Posted tagged ‘dinner’
September 15, 2015
Such a busy morning it has been. Fern and her caterwauling woke me again, but I didn’t mind as much as it was after nine. I emptied cat boxes, fed the beasties then went downstairs. I made coffee, got and read the papers. Gracie was barking incessantly but I couldn’t figure out the reason. She came in when I called then I shut down the dog door for a bit. I looked at my e-mail and found out I needed to call the GOES site as it seems I have two accounts: one is the renewal I just did and a second account I must have started. Five times I tried to reach a human being but all circuits are busy. (The GOES program is for trusted travelers: I skip customs, stop at a kiosk, put my hand on the screen for fingerprint ID then get an entry pass. The last time I used it I beat the crew outside.) I am skeptical that all circuits are busy so I used the e-mail form for problems, but I don’t have much faith in that either.
The thought of flying always gave me a sense of awe when I was a kid. We’d go to Logan when we visited my grandparents so we could watch the planes take off and land. My uncle, only two years older than I, led the way. The Logan terminal back then was one long building shared by all the airlines. We used to walk through, and I’d take brochures of hotels, airlines and whatever else was offered. One time I made a scrapbook of my vacation, my imaginary vacation. I used pictures cut from the brochures and wrote a story to go along with each picture. I imagined the flight and wrote about the clouds below me and being so far above the ground. I described the airline dinner and the fun of eating on a plane. My hotel room was beautiful and overlooked the ocean. We ate dinner in ornate restaurants where the waiters wore white jackets and black cummerbunds. I found beautiful shells along the shore as souvenirs. I fell asleep happy and contended every night. It was the best vacation.
Categories: Musings
Tags: best trip ever, busy morning, dinner, flying, GOES problems, hotel room, Logan Airport, noisy cat, scrapbook, seashore, sense of awe
Comments: 8 Comments
July 5, 2015
Last night was wonderful except for the cold. I had to laugh when I looked at my guests and four of them were wearing their sweatshirt hoods and two of them were also wrapped in afghans. The rest of us also donned a sweatshirt or a jacket but no hoods. Dinner was a success from the appetizers to the dessert. The movie Independence Day was the perfect choice even though all of us had seen it. We clapped at the end of the president’s rousing speech about July 4th now being Independence Day for the world. Bill Pullman is way over the top, but I figure alien invaders bent on world annihilation deserve a speech more than a bit histrionic. Dessert was ice cream, just what we needed on a cold night, but the hot fudge and hot peanut butter sauces made the chill worthwhile. The evening ended quite late, after midnight. By the time I did a little cleaning and checked my e-mail, it was close to 3, but I still wasn’t tired. I watched a little TV, the perfect soporific, and shortly thereafter went to bed. I crawled out of bed at 11 this morning. I hope my neighbors didn’t wonder if I survived the night as my paper was still in the driveway.
One of my most memorable days was July 4th when I was around 12 or 13. We didn’t go to the fireworks, but I could see them from the hill behind my house. The colors would burst into circles first one then another. Some were single circles. Some were triples. They were beautiful. A couple of my neighbors were also watching and afterwards they invited in for a root beer. We sat around the kitchen table talking. The conversation went all over the place. They didn’t speak to me as if I were a kid, and that’s what I remember the most, how that conversation was the first tug of adulthood. I was a pushmi-pullyu looking in two different directions. Little changed that night, but the changes were starting.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Adulthood, appetizers, childhood, cold night, dinner, hoodies, ice cream, Independence Day, peanut butter sauce, pushmi-pullyu
Comments: 12 Comments
June 28, 2015
Last night the sky opened and the rain fell and kept falling until just a little while ago. I’m thinking we got an inch or more of rain. During the height of storm the wind was fierce, and the trees were blown about as if it were a hurricane. I have a branch down in the front yard, and my umbrella, despite its 100 pound base, tipped over onto the deck rail. One of my giant clay pots either fell or, more likely, was shoved off the rail and it shattered on the steps. I saw two grey spawns chasing each other on the deck, amorously I suspect, and they might be the broken clay pot culprits. I cleaned the mess and now have dirt under my nails.
