taking this circus on the road

It looks like we'll be taking the cats to the coast with us next month. ProcrastiGirl, our usual go-to superwoman in all things petsitting, is unavailable this go-round, and we haven't yet found a suitable replacement. And since cancelling our winter coast getaway is out of the question, it's becoming increasingly likely that the cats are about to get a vacation out of the deal.

On the one hand, we know from experience that they can travel with us successfully. Or at least, travel to the coast successfully. On the other hand, "can" and "will" are two entirely different things. It could be that they were so well-behaved because the windows of the cabin stayed open the entire time and they got a good dose of that temperate sea air, or because the cabin we were in was particularly to their liking, or because Mercury was in retrograde.

And even though they did great when we were actually there, carting them to and from the coast was an exercise in insanity. Smaug's ceaseless mow-mow-mow-ing on the hour and a half drive had us both twitching like prisoners of war in the first twenty minutes, and when she switched to the blood-curdling "aroo, aroo, AROOOO" halfway through, I was fairly sure Sal was going to yank the steering wheel to the right and just plunge us all over the side of the nearest bridge. I'm not sure I would've stopped him.

But barring some miraculous solution that presents itself in the next few weeks, we're just going to have to take our chances.

lunch, Ms. Bento:

• beef stir fry (tip steak, peppers, onions, carrots, green beans, kale, secret sauce)
• brown rice and peas with a carrot flower for garnish
• carrot sticks and Bosc pear slices
• FIRST SATSUMA OF THE SEASON OMG (although I love that they get increasingly wee as the season progresses...)

who knew evil could be so cuddly

I've said many times that Hobbes is a furry little terrorist, albeit a very adorable one, but he has recently upped his game and become downright tyrannical.

His newest tactic is to start tearing paper -- loudly -- when I go to the bathroom just after getting home from work at night. I think his expectation is that I will drop everything the moment I come in the door and sit with him (and Smaug, if he must make a concession) giving him non-stop attention until it's time to feed them. He's already disappointed that I'm not available 24/7 for uninterruped adoration, but if I must leave him for extended periods, then this routine is the minimum expectation if I don't want him to burn the place down. (He may not have opposable thumbs, but he could totally do it.)

Unfortunately, I frequently get home fairly late -- certainly much later than he would prefer -- and dropping everything (which would include my attache case, purse, lunch, and usually some other item(s)) really isn't possible. To say nothing of wanting to change out of work clothes, wash my face, put on slippers, etc. Or, heaven forbid, go to the bathroom after the 30 minute drive home.

He knows that as soon as I hear paper tearing, I'll come back to stop him. But since he chooses to do this while I'm in the bathroom...well, you see the problem, I'm sure. Meanwhile, he's out there like a paper shredder with a tail all, "WHAT ARE YOU DOING YOU SHOULD BE OUT HERE GIVING ME YOUR UNDIVIDED ATTENTION I AM GOING TO TURN THESE IMPORTANT PAPERS FROM THE INSURANCE COMPANY INTO CONFETTI UNTIL YOU COME OUT HERE AND ALSO YOUR PREMIUM PAYMENT IS OVERDUE PAY YOUR BILLS YOU DEADBEAT".

lunch, Ms. Bento:

• broccoli cheese soup (still so yum omg)
• broccoli and carrots
• celery sticks and smoked sausages
• bosch pear with walnuts as gap fillers

pulling a cat's teeth is like poking a bear with a stick

Hobbes goes in for dental work first thing tomorrow morning, which has the dual benefits of being super expensive and really pissing him off. He'll feel pretty blech when he first gets home, but we fully expect retaliation once he feels well enough to start destroying something.

Poor guy has to have at least one tooth pulled and some treatment for his gums (he has early signs of peridontal disease), so he'll get lots of comforting and coddling. Both from us, and from Smaug, who ensures that he has the cleanest ears the vet has ever seen. Then he should be back to his ornery self within a few days.

In the office today to do a presentation this morning, so had to throw something together last night. We're set for produce, but as you can see, my protein and grain options are, ahem, lacking. I really need to put on my big kid pants and just get some shopping done instead of bemoaning the end of New Seasons' delivery.  Although I hear rumors they may put in a store here in St. Johns, so keep your fingers crossed for me....

lunch, Lunchbots Duo:

• hard boiled egg (notably, unmolded)
• carrots
• peas
• cucumber
• cherries
• blueberries
• dark chocolate covered raisins

furry little terrorists

Our cats are going to be the death of us.

