Dining

J and I make a great culinary team. She's the "head chef" of our kitchen, and takes care of most of the "skilled labor" food preparation. My role is to do some more basic low-skill jobs to make her life easier. She knows exactly how to delegate certain tasks to me so that she can make sure that she's freed up to flip something into the skillet at exactly the right moment, or to add an extra layer of glaze at exactly the right moment in the mixing process, or to taste for an elusive and subtle texture. I do my part proudly, though. For instance, I can....well, I'm able to...okay, so I'm not actually good for much of anything in the kitchen except for carrying the groceries in from the car (but not putting them away, because I don't know where the correct spots are) or maybe taking out the trash once the bag gets full.

This is why cooking for the boys on Saturday evenings is so stressful. They usually don't look forward to it any more than I do.

Sometimes J is able to get something in the crock-pot earlier in the day, and that's a nearly foolproof method of ensuring that we'll all get a hot and delicious dinner in her absence. I say "nearly" foolproof, because someone might have endangered their family and home by turning the crockpot to "Low" instead of "Off" when they took the chicken out last week and then left a quarter-inch layer of sauce that gradually turned to charcoal in the bottom of the pan until the next morning. Someone might have scrubbed hard to get the crock clean that afternoon.

But on days like today, there just wasn't time to get something prepared beforehand.

"Wait," I called to her as she headed out the door "what am I going to give the kids for dinner?"
"Uhh...bacon and eggs. But don't give Owen eggs. Check James' Berenstein Bears cookbook for a breakfast toboggan recipe that he wanted. He'll eat that."

The kids looked as concerned as I did.

We rammed around the downstairs for a bit and penned Owen into corners while we built tall block towers before turning on the soundtrack to Jaws and letting him loose. When they started to show signs of being hungry (screaming, whining, and crying) I decided that I couldn't put off dinner prep any longer and went into the kitchen to start working.

I was already too late, and I knew it. J doesn't dread cooking like I do, so she starts doing food prep BEFORE the kids are melting down from hunger. My work becomes exponentially harder when I put off food prep until they're screaming and tugging at my leg. I went into the kitchen and reviewed my plan:

For Me:
A rasher of bacon and an omelette. I love omelettes, and they always turn into a heap of nasty looking egg mush when I try to make them. I knew we had all sorts of delicious things to put in an omelette (sun dried tomatoes and gruyere cheese) so I was up for risking failure again to get my omelette. I looked up instructions for omelette making on incredibleegg.org and read the directions carefully several times. Yes, I was sure I had it this time. This was going to be fine.

For James:
From page 14 of "The Berenstain Bears Country Cookbook--Cub-Friendly Cooking with an Adult" I found the recipe for a Tasty Toboggan. I wondered as I looked at it whether I counted as "an adult" that was qualified to help a bear cup with this recipe. It basically looked like a piece of french toast on two pieces of bacon. I decided not to get over-ambitious and to just do a piece of regular toast instead of French toast. After all, I know my limitations. James thought it was very important that I make sure that there was a visible pat of butter on the toast. He's really big into making the final result look just like the picture. I also decided he needed to eat a sunny-side up egg.

For Owen:
A clementine, cut up and seeded. A piece of toast with jam, cut up into small bites. Maybe a couple bites of bacon.

This wouldn't be too hard, right?

I started with the bacon, and that went okay, except for Owen continually pulling at my leg. Bacon is one of those things I'm actually okay at. I can usually guess when it needs to be flipped in the pan and when it needs to come out. So that went fine.

Then I got out the eggs. One egg for James. I put that in the pan while Owen tugged at my leg and screamed. "Yes, I know you're hungry. Let Daddy work."

I got two eggs out for my omelette and attemped to whisk them up in a bowl while James' egg was frying. "Owen, no, stay out of the trash can." <set down the eggs on the counter> "Owen, what do you have in your mouth" <set down flipper> "Did you fish that out of the trash?" <go to pick up egg, knock one onto the floor which breaks> "AH, no stay out of that. James, come in here and sit on Owen until I get this picked up." "Hey Daddy, why are you cooking the flipper?" "AHH!" <pulls flipper out of pan> "Gah!" <pulls Owen out of egg mess on floor>

By the time I got back to James' egg it was burnt on the bottom, and then it broke when I tried to flip it. The toast popped as I was attempting to deseed the clementine, and I gave up on letting Owen roam free and let him scream out his hangriness in the high chair while I attempted my omelette. I shredded the cheese, cut up the tomato, and made sure that the pan was greased and hot.

