Thrills, no spills and sunshine

 I was determined to walk today, because my spirits get very low when I don't, and recently what with ice and Helen, it's been too risky.

Anyway, sunshine today 

What they call a moderate wind and I call a bitter blast, but I really needed to get out.

As soon as I stepped outside, the adventure began. My door locked itself behind me. I don't take my keys when I walk, no need. 

There's a snap lock for the cleaning family, they can lock without using a key, when they leave, and the other lock which needs a key. I never use the snap lock, but it evidently had got turned inside the door to the locking position. Oh.

Then I remembered my emergency keys in an undisclosed location. Requiring a climb up. I usually use the stepladder stored in there, but the last user had returned it with the steps facing the wall. I can't lift and turn it to get at the step I need to reach the keys. Oh, again. 

Then Carol Cane saved the day -- reached up, hooked the keys onto the handle, bingo. Managed to unlock the door, stiff, unused key, and then had to return them to the UL.

I couldn't reverse the hooking idea but found an unopened paint can to stand on, juuuuuust reached the hook. All fine now.

And when I finally made it out, it was beautiful. 

Bitter cold wind but I was insulated, remnants of light snow yesterday. 

Down there on the right I found a small cinder block in the trees which I carried home for yet another item to prop up the lavender container. Did I mention it's on a slope? Now there's an assortment of bricks, rocks and other items trying to keep it in place. We'll see. 

So I counted this as a series of successes. Small, but you take them where you find them.

And the landscape at home, speaking of fridge magnets,  here's the max stuff I have on my fridge, long past the days of Handsome Son's artwork!

Bits of art by friends, voting proof, librarian support sticker. On the left, my DNR form where EMTs would see it as soon as they come in the front door.

On the side where you don't see, unless you're working at the counter, various reminders, and a butterfly Chris will recognize.

You'll notice apples and potatoes feature here, I wonder why.

Here's a Portuguese take by cartoonist Zez Vaz, on our current situation. He's at zezvaz.com

Happy day everyone, small stuff is okay, life's made of small stuff.

Now more than ever.

Tofu Katsu, and Misfits

In prep for today's Misfits delivery including tofu, I made the dipping sauce and organized the breading. This makes crisp sticks of tofu which I plan to go with soup.

Easiest sauce ever: small dash oil, ketchup and soy sauce. That's it. So I hope the tofu shows up. Yeung Man Cooking stars again.

Meanwhile the bags and ice blocks are out for return, and you can see the lavender trying to fall over again 

It's topheavy so the wind or a climbing squirrel, can topple it. The roots are through into the ground, but I don't like them to be yanked about when the pot falls over.

Update: The tofu arrived, but today, unusually, the delivery came mid-afternoon, rather than midmorning, so my lunch plans underwent a change. Tofu sticks for supper now, with spinach. The instructions say to test when the oil is hot enough, put in the tip of a bamboo skewer, if bubbles form, it's hot enough. I don't have one, so I used a bamboo knitting needle.

Here:

Very crisp and crunchy, finger food, dip in the sauce. 

No new eggs, potatoes or  apples this week, owing to a surfeit.  And possibly these are chickpeas but you never know.  Sliced cheese instead of a block, I really have to read my orders better, but oh well. Oats for crumbles and bread baking. Berries and yogurt for desserts. Chocolate cherries because I'm worth it.

Gary is home,  picked up the houseplants I was rehabbing for him, and gave me an update on a piece of furniture the across the street neighbor is replacing. Doesn't take much to entertain me these days. And wherever Gary is, there's action.

There he is, helping carry it out.

If you're thinking about a support puppy in these stressful times, see what the little martians do.  Just sayin.

Reclaiming my flag today 

Today's cute winter boots, immigrant rights

Here's what's up today. I've sent away for my cards, which I will leave around in places like the library, and give to friends.

At home, the Sock 'n Glove Ministry continues, probably needed all the more now 

This yarn is interesting. It's braided rather than plied, and creates a lovely warm springy fabric, good for socks.   After this pair, I have enough yarn to double the threads and knit gloves. 

It's friendly to knit, a contrast to that brilliantly colored yarn I've been using, which fights every step.  It looks lovely when done but I don't look forward to knitting it. 

However it's what I was issued with, so I feel I need to use it. The socks have certainly been well received, so there's that. 

This yarn is much more restful. Right now there's enough fighting without having your yarn joining in.

Happy day everyone, looking forward to tomorrow's Misfits, because there's an interesting tofu idea I plan on after the halibut is gone, along with the Spanish Fork potato croquettes.

Meanwhile Hamish Macbeth is still going.

We can keep going too, and thank you everyone who is doing their bit of resisting the current evil administration, even though it's uncomfortable to do it. 

We need to be able to look back in future years, no matter how it goes,  proud of what we did to fight back.