I like Sundays, and though they are no longer the same quiet Sundays of my childhood, they do seem more subdued than any other day of the week. The kids aren’t playing in the street and even the dogs are quiet. I remember Sunday dinner as my favorite meal of the week, and I remember all of us eating together at the table. That was unusual as my Dad worked long hours and generally came home late, after we’d already eaten. He was a salesman who worked back then for J. P. Manning Co, a huge tobacco wholesaler in Boston which, among other things, sold cigars and cigarette vending machines. Once I went with my Dad to his office in Boston, but I stayed in the car. All I remember is seeing the name J. P. Manning across the top of a window.
Every dinner on Sunday had a roast as the center piece, mashed potatoes, gravy and a vegetable or two: green beans, peas, yellow waxed beans or string beans, all from cans. My mother bought her set of Sunday dishes from the supermarket, a dish a week. She also bought the accompanying dishes including a gravy boat, a vegetable server which held two vegetables and a platter for the cut slices of meat. The dishes were off-white with what looked like wheat on them as a decoration and were made of melmac. Though the dishes lasted forever, they started to fade over time and were relegated to being every day dishes.
When my mother started serving Sunday dinner on real dishes, it was cause for celebration. My mother was acknowledging we were growing up and could now be trusted with breakable dishes.
Categories: Musings
Tags: beans, breakable dishes, broken branches, broken flower pots, buckets of rain, China, cigarette vending machines, dinner, grey squirrels, mashed potatoes, melmac dishes, quiet days, salesman, Sunday roast, sundays, tobacco
Comments: 9 Comments
April 5, 2015
Happy Easter and Happy Passover!
This morning my alarm jolted me awake at 6:15. I went down to my friends’ house to decorate the tree by their deck, an Easter custom. I hung a cardboard tiled banner with Peep in the middle and a chick on each side, several colored eggs and a small glass flower pot with a hyacinth. It was cold, only 34˚, and quiet until I heard the loud gobbles of wild turkeys. Four huge toms appeared on the front lawn across the street. Their tails were fanned. They strutted across the lawn, gobbled again, together as if they practiced, and went around back. I watched until they disappeared. Wild turkeys are common here, but these were the biggest I’ve seen.
After I finished decorating, Gracie and I went to the ATM and then to Dunkin’ Donuts. I didn’t see another car until the main road. It is quiet in neighborhoods on Easter morning. At Dunkin’ Donuts I was third in line.
The day is sunny and bright.
This afternoon we’ll get gussied up and go to our Easter dinner at the Ocean House. I think it is the only day I voluntarily wear a dress and fancy shoes. We always wait for a window table as the restaurant looks right onto the rocks and the ocean; hence its name. Out the windows you can see and hear the gulls circling over the water. If there is wind, there are whitecaps.
It doesn’t matter how many times I see the ocean or the gulls or the rocks because every time is mesmerizing. The waves slap the rocks and water flies into the air. Gulls walk on the wet sand and leave their footprints. They always seem to look proud as they walk.
During dinner we chat, laugh, take pictures, all sorts of pictures, and often look out the window. We always say how beautiful it is and how lovely the view. We also always say how lucky we are.
Categories: Musings
Tags: 34˚, decorating the tree, dinner, Easter dinner, Eggs, fancy clothes, fun dinner, gulls, Happy Easter, ocean, Ocean House, rocks, sunny and bright, whitecaps, wild tom turkeys
Comments: 14 Comments
December 12, 2014
Piles of Christmas bags filled with wrapped presents sits on the couch ready to be boxed and mailed. My marathon wrapping session of Colorado gifts has ended. When I finish here, it is over the river and through the woods to UPS where they will box and sent. I will pay and breathe a sigh of relief.
I don’t have my tree yet. That will have to be on Sunday as tomorrow is booked with the annual play then out to dinner with my sister. The play this year is Meet Me in St. Louis. The dinner will be Italian. It always is.