I poured my egg mixture into the pan and made sure that I gently pushed the uncooked portions towards the heat in the center, then continued cooking, gently tilting the pan and moving the cooked portions as needed.

I ended up with a heap of nasty looking egg mush.

Owen ate his clementine in about eight seconds and then refused to eat anything else, pointing instead at the big plate of monkey bread that J had made earlier in the day.

James was thrilled that I put a pat of butter on his piece of toast so that it looked like the picture, but then tried to eat a spoonful of just butter and almost threw up. He ate some of his bacon, but then just begged for the monkey bread that J had made earlier in the day.

I ate a few bites of my egg mush and decided that monkey bread would probably be better.

We're all really glad that I only cook once a week. The kitchen works way better when I'm just helping the master.

Afternoon of a Dryad

Although I am a young spirit, the roots of my tree are firm in the soil here. My name is Rosaceae, although in your tongue I'm known by the ugly name of "crabapple." I've been fortunate enough to come into the land of some good folk, and I was well-watered and looked after in my early weeks. Now the weather is cold and I'm preparing to sleep, but something one of the little ones said today gave me a fright. The father ordered new rubber tires for his automobile, and they were delivered to their door. He brought them inside, and I watched him show them to his little ones. The little ones played in them, and I was happy in their delight, looking in through the front window as I do and smiling on the hearth. Did you know they've brought one of my cousins into their home? One of the Abien family, a tall and prickly nymph by the name of Balsamea. She's all covered in lights and glass baubles, but she leans awfully and I suspect she'll drop her needles all over their carpet just to spite those little boys. (The small one grabs at her lower boughs incessantly.) But as I was saying, it was the older boy that gave me the scare. When the father drove his automobile back today with the new tires on it, the little one yelled at the top of his lungs to the mother: "Daddy saved me a tire and now we can have a TIRE SWING!" I hope that the father has more sense than that, but he appears to do whatever the little ones want most of the time. My arms hurt just thinking about a swing--even in adulthood we Rosaceae aren't particularly given to swings and treehouses and all those boyish constructions. He ought to see about a nice sturdy Quercus or Acer in the backyard for that sort of job. But then again, at least I have a family. My friend Cornus from next door has been sitting by an empty house for the better part of three months, and today when a woman stopped by to look at it with the realtor I overheard them talking about the "trumpet playing next door." Poor Cornus. But then again, she doesn't have to worry about tire swings.

Game Theory

We all do things for our spouses that we'd rather not, but we go along with it just because we love them and want them to be happy. Okay, everyone say what that is right now without thinking one two GO:

And now you know what to talk about in marital counseling.

I said "playing games."

We used to play Phase 10 all the time when we were dating. It was important for us to spend lots of times playing games, because we were college kids and we couldn't cook or drink wine. Also, J LOVED (and still loves) playing games and I liked getting to see her.

She won all the time. Maybe not every single time, but a ridiculously high percentage of the time. Her game-playing dominance was kind of like watching the Bills and Patriots over the past fifteen years, even down to her propensity to wear hoodies. (She didn't cheat to my knowledge...) I'll let her speak to whether or not she was a gracious winner and a good sport. (If you want to ask her about it, start by asking her what "the doggy" is.)

Anyhow, she agreed to marry me, and then I didn't have to pretend to enjoy playing games anymore.

Okay, it wasn't quite like that, but we definitely stopped playing games nearly as often as we did when we were dating. And I can't say that I really missed it.

Every once in awhile we'd get into something, like with the Wii. We've been through Wii sports phases, Mario Party, and even Monopoly. We play poker with great enjoyment when we visit Pennsylvania with J's brothers. But we've never picked up the regular habit of card games between the two of us again like when we were dating.

But now there's a twist: James likes games.

We were visiting PA last week and we played Battleship with James. He loved it. He was completely into it, and he played the game all the way to the end. He's always been fascinated with playing cards (and poker chips) and I think that he has the disposition to love card playing.

There may be a renaissance of game-playing at the Smith house. This is probably just--in many ways I took advantage of J's good faith when she walked down the aisle.

I just hope James doesn't get into Phase 10.

James Takes the Matter Up

James still regards his room as a structure separate from the rest of the house. Well, not HIS room. Technically it's a house he shares with George.

But that being the case, he needs Christmas decorations for him and George that are different than the ones downstairs. (In OUR house.)

