to the SF Symphony Orchestra. Too bad, I was going to listen to Bronfman play the Chopin Etudes and tell you how he did. I am sure I would have been kind.:) I just love to watch Bronfman play.
Also I was going to see the spring-time emerald green hills of the Bay Area. If there were such a color as Blinding Green, that would be the name of that color. It is unbelieveable. And the oaks are almost black-green, and it's a glorious combination. Something so wonderful from this little brought-up-in-South-Texas denizen, that color. Ah well, perhaps next year. If the Signs are right. YAZZYBEL
Friday, March 4, 2011
More About Laredo
Good morning!!
We'll talk more about Laredo, Texas, today, especially since it is right there on the front page of the newspaper. The Laredo in the paper today bears no relationship to the Laredo of my childhood, yet I feel that I must comment about it.
President Obama and President Calderon are there on the front page, smiling broadly as they have concluded an agreement which will allow Mexican trucks and truckers access to all American highways and destinations. The Goody-Two-Shoeses among us will smile beatifically and think, how nice for the poor Mexicans. I am not a Goody-Two-Shoes, and I don't think that way.
I first heard about this deal on midnite-gun-nut radio, which I listen to in my insomniac hours, and I first heard about it ten or fifteen years ago. This truck agreement was to cut a lot of money out of US control, by importing goods from China to ports in Mexico (instead of Long Beach, etc. in the USA. Not as many people employed in the USA on that one, right?). Then the Mexican truckers, who are poorly paid by comparison to the United States truckers, will pick up those Chinese goods and cross the border without inspection or hindrance, and zoom up several massive freeways towards a central US port of deposit, from whence more webs will pick up the goods and head for the nearest Walmart, supermarket, or wherever they are bound for. Do we or do we not understand that there are many many US truckers who will not get paid for this work? And that the ones who do will be competing for the work at the lower rates earned by the Mexican drivers? This is a business deal for the sake of Big Business. Nobody else. Like the China trade.
Back to Laredo. This massive freeway will lead from Laredo up Hwy 35 towards San Antonio, then skirt around the southeast portion of the outside San Antonio go-around. (San Antonio has two go-arounds.) From there it will rejoin 35 and head north by northeast through (but not quite through) all those cities along that freeway. I am a devotee of Realtor.com, and wondered for a time why those lovely houses in the towns of Round Rock, New Braunfels, etc., were going for such a low low price. Well, I think it's because the owners had heard the distant early warning. I would not buy anything remotely near highway 35 now. Get out your map and trace a line on 35 from Laredo up to Little Rock, Arkansas. This is where the depot is supposed to be. Nowadays, since the trucks can go anywhere, we have no need for a depot to switch over to American trucks which was part of the first idea.
You will notice that Texas is neatly divided into two by this procedure. When last in Brownsville, Texas, two years ago, we noticed that the huge freeway which chops that city in two and has been in a confusion of non-completion for years, was approaching completion. That freeway is to head along the southeastern section of Texas and terminate in Louisiana somewhere, but you know what? They won't need to terminate it anywhere now. The truckers can just barrel on through all the states even if their wheels are falling off and their combustion is fouling the air, because they are not to be inspected at the border. What border?
If I sound crazy or confused on this subject, I urge you to try on Google, "Trans-Texas Corridor." In fact I think I will do it right now; should have done it before starting this garbled post. Well, there it is. Wikipedia says that the one huge corridor idea was abandoned in 2009-2010, in favor of leaving the more traditional system in place. Somebody figured out that, if we give up all the regulations, let Mexican trucks come in, willy-nilly, we would not have to have those big 12 lane superfreeways and toll stations. Phyllis Shaffley was one of the people wailing most about that old plan; I would read her and reluctantly agree with her. It was the end of Texas as we knew it, and have you-all noticed it? It's the end of the United States as we knew it....but of course, you've noticed that already. Haven't you? YAZZYBEL who promises more childhood, sunny skies, and return to sanity tomorrow.
We'll talk more about Laredo, Texas, today, especially since it is right there on the front page of the newspaper. The Laredo in the paper today bears no relationship to the Laredo of my childhood, yet I feel that I must comment about it.
President Obama and President Calderon are there on the front page, smiling broadly as they have concluded an agreement which will allow Mexican trucks and truckers access to all American highways and destinations. The Goody-Two-Shoeses among us will smile beatifically and think, how nice for the poor Mexicans. I am not a Goody-Two-Shoes, and I don't think that way.