I need to get in gear. My house isn’t the magical Christmas scene it usually is by now. My back is to blame. It hurts when I carry things and hurts when I don’t. The only time I get relief is sitting with pillows behind me. I’m thinking that sounds like a bon-bon day. I’ll wear frills and call for the maid to indulge my every whim.
A spawn of Satan came in the mail. im6 sent it to me. The spawn is grasping a bag of acorns, ammo I suspect. It is in this room with me. I swear its eyes follow me, and I think I heard the acorns rattling. The spawn is cute which is its weapon. You get drawn in and then whack. The spawn has you. Gracie thought it was hers. She does have several stuffed toys so it was a natural mistake, but I saved the spawn from Gracie clutches. I don’t know why. I’ll regret it. I’ve seen all the movies. Chucky comes to mind.
Today is sunny and the sky is blue. I almost didn’t recognize either one as it has been so long since their last appearance. They are welcomed, but neither is enough to keep the cold at bay. It’s in the mid 30’s and will stay that way all day. It’s a bundle day.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Christmas play, decorating, dinner, maid, mailing boxes, Meet me in St. Louis play, spawn of satan, Stoneham Theater, stuffed squirrel, sunny but cold, Tree, whims
Comments: 12 Comments
November 15, 2013
No sun today and a fairly strong breeze, but the day is warm for November, in the high 50’s, and will be the same all week. One day may even reach 60˚. I’m thinking the deck with my face to the sun.
My back is screaming loudly from my over-doing. I am not a slow learner but just figure I can do what I always used to do. I can’t. Yesterday I hauled out the heavy litter. It is biodegradable pine litter which turns into sawdust when wet, and the bag was heavy. I carried it downstairs, outside to the car and then lifted it into the trunk. I also went shopping for my dinner ingredients and toted three heavy bags of groceries into the house. I left the stout in the car and thought I was being cautious. I wasn’t. I spent the whole middle of the day and the afternoon getting dinner ready. All of the dishes were ready to cook, and because I just had to put two of them into the oven and reheat the carrots, I got to spend the evening sitting with my friends rather than in the kitchen. I thought getting everything ready was a great idea. I was wrong. I never thought about all that standing while I worked.
Dinner was perfectly planned from appetizers to dessert. I, however, didn’t plan for my back, but luckily for me my friends did the clean-up. I just sat and gave directions. It sort of made me feel like the lady of the manor.
I slept little last night between Gracie’s snoring and my back aching. I didn’t even go upstairs until 2 AM. I most decidedly see a nap in my future.
I have wonderful leftovers for dinner tonight.
Categories: Musings
Tags: bad back, Clouds, dinner, grocery shopping, leftovers, perfect dinner, Snoring, toting and carrying, warm day
Comments: 13 Comments
November 14, 2013
The weather is quirky. Snow fell the other day, but today and the next few days will be in the 50’s, tolerable weather. The nights will be cold but that’s November, and that’s why I have a comforter on the bed and animals who snuggle.
The bird feeders need filling and the red spawn needs to be shot. It has defeated my squirrel buster feeder by being small. It jumps from the deck to the feeder, grabs some seed then sits on the deck rail to eat it right in full view of me. I run out to scare it away but it knows when to come back. I’m thinking some acorns, a bit of irony probably lost on the spawn, or small rocks as ammo stored upstairs. I’ll open a window and aim though the sound of the acorn hitting the deck should sent that spawn running. He knows he is targeted. Think hose and last summer.
Much to do today. My friends are coming to dinner, a very late birthday dinner. They both have their birthdays in September and mine was August, and we have yet to give each other our gifts. I have to shop so last night, to save time from today, I set out all the dishes and silverware. We’re having pork tenderloin with an herb crust, smashed potatoes baked in the oven and glazed carrots. I’ll make my Moroccan appetizer, muhammara, and put out cheese, to me the most versatile food of all.
I am a cheese lover except for gorgonzola and blue. They even smell bad to me and blue always looks as if it has been around too long to eat. Cheese is a staple in my fridge as many of my meals are just cheese with bread or crackers. Brie is a huge favorite.