They're now 15 years old with no signs of slowing down. The only sign that they're getting older is that they've gotten increasingly needy and demanding, particularly in the last couple of years. Since Hobbes' earlier troubles with urinary tract infections a few years ago, he's learned the power of peeing ouside the box and now wields it like a weapon. Smaug has decided to become assertive in her later years, and has developed a particularly evil one-two punch of strategic peeing (heating vents) and yowling at just the right frequency to curdle both blood and milk. For hours.

Like good parents, we thought perhaps they're trying to tell us something is wrong. But vet visits thus far have yielded little. They're both ridiculously healthy -- which...I mean, obviously we're happy since neither of us can contemplate life without them...okay, one of us can't contemplate life without them -- and with the exception of the usual signs of geriatric(!) cats, tests come up clean. They eat fine and as long as they are the center of attention for the full length of time they deem necessary, are perfectly behaved.

Any change in routine or schedule is likely to result in a destruction of property of some kind, the severity depending on the length of time we're gone, how close it is to feeding time, and probably whether or not Mercury is in retrograde. For example: anything made of paper left out where Hobbes can get to it is inevitably going to suffer shredding when he's displeased about whatever. The morning I came downstairs a half hour later than usual, I was greeted by Smaug's last vet bill in a million itty bitty pieces all over the dining room floor. When I refused to let them into the studio while I was writing, I came out to find the stack of user manuals for appliances that had been temporarily stacked on the credenza now pushed on the floor, their corners systematically chewed and mangled. When Smaug decided that the canned food she'd been eating for four years suddenly wasn't up to snuff, suddenly peeing along the living room baseboard became the the new fun activity of the moment.

And the list of things that cannot be left out unattended continues to grow: blankets, pillows, clothing, shoes, fabric of any kind, loose rugs, plastic bags, dish rags/towels, loose papers, plants, glasses with any liquid, food of any kind (including dishes not completely clean of any food residue), bags, purses, anything that rolls, or magnets. And probably something else I'm forgetting.

To say that they dictate in our household would be an understatement so large it would have its own gravitational field.

lunch, lunchbot duo:

• maple rosemary chicken breast
• glazed sweet potatoes
• steamed broccoli
• orange sections

snack, matryoshka:

• molded egg
• carrots with peanut butter for dipping
• orange sections
• dark chocolate-covered raisins

from a distance, we look like paragons of efficiency

Smaug and Hobbes, being their usual productive selves, which is to say IN ABSOLUTELY NO WAY WHATSOEVERProductive weekend, I'm happy to report. Which is a relief because I feel like there's a countdown clock hanging just over my shoulder -- as previously mentioned, I'm taking off the second half of December to coincide with Sal's winter break from school but there is much to be done in the next week and a half. Nonetheless, I feel like a kid looking forward to Christmas, or perhaps the way I did in college: excited to have a breather from the stress and homework and tests, but a shitload of difficult finals to get through first.

It started off on the right foot: not with work, but with fun. Friday, I met up with my friend Kim for coffee (well, hot chocolate, actually) and we spent a few hours catching up and trading info on cool creative things, tools, and new places to spend way more money than we should shop for all the things that make an artist's heart go pitter pat. So it's thanks to her that I was feeling energized enough to focus on website updates when I got home.

So I've completed a few more updates on the guest room and library projects from a few years ago. We're getting into the exciting stuff now, like neato decorative window films and painting the walls at last:

Library, Part 4: Fixing the Window & Wall

Guest & Creative Room, Part 4: Fixing the Windows & Ceiling

Guest & Creative Room, Part 5: Painting the Room

Note that the text is not the same for these posts, nor will they be from here on out.

I hope to have the painting in the library posted tonight; that was a far more dramatic change. It was fun to look through the pictures for these phases of the projects and remember all the little snags and interruptions we had to overcome, but to look at them knowing about the end result and how much we love the outcome. Or to relive the sense of accomplishment when we'd successfully completed a particularly challenging part (wall patch ftw!). One of the reasons I've been documenting all our home improvement (mis)adventures is to be able to go back and see how far we've come and to remember what it took to get to this point. As I've gone back through these pictures to get caught up on these two projects, but with a few years' distance, I'm reminded of all the hard work that went into them and each time I go into those rooms now, I have a renewed sense of pride in them. Also, how thankful I am that we got rid of that heinous pink.