I first heard about this deal on midnite-gun-nut radio, which I listen to in my insomniac hours, and I first heard about it ten or fifteen years ago. This truck agreement was to cut a lot of money out of US control, by importing goods from China to ports in Mexico (instead of Long Beach, etc. in the USA. Not as many people employed in the USA on that one, right?). Then the Mexican truckers, who are poorly paid by comparison to the United States truckers, will pick up those Chinese goods and cross the border without inspection or hindrance, and zoom up several massive freeways towards a central US port of deposit, from whence more webs will pick up the goods and head for the nearest Walmart, supermarket, or wherever they are bound for. Do we or do we not understand that there are many many US truckers who will not get paid for this work? And that the ones who do will be competing for the work at the lower rates earned by the Mexican drivers? This is a business deal for the sake of Big Business. Nobody else. Like the China trade.
Back to Laredo. This massive freeway will lead from Laredo up Hwy 35 towards San Antonio, then skirt around the southeast portion of the outside San Antonio go-around. (San Antonio has two go-arounds.) From there it will rejoin 35 and head north by northeast through (but not quite through) all those cities along that freeway. I am a devotee of Realtor.com, and wondered for a time why those lovely houses in the towns of Round Rock, New Braunfels, etc., were going for such a low low price. Well, I think it's because the owners had heard the distant early warning. I would not buy anything remotely near highway 35 now. Get out your map and trace a line on 35 from Laredo up to Little Rock, Arkansas. This is where the depot is supposed to be. Nowadays, since the trucks can go anywhere, we have no need for a depot to switch over to American trucks which was part of the first idea.
You will notice that Texas is neatly divided into two by this procedure. When last in Brownsville, Texas, two years ago, we noticed that the huge freeway which chops that city in two and has been in a confusion of non-completion for years, was approaching completion. That freeway is to head along the southeastern section of Texas and terminate in Louisiana somewhere, but you know what? They won't need to terminate it anywhere now. The truckers can just barrel on through all the states even if their wheels are falling off and their combustion is fouling the air, because they are not to be inspected at the border. What border?
If I sound crazy or confused on this subject, I urge you to try on Google, "Trans-Texas Corridor." In fact I think I will do it right now; should have done it before starting this garbled post. Well, there it is. Wikipedia says that the one huge corridor idea was abandoned in 2009-2010, in favor of leaving the more traditional system in place. Somebody figured out that, if we give up all the regulations, let Mexican trucks come in, willy-nilly, we would not have to have those big 12 lane superfreeways and toll stations. Phyllis Shaffley was one of the people wailing most about that old plan; I would read her and reluctantly agree with her. It was the end of Texas as we knew it, and have you-all noticed it? It's the end of the United States as we knew it....but of course, you've noticed that already. Haven't you? YAZZYBEL who promises more childhood, sunny skies, and return to sanity tomorrow.
Thursday, March 3, 2011
Memories of Laredo
Good morning!
When my sister was here last week, we talked about Laredo and Laredo memories. And she was saying, "Remember this or remember that," and I realized that since I am six years older than she, my memories go back a lot farther (childwise).
I was born in San Benito, but Brownsville was always our home base. San Benito, Brownsville, and Port Isabel are the three main compass-points of my early childhood. All these towns were definitely tropical in climate (sub-tropical, really, which means that they were rarely cold...) with a stiff southeast breeze blowing in from the Gulf on most days to keep the air moving and the inhabitants amiable.
Laredo was another story. Laredo was up along the Rio Grande about a hundred and fifty miles, along to the northwest. There was no mitigating tropical Gulf breeze there. Laredo was hot and hotter. Two of my cousins graduated from medical and dental schools and chose Laredo for their homes and their practices. My father's cotton business required connections with Anahuac, Nuevo Leon (or was it Anahuac, Tamps.?) --anyway, it was over in Mexico and quite close to Laredo and Brownsville both--so he would frequently drive back and forth from Anahuac, often going to Laredo along the way. The River Road was a very important conduit for automobile traffic on the American Side.
When I was very young, we moved away from my American grandparents' rented house in San Benito and went to Laredo to live so that my parents could be closer to Daddy's work in Anahuac. We also moved to Anahuac for a short time but that is another story. We'll stick to Laredo on this one. Those early visits were probably before my cousins graduated from school and set up their practices, so we had no real connections there at that time. I remember my mother moving us into an apartment there, red brick with wrought iron balconies. On one of those balconies, I stuck my head between the bars and it was--stuck!! No amount of pulling could move it back out, and finally the firemen had to come and get me out somehow. I remember my feelings of rage and humiliation, and the smug expression on my little sister's face as she watched with the rest.