Resistance today, and Textiles and Tea

Here's how you can help the resistance: if you have a blog, please show these pictures to your readers. This is your mission, if you choose to accept it.

There were massive protests all over the country on Presidents Day, NO coverage from mainstream media. We have to do it ourselves, modern-day samizdat.

Here's just one

And here's the ad that the Washington Post first agreed to run, then chickened out on. Trigger alert, picture of M**k.

Thank you. This is a valuable cute winter boots work you can do,  all set up for you. 

And here's a chance at a bit of fun while flooding an inbox

Then there's art, another form of powerful being and making. Today's Textiles and Tea featured an amazing young artist, Crystal Gregory.

She creates enormous installations, using cotton fiber and industrial materials such as concrete, molten pewter, drywall, ballchain. 

She's considering the contrasts and comparisons of hard and soft, rigid and flowing, transparency and solidity, in modern life and society.

Just look.

This was a museum presentation, with dancers climbing and interacting with the weaving. She also moved the concrete tubes regularly, like inanimate dancers.

Knitted work here, embedded in concrete 

Left,  Anni Albers, groundbreaking artist of the Bauhaus, who came to Black Mountain to work and teach away from Nazi Germany. Right is Crystal Gregory, showing Albers influence on her work.

This is an artist to follow. Upcoming shows in Tribeca, Asheville, Vermont and other places, which she's going to put up on her website. Check her out!

Happy day everyone. Breathe, resist, find a bit of fun, too.

High winds, warm kitchen, important information

The house is harder to keep warm in high winds, drafty, so this was a good day to cook and get a warm kitchen.

And I seem to have got into a frenzy of cooking, what with deciding on Spain on a Fork potato croquettes, to use potatoes, then remembering I had the halibut defrosted in the fridge. 

Then I thought why not both. Lifelong mantra: when in doubt, do everything.

So I had a bunch of things going at once. Nuking potatoes to mash them, frying onions and garlic, grating cheese, mixing spices, panko,  that's the potato things, and grinding almonds, finding the oats, panko again, drying fish, that's the halibut pieces, oiling glass pan likewise. Cooking for one and I need a sous chef, and a dishwasher.

Originally I planned on walnuts, not almonds, for this breading, and found I'd used them up, so I had to use what I had.

And here's lunch. A beautiful piece of halibut with crisp breading, 20 minutes at 400f, in case you wondered. This time and temp cooks the fish and the breading nicely.

The other things are Alberto's recipe, more or less, mashed potatoes (!), grated cheese, egg, scallions, fried onions and garlic, seasoned with cayenne, smoked paprika, turmeric, seasalt, cumin, fried in the onion pan but I didn't wipe out the pan between, because flavor.

This frenzy has yielded several meals, and will mix and match with the soup and bean bread things.

It occurs to me that when I need an afternoon nap, it's after a morning like this.

Elsewhere Meetch (!) discussed names and how they're pronounced. My sister Irene,  EYEreen in the UK became  eyeREEN in Canada, never eyeREENee, despite the name police. She adapted to Canadian ways, Missy. Considering her temperament, it's ironic that her name means peace. Maybe my mom was being aspirational.

Nephew Gerard,  GERud in the UK,  became GerAHRD in Canada. You could tell whether a brit or a Canadian was calling him by how he pronounced his name when he answered!

Me, I'm often addressed as Lisa, don't ask me why. It's a mystery. I occasionally also have a little discussion with people who insist they want to use the full version of Liz, despite my preference.  The long version was my mother, not moi.

We had a lovely neighbor long ago who said she'd never met a PhD before (Handsome Partner) and she really couldn't call him by his first name, nor me by a nickname, not respectful.

She resolved it by referring to us as Betty and Doc! Like an oldtime comic strip. We loved her and everyone knew who she meant, so no harm done.

Today is about keeping warm, after a brisk interlude outside in my bathrobe earlier. I'd stepped out into a high wind, to put out the Freecycle bag and found the steps covered in earth and debris. Probably squirrels digging furiously as they do. 

I couldn't ask my nice Freecycler to step over that mess, so I swept it clean and more or less righted the lavender container plant knocked on its side, wind tearing at me. 

Now I'm up for knitting and reading. Hamish is still on my schedule. I wonder what I'll do after I've read all the Hamish books. 

My days have devolved into:

up early, morning care, breakfast, QiGong, email, blogs, Hamish, cooking, lunch, Hamish, knitting, Downton Abbey YT shorts, afternoon tea, Hamish etc.

On the other hand, it could be worse. And the fish will keep my brain working, at least that's the hope.

And, since gender and ignorance about it keep appearing in our news, here's the Talmud's take on it

Happy day everyone, eat fish. Or something.

This flag display is getting like my sock mending -- more darn than sock. Any more rights threatened and I'll end up with more flags than blog.