So once we finished setting up the Christmas tree yesterday and strung up all the lights and stockings, we proceeded upstairs to set up James' Christmas tree (the tiny fake one that we bought in North Carolina) complete with three decorations, a bow, and a window candle.

He even remembered which decorations he had from last year. An clay star with the letter R on it, a Winnie-the-Pooh ornament, and an "apple." (Really an old red bulb that used to have an R on it, but was long ago rubbed off.) "R stands for Christmas" he told me.

We didn't get around to setting up the odd strand of colored lights yesterday before we gassed out on finishing the decorating. James had requisitioned them by that point for his tree. (Me and George need some lights for our tree up in our house.) He went to sleep last night reminding me that we needed to set up his lights in the morning time. And also to have some Cinnamon Crunch Toast cereal.

The first thing he asked for this morning when his eyes opened were to have the Cinnamon Crunch Toast cereal, and then to decorate his tree. I'm not entirely sure that he slept.

He hasn't been holed up in his room (house) all day, though. He's set up a juice stand underneath our Christmas tree and is taking orders for juice and selling them to me, J, and Owen.

J is currently re-reading the Harry Potter books, and we were jokingly going through what we thought we might see in the mirror of Erised the other night. I asked "What do you think James would see in the mirror of Erised?"

We just sort of looked at each other for a long time. As someone who knows him well recently said "Isn't he just a psychological treasure trove?"

I don't claim to know what he wants at his deepest, most subconscious level. (And I'm not sure he knows either.)

But he definitely loves Christmas.

Cocked Hat

We were all hatted this morning. It was because we were all going outside for a run. In December, of course, in upstate New York.

I saw that the weather for the next few days was supposed to be gray and constantly rainy. My reaction to this was, as always, "thank goodness it isn't going to be snow." But my second reaction was "we ought to go for a run all together if we're going to get one in this week." I'll probably get up and run a few times in the early morning, even if it is rainy out. J might head out during the afternoons if there's hot coffee waiting when she gets back and/or the boys have been steadily driving her insane all morning. But this was our last chance to go out as a family.

So we put on our hats.

The boys look SO cute in their hats, which means that they don't want to wear them at all. James wore his James D. Bear hat, which is one of my favorite hats ever. It used to look huge on him, but now it's starting to look a little stretched on his bulbous head.

THE James D. Bear hat

Owen has a nice hood on his fluffy winter jacket, but J put a hat on him anyway. Owen does not appreciate hats. He doesn't appreciate his fluffy winter jacket, either. He can't move his arms in it, which means he can't suck on his fingers. And if he can't suck on his fingers, he can't cope with the world when he feels sleepy/cranky/happy. Even when he isn't sucking on his fingers, he thinks they should be in someone's mouth. This morning when he woke up at 6:45 am and I brought him downstairs to read with me on the couch he kept on trying to shove them into my mouth. Then he smacked the lampshade repeatedly with James' Greek flag. Kids are weird.

Anyway, neither kid was particularly happy about wearing their hats. James thinks that his bear hat is for "babies," but of course he doesn't want Owen to wear it and he refuses to wear any other hat. (Aside from his blue San Francisco cap, which is also super cute but not nearly warm enough for a two mile run in December in upstate New York.) Owen was distressed about being in his jacket, and about having his hood up, and about having a wool cap on under his hood.

We bribed them with cookies. There's a delightful Italian pastry shop up the road from us past Culver on Empire. It used to be the case that if we were feeling particularly indulgent I'd stop in at the donut shop and get a treat. After all, I'd reason, we just got some exercise and it's nice to have something sweet and well-made. Now we go running as an excuse to get up to the pastry shop. The donuts, while quite for being donuts, are long forgotten. Today we brought back some biscotti and a chocolate-almond torte.

My hat, for the record, is a black wool cap that smells rather awful. I don't really have a good winter hat. Somewhere down in the basement there's a black Carhartt hat that I've also been running in, and neither one looks particularly elegant with a peacoat and tails.

J, on the other hand, has a cool pink runner's hat. It's warm, reflective, and looks pretty stylish. I would say that it's the nicest hat in the family, but it doesn't have ears. So James' hat still wins.

Cleaning One's Coat

The first thing you do when you pull your winter coat out of the closet, aside from grumbling about how it's finally so cold that you've resorted to pulling out your winter coat, is to check inside the pockets for any money you may have left inside last spring when it was finally getting warm enough that you didn't have to wear your winter coat so much anymore.