Wait a minute--I'm hearing--that could have happened anywhere! It's not about Laredo after all. Well, if you want to know about Laredo in general, you want to go to Wikipedia. I am telling about MY Laredo. Another part of my Laredo is our move to another place (perhaps one without wrought iron balconies) and the main thing I remember about that place is the bathroom. I had never seen such luxury. The bathroom was huge and it was purple. Lilac-colored Mexican tile covered every surface, and the fittings were all of the same beautiful color. Purple tub, toilet, wash basin. Even the toilet paper was of that color! I had never seen such a thing in the humble grocery aisles of San Benito, and remarked about it to my mother. "You can buy that colored toilet paper in Nuevo Laredo," she said. However, we did not indulge in that luxury and our paper was white after that brief introduction to the luxury of matching everything.
Another Laredo happening of those early times happened one Sunday morning, when my mother, the maid, and my little sister and I drove across the bridge to buy aguacates (avocadoes). The aguacates of those days were very different from the sleek things you get in a bag of four at the supermarket. They were small, and black, and full of a hideous fiber you had to pull out before eating them. (That's how guacamole was invented.) Their flavor was heavenly. My mother got a huge bagful of them, and we drove back across the bridge.
Now on this bridge was a wicked troll called the U.S. Customs. Rules for bringing in fruits and vegetables fluctuated often, depending upon the caprices of some insect pest or other, probably. My mother declared the aguacates, but the customs man said that she would have to surrender them for they were at present contraband. She was furious. I remember her arguing and sassing back the customs officer, but to no avail. He had to take those aguacates into custody. Fire was in my mother's eyes, as she said to us toddlers, "He'll just take them home for his own family!" Probably true. So she said to the maid, Lupe, "Lupe, take these aguacates and walk back to the middle of the bridge and throw them into the river!" And, while we stayed parked there, Lupe did so and we all went home grumpy but triumphant, having won over the U.S.Customs.
It's funny, I wouldn't have remembered that maid' s name, but as I was writing you this story, her name just popped out of my mother's mouth as natural as anything. Memory is a strange thing....you-all will sign out of my posting today and say, "She sure didn't tell us much about Laredo!" Well, I told you a little, and, as my mother would have said, "And that's not the half of it!!!" YAZZYBEL
When my sister was here last week, we talked about Laredo and Laredo memories. And she was saying, "Remember this or remember that," and I realized that since I am six years older than she, my memories go back a lot farther (childwise).
I was born in San Benito, but Brownsville was always our home base. San Benito, Brownsville, and Port Isabel are the three main compass-points of my early childhood. All these towns were definitely tropical in climate (sub-tropical, really, which means that they were rarely cold...) with a stiff southeast breeze blowing in from the Gulf on most days to keep the air moving and the inhabitants amiable.
Laredo was another story. Laredo was up along the Rio Grande about a hundred and fifty miles, along to the northwest. There was no mitigating tropical Gulf breeze there. Laredo was hot and hotter. Two of my cousins graduated from medical and dental schools and chose Laredo for their homes and their practices. My father's cotton business required connections with Anahuac, Nuevo Leon (or was it Anahuac, Tamps.?) --anyway, it was over in Mexico and quite close to Laredo and Brownsville both--so he would frequently drive back and forth from Anahuac, often going to Laredo along the way. The River Road was a very important conduit for automobile traffic on the American Side.
When I was very young, we moved away from my American grandparents' rented house in San Benito and went to Laredo to live so that my parents could be closer to Daddy's work in Anahuac. We also moved to Anahuac for a short time but that is another story. We'll stick to Laredo on this one. Those early visits were probably before my cousins graduated from school and set up their practices, so we had no real connections there at that time. I remember my mother moving us into an apartment there, red brick with wrought iron balconies. On one of those balconies, I stuck my head between the bars and it was--stuck!! No amount of pulling could move it back out, and finally the firemen had to come and get me out somehow. I remember my feelings of rage and humiliation, and the smug expression on my little sister's face as she watched with the rest.
Wait a minute--I'm hearing--that could have happened anywhere! It's not about Laredo after all. Well, if you want to know about Laredo in general, you want to go to Wikipedia. I am telling about MY Laredo. Another part of my Laredo is our move to another place (perhaps one without wrought iron balconies) and the main thing I remember about that place is the bathroom. I had never seen such luxury. The bathroom was huge and it was purple. Lilac-colored Mexican tile covered every surface, and the fittings were all of the same beautiful color. Purple tub, toilet, wash basin. Even the toilet paper was of that color! I had never seen such a thing in the humble grocery aisles of San Benito, and remarked about it to my mother. "You can buy that colored toilet paper in Nuevo Laredo," she said. However, we did not indulge in that luxury and our paper was white after that brief introduction to the luxury of matching everything.