Saturday, we got the paint for the creative room and I did the preliminary work on the aforementioned sooper sekrit project in preparation for (probably) painting this coming weekend. Sal had to do the transfer to secondary fermentation of his latest batch of beer (brewed last weekend). He also fixed the dripping faucets in the kitchen and bathroom, the broken handle on the toilet, and put in much-easier-to-use faucet handles in the utility sink in the basement. His trip to Home Depot for the hardware also included the purchase of nine(!) smoke/fire detectors and two carbon monoxide detectors so that we don't literally die in a fire. So yay, no house-induced death for us!

AND! We spent Saturday evening going through several boxes of papers and mementos that had accumulated in the eave closets, the product of needing to clean in a hurry -- for company, more often than not -- and throwing stuff we didn't have time for into a box "to go through later". Well "later" came Saturday night since I had to drag out some mementos boxes anyway to put away the things from the guest room that had been on display and stored in my old desk. We're not done, but we put a respectable dent in it.

Despite our weekend of industry (or perhaps because of it), the house looks like a wreck, but I should have time this weekend to instill some order. Nothing too catastrophic, thankfully. I do have to wrap up my website clients for the month (statistics analysis, final report, and invoicing), and I expect I'll be working some late nights right up until vacation starts in order to get the end-of-year programming done on the billing program, but at this point, I'm not in freakout mode. The fact that I'm still thinking I can fit in housework in the evenings indicates that I'm in not-yet-overwhelmed-but-possibly-a-tad-optimistic mode. Don't try this at home, kids.

And just to round out the list of accomplishments for the weekend, I got a breakfast AND lunch packed for today. I've been away from bento for a couple of weeks and I'm feeling it. There was the week of the holiday, of course, and I worked from home in the days leading up to it so no bento. Last week was occupied by visits from Corporate (the COO on Tuesday and one of the members of the Corporate IT Team at another division on Thursday) so I either was too busy in preparation to even get a drink of water (Monday) or joining them for lunch (Tuesday and Thursday). So again, no bento.

It's a testament to how little I go out for lunch, how infrequently I eat at chain restaurants, and how accustomed I am to my bentos that I didn't feel well at all last week. The restaurants were decent as chain restaurants go, but nothing about the meal felt good. Way too much food (I ended up leaving most of it on the plate, unfortunately, and I absolutely hate waste), much too heavy (even though I ordered a salad!), and the fruit and veggies didn't have as much flavor as I'm used to. Yes, I fear the worst has happened: I've become a food snob. :) I think in the future when I inevitably have to go for these Corporate lunches, I'll plan to pack a bento anyway to eat before/after and just order a small side of something for lunch.

Anyway, it's a relief to be back to a bento schedule. As I was packing today's, I initially felt a little rusty, like I was getting back on a bike after being away for awhile. Once I was done, I felt the familiar sense of comfort and assurance that I have something to eat tomorrow that I know will be good for me, that won't make me feel like chugging a bottle of Pepto afterward, and that gives me enough energy to get through the day. I know I go on and on about the wonders of bento and the difference it's made to my well-being, but I just can't overstate it enough.

breakfast, cute animals sidecar:

• satsuma mandarin
• red grapes
• plain yogurt with a dollop of marionberry preserves

lunch, deli club:

• chicken that Sal made for dinner Sunday -- he tucked slices of lemon under the skin and roasted it
• roasted potates (olive oil, salt, pepper)
• kiwi slices and red grapes
• satsuma mandarin and the last of the dark chocolate covered raisins

Oh how I love the satsumas. Sal came home from the grocery store Saturday night bearing an entire box of them for me. I'll probably give myself a rash of canker sores from eating as many as I possibly can while they're in season, but it'll be worth it.

each of us was created for it

No breakfast today so I was extra grateful to have such a pleasing and yummy lunch waiting for me.

lunch, blue bunny & moons:

• hazelnut-crusted chicken breast
• jasmine rice with peas, carrot flowers for garnish
• Cortland apple with carrot pieces as gap fillers
• walnuts and dark chocolate covered raisins

the view from the library to the back yard, through the back porch

I'm so in love with our home I can hardly contain myself some days. There's still a lot to be done, but we've reached a point where we can enjoy it as it is, even with the bathroom in its semi-demolished state and the kitchen looking like something right out of Good Housekeeping circa 1966. And in the fall, my favorite season, in my favorite city, it's like falling in love every day, this house. I took a few random pictures to remind me of that.