Ghana has no cheese because it has no milk. Ghana has cows but no Ghanaians drink milk. When I went back to Ghana, I was forced to use evaporated milk in my instant coffee just as I did in 1969. Ghana is not a place for coffee lovers or cheese lovers for that matter. If I were in the Peace Corps there now and still lived in Bolga, I’d find the Fulanis who tend the cows, buy milk from them and make my own cheese. It isn’t difficult.
In 1969, I figured everything was just part of the experience as did most of my friends, but when we got together, food always became part of the conversation. We all mused about what we missed the most. In Accra, we’d spend money at Kingsway Department Store to buy bruni food, white people’s food, to bring home. We’d travel to Lome, Togo because you could get ice cream, pastries and yup, even cheese. Lome was a volunteer’s paradise of food. One wonderful memory is when a bunch of us from Ghana were together in the Peace Corps hostel in Lome, something that didn’t happen often. We had all bought stuff to bring home, special stuff you couldn’t find in Ghana. Well, we had a huge party for no reason except we were together, had food and loved parties. We ended up eating just about everything.
Categories: Musings
Tags: carrots, Cheese, cheese in Ghana, cold nights, dinner, food conversations, Lome, Peace Corps Ghana, pork, potatoes, red spawn, spawns of Satan, throwing acorns, Togo, warming days, weather
Comments: 16 Comments
October 8, 2013
More fall-like weather followed last night’s rainstorm. Today is in the 60’s and the rest of the week will be the same. I went back to my sweatshirt this morning. The day is a bit dark though no rain is predicted. Every day is closer to the end of deck time. That makes me melancholic.
This morning I had a library board meeting, the last entry on this week’s dance card. I thoroughly enjoyed last week’s empty card except I did have that cleaning frenzy, now gone thank God, so this week looks like a lie on the couch and read week. Maybe I’ll add a few bon-bons.
The sun has just decided to make an appearance. It has that sharpness that comes on a cool day when the sun is just light, not warmth. I can see it glinting through the leaves. The bird feeders by the deck are in shadow now, a consequence of the changing angle of the sun. If I never went outside, I would still know the time of year by following the path of the sun.
When I was a little kid, I liked fall but I disliked the shorter days because we’d only have a little time to be playing outside after school before homework and dinner. In the summer we’d be outside until close to seven and even later. This time of year five was pushing it and four was more likely. We’d come in, plop down in the front of the TV and watch Superman and The Mickey Mouse Club while my mother cooked supper. We always had a vegetable, usually from a can, mashed potatoes and some sort of meat. My mother was a whiz with hamburger. Her meatloaf was spectacular with ketchup on the top and bacon over the ketchup. We used to fight to get the crispy bacon strips. She’d also make hamburger in gravy over mashed potatoes and American chop suey. One of our favorites was a pseudo-Chinese dish with bamboo shoots and hamburger. That one always seemed exotic. We’d also have chicken, but my mother always baked it. Roast beef was reserved for Sunday dinner. The only fresh vegetable I remember eating was carrots, and I didn’t like carrots until I was older. I wanted canned Le Seuer peas and could eat them every night. For my last family meal before leaving for Ghana, I chose roast beef, mashed potatoes with gravy and Le Seuer peas. I chose comfort food.
Categories: Musings
Tags: American chop suey, bamboo shoots, carrots, changing angle of the sun, closing the deck, coming inside early, dinner, empty dance card, fall weather, Le Seuer peas, Mickey Mouse Club, playing after school, short days of fall, sun, Superman
Comments: 18 Comments
June 11, 2013
Another early morning for me-this is a habit I have to break. I was up at 7, read the papers, even did the crossword and the cryptogram, then left for my library board meeting at nine. I just got home.
Last night it poured again. The world is green and lush but damp and chilly at only 64˚. It is supposed to rain again today. I have to go out later to do three errands but not until the afternoon. Yesterday I did my laundry, all three loads of it. The hall is now clear. I even took the clean laundry out of the dryer and put it away. Usually it sits there a while. I don’t know where all this industry is springing from, but I’ve had enough.
