feh

I have the crud and want to do nothing more than lay in bed and watch movies. It started with a scratchy throat Tuesday night that hasn't gone away, then achiness and stuffiness Wednesday night, then congestion yesterday, and by last night, was a full-blown cold.

It's supposed to be beautiful and warm this weekend, when I could be doing any number of fun and glorious things. But I won't be doing fun and glorious things, I will be dealing with the crud, holing up like a wounded animal and subsisting on soup and juice and NyQuil.

Feh. Feh, I say.

yesterday's lunch, Paris slimline

• chicken teriyaki meatballs
• steamed broccoli
• carrot sticks
• cucumber slices
• cashews and dried cherries

yesterday's snack, cute animals sidecar

• hard boiled egg
• carrot sticks
• almond butter for dipping

in which we try to save our souls with a good deed

As of approximately 10 PM Saturday night, I'm pretty sure that Sal, Sister, Guy, and I are all going to hell.

We spent four hours playing Cards Against Humanity* (link may be NSFW) and laughed so hard that our faces hurt, our ribs ached, and there were multiple near-choking incidents. This game is seriously demented and wickedly awesome and so very, very wrong. Like, you-need-to-take-a-Silkwood-shower-afterward wrong. We realized within the first hour that A) there's no one else we could play this game with, and B) it will feature regularly in Hall-Smiley family get-togethers.

*(If you haven't heard about it, it's basically Apples-to-Apples, if it had been created by an unemployed alcoholic uncle with a penchant for raunchy, politically incorrect jokes. Apples-to-Apples wishes it were this much fun.)

Aside from playing horrifyingly inappropriate and evil card games until the wee hours of the morning, we also took the Fabulous Miss M to her first-ever movie at a theater. I'd originally wanted to take her in June so her first theater movie would be Brave, but after seeing it, worried it might be a little too intense and scary for her, especially for a first-time theater experience. Luckily, Finding Nemo was just re-released in theaters, which she's seen dozens of times on DVD so I thought that would be perfect since the whole theater-going experience was going to be pretty overwhelming on its own.

We got popcorn with extra butter and introduced her to Reese's Pieces and plenty of sugary drink to wash it all down, because hello, Aunt Bitty and Uncle Sal are the awesomest. (You're welcome, Sister.) She sat wide-eyed from start to finish, enthralled by the huge screen and stereo sound and trailers for movies that aren't even out yet.

So we had a ridiculously fun time and Sister and Guy got a couple of hours of free time. Which would ordinarily earn a nice bit of good karma. I'm afraid, however, that after Saturday night, our karmic debt looks like the Greek government's balance sheet.

lunch, blue bunny & moons

• stir fry (chicken, onion, garlic, leek, rainbow chard, baby bok choi, orange sweet pepper, fennel, broccoli, corn, secret sauce) with sesame seeds for garnish
• jasmine rice with carrot hearts for garnish
• Bartlett pear half and cashews
• dried cherries

ace of cakes

So...this is a thing that happened today. Sal said, "Yeah, I thought we were doing serious faces...".

(Duff is here for Feast Portland this weekend and needed a kitchen for prepping a few things. Of course he came to OCI, because OCI is home of the Kitchen Ninja. I MEAN REALLY DUH.)

give us this day, our daily bread

We returned Sunday from a 4 day trip to northern Washington, where Sal attended a work-related conference and I tagged along, because hey, why not. More specificially, he attended Kneading Conference West, the purpose of which is "to inspire and educate novice and professional bakers, grain growers, millers, wheat breeders, wood-fired oven enthusiasts, food entrepreneurs, food writers, and anyone who loves to eat hand-crafted breads."

So basically, three straight days of talking about bread, literally morning, noon, and night, and Sal could not have been happier if he had been baked right into a loaf of artisan bread. He was so gleeful at the end of every day that he probably could've powered the entire city of Las Vegas with his excitement. And now there is talk of milling our own flour and (finally) building that earth oven we've been talking about for years.

While he spent his days at the conference, I spent my days writing and exploring the area around Mount Vernon. The last time we were there was with the Albino and Mr. T for the Skagit Valley Tulip Festival, (hence the picture up top). Even without the fields of rainbow flowers, the area is actually quite lovely and the little downtown area is also very charming. On one of my driveabouts, I ended at Bay View State Park, and another, discovered a really great park on a hillside overlooking the valley and enjoyed a wee picnic of cheeses and crackers while reading a book. Not quite the excitement of a conference about bread and baking, perhaps, but a lovely few days of R&R. I can do with a little less excitement at the moment, anyway.

Super behind on bento postings, but here are the last few. The rest are on the daily bento page, as always. (I just realized that I've had pretty much the same lunch for the last several meals. Hmmm, perhaps time to change things up.

9/6 lunch, Lunchbot Duo

• herb roasted turkey breast
• steamed broccoli
• Jazz apple slices
• cucumber slices
• carrot sticks
• strawberry
• sunflower seeds

9/6 snacks, Lunchbot Pico

• Jazz apple slices, cashews (morning snack)
• hardboiled egg, carrot sticks, cucumber slices (afternoon snack)

9/10 lunch, pink Natural Lunch

• herb roasted turkey breast
• steamed broccoli
• carrot sticks
• pear slices

9/18 lunch, origami squares

• herb roasted turkey breast
• steamed broccoli
• carrot sticks
• Honeycrisp apple slices
• dried cherries

there's a reason her secret service codename is renaissance

"If farmers and blacksmiths could win independence from an empire, if immigrants could leave behind everything they knew for a better life on our shores, if women could be dragged to jail for seeking the vote, if a generation could defeat a depression, and define greatness for all time, if a young preacher could lift us to the mountaintop with his righteous dream, and if proud Americans can be who they are and boldly stand at the altar with who they love… then surely… surely we can give everyone in this country a fair chance at that great American Dream."

-- Michelle Obama, speaking at the Democratic National Convention

MY HEART.

laptop recovery: boom roasted

I have officially survived Computer Apocalypse 2012. With aplomb, even. Hard drive successfully replaced and formatted? Check. All software, plug-ins, drivers, applications, and miscellaneous desirable (as opposed to undesirable) bells and whistles successfully installed and calibrated? Check. Over 67.5 GB of data successfully restored from the online backup? Check.

Laptop recovery: BOOM ROASTED.

And now my laptop is all shiny. It's like a little reward for all the sturm und drang of a computer meltdown. I am now in I Have My Shit Together mode, empowered to clean and reorganize and generally fix all the things. This will last approximately 2.5 weeks, and then I will be back to Have You Seen My Shit? I Think I Lost It Somewhere Near Albuquerque mode.

lunch, bento colors purple

• grilled Thai peanut chicken
• peas
• cucumbers
• carrots
• strawberries
• Honeycrisp apple

snacks, bento colors mini

• morning snack: Honeycrisp apple & cashews
• afternoon snack: hard boiled egg, cucumbers, carrots