spider web on the front porch, with Sal's Japanese maple in the backgroundIt was another whirlwind of activity at Hall House this weekend, so it was nice to have the steadying comfort of home throughout. Saturday was another OCI graduation, which meant Chef Salvatore gave another graduation speech. He gives the same one each time so he's had time to refine it, but he changes it every time, too, so he stays fresh and funny when he gives it. I've decided I'm going to video it next time.

a close-up of the crape myrtle I posted about last weekThe ceremony takes place in the morning and then there's a reception for the students and family afterward, so it takes most of the day. Things finished up just in time for the arrival of our Smiley family, who were coming to spend the night. We had a roast and veggies going in the crockpot all day to keep dinner easy, they arrived bearing a loaf of sourdough and a pan full of chocolate chip bar cookies. This is the reason our family is awesome. Well, one of the many, anyway.

We spent some time with the Fabulous Miss M before her bedtime, then had a late dinner catching up with Sister and Guy. (Late, at least in part, because Miss M insisted there was a ghost in the guest room. We promised her it was friendly.)

Sal and the Fabulous Miss M watching a movie on the inflatable bedThey had come for a race in town they wanted to go to and we would watch Miss M while they were gone. It meant an early start Sunday, but Miss M and I snuggled under the blankets while we watched Finding Nemo and that's not such a bad way to start the day. The three of us played and colored and had a tea party and ate breakfast, and next thing we knew Sister and Guy were back and it was time to say goodbye. But it was okay...we have Thanksgiving to look forward to next month, and Christmas after that, and I'm sure some get togethers in between.

just looking at them makes you want to take a nap, doesn't it?After they left, Sunday was a lazy day to recharge before the week starts up. We spent the day on creative stuff and naps and not being as productive as we ought to be and taking ten million more pictures of the cats because we needed still more of those.

view from the front porchBut mostly, we spent the day watching all the ways the light turns Hall House into an illustration from a storybook and thinking there's magic in the world if you know where to look for it.

the corner of my desk (yes, the decoupaged table), which happened to be lighted very prettily; it's part of a map of the Oregon Coast, with an arrow pointed to Oceanside; the full Maya Angelou quote is here

this vacation brought to you by the letters h and s and the number 2

click to see full photo galleryGUESS WHAT YOU GUYS WE HAVE BEEN ON VACATION AHA. We were being all sneaky.

Actually, would've very much liked to be posting whilst on vacation, because welcome to the 21st century and all, but since scary internet predators love posts that basically say HELLO WE ARE GONE FROM THE HOUSE PLEASE ROB US NAO THX, this is why we can't have nice things. Scary internet predators ruin it for everybody, you guys. Haters be hatin', yo.

So instead, we have had to save up our many days of vacation squeeage for one ginormous post. (We actually returned yesterday -- TO THE SURFACE OF THE SUN I MIGHT ADD -- but this post is so ginormous that it took us a day and a half to get it posted.) Think you can handle it? I don't know, the squeeage here is pretty heart-explodey, you may want to consult with your physician first....

Okay, so now that all the legal clappity-trappity is out of the way -- HELLO INTERNETS WE ARE BACK FROM MANY DAYS OF VACATION AND FUN TIMES. This is actually quite an accomplishment, on many levels and for more than the obvious reason. (That reason being, of course, that the fact that we ever return from time spent at the Oregon coast is a testament to our superhuman skillz of being responsible adults.) The less obvious reason -- at least to most of you -- is that we took the cats with us.

Put the phone down -- you do not need to call the mental health professionals for information on how to have us involuntarily committed.

See, Sally gets two weeks of paid vacation per year and due to the school schedule, they're fixed by the school calendar, so it's a week around the holidays and a week sometime in late June/early July. We take the opportunity during both of these vacation periods to spend at least 4 days at Oceanside, longer if we can. This year, his summer vacation just happened to begin during the 4th of July weekend, and so we were all WOOT WOOT 4TH OF JULY AT THE OREGON COAST BITCHEZ.

What we failed to take into account was how the holiday weekend would affect the availability of our primary and backup pet & housesitters. Whoops. This was a problem entirely of our own making, since we didn't really realize it until a month before, when availability for later in the week was of course gone so we couldn't move our reservations, and cancelling would mean forfeiting our holiday weekend reservation deposit.