My landscaper and I discussed the flowers he forgot to plant last week. I was able to grab him for the chat as I up and about so early. He promises tomorrow he’ll plant and then mulch. I reminded him that last week he also promised Wednesday. He laughed. Sebastian keeps telling me he wants to take down the two pine trees and the two wild roses in the front yard. I keep saying no.
It has been a long time since I last cooked a fancy dinner, and I’m thinking it’s about time for another. I’ll have to do my flow chart such that I cook over a couple of days so my back will be okay. No big dinner of mine ever gets done without a flow chart. It always starts with the recipes in order: appetizers, meat, side dishes and dessert. Beside each dish is where the recipe can be found. I then make a list of the ingredients by category like fruits, veggies, frozen, meat and assorted to make shopping easier. The flow chart also lists the steps for each day and on the day of the dinner for each hour.. Some things I can cook ahead a few steps but not finish until the big day. After the dinner time is set, my flow chart works around that time so all the food is ready and on the table together. The need for a flow chart grew out of past bad experiences when the dishes were ready at all different times and some dishes, especially salads, were left in the fridge and never served. My flow chart and I get made fun of by my guests. Taunting the hand that feeds you is never a good idea.
Categories: Musings
Tags: dinner, errands, flow chart, flowers, green and lush, Laundry, meeting, morning, plants, rain, recipes
Comments: 14 Comments
April 1, 2013
Easter was wonderful. The sun was shining the whole day in celebration. Dinner was perfect. Our table was at a window overlooking the water. Just for the fun of it, we brought a light up bunny from the Easter basket to decorate the table. Miss Bunny was pink with flowered fabric hands and ears, a lace collar and lights which blinked and she was quite the conversation piece. People pointed and laughed and chatted with us about our dinner guest. We took Miss Bunny’s picture as a memento of her big day. We each had a few drinks, generous drinks, and the food was delicious. My plate was empty with only a bit of gravy to prove there had been a dinner. The restaurant was totally filled, but we had a favorite couple seated near us. They were old, and the wife had to help her husband sit down. She was wearing a bright yellow spring coat and the best hat ever, round and flowered. I took a picture as she was taking it off at the table-the woman is smiling from ear to ear. They ordered martinis, and I liked that couple even more. After dinner, over dessert, we all agreed we loved our Easter tradition of dinner at the Ocean House.
Today is baseball’s opening day. Last year my Sox were in last place at the end of the season so any other place would be an improvement. The game is against the Yankees and starts at 1. I’ll wear my Red Sox sweatshirt and cheer like crazy. I am an eternal optimist. The Globe has been filled with articles discussing this year’s team and the toxicity of last year’s. Jackie Bradley Jr. is 23 and never got as high as Triple A, but he’s going to be in left field today and is, “Ready to start the adventure.” You have to love a baseball player who still thinks of baseball as a game, an adventure, and not a business. His fiancé and his parents will be at the game to watch his debut. Welcome to Boston, Jackie!
I remember the baseball of my childhood. It was when baseball sang of summer, of pick-up games in fields, of the whack of the wooden bats and the taunting from the outfield, “No Batter, no batter.” Baseball was seldom complicated: three up, three down and nine innings or less if we got hot, tired or thirsty. We shared gloves so everyone would have one. We only had one ball, and if it got lost, the game was halted while we all hunted for it in the tall grass beside the field. Bases were whatever we could find, and we’d pace out the distance between them one sneaker heel to toe to the other. We didn’t have umpires, and we’d get impatient at batters who stayed in the box far too long. Safe or out at one of the bases often became an argument, but not a serious argument, and we always settle it fairly so the game could continue. Baseball was easy to love when we were kids.
Categories: Musings
Tags: Baseball, dinner, Easter, Easter hat, opening day, pick up baseball, Red Sox, summer ball, water view
Comments: 20 Comments
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