True story, I once did find a $20 inside my winter coat pocket when I pulled it on for the first time late one November.

But not this year. This year the only items I found in my winter coat were crumpled up old faded receipts that had begun to smell like the inside of my pockets. (Or is that my pockets smell like old receipts? Who can say?)

One receipt was from December of 2013. Apparently I was buying a 6 oz bottle and some formula at the Pittsford Wegmans. The timeline for this seems wrong. James would have been two at this point, so I don't think he would have needed formula. Perhaps we were watching Liam? Silas and Abby hadn't been born yet, so it certainly couldn't have been for them. I didn't know what to make of this receipt. I spent $18. For each receipt I pulled out of my pocket, I tried to think what kind of wine I could have purchased with the same amount of money. I don't know what happened to the bottle or the formula, but a bottle of La Crema Pinot Noir would have been in order for about that much.

Next I found an AirTran luggage tag with J's name and address on it. That wouldn't have been any good in exchange for wine.

In February of 2013 we would have still been living at Washington Street, and apparently I spent $66 at the Brockport Wegmans. It looks like it was a fairly standard grocery run--soup, milk, beer, yogurt, pasta, biscuits, sweet potatoes, carrots, bananas, duck tape, some facewash, dark chocolate, and onions. It was dated mid-month, though. We must have been out of a lot of things. $66 could be a really nice bottle of premium scotch. But I suppose groceries are good too.

In March of 2013 I spent $1.83 on a cup of coffee somewhere. Apparently Sarah was my server and I made the purchase at 5:03 pm, but the top of the receipt is so faded I can't tell where it was. Sarah, whoever you are, and wherever you were working, thanks for the cup of coffee. I'm sure it was a $1.83 well spent. If I hadn't had afternoon coffee by 5:03 pm, I'm sure I needed it.

The next receipt actually gave me a good clue as to where I might have been--on an audition somewhere, presumably. I have another coffee receipt, dated one day later, this time for $2.43 (at 9:44 am) in the Atlanta International Airport. Airports always mark up the coffee something ridiculous. Then again, it's so hard to get a decent cup of coffee in the south that I was probably just glad to see a place with a name like "The Coffee Beanery." I don't remember, but I hope it was worth it. Also, if this was at the end of my trip, it was probably Sorrow Coffee.

We must have been traveling to Pennsylvania on February 15th, 2015, because I have a receipt from the Williamsport Wegmans for $7 at the hot bar. I bet it was sesame chicken for James during a lunch stop. I also bet I remember Valentine's Day 2015 quite vividly, and that we were working through a case of Ergo Rioja at that point. I was probably pretty happy on February 15th, despite the cold weather and the long drive.

I have two hall passes from Lima, both for Hannah on March 21st (year unknown), both to Study Hall. Neither is in my handwriting. I don't know what Hannah was up to that day, but I smell a mystery...

From April of 2015, I have a receipt for coffee and a scone ($3.87) from "Roberts Wesleyan University We Proudly Brew Starbucks" coffee shop. Unsurprisingly, the coffee shop has changed hands since then. I suspect that I was meeting Aunt Martha, and that James was pointing out all of the different flags that he recognized in the library coffee area. $3.87 wouldn't have gone very far anywhere else. I'm glad I had coffee with my sister. She's sick right now and I hope she feels better.

On January 7th of last year I spent $24 on a large chicken charlie pizza from Salvatore's. As much I would appreciate a bottle of Bordeaux for that amount, that Salvatore's chicken charlie pizza is REALLY good. Really, REALLY good. I should probably stop thinking about it.

In February of 2013 we were shopping at the Brockport Wal-Mart again. Lots of baby food, some cereal, some shampoo, and a pack of chapsticks. Again, groceries are important, but for $86 I'd almost be at a case of $10 wine with a decent rebate. (Of course, yes, you do have to pay for the rebate up front.)

I must have had a double in Buffalo in March of last year, because I bought something from the hot bar and a large coffee. Did I really NEED to eat lunch that day? What if I'd packed a peanut butter and jelly? Okay, I probably still would have needed coffee...but I'd still have $6 left towards a bottle of wine. (And there's a pretty good wine store in the same plaza as the Amherst Wegmans.

Well, we have a bottle of Riesling and a bottle of Chianti that we haven't finished yet here. And I also found $.56 in my coat, so I can keep on saving for something nice.