So by this point last month, it was looking increasingly grim for our heroes. But! When Sally called the place we usually stay to see about possibly moving our reserved days, Sherry (one of the owners of the place; they know us by name and give us priority reservations because we stay so often) reminded him that they're a pet-friendly place, and that the cabin we already had reserved was one of the "pets allowed" cabins. For a nominal fee and a refundable damage deposit, we could bring the cats with us. And thus, faced with bringing the cats with us or not going at all, we opted to bring them with us. See, I told you: it wasn't craziness, it was desperation. Not the same thing. Same zip code, though.

click to see full photo galleryWe did not choose this course without considerable trepidation, however. Hobbes' cystitis has increasingly become an issue in the last year, and any change in routine has resulted in many frustrating messes to deal with, not to mention the potential of expensive vet visits and medications. Neither of them travels well and the cabin, which is very small for two people, would be close quarters indeed for two people and two high strung cats. We figured we'd just prepare as best we could and make the best of it, no matter what happened. At least we'd still get to go to the coast. This is the "Everything's Better At The Beach" theory of problem-solving.

We brought extra linens and our own pillows, hoping that using familiar-smelling bedding would prevent them from wanting to mark it, and of course their food and cat box and all of that. We brought a few of their favorite toys, some catnip, the Feliway diffuser and some Feliway spray, and we got a prescription from the vet for a mild sedative to help with the car trip and transition to new surroundings.

Our plan was to leave as soon as we could after Sally got home Friday night. Friday night, however, saw both of us having worked an especially long day, ending an especially long work week, with little sleep. These are not ideal conditions for trekking to the coast with four days' worth of your own crap and two demon hellbeasts.

I'd given the kitties their sedative a few hours before, but rather than making it easier to gather everything and pack before Sally got home, it made it infinitely harder. They were both loopy within about 30 minutes of taking the sedative, and completely wobbly and disoriented, but while Hobbes was content to just lay on his cushion and mellow out (at first), Smaug wasn't having it. She kept wanting to jump up on things or suddenly dash off madly to no place in particular, but with the approximate agility of a dog on roller skates. She kept tripping over things, including her own feet, and missing whatever she was trying to jump onto and falling backwards, then skitter/wobbling into a nearby wall, doorjamb, table leg, etc., all the while pitifully crying, "Aroo? Aroo?" I felt simultaneously guilty, sympathetic, and exhaustedly amused -- c'mon, you wouldn't laugh at that? I call bullshit.

So I spent a great deal of time just trying to keep her from accidentally breaking her neck, and then Hobbes freaked out about an hour after she started and suddenly I couldn't keep him out of anything. When Sally called to see how it was going, I'm sure he could hear the hysteria in my voice; I'm still kind of astounded he came home at all, knowing what might be waiting for him there.

But come home he did, and we managed to get them crated (this is a two person job in the best of circumstances) so we could get on with the business of packing and getting out the door. Our plan had been that I would already have everything packed so we could leave as soon as he got home, but thanks to Stoned Cat Theater, we were a good two hours later than planned. We got out of town at a quarter to 1 AM and hoped to hell that neither of us would fall asleep. But Smaug helpfully yowled most of the way so we were in no danger.

We stumbled into our cabin at a little after 2 AM. Once we'd gotten everything put away (read: out of their reach) and appropriately Hobbes-proofed the cabin, we let them out of their crates. After an hour of loves and cuddles to help them feel safe about their new environs, and helping them onto and into the bed (the sedative lasts for 8 to 12 hours so they were still wobbly), we turned in for the night, exhausted. Hobbes proceeded to yowl for the next 2 hours, which is pretty much the only sound two exhausted adults are unable to sleep through. I assured Sally it was simply a reaction to the sedative, and that we did not in fact have nightly yowling to look forward to for the rest of the trip. I had no idea if it was or wasn't, but we were facing catricide here, so I had to think of something.

click to see full photo galleryThat inauspicious start notwithstanding, however, they were amazing the entire rest of the time. Mellow, loving, completely well-behaved. Not once did they pee anywhere other than the catbox. The normal craziness of mealtimes -- in which they go competely batshit at least an hour before feeding time, in which valuables are broken in an effort for attention and humans are heard to utter the phrase, "YOUR SISTER IS NOT A CHEW TOY!" -- was replaced with a calm, orderly manner. There wasn't a single, miniscule threat of a cystitis flare-up and it was nothing but peace, love, and harmony all the live long day. We were seriously freaked out at the change in these cats while were there. Could it be that cats need a vacation, too?