Another Laredo happening of those early times happened one Sunday morning, when my mother, the maid, and my little sister and I drove across the bridge to buy aguacates (avocadoes). The aguacates of those days were very different from the sleek things you get in a bag of four at the supermarket. They were small, and black, and full of a hideous fiber you had to pull out before eating them. (That's how guacamole was invented.) Their flavor was heavenly. My mother got a huge bagful of them, and we drove back across the bridge.
Now on this bridge was a wicked troll called the U.S. Customs. Rules for bringing in fruits and vegetables fluctuated often, depending upon the caprices of some insect pest or other, probably. My mother declared the aguacates, but the customs man said that she would have to surrender them for they were at present contraband. She was furious. I remember her arguing and sassing back the customs officer, but to no avail. He had to take those aguacates into custody. Fire was in my mother's eyes, as she said to us toddlers, "He'll just take them home for his own family!" Probably true. So she said to the maid, Lupe, "Lupe, take these aguacates and walk back to the middle of the bridge and throw them into the river!" And, while we stayed parked there, Lupe did so and we all went home grumpy but triumphant, having won over the U.S.Customs.
It's funny, I wouldn't have remembered that maid' s name, but as I was writing you this story, her name just popped out of my mother's mouth as natural as anything. Memory is a strange thing....you-all will sign out of my posting today and say, "She sure didn't tell us much about Laredo!" Well, I told you a little, and, as my mother would have said, "And that's not the half of it!!!" YAZZYBEL
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
All Sorts of Morning Thoughts
Good morning!
Do you all get a little supplement with your morning paper called Relish? Relish is one of those throwaway magazine supplements that have proliferated in latter years as newspapers have abdicated most of their responsibility to their readers. This one is about food, and today's issue is about breakfasts. Ours comes out on Wednesday, "Food Day" to the SD Union Tribune...The photography is excellent, and the recipes sound good.
The cover to the magazine today is about bacon and eggs and it adds a side of baked tomato. When I saw this picture I remembered an article I read in the early sixties about Irishmen and Americans and their heart attacks. The Irish ate bacon and eggs and sausages every day and hardly had any heart attacks compared to the Americans. The article, which was in the New York Times, I think, attributed the difference to the fact that these Irish men who were studied rode their bicycles everywhere they went, as opposed to the Americans who drove their cars. Another item occurs to me now. The real English or Irish breakfast isn't just bacon and eggs; it is bacon and eggs and tomatoes and mushrooms. Potatoes too sometimes. But let's think about those tomatoes and mushrooms. Isn't it possible that the addition of this fresh fibrous food to the breakfast converted it into a more salubrious menu?
My grandmother made yummy French Toast. Her method was to use eggs, beaten with a little milk (that is so it will sink into the bread), salt and pepper, and fry. I guess she often fried in bacon grease. If not, Crisco. This French Toast was always served with sliced tomatoes. Nothing sweet. No syrup. No sugar in the eggs. French Toast served with good sliced tomatoes is DELICIOUS. I never even saw French Toast served in a sweetened way until I grew up. Don't you all think that the addition of sliced tomatoes might make the fact that the eggs and bread were fried somewhat less dangerous? Anyway it's an acquired taste that we also see in Mexico where tomatoes are often added to an egg breakfast, along with onions and chiles. A savory combination, and more healthful perhaps than just laying down that sausage or bacon and egg in front of somebody.
The second person plural I have been using in those paragraphs up above is written as you all, but I don't mean to address you all...I mean to say, you-all, which in my Texas childhood was one hyphenated word with the emphasis on the first syllable. YOU-all....Now persons from the more purely Southern states like Louisiana and Georgia and so on, say, "y'all," with the emphasis on the second syllable. I just write it yall in my emails to save energy. But that was not what we said, there in the Central and Southern parts of Texas in my childhood. We always included the "all" in the second person plural of address, but the accent was as I said. "YOU-all," two distinct syllables with the accent on the first syllable.
Well, I could write more, but himself has arisen and is prowling around looking hungry. The bacon is in the pan and beginning to fry, so I will have to terminate this quickly. I was going to tell you about the pleasure of receiving an unexpected gift of wine from an acquaintance at church (now a friend!) after a chat at the Annual Luncheon a few weeks ago...what a kind thing to do, actually purchase the wine we were discussing and bring me a bottle of it!
And there was more pleasure this past week, with an invitation to a mid-day dinner with some old friends whom I've not seen much of in recent years. The food was very very good. The main dish was carne con chile, which is just like chili con carne but the pieces of meat are bigger. Really.
