Refreshment.

I got up at 4:20 this morning to take my daughter to the airport. We were both feeling a little bleary after the big day yesterday, and her whirlwind trip. I hugged and kissed her goodbye at the curb, turned around, and drove back home to get immediately back in bed, whereupon I slept till almost nine.

Shortly after that, the historian drove Supriya's cousin to the airport, and then the house was empty. My son and his family also left Salt Lake this morning--by now, they should almost be home. So it was just us, with only a few remaining errands (returning a tux, meeting the chair-and-table rental people at the venue for the pick-up) and a lot of red and pink roses to remind us of it all.

I made myself some pancakes.

I chatted with my daughter in Scotland.

I made the list of things I need to do this week. This took awhile, since I had to wait for my head to clear to let everything come into focus.

I made some mint lemonade from my mother's recipe (make a simple syrup, 2 c. sugar to 2 1/2 c. water; when the sugar has dissolved, turn off the heat, add a cup of mint leaves and stems, and let it steep while the syrup cools. Meanwhile, juice lemons and oranges till you have about a cup of juice, maybe 6 lemons and 2 oranges--I used clementines, so I used more. When the syrup has cooled, strain the syrup and mix the juice in. Use 1/4 c. mint lemonade concentrate to 6 oz. of water, or to taste. Make it icy!).

I cleaned up the kitchen.

I sent a few emails for work. Meanwhile, I drank a glass of mint lemonade. It's nice to have mint lemonade in one's metaphorical pocket--refreshment upon which one can rely.

I wandered the aisles of the grocery store, getting this and that, a few pistachios, some potato chips, a little basil, a little parsley, four peaches.

I collapsed into a nap.

After dinner, the historian and I found ourselves desultorily watching two movies--The Outlaw Josie Wales, which is, we both agree, a very durable movie, bearing pretty much endless rewatchings, and Role Models, with Paul Rudd, Seann William Scott, and Christopher Mintz-Plasse--not a great film by any means, but with a killer fantasy role playing battle scene at the end that nearly redeems its failings and excesses.

At a commercial break, I made myself some toast. Bruiser lay crosswise on the bed, ensuring that the two humans of the household could not both be on the bed, not with any degree of comfort, anyway. We reached the battle scene. As I remembered, it was totally satisfying.

'Shall we?' the historian said, meaning Bruiser and his walk.

So we went. And that was the day after the big day.

The Megastore recommends.

from Random Access

1. The weekend. Sometimes, it's good to pause and acknowledge universal truths: spring is beautiful. The moon is beautiful. Weekends are not only beautiful, they are fitting, they are just, and--I think we need to all admit this up front--weekends save lives. Take this weekend, for example. We ate Vietnamese food, saw Damsels in Distress, watched a grandchild's soccer game, took that same grandchild to lunch and bought him a birthday present, admired his awesome prowess in the bounce house, ate Mexican food, and looked at the giant, brilliant moon. Just a few days ago, I was filled with anxiety about whether I would get everything done that needs to be done. Anxiety, the people: synonymous with stress, as I think we can all agree. Stress is a killer. After the weekend, I feel relaxed, confident that I will accomplish all that is necessary, and maybe I also don't really care all that much? Who can say?/same diff. But in either case, thank God for the weekend. Who knows what might have happened to me otherwise.

dijon mustard,
prerequisite to a
sassy vinaigrette.

2. Cooking with what's in the house. Running son has a friend. They have been hanging out a lot. Did I say this friend is female? Today when they were exiting the house to go to church, I asked them if they wanted to have dinner with us after church. Sure, they said. So they left and I promptly took a nap, which ended when they returned. What? I said. Luckily, I was able to pull my wits together and make green curry cauliflower with rice, roasted brussels sprouts, salad with a sassy vinaigrette, and cut fresh fruit with mint sugar. And even though, in point of fact, I really didn't have quite enough rice, and the fruit was possibly a little on the worse-for-wear side of the fresh fruit spectrum, it all came off quite beautifully and deliciously. This abundance of surprise provisions, by the way, is a consequence of my being a terrible over-shopper for food. Sometimes this results in tears (over having way too many greens, for instance), but sometimes it results in a delicious dinner. And yay for that.

this is sugar.

this is mint.

3. Mint sugar. Mint sugar is the bomb. You put it on fruit, in judicious amounts, and it makes the fruit both slightly sweeter and quite a bit more refreshing. Here's how it works: you take some fresh mint, stems and leaves. Some people would tell you to remove the leaves from the stems, but I will tell you: not necessary. Because you're going to chop that mint, stems and leaves, until it is fine and finer. I usually take a couple of tablespoons of sugar and put it on the counter with the mint and chop away, because that way the sugar takes in the mint oil in the chopping process. When the sugar basically looks like it is flecked with infinitessimal fragments of green, it is ready to mix with whatever fruit you have cut up. It is brilliant with pineapple. It is piquant with strawberries. Today, I mixed it with cut-up black grapes, blood oranges, and blackberries (previously frozen). And it was--as always--lovely.

The market, week one.

So, yesterday was the first day of the farmer's market. Since our farmer farms up in Logan, the first week is always on the one hand thin, and on the other hand cool because often there are garlic scapes, which I and others have already rhapsodized about, so I'll just spare you, except to say that I have made a bunch of garlic scape pesto (you can read a perfectly lovely recipe for it here), I roasted a head of broccoli with some garlic scapes, and I used some of the garlic scape pesto to flavor the bechamel sauce for the baked penne and cheese I made. You would not want to be too close to me right now.


Other pleasurable happenings: we ran into some friends (the historian has known them since before we knew each other) who'd been married forever, who endured a rather lengthy and sometimes bitter separation, and now have decided to reconcile and looked suspiciously happy about it. We saw some friends from work and their adorable baby. We bought bread and a croissant (for me) from the excellent Crumb Bros. bakery people. We bought some arugula and some broccoli raab greens from Chad the vegetable impresario.


I am a little worried, because my herb people weren't there, and neither was the small-scale farmer the historian and I call Tremonton girl. I have already seen some of my favorite farmer vendors fall by the wayside, and I am not having any more of it. My herb people are important to me.


But on the plus side, there were the beautiful, tiny, super-fragrant and super-sweet strawberries from Weeks Berries of Paradise. Also, little new potatoes that are the color and size of a small Super Ball. And peas. So I am just going to cook those potatoes and peas right up, together, and maybe chop a little mint to go with them, and cross my fingers that Tremonton Girl and the herb people show up next week, or the week after.