As for us, we were in desperate need of this vacation, and wow, did we ever get it. On the first day, Sherry mentioned that our cabin had just opened up for the night of our departure date and would we want to stay an extra night. And you guys? That right there was proof of a benevolent universe after all, because there was no way we could've been all OMG YES PLEASE to such a thing if we didn't already have the cats with us.

click to see full photo galleryThe weather was a.maz.ing. We had nice but cool, cool and then cloudy, cloudy and then deliciously foggy, nice and a little bit warmer, really really nice and quite pleasanty temperate. Our last full day, we woke up to a perfectly cloudless blue sky that stayed that way the entire day. Most of the day was spent on the beach.

The day before had been mostly clear with a mild breeze, so we'd spent that day walking the length of the beach, in the water the whole way, stopping at tide pools and picking up shells and rocks and sand dollars. (We always bring home at least a rock or two when we go to the coast, so we have something from every visit, but this is the first time in a long time that we've brought home so many.) The first two days, we got to enjoy at least some beach time before it got too chilly, and then we cozied up in our little cabin with our fuzzy little kitties and good food, and marathoned our next new show. (Friday Night Lights, FINALLY! Cat: we must now squee because omg!!)

click to see full photo galleryGood food, of course, is a staple of our getaways. Our cabin this time was one of the ones with a mini fridge and hot plate instead of full fridge and stove/oven, so we have to plan our grocery list accordingly and make more things ahead of time, but still feast like Damn Hell Ass Kings. Tacos the first night, smorgasbord the second, crockpot chili the third (the night of the 4th). We'd intended to build a fire on the beach for the evening of the 4th, and to roast hot dogs and marshmallows and eat s'mores, but it got too cloudy and chilly for that, so we decided to try for Tuesday night and had smorgasbord. Yeah, feel so sorry for us and our awesomeness.

Unfortunately, Tuesday night was too windy for us to feel safe building a fire to roast hot dogs for dinner, but we had plenty to eat so we were in no danger of going hungry. Then near sunset, the winds calmed down and it got downright balmy (the temps all day had been in the 80s, but the wind throughout the day was enough to make it a tad chilly at times). We'd already eaten dinner so it was too late for hot dogs, but hey, we still had those marshmallows that needed a good roasting!

So we hightailed it back to the cabin, changed into some warmer clothes, stuffed a bag full of supplies (matches, newspaper, skewers, marshmallows, graham crackers, chocolate bars...oh, and a beer for Sally and jug of water for me :), and set out for the spot we'd marked for our clandestine beach fire a few days before.

click to see full photo galleryWe'd stockpiled some good dry driftwood and stashed it up in the rocks above the high tide line when we'd been out picking up rocks and seashells. We'd had our eye on a couple of nice firepits someone had built up (probably for the 4th), hoping that at least one of them would be unused once the holiday crowd was gone. They were quite a ways down from the beach entrance, a good mile and a half down the beach, and since most people tend to cluster right around the entrance (something I will never understand -- you have 3 miles of gorgeous beach, people, why the hell are you all concentrating within the same 100 yard radius???), we felt pretty confident we'd be able to use one of those pits.

A decent fog was rolling in by the time we were about halfway there and it well past sunset, so it was a bit dicey whether or not we'd find our stash. We ended up picking the closer of the two pits we'd staked out, which turned out to be the nicer of the two, with a huge log that was the perfect size for seating and a well stacked ring of rocks to give the fire a chance to take hold even with a decent wind.

In no time at all Sally had a good fire base going, and then got it built to a size that was strong and steady without being too big. And from there, we proceeded to roast half a package of giant marshmallows, eating one for every one that we used for a s'more. We watched the waves dwindle away behind the dark and the mist, and most everything around us turn hazy and distant. But it was clear overhead and the sound of the waves echoed back at us from the steep wooded slope behind us, and we could see swathes of stars above. We talked about how long it'd been since we'd sat at a campfire together, how long since we'd roasted marshmallows, how long since we'd seen so many stars, how long we'd been married. It'll be 14 years in a week, and that number seems both too big and too small in all the right ways.