Well, I had to abandon ship and finish up that bacon before it burned, so didn't finish this post without an interruption. I don't mind interruptions except for the fear that I will get blown off the site if I don't stick right with it. But I did go into the kitchen, feed my husband, make myself an egg fried in the same (clean) skillet and wrap it in a tortilla that was toasting over the gas flame next to the skillet. The reason the skillet was clean was that I use Spectrum Spray Grapeseed Oil to grease the skillet and it is such a superior product--it will leave the scrambled egg skillet almost clean. I sprayed a little more and threw in my egg. No tomato today, though. I will go into the pantry and look for a tomato juice to drink. I was going to write about memories of Mexico all this week but it just hasn't come up. I will scatter those memories over a number of days, off and on, soon. Maybe starting tomorrow. YAZZYBEL
Do you all get a little supplement with your morning paper called Relish? Relish is one of those throwaway magazine supplements that have proliferated in latter years as newspapers have abdicated most of their responsibility to their readers. This one is about food, and today's issue is about breakfasts. Ours comes out on Wednesday, "Food Day" to the SD Union Tribune...The photography is excellent, and the recipes sound good.
The cover to the magazine today is about bacon and eggs and it adds a side of baked tomato. When I saw this picture I remembered an article I read in the early sixties about Irishmen and Americans and their heart attacks. The Irish ate bacon and eggs and sausages every day and hardly had any heart attacks compared to the Americans. The article, which was in the New York Times, I think, attributed the difference to the fact that these Irish men who were studied rode their bicycles everywhere they went, as opposed to the Americans who drove their cars. Another item occurs to me now. The real English or Irish breakfast isn't just bacon and eggs; it is bacon and eggs and tomatoes and mushrooms. Potatoes too sometimes. But let's think about those tomatoes and mushrooms. Isn't it possible that the addition of this fresh fibrous food to the breakfast converted it into a more salubrious menu?
My grandmother made yummy French Toast. Her method was to use eggs, beaten with a little milk (that is so it will sink into the bread), salt and pepper, and fry. I guess she often fried in bacon grease. If not, Crisco. This French Toast was always served with sliced tomatoes. Nothing sweet. No syrup. No sugar in the eggs. French Toast served with good sliced tomatoes is DELICIOUS. I never even saw French Toast served in a sweetened way until I grew up. Don't you all think that the addition of sliced tomatoes might make the fact that the eggs and bread were fried somewhat less dangerous? Anyway it's an acquired taste that we also see in Mexico where tomatoes are often added to an egg breakfast, along with onions and chiles. A savory combination, and more healthful perhaps than just laying down that sausage or bacon and egg in front of somebody.
The second person plural I have been using in those paragraphs up above is written as you all, but I don't mean to address you all...I mean to say, you-all, which in my Texas childhood was one hyphenated word with the emphasis on the first syllable. YOU-all....Now persons from the more purely Southern states like Louisiana and Georgia and so on, say, "y'all," with the emphasis on the second syllable. I just write it yall in my emails to save energy. But that was not what we said, there in the Central and Southern parts of Texas in my childhood. We always included the "all" in the second person plural of address, but the accent was as I said. "YOU-all," two distinct syllables with the accent on the first syllable.
Well, I could write more, but himself has arisen and is prowling around looking hungry. The bacon is in the pan and beginning to fry, so I will have to terminate this quickly. I was going to tell you about the pleasure of receiving an unexpected gift of wine from an acquaintance at church (now a friend!) after a chat at the Annual Luncheon a few weeks ago...what a kind thing to do, actually purchase the wine we were discussing and bring me a bottle of it!
And there was more pleasure this past week, with an invitation to a mid-day dinner with some old friends whom I've not seen much of in recent years. The food was very very good. The main dish was carne con chile, which is just like chili con carne but the pieces of meat are bigger. Really.
Well, I had to abandon ship and finish up that bacon before it burned, so didn't finish this post without an interruption. I don't mind interruptions except for the fear that I will get blown off the site if I don't stick right with it. But I did go into the kitchen, feed my husband, make myself an egg fried in the same (clean) skillet and wrap it in a tortilla that was toasting over the gas flame next to the skillet. The reason the skillet was clean was that I use Spectrum Spray Grapeseed Oil to grease the skillet and it is such a superior product--it will leave the scrambled egg skillet almost clean. I sprayed a little more and threw in my egg. No tomato today, though. I will go into the pantry and look for a tomato juice to drink. I was going to write about memories of Mexico all this week but it just hasn't come up. I will scatter those memories over a number of days, off and on, soon. Maybe starting tomorrow. YAZZYBEL
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