To wrap up, I have a horrible suicide mission exciting announcement: I'm going to blog every day through December, even through the craziness of Holiday Pops. I'm posting the titles of all 31 blogs below. (As you'll notice, all taken from chapter titles of books that are currently being read in the Smith house.) I have no idea which order I'll goin, but every day I promise to cross off one of these "prompts."

Promenade
Dining
Old Smith and Old Smith
Young Smith and Young Smith
Passing of a Sportsman
Venture
Figures and Facts
Tenterhooks
The Mark Falls
Owen Walks and Talks
J's Body
J's Soul
---Gets "What-For"
The Altogether
---Takes the Matter Up
Sleuth
Cocked Hat
Going East
Bank Holiday
Office Work
Afternoon of a Dryad
---Gives Advice
Quittance
Christmas Tree
Game Theory
Bubbles
Incentives
Dobby's Warning
Gilderoy Lockhart
The Writing on the Wall
Owl Post

#trumpetwives

"Previous studies often find the highest exposure levels among the trumpet players. It is not unusual to find an equivalent continuous sound level (LAeq) of 93-98 dB for several rehearsal hours (McBride et al., 1992)"--Sound Exposure of Symphony Orchestra Musicians, Annals of Occupational Hygiene

....
"Honey, I'm going to be down in the basement for a bit."
"Okay, are you going to run the industrial power mower?"
"Yeah, I'm gonna try to get some mowing in before the kids go down for naps."
"How long do you think you're going to be?"
"Uh...I don't know. Maybe 45 minutes?"
"They might not make it that long."
"Okay, well just shout down the stairs when they need to go to sleep."
"Can you do any of your mowing with the engine covered or anything?"
"...you know it isn't really the same to mow with the engine covered."
"I know, I'm just wondering if there was anything you could save for the end. You know, so you could mow longer."
"No, I really need to to mow at full volume for a bit today."
"...okay."

....
"So, could you tell a difference?"
"Umm...on which bit?"
"Right at the end there, when I was kind going in shorter bursts with the jackhammer? You know, I was going BRRRRRT-BRT! BRRRRT-BRT!"
"You were doing something different than you usually do?"
"Yeah, I was trying out this new titanium coated bit. It definitely feels different. Did it sound any different to you?"
"Mmm...I could listen for it again. But it mostly just sounded like your regular jackhammering."
"Aw, nuts. I was hoping it SOUND different. You know, obviously different."
"Maybe it did and I just wasn't paying very close attention."
"You know, they're selling the titanium coated models now with a diamond tip. I think that might be worth trying."
"That sounds kind of expensive."
"Yeah, it probably wouldn't be cheap. But I already know exactly what size to order, since I like the size I currently have."
"What do you think that would do for the sound?"
"It would make the jackhammer even louder. Maybe a bit brighter too."

....
"Okay, once we get home we need to clean up the kitchen, and we should make sure the table is wiped off before we go to bed tonight...and...oh, you probably need to run your outboard motor in the basement for a bit, don't you."
"Well, I'd rather watch the game, but..."
"Do you think maybe you could take a night off?"
"I don't know."
"Really, you'll have plenty of time to make it up later in the week, won't you?"
"I just don't think I'd be able to relax and enjoy the evening if I knew that I hadn't cranked up the outboard motor in the basement for at least, I don't know, a half-hour or so. It'll be a light session though, I'll go as quick as I can."
"I don't know about the kids, honey. They're kind of squirrely."
"Just let the kids do what they want for a half-hour and I'll put them to bed once I'm done with the outboard motor. And then I'll help with the kitchen, okay?"

....
"Ah yes, Smith. Your reservation is right here. Non-smoking king?"
"Yes, that should be fine."
"We're going to have you in Room 304. Enjoy your stay!"
"Thanks very much. Hey, quick question for you..."
"Yes, sir?"
"I have a garbage truck that I'm going to need to drive around and operate for a bit...probably raise and lower the pressure lifter and run the compacter for about 45 minutes or so. Is there a good spot in the hotel for me to do that?"
"Hmmm...there are lots of other guests this weekend, sir."
"You don't have, maybe, an empty conference room or something? Or, if there's an empty room nearby where I am, I could make sure I'm pointing the truck in that direction?"
"Is it really necessary for you to operate a garbage truck in your hotel room, sir? While you're on vacation?"
"You don't understand...I need to do it every day. My wife can vouch for me on this."
"He definitely does it every day."
"It's kind of like being in perpetual Olympic-style training."
"Except louder."