We were done eating long before we were ready to leave, so we just sat and enjoyed the fire until it had mostly burned down, then doused it with sand and headed back in the dark, the waves at our left, the cliffs at our right, the stars overhead. And that ended the last full day of our summer beach vacation.

click to see full photo gallerySo basically, we did like we always do on these secret coast getaways. We read big books from our tottering To Read Pile and listened to iPods and dozed in the sun. We talked and we laughed. We started a new show and ate lots of good food. We waded in the water and got used to sand in and on everything. We took pictures. Lots and lots of pictures. We watched sunsets and listened to waves crashing and dreamed about the tiny little place we'll have on the coast someday.

lunch, movies, and naked bike rides

[NOTE: Had this all ready to post this afternoon but my phone wasn't cooperating so I had to wait until I got home to upload the pic via bluetooth. A simultaneous "GRR!" and "YAY!" for technology....]

No time for breakfast today so a little bigger lunch. Tuesdays seem to be like that more often than not, mainly because I have a lot of meetings on Tuesdays. More than usual today, since one of my monthly conference calls is today, too. But! CSA share pickup tonight, woot woot!

Laptop Lunch box:

• ham & cheese wrap
• salad: wild mixed greens, red & green leaf lettuces, sesame seeds (homemade balsamic vinaigrette in the small container in the silverware compartment
• star-molded egg, greens for garnish and carrots as gap fillers to add to the salad
• fresh blueberries; dark chocolate and yogurt covered raisins in the small container

We saw Toy Story 3 Saturday night, and...well, no spoilers here so I'll just say that IT WINS THE ENTIRE UNIVERSE OF PERFECTION AND AMAZINGNESS BASICALLY. And also makes you cry like a fountain. NO NOT JUST ME SAL CRIED TOO EVEN IF HE DENIES IT BECAUSE HE IS A BIG LYING LIAR.

Saturday was also the annual Naked Bike Ride, though we didn't encounter any part of the ride this year. Portland, btw, had over 13,000 riders this year. I don't know how that compares to the turnout in other cities, but wow, that's a whole lotta naked!

The first time we ever encountered the naked bike ride was the about five years ago. We were driving someplace downtown and were stopped at an intersection by cops on bikes stopping in front of us and less than a minute later, this whole stream of naked bike riders went streaking by. It was awesome and hilarious, and I think we must've sat there and laughed the entire time. Portland ftw!

ETA: And thanks to this late posting, I've already picked up this week's share. A couple of new-to-me veggies this week: Italian lacinato kale and French sorrel. How exciting! Wonder if Sally has ever used either of these?

In every share so far, we've had garlic greens and/or spring onions, with those thick, long, pretty green ends that you see in the picture at that link, and they're always poking out of the bag along with everything else overflowing out of the top. I don't know what it is about those garlic and onion greens, but Hobbes goes completely bananas as soon as I walk in the door with them. I can't keep him away from them!

The first thing I do when come home Tuesday nights is march directly to the kitchen with the bag held well out of his reach (as he jumps along the way trying to reach them), pull out those greens and chop off the tops to put in the compost bin. Which then goes back under the sink with a twisty tie around the cabinet handles so he doesn't pry the door open trying to get at them. The rest of the produce is safe from him after that long enough for me to go change out of my work clothes and get a drink of water before I return to clean and store everything from the week's share.

hoping for good news

bunny & moon box:

• egg scramble wrap: eggs, broccoli, green onion, and basil in a flour tortilla
• steamed broccoli
• heirloom tomato (1st of the season!) and fresh mozzarella pearls with basil...kind of a caprese sort of thing
• dried mango slices, yogurt covered raisins, dark chocolate covered raisins

We're nearing the end of this course of antibiotics with Hobbes, so I need to get him in to the vet tomorrow or first thing next week if I can. He seems to've responded to the treatment, so I'm really, really, really, REALLY hoping that it's another indicator that he just had a really bad infection and that it's not cancer. It may mean more antibiotic for a little longer if the infection isn't completely gone, but that's nothing.

Keep your fingers crossed for us and for him, kay?

monday? again?

Back at it after a busy (but lovely) weekend. Went down to Salem Saturday to spend the day and night with family (Sister, Guy, and the Fabulous Miss M) and as usual, had a great time together. Sister wrote me earlier last week to say that Miss M had asked if she could come to Portland for a picnic with Aunt Bitty, at which point I melted all over the floor, and had we not already had plans to go down there anyway, I would've dropped whatever I was doing and immediately driven right down there and whisked her away for a full picnic at the park, replete with every treat and confection I could cram into a wicker picnic basket. Because obviously.

Came home yesterday afternoon to the house in disarray thanks mostly to Hobbes, whose freakouts at the least little change are now apparently SOP at Hall House. Sigh. (Yes, I need to get to the pet store to get some Rescue Remedy. It's my last best hope, so everyone who reminded/recommended, keep your fingers crossed for us that it actually works miracles. Otherwise my next purchase will be a kitty-sized straitjacket....)

But! Once that was dealt with, I plotted out our vegetable garden layout, then Sally, that lovely man, did the actual planting so I could squeeze in a bit of writing time. Everything's now in the ground, juuuuuust in time for a late spring cold snap that's supposed to roll in tonight.

Anyway, it was a beautiful day and evening, and very warm, so we fired up the grill and whipped up dinner together. Then watched a movie while we ate and had chocolate gelato later for dessert. Not bad for a random weekend.

Bunny box, bottom tier:

• grilled chicken from last night's dinner (marinated first in a concoction of Worcestershire, garlic, oil, red onion, leek, dijon mustard, and sea salt)
• homemade potato salad (red potatoes, hard boiled eggs, leeks, red onion, yellow mustard, whole grain dijon mustard, red wine vinegar, oil, sea salt)
• carrot sticks and sweet pickles

top tier:

• kiwi slices and supremed orange sections
• "stripes" of yogurt raisins and dark chocolate covered raisins

Sir Not-Appearing-In-This-Bento:

• in my pink strawberry sidecar (which I ate for breakfast before taking a picture) was vanilla and almond granola, a mini sidecar of Greek yogurt and strawberry preserves, and Braeburn apple slices

Bento 2010

Woohoo, first bento of the New Year! To celebrate I made my bento extra special by...doing absolutely nothing special whatsoever. Eh, first day back to the office since a week at the coast, whaddya expect? It's amazing I came back at all.... :)

clockwise from right:

• beef stew -- Our patented Coast Crockpot meal, which Sal made the last night we were there. If you can make them out, those eensy weensy orange bits are carrots cut into 1/8" cubes. Not created by some special contraption found in 2 AM informercials and dubious mail-order catalogs, but diced by the chef and his Knife O'Doom into the cutest pile of wee carrot cubes you ever saw.
• flour tortilla, with maple-smoked cheddar slices on one side and sesame sticks on the other side
• Pinova apple slices and in the side container, half dark chocolate-covered raisins and half yogurt-covered raisins

*True story: when he was in culinary school, his Knife Skills class required what are called proficiencies in a whole list of specific shapes and sizes. Grades were given based on accuracy, precision, speed, efficiency, and consistency. For weeks, everything in our fridge was cut into all kinds of shapes and size whether it needed to be or not. :)

Fun Fact: The 1/8" dice cut is called brunoise. There is a smaller dice that was a proficiency requirement, called a fine brunoise, which is a 1/16" cube. Get out your ruler and look at how small that is. On a regular ruler, it's the smallest tick mark on there. Yes, that one.

The coast was fabulous. We had great stormy weather for three days, though it cleared up enough late Thursday evening (very light sprinkles, light wind) that we could head out to the beach to greet the New Year. There was fog and the moon peeked through enough to light up the waves a bit, the waves themselves were still pretty sizeable, and it was chilly but not miserable. Magical, in other words. And I needed that. Don't we all?

Got some writing done (including 6 pages on [spoiler]), did some reading, watched lots of shows/movies, ate some great food. Saturday was beautiful so we got a chance to spend some time on the beach and takes lots of pictures to add to the hundreds (thousands?) we already have. And of course Sunday it was even more beautiful just as we were leaving. We lingered a bit to soak it up before driving off.

It was hard to leave, as always, but we were glad to get home to our beloved house, cozy bed, and snuggly kitties. They make us completely crazy most of the time, but we miss the little bastards when we're gone. And thanks to our very good friend, we don't have to worry that they're going to set the place on fire, which is only a slight exaggeration of their diabolical tendencies. If Hobbes ever developed opposable thumbs, we'd start sleeping in shifts.